Criticism of Geriatric

[Mathdino]

if you don't like the geriatric ruleset don't play geriatric games ok next

[Mathdino]

Ellibereth's ruleset specifies that players should apologise after mislynches they were a part of.

[Mathdino]

I don’t know what you mean by preferential treatment?
I don’t think newer players would be that much interested in geriatric since most new players like faster paced games

I often find that newbies will get overwhelmed by newbie games that run too quickly and for too long.

Players that have been around for like a few months, sure, but not players on their 1st, 2nd, or 3rd game.

[Mathdino]

I think good evidence that gpc sucks is that when people are tearing it apart we are the most united in a topic I’ve ever seen

Just wanna point out that hyperactive players are, by definition, hyperactive on the forums, and will win a numbers game in any fight with geriatric players.

Cuz, yknow, most geriatric players spend most of their day doing something other than arguing with people on the internet.

[Mathdino]

I believe geriatric games will have raised town winrates because the ruleset is inherently townsided. Spreading posts out has a similar effect of short deadlines (which are townsided). The more time scum has to manipulate town, the more scum will throw town off the scent and cause mislynches.

I believe hyperactive games will have lowered town winrates. Not because the ruleset is inherently scumsided (god knows I could easily fill 15 posts a day with content), but because the sorts of players that intentionally join hyperactive games (and hate on geriatric games) are also the kinds of players that intentionally make themselves impossible to read by shitposting and spamming.

These sorts of behaviours don't help town wincon, and are primarily for the user's own enjoyment. If too many players are

significantly

more interested in their own fun, than in winning the game for their team (or other people's fun), this massively hurts town. It makes them unreadable. The best way to read people is to figure out what wincon they're playing to.

[Mathdino]

Shorter deadlines for sure are townsided. This is, I think, consensus (I think Mafia Universe has a higher town winrate). I'm extrapolating to say that geriatric rules are also townsided because there's less interaction available for scum to manipulate mislynches and derail scum lynches.

Re: Reading: Depends on how troll the shitposters and spammers are. If they always follow town wincon while doing their thing, then yeah it's easy to read. But if they're trolling on the side or making up wincons for themselves, AND are straight up bad at playing town, this makes reading them impossible. I think Hyperactive games are gonna be a honey trap for those kinds of players. Geriatric games on the other hand won't attract any particular anti-town styles I think.

@Firebringer: It's like you didn't read my post at all.

[Mathdino]

Possible, but I'm not sure the evidence supports that.

[Mathdino]

A controlled study would fundamentally not be controlled, as the players would get to know each other better which I think massively benefits town (speaking from a perfect towngame after a restart). I'll wait for others with more site history knowledge to pop in here on that argument.

You can argue theoretically either way. I think the shorter deadline argument actually makes more sense. Early reads are often better than late reads (there's a MD article for that one) and a longer deadline means scum has more time to break town cohesion and generate paranoia (also a MD article for that). Most scum plans require longer days, I think. Plus, I genuinely believe town players "slip up" more than scum do (because scum is self conscious) so more time gives more time for town to get riled up on a "scumslip" made by town.

Firebringer has claimed in another thread that he plays for personal enjoyment more than for wincon, and this has the side effect of making him impossible to read.
Another player once made up a wincon of hammering as much as possible. As he does this (anti-town) thing as both town and scum, it makes it harder to read and fucks with town.

My bet is you'll get more players that would be worthy of a policy lynch (anti-town behaviour [other than spamming], trolling, only fluffposting) in a Hyperactive game. And that's why I think Hyperactive games will be scumsided. I don't believe it would be scumsided at all if players who already like Geriatric games suddenly used a Hyperactive ruleset.

True lurkers will and should get replaced. Geriatric games aren't any more lenient toward lurkers than normal games. My experience is not that geriatric players lurk or get replaced much at all. A lot of them are wallposter types who provide a ton of substance (sometimes too much) in just one post.

[Mathdino]

There's an MD article does not imply true. MD articles are generally just the author's opinions. Regardless, can you link them over for me?

Here's a Mastina blurb about why early interactive tells beat late interactive tells. I misspoke, to a degree. What I meant is that the longer the day goes on, and the more content is being constantly generated, the more likely it is that MOST town players ignore the good stuff (early game) and start changing their reads based on lategame.

This is related to my belief that it's not very useful to try to read players' defending against you after you're already scumreading them. Any semi-competent scum will start to learn what you scumread people for, and will change or not change their playstyle after suspicion is cast.

tl;dr: More time with the same game means scum has more time to learn how to manipulate town and be townread by town. As town isn't as concerned with being townread, town will get mislynched more often with longer days.

You're absolutely correct that better towns get better reads as games go on. I would counter with "better scum is less likely to get lynched as games go on" as well. Longer deadlines very strongly benefit teams that are significantly better in player quality.

[Mathdino]

I would just like to point out to everyone that now we have a completed Geriatric Game (KUDOS TO AERONAUT FOR SUBBING ME IN).

And it was SIGNIFICANTLY easier for town to read everyone with less content and more substance per post.

Like, significantly. Like no question. The usual culprits of spamposting and fluffposting also had better reads and more substance which made them easier to read (imo).

Plus it was balanced out by having a neighbourhood with no post restrictions, which was a fantastic idea (not a geriatric neighbourhood but less content to read because fewer people).

Well modded, Aeronaut, and go town.

[Mathdino]

Lol we lynched the 1 shot BP because of course we did

The loved neighborizer was useless because scum could just kill them (instead they killed Not Mafia)

Double vote just confirmed me as town in 3p lylo (and scum could've won it with better play)
Had scum killed the loved neighborizer I could've theoretically chosen wrong

I think it was slightly scumsided counteracted by the ruleset