Open 463: Black Flag Nightless (Game Over)

[F-16_Fighting_Falcon]

Awesome game. The high profile playerlist made it really challenging. It was fun playing with all of you guys and Hydra-ing with Arthur. We were holding off on discussing reads until the N flip though but now it turns out we don't have to.

I think Empire played great especially. The fact that scum don't have night-kills was crippling was them.

[F-16_Fighting_Falcon]

CFJ, thanks for modding. It was a great game.

Regarding the setup, I get what you are saying about the playerlist getting better as opposed to worse. To town, it was beneficial because town were able to follow the lead of Cerulean and JT and scum were powerless to stop them. I still think if I were scum, it would have ridiculously hard to get away with no nightkills. For instance, if Cerulean suspected anyone, there would have been literally no way to worm out of it considering they were near confirmed.

On the flip side, playing with good players was great. Empire and Regfan in particular provided very good analysis and set the bar high. I am impressed.

Also, I don't understand why replacements were in an issue in this game. Anyone care to elaborate?

[F-16_Fighting_Falcon]

Also, I don't understand why replacements were in an issue in this game. Anyone care to elaborate?

presumably they were hard on scum? *shrug* it happens. this type of game will attract good replacements anyway, it's just impossible to deal with them in nightless

Oh, now I get it. Equinox was scummy but you guys completely turned that slot around and proceeded to lead the game. I can imagine scum would be mad about it. But this goes back to the point about nightless games being town-sided. But then Equinox seems like a very good player too. I assume he was just having an off game.

[F-16_Fighting_Falcon]

Yeah, I guess the JT/Ceru group and Arthur knowing each other well sort of made it harder for OS and Mehdi to squeeze themselves in. I guess I am just bad at reading Equinox then. Faraday, you gotta be kidding with that hydra link, lol.

Also, I was really wondering: Tierce/Vi, the way you kept telling Tammy to stop fighting with Jesse/Thor, were you trying to get on their good side or was that mere co-incidence that they were town?

Pedit: yeah we got lucky with absta. My first reaction to Arthur going after Sixty was wtf? But he quickly got better when I was being lazy with my catchups.

[F-16_Fighting_Falcon]

** My first reaction to Arthur going after Cerulean, not Sixty.

[F-16_Fighting_Falcon]

I don't really care now since I am no longer playing with my old account and most people I interacted with know about it - that takes care of potential meta problems. Basically what I wanted to do was play mafia while being emotionally detached regardless of affiliation and I didn't want meta arguments about how I get emotionally involved when I am town. But this playstyle works for me a lot better so I'd rather stick with this account and keep my new playstyle.

[F-16_Fighting_Falcon]

LOL at oversoul stalking my wiki

[F-16_Fighting_Falcon]

It is kinda funny you can figure out who is making changes to your page. I keep doing it to Eidolon's page.

[F-16_Fighting_Falcon]

LOL, no. Eidolon and I used to play mafia on a different site. I keep changing her page and updating stuff and writing blurbs about her to surprise her.

[F-16_Fighting_Falcon]

Vi, what solution would there be to prevent replacements impacting the game so massively though?

I can't think of one other than attempting to minimize the number of replacements out each game by creating some sort of "X has replaced out of Z many games" list to make people feel bad about replacing out of games while remaining active on the site.

Replacements happen. Some are legitimate, some aren't. We can discuss the Katsukis of the world and talk about how site culture is moving toward an attitude of "if you aren't having fun, just replace out", and ideally replace it with a mentality of mods generally not allowing people who replace out to play in their games.

The other half comes in predatory replacements, people who see a chance to dominate a game they're not in and replace in so they can play the hero. I fully understand why people do this; I question how many of those people have been on the receiving end of that happening to them.

Solving the first problem mitigates the second, and conveniently the first problem is the easier one to fix.

That seems like you are saying JT replaced in for less than stellar reasons but I really think their replacing in was beneficial for the game as a whole. In effect, they were doing cfj a favor by filling in when a player left. I for instance had an overall positive learning experience because of them. I doubt they replaced in for malicious purposes i.e. to dominate the game and "play the hero." But that is just one way of putting it. It could have been that they just saw an interesting game that they could get into and have fun and they are natural town leaders. Their replacing in also had a halo effect: Arthur and I wanted to sign up for a different game but chose this one instead because Arthur wanted to play with Faraday and I too was interested.

[F-16_Fighting_Falcon]

Vi never said their purpose was 'malicious'. A replacement that is doing anything less than playing to win is a poor replacement.

The point is that replacements can strongly alter the gamestate. Town doesn't usually play for the long game, but scum have to. Therefore, replacing a weak scum player with a stronger one will help scum (less odds of being lynched and better odds of being a capable planner), but replacing lynchbait Town with a strong Town player can be utterly devastating for scum long term plans.

I don't know if "malicious" was the right word. What I meant to say was that I doubt they replaced in so they could "play the hero" which carries a negative connotation and perhaps they replaced in merely because they were interested and wanted to help.

The alteration of gamestate is an interesting point of discussion. From my experience, I don't really care if lynchbait is replaced when I am scum. I just try to lynch the new player. Open 448 was a good example. However, I know for a fact that if some specific players I was buddying to in that game got replaced, it probably would have effected the outcome, i.e. I care more about endgame-bait being replaced than lynchbait because those are the players you are ultimately planning your master deception on. I agree that scum have to rethink their entire strategy upon strong players coming into the game and that can be challenging.

[F-16_Fighting_Falcon]

@ Thor, interesting hypothetical:

If you replace out at the end of the Day and no one replaces in yet and the mod announces a replacement during the night, and that replacement is killed the same night (without ever getting a chance to post), would you consider the game as part of your win/loss record? Assume you had a legit reason for replacing out.

[F-16_Fighting_Falcon]

@ Thor, interesting hypothetical:

If you replace out at the end of the Day and no one replaces in yet and the mod announces a replacement during the night, and that replacement is killed the same night (without ever getting a chance to post), would you consider the game as part of your win/loss record? Assume you had a legit reason for replacing out.

I've never replaced out or been replaced, so I've never had to consider such things.
I have been that replacement...

I would probably proscribe to the concept that a replace out is akin to a quit and either not count the game or count it as a loss, and do that for all replace outs regardless of the situation of what happened afterward because it would be an absolute condition.

This happened to me in a Micro. I was conflicted on whether to include it. I wouldn't say it is an absolute condition though because it matters if you were the only contributor to a slot which got night-killed immediately upon your replacing out since the only person who can legitimately claim that slot is you. I'll probably include that on my wiki. I don't know the end result yet but if it is a loss, I'll put it up as a loss and if it is a win, I'll put it up as a win. Doesn't make sense to only count losses.