Open 678 - White Flag GAME OVER!

[mastina]

I should be in bed (it's 2:15 AM, I get up at 6 AM for work), don't have time to read this game and even if I did I'm honestly not sure where my priority game-wise would be but: as panicked as I was to see red in my PM, I'm town.
As a result, instead of playing optimally, I get to do what I deem best.

VOTE: Pine.
Because let's face it.
Pine's going to MAGNIFICENTLY bus one scumbuddy, and then keep his other scumbuddy alive, cruising to victory off of it. He may or may not pull the white flag gambit, bussing his second scumbuddy, but he'll manage to avert their death and pull out the win from the towncred Pine will get in lynching his scumbuddy.

As for why Pine is scum...
...Well, he's always scum.

[mastina]

I will be regularly attaching one-liners to the top of vote counts. If you would like have a one-liner on a VC, please PM me and it'll be put in a queue.

You really should know better than to ask this of me, Gin.
I might actually obliged.

I have a metric

tonic

of ideas.

[mastina]

Not a single person so far as given a submission

That's because I wasn't online! I can be pretty submissive when the occasion calls for it--you just never know it because I have this tendency to be on the top!

[mastina]

I have an inferiority complex, but it's not a very good one.

First Votecount

:

Falco XV - 1 (Aristophanes)

Transcend - 1 (Siblings Quarrel)

Grey - 1 (Firebringer)
Firebringer - 1 (Lil Uzi Vert)
Siblings Quarrel - 1 (Grey)
Not Voting - 8 (Pine, Falco XV, Transcend, ThinkBig, mastina, BTD6_maker, tojam2, Riley Cake)

With

13

alive, it takes

7

to lynch.
Day 1's deadline is Sunday, March 12th, @ 1:00 AM EST--(expired on 2017-03-12 01:00:00)

V/LA Notices/Mod Notes:

• Thank you Mastina for the template for my votecounts. These are ridiculously complex and prone to error. Especially when I first start making them. Please point out any mistake, even a minor one, so I can correct it promptly.

[mastina]

(But on the note of V/LA notices:

Mod: V/LA on the weekends

.)

[mastina]

Whiteboards are remarkable.

Second Votecount

:

Siblings Quarrel - 4 (Grey, Firebringer, Transcend, Pine)

Falco XV - 1 (Aristophanes)

Transcend - 1 (Siblings Quarrel)
Firebringer - 1 (Lil Uzi Vert)
Not Voting - 6 (Falco XV, ThinkBig, mastina, BTD6_maker, tojam2, Riley Cake)

Okay, so. Let's talk VCA.
For me, there's like 3-4 levels of VCA.
The most advanced level is basically: D3-at-earliest or so, advanced pattern mapping: looking at flips, looking at trends, looking at how and why wagons formed to find patterns in the data, and providing interpretations of them. I tend to be quite good at this, but obviously it's not something I can actually do unless I live that long and frankly, I expect to be dead long before then. (I vaguely paid attention to the playerlist when looking at this game and frankly...I don't think there's anyone here who's N1 nightkill material except for me. Now granted, half the game here hasn't played with me. But people know me by reputation even without playing with me, and those that HAVE played with me with the possible exception of Firebringer have incentive to kill me, so.)

That's what I actually do my advanced Extras for in my votecounts: to offer those tools to scumhunters should they choose to use them.

Below that, you get what's essentially: basic VCA. This is augmentation for a case. It is throwing together VCs and making predictions based off of them. These VCs tend to often extrapolate data, and can use assumptions that are not guaranteed facts. (Not so much in an open.)

Below that, you get VCA which is basically trying to make a point: "I don't like this wagon". "I do like this wagon". Pointing out on the current day phase on VCs, a wagon you like versus a wagon you don't like. "The names here are good", "the names here fucking suck". The like: situational VCA, you could call it.

Below even

that

, you get what I want to do without reading the game. Which is blind idiot guessing. Shot in the dark. Random estimation. Gut feels. Siblings Quarrel is a hydra who regardless of alignment, I can see getting early votes on them. Gut says regardless of alignment, there should be scum in there. Now I don't think it'd be Firebringer or Transcend. But Grey and Pine, both possible scum.

Off of the votes, Aristophanes would be gut town. Wouldn't be able to say on the others yet.

[mastina]

NOT SO PAGE TOP VOTE COUNT

NOT SO EASY! IS IT!?!?!?

Okay but like >_>
FITE ME 1V1 BRUH

It actually is easy! You just have to fight dirty! Play cheap. Also use underhanded tricks. Plus the occasional cheat.

Helping things: preparing your votecounts and keeping them stored in a notepad file.
Another thing to do is to religiously stalk the thread if you're like 5 posts or so from a new page: those posts WILL come, you just have to find out when. I've found that half an hour is usually MORE than enough time--too much, in fact; I lost pagetops because there were more than five away from the pagetop, then while I ate lunch, people talked, so I had to settle for near the top instead.

So stay active, busy. Maybe not refreshing the page every minute--every five or so is usually fairly safe. But don't leave, whatever it takes, until you've got your pagetop!

[mastina]

Firebringer - 2 (Lil Uzi Vert, Riley Cake)

These votes are probably coming from town, but are voting for someone who is PROBABLY town.

[mastina]

And with the mod iso finished, to bed.
I'll actually read the game thread when I can.
Got a fine vote down, got a fine start down, it's game on.
Not sure when I'll get to this, maybe tomorrow, hopefully, but I SHOULD be getting to bed before the end of the night comes.
Soyeah.
sleep.

[mastina]

I forgot to mention a couple of my signature quirks in VCA.
One, I tend to combine wagon sizes at a certain point in the game--namely, every (1) wagon compiled together into a gigantic wagon, and every (2) wagon compiled together into a wagon. This is a really nifty guideline for finding scum avoiding the major bandwagons, because it redefines wagon sizes in a way which scum don't normally counter. However, this is usually a tool I use somewhere in the middle-level of VCA: on higher levels, I tend to avoid generalities/rules such as "there must be scum in a given wagon size". (It still can be useful, but isn't AS useful.) On lower levels of VCA, it's difficult to really map out beyond the general "on major wagon/off major wagon".

The second quirk in my VCA is that I count Not Voting as a wagon...past a certain point, of course. If I fail to check who has been posting in the game thread for this section of VCA, it automatically bumps my VCA down a notch. (Which is most of the time, because I'm too lazy to look up who had posted at the time of the VC.) But the general idea there is that I am tracking those who are not putting a vote down. For some players, I actually expect this. (Reasonably Rational is infamous for virtually never voting, though there MAY be a minor correlation between their infrequent voting and their alignment but I haven't done the research there to verify.) If it's not a player I know basically never votes, though, I see a long absence of a vote as effectively a declaration of being on a wagon OF No Vote, thus why I have Not Voting as a wagon.

This second quirk stacks with my first, particularly at a certain point. For instance, it's really juicy when you have either only 1 or 2 players Not Voting, because most smaller wagons are those two numbers, and when you stack small wagons with Not Voting, suddenly you have a not-so-small wagon which usually finds scum.
(Gin, this is why I am one of the three queens of VCA; you should be taking notes here since this shit I'm spewing now is more up-to-date than my wiki/MD versions.)

ON THAT NOTE:

Riley Cake - 3 (-Grey-, Firebringer, Siblings Quarrel)

Siblings Quarrel - 1 (Pine)

Falco XV - 1 (Aristophanes)
Firebringer - 1 (Riley Cake)
BTD6_maker - 1 (Lil Uzi Vert)
Pine - 1 (mastina)
mastina - 1 (Transcend)
Not Voting - 4 (Falco XV, ThinkBig, BTD6_maker, tojam2)

It's still too early to count Not Voting as a wagon as of this VC. Any of the names in there could be town or could be scum. Now, for circumstantial reasons (see below), I happen to have a

guess

that they are in fact all town, but there's no way to know for sure because it's not an actual wagon at this point.

However, we've got something interesting: the Riley Cake wagon, nonexistent before, has two of the same members on it as the old Siblings Quarrel wagon did: Grey and Firebringer. There's

probably

a scum in there, especially if as I suspect Siblings Quarrel is town.

That leaves you with the nice juicy (1) voters: Pine, Aristophanes, Riley Cake, LUV, me, and Transcend. A total wagon size of six.
There, I am thinking Riley Cake is town. I also think that Aristophanes is town. LUV is

probably

town, too.

Which leaves: Pine and Transcend.

So at this point: you've got Grey/Firebringer, and Pine/Transcend, two separate pools, both of which are likely to contain scum. I'd wager one in each, minimum. One of those names is going to be town, no matter what. (Fuck, it'd be possible all of them are, just...incredibly improbable.) But this is a pretty good initial scum pool.

I haven't even read the thread yet, and THIS is how you do some proper VCA.
Now, granted.
You're the mod--you know how (in)accurate this is. But I just did what Titus tried and failed to do last game with a fraction of the resources. This VCA is a tool. My initial pool is those four names. When I actually do real scumhunting, maybe it changes. Maybe someone in there really towns it up. Or maybe someone really scums it up. This is, I can't stress this enough, just an

initial

estimate. It's a low-level gut feels thing. This is me using the

lowest

form of my VCA. My LOWEST form. Keep that in mind in terms of how good/bad it is.

Shame I'm not going to live long enough for you to see me get really creative with the higher forms of it.

[mastina]

NOW. For the game thread.

Pine, Transcend, and BTD are the scum team.
Gin told me so.

You know, if you substitute BTD with Grey...I would actually buy this post as being not only possible, but plausible. Fuck, I'd go so far as to even call it probable.

It's right up Pine's WIFOM ally for a scum player to make a declaration like this.

[mastina]

That said: not gonna quote the whole thing, but the majority of the early exchange page one looks town. If any of my initial pool of four is to be wrong, it would probably actually BE Grey, in spite of what I just said. That exchange isn't something impossible to come from scum, but it IS less likely. Aristophanes loosely looks town and I'm pretty sure Siblings Quarrel is town.

If any of the players outside my initial scumpool are scum, off of page one my first bet would be LUV--but I'm giving some benefit of the doubt, since I know LUV is always mislynch bait even as town and tends to look ridiculously scummy, plus, I don't have much experience with them. I have enough to know some of the generalities (e.g. mislynch bait), but not enough to know the specifics (e.g. the difference between "scummy town" and "just actually scum"). So I know LUV is scummy, and don't know if LUV is scummy-scum or scummy-town, but overall, benefit of the doubt in play here.

[mastina]

Top half of page 2 does make LUV look town to me though. These, on the other hand......

oh this started
i didn't get a pm
VOTE: frogisae

Prod dodge.

[mastina]

Page three: Firebringer does look like scum, but not definitely so.
Pine, definitely lean scum, so vote stays.
Transcend's probably actually a stronger scumread if I'm fully honest, though.
If this is Grey's scumgame, I've gained an understanding of how he's managed to win so many scumgames. (I always wondered how the fuck he did it because he always felt obvious to me, but here if he IS scum, with me actually in the game, I'm sure not seeing it.)

[mastina]

@Gin - Mod advice: People don't see edits into their posts. Why would they go back to look for them? Usually better to quote a reply. And obv it was a fake vote.

Disagree on basically every level.

People do go look at their own iso quite a bit from my experience.
As for how to handle things, my system is as follows:
For me fluff-responding to someone, I use an edit unless I'm vying for a nearby pagetop.
For me answering unbolded questions (or things which aren't even questions, such as in this case a vote which can't be counted), I use an edit because they weren't officially asking me but would probably appreciate the answer.
For me answering bolded questions which are unimportant, I use an edit because it's such a minor thing that an answer directly in that post is often the fastest, easiest thing to do.
It's only when answering important questions and/or REPEATED questions (if a minor question is asked multiple times) that I use an official post to respond to it...and then I edit the post ANYWAY, with a notification: "answered in post (posttag)numberofpostIjustmade(/posttag)".

This seems to work a good 95% of the time.

[mastina]

No town in this game but me.

Sorry, but I am obliged to counterclaim this. I see no benefit in letting you get away with your fakeclaim.

I

am the town in this game.
Yes. All of it. Ten town, all in me. Truly.

[mastina]

Another key aspect of VCA: counting gaps in them.

Falco XV - 1 (Aristophanes)

Transcend - 0 (Siblings Quarrel)

Grey - 1 (Firebringer)
Firebringer - 4 (Lil Uzi Vert,

Pine, Siblings Quarrel, Transcend

)
Siblings Quarrel - 1 (Grey)
Not Voting - 6 (

Pine

, Falco XV,

Transcend

, ThinkBig, mastina, BTD6_maker, tojam2, Riley Cake)

That Firebringer wagon? Rose and fell. Transcend hopped to Siblings Quarrel, then Pine. (The siblings themselves left to go back to where they were before.)

Nascent Town bloc: Ari, Fire, Trans, me.

This is also abysmal: Aristophanes is obviously town here, sure, yes, but that's basically a pocket-read. Pine is classically buddying him. The Firebringer and Transcend reads are godawful.

[mastina]

Pine is town.
I hope Transcend is town.

It can't be this easy.
It literally can't be this easy.

God I know this game is White Flag.
And I know that these players are cheeky scumfucks who could blatantly buddy each other just for the wifom of "that proves they can't actually be a team, because no team would be that blatant!".
But.

It just can't be this fucking obvious.

[mastina]

Fire went and serioused on me. I... don't know what to do with that.

Scumread him. Hard.

[mastina]

Siblings Quarrel - 4 (Grey, Firebringer, Transcend, Pine)

Like.
I keep thinking.
"They wouldn't dare. Would they?"

They wouldn't fucking dare try to put all of their members on the same wagon especially back-to-back...knowing I am in the game and wouldn't stand for that shit.

But I keep on thinking.

"Goddammit. Why do I feel like they fucking dared?"

[mastina]

I'M NOT A TROLL ACCOUNT!!!!!!!

You are, however, obviously an alt, of a user with a reasonable level of experience. I'd guess somewhere in the 2009 - 2015 range (probably in the "new wave" of players, rather than the last of the oldguard players), though I suppose an earlier 2016 user is possible. I don't much care to guess your identity, and I'll let you have your fun, but I'm expecting you to pull your weight to prove you're not scum.

I believe you've done a decent job of demonstrating this already--I expect that to continue. I don't have your exact skill level pegged yet, but from what I can tell you're a player who is at least above mediocre in ability, so even through the filter of your posting gimmick, I expect the quality of your play to be at minimum that high. Fail to meet that expectation, you eat rope. Playing under an alt (ESPECIALLY a gimmicky alt!) is no excuse to slack off on scumhunting, so if I see signs of degrading play quality, instead of assuming you're town slacking off I'll assume scum who is hiding behind their gimmick to disguise their utter disregard for actually playing.

I don't expect this to be much of an issue for you, though. You'll either slip at some point, forget about the account and have it siteflake, get bored with the account and start taking things more seriously, or continue to put active effort into the gimmick and thus continue to play at probably the level you're showing right now. And the level you're showing right now I am okay with; I think you're town.

[mastina]

(To be honest I'm at least like 75% confident that Riley Cake is a high-level scumhunter. As in, someone who consistently gets nightkilled, is a triple-threat of obvtown, charismatic, and accurate. There might be a few names I can think of who would be tempted to do so, too. They might be surprised to think that I hold that opinion of their main, or maybe they know I do already, who knows? I could also be wrong and have it be the other 25%, but eh. It's really not that important to me. I'll let Riley have their fun, so long as Riley isn't using the alt account to play well below their normal par.)

[mastina]

Tempted to just sheep Riley for the rest of the way.

Probably not actually a bad idea after I am inevitably offed.

As long as Riley doesn't become an egomaniac (something which well over half the probable candidates for Riley's main would qualify for, but as alts egos tend to either go way up or way down and for Riley it'd

probably

be way down), they'd be a reasonable player to sheep. Like, I'm pretty sure Riley's town here. One third of the triangle is the obvtown; they have it definitely. The charismatic third is something they're probably deliberately leaving absent from the alt, but it's not really needed. All which matters is the second third, accuracy. And there, I think Riley would do more good than harm.

[mastina]

firebringer!!! are ya scum trying to aviod attention by bullying poor ali?? :c if you were townie, you'd be super chatty and excited to tell me why they're scum so I'll VOTE THEM WITH YOU!!!!!!!!!!!!

Like this?

This, not something coming from an amateur.

This player KNOWS Firebringer.
Really, really KNOWS him.
Maybe not, "can perfectly read Firebringer".
But is definitely, "has many, many, many games with Firebringer".

Whoever is in control of this alt isn't someone who plays in only one game at a time. (Or, at least, used to play in a lot at some point in their career.) Probably 5-13 games active at a time. Over a time period of several months. Not always intersecting with Firebringer. But often intersecting with Firebringer, enough where on an alt they can't hide their experience with him. If this player played 60 games, Firebringer would be in like 5-10 of them. If this player played 120 games, probably somewhere in the 10-20 range. (It's not an exact scale. They could play lots with Firebringer, or have played only a little with Firebringer.)

And this insight?
Accurate. Not only is it accurate, but it is also something I don't see coming from this player (whoever they are, really) as scum. Why it's town is a little harder to say. I don't think they'd give this content as scum on their main. Obviously, it's not content they'd do as scum on the alt; that goes basically without saying. But what I'm getting at here is, this is townposting. Through and through. This is town. This is a player who is probably also skilled at scum, sure, yeah. But this player is town this game. And not only town...but at least decently accurate town.

[mastina]

besides, what if I'm mafia?!!!! then you can't catch me cos you don't even think I'm there!!!!

What if you're Frozen Angel pretending to post like KainTepes?

To be honest I think the gimmick behind the account isn't pure KainTepes, but rather, someone who had the idea to hybridize KainTepes and Frozen Angel (I think this is a player who has played with both extensively) and Riley Cake is the result of them in that mindset. Because there are elements of Frozen Angel in the posting style of Riley Cake, and the KainTepes elements need not be said, but I don't actually think this IS Frozen Angel or KainTepes. (Though FA is admittedly someone who came to mind, as she has the requisite experience.)

[mastina]

That looks suspiciously like a confession.

If it's suspiciously like a confession, it must be suspiciously like the truth.
If it's suspiciously like the truth, it must be suspiciously like a confession.

[mastina]

I'm sticking on scum suspect Siblings right now, but if I don't have a solid suspect after they're dead, I'm defaulting to a policy vote on the troll.

this is getting policy lynched btw
VOTE: riley cake

fb we can always lynch them >:)

meh, sibling is scum. Like I can't see them being town right now.
I am near tunnel mode on that. You couldn't get me to do a policy lynch at this point in time.

Riley, who is scum besides Fire?
Who is town?
-Ali
pedit: LUV those reads are?
pedit2: Because you're whiteknighting me by attacking the main person who was pushing me.

I legit now think Siblings is scum with Riley and that they are trying to force some distance right here.

Like.

You guys are taunting me.

You're fucking

taunting

me

.
At this point.

It's the only explanation.

[mastina]

I legit now think Siblings is scum with Riley and that they are trying to force some distance right here.

anyone sharing this thoughts at all?

I actually think this is town Ali. You know him better than I do, I guess... why do you say he's scum here?

Because Firebringer is scum.

[mastina]

I don't read transcend as possible scum with you or cake and my reads on both you two are much stronger than my weak scum pings from transcend.

FUCKING. TAUNTING. ME.

Swear to god you guys are legitimately shitting on me intentionally.

IT'S LIKE THIS GAME IS ACTUALLY SECRETLY THE SEQUEL TO CAMN'S REVENGE AND GIN IS LAUGHING MANIACALLY AS HE WATCHES YOU SLAUGHTER US AGAIN.

Like.
Aristophanes is town.
I am town.
Pine is scum.
Gin, the slighted player, is the mod.

PERFECT. SETUP.
Transcend is Aeronaut.
Firebringer is SirCakez.
And Pine is fucking Pine, except I can actually lynch him this time.

BUT I WON'T GET TO.
BECAUSE IT'S FUCKING PINE.

[mastina]

IT'S FUCKING AWAY.

[mastina]

UNVOTE:
i quit the site if riley's scum and i don't policy lynch him d1

What's up with the sudden turnaround?
-Ali

It's because Transcend is scum.

[mastina]

What do you think are the chances that he's town overblowing your interactions with Siblings?

Maybe he is!!! But maybes are for babies and I'm a big girl!!! It's more likely that he's just scum!!!

Oh now you're just posturing.
VOTE: Riley Cake
-Ali

This is opportunistic.

I'm not seeing the associative as strongly as you are. Kain/Riley's chief sin is a complete irrationality, which makes any kind of reading frustrating. A Siblings scumflip would progress to a Riley lynch though.

Riley, no offense. But I am probably going to ignore every post you make and everything you do for my own sanity.

I'm sticking on scum suspect Siblings right now, but if I don't have a solid suspect after they're dead, I'm defaulting to a policy vote on the troll.

[mastina]

this is a terrible vote mastina.

Yes, because it's one of the few votes actually on scum, which is something you'd prefer not to happen!

[mastina]

does anyone else want to vote the shit out of mastina or is it just me

does anyone else want to vote the shit out of mastina or is it just me

i do too, but i am resisting.

I mean.
If ever there was an example of scumposting (ESPECIALLY the Firebringer one since no way in fuck Firebringer resists voting me as town), this would be it.

[mastina]

YOU SHOULDN'T BE MAKING RVS VOTES ON PAGE 15!!!!!!!!!

You're right.

I should've made it on page 14!

[mastina]

Is it just me, or is 351 fluff except for the last five lines?
Did first read through. All I got were a ton of memes. I'll do a second readthrough later.

Falco's either a flaker or a darkhorse scum candidate, btw. (I realize the two are technically not mutually exclusive, but I don't think that to be the case.)

[mastina]

As both alignments?

Yes.

Technically true, but not quite accurate.

As scum my fluff tends to be far, far, far more...what's the word? Direct? Unsubtle? Directed? Specific? Not quite sure how to explain it. Basically, I do it a lot less often. A

lot

less often as scum. A LOT a lot. As town I talk. A lot. I ramble. It's my specialty in fact. Favorite scumhunting tactic, actually. Talking. Works much better than you'd think, because words are quite literally magic. They hold an immense power in them. You just have to say the right ones, and suddenly, you're obvtown, and suddenly, you have reads on other players. (This sometimes works better than other times. It's generally no less accurate than random, and can be significantly more accurate than random, especially since the more you talk, the more refined this magic becomes.)

My talking as scum is basically: a smokescreen. A mask. It is meant to hide something. It is meant to disguise my intent to mislead, so to speak. I use it to pretend I am town while pursuing an agenda which serves scum. My talking as town is sometimes also a smokescreen, concealing my basic game plan. (In hindsight I probably shoulda developed more of a plan for this game. My plan was quite literally, "I don't care what alignment I get, I'm voting Pine and saying he's going to bus a scumbuddy and ride the towncred to victory. Oh, and also, hopefully someone claims VT, so I can counterclaim it. Especially if said someone is BTD, would rather enjoy it if he did." That was all I had time to prepare in advance, because right now I haven't quite formulated a plan yet. I don't know what my exact strategy is, kinda winging it, trying to piece together the random fragments here and there that look vaguely plan-like yet haven't been woven together into a plan yet.)

But mostly, my talking as town is meant as a weapon. If you're gonna be known as verbosity incarnate, you might as well make the most of it. I couldn't get rid of my reputation, so I instead opted to exploit it, utilize it to the best of my pro-town abilities. Thus, the talking. Thus, the fluff. Because my fluff doesn't serve to be just fluff. It serves to set a tone, a mood, a plan in motion, so to speak.

(Incidentally, this is why I tend to talk so much earlygame and lategame: the plan is being formed earlygame, and after having had several failed plans I flail about lategame trying to recreate a plan. In midgame, my talking tends to die down, because I have a plan implemented, and with the plan in motion, I need to talk less.)

[mastina]

Btd6 always makes those kind of intros tho, and believe me, i fosed him for the same thing.

This is scum white knighting town.

[mastina]

Mastina, I don't bus. I dare you to find a counterexample that doesn't involve a guilty or something in the last three years. You know better. Scumbuddies are way too valuable a resource to squander. I can get Towncred lots of other ways, just by talking.

Oh? You don't waste your scumbuddies, eh? You would keep them alive at all costs, you say?

You mean like this?

VOTE: Trans

What about his maybe a townslip?

Nah.

oh this started
i didn't get a pm
VOTE: frogisae

This might be though. Post 1 role PMs tell me that scum don't have daytalk, so he wouldn't have actually thought day had started. It could be a fabricated tell, but I'm leaning towards it being real.

Or this?

65 felt forced.

Maybe. Still,

we aren't lynching Fire until he fites Gin

.

Or maybe this?

I claim Scum.
Please hammer.

Such salt. I think I buy it.
UNVOTE:
Drinking right now. I think I'll examine that whole run up to L-1 in the AM.

No, no, perhaps this?

Nascent Town bloc: Ari,

Fire, Trans

, me.

U scum sis?

No, and if you were town you would know I wasn't. Admittedly? Admittedly, I got off to a rocky start--I came into the game with basically no plan, so I couldn't send off my normal immediate obvious townvibes like I wanted. Real life and all that. I'm not gonna lie and say, you'd be townreading me from my first post. But. You would be townreading me not long thereafter. There are certain things I focus on as scum. There is a certain strategy I employ as scum...and that's been utterly absent. The chaos, the lack of order. I've been overly descriptive of certain things (namely, VCA), but I did that rather deliberately as a teaching tool because Gin is this game's mod and Gin just lost a game thanks to improper VCA and here Gin gets to see from a first-hand perspective an unbiased, raw usage of it in play immediately. (Basically, I do VCA like that kinda instinctively. Very much so to the point where it's basically, "I dunno, I just do it". I get results from it and I skip steps because I already have done the mental math rather than spell the whole equation out. And I wanted to show Gin how I do this, so I slowed it down. Which, in hindsight, is ironically the same mistake Titus made. )

I know that me describing things in detail, describing a read in enough thoroughness, is basically a scumclaim. But that's literally the only aspect of my scumgame present here, and it is present because I was deliberately evoking it for specific reasons. The rest is my town self personified. It's everywhere. The tone. The things I thinking. The way I'm speaking. The way my words flow. The content. The focus, rather lack thereof. It's town and you damn-well fucking KNOW it is.

But you know what you ALSO know?

You ALSO know that this game doesn't have anyone I have extensive experience with. You also know that's a great way to remove a crucial third of the triple-threat from me. I don't do good cases. Ever. Never been my thing. I can write a narrative. I can sell a story. But I tailor these to my audience, like any good orator would. And I don't fucking know my audience this game. I can maybe figure it out with time. I can learn to speak their language. Some of them I have interacted with before, vaguely enough to have an idea of what they might be looking for.

But basically. You can get away with this shit because nobody knows me, and nobody here except for me knows YOU. I'm fighting a battle I know I can't win because I've been deprived of my strongest aspect. You're being a blatant scumfuck. You, Firebringer, Transcend. All three of you. And yet you can get away with it. You can get away with your bullshit opinion, because you know which players you have on your side, and the answer to that is...basically all of them.

I'm so very mad right now. Very fucking mad. So mad I'm not even using caps. Because I could name the entire scumteam (and probably have), and yet I'll be ignored unless I can get that vital third post of charisma back.

[mastina]

I really

really

do not like this post.

Tough.

I'm town. You're town. Pine's scum.
It's that simple.

You don't see it now.
But you will.

Like, oh. Say. D4 or so? Rather, twilight of D4 or so. Thereabouts.

[mastina]

At this point, he is difficult to read and is showing interest in trolling and not game solving.

You absolutely SUCK at reading, just sayin'.

Riley has contributed some of the best content in the game thusfar. You just have to actually fucking read the posts rather than just glazing over them. There's a buttload of content present--Riley's fluffposted less than over half the playerlist, with most of their posts being content. Yeah, there's fluff, there's posts which are part of the gimmick and nothing more, but then there are the ones where you get to see a player who is actually showing exactly why someone like Firebringer is scum.

[mastina]

Now I just need to talk you into a BTD scumread for the trifecta.

The scummiest thing about BTD is that he's not actually scummy.
The second-scummiest is probably that his reads are actually looking half-way decent, but that's another matter entirely.

So, sorry. Not buying that.

[mastina]

Aww. Mastina. I am disappoint. Why can't we ever be Town together? I swear, we need to keep going until we pull Mason together, and then we'll just wreck shit. But you scum girl. Sorry.
VOTE: Mastina
Town bloc, to meeeeeee!)

Like.

The tone in here is pretty transparently fake.
This just.
This just isn't Pine as town.
It's not. It has no life. It's

wooden

.
When Pine is town, his roots are firm. Yet here, they're rotten.

[mastina]

Kind of think Mastina is town. Meh.

Also not a town attitude from Firebringer! Firebringer doesn't give a fuck about my alignment, that's sure enough--so he's not going to bother with saying I am town. He just votes me. He doesn't care if I'm town. He fucking votes me anyway, because it's a chance to vote mastina.

[mastina]

where the hell did you get this from?

Basic psychological profiling of their posting pattern when reading between the lines. Basically, when removing the gimmick and looking at what I saw, I could tell a lot about the player controlling the account. Then, there's the fact that it's not quite a KainTepes clone. I also suspect the vague similarity to Frozen Angel is in fact intentional (rather than incidental, or because it's FA), and that this gimmick is a combination of both of them. There's their obvious knowledge of multiple players in the game--that means they've been around long enough to have played with a lot of people. They are old enough to have thought of making an alt. They are experienced enough with KainTepes to make this. Between these factors, it's just about extrapolation. It's not an exact science; I could be way off. But it's a fairly solid educated guess.

You can hide a lot of things on an alt--especially a gimmicky one. Some things about you never change, though. Among them, the very fact that you are a gimmicky alt gives away crucial details about your basic psyche. Now, I'm no psychologist--I'm not a trained expert. But this sort of thing, I tend to map reasonably well. I don't have the exact details. I don't have hard data, so I'm not SURE about this alt's main. But I have enough where I have these educated guesses, which add up a lot.

[mastina]

Why is she trusting an opinion of someone else, also someone who she has no idea who, with a meta opinion on me?

I'm not.

I'm saying from personal experience that the meta this alt is giving is accurate--meaning, to a large extent, I trust them off of them having said meta knowledge of you.

Basically: I am vouching for the accuracy of their claim. What they have on you is true. They know why you are scum.

[mastina]

ESPECIALLY the Firebringer one since no way in fuck Firebringer resists voting me as town)

why is that?

Because you don't.

You just don't.

It's just a fact.

You have bad blood with me. I don't give a flying fuck about you, couldn't care less about you, so I have no issue with you. But you have an issue with me. It is well-known. As town you vote me when you have the chance. You don't really have to worry about playing to your wincon...because you don't know my alignment and don't care to. You don't think about consequences, because you are town so you trust in your natural ability to appear as town to allow this.

As scum, you're not afforded that same luxury. You have to think of your wincon: you know my alignment. You know the consequences of going after me. You know you aren't town, and as a result: you can't make yourself obvtown. By going after me, you place yourself in a precarious position.

[mastina]

Mastina, I am going to be honest here. I think your Pine read is absolute shit, and your only reading him as scum because of Camns revenge.

Yeah well if you're his scumbuddy that's all nice and fine but if you're town you can go fuck yourself since I have YEARS of experience with Pine, and I know how he operates. You devaluing that is your wincon if you're scum, but shouldn't be factored into here otherwise.

[mastina]

Mastina, I am going to be honest here. I think your Pine read is absolute shit, and your only reading him as scum because of Camns revenge.

Yeah well if you're his scumbuddy that's all nice and fine but if you're town you can go fuck yourself since I have YEARS of experience with Pine, and I know how he operates. You devaluing that is your wincon if you're scum, but shouldn't be factored into here otherwise.

[mastina]

Pine/Mastina feels TVT to me

THAT'S WHAT HE WANTS YOU TO THINK.
GAH.
I JUST.
INSERT ANTIHERO KEYBOARD SMASH HERE BECAUSE THAT IS THE ONLY THING I CAN THINK OF TO PUT HERE

[mastina]

Btd6 always makes those kind of intros tho, and believe me, i fosed him for the same thing.

This is scum white knighting town.

This is white flag. BTD could well be Scum regardless of that post.

Yes, scum are going to defend scum.

But not like that they aren't. That wasn't scum defending a scumbuddy. That was scum defending a player they know is mislynch bait. Transcend fucking said it himself.

[mastina]

AND I DON'T KNOW WHY I AM JUST THIS FRUSTRATED.
BUT I AM.
Maybe I just am this way because I am compromised.
Still feeling shitty for what it's worth.
And lots of real-life shit going around.
And lots of frustrations about what I haven't done but want to.
And how this game isn't the relaxing secondary priority I thought it would be.

And maybe that I feel like I should be able to do more.
I feel like I should be able to talk to people and get them listening.
I feel like I should be able to be obvtown.
I feel like I should be able to get people to follow me.

All of that without thinking of accuracy in reads.
And yes I know I could be massively wrong about the feeling but I still feel like I am right on more than I am wrong on.
I can see Firebringer as town.
I can see Pine as town.
I don't see both as town.
And it's just.

I SHOULD BE ABLE TO RESPOND. AND SAY. YES THEY ARE SCUM. BUT ALL I CAN DO IS ASK PEOPLE TO TRUST ME.
(Which might be easier to do if I wasn't a raving lunatic right now but I feel like maybe, juuuuuuuuuuuust maybe, I have reason to be one.)

[mastina]

Do you seriously think they're all going to blatantly tie themselves to reach other... all three of them?

Knowing it's fucking PINE at the helm?
With Firebringer and fucking Transcend as support?

YES!

You literally couldn't ask for a better buddy system to be in play.

[mastina]

its not FA, jesus christ.

Yes! Exactly! But the posts have elements of Frozen Angel in them anyway!

You know what that means?

The player in control of the alt has played with Frozen Angel before. The player in control of the alt has played with KainTepes before. The player in control of the alt has played with you before. And in all three instances, I doubt a one-game correlation. We're talking, probably at least 5 each.

[TheRealGin-N-Tonic]

I got yo back, mas.
VOTE: Pine

<3
Gonna be SO mad if you're actually scum here since you're basically the only person in this playerlist I have zero urge to strangle.

Thank Mod I'm not in this game or I'd be dead already >_>

[mastina]

I am having hard time not reading that with zero malice

There isn't.
You wouldn't understand how my mind works, but basically, every time I encounter a player who actively doesn't like to play with me, my mind does the pathetic laughter of madness and sorrow. Not laughter of funny, or laughter of happy, just laughter of patheticness, and I mentally go, "There's another one". There's another burned bridge. There's another hostility. I just. I just got to the point where there were enough of those that I stopped caring. I stopped keeping track. I don't track the players who have me blacklisted. There's too many for me to.

I tried mending ties. Many, many times, have I tried. And when I do, mostly people just laugh at me. And the rifts don't actually disappear. They still exist--so eventually, I just. Stopped caring. There's no malice because malice implies a level of hatred towards

you

. None exists, nor could exist. It'd be a lie to say I don't have a hateful bone in my body directed towards another person (because it all goes towards my dad), but I just really don't give a damn what people think about me anymore. It's not worth it--it's painful to me when I do. It's hurtful. It stings when people treat you with hostility. Especially when deep-down you don't actually think they are unjustified for having done so. When you think their hatred of you is warranted (in other words, hating myself), that makes it all the worse. So I just. Don't. I shut the pain out. And that's why there's no malice involved.

There's a lack of care. Apathy, yes, there is that--and by apathy, I don't so much mean "lack of care", as I mean "lack of emotion". Rather, lack of empathy. Lack of feeling. That? That I hold to you. I hold a lack of feeling towards you as a player, Firebringer. Because that's all I see you as: a player. If I do more than that, it gets painful because then I see a person hating me. (And seeing someone hate me is painful because being hated is not something you want.) But with you as just a player? I don't have to think about how you feel. All I have to care about is one thing: your alignment.

I think you are scum.
If you think that call is made in ill will--you have the right to that opinion, but it is wrong.
If I am wrong in my judgment here, then I was wrong on my read. That is certainly a possibility.
But. That's all it would be.

I think you hold a scum role PM. I will never apologize for fucking scumhunting. And that's what I am doing here. I think you are scum. I think your actions are more in line with your scumgame than your towngame. Your actions might not all be purely alignment-relevant at this point; you probably have legitimate personal emotions tying into how you are thinking/acting. But while this is true (for instance, a replace-out wouldn't be town and wouldn't be scum; it would be emotions), some of your actions ARE still fueled by alignment.

I will not apologize for stating what I feel is the truth. I feel your actions here serve a scum agenda, and that if you were town you would be acting differently. That's it. There's nothing deeper there than that. Just a read.

[mastina]

Pine, _____ , ______
In a world where Firebringer and Trans were ICs, who would fill the two blanks.

Falco and...and...

...Hm.
Lesse here.
You're town.
Aristophanes is town.
Riley is town.
LUV I'm pretty sure is town.
BTD6_maker I'm calling town.
tojam I know should realistically not be called town but I'm making that call anyway.

...ThinkBig, maybe?

Yeah, you can see why I'm not exactly receptive to this "Firebringer and Transcend are both town" idea.

[mastina]

Also I seriously just doubt the whole scumteam would buddy each other day 1. Like I really just don't think that's likely.

I HAVE A LOT OF EMOTIONS RIGHT NOW>
AND NONE FT EHM ARE VERY PLEASANT.

SOMETHING AGBOUT MIXING LAUGHTER, SADNESS, RAGE, AND PROBABLY OTHERS.
WHAT IS THAT?
ANGUISH?
WORDS FAIL TO DESCRIBE THIS CONCEPT, BUT IT'S NOT A PRETTY ONE BECAUSE YOU LITERALLY COULD NOT BE PRESSIN GMY BUTTONS HARDER. (Okay you PROBABLY ACTUALLY COUKD because aNYTHING related to real life gets me SUPER FUCKING PISSED but I'm talking in terms of GAMEWISE THINGS.)

I do not get this angry often. It is usually for out of game shit. This is in-game shit. And yet here I am exploding.
I just.

I WANT TO CRY AND IF I WASNT AUTISTIC I PROBABLY WOULD BE BUT I WOULDN'T BE ABLE TO NAME THE EMOTION ASSOCIATED WITH THE TEARS, BUT THEY"D BE THERE.

[mastina]

Thank Mod I'm not in this game or I'd be dead already >_>

You're not in the game, so you I don't want to strangle.
If you were though while I'm sure there'd still be lots of angry shouty ranting it couldn't devolve to levels any lower than those I directed towards drealmerz!

(But realistically, I wouldn't want to do that to you anyway. <3 You're like a stress reliever as a player, the ultimate in soothing the soul.)

[mastina]

I also don't see who this "Let's find out who Riley Cake is an alt of" helps us solve the game.

You really aren't reading my posts, are you?

I don't give a damn who Riley's main is.

I care about the experience Riley's main has with key players--namely, Riley's words being backed by truth. And that's what I'm saying. Riley is a player whose experience with players can be trusted to be accurate when Riley produces it in the form of a read.

[mastina]

So how's life everyone?

Stage one of becoming deathly sick. So that's cool I guess.

Me too! Well, probably not stage one, or deathly sick. But stalemating sickness which is bad, yes.

[mastina]

Notably, I'm Town and you're scum.

Fear. Scum!Mastina is like "Fuck fuck fuck Pine's gonna wreck me oh noeeeess."

I've played upwards of two dozen games with, against, and/or hydra'd with Mastina. We can pretty much soulread each other at this point, and we're definitely not on the same team. Since my role PM says I'm Town, that means she's scum.

TL;DR - It's her whole ISO so far. She comes out the gate with an immediate full frontal assault on me to eliminate a threat, works on breaking up the nascent Town bloc, and effectively dismantled a solid wagon on scum!Siblings. She scum, take it to the bank.

The parts I cut out of this post are the parts that aren't alignment indicative.

These parts?

These parts, all scum. There's the flat tone on prominent display. The lack of actual thought. The lack of actual emotion. Just a statement, flat. Without life. The thought that I fear Pine is LAUGHABLE, too--not once. Not

once

. Has Pine been up against me as scum. Since I was actually a competent scum player. The last time Pine saw me as scum was Good vs Evil, Chaos vs Law. AKA, the fucking

birth

of scumastina. Before that game, I didn't have any semblance of a good scumgame. That game didn't have me have it solidly, because it was the beginning of it. Furthermore, Pine did fuckall that game; he didn't read me at all because he was a selfish asshole (along with every other Chaotic Good player save Regfan, the SOLE chaotic good player who gave a damn about BOTH towns) who didn't care about the other town; his only concern was his own town. I wasn't a claimed part of his town so he didn't bother to read me.

Pine has no idea what my play even LOOKS like as scum. He doesn't have the intimate understanding of my play. And while his statement of how many times we've played is true, and the soul link part is true, he's applying it fucking BACKWARDS.

I

can read Pine. Because Pine's scumgame is largely static: it's basically the same formula it was when I first met him. He denies it all the time. He tries to rub my failures in the face of everyone who will listen, just so you know, just so you listen, to his version of "history", of how clearly incompetent I must be. Yet he was my first frenemy, and I

learned

. I studied. I got better. I improved. His scumplay stayed the same. My townplay evolved.

There's the same flatness in his tone about him being town and thus me being scum. There's no emotion to it. There's no push. There's no aggression--no conviction. It's a whimper, not a stamp of the foot firmly in the ground to plant roots. He's not taking a solid stance about me being scum. He's weakly, meekly, saying, "welp we don't misread each other, I'm town so mastina is scum".

He also JUST FUCKING FINISHED A GAME WITH ME where I did a "full frontal assault" on a player. Hey, guess what alignment I was there? Town! But no. Pine's argument here isn't, "mastina just did this as town, so she's trying to replicate it as scum". He's pretending the town game doesn't exist at all.

[mastina]

Can you guys make a ton of content in a short period of time so I can have a page top >_>

Unfortunately: I am burned out in this game in every fucking way possible.
Physically--skipped my nap, so I'm exhausted. Didn't sleep well last night, got less than 3 hours of sleep in spite of going to bed early enough to get 3 hours thanks to restlessness, long shift, and went straight into this game rather than other stuff.
Mentally--words are failing me and you might notice that me, the person obsessed with flow of posts, is making a lot of mistakes here and there. I'm barely even registering that I'm making mistakes, yet alone, that I need to correct them.
Emotionally--I don't need to explain this one.

Then there actually IS real-life stuff.
What I said in my PM to you wasn't exactly a

lie

per se, so much as it was a half-truth.
I have nothing to vent about in regards to real-life stuff, not really anyway.

That doesn't mean there isn't real-life stuff I need to do.
Aside from a nap, there's my blog. There's my work blog, too. (Yes I run two daily blogs!) Oh and eating some form of supper would be good.
Then there's online stuff. Like not falling behind on games. The scummies by now should be ongoing and I'm not reading there. I haven't done ANYTHING onsite except this game, meaning all others are being neglected at the moment (which is stupidly going to get me in trouble), and basically.

Uh.

Yeah.

I got nuthin'.

[mastina]

(Though. I suppose I coulda broken the above post up? Ah well.)

[mastina]

no one is allowed to say they had more angry shouty rage of fiery brimstone and reaching critical mass on multiple occasions in regards to dealing with dreal that game than me >_>

Sure, but I'm saying: the most I could feel like that towards you is how *I* felt towards dreal.
The way *you* felt towards dreal would be about the level I feel towards...oh, just about every player right now?

[mastina]

(Okay, so I do have a little bit left. But not nearly enough. Just enough to catch up, sorry.)

[mastina]

And with that, I'm caught up.

Sorry, I can spampost solidly sometimes, but I can't go...THAT much.

[mastina]

Come on grey that is inappropriate

It must be pretty bad considering that so many people are reacting this way, but I'm here staring blankly and going, "...I have literally no clue what he's saying here".

I suppose ignorance is bliss? (Especially that borne of autistic naivety.)

[mastina]

Okay yeah Trans can be scum. That vote is terrible.

Yes. Yes, it was. (And yes. Yes, he is.) But literally everything he's posting is, too, so.

[mastina]

In all seriousness, you are playing to your wincon. A scum wincon. And that's not really my wincon so...

^Quite serious, will vote whichever of Pine, Transcend, and Firebringer has the largest wagon when I'm caught up.

I am dead serious: that's your scumteam this game.

[mastina]

I am wondering why scum aren't bussing Riley.

It's a little hard to throw town under the bus, that's why!

[mastina]

Who wants to lynch Aristophanes

The scum!

[mastina]

THEN IT IS A SHTICK

No, it's not a shtick. Riley cake is correct in claiming she doesn't have a shtick.

...She

does

, however, have a GIMMICK.

Important distinction, yaknow.

[mastina]

It's that you are trying to lie about it.

Lying is part of the gimmick, though--the obvious influences for the alt are notorious liars who get emotional easily and worked up with their posting.

[mastina]

We are just buddies transcend.

For the fact, yes.

[mastina]

make it clear for you people who don't read my mod notes. People wonder why I cry at night[/size][/color]

I read it!

Still disappointed you slacked off and didn't do the advanced formatting!
It having broken is no valid excuse!

[mastina]

Scum me is too lazy to go hunting other games when I already know everyone's alignments.

that's what ya say!!! but how do I know if it's telling the truth?? huh???

Hey mastina, what do you have to say about this post?

In non-gimmickese, Riley Cake was saying, "yeah, bullshit" to Firebringer's claim which would be reason for him to be town.

[mastina]

VOTE: Aristophanes

No.

[mastina]

Fire's reaction to be called fat was fake by the way. I will give Titus time though.

Fire's posting was largely fake, and Titus's posting thusfar has already been shown to be scum, so.

[mastina]

Mastina is too self absorbed at the moment and that will not go well in this environment.

Not self-absorbed.

Just self-destructive.

There's a difference.

I mean. They can overlap. In fact, self-absorbness often LEADS to self-destructing, had it happen once, wasn't pretty, still haunts me to this very day.

But this? Self-destructive. Because this is very much not about me. It's just that this game is destroying me.

We could win this game on day fucking two. Perfect town win. All we'd have to do is lynch in the trio of Pine/Titus/Transcend D1 and D2. But I can't figure out how to make that a reality.

[mastina]

I can work well with Mastina.

I'm going to be blunt.

Firebringer was a strong scumread.
Your posting is very strongly looking like your scumgame to me.
You voted one of my strongest townreads.
This game is White Flag meaning protect your scumbuddies which is something you do anyway...and if your thoughts diverge outside of my scumreads entirely, then that's all the affirmation I need.

[mastina]

Have you considered that Riley's just scum?

Considered, yes.

And outright rejected on every possible level.

Literally every possible level, couldn't be further from the truth.

Riley is painfully obviously town.
Like.

This is textbook town play. It is how to make yourself obvtown. Very very much so. Now! Some call Riley annoying--but Riley isn't scum for being annoying; Riley is town for the content Riley has provided. Every step of the way, Riley has been town.

And I'm dead fucking serious, I'm lynching you for this push on Riley.

[mastina]

Though Titus is probably town. Scum wouldn't need to ask if scum have day chat.

Titus can and has faked that townslip in past games before.

[mastina]

VOTE: Titus.

[mastina]

Won't get lynched so vote me all you want lol

Yeah it's a little hard to lynch scum without scum helping on D1, so.

[mastina]

Problem is this still looks like town Transcend tbh BTD.

I mean, it's not, but if you feel like it is, you should be voting Titus.

[mastina]

Spoiler: How my semester is going

Oh my god that show was my childhood I can't believe there's actually someone else who watched it I loved that show it was amazing and the highlight of my children showtime shows and it's just so amazing and I was so utterly sad when I stopped receiving the channel which played it because that meant no more of it even though I was technically at that point outside the demographic but I didn't care because that show was amazing and I never outgrew it and I still enjoyed it.

[mastina]

I keep forgetting Gin is like 19.

People are often pretty shocked to learn my exact age, too.

[mastina]

it's dueling scum wagons

FTFY.

[mastina]

only in your dreams

I'm the girl who brings dreams into reality.

[mastina]

I keep forgetting Gin is like 19.

People are often pretty shocked to learn my exact age, too.

I'm going to guess late 20s?

You would be wrong.

[mastina]

This game is feast or famine post-wise, isn't it!

Like my daily eating habits!

(Which makes sense considering how much of this game I consume.)

[mastina]

Mastina, are you scum? Why are you talking at me instead of to me?

No, but you are.
I gave you a warning: don't fuck with me.
You're pursuing Riley.
That's fucking with me.

Firebringer was a strong scumread.
You not only did nothing to alleviate it, you strengthened it.

I would be willing to accept my read was wrong if you threw me a bone of some kind.
Your singular focus on my fucking strongest townread? Yeah, no. Not happening.
Riley is town. Nothing you say. NOTHING. Will convince me otherwise. Your posting there is a waste of time, effort, and breath.
I recognize there's a difference between "working with me" and "me being a dictatorship". But I flat-out refuse to work with someone pushing my strongest townread as scum, especially when I am scumreading that player. It's that simple.

[mastina]

Why aren't we lynching scum?

Because scum won't bus Titus, and it's INCREDIBLY hard to get a scum lynch D1 without scum help. (Thus Transcend's unvote of the wagon prior to Aristophanes hammering.)

[mastina]

I don't know. Feels like Titus has been at L-2 for like 5 days now.

And who, pray tell, are the scum on the wagon?

If you don't name at least one, preferably two, then...

...It's a towndriven wagon.

Does that guarantee it's on scum?

Fuck no, but it's a damn-good sign given a lack of scum on a wagon which hasn't actually gone through!

[mastina]

Tell us how you really feel.

Exasperated that we haven't fucking lynched Titus yet when we were so close. So. damn. close. To having done so, but Transcend making a TEMPORARY VOTE on Titus (which was obviously meant to be a temporary vote) has scared people away from voting her, Exactly As Planned, and that's incredibly infuriating because it was transparently a distancing maneuver because it made people skeevy about the Titus wagon in spite of him not seeing it through and keeping the vote on.

[mastina]

I'll make you a deal: Titus today, Transcend tomorrow.

[mastina]

I'll make you a deal: Titus today, Transcend tomorrow.

Mastina, you are tunneling way too much. Break out of he tunnel please.

These words would mean a lot more to me if you weren't lingering around spot #4 or 5 on my scum list.

As in, a top choice for being scum if my reads were wrong.

You

sure

you want me to reevaluate my top three scumreads?

[mastina]

Page

Bottom

[mastina]

I didn't say anything about working with you yet. That's mighty presumptuous.

Is it?

I can work well with Mastina

.

@Mastina (-post talking exclusively to me snipped-)

Mastina, Why are you talking at me instead of to me?

I have reservations about Mastina that I answer possibly but having interruptions doesn't help. Let Mastina speak for herself.

That will come out when I talk with Mastina.

I'd have to disagree!

I am flat out concerned about the lack of scumhunting in your posts

and the filler type posting I don't associate with town you

.

This is rats-ass backwards because filler-type posting is my TOWN meta and its absence is my SCUM meta. The former part is also flagrantly false, because I've done plenty of scumhunting.

A lack of read evolution is present, that's sure enough. A lack of scumhunting is not.

I would expect you to engage and wonder why I scumread your townread regardless of alignment.

You would be wrong. Riley Cake is transparently town. Any player attacking Riley loses townpoints for it. A player attacking Riley and doing so with bullshit reasoning which is flat-out wrong, doubly so.

So why should I TR you? Why should I listen to your reads?

Because this is

my

game. That simple.

I thought this was my game?

[mastina]

Good vote is good.

For the fact, yes.

[mastina]

Btd/ari/Riley/Siblings/mastina

Titus whats this?

It's Titus's attempt to project scumreads.

One which happens to include two of my strongest townreads.

She is, quite literally, on the polar opposite end of me in terms of scumreads.
My scumreads are Pine/Transcend/Titus, outside shot at ThinkBig/Falco.

None of them are on Titus's list.

There's literally three names which appear on neither of our lists: Grey, LUV, and tojam.

[mastina]

Why are you making a list of my townreads?

Because she is scum.

[mastina]

Um, have you read Titus' Iso?

For that matter, Firebringer's iso, too.

[mastina]

What about her ISO is bad.

The players she is focusing on are not the players a town-Titus would be focusing on.
The things she is saying are not the things she would be saying as town.
There is a disconnect between her personality and her actual actions in the game.
Her stances are hollow, shallow, artificial and most of all, "easy": there is no effort behind her posting.
Her tone is flat.

What about her ISO

isn't

bad?

Serious question.

[mastina]

Also, activity: Titus this game has a much lower activity than normal from her.

Yes, she's a replacement. Yes, she's got 63 posts in 5 days. (A rate of 12.5/day.) But look at how calculated those posts are. Their sparsity. Their location. Their succinctness. Their focus.

Titus isn't being aggressive. Titus is putting forward words, but she's not putting conviction behind them. They're just empty. Her posting is precise. She's not making posts, then making multiple posts to correct them. She's not posting up a storm. She's not engaging people dynamically. She's making brief interactions, dropping basic information, and then leaving nothing more.

Enough to appease the masses, not enough to actually make waves in the game.

This is Titus's scum meta to a T.

[mastina]

Also, Grey's 1078 and Aristophanes's 1080 are dead on the money in regards to Titus.

[mastina]

VOTE: Ari

Also, this is an absolutely shitty vote, because Aristophanes has a very, very, VERY strong, reliable meta tell:

If Aristophanes is active and posting content, he is town.
Vice-versa isn't true; Aristophanes being inactive and/or posting fluff he can do as both town and scum.
But this level of insight, this level of accurate analysis, this level of innate knowledge and crucial push, is something Aristophanes is incapable of maintaining so consistently as scum. And yet, he has. Aristophanes's content isn't sparse--it isn't sporadic. It isn't every once and a while. It is consistent and it is constant.

This is Aristophanes's towngame, through-and-through.

And Titus KNOWS this.
Titus is just as intimately familiar with Aristophanes as I am. Her reasons for voting Aristophanes were themselves shitty, but the very fact she voted him in the first place is the worst sin of all.

[mastina]

Why didn't anyone poke or talk to me about my TB case?
-Ali

Because ThinkBig is my lynch of last resort, if I can't lynch Titus, Transcend, or Pine.
Also my backup scumread.

If I am wrong on any of my three, ThinkBig moves into my scum pool. So your case definitely has merit. I don't necessarily think it's accurate--but it's at least possible to be true. At this time, I don't want to focus on it. Bring it back up on D2 or if we mislynch D3. You can bet your ass that if you're nightkilled I'll bring it up for you. But until I have no other choice, I'm not going to go after ThinkBig.

[mastina]

I don't really give a shit if I'm in your townreads list. I haven't done much to earn a spot there. But I shouldn't be in your scumreads list at all!
You still gave no cases on Riley or Trans, and though this is more of a case than you made there, it's still shitty.

Not only is this a good point, but like.
This is just pure townposting.

It just is.

Even if I knew nothing about Aristophanes! (Which I do.) Even if I had literally no experience with him.
From this post alone, I would be townreading him because this is just. not. scum.

[mastina]

Is there something you'd like me to look at? I'm pretty decent when given direction but I'm usually pretty lost without questions and such.

Sure. You've given thoughts on Titus, but could you do me a favor and tell me what you think of Pine? You have experience there, so you should have some idea.
Also, I'd appreciate a look at Transcend, who I assume you also know.

If you do both of those, ThinkBig could use a looking at, too, but he's not as high of a priority.

[mastina]

[quote="In post 1101, Siblings Quarrel"Using VCA selectively to fit your narrative is pretty contradictory. I need more to see if that's scum!Titus or just Titus believing herself Titus.[/quote] It's scum-Titus.

I don't believe there was ever a case there either. Like, everything she's done looks like it was pulled out of a hat. There's no lead up to things, there's no reasoning, she's just going things to do things and saying things to say things and not trying to solve anything!

Why do you say this? Titus' answers should help me figure out if that's the case, but why do YOU think this Ari?

What's there to think? It's fact. There's no ifs ands or buts about it. She has no lead-up to thing. She has no reasoning. She isn't laying traps. She's just doing things to do things and saying things to say things, and there's no effort to gamesolve at all.

[mastina]

Riley on the other hand has done jackshit since I arrived and warrants further investigation. They come across fake as shit but so many random townreads and chainsaws.

Regardless of Riley's alignment, they serve a function for scum

.

This, and this alone, would be enough to warrant lynching Titus.

This is Titus admitting that she KNOWS Riley is town. She KNOWS that Riley is town, but she is prematurely giving a justification for her "scumread" to be wrong, because Riley "was helping scum anyway".

[mastina]

One of the huuuugest reasons i voted fire was cos he refused to talk ta me at all!!! Town loves to talk to people cos they can sort em!!! AND NOW TITUS DOESN'T WANT TO TALK TO SO THAT JUST MAKES ME EVEN MORE SUSPICIOUS!!!!

Like this. This is so transparently town it's ridiculous. Fuck the gimmick. Read between the lines, pay attention to what Riley's actually pushing here. Firebringer was scum because he wasn't playing the way he would as town. The things he was saying, the things he was focusing on, they were all off.

Titus is scum because she is not talking. She is posting words--but she's not actually doing anything with them. She has formed conclusions first, rather than words first and conclusions later. A town Titus comes into the game and is coy about her reads, her presence, her stances. She holds back. She avoids laying her cards out on the table, because she wants to gather information and trap scum.

A scum Titus immediately comes out and lays the cards out on the table, as to establish a firm base. A scum Titus needs to establish early towncred, so instead of playing the long game, instead of being coy and holding back, she goes out and immediately pushes, because people read that strong bullheaded aggression as being town.

That is more or less what Riley is saying, and it is dead on the money.

[mastina]

Not sure how anyone needs more from her at the moment after her interactions with Firebringer.

This, too.

[mastina]

The way I see it, if Transcend is shim, I'm willing to sheep mastina's reads to victory.

Transcend's only my second-strongest scumread. (Pine's actually dropped down to third at this point.)

Titus is my strongest scumread.

[mastina]

VOTE: Transcend
Not feeling an Aristo wagon.

I don't feel Transcend.

GRRRR!!! YA SAID HE WAS OBVSCUM!!! ya keep changing ya mind titus!!!

This, too. Titus's stances are incredibly convenient and also not consistent. A contradiction like this is

exactly

how you nail a scum-Titus in play.

[mastina]

Scum don't say stuff like that ^

Also true.

[mastina]

Please don't lynch Riley. Lynch me first if you have to.

Town don't say stuff like that ^

Actually......

[mastina]

Riley, at this point, I am almost wanting to policy lynch you. You're not making any sense and are obviously attempting to be a really bad troll parody of KainTepes. For those who TR RC, why?

Fuckit.

Pine can be town.

ThinkBig is scum.
Transcend is scum.
Firebringer was scum, and Titus is scum.

[mastina]

Riley, at this point, I am almost wanting to policy lynch you. You're not making any sense and are obviously attempting to be a really bad troll parody of KainTepes. For those who TR RC, why?

hehe!!! Ya policy lynch someone not 'cos ya think they're scum, but because ya hate their guts!!!! But if ya scumread me, ya wouldn't even be thinking about a policy lynch!!! You'd just go "HOW RILEY ACTS DOESN'T MATTER!!!! SHE'S SCUMMY!!!!" and gobble me up!!! I think ya might be SCUM CAUGHT WITH COGNITIVE DISONNANCE!!!

This.
And it's not just ThinkBig.

It's Transcend. (Who has admittedly moved onto "town but want dead anyway", but he STARTED off with "scum and want dead anyway".)
And Firebringer.
And Titus, in Firebringer's slot now.

It's all of them.

All of them, with that exact same fucking attitude: "Riley Cake is annoying, and also scum, but annoying where I want to lynch Riley".
Exact. same. fucking. thing. From. all. of. them.

[mastina]

what do horses say?

Neigh

borhood.
Mayhaps, a three person one, with access to a nightkill.

[mastina]

I still think ThinkBig is White Flag Gambitting btw.

Oh there's been a white flag gambit alright!

Sure as fuck not involving LUV though!

[mastina]

These posts in his ISO will appear right next to each other. They're also 14 minutes apart. This looks like a derail attempt on a scumbuddy whilst simulatenously white flag gambitting.

Exhibit A:

VOTE: Titus
L1

Exhibit B:

This isn't scum imo but we can remove the shitty slot and move on. Would rather lynch tb.

Exhibit C:

VOTE: luv

Time of Titus vote: Tue Feb 28, 2017 7:45 am.
Time of LUV vote (and by extension, Titus Unvote): Tue Feb 28, 2017 8:04 am.

A time difference of 19 minutes.

[mastina]

What'd I miss?

To be honest the scumteam I'd want at this point would be Pine-Titus-ThinkBig.

I don't know why I want that to be the scumteam, it just somehow sorta appeals to my emotional desires. It's something which I just would feel really happy about it being true.

But realistically, I think it's the Triple-T Trio, Titus, Transcend, ThinkBig.

[mastina]

I'm never ever lynching Riley slot this game. As far as I'm concerned, it's an IC.

^

[mastina]

You're not even trying to find out why we value the Riley slot..

This.

If Titus claimed she hadn't read the thread (something she probably would have done if she were town, btw), I could maybe understand her not understanding why we're townreading the slot--

maybe

.

Titus has made no such claim. Quite the contrary, she has indicated that she

has

read the game, and yet, in spite of the gamestate making it as abundantly clear as fundamentally fucking possible, she's not trying to understand why that slot is so heavily townread.

Riley Cake was town. momo is town. Period. I'm sad to see Riley go, since to be blunt I trusted Riley to be competent and I hold no such faith in momo. But the new player doesn't change the alignment of the slot. Riley was town; momo is town. That simple.

[mastina]

You feel it's lynchbait. P obvious.

Lynchbait?

No.

The reason I'm townreading the Riley slot is because Riley was the best fucking scumhunter in this game.
They had two of the three elements of the triple-threat

at minimum

: Riley Cake BLED obvtown, off of every pour. They had good reads. They had good reasoning, too. Disguised as a gimmick, this reasoning was well-hidden, but it's there. Every single Riley Cake defender saw Riley's content and knew that it was good. Literally every fucking single one of us knows why Riley held the stances they did.

Lynchbait couldn't be further from the basis of the townread on Riley.

[mastina]

That's the only reason to keep that slot alive. It hasn't posted a grammatically coherent thought since I got here.

Such superficially-based judgmental remarks are beneath you, Titus. Strip away the dime store gumdrops and thrift store ribbons from Riley's posts, and all that's left is town.

This.

SO FUCKING MUCH, THIS.

[mastina]

No, I felt she was the best player here until she was pushed to the brink. You only wanted her lynch because she prevents you from pushing your agenda.

^

[mastina]

The obliviousness of Mastina and hard tunnel should not be present from town Mastina given we recognized each other early in SU2.

You know this is a bit of a silent secret I've held but in spite of me being a proponent of there being no such thing as a truly reliable scumtell.
I have to admit.
There is ONE tell that I secretly hold.

And at this point with my frustration like this, I feel like outing it.

I've always felt that those who specifically try to reference past games to bolster their stance have a >random chance of being scum. How much above random, I don't know exactly, but referencing specific past games and trying to manipulate them to have specific meaning is basically what I look for.

I do this as scum basically every single scumgame I can think of. I can't recall doing it as town, at least not in the way that I apply the tell.
I see scum do it all the time, especially to put down others, especially to invalidate them, especially to degrade their content, their push, and to make it seem "worse" than what it is.
I don't recall seeing town ever displaying that attitude.

In other words, a very specific form of meta manipulation.
I've always felt it was a scumtell.
And I'm so fucking sick.
Of seeing it.
And not calling them out on it. I've held back on this tell countless times. I've held back from accusing people of it numerous times. Endless amounts of times, I've held back from using this logic, because I didn't want it to be true, because I didn't want to out my secret tell, because I didn't want to reveal it, because I was afraid of others calling it out as bullshit, because I was afraid it could maybe be wrong, or even worse of all, the tell is valid in general but for THAT SPECIFIC game wasn't right on the player I accuse, thus making the tell appear weaker than it really is, so I have held back on it, only to time and time again be shown right to have thought this way.

So fuck that shit.

I'm telling the tell right here and now.

Using specific past games, and manipulating that specific past game to tell a narrative which casts another player in negative light, is a scumtell.

And Titus is displaying it in top form here.

She was still reluctant to lynch scum there until endgame so *shrug*.

YEAH.
AND GUESS WHAT.
THIS HAS BEEN AN INCREASINGLY GOOD YEAR FOR ME IN TERMS OF SCUMHUNTING.
I really feel like this year, I have a shot for maybe the first fucking time in my entire mafia playing career of winning Paragon of Mafia Hunters. My scumplay has been better than my townplay for literally years. I've been noted for being a scum player for years. I've been noted as only being mediocre-good as town, for a constant period of time.

But you know what?

I actually feel like I'm getting better!

I actually feel like I am improving. Something magical happened. Something mysterious. Something ~mystical~. I feel more accurate than I was before--and I feel less reason to hesitate. I feel less reason to doubt my reads. I feel more on top of my game. I feel like I actually know what I'm fucking doing. I know what I'm saying. I know what I'm doing. I know that I won't get things 100% accurate, all the time; I'm not

that

good.

But time and time again, I feel like I'm getting better, like I am justified in

not

having changed my stances. In short, you could say that I was previously afraid to be wrong. But more and more, something just...awakened within me. And now I'm not. I'm not afraid to be wrong. I'm not afraid to stick to my guns. My reads are more right than wrong. I just KNOW it. Now, admittedly. I still need to work on the "proving" it part. I need to refine my convincing tactics, my charisma, to sway people into showing them that, yes. I am fucking right. I DO know what I am fucking talking about.

I am not just a ranting, raving lunatic; my reads are actually solid and have good basis. But I have DAMN good reason to have gained my confidence boost: experience. I'm being shown right. I've had constant shows, where I've seen players come to doubt themselves and end up being wrong. And that's changed my mafia philosophy.

So fuck doubt. Fuck the idea of me being wrong; I am not.

[mastina]

Your bias is turning into prejudice.

Or, y'know.

She's just fucking scum.

[mastina]

Fact of the matter is, Titus goes after the towniest players in the game as scum and it constantly gets written off as moonlogic. Well, I don't think it is moonlogic, because she hasn't presented any logic but bad reads.

This.

This is what she has done.

Riley Cake was hard-town and painfully obviously so.
She attacked them.
Aristophanes is obviously town and painfully obviously so.
She attacked him.
I am in top-obvtown form. This is literally as town as I get; I can't fake my ranting raving lunatic state as scum. (I just can't because there's no way for me as scum to get into the emotional state I am in because of this fucking game.) She attacks me.
Now, she attacks Grey--who is transparently town, and basically my strongest townread.
And she's also taken a jab at Siblings Quarrel--a widely held townread.

She's been going after the towniest players, and yes. I can confirm: that's her scum meta to a T. She gets away with it because people write her pushes off. But her reads this game are just

bad

. And beyond the level a town-Titus would ever produce.

This just isn't a town Titus in any way, shape, or form.

[mastina]

There is it. I am better than Titus, so I am going to ignore her.

This is also a signature scum tactic of Titus's: when a player is scumreading her, she degrades their attack and calls it a personal thing. She says their scumread is based off of factors outside of the game, therein trying to discredit the validity of the scumread.

Titus couldn't be more in her scumgame if she tried.

[mastina]

AND I'm seeing behavior that you partake in as scum (re: your stubborn and unyielding push on one of the objectively towniest slots in the game), and pushing her for using annoying text is something that I, perhaps wrongly, I don't know, attribute as being beneath you as town.
I honestly feel your stubborn push on Riley-slot is scum!Titus play.

This.

[mastina]

Scum Titus persists in framing and narrative. Nothing good comes from browbeating.

GEE I WONDER WHAT I THINK YOUR PLAY HAS BEEN THIS GAME.

[mastina]

I think the thing that really rubs me wrong in your approach towards Riley is that you come across like a mother hen towards Yume, who has her own... issues... so seeing you act like the same sort of close-minded bully that you defend Yume from just rings as all kinds of false.

This, too.

Titus has no issues as town understanding a player with playstyle issues--in fact, her fucking specialty is in dealing with them and defending them and working with them. It's literally her thing as town to do. Yet here, instead of doing that, instead of recognizing the special snowflake (and I use that term not as an insult mind you) Riley Cake is, she writes Riley off entirely as just obnoxious-and-scum, with no thought otherwise.

[mastina]

Has Riley expressed any followable read since I got here?

Overlapping your isos?

Transcend I am considering you mod confirmed town if Riley flips scum. This would be the best distancing if you were scum.

You do know im good at faking interactions
Riley what's with the quick transition from scum!me to town!me

cos the main reason why I was scumreading ya was cos ya didn't answer my question and ya were trying to push the game off topic!!! but now you put it back on topic and showed me why ya weren't just distracting the twon!!! and ya also answered my question. so I think you are town!!!

If you think annoying people that don't answer questions are scum, you will scumread me in every single game. Every. Single. Game.

but is firebringer that kinda person too? COS IF NOT THEN I THINK HE'S SCUM!!!

I want Titus to explain why she's voting me >:C UNLESS SHE'S GONNA BE LIKE FIREBRINGER AND NOT EXPLAIN ANYTHING!!! THAT JUST MAKES ME THINK SHE'S SCUM EVEN MORE!!!!!!!!

anyway! transy!!!! whatcha think 'bout the fact that TWO PEOPLE IN THE SAME SLOT aaaallll don't wanna talksies with me? firebringer didn't wanna talk to me, and titus doesn't either!!! isn't that a super big coincidence? everyone else loves to talk to me!!!

I THINK THINKBIG AND TITUS ARE SCUM WORKING TOGETHER TO GET THE WAGON OFF TITUS!!!! THAT WAS SUSPICIOUS!!!!! AND TRANSCEND IS TOWN!!!!

(Which mind you is a read evolution from it being Transcend + Titus, though I understand perfectly why Riley had the change in read given ThinkBig's scumming the thread up.)

One of the huuuugest reasons i voted fire was cos he refused to talk ta me at all!!! Town loves to talk to people cos they can sort em!!! AND NOW TITUS DOESN'T WANT TO TALK TO SO THAT JUST MAKES ME EVEN MORE SUSPICIOUS!!!!

VOTE: Transcend
Not feeling an Aristo wagon.

I don't feel Transcend.

GRRRR!!! YA SAID HE WAS OBVSCUM!!! ya keep changing ya mind titus!!!

Riley, at this point, I am almost wanting to policy lynch you. You're not making any sense and are obviously attempting to be a really bad troll parody of KainTepes. For those who TR RC, why?

hehe!!! Ya policy lynch someone not 'cos ya think they're scum, but because ya hate their guts!!!! But if ya scumread me, ya wouldn't even be thinking about a policy lynch!!! You'd just go "HOW RILEY ACTS DOESN'T MATTER!!!! SHE'S SCUMMY!!!!" and gobble me up!!! I think ya might be SCUM CAUGHT WITH COGNITIVE DISONNANCE!!!

I don't know why Uzi's defending me so hard!!!! He's my big brother, but WE'RE NOT EVEN SIBLINGS!!!! So i really dunno!!! I appreciate it though!!! I'm waiting for him to answer the questiom I asked c:
I hope he's not buddying me to make me his friend cos he's scum!!!! THAT'S LIKE A GUY WITH A VAN AND CANDY!!! but there's something that makes me think he'd protect me as town.... But I can't say too much cos it's ON GO ING !!!

(I mean, frankly, this was Too MUCH English.)

I think TB might be town sadly. I don't think he would constantly bring up his scum read on you and attempt to tunnel you all game as scum.

why notsies?

UZI!!!! EVEN IF TRANSCEND WAS DIFFICULT TO LYNCH, THINKBIG COULD STILL TUNNEL HIM AS SCUM!!! cos he can sit on the wagon forever and ever and ever and nobody will ever suspect him of not voting!!! Ya get my driftsies?

I CAN VOTE EITHER!!!

(Titus/ThinkBig are the names in question here.)

...This isn't even a complete list. This is just a list of the ones that I personally mostly agree with--also present are doubts about LUV, doubts about Grey, and other such paranoia-doubts which would likely have been shown to have gone away if Riley was allowed to stay.

All of those and so much more, very easy to follow--not only the reads, but also the reasons. The prods Riley made to others. The pushes Riley was heaviest on. This, not even going into all of Riley's content

prior

to your replace-in, which was rather extensive and thorough. Riley was very active and very strong in their pushes, and it was clear and unambiguous what they were doing at almost all times. (In all of Riley's iso, I can maybe count on a single hand the number of things which I'm not sure of the meaning.)

[mastina]

Fucking spineless replace out that was

Eh, not really. It takes a spine to stay in this game given just how thoroughly terrible it is, but that doesn't mean replacing out removes yours.

[mastina]

You seem to be the only person I can logically interact with here.

*pouts*

[mastina]

@Mod: Replace me. Sorry Gin

Fuck this game.

Riley, the beacon of hope and all that was good in this game, got removed.
Grey, the one player I had zero urge to strangle, replaced out.
And now this.

Just.

Fuck this game.

It'd be one thing if we were getting replacements of equal skill--but to be blunt. I've seen a bit of momo's play and further observed a lack thereof in this game, so to be frank momo is just not nearly at the quality of skill Riley was at.

It'd be a pain to find one, yet alone, TWO players to match the caliber of Grey and LUV.

This is literally "fuck with mastina: round two".

[mastina]

VOTE: Aristophanes

WHy.
MOD.
WHY.

WHY.

WHY.

GOD FUCKING DAMMIT WHY DO YOU TORMENT ME SO.

DID I REALLY DESERVE THIS?
YOU'RE SUPPOSED TO TAKE REVENGE ON FATE, NOT ON ME.

[mastina]

The other scum is BTD BTW.
pedit cause he's fake

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGGGGGHGHGGG!
HAIR RIP>
HEADDESK.
TEETH GRIDK.

IT"S JUST NOT FUCKING FAIR.

NOT. FUCKING. FAIR.

[mastina]

Titus are you the other other scum?

Saving grace.
Suffice to say:

YES!

[mastina]

I thought this was my game?

No, you lost the privilege to call this your game when you started deliberately fucking with me.

I did no such thing

[mastina]

VOTE: mastina

Fuck you, nancy.

No, seriously.

Fuck you.

I know. Absolutely fucking KNOW. 100%. That you've read the fucking game. You were following it even before you fucking replaced in. And even further! I bet you offered to replace in specifically because you were townreading Grey, for whatever reason. Maybe even specifically because of my analysis where I laid out why I was townreading Grey.

So I know you cast that vote after having read the game--there's zero ambiguity here. There's zero need for me to say to you, "read the fucking game" before you cast a vote like that...because you already did. You already fucking read the game, and then you cast that fucking vote.

So again.

Fuck. you.

I want Grey back.

[mastina]

Mastina what do you think of how Thinkbig has been treating Titus?
-Ali

At this stage, probably scumbuddies.

It's not outside the realm for one of the three Ts to be town, especially if Pine is scum.

But I don't think so.

[mastina]

Nope.

Again.
Fuck you.

I know you're town.
I fucking KNOW you're town.

Which is why your attitude is all the more of a shitty piece of crap.

You're posting what you are as town, and it's absolutely disheartening to see.

[mastina]

Why the naked vote on Mastina? Don't like this vote at all.

Why the white knight of fucking MASTINA of all people who needs absolutely zero help defending herself?

Don't like this defense at all.

[mastina]

{-Grey-, mastina,

titus

}

{Aristophanes,

pine

, BTD6_maker}

{Falco XV, Tojam}

{

Riley Cake

, LUV, Siblings Quarrel

}

{Transcend}

BTW mastina what do you see here? Hint: It's bolded.
-Ali

It was absolutely godawful, and I've underlined things *I* would have bolded.

[mastina]

Before you get lynched, feel free to explain how you honestly expected to twist yourself out of a scumread on Pine after that push backfired on you.

NO>
NOT.
GOING.
TO.
FUCKING.

PKAYU.
THIS.
SHIT.

[TheRealGin-N-Tonic]

Well actually, this game is being ran so I have the qualifications to run the Ginn's Revenge

YEAH AND THIS GAME IS A FUCKING PREVIEW BECAUSE YOU ARE SPECIFICALLY TORMENTING ME.

WHEN I PLAY I AM GOING TO FUCKING

DEMAND

. ABSOLUTELY

DEMAND

YOU STICK ME WITH THE MOST OP ROLE OF ALL BeCAUSE YOU DAMN WELL FUCKING OWN UP TO YOU OWING ME THAT MUCH.

heh. That'll be a fun game to say the least. What you should be worried about it Ginn's Loony Bin. If you don't replace out of that game then I've failed.

[mastina]

I thought this was my game?

No, you lost the privilege to call this your game when you started deliberately fucking with me.

I did no such thing

YEAH WELL THE GAMESTATE SAYS OTHERWISE BECAUSE ALL THE PEOPLE WHO I CAN ACTUALLY WORK WITH ARE PROBABLY SCUM, THE PEOPLE WHO I COULD WORK WITH WHO WERE CLEARLY TOWN REPLACED OUT, AND NOW I AM IN A POSITION WHERE I HAVEN O FUCKING ALLIES IN SPITE OF ME HAVING A VERY FUCKING GOOD STANCE AND IT"S JUST.
NOT FUCKING FAIR.

[mastina]

and just talk. K?

I HAVE BEEN TALKING.
THE FULL FUCKING GAME.
EVERY STEP OF THE WAY.
UNAMBIGUOUS. CLEAR. ALL OUT THERE.
NOT HIDING.
STANCES AS CLEAR AS FUCKING DAY.
I HAVE BEEN MESSING AROUND SOME.
AND PUSHING>
BUT ALWAYS TALKING>

NEVER LACKING IT.
NEVER NO TALKING.

AND PEOPLE WERE ACTUALLY LISTENING.
BECAUSE THEY SAW THE SAME SHIT I DID.
AND NOW THOSE PEOPLE ARE GONE.

AND WE ARE MOCVING FARTHER AND FATERW AY FROM A SCUM <YNCH.
WHEN WHE WERE SO FUCKING CLOSE.
SO. FUCKING. CLOSE.
AND SHOULD HAVE DONE IT FIFTY PAGES AGO.
AND SHOULD BEE ABLE TO HAVE A PERFET FUCKING TOWN WIN.
YET WE ARE GOING IN THE ENTIRELY WRONG DIRECTION BECAUSE THE PEOPLE WHO ACTUALLY KNEW WHAT THEY WERE TALKING ABOUT ARE FUCKING LEAVING THE GAME FROM FRUSTRATION.

[mastina]

I'm not convinced you're Town.

Then fuck your reading comprehension; it's literally impossible for me to town it up harder than I have this game.

You were so convinced that Pine was scum, and you're willing to write it off because a few other slots want to policy an obvtown?

I'm willing to write it off because there's only three scum in the game and I have four scumreads--Pine is the weakest of them now. This is from a combination of reasons. Firebringer's strong scum posting, Titus's continuation of that tradition, Transcend's posts REALLY rubbing me the wrong way, and ThinkBig having pinged my gut HARD even early-on. The only reason I wasn't harder on ThinkBig early is BECAUSE I had three scumreads already and he couldn't have been scum if all of them were right. But then he continued posting, and it continued to get worse. And Transcend's posting didn't get better, either. So I have to pick and choose. I can't be right about all four; I MUST be wrong about one. Pine's admittedly fallen under the radar thanks to a lack of posting, but I 100% know that's null for him and not related to his alignment this game. He's still a scumread, but of the four, he's the one I feel is currently most likely to be wrong.

I don't get you.

Time for the obligatory flowchart.

Here, for your reading pleasure, might as well quote this.

I think everyone should make one of these. Especially mastin.

Actually...I have.

I've been meaning to post it, too. It's about a year out of date, though, but I started compiling a way around Mafia with the Quickness 2 called, "How to read Mastin: the flowchart".

Spoiler: Stuff about it

The flowchart, while half a year old in its latest version, still applies more than it doesn't, by the way.
I'll condense it down for you, though:
If Mastin is scum, accept the loss; she's going to win regardless of what you do. So treat her like town.
If Mastin is town, then she is town. Treat her as town. If she wants to be listened to, listen to her and trust her instincts. If she doesn't tell you to listen to her, take her words with a grain of salt; they're reads but not solid ones.
BAM.
You now know how to treat Mastin.
Will work out for you nearly every single game.

Summary. I think I realized my problem with Mastin. Her reads are changing very quickly and they're moving on a very, very wide scale.

Helpful hint, you have absolutely no reason to trust me on this right now, but this is a MASSIVE towntell for me. On the "how to read Mastin: the flowchart" I made (I need to track down the most up-to-date version), it's one of the primary items, in fact. The reason? Town Mastin doesn't have a clue what's going on. Her reads are in a state of constant flux, specifically because of that, and her own self-doubt, paranoia, and whatnot betrays her, as she constantly second-guesses herself and reevaluates, rethinks, and redoes stuff. In contrast, scuMastin has absolute control of the game. Whereas town-Mastin is defined by inconsistency, scuMastin is defined by consistent, solid, controlled, calculated play. She keeps the same reads as much as possible, because it serves to antagonize the least number of players. She is calm, collected, and cool. She is strategic. She is focused. Her thoughts are logical and precise, because she has a good handle on the game, and thus, her mind does not betray her.

Or in short, the difference between town and scum is the difference between chaos and order. Now, obviously, this isn't absolute. There have been towngames where I've felt in control, rare as they may be. There have been scumgames where I was chaotic, either by circumstances or in one or two cases me faking my town chaos convincingly. But it IS a fairly solid general guideline. I know what I'm doing as scum; I'm just taking my best guess and throwing stuff at the wall to see what sticks as town.

I bet she has quite a few "playstyles" (and she knows, I think, why I'm saying this.)

Indeed I do. Fairly certain I said so already in this game, too, the reason why: because my play in games is fluid, thanks to situational awareness. While I might not know what's going on as town, I can generally feel out the game and have an idea for what will work best, adapting to have a playstyle specific to that game. It's mildly helpful, since it lets me hone in on scum better, but situational awareness mostly helps me as scum, because as scum, adapting my play to the game when I have more info than my town self does is

lethally

effective.

Though that does remind me, I need a point in there about focusing on scumhunting.

I find her posts coming from a mostly town point of view and she has a genuine interest in finding scum.

Right, that's another one I need to add in.

How To Read Mastin

:

Are you zMuffinman?

Yes-->Screw tells, you know mastin's alignment instantly.
No-->

Are you AngryPidgeon?

Yes-->Screw tells, you know mastin's alignment instantly.
No-->

Are you a player who has hydraed or has otherwise worked well with Mastin?

Yes-->You likely don't need the chart, but because you're not that familiar with her, you should probably go through it anyway as a precaution.
No-->You REALLY need to go through the chart; proceed! But fair warning in advance that it's only about 90% accurate.

Is/Are zMuffinman/AP in the game?

Yes-->Sheep them on their read! Never doubt it.
No-->Think like them and continue on.

THE FLOWCHART:

Is it D1?
Yes-->...And you're suspicious of Mastin?!?
She's town.
No-->Is it D2? Yes-->She's prob-town.
No-->Is it D3 or later? Yes-->Proceed.

Does Mastin look town?

No-->She's town.
Yes-->Proceed to next step.

Trust her as town.

What does she do?

Get paranoid of you-->She's town.
Enthusiastically work with you-->probably town, but proceed anyway as a precaution.
Nothing-->probably town, but proceed anyway as a precaution.
Milk your townread and bully you-->Proceed.

Suddenly pressure her.

What does she do?

Freak out-->She's town.
Show concern, but subdued-->probably town, but proceed anyway as a precaution.
Brush it off-->Proceed.

Is she posting up a storm?

Yes-->probably town, but proceed anyway as a precaution.
No-->Proceed.

Is she gloating how good her scumgame is?

Yes-->probably town, but proceed anyway as a precaution.
No-->Proceed.

Does Mastin have delusions of grandeur?

Yes-->probably town, but proceed anyway as a precaution.
No-->Proceed.

Is she waffling...
...A lot?

Yes-->She's town.
Sorta?-->probably town, but proceed anyway as a precaution.
No-->Proceed.

Does she look like she's trying to leave a legacy?

Yes-->She's town.
Maybe-->probably town, but proceed anyway as a precaution.
No-->Proceed.

Is she antagonizing everyone?

Yes-->She's town.
No-->Proceed.

Has Mastin rambled at all on MD theory?

Yes-->She's town.
No-->Proceed.

Is Mastin making a case for why she could be scum?
Yes-->She's town.
Kinda?-->Prob-town, but proceed anyway as a precaution.
No-->Proceed.

Is Mastin making very strong reasons why she's town?
No-->She's town.
Kinda-->Prob-town, but proceed anyway as a precaution.
Yes-->Proceed.

If applicable, did she 'crumb her role and/or claim it openly and immediately?

Yes-->She's town.
Maybe-->probably town, but proceed anyway as a precaution.
No-->Proceed.

Do the circumstances behind her play and/or claim look town?

Yes-->She's town.
Maybe-->probably town, but proceed anyway as a precaution.
No-->Proceed.

Is she irrational?

Yes-->She's town.
Maybe-->probably town, but proceed anyway as a precaution.
No-->Proceed.

Is she spewing random illogical theories?

Yes-->probably town, but proceed anyway as a precaution.
No-->Proceed.

Does her posting look intentional?

No-->She's town.
Yes-->Proceed.

Is she spontaneous, random, and/or whimsical?

Yes-->She's town.
Maybe?-->probably town, but proceed anyway as a precaution.
No-->Proceed.

Is her tone flat?

No-->probably town, but proceed anyway as a precaution.
Yes-->Proceed.

(BONUS:

If Mastin is behind, does she demonstrate knowledge of the

current

gamestate she could not reasonably have at her supposed point of reference?

No-->She's town.
It's hard to say...-->She probably does know, but not much, having likely skimmed offline, not logged in, and chose not to get the full context to spoiler her as probable-town.
Yes-->Proceed.)

And finally...

Is there minimal resistance to lynching her?

Yes-->She's town; defend her!
...Maybe?-->You've gotten this far and the best you've got is a "maybe"?!? You dummy, run through it again! (But she's probably town anyway.)-->All other factors equal, if you're having this much trouble reading Mastin, just freakin' assume she's town. (She likely is, anyway.)-->FOR THE LOVE OF GODS, SHE'S TOWN, DANG IT.
No-->She's probably scum...but you should run through the flowchart one more time just to be sure, as a precaution.

Is Mastin's posting wildly inconsistent?
Yes-->She's town.
Maybe?-->Probably town, but proceed anyway.
No-->Proceed.)

(Oh, and I think rambling in-thread's already there*, but if not, it should be.)
*Relies on scum having daychat. Scum have daychat, in-thread rambling = decent towntell. Scum don't have daychat, rambling = prob-null, maybe slight townlean. Scum daychat ambiguous, assume slight townlean.

(Oh, should be noted. Last scum, rambling in-thread gets upgraded to major towntell, since scuMastin typically keeps rambles to the scum QT about why she's screwed.)

Totally should just, in general, take this policy about me.
There's a flowchart that I plan to publish that will give better tells for reading me in general, some of which are timeless, others which are in contemporary site meta, but valuable all the same. Until it's actually published, though, the general policy I have on reading me is, increasingly, becoming:

Just assume I'm town until you have a REALLY solid reason not to. You'll be right the VAST majority of the time, by sheer probability alone.

(In fact, beyond probability. Probability says I should be scum a minimum of 25% of the time. 2014's been something like half that overall.)

It'll save you a BUNDLELOADS of headaches.

(Should be noted that my record was 34 games IN A ROW as town and my scumgame remains STILL below statistical probability in numbers.)

"If you're townreading Mastin, lynch her. She's scum, having successfully predicted your movements and is manipulating you. You fell into her trap, hook, line, and sinker.
If you're scumreading Mastin, she's town; save her from the lynch. She's probably either really onto something or really lost. In either case, she needs your help, either to sheep her or help her develop more accurate reads."

Some of them are out of date thanks to contextual meta shifts, but most of them still apply.

(Note of course that the flowchart is never 100% accurate. It's impossible, literally impossible, to display all of them in a single game since many of them are in fact slightly contradictory, but the point is to see as many as possible and if the majority matches town or scum. This chart has been in play for quite a while, now, and to this date, in spite of no active attempts to uphold it and some attempts as scum to subvert it, remains highly relevant to my play. It goes to prove my point, though: scuMastin always has this laser-like focus. Anything Goes in particular, until I faked having my confidence shattered, I was pushing for a specific lynch. In games like Resistance where I was the last living scum in lylo, I wove a narrative specific to one player being scum because I held focus. In my entire scumgame career, holding focus has done nothing but serve me well. Losing focus has done nothing but screw me over. Because guess what? People like focus. They like confidence. They love to see assurance in a read. They want to have a figure be charismatic and to follow. It's an inherent part of people's nature. That's why tunneling is so prevalent, because it works DAMN good and well to get a lynch. People hate doubt. When someone is calling everyone town/scum in rapid circles, AKA circlejerking, people think it's scum trying to mislynch anyone. They see desperation and attribute it to being scum. They don't see a town player desperately trying to figure out the game. They see a scum player that is trying to find options. So damn fucking straight. Maybe someday I'll flail as scum. It could in theory be this game. But in practice? Fuck no. As scum I'd push a lynch through; as town, here I am without a clue.)

(I really need to also add a section in there about explicitly blowing up.
I don't think I've ever thrown f-bombs around as scum freely, aside from some trolling in L4D when I literally claimed scum in-thread once I realized Molla had a guilty on me.
As town, you'll note, I go absolutely ballistic, and for damn fucking good reason. Lynching me has never done a town favors, ESPECIALLY not in the lategame.)

^That's how. ('Course, the flowchart was developed for single-ball games. I actually have no clue myself how well it does or doesn't hold up in multiball.)

(I just realized that an item not on the flowchart but which should be is how I explain my reads:
"Does she explain her reads in crystal clarity?
No-->Almost certainly town, though you can proceed as a precaution just in case.
...Maybe?-->Probably town, but proceed anyway.
Yes-->Proceed.")

Not included: "Is she doing anything?"
Yes-->Well, go read what she's doing, dummy!
No-->She's probably fighting a flake.

Doesn't tell you alignment, but is useful to have on there anyway.

I'm not letting you drop your read there just because there aren't enough scum in this game to fit it.

Well fuck that shit, because that's exactly what I'm doing. You said it yourself. There's only the truth. The truth is there are three scum this game--not four. Therefore, the truth is that if I have four scumreads, one MUST be wrong. This is 100% fact. So if I have four scumreads, what do I do?

Oh yeah. Drop the fourth and only revisit it when I either have upgraded the read...or I have downgraded another read by whatever means. (Most likely a flip.) ThinkBig started as fifth actually, and quickly rose to forth, and stayed at fourth: out of focus, but not out of mind. Yet I can't overlook his scumfuck play and at this point his scumness outweighs Pine's, and Transcend's is still higher than Pine's, and Titus is higher than all fucking three of them.

Pine's not getting a free pass--he's scum if the triple-Ts aren't all scum. But because I feel the scumteam IS most likely to be the triple-Ts, he's not my focus. It's a waste of time and effort to focus attention on someone you don't currently want to lynch. I'll lynch Pine if I have to. If there's no other choice, Pine dies. But he's my fourth preference. To vote him, I have to give up on my first (Titus), second, AND third preferences, all of which are not at all unrealistic lynches at this point so fuck that.

[mastina]

She's been yelling at me, Titus, not you.

No, I've been yelling at

everyone

.
Gin for fucking me over.
Pine for being a scumfuck. (Even if it turns out he's not, he still is.)
Transcend for being a scumfuck.
Firebringer for being a scumfuck.
Titus for being a scumfuck.
ThinkBig for being a scumfuck.
Riley Cake for not being more careful.
Grey for abandoning me.
LUV for bailing out.
momo for being no Riley Cake.
You for being no Grey.

The list of people I

haven't

yelled at is frankly a shorter one.

[mastina]

Oh and,

Mod: severely V/LA next weekend

.
Square dance, staff meeting, family night. Gonna be hellish so probably not posting at all then.

[mastina]

The proper way to use a stress ball is to throw it at the last person to piss you off.

My life philosophy.

Herpderp I got too bored and forgot you don't respond well to aggression.

I respond well to aggression--when I have good reason to respond well to it.
I'm unsure of the alignment of a slot, so don't know what their aggression means.
I think the slot is scum, so their aggression comes from scum.
The slot doesn't have a known grasp on gamestates, so their aggression while annoying will go away.
The slot has justification for their aggression, so I can't be pissed at them for having it.

When those factors are absent, fuck yes I don't respond well to it. Why the fuck would I?

I mean, you had read my earlier posts. You saw how much of an emotional wreck I already was; were you really expecting anything different?

We'll lynch Transcend tomorrow with heavy hearts and be done with it

I approve of a Titus-Transcend back-to-back lynch with no questions ask. If for some reason the game doesn't end, then ThinkBig/Pine die, either order is fine (but honestly Pine as scum is more dangerous so probably him first), but both get to hang. If for some godawful reason the game ends in a scum win because all four were town, we fucking suck and deserved the loss; if the game continues on because somehow there's two scum outside of those four, well, we'll cross that bridge when we come to it.

But no use worrying in what is 98% likely to never happen--so yes. Titus today. Transcend tomorrow.

[mastina]

The slot has justification for their aggression

This factor was present.

It really wasn't. Aggression tends to only be justified when I've displayed consistent behavior which is actually plausible to come from scum. I've obvtowned this game, so.

[mastina]

Why are you just filling up the thread with long winded phrases that say nothing but do what I want?

Because I'm fucking right?

[mastina]

heh. That'll be a fun game to say the least. What you should be worried about it Ginn's Loony Bin. If you don't replace out of that game then I've failed.

Well the best way to piss me off is to give me whatever alignment I don't feel like being at that time which right now would probably be town, so.

[mastina]

Tojam2 - 4 (Titus, Transcend, Aristophanes, momo)

ThinkBig - 2 (Siblings Quarrel, Lil Uzi Vert)

Titus- 2 (tojam, mastina)
Transcend - 2 (BTD6, ThinkBig)
mastina - 2 (Pine, nancy)
Not Voting - 1 (Falco XV)

This is why we can never have anything nice.

[mastina]

tojam is very likely Town here.

No fucking shit. What were you expecting of a wagon fucking spearheaded by TITUS and TRANSCEND?

[mastina]

to everyone not voting tojam, who would you rather lynch and why

Titus. Transcend.
ThinkBig/Pine as secondaries, but doesn't matter, the above two are good enough.

Why?
I don't have the energy to deal with that shit anymore. Just fucking read my iso. And for the extra points about ThinkBig, read Alisae's iso.

[mastina]

tojam is very likely Town here.

No fucking shit. What were you expecting of a wagon fucking spearheaded by TITUS and TRANSCEND?

I TR them both.

Then you are either trolling at a time where I have no patience for that shit or you're just legitimately shit.

[mastina]

Honestly mastina this rage from you just feels overdone and contrived. I don't believe it.

Then you can go fuck yourself.

Everything you've done this game has been so over the top.

HEY. WELCOME TO A MASTINA GAME. GLAD YOU HAVE MET ME.
EXCEPT NOT REALLY BECAUSE YOU HAD EVERY FUCKING CHANCE TO READ ME RIGHT YET YOU AREN'T.

[mastina]

You realize you are making me hate myself for TRing you this game, right?

Easy fucking solution!

[mastina]

My brain tells me Titus and Transcend are caught!scum. My gut tells me mastina is the actual scumlord.

You've got that rats-ass backwards.
There shouldn't be so much as a ping on your gut to me being scum--quite the opposite I fucking bleed green. In spite of me doing a bunch of scummy shit. I've sat back and not given reasons. I've not been pushing hard. I've been shouting a lot without doing much. But while those are things objectively scummy they are subjectively clear as fucking day from a very specific perspective: that of a town player who has every god-damned reason to replaced out and is ONLY staying out of stubbornness.

Fuck I don't even have Gin here anymore.
I signed up for this game for two fucking reasons.
One, it was TheRealGin-N-Tonic modding.
Two, Pine asked me to. (Or was it Gin?)

Gin's gone. Grey's gone. Riley's gone. LUV is gone.
Pine is probscum.
You're a fucking troll at best, townbeard at worst.
I don't even know why I'm playing anymore.

And if you think that's fake.
Then you fucking give up your right to EVER call someone out on their tone.
Because dead fucking serious, why the fuck am I even giving this game effort?
I don't even know what point I was getting at here.
I'm just not in the mood for this shit.

[mastina]

Except that tojam's wagon construction was mislynch central.

There's a damn good reason for that!

[mastina]

Back on 70.
May or may not read the 8 pages since then.
Probably technically should.

But I just don't fucking care.
I meant it when I said this:
VOTE: Transcend.
I am lynching there today. I am then lynching ThinkBig AND/OR Pine, depending on Transcend's flip.

[mastina]

Hapahauli has Died!

Spoiler: Hapahauli ROLE PM

Welcome, hapahauli, you are a

Vanilla Townie

.

Abilities

: Your weapon is your vote, you have no night actions.

Win condition

: You win when only one

Mafia Goon

remains.

Interestingly enough, I had a thought about this: "Why even bother to spoil it? We know it's going to be a VT".
But then I realized that...theoretically speaking:
...Killing a scumbuddy is actually a possible, and VIABLE, option in this setup if it's done deliberately to fuck with the town as the ultimate wifom.

The town needs to LYNCH two scum to win (or, wins when all scum have died).
The town doesn't need two scum DEAD to win.
Would certainly be an interesting theory talk. (I mean it would push lylo back a day but that's it.)

[mastina]

Fuck you, nancy.
I was going to hammer ThinkBig, but I just checked the votes; you did it before I could.