[DISCLAIMER: This is a long one folks. Mainly because I am not discounting this may be my very last game post.]
Ok, here goes.
Nik is town. Q21 hit it on the head when he explained his reasoning as to why he believed Nik's claim. It was early enough that there were plenty of opportunities for a counterclaim. There were, obviously, no counterclaims and Nik's play so far didn't lead anyone to believe he was trying to force one either.
havingfitz is town if there are two scum left. If there is only one left then Mafia is pretty much screwed if Hoopla is trueclaiming. In order to avoid the draw if Hoopla is trueclaiming, scum have to get a mislynch today so that they can sacrifice one of their members in the endgame to kill Hoopla. Any scum lynch today forces a draw at best and sets up a total mafia defeat tomorrow if town lynches scum unless that final scum somehow manages to get Hoopla lynched. Not a very high probability event. So, havingfitz is town because I know I'm town. If he were scum he has to hammer even though it will throw mighty suspicion on him when I flip town. If scum see a townie at L-1, they pretty much have to hammer and deal with the consequences. It's not a sub-optimal move, it's the only move. Havingfitz didn't hammer, therefore he is not scum.
Myself(Oso) is town. No concrete evidence to give you guys except to point at my play so far. I realize that there are doubts as I am in a pool of players that are possible scum by simple process of elimination. Plus I have made at least one verifiable bad call, TBM. I arrived at my conclusion based on a line of reasoning that was flawed (I had a townie tagged as scum) and a premise that may have been flawed. Mainly that there was at least one player on the D1 Hoopla wagon that was scum. He came off as the scummiest of the three. I'm still not ready to totally abandon that theory either, mainly because I don't believe that Hoopla false-claimed. Probably many instances as well you could infer I was setting up something if you re-read my posts and assigned a bad motivation to it. Trust your instincts there. Most of you at some point have stated you think I have a good possibility of being town. You aren't wrong.
Hoopla is still town as far as I'm concerned. She has done nothing so far that has really tripped my scumdar. Even at this point, I'd rather assume there was at least one scum on her D1 wagon than to grant there were none and thus throw her back into the pool of players that might be scum. Why? Simply based on her play. If she turns out to be scum after this is all said and done, she is going to get a sincere 'Well Done' from me. Her logic is flawed though as it has lead her to an erroneous conclusion that I am scum. Understandable since I know something she doesn't, my alignment. But I'm not willing to admit at this point there is something sinister about her arriving at that conclusion.
Midnight Sorrow is scum. Process of elimination.
Inflatable Pie is also scum for the same reason. Process of elimination.
I'm keeping my vote on Inflatable Pie because of the three people I had tagged as possibly being scum, havingfitz has eliminated himself simply by the fact that he has not hammered me and IP was in my original pool of scum candidates from the beginning of the day.
The question for the rest of the players, is what do you think? Here are the pairing excluding Nikanor and havingfitz. I have tried to step outside my point of view where possible but in regards to those two, no. No way in hell that I can see that either of them are scum.
Oso/IP – This works, if you assume that we would bus to the endgame but fails as then we would know that Hoopla is a PGO and the best we could hope for was a draw. We would have basically given up any reasonable chance of winning for a 'not lose' or 'everybody lose' instead.
Oso/MS – Same as Oso/IP. It would be bussing. The only way I can be scum with either of those is if you folks think we have given up any hope for an outright win. The only thing I can say to counter that is: No way. This is a game and I 'simply don't do that'. Clear win with gloating and bragging at the end or clear loss and congratulating the winners on a well played game. Draws are particularly unsatisfying to me.
Oso/Hoopla – This works. We've had words and enough banter back and forth that most folks wouldn't see any blatant distancing but we really haven't buddied up to each either. If this is case, then one of us bussing the other near the endgame (or better yet me doing something just scummy enough that Hoopla can jump on and further reinforce her town/PGO claim) is an optimal move. The one remaining threat (Nik the cop) gets removed during the night, Hoopla then uses her intellect, persuasive powers and pretty much bullet proof role-claim to lynch/NK townies to a scum win.
So of the pairing that have me in them, if I am lynched and flip scum then IP and MS most probably aren't scum but Hoopla's chance of being scum goes way up. When I flip town, you will know that IP and MS are still in the running for scum and it greatly lowers the chance of Hoopla being scum. Plus my flipping town clears havingfitz in the eyes of the entire town and you don't lose any advantage of having a confirmed townie knocked off during the night. On my lynch you will still have a confirmed townie for tomorrow because they can't kill both Nik and havingfitz in the same night.
It won't do any good though
as the game will be 2 town-2 scum and if Hoopla has true-claimed then it is No-Lynch/NK Hoopla/No-Lynch/NK remaining town. For town to get a clear victory out of this, we have to lynch right twice.
Now the pairings with Hoopla having false claimed.
Hoopla/Oso – See above.
Hoopla/MS – Can't happen. Hoopla would have Hammered the second she saw IP at L-1
Hoopla/IP – If Hoopla falseclaimed then this is the only possible pairing that makes sense. She didn't hammer him. But this also fails because if she false claimed in the beginning, then there is no reason to worry about having to default to one mafia/one PGO in the endgame. She can bus her partner near the endgame and ride the PGO-claim and renewed credibility to a scum victory. Same as the Hoopla/Oso pairing. This further reinforces my impression that she is not scum and is true-claiming.
IP is scum folks. And MS is his partner.
That's it. Every theory and justification I can come up with that takes into account all the facts as I see them.
Nik-Town
fitz-town
Hoopla-Town
Oso-Town
IP-Scum
MS-Scum
My Uncle always use'ta say, 'You can't get no blood from a turnip.' .... He'd say the same thing about gettin' it from a stone, too.
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I never said nothin' back to him. You don't want mess with no freak that's searchin' around that hard for blood.