Gistou (Over!)

[Cerberus v666]

Cult still having a recruit after we lynched the leader is not something I realized tbh.

cuase we didn't recruit anyone after that point. the only time we tried it got blocked.

and the kill was not that obvious. there was a mistrious kill night 2 and I was using it for my claim. it was our kill.

The sillies thing about all of that is that the kill was OBVIOUSLY performed by nos with the info town had. Town should have KNOWN the cult had a night kill after nos flipped without any personal targeted abilities. That means if he was seen visited someone, he was killing or culting them. Since the people he said he was visiting all flipped, town then knew he had not attempted to cult them(unless he was trying to cult me, but my immunity to being culted was NOT known to any of the players because it wasn't included in my role card), so he MUST have performed a kill on them.

[Frozen Angel]

yeah , I was just slipping at some point and solving that for town ^ and rach told me "you didnt got culted becuase you weren't a human!" so I backed off immidiatly and never talked about it

even after dave flip!

[Frozen Angel]

who did we tried to kill night 4 , I can't recall

oh heartless

there was a missing kill that night , I thought we cross killed.

[Frozen Angel]

I mean killed one target with someone. ooohhh yeah, I tried to kill rach that night with almost 50 so we both killed poor toog.

hartless was wuldens shot I guess ... I'm too lazy to check.

[mastin2]

That moment in postgame when there's a ton of extra pages, signaling to you as a mod you either did something really good or really really bad.

Anyway!
I just remembered: I promised that I would post this in postgame.
N5, up until two hours before deadline, the wuldens were set to kill RachMarie. Why was that important? Because that meant Nicholas Schroder and Alexis Galenos would die on the same night. And...this was SO close to deadline, that I had actually written the scene for it! This is what you guys missed out on:

The Tragedy of Gistou

Blood. While the hunters need it for sustenance, they had always been--prior to Gistou--hesitant to shed it. For centuries, the way has not been "kill those who find out". While a forceful turn of those who found out was mandatory until the hunters took a more public role circa 70 years ago, never would the hunters actually slay a victim. They would keep things as quiet as possible, and only if a threat to their existence and their masquerade arose would they take drastic action. After the second golden age of the paleskins began, the rules were loosened even further, such that many who discovered it were left to live ordinary human lives, and only those who were security risks had measures taken. Even then, these measures would usually involve a lifetime of luxury simply in a gilded cage, unless of course the person in question accepted the generous offer, the gift, of vampirism for their freedom which they were free to at any time.

Gistou changed much, but ever-persistent, some things remain. Among them, many of the hunters, be it vampire or nosferatu, maintain their beliefs. Most hold the stance of only taking what is necessary to survive, abhorring acts of extreme wanton destruction. A few take it even further, and nobly stick proud and true to the dead system of the past years, to only take what is given to them, even if it is not enough for them to thrive. These individuals, precious few as they may be, provide beacons of hope to the world around them, that maybe, just maybe, peace can be obtained some day.

They suffer, day to day, in their battles, but they keep on surviving, for the sake of fighting in the way that should be fought: only against those warmongers, who promote violence against everything indiscriminately. These heroes are far and few between, but are widely considered the works of myth and legend. Many have stopped believing in them at all. What sort of soul in Gistou could possibly carry that load and survive stronger than ever? Who could gain strength from their suffering and resolve only to fight even harder than before?


War. While the undead had been built for it--literally--they had since bred themselves for a different purpose altogether, a state they had maintained since the elder days of Agnigi. They had toiled, they had turmoil, but always, they would survive, but no longer to fight. Not in the way they had. They were special. They were blessed. They had always been around to help. Not a single soul among them turned bad. Some of them fell. They doubted themselves, they could still be killed, but they would recover and press onward into the future.

To serve. That was their given goal. To protect. That was their intention. To live among. That was their goal, their dream. And it was the greatest thing ever when it was achieved. They knew: "We are not alone." So, they learned. They adapted new philosophies, and their goal was simple: peace. It was a life they considered full. They abhorred the thought of losing what was now theirs, so they resolved never to not care.

They held concerns every time a crisis would arise, so they did what the could, subtly, to assist. It was their place, they thought, to stay out of sight, and given their history, it was also their wish. In their harmony, they existed with purpose, and in their secrets, they could flourish. The threat of Gistou initially was only a mild issue, yet when the situation changed, a hard decision came: they'd have to join in, too. This was of course controversial, but they'd made up their minds on what to defend. But while most supported this, it was not all. Some still desperately clung to an idea, the idea of peace.

The purest of the pure can insist: hope is not lost. These few have not lived sheltered lives. Like everyone else, they have been exposed to the hardships of the world. So how is it that they remain so adamant in their beliefs? Because they hold faith, something all too many have since thrown away. They believe in the good in others, and try to bring it out and let it shine. In this process, they show themselves to be like the ever-inclusive day itself, allowing the spread of light itself across the gloomy land. This purity, this untouchable, uncorrupted essence of all that is right in the world, was virtually nonexistent even in Agnigi, yet somehow, this has not stopped whispers across the land of mystical tales about the true path.


Much blood has been spilt. No night goes without it, since the raging fires of hatred burn through the night, as the desires of the decadent run rampant. Gistou is a world which favors the strong, where the weak are weeded out and exterminated. Yet still, they fight on to live, and some souls, even those that are not as strong as others, continue to trend onward against the abyss.

It seems that in the current state of affairs, it could be said that there are many paths which could be considered right. None can be certain who is justified. Perhaps none of them are, or perhaps they all are. Across the land, the general consensus seems to be that belief, faith, comes in three forms: that in the ways which have always existed, that in the ways of the wulden, and now that in the ways of the unknown which plague the land, spreading their toxic influence, their waste, even worse than that when Dmitri Damanos still drew breath.

Of course these manifest in different forms. Belief in the ways that have been depends on where you draw the line on 'has been': the hunters have at least three from which they draw theirs, and the undead have at least two. Humans have as many beliefs as there are humans, and so, a consensus cannot be found. But the furthest from Gistou and universally the most optimistic is in that simple, long-forgotten truth, an idea almost revolutionary and pioneering a new path in spite of it being nothing not already known: the pursuit of happiness not just for oneself, but for all.

Yet in this war, in this conflict, could such a system even work? The days pass, and the dead continue to climb in count. The night was long, the results were not pretty, and ultimately, the findings were scary. For when the corpse of

davesaz

is discovered, nobody can tell

what

he...or would he be an IT now? impossible to tell...currently is, yet the writings around him make it clear what he once was. The wulden had once followed Dmitri Damanos to a fault, or so people believed. Surely, that unwavering devotion could never be broken.

And his...its...belongings all indicate a secret, hidden admiration to the great "god". In a notebook, several secrets are found encoded, but while the encoding exists, it is simple to understand enough to realize his purpose was as an infiltrator, a spy, and that he was supposed to look and act human, in spite of his devotion to his deity. Whatever shred of the lycan was human...no longer was, because the abomination before the denizens of a small town, felled some time during the night, was neither. This...this

thing

was reminiscent of the earlier find on

Nosferatu

, and a further investigation would reveal a second book, but this one with gibberish text:

ΗΜΕΡΟΛΟΓΙΟ της βαθύτερης ΠΛΑΝΗ

Моя истинная цель служит другой.

Things are not quite as they seem in Gistou, and the weight of the world begins closing in on people. The creature, deceased, was clearly a sign of things to come, the only question being:

what

, exactly? The only clue: in the first journal, a clear message in English. "The world is ours. Unite all they like, they are still powerless to see us, to stop us. They know nothing. And thus we will destroy them in the darkness."

This proves no empty threat. A great figure of interest had been killed, a former (albeit hidden) warlord of the wulden, so the celebrations should begin, if not for the wasteland left behind: the world is suffering, and some can't even survive the onslaught. The blood, the war, is still ongoing, and though some feeble attempts at coalescing people have been made, while rudimentary teamwork has been implemented at some basic level, it is not without casualties, it is not without pain, it is not without the loss, even of those who embody their lore.

Pant.

The weak sound in the distance.

Pant.

Emerging from a forest, drenched in blood,

RachMarie

stumbles forward.

Pant.

Pant.

It's unclear how much of the blood is of some unknown enemy, and how much is gushing out from the gaping wounds in the legendary warrior.

Dawn.

RachMarie

had made it to dawn, the warmth of the morning light touching them.

"Is...it really you?"

There, nearby, lying down,

RachMarie

sees them all too clearly now.

Expedience

coughs up blood. "In the

flesh

."
They both smile.

"There's my Alexis."

Even knowing how lethal it would be, they cannot help but share a laugh together. "Nick, I finally found you."

"I'm sorry that I left you."

"I know. But we both had to try to help, in our own ways."

RachMarie

, Nicholas Schroder, looks to the world around them, giving a solemn smile. "I...guess we both failed, then, didn't we?"

Expedience

shakes their head. "Mm-m." Grinning, they point to the same scenery. "Look how beautiful it all is, then you tell me it wasn't worth it."

"I guess you have a point."

"I always do."

Both continue to cough up blood, shivering, no longer feeling the heat of the coming day.

Expedience

sheds a tear. "I wish we had more time."

"Yeah...me too."

"But...at least we're here now, right?"

"Yeah..."

"We've done so much good now...I guess it's time to leave the rest in their hands."

"They're screwed."

RachMarie

decides to lay down next to

Expedience

, Nicholas Schroder now grasping the hand of Alexis Galenos tightly.

"Can't blame them for trying."

"Maybe you can't, but I love to."

"And you wonder why you never got much credit for your deeds."

"I liked it better that way."

"So did I."

Some nearby travelers slowly begin to approach.

"I guess, in the end, we're just two more victims of Gistou."

Expedience

gives a last shake of their head. "We're just two inhabitants of Agnigi."

"I...can live with that."

Their vision fades together, Alexis Galenos and Nicholas Schroder looking each other in the eyes, smiling, and slowly, together, slipping away.

For so long had the two been separated, and only now, in death, would they be joined once more.

The hardships of Gistou become increasingly apparent, as the two greatest forces of change short of Dmitri Damanos himself were discovered dead on the new day. The bandit-hunter, the village girl. The first nosferatu, the unfortunate victim. The broken warrior, and the brave maiden. Destined to be forever intertwined in this tale, and now faced with their final resting place, as two travelers that stumbled together at just the right time.

With the looming shadow of dark forces about, there would be no time to mourn, no time to grieve, and also, no time to prepare. The assaults of the day were already on their way.

Wouldn't that have been SO cool? I mean, sad, yes, but also: character interactions! They were good! They were amazing! They were...
...Not to be.

[RachMarie]

oh gods you brought tears to my eyes again Mastin what a beautiful love/death scene.

[rb]

I actually had a guilty on me N4 when I claimed miller. So no matter what I claimed I would have been caught lying.

The only lynch on someone who didn't have a guilty was Wayward Thinker.

[rb]

Oh and ASOIAF was so cult that it hurt my brain to watch people not lynch her. If she won the game many tables would have been flipped.

[Cerberus v666]

I actually had a guilty on me N4 when I claimed miller. So no matter what I claimed I would have been caught lying.

The only lynch on someone who didn't have a guilty was Wayward Thinker.

True. Someone should do the math on the likelihood of a guilty being received each night, given the number of investigatives that existed. At game start, there was like a 30% chance of an accurate guilty for each slot with the ability to investigate race or alignment. 9 such investigators(not all town, for the 3 scum ones their odds of hitting scum were a bit lower). Mathblade, wanna do math?

[Cerberus v666]

Oh, and there was also a watcher and a tracker, so...they could also get pseudo guilties on people. Odds were a lot smaller that they'd hit though, compared to the racial checkers and cops.

[mastin2]

HUUuuuuuuuuuge thanks to Mastin for a colossal/epic/unprecedented amount of work and dedication to modding. I stand in complete awe. I have never played a game that so much thought as gone into. I think this made MS history!

<3

Just if they contain so much hints like the way they had in this game you better tell people what they must expect before signing them up.

The only hints I was expecting people to take from the flavor was the expectation that the characters Nicholas Schroder and Alexis Galenos were both good guys. (Making a claim of them to be innocent child lite.) I was also expecting that people would think maybe, just maybe, instead of actually being in the game, they could instead exist as scum fakeclaims. (I also wanted people to think that maybe they could be evil, but I wasn't convinced they'd actually think that.)

Anything else, correct or incorrect, was not something I anticipated. I expected some flavor speculation to happen, of course. But you have to keep in mind: all scum had the option to request FAKE FLAVOR. Not just a fake role PM. Fake flavor for every night. Nobody, not even once, over the course of the game, asked me to do this for them, in spite of them having that power, because they didn't think it necessary. (That, or they forgot.) The speculation was, therefore, inherently going to be flawed.

Now! Mind you. I wanted people to scrutinize something, yes, but it was not the flavor! I wanted people to scrutinize the

Mechanics Post

. The Mechanics Post flat-out told everyone everything, just subtly. It told the scum they were scum. It told the town what scum would look like. It told the town what town would look like. It also told the special town (undead risen slave and individual nosferatu) that they weren't quite like the normal town, implying something was going on to make them different. And it also warned about the cult: NOTHING was known about the cult. Nothing, at all. Meaning, inherently, the cult would not be the wulden because there were facts known about the wulden.

This is why I continuously referred people back to it, and repeatedly reminded players of it. They were looking in all the wrong places: in the opening flavor, in the flavor for their role PMs, while overlooking the obvious right in front of them. I didn't think flavor speculation would do anything, especially given the number of safeguards I gave the scum: conversions would have their original claim to truthfully claim. All scum had the ability to fakeclaim. (Plus, this all being original flavor, there was no source material to compare it to.) Between the two, claiming would be seen as not only virtually worthless, but also potentially detrimental to the town. I figured the same for flavor spec: it would be done, but it wouldn't be done successfully.

[mastin2]

I don't know why you are arguing with this, we had an argument day 2 for the simple ideas of who was aligned with who.
We had to read the flavor to understand this better, or at least get an idea.

To be blunt.
ESPECIALLY as culted scum.

Why the heck was there any doubt?
Between the mechanics post, and you having a list of

every possible town wincon in the game

save one (you didn't have the Undead Risen Slave one, but that had already flipped), you shouldn't have needed flavor to understand the difference.

One, those claims would not have been given to you if they were scum roles.
And two, those claims had a clear pattern to them: threats eliminated, versus threats to the new humanity treaty with at least one alive.

Flavor wasn't needed to read that. Reading game mechanics was.

I did not intend for you to figure it out through flavor. I intended for you to figure it out by reading the mechanics.

I mean.
I understand faking doubt.

As scum, especially culted scum who started as town.
Faking doubt is a needed skill.

But there shouldn't have been ANY real doubts in there.

[RachMarie]

@ Mastin

I loved the flavor it helped me to really step into BEING Nicholas and I am glad you did not change the gender of him and Alexis, I think it worked anyway since I happen to be bi and I think Exp did not care either way at least he did not seem to. I just wish he had gotten the clue sooner. Especially after Nero made me hard claim.

Exp you are a cool dude with a cool avatar I do hope you know I was role playing lol. But I think becoming Nicholas heart body and soul is what helped me play like I did.

[mastin2]

the setup factions and races were to fitted on each other

They weren't meant to be. The town had a vampire and had a nosferatu. Not to mention, an undead who was NOT part of the undead risen slave. Especially if both had lived, and succeeded in recruits (upping their total numbers from 2 to 4), this would have given proof of the individual vampire faction, the individual nosferatu faction, and by extent, lent some credence to the idea of an individual wulden faction.

The way I saw things: the individual undead, with the presence of undead risen slaves, told the game that there could be individuals of a race that are by themselves, divorced of any factions. At some point in the game, someone correctly speculated that individual effectively meant "by themselves", as in, a lone person: individual human, individual undead, individual vampire, individual nosferatu, and while nonexistent in the game proper, as a fakeclaim individual wulden.

I was not expecting flavor speculation such that they'd assume all of a race were evil, especially when I had designed the game such that almost none of them were! It also didn't help things that the only player to attempt the individual wulden claim, Lady Lambdadelta, actually botched it: she didn't claim some specifics of her fakeclaim (which was fully written out), and had she done so, it would have been more clear that her (fake) role was a match for (real) others. And when her claim went badly, the wulden faction gave up on the idea of claiming wulden, which of course increased the power of racial checkers.

mastian was refusing to give us a fake claim for race other and then I was like

The reason that I did not give you a claim was because you already had one: your starting role PM. When I design roles, I generally assume that players are going to tell as few lies as possible. I also, in all of my fakeclaims that I handed out, gave scum the advice: "adjust as desired/needed", because the claims I would build for them would work fine in theory but in practice the scum might think it a good idea to tweak them and improve on them in certain areas. So, the assumption was, as I tried to explain to you, that you would claim your real role, your starting role, with any needed modifications to it, including to race. It would only take one or two sentences for you to justify how you're not a human, and because you'd be paraphrasing my words anyway, it wouldn't matter what you said.

That was the difference between those starting as scum and those who were recruited: it was assumed that those who were recruited would go with their real role, and modified subtly as needed. Since direct quoting isn't allowed anyway, they would be paraphrasing my words, or in their case, lying out of their asses.
It was a given that those who started as scum wouldn't claim their real role, so they needed fakeclaims.

we're fucking screwed this race checkers are alignment cops in this setup.

It was a given that race checkers would be strong against the cult, but the cult has a natural advantage: a player who was already checked by a racial checker can be recruited, and once checked, is unlikely to be re-checked.

Mind you!

This twice worked out for scum!

davesaz was checked by TheWayItEnds. He was close to being lynched, but TheWayItEnds claimed to have checked him as human, and the lynch on davesaz was averted. If Yume (the person who submitted the vig on him) had been paying attention to the thread closely enough to have read that claim, then davesaz would never have gotten shot, and never have gotten lynched, in spite of him having lost the immunity.

rb was ALSO checked by TheWayItEnds. He ultimately was caught both because of a guilty on him, and him claiming racial miller (had he claimed normal miller instead of racial miller, he would have countered the CORRECT type of cop), but had TheWayItEnds shared this result with Expedience PRIOR TO Expedience's investigation, and had rb not made that claim, rb would have not been lynched because TWIE would have backed him up.

The cult's advantage here is that, unlike the other scum, the cult can CONTINUE to recruit. Meaning, instead of having one person checked, they can continue to have people that were checked recruited. Bacde was confirmed undead by RachMarie, for instance.

the very basic assumption of mastian was people will listen to her and will assume all races may have good or bad people but it wasn't the case and people will go with the thing they can see in a pattern.

This though is true. Yes, it was an assumption on my part that people would assume all races could have good or bad people. I did not expect them to all go "wuldens are bad!". I also did not expect them to know "other = bad!" until a cult had flipped, because I expected them upon getting an "other" result to be, "...huh?". And, mind you, when Expedience got a cult result on Nosferatu, that's exactly what happened. He didn't know what he had gotten.

and a 5 player masonary in this game that I didn't even mentioned earlier

The reason the undead risen slaves were built that way is really simple: they could have become a scum faction. So I wanted them to have the ability to deduce, "maybe we're not supposed to be town". I wanted them to be able to have that level of caution, for them to be able to figure out that maybe they could be something that was a potential threat. (They were!)

...Yet I

also

didn't want them to have mod confirmation of each other at the start. So I told them that they were not confirmed to each other, because I ALSO wanted them to have the ability to deduce, "maybe we're actually town". I also wanted them to be able to figure out, they could potentially be no threat. (They were!)

I wanted them to have both. Because both were equally right, and both were equally wrong. They were both town, and not town. They were both potentially-scum, and not potentially scum. They needed to know who each other were, but they needed to not from the get-go know that they were confirmed to each other, because I knew that having a 5-man masonry was...not a good idea in any sense. Especially when said 5-man masonry can potentially shift into a scumteam midway through the game!

[Firebringer]

Mostly upset that I wasted a good scum game on something this ridiculous.

Tbh i agreed with this post when you made it.

ok new philosophy.

i'm town.

if at the end of the game i'm told that i lost because i didn't understand semantics, i will choose to believe that i won.

the end. i will make this mafia even if it is not mafia.

To this day will still continue to think this game was just random stuff happening.
We were all secretly town guys. :3

[mastin2]

This game was pretty awesome. Thanks for modding mastin!

<3

I have no idea how I survived 5 phases after getting confirmed cult. my claim was absolute trash lol

You might've done better if you realized that the fakeclaim I actually DID make for you

had

a name.
You missed it and improvised your own.
But I gave you the name

Nick

.

Galenos

.
As in, a secret child of

Nicholas

Schroder, and Alexis

Galenos

. (The concept of naming the boy after the father is nothing new, after all.)
If you had kept 100% to the flavor of that role, then both Expedience and RachMarie would have recognized that the role was clearly making references to both of them, references which you could NOT be making up, and therefore references that MUST have come from the mod, giving validity to your claim. You would have been one happy family!
...Except you were trying to murder them all.

Small

detail.

[Firebringer]

For someone who tells me that flavor and reading into it doesn't matter, its funny for mastin to tell us to use the flavor to make a defense.

[RachMarie]

yeah why were you trying to murder your parents see bad child

[Firebringer]

You kept trying to lynch your child.

[RachMarie]

You were culted I had to for Alexis, for town, and for glory

[mastin2]

As Mastin as since realized though, balance was off. And limiting the power of the BP-vigs and race checkers would be the fix (and not tampering with Vanilla's as FA suggested).

Like I said, I don't think that I was that far off the mark.
If hitting the bullseye is perfection, I think I was one, maybe two, rungs over. (These being small, thin rings, rather than wide rings. We're talking like a 10-ring-minimum target here, not a 5-ring one. Something like this.)

My solutions would be to give the vigs only a 1-shot communal BP so the cumulative number of shots it would take for them all to die is decreased from 6-->4.

Believe it or not, I

almost

did exactly that, except two communal BPs instead of 1. That would've meant 5 rather than 4, but it'd still be easier to take all three vigs out. For instance, Titus would have lived through N1...but all three vigs would now have lost their BP status and been vulnerable for the rest of the game. This is one of the things I would have changed.

TWIE should not have been a race checker.

This was also the second change I would make.
Kuroi was pure town, so him being a racial checker was all the pure town needed. It also made mechanical sense, as he'd need to know a human in order to recruit successfully.
Rach wasn't pure town, so being a racial checker wasn't meant to influence the town so strongly, but what it was meant for is to help Rach get a better idea for who to recruit.
This was also why dramonic was a racial checker: the undead risen slaves were a separate faction. They were worded in a way that I knew they could be played as either town, OR as scum. If they were playing like scum, then dramonic's check would be needed in order to scout out potential recruits.

But if all three were playing purely as town, then that was all they needed. TheWayItEnds was redundant. I realized this either D1, or early D2, but by the time I did recognize it, obviously I couldn't just go, "hey, TWIE, so I realized the game needs adjustment, sooooo...you're vanilla now!"

Mainly again, it also had no way to deal with the cop-vigs, or race checkers.

Not being able to deal with the vigs is fair enough, though that would be addressed if the vigs' BP was handled differently. But people keep saying they were vulnerable to race checks, and I keep on saying the same thing: I do not think I am in the wrong to say the power of their recruit being able to nab people

already checked

is incredibly strong and more than enough fair compensation for the racial checkers.

While a player recruited and then investigated would be screwed, a player investigated and then recruited would instead screw the town over. It works both ways, and I do not think it is at all unfair to balance with that taken into account.

This game was really townsided by definition and whoever talk otherwise is not really paying attention or just assumes oh fuck there was a cult so it was op let town get whatever makes them Imba.

On that note:

When I designed the game, it was under the assumption that the town would be clueless. It was under the assumption the town would be paranoid. It was under the assumption that--without some serious help--the town would self-destruct, meanwhile the scum could laugh their asses off in the background knowing

exactly

why they were failing. And, circa D1-D2, this is actually

exactly

what happened! Not in the way I envisioned it, obviously, but still more or less: the town did not know who their allies were. The scum did. The town did not know who their enemies were. The scum did. The town was running around, confused. The scum were telling them what idiots they were being.

This is because, prior to mykonian's thread on the subject, my way of balancing games was more in the mykonian school of thought: assume the town is going to be morons. Assume the town is going to be incompetent. Assume that the town is going to be idiotic enough, that if they don't have roles guiding them through the process, they will not possibly be able to win the game.

And, as it turns out, I wasn't too far off the mark. Like I said above: I think I missed the bullseye. I think I slightly overcompensated. The town had

slightly

too much on their side. But I don't think it was that much. They used almost all the power they had, and they needed almost all of it, because they came

dangerously

close to losing the game at many points. And, the special town players were carried by a single individual (RachMarie), being

this

close to having been eliminated. So the special town almost did lose, in spite of their massive power, and the normal town was one or two different night actions away from being fucked over.

They didn't need every bit of strength I gave them. But they needed most of it.

[Nero Cain]

Oh and ASOIAF was so cult that it hurt my brain to watch people not lynch her. If she won the game many tables would have been flipped.

there was like 0% chance she'd stay alive with both me and Almost scumreading her.

[mastin2]

No actually I did not buy LLD's claim completely I forget but something in it just did not jibe with mine, but I knew if I pushed it would mean revealing myself so I went with blocking her then there were so many deaths that I second guessed my read a few times.

There was that. Lady Lambdadelta fucked her claim up when she claimed she did not have a recruit. (Something I specifically put in her claim for good reason!) You're probably referring to that fact, which I noted early-on in the spoiled dead thread.

Had LLD claimed her fakeclaim as it was given (that being, including the recruit! I put that in for damn good reason), you probably would have backed her up.

I was pretty shocked when I saw individual nos claim after the point i was sure there is no isolationist left

You have NO clue how frustrating it was for me to read you ranting about that.

I, as the moderator, wanted to SCREAM, "BUT THERE IS AN INDIVIDUAL NOSFERATU IN THE GAME!", but for obvious reasons, all I could do is passively sit and let you fume.

setup was just to predictable based on flavor

Umm...this really doesn't jive with the above.
You can't be shocked about the individual nosferatu claim after there's no isolationists left, AND say that the game was predictable based on flavor. Those two are...kinda mutually exclusive?

at least it seemed like it was to predictable.

SEEMED being the key word!

I put many twists and turns in the setup specifically to mess with people's predictions. I wanted people to be surprised by events. I wanted people to not know the full picture. I wanted people to think they did, only to time and time again be proven wrong.

Which, I did get a lot of, mind you. Especially from Almost50.

Mostly upset that I wasted a good scum game on something this ridiculous.

I mean, you knew it was multiball going in.
You knew it had a cult, going in.
You knew it had all those ridiculously complex mechanics, going in.
You knew

it was a mastina game

going in.

What were you honestly expecting it to be?
It was going to be crazy, it was going to be insane, no matter what you did.
There was going to be a high mortality rate, and a high number of actions that could potentially fuck a faction over, no matter what.
It was going to be ridiculously swingy, no matter what.
A game this size, with no player as a FULL vanilla, guaranteed that.

And you were told all of this from the get-go.
I tried to give every faction about an equal chance of winning, all five of them.
One in particular was slightly overpowered especially because a second was backing them (the special town), but were you expecting a game like this to play in the same matter as a single-ball non-role-madness, 20ish-player game? Of course that wasn't going to happen. A good scumgame for that type of game isn't a good scumgame for this type of game. A good scumgame in this type of game emphasizes having fun, while not being a hero (heh).

Ultimately, when I mod a game, I am not looking for players to take things super-seriously. I am looking for players to enjoy themselves, to have a thoroughly rich experience, where they'd have a blast even if they were the D1 lynch. I have always been consistent about this looser stance on balance, on this more "casual" take on the game.

I am sorry if that was not your experience.

and my own claim just came out ! Individual human champion was brilliant , whoever disagrees need to be hanged in a city center!

At that point in the game, I do think your individual human champion claim was in fact fairly good. The problem that arose from it though was that it had information that could be faked because you were using only information from players already flipped. The Nick Galenos claim, if you had adapted it into the individual human champion claim, would have done the same thing, except ALSO having information NOT public at that time, giving it credence.

[Toogeloo]

Mastina also claimed that the Town Champs never used their special vig shots which would have been more negative town utility that she was hoping for.

[mastin2]

Well, first and foremost: I can't even begin to describe how delightful this game was both concerning setup & mechanics AND flavour.
I can only say this:

@Mastin: Pre-In me in ANY AND ALL your future larges.

<3

Also, I said this in the dead thread, and I'll say it again:
Balance did not account for scum outing their investigations to town.
When I designed the game, it was an assumption on my part that scum would keep their investigations to themselves. This meant, I ASSUMED that 3/7 racial checkers would DEFINITELY keep their results to their own topics, potentially 4. (Depending on the Undead Risen Slaves.) I also assumed that there was a 50% chance that the faction cop kept their results to their own topic. (Which almost did happen! Except, Luna Fox has a big mouth. )

On D2, two of the three guilties outed were given to the town BY SCUM. The third guilty was given to the town by a person who

wasn't even sure they were town

. (And, strictly speaking, wasn't!)
I did not balance the game assuming scum would give the town free information. YET ALONE, that the town would then TRUST that information given to them when the player having given it flipped scum. But that's exactly what happened.

Of course balance is going to skewer in favor of the town if the scum are HELPING THE TOWN by giving them information they shouldn't be giving.

That halves the investigation power of the town outright. The tracker, rolecop, two full-checkers, and potentially also the watcher holding their results back from the town, while 3-4 of the racial checkers also hold their results from the town, while one cop might also hold their results from the town, would significantly weaken the town, no?

And that is what I had built the setup assuming.
It proved to be a wrong assumption, especially since the undead risen slaves had outed literally every single facet of their faction (save their kill) D2, but it was in fact my assumption, and I do not think it was that unreasonable an assumption to have made.