/Invitational 13: The battle of Yarmouk. Decisive victory!

[mith]

Fishy is totally stealing my MO of making awesome cases out of little wording/formatting things in early posts.

VOTE: DeathRowKitty

[mith]

chamber: You know what else smells fishy?

Fishy

Calling a wagon reasonable, and then voting for one of the wagoners.

FOS: chamber

KittyMo: What is your read on DRK? Why Panzer?

[mith]

chamber: The existence of alternative self-consistent thought processes for that action does not nullify the point, which is that your post seems off to me. That you are ducking the implied question of "why are you doing this?" with hypothetical reasons doesn't make me feel better about you.

KK: I like your posting so far, but I wouldn't go so far as to say I have a "strong" read on you - I don't believe I've played with you before, for one thing.

Something seems a little off with DRK's response to Fishy (insofar as DRK is voting for KittyMo and would seem to be in favor of getting rid of one of them), but I may be confirmation biasing myself. Ditto with caring so much about the deadline lynch rule, which should never be an issue if we are a good town.

[mith]

DRK: It's probably not productive for me to start off on a long rant about the pointlessness of "random" votes, so I will just say that if you are still voting for someone randomly on page 2 in the middle of non-random discussion, you're doing it wrong.

Who do you find scummy so far?

Fishy: I don't see DRK responding to a joke with a joke - I see DRK responding to a joke with a serious "call me something else", and then going on to make a separate point about Panzer (and then riff on the frog thing). Anyway, I concede that DRK probably wasn't thinking about that vote as a serious thing regardless of alignment.

On the deadline lynch thing, though, it just strikes me as the sort of thing scum asks about trying to look helpful, rather than the sort of thing town genuinely cares about (since, as I said, it shouldn't matter).

[mith]

The possibility of confirmation bias likely slipped into my thought process after reading this early today (linked from a more recent lifehacker article). Poor choice of phrase anyway; it's not that I was worried I found that scummy only because I already found DRK scummy, it's that I'm aware I probably only noticed the (apparent) incongruity of that statement because it was DRK responding rather than someone else.

[mith]

DRK: There was nothing to question until you made that comment. I default to the assumption that all votes are meaningful anyway - at the time, I was just thinking about where your vote was placed, not that it had originally been "random" and that you were still on it and therefore it had "become" serious. If I had been looking for a transition from random to serious, that was the first post you made after KittyMo started posting.

Anyway, I don't really have any reason to disbelieve that you tend to not unvote unless you have somewhere to go with it (and will again resist the urge to go on a Mafia theory rant about it).

The way the Panzer wagon formed is making me uncomfortable, despite what is basically an inversion of what chamber did earlier. I'd still like a straight answer from chamber re: his Panzer vote.

Katsuki: Are you always this lurkerish? Top two, reasons, go.

UNVOTE: DeathRowKitty
VOTE: chamber

[mith]

Katsuki, I can already tell that we are going to get along swimmingly. (Or, er, the exact opposite of that.)

Top two, reasons, go.

KK: Eh? I'm following my weak (gut) read of "I like your posting so far" by not finding you scummy, just as I was following my slightly stronger (not gut, albeit "minutia"-based) read of DRK by voting.

[mith]

DRK: On Panzer's wagon, chamber's vote still bothers me of course, and then that it got to 4 so fast (and with one player still not posting) puts me off thinking Panzer is actually scum. (As for the "inversion" comment - chamber said your wagon was good, and then voted for someone (Panzer) on it, while Panzer said he suspected two people on your wagon, and then kept voting for you anyway.)

Rhinox: After my vote, DRK did not make another post to comment on until the page 2 post. In the meantime, of course I asked about other things which had just been posted. (As for theory/semantics - you

have

played a game with me before, right? It's kinda my thing.)

Fishy: "weakening his read on KK"? Huh?

I'm not liking Katsuki... the lack of reasoning is just always going to rub me the wrong way, but coupling that with the wagon-happy voting and itchy hammer finger, I'm not seeing a pro-town motivation.

[mith]

KK: I am starting to feel like you aren't actually reading what I'm saying. My scum-read on DRK was initially based on the same "minutia" Fishy pointed out (thus "awesome case" in that post). There was other stuff later (post 34).

Rereading your previous post in the context of this latest question, you seem to be implying that I followed Fishy's scum-read but not his town-read, or at least not the strength of his town read, and therefore [???], which makes no sense.

Rhniox: My opinion was that Fishy's case was "awesome" and warranted a vote. I'm not sure what expectations you have beyond that, but I'm sorry to disappoint. As for "asking others to provide an opinion", I was asking Kitty Mo for her opinion because she was the subject of the original DRK vote, and I was surprised that she didn't post more on the subject than "You jerk. <3".

I was satisfied with the responses DRK gave page 2, and chamber's lack of actual response to my earlier question has been eating at me.

[mith]

chamber, I would still like an answer to "Why Panzer?".

Panzer, why me?

[mith]

KK, I was not discouraging or smearing Fishy's read. You asked if

I

had a strong town read, and I didn't; it didn't even occur to me that this had anything to do with Fishy's answer until later in the conversation. The implication that I should have a strong town read on you because I agreed with another of Fishy's reads is silly.

(If had wanted want to "undersell" his town read, I could have pointed out that you asked him for his "towniest" read when only three other players had posted to that point, one of whom he was voting for. The case could be made that you are overselling his read. Also, how could I be underselling the idea of KK-town while also following the same pattern of trying to appease dissenters? That doesn't make sense, and looks like you were prepared to view my response negatively whatever it had been.)

I would

love

if chamber and Panzer would actually respond to my questions rather than ignoring them.

[mith]

First DRK says I'm old, and now chamber says I'm boring? Your words, they wound me.

chamber, I will stop being boring when you stop ignoring the question of why you are voting for Panzer. (Actually, I probably won't, it comes with being old. But it's worth a try.)

[mith]

I would obviously rather lynch Panzer than someone I am certain is innocent. I'm still having a hard time seeing who he could be scum with, though - I think everyone other than me has been on his wagon or expressed support for it at some point, and has had ample opportunity to do something else.

Fishy: Any thoughts on chamber's continued lack of reasoning for his vote? On rereading page 1 I find it odd that you initially questioned him about this and have since let it slide.

[mith]

Another vote without reasoning from chamber... Maybe he'll answer Fishy this time.

Katsuki is a strong number two for me right now. Lots of lead-wagon hopping yesterday with little substantive explanation. #142 "Sigh" doesn't fit with #150's professed strong Panzer-scum read.

DRK's word choice in #154 is odd - "Interestingly enough" is a strange way to word what amounts to "I agree with Fishy", plus the "terrible at reading her" comment sounds like fence-sitting.

KittyMo's #62 doesn't bother me in the context of explaining #53, but I'm getting hung up on the "until", there - it's hard to read that without a connotation of "hammer as soon as Rhinox posts, kthxbye".

Fishy: See question on previous page (#145).

Would also like a response from KK on his line of questioning in #117, but my gut is leaning toward "misguided line of questioning from a townie who genuinely thought he was on to something".

VOTE: chamber

[mith]

Kitty: "Awkward"?

As for people not giving reasoning, it's not just "no reasoning = scummy". My reads are often largely based on assessing genuineness, and so the lack of reasoning does get in the way of that - but in the case of chamber and Katsuki, the lack of reasoning is coupled with their other actions throughout the day. chamber was the first vote on a wagon which jumped to L-1 quickly, backed off, and then jumped back to lynch, during which time chamber made precisely zero statements about why he was voting for Panzer or what he thought of the wagon, and instead asked about Panzer's early Fishy/mith suspicions with no followup or analysis (#83), and about Panzer's browser (#86).

Katsuki did hint at some additional Panzer-associated reads, but didn't specify them until after Fishy voted for me and after I expressed suspicion of Katsuki - there's no good town reason that I can see for this sort of vagueness; rather, it looks opportunistic/OMGUSish, to me. For that matter, he would rather have lynched me than Panzer

but didn't mention that while saying he was ready to hammer Panzer on page 2

? Seriously? That sounds genuine to you?

Not liking "He wanted you lynched more than he wanted to lynch panzer" - this feels an awful lot like Kitty speaking for scumbuddy Katsuki.

Fishy: Fair enough.

[mith]

I do say interesting things - see, chamber, not boring after all - but I sure didn't say anything even remotely the same as "You can't have more than 1 scum read" or "Your scum reads must be equally potent". What I did say is that the implication that your read on me was stronger than your read on Panzer does not jive with your actions on page 2.

[mith]

chamber: You have absolutely given me plenty to judge by, that's why I am voting for you. Continuing to read after the transition word ("but") might be helpful. Or reading is boring.

[mith]

"Attack me with the stated or at least implied reason of not explaining a vote" is an oversimplification of that sequence of events. I pointed out an apparent inconsistency in your vote vs. the rest of that post (#16). Rather than explaining your reasons for voting, you evaded that implied question with alternative explanations, while not committing to one as your actual train of thought (which already feels not-genuine). Thus, e.g., "straight answer" in #45 (to paraphrase: any act can have a valid explanation - I wanted

your

explanation, not just a theoretically valid one). In a vacuum, the lack of reasoning for your vote would have been annoying, but not vote-worthy.

I totally disagree that your questions of Panzer show critical thinking - what they show is that you tossed a couple questions at the person you were voting all day and then went precisely nowhere with them (nor with anything else happening, including the PanzerWagon temporarily dying and you seeming pretty indifferent about that despite someone you did not find scummy near lynch in his place).

That

is what feels disingenuous to me... not the questions themselves, but how they fit in the overall context of chamberPostingDay1.

[mith]

I'm pretty satisfied with chamber's posting in our recent exchange. Totally disagree with him on a lot of things (for example, I will never trust the collective over my own personal read, if only because the collective includes scum with a different agenda), but I'm coming around to the idea that he does believe what he's saying. And post 177 seems like something scum would be less likely to ask. (FWIW, I don't think you/we are stifling the game here at all - people just aren't posting, and haven't been for some time.)

UNVOTE: chamber
VOTE: Katsuki

[mith]

Went to doctor yesterday, and the meds I'm taking are kicking my butt right now. I'll try to make sense of this KK/DRK argument when my head clears.

(Also, I am having a hard time thinking about anything in this game outside of the desire to argue with chamber about his playstyle, and I think that would be counterproductive at this point.)

[mith]

I would vote for Kitty over KK at this point. Very happy with my vote on Katsuki though, after rereading the last couple pages.

[mith]

Katsuki: "I thought he was doing something I caught him doing in another game where he was scum." - What did you think I was doing, and when did you first think this?

Fishy, #201: "His D1 line was "I thought panzer and mith were scum together, but mith wouldn't be lynchable until panzer was gone, so I voted for panzer until mith wagon started"." - Except he didn't vote for Panzer, and there was really no reason to think a mith lynch wasn't viable. On page 2, we have Katsuki voting DRK, followed by you switching from DRK to me, followed by Katsuki responding to you without a vote change, followed by you switching to Panzer, Panzer getting to L-1, and Katsuki stating willingness to hammer at the end of page 2 with no mention of me. I want to explore this more fully once Katsuki has answered the "when" part of the above question, but in the meantime I can't shake the feeling that you (and Kitty Mo, previously) are coaching Katsuki to some extent.

You say the mith/Panzer idea is "the kind of complicated conspiracy that scum don't really make up" (really? a suggested pairing qualifies as a conspiracy theory now?), but in ISOing Katsuki all I see is an opportunistic voting pattern which happens to include me and Panzer, with some vague "mith-related reads" thrown in to explain his willingness to hammer on page 2. I simply don't buy a scenario of Katsuki-town having mith-scum as his strongest read and not mentioning it even in passing despite previous suspicion directed my way. Instead, he only acts on this read after the opportunity for super-quick townie lynch has passed.

[mith]

Really want an answer from Katsuki before I get into some of this further (including the "red herring").

As far as "not the kind of thing I think opportunistic scum make up", the problem with your argument here is that opportunistic scum Katsuki wasn't saying most of this until trying to explain his behaviour today. Whether or not "I was too chicken to vote for him before" would have helped lynch me yesterday, earned him town points yesterday, made the switch easy yesterday, is all irrelevant because

he wasn't giving that explanation yesterday

. All that's in his ISO is that he was willing to hammer Panzer and then the implication that he didn't think a mith lynch was viable until you jumped back to me. Neither of these strike me as out-of-character for opportunistic scum at all.

[mith]

Posting from phone, so I'll keep this quick. Fishy's post is a little over the top, but we're close to deadline and Kitty is more likely scum than KK, so let's do this thing.

UNVOTE: Katsuki
VOTE: Kitty Mo

[mith]

Don't have much to add tonight. Still waiting on an answer from Katsuki. No read on DRK's wall, but the follow-up on this page feels a bit off.

I'm tired and grumpy and ready for a flip to analyze.

[mith]

"From the very start of the game in how you approached the panzer wagon." - Ok, following up then: How does this fit with your actions at the start of page 2? The sequence of events here:

#16 - chamber votes Panzer
#17 - Kitty Mo votes Panzer
#18 - mith gives FOS to chamber and asks Kitty Mo about her vote
[discussion about chamber and DRK, mostly]
#31 - Katsuki votes DRK (L-1!) with no comment on either Panzer or mith
#32 - Fishy unvotes DRK and votes mith
#33 - Katsuki sticks with DRK vote and no further comment.

These are not the actions of someone who "from the very start of the game" suspected me for my approach to the forming Panzer wagon.

#258 - First, this (#214) wasn't a case; it was a response to Fishy arguing that scum wouldn't act as you acted. The case is summed up simply as:

I don't believe that your statements re: your suspicion of me and Panzer are consistent with your actions.

(Also not a fan of you responding to my posts with strawmen.)

[mith]

I need to re-read the whole DRK/chamber/KK interaction in light of the flip, and I'm not sure when I'm going to have time to do that (about to dive back into a weekend of board games). In the meantime, I'm still satisfied with my Katsuki=scum read, so I'll plant my vote there.

VOTE: Katsuki

[mith]

Alright, finally a little free (non-nap) time tonight.

Fishy's #220 screams town. Moving on.

Pretty much in agreement with Fishy's argument on KK. He could have voted for me, and instead voted for scum. The only significant scenario I can see him doing that in is if he's scum with Katsuki and didn't want to have all three scum on my wagon.

Rhinox is left as the most likely bus by PoE, but I've read him consistently as town. So I'm feeling pretty confident that our remaining scum were off-wagon.

That makes me extra happy about my Katsuki vote, because DRK/chamber doesn't make a whole lot of sense as a pairing to me. Of the two of them, I lean toward DRK just on the sheer weight of his push counter to the Kitty lynch.

[mith]

chamber and Rhinox being obtuse at each other is kinda funny. DRK being obtuse is kinda scummy. Katsuki continuing to not post anything of substance is

kinda

annoying.

Not hammering. I'd still much rather lynch Katsuki.

That's all I've got right now. Bad day.

[mith]

On one hand, I'm kinda glad this game is going so slowly, because my week has been rough and I don't know if I would have the energy to catch up on a more active game. On the other hand, this game is dragging horribly, shame on us.

Katsuki lynch is looking really unlikely right now. I may feel really stupid about this later, but my gut read on chamber today is town. So, counter-wagons, ho!

UNVOTE: Katsuki
VOTE: DeathRowKitty

[mith]

Well, yeah, unless someone switches first.

[mith]

DRK: I find it hard to believe that you genuinely don't understand why chamber is/was being voted. I don't find it so hard to believe that chamber or Rhinox are town talking past each other trying to score points in their cute little spat.

But, "for reasons stated":

UNVOTE: DeathRowKitty
VOTE: Katsuki

[mith]

I'm going to be limited-access for the weekend as well, though I should be able to check in Friday before I head out.

[mith]

Re: Coaching - It's a little silly to call this an odd statement when Fishy admitted he was doing this (#215). I don't feel all that strongly that it's a scum-tell/buddy-tell, but I did want answers directly from you rather than filtered through someone else's view of the game.

Re: #2 scumread - Seriously? I was voting for you for a week, and happy as I am that it was a good lynch, I switched to Kitty because it was the best option at deadline, not because you had dropped back to #2.

[mith]

Bweh?

[mith]

Grr, there is very little in Mafia that I hate more than WIFOMing myself over a self-vote.

Rhinox, I'd like your thoughts on DRK's posting at the end of day 3. (And then I'd like Fishy's, but Rhinox first.)

[mith]

Fishy's turn.

[mith]

"Makes it feel a little like DRK knows we've mislynched and is excusing his part in it." - This, exactly.

Coupled with Rhinox's stance on Katsuki and DRK yesterday vs. how he has come out today (#367 in particular), and that possible pairing is giving me pause.

I think Katsuki/DRK is probably still the most likely case, but I'd rather lynch DRK at this point.

VOTE: DeathRowKitty

[mith]

Fishy: Pairing-wise, I think we're mostly on the same page. From my point of view, I have to consider the possibility that you are scum with one of them, and Fishy/DRK makes more sense than Fishy/Katsuki; that's a pretty minor difference though, as I can't see why you would have switched off of me day 1 in either case unless you were really confident in me going down day 2 (and your day 2 play doesn't fit this picture). The bigger difference here is that, to me, Rhinox/DRK explicitly fits what I've seen today, whereas other pairings are more "nothing is strongly ruling this out"... KK/Katsuki, for example, would explain KK's day 2 vote to some degree but would not explain their play today (other than the "we have given up on winning this game" possibility).

Our main difference though is your DRK town read. You mentioned earlier in the game that his posting felt genuine/un-edited... to me it reads disconnected and disinterested in catching the scums. See also: #312 + #361 ("imma stay off this townie-wagon and act dumb about it"/mea culpa for not doing something to stop it), a variety of excuses and fence-sitting (end of #324, #361 again, with the odd "teach me about this game" comment, #381/#385 today)... apart from his doggedly sticking to KK through days 2 and 3, and lightly defending me (when it looked like I was going to be lynched anyway day 1) and chamber (when it looked like he was going to be lynched anyway day 3), I'm not seeing much in the way of solid reads or analysis.

[mith]

Fishy: This is a minor point, but between the vote count you posted and Rhinox's vote, I voted for Katsuki and KK voted for DRK.

I do largely agree that Rhinox voting for Kitty Mo at that point looks solidly town, but I don't agree that it's an absolute no-go even in the Rhinox/DRK or Rhinox/Katsuki cases. The latter is actually the easier case to make, because I've already made it (re: KK/Katsuki): Rhinox voting for me at that point would have put all three scum on my wagon. But for Rhinox/DRK, I could certainly see him thinking "I'm going to distance some for now, and then switch to a mith lynch as we approach deadline"... only he got stuck by your post + KK and I both jumping on.

(I also disagree that those two options are "mostly indistinguishable" from his behavior today; in fact, this argument seems inconsistent to me with the previous day 2 argument - you seem to be saying that Rhinox-scum would have ignored low-risk distancing to go for the "easy" town lynch and chance at a flawless win the next day, but now would be ignoring the possibility of his partner surviving to set up for the solo win. You gave a scenario for Rhinox/partner surviving yourself: wrong lynch today + KK lynch tomorrow. The alarm bells are ringing so loudly for Rhinox/DRK because of the change in Rhinox's stance from yesterday - "don't see me voting outside of chamber, DRK, or mith today", "my next choice would be DRK" - to today; I think there's a relatively good chance that Rhinox saw your post + my voting yesterday and thought "easy-mode Katsuki lynch, and then I can get mith or KK lynched tomorrow with Fishy's DRK-town read", whereas if it were Rhinox/Katsuki I think he would have jumped on the chance I gave him to go after DRK.)

Happy with my vote - DRK's recent posting is more of the same (re: my #390).

[mith]

Rhinox: Re: parenthetical - Er, no, not really, it doesn't make me feel better that you started back after DRK (#399) only after my DRK vote and Fishy's unvote (#395).

Fishy: "the scumlynch seriously damaged the scum"... yet "now (and yesterday) Rhinox is hugely town". (I also have a hard time viewing a move as "clumsy" when, if that is in fact the pairing, he has you making WIFOM "why would he do this?" arguments for him.) Anyway, as I said in my previous post, I agree with you that his day 2 vote looks strongly town, I just don't agree that scum-Rhinox would absolutely have avoided that vote if partnered with DRK, and in particular don't think that he would have been worried about the damage the potential scumlynch would do to his chances (since the chances of a KittyMo lynch at that point would have still seemed quite low to him, and since the town-cred gained for him personally in the event that the lynch did happen does quite a lot to offset the risk).

[mith]

At this point, 413 is just making Katsuki look consistently OMGUSy to me. I've been constantly mentioned as a scumread by him until today, and now he's happy to put his faith in me because I'm voting for someone else? Rhinox was town yesterday, then falling toward neutral (as of #391, after Rhinox has stated he's ok with a Katsuki lynch, and some arguing between the two of them), then town again #401's "rather lynch you than kats". Fishy was town yesterday, but now in the lynch trio, along with KK (to be fair, #373 did mention KK with some very lazy reasoning).

Echoing the "where's KK?" sentiment; I have been too busy arguing with Fishy, and didn't notice that KK has posted all of three words today.

[mith]

420 was actually a direct response to your 419 (that is, I disagree on the "phony pandering" part). OMGUSy = mildly scummy in the absence of context, but hard to read in this case whether he's OMGUSy scum or town.

I do think it's pretty likely he's scum, I'm just not as confident in that as I was yesterday. That said, his posting since 413 hasn't given me any confidence in his townieness either, and no big warning alarms have been triggered by KK finally gracing us with his input. So, I'm going to go ahead and hammer.

UNVOTE: DeathRowKitty
VOTE: Katsuki

[mith]

Well. Pretty sure I'm still voting DRK today. Pair-wise, I've got DRK/Rhinox >> DRK/KK > Rhinox/KK >>>>> Fishyreallydoesn'tlooklikescum.

Need to find some time to do some rereading, make sure I'm not missing anything.

[mith]

Checking in. Very busy at work, and limited computer time outside of work, so haven't had an opportunity to read and think on this game yet. Maybe tonight, if I'm feeling ok.

[mith]

Will definitely do some reading tonight. This week has been pretty awful so far. (And Fishy, I'm not sure why you felt the need to apologize, considering how little the rest of us have posted.)

[mith]

Ok, nothing making me doubt Fishy-town on re-read. See #390, which applies pretty much equally to all pairings: Fishy's switch from me day 1 might have made sense if intending to set up for my lynch the next day (though - and this is definitely a little egotistical, but whatever - I have a hard time believing he wouldn't have much preferred me getting lynched day 1 to Panzer), even his Kitty Mo vote might have fit that, but post #220... no. On the off-chance that he's pulled some crazy bold gambit here, I think KK is his most likely partner (simply because with the other two he had KK to jump to as well!), DRK next, and if it's Fishy/Rhinox I'm going to yell at them for wasting our time because they had this won without the Kitty Mo votes.

With the other pairings... Rhinox/KK still feels the least likely. I'm a bit at a loss for what else to say about the possibility of Rhinox being scum with respect to the day 2 vote - Fishy, ISO me and re-read yesterday's argument - but whereas I feel it's plausible either one of them might have bussed, both of them doing it, even with KK "in danger" at two votes and Fishy's call to arms, seems wrong. So the pairings still point to DRK (again, see yesterday's discussion re: Rhinox/DRK; I don't think I have anything left to add there).

If I evaluate them individually, I do think Rhinox is the least suspect, where my pairings come out with him second; his posting yesterday doesn't sit well with me of course, but only in the context of him possibly being scum with DRK... I can at least see why he might have waffled (heck, I was voting for Katsuki at the end of the previous day), and otherwise, he has seemed genuine. But: "So, would scumRhinox mind too much about a Kitty lynch? For me, the answer is clear." Me too. (Hint: the answer is no.)

KK's most suspect posting is the lack of it. There has been very little content aside from a strange series of questioning directed at me (which even he admitted was "feeling misguided") and his lalalaican'thearyou exchange with DRK. From my point of view, his actions are a little questionable for scum. (Day 1: Fishy asks why KK didn't hammer/threaten to, with a negative connotation; I ask the same with a positive one. Day 2: He could have voted for me instead of bussing. But that's not likely to be persuasive for anyone outside my headspace.)

DRK, there have just been a lot of things that don't add up to "town". #154 is sticking out in particular right now given the KittyMo flip (see my #159). #227/#235 (re: his "I'm not unvoting KK" stance... which, er, seems to have slipped his mind yesterday), meh. #312's "Call me stupid", doesn't feel genuine. #361 still feels like a slip. #376 doesn't feel genuine either (it actually feels more like the sort of question I would ask at the beginning of the game to avoid that silly random voting nonsense, not the sort of question you ask of a self-voter on day 4).

I'm out of town this weekend... I want to give this one more think when my head is clearer, but I expect I'll be voting Monday.

[mith]

Just got home. Meh. Guess I'll find out soon if I'm right about DRK/Rhinox.

[mith]

I guess it's possible DRK and Rhinox missed each other last night, but that seems unlikely. That leaves Fishy/DRK vs. Rhinox/KK + Fishy/KK (+DRK/KK on both sides of the equation), and Fishy/KK would represent monumentally bizarre play on Fishy's part, since he would have just needed to wait for me to vote.

I'll read through as soon as I'm off work tonight.

[mith]

Alright, home.

Scumpairs are still Rhinox/KK >>> Fishy/DRK... The latter would explain Fishy's persistent town read on DRK, but not much else.

I'm going to go ahead and hammer before I talk myself into something stupid. Changing my mind has rarely worked out in past endgames.

VOTE: Kublai Khan

[mith]

>_>

[mith]

Sorry about wasting everyone's day today; I was needlessly paranoid re: game balance.

[mith]

Constant Vigilance.

[mith]

Yeah, this was fun apart from the lurking. I was pretty frustrated day 1, though I'm not sure which of the following contributed the most:

1. Stupid real life stuff sapping my energy and stressing me out.
2. I keep taking such long breaks between games.
3. I would rather have been town after White Flag's exhausting experience.
4. I just do better as scum when I can manipulate pairings rather than dealing with direct scumminess.
5. I really wanted to get chamber or Katsuki pulled into an argument, and they were having none of it.

I was half-resigned to my day 1 lynch, much of my behaviour toward Panzer and chamber was to seed possible links in case I did get lynched.

Fishy played a really solid and active game from the beginning, and I felt Rhinox was even more obvtown until the KittyMo rallying cry (and after, it hardly mattered because Fishy was so strongly in the Rhinox-is-town camp). Fortunately, two scum can just barely pull it off against two unlynchables.

I found Fishy's rationale for his vote timing (not wanting me to force a mith/DRK decision) especially amusing given that I was stalling to avoid the same thing, and that I had the ability to force that decision despite his vote.

[mith]

Re: 447 - I read that as him saying "I'm only considering DRK or KK, and the possibility of being scum together isn't relevant to the decision between the two of them".

My biggest concern in the quicktopic

by that point

later (456) was him talking himself out of DRK/KK moreso than mith/DRK and voting me, to the point that I was urging DRK to vote to force a DRK vs. KK decision. [edit]I wasn't too worried after 447, though I had mentioned it as something to keep an eye on at the end of day 3. (Oh how I have missed being able to edit.)[/edit]

[mith]

Fishy: Yeah, it would have been more interesting if I hadn't nearly gotten myself lynched day 1. After that, there was no chance I was using it. (Though forcing you to make a mith/DRK decision if I'd worried we weren't going to get the immediate win would've made for an interesting endgame.)

We never asked about the LYLO-doublevote situation (for obvious reasons). I think we would have been hesitant to assume it would work anyway, given my paranoia regarding town powers (

and KittyMo's: "If we're already at 6 town - 3 scum and I've got a conditional double vote, I feel like town power is going to be pretty serious."

ignore this, I forgot that she had missed the "nightless" part at that point, she retracted this later). Duplicates of either of our roles on townies would have served to blow that plan up.

[mith]

Oh, and mykonian: I'm totally fine with the QT going public, and I assume the others are as well (but you should probably confirm with them first).

(And thanks for modding! I read through the flavor yesterday, after totally tuning it out for most of the game.)

[mith]

I honestly don't know what I could've done to make myself appear more townie, so feedback in that department would help.

From the point of view of "things I was able to take advantage of as scum", see #420, which was probably the easiest post to write in the entire game because I was being 100% genuine. That was actually intended as a soft-defense of you, to subtly reinforce the possibility that I had switched off you because you were my scumbuddy (which unfortunately was too subtle and missed everyone, to the point that I had to spell it out in #440)... But OMGUSy town are easy to manipulate, in general.

Also:

I'd easily lose 1v1 with any scum in this game as my argumentative and language skills are very weak.

There's really only one way to develop those skills... and it's not to vote-hop with no reasoning.

[mith]

Yeah, that did start out as "I don't see how DRK is surviving this, so I need to blow up the Fishy/Rhinox lovefest", but it was immediately clear that Fishy wasn't budging on Rhinox-town, after which I tried to find that perfect balance of losing the argument but not losing it so badly that Fishy would question why I was trying to lose it.

It helped a lot that it was a pairing argument, which is what I wanted Fishy (and the game) thinking about anyway (I was pushing this line of thinking as early as post #293). It's satisfying when you can make a valid argument against your scumbuddy when that same argument will lead town in a different direction.

[mith]

(I'm just glad it was Fishy that bit on #374 and not you; trying to make a Fishy/DRK argument at that point would not have gone so well...)

[mith]

I think I explained pretty much why I had that switch of reads D4 though I think

What I got out of your explanation from 413 was that you found Fishy's read progression scummy... yet it was mirrored closely by my own read progression (and this was not an accident), but since my "read" was steering me away from you, and Fishy's read toward you, that seemed to lead to a total reversal in your own reads on us. I wasn't really doing anything to make you trust me other than not voting for you.

That switch itself was pretty irrelevant by that point anyway; but what I did have an eye on was how everyone would respond to my move toward DRK - I was counting on your OMGUS leanings steering you away from mith-DRK on account of me; Fishy's pairings steering him away on account of the strength of my push; Rhinox's "I'm not scum with DRK!" reaction nudging him away from DRK as his top choice (only moderately successful, but enough). KK was the wild card, I had no idea what he was going to do for most of the game.

[mith]

Ah, yeah, I forgot about the day-after part myself. And as you'll see in the QT, I didn't read her PM very closely in the first place. >_>