Okay regarding Malcolm:
859 and the follow-up in
872 is mildly town. Malcolm is calling out what they believe is scummy behaviour in Yeet, a player they otherwise townread. After fua expresses agreement with it, Malcolm clarifies that they still think Yeet may be town. Gives an agenda-less vibe, an impression more of town saying what they think than scum aiming for a particular outcome.
1093 reveals nuance to the Nordom read and also provides evidence that Malcolm will push someone without feeling the need for it to lead to a solid read. I feel like a more common scum approach is more one-dimensional. Pressure player -> read output. Scum don't want to waste the material they have! Whereas Malcolm is coming up with material and then being like "actually nah", which is not conclusively town but town-indicative imo.
Despite these things I liked from early game, one notable thing is the players that Malcolm has chosen to pressure at this point in the game. People like Wu, Nordom, Yeet, Tene - who I would classify as juicier pressure targets, whilst he chose to defend Datisi. a more established player.
^That said, the shift from tenebro to VP in
2450 and
2451 is a positive direction.
I don't have much else to say up until the reaction to the newly formed wagon. I find the outrage at the wagon to be entitled in a towny way. The "why is April's slot under so little pressure?" feels like genuine disbelief that a person Malcolm thinks of as scummy is rounding up the town.
^I am not entirely convinced of this and will think again on it tomorrow but that's currently where i'm at.
--
Overall I'm not convinced Malcolm is town, but I'd class it as a mild townread overall. I continue to believe that VP is scum to the point where I would like to push for his elimination. I think that there has been a play shift since around the time of my vote, where VP has stopped thinking about their reasoning and has started just spewing nonsense (see the attack on fire filled with logic holes and misinterpretations that others have obviously noticed). I don't know the exact reason for this shift, but I don't think it comes from town and could be a scum attempt to look more town and "loose". I have seen a similar sort of thing before from experienced players as scum under pressure, and while I don't think VP is scum
because
of that anecdotal evidence, it somewhat reassures me that I'm not misreading something that I should be finding townie.
