UK Eastermeet 2022 Invitational (Game over!)

[cpol]

Everyone has a potato.

I genuinely guffawed so loud Mel had to come check as to what was so funny.

10/10 on the memes George.

Will add actual value* later.


(*Value not guaranteed)

[cpol]

Given that the potato mechanic is clearly what everyone wants to talk about, and is the most important thing in the game right now, I am happy to state that I would give away my potato if I find a suitable recipient.

[cpol]

Tbf I was going off Posties assumption of a potato stealer of some kind.

[cpol]

There's no reason for town to want to give away their potato. Please explain, cpol

I'm pretty happy with my potato based statement as it is tbh

[cpol]

Primates vote on Bella did come in pretty quick. What are you actually wanting to achieve here, Primate?

[cpol]

Pfft, play the ball, not the man.

It's a genuine question. I see more scum plays than town plays myself in placing the nomination down that early and am wanting to know your thoughts on why you did so.

[cpol]

This is important.

Thorin Oakenshield, 6

Hmmm... RIP, Crown & Dwarf I think

Maybe then anchor, torch and Viking??

[cpol]

I'm pretty happy that the potato play is the right play at the moment, and Bella seems like a fair choice given what's been said so far, so...

VOTE: Bellaphant

[cpol]

...I just realised you wwre talking about cpol, not myko. Yes, I would love Cpol to come talk to me.

@cpol, how do you feel about CES?

Largely indifferent at this point? I agree with potato based play being something we should do.

I'm most comfortable with Primate at the moment. Everyone else is swinging from me having a good feeling to a bad one. But, I mean I have no idea what I'm looking for..!

I'd like to see more from the people who haven't posted much yet - or move towards the threat of de-potatoing them if there isn't engagement soon.

[cpol]

By that I mean from Nexus, Takuma and Wenna, to confirm.

[cpol]

As much as it pains me to say so, Takuma. Reading the game, but not offering up anything to get a read off.

I give Wenna the benefit of the doubt due to possibly being busy, or not even knowing the game has started.
Don't know what to make of Nexus at all yet.

[cpol]

On the basis that it doesn't sound like Bella interacts with the board I would still like to proceed with the potato voting before exonerating. Gotta keep the nomination open to do that.

[cpol]

I disagree, I think there is a conversation to be had around it. And I don't think it's always anti-town.

[cpol]

Let's test this then!

Pass Potato to Fenchurch

I'm a VT. Like in the WereLeg game I'm more than happy to give up a potato, especially as the conversation has moved towards me. I did want to pass it off to someone I thought may be a pro town power role in case of a potato stealer or the likes, but I'm not getting a strong enough vibes from anyone to do this. Instead, I'll test how Fenchurch reacts.

I'm not scum, but do see myself as low hanging fruit for an execution - either today or another day, so hopefully I can remove myself from that consideration and we can scum hunt elsewhere, especially today where there is still some time left in the day. Of course, if Fenchurch does believe me then I can have the potato back, but I only want it if it allows the conversation to go elsewhere. But my potato is now Fenchurch's your hands, so do with it as you will!

I'm still struggling to see how voluntarily handing over a potato could ever have been a scum play? And suspect there is at least one scum in the group of people who believe it could have been, as per the low hanging fruit comment. But hopefully this is now an end to the potato conversation, as I think anyone else now handing one across given the justification for doing so, is alignment neutral at best.

My vote stands on Bella for now.

[cpol]

but do see myself as low hanging fruit for an execution - either today or another day, so hopefully I can remove myself from that consideration and we can scum hunt elsewhere, especially today where there is still some time left in the day.

You are too down on yourself, the votes of Nexus and Klick had nothing behind them really. Primates question to you did. I don't think you'd be on the chopping block anytime soon.

I think this was a mistake, Fenchurch is the one person who doesn't remember that you had the same sentiment in the physical game.

That's fine, but the potato is only available today, and I didn't want to do this too late in to the day that we can't discuss how it plays out and then move on from there.

[cpol]

I will say that in at least two WereLeg games in the meet Myko kinda buddied with me, and both times was scum iirc. There is a level of the same behaviour happening here.

[cpol]

@Postie - I'm interested in your assessment on me there. You seem to be contradicting yourself by saying that you are aware that I've been miss-executed in multiple games, then seem to not like the fact that I have also acknowledged that this is indeed the case and so I have chosen to try and do something about it? I've been more active than many others in the game have so far as well. Seems more like needless discrediting than actual value. What are you actually trying to say?

[cpol]

Given that I saw the Meno trigger pull exactly as Fenchruch did, I'm more than happy to hammer Meno at this point. Poro’s points on the backtracking on previous promises to not hammer also back up this feeling. Even if the excuse if that they were zooted (I love it), that can't be an excuse that is allowed to stand. However, I do want other people to have the chance to post before the day ends, so will hold off in doing so just for now.

I see Fenchurch vs Postie as a likely Scum vs Town interaction, and I'm leaning towards Postie as Meno's scumbuddy. There seem to have been a lot of mental gymnastics going on in trying to discredit the potato play, both yesterday and today. And despite what has got to have been one of the most dubious quick hammers from Meno I’ve seen, Postie hasn’t said anything about it other than the very quick vote/unvote. Postie is putting up a better defence for Meno than Meno is themselves!

[cpol]

Also, thank you to whoever allowed me to be alive and playing on my Scumday! aha

[cpol]

Self voting is such a dumb thing to do.

There is also the chance that Meno is a Tanner or something of course. Were there any meme-y One Night Ultimate Werewolf games that were played that could mean it's a role that's included?

[cpol]

That's the one. I purely float it as an idea as I can't otherwise explain their behaviour other than as scum, and have played a bit more ONUW recently and it came to mind!

[cpol]

Menno townread for reasons that would be unwise for me to go into (not role-related).

Given the current position on Meno, is there anything that you would like to expand on from this comment now?

[cpol]

And Postie, just to be clear, as I don't believe you answered Nexus' first question in your post #203, what are your thoughts on the Meno and the related wagon right now? Do you believe they are (or could be) Town based on what has happened so far? Do you genuinely think there is a reason that they are not the execution today?

[cpol]

Indeed, no hiding that. I've already said I can see you as a buddy with Meno.

[cpol]

Who would be your top pick to execute right now Meno?

[cpol]

Why Klick?

[cpol]

Gotta be honest here, I'm not feeling the Meno execution as much right now. Their ISO reads very town, all except for the now infamous execution post.

Your honour, I am not scum, I was simply on drugs.

also, mykonian was the nightkill and Takuma the vigkill... obviously

and I'm pretty sure cpol is town anyway

Woooo, I survived the night!

I have some very interesting thoughts I'd be willing to share, if requested

please!!!

I think Nexus is scummy for myko scumreading him and myko being killed but that's light atm.

This does not seem like someone who is scum coming into a new day after performing an extremely questionable execution to me.

I also agree with others that have said that the self-vote in post 188 also feels like someone simply giving up on the game given the position they are in.
The claim of VT is fine, but the ‘flavour’ also seems to fit, so I like that as well. The VT claim also fits in with the self-voting play.
Not that I could right now I appreciate, but I would now NOT be hammering if I had the chance to.

I don't think it's quite as straightforward as scum potato vendor = cpolscum, so I don't see any need to rush it.

I'm happy for the day to end.

===========[]
[]===========

This is the post I like the least in the last couple of pages. It feels like momentum is moving away from Meno, and this is a not-so-subtle nudge to get it back on track.

[cpol]

@CES - you said that Meno's hammer was damning. So to confirm, you think they are definitely scum? If we execute them and they do come up as scum, who would you want to execute the following day? If they did not come up as scum, where would you be looking instead?

[cpol]

If we execute them and they do come up as scum, who would you want to execute the following day? If they did not come up as scum, where would you be looking instead?

I've never liked this question. It's a distraction. Have you ever done like a crossword (or other word puzzle) where you're given a letter in a word and you immediately get it, even though you had previously considered that very same possibility?

You saw me playing scrabblegrams or whatever it's called....

[cpol]

Nothing has changed, and if Chris' potato isn't explained I want him to die today

I'm not satisfied by any explanations I can think of that involve Chris-town being saved by scum.

I think any conversations around this have shown it to be NAI. Either I am scum and set the whole thing up, or I am town and have been set up as a miss-execution. It seems most likely that scum gave me the potato, but someone owning up to that doesn’t help either way. Rather than the potato itself, do you think I'm playing scummy?

With 10 players alive we are in a bit of a tough situation here, as both Menno and I are suitable execution candidates, based off what has happened, but I know I am town, and can see a world where Menno is as well. However, the number of executions we have is now dwindling. Assuming that we are both executed, and night kills go off each nigh that means we are then at 6 players alive. I think Postie asked it earlier, but is having 3 mafia likely in this player number? How many executions do we actually have?

If it helps, again I am a Vanilla Townie, and my role name is ‘Eight People Watching One Game of Hive’.

@CES – I’ll reword my previous question then. Can you give an update on any thoughts and feelings you have on people? General reads of the game?

[cpol]

What didn't you like about that post?

[cpol]

FWIW Postie I also think you are likely town now also. The stubborn instance that I must somehow be scum feels more townie with a certain view of the game stuck in their head, than scum pushing for a miss-execution.

@Menno - you've talked a decent amount about your thought process around the execution of Bella. However, you've not yet acknowledged that your play was also potentially going to get me killed along with it. You even follow up the execution stating that "pretty sure cpol is town anyway". What was your thought process around that at the time?

[cpol]

Here’s my case for sum!CES

#15 – starts the push towards Bella for the role fishing hint
#18 – Starts the potato play conversation
#28 – Continues with the potato play
#43 – Continues muting that the potato play is the right thing to do
#48 – Does help explain what the roles in the game likely do to Bella
#49 – But then still casts doubt on Bella
#71 – Noncommittal view of Fenchurch
#108 – Question to Nexus, not much to interpret here…
#119 – Still potentially pro potato
#134 – Chucks a ‘probably town’ comment towards Myko
#183 – Quickly on the Menno wagon
#187 – Continues on the Menno waggon
#234 – Pushes for the hammer of Menno
#244 – Dodges the question on thoughts of the game / Menno’s potential scum partner.
#267 – Continues putting pressure on Menno
And I will note that they have also not answered my last question on wanting some general feeds.

So, my though process is as follows. At least two of the three confirmed townies were not interested in potatoes (Myko reads as lukewarm I feel and Takuma clearly dead against. I'm not so sure on Bella.). There also seems to have been a general consensus among many other players (albeit not one I necessarily agree with) that talking about potatoes etc is not great for the town. So, despite my own thoughts, the confirmed town majority did not like it I feel, and also the hivemind. However, CES has pushed for this quite a lot, stating his thoughts on the setup of the WereLeg game made it pro town (see post #43). A possible outcome I can see here is that CES knows about the potato giving role (given that I assume it is indeed a scum role), and so pushed for the ‘pro town’ potato donation play to play out the exact scenario we are in now – get a townie to give theirs up, then vendor them a potato at night to cast suspicion.

There has also been a general lack of reads in the game so far, and questions on general reads etc have been dodged. A read of their ISO shows a fair few comments, but nothing that is particularly committal until the push on Menno. Post #244 gives a fair reason behind the continued pressure, but given the hammer that Menno did it would be pretty easy to justify a miss-execution the following day.

Also, Myko was the suspected night kill, and one of CES’s few reads so far was Myko, which could be setting up a bit of distancing. Myko called out the potato scum!CES theory in post #77 as well I see…

VOTE: CES

[cpol]

This whole exchange feels like basically a distraction. Here's what I find interesting: Menno has now made some more comments about "why" they hammered Bella - do any of their comments actually feel like they explain or illuminate what happened?

No, they don't. And I hope that you can see from my other questions to Menno that I wasn't enamoured with their responses. I'm still waiting for an answer to my last question about me also being technically included in the execution. Like I said before I like almost all of Menno's comments, but I don't like the execution at all.

[cpol]

I'd like to hear more from Primate today.

[cpol]

And maybe it's too early in the game for this but I do find that "who would I be the most mad about losing to if they turned out to be scum?" tends to correlate with scum often enough for me for it to be a useful tool to decide who I need to not back off, and I can tell you I will literally never let any of you live it down if either Menno or cpol are scum and just never executed for some reason

I think this is a dangerous way of thinking, Postie. You’re forcing the game to have the narrative you want it game to have, rather than the one it does. I implore you to have a re-read of the game from an objective viewpoint. You’re a strong town read for me, but I think your lack of objectiveness here isn’t helping. I’m happy to be questioned on anything from me that you are still unhappy with.

That's part of what's so frustrating about no one voting cpol with me - never got a chance to see how cpol responds to pressure

Not that it necessarily matters, but if I came under substantive pressure, I’d react similar to how I did yesterday - that if it were looking likely the execution was going to stick I would accept it. I’m VT, I have no abilities to affect the game, and enough interesting conversations have happened around me (unfortunately including potatoes) that I think me flipping would offer up some benefit compared to a random shot in the dark and would also add some clarity to what’s been previously said. If it is going to happen, I'd rather it was early in the game than drag it out to an end game conversation. Though I do think that I have shown enough pro town play to be a bad choice. And of course I’d still rather try and get scum.

For me I think that CES should claim. If the claim is good, we move to Menno. Menno has also claimed VT and is in a similar position to me where them being executed gives us information to work with, and whilst I can definitely see Menno being town, the execution was still very questionable, and I'm not completely certain - it could go either way for me and I wouldn't be surprised. If the claim is bad, then the execution on CES stands. We're short on time now to move anywhere else I feel.

[cpol]

Yes, I very much disliked your posts #128 #129. I didn’t understand why you’d come in so hard for me. And, I’ll be honest, there was a little OMGUS-y ness around being called lazy, a slow learner and then being facepalmed at I brought this up in post #133, asking why you were doing what you were doing, but you never replied.

You then came is super hard again the next day following the execution and again I couldn’t understand it from a town point of view at the time. I read it as trying to discredit what I thought at least was a pro-town play again (as I thought you did in 128 and 129) and that you were pushing for the execution of me as an easy miss-execution, potentially set up by yourself. I saw this as scummy.

I’ve since re-evaluated as I’ve previously stated.

[cpol]

Don't find him particularly scummy, lean town. Him keeping his thoughts limited to certain issues is a bit of a shame. I don't agree with your argument against him and Chris' case is uninspiring.

Then why aren't you voting Menno right now? You even said you think they are scummy in #324.

[cpol]

Do you have any actual reads you can substantiate

Nope

And you can't even chose between either CES or Menno at this point?

[cpol]

Of course.

So firstly, as a VT I saw the potato as a mechanic that I could at least do something with, fairly risk free. Worse case scenario is that a die, and if a townie is going to die it may as well be a VT. Lacking a power role, it was something mechanically I could actively engage with to try and drive some conversation and get some reads from. I was also in favour of using it to get an additional execution out of the day, or at very least putting the pressure on someone via the mechanic as a counter to the Consuls. Eh, I just like the idea of the mechanic in general and wanted to play with it more than I got chance to during WereLeg tbh!

I was first was concerned around your thoughts on a potato stealer. Given that the potatoes were going D2, I thought this could be a way that they get used. My comment in #31 was relating to this - if I saw someone that I thought looked suitably town, and they had a feel of a power role about them, I'd give them my potato to protect them from this potential ability. I did try and vaguely clarify this in #34

Nexus challenged my comments, to which I replied in #40. I didn't want to completely out that my first idea was to give a potato to someone I thought particularly town, if the scenario arose. That felt like I'd be putting a target on them.

After getting no suitable town reads that I wanted to 'protect', I then instead decided to hand the potato off to someone, just to see how they react. In my head at least this would show that I was a townie by being willing to die to get information out in to the game (a statement that in hindsight clearly did not work!). I was also trying to react to the frequent miss-executions that seemed to be happening in FtF, and felt like it was happening again here. I could get it over and done with D1 and not have to try and defend myself during the end game. I wanted to do this roughly half way through the day so I could see how it played out, and see how people reacted to the situation. I chose Fenchurch because she was so anti the potato passing play I thought it would be interesting to see if that opinion changed afterwards. I did kinda expect to get it back to be honest, but Menno hammered so damned soon afterwards that it made the whole thing kinda moot. (Post #124 explaining why I did it when I did)

What I did not expect was to be given a potato, which again in hindsight was pretty dumb, and has caused a lot of confusion. I do still maintain that there is pro-town play in using this mechanic, though I will concede that the method that I went about it wasn't great.

[cpol]

lol.

Rest in peace, friend!

VOTE: McMenno

[cpol]

@cpol

- Why did you hammer without intent, given Poro had expressed they were still catching up?

Unfortunately, this is going to sound like a tall story, but I had just typed up a post stating that I didn't want the day to end without an execution, and that Menno dying at least gave us some information. I was going to vote for them, as I didn't trust the people that weren't voting at the time (and could run down the clock), and time was running out. When I pressed submit this was then shown:

good luck cpol o7

I wrongly assumed at this point that Menno was actually scum, and this was some kind of play to implicate me or something. I thought it was a final throw of the dice to cause confusion, especially as I had been one of Menno’s staunchest defenders. Hence my “lol.” I just decided to vote and then play out whatever came the next day, rather than try and type some long justification. My previous message would have sounded very disingenuous following Menno’s post. However, I now assume it was Menno saying that they were agreeing with me, and a general sigh of frustration to everyone else who has been slow playing and not offering much up to actually try and get scum.

For Poro, I had no faith in that they would be catching up on the game.

Need to think about what this actually means now in terms of scum reads.

[cpol]

That's certainly believable. Fenchurch's play around the start of D2 looks pretty suspicious now that the Menno execution has happened. The certainty around how things played out does look like scum who have come up with a narrative they want to push.

Stating that you think Klick didn't look town is also kinda crazy now. Especially given how yesterday played out. I'm not sure how you could come to that conclusion at the start of today.

[cpol]

That's not quite what I am saying.

Given that Menno flipped town, the chances of Klick being scum were super low. It's not helpful TODAY that Klick is dead, and it shouldn't have narrowed down your choices any further this day. The fact you previously though they were scummy is fine. Saying that you still would have now is what doesn't make sense.

[cpol]

Given that Menno flipped town, the chances of Klick being scum were super low

I actually don't follow that - what made Klick more town to you after Menno flipped scum?

I'll flip that round - why would you not have thought they were?

[cpol]

Because I'd stated that I was going to hammer Menno, and Klick was the first person to unvote to stop that happening. The Menno push wasn't even getting derailed at this point. Why would scum!Klick ever do that?

And their thoughts after this point were extremely forthcoming, I'm not sure how you can say they weren't? They were clearly scum hunting and proactively trying to look outside of Menno. You might have doubted Klick yesterday, but given that Menno flipped town I am really struggling to see how you could come in to this day as a townie being relieved that Klick was taken out of your potential options for looking at Scum in.

[cpol]

That's certainly believable. Fenchurch's play around the start of D2 looks pretty suspicious now that the Menno execution has happened. The certainty around how things played out does look like scum who have come up with a narrative they want to push.

OK, I've re-read and I'm going to rescind my comment here.

I'd reeaaaallly like some actual content from Poro and Primate. Primate managing to miss nearly all of yesterday and then being almost forced into the Menno vote is outrageous. Some good play D1 is doing serious work right now.

I'd be voting CES, but don't want them at E-1 right now. Though I'd go back to my statement from yesterday, I'd like a claim.

[cpol]

Certainly a claim that is easy to be countered if it were a lie. Though I am not certain that it necessarily has to be a town role, given that it was only active on night 0. I'm also stretching here, but 'The People Who Saw Us Dressed As Romans' is flavour that isn't directly related to the actual scummers who went to the meet, unlike Menno's and mine. It's an outside group that interacted with us, which could (tenuously) imply scum/3rd party. So all in all enough for me to move away from CES today, but not enough to state that this is a safe town claim.

I still don't agree on the Klick point of view, but will have to agree to disagree at this point.

VOTE: Porochaz

[cpol]

As far as I can tell you just called everything NAI - where's the "enough" for moving away part?

We’ve already had a lot of conversations around CES and seen their reaction. The claim for me also leans of the town side (60/40 I’d say). I’d much rather spend the time today putting pressure on the lurkers so they don’t get another day of not posting. Maybe we cycle back later if we’re getting nowhere, but more pressure right now doesn’t give us anything new I’d say. I certainly don't want to speed execute them.

…seems like a pointless line of enquiry.
Actually, just to be thorough: does anyone who played in previous invitationals know if fakeclaims were provided? I tried looking through past modded games via CDB's wiki but couldn't find any useful info that way.

Agreed – not really looking to pursue this any further at this point, just pointing out an observation in case it helps later. If we do ever hit scum, it may be an interesting cross reference however. Though your question is valid still.

[cpol]

Everyone

- I've just been thinking, in a 13 player game is it most likely that we have a 3-person scum team? In which case, if we wrongly execute today then we lose. Should we massclaim - popcorn from CES?

I think both Postie and I have raised that concern now as well. I can see it being a possibility myself, and at think point my reads are that you two are the most likely to be town, so would advocate playing on the side of caution.

I’m happy with a mass claim. I think we have at least 3 out in the open now anyway. Even if we don’t want to do that, given that we are possibly at a position where we must hit scum, townies with useful information should probably come forward – if there are any left. We’ve lost a few power roles already.

@CES

– what are your thoughts on Primate?

@Primate

– why were you struggling to get in to the game D2? Are you feeling the same way now? Are you up for a mass claim?

VOTE: Unvote

[cpol]

@CES

- That Primate post just before yours leaves you 'mostly clueless' still? Especially when you consider Nexus and Wenna as 'pretty lurkerish' straight afterwards? Am I to assume then that you are happy with their level of posting over the last couple of in game days?

[cpol]

I mean, I tried to counterwagon the McMenno wagon with you, my dude.

Tried to counterwagon with who sorry?

[cpol]

Ahh I see, I read 'with you' as 'alongside you' rather than 'by voting for you'. Carry on.

[cpol]

Well it confirms that the potato vendor is scum, and in that case, why did they save Cpol?

Surely you can't have expected a town potato vendor to suddenly come forward now, can you?

My money right now is on a CES/Primate scum paring. My thought process, going from “reasonable” to “wild” in my levels of speculation:

The amount of lurking primate has done the last two days is worse than anyone else’s in my opinion. I think they are flying under the radar due to the pro-town looking consul play D1, but other than that have not contributed anything that I consider particularly town looking.

Primate completely sat on the fence D2 around the Menno waggon and had to be pushed to commit to the vote. This feels like scum hedging their bets and hoping the town commits the miss-execution and generally trying to push the vote whilst giving themselves enough distance from it.

Primates other posting has been consistently, albeit vaguely positive towards CES without backing them up with anything concrete.

In post #286 for example Primate states that they don’t agree with me on Postie, despite me having backtracked my comments and changed my point of view by that point. He could have gone with “I now agree with cpol” instead of wanting to actively disagree. The choice of the negative slant feels more scummy than town.

I should stop pulling the poro read out of my ass and actually solidify it. Klick's been a bit scummy too.

This still hasn’t happened. Poro is a good person to default on a scum I think. Same with Wenna at this point, who CES seems to be pushing for. Klick at the time was a popular scum read who it was easy to throw some shade on to, even though this has since been proven to be incorrect.

Both Primate and CES have avoided clearly answering direct questions today (in my opinion). Primate never answered why they aren’t engaged with the game, CES whether they thought Primates level of play was acceptable. When asked about each other, each time the reads are vague.

...And now wilder stuff…

CES as the Consulmaker chose Primate and Menno to allow their scum buddy to chuck a nomination down early, hoping that the somewhat of a wildcard Menno would hammer. A pre-planned play, which could have been signalled by CES as well. CES votes for Bella in #18, Primate quickly nominates afterwards in #19. There is even this comment which I find a little fishy.

In terms of PrimBella, I think Primate has to have relatively specific beliefs as to how likely Menno is to act impulsively to rule out the move as scum but for it to feel reasonable as town. Personally, I think the more compelling argument against it is that I'm not sure scumPrim would choose to put the pressure on a scum buddy in that way.

An finally… If I had to guess I’d say that Primate is the potato vender, as the flavour kind of fits - “mandarin covered in Sellotape”, could be a replacement scum potato!

VOTE: Primate

[cpol]

Others have when asked? Or at least I've seen Menno explained the hammer by saying they were zooted, Nexus saying they aren't that invested because they are a VT, Poro saying that they weren't bothered by D1 because of the Consul/potato stuff and Wenna saying that they aren't super sure what to do in forum mafia. So I can't see why a similar level of explanation could be asked of you. Everyone there has been willing to put some kind of justification in.

[cpol]

If you think the potato vendor is scum (which you seem to, with your accusation of Primate) can you explain why they protected you?

Only by going back over ground that's been talked about ad infinitum at this point. Does it help anything? At it's simplest it adds confusion in to the game and lets us waste our time debating whether it was a scummy move or not, rather than actually scum hunting.

[cpol]

And my actual point was, why would they only have come forwards at this time when we are mass claiming instead of earlier in the game when it would have helped explain what had happened and removed some confusion?

[cpol]

OK, I can follow that train of thought. I just don't think I'd be able to add anything more than what's already been said. It's a difficult justification, the play seems to have been to go for a miss-execution another day rather than take the kill there and then.

The other option is that something else happened to give me a potato, maybe an invention from Klick? Or the whole potato thing was a skit by George due to his hatred of the mechanic F2f? But just like your previous question, it's speculative.

All I can say is that we are here, potentially needing to hit scum to keep the game going, and we're still talking about it, which isn't good. I'll ask what I asked last time, other than this, do you think I've played scummy? I can at least defend that.

[cpol]

Surely you can't have expected a town potato vendor to suddenly come forward now, can you?

An finally… If I had to guess I’d say that Primate is the potato vender, as the flavour kind of fits - “mandarin covered in Sellotape”, could be a replacement scum potato!

?

I'm implying that I could see Primate is a scum potato vender, very loosely based off flavour.

[cpol]

Others have when asked? Or at least I've seen Menno explained the hammer by saying they were zooted, Nexus saying they aren't that invested because they are a VT, Poro saying that they weren't bothered by D1 because of the Consul/potato stuff and Wenna saying that they aren't super sure what to do in forum mafia. So I can't see why a similar level of explanation could be asked of you. Everyone there has been willing to put some kind of justification in.

Not posting is not posting. What's the point making an excuse, the reason's the same, there were other things you enjoyed doing more (or needed to do more) than playing forum mafia in this specific game at that time.

So am I right in assuming that you just had a general apathy towards the game? And as a 'town' player, you were either happy with the direction that the game was taking, or simply not following it?

[cpol]

You got my intention wrong there Posite. I was saying that I'd moved on from the idea of there ever being a town potato vendor in the game. It seemed pretty clear cut to me they were scum (if they exist), and so was wondering why Fenchurch was still asking about it. Hence the come forward

now

.
However, scum potato vendor is still possible, and very likely.
I also said that I could see it being some kind of inventor thing.

So in short, in my head the potato vendor is like 90% mafia and I could not see why Fenchurch thought otherwise.

The 'keep the claim safe so that scum don't know I'm not a power role' play hadn't crossed my mind. At this point it's kinda moot though.

[cpol]

If there are three scum, then they only need to convince two townies to vote with them and the game is over, no? 8 alive -1 execution, -1 night kill gives us a 3/3 split the next day, ending the game?

So, assuming we

are

at 3, If CES were town, then at least two of Postie, Nexus and Wenna in theory should be scum, otherwise the game would have ended by now – i.e. with two townies voting for CES the other three scum would simply join the vote and end the day. Luckily (I hope!) I can’t see 2 of the potential three scum in Postie, Nexus and Wenna. They could of course all be scum, hoping that two townies follow them, but the Postie, Nexus and Wenna scum team is not one I can imagine myself.

Just extrapolating this out further to make it clearer.
There 3 people voting for CES – 5 are not. It takes 5 to execute. Assume there are 3 scum, and CES is Town, then the options are that:
0 scum are currently voting, 3 are currently not. They would all now vote and end the day and win,
1 scum is already voting, the other 2 are not. They would, and so end the day and win.
2 scum are already voting, the other 1 is not. This scenario wouldn’t end the day, and would rely on another townie joining the vote.
3 scum are already voting. Two of the townies would need to join the vote to end the day.

So, based off the fact that the day isn't over, I believe it means that for CES to be town

at least two scum must currently be on the vote

. And I can’t see that being true. I could believe one, but not two.

That means I have to agree with my conclusion that CES is very likely scum. So, I have to convince myself that this is correct, and also convince at least one other town player who isn’t already on the vote to do the same, whilst all at the same time have the 3 potential scum buddies dissenting against the play. Which, to be honest, sounds fricking awful. But if there are three scum, town probably only get the execution if they unanimously agree I guess? Or at least very close to that.

What’s is interesting is that this is actually the 2nd time that CES has been on 3 votes – it never progressed further then either.

The other option of course is that we are at 2 scum. But this is less risky, as it isn’t ExLo right now. (Just checking the math – 8 alive -1 execution, -1 night kill gives us 6 players left, with two scum. We’d be at ExLo the following day instead?) If that’s the case, and we execute CES and they flip town, we at least get to think about it for another day.

OK, I’ve put my train of thought down for all to see, and I guess if this is a horrible mistake, or I've fudged the maths somewhere, I’ll have to live with it. I don’t feel like we will get much more over going round the same topics of conversation, I don’t think anyone is going to suddenly make some kind of slip that we can latch on to anyway. But I also don't see me coming round to the idea that two of Postie, Nexus and Wenna are scum. And I would personally take the CES execution and re-evaluate tomorrow if it came to that.

Unvote

VOTE: CES

[cpol]

I'll unvote for the time being, because I don't want to lose, but I'll need more clarification than that as to why I am wrong in my thoughts.

Unvote

[cpol]

Please explain why over the course of this day, when you have been at three votes twice, you haven't been executed. Scum could easily have carried on the previous days case if they wanted to, it wouldn't have been a hard switch and wouldn't have looked like a quick execution to me.

[cpol]

I don't actually get how you can vote for Primate earlier in the day for lurking and somehow have issue with the theory that Nexus and Wenna, both of whom I would describe as having interacted less with the game than Primate.

I am not overly enamoured by Primates response to being called out - what I would call overly defensive/aggressive (similar to Patrick did to me during WereLeg one game when he was scum), plus for someone not 'invested' in the game, they sure responded quickly to being voted for. Nexus may have been luring a lot more, but several of their comments have resonated with what I was feeling at the time as well. I'll agree Wenna is a null for me at the moment, but could fall into that 1 voter category. And I still land on the fact that I can't see Nexus and Wenna together as a pairing.

[cpol]

Do you think that e.g. if there's a Nexus-Poro-Fenchurch scum team, Poro and Fenchurch would quickhammer me, risking a 1 in 3 that they get jailkept and the town is right back in it?

But also, just as an example, Poro hasn't actually posted while I've been at E-2.

The first time you were at E-2, the claims hadn't happened yet. The jailkeeper wasn't known, so could have happened.

Poro not posting does not mean that they haven't been viewing.

[cpol]

And I still land on the fact that I can't see Nexus and Wenna together as a pairing.

Why not?

Because I don't get any particularly strong scum vibes from either of them? Nexus in particular has been one of my top town reads for at least the last two in game days.

[cpol]

Do you believe there are two or three scum, @CES?

[cpol]

@Posite

Please can I have a sense check from you on what I am thinking?

[cpol]

@Poro

- so based off that I see that you you are saying that you think your potential town buddies at this point are indeed Nexus, Wenna and Postie (along with Primate) in your most likely version of the game. So, given that they are all currently voting for CES, and as I stated the town almost universally needs to vote for the same person today, why do you not follow them? What are you actually trying to achieve by voting Fenchurch? You think you are going to convince Nexus, Wenna and Postie to move their vote? If you are town, all you have done is create division at this point.

[cpol]

4 days doesn't fill me with confidence that we're winning this...

Like I said, I'm fairly sure all town need to be aligned to have any chance, and we've burned 6 days now already treading water and going over the same old stuff.

[cpol]

What are you waiting for right now, CES?

[cpol]

Why are you trying so hard to convince me specifically though? I'm open to be challenged, but so far you've posted to defend yourself, but not actually put any effort in to look elsewhere (outside of some posts in the general direction of Wenna). You've even just said you are passively hoping that others would chime in. You were certainly happy to post a lot when it was related to defending yourself. It feels like you think you have got me off your case so you can relax.

I'm happy to look again at Nexus, but pretty much any post anyone makes can be batted away with the "Could marginally competent scum fake this?" line. I can list the posts that make me think Nexus is town, and you'll drop that line, and that's kinda conversation over. And if you are talking about ‘could a scum easily fake this’ then the line ‘so now it's on me to save the town. Which will probably fail and I've got things to do, but I'll feel bad if I don't try’ ticks just about all the boxes to me, plus it has a nice level of emotional blackmail in there to boot.

So I don’t know what to say. I don’t believe there will be any posts in this game that don’t manage to fall in to the "Could marginally competent scum fake this?" pile – we’ve been at this a fair old whilst now and no one has pointed one out yet, I certainly haven’t. If you have some up your sleeve, now feels like the time to drop them.

So it brings me back to my original point – why aren’t you executed? And why are the people who are not voting CES right now seeming like pretty ambivalent towards the whole situation? Or at the very least not frantically trying to come to some kind of group conclusion. I personally don’t want this game to go to a last-minute decision, that feels like a loss to me. I can only see that scum want that.

[cpol]

I don't find Nexus town for the aloof shit posting though, I find them town because when they haven't done that they've often posted what I was thinking at the time myself, and also often going against the direction that I felt the the flow of the game was being steered. I can look at these posts and not see an obvious reason why scum!Nexus would post them. They don't steer to what I would see as a potential scum agenda. For me, they all pass your tests.

Do you think there is any chance Nexus is town yourself? Can you read though their posts and point out to me what posts seal the deal for you for scum!Nexus please? Or at least what gives you enough doubt? I'd point out the ones that I do like myself, but I feel that if you are scum then I'm handing the ability to counter my thoughts to you on a plate. So I'd rather see where our thoughts differ, and whether I can rationalise that.

What I do find frustrating is that the conversation is going to stall between the two of us. I don't think we are going to convince each other in isolation. You are going to do everything you can to convince me you are town - as you would for either alignment. I'm going to doubt every word you say. Some outside input into this would be appreciated.

[cpol]

I don't think that's the right play now - CES needs to post why Nexus isn't town, otherwise I've just laid out the exact points he needs to counter right in front of him. I want to see CESs take first, then I'll counter.

[cpol]

Post #4 is everything thank you CDB, it was worth joining the game just for the enjoyment I got out of that.

Just to let you all know I thought my role is a bit dubious and if I have to claim I'm not sure it will be believed? Although now I've read the intro to the game perhaps that's not such a worry.

Hi Nexus!!

I am

Titus

, the powerful yet doomed gladiator from the murder mystery… I’m a VT. My initial reaction, that I mentioned in my first post, is that this doesn’t seem believable because Titus doesn’t sound like a VT. But then all the VT flips have been slightly wacky stuff so…:shrug:

Popcorn to Primate.

Given that you are a VT - what about post #4 led you to think that you claim would be more believed? Your second post does not align with your first here. There is nothing in #4 that explains at that point in time why Titus may be a VT.

[cpol]

Post #4 is everything thank you CDB, it was worth joining the game just for the enjoyment I got out of that.

Just to let you all know I thought my role is a bit dubious and if I have to claim I'm not sure it will be believed? Although now I've read the intro to the game perhaps that's not such a worry.

Hi Nexus!!

I am

Titus

, the powerful yet doomed gladiator from the murder mystery… I’m a VT. My initial reaction, that I mentioned in my first post, is that this doesn’t seem believable because Titus doesn’t sound like a VT. But then all the VT flips have been slightly wacky stuff so…:shrug:

Popcorn to Primate.

Given that you are a VT - what about post #4 led you to think that you claim would be more believed? Your second post does not align with your first here. There is nothing in #4 that explains at that point in time why Titus may be a VT.

Bump.

[cpol]

Takuma was a Blackmailing Inventor Maker, what does a Blackmailer do in the game?

[cpol]

I did a big old read of the game again today, and I'm really sorry if I am wrong, but I don't land on Wenna being scum. Missing day 1 was a real shame, but Wenna's first post seems pretty town (soft claiming the Menno flavour, and not so soft claiming the VT role...). Yes, it's easily fakeable for scum to do that, but I don't think Wenna would. From there, their initial land was on Postie during the big old Menno discussion. I'm again not sure why scum!Wenna would do that. They've already built up the lurker reputation, either sitting back and letting the Menno waggon continue, or contibuting to it feels like the scum!Wenna play there. It could just be my empathy steering me here, but what Wenna is posting when she does start posting is pretty much coming across as the same as I felt - bemused and unsure, mixed in with a bit of memeing due to wanting to engage with the game whilst being unsure of what to actually do.

Then I think back on all the mistakes town has made this game that have lead us to this point:
Potato discussions D1/D2 (this has not proven to be pro town, has led to pretty useless conversations, and on hindsight no one under pressure would ever realistically give up a potato I think, scum or town - I appreciate I am to blame for quite a bit of this!)
Executing Menno
And now I think also the mass claim (the main takeaway I have from my most recent CES case is that scum would have been cautious and not wanting to speed execute due to not knowing the roles. They now know there is a claimed Jailkeeper, so that will factor in to their gameplay. Whereas Town gained nothing.)

All of these have been positively influenced by CES and/or Fenchurch to happen.

On top of this I do not like Fenchurch's soft claim. The first post read like a power role setup, the explanation at the end heavily leads into the other roles being VT.

I'd vote for either of them, and at this point wouldn't vote for anyone else at this point. My preference is still CES, but would swap if that is where the majority lies.

Unfortunately I am out all day tomorrow, so will have to commit to a vote before then, but I'll try and do that tonight after a few more thoughts come in.

[cpol]

I also still want to know what a blackmailer does please! I've googled but can only find Town of Salem stuff, and that implies it blocks secret communications??

[cpol]

From there, their initial land was on Postie during the big old Menno discussion. I'm again not sure why scum!Wenna would do that. They've already built up the lurker reputation, either sitting back and letting the Menno waggon continue, or contibuting to it feels like the scum!Wenna play there

But sitting back and letting the Mennowagon happen is basically exactly what she does! She may vote for Postie but the only reasoning she gives is hidden in some parenthetical in a different post. That's a toothless vote, unlikely to ever sway anything.

And can you really tell me that you can read #335 and think her claim that she thought Menno was town/she defended him is remotely plausible? I'm not sure if it's pure scum revisionism (it seems like you could get away with this for sure in real life) or if she actually misremembered how much she fence sat (with the obvious goal of letting a town execution happen without taking any responsibility for it) but she's doubled down on this obvious falsehood, so I don't think the motivation is actually that important.

I can read it that at the time Wenna thought that Menno could be town, maybe even strongly thought he was, but given the game runs on doubt didn't want to fully commit to the case at the time. And that with that in hindsight she believes she was stronger on that case than she was, but yes, I would agree there wasn't a staunch defence of Menno.

On the flipside, if Wenna was scum, and we assume that the scum saved me with the potato, why would she have been trying so hard to play devils advocate and stop that particular topic of conversation?

[cpol]

@CES

Would you go for a Fenchurch execution?

[cpol]

Who do you think would be partnering Wenna, CES? Can we get to some common ground there?

[cpol]

You're making me waiver here CES, but that point you have just made is an actual twisting of Wenna's words. She said she would hammer if the vote were at 5/6 on either side. She'd already said she was going to delay the decision. The vote is at 4/6, so had no intention of voting at that stage. If she had voted, she'd be going back on her previous word.

You could argue that this stance is still one that scum would take, knowing that two townies are lined up and wanting the majority to make the decision so you are blameless - I agree, but you can also argue that a townie could end up in this position.

Do you not think there is any chance that you are wrong on Wenna? There could up to another two scum out there.

[cpol]

Probably not going to get another chance to vote today now, so...

VOTE: Fenchurch

If it were either of CES or Wenna, at this point I could see either of them them buddied with Fenchurch.

The other option is we've been left to all argue among ourselves whilst the scum lurk and let us implode (implying the scum are somewhere in Nexus, Primate, Wenna & Poro), but I don't think that has happened. I firmly believe there are enough competent and experienced players in the non-lurker group that we'd never have made it into this mess in the first place if that were true.

So, Fenchurch fits that profile and has some questionable moments, and this let's us talk about CES and Wenna even more tomorrow if we are right, which sounds just....yah.

[cpol]

Holy shit!

Fair play Postie, I am not sure I would ever have come back around on you. And the Baby Izzy/Jailkeeper claim was also very good, seemed very fitting and very George.

I think that even if we'd stuck with CES as the elimination on the last day we still weren't in a good position to win anyway. All the PRs getting mowed down in quick succession was also very rough.

That was good fun, thanks George! Although I got far too invested and it ate up waaaay more of my time that I had the original intention of it doing aha