Mini 1651: One Flew Over The Monkey's Nest(Scum Wins!)

[Aquanim]

@mykonian

: What do you think is town-indicative about the recent posts of lemons?

[Aquanim]

And I doubt both were run up as scum

Any particular reason, besides two scum wagons being unlikely? Neither IL nor Metal seemed capable of pushing an alternate wagon (though Metal tried) and there are a few players I can think of who could conceivably been unable to push an alternate town wagon, if they were the third scum.

[Aquanim]

I feel like scum would have taken a side and hardbussed one of them. Two leading wagons on scum ending in apathy just doesn't seem right because it puts both in a shitty position again tomorrow.

I'll just say this: If IL and metal are both scum, the scumteam missed a big opportunity to bus one and give the other a decent amount of cred.

To consider a couple of hypotheticals:
- Boonskiies was welded onto the Metal wagon since before the Taly flip and couldn't have got off without drawing a lot of attention
- Mykonian committed quite strongly to Metal being town for some time
The list of possibles probably doesn't include only these two either.

Remember that if IL and Metal are both scum there's only one other scum remaining; their actual capability to get a bus lynch through isn't all that strong. Perhaps they tried to hardbus and failed.

I wouldn't want to make any decisions based on the above it being a three-way preflip association, but I don't think it's so unlikely that I'd rule it out.

My problem with drawing any concusions at all from the fact that we no-lynched is that so few players seemed to be interested at all in ensuring a lynch happened, and in being active for the final days. Perhaps the scum would have bussed given the opportunity but were simply not around to do it properly.

[Aquanim]

For similar reasons I'm not confident to say with certainty that one or the other is definitely scum for the sole reason of the no-lynch. If they're both town scum would probably have cheerfully hammered one of them... but perhaps the scum weren't around to do that at an appropriate time.

[Aquanim]

That all being said, despite his vaguely towny-looking posts toward the end of day 1 I'm going to need some good reasons to not pursue Metalcyanide again today, and InsidiousLemons has a fair bit to prove.

[Aquanim]

pisskop do you still have your shot?

[Aquanim]

I don't have any direct experience with RC but I certainly wouldn't have counted on RC investigating Mykonian. Or not investigating Mykonian, for that matter. RC says whatever the hell RC likes, is my impression.

[Aquanim]

She is a fairly honest person, if nothing else.

What are people's impression of Boons? He

is

in the game, after all.

I don't see how anything he's done so far is readable. That is generally a goal of scum, but in this case it seems likely to just be his style. I strongly dislike players who compromise their towngames to make winning their scumgames easier, and as such I'm okay with policy lynching them.

I didn't much like Aeronaut's posts in the slot before the replace but it's not a read I'd go to the bank with at this stage.

[Aquanim]

Speculation on such things isnt going to yield fruit.

We need suspects. Not what-ifs.

I still like boon, hasn't said anything and he sheeped RC

Why are either of these at all reasons to like boon?

And also, IL, you've caught up? What are your thoughts? Id still like to lynch you.

WTF?! LOL, and he's voting me?

VOTE: Metal

Blatant, obvious contradicion? I must be missing something here.

Granted, I understand he probably means he still likes the idea of lynching me.

If you understand that, why was this worth mentioning at all?

[Aquanim]

And you couldn't decide as scum to lurk, do nothing useful, and fake your "obvious town" meta because...

[Aquanim]

Well, I briefly had a look at a =24184&user_select[]=0&user_select[]=0&user_sort=Go]scum and =24184&user_select[]=0&user_select[]=0&user_sort=Go]town game of yours... and found you were far more active in both, even day 1.

Boonskiies, in general how much do you care about winning when you roll town?

[Aquanim]

Welp, should have previewed that one.

Well, I briefly had a look at a scum (Mini 1642) and town (Mini 1596) game of yours... and found you were far more active in both, even day 1.

Boonskiies, in general how much do you care about winning when you roll town?

[Aquanim]

My feeling for a while has been that if Pisskop with his daykills (well daykill now) is anti-town, then town would pretty much have to have another PR to compensate. I also find it a little hard to believe that town has boring roles like cop and roleblocker while something flashy like an any-cycle vig is antitown. Conceivable, yes. But in the end... he's town, move on.

(A one-shot vig is also far more believable than a two-shot one.)

This does however leave us in the poor position of having only one mislynch remaining, with no remaining PRs... and there are a lot of question marks in this game. It's winnable, but we're actually going to have to play Mafia to do it. Hopefully if IL is town his replacement is strong.

[Aquanim]

the annoying thing is that towards the end of yesterday and today, eektor has been posting sensibly.

Which posts in particular are you looking at and calling sensible from eektor? Especially posts from today, though I want to see both.

[Aquanim]

Aqua, you know I'm an alt. How come you haven't mentioned it in the thread?

It didn't seem relevant. I'd almost entirely forgotten finding out, for that matter. I don't know who you're an alt of.

[Aquanim]

You don't think that people would read me differently depending on what they perceive my experience to be?

Meh. I don't remember seeing anyone assuming you were a newbie - your posts don't read like you are one. Since I don't know who you're an alt of, "not a newbie" is pretty much the only useful information that your being an alt tells me.

It might have come up had you been wagoned or something but that hasn't happened.

[Aquanim]

@Mod: You're looking for a replacement for InsidiousLemons, remember?

[Aquanim]

Aaaaand I've been diagnosed with bronchitis. I can't do this right now, I'm sorry, if I stick around I'm just going to make the game worse for everyone by playing badly and posting sparsely. I'm extremely sorry to everyone, I won't try and keep playing games I can't be active in anymore. Lesson learned.

@Mod: Requesting replacement.

Seeking replacecment, hope you feel better.

He hasn't posted since this

[Aquanim]

Just in case of ctrl-F consider the above to be prefaced by

@Mod

[Aquanim]

I'm still okay with this.

VOTE: Metalcyanide

[Aquanim]

@Aqua Why do you think metal is scum?

None of my reasons from #898 have changed. As far as today goes, Metal's anger at Boonskiies and TheDudeAbides feels... overdone. I might write this up properly again later, not doing it for now.

Also, since you think he is scum, why would scum metal not want to vote for IL even when he was in danger of getting lynched and also only voting for IL when pressured to?

I'm not sure. Maybe IL (well, Bellaphant now) is scum as well. There's no good reason why a town Metal would not have voted for InsidiousLemons (or Taly) much earlier than he did.

I'm pretty sure tool is town just because this is the 2nd day he's voted me and trying to get a mislynch on me and isn't getting any support. As scum I would think his scum buddies would help him out.

This is very, very untrue. If Tool is scum he would quite cheerfully try and fail to push a wagon with no help from his buddies - it makes him look like he's doing something, without having to take responsibility for any flips. This does not make Tool scum either, fwiw.

What's interesting to note is at Day 1, we were deadlocked between lynching metal and IL. Day 2, metal's wagon is going strong and the IL wagon fell apart. Which makes me wonder if this metal wagon is being pushed by scum.

Half the people who were seriously pusing the Metal wagon yesterday (RC, Taly) have already flipped town. Is this you scumreading me?

Incidentally I don't want this day to end in the next 48 hours, at least; there is more I need to see.

[Aquanim]

MC's vote is a bit strange. Not really seeing that.

This was what you said about #282 at the time.

[Aquanim]

...
Why do you think I'm scumreading you when there are two more people on metal's wagon?

I consider myself primarily responsible for yesterday's Metalcyanide wagon. If you claim that scum have pushed to get Metalcyanide lynched that points pretty strongly at me. I would not say that Boonskiies "pushed" the Metal wagon very hard, though that does not make him town in any case. Elyse was behind the Metal wagon day 1 (though only after the Taly flip), but I don't think she strongly and actively pushed it until day 2.

If you think that the mafia actively want Metalcyanide dead then you'd best have a case for either myself or Elyse being mafia.

Why do you think that the InsidiousLemons wagon falling apart, and the Metalcyanide wagon holding together more, makes Metal town? What is your reason to rule out the possibility that myself and Elyse are townies and that our reasons to want Metal lynched remain as true as they were yesterday, and that the Insidious wagon has fallen apart because it was being (at least partially) pushed by scum who didn't really believe it?

Also, do you disagree with my opinion of your Tool townread?

[Aquanim]

EBWOP: "...pushed by scum who didn't really believe it, and as such have no attachment to their arguments as to why InsidiousLemons was mafia?"

[Aquanim]

That's not quite an answer to my question. What about this fact:

What's interesting to note is at Day 1, we were deadlocked between lynching metal and IL. Day 2, metal's wagon is going strong and the IL wagon fell apart.

made you say this:

Which makes me wonder if this metal wagon is being pushed by scum.

[Aquanim]

The question I want you to answer is this.

Why does this fact...

What's interesting to note is at Day 1, we were deadlocked between lynching metal and IL. Day 2, metal's wagon is going strong and the IL wagon fell apart.

lead you to this conclusion?

Which makes me wonder if this metal wagon is being pushed by scum.

If you want to have a talk about what I'm saying, we can do that. AFTER you answer my question.

[Aquanim]

If metal is scum, why would there be no counterwagon? You think a possible counterwagon for scum-metal would fall through (considering it had a high likelihood of forming as seen from day 1) when a scum buddy is on the chopping blocks? Where's the other counterwagon. This is why I think metal is town.

Who's to say mafia aren't trying to stir up a counterwagon? There's four people not voting, mykonian and tool trying to stir up interest in their lynches, and Metal himself trying to push a lynch on Boonskiies.

To posit a single explanation (possibly among many) as to why there is not a more well defined counterwagon, perhaps the InsidiousLemons slot is the third scum and has not been in a position to press a wagon. In any case, I think that in the case where Mykonian or Tool is mafia, the second mafia would not be comfortable jumping onto a TDA or eektor (or Boon) wagon without at least one townie on the wagon as well - and the town is again looking very sedentary today.

As for metal being town, I find that scum after talking during the night thought to push metal day 2, and might be why their is no IL interest today. Although if that is the case, IL might be town.

Now can you answer my question.

The short version is that I don't see the Metal wagons from today and yesterday as being different entities. The only flip in between was the RadiantCowbells flip, which I was confident would be town anyway, so the wagon on him today is not hugely different in basis to that of yesterday. It's mostly the same people, except for those who have died in the interim.

If you intend to make a serious case that Elyse or myself is mafia I'd suggest you get on with it. The day is ticking away.

[Aquanim]

@Elyse

: Do you find Mykonian's reply to you in #1463 satisfactory?

[Aquanim]

@Mod: Requesting prod of TheDudeAbides.

[Aquanim]

That's not quite an answer to my question. What about this fact:

What's interesting to note is at Day 1, we were deadlocked between lynching metal and IL. Day 2, metal's wagon is going strong and the IL wagon fell apart.

made you say this:

Which makes me wonder if

this

metal wagon is being pushed by scum.

So, you read that and thought I was talking about the day 1 wagon?

Also, which question didn't I answer?

@ Aqua can you answer that question?

Thought I did. I didn't pay attention to the "this". Aside from the observation that I pushed the Metal wagon more actively yesterday and Elyse is pushing it more actively today I don't think there is much of a distinction between the Metal wagons of today and yesterday. I'm not mafia, I don't think Elyse is mafia, and I don't think either of us has "changed our tune" in response to consultation with scumbuddies overnight. Elyse is more active now that she has thoroughly reassessed the game post-Taly flip overnight; I sat around for a while at the start of the day because I wanted to see some things happen without my pushing them, and I figured I had the towncredit to do it.

[Aquanim]

So he is. My apologies.

[Aquanim]

Everything considered we should probably try to wrap this up before Easter. If we nolynch a second time I will not be impressed.

[Aquanim]

Bellaphant:

I saw absolutely nothing to like about the Aeronaut/Boonskiies slot before or during the replace. Can you elaborate?

[Aquanim]

And Mykonian wanders in to... throw crap at someone scumreading Metal! Suprise, suprise!

[Aquanim]

Which is not to say that he does not have a point. That line is a bizarre justification for a scumread.

I just think it's very interesting that Mykonian's first reaction is not to ask Bellaphant for elaboration on anything, nor is it to query the scumread Bellaphant has on him, but rather to "defend" Metal.

[Aquanim]

Myokan scumlynch?

What? Are you asking Mykonian for a scumread, or stating that Mykonian is a scumread of yours?

I mean, I read the post after now, I am not surprised that people would be scumreading me. I'm dropping half thoughts and reads into the thread, some of my opinions run contrary to the town, I'm a stubborn guy by nature. That stuff gets gut scum reads. Which is what bella posts about, which is what a couple other people in the game have alluded to.

That happens every game. The difference per game is how people deal with it.

The other difference is what alignment you actually rolled.

[Aquanim]

So far as I could tell at the time, Boonskiies' predecessor in the slot (Aeronaut) said basically nothing of note despite having a decent number of posts. I scumread him then and I scumread the slot now.

[Aquanim]

So, it kind of seems like people are giving eektor a pass with the general reasoning of "Meh, his posting looks genuine to me at times."

I laid out my reasoning on eektor in #1179, with another point in #1334. Could people give me some reasoning as to why this doesn't look like scum to you, based on my points?

I think I replied to #1179 at the time. I agree with the point you made in #1334 (nearly voted eektor when he made that post, in fact). I am nevertheless scumreading other players more strongly.

[Aquanim]

Actually, I can say that better in more words.

Aeronaut wasn't widely suspected. Boon is quickly moving to the position of default lynch. The only thing that changed to that slot is that a new player came in who doesn't post. The whole case is "he doesn't post". It's shortsighted to judge that slot on just boon, which I guess is a better word than "stupid", but then, language isn't my strongest side.

On top of that it doesn't smell like scum lurking. If that's what's going on, the dude, tool, lemons are players that come to mind as options.

There's one more aspect to the case. If Boonskiies is town, there were no scum voting for Metalcyanide while Taly was still alive. I'm not sure who that damns but it's a fact to be considered.

Aeronaut was indeed not widely suspected at the time. That doesn't mean his posts at the time were not in fact scum-indicative.

[Aquanim]

...
First of all, he was out of the hospital, said he was going to be active from then on. Then first post on day 2, he picks one single post without looking at any others before it and there weren't that many posts there. So no that isn't a reasonable explanation for it.

I don't think that InsidiousLemons missing the context of that post reflects well on his slot but I don't think that it's especially important compared to looking at his play as a whole, and the wagon on him day 1.

I was hoping to put off making big moves until more discussion happened but at this rate we're going to end up with another nolynch.

[Aquanim]

In short, I think that Mykonian's read of Boonskiies is extremely suspect.

ok, rereading.

I think it's stupid to lynch boon.
I should have been more careful about the dude. I don't like him now I reread.
Don't want to lynch cyanide, IL still looks shifty.

Issue is that dude-IL scumteam doesn't make sense. We are likely looking at 3 since this is a mini, tool or elyse is likely sitting in my blind spot. Curious game, not enough scum.

vote the dude.

other possible person sitting in a blind spot is aqua, I guess.

First, he states that it is stupid to lynch Boonskiies. There is an argument to be made for this, along the lines of "we are better off lynching a slot we can know is scum rather than a coinflip". That's a reasonable point to make, though I'm not sure I agree - but it is NOT a reason to TOWNREAD Boonskiies. I do not think a reason to strongly townread Boonskiies exists in this game. It also presumably only applies to today's lynch - if Boonskiies is scum, which is quite possible, we can't just never lynch him if we want to win.

In the final part of this post Mykonian applies process-of-elimination to determine that Toolenduso, Elyse or myself must be mafia.

But he has not actually eliminated Boonskiies

. I do not think there is any possible way for Mykonian, as town, to come to the conclusion that Boonskiies is certainly town and that therefore one of Tool, Elyse or myself must be mafia.

The most likely reason for this is that Boonskiies is Mykonian's scumbuddy, and that having come up with a reason to "eliminate" him from the pool (a reason which only applies to today's lynch, at best, in fact) Mykonian felt able to ignore him in his process-of-elimination, even though this does not actually make any sense from a town perspective.

It is also possible, though less likely, that Boonskiies is town and that Mykonian was just lazy. I do find it hard to believe that Mykonian would rule out so juicy a mislynch as Boonskiies though.

I see no way that Mykonian can have come to this conclusion as town. It simply doesn't make any sense for a townie to hard townread Boonskiies here.

---//---

I also think Metalcyanide is scum but there is the outside possibility that Mykonian is white-knighting him. One way or another, given the certainty which Mykonian has displayed towards the slot despite paltry evidence, Mykonian either knows certainly Metal is town or is pushing all-in to try to avoid a Metal lynch.

I think I would prefer to lynch Mykonian today

but given the trouble we've had actually putting together the votes for a lynch consolidation on Metal may be safer.

Spoiler: Regarding Metaltown and Lemonscum

Given the way the Metalcyanide and InsidiousLemons wagons formed at the end of day 1, with a Metal wagon remaining from before Taly's flip and then an Insidious wagon forming in response - I do not think that InsidiousLemons scum and Metalcyanide town is a feasible theory. This is a votecount representative of the end of day 1:

INSIDIOUSLEMONS [5]: eektor,

pisskop

, TheDudeAbides, mykonian, Metalcyanide
METALCYANIDE [4]: Aquanim, Boonskiies, Elyse, Toolenduso
MYKONIAN [1]:

RadiantCowbells

NOT VOTING [1]: InsidiousLemons

If InsidiousLemons is mafia and Metalcyanide is town, who are the scumbuddies of InsidiousLemons who are trying to save him?

Furthermore, knowing that I am town and my historical ability to force a lynch through, I do not believe that if InsidiousLemons is mafia and Metalcyanide is town I failed to achieve a Metalcyanide lynch. I almost have a hard time believing Metal can be town at all given that.

I also don't think Mykonian's reasons for townreading Metal are sufficient to explain how strongly he has defended Metal.

Town. On it's own, I find post 282 stood out as a very town post. After that, the way the wagons form and reasons why the votes on him appear are the way mislynches form.

Like, so

vt

claiming like that is just silly, not scummy. But it's good at getting you attention and votes. Despite it just being a game, it's easy to form a mob.

Problems with this post:
- I see no way in which #282 was a town post at all. This was the post in which Metal claimed (entirely without basis) that a RadiantCowbells lynch would provide the most information, and said some meandering stuff that didn't really accomplish anything to Taly.
- Nobody is lynching Metalcyanide because he claimed VT.
- No explanation of why the Metal wagon looked like a mislynch wagon, and I also believe this simply isn't true. I pushed it against the town-Taly wagon and met significant resistance. The way the InsidiousLemons wagon assembled in response seems to be to be quite likely to be at least partially a scum response, whether it is a town wagon or a bus on inactive scum.

[Aquanim]

Spoiler: Toolenduso #1337

Well, if you still don't want to talk about that, I think I've adequately made my point.

Well, we went over it again, ended up on the same result. I've tried to explain the difference between scumminess and weird, you find ways to convince yourself weird is scummy. Of course it's not going anywhere, argument doesn't change with what the feelings of others are.

Only one way to find out, isn't there?

vote metal

I'm saying I hammered town. Still think he's scum?

I'm less convinced he's gonna flip scum than I was a few days ago

heh, already backing out?

lol.

Tomorrow you are going to say you know all along, I guess?

anyway, I'm on in 2 hours anyway.

vote IL

Mykonian, could you explain the reasoning behind these two votes?

Mykonian also had no answer to this question. I don't believe a town motivation behind those votes exists.

It can't possibly be a reaction test for me considering how strongly Mykonian is townreading me.

I don't believe a townie would be willing to hammer their hard-town-read (Metalcyanide), and then chicken out and not actually make a lynch happen. As a townie, he should either be willing to lynch Metal for the sake of a flip, or not if he's truly that confident... not flip-flop between the two to win some pissing contest with me.

[Aquanim]

...
So...why call it semi-crazy in post #1412?
...

So it wouldn't be fully ignored.

I imagine the point is "why did you call it crazy to any degree if you were hoping to get reactions out of it?".

[Aquanim]

Also, I disagree with Mykonian being suspicious for saying not to lynch me. If anyone is pushing my lynch it is OBVIscum driven as absolutely no association flips will be told by me dying. It is only Day 2. I am a Day 4+ lynch kind of person; mykonian has some experience with me.

Nah, if you flip town it substantially increases the odds of Metal flipping scum, since there would have been no scum on the Metal wagon at any point.

Also, the point is that Mykonian is using a reason to NOT LYNCH you as a reason to TOWNREAD you, which it is not.

[Aquanim]

EBWOP: any point before the Taly flip. Though I doubt Elyse and Tool are scum, so it probably applies to any point before the end of day 1.

[Aquanim]

You can go back to not trying now, Boonskiies, your team's caught.

[Aquanim]

Also, I disagree with Mykonian being suspicious for saying not to lynch me. If anyone is pushing my lynch it is OBVIscum driven as absolutely no association flips will be told by me dying. It is only Day 2. I am a Day 4+ lynch kind of person; mykonian has some experience with me.

Nah, if you flip town it substantially increases the odds of Metal flipping scum, since there would have been no scum on the Metal wagon at any point.

Also, the point is that Mykonian is using a reason to NOT LYNCH you as a reason to TOWNREAD you, which it is not.

So why not just lynch Metal? Yeah...bro, you're scum. Pushing far too much on the Boonie to possibly be town.

...You might not have noticed since you don't read the game, but I'm currently voting for Metal. After we lynch him, we can lynch you and Mykonian, and then town wins.

[Aquanim]

Also, Aqua, you shouldn't even try to push me at this point...people are going to come in and see I'm obviously town. LLL.

I dunno what world you're living in, mate, but I'm town and everyone knows it.

[Aquanim]

Well, you've amused me a little, Boonskiies, but unless someone else in this game takes you seriously and I have to disillusion them, pointing out your fabrications is a waste of my time. Suffice it to say that Mykonian being scum is the only reason he could have to townread you. (As opposed to try to put off your lynch for a later day, which he could conceivably do as a townie.)

The replacement and I haven't talked much yet. That, and her read, will change.

[Aquanim]

The most likely reason for this is that Boonskiies is Mykonian's scumbuddy, and that having come up with a reason to "eliminate" him from the pool (a reason which only applies to today's lynch, at best, in fact) Mykonian felt able to ignore him in his process-of-elimination, even though this does not actually make any sense from a town perspective.

That's wonderfully creative, aqua.

Not pictured: any reason why you would as town eliminate Boonskiies from the list of possible mafia.

[Aquanim]

I think I've posted three seperate things why I'm doubtful such a lynch will have success by now.

Now, look at it from the other side. Suppose I was his buddy, I could do three things. I could shut up about it and hope he lurks it out. I could bus my buddy. I could hardcore defend a lurker.

Which do you see happen?

I think "wonderfully creative" is as good as you are going to get, aqua.

That's the thing though. You are not *hardcore defending* Boonskiies. Your reasons for not lynching him are:

Aeronaut wasn't widely suspected. Boon is quickly moving to the position of default lynch. The only thing that changed to that slot is that a new player came in who doesn't post. The whole case is "he doesn't post". It's shortsighted to judge that slot on just boon, which I guess is a better word than "stupid", but then, language isn't my strongest side.

This isn't even a reason to townread Boonskiies. At best I would describe it as a reason to slightly moderate a scumread on him.

On top of that it doesn't smell like scum lurking. If that's what's going on, the dude, tool, lemons are players that come to mind as options.

This is a non-statement. No reasons given at all why it "doesn't smell like scum lurking".

I can't find any third reason, assuming it was in this daycycle.

And yet, without really noticing, you totally ruled out Boonskiies from the pool you said you were looking for scum in. I don't think you deliberately tried to defend him, beyond saying he wasn't a good lynch today on policy... it just slipped out that pursuing Boonskiies was totally off the table for you.

[Aquanim]

Thank you for confirming that from your perspective you claim to have Boonskiies as a hard town read, though. That makes this a fair bit easier.

[Aquanim]

I'd switch back to Metal if it became necessary to actually get a lynch today.

UNVOTE: Metalcyanide
VOTE: mykonian

[Aquanim]

@Town

: If you're not voting Mykonian with your next post I want to know why.

[Aquanim]

Aqua: why you switching from me to mykonian?

But I am going to VOTE: mykonian becasue I find his hard defense of me to be off and his defense of Boon is just dumb.

I'm marginally more sure about him than about you.

[Aquanim]

myo is a fair move.
boons is perhaps better

meeeeh... I'd do it, but without the association with Mykonian the case for Boonskiies is a touch sketchy. Then again, there is a bunch more Boonskiies posts to analyse now.

Boonskiies' case on Toolenduso seems like something thrown together hurriedly, and I don't really buy it. He decided he wanted a case for why Tool was scum, then went through Tool's ISO picking out posts he could say something about. (The bad and paranoid player in me wants to say that Boonskiies split it up into so many posts and spammed the thread so that my post would no longer be on the last page, and would thus not be so visible. Bad and paranoid, though.)

Boonskiies' claim that Mykonian would have attacked him regardless of Boon's alignment if Mykonian were scum:

Spoiler:

...
Yeah metal might be scum. But only if tool's not. Again, ScumMykonian would have bussed ScumBoon hands down there. There was absolutely no reason to protect me. At all. And ScumMykonian would have pushed TownBoon. There's no possible way that Mykonian is scum.

does not go well with his claim that Mykonian has prior experience with Boon and would know not to lynch him:

Spoiler:

Also, I disagree with Mykonian being suspicious for saying not to lynch me. If anyone is pushing my lynch it is OBVIscum driven as absolutely no association flips will be told by me dying. It is only Day 2. I am a Day 4+ lynch kind of person; mykonian has some experience with me.

Does Boon seriously think that Mykonian's alignment would be solely and reliably determined by whether Mykonian tried to lynch Boonskiies? Does he seriously think Mykonian is that unaware of what he would do as town when he rolls scum? Even supposing that Boonskiies' opinion of what Mykonian would do as town is accurate, that doesn't add up.

[Aquanim]

@Town

: If you're not voting Mykonian with your next post I want to know why.

Curious thing, shifting the onus of proof. In real life it's obvious, here in practical nature it hides that the wagon is based on gut feeling and little else. But one votes and more follow. Case? There isn't any. It's a collection of things that don't "feel right", interactions that are strange to you. And the funniest part is that if you'll actually force people to come with reasons, everybody will have their personal ones.

I mean, for testing purposes you could give it a go and see if I actually got it right, but it's not really the point.

Well, that's an interesting attempt at misrepresenting the case against you as "gut feeling" but it won't fly.

For the record, the purpose of that question is twofold:
1) If somebody does not fully understand the case, hopefully their answer makes that clear and I can clear up any misunderstandings.
2) If somebody has an actually good reason to think the case is flawed, I certainly want to hear that.

"Shifting the onus of proof" doesn't come into it. I've done my share of the proving.

Not that it helped anything, in the end. Still think it was the proper course. I know I'm going into self meta here, but imagine I'd have taken the same vitriol and put it in actual arguments against RC, what do you think would have happened to the game?

I think you'd have had to argue with RC, and that you'd avoid that regardless of your alignment or whether you thought you would "win". I imagine the point you're trying to make is that as scum you would fill the thread with rubbish by arguing with RC... but since you obviously know you wouldn't do that as town, and arguing with RC is a pointless exercise that might make you look bad, I hardly find it a convincing argument.

[Aquanim]

@Aqua
I'm having trouble understanding how you came to the conclusion mykonian is considering Boon as certainly town. Everyone else seems to get it so I think it's just me. Can you run me through that? ...

As you say it's a bit irrelevant now but the point was that Mykonian concluded that you, tool (or myself as an afterthought) were probably scum, even though he wasn't really scumreading any of us individually,

because

he'd eliminated everyone else (including Boonskiies).

...
I do think you make a good point that the leading wagons being Taly vs Metal and then IL vs Metal suggest Metal scum. What would a metal scumflip do to your mykonian read?
...

I'm confident Mykonian is scum regardless of the Metal flip. Metal flipping scum would merely make the remainder of the game very easy.

The more interesting question is what does a Mykonian scum flip do to my Metal read. Mykonian's actions towards Metal could be read as white-knighting a townie or defending his scumbuddy. Distinguishing the two is a difficult task I have not yet come to a satisfactory conclusion about.

[Aquanim]

EBWOP: Mykonian concluded that one player in the set of {Elyse, Tool, Aqua} was scum, based on his scumreads on TDA and IL and his townreads on everyone else (a set which includes Boonskiies). The previous wording was unclear.

[Aquanim]

Is anyone else interested/amused/concerned by the Echo effect of Aqua/Elyse/Tool about Boon's case? o.0
...

I'm not sure what you mean here.

[Aquanim]

I am getting a little nervous about all the people going V/LA for easter considering deadline is on Monday. In particular

@Elyse, Toolenduso, Bellaphant

: don't go V/LA until deadline without voting Mykonian first.

[Aquanim]

@Mod

: I'm not V/LA.

[Aquanim]

@Metalcyanide

: I think that in the next two days we're going to lynch Mykonian and Boonskiies and they're both going to flip mafia. This is your opportunity to sell me on the idea that you shouldn't come next.

Besides Mykonian and Boonskiies, who do you think is mafia and why? Why do you not think the other people are mafia?

[Aquanim]

don't think too much, it makes your head hurt.

@Elyse, toolenduso

: The above is Mykonian's reply to TheDudeAbides questioning Mykonian's scumread on TDA; Mykonian is not actually trying to push TDA with any reason or case, despite his vote on TDA, and the above post looks like the kind of thing that would be said to someone you know is town.

That being said: You have both alluded to some cause for doubt that Mykonian is town. You are going to have to explain that.

[Aquanim]

EBWOP: "cause for doubt that Mykonian is mafia" or "cause to believe that Mykonian is town". Whichever way floats your boat.

[Aquanim]

@eektor

: Can you give an update as to your read on Bellaphant/InsidiousLemons?

If you have any other interesting reads or points I'd quite like to hear them too.

[Aquanim]

My hesitance to lynch mykonian stems from my early townread on him. He and I had very similar thought processes and he would say things that were on my mind. This either comes from a town mindset or an adept scum mindset. Not to say that mykonian isn't skilled, but it's hard to fake.

Were most or all of those thoughts about Taly?

Because, while I didn't think Taly was scum myself, nor that on the whole he played exceptionally badly... pointing out his "mistakes" was like shooting fish in a barrel.

[Aquanim]

I have my doubts about mykonian but I'm not joining a wagon with eektor and metal on it.

Given Metal's previous statements about Mykonian (and Boon) he didn't have a choice under the circumstances, whatever his alignment or Mykonian's.

Have you looked at eektor's meta?

[Aquanim]

...
No counterwagon is troublesome. I have schoolworks I

have

to do, but Id like to exp]lore this game.

As far as I'm concerned, there was a counterwagon, and you're now on it.

Mykonian and Boonskiies did try to start wagons elsewhere, too, even if they were rather half-assed.

[Aquanim]

By the same token, if anyone is worried about the speed at which the wagon gathered momentum... look at the players who got on board it.

Aquanim - do you think I'm mafia driving this?
Metalcyanide - considering the other wagon on the table is his, what else could he reasonably do? (Especially considering how he got slammed for messing around and voting elsewhere in similar situations yesterday).
Pisskop - town pr
TheDudeAbides - do you think he's mafia who jumped on?

[Aquanim]

By my count there are less than 24 hours left in the day, and messing about at this stage got us a nolynch last time. We don't even have a wagon at L-1 any more...

Do not screw this up.

[Aquanim]

It was L-1 before; with Pisskop removing his vote and Bellaphant adding hers, we have returned to L-1. I think.

[Aquanim]

Happy

Yeah, I hope so. The below was written before that hammer, to give it a little context.

---//---

Okay, dealing with the less likely stuff first.

If Mykonian flips town then I'm not sure why Boonskiies would spaz out at me like he did if he is mafia. If he really thinks that having a go at lynching me is a good idea, why not wait until after Mykonian flips town? His present behaviour makes sense (kinda) only if he's trying to stop a Mykonian lynch. I'm not certain Boonskiies is town in this case but I think I would require a good explanation as to his recent actions to lynch him.

Besides that I'd basically need to rethink the entire game if Mykonian flips town.

---//---

If Mykonian flips scum, lynch Boonskiies. Do not go lynching into possible scum (eektor, say) when there's an obvious one under your nose. I'm not saying you can't think about other people but don't go flipping them until you've lynched Boon (and probably Metal, too).

If Boonskiies (somehow) flips town... I dunno. The below probably still holds to some degree, except you'll now be looking for two mafia rather than one. The only difference is that there will have been NO mafia on Metal before the Taly flip.

---//---

The remainder of this post (at least, most of it) assumes that Mykonian and Boonskiies will flip mafia. I was going to make some huge wallpost summing up the game... but I spent a lot of time not getting anywhere and eventually gave up. The following will have to do.

Metalcyanide is probably the most likely to flip mafia for reasons previously mentioned. The one thing which makes me seriously question this is Mykonian's attitude towards him at the end of day 1... my feeling is that Mykonian knew something I didn't about Metal. (The whole "I think he'll flip town; do you still think he'll flip scum?" thing.) Then again, I think Mykonian and Metal knew they had to distance there, maybe my feeling here was Mykonian's actual intent. <shrug>.

If Metal flips town

, take a really good look at Elyse. In that case, the two wagons Elyse has pushed (Taly and Metal) were both town, and she's been rather unenthusiastic about a Mykonian lynch. (Though I'm not sure why she would push all-in to get the Metal lynch today, since if he flips town today Mykonian and Boonskiies probably get lynched in the next days anyway and it would compromise her a fair bit). I tried to meta Elyse but didn't really get anywhere worthwhile. If she hasn't played for 6 months or a year her meta could be different anyway.

@Toolenduso

: You said you'd lost to Elyse's scumgame at some point IIRC. Keeping that in mind, what makes you confident she is town here?

I still have a hard time believing that I failed to get a Metal lynch D1 if the Insidious slot is scum but Boonskiies was voting Metal and Mykonian tried to "hammer" Metal at some stage... maybe the scumteam just couldn't help that wagon any more than they did.

About eektor... I dunno. I kind of liked the way he came at me over the "defensive" posts in d2, in that he did not try to make a bigger thing out of it than it was but also did not just ignore it (I feel that scum might have just not bothered pursuing an angle on such an unlikely lynch). That is a pretty piss-poor reason for a read, mind you. Eektor has been V/LA at some rather awkward stages as far as reading him is concerned. I have made other comments about eektor (in particular in response to tool's arguments), you can search my ISO for them. I think I found on a cursory read of eektor's meta that he tends towards the "reciting facts" rather than "making judgements" style as town, so that might not be a good point against him.

Tool is probably town, though his defending Mykonian lately made me a little worried.

TheDudeAbides is very likely town. Don't lynch him unless you have some amazing case which I can't see.

Unless there's another town PR Pisskop is town, no matter who (if anyone) gets shot before him. If someone else claims another town PR I'd probably lynch them before Pisskop, so there's that too.

So, the short version of the above... if you lynch Mykonian, Boonskiies and Metalcyanide and the game still isn't over, I'd lynch one of {Elyse, Bellaphant, Eektor}.

I'd like to talk about those three in the remaining time

. I imagine I'm likely to be long dead before that decision has to actually be made. That being said I am willing to discuss anybody.

[Aquanim]

...

I mostly agree with Aqua except I'm town and I don't really see TDA town. Or TDA scum for that matter but I don't see why he's ruling him out.

If nothing else, I don't really see a reason for Mykonian to bus TDA at the time he did. Not that Mykonian tried real hard to push that, so it's not completely impossible.

Besides that it's mostly a feel read. I like his attitude to the game, he seems to want to work things out. I haven't seen anything resembling a case on him.

[Aquanim]

<the awful realisation that to play to my wincondition I must also play towards the wincon of Mykonian and RadiantCowbells>

Eh, whatever. It's presumably MYLO, don't throw votes around willy-nilly.

[Aquanim]

I don't really see the point.

[Aquanim]

To narrow the pool of suspects, generally.

Well yeah, I see that - but I'm reasonably confident that scum would either shoot me or someone I wouldn't lynch anyway, in the present situation. Neither of which helps much.

Any particular reason you don't put Bellaphant on that list?

[Aquanim]

I'll be able to tell if my Tool scum theory is correct after he posts.
...

What became of this?

[Aquanim]

Who wouldn't you lynch right now?
...

I will answer this question, but later.

[Aquanim]

Looking back at the myko lynch, I think Bella and TDA would be the most likely to be scum on that wagon. If Bella is scum, the fact that tool left her out would make me think they are partners.

Why these two in particular?

[Aquanim]

Bellaphant, who do you want to lynch next?

[Aquanim]

I feel like it makes sense to no-lynch today. It eliminates possibilities.

I agree with this.

VOTE: No Lynch

And when Elyse or myself is dead tomorrow you'll have learned nothing of worth. Are you seriously considering lynching either of us?

[Aquanim]

One stubborn townie can't lose the game *immediately*, anyway.

For the record I've decided that if Elyse is scum I'd prefer to lose to her play than for this town to win. That's not quite the same as a townread but it functions like one at this stage.

[Aquanim]

Well, that's probably suicide.

[Aquanim]

How?

I don't see you winning a showdown with Elyse.

As for your actual argument there... pushing for two lynches which turn out to be town (even supposing that's true) doesn't necessarily make someone mafia. You'll need a much better argument than that.

[Aquanim]

I think town has giving up this game anyways. So everyone just vote for you who you want then I think we can try to figure it out from there after everyone casts a vote

That's a pretty bad idea, from a town perspective. if everyon just votes for who they likes scum quite possibly get an easy hammer on a townie to close out the game.

I really want to believe that if you were town you'd have thought that through. After the Mykonian flip I no longer have a lower bound on the incompetence of townies, but...

[Aquanim]

In the context that should perhaps have been upper bound. Whatever. Math is hard.

I'm not entirely certain this is the best play, but I really don't want to lose by not lynching Metal for three days.

VOTE: Metalcyanide

[Aquanim]

Aqua - you figured out that metal voting Eelyse is probably suicide, but you still think that he's doing it as scum?

I know, I know, believe me I know...

I think town has giving up this game anyways. So everyone just vote for you who you want then I think we can try to figure it out from there after everyone casts a vote

...but how can I let this post live?

If Aqua, Elyse and Metalcyanide are all town, then the scum team is probably Bella, Boon and one of Eektor and Tool. It's certainly 3 of the 4 and I don't think Tool and Eektor are buddies.

I agree with this, except that if Metal's scum I'd substitute him for Boonskiies. I'm aware that trying to get associatives out of Boon's play is a perilous prospect but if he's scum with Metal I don't see why he went apeshit after I posted the Mykonian case.

I'm really not sure which of Tool and Eektor I would go with, though.

[Aquanim]

This isn't much more than a gesture, but:

UNVOTE: Metalcyanide

[Aquanim]

@Elyse, TheDudeAbides

: I think you're both town, and you have strongly conflicting reads on Metalcyanide. Whichever one of you is right, convince me and the other one, or we lose.

I think the obvious first place to go is for TheDudeAbides to take a look at Elyse's case, most recently posted in #1668.

I fully intend to contribute to this discussion, as should others, but you both appear to be very sure - and despite my frusturation at the thought a townie might think #1681 is a good idea, I am no longer sure.

VOTE: Metalcyanide

Remember that time metal townread me after his "reaction test" and I continued to push him and all of a sudden I'm scum?

Yeah same.

Remember that Metal was scumreading Mykonian. After a townflip there it is not unreasonable that some of his previous townreads might alter.

[Aquanim]

@Elyse

: This is probably going to be hard, but I'm going to ask you to reassess toolenduso. I townread him too for a long time... but I've begun to not like the way he's kind of tagged on the end of a lot of wagons after they gathered momentum (Taly and Metal day 1, Metal day 2). Try to disassociate it from your Metal read. I don't know if he's scum, but I'm not really townreading him much any more.

I'll see what I can do about explaining my TDA read, but that's going to be difficult as well.

My biggest objection to a no-lynch today is that (with all due respect) if we let Mafia take three shots before the end of the game, I don't place much faith or trust in the players I suspect would be alive at 3p LYLO. If we only let scum have two shots between now and 4p MYLO, whoever the additional townie turns out to be I suspect I will have more faith in them, looking at my reads.

[Aquanim]

Be that as it may, I still no longer trust you, and I am concerned that Elyse does so blindly because you agreed with her on Taly and Metal.

[Aquanim]

I vaguely recall seeing you lose to Tool's scumgame once when I read your meta. If I'm recalling that correctly, what is the difference you're seeing between that game and here?

My concern with the Metal case is... well, it's a good case, but so was the Mykonian case. In some ways, so was the Taly case. Nevertheless, I feel-townread Taly, and I was right; you feel-townread Mykonian and you were right; TDA (and Mykonian, for that matter) feel-townread Metal, and I can at least see where TDA's coming from. Metal's... for lack of a better word, hysteria, about getting a lynch day 1, and the suicidal course of action he's chosen today (if he's scum, he's doing this with the blessing of his buddies?) do kinda feel towny, even if they're not good play.

[Aquanim]

I quite agree it doesn't follow a logical town thought process. The problem is I don't see a logical scum thought process either. What is he trying to accomplish?

[Aquanim]

No he lost to my scum game. ...

That happened too.

My recollection was correct - I was thinking of Mini 1568: http://forum.mafiascum.net/viewtopic.php?f=54&t=48144

Admittedly it looks like a wacky theme game and you died n1.

[Aquanim]

On some level I think that's an accurate assessment. I'm just not convinced that after consulting with his scumbuddies overnight, the best plan they could come up with is "you suicide into Elyse and we'll just watch you crash and burn". He could quite believably have gone after Eektor, Boonskiies or Bellaphant instead.

Perhaps my current line of thought is what they were hoping to accomplish. In the end, it's WIFOM.

What about desperately trying to save yourself at LYLO and attacking someone who wants you lynched (when you know you're town) is inherently untowny? I know the read's inconsistent with what he said day2, but townies do reassess the game after their scumreads flip town.

(I'm playing devil's advocate a bit here. The way the Insidious lynch on a V/LA lurker formed day 1 in opposition to the Metal wagon, and the Mykonian wagon built momentum day 2 so quickly, forms a pretty good story for Metal being scum. Nevertheless, we can no longer afford to get this wrong, so I'm trying to look at this from every angle.)

[Aquanim]

Aquanim, what games are you using for meta on Eelyse and tool?

I was mostly looking for scum games of Elyse; the two I read some of were Open 502 and Mini 1511. I don't recall learning much of importance, beyond generally understanding Elyse a little better.

I haven't set forth specifically to meta Tool but in looking through Elyse's games I found a scum game of his which I've perused briefly, Mini 1568. I just took a look over some random town games of his (read: skimmed his ISOs for about a minute) and... maybe there's a difference. Something along the lines of him being more conversational and relaxed as town. I'd need considerably more reading to be sure about that and in any case I'm not sure how I'd classify him this game.

[Aquanim]

I think town has giving up this game anyways. So everyone just vote for you who you want then I think we can try to figure it out from there after everyone casts a vote

That's a pretty bad idea, from a town perspective. if everyon just votes for who they likes scum quite possibly get an easy hammer on a townie to close out the game.

I really want to believe that if you were town you'd have thought that through. After the Mykonian flip I no longer have a lower bound on the incompetence of townies, but...

@Aqua, is this a comment on remaining town, or myk?

...

It's a comment about Mykonian. I don't blame townies for sheeping the case on him.

Would you be happy with lynching Boonskiies today?

[Aquanim]

...
@Aquanim Maybe I'm missing something but I don't see the IL lynch forming as a counterwagon to metal's lynch. Most people were on Taly and then when he got modkilled, the wagon on Taly split into metal and IL.

I think your recollection is inaccurate. There was a significant Metal wagon even before the Taly modkill:

Vote Count 1.12 - up to post #799.

Taly[4]: Elyse, mykonian, InsidiousLemons, toolenduso[L-3]
metalcyanide [4]: RadiantCowbells, Aquanim, Boonskiies, Taly[L-3]
RadiantCowbells[1]: Metalcyanide
Not Voting[3]: eektor, pisskop, TheDudeAbides

With 12 alive, it requires 7 votes to lynch.

Day ends on Monday, March 16th at 5:10 PM USA Mountain Time, or when a lynch occurs

That being said, the Metal wagon was at that point composed of players I did not feel comfortable on a wagon with on principle. (RC, Boon and a newbie? Come on.)

It is also true that with Taly's modkill and RC going off somewhere else the only common players between this votecount and later are myself and Boonskiies. Even so the Insidious wagon was nowhere to be seen until after Taly flipped, at which stage the only lynch on the table was Metal.

[Aquanim]

@Aquanim You are correct. One thing though I noticed is that if you think the IL wagon was to counter metal's wagon (assuming metal is scum), the people on IL's wagon ended up being confirmed town.

From what I saw, I started voting for IL, then after a while pisskop (confirmed town) joined, later mykonian (confirmed town) joined. At the end TDA joins. If metal is scum, I would put Bella as scum buddy for him refusing until pressured to vote for IL and TDA as joining the counterwagon of his scum buddy. Which I think contradicts itself and doesn't make sense for that to be the scum team.

Yes, a fair few people on that wagon flipped town. I also have to consider the possibility that you're scum with Metal and started the counterwagon on the Insidious slot, though I suppose you don't have to. Why do you not consider the possibility that if Metal and Bellaphant are scum, the remaining scum bussed Metal instead of Insidious?

VOTE: Elyse

..............................................................................

@Metalcyanide, Boonskiies

: Would one of you please unvote Elyse? I don't think there's any immediate risk of a three-way scum hammer (not because I think Elyse is scum, mind you) but better safe than sorry.

[Aquanim]

I think you missed the last question: if Bellaphant and Metal are both scum, you appear to have only considered the possibility that the third scum was on the InsidiousLemons wagon (hence concluding that it's TDA). What makes you think that the third mafia would not be on the Metal wagon day 1 instead?

[Aquanim]

@Toolenduso

: What do you think about the case Eektor has presented for Bellaphant, and the chat I've been having with him?

[Aquanim]

The case against Bella was pretty weak IMO. I can go into detail later if you want...

Yes, I want to see your thoughts in detail.

[Aquanim]

@Metalcyanide

: Same question as for Tool. What do you think about the case Eektor has presented for Bellaphant, and the chat I've been having with him?

[Aquanim]

...

My question to you, is are you willing to vote for Bella? The only person I see you thinking of lynching so far is metal and Boon, is that correct?

VOTE: Bellaphant
Does that answer your question?

Actually, since that's two votes.
UNVOTE: Bellaphant
while I consult with a couple of people. You may however take that as intention to vote Bellaphant.

My reasons aren't entirely the same as yours, though.

I would characterise the Mykonian wagon as being "controversial". He is an experienced player, strong-willed and argumentative; though it didn't really eventuate that way this time because he was V/LA over Easter, I can well imagine him going down all guns blazing. My experience with wagons of this kind on townie is that mafia are very hesitant to get on such a wagon, if they do so at all.

So far as I can see, that sums up Bellaphant's attitude to the wagon entirely. Despite the fact that she consistently scumread Mykonian:

...
Scum:
Myk: this is mostly gut, I don't like a lot of his pushes.
...

...
Myk seems to be defending metal; now, metal may or may not be scum, but either way he's not obv!town, as evidenced by points raised in Elyse's 1446 and his defense/counter in 1448. Regardless of Elyse's alignment (though I'm currently town-reading her), there is some suspicious activity and I can't see the advantage of town!Myk defending this.
...

Bellaphant put off voting for Mykonian until near the end of the day, and (both at the time and Day 3) tried to cast it as a vote "to avoid a no-lynch". As far as I recall, she is the only player on the Mykonian wagon who has attempted to avoid responsibility for that flip.

While Eektor may have put his first point about Bellaphant townreading Tool a bit awkwardly, it does seem a strange reason for Bellaphant to townread Tool all of a sudden. Tool's been pushing Eektor all game, what changed for Bellaphant to move Tool from a scumread to a townread?

I don't think that Bellaphant playing differently to how she played as scum with Eektor in their other game is particularly indicative either way. Knowing that Eektor would be familiar with her previous meta, she might well play differently here if she were scum, but that's not a positive argument that she is not town.

I have not reread InsidiousLemons' posts in some time; I was not particularly strongly townreading him day 1, though I felt that lynching Metal was preferable to lynching someone who had presumably been in hospital for the past week. I might do that, though I'm not sure it's necessary.

[Aquanim]

Boonskiies' case on Tool begins here though there is one previous mention of the read here.

[Aquanim]

@TheDudeAbides

: I know I said I townread you, but that wasn't a license to lurk for five days. :/

[Aquanim]

...
Aqua, I know you haven't exactly been gung-ho about a metal lynch, but would you consider it today? I kind of want to vote for him and I would feel more comfortable with you on the wagon.

Why would having me vote for Metal make you more comfortable?

Also, what is your actual read on Boonskiies?

[Aquanim]

Is that Boon and Metal and (Bella or Eektor)... or (Boon or Metal) and Bella and Eektor?

[Aquanim]

I have a hard time seeing Boonskiies and Metal as scum together.

Why did Boonskiies go apeshit when I posted my case on Mykonian, if that case had just saved his scumbuddy Metal from being the only wagon of the day?

[Aquanim]

As far as I can see, Boonskiies was voting for Metal (http://forum.mafiascum.net/viewtopic.ph ... 8#p6705768) right up until he switched to Tool, and then later to myself.

It's true that Boonskiies did not switch back to Metal as an answer to the Mykonian wagon. For that matter, he barely posted in that interval. Boonskiies being scum with not-Metal and not really giving a shit, or being town and not really giving a shit, both occur to me as possibilities.

[Aquanim]

I have some theories about Boonskiies' vote for you. He's given some kind of an answer to your question already:

...
meh, i'm just disinterested town forgetting that I'm in this game.
...

do you mind if I post said theories, or would you prefer to drag a more illuminating response from him?

[Aquanim]

@Toolenduso

: I assume you think Eektor and Metal are two of the three scum (if that is not true, say so). Who do you think the third mafia is?

[Aquanim]

In short, if Boonskiies is scum I wonder if he made that vote as a distraction from the pressure on Bellaphant. He might well have thought that the vote would be likely to make you refocus on Metal's vote for you; it is an outcome I expected from Boon's vote.

If he's town then he probably simply doesn't give a damn. I don't know how to read townies that simply don't care about their wincon. There's an outside possibility it was a reaction test.

[Aquanim]

Maybe we should all give 2 names we are willing to vote today. If you have more than 2, feel free to say all of them.

What do you guys think?

Okay, but unless someone would like to FoS me I intend to go last (or when I get bored).

I'd be okay with going before Elyse but I think her cards are on the table already.

[Aquanim]

Well my number one is Bella but I have a tie for 2nd which is Boon and tool. The way I see it one of them is scum, the other isn't. I really want a Bella lynch but I'll join one of those two wagons. The only one I trust to be town right now is Aqua.

What's your reason for saying it's exactly one of those two?

[Aquanim]

Oh, and whatever you do, townies, don't throw down any stupid votes. If we lose, that is not the way I would want it to happen.

[Aquanim]

I have been unable to find a game, scum or town, in which Boonskiies played this irredeemably badly.

Unfortunately, even that probably means nothing about his alignment.

[Aquanim]

From the perspective of associations at least, that team of his isn't 100% implausible.

Even so, the total lack of explanation is atrocious.

[Aquanim]

Wait... no, cancel that. He put Eektor and Tool on the same team?

Uh... I guess that's theoretically possible, but...

[Aquanim]

No, no... look. I read some town games, and I read a scum game or two. In ALL of them, you made some pretense of explaining your reads, which you haven't done here.

I am truly and completely uninterested in your own perception of your meta. It is worthless to me.

And when you get right down to it... I would policy lynch your play in any game I've seen of yours on principle. This game more than others. Even if I were to lose because of it, I think that would be worth making sure you never got to have fun with your playstyle in ANY game you played, town or scum. Maybe then you'd learn not to be a total fucking disgrace to the town alignment whenever you rolled it.

[Aquanim]

I don't care how good you think your reads are day 3 or 4, or even how good they actually are. If you're not generating material to read yourself and others in early days, you're not explaining your reads and pushing them to get them lynched, and you're not willing to compromise, you are totally worthless as a town player.

[Aquanim]

If nothing else, you get to have your """good""" reads lategame because players like me carried your sorry ass through days one and two. If everyone played like you, nothing of worth would happen for the first few days, there would be nothing to read, and scum would win like 80% of games.

I am sick and tired of having to carry towns because of the proportion which didn't give a toss about their wincon.

[Aquanim]

I don't even think Boonskiies is town this game, I'm just totally disgusted by the meta I just read.

[Aquanim]

Why would having me vote for Metal make you more comfortable?

Because you're my top townread.
...

What actual difference does it make if I vote for Metal, though?

[Aquanim]

I think there's a very real chance that my voting for Metal would put two town votes (myself and Elyse) on a townie (Metal), so I think I'm going to pass.

[Aquanim]

So, there's a wallpost so wally coming up that I've divided it into separate posts. (Nested spoilers were giving me trouble and I doubt they'd get read anyway.)

The first three posts are votecount analysis, the one after that is associations, and the last one is some actual conclusions.

I haven't come to any 100% conclusions and pretty much every part of it could use some more thought, but at three or so days to deadline it's time to stop mucking around.

[Aquanim]

DAY 1: THE BEGINNING

Spoiler:

Vote Count 1.03 - up to post #88.

Metalcyanide[3]: RadiantCowbells, oddmusic, InsidiousLemons[L-4]
InsdiousLemons[2]: pisskop, Aquanim[L-5]
Eektor[1]: Aeronaut
Aquanim[1]: Elyse
Elyse[1]: toolenduso
Mykonian[1]: TheDudeAbides
TheDudeAbides[1]: mykonian

Not Voting[2]: Taly, Metalcyanide

With 13 alive, it requires 7 votes to lynch.

Day ends on Monday, March 16th at 5:10 PM USA Mountain Time, or when a lynch occurs

Not sure if there's much to be made from this. Early-game posturing mostly.

Spoiler:

Vote Count 1.05 - up to post #165.

oddmusic[3]: eektor, RadiantCowbells, pisskop[L-4]
InsdiousLemons[2]: Aquanim, TheDudeAbides
Eektor[2]: Aeronaut, Elyse
TheDudeAbides[1]: mykonian
Taly[1]: Toolenduso
RadiantCowbells[1]: oddmusic

Not Voting[3]: Taly, Metalcyanide, InsidiousLemons

With 13 alive, it requires 7 votes to lynch.

Day ends on Monday, March 16th at 5:10 PM USA Mountain Time, or when a lynch occurs

Vote Count 1.06 - up to post #276.

oddmusic[3]: eektor, pisskop, InsidiousLemons[L-4]
Taly[3]: Toolenduso, Elyse, mykonian[L-4]
Eektor[2]: Aeronaut, Aquanim
InsdiousLemons[1]: TheDudeAbides
RadiantCowbells[1]: oddmusic
Aquanium[1]: RadiantCowbells

Not Voting[2]: Metalcyanide, Taly

With 13 alive, it requires 7 votes to lynch.

Day ends on Monday, March 16th at 5:10 PM USA Mountain Time, or when a lynch occurs

IIRC Oddmusic was looking like mislynch bait, but it was pretty earlygame - it wouldn't suprise me to see scum on the Odd wagon though nor would it suprise me a great deal for there not to be any.

Spoiler:

Vote Count 1.07 - up to post #361.

Taly[5]: Toolenduso, Elyse, mykonian, RadiantCowbells, InsidiousLemons[L-2]
RadiantCowbells[3]: oddmusic, Metalcyanide, Taly[L-4]
oddmusic[2]: eektor, pisskop
Eektor[2]: Boonskies, Aquanim
InsdiousLemons[1]: TheDudeAbides

Not Voting: None

Mod notes: Boonskiies has replaced Aeronaut.

With 13 alive, it requires 7 votes to lynch.

Day ends on Monday, March 16th at 5:10 PM USA Mountain Time, or when a lynch occurs

If I were mafia I wouldn't touch a nascent RadiantCowbells wagon with a ten-foot pole. No matter how it turns out, you're going to smell afterwards. Taly on the other hand looks like tasty mislynch bait.

DAY 1: TALY VS METALCYANIDE

Vote Count 1.12 - up to post #799.

Taly[4]: Elyse, mykonian, InsidiousLemons, toolenduso[L-3]
metalcyanide [4]: RadiantCowbells, Aquanim, Boonskiies, Taly[L-3]
RadiantCowbells[1]: Metalcyanide
Not Voting[3]: eektor, pisskop, TheDudeAbides

With 12 alive, it requires 7 votes to lynch.

Day ends on Monday, March 16th at 5:10 PM USA Mountain Time, or when a lynch occurs

To put it bluntly, Taly was mislynch bait. Especially considering the Metalcyanide wagon gained momentum long after the Taly wagon started, I would be shocked to not find any scum on the Taly wagon. Mykonian has already flipped town and I think Elyse is town, so that leaves Toolenduso and InsidiousLemons.

It would be plausible for the scum to be not voting but keeping their options open on Taly.

Spoiler: TheDudeAbides

You just jumped from

1) A lurker.

to

2) The person who the town player who has been strongest is already on.

These are rather safe picks, no?

How are you evaluating the strongest player (Eelyse)?
Do you think that she is wrong?
Why do you think that she is town?

I dislike Taly's insistence that he's being open and honest, and his unvote under pressure.
I think that IL looks better than he did.

Unvote.

Taly's 259 seems town motivated.

either way, to get back on track then, I'd take pbpe's or lists of reads esspecially early in the game as scummy then, having no contrary evidence that a player (taly in this case) just likes to do those.

I think coming under pressure and giving out a reads list comes from a townie part of the brain.

TheDudeAbides could plausibly have gotten away with voting Taly after these posts but I don't think it was his Plan A.

Spoiler: Eektor

Before Oddmusic flip:

RC - I think the push she did on Aquanim was bad. Some of the points did not make sense. After completing a game with her when she was an IC, this push seems normal play for her. I did like how she was the first to point out that Aquanim's defending oddmusic. She is possibly town for now.

Aquanim - Aquanim's defense of oddmusic makes him look like a good scum buddy for oddmusic. When the wagon started building on oddmusic, he tried to start a counterwagon on a lurker slot. Then when that fell apart he changed his vote to me which was the biggest counterwagon at that time.

Taly - I really don't like his posts. He seems to care more about what others think of him than trying to figure this game out. His posts looks scummy to me but I'm trying to figure out whether he is a newb townie or a newb scummy, because I checked his games and he has no completed games on site.

Elyse - I'm leaning town. She's engaging most players, trying to find motivations.

After Oddmusic flip:

Well, this game got a whole lot interesting. pisskop is definitely town and unfortunately oddmusic was town. I am thinking Taly is town and even though I have doubts I don't think he is a good lynch for day one. I have my suspicions on mykonian, Insidious Lemon and Aquamin. I need to reread and then I'll decide where to vote.

@Metal Annie is RC.

Eektor was pushing for an Oddmusic lynch, but null-newb-read Taly; after Oddmusic flipped town, he needed somewhere else to go... and nevertheless townread Taly. The read was hardly so strong that he couldn't have flipped on it but nevertheless I don't think it was his Plan A to do that either.

Also worth noting is that despite possibly having the space to do so neither of them flipped on their Taly read when a Metal lynch seemed likely. I find it hard to believe that a scumteam which didn't have the guts to jump on Taly to save their scumbuddy Metal would instead choose to try to lynch a slot which has been AFK for the past week. If Metal flips scum they're screwed - if Insidious flips town they're still screwed since they just pushed a wagon on a townie who wasn't around to defend himself. Looks like a lose-lose play to me.

It is worth noting that Metalcyanide did not switch onto Taly until quite late in the piece; if he were mafia I do not think he would be reluctant to vote Taly unless one (or even more so, two) of his partners were already on that wagon.

Conclusion

: I think that mafia would want at least one of their players on the Taly wagon; if there were not, I think at least one of them would be positioning themselves to get on. None of TDA, Eektor and Metalcyanide showed much interest in the Taly wagon, which leads me to believe that at least one of {Elyse, Tool, Insidious} is mafia.

[Aquanim]

DAY 1.5: METALCYANIDE vs INSIDIOUSLEMONS

Vote Count 1.19 - up to post #1267.

InsidiousLemons[5]: eektor, pisskop, TheDudeAbides, Mykonian, Metalcyanide(L-1)
metalcyanide [4]: Aquanim, Boonskiies, Elyse, toolenduso, (L-2)
Mykonian[1]:RadiantCowbells,
Not Voting[1]: InsidiousLemons

With 11 alive, it requires 6 votes to lynch.
Day ends on Thursday, March 19th at 5:10 PM USA Mountain Time, or when a lynch occurs

This votecount's been done to death a bit, but my thoughts are:

1) It'd be a pretty ballsy scumteam to push all-in on lynching a slot which has been AFK for a week. If Insidious flipped town the backlash on everyone on that wagon would be strong.

In particular, if Eektor or TheDudeAbides are mafia with Metal, why did they show no interest in the Taly wagon, but go hard for Insidious?

2) I don't see Eektor and InsidiousLemons as scum together, for obvious reasons. (Why start a wagon on your AFK scumbuddy at that stage?)

3) I'd really like to believe that at least one of these wagons was on scum.

There's probably more to say about this part, though.

[Aquanim]

DAY 2: METALCYANIDE vs ???

Vote Count 2.03 - up to post #1457.

Metalcyanide[3]: Boonskiies, Elyse, Aquanim
Boonskies[1]:Metalcyanide
TheDudeAbides[1]: mykonian
eektor[1]: toolenduso
Not Voting[4]: Bellaphant, pisskop, TheDudeAbides, eektor

Mod Notes: TheDudeAbides is V/LA until Tuesday. Bellaphant is replacing InsidiousLemons.

With 10 alive, it requires 6 votes to lynch.
Day ends on Monday, April 6th at 7:00 PM USA Mountain Time, or when a lynch occurs

There was seriously not a whole lot of movement on anyone but Metalcyanide at this point. On the other hand, TDA was V/LA, Bellaphant had just replaced in, and Eektor had been pressing for an InsidiousLemons lynch before the replacement.

I'm not really sure what to make of this situation - the lack of movement elsewhere might suggest Metal town, but I'm not entirely sure where his hypothetical scumbuddies would have gone here, either.

DAY 2: METALCYANIDE vs MYKONIAN

Vote Count 2.07 - up to post #1632.

Mykonian[5]: Aquanim, Metalcyanide, TheDudeAbides, eektor, Bellaphant[L-1]
Metalcyanide[3]: Elyse, toolenduso, pisskop
TheDudeAbides[1]: mykonian
Aquanim[1]: Boonskiies


Mod Notes: All V/LA's are over.

With 10 alive, it requires 6 votes to lynch.

Day ends on Tuesday, April 7th at 7:00 PM USA Mountain Time

, or when a lynch occurs

As far as I see, there are two possibilities here.
(1) Metalcyanide is scum, and his scumbuddies probably got on the Mykonian wagon pretty hard. I dunno if I believe all three would get on, though. That points the finger at Eektor, TDA and maybe Bella.
(2) Metalcyanide is town, mafia don't give a damn about this lynch, and since Mykonian is kind of scary to lynch the mafia are unlikely to get on in large numbers. That points the finger at Tool, Boonskiies, Bellaphant and Elyse.

[Aquanim]

Some Associations

Hypothesis 1: Boonskiies and Metalcyanide are not scum together.

I don't see why Boonskiies would bus Metal in preference to the Taly wagon day 1, or go apeshit in response to the Mykonian wagon day 2. Boon does do whatever the hell he likes, though, so this isn't ironclad.

Hypothesis 2: Eektor and Toolenduso are not scum together.

This one is not quite 100% either but Tool's had it out for Eektor all game.

Hypothesis 3: Eektor and Bellaphant are not scum together.

I don't see why Eektor starts a wagon on the InsidiousLemons slot after the Taly modkill if they're scum together. The push today could conceivably be a bus but the day 1 play would simply make no sense.

Hypothesis 4: Elyse and Metalcyanide are not scum together.

Well, duh. I don't think Elyse is scum at all, for that matter.

Given these hypotheses, consider the possible scumteams. I have divided them based on Metal and Bella's alignments for clarity.

Case 1: Metal is mafia and Bellaphant is town.

This rules out Elyse and Boonskiies, leaving:
Metal-Eektor-TDA
Metal-Tool-TDA

Case 2: Metal is town and Bellaphant is mafia.

This rules out Eektor.
Bella-Tool-Boon
Bella-Tool-TDA
Bella-TDA-Boon
Some team with Elyse.

Case 3: Metal and Bellaphant are both mafia.

This rules out Boonskiies, Eektor and Elyse.
Metal-Bella-Tool
Metal-Bella-TDA

Case 4: Metal and Bellaphant are both town.

Some combination of {Boon, Eektor, TDA, Tool, Elyse} that doesn't pair Eektor and Tool.

I expect some more of the above can be ruled out as well.

Salient point: unless the scumteam is Elyse-Boon-Eektor or something, and assuming all of the above hypotheses are correct,

one of TheDudeAbides and Toolenduso is mafia

.

[Aquanim]

On a {Toolenduso, Bellaphant/InsidiousLemons, Boonskiies/Aeronaut} scum team

Boonskiies' vote day 1

Boonskiies scumread me immediately upon replacing in. Why did he vote for the Metal wagon I was pushing?

This post

...
Aqua, I know you haven't exactly been gung-ho about a metal lynch, but would you consider it today? I kind of want to vote for him and I would feel more comfortable with you on the wagon.

My first thought when reading this was "Pretty please put Metalcyanide at L-3 so my scumteam can hammer".

Votecount analysis

This team was spread out for Taly vs. Metal, concentrated on Metal for Insidious vs. Metal, spread out and mostly not on Mykonian at the end of day 2. I can't see anything about this team that doesn't make sense votecount-wise.

Boonskiies' case on Toolenduso

The immediately apparent thing about this case was that Boonskiies decided he wanted to scumread Tool, then trawled through Tool's ISO looking for things he could stretch to fit a scum agenda. At the time, I believed this was to draw attention away from his "scumbuddy" Mykonian, which obviously was disproved by the Mykonian flip.

On the other hand, if Metal and Mykonian are both town, then I can well imagine Boonskiies bussing the hell out of his scumbuddy in that situation.

Tool's lack of reaction to this case sticks out like a sore thumb too. Sure, he mentioned it... but either he should be scumreading Boonskiies (in which case he should have done something about it by now) or townreading Boonskiies (in which case he should be concerned that a townie is voting for and scumreading him at MYLO). I suppose maybe I can buy that Tool's just more interested in pursuing Eektor, but... meh.

Process of Elimination

I believe that Elyse and TheDudeAbides are town. Recent interactions with Eektor have persuaded me that he is likely also town. That leaves Metalcyanide, Toolenduso, Bellaphant and Boonskiies.

Metal-Tool-Bellaphant is the only other likely possibility given those townreads. It's possible, but... meh. Tool has looked pretty genuinely interested in lynching Metal.

There is also the point that

Pisskop

,

Mykonian

, Eektor and TheDudeAbides all townread Metal. I am not so stuck on myself as to think I can't have been wrong about Metal. It's possible he's scum... but at this stage I feel it is less likely. His posts towards the end of both days looking desperate to get a flip on someone, and his push on Elyse today being pointlessly suicidal if he's mafia, tend to support that theory.

On the other hand, Metal and especially TheDude have been lurking hardcore day 3, and that does not please me at all.

Assuming that the scumteam includes Bellaphant, I think at least one of Boonskiies and Tool just about has to be mafia. I could conceivably replace Boonskiies with Metalcyanide or mayybe TDA/Elyse, or replace Tool with Elyse (as the other person on neither Insidious nor Mykonian) or TheDudeAbides (perhaps a scum bussed IL and voted Mykonian early, and I don't think it's Eektor). I should probably give further consideration to theese possibilities.

[Aquanim]

Oh, and individual reads lol. Boonskiies has been even more useless than his usual but I doubt that's even alignment-indicative. He's overloaded on games at the moment I believe so it's enirely possible his scumgame would be below par too, especially in a game it looked pretty clear he was winning anyway.

Bellaphant didn't really seem to push anything at all day 2, tried to sneak onto the Mykonian wagon with an avoiding-nolynch vote despite scumreading Mykonian, and I don't feel like she's trying to work out the game.

I was townreading Tool day 1 but I think I now townread him less than everyone else, basically. Except maybe Metal, but I'm hard put to see Boon and Metal as scum together.

[Aquanim]

It might be instructive to read Boonskiies' town ISO in the recently completed game Mini 1655: http://forum.mafiascum.net/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=61070

I particularly liked the part where he said his reads were good when he replaces into games. That was a good laugh.

[Aquanim]

<yawn>

Bellaphant's probably the better lynch but whatever.

VOTE: Boonskiies

[Aquanim]

Well, that's two votes for Boonskiies, and if he's town it's in range for a scum hammer.

I think I simply don't care. If Boon is town, we were losing this game anyway.

[Aquanim]

Even if you are both town and right, we would still lose the game, because you've been utterly unconvincing.

[Aquanim]

@Aqua I find case 2 and 3 more likely than your case 1 and 4.

I mostly do as well, I think.

In respect to Case 4, like you said earlier the indecision on the lynch between metal and IL makes me think one of them had to be scum. If you noticed IL wasn't around and voting. If IL was scum, that would have hurt the scum team's chances of pushing the counterwagon, which is why I think we ended with a no lynch and why I think out of those two IL was scum.

I agree that it's

probably

true that if Metal and Bella were both town one of them would have been hammered by mafia. I haven't given much consideration to this case, since I don't see myself catching a team that doesn't have either of them in it.

Also, I don't think tool can be paired with metal because when given the choice between metal and IL, he voted for metal. Only way he can be paired with metal is if he was scum with both metal and Bella. I think lynching Bella is the better way to go.

I think Tool+Metal is rather unlikely unless both Metal and Bella were scum, yes. I find Boon+Metal even less likely as scumbuddies on some level (not dependent on the Bella flip, even) but association cases with Boon are questionable.

Tool could conceivably have been uncomfortable getting on the wagon of somebody who had been V/LA and in hospital, and instead decided to bus Metal. It's a possibility but I think it unlikely.

Both of those are more likely than Elyse+Metal or Eektor+Bellaphant, for sure.

[Aquanim]

...
@aqua, the last two pairs in the post above: are they necessarily scum v town, or just not scum together?

Each of those pairs is not both scum. Could be one, could be neither.

[Aquanim]

VOTE: Bellaphant

I think this is the way to go.

You're probably right.

With regard to Boonskiies' reaction to my vote for him, I don't see anything about it which convinces me he wasn't scum selfvoting to try to get me to panic-townread him, then backing off when it became clear I wouldn't bite.

In my last game I ended up policy voting (and hammering) a >90% town-read because they martyred and self-voted. Besides the martyr, I felt he was the townie in the game who least deserved to have a mislynch on his record, but I did it anyway. Given that, my attitude to this one is "lynch it with fire" - but I am okay with it happening another day.

I want to do a little more thinking before I put my vote onto Bellaphant but it will happen.

[Aquanim]

Yeah, I got that. The way she hasn't really acknowledged the pressure against her is bizarre and I'd like to believe a townie would have done so.

[Aquanim]

Considering that Eektor was the first to push a Bella lynch in the thread today (as far as I recall) I'm not sure that's an accurate statement applied to him.

[Aquanim]

Are you positively townreading Bella for some reason that doesn't involve Eektor or Metal?

[Aquanim]

@Boonskiies:

picking three people who were probably scumreading you anyway, and then trying to make points off them continuing to scumread you afterwards, doesn't impress me.

[Aquanim]

VOTE: Boon

Any particular reason for doing this now?

[Aquanim]

Meh. I'm okay to straight-up lose if this read's wrong.

UNVOTE: Boonskiies
VOTE: Bellaphant

I reckon they're both scum, though.

[Aquanim]

...he is?

[Aquanim]

That aside, I haven't seen much evidence in the rest of this game that Boonskiies has felt some need to "check up on the thread".

[Aquanim]

@aqua, in post 1836 you said 'one of TheDudeAbides and Toolenduso is mafia.' If you still believe this, I think one of these is a better vote than me.

Yes, I do believe it. I am less confident about which one of them it is than that yourself (or Boonskiies for that matter) is mafia.

[Aquanim]

Eek and tool are both scum.

You said this before. Feel like saying something new?

[Aquanim]

A word to the wise: I sheep NOTHING that I do not understand.

[Aquanim]

If neither of you two feel like scumclaiming now I feel like we're probably safe.

Unless it's Elyse/Dude/Boonskiies or something else outrageous.

[Aquanim]

You know those two votes happening really quick, makes me a bit nervous.

Well, there's nothing much to be done about it now, unless you think that's scum quickhammering their scumbuddy. Which isn't completely impossible I suppose.

[Aquanim]

ROFL

Well, I'm quitting mafia forever.

[Aquanim]

I was never catching that team. EVERY competent player in this game was scum? Wow.

[Aquanim]

Okay, that does a small misservice to Eektor. Sorry.

[Aquanim]

Nah, I don't hold this against you, Eektor. You were V/LA a lot, it happens.

I could have wished more from Bellaphant but replacing day 2 into a dodgy slot is hard I suppose.

If Mykonian had pretended to explain his TDA read, or Boonskiies had pretended to explain his read on Elyse, maybe this would have been winnable. I hold it very much against them.

Even Metal didn't actually play a bad town game.

[Aquanim]

D1 for him was bad. And for my own part I should have waited longer on that kill.

How shall I put this... Metal was very scum-readable day 1, but at least he TRIED. Boonskiies doesn't seem to give a toss about his wincon, Mykonian's an arrogant tit, and Cowbells is... I don't even have the words.

[Aquanim]

Also, if anyone was wondering about the Taly modkill, he had evidently emailed Aquanim about wanting to be "friendsies" or something like that. I felt this was an inappropriate pm to be sending someone you are in a game with, it could imply you are asking for preferential treatment, so I made the decision for modkill. The listmod said it might have been better to force replace rather than modkill, but it doesn't sound like it would have effected things either way.

Force-replacing Taly wouldn't have changed my read on the slot. I rather hoped at the time you were going to force-replace me, which would have fixed the problem.

[Aquanim]

Also, despite what Radiant Cowbell said, this WAS approved for balance and normalcy:).

I imagine it wouldn't have been with a two-shot town dayvig.

It's not even that I'm sour about losing - though I am that a bit. I got completely outplayed by this scumteam, I can accept that.

It's just that I think I legit can't play town if I can't lynch the play of Mykonian and Boonskiies and KNOW it's so fucking terrible it has to flip scum. If I can't believe that, I can't push my reads hard enough, because I won't believe them enough. And if I don't have that, I can't play the game.

[Aquanim]

[quote="In post 1931, RadiantCowbells"]I don't understand why I'm getting hated on so much.
...[quote]
Claiming Cop day 1 was daft, I don't give a toss what Pisskop did or didn't say.

I am less mad at you than Boonskiies though. You at least played the bloody game.

[Aquanim]

I may not have been strictly trapped but you put me in a situation where that was my best move.

No, he really didn't, and it really wasn't your best move. In actual fact, Pisskop was never going to shoot you, had no intention of lynching you, and your paranoia and resulting claim directly got our most relevant power role killed. If you had not claimed, you would not have been lynched, you probably wouldn't have been shot, and you probably would have got many checks this game. We might even have won.

I'm really trying not to just flame you here. I have some respect for the fact that you put effort into this game; if you learn from your mistakes you may become a skilled townie... but you have to acknowledge that claim was a mistake, and learn from it, or I've wasted my time talking and playing with you.

If a townie is basically confirmed town by virtue of their role it gives them more latitude to make plays that don't make sense and which they don't explain for the purpose of reactions. They have less responsibility to be accountable for themselves. In my experience this often leads to them lurking and playing like rubbish - Pisskop did an okay job of defying that stereotype.

With regard to the twilight, it was convenient for someone like me in an unusual timezone to know that no matter when hammer occurred I would have the opportunity to post before night. That would not have been true with no twilight or with a 1-2 hour twilight.

[Aquanim]

My problem goes more or less like this. I imagine I'm a fun person to play with, at least for some people. I put effort in, talk reasonably to people, don't just scream at my scumreads (mostly). (My attitude to Boonskiies was an aberration, which I'll get to.)

The trouble is, I'm not having fun. Joining this game was a mistake I regretted from start to finish. The last game I played, I played more or less like this, except I pretty much carried town to victory. Apart from the high from actually winning, playing that game was bloody miserable too. It's not always the fault of whoever I'm frusturated with. Going V/LA or replacing out is sometimes unexpected and unavoidable, but it messes up the game for me. I take care to play one game at once, so they can't get in each other's way, and play only when I know (barring some accident) I won't have to just ditch the thread for days at a time. Not being practiced or skilled isn't really a town player's fault either, but again (especially in extreme cases) it makes the game frusturating for me to play. I can deal with those. Sometimes I'll lose because of them. That I think I can deal with, but it does all add up.

What I saw when I looked at Boonskiies was a player who DELIBERATELY sabotages his towngame, so as to be able to have fun in and autowin his scumgames. That is pretty much everything I loathe about Mafia. I have to be able to know, as a townie, that everyone on my team is playing to their wincon first and foremost. (Some players' egos get in the way of their towngame - that really annoys me but even then at least they were trying.) I don't think I can play the game when I know some people care less about their wincon than deliberately fucking their town meta over. I can't even dodge all such players - I wouldn't have signed up for this game had I know Boonskiies was going to be in it, but what the hell am I supposed to do when he replaces in?

I've tried to quit Mafia for more-or-less these reasons before. The problem was, each time I was leaving on a win. I always kept looking back at random games and thinking "Jeez, those townies are awful. I could do better than that." , and remembering the high from winning my last game as opposed to the misery it was to actually play the game. I've also always wondered what my scumgame would be like, having never rolled scum before. But the game is seriously bad for me. I get stressed, it sucks up large quantities of time, and though I've learned how to persuasively argue with people that don't trust me (a useful skill which I perhaps needed) I'm now learning how to flame people who annoy me (which I think I should not learn).

I've lost games as town before (offsite); in each of them, the scumteam (and in one case, the third party) was entirely catchable, but the town was either mindbogglingly lazy or let their humongous egos draw them into dick-waving contests rather than actually playing the game. (I am no longer enamoured of my previous site.) It annoys me that in this game I might have seen a truly good scumteam that a good town would still not have caught, they played really very well... but I'll never know for sure whether you were that good, because instead you were playing against this clusterfuck of a town-team.

For the record, I don't have a problem with the play of Pisskop, or Eektor (though I wished you'd turned on a little sooner). Metalcyanide, Taly, Oddmusic, IL, and Bellaphant have a fair bit to learn, but all had the right attitude. I feel like Boonskiies, and to a lesser extent Mykonian and RC, just pissed some fraction of a month and a half of my time down the drain, and that makes me seriously mad.

[Aquanim]

EBWOP: Flaming a small fraction of the town players, and then calling the town team a clusterfuck, may seem incongruous. Remember that between the vig shot and the modkill, we would have had barely enough lynches (possibly not enough) to policy lynch everyone in that pile. We're *stuck* with them, and it only takes one stupid town player at LYLO to lose the game.

[Aquanim]

I'm really trying not to just flame you here. I have some respect for the fact that you put effort into this game; if you learn from your mistakes you may become a skilled townie... but you have to acknowledge that claim was a mistake, and learn from it, or I've wasted my time talking and playing with you.

You're wasting my time talking to me then.

Did it turn out that the move was a mistake? Yes.

Would I do anything differently if that situation came up in the future? No.
...

Aaaand we're done. If you can't learn from your mistakes, then you've entirely pissed my time down the drain this game, just as badly as Boonskiies.

When was the last time you won a town game, RC? When was the last time scum felt you were worth shooting when you hadn't claimed a power role? Or even when you were literally modconfirmed...

I'm now being nasty and hurtful, and I know it. This is what playing Mafia does to me now. But there's only one person who's been on the town team in every one of the many, many games you've lost, RC. Maybe, instead of blaming everyone else, you should look at yourself.

I'd say the town was really only apathetic for maybe the last day. For the rest of the game, the town was fairly active as far as towns go. Lots of content posts, activity, etc. It just so happened scum played better.

It looked that way because I spammed the game and the mafia played pretty good towngames. I honestly believe that (at least) Elyse contributed more to town wincon than (at least) Boonskiies. If you take out my posts, those of the scum, and the noise, I don't know that it looks all that impressive.

I think I'm with RC though about the scummy nomination. They played well... but had they been pressured by the presence of a competent and experienced town-team, their play might well have looked not nearly so impressive. TheDudeAbides lurked hard for a lot of the game, for instance - if he had not been able to hide amongst Boon, Bellaphant and Mykonian, he would quite possibly have been caught. When three of the four (to be safe, including Mykonian) most experienced players, by FAR, in the game are all mafia, it is not suprising that they should take the game by storm. If they were newbies or players who hadn't been around for long who'd done this to a town (even this town), I'd be with you all the way, but...

I don't think Boonskies deliberatly sabotages his town games. I think he knows that it's beneficial in some instances to be difficult to read. A think a lot of players mistakingly take issue with players who don't play to their town meta, or don't have a town meta. Boonskies was more right about his reads than a lot of the players were. Now, he made it more difficult for himself to convince others of his reads by not appearing town, but I'm sure he'll realize that 2/3's of his games will be town and that might not be the best strategy. If it were me, I would adjust my scum game to fit my town game, not the other way around, but to each their own. I still feel like he was playing to his win condition, for the most part.

I won't go looking for the posts now, but I believe Boonskiies has explicitly stated that he alters his town games such that he can get away with things as scum, by pointing out times he's done it as town.

For all I know, Boonskiies flipped some coins to get his reads, and the fact that some of them hit scum was pure chance. He never explained ANYTHING about his scumread of Elyse, or Eektor for that matter. I don't even care how scummy he made himself look, if he'd posted SOME argument for that read, I'd have read it and evaluated it. I might even have been persuaded by it. But if he isn't even attempting to convince other players his reads are right with arguments to that effect, that's not him playing to his wincon, as far as I'm concerned.

[Aquanim]

In all seriousness, if Pisskop actually flipped town, and nobody else in the game gave a flying fuck about #850 at any stage, maybe you should re-evaluate whether that post was in fact as scummy as you claim, RC. Mafia isn't mathematics, you can't *prove* your answer is correct and then reasonably defend it against the disagreement of everybody else who's ever seen it.

[Aquanim]

I also liked playing with Aqua and mykonian, you two were both active and thoughtful players who I believe would have figured out the scumteam either in different circumstances or just if given enough time. I know where you're coming from, Aqua, because I've felt similarly frustrated at times, but it kind of sounds to me like you might be taking the game a little too seriously. Not trying to lecture here, but if you'd like to give the game another shot then I think one thing that might help you enjoy it is if you let the game be more of a game and less of a XXXX, if that makes any sense.

I walked into this game intending to take a back seat, mess around, and have some fun. I realised about halfway through day 1 that there were no other townies actively pushing for a lynch that made sense (whatever my reads on anyone else, the Taly wagon was always bad). Having realised that, I put myself forward and started totally directing the game, and made myself miserable doing it, because it was necessary if I were to be able to honestly say afterward "I played to my wincon as best I knew how".

There was ONE meaningful case this entire game (by Eektor on IL/Bellaphant) that wasn't made by either myself or the scumteam. Let that sink in.

You were at the center of this town. You had more than average say in who got lynched. But the posts here complain about people you dislike, and how you didn't win.

I'm very sorry aqua, but all that doesn't fit together. If you want to win and you are in the position to call the lynches, go find the scum. Elyse will always play as elyse, RC will play as RC, I will be myko.

I can go find scum in a game where the townies are actually trying and playing to wincon. I've done it frequently.

...
You can't complain about scum's competency and how other people suck when you were basically at the center of this town.

You lost all right to lecture me when TheDudeAbides asked you to explain your scumread on him and you refused. At that moment, you were not playing to wincon.

Like I said above, I'd have quite liked not to be at the centre of this town, and tried not to at the start. When nobody else would, I didn't have a choice, other than to let town totally crash and burn. Rather wish I had, in retrospect.

And then, you complain about how RC can't learn from his mistakes. I see very little self criticism from you here either. Given how this town needed very little push from the scum to implode, I daresay there's not a single townie here who shouldn't be looking at what went wrong here.

I got outplayed by the scumteam, I fully acknowledge that. If I ever intended to play a game again, I would go and look (privately!) at how my reads were wrong.

I've lost games before, and learned how to play better from them... but I look at this game, and what I see is "I could never have carried this town".

[Aquanim]

And the same to you, Boonskiies. You never gave so much as an indication of why you were scumreading Elyse. I literally have no way to distinguish that play from you simply making up reads as scum. It can't be done.

Getting shot day 1 because you found the scum should be your OBJECTIVE as a Vanilla Townie. Of course, I imagine that's unacceptable to you because it would give you no excuse for surviving to later days as mafia.

[Aquanim]

TheDudeAbides asked you to explain your scumread on him and you refused.

I don't understand what this site has with explaining your scumreads to your scumreads.

Oh, yeah, sure... but Mykonian never explained his TDA read to ANYONE. He shouldn't have even needed to be asked.

[Aquanim]

Meh, whatever. I have no delusions about my ability to convince Mykonian or RadiantCowbells that the sky is blue, much less anything else, and I've well and truly said my piece. To the scum, it was a pleasure to pretend to play town with you.

Goodbye.