Newbie 1561: Puppies! (Game Over)

[Cabd]

Good afternoon, everyone!

IC posts coming up.

As a disclaimer: As per the IC rules, I cannot and will not lie to you about any game theory questions you may have, regardless of my alignment. If you at any time have doubts about my answers feel free to have one of your SE players chime in to confirm.

As a secondary disclaimer, if I rolled scum, this does not stop me from slitting your throats in a different way!

[Cabd]

Hello! I am the IC (Inexperience-challenged) player in this game. That means in addition to playing as a player, I am also the teacher of sorts for this game. Regardless of my alignment, I am governed by the rules set forth for IC players. This means I

WILL NOT

lie to you about game theory, proper practices, and the like. If you have any sort of question about what a term means, what the acceptable plays are for a certain scenario, etc, I will answer it truthfully to the best of my abilities. I will cover some basic stuff in the next few sections. Click "show" to reveal the sections that you are interested in.

Spoiler: Starting the Game

The game usually starts in what is known as "RVS" which stands for "Random Voting Stage." In this phase of the game, players often cast votes for silly or little to no reason to get the game started. The game will progress out of RVS naturally within a page (1 page = 25 posts) or two.

Please note that it is ALWAYS better to lynch on day one than no lynch. This means that there will be one of us sent to the gallows within the next 14 days.

I will use that nice blue color whenever my post is meant as an IC post and not as a player playing this game post. If it's in my blue, it's factual theory stuff, not game play content. If you have any questions regarding setup or game theory, bold them for me so I know they're meant for me, please.

Spoiler: How to Play

During the day, it is your job to vote for the player you wish to be lynched. Use vote tags like so:

Code: Select all

[vote]Cabd[/vote]

Code: Select all

[unvote]Cabd[/unvote]

You can unvote and revote as often as you'd like, your vote isn't "stuck" or anything of the sort.

Try to make a post at least once every real life day. The game is a lot more fun and solvable when everyone is contributing.

Do

~NOT~

claim your role unless you are at what is known as "L-1". This means that there are enough votes minus one before you are lynched. There are several reasons for this, and I can go into more detail if anyone is curious.

Of note, you win with your faction even if you are dead. This means that if you are a role that has no special powers, your death over a power role might even help you win. This is why I advise always playing to the best of your ability.

Spoiler: Some Terms and Abbreviations

Here's a quick non-perfect list of terms you may seen thrown around:

IC: Inexperience-Challenged player (that's me!)
SE: Semi-experienced challenged player
Scum: General term for non-town alignments, in the case of this game, the mafia players
Maf: Mafia
L-# : The number of votes before a player is lynched. (Example, "Cabd is at L-4" means I am 4 votes away from death)
LYLO: Lynch (correctly) or lose. This means that if a lynch on town occurs, the mafia immediately wins
MYLO: Lynch (correctly or nolynch) or lose. This means a no lynch is allowable to drop numbers before LYLO.
BP: Bulletproof, a role that can get shot by the mafia once and not die
Doc: Doctor, a role that can attempt to protect people from nightkills
JK: Jailkeeper, a role that both protects and blocks its target.
Scummy: An adjective for any action (or player) more likely to come from or be mafia than town
Meta: A player's past style of playing from completed games as a given role as compared to their current play.
PR: Power Role, any role that is not vanilla town or mafia goon.
BoP: Burden of Proficiency, is the flawed arguement that older players should be the best player in any given game.
OMGUS (Oh my god you suck) is where a player essentially votes a player for voting them first.
NK: Night Kill. The mafia's kill they get to use once a night.
PT: Private Topic: The hidden secret forum where the mafia may talk at night and pregame.
Crumb: A hidden message that can be revealed as needed or will be found after your death hinting on what you do with a power role, or that you are that role.
Claim: An outright claim of your role. Please note you may NOT post your role PM, paraphrase.
CC: Counter Claim. This means that your role means that the player's claimed role cannot exist, making them liar mafia. Mafia can also do this to a town claim to force a 1 for 1 trade, so be careful and think everything through.
Hammer: The vote that brings somebody from L-1 to lynched. Never hammer without a claim!

[Cabd]

VOTE: Jasonwazza


Last to confirm, therefore most likely, in a blind sense, to be scum.

[Cabd]

To the first, I've been an IC twice before. I'll find the games later, as evidenced by the cake icon next to my name, today's (as in IRL day) not gonna contain much solid "meat" to it.

As for the second, I can dig meta up on that later, but I will say that as far as vote reasons go on page one, "last to confirm" is fun. Oh and also, singer, he said they're using QTs not PTs.

[Cabd]

so who has access to quicktopics

What exactly did you post this line for, choof?

[Cabd]

Singer, did you read all the mod posts at the very start of the thread or no?

[Cabd]

I was waiting for Cabd to follow up because if an IC jumps on this train he is ver likely scum, and to see what you would do after calling what is happening interesting, because I'm trying to understand if you are also waiting for people to jump on it to call them scum or if you are trying to break it up as soon as possible before a maybe less experienced partner gets caught in the bait.

Unfortunately by pointing this out you also ruin the bait. I was ghoing to let it simmer a bit. You remind me of when I was new, jumpy and try-hardish to a fault of ruining things early to analyse.

[Cabd]

If you'd actually done the meta on me you seemed to be chomping at the bit to do, you'd have known that post 73 was in fact a light read on you.

[Cabd]

More specifically, you're reminding me of myself in Xenoblade.

[Cabd]

http://wiki.mafiascum.net/index.php?tit ... lade_Mafia

[Cabd]

Just wanted to clarify that the scum and dead threads will be in QuickTopics, not private topics. While I like PTs, there was a bit of a mix-up at the beginning of the game as to which one to use and

we're going with QTs

.

Though it should be known that this point is mute because if he didn't officially confirm because he was talking in

his PT

, as a mod I'd consider that a form of confirming nowadays, as a way to sidestep that kind of "confirmation" issue. Just saying.

Also it's "moot" not "mute" but that's neither here nor there.

[Cabd]

Are you telling someone about your meta so they can learn how to meta someone with a bias, or are you deliberately feeding them a bad meta?

This is a game question not a theory question, but I can speak in generalities. Please remember to bold questions of theory in the future to help me find them in your posts.

Generally, most players don't bother to lie about meta because all posts from our prior games are publicly visible. All you have to do is click a player's username and then select "show this yser's threads" and read away for a sense of their games as each alignment. That said, there are a few players on this site who intentionally play off-meta to confuse players using this technique. Nachomamma8 would be one example.

Anyways, in this case, there's no bias per say. I declared, in this case, a read of matching another player's meta to my meta. It's not "meta (or bad meta) for a read on cabd" it's "you remind me of how old-cabd approached towngames, here's a link showing the old me I'm seeing in you"

You're making a logical fallacy here, so I ask you, choof.

Have you stopped beating your wife yet?

[Cabd]

My bad! Ended up at sunday dinner with the in-laws (or soon to be in-laws anyways)

117 pings. A lot.

[Cabd]

I'd like choof and cooper to remark on what they think and why first, and see if it aligns with the reasons I'm seeing here.

[Cabd]

If by "pretty ba show" you mean that I was flying halfway accross the USA to be home for the holidays and that I'm here now, then yes. Otherwise, no.

[Cabd]

Also I am going to flat out state I disagree heavily with singer's opinion that posting reads ITT is a bad thing. I've played many a scum game and I can think of maybe two kills out of a hundred or so that actually were targeted because of what a town player said their reads were. I have a well above average scum win rate.

[Cabd]

In fact... Reads list incoming.

[Cabd]

The game has gone on long enough that impressions have been made and there's no reason to withhold reads, so....

Town:

5.

copper223

-Mindset, actions, very town-oriented views of the game. If scum he's playing out of his mind. (I liked the prior avatar better though, Persona 4 is awesome)

4.

++--:

In addition to his very subtle points on copper-town, he's got a very "extinguish flames" style ISO.
it firms up as a town read for me because of the way he use the data accumulated. I'm usually quite weary of "just kidding guys not scummy just a reaction test" but if this was a scum-made test then my hat is off to this player.

8.

JasonWazza

: Jason's pride about his scumgame rings true here, so I'm taking this as tryharding jason. THat said, post 134 is actually pretty damn good and he's in my townpile for now. "Why aren't you guys fucking noticing me" isn't something I see scum-jason using as his re-entry ticket into the thread.

Not so Town (null):

6.

singersigner

: At first I liked singer for town. Later posts and hostility made me re-evaluate but I actually like that she's sticking to her guns here regarding reads lists and answering aggression with aggression. This might be higher but I'm leaving her here for now.

2.

Hostile Intent (formerly choof)

: Post 41 actually worries the fuck out of me given who replaced in. HI, did you replace in with a read on this slot of having read any of the game beforehand? I'm actually partially gutting some weird fowl play here but I suppose it is what it is. That said, incredibly unlikely to be scum with paul, so.

Below line of Lynch-ability (Scumreads):

3.

paulw556

: Post 24 pings my scumdar because of the weasel-words where we see "Honestly" inserted into a sentence it has no need to be in. Additionally, paul seems to be talking out reasoning and justification when in general, town just does things and feels zero need to preemptively justify them. Note "I suppose that is what the RVS is for" has no actual content and the post looks the same without it. 28 directly contradicts the point made in 24. Post 56 screams of "fell for bait" Unvoting the RVS vote and not re-voting, in addition to sheeping singer's logic, gives him good reason to not post ANY of his reads or opinions. Can anyone think of a single actual stance paul has taken since post 150?

1.

Epic Warrior:

I covered a bit of it in earlier posts, but the awkwardness here is very scum-ringing. More about this read later.

7.

Mallowgeno

: I dislike the "extending by choice" of RVS in post 108 as a reason to excuse fluff posting. I also dislike that "interesting" in post 108 followed by an unvote was never followed upon. The telegraphing of the ++-- vote when there was no vote in play from him makes me :~( And then the reasoning is poor as well. I started this as a null read but I couldn't justify leaving it there.




If I were to be calling a scumteam right now it'd be paul and EW, with Mallow being the incorrect scumread of my three.

UNVOTE:
VOTE: paulw556

[Cabd]

@Cabd
That's a readlist I am willing to call you town for.

Why?

[Cabd]

Hey hostile let's talk about your read on me, or more specifically why I scare you, anyways.

[Cabd]

That's fair. That said, I feel my re-entry into this game yesterday put down enough content to deliver enough material to base a read upon, so if that was a joke, where does your read lie, and why?

[Cabd]

:~(

I was hoping for our chat to be in real time, HI

[Cabd]

Paul's replacement did a thing that I will comment upon one it posts more but nothing in the wall makes paul any less scum, and the slot changing owners doesn't change the role PM either.

Interesting use of the word "yet"

[Cabd]

Conking out, will explain in the morning, but it has to o with the rates at which i find certain tells work on newer vs experienced players, and which players in this game are which

[Cabd]

I don't think what I was going to withhold is of any use, though.


I was keeping in mind the amished tell.

But that's useless against anyone who has prior forum mafia games under their belt. Which I found multiple other forum mafia sites showing that games under the belt are certainly a thing that exists.

[Cabd]

The "amished tell" is a published mafiascum tell form the old days. It's also on the ms.net wiki page.


"A player that makes any sort of excuse or reasoning for their prior slot-owner's posts or actions is more likely to be scum than the baseline" and it works in both directions, the negative is less scum than baseline. It only works on players not aware of that interaction, though.

[Cabd]

For the IC; is there a guide somewhere to where the line is on language and such? I'm not at all offended by HI's summary judgment at the end of the quoted post, but it does fall outside of my range of experience, so knowing what is kosher, what isn't and what to expect would be helpful. Thanks in advance..

Per site rules, you may swear like a badass motherfucker all you'd like. That said, personal attacks cross the line into bannable offenses. Mods may relegate this stricter than the guidelines I just mentioned, but it's extremely rare and will be in that mod's post at the start of the thread.

[Cabd]

For the IC; is there a guide somewhere to where the line is on language and such? I'm not at all offended by HI's summary judgment at the end of the quoted post, but it does fall outside of my range of experience, so knowing what is kosher, what isn't and what to expect would be helpful. Thanks in advance..

Per site rules, you may swear like a badass motherfucker all you'd like. That said, personal attacks cross the line into bannable offenses. Mods may relegate this stricter than the guidelines I just mentioned, but it's extremely rare and will be in that mod's post at the start of the thread.

Additionally, if you've yet to read this post, I'd advise doing so immediately. It's the site rules sticky, and covers threads both in and out of mafia games:


http://forum.mafiascum.net/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=6470

[Cabd]

I take it back it's apparently NOT on the wiki any more.

[Cabd]

I'd advise we come to a L-1 before deadline is too close, last thing we need is a claim and a sudden scramble to lynch elsewhere as need be.


I like my vote. Why is ++-- not voting with three days left to deadline? Fix that.

[Cabd]

Slots don't "make up" for prior actions given it's the same role PM.

Paul's posts are full of "liar tell" extra word stew, mixed with a great deal of having not a single stance on a single player.

[Cabd]

As mentioned in the reads post you hate so much, Mallow is on my would-lynch list, below EW and Drixx. Are you proposing a Mallow counterwagon? Because right now the only person voting there is you.

[Cabd]

Eh, half of one, five tenths of another.


I'm okay with a wagon on my other main scum read, I also (mostly) like the wagon.


UNVOTE:
VOTE: EW

THIS IS L-1 NOBODY ELSE VOTE UNTIL CLAIM PLEASE

[Cabd]

Theory question for the IC: You made a theory based argument that the game should put me at L-1 to force me to claim, and I tried to evade an outright claim, but got pushed into admitting I had no role to claim. You then put EW at L-1 and told him he needed to claim. I'd like to know the theorycrafting behind pushing for a claim, because I'm concerned that this approach you're using could be super useful to scum. If scum can get 1 or 2 town players to crack and admit they have no role, that significantly alters the balance as far as them trying to find the town PRs to kill. There's a lot of moving parts to this bit of play, so I'm asking you to give an answer as IC about the theory behind this. I don't recall seeing this approach before, and my guess is there are pros and cons to it that I haven't thought of yet. If you have the time, please be thorough.

In general as town, it is ideal to get a claim out of anyone driven to L-1, if you think that person is scum. As scum, it's a good idea to emulate town play and do the prior sentence anyways. See what HI did in regards to the wagon on EW for an example of what happens when you do NOT think the person is scum. While yes, you potentially limit the pool of shots of scum into a higher percent chane of hitting a PR; a PR claim and a 1 for 1 is generally a good thing in this particular setup due to the nature of how it works, with one or two exceptions that if requested I can break down later.

That said, this site's "metagame" if you will almost always involves getting a claim from the main wagon day one, and then either lynching it or lynching another person, also getting a claim from them. Lynching WITHOUT a claim almost always involves at least a consideration of a policy lynch on the player who hammered the wagon into a lynch without requesting the claim.

SO essentially, site culture here has decided as a whole that the double edge word of obtaining a claim from near-universally scum-read players beats the advantage scum gets of narrowing down PR potentials. Not a site-wide 100% blanket, but a good "general rule" to keep in mind.

[Cabd]

wait for them to claim or refuse,

Refusal to at least soft-claim, for example, "I am an unspecified PR" is pretty much a scum claim in site meta

[Cabd]

Major claim stall detected unless I've missed a post.

[Cabd]

@mod requesting early prod of mallow due to deadline

[Cabd]

Because i just got home and that was my first post in a string of many?

[Cabd]

What bugs me is intent to hammer was declared. Then EW makes a metric fuckton of posts without claiming. I'm pouring over the ISO now to see if anything strikes me as useful, but as of right now, no.

[Cabd]

You directly declared intent to hammer, and I directly said claims should be done at L-1?

[Cabd]

But just to make it perfectly clear, I am asking EW to claim before deadline hits and mallow gets here to hammer most likely

[Cabd]

Not entirely caught up but no fucking way is it a good idea to lynch blindly on day one, like... ever?

[Cabd]

At this point, I feel like I need to see more of EW actually playing without being on the edge of being hammered. At this point if he's hammered, I wouldn't be surprised by anything he might flip. The entire range of possibilities are in play and I suspect that any of the active players in this game could all make a well reasoned case for any outcome. (Be honest, Copper, you could!).

This sounds like something scum says about his buddy to vote the counterwagon.

[Cabd]

Regarding voting rules on mafiascum, we have a simple system where if nobody is hammered (put to a majority of players casting votes against them) then the day ends in a no lynh, no matter how close the votes were to achieving that lynch. This is why I advised getting a wagon to L-1 a day or two in advance, to avoid a no lynch.