Townplay Discussion Thread

[DragonEater70]

Apparently, we don't have a thread for this. Well now we do. This is the townplay discussion thread where you can discuss scum tells, strategies, offer advice, ask questions, and more!

[DragonEater70]

I'll start with a question: I noticed that sometimes as town I get into a gamestate where it's late in Day 1, or even Day 2, and I don't reallt feel I have any solid scumreads. Or alternatively I feel I have too many townreads and I know some of them are wrong but can't tell which. I'm curious to know: Does anybody else experience this? How do you guys deal with this situation? Is there any way to proactively avoid it happening in the first place?

[Gypyx]

if you have people you're *very* confident in being town generally that probably means sheeping them is the right call

otherwise you could try scumcasing people you townread to see what you find and if it feels right or not

[Bingle]

Is there any way to proactively avoid it happening in the first place?

The best way to play town well is to roll scum ime.

Seriously, though, my answer to being to quick to townreading specific players is generally to just ignore them entirely D1. If you are finding that you townread too many different players without it being playstyle/individual linked, you might consider a gamestate oriented approach to D1, where you try to encourage people to take a bunch of different stances and then eliminate someone a lot of people have strongly conflicting views about. It usually leads to pretty healthy conversation D2/3. I generally feel that whether the D1 elim hits scum is usually pretty irrelevant.

[Dannflor]

in short, stop handing out town reads so easily

I used to have this problem to an extreme degree and it helped me to be very stringent between what actually proved to be town indicative and what I felt *should* be town indicative but actually wasn’t

also yeah, you only need a few town reads you are confident on to work with them and get a solid elimination

I think the biggest folly with handing out too many town reads for not solid reasons is that you end up defending scum, im not saying you can avoid ever defending scum but i generally think the most important thing for any townie to avoid is *hard* defending scum

like it’s not worth hard defending that pocket town read on what you think is LHF if there’s even a semi-decent chance you’re wrong

[Psyche]

I'll start with a question: I noticed that sometimes as town I get into a gamestate where it's late in Day 1, or even Day 2, and I don't reallt feel I have any solid scumreads. Or alternatively I feel I have too many townreads and I know some of them are wrong but can't tell which. I'm curious to know: Does anybody else experience this? How do you guys deal with this situation? Is there any way to proactively avoid it happening in the first place?

I don't think it's to be avoided. Not having clear reads is the natural state, where everyone starts and tends to stay.
The thing to do in that state is to work on your reads by re-reading and discussing the game with both townreads and potential scumreads.
Have them explain their confident reads and also what they're unsure about.
Maybe they'll persuade you, maybe you'll notice something that allows you to strike out on your own.

Honestly, I think sheeping is too easily defaulted to -- and sometimes a waste of an opportunity to play the game you signed up.
If you don't agree with someone's reasons for doing something, using that to start a discussion is better for both you

and

that person than just letting them have their way.
Maybe sheep people to help sort or when forced by deadline, but personally if I don't have a confident scumread I'm staying unvoted until I do.

[humaneatingmonkey]

I'll start with a question: I noticed that sometimes as town I get into a gamestate where it's late in Day 1, or even Day 2, and I don't reallt feel I have any solid scumreads. Or alternatively I feel I have too many townreads and I know some of them are wrong but can't tell which. I'm curious to know: Does anybody else experience this? How do you guys deal with this situation? Is there any way to proactively avoid it happening in the first place?

I have an opposite problem where everyone's scum, and so i prod people until i get an intuition that "i can't empathize with this person right now", and so that usually means i'm on opposite world where they're town and they're probably right and i'm wrong, or they're scum. making sure they talk and making sure people talk about them generates a lot of info based on how they would react, how others would react, etc.

i'm seldom the person to solve a game though. my dayplay isn't really that great and my ego usually gets in the way.

[KayJayQueue]

The best way to get me to townread you is to be nice to me. Crazy how often that works. I’m so easy

[Radical Rat]

Keep in mind the expected number of scum players, and make sure not to hand out more townreads than should exist. If you reach a point where you're townreading someone and you already have the maximum amount of townreads, you have to decide if someone's worth kicking off the list. If there's no one you feel okay kicking off the list, don't add the new one.

That keeps at least one viable solve in play at all times, and you have multiple options available to compromise on if it becomes necessary. Ideally enough people will agree on at least one of them.

[Klick]

I'll start with a question: I noticed that sometimes as town I get into a gamestate where it's late in Day 1, or even Day 2, and I don't reallt feel I have any solid scumreads. Or alternatively I feel I have too many townreads and I know some of them are wrong but can't tell which. I'm curious to know: Does anybody else experience this? How do you guys deal with this situation? Is there any way to proactively avoid it happening in the first place?

I also experience this very commonly, and I've been experimenting with solutions to this problem that I'm happy with

I find the extent to which this is a problem is really dependent on read accuracy, how well I'm defining my townreads, and how much influence I want/need to have on the game. It's okay to be wrong if it's early and you're not trying to control the elimination - your wrong reads can e.g. springboard a useful conversation about certain players, or make your mindset clear to help people townread you. And that sounds like the phase of the game you're talking about.

If you're specifically aiming to be more accurate in your solving earlier on though and find you're townreading too many players, then I essentially agree with Dannflor - be more stringent in defining your townreads. If you know you're most likely wrong somewhere, then really dig into your reasons for townreading everyone and decide which ones truly hold value, and which you should discard (or even just cast aside momentarily - you still might not be wrong on some of those reads!).

[Klick]

Honestly, I think sheeping is too easily defaulted to -- and sometimes a waste of an opportunity to play the game you signed up.
If you don't agree with someone's reasons for doing something, using that to start a discussion is better for both you

and

that person than just letting them have their way.
Maybe sheep people to help sort or when forced by deadline, but personally if I don't have a confident scumread I'm staying unvoted until I do.

I think there's skill in identifying when it's best to sheep and when it's best to push something independently, and being able to flex between both to get value

I think for every player who sheeps too often, there are at least two who are too stubborn to sheep when it would be useful.

[Ranmaru]

I'll start with a question: I noticed that sometimes as town I get into a gamestate where it's late in Day 1, or even Day 2, and I don't reallt feel I have any solid scumreads. Or alternatively I feel I have too many townreads and I know some of them are wrong but can't tell which. I'm curious to know: Does anybody else experience this? How do you guys deal with this situation? Is there any way to proactively avoid it happening in the first place?

I vote someone to shake up discussion even if the scum read is shaky as a twig, so I can gather reads from how people react to me. Yet that is if the gamestate was slow. If there is plenty of content and I was afk, then I'd just focus on reading more and try to develop my reads. I think I get better reads that way anyway. The former may or may not get me heat but I do it anyway to create discussion and help me gain more leads. I basically try to drive discussion unless there are others already handling that role. I think a good scumhunter told me that, having a reads list with town | null | scum, in an ordered fashion, with reasoning, helps you discuss them with your town reads to help you narrow down the correct conclusions. Yet something I've noticed, I do this way too early sometimes, and I have to flip my reads sometimes. Yet one game, I didn't post any reads, and instead I was distancing myself from the thread a bit more. Then, a scum player voted outside of their stated reads, and that was really off, I voted them quick. They were a town read, that I did not establish in thread yet. It's annoying having to discuss these when such things happen. So nowadays what I do first and foremost, is I have an ordered list Town | Null | Scum, but I just order them with how I feel they should be placed. Sometimes I publish my ordered reads list, sometimes I don't. Usually I just give my 2-3 scumreads in that case and that's all people really need to know. I guess most important of all, stay engaged in some manner. Either by posting and interacting with others, or by being distanced yet reading actively. If you let the thread add up without reading it and there is a ton to read, it'll be much harder to be engaged and you may have a harder time gaining scumreads. Those are the times I feel like I'm scum when I'm town because I was that much away from the thread that I'm like shit... how do I get back in. Etc. (I guess replacing in to games helps you work on the 'getting back in' skill)

Not having clear reads is the natural state, where everyone starts and tends to stay.

You are making me think of Smash Bros with the neutral state. Damn. I guess to add to this, it's good to have discussion and wagons for the state to have more information and pressure. Yes this may be anti-town but I enjoy last minute swaps near deadline to make things chaotic and not let scum stay comfortable. My problem is sometimes I do this and it's saving scum by accident. Silly me.