Newbie 2089 | Endgame

[TistDaniel]

Hi everyone! I'm new here, but I've done some of the recommended reading, as well as a bunch of the pages on the wiki, some forum posts about strategy, and a few previous newbie games. I started reading Progo's previous game, because I wanted to get to know some of the people I'd be playing with, but this game started before I got to the first elimination, so I don't even know what role he had. I don't know anything about the rest of you.

Since this is a newbie game, there's a good chance that a new player has gotten a power role they've never had before, and don't know how to play. It benefits town if all town players know how to play their roles. So could the more experienced players talk for a bit about how the power roles should be played, strategy for using the powers, when it's appropriate to claim, etc?

One thing I would like clarification about in particular: one of Micc's posts says "Do not fake claim a power role as town!" I totally get that I can win even if I'm dead, and if I'm vanilla, me fake-claiming has the potential to screw up town in a big way. But what if I'm not vanilla?

So imagine I'm the cop, and I'm one vote from being eliminated. Cop is a very powerful role. This may be just me being new, but it seems to me that cop is *the* most powerful role in NewD3. If cop survives Day 1, they have a 28.5% chance of identifying scum during the night. So if I'm cop, and I'm one vote from being eliminated, I need to claim so that town doesn't kill me. But if I claim cop, there's a 50% chance there's no doctor to protect me, and scum will kill me during the night.

It seems to me that in this situation, I should claim Mason. Mason doesn't have a power that helps them to identify scum, or to prevent the night kill, so scum have much less incentive to kill me. Also, scum don't know until a power role dies that a game has a cop instead of a mason: it's a plausible lie.

In this situation, there is a town player who is absolutely sure that I'm lying, and if they say so, we both get killed and lose two power roles. That's obviously really bad. But if they can keep their mouth shut for just one night, I can get one scan off and potentially tell everyone tomorrow who one of the scum is--or at least confirm someone to be town.

Now obviously I'm new here, and if you all tell me that I'm wrong about this, I'll accept that. But it seems to me that our policy on town fake claims should be this:

1. If you're vanilla town, *never* claim a role you don't have.

2. If you have a power role, don't claim a power role unless you're one vote away from being eliminated, or you've used your power to obtain information town needs to know.

3. If someone claims a role you know they don't actually have, don't counterclaim until late the following day. This gives them time to use their power and confess their lie on their own without you having to out yourself. But as we get close to elimination the day after they fake claimed, you should then claim, because they're probably scum. Worst case scenario, you die before you get a chance to counterclaim, but your death reveals your role, and once town knows your role, they know the claim was fake.

I personally don't see anything wrong with this strategy, but once again, I'm new here, and I'm willing to accept if more experienced players tell me that it's bad. So please let me know what you think. And please also give an overview on how to play power roles for newer players who may have power roles for the first time in this game.

[TistDaniel]

Dunnstral, I know mafia can narrow it down to three possible setups. If we have a cop, we're either in A1 or C1. Mafia knows only whether we're in A or C. Both A and C can be masons, which is why I suggested that the cop fake claim as mason. From Mafia's perspective, that is a plausible claim. From the doctor's perspective, it is not, but mafia have no reason not to believe it. And if the doctor knows not to counterclaim until late the following day (or there is no doctor), town power roles are safe, and the cop gets a scan they otherwise wouldn't have gotten.

Thank you for your advice for power roles. Follow up questions:

Should cop claim the instant they detect scum, or should they try to find the second scum role?

Should doctor/jailkeeper claim if they believe they've prevented a night kill?

[TistDaniel]

Looking at tracker, they only coincide with doctor, jailkeeper, and town friendly neighbor. If they track someone who visits someone who dies, it's possible but unlikely that scum and neighbor targeted the same person at the same time. It's far less likely that doctor or jailkeeper would visit someone the night they died. It seems to me that tracker can almost be sure they've tracked scum if the target dies. So they should follow the same strategy as cop in this circumstance?

Is there ever a point where a cop should claim if they haven't detected scum? Actually no, that's obvious. If they've identified all innocents still alive, they should obviously claim, because the only players they haven't scanned will be scum. But what if they've identified all innocents left alive, minus one? Is that a good time to claim? It would confirm most of the remaining town players, which would be very advantageous to town, right?

What if you're the doctor, the cop/tracker got killed, and you blocked a nightkill? I think in that circumstance, you should claim. As I see it, the doctor's main function is to protect cop/tracker if they claim, and once they're dead, you're unlikely to block the nightkill ever again, so if you've blocked it once, that's probably the most valuable information you'll ever be able to give town. Am I right on this?

[TistDaniel]

Thank you for your answers, NorwegianboyEE. I'm glad I asked about this stuff. You've given me some perspective that wouldn't have occurred to me. I've been thinking that of course you have to claim once you know scum, but I think you're right, ideally it's better not to claim, just make a case against them, and save your claim for if nobody is listening.

And of course a lot of the stuff we're talking about probably doesn't translate to non-newbie games, where the setup can be very different.

[TistDaniel]

It wasn't a deliberate choice to read Progo. I did initially look for a game with multiple people I'd be playing with, but couldn't find one. If I recall correctly, I eventually settled on the most recent completed newbie game at the time I started reading.

[TistDaniel]

ofmerica, do you have any thoughts on strategy? Either power roles, or just general scumhunting? I haven't heard much from you.

[TistDaniel]

NorwegianboyEE:

Not especially. I've read 17 of Progo's posts, and it was all RVS stuff. I don't know which way he flipped, so I don't have any handle on his tells or anything.

I feel like all I really know about him is that 2087 was his first online game (though he played in person before that) and that he's never played League of Legends. (It came up as a discussion point in 2087.)

So ... I know almost as much about you as about him.

ofmerica:

My point is not that Mafia will be confused about whether we're in A or C.

Cop knows we're in A or C because those are A1 and C1 are the only setups that cop can appear. Mafia knows for sure whether we're in A or C, but they don't know whether it's 1, 2, or 3. A3 and C3 are both masons. Cop can claim mason, and Mafia doesn't know otherwise. If they're in A, it's A1, but Mafia thinks it's A3. If they're in C, it's C1, but Mafia thinks it's C3. Either way, it's a plausible lie to everyone except the doctor, if there is one, who knows for sure he's not in A3 or C3.

[TistDaniel]

ofmerica:

There's no other power role as worthy of killing as mason? I thought mason would be rather weak, since you have one confirmed town you can talk to, which feels like a pretty weak power to me, and once one of you gets killed, the other has no power at all. Perhaps I don't understand how to play mason?

As for my fakeclaim thoughts, I know what I'm saying is against current site meta. I'm just not sure that current site meta is correct, at least with regards to NewD3 games.

You're right, my fakeclaim thoughts do make it easier for mafia to fakeclaim, but not really *that* much easier. If you read my original post on it, I am saying that if a person doesn't explain their fakeclaim within one full game day, they're scum and should be lynched. So it's a short-term strategy at best for scum.

Also, it's not all that easy for scum to fakeclaim. While town can fakeclaim certain roles and scum won't know (such as, in my example, cop claiming to be mason) the reverse isn't true.

Look at the NewD3 setup table. If Mafia knows we're in A, and fakeclaims any role at all there's a 100% chance that at least one person knows they're lying, and a 66% chance that two people know. If Mafia knows we're in C, and they fakeclaim any role, there's a 100% chance somebody knows. The only time it's at all feasible for Mafia to fakeclaim is if we're in B. And they're still not guaranteed to be safe. They're definitely unsafe the instant another power role flips or claims.

[TistDaniel]

Welcome to the game, fwogcarf. Any thoughts on the discussion so far?

[TistDaniel]

Ah, that is a good point. If you claim to be mason, scum can eliminate all town power with a single kill.

Thanks for that insight.

[TistDaniel]

ProgoWoshua: I know, I can reread older games. I'm a very slow and analytical reader though, especially when the content is as important as a mafia game. Little details matter, and I don't think I can give this game the attention it deserves while also reading another game. I might finish reading 2087, but I probably won't until this game is over.

I'm reviewing older posts in this game right now, which is why I haven't been talking as much. While I was waiting for the game to start, I made a lot of probability calculations about how to play, and obviously I missed out on a lot of things that are very obvious to people who are more in-tune to the social elements of the game. As far as probability goes, I maintain that cop claiming mason at E-1 is a good move. But I obviously completely missed what ofmerica pointed out about how scum would be thinking they could neutralize all town power with a single kill.

Discussion so far has given me a lot to think about, and I need to re-evaluate what I thought I knew.

[TistDaniel]

But this is a newbie game, and it would benefit new town to know how to play.

Is it alignment indicative to not want to benefit new town?

[TistDaniel]

I'll be honest, RVS feels stupid to me. Part of my reason for wanting to discuss how to correctly play power roles is that I see it as an alternative to RVS. Y'all can just as easily vote someone for giving bad advice as for having a stupid name.

[TistDaniel]

VOTE: fwogcarf

Of course you're welcome not to join in on this particular discussion, but that reasoning for *why* not to join in doesn't sit well with me. On average, town power knows *more* about our setup than scum does. The only way I see this conversation possibly benefiting scum is if someone claims a role or is exclusively interested in discussing a single role, which we haven't seen.

This looks to me like a player (who hasn't contributed anything to discussion so far) activity discouraging other people from learning how to play town roles better. This does not sit well with me.

[TistDaniel]

Didn't think this would come up in game, but I am a psychology student. The field of psychology is currently embroiled in a replication crisis, after it was revealed in 2018 that half of the studies published ten years earlier, in 2008, failed to replicate. Psychology researchers have spent the past few years re-evaluating everything about the way psychology research is conducted, and re-examining all prior research. Some fields of research, such as psychology research, have been replicating just fine. Other fields, like priming, have been utterly demolished.

Also, the sort of psychology used in courtrooms is very often abysmal. For example, it was just last year that the state of Texas finally banned testimony obtained through hypnosis. The rest of the world has known that hypnosis is notorious for creating false memories ever since the Satanic Panic of the 1980s.

So when Frog comes in here backing up the idea of "consciousness of guilt slips" based on what's used in courtrooms, and citing a priming study published in 1979, that's about as trustworthy as citing Little Red Riding Hood.

I don't believe it was done with malicious intent. I'm just saying, I'm going to need a lot better than that if you want me to believe in consciousness of guilt slips.

VOTE: ofmerica

I do not like the way ofmerica in post 66 pointed Dunstral to post 62 (Progo's "slip") without even saying that there was anything wrong with it, and without voting Progo. This looks to me like scum trying to start a wagon without actually being on the wagon. It doesn't help that ofmerica is still defending this.

[TistDaniel]

Sorry, meant to say "some fields of research, such as *personality* research"

[TistDaniel]

Ah, sorry. I seem to have read post 115 out of context. Thought you were still maintaining that.

[TistDaniel]

AutoDefenestrator: While I agree completely on the value of RVS analysis, town starts this game with almost no information. Discussion is the only way for the town to obtain information. When someone does not join in the discussion, that is an anti-town act.

Virtually your only contribution to discussion so far is the extremely safe "I agree with everyone else about Progo, now that the drama is over and everyone is agreed about Progo". Town at this point has no reason not to think that you're scum. And if you're town, it's bad for town to end up eliminating you just because you never gave us any information to work from.

As I've said before, I dislike RVS. But I'm still here talking to people, asking questions, throwing votes, trying to get a town-beneficial conversation started. Because information benefits town, and I want to win this.

[TistDaniel]

I agree, D1 information has very little value ... *on D1*. After the elimination and the nightkill, town is going to look back at this discussion knowing the alignment of two players, and being able to assign much more significance to it.

What we're saying right now is going to be the foundation of D2 cases. And if we say nothing right now, town won't be able to make cases come D2.

[TistDaniel]

So according to you, we should each issue a random vote, hammer the D1 elimination, and then begin discussion on D2 with which D1 votes didn't seem random? Because if discussion on D1 doesn't matter, that seems like the optimal strategy.

I agree, solving games D1 does seem quite peculiar. But if I recall correctly, that's what happened in Newbie 1856. (That's one of the games I read before I started looking for people I'd actually be playing with.) It's rare, but it does happen.

[TistDaniel]

I believe Dunnstral is asking fwogcarf who is talking about an ongoing game. fwogcarf was talking about AutoDefenestrator (122).

[TistDaniel]

A lot of people have been saying that discussing town strategy is not alignment indicative, but I'm also the most town-read player (18, 59, 60, 72, 128, 137) when most of what I've done in this game is discuss town strategy. Not quite sure how to interpret that. Anyway, I decided to read back over responses to my discussion of town strategy.

Dunnstral came in (14) immediately after my first post (13), answering a lot of my questions. He didn't really go deep into advice for town strategy. He also didn't agree with my ideas about town power fakeclaiming. I asked (15) if cop should claim the instant they detect scum, or wait to find the second scum. (I personally was thinking that cop should claim immediately after detecting scum, since that's vitally important information for town to have, and there's a 50% chance there will be a doctor to protect cop.) Dunnstral never actually answered this question instead talking (17) about how cop shouldn't claim when they *haven't* found any scum yet. Could just have skimmed over my post and misunderstood.

NorwegianboyEE came in (16) to reply to Dunnstral's answers (14) to my questions (13). His advice is good. He townreads me after (18). I asked about an unlikely hypothetical situation with doctor (19). I think it's best to claim in that circumstance. NorwegianboyEE disagrees with me (20), but his perspective is a normal perspective for people to have. NAI. He responds (21) to another unlikely situation about cop that I asked about (19). His answer seems reasonable to me. Elaborates on views (22, 23), and points out (24) that cop doesn't need to claim after a guilty to make an elimination happen, so claim should be a last resort. He elaborates on this further (26). He didn't have to point this out, and I don't think anyone would have noticed if he hadn't, and it's good advice that hadn't occurred to me, and probably hadn't occurred to other newbie town. I think this *is* alignment-indicative, and it indicates town.

KittyTacky came in (28) to elaborate on what NorwegianboyEE said (26), then disagreed with my fakeclaim ideas (29). This is not an unusual perspective to take. NAI.

ofmerica pretty much just restated accepted site meta (35) when prompted (34). They seem to have misunderstood what I was saying about what mafia would know in my hypothetical, so I clarified (36). Then they went on to say that it's a bad idea to claim mason (37, 42). I'm not going to say this is alignment-indicative though, because I think mafia would want cop to claim cop rather than mason. I can read what ofmerica said as either town-beneficial or scum-beneficial.

fwogcarf said (48) that strategy discussion is NAI. I think it can be AI, as I explained in my read on NorwegianboyEE. Still, I can believe town having fwogcarf's perspective here. I prodded (49) saying that this was beneficial to town, and fwogcarf blew it off (52) saying that it wouldn't factor into his reads. He then said (53) that it benefits mafia more than town, but he wouldn't protest if the discussion continued without him (54). Seems a bit shady to me. If you believe that a discussion benefits scum more than town, why wouldn't you try to shut it down? I called him out (56) pointing out that his claim (53) that scum knows more about the setup is wrong (on average). He admits to having made a mistake (64). And it is an easy mistake to make. I don't think anyone was studying the NewD3 table as much as I was.

ofmerica (66) asked Dunnstral about Progo's "slip" (62), but without saying there was anything wrong with it. ofmerica spent a lot of P5 arguing that this was a slip. That looks to me like scum trying to start a wagon without actually being on it, and I said as much (116). ofmerica defends by saying that they didn't vote Progo because they wanted to hear from Progo first (118) ... but I'm not finding anywhere where ofmerica actually asked Progo to address what was happening, or anywhere where ofmerica actually addressed Progo directly at all. Just double-checked ofmerica's posts: they have not directly addressed Progo in this entire game.

Reads thus far:

NorwegianboyEE - Probably town for volunteering town-beneficial advice that wasn't obvious (at least to newbies) and wouldn't have been noticed if it were omitted.

fwogcarf - Might be scum for not trying to stop a discussion that he seems to have thought benefited mafia. I don't have a strong feeling about this though. Might be sub-optimal town play.

ofmerica - Might be scum for quietly trying to start a wagon without engaging in any actual questioning of the person the wagon targets. I'd put the odds of them being scum higher than fwogcarf, which is why this is still my vote.

I'd really like to hear more from the other five players though. Since I don't have much in their words to go off of, I'm going to post some stats:

AutoDefenestrator
5 posts: 44, 122, 123, 129, 130
447 words. 89 average words per post.

fwogcarf
12 posts: 38, 39, 48, 52, 53, 54, 64, 70, 78, 79, 80, 84
216 words. 18 words per post.

ofmercia
15 posts: 8, 30, 35, 37, 42, 66, 87, 94, 98, 103, 111, 112, 115, 118, 128
566 words. 37 words per post.

TistDaniel
19 posts: 13, 15, 19, 26, 31, 33, 36, 40, 41, 43, 47, 49, 50, 56, 116, 117, 119, 125, 131
2616 words. 137 words per post.

ProgoWoshua
9 posts: 45, 46, 51, 62, 68, 88, 89, 100, 102
183 words. 20 words per post.

KittyTacky
14 posts: 6, 11, 28, 29, 74, 75, 76, 86, 99, 110, 113, 114, 121, 124
437 words. 31 words per post.

NorwegianboyEE
37 posts: 9, 10, 12, 16, 18, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 27, 34, 57, 58, 59, 60, 61, 63, 69, 71, 73, 81, 83, 90, 91, 92, 93, 95, 96, 97, 101, 105, 106, 107, 109, 132
1474 words. 39 words per post.

Dunnstral
5 posts: 14, 17, 65, 67, 82
387 words. 77 words per post.

Frogsterking
7 posts: 7, 72, 77, 85, 104, 108, 120
234 words. 33 words per post.

I said (47) that I'm a very slow and analytical reader when it comes to mafia games. This is why. I'm collecting and organizing data as much as I can. I feel it helps with investigation. For example, you can tell at a glance that Dunnstral, AutoDefenestrator, and Frogsterking are the biggest lurkers in this game. fwogcarf and ProgoWoshua are less obvious lurkers: they've made more posts, but they've said less in those posts. I'm the most active player by wordcount, and second most active by postcount. NorwegianboyEE is the most active by postcount and the second most active by wordcount, which reinforces my townread on him: lurking is anti-town, and he's lurked less than anyone.

My vote remains on ofmerica.

[TistDaniel]

Oh, and I suppose I should point out that this is only current up to post 132. Though not much has happened since then.

[TistDaniel]

Ah, you're right. Fair point. I missed that.

[TistDaniel]

If cop claims cop, Mafia knows the cop is a threat. Masons, I still can't really see as a threat to mafia. They don't have a scan power. It's easier for me to believe that scum would let a confirmed mason live than a confirmed cop.

[TistDaniel]

But this is the thing you want to talk about? Not the Progo case?

[TistDaniel]

ofmerica, I think meta is more complex than just "the most effective tactics available". Meta is the most effective tactics *based on what is currently in common usage*. It's wrong to fake-clam as town power in current site meta, because current site meta says that town should immediately counterclaim.

If current site meta was that town should counterclaim late the following day, would it still be wrong? This still results in fake claims being eliminated, but it gives them the chance to use a power first. Perhaps it's not as good idea to claim mason as I had originally thought, but there's still a 50% chance that a cop who claims cop before scanning will never get to scan.

[TistDaniel]

I'll admit, I could be wrong. Part of where I was coming from originally was that I assumed that mafia would have more reasons behind the nightkill than just the power role. Let's say AutoDefenestrator claimed mason right now. He's saying he has no power to scan or block the nightkill. But we also know that it's his first game on the site, and several players are leaning on him for lurking too much. It seemed to me that mafia would be more likely to kill me, because I'm the most town-read player, I'm talking a lot, and maybe I got lucky with some of my reads. Meanwhile, a wagon might still form on AutoDefenestrator even if they do absolutely nothing about it.

Like I've said, I haven't played any games here before. Maybe mafia always kills power over someone troublesome in other ways. I've been assuming I'm probably going to be tonight's nightkill though.

[TistDaniel]

ofmerica: I suppose I'll have to take your word for it. You obviously have more experience playing here than I do.

[TistDaniel]

Anyway, my whole reason for bringing this thing up was to explain why I'm not townreading ofmerica for saying this. Even if this is just obvious to everyone here but me, that's still not a reason to townread ofmerica for saying this. It's NAI, which was my point.

[TistDaniel]

I'm just going by what reads I've seen so far. I don't think I've seen your reads. Feel like posting them?

[TistDaniel]

If you don't have enough to go on for reads at the moment, have you considered questioning people? Maybe you can catch someone in a contradiction.

[TistDaniel]

Glad to hear Frog is working on five factor stuff. I was worried it might be Meyers-Briggs. I actually did some data analysis on a five factor dataset (N = 30,000 or some absurd number like that). I might have additional insight on it, depending on what it is.

I'll be a bit less active for the next few days. My wife's birthday is the 23rd, and she likes to take a week off for it. We're getting our boosters and taking the dog to the dog park today, then doing an escape room with friends tomorrow. Having dinner with my family on her actual birthday, etc. I'll be posting every day, just not to the same extent I have been.

[TistDaniel]

So I vote ofmercia, ofmercia continues to townread me significantly after my vote, but I don't unvote. Then I post that I'll be a bit less active for the next few days, including that I have plans for today, and in ofmercia's very next post they decide that I'm scum and vote me.

That feels so scummy that it's hard to imagine scum doing that. I expect scum to behave more like ofmercia trying to start a wagon on Progo: subtle and indirect. But in ofmercia's case on me, this looks more like someone who isn't too concerned with how they appear. And of course scum should be very concerned with how they appear.

Honestly, I can totally understand ofmercia's view on me too. If I weren't me, that post might well feel lamist to me too.

I won't be moving my vote at the moment, but I'm interested in this development.

[TistDaniel]

For what it's worth, I think AutoDefenestrator is right: I think I would be playing very similarly to this as scum. The strategies I've been discussing probably won't come into play in this particular game, so he's right that I'm probably not giving a very large advantage to town. And he's right that this discussion might benefit me in future games.

He says I'm enough of an overthinker to try something like this. That isn't really how I see it. I was thinking I'd just play as town whatever role I got. I actually considered not reading my role PM until elimination so that it wouldn't influence my thinking. Though of course we had to read our PMs to confirm our roles, so that ended up not working out like that.

fwog says I'm probably the most consistent. As I mentioned in my first post, I did read a lot of the recommended reading for newbies. One of the articles says that being wishy-washy is a sign of scum, but I really don't think it is. Scum knows who they need to kill right from the beginning of the game. Town does not, and so their perspective should change quite often as new evidence becomes available. I personally see a consistent player as being more suspicious. If I'm the most consistent character, I think that should make me worth investigating.

[TistDaniel]

I say I'll be busy and not as active, and still end up being the most active player. ProgoWoshua, we last heard from you in post 102. It's now post 201. Where are you? Why so lurky? What are your reads?

[TistDaniel]

NorwegianboyEE, looks like you're townreading me, ofmercia, and your vote is on Frog for the Progo scandal. Have any thoughts on other players?

[TistDaniel]

Dunnstral: what's your strategy for finding scum?

[TistDaniel]

Frog: Is this SSS something you're still putting together, or are you waiting for a certain amount of activity before posting?

[TistDaniel]

Auto: Ok, I can see what you mean. If I'm looking for wishy-washy opinions as scum, and I say so, of course scum are going to make an effort to seem less wishy-washy in response to that.

I suppose what I should say is Dunnstral: will you be doing any questioning? Will you be putting any pressure with your vote? Are you going to do vote count analysis? Or are you just going to sit quietly and hope that someone does something scummy?

[TistDaniel]

Just did an ISO on Kitty, and I think he has probably given the most complete reads of everyone in this game:

In 99 he said both Frog and ofmercia seemed sus to him in the context of the Progo controversy. In 185 he said Norwe and I are probably town, and he's played a game with scum Norwe before. In 190 he said slight townlean on Auto, Dunnst is very null, but Kitty knows him to lurk as town.

Kitty's been flying under my radar, but now that I've taken a closer look, he looks like an experienced player who isn't afraid to voice opinions about other players. Leaning town on him now.

[TistDaniel]

Progo asked how I got the wrong post numbers in one of my posts.

Truth is, I'm copying all of the posts into a separate document so that I can view them all on the same page, and search by keywords. My operating system is Puppy Linux, and the default text editor allows for code folding. I've set up code-folding to work on plain text documents, so I can fold an entire book up into the table of contents, and then click a particular chapter to unfold that chapter. It's particularly helpful in Mafia, because I can have everyone's posts and votes directly in front of me at once, without having to load ten different pages.

How did I get the wrong numbers? I had folded up Norwegianboy's posts before citing the numbers, and accidentally cited two of his adjacent posts rather than the posts I intended to cite.

As for ofmercia, that was a typo. I retype all of the post numbers as I paste in the actual posts. I just mistyped 126 as 128, and didn't catch the mistake. My document goes 125, 128, 127, 128.

Here's my screen as it appears while I'm playing: https://ibb.co/c2kr28t

I'll reply to more, but I just woke up. Give me a bit.

[TistDaniel]

On my level of activity in this game: I've gone from being the most town-read player to the most scum-read player. But you know what? You all have reads on me. You've all *had* reads on me, probably long before you had reads on anyone else. And you have reads on me because you've seen me in action.

I expressed my view in 125 at the very top of page 6: "...town starts this game with almost no information. Discussion is the only way for the town to obtain information. When someone does not join in the discussion, that is an anti-town act."

I'm not hiding from y'all. I tell you what I think when you ask, and far more often, I tell you what I think when you don't ask. Sometimes I'm wrong. Sometimes I'm stupid. But this is my 43rd post, if I'm counting correctly. So if I'm scum, you won't have a hard time finding slips. Personally, I'm in favor of eliminating someone who isn't so easy to read.

[TistDaniel]

The booster yesterday hit me harder than the first two shots. I didn't sleep very well, and I'm feeling pretty out of it today. So if I'm a bit less active, that's why. Expect to be back to normal by tomorrow, I think.

I think I've seen the most scummy behavior from ofmercia, but I think true scum would make more of an effort to hide scummy behavior. Not quite ready to townread them yet, but they are at least one of the more active players.

Glad to see some activity out of Progo. Most of his reads seem to center around the controversy surrounding him, which makes sense from his perspective. Assuming he's town, the only alignment he's sure of is his own, so it makes sense for him to do vote count analysis on his own wagon. He is still one of the bigger lurkers in this game (by postcount, if not by wordcount). I'd like to see more from him, but he hasn't felt too scummy to me.

Progo reads Dunnstral as town for not being the first to openly scumread Progo for the "slip". I disagree. You can hardly tell what ofmercia is talking about unless you're paying very close attention or you reread. If Dunnstral came out against Progo at this point, it would look like he was the first to have a problem with Progo, and I don't think scum would want to be the first on a wagon. Sure, saying that it wasn't scummy makes it harder for Dunnstral to jump on that wagon later, but if it ended up being a real thing, he could just stay off it the entire day and get easy townreads after Progo's slip.

Assuming Progo is town, I see no reason Dunnstral must also be town.

Don't really have a strong read on Dunnstral either way, and I feel like I never will, which scares me.

As Progo points out, fwog is one of the more active players. That said, he doesn't really stand out to me. His post that Progo calls the most important is literally just "Nah". Perhaps from Progo's perspective, that seems townie, because Progo knows his own alignment, but I don't know Progo's alignment, so it doesn't mean as much to me.

Frogster is the fourth-lurkiest player by post count, but somehow also manages to fade into the background far more than the others. He says he has something planned, and I don't think I've put as much pressure on him because I've been waiting to see how it turns out. When will we see how it turns out, Frogster?

With the exception of ofmercia, all my scumreads are lurkers. I'd be happiest voting one of those.

[TistDaniel]

Oh neat! I didn't realize that ISO gave you post count. Well that's handy!

So ofmercia, I agree: activity does not equal town. But I also believe that activity is pro-town. The more active scum is, the easier it is to find their motivations. So when someone is very inactive, they're making it more difficult for town to function, whether they're town or scum themselves.

For what it's worth, I do think wordcounts help as well. Looking at post counts, Frog has 14 posts, which puts him above Auto with 10, Progo with 11, and Dunnstral with 11. But Auto has 992 words, Progo has 1310, and Dunnstral has 511, while Frog only has 432. Frog has said less in this game than our three biggest lurkers--but you wouldn't know that looking only at post counts.

I asked in 207 about the status of Frog's survey. That was more than 36 hours ago, with no response. The last time we heard from him was 189, more than 48 hours ago. Frog did say in his first post that he'd post his survey 10-12 pages in, which is right where we are now.

Looking back at Progo's reads, he says Frog and ofmercia can't both be scum, and he thinks it's more likely that ofmercia is. Based on the Progo controversy alone, I agree. But ofmercia has been here all along, taking part in discussion, answering questions, putting pressure on people. I still don't feel so certain they're town, but if they're not, we at least should see some signs that we're not appearing more and more as we go forward. I can't say that about Frog.

VOTE: Frogsterking

Frog, where are you? What are your reads? Are you ever going to post your SSS?

[TistDaniel]

I'm with fwog on this: I don't like how quiet Auto is. I don't think I need to rehash what I've said about lurking, because I feel like I've said it quite a lot recently.

I don't like how quiet Auto is, but I can also understand town having the views Auto has. I'm skeptical of how useful a lot of the scumhunting tactics people talk about actually are, especially on Day 1, so I can understand being reluctant of taking part in the process, particularly with how long day length is here. (I've read some games on other forums, and day length is 48 hours or so, so activity expectations are very different.)

I could believe Auto stepping forward and being more useful on Day 2. That said, I don't have so much faith in that outcome that I'd try to dissuade a wagon on him, or use a power on him tonight.

[TistDaniel]

In one of Micc's pre-game posts, he posted a link to a wiki page of articles on how to play well. I found a lot of the advice very disappointing.

"Antrax's Guide to Being a Good Townie" repeatedly gives the advice "Use your brain" without actually explaining what that entails. As a psych student, I can tell you that the brain has particular flaws that you need to be aware of and compensate for. You can think of it like a gun that always shoots left: unless you know that the gun always shoots left, and you deliberately aim to the right of your target to compensate, you will never hit your target. Telling people "Use your brain" without telling them *how* is a recipe for failure. It's like how conspiracy theorists repeatedly say "Do your own research" because when the average high-school graduate does their own research, they come to very different conclusions from people who do research professionally.

"Mastin's Golden Rules" suggests coming up with logic to justify your gut reactions. Again, as a psych student, I think that's the exact opposite of what you should do. There's a psychological phenomenon called "choice blindness", where people make choices without knowing why. You can actually have someone take a political survey, then swap it for a completely different set of answers when they're not looking, and ask them why they answered the questions in a particular way, and they'll tell you why *when they actually gave the exact opposite answers*. Like you can have someone who strongly believes that abortion is murder, swap their survey for one that says they selected the multiple choice option that abortions should be legal, and ask them about it, and they'll justify why they gave you an answer that's the exact opposite of what they really believe. "Oh, I really just meant in very particular cases, etc." So in my humble opinion, we should listen to gut reactions (gut reactions are often more accurate than conscious analysis) but we also need to acknowledge that they're gut reactions that we don't actually have any reasoning for.

Going beyond guides and into what I see in use, I feel like a lot of people majorly overvalue "slips". The idea is that scum somehow can't keep straight in their head that seven of the nine players in the game are not in on their secret, and so they keep saying scummy things without thinking about it. The idea seems really silly to me. I mean maybe in an in-person game it might happen from time to time, but we're all taking our time to write out replies and get all the details right. I think it's probably far more likely for town players to look scummy by accident than for scum players to accidentally let slip their one big secret. Not to say that Progo is town, but if he's scum, I don't think he'll ever out himself with pretend instead of intend. And I felt that way before the revelation that English seems to be his second language.

I'm also skeptical of reads based on player meta. "I played with him before, and he's like this as town." I mean that's great and all, and there probably is some value to that, but at the same time, N = 1, no control group, and no blinding for observer bias. I don't think this carries as much weight as many people seem to believe it does.

[TistDaniel]

I doubt I will catch scum today. I'm saying it's harder than people make it out to be, not easier.

But yeah, I agree with ofmercia. I read somewhere that town's odds of catching scum Day 1 are *worse* than random chance, because scum are the only ones who know what's going on.

[TistDaniel]

Auto: Looks like you're saying in 277 that I'm recommending seeking breadcrumbs and rationalizing gutreads, when that's the exact opposite of what I recommended in 273. Have you just given up on reading the thread?

Kitty: I agree that ofmercia seemed scummy in response to the Progo controversy. But ofmercia is right that they said the RNG stuff after I unvoted. Sure, Progo was scumreading them, but that's not a whole lot of pressure.

Let's look at Progo's activity:

Two posts at the top of page 5: 100, 102. We hear nothing at all from hum after that until 205, more than a hundred posts and four pages later. He drops his reads in 216, and then, up until ofmercia's RNG comment, never made another post. Progo had put very nearly the absolute minimum pressure on ofmercia that he absolutely could. Plus, I had just removed my vote from ofmercia, which I originally placed in 116 on page 5.

ofmercia has had a vote on them ever since Norwegian's vote in 93 on page 4. In other words, ofmercia has had at least one vote against them, sometimes two, for eight of the twelve pages of this game. They had been scumread by one of our least active players three pages earlier, and never heard from the guy since then.

I mean yeah, I guess ofmercia had a little pressure on them, but not more than they've had on them for most of this game. Actually, it feels like significantly less, because my vote which had ridden for six pages had just moved.

Are you really sure the "RNG" comment was intended to deflect pressure?

[TistDaniel]

It's page 13 and Frogsterking is now officially overdue on his SSS.

[TistDaniel]

I hate quote blocks, but ok.

I'll be sure to artificially boost my visual contribution to town by hunting breadcrumbs and making up vacuous rationalizations for gutreads from now on (Daniel, 2022), sir.

I read this as you ascribing those views to me. I realize you're not addressing me, but you're presenting it as if these are views which I agree with.

That just feels a little weird as it comes right after this post:

"Mastin's Golden Rules" suggests coming up with logic to justify your gut reactions. Again, as a psych student, I think that's the exact opposite of what you should do.

[...]

Going beyond guides and into what I see in use, I feel like a lot of people majorly overvalue "slips". The idea is that scum somehow can't keep straight in their head that seven of the nine players in the game are not in on their secret, and so they keep saying scummy things without thinking about it. The idea seems really silly to me.

It seems like you're suggesting that I'm promoting things that I literally said were bad ideas just four posts earlier.

[TistDaniel]

Welcome to the game, StrangeMatter! I notice you're quoting relatively recent posts. Have you been following the conversation? Are you roughly caught up?

[TistDaniel]

Good to hear you're mostly caught up. My wife should be out for a few hours, and all I'm doing is wrapping her birthday presents and occasionally walking the dog, so I should be available if you have any questions for me.

[TistDaniel]

Could be bussing? I mean, it's still early in the day, and there isn't much actual risk. Plus, if this does actually carry through to elimination, Kitty would be just about the last person we'd suspect.

It seems very unlikely, but I wouldn't say impossible.

[TistDaniel]

Yeah, you're right. Just because it's possible doesn't mean it's at all probable. I think we can safely say they're not scum together. It was poor reasoning on my part to suggest it.

[TistDaniel]

Going to go back and try to finish reading 2087. It seems a little more important now that we have two players from that game. I also find it amusing that they're both comparing me to the same person.

I'm a slow reader, and 2089 is my priority, so who knows if I'll ever actually finish reading D1, but things seem slow over here for the moment, so may as well try.

Have to say, I'm liking StrangeMatter. She feels like town to me, much more than Dunnstral did. That's also how she felt in the previous game though, so not sure if she just always seems like that.

[TistDaniel]

Yeah, I'm not so sure about learning player meta. It's more about testing a scumhunting hypothesis, and needing a larger dataset.

[TistDaniel]

It's a shame. I was looking forward to seeing how that turned out.

[TistDaniel]

My wife's birthday today, and she has tomorrow off as well, so I'm probably going to be less active, unless she decides to go off with friends. I'll reply to everything by Friday morning EST at the latest.

[TistDaniel]

Thanks, Frog!

Could you use help with your survey? If you're working with the IPIP, I have some experience with that.

[TistDaniel]

So what is your aim for the first and fourth section? Are you trying to see how attitudes change before and after the questionnaire? Gathering additional information? Collecting material for sentiment analysis?

My other question would be how long this will take to complete. I know some of the OCEAN tests can be long, but the longer a questionnaire is, the fewer people complete it.

[TistDaniel]

Frog: So you're looking for stuff like "How much experience do you have with Mafia?" Stuff that gets useful information out and starts a conversation?

I'll have to get back to you on the IPIP. I have exact numbers on my computer at home. (Out with my wife right now, writing this on my phone.) Every time you reduce the number of questions, you reduce the accuracy, but some questions are more important than others. So removing some questions results in a very large drop in accuracy, while others results in a much smaller drop. But I experimented with reducing the number of questions back in 2019, tracking how much accuracy was lost, so I do have the numbers and the most important questions saved.

[TistDaniel]

I'm way behind on this, and I feel like it's the worst time to have fallen behind. I have a shallow understanding of what's going on (I've read all the posts) but I feel like I need to sit down and go back over what you guys are referencing, do some closer examinations and stuff. But I'm going to spend my wife's last day off with her instead. She's leaving for a business trip in about a week, and working pretty much every day until then. I'll be back to my usual activity tomorrow.

[TistDaniel]

Though from what I understand, odds are very heavily against us, and D1 elimination is almost always town. In that sense, avoiding the D1 elimination would give us an additional town player on D2. But the elimination also provides us with information, and information is very important to town. Even if we do eliminate town, that's one more person whose alignment is known, and one more set of vote counts that can be properly analyzed.

(I'm here, by the way, just rereading the thread. Hope to post reads soon.)

[TistDaniel]

I've been rereading the thread, especially paying attention to how much players are talking about other players.

Most of us now have post counts around the 50s or higher. Strange is lagging behind with 29, but that's not her fault. She's been active, but she was a late replacement for a player who wasn't.

Our biggest lurkers are Auto with 15 and Progo with 19. These two players together have been posting less than any other single player in the game, aside from Strange. Auto in particular could post three times as much and still fall behind the activity of other players.

I criticized Auto for lurking around #125, and quickly became his top scumread, with him suggesting that I was scum in #195, voting me in #223, calls me his top scumread in #267, misrepresents what I just said in #277, and reiterates that he still wants to vote for me in #354. Auto has mentioned the names of other players 19 times, and seven of those times, it was my name. He has yet to mention ofmercia, Progo, or Kitty at all--esepecially strange, because those three players have been cecntral to one of the largest controversies in this game. Auto's vote on my feels like OMGUS, which doesn't always mean scum. He has yet to stop lurking in spite of my criticism, which also doesn't always mean scum. That said, I have yet to see anything from him that makes me think "town".

fwog has an average amount of activity, and has talked about everyone roughly equally. He doesn't have the highest wordcount, actually having several posts that are a single word. That said, he doesn't feel especially scummy to me. I know he was my first vote, but looking back on that vote now, I think his behavior there does make more sense as town.

ofmercia has a decent amount of activity, but most of it seems to be defensive. A very large part of their discussion has been defending themself over the Progo controversy. They don't seem to be on the offense much. They will occasionally throw a scumread, but typically on someone who voted them first. ofmercia has mentioned the names of other players 37 times. Twelve of those times, it was my name, eleven of those times it was progo's name. He has never mentioned Auto or fwog.

Progo is our second biggest lurker. He gave us a lot in his reads post (#216), but not much before or since. I feel like he was much more active last game (though to be fair, I haven't read very far in the last game--Strange, can you confirm?) so this drop in activity feels suspicious. That said, he has talked about everyone, with especial focuses on ofmercia, me, Norwegianboy, and Frog--which doesn't seem unusual, as we are the more active players, and the players more focused on Progo.

Kitty has a decent amount of activity, and does talk about pretty much everyone. Hasn't had much to say about fwog, and a whole lot to say about ofmercia, but other than that, seems to be talking about everyone roughly evenly. He's single-minded in attack, which could be a good trait in town. Though I do feel like his attack on ofmercia went a bit too far. I'll admit that ofmercia did look scummy though.

Norwegianboy has been especially active in this game, which I always like. He's talked about every player, though there are two tiers: he's focused especially on Dunnstral, Frogster, Progo and me, and less on the remaining players. There's nobody he's been ignoring, and nobody he's been absurdly focused on either.

StrangeMatter is a recent replacement, and has some catching up to do. She's talked about most players in #424, but has never once mentioned Auto, and neither has Dunnstral. #424 also seems to be that slot's only mention of fwog or Norwegianboy. The only time she mentioned Frog was asking what his survey was. But again, she's new here, and is replacing in for someone who hardly ever talked.

Frog has talked about everyone, especially ofmercia and Kitty. His early inactivity has been more than made up for by a surge of activity in the past few days. Good to see more of him.

Looking at possible scumteams:

I think it's pretty obvious Auto isn't working with me, but I don't see much reason he couldn't be with anyone else. He doesn't really talk about anyone else, and nobody else devotes much time to him either.

If fwog is scum, I think he's more skilled. I can't see him showing a lot of attention to anyone in particular. He has cast a few votes on lurkers, but hasn't pushed a major case on anyone, nor has he avoided talking about anyone. He could be partnered with anyone. Or he could be town, which feels more likely to me.

ofmercia, as I said, has played a very defensive game. I haven't seen him focused on attacking anyone. There's obviously tension between him and Kitty, and him and Frog, so it seems unlikely that they're scum together. It also seems unlikely that ofmercia would be scum with Progo.

Progo we haven't seen much. He feels towny to me based on what we have seen, but honestly, it's mostly been the one post. Probably not scum with ofmercia.

Kitty has launched an all-out assault on ofmercia, so I feel confident in saying that they're not scum together. For the most part, Kitty feels towny for me, single-minded in attack, but still taking an active role in investigation, and not utterly neglectiving anyone. Probably not scum with ofmercia or Frog.

Norwegianboy has been very active, and isn't neglecting anyone. He could theoretically be partners with anybody, but if he's scum, he's very good at it, because I haven't seen anything in his 83 posts to suggest it. He is single-handedly responsible for almost one fifth of the posts in this game, so it feels like if he were scum, he would have slipped up by now.

I still want to see more of StrangeMatter. As a newer arrival, I'm not confident saying too much about her. I could believe she was scum, most likely partnered with one of the players she doesn't talk about: Frog, fwog, or Norwegianboy. That said, I am getting more towny vibes from her than Dunnstral.

I'm feeling better about Frog lately. Initially I was suspicious of his lack of activity, but lately he's been feeling more to me like town, pushing hard for investigation. He's been especially focused on ofmercia and Kitty, so I feel like he's probably not scum with him.

At the moment, I feel most confident about VOTE: Auto.

[TistDaniel]

ofmercia: I'm sorry, you're absolutely right about Frog. I remember I added that as an afterthought, way after I finished the section about you, and I was working on Frog. To be honest, I'm not sure why I added it. Maybe I meant to add it on Kitty, forgetting that I'd already said that about Kitty.

I think I have to hold my ground on you being defensive. Your strongest attack was on Progo, who you didn't vote, you didn't question, and you didn't even use his name or say there was something suspicious about him in your original post about him. Ever since then, if I recall correctly, your only scumreads and your only votes have been on me and Kitty, and only after we'd put pressure on you for the Progo controversy. Am I wrong?

[TistDaniel]

Damn, it probably should be. These are some good questions for it.

[TistDaniel]

It's been a quiet day. If I'm not mistaken, this is where we are now:

ofmercia (2) - KittyTacky, Frogsterking
KittyTacky (1) - ofmercia
TistDaniel (1) - AutoDefenestrator
AutoDefenestrator (2) - fwogcarf, TistDaniel
fwogcarf (1) - NorwegianboyEE

Not Voting (2) - StrangeMatter, ProgoWoshua

29 hours left in the day.

[TistDaniel]

Is there something about your background you don't want us to know?

[TistDaniel]

To be fair, fwog may be right about this. My wife watches Big Brother, and a few seasons back there was a guy who legit had been an undercover cop, which he was keeping secret from all of the other participants. And it didn't help him out at all. He was one of the first eliminated.

I've been studying psychology for years, and that pretty much means I can tell you why everything you see on Criminal Minds is wrong, and why profilers are nowhere near as useful in real life as they are on TV. Basically, I can tell you when players here think they're better at investigating than they really are, but I don't think it makes me a better investigator.

I also don't think I'd be good at convincing people to vote a certain way. Not that it really matters, because I don't really have strong reads.

[TistDaniel]

That's a good point. I do feel like Auto is our best chance of hitting scum, but yeah, it doesn't really tell us anything.

[TistDaniel]

VOTE: AutoDefenstrator
That is E-1.

ONE MORE VOTE HAMMERS AND SEALS THE ELIMINATION!

(Sry, but i felt i should be very clear in a newbie game.)

Just felt we should have this at the top of the next page too, to be extra sure everyone sees.

[TistDaniel]

Auto, if you don't live to see tomorrow, is there anything town needs to know? Any insights into who's scum?

[TistDaniel]

UNVOTE:

I obviously haven't been on the same page as everyone else with claiming roles. It seems to me that the way everyone else plays, Auto's best strategy as scum in this situation would have been to claim a town power role, forcing town power to counterclaim, so his partner could nightkill the power role.

He didn't do that.

That's a pretty big sign that he's town.

[TistDaniel]

Ack! Sorry, I thought Strange's vote was on Auto, and we were now at E-2, not E-1. I'm wrong, and I'm too late to unvote.

[TistDaniel]

I realize. I thought Strange's vote has been on Auto, and she moved it off on the last page. I thought we were at E-2 when you cast your vote. I realize I was wrong.

[TistDaniel]

And then after that, Strange voted, which I believed was taking her vote off of Auto, putting us in E-2.

[TistDaniel]

I just woke up before my last post, reread the last page, and when Strange said she'd prefer to vote Kitty over Auto, I read that as moving her vote to Kitty from Auto.

It's a stupid mistake, and I expect to be the focus of a lot of attention D2, after Auto flips town.

[TistDaniel]

Does anyone know where in the world Micc lives? We last saw him before the attack ....

[TistDaniel]

Good game, everyone! Really glad I got eliminated when I did. I would not have been much help for town, and I spent the last week or so traveling, so I wouldn't have been as active as usual either. But yeah, you guys handled just fine without me.

[TistDaniel]

Good game, everyone! Really glad I got eliminated when I did. I would not have been much help for town, and I spent the last week or so traveling, so I wouldn't have been as active as usual either. But yeah, you guys handled just fine without me.

Have you had a chance yet to look at your research on the five factor model?

Thanks for the reminder! I just woke up at home with my own computer for the first time in a week, so this is the best time to get into it.

...except my script doesn't seem to be working correctly. I think it's because I wrote it in Python 3, and I'm running it with Python 2. Let me restart my computer with a different operating system and see if that helps.

[TistDaniel]

Changing to an OS that has Python 3 installed by default did get the script working. Then I had to go pick up our dog from the people who were watching her, and then come back and rewrite a few functions that I apparently deleted at some point. Anyway, rather than dumping a ton of data in here that isn't relevant to anyone else, let me just PM you.

[TistDaniel]

That was a good play on ofmercia's part to draw the night kill, it probably won us the game.

And Daniel for that matter.

That was my plan, by the way. Before I even received my role, I wrote up my first post with the intention that I'd post it in an attempt to draw the nightkill if I rolled VT.