mastina
, you’ve grown into such a strong player and member of the community. Congratulations on your scummie win. It is time.I remember it as if it were yesterday. I was sitting in my room, eating some of those microwave noodles (not ramen but the partially hydrated kind that you add a packet of sauce and sometimes peanuts or dried green onions or whatever) when I first started to see you post. These were the mastin days, of course, and you’ve gone through a number of transformations that I’ll discuss from my memory shortly, but I want to focus for the moment on my first games and experiences with you.
I know I often post in irreverent gifs and memes. These are usually the way that I, as a partially emotionally stunted almost-30-year-old man, can post my feelings without being too vulnerable. Plus, I think they’re pretty darn funny.
But I want things to get real now. And return to that first day I came across your first posts. I had taken a break from mafia for quite some time: I played in pablito’s Big Brother Mafia in 2007 but it wasn’t until 2010 that I made my triumphant return. You see, the game had just gotten too easy. The point being, when you started in 2008, I wasn’t playing much mafia. I didn’t return to play again until 2010. But it was in 2011 that I finally joined a game with you in it. But it wasn’t really you. It was Calcifer, the Nacho/Mastin hydra. And it threw me for a loop because one post you’d say something short and succinct and then the next you’d… well, we all know what mastin the first was like.
Unfortunately that was really my first experience with mastin 1. Not too long after that you moved to the next stage, mastin2. And mastin2 is where we really start to pick up steam.
I’m not sure what motivated the change to mastin2. It was an alt made for a new reputation. But it’s hard to do that when the name is the same. So I warily entered into the era of mastin2 with a one-two punch: Desert Mafia (my own game) and Reckoner’s Sexy Sedilla Semi-Open. The mastin2 era was marked by a respectable reduction in wall posts. I think those with poor eye-sight (please note, my eyesight is perfect) appreciated this.
But interestingly I think you were at the forefront. In a time dominated by YELLING IN CAPS, you were hyperposting. In my game (which was Desert themed because of my love of spaghetti westerns), I want to send you down memory lane and just read your iso. You were one of the first to do what I call the 8 in 10. Which is a string of 10 posts where you make up 8 of them. You posted 42, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49 and 50. As the moderator, I admit I found this more baffling than either effective or noteworthy.
But little did I know the site would soon be joining you. You were cutting edge, not just insane.
In the first game I played with mastin2, you did two things:
- noted you were replacing the great Ythan
- voted me.
You then left your vote there for 6 days while pulling out another 8 in 10: Posts 720, 721, 722, 724, 726, 727, 728, and 729 were all yours.
8 in 10.
Of course you were wrong on me, and I was lynched Day 1 despite being obviously town. But we’re talking about your
progression
here, not the actual effectiveness just yet.Of course, in the back of your head, I think you knew you were going at things differently. And that’s when you established the mastin2 players who cant scumhunt good academy.
Unlike many of our other illustrious players who have posted good articles, this was an ongoing project. You put out no fewer than 16 subjects. You correctly identified that mafia is rarely a game of logic, and although I have to say your long-windedness came out a bit these were required readings at my mafia book club, which was held on thursday evenings in a brick-walled basement while we ate scones and discussed the finer things. I wish those fair evenings could have lasted, but sadly the inescapable march of time moves on and so does this post.
So here we’ve arrived to mastina, and we’ve skipped a number of years. Obviously a lot has changed over the years. I became a discussion mod, then realized the error of my ways and became a listmod. But all the time you were evolving as a player. Until you’ve finally snagged a Scummie, and you thoroughly deserve it. I congratulate you on this victory.
I would, however, like to offer some advice going forward:
- Don’t forget your past. These things inform what we are and help us shape what is to come.
- Don’t forget your future.The present is a pain in the ass and it’s easy to become bogged down in the details. But don’t forget that this isn’t the destination
- If you’re making an old fashioned, use meyer lemon. Just trust me. I’ve done studies to see what citrus works best.
From me and my dog, Bark, Bark, Bark, Goodbye.
