Open 753: Nomination Mafia [Game Over!]

[Shoshin]

At post 863, Irrel. And not even saying you should townread me, just that I expected more paranoia from you about RC.

[Irrelephant11]

At post 863, Irrel.

Extremely fair point

At post 863, Irrel. And not even saying you should townread me, just that I expected more paranoia from you about RC.

I had plenty of RC paranoia... most readslists I share tend to mean “this is what I’m most confident in, but like maybe you should flip it upside down”

Anyway. Yeah, the earlyness of your request to tw in Starcraft Mafia is a good point.

Alright, I think I’m over my paranoia. And I think I’m closer to being able to read you correctly in the future, knowing what you’re capable of. Maybe

Next up, the case for town!shoshin

[Irrelephant11]

as an aside, I’m roughly 94% sure we’re all town here. And while my pre-game thought was that if I rolled scum I would probably do this very thing (nom three towns), in practice it seems very helpful to town tbh. Of course, that’s assuming I’m right about us all being town I guess

[Irrelephant11]

A town case:

1. Meta

As a matter of comparison, here's my my most recent scum game (https://forum.mafiascum.net/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=77970). It doesn't take a lot to see the differences there.

My priority as scum was to manipulate the most influential townies in the game (e.g. Irrel, the worst, Nauci, etc.) into townreading me. I did this by actively townreading them as quickly as possible, questioning them for not townreading me, and exclusively attacking players who questioned my towniness. I normalized my towniness as quickly as possible so that I eventually became the most townread player in the game. I was unlynchable at all points of that game.

In short, I behaved in ways that I predicted would get me townread. I never alienated anyone. I didn't take risks. I didn't use WIFOM. I played a simple game of manipulation.

In this game, I didn't try manipulating the most influential players into townreading me. On the contrary, I spent the early parts of this game trying to sort the strongest scum players: Irrel, Auro, & RC. Rather than manipulate these players into townreading me, I relentlessly tested their reactions while trying to sort. I knew this wouldn't help me get townread but I thought sorting these players ASAP was more important than having them townread me, at least in the short term.

a. Irrel

I voted Irrel for reasons that I knew would alienate a number of players, especially the bit about how he prefers scum. I was testing reactions so that I could sort Irrel as well as others around him.

Irrel knows that I know he prefers scum, so I knew Irrel would understand why I was voting him, at least to some extent. I predicted that town Irrel wouldn't let paranoia fester about me -- he's clear up my vote for those who didn't understand -- whereas scum Irrel would let the paranoia fester to potentially set up my mislynch.

This is how I sort Irrel in most of my games (e.g. is he allowing paranoia to fester when he could easily clear it up based on his meta knowledge?). And I can point to previous town games where I've townread Irrel based on the way he prevents paranoia from festering, so if you need further meta evidence that this is how I approach sorting Irrelephant (with 100% accuracy so far over multiple games), that can be provided as well.

As scum, I never approach the game by testing reactions because it's too risky. There's no reason for me to unnecessarily attract suspicion of others (including Irrel), or to create a situation where paranoia about me could arise in the first place, when I easily could have easily manipulated Irrel into townreading without attracting any suspicion or doing any actual scumhunting.

If I were scum, it would have been very easy for me to say nothing about Irrel's alignment, or to townread him. The fact I didn't do those things is strongly town indicative for me.

b. Auro

I slightly ignored Auro's questioning at the start of this game to test his reactions. He doesn't know me so I expected to receive flak from him. I also knew his questions would eventually be cleared up without any problem, and I believed town Auro would quickly reevaluate my alignment if he were to scumread me at first.

As a result of my test, Auro engaged a strong line of questioning on me that was one of the towniest things in the game. His push was especially towny because he felt so unconcerned about addressing my concerns about him & almost exclusively focused on trying to understand my thought process. His lack of self-concern in that push is part of why I'm locktown on Auro.

I don't engage this sort of subtle testing as scum because it unnecessarily attracts suspicion without any upside. Auro didn't leave that conversation townreading. On the contrary, he left it with lots of paranoia about my slot, paranoia that I let sit for the moment because again I wasn't worried about my appearance. The upside of my initial play around Auro is that I was able to townread one of the strongest scum players in the game.

This is something I exclusively do as town, not as scum. I never alienate a player like Auro as scum, especially when I predict that Auro would push me in precisely the way he did. My goal as scum isn't to be pushed because, again, I don't take risks as scum. I do things that have predictable responses (from my perspective), and those predicted responses are myself being townread.

c. RC

This is the biggest one. I never vote or push RC in any manner on D1 if I'm scum, straight-up never. I keep calling him town until LYLO. This is the biggest town tell for me, although you probably won't understand it if you don't know our history.

If I were scum, I relentlessly defend RC throughout the game because doing so causes RC to keep me alive. RC struggles with surviving, so if there's someone keeping him alive, he'll keep that person alive even if the player might be scum. And, in my case, it's especially the case because RC really really doesn't want to mislynch me. He'd feel too bad about it. As long as I defend RC, RC never pushes my lynch unless he's absolutely certain I'm scum, meaning he keeps me alive until LYLO.

As far as I'm concerned, my win condition as scum against RC is bringing him to LYLO and then mislynching him with the argument that he's godtier scum who got inside my head. I don't see myself losing in this circumstance with this player list, especially given Irrel's paranoia of scum RC. Plus, I think Irrel would prefer losing to scum me over scum RC. This would be much easier than trying to fake genuine attempts to actually sort RC, which as you've seen in this game, don't necessarily cause RC to townread me.

--

There's another massive difference between my play here and my play as scum: the way I interacted with Wazoo.

As scum, I don't keep interacting with a known mislynch, continuously trying to sort them. Look at how I interact with the mislynches in Starcraft. I occasionally made cases and then ignored the lynches until they died. I didn't show any genuine interest in their thought process, nor did I give them any chances to prove to me they were town.

But in this game, I kept trying to give Wazoo a chance. I read through his games (something I'm very unlikely to do as scum), kept trying to understand his reasoning, rereading this game to see if what he was saying made any sense. I never do this unnecessary stuff as scum, especially since I'd be worried that the more I interacted with Wazoo, the more I'd betray my informed perspective about his alignment.

3. Nominations

If I were scum in this game, I never nominate myself.

For starters, RC replaced out of the game calling me scum, so if I were actually scum, I would have been scared shitless that the townies would sheep him. I'd especially be worried about it because of how much flak I received on D1 from multiple players:

DT votes me regardless of what happens.

Fusco votes me because I called him scum.

SR votes me because I called explanations scummy and because he's misreading me based on stylistic differences (as well just mistaking wordiness for content when that's not the case).

Irrel votes me because he sheeps obvtown RC.

Auro votes me because I potentially alienated him yesterday.

Clemency votes me because he's a troll who maybe sheeps RC.

RC's replacement votes me because he's sheeping RC.

You get the point. If I'm scum, why would I take this risk? What's the upside? Do I suddenly become confirmed if I survive the nomination phase? No, there's no upside. I never take this risk as scum.

That said, even if I were to nominate myself as scum, I do so only with players who I reasonably could survive against. In other words, I'm not putting myself against Irrel/Volx. That's like flipping a coin. It's suicide as scum, something I'd never do.

Who do I take with me if I'm scum? I take the townie from the group of DT, Clemency, Fusco, Vedith. I might take SR. I might take one of Irrel/Volx but not both. I create an environment where my chances of survival are better than just flipping a coin.

Again, I don't play a WIFOM game as scum. And my scum meta bears that out. I win games as scum by taking minimal risks while manipulating players into townreading me with strong day play. If I'm scum in this game, I never nominate myself. It's an extraordinary risk with no reward.

For starters, this is all accurate self-meta up until this point. Obviously Shoshin is showing an awareness of her own history, so it’s possible she has found a brand new way to play scum that’s completely stellar and mind blowing. Anything’s *possible*. But I don’t find it very likely, and more than that: I don’t think she’d pull it off to this extent.

Some town markers for Shoshin she has displayed here that I think are hard to fake:
-Anger at RC for scumreading her and “being a dick” (only invalid if both are scum)
-A willingness to get into arguments, some of which she isn’t even really invested in, as a risky (for scum) way of sorting other players
-A scumpool that makes a lot of sense
-A slowness to townread strong scum players (makes sense for a townie) who probably wouldn’t notice if she got to a townread much quicker (which would have made more sense for her to do as scum)
-Being nominated against me with no guarantee that, given my paranoia of her from our last game, I wouldn’t push her lynch
-An opaqueness of reads for long periods of time, followed up by reads that make sense and explain the long period of being difficult to understand
-Ignoring questions (actually closer to NAI, but only because I think she knows she has to fake this as scum)
-Emotionality I think scum!her would be more reticent to explore

Some scum markers for Shoshin:
-sometimes I think she’s pocketing me
-sometimes I think she’s trying to mislynch me this phase so I can’t catch her out

[Alonzo]

Sooo...

[Alonzo]

I'm gonna revisit this entire thread start to finish, as we all should, then it's action time.

[Alonzo]

4.5 days left, il be reading for two

[chennisden]

Chem what is your full read list at this point?

I'll put the three nominees in a list with respect to each other, and then another list with everyone.

Nominees

Town:
volxen
Irrelephant
I'd lynch:
Shoshin

Everyone

Town:
volxen
Irrelephant
scum reading
Auro
Shoshin

idk:
Fuscosco
Alonzo

Scum:
Vedith
DoubtingThomas

[Vedith]

Ew

[Auro]

Temporary VLA for a day.

[DoubtingThomas]

Nobody can be that bad as town right

[Vedith]

Nobody can be that bad as town right

[ejjinami]

Temporary VLA for a day.

Noted.

[Alonzo]

rc smells

rc smells

what im trying to get at is
this is essentially as meaningful a reason as rc's push

Town.

[scum reading]

Nobody can be that bad as town right

I can feel RC’s absence in terms of activity

[scum reading]

Why did I quote, my bad

[Vedith]

Scum reading talk to me.
I'd love to have been town with you in this game but I don't see it.

Give me reason to not lynch you tomorrow.

[ejjinami]

Fuscosco has been prodded.

[Alonzo]

Spoiler:

I might rep out this game has been awful so far and I'm just going to get lynched first nomination phase anyway

I might rep out this game has been awful so far and I'm just going to get lynched first nomination phase anyway

You asked me to sign up for this game so I'll be really upset if you leave. Also, why are you running away from the challenge of not getting lynched on first nomination phase? Are you not up to it?

Oh, nice. RC's town, then. Good read on his part.

Hey Irrel, what's your read on SR?

I'm not lynching you today

If I have my way we kill

VOTE: Clemency

And btw the only reason you survive today is that I decide the aggravation of this shitty game isn't worth it

Have you finally decided to play according to your role?

Listen, if you present a case on Clemency, I’m willing to push with you. You seem town to me, if you play like this when you are scum, then props to you man, got balls

What do you make of Clemency's earlier vote on me, putting me at L-2 inspite of townreading me?
He seems to be riling RC up intentionally now - do you see town motivation for that?

Clemency is bad, agreed. DT, not sure. Wazoo, I got a bad vibe from initially but something he said later feels town to me.

Listen, if you present a case on Clemency, I’m willing to push with you. You seem town to me, if you play like this when you are scum, then props to you man, got balls

What do you make of Clemency's earlier vote on me, putting me at L-2 inspite of townreading me?
He seems to be riling RC up intentionally now - do you see town motivation for that?

Just because people have different reads, that doesn’t automatically make them scum.

I’ve seen a few games with clemency and he has his own style, I wouldn’t be eager to scum read clemency just based on his remark, even rc admitted he’s known for his charisma, can’t blame.

As for his L-2 on you, despite being weird about it, he stated it would be for pressuring. I’m fine with that, I believe getting information on you early on is good, because we can confirm both you and Volxen as town or one of you as scum, etc, since you guys know each other the most. If you guys were both scum and confirming each other as town, that would be unfortunate, that’s a relative low probability as well though.

Shoshin is scum

I have nothing further to say until I'm hammered.

I'm not scum, RC. I'm disappointed in you.

Big dump with a broken tag.

~fixed the first quote, ejj~

At this point town RC is buckling.

Potential reasons

Exhaustive tvt with DT or tvs.
Needle from clemency.
Ate from shosh

Aside from mentioning irrell, RC doesn't commit to a read... So far..

[scum reading]

Scum reading talk to me.
I'd love to have been town with you in this game but I don't see it.

Give me reason to not lynch you tomorrow.

Vadeth friend, share reads with me

[Vedith]

can u do a rainbow read for me vedith

So I was thinking and I can't do this yet.

Town
Auro
DT
Shoshin
Irrele

Scum
volxen
Fuscosco
Chen

Scum Scum
Scum reading
Alonzo

The Scum Scum just have 0 impact on my mind in this game.
If it really is an all town lynch pool Scum are staying out of the light.

[scum reading]

You’re scum reading RC? Anybody would know that after his lynch and his replacement, he is conftown. He was mad that wazoo being a bad townie and so he repped out, it should be obvious. I agree I’m scummy, I’m not as active, mainly because the game is being held hostage at the moment, I can’t push my scum reads because they’re not nominated. For me everyone here is town, there’s no reason for any scum player on that nomination to place themselves in such a dangerous and risky spot. All of them have brains and I don’t see them being that cocky to risk a scum lynch. I told them to figure out who wanted to sacrifice, but they keep on accusing each other while also town reading each other, which is crazy. I’m just waiting for them to decide on a lynch so I can push real scum. As for my activity, shoshin + rc + irrel are enough to fill up 60 pages day one, if I hopped in, this would’ve been like 100 pages. I am usually active as hell when nobody is speaking so I can get things started, but there’s no reason to with 3 people that are posting 10 times more than I would if I played like I usually do.

As for scum reads, {Chennisden, DT} Chennisden because he’s clem’s replacement and he was horrible on that auro vote as well as the RC push. DT because he went from a super active player to now popping in at random times, basically just shooting for a participation trophy. I do believe this lack of activity comes also from his feud with RC and he wants to slip under the radar after accusing a slot that eventually became conftown.

Vedith, get your reads up, they are yikes

[scum reading]

I would’ve placed myself in your scum not scum scum, scum scum def chennisden. Replace Alonzo from your scum scum before I put you on my scumdar

[Irrelephant11]

I don’t care who gets lynched at this rate
Everyone take your pick tbh
I’ll work hard to follow through with Shoshin’s plan if she flips town
I’m fine being lynched here
Volxen kinda didn’t respond to a few questions people asked him I think but idk

[ejjinami]

bump