God, I'm so lazy. Can't I just wire my brain to the computer, so I can download all the textwalls in my mind directly to the thread? I have to mention all the stuff I noticed days ago about Kaleidoscope...and Percy...and Lrdwhyt...but...but...I don't wannnnaaaaa. *stomps foot and throws a tantrum* Procrastination is one of my many fatal flaws in Mafia.
But baby steps. Tonight, I have comments for Thor and Baby Spice. And I'd made a throwaway comment to Thor about disliking Elmo's recent posts...but then I took a closer look at Elmo, and then I really, REALLY disliked them. So now I've turned into a full-blown logical case, complete with quotes and soul-sucking PBPA (ha to all those who say I'm a gut player!).
Actually, you know what? I still like the Lrdwhyt wagon, but in the meantime:
VOTE: Elmo
This vote may change depending on how Elmo answers this case and on what I find when I take a closer look at Lrdwhyt. Since I found Elmo townish early on, I'll reread his D1 content later with an open mind to see if my read still holds. See, part of why I usually find it safer to concentrate on the big picture is that I tend to suffer from confirmation bias when I focus too closely upon the nitty-gritty of one player's posts.
=========================================================
Thor, why did you settle for a compromise vote on Lrdwhyt so early in the day? Now wasn't the time to decide to switch to whoever had the biggest wagon. If you really think you've found scum, shouldn't you have been trying to sell the I am Innocent or Baby Spice lynches to us, instead of just going with the flow?
Also, what was your opinion of I am Innocent's meltdown and self-vote early on Day One? Did it strengthen or weaken your scumread of him?
For the record, I think I am Innocent has been suffering from a horrible case of confirmation bias today, but his trying to lock you into give town reads out of his conviction that you're struggling for suspects because he's nailed the scumteam has pretty much clinched that he's town for me. It's just an utterly townish mindset, particularly from an inexperienced player.
Thor665 wrote:Mina and KaleiÐoscøpe are in a middle cloud wherein Mina is being felt more town probably because I find her playstyle amusing
Nobody takes me seriously.
Thor665 wrote:Elmo, furcolow, and jasonT are the obvious towns.
Can you explain your read on Elmo for me? Truth be told, his play today has completely nullified my earlier townread. First he was unhelpful and flippant and brushed off of my questions early on (he reminded me a bit of Mikujin popping up out of nowhere in
ACoK
, after having ignored pages of discussion, just to make a snide comment about douchebags), and since then he hasn't taken a single firm stance. But what I find really off is that he hasn't even reacted to the fact that his one major scum read (Red Coyote) was wrong.
Actually, let's break down Elmo's D2 posts:
-One-liner ignoring pages of discussion to egg on Benmage to take my avatar bet.
-When I ask him this:
Mina wrote:So, uh, Elmo, other than fluff posts, do you have any suspects? Any thoughts on the players off the DF wagon, who you said you'd be willing to vote? What does Red Coyote's flip change for you?
Last week, it also felt as though you were enjoying the me vs. Benmage friction for its entertainment value rather than trying to be constructive. I'd assume that since you're pushing Benmage to accept my avatar bet, that means you think Percy's town, right? Or are you just trying to saddle me with an embarrassing avatar?
He ignores
every single question
, and flippantly admits to enjoying the drama between me and Benmage. Nothing about his suspects, about the players off the DF wagon, about his opinions on RC's flip, about Benmage or Percy or who he thinks will win the avatar bet. Nada. Just a
.
-Mentions the obvious reason for why havingfitz was NK'd (he replaced someone on the DF wagon) rather dismissively (ignoring the juicier question of why havingfitz was killed over Locke/IaI/jason/Benmage--I have suspicions on this, but I'll save them for later), asks Percy a few decent questions (although a bit redundant, since Percy had already explained his DF suspicions several times), and makes a reasonable point for why Percy would be less likely to vote RC as town (this I like, but it's not brilliant analysis and would be easy to fake as scum, particularly since he's not defending Percy with much passion--he agrees with Thor, but then he qualifies his town read with a seed of doubt). He is horrendously wishy-washy on Lrdwhyt:
Elmo wrote:
I'm also kinda interested in lrdwhyt.. I do agree with Mina a bit, some of his posts seem too close to IIoA for comfort. Definitely, I would like to see more stated reasoning rather than just conclusions. I'm not sure whether to push this by itself, or file it under "wait and see".
I don't think I ever even
used
the words "IIoA." My case had to do with Lrdwhyt's weird backtrack on jason and I am Innocent, his lack of scumhunting, his unexplained reads, and his defence. Which posts of Lrdwhyt do you think were IIoA? I want actual quotes. And how did you leap from "IIoA" to "stated reasoning rather than just conclusions"? Information Instead of Analysis means that on the contrary, he
isn't
giving conclusions, just talking about neutral facts. Those are two completely different, unrelated charges.
And what the hell are you talking about in the last line? Push
what
by itself? Why the hell wouldn't you try to pressure Lrdwhyt if you suspect him? This is a
horrible
comment for a townie to make. Get off your ass and "push" shit, instead of "waiting and seeing."
Oh, and another question. What did you think of imkingdavid's play?
-One-liner asking Sotty how she's distinguishing between BS being scum and a VI. Fair enough, although still easy to fake and diminishes Sotty's pressure on Baby Spice. Elmo, I'm just curious. Why did you choose to ask Sotty this question?
-But then, defends BS by saying that
Benmage
thinks BS would know not to attack him were she scum...but then quickly backpedals by saying this is just what Benmage thinks, and she
may
have done other scummy things, although he's not sure what they are:
Elmo wrote:Now, there may be other things that are "really" scummy, but I haven't seen them, albeit I haven't reread BS yet.
(I have my own view, but it's uninteresting.)
The bolded line in particular is horrendous. Seriously, how did no one notice this? Not "I'm going to stay silent so as not to influence people's reactions." Because his opinions are "uninteresting." Why did you even post such useless fluff? Give us your uninteresting opinions on Baby Spice,
now
.
Also clarifies in his next post that it's not his opinion and he doesn't "wholly agree" with Benmage's logic, but that he doesn't like the reasons people are using to attack Baby Spice.
-And his last post starts off with okay points in response to Thor on how his town read on Percy would depend on how Percy explains his DF stance, and how he can see more of a scum motivation for Percy's behaviour than BS's (which is reasonable, albeit it could be worded more precisely, but still really obvious and a bit on the IIoA side). I thought Percy had
already
explained his DF stance, but whatever, maybe Elmo missed it or wasn't satisfied with the explanation.
And then we get this:
Elmo wrote:I agree with this, but equally I'm (personally) not super happy about defending him from this specifically since (to me) there remains a reasonable chance he's scum. Along those lines, I should probably say that I don't have any confidence in BS being town, and I plan to reread her and try to get a better handle on her play within the next couple of days.
Another thing that's bothering me is that open, all-vanilla setups are, by a long way, the best kind to bus in. I don't want to start the conspiracy theories too early, but I would actually like to hear from everyone what they think about the possibility of Dry being bussed by at least one buddy.
So...um, he agrees with Thor's read on Percy...but is unwilling to defend him, even though he's already weakly defended Percy several times in his earlier posts...because there's a
reasonable chance
he's scum.
And he doesn't have
any confidence
in BS being town...even though, if you've been following this case, he defended her before from Sotty's attack just a few posts by saying he thought some of the arguments against her were spurious. He needs to reread her. Um...
what
?
Oh, and...maybe DF was bussed. Maybe. Just maybe, one of the confirmed players might be scum. He doesn't know. He doesn't want to start conspiracy theories, of course, not too early
when there are viable mislynches on the table
...but he'd be happy if
you
all shared your conspiracy theories, so he can decide if they're worth bandwagoning.
Oh, and he hasn't followed up on the Lrdwhyt suspicions he mentioned above--even though Lrdwhyt is the only player he seems to be suspicious of so far.
So the moral of the story is that you think the top suspects in the game might be town, so you're defending them, or they might not be town, so you won't defend them? Why did you even waste your time writing this post? It's all a load of waffle about theory padded to look like content. This is worse IIoA than anything Lrdwhyt is guilty of. Instead of coasting, why didn't you just get off your ass, reread Baby Spice, and then come back to us when you had something constructive to add? Or just reread Percy's more recent posts explaining his change of heart on Dry-Fit, and provided your own analysis on whether you thought his excuses were plausible?
Wow. I should reread his Day One, because I remember feeling that he was townish at certain points, but his Day Two posts are scumtastic, particularly coming from a strong experienced player. Seriously, I usually find long cases painting every single post someone's written in the game as scummy contrived...but every post Elmo's written today HAS been scummy. I tried to leave in what little he's said that could vaguely pass as town, just to be balanced. He has zero conviction or passion, has put no pressure on anyone (he still hasn't voted), and his picture could appear in the dictionary beside the word "wishy-washy." Seriously. I'm an indecisive, waffling player. I know what genuine indecision looks like. This is not it.
Elmo, I would like a point-by-point defence to this post, answers to all my questions, and a concrete list of suspects. How about you rank all the players in the game according to your suspect levels?
===============================================================
Sotty, I was tempted to join the Baby Spice wagon (although eek, BS and LW probably aren't buddies now--which raises the stakes of my decision) after that terrible vote, but hang on. That explanation from Baby Spice is very, um, unique, but her reasoning is much more of the town variety of special snowflake than the scum variety. Right now, I'd be much happier with a Lrdwhyt lynch than a BS one.
Baby Spice wrote:I thought if I'm wrong on benmage, and I'll happily admit I could be unlikely as it is, then perhaps one of Sotty or Mina was voting a scum buddy. If that was the case then they might panic and jump on me if I added a vote
To follow on. If Sotty thought that Lrd was scum, she'd stay there and suspect me of bussing. If Sotty was scum driving a mis-lynch she'd stay there and ride it down, especially with the vote count being off. Accidental hammer and all being easy to excuse in that case and it would screw up wagon analysis.
So let me ask you something. Do you personally still think Lrdwhyt is scum, for any reason other than me and Sotty voting for him? Or are you saying the whole thing was just a test of our alignment? Why is your vote still on Lrdwhyt?
If both Sotty and I had stayed on Lrdwhyt, what useful information would that have given you? Either we're town voting a player we think is scum or we're scum voting a townie.
And what made you think Lrdwhyt was being bussed, as opposed to just being the target of an easy mislynch?
(And, you know, for the record, that vote would have been a
much
better test had you given reasoning for your vote that didn't sound so unlikely that anyone would have a legitimate reason for reevaluating their reads and suspecting you more than LW.)
Also, what Sotty said about interacting with players I'm uncertain of and ask them questions so as to get a better read on them. I definitely feel like my exchange with Sotty was productive.
(or actually just following suspicions I already stated - take your pick)
.