Open 708: Pick Your Poison - Game Over

[Flubbernugget]

Moz - they've always been quick to push reads, and they're making good points amongst them.

HeWhoSwims - 66 critically analyzes how town and scum have to play differently to their win conditions, and pull reads from it. 164 handles the Thor/pp interaction in a way that gets the point across without belaboring it. There's also self reflection and uncertainty in some of their reads, which is comes off as honest. Very town.

Moneybags - I like 150 (reads list) . I can see the conclusions he made stemming out of the discussion he generated.

Bellaphant - I tend to see posts directly challenging asymmetric knowledge like 154 as hard to fake as scum (though not impossible). I also can't peg any scum motivation to the gut town read of texcat. It can also be difficult for scum to do a 180 on a stance without feeling like they have to cover tracks. I don't see that here.

Klick - making good observations. I'm partially sheeping 95 with my moz read above. They're also making reasonable pushes and seeing things that other players haven't.

Beefster - same 180 thing as Bella. Their reads are kinda weak, but I can see where most of them are coming from (except the moz newb thing, but I never call scum over one point)

CultofAthena - they caught the same thing I caught with PP early game. Their last post shows healthy town suspicion.

Maxous - good reaction to the pressure over their early Town reads. I can see them expecting that to be a moot point and moving on with the rest of the game, and didn't try to over explain their initial town leans.

Tl;dr: there's been a lot of strong town players for this early in the game and I took for granted that it was not immediately obvious what I was seeing.

[HeWhoSwims]

So make a case or something

Hmmmm...

VOTE: Flubbernugget
Telling me to make a case, when you are not. Plus telling us that voting Bella is a town thing to do, when you are not.

QFT.

Flubber, care to explain why both of these points are a thing?

[Beefster]

Town Lean:
Bellaphant - friendly in a town sort of way. Doesn't appear to be deceptive in any way. Genuine.
Moneybags - maybe I'm biased because he townreads me. Probably just gut though. I like his points about other players as well.
HeWhoSwims - seems genuine. Logic follows naturally in a non-deceptive way.
Klick - my initial reaction was more scum leaning, but his interactions (mostly with Bellaphant I think. Not sure of context since I'm looking through ISOs) have been useful and genuine.

Scum Lean:
Flubber - general sentiment, gut. I'm not really sure how to describe what it is that pings my scumdar with him. Maybe just that he comes off as manipulative, trying to run the show and gather towncred. *shrug*
Maxous (slight) - "don't really feel like voting Beefster anymore." switch to Bellaphant vote looks like a garbage reason. Not transparent. He doesn't look particularly deceptive though, so the scum lean is only slight.

Null:
Thor - timing reads are silly. Not too shabby for a first non-RVS wagon though. It generated some productive discussion.
PP - out of game defenses suck, but I honestly don't think they're all that AI now that I think of it. When non-game reasons are used to attack, however...
CultOfAthena - good questions. not much else.
EP - just a check in post. Nothing to go on.
mozamis - eh. I could see it going either way at this point. Hasn't contributed in a particularly helpful way, but isn't outright fluffposting.
texcat - Not enough to go on TBH.

Yup that's everybody. I thought I had more town reads than that for some reason, but then I looked at ISOs and changed my mind on some people.

[Errantparabola]

Mozamis

: Townread the page 1 entrance. Also townread his string of posts at the top of page 3. That reads like gamesolving to me.

---

Thor

: Push on Maxous seems a bit weird. People are cagey with their reads, it happens all the time. Especially early game—like this push is a stage prop to bolster the impression of a strong entrance. It could just be the “aggressive early game” that he’s talking about? Either way I hope I’ll get a better sense of him pretty quickly, seems like a guy who puts cards on the table. Or at least appears to.

---

Moneybags:

36 and 46 are posts that make me go “yes, good, reasonable, smart. I want to trust this guy” but at the same time, he’s also very on the sidelines, voice of reason, kind of guy. The kind of guy that’s endgame scum. Definitely expect people to start townreading him. (Update: I was right. Bunch of townreads just because the dude seems well put together, that's definitely something to worry about.) Will wait and see where he falls, but 46 “I’m not looking to pin everyone down…” is a small thing to keep in mind for me.

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texcat

: That line thing looks like a smart way to format posts. In fact, I’m doing it right now. Thanks texcat. I'll give it a test run, see if I like it.

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PenguinPower

: I agree, the Thor opening case is weak. My first thought was echoing Moneybags-- “Penguin sheeps Thor on Maxous, perhaps he’s trying to direct Thor’s focus off of him?” But maybe not so much.

61 rings true for me. If Thor really does open like this all the time, then I guess there really isn’t much to do about it from his point of view other than move on.

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Beef

: The Beef's reads on 91 make me wonder about what you think about Penguin's vote on Maxous. I would hesitate to pin down reads on either Penguin or Thor but they definitely do lean slightly in the direction of the beef, although I suspect that it is for different reasons.

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Klick

: The entrance at 95 is godly. Bella is a solid push, I missed it during my read but can def get behind the reasoning. My thoughts on mozamis are exactly that.

---

Flubber

: I'm running out of steam at this point and reading through Flubber vs. Thor is definitely starting to blur together. I'll probably go back and pick through page 5 at some point. At this point in time my gut is telling me to town lean this dude.

In fact, skimming through the later pages I'm definitely not gonna be able to process all those chunky posts so I'm gonna take a break and come back to it in a couple hours.

Reads as of right now? I have pretty comfortable townreads on Klick and mozamis. No real scumreads as of yet but I def want to scrutinize Moneybags first priority, maybe Bella and Flubber too. Shrug. I'm more comfortable calling Penguin town than Thor. We'll see when I get caught up entirely.

[Flubbernugget]

So make a case or something

Hmmmm...

VOTE: Flubbernugget
Telling me to make a case, when you are not. Plus telling us that voting Bella is a town thing to do, when you are not.

QFT.

Flubber, care to explain why both of these points are a thing?

Well, there's seven pages of content, and texcat didn't have much to say about it. The "make a case or something" was a reference to the fact that texcat was shading Bellaphant without pushing many reads.

Do you still think tex is town from their catch up? I don't.

VOTE: texcat

[Flubbernugget]

Errantparabola has a food entrance so far. I like their point about moneybags being the voice of reason, though I do still think they are town at the moment.

[HeWhoSwims]

Hm, guess I can see that. It just sounded like you were trying to let texcat make a case while ducking suspicion on your own so to speak.

I still think the Bella wagon is really meh but w/e. As long as it's not lynched without more incriminating stuff towards Bella.

pedit: I see moneybags being a voice of reason but don't see why it's bad. Especially in D1 which can be a chaos of accusations/reads without base and the highest amount of players screaming through each other.

[texcat]

So make a case or something

Hmmmm...

VOTE: Flubbernugget
Telling me to make a case, when you are not. Plus telling us that voting Bella is a town thing to do, when you are not.

QFT.

Flubber, care to explain why both of these points are a thing?

Well, there's seven pages of content, and texcat didn't have much to say about it. The "make a case or something" was a reference to the fact that texcat was shading Bellaphant without pushing many reads.

Do you still think tex is town from their catch up? I don't.

VOTE: texcat

This looks like

blatant

obvious OMGUS. When you said that you didn't understand Bella and Klick's town read of me, it was OK, but when I say something about it, suddenly it's shading? And what about Klick, he echoed Bella, but you say that he's "making good observations." Seems a little off.

You weren't pushing anyone and your vote was not on anyone until I voted you. Suddenly then you produced a list of townreads and then decide to vote me. Stinks like pond scum. I think you are scum looking for an easy place to park your vote, and you found it when I voted you.

[Flubbernugget]

It would have been an easy vote park when you were lurking. Not when you're here to defend yourself.

It's not that you said something about Bella, it's *what* you said. You were throwing rvs levels of suspicion when we're 8 pages into the game.

Your omgus claim is dumb for two reasons. 1) it's reasonable to have something to say about your first (lacking) post of substance. 2) I have enough town reads to POE down to 3ish players, making your lack of substance even more damning.

[Moneybags]

@Moneybags why exactly do you think scum can't do a 180 but instead wants to change their mind subtly? Wouldn't that pretty much depend on the playstyle of the scum players...? The rest of 150 is great though and I agree with most of it.

I feel like as a scum you're less likely to take risks, right? Pulling a 180 like that so early on isn't going to be something on your agenda. It draws attention to flip around like that. He's been giving some good contribution since as well so he's fairly town to me.

Maxous - good reaction to the pressure over their early Town reads. I can see them expecting that to be a moot point and moving on with the rest of the game, and didn't try to over explain their initial town leans.

I wanted to single this out because I very strongly agree with this. I think Max's reaction was very solid. I think they're town for the reasons cited above. I had the feeling when I first saw his reaction but I didn't really know how to put it into words. This articulates it well.

This looks like

blatant

obvious OMGUS. When you said that you didn't understand Bella and Klick's town read of me, it was OK, but when I say something about it, suddenly it's shading? And what about Klick, he echoed Bella, but you say that he's "making good observations." Seems a little off.

You weren't pushing anyone and your vote was not on anyone until I voted you. Suddenly then you produced a list of townreads and then decide to vote me. Stinks like pond scum. I think you are scum looking for an easy place to park your vote, and you found it when I voted you.

Ok so I don't know about it even being slight OMGUS. However looking at Flub's behavior, I do feel like you have described it accurately. I also feel like toned it down a lot after I called him out for attempting to domineer the game. I'd also like to note that HeWhoSwims made a pass at Flub's 1 liner posts in 164, and it was after this he started contributing more. His behavior feels entirely too self conscious.

I am personally good with either a PP or Flub lynch today. PP has been awol for nearly 2 days now so idk what's going on there. I'd like to hear more from him when he has the time.

[Bellaphant]

@he who swims, can you talk to me about your read on maxous?

[CultOfAthena]

I like 100 except the assumption that scum would be always distancing in the early game. Why wouldn't scum want to throw a little accusation out which can later be used to say "Look at this, I'm not this guy/gal's partner"? (among other stuff of course)

That's definitely something scum go for often, but I believe that tends to happen later in the game, when scum are more confident in their position to start to distance and play for the long game. The reason I pointed it out as an early read in specific is because, coming right out of rvs, tying yourself to your scumbuddy like that could be something that lasts for the rest of the game (and a short game that would be). It's also something unlikely to be WIFOM-ed, because I don't think a lot of people look at very early game interactions like that.

---

I'm not a fan of Beefster's response to my whole line of questioning with regard to his mozamis read. What I gathered from it is that the whole range of posts from 87 to 91 are largely superficial. Beef's explanation as for his interpretion of mozamis' three posts being "newbscum" seems to only apply to one of mozamis' posts, and despite him saying that it's something he'd have to think more on, it seems more like a point that he was quite happy to drop were it not for answering my questions rather than something that he's come to an actual conclusion on.

---

I'm also wary of the idea that most of the more recently active players are town, and this goes along with what I said earlier about getting a bad feeling from Klick's posts. Klick seems like he's trying to pocket people, or at the very least insert himself into some kind of townblock. Look at this whole interaction:

Spoiler:

...I have the dumbest gut read on texcat.

Which way is the gut read on texcat, and what posts does it come from? Because I have the same thing.

I mean there's only two of them and one is generic af so....

and it's town.

Yeah, I had a weird gut townread on texcat as well reading earlier. Something about the post he made on page 3 seemed like... minimal content, but in a genuine way? idk.

Perhaps this is paranoia, but it seems to me like Klick is attempting to appeal to Bella by making it seem like they share a similar thought process (exactly how scum pocketed me in one of my previous games). In 136, despite not knowing what Bella's read on tex is or where it comes from, he says that he has the same thing. If he actually originally shared Bella's exact same gutread, I would have expected him to just say it and then ask if Bella shared the same thing, rather than asking what Bella's read was first before sharing his own.



Also, @Flubber and @Bella, please respond to the questions in 163.

[Bellaphant]

I can't say much more than I have, especially as he hasn't responded to my question. Not sharing his reads didnt seen town.

I'm scumreading klick for strange interactions too.

[Klick]

Go into detail on that please? I'm very curious where you're getting a scumread on me from Bella.

[Beefster]

VOTE: CultOfAthena

Let's try something completely different.

[Flubbernugget]

I just don't get the idea behind telling him 'yo, stop doing A and I'll read you townish'.

The general idea is that calling something out makes someone less likely to do it. Even if penguin is scum, they've now lost a tool to bog the thread down with bullshit.

Cult, this answers your question to me.

[mozamis]

prod dodge, sorry.will cstch up tomorrow.

[Moneybags]

VOTE: CultOfAthena

Let's try something completely different.

But why? We have several fairly good leads right now.

[HeWhoSwims]

I have enough town reads to POE down to 3ish players, making your lack of substance even more damning

How... seriously do you want to consider this PoE in the D1 lynch or even further lynches? Can we (or well, you) really get 7-9 townreads that are strong enough and valid enough to pin one of the others down as undeniable scum? Agree that low activity = contra town but for the sake of town -assuming you're town for now- keep your vision open beyond this early PoE.

@Moneybags thank you for your answer, although I feel trying to see whether scum would take risks or not is a bit of WIFOM if I'm using the word right. Also 184 is a good discussion post again.

@he who swims, can you talk to me about your read on maxous?

I talked about it earlier:

I didn't really have a big opinion on Max after my last post. As I said in my catch-up post, I saw a weird thingy but it wasn't enough for me to scumread him. At this moment, I like his game, he's not avoiding any questions and he's weighing in and contributing to discussion. Not a big fan of the Bella vote (or the wagon in general) based solely off her entrance post but I can forgive it

And ever since this Max only posted that he was gonna be inact for a little bit. Ergo, my read hasn't changed. I like his game, slight townlean. I consider it quite a good thing he's not hesitant to answer questions. His vote on Bella doesn't worry me that much at this point.

@Bella, as has been asked... If you are spotting strange behaviour then surely you can elaborate on it? And @Beef, yes we can try out different stuff - but if there's a reason for your vote why not state it? Or is this a completely random vote?

[Thor665]

I feel like this miscommunication is due to a very polar difference in our play styles. So far I've been making passing comments to generate discussion. You have been interrogating people which gets reactions and also generates discussion. I can see why you would take an issue with me being less confrontational.

It's not a playstyle issue.

You opted to call me out.
You did not opt to call out anyone else.
I'm asking why and you're not answering yet.

@Moneybags - 5th verse, same as the first.

Thor, what changed from 110

Nothing.
What do you think changed?

I like the idea of a Flub v. Tex wagon adventure.
Bella is now an acceptable lynch to me also.
Beefster is wasting time.
Errant is playing right near the very edge of strategic lurking and should knock that crud off.

VOTE: Flubbernugget

[Moneybags]

I feel like this miscommunication is due to a very polar difference in our play styles. So far I've been making passing comments to generate discussion. You have been interrogating people which gets reactions and also generates discussion. I can see why you would take an issue with me being less confrontational.

It's not a playstyle issue.

You opted to call me out.
You did not opt to call out anyone else.
I'm asking why and you're not answering yet.

@Moneybags - 5th verse, same as the first.

Thor, what changed from 110

Nothing.
What do you think changed?

I like the idea of a Flub v. Tex wagon adventure.
Bella is now an acceptable lynch to me also.
Beefster is wasting time.
Errant is playing right near the very edge of strategic lurking and should knock that crud off.

VOTE: Flubbernugget

I replied to that post in 168.

EP said they have been sick. Even still they've contributed more than Tex and PP.

[Flubbernugget]

How... seriously do you want to consider this PoE in the D1 lynch or even further lynches? Can we (or well, you) really get 7-9 townreads that are strong enough and valid enough to pin one of the others down as undeniable scum? Agree that low activity = contra town but for the sake of town -assuming you're town for now- keep your vision open beyond this early PoE.

It's atypical to have this many town reads, yes. That's why I was hesitant to revote in the poe pool after unvoting. I don't see what the problem is with this is, and considering you didn't seem to take issue with my reads list, I don't see why you're taking issue to it either.

You're also arguing from a really strange angle that my early reads are locked in stone.

[Errantparabola]

Errant is playing right near the very edge of strategic lurking and should knock that crud off.

I'm disappointing you yet again! I'm in travel all of today, driving back to uni. Scout's honor I'll be here when I get back.

[mozamis]

VOTE: maxous

Town leans pls

This looks a bit opportunistic to me.

yeah this could be a good catch. 3rd vote on the wagon, no great reason for it.
town lean Beef,

fos flubber

[mozamis]

These posts look like newbscum, but mozamis is obviously no newb.

why?