Excalibur [Endgame]

[Auro]

Nancy and UT are town

How strong are these reads?

[DVa]

we make them gladiate the following day and lose and so on and so on and so on, until we kill all but one scum and if the vig is actually successful, then Merlin kind of becomes irrelevant anyway.

uh, no, the person who has claimed the sword does not gladiate the next day lol. This is because it's revealed that the sword has been claimed, so if only one person claims to have claimed the sword, that person is town.

Merlin is someone who can avoid a gladiation by claiming his role, although it does guarantee he dies shortly afterward.

[Auro]

I'm still wondering if it's just not a stronger play for everyone BUT Merlin to attempt to claim, so that we get a BP in the mix that scum doesn't know exists.
Then if said player is ever gladiated, they can just claim Excalibur-holder, Merlin can confirm and also confirm Arthur exists.

This is random play, though, so balanced must mean a 50-50 chance of town wins anyway, right?

[DVa]

Merlin can't prove he is Merlin then though

scum never counterclaim merlin in this setup unless it's lylo or something

[Elsa Jay]

Nancy had one post to her name when Lady decided to label her town. I wouldnt put to much faith in that read, Auro.

[Auro]

uh, no, the person who has claimed the sword does not gladiate the next day lol. This is because it's revealed that the sword has been claimed, so if only one person claims to have claimed the sword, that person is town.

Merlin is someone who can avoid a gladiation by claiming his role, although it does guarantee he dies shortly afterward.

Yep, sword holder shouldn't gladiate. They should attempt a vig though.

Merlin can't prove he is Merlin then though

scum never counterclaim merlin in this setup unless it's lylo or something

Yeah I think I talked about this in a later post.

[Auro]

Nancy had one post to her name when Lady decided to label her town. I wouldnt put to much faith in that read, Auro.

It could either be early loose bucketing, or actually strong reads she intends to carry through the game. I call BS if it's the latter, hence asked.

[Gamma Emerald]

Throwing out a thought:
If scum claims Excalibur, they die immediately.
Town can vote on someone to claim Excalibur for the day. ONLY that person claims at night. If they're scum it remains unclaimed, lynch next day. If there's a claim treat them like an IC the next day.

Sure. Give me Excalibur.

Town should probably vote for a consensus scumread to claim Excalibur, for maximum benefit. If they're scum they can't claim and we get a confirmation in the night. If they're not scum and claim we know they're IC -- they're gonna either contribute the next day and kill themselves, or Merlin confirms they're Arthur and we move on.

No, the correct method is for me to claim Excalibur, and then next day if I'm Arthur, to inform me.

Basically, me being unkillable and IC means people can't do the stupid paranoia thing about me. I get to give my reads without the whole "LLD is great at scum" argument.

I'm the optimal target.

This sounds reasonable, and no one that I’d want to promote this agenda for over LLD is around, so I’m in favor of this plan.

[Nancy Drew 39]

Yeah, that’s a great idea. We lynch the scummier of the two and lesser of the two scumreads either attemps to vig yet another consensus scumread and if there’s only one kill, we make them gladiate the following day and lose and so on and so on and so on, until we kill all but one scum and if the vig is actually successful, then Merlin kind of becomes irrelevant anyway.

Echoed your sentiment especially wrt the last sentence in an earlier post. Is there some way we can make this strategy better involving Merlin's role?

If we're sorting people already, I'll town you.

Thanks.

Well, the problem is that if both Merlin and the consensus designated scumread both claim the sword - assuming of course that the designated scumread is actually town - then Merlin claiming, makes it random and therefore no way of checking that player’s alignment.

[Auro]

Well, the problem is that if both Merlin and the consensus designated scumread both claim the sword - assuming of course that the designated scumread is actually town - then Merlin claiming, makes it random and therefore no way of checking that player’s alignment.

If we end up making Merlin claim it, he might as well -- IC then on.

[Auro]

This sounds reasonable, and no one that I’d want to promote this agenda for over LLD is around, so I’m in favor of this plan.

There's also a problem that she could just hold the sword and not vig anyone, destroying the point of the mechanic - and we wouldn't want to lynch her because she'd be an IC.

[Auro]

@Nancy, scum will never claim the sword. If they try, they die.

[Gamma Emerald]

LL coming out hot with the reads.
What makes Nancy and UT town?
Why is mechanical talk scummy in an open setup?
If I was scum and you asked me to bus-gladiate, I'd do it in a heartbeat.

Throwing out a thought:
If scum claims Excalibur, they die immediately.
Town can vote on someone to claim Excalibur for the day. ONLY that person claims at night. If they're scum it remains unclaimed, lynch next day. If there's a claim treat them like an IC the next day.

Kill resolves before claim. Yes, we'd effectively gate the scum kill but we'd also render the setup as 13-4 mountainous.
But I think you're right in that we could effectively use the sword claiming as a one-shot cop, but, again, that renders the bulletproof aspect of it kind of useless.

@MOD: If Merlin dies and flips, does Arthur's identity get revealed with the flip?
Can Merlin claim Excalibur?

Tone on both. It's what I expect from them.

It's not that we can't talk mechanics. Mechanics is NAI. It's that talking mechanics and using them to smother other interactions that generate reads + create "content" for scummy players is scumsided. Explained in a prior post, happy to explain again.

Crossbus Gladiates are inherently bad for scum due to the White Flag rule. If one scum remains, they concede. Bussing is far more likely to create a single scum surviving scenario, and eventually scum need to leave associatives, which means bussing is bad, especially day 1.

On this: I think bussing in general is less effective at furthering scum’s goals than creating an association with a town player. In Children of Hurin, I let the association between Nero and me fester, and that caused the game winning mislynch to happen, though Town wasn’t winning towards the end anyway.

[Nancy Drew 39]

@Nancy: The bigger problem apparently is that a chunk of the playerbase will refuse to work with that, starting with LLD herself.

Well, they shouldn’t because that’s antitown. I think DVa’s hurt tags are a great idea. The two players with the most hurt tags, need to agree to gladiate each other. If players can refuse to do this, then how do we get any lynches?

[Kokichi Oma]

Throwing out a thought:
If scum claims Excalibur, they die immediately.
Town can vote on someone to claim Excalibur for the day. ONLY that person claims at night. If they're scum it remains unclaimed, lynch next day. If there's a claim treat them like an IC the next day.

I volunteer as tribute.

[Auro]

Well, they shouldn’t because that’s antitown. I think DVa’s hurt tags are a great idea. The two players with the most hurt tags, need to agree to gladiate each other. If players can refuse to do this, then how do we get any lynches?

This is why I want the mechanics talk first -- get consensus on following through the strategy, THEN follow it.

There's still no guarantee some player who wants to screw around also claims the sword, no guarantee that the player holding it vigs the next night, and so on.

[Gamma Emerald]

Also I don't really agree that having a single strong town leader dramatically helps us here, it nearly cost us Witches Ball. Scum knowing who the one IC is makes it too easy for them to play around that slot. Consistently pushing PoE wins more often.

I refuse to be RC and force people to lynch in a list order. Actively refuse.

Yeah, you’re arguing with the person who got burned by that play, that’s not really doing anything cos they’re already onboard

[Kokichi Oma]

LLD flipped scum again it's looking like

[Auro]

Throwing out a thought:
If scum claims Excalibur, they die immediately.
Town can vote on someone to claim Excalibur for the day. ONLY that person claims at night. If they're scum it remains unclaimed, lynch next day. If there's a claim treat them like an IC the next day.

I volunteer as tribute.

Read further posts.
FWIW I don't think a town aligned player should act super scummy just to get to claim and go "Huh, I told you so" the next day -- clouds judgment and would give scum better reason to actually FoS said player.

Pedit: What makes you read LLD as scummy? Is this not a playstyle thing?

[Kokichi Oma]

She's a scummy person in general I guess that's a good point.

[Gamma Emerald]

This sounds reasonable, and no one that I’d want to promote this agenda for over LLD is around, so I’m in favor of this plan.

There's also a problem that she could just hold the sword and not vig anyone, destroying the point of the mechanic - and we wouldn't want to lynch her because she'd be an IC.

Why would they want to? If they aren’t Arthur they die, and their influence dies with them.
This looks like a scum thought.

[Gamma Emerald]

LLD flipped scum again it's looking like

Not feeling this
HURT: Auro btw

[Auro]

Why would they want to? If they aren’t Arthur they die, and their influence dies with them.
This looks like a scum thought.

They die only if they vig.
Which means a player with "influence" on getting the sword can just refuse to vig, and thus hold on to it stubbornly.

[Nancy Drew 39]

Well, the problem is that if both Merlin and the consensus designated scumread both claim the sword - assuming of course that the designated scumread is actually town - then Merlin claiming, makes it random and therefore no way of checking that player’s alignment.

If we end up making Merlin claim it, he might as well -- IC then on.

Obviously yes, if we scumread Merlin, then they claim the sword - then can safely claim the following day. But the problem with that, is that the real Arthur can’t claim until Merlin dies in that case right? Because once you posses the sword you can never unclaim it. The only way the real Arthur could ever get the sword in that case, would be Merlin dying.

And if Merlin claims before they get the sword, then they’ll get NK’d. And if they say who Arthur is, then Arthur dies. So Merlin having the sword is really not much help.

[Auro]

Why would they want to? If they aren’t Arthur they die, and their influence dies with them.
This looks like a scum thought.

They die only if they vig.
Which means a player with "influence" on getting the sword can just refuse to vig, and thus hold on to it stubbornly.

Also interesting. My fears that a player might work anti-town as an IC is scummy?