Newbie 1881 - Game Over

[nancy]

First order of business, do not communicate with anyone in this game or not in this game about this game. That means don't send any other player in the game a PM, don't talk to anyone else who plays mafia about the game on Discord, don't talk about the game on sitechat, don't mention the game in other games, and so on. Read the board announcement about this, thoroughly, please.

https://forum.mafiascum.net/viewtopic.php?f=11&t=30909

Please read the game rules post before you start playing. If you have any questions about the rules, or about your role, ask the moderator. Don't say what your role is or post your role PM or any other mod communication in the game thread. I am here to answer game mechanics- or theory-related questions and I will answer them truthfully regardless of my alignment, you can trust me on that because it's part of the rules of being an IC.

To start off I'd appreciate it if everyone answered a few questions:

1) What sort of activity can we expect from you this game?
2) Have you played forum mafia before, and if so, where, and how has that informed your play?
3) Do you prefer hunting mafia or manipulating town, and why?

I'll start off.

1) What sort of activity can we expect from you this game?
I should pretty much be living in thread, but I don't want to be too ubiquitous so that the thread has time to breathe.

2) Have you played forum mafia before, and if so, where, and how has that informed your play?
I've played on so many different sites that I've lost count. I'm from Westeros, where we play with short deadlines. I tend to get reads from interactions a lot, which lends itself really well to short deadlines, and I really value working with other people and try to keep everyone on the same level, so that no one feels excluded or irrelevant. That's the general attitude over there.

3) Do you prefer hunting mafia or manipulating town, and why?
I prefer hunting mafia, because I think trying to solve the puzzle of the game is a lot more challenging and rewarding than just lying through my teeth all game and having all the answers. I love working with other people and that comes a lot more naturally when I'm town, since I'm trying to solve things myself and it's pro-wincon for me to keep everyone motivated and interested in also figuring things out. There are very few things more enjoyable to me in mafia than working with people who I really connect with and solving the game together. When I'm mafia I just have to do things that other people like and that's not quite as rewarding. The only real fun I get out of playing mafia is working with my mafia team to lynch all the silly townies and either strategizing or just chilling out together in the mafia qt.

[nancy]

1) What sort of activity can we expect from you this game?
2) Have you played forum mafia before, and if so, where, and how has that informed your play?
3) Do you prefer hunting mafia or manipulating town, and why?

(1) I’m probably in a different time zone to most of you, and generally post in the evenings (my time), which starts now. I can’t post from work during the day, as this site is blocked on our work computers. Sometimes I post from my mobile phone. That’s one reason why my posts are usually pretty short. Another is that I’m still figuring out how to play this game.
(2) I’ve played one full game, and am now in a couple of games. I was mafia in my first game, which threw me, and I had no idea how to act, so probably played the game pretty badly. Prior to that game, I had never played mafia or any game like it in my life. I saw some kids playing it on the train and had no idea what it was. I came home and asked my own kids if they’d ever heard of a game where someone was the mafia, and they said of course! And here I am.
(3) After my bad first experience, I’d have to say that I prefer hunting mafia, not being hunted. I can see that manipulating town could be fun though.

Cool. I think you're town.

[nancy]

3) Hunting mafia i guess? I don't know what you mean by manipulating town

Sure, you can be town too for now.

If you're mafia, your job is to manipulate town into thinking that you are town, that your mafia partner is town, and that other town are mafia. Because you know everyone's alignment, every read you state in thread is actually a lie, every moment where you pretend to be uninformed about alignments is a lie, regardless of what you do your intent is always going to be to manipulate people because that's how you win the game as mafia.

[nancy]

Yeah, it can.

[nancy]

VOTE: stan1ey

cheers

Do you have anything to contribute?

[nancy]

I'm going to take that as a no.

Vote: SargeAlpha

[nancy]

What is "every once in a while" exactly, lmao.

What's the goldilocks zone? Lmao.

[nancy]

What is "every once in a while" exactly, lmao.

What's the goldilocks zone? Lmao.

I'll just use the word often instead of every once in a while lol

Goldilocks, like the fairy tale? I'm just using the fairy tale in this sense where you don't post too much or post too little. I read up on some theory beforehand regarding activity

Oh, nice.

[nancy]

Hum. Nothing's happening, I guess. SA, wanna talk about what you read up on a little more?

[nancy]

Wait lmao I missed an entire page. Ok.

[nancy]

Hey, all! Sorry I haven't shown up until now; the thread opened past my bedtime, so I slept through a lot of page 1.

Anyway, I can't tell if we're out of RVS or not, and I haven't seen anything particularly scummy yet, so I guess I'll just hold onto my vote for now.

As for

nancy's

questions:

1) What sort of activity can we expect from you this game?

So far, I tend to be more of a lower activity, wall posting type of player, because I like to take the time to really think and consider things before I post.

2) Have you played forum mafia before, and if so, where, and how has that informed your play?

All my games can be found on my wiki page. I think the only thing I've really learned about my play is that I'm fairly good at figuring out teams on day 3 (although it hasn't done me any good so far).

3) Do you prefer hunting mafia or manipulating town, and why?

I've only rolled scum once (in Micro 805.1), but I wouldn't say I really got the opportunity to

play

as scum, so I don't know which I prefer. Playing as town for me is as exciting as it is stressful, but the excitement tends to peak early (like, day 1) and the stress tends to just build after that. Sometimes, that stress sort of paralyzes me and blocks me from posting (I'm very conflict-averse, which is a trait I'm hoping Mafia can help me overcome), and theoretically playing as scum would be easier in that respect.

Oh hey that's a cool reason to play mafia. Also, interesting take on conflict and rolling scum. I guess you're kinda right that it's inherently less conflict-filled? Even though conflict is basically built into your wincon.

[nancy]

@nancy what are the point of these questions, especially question number 3

It helps to get a sense of people and to get some conversation started. I always try to develop a feel for people's baseline in games where I don't know anyone and those questions can be good for that. They're also the type of things that will usually come up at some point over the course of the game, so I think it gets that information out there earlier. Plus I feel like people have a tendency to tunnel a bit out of RVS, so I'm not a huge fan of the thing. "Who are we all and how do we play" feels like a healthier and more balanced way to start a game than "lol you're mafia".

[nancy]

It's scummy because they are making it seem like they don't want to vote because we may be out of rvs already, not very likely when we are barely on page 2. They answer their own question by mentioning that nothing scummy has really come up, which would mean that most likely we are still in rvs.

So if they were concerned about being out of rvs as a reason to have not voted, their own reasoning is negated by their own observation of the game, and should have felt comfortable voting freely.

For some reason they didn't.

Kinda like this approach to sorting Flicker, and that he saw the same thing that I saw.

[nancy]

Fuck. I meant to not answer that until they said something, but I just smoked a bowl on the shitter and forgot.

UNVOTE: maggie

VOTE: FormerFish

Not a fan of drug references

Um. Why are you voting him? Do you think it's scummy that he made a drug reference? I feel like I'm missing something.

[nancy]

So, I could either risk making a random vote and getting scrutinized for that, or I could be wrong about the RVS status and risk being scrutinized for not voting at all. I went with "don't vote, explain why, and assume people will understand," but that failed, and here we are.

Kinda like the transparency here, I guess.

[nancy]

You said you had the risk of making a random vote and getting the scrutinized for that versus getting scrutinized for not voting at all which makes me think that getting scrutinized is at the forefront of your mind.

What do you think this means for her alignment, if anything?

[nancy]

Hey SA, can I ask you, did you start writing 22 before or after I voted you?

[nancy]

There's no restriction, lmao. People just usually only do one, because the whole point of RVS is to say "lol i vote u" and hope that somebody does something during that period that feels alignment indicative, then to talk about that, and the game goes from there. It's kind of like saying hi, and you don't really need to say hi twice.

[nancy]

And your response feels genuine, which I like? It's not very alignment indicative but sure, let's say it's a little bit towny for now. I mean, it would have been scummy for you to actually call him scum for such bad reasons, so that not being a thing is the main thing I get from your response. Still like you for town, woohoo!

[nancy]

Yet?

[nancy]

Hum. Seems like a weird thought to have. Like, you're sort of suggesting that you're going to scumread him at some point?

[nancy]

i'd put this as NAI for both sides.

So, you don't think that FF would have played it up if he was mafia?

[nancy]

Sorry, I don't think I expressed myself well enough.

I think Formerfish is reading too much into it or taking the wrong meaning of what she wrote rather than trying to play it up tho. i'd put this as NAI for both sides.

You said you don't think that he was trying to play it up, but you also say that you don't think it's alignment indicative. In my mind, it's more likely that he would play it up as mafia, so if he hasn't played it up then it's a little bit town. So I'm just trying to clarify that you don't agree, that you think that he wouldn't have played it up as mafia.

[nancy]

Anyway, I already feel pretty good about this game considering it's only page 4.

I like Trinity's kind of guileless attitude, it doesn't feel put on and she doesn't feel nervous. I basically agree with stan's take that it's sorta villagery to have had the thought that she should keep her vote on someone who is active. Could be that she's just trying to do the Right Thing as a wolf, I guess, but that's not really how I'm feeling it.

Sort of like the way FF put down his thoughts on Flicker then immediately oopsed and said he had meant to wait for a response to her. It feels like a bit of a town thing to have thoughts on something that you're holding on to, and I think if he was mafia he would probably be more aware of what he was doing, rather than just plopping them down right away. I'm not a huge fan of way he's using logic there, feels a little forced, but I also thought the way Flicker held on to her vote was a little off, and I can believe that he just took that feeling a little further than I did.

The way OkaPoka is asking people questions feels good, I guess. It's not much but it's a start. I like that he was looking into Flicker's mindset rather than just laying down a superficial take that she was scummy for being self-conscious or something like that.

stan feels super relaxed and I guess I'm reading that as a town thing at this point. I like his Trinity read probably more than anything that's happened so far, I think. It really shows that he's looking for her motivation there and not being lazy with the way he's thinking about the game.

Sorta dislike SA a little, mostly just that he laid down and a vote without commenting on anything that was happening in his first, and hasn't really done anything since. Moar posts, pls.

Peeps should tell me if they think anything I just wrote is insane.

[nancy]

Right, i see your logic but i don't agree. By that logic you should have a town lean on all players because nobody played it up. even if we focus on just him, he could have just misunderstood and taken it as a chance to seem like town. Or just the idea of playing it might have not crossed his mind. Idk. I do see your logic and it makes sense but i made the mistake in my last game of being too leniant in town reading people for things so for me its not enough to say i have a town lean on him

Yeah, cool. I don't think it really moves the needle for me in any meaningful way on its own, but if we're near the end of the dayphase and I have an ISO full of things I kinda like a little bit and nothing I dislike, am probably going to townread that person, at least to some degree.

[nancy]

@nancy what are the point of these questions, especially question number 3

Now that nancy's responded, I want to know: What was the point of

this

question? You don't seem to have a problem with them, given you answered them (in post 18, although with less detail than basically everyone else). It also seems fairly obvious that at least one of the ways nancy uses them is for hunting, given how she'd already started sorting people based on their answers (12, 15). Plus, it seems a little off to me how it took you so long to wonder about them.

I sorta don't believe that these are things that bother you?

Feels a little more like you're looking for ways to dumpster him for not looking sexy than having legitimate concerns with what his motivations are. Particularly the way that you're kind of passive aggressively painting what he's doing as scummy without actually committing to a scumread. I'd expect that kind of approach when you've maybe had a scumread for a while and been stewing over it and there's just nothing about the person that you like, not in a super early game situation where first impressions are still being made pretty much.

So, uh, why is it scummy to you that he didn't ask me about the RQS thing right away? Why is it a bad thing that he asked me about something that you felt should be obvious? I don't necessarily agree that it should have been obvious and I don't think there's anything super harmful in asking that kind of question, so please help me see why you do?

I don't understand your approach here and I'd like to understand it so if you could talk more about what you're thinking / doing that would be super helpful.

Vote: Flicker

[nancy]

Sort of like the way FF put down his thoughts on Flicker then immediately oopsed and said he had meant to wait for a response to her. It feels like a bit of a town thing to have thoughts on something that you're holding on to, and I think if he was mafia he would probably be more aware of what he was doing, rather than just plopping them down right away.

I'm not a huge fan of way he's using logic there

, feels a little forced, but I also thought the way Flicker held on to her vote was a little off, and I can believe that he just took that feeling a little further than I did.

Its just that I'm having flashbacks to another newer player that like 3 of us just played a game with, 2.8. He was very stuck on rules and procedures during the game he was scum, and im pretty sure trinity was the partner there. He kept talking about procedures and how he wasnt sure if he was following them correctly. It led to his lynch on day 1.

To me the idea that someone is going to scrutinize everything you say is one from scum. As town I dont give a shit what I say or how I say it. I can either back it up or i end up being wrong and I may end up eating rope. If I'm a PR then that sucks, but as a VT one can only dream of eating the n1 kill. As scum I am much more aware of what I say and when. Everything I do is crafted to try and prey upon someones weak spot.

I've also quite recently played with a new player who awkwardly played rvs in that game and he ended up being scum.

This is all anecdotal.

This is like, extremely nebulous but I am townreading you for all of this, lmao.

[nancy]

because some people like to play RQS over RVS and usually RQS ends up with a stalled game with no where to go because game quickly devolves into asking questions about NAI things.

Hum. Either a) the questions asked in RQS were bad, or b) the people in the game didn't know how to push the game forward. I don't think RQS as a thing is ever going to be at fault for the game stalling.

Sure, in mafiascum meta people are more familiar with just tunneling on stupid nonsense and yelling at each other, which lends itself better to RVS than RQS for obvious reasons, and might feel uncomfortable actually treating each other with decency and approaching the game from a more reasonable standpoint, but to say that RQS is to blame for people not knowing how to handle it properly is, um, sorta shortsighted, I think.

[nancy]

Also like, I have the starts of two townreads and a scumread from how people responded to the discussion around RQS, so to say that it's not good for generating reads just ain't truth.

[nancy]

Prodding SargeAlpha.

Why no Iceman prod?

[nancy]

Oh my bad, lmao.

Thanks.

[nancy]

because some people like to play RQS over RVS and usually RQS ends up with a stalled game with no where to go because game quickly devolves into asking questions about NAI things.

Hum. Either a) the questions asked in RQS were bad, or b) the people in the game didn't know how to push the game forward. I don't think RQS as a thing is ever going to be at fault for the game stalling.

Sure, in mafiascum meta people are more familiar with just tunneling on stupid nonsense and yelling at each other, which lends itself better to RVS than RQS for obvious reasons, and might feel uncomfortable actually treating each other with decency and approaching the game from a more reasonable standpoint, but to say that RQS is to blame for people not knowing how to handle it properly is, um, sorta shortsighted, I think.

i guess it is shortsighted but you are the IC so you have some semblance of authority making it easy for scum!you to try and derail the game into non scumhunt mode. apathy and inaction are probably some of the leading causes of town losses in non role madness setups.

Um, I'm pretty sure that would be against IC rules. Like, if I'm mafia then I am straight up not allowed to lie about theory stuff to benefit my wincon. If I did then I would be banned as IC. This is why the IC role is so important in newbies. You need someone to be able to talk about theory stuff that you can trust to be truthful regardless of their alignment.

You're right that if I'm mafia I super want to derail the game and have people not scumhunting, though. I would just manipulate my position as the most experienced player to do that, not my role as IC specifically. Like, I can totally make shit up like "hey we should lynch this townie who claimed cop, that would totally be the best idea ever, right guys???" but I can't speak as IC and say "yeah it's optimal to lynch someone who claims a role".

Really just treat me as any other player and try not to think too much about the fact that I'm the IC when you're trying to get a read on me and such, because uhm, I actually am just another player and I'm not special in any way whatsoever in that capacity.

Also, kinda think it's a teensy bit towny that you're thinking about this, lmao.

[nancy]

Then again the way you worded that "leading causes of town losses" etc. feels a little brittle. Hrm. What are Tone Reads.

[nancy]

Also like, I'm pretty obviously not trying to derail the game into non-scumhunting mode I think, lmao, so yeah actually that's a pretty detached thought to have and from that perspective it doesn't really feel genuine, hm. You can join the poopoo list.

[nancy]

What are Pregame Readscales lmao

nancy ~ )) ---- )) ---- stan - FF, Trinity - [Iceman, Eragon] % )) - > SA, OkaPoka - Flicker )) ~

[nancy]

@nancy what are the point of these questions, especially question number 3

Now that nancy's responded, I want to know: What was the point of

this

question? You don't seem to have a problem with them, given you answered them (in post 18, although with less detail than basically everyone else). It also seems fairly obvious that at least one of the ways nancy uses them is for hunting, given how she'd already started sorting people based on their answers (12, 15). Plus, it seems a little off to me how it took you so long to wonder about them.

because some people like to play RQS over RVS and usually RQS ends up with a stalled game with no where to go because game quickly devolves into asking questions about NAI things.

Hey, @FF @stan @Trinity, does this feel like a scum-scum interaction to you? Feel free to punt on it.

[nancy]

@nancy what are the point of these questions, especially question number 3

Now that nancy's responded, I want to know: What was the point of

this

question? You don't seem to have a problem with them, given you answered them (in post 18, although with less detail than basically everyone else). It also seems fairly obvious that at least one of the ways nancy uses them is for hunting, given how she'd already started sorting people based on their answers (12, 15). Plus, it seems a little off to me how it took you so long to wonder about them.

because some people like to play RQS over RVS and usually RQS ends up with a stalled game with no where to go because game quickly devolves into asking questions about NAI things.

Hey, @FF @stan @Trinity, does this feel like a scum-scum interaction to you? Feel free to punt on it.

The question from OkaPoka seems a bit odd to me, but I don’t see why it would be a scum interaction.

Okay, why not? Do you have any hints of a read on either of them separately?

[nancy]

What are Pregame Readscales lmao

nancy ~ )) ---- )) ---- stan - FF, Trinity - [Iceman, Eragon] % )) - > SA, OkaPoka - Flicker )) ~

Can you explain what this means?

It's a sliding scale, townreads spread left, scumreads spread right. The % marks rand, which is 75%. (Everyone in the game has a 75% chance of being town.) Each dash is equivalent to about 2.5% off rand, and commas mean there's no difference.

Uhmm, other little details are that each double bracket is a hard grouping, each single bracket (not yet appearing) is a soft grouping, names surrounded by square brackets are slots that are either null or I don't want to lynch them even if they're in my PoE (for example, it's bad from a process standpoint to lynch an empty slot, because it can't claim), slots right of the arrow are in my lynch pool, the tilde separates lock townreads from mechanically confirmed town, ditto lock scumreads (lol yeah right) from mechanically confirmed scum.

So, it means that you and FF are like, a smidge above rand for me (say like, ~78% confidence you're town), stan is a smidge above you both (~80%), and SA, Poka and Flicker are smidges below rand (~70%). Iceman and Eragon are null.

Does that make sense?

If it's too complex I can just use a simpler tiered list, but using the readscale really helps me to get a feel for exactly where I want to place people in terms of confidence and how my reads all fit with each other. Hard and soft groupings are particularly helpful for me because it lets me put certain players together who I have similar-ish strength reads on but maybe have something about them that makes them a little distinct that I want to notate. I wouldn't expect you to do anything like this don't worry lmao, it's more for my own benefit than anything.

[nancy]

@nancy what are the point of these questions, especially question number 3

Now that nancy's responded, I want to know: What was the point of

this

question? You don't seem to have a problem with them, given you answered them (in post 18, although with less detail than basically everyone else). It also seems fairly obvious that at least one of the ways nancy uses them is for hunting, given how she'd already started sorting people based on their answers (12, 15). Plus, it seems a little off to me how it took you so long to wonder about them.

because some people like to play RQS over RVS and usually RQS ends up with a stalled game with no where to go because game quickly devolves into asking questions about NAI things.

Hey, @FF @stan @Trinity, does this feel like a scum-scum interaction to you? Feel free to punt on it.

The question from OkaPoka seems a bit odd to me, but I don’t see why it would be a scum interaction.

Also um, what do you mean the question seems a bit odd to you sorry? Explains?

[nancy]

You townread Oka?

[nancy]

@stan talk with me about this tidbit?

Also like, I'm pretty obviously not trying to derail the game into non-scumhunting mode I think, lmao, so yeah actually that's a pretty detached thought to have and from that perspective it doesn't really feel genuine, hm. You can join the poopoo list.

[nancy]

Omg I just skimmed your completed games and I think I might love you lmao.

[nancy]

UNVOTE:

What, dot tm

[nancy]

okay trinity, nancy, and stanley are town

im having a hard time really scumreading anyone rn tho

thought i had a direction with trinity but meh

im not really seeing flicker scum rn

pretty sure former is town

[nancy]

huh?

Your unvote is weird.

[nancy]

Sarge, how much to you is too much posting or too little posting?

If I can recall correctly, I posted on average about 4-6 times per day on one marathon game.
For me at the moment, I wouldn't post something unless it provides insight or contributes somewhat to everyone is doing.
Even with this though I got called out for posting too little on the third day, so I guess that amount of posting is too little.

Typically speaking, you should at least check in once every 24 hours at the bare minimum to comment on things, answer questions, or ask questions, but as the deadline gets closer, it is good to increase your posting and be more active, especially if no real lynch candidates have been presented imo.

I dont really like people announcing they won't post very much, it seems like a good way to announce your going to slack
Kinda like "OH GUYS! I only post 4-6 times a day so dont scum read me based on me never being around alright cool im also town!"
(edited for artistic purposes)

I like Oka's response, it feels natural to me, its not much to go on but I am starting to lean town

Eragon is town!!! jordan_dunk.gif

[nancy]

could you explain what transparency is?[/spoiler]

So like, imagine you've got a curtain, and behind the curtain is a big fat messy glob of brainjuice containing all your thoughts about the game. Everyone has their own special and unique glob of brainjuice, is part of being human. When you talk about things in the game, you're extracting stuff from your brainjuices and presenting them to rest of the game, basically by parting the curtain a little and sharing a little sample.

In it's most extreme form, you just make the curtain entirely see-through and everyone can just see all of your brainjuice, it's spilling out everywhere and it's kind of disgusting and no one really wants to look at it but it's also sorta compelling and they can't help but look. Practically speaking, though, it's kinda helpful to form your thoughts about things in a coherent way so that other people don't have to do a lot of work to figure out what the heck all that juice shit is that's happening. That would be, like, making a big ol' soup and when you come out the curtain parts and everyone can take a bit of a look at the big messy yucky glob and then they're given this delicious soup to eat and drink and they kinda get the best of both worlds. A bit of a view of the messy shit behind the curtain and a nice taste of coherency, and they can tell that that soup came from that glob because they can see that both have the same qualities, child like mother.

Thing is, if you're mafia, your brainjuice isn't like everyone else's. Your brainjuice is all contained in a neat little vat and there's nothing messy about it. It has air bubbles and shit, it's basically curated. So when you're bringing out your soup and ladle, people will see the vat behind the curtain and they'll be like, what? Who are you? And like, mafia can dress up their brainjuice and try to make it all messy, they can have these delicious soup recipes to feed everyone, but when it comes down to it, when they're doing the "transparent" thing and showing everyone what they think, there's no foundation to it, all they have is a silly-looking vat, they had to invent everything to make it seem like other people's ugly crap, they can't really part the curtain because if they do then people will notice that there's a disconnect between the soup and what's behind. And they're kinda smug about it, too, more often than not, you know. Power and secrecy does things to people.

Makey sense?

[nancy]

honestly, even if this sounds like sheeping...
I agree with ever single point you made, except...
I dont think Oka asking questions is AI and,
while Stan feels relaxed, his trinity read could be based off a little TMI and coming from scum, so I dont think that is AI either[/spoiler]

Sorta disagree. I think there's a lot of alignment information in the way someone asks questions and what they get from those questions.

Like, take our wagons in the last votal.

Formerfish (3) - OkaPoka, IcemanCh, TrinityNZ
Flicker (2) - nancy, Stan1ey
IcemanCh (1) - Formerfish
stan1ey (1) - SargeAlpha

Not Voting (2) - Eragon, Flicker

With 9 players alive it takes 5 votes to lynch.

So I'm a little wary of SA, right? Let's say SA votes Iceman, and a bit later I vote Iceman too. Now, why am I voting with someone who I think could be mafia? Is that a weird thing from me? Well, the way you figure that out is a) look at what I've done to figure out Iceman's alignment, b) look at what I've done to figure out SA's alignment, c) ask me questions about either/both if you're not satisfied with my process.

If I've just hopped on with SA and not done anything to figure him out or to figure out why he's on that wagon, that's kinda weird, no? Maybe you should prod me about that? Okay, and how do I respond?

"Oh hm, good point Eragon, yeah that's a little weird maybe this isn't a great wagon and I should unvote and look elsehwere. Do you have any thoughts on this other person?" Okay, that's pretty towny on a generic level, you can probably feel better about me from that.

"Uh, didn't think about it, it's not important so whatever." That's kinda scummy on a generic level, no? Maybe want to keep a closer eye on me.

"Well I have A, B, C, D, E reasons and listen to all this babble about how complicated this situation is and all of the great lengths I went to to figure things out." Hummmm, that feels kinda played up, you might think, yeah?

The game is all about figuring things out and the way people go about trying to do that is super important. Questioning is right up there with analysis as far as getting a read on someone is concerned, I think.

Anyway, digression aside, I did have a similar thought to you about stan's post, but I liked where he was coming from more than not and put that bit aside to keep tabs on as the game progresses. I'm sort of in wait-and-see mode with him. He's been following me around a little, but he's also had his own take on things, so I'm not like, super worried? It's pretty early and if he keeps up like this then I think I'll have a pretty good bead on him by the time we near the end of the phase. Plus, if he's mafia and he's clearing townies for us then that's never a bad thing.

[nancy]

"just tunneling on stupid nonsense and yelling at each other,"
-is it ok if I quote you on this in my sig?

Lmao, I mean you can if you really want to, not until the game ends though.

[nancy]

trinity is town because i don't see a new player interact that much and be scum

nancy ur town because i don't see you interacting that much to be scum

stanley feels like a rational town player

---

i thought trinity might have been scum with the rvs vote thing she did on FF but i don't think so anymore, mainly because i think her not understanding it was l2 seems genuine

flicker seems a bit defensive but nothing concrete yet

former is town because reasons

---
unvoted because we are out of rvs

and ill read that eragon post later

Hum. What interactions are you looking at from Trinity?

"Because reasons", rip, I cry forever.

[nancy]

Distancing alpha-omega Blueline 42 Redbull between flicker and Oka?

Oh my god.

[nancy]

that's a lot of effort for an analogy

I'm very weird.

[nancy]

This is..... I think.... the most beautiful post I've ever seen. The use of brain juice is amazing.

Also, you are either the best scum player ever or you are town. I'm going to lean town but I think ICs should always be lynched before LYLO.


I'm catching up and I really like your display of reads. I think it is a bit complicated and I need something to decipher it but the concept is cool.

Making me blush. Also, lmao at lynching IC's before lylo. Iceman pls.

God I'm having too much fun.

[nancy]

UNVOTE:


I'm shocked that no one pointed out that FF was at L-2 from RVS. It took 2 pages?

So far I'm leaning Town on trinity. I've seen her scum game..... this game she feels more natural.

It's honestly not a big deal for someone to be at L-2.

[nancy]

so Tl;dr

Paint blob A is town
Paint blob B is scum

Paint blob A is all spread around and messy and a thin layer because it is spread and lots of different things coursing through it and wild

Paint blob b is neatly within the lines because the person is wary about going outside of the lines?

tl;dr transparency is showing your work. "I think X is town." Leave it there, you're not being transparent. "I had A, B, C thoughts/feelings that led me to think X is town." That's transparency. "I can't seem to articulate why but I think X is town, here are posts that made me feel things." Also transparency.

[nancy]

but do you policy lynch ics?

Trying to pull up a bunch of other stuff but I'll answer this now since you've asked twice.

On D1 or D2 no. After that I think you should yes. Here is why.

As a town player and IC is just a more experienced player to help find scum. To me they only have a slight advantage although most of that is lost because new players can be a pain in the ass.

As a scum player they are like a super heros. They can easily sway new players into confusion and mislynches. There is a much bigger advantage to a scum!IC.

I also feel like scum is going to night kill the active/most experienced players first. So it brings in the whole..... why is the IC still alive after a few nights?


I just think that a town!IC makes LYLO super difficult.


Of course if we have a strong read on someone other then the IC we would lynch them instead.

Tldr..... If we have no super strong roads then IC should be lynched before LYLO.

No, Iceman. You don't treat the IC different to any other player in the game as far as their alignment goes. If someone who is very town and proactive doesn't die, that can be reason to suspect them. Like, why are you still alive, you're never getting lynched in this game according to people's reads and you're trying to solve the game with us, why do scum not want you dead? If the answer isn't "well they've been hard defending scum all game and tunneling on townies" then it very well might be "well they're mafia". Or they might just be town anyway and mafia didn't kill them because they're silly.

That's never a reason to just close your eyes and policy lynch them. You don't do that with anyone, IC or no. Can't really overemphasize this point, it's a mind-numbingly stupid, obscenely -EV thing to do.

[nancy]

(and just an aside. I find it weird that you corrected me in a post when I was unsure of your gender so I used a general term to address you. Like I didn't call you a dude. And its not a huge thing, just seemed odd to make your priority with my posting.)

Uh, I don't think that's weird at all and it's perfectly within anyone's right to insist on how people gender them. Is not your place to find it weird how other people engage with their own gender. Am not really sure what the point of this aside is since this isn't even remotely game-related. I really don't want anyone to feel like they can't speak up for themselves this game.

[nancy]

call me lazy but i was looking for trinity to either contradict herself or say something like "yeah i was being sarcastic and i knew i was putting formerfish at l2 just doing it for the shits and giggles xd"

You're so lazy!!!!

(I don't really think you're lazy.

Okay, maybe a little lazy. <3)

[nancy]

huh?

Your unvote is weird.

Why was it weird? He just pointed out that trinity voting brought me to l-2, and his vote was on me as well. Since his vote on me was in rvs and we are clearly out of it, it would make sense to move or at least remove a rvs vote which is currently the leading wagon based solely off of rvs votes.

Naked unvotes are wolfy.

It's slightly a meme.

Are you always this... logical?

[nancy]

@nancy what are the point of these questions, especially question number 3

Now that nancy's responded, I want to know: What was the point of

this

question? You don't seem to have a problem with them, given you answered them (in post 18, although with less detail than basically everyone else). It also seems fairly obvious that at least one of the ways nancy uses them is for hunting, given how she'd already started sorting people based on their answers (12, 15). Plus, it seems a little off to me how it took you so long to wonder about them.

because some people like to play RQS over RVS and usually RQS ends up with a stalled game with no where to go because game quickly devolves into asking questions about NAI things.

Hey, @FF @stan @Trinity, does this feel like a scum-scum interaction to you? Feel free to punt on it.

I think they are both overreacting to the situation. Oka seems to have played a game with RQS in it, as he stated how games turn out after they appear. So he would know what nancy was doing and why. The questions are pretty standard, and didn't oka answer them himself?

Flicker is giving off a scum caught for reasons they cant believe they were caught for, so they think they should lash out and play like really aggressively. I dont like their play here at all so far.

Could they be the scum team here? Meh... If I were to guess which was scum if it was 50/50 it'd be flicker right now (and just an aside. I find it weird that you corrected me in a post when I was unsure of your gender so I used a general term to address you. Like I didn't call you a dude. And its not a huge thing, just seemed odd to make your priority with my posting.)

town

Talk to me about this, Eragon? Am not really sure I'm seeing the same thing you're seeing.

[nancy]

@Flicker would super super appreciate your thoughts on players other than OkaPoka right now.

[nancy]

I like that FF is putting reasons out and explaining some scummy things he sees of Flicker, without trying to manipulate the entire town and strong-arm the Lynch

Alright, fair. I think where I disagree is that I don't think not strongarming a lynch is towny and I don't think strongarming a lynch is necessarily scummy, either. Like, scum very often just skate by all game and get lost in empty process work that doesn't really do anything other than make them look town. What has FF done to solve the game in that post? What has he done that scum can't do? Sure, his posts are reasonable, but scum can be reasonable. What is he doing that scum can't do, or what is he doing that would really be a detriment to scum if he did it?

It seems like you're townreading low-key performance and I think that's probably a blind-spot for you? I don't think being low-key is town. I don't think FF is mafia, he's hovering like a little above null for me right now, and maybe you're right and he's just town, but right now I just don't agree with your reasoning and I have some concerns with his play (which I'd sort of rather wait on talking about until he does more things).

[nancy]

it feels like it was phrased in a way that allows iceman to build upon it later to attack nancy w/o really needing to build a legitimate in game case on her

like instead of saying something about nancy feels off, feels like she is controlling town he goes with the proposition that cannot really be argued against

I don't think you're insane for thinking this.

But like, lmao, it doesn't feel very intuitive for mafia to come in the way he did and talk in detail about his idea that we should lynch the IC in lylo. He has to know that will look bad and if he's mafia he has to already be feeling like he wants me very dead with the way my thread presence is, so it's like, not a thing that he's ever actually going to cash in on and he would know that. I also kind of feel like it would take a bit more of an experienced player to try to use that as a way to break down trust, and kinda think he'd be intimidated by me given how he's a newb and newbscum generally suck up to the IC.

[nancy]

what joke??

Oka made a joke about the scum team being the 2 people who havent really posted much. In a newbie that could very well be what happens sometimes. Town has a want to get out there and meet each other. We want to size each other up, really get each others weight. We can only really do that by being right next to them, or as I know it to be called, dancing. This is how I town hunt and where I get my reads from. Scum has to be weary of everything they do each time they interact with people because its all a lie. What scum says to one person they have to say to all, and when you are lying lies tend to build on themselves until there is this invisible web. Then you have town people who start to dive into every word someone has posted and you start to see the web being built over time. Thats why is so hard for scum to hide forever, and why newbie scum try to hide until they cant anymore.

I dont see how its a joke...

and it seems opportunistic to me

Er, it seems opportunistic to think that two random people are mafia? Pls explain.

[nancy]

I like that FF is putting reasons out and explaining some scummy things he sees of Flicker, without trying to manipulate the entire town and strong-arm the Lynch

Alright, fair. I think where I disagree is that I don't think not strongarming a lynch is towny and I don't think strongarming a lynch is necessarily scummy, either. Like, scum very often just skate by all game and get lost in empty process work that doesn't really do anything other than make them look town. What has FF done to solve the game in that post? What has he done that scum can't do? Sure, his posts are reasonable, but scum can be reasonable. What is he doing that scum can't do, or what is he doing that would really be a detriment to scum if he did it?

It seems like you're townreading low-key performance and I think that's probably a blind-spot for you? I don't think being low-key is town. I don't think FF is mafia, he's hovering like a little above null for me right now, and maybe you're right and he's just town, but right now I just don't agree with your reasoning and I have some concerns with his play (which I'd sort of rather wait on talking about until he does more things).

ok, I understand that strong-arming isn't always a scum tell, and is sometimes actually towny, but normally doing it early D1 on a mis-lynch bait target pings me a bit, so the fact that FF doesn't is a bit towny.

I also have liked some of his other posts, but I understand that scum can do this to.

he is one of my stronger town reads for now, not gonna say it will never change.

I didn't mean strongarming is sometimes actually towny, I meant that I don't think you can just look at it as like, an objective tell and think, okay person A didn't do behavior X, town.

[nancy]

Let me clarify one more time becuae this is getting silly and distracting from finding scum.


Right now I believe that Nancy is town
Nancy would have to be an amazing scum player to not be town. To me Nancy is my first pick for town.

I made my comment about the IC because in the odd event that we have zero reads before a lylo that is where I would go. I don't see that happening though because Nancy is coming off so strongly as town.


For now we should set the issue aside and look for scum. Here is what I have so far.

Strong town: Nancy
Town Trinity FormerFish
Lean Town Erogon
Nuetral Okta Stanley Sarge
Scum Lean Flick

How did you get there on like, all of those reads?

Also, interacting with people is good.tm

[nancy]

not the fact that its 2 random people, the fact that its 2 people with zero thread presence and that are noobs(if im not mistaken)

if thats not hella opportunistic idk what is

I guess, but like, he has some shape of a townread on everyone else, no?

[nancy]

k

who is scum?

Right now im saying in you, flicker, stanley, and SA. You and flicker because of your attitudes and the way you are nit picking peoples statements to fit a profile you are trying to push, stanley for possible distancing in flicker ends up being scum, and SA because of activity.[/quote]
So like, for someone who seems as extensively logical as you, these reads seem pretty... wonky?

[nancy]

Rip formatting.

[nancy]

it's not the pagecount and number of posts that makes it slow its the lack of scumhunting and wagon forming which im at fault for but nonetheless its giving a slow impression

Lack of scum hunting? Its day 1 and we are on page, what, 8? We are still very much in the feeling each other out stage for anyone to have really strong feelings about wanting to hang anyone. Shit we can have hunches and we can have inklings, but if you are looking for a full blown case this early then you are scum and need to die.

Also, at you talking about the lack of wagons forming when you commented on not wanting to join the one on flicker and would rather do your own thing over there.

Hum. Kinda curious why you're not all over Flicker like white on rice right now

[nancy]

not the fact that its 2 random people, the fact that its 2 people with zero thread presence and that are noobs(if im not mistaken)

if thats not hella opportunistic idk what is

I guess, but like, he has some shape of a townread on everyone else, no?

so its just PoE then...

PoE D1???

I pretty much always use PoE day 1 though so I don't think that's weird as a thing. It's a little early in the day to be PoEing the game though yeah lmao

[nancy]

not the fact that its 2 random people, the fact that its 2 people with zero thread presence and that are noobs(if im not mistaken)

if thats not hella opportunistic idk what is

I guess, but like, he has some shape of a townread on everyone else, no?

so its just PoE then...

PoE D1???

adding onto this,

If it truly is PoE, im truly amazed that ANYONE can have 7 solid enough townreads that they think that the 2 scum are the only people they dont townred

He's townreading Trinity, me, stan, and FF, I think.

It's a little weird that he says those two might be scum when he had just said Flicker seemed a little defensive, I guess? Meh.

[nancy]

@Oka where'd you go my dude

[nancy]

Also lmao, Eragon, he only needs 6 townreads, is not like he's going to have a read on himself.

[nancy]

it's not the pagecount and number of posts that makes it slow its the lack of scumhunting and wagon forming which im at fault for but nonetheless its giving a slow impression

Lack of scum hunting? Its day 1 and we are on page, what, 8? We are still very much in the feeling each other out stage for anyone to have really strong feelings about wanting to hang anyone. Shit we can have hunches and we can have inklings, but if you are looking for a full blown case this early then you are scum and need to die.

Also, at you talking about the lack of wagons forming when you commented on not wanting to join the one on flicker and would rather do your own thing over there.

Hum. Kinda curious why you're not all over Flicker like white on rice right now

I would be if I saw anything in Oka's play that said he was town right now. I don't know Flicker and don't know how she plays. We could be taking something that happened at the outset of us meeting that has flavored our interactions in a way. I don't want to scum read someone based off a misunderstanding, I can stand to wait to actually try to sort her later. I think that Oka's play has been far and away more scummy, and I have something to base the read of him off of.

Okay, but like, you implied that anyone making cases this early is scum and needs to die, and Flicker did exactly that in her third post, so why don't you think that she needs to die?

[nancy]

also, 4 out of 8 is 50%

2 of 8 is 25%

and you have 4 from 10 pages

he has 2 from 6 pages

Math is tech.

[nancy]

Kinda want to wait until Flicker and stan have given their take on all this before I talk about my Oka read, would also be nice if Oka made a return to thread.

[nancy]

Kinda want to wait until Flicker and stan have given their take on all this before I talk about my Oka read, would also be nice if Oka made a return to thread.

You are scoring more town points for this line of thinking with me by the way. Scum!nancy would just let me roll through town!Oka if that was what this was.

Wait, why can't I be scum with Oka lmao

[nancy]

Searching for a replacement for SargeAlpha.

Rip

[nancy]

Oka, talk to me about your FF townread?

[nancy]

Iceman, who do you think Oka's insistence that the game go fast is scummy?

[nancy]

FF is actively engaging with people. He is also going out of his way to correct things that are not directly relevant to him which makes me think he is town cuz if i were scum i wouldn't care about correcting things and just let people argue and have at it.

What stuff is he correcting?

[nancy]

Oka you are insane if you think this game is dragging lmao

[nancy]

huh?

Your unvote is weird.

Why was it weird? He just pointed out that trinity voting brought me to l-2, and his vote was on me as well. Since his vote on me was in rvs and we are clearly out of it, it would make sense to move or at least remove a rvs vote which is currently the leading wagon based solely off of rvs votes.

maybe correct might be the wrong term

Okay so, what is he doing that's town for you if not correcting?

[nancy]

UNVOTE:


I'm shocked that no one pointed out that FF was at L-2 from RVS. It took 2 pages?

So far I'm leaning Town on trinity. I've seen her scum game..... this game she feels more natural.

I don’t understand the big deal about being L-2. I thought L-1 was the important one, as then it just takes one more to lynch. Why would you be shocked?

What do you think about like, stuff that's going on right now Trinity?

[nancy]

he is going out of his way to interject himself into conversations and attempts to make a genuine attempt at clarifying things that don't need to involve him

Would be really helpful if you could quote posts where you think he's doing that, and maybe like, say some more words about this maybe? I'm not super in love with your reasoning I guess.

[nancy]

yeah i think trinity is scum, she hasn't really meaningful engaged with anyone without really being prompted to.
feels like she is reading the thread, answers any questions directed at her and then disappears
town would be more proactive imo

VOTE: trinity
ff might hate me for voting her already but i don't really have questions for her

Am slightly worried about her myself, kinda just hoping she comes alive at some point soonish.

[nancy]

huh?

Your unvote is weird.

Why was it weird? He just pointed out that trinity voting brought me to l-2, and his vote was on me as well. Since his vote on me was in rvs and we are clearly out of it, it would make sense to move or at least remove a rvs vote which is currently the leading wagon based solely off of rvs votes.

has iceman even posted?


also, I dont like the fact that you are asking about a scumteam of 2 people(that might be newbies. I dont know) and have had almost zero thread presence

C'mon, its not a huge deal to make that joke. And Iceman had posted at that point, mostly to say that he wasn't forgetting about the game. He seems to be here now. I have like 2 games played with him recently. We'll see whats up with him.

what joke??

Oka made a joke about the scum team being the 2 people who havent really posted much. In a newbie that could very well be what happens sometimes. Town has a want to get out there and meet each other. We want to size each other up, really get each others weight. We can only really do that by being right next to them, or as I know it to be called, dancing. This is how I town hunt and where I get my reads from. Scum has to be weary of everything they do each time they interact with people because its all a lie. What scum says to one person they have to say to all, and when you are lying lies tend to build on themselves until there is this invisible web. Then you have town people who start to dive into every word someone has posted and you start to see the web being built over time. Thats why is so hard for scum to hide forever, and why newbie scum try to hide until they cant anymore.

@nancy

i mean he even was suspicious of me at the time but felt a need to clarify some of things i said even if i personally didn't actually mean those things

scum wouldn't really have motivation to do this imo
town would want to have the truth out there

Hmmm, I think I like this a little bit actually, yeah.

[nancy]

UNVOTE:


I'm shocked that no one pointed out that FF was at L-2 from RVS. It took 2 pages?

So far I'm leaning Town on trinity. I've seen her scum game..... this game she feels more natural.

I don’t understand the big deal about being L-2. I thought L-1 was the important one, as then it just takes one more to lynch. Why would you be shocked?

What do you think about like, stuff that's going on right now Trinity?

I’m still catching up on reading, there are a lot of posts! Will post soon.

My breath, so very bated!

[nancy]

yes

how are the results so far?

I'm getting the feeling they may be off but maybe you've done a retest so idk

I mean uhhh... not great

I would love to hear from anyone else regarding Oka, or am I just yelling out the window?

Damn the man!

Sorry.

I'll yell back soon dw lmao

[nancy]

You're allowed to say where you live but there is really no point.

[nancy]

Trinity, lmao, your location is listed under your join date. We already know. I thought you meant like, saying you live in Christchurch or something lmao.

[nancy]

Also um, the benefit of this being a forum thing is that like, you can post stuff when no one else is around and they can respond to it later. Ditto you responding to stuff later. You don't need to be present in the game at the same time as someone else to interact with them, it's a pretty cool deal tbh

[nancy]

and also Flicker

Pls words ty

[nancy]

Trinity, lmao, your location is listed under your join date. We already know. I thought you meant like, saying you live in Christchurch or something lmao.

Ok so now you’re all thinking people from New Zealand are idiots! Lol. That’s funny though, I can’t see it under my join date, and I can’t see anybody else’s.

Wellington

(I already thought that lmao)

[nancy]

Also um, the benefit of this being a forum thing is that like, you can post stuff when no one else is around and they can respond to it later. Ditto you responding to stuff later. You don't need to be present in the game at the same time as someone else to interact with them, it's a pretty cool deal tbh

Yes, true, it’s just that you were just asking me to post, and there were a couple of other comments from others about me not being around, so I’m just trying to manage expectations.

Mmm, thank, I feel very managed

[nancy]

I mean, my expectations do. They have feelings, apparently.

Yes.

This was a worthwhile post. Go me.

[nancy]

@nancy what are the point of these questions, especially question number 3

Now that nancy's responded, I want to know: What was the point of

this

question? You don't seem to have a problem with them, given you answered them (in post 18, although with less detail than basically everyone else). It also seems fairly obvious that at least one of the ways nancy uses them is for hunting, given how she'd already started sorting people based on their answers (12, 15). Plus, it seems a little off to me how it took you so long to wonder about them.

To answer your question Nancy. When I’ve been rereading this afternoon, this post from Flicker sounded fake to me - like she was just making this up to try to put something on OkaPoka.

Thank

[nancy]

(She has another post. You should talk about that one too when you get to it!)

[nancy]

Also um, the benefit of this being a forum thing is that like, you can post stuff when no one else is around and they can respond to it later. Ditto you responding to stuff later. You don't need to be present in the game at the same time as someone else to interact with them, it's a pretty cool deal tbh

Yes, true, it’s just that you were just asking me to post, and there were a couple of other comments from others about me not being around, so I’m just trying to manage expectations.

Mmm, thank, I feel very managed

Sorry for the corporate speak

I didn't mean it like that lmao

I just like wordplay <3

[nancy]

Oh god this is going to be interesting, hi Quick lmao

[nancy]

I always feel like I come across as scum when I just sheep

Are you talking about this game or in general

[nancy]

Iceman, who do you think Oka's insistence that the game go fast is scummy?

On this forum it's generally regarded as scummy. I kind of agree. The downfall of town is chaos, lack of information, or rushing things. All of our power is in the day when we can discuss and review comments. Speeding that up creates chaos and causes town to make mistakes, miss information, or not have a chance to review past comments for accuracy.

Basically speed only benefits scum.

Scum lurks in order to starve the town of information.
Scum creates and appeals to emotional responses in order to create chaos.
Scum insists on speed I'm order to force people to make mistakes.

I can kind of squint and see this as a thing, yes.

But like, you're sort of projecting your game theory ideas onto Oka's play. Oka might think that faster faster is good for town, and just because you disagree with his ideas about how to play the game that doesn't mean that he's scummy. There's sort of no, reading into Oka's actual posts here from you, which is not ideal. I hope that makes sense lmao.

[nancy]

And by actual posts I mean, Oka-as-a-player, not Oka-as-an-idea. Yes. Something like that. Words.

[nancy]

Oka pls.

[nancy]

are you this active as scum?

Not really.

odds that scum are iceman and sargealpha?

Why didn't you mention Flicker here?

[nancy]

Yes but you had just said that you found Flicker suspicious due to defensiveness thingy.

[nancy]

Um.

I'm not talking about your vote. You said "flicker seems a bit defensive but nothing concrete yet", then your next post you were like, odds are the mafia team doesn't include Flicker. That doesn't make sense if you actually suspected Flicker.

[nancy]

im not really seeing flicker scum rn

This is also a thing.

Um.

[nancy]

Um.

I'm not talking about your vote. You said "flicker seems a bit defensive but nothing concrete yet", then your next post you were like, odds are the mafia team doesn't include Flicker. That doesn't make sense if you actually suspected Flicker.

guess its kinda inconsistent with my logic but i was still going for the idea that maybe the reason why i wasnt getting any solid scumreads was because scum weren't talking

Ok.

[nancy]

The votes moved from FF to Flicker and who FF and Flicker are voting for.

FF might have gotten caught early and then talked his way out of things. That said, I have known him to be lynchbait, but a really good player, so I have a Null read on that dynamic of the game, however, because both Flicker and FF are voting the same person who seems to have produced a wagon out of nowhere seems pretty suspect to me.

Also, Nacy's post on this page seem to have Town tone and I know Nancy to be a pretty good Town player and they are voting for Flicker. I need to look into Stan1ey's progression and vote on Flicker more, but that is where I am at atm.

What are Tone Reads lmao

Pls explain the FF talking his way out of things thing, thank

[nancy]

That said, I have known him to be lynchbait, but a really good player, so I have a Null read on that dynamic of the game, however, because both Flicker and FF are voting the same person who seems to have produced a wagon out of nowhere seems pretty suspect to me.

How is this a sentence lmao

[nancy]

The votes moved from FF to Flicker and who FF and Flicker are voting for.

FF might have gotten caught early and then talked his way out of things. That said, I have known him to be lynchbait, but a really good player, so I have a Null read on that dynamic of the game, however, because both Flicker and FF are voting the same person who seems to have produced a wagon out of nowhere seems pretty suspect to me.

Also, Nacy's post on this page seem to have Town tone and I know Nancy to be a pretty good Town player and they are voting for Flicker. I need to look into Stan1ey's progression and vote on Flicker more, but that is where I am at atm.

What are Tone Reads lmao

Pls explain the FF talking his way out of things thing, thank

Stuff like saying lmao for no Scum motive would be a Town tone read.

I haven't read the thread, just going based on the VCs alone at this point.

Oh, that wasn't a question, lmao

Also I say lmao a lot, I'm pretty sure it has nothing to do with my alignment because I say lmao when I'm scum too, and I am actually laughing IRL it's not just a word, lmao

That said, I have known him to be lynchbait, but a really good player, so I have a Null read on that dynamic of the game, however, because both Flicker and FF are voting the same person who seems to have produced a wagon out of nowhere seems pretty suspect to me.

How is this a sentence lmao

What do you mean? How is it NOT a sentence?

You said a thing is null, then said the same thing is suspect? I can't follow your words at all. What or who is suspect? It's like you were having one thought then broke off in the middle and finished a separate thought or something lmao

[nancy]

Basically I think there's a good chance of Scum in FF and Flicker, don't know why that is difficult to understand.

Probably I'm stupid

[nancy]

also started to scumread flicker more cuz peer pressure and my solid town were scumreading him

[nancy]

Wait what, no, what happened to the link

[nancy]

also started to scumread flicker more cuz peer pressure and my solid town were scumreading him

Boop.

[nancy]

Surreptitious, ring a bell?

No, what

[nancy]

Quick, read game pls thx

[nancy]

Oka, talk to me about Trinity's posts now that she's made some?

[nancy]

yes

how are the results so far?

I'm getting the feeling they may be off but maybe you've done a retest so idk

I don't understand what this post is

[nancy]

Quick, read game pls thx

Don't really want to. I usually don't even replace into games with 200+ posts, so you're lucky to have me as it is.

You're... joking... right?

[nancy]

yes

how are the results so far?

I'm getting the feeling they may be off but maybe you've done a retest so idk

I don't understand what this post is

uh ur just looking at an iso of me right? ff was talking to me about something so i made a shitty joke


dunno what to make of quick, the fact that he is making a vote based on VC alone is something i would do as town and then get promptly l-1'd and forced by town to do a srs reread

Yes but not in a creepy way I promise

[nancy]

Quick, read game pls thx

Don't really want to. I usually don't even replace into games with 200+ posts, so you're lucky to have me as it is.

You're... joking... right?

Halfway joking, yeah.

Please add the other half of the way, thank

[nancy]

Oka, talk to me about Trinity's posts now that she's made some?

@OkaPokaperson hi you are a person hi

[nancy]

uh trinity's recent post don't seem to disprove my theory tho

Lmao this is certainly a wording

[nancy]

yeah this is def a stunt i'd pulled only to be forced to reread the game later
question is will quick actually reread the game

@quick how much do you stick to your morals

Not very well, unfortunately, because I have zero self-disipline.

Can attest.

I'm going to stop spamming the game for a while.

Bye!

[nancy]

Basically I think there's a good chance of Scum in FF and Flicker, don't know why that is difficult to understand.

Yes, finally, someone else seeing scum in FF.

eyes emoji

[nancy]

I knew what you were saying, lmao

I just thought it was interesting that you called your read a theory

[nancy]

Uhm. I don't understand this approach from you at all Trinity. What.

[nancy]

Okay but you can't just say that someone's reasoning for scumreading you is scummy just because you don't agree with it.

[nancy]

Pretty sure I believe what I'm saying.

Oka you are a very strange creature lmao.

[nancy]

Uhm. I don't understand this approach from you at all Trinity. What.

i guess I’m just not understanding why OkaPoka is scum reading me, I don’t think I’ve given any reasons for it. I’m suggesting that we instead look for the actual scum.

Okay let's start here. What part about his scumread on you do you not understand?

[nancy]

Where/how do you think you've been proactive?

[nancy]

Well that was fruitful lmao

[nancy]

Iceman lmao, I've made 135 posts, we're not even 1/4th of the way through the dayphase, I've said I'm waiting for 1-2 specific things to happen before I spew more reads, I feel good about where I'm at with the game and I'm trying to get a feel for the slots that I don't have much of a read on, I'm not sure what more you expect from me lmao

You should talk to me about your FF read in a way that isn't just meta, because meta sucks

Also your Trinity read. Please don't tell me that's also just meta or I think I might cry

[nancy]

Rip.

Well any way at all that you're able to articulate the reads would be helpful I guess. Kinda feel like if I can get a handle on FF and Trinity then the game is pretty much solved, so I could use as much input as possible even if it's horrible evil meta stuff. And if you're able to talk about them in a way that isn't meta then even better. We can talk more later as well when I go over my own reads on them.

Am sleeping now, goodnight!

[nancy]

Formerfish:

Feels like he has similar reads as me, especially feel that 347 is towny

Eragon:

Mostly based on 180 and general attitude, if you will

Um, could you give more words about those two posts that you linked? What did you like about them enough to single them out?

Also, I feel like Formerfish and Quick aren't scum together, based on 380.

Am curious why you think this as well.

[nancy]

@nancy,

you asked me what tone reads were or something like that. I gave an example and you said that was NAI. In between where you answered I brought something else up where you used lmao again but I didn't TR you for it because it seemed to be something you do regularly. What do you make of that?

Quick, that wasn't a question, lmao. I was making a joke about the nebulous nature of tonereads. You stating a townread on me for tone means basically nothing. I don't make anything of you not townreading "lmao", it's a silly thing to read into and I literally told you that it doesn't meant anything for me lmao

[nancy]

So if I look at just this game and ignore meta then.... I have to be honest in that I would struggle to place Trinity as town. I would put a scum lean on her either though. In isolation to this game she reads mostly neutral to me.

For FF looking at just this game I would say he's a town lean. Actively engaging, pushing people until he's satisfied, and giving clear reasoning behind his reads. This to me is town.

Adding in meta for both trinity and FF just gives them a bump into more towniness.

Is meta really that wrong to look at?

Sort of.

Meta is basically a playstyle read, right? So when you're saying "X is town because meta", what you're really saying is that you recognize their playstyle. Maybe in past games, they had a certain playstyle as town, and a certain playstyle as scum, and there were very noticeable differences between the two. The thing is, playstyle is not a static thing that doesn't ever change. It changes from game to game, sometimes drastically and unpredictably. It depends on the playerlist and size of the game, the game mechanics, their role, the person's mood and life circumstances, what they learned in their last game, so many things that aren't related to alignment even a little bit.

So in order to say that you think someone is town because of meta, you need to have an extremely nuanced understanding of that person's playstyle, you have to really know them as a player, and somewhat as a person, too. The only way you can develop that kind of understanding is by playing with them a bunch, getting to know them really well, and figuring out where all the little pieces go in their special little puzzle of a brain. Unless you have that level of a relationship with them, it's really unwise to ever presume that you can get a read on their alignment just from their playstyle.

The way you should use meta is to find someone's baseline, and use that as a kind of springboard from which to read them. What level are they playing on? If they're inexperienced, or have a bad wolf game, then you're going to read into their play differently, and it's generally going to be easier to get a strong alignment read on them. If they're experienced, or have a good wolf game, the things you look for to figure out their alignment change, and you have go simultaneously deeper and broader.

Let me give you some examples.

There's a player on mafiascum called Creature. There's a really huge difference between the way he plays mafia and the way he plays town, and pretty much the only way to reliably read him is by understanding his meta, because his town game by itself can be really hard to get an alignment read from. When he's mafia, he's basically frozen all game and he posts less and less as the game progresses. When he's town, he tends to be pretty active and his activity can really get up there in the later stages of the game. So essentially the way you read him is by tracking his activity. Well, that's the lazy way to read him, anyway. And it's only reliable because he has hundreds of games and his meta hasn't changed for years.

And the thing is, having people like this in the game, who just only really play as one alignment, is really really terrible and contributes to toxic game meta, because at that point it's more a farce than a real mafia game of reading into mindset and motivation. Imagine a 13p game with 13 players who have that kind of meta. Run 10 games with those same 13 players and every time the lowposters are mafia and the active posters are town. That's not a real puzzle.

Another example, from a game on mafia universe where I was in a hydra. I was pushing on Dp101 for most of day 1, and Dp101 was mafia, but he was being defended by friends, who thought he was town. I dropped this case on him at EoD1:

Spoiler:

Going to try to summarize my thoughts on Dp101 here.

Felt like the incoherent way that he was orienting his play around his catchup posts was wolfy in a way that's hard to describe. When I read them I feel like he's posting them because he's aware he has to give thoughts, not because he's catching up and just wants to be talking about where he's at. You have posts like 1518 which just feels like wordvomiting and doesn't really express any kind of a solid stance.

And going through his ISO there's just almost no stances and I think if he were town he'd have things to say as he read but he doesn't.

When you get to his "caught up" post you've got two reads here that are very weak and feel incredibly awkward. His reasoning for momo being mafia is super stretchy and I struggle to believe that anyone could get a scumread in the way he's claiming to. His points on Big Boi make even less sense and he's again not really talked about why there's scum motivation in anything there. Whole post feels like casing a townie and a partner and voting the townie. Don't understand how these are the most important things he has to say about the game at this point.

Very little else from the slot, think the way he came into thread earlier and started looking for reasons to vote/not vote annulus then ended up with 2093 which was just posture hasn't felt like he's really interested in actually solving here. The readslist is eh, fairly easy stances and I think if he's a wolf here his play is oriented around catchup sprees, making big posts that look good, not really doing much in thread, not pushing things in any meaningful way, don't feel like he has stuff that he cares about very much and that feels wolfy to me.

Boquise, Alette, Cuthalion and Lissa, who were all very familiar with Dp101, and who were town, were arguing that Dp101 was town by meta. Cuthalion made these two posts about him:

Spoiler:

strongly disagree

lines up far more heavily with dp's village game, especially early on elements

there are a couple of worlds in which he could be a wolf here, but it's really not likely

it's a sort of

self-aware bumbliness/backtracking earlier on combined with the more straightforward posting near the end of the phase

plus the push on him at the end(lol)

he's near or at the top of my village list

wrt dp

it's

he's

villagery

um

i've pretty much thoroughly explained the read inasmuch as it exists (which is to a decent extent), i think that even on the off chance that he is a wolf here there's...

complaining about his lack of producing things/activity/wolfreading him for it is kinda

heavily suboptimal when at least he's providing plenty of thought-out and verbalized reads and actually trying to engage with the game moreso than cough over half of the game

i do think his play has been pretty villagery/in particular recently i did like the comment about alette being the "villageriest he'd ever seen her", which is a thought i absolutely had not long beforehand

and i think it's a good look to hear that from him here as well, combined with his earlier stuff

i think he'd try to... affect the game more as a wolf, too?

when/where possible

At which point I became really frustrated and made this post:

Spoiler:

So, let me get this straight. Dp's town meta and scum meta are so drastically different that he's automatically obviously town in his town games and obviously scum in his scum games, and he's done exactly nothing to try to change this despite it apparently being known by anyone who has played with him? Is that what you're telling me?

Because I can believe that kind of meta when it's the scumgame that's bad but if he loves playing scum so much I fail to see why he wouldn't level his play and try to put more effort into his village rands in order to make it less than instantly obvious that he is a wolf when he's a wolf, or if not that then throw in a slanking wolf rand now and then to make it not such a hard meta tell.

How many times have you played with Dp when he's been a wolf and when he's been a villager?

i do think his play has been pretty villagery/in particular recently i did like the comment about alette being the "villageriest he'd ever seen her", which is a thought i absolutely had not long beforehand

This reasoning isn't something I can follow at all? He was heavily scumreading Alette near deadline when everyone was scumreading Alette. He's now saying Alette is the villageriest he's ever seen her when everyone is calling her town? And this a reason for you to be townreading him??? What is he supposed to do, continue saying Alette is scummy?

Like, forgive me for being incredulous here.

Which Cuthalion responded to by properly towncasing Dp, and after reading this case I relented, backed off and respected the meta townread on Dp:
(I've snipped the Dp101 quotes because they were huge readwalls.)

Spoiler:

dp wolf game readlists: (diff games)

-snip-

-snip-

dp villa game readlists: (same game diff days)

-snip-

-snip-

this game:

-snip-

know this is a lot of words quoted but I'm going to talk about what I think it shows/means and I think you really only have to look at a few reads in each to at least... understand what I'm trying to say regardless of if you agree with it

think there's a distinct difference in the way dp thinks through things in the wolf games vs. the villa one + this one

wolf game thought processes are kinda surfacey, not sure i really like that word for it but it's largely, like, genericish. Generically Towny Process. it's kind of flat. he's saying reasonable nice-sounding things that like, make sense and stuff, but it's commentative and doesn't really indicate anything deeper being there. he's... saying things about their posting, but not really actually working on figuring out their alignments.

villa game i think he's like, fairly visibly working through stuff as he writes about each person? there is nuance and depth, not

quite

as heavily showing in this game as it was in badfellas (comparison towngame) d2 but it's for sure there. real-feeling care about being correct (like, the slightly emotive comments/emotional i guess subtle slight fluctuation sprinkled through the processes? it's not at all strong emotion i'm not even sure emotive is the word but like. there's a great deal of flatness in the wolf processes that... isn't in the villa ones.) and like, meandering through/teasing stuff out in his head.

like the wolf game processes are a straight line and the villa game processes are a twisty/wiggly/tangled one. flat vs. bumpy.

The real issue with all of this wasn't that Cuthalion and co. had a bad read. There's nothing wrong or problematic at all with getting someone's alignment wrong in a game. What was problematic about this was that because it was a meta read, he was arguing from a position of authority. I couldn't really call his read into question, because he "knew Dp better than me" and my point of view was automatically less valid as a result. I couldn't argue against his reasoning, because I didn't have the same level of experience with Dp, I didn't have those past games that I could talk about to argue against his read. I could only talk about my reasoning about things he had done in that one game. It's equally sucky from Cuthalion's perspective, because he was stuck in a wrong read and there was no way for him to get a sanity check, to get someone to challenge him on his perspective.

Dp101 was replaced that game, btw, and I strongly scumread the replacement as well. I dumped a huge case on why the sub was mafia before I died. The slot endgamed town, with both Boquise and Alette (who knew and meta townread Dp101) alive and townreading the slot.

I think that's pretty much the crux of the problem with metareads.

a) You're making the game about things that it shouldn't be about.
b) Reading into playstyle is very rarely reliable.
c) You're alienating yourself and anyone who doesn't share your meta knowledge, and alienation is the surest way to lose games as town.
d) You're lowering the standard of what passes for town play in the game, which makes it easier for mafia to win.

Use a meta read to supplement an alignment read you have based on other reasoning? Sure. Avoid playstyle false positives by learning that a player does certain surface-level scummy stuff as town? Great. But it should never be a significant part of why you are reading someone the way you are and you should always be able to communicate with other people on equal terms about the read and what their behavior means for their alignment.

Here's one last example to top off an already too-long post. In my last game here, I got two correct townreads on townies that had kind of scummy playstyles by reading into their mindset, which is essentially the start of what would constitute a meta read, since good meta reads are just a heightened understanding of someone's mindset. My read on both wouldn't have been possible if I hadn't managed to figure out what level they were playing on. The two main points where that came together were Vulcan's "chicken-headedness" and TheRampage's bullrush-style play that came across as scummy on a surface level.

Spoiler:

I really like vulcan, I dig how he approaches the game. I like his posts when he talks about how he's thinking about things. His response to the progression thing early on where he said that he was either scum or just clueless town or something along those lines felt like a towny way to respond to that and sure I think the read progression is bad and his treatment of Draynth is bad but I can see a world where it is just chicken-headed town and not necessarily scummy so I don't come out of that feeling too bad about him. What really does it for me is the stuff Nacho pointed out about his mindset, I thought they were really good observations. I don't want to lynch him today.

I like the way TheRampage is just going at the game with all he's got and talking about how he's seeing things whether other people like it or not. I feel like if he were mafia he would be at least a little skittish about pushing Ircher but he's not at all. I also like the way that he's focusing on other things besides Ircher and not just spamming the thread and shoving the scumread down our throats. His read there and his treatment of it and his thread presence feel more town than mafia. I haven't put a ton of thought into this read and I haven't read his ISO super closely but I don't think I want to lynch him today.

Coincidentally, northsidegal, who was mafia in that game, based 2-3 of her reads that game on meta. It made no sense for her to base her reads on meta in the way she was, it was an excuse for her to avoid producing real reasoning, and because no one else in the game was using meta in that way, she ended up being correctly scumread for it. If the townies in the game had been throwing around meta reads, she would have fit in just fine. This is what I mean by point "d" above.

Hopefully this wasn't too long, lmao.

[nancy]

OK, I did a one over on Ice. he seems to be saying stuff without really saying much. Lot of talk about the IC. Didn't like that he would PL the IC if they were alive D3. That's probably the most notable thing I saw.

Explain saying stuff without saying much and what that means about his alignment for you? Why don't you like the PL thing?

[nancy]

sorry guys, I was sleeping, woke up early, and went to a golf tournament and am finally home.

I will be catching up but I saw someone say something about voting...


I will say this here and now, I am NOT a believer in pressure votes.
When I vote somebody it is because I have a strong belief they will flip scum.
yesterday, I felt like Oka and flicker were both scummy enough to warrant a vote, but me voting would've put them at L-2(iirc)
and I dont think L-2 is a good spot rn because it normally warrants a claim, and claiming this early into the game is bleh, and the game devolves into Neanderthals fighting over which claim people believe

Hum.

You really shouldn't claim before L-1 and someone has given intent to hammer.

[nancy]

im not really seeing flicker scum rn

This is also a thing.

Um.

would Oka be considered 180'ing or Fencesitting right here?(game theory question, not for actual game)

Is an inconsistency in his progression. If he's mafia, his stance on Flicker is a little glimpse into the fact that he's lying about his reads, because he can't keep his thoughts on her straight and reads into the same content from her in different ways based on thread temperature. Is possible that he just had that inconsistency as town too, though, I think, so it's a little scummy maybe but not very? He seems pretty scatterbrained as a player so I think it's probably less indicative than it might be otherwise. I also sorta liked his response to me about it, I guess, which helps a bit.

[nancy]

God, I feel like I really need a sanity check on my Eragon townread.

[nancy]

@Trinity, why didn't you respond to me last night?

[nancy]

Eragon, can you give like, a rundown of where you're at with reads right now please?

[nancy]

ST-{none}
T-{Formerfish, Nancy}
LT-{Stan1ey, Quick}
N-{Trinity}
NS-{oka, flicker, iceman}
S-{none}

not much different, im liking iceman less and trinity was moved down
I put quick in LT because I dont think scum would draw too much attention to themselves for not reading the thread and it feel natural

I don't mean just a readlist, I mean words about where your head is at with the game.

Like, you've posted about a bunch of stuff and I've agreed with a lot of what you've had to say but when I think about your reads and how you got to them I kind of come up empty? Also just kind of don't have a sense of what you're actually doing here to solve the game, feels a bit like you're just showing up and commenting on everything but not doing a whole lot else and it's worrying me.

[nancy]

though tbh im starting to doubt a lot of my solid townreads, i think nancy is my only solid townread left, everything else is shifting towards null or scum

Um, why?

[nancy]

we all have our preferences.

No, like, it's a sitemeta thing. We don't claim at L-2 here. People sometimes claim early out of frustration or stupidity or something, but if you're sane and in a sane game you don't claim before you're actually seriously threatened with a lynch, which is at L-1, when someone is thinking about putting the last vote down to kill you.

[nancy]

though tbh im starting to doubt a lot of my solid townreads, i think nancy is my only solid townread left, everything else is shifting towards null or scum

Um, why?

people aren't doing things im expecting them to do

Could you be more specific please?

[nancy]

ST-{none}
T-{Formerfish, Nancy}
LT-{Stan1ey, Quick}
N-{Trinity}
NS-{oka, flicker, iceman}
S-{none}

not much different, im liking iceman less and trinity was moved down
I put quick in LT because I dont think scum would draw too much attention to themselves for not reading the thread and it feel natural

I don't mean just a readlist, I mean words about where your head is at with the game.

Like, you've posted about a bunch of stuff and I've agreed with a lot of what you've had to say but when I think about your reads and how you got to them I kind of come up empty? Also just kind of don't have a sense of what you're actually doing here to solve the game, feels a bit like you're just showing up and commenting on everything but not doing a whole lot else and it's worrying me.

ok, so basically like explaining my reads?

Lmao basically yes.

[nancy]

Um, where your head is at means like, how you're doing as far as solving the game, how you feel about the gamestate, how you feel about your reads, what reads you feel good about and don't feel good about, stuff like that.

[nancy]

Looking back on his ISO, I guess it wasn't so much that he was saying stuff without really saying anything, but more that he just has these kind of simple statements that people ask him about and that makes up a lot of his content. As far as saying stuff without really saying anything being Scummy, it's a way to pad your post count to make it look like you are contributing to the game more than you actually are. It's a tell common on my homesite, PerC.

Please quote examples.

[nancy]

Vote: Quick

I don't believe that your read on Iceman is real. You're saying that you disagree with him or he is bad therefore he is mafia, which is nonsense. Your entire case on him feels like shade and I don't like it one bit. Please catch up and provide thoughts on the game.

[nancy]

And I think its odd that they have a town pile of 6 people and the other 2 are null pile?
So no SR’s?

Okay, but do you believe the reasoning she uses? It's still early in the game, so why do you think it's unreasonable that her reads might be weak? Why do you think it's scummy that she doesn't have any scumreads?

[nancy]

Stan1ey: I would love to see more activity from him because I think his posts are pretty towny, but he’s only had 9 posts in the game, so I cant give him much more than a light town read.

Could you quote which of his posts feel towniest to you and maybe say a few words about why?

[nancy]

Also, thank.

[nancy]

@nancy you dropping your scumread on flicker or is quick simply more scummy?

She's still around null, maybe a teensy bit higher after her last post? I kinda liked her "there's room on the wagon" thing but that's extremely lolread. Am scumreading Quick more than I was scumreading her before though.

its not just the fact that she doesnt have scumreads, its that here TR's are for really weak reasons, like attitude, activity, mindmelding, and pointing out Info

Okay but do you have an idea of what more you expect at this point in the game? And even if you think her reasoning is bad maybe, can you believe that she might think that those things are important or relevant to her?

Stan1ey: I would love to see more activity from him because I think his posts are pretty towny, but he’s only had 9 posts in the game, so I cant give him much more than a light town read.

Could you quote which of his posts feel towniest to you and maybe say a few words about why?

sure

Yay!

[nancy]

I'm kind of tired of waiting around for stan to get prodded and post so I think I'm just going to go over my FF read and other things in a bit. My stomach needs food.

[nancy]

To start off I'd appreciate it if everyone answered a few questions:

1) What sort of activity can we expect from you this game?
2) Have you played forum mafia before, and if so, where, and how has that informed your play?
3) Do you prefer hunting mafia or manipulating town, and why?

1) Fairly active but my posting will probably drop of next week
2) This my third game so far. I think the most important thing i've learnt is to always think about motivations behind posts.
3) Hunting mafia i guess? I don't know what you mean by manipulating town

i like his response to #2 here, its not really AI but it starts off good

I read Flickers post as just confusion about RVS which is justified, i dont really care for it either. I think Formerfish is reading too much into it or taking the wrong meaning of what she wrote rather than trying to play it up tho. i'd put this as NAI for both sides. Also, @Flicker - i've seen people make multiple RVS votes, it doesnt really matter. tbh if playing the RVS in an unorthodox way like voting multiple times kick starts the game then imo its better because i hate the RVS.

HOWEVER - TrinityNZ's vote change and reasoning that she wanted to move it off of a player who is being replaced actually makes me think she is town. Like i said, nothing wrong with throwing your vote around if it kick starts the game. The RVS' only purpose is to get the game moving. mafia players want us to have a nice slow game with low activity, she could have kept her vote on maggie where it would have no affect on getting the game moving and none of us would have questioned her. But she decided to change it and risk drawing attention on herself anyway. i dont think mafia players would do that

i like this because he holds up to what he said about motivation of posts and also i like his perspective on it.

Hey, @FF @stan @Trinity, does this feel like a scum-scum interaction to you? Feel free to punt on it.

The question from OkaPoka seems a bit odd to me, but I don’t see why it would be a scum interaction.

Oka's question doesnt seem odd to me. But with Flicker's question I don't see the point at all. I also don't understand why she would feel the need to mention that he didn't answer them as well as other people. (also i checked - Oka actually put in roughly the same amount of effort I did when answering them).

I guess the point of a scum-scum interaction is to make it seem like they are trying to sort eachother without going too hard as hard bussing is a scumtell. Maybe, but i don't think so. Oka had a reasonable answer and i see nothing wrong with his original question. so i don't think it's scum-scum

Here is what i think happened - Oka actually made a question to Flicker in #47 and then in #49 criticized her response. Flicker did not respond to this but instead wrote post #80. So instead of responding to the fair criticism by Oka, Flicker threw some criticism straight back at OKa. I think this is scummy, especially because there was nothing really substantial in what she was saying, its like it was pulled from thin air because she thought she needed to give something back as a way to turn people against Oka instead of herself

VOTE: Flicker

again looking at the motivation from a towny perspective IMO.
i also think he has been giving unbiased opinions.


He is not a strong read, and i would like to see some more info from him, but im fairly confident in him being towm

ok_hand

[nancy]

@nancy

I certainly think Flicker should have some stronger reads at the time they posted that

they posted their reads list on Page 17

Mmm. Maybe.

[nancy]

(Maybe you should ask her stuff to figure out how strong her reads are and see how that matches up with your expectations.)

[nancy]

Quick, if you don't want to read a game, don't replace into a game. You need to cut out the attitude because it doesn't belong in a newbie game and you straight up don't belong here either if you're going to be like this.

[nancy]

Yeah, I saw as much. He's saying I blackmailed him and such and is being really inappropriate. I was worried this might happen when I saw him take the slot.

It's your obligation to read the game if you replace in, regardless of your alignment, no one is exempt from this. You also need to treat other players with respect. Am not going to tolerate toxicity in any game where I am IC.

[nancy]

I'm gunna take a break.

Thank you.

[nancy]

I understand you're frustrated Quick, you just really need to find a way to not let that get the better of you in games. You're a fun player to be around when you're not tilted.

[nancy]

Anyway yeah Quick is probably town. This wasn't the ideal way for me to get the read by any means but I don't think he loses control like that if he's mafia here. Will make time to properly read and post stuff in a little.

[nancy]

but do you policy lynch ics?

Trying to pull up a bunch of other stuff but I'll answer this now since you've asked twice.

On D1 or D2 no. After that I think you should yes. Here is why.

As a town player and IC is just a more experienced player to help find scum. To me they only have a slight advantage although most of that is lost because new players can be a pain in the ass.

As a scum player they are like a super heros. They can easily sway new players into confusion and mislynches. There is a much bigger advantage to a scum!IC.

I also feel like scum is going to night kill the active/most experienced players first. So it brings in the whole..... why is the IC still alive after a few nights?


I just think that a town!IC makes LYLO super difficult.


Of course if we have a strong read on someone other then the IC we would lynch them instead.

Tldr..... If we have no super strong roads then IC should be lynched before LYLO.

nancy, if you haven't yet, I'd like your thoughts on this.

I'm sort of suckering myself into ever so slightly townreading it, I think.

Like, on one level, you've got a wolf coming in and making a post that seems to be all about seeding distrust in the IC, even if he's not actually planning to ever cash in on the PL stuff since he knows with the thread presence that I have that he wants me dead as soon as possible.

On another level, it's just a really bad post, it's going to do precisely nothing to benefit him or his team 9 times out of 10, and as a wolf he has to know that. And I don't think wolves tend to make posts they know are going to look bad. Kinda lean towards reading it on this level because like, sure floating the idea of policy lynching people is bad, but the way he backs it up with this level of thought and explanation? Feels kinda like it's a genuine thought that he had rather than something he's pushing as a wolf agenda.

[nancy]

huh?

Your unvote is weird.

Why was it weird? He just pointed out that trinity voting brought me to l-2, and his vote was on me as well. Since his vote on me was in rvs and we are clearly out of it, it would make sense to move or at least remove a rvs vote which is currently the leading wagon based solely off of rvs votes.

Naked unvotes are wolfy.

It's slightly a meme.

Are you always this... logical?

Why no mention of FF using 2 games as Meta here?

Uh? I don't think this is a metaread from FF?

[nancy]

Vote: Quick

I don't believe that your read on Iceman is real. You're saying that you disagree with him or he is bad therefore he is mafia, which is nonsense. Your entire case on him feels like shade and I don't like it one bit. Please catch up and provide thoughts on the game.

Are you getting a scum caught for reasons they dont believe they should have been caught kinda vibe coming off of Quick right now?

Not really, but feel free to go over your take on that if that's how you're reading it.

[nancy]

OK, I'm caught up, AMA

/S

Seriously though I really hate being blackmailed to catch up in a game. Shit is just not right.

(1)

In other news, not sold on FF being Town. He got early TRs from people

(2)

and that seems to have stuck for not very good reasons I don't think. FF is a good player

(3)

, not ready to clear them just based on... Whatever people were TRing him for, because from what I saw, didn't see a whole lot of Town tells and def felt like I was strongly disagreeing with some of the stuff he's said so far.

(4)

1. Womp Womp. You didnt have to listen to us, you made a choice to. You could have stuck to your guns and probably would have backfired on you. Why did you decide to actually participate with the class?
2. Examples?
3. Ooooo... did you meta dive me? I love when I get doven into. What are you basing this statement off of?
4. More examples? Was it so hard to click that little Q button to focus on posts of mine you didnt like?

Yeah this wasn't very appropriate FF.

[nancy]

Anyway yeah Quick is probably town. This wasn't the ideal way for me to get the read by any means but I don't think he loses control like that if he's mafia here. Will make time to properly read and post stuff in a little.

Are you making that assessment based off anything more than a weak blow up and vote towards me? If he actually did catch up then he would have seen trinity express doubts about me and that she made her vote real on me. He would have seen Oka now expressing some doubt about me and could have tried to use those cracks to wiggle himself into a mislynch with me. He is like a whirlwind dashing from player to player calling the littlest things scummy, funny that this is all over us calling something he did scummy. Weird how different people make pushes for the reasons they do. Huh. How bout dat.

Quick's a bit of a whirlwind. I had only super skimmed when I said that and it seemed like a bigger blowup than it maybe was, but I still think he's more likely town from it. I don't really want to go over it too much because it feels really gross reading into toxicity but I think the way he approached my take on his Iceman read and stuff about being blackmailed into catching up, the way he started going out of his way to insult me, was incredulous that I didn't see eye to eye with him on Iceman, then checked himself out of thread when I came in and told him to cut it out, probably doesn't quite happen like that if he's mafia? I think if he was mafia he might have tried to discredit me in other ways than he did. His frustration felt genuine and I think it probably wouldn't have been genuine if he was mafia.

It's not a take-it-to-the-bank read I guess, and I'm sort of pulling myself back a little because I'd really rather feel sold on him him for positive stuff that he's done in the game, but I think his response to me about the Iceman thing felt genuine and that read feels more like a real read from him than it did before. So I'm less concerned about that than I was and I have a few things from him that I think are probably town things. I think his response to your interactions with him felt pretty genuine.

[nancy]

So @FF I think my issues with you come down to two basic things.

One is that I feel like your process has been pretty uneven. Early in the game you were spooling out a bunch of logic in how you were reading things, covering all the angles, and then you kind of just stopped doing that at a certain point? The first time you talked about your reads as a whole you barely had two sentences to say about them all, they didn't feel thought-through at all and that felt pretty wrong to me.

And when I look at the way you've been pushing Oka and now Quick, your logic feels a little sloppy and it doesn't super feel like you're actually trying to get a read on their alignment? Feels like you're just shoving on them and trying to sell your read with fire rather than actually believing that they're mafia and you have a correct read. I also haven't really seen any reassessment or doubt from at all on your Oka read and that's sorta concerning. I agree with Quick's feeling that it seemed like you were trying to antagonize him there while he was tilted and I think that's kinda scummy of you.

And like, your entire scumread on Oka is based on meta and I think that's scummy of you as well. I haven't seen you engage with Oka's content outside of the narrow scope of a meta take you on had on his early game.

The other is that I don't really know what you're doing to solve the game here. (This is kind of tied into the first thing about your process.) I don't think you've really gone over what your townreads are and why they are things and that's pretty concerning to me considering how active you've been. You have a PoE pool but I haven't seen any of the work that you've done in getting there or any of the work you've done to refine it or challenge it. Kinda just, yeah, would like to see more from you than the sort of agenda-y pushes that it feels to me like you've been doing for most of the game so far.

[nancy]

Id like to know how exactly. He mentioned multiple times he wsnt going to catch up, and he caught some flack for that. Then the next thing we know he is doing isos and then is fully caught up. Like I said he could have not done that and still played the game, but instead he made a choice to listen to the group. I think that exploring how that happened is game relevant. And I dont like how he just skipped over the rest of the post which would help me understand where he was coming from if he could show some of the posts that helped him form his read on me.

That's fair. Am referring to the "Was it so hard to click that little Q button to focus on posts of mine you didnt like?" bit.

[nancy]

Nancy, what does ‘tilted’ mean?

Super upset and usually out of control.

[nancy]

Is there any chance that FF and Quick are scum partners and planned a bit of a set-to? What do others think?

Not a snowball's chance lmao. Would bet the game that the team isn't ever FF/Quick.

[nancy]

Trinity you're um, a really conflicted slot for me. I'm torn because I feel like the way you've been newbtelling has been towny but like, you make posts like 520 where I feel like you're completely unworried about certain people being mafia or your read being wrong, and your scumread on FF seems to just be that he's not playing as aggressively as usual which is like, okay? Sure, I guess, but you haven't really done anything to try to understand his mindset or read into his motivations anywhere and I'm just struggling to get a sense that you're trying to figure people out here.

I still just have no idea how to parse your response to Oka's push on you. Like, I've read your past games, I feel like you've shown in those games that you're aware that the type of logic you use in 391, 393 and 395 isn't reasonable or realistic at all, so I'm left just kind of going ??????? and can't really figure you out at all here.

[nancy]

Is there any chance that FF and Quick are scum partners and planned a bit of a set-to? What do others think?

Not a snowball's chance lmao. Would bet the game that the team isn't ever FF/Quick.

It would be a clever thing to do though, right?

Hum, I don't think so, no, not really. You'd just be bringing negative attention to both yourself and your mafia partner which isn't a good thing no matter how unaligned you might think you will look from it. Why?

[nancy]

Trinity you're um, a really conflicted slot for me. I'm torn because I feel like the way you've been newbtelling has been towny but like, you make posts like 520 where I feel like you're completely unworried about certain people being mafia or your read being wrong, and your scumread on FF seems to just be that he's not playing as aggressively as usual which is like, okay? Sure, I guess, but you haven't really done anything to try to understand his mindset or read into his motivations anywhere and I'm just struggling to get a sense that you're trying to figure people out here.

I still just have no idea how to parse your response to Oka's push on you. Like, I've read your past games, I feel like you've shown in those games that you're aware that the type of logic you use in 391, 393 and 395 isn't reasonable or realistic at all, so I'm left just kind of going ??????? and can't really figure you out at all here.

Also, you just kind of ducked out when I was questioning you about the Oka thing, which is really sketchy, and you haven't responded to my attempt to pick up on that again, which again, why, if you're town, are you avoiding that conversation?

[nancy]

I really want to talk about my Iceman read because I feel really good about him and a few people don't seem to like him, so I could use a sanity check and maybe bring a few people around if it's actually a good read.

Let me clarify one more time becuae this is getting silly and distracting from finding scum.


Right now I believe that Nancy is town
Nancy would have to be an amazing scum player to not be town. To me Nancy is my first pick for town.

I made my comment about the IC because in the odd event that we have zero reads before a lylo that is where I would go. I don't see that happening though because Nancy is coming off so strongly as town.

I think the way he followed up like this on the PL nonsense is genuine, as bad as it is. It doesn't feel like he's trying to cover up on something after realizing he put his foot in his mouth. Like, he's simultaneously reiterating his stupid theory thing and his townread on me, so he's not trying to sow paranoia. I don't understand where the scum motivation is in any of this, and if he's playing for an angle on me then I don't think he townreads me this way.

I think I'm a bit lost at the moment. I've lost my town read on Nancy..... Please Nancy come back to town. I wanna believe. She seems to have just faded a bit and is just poking holes in everything. Not necessarily a bad thing but, doesn't seem like the way things started at first.

Straight up don't think he ever goes there as mafia. Especially after the earlier stuff about me, I think he would be feeling really conscious about how he was reading me and I don't think he would ever even think to get paranoid about me when I've been bleeding town all over thread. And just way he's talking about it, it feels so so genuine, the detail and shape of what he's saying about me, I can almost feel how worried he is. Like, a really reckless and stupid part of me is honestly tempted to just lock him as town for this one thing, that's how much I like it.

Iceman, who do you think Oka's insistence that the game go fast is scummy?

On this forum it's generally regarded as scummy. I kind of agree. The downfall of town is chaos, lack of information, or rushing things. All of our power is in the day when we can discuss and review comments. Speeding that up creates chaos and causes town to make mistakes, miss information, or not have a chance to review past comments for accuracy.

Basically speed only benefits scum.

Scum lurks in order to starve the town of information.
Scum creates and appeals to emotional responses in order to create chaos.
Scum insists on speed I'm order to force people to make mistakes.

This post feels kind of important in getting a read on him. I think if you look through his ISO, he has this approach where he's kind of focused on abstract theory stuff, rather than digging into the dirt of what people are thinking and doing in the moment, if that makes sense. I would normally feel like that kind of approach is scummy, but I think it might just be the way his brain works? I'll probably try to keep a close track of this part of his process because I think if there's a bunch of inconsistency there then I'll probably want to start rethinking my townread on him.

It's also relevant because of the speed of the game thing. I kinda think his Oka read maybe looks a little different if this isn't a thing he really believes and reads into.

One thing I don't really understand is his FF read.

For FF looking at just this game I would say he's a town lean. Actively engaging, pushing people until he's satisfied, and giving clear reasoning behind his reads. This to me is town.

Like, I don't think this is an accurate take on FF at all? He hasn't been satisfied in his push on anyone, has he? And he's barely given reasoning for his reads at all, so my response to that is, uhhh????

Definitely would like him to run me through his FF read in as much detail as possible because that's very strange to me and one of the few things that's really concerning me about his ISO here. Would sorta like to see a lot more of him, too, since he said that he was interested in being pretty active this game and I just haven't seen huge levels of engagement from him so far. Am also a very little bit concerned about how bare his ISO is in terms of showing the work he's done to arrive at the reads he has, so a bit more of that rather than just posting readslists would be pretty great.

[nancy]

Trinity you're um, a really conflicted slot for me. I'm torn because I feel like the way you've been newbtelling has been towny but like, you make posts like 520 where I feel like you're completely unworried about certain people being mafia or your read being wrong, and your scumread on FF seems to just be that he's not playing as aggressively as usual which is like, okay? Sure, I guess, but you haven't really done anything to try to understand his mindset or read into his motivations anywhere and I'm just struggling to get a sense that you're trying to figure people out here.

I still just have no idea how to parse your response to Oka's push on you. Like, I've read your past games, I feel like you've shown in those games that you're aware that the type of logic you use in 391, 393 and 395 isn't reasonable or realistic at all, so I'm left just kind of going ??????? and can't really figure you out at all here.

I guess I’m just trying to find my way as a player. I have read every single word in this form and have done my best to contribute, but I guess I’m not as articulate as you or some of the others. You put my concerns about FF in a post a few minutes ago way better than I tried to say it.

Although I don’t agree that I’m not looking for motivations. For example, I read that Oka’s motivation in pushing on me was to take the heat off him, and that’s what I was saying, and also trying to get a reaction back. Why is that unreasonable and unrealistic? Am I breaking some protocols I’m not aware of LOL?

Omg lmao. No you're not breaking any protocols at all. It seemed to me when I read it that you were basically saying that because you were town and his read wrong that it had to be scummy of him to think you were mafia. This is like, kind of drifting into OMGUS (wiki territory and it's a pretty common thing among newbies. But the OMGUS aspect of it wasn't what I was weirded out by so much as the way you seemed to think that he wasn't allowed to suspect you and was like, breaking the rules for doing so or something, lmao. Does that make sense?

But yeah okay, how you've explained it here makes sense to me. I just didn't get that at all at the time, lmao.

[nancy]

oops I forgot to close the bracket around wiki, rip.

[nancy]

Uhm. I don't understand this approach from you at all Trinity. What.

i guess I’m just not understanding why OkaPoka is scum reading me, I don’t think I’ve given any reasons for it. I’m suggesting that we instead look for the actual scum.

Okay let's start here. What part about his scumread on you do you not understand?

OK, I found the question you asked. (A) If Oka is scum, I do understand why he’s looking for reasons to try to scum read me. (B) If he’s town, I don’t believe I look like mafia, as I think I have been contributing to the best of my ability to trying to find scum, and am very open (I think you called me guileless).

What I was trying to do was to have you walk me through your thought process, so that I could understand why you thought Oka's approach to you was scummy.

Like, step by step: why do I find it scummy for this person to scumread me? Because I think their reasons are wrong or bad? Okay, but are they blatantly misrepresenting anything? If you think something that you've done is obvious and they don't think it is, the only way you figure out what they think is by talking to them. You didn't talk to Oka, you just said "you have scummy motives" straight away, which is kinda sketch as an immediate reaction if there's nothing else going on in the background for you.

Okay, so if they're not blatantly misrepresenting anything, is it possible that they could believe their read on me, even though it's wrong? How are you going to figure that out? Read through their posts about you, look at your own posts, look at their other posts about other players, see if there's like, a huge mismatch anywhere.

If they're treating you wildly different than they're treating other players, like, giving one player a bunch of leeway but being super harsh on you, that's a sign their motives might be bad. But if they have a certain idea about how people should be playing, that idea shows up throughout their reads, including their read on you, that's a sign that maybe their read is actually genuine.

I hope that makes sense and isn't too many words!

[nancy]

Also sorry if the switching between first and second person was confusing for you, rip.

[nancy]

I was um, simultaneously me and you and the first person bits were you and the second person bits were me talking to you. Lol.

Also I think you're town now lmao.

[nancy]

I need to talk about my Oka read too. The short version is that I basically think he's like, so pure and just the way he's all over the place feels really genuine to me but um, there are definitely some red flags that I kind of don't entirely know what to do about because they're just either him as town having really bad process or him as mafia lying through his teeth and there doesn't seem to be a huge way for me to tell which one it is without seeing a bunch more from him over the course of the dayphase.

I kinda think antialigns might be the way I lock in a read on him if nothing else works.

[nancy]

Very helpful, thanks

[nancy]

Oh my god why does this happen to me.

Very helpful, thanks

[nancy]

Alright I'm out for a while, I have written too many words for this game to deal with right now. Other people do things, thank.

[nancy]

nancy ~ )) --- Iceman, Trinity - Quick )) ---- OkaPoka, stan -- % )) - > Flicker ---- )) ---- FF )) ~

[nancy]

Rip lmao I forgot to move my vote.

Vote: FormerFish

[nancy]

I guess I hadn't voted.

VOTE: Quick

I'm putting my vote here for now. I don't like what's happened so far. I will change my opinion after Quick has made some solid reads/effort that is at least not anti-town.

This post really is weird, though.

Bluh.

[nancy]

Is there any chance that FF and Quick are scum partners and planned a bit of a set-to? What do others think?

Not a snowball's chance lmao. Would bet the game that the team isn't ever FF/Quick.

It would be a clever thing to do though, right?

Hum, I don't think so, no, not really. You'd just be bringing negative attention to both yourself and your mafia partner which isn't a good thing no matter how unaligned you might think you will look from it. Why?

@Trinity

[nancy]

I completely left Eragon out of my readscale, fml.

[nancy]

Oh... this makes me feel bad lol. I feel like I've been WAY more active and engaged compared to other games. It might just be that this is one of the fastest paced games I've been in. We're filling several pages everyday.

Oh my god, now I feel terrible for saying that lmao, I'm so sorry.

You're very right that this game has been super fast paced. There's nothing wrong with your activity level at all, I think I just had certain expectations from your RQS answer, but I feel you now. Don't stress, really, lmao, your activity has been fine.

[nancy]

@Nancy thanks for the info about meta. I'll try to back out of my meta reads and use more information from just this game.

My read on FF so far is probably tainted TBH because I've played the last two games with him. The first one he came in as SUPER aggressive but, he came in when there was a ton of toxic play and pretty much when in throwing swings at who he thought was scum. He ended up as town but, I had a scum read on him. The second game I played with him was much more like this game.

Anyways, I'll try to reform my thoughts around FF and come up with a new read in isolation to this game.

Hey it's super cool that you're so receptive, and I'm really glad you read the whole thing. I kinda feel like it was a bit much to read and I probably should have just posted the four dot points and left the examples out.

Anyway it's great that you're trying to be aware of his playstyle, I think this fits pretty neatly under what I mentioned as a good way to use meta. Like, you have an understanding of how he /can/ play as town, in a way that you found scummy, so now you know that that specific behavior from him isn't necessarily scummy. Doesn't mean that he's mafia for not playing that way or that he's town if he plays in the same way, just means you have a better feel for what level to read him on.

What was his alignment in the second game?

[nancy]

If you don't have a list of likely scum/town behaviors then how else do you scum hunt?

Oh boy. Alright, am going to try to keep this one short.

I think the most basic and reliable way that I've learned to read into alignment is to put myself in another player's situation and see if what they're doing makes sense if they're town. When I try to figure out whether someone is town or mafia, I look at their posts and think about everything that they should know as town, I think about what I know of their game philosophy and their playstyle, basically everything I know about them, and ask myself whether or not I would do the things that they're doing as town and as mafia.

Like, look at the paranoia part of my read on you this game. There's no "set of behaviors" that says that having paranoia on someone is towny. That's silly. I got a townread on you by putting myself in your shoes, thinking about how you would probably treat me as mafia, comparing how I thought that would look to the way your read on me evolved, and just not really being able to reconcile the two.

It's like, both very simple and very complex, and it's hugely dependent on your ability to understand how other people think and feel about things.

[nancy]

He's been town in all the games I've played. So I guess I'm missing what his scum play looks like.

Probably pretty similar to his town game.

[nancy]

Okay jesus I really need to stop posting lmao.

Bye!

[nancy]

I'm going to try to avoid being around too much today because I think I've been posting too much and am still waiting for content from some people, but hi WhyMafia!!! Nice to see you again! Please keep doing things!

@Flicker real-time interactions can be fun too!