A Story Revisited (Anything uPick): Day 6

[Varsoon]

Hi Varsoon. I'm gonna sheep you.

WHAT IF I VOTE FOR YOU THOUGH
WHAT THEN?

Anyway I've got a role that I think I actually gave Titus in one of my games, which is cute.
Well, I don't have the neighborizer part of it so it's not as good but
Eh.

[Varsoon]

Titus - Apple

Student of Warfare (Allied Unification Army)

Leave it to me.

You can't overcome this war just by getting stronger. Twice per day, you may write a message to any another player. She used to be a strategist, but now she is making way for new blood. Once per game, you may use this power. I will lock the thread and give everyone 24 hours to submit a vote to me. When the thread unlocks, each vote will take effect at once. I am prepared. You win the game when all threats to the Allied Unification Army has been defeated and at least one Allied Unification Army player is alive

[Varsoon]

I'd thought it had neighborizing abilities but it actually turned out that it had messages which is actually probably better.
anyway I basically have a carbon copy of the second ability, but it can't be used in LYLO/MYLO
I considered not claiming it but if Titus already claimed it, then me being furtive about it would be weird
And if Titus didn't claim it, shame on Titus, because this ability isn't really useful without town knowing about it.
Heck, in my game town knew about it and developed a SUPER SECRET messaging system and it still didn't help them, really.

[Varsoon]

UNVOTE:
Just in case I was voting anyone.

[Varsoon]

Wait, mastina can clear 5+ town?
How even?

[Varsoon]

That role doesn't exist.
Why did you say she should gladiate if she's a cop?

[Varsoon]

Loyal gladiator that we can choose to no lynch with.

This seems like a trap.

yeah mastina role is a lot of bs

Yeah I think either
1. Mastina doesn't understand the role
2. Mastina has not divulged the entirety of the role
3. Scum have something to stop this role if it is as-described and a town role
4. Mastina's scum and lying about the role.

Leaning real hard on 2/3 because if Mastina is scum why even claim it?

[Varsoon]

Yeah that's what I'm saying
It's probably real likely to be 2 or 3
Either way that's all literally nothing to worry about when we should just be focusing on the game of mafia before the game of mastina

[Varsoon]

So real talk should I read all 107 pages?

[Varsoon]

I don't see how my ability counters your gladiate, though?
I can only do mine once
Also the effectiveness of your gladiate is decided when it happens
Like your ability is meant to confirm if someone is scum or town
The gladiate part is negative utility, if anything
So doesn't my ability let us ESCAPE the negative utility of your ability?

[Varsoon]

I dunno, I sent RC a PM about it but I haven't heard anything back. :/
I doubt I'll get a straight answer but my role PM is worded kinda wonky so it's unclear if people actually vote with voting mechanics or just privately submit for who they want to be lynched.

[Varsoon]

I'm worried that if I actually can negate Mastina's negative utility, then scum must have something very powerful to counter us co-ordinating out in the open, like hidden voting bonuses or some shit so that we think it's all good but then the results come back and scum pushed the majority onto town with their votes. I don't think it gets revealed who voted for who with my ability, so it's not as powerful as Apple's in the role I quoted.

[Varsoon]

WAIT
PORKENS IS IN THIS GAME
VOTE: PORKENS

[Varsoon]

Jury's still out on how my role would interact with other vote-related powers but yeah
Everyone gets to cast a vote via PM and it's not revealed who voted who.

[Varsoon]

Jury's still out on how my role would interact with other vote-related powers but yeah
Everyone gets to cast a vote via PM and it's not revealed who voted who.

Don't use today. If we can get confirmation that it works protown, 100% using it tomorrow when we have a little more time for coordination.

Yeah wasn't planning on using it today.

[Varsoon]

What

[Varsoon]

...are we really stuck on gladiating because Mastina declared a guilty?

[Varsoon]

What Vecna said

[Varsoon]

Gonna wait for another VC, then.
If the gladiate worked, from what Mastina claimed, then the target is town?
So then what do we do?

[Varsoon]

Feels like I'm being taken for a fucking ruse cruise.

[Varsoon]

Go read Steven Universe 2 game mafia, hosted by Varsoon. Focus on Reasonably Rational. Right there is the fault in your assumptions. People read his role as towny and yet he ended up being scum. Hence, reading someone as town on their role alone is a bad idea. Even mastina herself would agree with me on this one.

I RAN THAT GAME and I still think Mastina is town
VOTE: No Lynch

[Varsoon]

This No Lynch guy is so screwed.

[Varsoon]

The way you would claim a guilty on Mastina is saying she is not loyal. At which point, if you were telling the truth, she would still be able to gladiate you, and thus we would lynch Mastina. If you say she's not loyal, and then she fails to gladiate you, then we would lynch you. This is mechanically solved by itself.

If you have claimed a guilty on Mastina, then at least one of you is scum and whether or not she is then able to gladiate you determines which one of you it is.

...barring miller, godfather, roles not working as they've been claimed, and other player/role interference. But yeah, this.

[Varsoon]

This No Lynch guy is so screwed.

Got anything more relevant for us?

Not really, beyond what I've claimed and said already.
I think all this setup spec stuff is kinda pointless and just makes people who disagree over it fight over something that's secondary and when all of everything resolves it'll be revealed as pointless.
I'm more annoyed with Nico and jjh and whatever for making so much noise over it when there's only three ways to vote right now anyway.

[Varsoon]

What a fun and exciting role.

[Varsoon]

RC also got back to me:
My role would break up a gladiate if I used it.
But it also lets double voters still be double voters
so If scum has extra votes, it's not great
but if town has extra votes, yessss

[Varsoon]

So why don't we make Mastina gladiate Nico
And then if it works
We can either lynch Mastina or just use my role if we want to lynch outside those two?

[Varsoon]

VOTE: Mastina

I honestly do not think this is a town role and I feel that my role is diametrically opposed to it.

[Varsoon]

VOTE: Mastina

I honestly do not think this is a town role and I feel that my role is diametrically opposed to it.

I could say the same about your role

How is my role opposed to yours?

[Varsoon]

I literally brought up my role WHEN WE HAD A GLADIATE and people told me NOT TO USE IT.
If you forgot, I replaced in late D2.

Don't ask me to try to decipher this setup, homedawg. I have no clue what my role's intended interactions are. That's why I fucking public claimed it, dawg. If I was scum, I'd have just held on to it for a free surprise hammer lynch late into the game.

[Varsoon]

Hence why I claimed mine.

[Varsoon]

VOTE: unvote

Aight then.

[Varsoon]

It's really hard for me to get into this game.
Reading the back and forth on mechanics spec is exhausting.

[Varsoon]

This is a personal hell of mine
Why are we letting this game be held hostage by two players?

[Varsoon]

RC should probably bring on a backup/co-mod to help with stuff that happens on timers, handle VCs, etc.
I didn't even get an answer about how my own power worked in relationship to gladiates until the night after I was thinking of using it against the gladiate. :/

[Varsoon]

^ Glad to hear it.
Just worried 'bout you is all, bud. Especially since my last large theme ended up tanking, I've been pretty cautious about that sort of thing.

[Varsoon]

Go on?

[Varsoon]

I'm going to warn you that any plan that hinges on Porkens is a bad plan.

[Varsoon]

Any plan that hinges on Porkens is a bad plan.

[Varsoon]

If Porkens isn't willing to give a yes/no to that, they're not playing the game at all.

[Varsoon]

Nico fucked up their gambit by forgetting they already outted how their role works.
So then when Nico got called out on it, they admitted it was a lie, but failed to reveal what they got out lying, hinting that lying wasn't really a gambit but just a power play to try to get Mastina quicklynched.
Then they walked it back to the 48 hour thing.
All while JJH claimed deathproof with probable assumption that scum-Nico, who was under fire by JJH, goes for a kill on him--we had no death, so possible.
Nico denies, blames JJH and/or Jingle for their role not working the way it should (how?) and then insists that there are plenty of other explanations for why there'd be a no-kill, to which Jingle corroborates that there is a loud doctor but doubts it blocked the kill.

I think that's the whole of it?

[Varsoon]

Now we're waiting on the 48 hour thing and for Porkens corroboration, which is about as annoying as it sounds.

[Varsoon]

To be fair, I am bad at reading.
Sorry.

[Varsoon]

Porkens rejected the thing and so NR got the triple vote

So what's keeping scum!mastina from rejecting the thing?
I don't understand why nico thought that gambit made sense, considering the above.

[Varsoon]

@JJH: Is it possible any other configuration of scum in this setup would've noticed that and tried to kill you in order to implicate Nico?

[Varsoon]

Wouldn't it look worse if the guy who was deathtunneling her died?
/shrugs
Regardless
I don't think it's a good look for Nico any way you come at it, but
What now?

[Varsoon]

^ That's why I'm asking if there's a configuration of scum that would actually rely on that.

[Varsoon]

If I was a strong town role and I got a random thing asking me to reveal my role to someone I don't know, I'd say no.

[Varsoon]

Though Mastina claimed it does say it's from you, so eh?
I still would say no if I didn't trust you.

[Varsoon]

Yeah I literally came into the game with a vote on Porkens and have been doubtcasting him since then.
Porkens doesn't play the game as scum. Heck, he hardly plays the game as town.

[Varsoon]

Porkens not giving you a yes on your role is more indicative that Porkens was not even around to pick up the PM for 48 hours instead of Porkens actually declining it for alignment-related reasons, imo.

[Varsoon]

Oh hey it's just occurred to me that Nico submits her action at night and Mastina got the thing which means she can't have been blocked in any way

ayyyyy

[Varsoon]

So....
Why did Mastina claim your message is about a role, then?

So Nico is lying, and Porkens can back me up here.

I was told, "Nico is demanding your role; you have 48 hours to comply, or she becomes a triple voter for you."

[Varsoon]

This is a personal hell of mine
Why are we letting this game be held hostage by

two

one player

s

?

[Varsoon]

This is a personal hell of mine
Why are we letting this game be held hostage by

two

one player

s

?

[Varsoon]

Noone else is making us content to engage with Varsoon. Theyre all just like, absent.

Get us something else to discuss in the meanwhile, and Ill gladly discuss it.

You actually think Porkens is town here? Regardless of the stuff that happened around NR?

I don't.
I don't have a great track record with Porkens, though.
That's why I don't put much stock into that read.

[Varsoon]

The easiest solution to this is just to lynch NicoRobin.
If they are town, then they weren't lying (or at least we can parse what was a lie and what wasn't) and we proceed like that.
If they were scum, then cool.

[Varsoon]

Otherwise, what can we do?
Only other solution is for us to try to shackle Nico and dictate who she visits, but there's about a dozen ways that could go wrong.

[Varsoon]

I mean, the scramble is real. We're on D3 with two dead. Can't we just lynch for once?

[Varsoon]

This is a personal hell of mine
Why are we letting this game be held hostage by two players?

[Varsoon]

VOTE: NicoRobin
Right?
If every conversation is just going to come back to this
Or Mastina
Let's solve it.

[Varsoon]

Cool, this isn't that game and roles like Mastina's shouldn't exist.
I refuse to play a game where town no-lynches five days in a row and just lets scum wheeeedle us down.

[Varsoon]

How come Mastina hasn't been shot, then?

[Varsoon]

'cruise to victory'
Sure does look like cruising to something
D3
no fucking scum lynches
just two dead town
And we're no closer to solving the game

[Varsoon]

Cool, this isn't that game

[Varsoon]

not sure if aristophanes is still scum honestly, but i still think varsoon is scum. i thought the same thing spectating that fakegod game that just finished and i was right there (if anyone cares).

VOTE: varsoon

Completely different game that's only 41 pages where I was a much different role and there since the start
Whereas here I have some bunk-ass hidden vote role with no means of hidden communication and I replaced in 100 pages deep.
But awesome case full of great points about me, I guess. It's at least more than cowtowing to Mastina and/or NicoRobin's play, so even though it's literally wrong, I'm still for it.

[Varsoon]

BTW at work so the soonest you'll get a content post from me is in over 3 hours, but I'd like to reiterate.
If you think Nico is scum, ask yourself, "how does this make sense coming from scum?".
You might default to, "scum caught in a lie, backtracking"…
…Except. While that may work as an explanation for some scummers. It doesn't work as an explanation for NICO. Quite the opposite, it's the very proof that she's town. You might struggle to understand how it makes sense coming from town, but serious question.

How many games have you played?
In how many of those games, was there a town player whose actions made no sense, but they were still town?

You're outright ignorant or lying if it hasn't happened in at least a third of your games.

It's a little difficult to show because she has a dozen past accounts, but I can show Nico's quite extensive history of this sort of thing.

I thought Titus replaced out. Why are you propping this moonlogic?
I've MODDED plenty of games that Nico's played. I understand where that play is coming from.
On one level, you're right, Nico is earnest and that earnesty is NAI.
But let's look at what Nico was earnest about--
Faking a guilty
Lying about their role
And when they realized they messed both up, they walked both things back in defense of self.
Why does town!Nico need to defend self and isn't just suicidal in a push/absolutely defeatist when it doesn't work out?
Why does town!Nico fake a guilty and lie about role against you?
It doesn't make sense to me.

[Varsoon]

Surprise surprise that I call this out and call out the forced crawl this game has been bent over backwards into and both Nico and Mastina are hard aggro on me for it
Where's the gladiate, though, Mastina?
Couldn't do that, could you?
Is it because you're lying about your role, or because you don't want to town-confirm me?
Mmmm, what is it?

[Varsoon]

Gladiate me right now, Mastina.
I dare you.

[Varsoon]

That's the joke.

[Varsoon]

This is a personal hell of mine
Why are we letting this game be held hostage by two players?

[Varsoon]

This is a personal hell of mine
Why are we letting this game be held hostage by two players?

[Varsoon]

Why not just lynch Mastina so we don't have to deal with this?

I'd like that but you know what people will say
"Mastina should gladiate first"

[Varsoon]

VOTE: Mastina

[Varsoon]

Woah, hold on now, Jingle.
You're town and Porkens is scum.
That's two whole other reads.

[Varsoon]

Good rule of thumb for me is if NSG hasn't obv-towned by D4, it's scum.

[Varsoon]

Meta's a fat turd and meta-reads are hot trash.

[Varsoon]

You're gladiate is what gives players the excuse to laze about and wait until you make the hard decision for them.

[Varsoon]

Failure to obv-town is my rule of thumb.
Disengaged is like half the players here including me

[Varsoon]

Yeah, who are you,

Titus

?
Stick with the game.

[Varsoon]

I'm not unvoting.

[Varsoon]

^ Which is driven by the roles.
It's just not a setup that was put together well, imo. No shit to the mod, I actually appreciate someone taking the time to run a game with a lot of huge power in regards to voting mechanics, but I don't think it works because it fucks with a fundamental aspect of the game of mafia.

[Varsoon]

Don't think that's the scum team at all, Jingle.
I think your posts are really good but I don't know about your judgment.

[Varsoon]

We had flips, they just were all decided by the scum team because lolmastinagambit

[Varsoon]

Me too.
Why do you think that happens with Mastina alive?

[Varsoon]

V/LA until Oct 29. Got a wedding to go to.

[Varsoon]

Congrats for identifying that Nico/Yume has played in games before, Mastina. Real ace detective work. You sure showed us.

You wanna talk cool meta points? Why not bring up how I play exactly this way in every single game I replace-in to this deep in as town?
Oh but nooooo suddenly can't mention meta when maybe you can't warp it to fit your own desiresssss

Garbage trash, please get lynched and die.
I shouldn't have to do anything besides point out that you alone have been responsible for why there has not been a lynch yet in this fucking TWO HUNDRED PAGE GAME
Fuck off with your self-righteous bullshit and eat some rope. Town-Mastina doesn't play this way and RC doesn't make that role as a town role.

[Varsoon]

So who has mastina 'cleared'
And why aren't those players dead from nightkills?
Do you people even stop to think
Do you?

[Varsoon]

So you're suggesting
Let me get this straight
You're suggesting that RC creates a setup in which
Mastina's role is town and then town also has protectives, too?

Really
Fucking really

[Varsoon]

Like straight up I can get
"Town gets a public cop but it makes town forfeit a lynch if they believe it"
But that's a one-shot role, at best. It's not unlimited use in a setup that also has protectives unless scum has Strongman shots and, in that case, where are the bodies?

[Varsoon]

Hah! I write all my flavor on the spot.

[Varsoon]

Since I've replaced in, though, every player's been so focused on the mechanics, mastina this, nico that and so it's been impossible for me to really engage without engaging there.
I dunno what to do to break free.

[Varsoon]

I like your confidence a lot, Jingle, but I'm actually not sure what your plan is anymore.

[Varsoon]

UNVOTE:

You're town.
Gamma's town.
Nero's town.
Nosferatu's town.
jjh is town (unless nico and mastina flip town).
Kuroi's probably town.

I think that's about where I am with it right now.

[Varsoon]

5 clears then lynch mastina to confirm. If we get to a low number of players (13/14) with no scum lynched and less than 5 clears, lynch mastina anyway.

If scum shoots the clears, they're literally shooting in the pool of players we would have lynched anyway, while extending the viable use of mastina's role.
If scum shoots mastina, they've solved the contention and also confirmed the players in question.
If scum leaves that be, they've given us a townfirm pool that takes us to ridiculous levels of game solve.
If mastina is scum, we lynch her before we're close to worried about endgame AND there is presumably some amount of hidden power that town has to catch the other scum in the meantime. Given that there is no reason for claims, there's no chance that scum can use said claims to narrow down and eliminate townpower prematurely.

It's not complicated. It's not holding the thread hostage. It requires nothing more than not quickhammering. Incredibly high town EV.

So what if Mastina's scum and it's just a regular gladiate and not alignment-based at all?

[Varsoon]

@LA: Thanks for clearing that up for me. I missed the desperado thing. I haven't really read all that much from before I replaced in. :/

[Varsoon]

I dunno, just seems too good to be true? In my experience, that's when closed setups bite you in the ass.
Anyway.
FB's pushing on Mastina feels NAI, like I can't parse if it's coming from genuine town frustration or just something to do to create plausible mislynch deniability if Mastina flips town or distancing if Mastina flips scum. I guess I haven't looked at FB that hard despite them being active?

As for Mastina, I thought this was town play from Mastina coming in to the game but the way they handled the whole Nico thing drives me up the wall and pings me mighty hard. Mastina's took 'in charge', if that makes sense? I also really, really don't like getting duped by scum gambits and this all has scum gambit written all over it so I'm going to be dubious of that slot until we get a hard clear on it anyways. We've butted heads in the past, though, when I was absolutely sure they were scum based on mechanics-oriented play, so maybe I'm wrong? Ugh. I just don't like it. Is that fine to say? I don't like or agree with Mastina's play and that colors a lot of how I read Mastina's interactions.

I'd expect more activity from Aristophanes and Meme Men's slot (Rylai and Lina's usually a fairly active hydra as town, iirc)
I'd also say NSG but apparently NSG's rebranded as this cool lurkposter now? I don't like it.

I'll give Nero, Nos, and Chickadee a look when I have some more time--I should'a gone to bed like 3 hours ago. Gotta go to my father in law's birthday dinner tomorrow but it's gonna be like an all-day thing so blah. Hence the V/LA through the weekend. But here I am, 3 AM, playin' mafia.

[Varsoon]

EBWOP: I might be confusing Mastina for Pirate Mollie in regards to some meta stuff--tried to look back for a game where I really doubled down on a scumread of Mastina for mechanics-based play and it was Mollie instead, meta's whack, memory sucks, maybe disregard that?

[Varsoon]

Jingle's town for proposing an actual strat and driving game engagement through this thick morass of shitposting
Gamma's town for actually having independent agency and putting in what reads as genuine effort to figure shit out
Nero's a gut read, 'cus when Nero annoys me and keeps me at arm's length, it's town Nero for me.
Nos is another gut read, mostly based on attitude of play lining up with meta expectations.
JJH's whole re:Nico thing convinced me he's town. The assuredness and claim don't come from scum, imo.
Kuroi between the soft-clear stuff and the catch-up into replace-out. Scum Kuroi would probably just hang out in that soft-clear zone and try to skate into a win on it. I try not to read alignment into replacements though so ehhhh this could go different depending on Mastina flip.

[Varsoon]

T_T
Why are people even voting me.

[Varsoon]

Oh, I thought people were voting me to try to lynch me.
See that's the problem I was having.
People don't seem to be scumhunting, but town-clear-gladiate-voting, which doesn't seem as fruitful to me.
I'm also confused because your list of people to gladiate on this page didn't mention me?

[Varsoon]

Under-wheme-ing

[Varsoon]

Who's a 'proper target', then?

[Varsoon]

...so you fake-claimed IC to avoid a lynch/being gladiate-confirmed as town?
Why?

[Varsoon]

Lots of low-confidence plays and surface-level thoughts. Can't decide if it's just unable to come to strong conclusions on slots or just opportunistic in voting. Lots of posts that don't really do anything but that's the norm this game. This kinda play in a 13p would be unacceptable to me but in this large of a game with the situation we have, I'm hesitant to say it's scum and there's at least engagement beyond what other slots have produced so, eeeeeh.

[Varsoon]

What about me?
JJ's town, been over that.
Vecna, though, I don't know how to feel about. I don't like their play or their logic.

[Varsoon]

HURT: Vecna, NicoRobin, NeroCain

[Varsoon]

I didn't vote myself but okay

[Varsoon]

Oh, yeah, 'cus Mastina was tryin'a give me the stink eye and I wasn't havin' it.
I'll still take the gladiate, though--there are better targets. I think we need to town-confirm people who actually will put in work and guide town and be threats to scum.

[Varsoon]

Jingle: Let him prove his alignment. Confirms his loud doc visit claim. Removes my suspicion. Good for overall game state. Also have some doubts because he's failing to see the obvious, while he really should. Maybe he has and thats why he continues to push for me to be gladiated. Ramblings discontinued.

Forget about this ^

HURT: Jingle

[Varsoon]

As someone who grew up with more online friends than real-life friends, I always considered people's identity to be far more tied up in what they had to say/share rather than who they were physically. I do try to respect folks online, but I tend to value gender far less as a marker of identity than a lot of people do.

[Varsoon]

Spoiler: More off-topic posts

And, yes, I do realize that gender is a social construct rather than a physical aspect of a person.
That said, most people do not perform their gender nearly as much in online interactions, which is why it continues to be something that is very secondary to me when considering others online. It's only when someone insists upon their gender as a major part of their identity and that gender clearly affects and informs their content that I consider it a larger part of who they are. That said, I find that considering gender as a core part of one's identity is problematic for several reasons, so it's something that I tend to avoid doing.

[Varsoon]

thought Varsoon would at least have a reaction to being scum read.

Am I being scumread? I thought a bunch of garbage people were voting me for a lynch until someone told me it was so I could be gladiated and then I was more fine with it.
It's really whatever.

Look, hard truth time.
Do you guys actually want to continue playing this game?
If no one WANTS to play, that's fine. We can chalk this one up to a UPick taken by too many replacements. Hell with the trouble RC's already had with replacements and keeping up with the game, I doubt he'd be too upset to be able to call it himself.

I wanna play this game. It's why I replaced IN in the first place.
No mod deserves to have their game abandoned to apathy.
That shit hurts.

[Varsoon]

this will be a vc

WHERE'S IT AT, THO?

[Varsoon]

Like I guess I am still the biggest wagon right now but it's like whatever
If I beef it, at least I'm freed from this game.
And if I don't, cool, maybe I get to whoop scum once this game is down to manageable numbers to actually play.

[Varsoon]

I wanna keep playing

It'd be cool if you could start

[Varsoon]

What if
and hear me out here
Mastina
doesn't produce
innocents

[Varsoon]

Like
How do we even know she hasn't just been gladiating scum players so far
that's what I'm sayin.

[Varsoon]

Like when we get to 13p
and we lynch mastina
and she just flips scum gladiator
like what then

[Varsoon]

If she's scum and isn't loyal or 'clearing' anyone, but just a regular gladiator, what then?

[Varsoon]

^ I don't see how that plan helps us very much but aight.

[Varsoon]

Because, if we have a pool of 5 conftown at 17 players alive and a doctor, town is pretty damn far ahead.

If scum are exclusively shooting in the players we would have lynched anyway, town is pretty damn far ahead because we functionally control the nightkill.

And all of this is assuming that mastina doesn't manage to hit scum, in which case we have scumlynches, or that our doc stops nightkills.

I fail to see how we get any cleared town if Mastina is scum and a regular gladiator.
Like the whole loyal thing isn't a part of the role at all.
The whole bolding shit in the thread isn't a part of the role at all.
It's all artifice
How do we get confirmed town from that?
Walk me through that logic.

I can see what you mean by saying we functionally 'control' the nightkill, but do we really?
I don't think so. Scum still kills whoever they want. Some may be the gladiated targets, some may not. How does this help us? At what point do we decide it's worth it to just lynch mastina?
Because until then
I don't think we're going to ever have a lynch on scum
and scum's definitely not shooting themselves

Does this make sense to you?

[Varsoon]

If scum shoots outside of that pool OR fails to kill their intended target, we get another clear. That's 4. Now scum has to kill one of the four, or any successful gladiate by mastina hits the threshold of 5 and mastina gets lynched. So in order for scum mastina to survive three more dayphases, scum has to shoot within the pool of players who were suspicious enough to be lynched in the first place. Which is... leashing the scumkill.

But they're not 'clears', Jingle. Oh nooo scum eventually hits 5 people in the 'pseudoclear' pile before mastina, who has to eat a lynch before the end of this game, does so. In the meantime, scum have forced town to give up their lynch for SEVERAL days, meaning town has NOT LYNCHED AT ALL FOR SEVERAL DAYS while scum just GETS TO KILL THEM. Do you see why this is a bad idea? Do you see how this isn't a 'leashed' scumkill at all?

Varsoon still extremely resistant to getting towncleared.

I literally bold-faced told Mastina to gladiate me. I don't see how that reads as 'extreme resistance'.
I'm also pushing for a 'clear' on Jingle (even though nothing is a fucking clear at all until mastina gets lynched holy shit you people are fucking stupid) because Jingle is a huge questionmark for a lot of people and town!Jingle will lead us to victory whereas scum Jingle just fucks us over, given that Jingle is the most outspoken force for moving this godddamn game out of the fucking quagmire it's been.
Why the FUCK is EVERYONE treating A FUCKING GLADIATOR like a PUBLIC COP?

[Varsoon]

I pay tribute TO THE ALMIGHTY BUNGHOLE
Long live the almighty bunghole!

[Varsoon]

The game is a chore but I'm down to stick with it until its conclusion.

[Varsoon]

*cough* maybe don't give scum roles that drive high levels of town apathy

[Varsoon]

*cough cough* In a larger-than-21-player-game

[Varsoon]

Very likely an oversight, though, and plenty of much larger games have been run to completion so I'm cool with playing it out.

[Varsoon]

It's still nice to have regular VCs at least once every 5 pages, even if votes don't change just so
1. Everyone knows votes haven't changed
2. Everyone knows you're still around and keeping up.

You can also include the prods/replacements info/timers going on your VCs so we can be a bit more aware of what's going on there.

[Varsoon]

But yeah I think you're doing fine and I don't begrudge you for how people have chosen to play the setup.
I also don't expect you to keep track of hurt tags or anything like that.

[Varsoon]

Still think it's a lousy idea to no lynch several times in a row in a game where we aren't getting any mod-confirmed clears from it.

[Varsoon]

VOTE: Mastina

[Varsoon]

Voting for a No Lynch in a closed setup is the stupidest fucking play town could ever make.
Especially if this shit is supposed to be role madness.
I already know, from my role, that the mod was designing roles with specific days in mind, because I couldn't activate my role on Day 1.
So there's no way I'm voting for a fucking no lynch here.

[Varsoon]

No Lynching is such a garbage move that's against the whole fucking thesis of mafia that I've outright made it not even an option in several of my recent games.

[Varsoon]

How do we know Scum doesn't get some role that powers up every fucking night and that artificially dragging out the game isn't screwing us over?
Do we have any reason to believe that town has roles sufficiently designed to benefit from extra nights being on the table versus the literal anything that scum might have?
Stop trying to play CLOSED THEME SETUPS like they're semi-opens or even normals, you absolute simpletons
How fucking moronic do you have to be to just say that it'll be fine to give up town's lynch SEVERAL DAYS IN A ROW
IN A GAME
WHERE LITERALLY
THE ONLY WAY TO WIN THE GAME
IS TO LYNCH SCUM

[Varsoon]

If a part of the design of a setup benefits town the most to coming to the solution of no lynching, that's bad setup design.
If it's unintentional, then I don't want to be complicit in gaming an unintentional aspect of the setup because

that's not playing mafia anymore

.

[Varsoon]

Mafia is literally built around 2 fucking actionable mechanics
1. An uninformed majority votes for lynches to try to eliminate scum.
2. An informed minority kills town to try to eliminate them.

That's it.
Any setup that breaks that CORE DYNAMIC of the game fails to be a mafia setup.
Playing in a way that's contrary to that CORE DYNAMIC is outright bad play that is far more likely to lose the game and ruin its integrity than to provide reliable results.

I'm cool with playing along with the whole gladiate garbage gambit, whatever.
What I'm not cool with is ending the day on another No Lynch after 200 fucking pages and nearly two months.

[Varsoon]

Does there exist a context in which town should No Lynch or scum should No Kill?
Sure.
Yes.
Absolutely.
It's super fringe and unlikely to happen in any game that's actually well designed, using normal roles and balance and an odd number of starting players, but there are situations where it could be a more effective strategy than outright lynching or killing.
But never, ever in a closed setup, especially a non-normal role-madness closed setup.
Like what the fuck
How do you not get this
How does anyone not get this

[Varsoon]

There are objectively situations in which it is better to No Lynch.

I wrote this. Of course there are. In open and semi-open setups. In normal setups. This setup is neither.

For example, follow the cop.

Too bad that's not the case in this setup.

If town can recognize a correct sequence of roles that increase their odds of winning by working together, then they should do so.

And that's bad design.

It's not morally wrong to attempt to use all of your tools to win the game, it's playing the fucking game.

Look, if you want to play some awful 'let us all use mechanics to gamesolve' game, then go play open queue or some mishmash where that's the case. It's not a question of morality or being on some 'high horse', it's literally a different fucking game. You're arguing that town should use its tools--that's fine; when they fully understand the scope of the game and the tools at their disposal. We don't here. This is a closed rolemadness setup; the only tools I can be certain of are mod-confirmed ones, like what's in my own role PM and lynching mechanics.

The ability to recognize when No Lynching or Massclaiming is useful as opposed to harmful is a skill, and saying otherwise is an insult to the people who use that skill.

Never said anything about Massclaiming but any game solved by a Massclaim is also a poorly designed game. I'm sure you pride yourself on skills that exploit the flaws in mechanical game design, but I'd much rather play the rhetorical game of Mafia.

I enjoy putting the little pieces together, solving the puzzle, and squeezing the value out of the roles. If a No Lynch is part of that, I'm going to No Lynch, or at least argue for it.

Too bad a No Lynch should never be a part of that in a closed role madness game. I've run closed role madness setups my entire fucking career on this site, Jingle. I've personally designed games and helped design games in which scum gets stronger and stronger with subsequent night phases in order to combat town information creep and mitigate swing. As a moderator of such games, I have literally come to the conclusion that No Lynch mechanics are often a means to abuse such roles and are contrary to the entire point of the game of Mafia as No Lynching drives player apathy. Once again, there are situations in games where a No Lynch is a great idea--like 4 players alive in a 3v1 normal setup. Too bad that's not the case here.

To say that the way I play mafia is worse than the way you play mafia is conceited and insulting.

I'm not saying it's worse. I'm saying it's incredibly short-sighted and literally undermining the moderator in order to play in this way in a closed rolemadness game.

To say that it's not mafia is insulting.

Not here. Don't take it personally that you're wrong.

To say that any setups that are breakable are badly designed is disgusting.

Except that setups can and will be poorly designed and breakable. This is largely avoided in many queues and is the biggest problem in closed non-normal games. I have personally designed setups that I have known to be breakable. I have unintentionally designed poor mechanics for setups.

If you want to balance your games around enforcing a lynch, then good for you, you can do that. If you want to come into other games and say "What you're doing is morally wrong and you shouldn't be allowed to play that way" you're prioritizing your ability to have fun over mine.

Never said it was morally wrong, just absolutely moronic and I'll never support it because it's both anti-town play and, for me, not enjoyable or in the spirit of the game.

I'm going to argue what I believe to be the best path to victory. If you don't want to, bully for you. But don't come in here and shove "You're not playing the game the right way" down my throat.

If you're town, you really aren't.

Take your 'this is a personal attack' garbage and throw it away. I'm sorry if your ego takes a hit when you learn that your approach to a game isn't the most likely approach to win that game; get over it.
I can provide you with over ten different closed setups in which no lynching benefits scum players, if you want, but I don't think that site meta would change anything for you.
I could try to explain to you further that, unless you're scum, you only have mod-confirmed means of defeating scum, which means that no-lynching is literally giving up the primary means of winning the game while also potentially fuelling scum roles that would be boosted from a no lynch.
I could even explain that, based on there being no flavor from the unexpected no lynch outcome of Mastina's gladiate, RC did not balance this game around the notion that town would No Lynch several times, which indicates that RC did not consider how No Lynching might break the game in the favor of one alignment or the other.
I could literally point at this game as an indicator of how much No Lynching drives player apathy and is unhealthy for the sake of the actual game of mafia.

But if you're going to take all that shit personally and write it off as some moralistic assault on you when what I'm proposing is that we

just attempt to lynch scum

, I don't think that I can reason with you.

[Varsoon]

I should elaborate--it's fine if town can find a sequence of roles that helps them win the game. That's normal and baked into setups by default.
However, when that sequence of roles is so powerful that it tilts the game into town's favor due to mechanical efficiency of that combo usurping any possible rhetorical doubt that could be sowed, that's bad design.
If you think it's somehow great design for a setup to have a public cop and loud doctor without scum having huge safegaurds to counter that power, kindly see yourself out of ever designing games.

[Varsoon]

Hey everyone, lynch Varsoon.

Hey Porkens.
Eat rope.

[Varsoon]

Enjoy the thread lock when it comes, jerkoffs.

[Varsoon]

I thought to myself
Man
I wish I could just force people to actually play the game and try to lynch scum so that I can win
Then I realized
Oh
I can.
Thanks for reminding me of that, Jingle.

[Varsoon]

Now, this is going to happen in about T minus RC-activity hours, so I look forward to another few game days of you all giving me shit for this decision.

[Varsoon]

[Varsoon]

You can release PTs, it's whatever.

This was by far the worst scum strategy I have seen

I agree. I replaced in and we were already knee-deep in a strat that I saw no chance of victory from. I tried to make the most of it.
Not enthused about how this game was handled on all sides of the bat.
I was hoping a turbo-bus might buy us the WIFOM we needed but, really, the results being unanimously against us in my private voter was good indicator of how up shit creek we were.
RC--don't modkill slots when your rules don't say you wouldn't do that. If I were listmod, you'd be docked modding experience at least for that kind of stunt.

[Varsoon]

EBWOP: When your rules don't say you'd do that.
Rules as written, inactive slots would be force-replaced here.
You modkilling them without adequate warning constitutes game-compromising modplay, especially given that players started ignoring lurker slots entirely because they'd flip via modkill anyway.

[Varsoon]

I agree that our powers weren't amazing. I think we would have had a better shot if we had played them differently, for sure.

[Varsoon]

iirc, a good deal of our kills outright failed, too.

[Varsoon]

The hilarious thing is that the role doesn't even make townclears.
It's just a gladiator role from a town PoV unless the user tilts that it's non-loyal.
Mastina just decided, for some reason, we were better off with her running the game
But that created so much game apathy that, combined with Mastina's own frequent absences, people weren't going to let that fly.

[Varsoon]

It's also a weakness of design that it allowed for a no lynch.

[Varsoon]

That alone should have indicated that it wasn't a town role in the slightest.
Which was the logic I was trying to present as a grounds for bussing but eh

[Varsoon]

'cus a town role that can only gladiate townies but allows for a no lynch is basically a public cop that gets rid of mislynches.
Couple that with other town roles like vig, etc. and town's pretty much incapable of losing.

[Varsoon]

So tell me, you guys really believing that was a scripted varsoon bussing theatrical performance? Because it seemed to me like it was a pissed off varsoon trying to desperately get rid of a powerfull town PR.

Dude deserves an Emmy if he is scum with Mastina here.

Give me my Emmy tho

[Varsoon]

I think the intention was that mastina would basically control the game and because town was 'deciding' who would be gladiated, she could rinse her hands of responsibility.

[Varsoon]

Exactly.
I think that we played it entirely wrong.

[Varsoon]

It puts far far too much attention on yourself as scum.
In a closed setup, doing that is a huge gamble.
It basically put the rest of the team into either having to hard bus or to be complicit.
It wasn't fantastic, no.
It could've played out better but probably not with this player arrangement ever.

[Varsoon]

I was just going for a hardbus and actually hoping we wouldn't have majority votes and day would end on a nolynch.

[Varsoon]

Didn't the mod publish the PTs?

[Varsoon]

You'll just have to wait for RC to make the PTs public ;P

Or just publish actions into the game thread

[Varsoon]

N1 was Vaxkiller
N2 was JJH--highly pushed by Nico, just how you called it.
N3 was Chickadee
N4 was Firebringer
N5 was strongman on Firebringer.

[Varsoon]

Mmmhm.

[Varsoon]

So
Wanna /in to more Yume games?

[Varsoon]

im still surprised porkens wasnt scum here

It's Porkens.
I've given up on reading him accurately.

[Varsoon]

I generally enjoy playing games with you.
It's been neat to see your progress.

[Varsoon]

Sorry I couldn't bring more to this one despite replacing in.

[Varsoon]

/shrugs
I don't care how 90% of the site feels.
That should be evident.

[Varsoon]

Well, then, thanks. I enjoy playing your games too. When shall the next one be?

Sometime early 2019, cooking up about three different setups atm.

[Varsoon]

Featuring masons that must survive with non-masons to win

**Quickly deletes all his files and furiously erases the setup design whiteboard, muttering, "Damn, they figured out the gimmick, damn damn damn!"**

Coming Soon (tm)

[Varsoon]

^ I would've been furious if we only won via modkill fiat.

[Varsoon]

Btw I didn't point this out in game for obvious reasons but this was pretty bad imo

I had a long flavour writeup for this but have chosen to replace it with the following disclaimer:
If you think I was incompetent enough to write a town role that would have ruined the game in the way that this one has I'm not sure why you would /in to one of my games.

Like this smells of modspew

Yeah "I had flavor but I won't post it out of spite; you should have figured out this was a scum role because I'm good at design" isn't a fantastic position to hold.

[Varsoon]

@Nico: I'm also super overgamed and Holidays are coming up, too. D:
That said, fuggit, pre-in me.

I agree that scum had strong powers. I think Mastina's role could have easily been used to push a strategic mislynch without her slot getting lynched afterwards, if she had towned the slot enough. Varsoon's role was quite powerful. Strongman countered the protective roles. Town barely had any investigative powers. This seems fairly balanced to me. Town just rolled over the scum, which happens sometimes.

I don't think my role was very powerful at all. It insta-forces vote-for-lynch, but given the situation we were in after D1, town would have very likely all defaulted to the most scumread wagon anyway. Best case scenario? Oh no town get a mislynch; something that would have happened anyway most of the time. It's powerful if you consider it as a forced mislynch but it's not--town still have agency and, provided they are already on the right track, it could easily just swing out as a scum lynch, which it did. Even had I not claimed I was the one doing it, it still would've resulted in a lynch on scum.

Strongman did not counter protective roles this game. Unless a doc truthfully claims who they will protect or a BP claims truthfully, Strongman can only ever be used on someone after the fact, which means that scum still lost an NK. We lost 2 NKs this game, too, so you can see how 'powerful' that turned out for us. If the role was to be actually powerful, it wouldn't be 1-shot strongman or, alternatively, it would have been 1-shot that's triggered when the killer is blocked. As it is, it's a shot that can only be used reactively AFTER a BP soaks a kill, which makes it an incredibly weak modifier that does nothing out outgame town.

[Varsoon]

A lot of powers that should have been factional abilities (1-shot Strongman, Ninja, etc) were role-based, further increasing swing, too.

Don't take my boo-hoo'ing the scum roles as me saying that's why we lost. We lost because we laid down poor play and town out-gamed us.

[Varsoon]

Oh, wait, crap, I still have a signup ban for at least 6 more days, Nico.
If it doesn't start up/fill before then, lemme know.

[Varsoon]

Discern alignment before building the roles?

[Varsoon]

Could just happen via mod Fiat.
Alternatively, write it on a role-by-role basis.
It'd be easy to cheese the flavor that Diablo brings his minions of Hell to the side of the scum team, who can have them deliver a strongman or ninja kill factionally.

[Varsoon]

There's always someone willing to replace in, in my experience, regardless of game.

I don't think it's possible for scum to win when town can clear and pseudo-clear more than the number of scum players in the game.