Open 781: JK9++ Game Over!

[Something_Smart]

V/LA until Monday

I'll be around for the next five hours or so.

[Something_Smart]

Wayyyyy, too slow turkey, but also hi!

Hi skitt, hi fb, hi S_S!

Hi!!

I would call out the people I'm hyped to play with but it's literally just the entire playerlist

[Something_Smart]

I’m ignoring my role PM and playing blind, I haven’t even looked in the private forums of the site in weeks

Probably shouldn't joke about this...

[Something_Smart]

I can't even trust myself.

[Something_Smart]

High risk, low reward.

Seems like low risk high reward to me, having a hider die without crumbing or because scum caught the crumb and killed their target is huge, whereas scum knowing certain players aren't hiders, when they could be other PR's and scum don't even know if there IS a hider, is not that bad.

[Something_Smart]

Pseudoclaiming hider narrows down the hider pool drastically, and lets scum shoot someone who is more likely to be hidden behind.

Which is good, because people aren't going to hide behind PR's or obvtown.

[Something_Smart]

That iso has a different tone than this game I think. Fire hasn’t fakeclaimed a scum role so he’s probably town

[Something_Smart]

The more SS posts the more I feel ok lynching him

Shocker.

[Something_Smart]

I am gonna let something smart pick my choices. Haven't seen him post in awhile. Interested who he wants me to case.
U GET THREE PICKS MR SMART.

and one of them will not be my real opinion. muhahhhaha

What now

[Something_Smart]

I have read all the posts at least once, that does not equate to being caught up

Let me go look real quick

[Something_Smart]

It seems pretty reasonable to me.

[Something_Smart]

not dismiss her and call her scum

Did you think this was a fair/good faith portrayal of my interaction with datisi?

I mean it seems good faith to me because he clearly took your troll readlist seriously.

[Something_Smart]

You called?

[Something_Smart]

(I'm back btw, Monday was a generous estimate.)

[Something_Smart]

That sounds like only half of what's required for a meta case.

[Something_Smart]

Foreshadowing a push sounds like something that would be objectionable but I actually think doing it so directly is more towny than not.

[Something_Smart]

it's kinda entirely how i utilize meta, whether or not people feel the same to games wherein i know their alignment

You compare people to their scumgames without asking whether their towngames are also similar?

[Something_Smart]

SS u feel more distant to this game than usual.

I think that's probably because I'm more distant to this game than usual.

[Something_Smart]

more like i compare them to all the games that i played with them, figure out which one is the best 'match' and see what their alignment was in that game

I guess that makes sense. What about my engagement is closer to City than PYP?

[Something_Smart]

I'm pretty sure the very first thing I did in PYP was get in an argument about whether a governor should claim.

[Something_Smart]

if it keeps up it's scummy for you

This is probably a product of lack of experience with me and so I'm not holding it against you, but this is definitely not true.

[Something_Smart]

It probably is. I'm a lot more likely to appear invested in things as scum.

[Something_Smart]

Okay well I wanted 3 people for u to pick for me to ISO. Then I wanted u to figure out which one i was lying about my opinion on.

Do you still want me to do this?

[Something_Smart]

you weren't in city?
i would have called you out on it cept you were townread more than me and it would have made me look bad

Every game is different. I wasn't really under any pressure so I didn't do it as much, but I still did push the you/Titus being aligned bit pretty hard.

[Something_Smart]

ss did you get any reads but from the bits of the game you did read?

You, gobbles, and lilith are townleans.

And to be clear, I did read the whole game, but that's not to say that I remember it all.

[Something_Smart]

Fair enough. I feel like gobble would respect Bingle enough to try to come up with some reason for scumreading him rather than just dropping straight-up gut and refusing to clarify.

[Something_Smart]

Now that I think about it, that probably isn't valid if Bingle is scum.

[Something_Smart]

Probably the same things town is doing at this point.

[Something_Smart]

ngl, the speed is very unnerving.

Honestly, I think the number of people who immediately popped in to express their dislike for the wagon is much more notable.

[Something_Smart]

why

Because flash wagons happen a lot and flash defenses do not happen a lot.

[Something_Smart]

what does this even mean? aren't you townreading gobbles?

It means exactly what it says. I don't really care that gobble's wagon reached L-2 quickly, but I do care that a bunch of people immediately stepped in to defend him. I wasn't suggesting that any particular conclusion should be drawn from it.

I'm townleaning him.

[Something_Smart]

but there was literally no case on gobbles scum? the flash wagon didn't have a case attached. It was like everyone just jumped on for 0 reason. Why wouldn't anyone call that out as weird or ask people to explain

I'm not saying it isn't a good thing to do. I'm saying it's unusual.

[Something_Smart]

ok, why do you think it's noteworthy that multiple people jumped in to defend him?

Because that rarely happens?

[Something_Smart]

why u townleaning gobbles again?

Fair enough. I feel like gobble would respect Bingle enough to try to come up with some reason for scumreading him rather than just dropping straight-up gut and refusing to clarify.

[Something_Smart]

ok and the conclusion is ...

like why are you pointing it out if you think he's town anyways? isn't it a good thing that people are defendign him?

The conclusion is not there yet. But if you're curious, my first instinct was that gobbles was being whiteknighted by scum who wanted to stay off the wagon.

It is a good thing that people are defending him. That doesn't mean that I can't have an opinion on the people doing it that isn't good.

[Something_Smart]

i think gobbles sort of explained a bingle read unless i am mistaken.

I guess. The point was mostly about him dropping "My gut." and then leaving; explaining it later isn't necessarily going to calm the pushback doing that might get (in fact it might make it worse).

[Something_Smart]

okay but who.
theres me, skitter, and blake who didn't like the wagon.

Who what?

[Something_Smart]

- feels more distant than i think town!him would be

Based on what?

[Something_Smart]

Also, taking weird stances is towny, but I don't even think I have taken any. Which of my reads do you think is weird?

[Something_Smart]

pyp

I mean, I'm in total agreement that I'm more distant in this game than I was in that one.

But what makes you think there isn't another reason for it?

In particular, I think that having just come back a few hours ago from a weekend V/LA during which 20 pages of content was produced would put me at a pretty significant distance from the thread, at least for a little while.

[Something_Smart]

i voted you for shading the people who objected to the gobble wagon because i don't get how that makes sense from the perspective of someone townreading gobble

Why is that something I'm more likely to do as scum?

Do you think I'm in the habit of intentionally appearing superficially contradictory (and it's NOT contradictory, by the way!) as scum for shits and giggles?

[Something_Smart]

Alright Blake feel free to revote although SS is looking juicy.

Your skill at reading me is impeccable, as always.

[Something_Smart]

I bet you don't even remember the last time I played in a game with you when I was town.

Pick Your Power, skitter and I were literally just talking about it.

[Something_Smart]

i don't know why town with those reads would say that, so it seems scummy to me. like it doesn't fit with the thought process you're purporting to have about the game, and that's a scum characteristic imo

Can you elaborate on what you think I said and why you think it doesn't make sense?

[Something_Smart]

https://forum.mafiascum.net/viewtopic.php?f=52&t=81123

[Something_Smart]

And you did townread me in that game eventually, but it wasn't until later in the game and you pushed on me initially.

[Something_Smart]

I'm sorry. It was maybe a little harsh. I'm pretty sure you did say in that game that you did scumread me just not as heavily as you claimed.

Regardless, you have misread me a lot in the past and it's one of the more notable things I remember about you.

[Something_Smart]

That was out of line though.

I just have hostility toward people scumreading me early in general because 80% of the time it's for dumb reasons regardless of my alignment.

[Something_Smart]

And while I don't know exactly what skitter is talking about, I'm pretty sure her reasons fall under that category.

It's entirely possible for me to townread someone and yet suspect the people who are defending them-- and I wasn't even doing that. I wanted to make note of something that I wasn't sure yet how I felt about and she called it out as though everything I say has to have a conclusion attached. And when I did helpfully tell her the thought process I was having, while explaining that I didn't have a conclusion yet, she seems to be treating it as though that was some ironclad claim I made.

[Something_Smart]

I can't really disprove your claims, I do think I have read you right before in games, maybe not as good as I'm remembering but I don't think it's wrong to say It's baseless.

You have, but usually it's taken a while iirc.

[Something_Smart]

i think you said that you're townreading gobbles
and that it's strange that multiple people came into the thread to complain about the wagon against him
(and that's weirder than multiple people wagoning him)

but if you think he's town i'm not sure why it's strange that people don't like his wagon

I mean, I think it was pretty clearly explained in my posts?

It is very rarely the case that I see multiple people come in to see a wagon that has picked up rapidly and immediately speak out against it. A lot of the time, the only person doing this is me, and a lot of the time I am ignored. I don't DISAGREE with the people doing it. I just think it's objectively a rare occurrence and therefore worth noting.

[Something_Smart]

it's not an ironclad claim but it's a thought process that doesn't make sense to me

The thought process is: "This thing happened. It doesn't happen a lot. I wonder if it means anything?"

What part of that doesn't make sense to you?

[Something_Smart]

you chiming in to say that you think it's strange that people are saying that makes it seem like you're shading the people protesting the speed of the wagon, which is the part that seems incongruent with townleaning gobble to me

It sounds like you're saying that town can't believe that scum would defend town? Because if I think gobble is town, then the only way that read would affect my read on the people commenting on his wagon is if I didn't think that scum would be defending a wagon on town. Since I clearly think it's possible for scum to defend town, I don't see what's incongruent.

Also, you seem to be confusing me saying what I think is possible versus saying what I believe. I hate the term "shading" as it's really just a charged way to say "having a negative opinion of", but I wouldn't say I was doing that to the gobble defenders, just because I put forward a possibility.

[Something_Smart]

It sounds like you're saying that my thoughts don't divide everyone neatly into a "town" or "scum" box, and that's bad.

[Something_Smart]

Or in other words, you have an extremely superficial view of what you expect from town.

[Something_Smart]

i think that's an inaccurate assessment

Well, see if you can explain it better. Because that's the impression I have from what you've said so far.

[Something_Smart]

Understand your thought process so I can try to show you where I disagree.

[Something_Smart]

how are you reading me rn ?

It seems like a weird angle for you to take that I'm scum for this superficial contradiction but you have better reasoning but you can't explain it. I don't recall you doing stuff like that in either of your recent scumgames, and I don't think you got this far in the weeds with anyone in City except for lilith when you were doing theater with her.

So leantown.

[Something_Smart]

I strongly doubt this engagement happens the way it does if both are town.

What makes you say this?

[Something_Smart]

What are you confused about?

[Something_Smart]

The beginning of it was unnatural from both sides.

So you would be scumreading us both but you don't think we make sense as partners?

[Something_Smart]

are you trying to get me to change my mind on you?

Yes.

[Something_Smart]

All it means is that I don't believe that the engagement would happen if you both were town.

Okay... I disagree. Do you have any reasoning or is it just gut feeling?

[Something_Smart]

Fair enough.

[Something_Smart]

Surely you don't think it's only worth it to get someone to townread you if you're already townreading them?

Your read on me seemed to be based on something that was very obviously inaccurate. I don't really care about the effort involved per se; it's just some typing, and it helps me engage better in the game anyway, something we both agree I was lacking. I didn't really care about your alignment, because it's not as if your scumread on me is less of a problem if you're scum. (It might be less solvable, but even then trying to solve it will still produce useful information, hopefully for other people besides just us.)

[Something_Smart]

On the one hand, we definitely are derailing the thread now. On the other hand, I still don't understand your reasoning, and I would still like to. It's your call whether you want to continue this conversation or drop it, or maybe come back to it later. I won't fault you for dropping it.

[Something_Smart]

I don't. That's why I wanted her to explain more because that's what she appeared to be doing.

[Something_Smart]

like there's some kind of disconnect there to think it's strange that people would comment on the flashwagon because that's what i'd expect town!him to be doing

I think you're continuing to confuse "strange" meaning "wrong" and "strange" meaning "unexpected." I meant the latter. You seem to be taking it as the former. I never actually even used the word strange.

[Something_Smart]

seems weird that you're ducking out onto chem right after I asked him for reads

just like, kind of pre-emptive and given what I know of chemist if he's town then him feeling pressured on re-entry is going to make him feel less like playing and make him more Lynch baity

basically, I think chem could be scum here and that's why I wanted him to give some reads and to try to engage him. and I feel like you voting him right as I'm trying to get his engagement up is liable to make it harder for him if he's not scum to get into the game

Does Chemist usually feel pressured after getting just one vote?

[Something_Smart]

I have a model of how chemist plays that has traditionally been fairly accurate and I think in this situation him coming back to votes would do that potentially, yes

Yeah, I trust that you know what you're talking about here. I've had times where even getting one vote can change my perception of the game and make me way more defensive.

[Something_Smart]

SS do you think skitter is scum?

She's a townlean. See 828.

[Something_Smart]

I don’t like skitter randomly going after chemist. It reads to me like she’s trying to get away from the SS interaction she had by creating new talking points on an easy slot to go after

Is that a thing town wouldn't do? If she thinks she got tunneled or sidetracked then she'd want to try to branch out and talk about something else, no?

[Something_Smart]

She doesn’t think she’s wrong about her scumread on you though

But she can still admit that she was getting tunneled.

[Something_Smart]

I’m confused by your use of tunneled. You are using as skitter self realizes she is tunneling right? I did not read it that way at first

Yeah. It seems to me like she realized it was a misunderstanding and while she might still scumread me it makes sense for her to want to engage elsewhere.

[Something_Smart]

like pb would fit the 'being chill' mode

But when does he not tbh

[Something_Smart]

even with the tunneling / misunderstanding what he meant about the gobble wagon he feels like scum!him i think

In what way?

[Something_Smart]

the questions you're asking and the way you're approaching the game feels like how you were interacting in city

Yeah. That's because that's how I interact as town...

[Something_Smart]

i mean i don't even feel SS is scumhunting here guys.

...and?

[Something_Smart]

do u not scumhunt anymore?

Not on D1.

[Something_Smart]

Like that’s not scummy?

It isn't.

[Something_Smart]

i don't think so
i'm basically basing it off of pyp and city
and i was scum in both so that might be warping my perception
but you feel a lot more like city than pyp

What specifically feels more like City than PYP?

[Something_Smart]

r u townhunting here? Ur still distant af and it bothers me.

Yes? I have like four townleans.

[Something_Smart]

you feel more passive and like you're reacting to things rather than trying to set/determine the conversation yourself

That definitely sounds like warped perception because I can't think of one time in PYP when I tried to set or determine the conversation.

[Something_Smart]

Of course. But it will be on my own schedule, not yours.

[Something_Smart]

I think I get it, but it seems like pretty early to make that determination, especially since there aren't a lot of things to have opinions on and there haven't been any situations that require mechanical guidance.

[Something_Smart]

Another one

Skitter was scum, I was town

[Something_Smart]

gobble claimed he was crumbing his role, skitter said she stayed off wagon because of said wagon, and now gobble claimed he's the serial killer. So gobble lied. So skitter lied.

That doesn't mean that gobble wasn't crumbing A role.

[Something_Smart]

SS, why the townlean on me? I feel like I’m playing significantly worse here than in zoey’s.

Admittedly I have been burned by this kind of logic but your play seems a lot less focused than in either of your scumgames and I think you'd be trying to get more done.

I didn't townread you in Zoey's, actually, because I thought it wouldn't have been too difficult for you to play the way you did as scum.

[Something_Smart]

Wait no, no oops, I love ponk ball

I agree. The best kind of genius is accidental genius.

[Something_Smart]

“Iiii” -> i read as a tracker crumb

what

[Something_Smart]

VOTE: gobble

Why?

VOTE: gobble

Qu'est-ce que c'est!? Pourquoi?

people have a read on gobbles here. I am shocked.

I am shocked they are not town reads!! Do you think we need to call their doctors?

L-2

Monsieur.... oh mon dieu.

guys i'm not vibing this wagon and i don't get it

OH.

Now I'm embarrassed I didn't see that one myself.

[Something_Smart]

+1, we still lynch gobbles today

I respect him trying to make a deal, but fundamentally he doesn’t have a town wincon and right now he’s in the weakest negotiating position.

He's in the weakest negotiating position... which means he's not a threat, right?

Since we can unilaterally make him lose, he has to do what we say; even though he says he won't be leashed, if a majority agrees to leash him, he'll have to follow or be lynched. That said, straight-up leashing is a bad idea because bus driver, but it seems perfectly fine to tell him to kill someone scummy and if he doesn't (or if you want to be harsh, if he doesn't hit scum) then we lynch him.

[Something_Smart]

Also — yes, we should still lynch gobbles, but you should change your vote temporarily to where you think groupscum is to make it easier to track where people thought scum was on D1 in retrospect when people look back at ofhrz’s ISO and the VCs

Or people could just read the game instead of using VC's as a crutch?

[Something_Smart]

i'm not super comfortable removing those setups until/unless we have further information that shows why this would be highly unlikely

I assume he's using probability.

I would dismiss seven T's (0.8%) but not one T (5.5%).

[Something_Smart]

Scum has more info about the setup so they could know that SK is a safe claim.

No they can't?

[Something_Smart]

No, then we’re weaker because we’re getting further away from outnumbering the scum and he gets to coast another day because people want to try and flip their scumreads.

This sounds like empty rhetoric to me.

You're talking about him surviving another day as if it's automatically a bad thing. Is it? If we compare lynching him tomorrow to lynching him today, the only difference is that an extra player dies overnight. If that player is > rand scum, then it's good; otherwise, it's bad.

Then, if he killed scum, we can leave him alive one more day to put us back on odds without worrying about losing majority. If he killed town, we might have to lynch him-- and this gives him a powerful incentive to play along and try to hit his strongest scumread.

If you assume that his reads are better than random, there is at the very least a reasonable argument for leaving him alive.

[Something_Smart]

if he thinks you'll shoot town he gets another person closer to lylo without having to do anything

And anyone who wants to lynch him might be scum who thinks he'll shoot scum or take out a future mislynch. What's your point?

[Something_Smart]

For the record, Occam's razor says this is town-you who actually has to read me for the first time, rather than scum-you specifically attempting to pocket me by tunneling me. (Which is something lilith has done, but it's still an unusual tactic.)

[Something_Smart]

That post was @skitter if it wasn't clear

[Something_Smart]

Mena already told me, thanks SS

Sorry, didn't finish reading before commenting :3

[Something_Smart]

There is NO INCENTIVE for the turkey to kill scum because that LITERALLY is playing against his wincon

Like in the world where we mislynch every day and the turkey saves us by shooting 3 scum in a row — what does he think happens, we go “yeah, thanks turkey, we just won’t lynch you so that you can win bc you were so helpful to town” lmao

Saying "there is no incentive to kill three scum" is not the same as saying "there is no incentive to kill one scum."

He has a very real incentive to kill one scum-- we lynch him if he doesn't. Whatever minuscule chance he has to win, it comes from doing whatever we tell him so he doesn't get autolynched.

[Something_Smart]

but cool, now i’m being pushed for being honest about where i am with the game, so i know to literally never do that again

[Something_Smart]

what do you mean by the part about zoey’s?

I wouldn't townread you if you were playing similarly to that game.

[Something_Smart]

no, i meant what about my play in zoey's did you think could come from scum?

...all of it? If I didn't think all of your posts could come from scum, I'd be townreading you.

[Something_Smart]

what?

That comment is not helpful and you know that.

[Something_Smart]

I think the scummy part is saying "I'll catch up". It's like a well-known secret that scum feels guilty for not giving content so they subconsciously make posts like yours.

Person dependent. Knowing lilith I think she would feel equally guilty about being behind as either alignment.

[Something_Smart]

Being able to come from scum is the default state of a player's posts, until they do something that seems unlikely to be scum. In that game, you were active and engaged, you expressed and pushed reads that had the potential to be an agenda, and you tried to work together with others. You never really did anything weird, contradictory, or unexpected. That's pretty much how your scumgames have gone as well.

[Something_Smart]

What happened to your magic ability to read me?

You've changed a lot.

Or maybe it was never there and you just happened to never roll scum against me.

[Something_Smart]

I actually really disliked smart’s efforts to preserve gobble because I think that gobble is very much not going to play pro-town however much he says he will, because I respect gobble too much to thing he would disregard his wincon just because

Would you compromise on lynching gobble as soon as he fails to kill a scum? Under that rule, doing anything other than killing scum is disregarding wincon.

Unless you think his wincon is to kingmake the game to scum.

[Something_Smart]

Ooh - gif copying as a response...I could lynch him today.

[Something_Smart]

Was the retraction serious? It read like a joke to me.

[Something_Smart]

I'm waiting for him to confirm whether it was serious before I say anything about it.

[Something_Smart]

VOTE: gobble

He almost certainly is scum.

[Something_Smart]

Because I didn't want him to back out of the VT claim?

[Something_Smart]

I meant during the first wagon or the one that prompted him to claim sk or voting him inmediately thereafter

Like why no and not at any point before the vt claim

Because I thought he was an SK before, and now I think he's groupscum.

[Something_Smart]

Gobble doesnt make sense as groupscum tho ... he got run up twice and the game magically freezes when he claims sk ?

So scum can't be run up?

[Something_Smart]

claiming sk seems like a pretty dumb move as groupscum

But not as town?

[Something_Smart]

Ss voting me is self preservation too

Right, that's why I didn't vote you and instead defended you both times when your wagon was high.

[Something_Smart]

Because why not vote him when he first claimed sk

Are you being deliberately obtuse? I clearly don't want to lynch an outed SK for mechanical reasons, but he's not an outed SK anymore. He's someone who admitted to fakeclaiming SK, and that makes significantly more sense from mafia who was hoping to get a pass for a few days but realized he wouldn't, than from either town or actual SK.

The situation has changed, and you're acting like it's the same and then getting confused about why my opinion changed.

[Something_Smart]

Its a silly thing to do as either alignment but i think its significantly more likely to come from town than scum because scum dont purposefully do things that might get them pl'd

I mean he obviously claimed SK to avoid being lynched.

[Something_Smart]

So it doesn’t matter that you defend me twice because with any other claim I die then
Huh.

Self. Pres.

Huh?

[Something_Smart]

Also the wagon had stalled so like ... why, at that point, rock the boat and change up the situation that took him out of the immediate lynch zone

Because it seemed like most people weren't willing to give him another day?

[Something_Smart]

Look, it's literally pl-able behavior and i dont believe scum does this

I have seen scum do it before.

The situation was not exactly the same; that was a closed multiball game. But it was pretty similar because people didn't know whether there really was an SK or not.

[Something_Smart]

You now voting me only because I’m not the SK means you would have voted me had I not claimed anything useful to you, despite you “town leaning” me earlier in the game.
Your two defenses of me don’t matter at all in that case.

Uh no? It means I'm voting you because you claimed anti-town and then took it back, and there's clearly scum motivation and clearly no town motivation in that.

[Something_Smart]

HOLY CLUCK

IF I WANTED TO CONTINUE TO LIve WHY DO I NOT JUST SAY OK GIVE ME YOUR LEASH TARGETS

I don't know. Why didn't you do that?

[Something_Smart]

Almost50 replaces Chemist1422

o/

[Something_Smart]

I'm very ill with some sort of respiratory sickness (please dear god not covid) so I will not be here much over the next couple of days

Be well turkey

We'll try to help lighten your load by removing all your responsibilities in this game.

[Something_Smart]

Like, I am NOT the Hider, but IF I WAS I'd be hiding behind Maria tonight. Now am I a Hider? Am I a Commuter? Or am I something else? I mean, I could be Tracker and "track record" would be my crumb. Then again, I could be just a VT messing around and making Scum unsure. Hell, I could be a 1-shot Tracker (thus KNOW there has to be a FULL Tracker) and I'm just baiting the NK away from them, while -simultaneously- telling them that I would be on Maria so they should be on someone else.

Oh, I've missed playing with you.

[Something_Smart]

Ok, yeah, I have no problems with

VOTE: SS

Why?

[Something_Smart]

the SR was still intact when I looked at certain VC counts (that made sense for the team to be in this lynch pool) and he was mainly not voting in all 3 of them (the scum that stays off wagons while his partners fish for the desired mislynch that would stick)

Ha ha ha.

[Something_Smart]

No, I shouldn't.

[Something_Smart]

You all should come up with actual reasoning for your reads on me that isn't clearly NAI, but we can't always get what we want.

[Something_Smart]

And I honestly feel like it's kind of ridiculous that I'm being pushed for calling gobble scum when that doesn't suit any agenda (if he's VT then I just look mega bad on his flip, if he's my partner and I'm bussing then lol, if he's SK then he probably shoots me if I fail to get him lynched), and sticks out like a sore thumb. Last I checked I wasn't in the habit of drawing attention to myself for no reason as scum.

[Something_Smart]

Like seriously.

The support for gobble groupscum is not there. I knew it wasn't going to be there. People are not thinking critically about the claim and retraction and instead just going "oh maybe he's VT who messed up" as if that makes any sense.

WHAT IS MY ANGLE HERE AS SCUM?

Please answer that. What am I trying to accomplish as scum, knowing that people are very likely not going to listen to me, because they never do?

[Something_Smart]

and I think your angle might be as simple as "survive" because I think the game has been headed towards the lynch being you if not gobbles for a while and so long as he was claiming SK there were voices (myself + others) strongly advocating for his death.

That's not even accurate. I had two votes when I voted gobble, and there were two other people also at two votes.

[Something_Smart]

s_s, what's your read on Mena?

Slight townlean? I don't remember most of the stuff he's done, but his interactions with me feel pretty reasonable and it doesn't look like he's shying away from interacting with me which I'd expect he'd do as scum.

[Something_Smart]

regarding the reasons for people being on his wagon - i have a lot of respect for SS as a player, i think he’s very intelligent and strategic, and i trust him over me completely when it comes to mechanics. i witnessed firsthand the kind of thought process that goes on when he’s scum, and i am absolutely, 100% certain that all of the things he said that seemed mechanically “off” to yall (ie the hider strategy with Bingle, and whether to leave SK!gobbles alive), he would say regardless of his alignment. scum!SS wouldn’t be saying things that he doesn’t genuinely believe is the best play. i can’t quote this verbatim but something he said to me while we were hydraing together is that he literally won’t post anything that he doesn’t think is true. on top of that, if he knew that what he was saying about hiders and keeping gobbles alive weren’t the best plays for town, i don’t think he would stick his head out and be the lone dissenter, i think his approach would be to not stand out. so feel free to think he’s wrong, but these takes being “wrong” is not scum indicative for him and i will defend this until the end of time. this is not a valid reason to scumread SS. even if my townread on SS is wrong (which i really don’t think it is), hell, even if i were scumreading SS, i would still argue that these points are not valid reasons to scumread him.

This so much.

[Something_Smart]

I think I still want to lynch SS because I looked back at some of his games and don’t think that he’s anything like his town self here

Elaborate?

I mean, I agree with you that I'm playing fairly differently, because my play is worlds apart when I'm under pressure versus when I'm not (and spoiler alert: the latter is easier to read), but it's definitely not the case that I'm playing more like my pressured scum self than my pressured town self.

If you're thinking of G&R III, I didn't give any shits by the time I was lynched in that game.

[Something_Smart]

I also really think they give the lie to this, because town S_S pretty definitively does scumhunt on D1 and this now sounds much more like an excuse for not having scumhunted than it fits into his meta of not letting people push him into stuff

Would you like me to find myself saying I don't scumhunt on D1 as town? I'm sure I can.

It's not literally true, of course, since it depends on the situation. But my philosophy is very much to try to find town in the early stages and then put things together mechanically from there.

[Something_Smart]

These all seem like arguments for a null read.

...I mean, yes. It's an argument for why a thing that people are calling me scum for is not a good reason to call me scum.

[Something_Smart]

i mean it's pretty clear that i'm aligning myself strongly with SS here which is just a stupid move if we're scum together.

Is it an angle you would take if you were scum and I was town?

[Something_Smart]

Where u at with everyone.

Skitter, lilith, Menalque, maybe A50 are townleans.
Gobble is scum.
Probably among the people who've voted me the vote I've liked the least is Bingle's, I would have expected him to understand why my gobble read flipped rather than just sheeping skitter's reasoning there.

[Something_Smart]

S_S what would your read have been on lilith if she’d entered the game hard shitpushing you?

Null probably, given that she did that to me last time as scum and I townread her for it, so it's completely WIFOM as to whether she'd do it again.

[Something_Smart]

where am i at? Ive basically the same stance as skitter on u. But u haven't really voiced opinions on me.

I mean I don't townread skitter because she scumreads me, so I don't see why you should expect me to have a read on you just because I have one on her.

You have a pretty good track record at reading me, but I also don't think it's a red flag for you to be scumreading me here, partially because you were tunneling me since before I was a major wagon. I don't think you've really done anything else readable in the meantime?

[Something_Smart]

Who do I have to convince to vote gobble to get this lynch over?

I'll do anything, you tell me, I'm in

The people who aren't voting me, presumably. Blake, A50, PP.

[Something_Smart]

hey SS did you see my response to this

I didn't. I agree with it though.

[Something_Smart]

i think its fair for u to have a read on me and skitter because we had the same position. R u not partially basing ur read on skitter in how she reads and formulates one on u? Do u think skitter is just sheeping my opinions here or something?

It was based on her scumreading me for a supposed contradiction about the gobble wagon, which I thought was an angle she wouldn't take as scum. As far as I can remember you never pushed me based on that, or on any unusual reasoning really. Your push is pretty generic and probably the way you would go about it as scum.

[Something_Smart]

you're also actively asking for other people to towncase SS but didn't read mine. is there a reason you're being an asshole to me?

In fairness, he is right that most of your supposed towncase for me was more of a nullcase. You admitted that your process of reading me is mostly mindmelding which is pretty much just gut, so I wouldn't expect your towncase on me to be very compelling. (I still don't even understand how you read me so well most of the time.)

[Something_Smart]

Yes. But you certainly wouldn't be alone.

[Something_Smart]

For what it's worth, I think lilith's recent interactions are much closer to how I would expect her to play as scum than her earlier ones were.

[Something_Smart]

Not to my knowledge?

[Something_Smart]

I'd have to think more about Something_Smart, because I would not normally expect the appeal to emotion that he used earlier.

To be clear, I wasn't trying to appeal to anything. I was just expressing my frustration, but you are right that I don't express emotion like that frequently.

[Something_Smart]

Correct.

I was looking to indicate what I was referring to without having to link it, but it was not precise, no.

Fair enough. Just making sure we're on the same page.

[Something_Smart]

I may not have an accurate conception of scum-Menalque.

But I don't think the scum-Menalque I know gets indignant about not being labeled a scum mastermind, when doing so directly opens him up to suspicion. Possible exception is if it's his partner's list he is objecting to.

[Something_Smart]

I don't see the inquisitive Maria, nor do I see the confrontational Maria either. It's like you're being a pale shadow of yourself. You aren't asking questions or making convoluted deductions. You are there but not really there.

I think that's mildly town indicative?

[Something_Smart]

Why are people talking about an SK after there was only one kill?

[Something_Smart]

That’s a bold claim for skitt to be making here if she’s SK, not that it makes it impossible

"Bold" is not the word I would use. I prefer "stupid".

[Something_Smart]

I find it highly amusing how many players are expressing that I'm either a scumread or a PoE read, and yet nobody has tried to wagon me yet.

What's amusing about that? It's not like people can only have one scumread.

[Something_Smart]

Hey S_S what are your reads and what do you make of what’s happening atm?

Honestly what gobble did has left me pretty tilted and not in the mood to effort. I still think Bingle looks the worst of the people who were pushing me, skitter was obvtown even before the vig claim, lilith is a giant question mark, you and A50 are town I think.

[Something_Smart]

Lilith's interactions leading up to skitter's claim look pretty awful but I think the fact that she's receiving pressure over me makes her town unless the scum are really bus-happy.

[Something_Smart]

i don't understand why being pressured more than you would make her town unless you were scum?
and i'm assuming you're not arguign that you're scum here

If she were scum then scum would probably be making more of an effort to shift the wagon off of her and onto me.

[Something_Smart]

You?

[Something_Smart]

But not very strongly, you're just the only person I have any significant negative feeling about.

[Something_Smart]

The more I think about it the more I feel like scum would be bussing lilith here rather than trying to swing it over to me knowing she'd die tonight or tomorrow and the people who pushed me would look bad.

[Something_Smart]

ss how do you feel about lilith rn?

ss did you answer this?
(and if you did, sorry, can you just requote it for me?)

Sort of. I said she was a big question mark in 2713. The short answer is I don't know. The long answer is also I don't know.

[Something_Smart]

But conspicuously lilith and S_S are not voting. Is it not impossible, but is it even implausible to say that they’ve had weird interactions and been defensive of each other, they’re both scum and the reason people are happy with either is because scum don’t want to stand out by collectively pushing a third townie as a read but town are torn over which one is more likely to be scum and that’s why the votes are split like this

Obviously that’s possible, but I actually think that’s fairly plausible

I'm not sure how much you've played with scum-me under pressure but I can tell you that if my partner and I were the two main wagons I would be bussing the pants off of them, not being wishy-washy.

[Something_Smart]

- if they're svt why is the s not voting the t

I mean, I can totally see scum-lilith setting out to pocket me and expecting to get townpoints from defending me while I'm being pushed.

[Something_Smart]

I think this is possible but not my experience. I actually remember you really struggling to make a decision on whether to bus your partner (Pine) in Added to the Group Chat when I forced you to choose between bussing him or saving him.

The difference is I wasn't under pressure there, I was fairly townread and I was debating whether or not I could use that trust to shield him.

[Something_Smart]

True, but I think that in this scenario there’s also the mitigating factor of your prior read on lilith making it hard for you to suddenly shift to bussing if you were on a “mutual townreads” course earlier on.

I don't think it would be hard for me to shift to bussing, I never had lilith as more than a light townread and they were based on very early things.

[Something_Smart]

It’s almost like he isn’t role claiming because he’s trying to decide what the best fakeclaim is or if we won’t lynch him for claiming VT because we’d know that he knows that fakeclaiming is optimal

okay use your head man

what's more likely, that I'm spending literal hours trying to agonize over what to claim, or that I'm at work and don't want to take the time to focus on this game?

I'm off of work in half an hour, I would like to talk to people before I die but I know that if I just post my claim now I'm going to be dead before then so thank you for your patience.

[Something_Smart]

You insult my intelligence.

[Something_Smart]

So what you’re saying is you have enough time to be up to date with exactly who’s voting you and to what level but not enough time to make a claim?

I'm going to write up my thoughts on the game and if I claim before then I doubt I'll get a chance to do it. Think of it as leverage.

[Something_Smart]

If skitter and I both agree to not hammer you until you get to give final reads will you claim now? I can make no guarantees on the penguin’s actions

I guess

[Something_Smart]

I would assume that PP would want to hear them as well, so that seems fair.

[Something_Smart]

VT.

[Something_Smart]

Now let me finish my work lol

[Something_Smart]

Why is it that I’m picturing you in a swivel chair stroking a white cat as you post this?

How did you get access to my webcam :0

Okay writing up now. Thank you for having patience.

[Something_Smart]

Okay so first of all I want to apologize to the game. Regardless of what Menalque says is or isn't plausible, my enjoyment of a game can actually be killed pretty easily, and I've actually had pretty much no wim for the entirety of D2.

The gamestate as a whole I think quite frankly has not at any point in the game been healthy. Gobble and lilith and I were all pushed pretty much entirely for being low-hanging fruit. Menalque's case on me is riddled with assumptions, generalizations, and just poor critical thinking in general. In a vacuum I would say it's scummy but I do think everything else about the way he's handled this game is extremely genuine.

The case on lilith is similarly tenuous, and while I almost certainly should be voting my counterwagon here, I'm not sure that it would actually be better for the game if she got lynched. If she's scum, she's probably being bussed or I'd be long since dead, but if she flipped the attention would probably go to my wagon.

Anyway. I definitely don't have a read on everybody. Some people have just slipped by my radar time after time, and some people I've paid attention to but wouldn't trust myself to read at this point in the game.

Skitter is town, because she doesn't have suicidal tendencies.

Menalque is town. He's extremely interactive, and every move is pushing the game closer to potentially being solved.

PP is leantown. His posting today has been pretty dynamic and it seems like he really does care about how things go down. When I've seen him as scum (at least Alisae v. Pine but there may have been others I'm forgetting) he faded into the background, pretty much always.

A50 is leantown. Very hard one to explain. I feel like with all his "I might not be the hider, but IF I AM..." bullshit, he's genuine reveling in trying to troll scum and not worrying about looking weird.

Maria and Blake are null. I know better than to think I can get a handle on these two very crafty players when I'm not invested in the game.

Firebringer and Datisi are null. I don't think I can recall a single thing of relevance either one has done aside from voting me.

Lilith is null. I can't in good faith extricate my read on her from my colored view of the gamestate, and I can understand how this gamestate came about with her as either alignment. Her early posting was towny. Her later posting wasn't. I want to give her the benefit of the doubt and say that she could be town shutting down under pressure, because I've been known to do that and she hasn't played town much since coming back. But I can't commit to a read on her.

Bingle is a scumlean. I know it's stale, but it's the only scum lead I have and it's better than nothing. It feels like he's trying to control the gamestate while keeping his distance. He jumped on my wagon earlier citing skitter's dubious reasoning and wouldn't engage me on it; he's challenged my mechanics but doesn't seem interested in talking it out. In other words, he's distant, and doesn't really seem to be engaging.

[Something_Smart]

ss part of why i was scumreading you this game is that you went after the low-hanging fruit in gobbles at just the times i thought scum would, at just the times i thought it was p obvious his actions didn't come from groupscum

Even though he wasn't groupscum, I disagree that that was obvious. The political aspect of the SK makes claiming SK definitely something that scum would consider doing to save their skin, and gobble is definitely the type of player who would consider fakeclaiming SK as scum (as evidenced by the fact that he did the even weirder play of claiming it as TOWN).

The timing of the retraction was when it seemed to be a foregone conclusion among most people that he was gonna be the lynch but they were going to scumhunt for a while first, which is pretty much the worst-case scenario for him in that spot (as scum he would have been hoping to derail and confuse the game), so he claimed VT to either try to avoid the lynch entirely or bait it onto him immediately.

To me, that made more sense than claiming SK as VT, something which surely means you'll have to be lynched at some point, and people aren't going to take you seriously, and town PR's might be distracted.

[Something_Smart]

also i'm sorry if i contributed to your lack of enjoyment

Nah it's not your fault. It's mostly gobble's, I think.

[Something_Smart]

The other thing about gobble is that my only experience with an SK fakeclaim and retraction was Kaede in this game, who claimed SK and later retracted to VT. I was the only one to (correctly) call her groupscum (it was a multiball game but people didn't know that at the time), and she ended up shooting me because she thought I must be the other scumteam slipping knowledge of multiball.

[Something_Smart]

Er, she may have retracted to vig.

But the point still stands.

[Something_Smart]

The thing is like, I don't see why it's more scum-motivated to go after someone you think is VT than to go after someone you think is SK. If gobble really were an SK he would be a huge thorn in scum's side and that's why I wanted to keep him around, whereas once he's retracted, scum could be secure in the knowledge that he would have to die at some point, and wouldn't have a reason to stick their neck out and try to lynch him immediately.

[Something_Smart]

- when he retracted the sk claim you thought he was groupscum or you thought he was sk?

Groupscum. I thought I was pretty clear on that?

- he retracted when the wagon was at l-5 (and it had been at l-1) so to me if h were scum retracting ... like it was a weird time to retract because the plan had worked and people were giving him some space

My impression of the gamestate was that people were moving off of him to focus on other people and get more reads before switching back and killing him, though it may have just seemed that that was the case because I was annoyed that I wanted to keep him alive and people seemed to not to be listening to my arguments.

But regardless, that doesn't actually matter for his motivation-- no matter what his alignment was, the only possible reason to retract to VT would be because he didn't want to be lynched for being an SK, so he must have been feeling pressure, even if it wasn't really there. Retracting when under no pressure makes as little sense as VT or SK as it does as groupscum.

[Something_Smart]

I’m not asking for a point by point refutation but I would like you to say what you think was generally wrong with my thinking there

Just to make sure we're on the same page, I'm referring to 2957.

Probably the biggest single thing is that you're taking everything I was saying really literally (like for instance, that I don't scumhunt on D1) when they are emblematic of how I approach the game in general and not absolute incontrovertible law. Your comment about 662 is a good example of this-- I said that scum was probably going to be doing similar things to town at that point. You said you disagreed with that, but it misses the point that that's still a very good representation of how I think-- it is always better to assume that something is NAI than to assume that it is AI.

The other thing I'd like to mention is the turkey thing, you seemed surprised that it could kill my motivation that badly. I guess you've never played in a game where that kind of thing has happened, but here is an example; I was a JOAT with a cop shot and I copped the N1 kill and was tilted for pretty much the entirety of D2. You said that you don't think what gobble did was bad but I heavily disagree, and when you try to think about the way I see the game I should think you'd be able to understand that. What he did basically demolished any chance we had of a normal D1.

[Something_Smart]

ok i think this would have been a useful thing to know and to explain why you reacted that way and your explanation makes a lot more sense in this context

Sorry, I did mention it, but to be perfectly honest I didn't want to dwell on it because I didn't want to come off like I was bragging

[Something_Smart]

now the trick is to figure out if ss v lilith contains {any} scum and how their alignments explain the weird/stalled gamestate

Surface level analysis says we are the same alignment and that's why scum don't care which of us gets lynched. The same surface level analysis suggests that scum will try to shift to lilith because she now has more PR equity than me.

Needless to say, I don't trust surface level analysis, and that's why I said there's a reasonable chance she's being bussed.

[Something_Smart]

Now that your read on me has shifted, what do you make of lilith launching a defense of me when I was getting pressured pretty strongly? Do you think that she would be likely to take that angle as scum?

[Something_Smart]

Lynx?

You basically hadn't interacted with me at all except for disagreeing with me on mechanics, and then you posted 1927 and 1931 which were the aforementioned sheeping of skitter's dubious argument.

The only other time you've said anything about why you scumread me is 2723 which is a pretty similarly flawed argument. You never really attempted to understand what I was doing.

[Something_Smart]

What did you make of these contextually, SS? Also, where and what about did we have a mechanics conversation that you thought was underresolved?

Spoiler:

Actively don't want dead:
Bingle
Pink Ball
skitter30 Datisi
MariaR Penguin Power



Need to sort:

Blake Belladonna
lilith2013
Chemist1422
Something_Smart
Menalque
Firebringer

like they see their partners are doing x, so they throw shade on the people not doing x to validate what their partners are doing, if that makes sense

Yeah, that's kinda what I thought you were getting at.

Softdefending gobbles and simultaneously casting shade at the other people soft defending gobbles to hedge his bets against the wagon shifting to a scumbuddy. I think the inverse conclusion (SS is not scum with Skitter/FB/I think there was one more person doing that) is more reliable, though.

I mean the top one doesn't mean much, just that you hadn't got around to trying to sort me yet. The bottom is a reasonable thing to be thinking about, I suppose, but it doesn't really address your read on me in a vacuum.

Probably some of the things I said about mechanics were too strong, I was going off of memory there because if I ISO'd everyone then that post would have taken hours. You haven't interacted with me much at all, I just haven't really felt like your vote on me was reasonable or that you justified it well.

[Something_Smart]

tbh I am not very motivated since I think i am largely being ignored. By both u who i scumread and u don't seem interested in engaging with that scumread which makes me wonder why town u would do so. And makes me more confident ur scum. and 2 everyone besides like datisi today aren't like making me feel like i want to contribute. No one is on my wavelength with maybe besides blake and i think she is kind of floating like me and maybe it makes me a hypocrite but i think that means she is scum.

I'm sorry, I definitely have been ignoring you. It's definitely my own fault, and I'll try to be better about it in the future.

I feel better about this game than I did earlier today, so that's good. Hopefully I'll be able to engage more going forward.

Is there anything in particular you wanted to talk about? I do think in an ideal world you should be able to read me right, though my play this game has been far from ideal and I can understand why you don't like it.

[Something_Smart]

yeah i am kind wondering if ur position on lilith is changing. or what u make of this whole lilith/u situation that is happening.

I mean, I think I've talked about it a fair amount? I had lilith as a mild townread before, she looked like she might have been whiteknighting me and then she acted real weird around the skitter vig claim and the townread evaporated, I think the gamestate right now is really hard to parse and makes it look like she might be town but I can see scum bussing her to screw with the gamestate so I don't really lean strongly either way.

I would like to see her interact now that the wagons have been defused, because I suspect that if she's town she was freezing up somewhat due to the pressure.

[Something_Smart]

Because she seemed a lot more aimless and all over the place and I didn't really feel her doing that in either of her scumgames that I've witnessed.

[Something_Smart]

I'm not going to apply experience from four years ago on that question, so the sample size is really too small. I think she's only been town once since returning (not counting a hydra game that I think she barely participated in), and she died N1.

[Something_Smart]

It certainly doesn't look random to me. Being wagoned can be a motivation killer for sure, as either alignment.

[Something_Smart]

I don’t think that’s a defense tbh. Everyone gets wagoned.

What would be a defense of? Do you think her lurking here is scummy?

[Something_Smart]

fair enough, i mostly asked cuz her motivation majorly dropped in city too

I'm pretty sure she was genuinely busy, and she was in a hydra so it was okay if she let her activity drop in favor of more important things. I don't think alignment had anything to do with it.

[Something_Smart]

Quite an odd breeze we're having today.

[Something_Smart]

@S_S when you get back here do you trust me to read datisi?

I think so? You're pretty familiar with him, aren't you?

[Something_Smart]

That's the type of content that I put out when I'm scum in order to look like I have more to say than I actually do.

I would object to this on the basis that I made it pretty clear what I did and didn't have an opinion on.