Newbie 2079 | Open House | Game Over!!!

[Prism]

Hello everyone. I'm an SE, or a semi-experienced player. I've been playing for 11 years, so I've been around the mafia block quite a few times. I'm eager to share all I've learned over the years with you, and my experience is here for you to draw upon. That said, I am far from perfect and I am most excited for the chance for some of you, as fresh young blood, to teach this old dog some new tricks. I hope we have a fun game we can walk away proud of at the end of the day.

I'm also grateful to get to play with Teeky again after missing the chance to be scum with them years ago, and for flow_trap, who was in my last Newbie. I look forward to the chance at working with you this time around, and if that proves impossible, I hope I can escape with a win one more time before being overtaken.

I don't feel inclined to vote either Cheeky or Taco based off what is posted. Typically it's in good form and general interest to vote someone anyway, but I will wait.

[Prism]

There are a few different schools of thought about how to approach the opening, but the most common right now is what Cheeky explained-the Random Voting Stage, or RVS.

It may sound a little absurd, but simply by voting impulsively or whimsically, organic thoughts and deep convictions will develop. Suddenly, you won't find yourself lacking in what to talk about. It's confusing at first, but it will happen with as much consistency and certainty as the setting of the sun. From a mess of chaos you will find yourself holding beliefs about other players and actions with almost religious zeal.

I definitely do not endorse not voting early. I'm being a little selfish by choosing to abstain, and I don't mind publicly divulging that my reason is just that I want my vote to carry a touch more weight when it comes. If everyone does the same, we'd be in real trouble, and I'd probably abandon it quickly!

[Prism]

(Other approaches to the opening are RQS, or Random Question Stage, where players might ask a brief survey of questions, hoping both to become more familiar and that some scum nervousness may shine through or color the responses. Some examples of what those questions might look like are: Which alignment do you prefer? How do you use your vote most effectively? What's your style as mafia: are you cooperative or more just out to protect yourself?

Another approach relies on personalized experience with the people you're playing with. Having seen them before, you might think you know a way to rattle them as mafia or divine something truthful early, and vote them or invite discussion to try and elicit that response)

[Prism]

Good now, I say; if I knew what the weather was like, I would probably say it is good!

Anyways: VOTE: RH9

Was there anything you disliked in their opening posts?

[Prism]

Why, and what made you pick someone else?

[Prism]

While it turned out to be a dead-end, I think my intent behind asking was obvious. The scumdar's got a false positive, but you're unusually reticent in pursuing it.

I've considered whether to do my part as an SE to kickstart us into gear by voting and taking a more aggressive tempo. I'm willing to be patient for a bit longer, and will point towards Cheeky's rapidly shrinking PoE (Process of elimination, she has Taco, flow, and Noksve as town) as something with more potential.

[Prism]

"Hesitant" is a better word, you were very forthcoming with the actual thought. It's just unaccompanied by a vote, which is a bit surprising.

[Prism]

I find that really amusing, since you saw how much effort I spend shutting players out of the game and weaponizing the pressure of deadlines as mafia, but fair enough. I'll review your start of Iceland later, but I imagine much has changed since then.

[Prism]

VOTE: VOTE: Prism as it is RVS

Was going to townread this vote but the RVS justification brings it back to nai.

Yeah thats fine, I don't see any other reason to vote Prism anyway other than to get a reaction (which I didn't really get)

If it's a reaction that you wanted, I'm a bit of a bizarre choice. I'm also wondering why you wouldn't either read into the no reaction (Were you hoping I'd be nervous as mafia?) or just rebait the hook and try again with someone else.

[Prism]

VOTE: Camel

Right, but you seem to think the fact that I didn't get defensive means you got nothing of value. There's no questioning whether it was actively town or not or investigating what you actually got in response.

(Personally I think it indicates nothing, but my issue here is in process)

[Prism]

How did I not see this coming lmao. Idk about forum mafia but it looks like cheeky is just bwing. Once I get eliminated just keep in mind my suspicion on cheeky. I unvote Prism and VOTE: CheekyTeeky

You seem to think it's a strictly negative thing, but some pressure is a good thing. It's a very similar idea to the one you had when you voted me to begin with. Do you really expect to get eliminated right now?

Cheeky's vote makes three, but I was sitting at two votes for a bit, too.

[Prism]

Prism seems really aggressive but I can't tell if they're pushy mafia or just a pushy townie, so yeah.

This is really funny to me, not because you're wrong but because compared to a non-Newbie I'm keeping myself on a pretty tight leash!

[Prism]

Glad this game is so entertaining

Always is, I haven't been playing this game for 11 years because I hate it after all. I can smile sometimes!

[Prism]

Most players here are new, too, and I don't think the reason I'm voting you is too advanced. I do think voting yourself would be a bad move as town, though: mafia need to get 3 town members voted out to win, and you want to make it as hard for them as possible. Even if you wind up wrongly voted, you want to leave useful information behind you.

I've posted enough for a bit, so I'll try to back off and give some space to the players with more limited access to chime in without being overwhelmed.

[Prism]

Anyways, I think it's time to UNVOTE: Prism now since they're giving off less-scummy vibes after they started posting more.

The last thing you said about me was:

Prism seems really aggressive but I can't tell if they're pushy mafia or just a pushy townie, so yeah.

This is talking about my spree of posting, and I basically quit posting immediately after this except for post 77. I'm not really sure what changed for you in between posts 69 and 135.

[Prism]

I'm seeing a lot of talk about power roles and when to claim. DaTacoX's post 110 is spot on. Town does not want to out the power roles on Day 1 for a few different reasons. First, they will likely die with their power unused. Second, they're a potential confirmed townsperson if the claims/flips work out to narrow it to exactly one setup. Depending on the information from our eliminations, nightkills, and claims, it can be a good idea to massclaim anywhere from Day 2 to Day 4. While this is definitely true in our semi-open Newbie setup, the same is true of most games onsite.

The best way to not out power roles is to simply discuss them, and the possibility of outing them, as little as possible. The only time we should be talking about this is when someone about to be voted out needs to claim (ex. at E-1)

And if you're talking about them without wanting them to even be outed, you're really talking in circles and are unlikely to get anywhere worthwhile.

[Prism]

I'm having a hard time deciding how to feel about Camel. I thought that the "when I get voted out" was preemptive and performative. I've seen a lot of mafia react that way over the years, and thus kept my vote.

I'm not a big fan of this sequence from RH9, so I could see myself voting there as an alternative:

Anyways, should I just vote RegRider as my second random vote? I think I'll do it anyways until he says something about it.
VOTE: RegRider

Actually, UNVOTE: RegRider. I forgot that he said that he was going to be inactive until D2.

Which takes place over the course of a minute. I'm not sure whether it's scummy to read the person only after voting them, but 123 just...immediately removes any hope of getting something from the vote to begin with by saying it's still random and only wants acknowledgement.

Depending on what Conner says in reply to my 180 I could also vote them.

[Prism]

Ah, 36 hour prods. My mistake. I'll try to be in later today.

[Prism]

Reading the last few pages, not much has stuck out to me.

Was putting a reads list together before I came in the thread, wrote at the top of the doc "snake guy is scummy af" without realising I am now the snake guy. Alas, I am Town, and clearly have bad reads on first impression

It is currently 2am where I am, so I'm going to try and get some sleep and remake the reads list in the morning

I didn’t see anything that could be interpreted as particularly scummy from Noksve. What are you referring to besides the lack of posts?

I thought this was a good question, and I was also curious as to what the other reads were even if they were immediately thrown in the trash.

I am also wondering if Connor has any other reads. He seems to have put me in the townlean bin based off of my 182, but most of the commentary on other slots have drawn neutral conclusions. That's not the worst thing-this is a very slow game, and honestly lacking in content across the board-but if there are any other reads, I'd like to hear about them.

[Prism]

And if the cake to the right of the avatar is accurate, happy birthday RH9!

[Prism]

I like to make strictly ordered lists of people from town to scum, so I'll try a stab at it even if there are a lot of slots I don't have much of an opinion on

Town
=====
DaTacoX
CheekyTeeky
RegRider
flow trap
RH9
MargotRosa/Noksve
camelCasedSnivy
Connordragon07
=====
Scum

I feel like I had a more concrete reason to vote camelCasedSnivy over Connordragon, which is more of a gut reaction to Connor's progression on me, but I'll shift over for now. I really liked Cheeky's reaction back in post 96. DaTacoX's posts on page 4/5 were all very good imo, and as mentioned previously I liked the question to MargotRosa.

VOTE: Connordragon07

[Prism]

To respond to Rosa, I'm an infamously aggressive and demanding player as both alignments. It is the norm for every game, whether 9p or 18p, for better or worse, to revolve around me. As town I am rigorous and demanding to a fault, and as scum I am a complete control freak.

I do not want to be that way this game. The point of it is to encourage the Newbies to find footing and learn something. I was willing to be patient to let others experiment, drive the game, and hopefully get comfortable and only nudge when needed. The first time I went out of my way to amplify a voice wasn't any vote or push but actually with Cheeky's town PoE, which I hoped would put pressure scum to try and break into it.

When the game clearly had trouble getting started and numerous players voiced bewilderment akin to treading water, I decided to play a bit more aggressive to help get us into gear. While I was not the first vote, the Camel wagon was clearly started by me.

While all of this is an explanation for my play so far, I don't think any of the above is indicative of being town for me. I genuinely want to make this a pleasant learning experience, and this has been more of a motivator behind my play than what rolecard I drew.

[Prism]

To be fair, I like how while nobody exactly townreads me, nobody completely scumreads me either. The reasoning provided by MargotRosa has convinced me to VOTE: Prism.

The crux of their case seems to be that I want to tag along to other people's (wrong) pushes so that as scum I can avoid the negatives that comes pushing people, and thus avoid pushing people myself. Rosa only comments up to my post 56, but they read to at least 105.

Do you find my distillation an accurate description, and do you believe it to be true?

[Prism]

Have I not tripped the scumdar anymore, flow trap?

FWIW I found 171-175 townleaning, just RegRider being concerned that RH9 was lying about the extent of experience, but not a hill I would die on.

[Prism]

I guess in many ways this game is the opposite of my persona in Iceland, but that's a bold statement.

[Prism]

At the risk of being OMGUSy, I'm wondering why you found it persuasive to begin with. Rosa only read the first 5 pages, and probably didn't know how to update it when I pushed Camel. You saw my turn towards being more proactive, which persisted in other dimensions after the Camel vote.

[Prism]

My reads haven't really changed since post 244:

Town
=====
DaTacoX
CheekyTeeky
RegRider
flow trap
RH9
MargotRosa/Noksve
camelCasedSnivy
Connordragon07
=====
Scum

I'd be willing to vote basically from flow trap down.

I don't see any issues with Connor's recent posts. While they're my best guess at a vote, my gut feeling about the progression on me isn't exactly decisive. It's uncomfortable for me to keep my vote at a place I increasingly feel lukewarm about, so I'll try to sit down work over the game again tomorrow. Maybe something will change, or maybe not.

[Prism]

I actually liked the questioning of RH9 that other players are so critical of. I clearly saw the scumhunting intent and the persistence made me feel like it wasn't just halfassed imitation.

[Prism]

I think "strong impression" is a misnomer when the bar is "not going to vote". That said, suit yourself.

[Prism]

It's a strictly ordered list. I have two townreads and a townlean. The rest are null or scumleans, and as my post on my vote implies, the scumleans aren't strong either. If you put 10 people on a mile long track, they are not guaranteed to be exactly 0.1 miles apart.

I would really encourage you to look at the actual reason I gave for it to be a townlean. I actually gave it once before and just restated it for you.

It's not a tonal read, which I generally don't do or believe in. It's finding a line of questioning plausible and thinking the persistence is likely to come from good faith. I don't think this is clearcut, but I don't think it's a stretch.

[Prism]

You're also making a weird comparison where my townlean of 171-175 is invalid because Reg has given less content than others. His lack of content is a valid criticism, but my read is a direct reaction to the content he did give in 171-175. Finding one section more likely town than not is enough.

By contrast, I have seen plenty from other players that I actively do not like and have questioned accordingly, and would probably be pushing more strongly were it not 4/5 different players I felt that way about.

[Prism]

The way you have engaged with my read of RegRider, asking for a reason only to completely dismiss it as impossible because of your own completely separate criticism of him, is deeply frustrating.

[Prism]

That acknowledgement was what I wanted. Thank you.

[Prism]

At the risk of being OMGUSy, I'm wondering why you found it persuasive to begin with. Rosa only read the first 5 pages, and probably didn't know how to update it when I pushed Camel. You saw my turn towards being more proactive, which persisted in other dimensions after the Camel vote.

I think you missed that this is asking for further elaboration on why you found Rosa's case persuasive.

I will not wind up having the time to go over the game again today, but I should have virtually unlimited time this weekend to read and talk as people desire.

[Prism]

Why is everyone against RegRider and Prism?

I think I said I TR Prism, if I didn't I did now :3

...My interpretation of this is just an outright scum claim.

VOTE: flow trap

Maybe I'll change my mind in the morning, but there's eagerness to take another shot at something and then there's blowing past every warning sign right after the first accident.

[Prism]

Don't get me wrong, there are clear differences between this game and Iceland, but they're all stylistic and trivial to fake as scum, and I think you're smart enough to realize that.

[Prism]

Votes up until that point"

I hadn't voted. Your wall in large part centered on my refusal to vote. The vote I did wind up placing, on Camel, you did not respond to or comment on at any point. It has the most justification in the game of any given at that point.

[Prism]

Maybe you're a bit too out of it from Diablo 2, and have some pretty important Political Economy readings with higher priority, but you might want to work back over your own points before leaving to their defense.

[Prism]

It means I don't buy how easy that townread was to get from you.

[Prism]

Margot was middling for me but that last post has them in a downward spiral.

[Prism]

"Votes are baseless" is just such a flummoxing critique of someone who hadn't voted, especially for Margot whose entire initial critique was about my abstention from voting

[Prism]

...Does it phase no one except myself and flow trap that MargotRosa, when challenged, clarified that my "votes up until that point read as pretty baseless" where at that point I had placed no vote? What votes are they reading?

[Prism]

I also am puzzled at that flow trap placement because that read on me from flow trap is deeply troubling from a meta perspective. Flow trap's last game with me they watched me control an entire game start to finish as scum, and turn myself into a UTR the second I felt like being one.

There's being eager to try again but townreading me with this little content is really out there.

[Prism]

My schedule frees up with the weekend tomorrow.

We have a deadline extension due to replacements, we have about 2.5 days. We don't have to use all of that, but it's not immediately dire.

[Prism]

...I feel like that is incredibly close to my distillation, but I guess there are some small differences (Ex. Pushing without voting means I'm not just hoping to tag along with others)

Still curious if this changed when I actually voted. You conveniently stopped your analysis at that point. Working over my defense, which explains the shift over time, would be mostly pointless only looking at pre-vote Prism.

P-Edit: Well this was bad timing, take care though

[Prism]

I'm here if anyone has anything they want to specifically discuss. I have a few things I'll respond to.

[Prism]

So originally I had a paragraph typed up here about how I'm moderately opposed to the vote. Working my way over DTX's points I'm now more "slightly opposed".

My earlier goal was to let us milk the pressure without getting in the way, but then I had to defend the townlean to Cheeky so that didn't really work. Now that it's on the brink of going through I'll be a bit more direct in my opposition.

I won't stand completely in the way as I'm not terribly confident, but I want to at least address the points against the slot.

[On the RegRider vote]It's more than that for me.

1. Voted on Cheeky for "pressure" then unvoted immediately when she was barely close to being eliminated.
2. Suspicious of flow for looking into and questioning his earlier messages. (Never actually answered the question)
3. Only comments thus far are on messages directed towards himself and responding negatively to Cheeky's posts.

Because of the lack of content and the fact that I've interpreted a lot of it to be suspicious, I consider RegRider to be the safest vote today.

#1 I don't think is stellar play and is arguably +scum. I think the stated goal of getting the reads was most important to RegRider more than pressure for its own sake, and I think his persistence on the point reinforces this idea.

#2 I...kind of agree with. 309 is just a bad post.

#3 I don't think is true, see their conversation with RH9

Okay, after getting through #2 more indepth, I'm a little more skeptical of the slot but still not one of my top picks.

[Prism]

To be fair, I like how while nobody exactly townreads me, nobody completely scumreads me either. The reasoning provided by MargotRosa has convinced me to VOTE: Prism.

I think that the some of the reasons provided by DaTacoX, especially the one on pressuring CheekyTeeky, has prompted me to VOTE: RegRider.

You really need to explain what about them is persuasive to you. I asked you three times about what you found persuasive from Margot to no avail.

I don't see what you see about RegRider's unvote on Cheeky, because you did something very similar to RegRider:

Anyways, should I just vote RegRider as my second random vote? I think I'll do it anyways until he says something about it.
VOTE: RegRider

Actually, UNVOTE: RegRider. I forgot that he said that he was going to be inactive until D2.

Perhaps the inactivity vs. E-2 reasoning is a major difference, but I'd rather hear it from you.

[Prism]

I think that the some of the reasons provided by DaTacoX, especially the one on pressuring CheekyTeeky, has prompted me to VOTE: RegRider.

Panicked for a second cuz I thought y'all just mislynched while I was gone lol.

That's a little much for someone you just had as a neutral read?

I don't think you're voting atm-who are your top picks to vote out today? We do need to start getting a move on.

As a small note, try to avoid use of the word "lynch" here. We're trying to phase it out of the site vocabulary, but I understand it's deeply embedded.

[Prism]

Town
=====
DaTacoX
CheekyTeeky
camelCasedSnivy
RegRider
MargotRosa/Noksve
Connordragon07
RH9
flow trap
=====
Scum

I think I've discussed my reads on flow trap & RH9 adequately. I should probably revisit Cheeky at some point, and Camel's gone up just by default and pure activity which isn't great either.

[Prism]

I...really think you can dig deeper into

why

the reasoning struck a chord with you, even if it might take time to pinpoint it.

[Prism]

We have about 44 hours to decide. Much of that will be eaten up by sleep. We should start trying to consolidate soon, flow trap is my preferred and is the largest counterwagon atm but I am willing to go Connor or RH9 as alternatives.

[Prism]

(And would hammer any wagon to avoid no elim, but I don't want people to think the current trajectory of RegRider is inevitable)

[Prism]

My flow trap read is based off of my prior experience with them in Newbie 2051: Iceland. It is difficult to explain to others except that I don't think they townread me so easily.

I also am puzzled at that flow trap placement because that read on me from flow trap is deeply troubling from a meta perspective. Flow trap's last game with me they watched me control an entire game start to finish as scum, and turn myself into a UTR the second I felt like being one.

There's being eager to try again but townreading me with this little content is really out there.

[Prism]

VOTE: Connordragon07

My interpretation is that there isn't enough appetite for flow trap today. Let me know if I am wrong. This is my next best suggestion.

[Prism]

I'm curious to hear more from RegRider, especially their thoughts on Connordragon and their reaction to the long sought-after readslist from Cheeky.

[Prism]

My flow trap read is based off of my prior experience with them in Newbie 2051: Iceland. It is difficult to explain to others except that I don't think they townread me so easily.

I also am puzzled at that flow trap placement because that read on me from flow trap is deeply troubling from a meta perspective. Flow trap's last game with me they watched me control an entire game start to finish as scum, and turn myself into a UTR the second I felt like being one.

There's being eager to try again but townreading me with this little content is really out there.

I mean, you acted quite different

I addressed this in post 356. If this read is legitimate, you are fortunate that it will go unpunished.

[Prism]

I will be around tomorrow to vote as needed. I'm pretty disappointed by the lack of substantive input from many of the slots as we approach deadline.

[Prism]

And actually, I might vote for Connordragon07 because he seems to want Cop to out if they have info even though this might put Cop in danger. See Post 453. VOTE: Connordragon07

Cop should out if they have a guilty, but this is funny coming from the person who was PR fishing.

...Is this seriously the only thing you have to comment on after being AWOL the last few days?

Tempted to abandon my own wagon and vote you for this alone.

[Prism]

FWIW I didn't take Connor's post as PR hunting, or talking about roles/guilties in this game at all. He was talking about how unused to voting people out without mechanical info he was, and gave two countervailing examples (abundance of clears, cop guilties, etc.) without applying them to this game. He wasn't asking for cop, inviting people to talk about a report, or even opposing voting people out today.

Please also note that this game is daystart, and that no night actions have been taken by any roles.

[Prism]

7 hours to deadline. I'm down to flip either of the two main wagons (Connor, RegRider)

I was opposed to RegRider up until he decided there was nothing worth commenting on from the last 3 days.

[Prism]

RegRider, not only did I ask you questions, Cheeky currently has 0 votes. She needs 5. You are not even voting.

Why should I assume this is even remotely in good faith?

[Prism]

The deadline is in literally 5 hours. We need to flip LITERALLY ANYONE

[Prism]

You (RegRider) literally spent half the day crying out for a readslist from Cheeky then completely refused to react to it, and are now pushing her anyway with zero votes 5 hours from deadline.

[Prism]

If RegRider would actually vote we could flip Connor

Alternatively if he doesn't we flip him by default, so lmao

[Prism]

My preference is still Connor but if him+Cheeky both show up I will flip my vote to Reg. I do not care who or what we wind up flipping, we cannot throw away an elim for no reason.

[Prism]

It is better to random vote than it is to no condemn.

It is 100% better to elim a VT over no condemn and without getting specific there are PRs where it is STILL better to vote them out than to no condemn. Elims are town's most precious resource in the setup and we only have three. No condemn instantly drops us down to two.

[Prism]

We're at 3-3. DTX/I are parallel with opposite approaches but available to swap.

What goes through really depends on which of Reg/flow trap show up. Margot's timezone doesn't leave me hopeful they drop by.

Cheeky/camel/RH9 are all voting between the wagons but could also show up and flip.

[Prism]

The deadlines given in vote counts aren't static; they actively counts down based off of when you load the page. I'll quote the most recent VC, and the quote will work the same way.

The deadline as of the time you loaded this page is:

Day 1 deadline is in (expired on 2021-09-27 18:24:47)

[Prism]

I'm not going to swap my vote yet but I am very annoyed that RegRider failed to vote and instead aimlessly commented on starting a vanity wagon with 0 votes on it.

This is fine if he is scum but disastrous if he is town and makes it

extremely

hard to avoid flipping him. As town you should generally not put people in a position where they have to either flip you or throw away an elimination.

[Prism]

Okay, with you and DTX flipping that would be enough.

If flow trap or Cheeky show up and want RegRider we can discuss me swapping instead, but it's looking very unlikely.

[Prism]

I still prefer flipping Connor but currently you're in a position to where you can strongarm whichever you want, and camel/DTX (who are currently set to swap to avoid no elim) both seem to prefer that flip anyway.

[Prism]

Hypothetically I could try and browbeat people into voting my preference but again, this is a Newbie and I think I should encourage cooperation and consensus behaviors over something more forceful.

I will shed no tears for RegRider regardless of what he flips given that he did not vote then peaced at deadline.

[Prism]

If we really wanted to YOLO we have 4 votes available, which is also enough to flip flow trap/Margot

but lmao

[Prism]

VOTE: RegRider

Sayonara, til next time.

[Prism]

I do want to note before nightstart that flow trap's seen similar deadline pressures repeatedly in Iceland, and iirc this timezone lines up for them.

Perhaps they just have a life atm but something to chew on

[Prism]

Town
=====
Taco
Cheeky
Snivy
MargotRosa
RH9
flow trap
Connordragon07
=====
Scum

[Prism]

...The voting is over, RegRider was just hammered, and hypothetically even if the voting was still going on an unvote with nothing else is risking no elim. You would have needed to swap.

[Prism]

I guess that makes me feel better since there wasn't a lot of time in between my criticism of 518 and post 519 but still a bit wonky.

[Prism]

Well I'm currently on the side of a road with a flat tire and several appointments to make for tomorrow so it might be a few days until I can get back into the game

[Prism]

Well I'm currently on the side of a road with a flat tire and several appointments to make for tomorrow so it might be a few days until I can get back into the game

Lame! Hopefully everything works out OK.

It turned into an "After Hours" esque saga that ended with me finally making it home to my apartment at 1am only to find my kitchen destroyed has been falling ceiling tiles and water damage.

So it will be another day or two yet!

[Prism]

I see several comments suggesting I should be a sort of town leader. While I often find myself unwillingly thrust into this position, in a Newbie game especially I would urge you to look more towards yourself and use myself and the other SEs for more general guidance or as a check on your trains of thought.

The point of playing here is not to simply sheep more experienced players, it's to develop the skills and toolset to play games effectively on your own. My experience is yours to draw on but this game should not and will not be me unilaterally deciding where we should go.

Don't be afraid to make mistakes. When the 3 SEs push or challenge you, it is not with the goal that you give up and roll with us but that you either sharpen your reasoning/explanation or realize an error and learn from it.

[Prism]

Nothing to say? I am disappoint. (๑′̥̥̥▵‵̥̥̥ ૂ๑)

For once I didn't run crying to you about it on Discord but it's been a long 24 hours, sorry.

This isn't going to be a game where I play cat/mouse with you.

[Prism]

What reads do you find questionable? I think of the one I have on your slot is probably the most stereotypically Prism read in existence, for better or for worse, but I know I have given others.

I hate to explicitly highlight the idea of doc/JK protection but any NK analysis that does not account for it fails from the start. I won't pass judgement on the validity of NK analysis in general but I usually steer clear from it until lategame.

[Prism]

Also, the most straightforward reason that I am town is that I would have let town no elim then used it as a learning opportunity after the fact. Even with an emphasis on teaching, it helps to see for yourselves the consequences of a no-elim rather than just hear my seminar on it.

[Prism]

If it's not you, yes.

...Or Hectic

...Or Ffery

...Or Nacho

Look man, you've got a point but I try

[Prism]

I think there are other times where it has served me extremely well, and I have repeatedly called it one of my most useful tools. Recognizing that I don't always hit in my application is easy, and I will readily cede there is a miss rate and room for improvement. The read itself should be the least surprising thing in the world to you. All of the wrong applications I listed I corrected within two games days except for our Trust Fall game. (Which wasn't even the first time I did it to

you

, see Chara's Folly. If you're curious for examples that worked, mastina/GreyICE both in Warehouse 13, HEM in Forest Fire.

Connor hasn't done anything to actively lower them since, they just haven't really impressed with seeming town either.

[Prism]

Do you understand how difficult it is for me to believe that you saw the classic Prism read on your slot, which you have repeatedly been a victim of, and your criticism appears to be that it is scummy for me to have it rather than that I'm just the same town dumbass I always am?

[Prism]

Yes, because everything you know about me, and everything about the constructive critical framing I make in scum PTs/postgame, points to 556 being true.

Again it is mind-blowing to me that you see the classic Prism read,

applied to someone who isn't even you (same slot tho), before you replaced in

and react with skepticism

[Prism]

I'm going to step back from this for now both because I want a lower postcount than I've had so far in general, and because 11 years of history is going to be completely unintelligible for the rest of the table. To be blunt I was not happy to see you replace into this game specifically..

[Prism]

You purported to have two townreads on Page 1. I had a townlean on a slot for trying to pursue a line of questioning he he thought had merit and for being persistent in it. Maybe it's not that hard to fake but I again don't see why this is such a struggle.

[Prism]

I suppose regardless of what is happening with me right now, I cannot keep the game waiting. At some point I must return.

I'll try to make time later tonight to reread, if not I will be in tomorrow.

[Prism]

Cat, I think it's almost time for you to be more forthright with your reads and opinions. Would you prefer to give it before I read or wait until afterwards?

Depending on how I tired I am after dinner I am hoping to get through this

[Prism]

Alright, I'm finished watching football, time to read the mafia game

[Prism]

I am 12 pages in and my head hurts. No wonder I have put this off.

[Prism]

Basically while driving around the last few days my thoughts have been like:

-RH9's way of not really giving reads, calling everyone town, and emphasizing that they don't know what to do repeatedly while simultaneously demonstrating some awareness of mafia from other formats has me wondering if it is performative. Comments like "I think Mafia will win" and "I think the mafia team is very smart" do not inspire confidence. Constantly piggybacks off of other's reasoning but can never explain what is persuasive about it.

-Cheeky's reaction to my RegRider read continues to bother me. It is not difficult to understand it is was a townlean for a single line of questioning. Despite this she continually claims my read was overly strong (For the 10th time, townlean) or strength of the read (townlean) or that it lacked in reasoning (Given repeatedly and she has never addressed it as implausible). What was wrong with it goes in circles.

-Connor's hesitance to really give reads until I asked really bothered me, as did the bit assuming RegRider would flip town preemptively. There was a part of me that thought their end of day asking about optimal play w/r/t no vote was +town but not enough to pull me off.

-flow trap's townread on me and catboi's prodding at my alignment both came off intuitively wrong to me in different ways

-Snivy I've just kind of shuttled as town by default which is really halfassed and not rigorous, but the chat background does make more sense and the general activity+level of comfort as time has gone on has made it difficult to resist.

[Prism]

-RH9's way of not really giving reads, calling everyone town,

These can seem a bit contradictory but this was meant to emphasize the paralysis and personal safety by hanging back, playing the noob card constantly, and not really going after anyone. Even the townreads are all surface and bland.

[Prism]

Panicked for a second cuz I thought y'all just mislynched while I was gone lol.

Slip

(Just kidding)

I think it's a legit slip.

Can you remind me why you were flipping back and forth between RegRider and Connor? Here you seem to believe this is a real slip.

The only criticism of the RegRider slot I see from you is lack of content. You also theorized that I was protecting a scumbuddy...but also that I should be instavoted if RegRider is town. This seems to suggest Reg was your second strongest scumread with nothing other than lack of content, while with Connor you thought they actively slipped.

I see that today you apparently worked back over Connor's ISO and feel better about their slot. I'd appreciate hearing what about his posting outweighs the slip in your mind.

[Prism]

I really hate that working my way up into the 20s cat actually beat me to half of my thoughts/questions I had here.

Son of a cat.

[Prism]

The explanation is that I changed my mind.

Further obviously the people mentioning Connor today.

I think the fact that catboi and I both separately thought to ask a question about the same progression means you should probably talk more about it.

[Prism]

I also almost asked basically the same thing as 597 so in conclusion I hate my cat and I'm putting him up for adoption

[Prism]

I've got to make a phone call but I'm basically done reading, will respond to your wall later cat

[Prism]

Nevermind no call

ALRIGHT CAT I'M COMING

[Prism]

I'd also like some clarification: You never actually expressed any sort of read on RegRider, but expressed a strong dislike for the wagon on him. Why is that? Further, why did you hate it when you thought it was hammered early, only to retract that feeling when it turned out it wasn't?

I made clear that I didn't understand the Reg wagon in 401 and wanted clarification of where it had come from, because something seemed off. Given that noone could give me an adequate explanation of why it had happened, I decided to distrust it.[/quote]I could track through all of this, but the shortest question I have is just: why was your vote on flow trap given all of this? Flow was the first vote on the wagon but then got off by the time you voted him, and was not on when you thought it was close to elimination.

[Prism]

I think we mostly agree on Snivy now even though I wasn't sure initially how to slot them. I think we know where we differ on RH9, too. I mostly agree on Cheeky even though the early transparency had them as a townread I recognize they can be performative.

I do think

Prism

is probably town at this point. My suspicion of her on entering the game was mostly a bluff to see how she'd react to it. Her response felt towny enough to me although I'm not sure how best to explain it here. It stuck me as genuine skepticism and annoyance at my push rather than the response of "drat, someone who knows me well replaced in and is scumreading me". I think the reflexive distrust of flow trap's townread of her is, in fact, a town-motivated thinking but a flawed one and was trying to get her to see the flaws in her thinking there. I buy her insistence she wouldn't have forced town to eliminate day 1 rather than letting it go to deadline.

This continues to bother me because it's unclear what reaction you were expecting or hoping for. It seems you might have wanted to dodge the too-quick TR scumread from me by going the opposite way, but this was something you've seen repeatedly with me. I didn't find the way you challenged it to be in good faith but something with the hope of playing the paranoia angle before having the gator snap its jaws on your arm instead.

I think the entire way I speak about gametime decisions-"mistake" "punish" "free", etc, makes the EOD play I make obvious. The townread WIFOM is not worth the price of giving town an elim.

MargotRosa

mostly just seemed like obvious scum to me, and the reception of her in-thread showed how people have a vulnerability to well-formatted wall posts. I found the analysis in them mostly undercooked, and since that point, she largely fell off. The awkwardness in her shifting reasoning for suspecting Prism felt to me like scum who was making up justification after the fact and forgot what their original reasoning was supposed to be.

I agreed with this gut feeling that they're obvious scum but that feeling has been lacking in rigor for me. I don't like to trust gut. I did like opposing RegRider and going on flow because of my own reads, which caused me to rein it in a bit.

I'll review the more specific interactions you highlighted when I next get the spirit

[Prism]

I really have no clue how to feel about catboi right now. Part of me wants to policy him because of that starting interaction with me. The other part of me says if you assume he's town, which is a giant assumption, our reads mostly line up.

[Prism]

This is too reasonable and too personally validating to be real. I refuse to believe this is the real you.

[Prism]

I'm gonna do it

I don't think there's any way you calmly explain that I was, in fact, exactly right with my perception of you as town. Either the claws would have come out and the eyes would have been scratched at or the jokes at my expense would have come out.

VOTE: catboi

[Prism]

I really don't know what to say to someone who seems to think that it is possible for a power role to receive a false (?) guilty on them.

VOTE: RH9

[Prism]

Presumably "knows my real role as a Mafia Rolecop" is saying Margot is the Rolecop rather than RH9 but uhhhh

Yeah. It's a statement.

[Prism]

VOTE: Cheeky

Cat's unvote makes me feel slightly better, not enough to bet the game on it but since no one else is going to vote him today might as well temporarily ally and hope for the best

[Prism]

I was really hoping for a lot more commentary from Cheeky there.

[Prism]

I have not been this lost as to what is going on, what people are talking about, and why those things are even relevant in many, many, many years.

[Prism]

You may ask yourself, "What is that beautiful house?"
You may ask yourself, "Where does that highway go to?"
And you may ask yourself, "Am I right? Am I wrong?"
And you may say to yourself, "My God! What have I done?"

[Prism]

so uh

catboi

whatchu thinkin

hope the weather's nice outside 4 u

[Prism]

I'm basically in the same boat. I have some rough order of preference but cat can fake everything so far and I can barely understand the last 6/7 posts of RH9, and without some more opinionated play from him he will always be a question mark.

[Prism]

Mine would be:
Town {DTX, Margot}
Town lean {flow, RH9, camel}
Scum lean {Regrider, Connor, Prism}

Can we get an update on this? Do you have any townreads at the moment, and I'm especially curious as to what you make of some of the lapses in memory Margot has made.

[Prism]

The apathy in this game is pretty overwhelming. I've worked over the game 2/3 times now and haven't come away with any strong feeling about virtually

anyone

, just slight feelings akin to pulling names out of hats. cat has the best content but has been "wrong" in his interactions with me and I've been bitten by it before.

I'm down to vote virtually anyone at this point. Not only do I not know who the best flip is but we're not even putting anyone in danger to find out.

VOTE: Margot

[Prism]

I made clear that I didn't understand the Reg wagon in 401 and wanted clarification of where it had come from, because something seemed off. Given that noone could give me an adequate explanation of why it had happened, I decided to distrust it.

Then I'm not sure why you "retracted" your hate for the wagon, then, without being given so much as an explanation.

I didn't retract my hate for the wagon. I retracted my hate for the fact that Cheeky didn't mention it was e-1, because it wasn't e-1, and the thing I mentioned hating didn't happen. I always hated the wagon

I don't know why I thought it was 4 to elim d1. Apologies. I retract my hate

You, again, appear to be contradicting your own words. Your actions mostly look like retroactive justification that doesn't hold water as any sort of believable thought process. The fact that you never even stated a read on Reg looks like you were positioning yourself against the wagon to look good later then blame others, and not that you had any sort of legitimate townread of RegRider. You can call your thoughts "stream of consciousness" but that doesn't absolve you from having to back them up at all and the fact that you continue to try to minimize this rather than produce any follow through suggests to me it's not a real thought.

I agree that the process around the wagon (very randomly strong read, retroactive justification) isn't the best but I don't think there's much contradiction with the claim about hatred w/r/t the wagon vs. Cheeky's vote. I was skeptical but reviewing Margot's posts around Cheeky's vote it actually lines up.

[Prism]

I am currently swamped with work. I appreciate the content and will tackle it from 6-8 EST

[Prism]

Same, no one has explained to me why RegRider is scummy.

Ok that's pretty stupid imo

To me that is not really alignment-indicative. But VOTE: RegRider just because the other reasons are good.

Progression sucks.

I'm not as sold on this. If you look at 415 contextually, it comes after a conversation with DTX. DTX gave three reasons and camel disagreed with only one-this didn't really come out of nowhere.

404 came in response to Connor. It took DTX's reasoning to get camel to vote there, but it's not very opportunistic imo. 404 was followed by a vote on me, for example.

[Prism]

I also think that the PR hunt thing D1 implicated RH9 as a PR so the fact that DTX died over them is very suspicious. If I were scum I would've shot RH9 no question.

Can you elaborate on this? I hate making you speculate on another slot's role but you seemed to think it was suspicious that I lived before. I also don't remember DTX giving away they were vanilla, if they did so. RH9 I admittedly could not make heads nor tails of their PR speculating WIFOM.

[Prism]

I feel like Mafia wanted flow trap eliminated but Catboi replaced them and now, Mafia is annoyed because Catboi is too towny to get eliminated. Also, now, I'm certain that ChekyTeeky is Town because they're the first player to outright say that the PR hunt implicated me as a PR. Now, I also somehow get why MargotRosa didn't pursue anybody on the RegRider bandwagon because everybody on that bandwagon was unlikely to get traction because they all seem perfectly like Town. So instead, she votes me because she realises that at least there will be players who might want to vote me and she is correct. So, I would actually congratulate her on that. And really, why is Catboi Mafia, independent of my associations? Catboi can perfectly well be Town but because I seem scummy, Catboi is dragged along while other people who I am likely to also be paired with like Prism who I called a Town Leader and later followed their vote on MargotRosa. If you're so certain that I'm part of the Mafia team, why do you think that Catboi is more likely scum than Town Leader Prism? Note, I'm not saying that Prism is Mafia. I still think that Prism is Town.

I think I'm actually able to make sense of this.

All of this paragraph-like the bit about mafia wanting flow trap eliminated-is working from the framework that Margot is mafia, right?

[Prism]

I'm going to go feral.

do it u nerd u won't LMAO

He's right though and it's something I realized when we were like 3 votes away. We were all way too hesitant to vote and put people in danger and the result is we tread water doing nothing for like 5 days until we finally decided to wagon Margot, and suddenly wow look at that there's actual dayplay again.

And yes if we're not careful we will again be a rushing an hour before deadline and it will be stupid

[Prism]

3 days away*

[Prism]

Margot's posting is...not too much new for me given that I already tracked through the "hate" bit about the wagon/false E-1 vote. There's the lingering question of how legitimate the RegRider read is that at this point will not be resolved. Townreading cat is...interesting? Town maybe?

Kind of want more discussion from them about the vote in RH9. The only justification I see for it is about RH9's thinking about the nightkill.

Looking ahead I see actually they don't like 719 and 720. I think they're overly simplistic reasons but I don't see why reliance on wikitells isn't to be expected from RH9.

[Prism]

Haven't been able to post much the last few days because I had a really bad headache on Wednesday and it only got worse up until Saturday, starting to feel a bit better now so I should be able to post more D3.

Rereading this entrance post I noticed that it's all shade >.> I think I was seduced by the Prism vote.
Connor/Margot not SvS.

Not 100% sure what SvS means so could I get a rundown on the acronym?

The recent posts Margot have made have made me feel a bit better about them, they could be Appealing to Emotion but at the same time they did give off a tired energy in their previous votes, and I feel like I'll UNVOTE: MargotRosa for now, if we don't switch to RH9 or somebody else by the time day is almost over then I'm fine to revote them, but I don't feel like having it end just yet. Should be on within the last few hours since that's only like 10pm-11pm for me so I shouldn't be doing anything else.

...Who do you actually want to vote though? I don't get this unvote since they still seem like first choice and your runner up several days ago was RH9.

[Prism]

I hate that some amount of cat/Margot/Cheeky are probably scum but it's virtually impossible to tell with how low the bar is for content atm, just show you know where the ISO button is and you've already passed the test

I'm less inclined to vote RH9 now that I actually can understand some of what he's saying. I guess I can go Connor or Margot. I doubt that's the exact team and that makes me feel like one of Cheeky/catboi is probably scum but I'd rather vote both Connor/Margot over them.

[Prism]

I think it says a lot that my "don't vote" pool is basically just camel who I'm more just praying to mafia jesus is town rather than anything super concrete

[Prism]

Sure. VOTE: Connor

I will try my best to be around tomorrow but everything's going to shit atm so am not exactly sure how much time I will have. Will definitely have time to move my vote where needed.

[Prism]

Well okay then, let's see if this ragtap group of somnambulists has managed to stumble into a scumflip

[Prism]

....We had a claimed PR and you killed catboi?

[Prism]

I'm just going to assume Cheeky is town after that kill. If RH9 is faking he'll probably get caught with claims (which we should do today)

Basically leaves me/Camel/Margot. I wouldn't put missing the claim past Camel and Margot has been too busy with irl and probably didn't see it.

[Prism]

I...do not know why you investigated two of the most town players, but I'll take it, I guess.

[Prism]

We do massclaim today though, yes. We probably should have had you go last but it doesn't really matter too much.

[Prism]

I don't think order really matters too much here. Scum knows how many PRs there are based off their own role and they know with that claim that there are no masons to worry about.

I'm VT.

[Prism]

If RH9 is tracker instead of cop I actually think we're in mechanical autowin.

I'm assuming he's not cop considering that he thought Margot was a Rolecop.

[Prism]

So I feel like I'm probably the worst Town Cop, ever,

F nevermind

[Prism]

VOTE: camel

Investigate either of me/Margot it doesn't make a difference what their roleclaim is.

[Prism]

(And yes, if that doesn't end the game I get that that is arguably a scummy hammer, but whatever order works for me)

[Prism]

You shouldn't have selfvoted there though since I have incentive to do that as both alignments (And the same is true of you if I were at E-1 in your stead)

[Prism]

With 2/3 of me/you/Margot the name of the game for everyone has shifted to "don't get flipped" where there's some incentive to hunt around but blatant survivalism reins supreme

I've seen scum selfvote repeatedly and am not going to sit here and let you go in the event it's a gambit.

[Prism]

Margot I am begging you to fakeclaim doc.

[Prism]

Prism you should have waited for Margot and you know it.

No, I shouldn't have, and I don't care what the flip says. Hammer me in retaliation tomorrow and lose if you want.

[Prism]

If you think I:

A) Did not kill nor roleblock RH9 as mafia, depending on the setup
B) Killed both a potential miselim and someone townreading me
C) Don't let town no-elim Day 1
D) Try to compromise wagon on my partner Day 1 (which is potential autoloss)
E) Actually compromise wagon my partner Day 2 over letting town no-elim/go on Margot

I don't know what to tell you

[Prism]

Cheeky is actually right. There's a small chance RH9 did not realize claiming cop here would be effectively autoloss as mafia. In that world, my hammer is suboptimal.

[Prism]

lmao

Well Cheeky

Perhaps you had a point

I'll tackle this later

[Prism]

...How is 361 a soft to target me? You were voting me and I was your last FoS

[Prism]

The last post, is literally about me being scum. It'd make sense if this were an offensive role lock but you're claiming it was protective

[Prism]

Let me be more specific: Why was I simultaneously your top scumread and top choice to

protect

?

[Prism]

Will revisit when I am home but if RH9 is mafia I literally threw away autowin yesterday so you can blame me if we lose lol

[Prism]

Margot, are you around? I have a question that only works if you are present at the time.

[Prism]

Let me be more specific: Why was I simultaneously your top scumread and top choice to

protect

?

The point was that I was going to jail you irrespective. Like, if you are scum d1, jailing you means I either prevent a NK, or prevent scum PR depending on whether you were goon or PR (and assuming we weren't in the column 3 setup)

I want to point out that while this would be a valid reason to JK me, this is the exact opposite of what you said in the post that you had prepared overnight to copy/paste.

I JKed Prism n1,

because I thought that Prism was most likely to be targeted d1.

(I crumbed that I would do this in post 361.)

"Prism was most likely to be targeted" in this context means "most likely to be nightkilled"

There is a way to salvage this, which is that this is a secondary reason to the reason in the world where I am town. There is no reason to think this was secondary, though, because I was your top scumread at the time you softed.

I worked out that,

given how wagons seemed to be going in this game, I'd be safe to just indicate who I was going to jail by making sure that I had jailed them

(and had some vague ideas to change my vote after e-0 had been reached if I needed to)

This doesn't see to indicate anything about me being town in the wake of the wagons.

I would appreciate some explanation of why I was "most likely to be targeted [by the nightkill]" at the time of 360. Looking at your claim that the pick was motivated by the wagons at the time makes this even worse. 339 is nearly identical to the vote count at the time of 360. The wagons are...RegRider with 2 votes and myself with 2 votes.

You also had yet to finish your catchup and only dropped in to quickly respond to a refutation I had rather than this being an interaction initiated by yourself with a night choice in mind

[Prism]

And Prism, feel free to interrogate me.

I have two questions:

1) There is only one possible cop in the game. Any setup with a cop has no other investigative role (eg. tracker or another cop). Why did you think MargotRosa might have a guilty on you?
2) These are the setup possibilities for a Mafia Rolecop:



Notice that there is no world where a Rolecop and a Cop are in the same game. Why did you think MargotRosa could be the rolecop?

[Prism]

I am interpreting this as saying the one mafia role it couldn't be as misdirection.

It is still unclear to me where the guilty claim even comes from, but I know you have explained it before so I'll try and revisit that instead of asking you for the tenth time.

[Prism]

I think this is Margot and the game is going to end the second I get them online at the same time as me, but I'll wait for that moment and to see what Cheeky thinks.

[Prism]

I could wax poetic here. I have like 5 different "Gotcha!" moments in mind to interrogate you with. Failing them would result in me getting more confident but...I don't think that answering them correctly would change anything at all.

VOTE: MargotRosa

The loss is squarely on me if this is wrong. We would have had mechanical autowin Day 3 and it was my responsibility as the most experienced at the table to go through the full motions.

[Prism]

Several factors went into that. First, the constant contradictions starting in our back and forth Day 1. Second, RH9 having several posts suggestive of him being cop (ex. In discussion with Connor). Third, those conversations with Connor not looking TvS. Fourth, RH9 never claimed PR Day 2, but you discussed your reaction to seeing it today on Day 4. This is likely because I made a mistake and thought he claimed, and voiced it at the start of Day 3. I went back and realized this didn't happen 5 minutes later but decided not to correct it for reactions. Fifth, the cat kill makes no sense for RH9 as I have been on the brink of voting him repeatedly while cat is an ardent defender.

[Prism]

EBWOP: Third, those conversations with RH9/Connor not looking SvS.

[Prism]

(RH9 did make two posts about Cheeky thinking they were a PR, though, and the second was a bit more suggestive they were right)

[Prism]

I forgot to list it but while rereading, this was the second I decided to hammer instead of waiting to discuss further:

I understand that my gameplay has not been great this game, and if you want to kick me out, go for it. It's been a rough one, and a bit of an emotional roller coaster of a couple of weeks, but I'm back now

I'll try to give individual feedback for people when I have time after work. I think the scumteam honestly played better than the town except we managed to somehow sleepwalk into that Connor flip which virtually ended the game on the spot.

[Prism]

So for the cop role specifically RH9, I want to say that:

1) You were right to wait until Day 3 to claim. Since your N1 report was dead, there was no point in outing Day 2.
2) It is normal to hit town-they're more frequent! Investigating your scumreads is typically the best idea, though clear-searching exceptions exist. If you're doing that you have nothing to apologize for-focusing on why your read was right or wrong is the best way to handle it.

[Prism]

You also put a lot of stock in the reports on myself in Cheeky. This is a correct logical process that leads to the right conclusion, but I don't want to make sure you don't miss another way to realize Margot was scum that last day: JK and cop simply can't coexist in this open setup, therefore she was scum by default in two different ways with the knowledge you had.

[Prism]

For Margot, I think I should discuss two different things.

First, you are clearly talented with your rhetoric and ability to frame arguments convincingly. Evidence of this could be seen in how various players reacted to reading through them without further digging. However, I think this bit you multiple times this game, where you simply said what you thought sounded good. One example was in the infamous criticism of my votes Day 1, while another was about protecting me from the NK Day 2. Your claims should hold up to basic investigation and process, and if they can't you need to reframe it to best explain the differences. You should be preempting basic fact checking or interpretative criticisms. You don't need to reinvent the wheel here or lay out a master plan-no scumplay is going to have a perfect explanation for everything, naturally-but you just need to be sure the bullets you're firing off aren't about to curve down into your foot at the slightest breeze of scrutiny.

Second, I think you underestimated your ability to win against me in 3 way. I think the points in 817 should have been persuasive, but that post was as much for you as it was for Cheeky. I was really hoping you would claim JK and give the hammer to me/Cheeky. The truth is that Cheeky and I do not think or hunt very similarly, and those differences clashed repeatedly throughout the game. It was very difficult for us to see the other as town at multiple points. It's easy for you to look at that list of points and say "Yeah they're all clearly valid as Prism is town," but some might have been less valid to Cheeky, and even the ones that were might not carry enough weight to swing it. Maybe the result would have been the same, but I personally thought you should have just kept a VT claim, and I think the mechanical backtracking we were able to do with both RH9 and yourself reinforces this.

[Prism]

While it didn't work, I think coming up with the soft claim and being able to hide in its ambiguity was a great example of what you should be doing more of. The ambiguity of that post gave you a lot of flexibility to hide behind, and simply going back was not enough to dismiss it. I had to really frame the post contextually and think about it to figure out why it was implausible.

The only reason I was able to see through it was that it was a hail mary mechanical revisionism where you were at a huge disadvantage, not that you did it poorly or that I did anything special. If it were about a read or a vote, I, and most others, probably would not have been able to.

[Prism]

The difficulty with claiming doctor, and why it would have been even more advantageous to town, is that it does two things simultaneously:

1) Confirms you as real, as there is no setup with only a doctor
2) Gives you a report as there was no roleblocker, which as you saw directly led to her being mafia by default.

She had to either kill you or cc you, there was no way around it.

[Prism]

(She could have claimed doctor AND killed you, claiming roleblocked, but this would have again resulted in going against me. The whole point of her JK claim was to go against you, and there was mechanically no way to keep both of us in the mix with the way claims were sorted.)

[Prism]

So it was an attempt at some funky emotional manipulation leveraged on the fact that Town had played sub-optimally. I don't know how solid a strat that actually is, but it was fun to have given it a go nonetheless

It is both very solid and completely out of the range of the site, whose collective scum meta is stagnant and so focused on getting townread as the end-all that they have blinders on.

You are right that experience served as a barrier to this tactic. While I don't speak for Cheeky, it failed for me simply because I had been there before and the position of having fucked up was rote routine. I wasn't tilted, just ready to be right or wrong for the millionth time.

[Prism]

I greatly look forward to playing again, and I hope I roll scum.