Newbie 1068 (Town Wins!)

[Shanman]

Hello Everyone!

As a start to RVS (Random Voting Stage), I'll vote for }|{opa because it's hard to type your name. You're

obviously

trying not to be voted...

Vote }|{opa

Have fun everyone!

[Shanman]

Random Question Stage!

Forthwith:

1) Are you having fun yet?

2) Chocolate or vanilla?

3) How many Mafia games have you played (here or elsewhere)?

4) Lynch all Liars?

5) Math or Sports?

6) Lynch all Lurkers?

7) What do

you

think of the RVS?


I'll post my answers soon, or after everyone, depending on consensus.

1) Having fun yet? Of course! I'm having a wonderful time pondering who we're going to be

killing

tonight... What a fun thing to do! [/sarcasm]
Actually, yes I am. I haven't played in a year, so I'm excited.

2) I would assume Chocolate, because it makes for a delicious ice cream and I like knowing everything.

3) I've played one forum game here, completed. Link, if you're into that kind of thing. I've also played some games on Epicmafia, but not for a while.

4) Yes. Townspeople should never lie. The only people who should lie are the scum.

5) I hesitate to say math, but every time I try to play a sport it turns out horribly.... If you consider non-competitive biking a sport, than sports.

6) No, even the best of us lurk sometimes. RL issues, being shy, inability to come up with points, ect shouldn't be held against someone. However, it's important to make sure that it's not just scum blending in.... I would say "Yell at all Lurkers Until they Post More.

7) I like RVS because it alarms people. It's hard to know when to move on though, at least for me it is.

I would like you to answer your questions now Mr. Nobody Special.

[Shanman]

Well,

some

people certainly have a lot to say... It's forum mafia! Jeez... we've got three weeks until the deadline. Let the people sleep for a while! It'll help us all be at our best.

As for you, RayFrost, I would like to say that I dislike your avatar. I preferred the one that you had in our previous game together. I think that makes you 3 for 4. 75% is not a good grade...
However, this problem could be fixed if a certain

someone

removed a certain

vote

from a certain

other person

... *wink wink*

[Shanman]

Who are you, again? /nomemory

You confirmed yourself as scum by trying to bribe my vote off of you. I shall not be fooled.

I was cop in Newbie 918, otherwise known as "The Trap" or "The Pageant that went Horribly Terribly Wrong"

And you confirmed yourself as scum by fooling the members of this town with your "microavitar".

FoS RayFrost

[Shanman]

...

if that was a vote there would have been hell to pay..

avi trolls don't deserve rope. vote hoppers do.

I like my vote where it is Mr. Kcdaspot, I intend to wait to see how Mr. }|{opa feels about a vote against him.

While I wait, mind telling me why you jumped onto the Neil1113 wagon? Bit odd to be forming bandwagons in RVS isn't it?

[Shanman]

In my game, from what little I saw of Rayfrost, he seemed pretty non-explanatory in his reads. He replaced in and was quickly lynched (town member), so I didn't see much of him.

I also find the town read interesting... I'm not going to ask for reasons though, because he really can't have any yet.

[Shanman]

I'm happy to hear that this will be a more fruitful game! I'm sorry for kind of... trying to lynch you last game? No hard feelings, right?

Also, just to let you know, I "unredacted" your redactions and found them unsatisfactory. Please try again, and find better reasons to redact.

[Shanman]

Might I point out for everyone, this is indefinitely note worthy material.

While I wait, mind telling me why you jumped onto the Neil1113 wagon? Bit odd to be forming bandwagons in RVS isn't it?"

"didn't see the other vote.. and i played with neil before."

Wow! I can't believe I actually found "noteworthy material" in my first shot! Maybe my skills haven't gone down all that much.

I remember in my first game, we harped on the contradiction one player made when he claimed to hate bandwagons a post after jumping on one. (We dropped that topic as a simple mistake, but he turned out to be mafia in the end.)

[Shanman]

@ ray: I thought that shan voted you. if he did it'd be a extreme vote hop. thus my comment.

If he had voted there my vote would be on him.. bout page five... whose yet to post?

I don't think that it would have been that extreme. }|{opa hadn't spoken yet, so my vote wasn't really doing anything. (Speaking of which

unvote

, I'm content with }|{opa's response.) My "vote", had it been one, on RayFrost would have been for seeing how he responded, as the reason wouldn't have been a good one. Just because I vote for someone, doesn't mean I'm positive that they're scum. It's just important to pressure people sometimes.

[Shanman]

Mod Note

: Oh, I didn't mention this before, and it's not a rule or anything (at least in this game), but if you can put votes and unvotes on their own line, it makes it easier for the mod as well as other players to see it.

Normally I wouldn't mention it, but good habits start early!

I'm going to assume that was directed at me, and make a formal apology for my egregious behavior. *Bows to Moderator Zoraster*

Mod Note: You're blameless; I never mentioned it before now. I just wanted to make a note of it now

[Shanman]

I just read the rules: Unvote: neil1113
Vote: No Lynch

An interesting vote. Care to explain? I would think that a No Lynch could only hurt us. However it would clearly benifit the scum because they would be at no risk for a day.

[Shanman]

By the way, does anyone know what the little thing right under people's names is? (It says "Townsperson" or "Goon" or something like that.)

It's a judge of how many posts someone has. Apparently being a part of the mafia is a good thing...

Yeah, I thought about that after I said it, and that became more clear. Whenever I've played before (never online), we've always started with simply falling asleep. That way in the morning we'd at least have something to discuss.
Basically, my vote could help the scum, but given the fact that we're basically just swinging a gun around and pulling the trigger at this point, it seems more likely that we'd hit a Towny than a Mafia.

I suppose I should let the IC explain this, but I think I might know. Usually the way to sort this out is with RQS and RVS. These allow for a bit of conversation, in which the Mafia might slip up. It can be used to see how people interact, as opposed to trying to analyze a night kill, which can be difficult, confusing, and very wifom.

In any game that I've seen so far, there was never a voluntary no lynch.

[Shanman]

Quick question here: you CAN claim to be a certain role in a post, right? I thought I read differently somewhere, but that wouldn't make much sense, and like I said I'm having problems remembering things right now.

You can claim your role, but it isn't suggested. If you're VT (Vanilla Townie), no one will believe you. If you're cop or doctor, you become a target. If you're mafia... well, you can feel free to claim.

If you FALSE claim, then you get lynched because you have no good reason to do that. At least, 99.9% of the time you have no good reason.

[Shanman]

Seems a little drastic Kcdaspot. Though I do think that WingDamage9001 is also overreacting. Nonetheless, this will stimulate conversation! Could I have your reasoning for both of these votes?

WingDamage9001

1) What did you see that screamed out

"I'M SCUM"

in such an ear-piercing, vote-bringing screech? (I have my own reasons, but what are yours?)

2) Why didn't you put them in your post?

Kcdaspot

1) Did WingDamage9001's lack of reasoning alarm you?

2) Do you think that this is a scumtell?

3) You responded to Rayfrost's post:

Also, nobodyspecial is town. So is }|{opa.

With this:

... town read on some one who hasn't posted yet..

please tell me he won't be like this the whole way through.

Why is this response different?

[Shanman]

1 and 2:

3 posts in? votes a BW?
again he better read the thread and give a better post than THAT if wants to convince me that he's not scum

3:

frustration really.

Hmm... I hadn't noticed he's only made three posts.

WingDamage9001, more questions:

WingDamage9001's Questions

1) What did you see that screamed out

"I'M SCUM"

in such an ear-piercing, vote-bringing screech? (I have my own reasons, but what are yours?)

2) Why didn't you put them in your post?

3) Are you keeping up with the reading?

4) Why haven't you contributed more? (Not in quantity,

quality

)

5) Did you know that you were hopping a bandwagon?

[Shanman]

"Hm. Rayfrost is your scumbuddy/coach? Nice to know, I'll be sure to remember it."

If I was scum, how would I know that he was also scum?

This can either be scum pretending to not know anything about how scum works, or a newbie proving he's town by not having any idea how scum works.

Fatso, did you read the opening posts by our moderator? It was quite clear that the mafia would know who their scumbuddies were from the possible PMs that were posted in Post 2.

The scum are the

informed minority

. They know what's going on.

[Shanman]

You can see a quicktopic at the end of many newbie games. (It's usually revealed.)

They show the names. The mafia have no reason to hide from each other.

Here's an example

[Shanman]

Hmmm... Just did some re-reading and:

FoS: WingDamage9001

FoMS: Kcdaspot

(for hopping around a lot. I suppose we all do that sometimes though.)

Well thank you for giving your opinions about these people, but how about some rational? You gave a reason for Kcdaspot, (which you yourself said was weak), but why did you FoS WingDamage9001? It seems like OMGUS finger pointing.

[Shanman]

Well, I'm still here. I've been watching this strange exchange between Fatso and Wingman.

I just reread again, and I'm still thinking that Wing seems like scum, but a little TO scummy to actually be scum. First he was saying I was scum because of a simple misconception, then there was the time he contradicted himself, (which MaxKojote pointed out in post #166 I believe), and then there was when he was talking about how scummy I was and how I was barning and a few posts later said that he was just trying to help everyone out by making things more clear. All this put together makes him seem more like an over-reactive Towny trying to save himself from the chopping block and point out scum at the same time. I would think actual scum would blend in a little better. I'll reread again later and see what I think then.

Someone can't be SO SCUMMY that they're TOWN, just like someone can't be SO TOWNY that they're SCUM. I kind of understand what you mean though. I'm just glad that we're getting a bit more of an opinion from you.

Also, Ray,

Comparing high noise AND signal to low noise and signal is kinda pointless: the ratio's going to be similar, but one's still less pro-town than the other.

... What?

^This^ I didn't get what you were saying at all...

[Shanman]

Don't forget that scum should be making arguments too. If they don't, suspicion falls on them for not scum hunting. If someone is pushing a particularly weak or flimsy case on someone, he/she could be scum trying to look like they're doing stuff. However, I do get what you're saying.

[Shanman]

I'll get to typing a defense tomorrow, but now I need some sleep. It's been a long day and I've barely had time to read through everything that's happened!

Neil, I'll get to your post tomorrow, but first, NobodySpecial, I don't think my posts were buddying at all. Ray was in my first game, so he was the person I was most familiar with at the start of the game. So, like at a party where you only know one person, I talked to him a bit more than others at the start. I don't think I've really favored him over others since then.

In addition, I don't know how he is a "perceived power role", unless you're seeing things that I'm not...

Again, really tired right now, I'll type up something better tomorrow.

Edit by Preview: Kcda, I only JUST noticed your post. You'll find why I was a bit closer to Ray in my reasoning above, again, if I missed stuff, I'll get to it tomorrow. My brain feels fried after all that Calculus.

[Shanman]

Ok, Neil, I think I can break down your case now.

1st. Notice how he's scum hunted very, very little. His posts consist mostly of fluff, agreeing with someone, or discussing the general context of the game (well Scum would, etc. Well Town would, etc.) Which brings me to my next point.

This is a valid point. I've been trying to do a readthrough, but it's been kind of difficult. I've been trying to read over my

last

game to get some ideas of what were important points, so it's been a bit confusing. I'm going to probably be able to to a comprehensive readthrough of all the players by Friday, if only because school work is fairly dominating today and part of tomorrow. I've been doing my best to contribute looking simply at the recent posts, but I've ended up just trying to give warnings of what we might want to look out for; which brings me to point two:

2nd. He seems to keep referring scum motivated techniques. On 6 different occasions, he actually brought it up. See examples below:

-snip-

I find it weird how often he talked about scum and what scum would do, in comparison to the

three times

I saw him mention townie motivated things. And can someone tell me that this persons next post does not seem like scum probably leading scum?

Yes, we should be looking for townie signs, but it's equally important to look for what scum might be doing to blend in or act townie. When I see something that scum might do, I point out that it's

something that scum might do

.

Also, context is important. I have bolded the parts that Neil took out of context to use as "examples". Quotes 1 and 2 come from the RQS. Quote one is a joke and quote two is a valid point for the policy "Lynch all Liars".

4) Lynch all Liars? --- Yes. Townspeople should never lie.

The only people who should lie are the scum.

Quote 3 was remarking on Fatso's suspicious vote for no lynch.

I just read the rules: Unvote: neil1113
Vote: No Lynch

An interesting vote. Care to explain? I would think that a No Lynch could only hurt us.

However it would clearly benifit the scum because they would be at no risk for a day.

Quotes 4 and 5... Neil, these are ridiculous accusations! Those are

clearly

taken out of context and this is

blatant

misrepresentation!

By the way, does anyone know what the little thing right under people's names is? (It says "Townsperson" or "Goon" or something like that.)

It's a judge of how many posts someone has.

Apparently being a part of the mafia is a good thing...

An explanation of why people have those rank things.

This is not at all scummy. This is being helpful

Quick question here: you CAN claim to be a certain role in a post, right? I thought I read differently somewhere, but that wouldn't make much sense, and like I said I'm having problems remembering things right now.

You can claim your role, but it isn't suggested. If you're VT (Vanilla Townie), no one will believe you. If you're cop or doctor, you become a target.

If you're mafia... well, you can feel free to claim.

Clearly the mafia part is a joke. I highly doubt that the mafia is stupid enough to claim mafia just because I said it was a good idea. I also don't think that it's scummy to joke that they

should

claim.

"Hm. Rayfrost is your scumbuddy/coach? Nice to know, I'll be sure to remember it."

If I was scum, how would I know that he was also scum?

This can either be scum pretending to not know anything about how scum works, or a newbie proving he's town by not having any idea how scum works.

Fatso, did you read the opening posts by our moderator? It was quite clear that the mafia would know who their scumbuddies were from the possible PMs that were posted in Post 2.

The scum are the

informed minority

. They know what's going on

.

Quote 6 points out that Fatso is either a completly newbie townie who doesn't even understand how the scum operates or scum pretending to be a completely innocent townie. The second part is to inform him, in case he is the former, that the scum know who's on their side and who's against them.

I admit that quote 7 was only taken out of context in that the surrounding posts explain it better. (This one I didn't bother to quote because the statement I was responding to was the most recent post.) I'll put in the quote I was responding to as well as what I was saying and then explain it.

I'm just saying that I think scum would at least try to blend in SOMEWHAT, whereas Wing doesn't really seem to have even tried to blend in at ALL.

EBWOP: I'm not denying the possibility of him being scum though, just showing a different angle.

Don't forget that scum should be making arguments too. If they don't, suspicion falls on them for not scum hunting.

If someone is pushing a particularly weak or flimsy case on someone, he/she could be scum trying to look like they're doing stuff.

However, I do get what you're saying.

This was obviously with regard to Wingman, and Fatso's thoughts that Wing is too obvious and is therefore clearly town. I felt that it was more a case of his arguments being found too weak, bringing him to the spotlight.

With all the fluff going on through his posts, it's more likely everyone will forget he's part of the game then an actual scum hunter. I know I did.

Neil, I found many of these points taken disturbingly out of context. If you were reading the quotes, I think that they look far from scummy. This seems like clear misrepresentation to cast me in a bad light.

FoS: Neil1113

I'm looking at the other arguments now, but I figured I should post this so the town doesn't think I'm trying to hide away.

[Shanman]

It's only gut; I don't really have much to bolster it with, but I really think Shanman is scum. Now, he's buddying pretty hard to Ray; it's unclear at this point whether Shan is just dumb (and RF is scum too) or Shan is cleverly buddying to a perceived power role.

Anyway,

Vote: Shanman

----------------------------------
For RF by request:

Well,

some

people certainly have a lot to say... It's forum mafia! Jeez... we've got three weeks until the deadline. Let the people sleep for a while! It'll help us all be at our best.

As for you, RayFrost, I would like to say that I dislike your avatar. I preferred the one that you had in our previous game together. I think that makes you 3 for 4. 75% is not a good grade...
However, this problem could be fixed if a certain

someone

removed a certain

vote

from a certain

other person

... *wink wink*

I'm happy to hear that this will be a more fruitful game! I'm sorry for kind of... trying to lynch you last game? No hard feelings, right?

Also, just to let you know, I "unredacted" your redactions and found them unsatisfactory. Please try again, and find better reasons to redact.

There are two of the most blatant examples. (Note to the careful reader: I have a slightly different definition of 'buddying' than most everyone else.) It's still somewhat of a tell.

RayFrost has been through this quite a bit already, but I figured that I should throw in my 2cents seeing as it's mostly directed at me. (A better 2cents than last night, anyway...)

RayFrost was in my last game, so I joked around a bit with him at the start of the game. A bit about the last game... a bit of funny business... a bit of "your reasons aren't reasons if they're redacted"... It was all in good fun in the first few pages of the game. In addition, I would have to see something pretty darn early if I was trying to buddy to "Ray the PR" in my 7th post, and on page 2 of the game, a mere 3 hours after the day started.

Also with this:

To that second point it could be construed as coaching, I thought.

Then I read more. and found out that that would mean that Shanman would in fact be coaching ray.

If I remember correctly wasn't shanman from way before? and he stated as much in thread...

Ray wrote that he has more experience. He's right. My first game was last year, and his was, (from beneath his avatar,) sometime around August of 09. I shouldn't be coaching him, even if I was scum. He would be dropping subtle hints to me, instead.

Lastly, again, Neil:

Does anyone else find it mildly ironic that the minute I call out Shanman, Ray (who in others minds are suspected with teaming with Shan) comes out and votes for me for making a case?

Or how about, what's even more ironic, is that Shanman gets pointed out for buddying Ray, Ray (who seemed to be very quiet the past couple days) suddenly comes out of nowhere to defend himself, by what? DEFENDING SHANMAN. This is either hard irony, or they are indeed a scum team.

So to sum it up, look at these few things when considering Ray. 1. He's quiet until... Shanman (His partner?) gets questioned. 2. He gets called out for buddying, and his only defense is (I don't see it as buddying and besides, I'm more experienced.) which doesn't suit well with me at all. I promise Ray, when Shanman is lynched and flips scum, you'll be next.

I personally don't find it strange that RayFrost would defend himself against a buddying claim if he himself didn't think one existed. He was in my previous game so he knew why I was more friendly in the beginning toward him than anyone else. He stated as much. I don't think it's odd that he would try to dispel the suspicion that might form for a "RayFrost-Shanman scum team" given what others had started to say.

Also, if RayFrost looked over your case and what quotes you based it on, I'm not surprised he voted you. It seemed like most of it was clear misrepresentation, which can easily be scum trying to push a mislynch.


People, sorry for the walls. It's hard to be concise when forming a defense.

[Shanman]

2nd.

He seems to keep referring scum motivated techniques.

On 6 different occasions, he actually brought it up. See examples below

I hate this whole (OMG YOU ARE TOTALLY MISREPRESENTING ME) argument. It's not unique, or original, and it's not a good defense. Especially when the line of questioning wasn't what CONTEXT you were talking about scum in, it was the fact that you were TALKING about them, and HOW MUCH you were talking about it. What is scummy, is not the context you were talking about scum in. I never made an argument concerning your logic behind every post individually, my argument is against your motivation to keep looking at scum thinking and talking about scum thinking

MORE

then you are town thinking and logic. THAT is my issue. Now, if you'd like to debate against THAT issue, feel free to. Otherwise, please stop with the "No, YOU!" defense, or in other words the OMGUS defense, even though you aren't technically voting for me.

Ray, I'll respond to you after this post.

Ok, I think that I may have misunderstood you. However, I don't see why saying "Scum" more than "Town" makes me scum though. I don't know why looking for scum tactics is worse than looking for town signs. We

are

trying to look for scum, right? While I understand that it's important to have town reads on people, the over all goal for the town as a whole is to lynch scum, not save town. Only the doctor needs to be concerned with saving the townies. Is it

bad

to look at the scum reasoning for things? If we want to find scum, it's important to note when we find something that a scum would do in this situation. Fatso voted for a no lynch. This was clearly a bad move for the town.

I noted that fact for the town

Would I have been not so scummy if I had said that "Town members don't vote for No Lynches, particularly on the first day" rather than "Scum would benefit more from a no lynch right now"?

In addition, three of your seven examples weren't even valid arguments for "scum thinking". (1, 4, and 5). They were throwaway comments or jokes that you used as evidence. I'm sorry if you don't like the "OMG YOU'RE MISREPPING ME" argument, but that's what those look like to me: filler to make your argument look more impressive by taking worthless things out of context. As for the others, again, I think noting actions that are scummy is important for finding scum or recognizing when town members are doing scummy things. If you'd like, I can go through them all again and tell you why I said them, but most of the reasons are in my previous post.

[Shanman]

Ok, here is a list of reads, from most scummy to most townie. I'm leaving Neil out of my list because, as the main proponent of my lynching, I'm not sure how objectively I can view him as a whole.

Scum
}|{Opa
WingDamage9001
Nobody Special
Fatso <------------May be "misled newbie"
RayFrost
MaxKojote
Kcdaspot
Town

This is not a definite list, it's subject to change, and it may be revised by Friday, when I hope to have done a full reread of the thread. Also note that Kcdaspot is more at the top through process of elimination, as the ones on the bottom stood out in particular.

@Kcdaspot - Happy Birthday!

Where is the wifom in the bolded statement? I was trying to show Neil that it shouldn't have made a difference HOW I said it. Whether I said it from the scum perspective or town perspective: it would amount to the same thing. The two statements in quotes are what I

could have

said and what I

did

say respectively.


Also,
Why do you hate WingDamage9001's vote? Is it the lack of original reasoning?

and,

Shanman may be acting odd. but rays chainsaw is DEFINITELY scummy.

What did you mean by Ray's "Chainsaw"?

[Shanman]

Oh, and why am I not voting? I didn't feel that anyone was scummy enough to deserve a vote earlier. However, looking back, I notice that my only vote has been for }|{Opa in RVS. Maybe I'm being a bit

too

conservative with my vote. I'll try to fix that in the future, but I don't think that I should be voting anyone right now, seeing as it can be perceived as deflection, and I want to sort this whole "Lynch Shanman" affair out without trying to deflect it by accusing someone else.

[Shanman]

Just a note, talking extensively about "scum motivated" tactics is a very town thing to do. It's the kind of language you use when you scum hunt. The only time you really refer to town motivations is when you are asking what the town motivation for something might be. I would never try to build up a case around how many times someone said the word "scum." Unless I were trying to prove that they were scum hunting, and therefore town. But otherwise, it's a null point.

UNVOTE:
VOTE: Shanman

/barn everyone. Generally scummy play, I'd like to hear a better defense.

[/quote]

Though I'm happy you've revised your opinion on my case, 1) Why are you still voting for me, 2) why did you vote for me in the first place if you don't believe in what Neil was saying, and 3) What was the "Generally scummy play" that you wanted me to defend?

[Shanman]

I'm not using it as a way to prove I'm town. I'm using it as a way to have fun. This is a game...

Unvote

It may be a game, but this doesn't seem like ANYTHING that a townie would do, especially just "for the lulz".

[Shanman]

Sorry everyone... I've had a couple problems lately. I can't believe no one has bugged me about that report I was supposed to give you on Friday! (I'm reminding you so you can do it now.) I'll have it up by tomorrow.

In other news, I found it kind of funny that Jora changed his mind about me, (not for a good reason, in my mind), Neil decided I was more town because of it. Just something to mention, since it only took 5 posts before Neil gave his change of mind. Just something to note.

[Shanman]

Ok, I was waiting for the mod's response, but I guess I'll post this now.

I'm asking to replace out. I really can't devote enough time to this game. I had enough time last year, but this year I'm just swamped with work. I know my play CAN'T be pro-town if I can't play, so I'm replacing out so a more involved person can help you out.

Again, I'm really sorry about all this... I mean, I promised a reactions and reads post two weeks ago, then SWORE it would be done on Wednesday, then never did it! Sorry about that. I hope my replacement will be able to make that post for me!

Goodbye everyone, it's been wonderful playing with you!

Shanman