On the Flying Scumsman (Abandoned)

[Prism]

/in if I made it in time

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/in if that counts as a signup post

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/in just in case it didn't because surely that had to be one if not

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/in

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I literally am talking to pops about wanting to vomit on Discord and she pinged me to sign up for this

The sacrifices I make

Panda Express still does takeout

[Prism]

Can I put in a pinch hitter

But have the money still go to me

Taking volunteers

I am literally about to vomit on my keyboard

[Prism]

If you're considering hydraing with popsofctown let this be a cautionary tale

Run and run far lest your pleas fall on deaf ears

[Prism]

It's okay I literally just ate too much

Also she told me not to get it LOL

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The things....I do....for this town.....

shoves handful of orange chicken in mouth

[Prism]

/in

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/in

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If this isn't a quickie Alisae you are dead to me I was going to skip it

[Prism]

I mean that being the case, I would find it very surprising that Insomnia would say to vig me only because he isn't townreading me yet, especially when he himself has acknowledged that his early game wim is low, and particularly in this game where the dayphase comes to a screeching halt twice a day while events take place.

Do you think this is scummy for him? I'm still working off of the posts where you seemed to imply he was likely town but deserving of a shot anyway.

So I thought it was a particularly bad take from a slot I was townreading, my kneejerk reaction was to write him off as scum for it and then I played with it in my head for a bit more and decided his specific head might still need to die if he was going to start proposing vig shots today since I think that's almost objectively scummy.

My issue is that your reaction to multiple posts was that these reinforced your view over the course of about 40 minutes, and you do go indepth about why you think they're scummy (Even though I think the contradiction between self-preservation and outing a general scumread explains much of it)

There's no explanation of why you flipped to him being a VI except for the "if insomnia is having one of his moments" which sounds like would have been one of the first things you thought of, way before "flipping the meta from this specific game"

[Prism]

I know the decision to abandon is disappointing for pops, but I was very glad to see it. I think my attitude was best summed up when I told pops I'd rather the game be abandoned than have us win.

To be blunt, I have never been so completely bored with a mafia game. At first it was because I just hate playing scum. At some point Day 2 it became not worth playing entirely. The only people playing even remotely well were Hectic/Searchers/JC, and all of them had significant flaws (Hectic wasn't proactive enough and didn't take advantage of his position, Searchers went 50/50 on reads but that's fine for Day 3, JC put in a ton of energy but the reads didn't quite follow)

I just have never had a more ugly, vicious, and downright condescending attitude towards a game. It's not a pretty side of me. I could keep it at bay and post at times but 3/4 days into Day 3 it became clear that it was not going to change.

I kept a private PT where I could share some of my thoughts/notes. Most of them are me being a condescending asshole and the thread will be deleted, but I'll quote the ones that could be somewhat insightful.

[Prism]

Spoiler: PT posts that I think are useful:

Night 1

I guess we're doing the lightning rod claim. I am pretty sure this is a terrible idea, but I'm not going to stop it.

Generally my instincts for who will townread what are still sharp. Farkran and Spiffeh townread exactly what I expected them to [Elaborated on in post 6], I suspect Hectic did initially as well but I might be on slightly shakier ground now. I expect to never really be able to satisfy Gamma without flipping the power town switch, which I don't want to do. [Minesweeper gave me a chance to do this without being public about it!] I'm not really eager to carry the game even if it's possible for me to do so. My role is also the least suited for it.

I guess for Day 2...

A Despair Night lynch would be nice. I'm pretty sure this winds up going on Foxy though. Town has a lot of players that will be difficult to lynch. The entire point of shooting Cappy is because they're probably never getting lynched. The rest aren't that town but won't really go down without a fight. I have no fight in me, though, and the lurkers will almost certainly be lynched by default today.

Getting townread by BY likely sets me up in a good position and wouldn't be too hard. Blake's ego and Taly's admiration of them are both glaring personality flaws to be exploited.

My approach to them Day 1 had two phases. In the first, I tried to avoid them as a topic simply because the longer it takes them to realize my strength the better. The longer it takes them to realize it the worse of a position they'll be in. I'm not really out be fancy here, I'm more about just winning than doing it with skill. In the second, I decided to modify my approach a bit to avoid a fight later down the road. Draw attention by directly engaging, but play purposely below my level to get to locktown status and then just never get reevaluated. This didn't really work: Blake really isn't interested in others, which is fine with me.

Farkran is townreading basically what I want him to. He'll reevaluate at some point but I can probably win the 1v1 by exploiting his comments about me. Hopefully pops can just carry this side of it.

Spiffehbringer I can get to townread me for a day or two at a time with some one-off comments but they're probably the biggest threat this game. I can get them to toneread me for oneliners but they're too smart for that, and fortunately memory of those brief impressions are short. I will likely never get townread by them longterm, and this is probably the N2 nightkill.

That Spiffehbringer death was tragic from a "What makes this game fun/exciting?" viewpoint but a godsend as far as winning the game went.

I doubt I'll wind up releasing this but in case I do it might be helpful to point out specific examples.

#412 was made specifically to get townread by Farkran. The timing was such that I was going to hold my tongue about a lot of his ideas of my play from #409, but that some things, notably my drive to not lose the same way, could not be held back. All of #410-#412 were made to give this impression.

Scrutinizing the Spiffeh slot and pushing early only to back off was basically the goal early. From there it was mostly just hide behind making plausible/reasonable posts while I still have no flips to protect me. My final read on Spiffeh was also specifically targeted. I'm really just trying to buy time here-Publicly choosing to view him as an asset and play a bit to his pride in his ability to scumhunt was the goal of #2634. I feel as though there's a good chance he couldn't help but townlean this section, but this is again one of those one-liner illusions that will get thrown off soon enough.

Bussing Foxy really isn't ideal here but we need to accumulate some sort of town credibility here: It looks like it will likely be up to us and Imperium to bring this home in the long run.

Simultaneously, I fear scum loses this game unless we get a shutout. I would really like it if Pine came out swinging here.

Tough stuff. BY/DA should probably die tonight.

Day 2, specifically my posts #3102 through #3124

Very little ulterior motive in the latest posts compared to the more nuanced targeting I leaned on Day 1; really just looking to make sure that if a town bloc forms we're in it. Generally taking angles I feel safe with (Searchers, Pine), even though I probably need to be more proactive to win.

There's a lot of thoughts I have on the Pine wagon, the M&K wagon, the scumchat, and how we should have played around these that I might post later but

Reading today this is a dumpster fire. I honestly don't even know where to start. I keep thinking this should be a scumloss but Blake and Farkran keep proving me wrong. These two are on the cutting edge of gamethrowing technology, absolute pioneers in the field.

Later Day 2

It's good in the short term that I don't post, worse in the long run. I probably should post.

But like, I really don't even know what to say here. Town me might pull out the machete and try to make my way through the jungle, but there is a very good chance I would have taken one look at the last 5 pages and requested replacement.

Bad day. My decision to townread Searchers a week or two ago was a bad one; I should have made up a read elsewhere and acted oblivious. I was hoping the slot would get vigged/mislynched without me doing anything but this is unlikely now.

Imperium needed to come out swinging 2/3 days before deadline to get a consolidation on a pet scumread. Instead they were completely AWOL. Defeats the entire point of their gambit if they're not going to take the position of town leader. This should have been a 4:0 shutout.

Pops made a minor mistake in that we probably could have gotten on Blake, only consolidating on EA in emergency, but that's okay. I had a very good opportunity to shove Blake in particular after her reply to Farkran with the vanity wagons and was too lazy to do so. I say "lazy" but outside of shitposting with Hectic and the ballin' minigames the actual dayplay is a waste of time for everyone involved

Spoiler: Misc scumteam notes

I was probably a lot more careful with how I posted in the scum Discord than I was posting in the thread. I realized pretty early on that if the Foxy hydra was proactive, they'd probably be townread for it, and if not probably wouldn't start posting until it was too late. I directed a lot of very general questions in the Discord that were aimed at getting them generally thinking about the game/chewing on what they should be aiming for: "How are people feeling about the game?" "What do you feel like you need to succeed?" etc. This did not work very well. Eventually, I did successfully motivate Pine once...but it had two crucial errors. First, I did it at night, which meant he could put off posting until the morning. Second, although he didn't wind up going for it inthread, he was trying to angle something I don't think was best longterm, and was significantly harder anyway (Tried to convince him to just townhunt+towntell, Pine I believe wanted to find a 1v1 somewhere)

I think xofelf had the most potential of any of us here. The posts she did make were fine, their biggest issue is that they were reactive. They proactively try to sort with no prompting? Easy townread imo

Imperium replacing out was unfortunate. I think their Day 2 position would have been incredibly powerful. Nacho coming in and encouraging wrong reads in a jam session would have been incredibly strong and probably demolished this game and gotten a mislynch, even without him directly pushing one. Some things aren't meant to be, though. With a combination of skill and luck, he proved me wrong on the lightning rod but never got to claim the reward.

EA tried. It just wasn't happening. Unfortunate.

I might go through my Discord with pops later, I gave more specific posting advice on engineering a townread from Blake early that might be helpful. Not sure what else there would be, though.

[Prism]

To keep it brief, I think #1669 was accurate, regardless of what anyone thinks of Gamma's line of argument.

The more glaring issue for your slot was the wrong M&K read. I think this went wrong in several ways: First, it didn't take into account the growth of Farkran as a player. I had the benefit of not only being scum but also the benefit of being the person whose playstyle he was attempting to steal entire sections of. He went to great lengths to copy my approach that in his view brought me so much success in Undertale. Second, there seemed to be an issue with sample size and high expectations. The latter is one of town's oldest nemeses, a true harbinger of doom, and it didn't sound like he saw that many games of yours in whatever Discord chat you had to begin with.

From my perspective, you basically ignoring my side of the hydra Day 1 was also really convenient. It allowed me significantly more freedom in how I approached the day, knowing that as long as I wasn't blatant I had free rein. This wouldn't suffice alone, but coaching pops on how to respond/generally pushing the rigor of their reads to the limit was the complementary piece that allowed it to work. I don't think this is as easily fixable; in a 34p game you have to choose who to focus on and roll the dice.

[Prism]

You know what, thank you Prism. I'm not super confident in my ability to play regardless of alignment, and that definitely shows just in the way you said. I *am* a reactive player, mostly out of habit. But I probably don't have to be if I tried something different, and also played more often.

You were great to play with, and I really appreciated your words of encouragement! You have a knack for coming off very sincerely and that just gets amplified the more you post, so I agree you should be more confident!

As a more general comment, I think that people tend to overly constrain themselves with thinking "I wouldn't do that as town!" Others typically know you a lot less than you do yourself!

I was probably never going to focus on you unless I was finding pops unreadable

I generally don't focus on logic-oriented players when I don't really know how they play since they're generally easier for me to read indirectly than directly

Like I said, choosing who to focus, especially in a 34p game, is completely necessary and is a dice roll. I don't think this was that avoidable; I deliberately tried to be unassuming for most of Day 1 to compound this issue for both your slot and Spiffehbringer. It's important to realize what the downside was, though, even if the tradeoff is generally worth it. Knowing you weren't reading my side, combined with pushing pops to the limit+at times outright coaching a response, let us have the best of both worlds: getting townread while still letting me operate unconstrained Day 1.

Spoiler: Coaching example, if you're curious

4/10/20:
Prism: For your most recent post you should add another post elaborating on the way it progressed for you, for example perhaps from the first phase to the other, and give a bit more about why it's not necessarily true
Prism: That the one Black Hole CO isn't here
Prism: If you do that Blake should townread it
pops: Do you know Blake well?
Prism: Nope, not at all
pops: Then I'm spooked
Prism: The "not necessarily true" part should be specific to one/two players rather than being airtight or overly general
Prism: Eh I mean you don't have to
Prism: I also just said "haha fake a buncha reasoning np"
pops: I think all 3 could be townt ho
pops: i dont get what you're saying
pops: When Krazy said "is black hole scum" I freaked out and thought he had an aha moment figuring me out since he so consistently accurately reads me
pops: then i finally realized
pops: is he asking "does black hole mean scum"
pops: I almost scumclaimed by posting "why ask that when you know I'll say no"
pops: would have been terrible
Prism: It's possible, right, but what got you there? You're thinking of these players individually, not in aggregate, which is why you should only touch on 1/2
Prism: Or at least, I'd expect someone to think that way, but that's just me
Prism: Feel free to trash my suggestion iuno shit lmao
Prism: And yeah that was funny
pops: Can I say "Prism is concerned I did not explain my thoughts clearly" or would that be bad. I don't usually follow up unprompted whic kind of makes it bad to add anything at a base level
Prism: Nope, needs to come from you, the point would be you thinking/chewing more on the question
Prism: Idk why you think you not normally doing it means it'll be scumread
Prism: But I trust you if you think I'm wrong here
Prism: Window closes when Blake responds btw
pops:

I am conflicted because in all my intel CO John Cena has only fought a single target very hard when he or the target is Black Hole. But CO insomnia and CO Silver Bullet would both have to be risking their lives oddly if they were Black Hole.

this is the closest to something I feel like I believe in
pops: idk
Prism: That's pretty good, do you have a bit about the way the phases progressed/what moment marked the shift for you?
pops: ok but if this loses us the game you have to support me while i play adc
Prism: I'd also remove "oddly" but this is very overly micromanaging
Prism: I'd say add the answer to the q I just asked at the start and call it a day
Prism: (Blake asked about the progression specficially-you split it into a dichotomy of phases; answering what the transition was and its significance is goes a long way)
Prism: Also, deal
pops: i added more
Prism: Mmmmm, that should still work. I probably didn't lay out what I was envisioning that clearly as I would have liked
pops: you scared me too much with the closing window shit so it was rushed
Prism: Fair
Prism: I like your follow-up a lot
Prism: Anyway that was super micromanaging I am sorry
Prism: thx for rolling with me being a picky bastard
Prism: Now to sit back and see if it works


The aim of this one was that I thought you were looking for evidence of a clear thought process, and that taking you "along for the ride" would come off as organic and be townread. You townread her afterwards for similar reasoning, but for a different post, so I never really got confirmation that it worked. Pops is probably the stronger scumplayer and was carrying this game on her strong ass back, but the point is that I could help what weaknesses she

did

have. This one was specifically targeted, but more generally it came in the form of challenging her reads relentlessly and making sure she had not just the reasoning but the evolution and the force of feeling behind them.

[Prism]

For Farkran, I stopped reading your responses to Blake at a certain point so I can't give feedback on that as much, but I think where you went wrong in our slot was failing to do due diligence. It seemed like you took the early townread of us and got preoccupied elsewhere. In order to get that early townread, I took out what I'd call "posting debt", in this case a demonstration of determination/ferocity, that you never really challenged me to cash.

My play Day 1 was on the weaker side, but by Day 2 I was flat out openwolfing. This was the worst game I have ever played as scum, and it is not close.

[Prism]

I think I wanted a Searchers kill, which most would have disagreed with but I thought the chance of them getting lynched from that point on was low.

One of my favorite parts of this game was coming in 2 hours before deadline, saying "Yeah these actions are bad and here's why I think that" but in question form, and then leaving them anyway two nights in a row.

[Prism]

Oh my god I almost forgot

Anyone who knows me knows that there's only one thing I love more than mafia: Shitposting

After persuading the team to shoot Cappy (my mistake, btw), I started running the shitpost victory lap. I was so amped up and excited to celebrate the death of Hectic.

I was well into making a GODDAMN HECTIC MEMORIAL VIDEO. It was going to feature numerous photoshops in a giant slideshow of like, our "best moments" together, a boatload of terrible memes, photoshops of us on the beach, etc.

It was set to the song he submitted to the song contest

Like, holy shit, I have never been so emotionally desolate and disappointed as I was in seeing Hectic live.

Spoiler: The two memorial images I finished before deciding to wait to see results

[Prism]

Found one more

Spoiler: bad hectic/prism meme

[Prism]

It's a pink ball

I think pops was behind the robbery, I wanted you N1ed basically because you weren't ever getting lynched (Which is my #1 criteria for shots)

[Prism]

Can the PTs for this please be released?