Newbie 1024 -- Minimalist Mafia (Game Over)

[Trendall]

VOTE: Mastin

[RedCoyote]

Vote Count 6

• Mastin

  (Nachomamma - Trendall)
  
  
  Trendall

  (Mastin)

  
  

  Not Voting

  (Kayi - Yenros - Neruz - Mute - Jay)

With eight alive, it takes five to lynch.

Current Deadline: Dec. 11th, 2010 at 5:00 AM

[Nachomamma8]

Well, then, was I doing the same for you, Neruz? I had you in the EXACT SAME POST as an ISO read. PEOPLE ARE ADDRESSING THE JAY ISO WHILE IGNORING THE NERUZ ISO.

Starts the game voting for the IC. I am not particularly fond of this, quite honestly.
Something in this post seems off to me. I can't put my finger on it, but this post rubs me the wrong way.
However, I have a town read on Neruz, for posts like this.

The Jay ISO seemed like it was going somewhere, this isn't really all that impressive or memorable of useless.

As to the gut read on Jay random-voting the doctor, I still find that scummy. Call it gut, eh?

I could use some more semi-confirmed town in this joint.

[Trendall]

If I make an argument against someone to be lynched, I make it clear. I'll pull up examples from past games--old as they are--

or even ones from off-forum (where I'm playing Werewolf) if necessary.

Heck, I recently went back to EM and found myself completely essentially lurking through days as town, when before, that used to be an EM scumtell from me, personally. So, 1:

You can't use another site against me

, and
2: You can't use something years old against me when more recent information will prove to be more accurate.

[Trendall]

If I make an argument against someone to be lynched, I make it clear.

I'll pull up examples from past games--old as they are

--or even ones from off-forum (where I'm playing Werewolf) if necessary.

Heck, I recently went back to EM and found myself completely essentially lurking through days as town, when before, that used to be an EM scumtell from me, personally. So, 1: You can't use another site against me, and
2:

You can't use something years old against me

when more recent information will prove to be more accurate.

[Kayi]

Wow. Mastin, please do keep your posts shorter. Trying to do my read for the day and I can't even... Wow.

The whole Mastin case is driving me mad honestly. Not because I don't somewhat agree, but because I feel it's going in circles (with Mastin's post getting longer and less readable.) People stated their case, Mastin has responded, people stated their case again, Mastin responded... There's not much more to it at the moment. Though I'm definitely curious as to what he'll answer to Trendall's most recent posts.

[Trendall]

Don't worry, I'm pretty much finished with it now. That's not to say that I've run out of points against Mastin, or that I can't repudiate his points against me, because that's definitely not true, but it seems like for every one thing that I post, Mastin posts about fourty things in return, to which I have a lot to say etc., and it's not really getting us anywhere. I'll be bringing up things that stand out/have stood out to me one at a time as we go along, but for now I'm just interested in what Mastin has to say about my previous pair of posts.

[Trendall]

Also, I'd like to get a general feel for what everyone thinks about what's going on at the moment. Does anybody particularly agree or disagree with any of the things that Mastin and I have said about each other?

[Mastin]

Alright. For reference, I have not read the sixteenth page, but let's just say after the above serious rant, I felt better, and once I calmed down and got a more level-headed thought process, I gained a lot of clarity.
First off, I owe you all an apology. For cluttering the thread, for getting emotional, for getting a tad bit condescending, y'know, pretty much falling into my old style of play which I swore to never do. I also owe you an explanation. See, my real life's been stressful, recently, but I'm sure you don't want to hear that. What you might want to know about is how in an off-site Werewolf game, I was in a recent debate. The person I was fighting against combined the Gambler's Fallacy with Burden of Proficiency. This was recently, so imagine how I felt, facing two examples of the exact same (okay, vaguely similar. But in my thought process at the time, exactly the same) argument. Short answer: rather frustrated. I walled there, too. But then, something amazing happened:
Two pages of walling later, both parties involved had a realization: it was a semantics argument. Neither side was wrong, neither side was right. We apologized. And guess what? ...We lynched a wolf that day. Another thing which I had thought about was when I was reading another game as an observer, I thought, "GEEZ, IF THIS TOWN DOESN'T GET THEIR ACT TOGETHER AND STOP FLINGING MUD, THEY'LL

NEVER

CATCH SCUM!", essentially.
...Which lead me to realize the irony of my statement, there. And that lead me to realize... "Whoops. I, uh, did it again."
Basically, this is exactly what I was afraid of happening when I started playing this game: I start out rather rational, but once I see an attack on my character (whether intentional or accidental), I explode. Whenever I see someone post an opinion which I fundamentally disagree with, I'll argue to no end against them on a matter of semantics. ...And that has to stop. Semantics arguments should be left for post-game and/or MD, not in the middle of a game. So, I probably won't be answering any of the responses to my rant about gut above, because that's what it is: it's a bunch of semantics, and arguing it only worsens the game state.
For that matter, however, I must thank you all, for giving me a few things which might be MD-worthy. Notably, a long talk on a subject taken for granted, instinct (gut) versus intuition (logic), and how each of them works in detail. Another was that one we discussed earlier during day one. Also, there's the fact that this game has made me quite well remember all of the flaws in my play, so it'll be easier to summarize them and basically, make a list of "things not to do in a mafia game".
There was another I had in mind, but I forgot it. Ah, well. Not that important.

Now, all that said, I think it's time I got back to playing the game. Not making a MD article inside a newbie game.

---

Let's move to page 16, shall we?
Trendall's vote is predictable, but unfortunately due to my earlier attitude, null. Had I kept a calm, rational mind and not walled (which frustrates players regardless of alignment), I could call this voting a scum tell, though.

As to the gut read on Jay random-voting the doctor, I still find that scummy. Call it gut, eh?

Alright, I'll accept that's how you feel.
These two examples do not contradict. The other site I'm playing on is recent. I've been playing for something like, one or two months on there. EM, however, I've played, like, once in the last year and a half. My profile on the other site is up to date, my EM profile is not. My attitude on EM was different, because EM is a COMPLETELY different site. My attitude on the other forum is similar, because I modeled my play there after the experience I gained from here. Hence, no contradiction. EM, completely different AND out of date. That other site, actually quite similar (see above; they even have the same accusations! ), and quite recent.
That's the difference between the examples.
As for this one, "old" is very subjective, you know. "Old" on EM is "nearly two years". "Old" on this other site?
9th Sep 2010, 10:57 PM was the exact time I signed up for my first game, there.
Again, no contradiction.

---

Kayi nails it in her post. I need shorter posts, the argument is going in circles (semantics arguments always will, because there's really nothing you can do about players using different terminology other than state your opinion once; after that, it'll inevitably get repetitive), etc. Anyway, now that I've caught up and hopefully clarified things, I intend to further my Trendall case. (Keep posting, Trendall. It helps me. )

[Mastin]

That's not to say that I've run out of points against Mastin, or that I can't repudiate his points against me, because that's definitely not true, but it seems like for every one thing that I post, Mastin posts about forty things in return, to which I have a lot to say etc., and it's not really getting us anywhere.

Yeah, see above; I do apologize for it; it's a bad habit leftover from my former days here. However, if you have points against me, state them. If I consider them to be actual points, I shall address them. If they're repetitions of previous points, I'll simply direct you to my original answer as to not clutter the thread.
As for your defense, that's your choice. Admittedly, I'm not very strong on the offensive. (Or rather, when I do go on the offensive, it's way,

way

overboard. So, not enough punch in my attack, or having far too much bite; I'm still trying to find that middle ground. Remember, I essentially consider myself a newbie. A newbie with a lot more games than most players, but still, a newbie who has a lot he can improve in his play.) However, when I do make a valid point, and you don't answer it, you'll have to face the consequences. But, meh, this is mostly irrelevant, considering how I haven't gotten around to making the full Trendall case. I really should. (Trendall, as you don't have a wiki page, would you mind linking me to your other games to make it easier for the meta section of my case?)
Anyway, on to work.

[Neruz]

Aaagh.

You seriously need to control yourself dude, i can handle long posts, but i cannot handle huge blocks of text.

[Mastin]

To be fair, it's kinda hard to judge how the walls look when you don't use the preview button (often, at least); to me, that didn't look like a solid block of text; it looked like it was rather readable. :/
(I type almost exclusively in the Quick Reply box.)

[Mute]

Aaagh.

You seriously need to control yourself dude, i can handle long posts, but i cannot handle huge blocks of text.

This to the Nth degree. x_X
Mastin, I do not suspect you to be scum, and my suspicions of a collusion between Trendall and L22/Nacho8 still stand. Together they are discrediting your suspicions, and Trend's doing it pretty well.

There's a rule of thumb to use when typing/writing/talking in general, and even the anagram used for it is easy to remember: K.I.S.S., which stands for Keep It Simple, Stupid. The long walls are honestly an eye-sore. I'd rather not see you lynched, but with the way you're reacting it seems that that'll be the case.

I know you rely on your gut a lot, as do I, so I can sympathize with you backing it up, but, it's a weak support in the face of facts. I had a hunch on who was going to be targeted N1, and I acted on my hunch. Using it I had a sturdy enough of a case against L22 (now Nacho8), and I'm still leery about him/her and Trend. But for now I'm keeping my vote to myself until I see a solid reason to vote for anyone.

But I've still got ISO readings to do.

[Trendall]

Trendall's vote is predictable, but unfortunately due to my earlier attitude, null. Had I kept a calm, rational mind and not walled (which frustrates players regardless of alignment), I could call this voting a scum tell, though.

Yeah, I had no idea how anybody would react to that vote. Voting for you might be seen as OMGUS or something, but at the same time, not voting for you would be seen as 'fence-sitting' (lol), so I thought I'd just throw a vote on and see what happens. There's nothing to be read into it.

(Trendall, as you don't have a wiki page, would you mind linking me to your other games to make it easier for the meta section of my case?

Here and Here. Again, notice that I've made like, four votes on people ever on this site or something. It's not scummy, it's not fencesitting; it's a byproduct of my weird, indecisive, perfectionistic personality. Also, if you fancy reading through the whole games, note that this 'burden of proficiency' thing doesn't come up at all. Plus, on epicmafia, the only other place I play, I don't think a single logical fallacy has ever been talked about in technical terms in the couple of hundred games that I've played over there. Which brings me onto my next point, which is simply...

---

One of your arguments against me, and correct me if I'm wrong about this, seems to be, in simple terms - 'Your argument has the burden of proficiency fallacy in it, and you should know better than to make arguments with this fallacy in with how many games you've played. This is scummy'. You realise that that's a burden of proficiency argument in itself, right?

[Mastin]

Also, if you fancy reading through the whole games, note that this 'burden of proficiency' thing doesn't come up at all.

Believe me; I will be looking.

Plus, on epicmafia, the only other place I play, I don't think a single logical fallacy has ever been talked about in technical terms in the couple of hundred games that I've played over there.

I have trouble saying anything other than "BS!" on this. It could be my time on EM was too long ago and the quality of play has degraded so much that such discussions never come up, anymore, but when I was playing in my thousands of games (I played when you were allowed multiple alts for free, so most of my stats are actually on other accounts) there, this came up it, like, at least a third of them. I have trouble believing that in HUNDREDS of games, this hasn't come up often enough for you to remember it. When I did go to EM, I saw signs of it, in people's reactions to Karma and Score. "Oh, this person has a lot of Karma/Points, they must be a good player, but haven't found scum; DIE SCUM DIE!" (Burden of Proficiency at its best.) You're telling me you've never seen it? You're telling me nobody's challenged it as a logical fallacy?
Come on, I consider that rather doubtful. I saw it when I revisited EM after over a years' absence, in less than twenty games. It was used at least five of my games. You HAVE to have seen it, Trendall. So, I can't help but think that you saying you've never seen it before is you trying to cover up a mistake. Maybe you didn't remember it at first, but were afraid of backtrakcing later-on, but it's trapped you, now, because to me, it shows.

One of your arguments against me, and correct me if I'm wrong about this, seems to be, in simple terms - 'Your argument has the burden of proficiency fallacy in it, and you should know better than to make arguments with this fallacy in with how many games you've played. This is scummy'. You realise that that's a burden of proficiency argument in itself, right?

I address this in one of my posts, I believe. I'll track it down if I need to.

[Neruz]

You're doing it again you know. That response to the epicmafia thing could easily be about 1/4 as long and still communicate the same information.

[Neruz]

I'm also going to add that i don't really support a Mastin lynch at this point. While i am

severely

tempted to support it just to ensure i never have to look at another one of those wall posts, intellectually i'm pretty sure that isn't a scum tell >.>

[Trendall]

Mastin, I've seen it. I've used it against people. Sometimes it's right, sometimes it's wrong. It's right a surprising amount of the time. I have never seen the term 'burden of proficiency' come up. That was my point. And rightfully so, because I still don't think it's a fallacy.

[Mastin]

I'm trying! >_< Conciseness has never been one of my strong points; as mentioned, I'm obsessive about conveying

exactly

the message I want, but am terrible with words. (I stutter a lot in RL, and tend not to talk 'cause I'm trying to think out sentences in a way which makes even remote sense.) The result is that I make something wordy unnecessarily when something far more concise (which I legitimately never thought of wording that way) would suffice. It's just who I am, okay? :/
You might, uh, call me practice for more severe diehards?
(By that, I mean, you WILL encounter a lot of wallers on MS.net; it is becoming a more frequent problem. You WILL see others who freak out emotionally; it's sadly quite common. And you often times will see both at the same time, unfortunately. You find ways around it; believe it or not, I of all people skim a lot. )

[Neruz]

'Burden of Proficiency' is a somewhat mafia-specific form of the Argument from Authority. The thing is though that it's not actually a proper AfA.

What makes an AfA a logical fallacy is when the authoritive person comments about a subject that they have no authority for. If Albert Einstein made an authoritive statement about, say art, then assuming he is correct because he is Albert Einstein is an AfA. But if Mr. Einstein makes an authoritive statement about physics, then assuming he is correct is

not

an AfA.

Thus, whether or not the Burden of Proficiency is an AfA is on very shaky ground, as you could legitimately argue that experienced players -are- authoritive about catching scum, especially if there is prior evidence to indicate that the player in question does show a pattern of catching scum often as town. (For those of you in the know, Bayes' theorm technically applies here.)

[Neruz]

@Mastin: It's not so much the walling itself which i find unreadable as it is your particular style. I have no problem whatsoever with large posts if those posts are large because they contain a lot of content and are edited nicely so that paragraphs are seperate and different subjects are clear and concise.

From what i can tell, this is not the case in your posts; you seem to either reiterate the same point in different language multiple times or bring up multiple points in the same sentance with no rhyme or reason, this, combined with the fact that you don't blank lines between paragraphs, makes reading your posts extremely difficult.

[Mastin]

And yet, Trendall, we have a wiki article for it. It's used often pretty much everywhere...
...But on every site I've played on, it hasn't proven to be true. It IS a fallacy. It shouldn't be used. It COULD be right!
...But that's true of pretty much any fallacy. It could be right, but is it more likely to be right?
No. That's why you don't see me blurting out my MITs in every game. They can--and have--been right in the past...but no more so than anything else. (And for fallacies, if anything, it's less so.) It's a fallacy, and I don't believe even on EM that people deny it. I've seen the argument used--and you've admitted to using it--there, but almost every time

I

played, the player denied it. Denied being good, denied being popular, denied being experienced--most just excuses, but that only made up about half of the denials. The other half? Pointing out how the logic is flawed, how it's a logical fallacy.
Ask any player on this site, and they'll say it's a logical fallacy. Ask a player who's been accused of it on any site, and they'll say it's a logical fallacy. Even on EM, go ahead and ask someone who has a lot of karma or currently has a score about it, and I bet you they'll say it's not true, aka, it's a logical fallacy.

You trying to defend it is scummy to me, because everything I've experienced tells me that it's practically common knowledge about that fallacy. They might not know the name of the fallacy, they might not know to call it a logical fallacy, but it's common knowledge that it's false. That's my experience, and if you couldn't tell, I base a lot of my play on experience. So, when experience tells me something's a common logical fallacy known even by those who don't know the name of the logical fallacy... (if that makes sense)
...It also tells me someone denying the above is likely to be lying, trying to cover their tracks, desperately trying to fight out of a corner. Yeah, vote stands.

[Trendall]

And all of that isn't a burden of proficiency argument because...?

[Mastin]

as you could legitimately argue that experienced players -are- authoritative about catching scum, especially if there is prior evidence to indicate that the player in question does show a pattern of catching scum often as town.

Nope, not from me. My record is abysmal. I'm good at finding some town reads, but not at scum reads. So, yeah, it doesn't apply to me. If you asked pretty much any player who knows my name, "Is Mastin a good scum hunter?", I'd bet that at least 75%--if not close to 90--would say, "NO!" The other 10-25%? "Eh, maybe", or "Eh, sometimes", or "No more than any other player". (Okay, so maybe one or two people--like 1-2%--would say, "yes", but the simple fact is, the vast majority of people would say I am not good at catching scum.) I believe I made this clear from very early on, that I'm not a good scum hunter, so Trendall would've known.

Spoiler: Length reply to Neruz

@Mastin: It's not so much the walling itself which i find unreadable as it is your particular style. I have no problem whatsoever with large posts if those posts are large because they contain a lot of content and are edited nicely so that paragraphs are seperate and different subjects are clear and concise.

From what i can tell, this is not the case in your posts; you seem to either reiterate the same point in different language multiple times or bring up multiple points in the same sentance with no rhyme or reason, this, combined with the fact that you don't blank lines between paragraphs, makes reading your posts extremely difficult.

Would you rather I do this?

Make insanely large gaps for very little info?

I tend to separate my paragraphs by thought. If two thoughts are related, yet seem like they need a line break...
...I use one, like here. Or if I'm continuing on the same subject but it's a long paragraph,
I'll break it up where convenient.

When I start a new thought, I go to a new paragraph, meaning that gap is larger. However, since I do chain my thoughts together a lot, there tends to not be a lot of these. The alternative to my style of posting single line breaks under the above is to either 1: make insanely short paragraphs, making the post look a lot longer (hence, more intimidating)--something I don't want--or to 2: make insanely long, blocky paragraphs, same result. (I personally hate paragraphs which go beyond five--maybe six--lines.) This, for example, is a decent--albeit a bit on the long side--paragraph, at four lines in the Quick Reply box.

As for me bringing up points multiple times, this has been explained already; I'm really bad with words, and yet, I want to get my message across as clearly as I can. The two end up making me fairly repetitive. That's one of THE main critiques I get whenever I write, "Stop being repetitive, Mastin!"

I am well aware of the problem, Neruz, but as this post should show, I'm kinda screwed no matter what I do: there's no way to make people happy.

I am trying to change my style, but I'm not very good at it. >_<

[Trendall]

Mastin, have you tried writing something, then going away for ten minutes to do something else, then coming back and rereading it and cutting it all down? I suspect that you might do that, but if you don't, try it, it might work.