Open 326: Pick Your Poison (Ende des Speils!)

[Nobody Special]

My responses are bolded

DO NOT DO THIS.

It makes it IMPOSSIBLE to read.

Learn to quote properly, and don't be lazy.

[Maruchan]

I just don’t want us to get tunnelvisioned on the first day, and leave some possible slips unnoticed.

Thunder is town.

And before I lay a vote down for Maruchan, I’d like to hear what Thor has to say and then re-evaluate based upon Maruchan’s fear of Thor driving someone into the ground. I’d have to say, after just playing a game with Thor, it’s a legitimate fear because he has a glorious beard and an even more glorious sense of pressure and reasoning. (And yes, Thor, I’m sorry, but this is the last time I’m going to complement you. At least until you catch me a scum. Because I don’t think I really need to build you up, and because I think it’s time for me to stop referencing you in every post I make. I think I’m just excited to be playing with a friendly Robo and Thor face who shall hopefully have my back this time and not be trying to murder me.)

Finally somebody with some sense! Follow the lead wait for the person I accused of disliking RQS to verify my story, before you call my story shit. Kaithnxbaigurl.

Concision is pro-town.

Concision?

Here, you indicate that scum like to save their votes until they see the most likely-to-succeed bandwagon. Since you mention this, it would indicate that you find his behavior scummy. Then suddenly, you say that you believe that conservative town do it too. You seem to flip, indicating initially that it's slightly scummy, to a null tell. If you thought it was null, why did you bring that up in the first place?

Yet I did it all IN THE SAME POST. I was laying out all the possible things saving a vote could mean, and AFTER explaining all they could mean, I then implied it was a null tell. If I had done it in 2 posts, consecutive, or way apart, I would agree with you and say that I am sitting on the fence. However, since I started it in one post, and ended that post with "ITS NOT A SCUM TELL", I would say I picked a side. The side saying it's not a scum tell. (apparently this is a three-sided fence btw. odd)

That's true with RVS bandwagoning too, no? By your logic, since there are 9 townies and 3 scum, should we not do RVS bandwagoning at all? That's a probabilistic fallacy.

I don't think you should take an RVS bandwagon to lynch no. Not at all. However building pressure on an RVS bandwagon is perfectly acceptable, because in an ideal vacuum situation with no variables, those with nothing to hide will not crack under said pressure, so said pressure will eventually disappear. While those with something to hide, WILL crack under pressure, in which case the pressure is a good thing. And once they've cracked and you lynch them, it is no longer a RANDOM vote, so I would no longer classify it as an RVS bandwagon.

That's true with RVS bandwagoning too, no? By your logic, since there are 9 townies and 3 scum, should we not do RVS bandwagoning at all? That's a probabilistic fallacy.

I actually do have evidence that this is a probable scenario, thanks. and you should read thunder's post.

For instance- "Do you like being town or scum?"

I totally agree with you. I like that question in particular. -glares to Thor-

Saul's votepost is bad, bad, bad. First of all, we should be looking for scum, not players that don't care. Also, one does not "cause their side to lose" by being seen as something besides town- it's not like Day 1= lylo, after all. Townies win as long as they side wins, regardless if they get lynched or not.

Besides, I'd argue that Marachan IS posting far too much and providing too much text in those posts, to be considered a player that "doesn't care about the game", bizarre implosion aside.

Thats because my words have been twisted. I don't care if my actions are scummy, cuz only scum have bad repercussions from looking scummy. When town looks scummy, if they get lynched, their flip helps town by being able to re-read as their confirmed town status.

Also, scum love to bandwagon players "for the good of the game", because that way, they won't be held accountable later on if the player is a townie, and can still get townie points if they flip scum. It's a win-win for them.

I didn't even think of that so far during this game ,but you're right.

Yeah Page 4 doesn't need all these lengthy posts, it kind of makes me feel like scum are overloading to look like they have more content than they do. It's really useless to type all that much, not enough has happened. In fact walls at this point are drawing my attention more negatively than positively towards those players. Walls are to be used when necessary...not frivolously.

So its a bad thing if the game actually STARTS being a game on page for, rather than on page 10? Its bad for us to start actual content early? ... Why exactly?

This (And NS's comment) is completely true. Walls are, if anything, anti-town. They flood the thread with words, which can cause disinterest in the town.

Oh. I Honestly did not know this. You can meta me if you want, but I have ALWAYS loves walls, and I love reading them too. Sorry. I will attempt to post less walls now, knowing that people don't like them.

Although I usually only post walsl in response to a wall that is usually pointed at me.

I don't neccesarily agree with that there isn't much "content" in said walls, but that may simply be because I'm the one that wrote mine, so I'm naturally biased.

I think it had a lot of content. I usually only reply to actual content and/or stuff related to me. So anything that I didn't quote (unless it doesn't relate to me) is about it that I think is content-less.

DO NOT DO THIS.

It makes it IMPOSSIBLE to read.

Learn to quote properly, and don't be lazy.

That is actually the first time I have ever done that, and I am sorry. Won't happen again. I was just trying to cut down on the length of my post by not putting a gazillion quote fragments in it, like this one.

Fixed quote tags -- Mod

[Maruchan]

damn it I messed up two of my quote tags.

[glowball]

ANYONE USING META AS AN EXCUSE TO WALL WILL BE EXECUTED. MAYBE NOT IN THIS GAME BUT IN MY HEART...

I WILL NOT BE READING WALLS.

IT IS DONE.

[JonWJ007]

Woke up to see numerous posts from you guys, wow!
For now,UNVOTE: NihilisticNinja before doing a proper readup.

But I'm going to ask some that I feel are relevant.
1) What time zone are you in?
2) What is your experience playing Mafia (ie, how many games have you played, how long etc)?
3) How often do you post/How often do you expect to post?

1) GMT +8 hrs. So probably when you guys are active, I'm sleeping away; vice versa.
2) Played 1 newb game. Didn't contribute much, but won the game as townie(luckily with the help of the IC & others). Currently playing in this opened game, and soon a newb game. Trying to improve my style of play, forgive me.
3) Post when I felt something struck my mind. Short posts.

Gotta go for work now. Post later at night. kthxbye

[glowball]

ANYONE USING META AS AN EXCUSE TO WALL WILL BE EXECUTED. MAYBE NOT IN THIS GAME BUT IN MY HEART...

I WILL NOT BE READING

UNNECESSARY

WALLS.

IT IS DONE.

You have until half way down the post to convince me it is worth reading.

[Maruchan]

which of the walls have you not read, if any?

[NihilisticNinja]

Sigh, here we go again.

Now, NihilisticNinja, to answer your question: Because I'm still trying to learn how RVS works exactly. It wasn't in the off-site game I played and was in both games I'm playing on this site. I'm trying to learn how it works for future games, as no one else seems to go through the same grilling I do over how I play RVS.

So, essentially, it is because you wanted to know if voting again in the RVS would attract more suspicion, because your earlier play had caused people to be suspicious of you? Am I reading this correctly?

Finally somebody with some sense! Follow the lead wait for the person I accused of disliking RQS to verify my story, before you call my story shit. Kaithnxbaigurl.

I don't disbelieve the main point of your story, actually. You have no reason to make that up. I disbelieve a couple points- primarily that the lynch was SOLELY A RESULT OF THOR'S RQS PUSH- because as noted later, if it wasn't, then your argument is indeed a probabilistic fallacy.

Yet I did it all IN THE SAME POST. I was laying out all the possible things saving a vote could mean, and AFTER explaining all they could mean, I then implied it was a null tell. If I had done it in 2 posts, consecutive, or way apart, I would agree with you and say that I am sitting on the fence. However, since I started it in one post, and ended that post with "ITS NOT A SCUM TELL", I would say I picked a side. The side saying it's not a scum tell. (apparently this is a three-sided fence btw. odd)

Yet, here's the rub. WHY DID YOU BRING IT UP IN THE FIRST PLACE? If you felt that it was a nulltell, then why didn't you just end your post with, "Well, I was just curious." The problem is with the whole "well, scum could do this but townies could do this as well so it means nothing." It just feels like your feeling for reasons to attack him later.

That's true with RVS bandwagoning too, no? By your logic, since there are 9 townies and 3 scum, should we not do RVS bandwagoning at all? That's a probabilistic fallacy.

I don't think you should take an RVS bandwagon to lynch no. Not at all. However building pressure on an RVS bandwagon is perfectly acceptable, because in an ideal vacuum situation with no variables, those with nothing to hide will not crack under said pressure, so said pressure will eventually disappear. While those with something to hide, WILL crack under pressure, in which case the pressure is a good thing. And once they've cracked and you lynch them, it is no longer a RANDOM vote, so I would no longer classify it as an RVS bandwagon.

At this point, I do agree that we have reached an impasse. If Thor confirms that he has pushed a player to a lynch as a result of RQS (Keep in mind that he has to have pushed a player to lynch- because otherwise, it's the same thing as a RVS wagon- the pressure would eventually disappear), then your reaction is natural, and any evidence based on such a push is null and void.

Also, I misread Thunder's post. I personally found the way it was formatted confusing, so apologies to Thunder for misrepping him. Let me respond to his actual argument, such as it is:

Which, although later proclaimed as a joke, I don’t read it as a joke a scummy player would make.

When did he clarify that it was a joke? Looking in Iso, I don't see such a clarification.

And, since I think I should lay my vote down on someone, I’m going to lay it down on
VOTE: NihilisticNinja
Because he didn’t like my questions, which I took great pains to make relevant, and because he jumped on Saul’s wagon… well, not really for any reasons.
Right now, I’m fairly confident in my newbie town read, and I think the only reasonings he gave for evidence as scum are what I’m reading as newbie town.

So, essentially, you're voting me because we disagree on a read? I can see how that could come from newbtown, that doesn't mean that it did. Personally, I think it just as likely that it was a slip from newbscum, worried about pressure, and then he quickly tried to cover it up. This is backed up by the fact that the first time glowball asked him about why he was worried, he completely ignored it, instead of providing an explanation then.

Also, keep in mind that I was the first to vote for that reason.

Sadly, long posts beget more long posts.

[Xalxe]

Votecount 1.4

Maruchan (4)

: lane0168, Supreme Overlord, saulres, Auckmid
saulres (3): Maruchan, glowball, NihilisticNinja
RoboThor (1): Nobody Special
Auckmid (1): Amrun
NihilisticNinja (1): thunderwielder

Not Voting (2)

: RoboThor, JonWJ007

With 12 alive, it takes 7 to lynch.

Deadline

: August 13 ((expired on 2011-08-30 14:58:38))

Up ahead, you'll see the beautiful Karlstor. Once, Munich was a walled city, and this gateway was one of only four ways to get into the city. Now it just looks pretty, ja?

[saulres]

it is because you wanted to know if voting again in the RVS would attract more suspicion, because your earlier play had caused people to be suspicious of you? Am I reading this correctly?

Umm... No. I didn't think I was suspicious before that. I think I had people who preferred to ignore all flavor and instead play RVS getting on my case and even throwing random votes at me. I didn't really think they thought I was scum, I thought they were trying to force me to change how I wanted to play this time if I wanted to keep playing. So I did, throwing a random vote at someone who hadn't been involved in the thread in any way yet.

Then after 15 more posts (most of them from Maruchan) I decided I had a "better" target for my RVS vote because I had a funnier "reason". But I wasn't sure if posting in order to make that joke would be seen as a scumtell. So I asked.

[lane0168]

But I'm going to ask some that I feel are relevant.
1) What time zone are you in?
2) What is your experience playing Mafia (ie, how many games have you played, how long etc)?
3) How often do you post/How often do you expect to post?

1.) Central Standard Time. As in Minnesota, USA.
2.) This is my fourth game on the website. havent played in a few months. Otherwise i'd drop anything to play in real life
3.) If i have something to say everyday, i should be at my computer everyday after work. I stay in hotels during the week, so i have a lot of free time

Maruchan, please omit everything that is not absolutelyl necessary in your posts. is it necessary for you to quote someone and then respond with "concision"? absolutely not. especially when you know what they mean. half those quotes did not need to be quoted and responded on if not all

[thunderwielder]

ANYONE USING META AS AN EXCUSE TO WALL WILL BE EXECUTED. MAYBE NOT IN THIS GAME BUT IN MY HEART...

I WILL NOT BE READING WALLS.

IT IS DONE.

I know you "corrected yourself", Glowball, (I haven't had time to read through the whole thread, and most likely won't be able to until tomorrow night, because I have to leave soon) but I want to quote this.

Can you explain to me how the above quote is considered pro-town?

Because, to me, this is a blanket statement for you to avoid really analyzing anything that isn't shouting at you in the face.

In my last game, I got into an argument with a guy who turned out to be scum on the same subject. He too vehemently disagreed that anyone should ever post a wall. Which I didn't buy. Which led me into an investigation against him. Which led us to lynching him and finding out he was an evil scumbag.

My main point about this attitude (in that game, this game, and will be for my entire Mafia career), is that making everyone NOT post walls limits the amount of information we have to analyze. Sure, it might be easier to read right before going to sleep when the eyes are getting tired from a whole day and from looking at the computer screen for a long period of time.... but in that case, just take a break. Rest your eyes for a half hour, and come back to it later.

There is

NO reason

why we should refrain from posting walls. If everyone in this game were posting walls, sure it might take longer to read, but we'd be able to see who was just trying to fill up space in order to blend in and who was actually trying to hunt scum and win the game. Analyzing language is not just a part of the game, it's pretty much almost ALL of the game.
Why would we then encourage everyone to

limit

their conversation and their contribution to the game?
I can think of no reason. Unless it's scum trying to limit the amount of analysis, and hoping everyone will just stop contributing all together.
(If you hadn't corrected the above post that I quoted, I would be voting for you based upon my principles alone--and a bit of my last game).
Again, why does a townie want to limit information?
I LOVE unnecessary walls. Because it's pretty freaking obvious that they ARE unnecessary, and that MEANS something. It tells us something about the poster. It gives us more of a chance to see flaws in arguments and contradictions.
I say: give me more walls.
If they are filled with content, we get closer to finding scum.
If they are filled with nothing meaningful, we get closer to finding scum, because townies should be always trying to contribute SOMETHING.

[Maruchan]

But I'm going to ask some that I feel are relevant.
1) What time zone are you in?
2) What is your experience playing Mafia (ie, how many games have you played, how long etc)?
3) How often do you post/How often do you expect to post?

1.) Central Standard Time. As in Minnesota, USA.
2.) This is my fourth game on the website. havent played in a few months. Otherwise i'd drop anything to play in real life
3.) If i have something to say everyday, i should be at my computer everyday after work. I stay in hotels during the week, so i have a lot of free time

Maruchan, please omit everything that is not absolutely necessary in your posts. is it necessary for you to quote someone and then respond with "concision"? absolutely not. especially when you know what they mean. half those quotes did not need to be quoted and responded on if not all

I don't know what concision means, I didn't even know it was a word. I was asking

"what's this?"

[saulres]

http://www.dictionary.com

[Maruchan]

dictionary.com the words "bus" "WIFOM" "EBWOP" "buddy" "IGMEOY" "fos", or any of a million more.

tell me if it gives you a result that is comparable with the definition of said term in forum-mafia.

I already dictionaried it, and knew what it MEANT, I was asking what it meant in-context, because I wasn't sure if the definition I read fit in-context.

Thanks for trying to play the One-Up game with me though!

[Supreme Overlord]

I WILL NOT BE READING WALLS.

While I appreciate that you may not like reading them, the fact of the matter is that some players will post walls, and there will be content in them. Refusing to read walls is anti-town.
UPDATE: OK, halfway down is acceptable. (Guess I'd better put this at the top) I usually post in chronological order, as I tend to go away from the internet for a while and come back later, catching up as I make my post.

Ahh see, if I hadn't made my comment about RVS, Saulres wouldn't feel the need to ask about appearing scummy, therefore you wouldn't have your main case right now. Everyone always calls my actions scummy, but I do WHAT I do, because it causes interaction! Even if it sticks me front and center for people's attention ,and therefore scrutiny, most of the time, The interaction between members is worth it! This is the crux of my playstyle, and thats why I am so overtly-aggressive about the LITTLE things early-on. It puts pressure on those causing the little things, causing them to make bigger things.

Eh, what you have to be able to balance is the risks of appearing scummy with the rewards of provoking interaction. Also, this looks like you're trying to take credit for the first 'real' vote. I doubt your post (which prompted saulres to vote in the first place) had a large effect on him questioning whether to change his vote later on.

No? I think thats EXACTLY why he "sarcastically" asked about appearing scummy later. I said something he did is a possible-scum-action, and so he is worried about appearing scum.

I suppose only saulres can say for sure. To me, it seemed like you have moved past questioning his lack of RV, and were more talking about RQS.

And no, I am not trying to take credit for the bandwaggon, whether its a BW on scum or town. I am just trying to show that my way of nitpicking every little post DOES bring interaction, and brings a lot of attention to me. Which if I was scum is a bad thing, so why would I so it? Iunno. Beats me.

Well, it's early-game attention, which isn't all that dangerous. And it's fairly easy to deflect by saying 'hey, it's just nitpicking that get's stuff done; it's okay'. (Which is kind of working on me, even). Plus you can then use this very argument to say 'it's a bad thing, so why would scum do it', but let's not get into that...

And I have to balance the risk of appearing scummy? Wait I thought we were upset with Saulres for caring about appearing scummy. So only scum have to care about appearing scummy.

We can't keep this double standards! Either we have to say that Saulres caring if he appears scummy is a SCUM tell, in which case my lack of caring is a null or town tell. OR we have to say that Maruchan's lack of caring how he appears is a null or scum tell, in which case Saulres' caring is a TOWN tell.

Pick one, you can't have it both ways. It can't be scummy to care while being scummy to not care.

What I mean is that it's detrimental to the town to have townies deliberately doing scummy things in order to stir up interactions. I'm not saying you were doing that specifically here, but I thought it was kind of close and worth warning about. Let scum do scummy things and draw attention to themselves in their own time.

It's not about caring about being seen as town or not (scum need to, town don't); it's about deliberately acting in a scummy and potentially confusing way.

The way I see it, everyone who's playing for their win condition, at least in this setup, should care about if they're going to cause their side to lose by being seen as anything other than town. So caring is a nulltell, at least for me. And so is not caring, because it doesn't say what side you're on -- it just says what kind of player you are. One which is a detriment to their side.

Another way of putting it is that town shouldn't go out of their way of their win condition (scumhunting) to appear town. Whereas scum have to appear town in order to acheive their win condition. (I hope I'm being clear here.)

I can try to defend myself fro mthe first vote, but the second vote was put on just because I said to keep them coming, and the third vote is an OMGUS.

Sorry, I should have been more clear. I outlined my reason for voting you, then quoted your 'keep them coming' line as a joke before voting you. I won't make that mistake again.

I LOVE unnecessary walls. Because it's pretty freaking obvious that they ARE unnecessary, and that MEANS something. It tells us something about the poster. It gives us more of a chance to see flaws in arguments and contradictions.
I say: give me more walls.
If they are filled with content, we get closer to finding scum.
If they are filled with nothing meaningful, we get closer to finding scum, because townies should be always trying to contribute SOMETHING.

I second the sentiments in this post.


Maruchan, I'm not sure if someone else responded to this, but 'concision' in this context meant 'concise', as it saying as much as possible in as few words as possible.
I really don't like when someone asks for a definition, someone else gets upset that they asked, but no one actually bothers to answer.

[Amrun]

Having pretty serious technical diFficulties; will last at most until the 27th. Note the v/la banner.

I WILL be posting within that timeframe but when and how I can't quite predict.

I've been struggling the last few days and finally the technology demons havef ully latched on.

I really haven't read; I'm sorry.

[thunderwielder]

In response to Nihilistic Ninja, I was referring to this post, which saul says "To make a joke." But now re-reading it, I think he wasn't referring to his previous post but making a question. So now I can see your side of things. To me it looked like you were being opportunistic, but L-3 is not opportunistic...

It's late. I had another quote of yours to put in. But now I forget what it was...
Oh yeah.

Also, I misread Thunder's post. I personally found the way it was formatted confusing, so apologies to Thunder for misrepping him.

No worries.
UNVOTE: NihilisticNinja
I thought the misrepresentation was on purpose at first, and I couldn't see your real reasonings, but I think I now understand. I was also trying to catch someone who jumped on the wagon for flimsy reasonings, but I think I was too eager. I should have waited until the L-2 level at least, especially for an opportunistic sort of tell.

[thunderwielder]

Oh, and

@Mod, when is our deadline? It says August 13 right now...

[saulres]

I may miss stuff in my post here because of the length of some of the posts. I will certainly be reading them in ISO as the game day moves on; that's how I make my most informed decisions. But for now I see two things I can respond to; let me know if there are others.

Ahh see, if I hadn't made my comment about RVS, Saulres wouldn't feel the need to ask about appearing scummy, therefore you wouldn't have your main case right now. Everyone always calls my actions scummy, but I do WHAT I do, because it causes interaction! Even if it sticks me front and center for people's attention ,and therefore scrutiny, most of the time, The interaction between members is worth it! This is the crux of my playstyle, and thats why I am so overtly-aggressive about the LITTLE things early-on. It puts pressure on those causing the little things, causing them to make bigger things.

Eh, what you have to be able to balance is the risks of appearing scummy with the rewards of provoking interaction. Also, this looks like you're trying to take credit for the first 'real' vote. I doubt your post (which prompted saulres to vote in the first place) had a large effect on him questioning whether to change his vote later on.

No? I think thats EXACTLY why he "sarcastically" asked about appearing scummy later. I said something he did is a possible-scum-action, and so he is worried about appearing scum.

I suppose only saulres can say for sure. To me, it seemed like you have moved past questioning his lack of RV, and were more talking about RQS.

I never posted sarcastically and don't know what Maruchan is referring to there.

In response to Nihilistic Ninja, I was referring to this post, which saul says "To make a joke." But now re-reading it, I think he wasn't referring to his previous post but making a question.

Yes, this. I was answering glowball's question "Why would you need to change a RANDOM vote anyway?" when I said "To make a joke." I wanted to make a joke in my second RVS vote but was worried that changing the vote then would make me look scummy, so I asked if it would.

It seems I need, at least in this thread, to give up on making jokes, because everyone knows that mafia is serious business.

[Xalxe]

Oh, and

@Mod, when is our deadline? It says August 13 right now...

August 30th, not 13th. Boo me!

[lane0168]

So far we've decided if caring is or is not a scum tell. I think it depends on what they flip. Then we will be able to decide if it was a tell and if we were right.

Also we tried figuring out if changing rvs is suspicious.

Also we talked about whether we do or don't like walls.

Can we get to the point now? Cause its a little distracting from scumhunting imo.

I'm town. Now start talking about those two words. Decide if you believe me. And later in the game come back to it for more relevant information. Just keep the concision to a maximum. Haha oxymoron?

[lane0168]

Oh and as far as the caring thing, being scared about looking suspicious by changing your rvs and not caring about 4 votes on you can not be boiled down into caring vs not caring. Imo they are two different and seperate scenarios.

Disclaimer: I usually type as I'm thinking which is the reason I will probably double or triple post often. I apologize for this, but just when I'm done thing and press submit, ill think of something else to say.

[lane0168]

Alright, reread the game and I think that saulres is newbtown. I've been lynched for being accused of playing the newbie card. No one in that game could use their infinite wisdom about the newbie card to see the difference between that and actually questioning things because you are new and are just curious. I'm sorry I can't help it but because of that I start to be biased towards saulres-town just because I know what its like.

I'm glad thunder and nihil have figured out their differences and became friends. And is complimenting thor buddying?

Alright sorry again. Promise I won't post again for awhile. Work is slow

[Robocopter87]

RoboThor is still not active. Soon. And then you will get content to your hearts content.