Newbie 476: Slow, slow, slow, then FAST and over. Damn.

[mith]

(The watch topic link is at the bottom of the page, on the left side.)

Sir Tornado, do you really believe that truly random votes have any purpose in a Mafia game, or have you just been sucked in by their prevalance? Also, are you Mafia?

Korlash, that made me smile. Though, I wouldn't be so sure about Arkansas.

stephy_nz: If you had to decide right now who the scum are and your life depended on it, who would you say?

[mith]

No Lynch + Day 1 = Terrible idea. I could run numbers on it, but basically it comes down to this: The lynch is our only way to kill scum. If we no lynch day 1, the scum get a free kill, we have learned nothing, and we have lost a chance at killing the scum. In compensation, we

might

get useful information from the Cop, if there is one, but even that is counteracted by the fact that Day 2 it's 4:2, and it's still lynch-or-lose - so scum could easily fake/counter-claim Cop.

FOS: stephy_nz

for suggesting it, though it's most likely a newbie mistake. Lots of players have been fooled by the call of the no lynch.

I'm not asking you to

be certain

of who the scum are at this point. However, everyone has posted. Read their posts. Use your gut. Make an educated (or uneducated) guess. Your response may (or may not) tell us something in the event that you are scum.

Sir Tornado, if you don't believe your vote was useful, why make it?

[mith]

I hope I have demonstrated that you can get responses from people without a vote. But I would also like to get across to the new players (and to you) that rolling dice is a terrible way to start the game.

If I see you make an

apparently

random vote, or if I ask a particular player a question, or if stephy_nz tells us who she thinks the scum are (even at this very early stage) - that's all information. If I can see that your vote is truly random, however, it tells me nothing but that you think a vote is required at this point and you think rolling dice is an acceptable start.

Random voting is the crutch of the player that hasn't considered the alternatives.

[/soap box]

jmar, I don't think that's what she was saying. But stephy_nz, could you clarify?

[mith]

havok95, anything

can

give us information. Sir Tornado's vote could have led to jmar completely freaking out, or someone running to jmar's defense, or whatever. My point is twofold:

1. A diceroll vote does not have any inherent advantage as far as getting information over just voting for someone for a silly reason, or not voting at all and instead asking questions.
2. It does have an inherent disadvantage: namely, I know exactly why Sir Tornado voted for jmar (the outcome of the diceroll), and so I have learned nothing about Sir Tornado himself.

Let me be clear:

I am only talking about using dice tags.

Korlash is also discussing random votes, but the type he is discussing is not the same as the type Sir Tornado made - again, because we

know

Sir Tornado's is random.

(That said, Korlash, voting for the Mod or yourself is even more pointless than voting with dice.)

I've argued in various other threads about the uselessness of all types of random voting, but that's not an important discussion for an ongoing game. I just want to be sure that everyone takes away something from this game beyond "Ooh, one of the ICs used dice to make their first vote, I'm going to do that in all my future games!!1".

(And I also wanted to see how Sir Tornado responded - it could have been the case that he was Mafia trying to avoid responsibility for his first vote. But I don't think there's much to be read from his response.)

Korlash, I don't agree that suggesting No Lynch makes anyone look innocent. I do agree that stephy_nz wouldn't know either way. I think it's pretty much a null tell - I don't think she would've given a deliberately bogus argument for it as scum.

Also, you said you haven't seen anything "scummy" from Sir Tornado, but that something he said makes you "suspicious". That seems contradictory to me; care to elaborate on the difference between "scummy" and "suspicious"?

[mith]

Er. No. Everyone has a 2/7 chance of being Mafia and a 5/7 chance of being Town when the game starts. Not 50/50. That's some bad math.

Nice catch on the "if I'm town" thing, though. That's worth an

FOS: jmar

, IMO.

[mith]

"But the fact of there only being two outcomes, (Town or mafia) means that each one has a 50% chance of happening." <-- THIS IS NOT TRUE.

But if you believe it, and want to play a betting game I just made up so I can take your money...

[mith]

And for the record: Role assignment on this site is randomized, unless the Mod has explicitly stated in in the rules (which almost never happens, and never happens in Newbie games). Most mods use random.org or Excel to randomize their roles.

This is very important to remember if any of you go on to mod games. Unless you're running something with a weird mechanic like UPick or CYOR, never ever ever assign roles any other way than randomly. The players should not be making guesses on how you would assign roles.

[mith]

You're not going to get another lesson. I'm just going to go in a corner and weep for Alaska's education system. We can continue this discussion (if we can even call "you not having a clue what you're talking about" a discussion) after the game; it's irrelevant to catching scum. Suffice it to say: probability don't work like that - having two options != having equal odds for those options.

Having reread jmar's statement, I see he was talking about Korlash, not himself. So I'll remove the FOS.

Korlash, I'm still not seeing where you're making a distinction between "suspicious" and "scummy". So, question: If you had to decide right now whether Sir Tornado is scum, and the outcome of the game depended on it, what would you decide? (And if you tell me it's 50/50, you can expect to be verbally abused in the near future. ;))

[mith]

Bleh, I was planning to post something yesterday, but we ended up going to Tate Modern, and now we're about to go to the movies. But I'll reread/post tonight sometime.

[mith]

Bleh again. Got back later than I expected. And my brain is slightly fried from watching so many movies.

I don't really have a lot to say at the moment, anyway. I want to see more from stephy_nz and havok95 (and I want Holy to start contributing something of substance...). Korlash is mildly suspect, and I'm pretty happy with Sir Tornado and jmar for now.

[mith]

Players tend to go too far one way or another with the gut issue - either they demand a logical case for everything, or they rely solely on their gut and don't explain anything. Somewhere in between is more appropriate. Personally, I tend to let my gut guide me to a suspect, and then look for the evidence to back it up.

Pretty happy with that post overall. I'll probably decide on a vote when I get back from Brighton tomorrow night.

[mith]

Holy, I gave my "list" (as far as I have one right now) two posts ago. However, I'll update it now with the new developments.

Suspects

Holy - Something doesn't sit right with me in her last few posts. I'll have to look more closely on reread, but my "gut" is saying she's scum.
Korlash - The thing with Sir Tornado bothers me. He's posting a lot though, and he hasn't made any major slip-ups as far as scumminess goes (his lack of math skillz are a null tell as far as I'm concerned).
stephy_nz - I have very little read on her at the moment. She's here in the list because of the FOS earlier in the game, and because the other three are lower.

Not so much

jmar - My gut has its eye on him (that sounds painful), but I've been happy with his posts overall.
havok95 - I disagree with his OMGUS stance (unannounced OMGUS votes

can

be a scum tell (though closer to null) - announced OMGUS votes at the very beginning of the game are no different than random votes), but I'm happy with his posts as well. He seems to be trying to hunt scum.
Sir Tornado - I don't think he would've backed down on the dice voting so quickly as scum. Scum tend to have trouble backing down from things, even irrelevant ones.

Beacon of innocent goodness and love

mith

More detailed post later/tomorrow, lots to do today.

[mith]

Yeah, Holy, I got what you were saying, but the way you worded it was pretty scummy. If you want to ask "Why are you FOSing me??", ask "Why are you FOSing me??". The way you worded it suggests you are more concerned with staying on my good side.

(Also, I didn't FOS you - I put you at the top of my list. Personal preference, but I tend to reserve the FOS for specific scummy things, or to get a reaction. Being at the top of my list is a bit more serious; unless for some reason I'm not voting - like here, as I wanted to reread - I will almost always be voting for whoever is at the top of my list. Watch:

Vote: Holy

.)

As for why I put you at the top of my list, I gave my reason at the time in that post. Something didn't feel right in your posts. After rereading, what bothers me is that:

1. You started off the game not posting much of substance, aside from your FOS on stephy_nz.
2. When I called you in this, you claimed to be waiting on stephy_nz and havok95 as well (even though there was plenty else to talk about).
3. When questioned about stephy_nz by havok95, you gave them impression of not actually caring whether she's scum or not.
4. You then tried to compare your posting history to mine (?) and said you were waiting for more from me - fair enough on that last bit, but this seems like an attempt to shift focus to me or even buddy up to me (with the joking)... I can't even tell which, but it bothers me either way.

FOS: havok95

for the comment "by the way, you shouldn't think she is scum, because it's WIFOM".

(Aside/Rant: I highly recommend the recently bumped WIFOM thread in Mafia Discussion. WIFOM is a badly overused term. The origin is a specific type of argument: "I wouldn't _____ if I were scum." This is a WIFOM argument - the player in question could have done _____ with the intention of making this argument to "prove" his/her innocence. An argument being WIFOM doesn't even make it invalid; it's just a shortcut way of saying "You

might

_____."

What havok95 is calling WIFOM isn't, at all. And his usage is dangerous. Essentially what he's saying is "You find something scummy. That's WIFOM. Scum wouldn't do something scummy or they would get caught. So it's not really scummy." Which is silly. A scummy act is not

proof

of guilt, but it is

evidence

. Without such evidence, we would have very little to go on.)

[mith]

I'll second that emotion. Or something.

havok95 - If Holy is town, obviously she is going to operate under that "assumption" for her own suspicions. It would be a (very weak and stupid) WIFOM argument for her to suggest that she

must

be town because she wants to lynch, but that's not what she did. There's nothing wrong with her finding stephy_nz's stance suspicious.

I should point out though that the thing that bothered me about your comment was not your invokation of WIFOM, but that you said "you shouldn't think she is scum".

Holy, the way you word things may not matter to you, but it matters to me. Wording can indicate motivation, which in turn indicates alignment.

You agree with number 3? You

wanted

to give the impression that you don't care whether she's scum?

I understand what you're saying about the "testing" thing - I push and poke and prod players to get reactions all the time. But once again, your wording here bothers me.

[mith]

I am super special awesome happy with my vote.

Or something.

(I desperately need to reread this game.)

[mith]

I strongly disagree with part of that... If someone says I'm suspicious, I want to know why. Heck, if someone says *anyone* is suspicious, I want to know why - forcing scum to explain their suspicions is the best way to catch them being disingenuous or in an outright lie.

[mith]

(That was at jmar, forgot to preview...)

[mith]

Ok, we definitely need some voting happening. Why is no one voting?

[mith]

That was a terribly vague list, Holy. And my scumdar doesn't like it. But before I go into why, try this:

Post a list of the players in the game from scummiest to least scummy. Give a reason why each player is above the next person on the list.

[mith]

Holy, regarding your "reason" for putting me so high on your list - yeah, it's a bad one. Not only was it an obvious joke, but I could easily find other games where I have said similar. My placement on your list feels pretty OMGUSish.

More tomorrow. Well, today, actually, since it's 2am.

[mith]

Sorry, I keep getting distracted. Will definitely post again before the day is done.

[mith]

Right.

What bothers me about Holy's post 138 is the inconsistency. She lists me and jmar as having "good posts", while she says havok has "confusing WIFOM posts"... yet says the same thing about all three of us with regards to alignment ("could be either townie or scum"). She goes with "neutral posts" for Sir Tornado and "not much post atm to assume anything" for lionden_56... yet goes "maybe townie" for the former and "still might be scum" for the latter.

I just get the impression from her that she's not really trying to catch scum. Perhaps early on my impression might be skewed by the fact that stephy_nz never responded to her accusation, but she's spent most of her time since my vote defending herself (granted, that's to be expected to a point, but she's only ever had one vote on her, and there was plenty else to talk about), and the reasoning she gives in 152... well, let's look point by point:

Regarding Sir Tornado - Does no one else find it curious that her reasoning here is that she feels like his

wording

is trustworthy? She's been consistently playing the ESL card, yet in spite of the fact that she doesn't know what sort of player he is and has concerns about her own wording coming off wrong, she considers herself capable of judging another player on this basis alone?

Regarding Korlash - If I'm remembering correctly, Korlash's gut was aching for Sir Tornado and myself because of our IC status. Not because we were his "suspects". (I disagree with this line of argument anyway... Mafia are no less likely to say who they might vote for without reasoning... if anything, they're more likely to do so.)

Regarding me - We both agree it's a bad reason. It doesn't bother me that I'm second on her list. What bothers me is that she doesn't seem to have any particular reason for putting me that high (aside from, I'm assuming, the fact that I'm voting for her). Like I said, OMGUSish.

I dunno. The whole thing just seems kinda thrown together because she had to appease me, rather than because she has actual suspicions and actual reasons for those suspicions.

havok95 has moved up to second. I don't like this baiting thing at all. Need to remember to do a reread of his posts at some point.

[mith]

Holy, you kinda glossed over the whole "inconsistency" thing there. Try again.

ESL = English (as a) Second Language. Sorry, that's not a particularly standard acronym even for native english speakers - just got into a habit of using it in some Antrax games back in the day.

[mith]

And MeMe, I assume you mean October 26. Unless we're playing a time-travel game and I wasn't aware of it...

[mith]

I've been busy patrolling the forums (and was gone most of the day yesterday). Sorry. In Brighton tomorrow and Wednesday as well, but I'll post thoughts today sometime.

[mith]

I would like to see Sir Tornado participate more. That said,

1. I don't think he's "lurking", I just think he forgot about this game. (Add "lurking" to the list of "terms mith thinks are badly overused in Mafia", along with WIFOM.) So I find Korlash's initial attack strange.
2. I don't find someone using "kill" instead of "lynch" at all noteworthy, and it so it bothers me a bit that, of all the things Sir Tornado

could

have commented on, he chose that.
3. I do find it a bit strange that Korlash is

defending

his use of "kill" over "lynch". A deadline lynch is still a lynch, and I think Korlash probably knows that. I'm not sure whether he's making a distinction because he really believes a distinction should be made, or whether he's more worried by the attack than he really should be.

Holy, I don't really think you answered my inconsistency concern. Go read my post on the matter one more time.

People, we have a deadline. If you're not voting,

you should be

.

[mith]

Still not liking Holy. Very much not liking that neither Holy nor Korlash are voting.

That's all I've got time for today, back home tomorrow night.

[mith]

Korlash, go reread post 19 - none of that was based on the timing of the lynch/no lynch. Quibbling over the semantics of how the lynch fails to come about is meaningless in the face of the cold hard logic that not having a lynch

is bad for the town

. Even a

completely random lynch

is better than no lynch, and to equate any lynch decided on by the players with a random lynch is scummy as hell.

Need to do some thinking on why you are arguing this (whether it's because you actually believe it, or because you're Holy's scumbuddy and hoping she won't be lynched, or because you're scum with someone else and hoping an innocent Holy will be lynched and you can say "I told you so").

jmar, I singled out those two because they had posted since my previous post (where I told everyone they need to be voting).

More throughout the day, I just woke up.

[mith]

Korlash, if you don't like the leading wagon,

vote for someone else

. Eesh. I'm not suggesting you should get behind a lynch you don't agree with just for the sake of a lynch. I'm suggesting you should find a vote you

are

happy with and make it.

And if you think Holy is innocent,

tell us why

. Talk us out of this tragic mistake. I don't want to lynch an innocent. I do want to lynch

someone

, because that's the only way we're going to kill scum, and particularly with this setup we don't have a lot of time to screw around. But I want to have the best chance of lynching scum possible. You moaning about how deadline lynches suck and how you don't want to vote for Holy

doesn't help us

(unless you're scum, because you're definitely helping me lean toward that conclusion).

[mith]

Korlash, you're strawmanning my position like mad. I just woke up, and I don't feel in a ranty mood, so I will just say:

Right now, Holy has

two freaking votes

. There are two others besides you with one. If you think either of those players are more suspicious than Holy, then it would be in your interest to vote for them, if you are innocent.

(On the other hand, if you are, say, scum with Holy, or if you are scum with someone else, know she's innocent, and want to play the "Don't come crying to me" game - close relative to the "I told you so" game - then your play here makes perfect sense.)

More on Holy after breakfast. Was going to post more last night, but I took a Benadryl and fell asleep. Doh.

[mith]

Right. Holy.

My problem with your post (138) is

not

that you're unsure. That's just a fact of Mafia.

My problem is the

inconsistency

(I'll emphasize that word again, because it's the key one) between your

reasons

and your

impressions of alignment

. Either on their own would be fine - there's nothing wrong with saying "Well, him I find more scummy, him and him I find more townie, and these three could be either", and there's nothing wrong with saying "Well, you lot have made good posts, you lot have made neutral or not-very-many posts, and you're a confusing WIFOM fiend" - but together, in your post, the two just don't add up.

I simply don't feel you have given that much thought into who the scum are - and that the minor inconsistencies and contradictions point to this - while attempting to give the impression of being a helpful innocent, and so I think you are scum yourself.

I am fairly confident that at least one of Holy and Korlash is scum. Maybe both. And once again I am stuck with a conflict between my brain (screaming that Korlash is scummy has hell in his last few postS) and my heart/gut/whatever (still saying that Holy is scum). I'm sticking with the latter this time (and I must admit, it's mostly because in my experience, me changing my mind at the last minute is a terrible idea).

I should be on for at least the next few hours, so if there are any developments, I'll take them into account.

[mith]

That was hammer, so I'll save my comments for tomorrow. Sweet dreams, all.

[mith]

Good game all.

I had Korlash at the top of my list going into night (for future reference, Korlash, whatever your stance on deadlines, refusing to vote was hella scummy), but then I had jmar second and Sir Tornado fooled me completely. And Korlash played today quite well from what I read.

Sorry about getting you lynched, Holy... hope you enjoyed our arguments as much as I did, though.