Newbie 871 - Game Over Town Win

[boberz]

There are two mafia aligned players, it is in the rules at the top of the thread. I am slightly worried you have not read these, and it makes me wonder how much you have read of anything. Scum would take notice of posts, but I am wandering into WIFOM.

I haven't been talking about this specific game in the Lynch/No-Lynch discussion. Yes, the GM has told us there are 2 scum in this game. Is that the normal procedure in this forum?

So you don't need to worry about my reading skills. We have obviously been talking past one another.

There is always 2 scum in newbie games, I do not mind you not knowing, but it is in the first posts so you should have read it. I am not convinvced we are talking cross purposes.

Your two errors: claiming no-lynch is never right despite players (not just me) trying to explain why you are wrong, and not reading the original posts properly creating doubt about your concentration.

However your mistakes are not scum ones. I am going to shut up for a bit. I would like to hear back from DarthRandall1138 (who I may call Darth from now on) as well as Yarmond and herd456 (who may become herd).

[ksen]

Based purely on the probabilities there are definately situations where it is worth it, so unless your willing to trust the reads of people you have reads on over mathmatics then I do not really think there is an argument. Town do not lose a lynch, they just postpone the lynch until the probabilities are better and the information is greater, I repeat they do not lose a lynch.

If town doesn't lynch how have they not lost a lynch?

The mathematics also argue to lynch everyday:

Game with a day 1 lynch and 9 players, 2 of which are scum (assuming 1 nk a night):
=========================================
Day 1 chance of getting scum: 22%
Day 2 chance of getting scum: 29%
Day 3 chance of getting scum: 40%

Game with no day 1 lynch with 9 players, 2 of which are scum (assuming 1 nk a night):
=========================================
Day 1 chance of getting scum: 0%
Day 2 chance of getting scum: 25%
Day 3 chance of getting scum: 33%

So it looks to me like as the game progresses your chances of getting a scum in a lynch dramatically increase if you lynch everyday.

And in case it's not clear I'm engaging in a purely hypothetical discussion and not meaning to address anything to do with this game.

[ksen]

There is always 2 scum in newbie games, I do not mind you not knowing, but it is in the first posts so you should have read it. I am not convinvced we are talking cross purposes.

Where have I ever said I didn't know how many scum were in this particular game?

Since reading the OP I've known how many scum are in this game.

It's apparent you've been engaging in the discussion as if I'm talking about this particular game. When I joined this conversation it to talk about general town strategy in any game, not just this one.

[Ether]

Boberz: some caveats apply, but scum benefit from not having their opinions pinned down, and townies don't. People frequently ignore lurkers when they see people who they perceive as actively scummy, which lets the lurkers fly under the radar. It's easy to lurk, and towns lose a lot of games that way.

Patrick, Incognito and I are all pretty close, and none of us particularly enjoy being scum. (Well, Incognito does.) If they were scum together, they'd need time to bitch about it. Patrick and I certainly did when we were scum together; I can link you to that QuickTopic.

Like Patrick, I'm not all that interested in your case on Incognito either way, but I think you're probably town.

Ksen's case against no-lynches only covers days that start with an odd number of players; it gets more complicated when you factor in parity and some night actions. But I'd rather not get into this. In general, lynching is good.

I didn't speak to Incognito last night. Though this deduction seems odd if you're having to take our word on that.

Yeah...when I made that first post, I kind of forgot that I hadn't been on all night. I only realized it afterward.

[ksen]

Where do you see if people are lurking? I don't see anywhere that says who is watching the thread.

[Ether]

If someone doesn't post, it's lurking. If someone posts but it's not clear who it actually thinks is scum, it's active lurking.

Generally you need more than 12 hours to determine this.

(There is an online list, and a "Users browsing this forum" area. You can see who's watching Road to Rome or posting a message, unless they set themselves to invisible. I know Boberz, Incognito and you and I are all visible--don't fix that!)

[Incognito]

A good deal to respond to here...

@boberz:

reading through your case, I don't understand why the first portion of it would be more likely to be done by scum -- you yourself mention that my vote seemed almost like a trap to catch opportunistic scum. Wouldn't that imply that you would expect something like that to come from Town then?

With respect to the FoS on Patrick, I obviously disagree with you when you say it was completely pointless -- Patrick (along with Ether) is one of the two people I'd like to get a read on as early as possible. Hence, FoS. Maybe IGMEOY might have been more fitting.

Lurking is not a scum tell, active lurking might be but we are much too early to discuss this.

I agree it might be too early to discuss this, but I disagree with you on your stance on lurking. I think lurking, like most other tells, is a situational tell; for someone like Ether who much enjoys being town, lurking when done by her is absolutely a scum tell. In fact, I think most people on-site and elsewhere tend to lurk more as scum than town. Active lurking is only a form of lurking, though I probably agree that it's usually a stronger tell than flat-out lurking.

You try to test ksen and whoever else wants to answers logic/knowledge/ability to read the wiki, I cannot really work out why. To me town would want to help a person who has not understood by explaining said situation, not try and evaluate their effectiveness, possibly exposing them to scum manipulation later. Not that I believe ksen is a bad player, but that is another issue.

I didn't really want to test his ability to read the Wiki, actually. I was hoping that he or someone else might be able to do some critical thinking. Obviously I could have spoon fed the answer to everyone but part of my job here is to get you all thinking like Mafia players. Thinking critically for yourself is helpful in this game.

As for 3, I merely wanted clarification from DarthRandal on the thing you questioned him on because I found myself somewhat confused by it too. Why do you assume that it's me buddying up to you?

What scenario could possibly be in place to make us NOT want to exercise it?

At the risk of licking more rear-end

(heh)

what boberz said in 14 covers this.

I wasn't on AIM between...6 and 8:30ish pm last night, EST. So, um. Feel free to correct me, you two? I'm sure you're very ethical about this sort of thing.

I wasn't on AIM at all yesterday; I was busy cramming for a big exam which I just took this morning. I'm beat.

I somewhat agree with the early town tells on boberz.

---

Ether raises a mildly interesting point though about the pre-game stuff that I hadn't considered. I know if I were scum, I would have asked for 72 hours to confirm in order to have enough time to talk with my partner. I'm assuming Patrick and Ether, as experienced players, might have asked for similar? Won't be checking either one off as completely Town at the moment, but it's something in their favor.

How would town know it was in that situation? In the games I've played on other sites the Town doesn't normally know how many scum are in the game.

If you're claiming that you knew the number of scum in Newbie Games to be 2, why would you

not

be able to tell when we're in the type of situation mentioned by boberz even if games you've played elsewhere didn't allow you to determine this?

[Ether]

I don't think any of us would take 72 hours as scum. 72 hours is a lot. But I do think you'd arrange some time to be on AIM together.

Not sure what I'd expect with an IC/newbie pair. (I don't seem to have the timestamp for when I confirmed in 530, although judging by my newbie scumbuddy's PM to me, the game didn't open for at least 24 hours. Incognito, you replaced into all your newbie games where you were scum, right?) I guess that's a more useful thing to figure out.

[Incognito]

I would. Most def. And yeah, I've never been scum in a Newbie straight from the get-go. I've only done Newb-scum in replacement gigs.

JDodge opened 530 after a weekend, so I don't think it really does any good when looking into you. I should check on the 'tricky half of Pathetric, though.

[Ether]

I'm going to take your word for this and write you off as town. Awesome.

I don't think Patrick's been scum in a newbie game in ages. Replacements included, he was probably a newbie last time himself.

the 'tricky half of Pathetric, though.

You know, every time I worry that I'm saying something that might alienate the newbies, you remind me that I could be doing so much more. ♥

[Annachie]

This is my second game one this site, and I've played in one other game at a different site. As you may have guessed that first game here also had DathRandal in it.

<--- The dread pirate Bobbi-Blu. My youngest.


Ksen, there are deifiate circumstances where a no-lynch is a viable option, but not hat many.

To answer Incog's 'challange'(?)
If ther are three town and one scum left (and remember in newbie games we know we start with two scum and get told when we lynch one) then a no-lynch is mathamatically viable. (from 1/3 chance to voting for a scum reguardless to 1/2)

Incog I got told once that newbies reading the howto's is a scum tell. How should I treat being told to read them?

I don't like random voting. Voting should always have a reason though I admit the first couple of votes cast are essentially random. Random votes leads to random lynches and, to me at least, that seems to be too easy for the scum to manipulate. A no-lynch is preferable to a random lynch.
THough I honestly don't think we'll end up with a random lynch.

Ether. It's not entirely my idea. It kinda sums up the early discussion from my first game here, though the way I presented it is all me. It seemed to stir up quite a discussion and, admitadly accidentily, revealed a scum. (Not that we managed to lynch him. Newbie 844 if you're interested) So I thought it would make a good starting point.

The whole Ether/Patrick/Incog things worries me slightly. Must be the slight inference of out of game communications.

[Patrick]

Ether raises a mildly interesting point though about the pre-game stuff that I hadn't considered. I know if I were scum, I would have asked for 72 hours to confirm in order to have enough time to talk with my partner. I'm assuming Patrick and Ether, as experienced players, might have asked for similar? Won't be checking either one off as completely Town at the moment, but it's something in their favor.

Actually, I have a hard time seeing experienced scum trying this in a game where the mod puts in the first post, "bolded people have confirmed". I think they'd worry about it sticking out. Maybe an experienced player would prefer to stall for a smaller amount of time, as I did with Ether when we were scum together, but I don't want to give this kind of reasoning much weight. For example, any IC and newbie could have got in a decent chat if both were online at the same time.

ksen's question does seem bizarre, since it seems he's saying he had an answer to it. It would have made more sense to me coming from someone who didn't know the number of scum.

I'm going to take your word for this and write you off as town. Awesome.

Meh. Can sort of see it.

[Ether]

Annachie: We've all been talking for years, but not about this game. I promise that any coordination will be shamelessly in-thread. Could you elaborate on how that discussion played out in 844, or should it wait?

Meh. Can sort of see it.

Why "meh?"

[Patrick]

Because I don't have as much confidence in it as you apparently do.

[Annachie]

Tha game (844) was kinda different, I assume, since one player had to be replaced, then his replacement replaced before the game started. Then annother player expressed concern that we should hold off voting until that replacement had posted so I thought 'Ahha, too much concern he must know something' and called the two of them out as a scum pair. To which the replacements response was to describe the two of them as "The Laurel and Hardy of Mafia"

For those who don't remember Laurel and Hardy they had a catch phrase "That's another fine mess you've gotten me into" so I thought, Ahha!.

Turned out that Mr. replacement was one of the scum, both players ended up being replaced, and the guy who replaced into the scum spot was really good and experienced and talked his way out of it.

Anyway, what matters is that we got the discussion rolling, although a few random votes helped there, and people made mistakes because it was rolling along fairly well. Of course a very vocal newbie with eratic play masked things a bit.

If someone doesn't post, it's lurking. If someone posts but it's not clear who it actually thinks is scum, it's active lurking.

I think I have to disagree here, at least with the second part. There are definate times when posts don't reflect who the poster thinks is scum but the post is still scum hunting.
Posting with no content is more active lurking.

(He says after basically doing that. But in my defense I was answering a question)

IGMEOY Ether, Incog, Patrick

With only two scum and the way you

three

people seem to read each other better than us 'strangers', I'm really curious to see which way you fall on each others scummyness, hence the eye.

[Ether]

I'd certainly say someone's active lurking if it keeps consistently asking questions without showing signs of drawing conclusions. I usually wouldn't accuse someone of active lurking over an individual post, but I wouldn't do that if the post was a joke, either. Lurking is a pattern sort of thing.

I'll answer your question after you say how

you

feel about us.

[Annachie]

lol Ether. Actually, I'm leaning towards town for the three of you. Just a gut feeling.

[Ether]

Elaborate?

May I wait until a few other people weigh in on this stuff, too, before giving my own take? (I'm prepared to do it now, but I'm really more interested in getting content from you six. I figure Patrick and Incognito should be fairly simple--meta is nice like that.)

[Ether]

Hi, Herd.

[herd456]

Hi, this is my first game on this site, but I've played a bit elsewhere. Mostly live, though, so my experience for this type of game is limited (i.e. one game)

I'm rather fond of random voting, so

vote: Patrick

because of how irritated the Greek language has made me today.

Anyway, the dynamic between Ether, Patrick, and Incognito is interesting. I'm not sure how much to attribute to their experience and prior interactions, but I extremely doubt that any pair of them is scum--and not just because of how mathematically improbable that is. I'm not getting any other reads right now, other than the AIM thing's pushing Incognito a little toward town.

[Ether]

I'm not sure how much to attribute to their experience and prior interactions,

How much of what?

What do you think about Annachie?

[herd456]

How much your play is affected by your knowing each other, and thus how much of what I might otherwise be able to read may be null because you know how to hide it with each other.

Most of what Annachie has said is summary of another game and some debate about random voting and lurking. I do tend to agree more with you, Ether than I do with Annachie on active lurking, though--your definition essentially fits my own. I have a hard time reading him too strongly either way, though I will say I don't like how he seems so eager to see how you three (Ether, Patrick, Incognito) react to one another that he hasn't formed much of an opinion himself.

[Ether]

Having experience with each other would hurt us as scum, not as town. Anything that they know to hide, they'd have to hide anyway. But I know what to look for, and what feels off.

Annachie, uh, did give an opinion when asked.

[Incognito]

Incog I got told once that newbies reading the howto's is a scum tell. How should I treat being told to read them?

Did the person explain why he or she felt scum would be more likely to look up how-to's in the Wiki than town would? Do you yourself feel that way?
I personally don't see it as something that's definitive in the scum tell department; I think newbie town

and

newbie scum would be about equally likely to look up random factoids during and prior to their games, so I'd consider it more a null tell if anything.

@Patrick:

I don't believe starkmoon was updating the "confirmed bolded" thing in regular fashion when she received confirmations. So while I can see where you're getting at with your disagreement, I don't think it would completely apply here.

-~-~

Annachie (your kid's adorable, btw), does "IGMEOY" mean something different to you than it would to me? I typically consider "IGMEOY" a way for someone to show who they're suspicious of, so I'm confused as to why you IGMEOY-ed Patrick, Ether, and me but then concluded in your #41 that you were having a gut town read on each of us. Clarify? Also, you mentioned that you played with DarthRandal before in your previous game. Do you have any meta tid-bits that might be informative with regard to your interpretation of his play?

DarthRandal, do you have any tid-bits about Annachie's play?

I feel like unvoting Ether, but I can't think of any place striking to move it at this time. So yeah.

[Ether]

Herd would be a decent start. But I'm too lazy to vote today. Maybe tomorrow.

I'd rather see Annachie hold off on interpreting Randal's play until after Randal's made a few more posts.