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

[jmar]

Interesting post Korlash... mind telling me why you think stephy is probably town?

Also, I've played my fair share of mafia games. I used to belong to this site about a year ago, I stopped coming and lost my username and password. But I played several games here and in real life as well.

Note this doesn't by any means mean I'm skilled. I played here for a couple months, but I haven't played in awhile so I'm quite rusty (evidenced by my complete inability to even bold votes), which is why I joined the newbie queue.

[MeMe]

Vote Count

jmar

(1):

Sir Tornado

Sir Tornado

(1):

jmar

stephy_nz

(1):

havok95

No Lynch

(1):

stephy_nz

not voting

(3):

Holy, Korlash, mith

Four to lynch.

[Korlash]

Interesting post Korlash... mind telling me why you think stephy is probably town?

Sure can there... First off it is a fairly common newbie mistake to think a no lynch is better then killing off a towny. I myself wanted to do that my first game when it was like... 12 players. Everyone got made at me and bad stuff happened :O

Secondly it is a good mafia ploy to suggest a no lynch sometimes. This not only makes them look innocent but could in fact bring about a no lynch, giving them the edge they need. However I don't think any player would know that on their first game.

Then you just get my gut feeling.. though I think I'm always more trusting of girls.. I don't know why ><

So thats my take on it. Think what you like for now. Its way to early to actually have anything to go on yet.

[jmar]

I agree, just something that caught my eye.

[havok95]

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.

You can get information out of random votes--specifically, how certain people react to having a vote on them. My vote will likely change in the next couple of pages as a post history; the more posts there are, the better it is for the town--even if we lynch a townie by mistake, we can go back and look at all their posts and make decisions based on that. Random votes are a better way to get people talking than asking them nicely.

[Korlash]

Not always...

Take an experienced player... They won't act out over one little random vote. In fact some people won't do anything when they are one vote away from a lynch. This early in the game a vote is meaningless.

Now take an inexperienced player. They get a vote on them and might go crazy. They don't want to be singled out this early. And if they are town they might do some rookie mistake that will eventually get them lynched.

In short, sometimes random votes are not only worthless, they actually hurt the town.

Now sometimes you can get lucky. You can hit a newbie mafia. Then you might get somewhere. Or you can hit an experienced mafia and maybe get lucky. Or hit a town and have one of the mafia do a mistake. But overall the random voteing is only good to get in posts quickly. The vote itself is overall meaningless.

Now I on the otherhand, try to promote activity without the early voting. It A) doesn't create early game conflicts between players, B) Doesn't give me any early "stands" on players and C) Doesn't give the mafia any fodder to use against me. Mostly all random voting is is people posting. So I figure, just post. Don't even bother with random votes.

And I'm not saying votes don't hold pressure on people. If you can give a logical reason, good support, and a semi-viable presentation about how someone "might" be mafia, then vote them, it will create some pressure. No one will be worried about a "I think you look crazy, Vote: You!" But they might get scared when you come at them with "You said this, this, and did this. A towny would never blank. So you are either a bad player or mafia! Vote: You!"

Or thats my take on it. I do random vote sometimes... Mostly I vote for the Mod or myself though... I never risk pressuring a newb towny into something I will later regret...

[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"?

[Sir Tornado]

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]

Well... I actually never thought of it that way (and, I haven't encountered anyone here so far who argued that way) but I agree with you that it makes sense. I should not have decided my vote on the cast the dice.

[Sir Tornado]

If I had to use my gut I would vote for Mith.. Mostly cause I always fear the smart helpful people...

I wouldn't mind a bit more from Holy and Havok before I start my voting stage...

My early views... Stephy is just a new player... Probably town from my experience... Holy I can't say for certain... Maybe a new player who doesn't want to say too much because its her first time as mafia... Maybe just doesn't want to attract any attention to herself... Sir Tornado... Could go either way... I haven't actually seen anything scummy from him yet but his comment about getting the game underway makes me suspicious. I know a lot of ways to get the game underway... Most of them actually ends up getting me lynched... but hey... it still works... jmar... Eh.. Hes shown his inexperience and hasn't said much to stand out.

Then we have Mith... Who... Um... probably one of the smartest players on the forum... So again I can't say for certain...

So I'm going to remain voteless and see where the discussion gets us. But if I had to vote I would throw it on Sir Torn or Mith... I'm sure that will change by the time I actually vote though..

Wait, you say you haven't seen anything scummy from me and yet say my comment on getting the game underway was suspicious? Isn't that a contradiction of sorts? (Also, I want to know

how

my comment about getting the game underway was scummy)

[Holy]

@ Sir Tornado > Happy birthday!

Actually when I read everyone posts, it make sense if you all are innocents, but we knew it isn't, there are 2 mafia to find.
So I re-read again, and I found that I feel kinda strange about stephy_nz votes, at first I try to ignore my feeling, because she might be just a newbie townie like Korlash said, but then again, I am too a newbie and I prefer try to lynch a suspect and hope it hit the mafia than vote for 'no lynch'. So I try to think from mafia perspective...as stephy, it could be that She votes 'no lynch' trying to be like an uninformative and careful townie, but actually it doesn't matter for her who lynched at day 1 as long as it is a townie because as a mafia She can murder when the night comes.

Well, then again, I might be wrong. But I've got my FOS at stephy_nz for now..

[Korlash]

Wow for a second there I thought I had to answer two questions... turns out its the same one...

Ok.. sure...

Sir Tornado said "Because, if you don't make up a vote, or do something similar to get responses from people, the game never actually gets underway." (I didn't feel liek quoting right now...)

Now I take that as you trying to tell us to vote. To me, thats a big weird. I haven't voted yet and jsut by talking got you and Mith to both actively ask me stuff. So, Yeah saying you have to vote or something similar (An Fos? How similar can you get to a vote??) to promote activity is crap. And when someone says something thats crap I think it makes them look suspicious. But I don't consider this a scum tell at all.

I'm very careful with my accusations of scum, just because I have a small feeling on someone doesn't mean I automatically assume they are scum. But it does make me look more closely at their posts from then on.

OOC: Ohh a Birthday... is there cake? Do I get some?

@Mith: My whole point when I vote myself or the Mod is just to joke around. I don't try to promote anything with them. Like I said I'm not a fan of random votes...

[jmar]

For me, the thing that stood out from Korlash's post the most was how he said he'd lynch Mith if he was goin with his gut. But I wasn't gonna say anything until I saw more from him. But now that we're getting into discussion, I think it's interesting. Here's my reasoning.

See, Mith is probably town. Just from sheer mathematical odds he's probably town. (5 town, 2 scum).

Now if I'm town, I see Mith as a resource. As one of the most experienced players on here, he's definitely dangerous if he's scum. But he's also a huge benefit if he's town, simply because his experience will be helpful for us. If I were scum, I'd want him out of the way as early as possible. Mith will prolly be doc-protected tonight if there is one, so it makes him risky for a night kill.

Also, Korlash said Sir Tornado was his backup- another experienced player. So right now I've got an

FOS

on Korlash, simply because he seems to want to isolate the newbies.

Of course theres still the huge possibility that Mith is scum, in which case were probably all screwed.

[Korlash]

When did I say Torn was Mith's backup?

Also... Mathematically... everyone is more likely town in you argument. So it still proves nothing.

But, take it like this, each player has a 50/50 chance of being mafia or town because its all randomly assigned. So Mith has a 50% chance to be mafia. As do I, as does Sir Torn, as do you.

This early I have nothing on Mith. But in my experience, a lot of really good mafia players like to really help out the town and newbies so they gain trust from them. I can see this as Mith's plan, or I can see him as a really good IC helping us. I didn't vote for him because I didn't have anything to go on. Just because I said he was on top of my list meant nothing this early.

Also the Now "if I'm town" comment could have been worded better.. maybe.. "As town. I see Mith as a resource." Its not really important, but using the words "If I'm town" When the phrase "I am town" Would be better seems weird to me. I'm not saying it means anything, just a thought.

[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.

[Korlash]

Actually I thought in depth about this for a while... see there has to be the exact same odds for everyone seeing as how its random. and because theres only two choices it becomes yoru either town or mafia. The fact that there are more town roles shouldn;t actually play a part when it comes down to the overall point.

See the first person to get their role can either be town or mafia, then the same goes for the next. Thats 50/50 for both. Then you have to go into are both mafia roles assigned yet? So the next person might have a 50/50 chance or might have a 100% chance of being town, then the same goes for the rest.

But, there is no rule saying who the first two people are. If its truely random the Mod should pick a name at random and assign at random. So any one of us could be picked first, so we all have the option of being A) A town or B) a mafia. THen if we become town theres like 25% chance at doc 25% chance at cop 50% at vanilla...

Thats jsut my basic principle. You have to look at some other details, does the Mod go off the original list? That would then say who the first two to get roles are. Does the mod flip coins or pull out of a hat? Does the mod jsut randomly do it in their head? What are the mod's views on IC's on the same side?

The concept of trying to rationalize a percentage of being mafia, or a ratio of town to mafia can be seen from many many different view points, and can never be the same in two different games.

But the fact of there only being two outcomes, (Town or mafia) means that each one has a 50% chance of happening. Or as I like to put it, a coin flip.

the 2/7 and the 5/7 thing is a good way to look at it in general, but its still a toss up 50% chance per person until you know the others.

But all of this is meaningless so

[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.

[Korlash]

Oh i bet $50!

Ok Jmar... Mafia or town... *flips coin* Heads... Town...

Korlash... *flips coin*... Heads... town...

Mith >.> <.< *replaces coin* *Flips coin* ... Wow... it fell through a crack... this game is rigged! I want my money back!!!

[jmar]

I also said "if I'm scum." I don't really see the big deal about the word "if," but meh, whatever.

[jmar]

Also, Mith is right about the probability thing. Korlash, think of it this way. Lets say me and your coins came up tails, and we were both scum. Now what happens to your 50/50? There's only two scum, so your coin just became two-headed. It's 2/7 scum and 5/7 town.

[Korlash]

I already said that...

"See the first person to get their role can either be town or mafia, then the same goes for the next. Thats 50/50 for both. Then you have to go into are both mafia roles assigned yet? So the next person might have a 50/50 chance or might have a 100% chance of being town, then the same goes for the rest. "

My point is that no one should automatically get their roles first. So we have 7 players. And before any of them get a role they all have a 50/50 chance. If any of them can be chosen first then any of them can have that 50/50 shot.

But for the sake of not getting another lesson from Mith, and for not giving the mafia any more fodder to use against me, I'll admit the 2/7 5/7 is a better way to look at it... At least until I solidify my argument... >.> <.<

[Sir Tornado]

Korlash, your coin flipping corelation is incorrect. This more like picking up chits from a hat. There are two that say scum an five that say town. The chance to pick up town is not 50%. It is 5/7.

[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. ;))

[Holy]

O my~ I'm laughing here...

Actually maybe Korlash should try it physically with a real 7 balls/straws/anything with 2 colours, a box, a blindfold, a paper and a pencil. Plus 1 two-sided coin if He still insist...

But I'll drop this matter...

[Korlash]

Actually I spent a good 5 hours on my thinking way back when... I was trying to prove/Disprove the whole Both IC's are likely to be one mafia one town thing. I must have flipped 100 coins, drawn lots over 3 dozen times, threw darts, randomly assigned in my head, used a random probability thing on my calculator, dice rolls, dropping marbles, and all manners of what nots. It was a slow day... ><

Suffice it to say, each method of picking randomly has a different outcome and probability. Picking from a hat does get you the 5/7 2/7 ratio. Yet coin flips cannot have more then a 1:2 ratio. My argument is still flawed and will need more work before I actually try to use it. So i do love all the talk! Research!

Yet I still see no grounds on which this argument even holds so far in this game so all this talk is kinda pointless.

As for what I would say on Sir Torny as of this very second... if my life, the game, and all the turtles in the world depended on it... would be... Wait... What’s wrong with the Alaskan educational system? I was raised down South... taught to count on all 40 of my fingers and how to say my A, B, Ts! Just because I am trying to create a viable, theory in which I can understand randomness, probability, outcomes, ratios, and all manner of the laws of Physics, gravity, and dice roles, doesn’t mean I ain’t no smart!

Back to Torn... I would say he is town. And I would say You are town. Yes you! The person reading this... Hi... Yes I see you.. I'm behind you! BOO!

There has only been 2 pages of posts, with three of the players still as unknowns mostly. There isn’t enough to go on at all. But in the interest of promoting activity I spoke my mind about a simple statement Torny said and you seem adamant in either clarifying that (To a very overly extent) or trying to make me come off as a bad guy for suggesting it. this could just be you trying to promote useful discussion, player activity, or clarification of some hazy statement. I don't know which...

But in my mind the term "Suspicious" and "Scummy" Don't mean the same. suspicious means they did something you either didn't expect, or that you didn't want them to. So you point it out in hopes they give you a reason, give you more to go on, or fix it. A lot of town do a lot of suspicious things, sometimes they contradict themselves because their views have changed from other peoples posts. Some people automatically assume a contradiction means your scum, it doesn't. Sometimes there is a very reasonable excuse.

Scummy, on the other hand, is a slightly higher step up. This would be things you actually classify as scum tells, or mafia behavior. I myself have my own privet list of some scummy behavior. I try not to bring it up because most people don’t seem to agree with me on any of it… So meh… The scummy behavior is what you would actually use against people when you vote them. Take reasons for their votes, lynching a towny, twisting words and statements to make that person seem town, certain comments, etc… can all be considered scummy to some degree.

I personally do use the words scummy and suspicious together or even intertwined. But this early on I can’t say anyone has done anything scummy. Maybe to promote activity I will say something is suspicious and see what happens. But overall, you can’t really tell the scum yet. Well I can’t… I don’t know what the hell you guys can do… Maybe you guys can like.. read minds… or… like… the Role pms… HACKERS! I banish you all to the outside… Breath in that horrible fresh air and bask in the blazing rays of the sun! BURN DEMON BURN! *throws water at you*