Newbie 2050 | The End

[StatueSurfer]

Hi, I'm StatueSurfer

and I'm an alcoholic

VOTE: Exquisite Crab because they must taste delicious

[StatueSurfer]

Scums more often give reasons to meaningless actions. Even if the reason is no reason.

This isn't compelling, because three other people, including me, and totaling over half the players, gave a "reason" for their random vote.

What specifically makes Charles and Lone's reasons look scummier than anyone else's?

Okay, that's kinda weird if you can't explain why you feel that way. Scumlean on Alice.

Also:

Very (and I mean

very

) slight FoS on RayFrost for stacking in RVS.

Slightly less slight FoS on Crab for kinda sheeping Alice's reads without giving an actual reason.

Null on everyone else for now.

Also, uh, you didn't miss Alice's edit, right Harumi?

UNVOTE:

[StatueSurfer]

Not everyone.

Also about Charlie, saying that he is voting for no reason could be made to sound more funny.

That being said, it is too early to give strong reads.

I actually agree with this... before I posted I realized that part of his post seemed a little bit, ah, self-concious, like he was actively trying to make his vote seem random or something. It just felt unnatural. (I didn't write any of that in my first post because I didn't want to give Alice my answer)

Also looks like you backed off sussing Lone, or would you like to explain that?

In reverse, I don't think what Alice said is particularly suspect. It's not the greatest reasoning because other people gave reasons (myself included), but people get feelings all the time. Having a dislike of a specific type of reason for this part of the game is fair.

I find Crab going "oh yeah I can totally see that" when Alice's reasoning is far from sound is more suspect to me.

Harumi, is there a reason that you're suspicious of Alice, but you have no suspicion of crab who just sat on Alice's reasons without any of his own? I'd say it's flimsier to back up someone's flimsy reasons than to have flimsy reasons themselves.

I agree with the part in italics, and I also find it very suspicious that despite being over 24 hours since Crab's first post they haven't returned to respond to two people sussing them, so I think I'll turn the pressure up.

VOTE: Exquisite Crab

The point about Harumi is interesting, but since they missed the edit I think they're just maybe a little absent-minded.

Townlean on Frost.

What is this, a correspondence club?

lol

While being seen as suspect is something that should be avoided, I don't think that's reason enough to feel obligated to follow everyone's lead. Why do you feel it's necessary to do what everyone else does?

It is in human nature. I don't feel that doing something else here is necessary. .

This feels like BS.

Exquisite crab's vote was scummy (or odd).But as they haven't got a chance to explain (or they are hiding?), I'll wait for them to explain what their reason was?

This reeks of being a parrot? 20+ posts go by, and this is all you can think to say? I guess you don't have any reads on the person who sussed you right off the bat? Also that question mark? lol?

Also Volxen hasn't posted anything except a naked random vote, and Malakittens has four posts with virtually no contribution, and Charles' only substantive post was a sheep on Frost.

[StatueSurfer]

I didn't find much in any posts except crab's. That was a weak sus which is already dead I think. I ain't good at pressuring people as town

I'll say... assuming you are town.

While being seen as suspect is something that should be avoided, I don't think that's reason enough to feel obligated to follow everyone's lead. Why do you feel it's necessary to do what everyone else does?

It is in human nature. I don't feel that doing something else here is necessary. .

This feels like BS.

No it is not. Check here.https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herd_behavior

It even has a name: the bandwagon effect.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bandwagon_effect

I

might

be able to swallow that if this were a live game and you had to make a decision in seconds. But you had plenty of time to make a decision, and it's not like somebody forced you to make a random vote. You deliberately chose to make a random vote, and using "human nature" to justify a deliberate choice does not help your case. Not to mention that you must've already had a read on Charles but decided not to act on it, and your defense here has not been good.

But, whatever. I don't actually care that much about the answer to this question. Here's something I do care about: you have avoided answering 2-3 times now the question of "Why did you suss Lone at the start of the game?" You told us why you sussed Charles, but not Lone. So let me ask you, point-blank:

Why did you suspect LoneMarkhor at the start of the game?

[StatueSurfer]

What happened to the big post I had at #50? It just vanished for no reason, and weirdly it's still viewable indirectly from my profile, but redirects to the new #50.

Anyway.

Why did you suspect LoneMarkhor at the start of the game?

The same reason as for Charles. There are 2 scums. Out of all entrances his and Charles I liked the least.

This is what you said about Charles after I pressed you the first time:

Not everyone.

Also about Charlie, saying that he is voting for no reason could be made to sound more funny.

That being said, it is too early to give strong reads.

Note the presence of an actual reason besides "I just didn't like it". I would like you write down the actual reason you didn't like his entrance.

Glad to see Volxen and Malakittens are showing up.

Everything Lunar has done so far has made me think that slot is scum. It feels like he's either bussing his partner or framing an admittedly very easy target to frame. That said, I would like to see Charles actually contribute, but for now

VOTE: Lunar Martian

Harumi what are your reads on everyone?

[StatueSurfer]

EBWOP: okay this is wacked that post of mine that vanished is still in my ISO.

[StatueSurfer]

So you agree that the person I'm voting is Mafia, and your reaction is to vote me? That's not a Town reaction at all. OK, I declare this game solved. It's Charles and Statue.

I didn't say he was mafia. I do, however, think he's scummy. And so what? I have scumreads on like four people. Obviously all of them can't be scum, and you look like the best candidate.

Also you never explained why you thought Charles was scum, which isn't helping your case.

And you are correct that if you being replaced in didn't clear the votes on your slot, you are at L-2. I wasn't keeping track and there hasn't been an official votecount posted yet.

[StatueSurfer]

Ok who are the four people, could you give me a run-down on why you think they could be Mafia? Why am I the best candidate?

Will do!

Also turns out it's actually 5 people, in no particular order:

-

Malakittens:

little activity, possibly active (well, "active") lurking. He has basically two non-fluff posts (since 63 is basically a EBWOP of 62) are 1) borderline IIoA and 2) a post with reads on two people
- ya boi

Charles:

Well, you summed it up pretty well in 72; self-conscious intro and pretty much no contribution.
-

Exquisite Crab:

when I was compiling this I actually almost forgot about him

because he hasn't posted in 2+ days.

Could the mod poke him please? (back on point: his only non-random vote post was sheeping a read from Alice)
-

AliceK:

starts with making two reads with zero explanation, then refuses to explain their read on Lone until like 60 posts later for some reason. Then justifies something they did with "it's human nature". Taking so long to explain that read is really sticking in my craw.
-

You, Lunar Martian/LoneMarkhor:

Let's give a rundown of everything your slot has done this game:
- Basically active lurked for the first day: not good
- Sheeped a popular wagon with no other reads: not good
- Replaced out as soon as I pressured them slightly: maybe coincidence but not a good look
- Replacement practically naked votes someone (someone scummy but still): not great
- Misrepresents what the person who called them on the above says: scummy
Basically the vote's on you because I'm more inclined to vote for someone actively doing scummy things as opposed to someone passively doing scummy things.

Other reads are townlean on Frost for good activity and questioning and null on everyone else.

Why did you suspect LoneMarkhor at the start of the game?

The same reason as for Charles. There are 2 scums. Out of all entrances his and Charles I liked the least.

Would you mind stating what in particular about the entrance you didn't like? Just so we're all on board.

They feel lazy, but author in both cases explained the vote (no reason; wasn't voted). That's all. Don't expect miracles from single posts. ^^

I didn't expect a miracle, I expected you to be able to answer a simple question, and now you've got me wondering why that took so long.

Hello Lunar. I hope you will have a good time with is. I might be voting you. I will unvote for now.
UNVOTE:

99% sure your vote was your random vote on me.

Hello everyone

VOTE: volxen
For no reason.

Hi RayFrost,

It is still pretty early for me to have strong reads on people, but I like your vote on Exquisite Crab.

The first post feels like it's overexplaining the RVS vote, which suggests there's a guilty conscience behind it. It's possible that a nervous Town would do the same, but it's more likely that Mafia would feel nervous.

The second post buddys/sheeps RayFrost's read on Crab, but doesn't do anything to solve the game. In fact, the other three posts are devoid of any game-related content, so Charles is yet to do anything at all to try and solve the game, including flat out refusing to attempt to have reads.

About that second point, that all applies to the guy you subbed in for, which isn't helping your cause much.

And in light the post Harumi just made while I was writing this, which should put Lunar at L-1, I'll UNVOTE:

[StatueSurfer]

So you asked me to explain all my scumreads, and then you didn't comment on it at all, which is interesting.

He can scumread us both. But he can't think that me scumreading Charles makes me Mafia if he also scumreads Charles.

Mmmmm... and that's because I don't. I think you opportunistically voted someone who was already scumread to try to get the heat off you (and failed spectacularly in doing so), which

taken together with my other points on your slot

, is quite possibly scum running damage control.

I will continue to share some but not all of my reasoning with the thread. If you ask I can provide reasoning, as I did. If you check my completed Town game, you will see I did the same thing there. Jumping to the conclusion that it's scum motivated without any explanation of why Mafia would want to draw attention to themselves by naked voting onto a wagon is pretty bad logic. Actually, in what world would Mafia ever do that? That's very bad Mafia play, and so if you think I'm Mafia because of that you're kind of insulting my intelligence.

I don't like the idea of judging people based on past games, and I don't like the slightly condescending tone of this post, and I think it's slightly asinine to hide your reasoning, but this is probably your most convincing post. I took a look at 2043 in fact, and I think you played significantly less aggressively there than here, but also in a different style from 2044, where you played more of a "calm mediator" role.

(Just a note if you are town: while I appreciate not changing your style just because someone doesn't like it, if your style as town keeps getting you lynched, maybe it would be worth changing things a little.)

Also Lone explicitly said that he hates playing as Town and is bad at it. Don't read into the replacement, but if you're reading into the replacement and ignoring that post you're being disingenuous.

And so are you, because what he said was this

I didn't find much in any posts except crab's. That was a weak sus which is already dead I think. I ain't good at pressuring people as town

He didn't say he hated it, just that he was bad at it. Second time by my count you've twisted words... not to mention that there's no reason for me to assume one of my scumreads is telling the truth.

Alright, like I promised, I'm going to make a readlist now. I believe I made the right choice to wait for reasons I will explain shortly.

Town

Harumi Ayasato:

The one pure person in this town, prove me wrong.

StatueSurfer, Ray Frost:

Reasonably active, and probably trying the hardest to find scum out of anyone here. Moderate-to-strong.

Malakittens, Volxen:

Didn't do a whole lot but did enough to not be a null read. Light.

Null

Charles:

No substantial posts.

Exquisite Crab:

No substantial posts, and they agreed with some dubious reasoning which while suspicious isn't enough for me to scumread yet.

Scum

Alice:

Alice has always been on my radar, as you've probably noticed, due to their strange way of selecting reads, as well as their rather poor justification for their behavior in RVS. They also apparently liked the confidence of Lunar Martian which I also find scummy, especially because of my read on them. Moderate.

Lunar Martian:

Previous player replaced out as soon as they were put under pressure, which rings alarm bells in my head even though I can't confirm that's why. (They also made no substantial posts.) As soon as Lunar enters, they immediately vote Charles, don't provide a reason despite having several opportunities to, and declare the game solved in Day 1, also without providing good reasoning. Every alarm bell in my head is ringing here. Strong.

VOTE: Lunar Martian for the reasons stated above.

This list is really bad overall. There's content with which to sort both the slots listed as null. I think both the people labelled scum are Town. The reasoning for Malakittens is interesting and especially poor. Apparently all you have to do to get Town read by Harumi is not "a whole lot". The reasoning on me is all pretty bad too. Those are things that happened, but there's no analysis of why any of it makes me likely to be Mafia. Actually they all seem like really strange things for Mafia to do, as I said.

I actually agree with a couple of your points here, because... that isn't a reason to have Kittens as a TR - in fact, he's one of my many scumreads because I don't think he posted anything particularly substantial. ...okay it turns out there's only one thing I agree with you on here.

I find it interesting that you pointed out his poor reasoning on Kittens but not Volxen, yet nullread both of them.

Oh right, the second thing I kinda agreed with you on was the reasoning on you, that Harumi says you didn't explain your vote, but you did after I pressed you.

@Harumi you need to start reading all the posts.

91, 94, and 95 are all basically the same post, and I find that reasoning BS, mostly because it's no longer RVS and I agree with Harumi's statement that you could use that to justify anything.

All this being said, I'm aware I'm sorta tunneling you here, and I'm really not as sure you're scum as I probably sound, since you've made a couple good points.

Anyway, I think these people are Town: Harumi, Alice, Ray Frost.
I'm not sure about these people: Malakittens, volxen, Statue Surfer.
I think these people are most likely Mafia: Crab, Charles.

Some of you may be surprised to see Statue in the middle row. I still think that the posts I pointed out were really bad, however Statue has some other posts I think are much better and indicate a genuine attempt to solve. Hence Statue has a happy home in the middle row for now.

Your reads list is pretty interesting. Since you're open to explaining things when pressed, I'd be particularly interested in why you TR Alice.

@Sirius can you poke Crab please?

And can we get some activity in here??

It feels like a freaking cemetary...

[StatueSurfer]

@StatueSurfer: I think there was a bit of a miscommunication. I wasn’t asking him to explain his vote, I’m aware he did; I asked why he did not do so immediately.

I guess so, because in your reads list you just said that he didn't provide an explanation. I saw you ask the why later, in a post I didn't quote.

[StatueSurfer]

It's been a little while, so lets spice things up a little. AliceK, who do you think is mafia?

No no no you of all people do NOT get to do this. You do NOT get to fly in here demanding stuff of people like you've been active this whole time or something.

Why did you sheep Alice at the start of the game? Why did you disappear for 5 days? Most importantly,

what are your reads?

I liked volx posting up until this:

I don't want to put Lunar up to E-1 so

VOTE: Exquisite Crab

I don’t like the willingness to vote someone who’s most likely being replaced vs someone actually in the game.

That has a bad taste in my mouth.

It also feels like it's voting based on an agenda rather than solving.

Nah, I don't see it. Volx has been relatively active and pretty townie, with questions and analysis. I see this as more of a way to FoS.

Also I don't believe Alice actually susses Lunar, because of this post:

I liked volx posting up until this:

I don't want to put Lunar up to E-1 so

VOTE: Exquisite Crab

I don’t like the willingness to vote someone who’s most likely being replaced vs someone actually in the game.

That has a bad taste in my mouth.

It also feels like it's voting based on an agenda rather than solving.

My impression is that one of crab's voters can be a Mafia with Charles. I need to look into all thread actually.

And of course Lunar is not voting Crab.

Also noteworthy is that Alice is effectively sheeping Lunar here. So huge FoS on Alice.

@Lunar Martian: I believe I asked you a question with my last post:

Since you're open to explaining things when pressed,

I'd be particularly interested in why you TR Alice.

And now I have a second question: What agenda do you think Volx is pushing with his vote on Crab? Honestly, how is that different from your vote on Charles, especially when you SR both?

Maybe you didn't see the post that was attached to (unlikely), so maybe you'll see this:

VOTE: Lunar Martian

THIS IS E-1

If you answer both, I might unvote you, depending on the answers.

***

DO NOT hammer Lunar before I respond to his answer. Just don't.

***

[StatueSurfer]

Volx said "I don't want to put me person at E-1." That suggests voting based on optics. I'll take a look at Alice.

Why?

Scums more often give reasons to meaningless actions. Even if the reason is no reason.

EBWOP

Why?

Scums more often give reasons to meaningful actions. Even if the reason is no reason.

I don’t really think that’s a scum tell; their reasoning isn’t any better than, say, mine.

That's everything I have right now. I am sorry. Reasoning isn't really important. The fact that you want to provide a one is.

I think it was this sequence that gave me an early Town read on Alice. Her more recent posting hasn't really done much either way, so she's probably closer to null now. It's pretty clear that Alice has played before due to her familiarity with jargon, but she really hasn't said or done much at this point. She said she would be more active over the weekend, so perhaps ask me again on Monday.

I don't really buy the logic RE: volxen... there are legitimate reasons to not put someone at L-1 (reasons I chose to ignore) like scum hammering a town early (as Harumi noted) or just plain LOLhammering by dumb towns, which is even worse.

Your post on Alice was... better. I don't agree with your conclusion, but I can see your reasoning, enough to UNVOTE: anyway.

Especially with Crab being our new flashpoint... not sure what to think about him. I don't know if he's scum or not, but he's posted so little and doesn't even seem to be paying attention to the game, so I honestly just don't want him in the game. And Alice makes a good point about him disappearing while being questioned, and I don't think it's worth the risk keeping such an inactive, scummy player around.

I'll probably vote for him in ~24 hours, although I might not depending on the circumstances.

[StatueSurfer]

So, obviously, I did not vote Crab yesterday, which is because I decided I wanted to see what Paopao did first.

Volx actually articulated a lot of doubts I have about Lunar that I've had swirling around a little.

First, there's the issue that Lunar's vote has been parked on Charles since he subbed in, which made some sense early, but doesn't make sense now since he apparently TRs Charles/Paopao now, even though literally nothing has changed.

The first half of #161 is pure fluff as Volxen said. And of course Lunar is going with his usual tactic of not explaining his reads. @Lunar: So I would really like to know what caused you to change your mind from {Charles, Crab} to {Volxen, MK} as your SRs.

#170, #176, and #177 are all fluff or IIoA.

For clarity, I'm currently at E-2 and Crab is at E-1. Please don't end the day.

UNVOTE: Lunar

Posting is better as of late.

What is your current take on my early posts, and what made you change your mind? Walk me through your progression please.

Be honest, even if it feels uncomfortable or scummy. If you're Town I think I'll recognize your honesty.

Something about the bolded part really rubs me the wrong way. It's like... Lunar's talking to someone that he's trying to convince

himself

is town. And MK hardly needs to be told how to explain their reads -- they joined as SE after all.


Alice's reads are also interesting... at #113 Alice says there is a high chance Lunar is scum, and then in #148 she says Lunar is town, a complete 180 with no explanation, because heaven forbid anyone in this game explain anything.

And for the sake of completeness, I'll be giving a list of my reads soon.

[StatueSurfer]

--

Guess I should've read that more closely, since on second look you just added Volx and MK to your SR in addition to Crab and Charles, so I guess that point doesn't apply.

I won't be posting again before the current deadline, but my next post WILL have my reads list in it! Promise!

[StatueSurfer]

I'd like to be put on record stating that I strongly believe that posting a list of reads at the

end

of a game day serves more to hurt town than to benefit it.

BUT I PROM-- fine, I see your point. I'll wait until Day 2.

Page Two: Ray, Harumi, Lone. What the hell is this kind of reasoning that Exquisite's vote is odd or scummy? RVS – saying "hello everyone" and voting randomly seems pretty NAI to me.

And now, you are either being dishonest or clueless. Because the vote that got everyone riled up wasn't Crab's RVS vote at #10, it was his decidedly non-random vote at #19, where he sheeped Alice with no explanation. Then he disappears for five days, and comes back and contributes exactly nothing, which is ridiculous considering that he was scumread by just about everyone and like a hundred posts had gone by since he'd last appeared but he apparently had no reads, which is, again, ridiculous. This is a great blueprint for how to get executed D1 with only three posts. Charles' slot was/is sussed for more or less the same reason (making very few posts and contributing nothing substantial).

Meanwhile, you come in, and do this:

#208: fluff post (which is whatever, you just came in)
#210: you say Alice is off to a nice start, then disagree with the read they made on that same page, which is weird
#211 & #212: already explained what's wrong with these
#213: already explained why Charles was sussed. The other part is bullshark, because #72 isn't Lunar defending themselves, it's him explaining his read on Charles.
#214: This is fine except for the fact you don't explain why you find him suspicious or why you doubt Harumi.
#215: I don't see this at all, and I've been tunneling Lunar since he came in. You posted those quotes, and I still don't get it.
#216: Very informative, thank you.
#218: Alice read is okay.

RE "i won't post reads": In your position, not posting reads is stupid because you're slated to get executed when the day ends, meaning getting NKed should be the least of your worries right now. So what you ought to be doing is anything in your power to prevent your execution.

And since you've only made me more sure your slot is scum,

I'll hammer you in ~24 hours

unless you say something that convinces me otherwise.

Also Paopao literally has 1 post since subbing in lol. Guess it takes 4 days to read through this thread...

[StatueSurfer]

Alright you know what? Fine.

VOTE: Cook

I stepped in and gave my analysis on the game.

Now watch me flip VT.

This is literally the most anti-town thing you could possibly do but okay.

[StatueSurfer]

WOW THAT'S SO RUDE.

Kind of a weird thing to say.

An SE is Mafia. Maybe both. My guess would be Mala, but I'm not sure. SEs: what is your relation to Krazy, and would you kill him?

This is either a townslip or you not actually paying attention, because there's

three

SEs (volxen is the third). And... I also don't understand the logic behind why you think a SE in particular would've killed him.

Please don't do night kill speculation this early.

Well, I'll indulge myself for a moment anyway, because this kill makes absolutely no sense. Multiple people said they thought this slot was scummy (and I don't remember anyone saying they thought they were town), so why kill them? Me and you were townread by just about everybody, so why wasn't one of us targeted?

IMO the possibilities are:
1) the scumteam is just newbies and decided to just kill a random townie
2) the actual townies are so completely on the wrong track that they're comfortable keeping us alive
3) the scumteam deliberately wanted to cause this kind of WIFOMy analysis by killing someone SRed (kind of ties into the above, since both would likely require skilled players)

and in light of that I'll drop it for the time being.

Now, my reads list:

Townreads:

Nobody because I'm paranoid

Townleans:

RayFrost: helpful to town, good points, good analysis, solid questioning
Volxen: good questioning, good analysis
Harumi: pro-town behavior, good questioning

Null:

AliceK: Bad reads, waffles constantly, but has started acting more pro-town of late.

Scumleans:

Malakittens: Little questioning, mediocre analysis (imo), feels like fake activity

Scumreads:

Lunar Martian: Bad entrances to both days, a lot of IIoA/statistical analysis posts, not a ton of actual analysis, mediocre questioning

An SE is Mafia. Maybe both. My guess would be Mala, but I'm not sure. SEs: what is your relation to Krazy, and would you kill him?

I played some games with Krazy and in some games that he modded back in 2019. I would nightkill a townread player from day one over Krazy.

I do agree with Frost that this is weird, and worded oddly specifically.

[StatueSurfer]

Sorry about the lack of activity, been busy the last couple of days.

Statue assume I'm Town for a minute. Who is your pick for the Mafia team?

Sure, I'm willing to dive into some fantasy for a moment.

Harumi/MK: if we take Frost's points as true, then MK seems like a potential partner here. They've had virtually zero interaction (I think I found one), and Harumi TRed MK based on rather spurious logic.

...and that's honestly the only good scumteam I can really come up with that doesn't include you, but here's another:

Harumi/Alice: two newbs explains the utterly bizarre nightkill! but doesn't make much sense otherwise.

I'll respond to everything else tomorrow, I promise!

[StatueSurfer]

It was your wording. It already looked like you were going to vote me regardless of “reactions”. IDK asking the thread what is your connection to Krazy felt like an alternative motive. It’s very easy for you to meta people rather than come out the way you did in D2 and ask. Like I said the whole way you have entered D2 is scummy as fuck.

Agree with this completely.

Also, Lunar: You now know that all three SE’s have a connection to Krazy. What are your thoughts on Ray and I? You’ve only talked about Mala so far.

I think your answers implicate you more than the other two.

In what way??

So, I'm going to start off by answering the first question you probably have, which is "why not lunar?"

My answer to which is I do not think Lunar is mafia. Instead of looking at what you think of as poor or missing logic from Lunar, I ask you to look at what would

motivate

Lunar to post in the way that they're doing currently. Does it make sense for a mafia member to be so polarizing to start the day off, essentially putting themself into the spotlight, after a rough start to the game day 1 where they were under suspicion?

I don't know. Maybe they're just bad? Maybe they figured there were so many scummy players in the game already they could slip under the radar? Maybe they figured that being aggressive would look townier? (which I saw someone [MK?] say about me earlier in this game) As I liked to say in live games, it isn't my job to justify bad scumplay.

On top of that, if we're assuming Lunar is mafia, why would Lunar pick Mala of all people to antagonize? There's lower hanging fruit to try and focus. Even if you're only looking at the SEs, Volxen would be an easier target for MafiaLunar to focus. If you look outside of the SEs, you could argue that either of Alice / Harumi would be an "easier" target than Mala depending on your personal views of them.

Now, you could say "well, MafiaLunar's not angling at [player] because they're mafia together" but that only works for one player.

I would argue that before this post, Harumi was TRed by most people (at least I think; he was TRed me, MK, and even Lunar at any rate), while I personally at least didn't see MK as town.

Further still, why would MafiaLunar, who has previous experience with Krazy, try to use experience with Krazy as the metric for why the kill makes sense?

Maybe he didn't think anyone would find that out.

I won't disagree that some of Lunar's methods are perhaps anti-town in nature.

But anti-town and mafia are different things.

I'm glad we agree on this, but it's my personal opinion that we should execute whoever the most anti-town player is at the end of the day.

Now, on to why Harumi:

I ask you, what has Harumi contributed to this game?

A theory disagreement with Alice which was more distracting than revealing.

That was a really dumb thing for Alice to say though. I called them out for it too.

Some point scoring[

Yeah, that does seem a little forced.

A reads list which essentially boiled down to "these people are not people I'm trying to push right now and they've posted, so they're town" - "neutral for not posting" - "Lunar's a popular vote right now, so I'm going to follow what other people say" and "this seems like an easy target"

The MK and Volxen (at the time, at least) reads are bad, and some of this could be more verbose so... well, you might have a point here. The reads on Charles and Crab are kind of dumb, but also consistent with overrating the towniness of players that don't post.

So okay. This is not a good reads list.

This post looks like someone trying to get points (

my

reads are based off of multiple posts!).

Eh, I don't think this is really compelling unless you were already assuming he's scum.

"We have to punish mistakes like these!" has to be one of the more blatant "making an excuse for when this person flips town" posts I've seen. "You couldn't possibly suspect

me

for voting them. After all, they was playing so badly. We had to get rid of them, for the good of the town!"

Harumi only gives up on trying to argue with Lunar when Lunar stops, even though it had passed the point of productivity. Which shows a desire to generate more noise (and score more points).

Honestly, I thought Lunar was more guilty of noise since he made basically the same post three times (and I said as much in #102). I

think

Harumi actually changes up his questioning in #98-- actually he isn't really asking a question there, although he is at least analyzing.

Harumi "doesn't like" crab's entrance but also sees someone they can push off to the following day and wants to try and push the Lunar lynch through on day 1 instead. ... Then, when the momentum of the Lunar lynch seems to be dying, Harumi's suddenly is all for moving over to crab as the tide (oceanic pun intended) seems to be shifting.

Now I feel like I really should've noticed that at the time instead of just right now. And you're right, he made zero analysis of any of Cook's posts.

Harumi is consistently behind other people when it comes to pushing or suspecting players.

Ignoring the point here for now, woulda been cool if you'd linked to multiple posts demonstrating this here.

This "you were doing okay at the end of D1" stuff is superfluous. Harumi's vote on crab was almost unexplained and born from seeing other people vote crab and seeing that a Lunar lynch wasn't going to go through. The "he was looking a little bit better" in day 1 is just a light, touch-once excuse for the vote swap when it happened, and we can see how easily Harumi switches back.

That is... definitely oddly-worded.

Hot take: could it be Harumi and Statue?

No, it couldn't.

I actually slightly suspicious of RayFrost right now.

And another unexplained read in a thread already full of them. Would you, could you please explain?

Could we get full readlists from everyone, please?

That's not a realistic possibility. It's never a small-brained play to kill a blank slot. It's some sort of big brain move.

You're either overthinking this or know it with 100% certainty (or, improbably, you're overthinking it and happen to be right)

Statue and if I'm Mafia, who am I partnered with?

Easy here, it's what I've been thinking all game would be your most logical scumpartner: Alice.

Reasoning:
- Alice susses Lone for no reason right off the bat, along with Charles
- They quickly explain why they sussed Charles, but take forever to give an actual reason for Lone
- Almost as if they had no reason except that they

knew

Lone was scum
- Later on, after Lunar replaces in, Alice goes from SRing to nullreading to TRing the slot is a very short span with no explanation
- Meanwhile, Lunar mutually TRs Alice based on some (imo) slightly shaky logic

I guess MK isn't impossible, and Harumi would make zero sense, so there you go.

VOTE: Lunar Martian

E-1.

So I definitely won't be ending this post with a vote on Lunar, especially not with the points raised by Frost.

@Harumi: why did you fail to analyze Crab's posts at all -- or indeed, really anyone's posts since your fight with Lunar?

Okay yeah there's some serious questions here, especially since Lunar/Harumi would be like the weirdest possible scumteam.

[StatueSurfer]

I'm pretty set on a PoE of Volxen, Statue, and Harumi. Everyone else is Town.

Didn't you have a scumread on MK, as she pointed out two posts later?

In fact, your

vote

is still on MK so um. What's up?

Bah.

I leave you!

You died, like, a week ago

Statue, are you wanting me to post a

full

readlist including my town reads?

You know I'm against that, but I will if you're

really, really

wanting me to.

I guess we're getting too close to the end of the phase now, so it can wait til D3 I guess.

@Alice would you at least mind telling us why you TR Lunar?

Also since I suss two people who IMO are incompatible as scum and one of them isn't at E-1, I wanna make things interesting VOTE: Harumi. That's E-2

@mod:

what happens if there's a tie in the vote?

[StatueSurfer]

I agree that we should massclaim. However, I don't agree with doing it "popcorn" style... considering the activity of this game so far, if

everyone

has to vote for the next claim, we're likely to waste half the day or more. So I think everyone should just claim as soon as they can.

So I'll go first. Vanilla Townie.

[StatueSurfer]

Frost hasn't posted for over 30 hours by my count, so I'll see if I can change that.

VOTE: RayFrost

[StatueSurfer]

Holy crap 2 and a half days have gone by, let's get moving people~

I believe I'm the last claim, and I don't counterclaim anything here.

I'm VT.

This took an inordinate amount of time to bring out but whatever.

yeah, I get work.

And kind of unnecessary to say you aren't CCing when you're claiming VT but w/e.

UNVOTE:

Ok so assuming that no one CCs, Mala is confirmed Town and volxen is likely Town. That or volxen got jailkept, realized we are in C2, and knew to claim tracker to pair with the Jailkeeper.

Yes, Mala is confirmed town now since everyone has claimed.

Which is why I think that the optimal play for today is a no-elimination.

Why?? If you're town, scum can kill MK with 100% certainty (by having the roleblocker block her and kill her), and you only have a 25% chance of tracking the scum. Or you could get roleblocked, forcing MK to have a 25% chance of jailing the scum to stop the kill -- and from your POV, executing someone purely at random has a

50%

chance of hitting scum. And of course if you're scum, you or your buddy can kill MK, scapegoat a townie with a made-up result, and get an easy mislynch.

---

Anyway

I could see anyone (except MK or myself, obviously) being scum at this point, but I guess I have to start somewhere.

Possible scumteams from my POV, arranged in least to most likely:

Lunar/Volxen: yes, he brought his buddy up to E-1, with someone who hates them (me) still alive and kicking... doesn't seem likely, especially given his good arguments against Lunar toward the end of the phase.

Alice/Volxen: this is not conclusively impossible, and that's the only good thing I can say about it. They voted on opposite sides D2 and (at last notice) had opposite reads on Lunar, and I don't really any reason why they would be together.

RayFrost/Volxen: Main thing that doesn't make sense here is why Frost would bother bailing out Lunar D2. Then again, Lunar already TR'd Frost, was onto PoE between me, Harumi, and Volx, so maybe they setup the miselim on Harumi to bait him into voting m-- yeah, this one is pretty unlikely.

RayFrost/Alice: They haven't really interacted much at all, although I might need to go back and check that. Alice randomly SR'd Frost in the middle of D2, so maybe this isn't so likely. They have a reason to keep Town!Lunar from being killed: he TRed both of them, so why not keep him around a patsy to vote with them?

Come to think of it, this one may be

less

likely than Frost/Volxen. Pretty sure Frost and Alice voted the same way on both wagons though, but then again, so did I, at least in spirit.

Alice/Lunar: I explained why I thought this was a good partner for Lunar D2, but I'll explain it again:
- explains why Alice SRed Lunar's slot at the beginning and then was so reluctant to actually explain it
- explains why Alice started TRing Lunar for no reason not long after he subbed in
- explains why Lunar TRed Alice back under spurious logic
- makes perfect sense for Volxen being the N2 kill target, as he asked Lunar a slew of questions at the end of D2, and if he's dead, Lunar won't have to answer them

Lunar/Frost: surprise, my top-townpick from D2 is part of my most likely scumteam (which is less because I find Frost really scummy and more because I find Lunar really scummy and think Frost is his most likely partner)
- Many of Lunar's actions don't make sense of a town perspective or a scum perspective, which is what he's been using to argue that he can't possibly be scum-motivated. Most of these, of course, seem crazy for a scum player to do...
- ...unless you have a top-TR to carry water and take the pressure off you.
- Both of the wagons Frost started came when Lunar was the top wagon, and both of them flipped town.
- Frost outright called Lunar's actions "anti-town" but said that didn't necessarily mean Lunar was scum, which is... true, but also sounds kind of similar to saying that Lunar is "too scummy," which isn't an argument
- makes perfect sense for Volxen being the N2 kill target, as he asked Lunar a slew of questions at the end of D2, and if he's dead, Lunar won't have to answer them (yes, I know this is a c/p of an Alice/Lunar point, it just makes sense for Lunar being scum to me)

So, that's, like, my opinion, man. And this vote should come as no surprise: VOTE: Lunar Martian

Also, I want several questions answered:

@AliceK

: you've ducked this twice now (including one from Volx, maybe I should've moved your teams higher up): WHY do you townread Lunar Martian? Please explain in full.

@Malakittens

: since you're our only conftown, please share your reads list with us.

@Lunar

: who's my scumbuddy?

[StatueSurfer]

Hang on a second. With two PRs then both Mafia probably move each night, so your no movement on me is a clear FYPOV. That means between Mala and

me being clear

and yourself being Town you're shooting 2 Mafia in a pool of 3. Why are you pushing a no elim?

That bolded part is putting in work.

@Statue I'm really not looking for associatives without flips. It's distracting.

Distracting? From what? You're already convinced I'm scum, what else is there for you to do but find my partner for when the game continues into D4? The only reason to not think that far ahead is if... you knew that there wouldn't BE a D4 if I go down.

This took an inordinate amount of time to bring out but whatever. yeah, I get work.

And kind of unnecessary to say you aren't CCing when you're claiming VT but w/e.

UNVOTE:

This is really sleazy shading.

Shading? I guess, but I outright put him in my top scumteam, so I don't know how much "shading" there is.

Actually volxen's PoE means 2 scum in: Statue, Alice, RayFrost. I'm inclined to just say that confirms volxen as Mafia and say it's Statue and volxen.

So you say in the same post that:

1. There are two scum in {Me, Alice, Frost} because of Volx's post
2. Volxen is confirmed scum

What's really funny here is that you apparently forgot about your earlier PoE of {Me, Harumi, Volxen} (this post), which I say because you never referenced it today.

And I love that this post came

three minutes

after your post saying you didn't want to do associative reads, because I guess you immediately realized how scummy that post was.

The reason it confirms volxen as Mafia is that I don't think Alice or Ray are Mafia.

This is a shaky definition of "confirm" lol.

I mean it's possible, but unlikely, since the roleblocker multi-tasking would mean a tracker would get a full guilty.

In any event you'd have to be pushing me and Statue as the Mafia team and you aren't doing that, so you're still Mafia.

The first part is pointless, and not even necessarily unlikely. N1 they're roleblocking a random person anyway, and you fail to consider that it halves the odds of a tracker getting a scum if one of them multitasks.

The bolded part is just dishonest, because you're treating Alice and Frost as though everyone should find them confirmed town, when the only reason you're confirming them town is because you "don't think Alice or Ray are Mafia," which... is just your read on them. Not any kind of confirmation lol.

Guess you can't have logic getting in the way of your push of Me/Volxen as the scumteam...

Also find it curious how unwilling you are to acknowledge even the possibility one of those two could be scum.

The fact that you didn't target anyone on night one isn't a mechanical clear FMPOV. It clears you from being a roleblocker, but you could be a goon and your partner both roleblocked and performed the nightkill on night one.

So with a no-elimination, I would be tracking from a pool of four players on night three, but we would be guaranteed to not lose during the night phase.

The key problem here is, the rest of us don't know you're town, so we can't trust you won't be setting us up to get fed a load of BS and mislynched. Because of that, we can't trust any guilty you get D4 anyway in a 3-2. And anyway, you aren't likely to track the scum anyway, so I think it's better to find scum today.

At least it will be

if more than three people actually show up!

Seriously, can we get some more people in here? Like is this Mylo or RVS?

[StatueSurfer]

So you say in the same post that:

1. There are two scum in {Me, Alice, Frost} because of Volx's post
2. Volxen is confirmed scum

What's really funny here is that you apparently forgot about your earlier PoE of {Me, Harumi, Volxen} (this post), which I say because you never referenced it today.

And I love that this post came three minutes after your post saying you didn't want to do associative reads, because I guess you immediately realized how scummy that post was.

You are clearly not understanding what I said. The question is whether it happened intentionally.

Okay, so your post here, just to be clear, appears to follow this train of thought:

1) "Volx's results, if true, clear me from being scum" (they don't) "because the roleblocker likely wouldn't multitask" (a questionable assertion),
2) "therefore, from Volx's POV, I must be town" (which is wrong, because you aren't cleared),
3) "I TR Alice and Frost, therefore neither of them can be scum" (this is an unbelievable level of confidence in your reads),
4) "therefore StatueSurfer must be scum," (which I'm not)
5) "and since Alice and Frost are confirmed town" (implied to be your view by #389, for no better reason than you TR them apparently) "and Volxen isn't pushing Statue/Lunar" (which is because Alice and Frost aren't conftown, making this pure tautology) "Volxen must be scum as well"

Is this about right? Because there are a few questionable pillars here, as I noted.

I notice you chose not to bother saying why:
1) you believe Alice and Frost are confirmed town on the basis of pretty much nothing
2) you think Volxen should believe Alice and Frost are confirmed town to the point that from his POV, Statue/Lunar is the

only

possible scumteam, when that is obviously BS.

I look forward to your justifications for these, especially 2).

VOTE: StatueSurfer

Case with post links Coming Soon^TM, but I wanted to get this out so that people are aware that I'm present.

VOTE: Unvote

Just realized I was being silly.

Silly? Silly how? If you believe I'm scum strongly enough that you're about to write out a detailed analysis of why I'm scum, then why would you be worried about me getting quickhammered by the scumteam?

Also, thanks for starting yet another wagon to get pressure off of Lunar, including your second straight on one of his voters, perfectly fitting what I suspected was coming if you were his scumbuddy! I guess I'm supposed to wait with bated breath while you do a devastating analysis of all of my posts, but I think I'll do what Harumi didn't do and preempt this with why I'm not scum, starting with every scumteam I could possibly be in:

StatueSurfer/Lunar Martian: Um... no. If we're faking this, I'll see you at next year's Scummies. Also: it is very unlikely I would attack my new partner right as they came into the game as aggressively as I did, and even less likely we'd be tunneled into each other in Mylo, and even less likely I would (or would have to!) bring him to E-1 just to get him to answer a question.

StatueSurfer/RayFrost: I seriously doubt Frost is about to produce a write-up saying why I'm his scumbuddy, but... well, the fact I'm writing this post kind of demonstrates why we're probably not scum together. Why go after your scumbuddy in Mylo? Why not just leave Lunar at E-1 for a while on D2, BS for a while about his partners, execute him and be just as surprised as everyone else when he flips town? If we think we can save him for later, why turn on each other the next day? Why would scum!me not go along with scum!Frost's suggestion to do "popcorn" style claiming (or even bother responding first to it, for that matter), which would waste more time and force town to no-elim or perhaps make a rushed miselim? (To build towncred I guess, but doesn't change the fact it legitimately hurts scum)

StatueSurfer/AliceK: Okay, onto scumteams that could actually make sense. Honestly, we haven't interacted much, but I don't know why scum!Alice would keep needing to be pestered to answer scum!me's questions. You could argue that's elaborate scum theater, but it mostly makes Alice look scummier, and we wouldn't want that. Also doesn't make sense for us to nightkill Krazy. Not a lot going in favor of this one, although it isn't totally unreasonable.

StatueSurfer/Volxen: Lunar's pet scumteam and what Frost will probably say as well. If I'm scum, this really is the most likely scumteam for me to be in. Well... I did (and still do!) have a townlean on Volx, and we've barely interacted, and Volx has questioned what were my top two D2 scumreads (that's Lunar and Alice). Well, again, there's no reason for scum!me to be the first to respond to Frost's post or to even disagree with it, and there is also little reason for scum!me to disagree with Volxen's suggestion of a no-elim (you'd think we'd have at least coordinated our thoughts on it in our PT). Maybe I was pressured into agreeing with Lunar and Frost? Well, 1) why bother when I put both of them into my top scumteam anyway, and 2) since Alice and MK have temporarily vanished, it would 2-for and 2-against the no-elim strategy, so it's not as if I would've been flying in the face of overwhelming opposition.

tl;dr if you're going to say I'm scum, you're 99% saying Volxen is also scum.

P.S.: Well, I... guess I didn't beat Frost's post out of the gate. Oh well. Which means I get to start trying to refute all that right now!

My responses are in bold.

So, I unvoted not because I think my read on Statue is wrong but rather because I acknowledge that I'm not perfect and don't want to risk coinflipping the game with both mafia immediately jumping onto the vote.

Obviously, if one of the mafia in this hypothetical scenario is Lunar (I highly doubt Lunar's mafia, but etc), it's not possible for the insta-lynch to happen. So it'd have to be exactly alice + volxen, which means no roleblocker (with volxen having fakeclaimed tracker), so it'd come down to whether mala could guess correctly which one does the kill come nightfall.

I'm not interested in the game going that direction simply because I was sloppy with my vote in a late game scenario.

Now, on why I think Statue is mafia:

This sequence of posts from Statue has a funky little dynamic.

Statue goes from "What alice said isn't compelling and is suspect" and "I find Ray suspicious, and I guess maybe Crab's suspicious, too but not really"

If you reread that more carefully, I actually said Crab was

more

suspicious than you. My FoS on you was a natural reflex from me coming Mafia played with much shorter deadlines.

to

"Yeah, Alice actually made sense. Haha I thought it too. It was a test." and "What Ray said is such solid reasoning to suspect this person even though I thought it was hardly noteworthy to start with."

Yeah, that first part wasn't a good look. This second part is total BS, since I pretty much said what you did when I FoS'd Crab.

Using the "time since posting" reasoning to suspect someone is one of the easiest cop-outs possible. Inactivity is not inherently an alignment tell. You previously barely found Crab noteworthy, but then someone vocal says stuff about it, and you go "yeah. What he said!"

After all, it's unheard of for scum, especially newbscum to take longer to formulate lies than town. Also, your post about Crab used my logic and

came after mine.

And it's a technique Statue uses in this game day and in other posts as well (like that one vote applies some ~magical pressure~ on me to post?).

It's also unheard-of for scum to try to delay town.

It's performative.

Performative? I brought Lunar to E-1, but I guess if you already think I'm scum then there was no risk there.

Statue's earliest "strong" read starts off, in game day 1, with suspecting someone on the basis of what is essentially just connection-based reading without confirmation.

??? Confirmation on a D1 vote? It's not like I brought him to E-1 there. Maybe I was grasping a little, but his whole entrance really rubbed me the wrong way. Note that I also suggested he was trying to frame Charles to take heat off his slot, so it's not like I was obsessed with the bussing theory

It's a lot more likely for mafia to throw this kind of thing out willy nilly because they're very focused on controlling the connections they can be seen to have. While it's not directly a Freudian slip, it is in the same family. I also have already explained my view on why it's anti-town.

Having "scum reads" on multiple people at the same time is basically just going "here's all the players I see as low-hanging fruit that I could shift my vote to if it's convenient for me."

Don't know what to tell you, other than I legitimately found all of them scummy for exactly the reasons I gave. Note that Alice and Lunar were not activity-based. Also: if I like to go after low-hanging fruit, why did I just put you in my top scumteam?

When looking at Statue's posting more closely, it seems like there's a lot more smearing of dirt on other players than actually trying to figure out the game. Take this post where we can already see Statue softening the stance on Lunar. "I'm not as confident in this read as I might seem" and "you're making some good points" reads to me as "maybe you're not as free a lynch as I thought, and I might choose to shift my attention elsewhere."

YOU aren't an easy lynch, Lunar/Harumi was 50/50, and Lunar has miraculously survived 2 days despite being brought to E-1 both times.

This post is reaching for any point to put against Lunar.

I mean... if you don't think any of those things are scummy I guess we just disagree (I thought he was fluffposting a little and that his response to MK was very weird). Also threw shade at Alice, and have kept exercising that specific point literally every game day.

This post has appeasement aimed at me to avoid suspicion (not gonna lie, it kinda worked),

I thought it was important to show why I wasn't doing what I said I would (and I did post reads with my first post of D2)

and then we see the shift to cook. Instead of any attempts to gain clarity from cook,

I assume you refer to his weird read on Lunar, and I gave him a window to explain and Lunar asked him outright, and he never did; he self-hammered instead.

Statue just goes with the town narrative that the slot is mafia. Completely gives up on trying to get the town to go with the Lunar lynch despite being oh so certain that Lunar was mafia.

I will absolutely admit that by that point I almost didn't care whether he flipped town or not because the slot was going to be so unreliable we were liable to miselim him later when we couldn't afford it. And his defense was atrocious, and why does scum!me tell him to try to save himself?

Even this reads post shows an overall softening of Statue's positions. This is convenient toward what I can see as the planned narrative: "I was so hard on the Lunar lynch D1, I think it's an easy push D2, let's get it." And then the rest are slotted into "I think they're lynchable" outside of the town leans and "I don't think they're easy to lynch" in the town reads (with one stand out that's not like the others - I'll be referring to this later).

Statue took 4 days to post! In Statue time, that's basically a mafia claim in thread. (Yes, I am poking fun.)

Also, the reasoning for voting Lunar is essentially canned. There was a small add-on in response to the way Lunar started Game Day 2, but it's hardly a case.

So any reasons I had to SR Lunar on the first day no longer apply on the second day? Again, if you didn't think they were valid, we just have to disagree.

It doesn't appear to me like Statue actually

looked

at the rest of the players over the night phase. There was no change in light of the flips. There was... nothing. Just a dusting of the hands and a return to business going after Lunar.

The flips were two inactive players, both of whom were voted on by Lunar at one time or another, flip town. Considering nobody had a problem with Cook/Crab's wagon, I don't think analyzing that tells us much.

The only reason that gets shaken up is the fact that I post a case (mistaken) against Harumi. Someone that Statue claimed to have in the "town lean" section alongside me. Yet that "townlean" just gets... swept aside because there's an opportunity to mislynch a townie that seemed difficult to lynch before.

Remember how I said I was paranoid in that reads list? I wasn't married to any of those reads, there were just how I saw the game at that moment. Hence how my top TR ends up my top scumteam, and how another townlean gets voted on. Which was a mistake -- I should've switched over and hammered Lunar before Alice hammered Harumi, but can't fix that now.

Also it's a little callous to make that eloquent analysis, then SR me for being persuaded by it. Note that prior to his vote on Harumi, Lunar's last readlist had Harumi as a townread.

And this post doesn't even provide any individual analysis of Harumi. In fact, there's no analysis of Harumi from Statue at all. Just sheeping of my read. And this vote looks like a "what if I just... tip the scales a little here... maybe it'll go this way?"

Wasn't much left to analyze, and Lunar and Alice also did not analyze Harumi's posts.

Thinking about it from a statue-as-mafia perspective, this is actually pretty reasonable. The lunar lynch was on the verge of happening. That should be easy to push in the following game day. Just repeat the same thing that's been said for the past two game days.

Yes, with that eloquent post by Frost, Harumi will turn into a really tough push after Lunar flips town. Wait, no it won't. Also, again, deliberately antagonizing you, the top TR, does not fit the narrative that I'm trying for easy pushes.

What could go wrong? If you regurgitate it enough times, it'll have to take eventually.

More antsy activity commentary in this post.

Please explain: why does scum!me want

more

activity in this thread?

The pairing analysis is whatever to me.

Okay.

There is one thing that I don't like.

Statue asks for a full reads list from Mala. As mafia, this makes sense to get from a jailkeeper. With it, you can assess which people Mala would be likely to target come night 3. This would make it easier to dodge a jailkeep and have the game actually end after a mislynch.

This also makes sense if you're town trying to get the only person in the game you know does not have an agenda.

We should be asking for mala to publicly assess the

individual

she thinks is mafia in this game day and that's it.

The less she shows of her hand, the better it is for us as town to have a shot at winning the game.

Fair enough. Didn't consider that because I figured we either get scum or go bust.

So you misrepresented me a bit and basically ignored my analysis today because it didn't fit your narrative. Also skipped over a lot of my posts about Lunar. Kind of understandable since there's a lot of them, but still. And I will freely admit that Day 2 I was not on my game, but am I scummy for being convinced by an analysis

you

wrote? And although you said I didn't analyze Harumi's post, I did go analyze your analysis.

And I'll ask you what I asked your partner Lunar: who is my scumbuddy?

[StatueSurfer]

My responses in bold again.

Not voting you on the off-chance that I'm wrong is a reasonable choice. It at the very least gives other people time to contribute to the thread if I'm wrong. Even if I don't think I'm wrong, being open to the possibility will avoid the whole issue of tunnel vision.

Honestly, I considered Volxen as the likely buddy (that was actually what the note was about in my previous post), but with how strong you're trying to push

away

from the possibility of it being Alice, it makes me lean toward Alice being more likely. Perhaps a bit on the WIFOMy side, but eh. I haven't done a deep dive into Alice's posts vs Volxen's posts to really get into it, but that's also something I can look at the following game day.

Fair enough on me misreading the "slightly less slight" sentence. I had to read it twice after you mentioned it to even realize I'd missed the second slight. Sometimes, my reading isn't too good after work.

The "performative" comment is about your focus on people's ~activity levels~ weighing so heavily on your reads on people. Maybe it's just you coming from a different, more real-time meta like you mentioned. Maybe it's just an easy way to shift things around. I think the latter is more likely than the former.

Scum are known to try to hide behind lower activity; after all, the less you post, the less chance you can slip, and the fewer interactions you have, the fewer associations others can pick up on. And if you make readlists and post reasoning as little as possible (lightbulb moment), town can't attack you for your crappy reads and bad reasoning.

I'm not expecting you to have confirmation on day 1. I'm noting that ~connection reads~ without any confirmed information is superfluous at best. Like you admitted yourself, it's grasping.

There was also the framing theory, and Lunar's slot was under pressure at that time.

Going after me at this point isn't about low-hanging fruit. It's about reading the room: I'm

going

to town read Lunar, as I already have been. Trying to convince me to vote for Lunar is going to be a lot harder than trying to convince other people. You've already shown a pattern of trying to catch both mafia without a flip in previous posting, so you'll be forced to say

someone

for the sake of consistency. And whoever you do say will be antagonized and less likely to vote with you. So, choose the person who you know isn't going to vote with you to begin with.

I wish I was scum!me, because they sound a lot smarter than I am.

By pushing so hard on Lunar days 1 / 2, you as mafia can't rightly shift away from the read and let it die. So, you're stuck in a bad position of having to deal with it the best you can. It's tough. I sympathize.

Let

it die? Lunar was brought to E-1 D2 and two of the people on that wagon are still alive. You act there's no legitimate reason to SR Lunar (just like Lunar acts like there's no reason to SR you or Alice), even though at least two townies were on that wagon. If Me/Alice is the scumteam, three townies were on that wagon. So what are we so worried about?

The small shade you've thrown Alice is minimal, and the lack of any real bite behind the interactions between the two of you combined with Alice's random scum read on me when I stated I thought Lunar was town reads as Alice-as-Mafia reacting with frustration to things not going as planned. Furthering my belief that it's probably you two, though I haven't done a deep dive on "if Statue is mafia" yet.

I'm probably going to SR someone who never explains any reads over someone who never explains one read.

You don't tell cook to save himself. You tell cook "if you don't convince me, I'm going to vote." They're different things.

Uh, I lose my hammer vote if he convinces

anyone

to unvote, so why even bother? Why not just hammer him right then and there?

RE: Not hammering Lunar on d2... removing Lunar from the game would force you to have to look at the rest of the playerlist in a more concrete fashion (as you didn't have anything concrete that wasn't Lunar), which makes the game harder for you to play. If you give the Harumi wagon a day, there's a chance that the momentum it gained will die from events over the night phase. My read likely caught you off guard and by surprise, and you wanted to take advantage of it while you could. Alice being the hammer on the slot only makes it make more sense to me instead of less.

Hold on. What fricking plan? In post #148, Alice suddenly decides that Lunar is town for no reason, which is just 4 of their posts (and 35 overall) removed from saying that there was a high chance he was scum. In between, I brought Lunar to E-1. What's the point of suddenly doing a complete 180 on him, and never changing that read, effectively preventing us from double-teaming our supposed target during Mylo? And if we're in cahoots, why didn't I back off my read of Lunar? What "plan" is any of this following? And still no reason for Me/Alice to kill Krazy N1.

Also, Mafia-Statue would want more activity because you'd be desperate to get the town to read your side of things and agree with it before a lot of activity can happen overall. You

need

the inactive players to vote with you.

As noted above, there were at least 2 townies on the Lunar wagon D2. If Me/Alice is the scumteam, all three of them were and 2 of them are still alive. Why would we be desperate? And anyway, more posts means more chances for scum!me to screw up, making it less desirable.

Admittedly, Town-Statue would want the same thing, but I don't think you'd be so concerned about it happening before I had the opportunity to post anything in-depth (because you'd be standing righteously in the knowledge that you're town).

Does more activity stop you from contributing to it or analyzing it? You were the one setting the timeframe on your posting.

That's just my take on it, though.

So, I'm guessing you're not going to budge on me being scum anymore than I'm going to budge on Lunar being scum.

Actually volxen's PoE means 2 scum in: Statue, Alice, RayFrost. I'm inclined to just say that confirms volxen as Mafia and say it's Statue and volxen.

I actually can see anyone as Mafia. Ray is my primary suspect I would like to vote tbh. Doesn't really like his Day 1, had a lot of interactions but avoided doing reads.

@AliceK:

Thanks for showing up. Two things: 1) Tell us why you TR Lunar, and 2) expand on your Frost read.

This is a really bad post. You need to elaborate please.

I mean, I agree they need to elaborate, but this is really rich irony coming from you, the guy determined to explain as little as possible.

Still waiting to hear why you think Alice and Frost are so certainly town.

Anyway, since near the end of D2, Lunar:

You made this post, which, as I explained earlier, is pure tautology. Alice and Frost are not confirmed town just because you inexplicably believe they are. And of course, you haven't bothered to explain why they are so definitely town.

You never really explained why you thought I was scum to begin with, just some muttering about "really odd posts". I'd ask you to explain, but you'd just repeat what Frost said.

Hang on a second.

With two PRs then both Mafia probably move each night, so your no movement on me is a clear FYPOV.

That means between Mala and me being clear and yourself being Town you're shooting 2 Mafia in a pool of 3. Why are you pushing a no elim?

Emphasis mine. This is obviously wrong, due to Mafia PRs being able to multitask, but you were probably hoping nobody would notice that. And when volx did, you threw another lie at him.

Why are you pushing a narrative that I learned nothing from my questions despite not asking me what I learned? Can you not see my reads changing after I say that? I have lots of thoughts. Most of them are wrong. The more I detail my reasoning in the thread, the more Mafia can latch onto the bad thoughts and tell me they're good. Instead, I share my vote, and people can agree/disagree.

There were three people voting you at this point. We know two of them were town, and I (who I know is town) almost hammered you on the basis of this post alone (something I now regret not doing). This post is the from same guy who also said:

N.B. In my one completed Town game, I was suspected heavily and died Day 1, while calling out Town for poor play. Mafia won that game.

That's very bad Mafia play, and so if you think I'm Mafia because of that you're kind of insulting my intelligence.

[/quote]

So somehow, you are certain you are a smart player and that we're doomed if we execute you, while simultaneously believing that you are not smart enough to recognize anyone trying to buddy you by praising the "bad thoughts" you have despite your intelligence. That should really be a numbers game: if most of the players (since as you love to point out, statistically everyone is town) hate your reasoning, but 1-2 people (e.g. scum) think it's awesome, shouldn't that be a tip-off that those two people are scum trying to buddy you, particularly if you're already this paranoid about it?

It does make a lot of sense if you're scum: after all, if you never post your reasoning, town can't ever attack it, and if you never clearly post your reads, town can't question why your reads shift, or even tell if they shifted at all!

Also, you "can blend in if you want to"? Your slot was in the spotlight when you subbed in; good luck blending in from that position.

On reread, I really don't like #96. You say, "I'm trying to find mafia" at the end. Except... you're pretty much just waiting/hoping for mafia to talk and make a slip. You claim it's to set up a high-information endgame... which we're supposedly in now, where you promptly forgot your PoE read from the day before. Even if you reached the same conclusion (via two bizarrely confident townreads), it suggests you don't actually care about whatever information you're supposedly generating, and would rather just push for your chosen mislynch. Furthermore, forcing town to ask for your reasoning (especially when you don't bother providing it a lot of the time anyway) drains more time off the day, helping scum rush town.

You also told Harumi that "scum take the easy path". It doesn't get much easier than miseliming inactives, hopping onto a bandwagon started by the towniest player and trusting the person who TRs you for no reason (Alice) to hammer them over you, avoiding questions from the guy you planned to NK, then going after the only one of your detractors who didn't claim a PR, and is also the only VT claim that you don't have to go back on a claim against or turn .

Especially

if Frost is your buddy.

And since I know you or Frost will probably bring this up, here's scum!you's motivation for everything:

- You were at E-2 when you came in, so "blending in" isn't an option. You decide to be aggressive and try to redirect attention onto the inactive newb Charles.
- Your initial (and only complete) readslist is also telling (here). Both of your SRs were the inactives, which should make them easy miselims. Your read on me was a hedge because I was TRed by just about everyone else at that point and you didn't want to stir the pot too much. MK and Volx's main recommendation at that point was that they were more active than Charles or Crab, so not much. That's about all I have there, although the Alice read may have been an attempt at buddying.
- But then the mod announces Krazy, a SE, is replacing in, depriving you of the easy miselim of that slot. Oops! Well, he needs to die so that he can't save himself.j
- Note that at this point, you had MK and Volx in your scumlist as per this post.
- You then antagonize what was at the time the weakest SE (I don't care what Frost says, MK was the weakest at that point in time), then switch to targeting Volxen, who pushed back the hardest, and interestingly you never engaged with Frost at all, and Frost let you get away with it. You never really explain what about MK or Volx's posts makes you change your reads despite being asked, which is inconsistent with other posts of yours where you say you'll explain yourself when asked.
- And then you vote for Harumi, claiming it's because of Frost's case (same reason I voted for him, I'll admit). But then you claim you sussed him

before

that analysis... but in that reads list I linked to, you had him as town, and never said anything about him being anything other than noobtown before putting him in your PoE.
- You repeatedly suspect he might be town and that Me/Volx are probably the scumteam (before you totally forgot about saying that), but the vote stays where it is of course, and then he flips town. Notably, you refuse to engage with Volx, who makes a good point here (3rd bullet point), calling you out for not explaining your reasoning on him

or

questioning him, also pointing out you cherrypick when you want to explain things. You just decide he's scum, and that's that as far as you seem to be concerned. This is also probably why you tried to kill him N2.
- You then go after me D3...

before

Frost claims. For all town!you knows, Frost might claim JK or Doctor or something, so to me it looks like you somehow knew he wouldn't claim a PR. Rather odd considering you sussed the Volx earlier, so why implicitly trust his claim? And why did you go after me? Because you knew I would go after you, and I'm the only one of your detractors who isn't a PR.

Your D2 PoE itself seems telling... because every person on it had placed a vote on you at some point, while your two "conftowns" in Alice and Frost never have, suggesting that you 1) view disagreement with you as a scumtell or 2) want to get rid of anyone who SRs you because you are actually scum.

And just to ask it again:

@Lunar:

Why are you so certain Alice and Frost are town?

Lunar, what do you make of the fact that Ray and Alice have mutual suspicions of one another?

Well, what's

your

opinion on it?

[StatueSurfer]

My read on Ray is based on the Day 1. I am doing notes to keep everything ordered and according to my notes Ray had interactions almost with everyone, but he didn't share almost anything not neutral. I think he was just looking like being productive. Also I no more TR Lunar, I would if Harumi flipped Mafia, because interactions between her and Lunar were clearly not svs. Right now it is open question. I am suspecting Ray right now. But I agree with no kill, we can no lynch to get back to odd number of players.

But why did you TR Lunar to start with? And you're on record saying you thought Harumi-Lunar was TvT, so what changed (again)? And why is an odd number of players so important?

[StatueSurfer]

I am very sure that vote count is wrong.

[StatueSurfer]

Well, whether we want a no-elimination or not, we're rocketing straight toward it, because despite having 4 people against it, only 2 of them have voted, and there's less than 24 hours left on the deadline. And MK never showed up to say anything either, so that's just great.

Volxen is trying to keep as many options open as possible for the scumteam. All his logic explains why various teams are options, but no teams are really ruled out. That isn't gamesolving.

You know what else isn't gamesolving? Refusing to engage your scumreads and tunneling in on your chosen scumteam while ignoring anyone not on it because you believe your townreads are sacrosanct.

Speaking of which,

why

do you townread Alice and Frost so strongly? For, like, the fourth time or whatever.

I relooked their interactions after my read and changed my mind.

You skipped over the question why you TRed Lunar at all, and this isn't really an answer to the second question. What about their interactions made you change your mind?

[StatueSurfer]

Well... I was the closest to the truth, anyway...

Well done. Will post more later.

[StatueSurfer]

By that stage of the game, there was no feasible world where I get lynched by virtue of the fact Lunar was 100% on the Statue / Volxen read (but preferred statue), and Statue was 100% on the Lunar / Ray read (but preferred lunar). Mala wasn't going to look at me with any suspicion, and she wasn't going to live to see the following game day either.

You're selling me a

little

short here... it's true I did think Volxen was town, but I definitely wasn't

100%

sold on it. It would've depended on his D4 result (which ended up being completely irrelevant). And honestly if I hadn't been turboed D4 I probably would've pushed you over Lunar (since it was obvious you were buddying Lunar, which only scum would do, while there was still a way, way outside chance that Lunar was town).

Of course even if I had done the smart thing and pushed you over Lunar, there's no chance he would've gone along with it, so the game was pretty much lost by D3.

Who would've thought the game-losing move was not hammering a town player...

I was mocked so much for my SE theory, too

The theory was sound, the problem was that you bungled the execution to the nth degree. You asked a question, then naked-voted MK with no explanation, and despite focusing on SEs never seemed to target Frost at all, which later on only reinforced the idea you were probably scumbuddies. Maybe you did think about him as a suspect, but it was impossible to tell when you're against explaining things on general principle.

It was a fairly good theory, honestly.

I couldn't exactly push for it being reasonable, though. And the less I actively supported you (I could've put way more into backing up your ideas), the easier it was for people to continue to suspect you. Sorry, not sorry.

Kind of funny I got suspicious of you based on an associative read with a townie... I actually caught onto the apparent connection between you and Lunar at the end of D2, but I didn't make an issue out of it because 1) I wanted to see Harumi flipped and 2) I feaed if I was right, I would get NKed.

That Harumi thing was something else entirely... in hindsight it's easy to see a lot of that "scumminess" was just noob mistakes.

The balance for town is to focus on finding mafia without seeming like mafia yourself.

You were doing okay on the "focus on solving the game" bit but were a little too loose with the "seeming town" part of things.

Cooperation and a lil bit more energy into having people understand your point of view can really improve your success, me thinks.

+1, +1, +1, +1

To add to this, by my calculations, the majority of the other townies had at least scumleans on you, um...

literally every single day after you came into the game.

(I can give you the day-by-day breakdown if you want) It would've been

much

easier to accept you as possibly town if you had actually bothered to explain what was going through your mind.

Why were you so sure of your townreads on Frost and Alice anyway?

I'll reiterate a piece of advice I gave you on the first day:

(Just a note if you are town: while I appreciate not changing your style just because someone doesn't like it, if your style as town keeps getting you lynched, maybe it would be worth changing things a little.)

@Malakittens what your logic behind SRing me and Alice at the end?

[StatueSurfer]

@Statue, how would you have reacted to me claiming that I tracked Ray on night three and that he didn't target anyone? That was my plan for day four, so that I could focus on pushing Lunar/Alice as the scumteam.

Well... I'd like to say with 100% confidence I'd push Frost there (since again only scum buddy people), but I don't really know... could've choked and gone Lunar/Alice, but we'll never know now.

I would've considered you confirmed town though, since I figured that scum!you would fake a guilty on someone for an easy miselim, although Frost's flip would've probably changed that.