Hyper

Originally Posted by whiteflame on 8/4/2026 at 11:58 AM (post #39)

Originally Posted by Hyper on 8/4/2026 at 11:48 AM (post #35)

Originally Posted by whiteflame on 8/4/2026 at 6:26 AM (post #30)

So the most recent one I can bring up is the Solo Leveling game, in which he was town. He has generally made a habit of providing at least a little reasoning in previous games for his votes, like in the 1990s-2000s Nostalgia game, but Awesome also just hasn't been in a lot of games, and I don't believe he's ever been scum. I just don't have a good frame of reference for his scum play. Posting a test vote does little to inform if he's off his usual playstyle, especially since the voting system for mafia has changed in his absence and he's kicking the tires a bit.

Good to know, thanks. What do you think of #32?

Brief opportunity to post.

I think it’s a tad defensive. No one called awesome out on it being a random choice, we said it was odd that he left it up despite just being a test. He returns and isn’t responsive to that, just saying why he chose me. Choosing the global moderator just because is odd, but not particularly sus. It’s more odd that he feels the need to justify it at all. If it’s a test vote, why does your target matter?

My impression is that the act of not unvoting in his justification post implies that it's no longer a test vote anymore. Granted, that's not particularly helpful in the absence of further reasoning, but I'm not sure if I'd characterize the post as defensive; in fact, it seems rather unbothered in the sense he doesn't care to elaborate.

Maybe like, Thoth > Casey slightly in towniness, but that's complete intuition and I don't really trust my instincts after being away from mafia for so long.

Thoth/whiteflame are unlikely to be a pair. awesome5000/whiteflame also probably aren't paired. #27 might make Thoth/Mag1cman slightly less likely to be a pair.

If I'm making reads from absolute first principles here, then whiteflame is somewhat towny for complaining about the setup potentially favoring town too much; my impression from his play so far is that he's a pretty calm player and if scum, I think he'd be more cautious about expressing what could be seen as annoyance as rolling scum here.

I can perhaps extend my townread on awesome5000 as well (just seems kinda out-there to vote based on a random out-of-game thing with #32; again, from first principles, scum are usually more self-aware of where their votes are), although that's very weak and it's a sign of the activity so far that I'm actually making this read on just two posts.

Still neutral on Thoth.

Originally Posted by whiteflame on 8/4/2026 at 6:26 AM (post #30)

So the most recent one I can bring up is the Solo Leveling game, in which he was town. He has generally made a habit of providing at least a little reasoning in previous games for his votes, like in the 1990s-2000s Nostalgia game, but Awesome also just hasn't been in a lot of games, and I don't believe he's ever been scum. I just don't have a good frame of reference for his scum play. Posting a test vote does little to inform if he's off his usual playstyle, especially since the voting system for mafia has changed in his absence and he's kicking the tires a bit.

Good to know, thanks. What do you think of #32?

Originally Posted by Thoth on 8/4/2026 at 1:57 AM (post #26)

Posted by Hyper on 8/3/2026 at 7:44 PM (post #7)

As such, be cautious of putting someone at E - 1.

I take it they don't say lynch wherever you came from.

They do, actually, but I usually follow what the host says in the votecounts (in this case, eliminate).

Originally Posted by Thoth on 8/4/2026 at 1:52 AM (post #23)

I don't see the point of skipping night 1 if a Mafioso is lynched today. Seems to me like that would make the game too swingy, and that, if anything, night 1 should be skipped if a townie is lynched.

Originally Posted by Thoth on 8/4/2026 at 1:54 AM (post #24)

I feel a deep, instinctive, visceral revulsion towards games that are not full of power roles, but it's probably for the best that I play some because I think reading behavior is both the most important aspect of Mafia and the one I am worst at.

This setup still seems to me like the winner is determined purely by RNG, but I suppose that intricate game design is none too important for a test of the host dashboard.

Originally Posted by Thoth on 8/4/2026 at 1:55 AM (post #25)

Nice to meet you. My Blood on the Clocktower game could use another player.

Originally Posted by Thoth on 8/4/2026 at 2:04 AM (post #28)

Someone needs to explain to me how and why this setup behooves any strategy other than rolling the dice and praying to RNGesus.

Nice to meet you as well. I'm not too much of a fan of rolemad games and tend to prefer technical ones like this setup, but it appears that I might be in the minority on that one. Regardless, when there's no power roles, all it means is that town needs to rely on behavioral reads to win (i.e. the old-fashioned way). No matter the mechanics, scum players still fundamentally have a different mindset than town players and that shows over time in their posting.

Do you have any reads in particular right now?

Maybe so, though I think placing scum at a 1-4 deficit seems a little much. I get that 1-3 is MYLO, but since a mislynch effectively places us at automatic LYLO, that just seems to make things a lot harder for scum than I'd think is reasonable.

It effectively gives town an extra miselimination to work with, which is nice (since in most games town only gets a fixed number of miseliminations). If it wasn't for that, then scum would pretty much always bus on Day 1 to reach the same final-three situation with a better position.

In the event of a quickhammer, I've got some thoughts on how I would direct my focus. Revealing that thought process would give scum more insight than I'd prefer to provide at this juncture.

That's a fair explanation.

Mostly has to do with my admittedly limited experience with awesome in previous games. Not terribly unusual for him to vanish at weird points for long stretches of time, particularly after casting a vote. This one just seems particularly throw-away.

What was his alignment in those games?

VTL: Mag1cman

Thoth's entrance was okay, I suppose.

I'm somewhat inclined to just take #13 and #14 as towny at face value; the transition from a direct question to Awesome5000, to an "agree-to-disagree" type post to me, is indicative of already having some level of internalized reads. There is the alternative explanation that Awesome5000/whiteflame are soft distancing as S/S, but that feels less likely off whiteflame's lack of attempt to push me on my townread on the former.

Originally Posted by whiteflame on 8/3/2026 at 8:11 PM (post #11)

Originally Posted by Hyper on 8/3/2026 at 8:44 PM (post #7)

Nice to meet you all. This is my first game in a few years, but I'm decently experienced. A few things to note about the setup:

Scum are heavily incentivized to quickhammer, since they can kill the scum player that made the hammer as well as the town player that wasn't voting for the elimination. As such, be cautious of putting someone at E - 1.

Assuming no bussing, every town player needs to agree on a scum suspect to secure an successful elimination.

Town's greatest problem during Day 1 is probably the time limit. Keeping #2 in mind, even a single town player hesitating for too long can be enough to sink an otherwise successful elimination. While activity is always important, the town-scum ratios here make it especially crucial.

Great to have you along for the ride this game, Hyper! Hope you'll join us for more in the future.

I agree on all these points. There is likely to be a good deal of disagreement on appropriate targets this game, which is going to make agreeing on an elimination target difficult, but I do think there's more value in that than not. I've got thoughts on the first of these that I'll keep to myself, but I do agree the incentive is there.

I hope so as well, thanks. I'm curious, is there any reason to hold your thoughts about the first point? Since quickhammering is a strategy that only scum can do (and thus, town should be prepared for), then it doesn't seem like there'd be much harm in discussing mechanics in that regard.

Originally Posted by whiteflame on 8/3/2026 at 8:07 PM (post #10)

Honestly, forgot this was happening today and didn't get a ping, glad I suddenly remembered before I called it a night.

Small but interesting group in this one. Odd way to balance the game regardless of that first lynch. If scum get lynched first, we skip the NP, so... scum lose out on an NK? I don't get that, seems to just dig their hole deeper since there are no other night actions. The other caveat makes a little more sense at least, otherwise the game could just end NP1 with scum reaching parity on their first NK.

Since a scum player is dying either way during the first day-night cycle (whether by elimination or friendly fire), scum are more incentivized to bus than normal. Losing the nightkill is presumably a way to balance that out.

I have a slight townlean on awesome5000; the introduction and vote aren't particularly alignment indicative by themselves, but keeping their vote on whiteflame afterwards reads like they lack scummy self-awareness. I'd expect a scum player to quickly unvote after making a vote they specifically call a "test".

Casey's entrance doesn't evoke any particular feelings in me; looking at their last game (Period Table of Elements Mafia), they made a similar post as town.

Nice to meet you all. This is my first game in a few years, but I'm decently experienced. A few things to note about the setup:

1. Scum are heavily incentivized to quickhammer, since they can kill the scum player that made the hammer as well as the town player that wasn't voting for the elimination. As such, be cautious of putting someone at E - 1.
2. Assuming no bussing, every town player needs to agree on a scum suspect to secure an successful elimination.
3. Town's greatest problem during Day 1 is probably the time limit. Keeping #2 in mind, even a single town player hesitating for too long can be enough to sink an otherwise successful elimination. While activity is always important, the town-scum ratios here make it especially crucial.

/in

It's been a good few years since I've played, but I'll give it a try.