whiteflame

By the way, I think you should already have some teams up by now. Not doing so is pretty anti-town. Not saying it’s scummy, it’s just poor town play.

I didn't have the time to go back and figure out those potential pairings, usually like to wait until I have a stronger scumread to start from. I get if that seems anti-town, but that's how I operate.

Well, I’ll be honest and say I don’t exactly know what to think either, but the reason for my question is that Wylted first wanted to Lynch me then “saved me” and pushed Lunatic. This is exactly why I asked the question. And why I said Lunatic flipping Town would push me onto wanting Wylted.

Wylted's been in my POE too, but I haven't explored the potential link between him and Luna. So he would at least be on my shortlist.

I want to hear everyone’s opinions. Who are the teams, how will they re-evaluate if the Lynch flips Town, etc.

That's a complicated question to answer and, once again, it will hopefully be further informed with results from the NP and claims next DP. If you want possible pairings, I'd have to go back and do a deeper dive to dig into any behavioral tells linking people together. If we lynch Luna and he flips scum, I wouldn't be surprised if that puts pressure on me since I've been townreading him.

why do you say this?

Because you asked us to lock in our lynches a DP early and I don't think we should be doing that.

Mild resistance to the Luna lynch last second by whiteflame and guess what magic is town. We know he is town and he wanted to lynch luna

I'd prefer a lynch to a NL at this point, even if that choice ends up being Luna. I don't scumread him and he's not in my POE, but if that's where most of us are leaning, I'll accept it.

I would hope that we'd get some results and claims to inform the next lynch and not just base it on how we see various players right now.

I'm also really hesitant to lynch Luna blind, which we'd almost have to do at this point.

What are your thoughts on Luna

Behaviorally pretty townie. I'll admit that that partially comes from just being on the same page in our reads, but it's also his apparent hesitancy to jump too fast. He posted a vote on me when Magoroth sussed me, but then quickly dropped it without prompting. I think he'd be more readily using pressure to his advantage if he was scum.

Fine. Your losses.

I will paraphrase because the phrasing is rather short.

Basically there is nothing in my role card that says “You are Vanilla” or “You have no abilities"

It says, and I’m paraphrasing, “You have the power to vote”. More specifically it says that’s my ability, to vote.

...That's literally how most Vanilla claims on this site are framed, some variation of "you can participate using your voice and your vote." That's not hyper specific, angle shooting, nor should it push anyone to verify your claim.

For you to think I’m scum, you’d have to believe that scum weren’t given fake claims or I fake claimed some random shit I came up with in my head. And that’s why I can’t give a justification. But considering what Kohai said - and that it seems likely scum were given fake claims - I have no idea why you’d believe this. I’m not giving my justification. Not because I’m scum, but because the way of saying Vanilla (it does not specifically say I have no abilities) is uncommon and would likely out other Vanillas.

I'd have to believe that your character was among the fake claims given to scum and that you then chose to claim Vanilla because you weren't given a fake role claim and it's relatively safe.

As for that reason for not giving your justification, it's specific enough that I found it believable, but it's also giving you cover not to say it at all under the pretense that it might harm another town player. I bought it last DP for that specificity, I'm less sure now.

Slightly over 1 hour left with enough players to decide things with given plurality. Is mago something you could get behind?

I don't love defaulting to the Vanilla claim, but it's better than potentially lynching a PR blind and he is already in my POE. I can't say I've liked his reasoning for not giving his justification.

I ain’t waffling on shit. I’m not giving the justification. I already said why.

You mentioned angle shooting and claimed that giving it might result in other people giving away that they're Vanilla, right? I can't say I understand the former, but I also can't see your PM, so that's not my call to make. I don't get the latter, though, particularly if the decision is between you getting lynched and outing someone else as Vanilla (which I'm not convinced your claim would do anyway).

I can't see VTNLing at this point. It might have made sense if Mag1c hadn't self-destructed, but now we're back on an odd number of players. All it does is reduce the number of flips we have.

Is your character in ocarina of time?

Sorry, spaced on this this evening. No.

Alright, basic breakdown of the events of this DP and last. I'll focus on the more pertinent moments.

DP1:

I posted a mid-DP1 breakdown of what I saw from everyone, though it's only pertinent if you're looking for behavioral patterns.

Pie got the softclaim effort rolling with the M/F claims, limited pushback beyond REF. Several people thought you were in the game for a hot minute there based off one post apparently.

First claim came from Magoroth: Peatrice - Vanilla. Largely been regarded as townie ever since, with some (myself included) keeping him in POE. Townreads are largely based on the claim itself, since it's pretty likely scum were given decent fake claims and wouldn't claim such a minor character (admittedly WIFOM) and he pushed back on giving justification feeling it would be "angle shooting" and might reveal other Vanillas in response.

Second claim came from Thoth, who as you may or may not be aware got lynched last DP, though Banana used her Governor to reverse it before being killed herself in the night. We've spent a lot of this DP talking about the hammer from Mag1c, so I won't discuss that more here. Pie, REF and I had votes on him, but were absent during the last portion of this DP, so we didn't see the Link claim and came back to confusion.

DP2:

Largely the shitshow you're already aware of with a prolonged stand-off between Pie and Mag1c. That ended back on page 14, so you're probably caught up beyond that. The long and short of what's happened beyond that is that there's been a push for both Thoth (now you) and REF to claim. I'm at least agreed on the latter. I think Pie has a point about the possibility that scum were given a substantial character as a fake claim, which is probably why he's still wary of you. I'm less sure, but I have seen Thoth absent as both scum and town before, so his presence or lack thereof it's NAI to me. The Link claim itself I'm townreading, though that might be a bit too presumptive.

Alright, I’ll be back at work after lunch and I’ll get that to you then.

Thank you for agreeing to sub in for this! If you need info on what's gone down so far (hopefully you have some insight already), I can give you a breakdown.

I just kept reading over and over that the Banana kill means the scum team isn't competent. I don't buy that, I think a competent team could have killed her. People were restricting their POEs based on that and I think it's a mistake.

I agree with this much.

your POEs and arguments seem to most align with what I see as the overall scum 'push' this DP. Wylted and Mago seem to be going more against the grain and exploring options, Mago pushed back against the push for claims. Pie I tepidly town read because the death tunnel on Magic makes sense from my perspective. I don't think he's beyond faking that but it's just a long shot for me to see him as scum based on how he's acted this game, who he's pushed and how he's reacted. Thoth I think is town because he's Link. Luna seems sus to me and you just stick out part from POE and part from you generally aligning with him at crucial moments. It could be Luna/Mago. Maybe it could be Wylted, but I don't think he's playing scummy, he's very erratic and yolo-ish, which from what I've seen is his town meta.

At least that's a pretty clear set of reads, though I still don't get the mentality behind your read on me. I gave my reasoning for having you in my POE already - that being a common thread among many player's reads doesn't make it scummy, especially since many of the people you're townreading agree.

Why? He held out hope that that ridiculous demand would be honored precisely because he felt backed up by two prominent players. If he had been met with a solid wall of 'claim, now' then entire thing would have been over in the first few hours and town could have moved on.

Would love to believe that. I was calling for a resolution of the dual claim early on, but that didn't seem to gain any traction. Maybe Mag1c would have behaved differently under early direct pressure, but he didn't seem likely to move on the issue.

TMI shouldn't be beyond you. I also don't think it reduces POE in such a hard way. Scum know both players are town - both players claim, you kill the one with the better role, that only eliminates one from POE going forward and you make sure he has the least troublesome role, or you may even pocket one or both since you defended them. If one has a scummy claim you can then say you've had a change of heart without too much justification. And in both outcomes, when the dust clears you look good for being the voice of reason. It's a solid play as scum.

The concept of TMI isn't the problem here, it's the application. If getting both claims solidifies them as town, then they're more likely to be protected during the night as well, so no, there's no guarantee of removing someone from POE. And suddenly changing a strong behavioral read because someone's claim looks a little sus would also stand out.

I think you should just full claim, dude.

Still working, and have a lot of shoveling to do later. Blizzard turned out to be late, not overrated.

Hopefully you don't have to dig yourself out too much with this snow. Barely got any here.

I'm Impa. The reason I thought Link and Zelda were town early is because my PM pretty unequivocally aligns me with both of them, I'm a nursemaid and protector to Zelda and a mentor to Link, being an important recurring character throughout the series.

Hey, another character I recognize, this one from Ocarina. Honestly hadn't realized she was a recurring character, but then she apparently looks pretty different across games. Nursemaid but not Doctor? Hmm...

One thing I picked up rereading DP1 is that the Banana kill, which originally did not make sense to me, is making a lot more sense. She claimed that her role was confirmable at the end of the DP and would town confirm her. I had forgotten about that. The only reads she gave were a very tepid townread on me. And looking at the soft claims list, she claimed a female character, and Link was outed and lynched at the end of the DP. So scum could have been hunting for power roles/possible confirmed townies/Zelda, killing within softclaimed POE (that would be WF, me, and Banana). I don't think the argument that the kill was driven by an incompetent scum team holds water in light of this. This makes me scum read WF a bit.

So in other words, the takeaway is the same as what several of us have already said, that Banana was likely the target because she claimed a confirmable role. I said as much earlier. Not sure how that puts the spotlight on me, especially since it's been the prevailing opinion on why she was killed. This is such a weak sus, man.

Luna's post also sticks out to me, where he accused me of 'only voting Thoth after the CC debacle', something that after the rereading the DP makes zero sense, I wasn't even online then. And he also accuses me of lurking and popping in to crack a joke at the end of the DP. Why would he think I was lurking and have a genuine mistake/false memory of me voting Thoth after the CC? Especially when the whole drama was about Thoth being hammered by magic immediately after the false CC? This whole paragraph just reads as contrived to me, and not coming from any normal recollection of those events that someone would have.

I didn't get Luna's point about you VTLing Thoth only after the CC was discussed, and I'm not one to talk about the timing of posts at the end of the last DP given how I came in at the end, but the timing of your gif earlier when Mago claimed he saw me visit Banana felt pretty opportune.

The Luna/WF 'you are both town' refrain also seems borderline TMI. I really don't see where that reasoning is coming from, and if you did sincerely believe that, why not pressure Magic for a claim more resolutely instead of letting the farce drag on forever? Demanding that Pie claim was an on-its-face absurd demand, as Pie didn't accidentally hammer someone last DP. It felt like building town cred, being the 'voice of reason', and then being able to lead town afterwards because they both knew how this would turn out. Also, it was predictable that playing that role was allowing the conflict to spiral out of control and consume a lot of energy by giving Magic false hope that he could argue his way out of the problem.

Literally kept telling them to just claim and get it over with, and when I did eventually put pressure on Mag1c to claim, he self destructed. The argument that we should have done it sooner when he was already resolute in his demand that Pie claim first is ridiculous. And this notion that our seeing what was apparently a town vs. town argument for what it was somehow implicates us is beyond me as well, particularly as it would be a hazard as scum to reduce POE by the two players who were actively arguing that the other was scum.

If we claim at all, we should only claim characters. Won’t do us much good, but it’s not as bad as outing potential power roles.

It seems like the safe route to take here, though if scum do have fake claims, you're right that it won't do us much good to get them.

I'm going to read back through as well, but for now, consider my vote on REF. I'm good getting his claim before we make a decision on a lynch.

I'm at a loss for words, so I'm calling it here. I'll help pick up the pieces tomorrow.

Ive already said that it’s a matter of principle at this point. And he has 3 votes on him. Unless he thinks theres 3 scum, golden rule says one townie thinks he’s scum too. Get 4 on either me or him, Idrc. I’m not scared. He’s acting like it’s the end of the world.

I believe Wylted removed his, so it's 2 votes now. I've already said I don't believe either of you are scum, but I'll hold to the view that someone who is under pressure, particularly sustained pressure, should claim. I hope Mag1c is taking a breather from this and will come back willing to claim, then we can move onto you and hopefully get past this one way or another.

VTL Mag1c

As for what to do with all this, I still don't see much point in pushing off from the mutual claim. It seems like the main issue is order of operations. Why don't you both just pick a time and claim simultaneously? Make this real simple.

I'm... wow, this is a lot from Mag1c. Not even sure what to do with all this. He's clearly legitimately angry at least, I'll give him that.

Could it be? Sure. Anything is possible. But the fact that he thinks he’s entitled to be townread for it is a disgrace. If he made the mistake, he’s an idiot for it. You were Mikal’s partner in Alien Mafia, so you know that Town just took it as a legitimate mistake and moved on. I’m not making the same mistake again. At the worst he’s scum. At the best, this sets a bad precedent.

I'm not townreading him for having done it. For all he says this is obviously a mistake, I can see a world in which he executes on this. Like you say, I've seen this kind of thing before from Mikal, even if it does look significantly less opportunistic here - it all puts him in the spotlight much more obviously than Mikal's lynch did. It's the litany of responses that make me townread him, partly because they keep him in the spotlight. As for lynching him on the basis of bad precedent, I can't say avoiding that is reason enough to lynch someone I'm townreading, but I get your point.

I don’t think it’s sloppy at all. His obvious goal was to lynch Thoth. He was going to lynch him to begin with. But then Thoth dropped the bomb that he was Link. Naturally, that would’ve derailed the lynch. But he just hammers first blindly without checking his PM.

If that was his obvious goal, then I'd have to believe that he ignored the opportunity up to the point that Thoth claimed, then chose to hammer with an obviously disprovable CC, particularly if he anticipated the flip. It's sloppy from a scum perspective, sloppier still to then make this a heads up between the two of you.

He hammered Link. That should objectively be scummy. He can make whatever excuse he want. But the fact is that he hammered Link.

Scummy or a couple of pretty terrible errors in a row. I agree the action itself looked bad, I'm just not getting the same take-away.

Meh. I lied. Whiteflame is busy. I was hoping for more reactions.

Well, that was fun while it lasted. Big risk of getting CC'd and having someone out their investigative role, but glad that apparently didn't happen.

I'm heading home, I will catch up when I get back. Just skimming right now, but Mag1c, for the love of God, lay off the caps lock. It's hurting.

I’m headed out to dinner now, I’ll be available for any responses later this evening.

Whiteflame are you going to state why you visited Banana last night or were you going to shut up about it until someone called you out on it?

Are you claiming that you saw me visit Banana, then? Because that’s not what I did.