First of all, unlike the annul lynch, since the votes for Seraph were so close and there was a reasonable chance of having the JBright wagon win (especially since the only reason Seraph won was because of a late shift) the vote lists for Day 3 should be looked at closely. The 5 (non-Jbright) people who voted for JBright were:
GMarshal, chaoser, CubEdIn, kevconsim, and LastArgument
I think it extremely likely that at least a couple of these are scum. Barundar already posted a good analysis on why kevconsim is a good candidate for lynch. But I want to introduce another lynch candidate: CubedIn, who I think is likely scum.
Day 1:
All throughout Day 1 Cubedin tries to say that annul isn't the best lynch while at the same time making sure he joins the wagon once it reaches the sweet-spot of after the point of no return but before it look way scummy to join the wagon. He also refuses to commit to an opinion.
This is Cubedin's first post of substance:
+ Show Spoiler +
On February 24 2011 19:14 CubEdIn wrote:
Ok ok.
I had a bit of time to go through the thread, and most likely I will be a bit more free at work today so hopefully I'll contribute more.
But this is what I got so far:
1. Icemac vs Gmarshall.
I don't think either of them is scum, and here is why:
Gmarshall did play a bit different in Mafia 36, but the reason for that was, he was picked Bodyguard on day one. Which means that his place was safe, at least for the first few days. Nobdy was going to lynch him, even if several people would FoS him, which gives one a nice, safe place in the game.
In this game, however, he does not have that advantage, so I think it's somewhat normal that he's a bit more touchy, a bit more aggressive, but at least he's trying to provide decent information and come up with a somewhat-well-though-out-plan.
Basically, the only problem with his plan is that a bunch of the cells could be mafia-infested, but that can also work to town's advantage if the greens in the circle can figure out that the red is trying to play them. As far as nobody claims early, it should be ok, IMO.
Besides, like LSB said, you can't really STOP any kind of town circle as long as PMs are allowed, so there's no reason I can think of to try to stop town this. At best, this is a more "imposed" cell that any player can embrace or ignore. I don't think it can be considered scummish.
Icemac, on the other hand, is a smurf, so I can't know what he's usually like, but I'm guessing that he played with us before, and that's why he's being overly aggressive in some instances. I don't think that makes him scum though, especially if he played in Mafia 36 and he's got an idea about what GM "should play like", and isn't.
If he didn't play with us before, he might just be a tad on the aggressive side by nature. I don't see why this is considered a bad thing, and I don't see why it's a reason to vote for him. To me, most of the things he said come out as being townish.
Either way, it's not really a reason go wagon him no matter how you look at it, and I'm quite suspicious of the players that ganged him so fast.
2. LSB vs. Annul
These are both quite experienced players, so I don't think you could get a "read" out of either of them. But it is reminiscent of the way LSB started out Harry Potter Mafia (when we were mafia together), and he was attacking RoL all over. Which lead to both of them being lynched and clearing up DrH of accusation for quite some time.
Now I'm not saying LSB is doing this, I'm saying that EITHER of them could be doing this. Or they can both be town or both mafias.
I know this is inconclusive, but my "bottom line" would be... don't go for either of them until there's further proof. If you don't know what I'm talking about, go read through the first two days of HP mafia.
3. Ser Aspi
This is the most suspicious player to me so far, mostly based on one post:
This is weird, really weird. Mostly because it came RIGHT after LSB made some decent points against Annul. If he wanted to vote for Annul he'd have had a lot of damn good reasons by just "believing" LSB's analysis. But instead he goes and basically OMGUS-votes Annul. Why on earth would you do something like that?
Now, I'm not saying he's not right about the smurf/experienced thing on Annul, but he basically voted for him because Annul pointed him out for being a smurf, and he openly admitted that.
That's most fishy to me, out of everything I read so far.
The second suspect would be Jackal, but I doubt it's a good idea to lynch him over just two posts (like Ser Aspi too, actually). I don't find it odd that he's not being overly aggressive as usual, because it's very early in the game, but I do find it odd that he made the remark about the PM. That does seem a bit off-character.
That being said, I don't have any idea of who to vote for actually, at least not yet. But I do know one thing: If Annul and/or LSB are not scum, they'll probably be taken out pretty early in the game, so I don't think it's smart for town to lynch either of them (especially not LSB, since he seems to be a target for Mafia early on when he's red, and if he IS mafia, then he has a pretty pro-town way of playing it, so I think it's safe either way).
Ok ok.
I had a bit of time to go through the thread, and most likely I will be a bit more free at work today so hopefully I'll contribute more.
But this is what I got so far:
1. Icemac vs Gmarshall.
I don't think either of them is scum, and here is why:
Gmarshall did play a bit different in Mafia 36, but the reason for that was, he was picked Bodyguard on day one. Which means that his place was safe, at least for the first few days. Nobdy was going to lynch him, even if several people would FoS him, which gives one a nice, safe place in the game.
In this game, however, he does not have that advantage, so I think it's somewhat normal that he's a bit more touchy, a bit more aggressive, but at least he's trying to provide decent information and come up with a somewhat-well-though-out-plan.
Basically, the only problem with his plan is that a bunch of the cells could be mafia-infested, but that can also work to town's advantage if the greens in the circle can figure out that the red is trying to play them. As far as nobody claims early, it should be ok, IMO.
Besides, like LSB said, you can't really STOP any kind of town circle as long as PMs are allowed, so there's no reason I can think of to try to stop town this. At best, this is a more "imposed" cell that any player can embrace or ignore. I don't think it can be considered scummish.
Icemac, on the other hand, is a smurf, so I can't know what he's usually like, but I'm guessing that he played with us before, and that's why he's being overly aggressive in some instances. I don't think that makes him scum though, especially if he played in Mafia 36 and he's got an idea about what GM "should play like", and isn't.
If he didn't play with us before, he might just be a tad on the aggressive side by nature. I don't see why this is considered a bad thing, and I don't see why it's a reason to vote for him. To me, most of the things he said come out as being townish.
Either way, it's not really a reason go wagon him no matter how you look at it, and I'm quite suspicious of the players that ganged him so fast.
2. LSB vs. Annul
These are both quite experienced players, so I don't think you could get a "read" out of either of them. But it is reminiscent of the way LSB started out Harry Potter Mafia (when we were mafia together), and he was attacking RoL all over. Which lead to both of them being lynched and clearing up DrH of accusation for quite some time.
Now I'm not saying LSB is doing this, I'm saying that EITHER of them could be doing this. Or they can both be town or both mafias.
I know this is inconclusive, but my "bottom line" would be... don't go for either of them until there's further proof. If you don't know what I'm talking about, go read through the first two days of HP mafia.
3. Ser Aspi
This is the most suspicious player to me so far, mostly based on one post:
This is weird, really weird. Mostly because it came RIGHT after LSB made some decent points against Annul. If he wanted to vote for Annul he'd have had a lot of damn good reasons by just "believing" LSB's analysis. But instead he goes and basically OMGUS-votes Annul. Why on earth would you do something like that?
Now, I'm not saying he's not right about the smurf/experienced thing on Annul, but he basically voted for him because Annul pointed him out for being a smurf, and he openly admitted that.
That's most fishy to me, out of everything I read so far.
The second suspect would be Jackal, but I doubt it's a good idea to lynch him over just two posts (like Ser Aspi too, actually). I don't find it odd that he's not being overly aggressive as usual, because it's very early in the game, but I do find it odd that he made the remark about the PM. That does seem a bit off-character.
That being said, I don't have any idea of who to vote for actually, at least not yet. But I do know one thing: If Annul and/or LSB are not scum, they'll probably be taken out pretty early in the game, so I don't think it's smart for town to lynch either of them (especially not LSB, since he seems to be a target for Mafia early on when he's red, and if he IS mafia, then he has a pretty pro-town way of playing it, so I think it's safe either way).
He soft defends annul by saying that we should wait for further proof before we lynch him here:
I know this is inconclusive, but my "bottom line" would be... don't go for either of them [LSB or annul] until there's further proof. If you don't know what I'm talking about, go read through the first two days of HP mafia."
and here:
That being said, I don't have any idea of who to vote for actually, at least not yet. But I do know one thing: If Annul and/or LSB are not scum, they'll probably be taken out pretty early in the game, so I don't think it's smart for town to lynch either of them (especially not LSB, since he seems to be a target for Mafia early on when he's red, and if he IS mafia, then he has a pretty pro-town way of playing it, so I think it's safe either way).
and also attacks the latest addition to the annul bandwagon, Ser Aspi, with this:
This is weird, really weird. Mostly because it came RIGHT after LSB made some decent points against Annul. If he wanted to vote for Annul he'd have had a lot of damn good reasons by just "believing" LSB's analysis. But instead he goes and basically OMGUS-votes Annul. Why on earth would you do something like that?
The points he makes are fairly valid, but he is clearly arguing against the annul lynch at this point. Note that he also throws 2 FoS's around (on Ser Aspi and Jackal) and then backs off them by saying that we should vote for people off one or two votes. In other words, he is being extremely indecisive and wants to leave his options open. Definitely something a scum waiting to see how the wind blows on annul would post.
Speaking of wind blowing, here's his "I vote annul" post:
+ Show Spoiler +
On February 25 2011 06:33 CubEdIn wrote:
I find it very scummy that someone gets to tell me that I have to change my vote to one of the two (Granted, I didn't vote yet, but let's assume I had my vote on Ser Aspi).
Who are you (Gryff) to tell me I have to change my vote? It's a game. It's definitely not LYLO. I can vote whoeverthehell I want. You disagree? Then try to get my lynch afterwards, but don't try and influence the vote while it's going on without any serious reason.
You think it's scummy that some people can have their own opinion that's not similar to what everyone else says? How so? Is it not scummier to band wagon someone?
That being said, I am going to bandwagon! But not because I don't have the balls to stick to my own choice, but because I found annul's downward spiral to be quite scummy. He seemed OK at first but then started to respond aggressively to the posts, which is exactly what I do when I'm scum.
I still think that it's a bad idea overall to lynch someone with decent experience on day 1. I would much rather have annul as a day 2 lynch or so, but I already explained why I really doubt Icemac is town, and his posts made me think so even more.
Also, RoL's intervention made me think that gryff (my 2nd in line choice, after S.A.) is town, because if he'd be mafia, the mod-intervention would be imba. And I know from when I was mafia in 36 that the mods posting in the thread is 90% to stop the town from taking the fast train to nowhere.
That being said, I sure hope LSB is not wrong about this
##Vote Annul
I find it very scummy that someone gets to tell me that I have to change my vote to one of the two (Granted, I didn't vote yet, but let's assume I had my vote on Ser Aspi).
Who are you (Gryff) to tell me I have to change my vote? It's a game. It's definitely not LYLO. I can vote whoeverthehell I want. You disagree? Then try to get my lynch afterwards, but don't try and influence the vote while it's going on without any serious reason.
You think it's scummy that some people can have their own opinion that's not similar to what everyone else says? How so? Is it not scummier to band wagon someone?
That being said, I am going to bandwagon! But not because I don't have the balls to stick to my own choice, but because I found annul's downward spiral to be quite scummy. He seemed OK at first but then started to respond aggressively to the posts, which is exactly what I do when I'm scum.
I still think that it's a bad idea overall to lynch someone with decent experience on day 1. I would much rather have annul as a day 2 lynch or so, but I already explained why I really doubt Icemac is town, and his posts made me think so even more.
Also, RoL's intervention made me think that gryff (my 2nd in line choice, after S.A.) is town, because if he'd be mafia, the mod-intervention would be imba. And I know from when I was mafia in 36 that the mods posting in the thread is 90% to stop the town from taking the fast train to nowhere.
That being said, I sure hope LSB is not wrong about this
##Vote Annul
Note that he spends the first half of the post getting worked up about being told he should bandwagon. I interpret this as the real CubedIn, he doesn't like to bandwagon unless he has been convinced that the vote is best for town. Then, as he himself acknowledges, he goes against his own tendencies to vote for annul even though he still doesn't think its the best lynch:
I still think that it's a bad idea overall to lynch someone with decent experience on day 1. I would much rather have annul as a day 2 lynch or so, but I already explained why I really doubt Icemac is town, and his posts made me think so even more.
So, why would he do this? Well, one explanation is that no one is scummier exists (although I think he says in the quote above that icemac is more likely mafia than annul, pretty sure there's a typo somewhere). The better explanation that fits all the data is that Cubed is mafia and wants to get on the annul bandwagon since it is really likely annul will be lynched.
Day #3
Again, Cubedin fails to commit to any kind of opinion on the lynch until late. When he ends up on JBright, the vote post reads more like an excuse for not voting for Seraph.
This is the first mention of CubedIn liking JBright more than Seraph or LD and, as was noted by lots of people, it was a very scummy argument that a) didn't involve any work on his part and b) doesn't actually address the most important part of any lynch, which is whether the person in question is scum or not.
On March 03 2011 05:06 CubEdIn wrote:
And one last thing:
Two games ago, someone said to me (I dunno if it was Barundar or LSB or someone else, doesn't matter), that you have to lynch for information. Who do we get most information out of?
I would guess Jbright because it gives us more information on the people "tied" to him (Seraph and LD, was it? Or someone else I'm missing, I didn't have time to go back through the thread all the way).
And one last thing:
Two games ago, someone said to me (I dunno if it was Barundar or LSB or someone else, doesn't matter), that you have to lynch for information. Who do we get most information out of?
I would guess Jbright because it gives us more information on the people "tied" to him (Seraph and LD, was it? Or someone else I'm missing, I didn't have time to go back through the thread all the way).
When Barundar asks Cubed, very reasonably, to specify why Cubed picked JBright over Seraph or LD, Cubed responds with:
On March 03 2011 05:44 CubEdIn wrote:
Either is fine with me. Be it Jbright, Seraph or Chaoser.
I chose Jbright because I saw a post where someone was grouping them together (JBright/Seraph/LD i think but I can't find it right now).
I need to look through the thread again, but it was basically saying that if one of them is red it's highly likely that all three of them are.
If it comes to it, I'll look, but, as I said, I'm ok with either.
And to a lesser extent, I'd be ok with LD, but he seems to have picked up his posting a bit so I'm not willing to peg him as scum just yet.
I am very much against the LSB lynch though, since he's one of the more experienced players, and people seem to be quite quick at jumping on the wagon. Bumatlarge made some interesting points, but it seems that we are dismissing the day-1 lynch which was largely attributed to LSB.
Of course you can say it was luck (as he was probably gonna buss annul anyway), or that it's a complicated mafia plan, but the fact of the matter is that it got us a dead mafia.
Also, Barundar, you're saying that you want to be lynching the mafia, but are you 100% LSB is red? Are we going over that whole "nobody should be sure" thing again?
Either is fine with me. Be it Jbright, Seraph or Chaoser.
I chose Jbright because I saw a post where someone was grouping them together (JBright/Seraph/LD i think but I can't find it right now).
I need to look through the thread again, but it was basically saying that if one of them is red it's highly likely that all three of them are.
If it comes to it, I'll look, but, as I said, I'm ok with either.
And to a lesser extent, I'd be ok with LD, but he seems to have picked up his posting a bit so I'm not willing to peg him as scum just yet.
I am very much against the LSB lynch though, since he's one of the more experienced players, and people seem to be quite quick at jumping on the wagon. Bumatlarge made some interesting points, but it seems that we are dismissing the day-1 lynch which was largely attributed to LSB.
Of course you can say it was luck (as he was probably gonna buss annul anyway), or that it's a complicated mafia plan, but the fact of the matter is that it got us a dead mafia.
Also, Barundar, you're saying that you want to be lynching the mafia, but are you 100% LSB is red? Are we going over that whole "nobody should be sure" thing again?
The post doesn't really answer Barundar's question. He randomly references one of Ser Aspi's posts that was made at the end of Night 2 as his support for not caring which of the 3 (of Jbright, Seraph, and Chaoser (?)) die. This is just a really strange attitude for a townie to have. There are three choices and it pretty unlikely that all three of them are mafia. Any townie would be looking over the three's posts to try and see which of the three was the most scummy to them. CubedIn just doesn't really care.
So, this behavior doesn't make sense as town, but does it make sense as mafia? Of course it does. It is basically the same thing as the annul lynch. CubedIn wants to delay for as long as possible so he can vote Seraph if it looks like the Seraph lynch is inevitable (or if JBright is definitely going to get lynched) or can jump on JBright if he needs to.
This is the post where Cubedin votes for JBright:
On March 03 2011 08:43 CubEdIn wrote:
Ok I'll vote for JBright as well.
I went with Foolishness' idea and thought hard about the two: Seraph and JBright.
There are more reasons to pick Jbright though:
1. His inactivity (I found like 12 posts of his, as opposed to 29 of Seraph, I don't know if I counted right but that's half the posts either way), I know this doesn't mean much but it's a start.
2. Coag's reasoning: He brought him up early, then others have been brought up. It's pretty clear that this mafia team is not defending their members, since Annul's lynch went pretty easy, but derailing lynches is a must if they want to survive. I'm inclined to think this can also be a clue.
3. I have looked at Foolishness' analysis of Seraph and I'm not convinced. It's basically a posting habits analysis, and albeit pretty conclusive, it doesn't necessarily mean he is red. Yes, he's behaving oddly, but not scummier than JB.
That being said though, even if Jbright flips green, I think it's a good idea to get rid of Seraph tomorrow (meaning, not lose track of him after nightfall). I went back a good number of pages and didn't find any relevant clues that the two are tied together, so I don't think that they are very much connected by anything other than WIFOM. Or, if a vet wants to shoot someone, I think he would make a better target than LSB. My two cents.
##vote JBright
Ok I'll vote for JBright as well.
I went with Foolishness' idea and thought hard about the two: Seraph and JBright.
There are more reasons to pick Jbright though:
1. His inactivity (I found like 12 posts of his, as opposed to 29 of Seraph, I don't know if I counted right but that's half the posts either way), I know this doesn't mean much but it's a start.
2. Coag's reasoning: He brought him up early, then others have been brought up. It's pretty clear that this mafia team is not defending their members, since Annul's lynch went pretty easy, but derailing lynches is a must if they want to survive. I'm inclined to think this can also be a clue.
3. I have looked at Foolishness' analysis of Seraph and I'm not convinced. It's basically a posting habits analysis, and albeit pretty conclusive, it doesn't necessarily mean he is red. Yes, he's behaving oddly, but not scummier than JB.
That being said though, even if Jbright flips green, I think it's a good idea to get rid of Seraph tomorrow (meaning, not lose track of him after nightfall). I went back a good number of pages and didn't find any relevant clues that the two are tied together, so I don't think that they are very much connected by anything other than WIFOM. Or, if a vet wants to shoot someone, I think he would make a better target than LSB. My two cents.
##vote JBright
To start with, CubedIn needs to make a vote at this point because he is leaving for the night. As mafia, he needs to vote for JBright at this point because it was close between JBright and Seraph. Of course he could just be a town voting for the wrong person. However, this explanation doesn't hold up as we realize that Cubed can't come up with many reasons to vote JBright. Reasons 1 and 2 are both questionable reasons at best and 3 is essentially saying why Seraph isn't likely mafia. Never does Cubed actually come up with a reason that JBright is mafia based on JB's actual posts, when this is the first thing a townie would do.
And then, in the last paragraph, Cubed says that we should continue to look at Seraph after the lynch. This covers him in case Seraph dies and makes him sound like he was almost suspicious enough of Seraph to vote him, but was just a little more suspicious of JBright. In other words, it is a way to distance himself from his own opinion.
On March 03 2011 09:07 CubEdIn wrote:
That's true, but Ser Aspi made equally reasonable posts about JB as well (in day one as well as day two). I don't particularly like the guy, but he did bring up some good points, and he seems to think that both are scum, if anything, JB more than Seraph.
I suggest we get rid of both, and whoever wins the tally gets lynched while the other one gets vig-shot.
But I am sticking with Jbright for tonight. The fact that a bunch of alternative suggestions popped up makes me think Coag may be on to something..
That's true, but Ser Aspi made equally reasonable posts about JB as well (in day one as well as day two). I don't particularly like the guy, but he did bring up some good points, and he seems to think that both are scum, if anything, JB more than Seraph.
I suggest we get rid of both, and whoever wins the tally gets lynched while the other one gets vig-shot.
But I am sticking with Jbright for tonight. The fact that a bunch of alternative suggestions popped up makes me think Coag may be on to something..
And here Cubed pushes for JBright a bit, but again not hard enough to arouse suspicion should Seraph get lynched. For someone who thinks that a Seraph/JBright lynch is pretty much a wash, he seemed to be pushing for JBright pretty hard.
Conclusion: Cubedin acted the same in both scum lynches: holding off until the last possible minute to give a solid opinion while subtly defending the scum. He then makes the best possible mafia vote. It could all be coincidence, but given his posting I think he's probably scum.
If it were day, I would vote CubedIn.