Newbie Mini Mafia XXXIII - Page 2

On December 19 2012 11:00 Spaghetticus wrote:
K first post :D

LAL: I think LAL the policy is stupid, but think LAL the conversation about whether to implement the LAL policy is great. My lynch decision making is flexible, but lurking constitutes a substantial markup on the probability of me lynching you. If you lurk, I will be on your case, and if your answers are not adequate I will put you on my to-lynch list.

For lying I am the same. In the one game I've played I lied to hide that I was a cop. If you lie this draws massive attention, but it's important to look for motive, intention, and possible outcomes as well.

- Cakepie
- Kickstart
- Fatchunk
- Aquanim

Have not posted yet (correct me if I'm wrong). Please disregard this list when considering my contribution, I post lists because they are useful and I have them anyway, not to appear useful. Keep your list hate to yourself

@Threesr
You are about to come under massive amounts of pressure if you don't conform/comply with LAL attitudes (not a threat, just a prediction). Your position at the moment is too empathetic for a game where the most important tool is the noose. There will be times when people will lurk because they don't know what to do, and at these times, it's more likely that they don't know what to do because they are a more complex role (scum). If you are looking for certainty then you are almost certainly playing the wrong game XD

To nubs in general: Please make an effort to keep your posts clear and informative, as a lot of us will be playing catchup. Do not be under the impression that (wordcount) = (town behaviour), others and myself will go through your filter and swathes of cruddy posts actually draw attention. Please keep the bickering impersonal, and have a great game :D

My previous game (cop) (win)

On December 19 2012 11:27 Spaghetticus wrote:
Mocsta I honestly think it's too early to be getting town reads. This is in response to your acknowledgement of Chroma not your null on me. The positives of such a move (that I can think of) are that if you are good at reading people your reads yours will hold more weight than those of a bad reader. The negatives are that if you are a below average reader then you are throwing town off, if you are scum you could be solidifying a position as head town, and read confidence improves with time. I don't see it as a solid move this early. I like the drive you are giving town though.

In my last game the scum only had two players and there were no ways to interfere with the reliability of the cop power. I was 100% certain that any inspection I made was correct, which made for a bit of a lopsided game. The game ended quickly as one of the scum was trying to opt out of the game and was playing fast and loose. I can't really give great insights into cop play as I was actually correct in my initial read on both scum, which is something due more to luck than any skill on my part.

On December 19 2012 12:30 Spaghetticus wrote:
Strong post Cakepie, keep it up.

@Everyone How many games have you played?

I want to compile another list, for personal use and otherwise. Even if you have already made this information available could you please do so once more so I don't need to trawl through starter fluff again?

I am concerned about people pulling the nub card, and want to be able to assess the legitimacy of these claims easily.

A massive mistake people were making last game was to assume that people were scum if they were inexperienced, which IMO is pretty silly in a nub game.

On December 19 2012 20:34 Spaghetticus wrote:
I just looked though everyone's filters and took some notes. I have a terrible memory and find it gives some context to the names I try so hard to remember. If you find it difficult to associate a person's name with their actions so far, I suggest you look through their filter in order to put a face to the name, and prevent them lurking past you.

I will now try and compile a synopsis before bed.

On December 19 2012 21:02 Spaghetticus wrote:
Lurkers:
Threesr: He seems to want to defend lurking, which is really weird. Only contribution to date is disputing LAL.

Cakepie: One very solid post. Would like to see more, though I think you have contributed more than a few other people here.

Orange: Very little substance so far.

Fatchunk: One post.

Kickstart: Two posts.

Sylencia: Seems to want to contribute, but is struggling.

Corazon: One post.

Shz: low contribution, attempts to stimulate discussion have been weak.

So we have a bit of a lurker problem. Some of you I think will have no problem increasing production, but some others seem reluctant. If all you have done is discuss LAL policy up to this point, you need to contribute more. Give us your scummy reads if you have any. I would put money on the day1 lynch being one of the names I just mentioned, please try and make sure it’s not you. At this moment in time my prediction is that either Corazon, Shz, or Threesr will get bandwagoned.

On December 19 2012 21:19 Spaghetticus wrote:
For the record, I find Cakepies text dump(s) actually fairly good. For the most part he has stayed on track and made his positions clear. I also agree with most of what he has said. I'd still like more, but he is far from lurking or suspicious in my eyes (relative to many of the other lurkers).

On December 20 2012 00:09 Spaghetticus wrote:


I am someone with a natural inclination to lurk. So far I'm on my 6th page of notes, and once I have more than a 30% read on anyone as scum I'll make a case. Until then I just trawl through the data and try to keep others on track. I'm reluctant to play aggressively until I have a foot to stand on.

Personally I would like people to focus their efforts away from Mocsta and Cakepie, and focus almost exclusively on the lurkers. If they do happen to be scum then at this rate they will leave a trail and we will nail them day two.

Anyone looking for brownie points should try and focus on contributing OC, that is, post a case on one of the many lurkers. I'll give you a hint: if you are one of the lurkers, you need to score brownie points by proving yourself more useful than your lurker brethren. Bandwagonning on lurkers that have already been called out does not count!

On December 20 2012 10:47 Spaghetticus wrote:
@Threesr
Please leave the attitude at the door. By making things personal you are bringing out people’s emotions, when what we need is reason. When OMGUS votes are cast something is going wrong for town, the fact that you are causal to the OMGUS means your activity is hindering town. Please keep things civil and impersonal, and rather than address only comments made at you, please do your best to develop cases that are not immediate to your survival. If you contribute to town, you will be valued and your chances of getting lynched go down, more so than the knee-jerk slinging of mud has got you by far.
Also, with your votes, you are flipping around so much that any case you do make seems like only a distraction until some new and shiny muckup catches your eye. If your vote is just a means of applying pressure (which my town hypothesis of you would indicate), then it’s better for you to stick to a person and pressure the shit out of them, than to switch willy-nilly, as people start to disregard your vote, knowing it will soon change.

On December 20 2012 12:02 Spaghetticus wrote:
Internet back up, quicker than expected :D

Chromatically I strongly disagree, I think the approach of Shz is great. I disagree with his conclusions, but the approach is immensely valuable, and I will likely be voting in line with this approach.

I've said it twice and I'll say it again, this is not a game of certainty, and our first lynch is more likely to come up town. If anyone is having confidence in their reads of over 40% they are either prodigal or misguided. We should not only expect a town lynch, we should prepare for one. All this posturing is setting up for day two when the real game begins.

On December 20 2012 12:05 Spaghetticus wrote:
@Corazon
Any and all of your assertions that head/scum hunting is bad are wrong. It is cool that you have struck out to find your own understanding of the game, but at this point we really need some information, and the only way to get that is scumhunting. There are plenty of resources on this site that will tell you why scumhunting is protown, I shouldn’t need to convince you by way of this thread.

You have made several slips that could be construed as scum behaviour. I do discount this evidence entirely as I do not believe Freudian slips to be of much substance. While it is unfortunate for you (and town if you are town) that this has happened, as some people are easily swayed by this type of evidence, I implore you to not let it affect your utility to the town by causing you to go defence mode. Rather, pick your best read, and stick to them like a limpet. Also proof read your posts just to make sure it doesn’t happen again.

What I told Threest in regard to OMGUS is equally relevant to you if not more, as (don’t quote me on this) your OMGUS was more explicit. Your vote is not a bargaining chip, it is a tool for pressuring and lynching.

Your idea that lynching useless town is better than lynching useful town does hold some merit, but honestly it shouldn’t influence the equation that much.

I just finished reading your filter and your posts are all stuck in the past addressing Threesr, please bring some more up to date content to the table.

On December 20 2012 12:06 Spaghetticus wrote:
@OmniEulogy
Your contribution has been almost entirely limited to the Threesr/Corazon debacle. This is not an untapped vein to begin with, regardless of where your vote lies, please contribute elsewhere. You mentioned being suspicious of FC?

On December 20 2012 12:17 Spaghetticus wrote:
@Orangeremi
Do you still believe it is not beneficial for mafia to lurk? You shouldn’t, as you’d be wrong. As I have done before, I would point you to the resources available on this topic on this very forum. Lurking bad. Speaking of which, you still only have a one page filter. Admittedly my filter is only two pages, but your one page only has 1-2 posts of any substance.
Step up if you’re town, continue to stagnate if you’re scum.

On December 20 2012 12:20 Spaghetticus wrote:
@Sylencia
I have not yet read your filter yet but you need to step up now as you have very little time left before you need to vote. You are actually a mildly scummy read for me in that the only real information I have on you is that you have claimed a legitimate reason to lurk. You will need to put a lot of effort in if you want your words to stay strong in your absence.

On December 20 2012 12:31 Spaghetticus wrote:
@Kickstart
I'm afraid I didn't make myself clear, though you were you for an update anyway XD

I asked you because you've played the most games, how are the players in the current game acting in comparison to when you've played with them before? I assume you've run into at least one in your travels?

On December 20 2012 13:26 Spaghetticus wrote:
@Chrom
I have absolutely zero problem currently with the way you conduct yourself. Your approach is direct, and simple. I begin to suspect they are a little forced, as I can't imagine anyone that is this selective in the data they choose to interpret wanting to play a ridiculously complex game like mafia, but for now you serve a purpose (that sounds more cold than I mean it ).

I would normally brush your commentary aside, but I feel that while I have been very active, I have given next to nothing on my actual perspective. So that you have a standard to later judge my actions by, I will respond.

"I dislike your post saying that we should "expect a town lynch". Good towns can find scum d1. Good players can be correct in their reads with over "40%" certainty. Your post reads like you're not going to even try to find scum."

Assuming you are town, you should start the game with a neutral 25% suspicion of everyone (you are the 13th player). Through day one, people will pave the way with false bravado and bluster, but ultimately, day one only serves to identify the people you are playing with. I now have a feel for your styles, an have limited information about what you can and cannot do without bringing the scumhunt to your door. There is incredibly little actually being done, and evidence is inconclusive. I admit, I don't know the actual statistics, but I assume the chances of lynching scum on day one is 25% or less. I believe the inputs for this equation are actually very complex, but I'll try and simplify and communicate the little I do understand.

You posit that 'good' town can find scum d1. This is true, and that should be a focus, but this is unlikely to happen because:

1) - Good scum are approximately equally as abundant good town. For every master inspector there is an escape artist. Your argument from town competency is counteracted.
2) - The scum are manipulating our vote. Three informed votes have a lot of sway in the uninformed majority.

As I hope to have adequately expressed above, it is actually incredibly optimistic to expect a day one scum lynch. On top of this, any scum lynches could be the result of an early bus, which leaves the scum with all the cards. I expect the number of successful scum lynches that do not involve some more advanced mafia play are even less than the 20-25% mentioned earlier.
Mafia, much like starcraft, is a game with phases. I play macrozerg, I win with broodlord infestor. Trying to 6pool out a win on day one is not my style.

On December 20 2012 13:34 Spaghetticus wrote:
@Corazon

The information is there for the reading.

Please don't surrender if you are town, the voting is inconclusive. People have been pressuring with their votes all day, the only difference here is that they all decided to do it to the same person. Sheeping this hard this early is crazy and almost certainly scum manipulation. Despite your play being scummy, I would prefer someone else get the lynch just so that the sheeple will stop being so lazy and keep making cases. That a supposed majority have settled on one person this early is IMO retarded, people need to throw down the hivemind mentality.

On December 20 2012 19:27 Spaghetticus wrote:
how long until lynching? I need to plan logistics.

@Mocsta
My read on Threesr mirror's Kickstart's, though I by no means condone Kickstart's lurking (still one page filter!?). The battle between Threesr and Conazon reminds me of my only other game. Both Kush and WeeTee were conspicuously weak players and everyone was gunning them down. I launched a defense similar to the one I just threw out, and while WeeTee got lynched (innocent), Kush (also innocent) managed to stay alive and we had scum gg after the second night. People that are new read too far into other noob's actions, it's a complex element that people in higher level games don't need to worry about as much.

While I am not saying that there is absolutely zero chance of these players being scum, I think that the information available points to them just being bad town. With Threesr, it's the fact he's been modkilled for lurking that gives me the feeling his obnoxious internet persona is not a skilfully crafted scumshield.

On top of me actually thinking neither of them scum, I also think it's best for the town if we talk about other people regardless of their level of guilt, as if either of them is scum they are almost certainly a weak one, and not likely to stay off our radar for long.

We waste time talking about points that have already been said, both players have been drilled to death. My inclination is to believe that the lurkers hold at least 1-2 mafia, as they have had no reason to step up because Threesr and Corazon have been taking all the heat. By being complacent and lazily voting for the conspicuous, we have let too many people fade into the background.

On August 24 2012 12:34 Spaghetticus wrote:
This is a repost of my case against Shady Sands.
I hope I'm using the tags correctly now... As I will probably be unable to respond to any criticism immediately for the next 10.5 hours, it would be lovely if any comments directed at me could be made quite salient. I'll be tired when I get home and deciphering pages and pages of text can be difficult without cues.


@Kush
So in the few hours this game has been running I have somehow managed to both bandwagon and lurk? This seems brash considering how tentative you have seemed to want to be so far.

I have not bandwagoned. The extent of my contribution is having agreed with Scrawn's lurker policy, but also criticised it for being too conservative. I haven't had time to lurk, as afore mentioned I am a busy person who does not have time to sit on this thread all day and respond in real time to every comment. There is also very little to go on at the moment, just because I am not pretending to contribute does not mean that I am not going to actually contribute as soon as I have something to say.

Now looky here... I do have something to say!

I think Scrawn is doing a good job as town, this certainly does not mean he is beyond suspicion, but he has been fairly reasonable up until now.

I do however, disagree with Lvdr's assessment of Shady Sands. He has been very critical so far, but nothing he has said comes to mind as particularly proactive (I'll eat my word if he can give me a counter-example). In particular, his critique of Lvdr's comment:

filter
On August 24 2012 08:54 Lvdr wrote:


He said:


This seems like empty criticism, as he almost seems to deliberately misinterpret the statement in order to give himself something to say. If Lvdr thinks we should lynch lurkers, but not give up actively scumhunting in order to do this, then it does not at all seem that he is suggesting these two things are mutually exclusive. Yet this is what Shady seems to suggest.

Furthermore, Lvdr has played with Shady before, and claims that Shady should by now have an idea of Lvdr's policy preference.

Soon afterwards, he had the following criticism of Fubu's post:

On August 24 2012 06:30 mkfuba07 wrote:


He wrote:


This is an accurate criticism, but not particularly useful. IMO (and fubu feel free to step in and correct me) Fubu's post was poorly written and he mistakenly made his both a descriptive and prescriptive assertion: that we will all look for scum during the day and the night and that we should all look for scum in the day and the night.
If my interpretation is correct, then this is a completely understandable mistake and speaks extremely little of some scummy motivation he may or may not have.

So far I have shown you two examples of what I believe are needlessly critical posts, that is: posts that are needlessly skeptical of things that will not help us catch scum. Now, as WeeTe has already mentioned, posting lots is generally attributed to town behaviour. However, posting lots of unproductive criticism seems like the sort of thing a scum would do to look like town but not contribute to the lynching of scum.

FoS Shady Sands

I would like to note that I am the first person to my knowledge that is acting against Shady, and IMO I am the first person to put up a decent reason to actually suspect anyone. I'm gonna get back to study, and I'll likely be unable to post for the next 11 hours, at which point I'll go through a read and post before heading to bed.