Consider the sequence of events.
On December 26 2011 17:03 Blazinghand wrote:
Team: Radfield (yourself, who is confirmed town to you), plus Zona (for example), plus someone who gives off a solid town read like, say, Blazinghand. If the mission fails, you can reasonably say "well I think this was Zona" (though others will not be able to do so). The beauty of this though is, assuming you're right about the "1 mafia among Zona/Palm/Rad", If your mission succeeds, you've pinned down a mafia member! (WIFOM alert: Mafia, knowing this, might intentionally not sabotage, etc).
Team: Radfield (yourself, who is confirmed town to you), plus Zona (for example), plus someone who gives off a solid town read like, say, Blazinghand. If the mission fails, you can reasonably say "well I think this was Zona" (though others will not be able to do so). The beauty of this though is, assuming you're right about the "1 mafia among Zona/Palm/Rad", If your mission succeeds, you've pinned down a mafia member! (WIFOM alert: Mafia, knowing this, might intentionally not sabotage, etc).
(a few more back and forth posts between the two I will discuss later)
On December 27 2011 10:26 Radfield wrote:
OK, I'm just going to propose a team then.
Myself
Palmar
Blazinghand
It obviously goes against my initial post, but that first post was really just to get things kicking.
OK, I'm just going to propose a team then.
Myself
Palmar
Blazinghand
It obviously goes against my initial post, but that first post was really just to get things kicking.
Palmar pointed out Blazinghand's little "WIFOM alert" portion, but it's the sequence of events that caught my eye. Notice that Radfield "goes against his intial post" after Blazinghand's post and then includes Blazinghand in his team.
However, what's damning is that Radfield accepts Blazinghand's poor logic in the process. Here are the back and forth posts.
On December 27 2011 06:06 Radfield wrote:
Well, what you were saying earlier is that if I think 1 of Zona and Palmar is scum, it makes the most sense to actually take one of those players along. That would decrease our odds of victory, but increase our information potential. Yes?
Well, what you were saying earlier is that if I think 1 of Zona and Palmar is scum, it makes the most sense to actually take one of those players along. That would decrease our odds of victory, but increase our information potential. Yes?
Radfield has (implicitly) come to the correct conclusion ("decrease our odds of victory") here that if he believes one of Palmar/Zona/himself is a spy, then taking one more of us along with himself, if he is town, (so a 50/50 chance that myself or Palmar is a spy) is worse than picking from the rest, where the chances would be 33%.
On December 27 2011 06:16 Blazinghand wrote:
Indeed. But this is only a viable tactic because you personally know that you are not scum. I'm not the current leader, so I would gain no additional information from you selecting one of Zona/Palmar to come with you, even assuming I shared your thought that 1 of Zona/Palmar/Radfield is scum, because *I* can't rule *you* out. So with my knowledge base, with your assumption of 1 of Zona/Palm/Rad being scum, I actually would not want you to pick 2 from that group, but rather, to pick me, since I myself know I am not scum, and I want to maximize our success rate.
Effectively, the leader's D1 is fundamentally different from a non-leader's D1, because the leader knows his alignment and is select the team. Since I'm currently not the leader, I think we should maximize win rate which will maximize info gained. You as the leader are not working with the same information I am, so you will have a different motivation.
Indeed. But this is only a viable tactic because you personally know that you are not scum. I'm not the current leader, so I would gain no additional information from you selecting one of Zona/Palmar to come with you, even assuming I shared your thought that 1 of Zona/Palmar/Radfield is scum, because *I* can't rule *you* out. So with my knowledge base, with your assumption of 1 of Zona/Palm/Rad being scum, I actually would not want you to pick 2 from that group, but rather, to pick me, since I myself know I am not scum, and I want to maximize our success rate.
Effectively, the leader's D1 is fundamentally different from a non-leader's D1, because the leader knows his alignment and is select the team. Since I'm currently not the leader, I think we should maximize win rate which will maximize info gained. You as the leader are not working with the same information I am, so you will have a different motivation.
Here, Blazinghand reiterates his strategy, which he states "maximize win rate" (it does NOT), and talks about "You as the leader"..."will have different motivation."
On December 27 2011 06:21 Blazinghand wrote:
._. we only really gain information if the mission is successful. If the mission fails all we know is "someone of these three is scum" the point of that post is that Radfield is not acting optimally given his assumptions, not "oh we should do X" because I think Radfield's assumptions are wrong anyways. I'm just pointing otu that given what he's said, it's a terrible idea to pre-vote Yay on him and you should unvote.
._. we only really gain information if the mission is successful. If the mission fails all we know is "someone of these three is scum" the point of that post is that Radfield is not acting optimally given his assumptions, not "oh we should do X" because I think Radfield's assumptions are wrong anyways. I'm just pointing otu that given what he's said, it's a terrible idea to pre-vote Yay on him and you should unvote.
Blazinghand here even states that "we only really gain information if the mission is successful" - while suggesting a strategy which does NOT maximize the chances of success. At the very least, Radfield has realized this.
And after that, Radfield proposes his team, which if you'll notice, follows Blazinghand's proposed strategy. When asked why he picked it, he states:
On December 27 2011 10:31 Radfield wrote:
yay or nay.
Here is my reasoning.
Palmar's only post, while brief, is an important piece of advice and not one I had even considered.
Blazinghand seems townish and willing to reason out and his posting is sound.
I know myself to be town. Honestly, any Day 1 leader who DID NOT put themselves into the first mission would be auto-scum as far as I can tell. It would be blatantly playing against your win-con. In fact, it seems like leaders at every stage of mission will be putting themselves in. No?
yay or nay.
Here is my reasoning.
Palmar's only post, while brief, is an important piece of advice and not one I had even considered.
Blazinghand seems townish and willing to reason out and his posting is sound.
I know myself to be town. Honestly, any Day 1 leader who DID NOT put themselves into the first mission would be auto-scum as far as I can tell. It would be blatantly playing against your win-con. In fact, it seems like leaders at every stage of mission will be putting themselves in. No?
He does NOT acknowledge that he is following precisely what Blazinghand has proposed. And worse, I expect Radfield to realize that Blazinghand's proposal does NOT maximize the chances of success given the assumptions, which both of them seem to accept without questioning.
After the N1 failure, both players basically attack each other (while emphasizing the "one spy on day 1" idea) without really considering the possibility that Palmar is the spy.
Actually, the more I reread, the more convinced I am that Radfield and Blazinghand are both spies. However, I will now go back and assume each of the Night 1 team members is the only scum on the team, and see if posts make sense under that assumption.