Long Game 82: Secrets Written in Metal

[Araris Valerian he/him]

Okay, so if we assume everyone has an extra life, and we want to get an alignment flip today, we can only vote for Illwei, Archer, and Danex. Also, I think we only have 2 viable scenarios with Archer (unless someone claims the kill on Illwei as well). Either he is village and sent in the kill on Danex, or he is elim, and the elim team decided to attack Danex and Illwei each once. The latter scenario only makes sense if we are willing to make some assumptions about the elim team, so for now I lean village on Archer.

20 minutes ago, Ookla the Confused said:

Archer

Have you considered what I’ve mentioned above? Just curious, because I do think an argument can be made to vote Archer this turn, but I’d like to know how you explain the attacks making sense if Archer is elim.

26 minutes ago, Ookla of Anarchy and Chaos said:

Reva walked over and poked Danex, hard. "Are you going to actually talk today?"

Isn’t this a bit... hypocritical? Also, could you give your thoughts on some of the other players? Archer, Sart, Illwei, and Szeth in particular. I mentioned during the night that I didn’t want to start off discussion by voting for you, Danex, or Mage, and while the attack on Danex changes that a bit, I think the point still stands that there are other people who have done/said more things worth analyzing.

I need to decide how important getting a flip this cycle will be. We could vote for someone that presumably has an extra life, and then NK them as a follow-up. Of the people that have lost a life, current Danex is the most suspicious to me, and I don’t really see myself voting for Archer or Illwei this cycle.

[Szeth_Pancakes he/him]

22 minutes ago, Ookla the Paranormal said:

For my own sanity, I'm just not going to respond to this. I believe you believe I'm evil, and I think you're village, so we can both focus on convincing everyone else instead of each other this round since that ain't happening. That said, if you don't ever come up with a secondary kill option, I will eventually have to rethink my read on you because you could just be committing to a tunnel to avoid having to engage dangerously with anyone else. 

My second kill option would be Danex or Illwei probably. Also, I don't have a kill ability (it's something else), so I find it suspicious that Archer told me to save it, then told us that he promptly used his on the first instance he could.

10 minutes ago, Ookla the Porched said:

Have you considered what I’ve mentioned above? Just curious, because I do think an argument can be made to vote Archer this turn, but I’d like to know how you explain the attacks making sense if Archer is elim.

I think the elim team attacked Danex, and Archer is lying that he used his one-shot kill to gain village cred. Then an unrelated villager attacked Illwei because she was suspicious.

[---]

1 hour ago, Ookla the Paranormal said:

and Illwei straight up asked not to be killed

you misinterpreted me. you think that I asked not to be killed? I asked for no vig shots to happen

We're all thugs, we all survive a kill. this means that if no coinshots acted last night, we'd go into today with 1 basically confirmed town, as long as the Elims didn't think everyone was a thug.

1 hour ago, Ookla the Wyrmslayer said:

P.S. I disagreed with Illwei's reasoning but RNGesus liked what she said.

do you still disagree?

Anyways, I think there's a few ways to proceed here.
1) We kill Archer - because he didn't die last night and we want a flip, and then at night we coordinate to bring some people down to one life,
2) We hit someone else to bring them down a life, and then coordinate kills at night. 

25 minutes ago, Ookla the Confused said:

My second kill option would be Danex or Illwei probably. Also, I don't have a kill ability (it's something else), so I find it suspicious that Archer told me to save it, then told us that he promptly used his on the first instance he could.

I think the elim team attacked Danex, and Archer is lying that he used his one-shot kill to gain village cred. Then an unrelated villager attacked Illwei because she was suspicious.

There's some things I want to say in response to this szeth, things that happened last cycle.

Anyways, unless someone else claims the attack on me, I assume that was the elim kill and Archer is telling the truth, as should you. This isn't me trying to force my village-ness onto you, it's me saying that generally, when there's a Nightkill and a vig potential, there's no point in saying the shots are probably wrong unless given valid reason to. valid reason being someone claiming the shot.

2 hours ago, Ookla the Paranormal said:

I also got that vibe, which confused me because I figure e!Illwei could have just tanked the kill and NKed or exed me. Edit: and therefore I wouldn't be able to claim the attack and they could say they were hit by the NK instead or something. Free WGG opportunity. 

Archer, did you shoot me or Danex? because right now it seems like you're saying you shot me.

[Kasimir he/him]

12 minutes ago, Ooklil' the Wei said:

do you still disagree?

Partly.

12 minutes ago, Ooklil' the Wei said:

We're all thugs, we all survive a kill. this means that if no coinshots acted last night, we'd go into today with 1 basically confirmed town, as long as the Elims didn't think everyone was a thug.

I think the Coinshot strat relied on the Elims themselves not having secondary kills to pull off, or alternatively - as you said, we're all Thugs, so the Elims could've just as easily tried a WGG. A WGG is fairly viable in this game IMO especially if the Elims don't have access to a reliable secondary kill (i.e. beyond a one-shot) - they'd have to persuade us to do their killing for them, or be restricted to killing the lynch target each time. I think most of us could infer or suspect that everyone was a Thug by last Night, so I'm not sure it was a worthwhile trade-off.

And I still feel the lack of a flip given the Archer-you-Szeth thunderdome was suboptimal. But I didn't feel strongly enough about it to go ahead with the kill. My initial target had been Archer (to guarantee a flip since I didn't have much of a Village read on him) or Danex - coinflip picked Danex, and then after you suggested we hold fire and I felt conflicted, coinflip said to not proceed, so I didn't.

My supposition was that if Archer is telling the truth, then Illwei was the Elim kill target. I'm not sure what to think about this, because that's the other counterintuitive thing to me. Szeth is, in my view, somewhat of a consensus Village read at the moment, and Szeth is not going anywhere. Do the Elims not have secondary Thug abilities? A more or less consensus Villager who can't be taken out except with two NKs isn't great. So why wasn't Szeth hit last night? Or were they gambling that Illwei might not have a Thug ability?

Szeth claiming to have a secondary ability that isn't a kill somewhat puts a pin in my theory. But if one-shot kill prevalence is even lower than expected, that's all the more mysterious, because it slows things down for both teams, in terms of game speed and information. So I'm not sure what to think about this right now.

Either way, the Wormmon's out of the Digivice now so we just have to proceed. Reva [=Tani], for a little more pressure for the moment.

[Archer he/him]

2 hours ago, Ookla the Porched said:

Okay, so if we assume everyone has an extra life, and we want to get an alignment flip today, we can only vote for Illwei, Archer, and Danex. 

Isn’t this a bit... hypocritical? Also, could you give your thoughts on some of the other players? Archer, Sart, Illwei, and Szeth in particular. I mentioned during the night that I didn’t want to start off discussion by voting for you, Danex, or Mage, and while the attack on Danex changes that a bit, I think the point still stands that there are other people who have done/said more things worth analyzing.

Picking off extra lives with the exe is a valid strategy to me. Don't have to limit ourselves to us weak folk. :). 

+1 that Tani is pulling a hit and run. 

2 hours ago, Ookla the Confused said:

My second kill option would be Danex or Illwei probably. Also, I don't have a kill ability (it's something else), so I find it suspicious that Archer told me to save it, then told us that he promptly used his on the first instance he could.

I think the elim team attacked Danex, and Archer is lying that he used his one-shot kill to gain village cred. Then an unrelated villager attacked Illwei because she was suspicious.

I didn't want to both target the same person. When I said that, I had the kill targeting Illwei and suspected that might be who you would target too, if you had a kill ability. Part of the reason I switched to Danex was actually because I thought Illwei might be killed by someone else. I didn't realize Thug with a kill was such a popular role and was only speaking to you. 

Would anyone like to counter claim my assertion that I killed Danex? 

32 minutes ago, Ooklil' the Wei said:

you misinterpreted me. you think that I asked not to be killed? I asked for no vig shots to happen

Archer, did you shoot me or Danex? because right now it seems like you're saying you shot me.

I thought you'd guessed I had a kill from my weird conversation with Szeth and also guessed that I had plans to use it on you, and was hinting that you had an ability like a scan that if you were allowed to live, the result of could be revealed to help the village. 

Danex. 

8 minutes ago, Ookla the Wyrmslayer said:

I think most of us could infer or suspect that everyone was a Thug by last Night, so I'm not sure it was a worthwhile trade-off.

I'm not entirely sure that's accurate. You've implied you're a Thug, so you had a three Thug pattern to base that guess on. If the elims don't have a second life, or if they don't 

[Szeth_Pancakes he/him]

2 minutes ago, Ookla the Paranormal said:

Would anyone like to counter claim my assertion that I killed Danex? 

I was speaking under the assumption that you were an elim.

[---]

@Kas

I think that there's a strategy in hitting someone that people still might vote out, in order to make sure people don't kill the elims. by bringing me, potential threat, mildly suspected, down to one life, it increases the chances of us killing me or Archer or whoever the vig kills were (danex)

I think for this reason that the Elims /wouldn't/ try to pull a wgg, because it's not just the elim kill that the life protects against, and by bringing them down to one life they increase the chances of them dying to the vote.

@Archer

1 minute ago, Ookla the Paranormal said:

I'm not entirely sure that's accurate. You've implied you're a Thug, so you had a three Thug pattern to base that guess on. If the elims don't have a second life, or if they don't 

ah yes

that is ... words.

anyways, i thought that my coinshot statement should have been blatant to those who were thugs with a kill and village, but i didn't want to say it aloud explicitly. I was talking about thugs, not coinshots. You thinking i had a scan ability is interesting but that kinda implies that what i was going for worked and that the elims might have thought i wasn't a thug.

[Quivil she/her]

12 minutes ago, Ookla the Porched said:

Isn’t this a bit... hypocritical?

"True. However, I would still like to hear from him."

38 minutes ago, Ookla the Porched said:

Isn’t this a bit... hypocritical? Also, could you give your thoughts on some of the other players? Archer, Sart, Illwei, and Szeth in particular. I mentioned during the night that I didn’t want to start off discussion by voting for you, Danex, or Mage, and while the attack on Danex changes that a bit, I think the point still stands that there are other people who have done/said more things worth analyzing.

I need to decide how important getting a flip this cycle will be. We could vote for someone that presumably has an extra life, and then NK them as a follow-up. Of the people that have lost a life, current Danex is the most suspicious to me, and I don’t really see myself voting for Archer or Illwei this cycle.

"I believe the Feruchemists didn't suspect that everyone here - or most people here - would survive their first attack, and that's why they attacked one of us three who didn't say much yesterday."

21 minutes ago, Ookla the Wyrmslayer said:

I think the Coinshot strat relied on the Elims themselves not having secondary kills to pull off, or alternatively - as you said, we're all Thugs, so the Elims could've just as easily tried a WGG. A WGG is fairly viable in this game IMO especially if the Elims don't have access to a reliable secondary kill (i.e. beyond a one-shot) - they'd have to persuade us to do their killing for them, or be restricted to killing the lynch target each time. I think most of us could infer or suspect that everyone was a Thug by last Night, so I'm not sure it was a worthwhile trade-off.

...

Either way, the Wormmon's out of the Digivice now so we just have to proceed. Reva [=Tani], for a little more pressure for the moment.

 

I'm giving up on trying to RP the whole thing.

I have a bunch of violin to do and danex hasnt talked yet. also, real life seems to enjoy happening.

The Elims could so totally have decided to NK one of their own to try to get village cred.

GUYS! WHAT'S A WGG????? I'm tired of feeling confused about this!

[Archer he/him]

13 minutes ago, Ookla of Anarchy and Chaos said:

The Elims could so totally have decided to NK one of their own to try to get village cred.

GUYS! WHAT'S A WGG????? I'm tired of feeling confused about this!

You know what it is, you just don't know it as a Wounded Gazelle Gambit. :P. Elims shooting their teammates for village cred when they have protection eg. an extra life. 

It's fairly rare though. I wouldn't pull it on Illwei this early unless I was REALLY sure they'd be exed and shot if we didn't do anything. 

19 minutes ago, Ooklil' the Wei said:

 

ah yes

that is ... words.

XD. Lemmie complete that thought. If they all are Thugs under a different name, they might say, okay two thugs, two [Feruchemical name for Thug]... maybe there's doubles of each role. The power of a name change can throw people off. 

26 minutes ago, Ookla the Confused said:

I was speaking under the assumption that you were an elim.

Do you have any appetite for a Sart kill? 

[Kasimir he/him]

1. I've changed my name back. I'm sorry, I can't live like this, it's too confusing and I don't know how I managed to remember to log in to 17S many Ookla seasons ago (2014? 2015?) when I was Ookla the Piratical.

2. 

59 minutes ago, Ooklil' the Wei said:

I think for this reason that the Elims /wouldn't/ try to pull a wgg, because it's not just the elim kill that the life protects against, and by bringing them down to one life they increase the chances of them dying to the vote.

Eh. It assumes the Elim team thinks like you do. WGGs are a gambit for a reason because you're always giving up that extra life. The reasoning that bringing themselves down to one life increases the chances of them dying to the vote is true of a WGG in any game - WGGs always inherently require that you decide to trade off the protective value of a passive life for trust. So if this were prima facie a reason against a WGG, then people wouldn't pull off WGGs simpliciter. It'd be a theoretical thing that never sees action in any game. I think you're also arguing that in this game, since Thugs are everywhere, the odds of being shot again are higher, except I'm not sure that's really the case, since it's been argued in past games people seem allergic to going after the kill target a second time. And also, the gambit part on winning trust. It's also a bit more fraught - if it'd hit someone like Mage or Tani I'd be more willing to give them a light Village read, but I'm not so sure the trade-offs are bad in your case, given that Szeth was not going to be a candidate anymore, and you and Danex were mentioned as suspicions. I would agree it's not your Elim style though, so if you're Evil, this is probably not something you'd do. So it's convenient for me that you got hit I guess, since I was light Village reading you anyway, and this makes me feel a bit better about it.

1 hour ago, Ookla the Paranormal said:

I'm not entirely sure that's accurate. You've implied you're a Thug, so you had a three Thug pattern to base that guess on. If the elims don't have a second life, or if they don't 

Here's the thing though. The Elims have two pieces of info we don't, which includes whether they have a secondary kill (one-shot or otherwise), and their team size:

33 minutes ago, Ookla the Paranormal said:

XD. Lemmie complete that thought. If they all are Thugs under a different name, they might say, okay two thugs, two [Feruchemical name for Thug]... maybe there's doubles of each role. The power of a name change can throw people off. 

Four Thug-roles in a nine player game is absurdly high. Suppose the Elims also had a secondary kill (one-shot or otherwise.) That's even more glaring as a hint that there are even more Thugs than declared because for game balance to work, the GM has to factor in four kills floating around along with the Elim kill and look at what happens if the Thugs don't hit each other. It'd be awfully swingy.

I agree the Elims may not have worked it out, but eh, I think it's a reasonable inference if we make certain assumptions about the sorts of information they'd have access to.

Edited to add: @Ookla the Pianist I'm sorry I changed my name but I need to be able to sign in and it is difficult to live this way

>SadWormmon.jpg

Edited December 4, 2021 by Kasimir

[Mat he/him]

2 minutes ago, Kasimir said:

Edited to add: @Ookla the Pianist I'm sorry I changed my name but I need to be able to sign in and it is difficult to live this way

I mean, it just makes things easier for me. So don't worry about it. (Sad about the Wormmon pfp [or lack thereof], though...)

[danex he/him]

agh

i do not have time to play this game

uh yeah

im a thug

or i was

ill actually read stuff later

prob on monday im busy tomorrow

uh

dont kill me plz

thx

[Szeth_Pancakes he/him]

9 hours ago, ookla the quantificational said:

agh

i do not have time to play this game

uh yeah

im a thug

or i was

ill actually read stuff later

prob on monday im busy tomorrow

uh

dont kill me plz

thx

Strong village vibes from this

[Araris Valerian he/him]

Okay, let's run through the player list.

1. Illwei. Was attacked by elims (or possibly by Mage or Sart, who very well could be elims anyway), tied Archer with Sart last cycle. My current thought is to hold off on voting for her until we get confirmation from Mage/Sart, but also wait for at least one flip so we can reason out the chances of a WGG more.

2. Tani. No vote during the first cycle, then the second vote on Danex this turn. @Ookla of Anarchy and Chaos, can you explain again your reason for voting Danex? Based on this quote:

18 hours ago, Ookla of Anarchy and Chaos said:

"I believe the Feruchemists didn't suspect that everyone here - or most people here - would survive their first attack, and that's why they attacked one of us three who didn't say much yesterday."

it seems like you think the elims attacked Danex. However, Archer claimed to have attacked Danex in his first post, so are you referring to Illwei here? You mention 3 players, which I assume refers to my list of you, Danex, and Mage. So it seems like you should be voting for Archer if you think the elims attacked Danex. You also didn't respond to my request to comment on the other players: Archer, Sart, Illwei, Szeth, and Kas, who I forgot to put in the first list.

3. Danex. Placed the 4th vote on Archer with no reasoning given. No longer has an extra life, was allegedly attacked by Archer. Almost no way Danex and Archer are e/e. Probably the best person to vote out this turn if we want a flip.

4. Szeth. Placed the first vote on Archer, and has been doing a Matrim level tunnel ever since. @Ookla the Confused, I think you should back off on Archer unless Mage or Sart claims to have attacked Illwei. Otherwise the only reasonable scenario is that Archer did use a one-shot kill (or some bonus elim kill) on Danex. But I'm not entirely sure that elim!Archer would claim to have used the attack in that event anyways. If you are going to continue to vote for Archer, please give an explanation for the following facts and assumptions:

• There were 2 attacks last night
• Archer claimed one of the attacks
• Nobody has stepped forth to claim the other attack
• Presumably a villager that used a NK would check the thread the next day to see the results of their action (meaning Mage/Sart probably didn't attack Danex or Illwei)
• Presumably a villager that attacked Danex would counterclaim Archer
• Presumably an elim would not claim to have attacked someone (more so if they didn't actually attack said person)

Anyways, I agree with Archer's read of you; the tunnel looks village, but if you keep sticking to it while ignoring evidence to the contrary, you are probably elim.

5. Mage. Nothing here. Maybe an okay option if something comes up and we need to last-minute swing a vote train onto someone else.

6. Sart. Was the first target of the vote D1 (Kas, myself, and Archer), and has since fallen off the radar (except Archer is willing to revisit the vote on him). Voted on Archer for self-preservation, then switched onto Mage, around the same time I switched to Illwei. Haven't heard anything from them this cycle, but during the night they put Archer as a minor trust and Danex as a suspicion(?). I'd be fine voting Sart this cycle.

7. Archer. Placed the 3rd vote on Sart, then joined me on Illwei toward cycle end. Didn't claim to have an extra life. Has an undisputed claim of having attacked Danex. Voted for Danex right away this cycle. The combination of the attack and immediate vote strikes me as village. I also agree both with his vote on Danex and his willingness to vote Sart. He did say some things D1 that I don't agree with, so he's still at the back of my mind.

8. Kas. Oh boy. Placed the first vote on Sart, then switched to Danex. Voting on Tani this cycle. Kas has said a lot of sensible things this game, but hasn't really made much of a splash. All of his votes have been the first vote that player, and two have been the only vote. I'd vote on Kas this cycle, but he's probably the lowest on my list of people I'd consider voting for. @Kasimir, could you do some sort of consolidated reads post (not necessarily with justifications)? I'm having a hard time feeling out where you stand on a lot of things.

In summary, I'd vote for Sart, Danex, Tani, Mage, or Kas, in that order. Which is most everyone, but without a flip, that's the best I can do.

[Szeth_Pancakes he/him]

6 minutes ago, Ookla the Porched said:

4. Szeth. Placed the first vote on Archer, and has been doing a Matrim level tunnel ever since. @Ookla the Confused, I think you should back off on Archer unless Mage or Sart claims to have attacked Illwei. Otherwise the only reasonable scenario is that Archer did use a one-shot kill (or some bonus elim kill) on Danex. But I'm not entirely sure that elim!Archer would claim to have used the attack in that event anyways. If you are going to continue to vote for Archer, please give an explanation for the following facts and assumptions:

• There were 2 attacks last night
• Archer claimed one of the attacks
• Nobody has stepped forth to claim the other attack
• Presumably a villager that used a NK would check the thread the next day to see the results of their action (meaning Mage/Sart probably didn't attack Danex or Illwei)
• Presumably a villager that attacked Danex would counterclaim Archer
• Presumably an elim would not claim to have attacked someone (more so if they didn't actually attack said person)

Anyways, I agree with Archer's read of you; the tunnel looks village, but if you keep sticking to it while ignoring evidence to the contrary, you are probably elim.

I disagree with the last bullet point, but you're right. I'm still suspicious of Archer, even though other people seem a lot more suspicious.

Araris Archer

Edited December 5, 2021 by Ookla the Confused

[Kasimir he/him]

54 minutes ago, Ookla the Porched said:

I'm having a hard time feeling out where you stand on a lot of things.

This stands out and is a bit odd to me because I've been explicit in flagging out where I have light Village reads, so I feel as though you're trying to set me up as being more waffly than I've explicitly stated myself to be, and simultaneously also being waffly yourself - if I'm the last person on your current "would vote" list, then why even mention you want to vote me this cycle?

But I can also kind of see why because this game I'm having more light Village reads than actual Evil reads. Which is a bit unusual for me since I don't often have light Village reads early on. I'm going to credit this to the low level of discussion and the lack of an actual flip. As you should know very well by now, I'm more a vote analysis guy, so without votes and flips, it's difficult for me to be able to solidify reads on players, but especially Evil reads.

I don't want to do a ranking, but let's see:

Off The Table:

• Szeth
• Illwei

I don't want anyone in this category to die right now. Illwei is more negotiable than Szeth, with Szeth obviously being my strongest current Village read and a much lighter Village read for Illwei. For Szeth, it's the Archer scope you pointed out, which I agree with. Szeth was too over-invested in that for it to seem Elim-like. For Illwei, it's the fact I felt her move last night makes a bit more sense as a Villager than an Elim, and also because I currently lean more towards the reasoning that it's not a WGG.

Prefer Not To Kill:

• Mage

I can't have suspicions of someone who hasn't said anything. In general, if a player is promising to be back, I'd like to hear from them first. But this stay of execution only goes so far, and depends on whether Mage really is going to show back up. Then again - there's Danex. More on Danex later.

Don't Care:

• Tani
• Sart
• Araris
• Archer

In a way, I could subdivide the Don't Care territory a bit more. But I'm not going to bother. 

Still'd like to hear more from Tani. Vote on Danex has been framed as a poke vote rather than suspicion. As a result, I am correspondingly apathetic about whether Tani stays alive. Same apathy for Sart. Sart did respond D1 to the votes and went CC which I don't agree with for tactical and historical reasons, but is a safe and easy location to stash a vote whether Village or Elim. (Which Sart himself lampshaded.) Speaking of which though, he's not wrong that we have to figure out what to do about the inactives.

Just to be blunt, I don't share Illwei's and Szeth's reads of Archer in terms of playstyle. I do see a bit of playstyle drift but I've made my thoughts on that matter clear. But I still think Archer's current behaviour is consistent with both Elim and Village Archer so I don't have a strong opinion on him. I could countenance a lynch on Archer for informational reasons but I've generally been persuaded by Striker's point (or was it Danex's? Ages ago) that it's better to lynch people you actually want dead than for FAFO reasons. I was initially somewhat more wary of Archer because I felt Archer was deliberately trying to tie himself to me D1 before the flip, and my gut disliked that. Now that we know Archer's a Thug, I think it's still possible but maybe less likely. At any rate, overall no strong opinion.

Araris. I see Archer's reasoning about Araris's engagement with Szeth being a bit unlikely for an Elim since an Elim should be more apathetic but...I don't know. Elim Araris (I haven't seen this behaviour in Village Araris yet) has a habit of knuckling down for engagements on points of principle regardless of whether he should. Sometimes it goes well for him. Sometimes it doesn't. But historically, I've always only been able to get a more solid read on Araris after a couple of cycles. I don't have anything determinate at the moment. Something about Araris's comment on the game being over in three or four cycles did strike me as a bit odd though, since I thought at that time that it seemed to suggest Araris thought there were no other operative kills or Thugs, which would be a strange inference for a Thug with a secondary ability.

But then again, we now know secondary abilities may not involve kills. But that statement stuck out to me at that time. It does rely on a set of distributive assumptions so overall I'm just /shrug on Araris.

Probably Don't Care:

• Danex

I still don't like Danex's voting patterns, but I feel it's potentially exposed as a position for an Elim to go for. I feel as though the corollary almost has to be that one of the reasons an Elim would be that blatant is potentially because of a confederate being threatened in votes as well. But at that time, it was really just a Sart-Archer thunderdome, (3-2 split between Archer and Sart, someone correct me if I'm wrong as it's late and I'm tired) and would also entail that Archer, Danex, and Sart are all not Elims together.

Danex could be in the Don't Care category but I don't like Danex's vote, and feel it was a bit too opportunistic, and Danex hasn't done anything since to give me a better opinion of him and that's really what it boils down to for me. I don't share Szeth's Village toneread of Danex from that post, in general. Would I put the final killing vote on Danex eventually? Well...

The thing about going for Danex is I'm not a fan of the general apathy surrounding Danex suspicion. Same with Archer this cycle, really. I feel like most of the votes this cycle have elicited so little reaction I just find it hard to see how we're on the right track at all. Granted, a two-man Elim team can't do much, but I'm just not feeling pushback or investment in the votes beyond Szeth and Szeth has been singularly invested in Archer and is my strongest Village read so I'm ignoring him for the purposes of analysis.

1 hour ago, Ookla the Porched said:

All of his votes have been the first vote that player, and two have been the only vote.

You all need to vote for more sensible players then

I've made my thoughts on vote manip clear. And I'm doing exactly what Village Araris did in LG73 and the LG where Mat tried to set Village Araris up: if I see no particular reason to jump in on a wagon that I'm fine with and is proceeding fine without my help, I'd much rather go for and try to pressure people I want to hear from. I prefer keeping suspicions broad than having the conversation narrow on a few players.

If I'm right that the low temperature so far suggests that we haven't actually significantly threatened anyone who is actually Evil, then excluding my current Village reads, I'd have to look within the <Tani, Mage, Araris, Sart> set. Sart is dubious IMO because Sart already got voted on D1, and my two Village reads (however weak) were driving the other train.

Which I guess is a way of saying: Tani, Araris.

[Archer he/him]

Brawnze realized the jog was up. Assassins were after him, so it was time to show the world why his people had elected him to be their representative. He fished a bowtie out of his pocket and checked out his reflection in the window of a nearby shop.

“Me name is Brawnze. James Brawnze.”

He suavely dashed down the lane to investigate where the arrow had come from. Alas, his assailant was long gone. All the was left was a bow, but on its shaft was a signet mark he recognized in a heartbeat.

“This symbol be bad. Me being hunted… by the bad man Bronzefinger.”

*

First of all, last time I was evil with Danex, they were willing to use inactivity to avoid suspicion. Otherwise, yeah, I normally read stuff like Tani and Danex’s leaning of RL explanations for inactivity to be villager, while something like Mage’s post was more what I’d expect of an elim looking to get caught up on the doc before they make a post they might have to backtrack on.

This post is a mess. Everything below this paragraph I wrote before Araris made his most recent post, and was sitting on until he made his move. Given that he voted Sart and made a reads list that I like the looks of, including the mild suspicion of Kas which I think v!Araris would have for the same reasons I was sus of Araris, I’m struggling to justify exing him. And as you’ll see, I tried. But since Szeth voted him (I am so close to just voting Szeth honestly), I think it’s worth scrutinizing Araris. Again, my current read on them is village-leaning, even though I wrote the rest of this hoping they were evil:

 

Araris was pinging my elimdar because I am always suspicious of anyone that defends me too much. :P. I think e!they would think that v!they would take my side and argue Szeth’s points were flawed and so they would. I feel like if you spend that much time arguing an exe is being done for bad reasons, you’d be willing to CC rather than let it go through. That he didn’t suggests Mage as a possible teammate. That he stuck to his guns suggests e!they were okay with me dying because that’s a free mix and they get village cred from it based on their positioning.

As for the Illwei kill, I think e!they would pounce on the opportunity to get rid of Illwei because she hadn’t said much D1 beyond suggesting I be exed. That avoids implicating him, and directs the next exe towards me, and gets a good player out of the picture. It also suggests a low-activity teammate, although that’s confused by their regular calls to coinshot those players, which brings me to the major problem with this theory.

Sure, Araris has been sticking to arguments that are in their wheelhouse regardless of alignment, and is the most active person I don’t have a confident village read of, but I can’t for the life of me figure out who their teammate is. Best guess would be Sart, who conveniently also avoided being implicated in the D1 mix by hoping off, but even that requires us to guess that he was bluffing about be willing to move the exe back onto them D1.

This is really piecemeal, so my confidence in this read isn’t great. But whenever all our top suspects are low posters, that’s usually a sign that an active elim has slipped through undetected.

*

Why Araris Might be Evil:

-D1: “I doubt there are any kill roles this game, but if there are, I'll echo my call from the last game to target any players that aren't voting/participating in discussion.” Directs kills away from him (but implies active teammate.

BUT -D1 felt I’d signalled them out for what was a basic stab for them.

-D1: “I do realize my vote is currently kinda useless, so let’s see if I can fix that.” Trying to avoid appearance of a pure vanity vote while also directing traffic late to make sure their teammates weren’t hit?

-Spent the final hour before rollover arguing with Szeth why their vote was a bad one. Elims like being around near rollover to switch their vote if needbe.

-D2: “we can only vote for Illwei, Archer, and Danex” possibly hoped to direct conversation towards that set, of which at least two are village. Also ended that post with an ‘I need to think’, which could be stalling.

People e!Araris Probably Isn’t Teammates With:

People I Trust:

-Kas: didn’t know the elims for sure have an NK

-Illwei: targeted by the elim kill

-Szeth: commitment to their tunnel

People he’s distanced himself from:

-Tani: Included in D1 list of inactives he suggested coinshotting. And N2 list. Called them hypocritical, which a teammate likely wouldn’t do.

-Danex: Included in D1 list of inactives he suggested coinshotting. And N2 list. BUT technically was defending Danex when calling Tani’s vote bad. AND: People he’s pinged: Mage/Danex/Tani, Szeth/Danex/Archer. Could have been trying to summon Danex.

-Mage: Included in D1 list of inactives he suggested coinshotting BUT advised against CC D1 saying “I’d prefer to vote out someone that has been talking”. Also was active near D1 rollover which might indicate they were worried about the Mage wagon. BUUUT N2 said “I'll repeat my request for a Coinshot or the like to go after one of Danex/Mage/Tani”. They’d have to be relying on better chance of someone else being hit/Thug extra life.

-Sart: D1 Said they’d vote Sart over Archer. BUT put them 4^th on his list of suspects N1, which is a non-starter realistically.

 

EDIT: Kas, why must I always be ninja'd by you. 

Two things. One, "Something about Araris's comment on the game being over in three or four cycles did strike me as a bit odd though, since I thought at that time that it seemed to suggest Araris thought there were no other operative kills or Thugs, which would be a strange inference for a Thug with a secondary ability." This is a valid point, but if v!Thug Araris didn't know everyone was a Thug because we didn't know that D1, then they'd have had no reason to suspect they weren't special. I assumed Mat just liked me and didn't question it. :P. 

Two, I too have a sinking feeling. Not sure how much of it is inactivity driven versus going after the wrong target. Plus the elims have extra lives possibly so they can play cooler. 

Edited December 5, 2021 by Ookla the Paranormal

[Kasimir he/him]

15 minutes ago, Ookla the Paranormal said:

EDIT: Kas, why must I always be ninja'd by you. 

Two things. One, "Something about Araris's comment on the game being over in three or four cycles did strike me as a bit odd though, since I thought at that time that it seemed to suggest Araris thought there were no other operative kills or Thugs, which would be a strange inference for a Thug with a secondary ability." This is a valid point, but if v!Thug Araris didn't know everyone was a Thug because we didn't know that D1, then they'd have had no reason to suspect they weren't special. I assumed Mat just liked me and didn't question it. :P. 

Two, I too have a sinking feeling. Not sure how much of it is inactivity driven versus going after the wrong target. Plus the elims have extra lives possibly so they can play cooler. 

Put those class skills in Ninja for a reason 

I think on the first point, yes, but my thought in a small game with at least one Thug, the immediate inference should be that the GM might be trying to slow down the kill pace. If the Thug has a one-shot kill, then potentially the inference is that the game needs some brakes (i.e. more protects or Thugs) or it'd be over really fast. That was my thought process D1 anyway, but I can definitely see where someone might draw the opposite inference, that it'd be over really fast. I'm actually not even sure it's reason for suspicion, which is why I didn't really mention it on D1 or N1. People obviously also lie and soft other roles for various reasons. Moreover, it's really only odd in a bad way if you think that Feruchemists are less likely to be Thugs or have Thug-like abilities, on top of everything else. But back when I was reading it, I made a mental note of the comment and it stuck with me today, so I thought I'd bring it up anyway and see what people have to say.

[Araris Valerian he/him]

3 minutes ago, Kasimir said:

This stands out and is a bit odd to me because I've been explicit in flagging out where I have light Village reads, so I feel as though you're trying to set me up as being more waffly than I've explicitly stated myself to be, and simultaneously also being waffly yourself - if I'm the last person on your current "would vote" list, then why even mention you want to vote me this cycle?

Yeah, sorry. That was vague and not what I was actually trying to get across. I meant that as more of a "I don't have a good feel for Kas's reads (and the suspicions in particular) overall" than a "Kas hasn't given clear reads". Maybe you're right that I'm waffling, but that's partly because you are at the bottom of the player list and I didn't entirely feel like reading all of your content again (I'll do you first next time). I'm also honestly just unsure because we don't have any flips. You and me and Archer can all talk a good talk regardless of which team we are on, and I wanted to make it clear that I'm holding you at arm's length. 

14 minutes ago, Kasimir said:

1 hour ago, Ookla the Porched said:

All of his votes have been the first vote that player, and two have been the only vote.

You all need to vote for more sensible players then

I've made my thoughts on vote manip clear. And I'm doing exactly what Village Araris did in LG73 and the LG where Mat tried to set Village Araris up: if I see no particular reason to jump in on a wagon that I'm fine with and is proceeding fine without my help, I'd much rather go for and try to pressure people I want to hear from. I prefer keeping suspicions broad than having the conversation narrow on a few players.

This was not supposed to be an accusation, it was just something I noticed and felt like throwing in there, partly because it's the opposite of what I noticed that I tend to do: follow players with a second vote to double-down on the pressure, with the downside that I'm giving up my influence on who is a candidate for votes in the first place. I had this thought during D1, and it was part of my push for votes on Illwei.

I just now realized that Szeth is voting for me, because the original vote in that post was for Illwei, which confused me. 

I don't really have a response to anything Archer posted (and I don't think he was looking for one), but as to this:

20 minutes ago, Ookla the Paranormal said:

-Sart: D1 Said they’d vote Sart over Archer. BUT put them 4^th on his list of suspects N1, which is a non-starter realistically.

I am currently voting on Sart, in part because you seemed to indicate that you would be willing to vote on him, although your comment was directed towards Szeth.

[Kasimir he/him]

19 minutes ago, Ookla the Porched said:

You and me and Archer can all talk a good talk regardless of which team we are on, and I wanted to make it clear that I'm holding you at arm's length. 

First is strictly-speaking untrue because I haven't been Evil in eons and we were both mostly inactive in the one game we played where I was Evil and you were Village (MR3), but I'm flagging this because House Urbain approves of this message  

19 minutes ago, Ookla the Porched said:

This was not supposed to be an accusation, it was just something I noticed and felt like throwing in there, partly because it's the opposite of what I noticed that I tend to do: follow players with a second vote to double-down on the pressure, with the downside that I'm giving up my influence on who is a candidate for votes in the first place. I had this thought during D1, and it was part of my push for votes on Illwei.

I'll admit this is a recent playstyle shift for me (not sure if it's drastic since no one @ed me over it) but it was triggered by a conversation with Striker in a previous LG (I think it was Striker?) It's the giving up of influence that I'm lately trying to push back against by applying pressure on people I actually want to see dead or have pressure applied to them, and just doing things with my vote that isn't securing/padding the lynch train. Obviously if it's lylo or we really need to lynch that player, or if I absolutely prefer to see one player lynched over another, I'm on that train, bells and kettle on.

Edited to add: You know what. I'm going to do that kasyana indecisive thing. Araris, Mage. I've seen you, you probably saw me. Thoughts on the state of the lynch? [ @Ookla the Pianist - vote added]

Edited December 5, 2021 by Kasimir

[Araris Valerian he/him]

44 minutes ago, Kasimir said:

First is strictly-speaking untrue because I haven't been Evil in eons and we were both mostly inactive in the one game we played where I was Evil and you were Village (MR3), but I'm flagging this because House Urbain approves of this message  

You forget LG 20 (but I am assuming here that your village skills translate well into elim-that-can-talk-like-a-villager skills).

Edited December 5, 2021 by Ookla the Porched

[Mage he/him]

Okay, super sorry for my lack of inactivity, but here is my going-through of the player list.

Araris: Jumped on the Sart bandwagon, but then switched to Illwei for no apparent reason. That's a little suspicious, but I'll follow this line of logic further when I get to Illwei. They could potentially be an elim teammate with Sart. Voting them at the beginning, then switching. Has been very active this game, but if inactivity is an indicator of suspiciousness then I'm the most suspicious here.

Illwei: Weird stuff going on with Archer. Like Araris said, it could be some weird ploy of them working together, but I don't think so. Was voted by Araris and Archer. I could potentially see an e/e team between Illwei and Araris, because Araris could have thrown his vote at Illwei to throw off suspicion if one of them got exposed, but I don't think its likely.

Tani: Has given us hardly anything to work with. I know its hypocritical of me to complain, but I'm going to anyway. When they sort of reactiated last night none of their posts had any substance to it. I don't know what I think vil/elim wise, but killing them wouldn't tell us much, but that could be exactly the reason why we should vote them. This game hurts my brain.

Danex: Once again, not much to work with except their vote on Archer. That was the vote that went through, so it's not horribly suspicious. Due to the lack of substance I'm going with gut and saying village?

Szeth: Voted for Archer, so by the same logic I used with Danex I don't suspect them. That logic is probably wrong but I'm sticking with it. There seems to be a decently common consensus that Szeth isn't elim. I haven't been in a game with Szeth before so I can't speak to playstyle stuff, but I'll trust your collective opinion.

Mage: hi

Sart: Got bandwagoned on very first. They retaliated with a vote on Archer. Then they switched to me which biases me against them. I kind of suspect them because they have been consistently active, but not revealing too much of what they think.

Archer: Very active. Votes all over the place though. First Sart, then me, then Illwei. By the same logic that I used on Araris, they could be in league with Illwei, voting them once their vote no longer mattered. There also has been a common consensus that their playstyle/tone is quite suspicious. Once again I can't speak to playstyle, but it seems to be a common opinion and I see where everyone is coming from.

Kasimir: Has been playing very levelly, and hasn't done anything suspicious, so I think I trust them. That could however be exactly what they want me to think...

Ultimately I think my most suspicious list, in order, is Archer, Araris, and Illwei. Please critique any of my logic.

Note: Ookla season and the fact that the shard splits up threads into pages makes it bloody difficult to use ctrl-F when going through and doing reads. If anyone knows a better way to do this let me know.

Edited December 5, 2021 by Mage

[Archer he/him]

2 hours ago, Ookla the Porched said:

I am currently voting on Sart, in part because you seemed to indicate that you would be willing to vote on him, although your comment was directed towards Szeth.

I'm not sure that's where I'm at right now, but I was certainly curious if Szeth had landed there. I have a bad habit of not wanting to kill people who ask not to be killed, so realistically I've stopped baring down on Danex. 

11 minutes ago, Mage said:

[1.] Danex: Once again, not much to work with except their vote on Archer. That was the vote that went through, so it's not horribly suspicious. Due to the lack of substance I'm going with gut and saying village?

Szeth: Voted for Archer, so by the same logic I used with Danex I don't suspect them. That logic is probably wrong but I'm sticking with it. 

[2.] Mage: hi

Archer: Very active. Votes all over the place though. First Sart, then me, then Illwei. [3.] By the same logic that I used on Araris, they could be in league with Illwei, voting them once their vote no longer mattered.

[4.] Note: Ookla season and the fact that the shard splits up threads into pages makes it bloody difficult to use ctrl-F when going through and doing reads. If anyone knows a better way to do this let me know.

1. The elims have to vote somewhere. Voting off a villager is good for them. Why wouldn't they support mixes? At least until they're sure to go through, then they might hop off, like Sart did. Better to pressure villagers than risk being under fire yourself. The line you bolded doesn't make sense to me.   

2. Hi! Thanks for the post!

3. Illwei's vote mattered. It was the third on me. Afterwards one was added and one was lost, so the wagon ended up with three votes. There was a number of one vote trains out there. If she had instead added to one of those, it'd have been 2 to 2. With my vote, added in self preservation, it'd have been 2 to 3 in my favor and I'd have avoided the exe. Similarly, I could have +1ed a wagon on someone other than Illwei, such as Kas' on Danex. Instead of making both the first and second wagons problematic for my e!team, either of us could have voted differently and sought a better result. It makes no sense that we'd be teammates. Also, Illwei was shot by the elims, so we'd have to have bussed twice in a row in C1 for that to work out. 

How'd you come out of that thinking the team is Illwei-me and not me-Araris? I'm blatantly defending him, kind of. 

4. hahahahahahahahahahahhaha no :(. The Shard is optimized to be a book discussion forum, not a mafia forum, unfortunately. 

Mage

[Araris Valerian he/him]

2 minutes ago, Ookla the Paranormal said:

4. hahahahahahahahahahahhaha no :(. The Shard is optimized to be a book discussion forum, not a mafia forum, unfortunately. 

Yeah, we really need an ISO feature, that would boost the quality of life around here by a lot. I wonder how hard something like that would be to implement, and if it would be useful on other parts of the forum.

36 minutes ago, Mage said:

but then switched to Illwei for no apparent reason

I gave a reason, which was two-fold: I was opposing the vote on Archer (largely for meta reasons at that point), and I was making a guess at what elim!Illwei might have done under those circumstances.

I'll leave other folks to critique the logic leveled against them.

11 minutes ago, Ookla the Paranormal said:

How'd you come out of that thinking the team is Illwei-me and not me-Araris? I'm blatantly defending him, kind of. 

If we hadn't already had a couple of very successful games together as elims, I'd say that our interactions don't really fit with us being elims together. It's too blatant. But, based on those games, I bet we could pull it off .

[Mage he/him]

30 minutes ago, Ookla the Paranormal said:

How'd you come out of that thinking the team is Illwei-me and not me-Araris? I'm blatantly defending him, kind of.

Do we know how many elims there are? Because it might be a threesome team with Araris in there.

34 minutes ago, Ookla the Paranormal said:

1. The elims have to vote somewhere. Voting off a villager is good for them. Why wouldn't they support mixes? At least until they're sure to go through, then they might hop off, like Sart did. Better to pressure villagers than risk being under fire yourself. The line you bolded doesn't make sense to me. 

Good point. My thinking was for a vote to go through, there's a decent chance some of those in the vote are vil. I didn't consider that the elims could have been pushing for that and convinced others to go in on the vote. I'll go do a re-read on Danex, and Sart too.