Mid-Range Game 38: The Council of Elrond

[Elbereth she/her]

 

MR38: Cycle 2 - A God’s Fall

When all stories were told, Elrond asked, “Who should take the Ring, then? If this must be done - if the Ring must be destroyed - then only the strongest and bravest might hope to withstand it long enough to bring it to the Fire.”

At first, the council members began nominating themselves, telling why they were of course the perfect person to bear the Ring, until Elrond shook his head. “Choose others,” he said. “If all only talk of themselves, then we shall get nowhere. Who of your fellows do you feel deserves this honor?”

The discussion grew more interesting and more heated, then. Tinuial brought up Phellom - Elrond privately thought that the Elf would have difficulty holding onto the Ring should he be given it, but he would not go against the will of the Council should that be their choice. 

Aranmir and Yuriel were put forward as well, and each for their part seemed happy to take the burden. They seemed better choices than Phellom to Elrond, but still he hesitated to grant them that honor. 

Then the man in the black hat put forward Ulmo. Elrond had... been trying to ignore the presence of the Valar and his strange presence. If the god wished to speak, he would listen, but thus far he had seemed content to merely sit and watch. 

Within moments, Aranmir concurred, and even Phellom said he would put his support behind Ulmo rather than himself. The god himself said nothing, but the council agreed quickly: if any could bring the Ring to the Fire, a god more powerful even than Sauron would be the perfect choice. 

As the day grew into late afternoon, Elrond nodded. “Ulmo, then, shall be the first of the Fellowship. It is done.”

But what they did not remember is that resistance to the Ring does not reside in power. For good reason had Elrond not volunteered himself - despite Astranwir’s suggestion - and if a mere Elf lord could wreak havoc with the Ring, a Valar...

Elrond instructed Gwendolyn to keep the Ring for now, which was a pity, in Ulmo’s eyes. But soon enough he would be alone with the Fellowship, and when he took the Ring for himself and absorbed Sauron’s power with it, he would be greater than even Manwe and Varda’s might. 

For now, though, he had no further interest in who was selected. Stepping into a nearby fountain, Ulmo vanished from sight, content to merely listen until the Fellowship was complete.

Stink was elected to the Fellowship! He was Corrupted!

 

Vote Count

Stink (3): Bard, Kas, Wibble
Kas (2): Coda, Wonko
Elbereth (1): Straw
Aman (2): Rath, Striker
Burnt (1): Fifth

Cycle 2 has begun. It will end in 47 hours at 7am Eastern Time. 

Player List

1. Straw - NPC, Astranwir the Blue
2.  Fifth Scholar - Robin Smallburrow, hobbit Shirriff fleeing “Sharkey”
3. Coda - Aidenn, scholar studying the effects of the Ring on the psyche
4. Kasimir - Aranmir, a captain arriving from Gondor
5. Amanuensis - Yuriel (First Finder)
6. Xinoehp512 - the Observer
7. Wonko the Sane - Gwendolyn (Elf from the Grey Havens)
8. Pejidot
9. Burnt Spaghetti - Tinuial (Clandestine Attendee)
10. Aragorn
11. StrikerEZ - Striker, bootleg Strider
12. GoWibble - black hat from XKCD
13. Rathmaksal
14. Stink - Ulmo
15. Young Bard - Phellom (Elf of Mirkwood)

[Burnt Spaghetti she/her]

Well then.

Hey,

At least it was only one this time and not three >>

welp. 

but hey, information is gained! Now we can vote in more informed manners!

siiigh

okay well that makes bard a tad suspicious considering that last minute vote then. 

blarh im tired and don't want to think through all the implications this means >>  ill comment tomorrow >>

[GoWibble he/him]

Oh, gosh, now I'm incriminated...

Stink was corrupted.

Rust and Ruin! 

Someone else then...

 

[Kasimir he/him]

[OOC: Whaaaaat. I had gambled he would be Good because I didn't figure my main suspicions would go for it immediately urgh... Sigh. Anyway :/ A few initial thoughts—RP to follow later. 

-Everyone on the Ulmo vote should be looked at. This includes me, GoWibble, and Bard, but also Striker and Burnt, who both indicated Ulmo would be their D1 choice of Seven. 

-I feel not all the Corrupted would band on the Ulmo vote as they would know the result would compromise them all. Of all who voted on Ulmo (soft or otherwise), I am personally suspicious of GoWibble most. I can't decide if Bard or Striker is my next in terms of suspicion strength, with Burnt temporarily last. 

-I would be reluctant to vote anyone implicated in Ulmogate today. This can change as more information comes down the line. Right now, I will slap a temporary vote down on Fifth and go look over the votes again.]

[Young Bard he/him]

Hmmm... That's disappointing. With those results, I have a moderate suspicion of Kas after that round. Actually, I'm surprisingly less suspicious of GoWibble - nothing about their language strikes me as suspicious - they voted on Stink mostly randomly, and the rest of what makes them suspicious is ties to Kas. I could see Elim Kas tying themselves to Wibble so that if he came under suspicion Wibble would too, first with voting for Wibble, then supporting Wibble's vote on Stink who Elim Kas would have known to be a fellow Corrupted. On the other hand, if Kas and Wibble were both Corrupted, then they probably wouldn't have associated themselves together so publicly in thread.

---

As Ulmo vanished into the air, there was a brief moment of silence, as people realised the error they had made. Already, they had a Corrupted in the Fellowship, and it would likely not be the last, if they did not choose wisely.

"Uhhh... I don't suppose we could, um, undo Ulmo's nomination, or something, could we?"

"The needs of this mission are too great." Elrond replied with a sigh. "If we withdrew and replaced nominations, I fear we would still be sitting here when Sauron himself arrives at the Last Homely House. We shall have to go on. Besides, it doesn't appear Ulmo is present for us to inform him he's been withdrawn, nor would he take to it kindly if he were."

Phellom thought. In appointing one of their own, some of those corrupted by the ring must have shown themselves. In particular, Aranmir, who made himself out to be so humble and friendly, seemed to Phellom to have played a key role in Phellom's appointment. He would have to be more careful not to let himself get manipulated into making a hasty decision in future.

[Kasimir he/him]

26 minutes ago, Young Bard said:

Hmmm... That's disappointing. With those results, I have a moderate suspicion of Kas after that round. Actually, I'm surprisingly less suspicious of GoWibble - nothing about their language strikes me as suspicious - they voted on Stink mostly randomly, and the rest of what makes them suspicious is ties to Kas. I could see Elim Kas tying themselves to Wibble so that if he came under suspicion Wibble would too, first with voting for Wibble, then supporting Wibble's vote on Stink who Elim Kas would have known to be a fellow Corrupted. On the other hand, if Kas and Wibble were both Corrupted, then they probably wouldn't have associated themselves together so publicly in thread.

Good, so does that mean you'd be willing to vote GoWibble? Because if so, I'd be interested to see what the result is

I also note it's an interesting reversal from your previous position where you expressed uncertainty of GoWibble, and suggested that my alignment depended on GoWibble's. Yet between this cycle and the previous, you've somehow decided that first, I'm evil, and second, I'm now the determiner of GoWibble's alignment? How does that work?

I think the interesting thing to me is Bard's late vote for Ulmo. I'm understanding of the late part - the end of the cycle caught me pants down the last iteration of this game. But given Bard's resistance to Aman, he could have: A) opted for a three way tie, which would have reduced the chances of RNGesus picking Aman, B ) picked me, which, by his own admission in the previous cycle, he had more reason to trust than STINK, C) left it as a two-way tie, or... apparently, gone for D) voted for STINK.

Voting STINK instead of me makes little sense if you think my alignment depends on GoWibble's. Because if so, you can't infer from my alignment to GoWibble's.

In fact, if you think I'm evil, you almost certainly have to think both Bard and Aman are good, given that I intervened strongly to kick the cycle away from a Bard-or-Aman lynch, when (on the assumption either was evil) banding on either of the bandwagons would have attracted little scrutiny, allowed me to maintain Top Villager Streetcred, and allowed a teammate to enter the Fellowship! So you would have to believe both are good! And if you do think both Bard and Aman are good, vote them! If you're wrong, I promise I won't ask too hard how it feels to be wrong like I was  (I can't promise I won't gloat a little, though.) And if you're right, I welcome it because that gives us a solid two villager lead in the Fellowship, which - fantastic!

Note that you would also have to believe that I deliberately chose to kick things away from encouraging a natural me-lynch to encouraging a STINK lynch when STINK was skating by fine, once again tanking credibility damage. I've found simpler Rube Goldberg machines...

Edited November 13, 2019 by Kasimir

[Young Bard he/him]

Hmmm... Those are good points for why you're not an Elim - in particular the Rube Goldberg part. And, sure, if you want me to, Wibble. (He's probably not going to get elected this cycle anyway, so consider it a placeholder while I figure out who I'm actually going to vote for.)

In response to the different options, I think I made the right one - I dislike leaving things to chance, especially when there's some alternatives I like more than others, so a) and c) were never going to happen. b ) was a distinct possibility, but I decided against it mainly because of this line:

Quote

[OOC: I especially dislike defending fast discussion bottlenecks, because that's exactly what happened last game - I ended up in a position where it seemed to me as though optimal play was for me to hammer one (Fifth) I actually thought was Corrupted. That might be acceptable tactically but it seems to me that the key is to avoid ending up in such a solution. So I don't want to go back and be cornered again. And of course as I've mentioned previously - it's a discursive trap because the more we talk about this, the more we end up forcing ourselves into that reinforced bottleneck, where the only way to go informationally is to bite the bullet. It's a tactic I intend to keep in mind for future uses when Evil, but I definitely do not want to end up there when playing for Village.]

That line felt weird to me, and I suspected it could be a way of Kas trying to seem like he's already a villager this game without being so overt about it he was likely to be challenged. I mentioned this in several PM's last cycle, including my PM with Kas, so they can confirm that. I said I was more likely to vote for Kas than Aman, but that is very different to saying I thought Kas was the best choice even last cycle, far from it. Combined with the results of today's lynch is why I was quite suspicious of him in my last post.

Which left d), voting for Stink, which was the option I went with. I thought I had an hour longer than I did, which was a mistake on my part due to daylight savings shenanigans, so my apologies that it was left so late - now that I know the correct finishing times, future votes will be earlier.

As for my reversal of my suspicion of Wibble, I was working off of the assumption that Kas is Corrupted. If that were the case, I struggle to believe that Kas and Wibble would allow themselves to be associated so closely in thread, first by Kas voting on Wibble, then them bandwagonning onto the same candidate, which tied them even closer together in a way that I don't think fellow Elims would do, which is what changed between then and now. Kas has responded well to a lot of the points that made me most suspicious of him, which means that I'm less confident in that assumption now, but I'd still say an E/E pair for Kas and Wibble is extremely unlikely, and if one of them is going to be an Elim, it's more likely to be Kas. (Though V/V is a possibility.)

[Amanuensis he/him]

Amanuensis

I still think this is the best call

• (1) Fifth Scholar: Kasimir, 
• (1) GoWibbles: Young Bard, 
• (0) Amanuensis: 

ED1T:

Hm. STINK/Kasimir/Wonko? I'll need to read the posts to say for sure. I feel pretty good saying Rath and Striker are both town.

Edited November 13, 2019 by Amanuensis

[Rathmaskal he/him]

Just now, Amanuensis said:

Amanuensis

I still think this is the best call

I was with you cycle 1.  I'm not completely against this yet, but we really missed the opportunity for this to be optimal.  I may come back to you anyway.

[StrikerEZ he/him]

@Amanuensis I agree. Amanuensis

I don’t particularly like Bard’s reasoning so far, and I’ll try to figure out why when I don’t have class.

[Kasimir he/him]

1 hour ago, Young Bard said:

It's a tactic I intend to keep in mind for future uses when Evil, but I definitely do not want to end up there when playing for Village.]

Ngl, I knew this line would strike some people the wrong way but ultimately decided to leave it in. As early as LG5 (IIRC anyway, it blurs up in my head after a while) - Joe mentioning he knew he was good triggered some people and got them to vote for him. (He wasn't evil. I was.) And in MR4, Wilson also got on my case for listing out everyone who could have taken an action (or something like that) before adding "Well, there's me, but I know I'm good." Unfortunately, I turned out to be Village. Welp. (I've linked the Wilson episode as it directly involves me and it's funny. You get to watch Wilson get trolled by all three of her suspects!  )

Anyway, I'm actually not particularly fussed about getting elected, and I think I'm a bit more helpful if I'm not elected, so I decided to leave it in, and to see what happens. Given that something like this has a history of raising the hackles on some SE players, and I've certainly been around long enough to know that, you could say choosing to bite the bullet would be another instance of suboptimal Evil play. Kind of sad if most your "Kas is Corrupted" theory is built off that though  Especially since I have a history of making those remarks, consequences be stormed, whether as a Villager or otherwise  

I accept the distinction between thinking I'm the better choice between me and Aman - but then who did you think was the best choice of all viable candidates at that time? 

I have not yet decided how I feel about Aman, but I will feel very put-out if he's producing more text than me, since I'm barely two pages into my NaNo  I'll sleep on it and come back to think, as I need to re-evaluate some of my assumptions, at any rate, and I'm tired and frustrated with myself  

Edited to add: Also Bard, I guess I was imprecise with my words because my point was, how willing are you to actually elect GoWibble? I'm interested in how certain you actually are, and I feel betting behaviour is a good model for subjective certainty  

Edited November 13, 2019 by Kasimir

[Wonko the Sane he/him]

Not a lot of time, barely 5 minutes left in my break. sigh. I wanted to do some RP.

First, Bard's last-minute vote is so suspicious that either there are a lot more Elims than I thought -- like, around 7 -- or I think he's Village. Because of the way El changed the numbers, I don't think a sacrifice play is as reasonable this game as it was the last. And -- if he's an elim -- that's what this was. Everyone has been thinking and talking about last-minute elim vote shifts, so a play like that would guarantee that he comes under fire, enough that electing him becomes very unlikely. It's possible he was counting on this specific reasoning, but nothing about the way he's defended himself suggests that. So I'm going to go with Bard.

Kas, I actually do think both Bard and Aman are village.  I'm less sure about you. Between you and Wibble, I pick Wibble for the elim, but you were still the one who turned it from a random vote into a lynch. Also, if Wibble is an elim, he's not getting a lot of guidance from his team, because so far he's playing pretty much like a typical new player.

Side note... Did anyone else notice that El apparently considers herself a valid lynch target?  @Elbereth Is this a joke, or do you plan on letting us elect you? What will happen if we do???

 

[Elbereth she/her]

EDIT: I rescind my comment about there being no secrets.  

Edited November 13, 2019 by Elbereth

[Guest Coda]

Aidenn frowned at the result of the vote. He had really trusted Aranmir, but this outcome put his innocence into question. Was Aranmir Corrupted? For safety's sake, he would not vote for him. 

"I vote for Phellom(Young Bard) as one of the few people I mildly trust."

Edited November 13, 2019 by Coda
Color

[Elbereth she/her]

Type 

[*color=red]your vote[*/color]

without the asterisks. 

[Fifth Scholar he/him]

9 hours ago, Amanuensis said:

Amanuensis

I still think this is the best call

• (1) Fifth Scholar: Kasimir, 
• (1) GoWibbles: Young Bard, 
• (0) Amanuensis: 

ED1T:

Hm. STINK/Kasimir/Wonko? I'll need to read the posts to say for sure. I feel pretty good saying Rath and Striker are both town.

Oddly enough, I agree (at least on the last part); I think Bard is more likely to be evil than Kas, but do like Rath a lot more after last cycle’s voting, and have tipped the other way again on the Striker Seesaw, believing him to be good on balance, if not near my first choice of nominee. 

8 hours ago, StrikerEZ said:

@Amanuensis I agree. Amanuensis

I don’t particularly like Bard’s reasoning so far, and I’ll try to figure out why when I don’t have class.

I will just go with Occam’s Razor here: Stink was elected as a Corrupted with a last-minute tiebreaking vote. The person who did this should be in no way a candidate for our immediate trust, much less two nominations; even if you assume Eliminator!Bard wouldn’t dare to act so aggressively and publicly to help a teammate, that tell isn’t worth much once you get deep enough into the IKYK, and frankly, an outed!Corrupted!Bard isn’t the worst thing for their team—at the very least, he’s a wild and unpredictable vote we can’t afford to shut up. At best, we ignore or overanalyse what in other circumstances would be rightfully hailed as a clear elim tell. I’m not saying village!Bard is out of the question, or that he should be ignored, but ultimately I would not put him near the Fellowship. Which makes this concerning: 

5 hours ago, Wonko the Sane said:

Not a lot of time, barely 5 minutes left in my break. sigh. I wanted to do some RP.

First, Bard's last-minute vote is so suspicious that either there are a lot more Elims than I thought -- like, around 7 -- or I think he's Village. Because of the way El changed the numbers, I don't think a sacrifice play is as reasonable this game as it was the last. And -- if he's an elim -- that's what this was. Everyone has been thinking and talking about last-minute elim vote shifts, so a play like that would guarantee that he comes under fire, enough that electing him becomes very unlikely. It's possible he was counting on this specific reasoning, but nothing about the way he's defended himself suggests that. So I'm going to go with Bard.

Kas, I actually do think both Bard and Aman are village.  I'm less sure about you. Between you and Wibble, I pick Wibble for the elim, but you were still the one who turned it from a random vote into a lynch. Also, if Wibble is an elim, he's not getting a lot of guidance from his team, because so far he's playing pretty much like a typical new player.

Side note... Did anyone else notice that El apparently considers herself a valid lynch target?  @Elbereth Is this a joke, or do you plan on letting us elect you? What will happen if we do???

 

Wonko, as I said, overanalysis is very much a thing; I agree that this wouldn’t be a normal Eliminator move. But this isn’t a normal Eliminator game, and we should expect the Elims to try to get away with whatever they can. In this case, that includes not voting, voting unhelpfully, and voting last-minute to elect teammates and later allow the move to be characterised by a sympathetic and paranoid public as village-inclined. I do not intend to let myself look too deeply into things to the point of self-confusion, particularly with my time restraints, and you have now joined my official Dubious list. Hope you enjoy Bard’s company there. Oh, and Coda’s: 

3 hours ago, Coda said:

Aidenn frowned at the result of the vote. He had really trusted Aranmir, but this outcome put his innocence into question. Was Aranmir Corrupted? For safety's sake, he would not vote for him. 

"I vote for Phellom(Young Bard) as one of the few people I mildly trust."

As I asked Wonko, why do you trust Bard after the vote on Stink? Again, while it is possible he is innocent, IMO there are far better targets outside of both him and Kas which we aren’t properly examining, and both of them look suspicious after their votes last cycle. Out of everyone’s voting history and final location of their vote, I definitely trust Rath the most for leading a double-vote on Aman, who I also consider village, and for not dumping his vote on a random third party, the GM, himself, or not using it at all. 

[Straw he/him]

Once again, I vote to elect Elbereth! We've seen Elrond's viewpoint, and we know that he isn't corrupted.

[Kasimir he/him]

[OOC:

Meta used to complain that I had a problem because everytime I see bad reasoning, I can't help but pick a fight, even if that doesn't make the person Evil. I've been trying to curb that tendency but-

7 hours ago, Wonko the Sane said:

First, Bard's last-minute vote is so suspicious that either there are a lot more Elims than I thought -- like, around 7 -- or I think he's Village. Because of the way El changed the numbers, I don't think a sacrifice play is as reasonable this game as it was the last. And -- if he's an elim -- that's what this was. Everyone has been thinking and talking about last-minute elim vote shifts, so a play like that would guarantee that he comes under fire, enough that electing him becomes very unlikely. It's possible he was counting on this specific reasoning, but nothing about the way he's defended himself suggests that. So I'm going to go with Bard.

Sorry, I'm with @Fifth Scholar on this. Like it or not, once there were two votes on STINK, an Eliminator team would be passing up a very big chance if they didn't try to hammer the vote through. Giving up literally having 1/4 their goal more or less handed on a platter for the sake of maintaining cover is silly, especially if the other options up for the lynch are not Eliminators. (This is something we don't know, so I'm flagging this anyway.) For what it's worth, my vote is also staying on Fifth at the moment, as he's at least encouraging we look at other election candidates. Which is what I've suggested as an immediate, obvious response to a bad lynch!

That being said, the lynch activity is very interesting in terms of the connections it furnishes and I do intend to go back to analysing it when I'm not rushing work  

Also, losing cover is hardly a death sentence - I'm not convinced electing him becomes unlikely, as you're arguing for doing just that right now! Anyway, IKYK is a landmine and I've always been awful at them (lesson from last cycle folks: gambling is bad. Don't do it.) so let's avoid that. Even so, I find it very interesting that you think Aman is good but...you'd rather vote for someone implicated in securing a bad lynch than Aman. Seriously? That doesn't check out here, and it reads to me like you're trying to gain some credibility but try to sneak Bard through anyway while the iron is hot. This punts you down into my suspicions.

If it's not obvious, I distrust Bard for scoring the goal, but also because I still think the initial Bard votes sprung up very quickly.

7 hours ago, Wonko the Sane said:

Kas, I actually do think both Bard and Aman are village.  I'm less sure about you. Between you and Wibble, I pick Wibble for the elim, but you were still the one who turned it from a random vote into a lynch. Also, if Wibble is an elim, he's not getting a lot of guidance from his team, because so far he's playing pretty much like a typical new player.

Good. So you should not have any difficulty voting Aman. I don't really care at this stage if you don't want to vote me (I'd be a bit more concerned at endgame, if I had no other solid leads on Villagers) but then you should go and vote the person you think is good who has not been implicated in any sketchy stuff. Like, really. It's that obvious. Don't take the chance at all. Anyway - I regard this as a more sensible argument - in defending my arguments against Wibble to others, I do concede there's a heavy element of gut, but I'm not really sure why playing like a typical new player should indicate anything at all.

Eliminator teams don't play the same way because of constitution. A look at the last game's Eliminator doc should already tell you that. Coda was playing extremely active and strategising extensively. Not all new players do that. And sometimes, Eliminator teams do instruct new players to...behave extremely new. (I certainly was asked to do so in LG5, my first game.) Wibble's improved in activity and cast a vote, and yet despite being in a PM with me and responding to it, he somehow misses that STINK is PMing him? Of course it could be a careless mistake. We all make them. But then, look at the broader picture: Wibble's skated by in the discussion. His main strategic role was to place a vote on STINK, one that I ended up throwing a vote on in an attempt to shift the lynch from what I felt was a quick bottleneck. And actually, that's suspicious to me: because that's a really easy way to set up an Eliminator lynch. Sneaking a vote out in the hopes that more people will band on top of it, or leaving it there for a potential opportunistic hammer. Which is exactly the strategy employed the several times over the last iteration.

A final overall comment: I think people need to remember we don't need to find Eliminators, though that certainly helps. We just need to elect literally the least suspicious person we have. (I don't really think we have space for a second informational lynch at the moment - let's just get it right this time.) Suspicions don't need to be the sort of thing that gets people lynched in a standard SE game. Telling me you think something is consistent with being an Eliminator or Villager is besides the point. The point is: why would you even vote such an ambiguous person into the Fellowship? On the other hand, I would also be suspicious of some of those who have generally avoided getting entangled in any of the major issues. Because that's a natural space for some Eliminators to lurk - to appear as above suspicion as possible in order to get lynched. In that regard, I would be suspicious of Burnt; for one, I think she trusted me too fast and a bit too strongly, for another, she mentioned possibly voting on STINK but threw a vote on Pejidot, which I actually do encourage - we need to spread our discussion beyond a narrow set of candidates! - but also reads to me like a potential way of distancing herself from what she knew would be a bad lynch. 

I would be tentatively willing to back an Aman lynch at this stage but I want to look back at the vote patterns, and anyway the cycle is still young so I will leave my vote where it is right now.

N.B. I don't especially suspect @Straw right now, but given how unhelpful he's being, I'm not going to vote for him out of pure spite  ]

Edited November 14, 2019 by Kasimir
closed floating paranthesis so El and I would not have conniptions. you're welcome el

[Wonko the Sane he/him]

I'm currently writing RP, but I'll quickly respond to keep the discussion going.

Your points on Wibble are fair. I was just a little caught off guard by how he hasn't even tried to defend himself, but you're right, that very response could be the intention.

I still feel pretty strongly about Bard. 7 elims is almost certainly broken, so the only elim count I could see him pulling that on is 6 elims. You have to keep in mind that there's more at risk than a lost opportunity. If there's 5 elims, and two of them fall under severe suspicion, then the elims have lost. They can't afford suspicion; they can't even afford to just skate by. They need the majority of their team to, at some point, be among the most trusted players in the game. A five elim team has exactly one caught-elim to burn; a 6-man team has two. It's possible that the 6-man team could afford throw away one member C1, but I think even that is a bad play.

You're right about the IKYK potential, but I'm just not seeing that in Bard's defense of himself. If that's the plan, he has tremendous patience, because he said nothing to even suggest it, and no one else even thought of it before me.

All that said, you're right -- I'm not absolutely certain of Bard, and I'm willing to consider other lynches. Aman is an option, and probably a safe one, but I'd rather spend my vote, at least early in the cycle, learning things -- like how Coda stepped in to vote Bard without any justification, making them both more suspicious. If Bard did pull the risky play, then getting him elected without another dramatic incrimination would be a godsend, and Coda certainly seems to have leaped on it. :/

I have to shoot your own argument back at you -- if you're so concerned about getting a lynch you're confident in, why are you voting Fifth? Is he really the "safe" option in your eyes? I'll admit he's been helpful, but you trust him more than Aman/Striker/Rath? Or are you, too, using your vote to make a statement?

Bottom line, like you, I'll sign on to an Aman lynch, but I'm not willing to start it until much later in the cycle. I do want my vote to still do some good, though. I'll move it to Rath for now; not sure how much good that does, but we'll see if anything comes of it.

[Amanuensis he/him]

I'm comfortable enough with my village read on Rath that I don't mind adding my vote there as well. Even if Yuriel would still prefer going on the journey herself to avenge the death of her husband by destroying the One Ring at last.

Edited November 14, 2019 by Amanuensis

[Kasimir he/him]

6 hours ago, Wonko the Sane said:

I still feel pretty strongly about Bard. 7 elims is almost certainly broken, so the only elim count I could see him pulling that on is 6 elims. You have to keep in mind that there's more at risk than a lost opportunity. If there's 5 elims, and two of them fall under severe suspicion, then the elims have lost. They can't afford suspicion; they can't even afford to just skate by. They need the majority of their team to, at some point, be among the most trusted players in the game. A five elim team has exactly one caught-elim to burn; a 6-man team has two. It's possible that the 6-man team could afford throw away one member C1, but I think even that is a bad play.

You're right about the IKYK potential, but I'm just not seeing that in Bard's defense of himself. If that's the plan, he has tremendous patience, because he said nothing to even suggest it, and no one else even thought of it before me.

But is Bard really a caught Eliminator? Look, I'll be frank - I vacillate between suspicion of Bard or not. Partly because of your arguments, and partly because I haven't had a chance to really drill down into the results like I'd want to, and also because Lord knows Villagers can reason badly and make bad choices. But even then, the mere fact that there is room for uncertainty suggests that the position really isn't as fatal for the Eliminators as you say it is. Even if Bard is an Eliminator, I honestly think the vote is more opportunistic than an actual plan from the outset, and the Eliminator team must know it's possible to attempt to shift suspicion instead onto the other dude who instigated a lynch on not-Bard-and-not-Aman, namely, hello, it me.

There are no scans in this game and no Eliminator kills, which means we have less information than we would in a standard SE game, and we have less room to be wrong (though debatable) than in a standard SE game. Uncertainty isn't a great posture for the Village. As such, I think you're really overestimating how awful it'd be for someone to be caught sealing off the lynch on a known Eliminator. Even so, I don't really think it matters at this point, because what does matter is that everyone, myself included, implicated in that lynch should not be a serious Fellowship candidate.

I would actually go so far as to say that I would in fact be suspicious of Bard's defense because Bard's chief defense has been to shove the suspicion onto me instead. You don't need to be certain about my alignment for this - you just need to agree that this is consistent with one kind of Eliminator strategy. At which point, I'd once again go back to the whole "vote someone who you can say better things about than "well they're kinda Eliminatory but also kinda villagery."" In that respect, I do believe that you're overstating the case for Bard's Good alignment. (And I acknowledge that in responding to you, I'm probably overstating the case for Bard's being Evil.) 

Anyway, I think we both agree about strong or informative lynches, so I'll stop here, because otherwise, Dalinar wants to buy our horses. We apparently breed horses that won't die - it's the only explanation for why we keep flogging them.

6 hours ago, Wonko the Sane said:

All that said, you're right -- I'm not absolutely certain of Bard, and I'm willing to consider other lynches. Aman is an option, and probably a safe one, but I'd rather spend my vote, at least early in the cycle, learning things -- like how Coda stepped in to vote Bard without any justification, making them both more suspicious. If Bard did pull the risky play, then getting him elected without another dramatic incrimination would be a godsend, and Coda certainly seems to have leaped on it. :/

I have to shoot your own argument back at you -- if you're so concerned about getting a lynch you're confident in, why are you voting Fifth? Is he really the "safe" option in your eyes? I'll admit he's been helpful, but you trust him more than Aman/Striker/Rath? Or are you, too, using your vote to make a statement?

 That's fair - I'm definitely wary of Coda, and I believe I have listed him as a potential suspicion last cycle. I also agree we should definitely spread discussion of other potential candidates.

That being said, well, the simple response - actually, yes, it's both. The fact we're voting in thread is a public speech act. It is making a statement, and it also is doing what a vote is supposed to do. And yes, I'll bite - Fifth is my biggest trust for the moment, because I haven't had time the whole day to actually do the careful analysis of the D1 votes that I wanted to do, and without that analysis, I'm not comfortable determining where I stand on Aman. Certainly, I'm not willing to say I think he's the most likely to be Village, until I have sat down and actually reflected on my bad life decisions and more importantly, on what went down on D1  Similarly, while I had first said Burnt was my biggest trust last cycle, I am basically rethinking my trusts as well. So she's out for the same reasons as Aman is out. Fifth is my biggest trust simply for: A. making what I consider to be sensible arguments, and B. encouraging an expansion of election candidate discussion. I am happy to have my mind changed by persuasive arguments, or by my own ability to actually sit down and do analysis  

I have a bit of a negative gut read on Rath, but I think it's for the same issue as with Straw, but I'd need to look back at D1. If it's for the same issue with Straw, then I'm ignoring it, as it's just personal bias  (Major promissory note, I know, but I've only just gotten off work.) 

Striker...Striker is off out of sheer principle. I'm not sure where I stand on Striker now (see: need to re-read D1). I was suspicious of Striker on D1, though IDK, maybe it's residual trauma from QF40  More seriously though, my suspicions of Striker are weak and based on: A) weak metagame reason, B ) paranoia connections, and C) as I've said before, Striker told me earlier on D1 that STINK would be part of their Special Seven. As such, I'm not really comfortable voting them into anything right now  

Edited November 14, 2019 by Kasimir

[StrikerEZ he/him]

6 hours ago, Kasimir said:

Striker...Striker is off out of sheer principle. I'm not sure where I stand on Striker now (see: need to re-read D1). I was suspicious of Striker on D1, though IDK, maybe it's residual trauma from QF40  More seriously though, my suspicions of Striker are weak and based on: A) weak metagame reason, B ) paranoia connections, and C) as I've said before, Striker told me earlier on D1 that STINK would be part of their Special Seven. As such, I'm not really comfortable voting them into anything right now

On a more serious note, Kas is telling the truth. At some point on D1, I told Kas in our PM that Stink would be in my special seven. I had chosen the other six based on my gut feelings about them, and chose Stink randomly for my seventh person. I didn’t use RNG, just kinda looked who I hadn’t chosen yet and picked someone I knew was a good player. Maybe I would’ve had better odds using RNG.

Also, Wonko does make reasonable arguments, but I feel like he is making those arguments under the assumption that Bard is good. Which, as a villager, you can never be 100% certain of. I could see two scenarios: 1) Wonko and Bard are elims, and Wonko is working to get Bard elected at the expense of himself getting elected later, which would imply there are a lot more elims than we think, or 2) Wonko is elim alone and Bard is actually just a villager he’s trying to get elected to gain himself credit. Or Wonko’s a villager being fooled by elim!Bard. Or they’re both villagers. I think the first two options are the most likely, but I wouldn’t be surprised if either of the second two happened.

Also, seeing as an Aman election probably isn’t happening, I’m gonna vote on Rath. He hasn’t done anything I’ve found particularly suspicious (mostly because I can’t remember anything he’s done), and it seems like he’s a candidate several people would be willing to support. If more people start saying they’d want to elect Aman, I’ll change my vote back. 

EDIT: Didn’t change Aman to green, oops

Edited November 14, 2019 by StrikerEZ

[Kasimir he/him]

Aranmir worried at the ring on his finger, worn smooth by long care. He realised what he was doing, then, and stopped. "I will nominate Yuriel," he said, flatly. "Of all who know her tale, she especially deserves the chance to avenge that which she has lost."

[StrikerEZ he/him]

2 hours ago, Kasimir said:

Aranmir worried at the ring on his finger, worn smooth by long care. He realised what he was doing, then, and stopped. "I will nominate Yuriel," he said, flatly. "Of all who know her tale, she especially deserves the chance to avenge that which she has lost."

Oh, now you’re gonna vote for Aman? Rath Aman

[Fifth Scholar he/him]

I’m both disappointed and relieved at the lack of discussion; disappointed because we might either be passively electing Corrupted, or else letting them skate by passively, and relieved because I don’t have to catch up on too many posts. (That said, the existing posts are long as a general rule. ) 

My basic thoughts right now are pleasure that Rath’s wagon gained traction but not so much traction that I suspect it (and the people on it and in general support of it are those who I’ve had village reads on (except Wonko and for a few hours Striker, more on him in a minute)); Aman is a fine choice as well, if more vocal, and I have a general principle of being more wary around him as he’s silver-tongued regardless of alignment. My hesitation with him is that what he has said isn’t strongly AI for him, though to be completely fair Rath hasn’t said much of note this cycle either. 

Straw’s refusal to participate in any discussion or take any stances which might bring him into a position where his alignment could be questioned lead me to doubt that he should be appointed, joining my list of Dubious candidates; voting on the GM, while fun, doesn’t help the village in the slightest. Kas isn’t on that list after several long and sensible posts, which are well reasoned even if he is evil (and he still very well could be, which is why he should not be nominated unless necessary; however, he’s being useful and active enough to be kept around either way). 

I’m back on the Evil side of (or at least leaning further over on) my trademarked Striker Seesaw, and am generally conflicted enough about him right now that I would not suggest his nomination. 

9 hours ago, StrikerEZ said:

Oh, now you’re gonna vote for Aman? Rath Aman

Even if you intended to vote for Aman to begin with, your willingness to bandwagon is disillusioning; if you’re village, it makes it harder to get good discussion on lynch candidates and can lead to accidental runaway lynches on Spiked, as well as the general problem that it frustrates attempts at analysis; meanwhile, if you’re evil, the above properties make it an excellent smokescreen for your actions, and also appear to be an easy way of either gaining village credit by voting for several villagers, or justifying a vote on a leading evil candidate in the long run. (To be fair, I’m leery of Aman, which is why I’m staying on the Rath lynch despite uncomfortable bedfellows (Wonko), and may be judging you too harshly in light of this, but I believe my points still stand.)