WW16: The Outlaws and The Olives

[waterbat]

re: 4-hours of silence

i think we've reached that stage in the game where no one gives a crap during the first half of the 24-hour of the timer. this seems to have happened in previous games - usually (like today) im around for the silence and miss the good stuff.

[waterbat]

oops - x-post a whole page of posts that proves me wrong :D

[Gaspar]

I'll respond to the allegations first then give some thoughts in a follow-up.

My main regret this game is that I haven't been able to be as active as I normally am. I think my activity level is pretty constant regardless of which role I draw, if you look at WW7 which is the only game I actually lived long enough as scum for it to be relevant I was one of the more active participants all the way to endgame, so I'm not the type to go lurker when I roll wolf. I just haven't had consistent time since Night 2. Anyway, nobody cares about that so I'll move along but that's what I actually feel guilty about so I thought I'd start with it.

So let's see, the rest of the case is that I defended Mattimeo on the first wagon and I've voted incorrectly at every turn. Well, on Mattimeo I don't think my defense was a particular push for his innocence but rather a "let's not lynch our protective role unless we're really frigging sure." I made two posts questioning him, the first was before the Injera claim so all I was going off was his generally sketchy behavior and the second was before the Qgqqqqq claim where I legitimately thought it might not be a bad idea to let the Injera-Mattimeo test play out. I still think it was pretty risky even though the result was good, I don't love the process.

In terms of my "voting incorrectly" that's a pretty gross overstatement in a game where we've had 2 scum lynches. I said before and I'll say again that I think its way too convenient to just assume all the scum avoided Mattimeo and its a path to losing the game. But specifically, which of my incorrect votes is suspicious? I feel alright about all of my votes because I think the reasoning behind each was logical. You can't to worked up about being wrong in these games, just the nature of them is you're going to be wrong a lot.

If there is something in particular someone would like me to answer for, by all means, but I didn't see anything else in anyone else's attacks other than novices.

[Molach]

After rethinking things, I have come to some conclusions.

Firstly I think that Injera is a wolf.

why?

his role is follower, meaning that he can only determine the name of the power used. Seems more like a role-scanner than an investigative role to me. Or namely, something more useful to wolves, perhaps. (unless of course a village follower finds a roleblocker, but in this power-lite setting I find that far less likely than a follower to just find other investigative roles or any protective roles).

One problem with this theory, I realize, is that it would mean the wolves have at least 3 powers out of 6 members. and I honestly don't have a lot of explanation for that ... however given the set up (blood brothers et al) it seems that what powers we do have tends to be skewed in favor of the mafia. therefore, I wouldn't be too surprised.

Sorry for quoting all. If Injera follows someone who does a 'night-kill' action, you don't see that as useful for village?

[Gaspar]

What I suggested last game night was that I think a lot of the post-lynch reactions were interesting - obviously there's that sort of "why we all play werewolf" emotional release at the end of it but I thought it was worth examining the number of players who sort of moved to a "SEE THIS IS WHY THIS CLEARS ME" posture in the post-lynch. It dovetails with my theory that this was not a clean scum/non-scum split on the voters.

To expound on that, one of my preferred scumhunting tools is trying to ascertain the composition of the pack from their known behaviors. Its not as good as blatant tells, but I think its useful. So let me posit a theory. Let's say our mafia team is something like this:

Thestick, Mattimeo, Pindicator, Lewwyn, Jkaen, Novice*

*note, I don't think this is actually our group, I'm just throwing a plausible composition out there for purposes of this example.

On Day 1, Thestick earns the MNG-memorial trophy for worst first day performance by scum. Mattimeo also looks quite scummy and is forced to role claim to save himself. If the rest of the team is 4 experienced players, several of whom who have rolled wolf before... well, if I'm on that team I've written those two off already. We still have a strong team of players who are easily going to be able to blend in, so I'm going to go ahead and drop stick like a bad habit. I wouldn't touch the Bigger run with a 10-foot pole. If I'm really savvy, I'd try to be one of the first on thestick because he's obviously playing terribly and going to be unable to fight the lynch off.

On Day 4, I'm sitting around watching the lynch, I know Qgqqqqq and Injera are telling the truth and I don't want the stink of cutting down a power role on me so I decide that now is the time to cut bait on Mattimeo who hasn't actually done anything useful with his power to this point. I also now have the identity of presumably the only village investigative roles which I can kill the next two nights. Matt's been awkward in the thread and I know there's no way to save him long term, so let's get him out of there, build some serious village credit and move along to hiding the remaining team members who I know can survive in thread.

You can say this all very not plausible but the night kills also seem to follow a train of an experienced player at the head of the pack who is directing the kills based off player skill/past-experience. Sure, zakalwe was a kill anyone would have made on Night 1. But the Serdoa kill after he just landed the deathblow on a villager is not something an unskilled scum is going to do - he looked very mislynchable. But a skilled player knows Serdoa is a strong player and wants him out of there. Same on Night 3, if you're not good at reading tea leaves you see uberfish has had heat all game - maybe we should just leave him and get someone else.

So to think we have some completely disorganized team just screwing up left and right just doesn't fit the evidence IMO. I think we have some quality scum leaders and some solid blenders. And right now, I think Lewwyn has contributed absolutely nothing this game and looks like a good bet for one of our experienced blenders.

[pindicator]

So, Gaspar, Jkaen and Injera are wolves?

It's a thought, one I'm going to look back at posts and see if they back the theory. I also had another theory in the posts that followed, so will have to check that too.

[waterbat]

To expound on that, one of my preferred scumhunting tools is trying to ascertain the composition of the pack from their known behaviors. .

i really like this and your conclusions, gaspar.

kills on serdoa and uber were *very* surprising to me - but not *surprising* in the "wow, these guys don't know what they are doing" kind of way. In fact, I think these targets were also chosen because they did not have strong links to any mafia. Noone could go back and try to put the kills together from a tactical standpoint. There's no readily apparent frame jobs in play which could give us info. I am going to re-read that now - but I remember thinking that after uber's death.

I thought Lewwyn was prohibited from rolling wolf - a tenet of the secret charter of RB WW games.

[Catwalk]

After rethinking things, I have come to some conclusions.

Firstly I think that Injera is a wolf.

why?

his role is follower, meaning that he can only determine the name of the power used. Seems more like a role-scanner than an investigative role to me. Or namely, something more useful to wolves, perhaps. (unless of course a village follower finds a roleblocker, but in this power-lite setting I find that far less likely than a follower to just find other investigative roles or any protective roles).

While this is purely a meta theory, I do agree with it. It makes little sense for a villager to have it, as it is essentially useless. All you can do it with it is catch a wolf doing a night kill. And only one of the wolves sends in the night kill (at least that's how it's been done so far). It can also be used to out wolves lying about power roles, but wolves don't particularly need to lie about power roles. The wolves we've hung so far simply said what their abilities were. For a wolf, however, this is a highly useful ability. It's exactly what a wolf wants to know about the town: Who has an ability, and how can we use it against the town (or just eat him).

This theory alone is not enough to hang Injera, it should be combined with a close examination of posts and votes. I'm too lazy to do that right now, but I might look into it later.

What I suggested last game night was that I think a lot of the post-lynch reactions were interesting - obviously there's that sort of "why we all play werewolf" emotional release at the end of it but I thought it was worth examining the number of players who sort of moved to a "SEE THIS IS WHY THIS CLEARS ME" posture in the post-lynch. It dovetails with my theory that this was not a clean scum/non-scum split on the voters.

I get where you're coming from, but from my perspective I really was immensely relieved to have done something that might ease the pressure on me. I've been under heavy fire for odd play and posts D1 and D2, and there was no way that suspicion would go away without helping to hang a wolf. Which other players' reactions strike you as peculiar?

To expound on that, one of my preferred scumhunting tools is trying to ascertain the composition of the pack from their known behaviors. Its not as good as blatant tells, but I think its useful. So let me posit a theory.... (snip)

I think this is a pretty good theory, especially in light of Mattimeo hanging thestick on D1. I can definitely imagine a double bussing scenario, Mattimeo was a weak card on D3. The important question then becomes when they decided to bus him. I do agree that not all are cleared by hanging him. I don't want to use this theory to actively scumhunt right now, I think it should be used to reduce the amount of village cred given for hanging Mattimeo.

I really don't know at the moment.

I'm definitely starting to think novice is scum, just because it seems like an enormous risk from the mafia to leave him alive this long if he was village. He's also the mayor, which if he's village could potentially cause problems for the mafia in a tight day. Don't know how he's still alive tbh.

My guess is so the scum can get us to hang him. Already we have a potent theory that the wolves have bussed one or two of their own, this points quite strongly to novice as he was quick to catch on to thestick. I don't believe novice is guilty, though. But I do believe the scum want us to think he is, and therefore leaves him be. Moreover, they may have been able to scry Serdoa and discover that he was a suicidal mason. So far this game is scrying heavy, and two out of two wolves have a power role. The Qg kill was also a good one, he had an unlimited shot ability that was decent at detecting wolves.

Since there finally is a little bit of pressure on Azza, I'm going to try to compile a proper case on him tonight. In a nutshell, it's this:
1) He posts nothing of substance, and has posted very little in general 4 days straight now
2) He parks votes early and leaves them there
3) He likes going after safe targets, and he has a poor voting record

This tells me he's voting for alibi. He's not terribly interested in hunting scum, he's interested in casting a safe vote on a villager without attracting suspicion.

[Ichabod]

I'll give some support for Gaspar, mainly because there's something strange about Lewwyn in this game. I found his attack on me to be pretty in character, and he made an effort to present a case, not just follow. But after my defense, his reaction was something like: "meh, you defended". He took a posture of whatever, not sure if you are good or bad, whatever. And I didn't like that.

So, before doing anymore indept research: Lewwyn.

I would like to hear from Novice what makes him suspect less from Lewwyn from the group of Mattimeo non-voters?

[waterbat]

we cannot wait until late in the day to push seriously on lewwyn (or Azza for that matter). They are likely gone leading up until lynch time so will not be able to defend past a certain point.

lewwyn