Mid-Range Game 55: Sudden but Inevitable Betrayal

[---]

weh

Szeth

[Mat]

Lotus

Isn’t this exciting 

[Szeth_Pancakes]

25 minutes ago, Illwei said:

weh

Szeth

 

1 minute ago, Matrim's Dice said:

Lotus

Isn’t this exciting 

O.o

[---]

Szeth is alliance, but Archer and Lotus are reavers. they might have recruited mat last night.

[Mat]

37 minutes ago, Szeth_Pancakes said:

 

O.o

(My vote is entirely unrelated to Illwei’s lol)

34 minutes ago, Illwei said:

Szeth is alliance, but Archer and Lotus are reavers. they might have recruited mat last night.

…Please explain where all these conclusions came from. And how you somehow linked me in there two seconds after I voted Lotus. And why I’d be working with the Reavers whose goal is to kill everyone.

I’ve had PMs with all three of those players, though. Actually those are the only PMs I’ve had. Szeth/Archer yesterday and Lotus today. I started all of them and none were very productive 

Edited December 23, 2021 by Matrim's Dice

[+Lotus]

8 minutes ago, Matrim's Dice said:

I’ve had PMs with all three of those players, though. Actually those are the only PMs I’ve had. Szeth/Archer yesterday and Lotus today. I started all of them and none were very productive 

Hey now our PM is very productive.

[Mat]

9 minutes ago, Lotus said:

Hey now our PM is very productive.

I meant in the sense of you recruiting me to the Reavers

[Szeth_Pancakes]

59 minutes ago, Illwei said:

Szeth is alliance, but Archer and Lotus are reavers. they might have recruited mat last night.

So you think Archer and I planned for the “Archer is actually village” conclusion to be drawn? Wouldn’t that be kind of risky?

[---]

this is all the solving i have the effort for

and time

 

time to go to work

[Archer]

50 minutes ago, Lotus said:

Hey now our PM is very productive.

Do share! 

40 minutes ago, Matrim's Dice said:

I meant in the sense of you recruiting me to the Reavers

Ah yes, because Reaver recruitment involves persuading people to become evil via PM's. Not going pew pew you're evil now, live with it. 

Also, you have a terrible habit of casting votes that look like they're in reaction to a vote that was just cast. 

32 minutes ago, Szeth_Pancakes said:

So you think Archer and I planned for the “Archer is actually village” conclusion to be drawn? Wouldn’t that be kind of risky?

to be fair, it's as good an idea as the fake claim thing was :P. 

2 hours ago, Illwei said:

Szeth is alliance, but Archer and Lotus are reavers. they might have recruited mat last night.

Szeth

Mat is targeting peripherals and Illwei is targeting, well I think at least two wrong choices, so that's interesting. Why would you vote for the Alliance of the bunch, instead of who you think is a Reaver? 

The obvious connection here is Lotus-Illwei based on their matching votes. When I tried to work it out, I couldn't peg Szeth as anything other than Crew, so I'll object by voting Illwei

[Mat]

9 minutes ago, Archer said:

Ah yes, because Reaver recruitment involves persuading people to become evil via PM's. Not going pew pew you're evil now, live with it. 

…Right that’s a thing. Illwei’s comment makes more sense now :P.

10 minutes ago, Archer said:

Also, you have a terrible habit of casting votes that look like they're in reaction to a vote that was just cast. 

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[Steeldancer]

Welp I failed on the "sign into the shard every day" front. Lol. In my defense I was reading a *really* good light novel, but I still should have hopped on. 

Uh, so we killed someone of... a faction. I'm assuming they probably wanted to do me (in general, not specifically) in, so yaya. 
I don't have much to say. Incidentally we have 10 people left, so about 3 more cycles at the current pace. I think, I did that mental math in about 2 seconds. 
I feel bad for not voting last turn, so let's throw my hat in the ring too with a nice Lotus
 

Edited December 24, 2021 by Steeldancer
tossing a vote in

[Mat]

Interestingly, I now think Steel might be Alliance.

[---]

Ok lol

 Archer

[Szeth_Pancakes]

Complimentary VC:

Archer (2): Szeth, Illwei

Lotus (2): Mat, Steel

Illwei (1): Archer

Edited December 24, 2021 by Szeth_Pancakes

[Elandera]

You have about 13 hours to get in votes and actions. Also, this turn will close at noon PST, but because of Christmas Eve stuff combined with shifting work schedules, the next cycle may take me a few hours to get posted. 

[The Unknown Ajah]

I'd rather Lotus than Archer. He and Szeth both came off very village.

[Szeth_Pancakes]

Augh…

The more that I think about it, the more I feel like Archer is village. I just can’t quite reason the fact that he said it was “okay to vote” basically everyone else who was on the table for the exe. That doesn’t quite seem like it could be a coincidence, especially since that’s nearly half the players. It would be plausible in a two-Reaver game, but I think it’s more likely that there are three or four of them.

[Devotary of Spontaneity]

On 12/22/2021 at 5:06 PM, Archer said:

It's also possible we had a conversion, and Danex was the Operative kill. The Shepard theory is believable though, because that would help explain why no Secrets were discovered. 

It wasn't necessarily about the team, although if they'd connected with a teammate or been converted, that would have been great. Plan A was figure out what they were thinking, reasoning that they'd at least probably try to avoid voting for potential teammates, hence my interest in getting them to vote on someone. I gave them possible pairings and stuff and they ended up choosing the Mat route, which realistically I had down as a villager, so that made sense. Plan B was go deep cover and hope to find the Secrets if the exe didn't go our way. But that wasn't going to be needed because they were being heavily voted upon. I actually was interested in who might jump off that wagon once it got to four votes because that might have been Reaver indicative, but there was a secondary benefit of we would have guaranteed killed a!Szeth that round if they hadn't chosen to do what they did. I was also waiting for the elims to hammer and show their hand too, because they should be trying to protect their Alliance allies. It's hard to tell what happened there because the gambit thing threw everyone's final votes off.

True that on any given cycle a conversion is more likely than a shepard blocking an attack. I already didn't think there would be an operative since an extra kill every cycle makes the game too short, so I was a bit hasty on this one. The shepard using their action or not wouldn't have a huge impact on whether secrets are uncovered.

Eventually it might have paid off to know an alliance member, sure. If Mat was actually in danger would you have wanted Szeth dead? Why would the reavers have jumped off a wagon of someone who wasn't a reaver, back when you thought Szeth was alliance? It's not like the reavers know whether or not someone is alliance.

On 12/22/2021 at 8:53 PM, The Unknown Aon said:

It's not. The doctor saves a person, so the fighter will kill the attacker and survive.

Fighter counterattack only happens if they or their pilot get killed, not just attacked.

23 hours ago, Illwei said:

The theoretically correct thing to do here is to not kill anyone during the day. no one votes and crew searches. makes it harder for the reavers to know who the crew are and who the alliance/operatives are as well as makes sure we don't kill crew in an attempt to kill a faction we don't even need dead to win.

no one is going to listen to me on that, but it makes sense. think about it. It requires absolutely everyone to not vote though and an agreement to completely vote out anyone who places a vote the next turn.

My two cents on how the game should be played.

I had the thought yesterday but then was like "nah that doesn't make sense, the more reavers we kill the longer the game goes" but that's not necessarily true depending on distro, hm?

someone tell me where I'm wrong here

We found zero clues C1 and that was likely with mechanics searching. I did some pregame calculations for 8-2-2 with two mechanics, losing one crew per cycle and it averaged to 0.85 in the first cycle and ~2.5 clues in the first four cycles combined, with steadily decreasing returns. With zero clues so far and likely not everyone submitting actions, it would take a long time to find enough clues. Without killing anyone, alliance+reavers would get enough people to force a vote in probably ~4-5 cycles.

7 minutes ago, Szeth_Pancakes said:

It would be plausible in a two-Reaver game, but I think it’s more likely that there are three or four of them.

Well there definitely didn't start out with three-four reavers because that's way too few crew, reavers, have a 1/4 conversion to add more people, and also a four person reaver team could have just open claimed C1 and won because the alliance would vote with them.

I don't see a!Szeth trying to kill someone he thought was a reaver, so that the least likely Szeth alignment. Archer's running a weird mix of wanting to stay in deep cover but also being willing to kill Szeth immediately since that was where his vote was before Szeth brought things into the thread. Not caring who Szeth voted for makes sense if he already planned to exe Szeth but is a steep price for deep cover if he would have let someone he thought was village die. Lotus being detached is more noticeable as an elim but does also appear in village games.

[Szeth_Pancakes]

15 minutes ago, Devotary of Spontaneity said:

Well there definitely didn't start out with three-four reavers because that's way too few crew, reavers, have a 1/4 conversion to add more people, and also a four person reaver team could have just open claimed C1 and won because the alliance would vote with them.

…true. I was thinking nonstandard vil-elim distribution because there’s an extra faction (and a half), but you make a good point. Archer

[---]

Devo is not a reaver

Archer voting me was a direct attempt to emphasize my theory of an Archer-Szeth team. this means szeth is probably not a reaver. it should be blatant I'm not a reaver at the very least. Archer voting me for... "voting a townread of his" is just not something that a villager does

Szeth is...acting pointedly different than i remember them being before. could be alliance, not worth it. Archer has a team, as alliance he woudn't be so open pushing szeth.

5 hours ago, Steeldancer said:

Uh, so we killed someone of... a faction. I'm assuming they probably wanted to do me (in general, not specifically) in, so yaya. 

steel isn't alliance, could be a reaver /shrug. most likely not.

[Elandera]

Also, I know there wasn't a specific inactivity filter, but @Walin, if you do not post in the thread by the end of this turn, I will start seeking a replacement.

[Mat]

6 hours ago, Illwei said:

steel isn't alliance, could be a reaver /shrug. most likely not.

That’s the exact line which made me think he could be.

[Teia]

I’ll vote Szeth, just because I’m not sure anyone else seems as suspicious. I feel like Szeth was kind of forward in putting Archer under the bus early on.

[Walin]

Alright, time to hop into the thread. Sorry for my absence; it was unintentional.

Now, time for some analysis!

I'm partly joking, because I don't really know how to analyze, or how to make reads. So as of now, pretty much everyone is at the default 70% village-ness in my mind. I'll review the last cycle, though, see if I come up with anything to add to everyone's individual analyses.

___________________

Nonto woke up. He didn't quite remember laying down inside a cargo hold, but he did remember staying awake for nearly 40 hours working on that tricky component. Had he fixed it yet? If he hadn't, then why...he rolled over, and got up. He would go through his morning routine first, then answer all these questions. After all of that, he would be clearheaded enough to really do some thinking.

Looking back into the recent past, Nonto tried to retrace his steps. ...It appeared the repair required a couple tools that Nonto didn't have. He'd have to ask for it from someone else, and considering the time, they probably weren't awake. He'd already been up 40 hours, and the component wasn't on a ticking clock. Besides, he really started to lose focus after about hour 22, so staying up was more an exercise in procrastination and optimistic delusion about his capabilities. He'd get some sleep, then go borrow some tools. Then after that, he'd finally be done with all the backed-up work for the week, and he could return to his normal "waiting for something to break" routine. Or rather...wait, there was something else going on in the ship. Some discussions of some kind. He'd have to go ask someone to give him the full run-down; maybe it was important.