Mid-Range Game 66: Knights of Wind and Truth

[Aeoryi]

Okay- my stance on roles is as follows:

Stonewards, and Bondsmiths are definitely the weakest roles. Stonewards get a somewhat decent redirect at ideal 4, and have a nice and easy ideal proc. Bondsmiths get neither of those things, having an extremely niche ideal proc and the adhesion surge (which I would refrain from using).

Willshapers are the thugs of this game, I feel. It's basically so heavily implied in the order ability. Not that thugs are bad, but still.

Edgedancers, likewise, are the lurchers of this game. They place mid-low due to the amount of role-blocked and redirects in this game.

The surge of illumination is by far the most powerful in my opinion. It puts lightweavers and truthwatchers at the top of my tier list for sure.

Windrunners and Skybreakers are very similar, but I would say Skybreakers are slightly better. Elim for either is also strong. Due to the scan on skybreaker 4th ideal, I would compare the skybreaker to a seeker.

Dustbringers are more akin to coinshot, in the way they have an incentive to try and hit elims. Their ideal proc is very village coded, and due to their extra survivability, they match more of a standard vig role. 

An Elsecaller can screw people up in many ways. Without great foresight, the massive utility given by the surge of transformation could actually bite you. It places near middle.

So yeah.

1 minute ago, Araris Valerian said:

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Life before death. Any field of lavis polyps would inevitably become infested with worms, and by the time you went through the lot, some of the crop would be dead, or beyond salvaging. But, well, dwell on that instead of getting on saving the ones that could be saved, that was a way to starve the whole town. Aradon scratched his head. The Knight's Radiant weren't quite lavis polyps, and none of them here were dead yet, so maybe he didn't know what he was talking about. He called out to his spren.

"Spark, what do we do?"

A ribbon of blue light whirled around Aradon's head before resolving into the form of a boy, dressed for playing, standing midair. Spark, infuriatingly, began scratching his own head in imitation of Aradon. Honorspren never seemed to entirely distance themselves from the habits of their cousins, the windspren.

"Why ask me?"

"You're an honorspren. I'd like to act with honor, but all I've ever known is farming. Not much honor to be found there"

The boy crossed his arms and frowned more seriously. "Sure there is. What would happen if you dallied in your work. Said you wormed the whole field but really had passed on a row or two."

Aradon scowled. "No farmer worth his crem would do that."

Spark twirled in the air, a triumphant grin on his face. "And that's why I know you'll act with honor here. Folk are going to die. And no Knight worth his oaths is going to sit back and just let it happen. Life before death."

With that, the spren flew into the sky, dancing on the currents of air. Aradon sighed, and headed for the field. Time to get talking to folks.

---

Alright, some game thoughts. I don't think we should mess with the exe to manipulate who gets the extra ideal, especially C1. The exe is our tool for finding elims, first and foremost. If some folks get a bit stronger on the side, we can worry about them later. And a vote for "giving someone an ideal" is a vote that doesn't help determine that player's alignment. No sense giving the elims somewhere to hide. Points to Archer for expressing something similar.

Gonna park my vote on Wit for now, as someone who claims to have played mafia a bunch but also is asking who is suspicious. Seems a little incongruous and maybe like he's been focusing energy outside the thread.

Honestly thinking about voting Mat as well, despite my earlier statement about RP. Mostly in regards to the second vote and his engagement with Aeoryi.

In response to Aeoryi, I'm not sure that it's meaningful to compare the power levels of the roles, due to redirects and roleblocks, which simultaneously have a power level determined by the strongest other roles and diminish the power of said roles. But since I'm a bit biased, I'll say the Windrunner is the most powerful. Vote manip+roleblock is very versatile.

 

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Yeah I sorta went ahead and compared all the roles before the game even started sorry bro.

 

 

[Kasimir]

3 minutes ago, Araris Valerian said:

Gonna park my vote on Wit for now, as someone who claims to have played mafia a bunch but also is asking who is suspicious. Seems a little incongruous and maybe like he's been focusing energy outside the thread.

Serious question. We willing to C1 a new player to this community? 'Cause if you're not going to and Wit is E, he knows it has no bite. And if you are going to...ngl, that's a you thing. I'm not really down with that one.

[Araris Valerian]

Just now, Kasimir said:

Serious question. We willing to C1 a new player to this community? 'Cause if you're not going to and Wit is E, he knows it has no bite. And if you are going to...ngl, that's a you thing. I'm not really down with that one.

Wait. Hasn't Wit played before? I know he's new, but is this his first game? I feel like I had to @ him once and it was hard.

[Aeoryi]

1 minute ago, Kasimir said:

Serious question. We willing to C1 a new player to this community? 'Cause if you're not going to and Wit is E, he knows it has no bite. And if you are going to...ngl, that's a you thing. I'm not really down with that one.

Quote

Quote box

Didn't wit play in that QF flavoured Alice in wonderland?

[Kasimir]

1 minute ago, Araris Valerian said:

Wait. Hasn't Wit played before? I know he's new, but is this his first game? I feel like I had to @ him once and it was hard.

I thought he hasn't? He signed up to spectate QF68 but I don't recall him playing before. Anyone remember him?

[Araris Valerian]

Found it. He played in the Alice game, which I IMed, so not completely new. Qualms dealt with.

[Aeoryi]

1 minute ago, Kasimir said:

I thought he hasn't? He signed up to spectate QF68 but I don't recall him playing before. Anyone remember him?

He played in that game JNV co-gm'd. I checked.

[Kasimir]

5 minutes ago, Araris Valerian said:

Found it. He played in the Alice game, which I IMed, so not completely new. Qualms dealt with.

Reasonable, then I don't care anymore

[Aeoryi]

11 minutes ago, Kasimir said:

Reasonable, then I don't care anymore

Wit did actually miss my question- I would really appreciate if he answered it instead of the post right after but you know I'm not installing a Greek keyboard to ping him again so yeah he's currently N- in my reads

 

[ΨιτιsτηεΒέsτ]

1 hour ago, Aeoryi said:

Hm. In what situation would you use vote manip?

Mat

As Devo mentioned, it isn't actually too late to change votes. It's like, 23.5 hrs to rollover. So there you go.

Also, I forgot to ask @Ashbringer a question:

@Ashbringer, what's your opinion on archer? 

Could you answer my question please? (last post on page 2)

EDIT: 

@Experience, could you explain why you said "huh" and then left? Was it IRL reasons? I saw your latest SU, but I just wanted to make sure.

Yep I did miss it.

2 hours ago, Aeoryi said:

 

 

Yeah

The thing is; no one has major suspicions

So what that means is we need to get people talking; I'm no good at asking questions but maybe this can spark discussion :

@Archer, why are you voting ashbringer? Especially when you said something about mat.

@Kasimir, would you be willing to elaborate on why you believe TJ and JNV are V?

Uh I don't know how to ping you, wit, but do you have any opinions on the game so far? Any gut reads? 

@Araris Valerian, what's your opinion on the roles? Are there any roles you feel are better or worse than others? Why?

@JNV, you voted for experience for saying one word and dipping. Do you think that your read on exp would've changed if he didn't say anything? Why do you think that experience said, "huh"?

@|TJ|, I don't know if you're around yet, but if you are, would you mind telling us about some thoughts you have while reading the thread.

@Ravenclawjedi42, what's your opinion on vote manip? How do you think it should be used this game, and how do you think eliminators will use it?

@STINK, how good at breakdancing are you (sorry I suck at coming up with questions)

@Devotary of Spontaneity, what would be the optimal way to use the votes to grant ideals? What would be the VC for this?

@Matrim's Dice, what's your stance on less active players?

 

No, no gut feelings, except that you are asking a lot of questions.

28 minutes ago, Aeoryi said:

Didn't wit play in that QF flavoured Alice in wonderland?

I did, even though that was already affirmed. I did not really understand a lot of it, and still see myself very inexperienced to the particular vocabulary used here. And I did spec that other one.

[Aeoryi]

Just now, ΨιτιsτηεΒέsτ said:

Yep I did miss it.

No, no gut feelings, except that you are asking a lot of questions.

I did, even though that was already affirmed. I did not really understand a lot of it, and still see myself very inexperienced to the particular vocabulary used here. And I did spec that other one.

Someone has to kickstart village discussion. If everyone goes silent it'll be like kas' QF - 

[Kasimir]

3 minutes ago, ΨιτιsτηεΒέsτ said:

Yep I did miss it.

No, no gut feelings, except that you are asking a lot of questions.

I did, even though that was already affirmed. I did not really understand a lot of it, and still see myself very inexperienced to the particular vocabulary used here. And I did spec that other one.

Question for you: are you able to give (for now, temporarily, go with gut or anything) - two players you think are Village (loyal KRs) and one player you think is a traitor?

[ΨιτιsτηεΒέsτ]

4 minutes ago, Kasimir said:

Question for you: are you able to give (for now, temporarily, go with gut or anything) - two players you think are Village (loyal KRs) and one player you think is a traitor?

It would be mostly a random guess, but yes.

Edited November 6, 2023 by ΨιτιsτηεΒέsτ

[Aeoryi]

Sleepy time for the night 

See you all tomorrow morning!

[Kasimir]

7 minutes ago, ΨιτιsτηεΒέsτ said:

It would be mostly a random guess, but yes.

Who then?

[Mat]

1 hour ago, Aeoryi said:

Yeah but kas does have a point you sorta did lurk... 

But then again that could've been an argument. I rank that an NAI (whatver that means) rather than a e!read.

Sometimes I’m not in a position to write up a post but I have a minute to scroll through the thread, so if you saw my name at the bottom and I didn’t say anything that’s probably why.

NAI = Non Alignment Indicative (meaning “this doesn’t mean anything eother

1 hour ago, Araris Valerian said:

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• .

Honestly thinking about voting Mat as well, despite my earlier statement about RP. Mostly in regards to the second vote and his engagement with Aeoryi.

 

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I think I broke the quote but am not sure lololol

To be clear, I’m not saying we should hyper coordinate the exe or overfocus on who’s in second, but I also don’t want to act like it’s not a factor. I think the mechanic deserves some discussion, and that we should find the middle ground.

Meant to quote Kas but I didn’t grab it and now I forgot what it was. I think just saying “fair enough” to his reply of me? I’ll check later EDIT: It was that, plus saying that I’m pretty sure I consistently ignore early votes on me regardless of alignment. But you have a better memory than me when it comes to these things so I may be wrong.

Village points to both Raven and Wit for openness and honesty respectively

Edited November 6, 2023 by Matrim's Dice

[Kasimir]

5 hours ago, Matrim's Dice said:

Legitimately don't know what you're getting at here. Maybe I haven't read things close enough. Is there a reason you're against formally using the second vote? I think certainty is always better, for both alignments yes, but elims start with more of it and I'd like to even it out in any way I can. (To be clear, I'm not advocating for a hyper-focused effort, I'd just prefer more than no thought go into who falls second. I don't think letting the trains fall naturally will work super well because everyone knows what the second place vote does and that will affect things whether we talk about it or not).

See (sorry Mat, this isn't so much @ you as a general thread thought thing) - I think everyone's been engaging with the orange, but I also agree with Mat on #2 as I might not necessarily want a secondary suspect to be empowered. I think where we differ is just that I don't feel all that much can be done about it without going back to exe engineering and consensus problems, with a side of cheap voting. (Too bad we aren't using crypto!  ) I do notice on re-read that Mat doesn't disagree with it being potential easy cover for votes, and thinks that it can be called out, so our disagreements are probably largely practicability ones.

I will say I like Mat's consistency here, but I respect Mat's E!play a bit too much to be willing to ascribe a read significantly.

Sigh. Let's try again. Current state of thoughts:

Recategorising this as the bucket of people I have any slightly positive read on and thus, at this current point in time, would not vote today:

: Araris, JNV, TJ, Devo, Aeoryi, Wit, STINK (purely bro reasons this one sorry)

 Everyone not in the first bucket:

: Archer, Mat, Ravenclaw, Ash, Exp

Italics are negotiable. Raven's a solid null for me — haven't been able to get a good handle on them/their play, that's all. Honestly I don't know why I am hesitating here because theoretically I should be ok with Archer or Mat but my mind is also screaming internally at the idea of a dead thread >>

With Mat, part of me is considering whether it's just a Villager tactical disagreement, which happens a lot, but I also don't really feel it. With Archer, it's just a nagging feeling about his play. Think I'm going to nap on this one.

There's a tactical reason for relieving Exp but at the same time, that's more or less a toothless vote, and I'd rather not go there if it's not needed and trust Exp will take care of himself and the GM/IM will PH if necessary.

P.S. Warning to people - be careful about double messaging. Two of my PM messages merged for some weird reason and IDG what happened.

[ΨιτιsτηεΒέsτ]

37 minutes ago, Kasimir said:

Who then?

I’m, ravenclaw seems like he might be a little suspicious, maybe… I don’t know.

I don’t think it is Aeoryi

36 minutes ago, Matrim's Dice said:

Sometimes I’m not in a position to write up a post but I have a minute to scroll through the thread, so if you saw my name at the bottom and I didn’t say anything that’s probably why.

NAI = Non Alignment Indicative (meaning “this doesn’t mean anything eother

I think I broke the quote but am not sure lololol

To be clear, I’m not saying we should hyper coordinate the exe or overfocus on who’s in second, but I also don’t want to act like it’s not a factor. I think the mechanic deserves some discussion, and that we should find the middle ground.

Meant to quote Kas but I didn’t grab it and now I forgot what it was. I think just saying “fair enough” to his reply of me? I’ll check later EDIT: It was that, plus saying that I’m pretty sure I consistently ignore early votes on me regardless of alignment. But you have a better memory than me when it comes to these things so I may be wrong.

Village points to both Raven and Wit for openness and honesty respectively

What are village points, and what is vote manip?

7 minutes ago, Kasimir said:

See (sorry Mat, this isn't so much @ you as a general thread thought thing) - I think everyone's been engaging with the orange, but I also agree with Mat on #2 as I might not necessarily want a secondary suspect to be empowered. I think where we differ is just that I don't feel all that much can be done about it without going back to exe engineering and consensus problems, with a side of cheap voting. (Too bad we aren't using crypto!  ) I do notice on re-read that Mat doesn't disagree with it being potential easy cover for votes, and thinks that it can be called out, so our disagreements are probably largely practicability ones.

I will say I like Mat's consistency here, but I respect Mat's E!play a bit too much to be willing to ascribe a read significantly.

Sigh. Let's try again. Current state of thoughts:

Recategorising this as the bucket of people I have any slightly positive read on and thus, at this current point in time, would not vote today:

: Araris, JNV, TJ, Devo, Aeoryi, Wit, STINK (purely bro reasons this one sorry)

 Everyone not in the first bucket:

: Archer, Mat, Ravenclaw, Ash, Exp

Italics are negotiable. Raven's a solid null for me — haven't been able to get a good handle on them/their play, that's all. Honestly I don't know why I am hesitating here because theoretically I should be ok with Archer or Mat but my mind is also screaming internally at the idea of a dead thread >>

With Mat, part of me is considering whether it's just a Villager tactical disagreement, which happens a lot, but I also don't really feel it. With Archer, it's just a nagging feeling about his play. Think I'm going to nap on this one.

There's a tactical reason for relieving Exp but at the same time, that's more or less a toothless vote, and I'd rather not go there if it's not needed and trust Exp will take care of himself and the GM/IM will PH if necessary.

P.S. Warning to people - be careful about double messaging. Two of my PM messages merged for some weird reason and IDG what happened.

What do the…Pokémons?…mean?

[Kasimir]

3 minutes ago, ΨιτιsτηεΒέsτ said:

What do the…Pokémons?…mean?

In this specific context, Pukamon (Digimon on top) is anyone I Village read or have a vaguely positive read on. Village being - you said you play mafia IRL right? Village = town/not-maf/non-wolves. Gizamon (Digimon on the bottom) is anyone I either Evil read or have a vaguely negative read on.

I'd like to be more fine-grained but this is C1 so I am going to settle for a 'will vote' / 'won't vote' distinction in my reads for now.

Edited to add: Part of me is wondering if Wit is pulling a FNG play but I also kind of feel E!Wit doesn't lurk like this without it being a calculated choice, so I am more willing to stick him in the Pukamon bucket still.

Edited November 6, 2023 by Kasimir

[ΨιτιsτηεΒέsτ]

2 minutes ago, Kasimir said:

In this specific context, Pukamon (Digimon on top) is anyone I Village read or have a vaguely positive read on. Village being - you said you play mafia IRL right? Village = town/not-maf/non-wolves. Gizamon (Digimon on the bottom) is anyone I either Evil read or have a vaguely negative read on.

I'd like to be more fine-grained but this is C1 so I am going to settle for a 'will vote' / 'won't vote' distinction in my reads for now.

Got it

[Mat]

1 hour ago, ΨιτιsτηεΒέsτ said:

What are village points, and what is vote manip?

Village points = reason to light village read (aka I think you lean village atm)

Vote manip = Some roles can manipulate the votes to be different from how they were intended to be cast

[Kasimir]

10 hours ago, Matrim's Dice said:

—Certainly you can’t honestly call this a tunnel, the only reason I keep bringing it up is because other people do

Ngl I like this siiiiigh. Feels like given the MatTunnel Thing, E!Mat would be more than happy to lean into a tunnel. Then again, MatTunnel wasn't a big thing people noticed in Szeth's LG either.

@Devotary of Spontaneity, current reads? Can do a 2 V / 1 E if it's a struggle at this point in the game.

@Archer - Have your views on Mat specifically shifted?

@Ashbringer - If I asked for 1 V / 1 E, would you be able to do it right now? Sympathetic to the rust because I swear to god I took a break for three games (?) and suddenly I feel like I don't recall how to Village well at all.

@Ravenclawjedi42 - Similar question. 2 V / 1 E, you can be wrong, it's ok, just 'where you stand rn.' If 2 V / 1 E not possible, how about 1 V / 1 E?

@Matrim's Dice - Acknowledging you lean V on Raven and Wit, do you have a current E read? Still Exp?

---

Keleran knelt and scratched in the sand.

"I thought you said you were going to talk to people, Keleran," Ellu said, hands on her hips.

"I'm talking to you," Keleran muttered.

"People who aren't me, Keleran! You're supposed to work together with your squadmates!" Keleran groaned inwardly. That was the problem, he thought. So much expectation. So much obligation, you could hardly breathe for the weight of it. And fool him, he'd agreed, or his Words had been accepted, as Ellu had cheerfully informed him.

Truth to be told, he'd thought she was a Voidbringer when they first met. But he hadn't known what Voidbringers were, back then. Hadn't known all that much, really.

Choosing life, or death. It hadn't felt like much of a choice, when he'd put himself between Battarin and the whitespine. His hands had been shaking as he held the stick, but he'd some crazy idea that you couldn't back down, ever, or the whitespine would pounce.

These Words are accepted, said a voice like thunder, and Keleran had thought he was dreaming it all up, until Ellu had said, "I'm so excited Keleran! You're going to be a Knight Radiant!" and then all of it had unravelled: the new set of expectations, the fact he was ill-suited for an order of warriors and apparent physical powerhouses, the way his father had seen his dream die before his eyes as he released Keleran to Callar and the Blackthorn's Coalition in Jah Keved.

He never really thought about being in the same Order as Callar. As far as Keleran was concerned, they were night and day. Callar was everything a Stoneward was supposed to be: dutiful, essential. And Keleran was Keleran. It never helped, making the comparison.

Too much weight on his shoulders.

"I'm trying to work things out," he said, for Ellu's benefit. "See, here's Shay. I haven't really..." he bit his lower lip. "I haven't really felt right about her."

"Yeah, you're really bad at talking to girls, Keleran!" 

"Thank you for your support, Ellu, please work with me here." He added a symbol for doubt next to the glyphs that spelled out Shay's name. "I don't know. I guess I should feel her enthusiasm is a good thing, but somehow I don't. And yet everything feels like it's built on quicksand."

Ellu shook her head. "You were all never meant for this sort of lurking and spying," she said, sadly, and for a moment, Keleran thought she sounded so much older than her usual child-like self. "Radiants. Lightweavers, maybe. But that's the sort of thing Cryptics love. You were meant for the desperate moments, when someone had to step up, and do what's right. No matter the cost."

"Ellu..." Keleran said. Helplessly. "I'm not a soldier. I'm really bad at it. I don't know what to do with this situation. Please pick someone else."

"You aren't," Ellu said, readily. "But we don't need soldiers."

"We do need soldiers," Keleran retorted, stung. "The Coalition is getting hammered in Jah Keved. We need enough Radiants on the battlefield. Callar is doing his best to bring everyone up to speed."

He returned to scratching names in the dirt. Some of them were traitors, but how did Callar expect them to find them all? Keleran didn't know.

[STINK]

Damn this thread is active in-between smiting spam bots and reading this thread that's like 20 minutes of my day gone just on waking up and checking the Shard good job everybody keep it up

Also I'm not gonna quote it but couldn't help but notice Aeor did indeed vote Matrim again as Matriam  One of you guys needs to pick up on this can't have Fifth sitting there going "wait does that count"?

Also everyone's throwing the word tunnel around it's been like 24 and a bit hours of the thread no-one can be that far down a tunnel yet it's more of a hole in the ground in my opinion.

Anyways off to the dentists ciao

[Kasimir]

7 minutes ago, STINK said:

Damn this thread is active in-between smiting spam bots and reading this thread that's like 20 minutes of my day gone just on waking up and checking the Shard good job everybody keep it up

thank u for ur service

@Fifth Scholar I noticed you did not commemorate the sacred festival of Rollovet, sir. In honour of Rollovet and Fifth, this November, may I propose:

Spoiler

 

Edited to add:

Me, watching Stick and Aman read this thread:

Edited November 6, 2023 by Kasimir

[Devotary of Spontaneity]

If providing ideals to the #2 player was a priority, we'd be better deciding who that will be with a second vote and then having a few players vote for that person (3-4 fewer than lead). I don't think this should be a priority, since this makes it much more likely that the actually first place vote is settled too early and doesn't have room to be properly discussed/decided. If #1 is settled late in the cycle then we can come back to ideals. So I do agree with Archer on this but still think we don't want to be aiming for ties. That + 'shooting an inactive if no suspicions on posters' is suspicious. Mostly a same opinions but different priorities thing.

I'm not suspicious of Wit. he seems to be latching on to whatever's available for help in a way that an elim would not need. Would like to know where he got village read on Aeoryi from no gut feelings other than her asking lots of questions.

I never like people trying to consolidate votes early on Aeoryi but it does seem like she's trying to solve the game and figure things out. I remember this being true for her in LG 97 but it's hard to check through her content.