Break Tank 4: Last Night, Rain Mingled With Mist

[Mat he/him]

JNV makes the most sense here I think

Mostly am confused because there's no way the Pattern hasn't massively screwed with things but yeah

[Aeoryi she/her]

3 hours ago, Mat said:

I am certain that JNV blocked me

Because there's no other explanation

I wanna know why

Also it happened I changed it

am just mat now and will be forever

How did they block you

[Archer he/him]

45 minutes ago, Aeoryi said:

How did they block you

More importantly, if you're certain they blocked you, you're certain they aren't the Forsaken. Exing e!JNV harms the village by cutting our opportunities to hit the Forsaken from two to one. I won't hound the point too hard, but Mat not searching for the Forsaken isn't a great look. 

[Haelbarde he/him]

@Mat What scans did you get last night?

[Haelbarde he/him]

---

New post that will probably merge

Going to put a vote on Mat while I wait for a response.

[Devotary of Spontaneity]

Exing me doesn't give any information other than that Archer was hit by pattern or e!Mat or e!JNV N0. Wizard was hit by Mat N0 and/or N1 presumably. If Hael wasn't hit and isn't evil, then neither JNV nor Wizard are the Forsaken. Forsaken Hael with e!Mat could've claimed whatever he wanted whenever and didn't have to be so cautious, but still possible. I don't think there's a mechanical reason Aeoryi can't be forsaken except the thief taker claim, which hasn't been counterclaimed w.r.t pattern degradation. I can't stay to figure this out though so I guess stick on Mat? Don't really like that. I'd like another scan other than mine on JNV but don't know if we can get that. I'll vote Hael if anyone's willing to join, since Mat presumably isn't Forsaken.

[Aeoryi she/her]

11 minutes ago, Devotary of Spontaneity said:

Exing me doesn't give any information other than that Archer was hit by pattern or e!Mat or e!JNV N0. Wizard was hit by Mat N0 and/or N1 presumably. If Hael wasn't hit and isn't evil, then neither JNV nor Wizard are the Forsaken. Forsaken Hael with e!Mat could've claimed whatever he wanted whenever and didn't have to be so cautious, but still possible. I don't think there's a mechanical reason Aeoryi can't be forsaken except the thief taker claim, which hasn't been counterclaimed w.r.t pattern degradation. I can't stay to figure this out though so I guess stick on Mat? Don't really like that. I'd like another scan other than mine on JNV but don't know if we can get that. I'll vote Hael if anyone's willing to join, since Mat presumably isn't Forsaken.

I mean we know you aren't df 

Like cmon

EDIT:

sorry for the tone I've been on MU too much lol

Edited December 20, 2023 by Aeoryi

[Ookla de los Cuervos he/him]

im going to continue with no execution for now.

[The Wandering Wizard he/him]

5 minutes ago, TheRavenHasLanded said:

im going to continue with no execution for now.

We can safely kill someone today and tomorrow and if we don't find the Forsaken, we lose.

[Aeoryi she/her]

2 minutes ago, The Wandering Wizard said:

We can safely kill someone today and tomorrow and if we don't find the Forsaken, we lose.

Devo

.. @DrakeMarshall/ @Kasimir VC please?

[DrakeMarshall he/him]

46 minutes ago, Aeoryi said:

@DrakeMarshall / @Kasimir VC please?

Sure I'll do it but dawg this is a 12hr cycle BT and in general don't expect quick on-demand official tallies from GMs, you can always make your own if you're really curious!

Vote Tally:

Devotary (4) - Wizard, JNV, Archer, Aeoryi

Hael (1) - Devotary

Mat (1) - Hael

JNV (1) - Mat
No Execution (1) - Raven

[Haelbarde he/him]

Yay! No more Ooklas!

So I had wanted to get Mat's response to what actions he did for Night 1, but seems like he doesn't intend to share, so we'll go ahead and post this anyway.

---

Alright, so my assumption is that there is a Forsaken with one Darkfriend ally. They cannot communicate with each other privately, so the only communication they've had as in thread where we can see it.

I think I'm willing to accept Aeoryi's claim of being victim to the bubble of evil. Doesn't mean they're not a darkfriend (though I don't think they are), but it does mean that they are not the Forsaken.

Regarding Devo:

N1 Archer as Wisdom determined Devotary was Forsaken
N1 Aeoryi as Gossip got that either Devotary was village or Forsaken (but not a darkfriend)
N1 Raven as Veteran attempted to kill Devotary, but nothing happened
N1 Wizard as Watchman received Devotary as their second name
So, with my N0 intel, either I was poisoned/drunk and one of Wizard and JNV are the Forsaken, or I was not, in which case those two are not Forsaken and Devotary is able to. So it's a matter of whether Mat really got me drunk or not N0. 

It is possible that Archer was given incorrect information C1 (bubble of evil), and Aeoryi's information doesn't give a positive ID. It's possible that Wizard was drunk N0 and so a village read of Aeoryi doesn't help support Devo being a DF or Forsaken. It's possible that the bubble of evil changed Aeoyri's role C2. But the question is how did Raven's ability fail? Only way they don't die is if they didn't use it (feels unlikely), or they were poisoned/drunk. Which means either JNV or Mat is truthful about their roles and is evil.

If JNV is an evil apothecary, then that means that I was not drunk N0, and so Wizard and JNV are not Forsaken. Which means that Mat was lying about being an innkeeper, making Mat Forsaken, with JNV blocking the kill. This is trolly on JNV's part rather than necessary.
If Mat is an evil innkeeper, I think that means I was drunk N0, and one of my targets is forsaken. evil Mat could be covering for evil Wizard, but I'm not thinking that's likely, though flagging it as a possibility to look back on later. In this world, JNV is Forsaken, while Mat trolled Raven by getting drunk. Still inclined to believe this tbh, but let's keep going.
If the bubble of evil hit village Mat instead of Archer, it wouldn't cancel the action, just give false information. My own scan would still be affected by drunkenness, so it would turn the combination of our scans into saying Wizard is Forsaken. But if the C1 bubble of evil didn't hit Archer, then we've got a contradiction with the Archer claim of Devotary as Forsaken. Only way that works is if Wizard and Archer are evil buddies, I think. But this doesn't explain why Raven's action failed. Because I don't see village Mat or JNV blocking Raven. So I don't see this as likely.

So what if Mat didn't make me drunk N0. Possibly in this scenario they are not an Innkeeper. That means JNV and Wizard are clear, and that Aeoryi and Devotary are different teams. A village read of Aeoryi, makes Devo a darkfriend or a Forsaken, and taken with Aeoryi's Gossip, puts them as a Forsaken. In a world where Aeroyi is truthful about the C2 bubble of evil but is a darkfriend, this still allows Devo to be Forsaken, but does still allow them to be village. But I'm more inclined to give the Aeoryi village read. We have to give a reason for the Raven kill failing. I don't think evil!Raven makes sense in this world - an evil veteran wouldn't ever want to show their ability, and I think would be more likely to fake claim something less verifiable. I guess it's possible there's a Devotary/Raven team up. But then that makes it more likely for there to be a village Mat who would have made me drunk N0. So I still don't see it.

---

Hrm. This is the mess. Outside of my own alignment the thing I'm most sure about is that Aeoryi is probably telling the truth about the C2 bubble, and so cannot be the Forsaken.

If we go on gut reads, I'm feeling off about Devo and Matt, particularly with how they're posting and voting. I can probably go into it more later, but it's under 45 min to rollover so later. So what if Devo = Forsaken, and Mat = Darkfriend Innkeeper. 

I think it works if I got hit with the bubble of evil, while evil innkeeper Mat does hit both Wizard and I as claimed. I believe the bubble of Evil would mean my results couldn't be relied on as with drunkeness. That then opens up all of the Devo actions suggesting Devo to be evil as being successful. 

So with that in mind, we'll go with Devotary instead of Mat.

1 hour ago, Aeoryi said:

Devo

.. @DrakeMarshall/ @Kasimir VC please?

I know Drake just ninja'd me again, but here's one with my vote change incorporated.

Vote Tally
(5) Devotary: Wizard{1}, JNV{1}, Archer{1}, Aeoryi{1}, Hael{2}
(0) Mat: Devotary{1}, Hael{1}
(1) JNV: Mat{1}
(1) Hael: Devotary
(1) No Execution: Raven{1}

(5) Devotary: Wizard, JNV, Archer, Aeoryi, Hael
(1) JNV: Mat
(1) Hael: Devotary
(1) No Execution: Raven
 

[DrakeMarshall he/him]

edit: fwiw I do actually appreciate knowing that we have the same count

Edited December 20, 2023 by DrakeMarshall

[Haelbarde he/him]

---

Follow up post in case this merges

Just now, Haelbarde said:

So I had wanted to get Mat's response to what actions he did for Night 1, but seems like he doesn't intend to share, so we'll go ahead and post this anyway.

To clarify, something that contributes to me being generally suspicious of Mat is that he hasn't (that I can see) made any claim of his N1 actions, when in a all villagers sharing information to solve the puzzle, that'd be the first thing I'd expect a villager to do. Rather, he conveniently doesn't bring his role up when Raven mysteriously seems to have had their action blocked. Evil Innkeeper Mat could well be responsible. 

[Aeoryi she/her]

Hael you are a puzzle solving God just so you know

[Aeoryi she/her]

7 minutes until rollovet

[DrakeMarshall he/him]

ALRIGHT GENTLEPERSONS IT IS TIME!

THE TURN HAS ENDED

THE GAME HAS ENDED

Our time together draws to a close

Aftermath will be posted in several hours most probably!

[Kasimir he/him]

Aftermath: Memories of Spring

Night fell on the village of Helgen, with the gentle rain and the soft mist.

Blood splattered across the cobblestones; old Sargon, dead at last, and the travelling gleewoman, Kalenir, who had named herself Osan'gar.

She had offered to use the endless time loop, the bubble of Evil, to turn each and every last villager within Helgen into a shadowspawn of their choosing, and had hesitated, surprised, when the Village Wisdom, Bladdar, had screeched about not having enough time for this because he had to go take a piss and whacked her over the top of the head with a club.

This had started the frenzy as the villagers of Helgen descended on Kalenir and old Sargon both, beating them to death.

Blood on the cobblestones; mingling with the rain.

The mist crept on in, as it always did, promising oblivion, promising absolution from the misdeeds of the day.

 

 

In the morning, the sun rose on the village of Helgen.

Overnight, the rain had turned into a gentle coating of snow, blanketing the street and thatched roofs. The air was crisp, cool and clear, with the green scent of pine boughs and the promise of Swovan Night and feasting to come.

You stare at each other, amazed and barely able to believe it.

The Forsaken is dead. Helgen is saved. 

For now. Always for now, for there are no permanent endings, not as the Wheel of Time turns.

As the crisp winds swept across the village green, they brought with them the memories of spring.

Spring, a time for joy and new beginnings.

The wind was not the beginning. There are neither beginnings or endings to the turning of the Wheel of Time. But it was a beginning.

 

 

Quote

Devotary of Spontaneity (5): Aeoryi, Archer, Haelbarde, JNV, The Wandering Wizard
Haelbarde (1): Devotary of Spontaneity
JNV (1): Matrim's Dice
No Exe (1): Raven

Kalenir / Devotary of Spontaneity was exed! She was the Forsaken! The Villagers of Helgen have won! 

Thanks to everyone who signed up to help Drake and myself test this thing! Thanks to @StrikerEZ for being the group slacker with me, and @DrakeMarshall for being the cool GMing bro. BT4Gangchat best chat  

Please do not post in this thread until the second post is up.

Edited December 20, 2023 by Kasimir

[Kasimir he/him]

Archives

Spoiler

• GM Mastersheet
• Spec Doc

Player List

Spoiler

1. @The Wandering Wizard - Watchman
2. @Aeoryi - Gossip/Thief-Taker
3. @JNV - Apothecary
4. @Mat - Innkeeper
5. @TheRavenHasLanded - Revir Veteran
6. @Devotary of Spontaneity - Kalenir Forsaken
7. @Haelbarde - Mazrim Taim Elder
8. @Archer - Bladdar Scammer Wisdom

 

Edited December 20, 2023 by Kasimir

[Haelbarde he/him]

This was super fun! Thanks for running! And well done everyone. Your early choices to sow chaos Mat were great, and if not for Archer's bold lie that helped direct everyone to Devo I reckon you might have had the game. And nicely played Archer.

The uncertainty in all the information was doing my head in >> but it made for a wonderful puzzle. Feels like there's stuff to tweak, and I'd be curious how it'd fair at double the player count, but seems quite workable a ruleset.

[Aeoryi she/her]

Uh okay thoughts:

1. I wish the game was longer sort of. I agree it was fun, but realllly short. 
2. I'm also pretty sure the d1 mass claim worked really well in terms of the village.
3. I agree with hael that it made for a pretty interesting puzzle. 
4. I feel like devo got fairly unlucky with the scans (like my nice devo is village devo is forsaken scan that I thought was useless). 
5. The pattern degradation was pretty cool imo and I liked the uncertainty around the scans.
6. Also speaking of which, there was a lot of game elements that relied on luck. Pattern degradation, drunk false information, gm facts, and a bit more things. Normally, it'd be fine, but due to the finite length of the game rng is going to play a big role.
7. I really enjoyed this game altogether.

And yes I have to give the credit to hael how did you solve the puzzle so quickly

And quokka read the rules described pretty well how the game went for me

[Kasimir he/him]

After-Action Report

I'll be posting mine, Drake has his own thoughts which he will be offering. Before I do that, Drake and I would like to thank everyone for participating and request feedback. The point of a BT is to testdrive weird mech for use in a proper game. We have our thoughts on this, biut would also like to hear yours.

To be upfront, we were testing a Leviathan type ruleset, where the timeloop hamstrung the exe, but also required Villagers to be more careful about what they wanted to push and what they didn't, due to the time limit.

• Balance/Distro

Drake and I felt the game ended up being a tad V!sided in practice, but not overly so. This I think is counterintuitive because to most players, the ruleset appeared E!sided, and both Drake and I had concerns about whether X was enough - Drake's back-of-the-napkin models suggested even two cycles would've been fine, which bears out here in practice. We hesitated a bit about whether to go for X=3 or X=4, but X=3 felt like a decent choice in the end, given how it played out.

We probably could've dialled back on the info roles just a bit. Even with Pattern degradation, drunkenness, and poisoning in play, players still treated info results as prima facie plausible and used them to guide reasoning. This functionally meant that all the sources of uncertainty ended up having a small net effect. This matches with Drake's and my experience elsewhere, but is also a good thing!  This means players do not trust scans blindly, and probably shouldn't anyway.

RNGesus really had it out for the Elims there, with Aeo's D1 scan actually being very rough for them, but in general, it wasn't overly so - that same Day, Archer was considering asking if Devo was the Forsaken, meaning that what really drove the Village was some solid play with regard to their roles.

• Overall Patches/Thoughts

1. Something Devo and I differed about in Committee was whether duplicate roles were permissable. Devo was of the view they shouldn't be; I was concerned as I felt the Elims just didn't have that much space to hide in, and LG92 demonstrated that Elims generally struggled with the pressures of massclaim environments. At some level, the stakes of the ruling was about either setting a high bar for the Elims to match up to or die, or taking away one sort of tactic (ccing) from the Village. I do think it's interesting that Devo and I have swapped positions after this game: I think the 'no duplicates but Forsaken knows one role not in the game' ruling is fine; Devo is reconsidering no duplicates. I'm not sure but FWIW think allowing duplicates is fine too.

2. I didn't like Raven getting blocked for declaring his shot, which he had to do. A really easy patch of Raven's role was to make it a Day shot instead of Night. That way, the Veteran can still be shut down at Night and the next Day, but can't be shut down just by declaring the shot. Actually, Raven's role was meant to be a Day vig all along. Not swapping it back to Day shooting was a mistake because the game starting on a Night was a last-minute change.

3. The Watchman is particularly cursed to make drunk. Drake thought of a better patch but by that time, Wiz had received results, so we felt it was better not to go there at all. The solution here is to roll category, then RNG for a player not in that category each time. See spec doc for more explanation.

4. I'd like to make Gossip less swingy if I could. With facts being randed across four categories (targeted/targeting/alignment/role), it's harsh for Devo as she has a 1/2 chance of being sussed, and a 1/4 chance of being identified as the Forsaken, even with the shelter of one false fact and one true. As it's rough to find other facts within the context of a forum game, I'm considering making the Gossip act once every two cycles, or something. Not sure. Interested in recommendations here.

5. Pattern degradation didn't really play that big a role in causing problems, which was as designed - it's more meant to add a touch of uncertainty into the game, rather than cause more problems for the Village. We had no Pattern degradation at all C1, and on C2, Aeo got what was arguably an upgrade to Thief-Taker. Whether this will hold true in a longer game is unclear.

6. I think Elims struggled a bit with meta here. It's clear that Mat wasn't hesitant to claim here, but he was hesitant to talk about his scans - probably partial lessons from LG92. The split in attitude is actually what drove both Archer and Hael onto him and they never let up. Devo then became suspicious by association. I get that Elims wanted room to manuever in - it's just that it caused them quite a bit of suspicion from Villagers in the process.

7. Archer's and Mat's lying sprees were actually hilarious  Mat made Archer drunk N1 and then couldn't work out why Archer had correctly scanned Devo on D2. As it was, Archer just completely lied about having scanned Devo, and then was confused by his results when he asked on D2 if the Forsaken was in <Hael, Raven.> (JNV had been made drunk by Mat, so the answer Archer got was truthful: 'No.' We don't know if this might have changed the game completely if Devo hadn't been exed.) Meanwhile, even had Mat decided Archer was lying, he couldn't call Archer on it, because he'd have to admit lying about Archer  In short, I'm just going to quote HBO Chernobyl here: "Every lie we tell incurs a debt to the truth. Sooner or later, that debt is paid."

8. Thinking of allowing PMs, but requiring players to declare who they are PMing in thread. The upside of this patch would mean we can have an Elim doc back, allowing Devo and Mat to better coordinate and strategise.

Recommendations

I think this game format can be run as a MR or a QF, with the suggested patches. Even with alternating Day/Night cycles in a QF, if it ends in six 24-hour cycles, I'm not sure it matters. I guess it could be an LG as well, but it'd need more players to guarantee a higher X value. I'm uncomfortable with it on the grounds the game can end really early if the Forsaken is exed. I would lean QF but MR is doable as well.

Once again, thanks to everyone for playing and helping us out, thanks to my bros for helping co-GM and IM this clowncar on stilts, #BT4gang best gang!

[Archer he/him]

That was fun!
-The vote for everyone strategy to weed out Dragon claims early is effective. I'd rather save us the trouble by making the rule that the Dragon must claim before Rollovet.
-Wisdom set up a nice collab with V!Poisoner to get a trustworthy Forsaken scan. I did not expect that I was drunk... Or that JNV was drunk and couldn't poison me... Glad that never mattered or I might have been very confused!
-Aeoryi's role switch claim was a solid indication of them not being Forsaken. Hard to counter claim that.
-I know you said it might have been either alignment, but E!Poisoner/Innkeeper felt predictable. Also predictable was giving the Forsaken a 'tidy' role: one that wasn't too complicated, lest they mess up their fakeclaims when they don't know they've been poisoned etc. Perhaps giving them multiple role options to choose from when fake claiming would have given them more control over their fate.
-I don't know why the Forsaken didn't bus. When I saw Devo's EOD post D1, everything clicked into place for me.
-I was actively ignoring mech analysis past D1 because Hael's results didn't match my reads (kudos to Mat for lying from the start to confound mech analysis). How people interacted with the roles they had was really telling of their alignment. I think the unfamiliar environment helped us more than the scan results did. It's possible that'll be reduced the next time around, or by a different elim team composition. The team having a good understanding of the rules might have prevented them from being easily village read. Aeoryi publicly discussing their rules confusion felt pretty genuine.
-Lying about having scanned Devo did what I wanted it to. I got Raven to attempt to demonstrate their role, checking them and forcing Mat's hand to check he wasn't actually the Forsaken. After the D1 no votes, I wasn't confident in the village's killer instinct. It was a controlled risk because if I'd been wrong, I'd get a v!Devo flip that confirms their scan on me was valid. My apologies for misleading y'all. I probably wouldn't have done it in a longer game. Time crunch was weighing on me.

-I'm against having PMs. I feel like the spirit of the game is to force public claims and collaboration about that info, and I enjoyed that part. 

Good job, team.
Thanks for running this, Kas, Drake! 

[Aeoryi she/her]

I lost my master post!

Okay:

1. Needs to be MR not QF due to the amount of solving there can be
2. Gossip should should maybe recieve drunkenness/poisoned as a GM Fact instead of role or alignment
3. Suggestion: Make Dragon Reborn and Veteran both a role similar to the innocent child role (ref: innocent child role from MU) in essence, so keep their current functionality
   Spoiler

   The innocent Child may at any point during the game request to be confirmed as a town-aligned player by the host.

   But make it so they have to submit the order pre-rollovet, and then it gets announced by the GM, to make it more official 

4. I'd make pattern degradation take more of a toll as the game goes on. Making it affect more players is the easiest way, since one pattern claim causes the entire extra-uncertainty layer to disappear 

5. The game needs more ways to be drunk/poisoned, I feel. In LG92, trolls were commonplace, and it worked fairly well as an anti-claim thing.

6. Agree with archer no PMs. That would ruin the fun (and some roles) 

7. This was actually really fun to figure out, but I just wish there was more to go with.

Edited December 20, 2023 by Aeoryi

[Kasimir he/him]

Special F for the true unsung hero of the game, @StrikerEZ the IM, who heroically fought through the messaging flood of BT4Gang:

Spoiler

Striker bro, we are not so sorry