Mid-Range Game 8: Highborn Intrigue

[Seonid he/him]

Well, Orlok, in some ways it's a relief to know that others are having as much trouble as I am pinpointing Conspirators. But not enough of a relief.

 

But now, this is the moment of truth. Our assassin had better strike true tonight. I now know what the Village felt like in the AG, and it's not fun.

 

EDIT: It's obvious now that there are only 3 Eliminators left. Which means, that, after the Assassin kill and the Conspirator kill, we will have 5 players left. If one of the Eliminators gets hit by the assassin, then it will be 3-2 in the Village's favor. Dangerous terms.

 

If the assassin doesn't strike, then there will be 6 players left, and we'll be tied up. Potential to win, certainly. But still dangerous terms.

 

If the assassin misses, then we're stuck...

Edited September 21, 2015 by Seonid

[Macen he/him]

At this point I believe the game is over. I'm fairly certain that the guardsman is a conspirator as well, so they get two kills tonight.

Oh well, well played conspirators.

[Seonid he/him]

It is certainly a possibility. I've been considering it for as long as I've known who the assassin is (which is since the first kill they made). If they were, though, I'd assume that Ren would just end the game at this point. I'm almost certain that none of us has Shardplate left, and even if we did, we couldn't lynch the Conspirators fast enough to prevent their win.

 

But, since there is still a chance that our guardsman/assassin is good, I'm not going to reveal them in-thread.

 

To the assassin, though:

 

In our PM, we talked about hitting either Macen or Shallan tonight. I'm still sure one of them is evil. I can't tell which. I propose targeting Venture Mistborn instead. Given my track record, I don't blame you if you ignore it and just go ahead with our plan, but Venture has been catching attention for a while, and I derailed the lynch from him onto Gamma, because of legitimate suspicions and a lack of opposition. He's worth hitting, I think. Especially since Bort wasn't evil.

 

Or hit SilverDragon, who fits the profile of an inactive Eliminator well. Again, I don't trust my own judgement at this point, so make your own call, but either of those two would be worthwhile.

 

Also, if you are evil, you've already won now, so just come out and gloat about it. Don't keep us in suspense.

[Curious Anamaximder he/him]

Still on Shallan.

[Macen he/him]

So. I'm in the process of doing some Hyper-Analysis since I finally have time, and I think I've been barking up the wrong trees. I'm going to continue (i'm only up to day 7) but so far the bad guys look like Orlok and PK. I'm leaning more towards Silver also being bad, but just inactive - if not then it's Vin.

My analysis has pretty much cleared Seonid and Shallan (which makes me feel like an idiot - but I was basing those suspicions off of feelings, not numbers). I will finish my analysis and post it (ren, do you mind if I put a hyperlink to a Word doc with the whole analysis, since it's like 6 or 7 pages long?).

EDIT* Ok, here is the important part:
 

Living Player List         Voted For:        Bad Guy           Good Guy        Not Dead         
Sheon Idris (Seonid)                              2                      6                      0                     
Seavul Karlon (The Silver Dragon)          0                      0                      0                     
Mace (Macen) Shard Bearer                   0                      3                      1                     
Nivina Odict (Shallan)                            2                      3                      1                     
Orlok (OrlokTsubodai)                           1                      3                      0                     
Eradin (Paranoid King)                           1                      4                      2                     
Vin Elendel (Venture Mistborn)               0                      2                      1                     

 

Living Player List         Voted For By:   Bad Guy           Good Guy        Not Dead         
Sheon Idris (Seonid)                              0                      0                      1                     
Seavul Karlon (The Silver Dragon)          0                      0                      0                     
Mace (Macen) Shard Bearer                   0                      1                      0                     
Nivina Odict (Shallan)                            0                      0                      2                     
Orlok (OrlokTsubodai)                           0                      0                      0                     
Eradin (Paranoid King)                           0                      2                      0                     
Vin Elendel (Venture Mistborn)               0                      3                      1          

 

And I think this is important too:

Wannan (7): Nivina Odict, Sheon Idris, Efrihm, Mortago, Eradin,Klanal, Orlok (Re-ordered into vote order)

 

*EDIT 2* Note, Both Seonid and Shallan had voted for Hero in previous cycles. That's why they got two notches.

Edited September 21, 2015 by Macen

[Macen he/him]

My analysis mixed with my gut feelings tells me Shallan is Good, and seonid is *Probably* good. If I was to take that into account and run just the numbers, the bad guys are: PK>Orlok>Venture/Macen>Silver>Seonid>Shallan

 

*EDIT* Note, I would put a tossup between Venture, silver, and myself since I think they have 1 completely inactive player (silver).

Edited September 21, 2015 by Macen

[Orlok Tsubodai]

Macen, I'm really not sure why those tables lead you to conclude that I'm guilty - would you care to expound on them, so that I can better understand your reasoning and do my best to prove to you otherwise?

[Macen he/him]

Macen, I'm really not sure why those tables lead you to conclude that I'm guilty - would you care to expound on them, so that I can better understand your reasoning and do my best to prove to you otherwise?

To be fair, I'm probably right behind you on the suspicion list if I was to be 100% neutral. The only thing that puts you over me was that you were the last person to vote for Hero when it was obvious that he was going to die. You are tied with me on number of people voted for that were good (mine were the same one twice, then Bort after you made good points about him).

 

Mind you, none of this is iron clad proof, but we don't really have any iron clad proof for anyone (PK is definitely our closest to that, after PK it's mostly just little nuances here and there).

If I was one of the others I'd have it as a tossup between you and I for the 2nd eliminator left. For the 3rd it's probably silver, but possibly Venture.

[Orlok Tsubodai]

Right... Ok, so whilst your tables are a good idea, and I can see where you are coming from, I do have a few concerns with your extrapolations if guilt.

1) My delayed vote on Hero was out of a desire to have another target brought forward, so that a discussion, rather than a bandwagon occurred - I do not like bandwagons terribly much, as we don't draw all that much information from them - and although it did happen that we found an accurate target, we would have benefitted far more had another potential lynches been raised - we would have seen, for example, who was prepared to try to shift attention from Hero, and who seized upon the opportunity to do so.

2) Your table ignores the fact that I returned from inactivity at a point where I was no longer even mentioned amongst the inactives - had I been an eliminator, what better place to remain - practically forgotten - a position from which I could have exercised the eliminator kill with impunity?

I think you place a too much weight on Shallan voting for Hero twice - yes, she did vote on an eliminator, but is this not a usual technique to gain trust? Her reasoning was shaky enough that has a bandwagon not occurred she could well have 'been convinced otherwise' and removed her vote.

Overall, whilst your analysis is very interesting, I'm against placing too much weight on the numbers, and ignoring the interactions themselves.

[Shallan she/her]

Well, I'd just about completely agree with your analysis, Macen. Of course, that's mostly because it goes along with what I already thought.

But actually, that's a good way of looking at it. Voting is the only public action, and it's probably the most important one too. Oh, Orlok just ninja'd me.

Well, I think he puts just enough weight on me voting for Hero twice! ( )

I do see your point, Orlok, but I had voted for him at a time when he was not going to be lynched, and after my vote a lot of people got behind it. I'd agree that interactions are important are important, but utimately, the destination matters more than the journey. (So call me a Voidbinder)

But anyway. I think the assassin is almost certainly on the village side, because otherwise the Conspirators could reveal themselves now and win, assuming they have 3. So this discussion should be geared toward finding a good target for the assassin.

[Macen he/him]

Well, I'd just about completely agree with your analysis, Macen. Of course, that's mostly because it goes along with what I already thought.

But actually, that's a good way of looking at it. Voting is the only public action, and it's probably the most important one too. Oh, Orlok just ninja'd me.

Well, I think he puts just enough weight on me voting for Hero twice! ( )

I do see your point, Orlok, but I had voted for him at a time when he was not going to be lynched, and after my vote a lot of people got behind it. I'd agree that interactions are important are important, but utimately, the destination matters more than the journey. (So call me a Voidbinder)

But anyway. I think the assassin is almost certainly on the village side, because otherwise the Conspirators could reveal themselves now and win, assuming they have 3. So this discussion should be geared toward finding a good target for the assassin.

 

I've put my two cents in, and am about to leave work and have bowling tonight. I'll post a link to the vote tallies and kill tallies I made (it's a google doc) just because it won't all fit into a single post. Note that I did not take into account vote manipulation, would have taken forever to go through each post, I just took the votes from Ren's posts.

Doc Link

[Paranoid King he/him]

Thanks for your chart, Macen, that puts most of our info in one place. Why most instead of all? Because you're neglecting to think of inactivity. The eliminators haven't eliminated anyone in the last two cycles.(not counting assassin kills.) Why not? This game would be in the bag for them. They have nothing to lose by killing people. The only reasonable explanation is that many of them are inactive. And however many good guys vote on me, I'm not inactive.

[Seonid he/him]

If Silver is, in fact, an eliminator, then it would be good to hit him. Even the risk of shardplate isn't great. If there is Shardplate, we're still tired, and can still win. If not, then we've caught an eliminator.

The only danger is if silver is an innocent. If that's the case, then we sink ourselves by hitting them.

If Silver is innocent, then 3 active players are eliminators. Venture Mistborn probably is, in this case. I doubt Orlok is, because of when he came back into activity. I'm not. That leaves macen, shallan, and paranoid king as options. Of the three, right now I'd see paranoid king as the least suspicious, honestly. I've mentioned this before, but his late vote on hero that didn't get counted seems to risky to be an eliminator play.

If we're offering targets to the assassin, I'd say hit silver, or if you're really worried about silver being an innocent inactive, hit venture.

[Renegade he/him]

Just under 2 hours left to go!

[Renegade he/him]

The turn is over!  Write-up coming soon.

[Renegade he/him]

Aftermath: Honor is Dead

(Special thanks to Shallan for most of the final part of this write-up.)

The highstorm was long over by the time that Orlok and Nivina Odict marched through Dalinar’s warcamp in the waning light.  Seavul Karlon, the courier and informant working for them, had seemingly disappeared long ago, without a trace.  It certainly had made their work more difficult, but under the stern influence of Sadeas, they had persevered.  Now, only four of the nobles stood between them and Dalinar.

“I have convinced Brightlord Eradin and Brightness Elendel to flee the Shattered Plains,” Orlok spoke.  “I personally watched their carriages go, so they should be no problem for us.”

“And what of Mace and Sheon Idris?” Nivina asked.

Orlok shook his head.  “Too stubborn for their own good.  Doubt that the king himself could get them to leave here if he asked them.”

Nivina sighed.  “Then we will have to exterminate them.  You can go take on Mace, as you’ve just battled him last night, while I go for Brightlord Idris.  Once I’m finished, I’ll go take on Dalinar himself.”

“Good,” Orlok nodded.  “I’ll go back to Sadeas’ warcamp after I’m done, and hopefully hear the good news.”

Nivina nodded silently, and the two ran off in their own directions.

-----

Orlok found Mace walking through the warcamp’s market, perusing through several crates of exotice fruit.  Orlok walked up next to Mace and coughed subtly.

Mace looked over at Orlok.  “Ah, hello,” Mace said tersely, hefting his mace.  “You here to kill me yet?”

Orlok chuckled softly.  “What do you mean?  I am completely weapons-free, as you can see.”

Mace leaned in to Orlok.  “I know that it was you who attacked me last night,” he whispered.  “Had the highstorm not messed with things, you’d be dead now.”

“Oh, I doubt that,” Orlok spoke.  Without any regard for the numerous spectators nearby, Orlok kicked Mace in the shin.  The former-Shardbearer dropped his mace, falling to his knees.

“Please,” Mace spoke, coughing.  “This is madness.  If you do work for Sadeas, then you should know better than to trust a slimy rat.  Wasting the lives of his--”

“Quiet!” Orlok yelled, angerspren pooling at his feet.  “Your words will not save you, Brightlord.  I’m sorry.”  Without further thought, Orlok slammed the mace down, shattering Mace’s skull.

Nearby, the market patrons were in a frenzy, running and screaming.  Orlok knew he wouldn’t have much time left to live, but this was part of the contingency plan.  All he had to do was…

“Hello,” a cold voice spoke in Orlok’s ear, chilling him to the bone.

“Rengar,” Orlok muttered, as if a curse.

“I managed to glean a bit of information… forcefully, I’d say, from your informant, Seavul Karlon,” the ex-executioner said.  “He was almost ready to betray you, can you believe that?”  Rengar chuckled.  “Unfortunately, I had to kill him, after exhausting all the information he had.  Justice can’t be stopped, of course.”

Orlok shivered in fear, but nevertheless looked smugly confident, as Rengar swiftly cut through his head.  Orlok and his severed fell to the ground, next to the deformed body of Mace.

Realization hit Rengar as he examined the smug look on the severed face of Orlok.  He was just a diversion, Rengar thought, looking at the gathering crowd of people around him and running off before anyone could stop him.

-----

Nivina Odict wore white on the day she was to kill a highprince.  Of course, Dalinar Kholin had no idea what was about to occur.  To him, she was just another artifabrian who assisted his brother’s wife.  But to her, he would just be her latest victim.  She walked into the feast room as normal, if anything could be normal with over two thirds of the nobles dead.  Of course, that wasn’t all her work.  Some had been “guarded” by her compatriot, Orlok.  They had all met unfortunate… accidents while under his watch.  And of course Wannan and Seavul had aided them.  But Wannan was dead, Seavul as good as, and Orlok off “guarding” Mace.  Nivina was pleased she had managed that much.  She had always wondered if she could kill someone who knew what they were doing.  Not like the pathetic Brightlords, artifabrians, and even guardsmen that she dealt with on a nightly occurrence.  No, this one would be a challenge.  The Blackthorn.  The man who united Alethar.  With Sadeas, of course.  But still, to have forced the unity of eight other squabbling highprinces?  That was no small feat.  She continued, but instead of turning aside to talk with the other nobles, she headed straight toward the man himself.

“Hey! What do you think you’re doing?” It was Sheon Idris. Nivina had liked him, but he was entirely too discerning as of late. He had even asked if she was a conspirator! Imagine that! It was too bad, though, that this had to happen. She held her freehand out to her side and concentrated. One. Two. Three. Four. Sheon reached her.

“Nivina! Are you all right? You don’t look good.” Five. Six. Seven.

“Fool.” she said. “I didn’t want to do this, but-“ Eight. Nine.

“Do what? What are you talk-“ Ten. Nivina swung her hand up and the Shardblade materialized in front of Sheon’s chest. He stopped talking, and immediately fainted in surprise. Nivina pointed her Shardblade down at the Brightlord's throat, then sighed. Sheon was out cold, and wouldn't be a threat to her anytime soon.

However, Dalinar had noticed. She had thought that he wouldn’t react so quickly, but she supposed his soldier’s reflexes would kick in.

They couldn’t hope to do anything against a Shardbearer. Perhaps Adolin, but he was off with one of his girlfriends. What a pity.

As Dalinar shouted for his guards, he mirrored her earlier motion and began to summon his own Blade. But, just as Nivina had planned, the guards never arrived. Brightness Katara and Badhab Eony would have been there immediately, but she had already killed them. And the last of them, Orlok, had other duties to perform. His Blade finally materialized, more slowly than she had thought it would. Maybe he didn’t think she was a threat. If so, he would be dead wrong shortly. She brought up the Blade in an overhead sweep. He blocked it, but strained. Years of work had brought Nivina to this point, and she knew exactly how to deal with Dalinar. He was about to do a backhand… yes, there it was. She knocked it away and countered where his defense was weakest- at his left leg.

Movement flashed from behind Nivina, and something slammed into her before she could strike.  Her Shardblade immediately dissipated as Dalinar rose, nodding to the newcomer.

Rengar stood over Nivina, pressing a foot against her back, preventing her from moving, and, with her limited reach, preventing her from summoning her Shardblade effectively.

Rengar raised his sword, but Dalinar motioned the ex-executioner to stop.  "Give me your Shardblade," Dalinar said to Nivina without emotion.  Rengar released the pressure from his foot, allowing Nivina to unbond her Shardblade, the silvery sword coming to rest on the floor beside her.  Normally, she would rather die than give up a Shardblade to a man such as Dalinar, but in this case, her death would just give him the Blade anyway.

Dalinar picked up the Blade gingerly, nodding to himself.  "You performed admirably, adversary," Dalinar admitted to Nivina, "and you have revealed that I am no longer the man I once was.  The Blackthorn."  Dalinar paused, wincing at the thought of his past.  "Despite your efforts, I will not have you executed.  Perhaps, once, I would have, but now... I do not think so.  I will, unfortunately, have to get you placed into prison for quite a while, for acts such as yours cannot go unpunished."

Rengar picked up Nivina, who struggled in vain, and carried her off, leaving Dalinar to think about the deaths that had come in the past few weeks.  They had been due to him, in a way.  But he'd have to overcome his weakness.  Strength before weakness, he thought to himself, quoting a line from a book he had just begun reading, before going into his study to think.

---

Mace was assassinated!  He was a Noble Brightlord!
Sheon Idris was “killed” by the conspirators!  He was a Noble Brightlord!

The game is over, and the Conspirators have won (sort of)!  (Like QF2, I had to be evil and not let you outright kill Dalinar! ) Nevertheless, congratulations, and well done to all!  As usual, here are the game docs:

Game Spreadsheet (Has 2 tabs)
Conspirator Doc
Dead Doc
Spectator Doc

Player List:

 

Draela Heb (Haelbarde) Noble Brightlady
Sheon Idris (Seonid) Noble Brightlord
Brightlord Wannan (Herowannabe) Conspirator Brightlord
Arilir (Araris Valerian) Noble Brightlord
Seavul Karlon (TheSilverDragon) Conspirator Courier Shardbearer
Brightness Katara (little wilson) Noble Guardswoman
Merilee Kavdar (RippleGlyf) Conspirator Brightlady
Kipper (Kipper) Noble Assassin Shardbearer
Cleo (Winter Cloud) Noble Con Artist
Bortholemew the Blind (Bort) Noble Brightlord Shardbearer
Seixa (phattemer) Noble Worldsinger
Leyton (IrulelikeSTINK) Noble Courier
Mace (Macen) Noble Brightlord Shardbearer
Brightlady Nivina Odict (Shallan) Conspirator Artifabrian
Em-son-of-none/Maggus (Emerald101/Gamma Fiend) Noble Brightlord Shardbearer
Caesarae (Adamir) Noble Con Artist Shardbearer
Orlok (OrlokTsubodai) Conspirator Guardsman
Norlav (Alvron) Noble Courier
Resha (RavenRadiant7) Noble Brightlady Shardbearer
Eradin (Paranoid King) Noble Artifabrian
Vin Elendel (Venture Mistborn) Noble Worldsinger
Efrihm (Alvom Halbin) Noble Brightlord
Badhab Eony (The Honey Badger) Noble Guardsman
Klanal (Clanky) Noble Artifabrian
Patch (Feligon) Noble Brightlord
Mallan (Mailliw73) Noble Brightlord
Owain (TheMightyLopen) Noble Courier
Mortago (a smart guy) Noble Ardent

Edited October 28, 2016 by Alvron

[Seonid he/him]

Well done, conspirators. Well done indeed. I'd been wondering about you, orlok, but I decided to trust you anyways. A mistake, as it seems. Well done

[Haelbarde he/him]

Oh, so I was corrupted. Surprised I was night 1's pick for corruption.

[Paranoid King he/him]

So why didn't conspirators kill anyone in the last few rounds? They had enough actives, and no reason not to.

[Guest]

Don't you know, Orlok is always evil?

In retrospect, I'm not sure how I would have approached PMing peoples. It does give you an incredible amount of information, which is why I wish more people would make use of it. Unfortunately, since I am one of the few who does, it paints an unnecessary target on my head. Ah well. Perhaps my best situation would be a vanilla role, so the town doesn't lose anything with me.

I am pleased to notice that the Eliminators picked up on my "slip." Disappointed I would be if no one noticed that.

TheSilverDragon was the only Eliminator that I had virtually settled on before my death, so Orlok and Shallan were only mildly suspicious to me. Good job, you guys!

Edited September 22, 2015 by Guest

[TheMightyLopen he/him]

Good game Eliminators! You had me off target the whole game. First I trusted Hero until the thing with the Artifabrian, then I trusted Shallan until I..........died.   About the only thing I can say for myself is that I thought Alvom was innocent, and I wasn't sure about that. I did notice Kipper's "slip", but I wasn't sure if he did that intentionally or not. The thing that was really frustrating for me is that I didn't see a single useful message with my ability. PM EACH OTHER MORE SO I CAN SPY ON YOU!.....is what I wanted to say during the whole game. 

[Herowannabe he/him]

Great game all, and surprisingly close! I enjoyed following it long after I died.

In case anyone was and is still wondering, the Contribution Crusade was not a ploy or a trick or anything of the sort. It is something I'm firmly committed to. Imagine how different this game could have been if all the players had been active.

As far as actual strategy goes, I decided pretty early on that I was going to play a reckless, risk taking game, knowing full well that I wasn't likely to survive long (I usually don't anyway). I pmed Wilson on day 1 fully with the intent to manipulate her and try to glean information. It was working beautifully (everything I said about our PMs was true- she told me she trusted me more than anyone else and revealed a handful of things to me) but after a few cycles I got paranoid that she was on to me and playing me, so I got Shallan to kill her.

Anyway, after that I continued to play recklessly, posting a lot and being very vocal to draw attention to me while Shallan and Orlok laid low. They even told me there were going to start voting for me and I encouraged them to do so, to separate us and our play-styles as much as possible. And I feel like it worked very well.

Anyway, thanks everyone who participated! And a big thanks to Renegade for GMing- the game was entertaining and (I feel) very well balanced, and the writeups were fantastic.

The only suggestion I might make to Renegade (as well as to future GMs) is to limit the number of cycle-extensions you allow. This game basically turned into a Long Game since the majority of day cycle were extended to 48 hours. While I see and understand the need for the occasional cycle extension, players shouldn't be able to rely on them to allow for more discussion. Players ought to go into a game expecting the cycles to end on time and have all the discussions/votes/actions that they want to perform done before the deadlines. /rant

But seriously, great game Renegade!

[TheMightyLopen he/him]

But seriously, great game Renegade!

 

I knew there was forgetting something in my post. Thanks Renegade! It was very fun(and with as many Shardplates as we had I think it was ok for the eliminators to have a Guardsman) and I really enjoyed the write-ups!

[Macen he/him]

I'm happy with my analysis. I needed to combine all of my analysis with my feelings and I was 100% with all of the conspirators. I did waste a lot of my work day post analysis when I looked at heroes title though....

Edited September 22, 2015 by Macen

[Macen he/him]

My only complaint is that you didn't end it yesterday. especially after I posted what was happening (sorry for auto-correct). I wasted like 3 hours analyzing the game that was already over.

Edited September 22, 2015 by Macen