Long Game 25: A Breath of Power

[luckat she/her]

8 minutes ago, Assassin in Burgundy said:

@luckat, I'm paying attention. This is my first game so I'm still trying to figure out how this all works.

Thanks for responding. Good luck figuring it out.  But did you hide your post? Because you aren't supposed to do that, and if you don't have a post in the thread no one will be able to tell if you're paying attention.

15 minutes ago, Magestar said:

I'm going to be entering the breath lottery every night until I can get a lifeless or two.  I think I can have two.  I hope so.  I see no reason not to enter the lottery every night until you can perform the action limit.  So, yeah.

Also, I think it will be more important for the village to get lifeless and straw men then to get Rabbits.  We need to survive, we have a day lynch, and once we have a few lifeless, some of us should save to get Rabbits.  Actually, a few should start saving right away, and anyone who has lifeless should protect them.

Most of this does not work without cooperation, and a good deal of knowledge.  Unfortunately, it appears to be very difficult to find out who is who in this particular game.

It wouldn't hurt to use your second action to store a Breath in Awakened Clothing if you have more than one Breath and retrieve it when you have enough Breath to make something more useful. Then at least if the Returned steal your Breath, they won't get as much, and you'll have the Clothing for in case it's ever useful. I agree that Strawmen and Lifeless are most important for the village. And remember, if anyone wants to make a Lifeless Rabbit, they can put their initial Breath in a Lifeless or Strawman to use until they have enough total Breath for the Rabbit, and then retrieve the Breath from the old object, so saving up Breath for later isn't necessary.

[Dani she/her]

@luckat I've been reading through the threads, but I just don't know who to be suspicious of, or what things make you suspicious of each other. From what I've read, it's mostly that players acting differently catch suspicion. I wouldn't know who usually acts how, so I'm kind of just understanding the game for a cycle or two.  

[Magestar he/him]

Yeah, I made some lifeless clothing, before I remembered that I could retrieve it.  I'm glad of that now.

[Assassin in Burgundy he/him]

@luckat Sorry about that. I probably need to reread the rules 

[Ecthelion III he/him]

I'm dead unless I win the lottery, so peace out.

[Doc12]

@Ecthelion III do you have any suspects before you go? 

Yes I know you still suspect me. Any others? 

[TheMightyLopen he/him]

I don't really have much to add to your advice luckat, besides that I agree with most everything you've suggested. I think you're right that Lifeless and Strawmen are the most profitable uses of Breath at this point in the game, since Ropes are kind of a shot in the dark and Rabbits are just the same, but actually kill people.  That usually doesn't end well during the first few Cycles(I'm speaking from experience here >>). But yeah, that's about it.

[Elbereth she/her]

LG25: Day Two - Stillness

The night was still again, as it had always been before recent days. No floorboards creaked in the middle of the night. No doors slipped open and shut. No daggers gleamed in the darkness. There was only a tiny flicker of color, in a tiny corner of the town, and then it was gone and the night was quiet again.

But... all was not right. The night was silent, but it was no longer calm. Death had come to leave its mark, as it always did. And the deaths were not over. Somehow, every sleeping mind sensed that, and tossed and turned in dreams of darkness. Death had paused for a moment, the last frozen moment before the knife plunged down into an unsuspecting back. 

But it was returning, and soon enough the night would be filled with stifled screams. For now, though, there was only a slowly growing fear, and a stillness as fragile as glass.

---

Breath was stolen! 
No one died!

Day Two has begun. You have 48 hours to decide who to lynch. 

Quicklinks

 

Signups
Night Zero
Day One
Night One

Player List

 

1. Luckat (Lularah)
2. Bugsy (Unknown)
3. Araris (Alalar)
4. Assassin in Burgundy (Burganaa)
5. Magestar (Yulis Zorander)
6. The Only Alex
7. Silverblade (Ryth)
8. Conquestor (Lorien)
9. SilverDragon (Jaftar)
10. Mark (Darb)
11. Elodin (Eventeo)
12. Sheep (Kelek)
13. Deathclutch (Asher McClallen)
14. Straw (Pallelae Hominis)
15. Paranoid King (Plathar Ku)
16. Daniyah (Dimsari)
17. Ecthelion (mysterious cloaked figure)
18. Lopen (Talion)
19. Frozen Mint (Shivawn)
20. Dalinar Kholin (Varg)
21. Meta (Cog)
22. Doctor12 (the Healer)
23. Twei (Kolth)
24. Bard (Brick)

Edited August 24, 2016 by Elbereth
breath was stolen

[Araris Valerian he/him]

Well, I guess Ecthelion won the Breath lottery, so lucky him. I'll start off the cycle with a vote on Magestar because of his statements during the night cycle, which were generic and villagery but didn't actually add anything productive to the conversation, in my opinion.

If we didn't have an inactivity filter, I would jump at those players, but we do, so hopefully we can get a bit more discussion this cycle.

[Magestar he/him]

They were generic and villagery, but because they didn't give you anything, you'll vote for me?  Really?

Why do I have to put up with this.

I don't have a lot of time right now, so sometime this afternoon (for the east coast) I will post my reads, gut feelings, ideas, etc.

[Conquestor he/him]

What if  Ecthelion is a returned because he might be that one role that if you are a drab and die, then you become a returned instead. I mean, it's funny that the last cycle he had to live, then he happens to win at the lottery? I just think it's a little weird, unless someone can claim they gave her breath.

Edited August 24, 2016 by Conquestor

[Doc12]

10 minutes ago, Conquestor said:

What if  Ecthelion is a returned because she might be that one role that if you are a drab and die, then you become a returned instead. I mean, it's funny that the last cycle she had to live, then she happens to win at the lottery? I just think it's a little weird, unless someone can claim they gave her breath.

Eh, friend Conq, Ecth is a guy. 

The avatar throws you off eh? 

 

Anyway, there are really only three reasons he lives. 

1.) someone passed breath.  unlikely, as no one claimed to do so, and no one died last night. 

2.he got lucky at lottery 

3.He was a potential returned. 

Of course, he'd claim the second one. We'll see. 

Edited August 24, 2016 by Doctor12

[Magestar he/him]

I also won the lottery.  Not sure if multiple people can do that, but I think they can.

The fact that Drab can return in this game is weird.  I understand it, mechanics-wise, but it just keeps messing with my head. 

Yeah, the avatar throws me off as well.

Edited August 24, 2016 by Magestar

[AliasSheep]

3 hours ago, Magestar said:

They were generic and villagery, but because they didn't give you anything, you'll vote for me?  Really?

Why do I have to put up with this.

I don't have a lot of time right now, so sometime this afternoon (for the east coast) I will post my reads, gut feelings, ideas, etc.

Generic and villagery makes you seem like an Elim because they're so unremarkable posts that an elim would be able to pass as a villager when making them.

[Magestar he/him]

3 minutes ago, AliasSheep said:

Generic and villagery makes you seem like an Elim because they're so unremarkable posts that an elim would be able to pass as a villager when making them.

I don't know what to say to that.  I feel like if I say something villager-y, you will say I am an Elim trying to seem like a villager.  What do you want me to do, act like an Elim?  That makes no sense.

I have time now, so I will post some of my suspicions.

I would have an Elim read on Ecth, but if their breath was really stolen, that makes no sense.  So, mostly confusion.

Frozen Mint gave me bit of an Elim read the first day, when she voted on me for no real reason, it seems like they were probably told to do it in a Doc or something.  Same with Mark, although he did it better.

Slight Elim read on Bard, not really sure.  

My village reads are on Luckat, and a little bit on Conq.  Doctor seems like they are trying to be helpful... Idk.

I have really mixed feelings about Meta. I... I just don't know.

Everyone else has been really quiet so far, or I just don't have anything on.

[AliasSheep]

Just now, Magestar said:

I don't know what to say to that.  I feel like if I say something villager-y, you will say I am an Elim trying to seem like a villager.  What do you want me to do, act like an Elim?  That makes no sense.

It's that they're both generic and villagery.  Saying something villagery is an indicator of being village, but if the posts are vague or without large amounts of accusations, or just generic in general, then it's going to seem like an Elim for the reason I stated above.

[Magestar he/him]

Ah.  I see.    Well, in my last post I tried to be helpful.  I'll see how this goes.

[Paranoid King he/him]

Here's my philosophy: The villagers have no info D1. The eliminators have all the info. Therefore, the lynch will be steered toward a villager. So I think Magestar is innocent. Just thinking meta was normal and missing that someone lost breath doesn't seem like strong evidence that he's an eliminator. Neither does not talking about the lynch during the night cycle.

I'm voting for Araris, because after lynching one of the two villager candidates, he switched to the other one immediately at the beginning of the next night cycle. His reasoning for voting for bugsy was that he was suspicious of him, and would rather he die than have a coinflip. Fair enough, but if bugsy is innocent, why would that mean that mage is guilty?

Edit:

Araris and AliasSheep, how do you tell if a post is "Villagerey" or not? An Elim can make villager posts, just like a village can make Elim posts.

I can say, "So I was talking with some other people in a ... PM ... and we decided that the best thing the villagers could do is to not vote on anybody. That way, we'll be forced to vote on people if we want to lynch them, so you'll know who w- the Elim are. It can't hurt to try it for just a cycle or two."

But a villager could say that. So could an incredibly poor eliminator. You can judge whether a post is villager or not if it contradicts knowledge you know is true, or if they vote for someone you're pretty sure is a villager. But commentary about the game can be made by anyone.

Edited August 24, 2016 by Paranoid King
To avoid a double-post

[AliasSheep]

1 hour ago, Paranoid King said:

Araris and AliasSheep, how do you tell if a post is "Villagerey" or not? An Elim can make villager posts, just like a village can make Elim posts.

I was just defining "Villagery" as "a post that the reader would consider to be indicative of a village player" or "a post that the reader thinks a village player would post".  I'm not necessarily good at finding them myself, but that's what I interpreted as a good definition for explaining Araris' point.

[Araris Valerian he/him]

Good point, Conquestor. I posted about that earlier, but then totally forgot when this cycle started. I'm not really sure what the best way to deal with that situation is. We could ask people to reveal if they won in the lottery, but if 1 or more returned lied about it, then there is no way for us to get accurate information about the number of winners. And that would in turn just tell the Returned who now has extra breath to be stolen. If we roleblock Ecthelion 3 rounds in a row, then that should kill him, unless he wins the lottery, and assuming that he is returned. This is because he would have only 1 breath after returning. I'm not sure if it is worth doing that, but it is at least a possible plan.

I totally agree PK, that the village has no information day 1. That also means that the eliminators don't really have to do any lynch steering. Actually, if I'm an eliminator, then that would probably make Magestar more suspicious since I directed the lynch away from him. At this stage of the game, lynches give information, and I don't have anything against lynching Magestar. I never said that I wanted to avoid a coinflip. I was just backing up a statement I had made earlier in the game with my actions. The exact wording of my post is this:

Quote

Well, I said that I found both Bard and Bugsy suspicious, and since Bard doesn't appear to be up for the lynch, I'll back up my words with a vote switch to Bugsy.

I would say a generic villagery post is "For me to win, we need to team up and share information, which is going to be hard to do." (Not a reference to a specific post)

There is emphasis on the player's win condition, and a vague hint at strategy, but nothing actually useful.

Quote

Well, I am now openly frustrated with this turn of Events.  It would have been the same outcome whichever of us you had decided to lynch, but I am still annoyed that we lost a villager.  I hope things go better tonight.

Quote

I'm going to be entering the breath lottery every night until I can get a lifeless or two.  I think I can have two.  I hope so.  I see no reason not to enter the lottery every night until you can perform the action limit.  So, yeah.

Also, I think it will be more important for the village to get lifeless and straw men then to get Rabbits.  We need to survive, we have a day lynch, and once we have a few lifeless, some of us should save to get Rabbits.  Actually, a few should start saving right away, and anyone who has lifeless should protect them.

Most of this does not work without cooperation, and a good deal of knowledge.  Unfortunately, it appears to be very difficult to find out who is who in this particular game.

 

The only really informative thing here in these posts is that Magestar is planning to get lifeless. Due to the statement at the end, the rest is just fluff, as I see it. Magestar did give us a list of his reads. If he votes on one of them (or elsewhere), I might consider sending my vote to someone else.

[Magestar he/him]

I think the best person to vote on right now would be Frozen Mint, partially because I think they are the least active of my suspicions, partially because I feel like voting on someone right now, to spark some discussion, seeing as so few people are, and partially because of Araris.    If @Frozen Mint can provide a decent argument against this, I'll switch to Mark.

I feel like we should be having a whole lot more in thread discussion, considering the number of players we have.  We have a current rate of less then a post an hour here.  Seriously.  And it's mostly the same people.

Edited August 24, 2016 by Magestar

[Araris Valerian he/him]

@Magestar: You didn't actually place a vote. @Ecthelion III: I would like to hear what you have to say, both on what happened to you and who you are suspicious of right now.

I would like some feedback on whether or not we should try and figure the probability of winning the breath lottery (so, have people reveal their results of the lottery). It would at least give us approximate odds of Ecthelion being a returned, and future players that don't get killed by being drab.

I actually didn't enter the lottery, due to confusing cycles in MR 16 with this game. So that would slightly raise the chance that Ecthelion recieved Breath.

[Magestar he/him]

Oops.  Stupid BBC code.  I tried to place a vote, but apparently... Actually, I have no idea what happened.

[Metacognition he/him]

So I had quite the conversation with Magestar in PMs over the night and while he hasn't allayed all of my suspicion of him, I'm at least willing to give him the benefit of the doubt for now. But, if Mark is a villager (I highly doubt it), I'll probably be going back to him because part of my read on Mark is based on the idea of Magestar being innocent. 

As I eluded to, I went back through the first day and I really think that Mark is most likely a Returned. 

To start with, he contacted me during Night Zero basically just because. He asked me if I had anything I wanted to say to him even though basically nothing had happened. This, in and of itself, wouldn't be all that concerning as I could see villagers creating preemptive PMs just as likely. But, when combined with everything else, I think this was Mark wanting to have a means of getting my thoughts before I went to the thread with them. A way to keep tabs on me and see if I was suspicious of him or his teammates. 

So starting with Night Zero: 

Quote

Nothing much to say except meta seemed a but suspicious,  calling bard out for poke voting. Sure, it was a night turn, (and so, he's calling bard good, not evil) but still. I've never seen him say that before. Actually, I've never studied him talking before. But, this is my observation. I might be reading too much into it.

He starts off fairly suspicious of me, but also seems to be hedging about it as well. Almost as if he doesn't want to get the blame for if/when I die. 

Then the PM happens, which seems a bit weird to me. Kind of like he wanted to see how I felt about him accusing me in thread. We talk for a bit and he tries to get my breath total out of me by supposedly telling me his total. So he was already fishing for information. Then, I tell him about one of the rudimentary plans I had to help us find Returned. I told him that I was exhausted though, due to being so busy at the start of this game, and I'd try to get it up tomorrow. Then Mark offers to post it instead. To me, it felt like he was trying to take some credit for the idea which would make sense if he was a Returned. If he could attach his name to a plan that he knew came from a villager to stop the Returned, then that would make him look a lot more like a villager later on. 

That's the last I hear from him, which makes sense for the 180 he did once Day 1 started. 

Quote

Hmmm...  I've done some thinking, and I find Magestar to be more suspicious. I was originally going to vote for bugsy, but I find that I would've said almost exactly what he said in most situations. Given that this lynch isn't really in the hands of villagers, I think I should just vote, rather than hesitate. So, there.

Ah.. didn't see meta's post until I finished. Regardless, I think I agree with him to an extent

The next time that Mark mentions me, he's gone from suspicious of me to voting along beside me. And again, hedging on why he's voting a certain way. Plus, I think that his wording, "Given that this lynch isn't really in the hands of villagers" sounds like a slip up to me. How was that lynch not in the hands of the villagers? We'd only had a few votes by that point in time and there was still plenty of time and there were a lot of people who hadn't voted yet. 

But what really got me when I read back through was this whole bit that he said next: 

Quote

But, one thing I noticed was that the reason people called out meta's playstyle this game was not that he was posting less, but rather that he specifically targetted one person. Granted that that's what he does every game, I'm still not convinced behind his reason for voting. But, given that Meta is (or rather is going to be, if he lives) one of the main drivers of conversation, it would be useful if he lived atleast for the start of the game (and until the end if he were villager.)

This just doesn't make sense to me. It sounds like he's trying to put suspicion on me, but then goes on to say that it's something that I do every game? He votes with me, but isn't convinced by my reasoning? And finally, I don't even know what to make of the last part, but it does seem like he's using outside knowledge to come to those conclusions. This entire thing just seems to be a bunch of double talk. Meta is suspicious, but he's not. He could die or he might not. It's like he doesn't want to come off too strongly in either direction; much like an Eliminator would want.

Finally, last night:

Quote

I'm me! Does that help, @Magestar?

Quote

Well, that wasn't really sarcasm, just silliness. 

He doesn't seem all that concerned about the possibility that he could be the next target from the Returned. In fact, he's downright nonchalant. Perhaps because he knows he won't be targeted due to being a Returned?

 

So that's my case. I really think I'm on to something here. And if I'm right, we soft clear Magestar as well since the vote was pretty close and I don't think they would've taken that big of a risk. Magestar was pretty well set to be lynched until fairly late in the day after all. 

[Paranoid King he/him]

4 minutes ago, Metacognition said:

Finally, last night:

He doesn't seem all that concerned about the possibility that he could be the next target from the Returned. In fact, he's downright nonchalant. Perhaps because he knows he won't be targeted due to being a Returned?

You're really reaching there, Meta.

Regardless, I agree with you. Mark was fairly high on my priority list as well, because of his vote placement on D1. He sent me a PM as well, but mostly just talked about how the eliminators probably entered the lottery.

Who else got a PM from Mark, and was anything important shared?