Long Game 46: A Land War in Asia

[Mr Doctor]

It may be worth noting Cadmium Compounder had a suspicion of Fifth Scholar for quite a while, as evidenced here, and he only rescinded that vote once Fifth provided some sort of response, and Elenion became the next-best target. CadCom then posted this last Cycle, which stated that his suspicions of Fifth were still there. He ostensibly voted on Rand only because he wanted a discussion, which proves that he believed Fifth was as much of an Elim as Rand was, but since the focus was on Rand, CadCom likely thought that he could get more discussion and alignment-reading out of people that way.

 

CadCom has been killed by the Elims. He was the first player to bring up analysis of any significance against Fifth, and until now was one of the few to vote on him. Last Night's kill could have been an effective way of quietly removing the most vocal opposition of a teammate, with the Elims hoping that the focus on Rand was distracting everyone so that the kill looked more like a shot in the dark. I'm not sure if I have to go and get my aluminium-lined hat because of how conspiracy-theory that sounds, but I suppose that this game is literally about people conspiring against other people.

 

That's not nearly enough in my books to justify a vote just yet. I'll be on a couple of hours before the end of the Day to give my arguments and vote.

 

Question about game rules: when a new player replaces someone who dropped out, do they take on the role, alignment, and items of the person that they replaced? Because if that's the case, I may end up having to suspect Drake Marshall as much as I did Eternum.

[DeTess she/her]

While it is true that you mentioned him, you only ever did so in relation to what someone else said. You never went through his posts again to establish what you where thinking about his newer posts and you definitely didn't establish a position of whether you where going to vote on him. You did bring up that you wanted to lynch him after that had already happened, which is a rather safe thing to say if you wehre team-mates with him.

Regarding Devotary, he claimed with less than an hour to go, which is  just enough time to get people to move votes, but still leaves a very small window for a counter-claim. Judging by previous cycles, the amount of people on around End of Day was rather low, and he only pinged those whose votes needed to move, so it would have been a safe move for elim!devotary.

I keep bringing it up despite me being wrong and you being right precisely because you where right while, in my opinion, you didn't have anywhere near enough information to be so certain that you felt it safe to start accusing me, unless you where an elim and therefore knew Devotary's claim was likely true.

As for why I voted so late? I literally got on 10 minutes before the cycle ended, and catching up and making my case against Jondesu cost me 9 minutes. By that time I either needed to switch to Devotary, or let myself be lynched when I wasn't certain about Devotary. If you want to accuse me of last-minute hammering, don't lynch me when I'm gone (and have announced that would be the case) for most of the cycle.

Edited June 14, 2018 by randuir

[DeTess she/her]

30 minutes ago, Mr Doctor said:

Question about game rules: when a new player replaces someone who dropped out, do they take on the role, alignment, and items of the person that they replaced? Because if that's the case, I may end up having to suspect Drake Marshall as much as I did Eternum.

Yes, they take over everything from that player. basically the only thing that changes is the name of the one posting.

edit: oops, double post. I hadn't realized that as Doctor ninja'd me.

Edit2: @Mr Doctor, I'd be careful with drawing too many conclusions from individual elim kills, as that's a big pit of IKYK. Overall trends (elims killing mostly loud or mostly quiet players, for example) are useful, but reasons for individual kills can go any which way.

Edited June 14, 2018 by randuir

[Mr Doctor]

I did say that I'd leave further posting until I'd actually gotten some sleep (1am here, and I was trying to fix a sleep schedule), but I'll leave another parting thought to fuel the discussion that will (hopefully) happen when I'm inactive. Rand's last post got me thinking, so here we go.

 

I've stated before that I don't like how Rand is all but refusing to defend himself. I said here that his lack of counterarguments so far could have been him dodging the spotlight long enough for everyone to lose interest. At the time I thought that it was a stretch for someone to do that, but Rand's had plenty of time to provide something that addresses the original arguments against him and has given precious little. I'm rethinking whether or not it is such a stretch.

18 minutes ago, randuir said:

As for why I voted so late? I literally got on 10 minutes before the cycle ended, and catching up and making my case against Jondesu cost me 9 minutes. By that time I either needed to switch to Devotary, or let myself be lynched when I wasn't certain about Devotary. If you want to amke a case against me for last-minute hammering, don't lynch me when I'm gone (and have announced that would be the case) for most of the cycle.

This doesn't address the arguments that people made on the initial vote against you. I don't believe that your vote on Devotary was more telling than anything else, because it was self-preservation. This argument makes sense, but it doesn't change the fact that you seem to be ignoring the original suspicions against you, other than a scattered handful of sentences. I don't necessarily agree with all of the arguments that were made against you, but I do have my own suspicions, and this is now adding to them. Those arguments aren't so important to me, but the fact that you seem to have no response to them is very strange.

If a player ignores the votes against them and instead tries to get on with the game, then it looks like passive misdirection. It also shows that they're not willing to give away anything of their thoughts in a situation where their thoughts are going to be the most subjected to analysis; not only are all eyes on them, but when under pressure, they're more liable to reveal alignment through slip-ups. If they act like the pressure isn't there and refuse to give us anything on the matter, then it makes me think that they have something to hide. This is the same sort of suspicion I had against Eternum for avoiding Elbereth's accusations.

Quote

Okay, what's it with me and getting lynched when I don;t have time to respond? The last two games I got lynched, (three if I get lynched this game) I got lynched while not being around to respond to the votes at all. I've barely read through the thread to properly understand the case against me, but one thing did stand out during my short skim, being Jondesu's argument for Village!me and village!Devotary. That (assuming devotary's claim is true) shows just a bit too much pre-info.

 - Rand, here

Fair enough, but you've had an entire Night and an almost an entire extended Day to read the thread to properly understand that case by now, and you've given us very little.

[DeTess she/her]

@Mr Doctor, I believe the argument against me from D3 was the same as the one just brought by fifth, namely that I seemed to  be hedging Elenion's alignment too much. If there where any other arguments that day that I missed, please link them so I can take a look.

Anyway, as I said when Fifth brought them up, i can see how people came to that conclusion. it assumes I made a pretty big mistake, as elim!me should (and I hope, would) have bussed or hard-defended Elenion, but not remained in the middle, as that would put me in this exact situation. However, as I said in response to fifth already, I was just generally unsure about him.

As for me moving on, that stems from what I said before, I understand where the accusation si coming from, and the only way I see t prove my innocence is to move on and catch an elim. Worst case scenario, I get lynched, but at least in that case I've left analysis of other people that can be evaluated when people know I wasn't trying to manipulate things.

[Rathmaskal he/him]

So, we've reached the point at which other people are hopping on the Fifth bandwagon...which is actually slightly frightening for me.  At this point in the game, we have so many abstentions in voting (fully half of the current 'active' players have at least 2 abstentions) that it's been very easy for elims to hide in the shadows.  The fact that everyone has had to primarily restrict their analysis to people who have been active has, I'm sure, resulted in some bad reads on various people.

With that, here are some of the thoughts that have come across my brains recently:

• randuir seems to have a very strong read of village on me based on a couple of his posts...my biggest concern here is that it could be TOO strong and it could be designed to build trust from me so that I'll come in and help defend against any lynch attempt later on (especially since that was close last day cycle)
• Fifth Scholar and Mr Doctor are still the two most suspicious D1 voters to me
• doc12 has voted twice...for Araris and for Devotary...with an abstention during the Elenion vote in between.  That seems a bit over-the-top elim behavior, but still seems sketchy.
• After reading back through CadCom's posts, assuming the lynch wasn't just random, randuir and Fifth Scholar should be looked at a bit closer.
• Probably the biggest struggle I'm having right now in analyzing people is that we don't have a large enough number of people throwing their suspicions out there for me to really trust the mob.  Right now, most of the lynches and votes have been fairly low numbers (5/3/4 votes have been sufficient for lynching so far).  At this rate, it will be really easy for the elims to continue to affect the vote without putting very much at risk.

That being said, I'm going to stick to my guns and vote for Fifth.  I've become significantly less confident in this vote in the past (earth, not cycle) day or two, but it's still one of my top options.  I have several meetings today, but should be able to hop back in for the last hour of the cycle to see if anyone has anything convincing enough for me to change my vote.

Also,

Quote

Rath likewise, who has been coming up with theories of various sorts.  -Jondesu

Not sure how to take this...haha.  "of various sorts" could be the forum version of "Bless your heart"...but I appreciate getting noticed.

[Dalinar Kholin]

@Drake Marshall I strongly disagree with you reasoning for voting on Fifth. I think it's entirely understandable to want to lynch Randuir (I myself voted on him), and I think there is strong reasoning for it. The other argument brought up in the past (that he's was the final vote on Araris) I think is also bad. Putting the nail in the coffin of a lynch is not a terrible idea, because a single action (if they had it) would get them a second lynch.

@Rathmaskal  I understand your focus, but I think you're tunneling. I suspect at most one, maaaybe two was involved in the day one lynch. Why get involved unless Bugsy is an elim? I'm confused why you're so certain that those people are suspicious.. 

Both of you aren't very confident, yet nonetheless willing to vote for Fifth. This feels like a mislynch waiting to happen. 

[Steeldancer he/him]

@Rebecca @Coop772 @ElephantEarwax I'll be leaving for work soon, so this is my final inactivity warning to you. 

[DeTess she/her]

@Rathmaskal, I don't remember stating a hard village read of you. Did I forget about something?

As my last read on you was fairly neutral afaik, I might as well go and check how that changes though.

*Elevator music plays*

Well, that wasn't particularly enlightening. I'm getting the feeling that Rath ahs played this game before (he said as much), but that's about it. He said nothing that stood out in a negative way, and had little telling interactions with Elenion. That's a decent reason to read him as slightly village for now, but he's someone to keep an eye on.

I've also done a reread of Jondesu, but apart from the thing I highlighted last cycle (he seemed to be jumping quite far to get to the doc=evil conclusion, and though it's not impossible for a villager to do that, it;'s easier for an elim to do because of their insider knowledge), I haven't spotted anything particularly informative on his alignment. It'll be interesting to see how he decides to vote in the coming days, and if he abstains entirely I'll be quite willing to lynch him.

[Dalinar Kholin]

Bort. I want to offer a counter to the Fifth bandwagon. I don't like his activity this day cycle. I vote for Randuir, he proceeds to question my claim, places a vote on me. When I remove my vote on Rand he removes his (notably, not when I defended it, just when I removed it, which I find odd). If he truly had a problem with my logic, then why didn't he keep the vote on regardless of whether I removed my vote. Furthermore, he hasn't done any analysis and it appears he isn't going to put a vote on anyone this cycle. I find that odd for a village, it's possible he just doesn't suspect anyone or is busy. But, @Bort I would like an explanation.

@randuir @Sart @Fifth @Rathmaskal @Jondesu @Drake Marshall Thoughts on Bort?

I find straw's playstyle this game very odd, but I don't have a read on him either way. I agree that the nail in the coffin of Elenion is a strong mark in the favor of Sart. I'm still suspicious of Randuir, but perhaps the play on me is setting up a counterlynch when Rand turns village.

Edited June 14, 2018 by Dalinar Kholin
mispelled something

[Bort he/him]

@Dalinar Kholin

First, a correction. I do have a vote on someone - Doc12. It's in one of my earlier posts.

Second, as to why I removed my vote from you, I got the discussion I wanted from you. You explained your logic, I explained mine, and I decided to follow my own advice, and look at the people that sealed Devotary's fate by keeping their votes on them. Doc12 seemed like a good choice, since he was also part of the bandwagon on Araris on day one.

[Doc12]

Whee another bandwagon. I apologize for being again unable to come up with the huge analysis posts that I promised myself I'd try to do. Problem with these big LGs is that once you lose your footing, it's really hard to recover and regain momentum. I have been scanning the thread, but haven't been doing much analyzing and honestly don't have many strong reads right now. It's 2AM, and really not a good time to try posting, but if I don't post now, I won't post at all today. Bort, if you want your answer to why I didn't retract my vote, here it is: I was fast asleep, as I always am the last five or six hours before turnover. 

It feels wrong not to put a vote, but I am dead tired, and any vote now will be without analysis, which would not provide any information for you guys the next night. I'd rather try hard to catch up on the night cycle to have an argument ready for the next day. 

So....goodnight!

[Rathmaskal he/him]

Dalinar brings up a good point...  I'm going to pull my vote off Fifth for now.  As I mentioned earlier, I should be around for the hour leading up to the end of the day, but I just wanted to check in and see what people had since my last meeting got out a bit early.

[Fifth Scholar he/him]

Alright, before I proceed I just want to ask each person voting on me: why? Rand is mostly off the hook, as he’s explained his vote, but I’d like more justification from everyone else. 

8 hours ago, randuir said:

I keep bringing it up despite me being wrong and you being right precisely because you where right while, in my opinion, you didn't have anywhere near enough information to be so certain that you felt it safe to start accusing me, unless you where an elim and therefore knew Devotary's claim was likely true.

Alternatively, I had just taken a strong stance based on past experience with Devotary, and the stance was due to timing and a lot of evidence I already brought up. The fact that my stance is correct is an IKYK—an Elim could conceivably guess Devotary’s claim was correct, and say so in thread, but if this is as major of a “slip” as you’re implying, an Elim could also cast doubt on Devotary’s claim to lynch her or to gain village cred for “imperfect information” or “progression of thought.”

[DrakeMarshall he/him]

10 hours ago, Fifth Scholar said:

This seems like something you point out and explain, and not something you vote on a person for. In addition, I’d appreciate an explanation as to how my accusation is uncharacteristic of me so I can actually respond to your point. 

Isn't one of the main points you have against Rand that he was pointing out and explaining greivances against Elenion without backing it with a vote, and thus fitting the profile of distancing?

No need to inform me that my vote is poorly explained. As I said, I know it's not great, but it's the best I got right now, on limited information after being thrown into the game mid-cycle. A lot of the other people I suspected from today I am reading pretty village on now, after skimming the backlog of posts (I've mentioned this with Rand, Straw, and Sart). I want to look a bit more closely at Mr Doctor, but also wouldn't mind procrastinating a bit on accusing a newer player. I also want to look more closely at Bort, but that suspicion is no better articulated then the one against you.

I just realized you are currently leading the lynch, so if I was wrong, sorry.

6 hours ago, Dalinar Kholin said:

Both of you aren't very confident, yet nonetheless willing to vote for Fifth. This feels like a mislynch waiting to happen. 

I don't very much agree with the notion that you shouldn't vote if you don't feel confident about it.

 

EDIT: There hasn't been a tally in while, has there?

Vote Tally
Fifth Scholar (2): Drake Marshall, randuir
Bort (1): Dalinar Kholin
Doc12 (1): Bort
Straw (1): Sart
randuir (1): Fifth Scholar

Edited June 14, 2018 by Drake Marshall

[Snipexe he/him]

Ok, I’m joining the Fifth bandwagon. I have one main reason, and that is how Dalinar is defending Fifth, and then trying to start another bandwagon. It doesn’t seem logical, and because of how close it is to the end of the cycle to me it implys a  sense of desperation, and that Fifth and Dalinar are communicating.

Edited June 14, 2018 by Snipexe
On mobile, color tags didn’t work right

[Fifth Scholar he/him]

1 minute ago, Drake Marshall said:

Isn't one of the main points you have against Rand that he was pointing out and explaining greivances against Elenion without backing it with a vote, and thus fitting the profile of distancing?

The point was that Rand stated his thoughts on Len in doublespeak, accusing and defending him in the same posts. Voting wouldn’t have changed that fact. It looked to me like distancing, coupled with potentially trying to subtly give Len towncred. I’ll admit that I’m not as sure as I was a few hours ago on Rand but he’s still the best lead I have. 

I’m mostly fine with poorly explained votes, and sympathize with the position you’re in, but I’d at least like some explanation of why I’m being lynched, if that’s going to be the final outcome of all this. Unfortunately, it will be others that will examine that explanation, as I will likely be gone for the rest of the cycle. Goodbye, and lynch wisely. 

Snipexe, I give you the same question I posed to Drake and Rand earlier; other than the votes themselves, why are you lynching me? 

[DrakeMarshall he/him]

4 minutes ago, Snipexe said:

Ok, I’m joining the Fifth bandwagon. I have one main reason, and that is how Dalinar is defending Fifth, and then trying to start another bandwagon. It doesn’t seem logical, and because of how close it is to the end of the cycle to me it implys a  sense of desperation, and that Fifth and Dalinar are communicating.

Personally, I would not expect Dalinar would defend Fifth quite so openly if they were really elim buddies, but that's a matter of WIFOM I suppose.

[DrakeMarshall he/him]

You know, actually, I'm switching over to Bort. Sorry about doing this in the last hour, but hopefully I'm right so it won't matter.

I have three reasons I choose to do this:

1. Bort is active and cast a vote, but isn't weighing in on the major lynches and suspicions, so I wonder if they are distancing somebody.

2. Additionally, I gathered some stats, and prior to Len's flip, Bort avoided bringing up Len in his posts basically more than any other living player.

3. My vote creates a tie, and while I haven't quite gotten to reading the latest rules for this game, I'm pretty sure there's a fun tie mechanic.

EDIT: Tallies galore!

Vote Tally
Bort (2): Dalinar Kholin, Drake Marshall
Fifth Scholar (2): Sart, randuir
Sart (2): Mr Doctor, Snipexe
Doc12 (1): Bort
randuir (1): Fifth Scholar

Edited June 14, 2018 by Drake Marshall
Updated vote tally.

[Mr Doctor]

Well, I’ve so far been unable to come up with much new analysis. I don’t feel confident enough in my views on the current targets for lynch, so I’ll refrain from voting on them. In fact, I don’t have much in the way of confidence in my suspicions of anyone.

 

I will be keeping an eye on Drake Marshall because he inherited Eternum’s position, and I’ve been suspicious of Eternum for a while now. However, it feels like a really nasty move to vote on someone solely on the actions and analysis of the player that they replaced, on the same turn that they appeared. Such a vote wouldn’t give Drake any chance to defend himself, as he doesn’t have any history to draw upon and can’t exactly explain what Eternum was thinking. I’ll keep an eye on Drake, because if Eternum was still around then my vote would still be on him.

 

For lack of a better option, Sart. I don’t feel like the vote on Straw has any real bearing (which doesn't indicate much, but it's something), and I haven’t been especially impressed with his ability to defend himself against scrutiny in the last turn or so. As much as I like his arguments in favour of self-preservation, you don’t need to be an upstanding Villager in order to make good arguments. I don’t believe that his votes on Devotary and Rand were justified very well either, and I'm generally unsure of him due to other reasons. I’ve gone over that here, so I’ll refrain from repeating myself for everyone’s sake, and because it’s not long until turnover and I’ve left my vote to the last minute again. If anyone wants a bit more depth to my reasoning I can provide that during the Night. Turnover is generally at a decent enough time for me, but only if I get up earlier than I usually do. Which I didn’t.

[DrakeMarshall he/him]

4 minutes ago, Mr Doctor said:

I will be keeping an eye on Drake Marshall because he inherited Eternum’s position, and I’ve been suspicious of Eternum for a while now. However, it feels like a really nasty move to vote on someone solely on the actions and analysis of the player that they replaced, on the same turn that they appeared. Such a vote wouldn’t give Drake any chance to defend himself, as he doesn’t have any history to draw upon and can’t exactly explain what Eternum was thinking. I’ll keep an eye on Drake, because if Eternum was still around then my vote would still be on him.

Actually, you have my leave to vote on me if you want. Since I can still defend Eternum's behavior prior to the switch, which I do believe is indicative of town alignment, even if I can't get in their head.

Edited June 14, 2018 by Drake Marshall
I made an error? INCONCEIVABLE!

[Snipexe he/him]

Sart, because there might finally be a chance to lynch him, and I'd much rather lynch him then fifth, because he reads as much more as an elim to me. He has be posting bizarrely, and just generally seems weird. i have made reference to this previously, and I just really suspect him.

I'm switching my vote because of this:

54 minutes ago, Drake Marshall said:

Personally, I would not expect Dalinar would defend Fifth quite so openly if they were really elim buddies, but that's a matter of WIFOM I suppose.

 

[Sart he/him]

Well, now I'm threatened by any vote changes. Fifth Scholar. I killed an Elim in the votes for pete's sake.

[DrakeMarshall he/him]

A three way tie?

INCONCEIVABLE!

[Sart he/him]

Actually, that doesn't work. Bort