Long Game 59: Shadows and Spikes

[Furamirionind They/Any/All]

Good game everyone. My goal for my Hoid claim at the end was basically to just make people do a double take. I hoped, but didn't actually expect to convince anyone I was Hoid. I'm no Aman after all. : )
Stick played a marvelous game, and unfortunately, once we figured out it was role madness, it was a bit easy to clear people. If people had followed my roleclaim, It would have given Stick the game, and I would have been happy with that.
I said I destroyed the Atium spike, which Stick of course knew was false, but part of me was hoping she'd play along... I understand not doing so though.
Also, Drake, where's your sense of fun? : P
I also didn't think the abilities I gave myself were that bad. lol.

I don't have a lot more to say off the top of my head... but quick note to Venture:

Did I not make it clear enough? I even edited my post to prove it. : P

Now to read the docs! : )

Edited September 13, 2019 by Furamirionind

[DrakeMarshall he/him]

Thank you for running this game, Lum and Coop. I don't think I can overstate my appreciation for GMs for these games.

Hopefully I have redeemed my mistakes on D2 by pushing the lynch the right way on D3.

It was interesting how this setup dealt with having relatively few players (considering the low-ish player count, the activity was pretty good though). On one hand, the village had a comparatively large number of confirmable roles, and on the other, the eliminators had LyLo by D3. Each of these things is a fairly significant advantage, and it isn't obvious to me that one outweighs the other, but the game was definitely going to be decided one way or the other in the course of only a few cycles.

20 minutes ago, Furamirionind said:

Also, Drake, where's your sense of fun? : P

Well, you had come sort of close to actually convincing me, is the thing.

If I had known for sure what you were doing, I would have probably played along. But as it was, I was genuinely going through my thought process in the thread, trying to figure out if you were telling the truth or not.

[CadCom he/him]

Oh wow. This game was extremely fun. I really enjoyed playing it, and I'm glad that I was able to participate. 

@Lumgol, thank you for running this. I realize that there were  less people than you originally expected, but I still think you did a decent job at balancing the game. I would say that the game was relatively evenly balance, but with a steep slippery slope on either side (More so on the village victory side). Once one side gained the advantage, it became basically impossible for the other side to regain any semblance of winning. 

@_Stick_ I really think your efforts were amazing. I'm glad I was able to catch you when I did, but It would have been funner if you had been able to convert someone either night. I should have let you pull off the conversion, and If I knew in some way that you would have converted me, I probably would have let it go through. 

[Furamirionind They/Any/All]

Oh, I should also apologize to Aman for not trusting you.  I was pretty sure you were village, but not 100% (Which I mean, no on should be 100% sure : P ), but between reading you as village, and believing your story as to why/how that happened, I really should have pushed harder against your lynch.

I know when I played with Orlok, he was pretty frustrated with his reputation too, as it made it extremely difficult to just play the game for fun, as the elims are always quick to kill him, and the village is quick to lynch him.

---

I had something else to put here, but I forgot it... : )

[Amanuensis he/him]

29 minutes ago, DrakeMarshmallow said:

Hopefully I have redeemed my mistakes on D2 by pushing the lynch the right way on D3.

Considering I was the one gunning for the Inquisitor D2 while you pushed the lynch on a Seeker, I'm not so sure

I'm a little sad that the game was concluded. Had I still been alive, I would have argued that Stick be allowed to Convert for the fun of it. With people anticipating her going for one of the vote manipulators, it would have been really fun to see if Stick threw a wrench into things by converting someone like Cicada, or if she'd convert Rath/Drake and play IKYK games with you all until you lynched her the third time.

1 minute ago, Furamirionind said:

I know when I played with Orlok, he was pretty frustrated with his reputation too, as it made it extremely difficult to just play the game for fun, as the elims are always quick to kill him, and the village is quick to lynch him.

Exactly this tbh. I harbor no anger or bad feelings over what happened since it's my own fault for not double checking the allomantic metals before I posted, but it really isn't fun / is really discouraging for me when people take the whole reputation too far. It's a large part of why I don't play much anymore.

Edited September 13, 2019 by Amanuensis

[Furamirionind They/Any/All]

4 minutes ago, Amanuensis said:

Exactly this tbh. I harbor no anger or bad feelings over what happened since it's my own fault for not double checking the allomantic metals before I posted, but it really isn't fun / is really discouraging for me when people take the whole reputation too far. It's a large part of why I don't play much anymore.

You could always just do RP. : P
I've heard legendary rumors about your RP too, but never got to experience much of it. ; )

[Lumgol she/her]

11 minutes ago, DrakeMarshmallow said:

It was interesting how this setup dealt with having relatively few players (considering the low-ish player count, the activity was pretty good though). On one hand, the village had a comparatively large number of confirmable roles, and on the other, the eliminators had LyLo by D3. Each of these things is a fairly significant advantage, and it isn't obvious to me that one outweighs the other, but the game was definitely going to be decided one way or the other in the course of only a few cycles.

Yep. I think if I had to change it at all, I would basically just remove Iron spikes, but also make a few village roles less powerful, the Seer for example. With the slow conversion rates, the Inquisitor will want to use the Iron spike above all else, which just gives less time for the other spikes with their fancy fancy powers. I really wanted to see the fancy spikey powers in action. XD

[Stick. she/her]

GG everyone  Great write up, Lum. XD 

10 hours ago, Furamirionind said:

I said I destroyed the Atium spike, which Stick of course knew was false, but part of me was hoping she'd play along... I understand not doing so though

I do always play SE with the intention of having fun first and winning second, and I admit it would’ve been very fun to convert, but with the MR having started off I figured it’d be best to end the game here. Plus I’d feel bad for stripping the village of its victory xD. I wasn’t sure how many of us would pick having fun over winning. 

9 hours ago, Amanuensis said:

it would have been really fun to see if Stick threw a wrench into things by converting someone like Cicada, or if she'd convert Rath/Drake and play IKYK games with you all until you lynched her the third time.

My plan was to keep going for Rath until it went through xD 

I think my only concern with the game was that the village had way too many ways of clearing each other, with the whole role madness thing going on. Also how the game could only go one way or the other after D3 - the low number of players is probably to blame for that. But regardless, it was enjoyable. Thank you Lum and Coop for taking the time to run this game! 

[DrakeMarshall he/him]

19 hours ago, Amanuensis said:

Considering I was the one gunning for the Inquisitor D2 while you pushed the lynch on a Seeker, I'm not so sure

I'm a little sad that the game was concluded. Had I still been alive, I would have argued that Stick be allowed to Convert for the fun of it. With people anticipating her going for one of the vote manipulators, it would have been really fun to see if Stick threw a wrench into things by converting someone like Cicada, or if she'd convert Rath/Drake and play IKYK games with you all until you lynched her the third time.

Exactly this tbh. I harbor no anger or bad feelings over what happened since it's my own fault for not double checking the allomantic metals before I posted, but it really isn't fun / is really discouraging for me when people take the whole reputation too far. It's a large part of why I don't play much anymore.

I am sorry for lynching you. There are signs I should have seen that pointed towards your innocence. I wasn't willing to change my mind, in part in response to your suspicion against me the previous cycle, and I really should have been.

But I don't think you're being completely fair here. I clearly do not know the whole of your experience with people taking reputation too far, but speaking as the person whose thought processes largely invoked your recent lynch, are you willing to consider that this may not be the case in this game?

Do you believe that in this game, your reputation prevented you from getting a fair chance?

• You got unlucky and made an understandable mixup, but it resulted in a false claim. Yes, reputation absolutely changes the character of how people respond to the situation, but people without a reputation have certainly been mislynched over lesser misunderstandings. Indeed, by your own reasoning, simply being active and not yet having cleared myself in your eyes was lynchworthy, or at least scanworthy, one cycle prior.
• You were reasonably close to not getting lynched. Had I not pushed hard for lynching you, other players would have let it be, as they were already doing before I posted. Or had we not both been kind of busy with ongoing other stuff, there is also a reasonable chance your lynch would have been averted.
• I kind of go out of my way to give you a fair chance. I've never really been one to suggest or agree with a D1 lynch or nightkill on you or anyone in a similar position, for the exact reasons you are stating, because when something like that starts happening one too many times, it's really not alright. I am always a bit reluctant to target you unless I have a reason to target you and you specifically, which really isn't something I do for most players. It's just that I did perceive a reason to target you specifically in this game. Perhaps you believe I should have known better, and you would be right, but I legitimately believed you were evil, and so I acted on it.

Regardless, insofar as you have a legitimate grievance, please do not hold it against anyone else here but me. Yeah other people voted for you, but the fault was mainly mine, and not something I would want you to hold against the shard or SE as a whole.

[Amanuensis he/him]

Like I said, nothing personal.

I do think that if a vast majority of players posted exactly what I did, they would have been given the benefit of the doubt and allowed another night turn to prove their role. Heck, a Village Tineye could have easily confirmed if I was honest or not while I checked another player's role, and the village would have benefited a lot more for giving the only claimed Seeker a chance over lynching the "Inquisitor" that day, should I really be them.

That and your reasons for suspecting me directly contradicted the inevitable conclusion of me being evil. You were suspicious of me for basing my current read of you off other people's observations instead of my own, while insisting I was paying enough attention to figure out your role from an extremely obscure comment among an ocean of words. In my honest opinion, one of those facts could not simultaneously exist with the other in a game without PMs.

It's all good. It's just a symptom of a recurring problem with "veterans". It is my opinion that past games should not impact current ones. Just because I have lied to save myself in the past doesn't mean I always lie. And like with the vanilla claim, it doesn't mean a lie isn't for the benefit of the village.

It's not exactly a me thing. I take issue with the stubbornness more than anything. Given the facts I presented that turn, the possibility of me being honest should not have been discarded so easily.

But I suspect no matter what, we will both harbor the belief we were in the right. And honestly?

That's okay.

ED1T: Good game everyone. I wish it could have lasted a bit longer, but everyone played phenomenally.

Edited September 14, 2019 by Amanuensis

[DrakeMarshall he/him]

I suppose I do believe past games should impact current ones. I'm glad Anonymous Games are an option, and hope more of them appear if possible, but yeah. This game is a game about lying, and at least to me, a legitimate factor in how lying works is that it can sometimes make things harder when you succeed at it.

36 minutes ago, Amanuensis said:

But I suspect no matter what, we will both harbor the belief we were in the right. And honestly?

That's okay.

Agreed. I kind of hope we understand where the other is coming from a bit better now, but I'm fine with agreeing to disagree on this.

[Furamirionind They/Any/All]

Idk, I took issue with Aman's death the same reason I took issue with mine in LG56.
After reflecting on the game, I don't think the issue is actually reputation, just circumstance.
There is of course an issue with reputation, but as I was killed in that game for the same fundamental reason Aman was killed here, it doesn't make sense reputation is the issue, as... I have none. : )

anyways, I had more to say, but if the conversation is over, I won't post it.

[Elbereth she/her]

It's well past time for this game to be closed up. Many thanks to Lumgol for running such a fun game, and managing it well even with so few players. (Also, that aftermath writeup is hilarious.) Well done to Stick for being an excellent inquisitor, and I'd also like to point out the interesting discussion re: experienced players that was had in the aftermath for being important and level-headed. Congrats to the village for winning, and see you in the next game!

As always, if anyone would like to try their hand at running a game, please get ahold of Wilson, Fifth Scholar, Devotary of Spontaneity, or myself. Not only will we get you added to the list, but we'd also be more than willing to help out in any way we can. 

You can also ask questions and get some hints and feedback from everyone in our Art of Game Creation thread. With all the games that we've run so far, we have plenty of experienced GMs that can help you refine any game you're thinking about. If you would rather keep some detail secret, or are self-conscious about posting in thread (there's really no need to be; while we do slaughter each other, we are very polite about it), then I'm sure one of our fantastic committee members (Amanuensis, Araris Valerian, Stink, Elandera, or Sart) would be more than willing to help you out in private.

Thanks again to everyone that played, and we look forward to killing seeing you in future games!  

Edited May 23, 2020 by Elbereth