Long Game 73: The Forgotten Coup

[Ashbringer]

SHADOWBLAAAAAAAAZE!

Mine.

[Kasimir]

[OOC: My two PM buddies are gone. I am going for the gun. 

I think I know what you were thinking, Alv. Don't know if you approve of this message but the gun is mine.]

[Gears]

I'm surprised they haven't killed Kas yet. Then again, TJ had the Lantern [feeds my Araris suspicions]. Good for STINK. Village, send many people after the Book of Warding so the elims don't get it. Sidenote: Based on scans and actions, I trust Araris a little. They've consistently gotten and used Defense items. Then again, this could be the elim strategy of stockpiling Defense and garnering village trust while getting them hooked on a bit of Defense. Combined with the Lantern kill... I still don't like that post where they voted for Striker. Also, we should really try to coordinate the gun snatching [EDIT: Kas the ninja, coordinating guns before I said to coordinate guns. Good on you.] Then again, a bussed elim could snatch it to try to kill a villager like how Order did. 

People currently on my radar: Ventyl, Devotary, Striker, Araris. [I'll look at them later, I'm a bit busy now. Maybe in 20-24 hours.]

Items we NEED: Shadowblaze [URGENT], Book of Warding, Lantern [SIGNIFICANTLY LESS URGENT]. Swarm them if you have to. Just get them [less so with the Lantern, but still very useful]. If you get the Shadowblaze today, you will become an immediate target. Pass it or LoF and pass it some other time. Alternatively, die with it. If you do so, we have a confirmed villager in Archer [who would be a suspect for their behavior if they weren't the NR]

Items we WANT: Chalk, Crabs, Acid, Maps. Acquire, they are helpful. 

Edited February 10, 2021 by Gears

[Kasimir]

20 minutes ago, Gears said:

Shadowblaze [URGENT]

[OOC: Hard disagree on Book of Warding. Only matters if people actually draw the lines. Shadowblaze keeps Archer on our side, and more importantly, adds a passive +1 to Defense, meaning a LoW drawn by a Shadowblaze-holder will still be equivalent to a LoW drawn by a Warder+. Would rather err on the side of getting the Shadowblaze - at most there's three of them (likely), and probability is not on their side.

I'd take my own advice but I'm implementing Alv's plan (which I think to be a good one. We'll see about that. Dovie'andi se tovya sagain.]

[Archer]

I'll caution that if we exe an Elim today, they're likely to grab the gun to take out a villager as they go, as TUO did. I recommend no one touch it until tonight. 

 Ventyl, did you pass the clock? 

Someone may grab the Shadowblaze and pass it to me tonight, so the earliest point I can become an Elim is the next Day.

I'd passed my map to TJ yesterday, forgetting they already had one. He suspected he or Kas would be NKed. 

There's 14 of us left. Let's assume 3 elims for a second, although my gut says there's only 2 more. The Book of Revocation is the most valuable item for the elims, so let's get someone villagey going for it. The logistics of the Shadowblaze are complicated enough I think they'll not grab it and instead try to steal it later. If they grab it and pass it to me, it's really blatant. If the village starts having too low defence, that's also painfully obvious. 

Please remember to submit your actions. At least one person should get a map, but getting the chalk is also very important. We can only get 11 things, so maybe avoid too much overlap. Elims will go for what they can use before what they can deprive the village of. 

Edited February 10, 2021 by Archer

[StrikerEZ]

@Kasimir Would you want to try and go for the gun with me? We could go out as RP brothers.

[+Lotus]

Good job STINK! I knew you had it in you.

[Devotary of Spontaneity]

It is a problem that an elim up for the exe could go for the gun and potentially kill anyone else trying for it. Roleblocking the exe target would make that no longer a concern. On that note, we only want one person to go for the gun because if multiple people go for it, nobody gets it.

For the Shadowblaze, regardless of who gets it we'll want lantern users standing by to see what the defense totals suggest about the holder's alignment. Right now, we only know that Araris and some anonymous player have lanterns. Since the Shadowblaze is destroyed if the owner dies, it's probably worth spending the chalk saved on defense to protect a village Shadowblaze holder.

Ventyl does not currently possess the clock.

[Ashbringer]

TJ already had a map?

I used my map, and based on the number of Valuable items I assume that TJ used one as well. This feels like a double-map-drop.

 

Idea: have Ventyl and only Ventyl grab the Book of Revocation. That should at least keep the Elims from gaining another stealing specialization. (I could go for it too but... uh... I'm busy )

I'd probably be willing to vote out any of Striker, Gears, or Ventyl, but first: @Flyingbooks, what have you been doing actionwise?

[Kasimir]

8 minutes ago, StrikerEZ said:

@Kasimir Would you want to try and go for the gun with me? We could go out as RP brothers.

Duncan rose, and picked up his coat. Putting it on was tiring. It felt like a lifetime of scars. How many tours had it been, since that first on Nebrask?

The Forgotten used you. Wyrmed their way into your head. They got you to kill, to do their dirty work for them. To suspect the others in your squad and platoon, until they'd turned on each other, until they'd died, and Duncan had run, and run, and tried to forget, even as the medals glinted on the others' chests as they were honoured for surviving Nebrask and Duncan court-martialed for desertion and sent back.

Darkness in Wyatt's eyes as he smiled.

He killed them. Kessen and Tory both, but his courage failed him when Wyatt awoke, and whispered, "They'll never believe you, you know."

Duncan knew.

And now he was back on Nebrask, and it was happening, all over again, and it was breaking his heart, but—

"Do your duty, soldier," Wyatt had said, at the very beginning, when Duncan still thought they were on the same side. He had done his duty. And now, he was going to do his duty all over again.

"Frederick," Duncan whispered. "I'm coming for you, little brother."

The war never ended. Some wars came home with you. But Duncan Kerr had been lost for a very long time, now. And broken.

With grief in his heart and duty in his spine, Duncan Kerr went to war again.

[StrikerEZ]

@Kasimir ....I hope that was a joke RP vote. I wasn’t intending to actually go for the gun. I didn’t the other time it showed up, why would I now?

As for my vote: Ventyl. I’ve stated my suspicions of him before, and I still think we should shrek him now. If no one is willing to vote him out with me, I would be down to go for any of Gears, Devo, or Araris.

[Araris Valerian]

I'm pretty sure Ventyl is village. Every game I pay with him he sets off all my elim radar things, and then he's village. I also get the impression he's not paying tons of attention this game. I can't think of another explanation for trying to throw shade on the only confirmed villager during the Night.

And my vote is going on Striker. My gut reaction to his post against Gears last cycle was that he was elim. His reads list made me back off, but I think since Gears is much more likely to be village at this point, I'm more comfortable with sticking to my gut. I also agree with Kas that TUO would have been more likely to make that vote following a teammate (and if I'm wrong, supsicious!Kas will be after me).

[StrikerEZ]

I just want to say: I think it’s highly likely that I could be the elims’ scapegoat right now. They killed/shrekked the three players I was so certain were elims, making me look worse in comparison. I’m still alive by now (a feat in and of itself ). Plus I’ve been a very talkative player and have (most likely) interacted little with the elims in terms of suspicions (besides for Connie, who I did in fact express suspicion of way back on D1/D2, at a time when there was no reason to draw attention to her). As for TUO: I think it makes far more sense to follow a villager with suspicions than an elim. If either of you flip elim, that makes the other look bad. Later I’m going to make a longer post both for the case against killing me and the case for killing one of Gears (though I’m leaning less on him now), Devo, Araris, or Ventyl. 

[Araris Valerian]

21 minutes ago, StrikerEZ said:

I just want to say: I think it’s highly likely that I could be the elims’ scapegoat right now.

What do you mean by this? I'm pretty sure Kas and I, and maybe Gears, are the only players that have mentioned any suspicion of you. And I'm pretty sure the only way elim!me would have voted for you early last cycle over TUO is if you were also elim. The TUO bus would have been way too easy to pass up. Kas has seemed quite village to me, especially with the vote on Connie, and I'm leaning village on Gears, despite my earlier concerns, since I doubt TUO would have gone for a bus like that. So I actually think no elims are voting for you, which makes me a bit more comfortable with where things stand.

[StrikerEZ]

2 minutes ago, Araris Valerian said:

What do you mean by this? I'm pretty sure Kas and I, and maybe Gears, are the only players that have mentioned any suspicion of you. And I'm pretty sure the only way elim!me would have voted for you early last cycle over TUO is if you were also elim. The TUO bus would have been way too easy to pass up. Kas has seemed quite village to me, especially with the vote on Connie, and I'm leaning village on Gears, despite my earlier concerns, since I doubt TUO would have gone for a bus like that. So I actually think no elims are voting for you, which makes me a bit more comfortable with where things stand.

I meant that I think the actions the elims have taken in terms of who they've chosen to kill were done in a way to make me an easy grinch target. They may not necessarily be voting on me themselves, but they are doing things behind the scenes to make me look more suspicious. And I'm pretty sure other players have expressed suspicion of me. Ventyl, for one. 

[Kasimir]

[OOC: It's not. You're my leading suspect in terms of voting patterns. I'm alternatively suspicious as well of Ventyl (but I don't see him as being Evil with you, and my question with Ventyl would come down to whether that's just weak Village play or Evil play, because frankly it's easy to mix the two up at times), Ash, Reading, Random, and Books for various reasons. Books is a strange case because of their voting patterns but also their actions - I'm just gonna come out and say it, but Books claimed to TJ to have laid down a LoW on N3, and in my view, if Books and TUO were teammates, TUO would've done better to claim persistent Warding off Books' Ward and have them keep quiet about it than saying he forgot an action, which ends up looking a bit more suspicious. And yet, Books' voting patterns are odd. So there's that.

I'm also suspicious of Araris. I think it's always good to be suspicious of @Araris Valerian as being matched up on opposite teams against Araris has never ended well for me  Be nice if you could also publicly confirm our Defense level, please. Anyway:

• TUO's vote slammed down very fast behind yours. The counterpoint is that he was sheeping you and hoping to get you killed alongside him when he flipped Evil, but that's a strange response: TUO wasn't really voting or drawing that many connections. He mentioned weak suspicion of you, with no reason at all. So why would he vote alongside you, against a player who had voted on you? If he were interested in implicating you all along, he would've given you a better read from the start, and begun to lay down those connections! He was content to otherwise play the item analysis game and fly under the radar. Sure, that plan started to go awry when he took heat for not using the map, but then again, he was hardly the leading candidate that turn until he threw that suspicious vote on you. It's difficult to see why TUO would've started playing the 'paint connections' game at that juncture, and it was a noteworthy departure from his playstyle up to that point. It's unclear why TUO would otherwise do so - and while it's sometimes really poor Evil play, poor Evil play is often better explained as response to tactical imperatives.
   
• Keep in mind also that Team Evil at this point in time had just lost Connie. Evil losses tend to be felt more than Village losses, due to the numerical disparity. A team working immediately from a position of disadvantage - literally what do they have to gain from trading TUO in a kamikaze move for you, Striker? It's rare I'd argue a single player is indispensable - getting TUO to go down and take me down with him is still a bad trade for Team Evil, though to be fair, I've never been a good player anyway. You were in a PM spider position but unless you were close to piecing together some crucial piece of information, I'd argue there's no real reason to require a sacrifice to bring you down.
   
• So what would the tactical imperatives be? Well, let's see. Gears had just loudly and noisily called you out with a vote. And having a teammate get challenged might be grounds for an opportunistic vote to seal the push against Gears. Team Evil - much less a player who has never, once voted this entire game up to that moment has no reason to endanger themselves with a sudden push against Gears when they could NK him or have Villagers go after him in a misgrinch. Gears has been known to have Making+ since N1. There is no reason Gears would be especially more of a threat than before. I submit the reason that does make sense is that TUO overreacted to Gears' confidence and the vote on you.
   
• But alright, let's zoom out a little. I did feel you were pushing a bit too hard and fast against Mat/Illwei/Quinn early on, but I've been playing this game on power-saving analysis-lite mode, and I was having difficulty picking out whether I felt your pushing against Mat that hard was a Villager-on-Villager barfight, or an Eliminator pushing more recklessly against a Villager. I agree with Illwei: I still get the sense you were trying too hard in these exchanges. The question is whether you were pushing too hard as Evil Striker seeking thread dominance or grinch control (which would match your SpiderEZ play), or whether you were a Villager erecting a Vietcong grade tunnel. Coupled with your voting, I'm gonna lean Evil on you.
   
• I am of the view that staying on Mat D1 was a better choice for you: I agree with Archer that Evil had little reason to swap to the Danex train. They already knew that Danex was Village and swapping in a last minute counter-train would get all participants scrutiny. Better to stick it out on Mat: which places you squarely in the suspect pool of <FlyingBooks, StrikerEZ, TJ Shade, Devotary of Spontaneity>. Moreover, we now know TJ to be Village. I agree we're likely to see one or two Evil players on this train. Your vote remained remarkably stable through D1, with no recorded shifts or uncertainty, which you might expect from a D1 Villager, which is more usual of a player with better informational access. The same point could be made of those on Gears, but we now know STINK was the Thief. [I don't take this to be particularly damning - but I do think it's a point worth noting.]
   
• I don't think your claim to have mentioned Connie on D1 or D2 is exculpatory - I just backread the entire game thread twice, and even I don't remember much of you mentioning Connie, only Mat and Illwei talking D2 about a shared suspicion of Connie and getting an alternative train going. Mat was the only person to vote Connie D2, and that died quickly/got derailed. If Connie had slid so far beneath the radar, mentioning her but doing nothing about her doesn't really matter. Suspicions unbacked by votes, or that aren't even really mentioned or tracked again are in and of themselves worrisome. 
   
• Things get more interesting on D3, where you come in after Archer's vote on Ventyl to place another vote on Ventyl. Just for context, this is what the state of the votes looks like:

  Quote

  Lotus (2): Illwei, Reading
  Connie (2): Kas, TJ
  Gears (1): Araris
  Ventyl (2): Archer, Striker

  
  To me, you and Reading both look strange at this stage of the voting. Reading placed a vote on Lotus for more or less a gut read, tying Lotus off with Connie, which I read as a soft-protect of Connie, since ties are randomly decided. Rather than save Connie directly, you stack a second vote on Ventyl, creating at that point in time a three-way tie. You withdraw swiftly after Archer decides he isn't keen on Ventyl anymore, which is in itself interesting. You specifically state in that same post:
   

  Quote

  I'm still paranoid the elims' kill choice was an attempt to frame me/make Illwei look good. I'm almost certainly just tunnelingn on them at this point, so I'm trying to not think about them ), Devotary, Gears (both of these two are people I think could be behind not killing anyone on N1: Devotary being pragmatic enough to see the advantage and Gears being chaotic enough to come up with it in the first place), maybe Flyingbooks (they seem to be hanging on the edge of the game for the most part). Not sure who else I would think likely to be an elim, but these are players I'd be willing to shrek today.

  
  Funny how despite saying you mentioned Connie early as suss, come D3 when Connie is actually on the lam and she's....not one of your grinchables, eh? You do in fact add Connie to your list - after Illwei comes out against her - and then you swap to Connie: much later on in the Day, at which point it's clear that Illwei either has mad persuasion powers (after asking us to sell you on Connie/Gears/Devo - hello? Isn't that your job as a Villager? Aren't these your suspicions? Why should we need to sell you on them when we could be Evil!) or Team Evil decides it's a wash and bused Connie and called it a day. You don't come out looking good from those voting patterns at all and I'm doubly concerned that your suspect list hasn't shifted all that much since D3. Hell, even I'm not unconvinceable about your Evilness, and I've dithered about my other suspects. If you're still working off the N1 no kill reasoning, that's plain weird since we have no reason to assume there was no N1 kill at all. (See: what changed?)

• D4 is interesting as well. Gears comes out swingin' against you, Mist slaps a vote down on Gears citing RNGesus, you vote on Gears, TUO sheeps you within minutes on Gears, and I look at it, get indigestion from all the bad gut feelings, and go for TUO instead. You @ me about why I go for TUO over Gears, which I take to be a soft defense of TUO, since you're tacitly claiming you don't think he's that suspicious, and that I should be more suspicious of Gears instead.

Quote

Striker (0): Gears<1>, Araris <1>, Ventyl<1>
Gears (3): Mist, Striker, TUO
TUO (9): Kas, TJ, Ash, Ventyl<2>, Araris<2>, Gears <2>, Reading, Books, Devo
Ventyl (1): Archer
Devo (1): Lotus

NB: @Sart, could I get a past votecount check please? My tracker shows that Ventyl withdrew from Striker and went to TUO but is not recorded as doing so. I'd like to know if that's deliberate, or a mistake. 

Ash is interesting - he follows us on the TUO train which ties TUO with Gears, and barring vote shenanigans, has gained a little trust for doing so. TUO is still attempting to defend himself at this point in time: there is no bus. Yet. 

Ventyl swings the grinch over to put TUO in the lead, as the chronologically fourth vote on TUO. What to make of this move is questionable. Ventyl switches over from suspicions of Striker after being called on them by Archer, and reacts almost immediately to TUO's attempted defense by voting on TUO instead. Ventyl backing down because of Archer but still suspecting Striker into the Night is strange: it could be an Evil player having an "oh crap" moment at the challenge and deciding to get some credit by bussing TUO. Or it could be a Villager doing exactly what he is supposed to do: by re-evaluating evidence. After Ventyl comes Araris, by which point we can safely say that there's a queue for the TUO bus. 

Slightly more suspicion accrues to Reading and Books here for being late voters on the TUO bus: Reading's insistence that Gears v. Striker is Villager-on-Villager action without much evidence is interesting in light of earlier vote patterns (see: Lotus v. Connie) and in light of his insistence that TUO being Evil somehow lends credence to the first proposition. Books claiming to dislike the votes on TUO but also not wanting Gears or Striker dead and slamming a vote down on TUO anyway feels oddly performative, like an Evil player reluctant to bus and trying to pass that off as Village: if you don't like the train, note your objections and don't vote. TUO was dead anyway and there's literally no reason to try to weasel onto that train despite hating it. 

• One consideration: I asked it, and so did @Burnt Spaghetti to me in a PM: "Why is Striker still alive?" PM spiders doing their job well or appearing to be an info-nexus are often superb targets for a night kill. So why is Striker still alive? One possibility is that he's being scapegoated. But the other salient possibility is that Striker is Evil, and that cannot be ignored either. I previously mentioned that since a misgrinch raises Wild Chalkling strength, Team Evil cannot expect to win this game without at least some attempt at a thread-dominant player working grinch control, or at least trying to. While they'll be happy to let us cut our own throats, they can't afford to just let us discuss without malign interference either. And the main issue I have with that is that I'm more persuaded by Striker's voting behaviour and patterns than - to be really honest - what TUO did or the fact that he's still alive. To me, those are additional data points. I do think they point to Striker's being Evil, but I am happy to be convinced otherwise, if I am mistaken. 
   
• Bottom line: I'm fully on the Striker Delenda Est train today. I have other suspicions I'd like to see pressured: I've flagged some of them in this post, which is already getting longer than is healthy for a single person. At this point, I'm honestly just gonna say you're my strongest suspicion due to your voting patterns and behaviour. If you're Village, then I'm sorry. I'm certainly fallible and as long as I'm alive, I will use the information from your grinch to try to make sense of the game and help the Village before Team Evil comes for me. But I'm not playing this game to sheep. I'm going where my reads and the voting patterns take me, and right now, it's you.
   
• Ave in perpetuum, frater. Ave atque vale.]

Edited to so not to torture the GM: Apologies @Sart, Ventyl's post with his vote is here.

Right, that's it for today. The Wyrm Inquisition withdraws temporarily but will keep an eye on all you citizens, time to get a cup of tea....

Edited February 10, 2021 by Kasimir

[Araris Valerian]

38 minutes ago, Kasimir said:

Be nice if you could also publicly confirm our Defense level, please.

Oh, yeah. I’ve been taking TJ for granted. We had 1 defense last night.

[StrikerEZ]

59 minutes ago, Kasimir said:

Keep in mind also that Team Evil at this point in time had just lost Connie. Evil losses tend to be felt more than Village losses, due to the numerical disparity. A team working immediately from a position of disadvantage - literally what do they have to gain from trading TUO in a kamikaze move for you, Striker? It's rare I'd argue a single player is indispensable - getting TUO to go down and take me down with him is still a bad trade for Team Evil, though to be fair, I've never been a good player anyway. You were in a PM spider position but unless you were close to piecing together some crucial piece of information, I'd argue there's no real reason to require a sacrifice to bring you down.

I wasn't trying to say that TUO was trying to kamikaze and take me down with him. I just think that it makes far more sense for an elim to sheep a villager than an elim. If you're just sheeping an elim and then that elim flips, you automatically look worse. And I don't think the elims think I'm indispensable or anything. I think they think I serve a good job of getting people to focus on me and draw attention away from them, which would eventually lead to my death rather than one of theirs. I don't know if TUO's move was an attempt to implicate me by association in case they died, but it's the one thing that makes the most sense to me. And I wish I had been less busy over the course of D4 because I do remember finding his sheeping vote on me odd, but didn't comment on it because I was just trying to keep up with the posts and forgot about it. Plus I was tunneling on Gears and probably still am.

1 hour ago, Kasimir said:

But alright, let's zoom out a little. I did feel you were pushing a bit too hard and fast against Mat/Illwei/Quinn early on, but I've been playing this game on power-saving analysis-lite mode, and I was having difficulty picking out whether I felt your pushing against Mat that hard was a Villager-on-Villager barfight, or an Eliminator pushing more recklessly against a Villager. I agree with Illwei: I still get the sense you were trying too hard in these exchanges. The question is whether you were pushing too hard as Evil Striker seeking thread dominance or grinch control (which would match your SpiderEZ play), or whether you were a Villager erecting a Vietcong grade tunnel. Coupled with your voting, I'm gonna lean Evil on you.

I know I can't convince you on this point, but I do know that I was just going too hard on those players in the early cycles. I was way too overconfident in my own abilities, and I've been far more wishy-washy with my reads since then.

1 hour ago, Kasimir said:

I am of the view that staying on Mat D1 was a better choice for you: I agree with Archer that Evil had little reason to swap to the Danex train. They already knew that Danex was Village and swapping in a last minute counter-train would get all participants scrutiny. Better to stick it out on Mat: which places you squarely in the suspect pool of <FlyingBooks, StrikerEZ, TJ Shade, Devotary of Spontaneity>. Moreover, we now know TJ to be Village. I agree we're likely to see one or two Evil players on this train. Your vote remained remarkably stable through D1, with no recorded shifts or uncertainty, which you might expect from a D1 Villager, which is more usual of a player with better informational access. The same point could be made of those on Gears, but we now know STINK was the Thief. [I don't take this to be particularly damning - but I do think it's a point worth noting.]

Again, my tunneling on Mat and insistence on staying there was due to the aggressiveness I was playing with in the early cycles. As for the players who were voting for Mat, I would be down for voting for Devo. I've been suspicious of her all game so far.

1 hour ago, Kasimir said:

I don't think your claim to have mentioned Connie on D1 or D2 is exculpatory - I just backread the entire game thread twice, and even I don't remember much of you mentioning Connie, only Mat and Illwei talking D2 about a shared suspicion of Connie and getting an alternative train going. Mat was the only person to vote Connie D2, and that died quickly/got derailed. If Connie had slid so far beneath the radar, mentioning her but doing nothing about her doesn't really matter. Suspicions unbacked by votes, or that aren't even really mentioned or tracked again are in and of themselves worrisome. 

Going to comment more specifically on this later, but yeah, I understand this. Connie did keep slipping in and out of my radar, though there are reasons (which I will get into in a later quote).

1 hour ago, Kasimir said:

To me, you and Reading both look strange at this stage of the voting. Reading placed a vote on Lotus for more or less a gut read, tying Lotus off with Connie, which I read as a soft-protect of Connie, since ties are randomly decided. Rather than save Connie directly, you stack a second vote on Ventyl, creating at that point in time a three-way tie. You withdraw swiftly after Archer decides he isn't keen on Ventyl anymore, which is in itself interesting. You specifically state in that same post:

If I wanted to protect Connie...wouldn't I just have voted for Lotus? But I didn't see any reason to vote her, so I voted for someone else that I was suspicious of that I saw someone else was willing to possibly grinch as well. And when the Ventyl train isn't even leaving the station, my vote isn't doing anything there, so no point keeping it there.

1 hour ago, Kasimir said:

Funny how despite saying you mentioned Connie early as suss, come D3 when Connie is actually on the lam and she's....not one of your grinchables, eh? You do in fact add Connie to your list - after Illwei comes out against her - and then you swap to Connie: much later on in the Day, at which point it's clear that Illwei either has mad persuasion powers (after asking us to sell you on Connie/Gears/Devo - hello? Isn't that your job as a Villager? Aren't these your suspicions? Why should we need to sell you on them when we could be Evil!) or Team Evil decides it's a wash and bused Connie and called it a day. You don't come out looking good from those voting patterns at all and I'm doubly concerned that your suspect list hasn't shifted all that much since D3. Hell, even I'm not unconvinceable about your Evilness, and I've dithered about my other suspects. If you're still working off the N1 no kill reasoning, that's plain weird since we have no reason to assume there was no N1 kill at all. (See: what changed?)

I forgot my early suspicions of Connie at first. Illwei reminded me of them. And as for asking for people to persuade me: I was insanely busy over the course of D3. I shouldn't have even been able to get on to vote for Connie in the first place, but I managed to squeeze some time in. I was asking people to persuade me because I knew that I wouldn't really have the time I'd like to deeply look over things. And of course my vote on Connie, after seeing the arguments for each of the players, would be at the end of the turn, because that's when I was actually free. And I know that my suspicions haven't shifted much. I haven't had time to go reread anything and most of the time I'm just reading things as they happen. Making plans and reads on the fly, letting what I can remember plus what I'm currently reading affect how I think of a player. Which is how you get me saying I thought I sussed Connie earlier on, or come up with the plan to help Stink get his bribes (which was highly inefficient, though effective), or end up sussing Quinn/Mat/Illwei for a very long time. If I manage to survive today, I hope to try and do a readthrough of the thread at some point, though I can't promise much activity this weekend as it's Valentine's Day on Sunday and I will be spending most of this weekend with my girlfriend. So, maybe it would be a good thing if I die this turn.

1 hour ago, Kasimir said:

D4 is interesting as well. Gears comes out swingin' against you, Mist slaps a vote down on Gears citing RNGesus, you vote on Gears, TUO sheeps you within minutes on Gears, and I look at it, get indigestion from all the bad gut feelings, and go for TUO instead. You @ me about why I go for TUO over Gears, which I take to be a soft defense of TUO, since you're tacitly claiming you don't think he's that suspicious, and that I should be more suspicious of Gears instead.

I did think that Gears was more suspicious, yes. I still do think he's suspicious. That doesn't mean I didn't think that TUO wasn't suspicious at all. 

1 hour ago, Kasimir said:

Bottom line: I'm fully on the Striker Delenda Est train today. I have other suspicions I'd like to see pressured: I've flagged some of them in this post, which is already getting longer than is healthy for a single person. At this point, I'm honestly just gonna say you're my strongest suspicion due to your voting patterns and behaviour. If you're Village, then I'm sorry. I'm certainly fallible and as long as I'm alive, I will use the information from your grinch to try to make sense of the game and help the Village before Team Evil comes for me. But I'm not playing this game to sheep. I'm going where my reads and the voting patterns take me, and right now, it's you.

I can respect this. I do hope that maybe you might change your mind, but I understand if you don't. 

[Kasimir]

[OOC: 1. Since I'm 2014 Kas, I'm gonna go back to what 2014 Kas does best, which is instigate. Village, we genuinely need more activity and discussion than this, if we want to find Team Evil. Evil hunting is a group effort, not an individual effort. I'd like to hear from @Burnt Spaghetti, @Shard of Reading, @Flyingbooks, @Ashbringer, @Ventyl, @Lotus, and @Mist especially. Even though I also suspect some of you of being Evil. Archer and Gears, you don't need an invitation as you are vocal but I'd appreciate anyway  Your good sense would also be appreciated, @Devotary of Spontaneity  The thread should not devolve into an exchange between me, Striker, and Araris when all of us could be Evil, or all of us could be tunneling Villagers. Discussion keeps us honest and discussion corrects our false reads and analyses. We need it. Badly. If we don't have it, we're ceding informed control of the grinch.

I'm not saying adopt my playstyle, I'm just saying we need you to take back control of the thread, really.

2. As I've said, I'm suspicious of Reading as well for opportunistic voting patterns (mentioned in that ginormous post), and Books for voting patterns that are strange, including that very self-conscious post against the TUO grinch. I go back and forth about Ash given his vote on TUO, and I am having difficulty deciding on Ventyl, due to his tendency to sheep, tunnel against evidence, and extreme defensiveness when targeted for suspicion. The latter is the biggest warning sign, as Evil players are usually hypersensitive to being selected as a suspicion. I would probably be willing to swap to Reading as a secondary vote target while making my mind up on Striker. (Honestly, that's partly why I'm going for the gun as I intend to gun one of them down. You're all free to convince me who to shoot if not Reading or Books by sharing your suspicions in orange, by the way, as both Wyrm'alor and I share the view that a kill is best used as a secondary grinch.)

3. I think my issue with my alternates boils back down to the fact that I find the Striker train more informative than another train. I don't especially have raging suspicions of Gears anymore ( @StrikerEZ I'm interested if you have reasons that don't boil down to the N1 kill or Gears instigating that confrontation) - and suppose we grinch Gears. Who would Gears' flip tell us about? ...It just points back to you, Striker. Maybe Araris, given he's been painting Gears for a bit D1 and D3. And maybe Mist, though Mist certainly claims to be RNGesusing. STINK is the Thief, and we know that for certain now. Mat and Quinn defended Gears for a while and we both know they're Village and dead. So what's gained by going for a Gears grinch at this point? Interested in why a Devo lynch would be any better, either. 

4.

4 hours ago, StrikerEZ said:

I wasn't trying to say that TUO was trying to kamikaze and take me down with him. I just think that it makes far more sense for an elim to sheep a villager than an elim. If you're just sheeping an elim and then that elim flips, you automatically look worse. And I don't think the elims think I'm indispensable or anything. I think they think I serve a good job of getting people to focus on me and draw attention away from them, which would eventually lead to my death rather than one of theirs. I don't know if TUO's move was an attempt to implicate me by association in case they died, but it's the one thing that makes the most sense to me. And I wish I had been less busy over the course of D4 because I do remember finding his sheeping vote on me odd, but didn't comment on it because I was just trying to keep up with the posts and forgot about it. Plus I was tunneling on Gears and probably still am.

It does, but my objection to the sheeping read is that I consider it less likely because TUO hadn't been sheeping for literally the rest of the game. This was a sudden shift in strategy, and moreover, it was explicitly the manner of his sheeping you that put him in danger. Otherwise, the Gears-you debate had been so noisy it's not clear to me there was much gained. Sheeping you was both opportunistic, and formed such a trade-off that caused even more spotlight on TUO. In other words, his sheeping you was essentially a kamikaze trade off, because it was probably the worst thing he could've done right when you and Gears were sucking all the oxygen out of the room where the debate was concerned.

Is it impossible? No. But I have to make a judgement on what I find more probable, and these are my conclusions - on this read, he wouldn't be sheeping you, but overreacting to what he saw as a threat.

4 hours ago, StrikerEZ said:

I've been suspicious of her all game so far.

Why?

4 hours ago, StrikerEZ said:

If I wanted to protect Connie...wouldn't I just have voted for Lotus? But I didn't see any reason to vote her, so I voted for someone else that I was suspicious of that I saw someone else was willing to possibly grinch as well. And when the Ventyl train isn't even leaving the station, my vote isn't doing anything there, so no point keeping it there.

Depends on your Evil profile. If I'm right that Reading is Evil, then Evil vote clumping isn't ideal. Some more risk-friendly Evil teams (hi Araris!  ) are willing to take vote dilution risks (1/3 odds) over a more noisy and suspicious/blatant countertrain, especially since I and TJ were the only two on Connie at that point in time and I had withheld my reasoning. Evil teams have historically displayed both behaviours - I just haven't played Evil Striker before so I wouldn't be certain of which to model.

4 hours ago, StrikerEZ said:

I did think that Gears was more suspicious, yes. I still do think he's suspicious. That doesn't mean I didn't think that TUO wasn't suspicious at all. 

I'm not saying you didn't think TUO was suspicious - I'm saying that asking players (well, me) to prioritise Gears over TUO is in fact a way of shifting flak from TUO to Gears. This looks all the more worse in light of TUO's flip. In fact, I'd argue that defending TUO would've been a really bad look, as is evident from how TUO gave some lukewarm defense (this is where I am a bit suspicious of Ash despite his vote as he comes across as trying to coach TUO a bit, but even so.) Evil play doesn't require robust defense or the complete avoidance of suspicion: you just don't have to be the leading candidate. It's like the story of the campers and the bear: don't be that last guy! In that light, trying to peel people off to Gears isn't a bad strategy for Evil.

5 hours ago, StrikerEZ said:

I can respect this. I do hope that maybe you might change your mind, but I understand if you don't. 

I regret that switching on a bit more of analysis mode as you mentioned earlier seems to have put us on opposite sides with regard to where the grinch should go :/

[Gears]

Striker. Reasoning is as follows: You seem to conjure suspicions out of nowhere occasionally [EX: Illwei start of D2, Condensation] and say that you had mentioned them earlier. In most cases you did, but just as an aside with barely any reasoning. Then you follow those suspicions with no reasoning and say, "I suspected them earlier." In addition, many of your votes seem to be capitalising on small mistakes that you are blowing out of proportion in an attempt to kill them. Instead of being open to an alternate perspective, you weave a narrative that seems specifically designed to get them killed [EX: Matrim, Gears].

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SpiderEZ has decide to hoard books now. Anyone wanting a book should file a claim, citing Article 13, section B, lines 23-45.

In other news, @Matrim's Dice, Matrim's Dice. I personally find it odd that you would paint a target on my back purposefully. Plus I disagree about the defenses thing. If we overdefend (and I'm only recommending overdefending by a little bit each night, maybe one or two people), then that gives us a bit of leeway if an elim gets lucky and roleblocks someone. Seems like it would benefit an elim to have us not overdefend. Just do some careful digging, persuade people away from overdefending, take out a couple key people, and we get overrun. All of this makes me very suspicious of you.

So this vote seems a bit sensible. It seems strange that Matrim would do this. [But the point about disagreeing seems odd. People are allowed to disagree] But then the misunderstandings are clarified, and Striker remains on Matrim despite new evidence.

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  On 1/30/2021 at 10:31 AM, Matrim's Dice said:

On 1/30/2021 at 10:31 AM, Matrim's Dice said:

Bold mine, again. Striker is seeming to suggest that it's suspicious for me to have reasoning, Which it's not...

Okay, to be clear: I was trying to say two things at once. The first being that it’s concerning that there’s only like...2-3 players posting reasoning and we only like 9 hours left in the turn. 

The second thing I was trying to say is that, because you were one of the few actually posting reasoning, I was able to go through and find flaws in your reasoning.

  On 1/30/2021 at 10:31 AM, Matrim's Dice said:

  On 1/30/2021 at 10:31 AM, Matrim's Dice said:

Bold mine just now. This was the reason I voted Striker originally, and I included the book thing as sort of a second afterthought because I misunderstood what Alv meant.

Okay, I see what your primary reasoning is now. I still think the book thing was you picking reasoning opportunistically.

  On 1/30/2021 at 11:01 AM, Matrim's Dice said:

  On 1/30/2021 at 11:01 AM, Matrim's Dice said:

If it wasn't clear, that is what I was addressing. I don't want us to run out of chalk N3-N4 and then just insta-die over three cycles. If everyone draws a line tonight then we're cooked.

This isn’t what I’m suggesting though. I’m literally just saying that I’d prefer we have 1-2 extra protects each night to avoid roleblocks and stuff. Even if we go overboard a bit, there’s like, what, 3 maps? Plus someone probably started with one as well. It just seems way too odd to me that you’re so adamant about not accounting for roleblocks and stuff. It would be way too easy for the elims to mess us up if we don’t overprotect at least a little.

Anyway, I’m sorry for the misunderstandings, but I still think you’re worth voting on. 

As you can see, despite the points Striker used being explained, Striker remains on Matrim. 

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I think I'm going to place a preliminary vote on Ventyl. Mostly because I am going to be busy tomorrow, and want to make sure I remember to place a vote. Planning on spending tomorrow night hanging out with my girlfriend, so I probably won't be on very much for the last 6-7 hours or so because of classes and when I'd be hanging out with her.

As for why, I think it is odd that he decided to use the vote manip in the way he did. Not sure what I think the intent was, but it does give me odd vibes. If he flips elim, I say we take a look at Illwei again.

This post is not one of the votes I was talking about, but it is good to note. Why look at Illwei again? Illwei was fairly cleared at this point.

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Connie. I won’t have time to come on after this probably. I think this makes the most sense of the people people are willing to vote on.

No reasoning, no points. Easy credit for no work.

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Okay, to make something clear that should’ve been pretty obvious: I grabbed the clock. I was trying to keep it a secret so that the elims (and Thief) wouldn’t know to try and take it from me. Given that I suspect Gears of being an elim, trying to hide it is pointless now. I’ve suspected him for awhile now (primarily because he fits the profile for the events of N1-both for if there was no kill and if they hit Quinn and decided to go again N2), and this is a very odd move to me. Why out me to literally everyone without consulting me first? If he was a villager, he just painted a target on my back for no reason. If he’s an elim, he’s already got a target on me himself and would be looking for a way to take me out. So, he sees I lied and takes an opportunity. 

Reasoning against Gears: Profiling and revealing. Striker makes no attempt to consider the perspective of the idiot village and attempts to build a case against me. They cite prior suspicions without those suspicions existing [as far as I can remember/find in my iso]. Then come the post-justifications. Reasoning for suspicion in post. Staunchly opposed.

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Gears: Okay, so, I haven't liked how much they've been like "oh, here's what the elims probably did," with regards to whether they did the N1 kill or double tapped Quinn. It honestly feels like he's trying to not lie about the fact that he knows why the elims did what they did. And now, this play with the clock. I grabbed the clock last night after no one grabbed it D3. I was originally going to grab it D3, but ended up deciding against it because I figured other people would be going for it as well. Once it was still around, I decided to go for it again. I feel like I must've said that in thread, but if I didn't, please call me out on that. As for what Gears himself did, I think it makes the most sense as an elim play. If he was a villager, he'd have to be very confident that I'm an elim for him to come out and call me on the lie. If he's a villager, he should've realized that if I was also a villager, calling me out on this would let the elims know that I have the clock. If he's an elim, it doesn't matter if he lets everyone know as the elims already know and he can use the fact I lied (reasonably so, I would say) to get people to try and shrek me. As of right now, he is my strongest elim read.

Why wouldn't I lie? I lie a lot in these games [see MR46, that was a doozy of a lie-fest, Cryptics would have flocked to me]. I see no reasons why a villager would not speculate on elim actions. Also, the evidence hinges on the fact that I'm intelligent. That is a lot to predicate this on. Besides, this read seems designed to paint all of my actions in a negative light. No attempt to view anything from the village PoV. 

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@Ventyl: First, I'm going to explain what happened in our PM. As several of you out there are aware by now, I spent the first few cycles dedicating a significant amount of time figuring out who the thief might be. This ultimately winded up being a waste as Stink was apparently claiming Thief pretty openly, according to the late Illwei (in a PM) and Stink himself. At some point, I told Ventyl that I had narrowed down the Thief to one of a few candidates, which wasn't too hard. All I had to do was look at who took items from the camp supply on Days when we knew the Thief had stolen from someone. By the end of D2, I'd narrowed the Thief down to SoR, Burnt, or Stink. A little after I told Ventyl I'd narrowed the Thief down to one of three people (not telling him who they were), he asked me if Connie was one of them, and I told him no. He asked if I could tell him more, and I said it really wasn't that hard to figure out who the Thief possibly was. 
Now, I'm going to talk about why he is one of my strong elim reads. The fact he's just been mostly following other people's reads, his immediate backing down if someone points that out, his wishy-washy voting patterns, and the fact that he seems to be trying his best not to vote on Gears right now, my strongest elim read.
 

PM reasons. Easy to misrepresent events, easy to skew.

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As for TUO...well, I’m not surprised they were an elim. I was suspicious of them. I voted and kept my vote on Gears because they were my strongest elim read at the time. Maybe my reads are just completely off this game. If I survive the night, I will most likely scrap all of my reads and look at anyone else who’s still alive that I haven’t already suspected. Besides Ventyl. He’s the only player that could’ve taken the clock from me, (confirmed with Archer that no one who received his Specializations could’ve stolen from me) and I think that is extremely sus, on top of his already sus behavior all game so far. I will be voting him next turn (assuming he’s still alive, because I wouldn’t be surprised if the elims kill him tonight just to mess with me)

It's not inherently suspicious for a player to steal from you. If they thought you were suspicious, it would be the villager thing to do. 

In conclusion: Striker's suspicions and votes seem to come from the perspective of someone who wants the chosen few dead and will find any reasoning to do so, NOT from the perspective of someone who actually wants to find the guilty. They refuse to consider the PoV of a villager and fit every action into the chosen viewpoint. 

Then the Order vote. A sheep from an elim who had never sheeped before. Other people have talked this point to death, but it contributes. Another point that makes me think better of Ventyl: You were the only one who knew they had the Revocation Specialization. As such, why aren't you dead? They could have silenced you easily, and then no one would have known that they had stolen it, merely that it had been stolen. The benefits of the Lantern returning to the pile are not high. Perhaps Araris is an elim and trying to become the sole indicator of Defense, but still. You have been coordinating things this entire game. You have been SpiderEZ. You have been Connected. So why aren't you dead? 

[Thank you for coming to my TED Talk.]

Edited February 10, 2021 by Gears
Grammar

[Burnt Spaghetti]

8 hours ago, Kasimir said:

 

• One consideration: I asked it, and so did @Burnt Spaghetti to me in a PM: "Why is Striker still alive?" PM spiders doing their job well or appearing to be an info-nexus are often superb targets for a night kill. So why is Striker still alive? One possibility is that he's being scapegoated. But the other salient possibility is that Striker is Evil, and that cannot be ignored either. I previously mentioned that since a misgrinch raises Wild Chalkling strength, Team Evil cannot expect to win this game without at least some attempt at a thread-dominant player working grinch control, or at least trying to. While they'll be happy to let us cut our own throats, they can't afford to just let us discuss without malign interference either. And the main issue I have with that is that I'm more persuaded by Striker's voting behaviour and patterns than - to be really honest - what TUO did or the fact that he's still alive. To me, those are additional data points. I do think they point to Striker's being Evil, but I am happy to be convinced otherwise, if I am mistaken. 

I still stand by this. I know I've not been active in this game, I've said very little, both in thread and pm. But when trying to get myself to do something of use, my first thought was to ask those who are coordinating things. So I talked to TJ briefly, and then went to talk to striker and the thought above struck me. As he has been vocally a pm spider this game. One of the two we have had coordinating actions and stuff. To be fair the question could be asked of TJ too, but they are dead now. My thoughts focused on striker as I remembered them being vocal in thread as well. Someone vocal and influential in thread and in pms? indeed, how have they been allowed to survive this long. Perhaps they are being framed. This is a possibility, I will grant that. Especially following their vote on gears on TUO's removal.  If they are village, of course they would have been left alone. Because we would see reason to suspect them. But then. at the end of the day. Suspicion is suspicion, and I'm willing to commit to this one. I think if we don't vote you out, striker, we will be eaten alive by the paranoia and concern around your survival. As gearling said, you're connected. Thats a scary thing. it has been very useful, don't get me wrong. But it just, idk, It gives me, yknow. Vibes.

[Ookla-son-son-Ventyl]

I would like to say, I passed the clock to Gears. Then, in my PM @Sart said I passed it to the thief. But that obviously isn’t right since STINK just won as thief.

[StrikerEZ]

2 hours ago, Kasimir said:

( @StrikerEZ I'm interested if you have reasons that don't boil down to the N1 kill or Gears instigating that confrontation)

I honestly don't. Gears. 

3 hours ago, Kasimir said:

Why?

Why am I suspicious of Devo? Because her voting has felt opportunistic to me and I think she would fit the kill pattern we've seen so far. 

3 hours ago, Kasimir said:

Depends on your Evil profile. If I'm right that Reading is Evil, then Evil vote clumping isn't ideal. Some more risk-friendly Evil teams (hi Araris!  ) are willing to take vote dilution risks (1/3 odds) over a more noisy and suspicious/blatant countertrain, especially since I and TJ were the only two on Connie at that point in time and I had withheld my reasoning. Evil teams have historically displayed both behaviours - I just haven't played Evil Striker before so I wouldn't be certain of which to model.

You haven't had a chance to play with elim!me before. When a teammate is under fire, I almost always go for defending them, no matter the cost. Obviously I can't prove that this is the case for this game, but you can ask Lotus or really anyone from QF50.

Also, @Gears most of your points are things I addressed in response to Kas.

I...really don't think there's much more point in me trying to defend myself anymore. I've got a stressful day coming up and very little time to devote to this. Grinch me if you guys want I guess.

[Kasimir]

1 hour ago, Ventyl said:

I would like to say, I passed the clock to Gears. Then, in my PM @Sart said I passed it to the thief. But that obviously isn’t right since STINK just won as thief.

[OOC: You may need to PM Sart on that one and get back to us. I don't think Sart can confirm this in-thread, as this would kind of involve/require him to tacitly confirm part of what you've said.

@Devotary of Spontaneity- I assume you Crab scanned Ventyl, then?

Hmm. Striker Reading.]

Edited February 10, 2021 by Kasimir
not bolded

[Random Bystander]

You all lost me. I no longer understand what is happening.