Kasimir

[OOC: This is my problem in a nutshell with Ventyl. Inflexible suspicions, part sheeping, and overdefensiveness. I could give him some credit for being the start of the turning point where the TUO grinch was concerned, but he backed down after you challenged him, and it's hard to determine whether that's really the beginning of the bus, or if the bus began after Ventyl. Response to Gears, but gonna quickly @StrikerEZ in on this one. My personal suspicions for Reading and Random Bystander boil down to peripheral play. In Reading's case, as I've outlined in the massive wall of text (not the best place, I know, sorry ) two votes jump out at me - D3 where Reading suddenly jumps on an existing Lotus vote once I tied up by putting my first vote on Connie. Reason: negative gut on Lotus's reads list, which isn't much to go on. A few other players had expressed concern about the reads list too, but I'm more interested in what Reading's action does - it effectively turned Lotus into the leading vote train, against my single, deliberately-unsubstantiated Connie vote. I could see that as a teammate cautiously trying to poke someone else ahead while waiting to see if anyone else bites on the Connie train. The second thing that stands out for Reading in my view is the late vote on the TUO train D4: Reading more or less states, for no apparent reason, that they believe the Gears-versus-Striker trains are both Villagers and TUO is most likely Evil. Where does this certainty come from? [Color-edited for Sart's sanity.] I dislike this framing because it sets up Striker and Gears both as Villagers, and...if you're suspicious of either of Gears or Strikers, that's one hell of a red flag, and it's not really clear where this comes from. Araris does press Reading a little on the issue, and Reading backpedals a little. One thing to note is Reading did in fact claim to be the missing LoW on N2, bringing our total up to a Defense of 6. If this is true, then TUO and Reading would both be Warding in the same Turn, which I find mildly odd if we were to presume Reading were Evil. My suspicions of Random Bystander as I said - peripheral play, and a bit of gut, plus I'm always naturally suspicious of players who emphasise being new a bit too much. I was Evil on my very first SE game and the team I was on immediately instructed me to lurk where possible and play the rookie to the hilt. (Alv would remember this, because we were Evil together that game, and he had to babysit me while I was busy crapping my pants that Meta and Wyrm were after me. Unfortunately, he's dead now. Ni su'cuyi, gar kyr'adyc, ni partayli, gar darasuum, Sarge, TJ, Illwei, Mat.) It's a fair strategy used by both sides - El wielded it to lethal effect as a Village Mistborn vigilante in LG15b, and Phat tried that tactic as well in QF6, though Meta and I were on his case. Random, especially early on, was also swift to respond to pokes, which could be a new player thing, but as I've mentioned, can be telling with regard to Evil players. Random has referenced playing such games before, so they're not that fresh off the boat either, and I note that they did delay on using the map, like TUO, until both TUO and Random were called out over it on D3. To which Random's response was that they'd had other actions planned. That seems weird to me, but Random also did use their map, and I find it weird that Random and TUO would both be on one team and one would use their map and the other not. (The counterpoint might be if TUO had to take the kill because Connie or someone else was unable to.)]

Matt had told him this, many times. (Over many lives, really. Countless lives.) [OOC: Yep. Exactly. Plus, silence lets the Forgotten hide. Best case scenario, no misgrinch today. But absolute worst case scenario, we misgrinch and focus on what had been a three-Villager squabble because no one else said anything.] Keep your suspicions fluid. Duncan didn't know if he was doing the right thing. Condemning his brother to die - could he do that? And yet, the reasoning seemed... He told himself he didn't have to decide now. And yet, he wondered if it was right to focus on the one named Reading at this point. He had, after all, been suspicious of Grace Brooks... [OOC: Random Bystander, apologies for the suddenness but I don't want to forget as I need to sleep soon >>]

[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.]

[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. 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. Why? 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. 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. 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 :/

[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: 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: 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. 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....

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.

[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.]

[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.]

Duncan tried to sleep but felt he was walking in a nightmare. Rithmatists moved, patrolled. Everyone tried to keep their spirits up. After all, they'd found two Forgotten among them already. Two down, Duncan thought, darkly. Three more to go, if they were unlucky. He hoped they were not. Master grant they were not. "I told you, you know," Matt said, casually, and Duncan jerked upright on his bedroll. Matt smiled, though his eyes were hard. Matt had always had a commanding presence, a way of getting the squad to stop and listen, when he spoke, "I told you. There was something strange about Wyatt. I told you..." Except he hadn't, Duncan thought numbly. Except he was dead and they'd found him, broken upon the earth, and it had been the first sign the platoon had been compromised, and Master help him, because Duncan had tried, and Duncan had failed and their medic couldn't save him and they'd pronounced him dead a few minutes later. "Keep watch," Wyatt had said, and Duncan had believed him, because Wyatt had been calm and assured, and knew what to do, and there was a casual air about Wyatt, the air of a senior soldier, one who'd seen it all and knew what to do, and who was still entrusting you with what needed to be done, and he made you want to trust him, and so it was Duncan's hand that drew the lines, and Duncan who stood watch. "This is wrong," Duncan whispered, as Tory beat Dig over the head with his shovel, until the man lay crumbled in the hole he was beginning to dig up. He swallowed, and tried hard to look away. He specialised in defense, not in lines that choked Dig's dying screams, if there had been any at all. He'd liked Dig. Wyatt gripped his shoulders. "Stay with me, soldier," he said, unbothered, and Duncan wanted to scream and run, but Wyatt had him. "Remember. If Dig was taken by one of the Forgotten, then he's not one of us anymore. He's not a brother." "Was he?" Duncan managed. "Oh, yes," Wyatt said. "Orders straight from the CO herself. Kingswright thinks he's Forgotten. You did too, didn't you?" Not like this, he wanted to say, but— "You going to fall apart on me now, soldier?" Wyatt asked. "No," Duncan managed. "I'm fine." "Good man," Wyatt said, approvingly. "Enough like you in this squad, and we'll hold the line without a single breach until our tour ends." Duncan lay unseeing on his bedroll, and wept.

[OOC: The wheels on the bus go 'round and 'round, 'round and 'round... Way down we go, lads! ]

[OOC: Way to make a guy feel welcome, man. You make him sound like a disease vector, a Typhoid Archer... Also, NR passes a random specialisation so Archer doesn't get to choose. Neither does his vic- I mean, student. ]

[OOC: Oh hey, thanks, this actually means no one needs to put defense orders in tonight, making Archer's LoM scanning plan more attractive. And if the camp gets overrun, we know you tricked us! But since it's so easy to be called on this one, I doubt it's a trap... Or is it? ]

[OOC: Working on purely gut/low analytical level here - Devotary shouldn't be ignored. Evil and Village Devotary both vote late, and Evil and Village Devotary both generally make sensible and clear comments, so I wouldn't take it to be exculpatory. It's obvious TUO was bused, so I'd also not get too enthusiastic about anyone beyond TJ (conservatively) who voted on TUO. IMO, no reason for TUO to jump so swiftly onto the Gears vote after Striker. Gears was already headed for a grinch at that point, and Striker wasn't in significant danger, leading Gears by a single vote. But poor (in the sense of revealing) Evil play is often explained by tactical objectives. So what I'm saying is that the best way to make sense of why TUO would break cover for the first time in the game in my view is for Striker to be Evil. (The other alternative has Mist as Evil and a coordinated effort to set up a misgrinch on Gears, with TUO immediately trying to bundle on to paint Striker as suspicious. I ascribe somewhat lower probability to this option, but it should be re-examined if Striker is grinched and found Village.) Strong suspicion on Striker. His reluctance to vote for Connie and challenge of my vote on TUO over Gears only increases how suspicious he is, in my view. Araris agreeing about TUO but going for Striker initially is strange to me, and feels a bit opportunistic as well, as though testing how much pushback this would get. The problem is that this scenario gives us Evil Araris and potentially Evil Striker, and we already know that TUO is Evil. Araris is known to bus his teammates as an Evil player, but this takes busing to new extremes. I think I would take the best reading of this situation to be: if we grinch Striker and he turns out to be Village (I currently ascribe lower probability to this outcome, but it is always good to track), we should probably start squinting hard at Araris. This is because I don't think Evil Araris has reason to bus Striker this early when it was just Gears calling Striker out, given the vote situation. Books' late vote on TUO doesn't sit well with me. No idea why; just reads a bit hedgy, and reluctant, but also trying to pass it off as a Villager response. I'm mildly interested in Lotus's vote, due to the lack of interaction. Ventyl tunneling on Striker and suddenly switching to TUO feels odd, too, as though he was checking for traction. I need to think more on this. And I've probably been ninjaed at least a gazillion times by the time this posts...]

[OOC: Thanks for letting me channel your dynamic entry vote energy, Wyrm'alor. @Sart - May I presume from the fact the gun isn't in the supply that someone else other than Alv and TUO successfully claimed it?]

Duncan raised an eyebrow. "As much as I appreciate your vote of confidence in my analytical commitments," he said, wryly, "I think you have me confused with my little brother. I'm the drunk one here." When he could get alcohol anyway. [OOC: Striker did the reads list, not me I'm laidback this game, remember?]

[OOC: I'd say that I regard safety to be a separate dimension from having reasoning or otherwise. I could lay down a reasoned post incriminating Archer as a Forgotten for his D1 defense of Connie against Illwei, and his D3 voting. It would not be a safe vote, given Archer's so far uncontested Non-Rithmatist claim. But ex hypothesi, it would have robust reasoning. Safe in the sense that Gears has come up in the crosshairs repeatedly as a grinch candidate. Village-wise, you could really be following robust reasoning to select a grinch candidate. But if you're Forgotten and Gears isn't, then Gears would probably not be a bad target to paint with suspicion given how many of us have expressed suspicion of him before. Incidentally, Sart clarified in response to a PM question that a converted Non-Rithmatist ceases to be able to teach specialisations. If we stop being able to identify Archer's next student, among other things, we should be suspicious. I think one thing the N1 no kill reasoning is missing from everyone so far is: what changed? We're saying the Forgotten found it a good strategy to not kill, because anyway their objective isn't to kill but to cause the camp to be overrun, and misgrinching Rithmatists helps them, rather than us since kills don't affect defense except in terms of reducing the number of available defenders. Okay, and if this is the case, why was Quinn dead N2? Was the plan not still viable? If your plan is good, there is no reason to abandon it. And yet we have a kill streak from Quinn to Illwei. What shifted their tactical considerations? If we can't find why their tactical considerations should have shifted, I submit it's more likely in my eyes they hit a LoF. Edited to add: If unclear, I don't suspect Archer currently, beyond Urbain paranoia. But I do think he is a useful illustration of the difference between safety and reasoning. Edited to add #2: In fact, I'm gonna come right out and say that my view is the Forgotten won't be hiding per se - oh, some definitely will, but given that misgrinches are their primary tool for ruining our defense, they're going to play the control kill + hiding game. This does reduce my suspicion of Gears a little, though I'm not really going to yell or get upset if he gets grinched.]

As Duncan had said consistently, he was in favour of using the clock as soon as possible. His view was that half the problem was getting a Rithmatist's hands on the clock in the first place; the other half was trying to retain control of the clock before Respected Madman or the Forgotten or a pile-up of Lines of Revocation caused the clock to vanish again. He especially hoped there would be no Lines of Revocation pile-up: they needed all the chalk they could get to keep defending the camp, as well as check up on their fellow Rithmatists, and even defend themselves. After some thought, Duncan tentatively agreed with Blackbane on the point: Frederick explicitly saying that he had attempted and failed to claim the clock was clearly intended to indicate that Frederick couldn't have killed Wei. This, though, had turned out to be a moot point since the Servant had discovered that Frederick had seized the clock, after all. The issue was that Frederick had publicly declared the previous night that he would be going for the clock (Duncan wasn't sure their ma'd raised such a reckless lad, but you never knew.) The way Duncan saw it, it was especially glaring in the light of other people who had gone for the clock not having mentioned it. Whether it was malicious or not was something Duncan was still making up his mind on: he supposed that as the only person declared publicly as going for the clock, Frederick could've been trying to make the Forgotten guess. Or he could be trying to appear innocent. The thing was, Duncan agreed in principle with Elysian. Matt [OOC: Meta] had taught him, on his last tour on Nebrask, before the day had drowned in blood and Forgotten malice, to keep his suspicions fluid. But his argument wasn't that Elysian's suspicions should be static, because they bloody well shouldn't be! ( ) His issue was that given a consistent pattern of behaviour where Elysian voted on the Servant at every available opportunity, and had expressed suspicions of the Servant all the way through the past day and night, and had even explicitly stated he agreed with Frederick's reasoning on why the Servant was suspicious - in light of all of that, a sudden swing to Frederick within the same post that stated the Servant was suspicious was in itself strange. He wasn't sure about Forgotten prioritising hiding, though. Duncan's own thought on the matter was that Forgotten behaviour depended on the psychological profile of the individual. [OOC: Odd take here: I generally agree with you, and it does feel a bit too audacious if Gears was Evil, but I also think that different players have different Evil profiles, which only comes up to me because of my recent backreading for Meta's game balance tips.] He had been, of late, running over the events of that night on Nebrask in his head. Wyatt, and his lies. The memories felt more vivid without the numbing fog of the alcohol. Duncan hadn't been this dry in so long. He hated it, hated the way the shadows all seemed to menace him. Hated the way he looked over his shoulder for Forgotten. Nightmares, when he did sleep. Dig in his grave. Matt, broken upon the earth. Rlint, the brave officer on the frontlines, powerless before the Forgotten. Duncan had never been there. Good soldiers follow orders, Wyatt had said, even though they'd whispered he hadn't, and that's why he was among them. Duncan shoved his shaking hands in his coat pockets and vainly wished that.... Wished that.... He agreed about Frederick's and Atreco's votes being safer, though. His leading suspect for the moment continued to be Atreco, though he was starting to eye Shimamura Sakura as well for the swings and felt uncomfortable about occupying the same voting bloc as Elysian and Faleast [OOC: Sorry guys, but when I suspect people, and then they vote or express the willingness to vote alongside me, I start smelling a rat ]

[OOC: Tired and it's been a long day so no RP forthcoming just yet. Just further thoughts, some of which are at request: I'm mildly suspicious of Gears' move. I know some players disagree with me on this in PMs. I don't think it's strongly indicative of his alignment, but I do think it's either an Evil move or poor Village play. The only scenario under which it doesn't turn out to be poor Village play is if and only if one thinks Striker to be Evil - which to be fair, Gears was leaning towards last night. Lying about possession of the clock is not itself something incompatible with being a Villager - both Villagers and Evil have reason to be deceptive about this, so calling Striker out in that light appears to be both trying too hard, and attempting to instigate a clock FFA, whether by the Thief, or by LoRs. I note that Evil doesn't need to go for item possession play, only to deny us these items or to force us to squander valuable resources re-acquiring them. I didn't Ward the camp last night because I was out of chalk. I no longer am. Resource scarcity is definitely an issue. I'm somewhat suspicious of Gears, Striker, TUO, and now Araris, so this thread has basically been me singing 'Every Major's Terrible' to myself but trying to adapt it for 'Every Suspicion's Terrible' instead while working out who my final vote will go to. (Akan datang.) I'm not happy with how fast the vote wagon sprang up on Gears, and I'm saying this independent of my suspicions. Short of us having caught Gears bloodyhanded and some kind of quiet Seeker coordination going behind the scenes, a vote train shouldn't have materialised this quickly, considering Striker wasn't actively in danger of being grinched (thanks @Illwei, imma try this one) at that point. I haven't been able to do vote analysis or deep reading yet. I am reluctant to break my declaration I will be Laidback!Kas this game, and I'm tired. At least it's not the vaccine. But you may want to take this into consideration with regard to the level of analysis currently backing my suspicions. Striker - the late vote on Connie doesn't look good, and Striker commenting - consciously, of course - that his main suspicions had all gone awry and he was at a loss could be consistent with an Evil player realising he has to account for the fact Illwei and Mat are Village. Or it could be a Villager who really has realised he needs to re-evaluate. Striker could be a convenient patsy. Or not. But if we're giving flak to Striker for tunneling on Illwei, then Ash and Ventyl don't come out looking very good either. With Striker, the added complication is that he's known to be PM Spidering, and to have coordinated Wards on one Night. With players occupying these roles, the usual question is, "Why are you still alive?" Taking down info-nexuses is always a good thing for an Evil team. Of course, if the correct reading of the situation is that Striker is being set up as the fall guy for today, then it's no surprise he's left alive - because he's the next grinch candidate. Or, he could be Evil. TUO - they're lurking comfortably in the vaguely helpful region, claimed to be Warding daily but forgot their order last night, and attempted to offer item analyses, which in my view, only go so far until we know how Team Evil is playing. I'm very wary of how swiftly they jumped onto the Gears wagon. This is their first vote of the entire game, and Striker's reasoning for Gears is not substantially different from what has been offered for Gears on any point save D1, minus Gears calling Striker out, but again - that's not necessarily Evil-exclusive. Araris - that post on the Striker-Gears clash is incredibly wishy-washy and appears to be extremely gerrymandered towards voting on Striker, coming from a player who has consistently voted on Gears on every single day (D1, D3, mentioned as suspicion N1 -Edit: Correction, I meant mentioned as suspicion N3, which just makes this look worse in my opinion) Gears showed up as a vote candidate, including against Connie. There's a shift from 'Gears is suspicious' to 'Gears has strong justification' - really? What is it? Because the only way Gears shows up as having strong justification is if and only if Gears thinks Striker is Evil. Lying about the clock is not itself sufficient grounds to deem a player Evil. And for the record, I know two other players who tried for the clock and failed. Unclear to me how the deception would've been obvious. So the bottom line of that post: 'Gears is suspicious, TUO is suspicious, but I'm going to go for Striker, who has done the same thing TUO did in my analysis, and also, Evil Gears should've been more thoughtful.' - Evil Gears does have a reason to: instigating a FFA. I'm not comfortable voting on Gears or Striker without further analysis. But TUO and Araris have crept to the lead where my suspicions are concerned. I'm not gonna highlight this it's a sea of OOC anyway. Don't @ me this isn't analysis and I mean it.]

Wei was dead, too. Duncan shook his head. It was happening all over again. He supposed Wei's death could have been to silence a fairly active and contributive voice, as the Forgotten continued to strive for a stranglehold over what was being said. While Wei had still been suspected, and close to being court-martialed, he was worth keeping alive. And yet the situation interested Duncan, a little. Shimamura Sakura and Faleast had both seemed to doubt that Wei was a Rithmatist. Their reasons had not convinced Duncan, and he had wondered if they seemed to be trying a little too hard. The key question was if it was simple tunnel vision, or something more malicious at work. It seemed the Forgotten didn't think that Wei would be controversial enough to be worth keeping alive. Or perhaps Wei had whispered something unwise in an aside the previous night. Duncan did know that Wei had asked a group of them about whether Evan could be a front, with Kaniae or someone else being the actual Non-Rithmatist, possibly seeking out conversion. Wei had even wondered if Evan was really Forgotten, with the Non-Rithmatist having brokered a deal with them. (He didn't think this was the reason for Wei's death. After all, there had been six of them in the group - five now. It wasn't worth killing for.) Duncan wasn't sure about that idea. It was good to keep a little paranoia, but Wei was sometimes prone to going a little too far off on paranoia. The issue was, if Evan was merely a front, then the actual Non-Rithmatist seemed to have trusted Evan from the first day, and Evan had trusted them too, despite not receiving any proof, especially since Kaniae had also claimed to be the recipient of a specialisation. The main way Duncan could see this working out involved the Non-Rithmatist teaching a specialisation to Kaniae, and verifying their identity to Evan as a go-between by telling Evan to confirm that Kaniae had received a specialisation. But this was strange, wasn't it? If the Non-Rithmatist trusted Evan so much, why not simply teach Evan a specialisation too? Duncan didn't think Wei's thought was impossible - certainly, TJ seemed to be mulling over the idea as well, but he currently ascribed it low probability. Blackbane's reticence was not unexpected but a little difficult to work with. But Duncan understood, as well. [OOC: I get the work contingencies thing, all the best, Sarge! Hope you'll join us in getting rid of Forgotten together after that in our playstyle reversals.] Now though, there was the fight between the Servant and Frederick, but Duncan was more suspicious of Atreco, with how swiftly Atreco had shown up in support of Frederick against the Servant. In truth, Duncan suspected all three of them (and didn't it hurt, the thought he didn't know if he could trust his little brother?) with the result that he was uncertain about where he wanted to go. For the moment, he would lean into his suspicions of Atreco. Perhaps with time, he could re-assess his position. [OOC: Ninjaed so many times...Only one post in this thread when I started Playing this game laidback is starting to take its toll on me. But I must be strong. I must.]

Because I'm a veritable wellspring of memes, I shall audaciously doublepost to present you this masterpiece, as a joint effort from the Dulabros (Wyrm's idea, my Photoshop skills) : Optimism when you're GMing and something goes terribly awry, as it always does: This is the way

[OOC: Man, I play one game laidback and all the subtle claims and "you didn't notice!" come out of the woodwork ]

[OOC: I feel drunk but I'm sober, I'm young and I'm underpaid I'm tired but I'm working, yeah I care but I'm restless, I'm here but I'm really gone I'm wrong and I'm sorry baby What it all comes down to Is that everything is going to be quite alright 'Cause I've got one hand in my pocket And the other one is flicking a cigarette]

Duncan blinked. He hadn't expected that Connie was a Forgotten, when he'd cast that first stone. It had been unease, a desire to keep the pressure on, and illness, though at least the worst of the fever had left. Wyatt. Wyatt hadn't been that way at all, but Kessen and Tory had dropped so deep you forgot about them. Forgotten. Well, now. Blackbane had said he needed a dead Forgotten to work with, to analyse. He had one.

So I promised that I'd offer at least some of my thoughts, from my perspective, on this discussion. It's been over a week and I don't feel so bad about double-posting now. I think you've raised a number of questions/issues that are important to think about. What is not okay to do to win? How do we prioritise fun over pressure? What do we do about backstabbing? How can we practice thinking from others' perspectives? If we're imposing on other people, breaking the game, or harming them/not letting them have fun, I think that's a problem. I deleted this section a few times as it sounds very egotistical. But the historian in me says context is important - ideas and perspectives don't emerge, as it were, fully-formed like Athena from the head of Zeus. Our thoughts and ideas are often conditioned by our experiences, and who we are. So here we go I guess. You can skip this otherwise, it's a short 'about me/these are the SE things that stood out to me' thing.