Young Bard

>:] Excellent. I'm excited for this, for a number of different reasons. Assuming I don't end up as a pinchhitter, this will be my first game in a while, and I suspect it's going to be an interesting game to come back to.

*blinks* It seems I accidentally started a trend.

If you don't get 25 players by the end of signups, I'll join. If you do, I'll pinchhit.

I'll sign up as a pinch-hitter, seeing as this seems to be quite a small set-up for the game, and while I'm not very busy right now, I'm not swimming in time either.

Ah, right. Clever, you sly flatterer. I was wondering why I was mentioned here. OK, I started responding to this before I went back and saw it was based off of a section of the Bible - since it's an adaptation, that changes how I respond to some of what you've written. First off, I want to second what everyone else has said about showing, not telling. Also, try and add a bit more of a distinctive voice into each character - what makes them different from those around them, and how can that be shown through their actions and speech patterns. Your language feels kind of stilted - contractions and figures of speech are actually your friend here to try and make your dialogue feel more 'natural'. Also, you can try and trust a bit more in using subtext to your advantage - if the audience knows the guards are worried about food because of Haman's incompetent leadership, a slightly strained conversation between the Guard and Haman can just as easily say all the things you want to say without pausing the proceedings to explain things to the audience. In the prologue, you make Haman seem completely incompetent, but he ends up being the 'villain' in the story of Esther. Making your villain seem incompetent and buffoonish undermines the tension that your audience might feel throughout the play, so I'd advise you try and think of a slightly more imposing characterisation of Haman, so that there's more tension to the story. Actually, you're two scenes in, and you haven't introduced the main character of the story, Esther herself, which is generally frowned upon unless it's for a specific reason. Macbeth is introduced two scenes late, for example, but that's because they spend both of those scenes talking about Macbeth and building him up as a character, so that's OK. The reason why this is so important is because your opening impressions of the play or movie are meant to give you a sense of what the play or movie is all about in terms of genre and theme, so your audience knows what to expect and look out for. For this, I'd say the major theme of Esther is discrimination and persecution (a sadly relevant modern topic, as well). Try and think about how what you're writing, especially in the opening scenes, can contribute to at least two or three of: characterisation for someone (not just through what they say, but in how they say it - speech patterns, etc.), the plot, the themes, and the worldbuilding/setting/backdrop (things that aren't essential to the plot of the story, but helps to make the world of the story feel natural and lived-in.) A quick warning ahead about how you portray Vashti defying the king's word - the way this is portrayed in the Bible has certainly not aged well, so you'll need to be careful how you go about portaying this. I encourage you to keep writing this - this kind of advice is stuff that can really only get ingrained into you via practice, and I'm still not as good at it as I'd like to be. Going ahead, I'd say the most important thing to focus on is doubling down on characterisation. Who are these people? What are they like? How would you feel bumping into them on the street? How do you want the characters to (emotionally) react to these characters? Are they supposed to hate the character with a fiery burning passion? Are we supposed to feel sorry for them? You want someone who is highly authoratitive to talk? Give them a really confident kind of voice. You want them to be seem as incompetent? They're constantly changing their mind, saying one thing and then back-tracking and saying something else, then try to leave via stage left only to change their minds and leave via stage right. You want people to see someone as malicious? They're cruel to those around them, they say one thing and then do another the next scene, things like that.

Correction about my: "I think I might know something about the Xino/Drought claim" - apparently Lover vote manipulations don't count technically as actions, and therefore can't be roleblocked or redirected in the way I was thinking. I don't have anything to prove or disprove that claim. ...Darnit, Snipexe. I was compiling a vote count, and you beat me to it. OK, I actually think I'm safer than I thought I was, so I can breathe a slight sigh of relief. I had also been preparing a last info dump about anything that might be relevant before my death, but as that's less likely to happen now, here's the possible list of Eliminator candidates. (I've removed those I considered clear, and Arinian since it seems fairly certain they're dying this cycle. I agree with Eternum's plan that Xino should send Eternum something (though I doubt Xino will see either of our messages so close to cycle end.) Now, these are (roughly) ranked from most villager-y in my mind to most Eliminator-y. Sorta-villager-y: 15. Arraenae as Alev 14. I think I am here as Itiah II (mainly due to a PM I made with them) Neutral: 3. Droughtbringer as Pyra Mainiak11. Megasif as Mega Sorta-suspicious: 12. Xinoehp512 as Reyalp Nwoknu 8. Snipexe as Snip 6. Walin as Nelden Dastardly 18. Cadmium Compounder as Deric Watar (I don't have time to explain why this cycle - but intend to next cycle.)7. Fifth Scholar as Marne

Note: All of this was written late, late last night, and isn't relevant to the last 15 hours or so of discussion, up until the last couple paragraphs, which I've just tagged on now. I'd appreciate a vote count from someone. Right. My to-do list currently: 1: Respond to Rae's RP 2: Do an analysis of Fifth, specifically 3: Try and do a more broad general analysis of other people that could be an analysis (already done, kinda, but I'd like to take a closer look at a couple people). *sigh* I can either half-do all of these this cycle, or do one of these properly. Number 3 I'm dropping, for now... My apologies if 1 and 2 aren't as up to scratch as I'd like. Alev made sure Neris didn't get away all the way back to camp - she looked peeved, and Neris was smart enough not to kick up a fuss. "Stay here." As Neris started shouting after... who was that again? Something about a lock? People had gotten annoyed at her before, but usually not that much. Unfortunately, Alev had made enough of a scene as they entered camp, Neris being dragged behind, that the troupe members were watching, only barely trying to hide smirks back from their faces - she couldn't sneak out with so much attention on her. Probably exactly what the sly old woman had intended. Neris flopped down on the ground, sulking, waiting for the troupers to get distracted with other things. Such a shame her own attention span was just as limited. In the tent next to her, she heard people whispering. "...not going well..." "...now that Encanis is dead..." "...What do we do?" Neris smiled. If only she could see their faces... Slowly, she tried to slip around to the front of the tent to try and catch a glimpse through the crack at the front. On that segue(ish. Not really. But be nice, please ) : Right. Running through all of Fifth Scholar's posts since the start of the game since the start of the game: Cycle 1: First post: They defend Wonko. They say we should target the Eliminators, not the Cthaeh. Asks for a rules clarification about the Cthaeh in the Elim doc. They poke-vote me. The defence of Wonko, at the time, seemed fairly NAI to me - just some discussion of lore, proof that they read the rules/books, etc. I still don't necessarily view anything in the language there as looking like it could be a distancing tactic, now that Wonko's flipped, it's a little suspicious. This is what caught my eye the first time around. The way they pushed on trying to lynch the Eliminators felt... slightly off. It was as though they were trying to make themselves seem like an asset to the village, while not saying anything that's particularly controversial or likely to be challenged. (In the two cycles since, no-ones disagreed with Fifth's assessment, and nobody's made any attempts to find the Cthaeh in the meantime, so this turned out to be a safer statement than even I would have guessed.) The rest seems NAI for this point in the game/cycle. Second post: Clarifications. Expresses concern about Encanis and likelihood of all the named Chandrian Roles appearing. Discusses kill roles. Removes poke-vote. Basically NAI, so far as I can tell. Third Post: Clarifications on part of his discussion when he defended Wonko, including a mistake about the rules (he claimed that the Sithe and the Cthaeh are the only ones to possess secrets. This is incorrect. Encanis and Cyphus also possess secrets, and it turned out Wonko was in fact Encanis, not a Sithe.) Votes on Eternum, defending Elandara. Says their gut is suspicious of Rae and Bort, but it's too early to act on. The first part, strangely, actually seems fairly villager-y to me - Elim Fifth would know this was false, and generally, Eliminators especially try not to get caught out on something which can so easily be falsified, from my experience. Naturally, the second part immediately negates any of that trust. They do so based on the meta, as well, using the fact that Elandara is a 'new-ish player', rather than any sort of defense of Elandara's posts, which might have seemed more suspicious later, and vote on an inactive, which is a fairly safe choice to vote on. Rae/Bort as suspects... at that point, those are probably fair suspicions, and it's good that those suspicions seem to be fairly continuous, not bouncing around. NAI, maybe slight village. Fourth post: Tries to figure out why they're suspicious of Rae - seems to chalk it up to 'just gut'. Been there, know how you feel. NAI. Fifth post: Clarifies questions on how votes are counted. Responds to my accusation of him. The clarification - I'm tempted to say that that's a way of seeming active without contributing, but I feel like that's me tunneling - Fifth seems to be contributing a fair amount elsewhere. NAI. The response is... fair, I didn't give him much to go on (hopefully, something I'm correcting now, even if it takes him a year to read the whole thing ). Such is the nature of Day 1 votes. NAI. Sixth post: Rectracts poke vote from Eternum. Encourages Walin to post reads. Says that they don't really have enough suspicion on anyone to place a vote. The only thing that's possibly alignment indicative there (to me) is his post to Walin. Again, it feels like something to say to seem active without contributing much. Then again, it could easily be a village thing to do as well (I've encouraged people to post a few times this game myself.) Slight Village - even if it is an Elim tactic, I don't think this is the kind of behaviour I want to discourage by trying to lynch them for it. ...OK, at this point it was past 3am and I nodded off, and then I had to leave when I woke up. I was originally building up to a vote on Fifth, but I'm not going to do that now. I... think I have some information that could be relevant to the Drought/Xino claim, which I'm passing on in PM's in the (very likely, it seems) event I die. For now, Arinian, largely due to self-preservation.

If it were a special kill, it would still be in the write-up, I would have thought. Unless Drake's trying to do some kind of baelfire-y thing of "Orlok? Orlok's not playing this game, and he never was. "

Hmmm... I've gone over the vote results over the course of the game - both in thread and the manipulations. I'm not tackling content, except where it pertains to voting specifically (just for time reasons, or else I'll be here all day - I might analyse a specific players posts a bit later.) Also... Aonar voted - should they be dead? Cycle 1: Elandara poke-votes Eternum, then swaps to Rae, then votes for Arinian. The Eternum vote didn't seem like a distancing tactic, just a way of sounding villager-y. The Rae vote seemed like a gambit to save themselves/lynch a villager. Wonko voted for Bort, then Aonar Cycle 1 - the Bort vote doesn't read like a distancing tactic to me, and Aonar we know now is village. Orlok initially votes for Wonko, then swaps to voting for Elandara, along with Bort and Snipexe. Snipexe later moves their vote from Elan to Steel after it seems possible that Elan would be lynched - this was explained later that Snip and Rae were lovers, but it's worth mentioning for completion's sake. Vote Manipulations: Drought: None -> Elandara (this, combined with the Ciridae choosing to lynch Elandara, is what caused Elan to die. Presumably, for the Ciridae to send in actions knowing it would be a tie, they must be in communication with the vote-swapper in order to organise this.) Walin: Vote Weight set to Zero Cycle 2: Wonko votes for Devotary - it seems mainly to be a defence of Fifth (which means that Fifth might be a candidate who's worth looking at more thoroughly, but that could be me tunnelling - I hope to analyse their posts this cycle). Eternum and Orlok vote on Wonko - neither read as a distancing tactic to me (especially Orlok, who's already helped lynch Elan at this point) Vote Manipulations: Drought: None -> Fifth Steel: None -> Snipexe Devotary: Xinoehp -> None (apparently chased by Scrael. Likely not relevant to the vote on Xinoehp since Devotary was the only vote and she did so 15 minutes before Cycle end.) Cycle 3: Alv and Eternum are the first two to vote on Wonko (neither seems like a distancing tactic, and Eternum in particular seems to be authentic to me, having voted for Wonko C2 as well) and Orlok cements it as well. After that, I think most of the votes could be considered NAI, unless people can get something out of the tone of the post (which I can't). Vote Manipulations: Orlok: Wonko -> None Walin: Wonko -> None How close people are to dying of the inactive filter: 3 cycles without voting: Eternum, Fifth, Snipexe, Alvron, Xinoehp, Bort, Cadmium, Bard 2 cycles without voting: Drought, Devotary, Walin, Arinian, Arraenae, Orlok 1 cycle without voting: Megasif, I think I am here Process of elimination: We have 16 players left alive (the player list seems to be wrong, as it's removed Orlok for some reason?). Orlok, Eternum, and Alv, I consider to be absolutely trustworthy villagers, for having voted on Wonko. (Bort, I don't yet considered hardcleared, because it's possible they voted on Elandara as a distancing joke vote, and then didn't get on when there was a serious chance Elan would be lynched. I do find it unlikely, though.) Wonko and Devotary also seemed fairly suspicious of each other, and not in a way that seemed like a distancing tactic to me, so I include them as well. That drops us down to 12 players. I also know I'm not an Eliminator, so that's 11 for me: 3. Droughtbringer as Pyra Mainiak - Has not voted - someone has voted on their behalf twice - probably a Lover. (It's almost certainly not a Skindancer redirect, seeing as Drought was compelled to vote for Elandara Cycle 1.) @Droughtbringer6. Walin as Nelden Dastardly - Their post at the end of the last cycle seemed really suspicious to me, but that died down a bit on the reread. I'd like to hear what they have to say in PM's before my final judgement, though.7. Fifth Scholar as Marne - I've mentioned before I'm suspicious of Fifth - I intend to do a more thorough analysis of Fifth's posts in particular later this cycle.8. Snipexe as Snip - Slight Elim read? (Yes, I know they're a Lover with Rae. That doesn't necessarily make them a villager, though - they could have a Cthaeh alignment together, or if Drake wanted to be trollish (and before he knew things would get so bad for the Elims), then he could still be an Eliminator.) Not a top priority, though, particularly since it brings down Rae, as well, who I'm not suspicious of currently.11. Megasif as Mega - Too little to say. Will be killed by the inactivity filter this cycle if they don't vote. Would like to hear more, @Megasif12. Xinoehp512 as Reyalp Nwoknu - Has been flying under the radar, and I really didn't like their vote on Bort - I'd like to hear you contribute more to the discussion on various lynch candidates and players, @xinoehp51213. Arinian as Ray Fox - Too little to say. Has mainly voted for themselves to avoid inactivity. Would like to hear more, @Arinian14. I think I am here as Itiah II - Too little to say - again, the Bort on vote seemed funny to me, and again, I'd like to hear more of your opinions on various players, @I think I am here. (They're going to die of the inactivity filter this cycle.)15. Arraenae as Alev - Seems pretty villager to me at the moment. Gut read, plus I trust Orlok's read, to a certain extent.16. Bort as Master Ash - I'm fairly inclined to say that they're a villager.18. Cadmium Compounder as Deric Watar - I'm... torn, on CadCom. I want to read through their posts again over the next couple cycles and talk with them more in PM. If they are an Eliminator, they're playing really well for a new player.

Neris slowly snuck up on Alev as she wandered towards the tree. It was a kind of a game at this point - see how close you could get before you got noticed. With the exception of a few spoilsports in the troupe, it was mostly encouraged - sneaking could be useful working backstage in the theatre to get from one point to the other to set off the appropriate effects at the right time. As such, Neris was nearly right behind Alev before smugly folding her arms. "The troupe says I shouldn't go near that tree. Has some nasty thing inside it or summat like that. All of them want me to have less fun than Tehlu's shining nosehairs, every single one of them. It's taken me all day to get away from them to even get this close." Neris leant in closer. "There's also other... things, around here, though they don't let me get a good look at 'em. Fair's fair, though, I don't let them see me, either. They seem to be guarding this thing. No idea how you managed to get so close, they're probably distracted or summat." Neris... is not the person to stop you from trying to go to the Cthaeh. In fact, I *was* planning on doing RP of almost exactly the same thing, so it makes sense for her to bump into you. At least Alev knows the danger now, and can drag Neris off by her ear if she wants to. Right. Obviously, Wonko, though I don't want to stop discussion for the day, so let's talk about a few other people. (I can take my vote off later if that's what we decide we're doing. I still am suspicious of Fifth, though I'll wait for other people to vote on them/say they're suspicious to prevent myself from potentially tunnelling. I think I trust Orlok completely now, as the person who sealed the fate of both Elandara and Wonko (a double bus is... possible, I suppose, but I really doubt it.) I also trust Alv, at this point - that first vote didn't feel like a distancing tactic to me (Fifth, by the way, I disagree with you describing Bort as 'basically hardcleared', as that vote could easily have been a distancing tactic, and had a post outlining as much before it got snaffled. ) Speaking of which, Fifth, I'm not ignoring your post, I just... don't have all that much to respond to it. You're suspicious of me, I'm suspicious of you - we'll just have to keep a close eye on each other. Other people I intend to analyse: Bort, Walin, and anyone who on a reread seems to have been close to Wonko/Elandara (or else who seem to have deliberately distanced themselves from them.)

Huh. Excellent. Good thing I wasn't around at rollover - I would have likely voted to lynch Steel over Elandara. (Well played, Elan - I didn't suspect you at all.) Speaking of things that didn't happen at rollover - there's no kill, which is strange - Drake, if there'd been a kill and it had been protected, would it have been announced in the write-up? In the OoA, kills are before the lynch, so that's not an explanation. It's possible some of the Eliminators are borderline inactive, so I'm going to place a poke vote on Droughtbringer, who didn't post or vote last cycle. Even if they're not an Eliminator, it would be good to hear them post more about the game so far, and any reads they have. Also, we can now, presumably, trust that Namer messages come from Namers, and not from Cyphus, which is excellent - whoever the Namer was, can you confirm tonight you sent the message and not Cyphus before they died?

Ehhh... I'll place my vote down on Fifth for now, though that's likely to change before the end of the cycle. Most of their posts so far have just read to me like they're trying a little too hard to convince people that they're village, just in the tone of the posts. (Elan, Arraenae, and Eternum are up for the lynch right now - out of those, I'd be most happy with lynching Eternum, as I'm not suspicious of either of the other two and it might encourage others to post.)

Ha. I intend on doing my own more original RP a bit later in the cycle, rather than just a mimicry, don't worry. Game related comments - hmmm... not sure I have too much to say at this point in time, tbh, though if something or someone catches my eye I'll mention it. There are a lot of different roles and abilities flying around, so expect any and all kind of actions to be fairly confusing. In particular, there seem to be quite a lot of manipulation roles (although we don't know how many of them made it into the actual game), so that's something we need to be especially wary of when considering the results of scans, or whether to attack someone with a Ramston Steel Knife if they have one (quick glance through the rules, and that seems to be the only vig kill role). All in all, there's probably going to be a fair amount of confusion and paranoia this game, even more than usual. Whether we should target the Cthaeh or the Evil Faction... I don't think this is a particularly important distinction. In general, I'll try and lynch my top suspicion for a non-village role, unless there's a specific strategic advantage to doing otherwise (such as if I want to see their reactions to me bringing up other suspicions before they flip). Addendum after writing this: Hmmm... On a second reread, a very slight elim read on Fifth, because they seem to be pushing a little bit too strongly for discussion, as though they want to seem village. I don't know their playstyle that well, though, so it's possibly nothing.

There was a silence to the air, and it was a silence of three parts. The first part was made by the things that were lacking. If there had been birds in the trees to sing, to croon and twitter into the night air, they would have filled the first silence with their colourful song. If there had been the sounds of wildlife, to break the silence as they cracked the brush under their feet in the forest... but there was no wildlife nearby, and so the first silence remained. The troupe stood staring at the embers of the fireplace. There was no clinking of pots as heapings of stew was doled out into the bowls of hungry travellers, no sounds of boisterous conversation as each of the troupe tried to outdo the others. There was only the ashes, and the sullen, sunken eyes. In doing so, they added a smaller, sullen silence to the first one. It made an alloy, of sorts - a counterpoint. The third silence was not an easy thing to notice. If you stood for an hour, you might begin to notice it - you could feel it in the trees hanging overhead and in the stones resting on the ground. It was in the slow air as it dusted by, holding the secrets it held of ages long since vanished to myth. And it was in the slowly dissipating ashes of the tents, as they slowly fell apart, decaying away and leaving nothing behind, except for the third silence. For this was the greatest silence of the three, wrapping the others inside itself. It was as deep and wide as autumns ending, as heavy as a great-river smooth silence. It was the sound of the troupe, waiting to die.

Droughtbringer - Bandwagonning so early in the cycle that the cycle hasn't even started yet? That seems suspicious.

I gave him 4 and a half hours before rollover... I've signed up closer to the end of the cycle than that before.

*sigh* I shouldn't sign up for this... I don't have time for this... Darn. It's a KKC game. Against (possibly) my better judgement, I'm signing up as Neris - the young orphan girl who's slightly too keen to go looking for trouble. EDIT: My intent, currently, is to have a much heavier focus on RP than strategy compared to what I normally do (though I should still have some strategy). So... don't lynch me for that, please.

I greatly enjoyed this game - it was well played by the Elims - if there hadn't been so few players to begin with, allowing us to knock people out by process of Elimination, we'd probably never have caught you. And Rand and Elan were fun to play alongside - congratulations to them both for helping the village in the last two/three cycles - I was watching on and I really had no clue what to do but you both handled yourselves well. Elan, in particular, played like a much more experienced player - if this had been an Anonymous game, I'm not sure I'd have believed he was a new player.

I was, yes.

Huh. When is this relevant from, out of interest? If Sophie had tried to commit suicide via converting last night, would that action have passed, or is that a clarification that is being applied this cycle?

Personally, I believe that Crimsn is the most likely Sophie right now, through process of Elimination. 1. Drought: Elenion seemed happy to lynch Drought - he firmed up the vote on Drought last cycle, where I think they'd vote on another candidate if Drought were an Elim buddy. 2. Eternum: They've been fairly absent this game, and has admitted they weren't really active enough to send in order C1. If they were Sophie, I'd have expected them to prioritise the game more. 3. Devotary: Basically everyone agrees that Devotary is almost definitely not Sophie. However, if Crimsn is proven to be Sophie after the lynch today and the game doesn't end, Devotary seems like the most likely candidate for being a convert over someone who's been close to being lynched twice and a borderline inactive. 4. Crimsn: I initially had a village read on Crimsn at the end of Cycle 1 with her accidental vote on Orlok - I thought an Eliminator Crimsn would have been slightly more careful. But having narrowed down the list of players to just these four, I think Crimsn is by far the most likely candidate to be Sophie. EDIT: Gah. I missed Rand's edit (I kept an eye on the thread, left, and then came back and thought nothing had changed), where they outline almost exactly the same thoughts and analysis as I did. Oops.

And Hal: The Lover! A pleasure to make your acquaintance. (For the record, the three of us have been talking in PM's since Rand claimed, and decided now that we're close to the late game, it would be best to claim and narrow down the list of possible Sophies to 4 people.)

Yeah, in retrospect, that was a mistake, and I apologise for having been a little insensitive, Bort. I hope I still see you around in future SE games and that this doesn't discourage you. It's certainly something I'll try to be more cognizant of in the future.

It was part of a plan Devotary proposed Cycle 1. If the Eliminators try to convert, they won't know which players have roles and which might have been protected from the lynch.

Rae's short for Arraenae, though I haven't seen them referred to by their full name in a while.