Elenion

Cloud[/color]. Good to hear from you. I see a problem with using Cytonics as a scan for elim kills: If everyone decides to use Cytonics against Eric the Elim, he'll just have his comrade Backstabbing Bob perform the kill. And I don't think the elims will have much motivation to kill those scanned by the UIB agent, because a person's role doesn't say much about their alignment.

Boris sat in the guardroom late at night, scratching in his journal with an aged pen. A few days ago, he would have been blissfully asleep by this time. But in those few days, he had felt a change come over him. The Boris of a few days ago was careless, painless, and lethargic. The Boris of today wore a bandage over an ugly chest bruise that still pained him if he breathed too hard. The Boris of last week said little and wrote nothing, but the Boris of today sat here, in a hard, uncomfortable chair, writing a report about each guard remaining, prepared to deliver a speech rousing them to action in the morning. For once, he was even sober, but that didn't last too long as he sipped some liquor to dull the pain in his ribs. He chuckled merrily. He may have changed some, but Boris was still Boris.

@Yitzi2Looks like your knowledge of game theory is much better than my own, so I'll defer to you on that point. I'm going to vote Cloudjumper because I don't like lurking as a strategy. Sorry, right now I'm more focused on LG24 than this game. I'll probably be able to do more analysis once it finishes up.

*Disney's Moana music plays* Well what can I say except 'You're welcome'?

Warning: the following post attempts to apply tactics from an economics class I'm in to this game. Extending PK's reasoning a step further, right now we're in what game theory (econ lingo for the study of competition) calls the Prisoner's Dilemma. Both sides have a dominant strategy to use Cytonics to defend from the other side, but the cost of both sides using Cytonics is the village taking on friendly fire (such as killing our own UIBs) while both sides lose players (like elim killers and PCOs) to the other's defenses. The ideal scenario would be that neither side uses Cytonics and so loses no players to the other side's defenses, but in that case each side would have an incentive to change their strategy and use Cytonics against the undefended other side. Game theory says that to escape the Prisoner's Dilemma, we either need to change the rules (impossible), impose a binding agreement to not use Cytonics (impossible), or play with these rules a large number of times until both sides implicitly reach an arrangement (impossible). Therefore, our best action is to play our dominant strategy-use Cytonics--and accept the friendly fire and death to enemy defenses that might result.

Agreed. If Meta doesn't put the kill in but it still happens, Araris and Flash are above suspicion, you know that you didn't make the kill, and HH is totally gone (and basically cleared), so that only leaves me. I'd do the same thing were I in your place.

And that gives us the last piece if evidence we need against Meta. If Meta actually believed Sart was an elim--as he said he did at the end of last cycle--he would have changed his vote to Sart to ensure the lynch. By keeping his vote on me, he gave Sart the opportunity to get on and tie the lynch, and we were only saved from that by Sart being distracted by the other game. Therefore, Meta must not have really suspected Sart, and the only reason Meta would lie about something like that is if Meta was an elim with Sart. @The Flash @Araris Valerian We now have concrete evidence against Meta. Do you trust me enough to follow my lead? @ManukosPlease shut Meta down tonight. I know he says that he's going to Hazekill me, but if I'm right about him then he's planning on dropping the Haze and just plain killing me instead. @Hemalurgic_HeadshotYou're now cleared, according to my analysis from last cycle.

Plato Andersen was in the missile room when the klaxons rang and the doors sealed. After checking his surroundings, he resumed reading his book, a tome entitled "Temporal Forensic Analysis: A Guide to Determining the Causality of Past Events". It sure wasn't interesting reading, but if Plato were to prove his innocence, it sounded like something that might be useful.

Then it's now or never for this game, because if Sart turns out village, the two remaining elims can sneak the kill around the block, then I'm next on the chopping block, and after you mislynch me that's game. For both our sakes I hope Sart is evil.

Spoilers for the future of one of the Book 1 characters. Viewer discretion is advised.

HH had already backed up your action, so all Meta lying would have done was to get him lynched together with Jon. Maybe you first, or maybe not, but Meta would have gone down the pipes right after. Anyway, my first priority is to ensure the lynch of an elim, and if Meta isn't going to be lynched, I'll at least attempt to take Sart down.

To be fair, Arwen is young for an elf, and the blood of Numenor that Aragorn has gives him a longer lifespan than other men.

@Araris ValerianThat's exactly what the elims planned to happen. Jon was the one who leveled the accusations against you, but when it became clear that he was going to be lynched only then did Meta step in and defend you. Look at the order of votes: before Meta voted on Jon, there were already 7 votes on Jon: yours, Flash's, Yitzi's, mine, Cloud's, Drought's, and HH's, compared to only Jon's vote on you. Meta wasn't defending you, only bussing his teammate for trust. And it looks like it worked.

You make it sound like I sprung this on you at the last second to try to entrap you, but my analysis that implicates you has been up for nearly 36 hours now. 1. I didn't think I was being that subtle about my Jon-blocked-a-teammate theory; I've been bringing up the idea of Jon targeting one of his own at least once per cycle. It's only this cycle that I've suggested that you were the teammate being blocked, and I wasn't subtle with that either. Also, I didn't say that you had put in a Hazekill action, I instead suggested the elim kill because it is repeatable and you wouldn't have wanted it to go through anyway. Here's exactly what I said: 2. Yitzi called me out for leaving myself off of the experienced list, but the whole reason I made that list was so I could see which experienced players the elims might have. I'm not going to put myself on that list because I know that I'm not an experienced player working for the elims, even if I am an experienced player in general. 3. I didn't guide you at all into blocking HH. In fact, I thought that if I was implying anything I was implying that you should check in on Yitzi, because he was active, and a few cycles ago I had pressed him into directly claiming to have only one role so that he wouldn't have a fallback excuse if he was caught any sort of action. Where did you think that I was guiding you into blocking HH? 4. I guess it's possible that the elims have a Rioter if the village has two Smokers; however, I really don't think that both of the Smokers are village, so that point is moot. 5. Last cycle we had almost complete activity (everyone except HH), so I was hopeful that we wouldn't have inactivity woes from here on out. Maybe I was being too optimistic, but I think there's still a chance for us if we lose this lynch. If after Meta's comments and my countercomments you'd still rather lynch Sart, I'll follow you in that, but I really think we need to remove Meta today because he's active and more likely to be evil. The evidence against Sart is circumstantial, while against Meta it is more solid. @Manukos @Hemalurgic_Headshot @Araris Valerian @Sart So far only three votes have been cast out of 7 players. Please, read up on what has happened, draw your conclusions, and vote!

Which is also telling considering the alternative to Sart is HH, who's basically inactive and has been for the last few kills. Sart is my suspect for the second elim, but my evidence against him isn't nearly as good as it is against Meta, which that's why I've moved against Meta first. I'm concerned about the lack of votes thus far. If nobody votes, we leave ourselves open to a hammer vote from the elims. If y'all would prefer lynching Sart to Meta, we can do that today, and then have Meta and Manukos Hazekill each other tonight to ensure that no active Hazekiller can put in the elim kill tonight. I'd rather take Meta at this point because I think chances of him being an elim are higher than Sart, but I think the chances of both are over 50% and lynching either would be beneficial. If two votes materialize on Sart and nobody joins me on Meta, I'll change my vote to Sart and lock in the lynch. @The FlashHave you finished your analysis of my trustworthiness yet?

Yes he has. I just asked him IRL.

Or it will end up awkward, like you and me (I'm Ecth's brother). That would be equally humorous.

There is the fourth elim to consider, who likely is an Allomancer (HH and Sart both are), but even if not there is the chance of offensive Smoking. It's definitely not proof; we don't even know if elim roles were chosen or randomized, but I think a Smoker is more likely an elim than, say, a Coinshot, Lurcher, Thug, or Rioter.

Araris was quoting Meta in response to me: I didn't remember that Meta had claimed Copper Spiked. That makes him have a role I expected to be with the elims, furthering my suspicions on him.

Some of what will happen cannot be predicted; we don't know if a given weapon will end up in the hands of pacifistic villagers, aggressive villagers, or even with the elims. I think 2 repeatable kills and 2 one-time kills sounds good for a game designed to be kill-heavy, and after the game is over the GM usually looks back over the game and remarks on what tweaks they would make if they were to run the game again.

You're going to be the Convict's Ward, and Ecth or Bridge Boy is going to be the Pauper Baron, and I'm going to be laughing.

I think that it's still a little complex to be a QF, what with rooms, items, PMs, and all. There's also the problem of inactivity: very few players are going to use their only shot with the kill item on an inactive.

Meta started out with a Spike, other than the one that he got from that lynch a few cycles back? What was it? @Manukos It's good that you're honest. This way, we can be prepared with the necessary info if that becomes relevant to the lynch. Because the other evidence in the game points to your innocence, and because you could have lied and probably gotten away with it, I trust your story. @The FlashI don't think there's anything that definitively proves my innocence, but I have an alibi for the night Jon targeted a teammate because I was Hazekilling Yitzi, and Manukos targeted me the night that Cloud was killed and can back up that I performed no actions. So I'm either village, or an elim that hasn't put in the elim kill for the last 3 cycles. Also, I put myself on the Hazekill list, so if I am an elim I'm certainly making things difficult for my team.

WARNING: LARGE ANALYSIS POST INCOMING. Okay, so they got Yitzi, unsurprisingly. He was widely regarded as village guaranteed not to have protection compared to Flash's possible Pewter stash. @The Flash don't tell anybody how much Pewter you have left, if you have any. It'll keep the elims guessing as to whether or not it's safe to kill you. @Manukos @Metacognition Whom did you Hazekill last night? There are now only seven of us left, and Flash and Araris are above suspicion. I can fully trust myself, so that means that the elims must be in [Meta, Manukos, Sart, HH]. HH hasn't posted at all in the thread since D6, so if he has been putting the elim kills in for all this time I'm going to be very put out. Meta and Manukos posted yesterday, and I spotted Sart's name on the recently-viewing list right after turnover, so any of them could have been on to put in the elim kill. Unfortunately, two of those three are Hazekillers, and unless Sart is the only remaining elim (highly unlikely given 21 starting players) that means that we have yet another elim Hazekiller in our midst. That also explains why the elims would have elected to kill last night despite the possibility of it being blocked: they knew that their elim Hazekiller could put in the kill with no chance of being blocked, and then claim to have Hazekilled a target that did not put in an action. What we know at this stage: Flash and Araris are clear. Unless he's doing some hardcore lurking, HH is also clear, but HH is a known lurker so him being evil can't be discounted. The elims possess at least one living Hazekiller. The starting elim team was composed of a Courier, 2 Hazekillers, and likely a fourth player. Chances that Seonid would have started out the elims with a Courier and then 3 Hazekillers are very low. Therefore... One of [Manukos, Meta] is evil, but likely not both unless the elims started with 3 Hazekillers. One of [Sart, HH] is evil (again assuming the elims didn't start with 3 Hazekillers). Therefore, we need to take one of these pairings and figure out which is evil. If we have a mislynch today, we have a safety net in that next Day our numbers would be 3 against 2, with a guaranteed elim paired with the dead villager, and the villager that would be elim killed would have time to analyze the results of today's lynch before they go down. Even so, I don't want to use that safety net. To figure out what the pairings our, next we need to dredge up what happened D6, the day that we lynched Jon. Jon throws his vote down on Araris. Araris later retaliates, but these votes aren't important because each "knew" the other was lying. No real analysis required. Yitzi (village) votes Araris Flash votes on Jon after Araris claims Len is skeptical of Araris' claim and votes on Araris Yitzi switches votes to Jon after Araris makes a fullclaim of all of his actions Len realizes that Brightness' PMs closed after her death, and switches his vote to Jon Cloud votes on Jon Drought votes on Jon HH confirms Araris' alibi and votes on Jon Meta confirms Araris' alibi and votes on Jon Manukos votes on Jon. He also says "message to the elims : if you kill someone at least post on that night , chasing ghosts with no info isn't fun at all ", which I read as village. I'm going to refer to this statement later, as it is a key piece of evidence to Manukos' innocence. Discussion gradually fizzles out Jon is lynched Matching up this order of actions to our suspects, we see that Meta and HH both voted Jon at about the same time while confirming Araris' alibis for two nights, while Sart did not vote. However, as I said earlier, this wasn't alignment-indicative for Meta, because had Meta lied Araris' testimony being verified would have led to Meta being lynched. The same reasoning can be applied to HH, and both votes came at a time when the bandwagon had already taken off on Jon, so unfortunately we can't tell a lot about either player. Sart wasn't even on, so he's completely out of this analysis. One thing that does stick out to me, though, is that Jon was very insistent, even to his death, that Araris and Meta were working together to frame him. This could have been an attempt to distance Jon from Meta before the former died. Next up, we must re-approach the million-dollar question: whom did Jon Hazekill the night that he claimed to have Hazekilled Araris (but we know that he didn't)? I made a table of all players and their alibis for that night. Cross-referencing that with [Manukos OR Meta] + [Sart OR HH], I find that all four of those players did not post that night, although Meta was hanging around right around that turnover. Meta, however, denied putting any action in because he later said that he meant to implant his Spike but didn't have time. Manukos, according to his own statement earlier, would have considered putting the elim kill in unsportsmanlike because he didn't post that night. Because of the general dearth of information surrounding Sart and HH, I think we're going to have to make our lynch decision based off of [Meta OR Manukos]. And for that choice, I think the evidence is against Meta. The evidence against Meta, summarized: Last night, an elim kill got through, giving us information that implicates one of our Hazekillers. The question is whether Meta or Manukos is evil. During the Jon lynch, Jon leveled accusations of collusion against Meta and Araris. I suspect that this was meant as a distancing tactic by Jon, attempting to associate Meta with Araris, the confirmed Thief. Meta's testimony against Jon is not alignment-indicative, because had he testified the other way Araris would have ensured Meta's lynch for lying. Meta was on around turnover as N5 started, and so could have put in the elim kill for Jon to block. He was the only one of the four remaining suspects known to be active around that period. I was on many times during that Day, and I have a habit of checking who else is viewing the page, so that reduces the chances that one of the other three could have viewed undetected. Manukos has established that he views putting in elim kills without posting in the thread at least once as dishonorable. This further reduces that chances that he or a teammate put in an action without posting. While this doesn't directly imply Meta's guilt, if a Hazekiller went bad and Manukos is innocent, that leaves Meta. I'm sorry Meta if you're innocent and I'm making a blunder. If there's a fallacy in my reasoning, don't hesitate to point it out. "Once you eliminate the impossible, whatever remains, no matter how improbable, must be the truth." --Sherlock Holmes

That's coming from the guy currently on top of the leaderboard for most rep in the last week. My rep/post ratio is less than 40%. Anyway, I'll admit that I underrated just how evil Tonk Fah is, but for some reason I don't think of him when I think of despicable characters. Maybe it's because he doesn't get enough "screen time" to flesh out just how despicable he is.