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Fifth Scholar

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  1. Fifth Scholar
    Vote Count: >Azure Mouse (1): Melon Dingo >Coral Swan (3): Amber Vulture, Cream Tuatara, Indigo Weasel To the best of my knowledge, the current votes as they stand.
  2. Fifth Scholar
    The forest had grown quiet again, only an occasional snapped twig underfoot or rustling leaf marking the passing of the company. Elves moved quietly, it seemed, and while Thalin occasionally felt himself a clumsy fool when he made a lot of noise, he noticed that his movement was the only sound anywhere near him in this oppressive forest. In contrast to the low hubbub of voices at the beginning of the journey, silence now lay upon the thick forest air like a heavy, all-enfolding blanket. While he hadn’t known Elves to be the most talkative bunch, they should be discussing more than they were at present, that’s for sure, particularly if hidden killers did indeed permeate their ranks. Kadgar, one of the last members to join their ranks, hadn’t even said a word since he joined up. Well, if that state of affairs continued, Thalin may have to use his battleaxe to set them straight. Letting the Mordor scum lurk in the back of the party was dangerous, and Thalin resolved to call each one out until they spoke. (@Dalinar Kholin)
  3. Fifth Scholar
    “Umm...yes, Fade, that was useful,” Thalin said consolingly. “Though next time you may try stumbling away from the spider instead of into it. Move like that will get you killed in a real battle.” He paused, realising he sounded more gruff than intended. “Nevertheless, you did fine, and ended up killing the creature. Probably best to avoid washing yourself in that stream, though. Wipe the gore off as best you can and then we’ll get moving again.” Thalin turned to Elandera, the archer who had responded with such speed, and gave a grudging nod of respect. He may not trust all the Silvans, but they proved a sight handier with a bow than any dwarf he’d seen. The Greeenwood archers were said to be among the most accurate Elves, and hopefully that’d bear itself out in the coming days, with threats more serious than the spider Fade had “slain” following them, from without and within. Thalin anticipated more skirmishes and battles after this one, and getting to know someone who could watch your back during them would prove useful. Even if that someone was an elf. As Fade extricated himself from the corpse of the still spider, Thalin noticed a man, a Gondorian from the look of his clothing, slowing pushing the body with a large stick towards a stream. He shook his head. It does dispose of the remains, but once the company moved on the corpse could have just been left to rot on the forest floor. Thalin was particularly unsettled that the man was from Gondor; he had heard rumours about Gondorian Spies within the traveling group, who were trying to get the party to move to Minas Tirith. Well, they were going to have at least one person to argue against; he hated Minas Tirith with a passion. The soldiers were generally fine, but the nobility and Steward were all corrupt fools, and decent soldiers didn’t make half a whit of difference if they were taking orders from corrupt masters. Thalin resolved to keep an eye on Eleryn, and any other self-professed Gondorians. Anfalas, his supposed place of origin, was large, and held more than docile herdsmen within its borders. He shook himself out of these thoughts, the march being resumed once again, and took his usual place near the front. Daydreaming and speculation did no good while the company was in present danger, and Thalin would need all his wits about him to be alert and watch for the myriad denizens of the dark forest.
  4. Fifth Scholar
    Thalin tromped along the Old Forest Road in his heavy studded boots, near the front of the line, slightly disgruntled at the whole questing concept. Hmph, he thought irritably. I thought that wizard bloke had some sense, but then he went and put some random elf in charge of this expedition. And all from some excuse about noble lineage. Well, at least that elf lady, Rossiel, was still talking to him. She didn’t pretend that Thalin was some kind of second-class citizen, like all the other elves did. But even she wouldn’t talk him into taking orders from that snooty elf at the front of the column. Thalin shouldered his massive battleaxe, glancing about occasionally for spies, eyes in the forest and black bats wheeling overhead, or stray patrols of Orcs from Dol Guldur. Dealing with those the last time he had passed through Mirkwood had taken much of his strength and will, and he would rather not encounter them again. Thalin continued looking around him as he marched westward. Behind him, slowly fading into the mists of the forest, were the Mountains of Mirkwood, their oddly-shaped peaks rising high above the murky canopy. To his left, a stream ran adjacent to the path. Thalin knew better than to put so much as a toe into it—enchantments would lie heavy upon its waters. Thalin then looked above him for the first time, and gasped. A great web lay slung over the trees, casting thin shadows over the small company. Out of it dropped a single forest spider, looking for quick prey. “Everyone look out!” Thalin yelled, shoving the nearest person, a man muttering about something called sticky glue, out of the way of the monster. He swung his axe, removing one of the spider’s forelegs, but it merely bellowed in pain, wobbled unsteadily, and continued to advance. Setting his axe in front of him, Thalin gritted his teeth, hoping one of those elves would help him defend the creature. I’ll be trying to RP everything this game, including game commentary, but I’ll try to keep it distinguishable. On that note, anyone want to confront the spider? If you don’t, Thalin’s lady friend Rossiel might have to, and that would be embarrassing for his reputation
  5. Fifth Scholar
    Not Seonid, obviously, but currently living players are Amber Vulture, Amethyst Scorpion, Azure Mouse, Chartreuse Penguin, Coral Swan, Cream Tuatara, Indigo Weasel, Ivory Dragonfly, Mauve Crocodile, and Melon Dingo.
  6. Fifth Scholar
    Thank you, Ostrich. The idea came from Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s poem “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner,” which uses the same rhyming pattern and structure as my writeup, and also talks about the consequences of shooting harmless albatrosses.
  7. Fifth Scholar
    Well done, as has been stated before, to Doctor. I have three main takeaways from this game: 1. My record of trusting Eliminators is bad, still. 2. I shouldn’t have toned down my paranoia as the game progressed—I should have upped it, and suspected the “cleared” people like Doctor and Straw. I blame Sart for trying to tone it down. 3. Tone and voting patterns don’t clear people. Ever. I need to relearn this lesson as many times as it takes. I cleared Doctor and Walin for this, and I hopefully shan’t do it again. Knowing me, I probably will. Overall, it was a fun game, even if I’m slightly annoyed at myself for again leading the village down the wrong path. Well played Elims, and thanks to my fellow villagers for being kind enough to put up with my constant suspicions of you guys.
  8. Fifth Scholar
    Far better to try to get a suspected innocent lynched at LyLo than someone who’s been read as village or neutral for most of the game. While Straw may be guilty, rushing into a bandwagon head-on tomorrow isn’t the greatest idea. We should consider the possibility of Straw being framed, as well as other potential Elim teams. The fact that Straw left his vote on Elandera makes me want to lynch her, actually, as it’s either distancing if Straw is an Elim, or a genuine suspicion if he’s village, and if he’s village Elandera is one of the last feasible suspects remaining. @Elandera Your Straw/Walin theory intrigued me. I’d like to hear from them both before drawing conclusions, though. @Mr Doctor, I suspect Elandera because she has a bad voting history and nothing to clear her, and Walin because he clinched a lynch on Burnt, outside the looking-like-Elims Straw/Elandera pool. I originally suspected you because you joined the Burnt lynch, but my overall village read on you hasn’t really changed because of that, given that I did the same thing.
  9. Fifth Scholar
    Assuming there aren’t three Elims, and we’re therefore dead tonight, I think I suspect Elandera and one of Mr Doctor/Walin. The first probably more than the second. Straw’s retraction on Burnt, a mislynch candidate, clears him to a reasonable extent. Plus I still think Straw is an easy mislynch. As I should have done last cycle, I’m going to vote for Elandera tomorrow, probably. As a side note, that was a terrible mislynch and we better be able to recover from that, or we’re basically screwed. Edit: Steel’s game has been moved out of “currently running” on the GM spreadsheet. Wonder if that’s telling...
  10. Fifth Scholar
    ...dangit, Elandera. I was midway through this analysis myself. I agree with most of it, though I think some of your conclusions may be slightly harsh. While Straw does seem more suspicious, I will keep closely in mind that much of what you marked him down for is NAI for him, such as random bandwagon-y votes. Before I place my vote, I want to consider the three most likely Eliminator teams: 1. Elandera/Burnt 2. Burnt/Straw 3.Elandera/Straw Unless Elandera is going for a bus here (which is quite feasible), team 3 looks the most unlikely. Team 2 is what Elandera believes, which of course she does, but I’m having trouble with it. Why? Burnt and Straw are the easiest scapegoats for village mislynching, and the two both being on the same team feels wrong. Team 1 seems weird given the odd shade-casting that went down between Burnt and Elandera earlier this cycle. I am leaning closer to team (0): Burnt with Straw/Elandera, possibly leaning a bit more likely on Straw? Maybe?. But I really don’t like any of the three candidates—they all have reasons to be good and reasons to be evil, but the webs of connections between them are hard to puzzle out and are much muddier given everything that’s happened this cycle. However, overall, and due to the nature of the votes on her at the beginning of this cycle being mostly poke-votes, one of them likely cast by a villager and one by an elim to distance, I will go ahead and vote Burnt Spaghetti.
  11. Fifth Scholar
    Woohoo! I’m very ready to RP in a Tolkien setting. Sign me up as Thalin, a grumpy red-bearded dwarf who isn’t really familiar with all these Silvans but has formed an unlikely friendship with Rossiel, another elf in the company. His personal philosophy regarding his enemies is to indiscriminately chip away at them, and though his willpower occasionally falters, he remains constantly committed to any quest to which he is assigned.
  12. Fifth Scholar
    Whoever you find suspicious, of course. I’m just remarking that since both of you voted on Burnt, and all three of you are on my suspect list, it’s making me paranoid and not want to lynch Burnt, which is bad because one of you might just be an intuitive villager instead of an elim. Second, in the tags it says “the final showdown approaches”. Am I reading too much into this, or are there three Elims left? Because if so, we’re at LyLo.
  13. Fifth Scholar
    I dislike that two of the people in my suspect group are voting for the third person, just saying.
  14. Fifth Scholar
    Yay, thank you Elims!!! You finally killed Sart. Now I can focus on actual suspects. My apologies for my somewhat unwarranted paranoia, Sart. @Steeldancer Since Max can no longer revive people, is there a particular reason people are still spending time as mostly dead? And now, I have to choose. There are seven people. 2 hard-cleared Snipexe, myself 1 village read Mr Doctor 4 others Burnt, Elandera, Walin, Straw It would be terribly unsportsmanlike for me to swing a lynch onto Mr Doctor today, considering I haven’t really voiced any suspicions of him all game, and that he’s my top non-confirmed village read. I’ll admit I am less sure about him, particularly given his voting during the last few cycles (though we’re all guilty on that count), but I’m certainly not going to lynch him while other options remain open. Our four options, in Sart-summary form: Elandera: The active one Straw: The quiet one Walin: The not-voting one Burnt: The PM one I will strike Walin from this list. While I do not approve of his stance on voting, I do not believe it is alignment indicative from him, and if he is an Elim his voting should be obvious enough if/when it changes to catch him. In addition, he just feels like too easy of a lynch target, similar to Manukos. The other three are the people I’d like to see lynched. Unfortunately, I can only kill one of them each cycle. The utilitarian part of me wants to have me, Doctor, Snip and Walin vote to kill one of the people in that group every day, until they’re all dead and the game is (hopefully) won (assuming my reads on Doctor and Walin are correct, which given my history...unlikely). However, such a strategy is eminently impractical, given that it requires everyone to do the same thing which is no fun. I will vote on Elandera for now, pending a more detailed review of the three in my suspicions list.
  15. Fifth Scholar
    You’ll get there. The cracks in your sanity are slow to appear and even slower to widen, but there’s no way to push them back together into the whole they were. Your thoughts on Elandera are interesting—I hadn’t thought to check her voting patterns, to be honest, as my suspicion of her was based mostly on the fact that I felt like she was trying to pocket me. My suspicion of Burnt is more nebulous, and I’ll look into it more once I know how Manukos flips, and my Straw suspicion is basically a toned-down version of my paranoia that the Elims are distancing/bussing. I really want to kill Straw just because he’s gone 9 cycles in an LG without being mislynched, which is downright inconceivable
  16. Fifth Scholar
    I think the next MR is an AN run by Seonid.
  17. Fifth Scholar
    As you wish, Steel, I shall return to activity. In less than 24 hours, I will be able to return to my usual level of analysis! I’m very glad I got over this hump of inactivity. As a side note, my top three suspicions are now in no particular order Burnt, Straw and Elandera. Once I get more time I’ll look at the three of them some more.
  18. Fifth Scholar
    Inconceivable! This summary is beautiful. As a side note, the rest of your narrative is a bit too simplistic I feel, especially since I retain suspicions of Elandera, but I am willing to kill Manukos even if this sudden vote train has made me a bit hesitant. I will never trust you, but I’ll hold off on suspecting you. So, Elandera, I am getting nervous about you for some reason. Once I get the chance I’ll look into it more, but I just want to note this suspicion for now.
  19. Fifth Scholar
    Don’t you go drawing any village lines to Sart, now. He’s a tricky one. Does it really look less realistuc now? We know the Elims have a busier who used vote manipulation, if I’m so evil as you claim. I Daggered Randuir’s vote onto himself. If Sart can use a Rum to kill Elenion and get a free pass, but I can use a Dagger to try to kill Randuir and be strung up, that hardly seems fair. Remember, when I flip village: Kill Sart. (Just kidding, kill the most likely Eliminator. It might be him, though.) Does it not? I will hazard a guess that Dalinar was killed last night because he seemed village and was unlikely to draw suspicion or be mislynched. He may have said something inthread or in a PM that set off an Elim. There are many possibilities, and your theory needs confirmation by @Sart before I start trusting it. Yep, not arguing with you here. Inactives and semiactives, when lynched, do not feel good when they flip village. So I tend to stay away from them when I have an active player to lynch, because those typically have more points against them. This is all true, and I will not contest anything you said here, other than to point out that bandwagons give places for Elims and semiactives to stick their votes, and hide them. Also true. I’d say that you and I are the most active analysts still alive, and with both of us feeling pressures on our time we’re able to commit to SE, the overall analysis happening in thread has been significantly reduced. So with less “information” (which is often just less people willing to look at that information), bandwagons flourish. It's not inconceivable that someone if someone speaks strongly with enough conviction, people will listen, and they are entertaining while they do it, then they will be far more engaging than if they just state their theories. Or, perhaps, if they lay their thoughts out in a memorable and interesting manner. These are all true, but again, my case against Rath was supported by what I felt was, at the time, a decent bit of logic, and with my activity dropping I had to resort to drama in place of hard analysis (though you didn’t link the post where I tore apart all of Rath’s posts). Agree with all of this. My issue is not with your logic here, it’s your conclusion. Lynched into retirement would be fun if I wasn’t village. It might actually be fun anyway. I’m curious as to one thing, though; if I am an Elim, as you say, why would I push so strongly against someone, nearly staking my alignment on it, if Im trying to remain undercover? edit: Oops, you do bring that up. Well, I’m still curious as to your response, considering that you voted on me regardless. I’m also going to say that when I am lynched, and I flip village, don’t go accusing Doctor for this as the only reason against him. Manukos does seem like an interesting target, actually.
  20. Fifth Scholar
    Hi. So I’ll pull this up again, except I’ll modify it some more: Gamestate 10 living players Walin, manukos, Burnt, Elbereth, Snipexe, Straw, Fifth, Sart, Elandera, Mr Doctor 2 confirmed good Fifth Scholar, Snipexe 1 soft-confirmed village Sart decided to let my paranoia continue 2 village reads of mine Mr Doctor, Walin 1 confirmed neutral Elbereth 2 active suspects Elandera, Sart (kinda) 3 semiactive suspects Straw, Burnt, manukos I am now willing to lynch an inactive, based on my suspect list, as I have more inactives than actives on it. If I was careful enough, there should be about a 40% chance of me firing a gun into that crowd and hitting an elim. Since I’m not careful, and I probably let an elim slip through somewhere, there’s more like a 20% chance, in reality. I understand people want to lynch me today; I probably would argue for my lynch if I wasn’t me, and the only reason I’ll oppose it is because the village can’t afford a mislynch right now. I’d again like to apologize to Rath for leading a lynch on him, which was a definite mistake. I wouldn’t kill Sart right now, so I’m probably lynching within [Burnt, manukos, Straw] today, if possible. Oh, and something else: we have 7 villagers and 2 Elims alive, with one Neutral Max. Assuming that myself, Snipexe, and every villager reading this is confirmed good, that means that all you villagers out there, you have a 33% chance of hitting an Elim by chance with your vote. If you use logic, the chances are higher. If you burn iced animal crackers and roll a d6, your chances are very high. Either way, choose well, and find the time to analyze since I really can’t at the moment. I will change my vote to Burnt for now. Logic!Fifth out.
  21. Fifth Scholar
    Am I? Good question. I’ll let you see in the language of that post if you can find anything that looks like a confession. I’m re-examining all the players right now, and will hopefully have thoughts by tomorrow night. edit: this is me having too much fun with being chaotic good, and I should probably stop. But it’s basically the only thing I can do with my time constraints, so I guess you’ll have to put up with spontaneous!me until three days from now when I can be more active again
  22. Fifth Scholar
    Well, that’s my bad, Rath. To be fair, driving and joining a mislynch was easier than using a kill outright, given that you were under pressure. Bussing Rand may or may not have been wise, but it certainly worked, and I’m very regretful and sad that my team is losing at this point but I feel like I’ve played this as best I could. I was doing well cycle five when Rand got lynched, and the distancing was thorough enough that the accusers never really came under suspicion, until there were no more mislynches to jump on that could easily be led. So now one must be created, if the Elims are to win. Snipexe. The Rath lynch was my last link to logic, and it is snapped. (I’ll get a real vote down later once I figure out which lynch candidates are villagers)
  23. Fifth Scholar
    It turns out summer camp’s schedules are actually kinda weird, and not consistently busy like I thought. They can be sporadically busy at times, though. I will go after you if Rath is village an Eliminator. And if I’m wrong, then I’ll go after myself and hopefully be lynched into retirement in the depths of purgatory for my crimes against humanity back when I was a fearless raider. It’s a mislynch, but hey, I get access to all the information on who the Elims are in the dead doc.
  24. Fifth Scholar
    Y’all and this lynching inactives thing. Maybe I shouldn’t complain because I can stay fairly active and therefore away from the lynch, but this strategy will just kill discussion in a different way. Lynching actives kills discussion by killing discussers, but killing inactives kills discussion because you can’t draw much from people who don’t talk. TL;DR either way we reduce discussion so let’s just kill who we find suspicious rather than picking a group and hunting in it.
  25. Fifth Scholar
    I saw that post, and it does make me less sure about him, but the fact that Rand explicitly asked Rath “do you want to retract?” and Rath said “no” smells of distancing to me. It could be village!Rath keeping his vote on Rand, but...the interaction just seems very convenient. Also, I still want a Rath lynch for the information it would grant us. I like this readslist, as I mostly agree with it. I would contest you on two points: Rath and Straw. Straw seems mostly OK to me, as he’s being accused of “Straw things” that he’s typically village for, and Rath I maintain a slight eli read of. In addition, I kinda see you as suspicious, though I’m not exactly sure why (I’ll look at it later, hopefully), and I’m pushing Dalinar and Sart both to neutral so I can get a better look at both when I have time.
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