Mauve Crocodile

I am very sorry for my disappearance the last 24 hours—I was without WiFi and could do little except check my docs every once in a while. [OOC]No ostracism. Interesting, but unsurprising. It would not have made for a very fun first day.[/OOC] Adolin shook himself awake, drawing himself up out of the corner where he had been dozing. He frowned. Did that Parshendi music really put me to sleep already? he berated himself, irritable. Glancing around for his brother and father, and seeing neither, Adolin decided he could afford to spend a little time socialising with the foreigners. The Alethi women always steered clear of him, cognisant of his reputation (which was ridiculously overblown), but perhaps these Parshendi would be more friendly. The consistent pounding of the Parshendi drums in the back was hardly dance music, but at least it had rhythm. Adolin stepped towards one of the dignitaries (@SE_Venli) and extended his hand. “Care for a dance, my lady?” he asked.

[OOC]Bad idea. I am not on the Chicken Brigade, but given the sheer number of bird accounts, I would appreciate remaining in their good books. [/OOC] Adolin turned back to Jasnah. “I think Uncle Gavilar guarded the cellars against Father; I doubt we would find him there, though to be sure he could likely dispatch whatever paltry force stood in his way, were he truly determined to get in.” He shook his head sadly. “Father is likely in a more out-of-the-way location. I doubt he even wants to attend Uncle’s meetings; he thinks they’re a waste of time. Perhaps if he was convinced that the Parshendi would be influenced by a display of force, he’d come running.” Adolin grinned ruefully. While his father may have a slight problem with alcohol, there was no man in Alethkar who could match him in a fight of any kind, and Adolin hoped to see more of the strong warrior in his father, rather than the pitiful drunkard that emerged at times. Turning away from Jasnah, he strode purposefully down the hall, hoping to find his father, or alternatively any attractive ladies to dance with. Having no real cause for concern, he didn’t really mind which.

Adolin saw Jasnah reproach Wit, though his cousin looked slightly shaken. He couldn’t blame her. With many strangers roaming the palace, who had time to pay attention to that overblown fool? There were far too many potential women around to woo, and Adolin intended to begin talking to a few of them soon. But first, he moved to console his cousin, placing a hand around her shoulder. “Don’t let Wit get to your head, Jasnah,” he spoke. “That’s the fastest way to get yourself played into his hands, and Almighty knows that’s the last place you’d want to be.” My apologies for the slightly delayed check-in, and lacklustre RP—I intend to remedy both of these things before long. My activity may not be strictly excellent this game, but it will be reasonable enough as to allay any concerns about my going inactive. Docs should help keep me engaged, as shall PMs, so anyone looking for an interesting person to talk to is free to shoot me one of those. Especially any ladies in the palace. (I swear I am not Elenion. I swear it with every fibre of my being.) As for any game thoughts, I believe there is not much to say. The thread has consisted mainly of RP, which is excellent, and a trend I hope to see lasting longer than the first day. The numerous win conditions and factions will certainly muddy the waters slightly, but I believe almost everybody can pull off a victory in this game, with the exception of some conditions that may be incompatible with others. As such, I would advocate not publicising win conditions unless it is strictly necessary (or you just want to) in order to facilitate a more fun game, where each individual (and perhaps some factions) are working towards a goal instead of the entire thread working in concert to fulfill as many win conditions as possible, which, while it would be efficient, would also strip the game of much of its joy. I don’t think this is a particular danger, I’d just rather that people consider the ramifications of revealing information before doing so.

Well, since that's the cycle, and the game, over, I'd like to congratulate the EIB team on a game very well played. I thought I had it in the bag, but your endgame play really threw me. I just wish I had listened to my gut and eaten Mouse earlier in the game. But I couldn't, he was just so entertaining, and so vocal I thought he couldn't possibly be one of the Fleeing Informants. For the record though, watching Tuatara to see who did something to them was never going to work. I suspected the final Informant would be among the three named, but knew it wouldn't be the person making all those claims. So, going into this final cycle, I was down to the choice of Mauve and Mouse, and picked wrong. A 50:50 choice decided the fate of the game, and I picked wrong. So, well done again guys. Also, apologies to Melon Dingo and Amber Vulture. If it is any consolation, you were very tasty.

I'm here, sorry. My net connection has been off all night, and I'm just on my way out when it comes back on. I will check in again when I am home again.

Well, I see the way that the votes are going, and I'm sticking by my team. Fifth time's the charm, let's break this frankly embarrassing mislynch streak. Amethyst Scorpion, Amber Vulture.

Ugh, I had some things come up and wasn't able to get my main vote in before rollover. However, I was able to get my secondary vote in: in addition to being a EIB agent (i.e. Tineye) I also have a spike which grants me the powers of a Rioter, which allows me to add an extra vote onto anyone. That's the vote manipulation that has been happening, and in the interest of full disclosure for any Villagers who might still be alive, Azure, Tuatara, and I agreed to reveal that. Hopefully the Elims will be just as honest and tell us who they are. I will be annoyed, impressed, and amused if this is the case. The term that sprang to mind for me was "mildly irritated", given the fact that we have a 100% record of lynching Villagers. I think that decent evidence that we're not Elims is that the game is not over. It is possible that the Elims have to outnumber the Village, but if that's the case and I'm an Elim it wouldn't matter, because I have the extra vote. It's a reasonable assumption that there isn't any other vote manipulation, unless someone else hasn't used theirs all game. If I was an Elim in this checkmate situation, I wouldn't perpetuate it this long. That's just unsportsmanlike. For the reasons that Azure has given, and because I don't want to miss my vote again, Amethyst Scorpion.

It depends on numbers. However the vote goes, next cycle we are down to six (assuming they get a kill in here and wherever they could, because why wouldn't they?). If we kill one of them, and they are elim, then the elim team is down to two, and we know who they are. That puts us at 4:2 in our favour, shenanigans withstanding. If we vote for someone else, and they are the elim team, there is nothing we can do. If they are telling the truth, and we kill one of them, and the elim team is 3 players, then there is nothing we can do. If they are telling the truth and the elim team is less than 3 players, we still have advantage of numbers, even without one of them. I've mostly been of the opinion that the Elim team is three players, and I'm not saying that because it means that you shouldn't kill one of my team . The EIB agents can get up to three players in their doc. The ability for Villagers to communicate is extremely valuable, because it reduces the lack of information, and that's especially important in a blackout game. If the job of the Elims is to kill all of the Informants, then they already have a hard time because they don't know which players they have to kill. They might also have some sort of scan to help them with that, but I doubt it since they haven't killed an Informant since C1. That's all been us. Because of that, for most of this game I've believed that there is a team of three Elims to balance the three Villagers who can communicate. However, the caveat of the EIB agents is that when we add a player to our doc, the person who adds them dies if they aren't Village-aligned. So you can either have one player in the doc, or three, so the EIB isn't quite as powerful as one might think. But then again, if the agent who adds the person dies, then the remaining agent has a confirmed non-Villager. So it's still sort of powerful. I don't know. I want to say that there are three Elims, because that seems to mirror the three in the Bureau doc. Assuming no neutrals, that gives us eight remaining, which I think is a reasonable pool of people. Another reason for more Elims is that it makes it slightly less arduous for them to guess who is an Informant, assuming that is even their win-con. I don't think that it's necessary to lynch one of us to learn that we're honest. If the Elims have half a zincmind between them, they'll kill one of Azure, Tuatara, and I today. That will be enough of a sign that we're honest, and if one of us gets lynched this Cycle then you'll only have one cleared Villager left next Cycle. Do you believe that it's worth the risk of trusting us to have two cleared Villagers next Cycle? EDIT: Not yet. Tuatara is voting on Swan because they find Swan the most suspicous. I'm inclined to agree, because of the people on our list of suspicions, Coral has a decent number of large posts, which would be a point in their favour in the eyes of a Villager, and makes them a threat because they'd be harder to lynch. But I'm still undecided, because that's not especially sound reasoning, and my instincts have failed me for three lynches in a row.

Tuatara wasn't up for lynch. It was between Falcon and Vulture, pretty much the entire cycle. Oh dammit, I was thinking of the C3 lynch. Green Falcon, green penguin, basically the same thing. Serves me right for getting up too early. I voted on Falcon because I was unsure about what role that they had. I was expecting this game to have a weird neutral role, given the fact that the blackout format is the perfect scenario to do that sort of thing. I was also expecting the Informants to have some information about the Investigations Agents, so that they knew that at least someone was trying to protect them, and so when Falcon acted weirdly and said that either the Village or the Elims would want them dead I assumed that they had to be neutral at best. Again, I was wrong.

Cream Tuatara is correct. I am an Elendel Investigations Bureau Agent, and we did add Cream Tuatara. Azure decided to be the one to take the hit on C1 in case we ended up scanning an Elim and dying, but instead we got a Refugee. As far as I can tell, neither Tuatara nor Azure have been taken by a Kandra (the existence of which I'm starting to heavily doubt), as their behaviour in the doc is consistent from the start. We added Tuatara early on, and they haven't changed their behaviour. He points out that Falcon is specifically behaving like the people they are supposed to be protecting, and yet they still vote for him. That is too much of a colossal facepalm to sell the story. Sorry, but this is enough to make me believe that something else is going on. I expressed these doubts in our doc, but since it was either Falcon or Tuatara up for lynch, and I could only be sure about Tuatara, I saved the one that was cleared. I wasn't happy about any outcome of that lynch, but I was more alright with saving a definite Refugee than someone who was a possible Informant. Maybe that was a mistake, but I'm hoping that it wasn't. Some RP, because that's the best proof that I'm not a Kandra. Boom. The sound through the metal chambers of the Pride of Terris. It was a deep, reverberating sound, and carried with it all of the ominous finality of a funeral bell. Boom. The ship was large enough, and the source far enough away from the common room, that most did not hear it. They remained in their little circle of light, staring around at their companions and wondering which of them were the murderers. Boom. Denesta Vreaux withdrew her metal arm from the wall. She flexed the mechanical fingers, listening to those familiar clicks. She knew those sounds well, almost as well as her own breathing. She knew that one finger was getting a bit stiff, she knew how long that would take to fix. This arm was more than just a prosthetic; it was part of her, and she knew it well. For all that she knew, she still couldn’t do what she was meant to. Denesta raised her metal fist and punched the wall. Boom. She gritted her teeth from the impact. The Bureau should have sent someone competent. They should have sent someone who knew what they were doing. Instead they sent a dried-out, stupid woman whose previous assignment had been inspecting agri-plants on moons and asteroids that no one cared about. She was trained, technically. She knew the protocols, she knew how to forge identification and send covert communications. She knew how to vanish into a crowd if she had to. That didn’t stop her from feeling like the only reason she’d gotten this job was because she was a Tineye. They should have sent someone else. Denesta gritted her teeth and punched the wall again. Agent Lion wouldn’t have gotten six innocent people killed, she was sure of it. He wouldn’t have ended up throwing the very people he was trying to save out of the airlock. Harmony’s bands, she was almost hoping that she would die next, to save her the shame of facing what she’d done. Denesta felt the voice before she heard it. It was the presence of mockery and cruelty. “It wouldn’t be fair if you got out of it that easily,” the voice said from just behind her. Denesta turned, but nothing was there. “Everyone knows that monsters have to face the consequences,” the voice said. “That’s justice. That’s Harmony’s will.” She wasn’t a Pathian. If Harmony even still existed in a recognisable form, he was too large and too unfocused to care about the justice of small people. “One person,” the voice said, “maybe not. But when six people are dead, broken, Ruined, maybe Harmony starts to care.” How would the voice know? It was just a fancy, a splinter of her mind. The voice chuckled, the laughter full of echoing doom. “Oh, child,” it whispered. “I am of him, as you know. Half of Harmony. I know his mind.” “Go away, Ruin,” Denesta whispered. “But how could I leave you?” the voice asked endearingly, swirling around her. “How could I leave my dearest child?” “I’m not yours,” she said, her voice feeling like rusted nails sliding through her throat. The voice laughed, and Denesta swore that the ship rattled and shook with that terrible mockery. “Oh, child,” Ruin said tenderly. “You are mine. You are my agent, just as the Survivor was. Just as the Ascendant Warrior was. Just as all men and women are, at some point in their lives. But you…you are the most faithful.” “I’m not yours,” Denesta said. She raised her metal fist to hit the wall again. “Yes,” the voice hissed. “Strike it, destroy it, Ruin it. Break and tear and kill.” Denesta’s arm trembled. She lowered it, and Ruin chuckled. “Not mine, you say?” it asked. “Then what about the massacre on Lestin Prime? What about the rebellion on Vindefwal Station? Were these not things that you could have prevented?” “Shut up,” Denesta whispered. “The more you resist, the more it will hurt,” Ruin said gently. “I’m only trying to help you, my daughter. Give in. Admit who you are.” Denesta bowed her head. She’d failed her mission, and the Bureau would never learn what the informants had found. Heron Industries was dirty to the core, but its secrets were either ash floating through the wreckage of the station, or in the cold and dead minds of those who had already been flung out of the airlock. People that Denesta had sent out the airlock. Maybe Ruin was right. “Yes,” the voice hissed. “It will be easier for you if you admit who you are.” Would it make her feel better? Would it make the screams leave her head? “In time, yes,” Ruin said. “I can help you. I can make the pain go away. It will take time, but I promise you. It will happen.” It was so tempting to be at peace with her failures. “No,” she said. “What?” Ruin snarled, and Denesta felt its gaze fall on her. “I won’t do it,” she said. “You are mine, child,” Ruin said. “Maybe,” Denesta said, raising her head. “But I’m not going to do your work.” Ruin’s laughter echoed through her head. “You do my work by breathing, by merely living. If you didn’t Ruin, you wouldn’t live. I love that irony of you humans.” “There are still people alive on this ship,” Denesta said, addressing herself as much as the presence in the room that she could not feel. “I can see them safe.” Ruin snorted. “And what will that do? Will their happiness drown out the screams?” “No,” Denesta said. “But I’m not doing it for me. I don’t deserve that.” Ruin’s response was silence. “Nothing to say to that?” Denesta asked. Her voice echoed off the metal walls. It was the only voice she could hear. It was the only voice she’d heard in this room. Denesta reached into a pocket of her clothes and withdrew a small metal and plastic capsule. She pulled the cap off, exposing the surface of microneedles. She pulled up her sleeve and pressed the surface to the inside of her arm. She waited a second, and then burned the tin that she had just injected into her bloodstream. Immediately, her senses expanded. She could taste the stale air and knew how little time they had left until they were all gasping for a breath. She could taste her last meal as if it were fresh in her mouth. She could feel the minute flexes and rattles in the chassis of the ship. She could also feel that familiar ache where her metal arm connected to the rest of her body. It was a deep ache, and it set her teeth on edge. This was why she hated burning tin. There was no time to lose. She knelt down on the floor and started tapping on the metal. It was a specific rhythm, the first one that she’d learned. A call for help, recognisable by another Tineye. Once she had finished, she stood up and waited. A figure soon appeared in the doorway, wearing a distinctive blue coat. He nodded to Denesta in recognition. “Agent Mouse,” she said in greeting. “Our mission has changed.”

The remaining players, for everyone's convenience: Amber Vulture Amethyst Scorpion Azure Mouse Coral Swan Cream Tuatara Indigo Weasel Mauve Crocodile Melon Dingo I'll also start the Cycle off by saying "Whoops", "[expletive deleted]", "[expletive deleted]", and that if people now suspect me for tipping the balance onto a Villager, I fully understand.

Sorry, I'm here. I've had power and Internet issues all day. I probably don't have time to give anything unique on either of the two up for lynch, but I'll give my thoughts on what has already been said. Cream Tuatara I agree, this doesn't look especially good. But Albatross must have been set up, and since the information level was so low in C1 and votes were put on people for not great reasons, there's a reasonable chance that both sides of that lynch were being set up. I don't believe that there was much of a reason to vote on Tuatara in C1, and the defence against them was likely people defending someone who wasn't guilty of anything. I wouldn't say that it was a counter. As I've said above, I don't believe that it says all that much. Especially considering how the vote on Tuatara started, which was Magenta suggesting it out of the blue and having several people jump on it. It would be random chance (unless Informants know something more) if Tuatara was an Elim, which makes that occurrence NAI. Agreed, I've seen Elims in the past offer little reasoning for their votes and only show up to lynch Villagers. I suppose that they hope that it protects them in the long run. Yes, perhaps trying to hide in plain sight and avoid suspicion. By this point I'd expect some contributions. I haven't liked Dingo's behaviour so far in this game, but that's not really relevant at the moment because they're not up for lynch. Not enough to sway me. Post count is hard to get alignment out of, as much as I dislike low contributions. The telling point is when an Elim gets lynched and you can see that not only has a person not contributed, but their only votes have been to lynch Villagers. But that hasn't happened yet, so I don't think that much can be drawn from it. So instead of suspecting Tuatara for this, I'm just not very impressed. Can't say much about this. Following bandwagons and not contributing much either looks like a low-activity player following the crowd, or it looks like an Elim trying to push favourable lynches for them. Can't read much from that. Again, that post could be explained by low activity or a new player being unsure. Not surprising. At this point, I would sort of expect them to have some of their own opinions, but I'll give that a pass because I'm not giving any new opinions in this very post. A reasonable thing to say. Is this really a reason to vote on them? Is it because they're not being helpful? I think that the point to lynch such people is at the start, or once things quieten down and the real suspects have all been lynched. Not now, when we have other suspicions and incriminating behaviour. Chartreuse Penguin I would prefer some more detailed thoughts on this. I think that it's relevant, since Dragonfly is one of the more helpful and prolific players here, but I'd prefer that people don't just follow a leader, given that a Villager wouldn't know whom to trust. I think that changing their mind quickly is pretty NAI. Everyone would be confused by the lack of rules, and some thought into it could change their mind quickly without having to state that they've changed their mind in the thread. Perhaps they just realised that they were wrong, and wanted to gloss over the fact because no one likes being wrong. While it is explainable by them being in a doc, it's also explainable without that. See point 1. This does sort of feel like you're reaching for a conclusion here. Nothing more to say here. Yeah, I can see that. Pocketing someone who is about to die is an effective way of guaranteeing favour. The saying "fool me once" is relevant here. I agree with Azure in that Penguin is coming in after being inactive, and instead of offering some more neutral analysis is already defending two players, is pretty weird. I'm looking for people who know more than they should, which should be particularly obvious in this game due to the blackout format, and this seems like Penguin had a grasp of the situation particularly well after just arriving. That would imply a team or a doc to catch them up, and anyone who seems too sure is instantly suspicious in my eyes. Flip-flopping also looks bad for Penguin. There's not much progression of thought, and while you could say that they went away and thought about it, that starts to seem like an excuse for suspicious behaviour. It seems like Penguin is trying to solidify the lynch on Emerald at the cost of the 'nice points' as Azure says that he could have earned by pocketing him. This is pretty damning on its own, and I agree with most of it. Vote-manipulation is a thing in this game, so this seems reasonable. The Verdict I think that both Penguin (no, I'm not going to learn how to consistently spell Chartreuse) and Tuatara are suspicious. However, Tuatara's crimes seem to mostly be quietness and not being very helpful. Penguin has pocketed a doomed Villager and flip-flopped to solidify the vote. The Village is down four players (assuming that Informants are even Village-aligned), and so lynching an unhelpful inactive is, in and of itself, unhelpful. For those reasons, and with apologies for my inactivity and a promise to be more active from now on, Chartreuse Penguin. I will state that I am aware that voting this late and tipping the balance, especially if Penguin flips Village, will probably doom me. I'm willing to take that risk for the Village. Lynch me if you must.

Alright, if Falcon isn’t willing to help the Village, then I’m going to assume that their role is entirely neutral at best. If they’re the Kandra, then that represents a pretty large threat to the Village. The primary disadvantage of the Village is a lack of information, and the confusion sown among it by hostile factions. The bodyswapping of the Kandra exaggerates that immensely, as the Village cannot trust anyone nearly as much, even with hard-clears like scans. Falcon has offered nothing to help the Village, even as the lynch approaches. They initially refused to roleclaim because it would get them killed by someone, but since they’re likely to die to the lynch regardless and they’re still not giving us anything, I’m assuming that they’re either hostile to the Village, or neutral and unhelpful. (Bolded numbers are my own). I suppose that’s fair. I never really like lynches that aren’t justified by anything other than silence, but I suppose that others might not feel that way, especially about D1 lynches. I personally believed that the way that they were acting seemed more suspicious than not, and they hadn’t offered much to help the Village to outweigh the information value of lynching them. But again, that’s a super-subjective metric, and I understand that others may not have it like that. Reasonable. I would probably have done the same in your shoes (assuming that they aren’t Eliminator shoes, because those things would be terribly uncomfortable). Amber Vulture, despite the weirdness of their posts in C1, has proven that they’re willing to help the Village. And I’d rather not drive this game into inactivity by killing vocal people who I can examine later. Emerald Falcon is refusing to help the Village, and because of that almost certainly has a role that doesn’t help us. Not to mention that Amber has defended themselves adequately, and while I’m going to have to trust my own observations more than their defences, I think that it would be unfair to keep a vote on them given that I find their defence reasonable for the moment. I would add more to this discussion, but I'm late for something. I can expand on things if people have questions.

Well, the Cycle is drawing to a close, and I don’t have anything solid. Amber Vulture’s interactions with Magenta in C1 felt a bit forced. At the moment it looks like pocketing. The most information is on Falcon, but it’s not Eliminator-y information. I think that lynching a neutral gives us more time, and that will give us more information. Additionally, Falcon may not even be at risk from the lynch, if they are the Kandra. However, they very well might not be a Kandra. We know that this game started with at least one Fleeing Informant, which I would guess is a subclass of a Village role. “Fleeing” implies that they are, obviously, escaping from something, and the blackout format may mean that they probably wouldn’t know what’s hunting them. Their goal may also be to survive, maybe for a certain number of Cycles or until the game is over. Given the fact that the arrival of the Pride of Terris in inhabited space probably doesn't rely on the fact that X number of people are dead, I would say that it's a timed victory. Or maybe the narrative states that once all of one side is dead, the survivors are able to sit around for weeks until the ship arrives. I'm not sure. If I’m correct, and Fleeing Informants don’t know about their pursuers and are attempting to survive, then this fits with Falcon’s behaviour so far. A Kandra would probably keep their head low, and use its powers to escape detection. Falcon hasn’t done that. If Falcon is a Kandra and doesn’t get lynched, then they’ll most likely vanish at the end of the Cycle, and someone will be impersonated. Probably the least active person here, if Charcoal was also hit by a Kandra and the pattern holds. If Falcon doesn’t disappear, then we can be pretty sure that they aren’t a Kandra. I think that’s a risk worth taking to see what happens. Vulture looked like they were pocketing Magenta, and even though it seemed a bit too obvious, I can’t ignore the fact that they were willing to follow Magenta on a vote on Tuatara for no reason. I don’t have anything solid enough to vote on anyone decisively, but I’d rather lynch than not. Amber Vulture, I like your RP character and Denesta wouldn't vote for you, but I still suspect you. I'll also add my voice in asking for @Emerald Falcon to say something. We're all waiting for you, and silence makes things look worse.

Some if my earlier posts should shed light on why I think azure's post is good. I'm certainly not going to spoon-feed that info to you if you haven't picked up on that yet. A number of people seem to accept emeralds explanation of why they didn't know the village win-con, while still being willing to vote on them. Since the only additional info we'd get if emerald isn't lying is the name of his unaligned role, it's essentially a mislynch that won't even help much with identifying the real elims, as most people went in with the knowledge that falcon isn't an elim. It's basically the perfect mislynch, as it neither hurts nor implicates the elims. That's all reasonable. Thanks for clearing that up. I agree about the mislynch potential, and that and my theory about the Kandra means that it's probably not worth lynching them until we know more. I think that they should just go on a watchlist. Denesta lowered her hand as the man with the medallions looked at V before seeing that she was volunteering. She clenched and unclenched her metal fist. She wanted to be useful, not a drain on resources. She knew that the people who did nothing were the first to die. She didn't fear death as much as most people did, but she didn't want her death to mean nothing more than freeing up a few meals to feed people she didn't know. The exploration into the storage facilities could have proven her worth to the others. Those medallions were useful, but wouldn't have enough air for three, and she didn't want to deprive V of his mission. But she wasn't entirely useless. She walked up to the pair as they started discussing logistics. "I can wait at the hatch to the storage cabins," she said, nodding to V. She had to maintain this alliance, unsteady as it was. "You take one end of a rope down with you, and attach the crates to it. Give me a shout and I'll start hauling them up into the living quarters, then I'll throw the rope back down the hatch and wait." She might as well make use of this bionic. It was one of the few assets she had. "I thought that it would save oxygen if you didn't have to pull the crates up that ladder the entire way." Out of Character: Denesta would ordinarily accompany the party down into the storage cabin, but I'm trying to fix my sleep cycle and so I won't be on to provide RP for ~9 hours, so a supporting role makes more sense for her. Feel free to make her do things in your RP while I'm gone. Also, it would be cool if one of the GMs says that we find something interesting down there...

I’ll add my voice to the discussion on Emerald Falcon. I think that it’s pretty obvious that they’re not vanilla, and I thought that I’d expand on Azure’s theory. I think that it’s worth looking at, and I anticipate Falcon’s response. Given what Azure has pointed out, I’m of the opinion that there may indeed be two Kandra on board. One would be Harmony-aligned, and the other would not be. Maybe Trell-aligned, or maybe just rogue. The rogue Kandra’s goal could be to escape, whereas the Harmony Kandra might be hunting the rogue one. That would be an interesting bit of irony, since the “evil” role is trying to escape while the “good” role is trying to kill. That explanation is pretty flavourful in terms of the narrative of this game, and fits with what we’ve observed of Kandra in the books. It also makes sense in game terms: The Kandra is the perfect lone-wolf role. While they don’t have a lot of direct power (i.e. inherent scanning or killing ability, since neither of these are quintessential Kandra abilities, whereas impersonation is), the role would imply a huge amount of utility and strategy through impersonation through bodysnatching. If the Elims had that power, it would be a massive benefit to confusing the Village, and the coordination potential is frankly unbalanced to the point of default win. Likewise, if the Village had that power, all it takes is for a Kandra to infiltrate the Elim doc and then have the names of every Elim to lynch at its pleasure. And that’s just the beginning of the manipulation that could be pulled. It then makes sense that the power should be denied to both Village and Elims. It also fits with the story, because Harmony’s plan wouldn’t involve small disagreements like a dozen people trying to kill each other on a spaceship, and so his Kandra wouldn’t get involved. The reason that the target could be a Kandra is because of the power of the Kandra role. That amount of utility would make the “survive until the end” or “kill X players” extremely easy. It makes sense that the goal of a powerful role is difficult in proportion to its power, and one that requires the Kandra to not be passive, which the rest of the abilities would imply. That also makes it more difficult for the rogue Kandra to survive until the end, because they’re also being hunted by something that’s at least as powerful as they are. For those reasons, I think that if Emerald is a Kandra, they are neither Elim- nor Village-aligned. I do think that they are at threat from something, which makes me wonder if they are the rogue Kandra. Another thought occurs: the serum that the Kandra have in Mistborn Era 2 can cause a Kandra to temporarily liquify, but will kill a human. That sounds like the perfect item to use in this sort of game. Perhaps the Harmony Kandra has some of this, which could justify strange deaths. The Kandra may also have a set of spikes that they can swap out à la Paalm from Shadows of Self, which would give different abilities. Maybe swapping spikes prevents them from being able to bodysnatch for a Cycle, for balance reasons. I realise that Emerald Falcon themselves first introduced the possibility of two Kandra here. I'm going to think on what that means, but take from that what you will. This smells a bit of pocketing. I would prefer to hear what you think about Azure's theory, and whether you have anything to add. Why should they be looked into? The best information suggests that they're not a Vanilla, but they're not willing to divulge which. To the average Villager who wants to know more and doesn't have anything else to go on, a lynch with information is better than a blind one. And Emerald hasn't said that they're valuable to anyone. I don't see why this makes them suspicious. Could you explain why you think that? As an aside, if they're Elim, then their team probably isn't going to support them. And likewise if they're neutral, then they don't have a team to support them. So that's IKYK.

Denesta Vreaux shoved her mat of straps into the small air duct, hoping that no one would find it. Her joints would not enjoy another night on the metal floor. She headed out of the common room, muttering something about fresh air in case anyone cared to wonder where she was going. ‘Fresh air’ was lie. The recyclers were closest to the common room, and so the air ducts sent the best air into there. The further she got from the centre of the Pride, the dizzier she would feel as the air turned stale. Denesta had heard from another refugee that there were parts of the ship completely without air now. The storage cells sat deep in the hull, far from living quarters, and so had been the first to lose oxygen supply. There might be food down there, but no one was willing to brave the dark bowels of the ship with nothing but a breathing hose and a torch. Denesta shivered. There might have been people down there who had found the food supplies. They would have stuffed themselves full of supplies and gone to sleep happy, and then suffocated peacefully as the waves of carbon dioxide smothered them. Denesta walked swiftly from the common room. She could almost hear the sardonic laughter in her head. I had no choice, she told herself over and over again. It was vote on that poor person, or get thrown out myself. Everyone had heard the stories of long-distance freighters that stranded their crews for months. Nearly every time, the crew had succumbed to attacking each other. Sometimes it was violent, as told by the improvised weapons and the blood on the walls, and sometimes it was with resignation that the weak were culled, as the journals and log entries said. But it always happened. She'd read many of those news stories, never thinking that she might one day be in their shoes. She knew what happened when food supplies were low and corpses lay fresh on the floor. Her stomach roiled at the thought. Shouts echoed down the hallway from the common room. The person who was first to die was protesting louder and louder, their voice becoming panicked. Denesta gritted her teeth, clenched her metal fist, and tried to ignore the sounds. She rounded a corner, and nearly collided with a pair of dark figures. Instincts made her jerk backwards, bringing up her metal arm to defend herself. The sharpened edge of her forearm glinted, but she recognised the people. The man in the blue coat, the potential Allomancer, and a woman. Denesta couldn’t remember the name. Lisabel? Lisern? They glanced over at her, and Denesta lowered her arm. “Sorry,” she said. “I’m a bit on edge.” It was a stupid statement, and she knew it. Who wasn’t on edge? Denesta glanced behind her. “Look,” she said before they could dismiss her like the others had done back in the common room. “We need to stick together. We can survive through trust. All we need is for us and three others to make it through the next few days, and we’ll have enough food to last us until we can broadcast a distress signal. The others will turn on each other, but we can survive together.” She watched their faces, anxious. It was stupid to trust strangers, especially strangers that were meeting in the dark. But if they were making an alliance now, she would want to get in on it, even if it was forced. She didn’t want to be left on the outside without allies. The weak and lonely were the first that predators, both human and not, would turn to. They’re just as desperate as me, she told herself. They know safety in numbers, don’t they?

A vote on Tuatara doesn't seem valuable to me. The fact that they've had only two NAI posts means that the only things that we'll get out of it are: What happens if we get a lynch What their role is, if they have one What happens to the dead There's nothing there that we don't learn from lynching any other player. Lynching them gives us nothing about other alignments, and no matter how crazy the rules for this game are, it's going to revolve around the core tenets of SE, and so alignment and player relationships are going to be key. For that reason, lynching someone who already has decent connections to other players would be higher value than lynching those who only have a few posts to their name. Tuatara voted on Magenta without any good reasons, which I'm not too keen on, but I think that there's more to learn from more prolific players. Currently the only reasons to vote on Tuatara are because they haven't made too many posts, and because other people are doing it. That's really not a good enough justification. For those reasons, I think that I'll put my vote back on Magenta. No one else seems extremely suspicious to me, but the way that Magenta flips will tell me something about Amber Vulture, who thus far has unfailingly defended them, and has jumped on a vote on an inactive player rather than a potentially suspicious one. I would vote on Amber if others were willing to turn it into a lynch, but if I have to choose between lynching to get information on Amber or lynching a mostly-inactive, especially in C1, the choice is clear. Additionally, since Magenta was happy with going after Tuatara, their flip could also tell us something about Tuatara, which will also give something on Amber and Indigo.

~~~RP~~~ “That’s all well and good,” the man in the blue coat whispered to Denesta, “but my only fear is that helping too much is the exact kind of thing that’ll get us killed. Believe me, my grandfather knew of these creatures. They were intelligent. And they could be any of us.” His words settled into Denesta like spikes of zinc. One of Harmony’s servants, on the ship? That made it far worse than any mere predator. If Harmony himself had turned against them, then they were all but doomed. But even worse, if the Faceless Immortal on board had slipped free of Harmony’s circle… She would not let herself shiver. Fear was the enemy, as much as the Immortal was. The man who had spoken settled back to his place, drawing his coat closer around him. Denesta saw the Allomantic markings on the blue cloth, in an older style. Curious. Maybe he was an Allomancer of some sort. If he was, she could ally herself with him and gain some protection against the crew and the alleged predator. But some people thought that it was rude to ask, and Denesta didn’t want to be called Bronzetongue again. In a small space, where people were desperate and afraid, any imagined offence could turn into anger, and then that could turn into a shiv in the darkness. Denesta would keep her head down, and if this potential Allomancer did not want to reveal his power now, he might do so when things became worse. That was her hope, slim as it was. The man in blue’s eyes met Denesta’s, and she looked away. The people around the table seemed to be ignoring her request for order and leaders. Typical. A few were arguing softly about food supplies, and fingers were being pointed at a huddled shape by the wall. Denesta studied the figure in the corner for a moment. It was too dim in there to see if they were male or female. Whoever they were, they had fallen into the icy grip of mindless terror. Denesta Vreaux knew that feeling well. When the adrenalin faded but the fear did not, limbs locked up and the mind swirled. “…a drain on resources,” one of the people at the table was saying, shaking a finger at the person in the corner. “If they’re not going to help us, then we shouldn’t provide for them.” Denesta resisted the urge to sigh. It was so strange how quickly desperate people turned on themselves. As if killing their own would save them from their situation. As if, once they were sitting alone in the dark with everyone else dead around them, the blood on their hands would give them some sort of peace. Denesta flexed her metal arm. Blood on the hands offered no salvation, no peace. She knew that better than most. The clinking noise of her finger joints made people look over. Conversation hushed slightly as more eyes fell on her. They seemed to be wanting something from her. Advice? Support? “I…” she said, and then swallowed. All of those desperate, hungry eyes gave her pause. “Our food will not last forever,” she said. “Eventually, the weaker will perish.” Was she really saying this, her of all people? Ruin’s shadow must be laughing somewhere. “It might be…better for some to make it to the end of the journey than for us all to die halfway there.” The others nodded and looked away from her, then continued to argue. Denesta let out a breath. The words felt like acid on her tongue. She quietly withdrew from the table and returned to her mat of woven canvas straps. When she was sure that no one was watching her, Denesta withdrew a piece of hardened steel from her pile of belongings. She slowly scraped the metal down the edge of her mechanical arm. The sound made the man in blue glance over, but she ran the metal down the edge of her forearm again without meeting his eyes. She checked the edge. The metal of her arm was softer than the piece of steel, as she’d guessed. She sat cross-legged on her mat, scraping at the metal of her forearm, tapering the outer edge. The motion relaxed her, even though the sound made her skin crawl. She tested the edge of her arm. Not sharp yet, but soon it might be. She couldn’t rely on allies in this place. When the lights dimmed, she would have only her arms to defend herself. It might help if one doubled as a blade. I'll Devil's Advocate a little bit here. If Amber and Azure were indeed trying to protect a teammate, then wouldn't they wait? There's still a whole day left in the Cycle for Magenta to account for their errors, and it seems pretty sloppy for two members of an Elim team to jump on defending someone with votes the moment that the person had attracted attention. This is C1 and I was the first person to vote on Magenta, so I feel like it would be a bit of an overreaction for that defence of sorts to appear. However, both Amber and Azure voted on the same person that Magenta was voting on, which could either be a team coordinating against a single person, or an attempt to piggyback on an existing vote. It could even be that Amber and Azure are trying to pocket Magenta. I think that your point is pretty relevant, Melon. Azure has stated suspicion of Magenta, but not enough to constitute a vote on an active. They would rather lynch an unknown and inactive than someone who had some suspicion on them, but I can sort of understand that. It's harder to lynch someone who's been talking when there's someone who hasn't offered any help. However, it might have been an Elim stating suspicion of a teammate to distance. Hmm, I'm sort of rambling at this point. I was going to consider the Ivory lynch, but you've given me pause. An interesting discussion is the value of lynching an active versus an inactive. An inactive has potential to be helpful, but hasn't proven anything yet and so it appears like lynching them has a significantly smaller cost than lynching an active. However, I can also see that lynching an active who already has some connection to other players will give more information, and is therefore a higher benefit. I'm just not sure which one is objectively better. Anyone else want to weigh in on that?

That's all reasonable. An Elim probably wouldn't slip up like that in C1, so I'll chalk it up to mostly NAI. I find myself agreeing with Azure and Amber, so Magenta Albatross. I will be keeping an eye on you, though. I won't vote on anyone else just yet. C1 lynches generally don't feel very nice, even if they're useful (and more valuable in this format), so I'll want to spend some time deliberating.

I like the theory, and the Hemalurgist would probably be an Elim, but as Azure Mouse said, if the Elims get a kill as well as the Kandra, then the game goes too quickly. Unless the Kandra doesn't actually kill anyone, and instead can impersonate the dead. Let's say that the Kandra is on the Elim team. The Elims want to kill player A and coordinate so that the Kandra (player B ) impersonates them. When the Cycle rolls over, it looks like B is dead, but in reality A is dead and B is pretending to be A. That allows the Kandra to take advantage of kills while also allowing the game to move a bit slower. However, it might be that the Kandra is neutral, because neutral roles with cool powers could make the game a lot more interesting. In which case, this theory falls apart. I'm still not convinced that we don't have a Chimera on the ship, though. We don't know much, but we know that Hemalurgy can make all sorts of strange things, which gives the GM a lot of room to improvise. It's probably worth looking at the game mechanics as they emerge and determine how closely to the canon this game is, and if it's very close to what we know of Scadrian magic, then that narrows our suspect field. Hold on a moment... This is space-age Scadrial, so don't we have confirmed contact with other planets in the cosmere? Do we have any Worldhoppers on board, perhaps? That could be a neutral faction. As for my vote, I don't like Magenta Albatross's activity so far in the game. They jumped on Ostrich's poke vote with no other reasons. Also tried to convince us that they're vanilla, although this seems a bit TWTBAW (or whatever that Damnation acronym is). Hmm, not sure how much I like this either. The thing about this game is that it's hard to assume anything, because it's designed to be misleading and confusing. However, it's also themed around Scadrial, so there will be nuggets of truth and justification in the mechanics. Any player who seems too sure about anything in this game means that they probably know something more than everyone else. I think that a disproportionate knowledge of game rules is the way that specific roles can be spotted. This isn't much to go on, but it's more than I have for any other player. Magenta Albatross.

Hello everyone. ~~~RP~~~ Denesta Vreaux ran a finger along the steel wall. The scraping sound made some refugees nearby glance over and shiver at the sound of metal on metal. Denesta returned their gazes with unblinking eyes. She withdrew her hand from the wall and clenched the metal fist. The strangest thing about a mechanical arm wasn’t being unable to feel anything. It was expecting to feel something when you touched a fire, a cold beer, or a metal wall, and then finding nothing beneath your fingertips. Fifteen years, and she’d never quite gotten used to it. The refugees stood around the table in the common room, staring around each other with weary eyes. To Denesta, they looked as if they’d actually slept in the previous three nights. They were the lucky ones. As lucky as one could be, trapped in a sardine tin shooting though the emptiest emptiness in existence, with a bloodthirsty beast staring at them from the ventilation ducts. Denesta did not join them just yet, instead sitting on her bed and watching them for a few moments. She’d torn the canvas straps that secured the storage boxes deeper in the ship and woven them together to form a sort of mat. Anything to protect her elbows, shoulders, and hips from the cold metal floor. When she’d silently announced her claim to this spot, by dropping her meager belongings here and sitting down to rest, the others had looked at her strangely. Some had even spoken to her, calling her crazy before retreating to their hideaways underneath shelves or in vents. She’d shaken her head at that. If a creature wandered the halls—she was not sure if there even was one—then wouldn’t it keep to the shadows? Wouldn’t it lurk in air vents? Denesta remembered hearing that there were hundreds of metres of ducts and vents through any ship, ample place for a predator to hide and navigate. And if the killer was actually a human then he or she, too, would keep to the shadows. Humans who killed others were just predators wearing human skin. The common room was large, wide, and closest to the food stores. Not only that, but the freshest air passed through here. Denesta knew that those who complained of coughing lived in the outer parts of the ship where the air was stale. Yes, she liked her place here. And if she died in the night, then she died warm from the heater next to her blanket, and with clear lungs. Denesta sighed and stretched her legs. She’d gone through her third life extension twenty-three years ago, and was wondering if the grey hairs were something she would keep the next time around. She felt…distinguished. Respectable. Her friends had gone through the procedure and come out buxom and flexible. She’d asked to be comfortably mature. She hadn’t thought that her joints would start to ache earlier than before. She rose from her mat and walked purposefully over to the gathering of refugees. They had started to whisper about the food shortage, about the power levels in the engine, about their destination. No one was talking about the predator. One of the men was sitting over by a window, fiddling with his backpack. Denesta rested her metal arm on the table. The heavy clunk made people look over. “This is pointless,” she said in her most commanding voice. “Starvation will kill us slowly. Power supply will kill us slowly. This killer in the shadows will kill us quickly. But all of these things will be made quicker if we drift apart.” Dead eyes stared back at her, and she forced herself not to shiver. “We need to establish something,” she said. “A council. Leaders. Someone to give us order and make decisions so that we can defend each other.” Denesta looked over at the man by the window and beckoned. “You, come here. We need every voice to help.”

Well... tying the vote when we weren't sure that I would be able to survive would not have been good. As I would have died, and we would have lost vote advantage. We tie the vote, an Elim dies instead, we kill you, then we end up with me being next up for the lynch. Also, day 11, I think it was, I didn't have internet to try and swing the lynch :/ (If any of this makes sense)

Well I'm all for you guys having hope... but I'm just a Bondsmith So we kill one of you tonight, and that puts us at 2 to 2 for the lynch. We already know all the roles cause of our Skybreaker (Elephant), so we won't be making any mistakes there. Then, with my ability to remove the vote, I block Chameleon, and we're either at 2:1, if Zebra becomes active or 2:0 if not. So... yeah.

Well, it was worth a shot.