Gears

"Greetings," Dr. Gears said. "What is your purpose in being here?"

Ati?

Please note that I am not saying that the information is automatically invalid, just that it should not be accepted as fact. And yes, I might be a tad bit paranoid, but what is worse: Trusting something that fails or not trusting something that works? I think the former. Others might think the latter. It is a matter of opinion.

"Why yes!" the Anarchist replied. "And sadly, I used the last of my explosives upon entering, so alas, I am left without explosives."

In QF45, voting was mandatory, and thus I wished to vote immediately so I wouldn't forget and invoke the wrath of the Game Masters [oh horror and terror]. In games without mandatory voting [which I think I prefer], I do not wish to vote immediately as it serves no purpose. I must admit that I was mildly annoyed and allowed my emotions to negatively impact my decision making. I apologize. I still don't especially suspect Elbereth, so I'm going to read the many posts made whilst I languished in slumber and return with some thoughts.

Hoid.

Yep!

No, sadly, but... Yes! Congratulations, you win absolutely nothing!

Ah. Transformation is the only member of its set [scans] and thus would not be ranked. I concede the point concerning Abrasion, as it was simply an idle thought.

1. This character is canonically dead. 2. This character lives on Roshar. 3. This character is female. 4. This character died in Kholinar.

I don't remember either, but no. Fourth clue: This character died in Kholinar.

I didn't mention Transformation because a Knight Radiant with Abrasion would have Division [Dustbringer] or Progression [Edgedancer]. I admit that your statement is indeed true, however I do think that the odds of a kill being used with Gravitation is higher than you estimate. Surely ensuring the kill gets to the appropriate target is important?

Your words are wise. You have convinced me. Elbereth.

Because being perfectly amenable to lynching El is vastly different from actually pushing El's lynch. It has been 4 hours. Not everyone's posted. I want to wait and see. If El continues on this path of strange esoteric dark magicks, then I will vote. For now, I will reserve my vote for a later time.

Is it taboo to pre-write game analysis? If so, my apologies. I'm not really sure how to defend myself at the moment, as Striker cited my distaste for trust and you cited my pre-game analysis, both of which are not things I can easily rectify. I would also be amenable to lynching El.

If the epilogues go personal, it will probably be in the back half. Brandon's established a theme, so he can't very well deviate in the middle of his pentalogy.

There are many manipulating Surges. The margin of error is incredibly high. I am not saying that the information gained by one's roleblock/redirect should be rejected on principle, merely taken with a healthy dose of salt. If one wishes to act upon such indications, be aware that the information will not always be accurate.

Scenario 1: Person A has Transportation and Transports Person B's action onto Person C. Person C dies. This could be because Person B was the killer, or because Person C was slated to die anyways. Scenario 2: Person A has Adhesion and Adheres Person B's Action. There is no death. Someone else could have roleblocked the killer. There is no certainty in either scenario. There are also numerous other scenarios that could occur given these parameters. Transportation is only more valuable than the roleblock when one is certain that the only action the target is taking is a kill. Talking. In my admittedly inexperienced opinion, voting on someone for no purpose is meaningless. I am not opposed to a lynch, but it should be an informed, intentional lynch [as much as a lynch can be C1]

The game has been going on for 2.5 hours. I see no point in voting until we at least have mild suspicions.

No.

Hopefully the soliloquy in RoW epilogue will actually reveal something.

I believe I have accidentally both undervalued and overvalued Abrasion. As most of the actions that one would be targeted with are action manipulation, Abrasion does indirectly protect one's actions. However, as Division would almost certainly be boosted by Gravitation whilst Progression would not, you could be dooming yourself to a painful death to protect your actions. As such, Abrasion to protect oneself is not incredibly effective unless it is being used to protect Division or Progression. Of course, as Abrasion is typically paired with those Surges [sorry, squires], there is an incentive to use it and thus doom oneself to be struck down by your hubris.

Assuming the kill target and the redirector are both village, the odds that a redirected kill [in the early game[ hits an elim is low. In the late game, it might be better, if just to clear suspicions.

@Elbereth, I would appreciate it if you would provide some reasoning for your vote on TJ, who has done absolutely nothing except for warning those with Division and telling me that I stole xino's schtick. EDIT: ninja'd by TJ. Side note, I don't have anything against lynching TJ, I just don't see why specifically TJ

I will now rank Surges in the category they fall under. Action manipulation: Adhesion, Transportation, Tension, Cohesion. Adhesion is superior to Transportation because redirecting the kill would not be very helpful, even if redirecting other actions would be fun. Tension is alright, but given that the action cancelled is random, it only works mildly well as protection. Cohesion seems incredibly risky unless you have absolute certainty on the actions the two of you are taking. Vote manipulation: Transportation, Tension, Adhesion. It seems strictly better to move a vote than vanish a vote. Tension, which removes a vote on a player rather than a vote by a player, seems better as an option to protect someone from the lynch since people can change their votes. Action protection: Gravitation, Abrasion. I hope this one is obvious. Gravitation encompasses Abrasion. The following is some notes about Important Surges. Really Important Surges: Progression [the only protection], Illumination [PMs], Gravitation [the best insurance we have]. All others seem unnecessary, though a case must be made for Division. A villager with a kill is helpful, though given the limited Stormlight and uncertainty involved in killing anyone, it seems significantly less amazing than the others in the RIS category. Shenanigan Surges: Cohesion [switcheroo], Transportation [redirection]. Swapping identities seems quite fun, and it delves into Mind Games territory, since only the swqpper knows that the swap occurred, and so everyone else would see that their action affected someone else and assumed they were redirected because they couldn't know that everyone else was thinking the same thing. A redirect also has potential, especially since it's a random action. Misc. Thoughts: There is a bit of RNG in this game, if people submit more than one action. If you want your action to go through, you might want to submit two so the odds of that action being the one that vamooses drops from 100% to 50%.