Elbereth

Ooh. I do quite like that idea, Jondesu. Similar things have been suggested before (I'm pretty sure I brought up a variation on that in the QF14 jail doc), but not for quite a while at least. It would definitely be different than a normal game in some ways, but it would be very cool. The issues you'd have to deal with - one, the eliminators can't silence people who are getting too close/being too smart/whatever. So they're at something of a disadvantage there. (Now, it does help the eliminators in that they can still all plot together ala LG14. Not as much of an advantage, though.) I'd also recommend that jailed players cannot take actions either, just to inconvenience them a bit more (and obviously they would no longer be included in the count of people who the eliminators have to outnumber). One question I would have is whether you're saying this should only apply to the lynch, or also to vigilante/eliminator kills? Either works, but they do have somewhat different effects. I think you're saying that it's only lynching, yes? Not including town vigilante kills? Oh, and then the other thing is alignment. You would have to not reveal alignment of anyone in that game, otherwise if someone were lynched they would be completely cleared (or not, if they're evil) and still able to talk with everyone able to completely trust them. That's a recipe for a broken game. But take out alignment, and you'd be fine.

Lopen has an excellent point. Learning that someone is not Rath is actually rather useful. And, Rae, then that Faithful comes clean to someone before they're scanned. Alternatively, they decide not to be an idiot and buy the ionBlade on a cycle when they weren't the highest earner of Merit. Shouldn't be too difficult. It's true that multiple ionBlades would mean we couldn't tell which was the evil kill, but if there were multiple kills the Julii couldn't do anything anyway - they have to steal the blade before the kill is made, obviously. And hopefully any purchasers of ionBlades will notify someone ahead of time so that if they are somehow stolen from it's not going to be a problem. EDIT: Also, I'd appreciate a RP partner. Lumina can't exactly come up to anyone, but I'd welcome anyone coming up to her.

Yep. It would make them lurk more, true. That's not necessarily horrible, as we could focus more on those players, but I do agree that lurking is generally a bad thing. If we did a rotating way of choosing who should have the most Merit, we could have more success, but I'm not sure whether we should do that or not. I will note that Bellona isn't nearly as much of a problem as I remembered, looking at the rules again. It only comes into play if someone's earned more than 20 Merit, which is going to be fairly rare, I think. It's been 24 hours, and the most active posters are at maybe around ten, with signup RP. (I'm at 8 right now, I think, which is the point I'm using to base it off of because I haven't bothered to count for everyone else.) So that's not really going to be an issue. And don't stress too much about it, Doctor. I wouldn't be at all surprised if the eliminators thought of exactly the same plan as well. I thought of it, too, I just liked my variation more because I gave it a higher chance of succeeding its goal (because, obviously, catching out players with ionBlades is going to be a lot harder than getting ones without and semi-clearing them). Actually, I think it's more than semi-clearing them... if the person with the highest amount of Merit does not have an ionBlade the next cycle, the only possible reason that the test would fail (assuming there is an ionBlade kill attempted that cycle; if not then an item or two could interfere, I think) that I can currently see would be a Forsaken Julii taking the ionBlade instead. And at least there'd still be a 50/50 chance of that, which isn't all that horrible.

Bugsy's points - Um, yes, I'm aware role can only be used once per night. But that doesn't preclude you from using any other actions, and they could be entirely clear with their roles if that was really necessary for them, which it won't be. So that isn't very helpful. With Rath, that would work if the game was role madness, but it's not. So there'll be a lot of Thornes, and it'll be rather difficult to pin down which are Rath and which are really vanilla. Yep. I've had a similar idea since when I mentioned a possible way to soft-clear people, I just hadn't checked it with the rules until you brought it up again. While that's possible, it'll be difficult to figure out who does have the ionBlade, obviously, so it's still a guessing game. However. If you have a Julii steal from the person who had the highest Merit in a cycle (possibly the second highest as well, if that could be arranged, in case of Bellonas), you could soft-clear that person by trying to steal an ionBlade from them the next cycle. If they don't have one, it's quite likely that they're not an eliminator. A corollary option would be to try to control that so different people get the most Merit every cycle, but I'm not sure we want to go that far down a dictatory path. If we don't, though, it'll mostly be the same people getting cleared. (The most active and contributing players, too, which is rather an advantage, imo.) Thoughts?

The issue I'm having with that is, again, that the Forsaken don't need to lie. If necessary, they could be entirely above board about exactly what they can do and all of their role actions, and they'd still do fine because there is no action limit and it's not like the roles are kills, so they wouldn't be asked to do much to any fellow eliminators. Yes, the ability to prove a role can be useful if the eliminators choose to lie about it, but there's no reason to believe they will and plenty to think they won't. They might lie about their actions, but I rather doubt it (particularly given holoboxes/cameras) for the most part. So... again, it doesn't matter a lot. Regarding the QF18 example, Dani literally helped kill an eliminator. The closest we could get to that with roles here would be a Fabii using vote manipulation to lynch an eliminator. Other than that, there is very little that would allow you to clear a person based on role. Thus my questioning why it mattered all that much.

Lumina snorted, hearing Sanis’ little speech to Tiberius. Idiot. Yes, he had the power to spite Tiberius in public, if he wanted to. But what did that get him? Fear from the other lancers. Dislike from his master. No friends, no one loyal to him. And one day he would overstep his bounds, or Tiberius would decide that someone knowing exactly who he’d had killed was too dangerous, and Sanis would vanish, and no one would care. One of the dangers of being an assassin, she supposed. That was one of the reasons she’d never wanted to do such work. Lumina’s hand touched the hilt of the razor at her hip. There were other reasons, too. Disappearances in the night, poisonings? That was cheating. Much better a fair fight on the dueling ground than a knife in the back. If Lumina made someone her enemy, they knew it. Most people tried to avoid being her enemy, now. She shook her head and ascended the steps to Tiberius, bowing properly, unlike her predecessor. “My liege, ArchGovernor Tiberius, beloved of the Sovereign.” She uncoiled her razor and straightened it, laying the long blade at his feet. “I am your bright sword, sworn to follow your will in all things. My life is dedicated to you, and my death will be in your service. This I swear, as I have sworn before and will swear again, my sword and my life and my death to you.” She spoke quietly, not projecting her words like Sanis had. This was meant to be a private reaffirmation of her vow, not a public indignation. She rose with her razor as Tiberius accepted her oath, fitting it back at her waist carefully. They spoke a few words together. Then she descended carefully back down to the ground, and went to mingle with the crowd, as much as she could mingle. It probably looked more like stalking through the crowd in search of prey, but she couldn’t help that.

https://wordcounter.net/ Um. Leaving that kind of thing entirely up to the GM's discretion? Now that's a recipe for trouble if I ever heard one. From the rules: So in theory it shouldn't be difficult at all to calculate exactly how much Merit every single player has earned. Not how much they have, not only because of buying items as Rae pointed out but because of PMs costing Merit as well. Even so, it could be useful. And yes, the Bellona throws a wrench into that, but not a huge one. Most people won't be Bellona, so while a few peoples' tallies will be inaccurate, the majority will be fine. Doctor, my question for you would be why it matters? I mean. The Forsaken really don't have much reason to lie about their roles. If Rath are involved, they can easily just claim Thorne. And you can use as many actions as you want in a night, I think (with the exception of multiple uses of the same Item), so we can't keep people accountable with their roles. So no, roles aren't very provable, but they don't really have to be in my opinion. As far as poke-votes go, they'll definitely be different. GMs, if you retract from a duel but the other person does not, you may not initiate another duel, correct? If so, then that essentially means each person may only poke one inactive per turn. This does not mean, however, that you can't still vote, as duelers may cheer for other duels even if they're engaged in their own. So as long as someone is placing a real vote, everything should be fine. A few more thoughts and finally RP coming... soon. Ish.

Well, they do have to keep the Rath in mind as well. Making a group PM is much more dangerous if they have a Rath in their midst, and I wouldn't be particularly surprised. And even if they do decide to ignore that danger and go for a full group PM, it's still going to take a while for them to get coordinated, so I think using this time while we can is to our advantage. They may become coordinated, but for now they're not completely. Bringing up LG19 is an excellent point, though. That's a perfect analogy to that plan, and precisely why I don't want to do it. It didn't secure a village win in that case, though. (Only because the game was horribly broken, but still.)

All right, let’s get some game talk going here, shall we? Just because we can’t lynch yet doesn’t mean we shouldn’t discuss. So. One - a few brief reminders. 1. The lynch is different than usual this game. We can’t lynch today (though we could try a mock duel for practice), but we can starting tomorrow, and given that the lynch is arguably the most critical part of the game, that’s kind of important. So I suggest everyone reread the rules before tomorrow, just so we have as little confusion as possible about that. 2. Rath. Keep in mind that even if there were ways to clear people in this game (which… I actually think there might be, at least to an extent… thoughts on that in a later post, I think, because I’ll have to see if it would work), that doesn’t mean that person will stay good. So be careful about trust. 3. Merit. Obviously, Merit is important in this game. As a whole, the village will without doubt gain more Merit than the eliminators. That’s just a fact. But the Forsaken can also use what Merit they have much more effectively than can the Faithful, because they can coordinate (at least to an extent). So in return we need a lot more Merit to accomplish the same thing. Thus, RP is definitely something we need to be doing. But I would also advocate that we actually start talking about the game, given that 1) that gives Merit, and 2) that’s the bit that actually helps us win the game. If everyone only RPed and never talked about analysis or strategy, things would be rather problematic, yes? 4. Limited communication - I think it’s of note that the eliminators do not have a doc together as usual. They don’t even have a PM together, only a chain of PMs. (Note that I think that as a result the evil team will be balanced a little more strongly than usual, because limited communication will hamper them, possibly a great deal.) Among other things, that means we can’t rely on looking at lynch patterns quite as usual because they’re not going to be defending each other as a team. So that’s something to keep in mind. Fifth… well, I had an idea, so I’ll lay it out. Note that I don’t really think we should do this idea, both because it would be a bit more boring for all involved and because it would take a lot of organization and time, which I at least don’t have the time to do. (Corollary to that - my activity may fluctuate wildly, given that I probably shouldn’t be playing at all right now. Sorry. I mean, I’ll probably be just as active as usual, but if not, the reason is school.) Basically… the way this game is laid out means that we can calculate exactly how much Merit every person in the game has. If we also all came clean about items and roles and kept ourselves accountable, it really wouldn’t be too difficult to pin down the Forsaken, in my opinion. (It would take a lot of organization - figuring out who should get what items, or organizing rotating PMs to different people so we can keep people accountable for their Merit in that way and all - but it would be doable.) Particularly given that the Forsaken with the most Merit is the one who gets the IonBlade. I’ve noticed in the past that the more cards on the table, the harder it is for the eliminators to hide - it’s why eliminators do so badly in LGs. But I mentioned that I didn’t actually think we should do this. And that’s because it wouldn’t be fun. It’s like the item-passing in QF16, but even more dictatorship and accountability, and that’s not what makes the game interesting for everyone. So I thought I’d propose this, just because it was a thought I had and a possibility, but I personally advocate against it because it would make the game less fun. RP was going to be in this post, but I should really be working on schoolwork, so it will come later.

When Lumina pushed the door open, Khazad narrowly avoided running into it. He glanced at her as he ran by. She could practically see him deciding whether to stop or not, and she smiled slightly as he continued running. While dealing with him could be entertaining, she wasn't in the mood today. A second man followed him, and didn't manage to avoid the door. His face was vaguely familiar, but Lumina couldn't quite place it. After moaning for a moment, the man stared back at her with a similar expression of confused recognition. "Elentari?" Lumina arched an eyebrow. "Lumina," she corrected. "And you are...?" The befuddled-looking man held out a hand as he introduced himself. "Spartacus, at your service." Lumina absently shifted her rapier to her left hand and shook his right, staring at him. "Spartacus? The same Spartacus in the Moon Lord Rebellion?" Well, of all the people she'd expect to run into her door, this wasn't who she'd expected. "It's an honor to meet you."

Ssshhh, sssshhhh. The room was austere and cold, with only the gold trim of the black rug bringing in any hint of color. Lumina would’ve removed that too, if she could, but gold had to be included somewhere, unfortunately. She made up for that by covering as much of the edge as she could. In one corner was her bed, very nearly a cot by most standards, but comfortable enough for her needs. Bookcases lined one wall, mostly filled with philosophies and military histories. Along another was a rack of weaponry, holding everything from medieval-style swords to razors hanging down in a row, with a few daggers arranged parallel to the floor hanging above the hilts. The swords were sheathed, of course. They were made for use, not for showcasing. But the black razor gleamed in the sunlight from the only window in the room, looking out into the isolated corner of a garden modeled after a forest in winter. The window was cracked open at the moment, letting occasional flurries of snow into the room to melt on the rug. Lumina had heard that it was a room fit only for Blues, but she liked it. The room was plain and simple and cold. Just like her. She’d never really gotten back used to proper luxury after the Institute. Didn’t see a point. She sat in the only chair in the room, wrought iron mixed with blackwood. If anyone else came in they could sit on the bed, but no one ever did. In her lap lay a simple stone, white against her black trousers. One hand held the whetstone. The other gripped the only unsheathed sword in the room, a classic rapier (slightly too large to be historically accurate, in order to fit a Gold’s height and weight) that she’d named Wit. A rapier wasn’t as flexible as a razor, no, but it was different. People were generally bad at adapting to different, she’d found. That was why she liked it. The sword slid softly over the slick stone. Sssshhh, ssshhhh. Lumina’s hands automatically drew the sword along the stone precisely and carefully, as she’d done a thousand times. Ssshhh, ssshhh. Lumina the Silent, they’d called her at the Institute. Because she didn’t go into battle with insults and yelling like all the rest. Different. She’d learned how to use that. Ssshhh, sssshhh. There were noises outside. Yelling, running footsteps. Lumina frowned and set aside the stone, rising with the bare sword still in her hand. Hopefully just a glare out the door would do the trick. She hadn’t been planning to actually deal with anyone today, and was not pleased at the prospect of doing so. If the quiet she'd been enjoying wasn't restored soon, someone was going to bleed.

Signing up as Lumina. RP will be coming sometime this evening, when I have time to write it up.

Sanderson Elimination: Depictions and Memories Wilson Haelbarde Orlok Alvron Mailliw Elbereth Kasimir Arraenae Upcoming Seonid Burnt Spaghetti The Only Joe Stink Doc12 Amanuensis Wonko the Sane Bard Lumgol BrightnessRadiant Elenion DroughtBringer Wyrmhero Lopen Dicslaimer: I reserve the right to work on voices in any order I choose, though the order stated here is the order of request (or my choosing to begin work on your voice, in some cases). Voices that excite me get priority. Also, feel free to request your voice and I'll put it on the list. It may take a while, but I promise to do it eventually.

Links coming. I do plan to finish all the writeups for this game, by the way - I've been a bit busy travelling, but when I get home I do want to write them all out and post them before the next MR starts. Links, however, I can do now. Peanut Gallery Graveyard Spy Hideout Master Spreadsheet

LG26: Day 5 - Interconnectedness The worlds were silent, tonight. The cognitive knot shifted silently and malevolently, tightening its hold on the realms. But despite the ever-present danger, all was peaceful. On Nalthis, Breath swirled and danced in the night, being Awakened or given. An artisan painted by candlelight, a starscape of immense awe and terror. The gods of Hallandren slumbered in their beds, dreaming dark dreams though unaware of the cause. A solitary monk prayed in an austere Idrian chapel, high in the mountains. A few rabbits hopped through a village quietly, while in another a woman laughed scornfully in blood. Sel was full of life as usual. Merchants haggled and sold in Kae’s square. In MaiPon, a Soulforger painstakingly carved the final touches onto a soulstone. A little girl giggled at a philosopher’s attempts to get rid of her pesky questioning. A candle cast dancing shadows in a darkened hallway. A small lodge in the mountains was shrouded in snow. Peace flourished. On Taldain, sands shifted and swirled, brushing against the rocks that had existed for centuries, slowly becoming more worn down and eroded into more and more alien shapes. Deep sand waited, quietly patient and still. And above all, the sun ruled. Roshar, for one, was not silent. A highstorm roared across the edge of the lands, just beginning to build up strength and power. A battle raged on the Shattered Plains, soldiers and Shardbearers clashing in a thunder of noise and sound. But there were quiet bits, too. A cook sat smiling at a table. A Brightlord and a Ghostblood bickered over a thief. An older woman sat in a tent, staring down at a list of names. And Scadrial… Scadrial was mist-covered, as always. They swirled and danced excitedly, seeming a bit more active than usual this night. Watchers nodded in satisfaction as the mists swirled tightly, nearly condensing into liquid before finally bursting apart again. Science progressed. And a senate bickered over governorship, as usual. Metal crushed itself together in one little town to the south. A clock struck twelve. And above it all, the Cognitive Knot hung, a portendor of doom. It had already crashed upon them in its first wave. Now everyone simply waited and worked, plotting for their success and their lives. No one died, but the night was not still. There was silence, yes - but it was a silence of light footfalls and whispered bargains, of shadows and scheming and secrets and the darkness of death. Science was done on Scadrial! Day 5 has begun and will end in 46 hours. Player List

The next game's signups will likely be either the next LG (which should be posted sometime around Tuesday or Wednesday of next week), or the next MR around the same time, once QF18 finishes. Check back around then, and I'm sure we'll be happy to see you playing with us!

Cycle is closed.

The Night is over! Please do not post or PM until the new cycle is up.

Signups are closed! Writeup and roles will be out... soonish.

Arcturus, Betelgeuse, Riga, Sirius, Pleion, Castor, Pollux. That... was surprisingly difficult. Hm. WLIU, name 15 musicals that are or have been on Broadway. EDIT: Bah. *Pleione. So close.

Since it's been officially decided: signups will end on Sunday, September 25, at 7:00 p.m. EST.

LG26 - Night Two: The Scent of Death The scent of death swirled in the wind. Magestar’s corpse had been disposed of, but no one could cleanse the Cognitive Realm of the smell, nor the imprint that the death had made. It would fade in time, of course, but such a violent act as a death in the Cognitive Realm was not a common event, and the Realm (already bent by the Knot binding the worlds) was reacting to it rather harshly. A small group of worldhoppers all popped into existence in the same instant, very nearly appearing inside each other. After they extricated themselves from the pile they’d landed in, each person stood awkwardly, staring around at each other. Magestar was all too fresh in their memory, and what it was doing to the Cognitive Realm was obvious. And more death was coming. They could feel it. The Knot that bound them together physically was binding their fates, too, intertwining and melding them into a destiny which none among them could yet perceive. They looked at each other for a long time. Several times, someone opened his or her mouth to speak, but the words never quite came. Finally, who knew how long later, each worldhopper turned at nearly the same time, and simply walked away, to pursue their own various schemes. There would be more death before the end, yes. That was fact. But there was no need to add to that death toll, now when they didn’t know nearly enough about each other. There was no need for others to die. Not yet. No one was lynched! Vote Count Luckat (3): Arraenae, The Only Joe, Bugsy Dowanx (3): Lopen, Wonko, Amanuensis Night 2 has begun and will last 46.5 hours. Player List

Keep in mind that this is a QF. It'll only last about a week. There shouldn't be any need for pinchhitting. (There will likely be an inactivity filter, though.) Those who have asked to spectate will be invited to the spec doc as soon as one is made, though. Sorry for not being more on top of this game so far. Best guess at when signups will end is around this Saturday, September 24, though I can't guarantee that it will be that day.

So, I've finally found the time to write up my thoughts on LG25, yay. In a rather random order: Balance In my opinion, this game was fairly balanced. Apart from a few changes (discussed later), there is very little that I saw as a major issue. If I were to say one side was more strong, it would be the eliminators, but honestly a great deal of the seeming imbalance was luck early on - they managed to kill the villager with the most Breath, enabling them to make a Lifeless Rabbit immediately, and that person was also Potential Returned. That was a huge stroke of luck for them. Another part of their win was due to intelligence - they effectively controlled the lynch for the latter part of the game, because they made enough Awakened Clothings and the village couldn't coordinate enough to combat that. So the game may have favored the eliminators slightly (due to things addressed below), but in general it was fairly balanced. (Also, note for older players looking at the game - instinctively, it may feel more eliminator-balanced than usual. That's because it is. Because most LGs are so heavily village-balanced and I was trying to compensate for that. I'm still not sure whether I overcompensated or not.) Issues Amount of Breath. One mistake I made this game was that when I was distributing Breath, I failed to take into account that if you had, say, four Breath, you couldn't make a 4-breath Strawman because you needed to keep one Breath back in order to keep from being drab. I should have given each villager one more Breath than I did, essentially. I had intended that no one could make Lifeless Rabbits at the beginning of the game, and as people won the Lottery, the number of Rabbits would begin to grow. But since 10 Breaths were required and the highest number of Breaths in the village after Ecth's death was 6, the village never managed to acquire a kill, which was a problem given that the eliminators managed two. Which brings me to my second point. Breath Stealing. I greatly underestimated how much gaining the Breath of those they killed would help the eliminators. That (along with a GM mistake that led Frozen Mint to reveal that she had a high Breath count to an eliminator) let them have two Rabbits and a great deal of Clothing as well, so they controlled all of the death. I'm not sure how I would change this - perhaps increase the number/frequency of losing Breath, perhaps increase the amount of Breath in the Lottery, perhaps make there only be a chance of gaining the breath rather than a guarantee (as in LG4) or only gain a portion of the Breath. (Of course, a great deal of the reason they got so much Breath was that they targeted inactives who hadn't been using their Breath. If they'd been targeting active players, they wouldn't have gained nearly as much. In that respect, I'd almost be tempted to leave the mechanism as it is, because that is the village's own fault. It's not overpowering the eliminators if the village is letting them have free Breath by being inactive.) I most certainly would change the starting Breath average for the eliminators so that it was one less than the village average rather than equal (it was ~4 on both sides). More specifically, I'd raise the Breath count of the villagers up one on average but keep the eliminators the same. Strawmen on Potential Returned. There is one clarification I made which I regret: that Potential Returned still scan as such once they are turned. This meant that if someone had their Breath stolen and claimed that, if they then Returned they would be outed immediately if anyone scanned them. Of course, the other way around anyone who was scanned before and after would be outed anyway, and anyone who did scan as PR was essentially cleared until converted (which woulnd't have been a huge problem for the elims if they played things right, but confirmed good players even for a turn can be a great hassle)... Basically, I should've ruled to myself that turned PRs do not show as such once converted, and PAFO'd it to any askers. Potential Returned Number. One other small change I would've made is one less PR than I made. Three would have been a better idea, and in fact I nearly went with that, but added Ecth at the last minute. Other Commentary Lottery Numbers. If anyone's curious, how I originally numbered the Lottery was a number equal to 20% of the number of living players, rounded down. The intent of such a small number was so not to too heavily disadvantage the eliminators, given that the Lottery is basically a chance at protection. As the game went on I realized how the eliminators had the advantage with Breath stealing, and so I did not decrease the number but kept it at around 4 each time. Awakened Clothing. This is one aspect of the game that I'm pleased with, because it's taught the village a valuable lesson. Vote manipulation is powerful. It is every bit as important as kills - the two Rabbits were a problem, yes, but the larger issue was that since the eliminators controlled the lynch, the village had absolutely no way to kill the Rabbit holders (or any other eliminators) because they couldn't control the lynch. Don't underestimate vote manipulation. Potential Returned. As anyone who read the doc I linked knows, the original idea for this game was the Potential Returned, and specifically a gambit in which an eliminator reveals to someone and asks them not to protect themselves (or enter the Lottery) because they haven't told anyone about being PR or about whoever revealed them. In theory, this gambit could even work multiple times. I was very pleased that the eliminators did in fact come up with this, although they only used it once, on Frozen Mint (and even then it didn't in fact work, as she entered the Lottery anyway). So no real comment here other than that that was fun. One comment I wanted to make all game was, "Why is no one questioning the fact that Meta is surviving?" Everyone was aware of him the entire game and the fact that he might be evil, yet no one even asked why he'd been left alive, why, say, Twei had been killed instead of him. That was rather bizarre, in my opinion, but maybe there just weren't any (village) players who would usually think to ask such a thing. I'm not saying that there weren't multiple ready answers if that were actually asked, but I found it strange that no one even thought to ask. Finally, I just want to give a shout out to Luckat. She played fantastically this game, and is frankly the only reason the village didn't lost a lot more badly than it did. She did a lot more reaching out in PMS than in the past, asked tons of questions (as she has done in the past :P) and was very on-point in general. Props to her! This was a very fun game to GM. Thanks to Joe for co-GMing with me, and I hope to play with you all in future games! (Once I get done with GMing them all, of course...)

The Night has ended! Please do not post or PM.