Mid-Range Game 41 / Anonymous Game 8: Lord of Chaos

[Charcoal Hyena]

9 minutes ago, Chartreuse Penguin said:

Every channeler should have access to linking.  Assuming Fifth followed the lore, in order to link, you need a female channeler.  I believe you must have at least one more female than male channeler for any circle with the exception that M-F, M-M-F, M-M-F-F circles are possible.  And with the number of players, this is a moot point, but you must have a male channeler involved to go over 13 total channelers.

I actually forgot about that from the books. Interesting.

[Amber Vulture]

2 hours ago, Charcoal Hyena said:

Could you explain that? Weaving together? Is this a mechanic that only one or both of you have access to? 

Also, why Albatross?

Weaving together is a saidar ability, but other than that I may have misunderstood the mechanics of how weaving together works. I'll see if I can get more information for you. 

I had Swan, Falcon, Albatross, Penguin as of last cycle. I thought there was a good chance Swan would die to the lynch, Penguin claimed a PM with Ostrich last cycle that would have been a dangerous lie, and I thought Falcon claiming the kill on Crocodile and its effects made them somewhat less likely to be evil. I might have to reevaluate my list since Scorpion, Falcon, and Dingo are the only one still there who could have killed both Weasel and Ostrich.

[Emerald Falcon]

OK, I'm completely lost.

Claims:
Amber Vulture - Unnamed Forsaken
Amethyst Scorpion - Asmodean
Azure Mouse - Unnamed Female Forsaken (Graendal, Semirrhage, or Moghedien)
Charcoal Hyena - 
Chartreuse Penguin - Unnamed Forsaken
Coral Swan - 
Cream Tuatara - Lanfear/Cyndane
Emerald Falcon - Unnamed Forsaken
Fuchsia Ostrich Mesaana
Indigo Weasel Aran’gar
Ivory Dragonfly
Magenta Albatross Rahvin
Mauve Crocodile Shaidar Haran
Melon Dingo - Aginor/Osan'gar

Blegh. I was hoping going through, analysing peoples posts, and writing up the list of claims would help, but it didn't at all. (If I missed one, by the way, please correct me.)

So Swan was roleblocked last cycle, but there were still not one but two kills. It's possible that both kills were friendly fire, though, in which case, I'd appreciate if the Ostrich's killer spoke up. Otherwise, that makes me think that Swan isn't Lews. We can also rule out Mouse and Tuatara, who can confirm for each other that they're both saidin channelers, and since Vulture participated in the Albatross kill, they can't have killed Ostrich last cycle either. Finally, Dingo and Scorpion have both claimed an explicit role, which almost certainly would have been counterclaimed if they'd been lying, so I'm going to rule them out too.

That leaves Hyena and Dragonfly. Weasel seemed to trust Dragonfly, but confirmed good =/= confirmed right, so I'm not sure how much stock to put into that. Hyena, I'm also of two minds about - they're the one player to have PM'ed me, so far, and have claimed to me - I haven't had proof of that claim, but I at least have the opportunity to ask them how they acted in future turns. For that reason, by process of elimination, I'm going to vote for Dragonfly.

[Melon Dingo]

41 minutes ago, Emerald Falcon said:

That leaves Hyena and Dragonfly. Weasel seemed to trust Dragonfly, but confirmed good =/= confirmed right, so I'm not sure how much stock to put into that. Hyena, I'm also of two minds about - they're the one player to have PM'ed me, so far, and have claimed to me - I haven't had proof of that claim, but I at least have the opportunity to ask them how they acted in future turns. For that reason, by process of elimination, I'm going to vote for Dragonfly.

Dragonfly ended up PMing me, so I'll vote for Hyena.

The Forsaken list is probably as follows: (dead are crossed out, claimed are bolded)

• Aran'gar
• Asmodean
• Demandred
• Graendal
• Lanfear
• Mesaana
• Moghedien
• Osan'gar
• Rahvin
• Sammael
• Semirhage

We currently have four unknown Forsaken claims. In my opinion, they should just go ahead and directly claim their role. I honestly don't see why they shouldn't claim so we can confirm them.

[Ivory Dragonfly]

54 minutes ago, Melon Dingo said:

We currently have four unknown Forsaken claims. In my opinion, they should just go ahead and directly claim their role. I honestly don't see why they shouldn't claim so we can confirm them.

I disagree with this and can think of several reason it would be prudent to not claim.

First, it won't exactly help solve much. We know there are 13 Forsaken total, and one player has already flipped as not one of them. That means those who aren't actually Forsaken can wait until everyone else has claimed, then pick the names that have been left off the list. It might be suspicious that they waited, but they could feign inactivity. 

Second, what does knowing their names actually do? I can't think of much it helps the village figure out, other than maybe a canon timeline, but that won't help us find Lews. It does, however, help the Lews Crew a lot. If they have knowledge or the ability to Google, they can easily figure out who may be more dangerous based on canon.

Third, consider one of the Forsaken win-cons of killing Lews. What if they have a similar condition of finding specific roles to eliminate? We'd be handing them a win on a silver platter.

[Charcoal Hyena]

16 hours ago, Ivory Dragonfly said:

I disagree with this and can think of several reason it would be prudent to not claim.

First, it won't exactly help solve much. We know there are 13 Forsaken total, and one player has already flipped as not one of them. That means those who aren't actually Forsaken can wait until everyone else has claimed, then pick the names that have been left off the list. It might be suspicious that they waited, but they could feign inactivity. 

Second, what does knowing their names actually do? I can't think of much it helps the village figure out, other than maybe a canon timeline, but that won't help us find Lews. It does, however, help the Lews Crew a lot. If they have knowledge or the ability to Google, they can easily figure out who may be more dangerous based on canon.

Third, consider one of the Forsaken win-cons of killing Lews. What if they have a similar condition of finding specific roles to eliminate? We'd be handing them a win on a silver platter.

Though it seems like this lynch is becoming a Hyena vs Dragonfly situation, I agree with Dragonfly. Though claiming gives a sense of relief to the rest of us, reference Dragonfly's second point. Just a name doesn't help us much. Though I'm sure Fifth has done his research, to predict what abilities each Forsaken have just from their names would take a ridiculous amount of knowledge of WoT. Arcanist-level knowledge. From what I have gathered, it seems that the Forsaken have a lot of overlap in abilities, but each has a unique trick up their sleeve.

From what has been stated, there are differing but similar win-cons among the Forsaken. Most, if not all, involve the Dragon, but it would be folly to assume that all need the Dragon dead. In particular, I'd be interested to know specifically what Lanfear's win-con is, considering her relationship with Lews. Of any of the Forsaken, I'd be most suspicious of her.

I don't follow Vulture's logic in killing Albatross, not to mention I've been getting a bad feeling about them. I want to hear @Cream Tuatara's side of this. For now, in the interest of self-preservation, Amber Vulture.

[Amber Vulture]

1 hour ago, Charcoal Hyena said:

 From what I have gathered, it seems that the Forsaken have a lot of overlap in abilities, but each has a unique trick up their sleeve.

From what has been stated, there are differing but similar win-cons among the Forsaken. Most, if not all, involve the Dragon, but it would be folly to assume that all need the Dragon dead. In particular, I'd be interested to know specifically what Lanfear's win-con is, considering her relationship with Lews. Of any of the Forsaken, I'd be most suspicious of her.

I don't follow Vulture's logic in killing Albatross, not to mention I've been getting a bad feeling about them. I want to hear Cream Tuatara's side of this. For now, in the interest of self-preservation, Amber Vulture.

I think the base weaves are the same, or at least Ostrich and I seemed to have the same weaves, but some people apparently have items to enhance their weaves.

I've explained why Albatross two times already. What do you not follow? 

Fifth refuses to tell me more information about pooling weaves. I still only know that saidar users can pool, and I assumed from the example given that saidar users could only weave with each other, but I now realize this is not necessarily true. If saidar users can weave with saidin users, there's no indication the numbers have to be as specific as Penguin suggests.

[Amethyst Scorpion]

I agree with the not revealing names camp. I know I've already revealed mine so I kind of look like a hypocrite, but I revealed mine so that the thread would have more context in regards to the aims of the game. At this point though it would give Lews and his crew information that they don't necessarily have. And at the same time it doesn't do too much for the forsaken.

I . . . was hoping that a majority lynch would kill the lynchee. That would have made things so much simpler. There is very little incentive for me to lynch now because I can't really get much information out of it. If we hit the Lews crew killer then there might not be a kill and that might steer us in the right direction. But there is a higher chance of us not hitting it and then getting no information at all.

[Cream Tuatara]

At this point with a lynch that just roleblocks the player, we are essentially all left to our own devices with finding Lews. Either as single players or small groups, players can just use their weaves on any player they wish. There isn't the same obligation to go to the thread and post arguments to try and pull the lynch the way you want it. One potentially problematic effect from that is the fact that if everyone uses kill actions of some description the player count could decrease more rapidly than normal. 

Edited April 18, 2020 by Cream Tuatara

[Amber Vulture]

It's not worthwhile to roleblock two people, so I guess I'll just not take an action this cycle. Good luck, everyone else.

[Coral Swan]

Can confirm that a lynch does not prevent the creation of PM's.

I guess I don't see any reason why I shouldn't claim, now... I am M'hael, a Forsaken formerly known as Mazrim Taim. (Yes, he doesn't become a Forsaken until the end, but he was working with them pretty much the whole time- so I guess it counts.) (That's in purple as to not confuse it with a vote, by the way- it was red in my PM).

[Fifth Scholar]

Cycle is closed! Come back to see who is right...and who is dead. 

[StrikerEZ]

Semirhage glanced around her as she snuck through the small village in Amadicia she’d found herself in. She’d heard rumors of the Dragon being here through her network of darkfriends, and she was finally ready to take him out. He’d slipped from her grasp too many times now, and she had the perfect trap for him this time.
She heard a sound behind her, and she quickly readied some weaves, searching around her for someone touching saidar. It seemed to be an eternity of waiting and listening before she decided it must’ve been nothing. Just in case, she set up some protective weaves around her. There may not have been someone using saidar nearby, but one of Lews Therin’s Asha’man would be undetectable to her.
The building she’d been looking for seemed rundown and abandoned, but she could see several guards nearby. Granted, they were trying to appear to not be guards, but she knew better. Lews Therin would know better than to go anywhere without guards.
She prepared several weaves of fire, then set them off towards each of the guards. None of them were able to set off the alarm, so she strode into the building, preparing a weave of balefire to use on Lews Therin. The building was empty, to her surprise. Before she could begin careful unraveling her balefire weave, a surge of fire caught her from behind. She hadn’t even felt the weave being made before it was too late.

---

Amber Vulture was lynched!

Vote Count:

Vulture (2): Hyena, Dragonfly
Dragonfly (1): Falcon
Hyena (1): Dingo

Amber Vulture was slain! She was Semirhage the Forsaken!

Cycle 5 has begun! It will end in about 47 hours, on Monday 20 April at 9:00 PM EDT.

Please remember to get your orders in before rollover. Thank you! And good luck!

[Player List]

Amber Vulture Semirhage
Amethyst Scorpion
Azure Mouse
Charcoal Hyena
Chartreuse Penguin
Coral Swan
Cream Tuatara
Emerald Falcon
Fuchsia Ostrich Mesaana
Indigo Weasel Aran’gar
Ivory Dragonfly
Magenta Albatross Rahvin
Mauve Crocodile Shaidar Haran
Melon Dingo

[Ivory Dragonfly]

(Fifth, that cycle close deserves all the upvotes.)

Interesting choice in kill. I have my doubts that came from the Lews Crew, considering there was just enough suspicion on Vulture to cause a distraction. More likely, it was another village/neutral taking advantage of the fact Vulture was going to be roleblocked. If my theory is correct, it would also mean either the Lews Crew didn't take a kill action, or their action failed.

I'm inclined to trust Tuatara a bit more because of their action with Vulture, unless Moraine happens to be part of the game. But still, a hypothetical role is not enough cause for a lynch.

The low vote count is not a good sign moving forward. We need to get some more activity going. @Azure Mouse was the only player that did not post last cycle. What are your thoughts on the game so far?

Also, I want to point something out in regards to clearing someone based on actions. From the original game post:

Quote

This MR runs on a single 48-hour cycle. Most players have one action a turn.

Bolded is mine. As we know all players have access to some actions, this would suggest some players can take more than one action per cycle. 

[Amethyst Scorpion]

14 hours ago, Ivory Dragonfly said:

Bolded is mine. As we know all players have access to some actions, this would suggest some players can take more than one action per cycle. 

. . . That throws everything into the atmosphere, I totally missed that and was solely working on the assumption that everyone had one action like normal.

Okay, so without information from lynches, it would probably be in the best interest of the Lews Crew to simply lay low instead of sticking their heads where they shouldn't be. That brings my attention to Chartreuse Penguin, Cream Tuatara, and Azure Mouse as those who have posted least lately. So I'll probably say that those three are my biggest suspicions?

I've been working on the assumption that there is between 1 and 3 people in the lews crew. Currently one male and 3 female channelers are dead (plus Shaidar Haran who apparently isn't a forsaken if I've read that correctly). I would personally assume that there was a roughly equal number of male and female channelers at the beginning of the game, so for the rest of this post I'll be working with this assumption. If there is one extra I'll probably assume that they're female because Lews is male.

If there is 1 then it's 8-1. Lews, 5 male, 3 female. Probably the best case scenario. We have the least chance of hitting Lews from random chance, but we would also have more time and more chances to hit them. With 1.5 kills per turn this game will end in about 5-6 more turns.

If there is 2 then it's 7-2. Lews, a helper, 4 male, 3 female. Not much to say about this one, with a kill rate of 1.5 per turn it'll end in about 4-5 turns. This is assuming that every kill hits a forsaken and not the Lews Crew.

If there is 3 then it's 6-3. Lews, 2 helpers, 4 male, 2 female. Obviously the worst case scenario, if this were to occur then it would be the closest to a typical game of mafia. Although it does introduce an increased possibility of hitting one of the Lews Crew which would give us so much more information than we currently have! With 1.5 kills per turn, all of them hitting forsaken, it would take 4 turns for the forsaken to die. However in this scenario it is less likely for all the kills to hit forsaken.

I have to assume that either Lews themselves or one of their retinue has a protection ability to balance the game out and to justify the use of balefires. With that said, I don't know if we should be playing aggressively or defensively. If we play aggressively then we have more chance to hit Lews before they hit more of us, but they might just pull back and protect themselves so that they don't have to kill anybody and we slaughter ourselves. If we play defensively and only attack those we really think are Lews, then we essentially let them pick us off one by one.

And the worst part of it all is that if the general thread comes to a collective decision then Lews and their potential crew can just act accordingly! So really it's not a question to bring to the general thread because everyone has to play for themselves even though a concerted effort might be more fruitful!

[Melon Dingo]

The lack of a lynch has really been hurting us.

21 hours ago, Ivory Dragonfly said:

Bolded is mine. As we know all players have access to some actions, this would suggest some players can take more than one action per cycle. 

I think that's probably Lews.

[Cream Tuatara]

I guess my biggest suspicion is Azure Mouse. If they were Lews then they would have reecieved their character in green text, which is normally associated with being the main village faction. Even in a blackout game it would be an automatic assumption. However when players all over began revealing that they were forsaken, Mouse's activity dropped off to next to nothing very quickly. 

[Ivory Dragonfly]

2 hours ago, Melon Dingo said:

The lack of a lynch has really been hurting us.

I think that's probably Lews.

I disagree about the lack of lynch hurting, since the roleblock function is quite helpful in tracking down who can and can't take actions when people die. It is also helpful if we suspect someone of being Lews to roleblock them so they can't protect themselves. Also, if there was a lynch and the number of kills apparently available, we'd be going through people so much more quickly with likely no more success than currently.

Our biggest problem is lack of discussion. We're more than 24 hours into the turn, and we've had a grand total of three (make that four, I just got ninja'd) people say anything. @Charcoal Hyena, @Azure Mouse, @Coral Swan, @Emerald Falcon.

As for who can take extra actions, it is quite likely Lews is in that category. If he has teammates, then likely there is one elim with that ability. My bet was on Crocodile, since they were a step above Forsaken in the scheme of things. There may also be a neutral with more than one action.

2 minutes ago, Cream Tuatara said:

I guess my biggest suspicion is Azure Mouse. If they were Lews then they would have reecieved their character in green text, which is normally associated with being the main village faction. Even in a blackout game it would be an automatic assumption. However when players all over began revealing that they were forsaken, Mouse's activity dropped off to next to nothing very quickly. 

I can agree with this. Their apparent lack of activity also lines up with fewer kills. D1 when they were roleblocked, there was only one death, and this last turn when they never posted, again there was only one death. Azure Mouse.

[Charcoal Hyena]

Mouse seemed trustworthy earlier in the game, when they were posting more. However, as has been mentioned, their recent lack of activity is suspicious. IIRC, Mouse claimed as an unnamed female Forsaken. This could have been a fake claim that has gone unchallenged.

Azure Mouse, but then we need to do something to confirm their role while they are roleblocked. Just leaving them as is won't give us further information.

[Chartreuse Penguin]

So, it seems that Lews' crew (still unsure whether we're looking at just Lews or a team of sorts) has possibly been focusing on female channelers the past few cycles...my guess is that this is designed to reduce the chances of a good link being available.

So, right now, here are my primary suspects:

• Tier 1: Charcoal, Azure
• Tier 2: Coral
• Tier 3: Emerald, Ivory
• Tier 4 (don't really suspect): Melon, Amethyst, Cream

[Azure Mouse]

I am really sorry everyone, this past weekend has been really crazy for me. I am going to go and see what's happened since I was gone, then come back and check in. 

I feel like I am probably going to die this cycle, because it seems like either Lews(and possible crew) or someone else is taking advantage of the roleblock.

[Azure Mouse]

I am going to place my vote on Ivory Dragonfly for now, though I'm not sure it will help me at all. My biggest reason for this is that they haven't claimed Forsaken. Swan and Hyena have also not claimed, but I am the most suspicious of dragonfly.

[Fifth Scholar]

Cycle closed! 

[Fifth Scholar]

Writeup to be edited in or posted below. I’m working on it, but figured you guys would like to see the immediate aftermath of the mess of actions that was this cycle...

---

Azure Mouse was lynched and stilled!

Vote Count:

Mouse (3): Hyena, Tuatara, Dragonfly
Dragonfly (1): Mouse

Azure Mouse was killed by balefire! She was Graendal the Forsaken!

Ivory Dragonfly was killed! He was Moridin the Forsaken!

Melon Dingo was killed! He was Osan’gar the Forsaken! 

Please remember to get your orders in before rollover, and continue posting in-thread. Two cycles without posting will kill you. 

Good luck! 

[Player List]

Amber Vulture Semirhage
Amethyst Scorpion
Azure Mouse Graendal
Charcoal Hyena
Chartreuse Penguin
Coral Swan
Cream Tuatara
Emerald Falcon
Fuchsia Ostrich Mesaana
Indigo Weasel Aran’gar
Ivory Dragonfly Moridin
Magenta Albatross Rahvin
Mauve Crocodile Shaidar Haran
Melon Dingo Osan’gar

Edited April 21, 2020 by Fifth Scholar

[Coral Swan]

Not exactly what you like to see...

But given that we haven't lost yet, clearly we still have a chance. Not very helpful, I know  but its all I have time to say right now.