M73 - Fowl Play - Game Thread [HIDDEN]

[President Eden]

I should probably explain my radical end of day switch on Flum being top tier town, huh

do it. Sleepy Boze Clowden is too busy resting so it’s up to us to solve for now

[rdrivera2005]

as another aside, I am wondering whether flipping the AFKs actually helps or not. conventional wisdom says that it does, but they seem like horrible info kills. aside from the obvious fact that flipping them explains their alignment, we don’t really learn anything else about the game state.

but at the same time having them around in endgame also seems like a horrible spot.

meh.

I don't think I should be around at endgame. I am a too easy miskill considering my lack of vote D1 and my low post rate. I won't suicide obviously and I think we have at least two better targets before I need to go, but if both are town I should probably be next.

[President Eden]

as another aside, I am wondering whether flipping the AFKs actually helps or not. conventional wisdom says that it does, but they seem like horrible info kills. aside from the obvious fact that flipping them explains their alignment, we don’t really learn anything else about the game state.

but at the same time having them around in endgame also seems like a horrible spot.

meh.

I don't think I should be around at endgame. I am a too easy miskill considering my lack of vote D1 and my low post rate. I won't suicide obviously and I think we have at least two better targets before I need to go, but if both are town I should probably be next.

who are the two? and why not four?

[bozotheclown]

Fluminator self voting for the last hour makes it clear that his only motivation was avoiding the DK. I would have switched my vote to him at EOD if it would not have resulted in a tie.

[bozotheclown]

The BusinessLamp/Fluminator interaction was also suspicious, they could be the last 2 mafia.

[bozotheclown]

BusinessLamp telling us over and over what he would and wouldn't be doing as mafia is the same thing TFB was doing all game.

[bozotheclown]

Question for the class:

If someone says they are going to be an asshole this game and make it unenjoyable for anyone and if we have a problem we should suck it, is this anti-town?

pre the game though I did think that if I was mafia I would try and stoke the flames on the more personal arguments to obfuscate discussion, so this reads as potentially bad to me. yeah someone being miserable is anti-town, but calling attention to it and making the problem worse doesn’t help either. Again, though, I feel like this could be a thought you have in general

Point of Interest #3: Blamp votes for Kak. This is really interesting, given that just an hour and a half earlier, Blamp had given his vote preferences as "Chaqa > celaph > Demon":

i think im

chaqa>celaph>demon

at this point. debating first two

so my situation was that i came into the thread with 10 min left with no idea of what the vote count was. IIRC there wasnt really an up to date one readily available, it took effort to figure out. because i wasn't able to follow the events of the last hour, i wanted to just sit back and let the votes go wherever without influencing anything. however, you voted celaph, and people said it was tied. and i honestly don't remember exactly but i think i was just refreshing madly seeing what would happen and staring at the clock. and then when bozo's vote for kak came in i just piled on to that to combat one other person following your lead and it becoming another tie. plus i was sus of you at that time so that made me feel ok voting opposite. i did see celaph's "if i die" post and thought it was different from last time, too. it was stressful lol

i think if i'm scum there, even if celaph is also scum, i just lurk and don't vote. playing as mafia is fun and i wouldn't want to risk my experience for my partner who is under heat day one, lol.

i feel like the case on me is based on an assumption that I’d be dogshit when playing as mafia

i know it’s wifom but there’s an absolutely zero percent chance I actively vote to save celaph d1 if I were mafia. I’m more a cut bait and don’t go down with the ship guy lol. Flum can attest maybe based on my survivor play lmfao

Can you give me a summary of the game from you're point of view? Has it been as fun as your last game?

Definitely not as fun as my last game. Last game had the pleasure of impressing everyone, this game has just been an onslaught. I'm playing this game a lot more individualistically, trying to see what edges I can gain and what level of openness to utilize. The fun moments I've had are ones where I'm trying to shake things up and rattle people and try to create information. eg: pushing a Maniac bandwagon, interrogating pyxxy briefly

full summary:
So the game started off rough with me coming in after a super eventful/traumatic night where I lost my keys & phone while out at the bars with Bridget. And then for whatever reason that story was just incessantly questioned and doubted for no reason. That was really annoying. Sabi has a breakdown day 1, claims VT, and it feels fake. I decide not to push it because my best guess for what's happening is they're making some big brain play where they claim VT early to shroud a PR role. My other main suspects day 1 are chaqa and demon. Demon eventually starts acting pretty vitriolic, and before the game I decided that any real emotion someone showcases is going to make me townread them. So my main suspect day 1 was Chaqa, but I wasn't going to be on end of day. Towards the latter half of day one I notice celaph is doing the same sort of buddying to me as they were last game (which I think should point to me being town), and that raises my eyebrows a bit. I can't really be on at the end of the day because an hour before deadline I'm starting a game of Black Widow Brigade (the thing Karen played with RHAP people and sent out the episodes for). 10 minutes before deadline there's a lull in BWB, and I'm able to check the thread and try and catch up. I don't intend to interfere with the wagons, but I see that Chaqa ties the vote at the end. With one minute left I'm refreshing, and I see bozo's vote come in so I latch on that way to ensure that it doesnt tie (which I thought it couldve in the case that someone just saw Chaqa's post and didn't see bozo's). So I vote Kak. People are attributing way too much meaning to this vote.

Day 2 everyone was saying it was definitely going to be celaph the whole night etc etc etc. I'm still mildly sus on celaph, but having a 48 hour period where there's just a celaph wagon seems unproductive, so I decide to spend the whole day banging pots and pans for a Maniac wagon. My thought was that Maniac's read on celaph was very much fake and arbitrary, and that if Maniac was indeed scum, that would make celaph look innocent. I'm able to get a couple people on board with this idea, but with celaph and TFB having more solid wagons, it's unlikely that Maniac is actually going to go. So my new idea is that I'll just stay hard campaigning for Maniac until 5 minutes before deadline and then I'll swing over to celaph and see what happens. Brainbomb being adamant about voting celaph cements this idea for me, as brain/worcej were my towncore at the time. Prob still are. Idk. Also during day 2 is a fun moment where I catch pyxxy in a lie, and try to do my best bad cop presentation and see if he will just break. I don't think anything was accomplished from that but it was prob the most fun individual moment all game for me.

Day 3 and on are kind of all a blur for me. After the celaph vote, everyone was saying Maniac next and it was becoming all very groupthink-ish. I didn't think that Maniac was that scummy anymore after celaph's role was revealed, and was preparing to fight back against that wagon the next day. I was sus on Jamie/Sabi/ghug primarily, until ghug subbed out and his last message made me townread him. So going into the next day I would've probably wanted a Jamie vote. But then jamie claims cop with a guilty on Maniac, so I just think I'm wrong and confused and vote Maniac. And then he flips VT and I'm like "ok cool maniac was flipper". because jamie fakeclaiming in that way didn't even occur to me, lol. Seems soooooo unlike him from last game, where he railroaded you for lying. I'm still confused on the hypocrisy there.

And then I kind of check out, fly to LA, start the beginnings of a relationship(?) and now we are here, and I'm apparently being railroaded as scum. I'm hoping it's a large effort by the remaining scum to push my name because they're scared of me, but probably not. I haven't gone back and analyzed anything since the Jamie retract, and the TFB flip, but right now my gut just says to be sus on Sabi and Chaqa. I feel like Chaqa in particular could benefit as scum for getting me out here because I am a very independent thinker, and based on skimming today he seems to be wanting to just railroad through without being questioned. Sabi I've felt weird on all game and have been back and forth 20 times. I start to doubt myself when they have polite responses to my inquiries etc, but idk.

I get why I'm being targeted, because I have been cagier and less open with my every thought this game. But it's still wrong, and right now I'm hoping that some conglomerate of you/me/bona/worcej/brain/bozo will come together and figure out a better direction, because I don't think Eden will change his mind off of me. I'm frustrated because I know that my mafia playstyle would be so radically different than the playstyle I'm being accused of enacting. When I get to play as mafia, I'm going lone wolf. I wouldn't directly throw anyone under the bus, but I certainly wouldn't try to save people or try to associate myself in any way. It'd be my dream to be the last one surviving and solo win it. So when people are accusing me of like "omg he tried to save his teammates by campaigning for Maniac," I just know that it's so inherently wrong. I make a wagon for Maniac as a townie, not as someone whose obvious scum partner is dying that day. Like, what sense does that make?!?!?

And in general the game has just been a slog of personal drama without much levity. But i've still been trying. Been over-fixated at points. yeeeeee

for me it’s just like

if I’m mafia why do I suddenly adopt a “ghug is town” read into my alleged worldview, lol. I know these arguments hold zero weight but I feel like there’s so many soft behaviors that make no sense from me as a scum game

[bozotheclown]

I think this is BusinessLamp's scum tell, just like it was for TFB.

[brainbomb]

I also plan on helping finish of blamp tomorrow

here is a lyric for you blamp to say goodbye

But now old friends are acting strange
They shake their heads, they say I've changed
Well something's lost, but something's gained
In living every day

I've looked at life from both sides now
From win and lose and still somehow
It's life's illusions I recall
I really don't know life at all

I've looked at life from both sides now
From up and down, and still somehow
It's life's illusions I recall
I really don't know life at all

[brainbomb]

if bozo or myself dies I am absolutely on board with his read on blamp and rhk needing to go bye bye

[Bonatogether]

almost 700 words in, about halfway through last day

[President Eden]

if bozo or myself dies I am absolutely on board with his read on blamp and rhk needing to go bye bye

weird, I thought bozo said Flum and Lamp

[brainbomb]

if bozo or myself dies I am absolutely on board with his read on blamp and rhk needing to go bye bye

weird, I thought bozo said Flum and Lamp

okay well then ill do that

[pyxxy]

if bozo or myself dies I am absolutely on board with his read on blamp and rhk needing to go bye bye

weird, I thought bozo said Flum and Lamp

okay well then ill do that

Hammer the Flamppers tomorrow

[President Eden]

I’m really not thinking it’s Lamp anymore y’all. Flum sure but Lamp no.

[Bonatogether]

I’m really not thinking it’s Lamp anymore y’all. Flum sure but Lamp no.

probabilistically incorrect

[President Eden]

also brain, if you’re going to tinfoil on me to the point of leaving me to die then you could at least address the giant post I wrote about d1 and start thinking about it so you’ll be ready to lead once I flip Cop and you are released from the tunnel

[Bonatogether]

I want to talk about the blamp thing. There was a lot of thread momentum behind that, it seemed like, and the wagon peaked at four votes 7 hours out (eden, chaqa, brainbomb, bozo) and five votes at about the 43 hour mark (sabi, bozo, chaqa, demon, eden)? that did not jibe with my perceptions of how the thread was rolling.

The first blamp wagon slowly wallowed back into a 2-vote minor wagon of chaqa and bozo, which was kinda meh. It had no momentum. People were not stuck to those votes. The wagon was really just dead from about 24 hours left, according to VCA. Reading ISO of mentions of blamp, this is pretty much confirmed. We go from people (Chaqa, eden, sabi, bozo, demon, etc) hyping up the wagon, with Chaqa even wanting a hammer, but this just falls apart. Clearly this can't be entirely scum driven because there are simply too many people for that in any game state, setting aside any reads of people. If we use the currently generally accepted game state, this is just basically a town wagon. I'd spitball it as demon but that's really just a guess.

However, some opposition to the wagon crops up. At T-28:00, brainbomb pops up and says he doesn't understand how blamp became a runaway consensus scumread. At T-24:38, I say that blamp looks better off of boat man interactions in my wallpost. Flum says at T-21:57 that he failed at a blamp ISO because he can't read him.

Looking specifically at blamp, he has the 'my perspective' post, and the two god thread submissions.

These 3 posts are the basis for the collapse of the first blamp wagon, and the fact that many people backed off because of this is something worth noting. Let's talk about these posts.

The perspective post is notable for largely being a denial that blamp has agency in the game. At no point does any action blamp take change the outcome of what is happening. The most that he can accomplish is '[getting] a couple people on board" with a d2 Maniac kill. I'm not interested in what actually happened because what's going on in blamp's head is more interesting here, and this wallpost where blamp depicts himself as an observer without agency is not what I would expect scum to think - scum tend to be much more aware of themselves in the game, because they can make calls that they see the effect of - nks are the most notable example here, but watching everything else to be aware of cases developing against teammates also promotes a self image of capacity to change things. This is a basically town mindset: feeling helpless in the face of highposters and whatever just going on and on and not listening on a real level.

The two god thread submissions are interesting because they are potentially faked or editted. I believe we can determine their legitimacy based on similarity to the perspective post.

The first god thread submission represents a substantially different mindset. "I think I need to play nice with [Chaqa] until the time is right to maybe build a case" clearly shows blamp thinking that he can get the ball rolling on Chaqa. He is planning ahead to influence the game against a person who most people strongly townread. The line "I’m not going to say this in game thread because it won’t result in anything good, but my god is it frustrating" also indicates that blamp thought people were reading his stuff - noticeably different from what his previous post said. This again shows blamp considering how he thinks of himself as an active agent.

The second god thread submission also clearly demonstrates this tendency. "I’m debating whether it would be smart for me to potentially swing the momentum back to celaph at end of day in order to avoid my own miskill if celaph ends up being scum" is a clear expression of the idea that blamp has autonomy. Blamp thinks he can influence the game state in a meaningful way here. However, let's talk about that last clause. This is sent midway through day 2, where celaph is in the lead with somewhere between 4 and 6 votes, depending on the exact timing.His most recently posted read at that time is that celaph is not a bad kill but he doesn't want it to be a foregone conclusion. So saying "if celaph ends up being scum" is a very strange statement to make when 1) blamp scumread celaph to some degree and 2) blamp cannot know if he needs to swing momentum until celaph has already died. Later on in that message, he states that "a celaph town flip that I swing onto probably still lets me live, given how much effort I have put in to raise other points of discussion." This, for me, is an enormous red flag. Why does town!blamp consider what will let him live? Why does he care what people think of his effort to raise other points of discussion? This entire PM does not make sense as a town creation. It is a description of how to best avoid the dk for the benefit of town through creating good VCA and interactions, and not creating persuasive arguments against being killed or pushing other kills.

Stepping back for a moment, looking at all 3 posts in total, we see that the 'my perspective' post is relatively towny and the GT PMs look bad, the second one especially. How do we fit this into a theory of either town! or scum!blamp?

Looking at this from a town!blamp perspective, we can see that blamp is trying to work for town in the background, with deceit. He's giving up on directly influencing people and so he has resorting to stage-managing his appearances, and he's been doing this at least since d2.

Looking at this from a scum!blamp perspective, the necessary question is why does he post these? The answer is he survives - which worked - and no one is linked to him from these because they're nominally old posts and a perspective on the game as a whole, too macro of a perspective to give detail on any player. His wagon disappeared after these due to the seemingly towny thought that went into these. Interestingly, it took blamp about 180 seconds for him to copy and paste his second PM to the thread - very long. I timed myself to do the same - it took me 22 seconds and I was confused as to where my sent messages were. I looked in the outbox and the sent messages categories before doing a full check of the inbox, where they were. What took so long for him?

I believe it's relatively clear, then, that blamp is scum, but unfortunately these posts were not closely examined at the time, as it was coming up on EoD.

Other wagons start to gain traction around this time, specifically Demon, rdr, and Sabi. Rdr's wagon quickly fell apart, but Demon's and Sabi's would head into EoD strong and evenly balanced.

What prompted the rise of the second blamp wagon?

Eden wanted to obtain some fine dining fare with a clown and brainbomb just kind of did it. This wagon had no momentum as brain immediately left and Eden tried to talk blamp into towning. It is not significant in the broader considerations of this day.

Chaqa repeatedly stated that that blamp was the optimal kill, even after town opinion started turning against the idea. This is interesting because in the early part of the day he voted for blamp as a way to take votes away from ghuginator, but he shifts over the course of the day to the position that blamp is simply the unambiguous best kill. However, with the current flip, which he correctly predicted, he has switched his read to put blamp definitely outside the POE. Therefore I am willing to claim that blamp and Chaqa 1) cannot be scum together and 2) are very unlikely to be scum together.

I could probably say more but this is already massive and I'm tired. Possibly part 2?

TL;DR:
blamp is much more likely to be scum due to inconsistencies among his 3 most crucial posts.
chaqa and blamp are probably opposite alignments, so chaqa is likely town.

reposting the meme cause it's about to be relevant
https://imgur.com/a/HSxCl0F

[brainbomb]

your golden child had been hard tunnelling your golden girl for almost two weeks and you havent even budged an inch on your opinion of it. its like you are completely unphase by bona killing someone at the top of your core.

can you at least articulate anything at all about this?

[Bonatogether]

@scumbuddy eden can i go back to lurking now?