MAFIA 77: RETURN TO THE WEST [GAME THREAD] - [HIDDEN]

[Balki Bartokomous]

Sure, but within the context of Lfischl being on the block... does he really want to link himself to his teammate with his last act?

If he didn't care, he would vote Bozo, but he didn't, which means he didn't want to vote for a teammate.

I don't understand this argument.

The vote was 6 lfischl, 2 Bozo, 1 Damo, 1 Chaqa.

You are saying that lfischl knew that he was going to be chopped, and he would have thought that whomever he had his vote on would "link himself to his teammate." Aren't you using the opposite of that logic right now, that his vote "delinks him from his teammate"? Why wouldn't Scum lfischl apply the same logic you are applying right now?

So you are saying that we should assume that you are not scum because scum wouldn't have wanted to have his vote on you when he died?

In the world where the scum team is Bozo/Chaqa/lfischl, what should we expect lfischl to do when he is about to be chopped?

Vote Bozo, since he's up like 4 votes and it makes Bozo look good.

Wasting your vote on another wagon there was one reason I was suspicious of Bozo.

If it's Bozo/Chaqa/lfischl, then lfischl had been distancing from Chaqa quite a bit. Lfischl makes a point of saying repeatedly that Chaqa is his top scumread without saying anything scummy about Chaqa. So, lfischl sees that he is about to be chopped, why would he stop that distancing in the end?

A good reason not to stop that distancing is if you think there is an argument that keeping your vote on Chaqa can be used to suggest your teammate Chaqa is Town at some point. Which is....exactly what Chaqa is suggesting in this moment.

So, if there is good evidence you are Town, Chaqa, please go find it. This is not compelling.

[Chaqa]

I guess that the remaining mafia player is likely to be Tough Guy. Do we think that's true?

I feel like scum team likely does not kill Bunny last night if they do not have Tough Guy, but I'm not sure about that.

I'm also not sure it matters, but I wonder if anyone has thoughts on it.

I’m not sure if we can speculate on mafia roles too much since it was all random and saving the potential CWV for last makes sense anyway.

[Chaqa]

I don't understand this argument.

The vote was 6 lfischl, 2 Bozo, 1 Damo, 1 Chaqa.

You are saying that lfischl knew that he was going to be chopped, and he would have thought that whomever he had his vote on would "link himself to his teammate." Aren't you using the opposite of that logic right now, that his vote "delinks him from his teammate"? Why wouldn't Scum lfischl apply the same logic you are applying right now?

So you are saying that we should assume that you are not scum because scum wouldn't have wanted to have his vote on you when he died?

In the world where the scum team is Bozo/Chaqa/lfischl, what should we expect lfischl to do when he is about to be chopped?

Vote Bozo, since he's up like 4 votes and it makes Bozo look good.

Wasting your vote on another wagon there was one reason I was suspicious of Bozo.

If it's Bozo/Chaqa/lfischl, then lfischl had been distancing from Chaqa quite a bit. Lfischl makes a point of saying repeatedly that Chaqa is his top scumread without saying anything scummy about Chaqa. So, lfischl sees that he is about to be chopped, why would he stop that distancing in the end?

A good reason not to stop that distancing is if you think there is an argument that keeping your vote on Chaqa can be used to suggest your teammate Chaqa is Town at some point. Which is....exactly what Chaqa is suggesting in this moment.

So, if there is good evidence you are Town, Chaqa, please go find it. This is not compelling.

Shit man, is leading the charge on Lfischl, helping kill Bozo, and accidentally townslipping not good enough?

Worcej and bunny thought I was town.

I was right about bo, and nearly got day killed over it

I do that shit as town

[Balki Bartokomous]

Shit man, is leading the charge on Lfischl, helping kill Bozo, and accidentally townslipping not good enough?

Worcej and bunny thought I was town.

I was right about bo, and nearly got day killed over it

I do that shit as town

Let's go ahead and break that down.

Chaqa's vote for lfischl

I would find your vote on lfischl compelling if you actually said a single thing to support your read there. Like, one thing. If you said one thing that you found made it more likely that lfischl was scum...

Because you didn't, and because you did not "lead the charge on lfischl" at all, then that vote looks more like scum distancing than town "leading a charge."

Chaqa "Helping" to Kill Bozo

Helping kill Bozo looks particularly scummy to me, because it is pretty clear to me that Bozo was bussed to set up a winning scenario on the next day. Whomever bussed wanted credit. So who is it stepping up to claim credit? ...

The Bozo vote and End is also completely inconsistent with what you said was your view of the game a short time before ("probably Balki/Damo). So that action is super consistent with Scum!Chaqa who first tries to win outright by getting a Townie to vote for Damo or Balki, and then sees that won't happen, and tries to cling on to a bit of bussing credit as an alternative.

This is particularly glaring considering you were openly asking Damo to switch his vote to Balki, after the hammer had already basically confirmed at least one scum in Damo/Bozo.

Reads of Dead Townies

Worcej and Bunny thought you were Town? Okay. Koala and Bo thought you were scum. So what? Oh, is this why Koala died first?

Chaqa Was Just So Sure Bo Was Town

You were right about Bo.... Okay, yeah, you were super sure about Bo. What was it that made you so sure? Some of the players in this game are groping around in the dark trying to solve a puzzle. A small group of players have been given the answers. What does it tell us that you were so sure about Bo?

Chaqa's Self Scouting Report

"I do that shit as town"

Someone so aware of their own meta that they write about it repeatedly in a game, is also someone we might expect to try to copy that meta. Don't you agree?

Anything else?

[Chaqa]

Just because you don’t like my reasons for voting Lfischl doesn’t mean they didn’t exist.

And I was sure bo was town because I had a good town read on him.

I do it all the time with people, and it always irks those who think the only way to play the game is to build monumental cases and scum hunt.

I don’t scum hunt. I town hunt and vote for the people I don’t think are town.

[Chaqa]

Which means sometimes I vote for people I don’t have an active suspicion on, but you know what? It’s the same in the end when you can narrow it down using toe reads and basic logic.

[Chaqa]

It’s entirely exhausting for every single town thing I do to get declared as “something scum would do”

It’s just like how propagandists always simultaneously say the “other” is incompetent and a mastermind

[Chaqa]

This isn’t just about you, Balki, btw.

I’ve had this exact exhausting conversation at least 5 times with 5 different people

It’s a major reason I burn out of mafia and feel like stopping playing

[Balki Bartokomous]

@Chaqa, I believe you are quite capable of explaining why you think someone is Scum. You did it last game quite a bit.

[Balki Bartokomous]

I just read Chaqa's ISO from the last game played here. Chaqa was Town. He was alive the whole game and he voted wrong in the end, which resulted in a scum win.

Two things I noticed:

(1) Chaqa Shows Genuine Solve Energy and Logic as Town

I'll paste some examples below, but these are not all of them by any means. Town!Chaqa is all over the thread posting theories, whipping votes, and speculating about answers to the puzzle:

I've highlighted an especially egregious sentence from Damo that just shows Damo is arguing in bad faith and has no idea why I suspect Bozo or why I would vote him over a town read of mine in celaph.

Damo is either scum or not actively reading, which is unusual for him, no?

Like why does he get any town cred

If he’s mafia he lied about who he petted
If he’s town mafia wouldn’t care who pets who anyway

And by your logic me petting rivera on the night he’s killed should be important

There’s no consistency or logic to your game at all

1. Man I didn't even set up the bot, of course I forgot about the game.
2. Damo is scummy
3. TBH I forgot the exact line of thought that led to it, but I'm relatively sure it was because scum!Lfischl has no reason to switch to Bunny over me and breaking a tie is very towny
4. Are you for real? I voted Bona as a joke, and then I wasn't around for like 10 hours. When I got back, I was on my phone intermittent, and as soon as I got a chance to see a vote count I voted for you over celaph, who I town read.

I think you're one of those people who just can't see any other playstyle but yours as valid, or you're scum.

If I vote for worcej now, the wagon will balloon and people will go "woe is me there's NO WAY scum wagon would be so large, we must panic and vote out someone else in the last hour!"

So instead I'll come back to worcej when it actually means something.

If I was at all confident webdip as a community could stick to its guns, I would be voting worcej right now.

There's this weird Bozo-damo axis hyper-focused on me and I can't really figure out a scum motivation for it, outside me being a potential miskill.

Which is why I'm leaning toward worcej today.

This statement conveys no actual analysis or new information.

Like of course we need to get scum today or it's gonna be 4-3.

Well, there's three mafia in Bozo, Damo, Heart, Kak, and Fisch. I'm super confident Kak is town. So... i figure Bozo is about 75% likely to be mafia. The Ghug kill is a bit perplexing.

TBH I think Heart is the most likely mafia at this point.

Unrelated - I wasn't even joking when I said I should be town clear for ghug's N1 death. I know this is a meme, but scum!Chaqa would literally NEVER kill ghug.

I think Day 2 provides the most room for analysis. Two realms:

#1: Bozo is scum
In this scenario, Bozo barely escaped the noose. His teammate heart voted with him to save him, but the last teammate either voted for him (which seems unlikely at this point in the game) or was Damo.

So I posit: if Bozo is scum, his teammate MUST be damo. The reverse is not necessarily true.

#2: Bozo is town
In this scenario, celaph was killed with only one mafia voting for him. In this case, mafia would not be caring about the outcome of this TvT day. This would fit with either Kak or Damo. Interestingly, Lfischl was voting for Heart before voting for Bozo.

I think I'm going to lock in my vote on Damo for today.

(2) Chaqa Had a Hard Town Read on Lfischl All Game and Ended Up Casting a Losing Vote in the End Based on That

This was the Epilogue from Chaqa:

should have trusted Kak. Sigh.

Well done Lfischl. I was super pocketed.

After losing a game like that, and then playing with lfschl again a couple of weeks later, we should expect Chaqa to bring some healthy paranoia about lfischl's alignment to this game and maybe talk through how and why he got lfischl wrong last game.

Bump.

[Balki Bartokomous]

I just scanned my own ISO.

I've actually tried pretty hard in this game and put a lot of good analysis down. I refuse to be mischopped. Read my ISO. I'm Town.

[Chaqa]

Do I need to bump my response to that post?

Look man, I know you want to apply your own standards to my playstyle, but it just won't happen. You probably know more about what I did last game than I do.

[Chaqa]

We'll see what the final three looks like, I guess.

[Chaqa]

I just scanned my own ISO.

I've actually tried pretty hard in this game and put a lot of good analysis down. I refuse to be mischopped. Read my ISO. I'm Town.

As an aside, I don't generally think trying hard, posting lot, or "lots of [arguably good] analysis" are town indications.

Again, controversial stuff, but I think any behavior can be from any alignment depending on the player. It's what makes players like brainbomb so hard to read when they vomit content always.

[Balki Bartokomous]

I just scanned my own ISO.

I've actually tried pretty hard in this game and put a lot of good analysis down. I refuse to be mischopped. Read my ISO. I'm Town.

As an aside, I don't generally think trying hard, posting lot, or "lots of [arguably good] analysis" are town indications.

Again, controversial stuff, but I think any behavior can be from any alignment depending on the player. It's what makes players like brainbomb so hard to read when they vomit content always.

What techniques do you plan to use to read my alignment in this game?

[Balki Bartokomous]

To suggest that my posting is anything like brainbomb's is, ya know, ridiculous. I'm not saying I posted a lot so I am Town.

I think a reasonable forum mafia player can review my ISO and come away with a pretty accurate read of my alignment, so I hope people will spend the time to look at my ISO.

[Chaqa]

I just scanned my own ISO.

I've actually tried pretty hard in this game and put a lot of good analysis down. I refuse to be mischopped. Read my ISO. I'm Town.

As an aside, I don't generally think trying hard, posting lot, or "lots of [arguably good] analysis" are town indications.

Again, controversial stuff, but I think any behavior can be from any alignment depending on the player. It's what makes players like brainbomb so hard to read when they vomit content always.

What techniques do you plan to use to read my alignment in this game?

Your mistake is thinking there is any plan whatsoever.

What will likely happen is I will find one or two small things that I cannot imagine town!Balki or scum!Balki doing within the context of the game, and base things off of that. Such as Damo voting end.

If that seems like a bad way to play the game, well... I think wasting hours and hours writing a wall of text that no one is going to actually read is a bad way to play the game, too.

Last game, all those posts Kak made about Lfischl?

I didn't read them, and I don't feel that bad about it, because it wouldn't have resonated with me.

Whereas something like Damo voting end, which I can analyze in a short iterative process and come to a conclusion from, does.

I also generally do a lot of analysis based on how people interact with me myself, because I can gauge how people usually do so. It's why I can read ghug so well, because I can tell how town!ghug will generally interact with me vs. scum!ghug (though this game I didn't have a great read on him, admittedly, but no one is perfect)

[Chaqa]

To suggest that my posting is anything like brainbomb's is, ya know, ridiculous. I'm not saying I posted a lot so I am Town.

I think a reasonable forum mafia player can review my ISO and come away with a pretty accurate read of my alignment, so I hope people will spend the time to look at my ISO.

Words are wind.

[Chaqa]

The issue I have now is I believe you to be a very skilled mafia player, so I cannot genuinely tell whether this is invested town!Balki or invested scum!Balki.

[Balki Bartokomous]

The issue I have now is I believe you to be a very skilled mafia player, so I cannot genuinely tell whether this is invested town!Balki or invested scum!Balki.

Fine.

Go look for the things you can base a read on. Go look at lfischl's posts. Go look at Bozo's posts.

We're in day 7 or something of a long game. Surely there are things you want to read to help you make a choice. Whatever it is you would like to look at to help you answer the question, go look and tell us what it says and why. Nobody's looking for an essay. Short bullet points are great.