Harriet Slutter and the Philosopher's Balls: Chapter 6

[Pandora]

More thoughts on the game tomorrow; for now I will say that had I not died, Def and I would have owned the game!! Very bold move from the scum to target me!!

We targeted you because def was so keen to save you. There are always a number of "if X had happened then......" thoughts afterwards, and they come from all quarters.

Did the Scum know who their players were? Reading the posts I guess they did, which would have helped them tremendously.

Yes, we did, but I fail to see how us knowing who each other were helped us. I agree that the town not knowing who was playing each character reduced metagaming, for better or worse, but knowing who our fellow scum players really were wouldn't, and didn't, affect our strategy, planning or interaction with each other at all.

We also didn't know who was playing each of the townie characters either, so we had the same disadvantage as the town in that respect.

But that was only on my last day, right? Up till then, I was trying to hide myself. Day four, I took off my pants and stretched my legs out on the table, as I lit a stogie.

Unfortunately not. I had a l look back, and we had you pegged as Helena by the end of Day 2, not that knowing that changed what we did in any way.

[DarthPotato]

Thank you so much for hosting this wonderful game, Hinckley! I had a ton of fun even though I died Night 2. Like I said in the deadboard, I didn't want to be too hasty while using my role and take another Townie down with me. And looking back, if I did use it then, I probably wouldn't have used it on a member of the scum.

[Clanure]

Good Game Everyone!

First of all, huge props to Hinckley! The hosting of this game was top notch. I am so grateful you gave a 'noob' like me a chance, even though I feel I owe you a bit of an apology. I feel somewhat like a 3rd string punter on a SuperBowl winning team. Everyone gets a ring, but I don't feel like I contributed much. I was very nervous about letting the team down, so even though I spent a lot of time on the board reading, I didn't post much.

This was only my second EB Mafia game, and my first as Scum. Couldn't have done it without the rest of the team. I'll second what Kristel said; I had no idea how to play scum. I learned a boatload from Rick, Pandora, Scouty, Peanuts, Pie, and Kristel.

My thoughts on the anonymity aspect are mostly positive. Not knowing who everyone was certainly made you focus more on in-game behavior. I think the anonymity might have added somewhat to the shenanigans though.

Hinck, I hope you'll consider me for future games, in spite of my play here. I feel my EB Mafia career is just getting started and I'm anxious to spread my wings a bit.

If anybody has any suggestions for me, I'd love to hear them. Besides posting more, of course

Kudos to everyone! You all played admirably.

[Tamamono]

Bah, I had a feeling I should have changed to Firuz. Not that it would have made much of a difference, but still, I could get conclusion bragging rights like in Baritones 3.

Congrats, scummos! I was pretty sure that some of you were town (Rick/Pandora in particular), so really good job on that.

And thanks, Hinck, for a great game! Wonderful setup and story as usual.

I didn't appreciate being called a poor sport for my strategy, because it was a thought-out, legitimate strategy. I would never ruin people's game out of sour grapes.

This is where the anonymity played a big part; if I'd have known it was you, I'd have called your bluff and lynched you. All throughout the game I thought you were some newbie who finally snapped when he saw he was going to lose.

In hindsight, "I'm a pioneer. " should have been enough of a tell for me.

[fhomess]

I have a lot of thoughts about this game, but they'll come in more detail later. First, though, I really had a lot of fun despite being part of the flailing town. I really felt like we could have pulled off the victory even on Day 5, but the protector issue was a real problem. The main problem for me was that Barkonius had been convinced there weren't two protectors, and never properly clarified that he wasn't a bodyguard. I was open to the idea that there was a bodyguard and a protector the day we lynched Barky, but by the end of that day, I was convinced that Barky's claim was actually bodyguard. I partially blame Belinda for that as she was pretty clear in her communication to me on it, and used it as the basis for Barky being the scummier of the two protector claims. With that in mind, I didn't see room for them both.

Thanks to everyone for putting up with my thees and thous.

[Hinckley]

Hinck, I hope you'll consider me for future games, in spite of my play here.

You'll see more why when I have time to type out all of the feedback, but I think you're selling yourself a bit short. While you could've been more active, there was a quality in your posts that side-stepped suspicion. You had a lot of pings (Sorry I ever started that ) but as your first time playing Scum after only one Mafia School, I thought your posts were all right. Especially since you didn't rely on your team for the wording and often set yourself apart from them with your voting pattern. Of course I'd use you again.

[Scouty]

"Clanure (who is steadily stepping it up!) is the only one to ask how def could know Dave is Town if they blocked and killed the Investigator. Scouty blows it off and says it must be the Watcher. It isn't Scouty. Explore all avenues! There's a serial killer out there so someone will be lying besides the Scum. But they don't expect a serial killing team! Mwahahahahahahaha."

I think Clanure was asking how Helena would know if we were messing with her, not how she knew Purplonia was town, so I replied watcher, or rather that the watcher was in contact with Helena (which, though, we reasoned that she saw the vig (Purplonia) target Krup (I think it was Krup that night) and so tried to save her at great risk/bravery).

But, still, I didn't see the sk duo coming up. I think Rick/Pandora suggested something similar as a possibility.

[Hinckley]

I have a lot of thoughts about this game, but they'll come in more detail later. First, though, I really had a lot of fun despite being part of the flailing town. I really felt like we could have pulled off the victory even on Day 5, but the protector issue was a real problem. The main problem for me was that Barkonius had been convinced there weren't two protectors, and never properly clarified that he wasn't a bodyguard. I was open to the idea that there was a bodyguard and a protector the day we lynched Barky, but by the end of that day, I was convinced that Barky's claim was actually bodyguard. I partially blame Belinda for that as she was pretty clear in her communication to me on it, and used it as the basis for Barky being the scummier of the two protector claims. With that in mind, I didn't see room for them both.

That protector thing was such a mess. I can't believe I try to give the Town a shot at surviving the night and they shoot themselves in the foot by lynching both of them. Ah well... Did anyone look at my previous games for precedent? I have used a bodyguard and protector in my last three full size games. Have I mentioned that? Yes, I was disappointed in Zepher for not being more vocal and clarifying his actual role. It was easy to gloss over in all the other distraction that he was saying he was a normal protector. And then he just assumed there couldn't be a bodyguard since he was the protector. He didn't try to talk to Drubulum, Belinda didn't try to sort it out, at least it didn't seem so. It was just downhill from there. I'd have liked to see Palathadric focus more on the claims since that was everyone's reasoning for voting him and I would've liked Belinda to have said anything on the last day. Not that any of you guys are bad players, it was just a mix of bad tactics.

Thanks to everyone for putting up with my thees and thous.

Don't ever apologize for that. Ever. I loved you dedication to your quirk and was annoyed that people complained they couldn't understand you.

"Clanure (who is steadily stepping it up!) is the only one to ask how def could know Dave is Town if they blocked and killed the Investigator. Scouty blows it off and says it must be the Watcher. It isn't Scouty. Explore all avenues! There's a serial killer out there so someone will be lying besides the Scum. But they don't expect a serial killing team! Mwahahahahahahaha."

I think Clanure was asking how Helena would know if we were messing with her, not how she knew Purplonia was town, so I replied watcher, or rather that the watcher was in contact with Helena (which, though, we reasoned that she saw the vig (Purplonia) target Krup (I think it was Krup that night) and so tried to save her at great risk/bravery).

But, still, I didn't see the sk duo coming up. I think Rick/Pandora suggested something similar as a possibility.

Sometimes I take emotional notes. They're in the moment and don't always have the full picture. And if I yell at a player (and leave it in the notes I post ) it's always meant in jest.

Pandora and Rick, I hope you get your "your"s and "you're"s right and haven't gotten into a bad habit.

[Rick]

Hinck, thanks so much for letting me play another one of your great Fabuland themed games. It wasn't as crazy as both editions of The Forest, but you certainly managed to make us worry about all sorts of twists you could have included. I think I told you before the game that I didn't like playing with anonymous accounts, but it was a surprisingly refreshing experience. Pandy had the brilliant idea to make Barty an adowably cute, but slightly stooopid little bear. It resulted in no one targeting us and no one seriously suspecting us. The scum worked together incredibly well as team and we carefully planned every step and we considered all eventualities in thinking about our night actions. After a lot of us got called out for being quiet and flying under the radar, I never expected to make it to the end without a scum casualty, but we pulled if off.

None taken. I was pretty much, "Shit, I'm scum. What do I do now?", and would have been toast if it weren't for the scum team.

You were off to a bit of a nervous start, but you quickly managed to shake off the suspicions of the early days. It was a calculated risk to block def, but - as you know - I wasn't very hopeful when you were seen by the watcher. I'm impressed you managed to convince the town block you had a one-shot protection and effectively got the "other two protectors" lynched.

Thank you hugely to Rick , my Barty buddy. I loved what we did with Barty, and we had so much fun together discussing the game and bouncing ideas around. Each post was so carefully made, and the songs...

I agree. Thank you so much. We had lots of fun coming up with all sorts of (wacky) theories together and we spent lots of time thinking about how to make Barty appear totally cluuuueeeeless and such a charmer with his 80s love ballads.

Never gonna giiiiive yooooouuuu uuuuuuuup, never gonna leeeeeeet yoooooooouuuuuu dooooooooowwwwn!

Never gonna run arooooouuuuuuund and desert yoooouuuu!

Ah, everyone I came in contact with died. I had never coordinated actions before (I am obviously not good at that), though I suspected one of the bodyguard/protectors I was in contact with was scum.

And I wasn't right about any of my suspicions. I did horribly.

Your choice of targets wasn't bad at all. You could have played a pivotal role in the town block and, as fhomess suggested, you probably should have taken another night to sort out Pala's and Zepher's claims and perhaps should have realised they weren't conflicting at all given the town was up against the scum and a quite powerful SK. We thought you should have pushed for def's lynch on day 4, because there had to be a reason he was still alive. We found the Mentor (and Mentee) role on Mafiascum and we thought Dave was def's mentee and that def, the mentor, could recruit a new mentee after losing Dave (although it didn't explain why he tried so hard to save Dave). We considered posting about this, essentially suggesting def could recruit a new fellow SK and could continue killing, but we decided we'd be better off leaving def alive and letting the vig (known to us through our earlier role-cop result on Walter) take care of def. If we had lynched def, we'd be up against a watcher, vig, and two protectors that night, which would have significantly reduced our chances of successfully killing Walter that night. So, Zepher's bandwagon actually had almost all scum on it to make sure he got lynched and we were a bit worried town would notice when Zepher turned up town on day 5.

More thoughts on the game tomorrow; for now I will say that had I not died, Def and I would have owned the game!! Very bold move from the scum to target me!!

We found Cornelius was the cop on night 1. We decided to target him because once he got the spotlight on him for trying to get people to seriously start thinking about the lynch on day 1, he disappeared into the shadows again. So, we knew def could not be the cop when he revealed he was certain Dave was town. As Scouty already mentioned, we thought he was the watcher who found Dave killing. So, we took the risk to kill Dave, thinking he was the vig, and block def ("the watcher") from seeing us kill Dave. That turned out slightly different.

Also, I read on the dead board that the mysterious black figure was just accidentally left on the roof. Haha and here we were thinking it was a SK recruit or something!

We spent ages working out our night actions for the final night thinking it confirmed there was still an SK left. We thought Scuba had somehow inherited def's kill after being visited by the water bearer on night 3 and Trumpet's comments at the start of day 5 made us think he was the newly converted SK. It's why we called him out on it and redirected off of Barty that night, thinking he might target us.

The main problem for me was that Barkonius had been convinced there weren't two protectors, and never properly clarified that he wasn't a bodyguard.

Zepher claimed he was a regular doctor towards the end of day 4 and we were amazed that no one brought it up anymore on day 5 and happily voted off Pala. We even asked Peanuts to vote for Nightshroud to try and set him up as the alternative lynch, so we wouldn't stand out too much.

Pandora and Rick, I hope you get your "your"s and "you're"s right and haven't gotten into a bad habit.

If wastnt just the yours and youres we wanted to make it seem like we jus t typed out our sentenses without reading them again before hittingpost. as i said it was pandaoras briliant idae to post like this. we would have never gotten away with that without the anonumous accoutns so it helped us a lot in flynig under the rader.

[Scubacarrot]

Maybe I'm missing something, but why were Rick and Pandora playing one character?

I think my question got missed, I'm just interested.

[Hinckley]

. So, Zepher's bandwagon actually had almost all scum on it to make sure he got lynched and we were a bit worried town would notice when Zepher turned up town on day 5.

Zepher even said this would be the case and the Town didn't heed that warning at all.

[Bartholomew Bearbutt]

I think my question got missed, I'm just interested.

We just we're.

[Capt. Redblade]

Great game, Hinck. The comics were a joy to read and all the pretty daisy-style Harry Potter puns were just great.

It's a shame Town dropped the ball as hard as it did, but that's just evidence of a well-rounded, manipulative scum team. Well done, you rotten bastards!

Looking back on some of the screaming that went on Day Four, I can say a 24-hour cooling off period would not have been unjustified. I'm certainly not proud of some of my behaviour. Perhaps we should rename that thread the "Harriet Slutter Guide on How Not to Play Town."

Question is, what happens now to our furry alter ego accounts? Would you believe I've grown rather fond of Nicholas Dickory?

[TrumpetKing]

Was anybody shocked that I was Twatty? Did anybody have me pinned as someone else? Finally, will we be able to see the scumboard? I want to see their reaction to me calling out half of the scum on Day 2. I do have to give some credit to Redblade though. I asked him how he felt about them and he thought they were giving the "fluff" posts, so I called them out. So I still thought they were pretty scummy before, but I probably wouldn't have called them out for it if it wasn't for Redblade.

[Hinckley]

Question is, what happens now to our furry alter ego accounts? Would you believe I've grown rather fond of Nicholas Dickory?

Not sure yet. They can be kept for Harriet Slutter 2. I'd like to do anonymous accounts again for Steampunk II. I don't know if I want to create new accounts every time. I could. That might seem a bit much, but preserving the cute little characters so that everyone who reads the thread always sees that character name posting would be awesome.

As far as the 24 hour break, I'll speak more about it during individual feedback. I think that she be used in extreme cases only and I thought the warning took care of a good portion of the behavior. I'm most disappointed in people who perpetuated the negative energy after the warning. I think the 24 hour break would've been a bit too meddling of me. And I had people claiming they were doing it as tactic, so I neither wanted to confirm or deny anyone's allegiance or validate it as a tactic by host intervention. I should be able to trust people to act mature and people should be able to control themselves and make the right choices. It's a shame it didn't happen, but I'm not sure I would pause the whole game if it happened again.

I'm also not sure it was just the anonymous account that caused it. People making bad choices is what caused it.

[TrumpetKing]

I think it would be best to keep the profiles for Harriet Slutter two, but make sure we have all cleared the un-needed PM's and such, then bring in some new characters to fill in the spots of the original Odor Eaters. Then, randomize affiliations and such, and make sure we don't end up as the same person again.

[Scouty]

We spent ages working out our night actions for the final night thinking it confirmed there was still an SK left. We thought Scuba had somehow inherited def's kill after being visited by the water bearer on night 3 and Trumpet's comments at the start of day 5 made us think he was the newly converted SK. It's why we called him out on it and redirected off of Barty that night, thinking he might target us.

It was the right course of action. That black figure (which I speculated might be our killer, but thought it didn't match up with the pictures, so I dropped that idea) made me drop my doubts that a recruiting scum in this game would be a bit too much. Fortunately, there was no recruiting and we were just mis-leadingly paranoid .

Was anybody shocked that I was Twatty? Did anybody have me pinned as someone else? Finally, will we be able to see the scumboard?

The answer to that will be no, and usually is a no in mafias here. Our secret evil discussions shall be kept secret

Still, to answer your question, it was certainly noted you calling us out, but, especially on the advice of Panda/Rick, we took a controlled, chill approach to those sort of accusations, and hey, it worked!

[TrumpetKing]

I'm actually kind of surprised that you didn't kill me for that!

[Pandora]

I'm actually kind of surprised that you didn't kill me for that!

Sorry, but we had the Cop and the Vig and a couple of others take priority for our "attention".

And you pointed a lot of fingers in a lot of directions, but never really followed up or seemed serious about it.

[def]

Unfortunately not. I had a l look back, and we had you pegged as Helena by the end of Day 2, not that knowing that changed what we did in any way.

Actually, I can understand that. I was so annoyed at people lynching Wang on day 2, particularly the logic, 'Snarky was town so Wang is scum'. And I knew it didn't matter to me whatsoever as a neutral, but I just kept sticking up for him. Gah! I actually wrote on our Writeboard, "I can't shut up!" Yes, that's me

This is where the anonymity played a big part; if I'd have known it was you, I'd have called your bluff and lynched you. All throughout the game I thought you were some newbie who finally snapped when he saw he was going to lose.

It wasn't a bluff! I really knew what I said I did, and was holding you hostage! The only reason I pulled it back (in private) was that I would have felt bad shafting Belinda and Looney. The rest of the town were being total dicks, but those two were being very rational with me, so I told Belinda I'd only reveal Drub... Then Barky did it, and I was debating whether or not to reveal Looney (who ended up backstabbing me anyway...). Luckily the town chose not to lynch me.

But, and I say this in all seriousness, there would have been consequences for lynching me

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

So if Dillpickle was town, Belinda was town, and I didn't blab about Looney, how did scum know to kill the vig?

[CMP]

So if Dillpickle was town, Belinda was town, and I didn't blab about Looney, how did scum know to kill the vig?

Rick/Panda suggested we rolecop him Night Three. We had relatively accurate suspicions about who had what roles anyway, so it didn't matter all that much to us whether you got voted off and revealed the PRs.

Edited May 12, 2013 by CallMePie

[Kristel]

Hinckley, I liked that we didn't know who was playing who in this game. The names weren't particularly easy to remember at first, but I found it less confusing than having to remember both the players' usernames and character names. It also seemed to reduce the metagaming significantly and meant that the focus was more on players' words and actions, rather than how they behaved in previous games.

I appreciate that this would have been a lot more work for you in setting up the game, but I hope there will be more mafia games using this approach.

While the anonymity would have contributed to the nature of the attacks on Helena/def on Day 4, I'd like to think we learnt from that experience and won't be seeing it again in future games, or at least not to the same extent. At the time, I thought def wouldn't go through with revealing the night actions because of the potential impact that it might have in future games, namely that no-one would ever trust him again. In hindsight, he used the information he had to stay in the game a little longer and it wasn't like he screwed over a team mate to do so.

def, not sure if this has been asked/answered already, but would Helena have followed through if she did have the most number of votes? Looks like you answered my question while I was writing this post.

Belinda/nightshroud, I made a mistake by writing in a PM to you that "our" (meaning town) win condition was to "outnumber the scum and the neutrals". Did you notice that? Once I realised what I had done, I was sure my head would be on the chopping board.

I want to say thank you again to Rick and Pandora. :wub: Hinckley referred to us in the dead board as "Scum School". It was very much like that for me and there were several times that I thought to myself that I shouldn't be asking for so much advice from them, as they certainly wouldn't have signed up to be anyone's teachers!

[Pandora]

Rick/Panda suggested we rolecop him Night Three. We had relatively accurate suspicions about who had what roles anyway, so it didn't matter all that much to us whether you got voted off and revealed the PRs.

In fact we even discussed that it was better for the town not to know that we knew, because then we could sow more dissent and mistrust, which was another deciding factor in whether we wanted Barkonius or Helena lynched that day.

And from what Kristel had reported back and what def had said in thread, we were also pretty sure that Belinda was the watcher, too. What we got out of all that was the opportunity to lynch both protectors.

It was very much like that for me and there were several times that I thought to myself that I shouldn't be asking for so much advice from them, as they certainly wouldn't have signed up to be anyone's teachers!

The thing is, we were a team, so each individual's good work was good for all of us. Asking questions is a good thing.

[def]

def, not sure if this has been asked/answered already, but would Helena have followed through if she did have the most number of votes?

I kind of said it, but to be clear: I really hoped it wouldn't get to that. I told Belinda I would name one person, just for the sake of my reputation in future games. If I made threats without consequence, that would lead people to not trust me in future games too! I didn't consider telling the roles if lynched as a something to hurt my reputation because the only reason I was in the position was because I was part of a paired SK team, which will likely never appear again. So, the chances of me ever making a play like that again are roughly 0%.

I was stunned to see people in thread saying, "If you're going to blab, just do it now!" It was baffling, since my intent was never to blab.

[CMP]

I want to say thank you again to Rick and Pandora. :wub: Hinckley referred to us in the dead board as "Scum School". It was very much like that for me and there were several times that I thought to myself that I shouldn't be asking for so much advice from them, as they certainly wouldn't have signed up to be anyone's teachers!

You're not the only one who learned something there, I tend to panic when I'm scum and am contacted about my night action as well. I was really glad to get a chance to improve my crappy scum game.