Harriet Slutter and the Philosopher's Balls: Chapter 6

[Hinckley]

Thanks for the feedback Nothing too surprising for those on the Deadboard.

One thing to state though, in defense of some of your interpretations of me: The thing with Nicholas and Gertrude wasn't that I was thought they were scum for voting for me. It was that their explanations for it, including some hypotheses that were way out there (sorry to say) that made me doubt they could believe it. I had no idea who they really were, and their experience and skill level, but I've seen lots of scum come up with unlikely scenarios in order to push for a lynch. And in that situation, I had no idea that scum knew the roles already, so coming up with elaborate, way off base theories to push a lynch that might reveal some town power roles seemed plausibly scummy to me. I really didn't expect scum to have a role cop.

It goes back a few games, but it's never that a vote for me is a scum tell, there's always something about the way it's justified that sets me off. I would say 80% of the time, I don't call it as a scum tell. The explanation the other 20% strikes me as scummy.... not the vote, no, it's not the vote

Ah, sweet. Thanks for explaining it. I had totally over-simplified it in my head. That's pretty thorough reasoning right there.

[TrumpetKing]

Thanks for the feedback! I definitely agree with you, and I think that that area is where I need to work most on, too. And I've only been lynched first twice..... It's not that often!!

[Hinckley]

Thanks for the feedback Nothing too surprising for those on the Deadboard.

One thing to state though, in defense of some of your interpretations of me: The thing with Nicholas and Gertrude wasn't that I was thought they were scum for voting for me. It was that their explanations for it, including some hypotheses that were way out there (sorry to say) that made me doubt they could believe it. I had no idea who they really were, and their experience and skill level, but I've seen lots of scum come up with unlikely scenarios in order to push for a lynch. And in that situation, I had no idea that scum knew the roles already, so coming up with elaborate, way off base theories to push a lynch that might reveal some town power roles seemed plausibly scummy to me. I really didn't expect scum to have a role cop.

It goes back a few games, but it's never that a vote for me is a scum tell, there's always something about the way it's justified that sets me off. I would say 80% of the time, I don't call it as a scum tell. The explanation the other 20% strikes me as scummy.... not the vote, no, it's not the vote

Ah, sweet. Thanks for explaining it. I had totally over-simplified it in my head. That's pretty thorough reasoning right there.

[Esurient]

Thanks for the detailed feedback! I still have much to learn! I will continue to play and improve my game! Thank you!

[Scouty]

"Host feedback: Will you please stop being a Scummy killer in my games? You got a lot of pings during the game and I'm not sure how you avoided more suspicion. Your team stopped you from explaining that you've played Scum a lot and so your reactions were really mild and calm. In the last two games that you were a FABULAND killer, you always say the craziest flailing things when you're accused. No offense. This time, you worked with your team and took the advice to keep the reaction simple and focus on the team tactic. I don't even want to give the overall Scum tactic away. That'd be free school for the next team and the strategy would become more and more recognizable."

I'm only scum killer because of you , next time I likely will be too! Black crow forever. I was hoping to be town (I usually always do :p ), then I saw I was scum...then the scum killer again...mixed feelings, but I got in the evil groove and then we worked so well as a team together. Anyway, I made it a point to not stress out this game (considering recent game experiences and real life...no stressing out) and I'm happy to have fulfilled that. Still more to polish on my game. Thanks for the feedback.

[Nightshroud99]

Thanks for the feedback, I look forward to playing another game again when I have the time.

[Walter Kovacs]

Ah, sweet. Thanks for explaining it. I had totally over-simplified it in my head. That's pretty thorough reasoning right there.

Ah, sweet. Thanks for explaining it. I had totally over-simplified it in my head. That's pretty thorough reasoning right there.

Hinckley's been visiting the Department of Redundency Department.

Thanks for the feedback, Hinck. I've been going over the game in my head for the past few weeks. About the only thing I wish I had done a bit different was on Day 4, switching my vote to def a lot earlier than I did. Once the Watcher, the Protector and the Bodyguard were revealed, I was the only PR that def had under his thumb. I should have stepped into the light at that point, and switched to Helena, and try to bring the rest of the Town with me. Not sure if it would have worked, but I probably should have tried.

[def]

About the only thing I wish I had done a bit different was on Day 4, switching my vote to def a lot earlier than I did. Once the Watcher, the Protector and the Bodyguard were revealed, I was the only PR that def had under his thumb. I should have stepped into the light at that point, and switched to Helena, and try to bring the rest of the Town with me. Not sure if it would have worked, but I probably should have tried.

A problem there was that the claims were still somewhat vague. Barky did reveal the watcher and doctor ( ), but it wasn't 100% clear. In retrospect, Barky's reveal was a pretty solid roadmap to town roles, but if I were you, I wouldn't have claimed. I would have played pretty much exactly as you did, not revealing, and killing the SK at night.

[Hinckley]

Hinckley's been visiting the Department of Redundency Department.

Stupid phone of stupidity.

A problem there was that the claims were still somewhat vague. Barky did reveal the watcher and doctor ( ), but it wasn't 100% clear. In retrospect, Barky's reveal was a pretty solid roadmap to town roles, but if I were you, I wouldn't have claimed. I would have played pretty much exactly as you did, not revealing, and killing the SK at night.

I thought maybe Walter should've claimed as well. I was surprised how much revealing all of the roles in EB II worked in the Town's favor. While there was no way for people to know, the Scum had already investigated Looney Lumpylove so they knew the vig's identity. Of course, it could've gone either way. Lynching Helena instead of Barkonius didn't necessarily mean the Town would see that Nicholas and Gertrude weren't Scum. It would've given them the chance to see that Firuz was Scum, but who knows if they would've been able to find the other five behind her. It's seems to be a toss up as to whether having all the cards on the table helps or hinders the Scum. I guess it depends on what else is happening.

[def]

It depends on if you think a scum role cop is likely, and then on top of that, that they have found the roles.

In this case it was better to reveal, but I think in three out of four cases, keeping it secret at that point would be prudent.

[fhomess]

I don't know why, but somehow it just seems to take a long time and a lot of study for me to form any conclusions in mafia, and if I don't have that time I seem to be quite useless. So I think unless I know for certain that I will be able to invest a fair bit of time into it, I will probably not be playing for now. I think every game I am learning new things about note-taking as well and making my note-taking more effective, so hopefully that will help in the future.

I've been trying to simplify my thought process. I try not to think things through too much, particularly early in the game. I took some time off and I was a lot more relaxed in this game as a result. It's easy to get worked up when you're scum hunting or trying to avoid the town.

Fhomess, I really should've known you were Dillpickle. Your devotion to role-play is wonderful, even if it's only posting with beeps and clicks and letting Brickdoctor translate for you.

Ah, I totally forgot I made Brickdoctor do that. Really pissed him off, IIRC. I made some comment in the signup thread that I would only speak in beeps if given R2D2.

It's just your PM right after you accused me that threw me off into thinking you were scum. You didn't really sound like you were trying to understand what was happening, but more that you were hoping I would trip up so you could pile the pressure on me.

I don't remember exactly what I said, but I think I was trying to give you an opportunity to come up with a valid explanation without suggesting one to you. I wasn't really looking to go out of my way to figure out if it was you or Firuz at that point. I was hoping that you would provide that analysis, since you knew Firuz was scum at that point. If you had consistently made a strong case against Firuz, we might've had Kristel in a position where a mistake was made that would've clued us in. Oh, well, hindsight is filled with coulda woulda shoulda's that we don't really know what the outcome would have been. Scuba was really the only one that made an effort to suggest Firuz was the scum and not you, but by the time we had that conversation it was fairly late. Thanks for the kind words.

And in that situation, I had no idea that scum knew the roles already, so coming up with elaborate, way off base theories to push a lynch that might reveal some town power roles seemed plausibly scummy to me. I really didn't expect scum to have a role cop.

I was utterly convinced you and the scum were already working together by the end of the day, and even more so when Nicholas turned up town. The role cop hadn't been a strong thought in my mind either, and the idea that they would've been as successful with it as they actually were would have been beyond what I imagined possible.

[DarthPotato]

Thanks for the feedback, Hinckley! I thought the Lover Recruiter role was definitely an interesting idea, although I can't really think of too many scenarios where it could be used. I think someone should be in the game long enough to properly use it, although since I was killed early I probably wouldn't have the best judgement on that. Still, it may be better to just stick to original Lovers in the future instead of the Lover Recruiter idea.

[def]

I was utterly convinced you and the scum were already working together by the end of the day, and even more so when Nicholas turned up town. The role cop hadn't been a strong thought in my mind either, and the idea that they would've been as successful with it as they actually were would have been beyond what I imagined possible.

I believe you believed that, but it was very much against my best interests to do so, since it would have made the game run shorter. My role necessitated a long game.

[Capt. Redblade]

Host feedback: I approve of your level of participation this time. Nicely done. I think you know you got a little too aggressive, but you didn't stick out to me as one of the worst offenders. If you feel you went too far though, don't do it again! It was unfortunate that Helena Hippopaw (def) thought you were Scum as that was the turning point for the Town. When they lost you, they lost the numbers advantage and found themselves in a "lynch or lose" situation. If they had lynched Helena Hippopaw (def), you wouldn't have been killed and that would've given the Town an extra day. I don't think you did anything to appear Scummy at all. Simply disagreeing with Helena Hippopaw (def) is what made him think you were Scum. That was unfortunate as it wasn't really a good tactic to find Scum. Especially when he said "Anyone voting for me is Scum", of course Scum may find a reason to vote for someone else. So, I think that you were a victim of tunnel vision. You seemed to be working for the Town. You could step up your contributions as far as analysis and tactics go. With so many people around, sometimes it's hard to come up with new info, but taking the understanding of the situation one step further into developing tactics would improve your game. Your Coroner role was a little weird. I'm not sure I would use it again. It's for very specific instances and it led you to believe there was a janitor, which there wasn't. Bad host!

Thanks for the feedback. It was great fun playing and I'm glad I was able to reach an approvable level of participation. Mafia's one of those things where I really don't budget my time responsibly.

You're definitely right about the tunnel-vision. I got way too focused on what I perceived to be a sort of arrogance from def/Helena, and that really got me going. I didn't think about anything else after that, and it really came back to bite me in the megablocks.

The Coroner thing was very odd. Part of the problem might have been that I had never encountered such a role in the past, so I had to research it when I received my PM, but even then I don't believe I fully understood the concept. It might have been a problem on your end, it might have been a problem on mine, but I don't think I'll want that role again.

[Palathadric]

How would a coroner be useful to the town without a janitor?

[Hinckley]

How would a coroner be useful to the town without a janitor?

Nicholas's role would've told him if a dead player had a Night Action and if so, which one. It would say nothing about affiliation. In the rare instance that a member of the Scum team was claiming to have a role that a dead Townie had actually had. For example, if Boris Biddlesdorf had investigated Dillpickle Catterweed and they started talking and the Boris was night-killed and Rutherford Hablabble-Bibble claimed to be the investigator, something that actually was discussed, the Coroner could verify that Boris had the role. It would take a lot of circumstances to be right for it to be useful. Nicholas would've had to know that Rutherford had claimed investigator and that Dillpickle had been in contact with Boris about being investigated. Bleh.

[Capt. Redblade]

How would a coroner be useful to the town without a janitor?

See, that was exactly my question. And not being able to come up with a suitable answer myself was why I thought there must have been a janitor when in fact there wasn't.

Nicholas's role would've told him if a dead player had a Night Action and if so, which one. It would say nothing about affiliation. In the rare instance that a member of the Scum team was claiming to have a role that a dead Townie had actually had. For example, if Boris Biddlesdorf had investigated Dillpickle Catterweed and they started talking and the Boris was night-killed and Rutherford Hablabble-Bibble claimed to be the investigator, something that actually was discussed, the Coroner could verify that Boris had the role. It would take a lot of circumstances to be right for it to be useful. Nicholas would've had to know that Rutherford had claimed investigator and that Dillpickle had been in contact with Boris about being investigated. Bleh.

I think the main problem was that there were too many ifs in this scenario to make it plausibly useful. Add in the fact that the action was one-shot, so if I got it wrong the first time I wouldn't get another chance. I wasn't privy to the 10 000 conditions this role had, so if I had wasted it early on and then something like what you described happened, I wouldn't have been able to catch it. Having the coroner in there definitely caused more confusion than it was meant to alleviate.

[Kadabra]

Thanks for the feedback, Honckley! I really appreciate the compliments from a guy like you, and I am definite trying to cut the crap. I loved having you as a host and look forward to continuing to be a EB Mafia player.

[Hinckley]

Honckley.

You're very welcome.

[TrumpetKing]

I'e already said tanks, but thank you again. It was really fun, probably the most fun I've had, and I really feel like I played this game in a way that I didn't really care what happened to me, I was just here to have fun. You're right about me not being a threat. Though, it may be a god thing, because sometimes I try too hard to be productive, end up flailing, and getting lynched first! (It really doesn't happen that much, only twice..... I think I should receive a nomination for an EB Mafia award.... "Most Frequent Day One Lynchee"! ) But in all honesty, this was a truly great game, and I think the start of a new player within me, and I'm happy to have gotten to share it with all of you.

Woah...... I got really spiritual there.... Preach it TrumpetKing!!!

Wow, there were a lot of spelling errors there.... whatever, I'm feeling really lazy right now!

[Piratedave84]

Host feedback: Dave, Dave, Dave. It's your first anti-Town role and you made it through a couple of days. I think it's interesting that a couple people said you normally seem Townie to them, because in my experience I always suspect you of being Scum. You seem to always get a good share of accusation in early days of Mafia games we've played together. This time, it was really weird that you seemed so Scummy, sorry to say, when you weren't even Scum. I think you continue to improve and I know you're trying and invested in becoming a better player, but this was a bumpy first attempt at an anti-Town role. Two things stick out to me that you seemed really Scummy to me. You answer to most accusation were "I AM NOT SCUM" which doesn't really say much in a game where you're supposed to lie about it. You prove you're a Townie by adding to the conversation and pretending to hunt for Scum, making up analysis, so on. You seemed to be trying to avoid detection and didn't have any substance when you were accused. But the most glaringly Scummy thing you did was when you thanked Helena Hippopaw (def) for getting you off the hook and apologized for flailing. Flailing usually denotes having something to hide and if such a situation had been real an appropriate response would've sounded more like "Sorry I couldn't reveal this earlier. Thank you, Helena, for taking the risk to save me from the lynch. It is true that Helena knows my true allegiance. I hope you appreciate that we can't share exactly how just yet..." blah blah blah. Keep trying. It will get there.

Oh man this was so much fun!!!!

I did not try to be scummy, I though I was the same. I guess my subconsciously knowing I was not town impacted my posts!

Upon re-reading my post thanking Def, I see that is was overly polite and much, much different than my other posts!

I try to get better and gather tips and tricks every time I play, thanks for the feedback!

As for my partner and I's strategy; we had so much fun thinking of how we could mess up the game. I said it before and will say it again, had I not been killed (and now knowing the actual investigator was dead), we could have wrecked havoc in the game!!!!!

[Palathadric]

I see. Meh! We were pretty unlucky with our night actions, especially with me and Zeph targeting the same person on nights two and three. What would actually have happened had Ariattny or Helena been targeted on the nights we were both protecting them. Would I have died or not?

[Hinckley]

Yes, you would've died. Sorry.

[Palathadric]

And nobody would care for my dragons.