mostlytechnic

Wait, so now you're surprised that after you gave up publicly that someone else would vote for you? And the very fast was just because I happened to be around shortly after your post. It could have easily been hours later. Wait again... here you're accusing Chester of misunderstanding (which is correct, he DID misunderstand) but you did the SAME THING in misunderstand what I was saying about a hypothetical vig when you voted for me: Ping!

Hazel and Peter are now tied at 3 votes. I'm still ok with my vote on Hazel - she's either scum or an oak who doesn't want to be here anymore - and if the latter, I wouldn't expect activity from her, so no reason to keep her around. I personally don't think we have a SK. I did at first because I assume the vig didn't go out the first 2 nights. But since we've learned the vig DID, then it doesn't make sense for a SK to not show up till now. My gut says the extra kill last night was something like a PGO. Seems odd since we also have bomb claims, but no reason it couldn't be. We've had 2 investigators it appears, so looks like this forest isn't short on roles going around. Being not too "in your face" with people might be exactly why the scum or SK (again, if we have one around, but I doubt it) picked you. Sure, taking out Simon on day 1 would be great from their perspective, but they'd also assume there's a protector or watcher out there keeping him safe. When I've been on the other side, we've generally picked the first few nights as people who aren't big targets YET but could be later, so get them out of the way now hoping that any town protectors are keeping watch on the biggest targets.

I've never played with a hammerer, so this is just based on reading. But from what I understand, the last vote just appears as "hammerer" in the vote tallys, not the name of whoever the hammerer is. So it's usually obvious on day 1 that there IS one, and then after that it's tough to identify since their vote that they state publicly is still listed in the tally, but doesn't matter. The only way to catch them I know of is they WON'T be on the lynchee ever since their vote doesn't count twice. But we're back to mechanics And I just don't see a hammerer being of any use in this forest. Ah, so it was just ACTING confused? Sounds scummy...

But why a hammerer in this forest? It's a bigger deal in other forests on other continents (I think it's called mafiascumasia or something like that) because the whole setup is different. There is not a fixed time to end the day; it ends when anyone is hammered. So the effect there is that someone votes someone to the point of being one vote short of being lynched (and therefore ending the day) and it's a surprise when suddenly it's over and the lynchee is lynched sooner than expected. In THIS forest, how often does it happen that someone is one vote shy of being lynched at the end of the day? Pretty darn rare. So I just don't see a hammerer having much effect here. That said, now I'm doing some serious WIFOM because I was coming here all prepared to go build a case against hazel and attempt to see her lynched. Is it possible after the aborted attempt against me that she saw the writing on the wall and IS a scum making a desperate play to stick around? This is either bad town play, or a desperate scum. Either way, I am ok with supporting Hazel's move. Vote: Hazel Hazelnut (goliath)

Lemme address these, so that fighting over me is not a distraction today. And anyone who wants the context, click the little arrow next to Hazel's name there to see her post. Most of what you argued against me was my stating hypotheticals or explaining a theory, not stating facts. First, the "don't bandwagon me" was an OBVIOUS joke after I used carets in my post and after we lost a townie due to asterisks. Second, saying codes can be used to mislead. Even right there in what you quoted was me saying the misleading was to prevent the maples from learning anything when you use the codes. For example, if I said "hey stumps, I think Joe is a 123" then the maples would know I was thinking Joe was a power role. On the other hand, I could say "hey stumps, I think Joe is a 123 and Jeremy is a 456 and John is a 789" and then the stumps could check and see that 123 was the only code I actually used, but the maples wouldn't know which person I was talking about. And as for sending codes to people I didn't trust? Again, beating a dead horse for you, but I sent to everyone because I DON'T KNOW FOR SURE WHO ARE OAK AND WHO ARE MAPLE. Once they're a stump, then I know. And since I used DIFFERENT CODES for every person, I can communicate with whoever died, as opposed to the situations we're seeing where people want to claim to the stumps but can't because they didn't send codes to any of them. Third, I never said someone claimed vig. I was addressing HOW THE STUMPS COULD USE THE CODES. If they only got 1 vig claim via code, that person would probably be telling the truth. But that isn't true now since so many people haven't claimed. And yes, I still hold that the stumps should guide the vig using the claims. Someone who claimed a PR and seems legit, don't vig kill them. But someone who seems scummy out of the list of vanilla (or those who didn't claim at all), yes, vig kill one of them. The risk of loss of a vanilla is worth the chance of getting a scum, since I assume the scum all claimed vanilla via the codes. Or didn't claim at all, since so many didn't do codes that the scum had plenty of room to hide there. But enough of that, enough time wasted on this nonsense. Well, I took a quick check because I know I've seen millers around the forest several times lately. Cosplay school (which about 10 of us were participants in) had one. Red Menace had one. Silver City had one. And besides, if I got a role I wasn't familiar with, step 1 would be google "role name mafia" and the mafiascum wiki page is the first thing to come up. Now, all that said, I do think the claim is legit and I trust that Berty is town.

Wow, a first (in recent times at least) of a fighting pair getting over it rather than forcing one or the other to the death? Wow! Sounds pretty lazy, like you can't keep anyone straight outside your scum team. Hm. Hm. So when Nash doesn't want to talk mechanics, it's scummy, but when I do it it's all sorts of scummy to you? And you were all upset about me pushing codes and then today you start making up a whole new code system because suddenly it's a good idea? Make up your mind and quit accusing me of being scum because I'm trying to help! Go read what you quoted me as saying again - I said "I don't remember him being a focus of any attention yesterday, at least until the very end." UNTIL THE VERY END OF THE DAY WHEN I VOTED FOR HIM. I said he wasn't a focus for MOST OF THE DAY EXCEPT THE VERY END. No inconsistencies there except for where you're twisting my words. But my point still stands. He got a little heat from one good analysis of him and one vote from me. Why was that enough for him to run around making crazy claims during the night? The more I think about it, I think I like the theory that he was scum and they DO have a janitor (sorry, I can't buy that maples/3rd party are not revealed. That goes back to not being able to trust the game mod and I can't buy that). Having a janitor would mean they get the kill list early. Now, for him to be making claims before the deadline would require that they got the list even more before the deadline - can anyone confirm WHEN any vig kill was submitted to Alder? If it was early, he may have sent the list on to the maples early so they could make their pics and try to start the day quicker (especially since he posted he'd be travelling, might have wanted to push things ahead a bit) and that gave Barry time to spread some crazy - not thinking it'd save him since he already knew he was dead, but using a loophole to PM before it was daybreak and spread crazy to infect our discussions today. Combine that with a janitor action, and looks like the scum have done a good job of derailing a bunch of the day!

Berty, I really like your explanation of the kills. Barry being the vig makes sense. The big thing - why on earth did Barry claim anything to anyone? I don't remember him being a focus of any attention yesterday, at least until the very end. Worried that he pinged enough there that a vig would kill him so he was trying to claim to the town to be something? I strongly suspect that got him killed instead.

Ok... so we had 4 trees down last night instead of 3. How? (yeah, I hear you over there already typing away Simon, whining that I'm talking mechanics instead of suspects. Don't care, because this is important too. Plus I'm at work right now waiting on a test to run - I've got time to do this but not go back through 30+ pages of posts to scum hunt at the moment. That'll come, don't you worry) Normal night = 3 down. One lynch, one vig, and one scumkilled. And we saw 3 the first 2 nights, but can't identify the source other than the lynch. Why'd last night have 4? 1. A bomb. Barry's story about being a bomb I don't believe, since he didn't kill another tree with him AND the bomb in the story was his stump, not his death. Just doesn't pass the smell test. And Simon said the claimed Oak bomb is still with us, so not that either. 2. A serial killer. Definitely possible. But a SK wouldn't wait till night 3 to make their first kill - they'd have been killing every night. So that would mean the SK was one of the killers each night and the vig was quiet on nights 1 and 2. Definitely possible. A good vig won't kill every night, especially at first when there's no good scumreads yet. 3. A vengeful townie - but we've already got claims of a holy tree and a bomb, both still with us. And vengefuls make a kill upon death, so... it'd have to mean one of the dead from last night was yet ANOTHER vengeful role. 4. A PGO - similar to vengeful, but kills anyone who visits at night. This is possible - it would also mean that Barry was some role, either town or scum, but non-vanilla. But same as #3 - we've already got 2 similar claims. But if there IS a PGO, I'd say they should claim so the town doesn't lose any roles. So my current lean is #2. We've got a serial killer and a vig who refrained from killing the first two nights (or either the vig or SK was blocked in some way or the target was protected). See, THIS is why we need codes! The stumps should be able to answer what scenario we're facing because if done right, the vig would claim to them and say what he/she did each night, and then we'd know. But as of now, I think we're looking for both scum and a serial killer.

Key here - Barry did not die of a bomb. The bomb was used to remove his stump. So I suspect that (like I said, there's NO INFO in the pictures). The fact that his stump was removed with dynamite I think has nothing to do with any bomb claim he may have made. So let me throw out a possibility. is it possible that Barry didn't die of his own bomb (if he had such a role at all) - but that he died from a kill role that hasn't show up till now? Something like a PGO - if I understand right, the bomb that has been claimed (not Barry, the other one) only goes off in a death scenario. But a PGO can shoot ANY night visitor. So if Barry had a role (maple OR oak, wouldn't matter) and visited someone last night who was a PGO, that'd explain the extra death. Or have we been seeing 3 kills a night due to lynch/scum/SK and the vig's been sitting back till now, and since Barry was brought up yesterday, the vig killed? SO - Stumps - Can you clarify anything for us - has the vig been active (don't care who it is, just looking to know if we should be looking for a SK or not?) Can you tell us anything about Barry's claim as to clarify his role/death? I'm not fishing, I'm trying to figure out what happened so we can get past it and lynch a scum today. THIS! The last forest I was in, the town block got infiltrated and the scum used it to HUGE advantage and weren't suspect. That's why I said earlier in today that everyone should be looked at, even the town block. You could have a godfather in there, or (like the last forest) you could have someone who wasn't investigated but was "cleared" into the block due to other things, which were wrong :) So, town block, BE CAREFUL. Use the stumps as much as you can to verify anything you can. That's what the codes are SUPPOSED to be for. You could use them for things other than just yourself. Example - Player A and B are both in the block. Player A could say "hey stumps - B says he's a 42354 - can you disprove that?" and see what they say. If they've got a conflicting claim (from B or someone else claiming to be the same role) or any other reason not to believe it, then they can say so. And again, since you don't want to give away who's in the block and who's not, make it a whole list of all of us and use bogus codes for the ones you aren't really asking about. But as for the "reveal all" idea, NAY. Too much has already been revealed to the maples. The stumps should USE the info, not blurt it out.

You expect to get info from the pictures? It's been beaten into every game I've played since mafia school that they're just entertainment, not information! So now you expect the mod to step in and help us? I'm going with the obvious explanation - there's a janitor, presumably limited shot (like they usually are) and the scum wanted to hide two people from us. Either for confusion or because they were scum. Or one of each. Oh, so now being active and talkative is scummy? If you weren't already a stump I'd start trying to lynch you! Ah yes, let's just hunt EVERYONE. Oh yea - that's EXACTLY what we should be doing! Suspect everyone (even those of you in the town block, don't trust each other 100% - you can be infiltrated!!!) I'm flying under the radar? How could I be more vocal than I am this game? I may not be the first to lead a bandwagon each day (but when have I ever) but I'm certainly talking and pushing to scumhunt! I just wish the codes had been used so we could be much better coordinated and catch the maples.

My apologies, I've had some things outside the forest demanding my attention and I need to get back to them, so this will be short and not as detailed as I'd like. First, I'll also vouch for my portion of the miller events as told by Simon, with one caveat. I brought up miller in PM on day 1 simply as part of a list of potential crazy possibilities, not as a specifically miller conversation. In that context, I said I doubted a miller since one hadn't been claimed right away (and it was far enough into the day that everyone had talked). I also think Waldorf made a solid argument against Barry. I don't see the whole vote train changing tracks to lynch Barry today however, with so little time left. Additionally, I don't think Bobby is scum. His conversations today are too all over the place, sometimes giving up, etc. I can't see a scum doing that. They'd have help from other scum to guide responses to make more sense. So basically, I think he's too crazy to be scum But since there's already an abundance of votes on Larry, I'm ok with "wasting" mine on Barry. So: Vote: Barry Cherry (jluck) How on earth is pushing the codes scummy? They're the best thing the town could have going! Granted, they've failed miserably since people haven't participated and info has leaked, but IF DONE RIGHT THEY COULD HAVE WON THE GAME TODAY (well, it would have taken days to catch the scum, but the fate of the maples would have been sealed at least). So I stand by my assertion that the codes were NOT a distraction. The people fighting them were the distraction.

But why must a Maple counterbalance be at all connected to the stumps? Why couldn't it be a multi-shot janitor? Or more blocking? Or more rolecops? Or something we can't even think of? Your insistence that you KNOW something that MUST BE about the Maples is pinging...

I'll certainly agree that 8109 has a nicer cab. And this set already has a bunch of new color parts.

Poll added, sorry I forgot that. And yes, the new longer pneumatic would have been nice. The crane extension seems overly complex, but it had to be. They shoulda made the longer cylinder for this set and then maybe they would have sold better :)

Curious, care to explain what you didn't like about the set? Sure it's not perfect, but more details would be nice. I'm not a high-level Technic MOC-er, but I've build basically all the big Technic sets of the last decade and I didn't see glaring flaws here other than what I pointed out. It does use both, but used each where it made sense. The wheel lift just needs to be up or down, so use pneumatics there. Ditto for the extension of the crane (though a way to slow them down would be nice rather than slamming each way). But the crane boom and outriggers benefit from slower motion and being positionable, so LAs make sense there. I suppose the outriggers could have been pneumatic, but the fast action would have been awkward. Now, I'll grant that actually USING all the functions here is a bit awkward, since you've got pneumatic valves on both sides, gearbox levers on both sides, and a battery box direction switch on top. But that's due to the compact size of the set. Moving everything to one side would have been impossible on this scale.

Sure, there's scum roles that mess with investigations (framer, godfather...). However, I can't see anything that would change a revealed role after a death. That would make the Alder untrustworthy, and the game would cease to work if the players can't trust him. Seriously, the core of the game is learning affiliations after kills, so if that can't be believed, the whole thing falls apart. See for example the "death miller" version at this link: http://wiki.mafiascum.net/index.php?title=Miller It's a HIGHLY frowned upon version because it makes the mod not trusted. In fact, they've got a whole page over there on the topic (http://wiki.mafiascum.net/index.php?title=Bastard_Mod) and it's best said as "A common shorthand definition of a bastard mod game is that it is designed mostly for the moderator's amusement more than that of the players." Since that's not how we do things here, I can't see the stumps as being anything other than true Oaks. And that's the only realistic way to treat them going forward. Any knowledge I get will be shared with them so they can pull everything together - same as if I had a trusted town block to share with.

Lego 42008 Service Truck Thanks to EuroBricks for making this review possible! As I looked at the recent Technic sets, this was one that I thought looked interesting, but not enough to buy. So when the opportunity to review it came up, I jumped! It's a European-style heavy tow truck with pneumatics and motors, so that's pretty cool. And it's GREEN. It's a surprisingly uncommon Technic color. There's the 2015 24 Hour Race Car, but other than that and some of the small sets, this is it. So there should be lots of new part availability and so forth for people to geek out over. Let's see how it looks.... Name: Service Truck Set Number: 42008 Pieces: 1276 Price: $129.99 Minifigs: n/a Theme: Technic Year of Release: 2013 Links: Bricklink Peeron Brickset The Box A normal Technic box. Except for the exciting info in the bottom corners indicating that this set has BOTH Power Functions and pneumatics. That's pretty rare but very cool. The Back of the Box A lot more detail back here - both the main and B models are shown with their functions and sizes highlighted in a multitude of languages. With all the details I'm surprised that the HOG steering isn't identified anywhere. The main model does show that there IS steering, and most Technic fans see the gear on the cab roof and immediately know what that means, but I was surprised it isn't called out anywhere. As for the B model, instructions are online only, not printed, but that's normal. It seems to have a lot of functionality for a B model but is very similar to many other Technic sets with a claw arm and trailer. The Contents There are a TON of bags in here. Small ones with small parts, big ones with big parts, some PF parts, and a bag full of pneumatic stuff (including precut hoses, unlike old pneumatic sets). Oh, and 3 manuals and a sticker sheet in a bag together. No cardboard, but the books are enough to be reasonable protection for the stickers. Seriously though, SO. MANY. BAGS. The REALLY? The reason for so many bags? Not just the 1200+ parts, but also bags like this. There are TWO identical bags like this. Why on earth weren't they combined? I just don't get it. I'm sure there's something in Lego's packaging and logistics to explain it, but I don't see it. The Manuals Three thin books. Not much to say, other than this is a 2013 set so one book has that Win kid on the back. Eek. The Sorting Instructions So Lego obviously thinks you should sort the parts. Makes sense, since there are no numbered bags or anything like that. Just 1200 and some parts to look through. Being Technic, it's easier, since there's tons of black pins and blue axle pins and so forth, but there's still a lot to look through. However, sorting it right either needs a bunch of dedicated space, or a bunch of containers. I had neither, so I did this: The Part Sorting, Sort Of That's most of the parts, in the box. I kept them sort of sorted by size. There are a few things I left out - the wheels, big panels, pneumatic and PF parts, etc, but that's 90+% of the parts right there. Not TOO bad, and as long as you're careful, you can move the box around when you need to clean up for the night. It does how how oversize the box is though! The Stickers A BUNCH of stickers for this set. And they're not terribly useful for anything else. They're very specific to the tow truck, and they're mostly cut for the Technic panel shapes so they'd be weird on anything else. They do add a LOT of detail and color to the finished set though, so for once I will actually use them! The First Step The first actual page of the manual. I'm used to manuals having a picture of what you're making at the front - makes sense when it's a City set with multiple vehicles. Here? I just found it hilarious to see the finished truck there at step 1. The manual is standard Technic though - plain blue background, part callouts, and lots of sub-assemblies. The Build, 1 After a few pages, we have this. Anyone used to modern Technic can figure it out pretty quickly. This is the steering for the two front axles. As usual, it's some great engineering. The green beams under the arms of the second axle make the distance from the pivot point to the gear rack different, giving different turning radii to the axles. It may not be exactly right due to the limits of Lego parts, but the concept is certainly there and the functionality of the set is better due to it. The Build, 2 More pages, more pieces added. Again, any experienced Technic builders can recognize what's happening here. A vertical axle for the HOG steering, some frame at the front for a cab to be built off of, and some beams out the back to start building the body of the truck. And of course, a bunch of random-seeming pins and parts that'll be used for connections later. The Build, 3 Now things start getting interesting. This is the main gearbox. There's two red driving rings with then the dark grey gears to transmit the power to the light grey gears below. I'd bet money that the axle between the driving rings will be powered and there's gears coming that'll drive both axles from that simultaneously. And as an important note - the axles below (with the light grey gears) are NOT connected all the way through. The gap in the beams below the red driving rings is a gap in the axle as well, so there's 4 totally separate outputs on this gearbox. The Build, 4 This is now rotated and flipped from the last pic of the gearbox (note the axle with the universal joint in each photo). But I was right - the tan gears let the center axle drive both of the side axles with the driving rings. A motor will get connected in there and then we have 4 outputs, 2 of which could run at the same time. There's the axle with the universal joint, the black axle above the three tan ones (parallel to the u-joint), the back left output which gets redirected and ends up going to the dark grey 8 tooth gear in the top middle, and then the back right output which is not currently visible. The yellow connector sticking off to the right is a control handle to shift between two outputs, and there's a matching one on the right. All in all, a LOT of complexity in a small space! The Build, 5 That universal joint gets connected to another in order to take an off-center drive axle and connect it to a centered linear actuator. It also of course allows the LA to pivot. The Build, 6 The pneumatics appear! This grey cylinder is a pump. Turning the tan axle will rotate the short blue liftarms and power the pump. I'm sure this will connect into the gearbox for power, but there's a ways to go before we get there. The Build, 7 Actually, nope, I was wrong. That frame with the pump mounts right into the gearbox and onto the chassis. I've also added the winch, so now 3 of the 4 outputs from the gearbox are in use (large LA, pump, and winch). You can't see it, but the motor is also installed under the gearbox to drive it. The Build, 8 The 4th output of the gearbox drives these mini linear actuators. The drive is coming in on the gear closest to the camera and then the other 2 gears transfer power up to the far LA in sync. The Build, 9 Here's what those mini-LAs drive. A pair of spade-type outriggers. Since this is a heavy-duty tow truck that'll often need to pull loads out of ditches and so forth, these can dig into the ground for a lot of holding force. The Build, 10 Time to set the chassis aside for a while and build this. It's interesting how differently they can use identical pneumatic cylinders. The one in the black section can only swing the lower piece through a 90 degree angle. The one on top, despite a 2 stud stroke, manages to move the 15L beams a massive 9 stud distance thanks to the clever lever design using the 3x5 L beam and 5L beam. The Build, 11 So much added, so fast. The arm from the previous step attaches to the large LA to form the main crane arm of the truck. The pneumatic tubes all come together to a pair of valves to control those functions. Mechanically, the truck's pretty much done and there's still a book and a half to go in the instructions. That's a lot of bodywork to be added! The Build, 12 The bodywork starts with the cab. The battery box sticks in the usual Technic truck location behind the cab. Thankfully, it gets a sticker with green and red arrows that will help with knowing direction for functions later. The seats are black and grey instead of the blue that they often are. This is also an unusual case of a bare connection that ends up in a finished model. See the pin sticking forward between the seats? It's one of these used to stabilize the vertical axle that will be the steering. Only the pin on one side is needed, but this piece () wasn't available yet. The Build, 13 And that takes care of the cab. A few stickers here, but there's lots left on the sheet. Susanne gets a nice license plate too. It almost actually feels bland though. Especially once the rest of the truck is done and stickered, it feels like there should be more detail on each side of the grill here. And the black tubes for the sides of the windshield are a cheat. They don't line up vertically - the bottom is a stud farther forward than the top, so it needs to be something angled. It makes sense, most windshields ARE angled, but where many Technic vehicles would use axles there, there's no easy way to modify the bottom to put a connector for an axle instead (the top could take an axle though). That's why it's tubes - they have enough flex to do it. As for functionality, the doors open. That's about it. There's enough going on in the back of the truck I can forgive it though. The Build, 14 Here is one of the side panels. The other side is just a mirror image. It's a nice decorative panel, but why didn't they put one more of the small triangular panels above the "service" to smooth out the slope some more? Anyway, once you put these two side panels on and add the wheels, it's all done. The Side Comparison The side panels REALLY add a lot to this design, so I wanted to show exactly how much "mess" they're hiding. All the mechanicals of the bare truck are so cluttered by necessity, where the panel just smooths everything out and makes it look less Lego. I like the finished look. And since each panel is held on by just 3 pins, they're easy to remove to get to the battery box or fiddle with the internals. The Good Here's everything in the "deployed" position. You'd never actually use them all at once, but here it is. The crane arm has a decent amount of height, considering it's usage on a tow truck, and the extension on it works well enough. It's also good that the main boom uses an LA rather then pneumatics so you have height control. Full up there would be WAY too high for the wheel lift! Now that we have tires on, check out the front steering. Nice engineering making the dual steered axles do different angles like that. It's not something we see on real trucks here in the USA since the dual-front axle design is not common, but it's nice to see implemented. The Bad There are several small things that annoy me (and those of you with OCD will feel the same I'm sure) so let me point a few out. Each side of the truck has a flip-up panel with one of the gear shift levers underneath. There's a sticker to indicate functions, but due to the design of the truck, the sticker isn't centered over the lever. What? Look at the hoses coming off the small pneumatic cylinder on the hoist. They get in the way of the wheel lift coming up all the way. I'm not sure why they didn't design it with those hoses coming off the other side of the cylinder - I might have to mod it and see if there's a reason I'm not seeing now. There also is no good place to put the hook. As I played around with the truck, it kept snagging on other parts as they moved. The outriggers only come just to the table surface. They don't extend far enough to actually dig into the ground if you had it on dirt. but that's probably ok. They're nice looking but a little flimsy, so if they extended further, since most kids will use this on a hard surface, they'd try to lift the back end of the truck and fail. Access to the battery box switch is fairly tight. It looks roomy enough, but as a 6'3" guy with man-hands, it's tight getting my fingers in there to control it. Too bad they didn't use the PF switch and put it somewhere more accessible. The Video Note when I show the pneumatics at the end, there's an issue with the pump. Since there's very little tubing and no air tank, it builds up to max pressure very quickly. That leads to a loud clicking sound when the pump is running, since it's being forced to compress with no room for the air to go, and then the pump slams back open as soon as the gear turns a bit further. It's loud and annoying. Once you start using the functions, it quiets down, but then gets loud again a few seconds later. The Conclusion So, what's my conclusion on this set? Pretty cool! This was one of a series of service trucks in a short span - 2012 had the Pick-Up Tow Truck, and 2011 had a Flatbed Tow Truck - but you have to go back to 2006's famous 8285 Tow Truck to get a more direct comparison. I've built the 8285 and it's an awesome truck, but different in many ways than this one. 8285 is much larger and has a bigger piece count, so everything is bigger. However, that leads to a lot of empty space in the truck. There's not many Technic vehicles made that have as much empty room in them as the 8285. Also, 8285 had no motor, so you had to pump the pneumatics by hand. This one is much nicer in that regard. Overall, I like it better. For a non-flagship set, this packs a TON of features. The Ratings Value: 10/10 - It's so close to the famous 10 cents a part mark, and there's so many useful parts. Lots of panels, PF, pneumatics, so it's solid. Design: 8/10 - As a whole, great, but there's a few details that could be improved. Minifigs: n/a - Playability: 9/10 - Lots of functions, and it's in a common Technic scale so I bet it would work well for towing other vehicles around. It'd be better for smaller fingers than mine though. Parts: 10/10 - It's got both pneumatics and PF, plus if you want green Technic, it's the only place to go. It's the only source of 1x7 beams, the best source for 1x9 and 1x13 beams, and the only current(ish) source for green panels. Overall: 9/10 - Very solid.

Seriously, why are some of you so dead set against the codes? Here's what SHOULD be happening, if everyone had participated. Today, everyone claims their role to the stumps. Then they can look at the list. Hey, there's one person claiming blocker. We probably do have a blocker, so that's probably true. There's 1 person claiming vig, so that's probably true too. Etc. They could then guide the inveistigator to look into the vanillas, since that's probably where the scum are hiding. Narrow down the list of investigator targets significantly. Ditto for blocker, protector, whatever else we have. And frankly, tell the vig to target any of the vanilla. Either we'd lose a vanilla, or we'd get a maple. Worth the risk if you can narrow down the list by a third or so (AND know that the PRs are not being targeted), since we have a number advantage. I just don't get why people don't see the HUGE advantage we have, since on day 2 and day 3 we already have a group of absolutely confirmed oaks. That is massive, and so I know in my gut the maples must have a big counter advantage to balance. That means if we're not using our weapons correctly, we'll be dead. And the maples will get all the sunlight because we'll just be decomposing fertilizer for them. Or maybe furniture somewhere, I'm not sure what the lumberjacks do with our bodies...

I'd assume that someone sending 3 codes to 3 stumps in one post would all be saying the same thing, just saving the stumps from some PM work. What else would they be saying? So your argument here makes no sense. If you weren't a stump I'd be voting for you being scum!

sorry, you completely missed the point being made. All those who claimed via codes DID SO PUBLICLY IN THREAD. So when you say that all the claims you have are vanilla, it's REAL OBVIOUS WHO THOSE PEOPLE ARE! With being outed like that, I'm not surprised others haven't claimed in thread yet!

Yeah, this is why I said to send codes to EVERYONE so that no matter WHO got stumped, you'd have communication. Since we know 100% that our stumps are oaks, we need to use that to our full advantage. But now we can't. And to everyone - remember that codes can also be used to mislead. For example, I could say hey Catarina, Joe claimed #43 to me in a PM. That could mean something, or it could be total crap and the stumps would know it because I never gave Catarina "43" as a code for anything. Like I suggested earlier, make a list of statemens where only 1 is true and the rest use fake codes so we can say things without the maples gleaning any hints from it.

^^^ What he said. That's why we need EVERYONE to claim so the stumps can compile and see if anything doesn't make sense. (and don't you all DARE start a bandwagon on me for using carets!!!)

Should be easy enough - just make several pairings, and all but one use fake code words/numbers. So if the truth is that D talked to E, then post that (123) A talked to B and (345) B talked to A and (567) D talked to E and state that the numbers are NOT to identify roles, but just to identify which pairing is true. (assuming here that 567 was a code number you actually used for something). You'd want to make it a big list so there's nothing for anyone else to go on. If you just did 3, people would start to think about which was real. No, the codes are even more valuable since you stick around. We all should claim to the stumps today (I will as soon as I go pull up my file of codes from my other machine) and then you all can start compiling and looking for anything unbelievable. To the stumps (since I gave everyone unique codes): Catarina, I'm 74. Agnes, I'm 46. Vicky, I'm 61. It's the same info for you all, just saves a round of PMs of one of you telling the others.

Um, no, actually I was criticizing him, but for a different reason than you. Yes, it was dumb for him to call for an end to votes on you when everyone had already voted. But it was ALSO dumb for him to say there's no reason for someone to add an extra vote when the lynch is already "done" since nothing is done till the day ends.

And you forget - a few extra votes is a good thing. If she's a power scum role, it might be worth them revealing themselves by jumping off at the last minute to get a no-lynch for the day. Very unlikely this early in the game, since it would reveal her and the jump-off-ers to all be scum, but it's possible.