@ Skystone. The "They set up Rag to do it argument" was floated earlier. Reference:



So I felt it was necessary, in particular, to respond to.

I actually did a quick search to confirm this, but literally the only person in the game so far who has called someone liar is you, with reference to me. Lunch just disagreed with your proposition. Maybe you have issues with him on other axes, or bad blood due to other interactions, but that doesn't change the content of his posts here and now.

It also doesn't justify ruining the game for the nine other people who are playing.


Disagreeing with people's propositions isn't rude in a game about disagreeing with people's propositions. You also specifically stated there that your "gut is often right", in addition to several other self-congratulatory comments earlier about your scum-hunting prowess (e.g. "bloodhound nose"). It is well within Lunch's right within the context of the game to undermine that association, as you've clearly been using it as an argument for why people ought to favor your opinions.


This is an angry OMGUS conspiracy.

If I said to you that I was a catholic (I'm not, this is a hypothetical example), and you responded with "I disagree; I think you merely pretend to be a catholic to garner sympathy with other catholics," you're calling me a liar. Doesn't matter if you don't use the word "liar", the meaning is the exact same.

CL didn't just disagree with my proposition (and also, I'd really like to know how you know what CL meant when you are clearly terrible at contextualizing what people mean when they say ****), he downright said "I think you copped me first and acted all you knew all along second." How is that not accusing me of lying?

Or are you really that dense as to try to say "Well, actually, he didn't use the word liar so that means he isn't suggesting you tried to deceive people"?


To quote you: "in the interest of fostering a healthy play community, I almost feel compelled to vote for Zinger. These sorts of games work because the players involved agree to be good sports, to work toward the defined win conditions of their factions, and to participate in the back-and-forth between players. But Zinger is actively choosing to throw the game for town. And for what? A personal vendetta? That's asinine."

Seems you believe that fostering a healthy community is worth splitting hairs when it comes to me. Well, that's what I am doing with CL.

Prove it. I want you to show me and everyone else where I tried to say that because I have a strong intuition in this game that this is a good reason for people to favour my opinions. I'll wait.

No, actually. It's not angry, or OMGUS, or conspiratorial at all. It's merely an observation that you and CL are acting exactly like you both did in Shadow's game in which you were scum together. You are evidently both covering each other's backs with regards to me, both to undermine my position and to support each others. This is a clear collaborative effort between you two, and anyone who spends 5 minutes looking at your posts in this game and the last will see that, whether or not they are "angry", "OMGUSing", or buying into "conspiracies". Of course, if I'm right then you have every reason to try and undermine the connection I've drawn between you and CL, so of course you'd say my statement was baseless. But that assertion won't change the fact that if you indeed are both Town, then how come you're acting like you have zero cause to suspect the other's alignment?

Oh, you remember yesterday when you lied and said I was pushing a case against you, when in fact all I was actually doing was pointing out holes in your case against me? Well, just for clarity, now I'm making a case against you.

I am definitely on Zinger's side here. Do I agree with policy lynching CL? Not necessarily. Do I feel like Sky is misrepresenting Zinger's argument? Definitely.

I think CL has said plenty to upset zinger in-thread. I initially imagined zinger's reaction was solely a matter of CL consistently doubting that he wasn't playing games with his NLP when he wasn't, as i know zinger dislikes being doubted in that way and CL has a particularly callous approach. I missed the part where CL called zinger lucky which adds further fire to that flame.

Even given those two things, I still get the feeling i was missing something. Zinger's reaction to CL seems to me to be the end of an argument rather than the start of one, and i feel like zinger and CL didn't really openly conflict with each other in thread before zinger declared he was fed up. This to me suggests a high possibility that zinger and CL could be conflicting outside the thread, and although thats possible to do without being directly related to this mafia game (they could just be arguing as peers in a discord DMs or something), being on a mafia team together would provide them a natural location to butt heads out of thread.

I also want to have some faith in zinger that he wouldn't completely abandon playing the game for the purposes of expressing his contempt towards CL. If both zinger and CL are scum, then zinger can easily justify his play as being valid because bussing earns him townpants, a play zinger has fancied a few times in the past, as far as I can recall. A town zinger can also feel comfortable with his actions if he thinks CL is scum, but i'm not convinced I see a line of thought wherin zinger legitimately reads CL as scum here, although he's clearly upset and that could cloud his thinking.

I'd probably typically prefer a CL lynch to a zinger lynch just because i have a hard time reading CL.

At this point I'm comfortable lynching any of KoD, CL, or Zinger probably.

How likely do you think it is that scum shot amber primarily for reasons unrelated to the meme?

Regarding CL/Zinger:

Zinger's reaction reads genuine here to me due to past experiences. It is not uncommon for Zinger to take such serious approaches to players he, from his perspective, feels wronged by in some fashion (or dislikes the actions of someone for that matter). I've been the target of such ire several times (though never to the extent that Zinger focused solely on getting rid of me just to be rid of me -- that honor still goes to Ahlyis above all others).

CL's comments/responses towards Zinger certainly ring clearly to the tune of calling Zinger a liar (without using the word). I don't see a point in splitting hairs there. Rather, why bother questioning Zinger at all about the decision he made in the previous game? Not everyone does stuff randomly (like CL may do -- a la shooting me when I was scum in a previous game despite him having not mentioned anything concerning me). Zinger copped CL because Zinger felt CL was scummy (and he was proven right). Simple. Course, this is CL's schtick. As I've said many times, CL is out there in left field. No one could have predicted him.

All that being said, I do feel like Zinger is overreacting to CL here. What CL is doing (his responses to Zinger regarding last game) is similar to someone who lost a game, but claims to have still won. I, personally, find it odd that Zinger is choosing this particular hill to die on; however, the anger definitely seems genuine and right up his ally given CL's comments. I don't particularly believe that CL is necessarily scum here (as opposed to Skystone).


Skystone has crafted his responses in such a way that it, at the very least, is seemingly helping to perpetuate/exacerbate what is going on with CL/Zinger (through Zinger). D1 firmly established Skystone against Zinger, and of the two, I didn't find Skystone's arguments particularly solid towards Zinger. I still don't find Skystone's arguments today especially solid either since it literally does look like Skystone is, at the least, arguing with Zinger while trying to undermine Zinger's points towards CL (and echoing a "policy" lynch towards Zinger no less). When Zinger through the same reasoning back at Skystone (with regard to CL), it really did highlight how hypocritical Skystone is being towards Zinger. That's why I prefer Skystone as scum given the context of the arguments as opposed to CL and his left field shenanigans.

Besides, Skystone is doing a "stellar job" trying to back up Rag's whole lurker argument against me. Quite fitting coming from the guy who proposed lynching me and killing Amber because of the meme.

I don't think zinger is feigning a fight with CL, i'm just reading it as being a fight that is taking place at least partially out of thread.

Of all of the people involved in this, I would prefer to vote Skystone today. I like how he behaved yesterday, I certainly don't like how he's behaving today, and it seems entirely likely that he shot his own meme target just because he figured no one would expect it. Unless I see a very compelling argument to the contrary whiting the hour, that's where my vote is.

Whats your issue with skystone's behaviour today?

For the sake of relative amity, I'm willing to concede that I worded this poorly. "I don't believe you" is one of the medium to weak linguistic propositions that we can make with regard to our doubt of another person's reported experience. In many instances, it doesn't even per se require the assumption of untruth. For instance, we could propose that you had a minor inclination towards CL, it happened to work, and now you've seized on that anecdote as a complete success of intuition. Results-oriented thinking and what not. We can disbelieve that you were drawn to Lunch like a bloodhound, or that your instinct was legitimate (in the sense Lunch is always a little bit scummy in terms of what would constitute scumminess for other players) without disputing your narration.

To the other point, it's kind of immaterial what I think CL is saying. Particular sentences and particular claims can be read in a variety of ways. The content of CL's speech overlaps the kinds of accusations that many of the players in this game make on a regular basis. In fact, you yourself seem happy to throw the word liar when you personally perceive a disjunct between you perceptions and someone else's claims. Why is that same luxury not afforded to our abrasive little friend?



I'm not remotely splitting hairs. CL is participating in the game, if perhaps at the cost of annoying you. You, on the other hand, are proposing to throw the game out because you're mad.

There's a world of difference between those positions.


You used your successes as a cop last game to underscore the validity of your proposed Rag-cult. You also suggested your "bloodhound" nose and the accuracy of your intuitions as a reason why I might be disagreeing with you, thereby implying your own positioning as "town". For instance.


We aren't? I can't speak for CL obviously, but from my perspective he's his being his normal grumpy self. That isn't a tell in either direction. Note that he doesn't have any other votes.

You seem to be operating under the delusion that my criticism of you is an exoneration of CL. This is not the case. Your willingness to throw a game of mafia is not indicative of CL's alignment. My criticism of you is, likewise, not a defense of CL. They are separate phenomena linked by your overreaction.



Yes? You had already indicated that you viewed me as the scummiest actor up to that point. Town-like play entails voting for the people you find scummiest. Ergo, given that you declared me to be a candidate for scum, and given that you were pursuing an argument against me, I chose that phrasing. It's a reasonable enough choice on the assumption that you pursue lynches on people because you find them scummy.

...Right. I see the problem.

That may well be.

For the record, I am ultimately amenable to voting for someone other than Zinger if no-one else wants to join me.


Yesterday, you considered me to be acting "in bad faith" (which is to my mind a strong motivation to vote for a player), and I was also your preferred lynch candidate before Dusky emerged as an option.

That's not really like.

Sky, please understand that honesty is VERY important to Zinger. He has maintained his NLP through years and years of Mafia play, and never once broken it. So accusing him if dishonesty is quite different from accusing anyone else of the same thing (well, except possibly for me, I guess. But that doesn't matter here). It is the difference between accusing a college student of being bad with money and accusing an investment banker of the same thing. The same accusation, very different implications.

Ninja edit: that was the worst typo I've made all game. That's supposed to say "DIDN'T like". Oops.

My impression is just that he seems to be fanning flames and pushing conflict more than doing anything productive for the game. Plus all of the stuff others have already said about him.

Also, where the heck are Naga and Rubik?!

Two people missing from discussion.

I personally feel like fanning conflicts is a productive behaviour. Its through conflict that town ultimately generates reads, after all, though in retrospect you're right that they've done a lot more commenting on other people's behaviours than they have provided their own reads, which doesn't sit quite right with me. I'm not familiar enough with sky's meta to know if this is telling or not, though.

What are the things others have said about him?

I assume rubik is neglecting this game in favour of committing time to work and other social commitments. I know he's been around on discord, at least. No idea about naga.

since the deadline is approaching and skystone seems to support a zinger lynch and nobody a KoD lynch i'm going to formally

Unvote, Vote: Zinger

and by formally i mean formally declare my intent to vote zinger

I'm not sure if we're allowed to switch votes so i'll wait until closer to the deadline to actually cast my vote

and to reiterate for those paying less attention, my scum-read on zinger is based on my feeling like zinger has been bickering with CL outside the thread, which would imply they are mafia together.

That's effectively my basic position. Discourse is essentially always a net gain for town.

I tend to consider my comments on other players' behaviors to be partially synonymous with reading in the sense that behaviors which concern me (inconsistent/weak reasoning, faulty motivations, strange behavior) are the factors that I base my reads on.

To that end, I have committed to a few positions. Aside from the Zinger issues, I do not especially suspect you; I am uncertain about KoD; I am wary of Tevish. I find Aaarrrgh a bit suspicious, but I always find Aaarrrgh suspicious, so that might be a wash. I also dislike lurkers.

Also: votes, once submitted to Jay, are permanent. So maybe hold off.