The Syndicate

thellama73 wrote:A couple of people have now said that they think, between MP and Dom, Dom is the likely baddie if there is one. I disagree with that. Dom is being aggressive and unreasonable with MP, but that to me does not say baddie. I think Dom tends to be a more emotional player, and I think we are seeing this in his conflict with MP.

On the other hand, MP's sudden suspicion of Black Rock feels fishy to me, like he's in need of a distraction. I agree with SVS that BR's post was not weird or out of character.

Now we have two players (Long Con and BWT) misrepresenting Dom's vote. Of course, we know BWT is civvie, so he is surely just going off what LC said, but I am starting to get the sinking feeling that a subtle conspiracy is building against Dom. If I had to vote either Dom or MP, it would certainly be MP at this point.

Does anyone else feel like this Day 1 has lasted forever?

I'm not part of a subtle conspiracy against Dom. I wouldn't post something so easily disproven unless it were a mistake.

Sorry for the misread, it was indeed Rico and not Dom that did it:

Made
1
Ricochet (17) 6%
Dom
1
MovingPictures07 (10) 6%

These polls transferred to pure text mess me up sometimes, sorry for the slander, Dom!

Ok, so Spacedaisy voted for Lizzy after BWT had 4 votes. Dom voted for Rico after BWT had 5 votes, and A Person voted for himself as the final vote.

Baddies would know that BWT isn't on their team (duh) and that the odds are he's a Civvie. This: timmer (12), thellama73 (13), Turnip Head (14) is where BWT went from a single Day One vote to the 'person who's getting lynched'. So, before that time, it was up in the air, so a baddie might have been holding their vote in case of a need for a subtle rescue of one of their own. After, there was no more risk, so they could vote for who they like.

So Spacedaisy, Dom, and A Person have my eye coming from that angle.

Hi everyone... I got off work over two hours ago, and now I have finally caught up on the thread.

Thanks FZ. for posting those links to Vompatti's past games, I'm glad that they have been analyzed by some, but I haven't gotten to them yet myself. It's getting late here so I won't be delving into that tonight. Tomorrow is my mom's birthday, and while my brother already took her to see Seinfeld live, I still have gotten NOTHING for her. So tomorrow morning is likely to prioritize that, before I go into work for 11:00. I'll be there for a few hours, after which I come home, and soon after, leave for my mom's. Birthday dinner, good times, etc.

What this means is that I'll have to vote early, and I just know some people I am not likely to vote for at this point, so I guess I'll share that list at least. Not ready to vote for Llama, at least until I look into the Vompatti thing, which I intend to do once I have a little more time. So that's on hold. Won't vote Vompatti either, just because Llama says so. Like I said, I like to see proof that the accusation is accurate when we're talking about past games. Now the evidence is there, just need to look into it.

Dom-MP has obviously been a thing. I agree with MP that Dom is the one that made it into a "thing", and that MP was asking a simple question that Dom reacted to with a lot of... reaction. So, if this turned into a lynch with only MP and Dom on it, I'd vote Dom.

What else is going on... BR is suspicious of TH, I'd have to look over that again. I think that a baddie BR is more likely to lay low than to come out with a hot accusation like that so early. So I'll look again at TH to see if she's on to something.

FZ. is still prickly to me, I've seen baddies in a recent game come after someone early on for a Day One thing like they have a good reason, but it turned out to be a baddie just trying to get someone not on their team lynched. It could be personal to me, since it was me she came after, but I can't help but feel that could be what's happening here. That said, I have a small reason to think that FZ. could be on the level, but I'm not sure how to address it yet.

I'll probably end up voting BWT. Kidding!

I'll have a look again at the BWT voters. It's a little hypocritical of me, since I would have voted for him as well, for the same reasons I am considering an FZ. vote. Baddies like bandwagons, but if a bandwagon is already happening, smarter baddies avoid it altogether and let the voters get themselves in hot water. Maybe that's where I'll look... people who avoided the BWT bandwagon.

FZ. wrote:

Metalmarsh89 wrote:

FZ. wrote:

Ricochet wrote:

thellama73 wrote:

FZ. wrote:

thellama73 wrote:Also, SVS also said she doesn't like to vote for players who can't defend themselves and she was the first vote for BWT. Why not pick on her for a while?

Are you asking him to pick on SVS because you think she's bad? Do you think he's bad for selectively going after you and not her? Because you told him "You seem to think you have caught me in some kind of "gotcha" moment", which would mean you think he's genuine. If you don't think either is looking bad, why do you want him to go after her?

I don't want him to go after her. I was pointing out the hypocrisy in only calling me out on something other people did too. I don't think SVS is bad and I am still unsure about Rico.

Four other people voted for BWT because they saw it fit and did not invoke doing so despite hating to vote for someone who won't be able to defend himself (anymore). No hypocrisy there, I believe.

I don't know if llama is bad, but this seems like a weird reason to go after him. Why would he say that if he meant that in the case of BWT and then go and vote for him? So either, he meant it in regards to other people, like he claims, or he's a really silly baddie doing something like this

I'm willing to bet the former of the two. I think llama's post about lynching undefendable players and his vote for BWT are unrelated.

But I would like llama (and you) to explain why you want to lynch vomps today.

I haven't played a lot of games with Vompatti, but I think about 4-5. In one of them he was bad, and his behaviour was different than his other games. This one reminds me of it for a few reasons:
1. He joked about suspecting himself, which is what he did in that game?
2. He posts more serious game related posts
3. He's more involved.
Now, others can tell me they've seen him do 2 and 3 no matter what alignment, but if I keep letting people tell me this every time I have a suspicion, I don't see much point in playing the game

Can you list the games for us? Maybe someone else can do a read of them and analyze Vompatti's behaviour to see if they agree.

timmer wrote:

Made wrote:

Long Con wrote:

Made wrote:Yo, just a quick thought i want to get out while i'm thinking about it. Does talking about a player play style/tendencies this early in the game kinda taint possible future "AHH GOTCHA" moments later in the game?

I don't understand, explain more.

Like Hawthorne effect kinda.

So let's say it's agreed that I'm a very outspoken player, unafraid to offend. If I'm meek and submissive, then that's a ping against how I normally play. If the game starts and everyone's like "Yeah man, Made, he's such a feisty one" Baddie Made would attempt to play to his feisty tendencies more than he might otherwise. Through this we'd lose an opportunity to spot a baddie Made.

This is an interesting question. People who can "read" a player's baddie or civvies game can be one of the more dangerous mafia factors out there. And you are right, it's possible that if someone comments early on that someone is quieter than normal and they are quiet when they are bad or whatever, it can indeed cause the player to shift play style and cover their tracks. But just as some players are good at reading the play style, they are also often good at catching the reversal, knowwadimean?

What pings me more, for a Day 1, is when people bring that kind of thing up way early. I was very curious to see what would shake down from Vomps getting called out on Day 1, and part of my reread is to go and write down which people had glommed onto that. Calling Vomps out that early seemed odd to me, BUT I also know there are a few people who like to shake the tree on Day 1, so I considered it more of a potential gambit than a baddie move. More interesting to see who followed.

I thought it was more of a gambit on Llama's part, given that he did some analysis on the responses to it. Of course, the best baddie way to do something like that is to do something with serious intent, but to leave a back door of "it was a gambit". And now Llama is after Vompatti for realsies, it seems, so not sure where I fall on that one. I still don't know why he's so focused or sure about Vomps.

I can see the advantage of, instead of immediately analyzing a player's style at the outset, just taking notes and making it a case later. Then you don't affect the analysis be exposing that it's happening. That sounds like some advanced Mafia playing, requiring a reliable idea of how a player acts normally in previous games. A player would have to act the same way over several games in order for an analysis of their past behaviour to be viable.

Thanks for clarifying, Made, I think I got your point now!

Made wrote:Yo, just a quick thought i want to get out while i'm thinking about it. Does talking about a player play style/tendencies this early in the game kinda taint possible future "AHH GOTCHA" moments later in the game?

I don't understand, explain more.

thellama73 wrote:

Made wrote:

thellama73 wrote:Don't bother reading Ulysses. I did it last year and it was deffo not worth it.

linki Made: Lol

It's sitting on my desk right now I'm gonna at least give it a shot, and if it's really dumb, i'm just gonna throw it across the room mid sentence,

That won't be hard, since half the sentences in there are fifty pages long. To me it's one of the most blatant cases of the emperor not having any clothes.

*leans forward with interest* There's naked people?

FZ. wrote:

Long Con wrote:Sorry for missing the original vote, Black Rock and I were putting together a bunk bed and it took a long time, and I guess I'm used to the later deadline from the Champions game. I promise it won't become a problem.

I would have either voted for BWT with the crowd, or voted for FZ. Pretty much because they were, deliberately or not, reading me in a negative light where no such light was necessary. For the cross-game record, when I do a role analysis, I try to find ways to help the Civvies. I do it as a Civvie, a baddie, or an Indy. It just makes sense... as a Civvie, I want to help the Civvies. As a baddie, I want to seem like I'm helping the Civvies. The analysis part probably looks the same either way. I don't do it for cred, I do it because I enjoy doing it, and it can be helpful and fun to try and maximize the Civvie roles' power from the get-go.

How exactly did you maximize the civvie's powers with that analysis, I fail to see. If you're a civ, I apologize for going after you, but what exactly did you say in that post that none of us could read on their own?

I guess it just depends on how your creative brain works. I think I'm done talking about this.

Sorry for missing the original vote, Black Rock and I were putting together a bunk bed and it took a long time, and I guess I'm used to the later deadline from the Champions game. I promise it won't become a problem.

I would have either voted for BWT with the crowd, or voted for FZ. Pretty much because they were, deliberately or not, reading me in a negative light where no such light was necessary. For the cross-game record, when I do a role analysis, I try to find ways to help the Civvies. I do it as a Civvie, a baddie, or an Indy. It just makes sense... as a Civvie, I want to help the Civvies. As a baddie, I want to seem like I'm helping the Civvies. The analysis part probably looks the same either way. I don't do it for cred, I do it because I enjoy doing it, and it can be helpful and fun to try and maximize the Civvie roles' power from the get-go.

FZ. wrote:Lastly, was I the only one pinged by LC's analysis of the roles post? Sounded to me like a baddie who thinks the civvies have the upper hand in terms of roles and can't come out and say that he's pissed, so he puts it out there in the form of the many ways the civvies can have BTSC and get stronger. It's something I've seen baddies do too many times. To me, that's a baddie indication...

I don't know why you would decide to interpret my analysis as being pissed off. I wasn't pissed off, and I reread it, and it doesn't read as pissed off. I'll be back in a bit to decide how to vote.

Can't say I'm upset about the votes for BWT, for obvious reasons. :P

birdwithteeth11 wrote:Okay. I can see where FZ is coming from with LC. It comes off to me as being a bit "overly helpful" for sure. But the part that really stuck out to me was:

Long Con wrote:

Stanley Kubrick Realist, perfectionist director and genre hopper. He can once reshoot a day period.

This will annoy us at some point by delaying the progress, but at least it's a Civvie that we won't lynch.

To me, I don't understand how this is "delaying the progress" of the game if we lynch a civvie and Kubrick uses his power. It lets us restart the day over again, we're not down a civ, and we have plenty of new information to make a new decision on.

I'll wait to hear what LC has to say on the matter himself. But I am now very interested in his response.

Delaying the progress of the game... meaning we wait 48 hours for a lynch post, and instead of a lynch post, we get a Civvie outed and saved, and another 48 hours before we get to see a lynch result. It's good for the Civs, and it's annoying to me as a player. In an impatient way. I hope my response has interested you further.

I often post a role analysis near the start of a game. If you want to call it 'overly helpful' then that's your opinion. I think it opens people up to thinking about the roles creatively, and to keeping some things in mind in their general gameplay.

MovingPictures07 wrote:Frankly, I don't understand how LC wants the claim for Vomps's baddieness = activeness to be definitively proven, especially since there seems to be some dissent, unless he's asking for Llama to provide substantiation for his theory.

I offered one counterexample (Twin Peaks) and Vomps offered another (Occultism), both of which are valid examples. I'd still say I generally agree with Llama, though, since I was on a baddie team with Vomps twice (a game on RM... can't remember which, and the other one was McGyver IIRC), and he did seem a bit more post pushy. It's a weak observation though, especially since the reasons that one would post more or less are much more complicated than alignment-driven.

Offering ANY examples is a good start for substantiating a claim that someone's gameplay is different from the norm. I just like to see things backed up before I just accept that they're true. And saying so is not any sort of attack on Llama - his claim could be 100% true and his intentions 100% Civ for all I know. I'm saying I'll generally disregard an opinion based on a player's past games unless I specifically recall them, or the proof is laid out a little bit.

Well, since I'm on late at night, and not many people are around, I'll go through the roles and make some comments about them. That's always fun.

George Cukor wrote:American Director of Classic Comedies. Can target a player to reference a romantic comedy in each post they make.

Hilarious. Total window-dressing role, it doesn't affect the game too much. Perhaps we could increase this role's value to the Civs by having George target people he suspects.

Jean Luc Godard New Wave Director: Can send one message every day period to protege Truffaut.

François Truffaut New Wave Director: Can send one message every night period to mentor Godard.

Cool, limited BTSC. Between these guys and Tarantino and Rodriguez, we should have four Civs that are slightly more safe from lynching than the rest. These four are very valuable Civs.

Darren Aronofsky Another auteur who can find BTSC with David Lean using math, a common theme in his films.

Interesting. This role could probably benefit from some creative ways to use math, another BTSC Civ pair would be very useful.

Stanley Kubrick Realist, perfectionist director and genre hopper. He can once reshoot a day period.

This will annoy us at some point by delaying the progress, but at least it's a Civvie that we won't lynch.

Cecil B Demille Known for his flamboyant showmanship, he also successfully made the transition from silent to sound. Each night he searches for Howard Hawks. If he finds him, they gain BTSC.

Another opportunity to strengthen the Civs. It would be nice to be able to devise a way to help him find Howard, but I don't know any way that wouldn't simultaneously put Howard in grave danger.

[Orson Welles Excess and the demise of Don Quixote left the former prodigy weak. However, in his early days, he is stronger. For the first 5 votes, his vote will count as 2. And 0 thereafter.

Unfortunate, because it's in the mid to late game that the extra votes really start to make more of a difference.

Ingmar Bergman Evocative Swedish film director who often had religion as a theme in his films. May grant amnesty to a player 3x, which will result in his/her removal from the lynch that day.

Is this something that gets used the night before? Or can Ingmar remove someone from the poll mid-day?

Mafia - The Brotherhood (BTSC). Odd Night Kill.

Coen Bros. Jewish brothers who often use the same actors in their films. Can call upon the Golem to protect a player.

Duplass Bros. Mumblecore creators. Inspired by Cassavetes, their super-realism shows the nuances of every day life.

Wachowskis. Siblings known for their multi-part storytelling.

These baddie teams are somewhat weak, unless there are secrets, it looks like Duplass and Wachowski are pretty vanilla. And these guys seem to have the only protector role in the game, will they protect only themselves, or try to protect someone else to push suspicion on them? Probably the latter in earlier game, and the latter, later.

Mafia - The Hacks (BTSC). Even Night Kill.

Michael Bay Known for explosions over plot, this director, can distract civs and turn their minds off (role block).

Uwe Boll Known for video game adaptations, he can twice lock the thread when his work gets criticized.

Roland Emmerich Natural disaster movie guru, his over the top films do not garner much critical acclaim.

A roleblock and a thread-locker. Thread locking seems really annoying. What does it mean, no one can post until the Day or Night is over? I think it would take some skill to do this at the right time to gain a baddie advantage.

Looks like it's going to be, as advertised, mostly a down-to-earth straight-up Mafia game with few surprise angles from the roles... but the number of events may shake that up. Prizes and results of events could be the real bread and butter of this game, with the team that wins gaining a real advantage.

I'd like to see some confirmation that that is indeed Vompatti's "usual playstyle", I don't trust what people say because I think it's easy to CLAIM a "usual" for someone, whose games might actually show a broader variation that fails to conform to the claims.

The more "well-known" someone's playstyle becomes, the easier it is to manipulate people based on that playstyle. This becomes especially alarming when a person starts talking about their OWN usual playstyle, because it demonstrates an awareness of their playstyle. When one is aware of one's own playstyle and how people see it, they can choose to make specific changes in order to deceive.

thellama73 wrote:Serious question: Who wants to discuss lynch possibilities now, and who wants to wait until several hours before the vote ends?

What could we lynch someone based on? We could see who is named MetalMarsh to find someone who matches up to that famous criminal profile.

timmer wrote:

thellama73 wrote:I like the use of color in Chris Nolan's Memento. Very blue palette for the bulk of the film, and more yellow for the flashbacks. It gives it a nice consistent feel that is almost subconscious to the viewer.

I like using colour palettes as well, but man it has GOT to be subtle, or at least not garish and distracting. Peter Jackson did some wonderful work with colour tinting in the LOTR trilogy, for instance. It was noticeable, but added such an otherworldly feel to everything. I wasn't a fan of Soderbergh's blue/red/yellow work in Traffic, though. It was just so THERE, I found myself distracted. Maybe it's my own problem, but such things are important.

It was pretty in-your-face in The Matrix, what did you think of that?

What's not to enjoy about Braveheart?

Dom wrote:*is definitely a film pleb*

Then there needs to be a lower status.

I have never seen Casablanca. I don't like old movies, I like modern ones. I saw Citizen Kane at some point, and I don't really remember a single frame of it, I just know it bored me. I saw Gone With The Wind recently, and I enjoyed Rhett Butler's character, disliked the main chick, and just didn't feel immersed or invested in the storyline all that much.

In a game such as this, where it seems that so many of you have such a deep respect and admiration for these artsy directors whose movies I will never see, and whose names I will never remember.

My top movie of all time is The Matrix, I think that is the most perfect movie I have seen. Second and third are Braveheart and Aliens.

I voted for James Cameron, because Aliens is one of my top three movies of all time. Terminator 2 and Aliens are some of the only sequels I know that were completely better than the first movie, that's extremely rare from what I've seen. The Abyss was awesome too! I'm not the biggest fan of Avatar, but it had a lot of cool stuff going on. And Titanic, while not my usual genre, was very engaging and awesome too.

I've always thought Mel Brooks movies were full of crappy shallow jokes. I've never understood why he's so popular - I think maybe if I were Jewish I'd like him more? I don't know.

Game on! I am playing, but sorry that I won't appreciate the full artistic breadth that I'm sure this game will entail.