The Syndicate

Edited my original post to kind of account for the additional posts I made, sorry for the mess lol

And I don't dislike those people, I don't feel dislike towards them

It's just like, a 'fact' of life, human beings are kind of like that sometimes, I guess? Just the way I am, to focus on my own life, just naturally that way

I don't thnk it makes me or anyone else 'bad' or evil or anything, just makes it hard for me to think that people in general are great

Hopefully this makes sense, I keep thinking 'actually I think my point came across like 'this' by accident and making a new post to clarify it lol

And doing something for oneself I don't think is bad as such, like if we didn't look after ourselves we'd be unhappy too

It's just, sometimes I think it's a bit excessive if that makes sense

Like it's a bit too unbalanced, some people have nothing, some have almost everything but they'd rather keep getting more than help those who have nothing, purely for themselves

And to clarify, it's not like I think only people who are completely selfless are good or anything

It's just some people, it feels like a lot, kind of get comfortable and happy but then carry on getting even more, only for themselves

Some people focus on their family/friends and giving them the best life they can have and I think that's fair enough, that's not something I think makes them bad or anything, I think that's wonderful

But some people, like me, seem to just kind of do stuff for themselves when they could be doing stuff for others but choose not to

So yeah

- Do you enjoy tabletop and other board/strategy/card games other than mafia? If so, what are some of your favorites?

I've never played any other board/strategy/card games other than Mafia

- What is your favorite activity and/or location if you want to relax?

Hm, not sure, I don't really do anything to 'relax' but if I'm getting really worked up and panicky about something, lying on my back on my bed usually helps me calm down.

- If you could travel anywhere right now with no concern for time or money, where would it be? Why?

The moon or something lol. Or if it's possible, another planet. Just because I'd love to experience a whole new world, or see Earth from the position of the moon. I think it'd be beautiful and wonderful to experience something like that.

- Favorite book? TV show? Movie? Video game? In addition, do you have any esoteric recommendations for lovers of any of these to check out?

I'm not really a reader but I read a book called World War Z as a kid and I loved that, so I'll say that's my favourite book (but it's nothing like the movie, the only similarity is that the world is ending due to zombies but the zombies aren't even the same type of zombie, and none of the characters in the movie are in the book I don't think? It's very weird, and I found the movie disappointing after reading the book first)

My favourite TV show... hmmmm. If you asked me this two years ago I'd have said The Walking Dead, because I used to be absolutely in love with that show. I haven't yet seen the latest season (actually thinking of starting to watch it again today) but the season before that I found quite underwhelming. Season 4 I think it was, is my favourite. I also love Friends.

My favourite movie is probably Slumdog Millionaire. I haven't seen it in years but it was my favourite when I saw it.

My favourite video game of all time is Fallout: New Vegas. It's been my favourite game ever since I first played it when I was about 13, and ever since I keep going back to it every now and then and I love it so much.

I don't have any recommendations nope. My friend told me that I should play S.T.A.L.K.E.R since I like Fallout NV but I bought it but haven't played it yet so not sure what to say about that, but I guess I'll pass on my friend's words lol

- Jay already asked you about what you learned about yourself in Champs this year, but nonetheless I wanted to reflect in another way on our games together. What were some of your most treasured moments from playing your qualifier (Game 9) and wildcard (WC Game 1) Champs games this year and why? In addition, which player(s) from either game would you most like to play with again and why?

Umm, I'm not sure I have any specific moments that I treasure really, it's just the experiences as a whole that I found amazing. Although in the wildcard games, you being drunk was a highlight lol, because it made me laugh lots.

I'd like to play with everyone again haha. I'd love some kind of reunion games or something. If I had to choose specific people I'd like to play with again that stand out, if we hadn't already played again I'd have said you, but that's already happened lol, but also dich from wildcards. I thought dich was hilarious and loved interacting with him. And I thought you were really fun and nice to play with and kept things really interesting.

- What inspired and/or influenced you to choose Psychology as your focus of study at university?

Well I've always been interested in other people, personalities, motivations, feelings, struggles etc. So I was kind of drawn to Psychology as a way of learning more about how people work. But I actually decided to pursue acting instead at first, since that was my dream, and psychology was kind of a 'backup plan' as something I was also interested in. I enjoyed acting a lot and it was a way for me to take on another human being in my own mind and play them, and that was something I loved always, whether on the playground pretending to be different characters in different stories, or on a stage performing. So I went to drama school for a year, but after that I decided that an acting career wasn't for me, so I researched a bit into Psychology to see if I wanted to go to that instead and learnt a bit about mental illness and stuff, which really interested me and kind of ignited my desire to learn more, and I imagined myself being a clinical psychologist or something and it really excited me.

I've always sort of naturally found myself in situations where I'd help someone by listening to their problems and helping them wrap their mind round stuff, like my Mum when I was a kid, and then later my friends. So it kind of made sense that maybe people talk to me because I'm good, or at least, not *bad*, at stuff like that, and since clinical psychology is interesting, maybe that's the dream job for me. When I told other people about it they also thought it fit me well, and I've always been a kind of natural analyzer of other people, kind of like I have an inborn psychologist's brain or something lol, a curiosity about other people and my own mind. And I found myself getting really excited about the idea of being a clinical psychologist so I went for it. And here I am!

- Re: what dunya asked you earlier about people being good or evil, care to elaborate on why you believe you tend to gravitate towards a pessimistic view of the human race in general? (This is a fascinating discussion for me, and I appreciate that you two landed on different sides here.)

Well, I guess the main reason comes from the fact that I know people are out there suffering really badly somewhere, some people are born into poverty and struggling just to get food or water, some people are dying of deadly diseases that aren't yet cured. And I see all that, and then I also see people not doing anything about it, living their own lives, buying expensive clothes or tickets to concerts or whatever, when really that money could be going to people who need it more, charities, etc. It's like people are capable of choosing to ignore others, because they're far away, and focus on themselves. And I'm not trying to sit on a high horse here, I do this, I buy video games and stuff, knowing full well there are charities or poor people who don't have the quality of life I have. And instead of either giving some money to help, or going out and volunteering to do something, to help in another country, or to help in a shelter or something, I just sit and play video games. Not everyone is like this of course. But a lot seem to be, and I am. So it's like, a sort of selfishness I guess?

And then there's the fact that the media seems to focus on showing us all the bad stuff out there than the good, so I see a lot of bad things happen, caused by other people. Killings, abuse, greed, corruption. And after seeing all that, and seeing the unbalanced nature of the world and how many people don't really seem to care, it's kind of difficult for me to think of everyone as great people.

And I get it, I get why sometimes people focus on themselves and their families and those they care about. I don't think it's completely selfishness that drives it all. I think a lot of it is 'I love these people so I'm focusing on making sure they're having a good time'. I think that's probably the case for a lot of people, rather than "I don't care about others". EDITED IN TO CLARIFY: And in those circumstances, when people focus on themselves and friends/family because they love them and want the best for them, I think that's wonderful and admirable. But not everyone seems to have that motivation. Like for me, I spend my money and time playing video games because it makes me happy. I'd probably find happiness without them but I still choose to favour those things instead of helping others who need my money or time more than I do. [EDIT OVER]

And it seems even when people get to a point where they have so much more than everyone else, they try to keep it that way. I've never heard of someone winning the lottery and then splitting it to different charities after they've made sure they're comfortable or something for example. Maybe it's happened, I don't know. And even if it hasn't, it could be that they're just focused on their loved ones having the best quality of life they can, which again I completely understand and admire. But I don't think that's the case for everyone, it's not the case for me anyway, I just like video games so I spend my money and time on it, rather than helping someone who needs help. It's just purely about me. And I don't think I'm alone in that, maybe I am but I don't think I am.

I do believe there are good people in the world, I know some people who I have nothing but absolute love for, and nobody's perfect and we all may have a biased perception of things, not think about other perspectives sometimes etc. But still by looking at the world, and the inequality of it all, and then seeing all these terrible things happen in the media and stuff, it's kind of hard for me to say 'human beings are awesome', you know?

And then just day to day I tend to kind of be biased in imagining the worst of strangers. I'm always suspicious of strangers, suspicious of their motives or what they could do. Not that I'm convinced all strangers are harmful or anything, but the suspicion is always there. So there's that too.

Hopefully that made sense and didn't sound like I was lecturing people or anything, I'm not saying 'people are selfish and I don't like us' or anything, I get it, I have a focus on my own life and stuff around me because that's what's in my field of view, that's what my attention is on, and it's easy to forget about others far away, easy to purposefully forget too so that I can do what will make me happy. I just don't think it makes me a 'good person'. Sure I make sure to do some good, I donate to charities sometimes, I try to be kind and understanding and give people the benefit of the doubt as much as I can. But I don't think that makes me 'good' overall, and I don't think I'm alone in being that way, from what I've seen. So yeah.

I don't want to judge other people when I don't know them and I'm not inside their heads, so this opinion isn't like, set in stone, I'm willing to be proven wrong, and I don't have this like solid opinion that 'people are this way', because I don't know that. It's just, the stuff I see makes me lean towards those conclusions so far. So that's kind of my stance on it.

EDIT: And it's not that I think I/others have to be completely selfless to be a good person or a good human race or anything either, I think we all need to look after ourselves as well. It's just, it feels a bit excessive sometimes, when I see what some people have, the sheer amount of money or quality of life, yet still choose to spend time/money on themselves to further enhance their lives, purely for personal gain, rather than helping others, like myself, I do that. And that's the point I'm trying to make I think.

EDIT AGAIN (and again): And I don't dislike those people or myself for doing that, I don't feel dislike towards them/it

It's just like, a 'fact' of life, human beings are kind of like that sometimes, I guess? Just the way I am, to focus on my own life, just naturally that way. Maybe I'm a bad person for not disliking myself for it, or not disliking others for it, or seeing it as 'just the way it is' rather than fixing it for myself, I don't know.

I don't think being that way makes me or anyone else 'bad' or evil or anything, just makes it hard for me to think that people in general, like our human race, are great and wonderful and stuff

Hopefully this makes sense, I keep thinking 'actually I think my point came across like 'this' by accident and making a new post to clarify it lol

JaggedJimmyJay wrote: ↑Wed Aug 29, 2018 2:47 pm @Infected_alien8_, were there seven other infected aliens before you?

No lol, 8 was always my 'lucky number' as a kid. I always used to get clutch 8's in board games and stuff, and I also got my dog (who I love so much) on my 8th Birthday. So 8 has always been my favourite number!

[mention]Tsaiah[/mention] *

@tsaiah if you had to give someone one piece of advice for life, what would it be?

JaggedJimmyJay wrote: ↑Tue Aug 28, 2018 9:50 pm @Infected_alien8_, what is one thing you learned from your experience playing in the Mafia Universe tournament?

@Tsaiah, are there any players who you feel have most influenced your approach to Mafia (from any site)?

Each of you: what was the first Internet forum you regularly visited?

what is one thing you learned from your experience playing in the Mafia Universe tournament?

I learnt a *lot*, but one thing would be to keep my attention on things that are actually alignment-indicative. In my first game, there was a player called SR, and I found myself mindmelding with him a l o t, like the things he'd say were things I wanted to say too, and because of that, I was able to view my own thoughts laid out to the thread but coming from someone else, which proved to be a really useful experience. I learnt that, as he admitted, a lot of the thoughts I had that I pursued - ones I had withheld from saying in that particular game because he was already saying it all, but on my homesite they were things I'd flood the thread with - were actually more about picking at people's logic than actually determining their alignment. I realized I spent a great deal of time playing Mafia pointing out logical flaws or loopholes in others' arguments and acting as though logical flaws meant they were Mafia, when really a lot of it was just not indicative of alignment because we all sometimes make errors in logic regardless of alignment (myself included obviously). And it was only through seeing SR pursue things like that, that I questioned 'okay but, is this actually relevant to their alignment?', and a few others questioned it to, and he basically said that a lot of the time he didn't really think that far ahead about that, just saw logical error and wanted to dig into it, which is exactly how I was too, and it was like 'woah... that's what I DO!'. So I learnt that some things aren't alignment-indicative and some are, and even though keeping everything logical is useful in Mafia, spending all my energy and flooding the thread with pushing at someone for a logical flaw isn't the best use of my time. I should have learnt that already since I've mislynched someone for logical flaws before, but it took seeing someone else do it to make me realize what I had to change. It was pretty amazing.

I mean who knows maybe I completely misinterpreted what SR was saying and we weren't actually on the same page about that and it was just me but I still learnt a lot from him lol

what was the first Internet forum you regularly visited?

My homesite, though it went by a different name back then, but it's been my #1 forum ever since I was 12 or so, and up until like two years ago was the only one I'd ever used.

Infected_alien8_ wrote: ↑Tue Aug 28, 2018 12:11 am what's your favorite food? we're all big foodies around here.

Pasta probably. Like, spaghetti bolognese or something.

do you think people are inherently good or evil?

I don't know. I don't want to give an answer for that because I don't have one so whatever I write would be something I've only come up with right now and would probably be something I'd find a flaw in later. I also don't have a personal definition of 'good' or 'evil'.

I will say that I think I tend to gravitate towards a pessimistic view of the human race in general, but I wouldn't go so far as to say I think people are inherently evil. There are some people I see as absolutely good through and through and have nothing but love for them.

But I don't know whether I think people are ever 'inherently' good/evil, and if people are, in general, one or the other, I don't know which I'd ultimately decide on. I think a lot of people are capable of doing good things for others for example, kindness and thoughtfulness, and I think those same people are often capable of doing bad things for others and having selfish acts as well. I don't know if that means those selfish acts are 'evil' though. I've met some people who lean far one way over the other (far more giving than selfish, and vice versa). I'm not really sure where that leaves me.

So yeah, my answer is still 'I don't know' lol

I definitely want to hear the long version of this story!

Okay, here it is:

Spoiler: show

Well basically, we were in a game where everyone was given a role that included the name of somebody else playing and also a role name. I was a role called 'Town Innkeeper', and I was given the name Ltin, and I could make an Inn (a night chat) with 3 people each night and give that inn a name of my choosing. I asked the host if I could put myself in the inn and he said no. I asked if I could put 'Ltin' in the inn and if that would actually add me in the inn instead of ltin (I had a theory that night actions switched onto whatever name you were given), and he said I could try and find out.

So I created an inn called '[Night 1] Lie Detector Chat - Lies Here Will Be Sent To The Town Interrogator' or something. And I added ltin, and two other people. And it worked and I was there myself, though it turned out to be an error on the drunken host's part and I was never meant to be there lol.

So I played along as a confused person and told them I thought the inn was something like, if we told a lie, another role called 'Town Interrogator' would be informed of it, so we all had to tell the truth here. And I said I was Town and asked the others to say the same thing. The first of the other two actually admitted they were a third party role and claimed to us. And the other person actually admitted they were Mafia and that they would work with the third party and would kill me that night so that I didn't out them during the day.

I then claimed that I was also Mafia but that I was a secret member and I didn't know who the others were but I had the same win condition. We had a conversation about it, I asked how he planned to kill me without knowing my name (ltin) if targets were swapped like my theory predicted, and he told me that the Mafia had a role which could bypass that mechanic and also told us the Mafia had a messenger role which would contact the third party for them to work together.

Eventually he seemed convinced that I was Mafia, and said he'd asked the others if they could switch targets. He also said he'd contact me during the game with information and to warn me if I was barking up the wrong tree, like lynching one of the Mafia. They said they planned on killing this one person who happened to be my friend and always made Mafia 100x more exciting, so I tried my best to persuade them to kill someone else, but they ignored me completely.

The next morning I was alive, and so was he, but the person with my rolename 'Infected_alien8_' had been killed.

I considered just outing him then and there and revealing the truth of what happened, but I decided that it would be better if I tried to get some more out of him first. I decided to try to push on everyone in the game during the day, and wait to see if he'd ever signal me to stop pushing on them, and reveal any of his teammates.

Before I could do that though, they were outed as Mafia by our cop. So I decided to defend them, temporarily, to gain their trust and possibly get more information out of them. I told everyone the story of the lie detector chat, but told them all that that person had claimed Town and so I was sure of their innocence, and eventually he claimed to be the 'Town Interrogator' that got told when one of us lied, and he said he'd claimed to us already that night, and I agreed and got everyone to back off of him. He said we came back as Town. But then the roleblocker claimed to block someone, who then turned out to be HIS name, meaning he'd been blocked. So there was an argument about that as well and whether to trust the roleblocker, and whether maybe the inn was fake and created by Mafia to trick us into thinking he'd told the truth about being Town.

After that, while all that was going on, I put my plan into motion and started pushing on players I had been suspicious of day 0 and threw in some hints to him that I was waiting for signals. And when I was pushing on my first suspect, the next day, suddenly I received a 'disagree' rating on that post, from the guy. The post was only saying how I thought that person was Mafia. They never made another post defending them or anything, it was just that disagree rating that they dropped there some time after I'd said it and after the thread had moved on a bit.

I decided to switch onto my second suspect, and the exact same thing happened. They disagreed with a post I made when I suspected them - the only other thing I said in the post was an argument that they then quoted and agreed with, so the disagree rating must have been meant for me suspecting them. But again they said nothing about it in the thread, so it wasn't like they were defending them for some pocket tactic or anything, they were just disagreeing with my post to let me know.

I did it with my third suspect but got nothing. Did it with my forth however and the exact same happened again, they disagreed with my post saying I wanted to lynch them.

I was actually expecting them to use their messenger role to signal me instead of forum ratings but when I looked back at the chat I noticed they'd suggested their message only works during the night, so it made sense they'd use forum ratings as a signal instead.

Anyway, after a while of pushing on several others to see if anything stuck, I decided to stop the charade and announce what had really happened. I asked everyone in the thread if anyone had any objections to me revealing a list of who the Mafia are again, if I was in fact correct about it (this was the second time I'd done this and I was worried about ruining the game for people by making it too easy). Everyone said they were okay with it.

I told the whole story, pointed to the posts they'd disagreed with, and made my list of Mafia. I also pointed at the person who I'd tried to persuade him to kill the last night but I was ignored, and suggested maybe he was Mafia too and that would explain the resistance to kill him, but that I'd pushed on them too during the day and got no signal so he was just sort of a 'keep an eye on him too' on my list. So I had a list of 4 Mafia and then him. I also told them about the information he'd already given me, about the mafia messenger role and the role that could supposedly bypass the name-switch mechanic.

Most people believed my story but my friend spent a while argueing that I was lying, and then decided I was telling the truth but had been tricked and that the signals were false decoy ones to get us to mislynch. They reasoned that 1) the person surely wouldn't be silly enough to fall for my plan, and 2) the person to die that night was called 'Infected_alien8', and the kill itself was strange because they were a lurker and so not much of a threat to anyone, and they theorized that the person who I was tricking was actually the bypass name mechanic role themself, targeted me because they didn't really believe my story, were blocked and so the name switch took place and killed them. And since they didn't believe that I was actually Mafia with them, they had no reason to give me genuine signals to share their team to me. It was a good theory and made me doubt myself a bit. But I couldn't understand why he'd lie to me in the nightchat instead of just telling me he didn't believe me, and my intuition told me his signals were accurate, and I reasoned that I'd just defended him from a cop claim and so surely that would be enough to convince him that I was in fact Mafia, even if he hadn't been convinced the night before. And I also pointed out that the people who had been signalled were all people I was already suspicious of day 0 (and my reads are generally accurate on my homesite), which gave me all the more reason to believe it - although someone suggested that the reason it was those people who he signalled was because I'd be easily convinced to lead mislynches onto them.

But anyway, we lynched the guy, he turned out he was in fact the one who could bypass the mechanic, so my friend's theory seemed true to that point. The next day, though, my friend was dead, and when we asked one of the people on my list to claim, he claimed to be a messenger role, and I pointed out how the Mafia apparently had a messenger role, and this would fit perfectly. With my friend dead and little resistance to it, we lynched him, and he was in fact Mafia, meaning that signal had been true.

The next day we did the same thing, got them to claim, they did, it wasn't convincing, we lynched them, they were Mafia.

Same again the next day.

And then the next day... turns out there was a second Mafia team with an arsonist type role who had planted bombs on all of us and we all blew up and lost anyway lol. So all of that didn't even secure us the win. But it was a lot of fun.

And that was the second time I convinced a Mafia to tell me their team. The first time was when I was a third party messenger role with a gun and tricked one of them into telling me the others, tricked all the PR roles to reveal themselves to me using another role in the game's ability to target roles + post public announcements, and sussed out and blackmailed the serial killer and oh that was a g r e a t game, but that's a whole other story.

Also about the 'good vs evil' thing, I don't think I'm 'inherently good' or anything and when I say that I tend to lean towards viewing the human race in general in a pessimistic way, that includes myself, just in case anyone thought I was sitting on a high horse saying I thought I was better than anyone else lol, that's not the case!

what's your favorite food? we're all big foodies around here.

Pasta probably. Like, spaghetti bolognese or something.

do you think people are inherently good or evil?

I don't know. I don't want to give an answer for that because I don't have one so whatever I write would be something I've only come up with right now and would probably be something I'd find a flaw in later. I also don't have a personal definition of 'good' or 'evil'.

I will say that I think I tend to gravitate towards a pessimistic view of the human race in general, but I wouldn't go so far as to say I think people are inherently evil. There are some people I see as absolutely good through and through and have nothing but love for them.

But I don't know whether I think people are ever 'inherently' good/evil, and if people are, in general, one or the other, I don't know which I'd ultimately decide on. I think a lot of people are capable of doing good things for others for example, kindness and thoughtfulness, and I think those same people are often capable of doing bad things for others and having selfish acts as well. I don't know if that means those selfish acts are 'evil' though. I've met some people who lean far one way over the other (far more giving than selfish, and vice versa). I'm not really sure where that leaves me.

So yeah, my answer is still 'I don't know' lol

I definitely want to hear the long version of this story!

Okay, here it is:

do you know any good jokes i can impress my friends with?

Afraid not lol

Woops that was meant to be a emoji lol

Pancakes or waffles?

I've never had waffles, so pancakes I guess!

Do you prefer vanilla mafia or wacky madness mafia?

Wacky madness mafia!

What was your most memorable mafia moment/game?

Probably when I tricked a member of the Mafia into revealing all of their teammates to me and exposed them all, for the second time

Hello! Sorry in advance for my empty answers, I'm not very interesting lol

where are you from?

I'm from the UK

how often do you use facebook?

I used it to access a group chat for a project I was in at school

do you read the newspaper?

Nope

can you speak any other languages?

Nope

what's one physical feature you wish you could change about yourself?

No idea, 'grass greener on the other side' phenomenon and all that, I'd probably regret any change I made for some reason even though I have no idea what regrets those would be

what do you do for a living/study?

I study Psychology at University