Mafia Game 78 - Tales of the Malazan Book of the Fallen

[House Targaryen]

It is day 2.

15 players remain: Anomander Rake, Apsalar, Fanderay, Fiddler, Gruntle, Icarium, Karsa Orlong, Onos Toolan, Quick Ben, Sandalath Drukorlat, Silchas Ruin, Tehol Beddict, Togg, Trull Sengar, Yedan Derryg.

8 votes are needed for a conviction or to go to night.

2 votes for Anomander Rake (Gruntle, Icarium)

1 vote for Yedan Derryg (Anomander Rake)

12 players have not voted: Apsalar, Fanderay, Fiddler, Karsa Orlong, Onos Toolan, Quick Ben, Sandalath Drukorlat, Silchas Ruin, Tehol Beddict, Togg, Trull Sengar, Yedan Derryg.

[House Dalt]

W/r/t aspalar? Lack of coaching seems self evident, I know you said you disagree with scum being coached earlier but I *always* feed my buddies stuff to say if I'm FM, and I think most people do, it would depend on who the FM are, and I suppose the fact Daseem as a buddy lessens her townieness slightly as Daseem was also not around. I think we might not see Aspalar again anyway so it could be a moot point.

Ugh, I'd usually say 'Early Vanilla is town' but this site meta is completely different. No rush on the day anyway, I want more people to post.

With 2 posts, it doesn't matter if the FM fed her things to say or not. She's not around. So this doesn't really fit. Either way, the FM would be smart not to feed her stuff to say as she'd look more clueless.

I just finished a reread of Anomander. Things that stick out include:

1. He went after Silchas for qualifying statements. I tend to agree with him. However, it's also an easy argument as FM to make that will normally be ignored. Mexal made it last game on Kat and she was never lynched. He then more or less dropped Silchas for the rest of the day minus a few quick statements that he'd prefer Silchas over Dassem.

2. He never switched to Dassem. He could have, the Silchas wagon was more or less dead and he was around. He chose not to.

3. His day 1 was tame. He criticizes Silchas for taking the sting out of everything they say but nothing he said was controversal. He only went after Silchas then more or less stopped pushing it. After that, he spent a lot of time making posts like these.

This bothered me when I read it and I just realised why. QB is making some fairly big reaches here. I mean characterising Apsalar as 'consistently fluffy', while accurate, is a bit of a misleading way to describe someone who made 2 posts at a time where being fluffy is entirely acceptable and hasn't posted since. In addition QB appears to be ignoring the fact that things are much more obvious with a personal involvement when he says Santagars Sandalath's joke vote looked HORRIBLE but struggled to believe that a serious reaction to an obvious joke wouldn't sound bad from the other point of view. I guess it seems a little contrived to me.

I'm heading off in a little bit. I'll be back before the day is out.

ETA: Also, that's three in a row. I should let someone else get a word in.

Note he's defending Apsalar and Sandalath while recognizing in both instances that the reasons that people are suspicious of them are valid.

Nobody has absolutes that early, but that's absolutely not the point. Nobody expects serious cases that early either, but again that's not the point. The point is that your language defines the reaction you get from the target and the rest of the group. You will never even get close achieving anything with "This guy might be guilty, but probably isn't, it could go either way." Because nobody will listen and the target will just shrug it off. However, what you do get is flexibility which is a pretty nice thing for the FM.

Incidentally, some of that applies a bit to Onos as well, although I have to admit I feel a fair bit better about Onos than Silchas.

He does the same thing here with Onos.

Oh, how very kind of you to bring absolutely nothing new to the table.

This was directed to Yedan when Yedan posted his positive and negative impressions. He never followed up on this.

Picking on Fiddler doesn't make you look good though. Everyone's been doing it (with pretty good reason) already. The mass of low content posting (of a very different type to that of Karsa and Tool) plus wierd defensiveness (and OMGUS based suspicion*) when faced with a bare handful of votes certainly isn't ideal. But it's an inexperienced reaction to a couple of early votes, not necessarily a guilty one.

And again with Fiddler. A few posts before this, he was questioning Fiddler. Now he's somewhat defending him yet still pointing out that the reasons for picking on him are valid.

He also did this with me when I told him I don't believe that FM would be coaching players. He said that he disagreed with me but not with some of the specifics.

Every post he makes is an attempt to be reasonable and he's constantly playing on both sides of the fence.

I have two issues with this though.

1. He's too easy. He didn't switch his vote at the end of the day so he's obviously going to be a target today. So why not switch? At that point, he had to know that Silchas wasn't a valid option. It's possible the possibility of it being 7 v 7 could mean that Silchas could get lynched. I don't know.

2. Why nightkill Kalam? Makes no sense. If Anomander was Dassem's partner, he took away a suspect.

Regardless, there is enough there for me to vote Anomander Rake for now. Will continue looking at the others.

[House Wythers]

This is silly. So should/would an FM.

True. But a guilty has all rights to say he doesn't care. His role is designed to lie. If an innocent says something like this, it's either counter-productive play... or he isn't really innocent, in fact.

[House Dalt]

Well, there was the threat of the healer floating around as well...

I don't think Silchas is a likely FM any more.

Why don't you think Silchas is likely to be a FM anymore?

Who cares if there is a threat of a healer? Obvious heal choices include Quick Ben, Sandalath, Karsa. One of those three maybe with Karsa/Quick Ben being slightly more obvious. If they wanted to, they could have killed Gruntle or Fiddler for example. Neither were under any suspicions toward the end of the day and they weren't obvious heal choices. But no, they killed Kalam. Still makes no sense to me.

This is silly. So should/would an FM.

Absolutely however there is a clear difference between me and Rake. I'm not looking for sympathy. I'm not trying to play on your emotions. Simply put, lynching me is a bad idea.

[House Thorne]

Why don't you think Silchas is likely to be a FM anymore?

Already explained.

I'm out for the night.

[House Yronwood]

Players I have no real read on yet and would be willing to lynch. None has made any notable contribution (yes I know this would include me) My prefernce would be to lynch one of these as I think they would be the least useful for later analysis :

Rake, Apsalar, Gruntle, Tehol, Toc, Yedan.

Players that have posted alot and I would be willing to lynch:

Icarium - has posted nothing memorable in my first read-through.

Why does Dassem name a whole bunch of people as being people he 'has no read on' yet lists Icarium separately for the exact same thing? Many people on the top list had more content then Icarium had at that point.

Ignoring myself, I'll be looking at Anomander Rake., Yedan Derryg, Toc, Apsalar. Will add Trull to this list as well.

This comment makes me suspicious of you. It's as if you're looking at what went on in the lynch based on the vote record alone and not actually factoring in the events... I've caught bad guys before doing this exact same thing.

I don't think Trull looks as good as you do, evidently. I don't really see the idea of giving a partner last words to be that foreign, I guess. But I think I should point out that I was more than upfront that I wasn't that happy with my analysis on that group of voters.

Seriously?

I don't want to toot my own horn here but I think I played a pretty active role in getting that lynch through: I was the second vote on Dassem at a time when he wasn't a viable lynch candidate and I actively tried to convince people to switch from Silchas to Dassem. So yeah, I do think I look VPI if not CI at this point.

As for what happened at night, I can't see Kalam as reasonable kill, he was expected to be one of top suspects today. Only sensible expalanation I can invent is that Toc was presumed to be nightkilled, but was reborn as two halves because of his role... meanwhile, Kalam was targeted by a vig. If so, I'd like this vig to claim.

This just sounds, wrong... makes me wonder why you're trying to propagate the possibility.

What vig do you [know] of that a)kills on the first night for a reason other than to prove a vig claim b)doesn't claim a role before or after the act of killing someone.

[House Dalt]

Already explained.

I'm out for the night.

You cleared him because Dassem voted for him?

[House Dalt]

This comment makes me suspicious of you. It's as if you're looking at what went on in the lynch based on the vote record alone and not actually factoring in the events... I've caught bad guys before doing this exact same thing.

Relax sunshine. If I don't touch on the events of what happened during the lynch when I reread these people, then feel free to go after me. If I do, this statement means nothing.

[House Velaryon]

Absolutely however there is a clear difference between me and Rake. I'm not looking for sympathy. I'm not trying to play on your emotions. Simply put, lynching me is a bad idea.

Oh, yeah, no I'm not saying this as a comment on you just that what rake said is actually fairly null.

[House Dalt]

Oh, yeah, no I'm not saying this as a comment on you just that what rake said is actually fairly null.

Agreed.

[House Dalt]

Was going to edit this to last post but will make it a separate one.

This comment makes me suspicious of you. It's as if you're looking at what went on in the lynch based on the vote record alone and not actually factoring in the events... I've caught bad guys before doing this exact same thing.

One more thing Trull.

I also said in the very same post you just cherry picked from:

Regardless, will focus on the 5 above for the beginning and narrow those down.

Your post is disingenuous.

[House Dalt]

Reread of Yedan has turned up jack shit.

He made this post:

I have a little time for reading the thread.

It's day 1, so with no logical explonation I give just my impression:

Positive impression: Toc the Younger, Karsa Orlong.

Negative: Fiddler., Silchas Ruin.

Thanks for reading.

This was one of his first posts and its' the only one with any impressions. Fiddler and Silchas were getting heat at this point so nothing new in this post. He then votes for Silchas because Silchas attacked him and he considers himself an easy target. Rest of the day is focused on Silchas and he was not around for the end of day lynch.

There is nothing in his posts that points to his alignment in any way, shape or form. We need more from him today.

[House Westerling]

I'm going to try and catch up before I disappear for a few hours. I skipped to the night kill and it was a little confusing. That was likely the idea. I must say that I don't believe yesterday's lynch should have happened if the other two FM were both online and participating. They would have to be doing some ruthless (and IMO unnecessary) distancing to allow that lynch to happen on day one.

[House Yronwood]

Your post is disingenuous.

No it's not. Why are you looking at me again? Please explain, because from my perspective it looks like you saw the final vote tally, saw that I was the last one on and didn't factor in the fact that I was one of the people actively trying to get Dassem lynched.

[House Dalt]

No it's not. Why are you looking at me again? Please explain, because from my perspective it looks like you saw the final vote tally, saw that I was the last one on and didn't factor in the fact that I was one of the people actively trying to get Dassem lynched.

It was a beginning. I didn't read everything up until the lynch. As I said in my post, I was going to go back and read everyone individually instead of catching up. So I was narrowing my suspect list to give me some direction on who to look at. As you see from the end of my post, I say it's a beginning and not even sure it's the right way to go. It's simply being done to narrow my list down. If I reread you (which I haven't done yet) and failed to post anything about the fact that you were 2nd to vote and pushed the Dassem lynch, then you'd have a valid concern. But as I haven't reread you and I haven't posted a thing about you, you're jumping to conclusions on exactly what I plan on doing. It annoys the hell out of me as it seems like you're afraid that I added you to a list of people to be reread.

[House Westerling]

W/r/t aspalar? Lack of coaching seems self evident, I know you said you disagree with scum being coached earlier but I *always* feed my buddies stuff to say if I'm FM, and I think most people do, it would depend on who the FM are, and I suppose the fact Daseem as a buddy lessens her townieness slightly as Daseem was also not around. I think we might not see Aspalar again anyway so it could be a moot point.

....

Open question to everyone:

Based on what is known of Harlot's play style, would you say he is the type to micromanage and feed lines or the type to let a newcomer do their newcomer thing?

You haven't voted for him, have you?

Compare this with Tehol's reaction one post below yours. He looks much better. An innocent should care if he is lynched.

Anyone should care if they are lynched. Null to me.

ETA-

True. But a guilty has all rights to say he doesn't care. His role is designed to lie. If an innocent says something like this, it's either counter-productive play... or he isn't really innocent, in fact.

Missed this. WIFOM, but a guilty person's role is designed to lie AND look innocent. What Rake said was odd, but it didn't scream suspicious to me. Seemed pretty null.

[House Dalt]

I've reread Toc the Younger. First thing I want to say on him is that I do not believe the fact he has the D'ivers role as reason to consider him innocent. It means absolutely nothing. If he was evil and he saw Dassem come up as evil, he'd know that he'd be looked at very closely tomorrow. Making himself into the D'ivers makes it much easier for him to avoid being lynched as people are less likely to want to waste a lynch when they'd get no result. Lets not make the mistake of assuming that D'ivers means innocent.

As for his posts, I don't like his stream of conscious posting. It's the kind of thing I see an evil do because it's very easy to post little snips at people without actually building towards any kind of suspicions. You never really know where he stands because it's never clear.

An example is this post. There are suspicions of Kalam, Quick Ben, Fiddler, agreement with Trull, like Silchas, suspicions of Sandalath. It's looking at individual posts and finding a reason to come up with an opinion of it without actually touching on the whole body of work. Not a fan at all.

He followed up the linked post above with a vote on Sandalath.

Just quoting this because it's an example of a lot of nothing from Fiddler and more of him keeping his head down and safe.

So I see Sandalath's vote was a joke that apparently I didn't get either. So a few pages to comment on and this is what we get?

So the easy targets and OMGUS! Noted.

So the easy targets and OMGUS! Noted. Any you think polite invitation to discuss suspects over tea is the way to stir up conversation? Got a hint for you, won't work.

I was really liking Trull until he didn't appreciate Karsa's entrance. Boo! I am liking Rake, Karsa and Onos.

Sandalath Drukorlat because you really should at least try harder.

(would also vote Fiddler, Ben and Kalam, in that order.)

eta: strikeout for clarity.

He once again points out that he doesn't like Fiddler's posts (which he does a lot of) yet he votes Sandalath for not contributing enough. If we look at his last post and we look at this post, so far, he's made one point against Sandalath, several against Fiddler but he's voting Sandalath. He could be afraid of jumping on the easy train (Fiddler) but is setting himself up to vote that way should a train form.

He likes Onos and spends a few posts saying why. He follows that up by saying he doesn't like Onos' vote on Trull as he thinks Trull is innocent.

I will say I don't agree with Onos's vote on Trull. I get a more inno vibe than FM. Tool's vote seemed base on the 'dumb' statements, but they don't indicate evil (as Karsa is trying to illustrate)

I think Karsa is trying a touch too hard to poke and prod. I agree with most of it, but the prodding of Fiddler seemed a bit much. I thought it was pretty clear the list of low voters did not include the ones who hadn't posted. And something else he needled Fiddler about that is slipping my mind. Won't vote Karsa today, though.

eta: it was the way Karsa asked Fiddler how Kalam was a low flyer. Again, I thought it was obvious that Kalam and Tool were separate from that group. Overall it seemed like poking for poking's sake to look good.

In the same post, he posts against Karsa while at the same time saying he agrees with it. This is wishy washy and pointless. He's not really casting any suspicion on Karsa and he's saying he agrees with it so what the hell is the point of this post? It feels like he's just trying to post opinions for the sake of it instead of actually thinking through his opinions and what they might mean.

Don't be frustrated, spark a bit of conversation. Get your hands dirty. Just saying,'hey you low-flyers, we'd like to hear from you at your convenience, k?' is not stirring things up. You're lying down in frustrated silence because you have three votes? Are you hoping we feel sorry for you and decide to look elsewhere? Fight it, don't give in to it. I'm gonna have to go back and see why you suspected Tool and Kalam other than that they voted for you.

Again, we have another post directed towards Fiddler and more or less casting suspicion on him without being direct about it. It's very passive suspicion as he's done a few times so far.

Please don't do this. It's obviously meta for some reason and nothing that can be evaluated or discussed. Say it's gut and give a ew reasons but don't do this. For the record, my non-suspicion of Onos has nothing to do with meta, just what I see in thread.

Now is tha part of the day where I pop in and run off again. I *might* be back before the end of day, but highly unlikely. So while I like my vote on Sandralathdarsa, I'm going with Kalam right now. Sandradarthala has some posts I like, and I kind of agree on him with Karsa - he needs to be watched. I still have some vague sense of unease about Kalam and his posts aren't sitting quite right with me. Yeah, I got nothing more solid to throw out right now, but I don't like how he jumped on Fiddler with vigor and did the same with Onos, so it's mainly gut right now. I'd also not cry over a Silchas lynch, but I don't forsee a lynch on him needing my help. Fiddler is still an ok lynch, but I'm finding that I kind of want to keep him around. Eh - could go either way on him. His 'poor me' posts grated on me and I still think all the points on him are solid but holy cow is he an easy target.

And finally, we have this post.

He has posted against Fiddler all day but now he wants to keep him. He agrees with the points against him yet think he's an easy target. Is that why he doesn't vote him? I don't know. Doesn't really say.

He meant to move his vote from Sandalath to Kalam. Why? Due to the fact that Kalam expressed suspicions of Fiddler and Onos. So why move the vote? At that point, Kalam and Sandalath both had 2 votes. Fiddler was on the Kalam wagon and he didn't really like Fiddler. So why move away? This is assuming he wanted to move the vote as he didn't bold it. Feels strange to me. Then he's gone for the evening and not back to make any kind of decision on whether to vote for Dassem or Silchas.

I'd also like to note that there is no mention of Dassem the entire time. This means nothing other than it should be noted.

Obviously Toc isn't going to be a viable lynch target today given he's the D'ivers, but I don't like him or his posts.

[House Dalt]

Open question to everyone:

Based on what is known of Harlot's play style, would you say he is the type to micromanage and feed lines or the type to let a newcomer do their newcomer thing?

He'll let them do their own thing. He's relatively new himself. I can remember games where he has played before but not a lot and certainly none in the last few years.

[House Dalt]

Hah, Apsalar is funny. No point in rereading that as there is nothing there since both posts were made in the RP stage. She'll either be modkilled or replaced so no point wasting time there.

[House Upcliff]

ArooooooOOOOOOOOOooooooo

So, to answer the obvious questions, I did not chose the timing of becoming D'ivers. I knew from the beginning that I would start Day 2 like this. It was not triggered by a NK or vig attempt. Don't ask how long this state lasts or if I can go in and out of this state, because that I will not answer.

The thoughts I had last night before I left were that Rake looked bad and I really wanted to take a closer look at Kalam. I didn't like some of his play even though there were a few things I couldn't quite square as FM (esp. his immediate vote for Sil right after Dassem's). Anyway, that was taken off the table so that's all good. I agree that he was a puzzling kill.

I think that Icarium looks fairly good ... I may have to check this but I remember that when asked he said he would not vote for Yedam, but would for Dassem. Why would an FM close that door? Good enough to take him off the table today.

I rather like Tehol (that is, until his latest post ...) but right now he is near the top through attrition. Sandalath looks better as a result of the vote, but not cleared. I was undecided about Karsa's place on the vote train. The details are fuzzy in my head right now, but he was kind of reluctant to jump on the train. He did, and not at the last minute, but he needs a looking into as well.