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[blueturtle1134]

Random smalltalk with Fallacy on Discord led me to this question:

Are there post restrictions? Like you have to use certain words or can't use certain words or have to capitalize certain things, or...?

[FallacyofUrist]

Reasonable post restrictions are possible, as this is Mostly Vanilla Mafia.

[Maximum Spin]

MaxSpin

Edited for the bits I want to comment on.

RGU: Third-party, possibly really a cop who has been tricked, but either way probably an SK. Maybe the even to his odds is MURDER.

I don't understand how he could be third-party here. We lynch you and you flip anything that isn't mafia? He's next. Consequently, I think he's telling the truth about getting a guilty result.

I do too, although we shouldn't discount the idea that he just came up with a very dumb play and is now stuck with it. That said, it's perfectly plausible that he did get a guilty result, which is why that's been my assumption the whole time. It's not like I could ever find out otherwise with certainty.

I should probably clarify that the key reason I think he's third-party is because he hasn't done anything to make me stop thinking that after I thought BHK was.

Next thing though... would you really lynch him next? I mean, if I hadn't been lynched in that hypothetical scenario, I'd be arguing that that's too eager, that he could just as easily have been misinformed, that lynching him is making the same mistake as lynching me was, and we need to take a second and actually play the daygame instead of rushing back and forth like a real-life lynch mob obsessed with killing on pretext. Maybe I'm the only one who thinks that way, but, maybe RGU is betting that I'm not? In fact, let me interpolate the rest of what you said about this here because what I want to say implicates all of it:

Whether you are in actuality guilty is a very different question.

SK needs everyone to die, challenging when you're not around to do it. What do you think he can do to achieve that if he only has two nights and three days to accomplish killing 10 players?

Cult need to lie low for as long as possible and get parity with the rest of the town, Not easy when you lose a member because they jumped the gun. Cult have 2 members at most right now, three tomorrow, meaning they're not going to throw a member away if they can help it, 'cause they win after N4 if they don't lose anyone and, get recruits every night, and scum kill non-cult.

(Right, I don't think he's cult. I think he's SK or maybe another ally. Then again, I guess he could be a cultist if the other cultists are too green and don't know enough to tell him not to do this, but, again, not banking on that here.)

Assume that I get lynched, flip town, RGU doesn't get lynched next. Now you have no real leads because everyone got distracted by the spectacle — I note that RGU seems to have been trying really hard to make sure everyone gets distracted, and RGU himself alleges that he investigated me because

To be honest, I wasn't very suspicious of him [...] I was hoping to confirm Maximum Spin as a member of the town, but...

and blurtle subsequently says

Spin is an obvious target for framing, as he's been pretty strongly playing town; getting us to distrust him would be a good first step for Mafia.

so one might infer that it might be a good first step for any third-party to remove somebody who spent d1 actively scumhunting and trying to lead everyone in the charge.

In contrast, even if we assume instead that an SK RGU genuinely believes that I'm mafia, this would then (in his assumption) give him the chance to validate his cop power and gain everyone's trust, and he still gets to distract everyone with this spectacle so you don't find the rest of scum (because there would still definitely be a rest of scum), and he can use his investigations to keep everyone confused until everyone becomes dead instead.

All of which is not to say "RGU is definitely an SK!" but that nothing is conclusory, there are always explanations for every contingency, we cannot assume any of these things are possible or impossible just because it's simpler.

Tric: probably really a miller. I feel that your, well, general sense of naiveté is genuine and town-directed. I also think you are possibly insane.

He has been less than helpful during the day, complaining about policy lynches on D1 and being delayed on D2, which apparently means Starver is super-guilty of something. Basically, if you didn't have a guilty vote on you, he'd be my choice today.

Hm, you do have a point there. But like I said, I'm very much a 'gut' player, which is probably the worst thing ever. My gut says 'TricMagic is just green, but genuinely believes the silly things he says'. At least, right now it says that. It might change its mind, I guess.

*shrugs* not sure why you keep bringing it up since I'd be more useful to town being undercover

dude I told you I'm biased toward claiming everything

if I had my way everyone would fullclaim on the first day and we'd work from there; not having information is never beneficial. I mean, that's just my opinion, but it really is my opinion, no deflection.

[randomgenericusername]

If I was a SK, this would be the dumbest strategy ever as it guarantees that I'm going to die if you don't flip scum. A SK would try to stay low and survive enough to reach endgame, because they only depend on themselves to win while scum has their team and town has the rest of town.

[hector13]

MaxSpin

Well, there's many things. Things like the excessive use of emoticons and nonserious comments like jokes or calling out players as "rude" for mentioning his broken logic [...] He's saying that my arguments are "dumb" and "bad" without really addressing why.

Bro, that is just how I talk.

He says that millera could mess with this result, but he isn't a miller. The framer is also dead. The only explanation is that he's scum.

I basically guarantee you that there is another framer. Just because everyone is convinced that there is no second framer, I feel completely confident that there must be one. And I am going to be so smug if it turns out there is one. Of course, you could also have been redirected, or any number of other things.

Your basically guaranteed framer turns into an if very quickly here.

Let's put it this way, again, with a little bit extra: we have 1 confirmed ability that changes an investigated alignment (Moony the inventor) and you and Tric have claimed abilities that change alignment. This is 3/11, 27% of the town. You are asking us to believe that there is another framer out there, meaning that 4/11 (36%) of the town can falsify investigations. We also have one claimed redirector, meaning 5/11, or 45% of the town could feasibly mess-up investigations.

As a counter to that, we have 1 claimed alignment cop, that can only use that ability on alternating nights. There may be another alignment cop in the game that could investigate on even nights to balance that out. Thus, you're asking two cops who don't know each other's alignments or targets to not target the same people on their respective nights, and to avoid hitting the target that 36% of the town may hit, 'cause you'd be silly to investigate a Miller claim.

If you were designing a beginner-friendly Mostly Vanilla game, how would you balance out that 45%, knowing that one alignment cop is working on alternate nights?

What you're not getting is that I am starting from the presumption that I am town, so whatever you perceive as "improbable situations" are just my best efforts to propose a scenario in which you could still be telling the truth, knowing that I am town. It's not scummy to... not be scum. Am I supposed to just go "well, you got me, I fold"? I can't, because you didn't get me. When you have eliminated the impossible (such as me being scum, which I know I'm not), whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.

You're asking RGU to ignore his guaranteed sane night result. How is what he's doing any different to what you're doing?

Finally...

emotions to have others pity him

This continues to concern me. When did I do this? I don't think I ever did this. That's not trolling, or subversion, or whatever. I'll even put it in greentext to prove it's neutral even though it makes no sense as advice, if you want: I don't think I ever made an emotional argument to attract pity or for any other reason in this game. What even is an emotional argument in mafia? "Don't lynch me because it would make me sad"? I don't even understand what you're saying conceptually. All I've done that is remotely emotional is... state my reactions to things, mostly facetiously? I guess stating your reactions to things is implicitly using pathos by inviting the reader to empathise, but the alternative is, what, not stating a true (though often exaggerated because that's part of my dialectical style) fact because it's not the kind of thing you want to hear? Let's not forget that pathos is one of the three core forms of rhetoric, there's nothing wrong or invalid about it.

One example of the appeal to emotion is suggesting that accepting a guaranteed sane night result is dumb and bad play.

You quoted Arthur Conan Doyle up there, but I would suggest that requires all the facts. In this instance, that would mean knowing all the roles in play and what action they took during the night. Given we don't have that, and even if everyone claimed both, we know there are at least two players obfuscating that knowledge, thus necessitating we fall back on good ol' Occam's Razor: the hypothesis requiring the fewest assumptions - that RGU's guaranteed sane cop investigation is correct - is likely true.

Considering this, there's a few things I need to ask:

a) what use would a SK get from having an alignment investigating ability?

b) you have postulated various scenarios in which RGU gets an accurate result while you remain town, but you don't seem to be postulating that RGU is gambiting scum. Why not? Is that situation less feasible than him being redirected to actual scum, or the second framer/fourth falsifying-investigation role targeting you the same night? What makes you give that answer?

c) do you think there's a simpler explanation that could convince us that you're right and RGU is wrong? Is there a simpler explanation that could convince us that you're both right?


Probable town pool: RGU, blueturtle, IcyTea, Starver

Probably scum: MaxSpin, Tric

leaning scum on MM, can't quite remember why, it's frickin' 2am guys sue me.

juicebox is nonexistent.

MaxSpin flipping scum does not clear RGU as confirmed town.

[Maximum Spin]

If you were designing a beginner-friendly Mostly Vanilla game, how would you balance out that 45%, knowing that one alignment cop is working on alternate nights?

That seems like more of a question to ask Fallacy.

I might start by putting two or three of the powers that can affect investigations (mine and possibly TM's and even more possibly MM's redirect) in town hands to discourage them from using them in a way that would affect investigations. I know mine seems to have been designed as a millstone to keep me from doctoring too much, or maybe the other way around. Next, I don't think there's another alignment cop who only investigates on even nights; I think there's another alignment cop with a totally different modifier (and RGU has something else to do on even nights, whether another ability or the scumkill). I could probably give you more suggestions if I wanted to put much thought into it, but I just woke up.

I also feel like Fallacy plays a harsher game than the rest of you might be expecting. He may well be expecting people to have enough sense to eg. double-check their night results on a second night; I know I would, as a GM. A game being beginner-friendly just means, to me, that it should be easy to understand, not that town can win without being competent.

You're asking RGU to ignore his guaranteed sane night result. How is what he's doing any different to what you're doing?

I would ask anyone to not ignore but reflect on a night result (on anyone) before lynching someone based on it in any game in which night results are not certain, eg, this one. If I were trying to convince him that he was mafia and he knew he wasn't, that would be one thing, but I am trying to convince him that his evidence is insufficient, while he is trying to convince me that the GM lied to me in my setup PM. Those are different things.

One example of the appeal to emotion is suggesting that accepting a guaranteed sane night result is dumb and bad play.

Saying that something is bad and dumb isn't an appeal to anything or even an argument, but just a prelude to an argument. Again, that's just how I talk (bro). Think of it as my thesis statement. I state that relying on a night result presumptively is bad and dumb, and then I explain why: because there are always factors you might not have accounted for that could explain why you're wrong, and you need to take a breath and think it through and play the daygame to figure out whether your night result is really what you think it is. Not playing the daygame is just, well, bad and dumb. Also, just for reference, I hadn't even heard of sanities before now; I've never played a game that used them before. So you can rehash that the result is "guaranteed sane" all you want but it doesn't affect my argument in the slightest, which was always that there are external reasons to doubt it.

You quoted Arthur Conan Doyle up there, but I would suggest that requires all the facts. In this instance, that would mean knowing all the roles in play and what action they took during the night. Given we don't have that, and even if everyone claimed both, we know there are at least two players obfuscating that knowledge,

The quote from Holmes applies to me here, not you. For me, it is impossible that I am scum, therefore I must assume that some other thing is the truth. Obviously you don't know that I'm not scum, that's the point of the game, so for you the situation naturally differs. In that paragraph I was explaining my perspective.
But,

thus necessitating we fall back on good ol' Occam's Razor: the hypothesis requiring the fewest assumptions - that RGU's guaranteed sane cop investigation is correct - is likely true.

Occam's Razor has never been all it's cracked up to be, honestly.

a) what use would a SK get from having an alignment investigating ability?

Well, I posited one potential gain earlier, which is that he can use it to appear trustworthy to town. It would generally be useful for identifying mafia and other third-parties (especially cult, who are in direct competition with the SK and should be eliminated immediately), that information to be used however the player thinks best. What use would anyone get from having an alignment investigating ability? What use would anyone get from having additional information to which other players are not privy? Whatever use you can make of it. Even scum could gain by using it to suss out third-parties. In fact, scum probably gains more by knowing who not to use it on.

b) you have postulated various scenarios in which RGU gets an accurate result while you remain town, but you don't seem to be postulating that RGU is gambiting scum. Why not? Is that situation less feasible than him being redirected to actual scum, or the second framer/fourth falsifying-investigation role targeting you the same night? What makes you give that answer?

Not at all (less feasible); I just can't prove or disprove whether he is scum, so I see no point arguing it, it would be no more clarifying than him arguing that I am. Besides, my gut isn't really telling me that he's scum. Maybe he is, it wouldn't be the first time scum has felt third-party to me or vice-versa, but as of right now that isn't my default position.

c) do you think there's a simpler explanation that could convince us that you're right and RGU is wrong? Is there a simpler explanation that could convince us that you're both right?

Define "simpler". And don't give me any crap about 'fewer assumptions', I am already assuming that other humans have consciousness, that causality and logic and mathematics actually work as defined, that everything I think I see and remember is not just a single momentary frame-capture out of an endless roiling chaos which will be obliterated in the next moment (even now as I finish typing this parenthetical!) (the trick is that, once i finished typing it, my memory of having typed it was part of that momentary structure, preëxisting and equally false) and replaced by some other fleeting structure; from where I'm standing the assumptions look infinite on every side.

But yes, I can name other arguments if you like, though, again, I just woke up, I don't want to put too much effort into it. Maybe RGU is just lying, made a too-ballsy move and now can't safely walk it back, or is even counting on the audacity of it to make everyone believe 'there's no way he would've done that on purpose!'; I know I've certainly done that last thing before, many times, relying on the refrain of "do you really think I'm stupid enough to have thought that would work?" to make it work. (It usually works.) Maybe RGU is scum, maybe you're scum, maybe we're all scum. Sorry, that one actually doesn't make sense, I think I nodded a bit there. Maybe I'm a miller and don't know it, or do know it and don't want to say it for some dumb reason, or can't say it. Maybe Fallacy has been lying all along and this is actually the most bastard of bastard games, lord knows I wouldn't put it past him. Do you know he keeps trying to make catpeople? The man's clearly beyond redemption. Maybe there isn't even any mafia, maybe this is a town-vs.-third-party game with abilities designed to mislead us into thinking there's a mafia. (That would actually be hilarious.) Maybe I was just framed, wait, no, that's not "simple" enough in your worldview, never mind. Maybe I'm even actually scum and there really is still another framer in the game, I guess that would technically make us both partially right. Maybe I'm just a lowly fruit vendor and this whole thing is an illusion created by MM's practical-joke JOAT powers or TM's "totally not scum" JOAT powers. Maybe RGU doesn't even really exist, maybe this whole game is a, er, right, supposed to be taking this seriously, never mind. Maybe I need to go back to bed. For like a week. Or forever.

[blueturtle1134]

I am trying to convince him that his evidence is insufficient, while he is trying to convince me that the GM lied to me in my setup PM. Those are different things.

That's a fallacy (har har!).

You're not trying to convince each other. Nobody will admit that they're scum unless they're a jester. RGU is trying to convince the rest of us that you are more likely than not to be scum. This is what people mean by emotional arguments. You're trying to frame it as RGU arguing something totally implausible by going "Boo hoo! I'm town but everyone thinks I'm scum!"

[IcyTea31]

Max, if you really are a doctor, who did you heal? I find ot strange that in all this desperate-seeming defense, you haven't even claimed an action.

[Maximum Spin]

You're trying to frame it as RGU arguing something totally implausible by going "Boo hoo! I'm town but everyone thinks I'm scum!"

[citation needed]

That's a fallacy (har har!).

You're not trying to convince each other.

a) that's not what fallacy means
b) I'm definitely trying to convince him that his evidence is insufficient. Sure, convincing everyone else is a collateral goal, but I also want people to play the game competently. While I also assume he is trying to convince everyone else to believe his claim, he definitely also has been making direct arguments to me to the effect of how dare I say I'm not scum when he KNOWS I am. Have you considered the possibility that I just didn't mention the parts where we both are trying to convince everyone else of things because that part is both obvious and not relevant to my point?

Max, if you really are a doctor, who did you heal? I find ot strange that in all this desperate-seeming defense, you haven't even claimed an action.

Didn't I already say / heavily imply it was hec? Because it was hec.

[hector13]

You're asking RGU to ignore his guaranteed sane night result. How is what he's doing any different to what you're doing?

I would ask anyone to not ignore but reflect on a night result (on anyone) before lynching someone based on it in any game in which night results are not certain, eg, this one. If I were trying to convince him that he was mafia and he knew he wasn't, that would be one thing, but I am trying to convince him that his evidence is insufficient, while he is trying to convince me that the GM lied to me in my setup PM. Those are different things.

He's not trying to convince you of anything, he's telling you the things you are saying don't gel with the things he has been told. He's being foolish telling you to stop defending yourself, but hey, we're not all perfect.

You quoted Arthur Conan Doyle up there, but I would suggest that requires all the facts. In this instance, that would mean knowing all the roles in play and what action they took during the night. Given we don't have that, and even if everyone claimed both, we know there are at least two players obfuscating that knowledge,

The quote from Holmes applies to me here, not you. For me, it is impossible that I am scum, therefore I must assume that some other thing is the truth. Obviously you don't know that I'm not scum, that's the point of the game, so for you the situation naturally differs. In that paragraph I was explaining my perspective.
But,

thus necessitating we fall back on good ol' Occam's Razor: the hypothesis requiring the fewest assumptions - that RGU's guaranteed sane cop investigation is correct - is likely true.

Occam's Razor has never been all it's cracked up to be, honestly.

Notably in a situation in which you fall foul of it.

b) you have postulated various scenarios in which RGU gets an accurate result while you remain town, but you don't seem to be postulating that RGU is gambiting scum. Why not? Is that situation less feasible than him being redirected to actual scum, or the second framer/fourth falsifying-investigation role targeting you the same night? What makes you give that answer?

Not at all (less feasible); I just can't prove or disprove whether he is scum, so I see no point arguing it, it would be no more clarifying than him arguing that I am. Besides, my gut isn't really telling me that he's scum. Maybe he is, it wouldn't be the first time scum has felt third-party to me or vice-versa, but as of right now that isn't my default position.

Can you prove or disprove anything you've said so far? What's the point of arguing those positions?

c) do you think there's a simpler explanation that could convince us that you're right and RGU is wrong? Is there a simpler explanation that could convince us that you're both right?

Define "simpler". And don't give me any crap about 'fewer assumptions', I am already assuming that other humans have consciousness, that causality and logic and mathematics actually work as defined, that everything I think I see and remember is not just a single momentary frame-capture out of an endless roiling chaos which will be obliterated in the next moment (even now as I finish typing this parenthetical!) (the trick is that, once i finished typing it, my memory of having typed it was part of that momentary structure, preëxisting and equally false) and replaced by some other fleeting structure; from where I'm standing the assumptions look infinite on every side.

But yes, I can name other arguments if you like, though, again, I just woke up, I don't want to put too much effort into it. Maybe RGU is just lying, made a too-ballsy move and now can't safely walk it back, or is even counting on the audacity of it to make everyone believe 'there's no way he would've done that on purpose!'; I know I've certainly done that last thing before, many times, relying on the refrain of "do you really think I'm stupid enough to have thought that would work?" to make it work. (It usually works.) Maybe RGU is scum, maybe you're scum, maybe we're all scum. Sorry, that one actually doesn't make sense, I think I nodded a bit there. Maybe I'm a miller and don't know it, or do know it and don't want to say it for some dumb reason, or can't say it. Maybe Fallacy has been lying all along and this is actually the most bastard of bastard games, lord knows I wouldn't put it past him. Do you know he keeps trying to make catpeople? The man's clearly beyond redemption. Maybe there isn't even any mafia, maybe this is a town-vs.-third-party game with abilities designed to mislead us into thinking there's a mafia. (That would actually be hilarious.) Maybe I was just framed, wait, no, that's not "simple" enough in your worldview, never mind. Maybe I'm even actually scum and there really is still another framer in the game, I guess that would technically make us both partially right. Maybe I'm just a lowly fruit vendor and this whole thing is an illusion created by MM's practical-joke JOAT powers or TM's "totally not scum" JOAT powers. Maybe RGU doesn't even really exist, maybe this whole game is a, er, right, supposed to be taking this seriously, never mind. Maybe I need to go back to bed. For like a week. Or forever.

At what point should we continue thinking you have the town's benefit at heart when you decide the best way to answer a simple question is a bizarre rant that you accept this isn't some solipsistic fever dream?

[Maximum Spin]

At what point should we continue thinking you have the town's benefit at heart when you decide the best way to answer a simple question is a bizarre rant that you accept this isn't some solipsistic fever dream?

This just proves that you don't know me very well, which is, well, completely fair and understandable. But for reference, I would always choose to make such a rant at any opportunity, in any situation (regardless of whether town or scum or not playing mafia at all), although if you've mistaken the described "fever dream" for solipsism, you've crucially missed the point. It's not just that I can't prove that you really exist, but that I can't prove that I really exist. But while I'd love to turn this thread, any thread, every thread into a complex nihilist/Buddhist philosophy discussion, believe me, I probably wouldn't ever talk about anything else if people would listen, I have a feeling that the other players wouldn't appreciate it, so I'll try to quash the impulse to continue. But my point was that it wasn't a "simple question". I genuinely don't know and can't predict what will make an explanation feel simpler to you, so all I have available is to throw out explanations until something sticks.

That, and I don't see how we could "both [be] right" at all; his fundamental argument is that I'm scum, and mine is that I'm not, we can't both be right.

Anyway, other things.

He's not trying to convince you of anything, he's telling you the things you are saying don't gel with the things he has been told. He's being foolish telling you to stop defending yourself, but hey, we're not all perfect.

I don't see how "telling [me] to stop defending [my]self" isn't "trying to convince" me to stop defending myself.

Can you prove or disprove anything you've said so far? What's the point of arguing those positions?

Well, no, but the expanded understanding of what I'm talking about is that my goal is not to prove or disprove per se but to try to convince people not to lynch me. Arguing "it's all a lie and RGU is scum" when I can't prove anything reduces it to my word against his, which isn't going to convince anyone, and usually the person to claim first "wins" in those situations. In contrast, offering alternative explanations, even though I can't directly prove that any of them happened, might get people to reconsider — most importantly RGU himself, if he really is being honest. Broadly speaking, convincing anyone this turn that I am not scum is unlikely; the best I can do is maybe convince people that there is a possibility that I might not be and that, since I'm certainly not going anywhere (unless I get nightkilled, I guess, but that would render the issue moot, and, besides, scum is unlikely to resolve the confusion by killing me) and RGU's alleged guilty result on me isn't going to expire, it's still necessary to play the daygame and scumhunt instead of yelling guilty at me. I mean, what else am I supposed to do, try to distract you all away from scumhunting like RGU?

[TricMagic]

Get hunting then.

[randomgenericusername]

I don't really see a point on continuing this, sicnenit's obvious Macimum Spin isn't going to confess being scum and I'm not going to unvote him. I have stated why I think he's scum and why we should lynch him, so the only thing left is waiting for him to be voted and lynched by the other players. This would be a good time to discuss other possible suspects.

[TricMagic]

Juicebox. Enough said about him. He's not here.

[FallacyofUrist]

Right. I suppose I'd better prod him then.