NJW:The maneuver was something I kind of trapped myself into... it ended up being the most plausible claim I could make to save myself. I wasn't actually too concerned about Naturegirl being lynched, though I would have preferred that it didn't happen. I'll explain why I did it:
To be fair, I'd have bussed Naturegirl if I were in your place. When she flipped scum, you'd have earned town-cred, and you'd also get a new angle of attack on Day 3: "Pooka didn't want a Naturegirl lynch on Day 1, and she flipped scum...I wonder why that is?"
Even I would have believed you were for real. To be fair, even while I had concrete evidence that Naturegirl is scum, I had doubts that Persus or Superdorf were actually the scum I was looking for. The fact that Persus voted on you instead of with you told me all I needed to know about his being a townie, leaving Superdorf...and while scum implicating scum is a thing, something about him told me that he's town.
Also, any thoughts on my play style? I think I did well, but there's certainly areas where I can do better.
You seemed like a really strong player, I was scared of you. Well done for mentioning the correct scumteam d1!
One thing that I might say about your scumhunting is that I never consciously tried to "pocket" you - I just mentioned your early mechanical speculation to make it seem like I'd done more than skimread it. But my motives there weren't entirely townie in any case, and you picked up on that.
Heh, I did THAT well. Back when I was scum, I was terrified when someone said my scumbuddy was a likely candidate for scum. I can only imagine what it's been like having the scumteam figured out. On Day 1.
Funnily enough, I wasn't consciously doing the pocketing in the game I played as scum either. The player I was pocketing mentioned it late in the game and, it was then that I actually relied on doing it more. One of the ways I did it was to praise that other player. When you repeatedly brought my analysis, a chord struck and I knew something was fishy about it.
Superdorf:Hm, on that note... I've noticed I tend to just kinda, erm, wither under any sort of pressure. I develop this sort of nervous lazy-apathy-- I become reluctant to say anything at all for fear of saying the wrong thing. Is there anything I can do to change that? Or is it just something I have to get out of my system with practice?
I'd say wrong things and get corrected for them. Chances are you'll know what to say and what to not say as any alignment, but first you actually need to be wrong to know what is wrong.
Persus:At one point I was thinking of fakeclaiming roleblocker because I knew Pooka was one, but decided against it because that would be too complicated.
My main strategy for determining if NJW was scum was seeing how Naturegirl reacted, so her blue voting NJW initially actually made me second guess things. I also considered the possibility of Superdorf being NJW's buddy, but I figured it was less likely.
Yeah...that would have resulted in a mess. You're a strong player, and I can see you probably had a plan and reason for doing it, but the risk of mislynch looks murderous. But by our mass claims and how they interconnected with each other, we had a great picture of Night 2. A web of actions being done where only NJW is the missing link.
Also, I'm glad to see that someone else thought Naturegirl was connected with NJW in one way or another! The blue voting NJW struck me as bussing, and what better lead to that other than her red voting myself in her very next post? She should have continued pursuing NJW, making it appear less likely that these two are scumbuddies.
Naturegirl and Superdorf (again):I’m hoping next game I play I get Town, since I clearly suck at being scum
I’m hoping next game I play I get Town, since I clearly suck at being scum
I've played three games and never rolled scum, and I dread the day I do... that kind of eloquent lie-weaving under pressure sounds like an absolute nightmare to pull off. (Ah well. I'll try to have fun with it.)
You did just fine. I had you pegged as town all through the second half of D1 and the first half of D2-- there was too much information flying about, was all, and NJW dragged you down with him. The odds were not in your favour.
Playing as scum is tricky but actually very fun once you get a hang of it. The first golden rule to being scum (in my opinion anyway) is to know that whatever you say or however you act will be recorded against you. By doing something, you send a message. For example, Naturegirl's red vote not being followed with a quick hammer sent the message that scum is either one man short, or she is scum. Likewise, confuse and cause chaos without you appearing to do so. Town WILL appear scummy. Exploit that. Capitalize on it. There will be no shortage of townies who make mistakes enough to kill them.
A harder part is planning with your partner in the scum chat without appearing to be in cahoots in the game thread. You will need to plan with your partner; as NJW admits, his planning didn't account for a Day 2 mass claim so he just entered it a bit badly. Now with a little more planning, he could have built a more believable story, enough to sway Persus over. If NJW urged Naturegirl not to post without him checking over what he says, her red vote could have been prevented and kept things sort of ambiguous (remember that I had not much concrete evidence against Naturegirl before Day 2, but how NJW and she acted gave me more than enough reason to suspect her!).
FINALLY, be consistent with your Town self. Scumhunt anyway. Find places to poke, build cases, etc. Just don't make your real, scummy motives show. Pretend you're concerned about town. Good acting is a great asset!
IonMatrix:The only thing that sucked was that I got lynched on d1. For some reason I feel like if I was alive I wouldve screwed up the whole game.
Don't worry about it. I also screwed up Day 1 by giving some slack to a newbie scum, thinking she was newbie town. But see, this is part of the Town experience: always expect that you will die, so do something or another that will help with scumhunting.