http://www.mafiauniverse.com/forums...omplacency-and-Power-Villaging-(by-Monstrman)

Was reading some articles, and I think this one is particularly relevant to this game.

 

gg Delphicon <3

QT diving is a go

 

One day I won't feel like it's unfair to scumread people who can't be in the thread. The rand isn't fair, so I shouldn't be fair, either...
--- Post automerged ---
Here's what the Machine up to today looked like...

... generally, people who got more than a few votes got lynched, with the exception of me.

It feels like while people gave out a lot of townreads, nobody was actually willing to work together this game...

 

gg Rubi and Delphi. Villagers win this setup a good chunk of the time on DLP imo, so solid job.

Good thing you had easy lynches like GH in the game though, that really helps lower the difficulty level.

 

._.

So like this is something eido suggested I do and I agreed it'd be a good idea so uh..here goes a thing....RIP me.



It was decided there wasn't enough dark souls memes on here so I'm doing my part to correct that...yeah...that's what's happening....

sigh

Alright so it's not exactly a secret that there's been uh I guess "friction" would be an at least a somewhat accurate way to put it regarding me and people trying to read me in I guess all of my games here so far except for RWBY kind of so ya know go figure. Rather than do nothing and let who knows what happen (worst case I guess resentment builds up for both me and you guys and this will be harder to fix later) I'd rather try and fix this now before any sort of meta gets set in stone and there's still a chance to reverse course here.

I suppose the first thing is to figure out why it's happening in this first place? Which the obvious answer is just playstyle clash? From what I've heard FS and DLP is more analysis driven and there isn't really much emotion involved? Which after playing a few games already is a "yeah duh" kind of thing. That's very much not a thing I'm used to, I don't know if I need to be giving my WW life story here but I'm going to just so you guys can understand where I'm coming from. I started playing WW on a Magic the Gathering forum that no longer exists mostly because forums were considered outdated and social media served the same purpose. Anyway it was brought over to that forum by one person and nobody else knew how to play so we all kinda had to learn how to play together as result there was no meta and no real guidelines about how people should act (never mind the general play of course being low level since none of us knew what we were doing), there was of course the regular forum CoC but everyone here probably knows by now it's very easy for things to get abrasive without ever getting near breaking CoC. As a result fights happened....a lot and it eventually just sort of became normal but it never got to the point where mods stepped in there was just a lot of tension most games. Overtime people kinda accepted it and people would say things and it was assumed that nobody ever really meant what they said but game health did slowly deteriorate after a while since nobody really got mad it still wasn't much fun with that happening game after game and we just stopped playing after about 10 months or so. I guess the point I'm trying to make is during my first few months on playing WW being aggressive was considered normal. I'm not trying to make it sound like anyone is sheltered or overly sensitive by comparison to the contrary from what I've been told FS sounds like it was even worse than GatheringMagic was when ti came to emotional play.

For that reason I do understand now why my play might have set off alarms for some people and why some people might be hesitant to engage with me just due to prior experiences people might have had on FS. So as a result what happens is a conflict of expectations where if I get somewhat aggressive my expectation is "well they'll know I'm not trying to be hostile/toxic and they'll take it in stride in respond" where as I think for some of you you see behavior that is probably unacceptable and at it's most extreme cause for banning (I would really like to think I've never gone that far but I'm not sure what FS was actually like) and as such either arn't use to and/or aren't willing to engage with. On the flip side for me since GM games were usually kind of like a chatroom since like I said before all of us were inexperienced (we also had joke phases d1 that would go on for half the day that annoyed me to no end -_-") so there wasn't a ton of analysis done until at least halfway through d2, generally people worked out reads by interacting a lot with each other. So in this setting where it's much more analysis heavy and people sometimes give firm reads on a person they've only spoken to once or twice that's something I'm very much uncomfortable with and something I have a hard time comprehending. It feels very cold to me I guess is how I would put it which makes sense due to the general meta being adverse to emotional play.

All that said I know playstyle clash doesn't excuse all of the behavior I've exhibited thus far and for that I'm sorry. I have a temper and I know that and I also know it's easy to get me frustrated. I need to do my best in the future to have a longer fuse and be able to stay calm under pressure however I also need you guys to be willing to meet me halfway here. I need you to not automatically assume ill intent in my posts but most of all I need you guys to be willing to engage with me. I know the popular thought is probably "well if I talk with fable while I'm wolf reading him he's just going to get even angrier and I'm just going to get tilted" and I can't promise that that will never happen but I think I can promise that I won't get like that 9/10 times at the very least. It might seem counter intuitive but if you talk about your reads with me or even before you develop a read on me that will only ever help me understand where you're coming from and I think it will also help you understand where I'm coming from. Yes sometimes even after that you'll still wolf read me (and some of those times it might even be because I'm a wolf!) and I might get frustrated still but if it's talked out at least I'm 100x less likely to rage out. On my side I need to not take it personally if someone does do and analysis post on me with an accompanying wolf read without talking to me first which I think I have a tendency to do where my hope is if I don't freak out you guys will be more willing to actually talk about your reads with me after the fact and some sort of understanding can happen.

I don't know how much this post helps but I feel I did need to make it if for no other reason then peace of mind for me. I don't want to be the person people groan at when they see me on a player list and I don't want playing with me to be unpleasant and certainly don't want to have to take 48 hour breaks away from playing every game. I mean dya pretty much said it during WH9 that I told her how much I like playing here and how I respect that the level of play here is generally high and the last thing I wanna do is bring it down. So please just all I ask is don't be afraid to talk to me in the future and understand that while I may be aggressive and sarcastic at times my intention is never to be hostile or mean spirited. Do that and I will do my best to keep myself under control and calm and not rage at anyone.

(Just go straight to 5:30 cuz I suck at embedding a video to a specific time >.>)

 

I am not sure what to say.
I don't even think that post was directed at me and the only reason I am responding is because I got asked to.

We played games on both mu and here and you know that I like playing with you in general, and a good amount of our d1 fricition was more me being in a somewhat bad mood and getting riled up by small stuff that should not have mattered.

I had a lot of problems with this game and I am not sure if I will play the next game(s) or not because of it, but our clash had very little to do with it.
I could basically write a paragraph on what I disliked about (almost) every single player in this game which culminated in me hating the game and having a lot of trouble forcing myself to play d2 onwards.
That being said, I know my play was everything but stellar and I was somewhat disgusted by the way I cleared myself, but it was too late at the time.
(Plus technically the scumteam knew the town role-pm before the thread was started, which I didn't know and no one else ever asked the mod.)

 

I can understand where you're coming from, Fable. When I first started online Mafia, I based my plays on the more experienced players in my community. Several of them played rather emotionally, but one in particular took it far enough to be toxic. He made it a point to get in shitslinging fights every game, and constantly made ad hominem attacks about the players, their plays and strats, and their skill in general.

I, being new, thought this was a norm and adopted some of it into my play. I have naturally thick skin, and believed his excuse that the shitstorms he brought to every game somehow contributed to solving it. As a result, every time I got scumread, I assumed that it was an attack on my ability to project/play town well, and would retaliate in kind.

It was only after realizing that truly solving the game was based on more than just tone+content, which shitstorms certainly add to, but rather analyzing the mindset behind that tone+content (i.e. "what motivation does this player have to make this post as town? as scum?"), that I figured out that that aspect of my game played no role in solving it.

That's not at all comparable to your play, nor am I drawing any comparisons from it; I shared it so you'd understand where I'm coming from. People play differently, and will always be differences in how any two people approach a given game, so I'm not going to suggest that you change your style or anything of the sort. I don't even think it was that bad, especially when compared to the ad hominem shitslinging I've seen in the past.

I will say this, though: communication is a two way street. Retreating into an emotional cave and hoping others will try to talk to you through the walls is rarely ever successful. I mean that seriously, and don't intend any disparagement. Good news: if you know you are prone to take it personally when you are scumread, and you know you prefer it ir people talk their read on you through with you, then you've already come half the way! Now, instead of expecting/hoping for every other player in a given game to take the time to talk to you before doing analysis of your posts, why don't you shoulder that burden yourself? It's a lot easier, trust me.

What I mean is, asking that people talk to you before scumreading you places an additional burden on each of their games. Instead of that, since you already know you take scumreads personally, just ask them to talk it through with you AFTER they scumread you. Does that make sense?

So if I were to scumread you and point to your posts as scummy, you should ask me about them, and take the responsibility of starting that conversation, rather than take it personally or get upset because I didn't talk to you beforehand. Starting conversations with others is at least as much your responsibility as it is theirs.

Sorry, I'm not even a DLP-based player, and I didn't mean to write so much, but I wanted to share my two cents because I could empathize with the post you made. I hope that counts for something, and I hope I was clear enough. For what it's worth, while you were frustrating to figure out, I didn't dislike playing with you. Hope to play you again sometime

@Fable

 

So I've only ever played on this forum and I was brought up by the likes of fonti Newcomb and Vaimes.

So like the way that I look at things is kinda influenced by how they looked at things in past games.

My mentality when it comes to games is usually to have fun. And if for some reason I end up raging or whatever, I don't take it outside of the game. Basically, what that means is that I don't hold anything you say/do in a game against you outside of game.

Like I'm pretty sure I've been screaming at Jan in the past in a game but I'm perfectly OK with playing a league game with him as soon as either one of us has flipped.

Point is, what happens in the game stays in the game, and I don't let it affect my viewpoint of anybody outside of game. (This is also a friendly nod to Vaimes as well.) I won't hold a grudge against you, and I won't let it affect anything beyond that specific game, whether it's a new game or other OOG interactions.

I think that I just have a fundamental misunderstanding of where people are coming from if they're off site. Like it's very hard for me to read people who don't generally play here (Tom, beru, Stanari, etc.) I've never been exposed to anything other than heavy meta and thought process analysis (I blame Newcomb), so when people get emotional I'm more likely to think scum AtE than Actual Town Reaction.

I should probably get more exposure elsewhere, but fonti convinced me to join a turbo on MU so now I'm scarred ... Hopefully not for life though.

 

Listening to fonti is fatal mistake.

It is known.

 

Haha turbos on MU are scarring experiences for anyone. Some people get addicted to being scarred though (perhaps out of self loathing, right Eido?)

They're not representative of other games. 18 minute day phases and 6 minute night phases means you hardly get any time to read or actually play. If you want to actually try a different site for a game or two, hit me up. I think you'd like FFR (my homesite). I'm hosting a 12hr/12hr turbo right now, but I think the 48/24hr phase lengths we have for full games would suit you better.
@Miner

 

Miner calling me out like that.

idk I try to be chill and it usually works out. I lose my shit like, once a year, if that.

True facts, if I implode in a game, I will never read it again, it just taints it for me and makes me cringe. There's a FS game where I was getting run up and got super tilted at someone (who turned out to be scum, lol) and I wrote a huge essay about why they/everyone sucked because this was before I learned AtE is a no-no. Yeah.

I think all the current DLP players (and most of the past ones!) are p cool and reasonable, so if they get heated once in a while, it's no biggie, as long as it doesn't escalate and leak out of the game. I'm sick of seeing "never playing with player x again" type posts offsite.

So my response to the Fable Wall is mostly "cool, let's play something now."
--- Post automerged ---
I think Jan calls me a crybaby literally every game we've been in together, but I still love him. Somehow.

 

Wat.

I was just being friendly ._.

 

I mean .. being a crybaby is not a bad thing. More a precious personality trait. <3

 

Good post, Fable.

I'll just fire off some stream of consciousness type stuff here.

I think a certain degree of friction is always going to happen in mafia games, anywhere. A certain degree of heat, of incivility. Fundamentally, it's a game where it's people's job to accuse people of lying, and some of the people doing that will in fact be lying themselves. Just like... at a basic level, it's a powder keg. It's why we have 2,000-word CoCs and multi-hour discussions about how to keep things fun in mafia, because so much of it is like... kind of designed to be fundamentally unfun, but in a weird addictive way like hot peppers that we like for some reason. So just... recognizing that, being aware of it, and being able to take a step back and disengage/reset when things feel bad are all valuable tools.

I mean, I get where you're coming from. But you also have to understand that direct engagement isn't the end all and be all. Personally, when I'm scumreading someone, the last thing I want to do is talk to them directly and have them try to convince me they're town. I want to see what they do on their own, and more importantly, sometimes, what they don't do. It's a style thing, sure, but it's also something I believe is good for my game - when you butt horns with someone over the topic of your own read on them, both alignments are trying to get you to read them as town, and I've personally found the difference in tone/nuance/mindset for that particular set piece to be very muddy and tough to distinguish.

I'll talk to someone I think is a wolf about their reads on anyone else in the game, about their thoughts about gameflow, about their mindset, their process, whatever - every data point helps - but I have zero interest in them talking about how villagery they obviously are.

Like... anything you think you have the self-awareness to be able to point out that you should be read as a villager on, you have the self-awareness to fake. (There are exceptions here, see Jan this game, or people who actually can empirically get out of their range and their range is enough of a known thing to matter etc etc etc, just speaking in general here)

So in terms of meeting you halfway, I'm definitely willing to engage with you, treat you with civility, all that. But I'm not going to just like... not make a read on you if I have a read on you, regardless of how much or how little we've directly talked in the game. Nor am I necessarily going to want to talk to you about that read. This isn't out of any kind of negative feeling toward you, it's 100% about me trying to play my game in the best way I know how. There's always room for adaptability and flexibility, and part of that is just like... recognizing our differences and being open to not just having a static way of "dealing" with someone you clash with, but...

Eh, starting to ramble a little bit.

I'm glad to have you here, Fable. I think emotion, even strong emotion, is a good thing for a mafia game. Caring is good. Being invested is good. Fighting desperately for your wincon is good. Just keep in mind - like you lay out nicely in your post - that everyone comes from their own background, that everyone is more than just words on a screen, and is in fact a real person, and if you fundamentally treat everyone with respect, even while you're shoving a lynch down their throat, people will generally have an okay time and things will work themselves out.

 

Thanks for the input everyone I appreciate it.

@Newcomb

One thing I disagree with you about is not talking to someone about a read you have on them. For example why is me asking about your progression on me different than someone else asking about your progression on me? Shouldn't the answer be the same no matter who asks you about it? Because it doesn't necessarily mean I'm trying to prove I'm a villager through it, it can just just as much be about making sure your logic holds up just the same as any read I would ask you about.

 

I mean. If you're a villager, then my logic doesn't hold up, pretty much by definition. And if you're a wolf, you have to represent that.

Which is why those kinds of conversations turn into arguments 90% of the time.

 

I mean true but not exactly what I meant or at least not entirely. Also meant it from a figuring out if it holds up in a figuring out if I believe that you believe it sort of thing.

Like say if I'm your primary push it doesn't give me much to work with if you don't talk to me about that read.

 

It's not a set-in-stone thing. Like, if I'm scumreading you I don't pretend you don't exist. I'll clarity points, I'll talk about the progression, especially if you're not the only one asking. What I won't do is get into a prolonged argument with someone I think is a wolf about why they have a wolf role PM. Frankly, if I'm wrong on them, that's the least likely thing possible to break me out of the tunnel, and if I'm right, what am I going to do, convince them they're a wolf? "Good show, you got me."

Again, I'm not saying you're /wrong/ to want to be interacted with in a certain way, I'm just saying people are different, and the process one person has trying to solve a game only has to mesh with the rest of the thread insofar as it's still possible to work together as a team.

 

First, two things:

One is that you have a vested interest in any read that is on you.

Two is that you're only going to approach this from the view that you're town.

Of course you're interested in a read about you. Not only that, but you're interested no matter what your alignment is AND you already know the answer to the implied question (of your alignment, which is town).

You're unlikely to be able to show any kind of thought progression / process here - you're town and that's that. Your arguments & reasoning towards that point are automatically (and necessarily) viewed with suspicion, since you have no option other than to say you're town and that people suggesting otherwise are incorrect.

Ultimately, very little is gained in such a discussion apart from increased noise in the thread, which is why most players here try to avoid them.

Even if your intent is to check their thought process and nothing else, is it likely to stay that way after engagement? I'd say it's pretty likely that /something/ occurs that makes you want to post more about what they've said, at which point we run into aforementioned problems.

 

I blame Fonti too.