Back to basics?

This game was sprung on me a bit suddenly, so it's going to be a bare-bones game; no interesting premise or rules. Next game I host will be more interesting, but for the time being...well, the formula is tried-and-true.

Roles:
- Two terrorists
One free kill at the end of each round. This means that they PM me a name and that person dies.
- One Intelligence Agent
One free investigation at the end of each round. This means that he/she PMs me a name and I tell him/her whether or not that person is a terrorist.
- One Assassin
One free kill at the end of every other round. This means that he/she PMs me a name and that person dies.

Each round will last 48 hours. I must get PMs before the end of the round or nothing will happen. If none of the people with special roles PM me, I will extend the round an additional 24 hours.

I have sent all four roles PMs with his/her specific role. If you did not receive a PM, you have no special role. Roles will be revealed upon death.

The game will end when one of the following happens:
- Both terrorists are killed (innocents win)
- There are as many terrorists as innocents or more (terrorists win)

PMing or other private communication (e.g. IM or email) between individuals is strongly discouraged. I cannot prevent you from doing it, but...don't. The exception is between the two terrorists.

The intelligence agent may not indicate that he/she has official information at any time. Obviously, you are expected to take advantage of it, but do so discretely. "I think X is evil" is okay; even "X is evil". "I'm the IA, kill X" is not.

When you die, you are allowed one post. If you are the IA, the above rule applies even more so than usual, since everybody will know (or think) you're telling the truth.

Player list:
- Eugene Chin
- GutlessWonder
- JacaByte
- jrsh92
- kickme
- LNSU
- mrxak
- prophile
- RJC Ultra
- SoItBegins
- Templar98921

As of Sunday, September 14 at 12am EDT (4am GMT), Round 1 has begun. Round 1 will end on Tuesday, September 16 at 12am EDT (4am GMT).

This post has been edited by orcaloverbri9 : 15 September 2008 - 10:51 PM

@orcaloverbri9, on Sep 13 2008, 11:59 PM, said in Global Thermonuclear War 31:

The intelligence agent may not indicate that he/she has official information at any time. Obviously, you are expected to take advantage of it, but do so discretely. "I think X is evil" is okay; even "X is evil". "I'm the IA, kill X" is not.

An odd ruling to make.

The I.A. revealing himself once he's found a terrorist is one of the most powerful (and dangerous) moves he can make.

If the I.A. can't PM anybody, and he can't say "I'm the I.A. and I KNOW this guy is evil," then what's the point of having an I.A., I ask?

I have to agree with Eugene here: that is an odd one.

It's not hard to make a case for or against someone; being the IA just helps you know who. It's not meant to be a very powerful role like the assassin, just to tip the odds a little towards the innocents.

EDIT: For the record, that rule was based on one of mrxak's:

Quote

I ask that any such conversation does not reveal your own role. For example, saying that you are the Intelligence Agent and you just investigated the person you are talking to would be a violation. Telling the person that you believe they are innocent, and suggest they vote out somebody would not be a violation.

This post has been edited by orcaloverbri9 : 13 September 2008 - 11:57 PM

I think revealing you are the IA in public is perfectly fine. As long as it's not confirmed until death, it can be used by anybody who wants to save themselves if a vote's going their way. That quote was taken out of context, and what I was talking about was semi-private communications to which not all parties were apprised. It was a ban on IAs telling just one or two people who they were to gain undue influence over the game. If an IA is going to reveal themselves, they should do it for everyone. Remember, no role should be so overpowered as to overshadow the innocent role. Keeping the IA from wielding such incredible power over the game is a good thing. They get confirmation of their hunches and can make better votes and argue for such better votes. That's their power.

One thing I am absolutely opposed to is death posts that attempt to interfere with the game's natural progression. If you're the IA and you die, and you know who was guilty, the time to reveal that information was before you died, not after. If you're just a regular innocent, don't use your death post to further your grudges either. Keep it simple, like a "Oops, looks like I died, good luck people!" or just don't post anything at all.

It's one of these things where a game of GTW should correspond to a game of Mafia in real life. If you can't do it when you're all sitting in a circle in one room together, you shouldn't do it online.

See, here's the thing: revealing that you're the IA opens up an entirely new can of worms. Specifically, people can and WILL say they're the IA (I've seen it happen) when they know they aren't. By extension, when the IA says he/she is as such, people may be inclined not to believe it. I see this as unfair manipulation of the game, since with enough discipline and analysis, it's possible to intentionally create one of those outcomes for your own purposes. The simplest solution is to put a blanket ban on it. I'll be watching; if it turns out the game would have been better if I had not added that rule, I'll leave it out in the next game I host.

There are certainly worse things I could have done (make players who can't vote, are immune, and might get bad info, for instance), and a minor change in pace isn't necessarily a bad thing. Can we stop focusing on one rule and just start voting?

I see absolutely nothing wrong with people lying about their role. That's pretty much the basis of the game anyway. I just have a problem with people not telling everyone the same thing.

But you're right, you could do much worse, and I'll let this one go if your mind won't be changed.

I think I shall vote for

Spoiler

kickme

, because I know he has seen this topic but he's made no reply. He also made a lame attempt at complaining on IRC about not being a bad guy again. I find this sort of thing highly suspicious, as I've done the same thing myself when I was pure dagnasty evil.

GTW is more about the politics and diplomacy than the actual lynching, I see no problem with people making claims (or PMs for that matter) as long as they don't use the role PMs sent to them by you as evidence.

mrxak , I had already seen this topic, as, I'm sure, had others; but you jumped on kickme straight away. I find that suspicious.

prophile and kickme are clearly in cahoots. Probably not, but I just love the word cahoots. Cahoots!

Cahoots, aye? I'd vote for you just for that, but I'd like you to fire the first shot in our once-a-round rivalry.

I'm not interested in vendetta's spanning multiple games.

You were during the game signup. What could have sparked this change in interests? Hmm...

Again, guys, treat that rule as an experiment. I don't think it will significantly affect the game, but I want to see how it plays out.

I obviously have very, very little to go on at this point...
I am considering voting mrxak. Last round, he screwed things up pretty badly. Though the blame can't be completely given to him for the fiasco that was last round, mrxak's presence messed things up. From a bystander's point of view (I died early) I couldn't believe that mrxak could possibly not be a terrorist. His behavior just screamed "evil!" to me. He was not, in fact, evil. He did, however, draw enough fire that while trying to keep himself alive he was forced to direct attention to innocents who were killed. While being the center of attention every round he not only needed to direct the vote to other players to stay alive, it was very easy for him-- everyone listened to what mrxak said and whether they agreed or not, his voice was heard-- to bad he kept going for innocents. When Eugene Chin made a massive case against him at the end of the game, it was the most convincing post I've ever read, but in reality all it did was "confirm" the feelings I'd been having all game that mrxak must be a terrorist. Of course, he wasn't... he was just insane...
I hate to carry grudges from game to game. I've made my share of mistakes and I'd prefer to have them forgotten. At the same time, however, part of me feels that mrxak should die quickly in this game. This isn't a "grudge", really. I'm not angry at him. However, last game descended into absolute insane madness and eventually a loss for the innocents because mrxak was in it. It may not have been his fault entirely. It may have been the only thing he could do to stay alive... but as I said, this isn't a grudge because I'm mad at him personally. This is a vote (or rather might be a vote, I'm not sure yet, and I still have time) because when he's in the game, things get ######ed up.

Give me a reason to vote for someone else and I'll do it. Give me no reason to vote for anyone else or agree with this reasoning, and my vote goes to mrxak.

Hey guys, if we don't nag off of mrxak, the terrorists may decide to kill him anyway. That may or may not be a good thing, depending on the way you look at it...

For now, my vote is going for jrsh92 , because grudges that cross over from between games is not something that we need. They're very, very unlikely to nab terrorists. I think you're reading far too much into the events of the first round. May I point out that only six people, myself, you, mrxak, SIB, prophile, and Eugene Chin, have posted so far? We should consider those who haven't posted yet as possible terrorists as well, which is a fact you seem to have gleaned over.

This post has been edited by JacaByte : 14 September 2008 - 01:01 PM

Jacabyte, I didn't vote for mrxak! I was only stating that it might be the best course of action. I also stated that it was not a grudge against someone who I didn't like, which I would consider to be an actual grudge, and simply considering the fact that his style of play will often influence the game badly. People's actions in former games have always influenced the vote, be it how likely they are to be terrorists or especially how they act when they're terrorists... my consideration of mrxak was based on how he acts when he's innocent-- dangerously. Seeing as how I did not even vote at all while people like prophile and mrxak have made completely unfounded votes early in the game where nobody has any evidence, it seems unreasonable for you to jump on me for simply thinking out loud about who might be the best to kill. I used all the information we have-- who was mostly responsible, from my point of view, for the loss of last game. Not who was responsible for killing me, not who pissed me off-- that would be a grudge-- but who will be the biggest liability for the innocents if he is innocent, not to mention the person who is statistically most likely to be a terrorist anyway. Though mrxak's vote was somewhat justified, going after people for viewing but not responding when there's nothing to respond to, the justification was quite weak. Prophile went after mrxak for "jumping on" someone that early... but how is the first vote of the game ever supposed to happen if you get accused of that when you have no prior votes to go with? Both of the previous votes were badly or barely justified and you go after me for mentioning the events that happened last game and how they realistically could effect this game, calling it a "grudge" when I didnt' even vote?

This post has been edited by jrsh92 : 14 September 2008 - 01:13 PM

And in that entire block of text that I can see, you never addressed my point that grudges should never be carried over from previous games. You instead tried to blow it off with circular logic that your post was a suggestion that voting for mrxak was the best course of action. Pah. You may not have voted for mrxak, but you dang well made it sound like you were going to:

Quote

Give me a reason to vote for someone else and I'll do it. Give me no reason to vote for anyone else or agree with this reasoning, and my vote goes to mrxak.

(Post screen shot as well, because you like to edit your posts to change their meaning and pin people)

Your point that mrxak presents the most danger to the innocents is based off your assumption that he is a terrorist based off the events of GTW 30. If that isn't a grudge, I don't know what is. My vote for you stands; it sounds to me like you're trying to hide something.

@jacabyte, on Sep 14 2008, 12:41 PM, said in Global Thermonuclear War 31:

You were during the game signup. What could have sparked this change in interests? Hmm...

Just because I assumed (and correctly, considering it was the subject of your first post, in jest or not) that you were going to come after me as part of a grudge, does not mean that I have an interest in it.

Also, congrats guys, we're not on the second page yet and we've already had my name appear 37 times. I'm glad we learned our lesson about tunnel vision last game so well.

@jacabyte, on Sep 14 2008, 02:24 PM, said in Global Thermonuclear War 31:

Your point that mrxak presents the most danger to the innocents is based off your assumption that he is a terrorist based off the events of GTW 30. If that isn't a grudge, I don't know what is. My vote for you stands; it sounds to me like you're trying to hide something.

I'm not the only one who made the assumption that mrxak was a terrorist last game...
http://www.ambrosiasw.com/forums/index.php...t&p=1929668
http://www.ambrosiasw.com/forums/index.php...t&p=1929153
http://www.ambrosiasw.com/forums/index.php...t&p=1928722
http://www.ambrosiasw.com/forums/index.php...t&p=1929275 this was simply the very convincing case against him, seeing as how it came from a terrorist... as I said, it wasn't a grudge based on my subjective interpretation of his actions. It was based on an objective analysis of the fact that his actions caused so many interprettions that he was a terrorist.

Quote

And in that entire block of text that I can see, you never addressed my point that grudges should never be carried over from previous games. You instead tried to blow it off with circular logic that your post was a suggestion that voting for mrxak was the best course of action. Pah. You may not have voted for mrxak, but you dang well made it sound like you were going to:
(Post screen shot as well, because you like to edit your posts to change their meaning and pin people)

Once again, I see what you are saying with grudges but I think this is a different situation. It wasn't like "mrxak has had me killed the first round every game since 12! We have to kill him now!", it was "when mrxak participates in games, the innocents lose."
Additionally, seeing as how I haven't done that since my first or second game and even then only did it when I was facing certain death and wanted to piss people off, waving the "you edit posts flag!" every time anyone accuses me of anything, which has been done for the last several games, is not only a prime example of the grudges you don't want me holding, but it just plain silly.

Holy crap, have I really killed you every first round since game 12? Sorry dude.