On exmachina64
Tbh, early posts didn't really bother me, I left his early interaction with Sorian with a null read
You guys make good points. StarSketch and Style both seem suspicious, but I'm tentatively leaning toward Style at this point.
It was an OMGUS vote, but I can see why you'd need to deflect suspicion from yourself.
I agree with Exodu5 that having three inactive players is hurting the game. Currently, I don't feel strongly enough toward players like Style or Vanguard to vote for them. For the moment, I'm going to vote for BlackBuzzard. Hopefully, Rynam, BlackBuzzard and Kerned can be more active today.
VOTE: BlackBuzzard
Also, BlackBuzzard's been relatively active on GAF since they last posted.
NOTE: less to do with rule break so much as the general pattern and attitude that would lead to this
Sorry.
I'll keep Rats in mind also.
The two who stand out most to me now are Style and PK Gaming. Style seems pretty frantic at this point, which could just be normal townie behavior if he's worried. Like others have said, PK Gaming jumped in at just the right moment to say he's still around and shift attention to Style.
Iirc, this was the post where I officially noted exmachina down as giving me a scummy vibe
The narrative isn't that you're mostly gone, it's that you're lurking and maintaining silence.
And you just admitted to it.
So when someone mentioned you today, you chimed in and attempted to deflect suspicion.
Fran definitely has an aggressive play style so far. I can't tell if he's a Persona user or a Shadow, but it's a bold play on his part.
Given that I'm scumreading fran, this post is exactly the sort of "oh, my scum teammate might be a little suspicious, yeah I guess I could see that, idk, but here's a post where I'm not ignoring my scum teammate while still not saying anything substantial"
My current five shadows are Style, PK Gaming, Vanguard, StarSketch and BlackBuzzard.
I would say something about me being so far on the other side of exmachina64 on these reads, but that's not affecting me (if anything someone I clash too hard with I might just town read really hard too) so much as the general mindset that seemed to go into these picks
I'm giving Style the benefit of the doubt for now with his power role claim and PK Gaming hasn't been around enough for me to strongly suspect him currently. Vanguard, Hyperactive and Exodu5 are my current suspects. In particular, I think Hyperactive and Exodu5 are working together.
Whatever man
I can't back it up at all right about now (because my vote is on you), but I'm fine with either of you and exodu5 being lynched
ALRIGHTY THEN
Analyzing time:
I actually analyzed the franconp post separately because it was a separate reason for my scum read, not as hard as my main reason for it. I started going through his posts thinking it was only a few posts that bothered me, before noticing that no, it's in more posts than I thought. I underlined/bolded the posts that especially bothered me:
In general, I'm seeing a tendency from exmachina64 to try and go on the offensive and accusatory, to find or create or come up with reasons to accuse other players and try and stick on them. In a scummy sort of fashion, he seems to be playing so as to push attention onto others and away from himself.
For example, the first post that I underlined, regarding him mentioned BB being on GAF. I don't care about him accidentally doing a rule break here, it's more that he had mentioned BB as being inactive, then seemingly goes out of his way to note down that BB is active on GAF and mention to put suspicion on him. He's creating reasons to be suspicious, and more damning is that he did it AFTER he votes for BB
The 2nd post was his post where he suspects PK Gamign and Style. The PK Gaming point:
Like others have said, PK Gaming jumped in at just the right moment to say he's still around and shift attention to Style.
again, feels like exmachina64 is trying to search/create reasons to be suspicious of others. It doesn't sit right with me. It's too conspiratorial or hypothetical, throwing out shade/suspicion without much actual substance while trying to create the illusion that there is something of substance behind the accusation.
The narrative isn't that you're mostly gone, it's that you're lurking and maintaining silence.
And you just admitted to it.
So when someone mentioned you today, you chimed in and attempted to deflect suspicion.
His 3rd post, again, does a similar thing for me. Creating reasons for suspicion, reasons to be on the offensive, etc.
Why do I think this is scummy? Because it's a good strategy for scum to use, or at least, a common one. Find specific issues or flaws across the thread, use those errors or contradictions or oddities you notice that aren't always that indicative of scum to come up with your scum list (so that you don't have to worry about your knowledge about who is and isn't scum mess you up, because you're solely relying on the things you pointed out)
Want an example of what I'm talking about? On pages 14 and 15 (up until I posted my reads list), I hadn't caught up with the thread, and so all my "posts" or "arguments" up until that point dealt more with errors or issues any alignment could really catch. Just before I posted my reads list, on page 15, I had a big post (Post #714)
http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showpost.php?p=224863995&postcount=714
K, all done. This post is more snark than reads, btw
I specified this specifically to clarify that the things I mentioned there weren't being taken into that much consideration for my reads
My previous discussion with franconp and Sorian was similar, in that while I was taking issue with how franconp discussed read lists that was something I think I could do quite easily regardless of alignment, but if I'm scum it's useful because they put the pressure on other posters, franconp and Sorian.
Almost every time I've played scum, hell, ESPECIALLY the first time, in Election Mafia, where I started off really timid until I figured out how to focus on just pointing out the logic that didn't make sense and focusing on accusing others, it's easier for me to find a target or a few people that bother me and waste my time butting heads or going after them. I didn't really focus as much on taking a wider view of as many players as possible, and any players I didn't feel I could have that decent of a case for I would just do a "yeah maybe, I guess I could see them being scum or town, it's a possibility, they're a decent player". And that's exactly what I feel exmachina64 is doing.
For posterity's sake, I feel similar about franconp, and somewhat similar about FluxWaveZ (although apparently he's like this ALOT, so I'm less sure I think on him)