The Hobbit Mafia [Town win]

[Thorthoth]

If I were to design a The Hobbit mafia game with 16 players, I would do it like this. I'm going off the book here.

Town: Gandalf, Bilbo, Elrond, Bard, The Lord of the Eagles, Thorin, a five of the more important dwarves. Which dwarves are more 'important'?

Scum: Sauron/Necromancer, Gollum, and two other scummy types... since Nazgul and Orcs aren't in The Hobbit, maybe giant spiders and trolls (...ha).

Serial Killer: Smaug

Game balance-wise, Smaug would have to be fairly powerful but with a big Achille's heel, maybe Bard would be able to check for his identity once each night and kill him immediately if found.

[BuJaber]

Here's my issue with people trying to guess the setup using theme characters: when they start going into details of how so and so would be like this or x character will have x ability or x has to be scum etc etc , it is HIGHLY unlikely that they are the character they are discussing so deeply, especially if it's not a town character. So whether they are innocent (town) or not, they are focusing the attention elsewhere.

So far I have come up with three ways to go about this (in no particular order):
1. We end the day as fast as possible. This forum is generally aggressively against a no-lynch on day 1, so in most cases ending the day means jumping on a bandwagon quickly. This is probably in scum's best interests, though there have been a few times where someone has picked up on something minor and managed to convince people to run with it and happened to be right. But the point is getting information. From the way the voting goes in day 1 and then from the night phase which gives us actual info on setup. This is not a great option, but better than discussing irrelevant stuff for days and then people start getting tunnel vision about who's who.

2. Seeing as so far Smaug seems to be the most talked about/feared, we lynch someone who could be him from the list of people who haven't hypothesized about his existence. That list is already finalized. So someone can't start talking about him now for an easy way to get out of it (me included). Does that mean people who mentioned him are not scum? Of course not, but they've also put themselves at the top of the candidate list for day 2, or at least day 1 investigative targets. So we'll be able to look at them closely later.

3. We let everyone continue on talking until someone guesses something about the setup that town knows is definitely wrong. This will probably happen eventually, but like I said in option 1, could also distract town and makes us talk for days and start latching on to people based on nothing concrete. Once your gut tells you something it can be very difficult to force yourself to have a neutral perspective about someone. Also I don't want us ending up lynching someone simply because we don't have a better option and we don't understand what they're doing.

For the record Thor seems to be all over the place and confused. I don't know him enough to know how good an actor he is, but I'm inclined to think he's town. And that's exactly the type of bullshit first impression I'm scared about

[Thorthoth]

For the record Thor seems to be all over the place and confused. I don't know him enough to know how good an actor he is, but I'm inclined to think he's town. And that's exactly the type of bullshit first impression I'm scared about

Here we go again... I'm just speculating to see if some rational inference can be detected... It's Day 1, everybody should be all over the place. If there is a Day 1 lynch it will be random... but I do think a non-participatory player should be lynched, just to give incentive for players to stay active and keep this game interesting (yawn.).

[DirtyDishSoap]

It's more or less the same "playstyle" he has had in a game I have hosted. More or less, he spent more time asking questions and trying to play the noob card until he beat an already dead horse.

BUT, there's no determining a pattern with him due to lack of actual gameplay from him.

[Thorthoth]

It's more or less the same "playstyle" he has had in a game I have hosted. More or less, he spent more time asking questions and trying to play the noob card until he beat an already dead horse.

BUT, there's no determining a pattern with him due to lack of actual gameplay from him.

DDS's criticism doesn't hold water..I am involved and thinking about the game. That is game play. What is DDS's game play? Trying to start a gang-up on an other player over a NON-reason?
...or maybe, DDS has something personal against me that is completely unrelated to this game....

[dakky21]

I don't think that DDS has anything against you, but it is true, your game play is starting to be boring. If you will always question how things work, your game play will be the same whether you're scum or town, becoming another Mitch. Though, even Mitch has a pattern when he is town and when he is scum. So you get what I mean.

[madmitch]

f*ck here we go again , if it ain't Doom it's Dakky ,come on guys give me a break, I am trying to change my game style so back off, thank god the only Doom I have to worry about is Doom mountain, now lets get to the game , now according to movie or book there was 13 dwarfs 1 hobbit and 1 wizard, so that should cover the hat argument, now I am sure that there is trolls and a nasty dragon and who knows what else is out there ? and in the posts I read I just see all explanations of this story ,way too many as far as I am concerned,and Thort you are trying to hard to impress us ,I am not sure if you are town or not

[Thorthoth]

Hmm, maybe I'm volunteering a necessary service.
Merely by posting something thought-provoking I create the rock for all the barnacles to cling too.
It's Day 1, we have nothing to go on but theorizing about The Hobbit theme.

Would somebody count up the posts and then we can lynch a non-poster and get this game really going.

Bring on the night*.

*...and no, I'm not saying I want the night because I'm scum, I'm saying that because Day 1 is useless.

[dakky21]

Would somebody count up the posts and then we can lynch a non-poster and get this game really going.

Bring on the night*.

*...and no, I'm not saying I want the night because I'm scum, I'm saying that because Day 1 is useless.

Exactly this what you wrote is the reason why Day 1 is NOT useless. You want to lynch an inactive instead of wanting to replace the inactives and you want it no matter what. You're scum again, aren't you? I'm thorn between you and BuJaber.

[Thorthoth]

Would somebody count up the posts and then we can lynch a non-poster and get this game really going.

Bring on the night*.

*...and no, I'm not saying I want the night because I'm scum, I'm saying that because Day 1 is useless.

Exactly this what you wrote is the reason why Day 1 is NOT useless. You want to lynch an inactive instead of wanting to replace the inactives and you want it no matter what. You're scum again, aren't you? I'm thorn between you and BuJaber.

No... I'm not scum.

Fine, let's vote 'no lynch' and get the day over with. Even that would be better than this purgatory..

[Minister Masket]

The Uruk-hai are merely a specific type of warrior Orc, "Uruk" being the black speech term for "Orc" and "Hai" the term for "Folk", so to refer to them simply as Orcs is perfectly valid. Gollum's torture in Mordor is the main catalyst for the advance of Sauron's forces across Middle-earth, both Thranduil and Gondor may still have been standing at the time the Fellowship passed them had Gollum died during the events of The Hobbit, and even if they had not, it is likely that The Fellowship would have set off from Rivendell sooner than a full month after the Council of Elrond with Frodo uninjured. Had they left earlier the weather in Redhorn Pass may well have been different, potentially allowing the Fellowship to circumvent Moria altogether. It is worth noting that it only took a further 27 days for The Ring to be destroyed from the date The Fellowship became split up, they would therefore likely have had the issues with Boromir during downtime in or around the city of Minas Tirith, making it far easier for them to regroup, and far less likely that they would have become fully split up at that point. Surely with the full group or at least a larger group still together when they reached Mordor it is likely that another of their group would be able to lead Frodo through the mountains, and rather importantly doing so without deliberately passing through Shelob's lair.

It sounds like yer taking your knowledge from the book trilogy mainly.
Now that might be granting you a slight advantage here because it's been over a decade since I last read em, so I'm using the films (plus a lore dictionary of sorts) for reference.

That being said, just want to mainly rebuttal those two underlined points up there.
Saruman and his spies were influencing the weather and conditions around the mountain passes, so I'm not convinced the Fellowship could've avoided Moria. Even if they had, we then might not have gotten Super Gandalf.
And I'm pretty certain the only beings aware of the secret Ungol pass were Gollum, Shelob and the few orcs up there. Certainly no-one on the forces of good knew about it.

And correct me if I'm wrong, but Gondor was very much still standing at the time of the war. Weak-ish yes, but that was overwhelmingly more to do with the Great Plague and Easterling attacks than Sauron's orcs.

I'm not. And I'm getting tired of your back and forth LotR talk with MM btw, it doesn't bring anything to the discussion.

On the contrary, you are now learning many, many Tolkien facts that you can now impress the girls with at your local library.

[Minister Masket]

In any event, I hate Days 1 with a passion and continue my stance in other games, and would rather proceed with a no lynch. Potentially gain way more knowledge on Days 2, rather than throwing the finger blindly.

[Pikanchion]

We are not going to lynch somebody for not posting actively, not yet anyway. Any serious attempt to lynch somebody for activity should be put on hold at least until a replacement is found for one or both of our absentee players, posting infrequently without providing much help is scummy, never posting at all means they're not even playing.

This being day 1 the town also has it in their interests to not simply lynch an inactive with no debate. This would leave the town in largely the same position as the day before on day 2, having basically given the scum a free kill. This is why the joke-vote stage of a game is important, it helps the town get reads on people, observe who will vote for whomever else and how far they may go with it, perhaps even sheepishly back out of a lynch they started.

Complaining about my debate with Minister Masket is akin to saying we should either make claims on day 1 or lynch entirely randomly (as what else is there to go on?), neither of which are likely help us compared to a well debated lynch, whatever the reasoning behind it. Meanwhile, as I have said before, I think it is important to know if anybody is playing more than one Dwarf, could anybody who is not doing so please state as much?

[Pikanchion]

That being said, just want to mainly rebuttal those two underlined points up there.
Saruman and his spies were influencing the weather and conditions around the mountain passes, so I'm not convinced the Fellowship could've avoided Moria. Even if they had, we then might not have gotten Super Gandalf.
And I'm pretty certain the only beings aware of the secret Ungol pass were Gollum, Shelob and the few orcs up there. Certainly no-one on the forces of good knew about it.

And correct me if I'm wrong, but Gondor was very much still standing at the time of the war. Weak-ish yes, but that was overwhelmingly more to do with the Great Plague and Easterling attacks than Sauron's orcs.

It is true that Saruman was integral to the weather conditions in the pass, but again this is somewhat dependant on Gollum's torture and Sauron's early advance, with the Nazgûl having chased the Hobbits right up to Rivendell it was clear that The Fellowship would be forced through the mountains somewhere in that general region. Without this knowledge, or even having gotten this knowledge a little later it may have given the time necessary to traverse the mountains before Saruman blocked it. To my knowledge Gandalf's new colour was merely a display of his new heirachical position within the Istari upon his resurrection, rather than an increase in his powers, although I may be wrong on that.

It is true that few others knew the pass Gollum used, however among that number were both Faramir and Gandalf. Meanwhile with both Aragorn and Legolas capable rangers, they may well have been capable of finding another (albeit much slower, and likely just as dangerous) route through the mountains if required.

[madmitch]

I thought this game is based on the Hobbit ,not the whole LOTR's storyline, so let's concentrate on this story line and not the whole series or we will never get anywhere. I don't think we should have a no-lynch yet and we should give the inactive players some time,I don't like the ideal of rushing to night because that is the scums favorite time

[Skoffin]

Gollum is not a bad guy, he just wants friends.

Out of interest, why do people keep separating 'scum' from roles such as SK? You know that scum just means 'evil non-town roles' right? So mafia and SK will be scum roles. Just something I've noticed and that has been triggering me badly.

And I would appreciate it if people would lay off Thor a bit; he certainly could be scum but that doesn't mean we need to be dickheads about his playstyle. He's new FFS, give him time to develop his ability and playstyle. I'd rather we not run off one of the few new players we have thanks.

I am not playing multiple roles in the sense you speak of, but several players here are in fact my multis. Come at me.

I hope I'm reading between the lines wrong and you're not painting a target on your back here with the role you claim to be...

Don't worry, it's just a joke mate.

[ZaBeast]

We are not going to lynch somebody for not posting actively, not yet anyway. Any serious attempt to lynch somebody for activity should be put on hold at least until a replacement is found for one or both of our absentee players, posting infrequently without providing much help is scummy, never posting at all means they're not even playing.

You're right we should not be lynching people who are going to get replaced anyways, at least at this point in the game, so let me Unvote my joke vote. However, I feel like if no major scum tell has appeared and the consensus is we should lynch anyways, town (I don't agree with absolutely having to lynch, see at the bottom of the post, which is why I'm not saying "we" instead of "town, not because I am not town (because I am town, obviously)) is better off lynching one of the semi-inactive people, since at worst someone who isn't helping much gets killed (though actively contributing people can do a lot of harm to town, see lion king mafia and the mandy situation).

Complaining about my debate with Minister Masket is akin to saying we should either make claims on day 1 or lynch entirely randomly (as what else is there to go on?), neither of which are likely help us compared to a well debated lynch, whatever the reasoning behind it. Meanwhile, as I have said before, I think it is important to know if anybody is playing more than one Dwarf, could anybody who is not doing so please state as much?

Of course a lynch should be debated to see the relationships between people. However, your debate is more like small talk when you discuss the book (and the wrong one) without making the discussion advance to make it look like you're contributing. I don't see how that's helping town's interests. As such, FOS MM for only posting LotR small talk. Pika, I've got my eye on you as well. About people playing more than one dwarf, I don't really see the difference it would make. It is likely that they are not all attributed, so why would it matter if someone has two characters (which would be kind of odd, btw)? Someone claiming two characters is either lying or Gollum IMO, both not good signs about his lifespan (though Gollum would likely be less detrimental to town than Smaug. I personnally would see him as a survivor)

Here's my issue with people trying to guess the setup using theme characters: when they start going into details of how so and so would be like this or x character will have x ability or x has to be scum etc etc , it is HIGHLY unlikely that they are the character they are discussing so deeply, especially if it's not a town character. So whether they are innocent (town) or not, they are focusing the attention elsewhere.

I'd argue that games where mafia members are "trying" to "guess" who the bad guys are are probably not that uncommun (if not it would be too easy to know who is town, right?). Therefore, I don't see why other non-town roles couldn't "guess" their roles (along with others of course). Especially for people like Smaug for wich there is not that many likely options as a role, if it is in the setup (which it probably is).

So far I have come up with three ways to go about this (in no particular order):
1. We end the day as fast as possible. This forum is generally aggressively against a no-lynch on day 1, so in most cases ending the day means jumping on a bandwagon quickly. This is probably in scum's best interests, though there have been a few times where someone has picked up on something minor and managed to convince people to run with it and happened to be right. But the point is getting information. From the way the voting goes in day 1 and then from the night phase which gives us actual info on setup. This is not a great option, but better than discussing irrelevant stuff for days and then people start getting tunnel vision about who's who.

2. Seeing as so far Smaug seems to be the most talked about/feared, we lynch someone who could be him from the list of people who haven't hypothesized about his existence. That list is already finalized. So someone can't start talking about him now for an easy way to get out of it (me included). Does that mean people who mentioned him are not scum? Of course not, but they've also put themselves at the top of the candidate list for day 2, or at least day 1 investigative targets. So we'll be able to look at them closely later.

3. We let everyone continue on talking until someone guesses something about the setup that town knows is definitely wrong. This will probably happen eventually, but like I said in option 1, could also distract town and makes us talk for days and start latching on to people based on nothing concrete. Once your gut tells you something it can be very difficult to force yourself to have a neutral perspective about someone. Also I don't want us ending up lynching someone simply because we don't have a better option and we don't understand what they're doing.

1. I believe the two lines I underlined kinda contradict each other. Just picking a lynch candidate semi-randomly and having everyone vote for him is not going to give us any information. If we manage to pick scum, the other scumsters won't try to divert the vote because it would already be a done deal (and they'd look very scummy) and will just vote for him. If we pick town, mafia members will be all too happy to have a free kill. Either way we get no info.
2. See what I said above.
3. I think the (irl) days will start dragging on if we just talk on and on about the setup and there is not that much info to be gained from it (very few, if any, significant interactions between people if they just discuss the setup). We should at least wait for the replacement(s?) before ending the day though.

Of course, the best scenario would be to catch a scum doing a mistake. I do believe though that between lynching randomly and not lynching at all, not lynching at all would be preferable. As I said, lynching randomly would give no info and make scum very happy. I know that's not the meta in here so I won't advocate further for a no lynch, though don't expect me to vote for someone "because we need to lynch somebody". Once I get a better opinion of the other players, I'll vote on the one I find the scummiest

[dakky21]

And I would appreciate it if people would lay off Thor a bit; he certainly could be scum but that doesn't mean we need to be dickheads about his playstyle. He's new FFS, give him time to develop his ability and playstyle. I'd rather we not run off one of the few new players we have thanks.

Says the former scum mate of Thor in Mass Effect mafia. Yeah, don't be a dickhead. Let him play his style more so he can use "the newbie" card again. Are you sided with him, again?!

[MudPuppy]

Not crazy about the no lynch talk as I'm not convinced we'll have any significant information other than a dead dwarf (or worse). IF (big IF), the 13-14 adventurers are all townies, then the no lynch option is more favorable than it normally would be... but I'm highly skeptical all the adventurers are good. We should not end the day without a lynch.

Yes, it is far too early to end D1. Yes, D1's generally suck and nobody should expect any real scum tells to emerge (but who knows).... Two players haven't even joined yet and talk of doing a quick bandwagon vote are misguided. I definitely have a hard time understanding why someone would not make a single post for 4 days after reading their role. The dude's profile says he's in Michigan so no Irma power-outage excuse and he last visited the CC this afternoon. Not going to rush it but if the guy doesn't want to participate than I'm more than happy to steer my vote his way.

While the LoTR back and forth is a bit annoying, I just see it as harmless banter between the two trying to one-up each other... No scum tells there.

Not sure how new of a newb Thor is but I'd echo backing off him. Often ultra-defensiveness is attributed to scum... and he's definitely being ultra-defensive. On one hand, perhaps it's worth pushing him even harder (dakky)... and I think Thor has brought a decent bit of pressure on himself... but I still don't feel comfortable with it. Newbs doing weird sh*t often make easy lynches and I'm not interested in going down that path atm.

[Skoffin]

I don't think people trying to guess characters/setup is going to do much to show what alignment they are; scum would certainly join in on that as speculating if a good way to appear active without actually doing a whole lot. It's safer to speculate than it is to openly state your stance on other players, hence my believe that those speculating may very well have scum amongst them. For that reason I am wary of both Pika and Masket. Though they may just be keen to have a reason to talk lore; but we shall see, for now they are both on my fos list.

And I would appreciate it if people would lay off Thor a bit; he certainly could be scum but that doesn't mean we need to be dickheads about his playstyle. He's new FFS, give him time to develop his ability and playstyle. I'd rather we not run off one of the few new players we have thanks.

Says the former scum mate of Thor in Mass Effect mafia. Yeah, don't be a dickhead. Let him play his style more so he can use "the newbie" card again. Are you sided with him, again?!

Yes, I am obviously his mafia-buddy again. I'm not suggesting you can't be suspicious of his playstyle or state why you find it so, I'm just saying we don't need to be dicks in the manner that we state it. You're welcome to keep accusing him, I just find the manner in which you do so to be somewhat distasteful.
For the record, I do believe some of his apparent newbieness is genuine.

[Thorthoth]

I thought this game is based on the Hobbit ,not the whole LOTR's storyline, so let's concentrate on this story line and not the whole series or we will never get anywhere.

Thank you, mitch, exactly. LOTR will probably be the next mafia game so everybody can save all that fascinating trivia for then.

[quote="dakky21'']

[quote="Skoffin'']
And I would appreciate it if people would lay off Thor a bit; he certainly could be scum but that doesn't mean we need to be dickheads about his playstyle. He's new FFS, give him time to develop his ability and playstyle. I'd rather we not run off one of the few new players we have thanks.[/quote]



Says the former scum mate of Thor in Mass Effect mafia. Yeah, don't be a dickhead. Let him play his style more so he can use "the newbie" card again. Are you sided with him, again?![/quote]

What the heck? Are you two playing good cop/bad cop? I haven't done anything scummy and everybody knows it. If dakky really thinks everything is the same as last game, that must mean he's a cult recruiter again.. He's (probably) not, but that shows what his arguments are based on: nothing.

Seriously, Day 1 is a waste and a blind lynch is more likely to take out a townie, so I'm fine with voting 'no lynch' and moving on to the first Night, ...and Night isn't just scum's kill-time. It's also a great time for power-role townies to gather information.

Vote No Lynch

[Skoffin]

[Pikanchion]

Seriously, Day 1 is a waste and a blind lynch is more likely to take out a townie, so I'm fine with voting 'no lynch' and moving on to the first Night, ...and Night isn't just scum's kill-time. It's also a great time for power-role townies to gather information.

Vote No Lynch

Every day a blind lynch is more likely to hit a townie, every day a blind lynch will be all we're left with if we no lynch and the relevant town power roles (which may or may not even exist) don't get lucky with who they investigate, any standard mafia game is designed around scum having a stronger night game than town. No lynch or activity lynch day one are bad for town, unwillingness to debate a lynch day one hurts the town's efforts to scum hunt on later days.

Unvote: Skoffin
Vote: Thorthoth

I thought this game is based on the Hobbit ,not the whole LOTR's storyline, so let's concentrate on this story line and not the whole series or we will never get anywhere.

Thank you, mitch, exactly. LOTR will probably be the next mafia game so everybody can save all that fascinating trivia for then.

How exactly would a debate over Gollum dying during the events of The Hobbit and its consequences be relevant during a LOTR trilogy mafia game?

[Thorthoth]

PIka, I think your last post just gave off a majorly scummy stench... but I want to hear what everybody else thinks.

I'm asking, folks: Which is scummier: suggesting a 'No Lynch' on Day 1 or trying to lynch the guy that suggested the 'No Lynch'?

If the consensus is that Pika is being scummy, we don't need to worry about a blind lynch. We can just lynch Pika.

Right now, I''ll just say FOS @ Pika but I may switch that to a vote if enough experienced players concur.

btw, read Pika's fine print too. What is he talking about?? Gollum died at the end of LOTR.

[Skoffin]

No-lynching is anti-town because it disadvantages town, not scum. Unless we believe that town has a stronger night game than scum does then we must lynch, and as it stands we have no reason to believe that town is stronger at night than scum. So pika is not scummy on that particular basis.