T-I-G CIV: Spambot Apocalypse (Game Thread)

[Nerwen]

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Even the grim routines of cyber-slavery could not permanently crush the Downer spirit. Once they became accustomed to their toil– which this "day" consisted of repairing a broken bridge-like structure, the virtual representation of a damaged circuit– the slaves fell back into the human habit of chatting. As they compared notes, they began to realise something strange was going on. Some had heard bot-like noises in the cells adjoining theirs; others had intercepted part of a frantic transmission from Nerwen and Aganzir.

"Some of us," they said in whispers, trying to avoid the attention of their overseer-bots, "are not what they seem…"

But no-one could agree who was acting the most robot-like.

Some favoured Morsul the Dark, others Boro.

"It's Blind Guardian," Sally and Lottie argued. "She's not here, which is very evil of her indeed."

"Yes I am," Blind Guardian piped up. "Here, I mean, not evil. Wherever here is. Where are we? Who are we? How do we play this, again?"

"The poor thing's just disoriented," said the figure who occasionally looked like Karl Marx. "Leave her alone.”

"Rune's right," said Galadriel55, nodding her daffodil-bells. "We should lynch him instead."

"Good! Let me take care of him!" cried Legate, snatching up a light-whip that one of the overseer-bots had left lying around (there were a few glitches in their coding).

The whip extended as it lashed its target, spiralled up and down his virtual body, brightening into a column of unbearably brilliant energy.

When it faded, there was no sign of Rune.

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In the real world, another young coma patient gave up his feeble grip on life. Another family mourned.

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Living
Inziladun
Galadriel55
Sally
Legate
Kitanna
Boromir88
Blind Guardian
Loslote
Morsul the Dark
Shasta


Dead
Coppermirror, Lommy– seized by Adult Friend Finder.
Nerwen, Aganzir– poisoned by webcrawlers.
Rune– lashed to death with overseer-bot’s light whip. (Ordinary cyber-slave.)

It is now Night Two.

[Nerwen]

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Inziladun had his own plans for escape. During the day’s labours, he had managed to palm a small ICE pick (ICE of course standing for “Intrusion Countermeasures Electronics”). With this, he hoped, he might weaken the code that defined his cell. Waiting until the bot-guards had passed by on their rounds, Zil drove the pick into the wall again and again. Fissures ran out from the point of impact, and the circuit-like patterns of the walls and ceiling were flickering, changing.

Then, alarms screeched and the clattering steps of spiderbots raced towards his prison.

"tom not like humans. humans bad,” the crimson-eyed bot muttered as it entered.

“Tom! What did I say? –This person,” Lucy announced officiously, " has performed an illegal operation and will be shut down.” Wresting the pick from Zil’s hand with her hideous claw, she hammered it into his skull, causing his head to explode.

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Living
Galadriel55
Sally
Legate
Kitanna
Boromir88
Blind Guardian
Loslote
Morsul the Dark
Shasta


Dead
Coppermirror, Lommy– seized by Adult Friend Finder.
Nerwen, Aganzir– poisoned by webcrawlers.
Rune– lashed to death with overseer-bot’s light whip. (Ordinary cyber-slave.)
Inziladun– ICE pick to the head. (Ordinary cyber-slave.)

Day Two has begun.

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[Galadriel55]

Nooooooo! Zil, you shall be avenged!

I was going to go through his posts, but I realise I'm out of time - I have to take the early bus to school today, and I'm coming home very late. At the moment, though, I can remember that Zil mentioned Seers a lot in his conversation with me. Could that have triggered some HINT button with the bots? I can't tell without rereading, and no time for that, but maybe someone else can take the idea?...

[Morsul the Dark]

Can't do too much have to et ready for work but I will say this. Zil is apparently a wraith both living and dead according to the list.

Truly though a real look through will come tonight after work.

[Boromir88]

For what it's worth, if I had been around to vote yesterday it would have been Morsul. Eventhough if Rune's posting didn't help his case, his first post was titled "Robocop" which I read as an intentional gifted hint. (Robocop being a very bad - but kind of adorably campy 80s movie about a cop who is killed but then gets robotically engineered to continue fighting crime. That would have made me wary enough to not vote Rune on day 1.)

Where G55 and Morsul were giving the biggest "I'm the hacker" vibes. G55 doing it intentionally and in Morsul's case more of just Morsul always being the most confusing.

It typically gets me into trouble, but really it's just silly if we think we know who the hacker is but decide "oh hey, we need to lynch bots not the hacker, so let's vote for someone else who looks shady, even if G55 is intentionally looking hackerish." I mean yeah, we have to lynch the bots, but at the same time, if someone's going out of their way looking like the hacker, they either are the hacker and it would be better off to lynch sooner rather than later. Or their a bot playing the hacker because they know the reaction is going to be "oh we have to kill bots, not the hacker." If the hacker wants to be the early lynch sacrifice that's far less damaging than just letting the hacker stay around indefinitely. When we know the bots aren't going to kill the role and when the lynches get more crucial making it easier for the bots and hacker to join forces and push the lynches to their favor.

All this going to say G55 and Morsul are topping my suspicions based off of yesterday's activity. Spammer or hacker, evil behavior is bad and we would all be better off to rid the virtual town of it,

[Kitanna]

Originally Posted by Boromir88

For what it's worth, if I had been around to vote yesterday it would have been Morsul.

If ifs and buts were candy and nuts we'd all have a bowl of granola.

I have a few hours before work so I'm going to run through Zil's posts and whoever else I have time for.

1) Mostly banter though he does have this to say in response to Rune's "smokescreen" comment

A spambot might consider openly questioning the number of its kind, certainly. So might the innocent, though. At any rate, it's rather vexing to not know what we're facing. I guess I'll go on the assumption that there are three 'bots. Since there are only 11 players, and there's a Hacker to assist them, that would seem reasonable.

2) More banter, but he does go back to the bot count

We don't know the number of the bots, but it's really not that important. Concentrate on getting one at a time and go from there.

3) Refers to a comment made by Morsul.

Originally Posted by Morsul

Though we could take G55's "I'm a wolf" comment at face value like hahaha see a wolf wouldn't actually say that.

Zil says this is highly doubtful, but that G55 is up to something. Makes reference to her being a seer dream target.
4) More back and forth with G55's odd behavior.
5)

This reaction is interesting. The last sentence is conceivably a Hacker giving the bots a nod across a crowded room. I'd think Boro would be more subtle than that, but such hinting is difficult to achieve and dangerous to attempt.

In response to Boro's own banter post. Given how much banter he was partaking in seems odd he'd jump on Boro's.
6) More back and forth with G55.
7) More on drawing the seer's attention and a comment about G55's "I'm a wolf" statement, stating it bears looking at.
8)

Nothing concrete, just something to keep in mind.

Points again to Boro's comment, particularly the last sentence.

Originally Posted by Boro

How do you even begin finding the bots?

Which taken out of context looks fishy.
9) Comments on Morsul's vote saying it looked innocent enough and if Morsul abstained it would have been more suspicious.
10) Response to a moddess clarification about the hacker and seer dreams.
11) Admits his suspicions are weak, but feels that Boro is shady and votes for him.
So a couple of possible theories about Zil's death
1) He was killed by bots he didn't mention so as to lead a path to those he did (G55 and Boro specifically) This leaves most of village liable.
2) G55 or Boro or both are bots and thought Zil was seer. Now having been subjected to both of them as baddies I don't know if they'd be so careless as to attack Zil like that given the trail leads to directly to them.
I'd say theory one is more believable. Zil mentioned very few people and those he did were mostly offhand remarks, banter, or flimsy suspcions based on little information.

[Morsul the Dark]

Originally Posted by Boromir88

I'd rather we have wolves. Spambots are nasty business. Years I've spent honing my wolf lynching skills, only to now have spammers. How do you even begin finding the bots?

Originally Posted by Boromir88

For what it's worth, if I had been around to vote yesterday it would have been Morsul. Eventhough if Rune's posting didn't help his case, his first post was titled "Robocop" which I read as an intentional gifted hint. (Robocop being a very bad - but kind of adorably campy 80s movie about a cop who is killed but then gets robotically engineered to continue fighting crime. That would have made me wary enough to not vote Rune on day 1.)

Where G55 and Morsul were giving the biggest "I'm the hacker" vibes. G55 doing it intentionally and in Morsul's case more of just Morsul always being the most confusing.

It typically gets me into trouble, but really it's just silly if we think we know who the hacker is but decide "oh hey, we need to lynch bots not the hacker, so let's vote for someone else who looks shady, even if G55 is intentionally looking hackerish." I mean yeah, we have to lynch the bots, but at the same time, if someone's going out of their way looking like the hacker, they either are the hacker and it would be better off to lynch sooner rather than later. Or their a bot playing the hacker because they know the reaction is going to be "oh we have to kill bots, not the hacker." If the hacker wants to be the early lynch sacrifice that's far less damaging than just letting the hacker stay around indefinitely. When we know the bots aren't going to kill the role and when the lynches get more crucial making it easier for the bots and hacker to join forces and push the lynches to their favor.

All this going to say G55 and Morsul are topping my suspicions based off of yesterday's activity. Spammer or hacker, evil behavior is bad and we would all be better off to rid the virtual town of it,

Boro's two posts... I want to hear a lot more from him. I think he keeps trying to steer us away from bots onto the hacker. If we assume BG is the Hacker(My current thought) that makes Boro a bot... if Shasta is a bot there's our circle of Evil

x'ed since my last.

[Morsul the Dark]

Ok quick before I go to work.


The votes for Rune::

Morsul: Like I said flimsy reasons but only first vote.

BG:Okay he has reasons about as strong as mine. So not too bad

G55: Voted for Rune to save me.

Legate: Votes pretty much same reason as G55 also pushed Rune over the top. Also hope his arm is Ok.

Out of these G55 and Legate are the most suspicious. I am very aware that my style makes me an easy target, as such I'm wary when people protect me, as it gives the baddies an easy lynch at a more critical time.



The votes for me:

Kitanna: Seems normal.

Rune: Makes sense now.

Shasta: Put me in the lead. But could be an innocent hoping for the best or a bot looking for an easy target

All in all not much to go on with these votes.



Votes for BG

Lottie and Sally

Both these are either overly safe votes or wreckless. Sally in my experience usually puts more thought into votes so hers is very unsettling.

Lottie's vote looks like typical not much to go on Day one stuff.


So all in all G55 and legate are my two top suspicions but mostly by default.

Followed by Sally.

Then after a wide margin Shasta.

x'ed Boro

[Nerwen]

Originally Posted by Morsul the Dark

Can't do too much have to et ready for work but I will say this. Zil is apparently a wraith both living and dead according to the list.

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“Ooops...” the spectral voice whispered.

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