Tol-in-Gaurhoth CXIV – The Evil Breath of Morgoth in Dor-lómin, game thread

[Eönwë]

And again, it's mid-game, I don't think it's too bold for an Infector (in this case Lommy) to have gone all-out on the Sally quarantining. Since she's already in the public eye as suspicious, she doesn't have much to lose by being in the spotlight, and the end result is that a non-wolf got lynched.

[Loslote]

So while I have a bit of time, I'm going to go through and take a look at something I consider very suspicious: the way Lommy talks about Boro in the context of the late Mac voters - or rather, the way she really doesn't talk about him at all. To begin with, she goes through the votes themselves:

Originally Posted by Thinlómien

Sally -> Macalaure 4

Another one who steered clear of the Huine issue, wondered aloud if she should vote Mac or Lottie. Went for Mac who had more votes of the two at the time when Huine was rapidly gaining more votes. Extremely dubious vote - especially if we take into account that at least to me at this point Huine didn't seem like a "lost case" at all.

Inzil -> Macalaure 5

"Because I distrust Lottie, and to a lesser extent, Pitch." Huh? Basically implied without straight up saying so that he would prefer not to lynch Huinesoron. The placement of this vote is pretty dodgy, but Inzil's last minute "Watch Huey be a wolf. " (after the lynch was resolved but the deadline had not come yet) has a very innocent ring to me.

...

Boro -> Mac 6

Claims to have crossposted, I'm not sure with quite how many votes. Still, clearly a vote that was - intentionally or unintentionally - towards saving Huinesoron. Therefore, deserves scrutiny.

Sally, Zil, and Boro all post at essentially the same time, especially given that Boro's vote is crossposted. She takes a much harder line on Sally and Zil, but acknowledges that Boro's vote "deserves scrutiny" as well.

Originally Posted by Thinlómien

Can I start giving paranoid wolf awards? YesterDay Mac and Brinn for thinking they're being framed by the Rikae kill, toDay Sally and Inzil being convinced they're done for. None of that looks very innocent to me.

Sally looks very furry to me right now. She did before, her vote was the worst, and her apologetic attitude toDay is not helping her cause at all. Fishy fishy lupine fish.

Here, Lommy is responding to Zil, and brings up Sally, linking them as both being late Mac users. She does not mention Boro here, though I believe she responds to his calling votes against her "throw-away" later in that post.

Originally Posted by Thinlómien

Bear watching

...

Boro - oscillating between weird Boro and normal Boro in this game. The glimpses of normal Boro I have seen have been mostly very reassuring to me, but his yesterDay's vote makes me more wary of him again.

...

Bear even more watching (trying to differentiate here because I realised I put like 80% of the village in the same category)

...

Would seriously consider quarantining

Zil - I used to think him quite innocent, and also was reluctant to join the chorus of lowkey Zil suspicion which seemed to be based on nothing more than the usual kneejerk "suspicious vibe" that always surrounds him - as I said, he's generally someone who's quite easy to get lynched so it makes sense for wolves to keep him on a suspicion list. But he's making me very uneasy now with his dodgy vote yesterDay, his fatalistic attitude about getting lynched toDay, and being fixated only on a few villagers (as someone said, convenient if he's a wolf thinking he's getting the axe).

Mac - okay, I hate to say this, but he has started to seem a lot more innocent to me. Like, my gut feeling is a lot better, but my logic still cannot fathom why innocent Mac would have acted the way he did yesterDay. Greenie summarised this quite well in her #666.

Sally - Eeevil cupcake. Eeeevil. Has been suspiciously safe in her choices since the beginning, tried to save Huine yesterDay, toDay first seemed to have given up and now is trying to convince people she'd have bussed a fellow!Huine. There's nothing innocent in this mix. Certainly my main suspect at the moment.

Here, Lommy puts Boro two full suspicion categories above Sally and Zil, saying only that his vote makes her "more wary of him". She is not really suspecting Boro at all, placing him in the company of me, Kath, Lhuna, and Rune - largely people who didn't vote for either Huin or Mac - even though he should be just as suspicious as Zil and Sally, since he did exactly the same thing they did.

Originally Posted by Thinlómien

But if it comforts you, I still suspect Sally more and I'm not sure two wolves would have done the same fishy packmate-saving move with similarly incriminating timing.

So just as a statement: I'd prefer to lynch Sally toDay because the evidence against her is pretty overwhelming, but I'm not opposed to Zil or Mac.

Responding to Zil again. Lommy isn't considering Boro as an option at all, and isn't including him in the group of late Mac voters. She continues to push Sally over Zil.

Originally Posted by Thinlómien

It is possible but why is it *likely*, Sally? Even if you were innocent yourself, you should have no idea about Zil. Addendum: oh, so this is just about maths? Not a very strong argument, given that maths doesn't take into account that you both voted to save a known wolf.

Here she is asking why Sally doesn't think it likely that she and Zil are wolves. Again, she doesn't mention that Boro also did the same thing, which actually would have strengthened Lommy's argument: one in three is more statistically likely than one in two.

Originally Posted by Thinlómien

I voted Mac before no one even half seriously suggested Huey was a vote candidate. The bandwagon against him came totally out of the blue for me. Therefore, my vote was in no way related to Huey. While Sally, yourself, and a few others voted Mac after Huey as a possible vote candidate. I don't see how does this not make you more likely wolves?? Of course, my vote doesn't make me innocent or you guys' votes don't make you guilty (case in point: Sally), but I was talking about probabilities. It is more probable for a vote that put someone else ahead of a known wolf to be a wolf's vote than for an average vote to be a wolf's vote. I understand if you disagree with my suspicion, but I don't understand if you disagree with the logical principle behind it.

This was toDay, responding to Zil's comment that Lommy also voted for Mac. Here she says that "Sally, yourself [Zil], and a few others voted Mac after Huey as a possible vote candidate." What I find interesting is that the few others is actually just Boro. Unless you count Shasta, which I don't.

In her very first post after Huin was quarantined, Lommy said that Boro's vote deserves scrutiny, but then proceeds to not mention it at all when talking about how the group of late Mac voters are suspicious. She only brings it up again in a list, where she places Boro in the second-best category but claims his vote makes her wary. Lommy strongly pushed suspicion of that group of people, while completely ignoring the third person in the group. If Lommy and Boro are packmates, this would have been Lommy pushing suspicion for votes like Boro's exclusively onto innocents (or an innocent and a wolf who was already under suspicion, if Zil is evil) who happened to vote the same way Boro did. If this strategy works, we would have lynched Sally yesterDay, Zil toDay if we still wanted to pursue that line of questioning, and we probably would have gotten distracted by something else long before we got around to Boro. This would be a great strategy for the wolves! I suspect that Lommy and Boro are packmates, and I would absolutely be willing to vote for one of them toDay.

[Inziladun]

Originally Posted by Loslote

If this strategy works, we would have lynched Sally yesterDay, Zil toDay if we still wanted to pursue that line of questioning, and we probably would have gotten distracted by something else long before we got around to Boro. This would be a great strategy for the wolves! I suspect that Lommy and Boro are packmates, and I would absolutely be willing to vote for one of them toDay.

Posting from my phone is cumbersome, but I think this makes good sense. I would be tempted to add Brinn as a potential packmate also.

[Loslote]

Originally Posted by Inziladun

Posting from my phone is cumbersome, but I think this makes good sense. I would be tempted to add Brinn as a potential packmate also.

If Brinn is a wolf in a pack with Lommy and Boro, she's being very bold about defending them. I guess I could see it as a possibility.

[Eönwë]

Ok, well it looks like not much has happened since I left.

I will hopefully manage to be in the last hour or so before the deadline.


Currently, my thoughts are:

I'm most interested in voting for Zil, Boro, or Lommy. Based on reasons I've stated on previous Days, plus Lommy's actions yesterDay and the interaction between the three, I suspect that there are at least two Infectors in this group.

I'm still suspicious of Lalaith and Rune, and I suspect that at that there is at least one Infector in that pair.

I'm feeling better about THE Ka now that it turns out Mac was an innocent.

I'm a little concerned at how well Greenie and Kath have been flying under my radar.

I'm still feeling mostly good about Pitch, Shasta, Lhuna, Lottie, and Brinn, but a few of them have said things that made me raise my eyebrows (and there is the possible Pitch-Hui link mentioned in my previous post) and I think it might be time for me to make sure I'm not giving people free passes based on earlier innocent-looking actions.

edit: fixed a sentence

[Shastanis Althreduin]

Sorta at a loss after yesterday. I was very much expecting Sally to be a wolf.

The reason I decided I was ultimately not gonna fight to not lynch her was Lommy's bit about the wolves ultimately not needing to kill her; I'm used to Hunters that have a bit added to their role, where they can beat a single wolf 1-on-1 at the end of the game. That isn't present here, but I didn't think about it till fairly late.

[Thinlómien]

Originally Posted by Eönwë

And again, it's mid-game, I don't think it's too bold for an Infector (in this case Lommy) to have gone all-out on the Sally quarantining. Since she's already in the public eye as suspicious, she doesn't have much to lose by being in the spotlight, and the end result is that a non-wolf got lynched.

YesterDay was Day3, so scarcely mid-game in this big village. Also I don't think I have been widely suspected until toDay. You're looking at toDay's situation to make sense of yesterDay, and it doesn't add up.

Lottie - yes I didn't focus on Boro's vote despite it being similar to Sally and Zil's. That's because I thought Sally and Zil looked suspicious for other things as well, while for Boro the vote was more or less the only suspicious thing about him. I don't see why this is weird. If someone that overall seems innocent to you does something dodgy, I think it's natural to move them into an unsure category in your head (as I did with Boro yesterDay). While if someone you already consider dodgy does something dodgy, it's red flags time (that was me about Sally yesterDay, and to a lesser degree about Inzil).

I'm really torn about Inzil at the moment. I still don't like his vote from the Day before yesterDay, and I don't like his crusade against me toDay because granted I made myself a very easy target yesterDay. But I am aware there's still a chance he's a misguided innocent (a position I can scarcely judge) and in suspecting him I'm throwing myself into an interesting adventure called tunnel vision, part three.

Eönwë's suspicion of me feels very opportunistic to me, while Pitchwife and Lottie's more organic and understandable. Granted, this might be partly because I have other reasons to think Lottie and Pitch innocent, but nothing in particular for Eönwë.

Now I'm off to look at Legate's posts. Meanwhile you guys please think about the fact that only the wolves could have known that Sally was innocent yesterDay. I'm sure that's carrying echoes into toDay in terms of bashing people who genuinely thought Sally was a wolf.

[Lalaith]

Originally Posted by Shastanis Althreduin

Sorta at a loss after yesterday. I was very much expecting Sally to be a wolf.

The reason I decided I was ultimately not gonna fight to not lynch her was Lommy's bit about the wolves ultimately not needing to kill her;

That is one whole bunch of negatives. I'm at a loss to make sense of it....

[A Little Green]

Okay so further proof of my utter cluelessness in this game – yesterDay I developed a theory that maybe Mac’s suicidal tendencies were due to him being the Hunter who had pegged a wolf and wanted to be offed. Looks like it’s time for another serious rethink.

Regarding the Legate kill, I think it’s possible he was picked just because more or less everyone agreed he was innocent. That said, I don’t think wolves can ever afford to kill someone just for that when there’s a Seer still on the loose. Our Seer will have had four dreams by now. Granted, some of those s/he dreamed may have died already, but even so, it’s a growing risk for the pack and I don’t think they can entirely ignore it. In light of that, this quote from Legate struck me -

Originally Posted by Legate

Okay, one thing is (nearly?) for sure - the votes in Sallywagon can't all come from Wolves. (I mean technically... that would be super bold... but probably they wouldn't yet do something like that! Besides if it was these four, then they'd have no reason to.)

Could this have been a possible reason why Legate was killed? This could have looked like a slip from a Seer-Legate who knew Sally wasn’t a wolf.

Originally Posted by Inzil

You know what?
I'm not going to hold out to try to save myself.

++Brinn

For being Rikae's Day 1 vote, for getting by since, and because the QT baddies are daring us.

Do the same, vote for someone else, or me,

I thought this was noteworthy. While I agree that Brinn still merits looking at (I’m not comfortable with the free-ish pass she is getting lately), Inzil effectively going “que sera sera, lynch me if you like” rubs me the wrong way. Could be Wolfziladun trying a bit too hard not to appear defensive – especially in comparison to Sally, who was being suspected for similar reasons and was definitely acting defensive.

Originally Posted by Pitch

Btw what I just said about self-exoneration and calculated votes also applies to Eönwë's reaction to me this morning. "I drove the last nail into Huiwolf's coffin, how dare you suspect me?" But you had to vote at a point when your vote would likely be decisive, and if you knew that Mac would come up innocent if lynched, voting Hui was your only viable option. 'looks like it's going to have to be...' = 'I don't like it, but I have no choice'?

I’ve been inclined to think Eonwe rather innocent than not so far, but this is a good point.

Originally Posted by Mac

Bring the butter, my body is ready!

Originally Posted by Boro

++Sally

Really don't like the idea of a panic bandwagon against me. If you're the hunter, happy killing.

If you're a wolf, thanks for giving me 500 heart attacks, but I'd consider us even considering the trick I pulled on you previously.

Originally Posted by Kath

Boro changes his mind and votes sally in the interest of self preservation. Why the change of mind here, Boro? I know you cross posted but I don't think you were actually in danger at this point. The majority of the village had voted and sally was already well in the lead with votes.

I agree with Kath here – this was strange. Boro does seem more than a little paranoid here, essentially voting Sally to prevent a panic bandwagon against himself even though he didn’t look like a very likely lynch candidate at this point. Mind you, going after people who seem “paranoid” hasn’t served me very well in this game

Originally Posted by Boro

1. Inzil I need to get a better read on, but there's a lot to be answered for with your defense yesterday. I never pegged you as a "roll over" type, until yesterday

2. Can we trust the QT now? Please. But I swear if they give us Brinn again I'm going to lose it.

2. 3/4ths of you are as suspicious as suspicion can be.

3. I'm starting to get a clearer picture, and imagining a pack of Lhuna, Lottie and Inzil. An unknown 4th at the moment, but I'm starting with you 3.

My voting may have been crap, but Lhuna's yours is completely clean since Day 1. Alarm is raised.

Lottie you managed to convince the hunter to change her choice in the last second and I have no idea why.'

Hm. I agree with 1, and with that Lhuna deserves a closer look and Inzil is a very possible wolf, but the rest of this I either disagree with or find fishy or both. Regarding the QT – yes, we can trust that the QT vote is benign; but no, we can’t trust that it’s any more likely to be correct than that of any other innocent, non-Seer person. Following the QT’s lead would give a very easy alibi for a wolf to vote for an innocent without raising too many eyebrows, so no, even with an innocent-majority QT I don’t really trust anyone who places too much weight on what the QT decide.

Regarding Lottie – that last point is off. Regardless of Lottie’s role, it would have been in her interest to try to convince Sally to change her pick. I’d have been stupefied if she hadn’t tried. Regarding Inzil – while I agree that he is one of the most suspicious people in this village, I think it would be very convenient for a Borowolf to say so if they were fellows. Inzil is a fairly possible lynchee either toDay or some other day soon, so an easy candidate for wolf-on-wolf bussing. Especially for a fellow who, like him, voted for Mac in a way that could have been an attempt to save Huin.

Originally Posted by Lottie

If I was a wolf, I would have been trying an awful lot harder to swing the vote Zil's direction, because I would have known for sure that Sally actually was the Hunter, and there would have been no motivation for me to lynch her. I voted for her because I thought there was an actual chance she was a wolf. If I really wanted to vote somewhere else, I could have pushed for Zil, who had also been suspected. In my opinion, the fact that there was no coherent alternative at all should speak to the idea that the people in Sally's crosshairs were not evil.

Despite my general dislike for statements that start with "if I was a wolf", Lottie makes a good point here – the wolves would have known Sally’s claim was genuine, and a wolf thinking they were under fire from the Hunter would have had a motive to try and lynch someone else.

Originally Posted by Lommy

WELLLlllllllll I got what I wanted...

...but it turned out not to be what I wanted after all. I have gone through a full cycle of *despairing laughter* -> what use is logic in werewolf when it's always wrong -> I should really have been the cobbler -> "hey at least I won't have to wonder about Mac and Sally for the rest of the game" overNight and now I'm trying to recover and be useful toDay. I mean what else can you do?

But yes, looks like yesterDay wasn't my brightest moment. Nor the Day before... But I can hardly do worse toDay - unless I decide to vote the seer and press for their lynch.

This makes me feel somewhat better about Lommy – though I might be biased since I’ve been wrong in much the same way about much the same people, so I can kind of see how that’s entirely possible.

Originally Posted by Brinn

I don't think a Lommy-wolf would be so bold to lead the charge against Sally. It's more likely to me that a wolf (or two) just went with the flow because with seven votes against Sally post-hunter reveal, that would've been a much easier way to hide. The fact that Inzil was so keen to jump on her doesn't make me feel any better of him. I do not trust him one bit.

This was my first impression, too. I could see a Lommywolf voting for Sally before the reveal, then consciously pushing for a Sally lynch regardless; but Lommy’s bloodlust (I love this mental image btw!) was a bit too open for this read to seem plausible for me. I think a Lommywolf would have made the same arguments for a Sally lynch after the reveal, but made them in a way that looked more balanced and reasonable rather than frantic and bloodlusty.

Originally Posted by Kath

Shasta also absolutely not believing sally. But he and Lommy have very different opinions on how to go about this. Lommy feels lynching sally either rids the village of a wolf pretending to be the Hunter, or means the Hunter can use their power and hopefully catch a wolf. Shasta feels it should be left to the Night. I think Shasta's version is safer for the village. Lommy's is high risk which she did admit herself, but felt it was early enough in the game that losing an innocent wouldn't be so bad. In terms of numbers, perhaps she's right, but I still think leaving the Hunter to the Night would have been better. Especially as if the Hunter was killed at night, and took down an innocent, then at least in the Day there might have been a chance of lynching a wolf, and so it would have been one wolf and two innocents dead, rather than now what we have with three innocents dead.

Originally Posted by Lommy

Look, I know it's a question of playing styles, but I think ww is the most fun when all the special roles get to do their thing, even if it's less advantageous for the side I'm playing in. Maybe mathematically Sally had higher chances of hitting an innocent. But I thought that it would be fun to give her the option, and we could live with the consequences. Maybe the break from ww made me take this game less seriously. Maybe I'm a bit of a cobbler, then. But I'm certainly not a wolf.

Regarding this whole issue – I think whether or not to lynch a self-proclaimed Hunter is very much a question of playing style and strategy, and in itself doesn’t give us much about a player’s alignment. Lommy’s explanation here sounds like something she would think regardless of role. The only bit rubbing me the wrong way is the last bit. “I’m certainly not a wolf” won’t convince anyone, even if true.

Originally Posted by Lommy

I'm trying not to get annoyed, because frankly I deserve to be judged for yesterDay, but can y'all step down from your high horses for a sec, however deserved your seating up there? The only people who could have known Sally was the real hunter were the wolves. None of us others knew that. We had to weigh her claim and decide what to think of it. A lot of us had the unfortunate starting point that we were already suspicious of Sally for one reason or another. Claiming to be the hunter is quite a good wolvish lynch prevention tactic because a) the real hunter might be reluctant to challenge because it greatly decreases their chance to get to use their special ability and b) conversely, flushing the real hunter out is a big favour to the wolves, it's like flagging a landmine for them. So I would certainly take a hunter claim with a bigger pinch of salt than say a seer claim.

I think Lommy is making sense here, too.

Originally Posted by Eonwe

Since I suspect both Zil and Lommy, I'm very inclined to see Zil's attack on Lommy toDay as a way to distance them from each other. It's only a matter of time before Zil gets quarantined (and rightly so, IMO - he's been suspicious throughout), and it might be enough to make her look better in hindsight (after all, it seems bold for a wolf to go after one of their own so strongly and before anyone else, right?). On the other hand, if Lommy is lynched toDay, then it looks like Zil spearheaded the attack, so it makes him look good in retrospect.

Maybe my judgement is clouded because I'm already convinced that Zil is evil and almost convinced that Lommy is too, but that's the feeling I'm getting here.

Hm. Definitely a possibility – if Lommy is a wolf, the pack would have been prepared for her to be under fire toDay for her role in lynching Sally. That said, the wolves would have been prepared for this even if Lommy isn’t one of them. Inzil starting the Day with a straight-up case against Lommy looks somewhat rehearsed, like something he (or his pack) had decided to go for in advance. And even if Lommy is innocent, it makes sense for Inzil to be the one of the pack to go most heavily after her – as he’s one of the most suspected people around, him being implicated in an orchestrated lynch of innocent Lommy wouldn’t really matter that much. I could see him and his pack deciding that he’s pretty much a goner but at least he could try to stick around for one more Day by getting Lommy lynched first.

I want to have another look at Legate's posts at some point to check for possible "Seer clues", as well as another look at a few players we haven't really focused on. It's entirely possible we're dealing with a wolf pack of, say, THE Ka, Kath, Rune and Lalaith, happily watching from the sidelines as louder and more chaotic players lynch each other.