TWG CXX: Postgame - Grinch’s gambit and Grandma’s troll dooms Christmas

[SpecsFlyer17]

TWG CXX: Lynch the Grynch

The Grinch Wins!



Role Reveal:
1. The Grinch: Oricorio

2. Santa Claus: Toby
3. Rudolph: TZP
4. Frosty the Snowman: THC
5. Elf: BDS
6. Elf: Xiao
7. Ebenezer Scrooge: Math

8. Grandma (who got run over a reindeer): davy


Event Log

N1
Grinch Wolf: davy (failed)
Grinch Naughty List: BDS
Grinch Seer: Math
Santa Nice List: TZP
Rudolph Seer: davy

Nice-List: TZP
Naughty-List: BDS

D1
Math lynched
Math: 2 votes (Oricorio, TZP, BDS (null))
TZP: 1 vote (Math)
davy: 1 vote (davy)
BDS: 1 vote (THC)
Xiao: 1 vote (Toby)

N2
Grinch Wolf: Toby
Grinch Naughty List: Xiao
Grinch Seer: TZP
Santa Nice List: Oricorio
Rudolph Seer: Oricorio

Nice-List: TZP, Oricorio (lol)
Naughty-List: BDS, Xiao

D2
Xiao lynched via a 3-way KitB
Oricorio: 2 votes (TZP, BDS (null))
Xiao: 1 vote (Oricorio)
davy: 1 vote (davy)

N3
Grinch Wolf: TZP
Grinch Naughty List: Toby (correct Santa guess)
Grinch Seer: BDS
Santa Nice List: BDS (voided)
Rudolph Seer:

Nice-List: TZP, Oricorio
Naughty-List: BDS, Xiao, Toby

THC + BDS (no vote) vs Oricorio is KitB at best, so Oricorio wins.

[SpecsFlyer17]

The detailed summary is below. Even if you don't read it all, please take away one thing- this game came down to a 3-way KitB where option 1 had the town winning, option 2 had davy winning (and either the town or Oricorio also winning later), and option 3 had Oricorio winning. Option 1 had to be taken since Xiao had a phantom. So really no one should feel too bad about losing. Enjoy the read!

Detailed Game Summary

N1

Spoiler

Xiao starts the game by replying to the host's role PM, "You're a Host. Entertain us or die". Great. Love that.

davy prompts some discussion regarding the value of Rudolph claiming certain seer results, which prompts some additional discussion regarding the ups and downs of claiming a Grandma seering, as well as how to handle a red seering.

Early in the phase, TZP requests that davy is seer'd, perhaps prompted by his message about the seering results in the main thread. Nice pick, tough break for davy.

Soon after, Toby puts his request for TZP to be put on the nice list, despite TZP only having posted one message in the main thread, which was just a greetings opener.

Oricorio then casts his requests: Wolf BDS, Naughty-List Xiao, and seer Math.

Back in the main thread, some administrative work takes place regarding a 2v1 where one townie doesn't have a vote. Ultimately, the host decides that these situations will result in a Grinch win.

THC gives some suspicions, and asks if the Grinch gives a wolfing. Oricorio reads this as human, but offers the possibility that it could be a fake. THC also GTH's davy as Grandma and BDS as the Grinch, a thought he would stick for the long run.

Perhaps in an attempt to dispel THC's grandma idea, davy brings up similarities of Oricorio's strange man play from the Lantern game. Oricorio and davy continue to go back and forth about mechanical posting.

Meanwhile, behind the scenes, Oricorio changes two of his actions with a few hours remaining in the phase. The wolfing target is now davy, and BDS will be naughty-listed.

[close]

D1

Spoiler

The wolfing fails, but Oricorio mentions that the Grinch can still win after a second mislynch. While true, it will now require a final 3 townie to be naughty-listed on D3, which is susceptible to Santa sabotaging. Oricorio will now need to play his cards right to avoid facing a D3, but it is entirely possible for the cards to fall that way.

Meanwhile, TZP now knows that davy is Grandma. How will he use this information?
Oricorio now knows that davy is either Grandma or Frosty.

Early D1 discussion revolves around Grandma, and the consensus is that a Grandma lynch helps the Grinch more than the town, so special care should be made to avoid lynching her.

Math becomes suspicious of TZP missing a rule (that the Grinch gets a seering), and builds some arguments against him.

Davy leads things off the voting with self-vote, claiming a safety as he will be busy irl during phase change. Is this truthful, or just an attempt to build votes for his own lynching? It draws a fair amount of criticism from the crowd, but Oricorio points out that it appears too obvious for Grandma to self-vote. Ultimately, davy never receives additional votes, although the final few minutes of D1 got spicy (explained later).

BDS places a vote on Math, which is null vote due to the naughty list. Discussion continues on the davy/THC dynamic.
Has anyone mentioned that NSM doesn't have a good multiquote/ISO feature? Anyways, Oricorio gives ISOs of the players, which eventually results in a TZP vote, but acknowledging davy as wolfier but likely Grandma. Meanwhile, THC double-downs on his belief that davy is Grandma.

Immediately after Oricorio places his vote on TZP, Math shows and does the same, although his suspicion list is criticized for being a bit soft.

Behind the scenes, BDS PMs Xiao, asking about Oricorio potentially parroting some of BDSs sediments. Xiao doesn't respond, and BDS shares the thoughts in the main thread.

A few hours before the phase change, THC drops a vote on BDS, fueled mostly by gut feeling.

TZP then shows up with an ISO of each player. Fully aware that davy is Grandma, he shares his suspicion that davy is Grandma and says he will avoid voting.

Oricorio, seemingly impressed by both TZPs ISO effort and town!Oricorio lean, withdrawals his vote; perhaps in hope that this read can be carried into D2. What he doesn't know is that TZP is the seer, and fully intends to seer him N2. He changes his vote to Math.

Going into the final few minutes of the phase, things were looking spicy. There was a 4 way KitB set to occur, with 1 vote on Math (since BDSs vote wouldn't count), davy, TZP, and BDS. The KitB was generated and davy was set to be lynched. This would have been extremely interesting, as the rules didn't specify what happens in that case. Likely, davy would've won, and no one else would've been taken down with him D1. That actually would've helped the town to some degree, as it would have made a D3 a lot more likely (since an extra townie would be around). However, TZP active and was fully intending on placing a vote, so this was likely never going to occur.

At the last minute, TZP votes for math, ending the KitB, as math now had 2 valid votes. Furthermore, Toby showed up as well with a last minute vote on Xiao, which would have also necessitated the KitB being rerolled.

Math was lynched with 2 valid votes, ending the phase.

[close]

N2

Spoiler

Oricorio immediately messaged the host with Grinch selections: wolf Toby, naughty-list Xiao, and seer TZP. This would set up a blue seering, which is a 50-50 shot as being Santa. If on N3 Oricorio decides to naughty-list TZP in hopes he is Santa, that will fail, as TZP is on the nice list. This could result in a messy N3 to D3 transition.

The main thread is relatively quiet, although THC admittedly accuses BDS of being the grinch, fueled entirely by gut feeling. This draws some questioning from the group. BDS also posts a suspicion list, suspecting davy or THC as the grinch and/or Grandma, while Oricorio rises in the suspect rankings. BDS believes TZP to be town.

Davy is also strangely absent with his thoughts, despite promising to post later in the phase. Perhaps this is an attempt to spark some suspicion going into D2.

Behind the scenes, THC messages everyone individually with a "I told (x) that if I die tonight (y) is the Grinch. So if I die, (x) is the Grinch trying to frame (y). If I don't BDS is the Grinch". Each player gets a different iteration of the message. Toby and TZP question the strategy a bit, although a conversation develops between TZP and THC that proves to spark an alliance.

Toby sends his nice list request: Oricorio. Ouch. This severely diminishes the chances of making it out of N3, although it's still possible. This essentially accomplishes nothing for the town, though there wasn't a ton of information to build off, however. In some good news for the town, the rules do state that even if Santa is wolfed, he retains his "dead" nice-list addition for future use, meaning Toby can still spoil N3 for the Grinch.

Perhaps puzzled by Oricorio's sudden vote removal in the final minutes of D1, TZP decides to seer Oricorio for his N2 pick. Nice. With a red check, it proves to TZP that Oricorio is either the Grinch or Scroog. If this information goes public, it will force Oricorio to either counterclaim seer, challenge the validity of TZPs claim, or use the miller as a defense.

With about 15 seconds left in the phase, TZP claims seer to THC in PMs, and that he seer'd davy orange. Perhaps under the impression that he would die N2, TZP offers this information to a trusted player.

Toby, aka Santa, is wolfed to end the phase, although since Toby still gets one more nice-list add, it's not much different from a vanilla town lynch at this point. Furthermore, with Toby dead, Oricorio may direct his N3 naughty-list at an alive player. This is important, as if the Grinch puts Santa on the naughty-list, Santa loses his power that night. Santa retaining his N3 nice-list addition is key for the town having a shot at escaping N3, and Toby's death possibly increased the chance of that. In a roundabout way, wolfing Toby may have been a positive for the town.

[close]

D2

Spoiler

Moving into D2, both BDS and Xiao lack a vote. Things could get weird with the voting on D2, and a potential N3 looks to be heavily favoring the Grinch clinching a win.

Relieved to be alive, TZP continues his conversation with THC, sharing the news of the red check on Oricorio. He also proposes a plan: He will state that the real seer offered the davy and Oricorio checks, wishing to remain anonymous to the public thread. THC supports the plan.

TZP breaks the news of the orange davy and red Oricorio checks to the public thread. As expected, Oricorio claims Scroog (the other red role).

BDS suggests both specials (Santa and Rudolph) claim publicly. This is generally well received, although it's an awkward situation because Santa (Toby) is dead, and Rudolph (TZP) was the one claiming to relay this information for the "real" seer. Behind the scenes, TZP gives THC the option to claim seer publicly, promising not to counterclaim (for now). This essentially, reverses the seer and mouthpiece roles of TZP and THC between reality and the public thread. And, if the Grinch bites on THCs claim and tries to wolf him N3, it will fail, as THC is Frosty. While it's not a guaranteed D3, a failed N3 wolfing dramatically shifts the odds back in favor of a D3 occurring.

THC claims seer in the public thread, which seems to be somewhat well-received, although Oricorio points out some small holes in his claim, which can be chalked up to THC being THC.

Meanwhile, davy is in a world of hurt and running out of options. He already had suspicions surrounding him, and the orange check is severely limiting his options. In a last-ditch effort, he PMs Oricorio claiming Grandma. The only way davy can win is if the town is convinced that THC lied about seer but also isn't the wolf. Since davy thinks Oricorio is likely the wolf, he asks Oricorio to team up and advertise this theory in the public thread.

Almost immediately, Oricorio copy-pastes davy's PM into the public thread, effectively ending davy's chances of winning a lynch vote. From Oricorio's standpoint, this was the correct move; it's the most logical choice for the miller, and trying to convince both TZP and THC would have been very difficult, as BDS and Xiao's votes will not count. Davy votes for himself, while oddly wishing BDS good luck in his resignation post.

Really tough break for davy this game. The N1 orange seering was extremely unlucky, and grandma!davy suspicions on D1 made it an uphill battle from the start. There isn't a lot he could have done, besides maybe false-claim something earlier to ignite suspicion, but even that was going to be hard because of the orange check.

Back in the main thread, no one counterclaims THC's seer claim nor claims Santa. Xiao shows up and claims neither special role. This leads to a prevailing theory that Toby was Santa, and the Grinch got a lucky blue check on him N1, leading to the N2 wolfing. While Toby was Santa, Oricorio hit him on N2 without any seer checks on him.

BDS eventually places a vote on Oricorio, mainly citing the un-countered red check on him, as well as various smaller suspicions that have led up over time.

At this point, there are really only 3 votes that matter: THCs, TZPs, and Oricorio. Davy voted for himself, and BDS and Xiao both have a null vote. If THC sticks to his BDS vote, Oricorio has an easy way out by voting BDS, although it could raise suspicion for jumping on a vote bandwagon. This would make things relatively interesting for N3, as that would put TZP (nice listed), THC (can survive a wolfing), and Xiao (naughty-listed) in the pool for the night. Toby still has his last nice-list additions, and it looks like a D3 would be very achievable.

However, there's an issue. If Oricorio naughty-lists Toby (who is the prevailing Santa suspicion), Toby will lose that nice-list addition. But, Oricorio has a blue check for TZP! From Oricorio's view, THC and Toby cannot both be blue, which means Toby is not guaranteed to be Santa; it could be THC or even TZP. Something is not true: THC cannot be the seer along with Toby being Santa, as TZP has the blue check. Interesting. Or course, Oricorio has to make it out of D2 first for this to matter.

Oricorio casts his vote for Xiao, citing PoE, which is a solid human play. Great move instead of jumping on the BDS train. THC then changes his vote to Oricorio, because a BDS vote appears useless. TZP then drops by and places a vote on Xiao, but is willing to examine other players, specifically Oricorio.

TZP then drops the big reveal in the public thread with an hour to go: he is the seer! Oricorio says this makes sense, as some of THCs actions would not have aligned with the seer. If TZP is to be trusted here, this explains Oricorio's blue check on TZP, which makes santa!Toby much more believable. This puts Toby in danger of being naughty-listed N3.

THC drops by and appears to stick with his Oricorio vote. With Oricorio likely sticking with Xiao, TZP has the deciding vote.

With about 15 minutes left, TZP flips his vote to Oricorio, claiming that he can't shake the red check. Oricorio is now set to be lynched.

Seeing no other choice, Oricorio changes his vote to davy in a list ditch effort to appear human, the idea being that the wolf wouldn't dare risk a suicide like that. This would take down davy and Oricorio if davy wins the KitB, since BDS's vote isn't counting. Davy, who was lurking in the background, sees the opportunity and PMs TZP, asking him to unvote so he has a shot to win. He doesn't realize that it's already a KitB, and TZPs unvote would actually give him the guaranteed win. TZP bites, and promptly unvotes, and chaos ensues.

THC then unvotes, making the valid vote total davy:2. That's it. TZP doesn't like this, and votes for Oricorio, making the apparent vote 2-2, but still giving davy a 2-1 edge.

With NINE seconds left, Oricorio flips his vote back to Xiao, creating a 3-way KitB: davy, Oricorio, and Xiao now all have 1 valid vote.

Xiao carried a KitB, so he loses and is lynched.

[close]

N3

Spoiler

Oricorio promptly submits a TZP wolfing and Toby naughty-listing, which seals the game. Toby will lose his power, resulting in a naughty-listed BDS and unscathed THC in the D3, which is an automatic Grinch win.

Oricorio final final final locks-in his submissions immediately, no questions asked. That's game. He had it pretty much solved, and by deducing Toby as Santa, and TZP as a non-Frosty role, there's nothing that can be done, really.

[close]

[SpecsFlyer17]

Player Analysis

Spoiler

Oricorio
Really really well played game as the single wolf. You were dealt some unlucky hands with a failed wolfing and TZP seering you red. Specifically, I thought you handled being checked red very well; you calmly claimed you must be the miller and didn't draw too much attention to it. Clearly, it worked, as it was enough to draw votes away from you during your last-second gambit. I thought your D2 play was very strong, specifically your first Xiao vote, ratting davy out, and the last-second gambit. When you voted for Xiao, THC already had a vote on BDS. The simple answer for you was to vote BDS, which would have set up your survival. However, you choose to vote for Xiao, which I thought was a very human play. Jumping on the obvious BDS train may have raised some suspicions from the crowd regarding hopping on momentum. Also, iirc you had been more suspicious of Xiao than BDS, so a BDS vote may have raised some red flags. Next, ratting out davy's PM was the correct move; you needed to fuel the miller!Oricorio theory, and chances are you weren't going to convince TZP that THC was lying but not the wolf. Xiao and BDSs vote weren't going to count, so fueling a davy lynch just wasn't feasible. Moving on, your gambit was 100% the right thing to do. Sitting back and doing nothing with <15 minutes left was not going to accomplish anything, so you gave yourself a chance to win by voting davy, planting the idea that the wolf wouldn't just suicide like that. And sure enough, it worked. Chaos ensued, and while you got lucky with how thing unfolded to some degree, the "do nothing" approach would have gotten you lynched for sure. Nice quick thinking. N3 was a no-brainer move for you. You had the game solved, locked in your actions within the first 20 minutes of the phase, and had the game clinched. Good job figuring it out. One thing I saw that maybe could have been better was your reaction to TZP's ISO analysis of you on D1. TZP human-read you, and you immediately withdrew your vote on him. I think that raised some suspicions from TZP, and ultimately I think it led to him seering you on N2. Clear MVP, both for being the sole victor and for playing wolf very well.

Toby
You were clearly pretty preoccupied irl during this game, which is understandable. Ironically, being somewhat inactive may have been a decent Santa D1 strategy; the last thing you wanted was to be careless and get lynched D1, which would have lost you the N3 power (although it didn't matter this game). I can't really fault you for putting Oricorio on the nice-list on N2, given that was still somewhat early in the game.

TZP
You had some solid seer returns this game. You knew davy was Grandma N1, and knew Oricorio was 50/50 town or Grinch N2. Can't ask for much better seer results than that. Maybe it goes without saying, but good job sitting on davy's orange check and not going public with that early; no need to paint a target on your back when davy wasn't at risk of being lynched. Good decision to seer Oricorio on N2; his reaction to your human-read of him was very sudden and I thought it deserved a seering. Moving along, I liked your alliance with THC. I would have trusted him too, and the plan to reverse the true seer role and mouthpiece worked out well; the seer information was well-received. Unfortunately, someone has to take the blame for starting the late D2 shenanigans. I think you somewhat bought the narrative that grinch!Oricorio wouldn't sign up for a suicide, and more so, you had a heart for davy when he PM'd you. Funny enough, before you even unvoted, it was going to be a KitB between Oricorio dying along, and davy dying with Oricorio, although you and davy didn't know that (and Oricorio would've likely gone back to Xiao.) Maybe lesson learned: don't trust the 3rd party players! They will screw you if they can. Anyways, good choice to revote Oricorio when THC unvoted, but by that point the damage had been done. I think the big thing here was to have faith in the red check and adhere to it. Yeah, it could be the miller, but a red check is valuable information that shouldn't come second to unproved suspicions.

THC
You had some really good reads early in the game. You started the grandma!davy narrative early, which gained traction and turned out to be right. Unfortunately, you missed on your grinch!BDS hunch. I can't argue against your gut feeling, but I personally saw nothing that BDS did to make him as suspicious as you thought he was. Credit to you, canceling your BDS vote to vote Oricorio late in D2 was a great decision; being stubborn as the sole voter on BDS was going to accomplish nothing productive. I thought that was a good play. Also, while your PM carousel on N2 didn't really accomplish any Grinch-hunting, I thought it was a decent reaction test, and it ultimately started the THC/TZP alliance which proved to be an important part of the game. While I don't think those PMs were going to accomplish anything, good on you for taking some initiative and trying something. I suppose it may have appeared a tad wolfy, but you're THC; you can get away with it! Finally, I didn't love the unvote at the end of D2, but things were going off the rails by then so it is what it is. If you would've held your Oricorio vote, he would've been lynched, although you didn't fully know that. My advice would be to stick with your plan (or at least a plan) instead of not voting at all. Especially when you had every reason to believe that Oricorio had a red check.

BDS
I thought you had the most methodical, well thought out takes from the town in this game. I saw virtually no reason to be suspicious of you at really any point (sorry THC, I just didn't see it). Good job realizing some of the game mechanics, specifically that each lynch should be agreed upon by 3+ votes to avoid weird naughty-list shenanigans. I felt bad for you when you woke up and saw what happened D2, given you had specifically asked everyone to not create a crazy KitB situation. I thought your reasoning for voting Oricorio D2 was sound, but unfortunately you didn't have a valid vote. Going off that, I thought you properly kept one major thing in sight: Oricorio had a valid red check on him. It's easy to get caught in the details over small stuff, but given how NSM TWG has been with mislynches lately, sticking to factual evidence (like a red check) is probably the best play, and I think you saw that in the big picture. It's a shame you couldn't be there for the end of D2, but obviously sleep health comes first (I say that as I'm writing this at 1:30a lol). I'd be curious to see how things would have turned out if you were around for the phase end. Honorable Mention

Xiao
I'm not going to beat a dead horse here, but inactivity just isn't good for any part of the game. Obviously irl stuff is more important than TWG, but if it's going to be as much of a hindrance to your gameplay as it was in this game, it's probably better to just not play. That being said, I'm glad you popped in every so often instead of a complete ghosting.

Math
You fell victim to a somewhat disjoined D1 lynch, probably fueled a lot by your suspicion list. I honestly forget exactly what you said on it, but I recall some people thinking it was vanilla and passive. That being said, I thought you had some good insight regarding some of the game mechanics. Maybe a little more activity early on would have helped your case, but it's hard to say.

Davy
This wasn't a fair fight, as TZP knew you were Grandma N1, and any potential teaming attempt with Oricorio was basically impossible with the red check on him. To be honest, I don't really know why there was so much grandma!davy suspicion early in the game; it seemed that everyone thought you were Grandma even before TZP went public. Good attempt with the last-ditch (or so we thought) effort to team with Oricorio early in D2. The idea was well thought-out, and you gave it the best shot you could. Unfortunately, it just wasn't going to happen given the circumstances. All that being said, I cannot believe how close you came to winning. Like seriously. Even D1, there was a remote chance you could have won if TZP hadn't voted for Math. And D2, good for you being tuned in. Yeah, the gambit wasn't your doing, but as soon as Oricorio changed his vote, you were in the PMs trying to get TZP to unvote. Seriously, good for you being situationally aware instead of just checking out. Secretly, I reallllllly wanted you to win the KitB, but Xiao's phantom got in the way. lBut yeah, this was an uphill battle from the start that made any strategy on your end basically impossible.

[close]

[SpecsFlyer17]

Game Balancing and Mechanics

Spoiler

What did you guys think of this game? I'll hit a few points.

Overall balancing, I honestly think this may have been ever-so-slightly wolf-favored. Mainly because unless the wolf misses 2 wolfings or Santa gets lucky with his picks, a D3 would be out of reach. This only gives the town one mislynch before a loss, which is a trait of a wolf-favored game. That being said, I figured it might be okay for a few reasons. First, there's only one wolf. Second, there are quite a few human specials. Third, there is a lack of a Master Wolf, so a red check was a 50/50 at being a wolf (which didn't help this game lol). And all that being said, D3 was still very possible given this setup, but Oricorio had the game solved so it wasn't going to happen. If Oricorio hadn't figured out who Santa was, D3 would have likely been played. A D1 start could have helped get to D3 as well, but with only one wolf, I didn't want to set up a lynch with no one having any information. But yeah, what do you think about the balancing?

Now for Grandma. Third parties are hard to balance. One thing I thought of after this game started was making Grandma seer'd green by the town but orange by the Grinch, thus eliminating an unlucky orange check by the seer. That prevents the situation in this game from happening, where Grandma had barely any escape since the town knew who she was. On the contrary, there's inherently a lot of luck involved when there's a seer, and having the possibility of Grandma getting seer'd early in the game may just be a reality of TWG. Finally, since a jester role can be difficult to pull off, it occurred to me that a rule could be made where the jester has priority on KitBs. Just food for thought. Sorry davy, maybe I should've thought of that earlier.

Frosty was a role that I considered making known to the player, but decided against it to prevent too many specials from claiming. It's probably not a big deal, but a self-aware Frosty could try to play themselves into getting wolfed.

Lastly, the nice/naughty-lists involve some degree of just guessing. I'm not sure that's the best thing for a game, although there was a fair amount of strategy involved. Any game with items or lists (like this one) is going to have some guessing/apparent RNG, but my fear was that it may have been a bit too much, or at least having too much influence on the game, specifically N3.

[close]

[Oricorio]

Two things about the phase breakdown:

- I didn't save TZP because he had a townread on me, I saved him because it looked like he was going to vote math, and I didn't want it to be exposed that BDS was naughty listed as I was counting on the BDS/THC conflict to carry me through.
- The ending KitB should have been consistently a Xiao lynch, as he had a phantom. The only thing I was gambling on was that BDS was still in the naughty list.

Anyway, I'm glad I was able to pull this off! It's my first wolf victory in nearly five years, so that's cool. Good job to TZP, you threw a few wrenches into my plans and there were a few times I thought I was dead D2!

[SpecsFlyer17]

In regards to the KitB, I guess the TWG gods were looking out for the validity of the game with Xiao losing the KitB then!

I'll make some edits regarding that in a little bit.

[BlackDragonSlayer]

Y'all had em right there and ya still fumbled the lynch :|

TZP's seerings were super on point this game. If I had given recommendations for the seering those probably would've been my picks too

[SpecsFlyer17]

Man, I legitimately feel awful about that, even though it didn't matter. It totally escaped me that Xiao had a phantom. Luckily it landed on Xiao anyways, but that could've ended horribly. Damn.

[BlackDragonSlayer]

Great job hosting, Specs!!! Would you be able to put up an interest poll for the next game?

[BlackDragonSlayer]

Man, I legitimately feel awful about that, even though it didn't matter. It totally escaped me that Xiao had a phantom. Luckily it landed on Xiao anyways, but that could've ended horribly. Damn.

In hindsight, in a game with vote removal phantoms should probably not be awarded. If I had picked up on that (during host sign-ups I somehow misread it as NO phantoms would be awarded) I probably would have mentioned it, but by the time I realized it was already far too late.

[TheZeldaPianist275]

I am so sorry everyone. Historic choke.

[SpecsFlyer17]

Great job hosting, Specs!!! Would you be able to put up an interest poll for the next game?

Poll is up. And thanks. I've used up my luck for 2024 though. Obviously there was a lot going on D2, but I'm disheartened that I missed the phantom and almost invalidated the game.

To be fair, Oricorio had the game basically solved by that point, so even if I had lynched the wrong player, it probably would have been somewhat safe to say he won after correcting the error.

[SpecsFlyer17]

In hindsight, in a game with vote removal phantoms should probably not be awarded. If I had picked up on that (during host sign-ups I somehow misread it as NO phantoms would be awarded) I probably would have mentioned it, but by the time I realized it was already far too late.

Well I guess in the parallel universe where the rules say no phantoms, we know Xiao gets lynched anyway :p

[TheZeldaPianist275]

Oricorio—fantastic D2 mindgame at the end there. That thing only works if someone's around to take advantage of it, which wasn't a guarantee since it was so late. Played me just enough to be persuaded by Davy's appeal in PMs. You were strong the whole game, but the ostensible SD was literally a game-winning move. Well done. I bow lol.

@humans, I really am sorry for losing focus so hard at the end there. That's 100% on my shoulders. Low-key bannable offense lol.

[Oricorio]

Alright, I'll explain my strategy and why I made the moves I did.

At the beginning of the game, I thought BDS and davy would be the biggest threats to me since, based on previous games, they'd be the ones to wolfread me regardless of what I did. Thus, I had BDS as my first wolfing target. However, I changed it because I thought that killing BDS would make it obvious THC wasn't a wolf, and I wanted to keep my options open at that point. So I switched BDS to naughty list instead and changed the wolfing target to davy. I did that before davy voiced a suspicion of me, which wasn't ideal because I knew that wolfing would look bad on me, but I thought I could talk my way out of it. After davy voiced suspicion on me, I did my best to discredit his solving process. Sorry if I was a bit harsh, but that's what you have to do to win! I seered math because I wanted to resolve the inactive players, and thought there was a greater chance of Toby and Xiao posting more substantively later in the phase.

For D1, I mostly played as if it didn't matter who would be lynched as long as it wasn't me, although I didn't want Grandma to be lynched that phase as it would be more convenient to me if they went down D2. TZP was a good lynch target, as I was stuck with BDS due to the naughty list but if I could lynch TZP I could disrupt a potential towncore forming between the two. I was watching the thread like a hawk at EoD with my online status turned off, and I was perfectly willing to let TZP die. But then, TZP announced they were likely pivoting to math. Since BDS was already on math, if it went to a KitB it would expose BDS as being naughty listed, which could end the BDS-THC conflict and could also direct Santa to undo my move. It wasn't ideal to lynch math, as I knew he was the Miller and I also knew that saving TZP after he townread me could look suspicious, but I decided it would be less bad than the alternative, so I voted math before TZP would.

For N2, I had decided on Toby as the wolfing target for several reasons. One, I had him pinned as a likely PR because of one of his D1 posts that felt like he was fishing for names. Secondly, he had the bonus of having completely wrong reads, so I could build a narrative upon his death. I also had TZP as a potential PR, hence the seering, but I thought that if TZP was the Seer he'd be unlikely to check me (lol). As for Xiao, a. it was a target unlikely to be chosen by Santa, b. I couldn't anticipate if Xiao would return to the thread or what reads he would have, so naughty listing him removed a wild card, and c. he would be an easy mislynch in a pinch due to his inactivity and phantom, so preventing him from defending himself with a vote could be useful.

I thought D2 would be easy, as all I really had to do was egg on the BDS/THC conflict without committing too hard to one side, and if that failed go after Xiao. However, then I got redchecked. I was panicking at that point, though I didn't let it show in the thread. Fortunately for me, I've dealt with fake redchecks on me several times as both town and wolf, so I knew how to handle this. When davy sent the PM to me, I was tempted to collaborate with him for a second, but then realized how little of a chance he had of winning and decided it would be better to gain the towncred by outing him than any benefits we could have from collaboration. I chose Xiao as the target to look towny, but was planning on jumping on BDS last-minute; THC switching to me prevented that, and I thought I was screwed at that point. Then there was another hope spot with TZP joining me on Xiao, but that quickly faded too. Then I did my aforementioned last resort plan of voting davy, which, to be honest, I did not expect to work. Still, I somehow got THC to unvote (with a little pushing from davy, thanks) and once the clock hit 3:59, I set a timer for 45 seconds so I could change my vote as close to phase end as possible. The rest is history, and the night actions were easy from there.