I didn't skim the math argument, nor did I skim you post. I just didn't feel like debating it as a side debate because it was clear from your posts that you don't understand how to math a game out, at least in a scenario where information concerning roles is out in the open.
There are a lot of assumptions you have to make concerning Delvros plan (which is why it wasn't a good plan, and why I ultimately voted for him), but if things played out as he had intended his plan DOES increase the chance of a mafia or town victory.
The scenarios he presented were entirely accurate. In a scenario where we are in LyLo and must lynch a mafia, he's the play. Town has a 100% chance at saving itself then. Ideally, Delvro hoped this composition would not occur, but it was a risk he was willing to take. Whether or not that situation was likely to occur is moot, seeing as how he had obviously decided putting himself in the open was a necessary risk.
Lets look now at a scenario where town must lynch a wolf to have a chance at winning. With Delvro left alive, thats one confirmed person who we know is NOT a wolf, and thus, town's chance of survival goes up. If we have a seer still alive who can claim, AND has cleared results, then that's even better. The chances of town making the correct play go up DRAMATICALLY when we know who is NOT the play given the situation.
As far as nightkill chances go, you've made an elementary mistake in assuming NKs a random, especially when there are revealed roles available. Once Delvro revealed, if he was left alive, it puts the wolves in an interesting position. Do they kill him at night to prevent the town from using knowledge of his alignment in endgame? Or do they shoot for another townie, but risk not hitting a townie and another, non revealed mafiat instead? When there is open information available to influence night choices, the game stops being about numbers and more about weighing options and choosing a path to go down. Trying to reduce his plan to a moronic level of simplicity such as "80% of the time, the final scenario would have been 4 townies versus 1 mafia." The wolves don't use a random number generator to make their kill, and neither should you when trying to predict endgame scenarios.
Leaving a confirmed mafia alive in this game doesn't increase or decrease the chances of a town getting hit by wolves in ANY predictable manner. If the wolves are trying to kill townies, Delvro revealing INCREASES the chance that a townie dies at night. If the wolves are trying to kill of mafia in a given scenario and know that delvro is a mafia, that doesn't increase the chances that he'll be targeted, it virtually guarantees it!
It is this fundamental error in elementary understanding of how you math out mafia games that made me not want to debate it. There were more pertinent issues to discuss and I opted to discuss them.
I didn't skim, I didn't lie, and I'm not covering anything up.
Concerning "good" play, congratulations on employing fallacy of equivocation! Not sure whether you did this intentionally or not, but the point remains that you've equivocated what "good" means in a given context.
"Good play" is pro-town play in the sense that they are interchangeable terms that mean the same thing. More simply, "pro-town play" is "good" play, from the "town" player's perspective. Doing things that are pro-town is generally a good way to play universally, since if you're playing in a pro-town way, then you're not going to fall under suspicion usually and thus, you increase your survival which is good for you regardless of faction, during the day at least. Sometimes though, being a "pro-town" player is "bad play" in the sense that being too helpful or too ambitious can bring you under the spotlight. This can be a disadvantageous position to be in if you are a town PR, as it can get you killed at night. Furthermore, this could be bad play for someone who is of anti-town alignment, as helping the town make too many good decisions can make it more likely that the town will catch you and your anti-town allies.
When I refer to my own play as good, it is always meant situationally. Of course a contention that someones play is always good is ridiculous, but of course, you would jump at the opportunity to claim common sense as your own stroke of genius. I've contended that my play is consistent. I've contended my play is good at times. I NEVER contended that my play is consistently good. I even provided an example of when I had poor pro-town play (i.e., not dismissing metagaming in FFVII mafia)! That was good play in the sense that it helped the mafia win when I was mafia, but it was POOR town play.
NO ONE has universally good play. Everyone makes mistakes. If someone had universally "good" play, they'd fufill their roles perfectly regardless of faction. They'd be the scum that never gets lynched and the town PR that dodges lynch and nightkill. What is "good" play from a player's perspective and "good" play from the towns perspective can be COMPLETELY different things.
The fact that you're contending that no play outside of an indisputable town role claim is pro-town is ludicrous. You're contending that just because the possibility exists that a person who is playing in a very pro-town manner MIGHT not be town aligned, we can not with certainty say that that play is pro-town. You're saying that just because a non-town player's pro-town play might be helping him win OVER the town (which means that from his perspective is play is both pro-town AND anti-town, in a sense that it's helping him survive), that we can't consider it pro-town. By that logic, anything and everything a confirmed town role does is pro-town, since you're asserting that play is only pro or anti town by virtue of whether or not we have knowledge of their alignment.
Sorry, but I need to tell YOU that mafia doesn't work that way. You're making in game judgements that rely on information that you don't get until AFTER the game (or atleast after people die). You can't use hindsight like that.
Ultimately, pro town play is play that encourages or encompasses behaviors and modes of the discussion and deduction that traditionally help the town find scum and win. That encompasses a LOT of behaviors, far too many for me to list here. But in principle, that's how it works. Just because a person who is anti-town by ALIGNMENT is doing something that is explicitly pro-town in CONCEPT, doesn't take away form the pro-townness of that action. Logically speaking it is to be expected that said player is probably acting in that manner to further his own anti-town agenda, but actions that are pro-town in concept that coincidentally fit the favor of an anti-town faction do not render those actions as no longer pro-town.
And lastly, the question of "how does explaining opinions show anything but long windedness?" Really scraping the bottom of the barrel here aren't you?
The more a play talks about, reasons out, and explains, the better an understanding you can get about that player's though process. More details means more information. More thorough explanations gives the town more to talk about, more to discuss, and more to debate. The more thorough a response is, the better chance that a poster's true intentions will show in it or that scum will slip or make a grave error in reasoning, contradict themselves, etc. The more thoroughly the details of things are hashed out, the more apparent inconsistencies will become. Having thorough debates are wars of attrition that scum lose more often than not. You'd be hard pressed to find any competent mafia player that believes not explaining your arguments in thorough detail is a good town play.
