The Salt Factory - Mafia Metagame Discussion Thread

[#HBC | Ryker]

I don't remember. It was a long time ago, but I remember the eruption in post-game.

 

[#HBC | Gorf]

barely read but lemme just say that abolishing the queue is the best thing thats happened in this forum in a looooong time.

edit

The only meta I try to use is "do I think this is a good player?". If the answer is yes, then cool. If it's no, I'll be more lenient in trying to figure them out. Outside of that, I try really hard to not even think about it.

this is the best way to play regarding meta and if you guys dont play like this you really ought to.

 

[adumbrodeus]

I just disagree with this. People aren't mechanical, they don't always make the same mistake scum/town. I purposefully search for people saying "This is maven town meta" so I have tools to use for when I'm scum and search for scum meta so I can avoid it, and I'd be really surprised if I was the only one. The only meta I try to use is "do I think this is a good player?". If the answer is yes, then cool. If it's no, I'll be more lenient in trying to figure them out. Outside of that, I try really hard to not even think about it.

I hope I'm not the only one who absolutely hates meta reads, and find games decided by meta to be boring as ****. I don't care if someone doesn't play Day 1 normally, if that's the case they shouldn't have joined a mafia game. But they did, so they post or die, and if they die and are town then at least we don't have to deal with that slot anymore.

Recently in a mafia game I made a fake scum slip while town in an attempt to get myself killed (kingmaker game with hero role (me)). If I was wrong on the executioner being scum, and he was town and he tried to kill me, would that be town's fault? When I made a fake scum slip? Because I believe that it'd be entirely my fault for that lynch, because I specifically acted in a way designed to get people to lynch me. Even if I was completely ignorant about how I was acting, it'd still be my fault. It's no different in regular mafia games. Town's job is the lynch the scummiest. Sometimes the scummiest player will be town. Town is doing it's job when it lynches that person. The only time it's truly the town's fault is if the person never actually did anything scummy and town just tarded out. And most of the times when I see that, it's over meta.

Plenty of people hate meta, but in a game about understanding people, using past behavior as an insight is extremely powerful tool.

But meta isn't something that should be applied purely mechanically, it should be used as a tool to understand how people think. I'll give a perfect example, Giraffelasergun was pretty dead set on my hornlocking with kary being an instant scumtell in the future because he viewed it as an attempt to halt town progress. Me and orbo had a laugh over it because my motivations for the play made that entirely inaccurate and that's especially obvious looking at when it occurred in previous games, and it was more a result of my big weakness, poor town control.

But here's my main criticism

Town's job is the lynch the scummiest. Sometimes the scummiest player will be town. Town is doing it's job when it lynches that person. The only time it's truly the town's fault is if the person never actually did anything scummy and town just tarded out. And most of the times when I see that, it's over meta.

Even if you're not using meta you can still understand how a person thinks over the course of a single game and figure out inconsistencies in thought process. Just lynching "the scummiest" is problematic from a game perspective because it shifts the impetus for town away from finding and killing scum to not being perceived as the scummiest. Since scumtells in general are based on revealing that a player is more concerned with surviving then killing scum, what is scummy at that point? The only discernable different between town play and scum play is connections.

Not to mention the fact that pure mechanical play is simply ineffective, strong scum are good at making weak townies appear scummy from a mechanical perspective. If town are picking lynches based on mechanical scummyness rather then understanding thought processes and reading from there, scum always has the power to improve their play and develop counter strategies to not make mechanical scumslips and convince town to make them but town has nowhere to go from there.

It's like fighting a guy in a fighting game that always grabs, sure you may get grabbed a bit but if you're working on improving your play you'll develop countermeasures and after a bit you should win 100% of the time. Unless the game's inherently broken, in pvp games good mechanical play is a supplement to good reading.

When did that happen? Should've blacklisted him for it. That's virtually the vilest thing a player can do in mafia.

I disagree for exactly the same reason as you stated in your prior post. People shouldn't fall for ATE, appealing to emotions is totally legitimate as a play to make but it shouldn't be a good strategy. People need to not fall for it and it's ridiculous that we'd hand hold the community because they can't be logical.

I think we just need to sort out our policies every now and then. Right now there's a couple of things I think we should change:

* We don't punish inactivty nearly as much as we should. Inactive players should be insta-lynched.
* We're way too lenient on AtE. Emotions have no place in a mafia game and should be punished.
* We should be more open with criticism. People are too scared to voice their opinions and need a thicker skin too.
* The whole concept of a player's "meta" should be thrown out of the window completely for a while.

All these things really hinder people's progess right now imo.

The problem with inactivity is there's literally no good options to fix it, everything we can possibly do punishes town.

I don't think meta is a problem in and of itself, I think people meta poorly. There was also a time when straight mechanical play of scumslips was causing town to lose a lot of games.

ATE just needs to be ignored, emotions that actually come out in play can help you understand a player's thought processes but people need to understand the difference between stagecraft and emotions.

 

[#HBC | Red Ryu]

Doing it in game versus using replacing out as a strategy is the key difference though.

Faking irl drama on a replace out is really grimy.

 

[#HBC | Kary]

* We don't punish inactivty nearly as much as we should. Inactive players should be insta-lynched.
* We're way too lenient on AtE. Emotions have no place in a mafia game and should be punished.

I've probably said this before, but I consider inactivity to be first and foremost a problem for the mod and not the town. If people are not playing the game at all, they should be dealt with by the rules (not saying I have any easy answers for this...) but town simply can't deal with several different slots that just aren't posting at all.

If players are coasting by and not contributing, I completely agree with getting rid of them. I don't want them in Lylo.

It's just people are robotic on this site more often then naught or really emotional. There needs to be a balance between the two.

Lol true. I don't think you can ever take all emotion out of the game. The trick is not letting it get out of control.

 

[adumbrodeus]

Doing it in game versus using replacing out as a strategy is the key difference though.

Faking irl drama on a replace out is really grimy.

Ah misunderstood. Thought it was meant that he was pretending to be planning to replace out. Ya, that is extremely grimy, replacing out should never be a strategy because it's adding in out of game elements.

edit:

I've probably said this before, but I consider inactivity to be first and foremost a problem for the mod and not the town. If people are not playing the game at all, they should be dealt with by the rules (not saying I have any easy answers for this...) but town simply can't deal with several different slots that just aren't posting at all.

If players are coasting by and not contributing, I completely agree with getting rid of them. I don't want them in Lylo.



Lol true. I don't think you can ever take all emotion out of the game. The trick is not letting it get out of control.

The problem is, how do you create a ruleset that doesn't force fake content, doesn't punish players who are generally very active but have short periods of inactivity. A lot of the problem is lack of in game rational behavior brought on either by lack of interest or lack of time, only scum have a motivation to be inactive theoretically while town have a motivation to be as active as possible.


Semi-related, the idea of restrictions that force or encourage inactivity are a terrible idea. Especially since we have issues with it but just in general, post restrictions of that type should not exist for example.

 

[#HBC | Kary]

I still remember Soup planning an emotional outburst into replacing out in order to save his slot. That sort of thing is disgusting to me. That's an extreme example, but we're so lenient. "Guys, I'm just so ****ing sick of the way we're treating each othe that I didn't want to post." That's accepted as a reasonable explanation for not contributing.

If you're replacing out of the game, in order to win at the game, I think you ****ed up somewhere in your thought process.

######################

Oh and I should maybe say something about meta.

I think we should probably just phase out 'meta' as a word in mafia games, because people just abuse it all the time. When you say 'meta' what are you saying other than you've played with that person before? You're not conveying any useful information. Even if a player did have a distinctive playstyle, simply saying that it is their 'meta' doesn't mean anything to someone who might be new, or have a different take on it from you.

 

[#HBC | ѕoup]

I think we just need to sort out our policies every now and then. Right now there's a couple of things I think we should change:

* We don't punish inactivty nearly as much as we should. Inactive players should be insta-lynched.
* We're way too lenient on AtE. Emotions have no place in a mafia game and should be punished.
* We should be more open with criticism. People are too scared to voice their opinions and need a thicker skin too.
* The whole concept of a player's "meta" should be thrown out of the window completely for a while.

All these things really hinder people's progess right now imo.

No. No. People aren't unemotional robots, and expecting people to be such is trivial. It's not that we're way too lenient on AtE, it's that people have quarreling opinions about what is and isn't AtE. If I'm angry about something, it's probably because I want to come off in such a way that is relating to my play. If you seriously believe that you can disconnect yourself so easily then you're probably lying or I wouldn't want to play with you. Emotion is unavoidable just like meta is, it's just how you perceive it. Classifying someone's intentions (in this case, anger, in my example) as some sort of textbook saying is ****ing callous. You should be reading into why they're angry instead of just assuming it's AtE.

THAT. Is DGames problem. People are unwilling to accept someone for how it is and want to make everything into some sort of clause.

This includes my 'AtE', or J's 'AtE' or any other unacceptable-and-completely-haram-type-of-play that DGames snuffs their nose at because they lack the ability to adapt. It is not mine nor J's fault for playing the way we do, and I won't change because you want to try and make me play the way you want me to.

Did swiss have to change? Ryker? Marshy? How about any other players with a unique style?

I'm calling anyone out who ever called someone bad or said their play sucked. You suck. That includes me because in the end it is my fault if I misread someone, regardless of anything. If I cannot adapt and I cannot understand something, that means I'm lacking as a player or I was lacking that game. Even players like Vinyl. are somewhat readable. Useless? Debatable, but still readable.

We should be embracing these types of things, not trying to get rid of it! I play games here because I like the personalities of the players! I don't want people to become absolutely formulaic and I don't think anyone else really wants it either.

I understand my emotions, or maybe even someone else's emotions can get the better of them but that happens when people like me are beaten down constantly because I do play with so much emotion. That's how I am. I try not to go off the deep end like I used to but if you can't accept that I play that way then honestly blacklist me because you'd be doing me a service from being told how I should play Mafia, and kindly love yourself.

 

[#HBC | ѕoup]

Meta is unavoidable. You cannot phase out meta. I do not want to phase out meta. Nobody is saying you need to read someone by meta let alone use it as much, and that's your choice if you do.

 

[#HBC | Kary]

soup, I feel you're wrong on some things buddy.

 

[#HBC | ѕoup]

Kary, I think you have a different way of looking at things and that's fine, but don't shun me because I don't see it how you do.

You cannot breed perfect mafia players who will play exactly like you want them to, and that's what makes mafia great. Everyone has a distinct personality and way of going about things, and I don't want to see that to change because Gheb is too narrow-minded to understand something that doesn't fit in his category of good play, let alone anyone else.

 

[Orboknown]

Gheb is the last person i would call narrow minded

 

[ranmaru]

I think emotions are real and if people are involved in a game then it will make sense they may feel frustrated with pressure coming their way. I think you just have to decipher it correctly, whether to see if it is genuine emotion or fake emotion. I think people should try their best to play calmy to be able to be rational but you can't be too robotic, or otherwise you'll just be a machine and who can read that?

 

[#HBC | ѕoup]

I think emotions are real and if people are involved in a game then it will make sense they may feel frustrated with pressure coming their way. I think you just have to decipher it correctly, whether to see if it is genuine emotion or fake emotion. I think people should try their best to play calmy to be able to be rational but you can't be too robotic.

Of course there's a fine line and nobody should be letting their emotions absolutely get to them, but completely discarding them is wrong

 

[ranmaru]

I agree with that. I also will say that I have gotten emotionally invested when scumreading people, which is why I have the motivation to take the time and effort to make such long cases. It is hard not to get emotionally invested. Emotion isn't a button you can simply press to turn them off.

 

[adumbrodeus]

Soup I think the frustration that many people feel has more to do with people falling for staged ATEs then attacking you for your play. Within the confines of the game and the rules you play to win, if it works, keep doing it. If it doesn't work, stop, refocus, figure out what you're doing wrong, and try something new.

It frustrates me how easily people can fall to an emotional play but I'm certainly not above weaving emotion into my play when I think it would be beneficial.

 

[#HBC | Kary]

soup, let me just say something which I sincerely believe. It lives down there under my avatar.
'The truth is probably somewhere in the middle'

Yes, if you were a better player, you would be able to read a player who was more difficult to read. But if that player also made it easier for you to read them, surely that would also help? Being able to explain yourself, to come across as trustworthy- these are parts of the game.

What I'm trying to say is, that you seem to be looking at things in absolutes. And in reality, things are not completely one way, or another.

 

[#HBC | ѕoup]

I'm not sure where emotion and explaining yourself are the same. I think being angry about something is an explanation in itself, because usually, people have a reason to feel a way about something one way or the other.

I will say that saying' '**** you all you all ****ing suck kiss my ass' isn't really explaining anything and is just ad homininem, but telling someone why you're angry makes sense. I've always tried to do that, in regards to myself.

 

[Orboknown]

Thing is
You can legitimately be angry about something and have it be completely unrelated to your alighment, or what you were doing to outside viewers

 

[ranmaru]

Thing is
You can legitimately be angry about something and have it be completely unrelated to your alighment, or what you were doing to outside viewers

Yes, well the better idea is to post in the social thread if you are upset outside of the game. Yet there is no rule that you can't post it in game though. There's gray area there. I try my best to separate it but might be a good idea to post a little bit about your life in the game if you want to seem human and likable.

 

[#HBC | Kary]

soup, I realize I don't explain myself in a direct way, but I think you missed my point.

What I'm trying to say is, do you expect other people to change if you refuse to change?

 

[ranmaru]

Yes, if you were a better player, you would be able to read a player who was more difficult to read. But if that player also made it easier for you to read them, surely that would also help? Being able to explain yourself, to come across as trustworthy- these are parts of the game.

I think that would help. I think with Soup is that he has played very well as scum, and has abused AtE, which worked and was valid. Once I have seen it in his town play I read it wrong and was too confident, for which I apologize in reading him wrong and causing him any stress, and in the past with our squabbles. It's weird, he gets a lot of attention as town but when scum he is able to be read more townie than me.

I think his play in Necromafia was great and I didn't really get why people were piling on him when he was jailer in that one game that finished. Don't remember the details though.

 

[SangfroidWarrior]

I'm just gonna leave this here.

 

[Maven89]

It is not mine nor J's fault for playing the way we do, and I won't change because you want to try and make me play the way you want me to.

 

[#HBC | ѕoup]

soup, I realize I don't explain myself in a direct way, but I think you missed my point.

What I'm trying to say is, do you expect other people to change if you refuse to change?

I try not to be so emotional, and I said that. I'm not trying to fill the game with what would be called AtE and I step back from it all knowing not many people like that. You can see it in most of my games when I take pause or I'm not around because I don't want to self-destruct, but there will always be a part of me that will be emotional as it's just part of my play.

 

[#HBC | Laundry]

barely read but lemme just say that abolishing the queue is the best thing thats happened in this forum in a looooong time.

edit



this is the best way to play regarding meta and if you guys dont play like this you really ought to.

I mostly use meta as a moron check if anything.

 

[#HBC | Gorf]

man its such a burden on decent players to moron check tho. its true cuz ultimately you dont wanna lynch scum but like... its like **** man.

also soup shut up man you dont play well. saying "i play the way i play deal with it" is ****in cancer. like what do you think someone whos been playing ****ty rock n roll for 30 years should just be... allowed to play... ****tily for the rest of his life?

 

[#HBC | ѕoup]

man its such a burden on decent players to moron check tho. its true cuz ultimately you dont wanna lynch scum but like... its like **** man.

also soup shut up man you dont play well. saying "i play the way i play deal with it" is ****in cancer. like what do you think someone whos been playing ****ty rock n roll for 30 years should just be... allowed to play... ****tily for the rest of his life?

I don't think Rock and Roll is the same as Mafia.

 

[Cheerilee]

It's not emotions that are the root of the problem, but rather how people fail to accurately deduce feigned emotions, inappropriate emotions, or how to adequately deal with genuine emotions in a given game. This issue actually is not one of emotion, but one of cognition. And unfortunately, you can't really address an issue with someone who has a flaw in their cognitive model within the span of a single mafia game, without it taking over the entirety of a mafia game... to just scratch the surface.

 

[adumbrodeus]

problem is a lot of mafia problems are like that, game theory (in the modeling and optimization sense) being another big one. A lot of discussions of optimization hinge on game theory which can very easily take over games.

man its such a burden on decent players to moron check tho. its true cuz ultimately you dont wanna lynch scum but like... its like **** man.

also soup shut up man you dont play well. saying "i play the way i play deal with it" is ****in cancer. like what do you think someone whos been playing ****ty rock n roll for 30 years should just be... allowed to play... ****tily for the rest of his life?

Well is his use of ATEs what's holding him back? Gheb gives the opposite impression, they've been effective. If he's successfully ATEing seems like the problem lies with everybody else and their cognition and his actual weaknesses lie elsewhere. Unless he's using it as a crutch.

Regardless your point is well taken, their unique style was encouraged because of their skill at the game and it made them more effective. If your unique playstyle is holding you back then seems like it's time to nix it. Unique isn't the same as good.

 

[The Man From Delamar]

Catching up, but I absolutely had to stop when I saw...

...i mean, I dunno who Swiss or marshy are and I ain't never seen Ryker play, but are they known for playing emotionally and having emotional outbursts? Is that his point? Or what?

If not then what? Being overemotional and whiny and playing on feels and gut and tunneling reads into the ground and etc are not a "unique playstyle", they're focusing on asinine matters and playing poorly, and frankly any good you accomplish on that route is gonna be broken clock twice a day luck.

As I said people may not be unemotional robots but it doesn't mean ya gotta barf all your innermost thoughts straight onto the keyboard. The option is available to chill out first. There's a fancy button called the Backspace and I use it liberally to trim unnecessary hogwash outta every post I make, every time. And yeah, sorry, but "I'm upset" is an example of as much.

Get angry/sad/whatever out of game. Get MOTIVATED IN game.

 

[#HBC | ѕoup]

I don't think it's something that I try to do, it's literally just how I think. I bring a bit of myself into games and if people don't like that then there basically saying they don't like me. I'm not gonna put it like that but it's genuinely how I feel, because I can't detach myself from my own personality.

 

[#HBC | Gorf]

I don't think Rock and Roll is the same as Mafia.

i dont think you should metaphorically stick your fingers in your ear and scream "LALALALALA" when you are consistently wagoned to near death/death. i think the best thing about your play is the fact that you can get things rolling extremely quickly, but that happens because of your god given talent to have such conviction on the weirdest things and to read so many things the wrong way. thats more of a laughing-at-you thing than a laughing-with-you, and thats my point. you dont succeed in persuasion and debates by screaming my way or the highway. you empathize with the stances of others around you and [/i]develop[/i] your ability to make the right play.

or, i should say, people who are good do.

 

[Cheerilee]

I don't think it's something that I try to do, it's literally just how I think. I bring a bit of myself into games and if people don't like that then there basically saying they don't like me. I'm not gonna put it like that but it's genuinely how I feel, because I can't detach myself from my own personality.

If you feel that you are being targeted for who you are in game rather than anything else in the game and the actual game is just being used as a form of punishment (for stuff you did in the past) then that's bullying. We both know that I've been bullied on another mafia site and the way I dealt with it was to just make new friends and isolate myself from the bullies. When I want to play the game, I play it on terms where I know I won't be harassed and can enjoy a good time, whenever I actually have time.

Imo you are getting personal about this issue because you feel like you are targeted in games because of who you are and because of that you get emotional. It's why you probably can't detach yourself from a game because I've only been on the fringe and have seen people say things like, "not again soup" "this is a soup thing" I think your entire commentary about you bringing a bit of yourself in a game is some form of humor as more often than not I saw more of other people dragging the you into a mafia game and you trying to separate yourself away from that. Like I said before, I wish that community matters would have less influence over actual game flow, but realistically speaking it is impossible for everyone to be given a tabula rasa from N0.

 

[~ Gheb ~]

Soup, I think you tend to take things personal a bit too easily. Humans may be emotional beings but that doesn't prevent them from keeping their emotions out of their posts. It's not like you don't have all the time in the world to read things carefully and digest them carefully and craft your posts carefully. If you don't make use of what's given to you then you got nobody to blame but yourself.

If you use your own play as exemplary it's not wonder that you believe emotions to be no problem. The issue with that is that your play is by no means exemplary and failing to acknowledge poor play and brushing it off as a personl quirk of yours isn't going to help your case. Sure, you can keep on doing what you're doing but then you got no right to complain about every game coming down to you having to replace out to avoid getting lynched.

Why would you compare yourself to Swiss, Ryker or marshy? Of course they didn't need to change their ways in order to do well. Why would they? They were already doing well on their own in the first place, not something I'd say about you. These three players could dominate games, your attempts at doing so backfire pretty reliably. They also don't replace out whenever things don't go their way. They also don't consistently lose their **** in every game they join ever. And you know what? What they're doing is a lot harder than what you do. You have no idea what playing on that level means. Just the amount of bull**** you have to deal with is staggering. You have to deal with 2-3 people who flat-out can't sumhunt. You have to make sense out of 3-4 players that aren't good at putting their thoughts into words. You have to deal with 3-4 people that think think you're scummy when they simply fail to understand you. And of course, you have to deal with inactivity and an abundance of AtE. Every game, all the time. And you know what? They suck it up and deal with it. They don't replace out or go insane out as soon as two people disagree with them or vote them. That's why they are good, that's why they don't have a reason to change their play and that's why they cannot be compared to you.

You're also wrong if you think that these people don't change or always play the same. Ryker's play at some point has actually changed quite noticeably. I specifically remember complimenting over how much he has improved and that wasn't even that long ago. But I realized how ... much longer ago he'd often tried to come across as somewhat authoritarian to establish his views and now his influence is just a lot more natural and confident without any false pretensions.

It is not mine nor J's fault for playing the way we do

Of course it is. You're a human being, not an animal.

 

[Maven89]

Soup, I love you bro but I don't think you ever learned the fundamentals of the game. The game isn't about faking/reading emotions, it's about faking/reading logic. Emotions are more like the dirty trick that you can use to smooth out rough edges. You can't scum hunt through emotions, we're not Jedi, we can't just trust our feelings and pinpoint scum

 

[#HBC | J]

Whoooooa hard disagree with you there Maven. Faking/Reading emotion are just as important as faking/reading logic. People just hate when their emotions get used and hurt, The ego is a fragile thing to most people.

I could honestly publish a book on that, but to each their own ways to play the game.

Which a lot of y'all are seeming to miss the key point: This is a game. Have fun! This is a parlor game in order to just have a bunch of friends play together and have fun. This isn't weighted competitively and people should really relax more. That's all I'm gonna really say on mafia meta-game discussion because I really don't wish to partake in the discussion since I play this for fun. I'm keeping an eye on the thread though.

 

[~ Gheb ~]

Ignoring emotions helps you win games.
Ignoring logic helps you lose games.

 

[The Man From Delamar]

Can I like that post more 'n once???

 

[#HBC | ѕoup]

If you feel that you are being targeted for who you are in game rather than anything else in the game and the actual game is just being used as a form of punishment (for stuff you did in the past) then that's bullying. We both know that I've been bullied on another mafia site and the way I dealt with it was to just make new friends and isolate myself from the bullies. When I want to play the game, I play it on terms where I know I won't be harassed and can enjoy a good time, whenever I actually have time.

Imo you are getting personal about this issue because you feel like you are targeted in games because of who you are and because of that you get emotional. It's why you probably can't detach yourself from a game because I've only been on the fringe and have seen people say things like, "not again soup" "this is a soup thing" I think your entire commentary about you bringing a bit of yourself in a game is some form of humor as more often than not I saw more of other people dragging the you into a mafia game and you trying to separate yourself away from that. Like I said before, I wish that community matters would have less influence over actual game flow, but realistically speaking it is impossible for everyone to be given a tabula rasa from N0.

Yeah. That's exactly it. People take one instance out of me and then turn it into some sort of sin against all that is DGames holy and I have to deal with people look at me through a magnifying glass. I cannot seem to overcome these instances and even now I have people misunderstanding and telling me I don't know fundamentals. Really? I know fundamentals and it's like people honestly believe that I don't incorporate logic into my reads. I do, however, try to have emotion in order to accentuate what I want out of someone or even trying to analyze the intention/emotion of someone too.

I am not some ticking time bomb who always wants to replace out, and I only feel that way when I have people trying to beat me down and misunderstanding me because of past grievances, and that's literally not fair and is ****ing insulting.