NOTW XXIX: Hired Swords (signup thread)

[Diamondeye]

I think Krill refers to the activity demand. Personally, I find it constructive. Compulsary (sp?) voting seems a good idea.

 

[Renata]

Yeah, I'm sure that is what he's referring to; I just don't know why such a rule would be broken, per se. But I'd like to hear the argument for why it might be; I don't want to go into a game with a fatal flaw if it can be fixed before starting.

 

[Ekolite]

I think the trouble with making ''activity'' compulsory is that some players quite often pretend to be inactive, hardly ever posting in the thread, while secretly masterminding some scheme or other behind the scenes. It can be a good strategy.

 

[Seon]

Psst Pinman. Psst oyzar

 

[Krill]

Broken: Just make a vanilla post voting to support yourself and vote every item to yourself.

It certainly shows you are still "active" in that you are around, but how hard is it to login and post a prepared statement once every 3 days? It doesn't force you to chat with people (which takes much longer) or even think about the game. You can still appear to be inactive though.

So the rule doesn't actually fix anything, short of creating "falsifiable" voting records.

 

[Diamondeye]

... Actually, that is a decent point.

 

[TForge13]

I'm ready to go!

 

[Seon]

Geheheheh, welcome Tforge13

 

[Love]

I'm in!!!!!

 

[Methos]

I'm in.

 

[Backwards Logic]

I understand why we want everyone to vote, but forcing everyone to vote is not the way to go about doing it. In a sense there's now a whole bunch of meaningless votes now being thrown around which dilute the voting patterns further. I don't see how forcing everyone to vote is going to help revert NOTW back to its roots. Not to mention what Ekolite said about taking away a strategy many players utilize. If it's inactivity in general that's trying to be exposed, there's enough IM'ing and PM'ing going around that the players as a whole generally know who's active and who isn't anyway. In this regard, forcing votes is unnecessary.

 

[Sprig]

there was/is compulsory voting in ATPG mafia game. How did you feel that has played out?
Without revealing anything about my voting pattern/strategy but people looking at it must be WTH or at the very least ignoring it completely.

 

[Backwards Logic]

there was/is compulsory voting in ATPG mafia game. How did you feel that has played out?
Without revealing anything about my voting pattern/strategy but people looking at it must be WTH or at the very least ignoring it completely.

Once I saw my role I knew having to vote was going to be a problem. There's also the issue of a lot more bandwagoning. Since people have to vote, the best way to not stand out or not put any effort into thinking is to accuse whoever getting accused at the time, which in turn makes it more difficult for that person to get out of being lynched. The problem I see is people will log on, accuse someone because they have to, then not come back until the day's over and thus there's no chance of that meaningless vote being changed. With this rule you're stacking things heavily against whoever gets unlucky. Take my vote against CivGeneral for example. In previous games I wouldn't have accused him since the 'evidence' was shaky at best but it was the only solid 'lead' at the time. I'm curious how many people accused him not because they believed the evidence but because they had to accuse someone. I don't view that as fair to him nor beneficial to the game as a whole. I'm sure I'm not alone when I say I only voted because I had to.

Not to appear sour, but my accusation of Love in ATPG's game was also based entirely on his rule of having to vote. In any other game because of my role I'm staying low and letting the masses kill each other off. It just so happens I find King Arthur and everyone jumps on me, not to mention my internet was still out at the time so flipping the bandwagon elsewhere came too little too late. I also think a lot of those votes had no real reasoning behind them either and again, had the rules been different they probably wouldn't have been there in the first place and thus I possibly could have wiggled out of it. We'll never know.

While the game isn't over, I think it's safe to say that the game was decided not by the specific vote casting but rather on the various abilities people had and how they were used. Not once was voting used as evidence against someone (other than in my case) so it in effect had no impact on the outcome of the game (other than lessening the chance of bandwagons being overturned/changed) which I think reinforces what I said earlier. Granted, I think I would have a survived a day or two longer had I not accused Love, but like I said earlier in traditional games I'm not making such a bold move that early.

So at least from my point of view, forcing votes doesn't improve gameplay other than giving the illusion everyone is taking an active interest in the game. In the end it basically didn't matter, so why force it and remove the "lay low/stay in the shadows/let others do my talking for me" strategy?

 

[PaulusIII]

I might consider taking that rule out after all though; there's good points why it's not going to work.

What I'd really like to do is to think of a way to get rid of inactive players, and by that I don't mean the people that post rarely but are always scheming on IM - I mean the people that drop off the face of the earth as soon as you start the game and have to be removed by vote therefore making the voting even more meaningless. Wolves rarely kill them off.

I'd say that if someone can post a support vote for themselves and vote all the items to themselves, someone can also spend a bit more time looking for evidence in the thread and give an informed vote. Even if you're playing behind the scenes, which is what most players are going to do anyway. My reasoning behind it all; I know it's flawed, but it's with the best intentions to keep the players active.

Also, at the rate signups are going I might have to rework the game so that there's place for 24 players rather than 36. Or everybody is just lazy with signing up for some reason.

 

[rhawn]

I would like to play in this one.

 

[Renata]

Having played on another site recently in a few games where voting is not mandatory but all-but-enforced by the players themselves (not voting is considered a "scum tell"), it *does* work. And yes, it makes it MUCH harder for the bad guys to get away with the "don't get noticed" strategy, which is sort of the point. (It also makes it harder for prophets and the like to do the same, which is why it's not ridiculously unbalancing.) People have to justify why they're voting the way they are; both innocents and guilty have to be wary of bandwagons; heck you can even wind up voting people just because all they do is hop on bandwagons without contributing anything original.

It takes some getting used to and some learning of new strategies, but IMO it is not broken.

 

[Askthepizzaguy]

What I'd really like to do is to think of a way to get rid of inactive players, and by that I don't mean the people that post rarely but are always scheming on IM - I mean the people that drop off the face of the earth as soon as you start the game and have to be removed by vote therefore making the voting even more meaningless. Wolves rarely kill them off.

It takes some getting used to and some learning of new strategies, but IMO it is not broken.

Where I come from, not voting is considered one of the worst things you can possibly do. However, if either the rules or the players don't wish to enforce "Death to the lurkers", there is a way of getting rid of the actually inactive players while keeping around the intentionally not talkative. Everyone simply sends a message to the host every round that says "present". That way the host knows you're still playing. Those who don't send in that message get a warning before they get booted. Let's say you miss three consecutive phases where you don't say "present" to the host and don't vote in the thread (which counts just the same as saying "present"). Then you should be removed.

And of course, setting yourself to invisible mode and not posting elsewhere is a good way of hiding your intentional inactivity, and also to make sure no one notices your sending of the "present" message.


Oh, and...... IN

Also, at the rate signups are going I might have to rework the game so that there's place for 24 players rather than 36. Or everybody is just lazy with signing up for some reason.

Give me a red-hot fire poker and let me go do some recruiting for you.

 

[Sprig]

I hope I am in a team with ATPG and Pinman !!!!

 

[J-man]

I'm IN!

 

[Methos]

I agree that the "you have to vote" rule is going to cause problems. We already have the problem of people jumping on bandwagons. If we added this rule, its only going to be worse. Similar to the "present" pm as suggested by ATPG, many of the GM's like to know what the players are doing, so why not have the players who scheme via IM simply send their logs to the GM. That way the GM knows who is being active and who isn't. Then the GM can react accordingly.