The Way of the Samurai [Concluded]

[Askthepizzaguy]

I'd like to offer some post-game thoughts on vigilantism and its value to the town.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

During the game, a number of people were not enthusiastic about the vig killings, even members of the vig squad itself. The thought I kept bumping into was that town really shouldn't be assisting the mafia in destroying townies, or townies felt uncomfortable about taking matters into their own hands.

The sentiment is nice, but lynches are basically the same thing, except more democratic. Meaning more susceptible to mafia changing the votes to make it a bad lynch, or people giving bad arguments to switch the lynch to someone innocent. Because of town's divided nature, it's easy for lynches to go wrong. Still, it is usually the town's best weapon.

If a town neither lynched nor performed any vig kills, every death would likely be a mafia killing a townie. A 100% chance of innocents dying. If a town lynches, as they should, not every death is guaranteed to be an innocent, and that is usually how you must win. Still, the mafia ALWAYS have a say in who gets lynched, so it is more inaccurate.

Vigilante killings, when directed by mafia, will be highly likely to hit townies. However, a townie knows he is innocent, and a basic townie is willing to die for the good of the team. If even a basic townie takes the initiative and decides on vigilante deaths, that means there is in fact a chance of mafia dying, and there is less chance of the mafia overturning such an action. They either have to direct the vig killings themselves (high risk), convince the director to attack someone (still risky) or directly sabotage the group attack itself (very risky and could involve too much mafia manpower). I would argue that vigilante killings, when used properly, are town's most effective weapon besides investigations and roleblocks. In some cases, more effective, since investigations can be false, and roleblocks might hit an inactive mafioso, and in such a case, they don't prove anything.

Death is of course the best proof of innocence, and if not innocence, at least not being a threat anymore. Life is quite absurd, and death's the final word, you know.

In this game I admit there was room for other options; the defensive strategy pever and I believe Reenk advocated was actually quite impressive and a good refutation of the idea that vigilantism was the way to go. It could be done without it, in this game. I don't believe that will usually be the case, but it works here, very well it seems.

This goes right along with my recent attitude change towards serial killers; if discovered early, they can be forced vigilantes, acting under town's will, and they can be destroyed at any point in the middle to late middlegame. If they follow orders, they become a huge threat to the mafia, and might take some of them down, or get killed by the mafia. It really does kill two birds with one stone, or in some cases, three... But they are still an endgame threat and have to die before then.

If there is a game with a serial killer and a vigilante, coordinating their attacks and having known townies direct those attacks is almost game-breaking. Here, multiple vig kills were not only possible, they happened regularly. It obliterates mafia very quickly, with good odds of success. In the CoV game, there were many moments in the game where there was a known serial killer and a known vigilante running around somewhere, and the effect of using both under town direction would have been absolutely devastating, and it was in several cases.

Town ends up having more voting members, more bodies, and more kills than the mafia itself, and the mafia ends up being forced to whack the serial killer, the vigilantes, the doctors protecting them perhaps, and they only have so many rounds to do it before they get killed themselves. Vigilantism is not something a serious town should shy away from.

In case it interests anyone:

Okay, I predict that Subotan will die for the lynch.

You're stuck on Lord of Lent, and although I usually detest focusing on newer players so early, because I find it advantageous to get a baseline reading of their mafia or townie play, in this circumstance 2 rounds will have passed so he had a chance to play.

Additionally I know nothing about Lord of Lent, strength or whatever. I could vig him and no one would know other than the vigs, yourself, and pevergreen.

Seeing as there seem to be no objections, and there are a lot of people involved, I'll count that as having some sort of democratic/town consensus. If it's a bad move, at least it was as a result of town attempting to win. I prefer to lose through trying to win, rather than from apathy.

This way you'll have someone to vote for besides LoL tomorrow.

him dying by lynch and us vigging LoL is just as cool with me.

I'm far from sold on LoL but it's like having 8910J in poker, you just go for the straight no questions asked.

Since subo was scum, I don't want to kill LoL. I doubt scum so much as fos'd each other with only two of them. We can provisionally put all of subotan's vote choices and everyone who voted him on a no-vig list.

Haven't looked through it yet to see who I'd like to go after, maybe there isn't any strong candidate.

Wait, Subotan was scum? In what way was he scum?

Please direct me to the post which says so. I read his death, I didn't see any outward indication...

Ehhh, I remember him saying a few things that sound like a confession.

And that bit where he was tied for the lead and said "diamondeye, you'll die unless you vote for slash".

And complaining about there "wasn't really any evidence".

All could be townie things to say.

I've already sent the orders to everyone regarding Lord of lent. Unfortunately such a massive coordination effort does not allow for nimble changes on the fly based on snap decisions.

This stuff has to be decided during the day phases. This is basically like Capo, where everything had to be decided before the lynch was even happening, or else, guaranteed, I'd be missing at least 3-4 people.

There is no reason currently not to suspect Lord of Lent, correct? As such he's as viable a vig as any.

Ah, killing lord of lent is fine, sure. That can't be called back what with attackers ending up dead.

Anyway. When used properly, vigilantes, serial killers, and the lynch can allow up to 3 deaths per day to be directed by known townies. If more deaths are caused by townies, the odds of successfully destroying mafia increases by quite a bit. If more deaths are caused by mafia kills, every one of those deaths will be wrong. Although there will be fluke circumstances where the town will miss them all completely, the odds are just stacked against that happening, especially if a little thought is put into who dies and why.

That kind of pressure also causes the mafia to focus on whacking the vig and the SK, possibly leaving investigators and doctors alive, especially if the vig and/or the SK have claimed. It just adds up to a nightmare for the mafia. With detectives, you can use the pre-emptive counter claim, the post-claim counter claim, or just bluff and suggest they're an insane or naive detective, to some effect sometimes. Roleblockers, the solution is simple, you randomly decide not to kill on certain nights, and that causes the blocker to think he's blocked a mafia when he likely has not. There are possibilities of enduring such roles, but vigilantism is something that you can't really argue against, can't really bluff away, and being inactive doesn't solve. It is the best weapon townies have, double edged sword though it might be.

There are some instances where it shouldn't be used. In the Star Wars game I hosted, for example, the longer everyone lived, the more powerful the town became in comparison to the mafia. Letting people live, or even attacking defended people on purpose, to prolong the game, were better options. But in general, vigilantism truly is the way to go.

/end rant.