Rubicon [Concluded]

[TinCow]

Night 6 concluded, write-up commencing.

[TinCow]

“Everything we hear is an opinion, not a fact. Everything we see is a perspective, not the truth.”
- Marcus Aurelius Antoninus Augustus

On his way home from the Senate, woad&fangs had heard the news coming down the Via Flaminia. At Auximum, the local senate had determined that the town would not obstruct the march of Caesar’s legions through the city. Prudently, the local garrison commander had withdrawn, but the speed of the Caesarian vanguard forced him to halt and take up a defensive formation. A brief clash ensued, but as with the garrison of Iguvium, many of the legionaries had served with Caesar in Gaul, and their loyalty was questionable at best. Soon after the battle began, many of the defending force deserted, with the majority simply joining the ranks of their opponents. Yet another road to Rome was open, and the crisis grew deeper.

This worried woad&fangs a great deal, and he returned to his villa to think about what he should do. He debated the situation with his freedman advisor, but could not reach a satisfactory conclusion. Eventually, he grew weary and called for his cena. Food and drink aplenty was soon brought before him. After a half hour of gorging himself, woad&fangs was finally slowing down a bit. The last few bites of baked pigeon had parched his throat, and his wine goblet was empty. Where was the damnable wine bearer?!

woad&fangs craned his neck around, looking for the man. He saw a figure in the back holding the wine ewer, and gestured frantically towards him. “Wine, damn you!” The man started forward quickly, holding the ewer out in front of him as he came. woad&fangs began berating him for his sluggishness, and the man took the abuse silently, pouring the wine as instructed. Suddenly, woad&fangs paused, having noticed the extremely large forearm muscles of the wine bearer. He had not always been so strong, had he? Before he could put voice to these thoughts, the wine bearer grabbed his head with both hands. Immense strength poured through his thick fingers, and the last thing woad&fangs heard was the sound of his own neck snapping.

…

YLC was lounging casually on a lectus, waiting for his food to digest, when a great commotion came from the front gate. A few shouts, followed by banging, and then more shouting, before the whole thing turned into an unrecognizable cacophony. A few moments later, an armed man rushed into the room. He paused before YLC, “Sir, the villa is being assaulted by men armed with gladii! You must get to safety!” His eyes wide, YLC did as he was told and retreated to one of the more secure rooms in the villa.

From his location, crouched in a bedroom with a locked door, he could hear the sounds of battle continue for many minutes. After a while, they faded, and irregular footsteps could be heard approaching his hiding place. A knock followed, and a voice stated, “They have gone, sir, we have held the villa and thrown them back!” YLC tentatively opened the door, to find an armed man standing there, clutching his leg, which was bleeding badly. He gave the man a piece of cloth to tie around the wound, and helped him hobble out to the main courtyard.

What he saw was horrifying. Bodies were scattered in multiple places, windows and doors were broken, and nearly everything of value in the room had been broken. His villa was ruined, but at least YLC was alive.

…

The butcher’s wife stayed up extra late, hoping that the strange men would return. She had told the fishmonger’s wife about what had happened the previous night, but the response was skeptical at best. The woman had had the gall to accuse her of making it all up, and had mocked her publicly for it. Tonight, the butcher’s wife was going to prove to herself that she was not crazy. Who were these men, why were they congregating outside her window, and why were they interested in everyone?

Sure enough, well after sunset, footsteps sounded on the street and a group of men approached, walking towards everyone’s villa. Within moments, other men began to emerge from side alleys where they must have concealed themselves, and barred the path of the first group. Both groups were armed with pugii, and soon a standoff began.

After a few shouts and gestures, three men emerged from the blocking group, and two from the walking group. They met in the middle of the street, between the two mobs, once again arguing and gesturing frantically. As with the previous night, everyone was frequently mentioned, and regular gestures were made in the direction of his villa. Other words drifted back to the window where the butcher’s wife stood. One of the men in the blocking group was saying something about “outnumbered” and “or else.” The leaders of the walking group turned and talked to one another quietly, before returning to their side of the mob. After some grumbling and shoulder shrugging, the walking group dispersed into the city.

As with the previous night, the group of men who had blocked the path of the others remained for some hours, scanning the dark side-streets. The butcher’s wife was pleased with the result; that bitch, the fishmonger’s wife, would get an earful for ever doubting her. Plus, she stank and her daughter was a whore.

…

As the Senate re-convened for another day’s discussion, the Senators filed in, their shoulders slumped and their brows furrowed. Yet another night had passed, and without fail the murders continued to occur. Another proscription was inevitable, and all were worried that their name would be the next one on the list. Few men paid much attention to the empty seat in the Optimates section, more were concerned with the notices that had been nailed to the Curia doors:

*taps mic* Is this thing on?

Hello senatos and welcome to good morning rome!. we have a great show for ya today that i hope will provide a lot of food for thought. So,, lets get started shall we.

I would just like to say for starters that you shouldn't trust anything caser says. Why would you listen to a dirty populare? and on that note, i'm disappointed with the lack of senators taking the direct root to deal with their opponents. This is a revolution! go out and get youre hands dirty. We all know that no matter what happens their is no way the senate is coming out of this intact. Do you really want the populares calling the shots? Trying to work with them is a fools errand my fellow optimates. If you show weakness they'll kill you. And if you refuse to join me, i might haf ta kill you.

Secondly, caesar would have you beleive that Sasaki Kojiro is one of my men. Well, he is. That's right, that traitorous dog caesar is telling the truth for once. Sasaki Kojiro is one of my most trusted lieutenants. and the best part is that even though you all know this, you won't believe it. its hilarious! I'm telling you right now that he is guilty as can be. won't your faces be red once i'm in charge? Well, those that survive that is.

Any loyal optimates should find a sharp object and stick it through one of these men:

Shinseikhaan
everyone
Ignoramus
Chaotix
It would really help speed things along, we can only kill so many people before our arms get tired from stabbing.

Cheers, and tune in tommorrow same time, same staiton.

Senators! You have been given the chance to save the Republic and take Pompey "the Great?" out of commision. Yet still he schemes and plots, Senators sent here and there thinking they are doing good but instead being manipulated and kept far away from investigating where they should. You are all puppets on his strings, I have told you his name, I have no need to repeat it.

"Gaius Julius Caesar" (No3. II Tri)

Alive (24):
Beefy187
Greyblades
LittleGrizzly
Sasaki Kojiro
everyone
johnhughthom
AggonyDuck
Shinseikhaan
spL1tp3r50naL1ty
Chaotix
Khazaar
Ichigo
Jolt
Gaius Scribonius Curio
Marshal Murat
Iskander 3.1
Captain Blackadder
atheotes
Tratorix
YLC
Askthepizzaguy
Ignoramus
TheFlax
Caius

Killed (9):
White_eyes:D
mini
Beskar
Yaropolk
pevergreen
Glenn
GeneralHankerchief
Andres
woad&fangs

Proscripted (4):
navarro951
Tiberius of the Drake
Cronos Impera
Cultured Drizzt fan

WoG/Suicide (0):

It is now Day VI. You may begin voting. This day phase will end on Tuesday, May 26th at 1:00pm EST.

[Greyblades]

Hmm thats twice now, I wonder why everyone is being targeted?

[Cultured Drizzt fan]

well I assume because he has been lurking, yet has been on the forums. (he has posted elsewhere, but here only posts enough to not get WOG.

[Sasaki Kojiro]

Vote:LittleGrizzly

As laid out here: https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showp...&postcount=807

Andres, your comments make no sense and make me wonder if you have some bias on this issue. You do not normally let people off the hook as easily as you are willing to with little grizzly.

[Splitpersonality]

that bitch, the fishmonger’s wife, would get an earful for ever doubting her. Plus, she stank and her daughter was a whore.

I have to admit, from the seriousness of the rest of the post, I laughed at this heartily. It seems Caesar is still pushing for Sasaki's death (it was sasaki, right?)

hm...

Vote: Abstain

Hopefully, I'll be back to change this later.

[Greyblades]

It was both Pompey and ol'Julius who wanted Sasaki dead last turn. I wonder why they have changed their tune?
Vote: LittleGrizzly

[Splitpersonality]

I don't think they both wanted him dead, that could be all WIFOM though.

"They only say they want him dead because he is actually working with them, but then etc etc"

[seireikhaan]

Vote: LittleGrizzly


I don't believe this cruel world, why are these people so entranced by my continued existence so as to prolong this benign suffering?

[GeneralHankerchief]

It's Sasaki.

It's a poorly-kept secret that Sasaki is the nexus of the pro-town network. Take him down and things go that much less smoother. Why hasn't there been at least an attempt on his life yet?

[Iskander 3.1]

Both LittleGrizzly and YLC seem very suspicious right now (see Andres' post from earlier: https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showp...&postcount=787)

Vote: YLC

[Sasaki Kojiro]

It's Sasaki.

It's a poorly-kept secret that Sasaki is the nexus of the pro-town network. Take him down and things go that much less smoother. Why hasn't there been at least an attempt on his life yet?

One can reasonably assume that I am protected...

[Cultured Drizzt fan]

then again, so was GH but he ended up dead. it is a bit strange they haven't even tried to kill you....

[Greyblades]

One can reasonably assume that I am protected...

Hmm, the night kills, even the failed ones, usually appear in tincows write-ups. I'm guessing Its safe to assume that you have not been attacked yet.

[ULC]

Vote: Sasaki

Nice one - I agree with GH, we should lynch Sasaki. If he's a dead, he will be a much more effective part of the protown network, rather then as a living member who in my book doesn't like competition nor being told off.

[ULC]

Both LittleGrizzly and YLC seem very suspicious right now (see Andres' post from earlier: https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showp...&postcount=787)

Vote: YLC

Sharp as a tack you are - having my villa ransacked must mean I am guilty! Notice I had no outside help! Must mean I am guilty.

[Greyblades]

If he's a dead, he will be a much more effective part of the protown network
What do you mean he'll be more useful to the town network dead? That's just dumb and somehow I doubt that any townie would be stupid enough to lynch the person leading a pro town group.

Unvote, vote: YLC.

[seireikhaan]

Sharp as a tack you are - having my villa ransacked must mean I am guilty! Notice I had no outside help! Must mean I am guilty.

Silly man, being attacked and surviving is no indicator of your innocence. Anyone could have attacked you. That you have enough wealth to pay for the service of men means nothing.

[Chaotix]

Lynching YLC is a very bad idea. Trust me on this one, we don't want to lose him.

By the same token, I think lynching Sasaki is not the greatest of ideas, either. He's been, essentially, keeping the town from killing each other off by setting up the opposing mobs. Although this could be better (i.e., two protections instead of one protection and one vig), he's helping to keep the kill rate down every night.

So, while I was planning to abstain, because I don't have much time to play this game today, I find my self Voting: LittleGrizzly, for the sole purpose of keeping these two alive.

[ULC]

If he's a dead, he will be a much more effective part of the protown network
What do you mean he'll be more useful to the town network dead? That's just dumb and somehow I doubt that any townie would be stupid enough to lynch the person leading a pro town group.

Unvote, vote: YLC.

A dead townie, although lacking a vote, has substantially more claim to innocence and has significant motivation to proactively help the town since he won't win otherwise. As a head of the network, this increase is manifold, since he becomes next to completely trustable and can handle sensitive information from others players such as abilities and send out instructions to be followed in an ambiguous manner so as the network doesn't truly grasp what is going on, limiting the effectiveness of infiltrators and insuring they must follow orders or be found out by the network leader, who will be using everyone to their optimum in his own true interests since at this point betrayal is beyond him.

Silly man, being attacked and surviving is no indicator of your innocence. Anyone could have attacked you. That you have enough wealth to pay for the service of men means nothing.

It is too - since I no longer have any stake in it, I am Consul Marcus Calpurnius Bibulus, a senator of the optimates faction. I've played against character the whole game trying to save the senate instead of being the whiny little prude who was angry at Caesar for "ruining" his consulship. Considering the Consul PM has not been revealed, I will not post mine, however, you may have everything other then that.

“It is not death that a man should fear, but he should fear never beginning to live.”
- Marcus Aurelius Antoninus Augustus

Marcus Calpurnius Bibulus (Bibulus)
Senator
(Optimates Faction)

As the son-in-law of Marcus Porcius Cato Uticencis, there has never been any doubt as to which political party you have supported. You are a staunch Optimates, and your efforts on their behalf have been richly rewarded. Unfortunately, the main reward that you were given was to be Consul in 59 BC with none other than Gaius Julius Caesar himself! That impudent lout turned the Mob against you, and they attacked your bodyguards and dumped human excrement on you! To save your own skin, you wisely retreated to your home and fortified it against intruders. You did you best to thwart Caesar by constantly proclaiming bad omens, but your term has often been ridiculed as the Consulship of Julius and Caesar.

You have never forgiven Caesar and the Populares for these grave insults, and rightly so! Perhaps now would be a good time to get revenge for all of the humiliations they have heaped upon you… sometimes literally!

Victory Conditions:
(1) Eliminate all Caesarians and Pompeians. You will be victorious even if you are dead if this goal is met.

OR

(2) Survive and eliminate all Populares Faction Members, including Caesarians.

Role Description:
Night Actions:
(1) With 1 other Senator, you can investigate one player per night. Successful investigations will show the target's faction.
(2) With 2 other Senators, you can attempt to protect one player per night. Any player you protect will be very difficult to kill that night.
(3) With 3 other Senators, you can attempt to kill one player per night.

Special Ability:

Now, I've spent most of this game trying my best to form defender cells answerable in a chain to each cells leader, in the hopes of protecting priority targets and being able to isolate those cells which fail, and hopefully ensnaring a mafioso. However, members amongst the first cell decided to be traitorous and went screaming to Sasaki, who has deemed me a threat, one that never existed.

In fact, I have enough information to hang some fairly powerful aspects of the town, and I am starting to feel very, very vindictive - luckily, only just starting.

[Iskander 3.1]

Lynching YLC is a very bad idea. Trust me on this one, we don't want to lose him.

And why not?

[ULC]

And why not?

Because I am one of the few players that takes a delight in watching everything burn occasionally.

Oh, what stories I have to tell

[Greyblades]

A dead townie, although lacking a vote, has substantially more claim to innocence and has significant motivation to proactively help the town since he won't win otherwise. As a head of the network, this increase is manifold, since he becomes next to completely trustable and can handle sensitive information from others players such as abilities and send out instructions to be followed in an ambiguous manner so as the network doesn't truly grasp what is going on, limiting the effectiveness of infiltrators and insuring they must follow orders or be found out by the network leader, who will be using everyone to their optimum in his own true interests since at this point betrayal is beyond him.

I see your point but I still think it is a bad idea to kill him, if for the fact that I don't like the idea of wasting a lynch when he's more likely to turn out to be town than most of us. Your claims to the contrary or not. Unvote: YLC

[Iskander 3.1]

Very well, Unvote: YLC for the time being...care to explain how you will promise to use your Consul duties to help us all out?

EDIT: I sill would like to reference Andres' post where YLC seems to know the inner working of how the mafia needed to use more than one night kill. If he's not mafia, might he still be in bed with them?

[Andres]

Vote:LittleGrizzly

As laid out here: https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showp...&postcount=807

Andres, your comments make no sense and make me wonder if you have some bias on this issue. You do not normally let people off the hook as easily as you are willing to with little grizzly.

LittleGrizzly basically told you to get lost when you fished for his role pm. I would have told you to go fishing elsewhere too in his place. I fail to see why LG should be lynched. Because he doesn't trust Sasaki? Come on now.

Anyway, I think YLC is the better lynch for today.

[Sasaki Kojiro]

LittleGrizzly basically told you to get lost when you fished for his role pm. I would have told you to go fishing elsewhere too in his place. I fail to see why LG should be lynched. Because he doesn't trust Sasaki? Come on now.

Anyway, I think YLC is the better lynch for today.

[Andres]

?

Besides, if you were so supicious about him, being in vigilante teams and such, why didn't you attack him?

If he would have been a lying mafioso, you would have killed him and if he would have told the truth, he would have been protected.



You're being inconsistent.

[Sasaki Kojiro]

It is all there to read and put together, andres, if you wish to.

[Andres]

It is all there to read and put together, andres, if you wish to.

Everything is in that one post?

What's your opinion on YLC and more exactly on the thing he said about needing two attacks to take out a protected target?

Here's the post:

No, but it's pointless to do so in a sense - either he is after it and we waste two night kills the mafia must make on him, or we don't, and the mafia must waste 2 night kills on him.

If he's lying, then he makes himself a target of the mafia needlessly, and thus we shouldn't bother with him. Remember, we have 2 mafia families, so the argument of WIFOM won't work in this situation for him.

I don't think Senators have that kind of information in their role pm. Is it in the consul/praetor role pm? How much of that has been shared in private? Why the need to share that info, since it's bound to get into mafia hands. If a consul/praetor would have that kind of information, then he wouldn't share it.

Or doesn't he care because he knows the mafia already has that info? But that could only be the case if he was mafia himself.

I think YLC is a good lynch; at first sight better than LittleGrizzly (unless there's more info available in the thread than just that one post).

Still, why didn't you try to kill LG if he was your prime suspect? You didn't hesitate to kill on a previous occasion.

[ULC]

Your so awesome at trying to pull things out of context, but my it's my fault for utilizing the English language in a way I can comprehend.

I was stating that it would take two nights (hence two night kills) to kill him, since he wold be protected in the first instance and vulnerable in the second - thus 2 kills are wasted on a target that was significantly less important.

Also, even taken in your context, I, nor would anyone else, need insider information. The death of GH was proof of that, where the first attack failed yet the second attack during the same night succeeded upon his person.

So stop making stuff up and trying to contrive it in a desperate attempt to stop LG from getting lynched.

Unvote:Sasaki, Vote:LG