Mastin's Guide to Playing Well

History

Original Publication: February 17, 2011 by Mastin

This guide was created on December 29th, 2010, in this thread by Mastin. It was later revised, on January 4th, 2011, starting here.

Last Revised: March 16, 2017 by Mastina

Introduction

These tips are meant to mostly be general, as a more universal guide, rather than game-by-game. My intention: improve your overall play, making you a better player than you were before. By the time you’re done reading, you should be able to better utilize your vote, be more capable of forming a solid opinion, build a stronger investigation, better make cases, and generally, wall less often, learning to say more with less. While all considered pro-town, these have use regardless of alignment.

First Tip

In the current meta, most people don’t have a problem with people not voting at all. Theoretically, you go the whole game without voting and get away with it. Similarly, unvoting without revoting. Don’t! This shouldn’t be you. There’s almost never an acceptable reason to waste your vote in Not Voting, and here’s why.

The classical Vanilla Townie Role PM states that they only two weapons at their disposal: their voice, that being, an ability to discuss things during the day and say what they believe…and their vote. With those as your only assets, if you choose not to cast a vote, you choose to waste one of only two given universal weapons at your disposal.

Votes are some of the strongest pieces of information available to the town. As the old expression goes, “A vote’s worth a thousand words”. No tool greater serves you in achieving a lynch; if nobody voted, there’d be no lynch. It is for good reason people do Vote Count Analysis; votes serve as the best indicators of people’s opinions. (More on those later.)

Vote count analysis has caught scum more consistently than any other technique I’ve witnessed. It really does work, because no matter how hard the scum try to hide themselves, they’ll leave a trail behind, and no matter how hard they try to avoid being found out by the vote count (it is possible!), trends emerge eventually which are condemning to them.

“But…I’m not sure of my reads!”

Sure! It happens. In fact, you’re far more likely to be doubtful than you are confident in them, especially if you’re a cautious player. You should still be voting. Why?

If there is so much as a single player who has >random chances of being scum in your mind, you should be voting them. 21% when scum make up 20%? Vote them. POE from townhunting eliminates names from the possible scum pool? Those left are >random chances of being scum; vote literally any of them.

For example, if you’re town in a 10:3 Mini Game, then each player you have to read has a 25% chance of being mafia. Get three solid townreads, and now each player left is 33% likely, already an 8% improvement over random. Every additional player you can name as town bumps the odds of catching mafia in those you cannot up higher than that established base percentage.

“What if it’s too early?”

There’s never a time too early to make a call like that. People form opinions even in the RVS and RQS off of the content provided. I honestly believe in every playerslot’s first two to three posts, you have enough to theoretically determine all the scum in the game. Plus, it’s not like you’re locked into a vote/read forever--you can always change it at any time should you choose to. It doesn’t matter if you’re wrong. You can often gain more from being wrong than right, even! Simply put, there is no excuse not to vote.

“You’re generalizing!”

Sure! There will always be exceptions, and if I tried, I’d never be able to list them all. Generally, I still recommend using your vote barring these special circumstances. Some of the more common acceptable times to not cast a vote are included in here for convenience.

Theme Game Mechanics

If there’s a special mechanic attached to voting, caution in casting one vote is justified. An example of this done well were the various insanities in the Stars Aligned series of games, which featured multiple various mechanics restricting votes, e.g. being unable to vote the same player more than once.

Another moderator who is notorious for vote manipulation mechanics is Varsoon, where at times it could feasibly take as little as two votes with twenty alive for a player to be lynched. In such instances, being cautious and aware of what could happen is always advisable.

A lynch is close

Whenever the player you wish to vote (or are voting) is close to a lynch, it can sometimes be prudent to avoid having/keeping a vote on there, as to prevent a lynch from occurring before you are ready for the day to end.

The game could end

If you are in lylo, or even Mylo, it goes without saying that you have every right to hold back on voting.

For additional information regarding the reasoning you should always vote, (except for when you shouldn’t) I would encourage you to read the thread which inspired this section of the guide.

Footnote

The reliability of Vote Count Analysis may be debatable, however, I will say that—in my personal experience—it has been the technique which has served me most faithfully. Obviously, it doesn’t always work. Yet in spite of that, for me it is a given that it works more often than it does not.

Second Tip

You’re voting? Good. Now what? Further your contribution to the town, of course! How? Simple: you strengthen your read. You almost certainly aren’t immediately convinced someone is 100% scum (which is good!). Far more likely is a weak—at best—read. This step is perhaps one of the largest parts of scum hunting. It’s what I have deemed the Personal Investigation.

Personal Investigation Defined

A Personal Investigation is any investigation conducted by you, the person, the player. Everyone does it in some form, even the scum. (They want to find who to kill and who they can lynch, which they accomplish by analyzing the information they have available. This is not too dissimilar to what a town player will do.)

To go into what that definition actually means, it is loosely this:

You think someone is scum, or alternatively, have formed an opinion someone is town. Regardless, you deem it important enough to mention in-thread. Let’s assume your read is not significantly stronger than random. You want to draw attention to them. You vote them (scumread), or vote with them (townread), and express why you have that opinion. Note that you don’t have to explain the opinion in order to express it. Even a one-liner, even a question…anything, to make your statement on the subject. If asking “Why did you do X?”, it tells people you find X worthy of scrutiny.

Essentially, any Personal Investigation you decide to post is meant to draw attention to that player, and express your opinion on them, be it that they’re town, or that they’re scum. The latter is more likely than the former. (You tend not to need to want to draw attention to a player you think is town, though there are situations where you will.)

These Personal Investigations can be of any length, from one-liner to massive wall of text, but in general, they’re reasonably short and to the point, commonly conveying a single thought. Interestingly enough, building off my first tip, a vote can be a Personal Investigation. So is doing an isolation read. So is metagaming.

You’re gathering up information from an investigation, and then stating your personal opinion on it. That’s really all there is to a Personal Investigation. You want the town to know you think that this player is scum, or occasionally, that this player is town. You see it as important enough information as to be worthy of posting.

These Personal Investigations serve to focus attention onto a player and cause others to (re-)evaluate them with your feedback in mind. When you do, you’re mainly looking for their reactions to what you have given. From their opinions, you will receive additional information. And that’s where your read will either be strengthened, or weakened.

With a more solid opinion formed, you have a better foothold on the game, in a position where you hopefully have something strong enough where you can push. If not, continue cycling through new Personal Investigations until you do. (A personal investigation is testing the hypothesis formed from your opinion, so it can and will be shown wrong just as often as right.) At that time, you can switch gears. While a Personal Investigation can convince others, its purpose is instead to force others to contribute, so the next step is in getting people to follow you. This will be defined in the third tip.

Using This Concept

Know The Doubt Zone

You know it. The zone where you have a read but lack confidence in it. This is where the Personal Investigation is done. If you’re passed this stage, then it’s no longer necessary to ask those questions, do that meta research, and gather information to analyze. Instead, your focus will be on presenting your findings.

Avoid Making Cases

Cases are what you do after the Personal Investigation. A case which you do not believe in fully is a disaster waiting to unwind. If YOU’RE not convinced in your read, how is somebody else supposed to be? And trust me, it shows. In the best-case scenario, you’re thought of as doubtful town, who are trying to convince themselves that their read is not wrong. In other words, you look like you’re suffering from confirmation bias, tunnel visioning your target. In the worst-case scenario, you’re thought of as scum, trying to justify a vote on someone you know is town. Neither is desirable.

Instead, when doubtful, stick to Personal Investigations. Certain formats of Personal Investigations resemble cases, but the difference between the two is that a Personal Investigation is meant to figure something out; a case is meant to convince others you have figured something out. A case is for after a conclusion is reached; A Personal Investigation is done prior to the conclusion.

Take your time

No need to rush if you don’t need to. However long it takes to get through your Personal Investigations is however long it takes. All in the name of getting a stronger read. If you accomplish that, it’s worth the wait. Strong reads don’t magically appear; it’s something which happens on its own, naturally.

Third Tip

Right, so you’ve formed a solid opinion. In fact, you’re pretty much convinced in your read on a player. Congratulations! You’ve got a strong read to work with! (For the sake of percentages, we’ll say this is 80-94% sure of your read. Keep in mind, I hate giving this a solid percentage and this is just an estimate for the sake of having a number. A simpler way of saying it is that you’re as sure as you can be without role-based information backing you up.) Now what to do with it?

Well, you can continue to post your Personal Investigations. “But…nobody’s following me! They aren’t convinced I’m right!” Well, then, that’s a problem, isn’t it?

Let’s fix that. The next step after a Personal Investigation is a Case. Oh, looks like we’ll need to define that, won’t we?

Definition of 'Case'

(Needed because there was a great deal of confusion on what I meant, originally.) My initial definition of “Case” was quite simple: “Whenever you try to convince someone else that your opinion--above all others--is right.” This met with some mixed reviews, and I feel it is due to me not having defined it well enough. You see, it’s a lot more complicated than that, even though that sentence sums it up fairly well.

For something to qualify as a case—to me—it needs to be in that range, that you’re convinced your right. If you aren’t convinced you’re correct, and try to convince others you are…well, then, it’s not going to work that well, is it?

Now, obviously—as with the Personal Investigations—in a case, you want to draw attention to a player. However, in a case, you want to do so even more than a Personal Investigation. The key difference between the PI and a Case is the motivation behind drawing attention to a player.

In a PI, you’re simply stating your opinion on a player. Cases are different. You are stating an opinion on them, sure, but this goes beyond that. No, rather, you are trying to convince the rest of the town that your opinion is correct, and (almost certainly) want them to follow. That really is the core of a Case: “I’m right!” While an explanation—as with PIs—is not required, unlike PIs—where explanations are not as common—a case almost universally will have explanations, even though they aren’t required. Of course, the simplest reason for why is that it makes a better, well, case. People tend to be a bit skeptical of another’s opinion if they state it without backing it up. If there is evidence helping them prove their point, as long as it seems logical enough, it’ll work far better.

To make a case, you need to go beyond simply stating your opinion on your target’s alignment. (Normally, why you believe they are scum.) When you are making a case, you’re not just stating something casually, to give your current opinion—you are trying to get others to follow you. Most of the time, this is you, wanting your target dead, hung. You more commonly will make cases to lynch someone. (However, it is not unheard of to make cases against the lynching of someone, defending them as being strongly town.)

You can’t lynch them by yourself, though! (Unless you happen to be a Vigilante. The lynch just happens at night, instead. :P) For that, you need others. You want people to follow you.

How To Gain Followers

We all know what a case is, though others’ definition of it might be a bit broader than what mine is. A case is still giving your opinion, but you are trying to convince others. It goes beyond making a statement; it is trying to make others follow the opinion you lay out. While explanations are not required to make a case, almost every convincing case will use them, because if you don’t explain your case, it’s probably not going to do its job: get others to believe what you do. Cases ask for others to agree with you and state why, or disagree with you and explain why.

…Which brings me to the point of Tip # 3. When you make a case, clarity is a necessity. You’re trying to convince other players that you are correct, not yourself. It might make perfect sense in your head, sure—now, it’s your job to make it make sense for others as well.

You want your case to be persuasive. Persuading the town is what makes a case, a case. All that said about a case, however, you might be under the mistaken impression that after all that hard work, you shouldn’t change your opinion at all. Heavens, no! Cases are stereotypically known to be longer, sure, simply due to the effort put in to convincing the town of your target’s alignment. (Note that not all cases need be long, nor take a lot of time. Some can be nice and short. Conciseness is a key factor in the best cases, actually, but most are longer.)

But just because you put all that work in doesn’t mean you’re forbidden to change your mind. If you’re wrong, you’re wrong, and you need to admit it. Because part of a case is still similar to a PI. Remember how a Case is also supposed to draw attention to a player?

Well, then, it figures that a case is also supposed to draw in opinions, too. You want to convince others that you’re right, but you also want them to comment on your findings, to either further solidify them, or bring them into doubt.

Cases ask for others to agree with you and state why, or disagree with you and explain why. While you have a strong read already, you need to make a case because sometimes, things change. You might have your read weakened (and if so, need to admit it), or it could be strengthened even further.

In other words, just because you make a case doesn’t mean you need to tunnel. You should—no, I think a better word is need—to remain open to input: you might have overlooked something which makes your case invalid. If you no longer believe your case, you need to say as much to prevent confusion should you no longer be available to clarify.

Watch Out For Your Weakness!

All that said, however, you need to be careful. I’ve seen plenty of times where someone still fully believed their case, but their responses gave off the illusion that they were doubting their cases and were no longer as convinced. This is unfortunately a part of human nature, I believe. Psychologically, if we see, “Alright, I was wrong about that specific point, but the rest of the case still stands!”, I tend to think we mostly filter out all but the first 4-8 words. :P

“But what can we do?!?”

Well, obviously, it’s a bad idea to defend an idea you no longer believe in. Don’t try that; it’ll make you look like an illogical, irrational fool who is to be ignored. Okay, so some players might like that, but not the kind who actually want to be listened to. :P

But if you can’t admit that point is no longer valid, what do you do?

Well, I have a theory on that. It sounds a lot worse than it really is: quite frankly…ignore it. “WHAT?!? B-But…that’s wrong on so many levels, I don’t even have the words to describe it!”

Patience. It makes more sense than you might think, especially when you attach “…within reason” at the end. :P

Simply put—especially in a longer case—a single invalid point probably isn’t that important to the overall case. Someone will almost certainly point out how it’s wrong, but just because they do so doesn’t mean you are obliged to respond. Because it’s almost certainly a small point, more like a technicality than anything else, it isn’t likely to be brought up more than once, so there’s not really a point in responding to it. You were wrong about a point, okay, but the rest of the case is still most likely valid, so you don’t need to admit a small point is wrong when the greater whole is right. (That said, however, please look above to my advice: if you are convinced that your case was wrong—or, at least, have it thrown into serious doubt—you need to make it clear. One point out of ten being invalid is a huge difference from seven points out of ten being invalid, after all.)

That said, this won’t always work. If more than one or two people bring up the invalid point as being ignored, you’ll probably be forced to address it. With this guide in mind, however, you can accurately describe why you chose to ignore that point, and if you present it well enough, they’ll likely understand why you chose not to address the point which was wrong.

Footnotes for Followers and Weaknesses

Footnotes cover the theory of the "doubt illusion" and "ignore it".

• Exploring Doubt

To further explain this theory, I really do believe we do this, even if it is subconscious. Quite frankly, if we see signs of doubt in someone—no matter how small—then we are going to doubt them. It’s like an idea—once planted, it’s contagious, spreading like a disease. (Inception was an awesome movie, by the way.) A small point which they admit is wrong will eventually grow in your mind to make you think they’re completely wrong. And if you think they’re wrong, you’ll ignore them. (To some extent, this can apply to the 7for7 fallacy, and even moreso it's inversion as something across meta--if you know someone's been wrong in previous games, you do not trust them in future games as much.)

This also has to do with emphasis. If there’s something unusual, we tend to pick up on it on some level. If nine points are defending, and one point is admitting you’re wrong, the one point about admitting you’re wrong is going to stick out—if not at a conscious level, then at a subconscious level. It’s different, in some way, and we pick up on it. Because we notice it more than the rest of the case due to the emphasis on it, it also sticks in our brains longer. Especially if—like with most cases—a person is skimming the response. Immediately, the words “I was wrong” will stick out, whereas the words, “no, you’re wrong!” will still blend in. It’s just how the human mind works. Trust me, I’ve seen it. I’ve been guilty of it. I’ve also seen the inversion. Since I was wrong more often than I was right, since I was a bad player more often than I was a good one, the moments I was right are what stick out to me when I remember my past games.

It’s complicated to wrap your head around, I know. I have a hard time explaining it, but just trust me on this. I know it’s true, even if you do not. No matter how aware we are of it, it’ll still influence us somewhat, and we can’t really stop it.

• Exploring Admitting You're Wrong

In ways, this is basically a worse version of the above. In an ideal world, you should be able to publicly accept you’re wrong. I mean, you will be, quite often. By probability alone, you’re more likely to be wrong than correct. Everyone SHOULD know this, and that even normal pro-town players will be wrong every once and a while. And you definitely SHOULD do it mentally. But again, I just don’t think the human brain reacts well when they see those words. I’ve seen plenty of people conclude that wrong-->scum, or wrong before-->wrong currently. Therefore, I am not convinced admitting you are wrong is the correct play even close to a majority of the time.

Back On Topic...

Sorry for the distracting footnotes, but I can't think of a better way to format them.

Oh, and speaking of responding to your case…

There is something quite vital you need to remember when you make a case: someone out there is not going to agree with you. In fact, there’s likely going to be at least one person who strongly disagrees with you. Unless you’re making a case against the player who most strongly objects (you obviously aren’t going to convince them that they are scum, after all. :P), it’s your job to convince them that you’re right. But that said, this is only one or two people (most likely) who disagree with you (with one of them possibly being your lynch target)—you have to see the bigger picture, here, and deal with the whole town, not just a few of the more vocal players.

To sum it up in one sentence: don’t get into a lengthy debate with your opposition, especially if it’s your lynch target. They have the right to defend their viewpoint, but if you’re sure of your read, you shouldn’t enter a giant Wall War with them. It rarely ends well, I can tell you. It clutters the thread, and when you both so strongly and avidly defend your stances, will most likely not convince the other. What the Wall War will do, however, is cause the rest of the town not involved in the debate to ignore you. No matter how valid your points are, they’re worthless if, say, the town thinks it’s a town-on-town argument.

Effectively, Limit Your Length!

Pretty much the only time you need to continue such a debate is when someone else actually states they agree with the opposition’s viewpoint. (Actually, probably only when multiple people agree with your opponent’s flawed defense.) When that happens, you definitely need to respond, but that’s one of the very few situations where it is necessary. You don’t want a Wall War keeping the town from reading. Let everyone read your original argument, first. When enough people have done so, then you can consider responding (especially if you see people siding with your opposition), but a surprising amount of times, it’s not necessary. If you make a solid enough case, your opposition’s counter won’t be believed by the majority of the town. Heck, if you let other townspeople look at both your case and your opposition, then they might even do your work for you and point out the flaws in your opposition’s argument for you. That doesn’t happen if you immediately respond.

Particularly if your opposition is scum, what they want is for your original argument to become lost in a massive wall of text war, which everyone skips. You don’t want the town to be lost if you’re still convinced of your points. (Again, if you’re doubting yourself, make that clear in-thread. If you still believe your case, it need not be said; that is implied already.) You want them to be able to follow along with your train of thought; you want them to see the evidence for themselves. You’ve given them your evidence, there for all to see—the last thing you want is it to become inseparable from a wall war after it. It really will kill your credibility.

Basically, this could’ve been summed up with two words: Don’t Wall. :P (Well, at least, not often.) But me being me, I needed to explain that concept better, and now I have. It’s alright to have an occasional Wall; I’d say two or three are actually quite healthy for a game, really. So, if you make a long case, that’s perfectly fine. If the walls continue, that’s not. Following my advice will hopefully limit the amount of walls to just a few. Not so bad. Pages of Walls? Did you know that even I skip them when they get too numerous? That says something: It’s really, really bad. :P

Footnotes

There obviously are exceptions to the case I used (where the people debating have 0% chance of convincing the other), but in my personal experience, they are far and few between; in the vast majority, neither side will yield, because either 1—it’s impossible (you can’t convince someone that they, themselves, are scum),

Or 2—because neither side makes an argument the other sees as convincing enough.

The former is far worse than the latter, for the record; this guide was meant to essentially stop the former as completely as possible. The latter is trickier. If you are in this situation—on either side—you might want to step back for a minute and re-evaluate the situation, see why your opponent is opposing you, why they are convinced differently than you are. If you understand their viewpoint (and after review, still disagree with it), you can better manipulate it to your side.

• Effectively, TextWall Overdoses are perhaps one of the worst game-killers out there. I can collect a series of quotes from hundreds of people who'd agree, and yet, EVERYONE does them from time to time. Well, almost, anyway. Why? Because they don't know how NOT to. They try, but they fall into a wall eventually. As mentioned, not necessarily bad in small doses; can be (and often is) good. Continuing, not so much.

"You Said This Already!"

Another related concept is repetition. If you’re like me and have trouble with words, chances are, you’ll repeat yourself like I do. Alright, in the original case, that might be okay to do. Heck, it can be good for unity and/or emphasis. I’ve even seen some people bring up a point multiple times humorously, as a semi-joke. You’ll want to be as clear and concise as possible in your original case, but it’s alright if there are some flaws, like little repetitions here and there. Key words: “in the original case”. If you continue pushing that point in later posts, it becomes next-to-worthless.

Again, it’s a psychological thing. People tend to not be amused by the same show twice, and even if they are, very few of them get better each time they’re watched. No, most become more boring, more dull, as they are watched over and over again. If you watch your favorite movie every day, it’s probably not going to remain your favorite movie for very long.

The same applies to arguments. More than that, people will think you’re trying to manipulate them with the logic, “if you say it enough times, it must be true!” (I know I never do, and I seriously doubt anyone else actually tries. But, hey, people think that, for some reason, and there's no stopping it.) In my experience, when people think you’re trying to do that, to make them think something is true by stating it over and over again, they react rather poorly. If you must repeat something, bring in some new points to make it more valid, give it a new perspective, try to expand the idea, instead of repeating the same old junk.

Otherwise, your argument becomes invalid to most people, no matter how strong it used to be. That said, just because someone says something you’ve defended against before doesn’t mean you should ignore them. And asking them to look for your defense against that very argument tends to make them do quite the opposite.

If someone brings up something which you’ve already explained in full, kindly link them to the post where you mentioned it, or maybe quote it if it’s fairly short. This saves them the trouble of finding it, while defending against their point in a concise matter. You can explain to them that point again in summary if it’s a bit long, or maybe you need to explain why it’s still valid when they might question it. That can be done in a sentence or two, and they’ll be satisfied.

You don’t need to do a paragraph or two. You already did that earlier. You don’t need to do it again! Conciseness really is pro-town, believe it or not. I know, I know, coming from me (and with the length of this guide), that advice is highly ironic, but it’s true! It really is. While I personally might have trouble achieving it, you should try your hardest to achieve it.

Wrap-Up

I know, this is quite the long read, but I really do think if I’ve done my job correctly that this advice will help you. I really do hope that when I post this revised (no longer so brief, unfortunately) guide, that it’ll help someone, somewhere, play a better game.

May your votes be meaningful!

May your Personal Investigations be useful to everyone!

May you create a good solid case!

And most importantly of all…

May you limit Walls! :P