[INNOCENTS WIN] First Anniversary Fanfic Mafia - Game Thread

[Chibi Pika]

Congrats to the innocents! Words cannot describe how badly I wish I'd gotten to play longer. Though I guess if the mafia had their way, I'd have been gone N0, huh. >:[

Now, as promised, here is my long-awaited complete collection of notes I took this game! On the whole, I think I did pretty well! There's one or two points where I look like a massive clown, but the majority of my reads were on-target. Mad props to Tefiren for basically managing to mirror my thoughts and reads throughout the entire game! It would have been a lot harder to watch without someone managing to voice 90% of my concerns. xD Apologies to Dave for misreading him D1, but at least I straightened out D2. Special congrats to Nip for being the first scum in fanfic mafia to avoid getting a scumread from me the entire game! And to qva for managing to baffle me up until the very end, lol.

Also thanks to Windskull for giving us sans circus.

Spoiler: DAY ONE

No nightkill. Potential explanations:

• The mafia targeted Fia and I protected her
• The mafia targeted someone under someone else’s protection
• The mafia targeted someone with bulletproof
• Town roleblocker blocked a killer
• Other protection is questionable. Two protectors is highly unlikely given the possible backup or seraph knight. Seraph absolutely shouldn’t have wasted their protect on N0. Leaning toward bulletproof got used.

Dave: Started out vocal but then backed off. Tough read. Unhelpful so far. Possible scum.
Diyem: Started out in favor of lynch, but was willing to consider new information. Reads as wanting to do what’s best for town.
Lauchs: Strongly in favor of lynch, mostly due to past experience.
Desper: Anti-lynch; suspected Namo at first, but feels well-meaning.
Tefiren: Consistently pro-town so far. Brings up good points so that we won’t forget them.
Fiametta: No strong opinions given, has mostly echoed other people.
Finnar: Aggressively pro lynch. Feels town. Currently scumreading my townreads. Hopefully not the cop.

Scumreads:

qva (Lauchzelot)​

Dragonfree (Dave Ambrose)​

NonAnalogue (Fiametta Fortunata)​

Townreads:

DawningWinds (Professor Finnar)​

Sike Saner (Ntairow Fade)​

elyvorg (Tefiren)​

SparklingEspeon (Espurr)​

Windskull (Nip)​

Null:

Equitia (Jen)​

Starlight Aurate (Yami Bakura)​

Persephone (Genesis)​

Fluctuating:

Namohysip (Diyem)​

Tanuki (Desper)​

Spoiler: DAY TWO

• Immediate scum vibes from Lauchs lol
• Oh. Lauchs is confirmed innocent now? Lame. (maybe qva just always feels scummy to me lol)
• WTF Finnar. I play hyper-aggressive obv-town and this is what I get.
• I really hope there’s a backup so they can confirm my role.
• Bad vibes from Jen.
• Fia still has yet to… offer new ideas...
• You guys. Lauchs isn’t confirmed until you verify that there’s not another bus driver.
• I wish I knew what innocent Dave looked like. Is he seriously scum again.
• Lmao so Desper’s confirmed then.
• Man we have a lot of confirmed people.
• We haven’t even gotten to the investigative roles.
• Diyem’s response to two protectors feels town.
• Why am I still scumreading qva.
• qva why does everything you say read like scum stoooop
• Hmmmm…. I suppose that bit of doctor-protecting logic from Dave isn’t very mafia-ish, but.
• You guys, this debate over how to protect the doctors is completely failing to take bus drivers into account.
• Seriously just let the mafia be distracted by the doctors while your investigative roles work their magic it’s not that hard.
• Where is this Namo train coming from. I stg if you people lynch Namo, I’m gonna be pissed.
• What are you people doing. If Namo were scum he would have had no reason to back down on D1 because qva and DW were pushing the idea that lynching was pro-town!!!
• This is really not helping my scumreads on Dave and qva. >:[
• PLZ CLAIM NAMO
• Oh my God. Tefiren pointed out that the mafia going after doctors is just them wasting their time. Thank God.
• GOOD. There is no reason whatsoever why a mafia would fakeclaim odd-night vig on an even day.
• WATCHER IS BEST ROLE CONFIRMED.
• qva is making non-scummy posts now, what do. :(
• Sike is only a suspect if there’s no roleblocker. We have no evidence for or against the roleblocker yet. Do not forget this everyone.
• TEFIREN MVP BY FAR THANK YOU.
• Dammit after all this Dave finally makes a solidly non-scummy post. Need to compare it to some of his posts from last game.
• Dave might actually be town wtf
• qva what even. What. What. Why can’t I read you.
• There is exactly zero percent chance that Espy is lying, and the idea that anyone is suggesting this is ludicrous.
• Gettin some serious scum vibes from Persephone.
• Voting Windskull???!!! No!!!!! Stop!!!
• Wow I actually really trust Dave now.
• qva WHAT
• plz not starlight nononono
• MY VOTE: PERSEPHONE
• HOW WAS I RIGHT

Scumreads:

NonAnalogue (Fiametta Fortunata)​

Equitia (Jen)​

Hard Townreads:

Tanuki (Desper)​

SparklingEspeon (Espurr)​

elyvorg (Tefiren)​

DawningWinds (Professor Finnar)​

Soft Townreads:

Windskull (Nip)​

Sike Saner (Ntairow Fade)​

Starlight Aurate (Yami Bakura)​

Namohysip (Diyem)​

Fluctuating:

Dragonfree (Dave Ambrose)​

qva (Lauchzelot) ??????​

Okay, I’ve had some time to recover. I feel like Dave almost can’t be mafia? Why would he start the Persephone train. It serves no purpose for scum. He wasn’t under suspicion. She wasn’t under suspicion. There were a million other targets. Unless it’s only to gain a free ticket to the endgame?

And qva???? Begging DW to unvote themself? That literally got Persephone lynched, and it came out of nowhere! It would have been SO EASY to just not?? And take out an aggressively pro-town player for free?? Why would a mafia pass that up?!

But then she posts things like this and I’m like???

Spoiler: DAY THREE

• I do not like your read pile at all qva. >:[
• Even if you’re not mafia, I don’t like it.
• …So I know Desper’s innocent and all, but he’s doing more work for the mafia than they ever did.
• I’m really glad that everyone agrees that Finnar’s scumread on me was nuts.
• ...Wait was Dragonfree seriously the only one able to see how ludicrously scummy Persephone’s posts were?
• Seriously, it was not luck that a mafia “happened” to get lynched.
• I really hope something more interesting happens today than everyone going in circles around Tanuki and DW. >>
• Wait now qva’s read pile is actually good? And I agree with all of it except Tanuki but only because I know for a fact he’s innocent? What???
• …whoa. Tefiren… is making me reconsider Finnar. Whoa. I might be wrong. I’m still iffy on it, but. It would certainly explain Finnar's weird scumreads and anti-town attitude?
• I just checked last year’s game. Watches don’t get swapped. Loki healed Dave, it got swapped to me, and I saw it on me.
• The more I think about the DW situation the more confused I get because they came so close to getting lynched yesterday, which would have been an absolute disaster and almost definitely would have gotten Persephone to come under fire immediately. It just doesn’t make sense for a mafia to take that risk.
• But if DW isn’t mafia then why did Espurr not see the killer.
• Either DW is mafia, there’s a ninja, or watching mechanics got changed. There are no other options.
• Big mood, Tefiren. All this anti-town town nonsense isn’t fun to watch either. At least Tanuki wants to play.
• Wait did Desper actually just have a good theory. Cause the thought that Finnar and Lauchs could be lovers did vaguely cross my mind, I just didn’t have anything to go off other than “they have both either confusingly cleared each other or refused to suspect each other.”
• ……...Does Dave have a weird role. What does that post mean. 👀
• WAIT. waitwaitwaitwait. No way.
• Hmm, Jen might be town? That reasoning about not wanting Diyem’s banhammer to get messed up seems pretty genuine.
• There are 15 mins left and I still don’t know if Finnar is just bizarrely anti-town town, mafia, or some horrible 3rd party designed to screw everyone over. @__@
• So the watching mechanics got changed, or there’s a ninja. Great. Just great.

Spoiler: DAY FOUR

• Yoooo my scumread on Fia was legit. B)
• Nice, Tefi’s the cop! I guess Bakura was probably some other inforole then?
• And thank god Diyem is cleared now, no more wasting time with everyone suspecting him.
• Unfortunately, this means I’m not sure who to suspect now.
• Desper, Tefiren, Espurr, and Diyem are all 100% innocent. The others… have all flickered back and forth.
• God I hope it’s not Dave or Lauchs, I hate how hard they’ve been to read. (Also Dave was foreshadowing a weird role, which I don’t think he’d do if it wasn’t, like, provable.)
• Hopefully Tefi can clear one of the others.
• Nevermind! Jack of all trades! Cool! Annnnnd, yeah, I’m just as miffed as Tefi that his inspection got wasted on me, lol.
• Having an inspection on Lauchs would have been really helpful ugh.
• Hell yeah, totally called Dave having the custom role.
• Oh snap we have a counterclaim. This gon’ be interesting.
• Alright. So even if qva is mafia and were to get Nip jailed today… if he flips innocent, that’d put instant suspect onto qva. Mafia have to play the long game. If this is a lie, it’s not a sustainable one. Which makes me want to think she’s not lying but argh.
• Hooo boy this is bad, all my scumreads are falling apart lol. At this point I’d basically just say: “Not voting for Desper, Tefiren, Espurr, or Diyem, the rest of us can all go.”
• Okay, Fiametta probably didn’t have a special mafia power if she was doing the killings. Question now is: was Genesis a roleblocker, or is there still one in the game.
• I guess either Nip or Lauchs is lying? I’m having a hard time seeing another option.
• Man, if there’s a 4th mafia, that means there’s a lot more lies to untangle, oof.
• Very curious about that custom role
• Hmm, would a track be affected by a swap? By last game’s rules, no. But by this game’s rules, we’ve had a watch get affected.
• I really wish someone would notice that incongruity with the watch results N1 argh.
• Bulletproof + being able to see who targeted you sounds broken as hell. Unless it’s meant to be balanced by a strongman?
• or unless ninja lmao
• In all seriousness, I think ninja’s been debunked by virtue of Non getting tracked to the kill N3, (if Equitia isn’t lying, that is).
• Equitia lying would mean that there isn’t even a tracker in this game. Which seems strange but idk.
• OKAY SO I GUESS DAVE GOT ROLEBLOCKED HUH
• GREAT THERE GOES MY ONE CHANCE TO DO SOMETHING USEFUL IN THIS GAME ;-;
• aaaaaaaa I would’ve answered if I could, you know this
• Man that mafia roleblocker had some friggin pinpoint strikes this game huh.
• At least this confirms that Genesis wasn’t the roleblocker. Hopefully they catch onto that.
• So Tefiren wins best rp post this time.
• Aaand good, it’s been brought up that the watch got swapped this time, which means the track should have. So yeah, Jen really should have tracked me to Tefiren.
• Yeah I’m really not buying that Nip’s mafia. Sorry everyone. I weigh tone higher than I weigh mechanical evidence. :P [edit: lmao here's my clown moment for the game]
• And like Nip just pointed out--bulletproof was a risky claim with qva’s foreshadowing. I don’t expect risky claims from mafia unless they’re highly experienced and also given a good setup for their lie.
• I hope you guys realize that I am waaaaay too obsessed with this game to forget my night action. :P
• OH HELL YEA THERE’S FOUR MAFIA AND NO GOOD SUSPECTS
• why am I excited about that lol
• One last note: can’t tell if Tefi is foreshadowing a weird one-shot ability or if that’s pure rp flavor.
• Okay, time for the rundown:
  • Espurr: 0% guilty
  • Diyem: mechanically confirmed
  • Desper: I have proof and no one else does. :V
  • Dave: plz ask me about Desper again
  • Tefiren: if Tefi is guilty then elyvorg is a friggin genius
  • Nip: I still just really don’t think he’s guilty? *shrug* It’ll be easy to confirm either way.
  • Lauchs: ahsfhjdgfds?????

(Pls feel free to comment, I need validation from barely getting to play lol)

 

[DawningWinds]

Fennell: Aggressively pro lynch. Feels town. Currently scumreading my townreads. Hopefully not the cop.

Who's Fennell? I'm guessing it's supposed to refer to me but I'm not 100% sure.

 

[Chibi Pika]

oh dammit, that was a typo from day 1 that I never corrected aaaaaaaaa

thank you I will fix that right away

 

[DawningWinds]

WTF Finnar. I play hyper-aggressive obv-town and this is what I get.

I'm pretty sure "WTF IS DAWNING THINKING?" is a common question that goes through people's minds when playing with me.

 

[Starlight Aurate]

While Discord has been blowing up with people raving about this game, I want to thank Negrek here for all the work you put in! This was so much fun and (from what I can tell) so well thought out. I had a blast and I see that the others did, too!

I didn't realize outing myself as the seer was a bad idea, haha. But lesson learned for any future games! I really enjoyed writing my own death text (I planned on having Ryou Bakura appear a la Season Zero with him regaining control of his left arm at some point, but since I died early I decided to incorporate that AND Zorc and throw in a bit about Florence from the Abridged Series).

Also I think it is HILARIOUS that elyvorg and I inspected qva on the same night XD

Thanks to everyone who played, and especially thanks to Negrek for putting this all together! I look forward to whatever future games this forum has!

 

[windskull]

Told yall I was bulletproof 8P Too bad I lost it at the worst possible time. I'm kinda surprised no one brought up the possibility of a bulletproof mafia player but hey, worked out for me for a little bit!

Anyways, first off, thanks to Negrek for hosting, I had a lot of fun! Second, I thought I'd answer a few questions that are burning in people's minds:

Why was qva targeted - qva was pretty aggressive D1, particularly on chibi, and we thought we might be able to draw some suspicion onto chibi. We were worried chibi might be bulletproof after failing to take him out day one. So we were hesitant to target again and then we got him anyways, lol. And qva also ended up being bulletproof, which we didn't realize until later, so that swap actually got us a kill, lol.

As fo why espeon was chosen day one in our attempt to swap-kill chibi... I've seen Espy get pretty analytical in the past. In hindsight I wish we had used Namo or Dragonfree instead, rip.

Yes, I managed to pick up on Starlight's softclaim, but by pure luck. I know nothing about Yu-gi-oh! I just thought that the thing about the millennium eye looked important and did a little research, consequentially realizing they had an inforole.

I had a feeling that Tefiren had either a tracker or a vigilante role, and knew my days were numbered, and planned on a fitting ending accordingly. I chose to kill Dave for purely ic reasons (mentioned in my death flavor), since outside of something totally wild that would cause someone else to be lynched, he would be my first and only kill. If I hadn't killed Dave, I would have went for either Tefiren or Namo. If I had survived to N5, I would have gone for Namo. Mutual kills woulda been real cool.

Speaking of that flavortext, I did my best to work in the loss of Nip's ability to it. He was so busy taking care of what he had to, that he couldn't focus on taking care of himself.

I felt real bad about the Namo and Sike bandwagons, because the first one happened when Namo was streaming, and the second happened while Sike was asleep. If the day hadn't been extended, that would have turned into a mislynch where the accused couldn't defend themselves.

why we didn't block Namo's kill - We thought Espy was going to watch him. If that had happened, Jen would have been implicated as roleblocker and definitely would have been lynched. Knowing the actions now... we would have been okay! It would have, if nothing else, extended the game by one more day. Rip.

After N0, Espeon was never targeted because she wasn't voting. We were focusing first on people who were voting.

Also it was absolutely hilariously fitting that the don was someone communicating only via phone

Anyways, I'm going to end this with the death scene I wrote for if I got lynched Day 4. Some of it matches the final text, but there's some different dialogue too. Enjoy!

Spoiler

He couldn’t believe this was happening.

This wasn’t supposed to happen.

Nip’s expression contorted into a snarl as he stared down his accusers.

No. He refused to go down without a fight. “So this is how you want to do things,” he hissed, flashing his claws. He could take down… one. Maybe two of them if he was lucky, before being overpowered. The air around him grew chilly as he prepared to launch an icy attack. He rushed forward with a screech-

Or tried, rather. But something caught him. He fell flat, and his attack died in his throat. He tried to stand, but his claw stuck to the malleable ground. His attack forgotten, now, he pulled back, managing to pull his claw free and stand. But he was already ankle-deep in the ground. Still, he twisted and fought and screamed, only succeeding in sinking faster.

When it became obvious he was only hastening his fate, he stopped panting and huffing as he stared the survivors down with a murderous glare.

“So this is the way it’s going to be, is it? You’ll turn on me because that’s the only way you can ‘win.’ I never harmed anyone. Not a single one of you. I was nothing but truthful, nothing but helpful, and you all turned on me.

“Maybe all of you were happy with staying here, flinging distrust at each other until there’s no one left, but some of us would like to be free. Some of us had reasons to fight. So yeah, I aligned myself with your little ‘mafia,’ since they were the only ones trying to find a way out!”

He had sunk up to his waist by now. He sucked in a long breath, his eyes as round as the moon, and spat a few feeble shards of ice at the ground as if that would free him. Failing that he reached his claws out and tried to drag himself forward, succeeding in pulling himself a couple of inches, but not in pulling himself out.

“When one of you dies tomorrow, remember my words: I never lied. I was never responsible for the killing. Or anything that got in your way! I only did what I had to! I’m sick of suffering because of the inaction of others! I won’t take it anymore!”

He was almost fully submerged now, tilting his head up to try and get air for just a bit longer. The feeling of the strange material was uncomfortable, though not painful. Whether it would suffocate him once he was fully submerged, he didn’t know. He didn’t want to find out. He didn’t want to die.

He didn’t want to die.

The last thing he managed to say was, “I hope Yveltal curses you all,” before succumbing, and all that was left of him was a streak of red.

 

[elyvorg]

Congrats to the innocents! Words cannot describe how badly I wish I'd gotten to play longer. Though I guess if the mafia had their way, I'd have been gone N0, huh. >:[

Now, as promised, here is my long-awaited complete collection of notes I took this game! On the whole, I think I did pretty well! There's one or two points where I look like a massive clown, but the majority of my reads were on-target. Mad props to Tefiren for basically managing to mirror my thoughts and reads throughout the entire game! It would have been a lot harder to watch without someone managing to voice 90% of my concerns. xD

I was so sad you were killed so early, too! It'd have been awesome to get to play with you more, especially as our thoughts lined up so much and we were townreading each other basically from the beginning. Tefiren and Chibi would have made such a good team. I got some fun RP out of his reaction to Chibi's death, but it would have been fun RP to have them both being alive and sort-of-friends (even though probably neither of them would admit it), too! >:(

That and, like, you had active scumreads on nearly everybody that on our end we only got rid of basically out of little more than pure luck and picking from our nulls. Man, you'd have just torn this game apart. Maybe Tefiren would have even admitted that Chibi might just be better at this game than him. (Maybe.)

• WTF Finnar. I play hyper-aggressive obv-town and this is what I get.

I know you already know very well how I felt about this, but SAME, THOUGH.

• Immediate scum vibes from Lauchs lol
• Oh. Lauchs is confirmed innocent now? Lame. (maybe qva just always feels scummy to me lol)
• Why am I still scumreading qva.
• qva why does everything you say read like scum stoooop

Honestly I might have felt the same way about all this if it hadn't been for my inspection result making her confirmed to me, bus driver or no. Heck, she was my biggest scumread on Day 1, hence the inspection (but by "biggest" I mean "I have the tiniest inkling about her that I have about nobody else yet", which isn't saying much. It was basically just because she randomly chose to lynch my biggest townread, and I wondered if it therefore maybe wasn't random).

• Seriously just let the mafia be distracted by the doctors while your investigative roles work their magic it’s not that hard.
• Oh my God. Tefiren pointed out that the mafia going after doctors is just them wasting their time. Thank God.

Glad I wasn't the only one that thought this! If they spent two days killing doctors, that's two extra days for inforoles to get info! I worried that me thinking this might have been skewed from the perspective of my vague plan to softclaim SUPER IMPORTANT INFOROLE THAT YOU TOTALLY WANT TO STRONGMAN KILL, HEY, MAFIA, but no, it did make sense to some other people.

• …whoa. Tefiren… is making me reconsider Finnar. Whoa. I might be wrong. I’m still iffy on it, but. It would certainly explain Finnar's weird scumreads and anti-town attitude?

Heh, I'd be happy that I (/Tefiren) made you think I had a good point, had it not been for the fact that I was hilariously wrong.

• Big mood, Tefiren. All this anti-town town nonsense isn’t fun to watch either. At least Tanuki wants to play.

Tefiren would be glad that Chibi agrees with him re: people playing the game wrong.

• Nice, Tefi’s the cop! I guess Bakura was probably some other inforole then?

Oh hey, you also noticed the bit where Tefiren casually claimed an inspection that nobody else except Dave even spotted, thank you, it really was not that subtle and I really wasn't trying to be.

(But I also didn't want to be too obvious of an unnecessary claim, hence pointedly just letting it naturally happen in the RP, because I was still half on my bait-the-kill-and-use-Fly plan at that point.)

• So Tefiren wins best rp post this time.

Awww, thanks! I had a lot of fun with that post. :3

• OH HELL YEA THERE’S FOUR MAFIA AND NO GOOD SUSPECTS

Tefiren would have been disappointed in Chibi here, though. It obviously had to be the black weasel, everyone else had a reason to be innocent!

• One last note: can’t tell if Tefi is foreshadowing a weird one-shot ability or if that’s pure rp flavor.

This was me sort of foreshadowing Fly, which was my one ability that wasn't on the role list. Not that Tefiren needed to pretend to have some super-special mysterious power to be able to boast about that, since escaping from certain death is just Tuesday for him, so on his level he was basically just emptily boasting and not actually thinking about that power in particular.

• Tefiren: if Tefi is guilty then elyvorg is a friggin genius

As I said to Dragonfree, man I wish I was that good at mafia.

(also I am amused by how you kept calling Tefiren "Tefi" throughout a lot of this. It's a shame it's presumably not in Chibi's character to do that kind of thing, because damn, imagine if Tefiren had been on a mutual-townread team with someone who insisted on calling him the one thing that reminds him of Forsira's existence.)

These thoughts of yours were really fun to read; it's validating to see someone else was fixating on the game just as much as I was despite not even being able to play.

Also I think it is HILARIOUS that elyvorg and I inspected qva on the same night XD

Oh man, yeah, I forgot to mention this in my notes last post. It's kind of hilarious for just how many reasons my one-shot inspection ended up totally wasted.

I had a feeling that Tefiren had either a tracker or a vigilante role, and knew my days were numbered, and planned on a fitting ending accordingly.

Haha, Tefiren's basically-pointless boasting about his other tricks did make the mafia afraid! At the time this was me trying to bait for the Fly gambit, but on Tefiren's end, he just wanted to revel in the idea that They (since this was just before he stopped thinking it was Them) might be scared of him for once.

And, ahhh, that's why Tefiren's kill ended up seeming a lot less ambiguously-murdery and much more like the same old probably-harmless jailing than I'd been hoping it would: because it was originally written as flavour for the jailing. Ah, well.

I did enjoy all the mafia members' death flavour! Makes me wonder if we were even really the good guys, heh (especially with the completely unnecessary way Tefiren insisted on ending things).

 

[Tanuki]

Oh, it's over. That's... something. I was just logging on to say goodbye. A less parasitic company offered me a provisional position while I finish my major. Good on the Town, I guess. Now no one has to deal with Desper than him, at least, right?



Is anyone there? I guess it's early. I'm just typing to a void, then. Maybe that's a fitting end. I've gotta go anyway. I replaced the office's coffee with decaf, and if they catch me here I'll get a lot worse than fired. Just came in to do that and leave my Tear Stained Letter of resignation. Good luck in whatever you all do. Catch those pokéballs, or whatever. I never did get into the games. Maybe I will now that I'll actually have any money. See ya

[[It was warm. Comfortable. Safe, with a body up against his breathing its own rhythm. For a moment, the nostalgic feeling kept him asleep until the realization jolted him awake. "Aurelia—?" but even before he finished, he saw the same grey bundle he'd grown accustomed to spending the night with snoring away.

"Sleepin' on the job," he chuckled quietly to himself. One paw ruffled the fur on the little kit's head. While the ancient loss hung on his heart, her purring slumber kept him chipper. "Guess that makes you m'first mistress since her. 'M I special, or'd you sleep wit' anyun who'd the coin?" Despite the joke, he couldn't laugh. He hoped a better life for the kit.

A light coat of dust clung to his hat. It seemed his dreams had brought the all too familiar, empty dessert to surround him. "Hell follows, 's they say," he mumbled. A paw swiped his hat clean while the other took it atop his head. A dusty trail interrupted the dry underbrush, winding as it was long, stretching even beyond the horizon.

Empty, vague and directionless: a sight he knew all too well. If all this had done anything, it was prove the devil he knew was better'n any other. Mayhaps the kit could've given him company, but he knew she was gone without looking. She deserved a better life, anyway, better than what he could give. "May yer dreamin' don't stop helpin' whoever," he said to the long gone Espurr, "and may y'next gau'dian be mo' t'yer likin'."

Th'were many goodbyes he could say (a prediction of his next meeting in hell with Sour Scales, a last apology to the knight too noble for his own good), but they all fell away as he walked along the wayward trail. They might remember him, he might remember them, but it didn't matter; his prison was walkin' through this world all alone.

He didn't need a send off. Never did. He tipped his hat to no one and did what he did best: left it all behind.]]

 

[elyvorg]

Oh man I only just noticed that Desper always protected Espurr, despite claiming when I asked him about seraph knights (and despite not being a literal seraph knight) that he wasn't the kind of guy who'd obsessively protect the same person over and over or anything, heh. That's pretty cute.

 

[Sike Saner]

Hell of a game, that. Big thanks to Negrek for hosting. :D

Gotta say, was legit surprised to have lasted as long as I did... right up until my last night was about to end, whereupon I was just about certain I wouldn't be nightkilled because with DW having flipped innocent, surely the mafia would try and get a "Sike was lying" bandwagon going for another mislynch, right? Right??

...Yeah, I'm not sure that would've worked. Maybe they weren't sure it'd work, either? At any rate, I was, however briefly, so convinced that I was likely to live the night that I'd cobbled together an RP post wherein I'd be benching myself for day 4, as well as inviting everyone else to play with my character in my absence:

Spoiler: Not canon, obvs.

[[Another day. Another of their number lost. Ntairow looked over each of the others, wondering who would be the next to disappear. Someone innocent? Someone undeserving of such a fate? She'd already failed to protect one. She'd furthermore directly contributed to the loss of another.

Her lips drew back in a bitter grimace. The professor had seemed for all the world to be working against everyone's best interests... and yet had turned out to be on their side. Once again, Ntairow had been misdirected. Sabotaged.

It was all too easy to misfire. To punish the wrong person. She tried her hardest not to lose sight of that fact. No jumping to conclusions about who had set her and so many others on the wrong track the day before. No assuming that the bandwagon against an innocent party had been deliberately engineered in the first place. It could have been an honest mistake on everyone's part, she reminded herself.

But dear Night, she wanted someone to pay.]]

Oof. Yeah, I, uh, don't think you actually have as much of a handle on yourself as you think, friend.

[[That "voice" again. "You!"]]

*flinches* Ah, yeah. Me. Aheheheheh...

[["Are you the one turning us against each other? Are you the one keeping us here?"]]

I... no?

[[Ntairow was silent for a moment. Then one of her hands took on a rainbow aura and fired a psybeam directly into the ground.]]

The f--Oh my god, I'm not the ground. I'm not this place! I don't think anyone is, actually.

[[Her lower arms folded. "Then prove it. Show yourself, you filthy coward."]]

That... is actually impossible. Sorry...

[[Ntairow snarled. "I will find you," she promised, "and I will make you wish dearly that I hadn't. You're going to confess every single th--"

She went deathly still, apart from her tail. Its branches fanned out, detecting something that wasn't there before: a presence, faint but growing clearer by the moment, as if appearing from within a thinning fog. Her eyes widened. Were the faceless speaker's defenses failing?

Another psybeam pierced the air, aimed toward the invisible figure.]]

Gah! (Oh god, the next one probably won't miss...) Uh... S L E E P

[[Her hand, already priming another attack, dropped back to her side. The colors dancing around it blinked out.

"What... what are..."

That's all she manages before crumpling to the floor in an awkward sprawl of limbs, sound asleep.]]

...I did not think that would work, holy crap.

Okay, so. For today, at least, Ntairow's going to be out like a light. Short of being jailed, nothing is going to wake her up prior to the night phase.

As for me, I will not be posting in the thread today, except maybe to vote. (Maybe.) I don't really think I have the energy to defend myself at this time, and with Finnar flipping innocent, I'm pretty sure all eyes will be on me (even though, let's be real: all it really proves is that Finnar was innocent).

All the information (that I can think of, anyway) that you could possibly need from or about me and my actions in this game can be probably found earlier in the thread anyway, barring of course what I did last night and why.

The answer to those questions is: last night I defended Tefiren. I did so because elyvorg had made it to my probably-innocent shortlist, owing to what I saw as helpful, pro-town-seeming contributions to the thread, having well thought-out judgments, and just making sense in general. Hopefully that wasn't a bad call on my part. Hopefully my judgment toward Tefiren turns out better than my judgment toward Finnar sjdfnjfsd...

As before, I'm going to keep the rest of my maybe-innocent candidates to myself so as to make it harder to guess who I might try to protect during the night. As for possible guilty reads, I don't have any at the moment.

I might be back for day 5--provided I survive that long, of course. We shall see!

At any rate, have fun, y'all. :D

(PS: Ntairow sometimes talks in her sleep. Feel free to have fun with that. :D Just don't make her say anything offensive, obviously.)

Anyhoo, thanks for the memories, all, and congrats to my fellow townies! :D

 

[Chibi Pika]

Alright, I think I've gotten the chance to take in everything from this evening. xD; I just wanted to extend a huge thanks to Negrek for hosting, for writing up all the posts, everything. I feel like the role flavor was even more fitting this game than the last, which was already a high bar! (Especially for the Mafia themselves.) These games are basically the highlight of the year, and I already can't wait for the next one.

Some choice moments from the night logs:

• That freaking double reversal N0, what are the odds
• Not one, but TWO investigations on Lauchs N1, both of which failed. Amazing.
• Jen's friggin' precision strikes with that roleblock hot damn. You were amazing, but also I'm obligated to say screw you. xD
• Desper protecting Espurr every single night asdf my heart.

Next, some elyvorg replies. :3

Spoiler

- Chibi tried to protect Tefiren the night he was eliminated! Man, if only Tefiren knew that. Also, Ntairow tried to protect Tefiren the night she was eliminated. Apparently that's a thing doctors should not do, geez. See, Tefiren's tricks are the best, he can totally protect himself, leave him alone, guys.

You were by far my strongest townread on D1, and I was worried that if the mafia didn't go for me (potentially out of fearing that protectors might target me due to being town leader last year?) that they'd go for you as the fallback. Not how it worked out, but I love the flavor implications.

I was so sad you were killed so early, too! It'd have been awesome to get to play with you more, especially as our thoughts lined up so much and we were townreading each other basically from the beginning. Tefiren and Chibi would have made such a good team. I got some fun RP out of his reaction to Chibi's death, but it would have been fun RP to have them both being alive and sort-of-friends (even though probably neither of them would admit it), too! >:(

I will forever be sad that this didn't get to happen. I was even setting up for it a bit in my D1 posts!

Tefiren would have been disappointed in Chibi here, though. It obviously had to be the black weasel, everyone else had a reason to be innocent!

Sorry I fell into a pit of DUCK CONFUSION for the entire game. xD

This was me sort of foreshadowing Fly, which was my one ability that wasn't on the role list. Not that Tefiren needed to pretend to have some super-special mysterious power to be able to boast about that, since escaping from certain death is just Tuesday for him, so on his level he was basically just emptily boasting and not actually thinking about that power in particular.

To be honest, the fact that Tefiren got one-shot commuter is absolutely fantastic. Also, regarding you getting a one-shot roleblock--no wonder you were so vocal about the possibility of town roleblock on D1! I was kinda perplexed by that, because roleblocking just feels so anti-town to me. xD Of course you were thinking about its potential town uses.

(also I am amused by how you kept calling Tefiren "Tefi" throughout a lot of this. It's a shame it's presumably not in Chibi's character to do that kind of thing, because damn, imagine if Tefiren had been on a mutual-townread team with someone who insisted on calling him the one thing that reminds him of Forsira's existence.)

Aha, sadly, I don't think I ever would have had Chibi himself call him that. That was just what I called him because it's easier to say quickly and my inner monologue is extremely verbal. xD

Awww, thanks! I had a lot of fun with that post. :3

I really wanted to thank you, for like... making Chibi such a big part of the narrative of this game? I've always been afraid of getting eliminated first, not just because of not getting to play, but because it feels like being in the game was meaningless. But Chibi's death... I feel like it had a huge impact on the game, both mechanically and narratively. It felt like it meant something. That means more to me than you can know.

Also just wanted to give props to Starlight for starting the death flavor trend, and to everyone else for continuing it! That was one of the highlights of the game imo, and it gave the overall narrative a unique flair that set it apart from last year's game. An A+ addition for sure. And because it became a thing after I died, I decided to write my own! (This isn't how it would have actually gone, mind, as it includes gameplay details that obviously would have been forbidden to include at the time. Think of it as me taking advantage of this being written in the postgame!)

Spoiler: Chibi's Death Flavor

The Pikachu’s ears stood bolt upright as he slowly crept his way to the base of the large tree that had materialized in the otherwise featureless space. He only had one chance, each night. Protect someone. Make a difference. Save a life, like he hadn’t been able to the time when it mattered the most.

He’d wasted it last night--he already knew that much. He’d felt drawn to her, the one using the phone. Whatever force had brought her here, and the force that brought him here… they’d been allies last time, he was sure of it. Not this time.

So he’d chosen the Archopy. The one most determined to win. The one that was way the hell too enthusiastic about this for someone who so obviously knew what it was like to walk the razor's edge between life and death. Like this was all just some game. That sentiment ignited a burning frustration inside Chibi. And yet… some part of him, deep down, would not, could not let that enthusiasm get crushed.

A shadow fell on the Pikachu from behind, and he already knew it was too late. But he killed that thought where it stood, lashing out into the darkness. He’d do it. He’d fight. He’d win. He’d make a difference. He had to.

And then his senses dissolved into nothingness. He reached out blindly, felt his claws clinging to the bark of the not-tree until his paws slipped clean through. Uselessly, he found himself reaching for his inner lightning despite knowing that it had been gone ever since he got here. (The pain had been gone too.)

Damn it. This was too soon. He hadn’t even gotten to do anything yet. He was supposed to be stronger than this. Strong enough to tear down any opponent, even the one he couldn’t see. He couldn’t be the first. He couldn’t be the weakest.

This was a mistake. This wasn’t how it was supposed to end. He should have been able to do so much more. What the hell good was his power—his existence—otherwise? A protector that couldn’t protect anyone, least of all himself. Useless. Just like he’d been before.

Would it make any difference at all? Being here. Dying here. He couldn’t save himself. Couldn’t save anyone else. Not here. Not back home.

Useless. Useless. Usele—

Aaaaand, in the event that Dave hadn't been freaking roleblocked, this was going to be my flavor response:

Spoiler: Response to Dave

The void is not quiet, and it is not peaceful.

Chibi’s not sure what he expected. But it wasn’t this. Suspended in the nothingness, both real and not. Hearing and seeing everything. Powerless to stop any of it. Useless. Just like he was before.

If this is his own personal hell, they did a good job. Maybe he deserves it. Maybe this is his punishment for letting that happen back then. The cruelest joke. A protector killed before he could save anyone. A meaningless death that will amount to nothing. Doomed to watch a fruitless struggle, unable to intervene.

(Part of him was hoping he’d go to the same place as… But of course it was stupid to get his hopes up.)

After what feels like forever, a voice prods at the edge of his mind. It’s different from the rest of the voices, the ones that he hears during the day. He’s not just eavesdropping. These words are meant for him.

At first he’s not sure what to make of it. The angry human, reaching out to him for answers. Answers that he can only give, to solve one of the mysteries plaguing the others. Part of him doesn’t want to believe it. But then, at once, a spark of hope ignites in his soul. This is it. This is what he was waiting for. And so, drawing on the worthless scraps of willpower still hanging from the edge of his soul, he screams into the void.

“That damn Raichu might be a lot of things, but he’s not lying!”

His words echo feebly. There’s no response. No indication that his words reached anyone at all. But still, he finds himself clinging desperately to that single small spark of hope like it’s the only thing that matters in this world. If there’s even the tiniest chance that he could make a difference. That his death could mean something…

Not useless. Not useless. Not—

Man... I'm not sure whether I prefer this being from the world where Dave managed to contact him. Or from this world, where Dave never heard his response, and he's just deluding himself into thinking that he managed to help. I'm... going to stop thinking about this now. :<

 

[SparklingEspeon]

Spoiler

"It occurred to Espurr in hindsight that this game had all been one big lucky accident. Every member of the Mafia had been caught stumblingly - had there been even one deliberate kill the whole game?

She'd been on the sidelines for most of it. That was her style, anyway. Sit in the background, spy on other people when necessary, and defend herself if it came to that. At the very least she had her trusty scoreboard that had dutifully kept her filled in on who was alive and who had died. It hadn't said a word the whole time it had been here, but Espurr was almost sorry to see it go.

The portal was right there; the portal back to her home world. She looked at the dull visage of the town behind her, which had never looked quite right to her the whole time she'd been here. As interesting as this had all been, she wouldn't miss it. Lucky accidents weren't her thing, especially when they revolved around life and death. Maybe Tricky would like it better, if Espurr could convince her this was all anything but a dream. If she could convince herself it was anything more than a dream.

And maybe a dream was all it way. maybe it was best if it stayed that way. Casting one more look at the floating scoreboard behind her, Espurr walked into the portal, and all she saw was white.

...

Slowly coming to. Espurr blinked her eyes open wearily, staring around the familiar confines of her bedroom once more.

Just a dream."

My character survived until the end of the game, but I wrote an ending for her anyway. Why not?

 

[Starlight Aurate]

Chibi Pika's notes are hilarious haha. I'm glad you shared these with all of us for us to see!

Also thanks to Windskull for giving us sans circus.

Best part of the whole game. I find it hilarious that
1. The thumbnail is my post saying "I don't know how to defend myself without giving myself away
2. Two posts in succession are my saying to Persephone, "If I tell you I'm innocent, will that make you feel better? :D" immediately followed by her saying "Jail Starlight Aurate."

Also I wanna give props to Dragonfree, Windskull and elyvorg for the death flavors in the final game post. They were so good! And they all fit together so perfectly well! I love the text that Chibi and SparklingEspeon also wrote for their own deaths, even if they didn't get to use them in game.

Also just wanted to give props to Starlight for starting the death flavor trend, and to everyone else for continuing it! That was one of the highlights of the game imo, and it gave the overall narrative a unique flair that set it apart from last year's game.

Haha, well, I can't really claim any credit for this. I had mentioned a few times future rp scenes I had in mind for Yami Bakura but was killed before I could put any of them in. Negrek knew this and so she offered to let me write my own death scene, which I took her up on. So thank you, Negrek, for making this addition!

I also want to comment on how perfectly the abilities matched the characters imo. Making Tefiren the Jack of All Trades seemed especially fitting, especially as I watched elyvorg's play style. When I first saw Yami Bakura was the seer I was like "There's no way this was random."

 

[elyvorg]

whoops I'm still not done having thoughts about this game

Also, regarding you getting a one-shot roleblock--no wonder you were so vocal about the possibility of town roleblock on D1! I was kinda perplexed by that, because roleblocking just feels so anti-town to me. xD Of course you were thinking about its potential town uses.

Honestly, that's not even why. My posts were about "if someone can roleblock the same person again then please do that", so I wasn't even really considering my own power, since I could only use it once. It's more down to me having occasionally GMed a handful of short chatroom mafia games way back when, in which, due to my inexperience, I often included a town roleblocker for the sake of it potentially being able to block the mafia don and get information that way, not realising that that's its only useful town application and everything else would just get in the way.

I really wanted to thank you, for like... making Chibi such a big part of the narrative of this game? I've always been afraid of getting eliminated first, not just because of not getting to play, but because it feels like being in the game was meaningless. But Chibi's death... I feel like it had a huge impact on the game, both mechanically and narratively. It felt like it meant something. That means more to me than you can know.

Like I've mentioned to you already elsewhere, Tefiren just did that on his own. I saw the message that Chibi was dead and realised that the Tefiren in my head was actually upset about it, and I knew I had to do something with that because that's fascinating, given what Tefiren is usually like.

Also, since in the Dave-seance flavour (man, "Dave seance" is not a pair of words I ever expected to see together), Chibi was still conscious and watching the whole game, I have to wonder how he felt about Tefiren's reaction to his death and the fact that Tefiren remembered his name while still pointedly not using anyone else's the entire time.

The Pikachu’s ears stood bolt upright as he slowly crept his way to the base of the large tree that had materialized in the otherwise featureless space.

The tragic-ness of this scene is amplified even more by the fact that the tree wasn't even where Tefiren was sleeping. It was his perch during the day, but obviously he wouldn't hide there at night; that'd be way too predictable! Come on, now. Chibi may not have known better, but you should have, surely. =P

The one that was way the hell too enthusiastic about this for someone who so obviously knew what it was like to walk the razor's edge between life and death. Like this was all just some game. That sentiment ignited a burning frustration inside Chibi. And yet… some part of him, deep down, would not, could not let that enthusiasm get crushed.

Awwwwww! *chanting* Weird awkward friends! Weird awkward friends! Weird awkward friends!

(Part of him was hoping he’d go to the same place as… But of course it was stupid to get his hopes up.)

Oh no don't tell Tefiren that if you do get harmlessly vanished in this game then you don't go back and get to see your missing friend again. (Though I guess this might be different, since Chibi's friend was lost as a part of his home story (man I need to actually sit down and read LC someday), while Forsira was vanished by the mafia gods to bring Tefiren into the mafia game.)

"It occurred to Espurr in hindsight that this game had all been one big lucky accident. Every member of the Mafia had been caught stumblingly - had there been even one deliberate kill the whole game?

Tefiren would balk at the idea that his final, totally-necessary kill was just random. He came to his conclusion through a very clever and cunning process of... elimination. Just process of elimination, really. But it wasn't luck; he's good at this game!

I also want to comment on how perfectly the abilities matched the characters imo. Making Tefiren the Jack of All Trades seemed especially fitting, especially as I watched elyvorg's play style. When I first saw Yami Bakura was the seer I was like "There's no way this was random."

That's the thing - they were random! It'd be unfair if they weren't, because it'd be too easy for us to guess people's roles solely based on whichever one fit the character best. Like, Yami as a seer may have been fitting, but him being the mafia don would have been even more fitting, given that he was the only villain in this place, right? But that would have been way too obvious and not fair on you.

But even though it was random, again, all my compliments to the random number generator that decided Tefiren should be a jack-of-all-trades. That is the absolute single most perfect mafia role he could ever have. Before the role PMs were sent out, I was all worrying about how I'd even properly justify Tefiren's role in-flavour in his head - there were so many things that wouldn't have made much sense being something he could do, and especially not as the only thing he could do. But then I didn't have to!

In fact, during some of my Day 1 RP posts in which Tefiren was musing about the types of "tricks" people might have in this game, I literally had to restrain him from thinking about the fact that his own tricks were so numerous and unpredictable compared to everyone else's. This wouldn't even have been deliberate hinting at my role, because it's just exactly the kind of thing Tefiren would think to himself anyway in any context - but I didn't want anyone to think I was hinting at my role when I wasn't actually trying to.

If I take part in next year's game (which, yes, I'm definitely considering, and if so I will definitely be Tefiren again because I don't have anyone else nearly as perfect for it as him), I am going to be so sad when he's near-inevitably not a JOAT any more.

To be honest, the fact that Tefiren got one-shot commuter is absolutely fantastic.

Honestly the only thing not perfect about Tefiren's role is the fact that his commuter ability was only one-shot. His other "tricks" - especially the murder one - were something he could believably justify in his Tefirenlogic as being something special that he doesn't want to use again because They'll be expecting it and he can't be predictable. But that obviously doesn't apply to simply escaping death, and I really wasn't sure how I'd properly flavour-justify Tefiren not wanting to use that one again if I'd had to. I guess it'd have just been because he was flying all night and therefore his wings were so tired that he couldn't fly for long stretches for the rest of the game - and then he'd tell himself he was just avoiding it out of choice to make things more fun and definitely isn't trapped and unable to escape any more.

And while we're talking about the fittingness of some of the roles, can we also talk about the fact that all three protectors were a character who'd failed to protect someone important to them in their home stories, and therefore they wanted to make up for it by doing their best to protect others? That's pretty adorable.

Also, while Dave as a fucking spirit medium seems at a glance to be just about the most hilariously un-Dave-like role imaginable, it somehow managed to work really well anyway given his previous game and the whole Mia thing and what Dragonfree did with it in his death flavour.

 

[windskull]

And, ahhh, that's why Tefiren's kill ended up seeming a lot less ambiguously-murdery and much more like the same old probably-harmless jailing than I'd been hoping it would: because it was originally written as flavour for the jailing. Ah, well.

Haha, yeah. Given more time, it would have been neat to write a more collaborative and more fitting end. But even as it turned out, I had fun! And I'm definitely looking forward to seeing you participate next time.

 

[NonAnalogue]

So I don't have a lot to add that people haven't already said, but big props to Negrek for running this game. It was chaotic energy almost all the way through; I don't envy having to keep up with all of it.

Side note: I absolutely could not keep up with everything in this game! So, uh, sorry to my Mafia teammates who probably could have used a Don who knew what was going on. I found out this game that when people freely refer to others as both their character's name and their own username, my brain rapidly loses the ability to keep track of things.

(Also Fiametta's gimmick in posts is really annoying to do on mobile, so I couldn't post as often as I'd like. I am nothing if not committed to the bit!)

Thanks, all, for a hell of a game!

 

[Sike Saner]

And while we're talking about the fittingness of some of the roles, can we also talk about the fact that all three protectors were a character who'd failed to protect someone important to them in their home stories, and therefore they wanted to make up for it by doing their best to protect others? That's pretty adorable.

Yesssss omg. ;A; So perfect.

Okay, couldn't resist. Here's some death flavor for Ntairow:

Spoiler: ♪ building towered foresight isn't anything at all... ♪

Through the darkness, Ntairow moved toward Tefiren's shelter. She moved briskly--she didn't dare assume she had the luxury of sneaking around--but the ground (such as it was) absorbed the impact of her steps well, allowing her to move in near-silence. The night was nearly as bright as day to her eyes, but she imagined that at least most of the others wouldn't see her if they happened to glance outside.

She almost wished they would. With the previous day's vote condemning an innocent person to a horrible fate (a cold pang of guilt twisted her insides at the thought, same as it had done every time she'd reflected on it since), all those eyes would probably look upon her with renewed suspicion once the night was over. If they could only witness what she was about to do, they'd realize she was absolutely on their side, at least where most of them were concerned. They'd avoid wasting their votes on her... and perhaps this time, they'd actually take down someone who deserved it.

As she neared her chosen ward, her senses remained on high alert. There was a chance, a very real one, that someone was watching her--someone who'd want her gone regardless of her benevolent actions. Someone who'd want to get rid of her because of them. If they were already staking out her target as potential prey, maybe they'd change their mind and go after her instead.

Ntairow wanted to think she could handle them with ease. In the beginning, she was sure she could. But after seeing a being as powerful as the human-who-wasn't fall to them, her confidence had faltered. All she could hope to do now was detect them before they could make a move against her. She might be able to--

Everything went black. Her tail flared, suddenly stripped of its senses, and her head whipped about in panic as she tried in vain to locate whatever had done this to her. A bone-deep chill set in at her feet and began moving up her legs, creeping at first but accelerating quickly, devouring all sensation in its wake.

She tried to cry out in rage, in frustration, in horror, but the undoing was already consuming her midsection, her chest. She was struggling to breathe. Barely a moment after, she was gone, never knowing what had hit her.

Once again, great game (and great postgame too, omg). Thanks all. :D

 

[SparklingEspeon]

As a parting note, I love that Namo's note for me on the day that I (inadvertently) set everything on fire is just 'cat'. That speaks on so many levels lol

 

[Namohysip]

Cat.