Why you aren't contributing as town.

[S0me0ne23]

I’ve been wanting to post this for a while, relating to the things I take issue with regarding how people approach fm as town, and as I’m deciding whether or not to come back to this site, I figure I’d just post this and see what people think. That being said…

The problem:
A lot of people on this site seem to think in reactionary terms: Somebody does something scummy, therefore I vote them. Something notable happens, I give my thoughts on it.
This type of play is WRONG.
Why? Because scum have no incentive to do anything. They literally can just put the bare minimum effort in, avoid any conflict, and just slank by the entire game. There’s also nothing pushing discussion, so town isn’t making any progress towards solving the game.

Another way people unintentionally avoid contributing is by posting reads, especially reads list. Instead of contributing, people post reads lists. Instead of asking people to contribute, they ask for reads lists.
This is better in the sense that people are proactively posting content, but at the same time it’s usually done in an impersonal manner. Reads lists are like essays, not conversations, and since mafia is inherently a social game, they lose a lot of the important content that comes from interacting with people to form opinions. It also focusses too much on what has already happened, with nothing to say about where to go from here in terms of reads.

This gives the false dichotomy of processing and pushing, where the only time people do anything proactive is when they arbitrarily decide who to lynch, and they do so with ill-informed reads based on a surface level glance of what he said, she said.

So how do we fix this?
First we need to define a goal for day play: Resolve players.
Resolving players can be defined as sorting players into one of two categories: Lock town, or lynched. However, townies need to be cautious about how they resolve players. Lynches are a limited resource, so they need to be used conservatively. Similarly, letting a wolf into your townblock can be a major setback, which can cause mislynches and force you to redo your reads.
Keyword is caution. Tunnelvisioning or blindly sheeping aren’t thorough enough to be viable playstyles. Instead, you need to analyze where players were coming from. Guess at someone’s thought process, then ask them what they were thinking. If you were wrong, maybe you shouldn’t be townreading them, or maybe you were townreading them for the wrong reasons. If you think someone may be scum, offer up a townie reason for their actions, and if they deny it, maybe you just didn’t see what their thought process really was. If a player accepts a thought process / motivation that was imposed on them habitually, they're probably scum. If you don’t understand something someone did, you can literally just ask why they did it, then see if their reasons or motivation are believable.
Most people I’ve seen here either feel lost or have blind certainty. Both of these are wrong; certainty isn’t something that just happens, it needs to be built up methodically. In order to effectively play town, you need to actively interact with players, both to form your own reads and so that other players can see that you are town. This is the only way that discussion can flow in a productive manner and should be the go-to method of gamesolving.
This is something that takes practice and nobody is perfect at, but you’re not going to get to the point where you can just ez read people unless you put the effort and intellectual curiosity towards actual human social interactions. It’s about learning how to read people, and if you can habitually view mafia with an attitude of learning, it’s only a matter of time before improvement follows.
I know a lot of people that do this, and I've found that most of the players that do are also the players that I have a high opinion of, but a lot of people don't do this, and I think this is the first step if people want to salvage this site's meta.

This is the longest post I will ever make on this site and fully intend to go immediately back to one-liners.

[EvanManManMan]

Yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes

[EvanManManMan]

Bro, villagers on this site fucking suck

Take note of this

[ladd]

Very well written, first part especially is extremely on point

Good job

Just try to actively sort people, doesn't mean that you necessarily have to post 1000 times or have the game solved by D1. Take it at your time

Use flips to see if you are going in the right direction

[ChubbyMooshroom9]

Bro, villagers on this site fucking suck

Take note of this

Hi Gobln, I’m the US government take a seat.

[TrueGent]

Good post

[EvanManManMan]

It's ironic because the only people who acknowledged this thread are the ones who don't need it

God

[ChubbyMooshroom9]

It's ironic because the only people who acknowledged this thread are the ones who don't need it

God

>jord

[EvanManManMan]

It's ironic because the only people who acknowledged this thread are the ones who don't need it

God

>jord

Jord is at least aware of how to play well

Plus he is a minority

[Chemist1422]

It's ironic because the only people who acknowledged this thread are the ones who don't need it

God

you implied something that would summon me

Anyway, thank you for the advice s0me0ne.

[Crimson97]

Damn so I'm supposed to actually play the game to win?

I know I'm bad, will try to apply this more.

[ChubbyMooshroom9]

It's ironic because the only people who acknowledged this thread are the ones who don't need it

God

>jord

Jord is at least aware of how to play well

Plus he is a minority

>red

[ManateeDude]

that reminds me. Readslists are absolute shit. They mean nothing.

[TheWabbit]

It's ironic because the only people who acknowledged this thread are the ones who don't need it

God

you implied something that would summon me

Anyway, thank you for the advice s0me0ne.

well

[EvanManManMan]

that reminds me. Readslists are absolute shit. They mean nothing.

It honestly depends on what else the person does. A readslist on itself is indeed meaningless. A readslist functioning as a summarization of other in thread reads then it is purposeful.

[ManateeDude]

that reminds me. Readslists are absolute shit. They mean nothing.

It honestly depends on what else the person does. A readslist on itself is indeed meaningless. A readslist functioning as a summarization of other in thread reads then it is purposeful.

Just writing your reads in brackets means shit. Used to explain previous reads or all reads is good.

[S0me0ne23]

It's ironic because the only people who acknowledged this thread are the ones who don't need it

God

you implied something that would summon me

Anyway, thank you for the advice s0me0ne.

:) np

[RAmcius]

well, i never find these readlist useful as a town and simply ignored, it's literally impossible to have reasonable reads on everyone early/mid D1, when these readlist are mostly made, you might have few reads right, but still hard time to prove those, but as a scum, oh boy, i was so happy to see them - you can see town opinions, so you know who will be easier to push and who you shouldn't touch. After you can make your own "readlist" from other people readlists and reactions to them for free towncred - for some reason people think scum can't fake readlists

[TheWabbit]

readslist forces me to think of a reason so the reads sounds more forced

i'd rather focus on people i think are scum early on and assert my unknown reads later on

[ManateeDude]

Subject: Episode IX | Game Over! (Bomb Boyage)

Kirize people want a reads list.

Its SirCakez lmao

[OllyRenard]

This was a great read

[ChubbyMooshroom9]

Subject: Episode IX | Game Over! (Bomb Boyage)

Kirize people want a reads list.

Its SirCakez lmao

STAY ON TOPIC.

Ironic.

[Schultz128]

Quit.

[LOLingHyena]

I just saw this post. It's nice to see this concept articulated so clearly for people.

[greenrabbit7]

>when you do most of the things on this list