Mafia: The Last Resort [EPILOGUE: THE END]

Okay, now this is interesting. Tea's response to Malky:

You because of your excuse for not talking. Guy did the same, but then he talked later anyways. Further, you are crossed off the list now because..well, you're talking.

Tea, while Guy did talk later, he only did so after you said you had vague suspicions. Then he made a post where he agreed you were suspicious and held off on voting in order to avoid starting a bandwagon too early.

So! Were you vaguely suspicious of Guy when you made your first post, and if not, why? He hadn't really said anything more substantial than Malky at that point.

I also have vague suspicions on Guy and Pinary if Tea turns out to be scum, but the more I think about said suspicions, the less sure I am about them. That said, here are my thoughts in case they prove useful later.

Guy is catching my attention because 1) he agreed Tea was suspicious but didn't vote for him and 2) more significantly, Tea's comment above seems to be trying to defend him. But ultimately I'm not all that convinced because I completely understand Guy's reasoning for not voting, and he did vote for Tea later anyhow.

Pinary drew my attention for voting for Tea, then moving it to g0m. If Tea turns out to be scum and g0m town, this would make me pretty dang suspicious... except for one thing. I started to suspect him as scum in Nightside for very similar reasons to that, and I was correct in that game. And I just find myself skeptical that he'd slip up in the same way.

In any case, after that reread, I didn't find a strong reason to take my vote off Tea, so it's staying there.

Unvote: Sruixan

Vote: Tea

Tea, you're looking pretty scummy to me due to a recent post of yours (https://eagle-time.org/viewtopic.php?p=1686#p1686). First, you didn't find Sruixan's initial post suspicious, which is perfectly fine. However, you go on to say that you don't understand why he got picked on a bit for that - then less than two sentences later state the reason, which is that it seemed like a nervous defense. This is a tricky wording thing - why would you go to the trouble of noting that you don't understand why I (and it was pretty much just me, although you act like it was a lot of people) jumped on Sruixan, when you already knew the reason? Furthermore, that issue is already said and done; why bring it back up?

And let's not forget that you already have a lot of votes on you - in fact, you'd hit the SL vote point when you made the post in question. Why argue for the person who would be your best bet at not being lynched? You're the only one who knows who you really are on Day 1. If you're town on Day 1, your top priority is survival - as far as you know, anyone else could be scum, except you. You're the only person you know is town; therefore, lynching anyone who isn't you has a greater chance of hitting scum. It is almost never in the best interests of a townie to defend someone else instead of him/herself on Day 1. Mildly-suicidal behavior like that is more akin to scum. So why'd you do it?

There are two simple explanations I can think of here.

1. You knew he was either a better player or had a more useful town role. The former might be possible, but you don't seem too familiar with him to have such a meta reason. The latter is impossible (for town), since this is just Day 1 - no investigations have been done yet. Unless of course you're lovers, but then you both go down if either one of you dies, which would make sacrificing one to save the other pointless.

3. You're scum who's decided that it's too late for you, and you're trying to bail a friend of yours out of a bad situation. Judging by the other games I've played with you, trying to do something like that in a way like this seems to fit with your style of play, but I could easily be wrong there.

Bottom line: Based on the evidence I have at hand, and through a large amount of extrapolation which I cannot prove at the moment but highly suspect, I think that Tea is scumbuddying with Sruixan. I'm switching my vote to Tea because he's caused stronger suspicions for me; if he flips town I'll have to re-evaluate my opinion of Sruixan.

AKillerCuppaTea – (5) – Ixcaliber, TimeothyHour, Dragon Fogel, MrGuy, Pick Yer Poison
Sruixan – (2) – Pharmacy, Whimbrel
MrGuy – (2) – ProfessorLizzard, Drakenforge
Drakenforge - (2) - Wheat, Schazer
Pinary - (1) - Mirdini
Mirdini – (1) – Solaris
Whimbrel - (1) - Insufficient Fresh
MalkyTop - (1) - g0m
g0m - (1) - Pinary

(Abstaining - 4 - AKillerCuppaTea, MalkyTop, Sruixan, Woffles)

With 20 alive it takes 11 to lynch and 6 to soft lynch. Deadline is in 5 hours.

Oh dear. Time is running short.

Unvote. Vote: Tea so the day won't be a complete waste of time.

I have my other eyes on Pharmacy for not talking, g0m for being shady, Whim from jumping on Sruix then dropping in to the darkness.

I am okay with Ix and Malky.

Also glad this forum has the AntiNinja Feature : D

I don't really have much problem with Wheat doing what he does. He can still tell us what he thinks and crap, he can still tell us what shit happens to him overnight, whatever.

The people that stick out most in my mind, right now, though, would be g0m, Forge, and...someone else. Shoot, I think it was Fresh...though in any case, this is just me hurriedly going over memory.

But in any case.

Vote: Tea

AKillerCuppaTea – (7) – Ixcaliber, TimeothyHour, Dragon Fogel, MrGuy, Pick Yer Poison
Sruixan – (2) – Pharmacy, Whimbrel
MrGuy – (1) – Drakenforge
Drakenforge - (2) - Wheat, Schazer
Pinary - (1) - Mirdini
Mirdini – (1) – Solaris
Whimbrel - (1) - Insufficient Fresh
MalkyTop - (1) - g0m
g0m - (1) - Pinary

(Abstaining - 3 - AKillerCuppaTea, Sruixan, Woffles)

With 20 alive it takes 11 to lynch and 6 to soft lynch. Deadline is in 1 hour.

The decision was uneasily made, and the sun dipped just out of sight below the horizon. With light still prevailing the guests found it too early to sleep, yet too late to make any alterations to the judgement they had chosen.

And so, just as they would have on any other night, the inhabitants of the Last Resort made their way to the bar.

They drifted towards it in small groups, falling back into the old habits. Soon talk began to rise up amongst them, and as they arrived at the bar a soft layer of chatter had begun to mingle with the other sounds of the room: the gentle splash of water in the fountain (muffled by its distant location in the courtyard), the uniform clinks of glass from behind the bar and the calming classical music infiltrating the room via gramophone. Through a glass ceiling the first stars could be seen to appear in the sky, their bright coldness an appealing contrast with the warm gleam of the polished brass that pervaded the building's décor.

If you put aside the memory of the gory events of the morning and focused on the moment, it could have been any other night in the hotel.

But then your ear would catch a snippet of conversation. Words like 'lynch' and 'death' would waft towards you, and every now and then you would see someone cast a glance at the doomed man. Not wanting to hear his begging or any budding manipulation, he had been tied up and a silk scarf gagged him. His presence was unsettling, yet no one wanted to risk losing sight of him either.

No, this was no normal night at the Last Resort. You have a feeling that things would never be the same in this once peaceful place.

The Day has ended, and the Twilight has begun. This will last 24 hours. The votes are frozen, but you may still talk. After this has ended the lynch of AKillerCuppaTea will take place and Night will begin. During this time the chosen target of the lynch may not speak.

So. We can talk for a bit.

Tea, any last words?

Yup.

...

I wouldn't mind a cuppa.

Hey so this twilight thing's an interesting mechanic. Tea, do you want to leave any final suspicions/famous last words? If you're town, you'll merely be vindicated in death. If you're scum, feel free to just name your scumbuddies.

I am a perfect, mindful moderator and no changes have been made to my previous post.

Oh. Huh. Tea can't talk, that's less useful.

Still somewhat useful, as people who were busy or whatever can comment on the lynch and its proponents or detractors, but I don't think we're going to get a lot out of that on this particular phase.

Eight hours.

You seven on his lynch: Who're your suspicions if Tea flips town? Who's worth pursuing if he flips scum?

<REDACTED>

Well, the main thing I notice is that there wasn't a serious effort by anyone to push another lynch. This means either Tea is town and the Mafia saw no need to shake things up, or Tea is scum and the Mafia decided that letting him die off was better than exposing themselves.

In either case, the Mafia are probably lying low. I mean, I'd expect there to be at least one scum on the bandwagon just by statistics, but it looks to me to be more of a case where the Mafia wasn't worried enough about where the lynch was going to try to draw attention to themselves.

So, while I'd need a reread to get specific names, I think I'd be most inclined to look at people who weren't getting particularly involved in the conversation. This is especially true if Tea is scum (and I've given my thoughts on that case already, inconclusive as they are); if Tea was town, it's more complicated. We had two random votes, then I voted him for being cagey and Pinary joined in on that; then the two random voters decided to stick with him. As a result, it would be hard to say if one of the random voters was scum, or one of the people who started pressuring him was; I'd guess there's at least one in there, but it seems a bit unlikely there'd be more than one. Although not impossible, seeing as Ix and Time are relatively new, and Pines and I are more experienced; I could see it happening that a new scumplayer would go for a random lynch and a relative veteran would try to push it into bandwagon territory.

So I guess my suspicions would be:
Scum Tea: look harder at people who were being quiet; weird thoughts about Pinary and Guy, but nothing I feel comfortable lynching based on
Town Tea: one of Pinary, Time, and Ix; or Pinary and one of the other two. Also people who were being quiet.

As I stated in my last post, I shifted my vote to Tea because I suspected him of buddying with Sruixan. If Tea flips scum Sruixan's on the top of my list. That's the only reason I suspect Sruixan at this point, though, so if Tea flips town Sruixan's back to the could-be-town-could-be-scum stage as far as I'm concerened.

When the last of the stars makes its appearance in the inky sky, the guests are forced to conclude that they can leave it no longer. They must go to bed (or at least make a show of it) but first he must die.

Some discussion about how to achieve this ends with a noose being fashioned out of some drapes. The bravest in the group drag the victim to the highest balcony, with the rest of the guests trailing behind. It takes only a few minutes. Tied up as he is, the lynched man was in no position to struggle, and his neck is cleanly broken.

The following procedures were a little more time consuming. The dead man's room is ransacked, his every belonging examined. They find the walls to be covered in red writing, with ink bottles and nibs (both used and new) filling the majority of the space. A few try to read the contents, but recoil in overwhelming horror even as their eyes alight on the first word. Eventually they find a book with pages written on not ink but pencil. In contrast to the bizarre sprawling texts that surrounded him, the words are neatly written to form the diary of the recently deceased individual. It is from this that his purpose is gleaned.

AKillerCuppaTea was a Doctor and referred to himself as Archduke Helme T. Saviour. He was cursed to always be writing, although he never consciously chose the words he put into ink – indeed, he never even knew what it was that came from his pen. To everyone else, however, these words would be abhorrent to such an extent that they could never even approach if they saw him writing, to the extent that he enjoyed a stay in a mental asylum prior to his stay at the Last Resort. He intended to put this to good effect by writing outside of a chosen person's room at night to deter any unwanted guests. AKillerCuppaTea was Town aligned.

Everyone leaves a little disturbed: mostly because of the powerful protector they just lost, but also because of the lurking red words they leave behind them.

The Night phase has begun, and will end on 3 September at 9PM GMT. Please be prompt with any night actions you may have.

SpoilerShow

Screw it. I'm making the hour of the deadlines a little earlier so they won't be awkward for me at all later. I'll be adjusting it progressively over a few deadlines until I'm happy with the hour, but it shouldn't take many attempts. If this makes any sense.

As everyone descends from their bedrooms to the dining room to enjoy their breakfast, it is not without a certain level of disquiet. And not without reason, as it soon becomes apparent that someone is missing from the breakfast table.

Almost as soon as this knowledge had rippled through the guests everyone leapt up and made their way (not without considerable speed) to the room of the missing guest.

Upon entering, everything seems at it should. Everything, that is, except for the lack of a person. People immediately fan out, looking at the contents of the room. It doesn't take long for an unfortunate to elect to look inside the bathroom.

There are no screams this time. It was what everyone was expecting, more or less, but they can't help but be stunned into silence.

The first thing you would notice in this room is the message, a startling red, scrawled on the otherwise pristine walls. There is no surprise in the nature of the liquid used to write it.

ARE YOU GOING TO TRUST YOUR HEART? OR YOUR MIND?

Below it in the double sink there sits two bloodstained organs, one in each. The left holds a heart, the arteries and blood vessels torn as if it had been ripped straight from someone's chest. The congealed blood dulls the gleam of the tissue, but there is no mistaking it.

The right sink holds, somewhat predictably, the brain of the deceased. It's less recognisable, separated clumps of grey clinging to wall and the sides of the sink. There's blood here too, but its almost irrelevant when placed next to the horror of this mutilated essence of a person.

Someone pushes the bathroom door open a little more, and the bath comes into view. And there it is: the body. An arm rests languidly on the side of the bath, and a head can be seen, but the rest of the corpse is submerged in blood.

Schazer was the Interceptor. Going by the name of Sarah Black, she was afflicted with absolute muteness. This gave her impressive powers of listening, and at the start of every day she would receive snippets of conversations that had taken place at night. She was Town aligned.

With another dead, the need to find the perpetrators becomes all the more important. Grimly, the guests return to the ground floor of the hotel to try again.

With 18 alive, it takes 10 to lynch and 6 to soft lynch. The day will end on 8 September at 8PM GMT.

SpoilerShow

The astute amongst will notice that this gives you six days as opposed to the usual week to lynch someone. This is for convenience, as I'll be away at the weekend, but you'll have two days of twilight as a result. I also have to say that this game may come to a screeching halt sometime around the end of this month as my broadband is being culled. I might be able to get internet somewhere (possibly at school, since they seem to be pretty lax with computer use as long as it's SFW and not interfering with school work) but that's going to last until it can be set up again. Apparently this will take a few weeks but I can't be any more specific than that. Apologies.

...Aw, darn. Eavesdropper might not always be useful, but I kinda liked the role when I played it.

In any case, did anything happen to anybody overnight?

Well, somebody left a cocktail outside my room last night.

I've got nothing from last night really.
If someone got roleblocked they should say so.

Now, let's see

AKillerCuppaTea – (7) – Ixcaliber, TimeothyHour, Dragon Fogel, MrGuy, Pick Yer Poison, ProfessorLizzard, MalkyTop

Okay so we lynched the doctor, we're just going to have to step up our game. Cops, trackers, watchers, you guys are going to have to be a bit crafty in revealing things now.
Anyway, there are a few things I don't like, but if you will refer to my votals, I think that the middle section might have at least one scum, but I don't really "know" votal poo.

I need to go back and re-read this I think.... :I

Oh, butterbiscuits. I did not expect Tea to be our doctor. Now I'm back to square one on my scumspects.

Nothing happened to me last night. I assume if I was roleblocked I'd have been informed of it, although that's never a given.

That cocktail outside Fogel's room seems like a good enough place to start the investigations with, I say. Fogel, did it have any effect that you know of? Or did you just find it in the morning or something?

I know what it did, but the effect was related to my role. So I'd rather not say more just yet.

The man known as Eddy Marsch rubs his temples as he stares at the floor.

"Okay, this is just great. I ain't happy about Sierra's death. I doubt any of us who ain't murdering bastards are. Oh, and my bad on pushing for the doctor. God, we're fucked."

He leans back, sighing and fidgeting, doing his best to mask the sweat pooling on his forehead. "Anyway. I can understand why you guys are suspicious of me, but trust me, I don't have any intentions of murderin' any one of you. Except the ones that are trying to murder everyone. I guess." He coughs twice. "Uh... yeah. Not sure what to say yet, just tryin' to, uh... fuck, I'm really makin' myself look bad, ain't I... uh, Victor seems like he's not a killy guy to me? I dunno, man. I'm bad at this."

EBWOP: "Fuck, I meant Sarah, not Sierra. Sorry."