Mharman

Could you point to what Pie said that was so dickish? I didn’t see anything worth getting offended over. Not from Pie anyway.

As for Wylted, don’t take him seriously. His remarks can be jarring at first, but sooner or later you realize he just has an edgy sense of humor.

And finally, about me: I wasn’t offended by the fact that your statement back there was a remark against men. I brushed that aspect of it off. Rather, I was irritated by the fact that the statement did nothing to refute Pie’s arguments against you. 

When you are being accused in a game of mafia, you must defend your innocence at some point. You have a few options:

1. Construct an argument based on logic, evidence, and deception if needed. This is the best option. While you run the risk of losing the argument and getting lynched, you have a lot of agency over what happens because you are actively taking the fight to your opponent. The more skilled you are, the more rewarding this option is.

2. Sit back and parrot others’ defense of you. This option is subpar, but you can get away with it on occasion; your odds are significantly better if you are a noob, since people expect less from you. Since you are relying on others to make your case for you, you have less agency over what happens. This is what players of lesser skill (usually noobs) tend to go for.

3. Become silent and hope for the best. This is a bad choice. If you are doing this, you are in a desperate situation. You can’t defend yourself because you aren’t skilled enough, and no one else can make a passable case for you, probably because there isn’t one. You may have been playing like an egregious town idiot, but you’re probably scum and on the verge of getting lynched. You have no agency whatsoever, all you can do is passively hope town gets distracted.

4. Make an argument that is completely irrelevant and fallacious. This is a horrible choice. You are trying to do something to help your case, but in reality you’re just flailing about, hoping town decides to believe you for whatever nonsensical reason. You spent all the at time typing up a post, and what did you do with it? Nothing useful, so now you’ve wasted the time of the players who read it as well. Not only have you demonstrated that you have no case for your own innocence, you have also demonstrated that you would rather actively distract from the issue than address any arguments. You look scummy for it. You have agency; the problem is, you’ve used it to drive any logically thinking player away from your side of the argument.

This is part of why Casey flipped on you, and it’s part of why I eventually flipped on you. You started off with option #2, but your post about Pie being the big bad man was nothing more than option #4. Pie being a man and you being a woman has nothing to do with who’s mafia and who’s town. It simply isn’t relevant to discussion town is trying to have, so bringing up that red herring/ad hominem combo will make you look scummy. In most cases where option #4 rears its ugly head, it’s because noob scum has been caught and they don’t know what to do at all.

I don’t blame you for playing like a noob; you are one. But please: Recognize the fact that you lost this game based on your poor performance, not sexism from others.

I’m sorry to hear you are quitting mafia. As badly as I just tore into your play this game, I think you have potential to be a good player, and I think your town play is pretty good compared to most noobs. Your scum play needs work, but that’s all the more reason to play more games and hopefully get practice there. If you ever want to return to playing mafia, the door’s always open for you.