Details of my role:1) I may only use my vigilante power during the night.
2) All you cops out there don't have to waste time or resources on investigating me. I'm a town Sneering Bastard, which means that I show up as
scum to any investigation. Yeah, this looks bad for me, but keep in mind that if I were scum I would prefer to fake claim this AFTER the cop wasted a power use on me.
Detective TimeSakana's claimed power has been
perceived as a very powerful ability. It poses a substantial threat to the side opposite of the one with the power. Seeing this, Sodium offers to kill Sakana immediately after the role claim. I respond by claiming vig, and Sodium nonetheless goes through with the kill in short order. Sakana flips town.
Here's what the story looks like if Sodium is scum:
Sodium sees Sakana claim Governor and knows that he poses a serious threat to the scum. Sakana's been looking fishy all game, and his roleclaim was less than clear, so Sodium seizes this chance to get rid of him. Things probably would have gone smoothly for Sodium even after Sakana flipped town. After all, vigilantes are known for making mistakes.
Except I roleclaimed before Sodium was able to use his vig. Sodium knew he was in deep shit at this point. You see, If I was scum, then I had absolutely no reason to try and interfere with the free kill of a threatening townie. It would have been in my best interests to keep lurking, as no one had their eyes on me at that point. Thus, Sodium reasoned that I would appear very townie after Sakana flipped town. Two town vigilantes in a 12 person game, even a role madness game, seems like a fairly remote possibility to me, if for no other reason than it creates the potential to accelerate the game far too quickly. If I look like town after Sakana's flip, then Sodium naturally looks like scum.
Sodium decides to make the best of a bad situation, and remove the threat to scum before I get a chance to get back from class and use MY vig to kill the scummy vigilante bastard. I suppose it's fortunate that I didn't specify that my vig is a night vig
So Sodium goes through with the kill, and here we are now with Sodium still trying to pass himself off as town. And succeeding, as it seems the train is now on Jam. While Jam hasn't been a paragon of townie, her general inactivity, lack of enthusiasm, and rolling over for death at this point remind me far too much of when she did the exact same things in Himelander as town. The case against Sodium here seems much stronger, much more concrete.
Of course, my theory against Sodium can be attacked from a couple of angles.
Possible Attack #1: Kef-kef, what if Sodium is town? Isn't your theory for Sodium's scumminess circular, since it depends on the assumption that Sodium is scum in the first place?Indeed, that cute story above was written with the assumption that Sodium is scum to begin with. It certainly does make everything fit nicely together, but it doesn't prove anything. However, the Sodium as town story doesn't work out nearly as nicely. Sodium being town means that there are two town vigilantes in a 12 person game. Or it means that Sodium is town and I'm scum, and as scum I tried to interfere with the killing of a threatening townie. Sodium being town means that he rushed to use his vig kill as quickly as possible despite town's best interest of weighing in on the situation and discussing the new circumstances I had brought to the table. Sodium being town just doesn't add up.
Possible Attack #2: But Kef-kef, what if both you and Sodium are scum and this is a masterful Xanatos Gambit carried out with the intent of making you look like a confirmed town?One scum is already dead. Sacrificing another scum for anything seems like a bad trade for me, as there are probably only three scum to begin with in a twelve player game.
Besides kids, Xanatos Gambits don't happen in real life. Brilliance in these sorts of games comes from making the right choice at every critical juncture, rather than from relying on some convoluted plan susceptible to crumbling in the face of the unexpected.
##Vote: Sodium.
Yes, that's a vote. You guys would have to move heaven and earth to get me to change my stance on this. I also don't want to accidentally miss the voting deadline again. I certainly do not recommend that town begins nailing down its votes en masse, but I do believe that this is the right choice for me.