Mafia Debate: Behavioral Analysis On D1

Bossy's entire argument reduces to this: "Town are uninformed, so their actions are baseless and random." There's two problems with that argument. First, town's actions are not "baseless and random" just because they're "uninformed" When I say the town is uninformed, what that means is that the town does not know the alignment of anyone else. The game is a puzzle that they have to solve. They do not know the solution, so they're uninformed. But that doesn't mean everything they do is "baseless" or "random." Town can act with a purpose. They can vote and unvote. They can analyze behaviors. They can analyze responses. They can ask questions. They can lynch. Each of those things are done intentionally, with the ultimate goal of exposing the scum. bossy is simply wrong that town's actions are "baseless and random" because town's "uninformed." Second, the fact that town are uninformed and mafia are informed means town and mafia act differently. So even if bossy's right that town's actions are "baseless and random," that's still a basis for analyzing behavior, because the mafia won't have "baseless and random" actions. The mafia cannot act "randomly" because their votes will reflect an informed perspective. If the town is building up a lynch on town, the mafia KNOWS it's on town. The mafia KNOWS it's a mislynch. The mafia can either support the mislynch or not support the mislynch. Either way, the mafia will ALREADY KNOW whether it's a mislynch. That makes their actions non-random, which means their behavior is DISTINGUISHABLE from town behaviors. Bossy says "scum-sided actions are just as likely to come from town as they are to come from scum." First, that statement is simply untrue. Mafia will act pro-scum more often than town because everything mafia do is pro-scum (or they wouldn't do it), whereas town do things that are pro-town at least some of the time (otherwise they'd never win). Thus, bossy's statement is false on its face. Second, even if town and scum both perform pro-scum actions, they do it with a different intent, and from a different perspective. Mafia do things from an informed perspective, so when they act pro-scum, they do it intentionally, and they know it'll be pro-scum. When town do pro-scum things, they do it unintentionally, from an uninformed perspective, so they don't realize ahead-of-time it'll be pro-scum. That fact alone allows town to distinguish pro-scum behaviors from town and scum. Bossy says "if town tries to read people or do anything but end the DP ASAP, they are liable to being misread as scum." This statement has no impact. Town are always liable to being misread. That doesn't mean they should sit around and do nothing. If they do nothing, the mafia wins. Town MUST do something, and anytime they do something, they're liable to being misread. That's simply not a reason against behavioral analysis. Bossy says "reactions can only be evaluated as reactions to something; some event is needed for there to be legitimate reactions that have motives behind them." I do not disagree. Town and mafia are always reacting to something. They're first reaction begins when they receive their role. Then, when someone posts in the DP, everyone reacts. The reactions continue. Yes, the FIRST vote that someone puts down will probably be random, but that doesn't mean that REACTIONS are random. The reactions themselves are legitimate. Bossy says "if scum are caught because their reads are groundless and they cannot judge the degree of certainty to put behind them, these reads must have less of a rational basis than the reads of town." I think bossy misunderstands how the degree of certainty tell works. Mafia often provide reasons with better reasoning than town's reads. Even so, the mafia can be caught, because often their degree of certainty won't match that reasoning. If the reasoning is really good, but the mafia is uncertain to an unnatural degree, then it suggests that the read itself is fake, even though the reasoning is good. The relevant issue here is whether the degree of certainty matches the reasoning. Whether the reasoning is good or bad, or whether the reasoning is more or less rational, is only relevant for the tell insofar as it helps evaluate the read's degree of certainty. Bossy says "if town cannot give rational reads, then there is no reason for assuming that the certainty they put behind their irrational reads are anything but arbitrary." I'm not sure what bossy's talking about. The degree of certainty will be a product of their reasoning. Townies don't go around calling someone scum unless they have a reason to think that person is scum. Their degree of certainty will reflect the strength or weakness of their reasoning, as well as how much depth their thought process has, plus other situational details and player meta. Behavioral analysis incorporates all these things. Bossy argues that town cannot "justify" their reads because it's based on nothing, I already addressed this argument multiple times, in this round as well as in the previous round. Bossy does a terrible job addressing the actual arguments I made in the prior round. He keeps saying town have no basis for their reads, but as I explained, town and mafia behave differently. The town KNOWS three things: (1) it knows that they have a different win condition than mafia; (2) it knows that mafia cannot treat the game like a puzzle because mafia knows everyone's alignments; and (3) it knows that mafia therefore must fabricate reads. Those three facts -- which the Town knows from the beginning of the game -- are enough to begin analyzing behaviors. They provide a "ground," or a "base," or a "non-random" element, to behavioral analysis. Bossy never addresses that argument. He does not ever explain how the town's KNOWLEDGE is not sufficient to provide a "ground." He simply just states -- without ever substantiating -- that town has no basis for its reads.