dedoporno: One of the safest scum claims is Vanilla, since there is practically no risk (at least this early on) of someone else calling you out on it. If you claim a role you risk the actual role holder to counter claim which may throw a wrench in your plan.
...but which will flush out the real power role. So sometimes it may by good play for scum to claim cop or doctor, to see who conteradicts or counterclaims.
But yes, claiming town vanilla, especially so early and without pressure, doesn't benefit town. Others have already elaborated on this. If the claim is true, it endangers the power roles, because scum knows whom not to NK. But for scum 'vanilla' is a safe claim (apart from WIFOM, which always sets in).
In any case, we do have two early claims and both of them were bad for town. Not a good Day 1 ... but then again which Day 1 is good for town? Of the two claims, mchack's has the feel of a genuine rookie mistake. It might be good acting and good scum play, but for now I am inclined to give him the benefit of doubt. Yog's play, however, still feels like either trolling or scummy or jestery. In any case he hasn't written anything yet, that makes his claim more believable.
flubbucket: Just terrible.
You claim to be cop and 1) claim straight out of the chute 2) claim to have simply missed a player....nope
Vote: yogsloth yogsloth: To be honest, I'm a lot more worried about your life than mine.
Was that a threat to flubbucket? Or just trolling/joking again? Or do you have, for a change, some knowledge to share that lead you to say this? I'm a bit worried for you, Yogs, your play, while being agressive, used to make some kind of sense in the last games. But this time you are different ... even flubbucket makes more sense than you, and that is a bad sign! ;-)