So here goes. I once read that if you're mafia, then your goal is to sit back and have Town annihilate itself, and not be its subject. But if you're its subject, then the scum would want to divert the attention of Town's anger. To put it in practice, if we assume Lift is scum, what are his motivations for taking a hardliner stance on LAL, and enact it on Agent? I'll write as I analyze.

> Page 1 (Posts 1-50):
The game starts off with me voting Lift, because of course, I'm an odd fellow. A couple posts later and he just gets 3 votes, back to two before the page ends. Agent's accursed joke claim is , and right off its heels, comes [url=https://www.gog.com/forum/general/harry_potter_and_gog_mafia_64/post15]Lift saying he outed himself as scum. But it gets better. #28 has Lift reiterate that it's possible Agent outed himself again, and that his joke hides actual scumminess. #32 he responds to me saying until the Pwen, he thought Agent was smart not to do this.

From the get-go and he was pushing this whole "Agent's claim is suspicious" thing, setting it up for the crescendo that would come later. But why? There needs to be 8 votes before a lynch may happen, and he only got two, and three very briefly, so if he were scum who was desperate for a diversion, Page 1 was not the appropriate time. Unless of course he was setting it up so that he can use it later, maybe in hopes of getting Town's anger to fall on him. The only reason I'd see for getting Agent lynched Day 1 is that Agent knows how to breadcrumb (see #63 Supernatural).


> Page 2 (Posts 51-100):
Agent points to his post in the previous ask, jokingly saying "spot the three lies" and that's when Lift gets even grander, and supposedly turning his then RVS vote into a real one because..."you['re trying] to establish lying as valid joke." Now that I've been writing this wall of text, this is getting even iffier. It's like Lift got more ammo for his agenda on Agent.

Hmmm, actually it's the "trying to establish lying as a joke" that's bugging me. I mean yes, the whole joke is about lying, but..."establishing" implies Agent is going to lie AND announce he's brazenly lying again and again, which I don't believe is sustainable Slytherin gameplay. Could work for some WIFOM, but not as something that needs to be "established" for the long-term. It wouldn't fly either, since as RWarehall put succinctly, the intent has to be considered.

Agent's claim is seen as a joke claim because 1. Agent already fell into this mistake in a prior game (the Pwen) and paid dearly for it, and 2. he literally ends it by saying he'll go read the rules. Those same rules allude to the "Watcher of Kalunga" incident. My first post also references the incident, and I wouldn't have done if it wasn't for the rules. This doesn't mean that Agent is definitely not Slytherin, as he might be banking on us thinking that he wouldn't do the same mistake twice, but I've seen little to think he's some cunning WIFOM master Slyth.


> Page 3 (Posts 101-150)
Up until the previous page, I think that a zealous Town Lift is as likely as a Slyth Lift, but this is where he swings towards the latter. My favorite is #103. This is where he frames Agent as either scum, or lying, and therefore deserving of lynch either way, and you've seen how he backtracked when I confronted him. Honestly? Agent doesn't seem that much of a threat to scum OR to town. Up until post #103, he's what I'd call "just there." Not admirable, but not horrendous either. Lift just made a mountain out of a mole hill.


I wanna go to sleep now, so. I've no idea why a scummy Lift would come down on Agent the way he did. He explained the rationale behind it in a much later post, but it didn't do much to tell me about Lift's actual motives. Would it have been different if it was yogsloth or trent being the first to claim Slyth? But even though I can't make sense of scum Lift's chase, his play style so far is scummy: setting up Agent's joke claim as something damning, framing him as either scum or lying and therefore must be lynched, and finally backtracking and only explaining it in better detail much later. Thinking of him as zealous Town doesn't mix well with his IMO scummy actions. THAT'S IT I'M DONE.