*sigh* I just hate RVS. I tried not to muck it up, but I just can’t help myself.

What do we have so far? bler makes a strange slip with the “dead mayor” bit, but then does provide a link to game #1. Fair enough. Kryspyn is trying to draw attention to himself, and wrym obliges with a terrible 3rd vote. Yech. Then dedo makes a weird slip confusing “factions” with “players”, and flub over-reacts. (Reminds me of him following wrym to the ends of the earth, or whatever, last game, lol). Everybody is suspicious, woo hoo! (Believe it or not, based only on these first 50 posts, I do have my first lunatic idea of who a three-man scum team might be, but even I think it best not to be just a liiiitle bit hasty there.)

Then, of course, we have a number of lurkers chipping in with useless posts, and one brand new player yet to post at all, which is usually not a great sign.

I can’t stand it. We have to have more to start with, as the usual Day #1, RVS nit-picking just doesn’t draw out enough. The usual “how many scum are there” conversation doesn’t entice me today, either.

So – the OP gives us next-to-no information about the game setup. I get the vibe that we’re supposed to piece the story together. After all, don’t most of these games start with a murder? Nobody’s dead here. There are no clear flavor delineations between good guys and bad guys. Why are we here? Why are we about to “hang” somebody (let’s go ahead and assume that’s how we roll in here in Grand Oak Gallows)?

So I’m going into my PM.

Yes, yes, I know. My apologies to players like Trent and others who hate that. I’m not at all trying to measure PMs looking for scum clues in the turn of a single word or phrase. I’m not role fishing. I’m not role claiming or not role claiming. I just feel like we have to start SOMEWHERE, and begin pulling reactions out into the open. I think it’s worth it, because reading the OP but then comparing it to my PM, it reads like a puzzle, and it’s actually kind of neat. I like it.

So here’s me: (all paraphrasing, of course) I love this town and love talking about it. I have a somewhat eclectic but harmless hobby. I am aware of a nearby metropolis, and I admire it, but I don’t like it for two very specific reasons.

I find my character to be kind of a neat little mystery. My wife recently bought me a “Twin Peaks” box set, and I’m currently working my way through it, and I catch that kind of vibe from this setup. Small town with a dark secret? lol. I dunno, but that’s the feeling I get. I sound like a character you’d meet in Twin Peaks.

First – I sound pretty conflicted. I like the big city, but hate it too? OK, buddy. Second – if my PM makes a contrast between the small town I live in and love, and a bigger city – how does that make sense that the small town is building a space program, of all things? Is that just random flavor? Is the scum team real-estate developers from the metropolis? Are they going to burn down the saw mill and take over?

So no, good people, don’t role claim, don’t compare micro-words in your PMs… but I think the first step towards winning the game is getting the lay of the land figured out. I felt the exact same way in the milk game. But please don’t just yell “SCUM” at me and sulk, as I’m just not going to have any more patience for that.