Ok, I think I'm relatively caught up on events.
wrt to Neon's focus on Vro still, it's honestly subjective. Neon's approach has, and still, looks like how Neon has acted, with relative variance, in multiple games I've played with her now. Is this dismissive? Yes, because I do not view Vro's posts the same way. After all, it's subjective. Social deduction, with its interactions, are fine and dandy if that's what you want to pursue and use, but it's not an exact science. For example referencing the Jeep Tell as your personal way of finding scum more often than not may seem to work for you, but there's nothing that explicitly indicates scum are more likely than not to vote third on a wagon necessarily.
I won't be combative, strictly, over this because I, obviously, don't have any hard data to put out (I doubt most people do), and I expect Rag to comment appropriately over seeing data indicating anything about what is being said. Suffice to say, you throw people into a game (the larger it is the more anything can happen), and there is no telling why someone will do what they do without being in their mind or, at the least, having an active window into their thought process.
So, that being said, I don't particularly care for Neon's outlook on Vro in terms of "social deduction" to try and catch scum. I'd say there is more stock in the conversations revolving around figuring out who the Kingpin of Crime is wrt to timeframes and whether or not someone is likely to post around the same time or not (and that debate is its own thing no less). I will say that I do like Fred's approach to calling Neon out though over her engagements with people and reasons for some of her "social deductive" posts. That is, given the amount of content flooding out that can be read upon, for Neon to maintain a stance less than favorable to being able to read any one particular post by a player as the game goes on (any post made could be seen as an "opening" post that is ripe with content to interact with and socially deduce) does come off as scummy when taken into account how Neon can normally be (and hide behind that normal persona of hers). Hell, after the Tea Party game, I'd say there is definite merit given Neon actively lied in scummy ways despite her desire to try and appease most parties to the best of her ability (though one above all -- Monster).
wrt to players in the Unknown zone, I haven't the faintest clue what is going on or any rough opinion on it with exception to Tevish and Vro. I believe Storm commented to me about how it was funny that I made a post after people had talked about said situation surrounding Vro with Tevish's disappearance. My own personal experience, from being focused at times, has shown me that people with ulterior motives do distract by making scapegoats of others. I've got no personal reason to believe Vro was behind Tevish's disappearance, nor do I subscribe to any particular school of thought about timeframes for posting since I tend to view forum mafia as a place where people come and go as they please when able. I certainly treat it that way due to, as Storm so eloquently put it, "soul crushing work". Regardless, that's my outlook on Vro insomuch as I don't view him as any more likely to be the Kingpin of Crime than anyone else.
That being said, if the goal of today for most everyone is to come to a consensus on a single person, then something is better than nothing in most cases. I'd personally opt for inactives/people that haven't shown up yet as that allows for corrective measures, due to the arrest feature, should the person come back/be active and be town. This also has the added draw of hitting in a pool that I am always found of looking into when scumhunting as I always believe scum players, in general, will play it safe (powerwolves are the exception for obvious reasons -- lol DK and Cobalt .. they're not players here).
wrt to the Kingpin of Crime's posts, yeah, I would say it's code. The only people that I know of that constantly mess with code, though, is Rag and, by extension, Rubik probably because of Rag. That's strictly off of code though. Rag has never struck me as a player that is performative though. She's always been interested in solving more so than not (as town). As mafia, she's more likely to lurk (and the last SMM showcased that perfectly when she switched, due to death, into mafia and faked a posting restriction of being silenced to avoid talking). Given this, I'd say Rag is unlikely to be the Kingpin of Crime just as much as Rubik is unlikely to be due to being the Daily Bugle. Far more productive to eliminate who isn't as opposed to who is honestly.
As for the content within the posts themselves, idk what to make of it other than yeah, they're definitely reaching out to people. I saw the theory about mafiates being around multiple dons floated around. Would that be more likely as opposed to a single mafia in a game of this size? Again, comparable game would be the last SMM (or even the second one) where there only ever was one mafia along with other threats (I am counting the brainwashed town from the second game as being mafia for all intents and purposes since, ya know, there technically was only one mafia in that game).
I'm more interested in playing with stocks given that I'm slow to react due to rl work days, but it's w/e. That focus won't stop me from participating in the topics at hand though so keeping up shouldn't be a problem other than slogging through multiple posts and spam at times.
