Handwriting analasis

[Auckmid]

Last game of mafia I played, something preaty amazing happend. I was framer, and at night, us mafia were chatting away, not thinking much about a spy. Anyway, the next day, suddenly 1 of the townies claims spy and claims that he knows who the GF is, and sure enough he's right, and ends up lynching the GF.

I looked back in the log, and none of us mafia had been so newb that we had said someones name. Curious, I asked the spy how he knew he was mafia (pretending to be a newbish townie). How he'd found out was in a way I never would have expected. He said that he had discovered that the guy was GF because he was the only guy in the entire game which always put a period at the end of every sentence. He saw that the GF always put a period at the end of each sentence, then the next day lynched the guy who always put a period at the end of each sentence!

Anyway, the morale of the story is that, despite Spy's haveing no abilitys, they can end up discovering highly useful information just by seeing the punctuation and capitalization the mafia used. They can do amazing stuff if played right, even vs Pro Mafia!

[Clawtrocity]

You should see how I talk in Mafia Chat.

i mean

u shuld c how eye talk n maf cht

[FalseTruth]

Yeah, whenever I get mafia, I try to mimic what 1 person typed like in the day chat. It works pretty consistently in fooling the spy. Spy always has to remember it works both ways.

I recently played a game when my fellow mafia member typed ¯\_(?)_/¯ in the night chat and then in day chat. Got lynched immediately.

[Auckmid]

Normally, the rule of thumb for non-pub games is that if someone one says something in aunique way during the day, and it is said by mafia during the night, the mafia is trying to trick the spy. If, however, the mafia says something in a unique way during the night, and it is happens again during the day, you can be preaty certain u found a real mafia.

[KnowingCrow]

I have gotten people lynched by mimicking writing styles seen in town.

Recently as Consig I saw someone abbreviate words with periods. "Red is prob. mafia". No period at end of sentence. Immedietly, coming back to mafia chat that night, I stated my findings from the previous nights investigation (Target had knives); "[NAME] is prob. doctor or sk".

The spy then outed himself, got the guy I was mimicking lynched, and was then shot the next day (By Vigi assuming Executioner). The guy who had knives turned out to be the SK, and mafia mopped up after that.

Another time I was the Spy, I pinned the Godfather turn one.

Day 1: Red: lol.

Night 1: [Mafia]: lol.

I didn't act on it yet, because it might have been a clever trick. But the next night they made the mistake of referring to the GF by name. "lol it said "You have sent [NAME] to kill [NAME]" (In context it was rather funny, which is something almost impossible to make up, thus confirming about 99% probability that the guy was the GF). I got him lynched, and he was in fact the GF.



One awesome thing I discover is "What if they were not as stupid as I think? What if they are just brilliant and they did X Y Z?" Usually, they aren't that brilliant. But damn, it gives me so many ideas of how to fool people.

[Rumpel1408]

¯\_(?)_/¯ isn't that special on EU server, almopst every channelplayer uses it, and even some pubs from time to time...

anyway interesting story

[Deolrin]

Well, that's basically the whole idea behind the Spy. :P

[TheJackofSpades]

THIS IS HOW YOU SHOULD TALK IN ANY NIGHT CHAT

[monster]

I was in a game a couple of days ago where a guy says : "monster is mafia, i recognize his writing style". The thing is I was really mafia but had been silent the whole time, and he mistook one of my teammates for me. Then that guy gained so much town cred for lynching me that everyone followed his every word - he then lynched a Jester and a Sheriff cos the other mafia who were still alive imitated their writing styles and the mafia won.

So yeah, writing analysis is a powerful tool but remember that it is never 100% reliable.

[AdmiralCain]

Anyway, the morale of the story is that, despite Spy's haveing no abilitys, they can end up discovering highly useful information just by seeing the punctuation and capitalization the mafia used. They can do amazing stuff if played right, even vs Pro Mafia!

I won several games this way as Spy (caught the mafia member who was the only player to start each sentence with a capital letter, or the only player to end each sentence with a period, or use a lot of smileys, etc.).

It can be tough because even if you figure it out, it can be hard to convince a stupid or paranoid town to lynch with the spy. They may assume that the spy is falling for the mafia's deliberate tricks, and it's hard to explain how exactly you identified the mafia member(s) before lynch countdown runs out.

One game the town was so noob that instead of claiming Spy, I had to fake-claim as invest in order to get the GF lynched as a "leader of men" (because noob town thought that was what GF would show up as, even though immunity was on...). But, it worked at least.