Anonymous Game Question

[Dolph Shtoss]

I'm in an anonymous game, but one of my antagonists has inadvertently revealed his identity, and more importantly, his intentions, through a forum post. So, since he revealed himself ( I'm 99% sure), can I use that to my advantage? Point it out to other players? Point to the forum thread?

Guidance please ...

[Josey Wales]

Action by a MOD probably depends on the intention and severity of the infraction (not that I think you are asking for this). The rule is "MUST NOT REVEAL UNDER THE PENALTY OF DEATH or WORSE, HAVING YOUR PLAYDIP MEMBERSHIP REVOKED" … but mistakes happen. I revealed involvement in a game in a forum post not realizing I was in an anonymous game (that I had created). Another player came along and posted and now 2 are out in the open. In that case, I created the game, invited all the players so I knew who was in there and everyone who joined knew I was in there. They just didn't know about each other.

I am not a MOD but I would say if it is innocent and not intended to influence the game then let it slide. But if you knowingly out the player and say "Hey, everyone, Josey Wales is Italy and so let's kill him" hoping that there are ant-Josey players that carry a meta-gaming grudge, then I would say you are crossing the line then.

A much more experienced MOD than my quasi-attempt at being one can shed a more accurate light I am sure.

[Jack007]

I'm in an anonymous game, but one of my antagonists has inadvertently revealed his identity, and more importantly, his intentions, through a forum post. So, since he revealed himself ( I'm 99% sure), can I use that to my advantage? Point it out to other players? Point to the forum thread?

Guidance please ...

This matter has been discussed here recently, and it came out, that a player revealing his identity would primarily harm himself and not the other players. Whether that is enough to legitimate to reveal the identity of that player to third party or not, I don't know. Taking the rule literally, it doesn't forbid that, as it says: "Players MUST NOT REVEAL *THEIR* PARTICIPATION in the game." It doesn't say one must not reveal the identity of the others.

Anyway, interested in an official answer to that question.

Jack.

[Josey Wales]

..Taking the rule literally, it doesn't forbid that, as it says: "Players MUST NOT REVEAL *THEIR* PARTICIPATION in the game." It doesn't say one must not reveal the identity of the others.

Jack.

Interesting, so another cheeseball strategy could be that someone could simply say "hey, France just told me that he was <insert name>" or "... you, know, I figured out that England is <insert another name>. What a maroon. Well, I guess we know who we can safely kill." All the while not knowing any such thing. I guess, in this context this would be a valid strategy - maybe not a particularly effective one, but one nonetheless.

[rd45]

OP, you should probably flag the original forum post. A mod will come along & delete or anonymise it eventually. In the meantime, probably best to try to forget that you know, and don't draw other players' attention to it.

The rules say that you can do whatever you want within the game - claim an identity for yourself or anyone else, for whatever reason - because all comms in the game are subject to the usual level of doubt - your claims could be true or false, malicious or helpful, etc. But comms outside the game (e.g. on the forum) are different, because they're reliably traceable to specific users.

[Dolph Shtoss]

I think my original question is being misinterpreted. I have no desire to “out” the person or see them punished for revealing themselves, as I’m sure it was in inadvertent disclosure. The question really is, can I warn others about the plan the player revealed in the forum post, by pointing to the post? Yes, that would reveal his identity to any others who where clued in to the post, but he did that himself to anyone paying attention.

[edmgrim]

I've played in lots of anonymous games where players have, in one form or another, accused other players of being specific people, made (somewhat obtuse)references to other games they are playing (or played in) or done other things that making identification easier.

It would be naive of me to say that it is impossible for me not to be somewhat influenced by such statements to consider prior player histories, I make a pretty strong effort to ignore them. More often than not, in fact, if I am in a position where I am on both sides of the conflict, it will motivate me to ally with the player who was more faithful to the spirit of anonymous games.

[Fatmo]

I think my original question is being misinterpreted. I have no desire to “out” the person or see them punished for revealing themselves, as I’m sure it was in inadvertent disclosure. The question really is, can I warn others about the plan the player revealed in the forum post, by pointing to the post? Yes, that would reveal his identity to any others who where clued in to the post, but he did that himself to anyone paying attention.

Ahh Ok I see what you are saying.

I'd say it's probably not the best idea to use forum posts and point to them in order to gain an advantage in-game. That's also a house rule around here, though I don't have the wording of that rule available at the moment. Granted, it wasn't great that the other player in question might have inadvertently outed him/herself on the forum, but if you start trying to use that to gain leverage in-game, that's just furthering any possible meta-gaming. You don't want to start spiraling down a rabbit hole and potentially the game spirals out of meta-control and three people get booted or whatever. Once games reach a certain level of that kind of stuff, they can be kind of ruined. Sounds to me like this game can still be healthy, so I'd not start bringing forum posts into it, especially with the anon thing.

You might be able to say to others "I'm getting a strong sense/good feeling/spidey tingles that X plans on stabbing Y" or whatever, and try to convince people to buy into your plans based on possible in-game reasons.

[Strategus]

I'm in an anonymous game, but one of my antagonists has inadvertently revealed his identity, and more importantly, his intentions, through a forum post. So, since he revealed himself ( I'm 99% sure), can I use that to my advantage? Point it out to other players? Point to the forum thread?

Guidance please ...

I'm interested in how you could use it to your advantage?

[Fatmo]

I'm in an anonymous game, but one of my antagonists has inadvertently revealed his identity, and more importantly, his intentions, through a forum post. So, since he revealed himself ( I'm 99% sure), can I use that to my advantage? Point it out to other players? Point to the forum thread?

Guidance please ...

I'm interested in how you could use it to your advantage?

Really it shouldn't be too difficult to imagine how you could easily do so. I'm fairly certain I saw the post the OP is talking about, and I can certainly see what he might be thinking and how he might be able to use it for his advantage. I can see how that would be tempting.

But he probably shouldn't. It is against the spirit of the rules regarding separation between forums and actual games. Those rules are there to try to keep games healthy and have every game played on its own. Games should be separate entities. For lots of people, anon games are an extra fail safe to try to avoid the meta-game as much as possible while playing competitive ranked games.