Ep. 1: "We didn't start the fire."

[Reicheru]

Just so I don't forget my smartass episode confessional title. :-)

(Give me a break... it's a quarter past four AM here...)

[Reicheru]

OK, here's a status report. Before the roles were announced, I spoke to everyone bar Leena, Carrie, Imagine and Tyler. I suspect one of the last two is a "ringer" for the first imprisonment, but it's interesting that everyone's actually turned up this time. Makes me kind of nervous too...

After the roles, I've spoken to Judith, Jennipher and Annaleise. All three are strong suspects. Nobody's giving too much away, but then they're not trying to appear too open either. I haven't a clue what they think of me. After two female / one male spies (S1), two male / one female spies (S2), I wouldn't count out the possibility of three females this time. Or three males come to that...

Based purely on profile (and the fact that they're the three right underneath the word "spies" on the board!) my initial picks would probably be Jakub, Anneliese and Shane. Actually I'm inclined to acquit Anneliese simply because I don't think you'd put an actual spy in that position.

I have a tentative alliance with Tenchi and Annaleise. Either could be a spy, but based purely on profile I'd say it's unlikely. (Which is exactly what I said about Gigi, and I didn't suspect her for a second until she and Julian blundered with their votes at Sage's exiling!) IF either one of those two is a spy, I hope I'm smart enough to spot it and get them out. I hope.

The Tenchi thing brings up another interesting point. It hasn't escaped me, and I doubt it's escaped Sam, that there's one element of Spies that has been completely missing until now. Sex! It's well known to any film fan that all spies HAVE to get laid on the job. James Bond did, Austin Powers did - hell, Jason Bourne spent most of "The Bourne identity" wandering about in a post-amnesiac fugue and STILL managed to part the love-curtains of muff with the pork-bellied cyclops. Spies are randy buggers. Hell, Leo, Allison and Tyson ALL were, and none of us got any action (though I'm sure it wasn't for lack of trying, especially at the beginning. We were like three sex-starved rabbits in heat).

But since there's a shy, bespectacled bishounen that's practically made for Reicheru, as I'm sure you thought of Sam! - what an opportunity for some character work right there. I'm really getting a "feel" for Reicheru right now, and she's very unlike either of my previous characters. Where they were positive, Rei is negative. She's hesitant, unconfident, and used to disappearing at the first sign of danger. And right now she's a total fish out of water. I'm glad I left her character open, it's becoming a lot of fun to develop.

And why not develop her in the direction of a romance? Nothing too hentai - after all, "cybering" with (I suspect) some horny male college student playing some horny male video store geek is NOT my idea of a fun night in. But there's definitely potential there, provided we both last long enough to work that way.

Right now we're still at the "fun stage" of the game. We're all having a laugh and getting to know one another. That'll end quickly enough after the first exile but I hope it becomes more Spies 1 than Spies 2 - clinical, not a bitchfest. The good thing is there's nobody I really detest as yet. (No Adrianas!)

I'll go into strategies and spy expectations later on. Tomorrow perhaps, once I've had a chance to meet some more people in their post-role modes. Right now it seems that you have the best cast of any spies game yet, I can't spot a weak link. Which makes it that much harder to spot who's not a spy... I can see this one lasting the full seven rounds easily. I can even see the spies winning for the first time. At least nobody's gonna beat me and Allison's personal best round total - we lasted eight and ten rounds, and there's only seven in the game this time! Unless you have some twist round without eliminations or something, or perhaps new characters... I wouldn't put it past you, Sam.

BTW, I thought the other day of my record... considering how well Tyson did, when I look at it in terms of figures, it's not encouraging. My record of wins against plays is zero for two. Only Karl (Mercedes / Antonio) and Trey (DJ / Tiffany) can match that, and obviously nobody's worse! I really need to get me a win this time, so put in a good word for me with the spies, alright? :-)

[Judge Sam]

Let's keep things PG-13.

Thank you for the status report; I enjoy reading your confessionals. You know that already though haha. I know it's nice to hear it every once in awhile though. Can't wait to see what Spies 3 has in store for you!

[Reicheru]

Like I said, "nothing too hentai". As though the "pork-bellied cyclops" comment wasn't bad enough... You'll have a job keeping this PG-13 though, if it's anything like last year. Let me remind you of:

Allison: "I thought your fantasy was to make love on a zamboni?"

Leo: "Let's be subtle. Hey Adriana, wanna f--k?"

Tyson: "Tyson - 'I think we should enjoy ourselves while we're here. Jacuzzi?' Adriana - 'Aaaaaaaaargh! No thanks, Buster.'"

BTW I realise that I've got a lot more confessionals than convos right now. I'm sorry about this, but don't worry, I've got some free time coming up so I'll be chatting a lot more.

[Reicheru]

OK... I've done this twice before so you know what's coming. I haven't talked to everyone for long enough to do the character stuff yet, but here's the spy stuff. At least one spy in each group unless otherwise noted:

MALE. Arthur, Imagine, Jack, Jakub, Miles, Shane, Tenchi, Tyler
FEMALE. Anneliese, Carrie, Jennipher, Jessica, Judith, Leena
GROUNDED. Arthur, Carrie, Jessica, Judith, Leena, Tenchi
TRANSITORY. Anneliese, Imagine, Jack, Jakub, Jennipher, Miles, Shane
REALISM. Anneliese, Arthur, Carrie, Jennipher, Judith, Miles, Shane, Tyler
FANTASY / ESOTERIC. Imagine, Jack, Jessica, Leena, Tenchi
AGED 26 OR BELOW. Carrie, Jakub, Jessica, Shane, Tenchi, Tyler
AGED 27 OR ABOVE. Anneliese, Arthur, Imagine, Jack, Jennipher, Judith, Leena, Miles
PROFESSIONALS. Anneliese, Arthur, Carrie, Jack, Jennipher, Leena, Shane
EMPLOYED NON-PROFESSIONALS. Jessica, Miles, Tenchi, Tyler
ENTERTAINMENT. Imagine, Jakub, Jennipher, Jessica, Judith, Tyler
LAW ENFORCEMENT / CRIMINAL / MILITARY. Anneliese, Arthur, Jack
FOREIGN. Anneliese, Jack, Jennipher, Leena, Tenchi
TRAGIC. Jack, Jessica, Miles, Tenchi, Tyler

Foreign was a special category in S2 because all three spies were foreigners. It isn't now... in Spies 1, my list was absolutely dead-on, a spy in every group. I hope that this one is the same. There's a couple of new interesting categories. There's a definite theme this time of people who are moving on or just passing through, and those who are stuck in the Burg, hence the "transitory" and "grounded" categories. I'm not so sure about the Law Enforcement category, none of the previous spies have been "professionals" in that sense, so for the moment I don't set as much stock in that one as in the others. Finally, I do think there could be three male or three female spies this time, especially as we've had two spies of one sex and one of the other in both previous spies games. Would you choose three of the same sex though? I don't think so... so for the moment I'm gonna keep the "male" and "female" categories.

So going on the stats, here's the most likely picks.

The smallest category is law enforcement, but I'm ignoring that for the moment. The next smallest are Esoteric, Tragic and Non-Professional. Taking them all:

Jessica, Miles, Tenchi, Tyler
Imagine, Jack, Jessica, Leena, Tenchi
Jack, Jessica, Miles, Tenchi, Tyler

Tenchi and Jessica stand out as being in all three. Tyler, Miles and Jack are in two each. Imagine and Leena only are in just one group, and nobody else gets a look-in. Seems to me that there characters are very similar stats-wise. The most likely suspects there to me are Miles and Jack, followed by Tyler, then Tenchi (who could be playing a very clever game), then Jessica. So let's say the first spy is one of those five.

If it's Miles, he's in the same category as Anneliese and Jennipher three times, Jessica and Judith twice, Leena and Carrie only once. Taking those four, if MIles and Jessica are spies, the third probably fits Foreign, Professional and LE. Anneliese and Jack fit perfectly, Arthur Leena and Jennipher get two out of three. If it's MIles and Judith, we're looking for LE, Professional and young. Shane Anneliese Arthur and Jack get two there. For Miles and Leena, it's young law enforcement - which could be anybody, since nobody fits both! Say Anneliese, Jack, Arthur, Carrie, Jakub, Jessica, Shane, Tenchi and Tyler. For Miles and Carrie, we're looking for esoteric law enforcement. Jack fits best, Anneliese Arthur Imagine Jessica leena and Tenchi get one hit each.

If it's Jack, he hits the same category as Jessica twice, Anneliese five times, Jennipher three times, Leena four times, Judith and Carrie only once. If it's Carrie, that leaves non-pros and entertainment vacant; Tyler and Jessica look like good fits. If it's Judith, a young non-professional is the third spy, so I'd say Jessica, Tenchi or Tyler.

Tyler I would have to do TWICE, once assuming he's grounded, once transitory, which I'm far too lazy to try... so let's do Tenchi. He hits Anneliese once only, but I don't think he'd do an alliance with a fellow spy. He hits Carrie twice, Leena three times, Jessice five times, Jennipher and Judith only once. If it's Tenchi and Carrie, old law entertainment are the categories: the first six oldies (Anneliese, Arthur, Imagine, Jack, Jennipher, Judith) all fit two, nobody fits three. If it's Tenchi and Jennipher, every category except Law Enforcement (Anneliese, Jack and Arthur) is covered. If it's Tenchi and Judith, Anneliese, Arthur, Jack fit all, Carrie Jennipher Leena and Shane fit one.

So let's say that assuming I'm right and one of Tenchi, Miles and Jack is a spy, the most likely combos are stats-wise (ignoring TEnchi-Anneliese combinations):

MILES, JESSICA, ANNELIESE
MILES, JESSICA, JACK
MILES, CARRIE, JACK
JACK, TYLER, JESSICA
JACK, JUDITH, JESSICA
JACK, JUDITH, TENCHI
JACK, JUDITH, TYLER
TENCHI, JENNIPHER, JACK
TENCHI, JENNIPHER, ARTHUR
TENCHI, JUDITH, JACK
TENCHI, JUDITH, ARTHUR.

Jack, Judith and Tenchi appears TWICE... Hmmm...

More later.

[Reicheru]

IT'S HERE!!! I know you've been waiting with baited breath for my character stuff (yeah, right!) and I'm not going to disappoint. This time it's JAPANESE CULTURE that's under the microscope.

ANNELIESE = WASABI. This fiery character might be a bit too hot to handle. I get the oddest feeling that she knows who I am. If so, that means that (1) she was in a previous Spies game, and (2) she's pretty much safe. If you bet me $100 that Anneliese wasn't DC (Adriana / Monica), I might take that bet...

ARTHUR = RICKSHAW. Arthur is straightforward and no-nonsense. He gets from point A to point B with no messing about, hence the weak analogy. I haven't seen too much of him but I like his manner. He could definitely be a spy. And ok, rickshaw's a bit of a stretch, but then how many common Japanese cultural stuff can YOU name?

CARRIE = IKEBANA, or in other words flower-arranging. She seems nice, she hasn't appeared much, she's got a fairly pretty manner. That's all I got, sorry. Damn, some of these are lame...

IMAGINE = NEMO, meaning "nobody", although I liked the fact that you had the "ringer" for the first imprisonment turn up at the first challenge. Had me worried!

JACK = SAMURAI. He'll love that one. Jack, for all he's in our alliance, is in essence a lone warrior I think. He's bold, opinionated, and not afraid to go after someone. If he's a spy he's a bloody good one.

JAKUB = ORIGAMI. He's a blank sheet of paper with nothing on it, and yet he manages to give the impression that he knows a lot more than he's letting on. He said something that makes me think he's also Spies alumni, but he's being very careful not to give anything away. Trey perhaps?

JENNIPHER = HAPKIDO. The martial art of using your enemy's strength to push them off balance. Or, in Jennipher's case, neatly evading all of your questioning without ever changing the subject or giving a straight answer. Talking to her is like talking to Rodney - but see below.

JESSICA = TSUNAMI. I just don't understand how something that starts off that innocently could do that much damage. I mean, there is ABSOLUTELY. NOTHING. TO. HER. AT. ALL. Her profile and her game face are so much eyewash. And yet apparently she's raised the suspicions of several people and got into a couple of fights before the game has even started. She's like a female version of the effect Rodney from Spies 2 had, but without any of his personality.

JUDITH = SUMO. It's great entertainment for a while, but you wouldn't want to be stuck in a narrow lift shaft with it. Next:

LEENA = BUSHIDO. Given how little I've spoken to her, I find her oddly compelling. She's extremely sincere. Somehow she's impressed me, and while it might just be character work, I have a strong idea that she's NOT a spy. What is bushido? Honor. It's rather interesting that she asked me if I'd seen "it" when referring to the imprisonment. Going by Sam's description of how they'd work, I would rather have said "them", since there was supposed to have been several parts, at least unless I'd been in previous spies games...

MILES = SUSHI. Last time I "foodified" the other players, so it's rather ironic that three of them now have foods for their descriptors. Miles, on the face of it, looks as healthy and wholesome as white rice, but I suspect something fishy in there somewhere.

SHANE = TYCOON. He's a successful businessman, so this wasn't exactly hard.

TENCHI = KAWAII! And also MANGA. He's a cartoon, but I like him. He seems as young as the character he plays. He could actually be Ben (Rashma) or Derek (Good Twin and Evil Twin out of Spies 2... damn, I shoulda wrote down some of my nicknames for the characters in confessions after the game! - or even possibly Meaghan, although I don't remember her being this aggressive.

TYLER = HAIKU. Inpenetrable and pointless. Where the hell IS he, anyway?

[Reicheru]

OK, it's just coming up to 6:00AM and I would normally be fast asleep right about now. Fortunately Alex is running the shop as my home is pretty much being totally refurbished, so I only have to be there once or twice a week at the moment. Good for the game, bad for my sleep patterns.

And BTW, I'd like to apologisef or the shortness of my confessionals. I know you want people to put down as much as possible, Sam, can we just say I'm trying?

OK - spy thoughts. (Finally!)

First off, let's take a look at the spies thus far. I'd group 'em into three different groups of "leetness" starting with the group that every single spy chosen by Sam has fallen into. Let's take a look:

1) PASSIVE SHORT-TERM. So far we have Gigi, Julian, Mercedes and Leo in this category. Their idea of fending off suspicion is to create as good a player persona as possible, and that's it. They're often bloody good survivor players. Julian in particular, I've played another game with him (James) and my experience is he does tend to use the same tactics.

These guys simply didn't get that Spies is a game of AGGRESSION. I can't stress this enough. In survivor you only have to outlast; in Spies you have to eliminate. Sitting back and watching the players tear themselves apart is no good because eventually they'll remember that you exist and come after you, and you won't have any defence. Whether you're a citizen or spy, aggression is key to this game. You have to form alliances, fake roles, do anything you can to create a citizen persona.

Also these guys often don't think what a citizen is going to assume. For example, one of Leo's biggest mistakes IMO was to put both me and Allison in the middle of his suspect list - I'd done the exact opposite, in order to shield them both if I got exiled, putting Leo at the top and Allison at the bottom. Me and especially Ally took a lot of heat for that.

There's never been a passive long-term player, cause being passive in this game is NOT thinking long-term. So let's move onto

2) AGGRESSIVE SHORT-TERM. Allison fits into this one, and she was a joy to work with - my only regret is she was under enough suspicion that I couldn't work with her as closely as I'd have liked. She understood that part of being a spy is creating a strong player identity and establishing yourself with the other cits. She got into alliances and identified roles. She made less mistakes than I did, and barring one blind spot and some really bad luck she would have won for sure.

3) AGGRESSIVE LONG-TERM. Here's what I think Ally missed, making one crucial mistake because of it. She always looked to survive a single round and never really thought ahead of that. I'm bloody good at chess because I can think four or five moves ahead easily. Only Tyson was this type of player. In the end I lost because of some bad mistakes that I should've avoided, but I think I played the game about as well as it can be played strategy-wise.


What I hope, because I want to win, is that this is like Spies 1 and we have three spies who basically don't do very much. Will it be like that? Doubt it.If they think so they know nothing about Spies 1 and Spies 2.

The next best scenario is one or two spies from group one, the rest from group two. You have to remember that Allison was already a lot more suspected than I realised when Leo and I chose her as the third spy, so she started with a disadvantage. Bad luck over Trey's investigations just made this worse. In Spies 3, the spies are starting from scratch, and an aggressive spy should be able to survive the early rounds pretty much unsuspected if they're clever. With two aggressive spies, I can see the game going the distance.

The absolute nightmare scenario, though, is three spies from the last group. This lot should cooperate to create multi-layered alliances, interlinked roles in which they can back each other up, and strong citizen personas that make it look like they can't be working together. They'll anticipate what the cits do and tailor their strategies to this. If the spies are this good, then barring a really unlucky investigation they should win.

Since I can't tell at this point who's thinking long-term and who isn't, let's take a look at each player as a possible passive or aggressive spy.

ANNELIESE - is definitely not a passive spy. If she's an aggressive one, which is possible, she stands a good chance of winning. Her role is believable, flexible and imaginative enough to keep the cits wanting her around. I must admit to some SKEPTICISM regarding this but will try not to be too SKEPTICAL unless it looks like she's lying.

ARTHUR, CARRIE and TYLER haven't been around enough to get a read on, but Arthur has some imagination and is willing to get into a role. How this would affect his spy performance I don't know yet.

MILES and JAKUB, especially Jakub, feel Leo-ish to me. Miles' reactions are interesting, he's debating about the number of spies. If he is one, this is a fairly strong play - it's kinda like me telling Adriana last time that Sam had to request my "lottery number" twice, so if anybody else said they chose it, they were probably a spy. It's the kind of little detail that, if you come up witht hem often enough, can be so convincing. My hunch, based on this and Miles' reaction to the role reveal, is that he's genuine.

JESSICA I think is a cit, and I think she genuinely suspects Jack. She's probably played by someone quite young and immature. Her character feels incomplete and she's blundering a bit. I've been wondering about the possibilities of making her my "mouthpiece" for this game (remember when I convinced Gindi to vote Gigi off, and then spoilt it by basically admitting to her that I was responsible for her exile?)

LEENA - my gut says cit, I don't think a spy would say what she said to me. (Also I have a very large gut.) If she's a spy, she's good, but she's not around all that often. We'll see...

JENNIPHER and JUDITH are problems. Jennipher is so unwilling to give out information that I'm inclined to believe that she's a fairly paranoid cit. Judith could be a spy, she's got a fairly good persona, and she's pretty non-committal. My gut says that what she's saying to me came from a citizen. The trouble is, others have told her things and she's repeating them as though they're her own.

JACK is also a big problem. I THINK he genuinely suspects Jessica, but I can't be sure. I also THINK he wouldn't be chosen because of his persona, but again I can't be sure. If he's a spy, he's playing the game hard and he's done the best job of perhaps anybody bar Tenchi.

TENCHI - if he's a spy, i'll be astounded. He comes across as a likeable and enthusiastic kid. He's eager to form alliances and share information. He seems as young as his character is, and I think he's played by a teenager who is sticking as close to himself as possible. Tenchi the spy is VERY aggressive, which is exactly what the three spies should be doing right now (but probably aren't).

SHANE - hardly appeared, but in many ways the most suss of the lot. Would you choose three male small businessmen in a row as your lead spies? i'd like to know more about what he's doing.

Here's my list right now:

JAKUB - Probable spy.
JUDITH - Probable spy.
SHANE - Possible spy.
ARTHUR - Possible spy.
CARRIE - Possible spy.
TYLER - Possible spy.
LEENA - Probable citizen.
JESSICA - Probable citizen.
JENNIPHER - Probable citizen.
JACK - Probable citizen, possible aggressive spy.
MILES - Probable citizen, possible aggressive spy.
TENCHI - Almost certain citizen, possible super-aggressive spy.
ANNELIESE - Almost certain citizen, possible super-aggressive spy.

[Reicheru]

At last, a short confessional!

Judith has just made me a very interesting offer. She wants to work with me and Tenchi to weed out the spies. First of all, I can't see a downside to it. If she's a citizen, she can be of great help to us. If she's a spy, she's less likely to imprison us because we're in her confidence, and I THINK I'll be able to spot it before she can do too much harm.

Another thing - she didn't seem to know about Anneliese. Jack does, but he's not stupid and he's hardly going to tell her about the third partner in the alliance without cautioning her to make damn she we never find out the info came from him. IF they're both spies. It's interesting too that she comes to me with this offer the day after we tell Jack how suspicious we are of her. He knows we're looking for a passive spy. He's in no danger himself, so maybe he wanted to make sure we wouldn't go after his partner?

So either Jack doesn't tell Judith because he's a citizen and doesn't want to give anything away, or he does tell her because they're both spies. So we could have Jack and Judith as spies, Jack as a cit suspecting Judith the spy, both of them as citizens... but could Jack be a spy and Judith a citizen? Interesting question...

[Jakub]

reicheru said:

JAKUB = ORIGAMI. He's a blank sheet of paper with nothing on it, and yet he manages to give the impression that he knows a lot more than he's letting on. He said something that makes me think he's also Spies alumni, but he's being very careful not to give anything away. Trey perhaps?

First Custard, now Origami. I really don't make a big impression on you, do I?

[Jessica]

I think I am enjoying your confessional the most Rei, and I loved how accurate the Tsunami thing was.

[Bebe]

Love it!