Random's acceptable, though I'd be sad that I'd be about to die and so would most people I know.

It would be better if I got to choose, of course — I'd choose people who were conscious and caring about the environment.

My only experience with wigs was on the low end of the quality spectrum, and gives me the shivers even just thinking of it. Actually, that's not true, I have another experience but that involved me in the wig.

I agree, atak. When mankind is gone, nature will eliminate the idea that intelligence is an evolutionary advantage and go back to producing insects, who are the real rulers of the planet.

Also, 100 million isn't necessarily best. Anywhere from 100 to maybe 500 million would be the sweet spot for the earth, I think, but I could be wrong about the details.

According to this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_population
100mn only gets you back to 500BC.
I'm thinking nearer 1mn might be better.

Intelligence is likely to evolve again, given time. My evidence for this, weak though it is, is that it happened once.

Be back in a bit, sorry.

Yes. But iirc the original wolf only made one post.

interesting read.

Excellent point, but indigenous populations in the Americas were overfishing, overhunting, and setting fire to enormous areas of habitat thousands of years before that, clearly not pursuing the kind of ecological balance for which they are always lauded. You do need a population large enough to ensure genetic variation though. And the pop. will grow so you'll have to periodically cull.

But hey, Bucky only wanted to kill all the Jews.

Am i right that there's greater genetic variation in Africa than there is outside it? Dunno how you'd measure it, but i'm pretty sure you don't need that many to ensure sufficient genetics, especially if you get to pick.

just reread it and don't think your recollection of it was accurate

u didn't want to vote hitch until the very end

in fact, i had to selfvote myself (which i never do) in an effort to get u to lynch hitch the next day

i recommend rereading it as it was a fun read and had lots to it

Do you really think you have the stones to press a button to kill 500 million people?

great well.

also, this is why i tried to do a shortened well in the pub, because i woudent have been able write the long answers that atak is, and because im not that interesting. i did have a few storys that i wanted to tell that i dident get a chance to, but i doubt that most people whould have wanted to hear them.

/talking about myself

atak,

if you could make the perfect ww player, what would he/she consist of?

how would you change my playing style to make me better?

how do you feel about the current run of very large mish-mash games vs smaller vanilla-ish games?

Yes. (also: note that I was talking about killing a few billion)

As I said, I'd hesitate. I'd need to be sure. But fear wouldn't hold me back, at least not forever. Remember, I have contemplated my own death several times, which is a similarly big deal from my perspective. I've stood by the tacks and felt the pressure wave as the engine flew by, ad it wasn't fear that kept me off the tracks, it was just not being sure. And when I was trapped in my kayak under water, my thought wasn't to panic or even to be afraid, it was very calm, slow "I think I'm probably about to die."

I could do it.

I may be recalling badly, it's true. I know I kept waffling at f5 — but I did know that killing someone who was probably a villager was likely to help regardless, because I didn't trust her to help at all and I knew she might gun for me later. It helped clean up the game so I/we could make better decisions.

Anyway, that is my recollection. When I pushed for her lynch I said it was because I thought she was a wolf,, but I was lying — one of the few times I've lied strongly (except about seer stuff) as a villager.

I'm not too concerned about genetic variation in a population that large — this isn't inbred cheetahs we're talking about. So cultural forces, as you cite, would make a big difference in my choice.

I'd also choose, if I could, cultures wherein the people seem to have respect for each other. What good starting over with people who seem doomed to destroy each other again?

lol what culture is that?

Re werewolf games of individual players: please, y'all don't be offended if I can't describe your games off the top of my head. I don't want to be wrong about this, because it's important... and I'll tell you how I know:

The single most important thing to my werewolf "career" was in shortline's well. He put me on his list of new players he thought might turn out to be really good. I think if he hadn't done that I'd have been much more likely simply to think of villagering as a mystery I wouldn't ever solve; with him having said it, I determined to make him right. (This was sometime in the middle of 2008, btw.)

I also decided, then, that I hoped some day to do a well that influenced someone in some way.

I'm not sure there is one, unfortunately. I'm taking suggestions.

I don't love it. The games are more about design; too many are unbalanced, and in even the best-designed of them the power roles are such a huge part of the game that vanillagers justifiably feel left out.

Also, I think people are becoming "experienced" without ever having and to learn actually to play well. That's not awful, but it does mean a whole lot of players aren't as good as they think they are, and don't have terrific opportunities to become better.

However, I do believe that complex games are very important, in part because they keep the potential moderators and game designers interested. Moderating a vanilla game has its charms, but frankly if that were all there were we'd have a lot fewer games.

I also do like force lightning...

yea this is true. there are alot of us.

would you be able to make a similar list, since you are one of the most respected players around right now.

also, you were asked who you enjoy playing with. are there any players that if you see in the sign up thread, you hesitate about signing up with because you just dont like playing with them?

this number isn't that far off from the number that those in control want

... which comment reminds me that I think epi is the once-active player I miss the most.

I have no desire, absolutely none, to be an entrepreneur. I just want to do what I'm good at; in the context of test prep, that's teaching. One thing I really liked about working for TPR, once I got the reputation of being the best, was that I could just walk in and ask which class I was teaching — I didn't have to worry about anything else. I even had my own classroom, which no other teacher had — if I was working, I was in that room (90% of the time), so I could just walk in and ask the studenst which class it was, and we'd be good to go. (I once got a bit int a physics lecture before finding out it was an LSAT class...)

Relatedly, I certainly appreciate money but am willing to sacrifice very little to get it; I think that most people who pursue monetary goals hard are justified in doing so, because the world revolves around money... but I'm proud and happy that I'm not like they are.

I don't know how to avoid harmful oligarchy no matter how many people there are, unfortunately.