How to read hydra slot advice?!?

[Frogsterking]

Open request for advice on reading hydra accounts. If I don't get any responses I'll begin solicitations. I'd like to hear takes coming from <rand players all the way to top world professionals, so regardless of whether you're <rand or pro, if you have an opinion on sorting hydras then this is the time and place to share!

[mhsmith0]

If you policy launch then then modbot will read them for you

[KnightsofCydonia]

This is why I always stress the importance of signing your posts in a hydra, whether or not your partner signs theirs as well. Not distinguishing your posts from your other head's posts may seem fine or desirable, but it ends up being a liability in the long run. If you seem to be obfuscating your takes- whether or not it's intentional- you're bound to be wolfread and yeeted.

TL;DR, It's the hydras' job to sort their own heads. Ask them to help their readability by taking that extra step and feel free to hold their feet to the fire if they refuse.

[Jkreind]

Open request for advice on reading hydra accounts. If I don't get any responses I'll begin solicitations. I'd like to hear takes coming from <rand players all the way to top world professionals, so regardless of whether you're <rand or pro, if you have an opinion on sorting hydras then this is the time and place to share!

Hydra with me and you will succeed!

[Jkreind]

This is why I always stress the importance of signing your posts in a hydra, whether or not your partner signs theirs as well. Not distinguishing your posts from your other head's posts may seem fine or desirable, but it ends up being a liability in the long run. If you seem to be obfuscating your takes- whether or not it's intentional- you're bound to be wolfread and yeeted.

TL;DR, It's the hydras' job to sort their own heads. Ask them to help their readability by taking that extra step and feel free to hold their feet to the fire if they refuse.

Good tip, we can do this @Frogsterking

[Frogsterking]

One thing I'm getting from the feedback so far is that hydra's have potential to annoy other players. So..im thinking a good town!hydra is probably going to be focusing on making themselves as easy to sort as possible. Maybe there are some general AI tells because deep down scum!hydra's have in their win condition to be difficult to sort? IDK yet. I am going to start requesting from specific players-- @Achromatic first--who I strongly suspect might have something to share! @Achromatic

Please!

[Jkreind]

@Prince J might have thoughts on this, since he’s a veteran mafia player

[Frogsterking]

I've had some ideas that are probably still a bit half baked and I'm throwing them out here in case they help someone else come up with better ideas. These are general principles that might be helpful for how to cooperate with other townies better while playing as a town!hydra slot:

--Get the discussing reads and co-op scum hunting process completed before posting plays/pushes/reads unless it's very urgent to say something or change a vote for example. This will probably--cough hopefully cough--go a long way toward making town slots less annoyed with your hydra slot.

--Make sure it's really, really obvious which hydra head has written each and every post.

--If you choose gimmick characters for the hydra then don't choose ones that are bad at communicating unless you are willing to break character.

These are ideas I had for how to avoid getting voted out as a hydra primarily lol. My ideas here don't answer the main thing I want to know though, which is how to guess the alignment a hydra slot is going to flip with greater accuracy.

[Frogsterking]

@mhsmith0 and @KnightsofCydonia it was your inputs that jumpstarted 8 for me. I'm curious if those are accurate rules of thumb for the kind of hydra slot you would prefer to play with as town?

[KnightsofCydonia]

Yes, that seems like a good ruleset. A corollary I would add for 1 is if you and your partner can't come to agreement on a read even after a long scumhunting process, point out that you're split on it. Head dissonance is okay, but you can prevent mistaken accusations of contradiction by being explicit about the dissonance.

Also, 3 is a good rule of thumb for gimmick accounts regardless of the setting.

[Alison]

Flowchart for reading hydra slots
1) Force them to sign their posts. If they don't, policy them.
2) Figure out if there's a head in the hydra that's particularly easy to read or polarized. If there is, read that head only and base your read of the entire slot on that head's posts. If not, go to 3).
3) Read each head's posts as though they were written by separate accounts and form individual reads on them. If you read most or all of the heads the same way, read the entire slot that way. (eg. if it's a hydra with 4 heads and you read 3 heads as town, then treat the slot as town.) If you have conflicting reads on the heads, defer to the read on the head you think is easier to read. If they're both equally easy to read, go to 4).
4) Ignore the slot and let someone else sort it for you, or apply heavy pressure tactics, reaction tests, or night actions to forcibly sort the slot. Basically treat the slot as you would treat any singular player that you find impossible to read.