You know, despite our best endeavours to spread the voting on Day 1, it is now looking very much (at least from my perspective) like not one vote was cast for a Wolf. And I suspect that the following Days were not much different. Let me explain how I have reached this conclusion.
On Day 1, of 17 votes cast, 14 were for people that we now know to be innocent. That's 82% of the votes on Day 1 for known innocents! The remaining three votes were cast for me and Nilp. Since I am fairly certain of Nilp's innocence, that means that, from where I am standing, not one Wolf was voted for on Day 1.
Day 2 was a bit better. Of 12 votes cast, 6 were for known innocent (50%), or seven from my perspective as one vote was cast for me.
On Day 3, we had a relapse. Of 15 votes cast, 10 were for known innocents (66.6%), or 12 (80%) from my perspective.
Overall, out of a total 44 votes cast over the three days, 30 have been for known innocents. That's 68%. For me, the figure rises to 34 (77%).
Considering that not all of the votes for those whose identity is not yet known will have been for Wolves, it is clear that we do not have a very good strike rate.
So, what does that tell us?
1. While voting patterns are normally of some help in finding Wolves, that is only the case when there are Wolves among those who are in the running and/or when we actually manage to find a Wolf. As matters stand, given our poor strike rate, the voting patterns are about as much use as a post by Formendacil.
(That's unfair - he was actually rather constructive in the latter stages of yesterday. Although the comparison may not be so unfair, as there may be something we can learn from the voting patterns, as I hope to show.)
2. The number of innocents that a person has voted for is, in these circumstances, not a particularly useful guide for determining who might be a Wolf. Four of us have voted for three innocents (mormegil, dancing spawn, Garin and myself). I doubt that any more than one, at most, of these is a Wolf. Shelob, a known innocent, cast both of her votes for innocents. And Cailin, also a known innocent and our esteemed Ranger, cast two of her three votes for innocents. Two other villagers - Formendacil and Kath - have voted two out of three times for innocents. In fact, only two villagers have not voted for a known innocent - Glirdan and Naria. And I (although I alone) know that Glirdan has in fact voted for an innocent twice (with one "no vote").
3. In light of the way that the voting has gone, there has been little need, if any, for Wolves to vote to go out of their way to get an innocent lynched. We have done that for them.
I conclude from this that we should perhaps not be looking at those who have voted on a number of occasions for known innocents. In the circumstances of our past three days' voting, this would have been unnecessarily risky behaviour for the Wolves. It seems to me that they are much more likely to have been placing "safe" votes, since we have given them the opportunity to do just that.
I acknowledge that these musings might be seen as self-serving, given that I have voted for three different known innocents. But I hope that you will see that there may be some merit in them. And perhaps they might actually help us to bag a Wolf today.
More in a bit with my thoughts on individual villagers - for what they may be worth.
