Correspondence

Dear kind visitor,

Welcome to our Wiki page! In this missive, we shall endeavor to explain who we are, how to read us, and perhaps elucidate some of the method behind our madness. We encourage you to take everything hereafter with a grain of salt, as any effort in self-meta, even the most enlightened, is inherently biased. However, we promise you, dear reader, that we will be entirely honest in this document, and shan’t modify it to suit any particular game.

About us/Our identity

We are a long-term, two-headed hydra. The identities of our constituent heads will remain indefinitely hidden. This is not negotiable, and we are taking steps to prevent slipping. Suffice to say that we are dedicated, tenured members of the MafiaScum community in good standing, which List Mods may verify on request. We have agreed on a single condition (at present) wherein we may voluntarily drop the masquerade, but that is unlikely to occur.

Please do not try to engage us on the topic of our identity. You are not entitled to it. We will at best ignore you, and persistence will only make us suspicious that you would rather talk about OOC stuff than relevant game facts. This goes for moderators as well - if you can’t tolerate a well-behaved hydra in your game without needing to know our business, we will respectfully decline to join. Should you manage to guess one or both heads, please have the decency to keep it to yourself. On a case-by-case basis, we may or may not elect to confirm a private inquiry, but we will not entertain wild guessing or those we don’t feel would keep it to themselves.

Our gimmick, and interpreting it

Yes, we are a gimmick account. Please do not confuse this with a joke account - we are playing quite earnestly, and to win. We have simply elected to impose an additional set of rules on ourselves for the fun and challenge of it. We will not be breaking this post restriction in-game under any circumstances.

For each game day, we will select one of about a dozen different forms of correspondence, and write in that style. We will use that style to indirectly discuss the game, often within a framework or narrative justifying the central conceit. For example, our original (and favorite) style is taking on the role of two Victorian-era ladies, discussing the gossip of the village their manors reside in. Within this framework, we will remark about Townreads in a positive and approving manner, and Scumreads in a negative or disapproving manner. While this does impose a bit of interpretation on the observer, we feel it is worth the added effort.

WARNING: We will NOT directly interact with you until post-game. Even then, we choose to use the framework of letter-writing to maintain the distance our personal ruleset requires. We will only ever discuss you in the third person, as from one character to another talking ABOUT you, rather than TO you. As such, insisting on direct answers to questions is futile. We will make every effort to address your concerns in a timely fashion, but it will be in our own manner, and likely oblique.

A final note on style - regardless of who is signing the piece of correspondence, regard it as having come from both of us. This post restriction necessarily lends itself to infrequent but detailed posts, and as such we usually discuss each development before sending it. One of us does not inhabit Henrietta and the other Phillippa, they are merely props in our pretense, masks to be doffed or donned at will.

Sincerely Yours,

Jules Verne and Bram Stoker

PS: More is coming! We would like to put out brief descriptions of various recurring characters and suggestions on how to interact with them, as well as a game record. For now, please be content with this...correspondence.