God's Imitator

Simply put, there were four types of possible instant death punishments in the game:

The first was when a criminal’s crime was announced. If they confessed, they would suffer instant death punishment, which couldn’t be offset by shelters.

The second was when a criminal chose to appeal but was voted guilty by other players. At this time, not only would the criminal suffer instant death punishment, but other players might also be ’jointly implicated.’

Whether it was players from the same community or players with similar crimes who would be jointly implicated depended on whether the number of players with similar crimes reached 5 people.

The third was against-conscience voting. If too many players failed lie detection at the end of the game, they would also suffer instant death punishment once more.

The fourth was ’final vote.’ At the end of the game, the five field communities had to vote to select one community, with all members suffering instant death punishment.

Except for the instant death punishment from a criminal confessing, which couldn’t be offset by shelters, other instant death punishments could all be offset by shelters.

But any method of offsetting instant death punishment could only take effect once.

Just when everyone thought the rules introduction was finished, the introduction on the big screen continued.

[Because the mechanisms related to criminal judgment are crucial, concerning the life and death of all players, a ’rehearsal’ will be conducted here.][Because it’s a ’rehearsal,’ this time will not produce any ’joint implication,’ but please still regard this criminal’s crime as real.]

[Besides this, everything is the same as the formal mechanism.]

A brief criminal record appeared on the big screen.

[Chen, male, 47 years old.]

[Due to economic dispute, killed a salesperson while wielding a sharp axe.]

[Judgment result: Sentenced to death for intentional homicide, not yet executed.]

[Criminal chooses ’Appeal,’ will have 1 minute for statement.]

Although it was called an appeal, because it was just a rehearsal, nothing happened.

Some players simply used this 1 minute to think about strategies within the game.

[The criminal has finished appealing. Please complete voting within 3 minutes, all players.]

Display screens on each player’s arm showed a countdown, and different options also appeared.

Players operated on their display screens one after another to complete voting.

Time passed second by second. Many players were getting somewhat impatient waiting when the final result finally appeared on the big screen.

[Voting result: Guilty.]

[The criminal will suffer instant death punishment in 10 seconds.]

After players waited another 10 seconds, they considered the standard procedure complete, finishing the rehearsal.

Although somewhat drawn-out, everyone had indeed become thoroughly familiar with the related operations and rules.

Before officially entering the second phase, the thinking time reserved by the game was much more ample than the first phase, so players gathered together again to discuss strategies.

After considering, Li Renshu said, ”Since it’s already determined the second phase has no other rules requiring visa time, let’s exchange for all our gold coins.”

Everyone went to exchange for all their gold coins, then came to the already-purchased plots to view specific methods for building shelters.

Each plot had a sign where corresponding operations could be performed.

When building a shelter, first 1 gold coin needed to be invested for construction, completed before the next round of the game began.

That is to say, plots obtained in this round could only become shelters in the next round.

After construction was completed, an additional ’balance payment’ needed to be paid. After payment was completed, it was considered construction complete.

The situation of paying the balance determined the probability of the shelter offsetting instant death punishment.

If 4 gold coins balance payment was invested, then what was built was a ’normal shelter,’ with a ’90%’ probability of offsetting instant death punishment.

If 1 gold coin balance payment was invested, then what was built was an ’inferior shelter,’ with only a ’50%’ probability of offsetting instant death punishment.

After completion, shelters could be sold in two different ways.

If selling to ’field players,’ then both sides could trade one-on-one, freely set prices, and purchase with gold coins.

If selling to ’audience,’ then operations were performed on the sign to ’list’ a certain shelter with a price, and all audience members could freely purchase.

Audience members couldn’t determine which specific community’s shelter they purchased, and field players also couldn’t determine which specific audience member purchased their shelter but if successfully sold to the audience, the transaction price would be broadcast on the big screen.

Seeing this, Li Renshu couldn’t help but frown slightly.

”The probabilities and selling prices of the two types of shelters don’t quite match up, right?”

Fu Chen didn’t understand what she meant for a moment, ”Where don’t they match?”

Li Renshu explained, ”Although at first glance settings like ’2 gold coins for 50%’ and ’5 gold coins for 90%’ seem reasonable, the problem is that building shelters requires considering not only construction costs, but also the cost of purchasing plots.

”If plot costs are also factored in, the price difference between these two types of shelters isn’t that large.”

She paused slightly and continued:

”From the current situation, Community 15 and us obtained plots at relatively low cost, approximately 4-5 gold coins per plot. While other communities obtained plots at higher cost, approximately 8 or even 10 gold coins per plot.

”Future plot prices will only get higher and higher. We’ll default to calculating at 8 gold coins.

”Then the actual cost of a ’normal shelter’ is 13 gold coins, while the actual cost of an ’inferior shelter’ is 10 gold coins.

”The difference between them fundamentally isn’t 2 gold coins versus 5 gold coins, but 10 gold coins versus 13 gold coins.

”Plots themselves are expensive. Building inferior shelters will similarly consume one plot, and the ’50%’ probability is too low. Although the expected probability of two inferior shelters is decent, in reality there may be relatively large deviations due to luck issues.

”For field players, no matter how you look at it, building normal shelters is more cost-effective.”

After serious consideration, Cao Haichuan said, ”Then there’s only one explanation. These inferior shelters are for selling to ’audience members.’

”The rules mentioned that audience members can’t see shelter details. That is to say, they not only don’t know which community is selling these shelters, but also fundamentally can’t distinguish between normal shelters and inferior shelters.

”This is a loophole deliberately left in the rules.”

Zheng Jie looked at other communities, ”In that case, Community 15 will definitely sell inferior shelters, right?

”Community 12 very likely will too?

”Communities selling inferior shelters can recoup more funds, and will have more advantages when bidding on land later. Under this ebb and flow, the financial gap will only widen.

”But if we sell inferior shelters, we’ll very likely trigger crimes and be jointly implicated...

”Or should we just not sell shelters at all and keep them all for ourselves?”