Ruleset 57

Core Rules

Ruleset and Gamestate

This is the Ruleset for BlogNomic; all Candidates shall obey it. Section One consists of the "core rules" of BlogNomic, covering basic proposal mechanics; Section Two contains the rules of the current dynasty; and Section Three contains the glossary, which exists solely to clarify the remainder of the ruleset. Rules may be referred to by their type, entire number and name or type and name. (e.g. This Rule may be referred to as Rule 1.1 Ruleset and Gamestate or the Rule entitled “Ruleset and Gamestate").

The Ruleset and Gamestate can only be altered in manners specified by the Ruleset.

Admins may correct obvious spelling and typographical mistakes in the Ruleset at any time, including replacing Spivak pronouns with the singular "they". A typographical mistake is defined as “A mistake in printing, typesetting, or typing, especially one caused by striking an incorrect key on a keyboard.”

Candidates

Anybody may apply to join BlogNomic (if he is not already playing) by registering at http://blognomic.com via the Register link in the sidebar, and then making a post announcing her arrival. An Admin shall add her to the roster in the sidebar and the GNDT, at which moment he becomes a Candidate.

An Candidate may leave the game at any time by posting an entry to the BlogNomic weblog requesting such an action. A Candidate may only change her name as a result of a proposal approving the change.

Some Candidates are Admins, responsible for updating the site and the Ruleset, and are signified as such in the sidebar. Candidates who wish to become Admins shall sign up with a username for the Ruleset Wiki, and submit a Proposal to make themselves Admins. Existing Admins may be removed from their posts by Proposal, CfJ, or voluntary resignation. New admins shall be given the GNDT configuration password when they become admins.

Some Candidates are Idle, and shall be marked as such in the sidebar. For the purposes of the Ruleset, excluding Rules 1.1, 1.2 and 1.8, Idle Candidates are not counted as Candidates. Admins may render a Candidate Idle if that Candidate has asked to become Idle or if that Candidate has not posted a entry or comment for more than 7 days. Admins may de-Idle a Candidate at her request - the Candidate's personal gamestate retains the values it had immediately prior to her going Idle. If one or more values would be undefined, it is set to the value new Candidates receive, if such a value exists.

A single person may not control more than one Candidates within BlogNomic. If anybody is suspected of controlling more than one Candidate, then a Proposal may be made to remove any number of such Candidate from the game, and to bar the perpetrator from rejoining.

Proposals

Any Candidate may submit a Proposal to change the Ruleset or Gamestate, by posting an entry in the "Proposal" category that describes those changes (unless the Candidate already has 2 Proposals pending, or has already made 3 Proposals that day).

Proposals can either be Pending, Enacted, or Failed. When a Proposal is first put forward, it is considered Pending.

Voting

Any Candidate may cast his Vote on a Pending Proposal by making a comment on that entry using a voting icon of FOR, AGAINST or DEFERENTIAL.

If the Candidatewho made a Proposal has not cast a Vote on it, his Vote is counted as FOR. If a Candidateuses more than one Voting Icon in comments on a Pending Proposal, his Vote is the last voting icon he uses. If a Candidateleaves the game or goes Idle, his Vote is no longer valid. If a Candidate votes against his own proposal, that vote may not be changed. This is referred to as a Self-Kill.

A vote of DEFERENTIAL is a vote of no opinion, or of faith in the decision of the President Thog. The vote will count as the same as the President Thog’s vote. The President Thog cannot cast a vote of DEFERENTIAL. If there is no President Thog, a vote of DEFERENTIAL counts as an explicit vote of abstention.

Enactment

The oldest pending Proposal may be enacted by any Admin (and the Ruleset and/or Gamestate updated to include the specified effects of that Proposal) if either of the following is true:-

• It has a number of FOR votes that exceed or equal Quorum, has been open for voting for at least 12 hours, and has not been vetoed or self-killed.
• It has been open for voting for at least 48 hours, it has more than 1 valid vote, more than half of its votes are FOR, and it has not been vetoed or self-killed.

The oldest pending Proposal may be failed by any Admin, if any of the following are true:-

• It has enough AGAINST votes that it could not be Enacted without one of those votes being changed.
• It has been open for voting for at least 48 hours and half or fewer of its votes are FOR.
• It has been open for voting for at least 48 hours and has fewer than 2 valid votes.
• The Candidate who proposed it has voted AGAINST it.

Whenever an Admin marks a proposal as enacted or failed, he must also mark his name, and report the final tally of votes (or the fact that the proposal was self-killed or vetoed).

Proposals the President Thog has voted to VETO are considered vetoed. Proposals the author has voted against are considered self-killed unless the President Thog has voted VETO on them, or they have fulfilled one of the other requirements to fail a proposal before the author’s self-kill vote is placed.

When President Thog votes to VETO a Proposal, any Admin may fail that Proposal from that moment on, even if it is not the oldest Pending proposal.

Calls for Judgment

If two or more Candidates actively disagree as to the interpretation of the Ruleset, or if a Candidate feels that an aspect of the game needs urgent attention, then any Candidate may raise a Call for Judgment by posting an entry in the "Call for Judgment" category. If the Candidate wishes, he may post anonymously by choosing "Call for Judgment" from the Author drop-down menu on the OPTIONS tab. The post shall go on to describe the issue, and measures that shall be taken to resolve it.

All Candidates may add votes of agreement or disagreement in comments to this entry, using appropriate voting icons (a Candidate's later votes overriding their earlier ones). Unfailed CfJs continue until they reach a quorum of FOR votes, a quorum of AGAINST votes, or if there is no hiatus going on, until four days have passed, and if there is a hiatus going on until two days have passed. After this time, if more than half of the cast votes are in favour, the Gamestate and Ruleset shall be amended as was specified. Otherwise, the CfJ fails. A Failed CfJ has no further effect.

Gamestate Tracking

Proposals, Calls for Judgment, and other official posts, as well as specific gamestate information, shall be tracked by the BlogNomic blog at http://blognomic.com. Any Candidate may post to the blog at any time, but may only make official posts to the blog when the Ruleset allows it. Posts following the format specified by a rule are considered official posts.

If no Candidate has commented on it, an official post may be altered or removed by its author; otherwise this can only be done as allowed by the Ruleset. The Admin processing an official post is allowed to append to the post to reflect its new status. Anything appended to a post in this way must be placed in the Admin field of the post, and the post's Status must changed to reflect its status.

A non-official post may not, through editing of the blog or otherwise, be changed into an official post, with the following exception: Whilst a non-official post has been posted for less than five minutes and has no comments, the author may change the categories as they wish.

Voting and comments are accessible through the link at the bottom of every post.

Specific parts of the Gamestate data shall be tracked by the Generic Nomic Data Tracker at http://blognomic.com/gndt/generic.cgi?nomic=blog. Any Candidate may update any Candidate's data via the GNDT, whenever the Ruleset permits it.

All updates to the GNDT are logged - if a Candidate feels that an alteration goes against the Rules (as they were at the time of the alteration), he may simply undo the effects of that alteration. If such an undoing is disputed, a Call for Judgment shall be raised.

Candidates shall be assigned a password for the GNDT when they join the Nomic.

Dynasties

BlogNomic is divided into a number of Dynasties. Each Dynasty is headed by a single Candidate, known as the President Thog, and is named according to the number of Dynasties he has headed (eg. "The First Dynasty of Myke").

The President Thog may vote to VETO any Proposal.

Metadynasties

Some Dynasties (called Metadynasties) have no President Thog and are named according to the number of Metadynasties of Blognomic (eg. First Metadynasty). Metadynasties may only be started by a successful Proposal, CfJ, or as allowed by another rule.

When a Metadynasty begins, the previous Dynasty ends and all Dynastic rules are repealed. The theme (and appropriate substitution of keywords) may be chosen by any method deemed necessary.

Because there is no President Thog, DEFERENTIAL votes are counted as explicit votes of abstention and no one may VETO a Proposal.

Victory and Ascension

If a Candidate (other than the President Thog) believes that he has achieved victory in the current Dynasty, he may make a post to the Blognomic weblog in the Declaration of Victory category, detailing this.

Upon doing so, the game immediately goes into Hiatus, if it hasn’t already. During this time, the only game actions that may be taken are those covered by Rules “Candidates”, “Calls for Judgment”, “Gamestate Tracking” and “Victory and Ascension”.

Every Candidate may respond to an active DoV saying whether or not he believes the poster has achieved victory in the current Dynasty (using the FOR and AGAINST icons).

The Declaration of Victory may be resolved after 24 hours, or after 12 hours if the President Thog has voted on it. Upon resolution, if a Quorum of Candidates have voted on the DoV and more than half of those votes were in favour, then the DoV passes - otherwise the DoV fails, and if no other DoVs are still pending, the Hiatus ends.

When a DoV passes, all other active DoVs are failed, and a new Dynasty begins with the Candidate who made the DoV as its President Thog. (That Candidate may pass this role to another Candidate at this point, if he wishes.) The Hiatus continues until the new President Thog posts an Ascension Address to the BlogNomic weblog - this shall specify the President Thog’s chosen theme for the new Dynasty, and may optionally include a proclamation that any number of Dynastic Rules will be repealed, and that any keywords will be replaced with new theme-appropriate terms.

A DoV may not be started in the period between a passing DoV and that DoV’s Ascension Address. When a DoV is failed, if it has a number of AGAINST votes that exceed Quorum, the Candidate who posted it cannot make another DoV until after 120 hours (5 days) have passed since the time their DoV was failed.

Dynastic Rules

G-Man

For the purposes of Dynastic Rules and the contents of proposals, the President Thog is not considered a Candidate unless specifically referred to as the President Thog.

Election

Each Candidate has a statistic ‘Supporters’ tracked in the GDNT. A Candidate’s Supporters can be any whole number. The default value for any new Candidate is equal to the ‘Supporters’ of the Candidate with the lowest number of Supporters.

Each Candidate also has a statistic GDNT ‘Endorses’ which is tracked in the GDNT. ‘Endorses’ can be the name of any active Candidate. A candidate is said to Endorse whichever Candidate is listed under their Endorses. If at any time a Candidate is Endorsing anyone other than an active Candidate, that Candidate then is set to Endorse themselves. A Candidate may, as a weekly action, change their Endorse to any active Candidate.

A Candidate’s Total Support is the sum total of the Supporters of all Candidates that Endorse them.

On or after the date 4-10-2008 at 00:00:00 GMT the Candidate with the highest Total Support who is not in debt, provided there are no active debates, has achieved victory.

Campaigning

Any action allowed by a sub-rule of this rule is considered a Campaign Action. Each Candidate has a statistic “Action” which is the date and time (date time) that the last Campaign action was taken by that player. This statistic is tracked in the GDNT and updated any time a Candidate performs a campaign action.

Grass Roots

If a Candidate has not performed a Campaign Action within the last 48 horus, the Candidate may perform a Grass Roots action by commenting “GR 1DICE12” in the GDNT. The candidate then increases their Supporters by the result of the roll and, if they are not endorsing themselves, the Supporters of the Candidate they endorse by one third of the result of the roll, rounded up.

Mud-Slinging

If a Candidate has not performed a Campaign Action within the last 72 horus, the Candidate may perform a Mud-Sling action by commenting “MS NAME 1DICE12” in the GDNT where NAME is the name of any active Candidate. The Candidate then decreases the Supporters of NAME by the result of the roll and their own Supporters by 3.

Fundraising

If a Candidate has not taken a campaign action within the last 12 hours, that candidate may perform a Fundraiser by posting 1DICEX in the GDNT where X is any postive number between 0 and the total number of supporters they have. The Candidate must then increase their money by the result and decrease their supporters by X*.25. Rounded down to the nearest whole number.

Going Abroad

If a candidate has not taken a campaign action within the last 96 hours, the candidate may perform a Going Abroad action by commenting “GA 1DICE2” in the GDNT. The candidate then sets their supporters to X, where X is the result of dividing the number of supporters they have by the outcome of the die roll. The next time this candidate takes/performs an action, they may instead double the amount of money they have and then take/perform the action.

Free T-Shirts

If a Candidate has not performed a Campaign Action within the last 48 hours, the Candidate may perform a give out Free T-Shirts action by paying 15 Money and making a comment of ‘Free T-Shirts!’ at the News Post. If e does, that comment isn’t BS. Then, within a period of 24 hours, any Candidate that endorses the Candidate who performed this action may add 1DICE6 to their own Supporters once.

Money

Each Candidate has an amount of money they have raised which is tracked in the GNDT in a column called “Money (Millions)”. This number may be negative. New Candidates start with 10 money.

If a candidate’s money is negative, they are said to be “In debt”

A Candidate who is not in debt may, as a daily action, donate up to half eir money (rounded down) to the candidate e Endorses. A candidate Donates by decreasing eir money by the amount to be donated and increasing eir Endorse's money by that amount.

Public Image

Whenever a Proposal by a Candidate passes with fewer than two AGAINST votes, the Candidate who proposed it gains one Supporter for every FOR vote on that Proposal. Whenever a Proposal by a Candidate fails with fewer than three FOR votes, the Candidate who proposed it loses one Supporter for every AGAINST vote on that Proposal.

Whenever a Proposal passes, any Candidate who voted FOR on that Proposal may once, within 24 hours, add one Supporter to their own Supporters. Whenever a Proposal fails, any Candidate who voted AGAINST on that Proposal may once, within 24 hours, add one Supporter to their own Supporters.

Debates

Prior to the Election, there are eight debates which occur for candidates to gain support in. Debates are numbered in order of their occurrence, starting at 1 and ending at eight. Debates are either Upcoming, Active or Finished. All Debates start as Upcoming. Each debate has a length, a venue, an issue, a start date and an entry cost. The length of a debate is equal to 30 times the number of the debate. The venue of the debate is equal to number of active candidates at the start of the debate times the five times of the number of the debate. The entry cost is equal to twice the number of the debate. Start dates are as follows: Debate 1: Start Date: 8-8-2008 at 00:00:00 GMT. Debate 2: Start Date: 15-8-2008 at 00:00:00 GMT. Debate 3: Start Date: 23-8-2008 at 00:00:00 GMT. Debate 4: Start Date: 30-8-2008 at 00:00:00 GMT. Debate 5: Start Date: 6-9-2008 at 00:00:00 GMT. Debate 6: Start Date: 13-9-2008 at 00:00:00 GMT. Debate 7: Start Date: 20-9-2008 at 00:00:00 GMT. Debate 8: Start Date: 27-9-2008 at 00:00:00 GMT.

If the current time is after the start date of a debate and the debate is still Upcoming, all debates whose number is less than the debate are Active or Finished, and e did not moderate the debate whose number is one less than the debate in question, a candidate may choose to start a debate by making a post to the blog. Upon doing so, the debate in question becomes Active The post should contain which debate e is moderating and the issue for the debate. The candidate who made the post is considered the moderator of that debate.

Any Candidate wishing to enter the Debate must post a reply to the Debate post with the phrase “I will enter.” E must then pay the moderator the entry cost, in millions of money, of the debate and . The Candidate then must provide the moderator with a response (via PM) containing up to Length number of words, but not exceeding Length. This pm must begin with the word “Debate” so the moderator can recognize it as such a response. The reply and response must both be completed within 72 hours of the Debate post being posted.

After 72 and within 96 hours have passed, the moderator must post a story post with “Debate resolution” in the title. If e does not do so in the allotted time, e must pay each candidate who entered the debate the entry cost in millions of money and the debate becomes finished. If e makes eir post, the body of the Debate resolution must contain the issue for the debate and a complete copy of the text of each valid pm he had received, in no particular order, each with an ascending numeric in front starting with number 1. The numeric associated with each entry is considered to be the numeric of the candidate who wrote that entry. If two candidates send the exact same entry, only the first one is considered to be a valid PM. The copied text should have the first word “Debate” omitted. In no way should the Candidate who created each text be revealed in this post. Any Candidate, even those choosing not to debate, may reply to the Debate resolution only once. In the text of their reply they may choose to enter a single numeric once. They may only choose a numeric in front of a response that was not identical to their own response. After 48 and within 96 hours after the Debate resolution, the moderator must resolves the Debate. If e does not do so in the allotted time, e must pay each candidate who entered the debate twice the entry cost in millions of money and the debate becomes finished. If e resolves it in the allotted time, the number of numeric replies are tallied. Each Candidate receives A / T * V supporters, where A is the number of candidates who voted for eir numeric, T is the number of total candidates for voted for a numeric, and V is the Venue of the debate and the debate becomes finished.

Media Exposure

There exists an stickied story post titled “Blognomic News Channel”, with the text, “Your official source for Blognomic politics.” This story post shall be refered to as the News Post.

As a daily action, a Candidate may post a comment to the News Post, and add 1DICE3 Supporters to the Candidate they endorse. Those comments are known as Blognomic Statements (BS). The content of BS must be somehow related to Blognomic, and cannot be an exact copy of previous BS.

As a daily action, President Thog may post a comment to the News Post, and add or remove 1DICE6 Supporters to the last Candidate that posted BS.

Agendas

There exists a wiki-document called ‘Candidate Agendas’. When a Candidate posts BS, if the date is before 1-10-2008 and that statement starts with ‘When I’m elected,’ all the text after it in that comment becomes added to the ‘Candidate Agendas’ document. This text is known as a BS Promise (or just Good Intentions). Good Intentions within the document shall be grouped by the name of the candidate that made them, and numbered starting from 1 for each Candidate. This rule cannot not be repealed during an Ascension Address. The ‘Candidate Agendas’ document may not be modified in any way other than those included by this rule.

Successful Calls for Judgement are explicitly permitted to modify the ‘Candidate Agendas’ document. A proposal by a Candidate is also permitted to change or remove that Candidate’s Good Intentions; however, if it does so then the proposal’s author gains no Supporters under Rule 2.5 for that proposal.

When a Candidate achieves victory (after hiatus ends), create a new rule called ‘Dynastic Agenda’ with the text, “This rule and its sub-rules may only be repealed through a successful proposal or Call for Judgment”. Under that rule, for each BS Promise listed for the new President Thog, create a new sub-rule named ‘Item N’ where N is the number of the BS Promise, and that BS Promises’ text becomes the new sub-rules text. Afterwards, if a rule called Agendas exist, repeal it.

Landslide Victory

Darknight has achieved victory. No Candidates, other than Darknight, may make Declarations of Victory. When Darknight makes a Declaration of Victory, repeal this rule.

Glossary

This is always at the end of the Ruleset. Its only effect can be to clarify ambiguity.

• It is noted that where a Proposal would amend the effects of Proposal Enactment, this does not apply to its own enactment unless explicitly stated (eg. a proposal proposing that enacted proposals earn their writer a banana when enacted would not earn a banana for its own writer, when enacted).
• Rules which trigger upon the Enactment or Failure of a Proposal are the responsibility of the Admin who Enacts or Fails it.

• Appropriate Icons: For use in voting, a check box http://blognomic.com/images/vote/for.gif shall represent a vote FOR, an X http://blognomic.com/images/vote/against.gif shall represent a vote AGAINST, an IMP http://blognomic.com/images/vote/imperial.gif shall represent a vote of DEFERENTIAL, and an Imperial Seal (currently http://blognomic.com/images/vote/seal.gif) shall represent the Imperial Veto.
• The "subject" of a blog entry is the part of the Title of an entry which is after the first colon. If the Title does not contain a colon, then the whole Title is the subject. Any entry whose subject is "" (i.e. an empty string) is not valid.
• "Posts" and "comments" refer only to those made to the BlogNomic weblog at blognomic.com
• A keyword defined by a rule supersedes the normal English usage of the word. A keyword defined in this glossary supersedes that defined by a rule. (eg. A rule specifying "Bananas are Blue" cannot be overruled by posting a dictionary definition or a photo of a banana, and a rule specifying "every day is Sunday" will be overruled by the glossary entry below.)
• Unless otherwise specified, game variables defined to hold numeric values can hold only non-negative integers, and any action that would set those values below zero instead sets them to zero. Any situation which would require a roll of DiceX when X is zero or lower always yields a value of 0 unless stated otherwise.
• Unless otherwise specified: When "X" is a number, to spend X of a numeric value "V" means to subtract X from V (i.e. replace V with V-X); no action may be taken which requires spending X of a numeric value when the subtraction would result in a number which is illegal as a replacement for that value (e.g. if the value represents a variable which is restricted to non-negative integers, but the subtraction comes up negative).
• Superficial differences between the spelling of geographic versions of English, e.g, British English, American English and Australian English shall be construed as irrelevant for the purposes of play.
• Gamestate is defined as any information which the Ruleset regulates the alteration of, such as Candidates’ names.
• All integers, unless stated otherwise by a rule, are in base 10.

Typographic Conventions

• Italicized text, also known as Flavor Text, is not considered part of any form of gamestate and may be used to clarify proposals or rules with examples, notes, and flavor text. For example, this italicized text provides an example of the use of italicized text.

Timespans

• References to "a day" (as an entity rather than a duration, eg. "Sunday") refer to that day in the timezone of the BlogNomic blog, which is considered to be GMT for all purposes.
• References to a "week" refer to the period of time between the start of a Monday and the end of the following Sunday.
• All references to time must be either specific or defined within the ruleset to be considered achievable in the gamestate. Abstract concepts of time (e.g. "dinnertime", "twilight") cannot be achieved until they fulfil one of these criteria.
• If a game action is a Daily Action, each Candidate able to perform it may take that action once per day, but not more than once every six hours.
• If a game action is a Weekly Action, each Candidate able to perform it may take that action once per week, but not more than once every twenty-four hours.
• Calendar Dates shall be represented in dd/mm/yy (day/month/year) format.

Keywords

• Quorum is equal to half the number of Candidates, rounded down, plus one.
• President Thog
• Candidate

Dice

References to "YDICEX" refer to Y X-sided dice. To roll dice, post DICEX in the comments field of the GNDT, replacing X with the number of sides on the die you wish to roll.

IEEE

• The IEEE auxiliary verbs used in Blognomic are:
  • Is required to: "shall";
  • Is recommended that: "should";
  • Is permitted to: "may";
  • Is able to: "can".