FAQ
General
What is BlogNomic?
It's a Nomic - a game whose rules are changed by the players as the game progresses. Using weblog posts, players submit proposed changes to the game, suggesting whatever they like, and the other players cast votes in comments to that post. If enough vote in favour of a change, we update the rules (which are kept on this wiki page) and carry on playing. Whenever anyone wins the game, we reset the rules, pick a new theme and start again.
For a general overview of how the day-to-day game works, read our New Player Guide.
Can I join in?
Yes, the game is always open to new players. You don't have to wait for a new round to start, you can jump in halfway through the current one.
The blog has had significant issues with spammers in the past so the current sign-up process is a bit manual. The quickest way to join the game is to head to Discord and ask an admin to sign you up. If, for any reason, that isn't possible or desirable for you, you can fill in this form. Either way, we'll then set you up with a blog account, and you'll then be ready to make posts and comments on the blog. The first thing you will need to do is to make a post announcing yourself as a new player.
The wiki requires a separate account from the blog. Instructions on signing up for the wiki can be found here, but you don't have to do that on day one, it can wait until you need it.
Do I need to have my own blog?
No. Players were required to have a blog in the early days of the game back in 2003, but that rule was repealed after a few months. BlogNomic is just a nomic that happens to be run within a blog.
The ruleset seems very daunting - is it always like this?
No, the game restarts periodically. Whenever anyone wins a round (known as a "dynasty"), the ruleset gets cut back to the very basic proposal-making rules, and the winner gets to pick a theme for the next dynasty. Each round lasts about a month, on average.
How much time does the game require to play?
It can vary from dynasty to dynasty, and from player to player. Regular players usually check in at least once a day, but it's possible to play just checking in every few days. The core game broadly assumes that players will check the blog at least once every two days (being the time beyond which proposals "time out" and can enact without reaching quorum), and the Community Guidelines caution against the game running faster than one check-in per day. Generally the game respects less active players - proposals usually only enact if more than half of players are in favour, so if somebody missed the vote then they would have been in a minority even if they objected.
How much time you give to the game depends on what you want to do. If you're just voting on proposals and taking a few game actions, that can be ten minutes a day, either checking in once a day to catch up, or quickly responding to new posts as they appear in the RSS feed. If you want to discuss proposals in detail and write your own, that can take as long as you like.
And each dynasty has its own rules for whatever gameplay is going on, which will reward different levels of activity. Being a Nomic, that aspect of gameplay is naturally as quick or as complex as its players want it to be. If a particular dynasty seems a little too fast-paced, you can always propose to slow it down, to see if any other players agree with you.
How will I know when the next dynasty starts?
Subscribe to whatever of the following works for you:-
- Like us on Facebook and you should see a post for each new dynasty.
- Subscribe to the Ascensions RSS feed and whenever anyone posts an Ascension Address (ie. whenever a new dynasty begins), you'll see it.
How long does each dynasty tend to last?
How do I leave the game?
If the game is looking overwhelming, boring or you just haven't got time to play it right now, you can ask in a comment or post to become "idle" - this will remove you from the game, and let you come back at some point in the future by asking to be unidled. Players idle out automatically if they don't do anything for seven whole days, but if you know you're not going to be playing any more, it's polite to let the other players know, so that the voting mechanisms aren't counting your presence towards quorum.
If you ever want to retire from the game permanently, you can make a formal proposal to that effect (or informally ask someone else to make such a proposal on your behalf). But we won't mind if you just idle out; BlogNomic has had hundreds of "idle" players over the years who left and never came back.
How do I become an in-game admin?
A player who wants to become an admin can just make a proposal to that effect. Players will probably expect you to have played at least one full dynasty, and to have shown that you generally understand how the game of BlogNomic works and how to apply its rules correctly.
Blog
I'm having trouble registering. Help!
If you use Discord, you can join the BlogNomic Discord through the link in the sidebar and say hello.
Otherwise, have a look at the list of users on the BlogNomic front page - pick an admin and try to contact them by some other means (some will have profile links that click through to their web pages) to let them know that there's a problem.
How do I get the blog to recognize my posts as being proposals?
When you're writing or editing the post, select the "Categories" tab and choose the "Proposal" category. Your post will then gain the appropriate formatting and appear in the pending list in the sidebar. You shouldn't type "Proposal:" in front of your subject: the blog software will add it automatically if it is in the correct category.
I forgot to put my post in the proposal category, what can I do?
This is easily done, with the category dropdown being in another tab.
Under the ruleset at the time of writing (August 2025):
- You can edit the post to be in the proposal category, if you notice within 15 minutes ("whilst a non-official post has been posted for less than fifteen minutes and has no voting icons in any of its comments, the author may change the categories as they wish")
- You can ask the Emperor to fix it for you if you notice within six hours ("a post is less than six hours old and appears to the Emperor to have been intended as a Proposal, and if its author does not already have two Proposals pending, then the Yard may move it into the Proposal category")
How do I get the name on my posts to match my BlogNomic name?
Change your screen name in your profile. Click My Account at the top of the page while logged in to edit your profile. Note that once you're a player, you can (at least at the time of writing) only change your name legally via proposal.
How do I get the boxes around text in proposals?
It's a convention at BlogNomic to put quoted rule text in a box, when proposing to amend or enact a new rule. This makes proposals easier to read, and removes any ambiguity about what a proposal means if it talks about "the following text", then goes on to say something else afterwards.
To put a box around text, just type a <blockquote> tag before it, and a </blockquote> tag after it.
Is there a BlogNomic RSS feed?
Yes. There's an Atom feed and an RSS feed. There's also an RSS feed purely of Ascension Addresses, should that be more to your taste. Or another one composed exclusively of comments.
If you're using LiveJournal, you can add the (possibly sporadically functional?) LJ feed to your friends page.
Are there any quirks I should know about?
- Blog timestamps
- Blog posts are timestamped to the time at which you started writing that post: if you click "Make a New Post" at 12:00pm and spend half an hour writing a proposal before submitting it, it will appear on the blog timestamped as 12:00pm rather than 12:30pm. So if you're taking your time over a proposal, it's best to write it in another window or a text editor and to paste it across when posting.
- Alternatively, the timestamp can be manually corrected just before submission, in the "Date" tab (note that it's UTC), or corrected afterwards by any player (within six hours) under a tracking Appendix rule.
- Quick Save
- When you're writing a new blog post, the "Quick Save" option doesn't save your post for future publishing, it posts it for everyone to see. If you're writing any sort of gamestate post (like a proposal or CfJ), you shouldn't use the "Quick Save" button, as it means your half-written version will be posted and reacted to.
- Profile settings
- The "Alert me when a new dynasty begins" profile setting hasn't ever worked.
- Private message outbox
- The Private Message "Sent" folder only stores messages where you've ticked the "Store a copy in the Sent messages folder?" box when sending them.
- Email logging
- There is a config setting ("Log Email Console Messages") that allows email sent through ExpressionEngine to be read by users with admin privileges. This is normally turned off (and dynasties with private communications tend to use Private Messages instead, which aren't logged in the same way), but players should be aware that it could be turned back on. A message on the email box warns that emails may be read by admin, even if the setting is turned off.
- Blog freezing
- The blog will often freeze for a few seconds when a new post is made, presumably because ExpressionEngine is recreating many thousands of past pages to ensure the sidebars are up to date.
Why has my "sticky" post disappeared?
Posts can be marked as "sticky" if a player wants them to remain at the top of the blog, rather than being bumped down by later posts. Strictly speaking from the perspective of ExpressionEngine, though, "sticky" just means "if this would show up on a page, put it at the top" - if your post is more than a week old, it will have dropped off of the front page, and won't show up any more. Non-Official posts can be easily fixed by editing the post and changing the Entry Date field to the current date; Official Posts can, at the time of writing (August 2025), have their Entry Date changed to the time of the current edit, but only if they "need to remain Sticky" and the old entry date is placed in the Commentary field.
How do I delete posts?
To delete your own posts, you can go to https://blognomic.com/update/index.php?/cp/content_edit and tick the box of the post you want to delete, then opt for "Delete selected" at the bottom. Removing official posts (such as proposals) may be against the rules, depending on what the rules are when you're reading this: check Ruleset#Gamestate Tracking. Chances are you're probably fine to delete a non-game post, but shouldn't delete an official post such as a proposal.
(Note that under the current blog settings, admins cannot delete other users' posts, although EE-level superadmins can.)
What does the "arrow" voting icon mean?
The arrow icon, represented as http://blognomic.com/images/vote/arrow.gif, was used in the ruleset of a couple of dynasties in 2009 - it was a supplementary vote that meant "this proposal has good flavour text or theme", and the then-ruleset awarded points for arrowed proposals. Although most dynasties do not use the arrow icon, one or two players still use it as a shorthand for "good flavour". You can use this icon by typing :ARROW: in a comment or post you submit.
What does [unfamiliar phrase] mean?
Some players use terms which aren't explicitly defined by the ruleset, such as "withdrawn" or "CoV". Some of these are explained on the Blognomic Jargon page.
How do I see the times a post was edited?
When editing a blog post, there will be a revisions tab which will declare which players edited a post. These revisions will include (but are not limited to) the initial creation of the post, the later edits during the edit window, and the resolution(s) of the post. Each of these has a timestamp in your local timezone (rather than the default UTC), and are accurate down to the minute.
To view the timestamps down to the second, you'll need to go to your profile's localization settings at https://blognomic.com/member/edit_localization and set Include Seconds in the Time Format to Yes.
Wiki
How do I register to edit the Wiki?
Click the Create account link. To keep spammers out, the registration process asks you for the "wiki signup password" - if you're logged in, this password is visible on every page of the BlogNomic blog, at the bottom of the right-hand sidebar (or at the very bottom of the page, on mobile).
The wiki isn't reflecting changes, what should I do?
- Double-clicking the refresh button should solve your problem (in Mozilla or IE).
- If you are registered and logged on, click on the Preferences link at the top of any page in the Wiki, then select "Misc Settings" and check the box before "Disable page caching". Save your settings.
How do I track changes in the Wiki?
At each page you want to track changes for, click on the watch link, usually on the top of the page. Alternatively, when you edit a page, you can check the Watch this page box, near the Save page button. That will mark that page for tracking.
Afterwards, the my watchlist link will keep track of changes in those specific pages.
How do I create a new page?
The easiest way is to search for your desired page title in the search box - if the page doesn't already exist, the search results will start with an invitation to create such a page. (eg. "Create the page "Hello world" on this wiki!") Click the red link in that text to create the page.
I've updated an image but the thumbnail on a page hasn't changed. What's up?
Try adding &action=purge to the end of the URL (eg. https://wiki.blognomic.com/index.php?title=File:Newganymede.jpg&action=purge) to force a refresh of the cached image.
How do I see the times a page was edited?
Clicking View History at the top of a page will show you all edits that the page has received, down to the minute.
To view the timestamps down to the second, you'll need to change your profile's appearance preference settings at https://wiki.blognomic.com/index.php?title=Special:Preferences in the Date Format section of the Appearance tab.
Note that all timestamps are given in your own local time, as opposed to the UTC time that the rest of the site uses.
Gameplay
How do I... do stuff?
The "game pieces" of BlogNomic are known as gamestate, and the relevant rule is that "For gamestate which is tracked in a specific place (such as a wiki page), any alteration of that gamestate as a result of a Player’s action is (and can only be) applied by editing that data in that place."
If we're tracking your game Money on a wiki page and you want to take an action that's described as "once per week, a player may gain £100", you can just update the wiki page to set your Money to its new value.
Is Nomic a team or solo game?
It can be either. Although nearly all BlogNomic dynasties can only have a single winner, it's up to individual players whether they work alone or team up to get there.
Some of this teaming up is done publicly, with players discussing the game and persuading others to support particular proposals, or take particular actions. This can be done as an exchange of favours, or an agreement to stop a leading player from getting further ahead.
Players can also make plans privately. These may be small temporary deals and persuasions, or bigger plans to work together for a large part of the dynasty, brainstorming strategies in private and perhaps with some pre-agreement (or last minute agreement) on which member of the team will actually get the crown if they're in a position to win. This kind of team play can often be informal but very committed, with players agreeing that they're just generally going to help one of their group win, for the remainder of the dynasty, with no conditions on that.
Some dynasties have a "No Private Communication" rule which requires all discussion to happen in public, precluding private deals. Others have a "Mantle Passing" rule which allow the winner of the dynasty to nominate another player to run the next dynasty; historically this has encouraged secret or public negotiations around kingmaking.
How does dice rolling work?
The BlogNomic Dice Roller allows players to make random die rolls, either because the ruleset requires it, or because they want a random number for some other reason.
If you post a comment there that includes the uppercase word DICE followed by a number (eg. "I roll DICE6 to dodge"), the DICEX string gets permanently replaced with a random roll of a die with that many sides, in your comment (eg. "I roll DICE6:4 to dodge"). To roll multiple dice, put a number in front like 2DICE8 - you can hover over the result with your cursor if you want to check the individual die rolls.
If you want to pick something randomly from a list, include that list in curly braces - eg. {Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday} to select a random weekday.
The dotted border around the roll shows that it's genuine. You can include as many rolls as you like in the comment.
See Ruleset#Random Generators for any limitations on die sizes, and other rollable objects, in the current game ruleset.
I withdrew my proposal. Why is nobody closing it?
Per Rule 1.5.2, only the oldest pending proposal can be closed. Withdrawing a proposal means that it is guaranteed to fail when it is closed, but it still has to wait for the queue to get to it, like all the other proposals.
Why not have withdrawn/vetoed proposals failable immediately?
This has been a contentious issue in the past. Arguments in favour are that it would speed the game up, letting people fix their own ideas quickly or move on to other proposals, and allow new proposals to be made even if the oldest proposal in the queue was holding things up. Arguments against are that it would give players less incentive to proofread their own work, would allow admins to withdraw and repropose more easily than non-admins, and that iterated reproposals of failed ideas would split feedback across multiple posts, making it harder for voters to follow discussions, as well as taking up a lot of space on the blog.
An argument for just fast-failing vetoes is that it would allow the Emperor to return slots to players for the good of the dynasty. In June 2010, a proposal passed which allowed vetoes to be failed immediately if the Emperor included the word "procedural" with their vote. It was repealed five months later, after it was found in practice that players were expecting any failing or withdrawn proposal to get a quick procedural veto, and complaining when they didn't get it.
Do conditional clauses work?
Sort of, but not as fairly as some players expect them to. Players sometimes make proposals with conditional voting subclauses, such as:-
- Dismantle the top seedbed and move all plants in it to the compost heap. If a majority of players who voted on this proposal also made a comment of "BURN", remove those plants from the game instead.
The usual intention is that it's a straw poll for a smaller secondary effect which people may or may not like, and which the proposer wasn't sure whether to include or not - but where it doesn't seem weighty enough to merit an entire follow-up proposal. A conditional clause is a bit like having a secondary proposal, without having to make one.
Mathematically, though, this secondary clause could enact with only a small minority of players being in favour of it. If there are 9 players, the above proposal could be enacted with a quorum of 5 FOR votes - at which point the "majority of players" subclause would only require 3 players to have approved it. So the secondary clause could take effect with only 3 players in favour and 6 opposed.
Tactically, these subclauses are generally accepted for very trivial rule changes, but can risk having their whole proposal voted down for anything larger: players can't be sure what the outcome of the final proposal will be, and will vote according to how they judge the worst case.
(These will function more like secondary proposals if worded as "if a quorum of players also made a comment of...", but in a slow voting group there is a risk of the clause not triggering at all - even if enough players would have wanted it - if the proposal times out or reaches its own quorum before receiving a quorum of subclause comments.)
What issues do the Building Block rules address?
- For more information, see Annotated ruleset#Special Case
- No Private Communication
- Prevents players from communicating privately about the game: all game chat must happen on the blog or in the game's public Discord channel. This is enforced on the honour system, with transgressors owning up if they ever realise that they've shared something they shouldn't have.
- Barring private communication is important in dynasties whose base mechanics wouldn't really work if players were free to share information with allies in secret (eg. the Acronym dynasty where players had to rate each other's acronyms without knowing whose was whose).
- Reinitialisation
- Allows players one "reset" per dynasty, starting over again with default stats as if they were a new player. This encourages players to get involved in a dynasty's gameplay, with less fear of making an early mistake that they can't recover from.
- Virtual Actions
- Gives a solid framework for writing rules which allow players to submit private instructions to the Emperor, which are then processed. They're usually for dynasties where some of the player information is privately tracked by the Emperor. Rules for players interacting with that information can then simply be written as "a player may pick up a secret weapon as a virtual action" without having to define the whole communication process from scratch.
- Low-Player Mode
- Switches off Dormancy. Dormancy is a core rule that pauses the game if participation drops below five players (including the Emperor). The game of Nomic generally needs four players to work.
- It also removes any incentive to try to win a dynasty by encouraging silence and waiting for other players to get bored or idle out. Before Dormancy, quiet dynasties sometimes got quieter and quieter until somebody proposed to end it (with "I win" if they're arguably in the strongest position; "random player wins" or "metadynasty" if not). Dormancy instead encourages players to recruit friends or wake up idle players. In practice, when Dormancy is triggered enough new players join the game within a day or two.
If a player votes before unidling, does that vote count?
At the time of writing, yes. The Votes rule says that:
A Player's Vote on a Votable Matter is the last valid voting icon that they have used in any comment on that Votable Matter.
This means that it's only checking for the presence of icons posted by a person in an earlier comment - it doesn't matter whether that person was a player of the game at the time of posting it. (The same goes for a new player posting vote icons before an admin adds them to the game.)
Why not legislate against admin advantage?
Admin advantage is where an admin player is able to gain some benefit that's not available to non-admins. This is typically where they are the first player to use a new action or scam that's appeared in the ruleset (because they enacted it), the last player to perform some action before it becomes more tightly regulated (because they enacted the regulation), or where they unidle to perform some game-winning action (since they can unidle themselves without tipping off another player that something is about to happen).
There are occasionally proposals to say that admins should have to "play fair" and not abuse this power, but it's been seen as a difficult guideline to follow. Where it puts an admin in a worse position than a regular player (if we say that any player can react first to an enacted rule change, except for the player who enacted it, who must play fair and wait), it also becomes a reason not to be an admin.
Talking to other players
How can I contact other players privately?
If you click on a player's name in the sidebar or at the top of a comment or the bottom of a blog post, you can send them an email (if they have not opted out of receiving email from players), or a "private message" sent through the ExpressionEngine blog system. Some dynasties use the private message system to communicate secrets between players and the Emperor.
Note that it is possible for blog admins to read emails (but not private messages) sent in this way. This option is usually switched off, however.
How can I join the Discord?
Since 2020, some players have been using Discord to discuss the game. An invite can be found at https://discord.gg/J7kP9KuHQK, and non-players are welcome.