Ruleset

Core Rules

Ruleset and Gamestate

This is the Ruleset for BlogNomic; all Souls shall obey it.

The Player named Brendan may freely edit the text of the Ruleset at any time.

It comprises five Sections: 1) the “core rules” of BlogNomic, covering the essential elements of gameplay; 2) the rules of the current Dynasty; 3) rules which apply in special cases; 4) rules which require unanimous consent to modify; and 5) the appendix, which complements and clarifies the Ruleset.

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

If the Ruleset does not properly reflect all legal changes that have been made to it, any Soul may update it to do so.

Souls

The process of applying for access to the BlogNomic blog is outlined in the FAQ. A human with access to the blog who is not already a Soul may make a blog post making clear their wish to be a Soul (plural form Souls); in response, an Admin shall add them to the roster in the sidebar, at which moment they become a Soul.

A Soul may only change their name as a result of a Proposal approving the change.

Some Souls are Admins, responsible for updating the site and the Ruleset, and are signified as such in the sidebar. Souls who wish to become Admins may 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.

Idle Souls

If a Soul is Idle, this is tracked by their name being removed or concealed in the list of currently active Souls in the Sidebar. For the purposes of all Gamestate and the Ruleset, excluding the core and appendix Rules “Ruleset and Gamestate”, “Souls”, “Dynasties”, “Fair Play”, "Mentors" and any of those Rules’ subrules, Idle Souls are not counted as Souls. The combined term “Idle Soul” can be used to refer to Souls who are Idle even in rules that do not treat them as Souls.

If a Proposal contains a provision that targets a specifically named Idle Soul, then that Idle Soul is considered to be Unidle solely for the purposes of enacting that specific provision.

When a Soul is unidled, if they went Idle in the same Dynasty, their personal gamestate retains the last legally endowed values it had, if they are still valid. Otherwise (including if a value is invalid, does not exist, or the Soul Idled in a different Dynasty), the Soul is given the default value for new Souls, if such a value exists.

An Admin may render a Soul Idle if that Soul has asked to become Idle in an entry or comment from the past 96 hours (4 Days), or if that Soul has not posted an entry or comment in the past 168 Hours (7 days). In the latter case, the Admin must announce the idling in a blog post. Admins may render themselves Idle at any time, but should announce it in a post or comment when they do so. An Admin may Unidle a Soul if that Soul is Idle and has asked to become Unidle in an entry or comment from the past 96 hours (4 Days), and Idle Admins may Unidle themselves at any time, unless the Soul who would be Unidled asked to become (or rendered themselves) Idle within the past 96 hours (4 days), and within the current Dynasty.

Admins who are unidling themselves should, in their first vote following each unidling, highlight their changed idle status and any changes to Quorum to have come about as a result of it.

Idle admins can resolve Votable Matters as if they were not idle.

Dynasties

BlogNomic is divided into a number of Dynasties. Each Dynasty may be headed by a single Soul, known as the Dark One. If there is no Dark One, the Dynasty is a Metadynasty.

An Interregnum is the period between dynasties, after a DoV has been enacted and before an Ascension Address has been posted. During an Interregnum the game is in hiatus; additionally, no DoVs may be made, and no Soul may achieve Victory. However, dynastic actions that are specifically permitted to be carried out during an Interregnum may be carried out.

Votable Matters

A Votable Matter is a post which Souls may cast Votes on, such as a Proposal, a Call for Judgement or a Declaration of Victory.

Votes

Each Soul may cast one Vote on a Votable Matter by making a comment to the Official Post that comprises that Votable Matter using a voting icon of FOR, AGAINST, or DEFERENTIAL. Additional voting icons may be permitted in some cases by other rules. A valid Vote is, except when otherwise specified, a Vote of FOR or AGAINST. A Soul’s Vote on a Votable Matter is the last valid voting icon that they have used in any comment on that Votable Matter. Additionally, if the author of a Votable Matter has not used a valid voting icon in a comment to the post, then the author’s Vote is FOR. A non-Soul never has a Vote, even if they were a Soul previously and had cast a valid Vote.

If a Soul other than the Dark One casts a vote of DEFERENTIAL, then the Vote of DEFERENTIAL is an indication of confidence in the Dark One. When the Dark One has a valid Vote other than VETO on a Votable Matter, then all votes of DEFERENTIAL on that Votable Matter are instead considered to be valid and the same as the Dark One’s Vote for the purposes of other rules unless otherwise specified.

A Votable Matter is Popular if any of the following are true:

• It has a number of FOR Votes that exceed or equal Quorum.
• It has been open for voting for at least 48 hours, it has more than 1 valid Vote cast on it, and more valid Votes cast on it are FOR than are AGAINST. Exception: Proposals which would change the text of a Core, Special Case or Appendix rule if enacted cannot be Popular on this basis.

A Votable Matter is Unpopular if any of the following are true:

• The number of Souls who are not voting AGAINST it is less than Quorum.
• It has been open for voting for at least 48 hours and it is not Popular.

Enacting and Failing

Votable matters have a status, which can either be Pending, Enacted, Failed, or Illegal. When a votable matter is first put forward it is considered Pending (which is tracked as having no status in the current blog software), and it remains Pending until it is Resolved.

A votable matter is resolved by an admin setting its status through use of the “status” field in the blog post editing form. When an admin resolves a votable matter they should mark their name, and are highly encouraged to report the final tally of Votes (or the fact that it was withdrawn or vetoed). Comments cannot be made on resolved Votable Matters.

A votable matter may not be resolved except as directed by the ruleset, and the status of a resolved votable matter, once resolved, is determined by the votes cast upon it, as assessed by the rules that govern the specific kind of votable matter (as well as any other considerations regarding the legality of the votable matter, such as the stipulations put forward in the Appendix rule Official Posts). When a Failed proposal has been Vetoed it may optionally have the Vetoed status upon resolution, which is considered to be the same as Failed for the purposes of all other rules.

This rule cannot be overruled by any other rule in its application to Calls for Judgement or Declarations of Victory.

Tags

Votable Matters have zero or more tags. Tags are represented in the title of a Votable Matter with the format “[X]” (e.g. “[Core] Wording Fix”, where “[Core]” is the tag). Votable Matters require the “[Core]” tag in order to make changes to the Core Rules, the “[Special Case]” tag in order to make changes to the Special Case Rules, the “[Appendix]” tag in order to make changes to the Appendix Rules, and the “[Perdurable]” tag in order to make changes to the Perdurable Rules. Votable Matters other than DoVs require the “[Victory]” tag in order to grant victory to a Soul.

If a Votable Matter would make a modification to the rules and it does not have the tag to make that modification, that Votable Matter will still be able to make that specific modification if any of the following on the following list are true:

• The modification is preceded or followed immediately by an unambiguous statement of which section of the ruleset it takes place.
• The modification specifically states a rule using its number or the name of the stated rule only occurs once in the ruleset.

Proposals

Any Soul may submit a Proposal to change the Ruleset or Gamestate, by posting an entry in the “Proposal” category that describes those changes (unless the Soul already has 2 Proposals pending or has already made 3 Proposals that day, though these limits do not apply to the Dark One).

Special Proposal Voting

When a Soul casts a vote AGAINST their own Proposal (which is not in the form of a DEFERENTIAL vote), this renders the Proposal Withdrawn, even if the author later changes their Vote. The Dark One may use VETO as a voting icon to cast a Vote on a Proposal; when the Dark One casts a vote of VETO on a Proposal, this renders the Proposal Vetoed, even if the Dark One later changes their Vote.

Resolution of Proposals

The oldest Pending Proposal may be Enacted by any Admin if all of the following are true:

• It is Popular.
• It has been open for voting for at least 12 hours.
• It has not been Vetoed or Withdrawn.

The oldest Pending Proposal may be Failed by any Admin, if any of the following are true:

• It is Unpopular.
• It has been Vetoed or Withdrawn.

If a Proposal somehow ends up being pending for more than 7 days, it is ignored for the purpose of calculating the oldest pending Proposal, and can be failed by any Admin.

When a Proposal is Enacted, its stated effects are immediately applied in full; the Admin Enacting it shall update the Gamestate and Ruleset, and correct any gamestate-tracking entities, as specified in the Proposal.

Calls for Judgement

If two or more Souls actively disagree as to the interpretation of the Ruleset, or if a Soul feels that an aspect of the game needs urgent attention, then any Soul may raise a Call for Judgement (abbreviated “CfJ”) by posting an entry in the “Call for Judgement” category.

A Pending CfJ may be Enacted by any Admin if all of the following are true:

• It is Popular.

A Pending CfJ may be Failed by any Admin if any of the following are true:

• It is Unpopular.
• It specifies neither changes to the Gamestate or Ruleset nor corrections to any gamestate-tracking entities.

When a CfJ is Enacted, the Admin Enacting it shall update the Gamestate and Ruleset, and correct any gamestate-tracking entities, as specified in the CfJ.

This Rule may not be overruled by Dynastic Rules.

Victory and Ascension

If a Soul (other than the Dark One) believes that they have achieved victory in the current Dynasty, they may make a Declaration of Victory (abbreviated “DoV”) detailing this, by posting an entry in the “Declaration of Victory” category.

Every Soul may cast Votes on that DoV to indicate agreement or disagreement with the proposition that the poster has achieved victory in the current Dynasty. If there is at least one pending DoV, BlogNomic is on Hiatus.

A Pending DoV may be Enacted by any Admin if any of the following are true:

• It is Popular, it has been open for at least 12 hours, and either the Dark One has Voted FOR it or it has no AGAINST Votes.
• It is Popular, and it has been open for at least 24 hours.

A Pending DoV may be Failed by any Admin if any of the following are true:

• It is Unpopular, and it has been open for at least 12 hours.

If a DoV is Failed and it had at least one AGAINST vote, the Soul who posted it cannot make another DoV until after 120 hours (5 days) have passed since the time their DoV was Failed.

When a DoV is Enacted, all other pending DoVs are Failed, the Soul who posted the DoV becomes Dark One, and the game enters an Interregnum. When a DoV is enacted then all game actions that led up to it are considered to be upheld.

If the game is in an Interregnum then the new Dark One must either Pass the Mantle (by making a post naming a Soul who was not the last dynasty’s Dark One, in which case the passing Soul ceases to be the Dark One and the Soul so named becomes the Dark One) or start a new dynasty by completing the following Atomic Action:

• Make an Ascension Address by posting an entry in the “Ascension Address” category. This should specify the Dark One’s chosen theme for the new Dynasty, and it may optionally specify new dynasty-specific terms as outline in the rule "Synonyms", and/or list a number of dynastic rules to keep (if none are specifed then the entire Dynastic Ruleset is repealed).
• Update the Ruleset to reflect any changed terms, and any dynastic rules which were not listed to be kept are repealed.

Once this Atomic Action has been completed the Interregnum ends and the new dynasty begins.

Fair Play

The following are BlogNomic’s rules of fair play. If any of these rules are found to have been broken, or if a Soul’s behaviour or actions are otherwise deemed unacceptable (socially or otherwise), a Proposal or CfJ may be made to reprimand or punish the perpetrator or, in cases of extreme or repeated violations, remove them from the game and bar them from rejoining. Souls should vote against any DoV that relies on having broken a fair play rule.

• A single person should not control more than one non-Idle Soul within BlogNomic, and should announce publicly if they control both a non-Idle Soul and any Idle Souls. This extends to exerting full control over the actions of another Soul, defined here as the controlled Soul’s game behavior being functionally indistinguishable from if the controlling Soul was logged into their account and playing through it, over a period of more than a day.
• A Soul should not “spam” the BlogNomic blog. What counts as spamming is subjective, but would typically include posting more than ten blog entries in a day, more than ten blog comments in a row, or posting a blog entry of more than 1000 words.
• A Soul should not deliberately exploit bugs or unexpected behaviours in the software running the game (ExpressionEngine, MediaWiki or other blognomic.com scripts).
• A Soul should not edit their own blog comments once posted, nor those of any other Soul.
• A Soul should not edit the “Entry Date” field of a blog post.
• A Soul should not make a DoV primarily to delay the game by putting it into Hiatus.
• A Soul should not do any action meant to make the game unplayable (for example, changing multiple keywords to the same word in an Ascension Address).
• A Soul should not roll dice that are clearly associated with a particular action in the Ruleset, but with the intention to not use these rolled values to the best of their ability to resolve that action. A Soul must use their own name in the Dice Roller, when rolling dice.
• A Soul should not deliberately and unreasonably prolong the performance of a game action once they have started it.
• A Soul should not use a Core, Special Case , Perdurable or Appendix rules scam to directly or indirectly cause a Soul to achieve victory.
• A Soul should not trade actions in BlogNomic for favors or compensation outside of BlogNomic, nor trade actions in any other game for favors within BlogNomic.

All Soul and idle Souls should be aware of the BlogNomic Community Guidelines. The contents of this page are not ruletext and are nonbinding as pertains to the ruleset, but Souls are encouraged to commit to upholding them to whatever extent is possible.

Dynastic Rules

Feudal Contract

Each Soul has a Prominence score, which is a non-negative integer that defaults to zero. If there is a Dark One, they should ensure that they confer meaningful advantages to Souls with non-zero Prominence scores.

Feudal Rewards

When a Proposal written by a given Soul is enacted and does not amend any Core, Special Case or Appendix rules, that Soul gains 2 Prominence; the enacting Admin should record this change.

Taxation

If the day of the week is Saturday on the Blognomic time, the Dark One must reduce each Soul’s Prominence by 10% (rounded down) of each Soul’s respective Prominence. The Dark One may only do this once a day.

Mortality and Darkness

Every Soul belongs to either the team Mortals or the team Darkness, by default belonging to the team Mortals; this is publicly tracked. The term “Mortal Soul” is synonymous with “Soul whose team is Mortals.” The term “Dark Soul” is synonymous with “Soul whose team is Darkness.”

Every Soul is either Seen or Unseen, defaulting to Unseen; this is publicly tracked as “Visibility.” If a Soul who is Unseen gains Prominence, that Soul becomes Seen.

If a Soul other than the Dark One is Seen and has zero Prominence, then any player may and should make that Soul Unseen, and when they do so, must simultaneously set that Soul’s team to Mortals (if that Soul was most recently a Dark Soul) or to Darkness (if that Soul was most recently a Mortal Soul).

Dark Wrath

If there are no Mortal Souls, or if there are no Dark Souls other than the Dark One, the Dark One may and should decrease the Prominence of all Souls by 1.

If there are no Seen Souls other than the Dark One, the Dark One may and should increase the Prominence of all Souls by 1.

Dark Regard

If there is one Mortal Soul whose Prominence is greater than that of each other Mortal Soul, that Soul is Bright.

There may be one Dark Soul who is Favored; this is privately tracked by the Dark One. The Dark One may change the Soul who is Favored at any time. The mantle may be passed between the Dark One and the Soul who is Favored, or vice versa, and the prohibition on deals between players in the rule “Mantle Limitations” does not apply to deals between the Dark One and the Soul who is Favored.

The special case rule “No Collaboration” does not apply to communications among Dark Souls or communications among Unseen Souls.

Dark Alliances

A Mortal Soul may not add the name of any Dark Soul to their Alliance, and a Dark Soul may not add the name of any Mortal Soul to their Alliance.

Dimensions

The Dark One has a single Dimension, being one of the past dynasties of BlogNomic, and has Dimension Access to it. The Dark One’s Dimension is privately tracked by them, and defaults to The Seventh Dynasty of Brendan.

If the Dark One’s Dimension is The Seventh Dynasty of Brendan, they may change their Dimension to any valid value.

Gates

Each Soul except the Dark Lord may have a set of Gates, which are publicly tracked, and consist of the distinct names of no more than three Dynasties from among those listed in the “Dynastic history” section of the Main Page of the BlogNomic wiki as of November 28th, 2021. Dynasties named in a Soul’s Gates must be referenced by emperor name (if any) and ordinal designation (such as “The First Dynasty of Myke”, “Myke I” or “The First Metadynasty”). A Soul’s set of Gates defaults to an empty set.

As a Daily Action, a Soul with at least 2 Prominence may pay 1 Prominence to change their own Gates by adding or removing a Dynasty name. A Dynasty name may only be added to a Soul’s Gates in this way if its Stratum is equal to or one greater than the highest Stratum already in that Soul’s Gates. (If a Soul has no names in its Gates, the highest Stratum in its Gates is considered to be zero.)

A Dynasty’s Stratum is equal to the ordinal numeral word in its designation, except for Round One, which has a Stratum of 30.

If a given Soul has a Dynasty name in their Gates, they are considered to have Dimension Access that Dynasty. Any Souls who have the name of that given Soul in their Alliance are considered to have Dimension Access to that Dynasty as well. The Dark One has Dimension Access to any Dynasty named in the Gates of any Dark Soul. If there is a Bright Soul, that Soul has Dimension Access to all Dynasties named in any Mortal Soul’s Gates.

Relics

A Soul may hold zero or more Relics, defaulting to no Relics. A Dark Soul may hold up to one Relic at a time, while a Mortal Soul may hold up to three Relics at a time. The Relics that a Soul is holding, as well as their variables, are publicly tracked. A single Relic may not be held by more than one Soul. A Soul may rearrange the order their held Relics are listed in at any time. Gaining a Relic is synonymous with commencing to hold that Relic.

Each Relic has a Name, which is a string of flavour text that is not also the Name of any other Relic; a Type, which is one of Aegis, Armament, Garb, Tool, or Trinket (defaulting to Trinket); and a House, which is one constellation named in the list at https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Former_constellation&oldid=995862721#List_of_former_constellations that is not also the name of a Soul or idle Soul. Once per day, the Dark Lord may add a rule to the ruleset named after a House. Whenever a new House is named, it's name cannot match the name of any existing rule. Any rule named after a House can do nothing except define a Daily Action that can only be taken by Souls holding that Relic.

If a Soul is holding more Relics than they are permitted to hold (see above), the last Relic listed of the Relics that they are holding becomes Lost.

Lost Relics

A Relic can be Lost or not Lost, defaulting to not Lost. When a Relic becomes Lost, it ceases to be held by any Soul who is holding it; when a Soul commences holding a Lost Relic, that Relic becomes not Lost. Each Lost Relic has a Location, which must be the name of one of the first 99 Dynasties (following the referencing convention set out in the rule Gates); there is a publicly tracked list of all Lost Relics and their Locations, called Obscurity. Whenever a Relic is added to Obscurity, it is added to the top of the list.

Whenever a Soul has Dimension Access to the Sixth Dynasty of Josh they may, as a daily action, Cast a Relic Into The Timestream. Casting a Relic Into The Timestream entails selecting a single Relic that they hold and making it be Lost by adding it to Obscurity, with a Location that is the valid dynasty of their choice.

A Soul may gain a Lost Relic whose location is a Dynasty to which they have Dimension Access as a daily action, provided that doing so does not cause them to exceed the maximum number of Relics they can hold at a given time, as set out in the rule Relics of Power.

Relic Recovery

A Mortal Soul who holds no Relics may create a Relic in their possession by selecting a past dynasty of BlogNomic from those to which they have Dimension Access, and gaining a Relic whose Name is a noun (or an adjective-noun phrase) that appears in the dynastic rules of that dynasty, and whose Type and House are any valid value.

The Dark One may create a Relic in the possession of any Dark Soul who holds no Relics, being a Relic whose Name is a noun (or an adjective-noun phrase) which appears in the dynastic rules of the Dark One’s Dimension or of a Dynasty to which the Dark Lord has Dimension Access, and whose Type and House are any valid value.

The Dark One may change a Relic’s Type to Trinket and make it Lost if:-

• It is an Armament, but its name is not a kind of weapon
• It is a Garb, but its name is not an item that can be worn
• It is a Tool, but its name is not a type of tool

Rulesets of past dynasties are not considered to be gamestate during this dynasty. For the purposes of the current dynasty, the ruleset of a past dynasty is the version of it (if any) that was archived on the wiki for it, at 00:01 on the 28th of November 2021.

The Weakness

The Dark One may have a Weakness, being a noun which exists in the dynastic ruleset of a past dynasty, and which is a kind of weapon or kind of tool. The Dark One privately tracks their own Weakness.

If the Dark One has no Weakness, he may select one by making a Story Post naming the Stratum of the Dynasty whose ruleset this Weakness appears in and the first letter of this Weakness, and updating his Weakness accordingly.

If the Dark One has no Weakness, he may not take dynastic actions outside of this rule, nor pass the mantle.

Event Types

An Event is an official post that meets a type definition in the dynastic rules, the type definition of which includes the following:

• A type name, such as “Auction” or “Quest”. A post with the Event type’s name as a tag is an Event of that type, provided it was (legally) posted while the type had a complete definition.
• A Response Format, the format by which a comment on that type of Event is classified as a Response for that Event. While other comments are allowed on an Event, only those comments which conform to its type’s Response Format are officially considered Responses. Whether or not a comment is currently considered a Response may change according to circumstances, but comments submitted on an Event while it is Ended can never be considered Responses.

An Event type definition may also optionally stipulate:

• Creation Condition(s). Unless they are met, an Event of that type may not be posted. They may include a format for the body of the post.
• Ending Condition(s). Unless they are met, an Open Event of that type may not be Ended.
• Ending Action(s). A Soul must do these when they End an Open Event of that type.

An Event is either Open or Ended, defaulting to Open. Except as otherwise specified, any Soul may post or may End an Event. To End an Event is to make it Ended by submitting a comment on that post saying it is Ended or is being Ended, and then immediately taking its Ending Action(s), if any. Once an Event has been Ended, it may not become Open again, nor may any player End it again.

Luminance

Each Soul has a nonnegative integer amount of Luminance, which is publicly tracked.

Challenges

There exists a list of Challenges, which is publicly tracked, defaulting to an empty list. Each Challenge must have a Dynasty Name, which is flavor text; a Prize, which is the name of a Relic that is not Lost; and a Creator, which is the name of a single Soul.

Heritage Connection

If a Relic is from the same Dynasty as the Dynasty named in a given Challenge, or is from a Dynasty which had the same Emperor as the Dynasty named in that Challenge, then that Relic is considered to have a Heritage Connection to that Challenge.

Dark Tyranny

The Dark One may use VETO as a voting icon to cast a Vote on a Call for Judgment; when the Dark One casts a vote of VETO on a Call for Judgment, this renders the Call for Judgment Vetoed, even if the Dark One later changes their Vote. A Vetoed Call for Judgment is Unpopular and cannot be Popular.

Special Case

Special Case Rules can be Active or Inactive. If the title of a Special Case Rule includes "[X]", where X is either Active or Inactive, then its status is X. Otherwise, its status is its Default Status.

Special Case Rules have a Default Status, which can be Active or Inactive. If the title of a Special Case Rule includes "[Rare]", its Default Status is Inactive, otherwise, its Default Status is Active.

When a new Dynasty is started, the Ascension Address may list any number of existing Special Case Rules to be set to a status other than their respective Default Status. All other Special Case Rules are set to their respective Default Status.

The text of a Special Case Rule that is Inactive is flavour text.

Seasonal Downtime [Active]

On the 24th, 25th and 26th of December, BlogNomic is on Hiatus. In addition, game actions defined by the core rules titled “Souls” and “Victory and Ascension” (with the exception of Voting in DoVs) may not be taken.

Dormancy [Active]

If there are fewer than five Souls, BlogNomic is on Hiatus.

Imperial Deferentials [Inactive]

If the Dark One has voted DEFERENTIAL on a Proposal, that vote is instead considered to be valid and either FOR (if more Souls have a valid FOR vote on that Proposal than have a valid AGAINST vote on it) or AGAINST (in all other cases). However, in either case, votes of DEFERENTIAL made by other Souls on the same Proposal are not considered to be valid.

Dynastic Distance [Inactive]

For the purposes of dynastic rules which do not deal with voting, the Dark One is not a Soul.

Malign Emperors [Active] [Rare]

The Dark One may be recipient of the Mantle, as if they were a Soul, during an Interregnum, as per the rule Victory and Ascension. The Dark One may not cast a vote of VETO on any Proposal whose effect is limited to the dynastic rules or gamestate; any such vote is disregarded for the purposes of proposal resolution.

Dynastic Tracking [Active]

The gamestate tracking page for this dynasty is the The Book of Souls page of the wiki. Unless otherwise stated, all publicly tracked gamestate information is tracked on it. An Dark One may change the wiki page referred to in this rule to a different page as part of their Ascension Address, provided that page did not exist at the time the Ascension Address was posted and does not begin with the word “Ruleset”.

No Collaboration [Active] [Rare]

If “Dynastic Distance” is also active, the Dark One is not considered a Soul for the purposes of this rule.

Souls may not privately communicate with each other about dynastic gameplay or votable matters that affect the dynastic ruleset or gamestate. Private communications are considered to be anything that any other Soul could not reasonably be privy to, perceive, or understand. Discussion conducted in plain English on the BlogNomic wiki and blog, and Discord channels, are not considered to be private communication. Idle Souls (or people who are not yet Souls) also face the same restrictions if they intend to become an active Soul during the course of the dynasty. The use of creative strategies to circumvent this rule may be considered to be a scam for the purposes of determining whether an infraction of Fair Play has taken place.

A mentor and mentee may still privately converse with each other, but should keep their conversations away from discussing specific gameplay strategy.

If information which was not allowed to be discussed is still privately discussed, the Souls who were part of the conversation should make a post to the blog disclosing what information was discussed as their earliest convenience.

Mantle Limitations [Active] [Rare]

The mantle may not be passed. (Players should also not make deals based on being made Emperor of the next dynasty by other means than achieving victory or being passed the mantle.)

Alliances [Active] [Rare]

Each Soul may have an Alliance, which is publicly tracked, and consists of the distinct names of no more than two other Souls; a Soul’s Alliance defaults to an empty set. A Soul may change their Alliance as a daily action.

If "Mantle Limitations" is also active, and if a Soul has achieved victory in this dynasty, has posted a Declaration of Victory which has been enacted, and did not change their Alliance for at least the 48 hours immediately prior to the posting time of their Declaration of Victory: then that Soul may pass the Mantle to a Soul who was named in their Alliance at the posting time of their Declaration of Victory.

If “No Collaboration” is active, it does not apply to communications between players who each have the other’s names in their Alliance, nor does the prohibition on deals in “Mantle Limitations” (if it is active) apply to players who have each other’s names in their Alliance.

Perdurable Rules

Prioritisation

• If two parts of the Ruleset contradict each other, precedence shall be construed in the following order:

1. The Perdurable Rules have precedence over any other Rule;
2. The Appendix has precedence over any other Rule besides the Perdurable Rules;
3. If a Core Rule explicitly says it cannot be overruled by a Dynastic Rule, that Core Rule has precedence over a Dynastic Rule, otherwise a Dynastic Rule has precedence over that Core Rule;
4. If a Special Case Rule explicitly says that it cannot be overruled by a Dynastic Rule, that Special Case Rule has precedence over a Dynastic Rule, otherwise a Dynastic Rule has equal precedence as that Special Case Rule;
5. If two contradicting parts have equal precedence, the part with more limited scope applies (e.g. if the rules “Souls may Kick each other” and “Souls may not Kick each other on Tuesdays” exist, and it is Tuesday, Souls may not Kick each other);
6. If two contradicting parts have the same scope, or have scopes that only overlap where they contradict each other, the negative rule applies (e.g. with “Souls may Punch a Spaceman on Friday” and “Souls may not Punch Spacemen on Friday”, then Souls may not Punch Spacemen on Friday).

Unanimity and Perdurability

A Votable Matter is Unanimous if every Soul has voted on it, and every Soul’s Vote is FOR.

If it is no longer the Eighth Dynasty of Brendan and the player named Brendan is not the Emperor, then any player may repeal this paragraph. If it is the Eighth Dynasty of Brendan and the player named Brendan is the Emperor, then the paragraph immediately following this one is flavour text:

Only the enactment of a Votable Matter can change the text of Perdurable Rules, except as specified in a Perdurable Rule; if a Votable Matter would modify a Perdurable Rule, and that Votable Matter is not Unanimous, then that Votable Matter is not Popular.

Eternal Emperor

If the current date is before January 1, 2022, and it is no longer the Eighth Dynasty of Brendan and the player named Brendan is not the Emperor, then any player may repeal this rule.

If the current date is on or after January 1, 2022, then any player may repeal this paragraph. The paragraph immediately following this one is flavour text:

If the player named Brendan is not Idle, and a player other than the player named Brendan achieves victory, then the victorious player may and must Pass the Mantle to the player named Brendan, and may not Pass the Mantle to any other player.

Imperial Lineage

If the current date is on or after January 1, 2022, and anyone who was a player during the Eighth Dynasty of Brendan is currently a player, then no player may achieve victory unless they were active during the Eighth Dynasty of Brendan, and unless their Visibility game variable for that Dynasty had the value “Seen” at some point during that Dynasty.

Irreparability

If the player named Brendan feels that the Perdurable Rules have caused irreparable issues for BlogNomic, then the player named Brendan may repeal any or all of the Perdurable Rules, and in doing so may restore the previous revision of the rule “Prioritisation” to its place in the Appendix. The player named Brendan may repeal this rule at any time.

Appendix

Keywords

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. (e.g. 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.)

Imperatives

Can

“is able to”

Shall

“is required to”

Should

“is recommended that”

Time

Daily Action

If a game action is a Daily Action, each Soul able to perform it may take that action once each day, but not more than once every ten hours.

Daily Communal Action

A Daily Communal Action is a Daily Action that can only be performed by one Soul per day.

Day

References to a “day” as an entity rather than as a duration (e.g. “Sunday”, “The day after performing this action”, or “August 2nd”), unless otherwise stated, refer to a day beginning at and including 00:00:00 UTC, ending when the next day begins. It can never be 2 different days at the same instant.

Week

References to a week as an entity rather than as a duration (e.g. “At the beginning of each week”, or “already happened this week”), unless otherwise stated, refer to a period of time between the beginning of a Monday and the end of the following Sunday.

Weekly Action

If a game action is a Weekly Action, each Soul able to perform it may take that action once each week, but not more than once every twenty-four hours.

Weekly Communal Action

A Weekly Communal action is a Weekly Action that can only be performed by one Soul per week.

Other

Comment

A blog comment published to the BlogNomic weblog at blognomic.com

Core Proposal

A Proposal which mandates changes that, even if conditionally, are limited to the creation, deletion, and/or amendment of core rules and/or the glossary, and/or renaming, banning, and/or the granting or removing of Admin status from one or more Souls.

Dice

References to “DICEX” or “YDICEX” refer to X-sided dice and Y amount of X-sided dice, rolled using the Dice Roller.

Dynastic Action

An action that is defined in the Dynastic rules.

Dynastic Proposal

A Proposal which mandates changes that, even if conditionally, are limited to the creation, deletion, and/or amendment of dynastic rules and/or gamestate defined by dynastic rules.

Effective Vote Comment (EVC)

A Soul’s Effective Vote Comment with respect to a given Votable Matter is that Soul’s Comment to that Votable Matter, if any, that contains that Soul’s Vote on that Votable Matter.

Commentary

When posting a blog entry, a Soul may use the “Commentary or flavour text” field of the blog publishing form to add their own comments or description of their post. For the purposes of all other rules, such text is not considered to be part of the post.

Discord

The BlogNomic Discord can be accessed at https://discord.gg/J7kP9KuHQK and is also linked to on the sidebar. Souls, as well as people who are not Souls but are interested in learning more about BlogNomic, may join the Discord by clicking the button in the sidebar.

Discord Channel

A Discord Channel is any channel on the BlogNomic Discord in the BlogNomic Discussion category. All Souls who are in the Discord should have the ability to access all of these channels. To reference a Discord Channel, use a hash (#) followed by the name of that channel (e.g. #random).

Flavour Text

If a part of the ruleset or gamestate is defined as being “flavour text”, it retains its context, but is not considered to have any meaning beyond being a string of characters. Souls are not required to obey flavour text and may not perform any action defined by it, and any statements that flavour text makes about gamestate are ignored.

Gamestate

Any information which the Ruleset regulates the alteration of. All wiki pages that the Dynastic Rules explicitly mention (except for dynastic histories and discussion pages) and any images or Templates contained within those Wiki Pages are assumed to be Gamestate.

Hiatus

If BlogNomic is on Hiatus, Dynastic Actions may not be taken (except where the rule defining the action explicitly requires it to be taken during Hiatus), and Proposals may not be submitted or Resolved. If multiple rules require BlogNomic to be on Hiatus at any given time, BlogNomic will continue to be on Hiatus until no rules require it.

Post

A blog post published to the BlogNomic weblog at blognomic.com

Private Message

A message sent via BlogNomic’s Private Messages system at blognomic.com.

Quorum

Quorum of a subset of Souls is half the number of Souls in that subset, rounded down, plus one. If the word Quorum is used without qualifying which subset of Souls it is referring to, it is referring to a Quorum of all Souls.

Resolve/Resolution

If used in a context of a Votable Matter, the word “Resolve” means to perform the act, as an Admin, of enacting, failing, or marking illegal a Votable Matter. The world “Resolution” means then the act of doing so. If used in any other context, the meaning of both “Resolve” and “Resolution” is the standard English meaning of these words. The resolution of a votable matter is tracked by reference to its status in the blog post edit form. If otherwise legally applied, the application of any status through the blog post editing form is sufficient to consider that votable matter to have been correctly resolved, but a resolved votable matter should have the correct status wherever possible; if any admin believes that a resolved votable matter has an incorrect status then they may correct it.

Rule

Each individually numbered section of the Ruleset is a rule, including sections that are subrules of other rules, except that the sections listed as comprising the ruleset in the rule “Ruleset and Gamestate” are considered sections but not rules themselves.

Story Post

A Story Post is an entry in the “Story Post” category.

Subject

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.

Subrule

A subrule is a type of rule that is nested within another rule. A Proposal that specifically affects a rule affects all of its subrules; a Proposal that specifically affects a subrule does not affect its parent rule or any other subrule of that rule, unless they are also explicitly cited as being affected by that Proposal.

Table of Contents

The directory of section headings that is generated by the MediaWiki software for most pages in the wiki.

Uphold

To Uphold an illegal action is to retroactively declare the attempt to take it to have been successful, and to declare that all attempted game actions taken after it were attempted as if the Upheld action had been successful.

Vote

The word “Vote”, used as a noun, means a Vote that is cast in accordance with Rule “Votable Matters”. The word “Vote”, used as a verb, means the act of casting such a Vote.

Voting 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, a DEF http://blognomic.com/images/vote/imperial.gif shall represent a Vote of DEFERENTIAL, and a crossed-out circle http://blognomic.com/images/vote/seal.gif shall represent a vote to VETO.

Wiki

The BlogNomic Wiki at http://wiki.blognomic.com

Gamestate Tracking

Official Posts

Votable Matters and other official posts, as well as specific gamestate information, shall be tracked by the BlogNomic blog at http://blognomic.com. Any Soul 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. Any single official post cannot be of two different types of official post unless a rule explicitly states otherwise. Dynastic rules cannot define posts in the “Call for Judgement” category to be a type of official post other than a Call for Judgement, and this restriction cannot be overridden by dynastic rules.

An official post may only be removed as allowed by the Ruleset. An official post may be altered by its author if it is less than 4 hours old and either no Soul has commented on it or (if it is a Votable Matter) if all comments on it contain no voting icons; otherwise this can only be done as allowed by the Ruleset. However, despite this, official posts can never be changed from one category to another, or changed to be a different sort of official post, if they have been posted for more than fifteen minutes. 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 be changed to reflect its status. An official blog post that has the status of Enacted or Failed cannot change categories, except that a votable matter’s illegal resolution may be overturned. An official blog post’s status may never be altered except in accordance with the rules that define that official post.

A non-official post may not, through editing of the blog or otherwise, be changed into an official post, with the following two exceptions: Firstly, whilst a non-official post has been posted for less than fifteen minutes and has no comments, the author may change the categories as they wish. Secondly, if a post by a New Soul is not in any category but follows the wording of a Proposal, in that it has written changes the gamestate and or Ruleset, and if it has been posted for less than six hours, then any Admin may change it to be in the Proposal category. A New Soul is defined as a Soul who has been a Soul for fewer than seven days or a Soul that has unidled in the past seven days after being idle for at least 3 months.

Any post that is or is made illegal as a result of an infraction against any of the prohibitions set out in this rule, except for a votable matter’s illegal resolution that has been overturned, continues to be an Official Post but may no longer have any effect on the ruleset or the gamestate. If it is a Votable Matter then it is Unpopular, regardless of any other performance against criteria set out in the core rules. When it is resolved it may be marked as Illegal by the resolving admin. A post that is illegal in this manner cannot subsequently be made legal by any means, except for the legal enactment of a CFJ. An illegal CFJ cannot cause itself to become legal.

Representations of the Gamestate

For gamestate which is tracked in a specific place (such as a wiki page), any alteration of that gamestate as a result of a Soul’s action is (and can only be) applied by editing that data in that place. One wiki update may contain one or more alterations, or one alteration may be split over multiple updates, as long as it is clear what is happening and the alterations are otherwise legal. The wiki merely represents the Gamestate tracked there, and is not the same thing. In the event that the Gamestate and its representations are different, any Soul may correct the representations to comply with the Gamestate.

If a Soul feels that a representation of the gamestate (such as a wiki page) does not match the gamestate, they may either:

• Undo the effects of any alteration that led to it, if that alteration did not follow the rules at the time it was made.
• Alter the representation to match what they believe to be the correct application of an incorrectly-applied alteration. This may include completing incomplete actions on behalf of the original Soul, if doing so would not require the correcting Soul to make any decisions on behalf of the original Soul.

Instead of repeatedly reverting and re-reverting a disputed alteration, however, Souls are encouraged to raise a Call for Judgement.

The historical fact of the occurrence of a defined game action is itself considered to be gamestate, tracked in the history of whatever resource is used to track the gamestate modified by that action, where possible, or in the wiki page Gamestate Modifications if this is not possible.

Orphan Variables

An Orphan Variable is a dynastic gamestate variable which has neither a location in which it’s tracked, nor a reasonable manner in which it can be determined from other gamestate variables, specified in the Ruleset.

A Soul may not take any dynastic actions that are contingent on the specific value of an Orphan Variable.

Random Generators

The Dice Roller at https://blognomic.com/dice/roll.php can be used to generate random results.

• The DICEN command can be used to generate a random number between 1 and N.
• The FRUIT command will return a random result from the following options: Lemon, Orange, Kiwi, Grape, Cherry, Tangelo.
• The COLOUR (or COLOR) command will return a random result from the following: White, Red, Green, Silver, Yellow, Turquoise, Magenta, Orange, Purple, Black.
• The CARD command will return a card with a random suit (either Hearts, Diamonds, Spades or Clubs) and a random value (either Ace, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, Jack, Queen, King). A card with a value that is either Jack, Queen or King is a face card.
• A list of comma-separated values in curly brackets (eg {x,y}) will return one of the values at random.

Any changes to the potential outcomes of the Dice Roller’s random result commands must be made by Votable Matter.

If a Votable Matter proposes a change to this rule that would require server-level access to the BlogNomic site to fully enact its effects, that Votable Matter must name a Soul with such access. Only a Soul with such access may Enact that Votable Matter. If that Votable Matter does not name a Soul with such access, that Votable Matter is Illegal.

If a number or other game variable is selected “at random” or “randomly” from a range of possible values, its value shall always be taken from a uniform probability distribution over the entire range of possible values, unless otherwise specified. This value must be determined by an appropriate roll in the Dice Roller, unless otherwise specified, and which value the roll result corresponds to must be reasonably inferable from the nature of the roll and any comments supplied by the Soul making the roll before or while making the roll. If a selection is explicitly specified as being “secretly” random, the Soul making this determination may do so using a private method of their choosing, instead of the Dice Roller.

Atomic Actions

An Atomic Action combines otherwise separate game actions into a single action.

• All steps of an Atomic Action are considered one action, including the steps of an Atomic Action that is itself a step of a parent Atomic Action.
• When a Soul performs an Atomic Action, they must complete all its steps; they must complete them in order; and they may not take any other dynastic action, or achieve victory, until all the steps are complete.
• If a rule allows the Soul performing an Atomic Action to skip some of its steps, the skipped steps are considered to have been completed.
• If a Soul arrives at a step in an Atomic Action and they cannot perform that step, they undo all the steps they have performed of that Action and are considered never to have performed that Action.
• If one or more steps of an Atomic Action were done incorrectly, the Soul must redo the Atomic Action; for that purpose, the Soul uses any legal steps that have already been completed in the illegal Atomic Action and only redoes the illegal ones. (For example, if an Atomic Action consists of rolling a dice and then doing steps based upon its result, the Soul would have to reroll the dice only if they rolled the wrong one in the first place, and would then have to repeat any steps that depended upon the result of that dice; however, if they rolled the dice correctly but took an illegal step later on, the result of the original dice roll would still be used in the redone step.)
• For the purposes of determining the ordering or legality of game actions, the time of an Atomic Action shall be the time that it is completed. For Atomic Actions that are redone, the time of completion is the last redone step.

Clarifications

Numbers and Variables

• If a set of valid values is not specified in their definition, game variables defined to hold numeric values can hold only non-negative integers. Any action that would set those values below zero is an illegal action unless explicitly otherwise stated in the Ruleset.
• Any situation which would require a roll of DiceX when X is zero or lower always yields a value of 0 unless stated otherwise.
• All numbers, unless stated otherwise by a rule, are in base ten.
• Unless otherwise specified, to “spend,” “pay” or “lose” an amount X of a numeric value “V” means to subtract X from V; to “gain” X of a numeric value “V” means to add X to V; and to “transfer” or “pay” X of a numeric value “V” from A to B means to subtract X from A’s V and add X to B’s V. Unless otherwise specified, only positive amounts can be spent, paid, lost, gained, or transferred, a Soul can spend or pay from only their own values, and a rule that allows Souls to transfer or pay a numeric value to another Soul only allows them to transfer that value from themselves to that other Soul (of their choice unless otherwise stated).
• If a Dynastic Action is defined as having a cost X of numeric value V, or defines a requirement to spend, pay, or lose X of numeric value V to accomplish an effect or multiple effects, then the arithmetic effects of spending or payment and the act of carrying out those effects are considered to be subsequent steps in an Atomic Action, with the spending or payment step taking place before the effects step unless stated otherwise.
• A Soul who has a choice in whether to take an action defined by a dynastic rule may not take that action if both of the following conditions are true: a) the action’s effects are limited to changing values tracked in gamestate-tracking entities (such as a wiki page), and b) the action would change one or more of those values to an illegal value.
• If a rule implies that the result of any calculation should be an integer (for instance, by attempting to store that result in, or add it to, a gamestate variable that can only hold integers), the result of the calculation is instead the result rounded towards 0.
• If a game variable has a default value but no defined starting value, then its default value should also be considered a starting value. If a game variable has neither a default value nor a starting value, then both may be considered to be the nearest legal value to zero that it may take (for numerical variables, defaulting to positive if tied), blank (for a text string or list that may be blank), the alphabetically earliest legal text string it may take (for a text string which may not be blank, with the digits 0 through 9 considered to precede “A”), or the list which is alphabetically earliest from the set of lists with the fewest elements (for lists which may not be blank, and considering each list to be a single unpunctuated text string, with the digits 0 through 9 considered to precede “A”).
• If the rules that define a game variable are amended, and some previously valid values become invalid as a consequence, any existing variables whose current values would become invalid are instead set to their starting value.
• Invalid values for game variables can never be used, even if the values stored in a gamestate-tracking entity remain valid. (for example, if X appears in a formula referring to a value that is a non-negative integer, X must be used as a non-negative integer)
• DICEN cannot be rolled in the Dice Roller if N is greater than one million.
• If a piece of information is described as being tracked secretly or privately by the Dark One (including secretly random selections), then that information may only be revealed by the Dark One when the ruleset allows it. If a Soul should already know such a piece of information (in that the Dark One has already told them it, or vice versa, and there is no way that the information could have been changed since then), the Dark One may repeat it to them.

Rules and Votable Matters

• If a new rule is created by a Votable Matter and its location is not noted in that Votable Matter, that new rule is to be placed in the Dynastic Rules.
• If a wiki page becomes gamestate as a result of a Votable Matter enacting, that page shall – unless otherwise specified – be reverted to whatever state it was in at the time of that Votable Matter’s submission (and if the page did not exist at that time, it shall be blanked).
• Where a Votable Matter would amend the effects of Votable Matter Enactment, this does not apply to its own enactment unless explicitly stated (e.g. a Votable Matter proposing that enacted Votable Matters earn their author a banana when enacted would not earn a banana for its own author, when enacted).
• Rules which trigger upon the Resolution of a Votable Matter are the responsibility of the Admin who Resolves it.
• Unless otherwise specified, a new Dynastic rule shall be placed at the end of the Dynastic Rules.
• If the Admin enacting a Votable Matter reaches a step which cannot be applied immediately (e.g. “two days after this Votable Matter enacts, Soul A gains 1 point”), that step is ignored for the purposes of enactment. Once a Votable Matter has been enacted, it can have no further direct effect on the gamestate.
• If a dynastic rule has no text and no subrules, any Soul may delete it from the ruleset.
• A rule may be accompanied by one or more illustrations, and an illustration may have a caption. In all situations, unless otherwise explicitly stated, an illustration and a caption to an illustration must be treated as flavour text.

Time

• For the purpose of all rules, time in BlogNomic is in UTC.
• 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.
• Where the month, day and/or year of a calendar date are ambiguous (e.g. “04/10/09”), it shall be assumed that the date is in a day/month/year format.
• A Soul may not take more than one dynastic game action at the same time (excluding any actions which have been ongoing for more than three hours).

Spelling and formatting

• 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.
• Souls may correct obvious spelling and typographical mistakes in the Ruleset and their own Pending Votable Matters at any time, including replacing Spivak and gender-specific pronouns with the singular “they”.
• A Soul may reformat a list of items in the dynastic ruleset to have bullet points or other appropriate list markup, if doing so would not change the order of that list, nor how any rules interpreted its content.

Names

• Within the Ruleset, a word only refers to the name of a Soul if it is explicitly stated that it refers to a Soul’s name.
• If a rule would ever have no name, it is instead given the name of the Votable Matter that created it, or (if this is not possible) the name “Unnamed Rule”.
• The names of rules and wiki pages (other than the Ruleset) are flavour text.
• Subrules can be referred to by a name which incorporates name of the rule they are a subrule of. Example: a subrule of the rule “Gin” is a “Gin Rule”, however the rule “Gin” is not a “Gin Rule” because it’s not a subrule of the rule “Gin”.
• When referring to a Votable Matter, the name used in reference to a specific Votable Matter may be simplified by not including braces and any text between the opening and closing braces. i.e. a Votable Matter named “Changes [Core]” could instead be referred to by the name “Changes”.
• When referring to a Rule, the name used in reference to a specific Rule may be simplified by not including braces and any text between a pair of opening and closing braces, as long as such a reference would be unambiguous.
• Where a Votable Matter refers to a second Votable Matter by name, it is assumed to refer to the most recently posted Votable Matter of that name which pre-dates the first Votable Matter.

Prioritisation

• If two parts of the Ruleset contradict each other, precedence shall be construed in the following order:

1. The Appendix has precedence over any other Rule;
2. If a Core Rule explicitly says it cannot be overruled by a Dynastic Rule, that Core Rule has precedence over a Dynastic Rule, otherwise a Dynastic Rule has precedence over that Core Rule;
3. If a Special Case Rule explicitly says that it cannot be overruled by a Dynastic Rule, that Special Case Rule has precedence over a Dynastic Rule, otherwise a Dynastic Rule has equal precedence as that Special Case Rule;
4. If two contradicting parts have equal precedence, the part with more limited scope applies (e.g. if the rules “Souls may Kick each other” and “Souls may not Kick each other on Tuesdays” exist, and it is Tuesday, Souls may not Kick each other);
5. If two contradicting parts have the same scope, or have scopes that only overlap where they contradict each other, the negative rule applies (e.g. with “Souls may Punch a Spaceman on Friday” and “Souls may not Punch Spacemen on Friday”, then Souls may not Punch Spacemen on Friday).

Mentors

A Soul may have another Soul as a Mentor. Souls who are willing to act as a Mentor are listed on the Mentorships wiki page, and are said to be “Tenured”. An Admin may add or remove their own name, or the name of a Soul who has requested a change on their own behalf, from this list at any time.

If an unmentored Soul requests a Mentor, or a new Soul has joined the game and has no Mentor, the Dark One should select a Tenured Soul and ask them to take that Soul on as a Mentee; if they accept, then such a Mentorship is established. The Dark One should take care to consider game balance when selecting a potential mentor.

A relationship between a mentor and a mentee is a Mentorship. The members and starting dates of all active Mentorships are tracked on the Mentorships wiki page, and whenever a new Mentorship is established, the Dark One should announce it in a blog post. A Soul may dissolve a Mentorship they are part of at any time, by announcing this in a blog post.

If there is no Dark One, any Soul who has been active in at least three previous dynasties may act as Dark One for the purposes of this rule.

Things that a mentor must do

A mentor must do the following:

• Make pro-active contact with their mentee when appointed, and explain the dynamics of the Mentorship system;
• Be available to answer any questions that their mentee may have about the game, including explaining the rules, common standards and etiquette of play, proofreading posts and clarifying game events;
• Introduce their mentee to the various platforms of the game, including the wiki, Discord, and end-of-dynasty notifications through the Facebook group or Twitter;
• If possible, give their mentee a nudge if it appears that they are at risk of becoming Idle;
• If they themselves go idle, communicate with their mentee to either continue to support them as an idle Soul or arrange a handover to another mentor if requested.

Things that a mentor should do

The following sets out suggested best practice for Mentorship relationships:

• The Mentorship lasts for four weeks or until the next Ascension Address, whichever occurs latest. It can continue informally for longer but after this threshold the mentor is no longer bound by any of the conditions set out in the parent rule to this rule, or any of its subrules.
• The mentor can and should advise the mentee on how to proceed in the mentee’s own best interests. This can include making connections with other Souls.
• The mentor should consider copying the mentee in on private, game-related communications, where it does not unfairly prejudice their own interests. The mentee should keep this information private without explicit consent from the mentor.
• The mentor and mentee may work together to achieve victory. If a mentor achieves victory with support of their mentee then they should, if the mentee wishes it, pass the baton to the mentee.

Things that a mentor should not do

The following sets out a list of things that a mentor should not do in their relationship with their mentee. All of these are considered to be Fair Play rules, as per the rule Fair Play.

• The mentor should not sock-puppet, bully, coerce or otherwise manipulate the mentee into performing any game actions.
• The mentor should not seek to dissuade the mentee from pursuing other alliances.
• A former mentor should not seek to use the fact of a prior Mentorship to influence the former mentee on an ongoing basis.

Synonyms

A dynasty may provide extra theming by using alternative terms for words like “Soul” and “Dark One”.

Each term in this list is synonymous with the term in parentheses

• Soul (Player)
• Dark One (Emperor)

When a new Dynasty is started, the Ascension Address may specify new terms for each entry in the above list, provided the newly chosen term does not appear anywhere in the ruleset outside of this rule (though if it only appears in rules which are being removed as part of the Ascension Address, it is fine), and that doing so would not cause two terms in the above list to become synonymous with each other. Doing so causes the old corresponding value (including regional spelling variations) to be replaced by the new value everywhere in the ruleset except in any of the parentheses in the above list.