Core Rules

Ruleset and Gamestate

This is the Ruleset for BlogNomic; all Believers 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 appendix, which exists solely to clarify the remainder of the ruleset.

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

Believers may correct obvious spelling and typographical mistakes in the Ruleset and their own Pending Proposals at any time, including replacing Spivak and gender-specific pronouns with the singular “they”.

Believers

Any human may apply to join BlogNomic (if they are not already playing) by registering at http://blognomic.com via the Register link in the sidebar, and then making a post making clear their wish to be an Believer. An Admin shall add them to the roster in the sidebar and the GNDT, at which moment they become a Believer.

A Believer may leave the game at any time by posting an entry to the BlogNomic weblog requesting such an action. A Believer may not rejoin the game within two weeks after having left. A Believer may only change their name as a result of a proposal approving the change.

Some Believers are Admins, responsible for updating the site and the Ruleset, and are signified as such in the sidebar. Believers 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. New admins shall be given the GNDT configuration password when they become admins.

Idle Believers

Some Believers are Idle, and shall be marked as such in the sidebar. For the purposes of all Gamestate and the Ruleset, excluding Rules “Ruleset and Gamestate”, “Believers”, “Dynasties”, “Fair Play” and any of those Rules’ subrules, Idle Believers are not counted as Believers.

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

When a Believer 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 Believer Idled in a different dynasty), the Believer is given the default value for new Believers, if such a value exists.

An Admin may render a Believer Idle if that Believer has asked to become Idle in an entry or comment from the past four days, or if that Believer has not posted an entry or comment in the last seven days. In the latter case, the Admin must announce the idling in a blog post. Admins may render themselves Idle at any time. An Admin may Unidle a Believer if that Believer has asked to become Unidle in an entry or comment from the past four days, and Idle Admins may Unidle themselves at any time, unless the Believer who would be Unidled asked to become (or rendered themselves) Idle within the previous four days, and within the current dynasty.

Dynasties

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

Proposals

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

Special Proposal Voting

When a Believer casts an explicit vote AGAINST their own Proposal, this renders the Proposal Self-Killed, even if the author later changes their Vote. The Auspex may use VETO as a voting icon to cast a Vote on a proposal; when the Auspex casts a vote of VETO on a Proposal, this renders the Proposal Vetoed, even if the Auspex later changes their Vote.

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

Resolution of Proposals

The oldest pending Proposal may be enacted by any Admin (by updating the Ruleset and/or Gamestate to include the specified effects of that Proposal, and then setting that Proposal's status to Enacted) 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 cast on it, more valid Votes cast on it are FOR than are AGAINST, 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 could not be Enacted without either one of the Votes AGAINST it being changed, or the set of Believers being changed, or by awaiting the passage of time.
It has been open for voting for at least 48 hours and cannot be Enacted.

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.

Votable Matters

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

Each Believer 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 Believer’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-Believer never has a Vote, even if they were a Believer previously and had cast a valid Vote.

Votable Matters can either be Pending, Enacted, or Failed. When a Votable Matter is first put forward, it is considered Pending.

Whenever an Admin resolves a Votable Matter, they must also mark their name, and report the final tally of Votes (or the fact that it was self-killed or vetoed).

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

Calls for Judgement

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

A Pending CFJ may be Resolved by an Admin if it has a Quorum of FOR Votes, a Quorum of AGAINST Votes, or if it has been open for voting for more than 48 hours. When a CFJ is Resolved, it is to be Enacted if it has more FOR Votes than AGAINST Votes and Failed otherwise. When a CFJ is Enacted, the Admin Enacting it shall update the Gamestate and Ruleset, and correct the GNDT and other gamestate tracking entities, as specified in the CFJ.

Any CfJ that specifies neither changes to the Gamestate or Ruleset nor corrections to any gamestate tracking entities may be failed by any Admin.

This Rule may not be overruled by Dynastic Rules.

Victory and Ascension

If a Believer (other than the Auspex) believes that they have achieved victory in the current Dynasty, they 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 “Believers”, “Votable Matters”, “Calls for Judgement”, “Gamestate Tracking” and “Victory and Ascension”.

Every Believer may cast Votes on that DoV to indicate agreement or disagreement with the proposition that the poster has achieved victory in the current Dynasty.

A Pending DoV may be enacted if any of the following is true:

It has been open for voting for at least 12 hours, has a number of FOR Votes that exceed or equal Quorum, and either the Auspex has Voted FOR it or it has no AGAINST Votes.
It has been open for voting for at least 24 hours, has a number of FOR Votes that exceed or equal Quorum, and has a number of AGAINST Votes lesser than half of Quorum, rounded down.
It has been open for voting for at least 48 hours, has a number of Votes that exceed or equal Quorum, and more than half of its valid Votes are FOR.

A DoV may be failed if any of the following are true:

It has been open for voting for at least 12 hours, and it could not be Enacted without either at least one of the Votes AGAINST it being changed, or the set of Believers being changed, or by awaiting the passage of time.
It has been open for voting for at least 48 hours and cannot be Enacted.

When a DoV fails and there are no pending DoVs, Hiatus ends.

When a DoV is enacted, all other active DoVs are failed, and a new Dynasty begins with the Believer who made the DoV as its Auspex. That Believer may pass this role to another Believer at this point by making a post to that effect, if they wish. The Hiatus continues until the new Auspex makes an Ascension Address by posting an entry in the “Ascension Address” category - this should specify the Auspex's chosen theme for the new Dynasty, and may optionally specify that the terms Believer and Auspex will be replaced with theme-specific terms throughout the entire ruleset, and/or a number of dynastic rules to keep. Upon posting such an Ascension Address, the ruleset is updated to reflect any changed terms, and any dynastic rules which were not listed to be kept are repealed.

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

This rule cannot be overruled by Dynastic Rules as it relates to Declarations of Victory, but can be overruled in other matters.

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 Believer'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.

A single person should not control more than one Believer within BlogNomic.
A Believer 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 Believer should not deliberately exploit bugs or unexpected behaviours in the software running the game (ExpressionEngine, MediaWiki or the GNDT).
A Believer should not edit their own blog comments once posted, nor those of any other Believer.
A Believer should not edit the "Entry Date" field of a blog post.
A Believer should not make a DoV primarily to delay the game by putting it into Hiatus.
A Believer should not do any action meant to make the game unplayable (for example, changing multiple keywords to the same word in an ascension address).

Seasonal Downtime

Blognomic goes into hiatus every year on December 24th, and remains in hiatus until December 27th. During this time no game actions may be taken except those described in the rules entitled “Votable Matters,” “Gamestate Tracking” and “Call for Judgement”.

Dynastic Rules

Cults

Each Believer belongs to zero or more Cults. The Leader of a Cult is considered to belong to that Cult. These allegiances are tracked privately by the Auspex.

Each Cult has a Name (up to seven words), a Leader (a Believer or Idle Believer), a Headquarters (a Location), and a Prophecy concerning the end of the world (a sentence). The Leader and Prophecy of a Cult are tracked privately by the Auspex. The Names and Infamies of existing Cults are:-

The HitchHikers (Obscure)
Liquid Faith (Obscure)
The Lords of Science (Tolerated)
The Midnight Crew (Mistrusted)
The Purifying Fire (Tolerated)
The Shadow Church of the Time Zombies (Obscure)
The Walkers (Obscure)

As a daily action, a Believer may attempt to form a new Cult by submitting an Order specifying the Name of that Cult, its Headquarters (any Location other than “Unknown”) and its Prophecy. If that Believer is located in the proposed Headquarters and is not already the Leader of a Cult, the Auspex may create a new Cult by adding its Name to the list above; the Cult is created with the Believer as its Leader, the specified Location as its Headquarters and the Prophecy specified.

Whenever the Auspex creates a new Cult by adding its name to the list above, they should inform all Believers by making a blog post stating that a new Cult has been created, and specifying the name of that Cult.

If the Auspex has an Order from a Believer requesting to join a Cult, and if they are a valid Initiate to it, and if both the Believer and Leader of the Cult are located in the Cult’s Headquarters, then the Auspex should make that Believer a member of the Cult and privately inform both the Believer and the Leader of this initiation.

A Leader of a Cult may transfer his or her leadership to any other Believer in that Cult, by Command, so long as that Believer has sent an Order accepting such a transfer. Upon processing such an action, the nominated member becomes the Leader of the Cult, in place of the previous Leader.

The Leader of a Cult may disband that Cult by command. When a Cult is disbanded, it ceases to exist.

Secret Requirements

Each Cult may have one more more Secret Requirements for its members. When a Believer joins a Cult, the Auspex should send him the current Secret Requirements for that Cult via private message.

The Leader of a Cult may add, remove, or modify a Secret Requirement of that Cult, by command. Upon processing such a Command, the Auspex should send a Private Message to all members of that Cult, listing its new Secret Requirements.

If the Leader of a Cult believes that another Believer who is a member of that Cult has violated one of the Secret Requirement, he may send a PM to the Auspex declaring which Secret Requirement he believes the Cult Member has violated, and why. The Auspex may, within 48 hours of receiving the request, agree with the violation. If he chooses to do so, the violating member is removed from the Cult, although they may thereafter apply to rejoin the Cult as set out in the rule entitled “Cults”. The Auspex must PM both the Leader and the violating Believer about the removal.

Idle Cults

If all members of a Cult are idle, the Auspex should delete that Cult.

Orders

Believers may send Private Messages to the Auspex at any time; these are known as Orders. If a rule says that the Leader of Cult may do something “by Command”, then the action performable by Command may be requested by submitting an Order with this precise instruction; the action described may then be performed by the Auspex, while the Order exists - upon the Auspex performing such a Command, the Order ceases to be an Order. This is the only way by which an action performable “by Command” may be performed.

If an Order is more than 48 hours old, it ceases to be an Order.

Initiation Criteria

Each Cult may have an Initiation Criteria. This may either be Open, Closed or Partial, defaulting to Closed. If the Criteria is Partial, the Criteria should also contain a list of Believers. If a Cult’s Initiation Criteria is “Open”, then all Believers are valid Initiates to that Cult. If it is “Closed”, then no Believers are valid Initiates to it. If it is “Partial”, then only the named Believers are valid Initiates. If a Believer is already a member of a particular Cult, they are not a valid Initiate to that Cult.

The Leader of a Cult may changes its Initiation Criteria by command.

The Auspex

For the purpose of all dynastic rules, the Auspex is not considered to be a Believer.

Moving Headquarters

As a weekly action, a cult leader may send an order to the Auspex requesting a move of the cult’s head quarters. Such a request must include the name of the location to which the cult leader wishes to move the HQ. Such a request is successful if the cult leader has at least N Believers (including the leader) distributed evenly between the current location of the Headquarters and the location to which it is moving, where N is the cult’s Secretiveness score. Otherwise, the request fails.

If the request succeeds, the Auspex notifies the leader and all that cult’s member’s of the change. In addition, he makes a blog post exposing the fact that a Cult has moved location without revealing the identity of the Cult, the old location of the Cult’s headquarters, or the new headquarter locations.

If the request fails, the Auspex notifies the leader of such.

Locations

Each Believer has a Location, tracked in the GNDT. (A Believer is said to be “located” in their Location, or simply “in” or “at” it.) Each Believer defaults to a Location of “Unknown”. Valid Locations are: The Cathedral, The Museum, The Observatory, The Library, The University, The Hospital, The Protest Camp, The Back Streets and The River. “Unknown” is also a valid Location, tracked in the GNDT as “-”.

As a daily Action, a Believer may change their own Location to any valid Location (except for “Unknown”).

Traits

Each Location may have a single Trait. Traits are either Ordered or Chaotic in nature: the Ordered Traits are “Crowded” and “Secured”, and the Chaotic Traits are “Damaged” and “Lacking”.

The Traits of Locations which currently have Traits are:-

The Back Streets: Damaged
The Hospital: Secured
The Library: Secured
The Museum: Lacking
The Observatory: Damaged
The Protest Camp: Crowded

If a Cult has two members in the same Location, its Leader may - as a daily action - send a Private Message to the Auspex announcing the Cult’s intention to add or remove one Trait from that Location (optionally describing the flavour text of how they will achieve this). Upon processing such a message, the Auspex must add or remove the specified Trait if it is possible to do so, then make a blog post announcing the change (or attempted change), and the Cult responsible for it. Upon doing so, that Cult’s Infamy increases by one level if it added a Chaotic Trait or removed an Ordered one; it decreases by one level if it added an Ordered Trait or removed a Chaotic one.

If no Locations have traits, the Auspex should select a random Location and assign it a random Trait.

Infamy

Each Cult has an Infamy, which may be one of the following, in order of increasing Infamy:

Eminent
Accepted
Tolerated
Obscure
Mistrusted
Disliked
Notorious

If a Notorious Cult would gain a level of Infamy, it remains Notorious; if an Eminent Cult would lose a level of infamy, it remains Eminent. Cults are, by default, Obscure. The Infamy of a Cult is tracked in the rule “Cults”.

Each Cult has a Power score. The Power of an Eminent or Notorious Cult is 3; the Power of an Accepted or Disliked Cult is 2; the Power of a Tolerated or Mistrusted Cult is 1 and the Power of an Obscure Cult is zero.

Each Cult has a Secretiveness score. The Secretiveness score of a Cult is equal to the Power score of that cult times 3.

Locations have an Infamy Tolerance; any Cult whose Infamy exceeds the Infamy Tolerance of the location of its Headquarters may not accept new Members. The Infamy Tolerances of Locations are as follows:

The Cathedral and the University: Obscure
The Museum, The Observatory, and The Library: Mistrusted
The Hospital: Disliked
The Protest Camp, The Back Streets and The River: Notorious.

Honour Among Thieves, Or Something Like That

The Auspex shall evaluate all Orders with good faith, and in particular should follow the following guidelines where unusual or exceptional conditions do not apply:

The Auspex should not decline to allow an optional action except where the action is clearly an abuse of process (such as a scam related to the timing of multiple actions sent to the Auspex at once), beyond a simple scam or loophole in the rules.
The Auspex should evaluate all Orders in the order in which they are received. Where more than one Private Message is required for a single Order, it should be considered to be received when the last message required is received.
If confronted with a Private Message which contains multiple Orders which are mutually exclusive (due to deleting the message, for instance), the Auspex should evaluate them in a top-down manner.
The Auspex should evaluate all Orders within 48 hours of receiving them, and should make a blog post if he anticipates that he will be unable to do so at any point.
If the Auspex believes that an Order cannot be performed due to a clerical error on the part of the Believer attempting to perform it (such as including two mutually exclusive actions in a single Private Message), the Auspex should inform the Believer of this fact.
If the Auspex does not perform an Order, including by choice or due to it being illegal, but not because it requires multiple Private Messages which have not all been received, the Auspex should delete the Private Message containing it and inform the Believer of the decision not to perform the action, but (except as otherwise indicated in these guidelines) should not inform the Believer the reason why it was not performed.

The Auspex may delete any of his Private Messages at any time.

Proposals authored by the Auspex whose effects would be limited to amending this rule do not count towards the Auspex’s usual limit of 2 proposals pending at once, and such proposals may be Enacted notwithstanding that they are not the oldest proposal in the queue (but all other requirements must still be met).

Insight

Each Believer has an amount of Insight, tracked in a GNDT column of the same name.

Inquisitions

As a weekly action, any Believer may perform an Inquisition by submitting an Order that:

Begins with the text “A charge of heresy as such:”;
Names two Believers other than the sender as Collaborators;
Names a single Cult as its Target; and
Includes a single List of Heretics composed of Believers.

When the Auspex receives an Inquisition, if any of the following conditions are true, then they may deem the Inquisition unsuccessful:

The sender, or either or both of the Collaborators, belongs to the Target;
The List of Heretics includes a Believer who does not belong to the Target;
There exists a Believer who belongs to the Target but is not named in the List of Heretics;
The sender, or either or both of the Collaborators, has already been a Sender or a Collaborator in a successful Inquisition which specified the same List of Heretics and same Target Cult.

If none of those three conditions is true, then the Auspex may deem the Inquisition successful.

When the Auspex deems an Inquisition unsuccessful, they should make a blog post exposing the Inquisition. That blog post should:

Names the sender and collaborators as the Inquisitors, but does not identify them as sender or collaborator; and
Names the Target and the Believers in the List of Heretics.

When the Auspex deems an Inquisition successful, they should:

Reply to the Inquisition with a confirmation of its success;
Privately inform the sender of the Target's Prophecy;
Increase the Insight of the sender and both Collaborators by ten times the square of half the number of members in its Target.

Philosophical Realignment

If the Auspex has an Order from a Believer (the Usurper) in a Cult (the Fiefdom), and all the following requirements are met:

The Usurper is not the Leader of a Cult with the same Headquarters as the Fiefdom,
The Usurper is a member of the Fiefdom,
The Usurper's Location was the Fiefdom's Headquarters at the time the Private Message was sent,
The Location of the Fiefdom's Leader was not the Fiefdom's Headquarters at the time the Private Message was sent,
The Private Message indicates that the Usurper believes that the Leader of the Fiefdom has violated a Secret Requirement of the Fiefdom, and
The Auspex agrees that the Secret Requirement was violated by the Leader in that manner,
The Private Message was sent within 48 hours of the violation.

then the Auspex may delete the Order and change the Leader of the Fiefdom to the Usurper. When he does so, the former Leader is removed from the Fiefdom, and the former Leader and all members of the Cult are to be informed that the Usurper has assumed leadership of the Cult.

Artifacts

Each Cult has a non-negative integer supply of Artifacts, which are privately tracked by the Auspex and 0 by default.

As a weekly Action, a Cult’s Leader may Search for Artifacts by Command, specifying a valid Location other than Unknown as the Target. Upon processing the Order, the Auspex should iincrease the Artifacts of that Cult by C*(V+P) where C is the half the number of Believers who were both members of the Cult and whose Location was the Target at the time the Order was sent, rounded down, V is the Extradition Value of the Target, and P is the Power score of the Cult. The Auspex should then send a Private Message to the Leader of the Cult informing them of how many Artifacts were earned. The Auspex should process Orders to Search for Artifacts in the order received.

The Extradition Value of a Location is the position of the Location in an ordered List of all Locations other than Unknown, kept privately by the Auspex. After processing an Order to Search for Artifacts, the Location searched moves to the Bottom of the list (and so has an Extradition Value of 1). If there is a Location other than Unknown which is not in the ordered List, the Auspex must place it in a random position in the List before processing any Orders to Search for Artifacts. He should not use the GNDT for this calculation, but instead another random device of his choosing.

Removal

As a daily action, a Believer may request to remove a specified number of Artifacts from those collected by a Cult, by sending an Order which announces such an intention, including the name of a Cult that he or she belongs to and specifying the number of Artifacts he or she intends to remove. (This number cannot be less than 1 or greater than 10.) If the Auspex has such an Order, he should process it as follows:-

If the named Cult has fewer Artifacts than the number specified, then the removal fails and both the Believer and the Leader of that Cult are informed of the attempt’s failure (and the identity of the Believer)
If the named Cult has a number of Artifacts greater than or equal to the number specified, then it loses a number of Artifacts equal to the number specified, and the Believer gains an equal amount of Insight; the GNDT update should indicate that this Insight was gained from Artifact Removal

The Order is then deleted.

Scrying

As a weekly action, a Believer (the “Scryer”) may attempt to Scry the date of the end of the world using an Artifact that they have access to, by submitting an Order which names the Cult whose Artifacts they will use in the ritual.

If the specified Cult has no Artifacts, then the Scrying fails and the Believer is informed of this. Otherwise, upon processing such an Order, the Auspex shall reduce the specified Cult’s Artifacts by 1, and privately inform the Scryer of a randomly chosen date which occurs after Doomsday and before the 4th of February 2013; such a date is known as a “Dark Day”.

The End of the World

The End of the World is due occur on a date privately tracked by the Auspex; this date is known as Doomsday. Doomsday is a date somewhere between the 15th and 31st of January 2013.

If the current day is on or after Doomsday, the Auspex should - as a daily action - End the World. Upon doing so, if a single Believer has a higher Insight than each other Believer, that Believer achieves Victory; otherwise, the clouds rumble and nothing happens. Either way, the Auspex should announce this event in a blog post - if a Believer achieves victory, their prophecy shall be announced in this blog post.

As a one-time action, a Believer may create an order with the subject Doomsday and include a date on which they think Doomsday will occur. When Doomsday occurs, any believer who predicted the correct date will gain N insight, where N is the total number of believers who failed to correctly predict Doomsday (Note: this excludes all Believers who did not make a prediction).

Activity

Each Believer is undertaking one Activity, which may be either “Studying”, “Searching” or “Other” This is tracked in the GNDT in a column titled “Activity”, with “Other” being tracked as “-”. By default, a Believer’s Activity is “Other”.

As a daily action, a Believer may change their own Activity to any valid value.

As a daily action which may only be taken on a Friday, the Auspex should Reward the Studious. Upon doing so, each Believer who is Studying gains Insight equal to three times the highest Power score among all Cults that they belong to.

As a daily action that may only be taken on a Monday, the Auspex may Resolve the Searches. Upon doing so, for each Believer whose Activity is “Searching”, the Auspex shall send a Private Message to that Believer listing the name of each Cult whose Headquarters is located in that Believer’s current Location, excluding those Cults whose Secretiveness score is greater than the Believer’s Insight.

Photocopied Flyers

Any Believer may submit a message or Proposal to the Auspex, to be reposted anonymously.

If a Proposal’s title contains the string “[Photocopy]” and was made by the Auspex, then it does not count as a Proposal for the purposes of the “2 Proposals pending, or has already made 3 Proposals that day” clause of the rule “Proposals”. The Auspex may not post an anonymous Photocopy proposal from a Believer if that Believer has two proposals, of any type and in any combination, pending.

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. (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.)

Can: "is able to"

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 Believers.

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

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.

Dice: References to "YDICEX" refer to Y X-sided dice, rolled within the GNDT. 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.

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 Believer’s Effective Vote Comment with respect to a given Votable Matter means that Believer’s Comment to that Votable Matter, if any, that contains that Believer’s Vote on that Votable Matter.

Flavour Text: When posting a blog entry, a Believer 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.

Gamestate: Any information which the Ruleset regulates the alteration of.

IRC Channel: The Blognomic IRC channel is located at #nomic on the slashnet network (irc.slashnet.org).

May: "is permitted to"

May not: "is not permitted to"

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

Resolve/Resolution: If used in a context of a Votable Matter, the world “Resolve” means to perform the act, as an Admin, of enacting or failing 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

Rule: Each individually numbered section of the ruleset is a rule, including sections that are sub-rules of other rules.

Shall: "is required to"

Should: "is recommended that"

Sibling Rule: Two rules are “siblings” of each other if they are both direct subrules of the same rule.

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.

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, an IMP http://blognomic.com/images/vote/imperial.gif shall represent a Vote of DEFERENTIAL, and an Imperial Seal http://blognomic.com/images/vote/seal.gif shall represent the Imperial Veto.

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 Believer able to perform it may take that action once each week, but not more than once every twenty-four hours.

Weekly Communal Action: If a game action is a Weekly Communal Action, it can be performed by any Believer, but only if it has not been performed (by any Believer) already in the same week.

Wiki: The BlogNomic Wiki at http://blognomic.com/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page

Gamestate Tracking

Votable Matters and other official posts, as well as specific gamestate information, shall be tracked by the BlogNomic blog at http://blognomic.com. Any Believer 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. No entry may be more than one of the following official types of post: Votable Matters, and Idling Post.

If no Believer 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. 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.

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 fifteen minutes and has no comments, the author may change the categories as they wish.

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 Believer may update any Believer's data via the GNDT, whenever the Ruleset permits it.

All updates to the GNDT are logged. Actions that change gamestate directly (defined in other rules) can normally be performed simply by applying their effects to the GNDT, which updates the gamestate accordingly, unless another rule specifies some other method of performing them; one GNDT update may contain one or more actions, or one action may be split over multiple GNDT updates, as long as it’s clear what is happening and the actions are otherwise legal. The GNDT merely represents the Gamestate, and is not the same thing. In the event that the Gamestate and the GNDT are different, any Believer may correct the GNDT to comply with the Gamestate.

If a Believer feels that the GNDT was altered such that it no longer matches the gamestate (such as by performing an action which was against the Rules (as they were at the time of the alteration), or by any other means), they may simply undo the effects of that alteration. Instead of repeatedly reverting and re-reverting a disputed GNDT update, Believers are encouraged to raise a Call for Judgement instead. Believers shall be assigned a password for the GNDT when they join the Nomic.

Random Generators

The GNDT 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 VEGGIE command will return a random result from the following: Potato, Carrot, Triffid, Pumpkin.

Any changes to the potential outcomes of the GNDT’s random result commands must be made by proposal; and any proposal that seeks to nominate a change to this rule must first identify an active Believer with server-level access to the BlogNomic site who is able to perform the changes, and must also update this rule to reflect the new potential outcomes.

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” 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” 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, lost, gained, or transferred, and a rule that allows Believers to transfer a numeric value only allows them to transfer that value from themselves to another Believer (of their choice unless otherwise stated).
A Believer 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 the GNDT and/or similar 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 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.
If a game variable has no defined starting value for new Believers, or for existing Believers upon the variable’s creation, then that starting value is zero (for numerical variables) or blank (for a text string or list).
Invalid values for game variables can never be used, even if the values stored in the GNDT 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)

Rules and Proposals

If a new rule is created by a proposal and its location is not noted in that proposal, that new rule is to be placed in the Dynastic Rules.
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 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 a rule would ever have no name, it is instead named “Unnamed Rule”.
The names of rules are not themselves rule text and have no effect other than being rule names.

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 (eg. "04/10/09"), it shall be assumed that the date is in a day/month/year format.

Spelling

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.

Names

Within the ruleset, a word only refers to the name of a Believer if it is explicitly stated that it refers to a Believer's name.

Prioritisation

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

The Appendix has precedence over any Rule;
A Dynastic Rule has precedence over a Core Rule, unless that Core Rule explicitly says it can’t be overruled by a Dynastic Rule;
If both contradicting parts are a Core Rule, or if both of them are a Dynastic Rule, the part with more limited scope applies. (e.g. if the rules “Believers may Kick each other” and “Believers may not kick each other on Tuesdays” exist, and it is Tuesday, Believers may not Kick each other.)
If two parts with the same scope contradict each other, the negative rule applies. (e.g. with “Believers may Punch a Spaceman on Friday” and “Believers may not Punch Spacemen on Friday”, then Believers may not Punch Spacemen on Friday.)

Ruleset 107

Contents