Core Rules

Ruleset and Gamestate

This is the Ruleset for BlogNomic; all Apprentices 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.

Apprentices 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”.

Apprentices

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 Apprentice. An Admin shall add them to the roster in the sidebar and the GNDT, at which moment they become an Apprentice.

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

Some Apprentices are Admins, responsible for updating the site and the Ruleset, and are signified as such in the sidebar. Apprentices 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 Apprentices

Some Apprentices 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”, “Apprentices”, “Dynasties”, “Fair Play” and any of those Rules’ subrules, Idle Apprentices are not counted as Apprentices.

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

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

An Admin may render an Apprentice Idle if that Apprentice has asked to become Idle in an entry or comment from the past four days, or if that Apprentice 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 provided they’ve made a post or comment declaring their intent to do so in the past four days. An Admin may Unidle an Apprentice if that Apprentice 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 Apprentice 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 Apprentice, known as the Wizard. If there is no Wizard, the Dynasty is a Metadynasty.

Votable Matters

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

Each Apprentice 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. An Apprentice’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-Apprentice never has a Vote, even if they were an Apprentice 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.

Proposals

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

Special Proposal Voting

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

If an Apprentice other than the Wizard casts a vote of DEFERENTIAL on a Proposal, then the Vote of DEFERENTIAL is an indication of confidence in the Wizard. When the Wizard 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 Wizard'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 has been Vetoed or Self-Killed.
The number of Apprentices who are not voting AGAINST it is less than Quorum.
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.

Calls for Judgement

If two or more Apprentices actively disagree as to the interpretation of the Ruleset, or if a Apprentice feels that an aspect of the game needs urgent attention, then any Apprentice 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 an Apprentice (other than the Wizard) 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 “Apprentices”, “Votable Matters”, “Calls for Judgement”, “Gamestate Tracking” and “Victory and Ascension”.

Every Apprentice 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 Wizard 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 the number of Apprentices who are not voting AGAINST it is less than Quorum.
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 Apprentice who made the DoV as its Wizard. That Apprentice may pass this role to another Apprentice at this point by making a post to that effect, if they wish. The Hiatus continues until the new Wizard makes an Ascension Address by posting an entry in the “Ascension Address” category - this should specify the Wizard's chosen theme for the new Dynasty, and may optionally specify that the terms Apprentice and Wizard 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 Apprentice 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 an Apprentice'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 Apprentice within BlogNomic.
An Apprentice 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.
An Apprentice should not deliberately exploit bugs or unexpected behaviours in the software running the game (ExpressionEngine, MediaWiki or the GNDT).
An Apprentice should not edit their own blog comments once posted, nor those of any other Apprentice.
An Apprentice should not edit the "Entry Date" field of a blog post.
An Apprentice should not make a DoV primarily to delay the game by putting it into Hiatus.
An Apprentice 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

Energy

Each Apprentice has an amount of Energy, tracked in the GNDT. New Apprentices start with no Energy. An Apprentice’s Potential is equal to 20, plus five times their Level of Mastery in Arcane. If an Apprentice’s Energy would be set to a value higher than their Potential, it is instead set to their Potential.

Domains

Each Apprentice has an amount of Mastery in each Domain. An Apprentice’s Mastery is tracked in the GDNT under “Mastery”: for each Apprentice, each Domain with nonzero Mastery is represented in the GNDT by the first letter of that Domain, preceded by the amount (Level) of Mastery they have in that Domain (e.g. an Apprentice with 3 Mastery in Fire and 2 Mastery in Arcane would have 3F2A in their Mastery cell). Apprentices start with no Mastery in any Domain.

The Domains are:

Fire - Element of chaos and destruction.
Water - Element of protection and change.
Nature - Element of growth and physical force.
Time - The skill to hasten, pause or even reverse the passage of time.
Arcane - Difficult to master, Arcane magic enables one to tinker with the strands of magic itself.

Spells

Each Apprentice has a number of Spells, tracked in their section of the Spellbook wiki page. An Apprentice is considered to Know all of the Spells tracked in their own section of the Spellbook wiki page, as well as all of the Spells tracked in the Wizard’s section of the Spellbook wiki page. All Spells on the Spellbook wiki page are considered Known to the Wizard.

A Spell consists of one or more Incantations in a specified sequence, each Incantation being a single sequence of two or more letters. A Spell may not contain more than one instance of the same Incantation, where that Incantation is the Name of a Power, unless stated otherwise.

The available Powers are listed as subrules to “Powers”. Each Power has a Name, a Description, an Effect and a Cost, which may be negative - the name of the subrule shall be the Power’s Name, followed by its Description in brackets. A Power may also require one or more Parameters, indicated by square brackets in its Effect. The options for each Parameter are listed in the corresponding subrule to “Parameters”, each option having a Name and a Multiplier (which may be any real number). A Parameter may include the Names of otherwise valid options for it in a comma separated list after a dash. (e.g. [Domain - FU, VI, YA]). If it does, the listed options may not be used as an values for that Parameter for that Spell. A Power’s Cost may be given by a formula with Variable Parameters enclosed in curly braces.

If a Spell includes the Name of a Power as an Incantation, immediately followed by the Name or Names of options of Parameters required by that Power, it is considered to manifest that Power with the specified Parameter options bound to it. The Cost of a Spell is determined by multiplying the Cost of each Power it manifests by the Multipliers of the Parameters bound to it, and adding the results. If a Spell’s Cost would ever be less than 1, it is instead set to 1.

An Apprentice may Craft a Spell with any series of Incantations by spending the Cost of the resulting Spell in Energy, making any choices required of its Parameters, and adding that Spell to their section of the Spellbook wiki page with a unique name of their choosing, and listing its Incantations and any choices made for its Parameters. They may note the Spell’s Effects and Cost in the Spellbook, but these details are not binding.

An Apprentice may Cast a Spell they Know by spending its Cost in Energy. Upon doing so, they must carry out the effects of every Power manifested by that Spell, in the order those Powers’ Names appear in the Spell’s Incantations, and obeying any noted choices that were made at the time of its Crafting.

The Wizard may neither Craft nor Cast Spells, unless a Spell explicitly forces him to do so.

Difficulty

Powers and Parameter options may have a Difficulty, denoted as an amount of Mastery in one or more Domains. The Difficulty of a Spell is determined by adding up the Difficulties of all chosen Powers and Parameter options for that Spell.

An Apprentice may not Cast a Spell if their Mastery does not meet or exceed the Difficulty of that Spell in every Domain. For the purposes of this rule, an Apprentice’s Mastery in each domain is increased by 1 for each Location Associated with that Domain at which they are Present.

A Spell is Associated with each Domain for which it has non-zero Difficulty.

Primal Powers

Powers with “Primal” in their name are Primal Powers. When Crafting a Spell, Primal Powers must be listed before any other Powers.

Powers

LEH (Learn)

Effect: Add one Level to [Apprentice]‘s Mastery in [Domain].
Cost: 5 + {Mastery Level in Domain Chosen}

FLO (Flourish)

If the Caster has no Mastery in [Domain], the remainder of this Spell's Effects are not carried out for this Casting.
Cost: 1

KRI (Crib)

Effect: If [Apprentice] cast [Spell] in the past 72 hours at [Location], the Caster may copy that Spell to their own section of the Spellbook wiki page.
Cost: 1
Difficulty: A1

TEM (Move)

Change one of the Locations of [Apprentice] to [Location - EF].
Cost: 2

IMP (Imprint)

Effect: The Caster may spend the Cost of [Spell] in Energy to change [Apprentice]‘s Imprinted Spell to that Spell.
Cost: 2
Difficulty: 1N

OBA (Obfuscate, Primal)

This Spell may not be added to [Apprentice]‘s section of the Spellbook wiki page by any method other than Crafting it.
Cost: 1
Difficulty: W1

MUL (Clone)

Append [Location] to [Apprentice]‘s list of Locations.
Cost: 5 * {Number of Locations already in the list}
Difficulty: 2N

SAC (Sacrifice, Primal)

The effects of this Spell are not carried out unless the Caster spends one Totem.
Cost: -4
Difficulty: 1F

NEW (Create)

[Apprentice] gains one Totem.
Cost: 8

DEL (Destroy)

[Apprentice] loses one Totem.
Cost: 5

INV (Invoke, Primal)

The effects of this Spell are not carried out unless the Caster has [Amount] Totem(s).
Cost: 1

RAH (Chant,Primal)

Effect: This Spell is copied to the Wizard’s section of the Spellbook wiki page if it doesn’t already exist in that section.
Cost: -3

This Power may not be incorporated in a Spell that also contains the Obfuscate Power.

FOC (Focus, Primal)

The effects of this Spell are not carried out unless the Caster is Present in a Location Associated with [Domain - ZA].
Cost: -1

MAS (Dominate)

Effect: If [Apprentice - WE] is the only Apprentice with a non-zero amount of Totems, nothing happens.
Cost: 15
Difficulty: 1F1W1N1T1A

ECH (Repeat)

Effect: The remainder of this Spell's effects are carried out twice.
Cost: 5
Difficulty: 5T

WAS (Washout)

Effect: [Location] loses its Association with any Domain and becomes Associated with [Domain] (the rule titled “Locations” shall be changed to reflect this).
Cost: 5
Difficulty: 2W

ODD (Unstable, Primal)

This Spell cannot be imprinted.
Cost: 2
Difficulty: W2

Parameters

Apprentice

ME - the casting Apprentice - X1
HE - (name of an Apprentice, chosen when the spell is Crafted) - X1.5
AL - any Apprentice - X2
WE - every Apprentice - X3 (Difficulty: 3A)

Domain

FU - Fire - X1
VI - Water - X1
YA - Nature - X1
OH - Time - X2
ZO - Arcane - X3
ZA - any Domain - X4 (difficulty: A2)
OM - every Domain - X4 (Difficulty: 5A)

Spell

TI - (name of Spell Known by the Crafter, chosen when the Spell is Crafted) - X1
PA - (name of any Spell, chosen when the spell is Crafted) - X1.5
LO - a Spell known by the Caster - X1.5
VA - any Spell - X2 (difficulty: A1)

Location

TE - a current Location of the Caster - X1
ZE - (name of a Location, chosen when the Spell is Crafted - X1.5
XE - any Location - X2 (difficulty: T2)
EF - every Location - X3 (difficulty: 4A)

Amount

NO - zero - X1
ON - exactly one - X1
SO - one or more - X1
SE - three or more - X1
MA - five or more - X1

Victim

MU - the Casting Apprentice - X-1
HU - (name of an Apprentice, chosen when the spell is Crafted) - X1.5
UL - any Apprentice - X2
WU - every Apprentice - X3 (Difficulty: 3A)

Recharging

As a Weekly Communal Action, an Apprentice can increase the Energy of all Apprentices by three times the sum of each Apprentice’s Mastery of the Arcane Domain.

If this action has already been performed during a Week, an Apprentice did not receive this Energy increase (due being Idle or not being an Apprentice at the time the action was performed) when it was performed, they may once during that week increase their Energy by three times the sum of each Apprentice’s Mastery of the Arcane Domain.

Locations

There is a number of Locations Apprentices may be Present at. The list of an Apprentice's Locations (the Locations they are currently Present at) is tracked in the GNDT column "Location". Each Location may occur in that list no more than once. If an Apprentice ever has more than one instance of the same Location in their list, they immediately lose all but one instance of that Location.

Each Location is within a Region, which is either the City, the Plains or the Mountains. The available Locations are: The Abode (in the City), The Silent Bay (in the Plains), The Dark Forest (in the Plains), The Ancient Temple (in the Plains) and The Extinct Volcano (in the Mountains).

Every Apprentice starts in The Abode. As a Daily Action, an Apprentice can change one of their Locations to another chosen Location by spending X Energy, where X is the Distance in miles between those two Locations. The Distance between two Locations in the same Region is 1 mile; the Distance between a Location in the Plains and a Location in the City or Mountains is 3 miles; the Distance between a Location in the City and a Location in the Mountains is 5 miles.

A Location may be Associated with one or more Domains:

The Abode - Time
The Silent Bay - Water
The Dark Forest - Nature
The Ancient Temple - Arcane
The Volcano - Fire

Staves

Each Apprentice holds a Staff, which may be Imprinted with a Spell. The name of the Spell Imprinted on each Staff is tracked in the GNDT under “Staff.”

As a Weekly Action, an Apprentice may Cast the Spell imprinted on their Staff without spending its Cost in Energy. They may do so even if that Spell is not Known to them, but must meet any other requirements for Casting that Spell.

Totems

Totems are small wooden items with great spiritual and magical significance. Each Apprentice has a number of Totems, tracked in the GNDT. New Apprentices start with one Totem.

Novices

If an Apprentice has joined the game or unidled within the past four days, then that Apprentice is a Novice; otherwise they are not. A Novice may not cast a Spell if it would modify a GNDT stat of another Apprentice, or the Spellbook of another Apprentice.

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 Apprentices.

Daily Action: If a game action is a Daily Action, each Apprentice 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): An Apprentice’s Effective Vote Comment with respect to a given Votable Matter means that Apprentice’s Comment to that Votable Matter, if any, that contains that Apprentice’s Vote on that Votable Matter.

Flavour Text: When posting a blog entry, an Apprentice 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, including all Wiki Pages, or GNDT columns, which the Dynastic Rules explicitly mention.

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

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 Apprentice 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 Apprentice, but only if it has not been performed (by any Apprentice) 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 Apprentice 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 Apprentice 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 Apprentice may update any Apprentice'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 Apprentice may correct the GNDT to comply with the Gamestate.

If an Apprentice 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, Apprentices are encouraged to raise a Call for Judgement instead. Apprentices 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 Apprentice 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 Apprentices to transfer a numeric value only allows them to transfer that value from themselves to another Apprentice (of their choice unless otherwise stated).
An Apprentice 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 Apprentices, or for existing Apprentices 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.
Unless explicitly stated otherwise, a wiki page shall be blanked when it becomes gamestate.
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 an Apprentice if it is explicitly stated that it refers to an Apprentice'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 “Apprentices may Kick each other” and “Apprentices may not kick each other on Tuesdays” exist, and it is Tuesday, Apprentices may not Kick each other.)
If two parts with the same scope contradict each other, the negative rule applies. (e.g. with “Apprentices may Punch a Spaceman on Friday” and “Apprentices may not Punch Spacemen on Friday”, then Apprentices may not Punch Spacemen on Friday.)

Ruleset 113

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