Ruleset Draft

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This is a draft of a possible replacement Core Ruleset and Glossary for BlogNomic - by allowing any Wiki visitor to make quick, tidying changes to the rules, we may or may not end up with a better, tighter set of core rules, without having to trudge through weeks and weeks of careful proposals. Feel free to make any changes to any part of this page, although if you're adding or removing a significant part from any rule, explain your decision on Talk:Ruleset_Draft.

If the final version of this ruleset ends up looking like a good idea, we'll just make a proposal to repeal the current core ruleset and replace it with this.

(Despite the first sentence of the first rule, this version of the ruleset is not legally binding, any more than any random copy of the ruleset would be.)

Laws

Ruleset and Gamestate

This is the Ruleset for BlogNomic; all Players must obey the most recent version of this document.

Section One consists of the "laws" of blognomic, covering basic Player and proposal mechanics; Section Two contains the "rules" of the current round, and Section Three contains the glossary, which exists solely to clarify the remainder of the ruleset.

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

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

  1. The Glossary has precedence over any Rule or Law;
  2. A Rule has precedence over a Law, unless that Law explicitly says it can't be overruled by a Rule;
  3. If both contradicting parts are a Law, or if both of them are a Rule, the part with more limited scope applies. (e.g. if the rules "Players can Fight each other" and "Players cannot Fight each other on Tuesdays" exist, and it is Tuesday, players cannot fight each other.)
  4. If two parts with the same scope contradict each other, the negative rule applies. (e.g. with "Players can Fight each other on Tuesdays" and "Player cannot fight each other on Tuesdays", Players cannont fight each other on Tuesdays.)

Admins may correct obvious spelling and typographical mistakes in the Ruleset at any time.

No Rule may contain a provision that bars itself from being altered and/or repealed. If at any moment a Rule exists or is altered in a manner that renders it to contain such a provision, the entirety of that Rule shall be considered void and with no effects on the Gamestate. A rule A is considered to fall under this paragraph's provisions if it protects another rule B from being altered and/or repealed and that rule B prevents rule A from being altered. Daisy-chains of protection also fall under this paragraph's provisions. The provisions on this paragraph supersede any text in a Rule.

Spivak pronouns, as defined in the Glossary, should be used whenever a Player is referred to.

Players

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

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

Some Players are Admins, responsible for updating the site and the Ruleset, and are signified as such in the sidebar. If a Player wishes to become an Admin, e should submit a Proposal to this effect. Existing Admins may be removed from eir post by Proposal, CfJ or voluntary resignation.

Some Players are Idle, and shall be marked as such in the sidebar. Idle Players do not count as Players, except when they are directly referred to as "Idle Players". If a Player has failed to vote for more than a week, or if has asked to become Idle, then any Admin may set that Player as Idle. Admins may un-idle an Idle Player at the Idle Player's request.

If the last Admin would go Idle or resign, they must immediately make one other Player an Admin.

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

Proposals

Any Player may propose changes to the Ruleset or Gamestate by making a Proposal. To make a Proposal, a Player must Make a Post, in the "Proposal" category, that describes the changes e wishes to be made. A Proposal is a Voting Post.

Only the oldest Pending Proposal may be Enacted or Failed. This does not stop Voting posts of other types from being Enacted or Failed.

When a Proposal is Enacted, the effects it describes are made by the Enacting admin.

A Player may not make a Proposal if e already has 2 Proposals pending. Furthermore, no Player may post more than 3 Proposals in the same day.

Voting

Some Offical posts, known as Voting Posts, may be voted upon. These posts have 3 states: Pending, Passed or Failed.

Any Player may cast eir Vote on a Pending Voting Post by declaring it in the comments of the entry. Valid votes are FOR, AGAINST, and DEFERENTIAL, which must be represented by appropriate icons. (If there exists more than one Vote from a single Player on a single Post, only the most recent of those Votes is counted.) If a Player leaves the game or goes idle, eir Vote no longer counts.

A vote of DEFERENTIAL is a vote of faith in the decision of the Emperor. The vote will count as the same as the Emperor's vote. If the Emperor votes DEFERENTIAL, or there is no Emperor, any DEFERENTIAL votes are not counted.

If the Player who made a Voting Post has not cast an explicit Vote on it, eir Vote is counted as FOR.

Enactment

If a Voting Post's counted FOR votes exceed or equal Quorum and that Post has been open for voting for at least 12 hours, or it has been open for voting for at least 48 hours and more than half of its votes are FOR, then any Admin Staff may mark that Post as Passed. This action is known as Enacting.Note that proposals are not open for voting during Hiatus. However, no Proposal may become Enacted unless either there is only one Player or a Player other than the one who proposed it has voted on it.

If a Voting Post has enough AGAINST votes that it could not be Enacted without one of those votes being changed, or if all Players have voted on it and it still cannot be Enacted, or if the Player who proposed it has voted AGAINST it, or if it has been open for voting for at least 48 hours and half or fewer of its votes are FOR, then any Admin Staff may mark that Voting Post as Failed. When the proposer votes against eir own proposal, that vote may not be changed.

Whenever an Admin marks a Post as passed or failed e must report the following information on the proposal:

  1. the final tally of for to against votes, or whether the proposal was self-killed or vetoed
  2. the time of enactment or failure
  3. the identity of the enacting or failing admin

Calls for Judgment

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

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

Gamestate Tracking

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

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

A non-official post may not through editing of the blog be changed into an official post.

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

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

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

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

Dynasties

BlogNomic is divided into a number of Rounds, referred to as Dynasties.

Each Dynasty has a single Emperor and is named according to the number of times which that Player has been Emperor (or Emperor equivalent) (eg. "The First Dynasty of Myke").

The Emperor has the following powers:

  • E may veto any Proposal; that Proposal immediately fails. (This veto may be contested with a CfJ if it is thought excessively unreasonable.)
  • E may change the BlogNomic header, the colour scheme and the voting icons, whenever e likes.

A page of Dynasty Records is kept on a separate weblog, recording events that took place during past Dynasties, noting eir themes, eir Emperor or equivalent, interesting rules, large arguments, the winning move, etc. A Dynasty record must accurately reflect the Dynasty it refers to. Players may submit Dynasty Records to the Emperor.

Metadynasties

If at any time there is no Emperor, any Player may propose that BlogNomic enter into a Metadynasty.

Metadynasties are named according to the number of Metadynasties that have occured (eg. "Third Metadynasty") unless the name is changed (see below).

During a Metadynasty:

  • The VETO icon may not be used.
  • Any player may propose a new header, colour scheme, Metadynasty name, and/or voting icons. If such a proposal passes, the changes will be made by any Admin.
  • A vote of DEFERENTIAL becomes an explicit abstention.

Any Rule may supercede these clauses.

A Metadynasty ends when a Player becomes Emperor, by any means.

Victory and Ascension

If a Player believes e has achieved victory as specified in the current Ruleset and no active DoV has been posted by em, e may Make a Post to the Blognomic frontpage entitled "Declaration of Victory". As soon as it is posted, a Declaration of Victory (hereafter referred as a DoV) becomes Active and remains so until it passes or fails. No Player may have more than one active DoV pending at any time.

Whenever a DoV becomes active and there is not a Hiatus in effect, a Hiatus begins. So long as a Hiatus is in effect, the only game actions that may be taken are those covered by laws 1.2, 1.6, and 1.9. A Hiatus may not end if either of the following stipulations are false and ends once they are both true:

  • There is no active DoV.
  • There are no pending CFJs.

Every Player may vote on an active DoV, saying whether e believes the poster has achieved victory or not (using the FOR and AGAINST vote icons). If a single Player votes more than once on the same active DoV, only the most recent of those Votes is counted.

At least two of the following three stipulations must be true before a DoV may pass or fail.:

  • 12 hours have passed since the posting of that DoV.
  • Less than 24 hours have passed since the posting of that DoV and the current Emperor has voted upon it.
  • 24 hours have passed since the posting of that DoV.

If two of these stipulations are true, a Quorum of Players have voted on that DoV and more than half of the Players who have voted on that DoV have voted FOR, it passes, any other active DoV immediately fails and the poster of the passed Declaration is considered to have officially won the Dynasty - the Dynasty ends.

If two of these stipulations are true and at least half of the Players who have voted on a DoV have voted AGAINST or two of these stipulations are true and less than a Quorum of Players have voted on that DoV, that DoV fails.

If no clear decision is reached after 24 hours a DoV has been posted, that DoV fails.

At the winner's discretion, e may choose another active Player to be the current Emperor for the next dynasty. This is known as Passing the Mantle. If the selected Player agrees, then all rights and responsibilities of the Emperor transfer to the selected Player. If the winner makes no mention of Passing the Mantle, it is assumed that the winner has decided to become the next Emperor.

When a Dynasty ends, all Players' GNDT stats are reset to zero or blank.

The Hiatus then continues until the new Emperor posts an Ascension Address to the BlogNomic weblog - this shall specify the new Emperor's chosen theme for the new round, and may optionally include a proclamation that any number of Rules will be repealed, and/or that the words "Player" and "Emperor" will be replaced with new theme-appropriate terms. If the new Emperor chooses not to repeal a rule, e may also replace any keyword in those rules with a new theme-appropriate term. The remaining rules, after the new Emperor's proclamation, shall be renumbered to keep a sequential progression. The new Emperor may also proclaim at the Ascension Address the veto of any Pending Proposals.

Upon posting this Address, and having made the Ruleset changes, the Hiatus period ends and the new Dynasty commences.

The current Emperor may not declare victory in eir own dynasty.

Rules

...

Glossary

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

  • It is noted that where a Proposal would amend the effects of Proposal Enactment, this does not apply to its own enactment unless explicitly stated (eg. a proposal proposing that enacted proposals earn their writer a banana when enacted would not earn a banana for its own writer, when enacted).
  • Rules which trigger on Enactment or Failure of a Proposal are the responsibility of the acting Admin, who is responsible to check if Quorum is met at the moment of the Enactment.
  • Appropriate Icons: For use in voting, a check box http://blognomic.com/images/vote/for.gif shall represent a vote FOR, an X http://blognomic.com/images/vote/against.gif shall represent a vote AGAINST, an I http://blognomic.com/images/vote/imperial.gif shall represent a vote of DEFERENTIAL, and an Imperial Seal (currently http://blognomic.com/images/vote/seal.gif) shall represent the Imperial Veto.
  • The "subject" of a blog entry is the in the Title of the entry. Any entry that does not have exactly one subject is not valid.
  • "Posts" and "comments" refer only to those made to the BlogNomic weblog at blognomic.com
  • A keyword defined by a rule supersedes the normal English usage of the word. A keyword defined in this glossary supersedes that defined by a rule. (eg. A rule specifying "Bananas are Blue" cannot be overruled by posting a dictionary definition or a photo of a banana, and a rule specifying "every day is Sunday" will be overruled by the glossary entry below.)
  • Unless otherwise specified, game variables defined to hold numeric values can hold only non-negative integers, and any action that would set those values below zero instead sets them to zero. Any situation which would require a roll of DiceX when X is zero or lower always yields a value of 0 unless stated otherwise.
  • Superficial differences between the spelling of geographic versions of English, e.g, British English, American English, Australian English shall be construed as irrelevant for the purposes of play.
  • Gamestate is defined as any information which the Ruleset regulates the alteration of, such as Countries' names and the blog colour scheme.

Typographic Conventions

  • Italicized text is not considered part of the ruleset and may be used to clarify rules with examples, notes and flavor text. For example, this italicized text provides an example of the use of italicized text.
  • Words in section 2 of the ruleset using a definition derived from section 2 of the ruleset rather than an English definition should be in bold, and a reference to the rule (if it is not the rule containing the word and the word has not been already referenced in the rule) that defines the word appended to it.

Timespans

  • References to "a day" (as an entity rather than a duration, eg. "Sunday") refer to that day in the timezone of the BlogNomic blog, which is considered to be GMT for all purposes.
  • References to a "week" refer to the period of time between the start of a Monday and the end of the following Sunday.
  • All references to time must be either specific or defined within the ruleset to be considered achievable in the gamestate. Abstract concepts of time (e.g. "dinnertime", "twilight") cannot be achieved until they fulfil one of these criteria.
  • An action which may be taken 'often' may be taken once per day, but not more than once every six hours.
  • An action which may be taken 'occasionally' may be taken once per week, but not more than once per twenty-four hours.

Keywords

  • Quorum is equal to half the number of Players, rounded down, plus one.

Dice

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

Spivak

  • The Spivak pronouns used in Blognomic are:
    • Subject case: "e";
    • Object case: "em";
    • Possessive Adjective case: "eir";
    • Possessive Pronoun case: "eirs";
    • Reflexive case: "emself".

IEEE

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