Tuesday, July 23, 2013

Protosal: Leg Cramp

Somebody should ensure that this finally makes sense and propose it:

Enact a new rule entitled “o_O”:

There is a GNDT column entitled “Clothing,” defaulting to “Covered”. There is a wiki page entitled “Style Logs”, with one section (referred to as their Style Log) for each Player.

Any Player (referred to as the Leaker) may, as a daily action, Guess the Style of any Player (referred to as the Target) (whose Style has not been Guessed in the previous 24 hours) by submitting their Guess as a Story Post titled “Exposing: [Target’s name]”. A Guess is Valid unless Nullified or Confirmed. A Guess is Confirmed if it is undisputedly known to be its Target’s Style.

If there are one or more Valid Guesses of a Player’s Style, their Clothing must be “Half-Naked”. If there are one or more Confirmed Guesses of a Player’s Style, their Clothing must be “Exposed”. No Exposed Player may change their Style or Declare or Achieve Victory.

Any Half-Naked Player may Nullify a Valid Guess of their Style in a Declaration of Victory or in the comments of the Guess’ corresponding post by revealing their nonce and showing that, when properly hashed with the Guess, it does not yield a hash agreeing with their Style hash in the GNDT. When a Player Nullifies a Guess of their Style, they shall record their revealed nonce and current GNDT Style hash in their Style Log. They may also change their nonce (but not their Style) and update their GNDT Style hash, with the comment “Nonce changed after Nullification”.

If a Half-Naked Player Declares Victory, they must, in their DoV, Nullify all remaining Valid Guesses of their Style. If any Player Declares Victory, they must, in their DoV, reveal a complete record of their Styles that agrees with their Style Log. If they do not agree, the Player becomes Exposed and their DoV may be failed by any admin.

Comments

Sphinx:

23-07-2013 12:23:39 UTC

for

kikar:

23-07-2013 12:28:04 UTC

for

Arlnoff:

23-07-2013 13:36:04 UTC

for Thanks Skju. That proposal really needed that.

Kevan: he/him

23-07-2013 14:09:01 UTC

This is just a regular post formatted as an informal “protosal” - Skju is suggesting that we proof-read it before anyone tries proposing or voting on it.

So it’s like a normal proposal, except nothing happens if we’re in favour of it.

Purplebeard:

23-07-2013 14:09:15 UTC

This is why I hate these proto-proposals.

Arlnoff:

23-07-2013 14:10:15 UTC

Yeah, I just read the title more carefully. Whoops.

Arlnoff:

23-07-2013 14:12:47 UTC

Maybe if we just don’t preface the title with “Protosal:” and instead use something that looks less like an official proposal. And Purplebeard, this is like the third iteration of this idea so I can see why Skju wants to make absolutely sure it is well written.

Purplebeard:

23-07-2013 14:22:02 UTC

Part of my problem is that this is the third iteration within 24 hours. People are more likely to come up with suggestions for improvement if they get the chance to read the proposal before the next attempt is posted and takes up another screen on the main page. The inevitable confusion caused by the post title annoys me even more.

(by the by, Kevan’s comment wasn’t there when I submitted my first one, but it works just as well with the added context, which I greatly enjoy)

Arlnoff:

23-07-2013 14:23:02 UTC

Ah, I see. Good point.

Larrytheturtle:

23-07-2013 18:48:22 UTC

for

Skju:

23-07-2013 20:46:23 UTC

No complaints?

redtara: they/them

23-07-2013 22:27:30 UTC

I don’t like wiki pages if we can avoid it, but I don’t really think we can avoid it.

Skju:

24-07-2013 02:14:25 UTC

I think you could apply a zero-knowledge proof to the issue, but that would probably be more complicated than a wiki page. :P

redtara: they/them

24-07-2013 08:03:14 UTC

Yeah, I’d prefer the wiki page :p

Kevan: he/him

24-07-2013 08:58:32 UTC

The other thing about Protosals is that they get less scrupulous attention than Proposals, because almost nothing is at stake - if a flawed or loopholed Proposal passes, then the inattentive voter may suffer. If a flawed Protosal is waved through, nothing happens until the Proposal is made, and voters will have to scrupulously read the follow-up Proposal anyway to make sure that the final wording didn’t break (or try to scam) anything.

I haven’t read this one in detail, but I think we can manage without a wiki, and just require the same information to be clearly stated in the accusatory blog posts - the player can link back to them (or other players can scramble to find one that contradicts the player’s claim) when victory is declared.

Sphinx:

24-07-2013 13:14:44 UTC

I’m having a little problem with making the Nonce public, since it’d be quite easy to find out your style by just hashing the 1000 possible styles with your nonce if it’s not secret anymore.

Arlnoff:

24-07-2013 13:44:45 UTC

Sphinx just proved Kevan’s point. Sphinx, you change your Nonce after revealing it for the proof, then rehash your Style and submit the new hash to the GNDT.

Kevan, the thing that is NOT revealed in the blog posts (and can’t be) is the Player’s actual Style at that point. There is currently no way to change one’s style, but if there ever is, Style must be tracked.

Kevan: he/him

24-07-2013 15:01:04 UTC

No, Sphinx makes a good and serious point. The rule requires a player to reveal their nonce - once someone’s done that, all you have to do is work out the hash of every possible Style plus that nonce, and see which of them matches the public hash they were displaying.

The proposed rule says “When a Player Nullifies a Guess of their Style, they shall record their revealed nonce and current GNDT Style hash in their Style Log.” - I’m just saying we could record this same information in comments to the blog post, rather than a dedicated wiki page.

Arlnoff:

24-07-2013 15:09:53 UTC

Oh. Ok, now I see. And yes, that info could be kept in a post. Anyway, I think PurpleBeard’s new proposal covers all these issues and we can leave all this complicated stuff behind. We’ll see.