Welcome to BlogNomic, a self-modifying game where changing the rules is a move. Players make blog posts proposing alterations to the ruleset, discussing and casting votes in the comments: if enough vote in favour, the rules are changed and play continues.

The game has been running since 2003 and resets every month or so. Have a look around the wiki for more information and history, or join our Discord. New players are always welcome to join the game at any time.

Saturday, April 26, 2025

Proposal: The Clocktower

To “Phases”, add a paragraph:-

Each Agent has a publicly tracked Clock value, representing the number of hours that they generally expect to take to submit their Routes this dynasty (not including time taken for private negotiations that may delay this). An Agent may change their Clock at any time.

Probably worth foregrounding the question of how quickly people are expecting the game to run, with Qenya and Lendunistus now having been due for 86 hours. If we have a clear majority and some outliers, it’d be good to know that that’s what’s happening.

Saturday, April 26, 2025

Proposal: Perfectly Balanced

Add the following to “Routes”

Each Agent can also has a Bid which is privately tracked by the Concierge and is a integer between 1 and 10 inclusive and defaults to 1. An Agent may change their Bid as a virtual action.

Add a subrule to “Guards and Burglars” called “The Sideline”

An Agent may be Sidelined but defaults to not being Sidelined. For the purposes of The Break-In, if an Agent is Sidelined they are not considered to be a Guard or a Burglar unless explicitly stated otherwise

Add the following steps to the start of to the Break In

* If there are more Guards than Burglars, randomly select a Guard which has the lowest Bid among all Guards and make them Sidelined. Repeat this process until the number of Guards equals the number of Burglars
* If there are more Burglars than Guards, randomly select a Burglar which has the lowest Bid among all Burglars and make them Sidelined. Repeat this process until the number of Burglars equals the number of Guards

In “The Break In” after the step “For each Burglar that encountered no Guards, set their Infamy to 12 minus the number of spots in their Route that are Grounds, minus 2 (to a minimum of 0) if they encountered a Camera Trap, plus 4 for every artifact they are holding.” add the following steps

* For each Sidelined Guard, set their Fame to be the average Fame of all Guard, rounded down.
* For each Sidelined Burglar, set their Infamy to be the average Infamy of all Burglars, rounded down.

In “The Break In” replace “If any Burglar who Encountered no Guards during this atomic action is holding at least one Artifact, increase the Successes of all Burglars by one; otherwise, increase the Successes of all Guards by 1.” with

* If any Burglar who Encountered no Guards during this atomic action is holding at least one Artifact, increase the Successes of all Burglars by one, including Sidelined Burglars; otherwise, increase the Successes of all Guards by 1, including Sidelined Guards.

In “The Break In” replace “The Agents disperse: set every Agent to be a Civilian, all Locations to blank, all Routes to blank.” with

* The Agents disperse: set every Agent to be a Civilian, all Locations to blank, all Routes to blank, all Bids to 1 and make every Agent no longer Sidelined

The idea is that if the teams are unbalanced, we randomly pick people so they don’t count for the round anymore. They can still score a success, but they can’t catch people or properly steal stuff.

The bid system allows a group working together to know whose route is going to go last. But of course its all secret so you could betray people and bid higher.

This opens the door to simply end a round early, cutting off people who haven’t submitted a route, and stuff remaining balanced. Also helps handle people going idle

Proposal: Rat Catchers Redeux

Add a new rule named “Accusations” with the following text:

An Accusation is a Story Post - Votable Matter with a title that starts with the text “Accusation:” followed by the name of an Agent. The author of an Accusation is the Accuser for that Accusation, and the Agent named in an Accusation title is the Accused for that Accusation. Members of an Accusation are the set of all Agents (including the Accuser) whose type (Guard or Burglar) are the same as the Accuser.

If the current Phase is Planning the Break-In, any Agent may post an Accusation if all of the following criteria are true:
* That Agent is not a Civilian
* The Accused is same type of Agent (Guard or Burglar) as that Agent
* The Accused does not have more Successes than that Agent
* There is not a Pending Accusation whose Accuser is the same type of Agent (Guard or Burglar) as that Agent
* There have been less than 2 Accusations posted since the most recent performance of Breaking In

When determining an Accusation’s Quorum, Popular, or Unpopular status, only the Members of that Accusation are included. Votes on an Accusation by Agents that are not Members of that Accusation are treated as invalid.

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

* It is Popular.
* It has been open for voting for at least 24 hours.
* It has not been Withdrawn.

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

* It is Unpopular.
* It has been Withdrawn.

When an Accusation is Enacted, the Admin Enacting it must change the type of that Accusation’s Accused to Civilian.

In the rule “The Break-In”, after the text “If every Agent has a complete Route,” add the text “and there are no Pending Accusations,”

Same as before except I added criteria where the Accused cannot have more Successes than the Accuser, to prevent the scenario that ais523 described where the Agents that are behind in victory simply BAMPAM the leader.

Missing Route reminder

Per the Reminders rule, this is a notification that the game is still waiting for the remaining Burglars Lendunistus and Qenya to submit their Routes. They were reminded to do so more than 24 hours ago.

(For game speed context: the current “Planning the Break-in” phase began at 17:30UTC on Tuesday. Two plans had been received from Burglars within the first 25 hours. It’s now been 65 hours.)

Thursday, April 24, 2025

Proposal: Lest we become too successful

As a new paragraph at the end of “Guards and Burglars”, add:

If a particular Agent currently has more Successes than every other Agent, and also had more Successes than every other Agent immediately prior to the most recent Breaking In action, that Agent has achieved victory.

I think we need a victory condition before we’ve had too many Break-Ins – otherwise the players who are behind are unlikely to vote for one, and the dynasty will eventually end up collapsing due to lack of victory condition (this sort of thing tends to happen a lot when we don’t have an early victory condition, because after a while the set of players in contention grows too small for them to be able to vote for one).

I tried to pick a victory condition that seems achievable within a reasonable length of time, given how slowly the Break-Ins are going, without being too likely to be decided by random chance.

Proposal: I Smell a Rat

Add a new rule named “Accusations” with the following text:

An Accusation is a Story Post - Votable Matter with a title that starts with the text “Accusation:” followed by the name of an Agent. The author of an Accusation is the Accuser for that Accusation, and the Agent named in an Accusation title is the Accused for that Accusation. Members of an Accusation are the set of all Agents (including the Accuser) whose type (Guard or Burglar) are the same as the Accuser.

If the current Phase is Planning the Break-In, any Agent may post an Accusation if all of the following criteria are true:
* That Agent is not a Civilian
* The Accused is same type of Agent (Guard or Burglar) as that Agent
* There is not a Pending Accusation whose Accuser is the same type of Agent (Guard or Burglar) as that Agent
* There have been less than 2 Accusations posted since the most recent performance of Breaking In

When determining an Accusation’s Quorum, Popular, or Unpopular status, only the Members of that Accusation are included. Votes on an Accusation by Agents that are not Members of that Accusation are treated as invalid.

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

* It is Popular.
* It has been open for voting for at least 24 hours.
* It has not been Withdrawn.

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

* It is Unpopular.
* It has been Withdrawn.

When an Accusation is Enacted, the Admin Enacting it must change the type of that Accusation’s Accused to Civilian.

In the rule “The Break-In”, after the text “If every Agent has a complete Route,” add the text “and there is no Pending Accusation,”

I think we need something more interactive to jazz up this dynasty. Everything is secret info and there’s not a whole lot of excitement while folks are planning their routes.

Since it’s on-theme for Guards and Burglars to betray their side and cooperate for mutual benefit, how about a way to rat out the traitors?

Proposal: Inside Job

In the subrules of “Preparation Actions”, replace all instances of “that only Burglars can perform” and “that only Guards can perform” with “that any Agent can perform”, then replace all instances of “after a Burglar performs” and “after a Guard performs” with “after an Agent performs”.

No narrative reason why subversive agents couldn’t choose to take these actions against the interests of their team.

Proposal: Lights Out

Reached quorum 6 votes to 0. Enacted by Kevan.

Adminned at 25 Apr 2025 10:52:29 UTC

Add a subrule to “Preparation Actions” called “Cutting the Power”:-

“Cutting the Power” is a virtual Preparation Action that only Burglars can perform. When this action is performed, until the next Break-In action has completed, Burglars are never considered to encounter Camera Traps, the Alarmed effects of Artifacts do not apply, and Keycards can’t be taken.

Wednesday, April 23, 2025

Proposal: Second Chances

Reached quorum 7 votes to 0. Enacted by Kevan.

Adminned at 24 Apr 2025 18:28:18 UTC

In the rule “Guards and Burglars”, insert the following text as the second paragraph:

Each Agent has a Protecting and Thieving, which are both publicly tracked numbers that default to 0 (unless otherwise specified in other rules).

In the same rule, replace the bulleted list with the following text:

* If there are more Burglars than Guards, make them a Guard and increase their Protecting by 1
* If there are more Guards than Burglars, make them a Burglar and increase their Thieving by 1
* If there are as exactly many Guards as Burglars:
** If their Thieving is greater than their Protecting, make them a Guard and increase their Protecting by 1
** If their Protecting is greater than their Thieving, make them a Burglar and increase their Thieving by 1
** If neither of the above are true, make them either a Guard or a Burglar in a secrely random manner, then increase their Protecting by 1 if they were made a Guard or their Thieving by 1 if they were made a Burglar

In the rule “Guards and Burglars”, add a subrule named “Career History” with the following text:

The default values for Protecting and Thieving are defined per Agent as follows:

* ais523: 2 Protecting, 0 Thieving
* Clucky: 2 Protecting, 0 Thieving
* Darknight: 2 Protecting, 0 Thieving
* DoomedIdeas: 1 Protecting, 1 Thieving
* JonathanDark: 0 Protecting, 2 Thieving
* lendunistus: 1 Protecting, 1 Thieving
* qenya: 1 Protecting, 1 Thieving
* SingularByte: 0 Protecting, 2 Thieving
* Trapdoorspyder: 1 Protecting, 1 Thieving

Fixed the increase amount this time from “Always the Bridesmaid, Never the Bride” comments

Proposal: Always the Bridesmaid, Never the Bride

Withdrawn to revise. Failed by Kevan.

Adminned at 23 Apr 2025 18:43:44 UTC

In the rule “Guards and Burglars”, insert the following text as the second paragraph:

Each Agent has a Protecting and Thieving, which are both publicly tracked numbers that default to 0.

In the same rule, replace the bulleted list with the following text:

* If there are more Burglars than Guards, make them a Guard and increase their Protecting
* If there are more Guards than Burglars, make them a Burglar and increase their Thieving
* If there are as exactly many Guards as Burglars:
** If their Thieving is greater than their Protecting, make them a Guard and increase their Protecting
** If their Protecting is greater than their Thieving, make them a Burglar and increase their Thieving
** If neither of the above are true, make them either a Guard or a Burglar in a secrely random manner, then increase their Protecting if they were made a Guard or their Thieving if they were made a Burglar

Set the Protecting and Thieving of each Agent to the following:

* ais523: 2 Protecting, 0 Thieving
* Clucky: 2 Protecting, 0 Thieving
* Darknight: 2 Protecting, 0 Thieving
* DoomedIdeas: 1 Protecting, 1 Thieving
* JonathanDark: 0 Protecting, 2 Thieving
* lendunistus: 1 Protecting, 1 Thieving
* qenya: 1 Protecting, 1 Thieving
* SingularByte: 0 Protecting, 2 Thieving
* Trapdoorspyder: 1 Protecting, 1 Thieving

When the Guards and Burglars are otherwise equal, this determines whether the next pick becomes a Guard or a Burglar depending on which they were more of in the past, so that everyone might get a chance to be a Guard or a Burglar at some point, on average, without putting people on the same team every time either. It’s still possible due to random luck that an Agent might always be one or the other.

Tuesday, April 22, 2025

Patrol Assessment: Guard Noise

Clinks and shuffling noises drift across the cold, still air of the town square. One Noisy Guard has a route with V as the fourth spot and V as the ninth. A second Noisy Guard has a route with K as the fourth spot and K as the ninth.

Monday, April 21, 2025

Proposal: Discovering the Meaning of a List

Reached quorum 8 votes to 1. Enacted by Kevan.

Adminned at 22 Apr 2025 16:12:14 UTC

In the rule “The Break-In”, after the text “where Discovered is a list of pairs of Agents and Spots” add the following text:

in which new entries to Discovered are always added to the end of the list and duplicate entries are allowed

Since the debate about lists has come to the conclusion that we should define a list per use in its specific dynasty, here it is: a definition of a list specifically for its use in this dynasty.

Proposal: Tiptoe through the Tulips

Reached quorum 7 votes to 0. Enacted by Kevan.

Adminned at 22 Apr 2025 16:10:41 UTC

In the rule “Skills and Flaws”, replace the Effect of Quiet with the following text:

Information about this Agent is not revealed to other Agents with the Observant skill, as described in “Assessing the Patrols” and “The Break-In”.

In the rule “Assessing the Patrols”, after the text “Leak the Routes of all Guards without a Flaw of Noisy privately to every Burglar with the Observant Skill”, add the following text:

, skipping over Guards with the Quiet Skill

This is what Kevan was trying to fix earlier. With this change, the wording adopted for Quiet is similar to Observant, just in the opposite direction, and the handling of Quiet in Assessing the Patrols is similar to the handling in The Break-In.

Proposal: Fourtifact

Reached quorum 8 votes to 0. Enacted by Kevan.

Adminned at 22 Apr 2025 16:08:46 UTC

In “Valuables”, replace the first two items of the definition of the “Scattering Valuables” atomic action with:

* Add 4 artifacts to the list of artifacts

Guard vs. Burglar balance is struggling even under the present ruleset, and with pending and recent proposals to make things harder for the Burglars, is likely to fall off even further. Guaranteeing 4 Artifacts gives Burglars more of a chance, as it makes it harder for the Guards to cover them all.

Proposal: Click-Click-Click-Clunk

Reached quorum 7 votes to 0. Enacted by Kevan.

Adminned at 22 Apr 2025 16:07:36 UTC

Add a new Artifact trait of “Locked” to the table in “Valuables”, with this effect:

Can’t be taken in the first two Minutes of a Break-In, or by Burglars who weren’t present in this Artifact’s Location during both of the previous two Minutes.

In the Effect of “Keycard”, replace “The Alarmed effects of other Artifacts do not apply” with:-

The Alarmed and Locked effects of other Artifacts do not apply

Replace the Effect of “Disguised” with:-

Can’t be taken by Burglars who are not Observant.

Add to the end of that rule:-

If an Artifact “can’t be taken” in a certain circumstance, this means that if an Agent would start to hold it in that situation, the Artifact instead does not have its Location changed.

A type of Artifact that takes some time to steal, and which can also be bypassed by a Keycard.

Also creating and reusing a generic “can’t be taken” keyword, based on Disguised.

Proposal: Soft Shoe Shuffle

Withdrawn. Failed by Kevan.

Adminned at 21 Apr 2025 13:02:16 UTC

In the “Quiet” skill effect in “Skills and Flaws”, replace “The Agent’s name is not revealed to Agents with the Observant skill” with:-

The Agent’s Route is not leaked to Agents with the Observant skill

Agents’ names are not revealed when leaking Routes anyway.

Saturday, April 19, 2025

Call for Judgment: An Orderly Way to Describe a List

Fewer than a quorum not voting AGAINST. Failed 2 votes to 6 by Kevan.

Adminned at 21 Apr 2025 16:55:58 UTC

Add the following to “Numbers and Variables”

Unless otherwise specified, a list can contain repeated elements, the elements of a list remain in the order in which they were added to the list, and when an item is added to a list, it is added to the end.

Unless otherwise specified, a set or collection cannot contain repeated elements, and when an item is added to a set or collection, it is added alphabetically (if its text based), in increasing order (if its is numeric) or at the end (in any other circumstances).

At their earliest convenience, the Concierge should inform all Agents who had a non-empty Discovery during the most recent Breaking In of their Discovery, using the above definition of a list.

I found Clucky’s use of the words “ordered” and “unordered” to be confusing and somewhat contradictory. This lays out the ordering of lists, sets, and collections in a more explicit way.

Call for Judgment: What’s a List?

Fewer than a quorum not voting AGAINST. Failed 1 vote to 6 by Kevan.

Adminned at 21 Apr 2025 10:07:32 UTC

Add the following to “Numbers and Variables”

Unless otherwise specified, a list is ordered and can contain repeated elements and when an item is added to a list, it is added to the end.

Unless otherwise specified, a set or collection is unordered and cannot contain repeated elements and when an item is added to a set or collection, it is added alphabetically (if its text based), in increasing order (if its is numeric) or at the end (in any other circumstances)

At their earliest convenience, the Concierge should inform all Agents who had a non-empty Discovery during the most recent breaking in of their Discovery, using the above definition of a list.

We should probably clarify what lists and sets/collections mean. Using general cs terms makes sense to me but happy to go with an alternative I think the important thing is that we’re all playing with the same understanding

Currently, Kevan ran the break in with Discovery not containing duplicate elements, and possibly not being in order. I think duplicates should’ve been revealed. But it all boils down to a list not being properly defined in the glossary.

Proposal: Shadow Boxing

Popular, 8-0. Enacted by JonathanDark.

Adminned at 21 Apr 2025 06:06:32 UTC

In the shadow ruleset, add a paragraph to the end of the rule “The Break-In”:-

After performing a Breaking In action the Concierge must then replace the full dynastic ruleset with a copy of the shadow ruleset.

If the proposal “Commas matter” enacted, replace “that are Grounds minus” with “that are Grounds, minus” in the shadow ruleset version of “The Break-In”.

If the proposal “Electric Boogaloo” enacted, add ” (which also can be referred to as the Break-In, the Break In, or Breaking-In)” after “may perform the following atomic action of Breaking In” in the shadow ruleset.

Then replace the text of the rule “The Break-In” in the dynastic ruleset with the version currently in the shadow ruleset.

A fixed reproposal of Waiting in the Shadows, also taking other queue proposals into account. (For added context, the shadow ruleset currently contains Break-In amendments from Okay But Like What Are They that weren’t copied to the live ruleset.)