I’ve put a new mini-essay up on the wiki. For posterity’s sake, I’ll put the text up here for whatever purpose is desired.

English has this really nice feature called the attributive verb, the upshot of which is this: There are words that implicitly exist in the rules in relation to an action that don’t need defining unless you want them to mean something else.

For example: If a rule exists that says, “Individuals may Punch a Spaceman on Friday,” then it is perfectly reasonable to refer to the Individual who is Punching as the Punching Individual, or to the Spaceman who is Punched as the Punched Spaceman, all with no further definition.

In fact, forget attributive verbs, those are perfectly valid words, period. The rules state, “A keyword defined by a rule supersedes the normal English usage of the word,” and, as derivative words are… Well… Derivative, defining Punch also defines the verbs (and any adjective forms of) Punching, Punches and Punched, the noun Puncher, and almost certainly a number of other words I haven’t thought of. Don’t overthink it. It just works.

Replace any instance of Individual/Individuals in the Ruleset with Nobleman/Noblemen.

Farsight must hereby idle.

Farsight must hereby idle.

Reword the first four Ribbons in the “Ribbons” rule to:-

* Ribbon of Letters: Own an Estate with Furniture from more Eras than every other Estate (the Eras are: Age between 0 and 100 years old; Age between 101 and 1000 years old; Age over 1000)
* Ribbon of the Sword: Own an Estate with Romantic Gifts of more different Explicitnesses than every other Estate
* Ribbon of the Bell: Own an Estate with Food of more different Topics than every other Estate
* Ribbon of the Robe: Own an Estate with Art of more different Styles than every other Estate

Enact the failed proposal called Simplify the Item System, then remove line

• Put the item up for auction via a story post.

Add a new rule to the ruleset, entitled The Moonlit Masquerade:

Midsummer approaches, and Louis XIV is throwing a masquerade under the moonlight as a feast of opulence and indulgence on the shortest night of the year. Whoever shines the brightest on this night will be regarded as the most Noble of all Noblemen for the year to come. The Masquerade is to be held on 18th April 2020.

If the Masquerade has elapsed, and one Nobleman is the Champion and is also not Dissolute, then that Nobleman has achieved victory.
If the Masquerade has elapsed, and no Nobleman meets the criterion above, then the single Nobleman who is not Dissolute who possesses the most Ribbons has achieved Victory.

Re-enact Proposal: Je Regrette Tout.

Set the Special Case rule “The Traitor” to Active.

Dearest noblemen of the court,

The fair name of our fair KING has been reviled. Yes, our very own LOUIS XIV (Long Live his Majesty!) has been rebuked by his own subject.

The Accused: Naught

The Offence: Slighting the good name of the KING.
On Slack in the “currentdynasty” channel, Naught said “even Josh mixes things up, and he’s been around for years”.
Moments later, in a true fashion of a traitorous coward, he redacted the name from his vile statement.

This action has caused me personal pain and sorrow to even consider that our KING (hallowed be thy name) could be any less than a shining beacon of nobility. I take umbrage with thee sir Naught! Umbrage I say!

-pencilgame

Add a new rule entitled “Inheritance” as follows:

Each Nobleman has an Heir, which is either No Heir or the name of another Nobleman; this is tracked on the Noblemen wiki page. A Nobleman may update their own Heir at any time.

If a Nobleman becomes idle, Louis XIV may assign all Items in their Estate to the Estate of their Heir, if their Heir is the not No Heir and is the name of a non-Idle Nobleman. Otherwise, Louis XIV may make a new Auction Post, listing the Items that were the former contents of the Estate of the idle Nobleman in question, instead of choosing them randomly as normal.

Ninja idles out automatically after a week’s inactivity. Quorum remains 7.

Create a sub-rule of “Items” called “Royal Patents,” which reads:

There exists a List of Patents, tracked on the Noblemen page of the wiki, which is a list of Items. As a Daily Action, a Nobleman may generate an Item, as per the rule “Items,” and add that Item to the List of Patents. When making an Auction Post, Louis XIV can opt to include one or more Items in the List of Patents as part of the Items to consist of the Auction; Louis XIV may change the name of the Items thus included. Those Items are then deleted from the List of Patents.

A malign interaction between Expression Engine, the platform upon which BlogNomic sits, and PHP has brought about an inflection point. Not to put too fine a point on it: we probably have to change the software used to render the blog, and it has to happen in the next few weeks.

Server admin and former Nobleman 75th Trombone suggests that we migrate to WordPress. The guarantees the stability of the blog going forward, as WordPress is large and well established, but it does mean that the blog will effectively be wiped and will be starting again from a clean install.

The current blog would be preserved as a read-only archive and the wiki would be unaffected.

We don’t have a precise timescale for this yet but 75th will doubtless update us when he can. Last time we did this we ran the two instances in parallel for a week or so before formally moving over at the end of the dynasty; I expect that we’ll do that again here.

Questions and further comments should go in the comments or on slack. Silence will naturally be taken as assent.

Replace the rule Items with the following:

Items
An item in an auction must have exactly the following 8 properties:
Name, Type, Impact A, Impact B, Style, Age, Explicitness, Topic.

Create an item for auction by carrying out the following Atomic Action:
• Give the item a name.
• Randomly choose one Impact A: +2 Power, +2 Prestige, -X debt, -2 Power, -2 Prestige to a minimum of zero
• Randomly choose one Impact B: +1 Power, +1 Prestige, -1 Power, -1 Prestige to a minimum of zero
• If -X debt is chosen for Impact A, secretly randomly choose a value for X: a number between zero and the median average Debt of all Noblemen
• Randomly choose one Type: Art, Furniture, Food, or Romantic Gifts
• Randomly choose one Style: Mannerist, Renaissance, Byzantine, Islamic, Far Eastern
• Randomly choose one Age: a number between 1 and 2000
• Randomly choose one Explicitness: Romantic, Lewd, Bawdy, Obscene.
• Randomly choose one Topic: Fruit, Meat, Candies, Wine
• Put the item up for auction via a story post.
If an item’s Impact B is either “-1 Power” or “-1 Prestige to a minimum of zero”, that item is Undesirable. If an item’s impact A is either “-2 Power” or ”-2 Prestige to a minimum of zero”, that item is Undesirable. Otherwise, it is Desirable.
Upon winning the item in an auction, Impact A and Impact B are applied to the winner.
Upon successful sale of an item at auction, the Nobleman who created the item is given +1 Power and +1 Prestige.

Replace the rule Ribbons with the following:

Ribbons
There exist five Ribbons, which are (along with their Requirements):
• Ribbon of Letters: Own an Estate with Furniture with Age between 0 and 100 years old, 100 and 1000 years old, and 1000 and 2000 years old
• Ribbon of the Sword: Own an Estate with Romantic Gifts of every available Explicitness
• Ribbon of the Bell: Own an Estate with Food of every available Topic
• Ribbon of the Robe: Own an Estate with Art from every available Style
• Ribbon of the Chancery: Have both the highest Prestige and the highest Power.
Each Ribbon may be held by no more than one Nobleman. By default, no Noblemen hold any Ribbons. Ribbons are tracked on the Noblemen wikipage. If all Ribbons are held, and one Nobleman has the most Ribbons, they are the Duchess of Ribbons. If a Nobleman is the only Nobleman to meet the Requirement of a Ribbon, they may (after removing it from any Nobleman who already holds it) hold that Ribbon.
When a nobleman goes idle, they cease to hold any Ribbons they were holding.

You can see the ribbon rule has barely changed. “Ingredient” was changed to “Topic” and “Champion” was changed to “Duchess of Ribbons”. The term “Champion” is too confusing with the term “Victor”, the winner of the game. I also changed “possible” to “available”, making no real difference other than standardization of language.

What happens to the old items?

Louis XIV shall use common sense to convert currently owned items from old style to new style while bearing in mind the spirit of this proposal is to reward those adventurous early adopters.
In areas where there is no common-sense conversion, Louis XIV must roll for new values as shown in the above rule.
To compensate for any perceived value lost during item conversion, the effected players (as determined by Louis XIV) shall receive a one-time debt relief equal to 10% of their current debt.
All currently open auctions will be closed with no winner.

If proposal “Cordon Rouge” is voted into law, the phrase:

• If -X debt is chosen for Impact A, secretly randomly choose a value for X: a number between zero and the median average Debt of all Noblemen

Would become:

• If -X debt is chosen for Impact A, secretly randomly choose a value for X: a number between zero and the Red Line value

If proposal “C’est une conversation” is voted into law, repeal the Locations and Socialiser rules. Both mention item sub-types, which this rule makes obsolete.

Kevan will be acting as pencilgame’s mentor.

Change the text of the rule Excess Spending to read as follows:

If a Nobleman spends to excess then they can expect some consequences. If a Nobleman’s Debt is greater than the median Debt of all Noblemen who have non-zero Debt, then that Nobleman is Dissolute.

A Dissolute Nobleman may not post a Declaration of Victory. If they do then Louis XIV may mark it as failed at any time. They will also have their Bid Messages treated as if they had a Money bid of zero.

As a daily communal action, any Nobleman may reduce the Prestige of any Nobleman with less than -10 Power by 1, to a minimum of zero.

In the rule “Weighted Power Factor”, change all appearaces of the number 0.1 to 1 and change all appearances of the number 0.2 to 2. Multiply the Weighted Power Factor on the Noblemen page by ten.

In the rule “The Lord Privy”, change “At any time, a Nobleman may reduce their Power by 2 and make a comment to any closed Auction Post announcing their intention to Petition the Lord Privy” to “If no other Nobleman has Petitioned the Lord Privy on a given Auction, a Nobleman may reduce their Power by 2 and make a comment to the Auction Post for that Auction announcing their intention to Petition the Lord Privy.”

Dear Noblemen,

I hereby formally announce my arrival and intention to become a player.

Long Live Louis XIV!

- pencilgame

Card and the Duke of Waltham both idle out after seven and nine days’ inactivity respectively. Quorum drops to 7.

To “Money, Prestige and Power”, add a paragraph:-

The median Debt of all Noblemen who have non-zero Debt is known as the Red Line.

In “Appeals”, replace “The median average of all currently active Noblemen’s Debt” with:-

A secretly random number from zero to the Red Line

In “Excess Spending”, replace “If a Nobleman’s Debt is greater than the median Debt of all Noblemen who have non-zero Debt, then that Nobleman is Dissolute.” with:-

If a Nobleman’s Debt is greater than the Red Line, then that Nobleman is Dissolute.

In “Items”, redefine the Valuable Impact’s effect as:-

upon winning a Valuable Item at auction, Louis XIV decreases the winner’s Debt (to a minimum of zero) by a secretly random number from zero to the Red Line