BlogNomic: The First Dynasty of Desertfrog

In the rule “Attainment” replace each instance of the phrase “minus the number of Damage tokens they currently have” with

minus twice the number of Damage tokens they currently have

Add to “Damage”:

An Individual can Grit to lose 1 Flesh Damage and gain 3 Soul Damage.

Add a new place to the list of public places:

Geneva

Add the following to the list of artefacts:

The Cheese Fountain

Description: A plasticy cheese fountain for use in dorm room parties. It is constantly producing molten cheese without input, but none of the cheese ever drains off, so a small monastery of volunteers under the organisation of the Institute works would the clock to safely dispose of the runoff.
Location: Geneva
Protocol: None
Effect: The Cheese Fountain is an Alive Artefact. No Individual may undertake any action that would cause the Cheese Fountain to take damage tokens.

Add a new rule to the ruleset, entitled Cheesing:

As a daily action, any Individual in the same place as the location of the Cheese Fountain may Cheese one of their artefacts by adding the following to it’s description in the ruleset: “It is covered in cheese.”

A cheesed artefact has its attainment value doubled.

If the Proposal “Mind the Gap” has been Enacted—

1. Amend rule 1.7 (“Victory and Ascension”) as follows.

In the paragraph beginning “When a DoV is Enacted…”, omit the last sentence, namely: “During this period, BlogNomic is on Hiatus.”

In the last paragraph, for “but can be overruled in other matters” substitute “but it can be overruled in other matters”.

2. In rule 4.1 (“Keywords”), in the keyword “Hiatus”, in the sentence “If BlogNomic is on Hiatus, Dynastic Actions may not be taken, and new Proposals may not be submitted or Resolved” omit “new”.

Amend “counter” to “token”.

Per the enactment of Missing in Action, I can report that the Institute recovery team sent on Capture #7747 are no longer responding to their assigned callsign. The Capture has been closed.

Add to Fetal Artefacts:

An Individual, as a Daily Action, can Nurture a Fetal Artefact they are carrying to remove 1 Damage counter from it.

In “Attainment”, replace

The first Individual to be the sole Individual who has the most Attainment past the 5th of Feburary 2020 at 12:00 UTC has achieved victory.

with

The first Individual to be the sole Individual who has the most Attainment past the 12th of Feburary 2020 at 12:00 UTC has achieved victory.

Oops

1. In rule 4.1 (“Keywords”), in the keyword “Hiatus”—

If BlogNomic is on Hiatus, game actions defined by the Dynastic Rules or the rule titled “Proposals” may not be taken. If multiple rules require BlogNomic to be on Hiatus at any given time, BlogNomic will continue to be on Hiatus until no rules require it.

for the first sentence substitute—

If BlogNomic is on Hiatus, Dynastic Actions may not be taken, and new Proposals may not be submitted or Resolved.

[As discussed in December, this ensures that special proposal voting (VETO and DEF), which is defined in “Proposals”, is still permitted alongside FOR and AGAINST votes.]

2. Amend rule 1.7 (“Victory and Ascension”) as follows.

Join the third paragraph (beginning “If there is at least…”) with the one preceding it.

Four paragraphs down, for—

If that Individual does not wish to retain their new status, they may pass the role of Director to another Individual by making a post to that effect, provided they haven’t yet made an Ascension Address for the new Dynasty.

substitute—

That Individual may pass the role of Director to another Individual by making a post to that effect, provided they haven’t yet made an Ascension Address for the new Dynasty.

[Improving my own iffy wording.]

For the next paragraph—

A DoV may not be started in the period between an enacted DoV and that DoV’s Ascension Address.

substitute—

Between the enactment of the DoV and the posting of the Ascension Address, no new DoV may be made and BlogNomic is on Hiatus.

and join this paragraph with the one preceding it.

In the next paragraph: for “The new Director will make” substitute “The new Director makes”; in “the terms Individual and Director”, enclose “Individual” and “Director” in quotation marks.

3. In rule 3.3 (“Seasonal Downtime”)—

On the 24th, 25th and 26th of December, BlogNomic is on Hiatus. In addition, game actions defined by the rules “Individuals” and “Victory and Ascension” may not be taken.

before “may not be taken” insert “(with the exception of Voting in DoVs)”. [This ensures there is no problem with 1.7’s “Every Person may cast Votes on that DoV” part, and serves to prevent confusion on this score.]

4. In rule 3.8 (“The Traitor”), in the second paragraph—

If there is no Traitor for the current Dynasty, the Director may secretly randomly select an Individual (other than the Director) and privately inform them that they are the Traitor for the current Dynasty.

after “current Dynasty,” insert “and BlogNomic is not on Hiatus,”. [Closing a loophole: this is not a Dynastic Rule, and it is therefore exempt from the Hiatus prohibitions as currently worded.]

And that’s a bit concerning.  What’s the point of DoVs if you can just propose something saying someone has won?

In “Fetal Artefacts”, replace

X is a string formed as “A B”

with

X is a string formed as “The A B”

Append the string “The ” to the beginning of every Fetal Artefact’s name.

After the third bullet point in “Captures”, add:-

* If any Collectors named an Artefact other than Objective as their suspicion, those Collectors each gain 1 {{flesh}} Damage

Initiate Capture #4.

To the bullet list in “Captures”, add:-

* Announce that the Capture has been closed

If this proposal enacts, the Director is encouraged to state whether Capture #7747 was ever closed.

Make a new rule with the text
The individual named Cuddlebeam has achieved victory

Make a new rule with the text
The individual named Josh has achieved victory

So, I can’t win.

The Marble -> The Glove, then using The Sports Cap to enter the Warp and empty my Collection of all of my Artefacts is the play, yes?

It has really felt horrible to wait and see how the Proposals just kept on coming days after days and there wasn’t much I could do about it. I know it has been plenty of dynasties now that have been won by Pooling, but it seems obvious that Conventional play really just can’t beat a voting bloc to basically Propose someone into victory, using mechanics as euphemisms. My mistake has really been to not make a bigger alliance in the first place. And I know that there has been a deliberate vote bloc strategy because Josh asked an amount of people to vote as a bloc. I also don’t have a winning scam (and despite having a few still up my sleeve, none are useful in this situation. Even having been able to pull a few this dynasty to my advantage hasn’t mattered either, because Proposals are so strong.)

It doesn’t matter how well you can play the game, or even the theme or mechanics - they’re just euphemisms anyways. Proposals are omnipotent.

I’m tired of this dynasty.

Add a new rule called: “Speed”:

The Individual named Tantusar has achieved Victory

Nothing here owo

Between the second-to-last and last paragraphs of “Fetal Artefacts”, insert:

If an Artefact with the name X already exists, remove three {{Spatial}} Damage from that Artefact instead.

In the rule “Containment”, replace “A Researcher may not pick up an Artefact in the Containment Facility, unless they are carrying the Security Pass.” with:-

An Individual may not pick up an Artefact in the Containment Facility, unless they are carrying the Security Pass.

Add the following as a new artefact to the ruleset:

The Sports Cap

Description: A snapback with a white brim and a blue six-panel cap. It has the logo of a British football team stitched into the front, but you can’t make out which one as it appears to be constantly resewing itself.
Location: Unknown.
Protocol: None.
Effect: When an Individual is holding this artefact they may travel to any Place without paying any associated damage costs (for Travel, Swimming etc).

Immediately conduct a recovery (as per the rule entitled Locating Artefacts), with the following changes:

• This recovery may be carried out regardless of whether anybody has moved in the last 16 hours, or whether it has been carried out previously as a daily communal action that day.
• Do not roll for the artefact with an Unknown Location; set the Sports Cap as the Artefact being recovered.

Would anyone be interested in or object to including an optional pronouns field in the member profile settings?

The idea would be that if filled in it could probably sit somewhere next to names in comment sections.

Am open to suggestions for improvement, etc. You have the floor.

Append to “Damage”:

If an Individual or other game object (such as an Artefact) has more than one of a certain type of Damage Token, all of that type may instead be represented by one token followed by the relevant number. (For example, “{{Soul}}x13 {{Flesh}}x4” would be an acceptable representation of an Individual’s Damage Tokens.)

Add a new rule to the ruleset, entitled Accellerant:

The Individual called Cuddlebeam has achieved victory.

Rename the rule Containment to Fetal Containment. Add the following to the end of that rule:

As a daily communal action, any Individual may Remove from the Ruleset an Artefact in the Containment Facility.

Rename the rule The Warp to Fetal Artefacts. Add the following to the end of that rule:

As a daily communal action, any Individual may add 1 Spatial damage to all Fetal Artefacts.

Create a new rule called “Trades”:

An Individual can post a Trade Ad, which is a blog post with the following:
- Its title contains the string “[Trade]”
- Its text body is “Trading X for Y”, where X (known as the Offered Artefact) and Y (known as the Desired Artefact) are Artefacts.

A Trade Ad can be Open or Closed, and begins Open. A Trade Ad can be Closed by its creator if they post a comment to it with the string “[CLOSED]”.

An Individual can perform the action of Fulfill an Trade Ad only if all of the following are true:
- It is Open.
- They are carrying the Trade Ad’s Desired Artefact.
- The Individual who posted the Trade had is holding the Offered Artefact.
- They are at the Location of the Individual that posted that Trade Ad.

An Individual can Fulfill an Open Trade Ad by posting a comment to it with the string “[FULFILLED]”. Doing so sets the Desired Artefact’s Location from yourself to the Individual that posted the Trade Ad and sets the Offered Artefact’s Location from the Individual that posted the Trade Ad to yourself.

A Fulfilled Trade Ad is Closed. Once a Trade Ad is Closed, it can never become Open again.

Add to the list of Esoteric Places:

- The Library:
  - This Location can be Travelled to by an Individual with a Library Pass, but only from Kielce.
  - An Individual at Kielce can Sell Their Soul to gain a Library Pass. This causes their {{soul}} Damage to increase by 10, and for them to gain a Library Pass (which is noted in the Damage column as [Pass]). The Library Pass is not an Artefact.
  - An Individual at the Library can Look Up an Artefact as a daily action and gaining 1 {{reality}} Damage and privately informing the Director of the Artefact they are Looking Up. Upon doing so, the Director should privately inform them of all of the Secrets of “[REDACTED]” strings on that Artefact in a timely fashion, if such Secrets exist.

Add to the rule “Artefacts” a subrule called “The Spruce Needle” as follows:

Description: A single green strand of plant matter, slightly resinous; efforts to verify via DNA testing that it actually fell from a spruce tree have failed.
Location: Unknown
Protocol: If both the Spruce Needle and The [REDACTED] share a Secure Location, no Researcher may choose to begin occupying that Location.
Effect: Any [REDACTED] holding the Spruce Needle may Focus to move The [REDACTED] [REDACTED], The [REDACTED], or The [REDACTED REDACTED] from a [REDACTED] [REDACTED] to a [REDACTED] Location.

Add to the rule “Artefacts” a subrule called “The Flywheel” as follows:

Description: An inactive gyroscope, fully contained in a brass cylinder from which exterior gearing has been stripped, 1.3 meters in diameter.
Location: Unknown
Protocol: A Researcher must [REDACTED] with this Artefact whenever possible.
Effect: This Artefact is [REDACTED]. As its Behaviour it deals 10 [REDACTED] Damage to all Individuals in a randomly chosen [REDACTED] Location.

Add to the rule “Artefacts” a subrule called “The Checkers” as follows:

Description: A set of two polished bone discs with vertically oriented milling around their circumference, which may be stacked. One appears significantly older than the other.
Location: Unknown
Protocol: A [REDACTED] should never carry this Artefact.
Effect: Any [REDACTED] who successfully changes this Artefact’s Location to The Containment Facility is considered to have [REDACTED] [REDACTED].

Except for the first time each word appears in the rule “Damage”, replace the following words as follows, throughout the dynastic ruleset:-

• Flesh with {{flesh}}
• Soul with {{soul}}
• Reality with {{reality}}
• Spatial with {{spatial}}

Then replace “remove 2 non-{{reality}} Damage Tokens” with “remove 2 Damage Tokens (neither of which is a {{reality}} token)”.

Move the Taffy from the Attendant to the Containment Facility.

Add to “Attainment”:

Past the 2nd of Feburary 2020 at 12:00 UTC, an Individual cannot have their Pursuit changed, unless they perform such a change themselves.

Initiate a Capture, code 7747.

After “Votes from Outsiders and Collectors are ignored, on Institute Proposals.” add:-

Votes of FOR, DEFERENTIAL and AGAINST from the Director are ignored, on Institute Proposals.

Select an Artefact at random and replace a randomly-chosen word in its Effect (ignoring words with three or fewer letters) with “[REDACTED]”.

Make the Attendant a researcher.

Deactivate “Imperial Deferentials”.

Add and activate a Special Case, “Interpretative Notes”:

Any instance of italicised text in brackets within the Ruleset (such as this) is an Interpretative Note.

An Interpretative Note has precedence over any Rules it would have precedence over if it was not an Interpretative Note. The remainder of the Ruleset has precedence over that Interpretative Note.

(A Dynastic Rule that contradicts an Interpretative Note in the Dynastic Rules has precedence over that Interpretative Note. A Core Rule that contradicts that Interpretative Note does not, unless it explicitly says it cannot be overruled by a Dynastic Rule. See [[#Prioritisation|Prioritisation]].)

To the end of the Special Case rule Imperial Deferentials, add:

In this case, the Deferential votes of other Individuals are valid votes but count as neither FOR nor AGAINST.

Amend “No Orphan Variables” to:

An Orphan Variable is a dynastic gamestate variable which has neither a reasonable tracking device (eg. a wiki page, and within there is a protrayal of the variable, with a different portrayal for each of the variable’s possible values - including absence as a possible portrayal), nor a reasonable manner in which it can be determined from other gamestate variables, specified in the Ruleset.

An Individual may not take any dynastic actions that are contingent on the specific value of an Orphan Variable.

Amend (if it exists) “{{safehouse}}” to “(S)”

Create a new rule called “Black Market” with:

Individuals have an amount of Money, defaulting to 0. This is tracked on the Individuals page on its own column. An Individual can Sell An Artefact by removing an Artefact they are holding or have in their Collection from the Ruleset to gain 3 Money. As a Daily Action, an Individual can Hire a Service by paying its Money cost. The following are the Services available for such an action, and their Money cost in “[]” brackets:

- Back Alley Doctor [1]: If you are in Eindhoven, remove 1 Flesh Damage Token from yourself.
- Hitman [2]: Add 1 Flesh Damage to an Individual at a Public Location.
- Safehouse [3]: You become Safehoused: you cannot become the target of the Services of other Individuals until you change Location. This is tracked in the Damage column as “{{safehouse}}”.

Add an Agenda Point to “Institute Proposals”:-

* Initiate a Capture with a code number (between 1 and 9999) which has been used by no other Investigations. (This is a High-Cost Agenda Point.)

After the Agenda Points list, add:-

An Institute Proposal may not contain more than one High-Cost Agenda Point.

Add a subrule to “Institute Proposals” called “Captures”:-

For any Capture which has been Initiated in the previous 48 hours:
* Any Researcher (who has not already done so for that Capture) may privately contact the Director naming a single Artefact to be the subject of that Capture;
* Any Collector (who has not already done so for that Capture) may privately contact the Director naming a single Artefact they suspect that the Capture is searching for.

If a Capture has been Initiated more than 48 hours ago and not been closed, the Director may close it by performing the following atomic action:
* Determine the Capture’s Objective in a secretly random manner, from among all Artefacts named as its subject by Researchers under this rule;
* If the Objective is Alive and not Incapacitated, add 7 {{soul}} Damage to it.
* If any Collectors named the Objective as their suspicion, and if the Objective’s Location is Unknown: change the Objective’s Location to the Collection of a secretly random one of those Collectors;
* If the Objective’s Location is still Unknown: change the Objective’s Location to the Containment Facility

Add a new Esoteric Place:

The Cathedral
    - This Place is also a Public Place.
    - This Place can be Travelled to, but only from Jerez. An Individual in The Cathedral can Travel, but only to Jerez.
    - A Individual whose Soul Damage is greater than the mean average all Individuals’ Soul Damage cannot enter The Cathedral.

Append to “Collections”:

A Collection is an Esoteric Place.

Replace the text of “Locating Artefacts” with:

If no Individual has changed Location in the past 16 hours and if an Artefact’s Location is Unknown, any Individual may (as a daily communal action) attempt to recover a lost Artefact by selecting a Public Place with at least one Individual and an Artefact with an Unknown Location (each at random) and applying the following:

* If any Collectors are in the selected Place, one of them is selected at random to become the Artefact’s Location;
* Otherwise if any Individuals are in the selected Place, one of them is selected at random to become the Artefact’s Location

Amend “Each Individual is either a Researcher, a Collector or an Outsider” to “Each Individual is either a Researcher, a Collector, a Cultist or an Outsider”

Amend “An Outsider may become a Collector at any time.” to “An Outsider may become a Collector at any time. An Individual can become a Cultist by removing from the Ruleset two Artefacts they are holding.”

Add a rule called “Cultists” with:

A Cultist can, as a Daily Action, Sacrifice a Artefact they are holding to remove it from the Ruleset and remove 1 Damage Counter from The One.

Add a new Artefact called “The One”:

  Description: It’s a dot-sized extraplanar entity formed by millions of fragments of artefact what-ifs and hypothetical inventions to be. Research points to that it’s a sort of mechanical Black Hole. It has a sort of eerie, but immensely attractive allure…
  Location: Unknown
  Protocol: Do not [Redacted] [Redacted] [Redacted] the One.
  Effect: The One is Alive. While it is Incapacitated, it cannot have a Location other than Unknown. The One starts with 50 Reality Damage Tokens (abbreviated as the Reality Damage token symbol with a “x Z” next to it, where Z is the amount of Reality Damage Tokens it has). The One cannot be held.

Add to “Attainment”:

If an Individual is a Cultist, then their Attainment score is equal to P where P = (50 - [the amount of Damage Tokens that The One has]) x 7 - [the number of Damage tokens they currently have]

Add the following to the list of Agenda Points in the rule entitled Institute Proposals:

• Making a Collector into a Researcher (This is a High-Risk Agenda Point.)

Add the following to the end of the first paragraph of the rule entitled Researchers and Collectors:

Any Individual who has been made a Researcher through an Institute Proposal may once change their Pursuit to any other legal value within 24 hours of that Institute Proposal having been enacted.

Between the second and third paragraphs of “Alive Artefacts”, insert:

An Alive Artefact which is Incapacitated cannot Travel.

If the Director votes against this proposal it does nothing.

Amend the text of the rule Locating Artefacts to read as follows:

Each Artefact whose Location is Unknown can be found by Investigating a series of clues.

Whenever an Artefact’s Location becomes Unknown, the Director should generate a list of ten secret random Public or Esoteric Places, and then eliminating any repeated Places on the list (retaining only the first instance of each Place). This constitutes the ordered list of Locations that need to be Investigated to find that Artefact, and can be referred to as that Artefact’s Discovery Sequence.

As a Daily Action, an Individual may Investigate a Location. To do so, they must Travel to a new Place, including in the comment box of the change on the Individuals Wiki page the words “Investigating x for clues regarding y”, where x is the destination to which they are Travelling and y is the name of an Artefact whose Location is Unknown. As soon as possible thereafter, but preferably within 24 hours, the Director should then privately communicate the results of the Investigation with the Investigating Individual. If the Place that was Investigated is on the named Artefact’s Discovery Sequence then the Director should respond with the next Place in that Artefact’s Discovery Sequence. If there is no next Place then the Director should instead indicate that they have reached the end of the Discovery Sequence. If the Place that was Investigated is not on the Discovery Sequence for that Artefact then the Director should provide a null response.

An Individual may at any time make a story post to the blog (with a title that contains the [Search] tag) describing a sequence of Places to which they have Travelled, in order, without any omissions, and which Artefact they were looking for. If that sequence of Places matches the Discovery Sequence for the named Artefact, then the Director should respond indicating as such; otherwise, they should respond indicating against. If the Director’s response if affirmative then the Individual has found the Artefact for which they were searching, and may update its Location to be in their possession (or Collection) at their earliest opportunity.

If two or more Individuals have extant posts tagged [Search] which refer to the same Artefact then they must be evaluated in the order in which they were posted, with only the first such post to have met the criteria for success being evaluated as successful by the Director. Whenever an Artefact’s Location ceases to be Unknown, the Director should cease tracking any Discovery Sequence information for it, and any ongoing Investigations do not need to be responded to.

The Director should, at their first opportunity, generate Discovery Sequences for all currently extant Artefacts with Unknown Locations.

Enact a new subrule of Artefacts, “The Transistor Radio”:-

Description: A small AM transistor radio with a silver plastic casing and General Electric branding, circa 1955. Any spoken or sung audio picked up by the radio will occasionally have its words altered to a list of numbers, delivered in the transmitted voice. Some such messages have been decoded to produce geographic coordinates or short sentences.
Location: Unknown
Protocol: None.
Effect: Idle Individuals and the Director are encouraged to privately send the carrier of the Transistor Radio their thoughts on possible loopholes in the ruleset.

To “Researchers and Collectors”, add:-

If an Individual ceases to be an Individual, all Artefacts they are carrying and in their Collection have their Location set to Unknown.

In “Collections”, replace “Each Individual with the Pursuit of Collector has a Collection.” with:-

Each Individual has a Collection.

And replace “Collector” with “Individual” throughout the first paragraph of Collections.

In “Artefacts”, replace “An Artefact’s Location may be either a Place, an Individual, a Collector’s Collection” with:-

An Artefact’s Location may be either a Place, an Individual, a Collection

In the effect of the Lunchbox, replace “A Collector carrying the Lunchbox” with “An Individual carrying the Lunchbox”.

In the effect of the Left Shoe, replace “all Collectors’ Collections” with “all Collections”.

In the effect of the Glove, replace “the Collection of a Collector” with “the Collection of an Individual”.

To “Collections”, add:-

If a Researcher adds an Artefact to their Collection, this act is considered to be a Breach of Protocol for that Artefact (regardless of whether it has a Protocol).

Add the following artefacts to the ruleset:

===Unicorn Blood===

*’‘'Description:’‘’ A large clear vial with a silvery liquid inside.
*’‘'Location:’‘’ RAND
*’‘'Protocol:’‘’ A Researcher must drop an artefact when they pick this one up.
*’‘'Effect:’‘’ An individual carrying this artefact may set their Damage tokens to 4, their Soul tokens to 4, their Reality tokens to 9 and their Spatial tokens to 6 and then set this Artefact’s location to a random public location.

===The Magical Lamp===

*’‘'Description:’‘’ A generic desk light, with a compact fluorescent bulb.
*’‘'Location:’‘’ Jerez
*’‘'Protocol:’‘’ A Researcher must pick this artefact up if it is incapacitated and they are in the same location as it.
*’‘'Effect:’‘’ This Artefact is alive. This Artefact may roam to Esoteric places and the Institute in addition to Public places. When this artefact roams, a random damage token is removed from it and roams one additional time. This artefact can only roam a maximum of 2 times per week. When this Artefact roams, a random Artefact that is in an unknown location is set to this Artefact’s location. If the previously unknown artefact is alive, it gains 1 Reality damage.

===The Monkey’s Paw===

*’‘'Description:’‘’ A savage looking mummified hand from a monkey.
*’‘'Location:’‘’ RAND2
*’‘'Protocol:’‘’ A Researcher must use this artefact upon picking it up.
*’‘'Effect:’‘’ An individual carrying this artefact may focus to gain 4 flesh damage and set an artefact’s location (other than the Pencil) from unknown to their own.

When this proposal is enacted, replace RAND and RAND2 with two different random locations other than The Containment facility.

In the rule titled “Locating Artefacts”, replace the text “If any Collectors are in the selected Place, one of them is selected at random to become the Artefact’s Location; Otherwise if any Individuals are in the selected Place, one of them is selected at random to become the Artefact’s Location; Otherwise, the Artefact’s Location remains Unknown.” with

The Artefact’s Location is set to the selected Place.

When an artefact is contained, the effects become flavor text.  So what happens if The Attendant gets contained?  If they were holding an artefact/had something in their collection what happens to it?

A narrative point that’s niggling at me, and probably worth pinning down: what exactly is a “Collection”, if items can be stashed there for free and returned at the expense of Reality Damage? Do Collectors have secret high-security vaults that items are being couriered to and returned from, or some kind of personal storage container or vehicle that travels with them? Or a combination of these, or something else? Why does taking an Artefact back out of a Collection affect Reality?

The rules we’ve got don’t describe Collections directly, and risk becoming contradictory (if they aren’t already) if players differ in their ideas about what a Collection actually is. (eg. Would a proposal allowing a player to move to a Collection be plausible or nonsensical?)

Make Jumble a Researcher.

In “Locating Artefacts”, replace “If no Individual has changed Location in the past 24 hours” with:-

If no Individual has changed Location in the past 16 hours

Add the following Artefact to the Ruleset:

The Cuppa

  Description: It’s a porcelain mug with a seemingly endless supply of tea.
  Location: Unknown
  Protocol: None
  Effect: An Individual at Norwich holding this item may as a Daily Action perform a Focus to remove 2 non-Reality Damage Tokens from themselves.

In “Redaction”, before “Upon determining such a Secret”, add:-

(The Director’s choice of each Secret should be made by choosing a secretly random word from a list of possible words that occur to them as being usable in the redacted space.)

I’m back, and I’d like to give BlogNomic a spin again.

Add to the rule “Artefacts” a subrule called “The Spruce Needle” as follows:

Description: A single green strand of plant matter, slightly resinous; efforts to verify via DNA testing that it actually fell from a spruce tree have failed.
Location: The Containment Facility
Protocol: If both the Spruce Needle and The [REDACTED] share a Secure Location, no Researcher may choose to begin occupying that Location.
Effect: Any [REDACTED] holding the Spruce Needle may Focus to move The [REDACTED] [REDACTED], The [REDACTED], or The [REDACTED REDACTED] from a [REDACTED] [REDACTED] to a [REDACTED] Location.

Add to the rule “Artefacts” a subrule called “The Flywheel” as follows:

Description: An inactive gyroscope, fully contained in a brass cylinder from which exterior gearing has been stripped, 1.3 meters in diameter.
Location: The Containment Facility
Protocol: A Researcher must [REDACTED] with this Artefact whenever possible.
Effect: This Artefact is [REDACTED]. As its Behaviour it deals 10 [REDACTED] Damage to all Individuals in a randomly chosen [REDACTED] Location.

Add to the rule “Artefacts” a subrule called “The Checkers” as follows:

Description: A set of two polished bone discs with vertically oriented milling around their circumference, which may be stacked. One appears significantly older than the other.
Location: Unknown
Protocol: A [REDACTED] should never carry this Artefact.
Effect: Any [REDACTED] who successfully changes this Artefact’s Location to The Containment Facility is considered to have [REDACTED] [REDACTED].

Add a new Esoteric Location as per the following:

The Outside:
- An Individual can Travel to the Outside, but only while at a Reality Tunnel of Length 3 or more.
- The effect listed in the rule “Damage” for Reality Damage Tokens is triggered at 20 Reality Damage Tokens instead of 10 for Individuals in the Outside.

Add a new Artefact named “The Drill”:

Description: A hand drill, featuring a large conical head with a spiral grove in it.
Location: Unknown
Protocol: A Researcher should not Focus this Artefact
Effect: An Individual holding this Artefact can Focus as a Daily Action to Drill Reality and do one of the two following options:
- Add a new Esoteric Location to the Ruleset called “Reality Tunnel” with the listed properties of :
  -“This can be Travelled to from X.”, where X is the Location of the Individual doing this Focusing.
  -“This has a Length of 1”
  -“Each time you perform a Dynastic Action while in this Location, you gain 1 Reality Damage.”
- Add 1 to the Length of a Reality Tunnel they are currently at.

Make the Individual named Cuddlebeam an Admin

Replace “Strong Gin” with “Bottle of Gin” throughout the dynastic ruleset, replace “Beer Googles” with “Goggles”, replace “The Living Portal” with “The Picture Frame” and “the Portal” with “the Frame”, and replace “Sticky Taffy” with “Taffy”.

Add “The ” to the start of the name of any subrule of Artefacts which does not already start with “The “, and capitalise the first letter of every word in the names of those rules.

In the [[Template:Flesh]] page on the wiki, change “Drop of Blood” to “token|flesh”.
In the [[Template:Soul]] page on the wiki, change “Brain” to “token|soul.”.
In the [[Template:Reality]] page on the wiki, change “Biohazard Sign” to “token|reality”.
In the [[Template:Spatial]] page on the wiki, change “Sparkles” to “token|spatial”.
In the [[Template:Dive]] page on the wiki, change “Water Wave” to “token|dive”.

Make the Individual named Darknight an Admin

After way more missed dynasties then I ever had wanted to miss no thanks to a long forgotten PW and a recovery system that seems to hate my old email, may I be unidled by someone? I know I have admin power but I’ll be darned if I can recall most of it atm.

Move the Sequin Brooch from the Institute to the Containment Facility.

Set its Protocol to be “None”.

In Keywords (rule 4.1) change “any images contained within those Wiki Pages are assumed to be Gamestate.” to

any images or Templates contained within those Wiki Pages are assumed to be Gamestate.

if “We Used To Dream of Colon-Bracket” has passed, revert all of its changes.
In the Dynastic rules and Individuals page:

Replace “?” with “{{Flesh}}”
Replace “?” with “{{Soul}}”
Replace “☣️” with “{{Reality}}”
Replace “✨” with “{{Spatial}}”
Replace “?” with “{{Dive}}”

If any changes to the templates used within this proposal, and the templates that they use, have happened since Tue 21/01/20—23:01:15 UTC, revert those templates to the state they were at that time.

In “Researchers and Collectors” replace the second paragraph with:

Each Individual has a Location, which is either a Place or Unknown, defaulting to Unknown.

Replace the text of “Places” with:

Several significant places are being observed by the Institute.

Add a subrule to “Places”, titled “Public Places”:

An Individual may Travel to any Public Place at any time by updating their Location to this effect. Whenever an Individual Travels to or from a Public Place, they must gain 1 Soul Damage.

• Jerez
• Kielce
• Rennes
• Eindhoven
• Bergen
• Norwich

Add a subrule to “Places”, titled “Secure Places”:

A Researcher may Travel to any Secure Place at any time by updating their Location to this effect.

• The Institute
• The Containment Facility

Add a subrule to “Places”, titled “Esoteric Places”:

Esoteric Places may only be Travelled to or from by methods defined in their descriptions, even if Travelling to a Place would otherwise be allowed.

• The Warp
   
  • An Individual may enter The Warp by the use of an Artefact that allows it.
   
  • An Individual in The Warp can Swim Out of It to Travel to any Public Place by gaining 1 Spatial Damage.

Amend “When you have 5 or more Flesh Damage Tokens, you cannot Travel. If you have 10 or more Flesh Damage Tokens, you cannot perform Dynastic Actions. ” to:

When you have 5 or more Flesh Damage Tokens, you cannot Travel. If you have 10 or more Flesh Damage Tokens, you cannot perform Dynastic Actions except Second Wind.

Add to “Damage”:

If (and only if) an Individual has had 10 or more Flesh Damage Tokens for the last 72 hours or more, they can perform Second Wind: Lose Flesh Damage Tokens until you have 9, then gain Soul Damage Tokens equal to that amount of Flesh Damage Tokens lost.

How would we feel about putting a permanent link to the EE inbox in the sidebar? It’s something I can never remember how to click to when I don’t have a new message waiting.

Add a Keyword to the Appendix:

Hiatus

If BlogNomic is on Hiatus, game actions defined by the Dynastic Rules or the rule titled “Proposals” may not be taken. If multiple rules require BlogNomic to be on Hiatus at any given time, BlogNomic will continue to be on Hiatus until no rules require it.

Replace the text of the Seasonal Downtime Special Case with:

On the 24th, 25th and 26th of December, BlogNomic is on Hiatus. In addition, game actions defined by the rules titled “Individuals” and “Victory and Ascension” may not be taken.

Replace the text of the Dormancy Special Case with:

If there are fewer than five Individuals, BlogNomic is on Hiatus.

Replace the text of the rule Victory and Ascension with:

If an Individual (other than the Director) believes that they have achieved victory in the current Dynasty, they may make a Declaration of Victory (abbreviated “DoV”) detailing this, by posting an entry in the “Declaration of Victory” category.

Every Individual may cast Votes on that DoV to indicate agreement or disagreement with the proposition that the poster has achieved victory in the current Dynasty.

If there is at least one pending DoV, BlogNomic is on Hiatus.

A Pending DoV may be Enacted by any Admin if any of the following are true:

• It is Popular, it has been open for at least 12 hours, and either the Director has Voted FOR it or it has no AGAINST Votes.
• It is Popular, and it has been open for at least 24 hours.

A Pending DoV may be Failed by any Admin if any of the following are true:

• It is Unpopular, and it has been open for at least 12 hours.

If a DoV is Failed and it had at least one AGAINST vote, the Individual who posted it cannot make another DoV until after 120 hours (5 days) have passed since the time their DoV was Failed.

When a DoV is Enacted, all other pending DoVs are Failed, and a new Dynasty begins in which the Individual who made the DoV becomes the Director. If that Individual does not wish to retain their new status, they may pass the role of Director to another Individual by making a post to that effect, provided they haven’t yet made an Ascension Address for the new Dynasty.

A DoV may not be started in the period between an enacted DoV and that DoV’s Ascension Address. During this period, BlogNomic is on Hiatus.

The new Director will make an Ascension Address by posting an entry in the “Ascension Address” category. This should specify the Director’s chosen theme for the new Dynasty, and it may optionally specify that the terms Individual and Director will be replaced with theme-specific terms throughout the entire Ruleset, and/or list a number of dynastic rules to keep. When such an Ascension Address is posted, the Ruleset is updated to reflect any changed terms, and any dynastic rules which were not listed to be kept are repealed.

This rule cannot be overruled by Dynastic Rules as it relates to Declarations of Victory, but can be overruled in other matters.

Throughout the dynastic ruleset and Individuals page, remove all instances of the strings “:Drop of Blood:”, “:Brain:”, “:Biohazard:”, “:Sparkles:” and “:Water Wave:”.

Then, throughout the ruleset and Individuals page:

• Replace “?” with “F”
• Replace “?” with “S”
• Replace “☣️” with “R”
• Replace “✨” with “X”
• Replace “?” with “D”

Repeal the rule “Emojis” if it exists.

Add the following as sub-rules to the rule entitled Artefacts:

Sticky Taffy

Description: A block of taffy that is extraordinarily sticky, but can’t be wrapped: any attempt to contain it in paper or plastic fails as it simply sloughs off the material.
Location: Unknown
Protocol: None
Effect: As a Daily Action, if the Individual carrying the Sticky Taffy is in a Public Place, they can Focus to Stick the Taffy. When an Individual Sticks the Taffy they must immediately Travel to a different Public Place, ensuring that the comment field in the wiki changelog contains the words “Sticking the Taffy”. For the subsequent 72 hours the source and destination locations are considered to be the same location for all dynastic rules.

Sequin brooch

Description: A piece of plastic costume jewellery that is studded with sequins.
Location: The Institute
Protocol: Whenever a Researcher is in the same Location as the Sequin Brooch they must clash with it.
Effect: This Artefact is Alive. As its Behaviour it will move to a random Public or Secure Location. If the Sequin Brooch is in the Containment Facility then the rule entitled “Containment” is considered to be flavour text. This effect takes priority over the provisions of the rule entitled “Containment”.

Make the Individual named Tantusar an Admin. Again.

Oh dear. Apparently I’ve been gone for… Four years? I’m back now. Can I please be unidled?

Create a new rule titled emojis with the following text:
At any point in the ruleset or relevant wikipages where an emoji exists, any Individual our the Director may add the name of said emoji, surrounded by colons as the name is described in this website https://emojipedia.org/
Any individual may use the name of the relevant emoji surrounded by colons in place of the character.
Any individual may add emojis in front of emoji names if there fires not exist the correct one in front of that name.
For all other rules, emoji names count as emojis and an emoji in front of its correct emoji name counts as one emoji instead of 2.

Enact a new Special Case rule called “The Tree”, and make it active, with the following text:-

Each Individual (including idle Individuals) may have a single Recruiter, tracked in the wiki page [[Player Tree]], and being an Individual, an idle Individual or “nobody”. If an Individual has no Recruiter listed, they may update that wiki page to set their Recruiter to any valid value, reflecting the person (if any) that they feel was the most responsible for them joining the game of BlogNomic.

In “The Warp”, replace all instances of “Researcher” to “Individual”

If the proposal Incentives (https://blognomic.com/archive/incentives1 ) has passed, change “Eldrich” to “Esoteric”

Add a new rule to the Special Case section of the ruleset, entitled New Player Boost [Active]:

Individuals can have Boost tokens (which can also be symbolised using the ⬆️ emoji). Each Individual’s Boost tokens (including those on idle Individuals) are tracked in the [[Boost Tokens]] page of the wiki.

Whenever a human becomes an Individual they gain one Boost token. If they name one specific other idle or non-idle Individual in their post making clear their wish to be an Individual then that Individual also gains a Boost token.

If an Individual becomes unidle, and has not been active previously in the current Dynasty, then they gain one Boost token per full month that has elapsed since the start of the current Dynasty.

If quorum is 5 or greater, then as a daily action, an Individual may spend one Boost token to add the symbol to their EVC on a Proposal. If they do, their vote counts as two for the purposes of that proposal, without quorum being affected.

Add the following to the end of the last paragraph of the rule entitled Special Case:

However, they (and any other information which they regulate the alteration of) continue to be gamestate.

Derrick has unidled, increasing quorum to 4.

Wow, we have a lot of admins in this game. Plus Cuddlebeam.

Enact a new subrule of Artefacts, “The Attendant”:-

Description: A traveller of ambiguous appearance, never fully glimpsed by Institute surveillance but suspected to be visiting from either the past or the future.
Location: Unknown
Protocol: A Researcher should not Clash with this Artefact.
Effect: The Attendant is Alive. The Attendant is considered to be an Individual for the purposes of all dynastic rules. The Director may cause the Attendant to perform any action that it could perform as an Individual, but only if a person (who is neither an Individual nor the Director) has privately suggested this to the Director.

Enact a new subrule of Artefacts, “The Glove”:-

Description: A size 8½ brown leather driving glove with light scorch marks.
Location: Unknown
Protocol: A Researcher should not use this Artefact in the Containment Facility.
Effect: An Individual carrying the Glove may Focus to take 4 ☣️ Damage and set the Location of a Nearby Artefact to themselves. An Artefact is Nearby an Individual if it is in their Location, or in the Collection of a Collector in the same Location as them. (Setting an Artefact’s Location in this way is not considered to be picking it up.)

ElFerde idles out automatically after seven days without a post, vote or comment. Quorum drops to 3.

Add a new rule to the ruleset, entitled Magnetism:

Any Individual moving from an Unknown Place to any other Place for the first time in this Dynasty may, at the same time, randomly select one Artefact whose Location is Unknown and move it to a random Public Place.

Change the text “The Institute and the Containment Facility are Secure Places; all other Places are Public Places” to read:

The Institute and the Containment Facility are Secure Places; the Warp is an Eldrich Place; all other Places are Public Places

Amend ” If the Admin enacting a Proposal reaches a step which cannot be applied immediately (e.g. “two days after this Proposal enacts, Individual A gains 1 point”), that step is ignored for the purposes of enactment. Once a Proposal has been enacted, it can have no further direct effect on the gamestate. ” to:

- Steps in a Proposal are fulfilled in the order they are written in the Proposal, unless stated otherwise in the Proposal.
- Once a Proposal has been enacted, it can have no further direct effect on the gamestate.
- A step reached in a Proposal is ignored for the purposes of enactment if it fulfills any of the following:
  - It cannot be applied immediately (e.g. “two days after this Proposal enacts, Individual A gains 1 point”).
  - It would make the state of the values of currently tracked entities incompatible with the Ruleset (For example, Bob has a Pear, Orange and an Apple, and then a Proposal sets the limit of the amount of Fruits they can have to 2.).

In the rule entitled Collections, change the text “Artefacts in Collections are never considered to share a Location with any other Individuals or Artefacts” to read

Artefacts in Collections are never considered to share a Location with any other Individuals or Artefacts, except those Artefacts which are in the same Collection.

To the end of the same rule, add the following:

If an Individual ever ceases to be a Collector then all of the Artefacts in their Collection have their Locations set to Public Places at random.

In the rule entitled Collections, change the text “Artefacts in Collections are never considered to share a Location with any other Individuals or Artefacts” to read

Artefacts in Collections are never considered to share a Location with any other Individuals or Artefacts, except those Artefacts which are in the same Collection.

To the end of the same rule, add the following:

If an Individual ever ceases to be a Collector then all of the Artefacts in their Collection have their Locations set to Public Places at random.

In “Locating Artefacts”, replace “any Individual may” with “any Individual (or the Director) may”.

Add to Attainment:

The first Individual to be the sole Individual who has the most Attainment past the 5th of Feburary 2020 at 12:00 UTC has achieved victory.

Enact a new rule, “Institute Proposals”:-

If a proposal has the “[Institute]” tag and its effects are confined to one or more of the Agenda Points below, it is an Institute Proposal.

Agenda Points are:-
* Making an Outsider into a Researcher, or vice versa
* Moving an Artefact from the Institute or from a Researcher to the Containment Facility
* Moving an Artefact from the Containment Facility to the Institute or to a Researcher. (This is a High-Risk Agenda Point.)
* Setting the Protocol of an Artefact to “None”
* Setting the Protocol of an Artefact to be the same as the Protocol of another Artefact

Votes from Outsiders and Collectors are ignored, on Institute Proposals. An Institute Proposal with no High-Risk Agenda Points is considered Popular if more than half of the Researchers are voting FOR it. An Institute Proposal with one or more High-Risk Agenda Points is considered Popular if three or more Researchers are voting FOR it. An Institute Proposal is considered Unpopular if at least half of the Researchers are voting AGAINST it.

Replace “A Researcher may not pick up an Artefact in the Containment Facility” and everything after it in the Containment rule with:-

A Researcher may not pick up an Artefact in the Containment Facility, unless they are carrying the Security Pass.

Remove “An Outsider may become a Researcher if fewer than a Quorum of Individuals are Researchers.” from the ruleset.

Add the following as subrules to the rule entitled Artefacts:

Red Notice

Description: A piece of taupe paper implausibly bearing the words “Red Notice” on top. It is signed by the Director but anything written above the signature disappears after a few seconds.
Location: The Containment Facility.
Protocol: To not use this artefact.
Effect: As a daily action, the Individual carrying this Artefact may Focus to Inscribe. When an Individual Inscribes, they must write a string of text (the Inscription) in a comment on the dice roller tool, and then randomly select from all existing artefacts. The selected artefact then has its Protocol changed to the Inscription.

The Sheriff’s Badge

Description: A tin replica of a sheriff’s badge, likely from a children’s playset. A bit dented but still very shiny.
Location: Unknown
Protocol: This artefact may not be allowed to remain in a Public Location for more than 72 consecutive hours.
Effect: The Individual carrying this Artefact may Focus to set their Pursuit to Enforcer. An Enforcer is not a Researcher or Collector for the purposes of any rule. An Enforcer cannot Focus. An Enforcer may Travel to Secure Locations as if they were a Researcher. As a Weekly Action, an Enforcer may take 2 ☣️ Damage to pick up 1 Artefact in the Containment Facility or 1 Artefact in the Collection of a Collector in the same Location as them. Whenever this Action is taken, the Sheriff’s Badge has its location set to Unknown and the Enforce who used it has their Pursuit set to Outsider.

Sticky Taffy

Description: A block of taffy that is extraordinarily sticky, but can’t be wrapped: any attempt to contain it in paper or plastic fails as it simply sloughs off the material.
Location: The Institute
Protocol: [REDACTED}
Effect: As a Daily Action, the Individual carrying the Sticky Taffy can Focus to Stick the Taffy. When an Individual Sticks the Taffy they must immediately Travel to a location, ensuring that the comment field in the wiki changelog contains the words “Sticking the Taffy”. For the subsequent 72 hours the source and destination locations are considered to be the same location for all dynastic rules.

Replace “If an Artefact’s Location is the Containment Facility, then its Effect is considered to be blank.” with:-

If an Artefact’s Location is the Containment Facility, then its Effect is considered to be flavour text.

Replace “sentence is considered to be a blank string with no effect for all purposes except those outlined in this rule” with:-

sentence is considered to be flavour text

To the first paragraph of “Artefacts”, add:-

An Artefact’s Description is flavour text.

In the “Keywords” appendix rule, rename “Flavour Text” to “Commentary” and then add a new entry:-

Flavour Text
If a part of the ruleset is defined as being “flavour text”, it is gamestate and remains part of the ruleset document, but is not considered to have any meaning beyond being a string of characters. Individuals are not required to obey flavour text and may not perform any action defined by it, and any statements that flavour text makes about gamestate are ignored.

Randomly select an Individual that doesn’t have an EVC on this proposal (if any). That Individual gains 3 Reality Damage.

I request to be made Idle. My attention isn’t on the game right now.

Change the Effect of Strong Gin to:-

If an Individual carrying the Strong Gin would receive [REDACTED] Damage, they receive an equal amount of [REDACTED] Damage instead.

Add to “Artefacts”:

“Carrying” an Artefact and “holding” an Artefact are synonymous.

Enact a new rule, “Attainment”:-

An Individual’s Attainment score is a number which measures their success in this world, and which may be negative.

If an Individual is a Researcher, then their Attainment score is five times the number of Artefacts in Secure Places, plus three times the number of Artefacts they are carrying, minus the number of Damage tokens they currently have.

If an Individual is a Collector, then their Attainment score is ten times the number of Artefacts in their Collection, plus three times the number of Artefacts they are carrying, minus the number of Damage tokens they currently have.

If an Individual is an Outsider, then their Attainment score is five minus the number of Damage tokens they currently have.

Remove the subrule “Lunchbox”

Enact a new rule, “Redaction”:-

Certain aspects of the Institute’s research are classified, and blotted out of their written records. While a sentence in the Protocol or Effect of an Artefact contains the string “[REDACTED]”, that sentence is considered to be a blank string with no effect for all purposes except those outlined in this rule.

At any time, the Director may decide (and privately record) the Secret of any “[REDACTED]” string which appears in the Protocol or Effect of an Artefact: that Secret may be any single word or number that appears in the dynastic ruleset, such that the sentence would make grammatical sense if the “[REDACTED]” string were replaced with it. Upon determining such a Secret, the Director should select a secretly random Researcher and inform them of the Secret, and the string that it corresponds to.

At the request of the Individual who was told its Secret, the Director may replace the string “[REDACTED]” in the Protocol or Effect of an Artefact with its Secret.

Attention all Institute staff. The Lunchbox was picked up by a freelance recovery team this afternoon and is now on site, under containment. The documented safety protocol of this highly destabilising object is that “If a Researcher has the means to destroy this Artefact then they must do so within 24 hours of having gained the capability to do so.” If any Researcher feels that they meet this criteria at present, or meets it any time in the near future, please proceed at once to the Containment Facility and initiate disposal procedures.

Pokes idles automatically after a week without a post or comment from them. Quorum drops to 4.

Create a new subrule to the rule “Artefacts” called “Void Razor”:

Description: An emptiness in space shaped as a 2 meter long blade.
Location: Norwich
Protocol: None
Effect: This Artefact is Alive. As its behaviour (and upon its carrier Focusing, and its carrier may Focus), it will cause all Individuals whose Location is “Unknown” to gain 4 Flesh Damage, if any exist. If none exist, it will cause a random Individual at its Location (or an Individual of the carrier’s choice at their Location, if carried) to gain 4 Flesh Damage instead.

Create a new rule called “The Warp”:

A Researcher in the Warp can Begin Diving by gaining 1 Spatial Damage, and are now considered to be Diving until they perform a Dynastic Action. If a Researcher has been Diving during the last 48 hours they can Retrieve a Fetal Artefact. The status of being Diving or not is tracked in the Damage column as “?” for being Diving, and its absence for not being Diving.

When a Researcher retrieves a Fetal Artefact, they add to the Ruleset’s list of Artefacts (subrules of the rule “Artefacts”) a new Artefact as per the following:

Name: X
Description: A mysterious, stillborn item from The Warp.
Protocol: None
Location: Z
Effect: Y

X is a string formed as “A B”, where B is a random word from this this: “Potion, Elixir, Ether, Pill, Panacea, Injection, Cream, Suppository” and A is a random word from: “Magical, Glowing, Incandescent, Frigid, Sparkling, Dark, Shining, Putrid, Transparent, Red, Blue, Yellow, Green, Shimmering”

Y is a string formed as “This Item is Alive and begins with 10 Spatial Damage. The holder of this item may focus to C and grant this item 1 Spatial Damage. If this item has 13 or more Spatial Damage, it is removed from the Ruleset. This is a Fetal Artefact.”, where C is a random string from the following list:

- Remove 3 Damage Tokens of their choice from themselves
- Remove 3 Damage Tokens of their choice from an Individual that shares a Location with them, other than themselves.
- Set the Location of a random Artefact you own to The Warp.
- Remove all Spatial Damage Tokens from an Individual at their Location.
- Remove all Soul Damage Tokens from an Individual at their Location.
- Remove all Flesh Damage Tokens from an Individual at their Location.
- Remove 4 Reality Damage Tokens from an Individual at their Location.
- Grant 3 Spatial Damage Tokens to an Alive Artefact at their Location.

Z is “The Individual named D”, where D is the name of the Individual that Retrieved this Artefact

In the rule “Damage”, remove “If you have 10 or more Flesh Damage Tokens, you cannot perform Dynastic Actions.”

Add to the end of that rule:-

An Individual with 13 or more Damage Tokens is Broken. A Broken Individual cannot perform Dynastic Actions.

The Duke of Waltham idles out automatically after seven days without a comment or post. Quorum remains 5.

What happened here, where Cuddlebeam took control of the Marble from its Unknown Location on Friday with a casual comment of “The Marble is mine now”? Neither of the explanations I can come up with fit the circumstances.

A report on my desk, please.

In the rule entitled Artefacts, change the paragraph that begins “An Artefact’s Location may be either a Place, an Individual, or Unknown”, to read as follows:

An Artefact’s Location may be either a Place, an Individual, a Collector’s Collection, or Unknown. If an Artefact’s Location is an Individual, it is said to be carried by that Individual, and all Individuals should, for the purposes of its effect or any actions taken, consider its Location to be the Location of the Individual who is carrying it. If an Individual shares a Location with an Artefact that is not being carried by another Individual, they may pick it up by setting its Location to themselves. If an Individual is carrying an Artefact, they may drop it by setting its Location to their own Location. An Individual may be carrying no more than two artefacts at any time.

Change the text of the rule entitled Collections to read as follows:

Each Individual with the Pursuit of Collector has a Collection.  As a daily action, a Collector may put an Artefact that they are carrying into their Collection by changing its Location to read “x’s Collection”, where x is their own name. Artefacts in Collections are never considered to share a Location with any other Individuals or Artefacts. Collectors may reclaim Artefacts from their Collection as a daily action by Focusing.

As a Daily Action, a Collector may add one Soul Damage Token to every Collector whose Collection contains fewer items than their own.

Add the following three Artefacts to the ruleset as sub-rules to the rule Artefacts:

Lunchbox:

Description: A small child’s lunchbox, decorated with Pokémon colours. Dented, with the colours starting to wear off.
Location: The Containment Facility
Protocol: If a Researcher has the means to destroy this Artefact then they must do so within 24 hours of having gained the capability to do so.
Effect: A Collector carrying the Lunchbox may, as a daily action, Focus to carry out the Effect of an Artefact in their Collection as if the were carrying it.

The Left Shoe:

Description: A patent leather brogue, tan, EU 42 / US 9.5. Brand new, not broken in.
Location: Norwich
Protocol: None
Effect: The Individual carrying the Left Shoe may Focus to throw it. Once the Left Shoe has been thrown, the Individual who threw it should randomly select a Place (including Unknown, the Warp, and all Collectors’ Collections). The Left Shoe’s Location is set to that Place. Any other Artefacts at that Place are then also relocated to Places at random.

The Right Shoe:

Description: A plimsol in pale blue. EU 38 / US 7.5. Sole is worn through at the toe.
Location: Unknown
Protocol: None
Effect: If ever the Left Shoe and the Right Shoe are in the same Location, any Individual may remove both Artefacts from the ruleset.

I have now joined and would like to become a player of this game

If “Locating Artifacts” does not begin with the words “If no Individual has changed Location in the past 24 hours”, then replace its first word with “If no Individual has changed Location in the past 24 hours and if”.

To the second paragraph of “Researchers and Collectors”, add:-

Whenever an Individual Travels to or from a Public Place, they must gain 1 Soul Damage.

In “Alive Artefacts”, remove “Alive Artefacts have a Sturdiness value, which defaults to 20.” and replace “An Alive Artefact which has as much or more Damage Tokens as its Sturdiness is considered Incapacitated.” with:-

An Alive Artefact with seven or more Damage Tokens is considered Incapacitated.

Add to that rule:-

An Individual may choose to Clash with an Alive Artefact that they share a Location with, by making a die roll which mentions the Artefact and which randomly determines the type of an Attack Token (which may be either Flesh or Soul) and of a Retaliation Token (which may be either Flesh or Soul): upon doing so, the Artefact gains a Damage Token of the Attack type and the Individual gains a Token of the Retaliation Type.

Amend the Effect of “Strong Gin” to:

Whenever any Individual in the same Location as this artefact (or the same Location as the Individual who is the Location of this artefact), they are Drunk. Drunk Individuals do not receive Flesh damage from any source.

Add to “Damage”:

An Individual, as a Weekly Action, can Recover: they lose 2 of their Damage Tokens of their choice.

Remove “If no Individual has changed Location in the past 24 hours and” from the ruleset.

Add the following artefacts as subrules to the Artefacts rule:

The WW2 Grenade
‘’‘Location:’‘’ Unknown
‘’‘Description:’‘’ An undetonated German grenade. It seems to be a dud as the pin has been pulled years ago.
‘’‘Protocol:’‘’ To not use the Artefact and bring it to the Containment facility as soon as possible.
‘’‘Effect:’‘’ An Individual carrying this Artefact may focus to activate the effects of all Artefacts in your location, including those carried by Individuals in your location. If an effect requires a choice to be made, choose it randomly out of the legal choices. If the effects apply to the Individual carrying them, they are instead chosen at random from among the Individuals within your location.

A Sketchbook
‘’‘Location:’‘’ Unknown
‘’‘Description:’‘’ A used sketchbook. It seems to contain drawings of mundane items.
‘’‘Protocol:’‘’ None.
‘’‘Effect:’‘’ An Individual carrying this Artefact may focus to copy a subrule of the rule “Artefacts” and set the copied subrule’s location to their own.

Lampshade
‘’‘Location:’‘’ Unknown
‘’‘Description:’‘’ An ornate lampshade. Anything it is set upon appears to become a lamp.
‘’‘Protocol:’‘’ None.
‘’‘Effect:’‘’ An Individual carrying this Artefact may focus to set another Artefact’s Location that they share to the Lampshade or to set any Artefact’s Location that is Lampshade to their Location.

Sandwitch
‘’‘Location:’‘’ Unknown
‘’‘Description:’‘’ A deli sandwitch that appears to be in mint condition. Whenever nobody is looking, it appears to regenerate bites taken out of it.
‘’‘Protocol:’‘’ To keep this Artefact’s location to be either that of a Researcher or the Insititue.
‘’‘Effect:’‘’ An Individual carrying this Artefact may focus to lose 5 Flesh Damage.

Enact a new rule, “Containment”:-

If an Artefact’s Location is the Containment Facility, then its Effect is considered to be blank.

A Researcher may not pick up an Artefact in the Containment Facility, unless either of the following is true:
* A blog post from the past 72 hours includes a comment of “Recommend authorisation of Researcher [Name] to access [Artefact]” (where “[Name]” is the name of the Researcher attempting to pick up the Artefact and “[Artefact]” the name of the Artefact being picked up) from at least two other Researchers.
* The Researcher is carrying the Security Pass.

Enact a new subrule of Artefacts, “The Security Pass”:-

Description: A top-level Institute security pass, with lanyard, hologram and various psychic reflectors.
Location: The Containment Facility.
Protocol: A Researcher should never drop this Artefact.
Effect: A Researcher carrying this Artefact in the Containment Facility may ignore that Location’s restriction on picking items up there. They may also Travel to any Secure Place at any time by updating their own Location to this effect.

If the proposal “Fnord Focus” has failed, this proposal has no effect.

Replace the sentence that reads “When an Individual Focuses, they must gain one Reality Damage Token.” with

When an Individual Focuses, they must gain one Reality Damage Token and add one Soul Damage Token to every Individual with the Pursuit of Researcher.

Change the Effects of both Strong Gin and Beer Googles to “None.”

Change the Protocol of Strong Gin to “None.”

Add to “Damage”:

An Individual, as a Weekly Action, can Recover: they lose 2 of their Damage Tokens of their choice.

Replace “An Individual carrying an Artefact who takes an action that is defined by its Effect must, as the cost of that action, gain one Reality Damage Token.” with:-

When an Individual Focuses, they must gain one Reality Damage Token.

Replace “An Individual carrying the Pencil may erase” with “An Individual carrying the Pencil may Focus to erase”.

Replace “An Individual carrying the Tiepin may change” with “An Individual carrying the Tiepin may Focus to change”.

Replace “an Individual carrying the Paperclip may perform the following Atomic Action” with “an Individual carrying the Paperclip may Focus to perform the following Atomic Action”.

Replace “When using the Switchcomb, you target at least one Individual in a Place you are located in.” with “An Individual carrying the Switchcomb may Focus to target at least one Individual in a Place they are located in.”

Replace “When you use this Artefact, take 1 Soul damage and set its location to Unknown. Then set another Artefact’s Location from Unknown to your Location.” with “An Individual carrying the Marble may Focus to gain 1 Soul Damage, set the Marble’s Location to Unknown and set another Artefact’s Location from Unknown to their Location.”

Replace “The Individual who possesses this artefact may post” (in the Beer Googles) with “The Individual who possesses this artefact may Focus to post”.

Replace “When used by an Individual (that is holding it), it will send an Individual of their choice at their Location to The Warp.” with “An Individual holding the Portal may Focus to send an Individual of their choice at their Location to The Warp.”

Add to “Artefacts”:

An Individual can only hold up to 5 Artefacts

In “Damage”, replace “tracked on the Individuals wikipage” with “tracked on the Individuals wikipage by the symbols listed below”.

Replace “Flesh:” with “Flesh (?):”.

Replace “Soul:” with “Soul (?):”.

Replace “Reality:” with “Reality (☣️):”.

Replace “Spatial:” (if it exists) with “Spatial (✨):”.

Halve the numbers 10 and 20 in that rule, then replace 15 with 7 and 30 with 10.

In “Researchers and Collectors”, replace “move” with “Travel”.

In “Damage”, replace “you cannot move to another Location via your performance of a Dynastic Action” with “you cannot Travel”, and replace “whenever they move to a Public Location via their performance of a Dynastic Action” with “whenever they Travel”.

Add the following Location:

- The Warp: Individuals cannot enter The Warp unless its via the use of an Artefact that allows it. An Individual in The Warp can Swim Out of It, to set their Location to any Public Location by gaining 1 Spatial Damage.

Add the following to the kind of Damage Tokens:

- Spatial: If an Individual has 15 or more Spatial Damage, whenever they move to a Public Location via their performance of a Dynastic Action, their Location is immediately after set to a random Public Place. If an Individual has 30 or more Spatial Damage, their Location becomes the Warp whenever it is a Location other than the Warp.

Add the following Artefact called “The Living Portal”:

Location: Eindhoven
Description: A 2m diameter metallic ring with arms and legs.
Protocol: None
Effect: This Artefact is Alive. As its Behavior it will set the Location all Individuals that share Location with it, to The Warp. When used by an Individual (that is holding it), it will send an Individual of their choice at their Location to The Warp.

Are the more exotic DICE options that were available in the GNDT (like FRUIT) still about, or did the move away from the GNDT provoke a consolidation of randomness around regular old numbers?

If Proposal: Clarity failed, this proposal does nothing. Otherwise:

Change the Protocol of the artefact Strong Gin to read “None”.

In the Effect of the artefact Strong Gin:

• Amend the first sentence to read “Whenever any Individual in the same Location as this artefact (or the same Location as the Individual who is the Location of this artefact), they are Drunk.”
• Change the word “Physical” to “Flesh”.
• Add the following at the end: “Individuals cease to be Drunk when they are no longer in the same Location as the Strong Gin.”

Create a new subrule to the rule Artefacts, entitled Strong Gin:

Description: A bottle of own-brand supermarket gin. It cannot be opened, either by unscrewing the cap or by breaking the glass. The liquid glows with a bluish-purple hue under ultraviolet light.
Location: The Institute
Protocol: The effect of this artefact must be observed by all Individuals in the same location as it.
Effect: Any Individual in the presence of this artefact becomes instantly Drunk. Drunk Individuals do not receive Physical damage from any source. However, all proposals or EVCs written by a Drunk Individual must be passed through this translator on its “Smashed” setting immediately before being posted. A Drunk Individual may not amend their own proposal for spelling or typographical mistakes (per rule 1.1).

Create a new subrule to the rule Artefacts, entitled Beer Googles:

Description: A pair of novelty glasses with what appears to be beer in the lenses. It is branded with the logo of a well-known internet search company.
Location: Jerez
Protocol: None
Effect: The Individual who possesses this artefact may post, as a comment to a proposal by a Drunk Individual, their interpretation of the text of that proposal. If the proposal is enacted then that interpretation is the text that must be added to the ruleset, rather than the original text of the proposal itself.If several interpretations exist on a single proposal then the first one posted is the one that is adopted.

If Proposal: A Europewide Search passed, instead set the Location of Strong Gin to Bergen and the Beer Googles to Eindhoven.

Remove all paragraphs that reference the concept of “Alive Artefacts”, in “Artefacts”.

Enact a new rule, “Alive Artefacts”:-

Artefacts can be Alive, and are by default not Alive. Alive Artefacts have a Sturdiness value, which defaults to 20. Alive Artefacts can have Damage Tokens, and these are tracked on the Individuals page. An Alive Artefact which has as much or more Damage Tokens as its Sturdiness is considered Incapacitated.

If an Alive Artefact is not Incapacitated, it cannot be picked up.

As a Weekly Communal Action, an Individual or the Director can cause a Roaming. This causes each not-Incapacitated Alive Artefact (in the order they appear in the ruleset) to change its Location to a random Public Place (unless it is in a Secure Place), and then (if it is not now in the Containment Facility) to perform its Behavior (if any) as described in its Effect. The Director is encouraged to perform a Roaming whenever possible.

Remove “As its Behavior, this Artefact will set its Location a random Place.” from Cursed Lego Brick.

Rename “Cursed Lego Brick” to “The Lego Brick”. (Everything here is pretty cursed.)

Replace “If an Individual shares a Location with an Artefact, they may set its Location to themselves.” with:-

If an Individual shares a Location with an Artefact, they may pick it up by setting its Location to themselves. If an Individual is carrying an Artefact, they may drop it by setting its Location to their own Location.

Amend “Soul:” to:

Soul: If an Individual has 30 or more Soul Damage, they do not have a vote on Proposals, and they do not count for computing Quorum for a Proposal.

Create a new subrule to “Artefacts” called “Blood Idol”:

Description: An otherworldly, but (perhaps) benevolent eldritch being sealed within a 1,5m statue of the Virgin Mary. It seems to be crying blood.
Location: Unknown
Protocol: Do not transition from being at the Containment Facility to not being at the Containment Facility while holding this Artefact.
Effect: This Artefact is Alive. Its Behaviour (and effect when used by an Individual, and an Individual can use this Artefact if they are holding it) is to set the Soul Damage of all that share a Location with it to 15, then to cause all those who lost Soul Damage in this way to gain an amount of Flesh Damage equal to that amount of Soul Damage lost.

Add to Artefacts:

Alive Artefacts in the Containment Facility have “Do nothing” as their Behavior, instead of the Behavior described in their Effect.

Add the following Artefacts to the ruleset.

The Switchcomb
Description: A novelty comb that is attached to a switchblade handle. It looks cheaply made, the sort of junk you would see at a tourist trap in a mall.
Location: Unknown
Protocol: Whenever you enter a Place, use this Artefact on another Individual with at least 2 Artefacts if such an Individual exists in that Place.
Effect: When using the Switchcomb, you target at least one Individual in a Place you are located in. If the Target is not a Researcher, they drop a random Artefact they are carrying, if they have at least 2 Artefacts.

The Marble
Description: A simple marble, it seems to roll in such a way that it is easy to lose.
Location: Containment Facility
Protocol: To not use this Artefact.
Effect: When you use this Artefact, take 1 Soul damage and set it’s location to Unknown. Then set another Artefact’s Location from Unknown to your Location.

Insert a new paragraph in the rule “Artefacts” immediately after its first paragraph as follows:

An Individual carrying an Artefact who takes an action that is defined by its Effect must, as the cost of that action, gain one Reality Damage Token.

Create a new subrule of “Artefacts” called “The Paperclip” as follows:

Description: A standard Gem-type 0.75g paper clip, bearing a few small rust spots.
Location: Unknown
Protocol: None
Effect: If there is more than one Individual who is a Collector, and one specific Collector has a number of Soul Damage Tokens that is greater than zero and greater than that of every other Collector, then an Individual carrying the Paperclip may perform the following Atomic Action:

1. Change the Pursuit of that specific Collector to Researcher;
2. Change the Pursuit of any Individual who is a Researcher to Collector;
3. And set the Location of the Paperclip to Unknown.

Enact a new rule, “Locating Artefacts”:-

If no Individual has changed Location in the past 24 hours and if an Artefact’s Location is Unknown, any Individual may (as a daily communal action) attempt to recover a lost Artefact by selecting a Public Place and an Artefact with an Unknown Location (each at random) and applying the following:
* If any Collectors are in the selected Place, one of them is selected at random to become the Artefact’s Location;
* Otherwise if any Individuals are in the selected Place, one of them is selected at random to become the Artefact’s Location;
* Otherwise, the Artefact’s Location remains Unknown.

To the list of Places, add:-

* Kielce
* Rennes
* Eindhoven
* Bergen
* Norwich

Enact a new subrule of Artefacts, “The Satchel”:-

Description: A battered leather satchel with two brass buckles.
Location: Unknown
Protocol: A Researcher should not carry this Artefact while in The Containment Facility.
Effect: When an Artefact is being recovered, if the carrier of the Satchel is in the selected Location, no die roll is made to determine the Individual who will carry the Artefact: the Satchel carrier gains it instead. The Location of an Individual carrying the Satchel is always considered to be a Public Place for the purposes of recovery rolls.

Good to see some old players unidling. It’s probably worth us maintaining a list of significant changes to the game, so that a returning player can get up to speed without having to close-read the entire Core ruleset - I’ve made a start with a Game Changelog wiki page, listing the three obvious things I can think of.

Add to the list of Damage Token types:

- Bleeding: Each time you perform a Dynastic Action, you gain as much Flesh Damage as your amount of Bleeding Damage Tokens.

Add to “Damage”:

Individuals and Alive Artefacts are Beings.

Individuals can make a Combat Action as a daily action.

The following are Combat Actions:
- Punch: Add 2 Flesh Damage Tokens to a Being that shares Location with you.
- Soothe: Remove 1 Flesh or Bleeding Damage Token from a Being that shares a Location with you and that has 10 or less Flesh Damage Tokens.
- Improvised Weapon: Add 3 Flesh Damage Tokens to a Being that shares Location with you. You can only perform this Attack Action if you have an Artefact.
- Stab: Add 1 Bleeding Damage Tokens to a Being that shares Location with you. You can only perform this Attack Action if you have an Artefact that is Sharp.

Add to the Effect of the Pencil:

This Artefact is Sharp.

Add a new rule entitled “Collections” to the ruleset as follows:

Each Individual with the Pursuit of Collector has a Collection, which is an nonnegative integer calculated by counting the number of Artefacts with their Location set to that Individual.

As a Daily Action, a Collector may add one Soul Damage Token to every Collector whose Collection less than their own.

Add to “Artefacts”:

Artefacts can be Alive, and are by default not Alive. Alive Artefacts have a Sturdiness value, which defaults to 20. Alive Artefacts can have Damage Tokens, and these are tracked on the Individuals page. An Alive Artefact which has as much or more Damage Tokens as its Sturdiness is considered Incapacitated. Non-Incapacitated Alive Artefacts cannot be held by an Individual.

As a Weekly Communal Action, an Individual or the Director can cause all Alive Artefacts to perform their Behavior as described in their Effect. The Director is encouraged to perform this Weekly Communal Action whenever possible.

Enact a new subrule of Artefacts, “Cursed Lego Brick”:

Description: A yellow lego brick.
Location: Jerez
Protocol: None
Effect: Whenever an Individual transitions from not being in the same Location as this Artefact, to being in the same Location as this Artefact, they gain 1 Flesh Damage. This Artefact is Alive. As its Behavior, this Artefact will set its Location a random Place.

Replace “An Artefact’s Protocol may impose restrictions on how Individuals interact with it.” with:-

An Artefact’s Protocol defines Institute policy on how Researchers should and should not interact with it.

Remove any sentence beginning “If a Protocol has been somehow breached”. Then, add to “Artefacts”:-

If a Researcher fails to follow the recommendation of a Protocol they are considered to have Breached it. If a Researcher (the “Transgressor”) has Breached the Protocol for an Artefact within the past 48 hours, any Researcher may set the Transgressor’s Pursuit to Outsider and (if the Transgressor is in a Secure Place) change the Location of all Artefacts carried by the Transgressor to The Containment Facility, and change the Transgressor’s Location to Unknown.

If it exists, replace “Read the Rulebook at least once a day.” with:-

A Researcher should not carry this Artefact for more than 24 hours without reading it.

Change any Protocols of “[REDACTED]” and “Unknown” to:-

None.

Enact a new subrule of Artefacts, “The Tiepin”:-

Location: Unknown
Description: A small silver clip engraved with roses and thorns. Attaching it to clothing gives the wearer the appearance of a non-specific person from any desired profession.
Protocol: A Researcher should not carry this Artefact in a Public Place.
Effect: An Individual carrying the Tiepin may change their Pursuit to Researcher, Collector or Outsider at any time.

Replace “An Individual may move to any Place at any time by updating their own Location to this effect, with the exception of the Places “The Institute” and “The Containment Facility” - only Researchers may move to these Places.” with:-

An Individual may move to any Public Place at any time by updating their own Location to this effect. A Researcher may move to any Secure Place at any time by updating their own Location to this effect. (The Institute and the Containment Facility are Secure Places; all other Places are Public Places.)

To the rule “Artefacts”, add:-

Individuals and Artefacts with Unknown Locations are never considered to share a Location with any other Individuals or Artefacts.

If the Pencil’s Location is not Unknown, set it to Unknown.

Add to “Artefacts”:

If a Protocol has been somehow breached, and its Artefact’s Location is an Individual, any Individual can Warp that Artefact.

Warping an Artefact sets its Location to Unknown, and then causes that last Individual to have held it to gain 1 Reality Damage.

An Individual cannot hold more than 5 Artefacts.

Create a new rule called “Experience”:

Individuals can have Experience and Perks, defaulting to having none. These are tracked on the Individuals wikipage. As a weekly communal action, an Individual can grant all Individuals 1 Experience. An Individual can spend 1 Experience to gain an instance of a Perk listed below. The following are Perks, and their effects (if any)
- Treasure Hunter: As a weekly action, you can set an Artefact’s Location to a random Location.
- Second Wind: Spend this Perk to remove half (rounding up) of your Flesh Damage.
- Medic: As a weekly action, remove up to 10 Flesh Damage from Individuals that share your Location.
- Italian: You are Italian.

.

Add a subrule to Artefacts called “The Soggy Meatball” with the text:

Description: A meatball that appears to be Italian, roughly 2 inches in diameter and always mysteriously oozing spaghetti sauce.
Location: The Containment Facility.
Protocol: [REDACTED]
Effect: When an Individual who carries this Artefact would take Damage from a non-Italian source, they take two less instead.

Add a subrule to Artefacts called “The Rulebook” with the text:

Description: A book of rules that appears to be from Monopoly.
Location: The Institute.
Protocol: Read the Rulebook at least once a day.
Effect: An Individual who carries the Rulebook may read from it as a Daily action. When an Individual reads from the Rulebook, they may change one letter in a Dynastic rule to a different letter if the Protocol was followed the previous day.

Add a subrule to Artefacts called “The DEF Flag” with the text:

Description: A square flag with red and green coloring bearing the inscription DEF.
Location: Jerez.
Protocol: Unknown.
Effect: An Individual who carries the DEF Flag may make Proposals with the DEF tag. Deferential votes cast on Proposals with the DEF tag count as the type of vote that the Proposal’s author cast instead of the Director.

To the list of Places add

*Graveyard
*Woods
*Warehouse
*Road
*Dirt Path

Move the paragraph starting with “Each Individual has a location” to the rule “Places”

In Places add the following text

An Individual must move to either the Dirt Path or Road Place if they are not on either before moving to a different Place.

Replace “An Individual may move to any Place” with “An Individual may move to a Place”

In “Fair Play”, replace “A single Individual should not control more than one non-Idle Individual within BlogNomic” with “A single person should not control more than one non-Idle Individual within BlogNomic”.

Create a new rule called “Damage”:

Individuals can have Damage Tokens (AKA simply “Damage”), tracked on the Individuals wikipage. Not having any of a certain Damage Token is tracked by its absence. The following are the kinds of Damage Tokens and their effects at having a certain amount of that kind of Damage Token (if any):

- Flesh: When you have 10 or more Flesh Damage Tokens, you cannot move to another Location via your performance of a Dynastic Action. If you have 30 or more Flesh Damage Tokens, you cannot perform Dynastic Actions.
- Soul:
- Reality: When you have 20 or more Reality Damage Tokens, set all of your amounts of other kinds of Damage Tokens to a random amount between 0 and 20 for each, then set your Reality Damage tokens to 0.

Enact a new rule, “Artefacts”:-

Each Artefact has a Name, a Description, a Location, a Protocol and an Effect. Artefacts that exist are listed as subrules of this rule, with their Name as the name of the subrule. An Artefact’s Protocol may impose restrictions on how Individuals interact with it. An Artefact’s Effect defines what it does and how this may occur.

An Artefact’s Location may be either a Place, an Individual, or Unknown. If an Artefact’s Location is an Individual, it is said to be carried by that Individual, and the Individual carrying it may, for the purposes of any action they take, consider its Location to be their own Location. If an Individual shares a Location with an Artefact, they may set its Location to themselves.

Add a subrule to Artefacts called “The Pencil”:-

Description: A 19cm hexagonal HB pencil with a black-painted body and no manufacturer’s name. Its lead is sharp and it appears unused.
Location: Unknown
Protocol: None
Effect: An Individual carrying the Pencil may erase from the ruleset any Artefact (except the Pencil) that they share a Location with.

Enact a new rule, “Researchers and Collectors”:-

Each Individual is either a Researcher, a Collector or an Outsider, defaulting to being an Outsider. This quality is known as an Individual’s Pursuit. An Outsider may become a Researcher if fewer than a Quorum of Individuals are Researchers. An Outsider may become a Collector at any time.

Each Individual has a Location, which is either a Place or Unknown, defaulting to Unknown. An Individual may move to any Place at any time by updating their own Location to this effect, with the exception of the Places “The Institute” and “The Containment Facility” - only Researchers may move to these Places.

An Individual’s Pursuit and Location are tracked in a wiki page called “Individuals”.

Enact a new rule, “Places”:-

Several significant places are being observed by the Institute. At present, these Places are:-

• The Institute
• The Containment Facility
• Jerez

A dark room, possibly empty. A whirring projector. A rectangle of light across a wall, showing static footage of a regular HB pencil resting on some kind of printed personality test. Either the recording is monochrome, or it is a black pencil on a grey table. A man speaks.

...we refer to them Artefacts because of the… smudging effect they exhibit on the universe, blurring the local laws of physics in some simple or complex way, from the perceptual to the physical. In nearly all observed creation events this process is… catastrophic and the original object is abhorred by its surrounding reality, being instantly destroyed or otherwise erased from the world. But in some cases reality is able to successfully… recrystallise around the Artefact, giving a jagged but stable boundary to its smudging effect.

The Artefact on screen here is the Pencil. We recovered it four weeks ago from a collector in Jerez, and the rumours about it proved true. Physical contact with another Artefact causes that Artefact to… vanish, and… as best as we can interpret our own lab notes… erase all record of it ever having existed. Whether this retriggers the same nucleation process that created the Artefact, or destroys it in some other way, we were unable to ascertain. Research was progressing as to whether the Pencil would give us secure way to dispose of certain… L-Class Artefacts, or if it was simply teleporting objects away with a simple antimemetic halo effect, when the Pencil itself… disappeared from containment. That our records of the Pencil survive suggest a theft rather than the Artefact collapsing itself under its own means. A research and retrieval team was despatched to…

As a hand reaches into view on screen, the voice cuts out, and the film flickers and slides out of frame, leaving a blank white square.

Replace “Person” with “Individual” (or “Individuals” when plural). Replace “Bookman” with “Director”.

Yay I’m technically Emperor and this is technically a new dynasty now! SUBMIT TO MY ALMIGHTY POOOWWWEEER

But yeah passing the Emperor role to Kevan. They are the Bookman now.

I’m the winner by the latest CFJ at the time of posting this, yeehaw.

I don’t want to be Emperor again though because I want to play, and am looking for candidates for transfer.

I request to be unidled.

I think I ought to mention how I feel about the dynasty. I got here because I usually put a lot of effort into winning—I quite enjoyed the challenges it presents. But I didn’t plan much when I started the dynasty, and when things got complex I didn’t see an easy way of solving the resultant lack of interest that the schema effected. I was hoping a bit that some interesting and balanced path might materialize, but that hope faded.

Anyway, I guess the talent of winning doesn’t always translate to that of inventing fun central dynamics. I didn’t really want to run a second dynasty at the time, anyhow. It kind of stressed me out. It didn’t help that the “real life” system was esoteric in nature. (My family actually noted that it didn’t sound as fun as Castaways, back when I was considering it for TyGuy6 1.)

So, we should do something fun next, and show our newest players a good time.

Btw, Happy New Year!!!

Randomly select an unidle player that has also made a comment or post on the blog within 72 hours of the enactment of this CfJ, from the following list of player names: card, Cuddlebeam, Josh, Kevan, pokes and The Duke of Waltham.

The selected player has achieved victory.

Create a new rule:

A Person can Dance by spending 1 Stamina. The first Person to Dance during this dynasty has achieved Victory.

after 14 days of inactivity pokes idles
after 7 days of inactivity TyGuy6 idles

quorum becomes 3 and Blognomic becomes Dormant