Friday, August 30, 2024

Proposal: Dangerous Waters

Timed out, 3-0 with 1 DEF and Elder Judge voting FOR. Enacted by JonathanDark.

Adminned at 02 Sep 2024 19:03:34 UTC

In the rule “Upgrades”, add a subrule named “Mine” with the following text:

Cost 5. Effect: As a Fishing Action, you may remove Mine from your Upgrades and add a Mine to the same Cell that currently contains your name, but only if that Cell does not already contain a Mine and is a non-Shore Cell. A Mine in a Cell is considered a Hazard.

Blow Up is an atomic action with the following steps and where Victim is the Fishing Contestant that the action is being applied to:
* Set the Victim’s Doubloons and Catches to 0.
* Remove the Mine from the Victim’s current Cell.
* Choose a random orthogonal direction.
* Move the Victim 3 Cells away from the Cell currently containing their name in the direction chosen above. If one of those moves would result in an illegal move, the Victim should be moved only as far as is legal. If that would result in moving the Victim 0 Cells, repeat the previous step and this step.

In the subrule “Blackwater Beast”, add the following text:

The Blackwater Beast is considered a Hazard.

In the rule “The Sea Chart”, add the following text as its own paragraph:

When a Fishing Contestant’s name is moved from one Cell to another Cell as part of a dynastic action, and this movement involves counting a specific number of Cells between the starting and ending Cell, that Fishing Contestant is known as the Traveller and they are considereding to be Travelling while that dynastic action is being performed. When Travelling, the set of Cells referenced as part of that count, including the destination Cell but not including the starting Cell, is known as the Path. If there are multiple unique sets of Cells possible in that count, each unique set of such Cells is a valid Path for that Travelling. When a Fishing Contestant is Travelling and they are the Traveller, if they chose the destination Cell itself voluntarily, they may choose any valid Path as part of that dynastic action. In any other instance of Travelling where the Traveller is not voluntarily choosing the destination Cell itself, the only valid Path that can be chosen is the shortest set of Cells between the starting Cell and the destination Cell.

and in the same rule, add a subrule named “Hazards” with the following text:

If the name of something publicly tracked in a Cell is considered a Hazard, whenever a Fishing Contestant’s name is added to that Cell as part of a dynastic action (if it wasn’t already as part of this rule), or whenever that Cell is in the chosen Path of a Travelling Fishing Contestant, the destination of that Fishing Contestant is changed to the Cell containing that Hazard, any other movement to another Cell as part of that dynastic action is ignored, and that Fishing Contestant’s name must be added to that Cell as part of that dynastic action. Additionally, as part of that dynastic action, the Effect of that Hazard must be immediately applied to that Fishing Contestant, known as the Victim when the Effect is applied.

{| class="wikitable"
|-
! Hazard !! Effect
|-
| Blackwater Beast || The Victim gains 2 Madness
|-
| Mine || If the Victim chose the Path containing the Cell that has this Hazard, they may immediately spend 5 Energy to remove the Mine from that Cell. If they choose not to spend the Energy, or if the Victim did not choose the Path or the Victim was not Travelling when this Effect was applied, the Fishing Contestant or Elder Judge who is performing that dynastic action must perform Blow Up as part of that dynastic action, applying it to the Victim.
|}

Travel across the Blackwater Bay shouldn’t always be so straight-forward when there’s danger in certain Cells.

Wednesday, August 28, 2024

Proposal: Heavy Cargo

Reached quorum, 3-0. Enacted by JonathanDark.

Adminned at 30 Aug 2024 06:38:28 UTC

In the rule “Fishing Contestant”, remove the text that begins with “Each Fishing Contestant has a Speed” and ends with “their Speed is 1”. In that same rule, add a subrule named “Speed” with the following text:

Each Fishing Contestant has a Speed which is publicly tracked. A Fishing Contestant’s Catch Weight is the calculated value of that Fishing Contestant’s Catches divided by 15 and rounded down to the nearest integer. A Fishing Contestant’s Coin Weight is the calculated value of that Fishing Contestant’s Doubloons divided by 15 and rounded down to the nearest integer.

A Fishing Contestant’s Speed is equal to the larger of:
* 1
* 4 - their Catch Weight - their Coin Weight

In the rule “Doubloons”, add the following text:

Each Fishing Contestant has a Banked, which is a nonnegative integer, defaulting to 0, that is publicly tracked by putting it in parentheses next to that Fishing Contestant’s amount of Doubloons. As a Daily Action, a Fishing Contestant whose name is in a Shore Cell may perform a Transfer, which is an action in which they perform one of the following:
* Lose a positive amount of their Doubloons that would set their Doubloons to no less than 0, and gain the same amount in their Banked
* Lose a positive amount of their Banked that would set their Banked to no less than 0, and gain the same amount in their Doubloons

Any dynastic action other than Transfer which references or affects a Fishing Contestant’s Doubloons does not reference or affect their Banked.

There is a growing incentive to gain and keep a lot of Doubloons on hand. We need to have some balance against people having a huge amount of Doubloons being able to move around and do what they please, by penalizing carrying too many Doubloons in the same way we penalize carrying too many Catches. Equally, there needs to be a way to offload that penalty by putting spendable Doubloons away for later use.

Call for Judgment: Dude, Where’s My Coin?

Exceeded quorum, 4-0. Enacted by JonathanDark.

Adminned at 30 Aug 2024 06:29:21 UTC

In the rule “Doubloons”, after the text “which defaults to 10” add “and is publicly tracked.”

Uphold all dynastic actions that were illegal only because they were contingent on the specific value of Doubloons as an Orphan Variable and not illegal for any other reason.

Currently Doubloons are an Orphan Variable because the rules don’t specify where they are tracked, and any dynastic actions we’ve taken up to this point that involved Doubloons have been technically illegal.

Proposal: So much Churning sends me reeling

Reached quorum, 3-0. Enacted by JonathanDark.

Adminned at 30 Aug 2024 06:36:50 UTC

Replace the last sentence of the rule “Obelisks” with the following text:

For every letter requested after the third, they must pay an additional 5 doubloons and increase their madness by 1. If more letters are requested than letters in The Big One, they receive all letters in The Big One.

Right now the game is looking to end with a Churn-the-Mind-off; let’s make it harder to guess the Big One with a single Churn the Mind.

Proposal: [Building Blocks] [Core] Building Back the Blocks

Exceeded quorum, 4-0. Enacted by JonathanDark.

Adminned at 30 Aug 2024 06:30:50 UTC

In the Building Blocks rule, replace the text “; these rules must then be transcribed faithfully to this section of the ruleset, and any Building Blocks rules not so named must be removed from the Building Blocks section” with this text:

. When a Dynastic Reset is performed, the Building Blocks rules selected in the most recent Ascension Address (if any) must be transcribed faithfully to this section of the ruleset, and any Building Blocks rules not so named in that Ascension Address must be removed from the Building Blocks section

In the Core rule “Victory and Ascension”, after the text “If it has not been done since the most recent posting of an Ascension Address, the Elder Judge or any Fishing Contestant” add the text ” (if it’s the latter, they must wait until at least 4 hours after that Ascension Address has been posted)”

Addressing the issue Kevan brought up in Anyone Can Help With The Chores, which is that the current ruleset requires that the Building Blocks are copied at the moment the AA is posted, whereas our changes at the beginning of the dynasty were intended to allow any player to complete what’s now known as the “Dynastic Reset” in the rules once the Emperor posts the AA. The Building Blocks copying part was the only thing left out from that change.

I also added the requirement that anyone other than the Emperor must wait 4 hours after the AA is posted before performing the Dynastic Reset, in case the new Emperor decides to edit their AA and change the instructions within the 4-hour edit window.

Story Post: It’s been 84 years

After what feels like ages, a new big one has been landed…. A jar of marmalade? As jonathandark is awarded his prize, a fight breaks out among some of the younger judges over who gets to eat the marmalade, watery gurgles echoing out. What a strange place


The fish function was doesn’t live in water and is stored in a jar

Before I got confused about the change is how to set the function up I had set it to be a mako shark just as a point of clarification.

Monday, August 26, 2024

Proposal: More Treasures

Reached quorum, 3-0. Enacted by JonathanDark.

Adminned at 27 Aug 2024 21:16:36 UTC

To the table of Artifacts in the subrule “Artifacts”, insert the following entries:

| Aeolian Pouch || Action: Choose any one Disturbance or Fishing Hole || Move that Disturbance or Fishing Hole one orthogonal step on the Sea Chart
|-
| Merfolk Charm || Condition: Your Oxygen would be changed to a negative value || Your Oxygen is unchanged
|-
| Pearl of Wisdom || Action: Initiate a virtual action ||  As part of resolving that virtual action, the Elder Judge must privately communicate to you an example of a string that is In Season. This example should be different from all of the current Found Fish, the Big One, and any other examples sent to you as a result of previous uses of a Pearl of Wisdom
|-

Replace the contents of the subrule Treasures with the following text:

When a Fishing Contestant who performs Diving for Treasure gets a result of Treasure, they may either
* gain 1DICEN Doubloons where N is their current depth, OR
* select the row from the table below where their Depth is within the numerical range of the Treasure Result column of that row, and then apply the Effect on that row to themselves:
{| class="wikitable"
|-
! Treasure Result !! Effect
|-
| 1-3 || Add the Aeolian Pouch to your Artifacts if you don't already have it
|-
| 4-5 || Add the Atlantean Helm to your Artifacts if you don't already have it
|-
| 6-7 || Add the Merfolk Charm to your Artifacts if you don't already have it
|-
| 8-9 || Add the Smooth Obsidian Stone to your Artifacts if you don't already have it
|-
| 10 || Add the Pearl of Wisdom to your Artifacts if you don't already have it
|-
| 11 || Add the Seeding Rod to your Artifacts if you don't already have it
|-
| 12-14 || Add the Twin Rune Pendant to your Artifacts if you don't already have it
|-
| 15 or greater || Choose any two of the above Effects
|}

Adding three new treasures and changing how doubloon gain works (currently you either lose doubloons or break even on average when Diving for Treasure).

Proposal: Free Rest

Exceeded quorum, 4-0. Enacted by JonathanDark.

Adminned at 27 Aug 2024 14:36:18 UTC

In “Disturbances” replace “and it is the only dynastic action which Fishing Contestants may take” with “and Fishing Actions may not be performed”

Not being able to rest because you don’t have the time to update everything is a bit annoying. We could allow resting for free any time, but I think simply banning Fishing Actions when a sight disturbances is pending might be fine

Sunday, August 25, 2024

Story Post: Another bellow

Before anyone has a chance to move, another bellow rings out across the bay. No one is Affected.

Saturday, August 24, 2024

Proposal: Getting The Bends

Reached quorum, 3-0. Enacted by JonathanDark.

Adminned at 24 Aug 2024 20:06:25 UTC

In the rule “Diving for Treasure”, replace the text “When a Fishing Contestant’s depth is set to 0, their Oxygen is set to 20” with the following text:

When a Fishing Contestant’s Depth is set to 0, they first make any adjustments to their Oxygen and subsequently to their Madness per the rules, after which their Oxygen is set to 20

I just realized an issue where a Fishing Contestant could change Depth from a large number to 0 and suffer no consequences because their Oxygen gets reset to 20 instantly before any Madness kicks in. This Proposal makes sure that the large change in Depth still has consequences.

Proposal: Usually people lock up treasure, not the other way around

Reached quorum, 3-0. Enacted by JonathanDark.

Adminned at 24 Aug 2024 19:31:37 UTC

In the rule “Diving for Treasure”, remove the text from “, and it is the only action” to the end of that sentence, not including the period.

We may as well stop Diving for Treasure locking up actions. With the slow descent it posed an additional risk when you go deep since you’d have to Dive for Treasure several times on the way back up, but now it’s not serving much purpose. And it does cause problems when people forget or aren’t aware that they can’t take any other actions.

Proposal: Take A Deep Breath

Reached quorum, 3-0. Enacted by JonathanDark.

Adminned at 24 Aug 2024 19:27:55 UTC

In the rule “Diving for Treasure”, replace the text “As a Daily Action, Fishing Contestants may increase or decrease their Depth by 1” with the following text:

As a Daily Action, a Fishing Contestant may increase or decrease their Depth by any positive amount known as the Depth Change, as long as the resulting Depth is within the legal range for that Fishing Contestant, but when they do, they must also decrease their Oxygen by twice the value of (Depth Change - 1).

and in the same rule, remove the text “If your Oxygen is below 0, increase your Madness by 2.” and after the text “their Oxygen is set to 20.” add the following text:

Whenever a Fishing Contestant’s Oxygen is changed, if it is below 0 after the change, that Fishing Contestant’s Madness is increased by 2.

and in the same rule, replace “it is the only action other than Sight Disturbances” with “it is the only action other than changing their Depth (along with any changes to Oxygen and Madness triggered by changing their Depth), Sight Disturbances,”

As Lukas pointed out, changing Depth by 1 per day is far too slow. This lets you change Depth faster per Daily Action, but the faster you go, the more risk you gain if you have less Oxygen when you perform Diving for Treasure and might get Breathe.

Friday, August 23, 2024

Proposal: The beast below

Popular, 5-0. Enacted by JonathanDark.

Adminned at 23 Aug 2024 18:34:26 UTC

in “Blackwater Beast” replace

There exists a Blackwater Beast that has the following publicly-tracked variables: Next Movement which contains a date and time (defaulting to the current date and time plus 48 hours), Last Known Location which is either empty or a Cell (defaulting to empty), and Failed Bellows which is a number defaulting to 0. The Blackwater Beast is also known as Beast and the two terms are synonymous.

If the current time is after the Beast’s Next Movement, any Fishing Contestant or the Elder Judge may perform the Moving the Beast action, and it is the only dynastic action which Fishing Contestants may take other than Sight Disturbances.

with

There exists a Blackwater Beast that has the following publicly-tracked variables: Last Known Location which is either empty or a Cell (defaulting to empty), and Failed Bellows which is a number defaulting to 0. The Blackwater Beast is also known as Beast and the two terms are synonymous.

Remove “Set the Beast’s Next Movement to the current date and time plus 48 hours, rounded down to the nearest hour, then roll DICE24 and add the result of this roll in hours to the Next Movement.” from the same rule

Add “Roll a DICE5. On a result of 3 or less, perform the Moving the Beast Action” as first step of “Sight Disturbances”

Having multiple timers makes playing the game kinda annoying because you look at



Fish Function Set 17 Aug 2024 18:34
Next Disturbance: 24 August 2024 08:00
Last Catch: 28 August 2024 14:00

and think its safe to do actions

I guess we could also just move the beast time up in the wiki so its easier to spot. but might as well propose doing it all at once

Story Post: A distant rumble

Just before dawn, a deep rumble echoes throughout the bay. The reverberations create an eerie resonance in the obelisk near Fishing Contestant Desertfrog, almost as if the black stone is humming. Nearby, Fishing Contestant Clucky squints at another obelisk in the distance; is that—no, it’s just a trick of the twilight. Even so, Clucky is irrationally comforted by his decision to wait until the morning light before heading over there. In another timeline, he would have been right next to—no, no, it was nothing. Though some of the Fishing Contestants are uneasy, none are adversely Affected by these events.

Proposal: What Madness Lies Beneath

Reached quorum, 3-0 with 1 DEF. Enacted by JonathanDark.

Adminned at 23 Aug 2024 18:31:43 UTC

In the subrule “Anomalies”, add the following text:

When a Fishing Contestant who performs Diving for Treasure gets a result of Anomaly, they roll DICEX, where X is the smaller of their current Depth or 20, select the row from the table below where the result of that roll is within the numerical range of the Anomaly Result column of that row, and then apply the Effect on that row to themselves:

{| class="wikitable"
|-
! Anomaly Result !! Effect
|-
| 1-4 || Subtract 2DICEN Doubloons, where N is the Anomaly Result just rolled, to a minimum of 0
|-
| 5-8 || Change your Diving for Treasure result to "Treasure" and follow the instructions in the Treasure subrule
|-
| 9-12 || Change the Blackwater Beast's Last Known Location to the same Cell that contains your name, then perform the Moving the Beast atomic action
|-
| 13-15 || Set your Depth to 0, then roll {A1,A8,F1,F8} and move your name in The Sea Chart to the Cell matching the result of that roll.
|-
| 16-20 || Roll a die whose faces have the names of all other Fishing Contestants, then swap your Catches with the Catches of that Fishing Contestant whose name matches the result of that roll
|}

Some bad outcomes, a good one, and a “could be good, could be bad” one.

Proposal: Relic Hunter

Popular, 3-0 with 1 DEF. Enacted by JonathanDark.

Adminned at 23 Aug 2024 14:45:14 UTC

In the rule “Diving for Treasure”, before the subrule “Treasure” add a subrule named “Artifacts” with the following text:

An Artifact has a Name, a Use, and an Effect. Each Fishing Contestant has a publicly-tracked Artifacts, which is a list containing 0 or more Artifacts, defaulting to an empty list.

If the Use of an Artifact contains an Action, a Fishing Contestant who has that Artifact in their Artifacts may perform that Action to apply the Effect of that Artifact. If the Use of an Artifact contains a Condition, every Fishing Contestant who satisfies that Condition and has that Artifact in their Artifacts must have that Artifact’s Effect applied to them by the Fishing Contestant or Elder Judge who performed the dynastic action that triggered the Condition. When the Effect of an Artifact is applied to a Fishing Contestant, as part of applying the Effect that Artifact must be removed from the Artifacts of that Fishing Contestant.

{| class="wikitable"
|+ Artifacts
|-
! Name !! Use !! Effect
|-
| Atlantean Helm || Condition: This Fishing Contestant is Affected by the Beast’s Bellow || This Fishing Contestant is instead not Affected by the Beast’s Bellow
|-
| Twin Rune Pendant || Action: Once at any time, select a Cell that this Fishing Contestant could legally occupy if they could move to it and that contains the name of another Fishing Contestant who could legally occupy the Cell containing this Fishing Contestant's name if the selected Fishing Contestant could move to it || This Fishing Contestant swaps their name with the selected Fishing Contestant in the respective Cells containing their names
|-
| Seeding Rod || Action: Perform Sight Disturbances once at any time || When performing Sight Disturbances as part of using this Artifact, in the step of Sight Disturbances that begins with the text "If there are fewer than Quorum Fishing Holes", treat every instance of the word "Quorum" in that step as "Quorum multiplied by 3" when performing that step
|-
| Smooth Obsidian Stone || Condition: This Fishing Contestant is Mad || This Fishing Contestant's Madness is divided by 2, rounded down to the nearest integer
|}

In the subrule “Treasures”, add the following text:

When a Fishing Contestant who performs Diving for Treasure gets a result of Treasure, they select the row from the table below where their Depth is within the numerical range of the Treasure Result column of that row, and then apply the Effect on that row to themselves:

{| class="wikitable"
|-
! Treasure Result !! Effect
|-
| 1-4 || Gain 2DICEN Doubloons, where N is your current Depth
|-
| 5-8 || Add the Atlantean Helm to your Artifacts if you don't already have it
|-
| 9-12 || Add the Smooth Obsidian Stone to your Artifacts if you don't already have it
|-
| 13-15 || Add the Seeding Rod to your Artifacts if you don't already have it
|-
| 16 or greater || Add the Twin Rune Pendant to your Artifacts if you don't already have it
|}

Artifacts sound more interesting

Proposal: Faster Boats

Unpopular, 1-3. Failed by JonathanDark.

Adminned at 23 Aug 2024 14:43:43 UTC

In the rule “Energy”, replace
“1 additional energy for every Fishing Action that Fishing Contestant has already performed in the last 20 hours.”
with

1 additional energy for every two Fishing Actions that Fishing Contestant has already performed in the last 20 hours (that is, 0 additional energy for 1 previously performed action, 1 for 2 or 3, 2 for 4 or 5 etc.)

being able to do only one action per day without paying extra is a bit annoying

Proposal: Retail Therapy

Reached quorum, 3-0. Enacted by JonathanDark.

Adminned at 22 Aug 2024 23:34:23 UTC

In “Madness” replace “which is an action where that Fishing Contestant may spend any positive amount of their Energy to subtract an equal amount of their Madness, to a minimum of 0 Madness” with

which is an atomic action where that Fishing Contestant may spend any positive amount of their Energy to reduce their Madness by the amount of Energy just spent and additionally spend any positive even amount of Doubloons to reduce their Madness by half the amount of Doubloons just spent, all to a minimum of 0 Madness

in the same rule replace “except that the amount of Madness subtracted is only half of the Energy spent (rounded down)” with “except that Doubloons may not be spent”

Wednesday, August 21, 2024

Proposal: 20,000 Leagues Under The Sea

Withdrawn. Failed by JonathanDark.

Adminned at 22 Aug 2024 23:33:36 UTC

If the Proposal “A slow descent into madness” was not enacted, this Proposal has no effect.

In the subrule “Treasures”, add the following text:

When a Fishing Contestant who performs Diving for Treasure gets a result of Treasure, they pick one of the options below and apply that to themselves:
* Coin: Gain 2DICEX Doubloons, where X is your current Depth.
* Vigor: Gain an amount of Energy equal to your Depth.
* Sanity: Subtract an amount of Madness equal to half of your Depth, rounded down to the nearest integer, to a minimum of 0.

In the subrule “Anomalies”, add the following text:

When a Fishing Contestant who performs Diving for Treasure gets a result of Anomaly, they select the row from the table below where their current Depth is within the numerical range of the Depth Range column of that row, and then apply the Effect on that row to themselves:

{| class="wikitable"
|-
! Depth Range !! Effect
|-
| 1-2 || Subtract 2DICEX Doubloons, where X is your current Depth, to a minimum of 0
|-
| 3-4 || Change the Blackwater Beast's Last Known Location to the same Cell that contains your name, then perform the Moving the Beast atomic action
|-
| 5-6 || Roll {A1,A8,F1,F8} and move your name in The Sea Chart to the Cell matching the result of that roll
|-
| 7 or greater || Gain 5 Madness
|}

Floating some ideas for Treasures and Anomalies. We can always expand or change these.

Proposal: Hitting Rock Bottom

Reached quorum, 3-0. Enacted by JonathanDark.

Adminned at 22 Aug 2024 23:30:52 UTC

If the Proposal “A slow descent into madness” was not enacted, this Proposal has no effect.

In the rule “Diving for Treasure” add the following text:

A Fishing Contestant’s Depth has a maximum value according to the Landmark of the Cell containing that Fishing Contestant’s name:
* Shore: Maximum Depth is 0
* Ocean: Maximum Depth is 100
* All other Cells: Maximum Depth is 10

A Fishing Contestant’s name may not be moved to a new Cell if the maximum Depth for that Cell is less than that Fishing Contestant’s current Depth.

It doesn’t make sense to be able to dive on the Shore, and it makes sense to be able to dive deeper in the Ocean, so we should have maximum Depths depending on the Cell.

Proposal: Energizer Bunny

Popular, 5-0. Enacted by JonathanDark.

Adminned at 22 Aug 2024 23:28:54 UTC

Add the following subrule to “Energy” called “Speed Up” and give it the following text

If it is before August 26th, 2024 the rest of this subrule is considered to be flavor text.

No dynastic actions may be taken other than the ones specified in this subrule. Dynastic actions specified in this subrule may always be taken, even if otherwise not allowed by “Blackwater Beast”

Any Fishing Contestant or the Elder Judge may replace “As a weekly action, a Fishing Contestant may Rest and gain 5 Energy.” with “As a weekly action, a Fishing Contestant may Rest and gain 7 Energy.” and then delete this subrule

Making it so that we can get more energy to do more things starting next week

Tuesday, August 20, 2024

Proposal: A slow descent into madness

Timed out, 2-0 with 2 DEFs. Enacted by JonathanDark.

Adminned at 22 Aug 2024 23:24:56 UTC

Create a new rule called “Diving for Treasure” with the following text:

Each Fishing Contestant has publicly tracked nonnegative integer Depth (defaulting to 0) and integer Oxygen (defaulting to 20). When a Fishing Contestant’s depth is set to 0, their Oxygen is set to 20. As a Daily Action, Fishing Contestants may increase or decrease their Depth by 1. If a Fishing Contestant with a Depth greater than 0 has not already done so since the last Sight Disturbances, they may take the “Diving for Treasure” action, and it is the only action other than Sight Disturbances or Moving the Beast that they may take. Diving for Treasure is an atomic action with the following steps:
* Randomly select one of the following outcomes: Breathe, Treasure, Anomaly, or Nothing.
* If the outcome is Breathe: Reduce your Oxygen by your current Depth. If your Oxygen is below 0, increase your Madness by 2.
* If the outcome is Treasure: Follow the instructions in the subrule Treasures corresponding to your current Depth, if such instructions exist.
* If the outcome is Anomaly: Follow the instructions in the subrule Anomalies corresponding to your current Depth, if such instructions exist.
* If you are Mad, set your Depth to 0 and your Oxygen to 20.

Create empty subrules called “Treasures” and “Anomalies”.

Append the following to the end of the rule Madness:

* Diving for Treasure

A subgame (get it?) that is intentionally incomplete, to see if people are interested in the idea. Ascending or Descending is a Daily Action by design, since I think Fishing Actions (and Energy in general) are already overloaded.

Proposal: Moving Things Along

Reached quorum, 3-1. Enacted by JonathanDark.

Adminned at 21 Aug 2024 14:31:28 UTC

In the rule “The Big One”, add a subrule named “Last Catch” with the following text:

There is a publicly-tracked Last Catch which contains a date and time, defaulting to the current date and time rounded down to the nearest hour plus 168 hours (7 days).

If the current date and time is on or after the Last Catch, at their earliest convenience the Elder Judge should perform the Last Call, which is an atomic action with the following steps:
* Resolve all pending Fish Identifications in the order they were received
* If the Big One Caught atomic action was performed as a result of the previous step, skip all remaining steps of this atomic action and consider it completed.
* If the Found Fish list is not empty, if there is only one Fishing Contestant whose name appears in the most entries in the Found Fish list, mark that Fishing Contestant as the Hero.
* If the Found Fish list is not empty, if there is more than one Fishing Contestant whose name appears in the most entries in the Found Fish list, among those Fishing Contestants mark the Fishing Contestant whose name appears first in the Found Fish list as the Hero.
* If a Fishing Contestant was marked as the Hero in this instance of this atomic action, perform the Big One Caught atomic action.
* Set the Last Catch to the current date and time, rounded down to the nearest hour, plus 168 hours (7 days).

In the subrule “Trophies”, add the following step just before the last step in the atomic action Big One Caught:

* Set the Last Catch to the current date and time, rounded down to the nearest hour, plus 168 hours (7 days)

Hopefully this is the agreeable version

Monday, August 19, 2024

Proposal: Diminishing Returns

Withdrawn. Failed by JonathanDark.

Adminned at 20 Aug 2024 19:58:52 UTC

In the rule “The Big One”, add a subrule named “Last Catch” with the following text:

There is a publicly-tracked Last Catch which contains a date and time, defaulting to the current date and time rounded down to the nearest hour. There is a publicly-tracked number named Bonus which defaults to 2.

If it has been 168 hours (7 days) or more since the date and time in the Last Catch, at their earliest convenience the Elder Judge should perform the Last Call, which is an atomic action with the following steps:
* Resolve all pending Fish Identifications in the order they were received
* If the Big One Caught atomic action was performed as a result of the previous step, skip all remaining steps of this atomic action and consider it completed.
* If the Found Fish list is empty, subtract 1 from the Bonus, to a minimum of 0.
* If the Found Fish list is not empty, if there is only one Fishing Contestant whose name appears in the most entries in the Found Fish list, mark that Fishing Contestant as the Hero.
* If the Found Fish list is not empty, if there is more than one Fishing Contestant whose name appears in the most entries in the Found Fish list, among those Fishing Contestants mark the Fishing Contestant whose name appears first in the Found Fish list as the Hero.
* If a Fishing Contestant was marked as the Hero in this instance of this atomic action, perform the Big One Caught atomic action.
* Set the Last Catch to the current date and time, rounded down to the nearest hour.

In the subrule “Trophies”, add the following step just before the last step in the atomic action Big One Caught:

* Set the Last Catch to the current date and time, rounded down to the nearest hour

and in the same subrule, in the atomic action Big One Caught replace the step “* Increase the Hero’s Trophies by the current Level.” with the following steps

* Increase the Hero’s Trophies by the current Level plus the current Bonus.
* Set the Bonus to its default.

This hopefully addresses the concern from Lukas that a penalty for not acting would make his trophies near-worthless. The Bonus incentivizes getting The Big One as soon as possible to get the maximum possible Trophies. A Fishing Contestant can achieve victory by simply getting The Big One each week for the next 2 weeks.

Proposal: Time Waits For No One

Withdrawn. Failed by JonathanDark.

Adminned at 20 Aug 2024 06:32:03 UTC

In the rule “The Big One”, add a subrule named “Last Catch” with the following text:

There is a publicly-tracked Last Catch which contains a date and time, defaulting to the current date and time rounded down to the nearest hour.

If it has been 168 hours (7 days) or more since the date and time in the Last Catch, at their earliest convenience the Elder Judge should perform the Last Call, which is an atomic action with the following steps:
* Resolve all pending Fish Identifications in the order they were received
* If the Big One Caught atomic action was performed as a result of the previous step, skip all remaining steps of this atomic action and consider it completed
* If the Found Fish list is empty, subtract 1 from each Fishing Contestant’s Trophies, to a minimum of 0
* If the Found Fish list is not empty, if there is only one Fishing Contestant whose name appears in the most entries in the Found Fish list, mark that Fishing Contestant as the Hero
* If the Found Fish list is not empty, if there is more than one Fishing Contestant whose name appears in the most entries in the Found Fish list, among those Fishing Contestants mark the Fishing Contestant whose name appears first in the Found Fish list as the Hero
* If a Fishing Contestant was marked as the Hero in this instance of this atomic action, perform the Big One Caught atomic action
* Set the Last Catch to the current date and time, rounded down to the nearest hour

In the subrule “Trophies”, add the following step just before the last step in the atomic action Big One Caught:

* Set the Last Catch to the current date and time, rounded down to the nearest hour

 

Lukas made a good point in an earlier comment, which is that if everyone optimizes their strategy to wait for a higher Level before submitting Fish Identifications and catching The Big One, no one will wind up doing anything, which will make the dynasty take forever to finish. This proposal aims to add in a weekly timer such that, if no one catches The Big One, the trophy instead goes to the Fishing Contestant who found the most fish during that time, to at least reward the player who achieved the most successful identifications in that time period. If no one does anything at all after a week, then everyone gets penalized, which should incentivize players to try to get some successful finds.

Sunday, August 18, 2024

Reverting Desertfrog’s recent actions

Desertfrog, I’ve reverted your edits on the wiki per the following sentence in the rule Disturbances: “If the current time is after the Next Disturbance, any Fishing Contestant or the Elder Judge may take the Sight Disturbances action, and it is the only dynastic action which Fishing Contestants may take.” I’ll perform Sight Disturbances now, so you can retake those actions shortly.

Sunday, August 18, 2024

Proposal: Found at Sea

Timed out, 4-0. Enacted by JonathanDark.

Adminned at 20 Aug 2024 06:29:40 UTC

Increase the Energy of the Fishing Contestant named “Desertfrog” by 7.

In the rule “Energy”, immediately after

Each Fishing Contestant has a publicly tracked integer Energy which can be between 0 and 14

add

and defaults to 7

 

Revisiting Clucky’s “Lost at Sea” proposal to give new players some starting energy.

Proposal: Achievements

Timed out, 1-2. Failed by JonathanDark.

Adminned at 20 Aug 2024 06:28:57 UTC

Create a new rule called “Achievements” with the following text:

The subrule “List of Achievements” is a list of names of Achievements, the value in Trophies that each Achievement is worth, and the requirements for satisfying that Achievement. There is a publicly tracked list that details, for each Achievement, which Fishing Contestant(s) (if any) currently meet the requirements for that Achievement. When counting the number of Trophies that a Fishing Contestant has for the purposes of any other rule, add the value of each Achievement whose requirements that Fishing Contestant satisfies to that total. The publicly tracked number of Trophies that each Fishing Contestant has does not include the value of their Achievements.

Create a subrule of “The Sea Chart” called “Claiming Cells” with the following text:

When a Fishing Contestant moves as part of a Fishing Action, they may Claim a number of orthogonally connected cells equal to their Speed. These Claimed cells must include the two cells that the Fishing Contestant occupied before and after their move, and cannot include any cells that are occupied by other Fishing Contestants. For each cell, the name of the Fishing Contestant that most recently Claimed it is publicly tracked by a clear indication on the Sea Chart (such as by marking the cell with an unambiguous abbreviation of their name, or by using a background color uniquely associated with that Fishing Contestant).

Create a subrule of “Achievements” called “List of Achievements” with the following text:

* Navigator (2 Trophies): Have the most Claimed cells on the Sea Chart.

Proposal: Forgotten Fish

Popular, 4-0. Enacted by JonathanDark.

Adminned at 19 Aug 2024 03:51:28 UTC

In the rule “The Big One”, replace “The Big One is a fish (i.e. an alphabetic string of letters that satisfies the Fish Function)” with “The Big One is an alphabetic string of letters that is In Season”.

In the dynastic ruleset, replace every instance of “is a fish” with “is In Season” and every instance of “is not a fish” with “is not In Season”.

I forgot a few places that still had “is a fish” and “is not a fish”, leading to the possibility that The Big One could still be an actual fish, and when replying to a Fish Identification, the reply could be confusing because it’s not entirely accurate to which strings succeeded or failed.

Call for Judgment: It also comes in “Dark” or “Light”

Popular, 4-0. Enacted by JonathanDark.

Adminned at 17 Aug 2024 18:07:05 UTC

Increase the Fishing Contestant known as Clucky’s Doubloon by 1

I had submitted “Salmon” during the first fish function. I believe that meets “lives in water and has a color as part of its name” as Salmon is itself also a color (as evidenced by the list of html color names https://www.w3schools.com/tags/ref_colornames.asp)

As a result, I believe I should’ve gotten one extra doubloon

Saturday, August 17, 2024

Proposal: A Trophy

Popular, 4-0. Enacted by JonathanDark.

Adminned at 17 Aug 2024 18:02:45 UTC

Add the following to “The Big One”

There is a publicly tracked integer called Level

In “Trophies” replace the step “Increase the Hero’s Trophies by 1.” with the two steps

* Increase the Hero’s Trophies by the current Level.
* Increase the current Level by 1

In “Trophies” also replace “at least 5 Trophies” with “at least 10 Trophies” whereever it occurs

Set the Fishing Contestant know as Lukas’s Trophies to be 3

Set Level to 3

yes this breaks if someone else gets a trophy before this passes but we can CFJ that away if needed

A Quiet Place

We have Low-Player Mode enabled, so the dynasty can technically go on with only 3 Fishing Contestants and the Elder Judge. However, I haven’t seen Lukas make any moves or blog posts in a few days, so I’m just wondering what we’re doing at this point. I can certainly keep making dynastic moves, but it’s not much fun if no one else is participating.

Friday, August 16, 2024

Story Post: What’s the function

Sorry for the delay but the past fish functions were as follows.


lives in water and has a color as part of its name


lives in water and is a foot long or smaller

Proposal: Variety Is Some Sort Of Spice

Popular, 4-0. Enacted by JonathanDark.

Adminned at 17 Aug 2024 18:01:02 UTC

In the subrule “Trophies”, after the text “Change the Fish Function” add the following text:

such that none of the strings in the Found Fish match the criteria described in the new Fish Function

When changing the Fish Function, it should be sufficiently different from the previous Fish Function such that new guesses aren’t using the same pattern(s) as the previous ones.

Proposal: Figuratively Fishy

Reached quorum, 3-1. Enacted by JonathanDark.

Adminned at 17 Aug 2024 17:56:22 UTC

In the rule “Fish Function” and the rule “The Big One” replace each instance of “alphanumeric” with “alphabetic”.

In the rule “Fish Function”, replace each instance of the text “is a fish” with “is In Season”, and in the same rule, add the following text:

An alphabetic string is In Season if it meets all of the following criteria:
* It satisfies the criteria described in the Fish Function
* It is not any part of the name nor the entire name of a fish in the list of fish names, ignoring any differences in upper or lower case letters, listed by the sections labeled “A” through “Z” on this Wikipedia page as it existed in the version of the page at the following URL: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=List_of_fish_common_names&oldid=1217985466

The Fish Function is illegal if there does not exist any alphabetic string that can be In Season.

Trying to address Clucky’s complaint that The Big One (and the Fish Function in general) is too easy when the possible space is limited to actual fish names.

Also getting rid of the “numeric” part of the strings, because it causes too many problems with other parts of the rules and isn’t necessary when we can expand the possible guessing space to all alphabetical strings that satisfy the Fish Function that aren’t actually names of real fish.

Thursday, August 15, 2024

Proposal: Sight Unseen

Timed out, 1-3. Failed by JonathanDark.

Adminned at 17 Aug 2024 17:55:27 UTC

In “The Big One” replace

The number of characters in the Big One is a publicly tracked integer called the “Length of the Big One”

with

The number of characters in the Big One is a private tracked integer called the “Length of the Big One”

Add an Upgrade called “Radar” with a cost of 10 and an Effect “As a Virtual Fishing Action known as Radar Activation, you may ask the Elder Judge what the Length of the Big One is. To resolve this action, they inform you the Length of the Big One”

In Trophies replace “Fail all unresolved Fish Identification” with “Fail all unresolved Radar Activation or Fish Identification”

Tuesday, August 13, 2024

Proposal: Funkalicious

Timed out, 3-0. Enacted by JonathanDark.

Adminned at 15 Aug 2024 21:41:45 UTC

In “Trophies” replace “Make a Story Post on the blog announcing that a Trophy has been claimed.” with “Make a Story Post on the blog announcing that a Trophy has been claimed, and revealing what the fish function was prior to being changed in this action”

Add a subrule to “Trophies” called “Function Reveal” with the following text

The Elder Judge should, at their earliest convivence, make a blog post revealing what all previous fish functions were (i.e. phrases that were a fish function at a previous point during this dynasty but no longer are) and then delete this subrule

 

Adding audit power to the fish function.

Proposal: Season Ender

Timed out, 2-0 with 1 DEF and Elder Judge voting FOR. Enacted by JonathanDark.

Adminned at 15 Aug 2024 21:39:41 UTC

In the subrule “Trophies” add the following text:

If only one Fishing Contestant has at least 5 Trophies, they have achieved victory. If more than one Fishing Contestant has at least 5 Trophies, no Fishing Contestant achieves victory until there is only one Fishing Contestant who has the most Trophies among all Fishing Contestants, in which case that Fishing Contestant achieves victory.

The wincon seems to be fairly obvious at this point, and there’s still plenty of opportunity for everyone else to catch up in Trophies, so I think it’s safe to add this now.

Story Post: What a….whopper?

With a heave, Lukas tosses the newest big one onto the trophy table… a big, mighty…. Minnow? Well, as the elder proclaimed, so it be.


Lukas scores another trophy. New big one has been chosen. Good luck

Tuesday, August 13, 2024

Proposal: Big 101

Timed out, 3-0. Enacted by JonathanDark.

Adminned at 15 Aug 2024 02:37:36 UTC

In “Fish Functions” add the following to the paragraph starting “To resolve Fish Identification”

Additionally, after resolving all the strings submitted for a given Fish Identification, if any of the strings submitted were Fish with the same name of as the Big One, the Elder Judge should perform the Big One Caught atomic action, using the Fishing Contestant who submitted the currently processed Fish Identification as the Hero, as part of resolving the Fish Identification action as a whole

In “Trophies” replace “If a Fishing Contestant submits a string as part of a Fish Identification that exactly matches the Big One, then as an atomic action the Elder Judge should take the following steps:” with

Big One Caught is an atomic action that may only be performed by the Elder Judge, and only when allowed elsewhere by the rules. When performed, a specific Fishing Contestant must be marked as the Hero in order to perform it. It has the following steps

Add the following step as the second to last step in the Big One Caught atomic action:

Fail all unresolved Fish Identification (not counting the one currently being resolved) actions, refunding the Fishing Contestant trying to perform the action any catches and energy they spent to perform it

In the same list, replace “Increase that Fishing Contestant’s Trophies by 1.”

with “Increase the Hero’s Trophies by 1.”

Sunday, August 11, 2024

Story Post: A quiet day

Another day, and nothing making a ruckus

Friday, August 09, 2024

Story Post: Did you hear that?

A foggy day greets the contestants, some of whom think they hear a loud bellow deep in the fog but shrug it off as nothing more then a trick of the wind

Proposal: A Simpler Creature

Timed out, 3-0. Enacted by JonathanDark.

Adminned at 12 Aug 2024 02:30:45 UTC

Replace the entire text of the rule “Blackwater Beast” with the following:

There exists a Blackwater Beast that has the following publicly-tracked variables: Next Movement which contains a date and time (defaulting to the current date and time plus 48 hours), Last Known Location which is either empty or a Cell (defaulting to empty), and Failed Bellows which is a number defaulting to 0. The Blackwater Beast is also known as Beast and the two terms are synonymous.

If the current time is after the Beast’s Next Movement, any Fishing Contestant or the Elder Judge may perform the Moving the Beast action, and it is the only dynastic action which Fishing Contestants may take other than Sight Disturbances.

For the purposes of this rule, a Cell adjacent to the Beast’s Last Known Location is one that is a single horizontal, vertical, or diagonal step away.

Moving the Beast is an atomic action with the following steps:
* Set the Beast’s Last Known Location to a random non-Shore Cell if it is empty.
* Roll a DICE2. On a result of 1, the Beast Bellows.
* If the Beast does not Bellow, add 1 to the Beast’s Failed Bellows and remove it from being publicly tracked on The Sea Chart if it is currently publicly tracked there.
* If the Beast Bellows:
** Do this a number of times equal to the Beast’s Failed Bellows: Randomly select a Cell from the non-Shore Cells that are adjacent to the Beast’s Last Known Location, then set the Beast’s Last Known Location to the result of that roll.
** Set the Beast’s Failed Bellows to 0.
** Publicly track the Beast’s Last Known Location on The Sea Chart.
** Each Fishing Contestant that is on or adjacent to the Beast’s Last Known Location, except for Fishing Contestants in a Shore Cell, is Affected by the Beast’s Bellow for this instance of this atomic action. Add 2 to the Madness of each Affected Fishing Contestant.
** Make a Story Post on the blog that the Beast Bellowed using any flavor text of the author’s choosing in the title, and a body that contains a list of Fishing Contestants that are Affected by the Beast’s Bellow
* Set the Beast’s Next Movement to the current date and time plus 48 hours, rounded down to the nearest hour, then roll DICE24 and add the result of this roll in hours to the Next Movement.

 

A simpler version of my previous Proposal. Thanks to Lukas for suggesting the algorithm.

Call for Judgment: A second correction

Reached quorum, 3-0. Enacted by JonathanDark.

Adminned at 10 Aug 2024 04:10:33 UTC

Uphold the illegal result of the first Churn the Mind action performed by JonathanDark.

Modify JonathanDark’s variables in the following way:
Increase Energy by 3
Increase Doubloons by 5
Decrease Madness by 2

I had a similar problem to SingularByte. The letters given to me for The Big One were “ttwinab” but there was actually no “n”. Unfortunately, I didn’t have time to get into SB’s CfJ before the edit window closed, so I had to make my own.

Call for Judgment: A correction

Reached quorum, 4-0. Enacted by JonathanDark.

Adminned at 09 Aug 2024 22:13:28 UTC

Uphold the illegal result of the first Churn the Mind action performed by SingularByte.

Modify SingularByte’s variables in the following way:
Increase Energy by 5
Increase Doubloons by 5

Apologies for having yet another cfj after there’s already been two for this action, but new information has come to light. My Churn the Mind clue was “ttiinab”, but the Big One was “whitebait”. Given that there’s no “n” in whitebait, the clue was invalid but the action can’t exactly be reverted without also reverting every subsequent virtual action. That’s messy, so I’m just requesting a refund; 4 energy for the madness, 1 energy and 5 doubloons for the obelisk action.

Wednesday, August 07, 2024

Story Post: The first trophy

Lukas has landed the first trophy of contest.

Story Post: Another calm day

Another day, another peaceful fishing trip

Proposal: The Lunatics are Running the Asylum

Reached quorum, 5-0. Enacted by JonathanDark.

Adminned at 09 Aug 2024 14:28:17 UTC

In the rule “Madness”, replace “they may not take any dynastic actions other than either of the following” with “they may not take any dynastic actions other than any of the following” and add the following items to the bulleted list under that text in that rule:

* Sight Disturbances (if it would be allowed by the Disturbances rule if this Fishing Contestant was not Mad)
* Moving the Beast (if it would be allowed by the Blackwater Beast rule if this Fishing Contestant was not Mad)

I realized that if a Fishing Contestant is Mad, the current wording of the rule blocks them from performing Sight Disturbances, but the Disturbances rule in turn might block them from performing Rest or Meditation, deadlocking them into being unable to do anything, so here’s a fix for that.

Proposal: Autonomous Beast

Withdrawn. Failed by JonathanDark.

Adminned at 09 Aug 2024 14:27:21 UTC

Replace the entire text of the rule “Blackwater Beast” with the following:

There exists a Blackwater Beast that has the following publicly-tracked variables: Next Movement which contains a date and time (defaulting to the current date and time plus 48 hours), Last Known Location which is either empty or a Cell (defaulting to empty), and Possible Locations which is a series of Cells that may be duplicates and are contained in {} brackets and separated by commas (defaulting to an empty {} brackets). The Blackwater Beast is also known as Beast and the two terms are synonymous.

If the current time is after the Beast’s Next Movement, any Fishing Contestant or the Elder Judge may perform the Moving the Beast action, and it is the only dynastic action which Fishing Contestants may take other than Sight Disturbances.

Moving the Beast is an atomic action with the following steps:
* Set the Beast’s Last Known Location to a random non-Shore Cell if it is empty
* If the Beast’s Possible Locations is empty, select all non-Shore Cells orthogonally adjacent to the Beast’s Last Known Location and add them to the Beast’s Possible Locations, separated by commas
* Randomly select 4 Cells from the Beast’s Possible Locations (keeping any duplicates from the random selection), or if there are 4 or less Cells to choose from simply select all of the Cells, and call these the Future Locations for this instance of the atomic action
* For each Cell in the Future Locations, select all non-Shore Cells orthogonally adjacent to that Cell and add them to the the Beast’s Possible Locations, separated by commas and adding the Cells even if any are duplicates of existing Cells in the Possible Locations
* Roll a DICE2. On a result of 1, the Beast Bellows.
* If the Beast Bellows:
** Randomly select a Cell from the Beast’s Possible Locations using the {} and its contents directly in the Dice Roller
** Set the Beast's Last Known Location to that Cell and publicly track it in that Cell on The Sea Chart
** Set the Possible Locations to empty {} brackets
** Each Fishing Contestants that is on or orthogonally adjacent to the Beast’s Last Known Location, except for Fishing Contestants in a Shore Cell, is Affected by the Beast’s Bellow. Add 2 to the Madness of each Affected Fishing Contestant.
** Make a Story Post on the blog that the Beast Bellowed using any flavor text of the author’s choosing in the title, and a body that contains a list of Fishing Contestants that were Affected by the Beast’s Bellow
* If the Beast did not Bellow, set its Last Known Location to empty and remove it from public tracking on The Sea Chart
* Set the Beast’s Next Movement to the current date and time plus 48 hours, rounded down to the nearest hour, then roll DICE24 and add the result of this roll in hours to the Next Movement.

 

Removing the burden of Moving the Beast from darknight and putting it into the hands of the Fishing Contestants. Similar to Sight Disturbances, once it’s time to perform Moving the Beast, all Fishing Contestants’ dynastic actions are blocked until it’s done. The cycle is 48 hours + a random 1-24 hours, so hopefully this won’t be a burden for anyone too often.

This looks like a lot but isn’t actually that complicated, just wordy.

This is also a great time to re-evaluate if we even want the Blackwater Beast at all.

Tuesday, August 06, 2024

Call for Judgment: No Illegal Actions

Unpopular, 0-5. Failed by JonathanDark.

Adminned at 07 Aug 2024 16:23:58 UTC

Undo the dynastic actions taken by SingularByte took between14:41 and 14:55 on 5 August 2024

Add a dynastic rule called “Revelations” with the following text

The Elder Judge must, at their earliest convenience, publicly reveal in a blog post any information privately revealed to the Fishing Contestant known as SingularByte as a result of actions taken by the Fishing Contestant known as SingularByte which took between 14:41 and 14:55 on 5 August 2024 then delete this from the rules.

Not a fan of the “you got information out of this so we’re just going to uphold your actions” approach proposed here https://blognomic.com/archive/disturbance_in_the_time_space_continuum#comments

If a piece of information is described as being tracked secretly or privately by the Elder Judge (including secretly random selections), then that information may only be revealed by the Elder Judge when the ruleset allows it.

Seems like the ruleset didn’t actually allow for certain information to be revealed, and when in doubt if private information is incorrectly revealed the best solution is to reveal it to everyone

Tuesday, August 06, 2024

Proposal: Shipyard

Reached quorum, 4-0. Enacted by JonathanDark.

Adminned at 07 Aug 2024 16:24:49 UTC

Add a new dynastic rule called “Upgrades” with the following text

Each Fishing Contestant may have a number of Upgrades. The name of each Upgrade which a Fishing Contestant has is publicly tracked.

Each Upgrade has a Name, an Effect, and possibly a Cost. The effect of an upgrade applies only to Fishing Contestants who have that upgrade. Each upgrade is listed as a sub rule to this rule, with the name of the Upgrade being the name of the sub rule and the cost (if it exists) and effect listed as the contents of the subrule.

If a Fishing Contestant’s location is the Shore then as a Fishing Action they may select an upgrade that has a cost which they do not already have and then spend the cost of that upgrade in Doubloons to acquire it.

Add an upgrade called “Motor” with “Cost 13. Effect: When performing the speed calculations in ‘Fishing Contestant’, add 1”

Add an upgrade called “Catapult” with “Cost 5. Effect: When performing Fish Identification, you may submit two additional strings even if you are not in the Judge’s hut”

Add an upgrade called “Range Extender” with “Cost 8. Effect: You may perform Obelisk action when you are in a cell orthogonally adjacent to Basalt Obelisks”

Call for Judgment: Disturbance in the Time-Space Continuum

Reached quorum, 4-1. Enacted by JonathanDark.

Adminned at 06 Aug 2024 14:34:51 UTC

Uphold the dynastic actions taken by SingularByte between 14:41 and 14:55 on 5 August 2024, and any actions performed by the Elder Judge in reaction to those specific actions.

SingularByte performed some dynastic actions that caused revealing of random bits of knowledge, but he did it after the Next Disturbance time without performing the Sight Disturbances atomic action first. This would normally be illegal, and would require him to perform Sight Disturbances and re-do the dynastic actions after, but because he gained knowledge that was determined randomly and can’t now be unlearned, it’s not so easy to re-do everything. The easiest way forward is just to uphold his actions this time. Had he properly done the Sight Disturbances first, the outcome would not have changed.

Proposal: Short range obelisks

Reached quorum, 4-0. Enacted by JonathanDark.

Adminned at 06 Aug 2024 14:31:36 UTC

In the rule Obelisks, replace the rules text “to perform an Obelisk action, a Fishing Contestant must be in the same cell as a Basalt Obelisk, and as a cost of performing an Obelisk action, a Fishing Contestant must either pay 5 doubloons, or increase their madness by 3. ” with

for a Fishing Contestant to perform an Obelisk action, that Fishing Contestant must be in the same cell as a Basalt Obelisk, and as a cost of performing an Obelisk action, that Fishing Contestant must either pay 5 doubloons, or increase their madness by 3.

Rules patch

Monday, August 05, 2024

ChaosGoblin is Shipwrecked

ChaosGoblin goes idle after over 7 days of inactivity. Quorum is unchanged at 4.

Story Post: A calm, quiet day in the bay

It’s a calm day to fish, nothing but gulls cawing and the breeze blowing. Nothing big bellowing out and scaring people into madness, not that such a thing lives in the bay

Proposal: Fish Buildup 2: Fishing Holes

Reached Quorum, 4-0. Enacted by JonathanDark.

Adminned at 05 Aug 2024 05:01:53 UTC

Create a new rule named “Fishing Holes” with the following text:

Some Cells on the Sea Chart may be Fishing Holes. Fishing Holes have a publicly tracked integer Buildup tracked by adding the Buildup in parentheses next to the Cell’s label. By default, Cells are not Fishing Holes.

When a Fishing Contestant performs the Collect Catches action, then as part of that action they receive a number of catches equal to that Cell’s Buildup (in addition to any other catches they earn from that action), that Cell is no longer a Fishing Hole, and the indication of Buildup is removed from that Cell’s label.

Add the following two steps to the Sight Disturbances action, immediately before the final step:

* If there are fewer than Quorum Fishing Holes on the Sea Chart, randomly select a non-Shore Cell. If this Cell is not already a Fishing Hole, it becomes a Fishing Hole with a Buildup of 0. Repeat this step until there are Quorum Fishing Holes.
* Increase the Buildup of every non-Ocean Fishing Hole by 1 and every Ocean Fishing Hole by 2.

 

Another take on Clucky’s Fish Buildup idea. The easily-accessible Fishing Holes will tend to get fished out quickly, while the harder-to-reach ones will stick around for a while, until they become attractive enough.

Saturday, August 03, 2024

Proposal: Fish Buildup

Timed out, 1-3. Failed by JonathanDark.

Adminned at 05 Aug 2024 05:00:38 UTC

Add a new dynastic rule called “Buildup”

Each Cell has a publicly tracked integer Buildup, which defaults to 0. Buildup should be tracked by adding the Buildup in parenthesis after the name of the cell in the sea chart.

Cells can be Fished or Unfished, and by default are Unfished. Cells that are Fished are publicly tracked by adding a * after their name in the sea chart, while Cells that are Unfished have no such mark.

When a Fishing Contestant performs the Collect Catches action, then as part of that action they receive a number of catches equal to that cell’s buildup (in addition to any other catches they earn from that action), the buildup of that cell is set to 0, and that cell becomes Fished

There is a publicly tracked value known as Rounds Until Buildup Is Updated which defaults to 3

Update Buildup is an atomic action with the following steps:

* Increase the Buildup of every Unfished Ocean Cell by 2
* Increase the Buildup of every Unfished Cell that does not have a Landmark and is not in the list of Disturbances by 1
* Make every cell Unfished
* Set Rounds Until Buildup Is Updated to be 3

Add the following step to the Sight Disturbances action, right after the “Any fishing contestants in that cell are moved to a legal adjacent cell in a random direction, if possible” step

Set the Buildup of that Cell to be 0

Add the following step in the second to last spot of the Sight Disturbances action

Reduce Rounds Until Buildup Is Updated by 1. If Rounds Until Buildup Is Updated is 0, perform the Update Buildup action

Proposal: What’s a fishing competition without a bit of cult magic?

Timed out and reached Quorum, 5-0. Enacted by JonathanDark.

Adminned at 04 Aug 2024 17:19:57 UTC

Make a new rule called Obelisks with the following text:

Some actions are defined as Obelisk actions. These are Fishing actions, but have two additional requirements; to perform an Obelisk action, a Fishing Contestant must be in the same cell as a Basalt Obelisk, and as a cost of performing an Obelisk action, a Fishing Contestant must either pay 5 doubloons, or increase their madness by 3.

Churning the Waves is an Obelisk action. The Fishing Contest who performs it should, as an atomic action, clear the list of Disturbances and then Sight Disturbances. This is permitted to be done irrespective of the Next Disturbance time.

Churn the Skies is an Obelisk action. The Fishing Contest who performs it should, as an atomic action, generate a random direction for each Fishing Contestant other than themselves who is not in a Shore cell and a random number of 1-3 for each of those Fishing Contestants, and then move those Fishing Contestants that number of cells in that direction. If one of those moves would result in an illegal move, the fishing Contestant should be moved only as far as is legal (which may be 0 cells).

Churn the Mind is an Obelisk action. The Fishing Contest who performs it may, as a virtual action, be given a number of random letters of The Big One. The number of letters given is of their choice, and should be given in a random order. Their madness increases by 1 for every letter requested after the third, and if more letters are requested than letters in The Big One, they receive all letters in The Big One.

 

Proposal: Trophies

Timed out, 2-1. Enacted by JonathanDark.

Adminned at 04 Aug 2024 17:16:52 UTC

Create a subrule of “The Big One” entitled “Trophies” that contains the following text:

Each Fishing Contestant has a number of Trophies, which is a publicly tracked integer that defaults to zero. If a Fishing Contestant submits a string as part of a Fish Identification that exactly matches the Big One, then as an atomic action the Elder Judge should take the following steps:
* Increase that Fishing Contestant’s Trophies by 1.
* Change the Fish Function
* Change the Big One and update the Length of the Big One
* Clear the list of Found Fish
* Make a Story Post on the blog announcing that a Trophy has been claimed.
This atomic action should take place before any other Fish Identifications are resolved.

In the rule “The Big One”, replace

how many consecutive characters of the string (starting from the beginning) exactly match the corresponding characters in the Big One.

with

whether the string comes before or after the Big One in dictionary order.

 

With the implication that Trophies should be connected in some way to the eventual victory condition.

Thursday, August 01, 2024

Proposal: We’re all mad here

Reached quorum, 4-0. Enacted by JonathanDark.

Adminned at 02 Aug 2024 04:18:37 UTC

In Disturbances replace “The Sight Disturbances action” with “The Sight Disturbances action is an atomic action and”

Then add the following step in the second to last position in the Slight Disturbances atomic action

Increase the madness of each Fishing Contestant whose current cell is in the list of Disturbances by 1

Proposal: Audaces Fortuna Iuvat

Withdrawn. Failed by JonathanDark.

Adminned at 02 Aug 2024 04:17:53 UTC

In the rule “Fish Function”, replace the text “gains 1 Doubloon. If it is not a Fish, they privately inform the Fishing Contestant submitting the virtual action of this fact.” with the following text:

gains Doubloons according to the following criteria:
* If there were 5 or less entries in the Found Fish list when this virtual action was submitted, they gain 3 Doubloons
* If there were 6-10 entries in the Found Fish list when this virtual action was submitted, they gain 2 Doubloons
* If there were more than 10 entries in the Found Fish list when this virtual action was submitted, they gain 1 Doubloon

For each submitted string in a Fish Identification that is not a Fish, the Elder Judge informs the Fishing Contestant submitting that virtual action of this fact.

Right now, a decent strategy is to hoard Catches and wait for other people to get enough correct guesses in the Found Fish list to get a good idea of the Fish Function, then submit a bunch of guesses with a much better chance of getting correct answers. If everyone takes this strategy, no one will make the first move.

This Proposal aims to change that by incentivizing guessing sooner. Since it’s harder to guess when there are less successful guesses to go by, a successful guess should be worth more.