Monday, August 04, 2025

Proposal: Do You Have a Reservation?

Withdrawn. Failed by JonathanDark.

Adminned at 05 Aug 2025 15:15:28 UTC

In the rule “Pitches”, insert the text “(Today Only:)” at the beginning of the first paragraph of that rule, and then add the following as new paragraphs to that rule:

(From Tomorrow:) The Yard has exactly twenty Pitches, numbered from 1 to 20. Each Pitch has a Multiplier, privately tracked by the Yard, which can be any number (to two decimal places) between 0.85 and 1.15; the Multiplier for each Pitch is set once (secretly-randomly) by the Yard and may not then be changed. Each Truck has a publicly tracked Spot, which is either blank or the number of a Pitch. A Truck who has a Spot of a specific Pitch is said to Occupy that Pitch.

(From Tomorrow:) Each Truck has a Reservation, which is either empty or a list of 1 to 3 Pitches inclusive that is privately tracked by the Yard, defaulting to empty. As a Virtual Serve Action, a Closed Truck may set their Reservation, in order of preference from most preferred Pitch to least preferred Pitch, and set their Operating Status to Dark as part of that action.

(From Tomorrow:) Pitch Assignment is an atomic action with the following steps, in which every random selection made by the Yard is performed in a secretly random manner:
* Set the Spot of all Trucks to empty.
* Collect the set of Trucks with a non-empty Reservation, called the Reserved Trucks.
* For each Reserved Truck (in a random order), find the first Pitch in that Truck’s Reservation list, from beginning to end of that list in order, that is not assigned to any other Truck’s Spot, and assign that Pitch to that Truck’s Spot. If there is no such Pitch, remove that Truck from the Reserved Trucks.
* For each Truck not in the Reserved Trucks (in a random order), randomly select from all Pitches not assigned to any Truck’s Spot and assign the selected Pitch to that Truck’s Spot.

In the rule “The Night”, insert the following as the first step in the Night action:

* (From Tomorrow:) Set up: Perform a Pitch Assignment.

and in the same rule, insert the text “(Today Only:)” in front of the text “Go home: Set the Occupants of all Pitches to blank.”

Trying a version of Pitch assignments, without yet proposing what the Multipliers will do, so that we can see if we like the method of assignment first. You get a random Pitch assignment every Trading Day, but you can improve your odds of getting the Pitch(es) you want by being Closed for a round and setting your Reservation.

Comments

Clucky: he/him

04-08-2025 22:08:49 UTC

Rather than making this something closed trucks do, I think it might honestly just work to do something like “Pick your pitch”.

Do you rush to 1.15, knowing someone else might also claim it? Or do you try your luck hoping that maybe something like 1.07 is free and you can just get that one? Adds another level to the whole “figure out what others are doing and adapt” mechanic

arthexis: he/him

04-08-2025 22:45:37 UTC

against

Kevan: Yard he/him

05-08-2025 08:23:55 UTC

[Clucky] I like that. We could even cut to the chase and have the pitch bonuses set to a known descending order from #1 to #20, rather being gradually deduced over a couple of nights.

JonathanDark: he/him

05-08-2025 14:43:19 UTC

Withdrawn in favor of Musical Chairs

against