Saturday, March 31, 2012

Proposal: Practical Diplomacy

Timed out and failed, 6-2, with 2 abstentions. Josh

Adminned at 02 Apr 2012 00:49:07 UTC

Add a new Institution to the list of Institutions in Rule 2.6:

The Embassy: When a Player influences the Embassy, they gain 1 Power.  Additionally, once during the next Cycle, that player may send a message to the Net directing it to send a message on Blognomic’s behalf to the mailing list at .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address).  The Net shall do so as soon as is reasonably practical, clearly stating that the message is sent on behalf of Blognomic, as long as sending the message would not violate any part of the Ruleset.

Add a new Dynastic Rule to the Ruleset.  Call it “Embassy Restrictions” and give it the following text:

The Net shall not send any messages to the mailing list at .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on Blognomic’s behalf that do any of the following:
*Cause Blognomic to attempt to register.
*Attempt actions that the Net believes are Crimes (either in the Net’s current location or in Agora).
*Attempt actions that cause one or more Slave Golems in Blognomic’s possession to deregister themselves or flip their Posture.

Additionally, the Net shall not send any messages longer than 100 words on behalf of Blognomic (excluding any disclaimer stating on whose behalf the message is sent).

Blognomic currently has a Golem named “The Diplomat”.  The Diplomat is effectively a player, and it will take any actions Blognomic instructs it to take on an Agoran forum.

Also, this does not let Agora affect Blognomic in any substantial way.

Comments

omd:

31-03-2012 02:32:26 UTC

imperial

Clucky: he/him

31-03-2012 02:52:55 UTC

against  against  against  against  against not this shit again

Clucky: he/him

31-03-2012 03:11:52 UTC

As not everyone is going to be reading the chat - here is the problem with this. It doesn’t matter that it can’t directly effect our gamestate (because the messages are one way). As long as people can potentially play blognomic sub-optimally to improve their performance in a separate game, its going to make blognomic less fun for the people who actually just want to play blognomic.

Soviet Brendon:

31-03-2012 03:12:20 UTC

for

southpointingchariot:

31-03-2012 03:32:27 UTC

imperial I think this stuff is fun.

omd:

31-03-2012 03:33:10 UTC

(This is debatable, but note that Golems, despite being players, are mostly powerless in Agora, so this arrangement is not really useful except for fun.)

Murphy:

31-03-2012 04:20:29 UTC

for

First, people play sub-optimally anyway for various reasons. Second, ignoring the side effect, going after a 1-Power institution is not obviously sub-optimal; all else equal, going after 1 Power and getting it is better than going after (say) 5 Power and not getting it.

Clucky: he/him

31-03-2012 04:22:13 UTC

@omd in order to verify that I’d have to be familiar with the agora ruleset. Also it establishes a bad precedent

Josh: Observer he/they

31-03-2012 07:13:57 UTC

against I have no interest in Agora and do not want any Agora in my BlogNomic. I am pleased that some people enjoy both but, you know, I also enjoy breakfast cereal, and I don’t keep trying to make proposals that link BlogNomic to my consumption of breakfast cereal, so that’s my benchmark for evaluating these proposals.

Soviet Brendon:

31-03-2012 09:12:20 UTC

against cov

Kevan: he/him

31-03-2012 09:13:20 UTC

“This does not let Agora affect Blognomic in any substantial way” is naïve. If you wire part of our ruleset to a lightbulb on the Agoran dashboard, then anyone at Agora who has an interest in that lightbulb just has to step into BlogNomic to affect it. It could just be someone registering a throwaway account to bid all their chips on the Embassy for one message, or it might be someone realising that the only way to stop an unwanted action in Agora is to shut down incoming Golem messages, and casually throwing out a spurious BlogNomic DoV, or taking some other action to shut our game down for the sake of theirs. Agora is, of course, a nomic whose players seemed to have no qualms about trashing a BlogNomic dynasty to satisfy a rule in their own ruleset, rather than just asking us politely. Actually setting up a Golem control button and a little red carpet is just asking for more crossfire.

And the rule of restrictions on appropriate interaction is - although enjoyably ironic - a bad sign. If Crimes or Posture are a big deal in Agora, yet they don’t have rules protecting themselves from Golems taking such actions, it just means that if a player wants to pull a Golem Crime exploit, it’ll likely be easier and quicker to get the “Embassy Restrictions” rule repealed or modified in BlogNomic, by whatever means.

against

Yonah:

31-03-2012 13:59:13 UTC

against The concept seems entertaining, but in reality would probably wreck a lot of things.

Patrick:

31-03-2012 14:34:05 UTC

against