Tuesday, November 30, 2010

Proposal: Jealous Gods

Add a new rule to the ruleset, entitled “Worshipers:”

In the city of Rome there are one hundred Citizens.  Each Citizen belongs to one of the following castes:
Senator (ten citizens)
Merchant (fifteen citizens)
Laborer (twenty-five citizens)
Farmer (fifty citizens)

A Citizen who worships exactly zero Divinities is called an Atheist.  A Citizen who worships exactly one Divitiny is called a Monotheist.  A Citizen who worships at least two Divinities is called a Polytheist.  Each Citizen may worship at least zero Divinities and at most all Divinities.

All Citizens begin as Atheists.

As a weekly Action, individual Citizens may offer up Prayers.  If the rule “Influence” exists, a die roll shall determine which Citizens offer Prayers, and whether each Citizen offers a Prayer in the Ephemeral, Material or Domestic sphere.  Divinities may Answer Prayers.  Each Divinity may anwer up to six Prayers per week.

If a Farmer offers a Prayer, and exactly zero Divinities answer the Prayer, then all Divinities shall lose one Prominence.
If a Farmer offers a Prayer, and exactly one Divinity answers the Prayer, then that Divinity shall gain one Prominence, and the Farmer offering the Prayer shall become a Worshiper of the Divinity who answered the Prayer.
If a Farmer offers a Prayer, and at least two Divinities answer the Prayer, then the Divinity with greatest Influence in the sphere in which the Prayer was offered shall gain one Prominence, and the Farmer offering the Prayer shall become a Worshiper of this Divinity.
If a Farmer offers a Prayer, and at least two Divinities answer the Prayer, and at least two of these Divinities have equal Influence in the sphere in which the Prayer was offered, then the Divinity with greater Prominence shall gain one Prominence, and the Farmer offering the Prayer shall become a Worshiper of this Divinity.

If a Laborer offers a Prayer, the Rules shall be the same as for Farmers, except the Prayer shall be worth two Prominence.
If a Merchant offers a Prayer, the Rules shall be the same as for Farmers, except the Prayer shall be worth three Prominence.
If a Senator offers a Prayer, the Rules shall be the same as for Farmers, except the Prayer shall be worth Five Prominence.

 

I don’t expect this to pass, and I suspect I can see only a few of its many flaws.  I’m proposing it mostly to get a sense of what it’s like to propose a rule, and in hopes that feedback in the comments will help me get a better sense of what needs to be considered when proposing a rule.  I have some ideas of where I think this idea could go, but am not sure how to articulate them—or how much to propose at a time.  Ways to steal Worshipers from other Divinities, ways to get a Worshiper to go Monotheist and maybe even convert other Citizens by the sword, etc…

Comments

Brendan: he/him

30-11-2010 23:28:28 UTC

I’ve been thinking about something along these lines, but my impression from the Ascension Address was that the game is supposed to take place with the old gods wandering around in the present day.  Did anyone else take that away from it?

At any rate, I’m not sure how this would work—“a die roll shall determine” doesn’t actually say who should be rolling the dice or creating prayers.  There’s also no expiration date on prayers, so it would be hard to resolve the assignment of prominence for answering them (or failing to).

against

Roujo: he/him

30-11-2010 23:31:05 UTC

Actually, you have to choose the Proposal category when you post and the “Proposal:” part will be added automagically. If you don’t… Then it’s not a legal Proposal - and it’s too late to just change it.

Don’t worry, it happens all the time when new players submit their first proposal. =P

Brendan: he/him

30-11-2010 23:32:55 UTC

Huh, I could have sworn I saw the empty checkbox on this post when I first clicked to comment.

Klisz:

30-11-2010 23:52:21 UTC

I don’t think there’s a problem thematically, though - it could easily be the modern city of Rome.

Klisz:

30-11-2010 23:52:42 UTC

Well, except that the castes could use rearranging.

redtara: they/them

01-12-2010 00:05:04 UTC

I like the idea and will likely vote FOR it when it’s made into a proposal.

redtara: they/them

01-12-2010 03:37:38 UTC

(assuming it’s reworded to remove the ambiguities brendan pointed out)

Subrincinator:

01-12-2010 07:36:15 UTC

Thanks, everyone!

Subrincinator:

01-12-2010 07:53:02 UTC

I don’t think I’ve learned the mechanics of the game well enough to understand how ‘random’ or computer-generated actions can be implemented and occur.  Have these happened in the past, and if so, what mechanisms have been used? 

In other words, if one day a week each Citizen goes to worship (or doesn’t go, as determined by an automated function), is there a way to randomly determine the sphere of each Citizen’s prayer?

Kevan: he/him

01-12-2010 09:37:53 UTC

We use the GNDT for die rolls that need to be publicly, unfakeably logged; if you make a GNDT comment that includes the string DICE6 or DICE13 or something, it gets replaced in the log with “DICE6:4” or “DICE13:7” to show the results of the roll. I guess this should go in the FAQ.

I’m not really sure what “a die roll shall determine which Citizens offer Prayers” is trying to do. Are you saying we should roll a hundred two-sided dice to see whether or not each Citizen offers a prayer? It’s also not clear how players go about “answering” a prayer; if you’re imagining a “prayer” blog post which players respond to, you should say that explicitly.

In terms of how much to propose at a time, it’s usually good to keep things simple - if you put too much into a proposal, it may get voted down because one of the extra clauses has a mistake that would break something, or simply because most people like the basic idea but not one of the later additions. Or it may turn out that people don’t really like your basic idea, in which case you’ll have wasted some time writing extra effects for it. (In this case, I think I’d probably have stopped after “All Citizens begin as Atheists.” and - if it looked like people were voting in favour - put the prayer mechanic in a second proposal.)

Alecto:

01-12-2010 13:13:26 UTC

Yeah, was going for a more modern spin - but I like your start anyway.