I like the idea, but the last sentence troubles me. Gamestate is defined as “any information which the Ruleset regulates the alteration of”, and surely we’d have to regulate the alteration of these Rule Books.

Can we not regulate without needing to write down or track?

That’s explicitly the challenge - to have gameplay governed by these entities that are explicitly amorphous, ambiguous and slightly abstract. All we will really have to go on when it comes to their contents is emergent precedent.

I’m not a big fan of secret rules.

Hmm… this isn’t really a “secret rules” proposal, more an undefined rules proposal. If you don’t like those either then that’s fair enough, although a Mornington Crescent dynasty should probably have at least a bit of that.

Mmmh, couldn’t I think that following Warton’s Old Peculiar I can move my Piece to Mornington Crescent? And than I would move it. Then Josh could think “No! That is not allowed for The 1884 Uxbridge Mornington Directory!” and then CfJ me. This would be illegal since a CfJ is gamestate and “The rules contained within these rule books may never be written down or tracked as part of the gamestate.”
Right?

Ps: and what is a “move”? Is changing the rule a move? Following what Peter Suber said under there——-> it is. I know it is not gamestate but however.

Right?

Again, don’t agree with this at all - I think I can raise a CfJ without having to write down a rule that doesn’t exist (“That contravenes rule 12.5 of The 1884 Uxbridge Mornington Directory!” - job done) - but I can see I’m fighting against the tide here.

I know it is not gamestate but however.

I would say that’s unambiguously not gamestate.

Yes. But what is a move then?

I appreciate the distinction, but I’d like the rules we ‘know’ to be written down somewhere at least. A mechanic whereby the plays define the rules, instead of the other way around, would definitely be interesting, though.

What I want to avoid most of all is a repeat of the situation we had waaaaay back in the 2nd dynasty of Angry Grasshopper, where a lot of players had no idea what was going on half of the time, and you were never sure if an action another player took was illegal or if it involved a rule you didn’t know yet.

Oh, that was directed at Josh’s second comment.

And anyway I thought too late about the “That contravenes rule 12.5 of The 1884 Uxbridge Mornington Directory!” solution. I think it could go, if it was not for the “move” thing. Maybe saying that the rulesets ar under Core Rules?

@Ely - I think that while the term “move” is currently undefined this creates no problem - it’s simply something that can’t happen under the rules so it doesn’t trigger anything - but I suspect that it’s a term that will become defined before long.

@PB - that’s a fair point. I think that what this prop was aiming for is more a dynasty based on precedent than necessarily on ambiguity, but it was also intended to allow for precedent that can be overturned, which is quite hard to do under the aegis of the ruleset. The proposal doesn’t actually prevent us from tacking the rules - we can do so unofficially on a wiki page - it just denies our unofficial count the full force of the ruleset, meaning that it can all be a) a bit more dynamic and b) the stakes for the real ruleset are a bit lower.

Oh sorry I read
“The rules contained within these rule books may never be written down”
as
“may not be named”

It seems that if you add “Rule XXX of book XXX makes this move legal under these exact circumstances” before any move, you wouldn’t have to follow any previous rules. As an extension of that you could just name a rule allowing you to immediately DoV by moving to Mornington, it would just be a matter of wording the post exactly right. 

I mean, I really like the idea, but i would prefer avoidind vote-a-winner Props or failing DoVs every day. Sorry.
CoV and always ready to change again

I like the idea and would definitely want to play something like this in another context, but unwritten rules are no fun for new or less-attentive players.