Friday, January 14, 2011

Proposal: She’s Not Just Here For Show

Times out and passes 11-0. -Bucky

Adminned at 16 Jan 2011 20:15:50 UTC

Add to “Carrying”:

As a weekly action, and only when the Queen has 15 food or more, an Ant who is Underground and is able to carry Eggs may reduce the Queen’s food by 10 to start carrying an Egg.

Add to “Dropping and Using”:

An Ant may drop an Egg to change the Caste of any Worker in their location (including themself) to Soldier, Drone or Virgin Queen.

A way to promote yourself, or hamstring other Ants by turning them into a less useful caste (until they die and come back as workers). Also provides a way for malicious Ants to deplete the Queen’s stockpile much more quickly than the glacial hunger trigger, which could eventually be an incentive for us to turn to honeypot ants for secure food storage.

posted by Purplebeard at 14 Jan 2011 10:59:49 UTC Comments (21)

Comments

Blacky:

14-01-2011 11:40:40 UTC

for Nice one!

Kevan: he/him

14-01-2011 11:47:10 UTC

for

Ely:

14-01-2011 12:25:41 UTC

for The ant should have to pay some food (or something else) too, if not it gets way too easy (she performs an action completely paid by collectivity).
And I would make it possible just for Workers.
Anyway nice idea!

Ely:

14-01-2011 12:32:22 UTC

Oh I didn’t read: “Ant who is Underground and is able to carry Eggs” so it’s just Workers, M Queens and V Queens. Allright!

William:

14-01-2011 15:47:39 UTC

for

Clucky: he/him

14-01-2011 16:20:04 UTC

for

Roujo: he/him

14-01-2011 16:20:28 UTC

for arrow =D

Ely:

14-01-2011 16:55:57 UTC

What does arrow mean?

Ely:

14-01-2011 16:57:19 UTC

That—> arrow ?

Klisz:

14-01-2011 18:05:27 UTC

@Elia: It’s an icon used to say that a proposal has good flavor. It was introduced in early 2009 but hasn’t gotten much use since then. Rules-wise, it doesn’t mean anything right now.

Roujo: he/him

14-01-2011 20:11:52 UTC

But I keep on using it anyway ‘cause it’s cool! =D

Darknight: he/him

15-01-2011 03:35:10 UTC

for

Oze:

15-01-2011 10:18:01 UTC

for

Winner:

15-01-2011 15:23:39 UTC

for

Subrincinator:

15-01-2011 17:12:53 UTC

for (and how do I make that up-arrow icon…?)

Kevan: he/him

15-01-2011 18:02:20 UTC

The word “ARROW” between colons.

Is it time to retire the arrow icon? We can type the sentence “I enjoy the flavour text and/or theme of this proposal” without forcing new players to waste their time rereading the voting-icon rules for an explanation which isn’t there.

Roujo: he/him

15-01-2011 18:26:47 UTC

Awwwwwwwww… But it’s cool… =P

I’ll add the description in the New Player’s Guide. =) (Come to think of it, I should have done that ages ago. =P)

Subrincinator:

15-01-2011 18:41:34 UTC

arrow to what Roujo said.

Purplebeard:

15-01-2011 19:10:17 UTC

I’d be massively in favour of removing the arrow icon.

Kevan: he/him

15-01-2011 19:33:04 UTC

Gentle in-jokes are fine and healthy, but in-jokes that look like game mechanisms seem unhelpful for confusing new players, and we get at least a couple of them every dynasty. If someone says “I vote FOR, maybe I can find a Cessna out there”, then clearly that’s some sort of ignorable cultural reference, but “I vote FOR, and I also vote ARROW” is bound to make any new player think that they’ve missed a rule and have maybe been voting wrongly. There are kinder ways to show off that you’re one of the cool kids who’s been playing the game for a while.

Roujo: he/him

15-01-2011 21:59:09 UTC

Yeah… There /is/ the fact that it looks like a voting icon. I never said “I vote ARROW”, as that would have been deliberately confusing, but I can understand that it still is.

I just think that it’s a convenient way of saying I approve without having to link an external Seal of Approval image. It’s an in-joke, sure, but my intent isn’t to confuse people, and I don’t want to show off my player age - I’m only a year old or so, anyway. I just want to put emphasis on what I think are good proposals. Once again, I understand that it can be confusing, though, which is why I’ve explained it in the Newbie Guide.

It’s like when people vote “FOR FOR FOR FOR” when they strongly agree. It might be confusing for new player (Was that FOR x 4?), but a reading of the rules clears it up.

Anyway, that’s my opinion on the subject. =)