Monday, July 26, 2021

Proposal: Witches Get Stiches

Adminned at 27 Jul 2021 16:33:27 UTC

In the rule “Richardo’s Journey” replace whichever of the following is current in that rule

Witching Hour is a publicly tracked date and time. When Richardo von Nestor or a Vampire Lord Winds the Clock, they take the current time, add 24 hours, roll a DICE24 and add the resulting number in hours, and that becomes the new Witching Hour. Whenever the Crypt Settles, Richardo von Nestor Winds the Clock. If the current time is after Witching Hour, the Organ is Playing. Otherwise the Organ is not Playing. While the Organ is Playing, no Power Actions may be performed.

or

Witching Hour is a date and time that is privately tracked by Richardo von Nestor.

There is a variable called the Organ, which may be Playing or Not Playing, and which defaults to Not Playing. If the current time is after Witching Hour, Richardo von Nestor may set the Organ is Playing. While the Organ is Playing, no Power Actions may be performed.

When Richardo von Nestor Winds the Clock, they take the current time, add 24 hours, roll a DICE24 and add the resulting number in hours, and that becomes the new Witching Hour. Whenever the Crypt Settles, Richardo von Nestor sets the Organ to Not Playing and Winds the Clock. When Richardo von Nestor is Wound Up (by default he is not Wound Up) then he may perform a Quick Wind, which works the same as a normal Wind the Clock but he skips the “add 24 hours” step and must make a blog post announcing that he has done so. He then ceases to be Wound Up.

As a Power Action with a cost of 0, a Vampire Lord may Observe the Mansion. When a Vampire Lord Observes the Manion they must spend between 1 and 3 Puissance and then privately notify Richardo von Nestor of their Observing the Manion action. When Richardo von Nestor is notified of a Vampire Lord’s Observing the Mansion Action, he must respond based on how much Puissance the Vampire Lord spent carrying that Action out; if 1 Puissance was spent he should provide a 12hour period in which Witching Hour occurs; if 2 Puissance was spent he should provide an 6 hour period in which Witching Hour occurs; if 3 Puissance was spent he should give the exact time of Witching Hour.

with

Sunset is a date and time that are publicly tracked. Witching Hour is a date and time that is privately tracked by Richardo von Nestor.

There is a variable called the Organ, which may be Playing or Not Playing, and which defaults to Not Playing. While the Organ is Playing, no Power Actions may be performed. If the current time is after Witching Hour, Richardo von Nestor may Start the Music. Doing so is an atomic action with the following steps
* Revert all Power Actions which were taken after the current Witching Hour, starting with the most recently performed Power Action and working backwards. If for whatever reason Richardo cannot revert a Power Action, they may skip reverting that action and continue reverting those which he can revert. He should then make public note of all Power Actions which could not be reverted and is encouraged not to perform the Enter the Crypt action until Vampire Lords have had opportunity to discuss how to handle the actions which could not be reverted.
* Set the Organ to be Playing

When Richardo von Nestor Winds the Clock, they take the current time, add 24 hours, roll a DICE24 and add the resulting number in hours, and that becomes the new Sunset. They then secretly roll another DICE24 and add that resulting number in hours to Sunset, and that becomes the new Witching Hour. Whenever the Crypt Settles, Richardo von Nestor sets the Organ to Not Playing and Winds the Clock.

As a Power Action with a cost of 0, a Vampire Lord may Observe the Mansion. When a Vampire Lord Observes the Mansion they must spend between 1 and 3 Puissance and then privately notify Richardo von Nestor of their Observing the Manion action. When Richardo von Nestor is notified of a Vampire Lord’s Observing the Mansion Action, he must respond based on how much Puissance the Vampire Lord spent carrying that Action out; if 1 Puissance was spent he should provide a 12 hour period in which Witching Hour occurs; if 2 Puissance was spent he should provide an 6 hour period in which Witching Hour occurs; if 3 Puissance was spent he should give the exact time of Witching Hour.

Set Sunset to the current date and time.

Make Richardo von Nestor Wound Up.

Self Killed—Clucky

Comments

Clucky: he/him

26-07-2021 04:31:12 UTC

This covers my problems with Josh’s proposal.

I’m not sure if the “If for whatever reason Richardo cannot revert a Power Action…” but will ever come up, everything should be revertible as long as you work backwards. But if it is, seemed good to have some kinda idea on how to proceed.

I know the Wound Up mechanic is a little clunky, but helps ensure the times get set fairly (something Josh’s proposal doesn’t address. It just makes the old Witching Hour suddenly privately tracked)

Josh: he/they

26-07-2021 06:22:41 UTC

I hate the automatic reversion. Hate it. I guess I’ll vote against this? Willing to live with it if it’s the wisdom of the crowd.

Clucky: he/him

26-07-2021 07:04:59 UTC

Without reverting, I don’t see how you keep witching hour a secret in a way that is fair to all time zones.

Kevan: he/him

26-07-2021 10:03:07 UTC

Full reversion does seem a headache, and maybe better saved for a time travel themed dynasty that can really get its teeth into it.

A milder “Richardo enters the Crypt as it was at time X” (Josh just looking at the wiki history to see what it was like at that point) seems like it might work, where any later spends still happened. Narratively the vampires would be belatedly realising that a human had been sneaking around unnoticed, and where a room actually collapses or something is erased, it was done in some time-delayed sense, or in a way that the vampires didn’t immediately notice.

There was some Slack talk about a secret sidebar bat-signal: although we can’t implement that in EE (because admins could look at the source to see what time it was set for), if Josh knows someone trustworthy who could write and run a simple “if time is after X, print Y” script on their own server, we could embed that.

Very late in the day for all this, though.

ais523:

26-07-2021 11:58:00 UTC

I agree that the reversion is the only way to do this fairly, but that just makes me think that maybe we shouldn’t do it at all.

Clucky: he/him

26-07-2021 15:19:36 UTC

having latter spends happen feels super unfair to the people making the latter spends, and creates weird time paradoxes around stuff like bloodthirstiness where if Richardo enters the crypt at 2 and makes a vampire lord bloodthirsty but they already spent their money at 4 and then the fact that they were bloodthirsty then doesn’t apply until Josh process the run at 6…

Brendan: he/him

26-07-2021 16:14:55 UTC

against

Josh: he/they

26-07-2021 16:32:22 UTC

against

ais523:

26-07-2021 21:41:17 UTC

against

Kevan: he/him

27-07-2021 08:50:03 UTC

[Clucky] I think we’d adapt to later spends, you’d just factor it in to whatever you were buying or building.

And paradoxes seem fine if you treat everything narratively as “Richardo snuck around and triggered or trapped some time-delay stuff, before leaving” - a collapsed Sepulchre becomes something that a vampire only realises when they head back to their coffin at dawn, a sigil takes some hours to charge up from the blood spilled across it, etc.

against

Clucky: he/him

27-07-2021 16:32:50 UTC

against freeing up a proposal slot