A Nomic Variant is a game whose players are expected to attempt to change the rules during play, but whose initial ruleset differs substantially from the PeterSuberNomicRuleset published by PeterSuber. Note that most players think of most of these as "types of Nomics other than the original" rather than "games similar to Nomic".
Some examples of general types, with specific examples of initial rulesets (note, though, that not all these types are mutually exclusive):
- Email play: A standard change is to remove the turn-taking restrictions of Suber's Initial Set. (Example rulesets: AgoraRuleset, AxiomRuleset).
- Reduced ruleset: A smaller, simpler initial ruleset is used, often without Suber's "mutable/immutable rules" dichotomy. (Example rulesets: MinicRuleset, BBNomicRuleset). Taken to extremes, this variant becomes...
- Pure: The initial ruleset has only one rule. (Example ruleset: PureNomicRuleset).
- Imperial: Rule-changes are approved by a dictator rather than by democratic vote. (Example ruleset: ImperialNomicRuleset). More or less the opposite is...
- Consensus-based: All rule-changes must be agreed to by all players. (Example ruleset: UnanomicRuleset).
- Socialist: There is no administrator -- all players share responsibility for all game administration. (Technically, this is true of Suber's original Nomic, too, but most online Nomics have one or more administrators.) (Example ruleset: SocialNomicRuleset).
Somewhat more, well, variant variants include:
- Blind: The players are not told what the rules are. (Example ruleset: ... well, if we told you, we'd have to kill you...)
- Autonomic: The rules are contracts, and are not all binding on every player. (Example ruleset: AutoNomicRuleset).
- Bifurcating: The game splits into subgames each time a proposal is made -- one in which the proposal is adopted and one in which it isn't. (Example ruleset: PolynomicRuleset).
- Monosyllabic Nomic: The Suber ruleset was translated into words of only one syllable. The translation has been recovered at MonosyllabicNomicVariant; however, it does not enforce the monosyllabic restriction.
- ProgrammingNomic: The rules are expressed in some programming language, and enforce themselves.
- Solitaire Nomic: Nomic for one (Example ruleset: SolitaireNomicRuleset).
- ThermodyNomic uses a very quirky ruleset in which the Three Sacred Laws (derived from the three laws of Thermodynamics) guarantee that without either significant changes or outsiders joining there will be chaos.
- Nomic Chess: The Suber ruleset was adapted to incorporate a standard chess game into the basic play. The ruleset is listed on
chessvariants.com. - Imperial Fundamentalism: Rule-changes are proposed by a dictator rather than by democratic vote. If a player ever votes against the adoption of a rule they are branded evil and are removed from the game.