Subject: Re: MN: Re: RE: Token Stacks and bonuses

From: riffraff@n...
Date: Wed, 19 Jul 2000 23:31:16 -0500

>It was just a suggestion off the top of my head, not something well
>thought out. The trouble with not waiting for the next Turn is that
>there is no point in having Stack Actions for just one Station. If all
>you have to do is put a Token on a Station and then do the Action one
>might as well just increase the cost of the Action.

I meant when the tokens have to be placed on multiple Stations, you can do
the action right after placing the last token. That way it still takes
multiple turns, and maybe other players can stop you getting to that last
Station. You're right though - one-station Actions would be useless that
way... of course, we could just not have any. (How about, for the ease of
discussion, we refer to this "place tokens on Stations to cause Actions"
idea as 'Gambits' (as distinct from Manoeuvres from the original rules
(even though they were also called Gambits.).)?)

>I'm having doubts about what I said now. I still like the idea of a
>stacks-manuvers thing, but how to get the Tokens on the stacks and
>what to do once they are there is puzzeling me.
>
>The non-adjacent quadrant thing is too messy. Putting Tokens used to
>pay for Actions on Stations seem unnatural to me.

I kind of liked it, in the same way I like putting Luxury Tax and Community
Chest money on Free Parking in Monopoly. It does seem, though, that there
should be a better way. I remember once having to figure out a Blue action
I could perform, just so I could get a Blue token onto a certain stack.
Eurgh.

>The trouble with
>allowing people to pick up Tokens is that other Players would just go
>around picking up your carefully placed Tokens.

It just seems so natural, though. You land at a Station with a token, you
get the token. It's like some kind of inherent law of boardgames.

>Maybe we could just have all stack related action require more than
>one Token on more than one Station, that would eliminate the delay
>problem. Tokens can only be placed on Stations that the Player
>occupies and they can't be picked up (but can be shunted).
>
>I'm still not convinced by my own arguments. Can anyone suggest
>something better.

Well, perhaps we should just leave it to simmer for a bit. I sort of feel
it all seems too complicated for a beginning ruleset anyway. We can always
bring it in as an IMCS Revisionary Supplement later on once we've figured
something out.

All we really need right now is to finalize Movement (including token
bonuses), decide whether or not to use Time (I prefer Time, but I'll bow to
the majority), and pick a few starting actions. And then we can
start....... PLAYING! AARGH! (ahem.) After that, we can bring back some
kind of Nomic system to add more complicated stuff like Token Stacking
Gambits and my Podumes/Player States ideas...

--Riff

"This calls for a subtle blend of psychology and extreme violence."
--Vyvyan, "The Young Ones"

---

From: "Snow" <snowl@s...>
Date: Tue, 25 Jul 2000 12:05:38 +0100

Riff said:
> the action right after placing the last token.

OK, so no one-station Gambits and mulit-Station Gambits can be played
immediatly after placing the last Token.

> Chest money on Free Parking in Monopoly

How strange, my sister plays by such a rule, but when we checked the
ruleset it doesn't exist. Maybe it was introduced in a later (or
earlier) version. Daft rule if you ask me, it just keeps all the
Tokens/money in the game so they saturate.

> get the token. It's like some kind of inherent law of boardgames.

It would certainly be nice to pick up Tokens, but how do we regulate
it? Limit picking up Tokens to one at a time, but allow 2 to be
placed (so you can protect useful tokens with a worthless Black). Or
prevent Tokens from being picked up with x Turns/Rounds of being
placed. Or have a charge for picking up Tokens.

> Gambits and my Podumes/Player States ideas...

OK, let's try to get some sort of rough draft going so we can see the
holes. I've cut and pasted some of the stuff posted here with some of
the stuff from the current Ruleset and produced a very rough draft. If
people suggest better wording I can update it.

Alternatively if Riff (or anyone else) wants to be editor e can
scavenge chunks out of it for their own version. I just want to be
able to see what I'm doing really.

http://www.egroups.com/files/l-nomic-d/

-- Snow
No sooner does Buffy TVS come back, than Charmed goes missing, and
Sliders is still AWOL. How am I supposed to get my fill of American
Sci-fi TV when _they_ keep moving everything? I blame
Murdoch/Gates/Blair/Europe; it's obviously a conspiricy. And they've
got golf on 12hrs a day. Somebody should kill Greg Dyke, that would
solve the problem. And there's that awful ColdPlay single being played
24/7, what's happened to British music? America is producing genius
like Eninem and Moby, and Britain is producing rubbish like Embrace,
Travis and Coldplay. Let's kill Jo Whiley, that would solve the
problem.