Subject: MN: Thoughts on Year 3 Week 4 Proposals

From: "Jonathan Ellis" <jonathan@f...>
Date: Thu, 6 May 1999 00:47:04 +0100

Proposal 711 - Walking In The Night [Amendment]
But what do we do when the player whose turn it is to play wants to play
a non-Walking move and someone else has just put the game time past
midnight by Walking? Does e have to miss eir turn and wait until enough
Players have Walked around to bring the time up to 5am? This is a
problem.

>Proposal 712 - Lost and Found [Multiple]
*GREAT* idea, as I mentioned before. Proposal 705 complemens this rather
well, as was the intention (though someone will have to add functions
for scarfs etc. eventually.

>We don't have a way of Losing things, yet.
Just you wait... I must admit one of my proposals for next week is going
to take a bet on this one passing. I'll put in some ways of Losing
stuff...

Proposal 714 - Time Again [Action]

> the duration of this Action can be any
> period the Actioning Player wishes, between five minutes and one
week.

This is odd. How on earth do you get one turn to last a week? (It would
need loads of blue tokens - 19 per day for days 2-7 (discounting the
five hours between 0000 and 0500) plus 18 for the first day (you get the
first hour as standard), for a grand total of 132 Blue Tokens...) Or is
the implication of this that Waiting ignores the maximum Turn length?
IMHO it shouldn't, that's what the "Farkle" move is for. This should be
changed to "between five minutes and the maximum legal duration of the
Player's turn."

Proposal 715 - A Pressing Special Need [Multiple]
Got it. Seems to have ironed out all the bugs.

>Proposal 717 - Slight CAMREC Rumblings [Multiple]
>{ Mornington Crescent should still be an important Station, I feel,
with
> its own Opening cost and special rules}

And what would be the result of this? Simply that nobody would ever
bother to land on MC if it costs three gold tokens to enter. It can
still be passed through anyway, as it is not Blocked but Closed, and of
course the other branch of the Northern goes straight from Euston to
Camden Town. I can't see any strategy that could conceivably make use of
MC having an Opening cost. (Oh, and BTW I'm not that keen on other
stations, for instance Dollis Hill, having special effects in non-MC
games. For instance, how would it affect the Czech Variant? One piece
moves to Dollis Hill, then follows a bloodbath as every other piece in
the game lands on top of it (movement to Dollis Hill being not just
permitted but enforced.) This is clearly broken and needs fixing.)
I would, however, like Dunx's idea that one can win the Czech game
by moving the Commuter to MC, in addition to the other way of winning
(for instance, if so many exchanges have taken place that there is no
way of pinning the final enemy Commuter down). But other pieces in the
game should treat it as a normal station.

Proposal 719 - Listen Very Carefully, I Will Say Zis Only Once
[Amendment]
In order to simplify the incorporation of new text into the Ruleset,
Proposals containing content which is to inserted verbatim should be
formatted in a similar way to the Ruleset. This applies particularly
to Enactments, Actions, and large scale Amendments.

This can be a bit difficult on both sides. The way I see it, the current
situation inconveniences only one person (the Speaker.) The situation
after this Rule inconveniences everyone else - besides, there is *still*
the chance that something might go wrong. Anyway, this is unenforcable
(what happens to proposals submitted in the "wrong" format? Are the
simply rejected for the sake of appearances, or are they let in in
defiance of the new Rule of this proposal? Either way, it is broken.)

Jonathan.

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From: kevan@d...
Date: Thu, 06 May 1999 08:21:51 -0000

> This is odd. How on earth do you get one turn to last a week? [...]
> This should be changed to "between five minutes and the maximum legal
> duration of the Player's turn."

A week was just an arbitrary upper maximum, just in case anyone ever did manage to amass hundreds of Blues. If anything, it'd work better as "any duration which is a multiple of five minutes". "Maximum legal duration" just seems a bit fiddly, particularly when it's obvious that a four-day Waiting Action during a sixty-minute Turn will make that Turn Illegal.

> MC having an Opening cost. 

Well, the Ostrich can scamper and hide there if it can get the Golds, a Team might like to try and get their Flag there to keep it safe, a Czech Variant Piece could Move there and become difficult to capture, and so forth. As you say, it can still be passed through anyway - better to keep it in for optional strategy than to declare it "normal" and render it meaningless, I feel.

> (Oh, and BTW I'm not that keen on other

I admit to not being entirely au fait with the Czech rules yet, but yes, this does seem like a pressing issue. Perhaps all Stations should become "normal" in a Czech Game, since the style is so different to typical MC games?

> after this Rule inconveniences everyone else - 

I can't begin to express my disappointment at this statement. The Speaker is doing eir job entirely voluntarily, putting in a great deal of time, dedication and effort to keep the Nomic above water - if there's any inconvience of eirs which can be lessened (by spreading it amongst Players or otherwise), it'd be ungrateful not to honour it.

If it takes, say, five minutes to reformat a sketched-out Proposal into a "proper" style, and twelve such Proposals are made in a Week, the Speaker has an hour's worth of work on eir hands. If the Proposers reformatted them themselves before posting, it'd take them about fifteen minutes each, and the Speaker could get on with eir other duties and - whisper it - real life.

But, of course, when you're writing a Proposal you can format it as you go along, and this is barely an effort. Three-space indentation on anything that's going to be pasted directly into the Ruleset (very easy to do with a macro; if you're using a text editor that doesn't support such things, I recommend kicking the Web for a "PFE" download site), clarity of amendment and passing thought as to how the Speaker's going to have to deal with the end result.

> besides, there is *still*

I think if it says "Proposals should be...", then anything that isn't can be optionally regarded as "not a Proposal". This rule could benefit from a little "...or they may be ignored" clause, I suppose.

Speaking as an ex-Speaker,

Kevan

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