Subject: MN: Rulesets Aplenty

From: Dunx <dunx@d...>
Date: Tue, 13 Feb 2001 22:14:42 +0000

To the Clan McNomic:

As a returning Player, I've spent some time this evening reading the
various rulesets which are extant, and although I haven't come to any
definite conclusions (particularly about the most recent iteration of the
New Ruleset) I would make the following observations:

1. the original ruleset is perhaps a touch too complicated - that's an
obvious statement, but one I've never really cleaved to before having
not participated for a long time.

My own take on this complexity is that it has two aspects:

a) difficulty - some of mechanics are over complicated for little gain.
As the inventor of Charge I would certainly accept responsibility
for some of this unnecessary difficulty, but there's actually a lot
less really difficult stuff in the Game than first appears and most
of what there is adds to the Game.

b) volume - there are a huge number of Rules, Possessions, Hats,
Station and Line States, Clamps, Disruptions, and so on. There is
just too much for anyone to remember, and frankly a lot of it isn't
terribly interesting. Indeed, a lot of Actions, Clamps and States
are just minor variations on each other introduced more out of
whimsy than anything else.

Of these two, I would have said that (b) was the larger problem simply
because it gets in the way of actually playing the game. I would also
add that a lot of these game elements don't really interact in
interesting ways - Kevan has said in the past that one of his goals
with the game was to have game mechanics which interact with each other
in interesting ways.

(Incidentally, my remarks at the end of (b) are not meant as an attack
on whimsy per se, merely on gratuitous whimsy obstructing the
playability of the game)

I would loudly echo approval for the idea of hiving a lot of this stuff
(both the complicated and the voluminous) off into Special Rulesets.
Ole's suggestion of freezing the standard rules to untried additions is
also sound to my eyes.

As for the content of the Special Rulesets - I wonder if we have scope
for building what would amount to discrete Ruleset components which
could be plugged together to make more complex Rules. I'm thinking
particularly that the Game Time and Charge/Current Rules could be
happily componentised in this manner (sorry, dreadful terminology -
blame the business I'm in).

It might be interesting to categorise any Special Rulesets we come up
with by complexity, size, whimsicality, and so on.

2. I'm not really in a position to cavil over the replacement ruleset which
was worked on over the Summer last year since I could have joined in
but didn't, but I'm not sure I like it much. I need to read it again,
but it seems to have thrown the baby out with the bathwater.

I do like the statement at the top about this game really having rules,
though.

3. the MCArena ruleset is interesting.

4. mechanism - I agree that there are problems with the administrative
burden of a Nomic (I find Kudos particularly onerous, as evidenced by
my various attempts to get rid of it) but its structure and the fact
that it places an end point on discussions is very useful.

The core point about MN when considering it as a Nomic is that the
Nomic part is not a competitive element of the game - it happens to be
a useful format for discussing and arriving at workable rules. That
structure is valuable, and I think is probably worth maintaining in
some form.

Finally, on the subject of Speaking: Snow is still the incumbent as far as
I am aware and was doing a good job the last time I was paying attention.
If he no longer wants the job then I'm happy to re-don the Speaking
trousers, but for myself I think I might be happier with a rotating
Speakership.

Cheers.

-- 
Dunx
"Fixing HTML is like grafting arms and legs onto a hamburger."
- Ted Nelson

---

From: "Snow" <snowl@s...>
Date: Wed, 14 Feb 2001 23:02:01 -0000

Dunx said:
> 1. the original ruleset is perhaps a touch too complicated
> ...
> but there's actually a lot

I think the first part of this sentence is the key point to the whole
discussion, it isn't difficult it's just complicated. The second part
I not sure about, I think most of the ruleset subtracts from the game.

> (both the complicated and the voluminous) off into Special
Rulesets.

Agreed.

> Ole's suggestion of freezing the standard rules to untried
additions is

The more static the better in my eyes.

> but it seems to have thrown the baby out with the bathwater.

It's not finished yet! _I_ don't think it's going in the wrong
direction, but that is one of the things we are discussing.

> I do like the statement at the top about this game really having
rules,

I was a member of this list for weeks, before I decided it was 'for
real'.

--
Snow
(this sig has been left intentionally blank)

---

From: Dunx <dunx@d...>
Date: Fri, 16 Feb 2001 06:49:45 +0000

On Wed, 14 Feb 2001, you wrote:
> discussion, it isn't difficult it's just complicated.

Indeed.

> The second part

I think I would agree with you on that point, but I suspect our positions
diverge somewhat after that. My thinking is that the core mechanics don't
need to be touched since they've been proven workable over several games,
but that a lot of the fluff which has accreted needs to be separated from
the basic rules.

> The more static the better in my eyes.

Indeed, especially if we can keep a ruleset stable through the duration of
a single game!

> direction, but that is one of the things we are discussing.

I realise it's not finished; I was just saying I didn't like the direction
it was taking.

Incidentally, the more recent version of the new ruleset you've uploaded
is unreadable on any browser I have access to (NS4.7 and NS6 on Linux).

Forward, anyway.

-- 
Dunx
Life. Don't talk to me about life.

---

From: "Snow" <snowl@s...>
Date: Sat, 17 Feb 2001 21:46:00 -0000

> is unreadable on any browser I have access to (NS4.7 and NS6 on
Linux).

Hmm, I check things on IE5 and lynx. I generally assume that anything
in between will work. It's mostly W3C standard HTML+CSS with a few
bits of HTML that should fail in a readable fashion. I suspect a
partial implementation of CSS is too blame. I've removed the CSS stuff
from the template, does this help?

I guess the moral is to always use W3C standard HTML and never use
Netscape.

--
Snow
(Considering Opera)