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Nomic

en.wikipedia.org

21–30 of 88 posts

Re: Nomic

#21
post #14

I've been interested in this idea of games with modifiable rules on and off, but something about the voting aspect doesn't appeal to me that much. Not entirely sure why. I like the self-referentiality of the rules being modifiable, but it just being a vote, "what rule change do you want?", feels unsatisfying. I'm not sure what to replace it by, admittedly. I did one experiment where instead of saying what the rules w…

My friends and I used to occasionally play a card game called Mao. The winner of each round (the first to get rid of the cards in their hand) could make up a new rule governing game play for following rounds. But they didn't announce their rule, instead punishing players who broke it by giving them an extra card. By watching the punishments, you had to try to work out their rule so you could avoid breaking it.

With the right group, it was quite fun, if rather tiring. You need to not take winning too seriously, because it's quite easy to make up a complex rule no-one will ever get - one of my friends had 'you may not play a prime number card on another prime number card'.

Re: Nomic

#22
post #10

It sounds like "Calvinball". http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Calvin_and_Hobbes#section_6

It was my first thought as well ;) But the article doesn't do the comic strip justice. https://lh3.ggpht.com/_zRSvuGbL2L0/TE0I0GlkcTI/AAAAAAAAAg4/k... http://littlebobeep.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/05/Calvinbal...

Thanks for making my evening.

Re: Nomic

#23
post #14

I've been interested in this idea of games with modifiable rules on and off, but something about the voting aspect doesn't appeal to me that much. Not entirely sure why. I like the self-referentiality of the rules being modifiable, but it just being a vote, "what rule change do you want?", feels unsatisfying. I'm not sure what to replace it by, admittedly. I did one experiment where instead of saying what the rules w…

My friends and I used to occasionally play a card game called Mao. The winner of each round (the first to get rid of the cards in their hand) could make up a new rule governing game play for following rounds. But they didn't announce their rule, instead punishing players who broke it by giving them an extra card. By watching the punishments, you had to try to work out their rule so you could avoid breaking it. With t…

Can you do "You get a card at random"?

Re: Nomic

#24

If there is one thing that the "internet" has lost, it's games like this. I used to love playing #wolfgame on IRC. Even Ultima Online (although hardly a typical heritage game) definitely shaped the way MMORPGs evolved. Anyway, back onto Nomic. After reading the Wiki and seeing the "Initial Rule Set" [1] then reading through a lot of the archives it became clear that "chaos" and administration was the downfall of this…

UO was so awesome. I blew 5 years on it. Siege Perilous! SP was the right direction, unfortunately not many people seem to agree with me ;)

Re: Nomic

#25

If there is one thing that the "internet" has lost, it's games like this. I used to love playing #wolfgame on IRC. Even Ultima Online (although hardly a typical heritage game) definitely shaped the way MMORPGs evolved. Anyway, back onto Nomic. After reading the Wiki and seeing the "Initial Rule Set" [1] then reading through a lot of the archives it became clear that "chaos" and administration was the downfall of this…

When searching for nomic on github, there are a couple of nomic projects using pull requests to propose rules and fork to know who's involved. Yet, they seem empty at the moment. I'd be interested in seeing such project working though.

Re: Nomic

#26
post #14

I've been interested in this idea of games with modifiable rules on and off, but something about the voting aspect doesn't appeal to me that much. Not entirely sure why. I like the self-referentiality of the rules being modifiable, but it just being a vote, "what rule change do you want?", feels unsatisfying. I'm not sure what to replace it by, admittedly. I did one experiment where instead of saying what the rules w…

Voting games can be painful. I remember Mafia, which is very crowd-dependent. People who slow-play/minimax games make Mafia intolerable. At 3:00 in the morning with 3 players left, the 30-minute discussions are painful. Just kill someone and lose or win already.

The variant I built (to give something useful to start the discussion, rather than blind suspicion) had a combat mechanic. You actually had to "buy" arms in order to do your killings. This meant that Mafia actually left a trace, because it was public information who purchased. (There was no in-game currency. The cost of buying arms was visibility.) If you were Mafia, you'd probably want to buy arms. On the other hand, the good guys also could benefit by arming up. The result of this was that there are two different strategies. You can not buy arms often (or ever) and evade suspicion during the day, but be weak against brawls and Mafia... or you can buy them at every opportunity and be strong in combat, but arouse suspicion and be more likely to die in the day phase.

There was also a brawling phase. If you thought someone was Mafia and wanted to go vigilante, you could. However, they could defend themselves. in addition to dying, you could end up wounded, which would make it obvious the next morning that you were in some kind of fight.

Re: Nomic

#27

If there is one thing that the "internet" has lost, it's games like this. I used to love playing #wolfgame on IRC. Even Ultima Online (although hardly a typical heritage game) definitely shaped the way MMORPGs evolved. Anyway, back onto Nomic. After reading the Wiki and seeing the "Initial Rule Set" [1] then reading through a lot of the archives it became clear that "chaos" and administration was the downfall of this…

The way I remember Nomic there was another rule, which defines an alternate objective function.

117. Any player who generates a contradiction in the rules automatically wins.

Re: Nomic

#29
post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It was my first thought as well ;) But the article doesn't do the comic strip justice. https://lh3.ggpht.com/_zRSvuGbL2L0/TE0I0GlkcTI/AAAAAAAAAg4/k... http://littlebobeep.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/05/Calvinbal...

Thanks for making my evening.

This was also my initial thought. Mao as well...
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