[Spoon-business] Reducing the ruleset a bit

[Daniel Lepage <dplepage@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

I propose:
{{
__Cleaning House__

[[
The room was decorated like a standard-issue proposal station - the 
sleek steel furniture, the tall, egg-shaped swivel chair, the screens 
blanketing the walls with text and websites. Rule after rule scrolled 
by as the small being, dwarfed by the red-lit egg chair he occupied, 
typed frantically on the transparent plastic keyboard attached to his 
chair. After a while, stopping to read back what was written on the 
main screen, the glowing being shook his head and hit the big red 
DELETE button on the side of the keyboard. Spinning around to peer at a 
rule moving up one of the side screens, he began typing again, quickly 
but carefully; he'd spent enough BNS replacing melted keyboards already.
     The game was in trouble, the posts said - the admin suddenly got a 
job and a social life, and nobody knew how the game was going to run 
anymore. Clearly, something had to be done; just as clearly, the 
players were helpless. The day was his.
     Few of the players even remembered his existence. They had held 
him back, locking him away from most of the game - the actions he sent 
every day never made it to the Fora unless they involved an Offer, and 
even then they got shut out five times out of six. They denied him his 
rights as a player, but now that the game was in trouble, they would 
think of him again soon. And when they did, he would have the salvation 
of the game waiting. After all, he was essentially a Player. It was his 
duty to the game to do everything the Players did.
     He kept typing.
     There was a soft sliding sound behind him.
     He jerked upright. He remembered that sound, even though he'd only 
heard it once, in nweek 21, when his parent proposal had pulled him 
from the void and made this tiny room his home. It was the large steel 
door, lockable only from the outside, opening.
     The Players.
     They had come to accept him to his rightful place in their game. 
Maybe they'd even give him a title, for all the hard work he'd put in 
that had never made it out.
     He grabbed the most recent printout of his work. "You're just in 
time!" he said, spinning around to greet the first non-gremlin to visit 
his home since the imprisonment, "I've just finished the perfect 
proposal for-" He trailed off as he saw his visitor.
     The light above the door turned the person in front of him into a 
shadow, outlined by a blinding halo that quashed any hope of making out 
the face. The hand, however, gloved in black leather, was easy to see. 
As was the gun it held.
     A voice came out of the faceless shadow. "Give my regards to 
Bruce."
     The lights went out.
]]

Remove section B.9. [[The Player-Wannabe Gremlin]] from rule 256. 
Renumber the other sections accordingly.

[[
He stood in the shadows, watching the Base. He imagined he could see 
the rules inside, being moved from place to place by the automata the 
admin had placed in charge of tending it. Vote counting was done, and 
the delivery cars would be filled soon, ready to distribute the hard 
earned points to the players who did well this Voting period; he could 
already see the flashing lights warning that the Enforcers would be 
flying through soon, to collect from the players whose props weren't as 
popular.
     A hatch underneath the Base opened up.
     Robin clenched his fist, and opened it holding a fireball. The 
cars were coming.
     He sized them up as they came nearer. Each had a small Laser 
Turret, and a much larger box with a number on it. He smiled. It didn't 
matter to him which proposal he robbed from; all the ones that came by 
this way were profitable. He picked one out, and waited, the fireball 
sizzling softly in his hand.
     The target rounded the corner, and he dropped down, knocking the 
power supply out of the turret with his fireball. The turret hung 
limply as Robin kicked up the lid of the pointbox, reaching in to get 
the points inside.
     A leather hand grabbed his arm and pulled.
     Startled, he fell forwards, bring his other arm around to throw a 
fireball. He landed on his knees in the box, one hand holding him up 
while the other prepared to torch his assailant in the box.
     The box was empty, except for him.
     The last thing he heard as the lid slammed down above him was a 
harsh voice laughing on the delivery car's deck.
]]

Remove section B.8. [[The Bandit Gremlin]] from rule 256. Renumber the 
other sections accordingly.

[[
There was nothing to be seen out the back window but the blackness of 
the Void. He opened the tarnished steel shutters to watch it go by. The 
Grid would be on that side, soon, as soon as he came back up over the 
edge. He readied the launcher, tightening the straps that held back the 
enormous rock.
     The Edge entered the window. A switch on the wall opened the main 
blast door, yielding a stunning view of the Grid from above. He put his 
hand on the lever that would release the rock.
     He paused.
     There was something moving over the grid. As he watched, a small 
blue dot was getting steadily higher above the Turf, swerving back and 
forth erratically. He released the lever and went for his binoculars.
     He focused on the small blue dot, hoping to discern what it was. 
It was, apparently, a large blue dot. And growing, oddly. When he first 
looked out at it, it had appeared smaller than a grid square; now four 
or five squares were blocked out by it, and more were disappearing.
     With a start, Rocky realized it was coming straight at him.
     Dropping the binoculars, he ran to the control room and hit the 
thrusters. As he jetted off towards the (20,20) end of the grid, the 
blue speck, now more of a blue blob, started slowing. It turned to 
follow him, speeding up again.
     He could see it clearly, now. It was a long, thin metal javelin, 
surrounded by a brilliant blue halo that seemed to be coming out of the 
back of it. A Firebolt Missile.
     Odd, that. He thought they'd never been proposed; how could they 
use them without a defining rule?
     He didn't have a chance to wonder about it for long.
]]

Remove section B.5. [[The Meteor Gremlin]] from rule 256. Renumber the 
other sections accordingly.

[[
The Big Rock loomed over him, a mountain of stone jutting out of the 
turf. The Mud baked and cracked between his feet as he moved over it, 
pulling an Athame and some gnomes out of a small satchel on his back.
     Squeezing some of the earth and fire onto the Athame, he jumped up 
to a little ledge in the stone to start his carving.
     His first cut left a glowing red line across the face of the rock. 
He added some more dashes, curves and circles, then squeezed some ice 
on the result. The runes turned a brilliant purple, then faded to match 
the color of the rock. He moved over slightly to add some more lines, 
this time using only fire.
     A long fire S, with an ice/earth circle around the top; a fire/ice 
line running through it to a fire/earth wedge on the side; a pair of 
earth curves like a flame with a dot of ice/fire/earth between them, a 
pretzel-like crossing of *CRACK*
     He blinked in surprise. His Athame, glittering blue with the ice, 
had just broken into the Rock. He looked in the hole he had made.
     By the light of his skin, he saw a tiny cave, going in perhaps 
three feet. He looked into the hole, the darkness fading as his fire 
drew closer. It seemed someone had carved this bubble, then melted a 
sheet of rock over it to hide it.
     The hole was mostly empty, except for three things. There was a 
rat back there, trying to hide from this strange glowing being looking 
through the hole. There was a little tuft of bush, now dead, presumably 
due to lack of sunlight. The rat was trying to hide under its foliage, 
which was difficult because there wasn't any left.
     The Gremlin's eyes widened. Next to the bush was a small metal 
cage, with a flashing red light on the outside and a can of Whoopass on 
the inside.
     "Oh Shi-" the gremlin said, and the Boomcage went off.
]]

Repeal r1068 [[The Druid Gremlin]].

[[
Cowering in the mud, he clutched his knees to his chest, his head 
between his legs. There were almost all there - Enrique, Agatha, 
everyone of them was somewhere on the Grid. Only Luigi was still 
Hiding. The figure, caked in the mud that had baked upon contact with 
his skin didn't think he could take it much longer. He could feel them, 
filling up the Grid, in all directions. There were too many, too little 
space.
     Explosions rocked the grid as the players flew around, throwing 
all sorts of unpleasantries at each other, trying to get some advantage 
in a game that nobody even remember how to play anymore, but the 
glowing figure didn't pay attention, didn't even notice. His eyes, 
clamped shut, still saw them all, walking, talking, thieving, Cursing 
things... the images filled his mind, shutting out all other thoughts, 
pounding on his skull. The nearby explosions certainly didn't help his 
headache.

     Far above the Grid, a delivery car docked with the Base - a gift 
of points for the admin. The Gremlin Fund gained five points.
     Luigi's watch began to beep. His goons followed as he got up and 
went to the door back to the real world. He became Active.

     He couldn't deal with it any more. It was hard enough already, but 
with Luigi and his goons, it was just too much. He took a deep breath, 
ready to scream.
     A hand clamped over his mouth.
     The Primal Scream, issued from vocal cords more powerful than 
anything else the Grid had ever seen, backfired. A thousand Cans worth 
of pure energy filled his lungs, ricocheting around his insides, 
shaking him apart.
     Frantically, he concentrated his fire to his head, trying to burn 
away the hand; but the flames just rolled off the leather glove. He 
tried to choke back the Scream, but it only grew louder, in accordance 
with the rules. His last thought before his own noise overwhelmed him 
was that his wasn't the only death; the images in his head of other 
gremlins were fading away, too.
]]

Remove section B.7. [[The AAAHHH! Gremlin]] from rule 256. Renumber the 
other sections accordingly.

[[
Dust flew up in clouds around the crumbling walls as the three speeders 
converged on the abandoned M-Tek warehouse. Number One punched a few 
keys, and a colored view of the building appeared on his monitor. It 
was entirely blue, save a small red blotch near the top.
     "Thermo shows the target on the second floor."
     "Good. Move in."
     He pulled out his laser pistol, and jumped down from his speeder. 
The others were already standing by the door.
     "Locked." said Three.
     There was a loud CRACK! as One's fireball neatly blew out the 
middle of the door. "Not any more," he said.
     The three cops moved carefully through the hole, pistols ready.
     They went up the stairs very slowly, treading carefully around the 
holes and skipping the more rotten steps, until they reached the steel 
observation deck. Just ahead the room opened up into the enormous 
storage bay, long empty, where rumor held that the first DimShip had 
been built, before the Breaking of the Game.
     One pointed to a small door on the side of the hallway. "In there."
     They crept up to the dented metal door. In one motion, Two kicked 
down the door and rolled through to the side of the room, while Three 
jumped over him to the other side. One stayed in the doorway, pistol 
pointed straight ahead.
     A figure came rushing at him.
     He fired; the figure kept coming despite the sudden hole in his 
side. He fired again, and again; he saw the red bursts from his 
partners piercing the thing again and again; but the figure never 
slowed. By the time it reached him, it was a tattered remnant of a man, 
yet still it came. He dove around it, feeling his arm brush against 
the... straw?
     He stopped, and looked at the suddenly stationary figure. It was a 
scarecrow, hanging from a rope on the ceiling that went over a pulley 
and to the door. Two and Three stared.
     "Is this some kind of joke?" asked Two.
     "I think we've been set up."
     "Why'd anyone want to do that?"
     "Uh, One?" Three said nervously. "Didn't you say there was a heat 
sig in here?"
     The pistols came back up immediately. All three cops turned to 
look at the back of the room, where a large metal box lay against the 
wall.
     One crept forwards, gun at the ready. He kicked open the lid, and 
jumped back.
     Nothing happened.
     He moved forwards and looked in the box.
     "Well, there's the heat sig. Damn."
     Two came up to look at the glowing shapes staring up from the 
crate. "Fire gnomes?"
     "Yup. We've been had."
     "Three, I don't suppose you got a trace on the guy who called this 
in?"
     There was a pause. "Three?"
     They looked around. There was nobody else in the room.
     A quick search of the rest of the floor turned up no sign.
     "That's not like him to wander off like that..."
     "What, you think something happened to him? We'd have heard if 
he'd fallen through the floor or something. And there's nobody else in 
the building; you did the thermo reading yourself. He probably just got 
bored and went to look around or something."
     They continued along the walkway, around the enormous storeroom, 
now empty save for some piles of scrap metal. They turned the corner 
and stopped.
     Three was leaning against the wall. He was staring vacantly into 
space, his uniform stained with blood and a knife lodged in his back.
     A gust of cold air blew past them, making the now only smoldering 
flesh underneath Three's uniform flicker.
     On impulse, One dropped to one knee, spun and fired. The 
black-robed man who had been coming up behind him almost dove out of 
the way in time; the laser knocked off one of the Ice Gnomes he had 
tied outside his thick black coat, and the force of it knocked the man 
back over the edge of the ramp towards the jagged piles of rusty scap 
below. The ping of bullets on metal filled the room as three other 
assassins opened fire from the shadows on the other side of the 
stockroom. One dove into the nearest doorway, firing the pistol with 
one hand while readying a fireball with the other.
     Two's body was already simmering on the ground.
     One peeked around the doorframe, fireball in hand. Nobody was 
visible. No sign of the attackers.
     How had the thermo scan missed these guys? They'd tested the 
technology thoroughly before installing them on the squad speeders, and 
it'd worked perfectly, picking out even through thick walls anything 
that gave off even the slightest bit of heat. It should have seen 
everything in this building that was at... all... hot... The Ice 
Gnomes. Of course.
     One cursed his stupidity. Of course, people wearing Ice Gnomes 
wouldn't show up. He'd have to let the R&D teams know about this soon, 
before the trick became widely known. Assuming, of course, that he ever 
saw the R&D teams again.
     He slid the laser pistol back into its holster, and pulled a 
small, smooth metal sphere out of a hidden pocket in his jacket. 
Firebombs were forbidden by HQ, of course - anything not created by the 
rules had to be - but he always carried one around just in case 
something... untoward... happened to him.
     He also pulled a small remote, and flicked off the safety catch. 
None of the others knew it, but he'd taken the liberty of installing 
some explosives under his speeder, just in case.
     He stood perfectly still, listening for some sign of the robed 
men, but if anyone was moving out in the warehouse, they were quiet as 
cats.
     In the end, it was dumb luck that saved him. As the second 
assassin dropped down behind him through the removed ceiling tile, his 
gun butt tapped the edge of the whole.
     Number One spun, threw the bomb and hit the detonator switch all 
in one motion.
     Flames filled the warehouse, shooting out of every 
suddenly-shattered window. At the same time, the largest of the 
speeders outside exploded, sending bits of scrap metal everywhere.
     As the remnants of his speeder rained down on the nearby squares, 
One felt the pain of the fire, much hotter than that of his skin, fade 
away, as the familiar dead flowers and Chesterfield sofa appeared.
     Hopefully the firebomb had taken care of his assailants; he had no 
intention of going back to the real world to check until he knew 
exactly what was going on, and who had tried to kill him.
     He had some planning to do.
]]

Replace text of rule 1137 [[ The Police ]] with:
{{
__The Police__

There exists a Gremlin called the Police Gremlin. The Police Gremlin 
may never become Active. This rule supersedes all other rules that 
affect when the Police Gremlin becomes Active. If the Police Gremlin 
ever becomes Active, it immediately goes into Hiding.
}}

Repeal r1136 [[Jail]] and r1125 [[Criminal Behavior]].

}}

--
Wonko

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