spoon-discuss: Look! it's a rant!

["David E. Smith" <dave@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

On Tue, 18 Dec 2001, Doig, Gavin wrote:

> You're not covered by the nweek 1 clause anyway, I think (not being a rule
> or a player). Although it might be viewed as a CFJ about the rules, I
> suppose (is it legal for you to ignore them? ;-)).

The rules only say that Players are bound to follow them, and that I am
responsible for "all game duties not assigned by the Rules to other
players."

The word "other" could imply that I'm to be considered sort-of a player,
but that might be needless nitpicking.

Honestly, I don't much care WHO scores how many points, who wins, who
loses, who gives themselves seventeen titles or is the Red Team's Flag
Carrier. I want everyone involved to have fun, and to play as fair a game
as is possible under the circumstances (given that much of the point of
the game is to tip the rules so that they're slightly unfair).

This is why, before I started, I asked people (those who were on the old A
Nomic list, before we changed it into the B Nomic list) to look over the
initial rules, and to ensure there weren't any gaping holes. A couple of
people did, you know who you are, and I thank you for your kind efforts.

Then a few people apparently looked through the rules, found unintentional
loopholes, and kept their mouths shut, waiting 'til the game started to
exploit them.

Note "unintentional." That's another one of those key words.

I'm not a player in B Nomic, and I doubt I'll have time to be one in the
near future. In A Nomic, my time in the game was a stunning run of
mediocrity; I wouldn't want to drag down this game by my participation (or
likely lack thereof). I do have a bit of a knack for organization, and a
bit of a knack for database stuff, and so I whipped together a few pages
to track rules and proposals so others, with more time and more brains
than I, could play and have fun, and I could sit back and watch the fun
being had by everyone else.

Guess what: This is not fun.

Rules aren't being proposed and debated. The list lies mostly silent, save
for the occasional outburst of "hey, I found another dickheaded mistake
Dave made! I'm gonna bugger the game!" and a chorus of "Me too!".

IMO, much of the fun from this type of game comes from INTENTIONAL
loopholes. Ones put there on purpose by players. Sheer battle of wits
stuff, it is. People exploiting loopholes that weren't put there by
players, but instead simply by the sheer ignorance and incompetence of an
admin, is more childish than fun in any sense of the word of which I am
aware.

I would ask that everyone who has exploited these loopholes grow up a bit,
and un-do their actions. Failing that, here's what will happen:

* I will award a Win to whichever jackass gave emself 1000 points. Right
  now, I don't recall who did it, nor do I much care.
* Since the same loophole will continue to exist, there will be nothing
  to prevent anyone and everyone from continuing to do so, thus requiring
  me to award an effectively infinite number of wins.
* As I don't have an infinite amount of free time to sit round the
  keyboard awarding Wins, I consider this to be something that would
  prevent the game from continuing normally. "Therefore, play ceases."
  Have a nice life.


...dave