quote: Original post by bishop_pass
The players actully build and form their own power hierarchy amongst themselves. This could have some fascinating side effects. One player might be elected to be the head of intelligence. This player, while not the head of state, has a great deal of power. He is essentially the owner of the state's intelligence, and might choose to share or not share certain intelligence with the other members of his government to enhance his power. This is very much like what goes on in the CIA and FBI. J. Edgar Hoover, former head of the FBI, was notorious for doing this.

Beautiful!

quote: I would strongly like to see the players able to set up their own legal system. Your idea about document signing sounds interesting. Can you elaborate on it?

While not my idea, I'd like to provide some speculation.

I believe laws are binding agreements to uphold certain precepts. Therefore, a legal system would be a collections of permissions (yes/no/with restrictions) where each permitted action also serves or disserves the objective of a participating entity. The entities therefore give-and-take for what they see as the best possible mix, but that is weighted against their fiscal needs. What I mean is that, if Lord A and Lord B wish to enter into a common law agreement, but Lord B is significantly wealthier (and Lord A thus stands to gain tremendous advantage in trade and protection), then Lord A has less "influence" (think: dimplomatic barter points) in the legal negotiation. If Lord A has a resource that is incredibly important to Lord B and knows it , then Lord A may even have more influence that B.

EDIT: formatting.

Edited by - Oluseyi on October 8, 2001 4:54:48 PM

Maybe I just don''t comprehend the idea well enough, but doesn''t the type of game you''re proposing sound a little like Shadowbane (www.shadowbane.com)?

-------------------------------
"A promise to a woman is just a lie that hasn''t happened yet."
-Mr. Floppy

Ghostface: I really don''t think so. A cursory glance at Shadowbane reveals YARPG (Yet Another RPG), though I''m almost sure I''m wrong so please correct me.

This idea seems to be based around diplomacy and command hierarchy rather than personal combat/competition. What I mean is that you, as Lord/Leige/King/Queen, etc, will hardly ever have the time to be at the forefront of battle. Rather you will control lands and armies and order delegates to fulfill specific actions. If you look back at bishop_pass'' first post you''ll see that he says the players start out as entities, by which (I assume) he means villages, tribes, countries, groups, bands...

That makes for a very different initial premise than an RPG in which you are a member of a party and personally engage in combat. There you are essentially a warrior (mages are warriors still, since their only impact is how they kill enemies or heal friends [gross oversimplification]) while here you are a strategist and politician.

quote:
Original post by bishop_pass

I have been trying to come to terms with how there could be public information and private information passed between the players while preserving the possibility of other players intercepting or eavesdropping on this information. What I absolutely would like to prevent is two players swapping email addresses and then sharing information completely safe from all the other players. So, there would have to be some way of preventing players of giving another player his email address. At first, this may seem impossible. But there might be a way by providing a limited set of communication between players that would prevent this.

Hm, this doesn''t really sound feasible. There''d surely be discussion forums, people learning about the game from friends, people playing from the same physical location, etc. One way or the other there will be out of game communication. If the game clearly considers this as a form of cheating, players will be unhappy because other players will clearly cheat.

Instead I believe the focus should be on making the out of game communications unreliable or not very useful, albeit legal (maybe the game itself could support perfectly private communications).

A way to counter private communications is to not let the players choose their start in the game world. A random start would separate players who know each other (and can trust each other) by large distances, hence making communication less useful. Randomized starting abilities, races, religions, etc would more likely place them in opposing camps, so they may even not want to communicate.

Changing player nicks after each game would make sure that the guys that lie using the private channels would not be remembered and can do their thing again and again until most players do not trust the private channels anymore.

To balance this I propose that as much as possible of the game information can become game objects. If two players create a secret alliance, they sign a treaty. If one of them betrays, the other can (depending on the laws these two abide to) claim treason and have the alliance document as proof.

If some spies find data on an enemies defenses in an area, these information become a game object (in this case, an object that would give an army a large attack bonus against the said area). The player cannot read this info then copy-paste it and email it. To send it he must use in game communication routes.

If some spies send news that a player is mobilizing his forces, this news becomes a game object. A player can email another and tell him, but by sending/showing him the news game object would also be a very important proof that he is not lying. Also, by sending the game objects, others can learn about the relation between these two (which in turn can create another info game object).

If a player is asked by his superior about the profits he makes, he can answer a certain number, but who can check/believe that? But also, he can create a "fiscal report" game object and send it in game to his superior.

So, these information game objects would only be generated by the game in certain circumstances and would be a credible evidence of the information they contain. Of course, some players would be able to forge these documents, but then it''s up to the game designer to choose how easy it is, and how easy it is to discovery the forgery. In example, forging an income report would be very easy if the reported profits would be just a little lower than the real ones, but a large lie would be easily discovered.

Maybe even only some very few players have the special skill of forging documents. Hmm, I imagine how many people would want these dead, and how many people would like to pay for their services and how much power would they get (they find out of lots of betrayals in time - many players would want that nobody challenges the forgers).

quote: Original post by Oluseyi If you look back at bishop_pass'' first post you''ll see that he says the players start out as entities, by which (I assume) he means villages, tribes, countries, groups, bands...

To put it more accurately, the player would be playing an individual who is optionally part of a larger government composed of other players each cooperating with each other to compete and safegaurd themselves from the other governments composed of other players, yet at the same time, each player is motivated to achieve the greatest power within his own government, and by doing so, is often serving his own self interests in concert with his government or possibly at odds with his government.

quote: Original post by Diodor
Hm, this doesn''t really sound feasible. There''d surely be discussion forums, people learning about the game from friends, people playing from the same physical location, etc. One way or the other there will be out of game communication. If the game clearly considers this as a form of cheating, players will be unhappy because other players will clearly cheat.

I agree. I don''t think it is really feasible to prevent players from engaging in out of game communications. But I do want to encourage players to use in game communications to make it possible for spying on these in game communications by other players. I think you have possibly come up with a way to promote this by thinking of cummunication packets as game objects.

quote: Original post by Diodor
A way to counter private communications is to not let the players choose their start in the game world. A random start would separate players who know each other (and can trust each other) by large distances, hence making communication less useful. Randomized starting abilities, races, religions, etc would more likely place them in opposing camps, so they may even not want to communicate.

I certainly envision that the players would start in random positions with a complete lack of knowledge regarding the identity of the other players. But the whole premise of the game is to build relations and alliances with these players, and it is reasonable to assume that some would be motivated to swap email addresses to communicate strategies or intelligence privately amongst themselves.

quote: Original post by Diodor
To balance this I propose that as much as possible of the game information can become game objects. If two players create a secret alliance, they sign a treaty. If one of them betrays, the other can (depending on the laws these two abide to) claim treason and have the alliance document as proof.

I like this idea of game objects. But I would like to retain the flavor of players being able to communicate with their own persuasivness and subtlety, rather than some ''ability'' defined by a die roll. Perhaps there is some happy medium between the two.

Perhaps by listing some of the key ''actions'' that might be available, one could come up with a methodology that would be suitable for many of them.

Here are some ''actions'' or features that I think would be interesting. This list is just preliminary.

1. Public Communication: Some examples might be speeches, television addresses, newspaper columns, advertising, signs, mass mailings, leaflets, etc.

2. Rumor Mill: Anonymously planted messages, a private message to another player knowing that player will spread the message around, etc.

3. Propoganda: Similar to public communication, and essentially uses the same tactics, but with a different intent.

4. Reporting: In general, the act of summarizing events/intelligence/data to others, possibly in the forms of reports, documents, etc.

5. Private Communication: Some examples include messenger/courier, electronic transmittal, telephone, voice mail, face to face, encrypted documents, mail, etc.

6. Request a vote: A motion is put forth to vote on a item, assuming a group agrees to this. This might be the extablished norm if a set of individuals agree to make decisions like this. It might the way to determine if a new law should be passed.

7. Vote: The selected group of individuals actually vote on an item.

8. Espionage: Includes attempting to intercept private messages, public messages with limited range, the changing and falsifying of information, etc.

9. Trial: It could be the case that players may agree to try another player or group of players based on the way they have determined a trial should occur.

10. Forming alliances, treaties, sanctions, and trade agreements.

11. Create a currency and an exchange of that currency between different nations.

12. Wage war.

quote: Original post by bishop_pass (with much snippage)

Again, this captures the spirit of what I would like to see. The players actully build and form their own power hierarchy amongst themselves.

I would strongly like to see the players able to set up their own legal system. Your idea about document signing sounds interesting. Can you elaborate on it?

This is exactly the kind of stuff I have been thinking about.

Take a look at Nomic. The funadament of the game is a self modifying set of rules, where players initially propose and vote on changes to the rules. Since the game is self-modifying, later rules of course can change how rules are made, votes are taken, etc.

In some games, the bulk of the rules are used to define completely new game rules, such as offices and titles and whatnot.

I think it would make an excellent foundation for creating a political and legal system. You would probably have to restrict the rule-making in order to keep some parts of the game consistent, but otherwise it would make a fine implementation for some of your goals (IMO).

JSwing

I looked briefly at Nomic, and it does look really interesting. I will look at it in more depth. Nomic appears to revolve around the act of making or modifying rules for the sole purpose of winning the game. This captures the spirit in concept, but it doesn''t use this concept in a larger political simulation (or so it appears).

I think a lot could be learned from this game though. It is interesting that Douglas Hofstadter wrote about it. Douglas Hofstadter is the author of the rather famous book Godel Escher Back, an Eternal Golden Braid a philopsophical book about AI and mathematics.

So, with that, does anyone have any ideas on how a game could provide an environment for players to build up rules, doctrine, and such and provide a methodology for the players to have these rules enforced? Presumably it is up to the players to provide some type of infrastructure to make sure the rules are enforced.

Hypothetically, assume that either through simulation of a constituency or the actions of multiple players interacting in a medium where a set of things are possible, chaos ensues. It is then up to the players to build a set of rules, a bill of rights, a constitution, or whatever you want to call it, to guide and mold this chaos into an efficient structure to better facilitate national power, security, and economic prosperity while at the same time appeasing all the players which belong to that entity to ensure no rebellions, or uprising, which in the end cause chaos again.

So, in effect, there are two sets of rules. Those immutable ''physically possible'' rules which are part of the game world and those rules which are created and modified and enforced by the players.

The rules which are created and modified by the players not only govern what is legal outside in the game world, but also govern what is legal when it comes to making rules and modifying rules. In other words, the players may make rules which govern the rule making process.

As an example to my above post, let's assume that the game world provides the 'physically possible' rule or mechanism that allows free press, free speech. In other words, the game provides the venue through several mechanisms, say: newspaper publishing, television addresses, advertising campaigns, column writing, leaflet dropping, etc. Any player may, if he has the resources, engage in such activities according to what is possible in the game world.

However, the governing body could possibly create a rule prohibiting these activities, or a subset of these activities. For example, free speech may be allowed, but leaflet dropping may be considered littering, which is ruled to be against the law. So, a player decides to engage in a campaign against the government by writing scathing commentary on the activities of the government. This player might even be a member of this government. Assuming that this commentary is available to the members of the government, they might decide to modify their decisions regarding certain laws.

Now, let's say that the player writing the critical commentary is head of a news agency (assuming that is a 'physically possible' thing to do in the game). He could charge 'game' money to sell his journalistic commentary, thus making money and increasing his potential power. Why would other players be consumers of this commentary? Because it is informative to them, and possibly helps them make better decisions, even within their own goevernment. So, the player writing the commentary might be killing two birds with one stone: he is making money, and swaying the opinions of other players.

Edited by - bishop_pass on October 11, 2001 1:04:48 PM