Re: DIS: Re: BUS: [proposal] No finger pointing on behalf
Kind of crossposting from Discord but: Ive played loads of the Sets game (I won once!!) and it was very fun while I was engaged with it. I didn't mind that the part of gathering 4 for a Set was "solveable", because the fun of the game wasn't there, it was in what Ais has pointed out, where you still need to negotiate and tackle with what you got and what others have to make the most of it. It was a very fun but not in the way it was designed to behave. On Friday, April 8, 2022, nix via agora-discussion < agora-discussion@agoranomic.org> wrote: > > > On 4/8/22 14:58, Kerim Aydin via agora-discussion wrote: > >> Huh? I don't think Cards are solved at all, and that's part of the > >> reason I find them interesting. We've solved the problem of forming > >> sets using cards from players who are active and willing to trade, but > >> there are lots of cards that players are unwilling to trade, or held by > >> inactive people, and making sets with those is much harder. > > I think the set-cashing part (so, like half the game) is nearly solved by > > the contracts - it's suppressed in-person dealing on discord noticeably, > > when a critical mass of players are just throwing things in a hopper, > > there are fewer opportunities to careful trading 1-by-1 (and the fun of > > guessing what a good deal is to different players etc). > > > Agreed. In the most recent Treasuror's report, all but 1 cash-in in the > last two months were 4 cards. That seems solved. > >> The consequence is that our current economy has really interesting > >> liquidity issues, and in practice players have been known to form > >> suboptimal trades because they need products more quickly than they'd > >> get them by forming a set and distributing the resulting products > >> fairly. > >> > > Both are going on, and I agree the resource-spending side of it isn't > > solved, but I've noticed that the card trading has just slowly tilted > more > > towards the contracts over time. > > The unsolved part in my mind is distribution. I think if you replaced > Cards with straight product rewards you'd get pretty similar play > without the contracts in-between things. > > -- > nix > Herald > > >
Re: DIS: Re: BUS: [proposal] No finger pointing on behalf
On 4/8/22 14:58, Kerim Aydin via agora-discussion wrote: >> Huh? I don't think Cards are solved at all, and that's part of the >> reason I find them interesting. We've solved the problem of forming >> sets using cards from players who are active and willing to trade, but >> there are lots of cards that players are unwilling to trade, or held by >> inactive people, and making sets with those is much harder. > I think the set-cashing part (so, like half the game) is nearly solved by > the contracts - it's suppressed in-person dealing on discord noticeably, > when a critical mass of players are just throwing things in a hopper, > there are fewer opportunities to careful trading 1-by-1 (and the fun of > guessing what a good deal is to different players etc). > Agreed. In the most recent Treasuror's report, all but 1 cash-in in the last two months were 4 cards. That seems solved. >> The consequence is that our current economy has really interesting >> liquidity issues, and in practice players have been known to form >> suboptimal trades because they need products more quickly than they'd >> get them by forming a set and distributing the resulting products >> fairly. >> > Both are going on, and I agree the resource-spending side of it isn't > solved, but I've noticed that the card trading has just slowly tilted more > towards the contracts over time. The unsolved part in my mind is distribution. I think if you replaced Cards with straight product rewards you'd get pretty similar play without the contracts in-between things. -- nix Herald
Re: DIS: Re: BUS: [proposal] No finger pointing on behalf
On 4/8/2022 12:52 PM, ais523 via agora-discussion wrote: > On Fri, 2022-04-08 at 19:45 +, nix via agora-discussion wrote: >> On 4/8/22 13:34, Jason Cobb via agora-discussion wrote: >>> Also, while timing scams are interesting gameplay, I don't think it's a >>> good idea to change the rules for the sole purpose of making them easier >>> to perform. In this specific situation, the timing element is likely to >>> be repealed soon anyway. >> >> Tangent to this topic: >> >> I feel like there's a recent push for these minmaxing/optimization tools >> (automation, acting on behalf, contracts) etc. The problem is that >> minmaxing/optimization is basically solving a puzzle. And once a puzzle >> is solved it's boring. This is what happened with Cards in Sets, they're >> solved now thanks to contracts. That was a fun exercise that took us a >> while of play. But that was a sub-game. If Agora as a whole becomes >> solve-able, it becomes boring. > > Huh? I don't think Cards are solved at all, and that's part of the > reason I find them interesting. We've solved the problem of forming > sets using cards from players who are active and willing to trade, but > there are lots of cards that players are unwilling to trade, or held by > inactive people, and making sets with those is much harder. I think the set-cashing part (so, like half the game) is nearly solved by the contracts - it's suppressed in-person dealing on discord noticeably, when a critical mass of players are just throwing things in a hopper, there are fewer opportunities to careful trading 1-by-1 (and the fun of guessing what a good deal is to different players etc). > The consequence is that our current economy has really interesting > liquidity issues, and in practice players have been known to form > suboptimal trades because they need products more quickly than they'd > get them by forming a set and distributing the resulting products > fairly. > Both are going on, and I agree the resource-spending side of it isn't solved, but I've noticed that the card trading has just slowly tilted more towards the contracts over time. -G.
Re: DIS: Re: BUS: [proposal] No finger pointing on behalf
On Fri, 2022-04-08 at 19:45 +, nix via agora-discussion wrote: > On 4/8/22 13:34, Jason Cobb via agora-discussion wrote: > > Also, while timing scams are interesting gameplay, I don't think it's a > > good idea to change the rules for the sole purpose of making them easier > > to perform. In this specific situation, the timing element is likely to > > be repealed soon anyway. > > Tangent to this topic: > > I feel like there's a recent push for these minmaxing/optimization tools > (automation, acting on behalf, contracts) etc. The problem is that > minmaxing/optimization is basically solving a puzzle. And once a puzzle > is solved it's boring. This is what happened with Cards in Sets, they're > solved now thanks to contracts. That was a fun exercise that took us a > while of play. But that was a sub-game. If Agora as a whole becomes > solve-able, it becomes boring. Huh? I don't think Cards are solved at all, and that's part of the reason I find them interesting. We've solved the problem of forming sets using cards from players who are active and willing to trade, but there are lots of cards that players are unwilling to trade, or held by inactive people, and making sets with those is much harder. The consequence is that our current economy has really interesting liquidity issues, and in practice players have been known to form suboptimal trades because they need products more quickly than they'd get them by forming a set and distributing the resulting products fairly. -- ais523
Re: DIS: Re: BUS: [proposal] No finger pointing on behalf
On 4/8/22 13:34, Jason Cobb via agora-discussion wrote: > Also, while timing scams are interesting gameplay, I don't think it's a > good idea to change the rules for the sole purpose of making them easier > to perform. In this specific situation, the timing element is likely to > be repealed soon anyway. Tangent to this topic: I feel like there's a recent push for these minmaxing/optimization tools (automation, acting on behalf, contracts) etc. The problem is that minmaxing/optimization is basically solving a puzzle. And once a puzzle is solved it's boring. This is what happened with Cards in Sets, they're solved now thanks to contracts. That was a fun exercise that took us a while of play. But that was a sub-game. If Agora as a whole becomes solve-able, it becomes boring. -- nix Herald
Re: DIS: Re: BUS: [proposal] No finger pointing on behalf
On 4/8/22 14:05, ais523 via agora-discussion wrote: > On Fri, 2022-04-08 at 13:54 -0400, Jason Cobb via agora-business wrote: >> I submit, but do not pend, the following proposal: >> >> Title: No finger pointing on behalf > FWIW, I'd prefer to expand the set of actions-on-behalf rather than > shrinking it (e.g. allowing objections/support to be made on behalf). > > One of the big advantages of being able to act on behalf is that it > takes the guesswork / constant refreshing out of timing scams, as long > as you can bribe the person who sends the message you want to react to. > If you remove that ability, then being able to get the perfect timing > is reliant primarily on how much you can stay online constantly > refreshing your email and/or how good you are at writing bots to > automatically send a message in response to another message. The latter > skill is mildly interesting, but the former skill is something that > it's a bad idea to encourage – it's a bad idea to steer people into > dedicating too much of their life to playing nomic at the expense of > other things, and refreshing your email constantly is one of the ways > you can spend a huge amount of time playing nomic. > > (I kind-of miss the days when it was possible to agree contracts in > secret, and have them gain act-on-behalf ability as soon as they were > made public, even if the consent itself hadn't been made public. > Obviously there are some issues trying to work out the gamestate if > that sort of thing is possible, but it meant that you didn't need to > make the existence of that sort of agreement public in advance and warn > everyone else about what you were up to.) > Things break if we allow acting on behalf for support/objections. For instance, Madrid has made contracts with clauses that allow acting on behalf to object to intents to shred (or would if this were possible). I don't think that's good for the game, and it removes the ability to destroy harmful contracts that only one person actually wants (except by proposal of course). Also, while timing scams are interesting gameplay, I don't think it's a good idea to change the rules for the sole purpose of making them easier to perform. In this specific situation, the timing element is likely to be repealed soon anyway. -- Jason Cobb Assessor, Rulekeepor, Stonemason
Re: DIS: Re: BUS: [proposal] No finger pointing on behalf
Oh, I had in mind to allow people to set up their own bots from their own email and revel in that anyone now has botting power. On Friday, April 8, 2022, Jason Cobb via agora-discussion < agora-discussion@agoranomic.org> wrote: > On 4/8/22 14:21, Madrid via agora-discussion wrote: > > Ive been looking into mailbots for officerless game tracking. > > > > If Contracts/Acting on Behalf gets repealed I'm up for using the same > tech > > for bots that can replace it. > > > > Actually, they could be useful too for secret "contracts", currently... > > > As I understand our current precedents, allowing someone to send mail > from your email address doesn't change the fact that the email is _from_ > them. What matters is the last entity involved that has free will. > > -- > Jason Cobb > > Assessor, Rulekeepor, Stonemason > >
Re: DIS: Re: BUS: [proposal] No finger pointing on behalf
On 4/8/2022 11:05 AM, ais523 via agora-discussion wrote: > On Fri, 2022-04-08 at 13:54 -0400, Jason Cobb via agora-business wrote: >> I submit, but do not pend, the following proposal: >> >> Title: No finger pointing on behalf > > FWIW, I'd prefer to expand the set of actions-on-behalf rather than > shrinking it (e.g. allowing objections/support to be made on behalf). The Referee/Arbitor rules are written so that the accuser is not ever also the judge/jury; I think that it's reasonably important that this separation be maintained. Whether or not automation/contracts are "more fun" and should be increased for most gameplay in general (I'm generally opposed to that, but recognize it's a preference thing for game play), mixing justice with efficiency is concerning to me, at least a bit. -G.
Re: DIS: Re: BUS: [proposal] No finger pointing on behalf
On 4/8/22 14:21, Madrid via agora-discussion wrote: > Ive been looking into mailbots for officerless game tracking. > > If Contracts/Acting on Behalf gets repealed I'm up for using the same tech > for bots that can replace it. > > Actually, they could be useful too for secret "contracts", currently... As I understand our current precedents, allowing someone to send mail from your email address doesn't change the fact that the email is _from_ them. What matters is the last entity involved that has free will. -- Jason Cobb Assessor, Rulekeepor, Stonemason
Re: DIS: Re: BUS: [proposal] No finger pointing on behalf
Ive been looking into mailbots for officerless game tracking. If Contracts/Acting on Behalf gets repealed I'm up for using the same tech for bots that can replace it. Actually, they could be useful too for secret "contracts", currently... On Friday, April 8, 2022, ais523 via agora-discussion < agora-discussion@agoranomic.org> wrote: > On Fri, 2022-04-08 at 13:54 -0400, Jason Cobb via agora-business wrote: > > I submit, but do not pend, the following proposal: > > > > Title: No finger pointing on behalf > > FWIW, I'd prefer to expand the set of actions-on-behalf rather than > shrinking it (e.g. allowing objections/support to be made on behalf). > > One of the big advantages of being able to act on behalf is that it > takes the guesswork / constant refreshing out of timing scams, as long > as you can bribe the person who sends the message you want to react to. > If you remove that ability, then being able to get the perfect timing > is reliant primarily on how much you can stay online constantly > refreshing your email and/or how good you are at writing bots to > automatically send a message in response to another message. The latter > skill is mildly interesting, but the former skill is something that > it's a bad idea to encourage – it's a bad idea to steer people into > dedicating too much of their life to playing nomic at the expense of > other things, and refreshing your email constantly is one of the ways > you can spend a huge amount of time playing nomic. > > (I kind-of miss the days when it was possible to agree contracts in > secret, and have them gain act-on-behalf ability as soon as they were > made public, even if the consent itself hadn't been made public. > Obviously there are some issues trying to work out the gamestate if > that sort of thing is possible, but it meant that you didn't need to > make the existence of that sort of agreement public in advance and warn > everyone else about what you were up to.) > > -- > ais523 > >
