Nomic

I first heard of this game in Douglas Hofstadter's previously mentioned masterpiece Metamagical Themas (some people are all like, "Eternal Golden Braid is better," but I'm all like "As if"). Designed in the early 80s by Peter Suber, Nomic is a game in which "changing the rules is a move. In that respect it differs from almost every other game. The primary activity of Nomic is proposing changes in the rules, debating the wisdom of changing them in that way, voting on the changes, deciding what can and cannot be done afterwards, and doing it. Even this core of the game, of course, can be changed." Yes, you can find that on Wikipedia, but I did do some more research; and besides, it's a very fitting description.

Because of this extremely interesting dynamic between rules and choice in game theory, games often take on the properties of the players involved. From attempting to forget everything you know about the rules to eventually getting into the fun of intentionally writing loopholes to exploit later, Nomic often blurs the already shakily defined line between game and simulation. While games can be played with pencil and paper with some friends, the most common medium the game takes on is that of the mailing list, with dozens of games and players submitting rules for voting simultaneously.

My first foray into online play ended in bitter tears, as I attempted to join AgoraNomic, the world's longest running Nomic (Est. 1993). The only reason it has been able to survive so long online is that many players are lawyers or some kind of savant maybe. They take the game very seriously, seeing it more as an exercise in philosophy and law than a game. Needless to say, I was too intimidated to even start. It would be hard anyway, as the game has inflated from the original 29 rules to the current ruleset of over two thousand, pertaining to everything from direction of play to special titles and awards for the players. Agora has seen a fair bit of history and is unlikely to shut down anytime soon. For example, it has survived multiple scams, loopholes, even a couple of wars. That's right. As the model for a successful Nomic is similar to a well-run, impossibly democratic country, many parallels, including conflict, begin to surface.

Perhaps the best example was the great Risho-Agoran war of '97. Rishonomic (since defunct) passed a rule stating its superiority over all other Nomics, additionally declaring AgoraNomic "generally boring". Militias quickly began to form on both sides, and the Agoran Commander-in-Chief hatched a plan that involved slowly introducing Agoran spies into Rishonomic under false identities. Once they had a majority, they could vote Rishonomic into an Agoran colony (via the "Overlord Rule" as it came to be known), with all Rishon votes going through an Agoran veto system. Unfortunately, there was dissent in the ranks, and a double agent of some kind ratted them out. The plan went through anyway and Rishonomic was completely under Agoran control. The plan fizzled out when Rishonomic passed a rule to redefine a word in the English language. Specifically, they passed a rule stating

"Repealed" means "painted white". "Aced" means "deleted from the ruleset". The Overlord Rule is hereby aced. This rule is hereby aced.

Soon afterward, Rishonomic crumbled when a rule was passed that replaced all numbers in the ruleset with the phrase "A Suffusion Of Yellow" (Heh. Douglas Adams). Since numbers are used to determine the priority and order in which rules were enforced, the entire game fell apart, handing victory to the Agorans.

This is the reason I love this game.