On 6/14/2020 2:25 PM, Cuddle Beam via agora-discussion wrote: > This is actually very interesting to me. Why is being able to strictly > enforce secret deals *even necessary*? In Blognomic, secret alliances are > rampant but there's never anything formal that forces you to do as the > alliance tells you to do. > > Instead, people do it because it's an IMMENSE faux pas to betray people. > Kevan puts into good words why people are so adamant about being honest or > at least professional to their teammates ( > https://blognomic.com/archive/eff_this_rule_in_particular):
tbh, that's true here too, the penalties to reputation for betrayal are worse than the actual game penalties. In a way, it's actually a force-multiplier on reputation: "If you betray me I'll drag you through the courts not for the lousy 2-blot penalty, but so I can show everyone what a weasel you were". More positive ways I've seen it used: - If you're coming up with a complicated multiplayer scam, forcing yourselves to write it all up as a contract can be clarifying; - If two parties already have a past history of not trusting each other, the spirit of "we're self-interested people negotiating in our own best interests" can actually enforce a bit of trust and mend fences when everyone then does the right thing; - Sometimes people genuinely want a secret sub-nomic with gameplay dynamics and stuff, with the ability to bring it to the courts to sort out whatever in-contract paradoxes arise. (in other words, an intellectual exercise to figure out what was breached where no one's really angry about it). But the actual court cases for secret contracts are extremely rare. > So - even if there ARE mechanics to strictly enforce secret deals, I don't > think it *actually* changes anything about the problem. Unless it's just a > cultural Agoran thing where people are way more permissive of being > backstabbed and betrayed, which I'd find jarring and would love to have > explained if that's the case. It's quite the opposite, if you're playing a sub-game where you *want* backstabbing as part of the play, you usually have to be painfully explicit or people won't enter into the spirit of it (e.g. "Clause X: We expect people to backstab each other in this Tournament and don't take it personally or carry it into the rest of Agora, please") -G.
