eirenicon comments on Pract: A Guessing and Testing Game - Less Wrong

5 Post author: brian_jaress 31 July 2009 09:13AM

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Comment author: eirenicon 31 July 2009 05:55:24PM 0 points [-]

Otherwise the game becomes one in which the object is to pay lip service to 'playing in the spirit of the game' while actually getting as close to the 'PGP encryption' ideal as one can without being unduly stigmatised.

I thought the object of the game was to have a fun contest in which you give your opponent a challenging problem and they do the same for you. Many games are broken, and these breaks are often called "exploits", for obvious reasons. Until it's patched, why not agree to ignore them?

Comment author: wedrifid 31 July 2009 09:23:21PM 2 points [-]

I thought the object of the game was to have a fun contest

Do you know what is not fun? Playing games where the real aim is to do what it takes to look impressive without going quite far enough to get shamed for it. That is 'work'. I expect people to pay me if I have to do that.

Many games are broken, and these breaks are often called "exploits", for obvious reasons.

And I advocate exploiting them aggressively until those responsible patch them.

Until it's patched, why not agree to ignore them?

Absolutely! The approach I tend to take goes along the lines of:

The game is flawed. Let's change it to X so that it works better. Agreed?

IF agreed THEN play engaging inference game FUN! ELSE generate PGP key. win EVEN MORE FUN "The game is flawed. How about...?" END

I find this particularly useful when playing 500 with folks who like unrestricted misere calls. It usually only takes a few rounds to make them change their minds.

Comment author: GuySrinivasan 31 July 2009 06:14:28PM 2 points [-]

Agreeing to ignore them is a patch. But unless you both agree to ignore them in exactly the same way, it's not a patch, and it's no longer a fun contest, it's at best just fun.