Existentially reliant parasites

A while back Jacob Butcher finally categorised me, You like negotiation games! He’s right of course and I especially like them when the negotiation is implicit instead of explicit, or to quote a more recent conversation with another friend, Where your moves are offers.

I love that idea. Moves are offers. Adorable. Juicy. It is likely that single characteristic, married tightly to a raw game theory core¹, is what has so attracted me to Wabash Cannonball. Moves as offers.

So I’ve been thinking for about a week now, mulling around ideas surrounding moves as offers and trying to see what sort of game could be wrapped on that skein. The working concept, which is weak, is a game in which each player has 1/Nth of a limited resource in the game and every move they either offer (partial) access to their stock to one or more other players, or exploits the access that others have offered while also offering access in return. All terribly vague, but the core sense is a sort of dance of offers and engagement and commitment and perhaps even betrayal. The obvious comparables are So Long Sucker and Intrige, but I’d like something far more implicit than those fine stalwarts, as well as far more implicit than explicit.

So far I’ve come up with…nothing. Which is fine for this stage as the thought toy has been delightful, but I’d would like to tangible realise this idea. Sadly inspiration has fled. Still, the thought toy is so charming, so very Mary Poppins in every possible very nearly perfect way.