Needs Help: That One Rule

The "politics" folders are walls of text about "things I don't like" (or "things that surprise some people") about the electoral systems in Canada and the U.S. Lots of back-and-forth, lots of "actually"-style paragraphs, and honestly, I don't think any of it really fits in That One Rule, except that That One Rule is very YMMV-y anyway in my opinion. I'd be strongly inclined to delete all the "politics" folders—UsefulNotes/AmericanPoliticalSystem already has a section on the electoral college—but I thought I'd raise the question here. Okay to delete those sections? Or alternatively, just to say "Some people regard XYZ as an example" and point people to the Useful Notes page for the details?

edited 11th Apr '17 4:28:26 PM by Narsil

I'll go ahead and open this.

Looking at the American folder... yeesh. No objections to chopping all those off and forbidding them.

I'd go further, and make this a game-specific trope, with the usual allowance for references to a game's rules in-universe,and lampshaded, discussed and invoked uses in a game mentioned within a work.

But no Real Life and no non-game examples.

I'd second removing the politics examples, and I also doubt the "General" professional sports examples belong either.

edited 11th Apr '17 6:06:00 PM by Prfnoff

Politics just begs for problems here... Remove that part if you haven't already.

My vote is to cut politics as well.

Really, I'm wondering if it would be best to tack on No Real Life Examples Please. That would cut out sports and other. I know that's a lot to chop, but the sports section feels like complaining and is a general mess. The conversational tone doesn't help.

edited 11th Apr '17 9:39:40 PM by pokedude10

1. Slap an In Universe Examples Only tag on it.
2. Cut those politics folders.
3. Adjust definition as necessary.

No Real Life Examples Please would not exclude sport rules. It does remove the metagame of sports (rules for how individual teams are allowed to pay players). The "General sports" should be removed on principle (no general examples).

~Madrugada's recommendation works for me.

edited 12th Apr '17 3:17:12 AM by crazysamaritan

Then again, this trope doesn't seem to be... all that thriving?

I went through the non-politics folders. There's one set of examples that I moved to the discussion page because the indentation was confusing. If someone familiar with the game Nobilis would take a look at them it would be greatly appreciated.

There were second-level examples, the a third level example referencing another game, then another second-level paragraph, which I couldn't tell if it was about Nobilis or the game in the third-level point.

Glad that folks agreed with me about the politics folders; I'll go ahead and remove them, sounds like there's consensus.

I agree that No Real Life Examples Please might not help. If it's valid to say "here's a crazy rule in chess", why isn't it valid to say "here's a crazy rule in soccer"? Which gets to the core problem, IMO—as it stands, this page is nothing but YMMV. It's "Here's a game, and a rule that I think is weird" (or "Here's a rule that other people think is weird but is actually a great rule because...")

My inclination would be to move most of these examples^note other than the politics ones which we need to kill with an axe to YMMV/ThatOneRule, and reserve this page for in-universe examples: TV shows where people are playing a game and commenting on its one weird rule, or games where the game itself calls out and acknowledges one rule as being weird. But I don't think we'd have enough examples left over to make a page, then.

I guess what I'm asking is, Is This A Trope?

edited 14th Apr '17 2:16:20 PM by Narsil

I have continued trimming, taking out the entries that are more about how much players (or spectators) don't like that rule and trimming that out of entries that are both about a complex rule and bitching.

I believe that it doesn't need to be YMMV: rules can be complex one of two ways: it's difficult to explain, or it's difficult to enforce. It's not a weird rule; it's a complicated one. A rule that's difficult to explain is clearly this trope. One that's easy to explain but difficult to follow or difficult to enforce should also count as long as the example explains ''what makes it a problem".

The definition is clear; I don't think the page is broken. It just needs a good scrubbing.

edited 12th Apr '17 11:59:23 AM by Madrugada

For politics, there's really not anything like "that one rule". There's nothing that limits it like that, such as a sport or game does about itself. Rules and laws in real life are far too extended and complicated anyway, so I don't think there's any system where the exception is just one or two rules that are on the level of the trope requires. Most laws tend to have a bunch of paragraphs detailing and complicating them regarding when and where they apply.

I'd support making it game and competition rules only.

edited 3rd Jul '17 11:17:01 PM by AnotherDuck

Looking at the wicks, I'm not too worried about trimming most of it.

I don't see why this should be confined to game examples. The way the description's written, and going off 's explanation, it should be flexible enough to cover examples ("that one complicated rule") from other media.

I don't know if it went through Ykttw; it's been on the wiki since at least '10. Maybe bouncing it back there for broader examples, after a healthy trim, might help.

edited 12th Apr '17 10:11:18 PM by pokedude10

What "rules" do other media have? I can't come up with any that aren't regulations or laws about how a media business has to operate, and if we're going to allow those, what basis do we have for disallowing politics or long-winded entries about salary caps and recruiting regulations in pro sports?

‘What "rules" do other media have?’

We would need folders for other media if the trope is invoked—if, say, TV characters are playing a (real or fictional) game in-universe and one character invokes a really strange and baroque rule to win. But it'd be pretty rare for it to be a clear case of That One Rule and not Loads and Loads of Rules. I mean, if Starbuck says "Sorry, Helo, you know you can't win three hands in a row by playing prime numbered cards", is that the one weird rule Pyramid has? Or does Pyramid just have a whole lot of crazy rules, and the writers make up new ones as necessary?

edited 13th Apr '17 3:09:39 PM by Narsil

If it's about some cast of some series playing a game where the trope applies, then it still applies to a game, just through the lens of some series.

That's on a similar track. If there's an example in media that has uses one complicated, controversial rule, it should count. It could be a fictional game, but could also apply to in-universe politics, laws, polices, traditions, etc. I don't think it's as rare is it sounds, but unfortunately I don't have any examples to put forward.

Edit: Looking at the description and examples again, I'm not so sure how this differs in practice from Loads and Loads of Rules. The point of both tropes seems to be "a game/system has a rule/rules that makes play/operations confusing." The only way this trope is contrasted against Loads and Loads of Rules in the description is "TOR is a localized case of the problem." So literally, the description itself says it is The Same But More Specific of Loads and Loads of Rules.

edited 13th Apr '17 6:11:29 PM by pokedude10

And the same (but more specific) can be an allowable reason to make a subtrope. In fact, it's one of the definitions of what makes a subtrope, so that's not a sufficient reason in itself to do anything to TOR.

I'd say there's a functional difference between "a Game has lots and lots of rules" and "a Game that has simple rules or few rules in general also has one complex or difficult to understand rule."

As to allowing "Other" even if the example is invoked (or discussed or Lampshaded or defied or whichever way it's played with,) in another media, it's still going to be about the rules of a game. So noting that this is about Game Rules only", not laws or regulations or accounting or recruiting practices won't really change anything. Except it will prohibit all the nattery complaining that we just cut.

edited 14th Apr '17 7:43:59 AM by Madrugada

Fair point on The Same But More Specific arguement.

To the other point, I still disagree because the trope focus seems misplaced and restrictive to fictional rules/laws/policies. I don't see why fictional laws/policies that fit the "few but complicated rules" standard wouldn't fit.

One example would be the Prime Directive from Star Trek. It's an internal organizational policy and a fairly simple Alien Non-Interference Clause. Yet in practice, that one rule leads to complicated moral and operational dilemmas. It's the first "general order", yet leads to a lot of issues and interpretations.

That being said, I'm willing to concede the point if there's no other way to prevent natter and keep the trope healthy.

edited 14th Apr '17 12:19:10 PM by pokedude10

Works for me.

This trope absolutely needs to be made YMMV. What one person finds complicated or frustrating, another will think of as straightforward and important in keeping things fair.

I'll do that after I've slept.