The Assassins' Guild: Eliminate! 2005 Rules
Changes which have been made to these rules since they were
originally published will be flagged in green.
1.0 Introduction:
Eliminate! is a game of mock assassination for a moderate number of keen
players. Each person has to try to survive the attempts of others to kill them
whilst eliminating their own targets. The winner is the person who survives to
the end of the game while eliminating the greatest number of their own targets.
If you have any questions about these rules once you have read them
thoroughly, please ask for clarification from the Umpire, who will be
only too happy to provide it.
1.1 Signing up for the game:
The game shall be open to people who live and spend a large proportion of
their time within the city of Cambridge. Students at the University are almost
certainly eligible to play; those who are unsure whether they live and work
close enough to participate are invited to contact the Umpire.
Those wishing to play should first read the rules. It is also vital
that you read the Eliminate! Players' Agreement, which
covers safety and general good conduct. Breaching the Players' Agreement is
at least as serious as breaching the rules.
Everyone who wishes to play should fill in the signup form, which asks for
the following details:
- Your name (first name and surname), indicating if different the name by
which you are usually known.
- A photo of yourself, in electronic form, which provides a clear
indication of your habitual appearance during the game. If your appearance
changes radically (eg. a major change of hairstyle) you are requested to
supply the Umpire with a new photograph. The Umpire may pay random visits
to players during the game to confirm that they look like their
photograph. If you are unable to provide a digital photograph of yourself,
the Umpire will arrange for one to be taken for you.
- College or department (if you are a member of the University).
- E-mail address, which should be your @cam.ac.uk address if you have
one.
- Your official address (including staircase and room number, if you live
in shared accommodation such as college buildings) and if different the
address at which you will be living (i.e. sleeping and spending a
reasonable number of hours) during the course of the game. In general you
should be sleeping at the address you provide at least one night in two;
if this is not the case please provide details of where you can be found.
Any player who has concerns about giving out their address should contact
the Umpire to discuss this.
- If you live more than twenty minutes' walk from the Market Square, give
details of places and times you can regularly be found in the city centre.
Please provide as much information as possible; the Umpire will cut it down
to what is required if you provide too much.
- The extent to which water-based weaponry is allowed in your room.
The options are no water (no water pistols or other water-based
weapon may be used in your room), with care (small water-based
weapons may be used if the user is careful) and full water
(anything goes). You may also let the umpire know of anything specific
in your room which could be damaged by water; this information will
be given to your assassin.
- A pseudonym, which will be used in news reports to disguise your true
identity. If you do not supply a pseudonym, the Umpire will make one up.
- Anything else which your assassins should be informed of, such as an
allergy to a substance that might conceivably be used in the game (not
terribly likely, since poison is not allowed in this game) or the fact that
you live in a shared set and assassins should be wary of killing your
roommate.
Anyone found to have supplied false or misleading details to the Umpire
will be disqualified, as will anyone lying to the Umpire about anything
else.
Conduct
In signing up to play, you agree to the terms of the
Eliminate! Players' Agreement. All players should have
read and understood this.
Photographs of targets are supplied to players on the understanding that
they are for use in this game only. Stockpiling them for use in future
Assassins Guild games is strongly frowned upon. Photographs will be marked with
the word "Eliminate!" in order to make their origin clear.
2.0 How to play:
The game, in brief:
- Before the game starts, fill in the signup form to inform the Umpire
that you wish to take part in the game.
- When the game starts, you will be sent an email with the name of your
target. Try to kill this person, as described in these rules.
- Whenever you make an attempt on another player's life, whether or not
you succeed, email the Umpire with a report. If someone tries to kill you,
report that to the Umpire as well.
- When your target dies, in whatever circumstances, the Umpire will send
you a new target to replace them.
- If you die, send a report of this to the Umpire. The game is now over
for you, and you are requested not to do anything which might affect the
outcome for the surviving players.
- If you do not die, congratulations! You have made it to the end of the
game alive and, if you have been successful enough in killing your targets,
you may even have won the game.
2.1 Killing people:
The weapons rules describe the various weaponry
you may use to eliminate other assassins.
- 2.1.1 Legal targets
-
You may try to kill any of the following types of player:
- The target you have been assigned by the Umpire.
- The assassin who has been assigned you as a target —
you will not be told who this is, but should you find out you may attempt
to pre-emptively defend yourself by killing him or her first.
- Anyone who is clearly holding a weapon. (You cannot
legally attack someone who was holding a weapon a few seconds ago but has
now hidden it again. This rule exists primarily to encourage players to
be discreet about carrying weapons in public.)
- Anyone who is in the process of trying to kill you. (This only applies
to people trying to kill you — assassins trying to kill other
people are not necessarily legal targets, and you should refrain from
becoming involved.)
- 2.1.2 Rules of engagement
-
You may use all manner of ruses to ensnare your target. However, there are some things you are not allowed to do:
- You are not allowed to impersonate authority figures such as bedders,
porters or the (real) police. This is so that players can take part in the
game without aggravating their bedders by refusing to let them into their
room. You should also not take advantage of bedders unlocking the door to
your target's room to break in and kill them or leave a trap. You are also
not allowed to take advantage of a fire alarm to attack your target. Note
that it is fine to impersonate the JCR committee, RAG reps and other student
positions.
- You are not allowed to impersonate the Umpire, for the same reason. If
someone knocks on your door claiming to be the Umpire (or, for that matter,
a bedder or porter), you may safely let them in. You are also not
allowed to impersonate the Umpire indirectly by, for example, forging
email messages.
- You may enter a target's room through an unlocked door or an open window
only. If the door is locked you may not make any kind of attack
through keyholes, letterboxes or any other gap in, under or over the
door.
- 2.1.3 Out of bounds areas and situations
-
There are some places and circumstances which, for reasons of sanity, are
considered out-of-bounds. No-one may kill anyone or be killed when they are
out of bounds, which includes the following:
- Lecture theatres are out of bounds, whether or not a lecture is in
progress.
- Practicals and laboratories are always out of bounds.
- Hospitals, libraries and sports halls are out of bounds.
- Churches, chapels, synagogues, mosques, temples, stupas or any other
official place of worship. The Umpire will not allow any player's
room to be considered an official place of worship, no matter how inventive
their excuse.
- Formal college dining halls and any other dining arrangement in
which food is served to the table. Anywhere you get food yourself from a
servery is in bounds.
- Any Ball, Event, garden party or similar. Regular college ents are in
bounds.
- Seminars, supervisions, tutor or DoS meetings and the like are out of
bounds while the supervisee is in the company of their supervisor or
other important person.
- Rowers are out of bounds while rowing and also while carrying their
boat, to avoid upsetting the rest of the crew when someone has to run away
from an assassin while they were supposed to be carrying the boat. The
same applies to other "serious" boat-related activities such
as canoeing. Punts are not out of bounds.
- Anyone working in a real proper office job is out of bounds while at work.
(This is unlikely to apply to anyone who is a student.) Anyone working at a
college bar or ent is also out of bounds.
- The CUR radio station in Churchill College is out of bounds.
- Official university society meetings or regularly scheduled meetings of
an unofficial society which takes place in college grounds, including in
players' rooms. Pubmeets are not out of bounds.
Computer rooms such as the Phoenix User Area, Cockcroft 4 and other
departmental computer rooms are in bounds subject to the following restrictions:
- Entirely out of bounds between 9am and 5.30pm on weekdays.
- Use only weapons which cannot possibly damage equipment. This probably
does not include any form of gun except to make "bang" kills.
- Avoid annoying other users. Do not use noisy weapons.
If you ignore either of these rules the kill may be disallowed at the
Umpire's discretion.
A computer room is, in general, defined as a place where the public (or any
clearly-defined group, e.g. members of a college) are permitted to use
computers. Players' private rooms do NOT count. Computer rooms which occupy
a completely separate room inside a library count as computer rooms and so are
in bounds outside office hours. Rooms which function as both computer rooms and
libraries such as the one in the CMS count as libraries.
Players who are regularly required to transport heavy, valuable or awkward
equipment for the purposes of a society or similar concern may, if they wish,
ask the Umpire to be out of bounds while doing this, in which case the Umpire
will pass on all relevant details about this to the player's assassin. In all
cases, players should be sensible about attacking targets who are carrying
large or delicate items.
If you are not sure whether a given time or place is out of bounds or not,
please contact the Umpire. Similarly, if there is something not mentioned on
this list you think should be out of bounds, ask the Umpire to consider it.
- 2.1.4 Accomplices and non-players
-
There are no accomplices (either players or non-players) in this game; you
are expected to try to kill your targets by yourself. If you kill someone with
the assistance of another player or a non-player or bring someone else with you
on an attempt, the kill is likely to be annulled.
2.2 Reporting:
Whenever you are involved in any assassins-related incident, such as
successfully or unsuccessfully trying to kill another player or innocent, being
attacked or killed or witnessing a killing, you should inform the Umpire as
soon as possible.
When anyone in the game dies, a report of the event will be published on
the game website, including the pseudonym of the killer and the pseudonym
(but not the real name)
of the deceased. Both players involved may submit reports, which are
encouraged to be dramatic and creative and may also be intentionally misleading (although outright lying is frowned upon). However, if your report is
sufficiently outlandish to make it unclear what actually happened, please
explain the raw facts separately to the Umpire in your email, as he likes to
know what is going on. All reports may be censored by the
Umpire in order to avoid giving away any information about the identity of any
of the players involved.
If you cannot be sure what happened in an attack, you may call a
"discussion phase" afterwards with the other assassins involved in
order to
clarify who was hit, who is dead, etc. Players cannot kill one another while
doing this, and should move to a safe place to avoid exposing themselves to any
entirely different assassins who might happen to be passing. Note that it
is unsporting to call for a discussion phase quickly in order to curtail an
encounter
which is still happening.
In general, all
players involved should submit a report of every incident; this way the Umpire
can correlate the reports and so ensure that the news is updated as quickly as
possible.
2.3 Dead players
Dead players should not do anything to influence the outcome of the game.
This includes pointing assassins out or passing on any information they have
to other players. Most importantly, dead players should not reveal anything
about the identity of their killer or the circumstances of their death.
If you have been killed, you should not announce this to anyone until you
are sure that the information could not be used to track down your killer;
preferably, you should wait until the report of your death is on the website.
This particularly applies to those using the #assassins IRC channel.
3.0 Timing
3.1 The attempt deadline
Since this is supposed to be a game for keen players, there is a time limit
for making attempts on your targets, called the "attempt deadline".
The initial attempt deadline will be four days after the start of the game.
Every time you make an attempt, your attempt deadline will be moved back to
four days after that attempt. If your attempt deadline passes, the Umpire will
strike you down with a thunderbolt and you will be removed from the game.
Attempts have to be of a certain standard to extend your attempt deadline.
In general, any plan which has a resonable chance of killing your target will
count, but the Umpire will not allow you to repeatedly extend your deadline by
making low-effort attempts. If a target is resisting your simple attempts to
eliminate them, you will be expected to show more dedication or creativity.
3.2 The end of the game
The game will last for three weeks, or until all but one player is dead,
whichever occurs first. If only one player is left alive, that player will be
the winner; if several players survive for three weeks, whichever of them has
killed the
greatest number of their targets will win. If two or more players are tied,
the Umpire will come to some arrangement with the leading players for
determining the winner; the most likely option will be that the game continues
for those few players only until one of them eliminates another target.
4.0 The Umpire:
The Umpire is Adam Biltcliffe of Clare College and may be
contacted by emailing
assassins-eliminate@srcf.ucam.org.
Players
wishing to contact the Umpire should do so via email; if you need to speak to
the Umpire in person then he will be happy to arrange a visit. Any queries you
have should be put to the Umpire before they become a
matter of life or death (yours or anyone else's).
The Umpire and his works are sancrosanct; attempting to take items from the
Umpire's pigeonhole or break into his
computer account is strictly forbidden. Impersonating the Umpire is also
forbidden; see Rules of engagement.
Player-Umpire communications may be made public at the end of the
game for everyone's enlightenment and amusement. If you do not
wish a certain communication to be made public, please tell the
Umpire.
The Umpire is immortal. Players should not attempt to test this
proposition.
5.0 Administrivia:
The game website is at http://www.srcf.ucam.org/assassins/elim;
you are probably reading these rules there now. During the game, news of deaths
will be published on the website along with any updates to the rules or other
important notices.
To avoid waste of bandwidth, game news will not be distributed by email.
Players may also be interested in exploring the ucam.rec.games.assassin
newsgroup and the #assassins IRC channel; those who wish to do so are invited
to consult the Assassins FAQ for more information.
History
The history of this set of rules is thought to be:
- Initial author unknown.
- Typed in by Paul Roberts (PER10).
- Later history unknown.
- Used by CUSFS for a while.
- Various modifications were made by Martin Hardcastle (MJH22), Julian
Birch (JMB29),
Richard Fairhurst (RJF1001), Ben Jameson (BFJ1000), Jim Cameron (JC10007),
Elizabeth Pringle (EMPP1) and David Allsopp (DNA1000).
- Paul Menage (PBM1001) was Easter 1995 Umpire, and initiated 3 targets per player.
- Nigel Harris (NJH27) made modifications.
- Ben Harris (BJH21) changed even more things, notably the bomb blast radius
formula to be based on a cube root.
- Chuan-Tze Teo (CTT20) modified still more rules.
- Martin Read (mpr22) corrected the text of the bomb rules, and set a
(semi-)codified timing rule (after a few shoutings, getting the wording right).
- Lynnette Dray (lmd21) modified a few more things, surprisingly.
- Charlie Baylis (cgb23) took this ruleset in 1999 in order to back out the
strange necromancy rules, and made a couple of other patches.
- Matt Laycock, Ed Nokes, Björn Holzhauer improved and HTMLised the ruleset,
with the help of J Doe, Matthew Wakeling, Dave Hammond and others.
- Ralph Owen (rho21), Ed Nokes and Björn Holzhauer altered the rules for Michaelmas
2001, with suggestions from Ed Wallace.
- Modifications made by Tom Garnett (tmg27)
- Clarifications and a few alterations made by Rosemary Warner (rjw76), with suggestions
from Ralph Owen.
- Matthew Johnson (mjj29) and Michael Cripps (mac57) updated the rules for Lent 2003.
- Matt Johnson (mjj29) tidied up the HTML, Ric Brackenbury (rab71) added a
few pedantic changes, and rewrote the bomb rules with Adam Biltcliffe.
- Adam Biltcliffe (amgb2) rewrote and restructured large parts of the rules for Lent 2004 in an attempt to make them vaguely comprehensible to new players.
- Martin O'Leary (mewo2) and David Birch (dtb26) made some minor changes for
Michaelmas 2004 and Lent 2005 respectively.
- Adam Biltcliffe made some major modifications to the standard rules for the
new Eliminate! game.
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