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Jeremy Lennert wrote on Mon, Apr 9, 2012 03:57 AM UTC:

A game rule is not a collection of words, it's an abstract specification of how the game transitions between different states. People who are playing Chess according to rules written in English and people who are playing Chess according to equivalent rules written in another language are playing "the same game", regardless of the fact that different words are used to describe it.

By the same token, "pawns may move 2 spaces forward on their initial move" and "pawns may move 2 spaces forward when beginning a move from their second rank" are the exact same rule in the context of FIDE Chess, because "the rule" is actually just a specification of which game states can transition to which other game states, and the set of possible transitions is the same in both cases.

They are different rules in the context of some Chess variants because they no longer describe the same set of state transitions. When someone is inventing such a variant, it is reasonable and appropriate for them to choose whichever generalization of the rule is best for their variant, regardless of which exact words someone somewhere decided to use to describe the original rule.

Though game designers who hope eventually to release expansions for their games should definitely think about how their rules will ultimately generalize in order to avoid headaches down the road...


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