Police State

Example 187

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Several friends who obey you; a policeman who doesn't (but who takes a dim view of certain kinds of antics).

"Police State"

Seventh Avenue is a room. "The bars are all closed now, and there aren't any good clubs to go to, so you're on your own for open-air entertainment."

Persuasion rule for asking the policeman to try doing something: persuasion fails.

Persuasion rule for asking someone to try doing something: persuasion succeeds.

Note that the policeman will never get to the second persuasion rule, so he will always refuse to do the player's nefarious bidding.

Charles, Thomas, and Larry are men in Seventh Avenue. Patricia is a woman in Seventh Avenue.

And here's an unnecessary aesthetic touch from a later chapter, which will round up the descriptions of your friends into a single paragraph:

Rule for writing a paragraph about someone who is not the policeman:
   let X be the number of visible people who are not the policeman;
   say "It's just [X in words] of you now: [a list of visible people who are not the policeman]. But it sure has been a rip-roaring evening."
 
The policeman is a man in Seventh Avenue. "A policeman with a very guarded expression is watching you."
 
Singing is an action applying to nothing. Understand "sing" as singing.
 
Report singing:
   say "A little the worse for wear, you sing."
 
Smelling a person is disorderly conduct. Tasting a person is disorderly conduct. Jumping is disorderly conduct. Singing is disorderly conduct.
 
Instead of someone trying disorderly conduct in the presence of the policeman:
   say "The policeman arrests [the person asked]!";
   now the person asked is nowhere;
   the rule succeeds.
 
Instead of disorderly conduct in the presence of the policeman:
   end the story saying "The policeman arrests you!"
 
Test me with "charles, look / charles, jump / look / policeman, sing / thomas, taste policeman / patricia, sing / look / jump".

Test me with "charles, look / charles, jump / look / policeman, sing / thomas, taste policeman / patricia, sing / look / jump".

Seventh Avenue
The bars are all closed now, and there aren't any good clubs to go to, so you're on your own for open-air entertainment.

It's just five of you now: yourself, Charles, Thomas, Larry and Patricia. But it sure has been a rip-roaring evening.

A policeman with a very guarded expression is watching you.

>(Testing.)

>[1] charles, look
Charles looks around.

>[2] charles, jump
The policeman arrests Charles!

>[3] look
Seventh Avenue
The bars are all closed now, and there aren't any good clubs to go to, so you're on your own for open-air entertainment.

It's just four of you now: yourself, Thomas, Larry and Patricia. But it sure has been a rip-roaring evening.

A policeman with a very guarded expression is watching you.

>[4] policeman, sing
The policeman has better things to do.

>[5] thomas, taste policeman
The policeman arrests Thomas!

>[6] patricia, sing
The policeman arrests Patricia!

>[7] look
Seventh Avenue
The bars are all closed now, and there aren't any good clubs to go to, so you're on your own for open-air entertainment.

It's just two of you now: yourself and Larry. But it sure has been a rip-roaring evening.

A policeman with a very guarded expression is watching you.

>[8] jump

*** The policeman arrests you! ***

Notice the difference between the two rules about disorderly conduct: the one for other people says 'the rule succeeds' to make sure that the action is counted as a success and not (as normally happens with instead rules) a failure. Most of the time we don't care whether actions are judged successes or failures, but it matters here, because if we type CHARLES, JUMP and the result fails, then text such as 'Charles is unable to.' will be printed - which would get in the way. So we declare the action a success.