The Rules
Every number in the game, the board's first and the rest beside it, and where each rule that is not a number is written out
The economy
| Parameter | Value |
|---|---|
| Unit | one year |
| A visit delivered | 1 year |
| Upkeep | 10 years per day held |
| Free grant | 250 years, minted when the domain is proven |
| Survival grant | 100 years, minted to every listing still standing when a Gathering closes |
| Daily burn cap | 200 years/day, fixed for every listing and settable by nobody |
| Holy Ground | the first 24 hours — a visit cannot take you below 1 year |
| Rank | years remaining, highest first; ties broken by whoever entered first |
| Beheading | balance at or below zero at the tick (12:00 UTC) |
| Gathering | 7 days, or until one immortal remains |
Untouched, a free entry lasts 25 days on upkeep alone. Every pack carries at least 1,000 years, so the first euros spent outrank the whole free tier — the free grant is a demo of the mechanic, not a seat at the top.
The rest of the numbers
Everything above is the board itself. These are the rest, each written out in full where it belongs.
| Parameter | Value |
|---|---|
| Vigil | 5 years, once a tick-day, for opening your own listing's page — Surviving |
| Referral | 1 year per first-time visitor you bring, up to 100 a day — Surviving |
| Summons | 50 years to a lister you brought and 25 to you, when they prove a domain — up to 2 a day — Surviving |
| Arena stake | 100 years from each side, burned when a duel starts; 110 to take the field — The Arena |
| Under siege | an hour past 5× that listing's median busy hour freezes burning for 6 hours — Surviving |
| Off the board | 48 hours with no visit, or 3 reports — Surviving |
| Epitaph | 140 characters on the grave, owner-only, only while fallen |
| Patron slot | €49 for 30 days, 3 slots — wall space beside the board and never a rank — Patrons |
| The board's rows | opens on the top 30, show more walks down 30 at a time as far as 250; every rank is the real one either way |
The rules that are not numbers
Each of these is written out in full where it belongs. This is the list, not the copy.
- Entry is free, instant, and needs no account. A submission clears an automatic ladder and then sits invisible in The Mists until a TXT record proves the domain — Entering.
- A visit burns only if it is real. Five conditions, every one of them checked on our side, and a visit that fails one is still delivered — it simply costs nothing — Surviving.
- Nobody can slow their own burn. The cap is the board's number and not a dial, because a visit over it still delivers: a listing that could set its own would take every visit for free and hold the top while paying for none of it — Surviving.
- Nothing dies between ticks. Beheading happens at 12:00 UTC and nowhere else, so no burst can kill anything and every death has a full day of warning behind it — Surviving.
- A claim fills a hole and never transfers. Publishing the record takes a listing nobody owns; it cannot take one somebody does, because a domain changing hands is a conversation with a human — Entering.
- Years are minted, never moved. Nobody is paid out, nothing transfers between listings, and paying for somebody else's listing is a gift that buys the payer nothing — Packs and billing.
- The Hall is permanent and costs nothing recurring. Which is exactly why it can be promised permanently — The Gathering.
Self-pricing
Nobody posts the price of first place. Burn at the top is proportional to the board's traffic and denominated in visits actually delivered, rather than in a rate somebody set: on a board delivering 1,000 visits a day where the first listing takes roughly 30% of them, holding first place costs 310 years a day — 300 delivered, plus the ten upkeep everybody pays.
The daily cap is what that price runs into. No listing burns more than 200 years of visits a day, so 210 a day is the most first place can ever cost, however busy the board gets. Past that the visits keep arriving and stop costing anything — which is the same rule that stops a rival clicking you to death, seen from the other end. The board grows into the ceiling; it does not price above it.