IS2000, Fall Term, 2003-1

When you are identifying a rule to work on you need to think about not just an action (i.e., a recommended play), but specifically when it should be done. If for instance, a play is good idea under several circumstances, then we will usually need a separate rule to specify each of the game conditions under which the play is recommended. It is possible to specify a set of game conditions for a single play, by using ORs between different individual conditions, but this is advisable only when the ORed conditions mean similar things. For instance, a single rule that determined that a bank loan applicant was inelligible might OR together things like: went bankrupt, committed felony, has too much bad debt, etc. because each of these things amounts to a different reason for which the applicant could be judged untrustworthy. But when an action is recommended for unrelated reasons it is better to capture each of those reasons in a separate rule. So a dramatic football play might be recommended if you're desparate (and the game is at a particular stage....) or in an unrelated way it might be recommended at an early stage of the game to throw the opponents off balance etc. These unrelated uses of the same play should definitely be in separate rules. So, when you are specifying a rule, (and asking that I post it as the one you will work on) try to specify not only the play itself, but the conditions that would make it appropriate.