Rule of What??

Everyone knows I don't like being /checked. Never have and probably never will. It's taken me awhile to finally be able to resist the urge to gear swap at every chance when people look at me, but now I just shrug my shoulders in reality and keep it moving.

Since I'm not swapping my equipment all the time now, it gives people more chances to read my bazaar comments. My latest one is getting quite a bit of attention, and I'm guessing it's because people don't know what it means.

"I'm a huge advocate of the Rule of 5."

The obvious question now is, what the hell is that? First off, it's a personal rule of my own, not to be confused with Lipinski's rule, which explains why you've probably never heard of it. Grab some juice and let's go on a learning adventure of what goes on in my head.

Jacinda's Rule of 5:

The collective thought process of a group of individuals experiences a rapid decline or an unnecessary state of complexity as the number of participants approaches or exceeds the number five.

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It's pretty simple and easy to understand. I don't deal with more than five people at any given time when I am out to accomplish a specific goal. When I'm just messing around, I could care less with how many are involved. When the time comes to getting something done; however, five is the limit.

My rule shares some similarities with the law of diminishing returns, except it applies to human behavior and not economics. Also, diminishing returns does not have a fixed value associated with it.

This may seem silly to some of you, but I am a firm believer of it. I've noticed in both reality and in game that when people are working towards goals, it becomes harder and harder to achieve / explain the goals as the number of people involved goes up. You can apply this to practically anything. Forums, gaming, your job, anything where more than one person is needed.

The easiest place to witness this rule in effect is the flow of a conversation. Take two people who are tackling a serious issue as our starting point. You will come up with a fairly engaging debate, but it's usually one opinion vs. another. Add a third person, and you have someone who will challenge the other two parties to come up with the best means of supporting their argument in order to gain the confidence of the third party and win by majority. This third person can also become the source of a completely original idea / presentation, but it can become difficult for their idea to even be considered because they will have to get the initial debaters to abandon or reconsider their own ideas. If a fourth person is brought in, you now have the possibility of either an overwhelming majority win, a stalemate, or yet another source of original ideas.

Eventually, you reach a point where there are too many original ideas at one time, and managing the conversation while both presenting and defending your own point of view becomes increasingly difficult. Bringing in a fifth person is basically an act of desperation. This person will now have to act as a mediator, or "the voice of reason" in order to establish balance and maintain order until an agreeable end to the conversation can be found. Of course, there is a chance that this fifth person will become opinionated and voice their own idea as well. The flow of the conversation is now at a critical limit. Another person, already one of the five, will have to step back and take on the role of the mediator. Adding a sixth person will only make things worse, and so on and so on.


So that's the meaning behind my bazaar comment. You may think it's the world's dumbest idea or the best thing I've ever posted. Whichever side you're on, you're more than welcome to challenge my thought process or agree with it. Just don't do it with more than five people. :p