[HN Gopher] Consensus Board Game
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       Consensus Board Game
        
       Author : surprisetalk
       Score  : 67 points
       Date   : 2026-03-19 14:06 UTC (8 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (matklad.github.io)
 (TXT) w3m dump (matklad.github.io)
        
       | jp57 wrote:
       | This is interesting, though I'd point out that "consensus"
       | actually means something different than a simple majority
       | agreement. It means "broad agreement". Almost nobody would
       | consider a 51/49 vote split among a large group as consensus; and
       | even 3/2 in a committee of five would be a stretch, especially if
       | the two in the minority are united on an opposing alternative
       | proposal.
       | 
       | I'm not sure that invalidates the core of the post, though, since
       | I think a different consensus criterion could be substituted
       | without losing the substance of the game.
        
         | stoneman24 wrote:
         | And that's before we look at whether the participants form a
         | quorate group (sufficient people are present to make a valid
         | choice).
         | 
         | Then we could consider whether all participants have the same
         | voting power. My son has a strong vote on what to paint his
         | room but much less on where to go on holiday.
         | 
         | Need to consider whether the votes could be hidden and revealed
         | at the end to avoid intimidation.
        
         | curtisf wrote:
         | "Consensus" in this post refers to the "consensus problem",
         | which is a fundamental and well-known problem in distributed
         | systems.
         | 
         | It's not about political consensus.
         | 
         | However, the paper that introduced it and proved it possible,
         | Lamport's "The Part Time Parliament", used an involved (and
         | often cited as confusing) "Parliament" metaphor for computers
         | in a distributed system
         | 
         | "Consensus" in distributed systems need not be limited to
         | majorities; it really just requires no "split brain" is
         | possible. For example, "consensus" is achieved by making one
         | server the leader, and giving other servers no say. A majority
         | is just the 'quorum' which remains available with that largest
         | number of unavailable peers possible.
        
           | jerf wrote:
           | As feedback to the author, I made the same mistake initially.
           | It was only around halfway through when I realized the voters
           | in question didn't necessarily care what they were voting for
           | in the usual preferential or political sense, only that they
           | were trying to have any consensus at all.
           | 
           | Looking back at the page again from the top, I see the first
           | paragraph references Paxos, which is a clue to those who know
           | what that is, but I think using "There's a committee of five
           | members that tries to choose a color for a bike shed" as the
           | example, which is the _canonical case_ for people arguing
           | personal preferences and going to the wall for them at the
           | expense of every other rational consideration, threw me back
           | off the trail. I 'd suggest perhaps the sample problem being
           | something as trivial as that in reality, but less pre-loaded
           | with the exact opposite connotation.
        
           | hammock wrote:
           | > it really just requires no "split brain" is possible. For
           | example, "consensus" is achieved by making one server the
           | leader, and giving other servers no say.
           | 
           | Which is funny, because that actually describes political
           | consensus as well, functionally, even if it's not what people
           | typically think of as the definition.
           | 
           | If you can effect enough of the right censorship or silencing
           | or cancelling, you can achieve consensus (aka no split brain,
           | at least no split with agency)
        
       | nogha wrote:
       | Green Team Wins is a board game that is based on consensus.
       | Players answer simple questions that don't really have a correct
       | answer. Eg. Pie or Cake. The answer with the majority wins. It's
       | a fun game to play with family or coworkers.
       | 
       | https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/347805/green-team-wins
        
       | KilledByAPixel wrote:
       | Why not use ranked choice voting?
        
       | gus_massa wrote:
       | I still don't understand the idea, but two questions anyway:
       | 
       | Why did R2 vote on the 6th column instead of the 1st one?
       | 
       | Why not just pick the leftmost column that has tree votes as the
       | winner?
        
       | dmurray wrote:
       | I don't get this part
       | 
       | > Here, you asked R0, R2 and R3 to abstain from casting further
       | votes in the first three columns, signified by black x.
       | 
       | If I can ask them to do that, and rely on them to go along with
       | what I ask - why not skip all the middle steps and ask them all
       | to vote for red?
        
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       (page generated 2026-03-19 23:01 UTC)