Pure Slate Conway's Game of Life

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aloola
Posts: 1
Joined: Thu Apr 02, 2026 2:11 pm

Pure Slate Conway's Game of Life

Post by aloola »

This is what I think spell circles are meant to be.

An implementation of Conway's Game of Life for a spell circle with base hex casting.
No addon functionality is used, but I strongly recommend having the Slate Works addon enabled when running this, or permanently powering the directrix — otherwise, it tends to freeze the game.
This hex is "pure slate", meaning the entire hex is on slates, and no program data is read from anywhere else.
While running over the sequence of slates, setup is done and the main quine is prepared. Then, the quine is run every 4 gameticks, iterating the game once every time.
GoL.png
GoL.png (214.83 KiB) Viewed 32 times
Video of the circle being run: https://youtu.be/q2SWqCHjpxI


Implementation details
The game area is 22 × 22 blocks, and the hex gets close to both the stack size limit and the pattern limit.
One raycast is made for each block in the extended 24 × 24 block area for every iteration, so there are no redundant checks, and changing the blocks while the hex is running would change the game; there is no hidden state stored.
For visibility, Blocks are placed with Place Block, so the player needs to hold a sufficient supply of new blocks to place, and broken blocks accumulate as dropped items. For long runs, a water stream under the game area bringing the items back to the player would allow for unlimited placing. Blocks that remain alive are not broken and replaced.


Code

Code: Select all

Greater Fold Reflection
Lesser Fold Reflection
Subtractive Distillation
Vector Disintegration
Bookkeeper's Gambit: v-
{
    Numerical Reflection: 0
    Single's Purification
    Vacant Reflection
    Rotation Gambit
    {
        Hermes' Gambit
        Gemini Decomposition
        Numerical Reflection: 0
        Selection Distillation
        Numerical Reflection: 1
        Additive Distillation
        Speaker's Distillation
    }
    Jester's Gambit
    Gemini Gambit
    Hermes' Gambit
    Retrograde Purification
}
Undertaker's Gambit
Hermes' Gambit
Rotation Gambit II
Hermes' Gambit
{
    Dioscuri Gambit
    Undertaker's Gambit
    {
        {
            Numerical Reflection: 0
            Jester's Gambit
            Vector Exaltation
            Greater Fold Reflection
            Jester's Gambit
            Subtractive Distillation
            Vector Reflection +Y
            Archer's Distillation
            Augur's Purification
            Length Purification
            Flock's Reflection
            Flock's Gambit
            Derivation Decomposition
            Bookkeeper's Gambit: v-
        }
        Rotation Gambit
        Thoth's Gambit
        Flock's Reflection
        Flock's Gambit
        Derivation Decomposition
        Bookkeeper's Gambit: v-
    }
    Jester's Gambit
    Thoth's Gambit
    Jester's Gambit
    Speaker's Decomposition
    Bookkeeper's Gambit: v
    Derivation Decomposition
    Bookkeeper's Gambit: v
    Rotation Gambit
    Speaker's Decomposition
    Bookkeeper's Gambit: v
    Derivation Decomposition
    Bookkeeper's Gambit: v
    {
        {
            Rotation Gambit II
            {
                Additive Distillation
                Selection Distillation
                Rotation Gambit II
                {
                    Additive Distillation
                    Selection Distillation
                    Flock's Reflection
                    Flock's Gambit
                    Derivation Decomposition
                    Bookkeeper's Gambit: v-
                }
                Jester's Gambit
                Thoth's Gambit
                Flock's Disintegration
                Additive Distillation
                Additive Distillation
                Flock's Reflection
                Flock's Gambit
                Derivation Decomposition
                Bookkeeper's Gambit: v-
            }
            Numerical Reflection: -1
            Numerical Reflection: 0
            Numerical Reflection: 1
            Numerical Reflection: 3
            Flock's Gambit
            Numerical Reflection: -3
            Fisherman's Gambit II
            Thoth's Gambit
            Flock's Disintegration
            Additive Distillation
            Additive Distillation
            Bookkeeper's Gambit: vv--
            Rotation Gambit II
            Numerical Reflection: 0
            Rotation Gambit
            Vector Exaltation
            Greater Fold Reflection
            Jester's Gambit
            Subtractive Distillation
            Undertaker's Gambit
            Vector Reflection +Y
            Archer's Distillation
            Augur's Purification
            {
                Gemini Decomposition
                Numerical Reflection: 3
                Equality Distillation
                Jester's Gambit
                Numerical Reflection: 4
                Equality Distillation
                Disjunction Distillation
                Vacant Reflection
                {
                    Break Block
                }
                Augur's Exaltation
                Hermes' Gambit
            }
            {
                Numerical Reflection: 3
                Equality Distillation
                {
                    Place Block
                }
                Vacant Reflection
                Augur's Exaltation
                Hermes' Gambit
            }
            Augur's Exaltation
            Hermes' Gambit
            Flock's Reflection
            Flock's Gambit
            Bookkeeper's Gambit: v
        }
        Rotation Gambit
        Thoth's Gambit
        Flock's Reflection
        Flock's Gambit
        Bookkeeper's Gambit: v
    }
    Jester's Gambit
    Thoth's Gambit
    Bookkeeper's Gambit: vvv
    {
        Bookkeeper's Gambit: --
    }
    Flock's Disintegration
    Numerical Reflection: 127
    Prospector's Gambit
    Surgeon's Exaltation
}
Numerical Reflection: 127
Prospector's Gambit
Surgeon's Exaltation
followed by repeating Hermes' Gambit.