Gather the support of the other Leaders of the land to pass this Test. But beware! Know who you can trust. Betrayal is always the easier way -- for them, if not for you.
See also the forum thread.
The followers establish your credentials as a leader worthy of attempting this test. They don't participate any further, and are not counted as participants. From here on, your decisions are your own.
Once you've signed up, you get 5 pebbles. These pebbles are numbered, and marked with your name and the name of the current round, so they look like "Pebble: Amtep-1, Y1 Shemu I-II" (up to Amtep-5).
One of these is not like the others! One of the five pebbles, selected randomly, is a poison pebble. You'll be told which one it is when you receive them, but no-one else can tell the difference.
The pebbles symbolise your support in Egypt's political structure. The object of the test is to get pebbles from as many different people as you can. But there's a catch! The poison pebbles represent false support. If at the end of the round you are holding two or more poison pebbles, it means you have been betrayed and you will be disqualified from this round.
Remember, you can't tell the difference between poison pebbles and normal ones. You will have to decide whether to trust the people you get pebbles from. If you're disqualified, you will be told how many poison pebbles you had, but not which ones they were.
An example to make sense of these numbers. Suppose we have 400 people in egypt who are active enough to either participate in this test or be recruited into it. Together, these 400 people would make up 80 participants and 360 followers (since each participants needs 4 followers in order to sign up). If all 80 sign up during a round, then there will be 5 passes that round. That works out to a bit under two passes per week, and about 45 total passes in a 6-month telling.
Note that despite this being a test with a significant element of subterfuge, it's possible to win it completely honestly. All you have to do is to have more supporters than anyone else, and have enough character insight to know whose pebbles not to accept.
The reason for requiring participants to bring 4 followers when they sign up is to reduce the pool of players so that it contains relatively more competitors and fewer supporters. You'll have to get the support of fellow leaders, rather than of lots of people who may or may not be interested in the test themselves. This makes it less of a popularity test, and reduces the effect of canvassing the chariot stops for pebbles. It also makes it much harder to use throwaway accounts for subterfuge.
The reason for the reward is to offer a prize that you wouldn't want everyone to have, so you have to give your support wisely, and you might have motives for giving a poison pebble even if you don't want to pass yourself. And of course the poison pebbles are an ideal gift for pushy people ;)
Is it too evil? I don't think so, but I expect it to be controversial. I think tests should have a dark side to them, otherwise they are Tasks rather than Tests.
After some discussion about the test reward, it seemed that I need to clarify "any building". I refer to any structure that can be owned by players -- basically anything you could salvage, with the possible exception of exceptions such as aqueduct towers. It does include the small stuff such as bonfires, chests, brick racks, and wood planes. It also includes compounds, but claiming a compound should not, I think, claim all the compound's contents. Just the compound itself. -- Amtep