A New Ruleset

Karen had texted Daniela to inform her about Marcel’s decision. Before she could even put her phone away, Dani was already calling back.

“Hey, Dani,” Karen answered.

Marcel could overhear bits of the conversation through Karen’s phone, her ear half-hidden by her coal-black hair.

“Right. Let me check,” Karen said, looking back at Marcel. “Mind if we go back? Dani’s still in the council room.”

Marcel nodded.

Just before the sun had fully set, they were already back at the student council room. Mari was still there, working exactly where they had left her, but now, a steaming cup of tea sat beside her, the mug unexpectedly cute, decorated with minimalist drawings of tiny, adorable dogs. Next to it, an untouched slice of lemon pie suggested that she was now working overtime.

The student council’s central room had shifted into its evening rhythm, the warm glow of artificial lights replacing the last traces of sunlight. Dani’s personal office stood across the room, next to a tight, glass-walled meeting space that could barely fit eight people.

“Hey, Marcel!” Dani greeted loudly from across the room, standing to meet him. “So, did you make up your mind?”

Marcel walked in, Karen following close behind. He thought about waving at Mari but stopped himself. She looked so focused that interrupting her felt wrong.

“Karen told me about your current situation. I’ll help you, under one condition,” said Marcel.

“Yeah, Karen filled me in already,” Dani said with a smirk. “No objections on our side.”

She stepped around her desk, planting herself confidently in front of Marcel and extending her hand to seal the deal.

“Welcome to Solaris University’s women’s football team, Coach Mars,” she said, beaming.

“Right,” Marcel replied, his voice steady but cold. He shook her hand firmly, though his eyes expressed a lingering hesitation. He had made his decision, but he still didn’t know what it would truly mean.

“Great! Lovely ending to our first day of class!” Karen chimed in, raising her hands in a playful, improvised celebration. “Now, if you don’t mind, I really need to get going.”

“Take care, Karen. Great job today,” Dani called after her, giving a thumbs up that clearly suggested she had been tasked with convincing Marcel. Karen couldn’t avoid letting out an expression of being fed up with Dani’s lack of subtlety.

“Let’s all meet tomorrow morning, right here. 8:30 AM. We’ve got a lot to do,” Dani continued.

“Got it. See you tomorrow, council rats,” Karen said with a grin as she waved and stepped out.

“This includes you too, Mars,” Dani added, making sure her expectations were crystal clear.

“Fine by me. But I still have a lot of questions.”

“Ask away.”

“Could you give me the details of my role? What exactly do you expect from me as a coach? Building gameplans? Leading training sessions? Tracking progress?”

“Yes. But don’t limit yourself to that. Do whatever it takes to make our team win!”

Marcel paused, caught off guard by Dani’s dangerously open answer. Her confident smile twitched as she noticed his unimpressed stare. A silence stretched just long enough to feel awkward.

“You should really revise your job descriptions,” Marcel said, breaking the silence.

“Huh? What do you mean?” Dani asked, still smiling, unsure what she had said wrong.

“I might get the team to win if I sabotage our opponents or dope our players, but there’s no way I’m doing that.”

“Heh… you’re right. Okay then. Do whatever it takes within what’s morally correct!”

“…That’s still way too ambiguous.”

A soft sigh. Mari lowered her pen and carefully closed her notebook. “Please let me take care of this,” she said, calm but decisive.

“Yes. Sorry,” Dani mumbled, her first moment of retreat.

“I’ll draft a proper role description for you. Give me a day. I want to make sure everything’s correct,” Mari continued, her professional gaze meeting Marcel’s. “Besides, we’ll need it anyway if we plan to hold a proper selection process for your future replacement.”

“Sounds good.”

***

When Marcel arrived home, he already had an idea of where to start. He needed to learn the rules, and watch an actual match, preferably at the highest possible level.

If he could understand the realm of possibility within the game, he could at least begin to think about how to approach it strategically.

Learning how to develop player skills was certainly important as well, but skills only mattered in relation to a team’s win conditions. In esports, players often wasted time developing skills that looked impressive but didn’t help them win. There was no reason football would be any different.

After a quick search, Marcel found the official rules. He was slightly thrown off by the number of variations. Multiple formats that changed depending on the number of players or the type of pitch. But the most popular, most official version seemed to be played with eleven players per side, on large grass fields.

The first thing that caught his attention: the size of official football pitches could vary wildly. The sheer scale of the field would definitely affect stamina and spacing: core variables that could likely make or break a gameplan.

That’s huge. Marcel scratched the back of his head, already feeling the gears turning. So not all stages are created equal, huh?

Goals, though, had a fixed size.

In this sense, just like in Gates of Faith, picking and counter-picking stages could be a big deal. He immediately wondered where Solaris’ university pitch landed on the spectrum. Was it among the smaller fields or the larger ones? Did it even fit standard measurements? Would it make sense to adjust the pitch size during practice, depending on where their next match would be played?

Marcel noted his questions and immediately continued reading the rules.

Most important rule: The team that scored the most goals within a fixed time won. A timed battle.

Did this mean there was some kind of tie-breaking mechanic? Apparently, it depended on the tournament format. Round robins could end in ties, but single elimination brackets used extra time, followed by penalty shootouts.

He’d have to dig into that later.

Next key rule: You can’t touch the ball with your hands or arms. Any other part of your body, though, is fair game.

That actually caught his interest. The game was called football, but in reality, it was less restrictive than he’d imagined. He’d always known headers were legal. He knew at least that much. But realizing the freedom of movement: head, legs, chest, even shoulders, gave the game more tactical layers than he’d visualized.

This had both defensive and offensive implications. Probably.

The only player allowed to use their hands while the ball was being played was the goalkeeper, but with multiple restrictions. They were bound to a specific area of the field and couldn’t grab the ball if a teammate passed it to them using their foot. Passes with the head, chest, or knees were fine, though. That seemed oddly specific.

Goalkeepers could only hold the ball for six seconds. That sounded logical, possibly meant to stop players from abusing the whole “grabbing the ball” mechanic.

Still, that raised a question: Who keeps track of that time? Is it precise, like a video game timer? Or do goalkeepers have to develop some kind of inner clock to avoid getting punished?

This also made Marcel wonder if there were any other special roles like the goalkeeper.

To his surprise, the answer was… kind of ambiguous.

There were positions with plenty of variations, but they all boiled down to three broad categories: Defender, Midfielder, and Forward.

The interesting part was that these roles seemed to be purely strategic. There were no unique mechanics tied to them. Nothing like how only goalkeepers could use their hands. It was probably just the meta-game.

There was no strict rule forcing teams to play within that structure.

So the only reason this structure exists is because everyone agreed to it? Huh. Sounds fragile.

But then he remembered how fighting games were usually divided into neutral, advantage, and disadvantage states; or characters, divided into categories such as brawlers, zoners, or rushdown. Concepts that, to him, were also fragile, but useful nonetheless.

He should definitely look into why teams were organized that way, but it would be unwise to blindly follow an agreement rather than a hard-coded game mechanic.

Last key rule: Set pieces.

Certain events triggered special game states. When the ball completely left the pitch, the game resumed with throw-ins, corner kicks, or goal kicks. When players broke the rules, it could lead to penalty kicks, direct free kicks, or indirect free kicks. And to start a game or restart after a goal, there were kick-offs.

Some of these game states were clearly defined by the lines on the pitch, but others, like throw-ins and free kicks, relied heavily on the referee’s judgment and perception.

So the game doesn’t just have systems. It has opinions.

This meant there was a third party with relevant influence, not hard and mechanical, but human.

That could make things potentially much more complicated than games with strict, coded rules.

This seemed like enough to get started with watching an actual game. There were plenty of other rules he could explore later, but for now, diving deeper would just confuse him. Reading about them without seeing them in action wouldn’t mean much.

“Okay, time to see what all of this looks like,” Marcel said to himself as he pushed the notebook aside and searched for any professional, complete game.