If i had to guess on the motives, the last time a similar game was played (non publically) the meta developed to be about self recognizing, this is likely a rule to avoid this. Winning strategy was some key string to identify yourself, cooperate with yourselt, play 3 otherwise. (Granted number of iterations was low, so people might not have moved to be non cooperating strategies enough (something like grim trigger))
If i had to guess on the motives, the last time a similar game was played (non publically) the meta developed to be about self recognizing, this is likely a rule to avoid this.
Winning strategy was some key string to identify yourself, cooperate with yourselt, play 3 otherwise. (Granted number of iterations was low, so people might not have moved to be non cooperating strategies enough (something like grim trigger))