Editorial Josh Sawyer on Chess and Clear Choice

[DraQ]

I think that best balancing system in a non-abstract game is trying to mimick the right parts of the reality and hope that it will allow for the same manner of diverse tactics and strategies as RL does.

Trying to explicitly balance a non-abstract game in the same vein as you can balance a small, closed, abstract ruleset is just going to result in shitty, artificially limited game.

 

[Captain Shrek]

Josh is using chess to demonstrate certain design concepts, not as a model of game to aspire to. If you think this post is about "how CRPGs should be like chess", then you've failed to understand it.

In fact you could easily rewrite Josh's post to omit any mention of chess and it would still make sense.

I think you fail to understand it Infinitron. Chess is being used as a sympathetic example to demonstrate that redundancy is NOT good.

What he is implying is that games should have components that are easily separated so that the user can identify them and enrich the experience of gaming by e.g. having a variety of builds. This is banal. Absolutely every RPG does this to some extent.

 

[Infinitron]

I think you fail to understand it Infinitron. Chess is being used as a sympathetic example to demonstrate that redundancy is NOT good.

What he is implying is that games should have components that are easily separated so that the user can identify them and enrich the experience of gaming by e.g. having a variety of builds. This is banal. Absolutely every RPG does this to some extent.

How is what I said a failure to understand that? It has nothing to do with what I said.

Yes, chess is being used as an example for demonstrating concepts - but not directly as a role model.

 

[Captain Shrek]

I think you fail to understand it Infinitron. Chess is being used as a sympathetic example to demonstrate that redundancy is NOT good.

What he is implying is that games should have components that are easily separated so that the user can identify them and enrich the experience of gaming by e.g. having a variety of builds. This is banal. Absolutely every RPG does this to some extent.

How is what I said a failure to understand that? It has nothing to do with what I said.

Yes, chess is being used as an example for demonstrating concepts - not as a role model.

Then chess is terrible as I said. Chess hardly embodies this idea, but rather proves that such orthogonality is not necessary at all.

 

[St. Toxic]

Chess is for old ladies. He should have used Monopoly as an example of rich and specialized rpg combat.

 

[Infinitron]

Chess is for old ladies. He should have used Monopoly as an example of rich and specialized rpg combat.

Monopoly is more simulationist I think, DraQ would approve

 

[St. Toxic]

+ There's dice. You don't roll any dice in chess, how's it supposed to be strategic?

 

[Weierstraß]

A reason Chess is not the best example to demonstrate this orthogonal but equivalent value and it's application in game design is that you are not making a choice between them. While it is obvious that the queen is powerful even to someone completely new to the game the relative values of the bishop, rook and knight is not at all as readily apparent. The rules of the pieces together with the context given by their symbols do not except in the case of the king really reveal what they are for.

 

[Roguey]

ITT: autists.

 

[Country_Gravy]

No mention of the tyranny of choices?

 

[CrustyBot]

Codex cannot into analogies or examples.

All I got from that long blog entry was that he likes systems that are put together with a specific purpose that is well supported by a game's content. I wonder what's his opinion on CoC P&P vs D&D. That, and people shouldn't be wrasslin with rulesets, but rather situations and encounters. Also, the whole orthogonally equivalent value tangent, which simply boils down to game balance in his case. Despite the wordplay and long examination of the usefulness of certain chess pieces, it seems like basic common sense principles at the heart of it, which didn't require the lengthy blog post to bring up - brevity and all that.

Then again, I accept that I cannot into reading and that I might be missing the entire fucking point.

I found this bit a little funny:

When designers develop tools, we should strive for clarity of primary purpose in a player's tools. The more obvious we make the value of the tools at a player's disposal, the more quickly the player will spend time fully engaged with the obstacles at hand instead of trying to figure out what they aren't "getting".

This could easily be an argument for simulationists. If a game's systems are geared towards simulation, then people will intuitively understand the purpose and utility of a system's components, even if it is presented through abstract mechanics.

i.e You don't need to justify how or why Strength will allow you to carry more shit, or why Agility makes your character move faster.

 

[Infinitron]

Codex cannot into analogies or examples.

All I got from that long blog entry was that he likes systems that are put together with a specific purpose that is well supported by a game's content. I wonder what's his opinion on CoC P&P vs D&D. That, and people shouldn't be wrasslin with rulesets, but rather situations and encounters. Also, the whole orthogonally equivalent value tangent, which simply boils down to game balance in his case. Despite the wordplay and long examination of the usefulness of certain chess pieces, it seems like basic common sense principles at the heart of it, which didn't require the lengthy blog post to bring up - brevity and all that.

Then again, I accept that I cannot into reading and that I might be missing the entire fucking point.

I found this bit a little funny:



This could easily be an argument for simulationists. If a game's systems are geared towards simulation, then people will intuitively understand the purpose and utility of a system's components, even if it is presented through abstract mechanics.

i.e You don't need to justify how or why Strength will allow you to carry more shit, or why Agility makes your character move faster.

Since when is simulation of reality intuitive?

 

[St. Toxic]

Everything is intuitive, as long as you keep it vague.

 

[bminorkey]

Also, the whole orthogonally equivalent value tangent, which simply boils down to game balance in his case. Despite the wordplay and long examination of the usefulness of certain chess pieces, it seems like basic common sense principles at the heart of it, which didn't require the lengthy blog post to bring up - brevity and all that.

But it doesn't just boil down to game balance, which is why he's discussing things that are "orthogonally" equivalent and not merely equivalent. His point is that interesting gameplay scenarios are created by providing the player with many highly distinct options that nonetheless have the same overall efficiency or value. Knights and bishops move very differently, have different purposes and are useful in different situations, but their overall strategic value is the same.

 

[DraQ]

This could easily be an argument for simulationists. If a game's systems are geared towards simulation, then people will intuitively understand the purpose and utility of a system's components, even if it is presented through abstract mechanics.

i.e You don't need to justify how or why Strength will allow you to carry more shit, or why Agility makes your character move faster.

Since when is simulation of reality intuitive?

Since before Hollywood started fucking people's perception of it up.

For example, if shotgun blasts really tossed people around like fucking ragdolls, then it would bev impossible to fire one without getting blown of your feet - Sir Isaac fucking Newton, bitches.

 

[Weierstraß]

Reality and realism is irrelevant. The important thing is that whatever is chosen to represent the mechanic suggests what the actual mechanic is for.

 

[DraQ]

Reality and realism is irrelevant. The important thing is that whatever is chosen to represent the mechanic suggests what the actual mechanic is for.

But, man, axes are blunt.

 

[Weierstraß]

Yours might be. If you know what I mean? Get it? "Blunt axe". Hah!

 

[Captain Shrek]

It has nothing to do with reality as much as it has to do with being entertaining.

 

[DraQ]

It has nothing to do with reality as much as it has to do with being entertaining.

 

[Weierstraß]

Blunt axes are at least 50% more entertaining.