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I attended a talk by Richard Garfield, the game designer behind Magic: The Gathering. He made a point that adding randomness to a game can be a way to give it t

by m12k 4y ago

I attended a talk by Richard Garfield, the game designer behind Magic: The Gathering. He made a point that adding randomness to a game can be a way to give it that property of "easy to learn, hard to master", and in turn make it easier for a community to grow around the game. When you add randomness, it becomes possible for novices to sometimes beat more experienced players through sheer luck. Contrast that with e.g. chess, where it doesn't take much skill difference before the most skilled player is almost certain to win. So randomness makes it easier for newcomers to get the occasional win, to keep them motivated while learning. But at the same time, randomness can make it harder to master, because the cause-effect-relationship between good decisions and good outcomes becomes blurred, like the article points out, defeating the trivial "reward function" we usually use for evaluating our performance. It takes a lot of discipline to say "I won, but it was luck, because I actually misplayed" and learn from that. And on top of that, high level play will become a game of analyzing and estimating probabilities, minimizing or maximizing variability depending on the strength of your position, basically embracing randomness as a gameplay element to be understood and sometimes even manipulated, despite being so intangible compared to most other gameplay elements. So used the right way, adding randomness to a game can both lower the barrier of entry, and raise the skill ceiling at the same time.

CPLX 4y ago
This is an interesting comment, and I'd add one other element to this, which is that randomness is way more realistic, if we think of games as something intended to represent the real world in some way. In real life the best marksman can get wiped out on the first day of a war, the best business strategist can get done in by a once in a generation disaster, and a hapless idiot in business can get an early big break. And so on. I feel like it feels much more natural and intuitive to us to play games that are a mix of skill and random chance.
- kqr 4y ago
  Note that this is also why some people prefer games that don't have chance -- to experience what that is like.
- pessimizer 4y ago
  That depends on whether you think that games should be simulations. Even if you think they should be simulations, you still might only want to reward optimal play over lucky play. If I'm using a simulation to train someone, I only want them to be rewarded for ideal play.
  - kqr 4y ago
    This is incorrect, as far as the research into training for expertise goes. You actually want simulations to be like the real world: complex, ambiguous, sometimes with delayed feedback and presenting multiple forms of the problem. Of course, it also takes a good mentor to debrief with and untangle what was bad luck and what was bad decision making. (See the Oxford Handbook of Expertise if this stuff interests you.)
spacetraveler11 4y ago
Thank you for this comment. See [1] for a video of Richard Garfield talking about this topic. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dSg408i-eKw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dSg408i-eKw
Kelamir 4y ago
An alternative to randomness is handicap. For example, Go game has ranks and based on them either you or your opponent get a handicap. Equal ranked players don't use handicap. It is counted that a stone of handicap is worth ~6.5 points, and that is what's used in handicap - one player gets additional stones placed at the beginning of a match. The system is aiming to provide you with 50% win/lose percentage, and every match to feel equal.
- sumy23 4y ago
  The issue with a handicap is that if you win you don't feel as good because you know that the only reason you won was the handicap. It's harder to draw such a conclusion when you win due to randomness.
LargeWu 4y ago
Agreed. I've seen comments in similar threads in the past where people rag on games like poker or backgammon because they believe the randomness factor moves them from skill-based to luck-based. In truth, managing randomness is actually one of the core skills of the game. Not just on the decision in front of you, but on future decisions as well. It's a hard skill to master. Moreover, the timelines to evaluate one's skill are long, sometimes hundreds or thousands of games, incorporating tens of thousands of decision points. It's not a wonder it's often misunderstood.
bsder 4y ago
> But at the same time, randomness can make it harder to master, Except that Magic: The Gathering is particularly bad for locking into specific "meta" (metagame) which then persists until new cards come out/old cards rotate out. Hardly random and hardly difficult to master. The best MTG players are really good at what I call the "game mechanics corner cases". The know all the weird ways to play and resolve the cards--this gives them a quite persistent couple percentage point advantage. However, it won't give them enough advantage to beat the "meta".

by m12k 4y ago

CPLX 4y ago

This is an interesting comment, and I'd add one other element to this, which is that randomness is way more realistic, if we think of games as something intended to represent the real world in some way. In real life the best marksman can get wiped out on the first day of a war, the best business strategist can get done in by a once in a generation disaster, and a hapless idiot in business can get an early big break. And so on. I feel like it feels much more natural and intuitive to us to play games that are a mix of skill and random chance.

kqr 4y ago
Note that this is also why some people prefer games that don't have chance -- to experience what that is like.
pessimizer 4y ago
That depends on whether you think that games should be simulations. Even if you think they should be simulations, you still might only want to reward optimal play over lucky play. If I'm using a simulation to train someone, I only want them to be rewarded for ideal play.
- kqr 4y ago
  This is incorrect, as far as the research into training for expertise goes. You actually want simulations to be like the real world: complex, ambiguous, sometimes with delayed feedback and presenting multiple forms of the problem. Of course, it also takes a good mentor to debrief with and untangle what was bad luck and what was bad decision making. (See the Oxford Handbook of Expertise if this stuff interests you.)

spacetraveler11 4y ago

Thank you for this comment. See [1] for a video of Richard Garfield talking about this topic. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dSg408i-eKw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dSg408i-eKw

Kelamir 4y ago

An alternative to randomness is handicap. For example, Go game has ranks and based on them either you or your opponent get a handicap. Equal ranked players don't use handicap. It is counted that a stone of handicap is worth ~6.5 points, and that is what's used in handicap - one player gets additional stones placed at the beginning of a match. The system is aiming to provide you with 50% win/lose percentage, and every match to feel equal.

sumy23 4y ago
The issue with a handicap is that if you win you don't feel as good because you know that the only reason you won was the handicap. It's harder to draw such a conclusion when you win due to randomness.

LargeWu 4y ago

Agreed. I've seen comments in similar threads in the past where people rag on games like poker or backgammon because they believe the randomness factor moves them from skill-based to luck-based. In truth, managing randomness is actually one of the core skills of the game. Not just on the decision in front of you, but on future decisions as well. It's a hard skill to master. Moreover, the timelines to evaluate one's skill are long, sometimes hundreds or thousands of games, incorporating tens of thousands of decision points. It's not a wonder it's often misunderstood.

bsder 4y ago

> But at the same time, randomness can make it harder to master, Except that Magic: The Gathering is particularly bad for locking into specific "meta" (metagame) which then persists until new cards come out/old cards rotate out. Hardly random and hardly difficult to master. The best MTG players are really good at what I call the "game mechanics corner cases". The know all the weird ways to play and resolve the cards--this gives them a quite persistent couple percentage point advantage. However, it won't give them enough advantage to beat the "meta".