691 replies to this topic

[blakdoxa]

Phys, on 18 July 2012 - 07:12 PM, said:

to be perfectly honest, the competetive scene will most likely be narrowed down to a very few builds and team structures, even if there are other viable options. Most people on the competetive video game scenes are followers, with a small subset of leaders. The competetive video game scene, especially in rpgs, prefers to narrow the scope of possibilities down greatly so that it is easier to deal with and predict. In fact they usually have a derogatory term for people who dont follow the trend, whether they win or lose, its highly annoying to them to have to deal with these mavericks.

I remember people who play magic online who would quit games with people not using a known deck construction type.

Anyhow the point is competitive gamers will probably only use a few very select builds anyhow, so worrying that it will lower options for them is kind of pointless, they will lower the options regardless.

Isn't this...degradation?

[Radiea]

Phys, on 18 July 2012 - 07:12 PM, said:

to be perfectly honest, the competetive scene will most likely be narrowed down to a very few builds and team structures, even if there are other viable options. Most people on the competetive video game scenes are followers, with a small subset of leaders. The competetive video game scene, especially in rpgs, prefers to narrow the scope of possibilities down greatly so that it is easier to deal with and predict. In fact they usually have a derogatory term for people who dont follow the trend, whether they win or lose, its highly annoying to them to have to deal with these mavericks.

I remember people who play magic online who would quit games with people not using a known deck construction type.

Anyhow the point is competitive gamers will probably only use a few very select builds anyhow, so worrying that it will lower options for them is kind of pointless, they will lower the options regardless.

Generally, when we balance things for competition, we balance it for the highest levels; AFAIK the people you speak of who go for the homogeneity and quit when they see "mavericks" often are people who are not actually very capable of playing at a truly high competitive level anyway.

Most competitive players might troll or laugh at the maverick for being perceived as playing suboptimally, but they would understand that if they lost to the maverick, it would be on them - they did not adapt well enough to a new build, a new deck, etc.

It's not really a valid reason to skimp out on Elite design, either, because it's not like Magic: the Gathering where there are cards designed specifically to appeal to Timmies, some for Spikes, and some for Johnnys. Saying "oh well they'll figure out one elite is better even if we balance it anyway" isn't really any reason to not try - same as your "they should at least try artificial randomness", except this doesn't have an a priori argument against it.