Game Design: Avoiding Min-Maxing

[faraday]

@the-sands said in Game Design: Avoiding Min-Maxing:

In other words, most games are designed around the idea that if you 'should' know how to do something you already do. You don't lack the points to buy everything you 'should' have because you've already got everything you 'should' have for free.

I'm just saying that if you actually read the game system's descriptions, that's actually simply not true. It's a disconnect between the descriptions and the way people play, which I feel leads to issues. But apparently I'm in the minority and don't really feel like arguing about it any more.

[The Sands]

@faraday For the WoD system the descriptions have always been complete nonsense. It is very easy for people to have the description 'greatest in the world' and still be worse at a task than someone with the description 'you've done this once or twice' because only half your pool comes from the skill.

[Pyrephox]

@the-sands IME it is much safer and easier to completely ignore the 'fluff' around a skill level description and just focus on the mechanical meaning of a skill/stat and the difference in levels as a function of "what can I reasonably do with this level". Because the whole 'a 5 means you're one of the best in the world' is complete nonsense, and it's almost always complete nonsense in any system that tries to say so.

More, it then becomes cringey because games start freaking out about 'oh no, this person has a 5! Why is a world-class patisserie in Podunk, ME' or wherever? You need to justify this level of skill!' when the honest justification is, "A 5 is what gives me the least chance of utterly failing when I do a moderately challenging task of what is supposed to be my specialty, and even WITH a 5, I'm still more likely than not going to fail unless I am also using my Magic Pastry Power that gives me +5 to all pastries made under the light of the full moon. And let's not even talk about if the GM decides this tower of cream puffs is difficult enough to rate a penalty."

And yes, in most systems, you're explicitly not supposed to have people at professional or above levels of competence roll for basic tasks involving that skill unless there's some sort of extreme stress or consequences for failure - but GMs do it alllll the time, so players adapt to that.

[ThatGuyThere]

@sockmonkey
I don't see this as stopping min-maxing just obfuscating the effectiveness of it. If I want the character to be really good at something I will still rush that stat to excellent the only difference is now two characters with excellent are not necessarily equal. In the end you would just have people vaguely min maxed rather knowing exactly min maxed.

[fortydeuce]

@pyrephox said in Game Design: Avoiding Min-Maxing:

"A 5 is what gives me the least chance of utterly failing when I do a moderately challenging task of what is supposed to be my specialty, and even WITH a 5, I'm still more likely than not going to fail unless I am also using my Magic Pastry Power that gives me +5 to all pastries made under the light of the full moon. And let's not even talk about if the GM decides this tower of cream puffs is difficult enough to rate a penalty."

Whatever, man. I just want a morning bun or a chocolate croissant. I'll take the roll at Fair.

[SG]

@arkandel said in Game Design: Avoiding Min-Maxing:

I'm a min/maxer. I'm also pretty unapologetic about it

I am as well, I just don't understand this obsession with 'well rounded' characters that game runners have. In my experience, a well rounded character either has no need to invite other people on adventures (if the system is sane and difficulties are realistic) or is completely useless because their stats are all too low (most mush games I've encountered).

If every character has a specialization, then they need to bring others along on a quest, and you know, share the fun.

[ThatGuyThere]

@kanye-qwest said in Game Design: Avoiding Min-Maxing:

Wait, why should everyone have these, though? People don't all have these skills. Like driving I get, imo you should be able to be fine driving a car baseline but maybe you aren't a stunt driver or a getaway driver or a street racer unless you invest in that skill.

While I agree with your thoughts completely, game designers often don't. For example with the drive skill, in OWoD days, Drive 2 was required to be able to drive a manual transmission by the skill description. So my that same skill description nearly everyone in my high school should have drive 2. I grew in a rural area where driving manual vehicles was pretty much a universal skill.

[The Sands]

@pyrephox said in Game Design: Avoiding Min-Maxing:

And yes, in most systems, you're explicitly not supposed to have people at professional or above levels of competence roll for basic tasks involving that skill unless there's some sort of extreme stress or consequences for failure - but GMs do it alllll the time, so players adapt to that.

Well, again, that's less a problem with the system (I will toss bad level descriptions onto being 'bad design', but only a minor sin) and more a problem with interpretation and escalation. First, like you said, you shouldn't even need to have to make a roll just for basic tasks, and even if you do in your normal day-to-day operations you can probably get a ton of bonuses (are you really working professionally with equipment you picked up at Walmart? There's actually a reason professional grade equipment costs more than consumer equipment. Since it is not under stressful situations should you be getting a bonus for taking your time?)

Secondly, people think you need lots of successes. No. Unless it is an extended roll (which really smooths out a bad roll) you need 1 success. Are they the greatest pastries in the world? Not today. Maybe tomorrow will be better, but you still succeeded and made 'good' pastries. However, people get use to 'Joe rolled 4 successes so unless I roll 5 successes mine sucked'.

With all that said nearly all games have breakdowns at the 'every day' level of use. Challenge Resolution Systems are geared to resolve challenging tasks and often fall apart when trying to resolve trivial tasks. This problem is so common that many systems have mechanisms so that trivial tasks aren't resolved using the game's primary CRS (one example is that in many games if your pool is far enough about a challenge you can simply take an automatic success).

[Thenomain]

I think most game designers don't understand the consequences of their own games very well. Being told that X means Y is good in theory, but in practice that's why we have the term "dump stat".

I think the only way to keep minmaxing from being a negative thing instead of just what you do to be hyper-effective at one thing is to make every part of the system important.

(Dove-tail into the Social Stats discussion.)

[Ganymede]

@thenomain said in Game Design: Avoiding Min-Maxing:

(Dove-tail into the Social Stats discussion.)

The first chance I get, Imma gonna vote you off the island.

[Arkandel]

@sg said in Game Design: Avoiding Min-Maxing:

@arkandel said in Game Design: Avoiding Min-Maxing:

I'm a min/maxer. I'm also pretty unapologetic about it

I am as well, I just don't understand this obsession with 'well rounded' characters that game runners have. In my experience, a well rounded character either has no need to invite other people on adventures (if the system is sane and difficulties are realistic) or is completely useless because their stats are all too low (most mush games I've encountered).

Well, I understand it, I just think:

1. there's no stigma involved (and I laugh at anyone who claims otherwise - like this: HAH HAH) or that there's anything wrong with making a specialized character.

2. it's already the case since what's the first question most people ask when they roll a new PC? "Hey, what do you guys need the most on your game/coterie/faction?" Well, if the answer is something like "we need a fighter" or whatever then why not make a good one?

3. The main argument to the contrary is kind of a strawman's argument - that people create idiot savants who are just terrible at anything else but their maxed stuff, but then they don't play out the drawbacks. So for example that you roll a fighter with Charisma 1, but roleplay a real charmer. That however is an issue with the system (for not using mechanized checks for charisma - if you have a stat it needs to be used as much as any other stat, dammit) or with the player, and mechanics can't fix bad players.

So there.

[The Sands]

@thenomain said in Game Design: Avoiding Min-Maxing:

make every part of the system important

So then you want Pastry Making to be important?

That's actually a semi-serious question. The point of asking is to illustrate that you simply can't make everything important, nor do I think should you. If I want to make a character who isn't particularly good at combat I should be able to. In fact, that's the whole reason some people argue for social combat. My character should not be badly disadvantaged by the fact I didn't chose to spend points on Pastry Making. If I want to make a character who is good at combat I shouldn't be completely ineffective because I didn't take social skills. I shouldn't be any good at social activities, certainly, but I shouldn't be in the situation of 'this character is worthless' because I am not good at social.

[Seraphim73]

@faraday I quite agree that the skill descriptions on The 100 were... not particularly right. I think we actually talked about it at one point while the game was active, and rewriting them was on the to-do list if we didn't close the game.

That being said, Resolve and Alertness are skills everyone should have at 3 in my mind, unless you want a character who is deficient in them. In fact, I think that they were set to 2 for everyone by default (but of course could be lowered from there). Dodge was the same way (ahh, FS3 2nd Edition, and The 100's perversion of it...). Now, for the rest of the skill descriptions... I agree with you. They weren't particularly good, because as you say, (almost) everyone has told a couple of lies here and there and been believed. To go along with the point that @The-Sands made, everything probably should have been shifted slightly so that 1 in Deception was "You told a lie once and it was believed" and the previous level was actually 0.

Now that I've totally ruined the spirit of teasing (sorry), I agree with you that games should plan for a default set of skills that everyone has and tell the players what they are and that they have them already. They should plan their points outlay so that everyone can get those, and still have enough points left over for a well-rounded character with an area or two of expertise. To do otherwise is to encourage min-maxing and ignoring the areas of weakness, especially if you're just waiting to pump some XP into them to get them to where they "should" be.

Like @Arkandel and @SG, I tend to be a powergamer (I prefer that description to Min-Maxer, but in my darkest hours when I'm being honest with myself, I'm a min-maxer at heart). However, I think that the difference between a powerful character and a (negative connotation) min-maxed character is actually not the 'max' part, but the 'min' part. If your character still has all the skills they "should" have (some Alertness, some Athletics unless they're a couch potato, some Resolve/Composure, maybe some social skills unless they're explicitly anti-social, whatever they learned in school, etc), and their BG and age justifies it, I don't have a problem with a character with a high skill or two. It's when every point on the sheet except for the bare minimum has been poured into being very good at one thing (usually combat, but sometimes social or medical)... that's when I start to have a problem with the character.

[Roz]

@the-sands said in Game Design: Avoiding Min-Maxing:

@thenomain said in Game Design: Avoiding Min-Maxing:

make every part of the system important

So then you want Pastry Making to be important?

That's actually a semi-serious question. The point of asking is to illustrate that you simply can't make everything important, nor do I think should you. If I want to make a character who isn't particularly good at combat I should be able to. In fact, that's the whole reason some people argue for social combat. My character should not be badly disadvantaged by the fact I didn't chose to spend points on Pastry Making. If I want to make a character who is good at combat I shouldn't be completely ineffective because I didn't take social skills. I shouldn't be any good at social activities, certainly, but I shouldn't be in the situation of 'this character is worthless' because I am not good at social.

I think you're misunderstanding what "make every part of the system important" means. It means that if you have standard stats/skills that everyone is taking points in, there should be places for all of those skills to be important in the game. If you have social skills, there should be places in the game to use them mechanically. Don't make standard skills and let people put XP into them and then refuse to let them ever be useful in a situation. This comes up a lot in discussions of social combat/systems, because it's fair to say that a game shouldn't make social skills part of the overall package of what you can buy into if you can't actually use those skills mechanically in the game. (Of course, things like Background Skills in FS3 are freeform/user-generated, so there shouldn't be a guarantee of their mechanical importance. They're often about PC color. But, in FS3 terms, the Action Skills the GMs choose to include in their game should all be skills that are going to be used in the course of the game.)

Maybe a better way to think of it is "every part of the system should have places to be used/effective."

[Arkandel]

@roz said in Game Design: Avoiding Min-Maxing:

I think you're misunderstanding what "make every part of the system important" means. It means that if you have standard stats/skills that everyone is taking points in, there should be places for all of those skills to be important in the game. If you have social skills, there should be places in the game to use them mechanically. Don't make standard skills and let people put XP into them and then refuse to let them ever be useful in a situation.

Yes, and that's where game-runners - and occasionally, players - get it wrong. Sure, you can blame the powergamer for not buying Drive and putting those XP into more Brawl instead, but how about taking responsibility for the fact Drive is completely useless and no one in living memory remembers rolling it in any scenario other than super rare stuff completely created to force its use, yet people get to use Brawl routinely?

I really think the only feasible objection we can make here is for players who don't buy stuff, but roleplay them. Yes, that's an issue. If I don't buy Drive I shouldn't drive better than a random person on their commute, else I'm cheating. However it still doesn't mean players need to be paranoid about it - just because you don't have Expression it doesn't mean you can't use big words. It takes more than a vocabulary to make someone an emotive speaker or adept tale-teller for instance.

[faraday]

@seraphim73 Yes I agree. As you know (but not everyone may), that's one of the things I adjusted in FS3 3rd Ed. The level 1 skill is expressly named "Everyman" and everybody starts there. The idea was to make it more obvious that even though you don't have Drive or Brawl on your sheet, you can still drive your car to work and try to throw a punch. You won't be particularly good at those things under stress, but nor do you live under a rock.

My issue with folks just ignoring the "nonsense" skill descriptions as @The-Sands has suggested is that some people actually pay attention to them. If I've never played WoD before, how the devil am I supposed to know that the skill descriptions are BS? I read the rulebook, it says (as @ThatGuyThere pointed out) "1 dot in drive means you can drive normally and 2 dots in drive are required to drive a stick shift". I'm gonna think "Oh - well then I probably should have Drive: 2".

That now means I'm now 2 dots "behind" someone else who comes along and ignores the skill descriptions and plays a driver without the Drive skill. It creates a situation that is inherently unfair between those who follow the rules and those who don't.

So @Arkandel - I don't see that as a strawman argument at all. It's a very real problem that creates an imbalance between the PCs.

But I agree with @Seraphim73 that the "max" part of min-maxing isn't the problem. I frankly don't care if you want to play an ace fighter pilot with exceptional reflexes. If that's your thing - go for it. I do however mind if that's all they can do, because I think it's silly. Even an ace fighter pilot went through basic training and knows how to pick up a pistol, has to pass physical fitness tests, and went through the military academy where they took something as their major. Those skills should be reflected on their character sheet, even if they're low. My definition of well-rounded is "not one-dimensional". It doesn't mean "one man army who can do All The Things".

[Sockmonkey]

Ahh! So many replies! Excellent! I'm at work so I can't reply specifically right now but, quickly...

I guess what I am trying to do is to create an environment where role-play is encouraged over roll-play. Where sheets are more like character overviews/guidelines than run-downs of stats. I suppose I am conceptualizing a super broad design that is low on complex systems (physical combat, social combat, etc) that ends up being much more freeform:

'Hey, your character is good at this stuff, your character kind of sucks at this stuff. With that in mind, here's the world: role play.'

The way I was picturing the sheet is that there would be attributes, core skills and then a shit-ton of refinement skills. I think I'd give everyone as many Average and Good blocks as they want; really, no limit on how many skills they could slot into that part of the bell curve. They would have a set number of Great blocks. Excellent would require oversight, probably needing to be offset with some Low and Weak blocks.

Or maybe not. Maybe I would just let people make whatever sheets they want to make. I'd likely make backgrounds optional on this hypothetical game that I will never make, haha.

Anyway, I will reply more thoroughly tonight when I am home.

[Thenomain]

@the-sands said in Game Design: Avoiding Min-Maxing:

@thenomain said in Game Design: Avoiding Min-Maxing:

make every part of the system important

So then you want Pastry Making to be important?

If it's part of the game system, then I better be playing Shokugeki no Souma, yes.

If it's not important, then the system is not doing what it should be doing.

And if it's a "do anything" system like WoD, then the staff isn't doing what they should be doing. There's a reason people who take the the Crafts skill push staff to let them use it to make cool stuff, because that's why they took the bloody Crafts skill to begin with.

If the game has rules about making cakes, then if I engage the system I should get something out of it besides a cake. Maybe I have a personally designed cake from a staffer. Maybe I have impressed the Lord of Cats so much that he's going to give me his cat-daughter's hand in marriage and half of his little cat-kingdom as dowery. (There will also be a Day of Catnip in celebration. Many books will be knocked off shelves. It will be glorious.)

If all I get is a cake then why did anyone roll anything? This is practically Rule #1: If the success or failure is not interesting, don't roll. (Not to be mistaken for Rule #0: If the rules don't make sense, ignore them.)

[ThatGuyThere]

@arkandel said in Game Design: Avoiding Min-Maxing:

I really think the only feasible objection we can make here is for players who don't buy stuff, but roleplay them. Yes, that's an issue. If I don't buy Drive I shouldn't drive better than a random person on their commute, else I'm cheating.

I played off this once on a character I ddin't buy drive for him but he was embarrassed by not knowing how so he insisted he could drive. Ended up in three IC car accidents before other characters stopped listening to his insistence that he could drive. Also didn't help that he was only Dex 2 so had one die to drive when called on.

[surreality]

@faraday said in Game Design: Avoiding Min-Maxing:

@the-sands said in Game Design: Avoiding Min-Maxing:

In other words, most games are designed around the idea that if you 'should' know how to do something you already do. You don't lack the points to buy everything you 'should' have because you've already got everything you 'should' have for free.

I'm just saying that if you actually read the game system's descriptions, that's actually simply not true.

FWIW, I'm not posting much due to project hackville, but I'm on the same page here.

I think a major step people can take in development on this front is to actually define what I'd essentially call a 'level zero' that represents standard baseline knowledge in that area without points being spent.

(Granted, I am also a crackpot that's looking at a means by which people can take negative modifiers to a specific task to actively really really suck at some aspect of that thing as a tradeoff for a minor boost to something else equally specific in the same skillset, so I should probably shut up, because all the dedicated min-maxers probably just collectively made some involuntary and very socially inappropriate noises just reading that.)