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| Fruits of a discussion on IRC | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Posted By: Hawaiian Pig <hawaiianpig@haloreachisnotcanon.net> | Date: 10/5/10 10:29 p.m. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
In Response To: Re: Why arena ranking promotes selfish play (Cody Miller) : The player who was killed though, has a lower K/D ratio and is now ranked : lower than they otherwise would be. But this doesn't detract from the Team overall. The teamkill hurts both him and the team; but the double kill causes a gain. In any case, our discussions on IRC about this (including Tar and Eiii) made this pretty clear; and I guess I'll post this for everyone. Contrary to what I've been suggesting, a player maximizing his K/D can be at odds with maximizing his Team's K/D. This teamkilling scenario aptly describes one where a player maximizes his K/D but does not maximize the Team's... even if there is no net loss. Still, some better scenarios, and far more realistic ones came up: 1:1Imagine this:
This is Cody's scenario from here. We have an opponent downrange engaging a teammate and an approaching enemy to your position. For the purposes of this scenario: C cannot engage you. D cannot engage B. The first contestable issue was whether or not Player A's decision to engage would differ based on whether or not he were "Selfish" (maximizing personal K/D) or "Team Oriented" (maximizing Team K/D). I argued before that any reasonable player would not pass up the opportunity to put a shot on an opponent downrange. That is to say, if you removed only the fact that Player B was there, there is still no reason to not put a shot on Player C. There is no telling what his health is like, or what might occur before you squeeze the trigger (i.e. he might take a hit and this shot might net you a kill). For both types of players, there is only one reason to pass up this shot: the interest of preserving your life. (i.e. if engaging C meant that you would die to player D). In this case, you would pass up the shot and tend to the more immediate danger. Selfish: "If I put a shot on C, will I net a kill?"
Ultimately the act of both players remains the same. But what if the scenario was designed in such a way that the outcome was perfectly known by A? Meaning, taking the shot will only net you an assist, and you will die in your encounter with D; and not taking the shot will mean you survive and kill D. This means: If you shoot C:
Personal K/D: -1
If you do not shoot C:
Personal K/D: +1
All things being equal; it's evident that the choice doesn't matter either way. What does matter, is player perception. The perfect knowledge available in this scenario is impossible. All we can do is weigh probabilities; and one's reasoning is apparently influenced by their approach, personal K/D or team K/D. Reality vs. PerceivedWhat happens in each case where perception based on each approach differs from reality. Imagine if, in reality, putting a shot downrange will not enable your teammate to get the kill, and he will die. Selfish: You perceive that your own danger is more important and requires your attention. You do not take the shot and save your life by killing D. In this case, the best option was to play "selfishly." Now imagine if, in reality, you will enable your teammate to get the kill: Selfish: You perceive that your own danger is more important and requires your attention. You do not take the shot and save your life by killing D. In this scenario, your decision didn't affect the team at all, but affected your personal K/D. Let's look at the Team K/D outcomes:
It would seem that acting selfishly doesn't affect your team. 2:1But, there's a catch! This assumes that every decision is, "My life for one teammate's life" Tar brought this up in IRC. If more than one teammate's life is involved, things get dicier.
In this case: If, in reality, putting a shot downrange will not enable your teammates to get the kill, and they will die. Selfish: You perceive that your own danger is more important and requires your attention. You do not take the shot and save your life by killing D. Again, the best option was to play "selfishly." If, in reality, you will enable your teammates to get the kill: Selfish: You perceive that your own danger is more important and requires your attention. You do not take the shot and save your life by killing D. Finally a conflict! The best options for each mindset are at odds with eachother! If you do not engage, you benefit your K/D at the expense of your team. If you do engage, you benefit your Team's K/D at the expense of your own. But which is better? Let's look at those Team K/D outcomes:
If we add a third teammate, the outcomes are:
As we can see, helping your Team makes both the best outcome and the worst outcome possible, and playing Selfishly results in the same outcome either way. But this has all been assuming that the Team oriented player will always take the shot and the Selfish player will always opt not to. In reality, these players make decisions based on divergent questions: What the Team oriented player decides to do will be based on how well they assess the situation: "Will my shot help?" What the Selfish player does will depend on how much immediate danger they are in: "Will I die if I shoot this guy?" I'd wager that the Team oriented player is more likely to perceive his ability to help, whereas the Selfish player will simply consider his survivability. If the Selfish player feels he is in danger, and cannot afford a shot, he passes it up and focuses on his own survival (resulting in the middle-road results for the team). If he feels he is not in danger, he takes the shot and, like the Team oriented player, can be afforded either the best or worst possible outcome. I won't say that I know the Selfish player always assesses the situation more aptly. However, I think his assessment is conducive to better results; knowing whether or not your shot will make a difference is much harder to gauge than your own survivability. If you know you can take this shot and survive, then the best possible of all outcomes is available to you (even better if you take the shot and kill D). If you don't consider your own survivability, you run the risk of the worst possible of all outcomes (-2, -3 or -4 depending on players involved). In short, the mortal calculus of a K/D oriented player seems conducive to better play.
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