Is it possible that you believe these stateful additions are the reason you are no longer dominating the game, instead of the possibility that your skills have decreased or that the average level of skill has increased in your absence?
No. I stopped playing because I could see clear advantages in using the equipment to which I was denied access.
You weren't denied access. You can still unlock them. You are simply to lazy to unlock them and now poopoo over the fact that there are unlockables because you are too lazy to do something to get them. You are essentially like an NHL GM that resigned because he thought that the other teams signing free agents was unfair and he was not willing to invest time and money to sign free agents.
Face it, you don't play the game anymore because you don't want to play the game anymore. Nothing about the game keeps you from playing it, only your opinion of the game.
Every player in TF2 has the same chance of unlocking the weapons. The analogy doesn't break here at all.
This is wrong.
Now that's just a silly logical fallacy. "You're wrong because you don't understand."
The fact that your first statement is wrong is proof of your lack of understanding. You aren't wrong BECAUSE you don't understand. You are wrong, period. Therefore, you clearly do not understand.
OK, how does the game prevent any player from unlocking a weapon?
You are committing a logical fallacy again. You are declaring something as false without giving any explanation whatsoever how and then you expect me any anybody else observing the discussion to swallow it whole without any questions asked.
You are essentially like an NHL GM that resigned because he thought that the other teams signing free agents was unfair and he was not willing to invest time and money to sign free agents.
Speaking for myself, I don't really play TF2 because there are games that scratch the same itch and don't require me to level up in order to experience everything they have to offer. It's the same argument you see among anime fanboys; why don't I watch the show that gets good fifteen episodes in? Because that's time I could spend watching a show that's good from the start.
OK, how does the game prevent any player from unlocking a weapon?
You are committing a logical fallacy again. You are declaring something as false without giving any explanation whatsoever how and then you expect me any anybody else observing the discussion to swallow it whole without any questions asked.
You clearly don't understand most of what has been said...
Ok, so I'm going to play some basketball. I'm up against Michael Jordan. It's one on one.
I've got spring shoes. Magic spring shoes that let me jump twenty feet in the air. I've also got a homing ball. It homes in on the hoop.
Michael Jordan has his body, and his feet, and no special tools unlocked. It's his first game.
He could have the spring shoes and the homing ball also, but he doesn't. He could get them the same way I got them. To do that, he has to play 1000 games. The games he played in the NBA and NCAA don't count. This is the Scott Basketball League.
Is Michael Jordan going to play basketball against me 1000 times, losing all 1000 times, just to get the spring shoes and the homing ball so he can win? Are you seriously going to suggest that my 1000 victories over Michael Jordan are legitimate victories because he had equal access to the special tools, he just hadn't unlocked them yet?
When you win at a stateless game like Quake, it proves something. It proves that in that game you had more skills.
When you win at a stateful game like TF2 it proves something as well. It proves you have nothing better to do than spend your time unlocking things.
OK, how does the game prevent any player from unlocking a weapon?
You are committing a logical fallacy again. You are declaring something as false without giving any explanation whatsoever how and then you expect me any anybody else observing the discussion to swallow it whole without any questions asked.
You clearly don't understand most of what has been said...
Then fucking explain it! That's all I'm basically asking from you two: To explain your position correctly and validly.
Seriously, you aren't refuting arguments, you are just declaring someone else as stupid or ignorant and think that's an argument and you guys are doing it over and over and over again.
You haven't presented any argument whatsoever to explain how the statefulness of sports is any different from the statefulness of TF2.
I think you're still gonna lose to Michael Jordan even with your advantages...
I agree. Also, Scott has assumed that he will lose until he has acquired the same equipment. This is false. I often win using the standard launch equipment. In many cases, I prefer the old equipment. Many TF2 unlocks are for novelty and differentiation only. The bow and arrow are just not as good as the sniper rifle. The backburner is NOT as good as the old flamethrower. I dislike the dead ringer, but revel in the cloak and dagger.
Ok, so I'm going to play some basketball. I'm up against Michael Jordan. It's one on one.
I've got spring shoes. Magic spring shoes that let me jump twenty feet in the air. I've also got a homing ball. It homes in on the hoop.
Michael Jordan has his body, and his feet, and no special tools unlocked. It's his first game.
He could have the spring shoes and the homing ball also, but he doesn't. He could get them the same way I got them. To do that, he has to play 1000 games. The games he played in the NBA and NCAA don't count. This is the Scott Basketball League.
Is Michael Jordan going to play basketball against me 1000 times, losing all 1000 times, just to get the spring shoes and the homing ball so he can win? Are you seriously going to suggest that my 1000 victories over Michael Jordan are legitimate victories because he had equal access to the special tools, he just hadn't unlocked them yet?
When you win at a stateless game like Quake, it proves something. It proves that in that game you had more skills.
When you win at a stateful game like TF2 it proves something as well. It proves you have nothing better to do than spend your time unlocking things.
Great, another hyperbolic analogy that has next to no value whatsoever.
One must assume in this case that you also played 1000 games and that you have probably also lost those 1000 games. Basically your argument is that seniority actually counts for something. Question is: what the fuck is the problem with that?
Nobody is preventing Jordan from playing those 1000 games and nobody is saying he won't ever get that special equipment you already have. This is not unfairness, this is simply seniority.
In fact, skill itself is a large part seniority as well. You develop skill because you have played the game or similar games over and over and over again for a long time. You aren't born with skill, you develop skill over years. You may be born with talent but that talent is only wasted until you develop it into a skill with what basically is equal to training and in the end results in seniority.
TF2 only essentially has an additional seniority mechanic. However, that isn't that different from any other FPS. Is it an unfair advantage for players who have played a particular FPS before to already know the layout of the map in contrast to noobs?
Regardless, this does not address the problem we have about the statefulness of sports vs. the statefulness of TF2. Should sports teams not be allowed to use seasoned veterans of their craft because they already have played at that level for years?
egardless, this does not address the problem we have about the statefulness of sports vs. the statefulness of TF2. Should sports teams not be allowed to use seasoned veterans of their craft because they already have played at that level for years?
You see, I would have given you the benefit of the doubt, but this sentence alone clearly indicate that you still fail to grasp the fundamental difference explained several times above. I give up. Others may continue, but I'm done.
egardless, this does not address the problem we have about the statefulness of sports vs. the statefulness of TF2.Should sports teams not be allowed to use seasoned veterans of their craft because they already have played at that level for years?
You see, I would have given you the benefit of the doubt, but this sentence alone clearly indicate that you still fail to grasp the fundamental difference explained several times above. I give up. Others may continue, but I'm done.
Great, another example of you not explaining anything but just declaring someone else stupid and think that's an argument. Fuck you Rym, you're a dick.
Basically your argument is that seniority actually counts for something. Question is: what the fuck is the problem with that?
Answer is: Everything.
Seniority should count zilch, zero, nada, nothing. 0. ZERO, NULL NIL. Number of Geodudes minus six.
This is the heart of your misunderstanding. This is the final time I will explain it to you.
Skill is the only factor that should determine winning. Nothing else. Not seniority. Not skin color. Not age. Not nothing. Only skill. Whether the skill is acquired by talent or practice doesn't matter. All that matters is how much of it do you have right now during the game we are playing. If anything else factors into the victory condition of the game, then it is tarnished. The more that other things besides skill factor in, the more tarnished it is. TF2 is as close to completely tarnished as it can be. WoW surpasses it. Candy Land is the absolute bottom.
If you still thing we aren't explaining, go back and read the old posts, and old threads, and listen to the old episodes. We've explained it over and over and over again. The only reason we aren't typing yet another explanation is because there is no point in repeating ourselves simply because you refuse to scroll up or go to the previous page and read again, more carefully.
Are you seriously going to suggest that my 1000 victories over Michael Jordan are legitimate victories because he had equal access to the special tools, he just hadn't unlocked them yet?
Conversely:
Are you seriously suggesting that all the wins by Eastern Conference NHL teams against the Atlanta Thrashers are illegitimate because they are an expansion team and not around that long yet?
Skill, equipment, etc. doesn't really fucking matter what gives the edge. The only thing I'm focusing on right now is you, Rym and Scott, declaring that stateful games don't have any merit despite your obvious hypocrisy of having already declared sports to have merit as they are in fact stateful!
Are you seriously suggesting that all the wins by Eastern Conference NHL teams against the Atlanta Thrashers are illegitimate because they are an expansion team and not around that long yet?
What? You're just proving more and more strongly that you don't understand this argument. This doesn't follow at all.
Skill, equipment, etc. doesn't really fucking matter what gives the edge. The only thing I'm focusing on right now is you, Rym and Scott, declaring that stateless games don't have any merit despite your obvious hypocrisy of having already declared sports to have merit as they are in fact stateful!
We've already explained that sports take great measures to mitigate their statefulness. We already agreed that sports without salary caps and such are stateful, and that tarnishes their legitimacy. You fail, though, to recognize our point that the within an individual game of (insert sport) the victory is determined by the skills within the bodies of the players on the field. They do not have an advantage in an individual game due to the result of the previous game.
The Atlanta Thrashers go on the ice with the same skates, same rules, same everything as the original 6 Habitants. Whether they win or lose that game is determined solely by skills inherent in the players themselves. Equipment that is outside the constraints of the rules is illegal. The Canadiens don't get a free goal for being an original six team. The refs theoretically don't give preference to either team. An individual game of hockey is a test of hockey skill between the players on team A vs the players of team B. In TF2 this is not the case.
Basically your argument is that seniority actually counts for something. Question is: what the fuck is the problem with that?
Answer is: Everything.
Seniority should count zilch, zero, nada, nothing. 0. ZERO, NULL NIL. Number of Geodudes minus six.
This is the heart of your misunderstanding. This is the final time I will explain it to you.
Skill is the only factor that should determine winning. Nothing else. Not seniority. Not skin color. Not age. Not nothing. Only skill. Whether the skill is acquired by talent or practice doesn't matter. All that matters is how much of it do you have right now during the game we are playing. If anything else factors into the victory condition of the game, then it is tarnished. The more that other things besides skill factor in, the more tarnished it is. TF2 is as close to completely tarnished as it can be. WoW surpasses it. Candy Land is the absolute bottom.
If you still thing we aren't explaining, go back and read the old posts, and old threads, and listen to the old episodes. We've explained it over and over and over again. The only reason we aren't typing yet another explanation is because there is no point in repeating ourselves simply because you refuse to scroll up or go to the previous page and read again, more carefully.
That is true for stateless games. Candy Land is a crap game because it is a stateless game that is entirely based on luck and not on skill or even on seniority.
However, WoW, TF2 and sports are stateful games. The problem I have is that you guys declared that stateful games already have no merit, yet you accepted sports to have merit despite them being stateful! In stateful games skill is not the only factor and that's that. It's simply the nature for the beast but that doesn't make them automatically inferior or without merit.
yet you accepted sports to have merit despite them being stateful!
THE GAME IS NOT STATEFUL THE PLAYERS ARE STATEFUL. THE GAME IS NOT STATEFUL THE PLAYERS ARE STATEFUL. THE GAME IS NOT STATEFUL THE PLAYERS ARE STATEFUL. THE GAME IS NOT STATEFUL THE PLAYERS ARE STATEFUL. THE GAME IS NOT STATEFUL THE PLAYERS ARE STATEFUL. THE GAME IS NOT STATEFUL THE PLAYERS ARE STATEFUL. THE GAME IS NOT STATEFUL THE PLAYERS ARE STATEFUL. THE GAME IS NOT STATEFUL THE PLAYERS ARE STATEFUL.
How do you not understand that? Hockey, in and of itself, is not stateful. Each player has a statefulness to him, because he's a human being, but ONCE AGAIN I STATE, the game is not stateful. If a player is injured, then that is a state of the player, not the game. You keep pointing at all this crap outside the rules and saying "Well, that makes the game stateful". As Scott and I have both said, there is nothing in THE RULES, which are WHAT DEFINES A GAME, that gives a player or a team an advantage for winning or losing a previous match. Basically, what you're saying is the same as me judging a game based on some crazy mod or house rule. If I play Settlers of Catan with a rule that it takes 200 wood to build a road now, I don't get to claim that Settlers sucks. In the same sense, I don't get to claim that Hockey (which has no rules stating that previous games effect this one) is stateful simply because a player can get injured. Every Hockey game is a challenge of pure Hockey between team A (which may be different than the Team A of yesterday) and Team B (which may be different than the Team B of yesterday). Each hockey game is an instantiated contest between two groups of people calling themselves Team A and Team B. The members of Team A and Team B may change, but that does not impart a statefulness to a single game of Hockey. The Hockey Season is a stateful contest made up of the results of a bunch of stateless, instantiated contests.
This is a case of Rym trying to define something clearly but only making it 80% of the way (a la Google), Scott is making bad analogies, and chaos is really going after the wrong argument.
Rym and Scott are both right in that they claim TF2 is a stateful game, as opposed to a stateless game. A stateless game being a game where since every possible variable is equal (or equally random) among players, and the game is ruled by a set of clearly defined rules. From that definition, because it is a fact that TF2 allows for some players to have access to different weapons just because they have played longer, it is a stateful game. I also agree with them that this is kinda bullshit since it does offset skill, much in the same way that I will never play Modern Warfare and other games like it.
But where their argument breaks down is that they try to claim that other things, like sports, are stateless. Sorry guys, sports are in no way stateless. I will even go so far as to say that most of the things they have claimed as being stateless, such as Quake and NS, are also not stateless by default (but they can be made so). And this is where I think the argument is getting mixed up. The statefulness of a game is defined by only two things: equipment and resources.
Board Games - In my opinion, these kinds of games are the only true stateless games. With a board game, let's take chess, you have two people, who have the exact same pieces, and are seated directly across from each other (literally or figuratively). Things like equipment are not an issue here, and the resources are equal to each player. Perfectly stateless, and a perfect representation of skill. By this same definition, you would also have to allow that Monopoly is an equally stateless game, since each player starts out the same way. But you also have to allow that since luck is a major factor in that game, it is not a true representation of skill.
Video Games - Unless certain conditions are met, I'd argue that no multiplayer video game is stateless. Some are very obviously so. Games like TF2, Modern Warfare, and Counter Strike are all stateful because the amount of time you spend playing does give you access to things other players do not. Games like Halo (original), Quake, and NS are designed to be stateless since every person has every piece of equipment and resource available from the start. But where this does break down is in the hardware. A person with a computer that is twice as powerful will have the advantage over the player who has a weaker computer. So even if their skill levels are equal, the person with the nicer computer will more likely win. This probably isn't such a problem as it used to be, but on that same level, Internet reliability factors in a lot. People who lag in games get shafted, regardless of their skill. The only way for a game to be truly stateless is if every player is using the exact same hardware on a LAN.
Sports - This is probably the epitome of where you see variances in equipment and resources. As Scott mentioned, different teams have different levels of resources, in the fact that there are no salary caps. The team with more money can afford better players and coaches. That's not stateless. And in addition to that, every single sport has equipment differences. This bat is better constructed than that other bat. These shoes grip the floor better than those other shoes. Do things like this negate skill? Not necessarily. Even if I had the best golf clubs in the world, Tiger Woods would still beat the shit out of me with the old set of clubs in my grandfather's attic. But among people who are completely equal skill-wise, a driver that can hit a ball 30 yards further has the advantage.
In the end, it just comes down to what kinds of games you like. Rym and Scott have made it very clear for a long time that they only like games where skill is most important, so they like having games that are as stateless as possible. That's fine, I like those kinds of games for the same reason. But it is stupid that they feel like all other games are worthless. That is like saying my old Honda is worthless as a car just because it can't beat a Ferrari in a race.
EDIT: Obviously I am too slow. There were like ten posts in the time it took me to write this.
That is true for stateless games. Candy Land is a crap game because it is a stateless game that is entirely based on luck and not on skill or even on seniority.
That's a profoundly incorrect statement that has almost no relation to the argument at hand.
What? You're just proving more and more strongly that you don't understand this argument. This doesn't follow at all.
Actually this follows directly. We must assume that Scott in his hyperbole has the advantage in equipment because he has the seniority of 1000 games played in his league. He is trying to say that any losses by Michael Jordan to him due to the disparity in equipment would be illegitimate because of said difference in seniority and resulting equipment. Conversely, all of Scott's wins against Jordan would be also illegitimate because of this.
Now the Atlanta Thrashers are an expansion team, one of the most recent ones. In a stateful game any of their losses can be in part be attributed to lack of seniority of the management staff as they simply don't have the players available or the know how to assemble a good team. Does this now make their losses they have accumulated since their inception illegitimate and do the wins that the other teams have gotten off of them also become illegitimate?
We've already explained that sports take great measures to mitigate their statefulness. We already agreed that sports without salary caps and such are stateful, and that tarnishes their legitimacy. You fail, though, to recognize our point that the within an individual game of (insert sport) the victory is determined by the skills within the bodies of the players on the field. They do not have an advantage in an individual game due to the result of the previous game.
The Atlanta Thrashers go on the ice with the same skates, same rules, same everything as the original 6 Habitants. Whether they win or lose that game is determined solely by skills inherent in the players themselves. Equipment that is outside the constraints of the rules is illegal. The Canadiens don't get a free goal for being an original six team. The refs theoretically don't give preference to either team. An individual game of hockey is a test of hockey skill between the players on team A vs the players of team B. In TF2 this is not the case.
I believe you two don't really make a necessary distinction here: Management and actual game-play. In hockey the distinction is obvious because the people who manage the team, which players are on the team and so on, don't actually play the game. In TF2 those two collide as the person who chooses the equipment also has to use it and know how to use it and have skill at the game itself.
To get back to the hockey analogy. The 1999-2000 Thrashers, did they really stand a fair chance in the stateful game of hockey? The only resources they had available were castoffs from other teams in the expansion draft. They didn't have an established development cycle. They didn't have the time to have their high draft picks develop. They are a fresh team of players that usually don't know each other, under a coach and management staff that none of them know, etc.
Now, it was unfair, but does that mean that their losses and their opponents wins are illegitimate because of this? And when do the losses actually become legitimate? They are now 10 years in the league and have made the playoffs exactly once, where they were swept in the first round. When did their losses become legitimate and are simply reflective of a bad organization and a bad team?
That is true for stateless games.Candy Land is a crap game because it is a stateless gamethat is entirely based on luck and not on skill or even on seniority.
That's a profoundly incorrect statement that has almost no relation to the argument at hand.
Actually he is completely correct by your definition of what stateless is. The sentence is not structured well though. Candy Land is crap because it is entirely based on luck, nothing else.
EDIT: Also I should clarify my above post a little bit. I'm not making the claim that the game of hockey, or the game of basketball is stateful. The games themselves are set by rules and as such are completely stateless. However, the sports that surround those games do not have restrictions on equipment and resources, and are thus, not stateless.
I think our confusion is coming from the fact that we have two games we're calling Hockey. We have Hockey, which is the things like "No shiving other players" and what defines a goal. This is an instantiated combat between two teams that does not take in to effect previous games. The players that are capable of playing that night are what make up the teams, and it's a straight contest of hockey skill. We then have the Hockey Season, which is, as I said in my previous post, a stateful game consisting of the serial playing of multiple games of Hockey, plus stuff like the draft, injuries, etc. Hockey is stateless (It doesn't matter how many games I've won beforehand, I get the same, or at least similar enough, equipment, abide by the same rules, and the victor is generally the team that has the greatest skill in Hockey), the Hockey Season is stateful (I get into the playoffs if I've won X games, I have to deal with drafting and other such things, injuries have an impact over multiple nights, etc.).
How's that?
EDIT: So to bring this back to the topic, Quake/NS/Whatever are Hockey, the stateless, relatively bullshit free, instantiated combat between two players to determine who has the greatest skill. TF2/MW/etc. are Hockey Season, which has all the other cruft that comes from holding state between contests.
Your point about different computers is very good. Someone with less lag has an advantage. Or perhaps in the old days, more lag was the advantage. Faster computers, better mice, better screens, all are stateful and distasteful.
Your point about sporting equipment is also apt, but I will show it does not matter.
Take for instance the example of the fancy high tech swimsuits used in the last Summer Olympics. I think it is absolutely clear that they were vastly superior to any that had come before. But where they fair? The answer depends on the context.
If you are talking about breaking world records, they are absolutely not fair. Comparing the time of someone using the new suit versus someone in a previous year who did not have it is unfair. Just as comparing a home run record achieved with a metal bat is unfair compared to a wood one. This is why baseball uses wooden bats to this day.
If you are talking about winning the gold medal in the context of a single olympics, the suit is absolutely fair. Even if not all swimmers have the suit, or choose to wear it, it is fair as long as it is available to all swimmers. If there is a factor, such as money, which allows some swimmers to have it, but others not to, then it is not fair. But if everyone has the suit as an available option, then the competition is fair regardless of whether or not every swimmer chooses that option.
So in your golf example, yes one player might have better clubs. However, if those clubs are truly better, why don't the other players also get them? All clubs are available to all players. Professional golfers all have enough money to buy whatever clubs they want. If one of them chooses sub-par (pun intended) clubs, then that is their own poor decision making.
Maybe they didn't start out with enough money for those $15,000 clubs. Maybe they had to play a few tournaments to get the cash to buy the better clubs.
Comments
Face it, you don't play the game anymore because you don't want to play the game anymore. Nothing about the game keeps you from playing it, only your opinion of the game.
You are committing a logical fallacy again. You are declaring something as false without giving any explanation whatsoever how and then you expect me any anybody else observing the discussion to swallow it whole without any questions asked.
I've got spring shoes. Magic spring shoes that let me jump twenty feet in the air. I've also got a homing ball. It homes in on the hoop.
Michael Jordan has his body, and his feet, and no special tools unlocked. It's his first game.
He could have the spring shoes and the homing ball also, but he doesn't. He could get them the same way I got them. To do that, he has to play 1000 games. The games he played in the NBA and NCAA don't count. This is the Scott Basketball League.
Is Michael Jordan going to play basketball against me 1000 times, losing all 1000 times, just to get the spring shoes and the homing ball so he can win? Are you seriously going to suggest that my 1000 victories over Michael Jordan are legitimate victories because he had equal access to the special tools, he just hadn't unlocked them yet?
When you win at a stateless game like Quake, it proves something. It proves that in that game you had more skills.
When you win at a stateful game like TF2 it proves something as well. It proves you have nothing better to do than spend your time unlocking things.
Seriously, you aren't refuting arguments, you are just declaring someone else as stupid or ignorant and think that's an argument and you guys are doing it over and over and over again.
You haven't presented any argument whatsoever to explain how the statefulness of sports is any different from the statefulness of TF2.
One must assume in this case that you also played 1000 games and that you have probably also lost those 1000 games. Basically your argument is that seniority actually counts for something.
Question is: what the fuck is the problem with that?
Nobody is preventing Jordan from playing those 1000 games and nobody is saying he won't ever get that special equipment you already have. This is not unfairness, this is simply seniority.
In fact, skill itself is a large part seniority as well. You develop skill because you have played the game or similar games over and over and over again for a long time. You aren't born with skill, you develop skill over years. You may be born with talent but that talent is only wasted until you develop it into a skill with what basically is equal to training and in the end results in seniority.
TF2 only essentially has an additional seniority mechanic. However, that isn't that different from any other FPS. Is it an unfair advantage for players who have played a particular FPS before to already know the layout of the map in contrast to noobs?
Regardless, this does not address the problem we have about the statefulness of sports vs. the statefulness of TF2. Should sports teams not be allowed to use seasoned veterans of their craft because they already have played at that level for years?
Seniority should count zilch, zero, nada, nothing. 0. ZERO, NULL NIL. Number of Geodudes minus six.
This is the heart of your misunderstanding. This is the final time I will explain it to you.
Skill is the only factor that should determine winning. Nothing else. Not seniority. Not skin color. Not age. Not nothing. Only skill. Whether the skill is acquired by talent or practice doesn't matter. All that matters is how much of it do you have right now during the game we are playing. If anything else factors into the victory condition of the game, then it is tarnished. The more that other things besides skill factor in, the more tarnished it is. TF2 is as close to completely tarnished as it can be. WoW surpasses it. Candy Land is the absolute bottom.
If you still thing we aren't explaining, go back and read the old posts, and old threads, and listen to the old episodes. We've explained it over and over and over again. The only reason we aren't typing yet another explanation is because there is no point in repeating ourselves simply because you refuse to scroll up or go to the previous page and read again, more carefully.
Are you seriously suggesting that all the wins by Eastern Conference NHL teams against the Atlanta Thrashers are illegitimate because they are an expansion team and not around that long yet?
Skill, equipment, etc. doesn't really fucking matter what gives the edge. The only thing I'm focusing on right now is you, Rym and Scott, declaring that stateful games don't have any merit despite your obvious hypocrisy of having already declared sports to have merit as they are in fact stateful!
The Atlanta Thrashers go on the ice with the same skates, same rules, same everything as the original 6 Habitants. Whether they win or lose that game is determined solely by skills inherent in the players themselves. Equipment that is outside the constraints of the rules is illegal. The Canadiens don't get a free goal for being an original six team. The refs theoretically don't give preference to either team. An individual game of hockey is a test of hockey skill between the players on team A vs the players of team B. In TF2 this is not the case.
However, WoW, TF2 and sports are stateful games. The problem I have is that you guys declared that stateful games already have no merit, yet you accepted sports to have merit despite them being stateful! In stateful games skill is not the only factor and that's that. It's simply the nature for the beast but that doesn't make them automatically inferior or without merit.
How do you not understand that? Hockey, in and of itself, is not stateful. Each player has a statefulness to him, because he's a human being, but ONCE AGAIN I STATE, the game is not stateful. If a player is injured, then that is a state of the player, not the game. You keep pointing at all this crap outside the rules and saying "Well, that makes the game stateful". As Scott and I have both said, there is nothing in THE RULES, which are WHAT DEFINES A GAME, that gives a player or a team an advantage for winning or losing a previous match. Basically, what you're saying is the same as me judging a game based on some crazy mod or house rule. If I play Settlers of Catan with a rule that it takes 200 wood to build a road now, I don't get to claim that Settlers sucks. In the same sense, I don't get to claim that Hockey (which has no rules stating that previous games effect this one) is stateful simply because a player can get injured. Every Hockey game is a challenge of pure Hockey between team A (which may be different than the Team A of yesterday) and Team B (which may be different than the Team B of yesterday). Each hockey game is an instantiated contest between two groups of people calling themselves Team A and Team B. The members of Team A and Team B may change, but that does not impart a statefulness to a single game of Hockey. The Hockey Season is a stateful contest made up of the results of a bunch of stateless, instantiated contests.
This is a case of Rym trying to define something clearly but only making it 80% of the way (a la Google), Scott is making bad analogies, and chaos is really going after the wrong argument.
Rym and Scott are both right in that they claim TF2 is a stateful game, as opposed to a stateless game. A stateless game being a game where since every possible variable is equal (or equally random) among players, and the game is ruled by a set of clearly defined rules. From that definition, because it is a fact that TF2 allows for some players to have access to different weapons just because they have played longer, it is a stateful game. I also agree with them that this is kinda bullshit since it does offset skill, much in the same way that I will never play Modern Warfare and other games like it.
But where their argument breaks down is that they try to claim that other things, like sports, are stateless. Sorry guys, sports are in no way stateless. I will even go so far as to say that most of the things they have claimed as being stateless, such as Quake and NS, are also not stateless by default (but they can be made so). And this is where I think the argument is getting mixed up. The statefulness of a game is defined by only two things: equipment and resources.
Board Games - In my opinion, these kinds of games are the only true stateless games. With a board game, let's take chess, you have two people, who have the exact same pieces, and are seated directly across from each other (literally or figuratively). Things like equipment are not an issue here, and the resources are equal to each player. Perfectly stateless, and a perfect representation of skill. By this same definition, you would also have to allow that Monopoly is an equally stateless game, since each player starts out the same way. But you also have to allow that since luck is a major factor in that game, it is not a true representation of skill.
Video Games - Unless certain conditions are met, I'd argue that no multiplayer video game is stateless. Some are very obviously so. Games like TF2, Modern Warfare, and Counter Strike are all stateful because the amount of time you spend playing does give you access to things other players do not. Games like Halo (original), Quake, and NS are designed to be stateless since every person has every piece of equipment and resource available from the start. But where this does break down is in the hardware. A person with a computer that is twice as powerful will have the advantage over the player who has a weaker computer. So even if their skill levels are equal, the person with the nicer computer will more likely win. This probably isn't such a problem as it used to be, but on that same level, Internet reliability factors in a lot. People who lag in games get shafted, regardless of their skill. The only way for a game to be truly stateless is if every player is using the exact same hardware on a LAN.
Sports - This is probably the epitome of where you see variances in equipment and resources. As Scott mentioned, different teams have different levels of resources, in the fact that there are no salary caps. The team with more money can afford better players and coaches. That's not stateless. And in addition to that, every single sport has equipment differences. This bat is better constructed than that other bat. These shoes grip the floor better than those other shoes. Do things like this negate skill? Not necessarily. Even if I had the best golf clubs in the world, Tiger Woods would still beat the shit out of me with the old set of clubs in my grandfather's attic. But among people who are completely equal skill-wise, a driver that can hit a ball 30 yards further has the advantage.
In the end, it just comes down to what kinds of games you like. Rym and Scott have made it very clear for a long time that they only like games where skill is most important, so they like having games that are as stateless as possible. That's fine, I like those kinds of games for the same reason. But it is stupid that they feel like all other games are worthless. That is like saying my old Honda is worthless as a car just because it can't beat a Ferrari in a race.
EDIT: Obviously I am too slow. There were like ten posts in the time it took me to write this.
Now the Atlanta Thrashers are an expansion team, one of the most recent ones. In a stateful game any of their losses can be in part be attributed to lack of seniority of the management staff as they simply don't have the players available or the know how to assemble a good team. Does this now make their losses they have accumulated since their inception illegitimate and do the wins that the other teams have gotten off of them also become illegitimate?
I believe you two don't really make a necessary distinction here: Management and actual game-play. In hockey the distinction is obvious because the people who manage the team, which players are on the team and so on, don't actually play the game. In TF2 those two collide as the person who chooses the equipment also has to use it and know how to use it and have skill at the game itself.
To get back to the hockey analogy. The 1999-2000 Thrashers, did they really stand a fair chance in the stateful game of hockey? The only resources they had available were castoffs from other teams in the expansion draft. They didn't have an established development cycle. They didn't have the time to have their high draft picks develop. They are a fresh team of players that usually don't know each other, under a coach and management staff that none of them know, etc.
Now, it was unfair, but does that mean that their losses and their opponents wins are illegitimate because of this? And when do the losses actually become legitimate? They are now 10 years in the league and have made the playoffs exactly once, where they were swept in the first round. When did their losses become legitimate and are simply reflective of a bad organization and a bad team?
EDIT: Also I should clarify my above post a little bit. I'm not making the claim that the game of hockey, or the game of basketball is stateful. The games themselves are set by rules and as such are completely stateless. However, the sports that surround those games do not have restrictions on equipment and resources, and are thus, not stateless.
How's that?
EDIT: So to bring this back to the topic, Quake/NS/Whatever are Hockey, the stateless, relatively bullshit free, instantiated combat between two players to determine who has the greatest skill. TF2/MW/etc. are Hockey Season, which has all the other cruft that comes from holding state between contests.
Your point about different computers is very good. Someone with less lag has an advantage. Or perhaps in the old days, more lag was the advantage. Faster computers, better mice, better screens, all are stateful and distasteful.
Your point about sporting equipment is also apt, but I will show it does not matter.
Take for instance the example of the fancy high tech swimsuits used in the last Summer Olympics. I think it is absolutely clear that they were vastly superior to any that had come before. But where they fair? The answer depends on the context.
If you are talking about breaking world records, they are absolutely not fair. Comparing the time of someone using the new suit versus someone in a previous year who did not have it is unfair. Just as comparing a home run record achieved with a metal bat is unfair compared to a wood one. This is why baseball uses wooden bats to this day.
If you are talking about winning the gold medal in the context of a single olympics, the suit is absolutely fair. Even if not all swimmers have the suit, or choose to wear it, it is fair as long as it is available to all swimmers. If there is a factor, such as money, which allows some swimmers to have it, but others not to, then it is not fair. But if everyone has the suit as an available option, then the competition is fair regardless of whether or not every swimmer chooses that option.
So in your golf example, yes one player might have better clubs. However, if those clubs are truly better, why don't the other players also get them? All clubs are available to all players. Professional golfers all have enough money to buy whatever clubs they want. If one of them chooses sub-par (pun intended) clubs, then that is their own poor decision making.