Yeah. A code of ethics applies equally to all people in a given field. So, all the people who play football are expected not to be sore losers. We call that "sportsmanship." It's an ethical code.
There's a significant difference between playing to maximize victory points, and playing to be the player with the most victory points.
I think "contextual" also means "situational." You play to get as many victory points as you can, given the resources you get and the moves of other players. That may not always be the most victory points.
How do we consider multiple competing risk-reward choices? Like, if my choice is a very risky move that could pay off big, or a less risky move that pays off less, how do we gauge when it is ethical to make which decision? Hypothetically, both choices could constitute "maximizing contextual utility," just in different ways. Do we simply ignore the other factors that go into making that decision?
Yeah. A code of ethics applies equally to all people in a given field. So, all the people who play football are expected not to be sore losers. We call that "sportsmanship." It's an ethical code.
More generally, as a member of society you don't leave your poop in public.
How do we consider multiple competing risk-reward choices? Like, if my choice is a very risky move that could pay off big, or a less risky move that pays off less, how do we gauge when it is ethical to make which decision? Hypothetically, both choices could constitute "maximizing contextual utility," just in different ways. Do we simply ignore the other factors that go into making that decision?
The answer to that one is easy. You just calculate the expected utility (in simple terms, the sum over outcomes of probability(outcome) * utility(outcome)).
I think "contextual" also means "situational." You play to get as many victory points as you can, given the resources you get and the moves of other players. That may not always be the most victory points.
Contextual means within the context of the framework of the game. Contextual utility in T&E; is victory cubes. Contextual utility in, say, Battletech the way we played it at RIT, ranged from killing motherfuckers with claws to working toward seeing your beautiful 85 ton hardened armor monster die from a single lucky shot to the head. Looser victory conditions mean more varied utility.
Let's say you play a game and lose. You are a sore loser and get angry. You go and take a dump on the floor in the other team's locker room.
Remind me never to invite Scott into my home to play a board game.
In the quoted text, I'm also referring to being given a choice between a 0.5 chance of winning and an explicitely less than 0.5 chance of winning because you want more data to estimate how close to 0.5 it is.
Hm another tricky situation. While it is definitely an essential part of mastering a game, it does fall into my extinction of playing for "outside of the game" factors even though in this instance, the factor is simply another instance of the same game. Maybe you could get this knowledge through self-study, and not need to play investigator while everyone else is trying to win?
I understand the perspective, and isolating the issue down to a specific instance and definition, I see how Scott and Rym can argue for the "Play to Win" attitude, but similarly I think that in the real world there are often metagames upon metagames upon metagames (etc.) upon games. Playing to win just one of the "games" (let's say, playing for maximum fun) might very well interfere with all the other objectives.
Easiest example of this in professional play to me is Starcraft. There are so many layers to professional starcraft, and for most of the players the actual final "win" objective is the path to the most money. That path might, at some point, even diverge from winning games (into advertising and promoting for example, at the cost of practice time that would help them win more matches). But even just in the context of the game, by playing for money, 2nd place becomes different from 1st place by a measurable (non-infinite) amount, to the point where taking a guaranteed 2nd is calculably better than a chance at 1st.
Contextual means within the context of the framework of the game.
Well, I knew that much. The question was whether "maximizing" that utility means that you always go for the most utility you can get, or if you just try to beat everyone else.
But even just in the context of the game, by playing for money, 2nd place becomes different from 1st place by a measurable (non-infinite) amount, to the point where taking a guaranteed 2nd is calculably better than a chance at 1st.
Agreed. But in that situation, you consider the entire tournament a game, wherein the payoff matrix is specified in money. Individual games are not games in themselves, but sub-games of the bigger game. ^_~
But even just in the context of the game, by playing for money, 2nd place becomes different from 1st place by a measurable (non-infinite) amount, to the point where taking a guaranteed 2nd is calculably better than a chance at 1st.
Agreed. But in that situation, you consider the entire tournament a game, wherein the payoff matrix is specified in money. Individual games are not games in themselves, but sub-games of the bigger game. ^_~
And the two overlap. Revealing a specific push you worked on in secret for over a week just with your training partners might win you the game within the game, but lose you the tournament when it could have potentially been revealed later. So by not "playing to win" within the individual game, and "playing to win" in the tournament... are you griefing within the individual sub-games?
"Playing to win" literally means "playing to maximize contextual utility." If the agreed-upon utility of a game is, say, victory points, then all players must attempt to acquire as many victory points as possible by whatever means necessary.
Typically the game will then state that whoever has the most victory points is, in fact, the winner. There's a significant difference between playing to maximize victory points, and playing to be the player with the most victory points.
Let me illustrate with examples: 1) You have a choice between two moves A)You get 1vp and all your enemies get 2vps B)Nothing happens In most games you would obviously choose B, but that clearly reveals that the utility is not vp maximisation.
You could say it's relative vp maximisation (i.e. vps relative to other players), but then let me bring another example in: 2) You know that player Y is going to get exactly 10vps at the end, and all other players will have less. You can choose between one of two strategies: A) You have a 70% chance of finishing with 11vps and a 30% chance of finishing with 0 vps You have a 100% chance of finishing with 9vps
Strategy A has a 70% chance of overall victory but an expected value of 0.77vps. Strategy B has a 0% chance of winning but an expected value of 9vps. In most games, you choose A.
So, in general the actual utility is not at all a matter of maximising victory points. The utility function is U(win) = 1, U(not win) = 0.
You maximize the percentage chance of you coming in first place.
Yes, that's what I've been arguing all along - I was demonstrating the flaw in Rym's statements. Unless of course you mean the tournament situation, in which case I must disagree strongly.
And the two overlap. Revealing a specific push you worked on in secret for over a week just with your training partners might win you the game within the game, but lose you the tournament when it could have potentially been revealed later. So by not "playing to win" within the individual game, and "playing to win" in the tournament... are you griefing within the individual sub-games?
Yeah, I shouldn't call them subgames - they don't meet the technical definition. The individual games within a tournament are not really games, and the only utility that is valid within them is still the utility of the tournament as a whole.
However, although looking at a tournament that way helps, other problems arise because utility != money. It means you're playing in a much more complex game where you're unsure of what the utility functions of the other players are, and even your own would likely be hard to define exactly.
I was typing out a similar scenario myself, but then decided to refresh the thread.
So, in general the actual utility is not at all a matter of maximising victory points.
This is my point of question as well. Does "maximize contextual utility" mean you must always pursue the highest amount of utility, or does it mean that you play in such a way that you wind up with more utility than everyone else?
However, although looking at a tournament that way helps, other problems arise because utility != money. It means you're playing in a much more complex game where you're unsure of what the utility functions of the other players are, and even your own would likely be hard to define exactly.
At some point, if everyone has their own utility "matrix" and is playing their own game (to win it of course), the idea of playing to win doesn't seem to say much of anything to me.
However, although looking at a tournament that way helps, other problems arise because utility != money. It means you're playing in a much more complex game where you're unsure of what the utility functions of the other players are, and even your own would likely be hard to define exactly.
At some point, if everyone has their own utility "matrix" and is playing their own game (to win it of course), the idea of playing to win doesn't seem to say much of anything to me.
Agreed. Monetary prizes for anything other than first place distort the situation, and if you want to encourage pure competition, you should only give out prizes for first place. However, if that's not how the tournament is set up, then that's not your fault; it's hardly unethical to play with the money in mind in that situation.
On the other hand, when there's no money involved, playing to maximise your chances of winning is the standard you should be held to.
Of course, real life is a game where you play to maximise expected utility, as with any other game.
Agreed. Monetary prizes for anything other than first place distort the situation, and if you want to encourage pure competition, you should only give out prizes for first place. However, if that's not how the tournament is set up, it's entirely reasonable to play with the money in mind.
Concerning monetary prizes, I always wonder about professional golf tournaments. They are sructured in such a way that many of the players get a payout. For example http://sports.yahoo.com/golf/pga/leaderboard/2011/18. 79th place still gets you over $10,000 for a few days of golfing. The top 15 players come away with six figures. It's insane. If you make it into the top 15 do you play conservatively in order to maintain your position? Or do you play for first place, and a possible 7 figure payout, but risk messing up and falling behind?
Probably depends of the golfer. Tiger goes for the win. Some nobody who won Q school a month ago will probably play more conservatively and blow what got them there in the first place.
It also depends on how close you are to the top, and how close you are to the end.
Groan. Got into a convo recently about ethical play in board games. What it comes down to is that people don't actually understand what the word ethical means. My argument is that as long as you are both A) playing by the rules and not motivated by an other factor outsie of winning the game, then you are always in the ethical right. What I mean is: don't cheat, and don't bring any meta factor into your play. If you are playing for second place, you are screwing up the game. If you are beating up on someone because they owe you $5, while knowlingliy passing up optimal moves, then you are messing up the game.
The opposition opinion was that certain moves make people feel bad, and that if you know they are expecting you to not play a certain way because of that, then it is unethical to do so. Unless you have turned this expectation into a house rule, I say these softies shouldn't be at the table.
Regarding the original subject and the topic of "ethics", I'm of the opinion that game or not, the status of an action is the same. If "making people feel bad" is wrong (not personally saying it is or isn't here), then it would still be bad to do it. As such I find it hard to imagine how playing for second place is "bad" in itself. Unless that's intrinsically bad somehow?
I play to win. Always. If the game reaches a point where I cannot win, I play to attain the highest possible place I can achieve, even if it means deliberately fucking over other players. Any system of ethics in which this is unethical is not a system of ethics I consider valid.
even if it means deliberately fucking over other players.
In fact, when first place is no longer an option, I sometimes go out of my way to dick over other players. I mean, I still try to place as high as possible, but I like to get unpleasant about it.
Screwing somebody over is a pretty sketchy set of terms really. If I steal your dice (literally, I take them from you without you noticing and keep them to myself), I'm a thief. If I "steal your dice" within the context of the rules of a game, I'm not given the same status as a thief. But if I keep those dice and take them home with me (and it wasn't a game where that's part of the rules everyone agreed to at the beginning/gambling), then I'm a thief. The difference between these actions isn't "the game".
At least that's how I see it.
Similarly, shit talking "can be ok", but if you cause someone emotional trauma with shit talking, game or not, you've done them some harm.
even if it means deliberately fucking over other players.
In fact, when first place is no longer an option, I sometimes go out of my way to dick over other players. I mean, I still try to place as high as possible, but I like to get unpleasant about it.
Yeah. That's generally how I play Monopoly when I get shanghaied into playing that piece of shit.
You place a bet on a game in which you are about to participate. That's unethical.
if you place a bet on yourself to LOSE and lose intentionally I would agree. What is the argument for placing a bet on yourself to win being unethical?
to expand on this, do you guy feel it is unethical to play a game you know is heavily in weighted in your favor or is structured to reward collusion between ostensibly competing players.
For example (taken from Freakonomics) sumos have been accused to cheating at the top level; higher ranked sumos will intentionally throw matches to allow sumos in danger of dropping out of the top league to keep their placement and retain the ability to earn large sums of money.
Another example would be Olympic athletes entering events they know their country is heavily favored to win due to technological or economic factors.
How about high altitude training vs blood doping. Both have the same physiological effect but one is considered cheating and the other is not.
How about forfeiting of a jousting match with the Black Prince to avoid causing him injury or death (ala The Knights Tale featuring Heath Ledger), potentially leaving England without an heir resulting in dynastic wars of succession (ala Dynasty Wars featuring Lu Bu).
The first time I play a game, I very rarely play to win. I play to work out which rules the person teaching the game might have missed. In other words, I try to break the game. If it holds up, I then start thinking about how I might go about winning, but even then I'm concentrating more on how the game works than on doing better than other players.
But mostly I play to have fun, with the game and with other people. Winning is part of that fun, but not always the most important part.
The first time I play a game, I very rarely play to win.
The first time I play a game, I play to win. However, since I am still learning to play, I concentrate on the most obvious path to victory. I don't try to do anything fancy. Games like Tigris & Euphrates, Agricola, Puerto Rico, and Caylus have a lot of stuff going on. There are multiple varied ways to score victory points in each game. However, each game also has one way to achieve victory points that is simple and obvious. T&E; you get points for adding times to your kingdom. Agricola you get points for animals and food. Puerto Rico you get points for the captain. Caylus you get points for the castle. The first time I play I find that easy and obvious path to victory points and hammer it as hard as possible and explore the other features of the game just a little bit along the way. I still try to win to the best of my ability and explore the games rules, simultaneously.
How about on later plays of the same game? Is there never anything you want from a game except to win?
I play a juggling/fighting game called 3 club combat. I happen to be one of the top players in the world, with only two other players who have beaten me with any consistency. Is it wrong that when I play with those obviously less skillful (read: anyone except a very small handful of players) that I don't play to win? If I did, those other players would never get any points, and I would walk away with it. I'm happy to mess about and try interesting moves and combinations. I'll still probably win, but along the way everyone has more fun. And if I don't win, it doesn't matter, as I'm not playing to win anyway. Which is cool.
Is it wrong that when I play with those obviously less skillful (read: anyone except a very small handful of players) that I don't play to win?
I'm nearly a (amateur) dan in go (its been a year or so since I've been playing seriously but I were around 2kyu then) and I love to play people who are brand new to the game. But I don't play to win as it were. I could give them a 9 stone handicap and they still maybe walk away with 1 point and no idea how the hell to play really. Unless I die or fall into a coma while we're playing I will win, period, full stop.
It would be nearly as unfair as me playing Gary Kasperov in chess or swimming against Michael Phelps.
There is no competition there. Only sound, crushing defeat for the poor newb.
I usually play someone who is so new as if I were playing someone who was of a nearly equal rank as me, so I don't make any crazy moves or weird gambits. I offer hints and suggestions and I usually only count their points. My experienced eye always tells me that I am ahead by 30+ points but at that level most beginners just see a mess of white and black and have no idea what just happened. It gives them a good fuzzy to know that against someone as experienced they got 30 points, it sounds like a lot and boosts their confidence. If they're curious I'll count out the 90 or so points I just got however it's not something I usually do. Not until they've played a few more games and have a better grasp of the situation.
Now in no way can I compare go to Agricola or any other board game except maybe chess or backgammon. It's a lot easier to become proficient in those games. It doesn't take years of study to get really good at those games. If I'm playing those games I'm playing to win, because even with a brand new player there is still a shot they can win. It maybe less than mine, but it's not zero.
As someone who has worn that newb Go hat many times, I am very familiar with the situation you describe. The thing is, even though you aren't playing to totally win, your winning is already a foregone conclusion. Since your odds of victory are already 100%, because the skill difference is so large, you can play however you like as long as you are still going to win.
The best comparison I can make is for Super Street Fighter IV. I'm not good at SSFIV. But, I did buy the game and a joystick, and I practiced for many weeks. While most players with actual skill could beat me without ever taking a hit, I was good enough to do the same to all my friends except Wyatt. Often what I would do is handicap myself and be like "I will only use jabs this fight." I would still win. I never allowed my chance of victory to be less than 100%, I just reduced the margin of victory. I took more damage, and the fight lasted longer, but I still won. That's the kind of thing that you can do when your skill is so vastly greater than your opponent's.
Comments
How do we consider multiple competing risk-reward choices? Like, if my choice is a very risky move that could pay off big, or a less risky move that pays off less, how do we gauge when it is ethical to make which decision? Hypothetically, both choices could constitute "maximizing contextual utility," just in different ways. Do we simply ignore the other factors that go into making that decision?
Easiest example of this in professional play to me is Starcraft. There are so many layers to professional starcraft, and for most of the players the actual final "win" objective is the path to the most money. That path might, at some point, even diverge from winning games (into advertising and promoting for example, at the cost of practice time that would help them win more matches). But even just in the context of the game, by playing for money, 2nd place becomes different from 1st place by a measurable (non-infinite) amount, to the point where taking a guaranteed 2nd is calculably better than a chance at 1st.
1) You have a choice between two moves
A)You get 1vp and all your enemies get 2vps
B)Nothing happens
In most games you would obviously choose B, but that clearly reveals that the utility is not vp maximisation.
You could say it's relative vp maximisation (i.e. vps relative to other players), but then let me bring another example in:
2) You know that player Y is going to get exactly 10vps at the end, and all other players will have less. You can choose between one of two strategies:
A) You have a 70% chance of finishing with 11vps and a 30% chance of finishing with 0 vps
Strategy A has a 70% chance of overall victory but an expected value of 0.77vps. Strategy B has a 0% chance of winning but an expected value of 9vps.
In most games, you choose A.
So, in general the actual utility is not at all a matter of maximising victory points. The utility function is U(win) = 1, U(not win) = 0.
You maximize the percentage chance of you coming in first place.
However, although looking at a tournament that way helps, other problems arise because utility != money. It means you're playing in a much more complex game where you're unsure of what the utility functions of the other players are, and even your own would likely be hard to define exactly.
However, if that's not how the tournament is set up, then that's not your fault; it's hardly unethical to play with the money in mind in that situation.
On the other hand, when there's no money involved, playing to maximise your chances of winning is the standard you should be held to.
Of course, real life is a game where you play to maximise expected utility, as with any other game.
It also depends on how close you are to the top, and how close you are to the end.
At least that's how I see it.
Similarly, shit talking "can be ok", but if you cause someone emotional trauma with shit talking, game or not, you've done them some harm.
to expand on this, do you guy feel it is unethical to play a game you know is heavily in weighted in your favor or is structured to reward collusion between ostensibly competing players.
For example (taken from Freakonomics) sumos have been accused to cheating at the top level; higher ranked sumos will intentionally throw matches to allow sumos in danger of dropping out of the top league to keep their placement and retain the ability to earn large sums of money.
Another example would be Olympic athletes entering events they know their country is heavily favored to win due to technological or economic factors.
How about high altitude training vs blood doping. Both have the same physiological effect but one is considered cheating and the other is not.
How about forfeiting of a jousting match with the Black Prince to avoid causing him injury or death (ala The Knights Tale featuring Heath Ledger), potentially leaving England without an heir resulting in dynastic wars of succession (ala Dynasty Wars featuring Lu Bu).
But mostly I play to have fun, with the game and with other people. Winning is part of that fun, but not always the most important part.
I play a juggling/fighting game called 3 club combat. I happen to be one of the top players in the world, with only two other players who have beaten me with any consistency. Is it wrong that when I play with those obviously less skillful (read: anyone except a very small handful of players) that I don't play to win? If I did, those other players would never get any points, and I would walk away with it. I'm happy to mess about and try interesting moves and combinations. I'll still probably win, but along the way everyone has more fun. And if I don't win, it doesn't matter, as I'm not playing to win anyway. Which is cool.
It would be nearly as unfair as me playing Gary Kasperov in chess or swimming against Michael Phelps.
There is no competition there. Only sound, crushing defeat for the poor newb.
I usually play someone who is so new as if I were playing someone who was of a nearly equal rank as me, so I don't make any crazy moves or weird gambits. I offer hints and suggestions and I usually only count their points. My experienced eye always tells me that I am ahead by 30+ points but at that level most beginners just see a mess of white and black and have no idea what just happened. It gives them a good fuzzy to know that against someone as experienced they got 30 points, it sounds like a lot and boosts their confidence. If they're curious I'll count out the 90 or so points I just got however it's not something I usually do. Not until they've played a few more games and have a better grasp of the situation.
Now in no way can I compare go to Agricola or any other board game except maybe chess or backgammon. It's a lot easier to become proficient in those games. It doesn't take years of study to get really good at those games. If I'm playing those games I'm playing to win, because even with a brand new player there is still a shot they can win. It maybe less than mine, but it's not zero.
The best comparison I can make is for Super Street Fighter IV. I'm not good at SSFIV. But, I did buy the game and a joystick, and I practiced for many weeks. While most players with actual skill could beat me without ever taking a hit, I was good enough to do the same to all my friends except Wyatt. Often what I would do is handicap myself and be like "I will only use jabs this fight." I would still win. I never allowed my chance of victory to be less than 100%, I just reduced the margin of victory. I took more damage, and the fight lasted longer, but I still won. That's the kind of thing that you can do when your skill is so vastly greater than your opponent's.