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The fallacy of "easy" - Page 4

Blogs > SiskosGoatee
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PRJ
Profile Joined March 2014
31 Posts
Last Edited: 2014-07-09 15:26:18
July 09 2014 15:25 GMT
#61
On July 08 2014 21:14 Goofinator wrote:
Technically there is a skill ceiling in starcraft, but the point is that it is just so stupidly high that no human could ever reach it. The idea with the juggling example was to make things easy to understand. Regardless, the point still remains that because the races are different, one player might have an easier time doing the tasks they need to do to win whereas another player has a harder time but if they were able to do all the tasks they would win all the time.

Stop propagating this nonsense. There are rock-paper-scissors type interactions in starcraft, and rock-paper-scissors is a fundamentally un-masterable game. Starcraft (and essentially every multiplayer game with interactions with your opponents that's not incredibly simplistic) fundamentally has no skill ceiling, by design.

And yes, this means that games that are thought of as having a "low skill ceiling" like cod or hearthstone, are in fact, infinitely difficult and un-masterable. It doesn't mean they are good, but it does mean you cannot ever reach a skill ceiling.
Nebuchad
Profile Blog Joined December 2012
Switzerland12387 Posts
Last Edited: 2014-07-09 16:05:16
July 09 2014 16:00 GMT
#62
On July 10 2014 00:23 Big J wrote:
Define play and master.
Because I think you will inevitably have to define them - or the follow up words you describe them with - through something like:
- play: you can use the tool in a way that makes sense*
- master: you can use it in a way that significantly increases your chance to win with it
*making sense: helps you achieving the games' goals*
*the games goals: winning

At the end of the day you have to describe it through what you need to achieve with it.
E.g.: There is absolutly no benefit in being able to be the fastests overlord dancer in the game, regardless of being incredibly hard mechanically. So despite being able to master this discipline, it does not help you with achieving your goals, so it does not make Zerg harder to play.


To say something like that you have to assume that every strategy is equally hard to pull off, which can't really be argued.

If I discover a build that gives me 80% winrate, the build will be both strong and easy, because if I can execute it, most people can.
If someone discovers a build that gives 80% winrate to people who have 360 apm and excellent multitasking and micro, the build will still be strong, because it will give some people 80% winrate. Still you can't say it's easy to do. Sure, it makes the game easy for the people who can execute it, but that's not what we mean by easy in this context.
No will to live, no wish to die
Big J
Profile Joined March 2011
Austria16289 Posts
July 09 2014 16:30 GMT
#63
On July 10 2014 01:00 Nebuchad wrote:
Show nested quote +
On July 10 2014 00:23 Big J wrote:
Define play and master.
Because I think you will inevitably have to define them - or the follow up words you describe them with - through something like:
- play: you can use the tool in a way that makes sense*
- master: you can use it in a way that significantly increases your chance to win with it
*making sense: helps you achieving the games' goals*
*the games goals: winning

At the end of the day you have to describe it through what you need to achieve with it.
E.g.: There is absolutly no benefit in being able to be the fastests overlord dancer in the game, regardless of being incredibly hard mechanically. So despite being able to master this discipline, it does not help you with achieving your goals, so it does not make Zerg harder to play.


To say something like that you have to assume that every strategy is equally hard to pull off, which can't really be argued.

If I discover a build that gives me 80% winrate, the build will be both strong and easy, because if I can execute it, most people can.
If someone discovers a build that gives 80% winrate to people who have 360 apm and excellent multitasking and micro, the build will still be strong, because it will give some people 80% winrate. Still you can't say it's easy to do. Sure, it makes the game easy for the people who can execute it, but that's not what we mean by easy in this context.

In that second case, the build will be easy for > 360APM and hard for others. Which to me is the same as the build being too powerful on a high level and weaker below. That does not contradict each other. But when discussing that build, you have to make clear that it is over-/underpowered at a certain level. Unlike e.g. Terran currently, which is umderpowered at most/all levels.

PS: I dont believe such dynamics to that degree exist in Starcraft. With my main indicator for that being that when a race e.g. Terran was strong on Korean level, you'd usually find strong Terran foreigners and a higer representation in the upper leagues. And when weak vis-verca. (Think 2010-11 vs 2012 or 2014)
Other example would be Zerg (2010-11 vs 2012-14)
Strong racial performances seem to radiate into all leagues/skilllevels.
Nebuchad
Profile Blog Joined December 2012
Switzerland12387 Posts
July 09 2014 17:51 GMT
#64
It's mostly semantics I think. Like I said, you can say the build makes the game easy for the people who can execute it. If that's what you mean by ease, then you're right that ease=power. I would use "easy" in the context of execution, in which case it obviously doesn't mean the same thing as "strong". I think most people understand "easy" the same way I do, but I guess I could be wrong.
No will to live, no wish to die
Djzapz
Profile Blog Joined August 2009
Canada10681 Posts
July 09 2014 20:12 GMT
#65
When I played SC2, I played Protoss and always felt like it was the most intuitive of the 3 races. And yet I felt like Terran was easier. In SCBW which I played a lot more, I felt like Protoss was both more intuitive and easier (and I played Protoss back then too). Always felt like Zerg was harder and the least intuitive if you want your build to line up and to make sense. I can't explain it but that's just how I felt about it.

But all those gut feelings are just about how easy it is to play and to sync in a vacuum, and I always felt like if you play at even a semi-decent level, they're all basically equally difficult to play properly. You might say that larva inject is hard to master and warping units at pylons is easy and stupid, but really once you've played the game for a while, the mistakes that the players of a given level make kind of average out, so Protoss is not disproportionately easy to play properly. It's easy to play for grandmas provided they'll play against other grandmas.
"My incompetence with power tools had been increasing exponentially over the course of 20 years spent inhaling experimental oven cleaners"
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