6 ms·

If you've ever played Risk online, this becomes obvious, very quickly. The worst players to have around are not your enemies, but the stupid ones. They'll rando

If you've ever played Risk online, this becomes obvious, very quickly. The worst players to have around are not your enemies, but the stupid ones. They'll randomly block your troops from attacking mutual enemies, accidentally bait you into attacking other players ("attack red together?" . "okay sure!" . hits three of their troops, after you hit thirty), not hold bonuses but not let you hold them either, waste all their troops on a useless endeavour, feeding the game to a third player, and so many more blunders. Sometimes, you really want to work with them, because they've tried to be nice to you, much more so than the rest of the players. Often, they fail miserably and drag you down with them. I'll take a smart enemy any day. Usually smart players don't want to be your enemy, unless you've done something to provoke them (oops... it's more fun). Even then, they'll ally with you in a heartbeat if you can take a mutually beneficial action. Something sobering to keep in mind is that the vast majority of people have the logical and mathematical capabilities of a good ten-year-old. There are ten-year-old chess grandmasters, USAJMO qualifiers, or to be less extreme, ten-year-olds that have a solid understanding of algebra and an intuition for proofs. Most people do not, and rely on heuristics or intuitions for everything. They do not even realize you can prove something, except with "it feels or seems right". It isn't because they're mentally incapable of learning the skill, it's because they never bothered to, or didn't think it was important.

SoftTalker 1y ago
Does this hold true for most multiplayer online games? I don't play, but my kids could often be heard yelling "why would you do that?!?" when they had a game going.
- ironman1478 1y ago
  This is really common in fighting games. Many okay players will get beat by really bad players who are really random. Better players in these games play in such a way as to mitigate effects of the randomness of their opponent.
  - programjames 1y ago
    That isn't a fair ranking. Some people are more idealist than you, and a priori want to believe others will play well. If you stick them in a lobby full of smashy noobs, they may not live long enough to update on those beliefs (within the single game). Of course, the same happens in reverse: if you go into a game assuming everyone is a smashy noob, and they're actually good at the game, you're going to end up in the losing position. The rate of mistakes changes the trembling-hand equilibria. The best players will, of course, figure out reputations for the other players as the game progresses, but calling some just 'okay' and others 'better' because they initialize the reputations to different values is not fair. Think about this: you've probably driven a car to get from Point A to Point B before. If you existed in a society where people were constantly making mistakes, in the sense of crashing their cars several orders of magnitude more often, driving a car to get from Point A to Point B is no longer a good strategy. But it usually is a good, if not the best, move you can make right now, because people aren't making mistakes that frequently. Here's another example: marriage (long-term relationships). Perhaps not all extra-marital affairs are mistakes, but a significant proportion of them are. If too many people are making these mistakes, leading to messy divorces, it's no longer worth it to even consider dating in the first place.
    - ironman1478 1y ago
      "but calling some just 'okay' and others 'better' because they initialize the reputations to different values is not fair" Why is it not fair? I was just stating how it goes. It's pretty well documented that the best players have the best defense, unless it's a game like UMVC3. The players at higher ranks tend to be better at playing defense and they just let their opponents kill themselves. They don't get blown up by wake up supers, dps, jump ins, etc. Okay players might be good at doing combos, but their game sense isn't great and they will frequently put themselves in positions to have the tables turned on them. They also don't focus on punishing mistakes and capitalizing on their defense. If you have good game sense, you can actually beat people really well with pretty mediocre execution. Even if you play multiple matches, these okay players will lose a surprising amount to the players who play randomly and are smashy noobs.
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anal_reactor 1y ago
> Something sobering to keep in mind is that the vast majority of people have the logical and mathematical capabilities of a good ten-year-old. I had a period of my life where I read a lot of "you're not special" on reddit, but then I finally understood that the ability to think logically on the most basic level already makes me very special. After spending some time with people from lower social classes and genuinely trying to bond with them I became elitist. These people just don't fucking think.
- elzbardico 1y ago
  The years made me realize that too, but there's also plenty of stupid people in upper-classes. And usually, contrary to the first ones, I can't escape having to deal with those.
  - anal_reactor 1y ago
    That's true.

SoftTalker 1y ago

Does this hold true for most multiplayer online games? I don't play, but my kids could often be heard yelling "why would you do that?!?" when they had a game going.

ironman1478 1y ago
This is really common in fighting games. Many okay players will get beat by really bad players who are really random. Better players in these games play in such a way as to mitigate effects of the randomness of their opponent.
- programjames 1y ago
  That isn't a fair ranking. Some people are more idealist than you, and a priori want to believe others will play well. If you stick them in a lobby full of smashy noobs, they may not live long enough to update on those beliefs (within the single game). Of course, the same happens in reverse: if you go into a game assuming everyone is a smashy noob, and they're actually good at the game, you're going to end up in the losing position. The rate of mistakes changes the trembling-hand equilibria. The best players will, of course, figure out reputations for the other players as the game progresses, but calling some just 'okay' and others 'better' because they initialize the reputations to different values is not fair. Think about this: you've probably driven a car to get from Point A to Point B before. If you existed in a society where people were constantly making mistakes, in the sense of crashing their cars several orders of magnitude more often, driving a car to get from Point A to Point B is no longer a good strategy. But it usually is a good, if not the best, move you can make right now, because people aren't making mistakes that frequently. Here's another example: marriage (long-term relationships). Perhaps not all extra-marital affairs are mistakes, but a significant proportion of them are. If too many people are making these mistakes, leading to messy divorces, it's no longer worth it to even consider dating in the first place.
  - ironman1478 1y ago
    "but calling some just 'okay' and others 'better' because they initialize the reputations to different values is not fair" Why is it not fair? I was just stating how it goes. It's pretty well documented that the best players have the best defense, unless it's a game like UMVC3. The players at higher ranks tend to be better at playing defense and they just let their opponents kill themselves. They don't get blown up by wake up supers, dps, jump ins, etc. Okay players might be good at doing combos, but their game sense isn't great and they will frequently put themselves in positions to have the tables turned on them. They also don't focus on punishing mistakes and capitalizing on their defense. If you have good game sense, you can actually beat people really well with pretty mediocre execution. Even if you play multiple matches, these okay players will lose a surprising amount to the players who play randomly and are smashy noobs.

deleted 1y ago

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anal_reactor 1y ago

> Something sobering to keep in mind is that the vast majority of people have the logical and mathematical capabilities of a good ten-year-old. I had a period of my life where I read a lot of "you're not special" on reddit, but then I finally understood that the ability to think logically on the most basic level already makes me very special. After spending some time with people from lower social classes and genuinely trying to bond with them I became elitist. These people just don't fucking think.

elzbardico 1y ago
The years made me realize that too, but there's also plenty of stupid people in upper-classes. And usually, contrary to the first ones, I can't escape having to deal with those.
- anal_reactor 1y ago
  That's true.