Confessions of a Meta-gamer
by GSMX
I don’t play every new game with blinders on. I meta-game! There I said it, but I’m certainly not alone.
Meta-gaming is a term that can get tossed around a little loosely these days. There’s very black-and-white bad meta-gaming…
From PlayDiplomacy.com 2013 House Rules: "Meta-gaming: Actions taken in a game which are based on information or events outside that game, whether in other games or based upon personal relationships with other players. Actions prohibited under meta-gaming include entering the game with a preset alliance, entering the game without the intention to win, playing as a team in more than one game, cross-game agreements and retaliating in one game as “revenge” for what happened in another game."
But then there are also rules in place that sound great in theory but tend to bump against human nature a little bit...
"All players in a game should be treated equally.”
"No referring to past games."
"Entering a game with the preset idea of attacking a specific player…"
Do we all try our best to turn off past experiences every time we walk into a game? We want to, we mean to. We know how a person played in one game isn't necessarily the same approach they'll take in this game. Everybody deserves a clean slate while past experience, personal knowledge, past emotions, and all that available information ought to have no bearing.
Realistic? Not particularly, at least not once you've been around for a while.
I freely admit that, on occasion, I've let past games bias my judgment on wanting to not ally with a player due to past headaches caused by personality conflict. I've specifically sought out games with strong players I want to challenge myself to beat. I've had reluctance to put trust in players with very high solo rates, and I've beendrawn to ally with players with high draw rates, assuming them more loyal. I've researched players to study their strategy, loyalty, temperament based on shout boxes, and level of competition. It's not easy to choose to ignore your own
knowledge. Try being a top ranker and expect to be treated like every other player in a public game: there's a reason we often choose to play anonymous games.
At the end of the day it's a relatively small community of active players with a good deal of accessible history and, personally, I really love this dynamic of the site. I like that players have to take into consideration their reputation beyond a single match-up, I find it an extremely interesting twist. History matters here, and it impacts how you have to approach the game. I enjoy the homework aspect of preparing strategy and I highly respect those who do homework when playing against me, as it elevates the game and forces me to constantly evolve. This helps make PlayDiplomacy an extremely fascinating place to play and I wouldn't change a thing. Well, maybe one…
Am I saying meta-gaming is a concept too abstract to govern? Emphatically not! There are absolutely lines not to be crossed. Do homework, just don't use history as an in-game influence on others (“Hey, check out game #... you can see that dude is a proven liar”). Have opinions on players, but try to keep an open mind in new games (more fun that way anyways). Try not to hold onto grudges (good life philosophy also). And, really, it's just a good rule of thumb to try to avoid games blending together; I generally pass on "rematch" games or requests from players I just played to participate in a new game just starting. A little distance of time goes a long way in keeping games fairly separate in your head.
The whole meta-gaming concept is a tricky business, with a very difficult challenge in drawing some of those lines, and even more difficulty detecting and enforcing bans on some of the less blatant examples. To what extent should we chastise or demonize a person for finger pointing at a player who's got a high win rate, in-game whispers about two players who had played each other multiple times in the past, encouragement to pick me as your ally because I’m much more reliable than “Our other neighbour who .. let’s just say I had a look at his publicly available surrender rate, but not suggesting you should do that...” All of these fall under the we-don't-want-you-to-do-that category, but it’s very (too?) idealistic to believe it doesn't happen or expect it not to.
People who talk, gossip. It's part of the social game. I’d suggest rather than fight it, we just embrace it.