gataka
Let's not derail this further.
Interesting topic, but yes; there's plenty to discuss here without getting into all of that. sweatdrop
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Gavyn the Mighty
forfeiting because you are losing, to me, seems very unsportsmanlike
Forfeiting in the hopes of denying your opponent his rewards is unsportsmanlike. Forfeiting because you no longer have an interest in playing this game - whether it's because you're losing or for any other reason - is not.
If you came into the game in the interest of winning, leaving when that interest is no longer attainable is perfectly logical - when 'honour' exists at-odds with logic, logic wins. If I go to an ice cream parlour that is no longer serving ice cream, is it unsportsmanlike for me to leave and find an ice cream parlour that is? And would it not be completely daft of me to leave my money there is if they were selling ice cream, even though they're not? Because I'm afraid that's precisely what you're suggesting. sweatdrop
Games are an entertainment medium - they are systems which convert 'minutes of my life' (among other things) into 'fun'. I invest 'minutes of my life' in the interest of receiving 'fun' in return; I play the game because I believe it offers that exchange favourably. What you're suggesting is that when that exchange ceases to be favourable, I should continue investing in it out of 'sportsmanship' - that because I began investing when it was worthwhile, I am somehow bound by honour to invest even when it isn't. That even though this parlour is no longer offering the ice cream I came for, I should keep throwing money at them because I was able to buy some on my last visit. No matter how good the ice cream may have been, that simply isn't an effective use of one's resources.
And what if that ice cream parlour suggested that because I didn't 'stick it out' and give them my money anyway, they were going to charge me more (or give me less) the next time I came to visit - that they were penalising me because they failed to offer a reasonable exchange. Does that seem like a sound business strategy? Would you visit there again?
In actively playing, a game is constantly requesting that the player reinvest their own resources into it; the game is trying to 'sell' its fun in exchange for the player's time. Like any customer, players have the right to refuse that request at any time they see fit; prior investment is not an obligation, and it is the seller's - that is, the game's - responsibility to make that request as attractive as possible. The right to forfeit, to stop investing their time, is a fundamental right of the player - any attempt to coerce players into waiving that right is unnatural, and unjustifiable. As I've said many times before already, the problem here is not that the game is allowing players to forfeit freely - players have the right to forfeit freely, and anything else would be a denial of that natural right - but because it is penalising those involved for exercising that right in the first place. The only way in which the game can rightfully avoid the sorts of situations you're proposing is by making the investment of time in the game more attractive - it should be giving players a reason to want to keep playing, not giving them reasons to not stop.
What the game really needs are better comeback features (Number 4 if you're counting, gataka wink ), so that players in losing positions don't feel that concession is their best option - players should always have a chance to win (or feel like they do, at least), and they should always have some idea of what they need to do in order to achieve that. If these things were true, players simply wouldn't be inclined to forfeit in the first place. The question of 'who will win' needs to remain unanswered for as long as there are two or more players left in the game - if a player is in a position where they can't win anyway, the game should just kick them out itself. If the game fails to do that, then you really can't fault the player for taking it upon themselves... redface