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Old 05-11-2008, 01:04 PM   #50
Zhiroc
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Join Date: Jan 2006
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Re: What Does "Fair" Mean?

In my opinion, there is no such thing as a perfect ideal named "fair".

There is, however, a quality that you can apply to some dimension of a game named "fair".

What do I mean? First, I think the concept of "fair" can only be described when there is some form of competition between players. To step away from MUDs, let's say two people are playing a "Myst"-style game. One solves all the puzzles, the other uses walkthroughs on the Web (or maybe even available in-game for all that this matters). Is this "fair"? I claim it is immaterial. If both players have had fun, it doesn't matter. Is the first player's fun diminished by the fact that the second person "cheated"? (If even that term can be applied.) No.

However, say the two people, or the game, starts to compare the players, and publish rankings of how fast players have solved it. Thus, competition comes into play, and therefore, "how" they progress matters.

Now consider MUDs. If you have a mostly pure PvE environment, is there competition? If not, then the only point of "fair" turns into ego points. "It took me x hours of gaming to get that level, I don't want someone spending $ to get it for free." (Yes, that is an oxymoron.)

So, the question is, what is it do you want to be "fair"? The work someone puts in to level? The money that they spend? Puzzles that they solve? The player's aptitude with strategy? The programmability of their client?

And sometimes it just doesn't work out how you think. To claim some "fairness" in PvP, does it matter if someone bought their way up, or have been there for years? In the end, the same character "power" is arrayed against you (though admittedly, not player skill--in that case, if you are trying to be ganked by someone 5 levels over you, wouldn't you rather be a bought up newbie?)

Specifically with pay-for-perks, generally speaking, in what matters to me, a system where money equalizes for time is much more "fair" than one where you can only buy the perks. However, there's a very sliding scale here. Having to spend $100s or even $1000s to equalize may sound fair, but unacceptable to me, as is the other way around, where I have to spend huge amounts of time to keep up with someone.
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