Two Different Attitudes Toward Chance
Photo by James Petts via Wikimedia Commons
What’s the first game you probably learned? Okay, probably “Peek-A-Boo” or something. Okay. That’s not what I want to talk about. Let’s move ahead a couple of years to the first board games you probably learn.
If I had to guess, I’d say something like a pen and paper version of “Tic-Tac-Toe”.
What’s the second? If I had to guess, I’d say something like Candyland or Chutes and Ladders.
Which is great because these two games have exactly the opposite attitudes towards chance. For the first game, the only chance involved might be when it comes to figuring out who goes first. After that, the game is fixed and there is no more chance. In the second game, the chance is related to either the deck of color cards or the roll of the dice. The winner is more or less fixed in either case, insofar as there is no real choice that they can make that will affect the outcome of the game. For Candyland, you’ve got the deck and to pull the cards. For Chutes and Ladders, there isn’t a lick of strategy outside of yelling something like “COME ON, FIVE!” or “JUST NOT TWO!” when you roll. And then you hit the ladder. Or the chute. And the game goes on, strategyless, until someone gets to the finish line.
These pure chance games are good to teach little ones how to play games because they have the structure of a game. They are the game you have to learn before you can learn to play a real game. Pick who goes first. Then go clockwise. Learn to sit still when it’s not your turn. Learn to not be a poor loser. Learn to not be a rich winner.
Games like Tic-Tac-Toe, however, are nothing but pure strategy. At first, you’re dealing with the fact that the best first move might appear to be the center but then, as you learn the subtle nuances of the game, that the best first move is really one of the corners. There are ways to always force a draw if you go second. Huh. Going first is better. You can do the corner thing.
And once you have the foundation of knowing how to wait your turn, knowing that the dice decide some things, and then that there are some strategies that are more subtle than others then you’re ready for REAL games. Like, say, Monopoly. Huh, the Oranges are the best properties in the game. Boardwalk and Park Place are nice, I guess, but they’re not the ones that are statistically landed on the most often. Huh. There are house rules. Huh, the house rules make the game last longer. Huh. This game kinda sucks.
Or Connect 4, aka “Gravity Tic-Tac-Toe”. Control the center. Some moves will allow your opponent to end the game. Don’t make those moves.
And then once you have games like Monopoly and Connect 4 down, you’re ready to see what the point of chance is for the game.
In pure chance games (Candyland, Chutes & Ladders), the point of chance is to allow even the little ones to win against the grownups. As games mature, the point of chance is to increase variance and give the kids who aren’t great at strategy a leg up…maybe…against the kids who are really good at strategy (other times, it’ll help them lap you that much quicker).
But, at the beginning, you quickly learn that there are two fundamentally different attitudes toward chance in a game along two poles. The one pole is when chance decides nothing more than who goes first. The opposite pole is when chance decides everything down to the winner of the game.
And once you have those two poles mapped out in your head, THEN you can really start to play.
My son and I were talking about this and I think there’s a third vector of games. There’s an entire class of games that require you to pay attention to things (and Tic Tac Toe does have some of this element). Slapjack, Memory, War, Solitaire – all of them penalize players for missing details or inattention in ways that directly affect the outcome of the game. Beyond chance and strategy, attention does affect the outcome of games.
Great piece! I enjoyed it BTW!Report
Another type of memory thing: for YEARS, no one in my family would play Trivial Pursuit with me, or, would only play it if I had to answer only “Sports” questions. I have one of those weird brains that latches on to dumb random facts (like: Tootsie Roll was the first commercially-sold wrapped candy and came out in 1896).
And yet, can I remember what I went to the store to buy? NOOOOOReport
As probably will not surprise you, I had the exact same problem. While it’s slipping now I used to know the hugest and most random assortment of crap that rendered me an unstoppable Trivial Pursuit killing machine. But yes when it comes to things like remembering the phone call I was supposed to make or did I pay the water bill, not so much
Also – Happy Birthday! I had to step away from the Twitters because I have several essays to finish but I was thinking about you and hoping it was a nice day. 🙂Report
it’s tomorrow….you didn’t miss it just yet. Though tomorrow is also my longest day AND they scheduled a faculty meeting during my one 45 minute break (aka “lunch”) so I will be eating my sad cup of yogurt while trying hard to figure out the most politic way to say “not it” on writing up the hellacious Program Review document for next year.Report
Oh good I’m glad I didn’t actually miss it! I hope it goes easy for you and someone slips you a cupcake along the way.Report
Hearts requires this also. My grandfather was ruthless at it, as he had a very good memory. He had one of those pre-computer computer jobs (he was a gear estimator for a ship building firm.) We would play with two decks of cards, so twice the number of hearts (26 possible) and two Black Maria’s and he would still be able to shoot-the-moon.
And with Trivial Pursuit, I would often play against my first wife teamed with her sister and mother. I would still win most games as I have a good memory for minutia. But like fillyjonk, I can loose my glasses on my face.Report
War? I thought that War was pretty predetermined by the deck?
Additionally, I’m trying to categorize Rock/Paper/Scissors and it’s a chance game that feels like worker placement.Report
If I didn’t notice who had the higher card my mom just kept going (so I missed my chance to do War) so I had to pay very close attention. I guess I thought that was part of the game and it’s always how I played it with my own kids.Report
The Piquet series of miniature wargames handled the chance-versus-strategy thing in an interesting way. There were three components:
One player at a time had “initiative,” meaning they could act. The other player could fire in response, but couldn’t necessarily “reload.” This initiative was random. Basically, each player rolls a d20. The player with the higher roll gets the difference in “initiative pips,” which they could spend to do stuff. Usually the winning player had a few pips, maybe 4 or 5. Sometimes they had 19. They could win initiative over and over again. You could never depend on getting initiative.
However, the “things you can do” were determined by a card deck. If the current showing card was “movement,” then you could move. If it was “reload,” then you could reload. It costs an initiative pip per unit to do that thing. You could only spend that point once per unit per card. It cost an initiative pip to turn the next card.
Combat results were highly random, but tended to be extreme. You didn’t “chip away” at enemies. You did a lot of damage, or none at all.
People complained that it was stupidly random, but the point was, you could never feel safe in your plans. Each initiative roll, each card turn, each combat roll, could change everything.
That said, the game still has a lot of opportunity for strategy. It’s not pure randomness. The decisions you make matter a lot.Report