Balance Chance and Skill

Consider the Target Audience

Who is the player?

• This is an important question, often the first one that a designer asks.

• Different players have different levels of tolerance for chance and skill.

Children

• Many adults assume it's easy to design a game for children.

• However, to make a game that is simple and compelling is quite complicated.

Competitive Gamers

Players with a competitive streak tend to prefer games with more elements of skill.

Why would designers add luck to skill-based games?

• It keeps things unpredictable, increases replayability, and allows players of slightly differing skills to compete.

• The greater the amount of luck in the game, the greater the potential difference between the players' skill levels while still allowing for a good game.

Even a small random element can take some of the sting out of losing.

Social Gamers

Social gamers play to socialize and to talk with friends.

• Those who like to play for primarily social reasons don't care much about intense strategy.

• Some may perceive that strategy takes away from the "fun" of the game.

  • It's all about the play experience, win or lose.

• A greater range of luck is tolerated but there still needs to be enough interesting decisions.

• Especially decisions that affect other players, which leads to social play.

  • Again, the greater the luck in a game, the more even the playing field.

Professional Players

Games that can be played professionally tend to have extremely strong skill components.

• Many of these games have no luck at all.

• Others do have some luck, but the skill elements outweigh the luck.

Families

Some games are targeted at families that play games together.

• These groups may contain a mix of young children, older children, competitive teenagers or adults, and social adults.

• Designing a game that can appeal to all ages is challenging, but not impossible.

Generally, family games tend to have certain traits:

• Short playing time, so as not to outlive the attention span of youngsters.

• Relatively simple rules, so they can be taught to children.

• Some elements of luck, to allow children and social players to have a chance of winning against the more competitive players.

• Some elements of skill with interesting decisions, to keep the adults entertained and engaged.

Playtesting for Luck/Skill Balance

How do game designers know if their game has too much luck or not enough?

• There are some warning signals when observing playtesters.

The players are bored.

There is too much luck in the game, or have too low frequency of interesting decisions.

• To fix this: convert some random elements to player decisions, or else shorten the length of the game.

The players are bored on all but their turn.

Odds are your game isn't as immersive as it could be.

• To fix this: Find a way for players to engage with other players through gameplay, or else make turns shorter.

The players never become engaged, or seem confused about what to do.

The game is too complicated, or that there are too many decisions, or there is too much information for the players to process.

• To fix this: Remove some decisions, automating them or making them random, or reduce the complexity of the rules in general.

One player beats all of the other players by a wide margin.

This suggests the game has too many skill elements.

• To fix this: Add some randomness to the game, or add mechanics that make it easier for players who are behind to catch up.

Exchanging Luck and Skill

There are many specific ways to alter the mix between chance and skill in a game.

• Adding randomness increases the amount of luck in the game.

• Removing random elements results from automating them or replacing them with player decisions.

• Decisions can be added by replacing automatic rules.

• Player decisions can involve thinking, or twitch.

  • When a twitch game exceeds a player's skill, it becomes luck.

This means that adding an extremely difficult twitch element to a game can actually widen the gap between beginner and expert.

Combining Luck and Skill

Games may have elements of chance, twitch skill, or strategic skill, but one always has the strongest influence on the game's outcome.

Games of Chance

Games that are primarily chance tend to fall into one of two categories: children's games and gambling games.

• For children's games, adding elements of strategic skill is acceptable in small amounts.

  • They can even make the game into more of a family game that's palatable to adults.

  • Adding twitch skill is also possible but care must be taken not to give an unfair advantage to the adult.

• For gambling games, adding elements of skill (either kind) is quite possible.

  • If those elements are strong enough, they can even convert the game to being primarily skill-based.

  • Even the illusion of skill is enough to make some gambling games more interesting — Some players feel that winning or losing is always in their power, since they have free choice, and this adds a compelling element to an otherwise dull game.

Games of Twitch Skill

It is difficult to add much luck or strategy to a primarily twitch-based game: The fun of twitch games comes from the mastery of a difficult dexterity challenge.

• Any elements of chance serve to remove control of the outcome from the player, which reduces the ability of a player to master th:ame, which in turn makes the game less fun.

• Tactical elements are common in twitch games, especially those that involve shooting.

  • However, heavier strategy can be disruptive and can remove the player from the flow of the game.

Twitch games are an adrenaline rush, and stopping the action so the player can strategize breaks the immersion in the gameplay.

Games of Strategic Skill

• Adding minor twitch elements to a strategy game can be a pleasant way to break up long stretches of strategy with a bit of action.

• Adding luck to a strategy game can widen the audience by allowing players of differing skill levels to play, while still allowing the weaker player to win occasionally.

  • Too much luck can take the thrill out of winning, if a player feels that he only won because of random events.
  • The acceptable amount of luck to add depends on the target audience.
  • Competitive gamers will generally tolerate only a small amount of luck, while social and family gamers can accept larger amounts.