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With the Holy Trinity out, let's take stock of 5E
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<blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 6468638" data-attributes="member: 42582"><p>I am assuming that "pattern recognition" is not just a synonym for human perception and cognition.</p><p></p><p>The two best chess players I have personally known both went on to be professors of mathematics at major US universities. Of the two best M:TG players I have ever known, one has a PhD in programming, and the other was quite strong at undergraduate mathematics. Of the two best Diplomacy players I've known, one also went on to be a professor of maths at Caltech, the other is a financial analyst who was a leader in his team at building Excel models.</p><p></p><p>These are the sorts of skill-sets, and skill-set combinations, that I think of when I think of "pattern recognition", or of the significance of the fact, mentioned above by [MENTION=3192]howandwhy99[/MENTION], that M:tG was designed by a mathematician.</p><p></p><p>None of these individuals I've mentioned was, to the best of my knowledge, ever any good at football (any version), although the Caltech guy was also quite a fast sprinter as a teenager and the Excel guy was, for a while, an aerobics instructor.</p><p></p><p>No doubt tactics are important in football, just as they are important in a range of other fields of physical endeavour (eg warfare). But based on the recruiting practices of the Allied armies during WWII, the individuals who are good at "pattern recognition" in the chess/M:tG/maths sense don't generally get sent to be front-line soldiers. They are used as code-breakers, to solve optimisation problems in relation to supplies, etc.</p><p></p><p>When Gygax (PHB p 7) said that playing D&D "realy increases playing skill. Imagination, intelligence, problem solving ability and memory are al continually exercise by participants in the game," I don't think he was meaning to imply that playing D&D will improve your abiity as a footballer. I've certainly never heard anyone say that of themselves, whereas I have read posts where people point to the game as having improved their mathematical skills (in my own case, it taught me to calculate and reason with probabilities).</p><p></p><p>I agree there are overwhelming similarities. That's one reason why I generally find the term "story game" unhelpful, as the games that it ostensibly carves out (often, though not always, ones that the poster doesn't pesonally care for) are simply not that different from (say) AD&D.</p><p></p><p>From my point of view, there are two things that the typical RPG has in common, that are practically definitive of this genre of games. The most important, I think, is that there is an imagined world, a shared fiction, in which the events of the game are imagined as taking place - and (unlike, say, in Battleship or M:tG) this fiction <em>matters to the resolution of action declaration</em>. This means that playing the game is not strictly algorithmic; judgement calls have to be made.</p><p></p><p>The other is that each of the players, other than the referee, has principal custody of, and responsibility for, one particular character within this shared fiction. Many of the differences in play approach arise from varying the distribution and detailed responsibilities of these roles (eg different expectations about the functions of the referee, about the motivations to which playes are expected to have regard in playing their PCs, etc).</p><p></p><p>Just as, from the point of view of a non-RPGer, RPGs are overwhelmingy similar, so I imagine that from the point of view of a non-human human social passtimes would look overwhelmingly similar, whether football or tabletop game-playing (social, draw upon and challenge distinctively human perceptual and cognitive capabiities, etc). Still, for those of us within the club the distinctions can be worth drawing, I think.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="pemerton, post: 6468638, member: 42582"] I am assuming that "pattern recognition" is not just a synonym for human perception and cognition. The two best chess players I have personally known both went on to be professors of mathematics at major US universities. Of the two best M:TG players I have ever known, one has a PhD in programming, and the other was quite strong at undergraduate mathematics. Of the two best Diplomacy players I've known, one also went on to be a professor of maths at Caltech, the other is a financial analyst who was a leader in his team at building Excel models. These are the sorts of skill-sets, and skill-set combinations, that I think of when I think of "pattern recognition", or of the significance of the fact, mentioned above by [MENTION=3192]howandwhy99[/MENTION], that M:tG was designed by a mathematician. None of these individuals I've mentioned was, to the best of my knowledge, ever any good at football (any version), although the Caltech guy was also quite a fast sprinter as a teenager and the Excel guy was, for a while, an aerobics instructor. No doubt tactics are important in football, just as they are important in a range of other fields of physical endeavour (eg warfare). But based on the recruiting practices of the Allied armies during WWII, the individuals who are good at "pattern recognition" in the chess/M:tG/maths sense don't generally get sent to be front-line soldiers. They are used as code-breakers, to solve optimisation problems in relation to supplies, etc. When Gygax (PHB p 7) said that playing D&D "realy increases playing skill. Imagination, intelligence, problem solving ability and memory are al continually exercise by participants in the game," I don't think he was meaning to imply that playing D&D will improve your abiity as a footballer. I've certainly never heard anyone say that of themselves, whereas I have read posts where people point to the game as having improved their mathematical skills (in my own case, it taught me to calculate and reason with probabilities). I agree there are overwhelming similarities. That's one reason why I generally find the term "story game" unhelpful, as the games that it ostensibly carves out (often, though not always, ones that the poster doesn't pesonally care for) are simply not that different from (say) AD&D. From my point of view, there are two things that the typical RPG has in common, that are practically definitive of this genre of games. The most important, I think, is that there is an imagined world, a shared fiction, in which the events of the game are imagined as taking place - and (unlike, say, in Battleship or M:tG) this fiction [I]matters to the resolution of action declaration[/I]. This means that playing the game is not strictly algorithmic; judgement calls have to be made. The other is that each of the players, other than the referee, has principal custody of, and responsibility for, one particular character within this shared fiction. Many of the differences in play approach arise from varying the distribution and detailed responsibilities of these roles (eg different expectations about the functions of the referee, about the motivations to which playes are expected to have regard in playing their PCs, etc). Just as, from the point of view of a non-RPGer, RPGs are overwhelmingy similar, so I imagine that from the point of view of a non-human human social passtimes would look overwhelmingly similar, whether football or tabletop game-playing (social, draw upon and challenge distinctively human perceptual and cognitive capabiities, etc). Still, for those of us within the club the distinctions can be worth drawing, I think. [/QUOTE]
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