CHANGING ATTITUDES
September 22, 2019
Keep Learning and Growing
The older I get, the more I find I have yet to learn.
My most recent learning experience included the games Wingspan and Crown of Emara. I had a terrible luck with both games, but I think I handled the second experience better, and will endeavor to do better in my next similar experience.
Luck is an element in most games, and it's so easy to let bad luck ruin the fun. But with the right attitude, you can still have fun. And more importantly, you can avoid hurting the experience for others.
Wingspan
I had played this game several times before and always enjoyed it, regardless of whether I scored well or poorly. But one particular session of the game just had me doomed from the start. All of the bird cards I was dealt required 3 resources, with duplicates, making it impossible for me to play a bird the first turn. None of them had what I considered useful powers. Neither of my bonus cards matched any of them in any way. And none of them matched the first two common goals. I announced this to other players when I should have kept my mouth shut. As the game progressed, my luck did not improve. By the end of the first round, I still had not taken any action beyond the minimal base actions of take 1 card, take 1 resource, or take 2 eggs. It was clear I was going to lose, while others were enjoying themselves with the fun combinations they were getting. I am ashamed to say that despite trying to stay quiet about it, I complained several times. The rest of the time I was silent and brooding, trying to figure out a options to at least score a little bit. Sorry, Marlin.
Crown of Emara
My only real bad luck in this game was the random choice of start player, which put me as last player. Although I have to admit that the game design is generally pretty good, I still believe it has a serious turn order flaw, especially in the four player game. For details, see my Turn Order article.
But I think I handled the situation a little better this time. Right from the start I could see that turn order was giving me a disadvantage. I tried to plan out my turns ahead of time, but on my first turn each of my first 3 preferred choices had already been taken by the other players. So I went with my fourth choice, and played through the game without much (for me) complaining.
But as the end of the game approached, it came to the point where I felt like flipping the table. I couldn't stop myself from exclaiming aloud when someone took the last card that would have saved me from scoring poorly. I tried to explain how the game gave a strong advantage to the start player and a strong disadvantage to the last player. The start player didn't understand, but Chris, who had brought the game, patiently taught it, and was 3rd player, understood my frustration. He even posted about it on BGG the next day, asking if others had found a solution for the problem. Thanks, Chris.
Recent Cooperative Game
At a recent convention, I played a semi-cooperative game. It was not a game I would have chosen, nor were all the players people I preferred playing with. But it was what was available at the time, so I tried to make the best of it. After a fast rules explanation, I made a mistake due to my mis-understanding a rule. One of my teammates basically tried to ignore my existence after that, not listening to my suggestions and doing things without my input even on my turn when I was supposed to make the decisions. But the other teammate was patient and re-explained, helping me make better decisions on future turns. I held my tongue most of the time, and politely reminded the inconsiderate teammate that it was MY turn only once. So I tried to focus on other elements of the game, commenting on the good things such as how strongly the game matched it's theme. Although it was not a great experience for me, I felt that my attitude had kept the experience pleasant for the other players and therefore I didn't feel so bad after the game finally ended.
Improving Gaming Behavior
I've noticed behaviors from other games that I want to try to avoid. I want to avoid behaving similarly myself, and I also want to avoid playing with those players who repeat their negative behaviors. Example: I'd prefer not to play a cooperative game with the player mentioned earlier in this blog.
Another behavior I'm trying to get better at is the tendency to make quick judgments in the first few turns of a game or even after the first full play of a game. In the past I often gave a particular game just one shot, and refused to play it again if I didn't enjoy that first play. I think most people tend to enjoy games more when they score well, and dislike games where they had bad luck or hadn't gone far enough through the game's learning curve. Now I try to give a game a second chance, and have discovered some favorites among games that I didn't like at first.
I have learned that my gaming preferences include games that avoid direct conflict between players, minimal "take that" and I generally dislike horror themes. So my new rule is I'll try almost any game that others really want to play if it lasts less than an hour.
I'm also trying to avoid locking in first impressions of other gamers. If a player is not following good gaming etiquette, I will try to politely remind them. If they seem to have a poor attitude, I will remind myself of situations when I had a poor attitude and try to give them another chance in a future game. But I'll still avoid playing with someone who has ruined my fun on more than one occasion.
(By the way, don't tell me not to judge people. Everyone is constantly judging others, whether they admit it or not. If you state that my judging people is bad, then you are judging me. Usually when someone says "don't judge me, but..." they are about to admit to something they know is of doubtful morality. And if no one judges anyone, then our society will move even further toward amoral chaos.)
Future Gaming
I think I have learned something from these experiences. Now I need to try to put my learning into action. But it won't be easy. My nature is to whine loudly, as many of my friends are painfully aware. Some of my closest gaming friends already know to remind me when I've been whining too much. Thanks, buddies, please keep doing that when I relapse.
So in future, I will continue to try to minimize my whining. It's hard for me to differentiate a simple comment such as "darn, I rolled a 1 again" from what others may consider to be annoying poor sportsmanship, but I'll keep trying. The alternative of sitting silent, as I have sometimes done in the past when losing, is also not as fun for my competitors as when I participate with a positive attitude. I think a factor is tone of voice, so I'll work on that.
But as a designer, I will also continue to analyse each game I play. I'll try not to do so quite as much during the game, but to save most discussion of the game mechanics for after scoring. I've found that my initial impression sometimes changes after the game progresses. If, after the first play of a game, I feel that it's a good game with a serious flaw, I'll try to give it another chance and watch for similar issues during the next play. And if the same issue still seems to exist during a second play, I'll suggest a house rule to fix it. Or design a new game that's (hopefully) better.
Candy Weber is the designer of BoardGameGeek: The Card Game, Universal Victory Point Cards, and Trios (coming soon from Flying Lemur Games.)