2nd Anniversary Announcements & Risks and Rewards
Jan 15, 2012 21:20:04 GMT -8
Post by t3h Icy on Jan 15, 2012 21:20:04 GMT -8
I haven't written anything about Pokemon in awhile, and thought to bring up discussion about risk and reward ideas in RBY.
Before that though, I want to update everyone on what's up with the site. First off, we finally have Pokemon Online, which is awesome, but it's still Stadium (not RBY) and it is still quite buggy. It's nice to see a bunch of our players in the top 10 ladder for what that's worth though. =)
About RBYPlus, I'm about ~95% done with it, but left it alone awhile back as I've been busy with University and stuff. I'll complete it when it's ready to actually be played (when PO is bug-free and preferably RBY). All that's left is some minor bug fixing with how I edited the moves and it will be finished when it needs to be, so don't worry about it getting forgotten.
And now the main announcement is that we're coming close to March, which is our anniversary month, and like last year, we will be hosting a huge tournament again. We had a few small problems with the tournament last year, such as motivation and slowness, but we'll be changing things up to adjust for that. For one, the tournament will not have Pools, and will be straight to a Double-Elimination Bracket, and no players will be starting in Losers' Bracket. Also, we usually have no problems with 2/3 sets as far as random luck comes, but after how Stips won by sheer luck against Crystal, WaterWizard and myself, we may do 3/5 sets from Round 1 to Grand Finals this time.
The bracket will also not be random and will be made by me, later shown to staff for suggestions and changes, and then made public to fix anything else before actually starting the tournament. We want the bracket fair, balanced and with the different communities spread out. Last time, we had a few sections of the bracket that were very easy (Jackal's Winners' bracket, Chaser's Losers' Bracket), while other sections were basically death (Crystal vs Earthworm for 13th, Posthuman vs Majintupacz round 2). We also ended up with mostly 2K10 in the upper half of Losers', with all of our guests in the bottom half.
So yeah, it will be a bit of a messy process to setup, but it will be done very carefully and reviewed by everyone to make sure everything is fine.
Oh and, there will be cash prizes again. There's still discussion about it, but I'll just say, since this tournament is RBY and will be played on Netbattle (not Pokemon Online) you'll definitely want to practice up for this! ;>
---
So about risk and rewards, I'm sure most players here know about this, but it's fun to discuss and perhaps any newer players can learn something. For any game that has random chance and/or requires prediction against an opponent(s), there is the game theory of risk vs reward. First let's give these a simple definition. A risk is a negative outcome, and a reward is a positive outcome, and one of them comes out as the result of anything involving luck/prediction.
Most strategy and action games have some or many, many options, and each of these have a certain amount of risk and certain amount of reward. For example, using Surf compared to Hydro Pump is a low-risk, low-reward move, while Hydro Pump is a medium-risk, medium reward. When Hydro Pump is used, the player may end up missing, but since it's only 20% to happen, it's only a small risk, while the extra damage compared to Surf is a better reward as it's more damaging.
Risks and rewards per situation are not static and change depending on the situation. If Zapdos is using Thunder against Starmie for a needed OHKO, there's a high risk of missing or not doing enough damage, but there's also a high reward for getting the OHKO. If this is happening at the start of the match though, the risk of missing may not cost the game, and the reward may not be good enough to keep the opponent from winning. Risks and rewards tend to be amplified when the game's outcome is at stake or when they can get a player closer to winning/losing.
So now that we know what risk and rewards mean, how does this work with RBY? Well, most of the game is based on luck and prediction, so this concept comes into play for almost every turn. Playstyles can also develop around playing with this, as a bold player may want to go for the high-risk, high-reward tactics more often, and another may prefer consistency and stick to low-risk, low-reward moves.
The development of a metagame is based on what strategies give the highest rewards, while having the lowest risks. Tauros for example is a very low-risk, high-reward Pokemon as he has virtually no bad match-ups, can cause major damage to an opponent's team without the need of inaccurate move or prediction, and is statistically one of the better Pokemon. Ditto on the other hand is high-risk, low-reward as he very rarely can provide help for winning the game. Using Ditto often results in playing 5v6, and even if he is fortunate, he can usually only take out just one Pokemon. This is why Tauros is OU and on almost every team, while Ditto is NU and never seen in serious matches.
The metagame also works to balance out tactics and have opponents ready for certain strategies. Zapdos for example is a low-risk, high-reward Pokemon, and arguably moreso than even Tauros. In response to this however, Golem and Rhydon become used, and can still serve a purpose outside of just battling Zapdos (unlike using Cloyster/Articuno/Kingler for Tauros). This then changes Zapdos' risk/reward amounts and why he later becomes considered worse in general than Tauros. Zapdos has higher maximum potential though, but also has a much lower average potential, thus making him a high-risk, very high-reward Pokemon in the OU metagame. If the opponent has Golem/Rhydon, Zapdos' risk problem comes into play, and without them, Zapdos is much more likely to sweep a bunch and any Pokemon (the reward).
Moves also are risk/reward. Explosion's greatest risk is being used on Gengar and doing absolutely nothing, costing the user, but is the strongest Physical (and overall) move which is helpful for taking out Chansey and Alakazam (and just about anything), and at the cost of a nearly fainted Pokemon, is a very nice reward. While Explosion is a consist move in itself, the situation where it's used comes into play and Explosion's risk/reward goes up and down.
All of this plays into how you should be building your team and how you should be selecting your options in a game. During a game, a player always has at most 9 options, and each of them will have varying risk/reward amounts per turn. Because of the dynamics of RBY, it's not simple to say which is the best option for every possible turn, and more often, the best decision is also based on what the opponent's is. RBY turn-based, but both players select their moves blindly, so prediction is helpful in winning. With prediction, a player can decrease the risk in moves, just by knowing the negatives of that option won't come into play. To better explain this, assume a player is about to use Explosion and the opponent has Chansey out with Gengar on the switch. This is naturally a risk, but if the user of Explosion is confident in predicting no switch to Gengar, then Explosion's natural risk decreases. Of course though, no player has even close to 100% accuracy with their predictions, so there is always a risk. On top, the game has 255s, so even perfect plays with "100%" accurate moves have risks too.
Pressure is a term used for when one player is putting another into a bad and risky situation. An example would be having Tauros out against Chansey in death range of Hyper Beam, but also aware of perhaps using Blizzard against the possible Rhydon switch-in. Tauros is pressuring the opponent because they have a greater average chance to gain from this situation, and are on the offensive. This means that an incorrect decision by the opponent can cost them. Tauros also has the low-risk/low-reward option of Body Slam if the player feels going all out is not necessary to help win the game.
Pressure is for offensive purposes to control the opponent and restrict their options, thus making them easier to predict correctly. It supports a player's abilities to predict the opponent by allowing them the greatest rewards, ignoring the risks. While superior defensive play can outdo and overcome pressure, RBY is mainly an offensive game, so good players tend to know how to pressure their opponents well. Sometimes pressure can come from just having a certain Pokemon (commonly Tauros), but pressure can come from specific situations too (Aerodactyl charging on the switch).
So how does this all come together to become a better player? A good player should be aware of all the risks and rewards in selecting each Pokemon and each of their moves for a team, and should be aware of all the options for each turn of a game. Weighing out the risks and rewards of each turn tends to lead to making bold moves as RBY is offensive. If a player is not playing offensively, they will either be doing less per turn than the opponent overall and slowly lose, or inevitably be put into risky situations at the opponent's desires and not theirs'. Therefore, to be a good player in RBY, the player has to make some risky moves at least somewhat often, and more often than not, these risks come from correctly predicting the opponent.
Predicting the opponent is simple on paper, considering they have at most 9 options, but complicated with the psychology due to each player choosing each turn blindly. Prediction in Chess for example is the opposite where the number of options is greatly increased, but a player makes each moves before/after the opponent does. Prediction is hard to explain overall as the human mind is complex, but it's something that comes naturally for players good at it that understand it, and for others takes a lot of practice to develop. This is a good article about prediction.
To use myself as an example with how risks/rewards comes into my gameplay, I dislike luck affecting my matches too much and have always used consistent moves/Pokemon and tune the general synergy of the team to be consistent too. However, I've focused a lot of my time in becoming a better player by developing my prediction skills so that I can play high-risk, high-reward and succeed more often than not (dependent on opponent of course). I believe that prediction is the absolute most important aspect of winning in RBY, so that's why I've spent the most time on it. By having good prediction, I also often pressure the opponent, and to help make this even stronger, I've spent a lot of time learning about damage ranges, match-ups, etc, to make my pressure more versatile and deadly. But, I also love game theory and for friendly matches I like to use odd Pokemon or weird strategies. Aerodactyl is a super-high risk/high reward Pokemon, but if I'm playing well, the risk goes down and Aerodactyl works out to be a fairly balanced Pokemon. Of course though, that any Rock or Electric shuts down his main strength (Sky Attack) completely, so I wouldn't dare use him in tournament, unless I'm confident that the opponent won't use one.
I also dislike using Gengar, but I do recognize him as a pretty good Pokemon. While he does play a lot on prediction anyway, I personally don't feel he's all that useful without putting something to Sleep and Hypnosis is a risky move, so I don't use him. Of course though, if I'm confident the opponent will lead with Jynx, then his advantage may make me consider using him. My gameplay and theories are an example of how different players have different playstyles, and while perhaps in the grand scheme of things, some are objectively better than others, RBY is far too complex to determine that, so I'm for supporting players playing in many different ways.
When it comes to analyzing game theory, or for here, strategies in the OU metagame of RBY, risks/rewards is always taking place. I strongly advise everyone to fully understand this concept if they want to become a better player, or enjoy theorizing about RBY.
Before that though, I want to update everyone on what's up with the site. First off, we finally have Pokemon Online, which is awesome, but it's still Stadium (not RBY) and it is still quite buggy. It's nice to see a bunch of our players in the top 10 ladder for what that's worth though. =)
About RBYPlus, I'm about ~95% done with it, but left it alone awhile back as I've been busy with University and stuff. I'll complete it when it's ready to actually be played (when PO is bug-free and preferably RBY). All that's left is some minor bug fixing with how I edited the moves and it will be finished when it needs to be, so don't worry about it getting forgotten.
And now the main announcement is that we're coming close to March, which is our anniversary month, and like last year, we will be hosting a huge tournament again. We had a few small problems with the tournament last year, such as motivation and slowness, but we'll be changing things up to adjust for that. For one, the tournament will not have Pools, and will be straight to a Double-Elimination Bracket, and no players will be starting in Losers' Bracket. Also, we usually have no problems with 2/3 sets as far as random luck comes, but after how Stips won by sheer luck against Crystal, WaterWizard and myself, we may do 3/5 sets from Round 1 to Grand Finals this time.
The bracket will also not be random and will be made by me, later shown to staff for suggestions and changes, and then made public to fix anything else before actually starting the tournament. We want the bracket fair, balanced and with the different communities spread out. Last time, we had a few sections of the bracket that were very easy (Jackal's Winners' bracket, Chaser's Losers' Bracket), while other sections were basically death (Crystal vs Earthworm for 13th, Posthuman vs Majintupacz round 2). We also ended up with mostly 2K10 in the upper half of Losers', with all of our guests in the bottom half.
So yeah, it will be a bit of a messy process to setup, but it will be done very carefully and reviewed by everyone to make sure everything is fine.
Oh and, there will be cash prizes again. There's still discussion about it, but I'll just say, since this tournament is RBY and will be played on Netbattle (not Pokemon Online) you'll definitely want to practice up for this! ;>
---
So about risk and rewards, I'm sure most players here know about this, but it's fun to discuss and perhaps any newer players can learn something. For any game that has random chance and/or requires prediction against an opponent(s), there is the game theory of risk vs reward. First let's give these a simple definition. A risk is a negative outcome, and a reward is a positive outcome, and one of them comes out as the result of anything involving luck/prediction.
Most strategy and action games have some or many, many options, and each of these have a certain amount of risk and certain amount of reward. For example, using Surf compared to Hydro Pump is a low-risk, low-reward move, while Hydro Pump is a medium-risk, medium reward. When Hydro Pump is used, the player may end up missing, but since it's only 20% to happen, it's only a small risk, while the extra damage compared to Surf is a better reward as it's more damaging.
Risks and rewards per situation are not static and change depending on the situation. If Zapdos is using Thunder against Starmie for a needed OHKO, there's a high risk of missing or not doing enough damage, but there's also a high reward for getting the OHKO. If this is happening at the start of the match though, the risk of missing may not cost the game, and the reward may not be good enough to keep the opponent from winning. Risks and rewards tend to be amplified when the game's outcome is at stake or when they can get a player closer to winning/losing.
So now that we know what risk and rewards mean, how does this work with RBY? Well, most of the game is based on luck and prediction, so this concept comes into play for almost every turn. Playstyles can also develop around playing with this, as a bold player may want to go for the high-risk, high-reward tactics more often, and another may prefer consistency and stick to low-risk, low-reward moves.
The development of a metagame is based on what strategies give the highest rewards, while having the lowest risks. Tauros for example is a very low-risk, high-reward Pokemon as he has virtually no bad match-ups, can cause major damage to an opponent's team without the need of inaccurate move or prediction, and is statistically one of the better Pokemon. Ditto on the other hand is high-risk, low-reward as he very rarely can provide help for winning the game. Using Ditto often results in playing 5v6, and even if he is fortunate, he can usually only take out just one Pokemon. This is why Tauros is OU and on almost every team, while Ditto is NU and never seen in serious matches.
The metagame also works to balance out tactics and have opponents ready for certain strategies. Zapdos for example is a low-risk, high-reward Pokemon, and arguably moreso than even Tauros. In response to this however, Golem and Rhydon become used, and can still serve a purpose outside of just battling Zapdos (unlike using Cloyster/Articuno/Kingler for Tauros). This then changes Zapdos' risk/reward amounts and why he later becomes considered worse in general than Tauros. Zapdos has higher maximum potential though, but also has a much lower average potential, thus making him a high-risk, very high-reward Pokemon in the OU metagame. If the opponent has Golem/Rhydon, Zapdos' risk problem comes into play, and without them, Zapdos is much more likely to sweep a bunch and any Pokemon (the reward).
Moves also are risk/reward. Explosion's greatest risk is being used on Gengar and doing absolutely nothing, costing the user, but is the strongest Physical (and overall) move which is helpful for taking out Chansey and Alakazam (and just about anything), and at the cost of a nearly fainted Pokemon, is a very nice reward. While Explosion is a consist move in itself, the situation where it's used comes into play and Explosion's risk/reward goes up and down.
All of this plays into how you should be building your team and how you should be selecting your options in a game. During a game, a player always has at most 9 options, and each of them will have varying risk/reward amounts per turn. Because of the dynamics of RBY, it's not simple to say which is the best option for every possible turn, and more often, the best decision is also based on what the opponent's is. RBY turn-based, but both players select their moves blindly, so prediction is helpful in winning. With prediction, a player can decrease the risk in moves, just by knowing the negatives of that option won't come into play. To better explain this, assume a player is about to use Explosion and the opponent has Chansey out with Gengar on the switch. This is naturally a risk, but if the user of Explosion is confident in predicting no switch to Gengar, then Explosion's natural risk decreases. Of course though, no player has even close to 100% accuracy with their predictions, so there is always a risk. On top, the game has 255s, so even perfect plays with "100%" accurate moves have risks too.
Pressure is a term used for when one player is putting another into a bad and risky situation. An example would be having Tauros out against Chansey in death range of Hyper Beam, but also aware of perhaps using Blizzard against the possible Rhydon switch-in. Tauros is pressuring the opponent because they have a greater average chance to gain from this situation, and are on the offensive. This means that an incorrect decision by the opponent can cost them. Tauros also has the low-risk/low-reward option of Body Slam if the player feels going all out is not necessary to help win the game.
Pressure is for offensive purposes to control the opponent and restrict their options, thus making them easier to predict correctly. It supports a player's abilities to predict the opponent by allowing them the greatest rewards, ignoring the risks. While superior defensive play can outdo and overcome pressure, RBY is mainly an offensive game, so good players tend to know how to pressure their opponents well. Sometimes pressure can come from just having a certain Pokemon (commonly Tauros), but pressure can come from specific situations too (Aerodactyl charging on the switch).
So how does this all come together to become a better player? A good player should be aware of all the risks and rewards in selecting each Pokemon and each of their moves for a team, and should be aware of all the options for each turn of a game. Weighing out the risks and rewards of each turn tends to lead to making bold moves as RBY is offensive. If a player is not playing offensively, they will either be doing less per turn than the opponent overall and slowly lose, or inevitably be put into risky situations at the opponent's desires and not theirs'. Therefore, to be a good player in RBY, the player has to make some risky moves at least somewhat often, and more often than not, these risks come from correctly predicting the opponent.
Predicting the opponent is simple on paper, considering they have at most 9 options, but complicated with the psychology due to each player choosing each turn blindly. Prediction in Chess for example is the opposite where the number of options is greatly increased, but a player makes each moves before/after the opponent does. Prediction is hard to explain overall as the human mind is complex, but it's something that comes naturally for players good at it that understand it, and for others takes a lot of practice to develop. This is a good article about prediction.
To use myself as an example with how risks/rewards comes into my gameplay, I dislike luck affecting my matches too much and have always used consistent moves/Pokemon and tune the general synergy of the team to be consistent too. However, I've focused a lot of my time in becoming a better player by developing my prediction skills so that I can play high-risk, high-reward and succeed more often than not (dependent on opponent of course). I believe that prediction is the absolute most important aspect of winning in RBY, so that's why I've spent the most time on it. By having good prediction, I also often pressure the opponent, and to help make this even stronger, I've spent a lot of time learning about damage ranges, match-ups, etc, to make my pressure more versatile and deadly. But, I also love game theory and for friendly matches I like to use odd Pokemon or weird strategies. Aerodactyl is a super-high risk/high reward Pokemon, but if I'm playing well, the risk goes down and Aerodactyl works out to be a fairly balanced Pokemon. Of course though, that any Rock or Electric shuts down his main strength (Sky Attack) completely, so I wouldn't dare use him in tournament, unless I'm confident that the opponent won't use one.
I also dislike using Gengar, but I do recognize him as a pretty good Pokemon. While he does play a lot on prediction anyway, I personally don't feel he's all that useful without putting something to Sleep and Hypnosis is a risky move, so I don't use him. Of course though, if I'm confident the opponent will lead with Jynx, then his advantage may make me consider using him. My gameplay and theories are an example of how different players have different playstyles, and while perhaps in the grand scheme of things, some are objectively better than others, RBY is far too complex to determine that, so I'm for supporting players playing in many different ways.
When it comes to analyzing game theory, or for here, strategies in the OU metagame of RBY, risks/rewards is always taking place. I strongly advise everyone to fully understand this concept if they want to become a better player, or enjoy theorizing about RBY.
