[MUD-Dev] DGN: Reasons for play [was: Emergent Behaviors spawnedfrom...]

[Paolo Piselli]

--- "Richard A. Bartle" <richard at mud.co.uk> wrote:
> On 29 July 2005, Paolo Piselli wrote:

>> Why are we still arguing Bartle's Types when Nick Yee is doing
>> such wonderful empirical research?

> Because there's no theory behind Nick Yee's work.  What use is it
> knowing that people do this or do that if you don't know WHY they
> do this or do that?

> To be fair, Nick doesn't claim he has a theory. He presents his
> work so that others may use it to create theories.

It is not important wether or not his work presents a full theory of
player motivation.  Your work and his are laying the groundwork for
how we will quantify player behavior and player motivation.  IMO
your research is helping us distinguish between "this" and "that" so
that in the future we may investigate "why".

> Personally, I don't think Nick's results do invalidate mine; I see
> them as supporting it.

I agree with this, and I think that Nick has overstated the
differences between your work in his articles.

>> Your statement is contrary to the evidence: "Achieving and
>> Competing: While Bartle proposed that Achievers and Griefers were
>> separate Types, they are in fact fairly correlated with each
>> other.

> If you want to change the definition of "achievers" and
> "griefers", yes. Also, if you want to use the 1995 4-type model
> rather than the 2003 8-type model, maybe.

> Just think for a moment what this result is actually saying. It's
> saying that most people who are achievers are also griefers. Now
> in your experience in playing these games, can you honestly say
> that most people you've met who are achievers are also griefers?
> If this were indeed the case, why would anyone ever make a
> distinction between grief play and achievement play? I didn't
> invent the term "grief play", the players did, yet how many of
> them regard "griefer" as a synonym of "achiever"?  Given the
> reported correlation, though, griefers and achievers should be one
> and the same thing.

I think this issue can get semantically confusing, because words
like "achievement" and "greif" can be used to describe both
motivations and behaviors. Certainly achievement-play and greif-play
are different behaviors, but it is possible that both are derived
from the same motivation.  As you mention in your won work, the
association could come from the fact that it is easier to greif
people if you are more powerful, therefore greifers engage in
achievement-play as a step along the path to their ultimate goal of
engaging in greif-play.  It is also possible that different
motivations result in the same behavior.  I think we need a better
semantic separation of player motivations and player behaviors.

>> On limitations of Bartle's model:

> This is in part a misunderstanding of the model. My model does not
> say that you can't like pizza if you like ice cream;

Yes, I never understood why Nick claims that you put players into
separate boxes when your tests give them a score with respect to
each type.

>> Nick's work should pretty much be considered required reading for
>> discussions of player motivations.

> I agree, but if you're going to cite it I want to see what you're
> going to use it for. How do you use it, as it stands, to help you
> design better virtual worlds?

This type of reseach can be used to plan and design gameplay that
facilitates engagement in associated behaviors.  For instance, if
achievement and cometition are associated, then design gameplay
where a player can both achieve and compete (such as WoW's ranked
PvP system).  Or on teh lip side, if greif play is strongly
associated with escapism and time spent online, then perhaps a
design that reduces immersion (what!?) and discourages long play
sessions (sacrilege!) would actually repel players who like to
engage in greif play (holy grail!!).

> Some general problems with Nick's approach (which Nick
> acknowledges, but some of those who follow his work seem blind
> to):

>   - The motivations suggested are implicit in the > questions.

This is a good criticism.  But I do not know how to separate
questions that treat behaviors and motivations.  Asking a player
what they do is simple, but asking them to explain why they do
things is asking for a great deal of self-awareness.

>   - Brainstorming motivations from correlations is > as subjective
>   as brainstorming player types from interviews.

Yes, I'm guilty as charged.  But its fun to wonder at, and maybe I
can someday work it into a dissertation :)

>   - There's no guarantee that there are 5 facets, > just that
>   there are at least 5 facets.

>   - There's no guarantee that the facets are at the > same degree
>   of abstraction. It could be like "penguin, eagle, > vulture,
>   mammal".

>   - The labelling of the facets isn't provided by > the factor
>   analysis.

>   - Some facets overlap but some don't. Leadership > could be an
>   expression of an achievement, grief or > relationship facet, but
>   it couldn't be an expression of the immersion facet - > that's
>   completely orthogonal.

Orthogonality is a big problem.  If player behavior arises from a
network of motivations that are interrelated, how will we ever make
cuts at the right level of abstraction?

> For a fairly recent and fairly detailed discussion, see

> http://terranova.blogs.com/terra_nova/2005/03/daedalus_projec.html

Wow, I should have read the comments attached to this article back
in March!  Great posts.

-Paolo

Paolo Piselli
ppiselli at yahoo.com
www.piselli.com
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