Thanks for the education. I didn't know this "choice" had a name; nor did I know about the naming of Morton's Fork.
Regarding footnote #4... a couple of my friends have expressed exactly that opinion about games here and there. "Tomb" comes to mind as an example; after 4 hours of play, with uncontrollable unknowns and incredible randomness - plus dice rolling! - their opinion was "let's save time next time, each roll a die, and high roll wins."
This was a really interesting article (as always)! It brings to mind so many things ...
(I am teacher, which is relevant to two of these:)
The first is that I am starting a board game design activity at school, and one of the things I hope to feature is a discussion/debate about what a game actually is. I am planning to feature the "game" Dotty Dinosaurs (https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/49443/dotty-dinosaurs), which I have "played" many times with my children. The interesting thing here is that there are zero decisions to be made of any kind (other than whether to play the game ... one might say, therefore, I have always lost at this game). I would argue on this basis that it is not a game at all.
The second concerns a colleague I used to have who, if he had a student who had misbehaved in some way, would offer them a challenge in order to get out of trouble: Roll a die (D6); if you get a 1-5 then you're in detention; but if you roll a 6 you can roll again!
The final one is the classic Eddie Izzard comedy sketch: Cake or Death?
I never knew this was called Hobson's choice, but has always been something I'm wary of in TTRPG's.
If there is always a single "correct" action to take in a circumstance it's something I try to change or fix.
Except for fireball, fireball is always a correct answer LoL
Hobson's choices are rare when Fireball is an option. š
Thanks for the education. I didn't know this "choice" had a name; nor did I know about the naming of Morton's Fork.
Regarding footnote #4... a couple of my friends have expressed exactly that opinion about games here and there. "Tomb" comes to mind as an example; after 4 hours of play, with uncontrollable unknowns and incredible randomness - plus dice rolling! - their opinion was "let's save time next time, each roll a die, and high roll wins."
Iām taking the choice of leaving a comment
Haha. A good choice indeed.
This was a really interesting article (as always)! It brings to mind so many things ...
(I am teacher, which is relevant to two of these:)
The first is that I am starting a board game design activity at school, and one of the things I hope to feature is a discussion/debate about what a game actually is. I am planning to feature the "game" Dotty Dinosaurs (https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/49443/dotty-dinosaurs), which I have "played" many times with my children. The interesting thing here is that there are zero decisions to be made of any kind (other than whether to play the game ... one might say, therefore, I have always lost at this game). I would argue on this basis that it is not a game at all.
The second concerns a colleague I used to have who, if he had a student who had misbehaved in some way, would offer them a challenge in order to get out of trouble: Roll a die (D6); if you get a 1-5 then you're in detention; but if you roll a 6 you can roll again!
The final one is the classic Eddie Izzard comedy sketch: Cake or Death?