Gaming Ethics (edited)

Post EDITED on 7/25/05, most new comments below in BOLD
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A fascinating subject, one that I would love to discuss with you all, is the subject of gaming ethics. Check out this article, from the Games Journal.

Consider this quote regarding sportsmanship:

"With regards to sportsmanship, you could say that most principles of sportsmanship are also basically ethical, with a few exceptions. Basically, the principles of sportsmanship are: don't quit, don't whine, do your best, play fairly, win gracefully, lose gracefully, abide by any decisions of the referees, and keep the game moving. All of these principles ensure that people a) don't feel that their time has been wasted, and b) have fun in the process."

The article discusses many aspects of gaming behaviors, including "metagaming", whereby results or events in one game are carried to the other. For example, attacking a certain player in Risk because he beat you in the previous game. Or, forming an alliance with a player in exchange for preferential treatment in the next.

One example which we had some discussion about was a situation in Serinissima, where a player (me) was overly agressive in gathering resources in the early stages of play. This made me an easy target for a second player (my Dad).

I argued against being attacked, suggesting other ways for my Dad to balance my apparent advantage, perhaps by alliance, or some other form of compensation. As leverage, I threatened that if he attacked me (which would have certainly knocked me out of contention for a win), I would spend all remaining resources on counter-attack for the rest of the game, even if it pushed a third player (my brother) into a winning position (which it certainly would).

In other words, the argument to my Dad was:

"If you attack me, I will spend the rest of the game attacking you back (with no chance of actually defeating you), effectively handing the victory my brother (who would certainly benefit from the war between the two of us). This will basically insure that neither of us can win."

If I did not employ this "poison pill strategy", Dad would probably have had a chance against Tab, and in fact I would have as well, although I would have had a better one than Dad. So I was offering a small chance for Dad, a decent one for me and Tab, OR ZERO chance for Dad and I, and hand Tab the game.

Naturally, Dad refused to see my logic, and attacked me. I fought back futilely, and Tab won the game.

In the end, both of them argued that I had behaived poorly, that he was not given any real choice but to attack me because I had over extended myself. Therefore, I deserved to be attacked.

Do you agree?