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论述机会成本概念及其在游戏设计中的运用

发布时间:2012-06-21 16:03:09 Tags:,,

作者:kyoryu

机会成本是个非常简单的概念。某行为的机会成本就是我们所排除的其它行为。

如果我用1百美元购买了一辆自行车,那么这一购买行为的机会成本便是我原本能够用这1百美元购得的其它东西。

当我们致力于游戏设计,特别是游戏中的决策时,这一概念更是非常有帮助。因为思考决策的机会成本能够帮助我们定义实际决策。

opportunity cost from learningall.com

opportunity cost from learningall.com

没有机会成本的决策便不是决策。这种情况非常少见——即便我们可以通过不做任何事而避免产生机会成本,所以任何行为的机会成本就是我们丧失不执行这一行为的能力。

举个例子来说吧,如果玩家能够免费施加一个特殊咒语,且这一咒语将持续影响着玩家行为,那么施加这一咒语的机会成本就是不对玩家造成这一影响。

思考机会成本也将有助于我们进行游戏设计,典型例子就是即时战略游戏。在传统的即时战略游戏中,玩家将拥有某种收集资源的收集器单元。大多数游戏的初期典型决策主要关于玩家是否能够创造更多收集器单元,开始建造进攻单元或开始建造防御单元。

但是任何选择都不会妨碍你在今后执行其它任务。立即创建生产单元并不会影响你在之后建造进攻或防御单元。甚至在许多游戏中,玩家可以同时建造这三种单元。

在早期建造生产单元会带来何种效果?这将对于你的经济起到促进作用,让你在早期获得生产收益(如果你在游戏中活得足够久的话)。同样的,在早期建造进攻单元将帮助你在敌人建立起防御单元前对其发动进攻;而防御单元也能帮你尽早地防御敌人的进攻。

当你着眼于这三种选择时,你便会清楚地注意到经典3大早期游戏战略(游戏邦注:扩张,急冲和防御)。“尽早生产”的机会成本便是尽早进行防御和进攻——如果敌人发动早期进攻你便会很容易遭受到侵害。早期防御的机会成本则是生产和进攻——如果敌人不能进行初期防御你便不能够利用他们,这时候你便会失去对抗防御型敌人的生产机会。早期进攻的机会成本是指玩家未获得任何生产回馈,而且仍然敌不过敌人的早期进攻(尽管你能够正面迎接敌人的进攻,至少有机会)。

关于机会成本的另外一个有趣之处在于MMO技能。在传统的MMO中,技能能够被持续反复利用(施放咒语或运用其他技能则没有),而这在某种程度上也阻碍了玩家运用其它技能。如果游戏中的能量再生速度较慢,你就需要考虑到技能的使用是否会消耗你过多能量。

所以到底什么是机会成本?一般说来机会成本包含了以下内容:

1.技能执行时间。在大多数MMO中,技能存在执行时间,这就导致玩家不能执行其它任务,而这时候技能的机会成本便是在此阶段限制玩家进行某些任务。

2.技能副作用。施加一个破坏力巨大的咒语将带来副作用,如激怒敌人而招致被攻击。在很多情况下这种副作用都是不受欢迎的。

3.相互排斥的技能。这主要表现在相互排斥的不同玩家“立场”上,或者我们也可以在咒语的实施中看到这一点,即在两个同时针对于相同目标的咒语中,一种咒语可能会阻碍另外一种咒语的生效,而不管这一结果是有害还是有益。

4.能量也是一考虑因素,它将阻止玩家施放其它咒语,但是这种情况经常出现在战斗后期(特别是当局势朝着不良情况发展时)。

游戏邦注:原文发表于2008年4月14日,所涉事件和数据均以当时为准。(本文为游戏邦/gamerboom.com编译,拒绝任何不保留版权的转载,如需转载请联系:游戏邦

Opportunity Cost

by kyoryu

Opportunity cost is a very simple concept.  The opportunity cost of any action is any other actions that are then precluded.

If I have one hundred dollars, and I use it to buy a bicycle, the opportunity cost of that purchase is all of the other things that I could have purchased with that hundred bucks.

When looking at games, and specifically decisions within games, it’s a useful concept, as thinking about the opportunity cost of a decision can help us define what the actual decision is at any point.

If a decision has no opportunity cost, then it’s not a decision.  This is rare – usually, even *not* doing somehting is a viable alternate, and so the opportunity cost of any action is, generally, that you lose the ability to not perform the action.

As an example, if casting a particular spell is free, and that spell has some lasting effect on the player, then the opportunity cost of casting that spell is *not* having that effect on you.

For another example of how thinking about opportunity cost can help in game design, let’s look at RTS games.  In a typical RTS game, you will have some type of gatherer unit that collects resources.  A typical decision early in most games, is whether the player should build more gatherer units, start building offensive units, or start building defensive units.

Any of these choices does not preclude you performing the others in the future.  Building production units at the immediate moment doesn’t stop you from building offensive or defensive units later – in fact, it makes it easier.  In many games, you could actually, to some extent, build all three at once.

So, what’s the effect of building production units early?  You get an early boost to your economy that (generally) will give you an early bonus in production, assuming that you live long enough to see it.  Similarly, early production of offensive units gives you the ability to do an early attack before your opponent has had a chance to build any defense, and early production of defensive units will defend your base against an early attack.

When you look at these three choices, the traditional 3 early game strategies (expand, rush, defend) become very obvious.  The opportunity cost of “early production” is early defense and offense – you become vulnerable to an opponent doing an early attack.  The opportunity cost of early defense is production and offense – you can’t take advantage of your opponent if they don’t defend early, and you lose any production boost you could use against a defensive opponent.  The opportunity cost of early offense is that you don’t get the production boost, and are still vulnerable against early attacks (although you can meet the opposing force head-on and at least have a chance).

Another interesting place to look at opportunity cost is MMO abilities.  In typical MMOs, abilities have sufficiently long reuses that casting a spell or using an ability does not, in any meaningful way, preclude using the other abilities.  And, with the generally slow regeneration of power, abilities usually don’t cost enough power for power to be a truly first-tier consideration in what you should do.

So, what’s the opportunity cost?  Generally, it seems to be tied to a few things:

1. Time to execute the ability.  Since, in most MMOs, abilities hav an execution time that prevents you from doing other activities, the opportunity cost of an ability is the fact that while it prevents you from doing other things during that time.

2. Side effects of the ability.  Casting a large, damaging spell may have side effects such as angering the opponent so that it will attack you.  In many cases, this is undesirable.

3. Abilities that are mutually exclusive.  This is often seen in “stances” that some classes can take which are mutually exclusive, but it can also be seen in spells where a spell can prevent another type of spell from being cast on the same target, either offensively or beneficially.

4. Power can be a consideration, as it can prevent you from casting other spells, but this usually happens later in the fight (especially when things have already taken a bad turn)

BTW, opportunity cost is an economic term, and you’ll be seeing a lot of things from economics in this blog over time.  Mathematical game theory is often used in economics, and games are often about resoure allocation, which is, in many ways, what economics is about.(source:Game Design the Wrong Way)


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