brownbear · @brownbear_47
28th Sep 2016 from TwitLonger
Skill Floor and Skill Ceiling Thoughts
Hey folks,
I recently watched a video by JaKaTaK (https://twitter.com/JaKaTaKtv) on the worker / army supply UI changes and the skill floor in StarCraft II and wanted to post some thoughts on it. You can find the video here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fcLBlY7SApk
I'll start by noting that I enjoy JaK's content, enjoyed this video and found it thought-provoking. This post is mainly intended to start a discussion and present my perspective on the matter, not label anything as "wrong" or anything like that.
JaK posits a good assumption that the ideal game is ideal to learn but impossible to master, and therefore we should strive to lower the skill floor while raising the skill ceiling. But I think we disagree on the concept of the skill floor.
To me, the skill floor is the entry cost of the game - the amount of skill the player has to develop before they can start playing the game properly. In a single player game, like Dark Souls, that's pretty easy to define - a player who gets through the tutorial area can reasonably expect to complete the game assuming they persevere through its tough challenges. It's harder in a competitive multiplayer game where there's no "middle" or "end". I see the skill floor in an RTS as accomplishing the basic tasks - building workers, army, bases, teching up, etc.
As a result, I don't really see worker / army supply in the UI as a component of the skill floor. I think any player that understands enough about the game to know that this information is relevant is well beyond the skill floor of the title. Instead, I would label this as one of many skills players can choose to learn to improve at StarCraft II. I think people see this skill as a component of the skill floor because it's something that players work on and master early on, but I still think it's well above the fundamental skill floor of the game - players don't need to care about this information to play and enjoy StarCraft.
Anytime a skill is removed from the game - say, auto-mining workers removes the skill of remembering to go back to your command center and task workers to mine - I see two high-level effects.
1. There is an impact on the player experience in playing the game
2. That skill can no longer act as a differentiator in overall player skill. The player spends their time doing something else.
I think in this sense, the decision to remove a skill from the game is always a trade-off in weighing the experience of the player against the skill's role as a differentiator in player skill. Here I think the trade-off is straightforward. The skill ceiling on knowing how many workers one has is fairly low and probably provides minimal differentiation between players. Meanwhile, it's a fun and interesting part of the UI and adds to the player experience, especially for casual players. But I think it's important to emphasize that this is a trade-off and never a free win.
This leads into my next point. JaKaTaK notes that he would rather matches be determined on skill rather than mastery of rote tasks. I disagree with this statement in a few ways. One, removing a skill from the game, even a skill that feels rote or monotonous, only pushes skill differentiation elsewhere. If that "new area" of skill differentiation isn't intentionally designed or interesting, it can be easily be far less interesting than the skill it's replacing. Two, mechanical differentiation is _the_ differentiator in player skill in real time strategy games (I wrote about this on my blog recently: https://illiteracyhasdownsides.com/2016/09/25/why-mechanics-are-critical-to-real-time-strategy-games/). Players often complain about tasks that feel "rote", like macro mechanics, but it's very critical that some other mechanical skill be offered to replace these tasks - players are going to do something else with that time, and if it's not intentionally designed it's probably not going to be an enjoyable gameplay experience.
But my main point of disagreement is that this actually makes life more difficult for casual players. Most casual players don't know enough about the game to differentiate themselves on decision making or strategy. Getting good at rote tasks that feel enjoyable is a fun and compelling alternative that is attractive to newer players. JaK himself mentions something along these lines in "The LAN Experiment" section of his Staircase method: http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/sc2-strategy/374400-thestaircase-an-alternative-improvement-method
I agree with JaK regarding his criticism of rote tasks that are only justifiable in that they "require high APM" - all mechanics should be interesting, and just because something is hard it doesn't mean that it's interesting. But similarly, just because something is hard or rote doesn't mean that it's automatically uninteresting. Execution is enjoyable and fun. Furthermore, without an intentionally designed, compelling alternative I would argue that it's almost certain that, in the absence of these mechanics, players would invest their time differentiating themselves on things far less interesting than what was originally present.
Thanks and all the best.