First, I realized I may not have been totally clear in my earlier communications. I'm not saying that all aspects of all cards should default to "may". I'm specifically thinking of triggered abilities, which are often secondary to the purpose of a card and easy to forget. With that in mind, I have a some more thoughts.
I was hoping you'd also address this point
It also has the benefit that if a player forgets to leverage an ability, they haven't actually broken the rules and, well, sucks for them.
but I imagine the response is "doesn't happen often enough to matter." But, as a player, it irks me when I'm obligated to tell somebody to take the benefit of their card when they'd otherwise forget it, in part because I may be helping them beat me and in part because it just delays the game.
Here's an interesting perspective on this. What you are saying is, I should change something, in such a way that, for certain players, it "sucks for them." Isn't that crazy? I don't want things to suck for anyone. Okay, you don't want to remind someone to gain a benefit; that just isn't as bad as missing out on the benefit.
I don't think it's crazy and I'll tell you why. My point is not that I want things to suck for other players. My primary concerns are that, by not making abilities optional, you 1) create a real possibility of corrupted game state (i.e. rules violations), 2) you place what should be an individual responsibility (playing optimally) on one's opponents (people who are punished for fulfilling that responsibility), and 3) you prevent optimal play in more-interesting scenarios where an ability should be unintuitively skipped.
Also, here's 2, rephrased in a way that I think captures the essence of it. In what
competitive game is it
fun to help your opponent beat you? In a relaxed setting with friends or newbs, I have no problem reminding people to take their ability or asking if they want to take it. Those are teaching opportunities.
You seem concerned that it's more un-fun (if you will) for people to miss the benefit than it is to have to remind them to take it. But I think that's totally debatable. Nobody gets to win for free; you learn from your mistakes and part of the fun is improving. It seems like you're limiting tactical space because of the chance that somebody might make a mistake and... not enjoy that? Well, I don't think many players are going to quit Dominion because they forgot to leverage an ability. I think it's more likely that they'll say "let's play again; I'll remember that next time and beat you!". But maybe that's just my mentality. I also haven't conducted focus groups on this or anything and I don't know what research you've done about it.
For a while there was a card, "+$2, put this on your deck." I changed it to "you may" because one player just constantly forgot to do it. For sure I might say "you may" to make it so someone isn't breaking the rules accidentally constantly.
This obv. isn't one of those cases. It is pretty in-your-face when you buy Inn despite not wanting to shuffle in any cards from your discard pile. In general when you want to do something, it does not say "you may" unless you might also want not to (or the Throne Room example). There could be an exception like my hypothetical card, but it would need to really earn that "you may." And the issue you are citing isn't forgetting, it's not wanting to shuffle a shuffled deck when confronted with unfriendly opponents, man.
Inn isn't the particular ditch that I would choose to die in on this issue. It is, to me, just example of a principle that I would have done differently, for whatever that's worth.
I still don't think I agree that adding "you may" adds appreciable complexity, though. The argument that you could make all cards better by adding complexity seems like a red herring to me; that's not really the issue. "You may" is a well-understood and common mechanic; it's also two of the shortest words you could meaningfully put on a card. And it elegantly handles all of the (rare, I agree) awkward situations that I can see.
There is no red herring here.
Here are two links to articles by Wizards of the Coast R&D members:
- http://www.wizards.com/Magic/Magazine/Article.aspx?x=mtg/daily/mm/188
- http://www.wizards.com/magic/magazine/article.aspx?x=mtg/daily/ld/188
These articles are discussing, which is preferable for Magic: "You draw two cards," or "target player draws two cards?" How could that small of a difference in complexity matter? And yet "you" is currently winning this battle.
Thanks for the links; these are really interesting. And I feel less bad about disagreeing when Mark Frickin' Rosewater thinks about this very much the same way I do. His argument is amazingly appropriate to the "may" issue. He covers all the points I would make. It's a common idea, it's a gateway to depth, and it allows players to feel clever / crystallize. I'm especially encouraged by their research showing that newer players do NOT get confused by targeted draw, as I just don't think they'll confused by "may", either.
On the flip side, this may be confirmation bias speaking, but I several issues with Zac Hill's article. The most prominent one is his ridiculous juxtaposition of "Option Charm" and "Divination". He's made the implicit assumption that there
will never be other reasons you would want an opponent to draw cards. He's precluded the notion of an Enchantment that causes players to lose life when they draw, for example. Maybe that's a terrible card idea; that's not really the point. To me, the point is that he's restricting the set of interesting interatactions to prevent confusion that their own research suggests
does not exist.
Also, one notable exception in their debate is that Magic phases sets in and out, while Dominion really doesn't (which, as a frugal person, I actually appreciate very much). They'll get an opportunity to revisit the issue in the next set. Dominion just won't, and that's another reason I would default towards a higher skill ceiling. The only people who will be playing it years after the final expansion gets printed are those who appreciate the extra choices. And I find it very hard to believe you'll lose even one sale to a default behavior of "you may". But, again, I have no particular evidence for that.
Theory also had a point I wanted to address:
This is also one of those things where each incremental addition of complexity doesn't seem like much ("Just a 'you may' here, what harm can it do?"), but taken as a whole it all adds up.
For example, you could think of examples where Smithy could be "You may draw 3 cards" and argue about how that's better for Peddler and Menagerie and Horn of Plenty sometimes.
Making cards "better" is a separate issue, to me. Choices always make cards "better" but I wouldn't argue that all cards need to be better or fit into every situation. For example, I don't think Inn is underpowered because it doesn't say "you may". But I do think it's an dangerously-subtle opportunity for corrupted game state and I also personally find it unintuitive.
I cited these before, but Bishop and Haggler are very good examples of where not allowing choice makes sense to me. It's central to playing the card and the lack of choice balances the card by creating an interesting trade-off for the player. These are also cases where removing choice on the card doesn't change the magnitude of the complexity; it just shifts the thinking from whether to leverage an ability to whether to play the card at all.
In my never-designed-or-published-a-game opinion, if you aren't going to change balance or the magnitude of the complexity by removing a choice, I would prefer to see it left in. Inn is an example where the choice does not greatly affect the balance of the card and, I believe, helps ensure game state validity while also being more intuitive.
EDIT: Quick fix.