Handicap Systems

Systems for making gameplay easier or more difficult for certain players in order to even the chances of all players to succeed or win.

This pattern is a still a stub.

Examples

Fighting games such as the Tekken or those of the Dead or Alive series allow players to choose starting health by percentage, for example 80\% or 140\%. This allows one player to have a handicap against another player.

Golf is one of the most well-known sports to make use of Handicap. In this case, the Handicap does not only serve to equal gameplay but also to indicate mastery of the sport.

Go uses a Handicap system of allowing the weaker player to place a certain number of stones in the handicap points before the actual game begins in such a way that both players are challenged while playing.

Using the pattern

In some games, players may be aware of differences in their playing skills. In order to make the outcome as uncertain as possible within the game rules and thereby more interesting, players may decide on Handicaps. These either make some actions easier for some players or allow those players other advantages so that the greater skills of other players are balanced and all players have equal chance of succeeding in the game.

Providing Handicaps for players can either be done by making it possible to set individual Right Levels of Difficulty (possibly by changing the skills of Agents), giving certain players more Resources or abilities (where differences in Non-Renewable Resources give greater Handicaps that other Resources), or limiting or ignoring negative consequences for certain players. Being able to change the Resources in a game with a Game World makes the game one with a Reconfigurable Game World, although the differences in configurations may not be that large from a structural point.

Individual levels of difficulty can be set by having different thresholds for evaluations functions, providing various bonuses to Score values, giving a head start in Races, or giving Skill advantages. The use of Asymmetric Resource Distribution, Asymmetric Abilities, or Privileged Abilities can have Balancing Effects, as players may not have to be as efficient or may have a larger Freedom of Choice than other players. In Self-Facilitated Games, the use of Handicaps is usually the result of Negotiation before gameplay begins, and a special form of Handicap in these games is to allow novice players Reversability by taking back their actions and performing other actions.

Dedicated Game Facilitators Agents Companions Self-Facilitated Games

Consequences

Handicaps can be used to give individual players the Right Level of Difficulty in Multiplayer Games and at the same time provide Player Balance or Team Balance. The presence of Handicap systems in games provides a form of Trans-Game Information, which can be a form of Score in a Meta Game. Handicaps are incompatible with Symmetry but are often used for the same reason: to achieve Player Balance.

As Handicaps are a form of Balancing Effect, they give all players a Perceived Chance to Succeed. If the levels of Handicap are gradually lowered as players become more skillful, their use provides a Smooth Learning Curve for players to achieve Game Mastery.

History

An updated version of the pattern Handicaps that was part of the original collection in the book Patterns in Game Design.