Social Dilemmas
Choice players need to make that either set their own individual gains against each others or against the gains of a social group they belong to.
Games where players belong to teams, alliances, or other types of groups that are supposed to cooperate can cause problems for those players because they might exist actions that would benefit them individual but harm the larger group. This creates a Social Dilemmas for the players in that even though cooperation would be beneficial in the long run for all involved parties, the players' have the possibility to reaping a shorter term rewards by acting egoistically or betraying the other players.
Examples
Republic of Rome Intrigue So Long Sucker
Using the pattern
Creating Social Dilemmas consist creating Incompatible Goals that pair Individual Rewards or Penalties against Shared Rewards, or Penalties. These are often combined with Risk/Reward, Imperfect Information, and Delayed Effects to add Tension by postponing or making it more difficult or impossible to notice how other players have acted. There are two well-known basic types of Social Dilemmas: the Prisoners' Dilemma and the Tragedy of the Commons.
The Prisoners' Dilemma is the classic example used in game theory and its name comes from the fictional situation of two prisoners accused of conspiring in two crimes, one minor crime for which their guilt can be proven without any confession, and a major crime for which the guilt can be proven only with one or more confessions. The prosecutor gives both prisoners the same deal: if both confess (which can be seen as an example of Betrayal), they both go to jail for five years (a Shared Penalty); if only one of them confesses, he goes free and the other goes to jail for 10 years (a Individual Reward and Individual Penalty respectively). Finally, if both refuse to confess, they both go to jail for one year (also a Shared Penalty). The core of the dilemma is that even though the option where both prisoners refuse to confess is better for them, for each of them there is a risk that the other will confess, and playing it safe by confessing leads to a situation where both prisoners end up in jail for five years. The design of Prisoner's Dilemma is shows how players can be tempted to not accept a certain Shared Penalty for the possibility of an Individual Reward but can also receive an Individual Penalty for misplacing trust in another player. If both confess, they receive a worse Shared Penalty than if they cooperated and this makes the choice one of Risk/Reward. The original Prisoners' Dilemma did not allow communication between the prisoners before making the choice. Allowing Communication Channels complicates the situation, and introduces Negotiation, but the issue of trust and thus the Social Dilemma, still remains.
The Tragedy of the Commons[1] revolves around avoiding Shared Penalties of having a Shared Resources being depleted. These Continuous Goals become dilemmas when players either cannot stop each other from consuming the resources or may not notice the consumption. The name stems from the case where a pasture is free to use for all herdsmen of a village but where over-herding would diminish its future capacity.
Although the reason for having Shared Penalties can be arbitrary in games having Social Dilemmas as the core gameplay mechanic, in others the use of Teams can provide motivation.
Designing Social Dilemmas requires designing actions with Individual Rewards for the player who performs the action but with Shared Penalties to the other players. If the Penalties are perceived as Individual Penalties or the game state can make the Penalties only affect one player, the actions are not guaranteed to be Social Dilemmas. An example is when players have agreed to accept Tied Results but one player can perform actions leading to that player receiving all the Rewards; in this case, the dilemma is either due to the chance of gaining more Rewards than otherwise or due to making the other players received the Penalties of not receiving the anticipated Rewards. Another example is Social Organizations where the main Penalty may be social rejection and the Reward is to be able to spend time and effort on other activities. A third is Enemies that are Enemies due to misunderstandings that the players are aware of.
Character Defining Actions Internal Conflicts Loyalty
Time Limits Betrayal Cooperation Rerolls Freedom of Choice Multiplayer Games Factions Internal Rivalry Delayed Reciprocity
When using Social Dilemma in the game, one has to consider what kinds of methods for Social Interaction there are in the game, as most uses of Social Dilemma require that players have to negotiate with other players.
Situations similar to The Prisoners' Dilemma arise when there at least two players who are dependant upon the Cooperation between the players. If Cooperation is sustained without Betrayal, all the participating players progress quite well in the game. The crux of the dilemma is that the first player to stop the Cooperation receives a large pay-off at the expense of those players who are still cooperating, and if all players stop the Cooperation, all players do worse than when cooperating. To work well, the Prisoners' Dilemma requires Delayed Effects of some kind from the actions that determine Cooperation, as this will create more Tension between the players.
The Tragedy of the Commons requires that there is a Renewable and Shared Resource, which has an upper limit for the renewal rate, and that initially the use of the resource is potentially unlimited for each participating player. Of course, the use of this resource should lead to something the players perceive as a reward. One common method, and also true to the original dilemma, is to use a Converter to create higher level Individual Rewards for the players. For example, a player belonging to an Alliance in a military strategy game can use the shared cities to create troops for himself.
Interface Aspects
The way players treat Social Dilemmas can be influence by how well they can communicate with each other. This makes it possible to modulate their behavior by providing Communication Channels, hindering Unmediated Social Interaction or enforcing Player Anonymity.
Consequences
Social Dilemmas give players a Freedom of Choice to do actions for egoistic or utilitarian reasons - but these may be influenced by Guilting evoked by the relations the players' have to the other players' affected. Since performing some of the actions possible in Social Dilemmas are likely to cause animosity from other players, these situations can create Tension and well as Emotional Engrossment. When players are aware of other players' Social Dilemmas, even if they only potentially are dilemmas, this affects these players' Perceived Chance to Succeed as well as create Risk/Reward situations for them due to Inherent Mistrust. The possibilities for Tension and Inherent Mistrust makes Social Dilemmas problematic to combine with Casual Gameplay. When players resolve Social Dilemmas so they do not directly benefit themselves comparably with others, this may be regarded as examples of Altruistic Actions even when they are actually No-Ops.
When other players are aware of dilemmas and they have Communication Channels to those having the dilemmas, it is quite natural for Negotiation and Social Interaction to occur. This may also support the rise of Cooperation, Dynamic Alliances, and Social Organizations when the Social Dilemmas are not resolved immediately due to being part of Continuous Goals, e.g. managing Shared Resources as in common in the Tragedy of the Commons case.
Relations
Can Instantiate
Altruistic Actions, Dynamic Alliances, Emotional Engrossment, Freedom of Choice, Guilting, Inherent Mistrust, Negotiation, Risk/Reward, Tension
with Communication Channels or Unmediated Social Interaction
Negotiation, Social Interaction,
with Continuous Goals and Negotiation
Cooperation, Dynamic Alliances, Social Organizations
Can Modulate
Can Be Instantiated By
Collaborative Actions, Incompatible Goals, Individual Penalties, Individual Rewards, Shared Penalties, Shared Resources, Shared Rewards
Can Be Modulated By
Communication Channels, Continuous Goals, Delayed Effects, Imperfect Information, No-Ops, Player Anonymity, Risk/Reward Teams, Unmediated Social Interaction,
Possible Closure Effects
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Potentially Conflicting With
History
An updated version of the pattern Social Dilemmas that was part of the original collection in the book Patterns in Game Design[2].
