Is luck too important?

[nzcamel]

@Victoria

If you are not arguing its optimal, then yeah, whatever floats your boat.

The game isn't difficult enough to require optimal play, and what is most fun is entirely up to you.

It's fair to say that for really good players, the Ai struggles to challenge them. Part of that being that VI has added more mechanics and features that are really interesting, but may be too complex for AI to be incentivised to play right, along with everything else. I guess that is why the great players all end up in MP - that is an option.
Having said that; there is no way that there is, say, an optimal way through the tech tree like there always has been in the past. Many of our choices or the CS sidequests, or boost side quests drag us off our path and change the game; change what we research first, and how we play. Beach n co. deserve credit for making Civ more alive than it has ever been

@nzcamel
I thought this was a civil discussion but it is clear you are more interested in belittling me. What's with the assertions that I can't play on higher difficulties and what does that do to justify your points?

Stop taking it all so personally Kyro. If you were less snide, maybe you'd get a gentler let down
I really have no idea how high or low you can play. I am just saying that if you can't get the game you want on level x, drop down a level rather than blame the game.

Just so you know and stop jumping to conclusions for how I make my decisions. My goal for every Civ game is to create the perfect civilization with maximum potential. I aim to be leading in every aspect for games that I play, have most of the world wonders, have the maximum number of policy cards available and the best of the great people. And I aim to do that without warmongering at all because conquering cities for progress is just so exploitable it is cheating to me. To that end Deity is not a suitable difficulty because the great people I want often get skipped by eras and game strategy is always about being faster and faster in one aspect. I am inflexible that way and restart games entirely when that standard has not been achieved. By extension just Victory is no longer important to me but how I win that matters more.

Yep, you are very inflexible. Read that into your writing long ago.
Do the rules of Civ allow it? Then it ain't cheating. Granted people find exploits in the game, which are usually removed - I don't think warring will be one of those.
I am cool with how you play the game. I admire that you try to achieve what you want, even if I would never play the game only devoted to the things you value. That is fine. What is not fine is you demanding that the game is restructured to favour your narrow way of playing!

Also I don't remember ignoring any of your points that are relevant to this discussion . I have been explaining why your ideas don't work out. You on the other hand have just been ignoring any of the questions and rebuttals by dismissing them based on the assumption that I am inefficient in gameplay because I am inflexible.

You have still yet to answer my most pressing questions.

Rotfl. Yep, it's all me. You on the other hand are immaculate

To those who claim there is no one viable strategy for all times, warmongering is THE most effective strategy for MOST times so long as there are neighbours to conquer. The game is just made that way. You can manipulate the map etc. so that isn't the case but that won't change what the devs had in mind.

Yes, you can utilise the map to your advantage. That is something the Devs have made clear that they wanted to add to the game to make it more interesting, God bless 'em! Warring has its downsides, and so other win conditions can still be optimal.

@Eliminator_Sr

You missed the point of why I said Sugar and Spice are overpowered, Which is to have a larger population faster so as to work more production. To that end those Luxuries are very potent. You also missed the point of how subtle values in the early game have cascading effects in the game. I've already explained twice why +2 isn't a small value early on and I'm not doing it again.

A Sugar/Spice start in peaceful games can mean a difference of 3 early World Wonders on Emperor difficulty, or just one on Deity. That's from experience and trust me I have restarted entire games at least a hundred times thus far.


To those who who say a bad start and by extension luck don't affect the game too much. How does a pacifist player make up for it? What if he really wanted a wonder and missed out because of a bad start? What if he wasn't able to race the ai to a favored spot for expansion because of the bad start?

You see there's just no answer for questions like that because the only solution is war or restart so to that end Luck is too important because it made all the difference. Also I won't call warmongering being flexible because it is the one solution for everything in Civ 6.

The real reason why Luck is too important in this game is because it has a Cascading/Compounding effect on the game. Bad luck doesn't just bite and leave you alone. You carry its effects for the whole game. You know why you you missed that Wonder by 1 turn? You founded the city 100 turns ago 6 turns later than you could have thanks to a late settler because you were beat to an early encounter with a Militaristic City state by 1 turn because you didn't have productive tiles at the start to rush the scout. It can SNOWBALL and that is precisely why it is too important.

That is the game bud. If you missed out on something, you change your strategy next time to adjust. That is how we get better. Luck is part of what we adjust for too. If you really really want something, you are best to overkill on it, to allow for stopping some random thing taking it away from you; just as happens in real life.

@Kyro

But it doesn't cascade if you follow the meta. It becomes a minor irrelevance, overcome by much stronger factors.

Like wasting production on wonders with lackluster benefits.

In any event, unless you go peaceful, there is so much margin for error its irrelevant. Putting a win back a few turns is hardly "too much luck".

This ^^^^^

@Victoria

I respect your ability to continue playing after losing something as coveted as Petra to the opponent. That kind of sting usually haunts me for the entire game and I would rather just start a new game. Or I would just raze the offending City and build that wonder again.

Starting a new game is taking the easy way out. Sure...plan how to not miss out next time...but finish the game. Pay the price, feel the burn, and let that change you.

I would not directly equate the presence of setbacks and failures to the term "challenging".

Professional atheletes make amazing feats seem easy to the viewer but that doesn't make any of the feats insignificant.

A "perfect" game against AI should be possible for players with the right skills and that should not be dependent on luck.

If you have setbacks and failures the challenge is to overcome them.
In terms of trying to convince most of us of anything, you need to let go of this "perfect" game. It's something to strive for...but if it happens too often the game isn't challenging.

I have played both Chess and Bridge, both games some would argue do not have luck but even they have luck. Less but it is there.
A perfect game is when you play without mistakes despite luck.. that is the key. last nights game I finished at turn 250 but it should have been around 200 and I believe 20 turns were down to bad luck and 30 turns were down to bad play.

So here is a question.... I tried to build Perta and lost it with a coupe of turns to go... would you call that bad luck or bad play... think about it.. My belief (and I respect you thinking differently) is I made a decision based on what my chances were and my choice did not pay off.... Luck or bad play... or good play?

Yep, yep, n yep

@Victoria

If you did everything right and still lost Petra it is luck because you have already done all you can and the game's just not fair to you that way because AI has +80% production for wonders on Deity. Honestly I don't think any amount of skill is going to grab an early game wonder if the AI decides to build it on Deity. That's just how Luck dependent it is. Stonehenge is outright impossible unless AI don't spawn with stone.

See...that actually isn't luck. If the AI is that juiced up on that level, you'd be the lucky one to get the wonder! They are the unlucky ones to miss out. Basically what the game is doing in regards to the best players is saying to them "We can't make the computer outplay you on an even field; so instead, we're going to strip you of half the cool stuff; and see if you can still win. Let's see how you go without Stonehenge etc"

And a good player who has beaten everything else and wants the challenge smiles, and says "Game on!"

It is handicapping the player. Golfers do this the world over to make games more interesting between players of different skill levels.

I don't play Immortal so I can't comment on that but Petra is very buildable on Emperor if you aim to build it before turn 90.

Edit: From experience who you pick for opponents matters a lot. Gilgamesh and Cleopatra tend to build it if they can so I generally avoid them if I really want Petra on Deity.

I also avoid sharing Embassies and Open Borders at all costs because AI tends to build Wonders you are building just to mess with you if they can see it.

Most of us don't pick opponents, cos we want to say that we can beat the game no matter who it sets against us. I might choose them sometimes if I want to play a game with say all the Euro civs (later once more are added) all the Asian civs, etc. But I don't include or exclude based on ability.

Nope you don't get it. I'm saying the only reason why the food is powerful is because it can help you focus on production, which is what you're essentially saying, working for production. Growing a population faster for the sake of production beats just working on production alone. Having forests to chop is luck too by the way. If you have to build a worker to chop wood then you're not really getting too much of an advantage anyway. Unless you buy the forest tile in a later era of course. Come on I wondermonger every game. You really think I don't know a thing or two about production or how to get them faster?

I don't have to accept alternative viewpoints when they're just factually wrong. At least my experimentation in the game tells me that for sure. Yes I'm saying you're wrong, but I don't mean it in a condescending way.

Game breaking. Overpowered. Too important. They're all the same to me. It can mean the difference between an enjoyable experience and not. That potential itself is game breaking to me. You're right I use it liberally but where I come from if you want something to change you have to make huge signs so it moves up the queue of priorities. If you're contending on my choice of words then I can only apologize.

You are condescending. Eliminator Sr has made some good points and you dismiss them out of hand. You do not make an argument for why he is wrong; you just state that he is wrong. Like the incense thing. Incense allows you to set aside a gold/faith social policy card without likely sacrificing a pantheon and a religion, and...do what...? Put in a production policy card!!

If you do not enjoy your experience of civ due to a level of luck in the game (and I do not like luck in a game where it is game changing) it is because of your own standards and wants. It really has nothing to do with Civilization at all.

As Victoria said, even chess has some luck. But given the lack of variability between terrain (there is none), and the even way that it's layout is identical game after game, luck is always going to be insignificant there. If we compare this to Civ with different maps all the time, and a terrain that is all over the show, what do we expect to happen? Variability comes into the game, and with it luck or chance does increase in terms of how any given scenario will play out on different parts of the map. But we accept that, at that level. Most of us do not even consider that so much "luck" as we do just what a game is when it reflects closer to real life. Chess is abstract. Hence why you can have a sterile environment with everything rigidly controlled. Civilization is dirty and messy. It incorporates better or worse much of life that is beyond the control of anyone.

 

[oedali]

@Victoria

I respect your ability to continue playing after losing something as coveted as Petra to the opponent. That kind of sting usually haunts me for the entire game and I would rather just start a new game. Or I would just raze the offending City and build that wonder again.

Wow. So you play this game expecting to finish every wonder you start building? It wouldn't be called a wonder "race" if you always win - no risk of losing would make it super dull. They might as well make Petra a national wonder then so you always get to build it.

For me personally the thrill of this game is the risk you take with every decision and the potential to win OR lose - whether it's a wonder, suzerain of a CS, a war you start with AI, barb camps, etc

 

[TheMeInTeam]

Adjusting strategy and making decision not based purely on science is in fact how real generals and other great people work. And they often have to overcome harsh situations, I have no issue with this being reflected in the game. The ability for us to choose our level of difficulty and our starting pisition through restarts allows for us to overcome easier.

I am fine, I do not always win, thems the breaks is how I look at it, at least I hold my head up and say I did it to the best of my ability.

There are different types of "random".

You have RNG outcomes where players make risk-adjusted valuation of their odds and invest accordingly.

You also have RNG outcomes that screw or help the player regardless of the player's choices, and rarely if ever have a material impact on future choices.

Civ as a franchise has both of these. The 2nd class has no place in the game, but it has still been present.

The answer to "is the game too dependent on luck" is both yes and no, depending on the type of luck in question. Note that despite my hatred for the design direction and UI of the two most recent titles in many respects, they are nevertheless an obvious improvement in the RNG category, despite civ 6's nearly objective regression in handling barbs compared to 5 (so far!) both are better than 4/before.

It was possible to get long-term screwed by barbs in civ 4 despite over-investing in stopping them. Aside from the opening turns in civ 6 (barb camps spawning too close/getting scouted instantly), this just isn't a part of the experience in the newer games.

Wonders and such are part of the first category. Their tradeoffs are often badly tuned, but they're still not choice-independent RNG screwjobs.

 

[HF22]

I know everyone hates "choice-independent RNG" negative events, on the basis they are unfun, but I've never understood it.

Strategy to me includes dealing with the consequences of events outside your control, as your response is within your control.

And from an immersion perspective, well history is just full of having to deal with things outside of your control. Stoicism, not by accident the philosophy of one of the greater Roman rulers Marcus Aurelius, was all about that problem.

 

[Ryika]

I know everyone hates "choice-independent RNG" negative events, on the basis they are unfun, but I've never understood it.

Strategy to me includes dealing with the consequences of events outside your control, as your response is within your control.

From a gameplay perspective, random events are just a way of taking control out of your hands without really adding anything enjoyable. Things happen "because they happen", not because a player has done something, the interactivity is basically nonexistent (other than having to possibly alter your strategy to factor in your now weakened empire). No new choices are generated, no new paths become available. All you have to do is clean up a mess, and who in their right mind likes to clean up stuff?

In terms of immersion... well, yes, ""choice-independent RNG" negative events" fill that gap, but unless your goal is to specifically recreate the negative feeling of real world catastrophes, there's better ways of representing them in ways that may have a negative effect, but also open new options. That would still run into the "something happened because it happened"-problem, but it would still combine immersion with potentially interesting gameplay.

well history is just full of having to deal with things outside of your control. Stoicism, not by accident the philosophy of one of the greater Roman rulers Marcus Aurelius, was all about that problem.

True, but Civilization is not history, and games are not reality. For most people, games playing games is a recreational activity, a way of fleeing reality, so the goal of a game should not be to mimic reality, but instead to be fun, and maybe educational.

For some people having such events would increase the fun factor of a game, but for most people that doesn't seem to be the case.

 

[Kyro]

I'm begining to find this concept of Diversity through Bad Luck more and more repulsive.

Just because you can play around it doesn't make it a balanced challenge.

Challenges must be reasonably fair and if they are unfair then they must yield an unfair reward. That is balance. Making up for bad luck isn't a challenge. It's bad game design because there's no reward and no justified cause for the setback to occur.

Too many design and balance flaws have been covered up under the pretense of "challenges" and it is sad to see people being deceived by it and defending it even.

No one is against diversity here we just want it balanced and fair and if RNG is to affect gameplay for any reason it cannot result in a net loss/setback/slower progress when a player adapts accordingly.

As it stands there is no way to make up for the loss that RNG presents in the game and that is precisely what everyone needs to see.

If the result is that you are put 30 turns behind because of it then it is a Punishment by the game for no reason other than RNG. That violates the fundamentals of good game design in how rewards and punishments are handled.

 

[nzcamel]

As it stands there is no way to make up for the loss that RNG presents in the game and that is precisely what everyone needs to see.

This makes no sense at all. Do you have no agency with which to adapt?

 

[Ryika]

This makes no sense at all. Do you have no agency with which to adapt?

Imagine there is an event that can randomly reduce the population of all your cities by up to 10.

The Chance of it triggering at a specific point in the game is 50%.
In your current game, it triggers.

You can now use your agency to adapt to this new situation by focusing more on food, and setting everything up for additional growth to get that population back.
What you cannot do is use that agency to end up in a situation that is equal, or better, than you would have been, had that event not occurred.

That's a terrible event.

Now imagine the same event, but it also increases output of trade routes by X and allows players to construct a new building that unlocks an extra trade route slot.

Now you can use your agency to adapt to this new situation, focus on producing food to get your population back, and constructing the infrastructure you need to get these extra trade routes up.
Ideally, this event has put you in a situation that makes the game more difficult for you, but at the same time, given you the tools to heavily mitigate the damage and catch up to, or maybe even get ahead of where you would have been, had the event not triggered.

That's... well, it's still a terrible event. But it's a good example of diversity done right (although there are of course downsides, such as "forcing" players to focus on a specific part of the game). It still requires adaptation, but it doesn't put you in a situation where you'll just be weaker for the rest of the game, which unfortunately most bad rng in this game does.

 

[nzcamel]

Imagine there is an event that can randomly reduce the population of all your cities by up to 10.

The Chance of it triggering at a specific point in the game is 50%.
In your current game, it triggers.

You can now use your agency to adapt to this new situation by focusing more on food, and setting everything up for additional growth to get that population back.
What you cannot do is use that agency to end up in a situation that is equal, or better, than you would have been, had that event not occurred.

That's a terrible event.

Now imagine the same event, but it also increases output of trade routes by X and allows players to construct a new building that unlocks an extra trade route slot.

Now you can use your agency to adapt to this new situation, focus on producing food to get your population back, and constructing the infrastructure you need to get these extra trade routes up.
Ideally, this event has put you in a situation that makes the game more difficult for you, but at the same time, given you the tools to heavily mitigate the damage and catch up to, or maybe even get ahead of where you would have been, had the event not triggered.

That's... well, it's still a terrible event. But it's a good example of diversity done right (although there are of course downsides, such as "forcing" players to focus on a specific part of the game). It still requires adaptation, but it doesn't put you in a situation where you'll just be weaker for the rest of the game, which unfortunately most bad rng in this game does.

Lol, if there was a random event in the game as bad as what you have used as your first example, I would be complaining too. There is nothing in the game like that, so back to the discussion at hand.

Edit: I should add that I do not mind random events of both types. The first which is only negative, and the second which is a mixed bag. I like a variety of randomness similar to what the little random events in IV introduced. Some were good, some were meh, some were bad.

 

[HF22]

I know I am in the minority on this one, so I do accept you guys are on strong ground about negative RNG events. The playtesting of more powerful negative RNGs for Civ 4 I understand was very clear people thought it was unfun.

But I can still dream about a more immersive game!

 

[Ryika]

There is nothing in the game like that

Not that extreme, but the whole game is based around inherent good luck and bad luck. It begins with your starting position; if you have good terrain, great, if you have bad terrain, then you'll just be slower without having any tools to make that land work better than it naturally does. Then you hope that no Barbarian Camp has spawned right next to your territory, and if it has (and you're not lucky enough to randomly move your Soldier in and intercept the scout), then you'll be defending against Barbarians during the early game and once again, there's not much you can do against it.

Which again is not a problem in itself, but it would be nice to have more tools to work against these things. Why does the Barbarian Policy for example only give you a combat modifier instead of also granting some yields when you kill Barbarians in your territory? That way, the impact of having to defend that early would be weakened, you could start using those barbarians actively mitigate bad luck.

 

[Felis Renidens]

Random events can be fine if they are not too strong. Suppose you have a strike (reduced production for a number of turns), or a disease (reduced growth) in one city. Perhaps you may avoid it in some way (having very high amenities, having a sewer...) or you can try not to depend on one city too much. The original civ had such events. I would make it possible to turn them off (or make them off by default). For me on a low difficulty it will add some excitement.

 

[nzcamel]

Not that extreme, but the whole game is based around inherent good luck and bad luck.

If you think this of Civ, then you must think it of all games that are not abstractly leveled like chess and checkers. Anything which remotely tries to simulate real world situations will have what you call luck involved. I cannot see how grand strategy or 4X appeals to you at all... except when it is abstracted like those even start star or snow flake maps they have as options for MP.

 

[SomeGuyHere]

Luck has always been a factor in Civ games and games like it. Currently, with a friend, I'm playing a game of Civ 5 and my starting location hardly allows 3 cities, they are awful production locations, and his location allowed him to play a fairly solid first 100 turns. We also rolled with random Civ's so that went against me to a point.

I wouldn't say luck matters in Civ 6 more then 5. It's just more apparent if you get bonuses early. Nothing that can't be played and eventually overcome.

 

[Ryika]

If you think this of Civ, then you must think it of all games that are not abstractly leveled like chess and checkers. Anything which remotely tries to simulate real world situations will have what you call luck involved. I cannot see how grand strategy or 4X appeals to you at all... except when it is abstracted like those even start star or snow flake maps they have as options for MP.

Haven't we already been through this earlier in the thread? It's not about luck being a factor, it's about not being able to really improve bad conditions.

 

[Olleus]

I'm going to chime in, having only read part of the comments, with some theoretical considerations. Apologies if this is repeating what has already been said.

First off, some - hopefully - completely uncontroversial statements. Luck is randomness working for or against you. Randomness is anything that you (the player) cannot predict. This can be from an RNG (eg: most computer games), or from some game elements you cannot see (eg: things behind fog of war), or from other players actions (as in chess and all multiplayer games). In a strategy game, randomness from each of those three sources are desirable when they increase replayability and undesirable when they prevent strategic planning. Getting the right balance between these two is what is important - if the randomness is too small every game is identical, if the randomness is too great then the players decisions (which is the interesting part of a game according to Sid and others) are irrelevant and the player is hardly playing at all.

I believe that an important aspect of randomness is firstly to have lots of small random decisions. This makes the game very diverse as there are lots of possible combinations, but also fair because it is absurdly unlikely all the randomness will go either in or against your favour (the central limit theorem or "law of large numbers"). Combat is a good example of this type of randomness. An event that would with 50% chance double your spaceship production and can only fire once per game (a bit like that GE) is less good. Secondly, as has been stated by others, randomness should give the player interesting decisions to make. The spaceship GE does work in this sense, as the player can choose to spend gold/faith or build IZ districts to boost their chances. Combat partly works here, the player cannot affect the RNG but can diminish its importance by bringing overwhelming strength.

From this starting point, and with these goals, I think it makes sense to ask if luck is too important (or even not important enough) in Civ 6. Entirely subjectively, I would say luck is too important in the early game: an early neighbour to conquer vs being rushed by barbarians, good vs bad terrain, getting vs not getting a religion are all highly random factors that (if playing at an appropriate difficulty) can make or break a game. Further more, they are to a large extent one-off decisions that will not balance themselves out. In the late game, however, luck is of about the right importance. Spies are the "right amount" of randomness IMO (many decisions of medium importance) compared to past civs, and so are GP, wonders and to some extent Eurekas, and terrain becomes less important. Of course the late game usually feels boring and samey, but that is due to player supremacy and the ability to override any luck rather than having the wrong amount of luck per se.

 

[nzcamel]

I'll agree that we are going in circles

I just cannot agree that "the whole game is based around inherent good luck and bad luck". I wouldn't play a game like that. I have stopped playing both computer games and board games where luck is too big a feature.

 

[nzcamel]

I'm going to chime in, having only read part of the comments, with some theoretical considerations. Apologies if this is repeating what has already been said.

First off, some - hopefully - completely uncontroversial statements. Luck is randomness working for or against you. Randomness is anything that you (the player) cannot predict. This can be from an RNG (eg: most computer games), or from some game elements you cannot see (eg: things behind fog of war), or from other players actions (as in chess and all multiplayer games). In a strategy game, randomness from each of those three sources are desirable when they increase replayability and undesirable when they prevent strategic planning. Getting the right balance between these two is what is important - if the randomness is too small every game is identical, if the randomness is too great then the players decisions (which is the interesting part of a game according to Sid and others) are irrelevant and the player is hardly playing at all.

I believe that an important aspect of randomness is firstly to have lots of small random decisions. This makes the game very diverse as there are lots of possible combinations, but also fair because it is absurdly unlikely all the randomness will go either in or against your favour (the central limit theorem or "law of large numbers"). Combat is a good example of this type of randomness. An event that would with 50% chance double your spaceship production and can only fire once per game (a bit like that GE) is less good. Secondly, as has been stated by others, randomness should give the player interesting decisions to make. The spaceship GE does work in this sense, as the player can choose to spend gold/faith or build IZ districts to boost their chances. Combat partly works here, the player cannot affect the RNG but can diminish its importance by bringing overwhelming strength.

From this starting point, and with these goals, I think it makes sense to ask if luck is too important (or even not important enough) in Civ 6. Entirely subjectively, I would say luck is too important in the early game: an early neighbour to conquer vs being rushed by barbarians, good vs bad terrain, getting vs not getting a religion are all highly random factors that (if playing at an appropriate difficulty) can make or break a game. Further more, they are to a large extent one-off decisions that will not balance themselves out. In the late game, however, luck is of about the right importance. Spies are the "right amount" of randomness IMO (many decisions of medium importance) compared to past civs, and so are GP, wonders and to some extent Eurekas, and terrain becomes less important. Of course the late game usually feels boring and samey, but that is due to player supremacy and the ability to override any luck rather than having the wrong amount of luck per se.

Good overview of the balance needing to be struck Olleus

 

[oedali]

I like how this thread is seeming to come to some conclusion.. We should archive it and publish as an article "Luck and randomness and Civ 6"

Here's another perspective on unfavorable, uncontrollable RNG that seems to bother some people: what I do is, instead of evaluating each game in itself, (eg why did this x% probability event happen to me and killed my chances or set me back x turns or caused me to quit), I look at the big picture and evaluate my Civ experience as a series of games. So if something "totally unfair" happened to you in one game, it will happen to the AI in the next game. In the long run everything cancels out - the power of statistics.

 

[Olleus]

Here's another perspective on unfavorable, uncontrollable RNG that seems to bother some people: what I do is, instead of evaluating each game in itself, (eg why did this x% probability event happen to me and killed my chances or set me back x turns or caused me to quit), I look at the big picture and evaluate my Civ experience as a series of games. So if something "totally unfair" happened to you in one game, it will happen to the AI in the next game. In the long run everything cancels out - the power of statistics.

Sure, that is one way of considering things, looking at the meta-game of say, 100 games of Civs rather than at them individually. I am disinclined to look at it this way for two reasons:
1) By this logic, luck evens out in every game ever designed by man. This makes the entire question of whether luck averages out in Civ trivial and meaningless.
2) I don't play large numbers of games of Civ, and almost every game I play will be with a different leader on a different map type with a different type of victory and strategy in mind. I want these to be balanced and fair individually, not just as an average.


Of course, there are two slightly different concepts here. Whether or not a game is fair, and whether or not luck is too important. Tick-tack-toe is undoubtly fair, but luck is probably too important. In Chess there is no luck at all, but (I'm told at high level) playing as whites is a big advantage, so the same is not fair.