mark chen job talk 2013

Emergent Forms ofExpert Gaming

Mark Chen@[email protected] markdangerchen.net

January 2013

The Talk page 1

You see a man preparing to give anacademic job talk…

The Talk page 1


But all he’s doing is reading aloud.

The Talk page 1


But all he’s doing is reading aloud.It’s a little surreal.

The Talk page 1



In fact, he’s just playing achoose-your-own adventure game…

The Talk page 1




Do you:

The Talk page 1




Do you:Ask him to get on with it? (Turn to

page 8.)

Let him continue? (Turn to page 15.)

OR

Get on with it! page 8

The man snaps his head up and begins to stammer.



He apologizes profusely and



He apologizes profusely andmakes excuses about losing track of time

or something equally inane.




or something equally inane.After he regains his composure,





he asks how you all are.





he asks how you all are.He prepares to roll a 20-sided die.






Turn to page 23.

Let’s see what’ll happen page 15

After a short while…


After a short while……



The man looks up, realizing everyone’s looking at him.




He stammers and does a nervous laugh.




He stammers and does a nervous laugh.After he regains his composure,





he asks how you all are.






Turn to page 23.

D20 resultsRoll Result Effect

1 Critical failure!

Strip to your undies, run around like a chicken, and faint.

2-9 It’s looking iffy.

Continue with presentation, but try to be more engaging.

10-19

It’s going well!

Continue with presentation, but don’t get cocky.

20 Critical success!

A beam of light shines on you for the rest of the day.

Emergent forms of expert gaming

Outline: brief statement on why games

matter past research on learning and expert

practice in World of Warcraft (WoW) current and future plans takeaways“Of all the things that make me a geek, nothing brings me more joy, or is more important to me, than gaming. I am the person I am today because of the games I played and the people I played them with as I came of age in the 80s.” – Wil Wheaton

Games are important huge cultural significance; shared,

global ubiquitous and pervasive

Ian

Gib

son

SharpW

riter

http://www.imagekind.com/The-Plumbers-Empire_art?IMID=5532638d-421b-42e6-8a62-31df6b56c218

http://sharpwriter.deviantart.com/art/Welcome-to-the-Internet-Please-Follow-me-322248378

Games are important for learning game = systems of

constraints w goals play = exploring and

understanding systems expert play = pushing,

exploiting, hacking systems for an imagined future

gaming = contextualized play in a larger ecology

(see also: Gee, 2011 GLS chat)

linkitch

http://linkitch.deviantart.com/art/Relatively-Portal-76837871

The world is made of systems!

gaming life systems -> success in life

How to cultivate gaming attitude?

(see also: Sutton-Smith, McGonigal)

enfu

http://enfu.com/

What does gaming look like?

a lot like STEM practice (cf. NRC’s framework for k12 STEM and LSIE volumes)

expert practice emerges out of “mangle” (Pickering, 1993)

critical, inquisitive, goal-oriented, playful

But each subculture/affinity group is a little different. It’s not monolithic.

Next up: expert practice in WoW raiding

(For more on 21st century skills, turn to page 74.)

Leet NoobsTHE LIFE AND DEATH OF

AN EXPERT PLAYER GROUPIN WORLD OF WARCRAFT

This work was funded in part by the National Science Foundation through the Science of Learning Center program under grant SBE-0354453.

World of Warcraft

MMOG 6 million subscribers in 2006

World of Warcraft

MMOG 6 million subscribers in 2006 fantasy with races / classes

World of Warcraft

MMOG 6 million subscribers in 2006 fantasy with races / classes complete quests, kill

monsters for loot and XP

Raiding

large group joint activity highly coordinated specialized roles organization and leadership Molten Core

Leadership tasks required for raiding

Wolfenstein, 2010

See also: Reeves & Read, 2009

Ethnographic methods (Taylor; Steinkuehler) pool of 60 regular players, 40 per session 2-3 times a week for 10 mos (11/05-8/06), 4-5 hrs each time over 1000 hrs of chat data ~100 hrs of video + select posts on web forums disciplined perception (Stevens & Hall, 1998)

Remember, ss target will change at Domo, but until then, your rezzer is to be ssed at all times.



Remember, who you give soulstones to will change when we encounter Majordomo Executus, but, until then, the priest or shaman who you’ve been assigned to should have your soulstone at all times.



Remember, who you give soulstones to will change when we encounter Majordomo Executus, but, until then, the priest or shaman who you’ve been assigned to should have your soulstone at all times.

a magic item that warlocks can give to others so that they can come back to life if they are killed

priests and shaman can bring others back to life (resurrect)

it’s important to give rezzers the ability to come back to life so they can rez the rest of the raid group

Theorizing the practice• Push-pull relationship of objects in a

network of activity…– Actor-Network Theory (Latour, 2005)

– Distributed Cognition (Hutchins, 1995)

– Mangle (Pickering, 1993; Steinkuehler, 2006)

– Assemblage (Deleuze & Guitarri, 1987; Taylor, 2006)

– Arrangement (Stevens, Satwicz, & McCarthy, 2009)

– Object-Oriented Ontology (Bogost, 2006, 2009)

– Roles and responsibilities constantly renegotiated, redistributed, and reconfigured to adapt to local settings

Regular chat channels and specialized ones by character role

say whisper party raid healsting madtankin splittranq madsheep soulburn madrogues

Communication practices

Hierarchical and interwoven19:30:00.953 : [2. madrogues] Rebecca: good... poison up... assist wei

-'good' refers to the fact that no Rogues said they have not done this fight. Even so, Rebecca clarifies our role—use poisons on our weapons and focus-fire on Wei's target.

19:30:02.484 : [5. madtankin] William: where is wallace tonight?

-madtankin channel for the Warriors. wallace is a character who usually comes to our raids.

19:30:07.703 : [Raid] Maxwell: Henry peels to Marcie

-role assignment

19:30:10.468 : [3. healsting] Drusella: *runs around like crazy people*

-Druids are getting a little silly now...

19:30:12.656 : [3. healsting] Sven: We could... DPS shaman, Holy Nova priests?

-more suggestions on turning certain healers into damage dealers instead

19:30:15.312 : [5. madtankin] Wallace: I didn't make it in time. Rawr!

-Wallace is still subscribed to the madtankin channel even though he is not part of the raid. These custom chat channels exist independently from any other channels in the game.

19:30:17.453 : To Lori: May I have a healthstone pretty please?

-Healthstones made by different Warlocks sometimes have different amounts of healing they can do (depending on how a player has 'specced' the character) which means they can be stored in one's inventory at the same time. In this case, I know Larry and Lori create different types of healthstones, so I've requested one from each.

19:30:17.687 : [Raid] Maxwell: Horace peels to Mary

-role assignment

19:30:19.640 : [4. soulburn] Lori: Les-for this fight you will be ssing Derek.

-what to do with that one soulstone that Lester has available

Communication practices

Analysis methods Discourse and interaction analysis (Jordan & Henderson, 1995)

Functional Pattern Analysis (FPA) (Rogoff et al., 2002)

Visualization of chat (Chen, 2009)

Some game play

Main topics of book

1. expertise2. trust

Expertise in game mechanics?

i.e., players exploring boundaries

unit frames showing health and status of raid members

my health and status

enemy health and status

cooldown timers for temporary effects

threat meter enemy

debuffs

ability buttons

more ability butt

ons

tank targets

chat window

various bits of info to keep track of

temporary bonuses or impairments (buffs

and debuffs)

minimap +add-on buttonsstreaming combat text

name and health of enemy

the jumble in the middle is the actual in-game fight

Expertise as sociomaterial practice Emergent through push-pull of constraints-workarounds Limited by access to the right social networks

Expert play = pushing, hacking, tweaking boundaries = arrangement of sociomaterial resources

World of Warcraft wiki

shared values of hanging out with friends gaming more than just players’ relationship

with game – huge social component

Camaraderie and trust

I love our raid. I know we are all going to get burned out at times and frustrated and upset and disagree with one another. It is part of being human. We are like brothers and sisters really. Stuff like this is going to happen.

meltdown prevented by realignment / reiteration of group values

Camaraderie and trust

A new add-on and its effect on raiding

no longer keeping models in our heads real-time visualization of numbers

(For details of how fights in WoW worked and how the add-on changed the group’s practice, turn to page 80.)

Victory!

threat meter add-on

Insights from WoW• Becoming expert depended on access to expert groups

and expert practice. (Collins & Evans, 2007)

• Not all players could gain access.

• Group success depended on coordinated action and trust in others to play their roles. (Hutchins, 1995)

• For my group, trust came from hanging out and having fun: social and cultural capital.

• Add-on changed how raids worked.

The Death of a Raid

• Add-on reflected overall change in WoW community.• emphasized efficiency,

progression, loot

• Didn’t just let us offload cognition; also offloaded trust. (surveillance tool)

• Hanging out and having fun wasn’t enough anymore.

• Eventual fracturing of group.

The Death of a Raid

• Add-on reflected overall change in WoW community.• emphasized efficiency,

progression, loot

• Didn’t just let us offload cognition; also offloaded trust (surveillance tool)

• Hanging out and having fun wasn’t enough anymore.

• Eventual fracturing of group.

Better understanding of game and development of tools led to demise of group—Were we playing it wrong??

And what’s this mean for education?

What next?continue investigating local gaming cultures• marginalized

groups of players• BoardGameGeek

users• DIY culture• golden age for table-

top

What next?review of game making tools for k-16 use

What next?design games that explore morality, critical engagement, meaningful decisions, and humanity

Gaming practice is highly situated and emergent in local cultures.

Expert gamers push at boundaries, find workarounds, and work towards an imagined future.

Education (incl. game designers) could cultivate a gaming way of life.

Takeaways

Emergent Forms ofExpert Gaming

Mark Chen@[email protected] markdangerchen.net

January 2013

Psst!Is that an easter egg?

Emergent forms of expert gaming

Congratulations! You’ve found the secret page!It lets you teleport to other parts of the story

and see the parts you missed!Go back to beginning. (Turn to page

24.)

See more about 21st century skills. (Turn to page 74.)

Learn about how fights work in WoW and how an add-on changed practice. (Turn to page

80.)

Read about possible courses from this speaker. (Turn to page 73.)

Attempt to break this presentation. (Turn to page ??)

Possible coursesGaming in context• Ecology of gaming (Salen)• In-game, in-room, in-world (Stevens et al.)• Mangle of gaming (Steinkuehler)• Assemblage of play (Taylor)

Games ethnography• Ethnography and virtual worlds (Boellstorff,

Nardi, Pearce, Taylor)• Making virtual worlds (Malaby)• Gaming as culture (Williams, Hendricks,

Winkler)

Designing games for museums• Active Prolonged Engagement (Exploratorium)• Learning science in informal environments

(NRC)

Social dilemmas and morality in games• Moral ambiguity in The Witcher (Chen)• Tragedy of the Commons (Hardin)

(To return to main story, turn to page 71.)

New literacies and 21st century skills

Produce, consume, remix, and critique

Communicate and coordinate Play and problem solve Perform, identity shift, and

metacognate Think in systems and form

social networks (Jenkins et al., 2006, NRC, 2010)


Produce, consume, remix, and critique


Communicate and coordinate


Play and problem solve


Perform, identity shift, and metacognition


Think in systems and form social networks

(To return to main story, turn to page 28.)

Tripartite roles: tank, healer, DPS


Yo, over here!

!


rogue (DPS)

warrior(tank)

priest (healer)

mage (DPS)Yeah, hit me!


rogue (DPS)

warrior(tank)

priest (healer)

mage (DPS)

pew pew!

Yeah, hit me!

SS, SS, Eviscerate!

+300 +120


rogue (DPS)

warrior(tank)

priest (healer)

mage (DPS)

pew pew!

Yeah, hit me!

SS, SS, Eviscerate!

+300 +120

Has the most threat and monster “aggro”

Threat and aggroTime 1

Player Ability Activated Threat Generated (hypothetical)

Existing Threat

Total Threat(hypothetical)

Wendy (tank) Sunder 260 780 1040

Rand (DPS) Sinister Strike 140 560 700

Shaun (healer) L. Healing Wave 400 400 800

Mandy (DPS) Frostbolt 500 0 500

Time 2Player Ability Activated Threat Generated

(hypothetical)Existing Threat

Total Threat(hypothetical)

Wendy (tank) Sunder 260 1040 1300

Rand (DPS) Sinister Strike 140 700 840

Shaun (healer) L. Healing Wave 400 800 1200

Mandy (DPS) Frostbolt 500 500 1000

KTM (Kenco’s Threat Meter)

(To return to main WoW story, turn to page 58.)