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[kilakan]

How could a "perfectly average" character have "an actual advantage", anyway? Especially in games where you command a whole array of characters, where you can build up a team of specialists which cover each other's disadvantages.

I find in quite a few games... rpg's largely that the 'perfect average' character has the largest advantage because with a bit more levels than other classes they can do everything/complete every objective/obtain every item by themselves.  It's especially irritating in games where you are supposed to have multiple characters to stand a chance, but the 'perfect average' dude can solo everything even if it's a little harder.

[Neonivek]

Indeed the exact opposite issue is annoying. It is annoying to create a specialized character only to find out that there was no point to it after all.

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Though the perfectly average character's main advantages are usually consistency and the ability to exploit other's weaknesses.

But lets bring up Red Dragon Inn with Zots. He is a perfectly average character in that game. He has three major advantages
1) Because he is perfectly average he has an answer for everything. Because this is a game about exploiting weaknesses that is rather sizable. So an enemy hits everyone with an attack, and the wizard usually has a way to avoid all three types.
2) Because he can attack much more freely, albeit not as powerfully, he can always attack a person's weakness.
and third and here is the big one
3) Because he is average he is not the main target. Everyone typically goes after people weak to them or that would take them out quickly. He tends to be overlooked and actually has an unusually good winning ratio because of it.

Sure, there are better attackers (Both Drink, Hit points, and Money) and better defenders (of all three types) but the fact that he can weather the storm and dish it out when necessary in a chaotic mess of attacks allows him to stand on top most of the time.

Mind you strictly speaking he isn't the best character (Serena is by far)... But he is the only example I can think of, of a character who his ability to be average is actually a huge advantage.

The big issue with some games, not all as Kilakan points out, is that they make Average too much of a trade off.

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There are a few ways to do average right.

[Quartz_Mace]

AI never surrendering no matter how outmatched or dead they know they are, ever!
This is a hilarious thing in DF adventure mode. If I wrestle someone to the ground and cut one of their appendages off, then demand they hand me a pouch of coins, they refuse! How dumb do you have to be. Fortunately, I can just wrestle it away, knock them out and gain possession, or kill them and pick it up, but you'd think they'd value self preservation.

I've also noticed this quite a bit in strategy games, like Civilization 5. Even if I'm twice as large as an enemy civ and have the military power to crush them lined up at the border, they refuse if I demand just a few gold per turn or some of their luxury resources. It's kind of stupid, really.

I've noticed the same to a lesser extent in Crusader Kings II, where you need a 100% war score in order to get AI to surrender. Sometimes this makes sense in a holy war, county conquest, or de jure war in which they will lose everything by  surrendering, by when surrendering ends with them being vassalized and it's they're 1,500 troops against my 15,000, and I'm at 50% score, they stubbornly won't surrender(although we can have white peace). Sometimes content characters will offer surrender at 80%, or I can press my claims at 97%, but it stills seems odd when they stick it out for so long. The reason I find this odd, is that, theoretically, if you were about to be forced to swear fealty to someone, surrendering early and accepting it would increase their opinion of you because of your compliance. It can be even better when they are gaining the protection of a very powerful liege, so their resistance doesn't make sense in some cases. Fortunately, this game is generally pretty logical about this, making it possible to vassalize much smaller realms peacefully if you shares religion, share a border, and are much stronger, but oddities appear.

[Shadowlord]

100% is just the point at which they'll surrender. CKII is pretty good in that regard (Hell, it forces you to surrender when you don't want to).

More annoying is Skyrim, where enemies will drop to their knees and beg for mercy, and if you leave them there, they'll get back up after a little while and attack you again. You pretty much have to kill everyone who surrenders to you, or cast calm on them and GTFO.

[Quartz_Mace]

100% is just the point at which they'll surrender. CKII is pretty good in that regard (Hell, it forces you to surrender when you don't want to).

More annoying is Skyrim, where enemies will drop to their knees and beg for mercy, and if you leave them there, they'll get back up after a little while and attack you again. You pretty much have to kill everyone who surrenders to you, or cast calm on them and GTFO.

Yeah, I was just saying that it can feel a bit off when the war is clearly hopeless and surrendering could be good for them, but these occurrences are pretty rare.

[Shadowlord]

Yeah, I agree. I expect the leaders that resist your 15k army with their 1.5k army tend to be like me: They're really stubborn about giving up their territory, and hope they can keep their troops far enough away from your armies to avoid being caught, and take enough of your things or reclaim some of theirs to keep the war looking competitive while trying to somehow engineer your defeat through diplomacy. (In practice, it usually doesn't work out, since to get someone to help, you pretty much need to have already had an alliance, unless you get really lucky and manage to marry someone important off to someone powerful to make a new alliance in the middle of the war - and also because smaller armies can't move any faster than larger ones (at least the last time I played))

[Bohandas]

AI never surrendering no matter how outmatched or dead they know they are, ever!
This is a hilarious thing in DF adventure mode. If I wrestle someone to the ground and cut one of their appendages off, then demand they hand me a pouch of coins, they refuse!

THE BLACK KNIGHT ALWAYS TRIUMPHS!!!

[Rolan7]

Battle doesn't need a purpose; the battle is its own purpose. You don't ask why a plague spreads or a field burns. Don't ask why I fight.

[Shadowlord]

So... He fights because he's contagious?

[notquitethere]

100% is just the point at which they'll surrender. CKII is pretty good in that regard (Hell, it forces you to surrender when you don't want to).

More annoying is Skyrim, where enemies will drop to their knees and beg for mercy, and if you leave them there, they'll get back up after a little while and attack you again. You pretty much have to kill everyone who surrenders to you, or cast calm on them and GTFO.

Ugh, worse aspect of Skyrim is the homicidal-suicidal enemies. People should flee when out classed!

[itisnotlogical]

My pet peeve about Skyrim is that there is virtually no way for your companion to die, barring unforeseen circumstances or killing them yourself. A companion will drop to the ground and surrender... and any enemy, from bandits to wolves to draugr to vampires to dragons will respect that, so there's no tension or fear of your companion dying.

[Graknorke]

So I'm trying to get into CS:GO
To play competitive you have to be level 3. To get level 3 you need somewhere in the region of 20000xp. You get 100xp per casual game. A game can take upwards of 20 minutes if it's a long one.

Who thought this was a good idea.

[miauw62]

Isn't comp csgo just peeking corners all the time?

[Graknorke]

It's the most engaging gamemode there.

EDIT: But what's doubly annoying is that the people I'm playing against in casual are better than the people I'd be playing against in competitive, since there's no matchmaking and anybody can end up with anybody.

[Catastrophic lolcats]

Isn't comp csgo just peeking corners all the time?

I've always liked the gunplay in CS but could never get into the base gamemode due to that reason. Thank god GO introduced gungame for casual scrubs like myself that enjoy arcade-y action.