God's Imitator

Zheng Jie said somewhat uncertainly, ”But what if some God’s Imitators are deliberately harboring ill intent?

”Even if theoretically, the entire lobby is positive-sum gameplay and provides extra earnings, what if God’s Imitators just want to deliberately trap players?

”If they deliberately design unwinnable games to scam players’ visa time, we can’t tell at a glance, right?”

After thinking, Cai Zhiyuan shook his head slightly, ”I think this possibility is low.

”Unless this God’s Imitator wants to die.

”We can simply reason through this:

”If a certain God’s Imitator deliberately designs unwinnable games to trap players, this is basically a one-time deal, because after being trapped once, players won’t play again and will most likely tell other players.

”If God’s Imitators can’t get sufficient earnings, they’ll die.

”To increase earnings in this situation, they’d need to increase single-instance exploitation earnings, meaning greatly increase the price per play.

”But players aren’t fools. If they see a certain game room has a very high price per play, this obviously has problems.”So if any God’s Imitator really dares to do this, I admire their courage. This is a dead end.”

Yang Yuting added, ”Right. We now know players can freely choose among multiple game units, so this game’s duration will definitely be relatively long.

”So it’s definitely ’repeated games’, not one-time deals.

”If God’s Imitators want to trap people, like tourist area exploitation, they must achieve two points: first is very high single-instance pricing, second is only one game occurrence without considering repeat customers.

”This game obviously can’t mechanically apply this.”

Zheng Jie was somewhat worried, ”But tourist area exploitation might also be many merchants uniting to exploit, right? Might God’s Imitators also have this tacit understanding?”

Yang Yuting shook her head, ”It should be impossible. Currently there’s no evidence proving God’s Imitators can mutually discuss, so this possibility should be very low.”

Everyone quickly noted this point.

Although what Wang Yongxin and Cai Zhiyuan said might not be 100% established, it was at least a good general direction.

With these two general directions, when players just entered games and weren’t familiar with rules, they could still enter the state faster than other players and seize the initiative.

Everyone looked toward Lin Sizhi with some anticipation.

After considering for a moment, Lin Sizhi said, ”I also have a speculation here. It may not be established, but everyone can pay attention after entering the game.

”Different game units should have rule differences or earnings reward differences.

”Everyone doesn’t need to think about specific rule details. Just use the simplest method for screening:

”Only play games with the simplest brainless rules that look like the most worthwhile rewards.”

Everyone was somewhat surprised. Obviously, this was another conclusion that sounded quite arbitrary.

Zheng Jie was very confused, ”Why? This kind of game is more likely a trap, right? Would God’s Imitators be so kind-hearted?

”Why would they design games to be simple and brainless with very worthwhile rewards?

”Isn’t it zero-sum gameplay between God’s Imitators and players? God’s Imitators must earn enough visa time from players to avoid death. If games are too simple, how can they earn money?”

Lin Sizhi explained, ”Yinzhang already said that players can freely choose game units designed by God’s Imitators.

”So this is actually a bit like multiple logical layers of ’number guessing’: when designing game difficulty, God’s Imitators must consider other God’s Imitators’ behaviors.

”Now suppose game lobby players see several different games. Among them are simple ones and complex ones, familiar ones and unfamiliar ones, ones with high rewards and ones with low rewards.

”Suppose these games all don’t have obvious traps. How would players choose?”

Zheng Jie said without thinking, ”Then definitely prioritize choosing simple, familiar, high-reward ones.”

Lin Sizhi nodded, ”Most somewhat intelligent God’s Imitators should be able to think through this reasoning.

”They indeed need to earn visa time to ensure they don’t die, but first they must ensure someone plays their games.

”So relatively intelligent God’s Imitators will design as much as possible toward simple, familiar, high-reward directions. This is also what Yinzhang said in speculation: most God’s Imitators should use gambling tools or chess games for design.

”However, God’s Imitators’ logical gaming won’t stop at this step.

”Just like how the more layers of ’number guessing’ the lower the number becomes, the more layers of God’s Imitators’ gaming, the more extreme the game becomes.

”Once God’s Imitators think this through, they’ll realize simply reducing difficulty isn’t enough. They must do it to the extreme in one go.

”That is, simply directly design the simplest games players are most familiar with and pull rewards as high as possible.

”Although other God’s Imitators may not do it so extremely, do you dare bet? The cost of losing the bet is death.”

Zheng Jie was stunned. He thought about it, ”But... games that are simple, familiar, and high-reward, how do God’s Imitators themselves earn visa time?

”Players indeed all came to play, but if they themselves can’t earn enough visa time, wouldn’t that become harming others without benefiting oneself?”

Lin Sizhi shook his head, ”Currently rules are still unclear, so I can’t give accurate answers.

”But as players, we don’t need to worry about this point.

”Because God’s Imitators will figure it out themselves.

”They’ll reduce game difficulty to minimum under circumstances of ’ensuring they obtain minimum earnings as much as possible’, because this is the Nash equilibrium all God’s Imitators will inevitably reach after gaming.

”Just like in ’number guessing’ games, the final result will only become 0.

”If God’s Imitators can’t think through this, they most likely wouldn’t survive until now.

”Conversely, if a God’s Imitator designed very simple games, it means they thought through this reasoning.

”Then they have no reason to plant traps in games.

”To summarize, as long as there’s ’players can freely choose games’, it determines this gaming logic: the more intelligent God’s Imitators are, the more they’ll use main rules to deal with other God’s Imitators, which also means their games will very likely be more harmless to players.

”We combine this with Cai Zhiyuan’s previous speculation conclusion: suppose games in the lobby are positive-sum games, then there will be extra earnings placed in specific game modes.

”Then God’s Imitators who made simple games will inevitably also make such choices.

”So comprehensively considering our current speculations, we can formulate this set of strategies:

”First, after entering the game, maintain low profile as much as possible. Don’t act like God’s Imitators to avoid being alerted and isolated by other players.

”Second, seek the simplest, most familiar games that look like the most worthwhile earnings and occupy positions early.

”Third, in these games, choose ’single-player mode’ as much as possible and seek extra earnings from ’positive-sum gameplay’.”