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Feedback on Quantum Seed Gaming

So much to unpack in this one.

As a massive fan of the quantum nature of reality, and the hypothesis that a cognitive though and collapse of probability waves informs the underlying nature of reality as we perceive it, I can vibe with this.

However, there are a few steps toward you conclusion that feel like circular logic… like a religious zealot claiming that their holy text is truth, because their holy text says so. I’m torn between this being heartfelt ritualism or Discordian trolling and parody.

Don’t get me wrong, it’s a fascinating ritualised cargo-cult paradigm, but I think Critical Role tapped into someone else’s “quantum seed” (in this case WotC’s), and happened to get lucky riding the zeitgeist wave. Life’s a lottery. Sometimes you go years or decades screaming into the void, playing your game at conventions and trying to get a bit of attention in the static white-noise of reality (I know a few designers like this)… sometimes you catch the eye of the right person at the right time, and everything falls into place (I know of far less designers where this has happened).

Similarly, watching where the money is going is just following the herd, reinforcing someone else’s “quantum seed”. Emulating D&D is lazy game design. Risks need to be taken, art needs to be made, passions need to be followed. Sometimes a disruption to the quantum state makes more significant ripples in reality than riding the waves of another seed’s echo.

It feels like you’re tapping into something with this manifesto, but I’m not sure I can agree with the specifics.

I don’t even know if you wanted a critique or discussion on the manifesto, but I’m going to try to add some ideas to every entry that gets posted.

(1 edit)

Hi, thanks so much for your comment!

I think we're in agreement on quantum mechanics as a universal phenomenon. However, I'm not sure I understand what you mean about "disruption to the quantum state"? A quantum system is a superposition of multiple states; observation is what leads to wave function collapse. Communication via quantum entanglement actually cannot be accomplished by disrupting the quantum state (https://www.researchgate.net/publication/349451988_Basic_Theory_of_Quantum_Entan...). You actually need to modify the quantum system for both particles (without quantum decoherence), then make multiple observations until you can describe the quantum system from a large sample of quantum states.(1) This is actually one of the hardest parts of interpreting a game!

As for game design, I don't think of it as lazy at all. I do use market data as a tool to tighten my search, but the real work of running the game involves a lot of trial and error. As a game designer, I do consider myself an innovator, but as a player my number one priority is inciting a superposition event with enough regularity to allow for high-throughput quantum tunneling between coordinates in time. As of writing my 4e game is very highly optimized, such that I have made hundreds of dollars in the stock market. There's nothing "cargo cult" about iterating upon a procedure when said procedure yields consistent results: that's just good science.

Thanks again for your comment. I rarely meet game designers with my same overlap of interests, so I'm already glad for participating in my first game jam!


(1) You can instead use coherence/decoherence itself as the information packet, but this isn't actually detectable against the background radiation of space (as you pointed out in your anecdote). You could theoretically do this at the Sanford Underground Research Facility, but I don't have the necessary clearances yet, and also my current playgroup is based in Connecticut.