To cull the dice
There is a concept in a lot of board games where you sometimes have to or want to cull your dice. A dice usually represents an action available to you or one of your choices so why would anyone want to cull it. This morning, I started thinking about how in life sometimes we need to cull our dice.
One of the first games I ever played is Quarriors. The game is all about to sacrificing your dice to get better dice because what you wan are the most useful dice in your collection. You want to build your hand. This sounds absolutely strange to any non-boardgamer but let me try to roll it out for you. In Quarriors, every turn you fight a monster and you have a particular defence (shield) and attack. Your attack and defence depends on your playable dice so what you want is the ability to use all your defence and attack every turn. (Side note: you collect dice over the course of the game and they all go into a bag and you can’t see what you have). So each turn, from the very beginning of the game you have the option to cull one of your dice. You start off with really crap dice anyway so you try to get rid of them and buy or capture better dice.
This game when you start thinking about it is very much like life. I hate deck-building or dice-building (like quarriors) games because if you are not good with your choices it is very hard to recover. My best friend on the other hand loves these games. I suppose I don’t spot it in time to let go of your useless (possibly bad) dice and play to where your strengths lie. In life, it is possible that this is the only skill worth having: the ability to identity the dice to cull. Even more important than holding on to the good and important ones. Many bad ones make a worse hand than few good dice.
So, back to the Quarriors: How to win? Be the first person to get a certain number of points. It is one of those games that rewards good decision making, right timing, some amount of ruthlessness aimed at your opponents’ hand. I know I am using the word ruthless but I am a Eurogamer so sue me. These qualities that most board games reward you for as as applicable in the outside world. No wonder so much of life seems like a simulation.
So, how can I learn to cull my dice better? That’s the question I’ve been asking myself. In order to learn how, I need to learn what first. Like all humans, I am in an endless struggles of:
things I want to do vs things I have to do.
what I want vs what is right
We are all basically trying to curb every single animalistic instinct. We all think of various reasons of over-indulging and we all do it. Is it because we are able to do it? Is it an evolutionary trait? Somehow, our psyches are more complicated than we give them credit for. We like putting people in boxes with labels because that helps us understand the world. However, if you explore your own head: at its very core, no singular action is isolated. All actions are a series of little actions; broken down like a software problem and can be split into all the its small components.
In order to cull any dice, you need to know what it is, how it happened to be there and how helpful it is to you. That is why I find it so hard to change bad habits. I constantly go back and forth on these promises or goals of making better decisions. What I am try to change is the surface: the problem usually lies deeper than the goal itself. Identifying that is the key; it is force needed to decelerate your bad dice. In the end, culling is natural and fundamental. It is what growth is, isn’t it?
“Overcome your guilt. Care, but not too much. Take responsibility, but don't blame yourself. Protect, save, help- but know when to give up. They're precarious ledges to walk. How do I do it?” - The Way of Kings, Brandon Sanderson
