The MTS-5, or: Balancing Challenge and Fun in games

Over the past year, Max (he’s 10 years old now! how time flies) has become very fond of chess. He’s a huge fan of games of all sorts – he’s also in Little League, which is not very common in Israel – but chess has become one of his favorites as of late.

For me, this new passion has led to an interesting set of experiences. I grew up playing chess with my father, who is a very strong non-professional player. It took me years to beat him even once, and since then it has only happened a handful of times. Since I left home and built my own family, I’ve hardly played – my three oldest have shown only a cursory interest in the game, thus far. So Max’s interest in the game is also a chance for me to crack my knuckles and loosen up the old chess-instincts, which are but a shadow of their former glory.

Despite being rusty, I’m still better than Max (surprise!). Now, I have to say that Max is a good player for his age, and is improving all the time. He is also an exceptionally good loser when it comes to this game – he seems to take losing with grace, and just enjoys the experience of playing. But after a recent game, I noticed in the corner of his eye a small twitch, and I asked him – “are you ok with losing to me?”

The tears were not too far behind, and the expected narrative spilled out. “I always lose, and I feel like I will never be able to beat you,” he said. And of course, I explained to him that it’s normal, since I am older and more experienced. He understood, but… still. I could see he was not happy with the situation.

Next, I did what any father would do: I offered him to let him win every so often. But no, he didn’t want that either. He wanted the game to be real, not fake. My heart went out to him, my sweet honest boy. Seeing how much he cared that it would be a real game made me cross out the other obvious solution – letting him win without him knowing it was on purpose.

But – what to do? I encouraged him to play with his peers more often, sure, and there he will indeed find a greater sense of accomplishment. But we spend lots of time at home, and I could tell how important it was for him.

So, I went to work. And a few days later my subconscious dropped a wonderful idea in my mind, coined – the MTS-5: the Max Training System – 5.

The MTS-5

Without further ado, let me get right to it. In the MTS-5, you start playing chess as usual, no changes to the rules. Except… after five moves, black and white switch places. Meaning, the player playing white takes over the black, and vice versa. Then, five moves later, the swap repeats, and so on. The winner is whomever does checkmate, as usual.

What’s nice about this game is that you have some control on the outcome – five moves are enough to do some damage, or put up a strong defense, even checkmate an unsuspecting opponent – but if someone blunders, they don’t have to carry it around for the rest of the game alone. A few moves down the line the stronger player will inherit the weaker position, and perhaps will be able to turn things around. This means that both sides remain more or less evenly balanced, as both white and black are being played by a hybrid the two players.

For those who have played chess themselves, this idea might sound like an extension of a well known training tactic of chess players: they play against themselves. Playing against yourself can be very hard and very rewarding, as you are forced to see the game from all angles, and never give in to the temptation of allowing one side to lose just because you feel like it. In the MTS-5, we extend this idea to a two-player version of playing against yourself, only “you” is now the mesh of the two opponents.

Why five moves, you ask? No reason! you can think of this number as a “difficulty level”, for the longer the time each player has before the next swap is the time they have to mount a strong attack. MTS-1 gives each player very little time to build something, and the game resorts to a form of chaos, all tactics and no strategy. Push the number too high up, on the other hand, and you’re back to the original game: MTS-1000 is basically the same as a normal game, since the game will end before the first swap.

So, the idea is to start with MTS-5, and as the players become more evenly matched, raise it to MTS-8, MTS-12, and so on. You tune the game to the optimal balance point of fun (which comes in part from the feeling that anyone could win) and challenge, whatever works for you.

And yes, eventually – you hope to reach the normal gameplay rules, where you stand or fall based on your own skill. But the way to that phase will be much more pleasant.

Final Notes

So that’s it! I hope you like it. What I like about it is that you can apply this idea to multiple games (though not ones like Stratego, where there is lots of hidden information that should not be shared). You can also make all sorts of rules and variations about when the switch takes place, and how often – all to balance out the power of the different players.

And why did I share this, you ask? Mainly because it reminded me again how many ways we have to mediate the world to our kids, and that it does not have to be an all-or-nothing decision. With some attention and creativity, we can find the system that mediates it in a way that teaches them about fair play and how to lose, without the burn of losing sucking away the fun of playing the game for its own sake.

Parenting Challenge: Check, and Mate.

(Sorry, I couldn’t resist).