In General: Engines and Investment pt.1

Welcome back Zoners. It is Sunday again, so that means your old Grandpa Growth is here with another In General. This is the segment we where talk about higher level strategy, game theory, psychology, and the mechanics of the game instead of the normal deck/card analysis that you get from the other guys. Today, we are going to be talking about a concept within strategy gaming known as investment. Grab some popcorn and settle in boys and girls. It is story time.

Investing in Games

What is an investment? I have a degree in business, but you don't need a degree in anything to understand this: Making an investment means to commit a portion of your available resources without getting any immediate return. Let's look at a couple of examples from outside of MtG:

• In Starcraft, or any RTS for that matter, you build production facilities like a barracks to train new units. In this case, you make an investment of 150 Minerals, 100 seconds of in-game time for which your worker will be unable to do anything but build, and the opportunity cost of not be able to do anything else with those two resources.
• In Bioshock, similar to many partial RPG hybrid games, you can buy abilities, upgrades, and various refills for ammunition, health, eve, etc. In this case, you can buy a Gene Tonic, to reduce the cost of your plasmid use. You spend 45 Adam now, to spend 15% less Eve every time you activate a plasmid. Again, your invested Adam is not refundable. So, this time the opportunity cost takes the form of all the other upgrades you could have bought instead. 
• In real estate, or basically any financial vehicle which you expect to appreciate, you provide the principal investment or initial outlay. You pay a large some up front and are compensated by seeing a small percentage of that money come back to you at regular increments. Again, an opportunity cost is associated with giving away that initial outlay. 

I have simplified these examples, but it is easy to see that they have the same basic parts. ANY investment uses the same working pieces with the hope of achieving similar outcomes. Now, here is a question, what separates good investments from bad investments? A simple question with a simple answer, but this is where the business degree helps. Next week we will follow along from our last example and take a look at the possible answers to that question. Stay tuned to the blog this week because we have plenty more great stuff for you: a new SNAP KEEP?!, You make the pick, a fresh edition of The Stack, and more from Uncle Landdrops and the guys. I am going to leave you with three very popular cards that see play in Commander. All of these requires an investment. I want you to look at each of them and apply the framework I explained above. What resources do you have to put in. What benefit do you get out of this? And finally, what else could you get with those resources?

-GG