View source for If it doesn't fit, don't force it

This lesson is a continuation of the previous. One side of the coin is ''"If you can do without it, do without it"'', while the other is ''"If it doesn't fit, don't force it"''. On one hand we can live without something, on the other we can't force something in if it's not doing any good. Mark teaches that getting rid of stinkers, the obvious bad cards, is easy. The same can't be said about designs that are good by themselves, but not so much when you take into account the whole set. Experienced designers should notice that while the card can be great by itself, it has to resonate with the rest of the cards. If it doesn't, it has to go away. Forcing that card to be kept where it is does more harm than good because you are wasting potential. Another card, better suited for a certain task, is being traded by something that is not the best card for that task. If the card that is swapped out is good enough it'll find its place in another set.

Mark notes that while his job is a dream job, it comes with a burden. He's offered more tasks that he can possible handle. In many scenarios he has chosen to put his family first and that is a conscious decision. As much as he liked to see some idea make it to the final set, more often than not that idea has to be stashed for later. The same happens in his life, he has to make decisions and every decision has its pros and cons. What he teaches is that you can't take a decision when that decision does not resonate with other aspects of your life. For example: to sacrifice his family in favor of something else is a poor choice.

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His discussion about forcing to fit in is about having limited space and/or time and we can't handle everything at once even if we'd love to. We have to have priorities. When we are passionate about one detail we tend to lose the bigger picture, that's the danger that he is talking about. I've read some articles in neurosciences that describe how the brain enters in a state which is somewhat similar to dementia when we fall in love with something or someone. We really lose the bigger picture in such cases. Our sights become narrower and we tend to make biased judgements.

I think this is very much related to personality styles. There is one truth in mental health that is: personality styles are stable. People are what they are and even if they wanted to, it's impossible to be someone else. Changes are possible, but not to the extent of adopting a whole new identity with completely different traits and behaviors. That's impossible to do. Take Mark as an example. He tells us that he expresses his emotions, he is short, he is stubborn and he loves Magic. Can he transform himself into a new person who hates Magic, who doesn't express his emotions and becomes the next NBA superstar? For all sane reasons that I can think of, no. Maybe he could act out of character for a while, but not forever or extended periods of time. If you read about acting, personalities, scammers and mental health, there are people who have this ability to act out of character for extended periods of time. The point I'm trying to make is: we can't force ourselves to fit in a place that we just can't fit in. Much less force somebody else to fit in. This is what makes personality disorders an extreme challenge, because these people are complex and we can't just use some powerful magic to change them.

Going back to game design, I can easily see how this relates to design in general. There is this concept of harmony that is somehow innate to the human's brain. How does something stand out? By having some feature that makes it draws more attention than other things. We are immediately drawn to something that stands out. In case of magic they have to be very conscious with that because as Mark states, a card has to serve a purpose and no matter how good it is, if it's not serving its purpose in a set it has to be replaced by another card. Cohesion and coherence are important. Think about a game. Every piece of it has to resonate with each other, much like each magic card is part of a set and can't be designed as a lonely card. Unless there are strong reasons to make something that stands out, a piece of the game must not break the cohesion and the coherence of the whole product.

This reminds me of some podcasts about the professional market and there is another truth. As much as personalities styles are stable, culture tends to be too. Companies have different cultures and it's harsh, but if a person doesn't fit there, there is no way to force that person to fit in. Doing that will surely end in some mental health problem. We could discuss here tolerance, racism, sexism, prejudice and so on, but let's skip all that for now because that's not the main matter here. I'm speculating here, but I suppose that when a product, a game for instance, feels disjointed, lacks coherence and cohesion. I'd imagine that the company behind it must have had some trouble with managing disagreements, dissonant voices among the developers and designers and somehow the product ended up hitting the market in its current state. Unfortunately I have no experience with managing all that and I can only admire how the guys at Wizards manage to keep Magic going on for so long with such high standards. The job that Mark has is hard, really hard.

= References =
* https://magic.wizards.com/en/news/making-magic/resolutions-2009-01-05
* Pedro Calabrez and his knowledge on neurosciences
* Max Gehringer and his knowledge about labor, the market and companies