Here is a short piece of philosophy for the community followed by my thoughts on the matter.
"One of the best-known Chinese philosophers, Sun Tzu (544–496 BC) who wrote The Art of War (also known as The Thirteen Chapters) was born during this period in the state of Qi. Sun Tzu’s work which is recognized as the oldest military treatise and one of the finest of all military classics played an important role in shaping ancient China and helped develop military (and more recently, business) strategies. For further details of Sun Tzu’s Art of War and his life, see Sun Tzu [1] and Tang [2].
One of the descendents of Sun Tzu, Sun Bin, was also a respected philosopher and a military strategist who witnessed and reported several interesting events in the state of Qi. Sun Bin relates a story known as “Tianji’s Horse Race” which is well-known and popular in China. Sun Bin was a friend of General Tianji of the Kingdom of Qi who liked to race horses. One day, the King of Qi wanted to race his horses with those of Tianji’s. The King and Tianji each selected three horses with different speed classes. The King’s first horse (say, K1) was faster than all three of Tianji’s horses but his second horse (K2) was only faster than Tianji’s second fastest (T2) and the slowest (T3) horses. The King’s slowest horse (K3) was only faster than Tianji’s slowest horse (T3). Sun Bin reports that the King and Tianji chose the same class of horses for each race. That is, in the first race the first class horses (K1 vs. T1) competed and in the second and third races the second and third class horses (K2 vs. T2 and K3 vs. T3) competed. Naturally, because Tianji’s horse in each class was slower than the King’s in the same class, Tianji’s horses lost all three races.
Sun Bin offered his friend Tianji some strategic advise to help him win the race. Having learned that the King would continue using the initial winning strategy of racing his horses in the original sequence (K1,K2,K3), Sun Bin suggested Tianji the following strategy: In the first round use the third-class horse (T3) to compete against the King’s first-class horse (K1); in the second round use the first-class horse (T1) to compete against the King’s second (K2) and in the third round use the second horse (T2) to compete against the King’s third horse (K3). The story ends when Tianji uses the strategy suggested by Sun Bin and wins the horse race with one loss and two wins.
In the parlance of modern game theory we would call Sun Bin’s advice to Tianji to use the sequence (T3,T1,T2) against the King’s fixed strategy of (K1,K2,K3) the “best response” strategy for Tianji. In this case, as the King would race his horses in the same order (K1,K2,K3), Tianji can win 2-to-1 by racing his horses in the order (T3,T1,T2) and receiving the payoff of one unit."
This is in essence what MKX could potentially turn into if the character-variation unlock rule set is not accepted. Players could be playing for the first match only by adopting a hard character-variation counter-pick strategy and may rely on lopsided 8-2 matchups to maximize their chances of winning the rest of the set. Players will not have to risk going even against anyone should they win the first match because they can simply play 8-2 character-variation counter-pick and win by default.
My personal opinion on the matter is less about the discussions about hard picking but rather to reduce the complaints that will rise from players adopting an 8-2 counter-pick strategy. There's nothing inherently wrong with counter-picking per se but in the end such an extreme form of counter-picking will hurt the growth of the community and ultimately hurt the tournament scene. It is my opinion that the rule set must enforce fair play while not necessarily removing intelligent tournament strategies such as counter-picking. Reducing the extremes to which counter-picking could potentially take place in MKX is ultimately what many people want. Top players will rise above regardless and counter-picking will always remain a valid strategy in tournament play. However, the growth of the scene will in the end be about encouraging Average Joe to be able to play his favorite character at a tournament and not end up being pigeon-holed into playing another character entirely because he will be hard counter-picked on his character-variation at the character select screen leaving Average Joe no choice but to trudge through an 8-2 match before he can then character-variation counter-pick his opponent.
The game is not out yet but let's not beat around the bush. With over 50 variations there will be 8-2 matchups and the variation system has been introduced in an attempt to go around or at the very least reduce the extremes of such an issue. Should variation lock be accepted, a large portion of character-variations will simply not make the cut and MKX will turn into yet another 4 character game so to speak. This will hurt the growth of the NRS scene as a whole, casual and competitive. Is that what the community wants? Have we, as a community, not learned from our past?
I cast my vote, and let the chips fall where they may.
