Trading and Online First Person Shooters

A few months ago I bought a PS3 so I could have a blu-ray player, and shortly thereafter I got Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2. I’ve played video games off and on over the years, typically on the PC, but I had never played online against other players before. While I enjoy the first person shooter game format, I’ve never been a hard-core gamer, and never considered myself to be very good. I've never had much time for it; I'm not exactly a kid anymore (33, married w/ 2 kids). I enjoyed playing through the single-player campaign, but what really hooked me was the online multi-player.

During the first game online I played I got absolutely destroyed… I had no idea what I was doing. I didn’t know the maps, I didn’t know the weapons, but most importantly I had no skills or experience to prepare me for the experience. I didn’t know how to operate outside of the pre-orchestrated structure of the campaign mode, how to find enemies and kill them before they found you first. However, by jumping in the ring and getting slaughtered over and over again, I started noticing what my competitors were doing to me, and with experience I began to formulate strategies and tactics for different maps and situations. After a few months and a lot of hours, I now very consistently take 2nd or 3rd place in free-for-all death matches (I still haven’t actually won a match, looking forward to that day).
Recently it occurred to me how similar trading is to online FPS games; I find the similarities to be remarkable (I’m strictly talking non-team based death matches here, obviously team based games such as capture the flag are different):

1A. In trading, you only make money by taking it away from someone else
1B. In online FPS’s, you only get kills by someone else dying

2A. In trading, your goal is to maximize your profits while minimizing your losses
2B. In online FPS’s, your goal is to maximize your kills while minimizing your deaths

3A. In trading, if you play to not lose (defensive), you may minimize losses, but you will also minimize your gains (I’m guessing some out there will disagree on this one, but everyone should agree that you have to place trades to make money)
3B. In online FPS’s, the guys who typically win are the most aggressive players, constantly moving and entering combat areas with skill and precision. The snipers and campers who hang out in one area for a long time don’t see enough combat to get a high number of kills

4A. In trading, the big money is made by those who are able to let their winners run
4B. In online FPS’s (MW2 specifically), getting kill-streak rewards is almost a pre-requisite to placing in the top 3. Anyone can rush into a firefight, get a kill or two and then die, but it takes great skill to get 7 or 8 kills in a row without dying so you can call in air support or drop in a sentry gun.

5A. In trading, the only way to learn how to trade is by trading, taking risks and learning from your mistakes. While there may be books and forums to read, each trader must develop his own methodology born out of his own experiences.
5B. In online FPS’s, the only way to get good is by playing, by studying how others play, and figuring out how to combat their techniques. There are no books or guides that will give you an edge against a human opponent, you have to learn through experience and trial and error.

6A. In trading, if a particular strategy or edge becomes well known, the trading community will find ways to exploit and eliminate that edge.
6B. In online FPS’s, there’s almost always a way to counter someone else’s technique, once you figure out what it is. With MW2 in particular, the maps are well designed with few choke points, and no real good places to hide. There are few (if any) decent places on the map where you aren’t exposed to someone coming up from behind you, and once someone figures out that you’re camping in a certain area, they will rush you and flush you out.

7A. In trading, you make money by exploiting the patterns created by others, which are a result of collective psychology
7B. In online FPS’s, you get kills by anticipating what your opponents will likely do, and a lot of techniques (and tricks) are grounded in the psychology. Most players have tendencies that you can exploit once you learn them (like the desire to camp out in the bunker on the Wasteland map or the house on the Estate map).

8A. In trading, you can make money using a lot of different styles. There are scalpers, swing traders, investors, price action traders, indicators, trend, counter-trend, range, etc. No matter what the strategy there is someone out there making money with it (except SCT of course). However, many would argue that the easiest way to be successful is by trading with the trend most of the time.
8B. In online FPS’s, there are lots of different styles of play, all facilitated by the large weapon selection with attachments and perks, and all can be successful if it fits your temperament and you learn the techniques. You have snipers, ninjas, heavy artillery (light machine gunners), et cetera, but I think many would agree that the most commonly successful way to play is by using a balanced assault approach.

There are probably a lot of other ways in which trading and online FPS’s are similar, these are just a few. In summary I think they are both addictive, particularly if you like challenge, risk, and competition.

The obvious difference is trading results in a change in your net worth, winning an online FPS game might only increase your sense of self-worth (unless you are a professional gamer, of which there are probably very few).

Anyone have similar thoughts or experiences? Anyone else out there addicted to MW2? I use the same handle in MW2 online as I do on ET… maybe you’ll see me out there sometime. Just not during my trading hours.

 

I play modern warfare also. I noticed similarities in all kinds of different competition after reading "The Art of War". No matter what kind of competition there is "art of war" seems to hold true in a metaphorical way with how to beat the enemy.

There are also hackers and cheaters in Modern Warfare similar to fraudulent activities that occur in the market place.

 

Games may be a great way to re-build/build up our self-esteem. When our self-esteem gets damaged, so too goes the results from trading...

 

The everywhere applicable theory - made up myself
if its a valid theory, can be applied on everything from warfare to farming chickens.


a. I've used trading rules with women, just 2 days ago a girl dragged me up to her room, a 6.5 , I compiled after a long series of pleadin and being super horny. I was staring at her while in her room, she had a cute face, but man her thighs were huge, I was not fking another fattie, I was talking to myself in the 3rd person, please do not go through this, u don't need this, STOP YOURSELF OUT
so I panciced and went , OH SHIT I have to pick up something from downstairs, I'm sorry I got to GO! I was running down the stairs like I just got out of jail for free, she's like WAIT WAIT in the background, I'm like hells no, Later in the night I ended up with a much cuter girl 7.5 super skinny, more my type, gave her a damn good slow fking.
Very happy with myself maintaining absolute displince while being very horny.


In fact many of the KO strategies is the same theory you use in a trade entry.

 

Agree with you, nowaydays there are so many hacker and cheater in games or business so we can't prevent them from hack and cheat all the times. Just do it yourself and have more experience each day so you have the fundmentation to the business

 

so every game I have ever played I have always won more than i lost, is this the same as trading? If you usually lose games maybe you shouldnt trade lol

 

I agree with the OP. In my late teens and early 20's I decided I wanted to be a world class Quake 3 player. After a year or two I had several opportunities to boot-camp with the top player in the world and grand champion of the game. I learned a lot about what it takes to be the undisputed world champion of one of the most competitive endeavors there is. I've carried many of my observations over to trading.

1) Being a big fish in a small pond feels good at the time, but when you face the upper echelons of the world, none of your small pond preparations are going to matter. The collective wisdom of the community dwarfs anything one person could conceive in a vacuum. You had to put yourself in a position to absorb all the lore as a foundation for personal growth.

2) Everybody who had a chance to boot-camp with the grand champion came out a much more skilled player. The more time a player spent sparring with him, the better they seemed to get, which meant that a lot of his success could be attributed to learned strategies and tactics. The upper crust players all spent a lot of time sparring against each other in invitation only practice sessions. Getting into that elite circle was coveted, but open to anyone who could play at that skill level.

3) The grand champion put more thought into his drills than anybody else. It's not just that he practiced a lot, he was very smart about how he spent his practice time.

4) The grand champion slept longer hours than anybody else I had met in college. He didn't impose a 24 hour cycle on himself like most people, he just slept when he needed it, and made sure to get more rest than anyone else. He also exercised quite a bit. He was quite good at tennis.

5) He ate healthy. Most gamers ate hot pockets and kept themselves awake by dosing caffeine. That was out of the question with the champion. I never saw him drink a drop of alcohol.

6) The handful of upper crust players had a machine-like consistency. What they did when they weren't playing had everything to do with it.

7) The champion's skills were transferable. He was great at all games and champion of several. I could see that he possessed a process and discipline that made him great. He sought out every top expert he could challenge and converse with when he began to learn a new game. He didn't start adding his own insights until the insights of others were well understood. Once he knew the boundaries of the box, he could think outside of it and truly innovate beyond the community's comfort zone.

 

how much those boot camps with the elite cost for quake3?

 

nice post filter_sweep. seems very true

i play but usually only during trading hours cause i find that if i don't distract myself from my automated systems i'll fiddle with them and make less.

i'll add you. my username is milddownsyndrome on the psn

it's the only game i own cause i hate wasting time playing and i know i will if i find something else fun. patiently waiting for black ops though

people who cheat are lame. especially boosters. what's the point? to get more emblems and titles that nobody will ever know you have. kids....

 

I appreciate the analogy to trading but I don't appreciate the spite you're implying. I've never paid for a boot camp in trading or video games. You don't even have to take my word for it, you can use your brain. None of us had the money for something like that back in college. Do you think the top player would need our laundry money when he was taking the first prize out of $100k tournament purses on a regular basis? This man was not a charlatan, he didn't need our money any more than George Soros needs your money. He needed to train with the best so he could keep winning tournaments. Anything else would have been a complete waste of his time.

Don't bother replying Shortie because I'm not going to respond your BS again.