Wonderful find. Strive for Step 3, be it casually or otherwise.

Originally Posted by [url=http://www.natural-selection.org/forums/index.php?showtopic=84913&view=findpost&p=1325044]Head crab[/url]

The "Natural Selection" Allegory Of The Cave

Step 1: The player is new and ignorant of any strategy/technic/common sense of the game. He plays on a server with generally not-so-good players. He manages to do very good compared to the other players. That server gives him the illusion that he is actually very good no matter what, perhaps the best. He is stuck at the bottom of the cave.

Step 2: An actual good player then plays against him and, at the same time, shows the less-good player that he can actually be beaten. The better player indirectly tries to show him that the less-good player is playing with not-so-good players who are giving him a bad example. However, this second step fails. The less-good player does not accept to see this new situation as the truth, as he has always been playing while thinking that he knew the truth : that he was a very good player. He will return to step 1, but he will form new beliefs to explain what he has experienced with the actual better player. He will believe that something out of his control - lag, hacks, scripts, Barney the purple dinosaur, Skippy the kangaroo, anything imaginable, etc. - is responsible for what he has seen, even though it is not the truth. Some people never pass step 2.

Step 3: Somebody could try to take our player to the exit of the cave, where he could see the day light. After a while, our player might start to see it, but it will fail for the few first times as it will take a lot of time to eliminate the old beliefs. Meanwhile, he may start thinking that there are perhaps ways to improve the way he plays. He may later make researches about strategies, game technics and he could try out new things. He then starts seeing the truth and he improves his gameplay. This player then begins to constantly learn new things about the game. After being fully at step 3, it is impossible for the player to have the desire to go back to step 1 or 2, because he would then find himself ignorant. Interesting. There are quite a few people who are at this step right now in this community, but most are still lying between step 2 and step 3.

Step 4: After having learned everything, our player now knows the real truth about everything in this game. He understands this truth and he is reasoning with it. He has got out of the cave and he can only feel sorry for the other players who are still in the cave. Nobody is at this step and the proof is that even the best players are still learning new things to improve their gameplay every day.

You can help some people get out of the cave, but only them have the capacity of reaching the exit. If they want to live in ignorance, I say let them, because it is their problem and they just won't have access to the good of knowning. The reason some people tend to go to step 3 is because they think it will be more beneficial and interesting for them, which can be considered as true, since it makes the games better, therefore funnier.