Chapter 645: Encouraging Long-Term Cooperation

Lu Bingjun gave a grave nod, "I see.

"That means Chen Guangming is actually quite a dangerous figure. If anyone encounters Community 12 in a future game, please take particular care."

The topic of community dynamics and Chen Guangming faded into a brief aside, and no one spent much more time on it.

After all, the Second Stage had brought considerably more communities into play, each with its own internal ecology, and each ecology producing its own distinct effects.

Based on the current matchmaking system, which specific community you faced in any given game was entirely a matter of chance.

Short of an extreme situation, paying too much attention to any one community's circumstances offered little practical value.

Ye Lin moved to a new topic, "I'm quite curious about the item inside the Miscellaneous Goods packaging.

"A stage prop knife?

"That's genuinely absurd.

"But in your session, that prop knife played an absolutely crucial role. Without it, forcing Zhao Heng into a violation would have been nearly impossible.

"Which means the Imitator designed it specifically with this kind of strategy in mind, a purpose-built prop for a very particular scenario.

"So what was inside the Food packaging?"

Qin Cheng was quiet for a moment, "A small bread roll."

Ye Lin blinked, "Special function?"

Qin Cheng spread his hands, "... It can ease hunger?"

The table went quiet for a moment. There was something darkly comedic about the design.

It was clear that in Qin Cheng's session, the dynamic had been considerably less intense, leaving enough spare violation allowances to go and investigate the contents of the other packaging types.

Since the Medications packaging had contained Class M drugs that directly shaped the game's strategy, it stood to reason that something interesting was hidden in the other two types as well.

It wasn't hard to imagine the expressions on Qin Cheng and the others' faces when they opened the Food packaging and found a small bread roll inside.

Ye Lin couldn't help but laugh quietly, though after a moment's thought she said, "That said, it makes complete sense.

"When designing the three categories of materials, the Imitator clearly applied a hierarchy of value.

"Medications are the most universally useful and most precious, arguably indispensable in a highly competitive session.

"Miscellaneous Goods contained the prop knife: rarely useful in most situations, but capable of enabling a very specific and extreme strategy under the right conditions.

"Food has no value whatsoever.

"So with only five violation allowances available, which type of material a player chose to open was itself a strategic decision. It was primarily a test of how sensitively players read the rules and how well they could judge the situation.

"If nothing in the rules suggested any use for the Food materials and a player still went and opened one anyway, all they would have done is waste a precious violation allowance."

After that, everyone exchanged further questions about the finer details of their respective experiences.

Since the rest periods in this game had been long, and both groups had sharp enough leaders to work through the situation on the ground, most of the strategic debrief had already been covered during the game itself.

Now that the remaining details had been filled in, everyone had a thorough picture of both sessions, and there was no need to spend much more time dissecting every individual moment.

Huang Shengjie summed it up carefully, "Right. So in the ideal scenario, the optimal earnings for this game would work out like this.

"Round One is too early to establish cooperation, so both sides run normal cargo and inspections, each smuggling Contraband independently without interfering with the other. Earnings come out around 80,000 Gold Pounds.

"Round Two is where cooperation can be established. Both sides drop inspections, and earnings go up to around 160,000.

"If the cooperation continues into Round Three, earnings stay at around 160,000.

"Under that scenario, both sides could each end up with roughly 400,000 Gold Pounds, and the winner's 10,000 bonus becomes more or less irrelevant.

"But if either side defects, the 1.5x multiplier turns a betrayal into a massive windfall, pushing potential earnings past 600,000. So instead of cooperating in Round Three, both sides fall into the prisoner's dilemma and end up with a sharp drop in earnings.

"In the end it's a mutual loss, and both sides walk away with only 250,000 to 300,000.

"Excluding the low-probability outcome where one side defects while the other cooperates, the earnings ceiling in this game is 400,000 Gold Pounds, which works out to around 160,000 minutes of visa time per player across five people.

"But getting both sides not to defect also seems unlikely."

Huang Shengjie scratched his head, half-exasperated, "So does this game actually favour cooperation or betrayal?"

Yao Yuan considered for a moment, "Neither. What it truly favours is long-term cooperation.

"This is a textbook prisoner's dilemma. Simple in structure, but without a clean solution.

"In theory, there's a scenario where two genuinely well-intentioned weaker communities happen to be matched against each other and stumble into full cooperation by accident. But the probability of that is extremely low.

"After all, the Second Stage has raised the intensity of competition across the Gallery. Even a newly assembled community like Community 23 contains small groups from the First Stage's fringe communities.

"As long as they can think through this straightforward logic, they'll end up defecting.

"The only way to truly break out of this dilemma is long-term cooperation, meaning two communities that have built a working relationship across more than one game, with both sides committed to maintaining it so they can continue cooperating in future encounters.

"The dilemma can only be broken when the gains from a single betrayal fall far short of the accumulated returns from ongoing cooperation."

Qin Cheng was thoughtful, "So the Imitator who designed this game was actually trying, at least in part, to shift the culture of the Gallery.

"Perhaps even with some degree of goodwill?

"Beyond the final settlement rules, there's another place this shows quite clearly: the choice of medication.

"The Imitator put Class M drugs inside the Medications packaging.

"If they had used Class 0 or Class F, that would have been genuinely harmful. With only one Patroller per side, any other player wanting to smuggle Contraband would have had to take medication.

"That could easily have led to a large number of players being pushed into taking the special drugs during the game, with a real risk of dependency. And even without dependency, there would almost certainly be a broken-window effect: players going back to the community and trying Class 0 or Class F out of curiosity.

"Class M is relatively safe, so none of those concerns apply."

At that point, Huang Shengjie suddenly jumped to his feet, "Right, exactly! And maybe now that the game is over, Class M medication has been added to the community's vending machine? That would be amazing!

"Come on, let's go check."

Several players hurried to the vending machine, though a few didn't move from their seats.

Huang Shengjie opened the special medications page with enthusiasm, then quickly deflated.

"Nothing.

"No Class M medication, no prop knife, not even a bread roll."

Everyone returned to their seats at the long table with looks of mild disappointment.