Please define "meta" as it is used in the forum

Yepyep

People discuss this a lot, the "meta game." I'm familiar with the prefix generally, but what do people mean by it in the game?

Thanks much. I looked for a definition posted somewhere in forum but couldn't find one.

KinDM

"meta" tends to refer to the sort of game outside the game. Basically, all the factors that aren't strictly programmed in, but can effect you all the same. Mostly, it's used to mean things like what characters you're likely to be facing in, for example, PvP. Stuff like "The current 5* meta is dominated by Thanos and Black Panther" means that the most likely teams you'll be dealing with include those characters.
It's also used to reference other factors, such as alliance domination, collusion via the Line app, shield check rooms, and other factors that are not necessarily discussed on this forum, but which can all have an effect on your gameplay. 

Hope that kind of explains it. 

Yepyep

Thanks Kin. Helpful.

Vhailorx

Meta-data is data about data (i always use an alphabet as a simple example.  The letters are the data, the order of the letters is metadata.).  So the meta-game is the game about the game.  

For MPQ purposes, the game is playing a match of MPQ, and the meta-game is all of the choices you make about how and when to play that match.  So as a non-exhaustive list

-which characters to brjng into a match
-which characters to roster/level/champ
-when to roster/level/champ characters
-which nodes to grind in which order
-which slice to join
-when to shield
-how to use healthpacks, tokens, currency, and other consumable resources.

dstann

Some great explanations so far.  When I see "the current meta" when it refers to this game I take it to mean the most effective play style at the moment.  So which characters and combinations of characters are being being used the most by the player base.  

jamesh

A lot of what people are talking about as "meta" is just the game itself.  Deciding that a pair of 5* characters are the strongest and work well together is a direct result of the game rules.

There are examples of people playing metagames though: the biggest being high level PvP. where they've developed a host of new rules that are outside of the game proper.  These govern who you are allowed to attack and when, among other things.  They'll even complain when people refuse to play by the rules of this metagame, even when the behaviour is consistent with the rules of the real game.

TPF Alexis

jamesh said:

A lot of what people are talking about as "meta" is just the game itself.  Deciding that a pair of 5* characters are the strongest and work well together is a direct result of the game rules.

That's not metagaming, no. But recognizing that a ton of people use those two, and looking for options that specifically counter them, even tho they might not be nearly as good as all-rounders, is metagaming.

IIRC, the term first really became popular in early MtG circles, and fairly quickly became narrowed from it's original definition of "anything that affects the Game, but isn't actually part of the Game's Rules" to much more commonly being used to refer to "What builds are really common right now".

purplemur

Douglas Hofstadter was one of the first contemporary writers to use the term meta as its own word. His work was influential in computer coding circles of the 80's; where it really gained usage. there is of course a huge transect with MtG and geeks and its easy to see the migration.
 In general the use of meta is when a thing references a thing. So Deadpool commenting about a lack of recognizable characters in his own movie is Meta. Norman rockwell self portrait with himself on the canvas painting himself is meta. Sesame street making jokes to kids about adults not getting the joke, that only the adults get is meta. The lego movie joke about a 3x2. This thread is meta in that we are discussing about how people on here discuss MPQ. It has been sloppily handled in current usage to be applied to any discussion that is introspective much like adding gate to anything scandalous.
On the forum I've seen the handle to generally describe data analysis(metrics) of who is strongest right now. like "gee i see a lot of BP/Thanos in the 5* meta", which is like saying the alphabet has 26 letters but i see RSTLNE the most. Just discussing tangible ways to overcome enemies you would typically face is not meta so much as when the players change their rosters because the common foils to the most popular lineups becomes widely known on the forum or planning your shield climb to coincide with low activity on LINE chat. That is the metagame.
I think the closest we've come to in-game meta is when gwenpool is like you have a wiki right? and the top search result for 'sploits takes you to the forum.{big ups stochasticism!}
Language grows and remains dynamic; however meta is used in this community can and will be different from Mirriam-Webster/Wiki/greek etymology. Their is no Queen to say one usage is acceptable and the other isn't. they're are limitless ways to right words and communicate meaning and if you get what there trying to say thats all that matters. So drop it like slang and use it or interpret its meaning in whatever way makes the most sense to you.
ya grok me?

jamesh

TPF Alexis said:

jamesh said:

A lot of what people are talking about as "meta" is just the game itself.  Deciding that a pair of 5* characters are the strongest and work well together is a direct result of the game rules.

That's not metagaming, no. But recognizing that a ton of people use those two, and looking for options that specifically counter them, even tho they might not be nearly as good as all-rounders, is metagaming.

IIRC, the term first really became popular in early MtG circles, and fairly quickly became narrowed from it's original definition of "anything that affects the Game, but isn't actually part of the Game's Rules" to much more commonly being used to refer to "What builds are really common right now".

I'd contend that there is a pretty big difference between MtG and this game though: (a) you're trying to counter the unknown deck of your opponent, and (b) you are trying to guess how your opponent will play that deck.

Here though, you know exactly what characters your opponent has chosen, and everyone's defensive team is played by the same simplistic AI.  If you had some way to customise how your defensive team was played (e.g. prioritise colours to collect, which powers to fire and which to ignore, what to target, etc), then there might be room for metagaming.

TPF Alexis

Oh, absolutely, but as far as I can tell, the term was introduced to gaming circles by Richard Garfield (who I believe got it directly from reading Hofstadter's Gödel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid. Excellent book if you can get through it. Very dense.), and then it's spread to other games from there. I know I saw it become common in D&D and 40K circles via the overlap between players who were into both those and MtG.

In any given game, the meaning is somewhat different, but they all fit the same category of using info beyond the rules themselves to change how one approaches the game.

And actually, there have been times when certain things in MtG have been so dominant that 75% or more of any given Tournament would be running, card for card, exactly the same deck. I don't think it's happened in a while, and that usually leads to some bans or something that break it up, but it has happened.