I think the idea of metagaming is quite interesting. It's a hated phrased, used and misused more than anything in gaming communities. Pros and Joes alike have their opinions on it. But how do we think about metagaming in a critical light? Let's start by defining what metagaming is.
Meta means (to my understanding at least) an abstraction of an idea... and gaming has to do with gaming. So metagaming is an abstract idea relating to a game. Let's put it in perspective with an example. I'm playing some custom games with my friend in SC2. I'm playing Protoss and he's playing Zerg. I have noted in the last 4 games we played, he went ling/infestor every single time. So I open with a FFE into 8 gate chargelot/archon and stomp him. So I metagamed him by using abstract knowledge obtained outside of my ingame scouting from that match to gain an advantage. I noticed a trend outside of the current match and used it to influence my strategy (blindly I might add).
Let's use another example that I think is closer to pure metagaming. You play IG in the bay area and you tend to play a lot of 5th edition mech lists. So naturally you take lots of melta guns. A sample list:
Imperial Guard "Steel Lions" - 2,000 points
Company Command Squad w/ Chimera - 4 x plasma guns - Chimera w/ heavy flamer
Company Command Squad w/ Chimera - 4 x plasma guns - Chimera w/ heavy flamer
Troops
Veterans w/ Chimera - 3 x meltaguns - Chimera w/ heavy flamer
Veterans w/ Chimera - 3 x meltaguns - Chimera w/ heavy flamer
Veterans w/ Chimera - 3 x meltaguns - Chimera w/ heavy flamer
Veterans w/ Chimera - 3 x plasma guns - Chimera w/ heavy flamer
Veterans w/ Chimera - 3 x plasma guns - Chimera w/ heavy flamer
Fast Attack
Vendetta
Vendetta
Hellhound - heavy flamer
Heavy Support
Manticore Missile Launcher - heavy flamer
Manticore Missile Launcher - heavy flamer
Manticore Missile Launcher - heavy flamer
Total: 2,005 points
This is classic mech vet taken off of Mercer's blog: http://www.imperiusdominatus.com/2010/09/army-lists-imperial-guard-plas-melta.html
You do well because you gaming group plays mech often. But you move to the southwest which is dominated by hoard armies and get stomped. The metagame here is different and you must adjust accordingly.
Pulling out to the bigger picture, let's say you're in the same situation as you were in the beginning, but you're playing ladder against strangers. You use this Chargelot/Archon build against all Zergs you play. Currently that wouldn't be as effective as it was a few weeks ago when most Zergs were going Ling/Infestor. We see a lot of 12 minute maxed 3 hatch roach pushes, which do pretty well vs. 2 base charge/archon. You can see how keeping up with current strategy trends can lead to easy wins/losses.
Even football is based on abstract trends. The plays that have been created are based on past games which were based on past games which were originally based on trial and error, just following the rules. If we were to play SC2 with no knowledge of SC1, the game would be very different right now. How long would it take Terrans to wall-in vs Zergs? How long would it take for the 4 gate as we know it to be created? How many months until 2 basing becomes the norm?
For more extreme examples of "purer" metagaming, I would suggest reading about how Magic can play out at higher levels. Truly complex and terrifying. You could spend years and years playing Magic and still struggle to understand the complex trends and mingames that go on at higher levels.
Let's bring this all back and think about how this can help us be better gamers. We know what metagaming is and we know some good examples. Does it make you a better player? Should you metagame your opponents? Is the metagame always right? How do we create builds and armies that stray from the beaten path and completely dominate the current metagame, yet still are considered "bad"? I'll cover my thoughts on these points in part 2.
