For those of you that are familiar with behaviorism, this game is one big operant conditioning experiment on YOU.
It is a variable ratio schedule of reinforcement. You don't know how many responses (ie - attacks on an enemy, or whatever) it will take to get the payoff (experience, treasure, or just the buzz from watching a creature die). A VR schedule produces the highest rate of responding, in chimpanzee, pigeons... or YOU. That is why it is the most common schedule of reinforcement in the game.
The game also uses fixed interval schedules, when certain tasks can only be completed at certain times of the day or month.
One of the keys in a reinforcement schedule is to not have the payoff require too many responses, otherwise there is ratio strain (too much effort for too little reward).
The game gets around this by creating a strong reinforcement history, having a small Variable Ratio schedule maybe VR4 (an average of 4 attacks will kill a creature at level 1 or 2). Once you have been conditioned, the reinforcement schedule is "thinned" (it takes 10, then 20, then 40, then 200, then 1,000 attacks to get the reward).
"Thinning" is done slowly - they are training you to do more and more for less and less - one step at a time.
Behaviorists have trained monkeys to press a lever 10,000 times for a single banana in this manner. They will press the lever until they tear muscles, break their own bones, bleed themselves, for hours.
Are you feeling smart now? For more information, look up behaviorism, or reinforcement theory, on the net.
When you are done reading, delete your character, cancel your account, and chop the game disks into small pieces with a sharp pair of scissors.
