Mehbark’s First Law

Any curve will leave someone disappointed. A 1% curve will disappoint people 2% short of their desired grade, and a 10% curve will disappoint people 11% short of their desired grade. Even a 100% curve will disappoint some people because every score is now meaninglessly high.

Why

Non-linear consequences. Point thresholds matter a lot in academics; the obvious example is GPA. For the grading scale that determines GPA, shown below, the only points that make a difference are 60, 70, 80, and 90.

Only getting to the next “step” is valuable, so being just below is frustrating—even if you were farther away before your grade was curved. Objective outcomes aside, a high B feels worse than a low A even though we know they can be arbitrarily close.

Height perception functions the same way. 6′0″ is not a milestone in centimeters (182.88), and 180cm is not a milestone in feet (≈5′11″). In an alternate history where the meter was different (maybe a different Earth circumference), more or fewer people would meet that threshold.

More examples

Grades are the most obvious example (hence the use of the word “curve”), but anywhere there are breakpoints, this effect might apply.

A Slay the Spire 2 player suggested that it should be possible to sell potions at shops. Being a few gold short of a valuable purchase is frustrating and often not strategically interesting (gold rewards are random within a range), but this proposed solution would create situations where you are just shy even after selling your potions.

Competitive Pokémon has a truly staggering number of relevant breakpoints. Investing EVs in a stat lets you survive, kill, or outspeed more often, but it is always at the cost of another stat, which means giving up surviving, killing, or outspeeding in other situations.

I feel like I am missing some obvious example.