Dominion Strategy Forum

Dominion => Dominion General Discussion => Topic started by: SwitchedFromStarcraft on January 03, 2012, 05:02:10 pm

Title: Any obvious strategy here?
Post by: SwitchedFromStarcraft on January 03, 2012, 05:02:10 pm
The board was:

Farmland, Fortune Teller, Hamlet, Hoard, Lighthouse, Lookout, Philosopher's Stone, Potion, Royal Seal, Vineyard, and Young Witch ( Wishing Well♦ )

This felt like a very weird board, probably because most of the cards I've not seen a lot of, and almost never buy. It was a colony game, and I formulated no strategy at the outset.  With a 5/2 opening, I took YW on principle, because I'm trying to attack more lately.  Beyond that, I was just guessing.  The ending felt weird too - 3 piles in a colony game, and more provinces gone than colonies.

With my first $6, I bought a Hoard rather than gold, and almost every time it came up I had a Hamlet and was able to buy 2 green cards, so I had a good number of golds. Did I just stumble onto the best approach, or is there something else I should have seen?

http://dominion.isotropic.org/gamelog/201201/03/game-20120103-131925-dbb88314.html
Title: Re: Any obvious strategy here?
Post by: WanderingWinder on January 03, 2012, 05:12:11 pm
This should probably go in the help subforum of game reports.
Title: Re: Any obvious strategy here?
Post by: SwitchedFromStarcraft on January 03, 2012, 05:31:09 pm
I considered that, but the rules for that board clearly state that I shouldn't post a game where I won.  It is designed to help folks figure out where they went wrong.
Title: Re: Any obvious strategy here?
Post by: WanderingWinder on January 03, 2012, 06:02:32 pm
Oh. Right. Wasn't thinking about you having won. Just game reports then.

As for advice... I'd definitely prefer lighthouse to hamlet here, at least early on. And then I definitely wouldn't go for hoard unless 3-pile depletion seemed quite likely to happen - in which case I'd prioritize province over platinum. I don't think multibuying green with a hoard in play is a winning proposition (until late game when you're probably buying a bunch of green anyway), and I don't think buying green with hoards in a colony game is a very good bet either - victory card + gold = 2 cards worth 3 money, which brings your money density toward 1.5, actually making it quite a bit harder to buy colonies.
Title: Re: Any obvious strategy here?
Post by: HiveMindEmulator on January 03, 2012, 06:22:34 pm
I'd also probably stick with lighthouse too. You're not going for a draw engine, so you don't really need the hamlet, and the lighthouse is really good defense. Wishing well also makes a pretty good bane card so I'd grab a few and consistently wish for copper. This can pretty easily get you a royal seal and a top-deck gold while taking minimal curses. (You still need to buy young witches because your bane density will eventually decline and you don't want to take all the curses). Once you start getting gold, you can transition into platinum and colonies. With about 3 wishing wells, curses should come slow enough that you can put together $9 hands.

I also agree that hoard is a bad idea because you'd rather just use gold to buy gold than use hoard to gain a couple golds along with VP cards. Gold density is more important than gold count in a colony game because you can't buy a colony with just one gold the way you can buy provinces.
Title: Re: Any obvious strategy here?
Post by: dondon151 on January 03, 2012, 06:51:40 pm
Is Vineyards an option here? There are some really cheap, spammable actions, and assuming you can give some Curses with YW, you might be able to slow down your opponent enough to not reliably buy Colonies for awhile.
Title: Re: Any obvious strategy here?
Post by: WanderingWinder on January 03, 2012, 06:59:11 pm
FYI, I'm not even sure I'd grab Young witch at all. It works dreadfully with the lighthouses and wishing wells you probably want. But you also have to watch out for three-piling. So this is a board you really can't just pick a strategy and let run loose, i.e. one where simulation is NOT going to help you much.
Title: Re: Any obvious strategy here?
Post by: HiveMindEmulator on January 03, 2012, 07:09:12 pm
FYI, I'm not even sure I'd grab Young witch at all. It works dreadfully with the lighthouses and wishing wells you probably want. But you also have to watch out for three-piling. So this is a board you really can't just pick a strategy and let run loose, i.e. one where simulation is NOT going to help you much.
I think this might be a good situation for a late young witch. I'm not an expert at that kind of play, but I sure lose to it a fair amount. Wishing wells are going to be great early, but once you've grabbed a couple golds, wishing well density will be down, and there's probably a chance to sprinkle in enough curses to hurt. And the mini-warehouse ability can be pretty useful too considering the high variance of goodness of your cards in colony games.
Title: Re: Any obvious strategy here?
Post by: Geronimoo on January 04, 2012, 02:59:13 am
This board is very hostile to Young Witch, so I wouldn't touch it. But to make sure your opponent doesn't either you'll need to buy either some Wishing Wells and/or Lighthouses. If you're a good deck tracker spamming Wishing Wells is very strong (almost as good as Labs)

I played around a bit with the simulator and this strategy was very strong: open Fortune Teller/Lookout, spam Wishing Wells (then simple BM for the rest of the game)

Code: [Select]
<player name="Spammed Wishing Well"
 author="Geronimoo"
 description="Spammed WW">
 <type name="TwoPlayer"/>
 <type name="Competitive"/>
 <type name="Colony"/>
 <type name="UserCreated"/>
 <type name="Attacking"/>
 <type name="Bot"/>
   <buy name="Colony">
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInDeck" attribute="Platinum"/>
         <operator type="greaterThan" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="0.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="Province">
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInSupply" attribute="Colony"/>
         <operator type="smallerOrEqualThan" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="5.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="Duchy">
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInSupply" attribute="Colony"/>
         <operator type="smallerOrEqualThan" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="4.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="Estate">
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInSupply" attribute="Colony"/>
         <operator type="smallerOrEqualThan" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="2.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="Platinum"/>
   <buy name="Gold"/>
   <buy name="Fortune_Teller">
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInDeck" attribute="Fortune_Teller"/>
         <operator type="equalTo" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="0.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="Lookout">
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInDeck" attribute="Lookout"/>
         <operator type="equalTo" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="0.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="Wishing_Well"/>
</player>
Title: Re: Any obvious strategy here?
Post by: kn1tt3r on January 04, 2012, 03:32:52 am
Tons of spammable cheap action cards, including ones with +$ and +buy. I'd be very suprised if Vineyards wasn't the dominant strategy here.

I'd probably open Lookout/Fortune Teller, buy lots of WWs, Hamlets and Lighthouses, possibly grab a Hoard (though I don't really know if I need one here), and at some point buy 2-3 Potions and go for Vineyards. Timing is very likely crucial here because piles might be emptied very fast, so this "some point" for the Potion buys is important to choose correctly.
Title: Re: Any obvious strategy here?
Post by: Empathy on January 04, 2012, 05:03:00 am
I'd go lighthouse/lookout if he goes YW. lighthouse/hamlet otherwise.

then lighthouse/hamlet on next cycle

spam lots of 2-buys, switch to potion/YW if the other is not defending. Potion/WW/lighthouse if he is.

Try to three-pile if he's going for a long game. If he's rushing points (early province+duchies), on the contrary slow down and try to ramp the vineyards up (this means not emptying the 2s but rather attack the WW / YW / fortune teller piles).

The beauty being that, if he defends, then that means he's emptying piles for you (WW and lighthouse), and if he doesn't, then you can slow down his game with attacks.

defending mid-game is always hard when you have a fat deck and your next cycle only hits in 2-3 turns. Just time the YW buy appropriately.

Unless he's going for the same strategy, he can't be rushing points *and* piles.
Title: Re: Any obvious strategy here?
Post by: underwatercolor on January 04, 2012, 06:50:19 am
This is tangential to your question, but interesting, I think.

Your Young Witch cursed your opponent on turns 3, 4, 7, 11, 17, 23.
Your opponent's cursed you on turns: 13, 14, 19, and 26.

There's a huge snowballing disparity there. By the time you drew your first Curse, you had already bought Platinum. If one looks to see what purchasing difference might have contributed to that, the only relevant difference is that ended up buying a Wishing Well instead of a Young Witch on turn 4. (This pretty much agrees with other comments that the YW is weak here, with proper defense.) You also got some good luck with the curse/bane ratio, I think. :)

Another side note from reviewing: as played, you should wish for Copper much more. :)

Like some other commenters, I would have bought Lighthouse early instead of Hamlet. I would also go for Lookout early; you're going to want to trash a lot of stuff in this game (even if you don't have Curses).
Title: Re: Any obvious strategy here?
Post by: DG on January 04, 2012, 10:07:25 am
The simulator actually generates some interesting results. The lookout/wishing well combination works very well, presumably because it creates a uniform deck of copper and wishing wells that cycles and trashes quickly. I did create a young witch deck that would beat Geronimoo's fortune teller deck, however a lookout+wishing well deck is better still and is much stronger than pure money. There are probably improvements that can be made if the opponent doesn't defend properly.

Code: [Select]
<player name="lookout/wishing well +late ft"
 author="DG"
 description="Spammed WW">
 <type name="Attacking"/>
 <type name="TwoPlayer"/>
 <type name="Competitive"/>
 <type name="Bot"/>
 <type name="Colony"/>
 <type name="UserCreated"/>
   <buy name="Colony">
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInDeck" attribute="Platinum"/>
         <operator type="greaterThan" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="0.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="Province">
      <condition>
         <left type="gainsNeededToEndGame"/>
         <operator type="smallerOrEqualThan" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="4.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="Duchy">
      <condition>
         <left type="gainsNeededToEndGame"/>
         <operator type="smallerOrEqualThan" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="2.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="Estate">
      <condition>
         <left type="gainsNeededToEndGame"/>
         <operator type="smallerOrEqualThan" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="2.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="Platinum"/>
   <buy name="Gold"/>
   <buy name="Fortune_Teller">
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInDeck" attribute="Fortune_Teller"/>
         <operator type="equalTo" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="0.0"/>
      </condition>
      <condition>
         <left type="getTotalMoney"/>
         <operator type="smallerThan" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="6.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="Lookout">
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInDeck" attribute="Lookout"/>
         <operator type="smallerThan" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="1.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="Wishing_Well"/>
   <buy name="Fortune_Teller">
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInDeck" attribute="Fortune_Teller"/>
         <operator type="equalTo" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="0.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="Royal_Seal"/>
   <buy name="Silver"/>
   <buy name="Lighthouse"/>
</player>

I tried a vineyards deck but the simulator wasn't generating extra buys from the hamlet for low cost cards. It's probably too slow to beat this handy lookout/wishing well combination anyway. The simulated game summary also showed 14 potions in the deck for no reason I could fathom, since the turn logs showed the bots only buying one or two potions as directed in the purchasing rules.
Title: Re: Any obvious strategy here?
Post by: ehunt on January 04, 2012, 11:03:18 am
Vineyards are amazing here. Without colony I'd be 100% certain they're dominant. I'd open lookout/lighthouse and buy nothing but potions, hamlets, lighthouses, and vineyards after that.
Title: Re: Any obvious strategy here?
Post by: SwitchedFromStarcraft on January 04, 2012, 01:54:36 pm
Thanks everybody, for the feedback.  I had registered that my banes repelled his YW attacks at a rate higher than chance alone would have suggested. This was in addition to his buying YW later than me, which also helped.

I should have been able to rule out the use of Hoard (gold+green = $ density of 1.5/card), especially in a Colony game.  Just this weekend, I was explaing treasure density values to newbies IRL. I fell prey to the "Colony game, got to have more money" idea.

I mentioned my resolution to attack more on principle, but that shouldn't overide consideration of the other cards, particularly in light of possible counters.  It was my unfamiliarity with the majority of the kingdom that made lots of cards easy to ignore. Luckily, there was little peril in this specific instance, but perhaps a higher priority principle is "examine carefully each and every card, ESPECIALLY if you rarely or never use them".