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1

Game Reports / How to play Noble Brigand Mirrors?

« on: August 23, 2012, 02:20:05 am »

Game: http://dominion.isotropic.org/gamelog/201208/22/game-20120822-225220-50a6717e.html

Does anybody understand how to play NB mirrors?  There is nothing else interesting on this board that could compete... possibly embargo to Pirate ships? but that's stretching it. 

Anywho, how do we play NB mirrors? 
-  Are players supposed to commit fully to NB at all costs first and risk terminal collisions? Even at the cost of golds even (this didn't happen but am curious).  Should we stop at a particular number of NB, say 3, 4, 5?
-  At what point do you green? Should players even buy gold at the risk they get stolen or load up on them because they can get stolen?  Normally duchies are bought at say... the Provinces < 4 mark with this much coin around.  Does the clock tick earlier as coins get be stolen? 
-  Minor point, gaining duchess... bad idea here right?  I mean there's already a ton of terminal collision.
-  Are there any cards that would supplement it well?  (I'm thinking Noble brigands/scheme would be a silly stalemate)

Thanks to those in advance that use simulators!

2

Game Reports / Midgame decisions!

« on: July 11, 2012, 02:41:39 pm »

Objective
So the point of this will be to make decisions and evaluate the mid-game.  Often we will have a certain goal/deck in mind but circumstances will change (opponent's strategy, shuffle luck, etc.) that we need to change our goal/deck as well.  I will leave you some information up to a certain point and hope to hear your suggestions on:
1. What the players are trying to do
2. How the players should react
3. If there are ways to set up multiple options:

Board Analysis
The board: Caravan, Embargo, Gardens, Ghost Ship, Golem, Horn of Plenty, Militia, Potion, Remodel, Salvager, and Transmute
This was a game between me and Qmech (a preeetty good player)
At first glance, there is not enough for an engine to be created, no + actions (Golem could count but there's only one cantrip).  All the other cards aren't very good at BM aside from militia and ghost ship at BM.   $5s aren't that special except ghost ship might come into play. 

Deck composition - After Turn 8
Qmech: 2 Gold, 3 Caravan, 1 Militia, 2 Silver, 3 Estate, 7 Copper
Grabbing what you would expect him to at every stage, Gold 6+, Caravan at 4+ and silvers at 3... probably could have gotten a second militia but seems about the same either way.  We can safely tag this player so far as BM militia.  The other deck ended up looking like this after 8 turns (one turn away from hitting reshuffle). 

RJ: 4 Horn of Plenty, 2 Militia, 3 Silver, 0 Embargo, 3 Estate, 7 Copper
RJ opens up with 4 Horn of plentys.  FOUR! What do people do with horn of plenty without an engine to get provinces? He uses one of the HoP early to gain an embargo, to embargo the embargo! 

What could RJ be attempting to set up, and how should Qmech be attempting to stop whatever he is trying to set up? Is there anyway for RJ to slow down Qmech? 

If there is any other information you'd like about this game just post it below and I'll add it

PS.  Hopefully I can do this quite often but I do get busy here and there. 

Edit: http://councilroom.com/game?game_id=game-20120629-133429-f5c60e1a.html

3

Dominion General Discussion / Midgame discussion

« on: June 28, 2012, 03:04:04 am »

Introduction
I want to try something new here.  There is a lot of evaluation on this site on specific cards, kingdoms, combos, etc.  There are card rankings for every price point done by the community.  We have articles on cards' strengths and weaknesses as well as combos and nombos.  There is a lot of help in this community about specific kingdoms from general advice to simulators. 

However, I feel like most of the analysis is limited on what to do at the beginning of the game.  Talking about different with openings and T3/T4 purchases etc. and a general strategy to pursue.  However, I want to have more of a discussion on the mid-game.  There are many adjustments people need to make after their first 6-8 turns occur.  Shuffle luck happens. 

I see a lot of players (me included) have plan A and B, then choose A.  Purchase their opening then T3/T4 gives them cards that helps plan B option instead.  Despite purchasing that benefits plan B, we continue to head to plan A despite the lack of synergy in the two separate plans.  There are a lot of different cases of this and I hope to have players thinking about the mid-game as a crucial part instead of auto-piloting. 

The set up
I will provide the kingdom as well as our respective decks at a crucial point, I will say T6-T8 will be a decent place to gauge.   I will also try to explain both strategies the best I can.  This will be done either from talks I had with the opponent or gauging purchases they have made up to that point.  This is because I do not want to expose the game logs and provide a more in-depth look on the situation.

Then simply, I hope people can offer any adjustments you would make to the strategies going forward for either if any.  I plan to also create a poll on which deck they believe is better at that particular point (also take into account their general strategy).  At the end, I will reveal the game logs and give my thoughts if neccessary. 

Questions
I have not posted a scenario quite yet because of a couple questions I have.  I am not quite sure where this best fits (Game reports? Puzzles? General discussion?) and also if there is any additional information or any adjustments you would like, please let me know.  Is there certain things you would like me to focus on?  Granted I am not good in a lot of situations, but I will try my best. 

tl;dr: I want to provide annotated games from the mid-game.  Help me.

4

Game Reports / Amb/Amb vs. Amb/Silver

« on: June 25, 2012, 01:46:36 pm »

The Game: http://councilroom.com/game?game_id=game-20120326-102040-5c2a480d.html

Key cards, Ambassador, Colony/Platinum, Haven, Nothing else.

I meant to post this awhile ago as ARTJoMS had some interesting things to say to me.  Essentially, he told me that my choice of double ambassador was a horrible decision in general, especially BM.  I responded that a Colony BM game is longer and helps my double ambassador choice.  Also the fact that there is Haven gives me two things.  Avoids terminal collision better and something to purchase at $2.  I also think that at worst, I come away with ambassador two coppers and purchase a silver/haven. 

Now he also said I won because I was lucky, and its pretty evident that T3/T4 could not have gone better for me so I don't disagree there.  What I am curious is that I think that amb/amb (in this board) is competitive if not better for the reasons I said above.  Or was it just because I am lucky this one time and using this to springboard my argument?

You can comment on the game itself, but it's not that interesting after T4...

5

Dominion General Discussion / If buying a silver gave a curse, is it better than IGG?

« on: June 14, 2012, 02:30:57 pm »

I assume the answer to this question is Yes.  Essentially I want to see the (lack of) value the extra copper of IGG provides (EDIT: as well as when this occurs). I want to learn more of the overall power of IGG as well as how to use its gaining benefit better. 

This question can probably be answered by how much would you pay for such a silver.  OR how often (and how much) the extra copper is better overall.  Although please feel free to use your gut feeling or whatever other metric you want to use. 

Remember, this isn't valuing coppers overall.  It is valuing coppers in the context of IGG games.  I would also like to hear the multiplayer's POV because I have no idea how good/bad this card is in multiplayer. 

6

GokoDom / Isodom 4 Challenge: Finals

« on: June 10, 2012, 03:03:22 pm »

Just a heads up, DG and RisingJaguar will be starting their match soon.  The logs will be up in a couple hours once the match is complete!

7

Dominion General Discussion / Popular Buys: Irregular Effects with/without

« on: March 07, 2012, 12:29:46 pm »

Lately, I've been staring at the popular buy page of mine (and a couple others) to see if I can learn a thing or two.  It's not that effective, but I ended up finding some very odd effects with/without in my searches.  I'd like to hear others irregular effects with/without numbers too!

For those that aren't familiar, this is the site http://councilroom.com/popular_buys
The statistic I'm referring to is how many standard deviations you outperform your expected win-rates for with and without (moreless?, I never read a definition but this is what I get from it).  Edit: The expected win-rates are generated by using the card's win-rate with/without combined with your overall win-rate.

Here is a link to my popular buy page.  http://councilroom.com/popular_buys?player=RisingJaguar
Hunting Party - Effect without 39.56.  I find it fascinating in the 10ish games I've avoided HP, I've won all of them.  I also very much consider this among the top $5 cards. 
Goons/Tunnel - -2.21/-2.08.  On the flip side, both of these have gain rates of 85ish%, so the off chance I avoid it I should be doing well right? Sadly not.
Scout - Effect with/without -1.46/-0.60.  Yeah I don't understand the worst card in the game. 

WanderingWinder's best Effects with, coming in at 9.21 is... Copper! Seems fitting as he's the main advocate of gaining coppers with his often Alt-VP cards rush.