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226

Puzzles and Challenges / Re: Empty the Supply with Bad Shuffle Luck

« on: July 09, 2013, 10:38:03 pm »

I love these bad-luck puzzles. I love them so much! Thinking it through, trashing is naturally crucial. One of the more notable tricks for emptying the supply is Haggler abuse, specifically the Black Market-Haggler trick. Black Market is not a feasible investment on a minimal-luck board, however. The Black Market deck will naturally give you the least optimal cards for Haggler tricks: say, Pearl Diver, Duchess and Secret Chamber. Straight haggler use, in which you hard buy colonies or provinces, is certainly possible, but requires more effort.

Because more buildup is required to get 10 Hagglers in play with an astronomical amount of money, I wonder if a single gain-and-play megaturn CC style is viable at all. If not, Scheme and scrying pool are excellent kingdom additions, bypassing the danger of a bad draw.

I suspect that the opening here and the corresponding trashing will mirror the mint/chapel tricks from the Chancellor challenge. The sooner the deck is thinned, the sooner crazy combos become possible.

Edit: I see that scott pilgrim allowed a lucky Black Market deck, which changes this challenge considerably. With that in place, CC-esque solutions are more viable. As for the complexity of kingdom cards being too numerous, I doubt that hamlet and nomad camp will be as necessary once we no longer assume the perfect nomad camp/watchtower-hamlet opening.

227

Puzzles and Challenges / Re: Can you beat the lucky Chancellor? (Part 2)

« on: July 09, 2013, 03:53:37 pm »

Only one Pillage is really necessary. The first one to succeed will knock out the Chancellor, forcing the lucky chancellor to go through his entire province-packed deck in order to find it again. Not much fun for the chancellor, is it?

228

Game Reports / Re: my worst game

« on: July 09, 2013, 01:53:22 pm »

Oddly enough, despite the complete lack of a viable engine here, there's one engine-y card that will become strong very quickly: City. IGG is famous for emptying multiple piles at once. Once IGG is piled through, Cities hit level 3, giving a substantial economic lift.

The downside is that City and IGG occupy the same price point. To buy one, you must ignore the other. Besides, if you go for Cities and ignore IGG, your opponent will buy out all but the last 2 or so IGG. Then he catches up on Cities, while your badly junked deck struggles to empty the IGG pile.

Is there any way to make City viable on this board? Or is it wiser to ignore it?

229

Dominion General Discussion / Re: WW's Power Rankings

« on: July 09, 2013, 02:56:10 am »

I'm still skeptical about Shanty Town in general, but HiveMindEmulator has a good point about ghost ship. Does this mean that Shanty Town synergizes with deck control effects? It's likely strongest when you have actions in the top 2 cards of your deck.

230

Puzzles and Challenges / Re: Can you beat the lucky Chancellor? (Part 2)

« on: July 09, 2013, 02:53:56 am »

I love that powerman's solution is purely economic, and doesn't need to screw with the Chancellor's playstyle. However, it does rely on a 5/2 split, which... actually, I'm not sure if it's allowed. I ought to double-check. Still, it would be best if one could demonstrate a variation of this that would work for any setting.

I'm also divided on whether or not to permit Colonies. It seems that if Colony were on board, the Chancellor should have the option of building his deck further to the level where he can pursue that instead of province. If the chancellor is programmed to ignore colonies on a colony board, it creates abnormally poor play for him.

Then again, it is in the spirit of the puzzle to limit the chancellor to simplistic strategies. The point is that clever strategies can overcome even the most potent luck advantages, and powerman, like our other contestants, has demonstrated this admirably.

231

Dominion General Discussion / Re: WW's Power Rankings

« on: July 09, 2013, 12:48:41 am »

And while few players would by Moat solely for the +draw, many solid and powerful cards draw the same amount. Ghost Ship, Witch, even Masquerade. If engines are desirable on a board with those cards, village pulls still further ahead of shanty town.

232

Puzzles and Challenges / Re: The Omniscient Spy

« on: July 08, 2013, 04:06:08 pm »

jomini, the idea of opening with mint is fantastic. Immediately, you are down to an 8-card deck, meaning that you reshuffle extra quickly. The spy must take great pains to prevent the chapel from connecting. The rebuild phase is interesting. In all likelihood, the spy will ensure that your coppers collide with your chapel rather than your estates. This means that you must think ahead in terms of what you will be able to buy.

Although long-term, the pawns are more promising economically, I suspect that squire into pillage is where we want to go. Picking off the spy is nice, but if we assume that this is the Chancellor/Spy variation where the opponent doesn't buy anything, we've got a much nastier attack on our hands. Pillaging the Chancellor ruins his ability to spy us on future turns, and he must wait until the reshuffle to get his stamina back. If his deck is sufficiently small, it's relatively weak. Against a "hard mode" scenario, though, where the opponent has been buying green the whole time, this can be devastating.

And of course, two spoils in a trimmed deck are nothing to sneeze at.

And as for chapel empowering the spy, I think it actually hurts it. Some of the Lucky Chancellor threads reached a point where the deck had only 4 non-cantrip cards, meaning that the whole deck could be drawn regardless of the hand's contents. Once that point is reached, the spy is powerless. Oddly enough, as frustrating as the omniscient spy can be when blocking chapel attempts, it becomes abysmal once you've finally chapeled down.

233

Puzzles and Challenges / Re: The Omniscient Spy

« on: July 08, 2013, 09:58:10 am »

eHalcyon, a similar point was brought up when I proposed this on the Lucky chancellor threat. The combination of quick province buy-up from the chancellor and vicious attack from the spy made success almost impossible. The goal of this thread is to break the impossible challenge into two manageable pieces. The chancellor challenge already exists by itself, and demonstrates the clever maneuvers players will have to use if they want to outrace a wickedly fast opponent. This spy-in-a-vacuum challenge, in which the chancellor-spy bot buys nothing, is purely to see how players respond to the spy attacks. If someone stumbles upon a strategy that can win the game against the spy in a reasonable amount of time, then we might make the chancellor-bot buy provinces. But for now, the human player doesn't have to race anyone but himself.

234

Dominion General Discussion / Re: WW's Power Rankings

« on: July 08, 2013, 09:49:38 am »

I don't agree with the general consensus that Worker's village is one of the best villages. Yes, you often want +buy, but rarely more than one, maximum two. And since in an engine that wants +buy you play more than one village per turn, the benefit of Worker's village is not that useful, while if you have a farming village for example, having the benefit several times worth more IMO (and there are lot of good +buy, other than Worker's).

I understand that worker's village, much like a Grand Market chain, often results in surplus buys. There are a few ways to capitalize on that, especially in the Prosperity set that those cards come from: Quarry makes each buy more effective for engine building, Peddler picks up an economic boost with spare buys, and Goons essentially turns massive buy count into a win condition.Worker's Village, like Scout or Outpost, is abnormally solid amongst other cards from its expansion.

The major difference between these cards, naturally, is that Scout and Outpost are both quite weak without trick-vp cards or duration effects. Worker's Village is a worthwhile component on any viable engine board. It is almost always good, and when a card like Quarry is on the board, possibly even great. I expect a reasonably high rank on this one.

235

Puzzles and Challenges / Re: The Omniscient Spy

« on: July 07, 2013, 11:49:11 pm »

And an odd thought: the topdecking ability of Royal Seal bypasses the spy very neatly. If the BM player purchases that on 5 instead of silver, his options open up slightly, and the spy is more limited (he has to specifically eliminate the Royal Seals before targeting silver, which forces his hand slightly).

236

Puzzles and Challenges / Re: The Omniscient Spy

« on: July 07, 2013, 11:47:05 pm »

For now, let's think of it as eHalcyon's explanation. It's closest to the original spirit of the thing. The big obstacle, as I see it, is getting a large enough number of useful cards in the deck that some will be useful even if the best are discarded. Nomad camp is probably a useful tool, considering the fact that it can easily dodge the spy's strikes. For thought experiment purposes, I plan to identify the course of events that would befall a pure Big Money board.

Assuming the worst possible split would give us 2/5, but this can naturally be improved with Baker in kingdom. It doesn't complicate things excessively, and most of us will use a Baker anyway, so let's grant that the player opens double-silver, spending the coin token in the process. The silvers fall to the 6th slot and 12th slot, and are removed by the spy. Turn 3 is 2 coppers, 3 estates, and turn 4 is all copper. Therefore, pure BM player purchases a single silver. On turn 5, there are 13 cards in the deck. If the spy knocks out silvers on cards 6 and 12, that leaves 1 silver guarenteed in this shuffle. turns 5 and 6 once more mirror the opening splits, and a 4th silver is purchased. Then the reshuffle occurs, with the first silver the BM player actually has in hand. Let's pair this with three coppers and a single estate. At this point, you can see the sort of problems any player would have.

I wonder, though, what impact it would have if the BM player didn't spend the coin token early. That would allow the BM player to score a Gold on any 5-value hand, which might accelerate things. Of course, that Gold would likely see little use given the powers of the spy. Is it an option worth considering for the BM player?

237

Puzzles and Challenges / Re: The Omniscient Spy

« on: July 07, 2013, 09:34:27 pm »

Exactly like that, eHalcyon. Thank you.

238

Puzzles and Challenges / Re: The Omniscient Spy

« on: July 07, 2013, 08:50:22 pm »

Originally, I proposed this as an odd variant on the Lucky Chancellor challenge. The variant was considered arbitary, but during the thought experiments, I was surprised how much it slowed certain strategies down. This is an attempt to see what that spy effect would do in a vacuum. Essentially, you're playing a solitaire game with a spy effect throwing you off every turn. If it helps matters, assume an opponent who opens Chancellor/Spy, keeps getting both in hand, but never buys anything.

The main reason I'm proposing this is to get an understanding for how the omniscient spy effect impairs your attempts to "get the ball rolling" on your deck.

239

Puzzles and Challenges / Re: The Omniscient Spy

« on: July 07, 2013, 08:29:16 pm »

You get spied every turn. Reactions are technically possible, but the spy can permanently intercept the reactions before you draw them. A high reaction density is therefore needed to pull off something successful. And once that happens, assuming this spy is intelligent, he'll let the reactions all collide in one hand, leaving you attack-proof but also inhibited.

In the case of secret chamber, that raises an interesting point. Would the spy bother spying if you had the secret chamber in hand? I think both versions should be looked into, but for now, assume the spy always plays itself. 

240

Puzzles and Challenges / The Omniscient Spy

« on: July 07, 2013, 05:29:32 pm »

Reading through the Lucky Chancellor board, I got an odd idea. The original idea was to add an extra obstacle to the Lucky Chancellor strategy by giving the chancellor an "omniscient spy," guaranteed to always discard the cards you really needed. This complicated the original challenge too much to be really enjoyable, but the impact it had on the player's ability to build was remarkable. For instance, in the "worst luck scenario" that the Chancellor puzzle ran off of, the spy would easily prevent the player from ever using his chapel, or even his ironworks, by positioning the cards at the 6th and 12th spots in the reshuffles. This becomes increasingly more complicated as the cantrip-control over your draws increases, but still presents an interesting block. Interesting enough to be a challenge in its own right.

Here is the challenge: from turn 3 onward, you are subjected to a perpetual spying effect with a P1 advantage. Assume your deck's structure is such that the spy impairs your success as much as possible (always hits your key cards, anticipates you playing or not-playing draw cards). Given any other 9 cards you wish for the board, what is the fastest turn-time you can get in acquiring all 8 provinces? Assume worst possible shuffle luck.

241

Puzzles and Challenges / Re: Can you beat the lucky Chancellor? (Part 2)

« on: July 06, 2013, 10:12:56 pm »

Hadn't noticed that.

242

Dominion General Discussion / Re: WW's Power Rankings

« on: July 06, 2013, 08:40:09 pm »

I have to wonder about the position of Shanty Town. It seems like many people on this site regard Shanty Town as roughly equal to or even slightly superior to vanilla village. I'm certainly less skilled than they, but I can't help but question this decision nonetheless. Shanty Town is an expensive necropolis unless it draws, but how often does it draw? Only if it is either the only action in hand or the last action in hand that you play. However, this brings up two thorny issues. First, if you have such a low action density that Shanty Town can normally be drawn without any actions, the likelihood of getting an action in the two cards you draw ought to be quite low, making the +2 actions a waste. And if you have terminal actions in your main hand, playing a +actions source followed by shanty town requires a pretty specific set-up. Shanty town, terminal, shanty town... and the end result is inferior to Village.

I wonder if people who like shanty town regard it as a lab variant instead of a village. It seems like that's the better way to regard it. In terms of engine enabling, typically the main purpose of a village, shanty town leaves much to be desired.

In my own ranking, I'm not sure I'd put it above Adventurer. Does anyone here understand it better?

243

Puzzles and Challenges / Re: Can you beat the lucky Chancellor? (Part 2)

« on: July 06, 2013, 08:32:39 pm »

Excellent work, jomini!

244

Puzzles and Challenges / Re: Can you beat the lucky Chancellor? (Part 2)

« on: July 06, 2013, 07:09:32 pm »

I see your point, jomini. Complicating the Chancellor scenario is rather arbitrary. I suppose it occurred to me for thematic reasons. Like Chancellor, Spy is a card of underwhelming power from the base set typically regarded as weak, with unusually impressive abilities if you're playing with a "perfect luck" approach. The fact that it fits seamlessly into the existing "Lucky Chancellor" challenge with cantrip status and $4 cost was icing on the cake. Perhaps building an engine in the face of a "perfect" spy would make a good puzzle in its own right, given how often our strategies rely on a single copy of a useful card that the spy could frequently snatch.

Thank you for your analysis. I look forward to whatever solutions you and your fellows may propose, whether against Lucky chancellor, lucky spy, a third option, or any combination thereof.

245

Puzzles and Challenges / Re: Can you beat the lucky Chancellor? (Part 2)

« on: July 06, 2013, 04:50:39 pm »

BoM is a great addition to the kingdom, but I'm not sure it will be enough against the spying Chancellor. Remember, he gets spy in every hand. With 12 cards on your 2nd shuffle, he can remove two cards from it over the course of 2 hands. Let's say your chapel is the 6th card in that deck, and BoM the 12th. In that case, you draw 5 starting cards, and he spies the chapel. Regardless of what you buy, you still wind up drawing cards 7-11, all starters, leaving BoM the 12th card. Then he spies that. Depending on what you do during turns 4 and 5, he could slow you down for a very long time.

Your solution is a very good one, and I think BoM with Baker in the Black Market is one of the better plans of attack against the chancellor. Nonetheless, you'd still face an opponent that can rob you of 2 cards per shuffle in the turn 3-4 stretch. This could easily delay any chapeling effect until turn 7 or later.

246

Puzzles and Challenges / Re: Can you beat the lucky Chancellor? (Part 2)

« on: July 06, 2013, 02:54:44 pm »

This probably isn't relevant until more solutions come out, but I thought of a twist that could take this challenge from difficult to impossible. The lucky chancellor opens Chancellor on 3, naturally. But what about his 4? Most of assume silver, but that really isn't necessary.

Spy.

It's from base, it's highly luck-dependent, and if the chancellor's perfect luck applies to his spy usage, it essentially pillages the unlucky human player every single turn. Best of all, spy's status as a cantrip means that the lucky chancellor buys up the provinces at the same tempo as normal.

To demonstrate the power level in question, the spy can repeatedly skip chapels, worker's villages, and militias as needed. Trashing down to the required deck of 4 non-cantrip cards will be nigh-impossible.

Naturally, we need to beat the Chancellor normally before adding in the spy. Does anyone here think that defeating the spy is even possible?

I think I will call this opponent the "Grand Vizier." A chancellor with a highly skilled assassin at his beck and call, crippling your best cards behind the scenes to eliminate all opposition to his rule.