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376
Power Grid General Discussion / why 21 is the most underrated plant
« on: January 05, 2014, 01:42:03 am »
so in one of my previous posts i had mentioned that i would make an entire thread devoted to plant 21 (2 coal/oil -> 4 cities) and why my friend & i rank it in the top 10 overall on USA/Germany style maps (i.e. a "normal" resource structure with no extra gimmicks that would affect things). it's not just us, either; the best online players will pay around $40 for this plant (and the also-controversial 20 plant, as well) a decent amount of the time! this tends to be the most contested of all of our rankings, as people often say "it's not an endgame plant outside of 5-6 player and there are more efficient 4-caps, so why bother?"

the answer can't easily be summed up in a single sentence. the 21's strengths are the most multifaceted of any plant - i like to call it the swiss army knife of power grid plants! so let's break this down in detail...

the first key factor here is that the 21 is the lowest-numbered 4-cap plant and also has a lower number than all but one 5-cap plant. when you compare this to the other 4-caps that look better on paper (28 & 29) it's a wide gap with some very important plants in between. having turn-order advantage over the 25 & 26 (the absolute 2 best plants in the game imo, as discussed before) is a huge deal, and there's also the 24 (good in 5-6 player) and even the 27 somewhat (decent in 6-player or if it comes onto the market very early).

probably more important than turn order, however, is how much earlier the 21 becomes available on average than the other 4-caps of interest or the vast majority of "endgame" plants. you can often get this plant during step 1, and i think that more than makes up for having to replace it at the end. obviously, the earlier you get the plant the more money you'll make from it...but there's also the fact that you are preparing yourself well for the midgame plant market stall by grabbing the 21 early on. this is one area where the "capacity is king" mentality promoted by many players on BGG and this blog can end up biting you in the ass - if you go in hard for the 25 or 26 and miss out on it, then ignore this plant, you could very well end up stuck with nothing while staring at a row of plants in the teens for the next 3 turns! or alternately, you could hugely overpay for one of those 5-caps because OMG I GOTTA GET AN ENDGAME PLANT NOW, when you would've been better off stopping and just taking the 21 for much less (speaking from plenty of experience on this one!). in these types of scenarios, the extra money you gain from the 21 will definitely make it worth having to buy another plant at the end.

the other factor that makes the 21 so strong is its combination of being a hybrid plant and using 2 resources instead of 1 or 3. this is where the "swiss army knife" element comes in - you can "play defense" by buying the cheaper resource if there's a big gap between coal & oil prices, or use its storage capacity to buy a bunch of the scarcer resource if this will attack a threatening player. though the 29 looks more appealing than the 21 with its efficiency, it really isn't much cheaper to run if you go the defensive route, and it's much weaker for offense since you can only store 2 pieces on it instead of 4. given that it's better to buy the more expensive resource for your hybrid the majority of the time, i give the edge to the 21 here as well. these properties also make it a useful storage plant for the last turn, and having extra resources for the end gives you a lot of extra flexibility in choosing your final plant!


so to try and condense all of this into a single paragraph: the 21 has excellent turn priority given its capacity, and it tends to show up early enough that it will more than pay for your last plant while putting you in a very good to great position when the plant market stalls in the midgame. the latter part also applies to the 28 & 29 when those become available that early in the game, but that happens significantly less often due to their much higher numbers. the 21's medium efficiency and hybrid status allow you to run it at least fairly cheaply or strongly attack a scarce resource as needed, as well as stockpile resources for the last turn, and that level of versatility is unparalleled in this game. put it all together and you have a plant which can be worth double its starting price even in in 3-4 player games, if it's early enough and you know the market is going dry.

377
Power Grid General Discussion / ranking the starting plants
« on: December 31, 2013, 07:44:02 pm »
this is a topic that has been discussed on BGG before but not on this blog, so i figured we should get the ball rolling! as with my other posts i will focus on USA/Germany and other maps with a similar resource structure.

so for those who may not remember, the possible starting plants are 03/04/05/06/07 in 2-player. 08 is added in 3P, 09 in 4P, and 10 in 5P. 6P is a bit less simple - usually you'll see the 13 last, but the 11 or 12 can replace it if it gets drawn that early. here's my attempt to break down the options in each size of game on "standard" maps:

03: 2 Oil -> 1
04: 2 Coal -> 1
05: 2 Hybrid -> 1
06: 1 Garbage -> 1
07: 3 Oil  -> 2
08: 3 Coal  -> 2
09: 1 Oil  -> 1
10: 2 Coal  -> 2
11: 1 Nuke  -> 2
12: 2 Hybrid -> 2
13: nothing -> 1

2-player: real cut-and-dried, yet perhaps the toughest one to explain: bid the 04 (2C->1) up to $8-9, loser grabs the 03 (2O->1). 05 (2H->1) is likely a couple bucks cheaper to run than 03 for the first 2 turns, but building first is always worth more than a couple bucks. 06 (1G->1) is almost always the worst starting plant since trash is so expensive and turn order is mediocre. i have seen arguments for 07 (3O->2) over 03 but do not agree with them. 03 costs a total of $9 to make $22 on the first turn, and most likely $6 to make $22 on the second turn - total profit would be $29. 07 costs $16 to make $33 on the first turn, and almost certainly $10 to make $33 on turn 2 - that's a profit of $40, which sounds like a big advantage over the 03.

however, i think what you lose out on with the 07 is easily worth more than $11. you go second for first build and will be guaranteed the worse turn order for turn 2 since you must build 2 cities with this plant. unlike the 03, the 07 uses more oil than is restocked per turn on 2P. finally, the 07 has awful synergy with the available plants on turn 2; 03 and 06 are obviously horrible in this spot, but the big problem is that the 08 (3C->2) hurts you more than it helps. since you cannot build & power 4 cities this early with such inefficient plants, one of those plants would be completely wasted on this turn, allowing the opponent to take the 05 and make as much money as you while keeping their turn-order edge. the 07 forces you to take the 05 or pass on a plant altogether on turn 2, either of which gives the opponent their much-needed 08 at list price. 07 + 05 and 04 + 08 will both power 3 cities on turn 2, but the 04 + 08 player will have cheaper cities and cheaper resources. the 03's main advantage here is that it allows you to make full use of the 08, so you can get it yourself or drive up the price for your opponent.

in short: 03 guarantees the best real estate and gives you a full set of options both for the initial build (claim more territory or play for turn order) and for turn 2 (take the capacity lead or keep turn order). the 07 leaves you with no options and guarantees you will be in worse shape than your opponent for the near future - i'd say that's worse than losing out on $11...

whew! don't worry, the others won't be nearly as long!

3-player: 08 is clearly the strongest here since it's guaranteed to be sold at list price. build order is much less important than in 4P and larger games, so long-term moneymaking and options rule the day here; that said, 05's advantages over 03 are so marginal that 03 is still the best choice for the 2nd buyer. 08 > 04 > 03, plain and simple.

4-player: even though it now becomes more important to carve out prime real estate early, i think the 08 is still the best overall starter on the majority of map configs. you make more money on turn 1 than everyone else and can afford to pass on a plant for turn 2, giving yourself good turn order and a lot of money once the good plants start showing up. however, there are some map configs where being 4th to build is a major handicap; here i would pay more than $10 for the 04, more than $6 for the 03, and even a little above list price for the 05 if necessary. speaking of the 05, guaranteeing 3rd in turn order is what makes that the fourth starter worth buying along with 03/04/08. 07 may seem to have an argument somewhere here since coal's price is driven up more here than in smaller games...but it still loses value since using oil doesn't attack as many other players and the lower restock rate is a problem. the 09 also becomes available for the last player here, but with bad turn order and low capacity it represents the worst of both worlds.

the starting plants in 4P should always be 03/04/05/08, but their relative value can change quite a bit depending on map configuration. 08 should be bid up heavily on more "balanced" maps like Germany, and still deserves some competition on most other map configs. the value of the others depends on how many cheap regions are available in the given map.

5-player: usually, you really do not want to be the last player without a plant in 5P. sure, you'll get that sexy-looking plant 10 (2C->2), but building 5th will almost always be much worse than even 4th since having 5 regions tends to bring more expensive ones into play and 5 players makes things more congested. the 10 will also have its cost driven way up by all the other worthwhile coal plants in play. thus, you will need to fight harder for the 4 plants mentioned in the previous section. i could actually see an argument for taking the 07 over the 10 last, but i don't have a ton of 5-6P experience and need to do some more work on this...

6-player: pretty similar to the above. get one of the big 4 plants unless it will ruin your building. If the 5th buyer takes the 07 then the 10 becomes the clear winner for the 6th player. if the 10 is gone then the last buyer faces an interesting decision between the 07 and the 13 (_->1); i favor the 13 since you can just build 1 city and carve out good turn order for the near future (remember that building 2 cities at the start is usually best). if the 13 gets bumped off the market by the 11 (1N->2) or 12 (2H->2) the 07 becomes a no-brainer.

i have also heard an interesting idea of buying the 06 then not building on turn 1, but i wouldn't recommend it unless you just want to be wacky for a game!

that about concludes this mutha! hope y'all appreciate this - let's see some discussion!

EDIT: adding in descriptions of each plant.

378
Power Grid General Discussion / ranking the best plants in power grid
« on: December 29, 2013, 04:32:03 am »
so i've played a ton of power grid with a friend who kicks my ass at least 90% of the time and has a rather unique mind for this game, and we've had many long discussions about elements of strategy which i rarely if ever see discussed on forums.  with that in mind, i figured i'd start with what i think is one of the more cut-and-dried ones: determining the best overall plant in the game!

what do i mean by "best"?  well, obviously there are many plants that can be the best available for a specific situation, but i am referring to the plant that is the most useful in the largest number of different situations.  this includes several components besides the obvious capacity & efficiency:

- turn order advantage/disadvantage compared to other "top plants" people are likely to have when a given plant generally becomes available.

- length of time the plant can be useful.  obviously part of this is being a legit endgame plant, but there are other factors which tend to be remembered less; consider how early the plant can make money, as well as how early the plant comes onto the market on average.  this is why i don't like to rank plants in the top 10 if they're almost never available outside of step 3, for example.

- safety of the plant's resource, particularly in the endgame.

- a bit of a flipside to the above...ability of a plant to "play offense" by driving up prices for others as it runs.  hybrid plants are the strongest in this regard, as they often allow you to switch between "offense" or "defense" (buying the cheaper resource) as needed.

- how strong a position the plant gives you on turn 1.  this applies to a small subset of plants and i would never consider a starting plant to be the overall best on any map, but the start is so key that i would rank the 04 and the 08 in the overall top 10 plants for USA/Germany.  probably even the 03 for USA...

with all of this in mind, i think i have a good answer to this question for USA/Germany and other maps with a similar resource structure.  on these, i would say that the best overall plant is the 26, and it's not even particularly close.

this may seem odd to some since the 26 has low-end endgame capacity and medium efficiency, but let's look at those additional factors we just talked about:

- turn order is a major strength.  it only "loses" here to two 5-capacity plants and two 4-caps.

- you can buy this plant on turn 2 and make money right away, and it should last you the entire game...can't get much better than that!  it's also available earlier on average than the vast majority of endgame plants.

- i think out of all the resources, oil provides the best balance of safety and attacking other players.  it definitely hurts others to drive up the price, but it's significantly less likely than coal to be completely run out.  there are just very few early oil plants worth buying, and in my experience the 32 is the only other endgame oil plant with a decent chance of coming out before step 3.


as a point of comparison, i think the 25 is the second best plant under the same conditions.  it has most of the same advantages as the 26 and an additional turn-order advantage, but it forces you to deal with the scariness of the endgame coal market. its efficiency and lower number often make this manageable enough not to drop this plant further, though.

i used to think the 30 was in a class by itself as the #1 plant: extremely safe (and often cheap by the end!) resource, great capacity, one of the only 6-caps you can realistically get before step 3, and incredible turn order for how powerful it is.  then i played a (smaller) game where i was able to buy it on the 3rd turn...and that one move cost me the game.  it just sat there collecting dust too long, as it took me a couple more turns to even reach 6 cities and trash had a worse ROI than coal & oil at that point (not to mention the much lower step 1 restock rate).  if that had been the 25 or 26 in that position, i could very well have won instead of finishing last!  however, i would still say the 30 is the third best plant thanks to everything else mentioned.

so to conclude all of this, in no particular order after the top 3 our top-ranked plants on maps with "normal" resources would be something like this:

26
25
30
32
08
04
20 (by far the hardest plant to play properly, but big rewards when you do)
21 (hands down most underrated plant imo, will make an entire thread about this one in the future)
38 (yea it's basically step 3 only, but a 7-cap with such a safe resource belongs here)

#10 spot is where it starts to get murky for me but i lean toward 03 for most games on maps that aren't "balanced" a la Germany.  don't like 31/36 since they generally don't come out until the point when coal starts to suck, and 46 has some of the same problems though the hybrid element helps quite a bit.  i feel like 39 & 50 (and usually 40 as well) just blend together and you don't lose much if you miss out on one of them and "settle" for another.  29 could be argued for 5- & 6-player games but i just don't think it's all that special when the 28 and even the 24 are there - really don't like the turn order for a 4-cap, but maybe that's not as big a deal as i think...

would be very curious to hear thoughts on this, and rankings for maps with different resource structures!

379
Power Grid General Discussion / Re: 5P game: removing plant 17?
« on: December 24, 2013, 04:01:32 pm »
Yep, I realized this long ago but continue to love the game anyway. I think it comes down to whether you want a faster paced mid game or less clear-cut decisions in the plant auctions, and I like the latter. Maybe I should write some more of my and my friend's thoughts on the game on this forum - maybe that could rekindle some interest in here! =)

380
Power Grid General Discussion / Re: 5P game: removing plant 17?
« on: December 09, 2013, 03:00:22 am »
thanks for replying! =)

i do disagree with your suggestion overall, for another reason i didn't mention in my last post: unless i'm misunderstanding what you're doing here, removing plants also messes with the odds of plant drops. i think the game "as is" has a good balance in that regard - you generally don't want to take a decent-to-good plant if there's a real chance of giving your opponent(s) a great plant, but in the early game there are times where the odds will favor this play due to the large amount of mediocre-to-bad plants still in the deck. gambling on a bad drop for your opponent(s) is also a viable last resort if you are significantly behind late in the game. removing weaker plants makes the generic "safe" strategy the optimal one in more cases, which i think makes for a less interesting game.

besides, if i had to remove one plant from this game it wouldn't be the 17 anyway! though it's certainly up (down?) there, i think the 14 stands out as the single worst plant on the whole. still, this has been an interesting discussion and i thank you again for everything here!

381
Power Grid General Discussion / Re: How much do plants get bid up?
« on: December 09, 2013, 02:02:27 am »
the one that i think would be most interesting to discuss on this site would be the 21, given how down this blog is on the 4-caps. heck, i'm tempted to make a separate thread just for that one plant - it really highlights a lot of the main areas where my friend and i disagree with some of the conclusions of this blog.

382
Power Grid General Discussion / Re: 5P game: removing plant 17?
« on: December 06, 2013, 01:40:52 pm »
pretty strongly opposed to this whole idea

i thought similarly when i started playing, but over time i've come to realize that almost no plant is completely useless. highly situational, sure, but enough that i would not consider removing any particular plant.

most people think those early trash & nuclear plants are worthless, but i've seen games where coal & oil get completely run out during step 1 and those plants become a must-have for the players behind in turn order. sure, you could argue that's not optimal play, but it's something that can happen and i think it's good to have options against that strategy should it arise.

there are also really interesting edge cases where it can be worth buying a lower-numbered plant during the early-mid or midgame even if it doesn't improve your capacity, simply because of a vast difference in the cost of resources that makes those plants profitable anyway. my friend actually did this TWICE in the origins tournament finals this year, and beat a player with years more experience than her by $2 or $3 in the tiebreaker!

383
Power Grid General Discussion / Re: How much do plants get bid up?
« on: December 06, 2013, 01:26:13 pm »
here's a fantastic post on BGG about this, from a very experienced online player:

http://boardgamegeek.com/article/12411264#12411264

caveat: in case anyone doesn't know, the only maps available online are USA/germany/france/italy/baden-wurttemberg, and USA is by far the most widely-played

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