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2401

Dominion General Discussion / Re: Adventures games over Skype?

« on: April 25, 2015, 11:08:43 am »

Yeah, sure, I'll do this sometime. My game comes in Saturday midday.

Want to play a game when it does?  I'm free early Saturday afternoon.

It depends on when the game actually gets here - if it gets here late enough I'll be playing with IRL friends all day, but if it gets here early and I have free time, I'd be happy to try it. I'll post / send you a PM if that happens.

2402

General Discussion / Re: Stop Shuffling Overhand

« on: April 25, 2015, 10:58:38 am »

I overhand the first few shuffles, then switch to a gentle mash shuffle plus some overhands. With just 10 - 15 cards, I can do about a dozen overhand shuffles in the time it would take me to mash 4 or 5 times, and it's probably random enough, maybe. I don't like the riffle shuffle for such small decks, really. It's too easy to just miss entirely and waste your time. But really, I like overhand shuffling mainly because it just feels satisfying to do.

I don't know if anyone else does this, but I usually alternate which side of the deck the overhand shuffle tosses cards to? Dunno if that helps.

I never pile shuffle. I do in Magic before several regular shuffles just to make the order different before i start shuffling, but it's neither random nor fast, so what's the point?

2403

Dominion General Discussion / Re: Adventures games over Skype?

« on: April 24, 2015, 03:22:47 pm »

Yeah, sure, I'll do this sometime. My game comes in Saturday midday.

2404

Dominion General Discussion / Re: CARD OF THE WEEK #5: Steward

« on: April 23, 2015, 12:36:31 pm »

Steward is excellent. In any engine with +Actions, there's almost never a time where you'll think "man, I really wish I didn't have that Steward". No matter what, it's going to be a little bit useful.

Really, the best part about it, and what sets it apart from Rebuild and other trashers is that it remains useful even when your deck has been trashed sufficiently, it basically never becomes a dead card. I played a great game earlier today where I could quickly set up Double Tactician using Steward as both my payload and my trashing (and my draw if I had to!). It just does anything you need.

I think the reason it doesn't have an article is really because it's just so simple. It does a little bit of what you need, whenever you need it. It's not the best draw card, not the best virtual coin, not the best Trasher, but it's pretty good at all of them, and as Jack of All Trades goes to show us, versatility is useful.

2405

Goko Dominion Online / Re: Gokoins/payment discussion

« on: April 23, 2015, 12:32:49 pm »

Honestly, I really like the "virtual board game" model. Tables and stuff are stupid, but if I own the physical game, all my friends play with me for free. I think it makes sense that online is just the same. I want to be able to play with my friends online without everyone paying for it. It gets them into the game, and then they buy their own copies, etc.

2406

Help! / Re: Anything I could have done to win this Feodum rush?

« on: April 20, 2015, 01:02:04 pm »

I think there is approximately zero reason to use Quarry in this kingdom. There is no +buy outside of Princess and the most expensive action cards are at $5.

Yeah, actually, I'm not sure why I thought it mattered at all. I guess my keyboard got ahead of my brain again.

2407

Help! / Re: Anything I could have done to win this Feodum rush?

« on: April 20, 2015, 12:54:25 pm »

That's what I was suspecting. With Quarry and Lab (and Remodel to some extent), the Tournament engine was likely much better. Thanks!

2408

Help! / Anything I could have done to win this Feodum rush?

« on: April 20, 2015, 10:46:34 am »

So I certainly fuck up a lot of games, but usually the reasons why are pretty obvious to me afterwards - I didn't know when to green at all, greened too early, bad strategy, random absurd buys, etc. Here, I think I might have just picked a sub-optimal strategy, but the game was close enough that I'm curious as to how I could have done it differently.

Code: [Select]

Beggar, Fishing Village, Wishing Well, Feodum, Ironworks, Quarry, Remodel, Tournament, Laboratory, Outpost
Game Log

I looked through the log after, and I probably played sub-optimally a few times, but not anything game breaking that I could tell. Here are my observations

• Gaining Remodel over Wishing Well was literally pointless, but this was late enough that it probably didn't cost me the game.
• Did I want an Outpost or two, if only to try and sneak in an extra Silver or two?
• Was I just not supposed to play Feodum at all here? I think that's most likely, but the rush seemed pretty tempting and I wasn't too interested in the mirror match.

Any tips would be cool. Rushes are generally where I play my best, so getting this aspect of my game perfected might help a bit.

2409

Dominion General Discussion / Re: Announcing Jack of all Dominion (android randomizer app)

« on: April 20, 2015, 08:26:57 am »

Jack of All Dominion is probably my favorite randomizer, and if I had my own Android phone it's the only one I'd use.

I prefer it over Dominion Shuffle because of the cleaner interface, more useful card filters (can require at least 1 / 3 / 5 of many actually useful different categories), swipe-to-replace in the results window, easier Kingdom saving, etc. You just have to try it, you'll love it. Also, Dominion Shuffle is really ugly.

If you're particularly lazy, the VP counter is also great.

2410

Dominion: Adventures Previews / Re: Adventures Retailers

« on: April 18, 2015, 04:31:03 pm »

Thanks   I think I'm going to pick up Adventures, but it will be the first physical Dominion box I will own.  I've always played with my friends' sets.

If you want to save a bit of money, you can buy the base cards separately and play with just Adventures for now. I actually bought the Base Cards even though I own every expansion, just because the box was conveniently small and the cards looked nice.

2411

Dominion League / Re: Season 7 - Announcing Livestreams

« on: April 18, 2015, 10:38:45 am »

I'll be streaming my league match against Eras at 10:30 AM EDT (so 1430 GMT) tomorrow morning (the 18th). Hopefully the lack of an exam the previous evening makes this one better.

it'll be at the usual www.twitch.tv/chrisisme2791

Stream's up now! Wish me luck!

2412

Dominion League / Re: Season 7 - Announcing Livestreams

« on: April 17, 2015, 11:21:56 pm »

I'll be streaming my league match against Eras at 10:30 AM EDT (so 1430 GMT) tomorrow morning (the 18th). Hopefully the lack of an exam the previous evening makes this one better.

it'll be at the usual www.twitch.tv/chrisisme2791

2413

Dominion General Discussion / Re: CARD OF THE WEEK #4: Doctor

« on: April 17, 2015, 07:44:30 pm »

Doctor is pretty swingy. On 5/2 it is often almost always the correct choice to buy. But, honestly, on a 4/3 you should also consider cards such as Forager, Steward, and Urchin over it. If Junk Dealer is on the board, you might want to try and just get a bunch of junk dealers. I mean, Doctor is good. It can be an awesome opener, but is swingy, and the other trashers simply add more reliability.

Man, you know what would be really crazy is the 7/2 opening. You have a very strong chance of trashing all of your starting estates.

Honestly, in that specific edge case where the board contained Doctor, Junk Dealer, and no other Trashers, and I opened 5/2, and there wasn't anything weird like Mountebank in the game - I would probably open Doctor overpay, then later buy a Junk Dealer that I can trash my remaining Estates and Doctor with. Doctor is just so helpful early in the game to get some early momentum.

2414

Dominion General Discussion / Re: Discussion about the Dominion meta

« on: April 16, 2015, 09:35:59 pm »

I definitely take my opponent's rating into account, but kind of backwards of what the OP talked about. If my opponent is of a good rank, particularly one higher than mine, and they do something I didn't expect or even think about, I immediately try to determine what about the kingdom I missed. This probably will change with experience.

I've noticed that ratings often affect the pace of the game. If I were to play a game against a level 40 player the game might last 12 turns, but if I play the same kingdom against a level 5 opponent the game could last 16 turns. This doesn't mean I played the second game worse, but rather it made more sense to get into a dominant position and control the game to the end.

There's also an interesting correlation with turn speed; there's kind of an inverse bell curve effect going on.  The lower the level, the longer the player takes for their turn, because they're not quite sure what they're doing yet.  As the level increases, turn time decreases; they become more sure of what they're doing.  As level increases further still, turn time starts to increase again, as the players are now thoroughly thinking through everything they're doing, rather than just buying and playing cards willy-nilly.

I've found this frustrating, as when I really need time to figure out a very complicated scenario over multiple turns, I sometimes get told I need to "learn to play faster"... I already did - I'm at the other part of the bell curve now!

2415

Dominion General Discussion / Re: CARD OF THE WEEK #4: Doctor

« on: April 16, 2015, 09:33:10 pm »

Doctor is one of the best trashers, and is a generally underrated card. Its swinginess is really what holds it back, but it's just so nice to trash your deck directly.

With any competent deck tracking in the early game, you can use it to somewhat consistently clear 2 cards out of your deck, with minimal impact on your current turn. The opportunity cost of most other Trashing cards is that it makes your current turn pretty bad, or nonexistent. The only real opportunity cost of Doctor is that it's a terminal action.

The overpay is huge, particularly on opens. If you hit $4 first, opening Doctor overpay is a reasonable move on some boards. You have a 40% chance of hitting an Estate; if you do, you've only got two left, and this makes the decision to name Copper or Estate on your next few shuffles generally much easier. If you don't hit Estate, you still get to trash a Copper and force a shuffle, though you'll either get a hand that can buy silver or a hand that can play Doctor reliably with $2 left, which is a bit awkward. ...Usually, there are better openers than this, depends on how much you need a thin deck.

2416

Puzzles and Challenges / Re: Draw your (randomizer) deck

« on: April 11, 2015, 11:05:12 am »

Guilds wasn't too hard.
Final result: 1 Card in Hand (and it's Journeyman if you can believe it)

Hand: Herald, Plaza, Journeyman, Taxman, Advisor
Play Herald
Draw Masterpiece
Reveal and Play Baker
Draw Doctor
(Now have: Plaza, Journeyman, Taxman, Advisor, Masterpiece, Doctor, +2 Actions)
(Cards in deck: CSM, Stonemason, Merchant Guild, Soothsayer)
Play Advisor
Reveal CSM, Stonemason, Merchant Guild
Opponent names Merchant Guild
Draw CSM, Stonemason
Play CSM
Play Doctor
Name Soothsayer (Trashed)
Play Plaza
Draw Merchant Guild (Deck and Discard now empty)
Play Taxman
Trash Masterpiece, Replace with Nothing (no Supply)
Play Stonemason
Trash Anything (Merchant Guild, I guess)

Remaining cards: Journeyman

2417

Dominion Videos and Streams / Re: Dominion Live Streams

« on: April 10, 2015, 06:05:25 pm »

In about 10 minutes (6:15 EDT, 10:15 GMT) I'll be streaming Dominion for an hour or two or three. Just playing Pro matches on the ladder and chatting. I'm trying to focus on improving certain aspects of my gameplay and not playing on "auto-pilot" so much, so if you'd like, feel free to give tips / ask questions / berate me.

www.twitch.tv/chrisisme2791

Edit: Stream is up, but it might take me a few minutes to fiddle with things for the best ratio of quality to actually working.

2418

Dominion General Discussion / Re: Kingdom Selection methods in real life?

« on: April 10, 2015, 09:06:34 am »

If I have a friend with an Android phone, I use Jack of All Dominion.

I use Randominion on iOS, I swipe away cards I don't feel like playing with.

Usually fully random, occasionally we'll "draft" sets by hitting random, each of us picking a card to keep, shuffling, etc. until it's done.

I kind of want to write a script or something that does everything the way I want to for a randomizer.

2419

Dominion Articles / Re: The 10 words card summary challenge

« on: April 09, 2015, 04:26:57 pm »

WW - Care to explain? Storeroom is a guaranteed $4 and 2 Buy every turn. CSM is nonterminal, very cheap, and potent - you can get to 40 cards by turn 14 pretty easily. Beggar / Gardens already has an article written about it.

Simulators aren't perfect, but CSM and Beggar are quite potent against a lot of standard benchmark BM strategies like double Jack. Storeroom is not quite at their level, but is good enough to be worth considering on a lot of boards.

I assume that one problem a Candlestick Maker-Gardens strategy would have against Double Jack (or many other non-Gardens strategies) is that Double Jack will buy Gardens (including prioritizing Gardens over Duchies) to deny them. A simulator isn't going to capture this unless you spend a fair amount of time optimizing the strategies against each other. The Candlestick Maker-Gardens strategy might also want a Jack of all Trades, and so on.

I did spend some time tweaking each script in this matchup in particular to have Jack start buying some Gardens as well, once the CSM player bought a single Gardens. I did a bit more work tweaking each one to respond to each others' strengths, but at a certain point it gets too complex (for me) to model. I mainly used "double jack in a simulator" here to provide a reference for a standard, fairly quick (13-14 turn) winning strategy that CSM can outdo.

But really, give it a try sometime, it's not a flawless or unbeatable strategy by any means, but it's a reasonable choice on boards, particularly boards that don't hand you an engine on a silver platter (cheap trashing, villages, +buy, payload all there for you). The thing that sets it apart from most enablers is that it's always nonterminal, each copy always gives you an extra buy, and it doesn't lower your money density at all. A lot of what's great about Ironworks is how its nonterminal when you want it to be and you gain one card for each Ironworks you have in hand - and those advantages in a way apply to CSM.

2420

Dominion Articles / Re: The 10 words card summary challenge

« on: April 09, 2015, 04:05:43 pm »

WW - Care to explain? Storeroom is a guaranteed $4 and 2 Buy every turn. CSM is nonterminal, very cheap, and potent - you can get to 40 cards by turn 14 pretty easily. Beggar / Gardens already has an article written about it.

Simulators aren't perfect, but CSM and Beggar are quite potent against a lot of standard benchmark BM strategies like double Jack. Storeroom is not quite at their level, but is good enough to be worth considering on a lot of boards.

As an aside, sorry for escalating this discussion earlier. Wasn't able to edit words out of my post quickly enough. Had a meh day.

2421

Dominion Articles / Re: The 10 words card summary challenge

« on: April 09, 2015, 03:56:50 pm »

Gardens: Rush if you can quickly gain two cards every turn.

(I've been meaning to write an article about Gardens, since most of the current content predates Beggar, Storeroom, Candlestick Maker, and other important enablers)

Is being able to quickly gain two cards every turn better than being able to slowly gain two cards every turn?  Like, maybe your opponent won't notice that you're going to go for Gardens rush?

Yeah - it's a lot faster to get half a dozen cards that cost 3 than half a dozen cards that cost 5, and every turn you take to get set up is a turn your opponent is closer to Provinces.

I'd probably go with:

(EDIT: Removed a post I was trying to take down 10 minutes ago. Apparently, on iOS you can't really select text on mobile. Fun, eh.)

2422

Dominion Articles / Re: The 10 words card summary challenge

« on: April 09, 2015, 10:24:59 am »

Gardens: Rush if you can quickly gain two cards every turn.

(I've been meaning to write an article about Gardens, since most of the current content predates Beggar, Storeroom, Candlestick Maker, and other important enablers)

2423

Dominion League / Re: Season 7 - Results

« on: April 08, 2015, 06:50:57 pm »

D3: nickchak 3 - Chris is me 3

2424

Dominion League / Re: Season 7 - Announcing Livestreams

« on: April 08, 2015, 04:30:41 pm »

I'm currently planning on playing nickchak at 4:30 PM (Eastern, 2030 UTC) on Wednesday, April 8. I guess I'll stream it here: http://www.twitch.tv/chrisisme2791/

The stream and matches should be starting any moment now.

2425

Goko Dominion Online / Re: Features Thread

« on: April 07, 2015, 08:55:13 pm »

I asked about this just yesterday actually, in response to a question on our forums. Here's what I was told:
Our first priority is getting the 2.0 version of the existing game out for web and then mobile. After those are live it will be a high priority to get Adventures live. "High", but not necessarily "highest". Adventures will be a major effort requiring substantial enhancements to the engine, AI and user interface, and we already have a long list of post-launch enhancements to the existing game.

The Adventures news is disappointing, but understandable. It looks like the most complex Dominion expansion ever made, by a lot, and I understand if that takes some time.

This post did bring up a point I wanted to make while you guys are working on this and before it's too late. When you release Dominion 2.0, will you be taking down Dominion 1.0? I really hope you do not, and please hear me out here.

As you've said, you'll be releasing 2.0 out for the web and mobile first, then you'll work on post-launch enhancements (including, presumably, any suggestions you guys implement from this thread), and then Adventures after that. Since Adventures will not be coming out with 2.0, and a variety of enhancements will not be happening until after launch, I fear that when Dominion 2.0 launches, it will end up being a net downgrade for players of Dominion 1.x with Salvager installed.

Without Salvager, Dominion 1.x is almost unplayable, and before Salvager came out, many players were driven away by the official implementation of Dominion Online. From what I've seen, in preview screenshots online (and please correct me if I'm wrong), Dominion 2.0 will be reusing the same interface as Dominion 1.0, down to the positions of cards, the positions of buttons, the off-screen log and chat windows which cover the game when triggered, etc. So while the stability improvements and whatever features you all manage to throw in by then will be great, the dropping of Salvager support without the features re-implemented in the new version of Dominion will mean that for the hardcore players, Dominion 2.0 will be a downgrade and a return to features of Dominion 1.x that made people quit in the past.

I guess the point I'm trying to get to is, if you can keep Dominion 1.x up until Dominon 2.0 is competitive with Salvager, it would save us a lot of headache. If you're planning on having all the Salvager features implemented at launch, then good for you guys, we'll figure it out I guess.