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976

Dominion General Discussion / Re: Enlighten me about Gardens

« on: July 19, 2011, 06:16:36 pm »

If you download my Simulator (http://dominionsimulator.wordpress.com/download/) you can try the built-in Gardens strategy (COMBO - Workshop/Gardens) and see how it beats most other strategies easily (of course the other strategies aren't trying to counter the Gardens player, but you can modify them so they do)

977

Simulation / Re: Dominion Simulator available for download!

« on: July 19, 2011, 06:02:09 pm »

@Razzishi:
I'll try to add the "number of buys left" and >20 number choices in my next release. I originally had a field to let people type in the number themselves which allowed fractions, but it looked ugly and was cumbersome to work with and I haven't ever found the need to use fractions myself.

@DG:
That's indeed a problem. Maybe you can add some extra buy conditions to avoid this behaviour?

978

Simulation / Re: Dominion Simulator available for download!

« on: July 08, 2011, 05:19:05 am »

yes, the simulator will not make any purchase that will result in a loss

979

Simulation / Re: Dominion Simulator available for download!

« on: July 01, 2011, 02:20:09 pm »

Alchemist should always be returned to the top when there's a Potion in play.

If you're not sure if the Simulator does something or not, you can always check the game log (sample game).

980

Simulation / Re: Simulating Challange #1

« on: July 01, 2011, 09:35:23 am »

Not anymore  Beat this (74-22 against DStu's latest):

Code: [Select]

<player name="Sim Challange #1 Geronimoo V2">
   <buy name="Colony"/>
   <buy name="Province"/>
   <buy name="City"/>
   <buy name="Quarry">
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInDeck" attribute="Quarry"/>
         <operator type="smallerThan" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="2.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="Caravan">
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInSupply" attribute="Caravan"/>
         <operator type="greaterThan" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="1.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="Woodcutter">
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInDeck" attribute="Woodcutter"/>
         <operator type="equalTo" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="0.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="Great_Hall"/>
</player>


981

Simulation / Re: Simulating Challange #1

« on: July 01, 2011, 09:04:14 am »

Opponent Max VP is indeed the max VP of all opponents. I changed your "buy out all the Woodcutters" to:

when ahead in points, Caravans and Cities gone and having played Woodcutter, Talisman, Quarry and a few Cities buy out the Woodcutters

It's not foolproof, but it's simpler and works in most situations.

982

Simulation / Re: Simulating Challange #1

« on: July 01, 2011, 08:39:17 am »

I crushed your bot 76-to-22  :

Code: [Select]

<player name="Sim Challenge #1 Geronimoo">
   <buy name="Colony"/>
   <buy name="Talisman">
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInDeck" attribute="Talisman"/>
         <operator type="equalTo" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="0.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="Quarry">
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInDeck" attribute="Quarry"/>
         <operator type="smallerThan" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="2.0"/>
      </condition>
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInDeck" attribute="Caravan"/>
         <operator type="greaterThan" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="0.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="City">
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInSupply" attribute="City"/>
         <operator type="smallerThan" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="10.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="Woodcutter">
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInDeck" attribute="Woodcutter"/>
         <operator type="smallerThan" />
         <right type="countCardsInDeck" attribute="City"/>
         <extra_operation type="minus" attribute="3.0" />
      </condition>
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInSupply" attribute="Woodcutter"/>
         <operator type="greaterThan" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="3.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="Caravan"/>
   <buy name="Lookout">
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInDeck" attribute="Lookout"/>
         <operator type="equalTo" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="0.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="Woodcutter">
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInDeck" attribute="Woodcutter"/>
         <operator type="equalTo" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="0.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="City"/>
   <buy name="Woodcutter">
      <condition>
         <left type="countVP"/>
         <operator type="greaterThan" />
         <right type="countMAXOpponentVP"/>
      </condition>
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInPlay" attribute="Woodcutter"/>
         <operator type="greaterThan" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="0.0"/>
      </condition>
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInPlay" attribute="Talisman"/>
         <operator type="greaterThan" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="0.0"/>
      </condition>
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInPlay" attribute="Quarry"/>
         <operator type="greaterThan" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="0.0"/>
      </condition>
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInPlay" attribute="City"/>
         <operator type="greaterThan" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="1.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="Province"/>
   <buy name="Great_Hall"/>
</player>

Lookout is the key and buying less Talismans (Talismen?). I copied your "buy all the Woodcutters to end the game when ahead"-strategy.

983

Simulation / Re: Simulating Challange #1

« on: July 01, 2011, 07:59:45 am »

Careful, Dstu's code has a [\code] tag at the end that must be deleted when copied into the VXML (or you get an error)

984

Simulation / Re: Dominion Simulator available for download!

« on: July 01, 2011, 05:06:00 am »

Like DStu said multiple buys are not accounted for automatically and you should add a condition like "if count in play Bridge (or Woodcutter...)>0". You can also use the condition "if available $ > X" in combation with the former to get the desired behaviour. I might implement something to support multiple buys (if you have suggestions how I to best handle this, they're very welcome).

If you have a Mint in your buy rules, the Simulator won't care if you just played 5 Platinums and buy that Mint anyway You can always add the "if count in play Gold =0" to the buy rules of Mint to avoid trashing good treasures.

If you have a Grand Market in your buy rules the Simulator will not play his Coppers if he can buy a Grand Market with the other money available (I built this in because Grand Market is a card I'd expect to see in a lot of simulations).

985

Dominion General Discussion / Re: Opening of the Day #1 (Strategy Discussion)

« on: July 01, 2011, 03:14:52 am »

In Dominion, there are some cards that are rarely useful, and Saboteur is one.  But there are no cards that are never useful.  I may be an idiot for suggesting it, but I stand by my choice.

...adding Zaphod to my idiot list...
Saboteur is such a weak card, please stop suggesting it. You're losing 2/3 of the games (even with a $5/$2). You might get away with it if your opponent is not very good and he also starts buying Saboteurs just to get back at you...

986

Dominion General Discussion / Re: Opening of the Day #1 (Strategy Discussion)

« on: June 30, 2011, 03:30:15 pm »

I wouldn't want to open with a council room however just in case the opponent bought treasure maps.

That's just irrational fear of the opponent getting lucky. Sure, he might get a lucky turn 5 activation and win, but in the long run he'll have to wait a lot longer than that and lose big time.

987

Dominion General Discussion / Re: Opening of the Day #1 (Strategy Discussion)

« on: June 30, 2011, 02:31:13 pm »

When the games get that close you need 100,000 simulations to find the best strategy But that would not be very useful in real play. It is however clearly better to have a Gold before going for green. Oh, and this is actually a very fast board despite the lack of engines: 15 turns, which means Treasure Map strategies are way too slow/erratic as are Alchemist strategies.

988

Dominion General Discussion / Re: Opening of the Day #1 (Strategy Discussion)

« on: June 30, 2011, 02:16:35 pm »

The Treasure maps get crushed, about 80/20

If you tried to simulate a treasure map strategy involving Ironworks and/or Watchtower it won't produce reliable results, because my simulator will make lots of mistakes (like always playing the Watchtower instead of holding it in hand and thousands more misplays...).

Oh and I beat your bot, WanderingWinder. I tweaked the buy rules just a little by waiting to buy Province until you have 2 Golds and buying Duchy a little earlier. (Also I was able to eliminate some rules that didn't affect the win rate much). This bot beats yours 49-to-43 (even 57-to-37 when both players open $5/$2):
 

Code: [Select]

<player name="OotD1 Geronimoo">
   <buy name="Province">
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInDeck" attribute="Gold"/>
         <operator type="greaterThan" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="1.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="Duchy">
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInSupply" attribute="Province"/>
         <operator type="smallerOrEqualThan" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="4.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="Estate">
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInSupply" attribute="Province"/>
         <operator type="smallerOrEqualThan" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="2.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="Venture">
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInDeck" attribute="Gold"/>
         <operator type="greaterOrEqualThan" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="5.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="Gold"/>
   <buy name="Council_Room">
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInDeck" attribute="Council_Room"/>
         <operator type="equalTo" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="0.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="Venture"/>
   <buy name="Silver"/>
</player>


989

Dominion Isotropic / Re: All previous turns occasionally visible in Isotropic games

« on: June 30, 2011, 04:23:03 am »

If it has an AI it will probably be very very rudimentary, but they'll compensate by hard coding a bunch of strong strategies that don't involve complex decisions like Smithy/Money, Gardens/Workshop, Council Room/Goons,...

990

Game Reports / Re: Horse Traders + Duke/Duchy

« on: June 29, 2011, 09:49:49 am »

Am I missing something? ...
Couldn't a province empty strategy get all 8 provinces by the time the duke/duchy hit say 6/6 duke/duchy? That would be 64-67 points (for the province player) vs 54-58 points (depending on #estates).

It seems you're missing a Province is worth 6 VP and not 8

991

Game Reports / Re: Horse Traders + Duke/Duchy

« on: June 29, 2011, 03:20:26 am »

I've simulated your question of turn 3 Gold vs turn 3 Duchy: If your opponent is going for Duchies as well you should indeed buy the Duchy over Gold turn 3, but if your opponent was initially going for a Province strategy and then switch when he sees you going for Duchy/Duke, then you should buy the Gold first (this will allow some Duchy/Silver buys which will greatly help your late game when you're swamped with green).

992

Dominion General Discussion / Re: Duke Analysis?

« on: June 28, 2011, 09:58:55 am »

Interesting.  What about big money smithy/province vs duke/duchy/horse traders?

big money smithy/province (37%) vs duke/duchy/horse traders (57%)

Identical buy rules as the ones I posted earlier, except Province bot buys 1 Smithy and Duchy/Duke bot buys 2 Horse Traders.

Horse Traders really seems like the perfect companion for the Duchy/Duke strategy. If you let both bots buy Smithy:

big money smithy/province (43%) vs duke/duchy/Smithy (49%)

993

Dominion General Discussion / Re: Duke Analysis?

« on: June 28, 2011, 02:59:55 am »

@WanderingWinder
All your arguments are valid of course and my initial bots did all the things you mention, but many iterations later trying to improve both bots against each other their behavior changed dramatically and the Province player slowly morphed into a Duchy/Duke player and the game becomes a race for the Duchies which the Duchy/Duke player will win because he starts off with the correct strategy while the Province bot adjusts only when he sees the strategy of the other bot.
When I add a Smithy in the mix the Province player gets closer, but is still unable to win (it's still a 3-pile ending). When I use the Chancellor/Stash shell the Province player suddenly wins (and big!) because this strategy is really geared towards getting $8 consistently and doesn't die out when it gets swamped with green cards.

994

Puzzles and Challenges / Re: Worst kingdom deck

« on: June 27, 2011, 06:36:35 pm »

Cool bot you built, DG! If you let it play against a dummy player you'll find your bot empties the Provinces in 24 turns which is about 2 turns faster than pure money and since the bot is playing far from optimal it's probably 5 turns faster.

Code: [Select]

<player name="Dummy">
</player>


995

Dominion General Discussion / Re: Duke Analysis?

« on: June 27, 2011, 06:21:02 pm »

Long term Province players will indeed be better at continuing to buy Provinces, but at the cost of letting the Duchy player get a lot of Duchies which makes his Duke buys huge.

996

Dominion General Discussion / Re: Duke Analysis?

« on: June 27, 2011, 06:04:09 pm »

In a pure money game I simulated a Duchy/Duke player against a Province player and after many iterations found these optimal:

Here's the Duchy/Duke player's game plan:
-when I have 1 Gold I start buying Duchies, I don't care for Provinces
-when all the Duchies are gone I go for Dukes (but will buy a Province if I have $8)
-when the Dukes are almost gone (3 left) I'll start buying Estates

Here's the Province player's game plan:
-when I have 1 Gold I start buying Provinces unless I see my opponent going for the Duchy/Duke plan in which case I'll turn to the dark side as well and buy Duchies over Provinces
-when all the Duchies are gone I go for Dukes (but will buy a Province if I have $8)
-when the Dukes are almost gone (3 left) I'll start buying Estates

>99% of these games end in piles and last 23 turns on average. The Duchy/Duke player wins 51% and the Province player wins 41%. If we delay the Province's player switch from Provinces to Duchies his win rate drops dramatically. If I let either player buy Dukes before the Duchy pile is depleted their win rate drops.

Quite a surprising result, no?

U can try these out yourselves if you paste these in my Simulator (VXML-button):
The Duchy/Duke player

Code: [Select]

<player name="BM - Duchy/Duke">
   <buy name="Duchy">
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInDeck" attribute="Gold"/>
         <operator type="greaterThan" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="0.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="Province">
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInSupply" attribute="Duchy"/>
         <operator type="equalTo" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="0.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="Duke">
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInSupply" attribute="Duchy"/>
         <operator type="equalTo" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="0.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="Estate">
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInSupply" attribute="Duke"/>
         <operator type="smallerOrEqualThan" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="3.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="Gold"/>
   <buy name="Silver"/>
</player>
The Province player (who will turn into a Duchy/Duke player out of necessity)

Code: [Select]

<player name="BM - Province">
   <buy name="Duchy">
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInSupply" attribute="Duchy"/>
         <operator type="smallerThan" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="8.0"/>
      </condition>
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInDeck" attribute="Gold"/>
         <operator type="greaterThan" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="0.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="Province">
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInDeck" attribute="Gold"/>
         <operator type="greaterThan" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="0.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="Duke">
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInSupply" attribute="Duchy"/>
         <operator type="equalTo" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="0.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="Estate">
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInSupply" attribute="Duke"/>
         <operator type="smallerOrEqualThan" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="3.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="Gold"/>
   <buy name="Silver"/>
</player>

997

Puzzles and Challenges / Re: Worst kingdom deck

« on: June 27, 2011, 02:22:12 pm »

None of those action cards actually increase your buying power.  (Unless you empty out two supply piles, which, as was already stated, has to be slower than Big Money and yields only $1 per City anyway.)

Playing ten cities for two cards, +1$, +1 buy, with nine thrones, will provide +19$ and draw a massive deck of cards each turn. If you have remaining workshop actions you can gain extra silver and probably spend it in the same round. You'll essentially buy out all the provinces in three or four turns once the cities hit. The Geronimo bot can work that out, even if doesn't make the right decisions on the throne rooms or find any short cuts to deplete piles.

The 19 turns isn't actually correct but the Geronimo simulator still says this is faster than money (even when it's not getting the decisions right).

Could you post the buy rules of the bot, DG?

998

Puzzles and Challenges / Re: Worst kingdom deck

« on: June 27, 2011, 02:20:34 pm »

The fastest strategy with just money to 8 Provinces is 25,7 turns. It starts to buy Provinces when it has at least 3 Golds.

Paste this in my Simulator (VXML-button)
<player name="BM - Big Money Ultimate">
   <buy name="Province">
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInDeck" attribute="Gold"/>
         <operator type="greaterThan" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="2.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="Gold"/>
   <buy name="Silver"/>
</player>

and let it play against this dummy player:

<player name="Dummy">
</player>

999

General Discussion / Re: Math Nerds...

« on: June 27, 2011, 04:01:38 am »

Given the correlation with Math, I wonder how many of us are also music nerds.  I'm all three!

When I'm not at my computer you'll probably find me in my music room working hard at a guitar solo or plucking away at a sonata of J.S. Bach. I posted some of my doodlings on youtube.

1000

Puzzles and Challenges / Re: The fatal buy

« on: June 27, 2011, 03:49:29 am »

Here's what I had in mind (Anon had the same idea, but made it more complicated than needed):
Geronimoo opened Silver/Chapel, then went for a Venture-deck occasionally buying Mining Villages when he couldn't buy a Venture. His deck looks like this when he makes the fatal buy of Contraband instead of the last Venture (he's greedy and doesn't want his opponent to have any ):

3 Mining Village, 9 Venture, Chapel. This is clearly able to buy 4 Provinces in a row without perfect shuffle.

He draws his hand of 3 MV's and plays them all for trash. Now his hand is 5 Ventures and his deck has 4 Ventures and a Chapel. He doesn't play his treasures, buys the Contraband by mistake and draws the 4 Ventures and Chapel and is now unable to buy a Province because of the Contraband in his discard.