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[Robz888]

http://dom.retrobox.eu/?/20140224/log.514cd37de4b0fe3236619906.1393272283024.txt

Code: [Select]

Crossroads, Trade Route, Watchtower, Alchemist, Baron, Caravan, Ironworks, Spice Merchant, Contraband, Margrave
After my opponent whines about shuffle luck for a while, he says this:

fap_on_it: ironworks was a mistake btw
fap_on_it: not worth it
fap_on_it: you have extra buy
fap_on_it: common mistake i know
Robz888: i disagree
fap_on_it: just shows that you don't have good understanding of the game

Obviously, I'm blocking this jerk. But anyway, I submit the question to the experts. Was Ironworks wrong? I think it was a good pick up, given my draws. It allowed me to pile drive the Caravans, which were an important source of draw for me.

[KingZog3]

I agree with ironworks buy, although maybe there is an argument for opening with it and not buying it turn 3/4. Even after the caravans are gone, picking up a spare crossroads or a Trade Route (probably don't have the spare actions, but still) or a watchtower, so I think it won't be totally dead.

[Kirian]

You split the Caravans 8/2.  That's a pretty good argument for taking IW.

[KingZog3]

You split the Caravans 8/2.  That's a pretty good argument for taking IW.

I didn't look at the entire game, but if that's the case then I think your opponent is just upset that he didn't buy IW. If he think IW is a substitute for +buy, he needs to learn more about that I think.

[pingpongsam]

Half the cards in the kingdom provide +Buy, thus the argument that the buying of any on +Buy card is a mistake for that card not offering +Buy is absurd on its face.

Crossroads/Margrave is the only viable alternative draw engine to a stack of Caravans as I believe Potion/Alchemist although tacking on Spice Merchant might speed it up). Nothing stopping you from picking those cards up after you have the majority of the Caravans. I haven't read the game log but I'm thinking you did something terrible wrong if you lost with 8 of the Caravans gained via Ironworks. Once I had Crossroads/Margrave I'd probably pick up a Baron to since the chances of connecting it with an Estate are outrageously good (and amplified with a stack of Caravans).

[pingpongsam]

The guy's name is fap_on_it, I wouldn't put any stock into anything he said.

[GeoLib]

The guy's name is fap_on_it, I wouldn't put any stock into anything he said.

OTOH, he's #14 on the isotropish leaderboard...

[eHalcyon]

When your opponent wins in convincing fashion, it's usually foolish to offer advice against the strategy that beat you.

[yed]

You are right, IW was worth it.

Alchemists are mistake not only because it is slow but also because after Margrave attack you must discard 3 out of 6 Alchemists on top.

[DG]

To be honest, after seeing his draws and your draws I'm not surprised he was in a foul mood.

I've got a buys and gains article mostly written so this should be a good kingdom for me to think about. So your opponent's point, that you are not utilizing your +buys because you are buying non-income cards, is right but not important. Since you are trashing down with a spice merchant your income isn't great anyway, ironworks is gaining a key card for you, and you can play it often with fast cycling. Silver helps you utilize +buys but it would have prevented the fast cycling that you achieved.

[Robz888]

To be honest, after seeing his draws and your draws I'm not surprised he was in a foul mood.

I've got a buys and gains article mostly written so this should be a good kingdom for me to think about. So your opponent's point, that you are not utilizing your +buys because you are buying non-income cards, is right but not important. Since you are trashing down with a spice merchant your income isn't great anyway, ironworks is gaining a key card for you, and you can play it often with fast cycling. Silver helps you utilize +buys but it would have prevented the fast cycling that you achieved.

Oh, I most definitely got significantly better draws than him--draws that doomed him no matter what either of us did.

I don't think that excuses his behavior.

[SCSN]

fap_on_it has an impressive amount of tactical intuition for someone with such gaping holes in his strategic understanding. My guess is that he's fairly new to the game and I'd bet on him becoming elite had it not been for his issues with anger management and spitefulness (taking those into account makes me not so sure).

The funny thing is that he literally admitted to being a "sore loser" and that that wasn't going to change after I pointed out that his incessant whining was as unproductive as it was justified. I find it a pity that I had to blacklist such a tough opponent, but being confronted with whiny chats whenever things don't go entirely his way depletes all the joy that playing Dominion provides me.

As for the actual game: Ironworks is fine, of course.

[2.71828.....]

fap_on_it has an impressive amount of tactical intuition for someone with such gaping holes in his strategic understanding. My guess is that he's fairly new to the game and I'd bet on him becoming elite had it not been for his issues with anger management and spitefulness (taking those into account makes me not so sure).

The funny thing is that he literally admitted to being a "sore loser" and that that wasn't going to change after I pointed out that his incessant whining was as unproductive as it was justified. I find it a pity that I had to blacklist such a tough opponent, but being confronted with whiny chats whenever things don't go entirely his way depletes all the joy that playing Dominion provides me.

As for the actual game: Ironworks is fine, of course.

This.  Precisely this.  He is a very good player.  But really annoying to play against.  Especially because every time he loses it is not his fault.  "You got super lucky shuffle luck."  "You played a poor strategy but I got screwed with my shuffle luck."  I had a very similar experience with him that I posted about here doing the same thing that Robz is doing- getting confirmation that my strategy was in fact sound, and that fap_on_it is just a sore loser, which is an extremely annoying characteristic in a good player.

[2.71828.....]

To be honest, after seeing his draws and your draws I'm not surprised he was in a foul mood.

I've got a buys and gains article mostly written so this should be a good kingdom for me to think about. So your opponent's point, that you are not utilizing your +buys because you are buying non-income cards, is right but not important. Since you are trashing down with a spice merchant your income isn't great anyway, ironworks is gaining a key card for you, and you can play it often with fast cycling. Silver helps you utilize +buys but it would have prevented the fast cycling that you achieved.

Sure, your starting 5-2 was a huge advantage, but I think that fap_on_it sealed his fate t5 going for potion.  Alchemist is totally unnecessary on this board with caravan and margrave for draw with spice merchant to trash away coppers (which helps cycling and hitting those other draw cards more frequently).  There is a reason alchemist is rated so low in Qvist's rankings.  It can be powerful when it is effectively used, but it is also a dangerous trap card that is totally unnecessary on certain boards such as this one.  (especially with margrave giving 3 card hands which make buying alchemists difficult)

Summary, the good draws didn't matter because even if Robz had not gotten those draws he would have won because fap_on_it went for an inferior strategy.

[JOG]

He just did the same thing to me after we finished this game:
http://dom.retrobox.eu/?/20140224/log.50a44d70e4b09c3f1c235128.1393287283780.txt
Claimed his bad shuffles caused the loss and that bishop is better opener than trader here. 
Played him quite a few times.  In over half of his losses, but none of his wins, he's said it was luck.

[JacquesTheBard]

My younger brother has shown the same combo of tactical capability and excessive temper that we see here. He'd probably never choose a name like fap_on_it, but sometimes I wonder how much it detracts from his enjoyment, as well as my own.

Do you think this sort of thing is easier to deal with IRL, or online? Online, everyone is more obnoxious than usual, but IRL tantrums cut deeper.

[shark_bait]

My younger brother has shown the same combo of tactical capability and excessive temper that we see here. He'd probably never choose a name like fap_on_it, but sometimes I wonder how much it detracts from his enjoyment, as well as my own.

Do you think this sort of thing is easier to deal with IRL, or online? Online, everyone is more obnoxious than usual, but IRL tantrums cut deeper.

The thing your brother need to realize with Dominion (and board games in general) is that they are games.  They are meant to be played and they are meant to be enjoyed.  Obviously most all of us enjoy winning.  It's thrilling to improve and to get better and winning is a direct representation of our improvement and progress.  However when playing Dominion goes from finding enjoyment by playing to an obsession to win the enjoyment of playing can be easily quenched by either losing from poor play or bad luck. 

As a top player who very much enjoys winning and very much enjoys Dominion I look to each game as an opportunity to learn.  You have to recognize that Dominion is a game of both skill and luck.  Some games you just can't win.  Most of the time even in games wherein your opponent had better luck you can look back at your own play and see things you could have done different.  Even if you played perfectly and still lost you have to recognize that it's just a game. 

Yes I want to win.  Yes I want to be at the top of the leaderboard.  But above all I want to have fun.  Dominion is what I do in my spare time.  When I have an extra 15-30 minutes I will play Dominion for the sake of enjoyment.  Enjoyment ultimately comes not from climbing the leaderboard but from playing and improving at a game I love.

Getting back to online vs. IRL, it's certainly easier to deal with these things online.  You can just blacklist said player or it's quite easy to ignore the chat or in the worst case if you get slow-played you could quit and not have to interact with that player again.  IRL you obviously have a relationship with your brother and I presume that you want to find enjoyment by playing Dominion with him.  Have you specifically told him your frustration with his attitude?  If he's not aware of this how can he improve?  I don't know you or your brother but communication would be my first bit of advice.  Luck goes both ways in Dominion but we are far more prone to notice it when it goes against us.  Perhaps it would also help if you tried to notice your own luck and say something like, "Sorry about that game, you didn't really have a chance when my Militia hit your chapel hand on turn 5."  It may be that you mentioning your luck will make him more cognizant of his own luck and realize that in the long run things do even out.

Alright, this got a lot longer than I originally anticipated. Having people to play Dominion IRL with is awesome and I'm jealous that I don't have a brother to do that with.  Best of luck with playing IRL Dominion with your brother and don't quit on him!

[Aidan Millow]

In the interests of getting better: Fap_on_it makes what seem to me to be several glaring play mistakes involving Margrave and spice merchant:

Turn 7: He keeps SM, Copper, Silver instead of triple Silver (which is reasonable enough) and then draws 2 with SM meaning he misses Caravan money.

Turn 9: He keeps Crossroads, Estate, SM (again instead of triple silver), and ends up trashing a silver and being unable to buy anything (on his potion turn).

Is the cycling Fap_on_it is getting in these turns really worth the buying power he looses or was this more likely mistakes made due to being on tilt or something?

[WanderingWinder]

In the interests of getting better: Fap_on_it makes what seem to me to be several glaring play mistakes involving Margrave and spice merchant:

Turn 7: He keeps SM, Copper, Silver instead of triple Silver (which is reasonable enough) and then draws 2 with SM meaning he misses Caravan money.

Turn 9: He keeps Crossroads, Estate, SM (again instead of triple silver), and ends up trashing a silver and being unable to buy anything (on his potion turn).

Is the cycling Fap_on_it is getting in these turns really worth the buying power he looses or was this more likely mistakes made due to being on tilt or something?

Cycling. I dunno about the second one, but for the first one, the cycling and more importantly, the trashing, makes that the standard play - certainly not a "glaring play mistake".

[amalloy]

In the interests of getting better: Fap_on_it makes what seem to me to be several glaring play mistakes involving Margrave and spice merchant:

Turn 7: He keeps SM, Copper, Silver instead of triple Silver (which is reasonable enough) and then draws 2 with SM meaning he misses Caravan money.

Turn 9: He keeps Crossroads, Estate, SM (again instead of triple silver), and ends up trashing a silver and being unable to buy anything (on his potion turn).

Is the cycling Fap_on_it is getting in these turns really worth the buying power he looses or was this more likely mistakes made due to being on tilt or something?

Cycling. I dunno about the second one, but for the first one, the cycling and more importantly, the trashing, makes that the standard play - certainly not a "glaring play mistake".

He could trash the Copper for coins instead of for cards though, right? Gets the trashing and the Caravan, which presumably is important in this game, while missing out on the cycling.

[SCSN]

Given that he just bought the Potion and is thus planning to go for Alchemists, the cycling + getting the Silver is better than taking the Caravan and leaving a Copper and Estate in your next hand. Caravan is less important in that case because you're going to get your draw from Alchemists, and Caravan instead of Silver makes it more likely that you can't afford an Alchemist during next shuffle, which would be a disaster.

I do agree that his T9 discards make very little sense.

[-Stef-]

I got reminded of this thread when I got automatched against this guy a couple of times recently.
I really don't like blacklisting based on stories of others, so I just accepted those, also a bit anxious to find out if these stories had any truth in them.

Two of the games were actually pretty remarkable. On both I started with a series of extreme bad luck, just kept playing, and by some miracle / misplays by opponent / luck later on, I managed to turn them around. Funny thing is that this was exactly the thing I would try to tell him ("If you run into a series of bad luck, don't just start ranting, but look for an opportunity of luck and just keep playing your best game). Except that I couldn't tell him because he doesn't really do chat, he just does ragequit.

Here I start with $5, $2, $4, $2, $4. This gets me Young Witch, nothing, Mining Village + Curse, nothing, Watchtower
Opposing Young Witch, Market Square, Caravan + Curse, Black Market, Remake. Ugh!

We both open Masquerade/Potion, but then he gets Hunting Party/Scrying Pool and on my side Masquerade misses the shufle and I'm stuck with $2 on turn 3.
Then his Scrying pool finds his only action and he can trade an estate for my copper. In the meanwhile I have a dead Golem and on turn 6 I have 3 estates, a copper and a potion.
Holy cow can games start worse? Fortunately he greens way too early and on an unlucky masquerade he selects the worst possible card (even giving away the province would be much better) log

Playing this guy isn't the kind of fun I'm looking for in games at all, but when gems like these happen... they're just extra sweet

[SCSN]

As in life, so in a game of Dominion, skill will make something of the worst of throws.

[eHalcyon]

What was the bad masq pass?

[markusin]

What was the bad masq pass?

I'm guessing the Golem that was passed on -Stef-'s Turn 8