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Author Topic: I really really hate tournament, but how do I avoid it online?  (Read 33706 times)

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Donald X.

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Re: I really really hate tournament, but how do I avoid it online?
« Reply #25 on: March 21, 2014, 03:56:57 pm »
+10

How would people feel about a short banned cards list for Pro games? Let's say you can pick three cards, and those won't be picked in Pro games you play, whether you generate the game or someone else does.

I think it's important that people not feel punished for say buying Cornucopia. In casual games of course you should be able to ban cards you picked from being used in games you generate, rather than having to generate a new list until you get a good one. And obv. you should be able to say "5 from Seaside" and so on.
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JW

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Re: I really really hate tournament, but how do I avoid it online?
« Reply #26 on: March 21, 2014, 04:08:52 pm »
+1

How would people feel about a short banned cards list for Pro games? Let's say you can pick three cards, and those won't be picked in Pro games you play, whether you generate the game or someone else does.

I think it's important that people not feel punished for say buying Cornucopia. In casual games of course you should be able to ban cards you picked from being used in games you generate, rather than having to generate a new list until you get a good one. And obv. you should be able to say "5 from Seaside" and so on.

This idea to ban cards from consideration in generating the Kingdom seems like a great implementation of an optional "veto mode."

For example, the host of a pro game might choose whether the Kingdom will be generated according to "veto mode" (and this is a visible characteristic of the game). If so, each player's list of (up to) three cards won't be included in the Kingdom (and when the game starts it should list which cards each player vetoed). Then a tournament's rules might require no veto mode, for example.
« Last Edit: March 21, 2014, 04:12:00 pm by JW »
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LastFootnote

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Re: I really really hate tournament, but how do I avoid it online?
« Reply #27 on: March 21, 2014, 04:14:49 pm »
+3

How would people feel about a short banned cards list for Pro games? Let's say you can pick three cards, and those won't be picked in Pro games you play, whether you generate the game or someone else does.

I think it's important that people not feel punished for say buying Cornucopia. In casual games of course you should be able to ban cards you picked from being used in games you generate, rather than having to generate a new list until you get a good one. And obv. you should be able to say "5 from Seaside" and so on.

Rather than 3, how about 1 per set you own? I think it's fine to want to ban upwards of 1 in 20 cards, but potentially problematic to ban, say, Village, Festival, and Throne Room in Base-only games. Or Militia, Witch, Thief. Etc.
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Donald X.

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Re: I really really hate tournament, but how do I avoid it online?
« Reply #28 on: March 21, 2014, 04:27:27 pm »
0

This idea to ban cards from consideration in generating the Kingdom seems like a great implementation of an optional "veto mode."

For example, the host of a pro game might choose whether the Kingdom will be generated according to "veto mode" (and this is a visible characteristic of the game). If so, each player's list of (up to) three cards won't be included in the Kingdom. Then a tournament's rules might require no veto mode, for example.
I'm not sure it would even to need to be an option, or that it causes issues with tournaments. For sure if it doesn't cause issues it should be allowed in tournaments.

The most extreme way to game the system is probably to not buy any expansions, and ban say Witch, Chapel, and Gardens. Then practice that mix a lot. I dunno, I'm not scared of that guy.
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Donald X.

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Re: I really really hate tournament, but how do I avoid it online?
« Reply #29 on: March 21, 2014, 04:30:32 pm »
0

Rather than 3, how about 1 per set you own? I think it's fine to want to ban upwards of 1 in 20 cards, but potentially problematic to ban, say, Village, Festival, and Throne Room in Base-only games. Or Militia, Witch, Thief. Etc.
Well it sounds reasonable, but where do the commonly hated cards fall? I can see some people really wanting to nuke more than one Intrigue or Dark Ages card.
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Donald X.

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Re: I really really hate tournament, but how do I avoid it online?
« Reply #30 on: March 21, 2014, 04:32:56 pm »
0

Rather than 3, how about 1 per set you own? I think it's fine to want to ban upwards of 1 in 20 cards, but potentially problematic to ban, say, Village, Festival, and Throne Room in Base-only games. Or Militia, Witch, Thief. Etc.
But wait, there's more.

Let's say you got to ban one card per 20 cards you owned, but could ban them from any mix of sets. That addresses "but I hate two Dark Ages cards" and also "don't let some jerk be the base set expert." But does it bother you that people who own more cards get to ban more cards?
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Awaclus

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Re: I really really hate tournament, but how do I avoid it online?
« Reply #31 on: March 21, 2014, 04:35:14 pm »
0

What if you could make a list of cards you want to ban in order from most to least important, and the number of cards you ban depends on the number of sets the host owns?
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JW

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Re: I really really hate tournament, but how do I avoid it online?
« Reply #32 on: March 21, 2014, 04:35:39 pm »
0

Rather than 3, how about 1 per set you own? I think it's fine to want to ban upwards of 1 in 20 cards, but potentially problematic to ban, say, Village, Festival, and Throne Room in Base-only games. Or Militia, Witch, Thief. Etc.

Both players should be able to ban one or more cards for a pro game veto mode, but it is only clear how this description applies to the person creating the game (e.g., if the person joining the game hasn't bought any cards, they should still get an equal opportunity to veto).

I could imagine a more complicated veto mode along the lines of what you're describing here as follows: the host of a game can activate Veto Mode (X cards), where X can't be greater than, for example, the number of sets they own. Then each player has a list of potentially banned cards and it takes the first X from that list as the banned cards.

I'm not sure it would even to need to be an option, or that it causes issues with tournaments. For sure if it doesn't cause issues it should be allowed in tournaments.

Someone who really likes a commonly banned card (let's follow this thread and suppose it is Tournament) might not want to play veto mode because that card will never show up.

Well it sounds reasonable, but where do the commonly hated cards fall? I can see some people really wanting to nuke more than one Intrigue or Dark Ages card.

I think LastFootnote meant that you can ban 1 card for each set that you own, but you can distribute those banned cards however you want across those sets (if you own base and Dark Ages you can ban Cultist and Rebuild, for example).
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Ozle

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Re: I really really hate tournament, but how do I avoid it online?
« Reply #33 on: March 21, 2014, 04:40:38 pm »
+5

I think you should be able to veto cards for several zaps per card, with an exponential amount going up
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Beyond Awesome

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Re: I really really hate tournament, but how do I avoid it online?
« Reply #34 on: March 21, 2014, 04:43:10 pm »
+2

I'm not a fan of veto mode. But, allowing pre-banned cards sounds okay. But, to be honest, I would rather there be an outright ban list that the majority agree on and not banned just because people hate playing the card but ban the card because the card actually causes to many unbalanced games like Tournament, for instance.

However, more than a banned list, what I think would benefit pro games the most is the ability to start with identical hands. I think a large problem with a lot of cards is that one player gets 5/2 and the other gets 3/4. This is very problematic with Cultist games where one person is likely to win the ruins split 8-2 and also Mountebank for instance and Rebuild. These cards would not be as powerful if each player got the same starting hands. Tournament though would still remain pretty random as would Black Market.
« Last Edit: March 21, 2014, 04:50:28 pm by Beyond Awesome »
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Polk5440

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Re: I really really hate tournament, but how do I avoid it online?
« Reply #35 on: March 21, 2014, 04:45:28 pm »
+2

How would people feel about a short banned cards list for Pro games? Let's say you can pick three cards, and those won't be picked in Pro games you play, whether you generate the game or someone else does.

I think it's important that people not feel punished for say buying Cornucopia. In casual games of course you should be able to ban cards you picked from being used in games you generate, rather than having to generate a new list until you get a good one. And obv. you should be able to say "5 from Seaside" and so on.

This is the conundrum.

I actually applaud the idea of pro games being something very specific and the same for everyone (the "full" Dominion experience). But, because you can simply not buy cards/set, that ideal is not realized. If this is not impacting sales, I would advocate no change.

I would prefer a very limited card black list to a veto mode if I had to choose between the two adjustments to pro games. I am anti-veto mode for pro games, for sure.

Rather than changing pro, I would prefer adjustments elsewhere to encourage more unrated or casual games and thus justify the difference. For instance,
  • allow users to deselect cards for unrated/casual games via My Cards
  • allow users to hide the kingdom if it is uniformly randomly generated in casual/unrated with "few" card restrictions ("pro" without the impact to the pro ranking)
  • allow variants such as veto mode, same starting hands, and point counter for casual/unrated games


If you allow too much variability in the type of games that can be played as "pro" then the rating doesn't mean that much.
« Last Edit: March 21, 2014, 04:47:16 pm by Polk5440 »
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hsiale

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Re: I really really hate tournament, but how do I avoid it online?
« Reply #36 on: March 21, 2014, 04:49:09 pm »
+3

Rather than 3, how about 1 per set you own?
That would be 9. Allowing, for example, to ban nearly half of the villages if I'm about to play a tournament match against a better player, making BM boards way more likely.
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Donald X.

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Re: I really really hate tournament, but how do I avoid it online?
« Reply #37 on: March 21, 2014, 04:57:22 pm »
0

I could imagine a more complicated veto mode along the lines of what you're describing here as follows: the host of a game can activate Veto Mode (X cards), where X can't be greater than, for example, the number of sets they own. Then each player has a list of potentially banned cards and it takes the first X from that list as the banned cards.
Well for sure "less complicated" is better.

Someone who really likes a commonly banned card (let's follow this thread and suppose it is Tournament) might not want to play veto mode because that card will never show up.
I don't imagine anything will reach saturation point, but you can just force a card in casual (let's say if you try to join that game and have banned that card, it alerts you).
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DrFlux

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Re: I really really hate tournament, but how do I avoid it online?
« Reply #38 on: March 21, 2014, 05:03:10 pm »
0

Is Rebuild actually good to get on 5/2? It seems like no silvers would hurt your ability to buy more rebuilds... I mean, you want rebuild early... but THAT early?

I guess it depends on what your other options are, but I think regardless, I would not be excited about opening Rebuild/nothing to my opponent's silver/silver.

I'm not a fan of veto mode. But, allowing pre-banned cards sounds okay. But, to be honest, I would rather there be an outright ban list that the majority agree on and not banned just because people hate playing the card but ban the card because the card actually causes to many unbalanced games like Tournament, for instance.

However, more than a banned list, what I think would benefit pro games the most is the ability to start with identical hands. I think a large problem with a lot of cards is that one player gets 5/2 and the other gets 3/4. This is very problematic with Cultist games where one person is likely to win the ruins split 8-2 and also Mountebank for instance and Rebuild. These cards would not be as powerful if each player got the same starting hands. Tournament though would still remain pretty random as would Black Market.
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JW

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Re: I really really hate tournament, but how do I avoid it online?
« Reply #39 on: March 21, 2014, 05:10:29 pm »
0

Someone who really likes a commonly banned card (let's follow this thread and suppose it is Tournament) might not want to play veto mode because that card will never show up.
I don't imagine anything will reach saturation point, but you can just force a card in casual (let's say if you try to join that game and have banned that card, it alerts you).

There are also people who just don't like the idea of a card-blacklist veto mode for pro games (Polk5440 expresses this viewpoint above). If veto mode exists they might prefer to play games without it.
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blueblimp

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Re: I really really hate tournament, but how do I avoid it online?
« Reply #40 on: March 21, 2014, 05:15:08 pm »
+2

How would people feel about a short banned cards list for Pro games? Let's say you can pick three cards, and those won't be picked in Pro games you play, whether you generate the game or someone else does.
I'm wary of the proposed mode for two reasons:
  • It reduces card variety. I like Possession. Lots of people don't. With this mode, lots of people will put Possession on their ban list, and I'll be playing with that card a lot less, meaning less variety for me.
  • The player joining the game can prevent the host from using the cards the host paid for. I bought Black Market because I like the card. I'll be sad if I play with it significantly less because of game joiners putting it on their ban list.
That said, if the number of cards allowed on the ban list is small enough, then hopefully different players' ban lists won't overlap too much, so the bans won't make too big an impact on the distribution of cards the opponent sees. Maybe 3 is small enough.
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Donald X.

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Re: I really really hate tournament, but how do I avoid it online?
« Reply #41 on: March 21, 2014, 05:21:19 pm »
+5

I'm not a fan of veto mode. But, allowing pre-banned cards sounds okay. But, to be honest, I would rather there be an outright ban list that the majority agree on and not banned just because people hate playing the card but ban the card because the card actually causes to many unbalanced games like Tournament, for instance.
There is no chance of a global banned list.

However, more than a banned list, what I think would benefit pro games the most is the ability to start with identical hands. I think a large problem with a lot of cards is that one player gets 5/2 and the other gets 3/4. This is very problematic with Cultist games where one person is likely to win the ruins split 8-2 and also Mountebank for instance and Rebuild. These cards would not be as powerful if each player got the same starting hands. Tournament though would still remain pretty random as would Black Market.
If turn-one Cultist wins the Ruins split 7-3 I think I am still in that game. That's my experience. Aside from cases where I can counter with Sea Hag or whatever. And if you haven't beaten turn one Mountebank you're missing out. It's pretty sweet.

I would not be optimistic about an "identical starting hands" feature, because I personally don't like it. I have nonidentical starting hands because that's better, which is not synonymous with "most skill-testing." When your opponent gets the favorable split in a game, whichever one it is for that game, remember, per aspera ad astra. You only get the joy of winning against the odds if you are sometimes put in the position of needing to. We already have Serf Bot for people who don't ever want a challenge. That's right.

I know many people absolutely adore Tournament and Black Market. I am just mentioning this as they get tossed around as game-ruiners. They are not stopping the top players from topping the leaderboard either; somehow, the good players do well despite the existence of these cards, despite nonidentical starting hands, despite sometimes your opening two buys are on the bottom.
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Donald X.

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Re: I really really hate tournament, but how do I avoid it online?
« Reply #42 on: March 21, 2014, 05:29:47 pm »
0

If you allow too much variability in the type of games that can be played as "pro" then the rating doesn't mean that much.
I'm not worried about that. I think the key concept for pro games is not being able to game the system (obv. you can play vs. yourself to inflate your rating and well that should be fixed too). Banning 3 cards seems sufficiently small (except in the no-purchases situation) that I don't think it's messing things up; yes, people will try to game the system with it (I am bad with Duke, ban Duke, I hate Minion but I do fine with it, leave it in), but I think it leaves ratings essentially just as meaningful. While making the game more fun for some people, which is the whole point.
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Donald X.

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Re: I really really hate tournament, but how do I avoid it online?
« Reply #43 on: March 21, 2014, 05:33:19 pm »
+4

Rather than 3, how about 1 per set you own?
That would be 9. Allowing, for example, to ban nearly half of the villages if I'm about to play a tournament match against a better player, making BM boards way more likely.
Yes, that's a good example of 9-10 being too many.

How about: you can ban any 3 cards... but only from expansions. Yes some people would be sad they couldn't ban Chapel, but you know, this seems kind of direct. You don't need to worry about buying Cornucopia being bad for you, you can ban Tournament. You can't ban cards from the main set, but you didn't buy that one. If you have no sets you can't ban anything, but we aren't saying "buy something if you want to ban something." The worst case now is buying just a small set and banning 3 cards from it.
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Donald X.

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Re: I really really hate tournament, but how do I avoid it online?
« Reply #44 on: March 21, 2014, 05:49:15 pm »
+3

I'm wary of the proposed mode for two reasons:
  • It reduces card variety. I like Possession. Lots of people don't. With this mode, lots of people will put Possession on their ban list, and I'll be playing with that card a lot less, meaning less variety for me.
  • The player joining the game can prevent the host from using the cards the host paid for. I bought Black Market because I like the card. I'll be sad if I play with it significantly less because of game joiners putting it on their ban list.
That said, if the number of cards allowed on the ban list is small enough, then hopefully different players' ban lists won't overlap too much, so the bans won't make too big an impact on the distribution of cards the opponent sees. Maybe 3 is small enough.
You are right about Possession. I wouldn't describe it so much as "less variety for me" - yes, that's what it is, but if you have 200 cards, you have plenty of variety. But you miss out on that particular experience. A few cards would be chosen especially often and so you wouldn't see those cards much (although you could force them in casual games and see if someone would play with you).

Let's say we're playing IRL. You come over to my house and I deal out cards from my personal collection and there's Black Market. And you say "oh man I don't want to play with that clearly awesome card." I think odds are I say "okay, no problem, let's be friendly." I am just trying to work through the logic of "I started the game but someone else can nix a card." I'm not going to make you suffer through a game with a card you hate, so that I can have the joy of playing with it. Of course IRL you would be bitching about it all game. But you know, it's part of the game that we play with the cards we want to, and that "we" includes everyone. The only reason to not just let you pick a particular 10 for Pro mode is again the "gaming the system" issue that Pro mode specifically exists to address.

If a card was sufficiently hated, like Mob (a Prosperity outtake), it didn't make the expansion, and you never got to play with it.
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popsofctown

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Re: I really really hate tournament, but how do I avoid it online?
« Reply #45 on: March 21, 2014, 05:53:10 pm »
+3

I would like something with an organic feel to it.  Something like this:

"You may pick up to 15 unfavorite cards.  You may pick up to 45 favorite cards.

Whenever one of your unfavorite cards would be selected as a non-bane card for the kingdom, it is swapped out at random with one of your opponent's favorite cards."

By default, your account has 0 unfavorite cards.  By default, you have 45 favorite cards you may not have even looked at, but Donald can pick them out so they are pretty average, good, happy well rounded batch of cards.  Unfavoriting the max number of cards has the strategic disadvantage of letting your opponent play with his favorite cards more often. It's impossible that your unfavorites completely make kingdom selection impossible because there are more favorites than non-favorites.

To me this seems like a nifty way of simulating, "please, I don't want to play a game with Boardwalk.  It's not that I'm bad with Boardwalk and want an edge.  In fact, you can pick whatever it is your heart desires to replace the boardwalk"
Which sorta happens at actual kitchen tables.

Humble suggestion
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Beyond Awesome

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Re: I really really hate tournament, but how do I avoid it online?
« Reply #46 on: March 21, 2014, 05:54:53 pm »
0

I'm not a fan of veto mode. But, allowing pre-banned cards sounds okay. But, to be honest, I would rather there be an outright ban list that the majority agree on and not banned just because people hate playing the card but ban the card because the card actually causes to many unbalanced games like Tournament, for instance.
There is no chance of a global banned list.

However, more than a banned list, what I think would benefit pro games the most is the ability to start with identical hands. I think a large problem with a lot of cards is that one player gets 5/2 and the other gets 3/4. This is very problematic with Cultist games where one person is likely to win the ruins split 8-2 and also Mountebank for instance and Rebuild. These cards would not be as powerful if each player got the same starting hands. Tournament though would still remain pretty random as would Black Market.
If turn-one Cultist wins the Ruins split 7-3 I think I am still in that game. That's my experience. Aside from cases where I can counter with Sea Hag or whatever. And if you haven't beaten turn one Mountebank you're missing out. It's pretty sweet.

I would not be optimistic about an "identical starting hands" feature, because I personally don't like it. I have nonidentical starting hands because that's better, which is not synonymous with "most skill-testing." When your opponent gets the favorable split in a game, whichever one it is for that game, remember, per aspera ad astra. You only get the joy of winning against the odds if you are sometimes put in the position of needing to. We already have Serf Bot for people who don't ever want a challenge. That's right.

I know many people absolutely adore Tournament and Black Market. I am just mentioning this as they get tossed around as game-ruiners. They are not stopping the top players from topping the leaderboard either; somehow, the good players do well despite the existence of these cards, despite nonidentical starting hands, despite sometimes your opening two buys are on the bottom.

I understand that you designed the differing starting hands for a reason. But, I don't think winning against "the odds" is skill testing. If you have two opponents of nearly identical rank. Chances are the one of the better opening split is going to win. This will be further compounded if that player also had the advantage of going first. And, I don't think comparing this situation to "serf bot" is correct. A lot of people on these forums play pro mode because they want the most unbiased gaming experience. Having identical starting hands makes the game less biased towards one player.
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KingZog3

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Re: I really really hate tournament, but how do I avoid it online?
« Reply #47 on: March 21, 2014, 06:06:44 pm »
0

I'm not a fan of veto mode. But, allowing pre-banned cards sounds okay. But, to be honest, I would rather there be an outright ban list that the majority agree on and not banned just because people hate playing the card but ban the card because the card actually causes to many unbalanced games like Tournament, for instance.
There is no chance of a global banned list.

However, more than a banned list, what I think would benefit pro games the most is the ability to start with identical hands. I think a large problem with a lot of cards is that one player gets 5/2 and the other gets 3/4. This is very problematic with Cultist games where one person is likely to win the ruins split 8-2 and also Mountebank for instance and Rebuild. These cards would not be as powerful if each player got the same starting hands. Tournament though would still remain pretty random as would Black Market.
If turn-one Cultist wins the Ruins split 7-3 I think I am still in that game. That's my experience. Aside from cases where I can counter with Sea Hag or whatever. And if you haven't beaten turn one Mountebank you're missing out. It's pretty sweet.

I would not be optimistic about an "identical starting hands" feature, because I personally don't like it. I have nonidentical starting hands because that's better, which is not synonymous with "most skill-testing." When your opponent gets the favorable split in a game, whichever one it is for that game, remember, per aspera ad astra. You only get the joy of winning against the odds if you are sometimes put in the position of needing to. We already have Serf Bot for people who don't ever want a challenge. That's right.

I know many people absolutely adore Tournament and Black Market. I am just mentioning this as they get tossed around as game-ruiners. They are not stopping the top players from topping the leaderboard either; somehow, the good players do well despite the existence of these cards, despite nonidentical starting hands, despite sometimes your opening two buys are on the bottom.

I understand that you designed the differing starting hands for a reason. But, I don't think winning against "the odds" is skill testing. If you have two opponents of nearly identical rank. Chances are the one of the better opening split is going to win. This will be further compounded if that player also had the advantage of going first. And, I don't think comparing this situation to "serf bot" is correct. A lot of people on these forums play pro mode because they want the most unbiased gaming experience. Having identical starting hands makes the game less biased towards one player.

I used to play identical starting  hands, and I think that's fine is casual mode. But very often $5 card/nothing opening isn't that amazing, even on a Mountebank board (It's very good, but far from unbeatable).
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Re: I really really hate tournament, but how do I avoid it online?
« Reply #48 on: March 21, 2014, 06:16:36 pm »
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I understand that you designed the differing starting hands for a reason.
Excellent.

But, I don't think winning against "the odds" is skill testing.
I don't know why you're saying this. It definitely tests skill. I imagine you are just repeating that "luck makes who-wins less indicative of who-played-better." I addressed that, with respect to opening hands, in the post you are replying to - the nonidentical hands are *not* there to test skill. That is not their point. The most skill-testing game is not the most fun game.

If you have two opponents of nearly identical rank. Chances are the one of the better opening split is going to win. This will be further compounded if that player also had the advantage of going first.
Are you saying that playing better isn't relevant? It's relevant. If you're saying "if we subtract skill, luck remains," that isn't really saying much.

A lot of people on these forums play pro mode because they want the most unbiased gaming experience. Having identical starting hands makes the game less biased towards one player.
The point to Pro mode is to have games where people aren't gaming the system. We want you to be able to pick what cards you want to play with, but recognize that you can cheat this way; so there's Pro mode. The point isn't to reduce luck; I have no interest in a "reduced luck" mode.
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Donald X.

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Re: I really really hate tournament, but how do I avoid it online?
« Reply #49 on: March 21, 2014, 06:27:40 pm »
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"You may pick up to 15 unfavorite cards.  You may pick up to 45 favorite cards.
I think it would be okay to let people mark cards as favorite/unfavorite for casual, and pick them more/less often. I am not sure how many people would go to the trouble; I am thinking, it would be late enough on the list of potential features to never add. For Pro mode I would like something that involves much less work.
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