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Author Topic: Discussion of whether specific Salvager features should be allowed  (Read 26770 times)

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silverspawn

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+1

Thank you for the amazing Salvager extension.

I am quite lazy. What I would love to see is a tracking display that shows my current deck size and my cards even during the game, like this screenshot from the gamelog:

If you do that, I'll quit playing Dominion.

GeoLib

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Re: Discussion of whether specific Salvager features should be allowed
« Reply #1 on: August 31, 2014, 03:12:10 pm »
+14

Thank you for the amazing Salvager extension.

I am quite lazy. What I would love to see is a tracking display that shows my current deck size and my cards even during the game, like this screenshot from the gamelog:

If you do that, I'll quit playing Dominion.

Ooooh. This argument again!

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ragingduckd

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Re: Discussion of whether specific Salvager features should be allowed
« Reply #2 on: August 31, 2014, 03:40:37 pm »
+1

I am quite lazy. What I would love to see is a tracking display that shows my current deck size and my cards even during the game, like this screenshot from the gamelog:



This been requested a few times and discussed at least a little.  I don't think any of the past Salvager devs particularly favor adding it, so it probably won't happen any time soon.

If someone comes along who wants to add it, then we'll have to argue about whether and how that should happen.  Until then I suggest tabling the discussion.
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blueblimp

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Re: Discussion of whether specific Salvager features should be allowed
« Reply #3 on: August 31, 2014, 04:14:50 pm »
+7

If you do that, I'll quit playing Dominion.

How do you know nobody has done this yet? Coded his own tracking extension even with additional features of displaying what cards are left in the draw pile and showing the exact percentage for each card type to be drawn by Wishing well if you play it...
This discussion has been done ad nauseam before. Let me attempt to summarize the main conclusions of the discussion.

Any sort of non-mental tracking, including both point counting and deck contents tracking, is not allowed by the rules, because anything the rules do not explicitly allow is implicitly forbidden. (This is the opinion of Donald X himself, so it's not really up for argument.) As such, playing with any tracking is playing a variant of the game. If all players in a match consent to playing the variant, then that is fine. If any of them doesn't, then the variant should not be used, and if one player goes ahead and tracks anyway, then that is cheating. (Notice how, in the current implementation of the point counter, it's implemented so that it's only used if all the players consent to its use, either by joining a game with "#vpon" in the title or by choosing not to disable the counter once in the game.)

The argument you raised is common: manual non-mental tracking is always possible when playing online, so how can tracking be forbidden? The reason is that, although it's possible to do undetectable manual non-mental tracking without the consent of the other player, it's still cheating. Undetectable cheating is just as much cheating as detectable cheating, and players want to trust that their opponents won't cheat, even if it's not detectable. (I think this is one reason that the argument tends to blow up when it happens: non-tracker users are concerned about surreptitious tracker use by their opponents.)

IIRC, polls show that players in general tend to like point counters but dislike deck trackers. (I'm in the camp that likes deck trackers.) But personal preferences actually don't matter as long as there is mutual consent about what tracking is permitted in the match being played.

Given that mutual consent is required to do anything, I think the other reason the discussions tend to blow up is deciding on what is tournament legal. This is up to the tournament organizer. For example, Stef's Dominion League defaults to #vpon (that is, point counting but not deck tracking) except by mutual consent.
« Last Edit: August 31, 2014, 04:16:00 pm by blueblimp »
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SirD

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Re: Discussion of whether specific Salvager features should be allowed
« Reply #4 on: August 31, 2014, 06:52:11 pm »
0

Thank you AI for the reply.

Thanks blueblimp for the recap.

I am not suggesting anything. I simply think the only weakness of Dominion is that games can take a very long time and the main advantage I see in Salvager is to help players speed up the game.
« Last Edit: August 31, 2014, 06:56:12 pm by SirD »
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Re: Discussion of whether specific Salvager features should be allowed
« Reply #5 on: September 03, 2014, 09:29:01 am »
+2

Any sort of non-mental tracking, including both point counting and deck contents tracking, is not allowed by the rules, because anything the rules do not explicitly allow is implicitly forbidden. (This is the opinion of Donald X himself, so it's not really up for argument.) As such, playing with any tracking is playing a variant of the game. If all players in a match consent to playing the variant, then that is fine. If any of them doesn't, then the variant should not be used, and if one player goes ahead and tracks anyway, then that is cheating. (Notice how, in the current implementation of the point counter, it's implemented so that it's only used if all the players consent to its use, either by joining a game with "#vpon" in the title or by choosing not to disable the counter once in the game.)

The problem is that by this definition, Dominion Online is always only a variant to the game, because it provides a full log. Adding a deck tracker would only summarize some data already available from the log (as does the VP counter). Is it cheating to use the log to track your deck whenever it's relevant, without asking for the opponent's consent? I don't think so...
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DG

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Re: Discussion of whether specific Salvager features should be allowed
« Reply #6 on: September 03, 2014, 10:50:09 am »
+5

No thank you. The information in a tracker will provide a clear advantage and will induce both players to use it if it is allowed. The information will probably not help decision making but replace decision making as players will have to deal with much less uncertainty.

Part of the skill of dominion is not only tracking information but knowing what to look for. An information tracker provides all information all the time and removes this aspect of skill as well.

Quote
I simply think the only weakness of Dominion is that games can take a very long time and the main advantage I see in Salvager is to help players speed up the game.

If the time is spent thinking then the time is not completely wasted. Playing without thinking is a waste, to my mind.
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silverspawn

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Re: Discussion of whether specific Salvager features should be allowed
« Reply #7 on: September 03, 2014, 10:54:45 am »
+3

wait, wait, i didn't start this discussion. i just wanted to quickly state my opinion, i never intended to start a discussion. calumniation!!

SirD

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Re: Discussion of whether specific Salvager features should be allowed
« Reply #8 on: September 03, 2014, 11:36:25 am »
0

wait, wait, i didn't start this discussion.

I am afraid, you did :)
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ThaddeusB

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Re: Discussion of whether specific Salvager features should be allowed
« Reply #9 on: September 03, 2014, 12:44:28 pm »
0


If the time is spent thinking then the time is not completely wasted. Playing without thinking is a waste, to my mind.

+1 for this
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Re: Discussion of whether specific Salvager features should be allowed
« Reply #10 on: September 03, 2014, 12:51:30 pm »
+4

Everyone against this should be sentenced to 100 games against Personman that include wishing well.
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blueblimp

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Re: Discussion of whether specific Salvager features should be allowed
« Reply #11 on: September 03, 2014, 02:45:39 pm »
+3

The information will probably not help decision making but replace decision making as players will have to deal with much less uncertainty.

Well, let me list some examples of why I think knowing deck contents allows for making interesting decisions. Of course, you can know these things without automated tracking, if you keep careful count. So then, why would anybody want automated tracking?

Think of it like a foot race vs a bike race. It's not fair for someone on foot to race vs someone on a bicycle, but within either race, it's fair because both competitors have access to the same equipment. Bike lovers are not somehow inferior or lazy because they use equipment to move faster. Similarly, although the advantage of automated tracking is smaller than a bike, it's possible to legitimately prefer playing with it or playing with it without being objectively wrong.

OK, on to the examples.

Ambassador war: I enjoy these more when I can know Copper and Estate counts to have some idea who is ahead at any moment. If you don't have a Silver yet, you may be aiming to have exactly 3 Copper in deck, so knowing how much Copper you currently have (and your opponent currently has, if they drop below 3 Copper) is useful.

Multi-Province turns: In a game without cost reduction and with a draw-your-deck engine, you'll typically want to aim for multi-Province turns. That requires a specific amount of buying power in your deck. For example, if your goal is to buy 2 Provinces per turn, you need $16. On a turn that you draw your whole deck, you can see how much buying power you have, but if you want to start planning how you'll get to $16 _before_ you first draw your whole deck, you need to know your deck's total current buying power.

Variable-value VP cards: Endgame decisions become more interesting when you know both how close you are to the next threshold and how close your opponent is. For example, take Gardens. If I see my opponent's deck size is 37, I may not be worried about them getting 4 point Gardens on their next turn, but if I see their deck size is 38, it's fairly likely. This allows for more accurate estimation of future point values. (I'll also mention Fairgrounds games with trashing, which I personally find incredibly annoying without knowing your deck contents, because you may unintentionally trash your last Copper and drop your point total.)

Balancing terminals and villages: Let's say you're running a draw-your-deck engine and want to end your turns with all action cards played and 0 actions remaining. Then you need n villages and n+1 terminals. (Terminal durations are interesting because they sort of count as half a terminal.) Planning this out becomes a lot more feasible if you know how many villages and terminals you currently have in your deck.

The unifying theme I think is that importance is shifted away from mental tracking and guesswork, and towards planning and calculation. This makes sense: when you have little information available, the most helpful thing is to gather more information and make decisions that work regardless of the unknown information; when you have a lot of information available, the most helpful thing is to make good use of it by planning farther ahead and calculating your turns more carefully.
« Last Edit: September 03, 2014, 02:50:43 pm by blueblimp »
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Kirian

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Re: Discussion of whether specific Salvager features should be allowed
« Reply #12 on: September 03, 2014, 02:51:22 pm »
+4

Everyone against this should be sentenced to 100 games against Personman

Who came up with that guy, anyway?
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SCSN

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Re: Discussion of whether specific Salvager features should be allowed
« Reply #13 on: September 03, 2014, 02:55:52 pm »
+6

If the time is spent thinking then the time is not completely wasted. Playing without thinking is a waste, to my mind.

I assume you also like to be presented with an endless string of 1s and 0s instead of the pretty pictures your computer's processors, after lots of thinking, have painted on your screen.

I like to occupy my brain as much as possible with activities a computer can't perform, which entails offloading such trivial tasks as counting and bookkeeping, the manual performance of which I consider to be not just a waste of time, but even an insult to human intelligence.

I love fast-paced action with plenty of creative choices per time unit; everything that slows down the game and decreases the frequency of creative thought in favor of straightforward procedures reduces the only thing I care about in Dominion: my personal enjoyment.
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blueblimp

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Re: Discussion of whether specific Salvager features should be allowed
« Reply #14 on: September 03, 2014, 03:00:08 pm »
0

Oops, one thing I forgot to mention in my previous post, but it's a different subtopic anyway. My understanding is that it's not uncommon for paper tracking to be allowed in tournaments of other strategy games where tracking is helpful.

Examples:
Scrabble: Tracking tiles is explicitly permitted: http://www.scrabbleplayers.org/wiki/images/a/af/Rules-20110605.pdf section IV.G.1.i.
MTG: Note-taking during a game is explicitly permitted: http://media.wizards.com/ContentResources/Wizards/WPN/Main/Documents/Magic_The_Gathering_Tournament_Rules_PDF1.pdf section 2.11.

My guess is that if Dominion had an active IRL 2-player tournament scene, then eventually taking paper notes would become allowed in that setting, but it's impossible to know for sure.
« Last Edit: September 03, 2014, 03:01:54 pm by blueblimp »
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liopoil

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Re: Discussion of whether specific Salvager features should be allowed
« Reply #15 on: September 03, 2014, 03:44:11 pm »
0

How does the salvager VP counter handle 3+ player masquerade games?
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AdamH

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Re: Discussion of whether specific Salvager features should be allowed
« Reply #16 on: September 03, 2014, 04:03:16 pm »
+4

Everyone prefers different things. People have their reasons for wanting point counter on that I don't understand. That's great.

I like disabling point counter because you can't use it IRL and I like to play IRL a lot. All of this mental processing that seems to be so taxing on the rest of you isn't that big of a deal for me because I'm used to it, and I get to play at a high level when I play IRL. If I used the point counter all of the time when I played online, I'd get out of practice very quickly at doing these things.

Each person likes their own thing. Everyone is their own unique beautiful flower. While I don't share the opinions of those who disagree with me, I'd prefer to just hug it out.

Group hug?
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blueblimp

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Re: Discussion of whether specific Salvager features should be allowed
« Reply #18 on: September 03, 2014, 04:24:27 pm »
+1

All of this mental processing that seems to be so taxing on the rest of you isn't that big of a deal for me because I'm used to it
Let me just pause and nitpick this passage from your (otherwise nice) post, because it seems like a common sentiment. Statements like this can't help coming across as "I'm good at mental tracking because I practice it, unlike you", which isn't so far from, although this is not what you said, "people who are bad at mental tracking are only that way because they're too lazy to practice it".

I think this is a fundamentally unfair and unrealistic attitude. People not only like different things but have different aptitudes too. To use myself as an example, I'm pretty good at math-like reasoning. Have I practiced it a lot? Yes. Do I like practicing it? Yes. Am I better at it than an "average" person who puts in a comparable amount of practice? Almost certainly. The key thing is that I acknowledge that there are people who both naturally have more trouble with math and don't like to practice it as much as I do.

I want to ask opponents of automated counters to extend that same courtesy to people who are naturally bad at mental tracking and/or don't enjoy practicing it. I absolutely believe that you have practiced mental tracking more than me. Would I be better at it with more practice? Yes. Would I be as good as you? Doubtful! All I'm asking is the acknowledgement that it is possible for different people to have different levels of ability.
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AdamH

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Re: Discussion of whether specific Salvager features should be allowed
« Reply #19 on: September 03, 2014, 04:26:54 pm »
+3

OK you're right. I attempted to adopt the tone of the people supporting it, but there was no need for that. My apologies.

Would I be as good as you? Doubtful!

You haven't seen very many of my videos, have you? :P
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silverspawn

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Re: Discussion of whether specific Salvager features should be allowed
« Reply #20 on: September 03, 2014, 04:31:52 pm »
+1

it is definitely true that different people are differently talented when it comes down to these things, but I can't see how it's supposed to be fair to just take them away and nullify this aspect of skill, when it's a part of the game as Donald X originally designed it. some people don't like it, well I don't like masquerade, possession and governor. I don't request a salvager feature that makes it impossible for both sides to buy these cards whenever they appear. that, in my mind, seems like an equally justified request.

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Re: Discussion of whether specific Salvager features should be allowed
« Reply #21 on: September 03, 2014, 04:49:23 pm »
0

it is definitely true that different people are differently talented when it comes down to these things, but I can't see how it's supposed to be fair to just take them away and nullify this aspect of skill, when it's a part of the game as Donald X originally designed it. some people don't like it, well I don't like masquerade, possession and governor. I don't request a salvager feature that makes it impossible for both sides to buy these cards whenever they appear. that, in my mind, seems like an equally justified request.

You can get close. Turn on Salvager's Kingdom generator, create an Unrated or Casual game, All / (Masquerade + Possession + Governor). Of course you can also avoid purchasing Governor (or any other promo card) in the first place and then host your own Pro games.
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silverspawn

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Re: Discussion of whether specific Salvager features should be allowed
« Reply #22 on: September 03, 2014, 04:52:25 pm »
+4

great, then make this feature thingy also for casual/unrated games only, and I won't say a word.

blueblimp

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Re: Discussion of whether specific Salvager features should be allowed
« Reply #23 on: September 03, 2014, 05:14:38 pm »
0

it is definitely true that different people are differently talented when it comes down to these things, but I can't see how it's supposed to be fair to just take them away and nullify this aspect of skill, when it's a part of the game as Donald X originally designed it. some people don't like it, well I don't like masquerade, possession and governor. I don't request a salvager feature that makes it impossible for both sides to buy these cards whenever they appear. that, in my mind, seems like an equally justified request.
Well, what's considered "fair" depends on what the players like. "Designer" board games (in the sense that the official rules created by the game designer are considered inviolable in some sense) are, as far as I know, a relatively recent phenomenon. For games we still play today that originated before the 20th century, such as Chess, Go, and Poker, the rules used in tournaments today are the result of centuries of rules development, where the versions we play today are simply the variants that players liked the most. Even for those games, there may be small-to-large rules differences even among what's played in tournaments. For example, tournament Go has slightly different scoring rules and wildly different time controls depending on which country it's played in. (The amount of time you're allowed to think in a perfect information game like Go easily makes at least as big a difference as the availability of non-mental card tracking in Dominion.)

About your example of particular cards, if there's a particular card that people feel makes Dominion a worse game for tournaments, I think it'd be completely reasonable to ban it in a tournament. For example, if there were general agreement that Rebuild decreases skill too much, then it could be banned from tournaments. This kind of card banning happens de facto in tournaments with kingdom design competitions anyway. I don't think you're going to get people on board with banning Masquerade, since I don't think it's generally disliked. But Possession, maybe. I'd argue against banning Possession because I believe it's a skill-intensive card and I enjoy playing with it, but if everybody else refused to play games where it's not banned, I'd have to live with that reality.
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Re: Discussion of whether specific Salvager features should be allowed
« Reply #24 on: September 03, 2014, 05:23:57 pm »
+2

This talk of banning "skill-reducing cards" turns my stomach. That is all.
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