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[jsh357]

http://www.gokosalvager.com/static/logprettifier.html?/20150101/log.505c6645a2e6c78ad2ed5ad3.1420131558947.txt

I'll get things started this year with an epic Rats victory.  I was crushed by his Mountebank for the whole game and lost the Scrying Pool split.  In the end, the furry wonders managed to gather in hordes and assure my victory. 

[liopoil]

I don't think your opponent ever had much of a chance in that one. Can't ignore rats there, doesn't matter how many splits you win, your scrying pools just won't draw as much.

Also, the main point of this post... /tag.

EDIT: On a kingdom with no direct form of +action, +cards, or trashing:

http://www.gokosalvager.com/static/logprettifier.html?/20150102/log.516d64d6e4b082c74d7bdb31.1420213265349.txt

[Elanchana]

This might be my best game of Attackmania yet. It started off on a bad note when my opponent got an early game Goons, but in the end I managed to thin down, win the Scrying Pool split, and do some MAJOR sabotage on their deck.

Also, this was pretty satisfying on my Expensive Taste board:

Elanchana Destler   plays King's Court
Elanchana Destler   plays Possession
Elanchana Destler   plays Possession
Elanchana Destler   plays Possession
Game Over

(My opponent resigned.)

[liopoil]

I finally bought the cards. One of the first things I did was this:


Log: http://www.gokosalvager.com/static/logprettifier.html?/20150103/log.50a43f07e4b0addfc4f4304a.1420319023082.txt

First try I got 3/4 (worst possible opening) and decided to restart. Second try I got the perfect opening, 5/2, (would have been happy with 4/3) and got a little more luck from there and did it in 6 turns. I misclicked near the end, gaining the last develop from catacombs instead of the last fortress, but luckily I had a scrying pool in hand to draw the develop so it was okay anyway.

Inn was useless, I bet it can be done in 5 with replacing inn and a bit more luck.

I also tried to empty the supply, but fell just short on buys. I was able to empty all the treasure piles by turn 10 though.

[Elanchana]

This week on BEST POSSESSION LUCK EVER...

[Elestan]

This week on BEST POSSESSION LUCK EVER...

Your opponent built an Alchemist deck with three Ambassadors in a Kingdom with Possession?

I guess sometimes, your opponent makes your shuffle luck for you.

[Awaclus]

What do you do when your opponent opens Dame Sylvia? You simply don't buy any cards costing $3-6.

http://www.gokosalvager.com/static/logprettifier.html?/20150213/log.510d7890e4b0ac7a7a0be611.1423851917883.txt

Code: [Select]

Beggar, Chapel, Pawn, Bishop, Catacombs, Knights, Mine, Adventurer, Forge, Peddler

[Throwaway_bicycling]

What do you do when your opponent opens Dame Sylvia? You simply don't buy any cards costing $3-6.

http://www.gokosalvager.com/static/logprettifier.html?/20150213/log.510d7890e4b0ac7a7a0be611.1423851917883.txt

Wow. Out of curiosity, would there have been any chance for Catacombs Big Money vs what you played here?

[Awaclus]

What do you do when your opponent opens Dame Sylvia? You simply don't buy any cards costing $3-6.

http://www.gokosalvager.com/static/logprettifier.html?/20150213/log.510d7890e4b0ac7a7a0be611.1423851917883.txt

Wow. Out of curiosity, would there have been any chance for Catacombs Big Money vs what you played here?

I guess you could always get lucky, but I don't think Catacombs big money expects to beat 5 Provinces and a Duchy in 14 turns (and I probably could have gotten another Duchy on my final turn if I had tried). There's also some flexibility here, you can add a Bishop instead of a Forge if you need to get more points but don't want to empty the Province pile.

[JW]

Wow. Out of curiosity, would there have been any chance for Catacombs Big Money vs what you played here?

Catacombs Big Money would have little chance. If your opponent did that then you can get all 10 Peddlers very quickly so you'd buy provinces faster on average than Awaclus did here. Relevant Mic Qsenoch post on related issue:

Two decks with five Highways might take 18 turns to end the game. One deck with 8-10 Highways might take 13 turns.

The general situation is: lots of engines require large numbers of specific cards to achieve maximum speed. If you don't contest important engine cards, your opponent can runaway with the game. When two players contest all the engine pieces, the decks that you end up with are often mediocre, but it was necessary to not get destroyed by the uncontested engine. There are lots of engine pieces that lead to this situation (Minion, Highway, Grand Market, King's Court, Villages, Bridge, Hunting Party, Lab, Stables, Scrying Pool, and many others)

The other big issue is that 4 Provinces is usually not enough points. There's usually a stack of Duchies for the engine player to catch up with, not to mention all the alt-VP cards.

But you are correct, sometimes people are just spinning wheels trying to build engines that don't work very well.

[Throwaway_bicycling]

What do you do when your opponent opens Dame Sylvia? You simply don't buy any cards costing $3-6.

http://www.gokosalvager.com/static/logprettifier.html?/20150213/log.510d7890e4b0ac7a7a0be611.1423851917883.txt

Wow. Out of curiosity, would there have been any chance for Catacombs Big Money vs what you played here?

I guess you could always get lucky, but I don't think Catacombs big money expects to beat 5 Provinces and a Duchy in 14 turns (and I probably could have gotten another Duchy on my final turn if I had tried). There's also some flexibility here, you can add a Bishop instead of a Forge if you need to get more points but don't want to empty the Province pile.

I only asked because I knew the factoid that Smithy-BM gets on average 4 Provinces in 14 turns, and Catacombs-BM has to do better than that.

Nobody seems to have implemented Catacombs-Big Money on Dominiate, so maybe I could do that, but some quick hand simulation suggests that Cat-BM is....actually pretty good, but not quite good enough. Cycling speed is impressive. You seem to get 27-30 VP in 13 turns but you're not going any faster at that point, and the engine seems quite smooth.

Meanwhile, JW's point below seems compelling; you would be going somewhat faster if uncontested for Peddlers, and then I don't see much chance.

[Awaclus]

Actually, "somewhat faster" might be an understatement. With just one extra Peddler instead of a Pawn, I could have had a double Province turn instead of the single Province, trash Province into Province turn that I had. Another extra Peddler instead of a Pawn, and maybe I could have had another double Province turn instead of a single Province turn. And I would have had those two Peddlers instead of two Pawns if I had been uncontested.

EDIT: Interestingly enough, Chapel/Pawn has got to be the right move on a 5/2 opening too.

EDIT: I played several Catacombs/BM games against Banker Bot and it looks like you can reliably get 27 points on turn 14.

[SCSN]

I knew the factoid that Smithy-BM gets on average 4 Provinces in 14 turns

Do yourself a big favor and forget this factoid along with all functionally equivalent ones. You want to either end the game with a point lead or get more than half the possible VP together with the certainty of being able to hold on to them. Getting X points in Y turns is only a very crude and misleading proxy for the latter objective, and occupying yourself with it is not only a waste of brainpower but it will actively point you in the wrong direction.

Like on this board it can't possibly apply because thanks to Bishop no amount of Green can come close to half the VP. The best strategy against a BM attempt is to Bishop a Peddler and buy a new one each turn until they're gone (5VP/turn), then switch to Golds and do the same (4VP/turn). Catacombs-BM can get X Provinces and Y Duchies in Z turns all it wants, but when turn Z+1 comes and it finally realizes the game is far from over, its deck is greener than a dense rainforrest with no way out.

A game I played yesterday neatly illustrates this concept: http://www.gokosalvager.com/static/logprettifier.html?20150212/log.514b5511e4b0b79c883b5e3b.1423793350871.txt

Chapel-Embassy-WV-Tunnel can make for a nice deck in a 4-card kingdom, but it's just hopeless in this particular 10-card one. Always consider the kingdom in its entirety instead of a 1-card subset and its meaningless performance in isolation. Otherwise you end up thinking that Ursain Bolt is the favorite in a marathon just because he can outrun everyone in the first 100 meters.

[pacovf]

Otherwise you end up thinking that Ursain Bolt is the favorite in a marathon just because he can outrun everyone in the first 100 meters.

Well, after the others get mauled and eaten, I doubt they will be finishing any marathons, so Ursain seems like the logical favourite.

[TrojH]

What do you do when your opponent opens Dame Sylvia? You simply don't buy any cards costing $3-6.

http://www.gokosalvager.com/static/logprettifier.html?/20150213/log.510d7890e4b0ac7a7a0be611.1423851917883.txt

Hey! You bought a Duchy, you big liar! 

Seriously though, I think your "avoid $3-$6" strategy is the best on this board, even if your opponent doesn't buy any Knights.

[Throwaway_bicycling]

I knew the factoid that Smithy-BM gets on average 4 Provinces in 14 turns

Do yourself a big favor and forget this factoid along with all functionally equivalent ones.

Well, I think the reason why I called it a "factoid" in the first place was to underline the point that, even if true, it might not lead to a valid argument. In any case, I am not sure it is wrong to wonder how much better Catacombs is than Smithy in situations like this. Now, there is a point that I was focused on the question "is there a way to get 5 Provinces faster than 14 turns?" which ignored two points that have previously been brought up here by Awaclus:

1) It's no good here to fail to contest Peddlers, and

2) There is a Bishop in the kingdom, and you can augment/supplement the original idea via the alt-VP route.

You emphasize the point that (2) is really key here because, yes, even if it does turn out that Catacombs-BM can grab (I'm making this up) five Provinces in 13 turns, Bishop can more than even the score so long as the game doesn't end too soon. And since (by hypothesis) the BM player has none of the Peddlers and never buys a Bishop, it's not going to end well for him or her.

One question on the example game:

A game I played yesterday neatly illustrates this concept: http://www.gokosalvager.com/static/logprettifier.html?20150212/log.514b5511e4b0b79c883b5e3b.1423793350871.txt

Chapel-Embassy-WV-Tunnel can make for a nice deck in a 4-card kingdom, but it's just hopeless in this particular 10-card one.

I think I have seen you opponent post here in f.ds before once or twice, so maybe there could be some clarification there, but the thing that really surprised me most here was the systematic choice not to buy Worker's Villages (you won that split 9-1, and it did seem to help :-)). And then also, sure, why no Bishop?

[AdamH]

I knew the factoid that Smithy-BM gets on average 4 Provinces in 14 turns

Do yourself a big favor and forget this factoid along with all functionally equivalent ones.

I mean, the point you make here is a good one, and you're correct. But I think there is some value in knowing things like this, you just have to be careful with how you apply that knowledge.

If I'm trying out some weird strategy that I don't know whether or not it's any good, there are cases when it helps to look at where I am on T14 and ask myself where I'd be against a big money player who had 4 Provinces already. If the answer is "totally screwed" then you've used this benchmark to good use. It's probably also useful to know how fast Smithy+BM can get to 8 Provinces if you're pursuing some other source of VP like Vineyards or VP tokens.

but you have to be careful not to assume that every game is a race to 4 Provinces, most games aren't.

[WanderingWinder]

I knew the factoid that Smithy-BM gets on average 4 Provinces in 14 turns

Do yourself a big favor and forget this factoid along with all functionally equivalent ones.

I mean, the point you make here is a good one, and you're correct. But I think there is some value in knowing things like this, you just have to be careful with how you apply that knowledge.

If I'm trying out some weird strategy that I don't know whether or not it's any good, there are cases when it helps to look at where I am on T14 and ask myself where I'd be against a big money player who had 4 Provinces already. If the answer is "totally screwed" then you've used this benchmark to good use. It's probably also useful to know how fast Smithy+BM can get to 8 Provinces if you're pursuing some other source of VP like Vineyards or VP tokens.

but you have to be careful not to assume that every game is a race to 4 Provinces, most games aren't.

I have to come down on the side of SCSN here. I mean, the only time the 4 in 14 is relevant is in Big Money mirrors, where it's all more or less just a race to that halfway point. And the problem is, if you're in such a game, that you can expect 4 in 14 is irrelevant - you have to play to the draws in the actual game.


If you're asking yourself, could I have beaten that?, then it honestly isn't going to matter that they can get 4 in 14 - you will have other sources of points, in every case - duchy at the least. But also, BM is going to play differently in that case, which will make them a little slower to 4 provinces, but give them better longevity. So 4 in 14 goes out the window.

[Awaclus]

Hey! You bought a Duchy, you big liar! 

Oh right, I did do that. Well, getting that Duchy over nothing was a non-trivial decision anyway.

[AdamH]

But also, BM is going to play differently in that case, which will make them a little slower to 4 provinces, but give them better longevity. So 4 in 14 goes out the window.

BM plays differently when the opponent isn't playing BM, yes (unless they're playing poorly), but how does that affect how fast they get to 4 Provinces? I thought you would do things like buy Gold over Duchy for longer, but still buy Province whenever you hit $8.

[WanderingWinder]

But also, BM is going to play differently in that case, which will make them a little slower to 4 provinces, but give them better longevity. So 4 in 14 goes out the window.

BM plays differently when the opponent isn't playing BM, yes (unless they're playing poorly), but how does that affect how fast they get to 4 Provinces? I thought you would do things like buy Gold over Duchy for longer, but still buy Province whenever you hit $8.

It really depends on a lot of things. There are certainly situations where gold>province is correct (actually this is true even in the lightning mirror - if you end up with $8 on turn 3, you should get a gold). To give another example, you are also going to be more likely to get a second draw card. But the bigger point is, so they have 4 provinces - so what? Your plan in the non-mirror isn't to just blitz half the provinces before them, really ever. (Ok, sometimes you do this, but that's more just that the engine is so so far ahead that this is safe).

[AdamH]

But the bigger point is, so they have 4 provinces - so what? Your plan in the non-mirror isn't to just blitz half the provinces before them, really ever. (Ok, sometimes you do this, but that's more just that the engine is so so far ahead that this is safe).

I'm aware of all of this, but a lot of times I find it to be a useful metric if you keep this in mind.

[Geronimoo]

My opponent opens 5/2 on a board with Fool's Gold and Butcher. I have no chance with my 4/3 open... until he buys Province turn 6

RedWing: turn 6
RedWing   plays 3 Copper, 2 Fool's Gold
RedWing   buys Province
RedWing   gains Province
Geronimoo   trashes Fool's Gold
Geronimoo   gains Gold
Geronimoo   trashes Fool's Gold
Geronimoo   gains Gold
Geronimoo   trashes Fool's Gold
Geronimoo   gains Gold
Geronimoo   trashes Fool's Gold
Geronimoo   gains Gold
RedWing   draws Estate, Butcher, Estate, Fool's Gold
RedWing   shuffles deck
RedWing   draws Fool's Gold

... I still lost this game after Duchy dancing

[Elanchana]

Elanchana Destler   plays Rebuild
Elanchana Destler   names Tunnel
Elanchana Destler   shuffles deck
Elanchana Destler   reveals Spice Merchant, Gold, Copper, Gold, Gold, Tunnel, Tunnel, Copper, Rebuild, Tunnel, Gold, Tunnel, Copper, Gold, Necropolis, Gold, Tunnel, Estate
Elanchana Destler   discards: Spice Merchant, Gold, Copper, Gold, Gold, Tunnel, Tunnel, Copper, Rebuild, Tunnel, Gold, Tunnel, Copper, Gold, Necropolis, Gold, Tunnel
Elanchana Destler   reveals reaction Tunnel
Elanchana Destler   gains Gold
Elanchana Destler   reveals reaction Tunnel
Elanchana Destler   gains Gold
Elanchana Destler   reveals reaction Tunnel
Elanchana Destler   gains Gold
Elanchana Destler   reveals reaction Tunnel
Elanchana Destler   gains Gold
Elanchana Destler   reveals reaction Tunnel
Elanchana Destler   gains Gold
Elanchana Destler   trashes Estate
Elanchana Destler   gains Duchy

So apparently Rebuild/Tunnel is a thing even with Colonies and Shelters.

My opponent didn't know that Tunnel's reaction included discarding it from your deck, so I had the upper hand to start with, but still. We piled on Golds. It was kind of awesome.

[pubby]

This is what happens when your last two hands were dead.

Code: [Select]

pubby plays 2 Gold, 1 Platinum, 1 Silver, 1 Copper
pubby uses 3 coin tokens
pubby buys Doctor
pubby overpays for Doctor with 14 coins
pubby looks at Curse
pubby trashes Curse
pubby shuffles deck
pubby looks at Curse
pubby trashes Curse
pubby looks at Estate
pubby trashes Estate
pubby looks at Curse
pubby trashes Curse
pubby looks at Copper
pubby trashes Copper
pubby looks at Hamlet
pubby discards Hamlet
pubby looks at Copper
pubby trashes Copper
pubby looks at Curse
pubby trashes Curse
pubby looks at Estate
pubby trashes Estate
pubby looks at Doctor
pubby trashes Doctor
pubby looks at Estate
pubby trashes Estate
pubby looks at Curse
pubby trashes Curse
pubby shuffles deck
pubby looks at Hamlet
pubby discards Hamlet
pubby shuffles deck
pubby looks at Hamlet
pubby discards Hamlet
pubby gains Doctor