Topic: funkdoc's journey to 5k (& beyond) (Read 50143 times)

DG · « **Reply #75 on:** August 29, 2015, 09:57:25 am »

Transmute, Scrying Pool, Island, Smithy, Tournament, Treasure Map, Laboratory, Stables, Vault, Possession, Copper, Silver, Gold, Estate, Duchy, Province, Curse, Potion.

I feel the problem with this kingdom is the tournament, or the prizes anyway. Without the prizes there isn't much going on and a plain vault +gold deck would be ok. Possession is likely to yield up those prizes though and they could easily tip the balance. A number of different games could then play out depending upon the prizes. I don't think you did too much wrong, for instance I don't think there's much advantage from taking tournament or island on turn 4. As soon as followers comes into play you should buy labs instead of stables.

funkdoc · « **Reply #76 on:** October 13, 2015, 08:39:13 pm »

hi yall

i haven't died, just finally reached my 5K rating goal (shortly before goko's death, as it turns out) and been watching top-player matches every night since then.

i never quite cracked iso level 30 there, so that's my next goal on the new client...but obviously i'm aiming a lot higher than that in the longer run. one thing i've seen a lot of in recent videos is engines without trashing - i had it in my head that trashing was an essential component of them, and would tend to go BM without it. that usually didn't end well, and i'm having a better understanding of why now - these seem to be some of the higher-skill ceiling boards.

funkdoc · « **Reply #77 on:** October 29, 2015, 01:58:46 pm »

so here's a general question

i had a game recently that had everything you'd want for an engine except villages. luckily black market was there...but it only had 3 villages: king's court, throne room, & hamlet

is it really worth it to go for these, considering how many villages you normally need to make it work? i feel like that would be enough for one player who gets them uncontested so you kinda have to i guess? but splitting them isn't enough for a fully cohesive engine, i would think.

i struggle with this kind of question in general, i.e. the value of denying someone else a great strat vs. leaving yourself in a weird halfway point

Mic Qsenoch · « **Reply #78 on:** October 29, 2015, 02:15:28 pm »

Quote from: funkdoc on October 29, 2015, 01:58:46 pm

so here's a general question

i had a game recently that had everything you'd want for an engine except villages. luckily black market was there...but it only had 3 villages: king's court, throne room, & hamlet

is it really worth it to go for these, considering how many villages you normally need to make it work? i feel like that would be enough for one player who gets them uncontested so you kinda have to i guess? but splitting them isn't enough for a fully cohesive engine, i would think.

i struggle with this kind of question in general, i.e. the value of denying someone else a great strat vs. leaving yourself in a weird halfway point

We need to know the kingdom to answer the specific question. With nonterminal draw, nonterminal draw + trashing, or cantrips + trashing it could easily be worth it to go for Black Market.

In general, you should just go for the great strategies. If splitting resources results in half-baked decks, that's perfectly fine, your opponent is now playing with a half-baked deck too. Learning how to win with the half-baked stuff is an important skill too. If they don't contest and it's really a great strategy then you win.

Dingan · « **Reply #79 on:** October 29, 2015, 03:22:24 pm »

Quote from: funkdoc on October 29, 2015, 01:58:46 pm

so here's a general question

i had a game recently that had everything you'd want for an engine except villages. luckily black market was there...but it only had 3 villages: king's court, throne room, & hamlet

is it really worth it to go for these, considering how many villages you normally need to make it work? i feel like that would be enough for one player who gets them uncontested so you kinda have to i guess? but splitting them isn't enough for a fully cohesive engine, i would think.

i struggle with this kind of question in general, i.e. the value of denying someone else a great strat vs. leaving yourself in a weird halfway point

It's always tough when there are a few key cards (Chapel, Tournament, KC, etc.) in the BM deck. You can either get lucky and pick them up on T3, or get unlucky and never see them, or not be able to afford them, before the game is decided. To my understanding, this is why people love or hate Black Market. So to answer your first question: I don't know, haha. It would depend on the board (shocker) -- how fast can alternative strategies be, is there junking that will slow you down, etc. Something like double-Jack can piledrive the Provinces well before you pick up that crucial KC on T14. From the sound of it, I would probably not go for the Black Market / engine, but I'd have to see the board.

But you're certainly right that in general, my decisions are often tailored or dictated by what decisions my opponent makes. Something like Embargo comes to mind -- if my opponent opens Potion on an Alchemist board, and there is no thinning, then I might open Embargo to spoil that plan. Swindler also comes to mind -- if my opponent ignores it, then I will start lining up an engine, whereas if they get it, then I might sway toward just buying Golds and Fortresses. I might pick up a Secret Chamber or 2 if my opponent has multiple Knights, but ignore them otherwise. And so on.

Decisions that affect other players is what makes Dominion a multiplayer game, opposed to just a bunch of solitaire games played in parallel.

funkdoc · « **Reply #80 on:** October 29, 2015, 11:03:57 pm »

thanks again yall

here's the log for the specific game in question: http://dominion-game-logs.s3.amazonaws.com/game_logs/20151025/log.0.1445733817832.txt

as you can see, i bought way too many terminals. i also still have issues knowing just how much silver to get in these kinds of games, especially with remake/upgrade when there isn't another really attractive card to gain.

still feels like opponent getting both king & throne is just too much but i'm sure there's plenty else to point out

funkdoc · « **Reply #81 on:** November 22, 2015, 10:18:24 am »

alright i should post things in here again!!!

still havent reached 5k on MF, but i did finally break top 50 in iso rating last night so that's a thing i guess. the ratings are wack as hell with it being so new still, but my peak goko iso rating was in the 400s somewhere so i still feel p. good. gonna be harder and harder to define goals from here, haha

anyway, i wanted to post one game from yesterday that took me by surprise, with an engine that i didn't see working at all. here's the log (oh hey logprettifier works again now yay~):

http://gokosalvager.com/static/logprettifier.html?http://dominion-game-logs.s3.amazonaws.com/game_logs/20151122/log.0.1448158416442.txt

i thought margrave-BM would outrace somebody stockpiling fishing villages, but i didn't see sage/cutpurse/prince all working together to make an actual engine out of this crap. it still seems rather slow to me but maybe the constant discard attacks are what make it the best idea here? also i would think sage would be the best prince target here, certainly not cutpurse.

not opening cutpurse was just me forgetting, and i probably should've always bought gold over harem given the attacks. there was a point when i just needed all the points i could get though, but maybe those harems should be duchies?

Jack Rudd · « **Reply #82 on:** November 22, 2015, 10:56:44 am »

Normally the best target for Prince is the first reasonably Princeable card it comes across. On a Prince board, you want to play your Princes quickly.

Fishing Village/Margrave is a fine base for an engine; I'd expect it to beat BM most of the time.

funkdoc · « **Reply #83 on:** November 22, 2015, 03:52:22 pm »

hmm, i still get scared of a plain old village-smithy engine on a board like that where it doesn't have the strongest support, but then margrave is far from just a smithy and fishing village is far from just a village. point well taken!

funny thing is, if you replace margrave with torturer there, i build the engine without a second thought. i just tend to see torturer on a whole different level from the other smithy variants in that kind of situation, but that's probably not quite right eh?

funkdoc · « **Reply #84 on:** December 05, 2015, 09:41:21 am »

alright, got some more games to post here!

game 1: http://gokosalvager.com/static/logprettifier.html?http://dominion-game-logs.s3.amazonaws.com/game_logs/20151204/log.0.1449239568883.txt

mainly curious about one thing here. my opponent said i shouldn't have gone for 3 junk dealers because "you want to get to $8". i felt there was a ton of great economy for cheap here, so i could trash more aggressively while still being able to build. in particular, i wanted to play black market as often as possible since the board was lacking in draw and +buy. whaddyall think?

BTW, i know i could've gotten both steed and princess on my last turn before they resigned, so no need to bring that up =)

game 2: http://gokosalvager.com/static/logprettifier.html?http://dominion-game-logs.s3.amazonaws.com/game_logs/20151204/log.0.1449241642267.txt

same opponent, with another criticism i wanted to talk about. i felt i had a significant early lead here and blew it. my opponent said i should've gotten altar because "after you play doctor 2-3 times you don't need it anymore". it seemed kinda late for me to get altar given that doctor worked out decently, but i guess there's conspirators after all the minions are gone. also i thought tunnel was the classic trap here - you want to play your one goons as much as you can, right?

also i've been doing really badly in governor games as of late, but i think i have an idea of why. i'll post something here if it doesn't get any better soon.

DG · « **Reply #85 on:** December 07, 2015, 09:02:52 pm »

Game 1 - Yes three junk dealers seems excessive but I don't think it's so bad. It will restrict your income a little so does it help you recover if your opponent gets followers, say? The junk dealers do trash but the discard attack restricts them a lot so they probably won't do much more than can be done with two of them.

Game 2 - Hmm. I don't really like doctor opening for 4 coins. So many games seem to be lost by trashing a copper there and being short of spending. The next thing to realize is that multiple conspirators are not going to be a big feature unless your deck builds really well, well enough to get a resignation from your opponent anyway. I don't think there is a single standout opening here since it depends how you want to play after the minions are split and there will still be a lot of work to do. For your game as played I think you should have got the altar on turn 5, it's soon enough.

funkdoc · « **Reply #86 on:** February 03, 2016, 10:07:14 pm »

oh hey this thread

i just have a general issue that's been killing me lately: i have no earthly idea how to play a draw-to-X engine. especially ones with no trashing - i've had 3 boards like that in the past week where that turned out to be the best strat.

watchtower's topdecking seems to be key to making that sort of thing work, especially when there are attacks of course. and i still rarely buy watchtower because i can't figure out how to use the topdecking well (mainly how often i want to topdeck more watchtowers), how many watchtowers i want total, etc. it feels like that card alone makes witch useless based on the games i've played, but i have such a hard time believing that for whatever reason.

i recently watched an old game of adam's where he was way ahead of his opponent in building a draw-to-X engine (hamlet + library) but lost because he had one dud turn at the end. and all it took for him to have that dud was to buy a duchy and a couple merchant ships! it felt like he needed 50 villages & draw cards to get through the whole deck without triggering bad reshuffles, and these decks seem way less tolerant of stop cards than other engines. are these correct observations at all?

i should probably save one of these boards and play it on stream vs. bots or something, eh? these are probably only behind procession games in the "i don't even know where to begin" category

Limetime · « **Reply #87 on:** February 03, 2016, 10:16:55 pm »

Draw to x engines get a huge boost from trashing, discard attacks, disappearing coins, disappearing villages, non-terminal coin, discard for benefit. If you're payload is just treasure good luck building a draw to x engine.

dedicateddan · « **Reply #88 on:** February 04, 2016, 04:48:37 am »

Watchtower's topdecking effect is nice and opens up a lot of options. At least one is nice on most boards.

Against junkers, chaining watchtowers can be used as a form of proactive trashing. Here's an example of four watchtowers being used to hold off a double sea-hag attack:
http://www.gokosalvager.com/static/logprettifier.html?http://dominion-game-logs.s3.amazonaws.com/game_logs/20160125/log.0.1453681293292.txt

AdamH · « **Reply #89 on:** February 04, 2016, 07:19:40 am »

Quote from: funkdoc on February 03, 2016, 10:07:14 pm

watchtower's topdecking seems to be key to making that sort of thing work, especially when there are attacks of course. and i still rarely buy watchtower because i can't figure out how to use the topdecking well (mainly how often i want to topdeck more watchtowers), how many watchtowers i want total, etc. it feels like that card alone makes witch useless based on the games i've played, but i have such a hard time believing that for whatever reason.

i recently watched an old game of adam's where he was way ahead of his opponent in building a draw-to-X engine (hamlet + library) but lost because he had one dud turn at the end. and all it took for him to have that dud was to buy a duchy and a couple merchant ships! it felt like he needed 50 villages & draw cards to get through the whole deck without triggering bad reshuffles, and these decks seem way less tolerant of stop cards than other engines. are these correct observations at all?

The kind of support that these decks require is an abundance of Villages (more Villages than you have terminal space for) and strong trashing. When I say strong trashing, I mean you need zero stop cards in your deck, so yeah when you buy green for the first turn you already run the chance of stalling and you need to have a plan for that. Acceptable plans include:

- Having huge enough turns that you only need one or two of them, I'm talking about at least Triple Province, maaaaybe you can get away with double Province if you can set it up fast enough.
- VP token cards as your payload
- NV/Island/Distant Lands tricks
- Ambassador/Saboteur or some other catchup mechanism (many other attacks just don't cut the mustard if you're super-behind but these guys can)

The other thing is that even if you are building your deck properly, you still usually have to find a Village and a draw card in 5 cards, which is still a lot to ask of these types of decks since you typically need so much payload (and many times you're using a Village that doesn't draw). You should expect stall turns and do everything you can to prevent them. Watchtower is especially nice because it allows you to top-deck a village and a Watchtower for tomorrow, but you need to buy/gain both of those every turn which can hurt your growth so often times it's better to just YOLO and hope you don't stall, at least until things really get moving.

Stuff that lets you discard from hand like Hamlet, Storeroom, etc. seems like it can be a way to keep going after you green, but this still requires really good draws and like more than 10 Villages in your deck to get any decent payload. This kind of deck needs Library to draw (most of the time Watchtower just isn't good enough) and/or some HUGE support like King's Court or Champion or something crazy. Draw-to-X decks are finicky enough that they need to be super-tight in order to be good at all, and I've said this like two times already but you need a LOT of villages. In a mirror, don't expect to do anything if there's just one stack of villages and you only get five of them.

Like, there's this conception that Fishing Village/Watchtower is a deck. Like, that's enough to spin your wheels, but without any support it's just a thing you can do to have actions and draw cards. FishVille is great for this kind of stuff but you need a lot more for this to even beat Big Money.

funkdoc · « **Reply #90 on:** February 04, 2016, 07:57:44 am »

here are a couple boards to get more specific...

#1:

Code: [Select]

Hamlet, Vagrant, Watchtower, Bridge, Talisman, Walled Village, Explorer, Library, Vault, Witch

#2:

Code: [Select]

Pawn, Squire, Warehouse, Watchtower, Conspirator, Counting House, Horn of Plenty, Jester, Witch, Adventurer

with witch involved, i didn't see engines being viable on these, but my opponent went for them and blocked like every curse. i guess being able to chain buy->topdeck watchtowers helps since you need those in your deck for other things anyway! also these boards do have some good non-treasure payload so that's a big deal? these were some of the worst losses i've had in a long time; i thought witch was the BM enabler that would beat the engines but these are made to stop junking attacks so no. i do wonder if, say, wharf-BM would win on these though...

Limetime · « **Reply #91 on:** February 04, 2016, 08:23:53 am »

The first board has Hamlet and bridge and another pile of villages so we can tell this is a draw to x engine.Open Talisman watchtower. Get a witch if you hit 5 without Talisman in play. Start topdecking Hamlet watchtower to defend against witch. Don't forget to buy curses and trash them with watchtower.

The second one seems like witch BM.

faust · « **Reply #92 on:** February 04, 2016, 08:32:27 am »

The first board really has everything you need for draw-to-X: Watchtower and Library, 2 Villages, Excellent discard-for-benefit, great +buy and a gainer. The second is trickier, I still think a well-built engine usually wins against BM. The problem there is that you have only one pile of Villages, so mirrors will end up in both of you having meh decks. But with Conspirator, Pawn adn Warehouse, the nonterminal support is just so good.

I think a problem in both boards is that you are playing Watchtower draw-to-X against junking and without trashing cards. This is high-skill because it involves lots of tracking: You need to know (a) how likely you are to draw another Watchtower for your next hand (b) how likely your opponent is to play a Witch. Especially on early turn, it is essential to track both decks in order to know when to topdeck a Watchtower and when you can get away with buying other cards.

assemble_me · « **Reply #93 on:** February 04, 2016, 08:33:33 am »

Quote from: Limetime on February 04, 2016, 08:23:53 am

The first board has Hamlet and bridge and another pile of villages so we can tell this is a draw to x engine.Open Talisman watchtower. Get a witch if you hit 5 without Talisman in play. Start topdecking Hamlet watchtower to defend against witch. Don't forget to buy curses and trash them with watchtower.

The second one seems like witch BM.

I'd get Squires, Watchtowers and Warehouses in the second one for sure as well, just because there's Witch (getting junk with Jester can hurt a lot as well). Warehouse is also a great help for Watchtower draw. I don't expect that to be very explosive or anything, but as it's the only way to defend curses I think it's totally worth it. You could be able to enable Conspirators that way, too, and maybe 1-2 Horns as gainers (although certainly no Horn megaturn)

Rabid · « **Reply #94 on:** February 04, 2016, 08:37:09 am »

#2

Is buying top decked witches via squire trash any good here?

Limetime · « **Reply #95 on:** February 04, 2016, 08:37:34 am »

Quote from: assemble_me on February 04, 2016, 08:33:33 am

Quote from: Limetime on February 04, 2016, 08:23:53 am
The first board has Hamlet and bridge and another pile of villages so we can tell this is a draw to x engine.Open Talisman watchtower. Get a witch if you hit 5 without Talisman in play. Start topdecking Hamlet watchtower to defend against witch. Don't forget to buy curses and trash them with watchtower.

The second one seems like witch BM.

I'd get Squires, Watchtowers and Warehouses in the second one for sure as well, just because there's Witch (getting junk with Jester can hurt a lot as well). Warehouse is also a great help for Watchtower draw. I don't expect that to be very explosive or anything, but as it's the only way to defend curses I think it's totally worth it. You could be able to enable Conspirators that way, too, and maybe 1-2 Horns as gainers (although certainly no Horn megaturn)

Since your payload is mostly treasure it doesn't seem worth it to go draw to x.

AdamH · « **Reply #96 on:** February 04, 2016, 08:38:20 am »

The second board: I'd probably open double Watchtower here, this is mostly because of the buy-and-trash-a-Squire trick that you can use to hit Witch, which is the only fiver you ever want. Good Watchtower coverage is something you want in this deck anyways, and Warehouse is an amazing card. If things go well for you I'd say you can go for the engine there, Squire as the only village is a little concerning, but if you only take one or two Curses then you were probably winning anyways, so the engine is just a way to win a little more. Note that you want like a million Warehouses this deck since there is no trashing at all and the deck will be really finicky still. Like, you want to empty the entire stack of Pawns, Squires, Warehouses, Watchtowers, and Conspirators into your deck and then it probably works well, but it might not feel like a draw-to-X deck as much as a Warehouse/Conspirator deck with some support; especially since the player who loses the Curse battle harder can easily just buy up Squires for denial without hurting themselves too much.

The first board: you have two stacks of villages and Bridge, which is an amazing payload for this type of deck. The concerning thing is that the only way to get past stop cards at all in your deck is Vault -- Hamlet works, I guess, but it's not very good. You have a lot of bad cards in your deck and keeping coverage up seems more costly -- you want to top-deck Hamlet and Watchtower each turn, which you can maybe do, but maybe you can't.

The Curse war seems most important here, too. I'd open Watchtower/Silver to ensure getting an early Witch and maybe a second one. The thing is, you don't really want 5 Watchtowers in your deck, your payload is terminal and so is Vault -- building this deck to do anything useful is going to take a long time and I worry that 10 Villages isn't really enough (you won't get nearly that many since piles will be gone before you ever get anything to happen). I'm not as sold on engine being good here, but it's probably OK.

DG · « **Reply #97 on:** February 04, 2016, 09:13:30 am »

Quote from: funkdoc on February 03, 2016, 10:07:14 pm

i recently watched an old game of adam's where he was way ahead of his opponent in building a draw-to-X engine (hamlet + library) but lost because he had one dud turn at the end. and all it took for him to have that dud was to buy a duchy and a couple merchant ships! it felt like he needed 50 villages & draw cards to get through the whole deck without triggering bad reshuffles, and these decks seem way less tolerant of stop cards than other engines. are these correct observations at all?

Yes the draw to X engines can come to a halt when greening. If you can score with vp chips, get a 3 pile ending, or discard the green cards before drawing then you will be in a better position.

Yes you do need a lot of villages if you want to play income actions, play a watchtower, then continue playing actions. This does make the engine unreliable unless you have trashing or good draw deck control. If you can only manage a misfiring engine then you should probably go for something simpler where you expect to draw treasures.

Watchtower defense can go either way. Each time it trashes junk it makes the deck safer. Each card added to the deck reduces the watchtower's coverage.

WanderingWinder · « **Reply #98 on:** February 04, 2016, 10:20:51 am »

I have actually been planning to do something about draw-to-X for a while now, but here are a few points:

Anything you can't get rid of in the action phase (mostly treasures, junks, and greens) are very bad, since once you draw one, every remaining draw card you play draws 1 less. With almost any in your deck, you WILL draw them, and it WILL hurt your ability to function a lot. First of all this is going to make you want trashing. But this means you usually can't afford to green very long. In turn, you get mega-turn implied to you, especially against someone who isn't going for Provinces with you. Any time your greening is drawn out, it's bad news.

As for the trashing, I don't think you actually need to get rid of absolutely everything - if you're stuck holding Chapel, you're fine (especially since you're going to be able to play it, hooray; this is true for many but not all trashers, but even if you're stuck holding e.g. remake, that's not too terrible, if you have 0 other junks).

You do need a lot of villages, because you tend to want to go Village Village Village Village Terminal Terminal and only then draw, which is especially bad because you have fewer cards to start with, making you need a way higher village density.

It's a myth that villages without draw are better than villages with draw here. All else equal, you prefer the draw still for sure. However, the lack of draw tends to be less bad here than elsewhere, plus the extra bonuses you get for balance (from not having draw) usually offset the lack of draw.

Of course, you still have the problem of needing to get a draw card to start, along with villages and maybe some terminals (though it's ok to draw those later), which is tricky, especially because you don't really want multiple of your draw cards at once. So sifting is quite good to get the right mix, but in general these engines are more finnicky and weaker than their "normal draw" counterparts.

Discard for benefit is nice, but be a bit careful relying too much on it. Hamlet is excellent of course, giving you discard outlet and village and pseudo-sifting.

funkdoc · « **Reply #99 on:** February 20, 2016, 03:13:05 am »

i've been getting killed lately, and right before i start this league season too! think i went from over 5k to mid-4600s in like...2 days? lmfao

it sucks because i get caught in a loop of chasing points/iso rating and play for hours longer than i planned to that night. and by the end i'm doing all i can to keep from banging my head against the table as i lose to the person who opened sea hag with lighthouse on the board. i can't get over how bad i apparently am, and that seems to seep into future games i play. i also stop wanting to play engines if i go too long, because my brain gets tired and i just want quick points. it just creates this assembly-line mentality to these games.

a big general issue with me is that i get massive tunnel vision for cards like scrying pool & hunting party. like, i will never EVER buy anything but these if i have the money. i will get nothing but draw/villages until i draw my deck, and only then do i add any payload at all. unless grand market's in the game and there's trashing, then i only ever buy grand markets even at the expense of draw.

a recent game against dingan illustrated this well: http://gokosalvager.com/static/logprettifier.html?http://dominion-game-logs.s3.amazonaws.com/game_logs/20160219/log.0.1455855302076.txt

i experimented with ignoring urchin here. i (wrongly, as it turns out) saw this as a race to get rid of all your starting cards & get grand market first, and thought 2x steward could be faster for that. i win that split but get destroyed...seems like having tons of draw was better because you can add gold and such (and buy coppers for mercenary later), which NEVER entered my mind whatsoever. really this game is a nice encapsulation of my typical flowchart atm.

in general, i can't process a bunch of new information at once so i have to just automatically assume certain things will be irrelevant. basically, instead of thinking outside the box, i always try to build the world's largest box. that's part of why i'm playing this game - this approach seems impossible here, but i can't conceive of anything else. i just don't know how to make sense of things without having a pre-existing logic for it, and i completely lose my shit when a game's results go completely against that logic. that's part of why i don't stream these games; it's a lot of me calling the opponent a moron for buying prince in a game with witch and only develop for trashing, then dying a slow painful death after they collide prince with fucking envoy on the very first fucking turn after they bought that garbage. maybe prince of envoy is just so good you still have to go for it but then my brain can't handle that possibility or how you would go about doing it with all the purples flying around and no extra gains and aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa

that above paragraph is something that's always kept me from going as far as i'd like in any game, and i wish i could figure something out. i want to make it to the A division but man this game just goes against my entire way of thinking...and yet that's why i keep persisting. i watch youtube matches from the usual suspects when i go to bed, but this game seems too board-specific for that to do a whole lot?

dunno, guess this post is a sign i need a break again

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Author Topic: funkdoc's journey to 5k (& beyond) (Read 50143 times)