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[DG]

I'm really beginning to like to kingdom supply based stats from the council room. This suggests the torturer prefers, from worst to best :  university, nobles, shanty town, mining village, hamlet, native village, inn, walled village, border village, farming village, village, festival, worker's village, bazaar, fishing village, city. It's interesting that three of the worst torturer partners are the villages from the Intrigue set.

[WanderingWinder]

I'm really beginning to like to kingdom supply based stats from the council room. This suggests the torturer prefers, from worst to best :  university, nobles, shanty town, mining village, hamlet, native village, inn, walled village, border village, farming village, village, festival, worker's village, bazaar, fishing village, city. It's interesting that three of the worst torturer partners are the villages from the Intrigue set.

Worst among the villages, which is an extremely important note.

[Dsell]

I'm really beginning to like to kingdom supply based stats from the council room. This suggests the torturer prefers, from worst to best :  university, nobles, shanty town, mining village, hamlet, native village, inn, walled village, border village, farming village, village, festival, worker's village, bazaar, fishing village, city. It's interesting that three of the worst torturer partners are the villages from the Intrigue set.

Whaaaaaaaa? Border village is worse than vanilla village with torturers according to CR? That's such a classic combo.

[HiveMindEmulator]

* You just have Villages, no Torturer: if you only have one Village, this is the single case where Shanty Town is better than Village, because you draw two cards rather than one.  If you have two Shanty Towns, that's equivalent to two Villages (and in Torturer/Village, such an outcome is not exactly rare).  If you have three Villages, then you get more +Card from the vanilla Villages than the Shanty Town.  But even if you have that one ST hand, the extra card has to actually be a Torturer (and it's pretty slim odds) to make a huge difference.

But the "huge difference" is huge. Potentially you start a chain, as opposed to having a completely nothing turn. Plus even if you don't actually find a Torturer, you are cycling more.

* You have Villages AND Torturer!  Yay!  This is what you want to happen, because it maximizes your chances of getting that all-important double-Torturer hit.  And in this case, Village is clearly superior to Shanty Town, because it draws you an extra card.

If you're going to belittle a 1-card difference in the other case, how is a 1 card difference big here? If anything, shouldn't the 1-card difference since it's 7 vs 6 instead of 6 vs 5?

And then what about when you start with exactly 1 village and 1 Torturer in hand? If it's regular Village, you need one of the next 3 to be Village and 1 of the next 4 to be Torturer to continue. With Shanty town, you only need 1 of the next 3 to be Shanty Town and one of the next 5 to be Torturer. So again, you have a slightly (25%) improved chance of extending the chain.

Now, all of this goes out the window if you have some trashing, since then you don't have issues of barely finding that Torturer, and regular Village will be clearly better, since you have no need to activate a Shanty Town. But in the case of pure village/Torturer, particularly early when action density is low, it would seem Shanty Town has a much better chance of starting up.

Regarding the CR stats, I don't doubt that they are reasonable, but my claim was that Shanty Town is better when there is no trashing, which is not reflected in those stats.

[chwhite]

And then what about when you start with exactly 1 village and 1 Torturer in hand? If it's regular Village, you need one of the next 3 to be Village and 1 of the next 4 to be Torturer to continue. With Shanty town, you only need 1 of the next 3 to be Shanty Town and one of the next 5 to be Torturer. So again, you have a slightly (25%) improved chance of extending the chain.

Ah, I see where you've gone wrong.

If you have Shanty Town then you need one of the next 3 to be Shanty Town AND one of the next 3 to ALSO be Torturer.  Play Shanty Town, you don't draw anything because Torturer is in hand, then play Torturer, and you need to have both parts in the next three cards rather than the next four.  You don't get +5 Cards out of having ST and Torturer in hand, you get +3 Cards.

EDIT: Oh, wait, I see what you're saying, never mind.  It's less than 25%, though- because if the Village is the fourth card, that's a case where Village-Torturer keeps firing and Shanty Town-Torturer doesn't.  Like, there is a possible best-case scenario for Shanty Town where it sees one more card, but that's not going to be the usual scenario at all.

[HiveMindEmulator]

Ah, I see where you've gone wrong.

If you have Shanty Town then you need one of the next 3 to be Shanty Town AND one of the next 3 to ALSO be Torturer.  Play Shanty Town, you don't draw anything because Torturer is in hand, then play Torturer, and you need to have both parts in the next three cards rather than the next four.  You don't get +5 Cards out of having ST and Torturer in hand, you get +3 Cards.

I'm confused here. I'm assuming you start with a hand of [ST,Tort,C,C,C]. You play Shanty Town, you play Torturer. You draw 3 cards. If one is a Shanty Town, and there is no Torturer, you play the Shanty Town and draw 2 more. There is no Torturer in hand. It's in play...

Oh, maybe you thought by "next 3" I meant "other 3 in hand"? I mean the three you draw...

EDIT: Ok, you got it, and I'm also wrong. This is not an edge for ST, because the original Village drew an extra card anyway.

[chwhite]

* You have Villages AND Torturer!  Yay!  This is what you want to happen, because it maximizes your chances of getting that all-important double-Torturer hit.  And in this case, Village is clearly superior to Shanty Town, because it draws you an extra card.

If you're going to belittle a 1-card difference in the other case, how is a 1 card difference big here? If anything, shouldn't the 1-card difference since it's 7 vs 6 instead of 6 vs 5?

Because the turns where you play multiple Torturers are more important than your other turns, and you have by far the best chance of playing multiple Torturers if you start off with one in hand already.

[chwhite]

Ah, I see where you've gone wrong.

If you have Shanty Town then you need one of the next 3 to be Shanty Town AND one of the next 3 to ALSO be Torturer.  Play Shanty Town, you don't draw anything because Torturer is in hand, then play Torturer, and you need to have both parts in the next three cards rather than the next four.  You don't get +5 Cards out of having ST and Torturer in hand, you get +3 Cards.

I'm confused here. I'm assuming you start with a hand of [ST,Tort,C,C,C]. You play Shanty Town, you play Torturer. You draw 3 cards. If one is a Shanty Town, and there is no Torturer, you play the Shanty Town and draw 2 more. There is no Torturer in hand. It's in play...

Oh, maybe you thought by "next 3" I meant "other 3 in hand"? I mean the three you draw...

Yeah, sorry, I was confused for a minute and edited that post.

What is still true is that, for a hand of ST-T-c-c-c, you need to have your village within the next three cards to continue the chain, whereas for V-T-c-c-c you can have it anywhere within the next four cards.  Or you can just have a Torturer and hit twice.

The only scenario where Shanty Town does better than Village with a hand of (Village)-Torturer-three coppers is when a Village is within the next three cards, and a Torturer is exactly the fifth card from the top.  That's not good odds.  Whereas Village is better if either part is in the fourth card down, or even if both parts are found quickly.

[HiveMindEmulator]

* You have Villages AND Torturer!  Yay!  This is what you want to happen, because it maximizes your chances of getting that all-important double-Torturer hit.  And in this case, Village is clearly superior to Shanty Town, because it draws you an extra card.

If you're going to belittle a 1-card difference in the other case, how is a 1 card difference big here? If anything, shouldn't the 1-card difference since it's 7 vs 6 instead of 6 vs 5?

Because the turns where you play multiple Torturers are more important than your other turns, and you have by far the best chance of playing multiple Torturers if you start off with one in hand already.

It's still one card. If it's not a Torturer, then who cares? The important thing is not how many total cards you got out of chaining your Torturers. It's how likely you are to actually chain them. If you're guaranteed to chain them, then sure Village is better for an extra card. But since we're concerned with finding Torturers to chain, 1 card in a big hand is less important than 1 card in a small hand.

[HiveMindEmulator]

Ah, I see where you've gone wrong.

If you have Shanty Town then you need one of the next 3 to be Shanty Town AND one of the next 3 to ALSO be Torturer.  Play Shanty Town, you don't draw anything because Torturer is in hand, then play Torturer, and you need to have both parts in the next three cards rather than the next four.  You don't get +5 Cards out of having ST and Torturer in hand, you get +3 Cards.

I'm confused here. I'm assuming you start with a hand of [ST,Tort,C,C,C]. You play Shanty Town, you play Torturer. You draw 3 cards. If one is a Shanty Town, and there is no Torturer, you play the Shanty Town and draw 2 more. There is no Torturer in hand. It's in play...

Oh, maybe you thought by "next 3" I meant "other 3 in hand"? I mean the three you draw...

Yeah, sorry, I was confused for a minute and edited that post.

What is still true is that, for a hand of ST-T-c-c-c, you need to have your village within the next three cards to continue the chain, whereas for V-T-c-c-c you can have it anywhere within the next four cards.  Or you can just have a Torturer and hit twice.

The only scenario where Shanty Town does better than Village with a hand of (Village)-Torturer-three coppers is when a Village is within the next three cards, and a Torturer is exactly the fifth card from the top.  That's not good odds.

Or another ST is fifth from the top and there's a Torturer 7th and so on. Basically, yeah, activated Shanty Town only draws 1 card more than Village, so the scenarios in which it's better don't happen super often. But similarly, unactivated Shanty Town only draws 1 fewer card than Village, so that's at least similarly unlikely to make a difference.
The question is which occurs more often and which makes a bigger difference.

[chwhite]

We should probably play some games to settle this.  Village/Torturer versus Shanty Town/Torturer, nothing but those cards and basic Treasure.  I'm pretty confident that adding nearly any other Action, and most real-life games will include at least one other relevant card, will tip the balance even further towards Village, but I'm willing to test in a vacuum anyway.

I should also be clear: optimal play with those three cards out may very well involve mixing Villages- possibly something like one Shanty Town first (when it's most likely to activate) and then Villages, as action density increases.  But if you can only rely on one or the other I'm going with Village for sure.

[HiveMindEmulator]

We should probably play some games to settle this.  Village/Torturer versus Shanty Town/Torturer, nothing but those cards and basic Treasure.  I'm pretty confident that adding nearly any other Action, and most real-life games will include at least one other relevant card, will tip the balance even further towards Village, but I'm willing to test in a vacuum anyway.

I should also be clear: optimal play with those three cards out may very well involve mixing Villages- possibly something like one Shanty Town first (when it's most likely to activate) and then Villages, as action density increases.  But if you can only rely on one or the other I'm going with Village for sure.

I'm happy to play, but I don't think it will "settle" anything. I think we can agree that the amount of times it makes a difference are small since it's a difference of one card here and there. So if we play a handful of games, we're not really any more likely to be able to draw conclusions.

[chwhite]

HiveMind and I just played two test games, and the Shanties in fact did win both times.

The big key was that you can open Shanty Town and use it as a Lab a couple times in the early game (and not open Silver/Silver), which is a pretty big leg up at the most important point even if ST becomes unreliable later.

We seem to be in agreement that opening Shanty Town, maybe getting a second, and then transitioning to Villages later is probably going to be the best plan with those three cards out.

[DG]

We seem to be in agreement that opening Shanty Town, maybe getting a second, and then transitioning to Villages later is probably going to be the best plan with those three cards out.

That's a good way to play shanty towns irrespective of torturers.

[HiveMindEmulator]

To extend the idea with Torturer to the more general (going back to my original post before all this Torturer discussion), the key idea is that Shanty Town is not just good in strategies with few terminals, but decks with low terminal density. This includes most early-game decks in no-trash (or slow trashing) games -- even if you are going for an engine eventually. The fact that it may be a little worse than a "real" village later on when you're drawing most of your deck may not be that big of a deal compared to its ability to kick-start you into getting into that engine.

With good trashing, you can hit high density very quick, so in those kinds of strategies which are more typical Village use-cases, Shanty Town is indeed likely to be the worst village. But it's the versatility to be useful in the other situations that makes Shanty Town an interesting card. It draws early, when you need the drawing more, and gives actions later on when you need the actions more.

[DG]

Going back to the original post, I think the comment about shanty town being bad with trashers is most directed at cards like chapel, remake, and moneylender that can become passengers in your deck mid game and simply obstruct the shanty towns. There are also a variety of other cards that might be preventing your shanty town from drawing cards but you don't particularly want to play from hand first: secret chamber, trading post, lookout, counting house, forge, tactician, throne, king's court, mint, bishop, island, chancellor, and others.

[jomini]

To extend the idea with Torturer to the more general (going back to my original post before all this Torturer discussion), the key idea is that Shanty Town is not just good in strategies with few terminals, but decks with low terminal density. This includes most early-game decks in no-trash (or slow trashing) games -- even if you are going for an engine eventually. The fact that it may be a little worse than a "real" village later on when you're drawing most of your deck may not be that big of a deal compared to its ability to kick-start you into getting into that engine.

With good trashing, you can hit high density very quick, so in those kinds of strategies which are more typical Village use-cases, Shanty Town is indeed likely to be the worst village. But it's the versatility to be useful in the other situations that makes Shanty Town an interesting card. It draws early, when you need the drawing more, and gives actions later on when you need the actions more.

Another area where shanty can be good is when you can control effective action density. For instance, cartographer and apothecary can both allow you to increase the odds of hitting activated shanties when you draw or they can push it back for a turn. Likewise, playing with cards like haven, courtyard, and mandarin can let you drop actions back on deck top to draw them live with shanty. Even sifting options like cellar, warehouse, and embassy can allow you to make better use of shanties by effectively lowering your action density.

[DrFlux]

I'm really beginning to like to kingdom supply based stats from the council room. This suggests the torturer prefers, from worst to best :  university, nobles, shanty town, mining village, hamlet, native village, inn, walled village, border village, farming village, village, festival, worker's village, bazaar, fishing village, city. It's interesting that three of the worst torturer partners are the villages from the Intrigue set.

The problem with this whole idea is you are confusing correlation with causation. Say village and city and torturer are on the board, with no + buys. Who is more likely to buy city over village? Probably the person who is winning the torturer war, slamming the other person and generating lots of money. Does that mean city is "better"? Heck no.

Similarly, do you really think bazar is a better setup for torturer than hamlet? I don't think so. A hamlet , with its extra buys, can enable you to buy two more with 4, or torturer+hamlet with 7. That's WAY better than bazaar in my experience.

Perhaps its just that the torturer combo is so good that if someone decides to skip it, even when the village costs 5, they usually lose. Most reasonable players will not skip the torturer chain with a village costing up to 4, but they might with one costing 5.

[HiveMindEmulator]

Also, we're looking at the wrong conditional. Torturer is more likely to be in the winning deck given that City is available than it is to be in the winning deck given Fishing Village is available doesn't mean that City+Torturer is better than FV+Torturer given that all 3 are available. Maybe in the games with just City and Torturer, you're more likely to run into the "village idiot" type of player who just buys Cities and ignores Torturers.

[DrFlux]

Well, we are also concerned with "how good" torturer + X is against other strategies, even with only one village available.

One additional challenge with councilroom data is that it is NOT dominated by optimal play. So it might be true that opening one shanty town then switching to villages is optimal. However, council room will not test this, because the games will reflect ALL the ways people choose to play shanty town.

[HiveMindEmulator]

What I mean to say is that City+Torturer need not be stronger than Torturer+FV to score better on that rating scale. I'll bet it's just more likely that people will play poorly and skip Torturer when City is around than when its just Torturer+FV.

[zahlman]

I'm really beginning to like to kingdom supply based stats from the council room. This suggests the torturer prefers, from worst to best :  university, nobles, shanty town, mining village, hamlet, native village, inn, walled village, border village, farming village, village, festival, worker's village, bazaar, fishing village, city. It's interesting that three of the worst torturer partners are the villages from the Intrigue set.

Whaaaaaaaa? Border village is worse than vanilla village with torturers according to CR? That's such a classic combo.

I'm guessing because it's hard to get to 6 reliably when you're buying $6 actions instead of Gold? :/