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Author Topic: Hoard/Scout  (Read 10791 times)

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Geronimoo

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Re: Hoard/Scout
« Reply #25 on: August 31, 2011, 06:22:05 pm »
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I played a bit with the buy rules from previously posted bots and this was a very small improvement (1-2%):
Code: [Select]
<player name="Slightly Smarter Hoard-Geronimoo">
   <buy name="Province">
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInDeck" attribute="Gold"/>
         <operator type="greaterThan" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="0.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="Province">
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInPlay" attribute="Hoard"/>
         <operator type="greaterThan" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="0.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="Duchy">
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInSupply" attribute="Province"/>
         <operator type="smallerOrEqualThan" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="5.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="Duchy">
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInPlay" attribute="Hoard"/>
         <operator type="greaterThan" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="0.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="Estate">
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInSupply" attribute="Province"/>
         <operator type="smallerOrEqualThan" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="2.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="Estate">
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInPlay" attribute="Hoard"/>
         <operator type="greaterThan" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="0.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="Gold">
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInDeck" attribute="Gold"/>
         <operator type="greaterThan" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="1.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="Hoard"/>
   <buy name="Duchy">
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInSupply" attribute="Province"/>
         <operator type="smallerOrEqualThan" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="6.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="Silver"/>
</player>

It buys Province only when it has a Gold in the deck (or a Hoard in play).

I also implemented guided's suggested strategy of waiting a little longer to go green and aim for the double Hoard turn:
Code: [Select]
<player name="Guided's Hoard">
   <buy name="Province">
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInDeck" attribute="Hoard"/>
         <operator type="greaterThan" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="0.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="Province">
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInPlay" attribute="Hoard"/>
         <operator type="greaterThan" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="0.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="Duchy">
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInSupply" attribute="Province"/>
         <operator type="smallerOrEqualThan" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="5.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="Estate">
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInSupply" attribute="Province"/>
         <operator type="smallerOrEqualThan" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="2.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="Hoard">
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInSupply" attribute="Province"/>
         <operator type="greaterThan" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="7.0"/>
      </condition>
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInPlay" attribute="Hoard"/>
         <operator type="smallerThan" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="2.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="Duchy">
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInPlay" attribute="Hoard"/>
         <operator type="greaterThan" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="0.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="Estate">
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInPlay" attribute="Hoard"/>
         <operator type="greaterThan" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="0.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="Gold">
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInDeck" attribute="Gold"/>
         <operator type="greaterThan" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="1.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="Hoard"/>
   <buy name="Duchy">
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInSupply" attribute="Province"/>
         <operator type="smallerOrEqualThan" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="6.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="Silver"/>
</player>

This performs slightly worse than my bot, but it's nice to see an alternative strategy can be viable as well.
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tko

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Re: Hoard/Scout
« Reply #26 on: August 31, 2011, 06:28:29 pm »
0

Smart Hoard-tko2.2 beats BMU 61-33, btw.
It's interesting to see how Big Money-Envoy destroys this, and many other bots I make.  For example, BM - Envoy beats Smarter Hoard-Geronimoo 60% to 33%.  Is Big Money-Envoy so amazing that I should stop trying to compete with it?
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Epoch

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Re: Hoard/Scout
« Reply #27 on: August 31, 2011, 06:39:40 pm »
0

Haha, don't be so shy about it! You don't want to stop preferring Hoard as soon as you have 2 in the deck. The goal is to get 3 or 4 or even 5 Hoards in the deck before you really start churning green cards, to increase the chances of plopping down multiple Hoards for a single VP card purchase. The idea is that it's really not that strong to add two cards worth 3 VP and $1.50 average to your deck early in the game. Here's a pseudocode suggestion:

I don't want to say that you're wrong in a flat way, because one thing that messing with the simulator has shown me is that sometimes subtle differences in one part of the strategy will make other parts of the strategy that previously weren't showing much promise suddenly work.

But I tried 3, 4, and 5 (and more!) Hoards in other iterations of the bot, and the reason we ended up with 2 Hoards is that the 2 Hoard version outperformed the more-Hoards versions.

Now, maybe if we changed some other rule, suddenly using more than 2 Hoards would be advantageous, but I played around with it a considerable amount and was never able to get a >2 Hoards strategy to outperform a 2 Hoards strategy.
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Geronimoo

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Re: Hoard/Scout
« Reply #28 on: August 31, 2011, 06:47:22 pm »
0

Smart Hoard-tko2.2 beats BMU 61-33, btw.
It's interesting to see how Big Money-Envoy destroys this, and many other bots I make.  For example, BM - Envoy beats Smarter Hoard-Geronimoo 60% to 33%.  Is Big Money-Envoy so amazing that I should stop trying to compete with it?

In a real game you wouldn't be buying only Hoards, you'd start off with an Envoy as well...
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tko

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Re: Hoard/Scout
« Reply #29 on: August 31, 2011, 06:49:29 pm »
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Would more Hoards do better or worse if we "colonize" the bot?  I often read generic statements made that Hoard is bad for a Colony game... I wonder if the simulator shows differently?

I agreed that 2 turned out to be the sweet spot for Hoard in Province games... maybe 3 or 4 is a sweeter spot for Colony games?
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Epoch

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Re: Hoard/Scout
« Reply #30 on: August 31, 2011, 07:03:16 pm »
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Would more Hoards do better or worse if we "colonize" the bot?  I often read generic statements made that Hoard is bad for a Colony game... I wonder if the simulator shows differently?

My intuition is that a (well-crafted) Hoard strategy will increase its lead over BMU in a Colony game.  In my experience, almost every strategy compares better to BMU in a Colony game than a Province game, and I'd think that Hoard, with a longer time to pick up more Golds, would be no different.

EDIT:  My intuition is, so far, wrong.
« Last Edit: August 31, 2011, 07:12:43 pm by Epoch »
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guided

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Re: Hoard/Scout
« Reply #31 on: August 31, 2011, 08:34:20 pm »
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But I tried 3, 4, and 5 (and more!) Hoards in other iterations of the bot, and the reason we ended up with 2 Hoards is that the 2 Hoard version outperformed the more-Hoards versions.
I am not suggesting the buy rules should target a certain number of Hoards at all. I certainly don't play that way. That's why I suggested the 8 (or 7) Provinces remaining rule. It's more a function of the progression of the game than the number of Hoards in the deck. "I'd like to get more Hoards, but not if we're approaching the endgame."
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guided

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Re: Hoard/Scout
« Reply #32 on: August 31, 2011, 09:16:58 pm »
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OK, played around with the simulator a bit and couldn't find any major boost from any Hoard-over-Duchy rule. But I do get a pretty consistent, small boost to pretty much any given strategy by adding this rule or something like it, in preference to buying Duchy with $6:

Code: [Select]
   <buy name="Hoard">
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInSupply" attribute="Province"/>
         <operator type="greaterOrEqualThan" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="8.0"/>
      </condition>
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInPlay" attribute="Hoard"/>
         <operator type="smallerThan" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="2.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>

The second condition is important. 7 or 8 Provinces seems to be the right number in most cases.

It's possible I'm mistaken in perceiving a large boost to such a buy rule (as opposed to a small boost), or it's possible that the more typical Hoard plus an action card finds more benefit from my strategy.
« Last Edit: August 31, 2011, 10:39:02 pm by guided »
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HiveMindEmulator

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Re: Hoard/Scout
« Reply #33 on: August 31, 2011, 10:29:27 pm »
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Code: [Select]
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInDeck" attribute="Province"/>
         <operator type="greaterOrEqualThan" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="8.0"/>
      </condition>
How would you have >= 8 provinces in your deck? Should the condition be on the supply?

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guided

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Re: Hoard/Scout
« Reply #34 on: August 31, 2011, 10:38:45 pm »
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Typo, sorry.
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Thisisnotasmile

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Re: Hoard/Scout
« Reply #35 on: September 01, 2011, 04:11:14 am »
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Would more Hoards do better or worse if we "colonize" the bot?  I often read generic statements made that Hoard is bad for a Colony game... I wonder if the simulator shows differently?

My intuition is that a (well-crafted) Hoard strategy will increase its lead over BMU in a Colony game.  In my experience, almost every strategy compares better to BMU in a Colony game than a Province game, and I'd think that Hoard, with a longer time to pick up more Golds, would be no different.

EDIT:  My intuition is, so far, wrong.

Unless you're rushing Provinces (and you're not because you're rushing Hoards to get Golds), Hoard will not be better in Colony games. In Colony games, you need Platinums to buy Colonies. Hoards do not produce Platinum, so why would they help?
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kn1tt3r

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Re: Hoard/Scout
« Reply #36 on: September 01, 2011, 04:58:27 am »
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Would more Hoards do better or worse if we "colonize" the bot?  I often read generic statements made that Hoard is bad for a Colony game... I wonder if the simulator shows differently?

My intuition is that a (well-crafted) Hoard strategy will increase its lead over BMU in a Colony game.  In my experience, almost every strategy compares better to BMU in a Colony game than a Province game, and I'd think that Hoard, with a longer time to pick up more Golds, would be no different.

EDIT:  My intuition is, so far, wrong.

Unless you're rushing Provinces (and you're not because you're rushing Hoards to get Golds), Hoard will not be better in Colony games. In Colony games, you need Platinums to buy Colonies. Hoards do not produce Platinum, so why would they help?

You could argue that you need those Golds to buy Platina, but the real problem is that with Hoard itself ("Silver plus") you can only buy lower Victory cards in order to get those Golds in the first place, which hurts much more in Colony games.
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Geronimoo

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Re: Hoard/Scout
« Reply #37 on: September 01, 2011, 05:31:18 am »
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If you plan on getting Colonies with Platina, I doubt you should ever buy Hoard over Gold unless there is an awesome Victory card you want to buy early like Nobles. A Hoard/Nobles Colony bot will beat a Nobles Colony bot 60-to-37
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Epoch

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Re: Hoard/Scout
« Reply #38 on: September 01, 2011, 10:51:25 am »
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Unless you're rushing Provinces (and you're not because you're rushing Hoards to get Golds), Hoard will not be better in Colony games. In Colony games, you need Platinums to buy Colonies. Hoards do not produce Platinum, so why would they help?

You don't really need Platinum to buy Colonies, of course: three Gold and a Silver (or four Gold, or two gold and three Silver, or three Gold and two Coppers) works.  My theory was that by increasing the density of Gold in your deck dramatically, you could sometimes just straight up buy Colonies, and lots of times buy Platinum with your Gold.

I never thought it was going to be a stellar strategy, don't get me wrong -- but BMU, while powerful in Province games, is pretty bad in Colony games, so I thought that the Hoard strategy would still be better than it.  But as far as I can tell, I was just wrong.
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DG

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Re: Hoard/Scout
« Reply #39 on: September 01, 2011, 11:06:38 am »
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Big drawing cards and silver is fine in province games. Big drawing cards and gold is fine in colony games. Reduce the hand size and you need treasures of higher quality.
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