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Author Topic: Was my strategy bad? Was my opponent's good?  (Read 2794 times)

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catsclaw

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Was my strategy bad? Was my opponent's good?
« on: September 21, 2011, 09:45:01 am »
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Here's a set I just played, as Fin Fang Foom: http://dominion.isotropic.org/gamelog/201109/21/game-20110921-063353-3640636e.html

My strategy was to use Quarry, Festival, and Envoy, with a few stray Courtyards and Fishing Villages.  My opponents was (I think) to Smuggle useful cards of mine, and buy Shanty Towns to cycle his deck.

He managed to buy a Province on turn 8 and another on turn 9.  There was a point where I could have bought the last Province for a tie, but I went for a win and lost.  Was there a better strategy, or did I just get unlucky?
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Fangz

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Re: Was my strategy bad? Was my opponent's good?
« Reply #1 on: September 21, 2011, 11:04:11 am »
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Seems like pretty much a wash given how close it was. Buying shanty towns to cycle decks is a terrible idea so don't do that.or maybe it isn't because most of his actions were non-terminals... My impression is that probably a faster and more effective strategy would be to make use of ironworks at some point instead of going to quarry. Grabbing fishing villages is about as good as festivals, and a great deal faster, and in the late game you are swimming in actions so you could have gained estates to draw cards.

Consider replacing envoy with courtyard - courtyard stays more useful when you start greening. You should have grabbed gold earlier, and started greening earlier and more strongly - turn 11 should have been a province buy, turn 14 you could have played envoy again to get a province, turn 16 you made an absolutely pointless festival buy, etc.
« Last Edit: September 21, 2011, 11:11:15 am by Fangz »
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pooka

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Re: Was my strategy bad? Was my opponent's good?
« Reply #2 on: September 21, 2011, 11:11:30 am »
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Looks like lucky smugglers to me.  I mean, I suppose you could have anticipated that his smugglers was due and bought an action card rather than gold on the turn he smuggled gold.  I don't know how analytical you want to be in a situation like that. 

I experimented for a while with not buying a province with my first $8.  I have seldom won a game doing so.  I have done well with restraining myself from buying gold too early, and then I am not faced with that dillemna so soon in the game.
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DG

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Re: Was my strategy bad? Was my opponent's good?
« Reply #3 on: September 21, 2011, 11:59:49 am »
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You had a perfect mismatch of extra buys and quarries from turns 5-12.  I've noticed how streaky a quarry has been in some games I've played too. A player who matches the quarries to the extra buy can be a clear winner. A player who draws the quarry without extra buys can be a clear loser. The quarry is a poor card that needs the right situation (such as extra buys) to make it good.
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ackack

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Re: Was my strategy bad? Was my opponent's good?
« Reply #4 on: September 21, 2011, 12:05:14 pm »
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I'd buy a second Quarry over the first Envoy, probably. I think your plan is okay, but you're going to be spending a lot of time building an engine that ultimately is just pretty good. And Smugglers is a strong card against your specific plan - if you're spending a lot of time Quarrying up to build an engine, he's likely to be able to get good cards almost any time his Smugglers appears.

This strikes me as a board where single Envoy Big Money would probably do well.
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ehunt

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Re: Was my strategy bad? Was my opponent's good?
« Reply #5 on: September 21, 2011, 12:59:50 pm »
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Looks like I'm in the minority here, but I'm quite tempted by an ironworks fishing village opening, going for fishing villages and envoys and only getting a couple of festivals all game (for extra buys during megaturns). Really, even ignoring the price difference, fishing village is just a much better card for you than festival in this game. Yes, the extra buy will be essential once your engine peaks, but to make festival-envoy work, you have to draw them together, and this is improbable even in a somewhat dense deck - you're much better off relying on festival only for the $ and buy late in the game.

Smugglers is OK on this board, but really not great. I think your opponent gets pretty lucky with his smuggling, but one thing to bear in mind is that on this board there are two great cheap cards - envoy and fishing village - and you forewent them in favor of better, more expensive cards (festival and gold). Your opponent didn't have to pay the opportunity cost of buying these expensive cards (because he could smuggle them) and  still had leftover $ to buy the important cheap cards in this game. By contrast, if you'd bought the cheap (but good) cards on the board, he'd be gaining no more with smugglers than with ironworks, and using an action he can ill-afford to use. Ironworks consistently gains two of the most important cards on the board (without a loss of an action); smugglers inconsistently gains -- something.
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Geronimoo

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Re: Was my strategy bad? Was my opponent's good?
« Reply #6 on: September 21, 2011, 01:14:55 pm »
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Without trashers, building an engine from this pool is very likely slower than Envoy+Money. But of course where's the fun in that...
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tko

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Re: Was my strategy bad? Was my opponent's good?
« Reply #7 on: September 21, 2011, 01:44:45 pm »
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Without trashers, building an engine from this pool is very likely slower than Envoy+Money. But of course where's the fun in that...
Fishing Village + Envoy seems like it can be amazingly quick.  The only example where I went for this with laser-like focus was 6 Provinces in 16 turns, but it's not a good example since I was assisted by an opposing Pirate Ship to trash my Coppers (and you said "without trashers").   I tried adding Fishing Village into the BM - Envoy simulation and I can't get it to compete (only 36% wins).  I'll put my algorithm in the Simulation thread as a challenge and see if someone can solve the problem.

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Geronimoo

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Re: Was my strategy bad? Was my opponent's good?
« Reply #8 on: September 21, 2011, 03:09:10 pm »
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In my attempts of making an engine bot for this board I came up with this game plan that probably beats Envoy+Money:

You'll be building an engine that goes for the double Province buy (so don't buy a Province before you can buy 2 in one turn).

Open Ironworks/Fishing Village and get an Envoy asap. Then get more Envoys as long as you have enough Villages in your deck to play them all. With $5 or more get Festivals and with $3 or $4 Fishing Villages. As soon as you have 3 Festivals in your deck get a few Golds.
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DG

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Re: Was my strategy bad? Was my opponent's good?
« Reply #9 on: September 21, 2011, 06:02:31 pm »
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To answer your original question Catsclaw, there is probably a better strategy on this board but nobody is quite sure what it is (precisely)! Getting the simulator to play it properly is quite hard too.
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