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Author Topic: How..?!  (Read 3054 times)

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Jeebus

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How..?!
« on: May 27, 2013, 08:02:15 pm »
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This is one of those games that I really don't understand.

http://dominionlogs.goko.com//20130527/log.50fd569ae4b0f82020d83fac.1369698635904.txt

How did I lose like this? To me it really really looks like horrible luck for me ALL THE TIME and great luck for him ALL THE TIME. To the tune of a 62-18 score.
I always have more Watchtowers than him, but he hits me almost every time. I hit him once, and then two times late game for Coppers. He buys a Moat and a SC, that I would never want to touch here. He keeps drawing Inn + Watchtower even late game, getting Province after Province. I keep getting them in the wrong order.
Am I missing something or is this really shuffle luck from hell?

DG

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Re: How..?!
« Reply #1 on: May 27, 2013, 09:09:08 pm »
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Watchtower don't provide much more defense against a mountebank than a curse does, and a mountebank gives you curses. Here you've also got the drawing combo with the inn but you're probably better putting one watchtower, mountebanks, and inns on top of your deck when you buy each inn. Without the top decking of actions an inn is quite expensive for what it is. You don't get a second silver before turn 11 and I'm guessing this leaves you short of the coins needed for gold.
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Jeebus

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Re: How..?!
« Reply #2 on: May 27, 2013, 09:35:53 pm »
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But does that really explain anything in this game? He's pretty much got one fewer watchtowers than me throughout the game, but he's getting a moat and a SC also! That's more actions clogging up than me. Also I wasn't aiming for Gold early, I was aiming for a deck with Inns and watchtowers, so that I don't get those curses as protection. You know, the way his deck worked..?

SCSN

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Re: How..?!
« Reply #3 on: May 28, 2013, 03:41:20 am »
+1

I agree with you on skipping Moat and Secret Chamber, but given that he buys them, you should expect to receive more Curses than him, and while ending up 1-4 in Curses is of course unlucky, I don't think it's exceptionally so (I'd say you could expect a better outcome ~60% of the time, whereas you make it sound like you expect it >90%) . Besides, focusing on luck is unproductive, especially when there are a lot of things that you could have done better (as there are in almost every game anyone ever plays):

T5: Inn, I'd get a second Mountebank here. The Inn does very little for you at this point, as your only actions so far are 1 Mountebank and 1 Watchtower, and you can't even use its ability to shuffle those back in. Inn gets stronger as your deck expands, get it later, near the end of a big shuffle.

T6: Second Watchtower is ok, though I'd seriously consider getting a second Silver first.

T7: Topdeck the Mountebank with Watchtower.

T8: I really don't like getting a third Watchtower over a second Silver. I mean, it's nice to be able to trash a Curse and Copper, but now you're effectively cursing yourself by not investing in your economy. He has a Gold already, you're very much behind at this point, time to catch up!

T9: A Spy??? That's crazy man :) You don't even have a second Silver yet... Spies do very little for you, this is just giving up.

T10: Another Spy?????? Game over.
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Jeebus

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Re: How..?!
« Reply #4 on: May 28, 2013, 06:06:36 am »
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I seriously believe assessing the game accurately is the most productive way to go, with strategy, tactics and luck. If you don't take the amount of luck into consideration, you take away the wrong lessons. So I think we might have a disagreement there.

But thanks for your advice, I think you're right about several things, especially second MB over Inn. T7 was because there were 7 cards left in my deck, one of which was a MB (and no Inn). Topdecking in that situation seemed stupid. But I was unlucky there. So the MB missed the shuffle.

Okay, so not having as much of an economy is bad, but should effectively serve me in getting less Curses and Coppers (whether that's worth it or not), yes? So I don't think calling it cursing yourself is accurate. After a while I have more Silvers than him and just as many Golds, but of course more Coppers and Curses, so still can't buy Provinces. I can't see that there's anything wrong with this analysis.

RTT

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Re: How..?!
« Reply #5 on: May 28, 2013, 06:30:48 am »
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you allways talk about topdecking from Inn but Inn only Shuffles the action cards in the remaining deck.
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DG

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Re: How..?!
« Reply #6 on: May 28, 2013, 07:11:45 am »
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Looking at it again, you didn't buy any provinces since your deck contained a lot of non-income cards. This would be watchtower, spy, island, band of misfits.
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Jeebus

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Re: How..?!
« Reply #7 on: May 28, 2013, 09:59:47 am »
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you allways talk about topdecking from Inn but Inn only Shuffles the action cards in the remaining deck.

Who's "you"? I noticed that DG does that, it was probably just a slip-up. I and SheCantSayNo were talking about topdecking with Watchtower though.

RTT

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Re: How..?!
« Reply #8 on: May 28, 2013, 10:32:01 am »
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yes it was only DG and when i read the other comments i didnt realise there was also watchtower in the Kingdom . sorry  ;)
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Jeebus

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Re: How..?!
« Reply #9 on: May 28, 2013, 10:57:42 am »
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Looking at it again, you didn't buy any provinces since your deck contained a lot of non-income cards. This would be watchtower, spy, island, band of misfits.

Um, Spy is never in the way of Treasure.
I don't think you've looked at the log very carefully at all. Going into turn 22 he has three Provinces. he has 10 "bad" cards (counting SC and Moat - he only has 3 inns, so those cards are pretty bad), but 3 less Coppers than me though. I have 8 "bad" cards (counting BoM since I see that I misplayed it, I should have played it as Spy when it crashed). We both have 3 Silver and 3 Gold! After that he always has more "bad" cards than me (increasing amount of Victory cards) and less Treasure (I buy more Silvers). Still he manages to buy the other 5 Provinces, I none.

Having a little less Treasure early should allow me to play MB more often. Spy should also help this a little. More Inns and Watchtowers too. So even if I have a slightly worse economy then, I should at least get less Curses and Coppers, not more.

I see two mistakes I made though. Not using the BoM as Spy. And not buying Inn at the opportune moment, like he did (important). We did end up playing MBs about the same number of times though, so that evened out. The huge difference that I see looking through the log, is all the times he got Inn + Watchtower in the right order and I didn't. And he got $8 a lot, with a worse economy.

DG

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Re: How..?!
« Reply #10 on: May 28, 2013, 11:52:36 am »
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I put it through the simulator and every spy and every island (before final greening) drops the win rate. Simulator also likes only one watchtower, although human card play could perhaps make a second worthwhile. A spy is always bought with the opportunity cost of having bought a silver. There are some misleading signals in this kingdom that a spy might be worthwhile but if you look at the card interactions more closely you'll see that it provides very poor value.
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ragingduckd

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Re: How..?!
« Reply #11 on: May 28, 2013, 12:11:56 pm »
+1

Your deck isn't really any worse than your opponent's, but neither deck is very productive.  You probably have comparable odds of getting a Province in any given turn, but those odds are unusually low... it takes 62 collective turns (31 each) to empty the Province pile!

Low-probability events lend themselves to uneven outcomes.  Soccer games often have scores like 3-1 because goals are so rare.  In comparison, basketball games almost never end with one team scoring three times as many points as the other.

So you got unlucky, but not as unlucky as an 8-0 Province split might normally indicate.  Now, if a Double-Jack game somehow ended 48-0, that would be something to marvel at!
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jaybeez

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Re: How..?!
« Reply #12 on: May 28, 2013, 08:25:32 pm »
+1

I remember this game, and I also remember much gnashing of teeth in the chat while the game was in progress.

But I did not saunter in to gloat, merely to say that in a game with variance, unlikely results will happen from time to time.  I did not play very well (obviously), and as AI noted, neither of our decks were especially good.  I'm not exactly an expert at Dominion game analysis, but I'm not sure there's much to understand about this game other than the fact that the outcome was very unlikely, in light of the cards we actually had in our decks.

EDIT: the one thing I will note is that I had three Silvers by the time you had one, which I think contributed to me getting two Golds before you had any, which I think must have contributed to my victory, somehow.  But still, doesn't explain why I was able to block your MBs with my single Curse three times, nor why I was able to piledrive the Provinces with a relatively weak deck.
« Last Edit: May 28, 2013, 10:33:20 pm by jaybeez »
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