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3476

Dominion General Discussion / Re: Supporting Alchemists

« on: July 01, 2011, 10:58:23 am »

There's nothing wrong with Silver, per se, but according to the simulator, BM without Alchemists handily beats Alchemists + BM (I've tried with 2 potions and anywhere from 3-6 Alchemists).

Why would you ever think alchemists work well with pure money? With pure money you're expanding a deck with treasures so your hands are filled up with so much generalised treasure that you'll eventually be able to buy green cards, lots of green cards. With alchemists you're adding cards with no treasure value (like potions) in order to get a specific draw (potions + alchemists) that sets up repeated plays of key cards, strong hands, card combinations, or cards that work well on large hands. The two strategies have very little in common and work against each other.

3477

Dominion General Discussion / Re: Ambassador vs Sea Hag

« on: July 01, 2011, 08:28:26 am »

Ambassador are sometimes quite difficult to judge as the other kingdom cards *always* make a difference. Once you've got your deck down to a nice controlled size with an ambassador you usually still need to expand out again with quality to finish the game. The other kingdom cards nearly always have a factor in the expansion and this feeds back into your early decisions (typically silver or ambassador at the start).

Having said that, the ambassador is nearly always superior to the sea hag. The quality of the cards is often superseded by the volume of cards in an ambassador game. A sea hag gives an opponent a card. An ambassador removes one or two cards and gives an opponent a card. After a few plays the ambassador is well ahead.

3478

Feedback / Re: Deck Scoring

« on: June 30, 2011, 10:06:16 pm »

It's quite hard to value a deck. A deck could have very little treasure, some curses, a couple of tacticians, and some golems. That doesn't look like a winner. However if there's a vault in the kingdom supply then the deck might become a lot better, provided you buy the vault, but that could be far too difficult for any algorithm to work evaluate. Let's not even consider how to rate your opponent's deck once you're playing a vault every turn with golem.

3479

Dominion General Discussion / Re: What to do with the Treasure Map buy?

« on: June 30, 2011, 07:37:39 pm »

wharf

3480

Dominion General Discussion / Re: Supporting Alchemists

« on: June 30, 2011, 06:40:23 pm »

Alchemists work best when you can reach a point where you can draw the entire deck (or some other equivalent). If you can't keep the alchemists rolling for a number of turns in a succession then they're not providing enough value.

I like the concept of a trading post with alchemists. Cut your terminal cards down to the trading post, some silver, a potion, and your provinces. There are all sorts of cards that are improved by playing them every turn when you draw your whole deck, including outposts and mines for example. Cards like a wharf can be balanced so that you play one each turn to complete your deck drawing and provide the important extra buy.

3481

Dominion General Discussion / Re: Does Horse Traders too effectively counter Minion?

« on: June 30, 2011, 05:20:47 pm »

Turn 9, I trashed Loan#2 with Loan#1... either I shouldn't have bought Loan#2 (is that the mistake?)

Two loans can be problematic. If one draws the other then neither will work before your next shuffle. If there's a good alternative purchase then take the alternative. Loans can be great in minion decks for thinning copper however they often get discarded and not played, or when they do get played they might force an unwelcome reshuffle.

3482

Dominion General Discussion / Re: Opening of the Day #1 (Strategy Discussion)

« on: June 30, 2011, 05:04:10 pm »

That's just irrational fear of the opponent getting lucky. Sure, he might get a lucky turn 5 activation and win, but in the long run he'll have to wait a lot longer than that and lose big time.

I think you'd be surprised just how much the probabilities change when moving from 2 treasure maps in 5 cards to 2 treasure maps in 6 cards. Buying another 5 cost card which can also add value seems like a better risks than the councilroom.

3483

Dominion General Discussion / Re: Opening of the Day #1 (Strategy Discussion)

« on: June 30, 2011, 02:40:35 pm »

I'd be tempted to play alchemists plus council room. This is a reasonable combination since you get the extra buy and the council room reduces the chance of the potions hiding at the back of the deck. I've never tried venture + potions but perhaps that would work too. I wouldn't want to open with a council room however just in case the opponent bought treasure maps.

3484

Game Reports / Re: Fun Board: Kingdom of Choices

« on: June 30, 2011, 02:30:14 pm »

I'd go for some sort of minions engine adding some goons for extra buys and points from multiple buys of cheap cards (some native villages, some pawns, many havens). As soon as that is running the tournament cards don't look that good although you might get some interesting plays from a princess and maybe even a diadem if you felt so inclined. I'd probably decide how to get that minions deck and how to close out the game based on play.

3485

Dominion General Discussion / Re: Rabble

« on: June 30, 2011, 02:21:43 pm »

The rabble seems a fairly balanced card. In the right situation the attack is very potent. In isolation it's a distraction. In the wrong decks it is pointless. It can sometimes be good just as an expensive smithy. You can tailor some passive defences to a rabble by good deck construction as well.

3486

Dominion General Discussion / Re: Duke Analysis?

« on: June 28, 2011, 03:56:08 am »

Playing any normal province strategy, when you know dukes are around, and see your opponent buying duchies, you start buying duchies as well to keep them to 4-5 duchies instead of 8. If, as a duke player, you can't get duchies faster than this province player who has made an emergency duchy switch, you're not going to be at an advantage.

From a situation where player (a) has 2 provinces and 3 duchies and player (b) has 5 duchies, player (b) is the favourite. Player (b) has already spent less, has as many green cards clogging the deck, and will take a lead by splitting the duke pile 4/4. If player (a) can empty the provinces while player (b) struggles buying dukes then it's not the dukes that are losing the game.

3487

Puzzles and Challenges / Re: Worst kingdom deck

« on: June 27, 2011, 06:04:26 pm »

For Geronimo, might not make sense to anyone else.

Code: [Select]

<player name="City">
   <buy name="Province"/>
   <buy name="Gold">
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInSupply" attribute="City"/>
         <operator type="equalTo" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="0.0"/>
      </condition>
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInDeck" attribute="Feast"/>
         <operator type="equalTo" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="0.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="City"/>
   <buy name="Workshop">
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInDeck" attribute="Workshop"/>
         <operator type="smallerThan" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="2.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="Throne_Room">
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInDeck" attribute="Throne_Room"/>
         <operator type="smallerThan" />
         <right type="countCardsInDeck" attribute="Feast"/>
         <extra_operation type="plus" attribute="1.0" />
      </condition>
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInSupply" attribute="Throne_Room"/>
         <operator type="greaterThan" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="1.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="Feast"/>
   <buy name="Throne_Room">
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInSupply" attribute="Throne_Room"/>
         <operator type="greaterThan" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="1.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="Silver">
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInSupply" attribute="City"/>
         <operator type="equalTo" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="0.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="Village">
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInSupply" attribute="Village"/>
         <operator type="greaterThan" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="6.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
</player>


When playing the cards, the bot has one major failing. It doesn't play a throne on a city unless it the last action card or when forced to do so with throne on throne. Cities are played before villages so it means the villages get throned as last resort for less value than the city. It also doesn't use a feast or workshop mid-turn to extinguish a pile mid turn then play boosted cities, but that's quite understandable. A human player can shave three turns off the bot through play.

3488

Puzzles and Challenges / Re: Worst kingdom deck

« on: June 27, 2011, 02:18:13 pm »

None of those action cards actually increase your buying power.  (Unless you empty out two supply piles, which, as was already stated, has to be slower than Big Money and yields only $1 per City anyway.)

Playing ten cities for two cards, +1$, +1 buy, with nine thrones, will provide +19$ and draw a massive deck of cards each turn. If you have remaining workshop actions you can gain extra silver and probably spend it in the same round. You'll essentially buy out all the provinces in three or four turns once the cities hit. The Geronimo bot can work that out, even if doesn't make the right decisions on the throne rooms or find any short cuts to deplete piles.

The 19 turns isn't actually correct but the Geronimo simulator still says this is faster than money (even when it's not getting the decisions right).

3489

Dominion Articles / Re: The Reliable Engine Part 1

« on: June 27, 2011, 02:06:24 pm »

However, the sparser your Minions are, the more they are used for cycling instead of earning.  You wind up with a Minion chain that behaves like a Chancellor instead of an earner.

Yes. If you add a festival you probably won't mind using a minion to discard and draw. If you add a native village you need to weigh up the benefits.

3490

Other Games / Re: What other games are as good as Dominion?

« on: June 27, 2011, 10:52:38 am »

If you want a family friendly game you can do worse than something like Carcassone. It's not my favourite game but it's my game that gets played the most, since nobody objects to it. If you want a heavy decision game then you're spoilt for choice really. There are many financial and resource management games where you need to maximise your opportunities and deny (all your) opponents any opportunities but you can't gang up on a leader. Agricola is one of example, but so could be an older game like Acquire. Bidding games (like Medici or Ra) also are fairer since players can overbid to shut out a leader from an auction, but that will just lose them the game if they can't make value from their purchase.

3491

Puzzles and Challenges / Re: Worst kingdom deck

« on: June 26, 2011, 10:29:23 pm »

Set up Geronimo's simulator to get workshops, cities, feasts, thrones, and villages and it will empty the province pile in 19 turns.

3492

Game Reports / Re: Never send a Golem to barter

« on: June 26, 2011, 06:26:58 pm »

Don't send him to a trading post, or as an ambassador, for an upgrade, or tell him to remake anything either.

3493

General Discussion / Re: Math Nerds...

« on: June 26, 2011, 02:33:13 pm »

Yes I was a mathematician. I can't remember any of those theorems and proofs nowadays though. Sometimes counting to 8 can be a problem.

3494

Puzzles and Challenges / Re: The fatal buy

« on: June 26, 2011, 11:14:42 am »

It's probably possible to have a deck of 6 different action cards that are certain to draw the deck, plus a horn of plenty, plus a mint. Each turn you could mint a new horn of plenty and then use one to gain a province. If you at any stage you lose all the horns by gaining victory cards then the deck fails. It's interesting but not a solution since Geronimo specified he was buying the provinces and not gaining them.

3495

Game Reports / Re: Trading Post/- or Vault/-

« on: June 26, 2011, 10:52:17 am »

It's true my Simulator won't play TP perfectly, but it's close enough in most cases. And if you have a deck of only Vaults, money and green the Vault is always played correctly.

If the Geronimo bot has {trading post, silver, silver, copper, estate} in hand and the opponent plays a vault, the bot will discard a copper and estate, typically draw a copper, not play the trading post, and buy a silver. Compare that to trashing the copper and estate with the trading post, gaining a silver and buying a gold. The bot always misses the opportunity to trash silver + other for silver. The bot always misses the opportunity to discard the trading post and keep treasure for buys, even when there is no possible draw under which the trading post would be played (as in the example above). These decisions lose games as these situations regularly occur in play.

3496

Game Reports / Re: Trading Post/- or Vault/-

« on: June 26, 2011, 06:16:49 am »

I spent some time working the simulations to try to make a first turn TP bot that could beat the first turn Vault bot but was unsuccessful.  Best I could come up with was a 38%.

If you're using Geronimo's simulator I'm afraid it doesn't make the right decisions on the trading post and vault discards.

3497

Game Reports / Re: Trading Post/- or Vault/-

« on: June 25, 2011, 09:57:17 pm »

The trading post is a strong card and it doesn't matter if it is a colony or province game; you'd rather have two silver in your deck than 4 copper. The problem in this kingdom is that it is working on only 5 cards hands and a trading post style deck gets less benefit from an opponent's vault. You can have also an extra action with the vault knowing you can discard it for a coin at worst.

I'd go perhaps for trading post then vault later. No reason why you can't have both.

3498

Dominion Articles / Re: The Reliable Engine Part 1

« on: June 25, 2011, 08:28:36 pm »

I was thinking about writing a bit more about minions but there is really a lot so I decided to cut it short instead. The main idea is the twin nature of minions, delivery (discard and draw) and payload (+2 coins).  As your deck develops you need to keep an eye on how much delivery and payload your minions can deliver and how the other elements of your deck change this balance.

3499

Puzzles and Challenges / Re: Worst kingdom deck

« on: June 25, 2011, 09:00:49 am »

FISHING VILLAGE!? With KC around!? Waaaaaay too good.

Fishing village and king's court gives you 3 to spend for two turns when drawn together. Gold and silver give you 5 to spend immediately and also return to the discard pile so get played more often. Gold and silver are better.

3500

Puzzles and Challenges / Re: Worst kingdom deck

« on: June 25, 2011, 07:37:43 am »

I think has already been considered on boardgamegeek with a solution similar to

Hamlet
Village
Worker's village
Walled village
Fishing village
Throne
King's court
Quarry
Workshop
University