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[Deadlock39]

I'm sure this has been talked about before, but I want to add such an option to the randomizer I am building, so I am interested in everyone's opinions.

We all know full random is great, but as more and more Dominion cards are released, we get less and less games with Colony/Platinum and Shelters. There's no reason to think that the original odds were somehow perfectly tuned, but something higher than where we are now seems better to me.  I am interested in any ideas people might have about ways to adjust the rates other than just rolling the same odds each game. 

I currently don't have any great ideas for Shelters because they don't seem particularly tied to the Dark Ages cards in a strong way. I might be happy with just a flat percentage for them.  Perhaps biasing based on trashers or alt-VP would make since for interaction with Overgrown Estate/Hovel.

For choosing Colony/Platinum, the most obvious thing to do is to bias around powerful cards since this is basically what the default rules did when Prosperity was released. My current plan is to pick out cards that are strong, or might be made more interesting by the presence of Colony from other sets (e.g. Prince, Chapel, Wharf, Masquerade, Tournament) to add into the list of cards that are counted when determining the odds to include Colony/Platinum.  The goal would be to push the overall odds back up to around 20%. (Odds were 22% when Prosperity released.) I also thought removing some weak cards from Prosperity might make sense too (Loan?, Talisman?)

I'm interested in any ideas about how to do this, or arguments against a particular method.

[werothegreat]

I think rather than going by "is the first randomized card from Prosperity", go with "does the first randomized card cost or more".

[Deadlock39]

I think rather than going by "is the first randomized card from Prosperity", go with "does the first randomized card cost or more".

That lines up with the general idea I have, but I only count 19 such cards currently (if you count ), so that would actually decrease your chances of using Colony. Just adding in all the + costs from other sets and still using prosperity would get closer to the 20% target, but would still be decently short due to the overlap. 

I'd like to factor in Events too, but the math on actual odds gets a bit harder with those. (or maybe it doesn't if you just estimate based on the first card chosen method)

[J Reggie]

I was just thinking about this, and I think it might be good to determine it by whether the first card is either Prosperity or Empires. Even though Empires doesn't have C/P, it's kind of like the sequel to Prosperity and that would give you close to the chances of getting C/P as when Prosperity first came out.

[ConMan]

I did discuss this in another thread. I was interested especially in having a method that still biased Colonies towards Prosperity-heavy games, but where even a Prosperity-free kingdom would have a chance of getting Colonies. My proposed Method 1 is pretty simple, too - just add 1 Prosperity card and 1 Dark Ages card to the Kingdom before randomising for Colonies and Shelters.

[Donald X.]

I'm interested in any ideas about how to do this, or arguments against a particular method.

The rulebook rule is just trying to make Platinum and Colony show up as often as other Prosperity cards. You aren't doing anything special to make Hoard show up more often; why Platinum and Colony? It's a rhetorical question.

If you do want them more often that's fine; figure out how often that is and then use that number. It's that easy.

I do not see any special attraction to caring about $6+ cards in the kingdom. They are not at all needed to make Colonies worth going for. You can argue the reverse - Colony helps make expensive cards worth buying. But uh. I wouldn't overstress that.

[pst]

I think this idea that several players have to increase the probability of Colony games to above other Prosperity cards is because of the rule where the probability has to do with what cards you have in that kingdom instead of what cards were available to be in the kingdom. Then it seems like colony games are tied to having these (sometimes) expansive cards in the kingdom. Hey, there are other expensive cards! Etc.

I would have liked a randomizer card for Colony that is part of the randomization (but of course doesn't count as one of the ten) instead. Then it's as common as other Prosperity cards, and it opens up for Colony games without anything else from Prosperity.

[Deadlock39]

I'm interested in any ideas about how to do this, or arguments against a particular method.

The rulebook rule is just trying to make Platinum and Colony show up as often as other Prosperity cards. You aren't doing anything special to make Hoard show up more often; why Platinum and Colony? It's a rhetorical question.

If you do want them more often that's fine; figure out how often that is and then use that number. It's that easy.

I do not see any special attraction to caring about $6+ cards in the kingdom. They are not at all needed to make Colonies worth going for. You can argue the reverse - Colony helps make expensive cards worth buying. But uh. I wouldn't overstress that.

Well of course you can consider Platinum and Colony no more special than another card. You can even make a reasonable comparison to Landmarks. By the officially recommended rules they do happen to be more special than other cards, as they are (Young Witch shenanigans withstanding) exactly 2.5 times more likely to appear than any individual Kingdom card.

It is of course easy to say I'd like to see Colony in 20% of games, and get a random number to choose, but that solution doesn't have a lot of appeal to me.  I think building off of the Prosperity rule will give a more enjoyable result than just rolling the dice each time.  This is based on my opinion that Colony games where Platinum is the only thing helping you get to $11 aren't quite as interesting.  Clearly this type of thinking is bordering on "constructed" Kingdoms, but I don't think it will have a different feel from the recommended rules.

I think this idea that several players have to increase the probability of Colony games to above other Prosperity cards is because of the rule where the probability has to do with what cards you have in that kingdom instead of what cards were available to be in the kingdom. Then it seems like colony games are tied to having these (sometimes) expansive cards in the kingdom. Hey, there are other expensive cards! Etc.

I would have liked a randomizer card for Colony that is part of the randomization (but of course doesn't count as one of the ten) instead. Then it's as common as other Prosperity cards, and it opens up for Colony games without anything else from Prosperity.

I think just sticking Colony into the Randomizer deck is a really interesting idea. This treats it a lot like a Landmark or an Event. It would have the opposite effect I'm looking for since it would make them ~2.5 times less common, but selecting it could be biased up to whatever level was desired.

[eHalcyon]

You could do both. Continue to do the prosperity card check and have it in the randomizer deck.

[popsofctown]

I think DXV's point is that if you are going to pick a card to increase the frequency above the recommended amount, why are you going for Colony?  It's just a card.  There needs to be an accompanying for Colony being one of the best designed most game-improving Dominion cards.

Obviously, we should be talking about increasing the frequency of Rats, that is a card.

[Infthitbox]

No joke, a friend of mine lamented the fact that colony/platinum showed up in such a small percentage of games merely because of the art on the Base Cards edition.

[Deadlock39]

I think DXV's point is that if you are going to pick a card to increase the frequency above the recommended amount, why are you going for Colony?  It's just a card.  There needs to be an accompanying for Colony being one of the best designed most game-improving Dominion cards.

Obviously, we should be talking about increasing the frequency of Rats, that is a card.

I understand the point. I just don't see it that way.  If you don't think Colony brings more to the game than any other random Kingdom card, then that is perfectly fine with me. I happen to have a different opinion. 

I also think that if the intention was to treat it with the same significance as any other kingdom card, then it should have been given a randomizer and treated like Events are now. As things stand, it is, and always has been, 2.5 times more likely than any other card. It also gets included based on the presence of certain other cards. The game, as it stands, does not treat it as "just a card".

Adding Colony and Platinum is also independent of all other aspects of radomization. If I increase the chance of playing with Rats to 100%, then I just decreased the chance of seeing any other kingdom card by 10%.  Increasing the chance of seeing Colonies may effect how other cards are played, but it does not reduce the variety of games that are being experienced. (unless you start increasing it beyond 50% of course)

So there is a defense of my position, but I am here to talk about ways this could be done, not about whether or not it should be done. I plan to do this, and am interested in ideas if people have them. If you happen to play Dominion IRL with me some day, and are not interested in the randomization schemes I have come up with, I will most likely be happy to play something that is randomized by-the-book.

[popsofctown]

Village is 6 times more likely or whatever to show up to.  It's still a deliberate design decision.  *shrug*

Like, what exactly are you asking for? If you just want to determine how you can increase the frequency, you throw some Colonies into the randomizer deck like pst/eHalcyon said, bam, done, there you go.  If you want some magical organic formula that puts them in the perfect amount and determines how many randomizer cards to throw in, then what the perfect amount is depends how much more than the average kingdom card Colony brings to the game, and it's the same as the question as whether Colony is better than other kingdom cards, only a matter of degrees.  I guess you can discuss to what extent Colony frequency should remain related to Prosperity, I think most of us at this point will agree that the relationship between Prosperity and Colonies is pretty meh and there's not really a need to keep them tied together.


If you wanted something super organic feeling I guess you could have player bid debt to get the right to be allowed to buy from the plat/col piles that game, but then you're playing a variant.

[Donald X.]

Obviously, we should be talking about increasing the frequency of Rats, that is a card.

Dude! Every time you play a game with Rats, add a Rats to the randomizer deck.

[Donald X.]

I also think that if the intention was to treat it with the same significance as any other kingdom card, then it should have been given a randomizer and treated like Events are now. As things stand, it is, and always has been, 2.5 times more likely than any other card. It also gets included based on the presence of certain other cards. The game, as it stands, does not treat it as "just a card".

The intent was to play with them about as much as you were playing with Prosperity, rather than particular Prosperity cards. I have fortunately previously spelled out exactly what the intent was.

Early on I tried things like, play with Platinum/Colony if any kingdom card costs $6 or more. That was way off from what I wanted, which was to see Platinum/Colony about as often as you see the rest of the set.

You know. Let's say you just own Dominion and Prosperity. Half of your cards are from Prosperity. How often should you play with Platinum/Colony? Man, I don't know, how about half the time? That sounds good.

But let's say you own 5 full sets of roughly 25 cards each, including Prosperity. Now Prosperity is about 1/5 of your cards. How often should you play with Platinum/Colony? Maybe 1/5 of the time? They are part of the Prosperity experience. An experience you are having at 1/5 the rate of pure Prosperity.

Going by the first randomizer card turned over (or first replacement if you keep some out) neatly matches the perfect ratio. In all Prosperity games you always have Platinum/Colony. When Prosperity cards are not showing up as often in your mix, neither are Platinum/Colony.

[mith]

Easiest way to increase the chances would be to change the number of randomizers you check. Playing with Colonies if either of the first two randomizers is from Prosperity would put the chances at 18.33% currently (vs. 9.6%; not quite double, they might both be Prosperity).

[Beyond Awesome]

I think for online, it should remain as common as it is, but not be tird to prosperity cards.

[Accatitippi]

I think that by far the most simple way is to tie Colonies to another expansion or two. Empires doesn't sound like the greatest fit, simply because it already adds a lot of alt-vp stuff.
My suggestion would be Cornucopia and/or Guilds.

[ipofanes]

Obviously, we should be talking about increasing the frequency of Rats, that is a card.

Dude! Every time you play a game with Rats, add a Rats to the randomizer deck.

From the Rats supply deck? So after 20 Rats games we play with a Rats pile of 0? Good riddance. Rats piles of about 3 may be a good reason to open Rats.

[ipofanes]

I think that by far the most simple way is to tie Colonies to another expansion or two. Empires doesn't sound like the greatest fit, simply because it already adds a lot of alt-vp stuff.
My suggestion would be Cornucopia and/or Guilds.

The simplest way would be clustered sampling: first randomise one to three sets and then the cards from the sampled expansions. We do this a lot, but then I play exclusively with cardboard, and samplnig from all expansions takes more setup time.

[Deadlock39]

Easiest way to increase the chances would be to change the number of randomizers you check. Playing with Colonies if either of the first two randomizers is from Prosperity would put the chances at 18.33% currently (vs. 9.6%; not quite double, they might both be Prosperity).

This crossed my mind last night. It is a pretty simple solution, and I like that about it.  I'm actually rolling a random card from the Kingdom after picking it in my randomizer, so I could also roll multiple times. That would change the distribution to something strange I guess.

I think that by far the most simple way is to tie Colonies to another expansion or two. Empires doesn't sound like the greatest fit, simply because it already adds a lot of alt-vp stuff.
My suggestion would be Cornucopia and/or Guilds.

For randomizing manually this would be a pretty good option. For a computerized version, I like cherry-picking the cards individually that feel the most like Prosperity cards (which is completely subjected, but w/e).  I also think playing with Colony 10% more often on the boards some cards appear in would increase the variety of games you get to experience (e.g. Tournament is a pretty different experience with/without Colony).

[popsofctown]

Obviously, we should be talking about increasing the frequency of Rats, that is a card.

Dude! Every time you play a game with Rats, add a Rats to the randomizer deck.

From the Rats supply deck? So after 20 Rats games we play with a Rats pile of 0? Good riddance. Rats piles of about 3 may be a good reason to open Rats.

No, no, no.   You buy another box of Dark Ages each time.   And worth every penny let me tell you.

[mail-mi]

Here's what my dad and I do:

Deal out kingdom.
Check if there are 3+ Prosperity cards. If there are, use Plat/Col
Check if there are 3+ Dark Ages cards. If there are, use Shelters.
If both of the above happen, great! Otherwise, shuffle the 10 randomizers and draw 2 out. If at least one is Dark Ages, use Shelters. If at least one is Prosperity, use Plat/Col.

It works out pretty well.

[AJD]

Obviously, we should be talking about increasing the frequency of Rats, that is a card.

Dude! Every time you play a game with Rats, add a Rats to the randomizer deck.

...And trash another card from the randomizer deck (or reveal a randomizer deck of all Rats).

[math]

Obviously, we should be talking about increasing the frequency of Rats, that is a card.

Dude! Every time you play a game with Rats, add a Rats to the randomizer deck.

...And trash another card from the randomizer deck (or reveal a randomizer deck of all Rats).

I'll trash Scout and Adventurer first.