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[Aleimon Thimble]

Lately I've been playing Dominion online again. My skills are a bit rusty, but I've managed to climb up to the top 500 overall as I'm remembering more and more strategical aspects of Dominion, as well as learning all of the new cards (Nocturne, 2nd editions, Sauna/Avanto). Although the client is not perfect, I'm glad it's there and I'm certainly enjoying my return to the Dominion scene

However, I tend to be a bit on the slow side with analyzing a kingdom. I like to make a thorough assessment of possible strategies before buying my first card as it helps me plan ahead. Nevertheless, my opponents tend to get annoyed or confused because they think I'm either slowrolling them or having internet issues. So my question is: is there some kind of unwritten rule how much time you should take to analyze a board before starting the game? How do you handle this issue?

[faust]

You can think as long as you want. If you realize you need to take a while, you could write "thinking" or something in the chat to let your opponent know you're still there. If they complain, you can blacklist them after the game using the lightning symbol in the end game screen. If you take longer than 5 minutes, your opponent may force-resign you. In that case, you can of course also blacklist them.

[aku_chi]

I also take a while to analyze some boards.  If I know I'm going to take longer than usual before my first buy, I often send a message like: "This board is tricky", or "Lots of opening options...".

I'll also take shortcuts in my analysis whenever possible.  After looking at the key cards on the board, it might be obvious that a Masquerade + Silver opening is going to be strong, even if I haven't figured out the final form my deck will take or the optimal build path after the opening.  So, I'll buy those cards while I continue my analysis.  Sometimes this isn't possible (chief culprit: Donate).

And, of course, the more you play, the faster you'll be able to analyze boards - so, this problem might resolve itself over time.

[Awaclus]

I wrote an article on this subject recently, which should help you reach the same conclusions in less time (by not spending time considering the inferior strategies). As for how thorough you should be, I think the answer is that you should think as much as you need — there's no reason to make hasty decisions before you know what you're doing.

[Dingan]

the more you play, the faster you'll be able to analyze boards

Not sure if I agree with this. Sure, you see certain basic things more quickly -- "Mountebank is really good here", "Trusty Steed is crucial", etc. But then with experience comes the ability to see the next layer of less-basic things, which potentially require more consideration/analysis.

It would be cool to plot something like average time a player takes to deem a board 'figured-out' (whatever 'figured out' means) vs. experience of the player (whatever that means -- possibly number of games played or what altitude the player feels they're at). If such a plot had peaks and valleys at various experience levels, I wonder what these would represent. Idk, would be neat to see *cough SHiT please make game data public *cough*

[Cave-o-sapien]

the more you play, the faster you'll be able to analyze boards

Not sure if I agree with this. Sure, you see certain basic things more quickly -- "Mountebank is really good here", "Trusty Steed is crucial", etc. But then with experience comes the ability to see the next layer of less-basic things, which potentially require more consideration/analysis.

It would be cool to plot something like average time a player takes to deem a board 'figured-out' (whatever 'figured out' means) vs. experience of the player (whatever that means -- possibly number of games played or what altitude the player feels they're at). If such a plot had peaks and valleys at various experience levels, I wonder what these would represent. Idk, would be neat to see *cough SHiT please make game data public *cough*

One of the things I know I could do better is envision -- specifically -- what my deck should look like going into the end-game on a particular board before the game even begins. "I should have X of this card, Y of this one... " etc.

If I'm being honest, I think too often I approach a game as a series of tactical decisions loosely knitted together, rather than having a well-defined strategy. I think those tactical decisions can be made pretty quickly, but it can take more time planning a comprehensive strategy.

And yes, please, please, please let's have that data.