Strategy question...

In yesterday's (Aug 22nd) DC, I decided to go with the charmer opening. I hardly ever use it. If I end up in the charmer it is usually from a busted dynasty opening. But, after racks 55641 and 54455 I really didn't like going with the dynasty with no 2s yet, and there were no good advanced options.

So, in considering the charmer, I had this:

-will only need three 5s (with rack distribution being a caveat)
-if I catch another 6, will probably be limiting my 4s to three zones (unless 6s don't come)
-6s will play the same as in the dynasty
-I will have greater 2 flexibility if next two racks have 0, 1 or 2 twos

For the dynasty
-will need four 5s (possibly 3 if distribution allows for rack 9 centre option)
- my 4s wont be limited to 3 zones. They will have 4 or even 5 zone potential
- 2s could be a problem, as I would be committing to dynasty with no 2s on board yet, and dynasty is the worst opening for extra 2s.


Any thoughts on the charmer opening in this case?

PS. IMO, my middle zone 4 should have been right centre and not top centre.





Oh....and on that rack distribution thing (see below)......lol.... I had one 5 in rack 6, and now 3 more in rack 6, and I am still hooped from 5 zoning unless I want to trainwreck my 2 connection, 4 placement, and block off 6s.

I laughed at the end when I thought those who went the dynasty are fine, and that I will probably have the max bonus points, but could be the only person who couldn't five-zone the twelve 5s

That said, if I hit a 5 in rack 8 I think I T1 with dogfloss..

Gotta love this game

When is the battle royale?

Arctic, I will never use basic strat unless absolutely forced to with very special circumstances in Round 4. See my game for my solution to this problem; going for one of the adaptations of advanced.

http://triplechain.net/reconstruct?chain_id=7237661

Yes, when is Battle Royale?

I agree with this. The basic strategy doesn't have a lot going for it.

As for your round 2 in that game, what was your reasoning behind going for the fake dynasty, instead of regular dynasty? Is it because extra 2s are easier to handle in fake dynasty?

Primarily 2s are easier to handle, but also I quite like advanced 5s with this distribution. There are definitely downsides though, like I'm screwed if no 6 comes in Rounds 3-4, I can never snake 4s with four dice in Rounds 5-8, and can't always utilise advanced 5s (as 6s clash).

But yeah, 2s are the most important consideration in this spot I think, with this distribution of dice there are a few good setups which will largely even out in the long run. Imo any setup here which isn't Dynasty or basic is pretty similar.

Plus I love playing this setup. I think it's awesome, super-flexible with so many good options. *throwaway comment, not a real consideration here*

Thanks Paul. Appreciate the feedback.

Wafffles had mentioned that he might run one this summer. The tourney activity was low over the summer, though, so I would expect the interest in BR111 would have been low. Several of the top players are playing none or very few tourneys.

If someone wants to run BR111 the biggest challenge is probably getting someone to do 2 of the 4 scoring categories.

Th10 did all 4 scoring catrgories for BR1 in post 4755 of this thread

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets...t?pref=2&pli=1

and a similar one for BR11 in post 4895.

The wins and average score seem straightforward, as they can both be pulled off the TC site and sorted pretty easy. The lenc points and H2H results would be the time consuming parts for whoever runs this (or maybe it is not a huge task since TH10 already made a table??)

Cliffs: Any excel wiz with the time can run BR111. I am assuming they could use the table that Th10 made and reload new player and scoring data..

All the other stats are fun and all, but there is only one winner on the tournaments page. Since not everyone reads 2p2, why not just run it like that? This takes away the need for all the extra work, which I am pretty sure someone will do anyway.

I wasn't suggesting how it should run, but rather pointing out how the first two ran. I was not even aware that BR1 or BR11 had another way of determining the winner beyond overall wins until Paul brought this to my intention. If you go to the actual tournaments, Paul had the most wins for BR1 and mrgibson did for BR11, so I initially thought that was all there was to it.

I then went back through this thread and found that the players had agreed that the "overall" winner of each BR would be the person with the highest overall ranking over the four categories (wins, ave, H2H, lenc points).

It would not matter to me if the winner of BR111 was based just on wins, but I didn't play in the first two so I feel the majority of those who did should decide whether they want just wins, or all the other stats playing a part in determining the winner for a BR111.

The only thing I care about is that when I update the tourney summary I will need to list a winner, and it should be clear before BR111 starts what the winning criteria is.....

.and there is a purple trophy to be had.

Arjun, in the DC you won on 8th Sept, can you talk me through your placement of the 5 in Round 7?

It was pretty basic thinking really. I didn't need the middle zone for a 1 or a 2 in rack 9, so I thought I would increase my odds of snaking 5s and possibly increasing my win EV.

I haven't done the math between placing a 5 where I did in rack 7 vs. where you did, given that you don't need the middle zone for a 1 or 2 in rack 9. I suspect that my play was -pointsEV since you asked the question?

Yup. Cases where you win: exactly one 5 in Round 8, at least one 5 in Round 9. Though you might also need Round 9 to contain fewer than two 1s. So 24%/20%.

Cases where you lose:
No more 5s - 16%.
Exactly one 5 in Round 8, none in Round 9 - 16%
No 5s in Round 8, 511xx in Round 9 - 4%
Potentially also the case mentioned above (exactly one 5 followed by 511xx) - 4%.

So you're either 24-36 or 20-40 (or somewhere in-between). It's pretty bad.

arjun's play of the 5 on the 7th rack is the standard play for me. I do it every time.

By Paul's calculation, it seems arjun is 20% to 24% to win the DC with perfect chains.

36% to 40% of the time arjun is guaranteed not to win the DC.

This is an excellent trade off. I'll always take a 1/4th to 1/5th chance of winning a DC in exchange for a 2/5 chance of busting.

Doesn't this calculation only compare your win and lose % against people who are playing the same board (after rack 4) as you?

I can think of one common scenario where choosing the 20% option is better for win EV and ratings EV. This is when there are tons of different boards in racks 1 to 4. If the 20% gives you +5000 points compared to -2000 for the 40%, then it may jump you above other strategies. It also increases your chance of snaking 5s and hence winning the DC if someone went advanced 5s (not applicable to this DC).

In this case, it increased my probability of beating the people who had 4s as the outer chain.

I was thinking the same thing. It appeared that the comparative analysis was assuming the battle was only between a 4 zoned outer chain of 5s and a 5 zone outer chain of 5s in two otherwise identical dynasty set ups. However, even though there was no risk of loss to an advanced 5s set up, the 4 zone dynasty was not the winner if Arjun missed a rack nine 5. Two different setups beat those players who secured 4 zones of 5s ( as I did) and did not set up for the centre option like Arjun

Wouldn't all other likely setups that could beat the 4 zone need to be deemed improbable before you can do a H2h win equity comparison?

In this game I would have played round 5 differently. 3 to bottom, 6 to left, 1 to the top. The 3 in the top is a bit ugly. In 3 racks to not get a 6 would be quite unlucky (6.5%).

I would have copied the round 7 play, because I have a spot for a round 9 1 (bottom). If the bottom 4 would have been a 1, for example, I would 4-zone the 5s in rack 7.

Here is Arjun's board in case there are anymore questions...

Getting the urge to come back yet, Gabe...?

link to game...

http://www.triplechain.net/reconstruct?chain_id=7297809

Why would you do this? I like arjun's play, but if you dislike the 3 to top, just play 6 bottom, 1 top and 3 left?

I'll start off by saying that I almost never play according to what other people do. If you can accurately predict all the combinations of other people's boards and adjust for that then you're both a lot smarter, and have a lot more time, than I have. I try to maximise a combination of the play with the highest points EV and the play that comes out on top the most often H2H. Let all the other **** even out in the long run. It seems to work for me.

My post above shows that arjun's play (and everyone else's apparently) comes out worse in both metrics.

Nope, not even close. Firstly, add on the cases where there are two 5s in Round 8 (20%). Then in this 40-44%, half of the time 4s will trump 5s anyway. Then chop off some more win equity for when there are no 2s in Rounds 8-9 (16%). Oh and also, I forgot to include that your play isn't superior when Round 8 contains exactly one 5 but also two 1s.

Then subtract off some other random **** that I've missed but someone will play. Like an advanced strategy that snakes all 3 chains.

This is not applicable here. The difference between four-zoning and snaking is 25-16=9. The difference between 3- and 4-zoning is 16-9=7.

TH10, where are you when I need you? I know you're reading this...

Basically, you can talk yourself into suboptimal plays all day by imagining what other people might have done. But you will just end up screwing yourself in the long run.

Arjun, I targeted you specifically because your game has come a long way in a relatively short space of time, and you, probably more than anyone else atm (except TH10), have the ability to challenge for the top spot.

Finally, I love how everyone talks about wins like it's the only thing they care about, then bitches about going on a rating downswing or turning from orange to red.

5 goes to the top left for me.

It went top left for me too. But, if I was in rack 6 as opposed to 7, I am playing like Arjun did.. I just didn't like Arjun's move as a rack 7 play.

That would be fine too, but the left area is your area to fit 3x1, so if the game starts spamming 1s, you just took away a good spot. In the bottom area, you most likely aren't putting any 1s, so the 3 is well placed.