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My DC setup from yesterday, I think we dubbed it "Superbasic" strategy, is quite rare, but when you get it, it has proven very successful. I don't think I have a higher DC winrate with any other setup

Just off the top of my head, if asked where you gets wins where others don't........... I would have to say taking a 445XX or 446XX rack 1 and going dynasty with 4s as your outer chain. Seems to have got you a few wins IIRC, and I don't think anyone else was doing it.

Games are usually won by whoever snaked the most, not by whoever snaked the right one.

After your setup, a great part of who wins is determined by luck

Did you get 2 of this digit? Whoever has that as his major chain will 4-zone and be ahead.

Rack 5-8 showed 3*6? Whoever did advanced setup with 6s will be ahead. That player will unlikely win if 5*6 showed up on rack 5-8, as his other chains will suffer.

Did you get 4 of a number? Hopefully that was not your minor chain.

So for me, the primary objective is to assemble any playable setup after rack 4 and if possible after rack 3 (only possible for setups with a degree of freedom, like basic strategy and Dynasty)

Deadline for registration for the Summer Match Play tourney is Thursday Jun 13 at 10PM MT. So far I have the following players registered.

Dogfloss, Derwi, wafflesobv, SubArcticK, lilrascal, nails, quaspl, Dos, Checky, Gaby, arjun13, anton-09 and Hg80.

Let me know if I missed anyone and/or you still want to register.

2024 Summer Match Play Tournament begins


Hello folks!! The matches are set and ready to join for the 2024 Summer Match Play Championship. See below. You have 3 days to join your match (join in the Tourneys section on TC site). If you don't join your match in 3 days you will forfeit. You have 20 days to complete your 50 games in round 1, so that will take you to July 6th (11PM MT). For more info see post 2024-16 in Tourney News.

First round matches are as follows.

(2) SubArctic vs (15) Cherrycin;
(3) Gaby vs (14) lilrascal;
(4) wafflesobv vs (13) Checky;
(5) Derwi vs (12) Dos;
(6) Dogfloss vs (11) quaspl;
(7) nails vs (10) anton-09
(8) Hg80 vs (9) Kokirixx.

We have 15 players so #1 seed arjun13 has a 1st round bye.

June 2024 DC Highlights

	DC Points
SubArcticK	246
Dos	228
wafflesobv	224
nails	218
SmalltownBoy	216
arjun13	208
anton-09	198
Dynasty	192
dogfloss	189
Hg80	188

	DC Wins
arjun13	4
anton-09	4
dogfloss	4
SubArcticK	3
wafflesobv	3
SmalltownBoy	3
nails	3
Dynasty	3
5 players	2

Monthly Race

• SubArcticK won a tight June DC race. A half-dozen players led at different points during the month, but SubArc posted three top-five scores in the last four days of the month to capture the monthly win. SubArcticK tied for the most top-10 scores (20) and top-five scores (13), and he also tied for fourth in wins (3). It was SubArc’s 14th monthly DC win, fourth-most all-time.
  
• Dos and wafflesobv finished second and third, respectively, separated by just four points. Dos had just one win for the month, but he tied with SubArcticK for the most top-10 and top-five scores, and his second-place finish in the last DC of the month allowed him to move from third to second. wafflesobv posted three wins and also tied with Dos and SubArc with 13 top-five scores.
  
• nails and SmalltownBoy rounded out the top five in June, separated by a scant two points. nails won two of the last three DCs of the month to vault up the standings, and 11 of his 16 top-10 scores were in the top three, including seven third-place scores. SmalltownBoy had 18 top-10 scores, the third-most during the month, and tied nails with 11 top-five scores.
  
• The rest of the top 10 was separated by just 20 points. arjun13 (sixth place), anton-09 (seventh place), and dogfloss (ninth place) led the table with four wins each. Derwi, NP, and consul finished just outside the top 10.

Milestones

• On June 21, Meg played her 3,000th DC, the 16th player to reach this milestone.

Stat of the Month

• 46: The number of third- and fourth-place scores in June. That’s the most for either category since April 2023, when there were 52 third-place scores.

2024 Yearly Race

At the halfway point, arjun13 has taken a commanding lead in the yearly race thanks to three monthly DC wins. However, the next six places are separated by just 14 points. arjun13 also leads the DC win and DC points standings, though the win category is much closer – the top six players are within five wins of each other.

	Yearly Race
arjun13	108
SubArcticK	66
dogfloss	64
SmalltownBoy	56
wafflesobv	54
Derwi	52
Dos	52
Hg80	31
shamsnemesis	23
velourfog	22
nails	22

	DC Wins
arjun13	20
dogfloss	19
SmalltownBoy	18
SubArcticK	16
nails	15
Dynasty	15
Derwi	14
wafflesobv	14
Dos	13
Hg80	12
shamsnemesis	12

	DC Points
arjun13	1391
SmalltownBoy	1184
dogfloss	1168
wafflesobv	1126
SubArcticK	1123
Derwi	1117
Dos	1095
nails	986
Hg80	934
Dynasty	930

2024 TC DC Stats

TC DC Hall of Fame

Haven’t really reviewed any TC play in years at this point.

Playing the 50 game match and against Arjun there were a couple games where I’m like ‘this was a terrible rack, how did it not hurt Arjun as much?’ Look at by his games and I’m just like ‘ya I’m terrible’.

Glad to see I’ve been making the same mistakes for 10+ years ��

Happy to analyze a game if anyone wants!

http://triplechain.net/reconstruct?chain_id=11694081

I set a new world record for ”Disconnecting 2s in racks 1-4 of a normal game”

After 2 or 3 years of TC I used to think it was..

TH10
Paul
…..little gap
Arjun
…..little gap
2 or 3 other people..
gap

Right now though the only curious question I have would be how close in skill would Arjun and TH10 be if they were both regs?? These two are clearly the best players I have seen.

I think with Arjun's DC win rate and the fact that he seems to be the only one immune to the overall rating drop that has hit everyone else, it is pretty clear he gaps the current field of players.

Though not recently, I have spent some time in the past looking at his games and due to the transparent nature of TC it is clear that he is (was) not doing anything significantly different or unique anywhere

When I have looked at past games of his I really never got the "why did he do that?" vibe. It is more like why didn't "I" see that as one of my options.

We could probably make a list of key aspects of this game..
-effectively using flexible openings
-positioning 1s
-positioning 2s
-avoiding orphans(disconnected numbers from a chain)
-advancing chains while also protecting/preparing for an overflow of bonus points (i.e. 11XXX, or 22XXX)
-preparing for rack 9 vulnerabilities.
etc.etc….

To me Arjun is the best because he handles the most important aspects of the game (like some of the above) better than anyone else, and by a pretty good margin. We could probably go through games and find spots where decisions he made were notably effective and others in similar spots did not see or make the same decisions.

But, applying that awareness to similar situations in the future might be tough for most players. In the end you have to see the game and play the board in front of you, and none of us are doing that as effectively and consistently as Arjun.

So, no shame in losing to the best waffles. He thumps us all....lol

I would need to play a bunch of timed games with Arjun and I can tell where his skill level is compared with TH10.
TH10 was insane at timed. I finish games usually just below the 2min mark. TH10 could beat you in less than 1 min.

We should play more timed imo. So much fun.

I think I found a leak in your game AK (or you have found a leak in my game).

http://triplechain.net/reconstruct?chain_id=11690741
http://triplechain.net/reconstruct?chain_id=11690744

I think you misplace the first digit of your Dynasty major chain (rack 5+). The way you do it means you cannot get the 3-3-1 (rack 1-4, 5-8, 9) snake without breaking your inner minor chain.

Thanks for pointing that out. Me not playing to snake the outer chain in rack 9 is very much intentional. But, there is no good reason why I should not at least start my outer chain in rack 5 with that option still available. I am not sure how my mind got to the conclusion that when I decide not to go for the snake option in rack 5, that I should also abandon the placement that would enable it .?? That is not very swift on my part.
If you could find all my leaks it would be greatly appreciated…lol

I have some thoughts on the Dynasty snake below.


My feelings on the rack 9 Dynasty snake.

The times that I play rack 5 to enable a rack 9 snake completion of the major outer chain are maybe 5% of the time at most. If there are very few ones and 3 or 4 twos I "may" go for it. There are a few reasons I avoid it.

- the 60% chance to fill the center in rack 9 is lowered, often considerably, by the fact that a 1 and/or a 2 could be competing for that same spot (lowered by how much depends quite a bit on how many zones of 1s are in play and whether there is an available spot for at least one 2)
- I really don't like that playing for the snake minimizes my opportunity to fill the center square with a connecting minor chain number. Let’s say that you have 6s outer major and 4s minor inner. You have two 6s in place for the snake and in rack 7 you get a 32551 board. Where does the 3 go? Are you going to block a 6 (pass on 5 zone completion of 6s) and hope for a 6 in rack 8 or 9, or are you breaking (for good) the minor chain? Playing for the snake really puts strain on the minor inner chain.

- the other reason I think may be overlooked lots. Let’s suppose we have a 6 outer chain again. Suppose I get two 6s in separate racks and then they dry up. I now have 6s in 4 zones and am as good with 6s as anyone who played advanced, and anyone who played 6s for the rack 9 snake in the Dynasty is toast.

Those are some of my reasons for very rarely playing the dynasty to snake when I have that option starting in rack 5. Unfortunately, all I have is an intuitive sense that the way I go is +EV. I don’t have the skill to calculate all the major considerations and make a claim that my way is better. So, my way could be a leak, and by a % that I would not be comfortable with if I knew it…lol

As noted above, none of my reasoning for not favouring the Dynasty snake should prevent me from playing my first outer chain spot to leave that option. I'll fix that in the future, and in doing so I am likely to find spots where I wish to continue fully committed to the rack 9 snake.

Sometimes the game forces you to try for the rack 9 snake, by giving you 2x6 in a single rack.
You are now running behind anyone playing advanced 6s and must hope for a 4th 6, if needed in rack 9.

The great majority of the time, when I get 1x6 and 1x6 in two different racks, I just 4-chain and hope not exactly one more 6 arrives. When the board is light on 1s and 2s, this might become less clear.

Gabe..

Kind of ironic that my first DC Dynasty snake option (July 29 DC) in awhile failed (for one the reasons I noted) and I would have been fine if I went the non-snake route. But, the conditions were good for the snake on the 1s and 2s front, so it was a good play. I got a Sklansky win....lol.

In rack 7 I had the unfortunate situation where I have both the 5 and 4 competing for the center. I went with the 4 but that left me parking the 5 north, unconnected. Was hoping for a 5 in rack 8 and one to reconnect in rack 9, but rack 9 came up dry for both 5s and 4s. I did get a 5 in rack 9.

I looked at your game and you had a connected parking spot for your 5 in rack 7, but none for your extra 6 in rack 9. I had the opposite.

It would be nice to quantify how penal the snake route is with that outer chain competing with the minor inner chain for 3 of the 4 center spots (instead of 2 of 4). Does the extra shot in rack 9 make up for that? Be pretty hard to measure I imagine.

One additional bonus I do see with the snake route though is that it does, depending on the set-up, provide more opportunities to 3-zone 1s. Not playing the snake often causes the outer chain in the Dynasty to steal a good 1 spot.

Ya you said it much better than I did. Just from one 10 game stretch I saw 2 different placements Arjun routinely used where after thinking about it I realized was definitely superior to what I was doing. My post was more of a ‘how have I never realized that before’ than anything else.

IÂ’m trying to adopt them into my game hence all the long matches IÂ’ve been doing (and some of the train wrecks IÂ’ve had). For the first time in a number of years IÂ’m definitely enjoying the thought process around the game.

For the TH10 vs Arjun debate, I started after what I’ll refer to as ‘prime TH10’. Many players have taken long breaks and come back (TH10 briefly, Paul, Gaby to name a few). When TH10 came back he was still extremely good but I remember him commenting about being rusty, and his skill level at that point I think is below current Arjun.

That said, I really donÂ’t think itÂ’s fair to compare the two. In the early days Dynasty and TH10 we groundbreaking (among others of course). Arjun was able to come in a build upon that and become better exponentially quicker. Had TH10 started later on I expect it wouldÂ’ve been very close. Regardless, both phenomenal players.

Re: Timed. Id be interested in playing some as well. IÂ’ve thought about ways of having a timed league on and off during the years but playing across timezones as we do I havenÂ’t come up with anything feasible.

I too have been trying to remotivate myself to get more curious about TC and different approaches, but it is hard. When something is new, challenging and fun (Like TC was for me when I found it) it is, at least for me, hard to replicate that level of curiosity.

Another factor is that we have an experienced group of TC players on this thread in 2+2, so there are not 3, 4 or 5 new posters with questions for the more experienced players – the kind of things that might get some of the old regs interested in discussing things.

It is what it is but for the most part we all have at least 5 years of experience, and mostly we are just doing the DC and a tourney here and there. I mean nails is the “new” guy here on this thread and he has been playing for several years, so that gives us some indication of the lack on new blood in this thread.

It seems the interest to discuss the game and strategies is pretty much gone for all of us, as evidenced by the thread postings.

But, maybe we can rekindle some of it...

July 2024 DC Highlights

	DC Points
dogfloss	256
Dynasty	230
SubArcticK	219
arjun13	214
wafflesobv	205
NP	182
lilrascal	175
shamsnemesis	157
Dos	156
nails	155

	DC Wins
Dynasty	5
lilrascal	4
shamsnemesis	4
dogfloss	3
nails	3
9 players	2

Monthly Race

• dogfloss won the July DC race, her second monthly win of the year. dogfloss took a big lead early in the month, watched it evaporate as several players began to catch up, then put it away with a win and two fourth-place finishes at the end of the month. dogfloss led the table with 15 top-five scores, including three wins and five second-place scores. It was dog’s 13th monthly DC win and her 13th consecutive month in the top 10.
  
• Dynasty posted a third-place score on the penultimate day of the month to capture second place. Dynasty led all players with five DC wins during the month, extending his all-time leading total to 515.
  
• SubArcticK and arjun13 finished in third and fourth place, respectively, separated by just five points. Both players had 21 top-10 scores (tied for the most in July), two wins, and 11 top-five scores. The difference? SubArc had six seventh-place scores, while arjun13 had five 10th-place scores.
  
• wafflesobv rounded out the top five, trailing arjun by only nine points. wafflesobv also had two wins and 11 top-five scores, matching the two players above him in the monthly standings, but he had fewer top-10 scores – 17, tied for fourth.
  
• Among the rest of the top 10, NP (sixth place) had 17 top-10 scores but no wins, lilrascal (seventh place) and shamsnemesis (eighth place) had four wins each, and Dos (ninth place) posted a third-place score on the last day of the month to vault into the top 10. SmalltownBoy, Checky, Kokirixx, and Guessinator finished just outside the top 10.

Milestones

• With her monthly win, dogfloss surpassed 1,000 total yearly race points in July.
• On July 14, lilrascal got his 100th DC win, the 30th player to reach this milestone.
• Meg. surpassed 10,000 DC points in July, putting her in 25th place on the all-time list.
• On July 4, Cherrycin played in her 2,500th DC, the 21st player to do so.
• A few weeks later, on July 29, lilrascal played in his 2,500th DC (and got the win!).

Stat of the Month

• 21: The number of players who amassed at least 100 DC points in July, the most since September 2023.

2024 Yearly Race

	Yearly Race
arjun13	120
dogfloss	89
SubArcticK	81
wafflesobv	64
SmalltownBoy	56
Dos	54
Derwi	52
Dynasty	35
Hg80	31
shamsnemesis	27

	DC Wins
arjun13	22
dogfloss	22
Dynasty	20
SmalltownBoy	19
SubArcticK	18
nails	18
Derwi	16
wafflesobv	16
shamsnemesis	16
Dos	14

	DC Points
arjun13	1605
dogfloss	1424
SubArcticK	1342
wafflesobv	1331
SmalltownBoy	1328
Dos	1251
Derwi	1248
Dynasty	1160
nails	1141
shamsnemesis	1079

2024 TC DC Stats

TC DC Hall of Fame

Since 2016. So yeah, a few years...

If I get that in rack 4, I'm going for the rack 9 snake almost 100% of the time. If I get it in a later rack, it depends on how the rest of the set-up is going.

My daily game messed up big time on my last play of the game. I'll post it tomorrow so you can see what happened. Chains didn't chain. It's very strange.

Well, I could get back from rack 6 to rack 5

Pretty useful skill

Here's the result of my daily game from yesterday. My final play was a 6 in the upper center which didn't show up and instead my 6's didn't get counted as snaked. My last 3 plays were extremely slow to respond. I ended up with a 10k score instead of a 30k+ score. Not sure what happened here.

Stop it, you're too kind

This is where I excel!!! Timed tourney with a 1 minute cap per game please

It is showing your 6s connected in the results now but still not recognizing the last 6 (north zone) or counting it. You should have 1650/640/144 = 31642 (same as SmallTownBoy). Tied 14th.

I'll let Zac know but in the past it has been hard to find the reason for these rare, "one off" glitches.