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When/Is it a Good Strategy to Skip Attempting to Get a Card on a Turn?

armstrong

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Hi folks

Just wondering. In general, it's helpful to acquire a card on every turn. But I notice sometimes people try to avoid being the first to cash in cards, to avoid getting "only" 4 reserves (which can basically disappear on two bad dice rolls). So sometimes the "first" person to play skips getting a card, so that they then become the 4th person (in a game of 4) to be forced to cash in reserves (assuming everyone acquires a card from then on, on every turn).

It seems the strategy is reasonable. I was just wondering if anyone has the math to show if it is beneficial or not?
Thanks in advance.
 

F15FreeEagle

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For me, I very seldom attack on the first turn, regardless of where I'm at in the turn order. Now if I'm down in the order a ways, and there's a territory defended by 1 or 2 troops next to me, that'll be an exception, or if I really want a territory, team games, etc. And of course the 12D map is ALWAYS an exception. As is 1vs1 (when I play that setting, which is rare.) But for me, it's not really about avoiding being the 1st player to turn in a set. It's about building a mini stack somewhere, giving myself a much greater chance of having a successful 2nd round. In theory, anyway. Doesn't always work so well though. :p
 

5battalions

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Well briefly getting the best reserve troop number can be decisive to avoid to get a card. Synchronizing those two factors reserve troops and cash time, humm, tricky, hfun.
 

ericjkline

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(1) In several game settings, there comes a time when a player’s cards are worth more than the cost of killing them. You don’t want to be on a team where you are trying to keep too many of those weak, valuable players alive (in movies and video games, this is called an Escort Mission, and it sucks). So I like to have a portion of the team be the weaklings. If the other team kills them, at least you don’t give them the cards. Many times, though, they aren’t worth killing anyhow.

(2) In some escalate singles games you sometimes want to sit and rebuild enough of a stack before taking more cards, so that you do not look too appetizing.

(3) If you already have a set with 3 or 4 cards, it can work to just turtle, and wait for the reserve bonus to reach the point where you are ready to cash. I’m more likely to do that in a team game. In a singles game, I think it just adds to the chance of a stalemate.

I have a whole bunch of other tactics for avoiding stalemates, and I’ve very rarely had them, even in Land Rush or Classic Massive.
 

youredead

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There are exceptions, but in scalate standard cashing the set first means you will lose the game unless you're very lucky.
 

armstrong

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There are exceptions, but in scalate standard cashing the set first means you will lose the game unless you're very lucky.

For real? So in optimal play, whoever cashes for 4 will lose? It's that much of a disadvantage? If that's the case, which position (out of 4 players) is the optimal cash?

A more related extreme question. What about the "strategy" of simply not holding any cards. This can happen by never conquering any territories, but it can also occur by one player getting a set of 3 cards (out of 3 cards), cashing, then not making any new conquers. I can see how they make themselves a complete non-target for other players (since the conquerer would not receive any cards for conquering that player), but at the same time, they are not going to get any reserves, which restricts their troop growth. I've tried to imagine how that would play out for a particular player, but I can't really visualize the outcome. My guess is they become the last player to be eliminated by the eventual winner.
 

youredead

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Out of 4 is not so extreme because the first gets 4 and the fourth gets 10 and normally everybody has other bonuses. With more players the difference grows.

About the other question, keeping 0 cards is crazy as the others keep cashing while you don't, and the only thing you can do is pray so that you can eliminate a weak player with 5 cards... In my opinion that's only a good idea if you are so weak that you need to be out of the game to survive.
 

Cardinalsrule

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There are exceptions, but in scalate standard cashing the set first means you will lose the game unless you're very lucky.

I don't at all believe that to be true.
 

ericjkline

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I’ve seen plenty of games won by someone who cashed their set early. It completely depends on the situation. It’s valuable to wait, but sometimes you just can’t, and you need the troops to take a command, get someone out of your area, or just have enough troops to stay alive (and be less of a target with less cards).
 

clarkenfeld

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I’ve seen plenty of games won by someone who cashed their set early. It completely depends on the situation. It’s valuable to wait, but sometimes you just can’t, and you need the troops to take a command, get someone out of your area, or just have enough troops to stay alive (and be less of a target with less cards).

Yep each map and each game is subtly or wildly different and you can't apply most principles in blanket fashion but have to be able to assess what's going on - drop, turn order, opponents etc and blah and so on. Sometimes you'll be delighted to be able to cash in first because it might secure you that narrow advantage early on that then allows you to put pressure on your opponents and sometimes you'll want to lurk in the shadows.
 

bilsi

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Ya, cashing the first set in for 4 doesn't mean you're going to lose....
 

youredead

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Of course, as i said there are exceptions. You can cash 4 and the last in the line fail or suicide against another one, or miss the turn, or you get an early set, or the game can be delayed and you get a new big set before the others... Weird things happen all the time and you can win regardless of your strategy... So my first opinion was too radical but in general it's not a good idea to give other players 20 or 30 more troops
 

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In a very large game, 12 or 24 players, if you cash first, you're probably going to lose, because the end ones get 30, 40, even 50 for their sets. But that's really the only time that cashing early will definitely mean you're not going to have much of a chance to win.
 

CaptSweatpants

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I like to do it t random times and situations. It keeps 'em guessing.
 

Virtuoso

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What about the "strategy" of simply not holding any cards. This can happen by never conquering any territories, but it can also occur by one player getting a set of 3 cards (out of 3 cards), cashing, then not making any new conquers.

I'm supposed to pull away but I've been itching to reply to some of these forum threads. I'm going to bite on this one.

I have played this strategy quite a bit. Maybe about 40-50 games or so where I chose to do this. I'm going to outline my experiences with it, which means describe what circumstances I personally chose to use the strategy, and how I tried to optimize its effectiveness.

The first thing to know is you're probably going to lose. I have won a few games like this but by and large, if you win, it's because you got lucky. One specific outcome has to occur for you to win. So if you want to try this, you have to NOT CARE about the outcome.

I play this technique when I play live games on another site (I've written my issues with live games on this site, on a different thread). So this technique would be an option I would choose for 4-5 player, standard map escalate games.

Generally, I notice when you play (or rather, when I play) live games, you'll likely not play as optimally as you would, if you had "unlimited" (24 hrs) to make your move. It doesn't mean you'll necessarily make mistakes, but you probably won't have the time, on every turn, to find the optimal play for yourself. So playing to get no cards (and to a less extent, playing live) is good if you:

1. don't care about the outcome
2. aren't in the lead
3. don't think you're going to win
4. don't want to think about how to play
5. are bored
6. are frustrated with the game not going your way so far
7. are busy with other tasks
8. are playing to pass the time
9. want to screw around with (1) the game and (2) the other players in the game

So the way I would do it, is to basically play the way you normally would, and at some point, if you get a set while only holding 3 cards, you cash them, and make no more further conquers. What you would like to have, is a stack on the board that is big enough, that if someone else attacks a 3rd player and MISSES (leaving that player with minimal left over troops), that on your turn, you are strong enough to tank your stack over and eliminate what is left of that player. Ideally, that player has 5 cards (although this isn't absolutely necessary), and you can then cash and eliminate the previous failed attacker, etc. So basically, the "specific outcome" I describe above, is that the player before you attacks a 3rd player and misses (chances are, it'll be a 3p game at this point anyways). That's when you can win.

So your stack has to be large enough for you to be able to travel "anywhere" on the board to finish of the decimated army. How big should that stack be? For a standard "classic" map of about 50 territories, obviously the bigger the better, but I'd say a stack of about 60 troops should be enough (my smallest stack victory ever was around 40 troops, and it was probably two times what I needed for the kill). Given typical gameplay, that basically means if you match a 3-card set when the troops are worth roughly 30, that is probably the minimum amount to give you a strong enough stack to win the "specific outcome" game, assuming most of your troop strength is on one territory, or can accumulate there over several turns of "reinforcements".

It is true that the others will stop mass attacking you. Your singly-held territories will soon disappear so if you have stacks in various places, make sure they get reinforced to one place while a path still exists. I generally believe one single stack is probably better than 2 half-stacks, for the purposes of this type of play.

In all likelihood, you'll finish 2nd, being the last player the eventual winner eliminates. I haven't in a single game where I lost, been anything other than the last person to be eliminated (so if there were 2nd-place medals, this would be the way to win them).

One "surprising" observation I have, is that if you play in this manner, whatever your stack strength is (60, 80, 100, what have you), the remaining (usually 2) player stack strengths typically will hover around your stack strength. Meaning, they'll target each other to kill, and will basically keep killing each other because they don't perceive you as a threat. But because it's now a 1-1 game for the other two, they tend to really go bloody. I haven't seen a game where I was sitting at 75, and then the other 2 just start increasing their troop counts, to 120, 150 and beyond. Basically, they'll float around your strength as they kill each other. This isn't necessarily intuitive but it's my experience.

So bottom line, you have to really not care about winning to play this way. And though you'll lose most of your games (>90%), the victories will be by far, the sweetest that you ever get. You will remember the few that you win, and each of them will absolutely have you in stitches. You... will... be... laughing... out... loud...

FWIW, I almost always opt for this technique when the circumstances present itself (i.e. I'm playing live, my 3 cards make a set when reserves are >25) cause sometimes it's just fun to mess around sometimes and take things lightly.

Cheers.
 
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Virtuoso

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Ok, so it seems I pulled off a possible win playing a no-card strategy. It isn't a sure thing cause its now down to 2 players, so it'll be a matter of who gets a set next (between me and Jazz). I'll add more later but you guys can observe the status of the game as it is now. I missed eliminating RLee by 3 troops way back when and was down to under 20 troops, when everyone else was in the 40s and 50s. Holding 1 card, I pulled all my remaining connected troops onto Switzerland, then just spent the next 10 turns collecting my 4 troops every round (3+1). I had 1 card after missing to kill RLee and I haven't gotten a card since.

Jazz just missed Spartacus and now its my turn. Once I get those 4 from Spartacus, I'm back in. The reason why this situation is possible is because holding only 1 card, it was never worthwhile for any other player to eliminate me.

https://www.majorcommand.com/games/517146/
 

Cardinalsrule

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Ok, so it seems I pulled off a possible win playing a no-card strategy. It isn't a sure thing cause its now down to 2 players, so it'll be a matter of who gets a set next (between me and Jazz). I'll add more later but you guys can observe the status of the game as it is now. I missed eliminating RLee by 3 troops way back when and was down to under 20 troops, when everyone else was in the 40s and 50s. Holding 1 card, I pulled all my remaining connected troops onto Switzerland, then just spent the next 10 turns collecting my 4 troops every round (3+1). I had 1 card after missing to kill RLee and I haven't gotten a card since.

Jazz just missed Spartacus and now its my turn. Once I get those 4 from Spartacus, I'm back in. The reason why this situation is possible is because holding only 1 card, it was never worthwhile for any other player to eliminate me.

https://www.majorcommand.com/games/517146/

But you are also capitalizing on another players bad luck and taking the cards from a nearly dead player. Had that not happened, you'd still be sitting there waiting to finish in 2nd place. Personally I would attribute your win to sheer luck rather than strategy.

Also note that I removed your 2nd post from yesterday. We don't call out other players on the public forums.
 
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