It has been about 8 1/2 years since I posted an update on my progress at on-line Dominion. (Long enough ago that Michigan beat Ohio State while I was playing.) Since then, Dominion has moved servers a couple of times. As a quarantine amusement, I started playing on the latest incarnation, dominion.games. The beginning rating is 38.8. Unfortunately, due to the increased load during quarantine, they stopped updating the ratings for a while. I was pretty sure I was better than that!
I guess I am, because today I logged in and had a rating of 54.3, which is good enough for 438th based on my games from the past few weeks.
(I only play 3-player, so I'm not sure how I'd do in the 2-player ratings instead of the 3/4-player ratings.)
Showing posts with label dominion. Show all posts
Showing posts with label dominion. Show all posts
Thursday, April 30, 2020
Saturday, November 26, 2011
Isotropic: Down to Level 13
Since Michigan had a nice lead against Ohio State, I thought I'd get in some Dominion games on Isotropic while I watched. The lead is now gone, and my enthusiasm for Isotropic has somewhat dimmed.
The guy who runs the site changed the leaderboard so that only the past 30 days of games count. That means my rating is based on only 18 games, and my level has dropped to 13. Because I don't have time enough to play that many games in a 30-day period, and because my rating will fluctuate based on what drops out of the 30-day window, this will be my last update on my Isotropic level unless the administrator heeds popular request and reverts the change.
That's probably just as well, since none of my isotropic updates have gotten more than 5 page views -- this blog doesn't have a huge readership in general, but my average is much better than that.
Anyway, to make this more general, I think there are advantages to having a site like this run by an interested amateur rather than a company. The complicated skill system is probably not something you'd see a big company doing, and there has been an emphasis on getting the gameplay right over flashiness. But a downside is that he can make unilateral changes like this without having to worry about losing business to negative feedback.
Well, I won my game of Dominion, and, oh, look, we just got our lead back.
The guy who runs the site changed the leaderboard so that only the past 30 days of games count. That means my rating is based on only 18 games, and my level has dropped to 13. Because I don't have time enough to play that many games in a 30-day period, and because my rating will fluctuate based on what drops out of the 30-day window, this will be my last update on my Isotropic level unless the administrator heeds popular request and reverts the change.
That's probably just as well, since none of my isotropic updates have gotten more than 5 page views -- this blog doesn't have a huge readership in general, but my average is much better than that.
Anyway, to make this more general, I think there are advantages to having a site like this run by an interested amateur rather than a company. The complicated skill system is probably not something you'd see a big company doing, and there has been an emphasis on getting the gameplay right over flashiness. But a downside is that he can make unilateral changes like this without having to worry about losing business to negative feedback.
Well, I won my game of Dominion, and, oh, look, we just got our lead back.
Thursday, November 24, 2011
19th Level on Isotropic
Just a quick note to mark my ascension to 19th level on the Isotropic Dominion server. I lost a game, dipped a level, regained it, then played 6 games against Ben next weekend. I guess the algorithm figures if you win 5 out of 6 against a newcomer, that's worth something. My estimated ranking is still climbing, to 37.129, but most of the benefit came from the plus/minus dropping to 17.445. It looks like I'm in striking distance of 20th level with one or two more wins, but a loss is always possible to send me back down...
Friday, November 11, 2011
Up to 17th Level on Isotropic
Last week, I blogged about playing Dominion on Isotropic and getting to 16th level. Since then, I have only had one chance to play again. Yesterday morning, I got up, and everyone else was asleep. Further, Jack and Christina were asleep in the family room, which limited what I could do in terms of the noise I could make. So I started up a game of Dominion.
The game featured two cards I know pretty well: Treasure Map and Lookout. Treasure Map gives you four golds if you get two copies in your hand at the same time, and Lookout, among other things, allows you to trash unwanted cards -- the only one in this particular set that let you do that. Those two cards are in the second expansion (the sixth has just been released), so I suspect my opponents were looking for more novel plays. I got the Treasure Maps on turn 9; my opponent who went for them didn't hit the jackpot until turn 14 (clearing out the junk really helps you get the Treasure Maps together). My opponent didn't buy a Lookout until much later; by the time he played it once, I already had played mine 3 times.
There were other factors -- I made good use of Jester, one of the newer cards -- but in the end, it wasn't close. I finished with 41 points, the guy who was late to the party on both Treasure Maps and Lookouts got 22, and the other guy, who tried a different strategy, hit 17.
As a result, I climbed up to 17th level. My plus/minus actually increased by 0.01 to 18.909, but my estimated ranking went up from 35.195 to 36.217.
I figure if I only post when I gain a level (or, let's say, drop five), I'll keep this blog from being overwhelmed with Dominion posts. (And keep it being overwhelmed with restaurant reviews.)
The game featured two cards I know pretty well: Treasure Map and Lookout. Treasure Map gives you four golds if you get two copies in your hand at the same time, and Lookout, among other things, allows you to trash unwanted cards -- the only one in this particular set that let you do that. Those two cards are in the second expansion (the sixth has just been released), so I suspect my opponents were looking for more novel plays. I got the Treasure Maps on turn 9; my opponent who went for them didn't hit the jackpot until turn 14 (clearing out the junk really helps you get the Treasure Maps together). My opponent didn't buy a Lookout until much later; by the time he played it once, I already had played mine 3 times.
There were other factors -- I made good use of Jester, one of the newer cards -- but in the end, it wasn't close. I finished with 41 points, the guy who was late to the party on both Treasure Maps and Lookouts got 22, and the other guy, who tried a different strategy, hit 17.
As a result, I climbed up to 17th level. My plus/minus actually increased by 0.01 to 18.909, but my estimated ranking went up from 35.195 to 36.217.
I figure if I only post when I gain a level (or, let's say, drop five), I'll keep this blog from being overwhelmed with Dominion posts. (And keep it being overwhelmed with restaurant reviews.)
Monday, October 31, 2011
Isotropic
When I first played the card game Dominion, I was "less than overwhelmed". Eventually the game grew on me to the point where a year later, I was playing in a tournament. Other than a weekly lunchtime game, I don't get much chance to play face-to-face. That's why I've been enjoying playing on-line at the Isotropic server.
There's been a long-promised official on-line version, but in the meantime, Isotropic fills the void nicely. It supports all of the released cards (often within hours of their release), and it is in fact used by the game designer and developers to playtest new expansions. There's a nice "auto-match" feature where you can tell it how many players you want to play with, and which expansions you prefer, and it sets up a game with other players.
This being a site by and for gamers, there's a "meta-game" of ranking; it uses an algorithm to determine how good you are based on how well you play against players of various rankings. What I find interesting is that it gives you both an estimated rating and a "plus/minus" error range. Then it awards you a "level" on the basis of the lowest part of that range.
So you start out with an estimated rating of 25 (the average), but an uncertainty of 25. Thus, your starting level is 0. As you play, the uncertainty is reduced -- but as a new player, you may find that your play is somewhat below average. Hopefully, your level moves up over time.
On Sunday, my estimated rating was 33.495 with a plus/minus of 19.492, netting me a level of 14. That's down from Saturday's level of 15. The drop is probably a result of a game Saturday night which was almost finished when I bumped my laptop battery on the side of a chair, turning the computer off and disconnecting a turn or two before the end of a game where I think I was doing pretty well. That's OK, though -- I'm sure I've benefited from others' inadvertent disconnections, too.
Yesterday, during the sad, sad Redskins game, I played three 3-player games. I won the first two, and came in second in the third one. Coming in second shouldn't have hurt me too much -- the opposition was ranked fairly high, and the ranking system counts it as a win over the player who came in third, and a loss to the first-place guy.
Looking at the leaderboard now, I see I moved up to 16th level. Encouragingly, that was more due to my rating creeping up to 35.195, and less due to my plus/minus dropping to 18.899. My total of 27 games is very small. I'm ranked #1609 overall. #1608 has played 577 games, and #1610 has played 1220. So I'm hoping if I can find more time to play, I can move my level into the twenties.
There's been a long-promised official on-line version, but in the meantime, Isotropic fills the void nicely. It supports all of the released cards (often within hours of their release), and it is in fact used by the game designer and developers to playtest new expansions. There's a nice "auto-match" feature where you can tell it how many players you want to play with, and which expansions you prefer, and it sets up a game with other players.
This being a site by and for gamers, there's a "meta-game" of ranking; it uses an algorithm to determine how good you are based on how well you play against players of various rankings. What I find interesting is that it gives you both an estimated rating and a "plus/minus" error range. Then it awards you a "level" on the basis of the lowest part of that range.
So you start out with an estimated rating of 25 (the average), but an uncertainty of 25. Thus, your starting level is 0. As you play, the uncertainty is reduced -- but as a new player, you may find that your play is somewhat below average. Hopefully, your level moves up over time.
On Sunday, my estimated rating was 33.495 with a plus/minus of 19.492, netting me a level of 14. That's down from Saturday's level of 15. The drop is probably a result of a game Saturday night which was almost finished when I bumped my laptop battery on the side of a chair, turning the computer off and disconnecting a turn or two before the end of a game where I think I was doing pretty well. That's OK, though -- I'm sure I've benefited from others' inadvertent disconnections, too.
Yesterday, during the sad, sad Redskins game, I played three 3-player games. I won the first two, and came in second in the third one. Coming in second shouldn't have hurt me too much -- the opposition was ranked fairly high, and the ranking system counts it as a win over the player who came in third, and a loss to the first-place guy.
Looking at the leaderboard now, I see I moved up to 16th level. Encouragingly, that was more due to my rating creeping up to 35.195, and less due to my plus/minus dropping to 18.899. My total of 27 games is very small. I'm ranked #1609 overall. #1608 has played 577 games, and #1610 has played 1220. So I'm hoping if I can find more time to play, I can move my level into the twenties.
Friday, November 13, 2009
Playing Dominion at Euro Quest 2009
I came in a close second. Then, this morning, I came in a close third. (I would have won if I had one more turn.) I'll need to win in the third heat to have a chance of advancing.
Thursday, May 07, 2009
Game Days
Last Saturday, I went to Timonium for a gaming convention. I initially went to exchange games as part of a trade, but since I paid admission, I figured I'd stay for the silent auction, and since I was staying for the silent auction, I might as well play some games. Here you can see me wearing my favorite hat and playing a game called "Estimated Time to Invasion". I was the alien -- the game wasn't that good.
Someone takes pictures at these gaming conventions and posts them at Flickr. Here you can see a picture of me playing Dominion. Probably the highlight of the day was seeing people playtesting unpublished expansions to Dominion. Well, that and getting a copy of Civilization, a game I lost in the 90s to some movers.
Someone takes pictures at these gaming conventions and posts them at Flickr. Here you can see a picture of me playing Dominion. Probably the highlight of the day was seeing people playtesting unpublished expansions to Dominion. Well, that and getting a copy of Civilization, a game I lost in the 90s to some movers.
Friday, November 21, 2008
EuroQuest 2008
I didn't end up in too many pictures this year, but here I am playing Dominion, a game I was less than overwhelmed by.
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