Thursday, November 13, 2008

Settlers of Catan Development Card Strategy

The concept for the Development Card Strategy is to ignore wood and brick completely when you are placing your initial settlements. Instead, you want, in order, Ore, Wheat, and Sheep. Cities and Development Cards are your friends.

To achieve 10 victory points, most of the time you'll want to:

  • Establish one settlement in addition to your starting 2. You'll need to trade for the Wood and Brick that you need or use Year of Plenty, Monopoly, or Road Building to help yourself out.

  • Turn all three settlements into cities. This should be the easiest part of the strategy considering how much Ore and Wheat you'll be producing.

  • Purchase large amounts of Development Cards. You should be a shoo-in for Largest Army. Usually, the last 2 points come from bonus points given to you by the Development Cards.

I played 25 games against the computer and tried each time to follow the Development Card Strategy. See this post for more information on the setup. My results and observations are below:

  1. I won 16/25 games (64%). While I tried to keep my expectations neutral, I did not think that this strategy was this potent. After playing all 25 games, however, I've changed my mind; this one is definitely playable, and I'll be trying it out when I play over the board games. I also feel that this winning percentage would hold up decently well if I played more games.
  2. It's definitely better to be in the 3rd or 4th position (79%) rather than in the first or second (45%).
  3. The data certainly seems to suggest that the more chances that you have of hitting one of your resources on any given dice roll, the greater your chance of winning the game. By adding up each resources chance out of 30 (eliminating the 6 chances to roll 7), the smallest number that I obtained was 15 and the highest 22. My winning percentage went up as I the higher the number, and the conclusion seems logical. However, I do not believe that I've played anywhere near enough games to be able to show causation, and I feel that, were I to run enough tests, the quality of resources becomes as important as the quantity.
  4. My winning percentage was dreadful for those games when I had less than 5/30 chance of hitting either wheat or ore - 3/11 (27%).
  5. I tend to try to avoid loading up on one particular number, especially 6 or 8. For example, If I've already placed first initial settlement next to an 8 ore, I'm loath to place my next one adjacent to an 8 wheat. I'm not sure that this has a large effect on winning percentage. In one game, I noted that 8's did not come up early, and the resulting lack of development may have cost me the game. In other games, however, doubling up had little impact. I think that it's more psychological for me; I'd rather get a small quantity each turn than get lots of resources on a few turns. I hate watching my opponents draw cards while I sit there.
  6. It's hard for your opponents to block you in completely when you only need one additional settlement, and it is possible to win with only 2.
  7. In only one of my games was I unable to draw the final bonus card that I needed. Regardless of what edition you're using, the percentages of various Development Cards stay approximately the same - 56% for Soldiers; 24% for either Road Building, Year of Plenty, or Monopoly; and 20% for a Victory Point. Since you're drawing a lot of cards, it's likely that you're going to get what you need. The key is to make the best use of the cards that you don't necessarily need.
  8. The hardest decision when playing this strategy seems to be determining when to buy a card and when to wait to buy a city. The earlier that you can get cities the better, but you simply cannot wait to buy development cards. You're going to need soldiers to keep the robber off you, and the other, non-VP cards come in handy too. If I'm close to having enough for a city, I'll usually hold out. If I've already bought a couple of cards and have a soldier in waiting, I'll definitely try to save up. Basically, cities trump cards, but cards are important too.
  9. The other hard decision is when to expand. If you're in a situation where your opponents can completely cut off your expansion, you need to make sure that you put down a road as soon as possible. Other than that, cities and cards generally take precedence since your initial settlement are probably placed in much better locations than your new one will be.

Summary of 25 games played using the Development Card Strategy:

  1. 3rd Player. Initial placement 8 ore, 9 ore, 11 ore, 3 wheat, 10 sheep, 4 brick. Lost. Obviously, only two chances in 30 to get wheat is not enough for this strategy, and I struggled for wheat the whole game.
  2. 3rd Player. Initial placement 3 ore, 8 ore, 3 wheat, 8 wheat, 5 sheep, 10 wood. Won. Resource allocation was good as far as percentages went - 7/30 ore, 7/30 wheat, 4/30 sheep. Unfortunately, production was based really heavily on 3's and 8's. These did not occur early, stunting my development. I was barely able to pull the game out.
  3. 3rd Player. Initial placement 10 ore, 11 ore, 6 wheat, 9 wheat, 5 sheep, 9 sheep. Won. My production totalled 22, equal to the highest out of all 25 games. Ore was a little lighter than I would have liked, but excess sheep and wheat made up for it. I easily won despite not being able to place a 3rd settlement due to being blocked.
  4. 4th Player. Initial placement 4 ore, 8 ore, 6 wheat, 11 wheat, 3 sheep x2. Won. I got perfect resource distribution, and won easily with largest army, 6 points for my cities, and 2 bonus points.
  5. 4th Player. Initial placement 6 ore, 6 wheat, 11 wheat, 3 sheep, 5 sheep, 9 sheep. Won. I was heavily invested in 6's, and that number came up a lot early. The win was easy with longest road, 6 points from cities, and 2 bonus points.
  6. 1st Player. Initial placement 2 ore, 9 ore, 11 ore, 6 wheat, 6 sheep, 12 sheep. Won. Ore was a little light with only 7/30, but I won with the longest road, 6 points from cities, and 2 bonus points.
  7. 4th Player. Initial placement 2 ore, 6 ore, 3 wheat, 6 wheat, 9 sheep, 11 brick. Won. Easy victory with largest army, 6 points from cities, and 2 bonus.
  8. 2nd Player. Initial placement 4 ore, 8 wheat, 11 wheat, 3 sheep, 5 sheep, 10 sheep. Lost. Lack of ore KILLED me.
  9. 3rd Player. Initial placement 4 ore, 11 ore, 5 wheat, 8 wheat, 4 sheep, 3 brick. Won. Easy victory with largest army, 6 points from cities, and 2 bonus points.
  10. 4th Player. Initial placement 9 ore, 9 wheat, 5 sheep, 10 sheep, 10 sheep, 2 brick. Lost despite placing a city on my first turn. Struggled for ore and wheat the whole game.
  11. 1st Player. Initial placement 2 ore, 9 wheat, 5 sheep, 9 sheep, 2 brick. Lost. I was on the low end of overall resources with only 18, and I had only 1/30 chance of getting ore. Needless to say, I got toasted.
  12. 4th Player. Initial placement 3 ore, 9 ore x2, 6 wheat, 10 wheat, 2 sheep. Won. Getting sheep was a challenge, but a deficiency with that particular resource didn't keep me from winning with largest army, 6 points from cities, and 3 bonus.
  13. 1st Player. Initial placement 6 ore, 11 ore, 4 wheat, 10 wheat, 3 sheep, 9 brick. Lost. I had 9 points and couldn't draw one last point from the development card deck; I had tons of soldiers.
  14. 1st Player. Initial placement 4 ore, 9 ore, 11 wheat, 6 sheep, 12 brick. Won. This one was close due to the fact that my total initial resources were only 15. I finished with largest army, 6 points from cities, and 2 bonus.
  15. 1st Player. Initial placement 6 ore x2, 11 ore, 5 wheat, 11 sheep, 12 wood. Lost. I struggled for resources in this one. Getting ore was dependent on a single 6, which drew the robber often, and only the single 5 gave me wheat.
  16. 3rd Player. Initial placement 4 ore, 9 ore, 6 wheat, 5 sheep, 11 sheep x2. Won. I had plenty of ore, wheat, and sheep, which led to an easy victory with largest army, 5 points for 2 cities and a settlement, longest road, and 2 bonus points.
  17. 3rd Player. Initial placement 5 ore, 4 wheat, 8 wheat, 11 wood, 6 brick. Won. Despite my best efforts to play a Development Card strategy, the best placements for ore and wheat gave me brick and wood, so this one played more like an expansion strategy. I finished with longest road, largest army, 2 cities, 2 settlements, and 1 bonus point.
  18. 4th Player. Initial placement 4 ore, 3 wheat, 8 sheep, 5 sheep, 11 sheep. Lost. This strategy is not viable with such low quantities of ore and wheat.
  19. 1st Player. Initial placement 6 ore, 2 wheat, 9 sheep, 9 sheep, 10 sheep, 5 wood. Lost. I struggled with wheat, having only 1/30 chance to get it. Still, I would have won next turn.
  20. 2nd Player. Initial placement 5 ore, 11 ore, 10 wheat x2, 6 sheep, 8 sheep, 3 wood. Won. I cruised to victory with plenty of resources. I had 8 points for 4 cities and 2 bonus.
  21. 1st Player. Initial placement 3 ore, 5 wheat, 10 wheat x2, 8 sheep, 11 sheep. Lost. I didn't have nearly enough ore!
  22. 3rd Player. Initial placement 4 ore, 5 ore, 8 wheat, 12 wheat, 3 sheep, 9 sheep. Won. This one was easy because of the near perfect distribution of resources - 7/30 ore, 6/30 wheat, 6/30 sheep. I finished with largest army, 6 points for cities, and 2 bonus.
  23. 2nd Player. Initial placement 3 ore, 6 ore, 6 wheat, 12 wheat, 9 sheep, 11 wood. Won. I had good resources again, very close to last game. I finished with longest road, 6 points from cities, and 2 bonus.
  24. 3rd Player. Initial placement 8 ore, 5 wheat, 10 wheat x2, 9 sheep, 4 brick. Won. I had a ton of resources, which made for an easy game. I finished with longest road, 6 points from cities, and 2 bonus.
  25. 1st Player. Initial placement 8 ore, 8 wheat, 3 wheat, 4 sheep, 4 wood, 3 wood. Won. I had plenty of ore and wheat due to 8's coming up a lot. I finished with largest army and 8 points for cities.

Sunday, November 9, 2008

Age of Mythology

The second game that we played at game night, with the same crew - Dee, Ed, and Joe, was Age of Mythology. Though Ed and I had gone over the rules previously, it was our first time to actually play.

There was a slight misunderstanding with the rules at the beginning; I thought that you could only harvest resources if you had a peasant present, so I produced two houses at the beginning. I was a bit ticked off when the rule was clarified.

Playing Greek, I ended up attacking Ed, Norse, in the first round. The other Greek player, Joe, followed up with another attack on his turn, and Ed's army was decimated. Dee, the other Norse player, attacked me a couple of times putting a big hit on my army. After he used a god power to destroy my woodshop, I declared all out war on him.

There are many games where players have to make a decision about who to attack. My thinking is that, if you build up a reputation for being vindictive, it will give your opponents pause about choosing to pick on you. Whereas attacking Ed at the end of the game might have won the game for me, instead I kicked Dee even after he was down. Was this the right move? I don't know.

Dee turned his focus to buildings and economy while I rebuilt my military might. Between Joe and I, we were able to decimate his forces, and I personally destroyed 3 of his buildings. Going into the last turn, it was obvious that the player with the largest army was going to win. Dee and Joe didn't have a shot, but Dee was able to get his revenge by attacking me. His raid of my resources killed one of my soldiers and eliminated my ability to recruit two others. Ed got the largest army with 13 compared to my 12.

The detriment to Age of Mythology is the length of time it takes. Most of the popular games today run about an hour a contest; I didn't time our time for Age, but it had to have been at least 2.5 hours.

Still, it is fun to play. Like Ed says, all the resource allocation games that we play lack a combat element. This one doesn't. In fact, I absolutely love the combat! It has a very rock/paper/scissors feel to it as you try to guess what your opponent is going to choose. I kept going back to the Princess Bride - "but you know that I know that you know that I know..."

A quick funny side note: the Norse Frost Giant seems to be one of the strongest units in the game. He attacks normally with 7 dice, and, on this night, usually used more like 10 or 12. In five contests, it was defeated each time without rolling a single 6.

Overall, this is a game that I want to add to my collection and play again.

Race for the Galaxy

At the latest game night, I played Race for the Galaxy with Dee, Ed, and Joe, and my winning streak was snapped with authority.

I started out following a very focused strategy of playing only worlds that gave me either a produce power or a consume power. I had 7 cards played and was getting my engine going when Dee ended the game. The points produced by his 12 cards easily dwarfed mine.

The first game or Race that I played, I won by getting huge points from producing and consuming, and I keep trying to go back to that strategy. Obviously, you win by getting the most points, and playing cards gets you points. Next time, I'm going to try optimizing VP production better.

Thursday, November 6, 2008

3 Strategies in Settlers of Catan

I have identified three strategies to use while playing Settlers of Catan:

  1. Development Card Strategy - Focus on Ore, Wheat, and Sheep, and buy lots of development cards.
  2. Port Strategy - Settle a 2-1 port and concentrate on that resource.
  3. Expansion Strategy - Expand as far and as fast as possible. Focus on Wood, Brick, Wheat, and Sheep.

My plan is to play 100 games against 3 computer opponents (1 Neutral Expert, 1 Aggressive Advanced, and 1 Neutral Advanced). For the first 25 games, I'll play Strategy 1, regardless of what the board looks like. For the second 25, I'll play Strategy 2; for the third, strategy 3. For the last 25 games, I'll play whichever strategy seems to fit the board best.

I'll write a post describing the results of each 25-game segment of my test. Let's see what I can learn.