Eric Pietrocupo
Canada
Montreal
Quebec
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After playing twice yesterday, I have realized that the extra dice cards are much more powerful than the special ability cards. First, because they bring you closer to your goal, second, because it give you access to higher level character. So not taking extra dice makes you stuck at a certain character level.
One player even had only bonus dice cards, He was rolling like 11 dice in the final round. Even if he did not had special abilities, the fact that you roll many dice many times will counter balance this. I think he managed to roll at least 9 of a kind. If the number of rolls were limited (ex: 3 rolls max) then abilities would make a difference.
Here are a couple of suggestions without modifying the content of the cards.
- As suggested in another thread, you must call the king before rolling for it, if you fail you must take the fool. It makes the fool used more often.
- Limited number of rolls per turn. Example, max 3 or 5 rolls.
- Each card that does not give you bonus dice and all fools give you a coin when acquired. You can use that coin at any time during the game to add a die of any value to your roll (like the queen). Probably, these coins can be used at the end of the game for the final roll.
What do you think?
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Darren Thornton
England
Exeter
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My motto is if it aint broke...
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Eric Pietrocupo
Canada
Montreal
Quebec
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It is broken!
Only take extra dice as power card and you have a red carpet to victory.
The best solution so far is to have a limited number of reroll. Ex: you can roll max 3 times. This will force player to take an use cards that manipulate the dice.
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Tom Lehmann
United States
Palo Alto
California
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larienna wrote: Only take extra dice as power card and you have a red carpet to victory.
This is certainly not true in my experience, which includes a LOT of playtests with many different play groups.
Typically, a player with one manipulator will beat a player who only goes for dice.
Sometimes, a player with two manipulators will beat a player who goes for just one manipulator.
Usually, a player who goes for just dice will beat a player who goes for three or more manipulators.
The game revolves around choosing when to go for your 1-2 manipulators, getting a pair of manipulators with good synergy (if you go for two), using your "double turns" wisely, and the timing around acquiring the General/Warlord and the King (if you don't get a General, then try to make sure you take the King).
If the other players are letting the winner get by with just dice, and get the General, and get the King, then someone is probably doing something wrong...
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Kevin Erskine
United States
Alexandria
Kentucky
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I agree with the OP. I've only played about 6 times, but most dice = win 100% of the time so far. Pretty much, whomever gets the General wins. For that reason, it's hard to get others to play. I may try it with the limit of rolls. Can't hurt.
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Robin Goodall
United Kingdom
Cambridge
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It's your game so play it however you like. Have you tried allowing unlimited (or just more than one) uses of the manipulator cards per turn? This may make the balance go the other way...
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Eric Pietrocupo
Canada
Montreal
Quebec
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Quote: It's your game so play it however you like. Have you tried allowing unlimited (or just more than one) uses of the manipulator cards per turn? This may make the balance go the other way...
You mean allowing players to use manipulators once for each roll instead of once per turn.
That could be another interesting solution.
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Steve Duff
Canada
Ottawa
Ontario
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By the way, that wasn't just "any other post" up there, that post by Tom is the designer of the game heavily disputing anything needs fixing.
If you're claiming it's broken, address his points. How many manipulators are you using? Are you going for too few or too many like he says?
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Tom Lehmann
United States
Palo Alto
California
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UnknownParkerBrother wrote: By the way, that wasn't just "any other post" up there, that post by Tom is the designer of the game heavily disputing anything needs fixing.
This is a variants thread, so the OP is certainly free to ignore me and alter the game he bought to something he's happier with as he sees fit.
My post was simply to add a data point. "Group think" can settle in very quickly within a single play circle regarding a game. For example, if everyone does go for dice in TCtK, someone will get lucky and succeed, by definition...
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Mark Biggar
United States
Sunnyvale
California
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Another variant that may fix your problem is actually based on how we miss-interpreted that rules the first few times we played. We played that after a roll and before locking down at least one die, you could only use exactly ONE of your character cards. Makes for some interesting choices.
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Kelly Krieble
United States
Bethlehem
Pennsylvania
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I really like this game, Tom.
What did you mean by this comment...
Tom Lehmann wrote: using your "double turns" wisely, .
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Tom Lehmann
United States
Palo Alto
California
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dr_divot wrote: What did you mean by this comment... Tom Lehmann wrote: using your "double turns" wisely, .
The turn order marker passes counter-clockwise, so the player who goes last in a given round, goes first in the next round, effectively taking two turns in a row.
This is still true when playing 2-player and is an important game balance point, allowing a player to spend a turn "setting up" before taking the General, for example, and then allowing their opponent to "set up" for a turn, before taking the King in response.
In games with more players, often a player buys a manipulator on their first of two "double turns".
For example, I often take a Serving Maid on my very first turn, provided I am the last player, and then take whichever dice card has the fewest left on my next turn (the first player turn of the second round). This puts me in a favorable position for taking further dice cards in subsequent rounds and greatly reduces the chance that I go bust and have to take a Fool. A Serving Maid is not as good as an Astronomer, but close, and the advantage of having a manipulator early on is considerable.
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Eric Pietrocupo
Canada
Montreal
Quebec
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Quote: If the other players are letting the winner get by with just dice, and get the General, and get the King, then someone is probably doing something wrong...
You somewhat imply that somekind of team work is required. But I have never seen any possibility of team work in this game.
Maybe this teamwork only shows up when playing with many experienced players. But if you play with newbies, this teamwork balance dissapears.
Quote: Double turns
First player moves in counter clockwise order. This creates double turn. Which is a nice mechanic by the way.
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Grant Fikes
United States
Abilene
Texas
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A common newbie mistake in my experience is getting too many manipulators and not having enough dice for the final roll-off. However, when properly balanced with dice, dice manipulators are extremely powerful, because they can turn a wide variety of undesirable rolls into desirable ones without you having to rely on a 1/6 chance of getting what you want. Did you roll a bunch of 5's when you wanted 6's? The Noblewoman can turn them into 6's without you having to re-roll them! Seeking 4's? The Philosopher and Alchemist can create pairs and triplets of 4's from various combinations of dice!
Don't underestimate the power of manipulators.
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Eric Pietrocupo
Canada
Montreal
Quebec
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The concept of a manipulator is good, but since you can reroll as long as you have dice, gaining an additional die indirectly also gives you an additional re-roll. This is why if the number of re-rolls were limited, there would be more interest in manipulating dice.
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Grant Fikes
United States
Abilene
Texas
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larienna wrote: The concept of a manipulator is good, but since you can reroll as long as you have dice, gaining an additional die indirectly also gives you an additional re-roll. This is why if the number of re-rolls were limited, there would be more interest in manipulating dice.
The main interest in manipulating dice is that, without manipulators, you're relying completely on chance to get the numbers you need. With manipulators, the range of numbers you can use is greater.
Suppose it's the final roll-off, and I need eight 6's to take the King. I've set aside seven 6's already, and I have two dice left. What is the probability that I will get another 6 in the next two rolls? Without going into the math, it's 91/216.
Now suppose it's the final roll-off, and I need eight 6's to take the King (as before). I've set aside seven 6's already, and I have one die and a Serving Maid left. What is the probability that I will get another 6 on my next roll? 2/3=144/216. A Serving Maid is better than an extra die!
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Tom Lehmann
United States
Palo Alto
California
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mathgrant wrote: Suppose it's the final roll-off, and I need eight 6's to take the King. I've set aside seven 6's already, and I have two dice left. What is the probability that I will get another 6 in the next two rolls? Without going into the math, it's 91/216.
Now suppose it's the final roll-off, and I need eight 6's to take the King (as before). I've set aside seven 6's already, and I have one die and a Serving Maid left. What is the probability that I will get another 6 on my next roll? 2/3=144/216. A Serving Maid is better than an extra die!
Your conclusion and overall principle is correct (and is the heart of underlying math foundation for TCtK) and your math for the last rolls is correct. However, the comparison is actually closer since you're really looking at the weighted probability (when you get down to the end) of two cases: Unspent-Maid, 144/216, and Had-to-already-spend Maid, 36/216 (1/6), and comparing that number to 91/216.
The real question is whether -- due to having one fewer dice along the way -- the Serving Maid had to be used earlier to set aside a 6 when you failed to roll one (and would have rolled one if you had one extra die)?
On each of these outcomes, the extra die helps 1/6 of the time. How does this 1/6 "insurance" add up over the course of a long sequence of dice rolls?
(Note that this is not the absolute probability that the Maid was spent, just the cumulative difference in the cases where the Maid had to be spent at N dice and didn't have to be spent at N+1 dice, for each die roll.)
If p = probability the Maid had to be spent along the way is > 53/108 (~1/2), then you're better off buying the extra die instead. Otherwise, you're better off buying the Maid.
The probability that the Maid has to be spent in these cases is, in fact, less than 1/2, so buying the Maid is better than the extra die.
[P is different for every number of total dice rolled and manipulator involved and hard to calculate (I wrote a simulator).]
The 53/108 value, however, is easy to see; solve the equality:
36p + 144(1-p) = 91 (after multiplying all terms by 216)
144-91 = (144-36)p
53 = 108p
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Danny O'Donnell
United States
Sacramento
California
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I'm a little surprised to hear people talking about getting only additional dice cards as if it's a strategy you can follow every game (or at least the vast majority of them). Maybe my memory is faulty, but it seems to me from the games I've played that you have to get pretty lucky to be able to grab an extra die every turn without having any ability to manipulate the dice you're rolling.
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Brian Bankler
United States
San Antonio
Texas
"I'm a soldier, I've killed people." "You are a doctor." "I've had bad days."
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PsychoDan wrote: I'm a little surprised to hear people talking about getting only additional dice cards as if it's a strategy you can follow every game (or at least the vast majority of them). Maybe my memory is faulty, but it seems to me from the games I've played that you have to get pretty lucky to be able to grab an extra die every turn without having any ability to manipulate the dice you're rolling.
It's not too difficult. Let's assume that no pile runs out.
Your first roll needs a pair or 4-5-6. Now you can get 15 relatively easily, then 3 of a kind becomes a favorite. With five dice you hit a real challenge ... you need 4 of a kind. But if you get it then the Bishop becomes doable. Now with 7 dice you can go for a high general and fall back into 5 of a kind or 30+.
With blocking you are likely to have to grab a single manipulator. But with 3+ players, the game often has someone with only dice. (After all, if you try for more dice when you have 5+ and fail, your backup plan is likely fine; everyone else had to pause a turn anyway).
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Eric Pietrocupo
Canada
Montreal
Quebec
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The few games I played recently made it really clear that taking manipulator instead of extra dice leaved you behind.
Consider that if you do not take an extra dice, it does not increase the maximum values you can roll. So if for example, you do not have enough dice to win a level 3 cards, taking a level 2 manipulator will still make sure that you will not be able to get a level 3 card.
Another thing to consider is that the more extra dice you get, the more re-rolls you get, so the more times each dice get a chance to be roll. The incrementation goes triangular as the number of dice increase:
1-3-6-10-15-21-28, etc.
So for example, if I have 6 dice, gaining a 7th die increase the value I can roll, but also gives be 7 rolls (of individual dices) for free. These 7 extra rolls increase the chance that I get the face I want which removes the need of having a manipulator.
The only solution so far I could see is to limit the number of re-rolls. Many other dice game does that. If the limit was 2 re-roll per player, then:
7 dice = 7+6+5 = 18 rolls
6 dice = 6+5+4 = 15 rolls.
So adding an extra die only grant me 3 rolls. The incrementation for adding a new die is constant what ever the current number of dice.
It could be a simple variant, easy to apply that does not requires extra material.
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Danny O'Donnell
United States
Sacramento
California
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I think you're severely overestimating the value of the extra rolls you're concerned about compared to the value of the various manipulator abilities. There's solid math a few posts up that shows that the Serving Maid, one of the least powerful manipulators in the game, is of more use to you than the 9 more effective rolls you get going from 8 dice to 9. Imagine how that comparison would go for the Sorcerer or Astronomer instead.
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Having more die is not always better. You want to make sure you have enough die only to keep up with the pace of the game. By this I mean that you need to have close to as many as the top die leader so that you will get a decent shot at the general and king/queen, or powerful manipulators. Other than that, having cards like the alchemist or philosopher is incredibly useful. If someone is winning a lot with going for only die then they are getting incredibly lucky on rolls or the other players are either rolling terribly or just suck at using their manipulators properly.
The first 2 games I played I did not get the general or king/queen, however I won both times. I won by using a decent balance between die and manipulators. The magician and astronomer are incredibly valuable cards and are always more valuable than an extra die, assuming of course that you at least have enough die to compete in the final roll.
I go for the alchemist, magician, and astronomer every time now, trying to maintain at least 8 or 9 die. If you have 9 die and good manipulators, you are very likely to get a full 9 of a kind on your final roll. If you have 11 die and no manipulators, you are lucky to get 8 of a kind on the final roll unless you roll very well.
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Eric Pietrocupo
Canada
Montreal
Quebec
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Quote: If you have 9 die and good manipulators, you are very likely to get a full 9 of a kind on your final roll.
In the games I have played, as soon as somebody has 7-8 dice, with at most 1 manipulator, he goes for the kings. So getting manipulators really slow you down and block your progress because you cannot get higher level cards.
I know that they are useful, but it mist games I played, people race for extra dice, which unlocks higher level characters, which force people to get extra dice to get the higher level characters before they are gone. Then before you know it, somebody has enough dice to roll for the king and try it.
So getting a manipulator is a huge slowdown. I agree that with maybe 2-3 more turns, players could get a few manipulators, but it the games I played, it's always a race for the king.
This is why I might try it with a limited number of roll (Probably 3). It would make manipulator more essential to survive preventing players to race for the king.
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