Other Wise » J C Lawrence

A trial of strategy

J C Lawrence — Sun, 18 Dec 2011 20:02:13 +0000

Another off-hand note that seemed more interesting after I’d noticed I’d written it:

My litmus tests for calling a game “strategic” are something like:

0) Does the game reward continuous planning from the current state out through the end-game starting from before the game’s actual start until the game ends?

1) Does the game also reward a continuous 3-5+ turn detailed look-ahead?

2) Are the decisions made in that detailed look-ahead primarily concerned with support of the continuous end-game planning?

3) Will players that fail to coherently do any of the previous three (necessarily(?)) lose to those that succeed in coherently doing the previous three?

Tribal bivalence

J C Lawrence — Sun, 09 Oct 2011 07:18:16 +0000

I wrote the following in a rather off-hand manner and found that I’d written rather more than I’d recognised I knew on the benefits of mobs and individual for the species:

Man is prone to witch hunts (and pillories and stocks and coventries, and…). Arguably the tendency toward witch hunts has been a significant contributing factor in the social binding and coherency that enabled our success as a species. We got the benefits of (assumed) individual intelligence and of herd/flock coherence, and that’s a pretty potent mix.

Economic game: a definition

J C Lawrence — Thu, 15 Sep 2011 22:14:59 +0000

I wrote the following recently as part of a discussion on boardgamegeek:

An economic game implements an economy which the players either significantly create or engage in during the course of play. An economy consists of one or more marketplaces in which one or more currencies are exchanged either for goods/resources or other (potential) currencies, and in which the cycle of inputs to conversions to outputs is or can be self-sustaining. A currency is merely a granular entity with variable value which is conceived of as a trade item for other currencies or value goods.

A hark to a yester-profession

J C Lawrence — Thu, 07 Jul 2011 01:58:10 +0000

I wrote this a bit ago on BGG and had trouble finding it later, thus I note it here:

It came to me out of the wet dark and leaked ichor down the side of my bureau. By morning it was dead, life having fled from its rends and tears and broken teeth for the crust on the floor. I buried it deep behind the midden and rolled a heavy stone atop to remember its breathing by. I dare not eat the dark apples from the tree that sprang from under the stone.

18C2C and 18OE at Kublacon 2011

J C Lawrence — Fri, 03 Jun 2011 06:48:23 +0000

A different horse’s gripping hand

J C Lawrence — Thu, 23 Dec 2010 03:56:43 +0000

Virtual graphs, virtual networks, connectivity expressed by derived relationships rather than represented directly… I last wrestled with these concepts in Corrupt Beneficence. In this post I’m waving an 18xx/route-building stick at them. The following discusses a possible mechanical representation of the operational side of 18xx as a card game.

Imagine cards. There are cards which simply represent railroad track and cards which represent revenue locations (cities and towns). Some revenue locations are also the home stations of various companies. Thus, for instance, the NYC card might also be the home station of the NYNH&H.

The director of a company, say the B&O, would have a card before them for Baltimore. On the Baltimore card they’d place a token for the B&O’s (home) station. Other revenue locations (non-home stations) would have spaces for companies to place stations ala the normal model. If player were running a different company than the B&O, they would have a different card of a different revenue location for that company’s home station if enough cards for that revenue location exist in the game

During the course of the game the B&O president would place track cards adjacent to the revenue location. Cards could be placed on each of the four sides (perhaps limited by game phase), forming a stack or route leading away from that location. The president might also place revenue locations at the ends of such stacks, assuming that the stack contains enough cards to satisfy that revenue location (eg the Lancaster card might require 3 track cards before it can be connected/placed).

And this is where the network enters. There are multiple copies of the revenue location cards. Thus for instance, the B&O may place track from Baltimore to Lancaster and thence to Chicago. Meanwhile another, say the C&O places track to NYC, and then Chicago and thence Scranton. There would be two Chicago cards, one on the B&O’s network, and one on the C&O’s network. Indeed a company might have the same revenue location on several of the routes that fan out from the edges of its home station.

This is where the network enters. All those repeated Chicago cards are the same location. Thus in the above example the B&O might run a train from Baltimore -> Lancaster -> Chicago (transitioning to the C&O’s network) -> NYC -> Scranton. In fact a route might transition across several different company networks as they connect shared cities into their routes. And in the above example the B&O might drop a token in Chicago (and thus on all the Chicago cards), thus allowing them to run trains out of every route in every company’s stack that contains Chicago. As companies acquire tokens in other company’s networks, they might also place track and revenue locations directly on those networks (where visible from their tokens) instead of onto the networks directly attached to their home stations. A virtual implied network, all build from cards!

Twitter Week: 2010-10-24

J C Lawrence — Sun, 24 Oct 2010 06:41:00 +0000

RT @nytimes: A Kind of Hunt That Even Deer Can Get Behind http://nyti.ms/ (And deer over-population is still a problem?) #
RT @sciam: The Little Energy Program That Could? http://bit.ly/9OrKCh (Any successes? More profitable paths?) #
The problem with the blind leading the blind: when they get somewhere they can't tell where (or if) they went. #badmeetings #ohdearleader #
Quick straw poll: How important is it to get 1849 back on the market? #18xx #
@scottredracecar I've been talking to a different #18xx publisher about 1849. Does that make a difference? in reply to scottredracecar #
@joshuabaer @technotheory @cyantist @davemcclure Yes, @alizatw is both female & an email maven. in reply to joshuabaer #
@scottredracecar: What sort of numbers do you think 1849 would sell? #18xx in reply to scottredracecar #
♺ @AsteroidWatch: See the comet making a death plunge toward the sun? Watch the coronagraph http://bit.ly/c2m8eH & watch lower right (4:00) #
♺ @venturehacks: Don't expect to pay yesterday's prices for exceptional talent; Facebook and Google have to buy whole companies to recruit. #
@scottredracecar: #18xx didn't buy 18EZ, newbies did. 1860 sold ~400 copies. Only hardcore will buy 1849? I figure 150-200 copies over 2yrs. in reply to scottredracecar #
@BrenoKummel Important to the market & important to development of #18xx as a genre. I find 1849 a significant (fringe) design in the genre. in reply to BrenoKummel #
@frandallfarmer I notice the implied operational tax and reduced productivity more. (Sarbanes-Oxley) #finance in reply to frandallfarmer #
@BrenoKummel Nod. 1849 has clearly affected my design processes/goals. Few others express the dangers of _any_ investing so clearly. #18xx in reply to BrenoKummel #
@BrenoKummel 1849 isn't so short. 4.5-5 hours here. #18xx in reply to BrenoKummel #
RT @titleofmagazine Man builds telegraph using only stone age materials found in the woods: http://bit.ly/96Pg0g (A Maker-fu Master!) #
@gilhova I say, "Heavens to Murgatroyd!", tho Betsy is a bit more common. in reply to gilhova #
RT @NASA: The Gravity of Water: See the big seasonal shifts in water across the Americas from the GRACE satellite. http://go.usa.gov/amS #

Twitter Week: 2010-10-17

J C Lawrence — Sun, 17 Oct 2010 06:41:00 +0000

RT @newscientist: Water cycle goes bust as the world gets warmer http://bit.ly/cLNUGy [Watersheds: the new goldfields] #
RT @sciam: Whooping cough in California: deaths caused by the anti-vaccination movement http://bit.ly/cCcMlr #
RT @sciam: Is killing yourself adaptive? That depends: An evolutionary theory about suicide http://bit.ly/cmNHDB #
♺ @scienceRSS: Scientific American: Will birth control solve climate change?: 150 people/minute join humanity… http://bit.ly/aoOWbp #
The true size of Africa: http://twitpic.com/2woim6/full #

Twitter Week: 2010-10-03

J C Lawrence — Sun, 03 Oct 2010 06:41:00 +0000

RT @timoreilly: Like Google's censorship map. http://bbc.in/bYI0EX Transparency is good. [Bravo!] #
RT @GreatDismal: The Polari Bible: http://www.thesisters.demon.co.uk/bible/ #
RT @newscientist: Bomb hotspots of northern Europe http://bit.ly/bRKiWY #

The great affair is to move

J C Lawrence — Wed, 15 Sep 2010 22:05:31 +0000

Now that 18FR-RCE is getting publisher attention (more on this later), I’ve been working on two more designs: 1845 and 18RT. 1845¹ has been in flight for more than a year now, but 18RT has replaced it as the smaller, simpler vehicle for trialling some of the core notions of 1845 while also exploring its own area.

“18RT?” I hear you cry? 18RoadTrain, an 18xx-inspired game set around the road trains of Australia, although in this case many Baltimore & Ohio inspired notions have been sneaking in as well.

Map

The current notion is for the map to cover the area from Darwin in the Northern Territory, down through Alice Springs to Adelaide in South Australia, and thence Melbourne in Victoria, and across to Brisbane in Queensland². Perth (Western Australia), Tasmania and the various major ports would be represented by off-boards, the Nullarbor Plains likely being implied by a token surcharge in the Perth off-board or extreme terrain costs for a single hex connection there. The primary focus of the map however would be a morass of dits and terrain surrounding the cattle ranches, metal mines and other bulk-export production centres.

Companies

The general idea is for a slew of private companies with 1870-esque revenue bonus tokens, accelerated track-builds, terrain discounts and the like. The general idea is that these would either be assigned to major companies ala many David G Hecht games, or sold (at close to cost) to major companies ala 1846.

I’d like to also represent, if only partially, the excessively poetic GSR and Ghan. Wrapping them in a revenue-based private is an obvious route, but perhaps less interesting. Instead I’ve been toying with the idea of a president-less investment vehicle (akin to the bank of England in 1848) which pays liability-less revenues as a function of both the current train technology level and much of the connection between Adelaide and Darwin has been built. Something similar might be also done with the (recent) iron ore connections to China, the Tasmania produce connection, the vast emergent wine industry etc, but in those cases in a manner which more directly connects to major companies operating in those areas.

I’m currently toying with 8-10 major companies which can be incrementally capitalised or fully capitalised at the president’s choice³.

Trains, err, Trucks

A first notion is to change how trains are managed. Of course they’re not really trains, but bear with me as calling them trains makes the 18xx-relevant language easier:

Unlimited trains per technology level
No train limits for companies
Maintenance fee due for each train at the end of that company’s operation of: ((current_tech_level – train_size)^2-1)*10. ie the sequence of $10, $30, $80, $150, $240 etc.
A company may research the next technology level and upgrade all of its trains (for a $fee) to the next available train-level. When doing so the company may not run the trains that are upgraded. This may happen multiple times in an Operating Round with increasing expense for each acceleration.
If no company researches the next available technology level in a given set of Operating Rounds, then the game does immediately before the Stock Round.
The definition of a legal route is changed. Only stations and off-boards count against train-length. Dits count for revenue but not against length. At least one train’s route must intersect both one of the company’s station markets and a small town/dit. All subsequent trains must either intersect one of the revenue locations touched by a previous train and a dit and a city, or must intersect a station marker (in a city) and a dit in the normal manner. As a result, a single station marker can support many possible train routes that spread out somewhat like a peacock’s fan from a single starting station (ie a sort-of flood-fill)⁴.
A company which pays a dividend and cannot profitably run a given train (ie income from the train is larger than maintenance fees) must discard the train (for no recompense).

Track

The next area of exploration is a tentative form of impermanent track combined with an inversion of normal revenue allocations:

Dits (towns) are generally worth more than cities and upgrade to be worth a lot more. Specifically dits appreciate faster and further than cities when upgraded.
Bush “track” is represented by narrow gauge track.
At the end of each set of ORs all narrow gauge track is removed from the map (dirt roads wash out with the rainy season)
Most of the centre of the board is terrain interspersed with single and double dits.
Yellow narrow gauge track can be upgraded to green standard gauge track, which is not removed at the end of the set of ORs
Single dit track does not upgrade (ala 1830).
Yellow double-dit narrow-gauge track can be upgraded a green tile to a mix of a narrow-gauge route and a standard gauge route. In this case at the end of the OR the tile is demoted to a green single dit of a higher revenue.
Yellow narrow gauge double-dits can also be upgraded green track with to both sides being standard gauge.
Green double-dit standard gauge cites can be upgraded to (standard) green/brown 4-exit cities.
The offboards which ring the map allow train (gangs) which run to them to double-count N dits for revenue.

Stock market

I’m interested in varying the rates of appreciation at different sections of a stock market, as well as stock markets which don’t have the traditional triangular shape⁵. What if the market had a different shape? What if the top-edge of the market weren’t flat? What if the rate of appreciation across the market were non-uniform in an interesting manner? What if navigating the marker’s new particulars were significant to gameplay?

A first toy idea is below⁶:

	40	45	50	60	70	80	95	110	125	145	165	190	220	255	295	340	390	450	520	600	690	795	915	1050	1210	1390	1600
	35	40	45	55	65	75	85	100	115	130	150	175	200	230	265	305	350	405	465	535	615	705	810	930	1070	1230	1415
	35	40	45	50	60	70	80	90	105	120	135	155	175	200	230	260	295	335	380	435	495	565	645	735	840	960	1095
	35	40	45	50	55	60	70	80	90	100	110	125	140	155	175	195	220	245	275	310	345	385	430	480	540	605	680
	30	35	40	45	50	55	60	70	80	90	100	110	120	135	150	165	185	205	230	255	285	315	350	390	435	485	540
	30	35	40	45	50	55	60	65	70	75	85	95	105	115	125	140	155	170	185	205	225	250	275	305	335	370	405
	25	30	35	40	45	50	55	60	65	70	75	80	85	95	105	115	125	135	145	160	175	190	205	225	245	265	290
	30	30	30	35	40	45	50	55	60	65	70	75	80	85	90	95	105	115	125	135	145	155	165	180	195	210	225
	25	25	25	30	35	40	45	50	55	60	65	70	75	80	85	95	105	115	125	135	145	160	175	190	205	225	245
	25	25	25	25	30	35	40	45	50	55	60	65	70	75	85	95	105	115	125	140	155	170	185	205	225	250	275
	20	20	20	20	25	30	35	40	45	50	55	60	65	70	80	90	100	110	120	135	150	165	185	205	230	255	285
	20	20	20	20	20	25	30	35	40	45	50	55	60	65	75	85	95	105	120	135	150	170	190	215	240	270	300
	15	15	15	15	15	20	25	30	35	40	45	50	55	60	70	80	90	100	115	130	145	165	185	210	235	265	300
	15	15	15	15	15	15	20	25	30	35	40	45	50	55	65	75	85	95	110	125	145	165	190	215	245	280	320
10	15	15	15	15	15	15	20	25	30	35	40	45	50	60	70	80	90	105	120	140	160	185	215	245	280	320	370

Market Details

The top row appreciates by 15% horizontally. The next row down by 14%, the next row again by 13% and so on down to 8%. Then the next row down by 9%, 10% etc back up to 15%. The result is a market that’s heavily skewed towards stock-appreciation at the edges, but is flat and uninteresting in the middle — that same middle that the shape of the market pushes all shares towards.
The magnitudes of the stock-price increases toward the top, especially in the second section, and are thus rather large⁷. It is hoped that this will provide a balancing tension between being dividend/income-centric versus portfolio/stock-centrism.
Arrows on ceiling cells by walls point down and to the right for when stocks bounce on the ceiling or hit the wall.
Similar arrows for floor cells merely point vertically up (no acceleration).
Red cells are possible pars (some will likely need to be removed)
Players may buy past 60% from the Open Market.
The coloured sections in the corner may be removed, or if they remain, are unlikely to have traditional definitions.

Stock price movement

Up or follow arrow if 100% in player hands
Right (at least) once if total dividend is larger than price
Right twice if total dividend is more than double price and company is incrementally capitalised⁸
No movement if total dividend equals price
Left if total dividend is less than price but larger than half of price
Left and down if total dividend is half of price or less
Down on stock sales (possibly once per sale rather than once per share)
Down if shares in the Open Market at the end of a Stock Round (maybe)

Game Events:

Yes, a stock can pay a dividend and move right or up and find its price reduced as a result. Of course it can also pay an inadequate dividend and move left or left and down for the same reduced price result. Simply consistently paying dividends is no longer enough to prosper.
(Not shown) the stock market is divided into diagonal stripes. Companies start with a limited and small number of station makers. As their stock prices move right across the various bars, they are allowed to buy and place additional station markers.
On the sale or research of the first 6T all share prices fall to the floor, move left (if possible), and then fall to the floor again. (This ordering is deliberate and specific) Again, like 18FR-RCE’s all-the-trains-rust moment, this is in recognition of World War II. It is generally hoped that this will happen when several companies are near or shortly past the market constriction around $105⁹.
The result of the steeply banked par values and stock-appreciation differences, encourages fully capitalised companies to par high in order to maximise capital and ease getting their price through the passage.
Conversely, incrementally capitalised companies do not want to par high as later shares will (almost necessarily) be much cheaper than the initially parred shares, and will proportionally fail to raise capital. However parring an incrementally capitalised company low simply fails to raise enough capital to be viable.

Footnotes

And more on 1845 later as well. ↩
ie everything except Western Australia. ↩
This may change. I do want to provide a choice regarding capitalisation, but I want it to be a real choice where both answers are frequently correct. ↩
I am also toying with using something like 1873′s train-multiple concept here. ↩
After 1828′s market which has a large new triangular section bolted on the end-tip of what is otherwise a normal triangular-shaped market. ↩
The gray sections are for calculations and are not part of the market. ↩
eg $210/share should a stock reach $1,600/share ↩
The notion is to have both incrementally capitalised and fully capitalised companies, at the player-choice per company, with the choice as to which to prefer and when being difficult. ↩
Recently termed the stock anus or sphincter in local discussions. ↩

Way aye blow the man down

J C Lawrence — Thu, 09 Sep 2010 21:24:35 +0000

Stock-trashing in 1830: Is it actually necessary for Good Play or is it merely gratuitously abusive? This came up recently in both our 18C2C game and in an 18FR-RCE game a couple weeks before. I’ve no doubt it will come up future games as well. In both the mentioned games I set about trashing the stock-market (often buying shares and then selling them at a loss and so losing money) and several players complained that I was just being unnecessarily negative and wasting everyone’s time with an overly long and uninteresting Stock Round, when in truth a lot of my later success in those games was due to the fact that I’d stock-trashed so heavily (and taken the loss) earlier. Yep, if I hadn’t stock-trashed, I would have come in dead last rather than competing for the win.

The primary keys to the value of stock-trashing¹ mentioned, are return on investment (ROI) and liquidity. It will take a little bit to explain exactly how, so bear with me.

Imagine a game of 1830, perhaps a 5-player game. The game starts, the private auction happens, and you get…nothing, or maybe only a really small private company. Everyone else has nice big private companies and everyone (who can) is going to float a major company. You will float a major company too, but they’ll be getting nice big revenues from their private companies and you’ll be getting what, a few more shares and their piddly revenues and meager stock appreciation to match?

Key point: You’re already losing the game. Yep, you are already losing.

Think about that. You’re already losing the game. The game has just started, and you are losing. If you let this continue, you will in fact lose. That is, or should be, utterly unacceptable and you’d better do something about it right now. You need to win!

Right now you have more money than they do, but they are making money faster than you are, and pretty soon they’ll catch up and pass you as they sell their private companies into their major companies. At that point the game is history and you’ve lost. If you’d like to compete for the win, and I assume you are playing for the win, then you’d better change something and change it fast. Going on wanly hoping isn’t going to do it. The winning players certainly have no interest in changing anything as they’re already winning (or at least contending for the win). You are losing, so it is up to you to change something so that you can win instead, and this is where stock-trashing can come in.

But before we get there, we’d better understand a little more about how and why you are already losing, because you are most certainly already losing, and losing badly.

At core you are losing because your money is not working for you as well as their money is working for them. Sure, you can buy more shares than they can, but their private company revenues have massively better returns than any share you can buy. What they’ve invested in is simply better than what you’ve invested in, and they’ve got more of it than you do. Even better for them and worse for you, in a few more turns they’re going to be able to sell their private companies into their major companies, pulling out gobs of money, and they’ll use that money to buy even more shares than you can! Their money is not only working better than your’s, but they have a great wad of free money just sitting there waiting for them to take it! You don’t have any of those advantages, but they do! Thus, you are losing.

Change something. Now.

In the classic form they’ll sell their private companies in for massive money and then immediately sell down (or even better dump) the company they just looted, adding all that wonderful stock-appreciation they’ve made in the meantime to their dividends and private company money, and then they’ll float a brand new company for a nice high par and never even bother to look back. If someone wants to take their old company, then they’re welcome to it as it has crap trains and no money² They’re interested in their bright shiny new company that’s full of bright shiny new money!

That classic form is not good for you. Sure, it is good for them, but I really hope your goal in the game is for you to win, not for them to win. So, you’d better change something, and this is where stock-trashing can usefully enter.

The core problem is that their money is working better than your money, and you have to change that. One of the things you can change is stock-appreciation. If after they loot their companies when they then want to sell those (now crappy) shares in order to buy bright shiny new shares in a new company full of money it turns out that you’ve already trashed their stock so they have no stock-appreciation…well gosh, their money isn’t working for them so well any more, is it? You’ve killed their ROI (stock appreciation). And if you also just happen to have left the Bank Pool full of their trashed shares so that they can’t actually sell much into the market, well, you’ve clipped their wings even more as you’ve killed their liquidity (ability to sell shares to raise capital). Oh, and that new company they float? How about you stock-trash that as well, really beat the crap out of it? They bought $600 worth of shares in floating that company. If you can beat it down hard enough, that $600 worth of shares will now only be worth $300 or less (perhaps given a little help from the other players). Again, now their money isn’t working for them so well any more. Sure, they’ve got control of $1,000 in bright shiny new capital — you can’t solve every problem all at once — but it is going to take a long time to get that share-value you destroyed back. But, even better, you’re probably going to be able to buy those shares you trashed back again in the next stock round pretty cheaply as they won’t have appreciated much! You buy the shares, you trash the shares, you wait a set of ORs, then you buy most of them back again on the cheap in the next Stock Round. Now your money is starting to work for you better than their money is working for them!

What makes this a little more interesting is that many good players will buy/sell the last (6th) share of a company they’re floating. They do this in order to dissuade the stock-trashers waiting in the wings (it now costs money to stock-trash as the par is higher than the stock price), but also so that they can then use that money to buy a share that will be paying better than their new company (their new company will miss at least one dividend as it has no train). Someone may also flip a share or two into the market while you’re building up your portfolio to dump, thus costing you even more money as you trash the market. The costs to stock-trash can be high.

How much is stock-trashing worth to you? How much is it worth to your position to beat them down? Is it worth buying 4 shares at $67ea and sell them at $65ea, losing $2 each? What about buying shares at $100ea and selling them at $90ea, losing $10 on each one? Or buying shares at $100 and selling at $82? There’s a judgment call here on how much loss is acceptable. There’s a point at which it is simply too expensive, but how much is too little and how much is too much? Not biting the bullet will lose the game, but losing too much money in stock-trashing will also lose the game. Finding the right middle ground is key³.

You’re going to have to lose money, to deliberately throw money away, in order to slow them down and to rescue your position, but how much money should you throw away and which stocks should you trash and how much? If all goes perfectly (unlikely) you’ll convert an obviously losing position to a competitive position, but doing that is going to cost you some of that money you so desperately need. More likely you’ll convert a losing position to a merely weak position, and then you’ll have to fight again, and again in later stock rounds, beating and thrashing the stock-market, taking losses as you do so, until you’ve caught up and pulled them down to your level. It won’t be cheap, or easy, but if you do win, you’ll have earned it by tooth and claw from the ground up.

But then isn’t the answer then to just make sure you always get some good private companies and thus bid whatever’s needed to get them? No. Pay too much and you’ll never get it back⁴. The guy without any private companies will stock-trash, you won’t get your money back from your over-large bids, and you’re losing yet again. There’s a balancing point, and it is hard to find and balance correctly⁵.

Also, won’t everybody just stock-trash, turning stock-trashing into a shared pathology that makes no net difference? Yes and mostly no. Stock trashing sacrifices opportunities. You’re buying bad shares or passing on doing any actions while the other players snap up the good shares. Do that too much of that and you’ll lose as well. Also you’re making good shares cheap, and the other players are going to buy some of them (at their new low price) — so you’re helping as well as hindering them with your stock-trashing. Getting that balance right is not easy. In short stock-trashing is a necessary thing, but also a fairly subtle and highly contextual thing.

Also, remember that stock-trashing is not your only weapon. There’s also track and the train rush to consider among others. 18xx players have many offensive and defensive weapons to choose among. Stock-trashing is just one.

Footnotes

There is another value of stock-trashing, which I’ll not discuss in this article, of manipulating operating order so that certain companies run before other companies. This can be critical, but is outside the scope of this article. ↩
That company is now a dog. If nobody takes that liability away from them, they’ll rescue it with their third company or, more likely, just buy its permanent trains out of pocket from the great dividends they’ll make from all their great new shares. ↩
And that’s a hard spot to find accurately. ↩
As learned to my cost in a game of 1856 where I bid $5 too much for the port… ↩
If it were easy, we wouldn’t be playing the game. ↩

Arsenic, lace and the cost of death

J C Lawrence — Thu, 09 Sep 2010 20:49:28 +0000

The concept of the poison train is common in 18xx games. Commonly it is the poison 4-train: the last train before the permanent trains, and might never run before it rusts, and almost certainly won’t run for long. From a design-perspective, how bad can that poison train be before it becomes unreasonable?

In the particular case I’m looking at, the poison train is a little worse than the poison 4-train in say 1830 as there isn’t a nice cheap permanent train on the other side. Instead…there’s another poison train right after the first poison train. Oy vey.

Some explanation is in order. I’m looking at a fairly standard extended train roster: 2/3/4/5/6/7/Diesel. The 4-trains rust the 2-trains, the 6-trains rust the 3-trains, the 7-trains rust the 4-trains and Diesels rust the 4-trains and 5-trains (both). Yep, 5-trains aren’t permanent. Also, both the 7-trains and the Diesels become available for purchase immediately after the first 6-train has been purchased. What this usually means is that after the first 6-train is bought, the very next train bought is a Diesel which rusts all the trains in the entire game, outside of that first permanent 6-train. It is fairly dramatic.

The problem with this pattern is that nobody wants to buy the last 5-train, as it will get to run no more than twice and probably only once before it rusts, if that.. So, I copied a page from Lonny Orgler: At the end of each set of ORs the government/foreigners buy a train from the supply. Thus, even if the players pause, the trains keep moving and the game advances. The twist I’ve added is that if the government buys the last train of a rank, thus making a new train-type available, then they also buy one of those (with all game phases changing as appropriate). Thus, for instance, if there’s one 2-train left, then the foreigners buy a 2-train and the first 3-train, thus putting the game into the green-phase. Or, more topically, if there’s one 5-train left, then the foreigners buy it plus the first (permanent) 6-train, thus rusting the 3-trains and starting the rush for the permanent trains. So far the form in our games has been that the foreigners take the first 6-train at the end of a set of ORs, and the first first company to run after the Stock Round buys a diesel, thus causing every other company in the game to lose all their trains. It is, as they say, dramatic.

What this all means is that not only is the last 5-train a poison train, but the penultimate 5-train is also a poison train. If a company buys the penultimate 5-train, then the foreigners will buy the last 5-train and the first 6-train and VOOM! the game is moving fast and that 5-train the player bought is about to rust very soon now. Ditto of course for the last 5-train.

But…if someone doesn’t buy the penultimate 5-train, then there’s another set of Operating Rounds while the foreigners/government whittle away the penultimate 5-train, and then at the end of the next set of ORs the foreigners take the last 5-train and the first 6-train — which means that the first 5-trains probably get to run 5 times, which is pretty good, and maybe too good.

And there lies the rub. Having a company buy the penultimate 5-train is essentially throwing money away, in this case $400¹. Who is going to buy it? The only player that has any incentive is the player that’s losing. They are losing, so they have to change something to have any hope of changing their position — except that in this case the only thing they can do also comes with a $400 fee. Ouch.

And yet players buy the poison 4-train in 1830 all the time. It hurts, they know it is poison, but they also know that if they don’t they’re really sunk. So they bite the bullet and buy the 4-train…and usually the first 5-train immediately after it (which softens the blow a little). And that’s fine, except that I don’t have any nice permanent train immediately after the poison train, just another poison train…

There are three basic cases:

1) The “losing” player buys the 5-train because if they let the non-permanent trains continue to run they will lose, but if they bring out the permanent trains then they’ll win (presumably because of their better diesel routes) Of course in this case they’re not really “losing”.

2) The losing player buys the poison 5-train because if they let the non-permanent trains continue to run they will loose massively, but if they bring out the permanent trains, then they won’t lose as badly. Thus buying the poison train improves their position.

3) The losing player buys the poison 5-train, brings out the permanent trains, and thus loses even more badly than if they had let the non-permanent trains continue to run.

The first case is ideal, and not a problem from a design-vantage.

From a design-vantage the second case is also fine and even somewhat ideal. However it requires unusually perceptive players in order to distinguish between the second and third cases a 3-9 Operating Rounds before the end of the game. That’s a pretty high competency threshold.

The second two cases are the more likely to happen in real games, and in those cases it may seem that the game-system is punishing the losing player by $400, and it is punishing them because they’re losing. They’re down, so the game kicks them. Worse, I suspect that many players will see everything but the first case as being the third case, and then they’ll often see that in the worst possible light as punitive punishment of the already destitute.

I don’t think that perception matches reality. The reality I’ve seen in games with players of mixed skill in our local 18xx group is that the first not-really-losing case is far from common (and is absurdly hard to detect), the third going-to-lose-even-worse is also not common and usually only happens after the game has spent an extended period in the already-losing-but-will-lose-by-less middle case, and the already-losing-but-will-lose-by-less middle case is actually the significant majority of all cases.

But, detecting that the middle case is actually the most populous case rather than the third case, requires a skilled and perceptive player. Just how high can, should, I set the bar of required player-skill for an already-losing player to make the Right Decision? It seems a significant question. I don’t want to design a hand-holding game for perpetual novices, but I also don’t want it to only be effectively playable by world-class players. Gah².

Which, even ignoring that more interesting question, puts me right back to the initial question. How bad can that poison train be before it becomes unreasonable? If the poison train cost $10,000 it is clearly too expensive to ever bite the bullet. If the poison train cost merely $1, then nobody would even blink at buying all of them. Somewhere in the middle is the this-hurts-but-I-have-to-bite-the-bullet point that also provides for the most interesting game decisions, and I have very little idea how to determine where that point is. For now I’ve picked $400. It is as good a number as any and better than most (and perhaps worse than a few?).

Footnotes

Okay, really 400fr, but dollar signs are simpler and more universal. ↩
Inclusivity sucks. ↩

Twitter Week: 2010-08-29

J C Lawrence — Sun, 29 Aug 2010 06:41:00 +0000

My respect for @timoreilley and #gov2.0 was just validated with PopVox (http://www.popvox.com/blog/). Thanks guys! #
@jdludlow Yeah, but each is also an opportunity to lay out the line again. in reply to jdludlow #
RT @neilhimself: SF Movie posters from an alternate universe where even the Roman #s were different. Some great ones. http://bit.ly/cNqjXz #
RT @sciam: To celebrate our 165th anniversary, Scientific American is offering 1845 prices on subscriptions! http://bit.ly/b9iNLM #

Twitter Week: 2010-08-22

J C Lawrence — Sun, 22 Aug 2010 06:41:00 +0000

RT @newscientist: From here to infinity: the struggle to save arithmetic http://bit.ly/bJYER4 #
RT @newscientist: Add salt as required: the recipe for fresh water http://bit.ly/9nCucJ #
♺ @hnshah: RT @om: Yet Another Bollywood Satire, Thanks The Guild http://tinyurl.com/2choh7n [If only] #
RT @timoreilly: Wow – this could change dynamics of #ebooks: in Japan, people are digitizing their own http://bit.ly/acMv8F via @naypinya #
@brettspiel: Yeah, but I really don't want to cross media-type boundaries in that discussion. in reply to brettspiel #
♺ @NASA: Commercial partner, SpaceX, completed its 1st Dragon high altitude drop test. http://www.spacex.com/updates.php [I'm excited!] #
@brettspiel Gotcha, and not a bad comparison given the Japanese situation I tweeted about earlier. in reply to brettspiel #
@BrenoKummel I've not tracked Essen this year as I usually do. 1880, Poseidon, Winsome Collection… in reply to BrenoKummel #
RT @GamesOnTheBrain: Chicago Express Coming to the iPhone http://bit.ly/cxeMHZ #boardgames #iphone #ipod [Yowzers!] #

Twitter Week: 2010-08-15

J C Lawrence — Sun, 15 Aug 2010 06:41:00 +0000

@GreatDismal I'm pleased with Tweetdeck for iPad in reply to GreatDismal #
‘John Doe’ Who Fought FBI Spying Freed From Gag Order After 6 Years: http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2010/08/nsl-gag-order-lifted/ #

Twitter Week: 2010-08-08

J C Lawrence — Sun, 08 Aug 2010 06:41:00 +0000

♺ @jodrellbank: The Perseids are coming! Follow @virtualastro @britastro for next week's #Meteorwatch news (trailer: http://bit.ly/9sST8p) #
♺ @GreatDismal: RT @dgroundsel: Aluminum foil ship floating on sulphur hexafluoride gas http://bit.ly/cm2ZSi [and http://is.gd/e32mP #
RT @oneillkza: Stock exchange crop circles connected to July theft of Goldman-Sachs HFT software? http://ow.ly/2l7hM http://ow.ly/2l7ae #
Mike Calhoon just won 1849 by going bankrupt on the 10H — our first ever bankrupt victor. Well done Mike! #18xx #
♺ @davemcclure: OH: "Apple is the Willy Wonka of the tech world." #iPhoneAsEverlastingGobstopper #GoldenTicket #
♺ @sciam: RT @lornina: #tcmy10 there's no such thing as sustainable water. Bruce Brandfon of Scientific American #

Twitter Week: 2010-08-01

J C Lawrence — Sun, 01 Aug 2010 06:41:00 +0000

@snicholson: I am a grumpy old man god dammit ! And get off my lawn! in reply to snicholson #
RT @newscientist: Green machine: Aircon that doesn't warm the planet http://bit.ly/cPzaqL #
What if I allowed players to put properties back on the market in Corner Lot? #
@alizatw I'm think more a way to recoup liquidity during the mid-game recession. in reply to alizatw #
@alizatw There's a rank & ordering problem there. Also fiddly. Not so keen. Inject at highest order is simpler & often hard decision. in reply to alizatw #
@scottredracecar Likely limited to once per game per player. As the game is currently ~1hr, I'm not so worried by length. in reply to scottredracecar #
@alizatw Of course, but you (only) get what it sells for. Call it "flipping". in reply to alizatw #
@GamesOnTheBrain: No, insert in price-order instead of bid/buy/pass. in reply to GamesOnTheBrain #
@sedjtroll: The rules decide what is in and out of scope. in reply to sedjtroll #
@richardtempura Dunno. What if you tested Corner Lot? I won't be at WBC. in reply to richardtempura #
@alizatw: The one I've heard most recently is "sweater kittens". in reply to alizatw #
@alizatw: They both tend to create autonomous uncontrolled endocrinal and hormonal responses that are prone to positive feedback loops. in reply to alizatw #
RT @newscientist:Emotions evolved as tools to manipulate others into cooperating http://bit.ly/cVeI6Z [This is a new thought?] #
RT @GreatDismal:Las Palmas Woman http://bit.ly/ahDDpU #
RT @timoreilly:"If you were hacking since age 8, it means you were privileged" http://bit.ly/aD92rm via @laurelatoreilly [Since age 13] #
RT @alleyinsider:Side-By-Side Comparison Shows Just How Slow Your Old iPhone Is by @willwei http://read.bi/9N5Tmt #
RT @newscientist:Phytoplankton in decline: bye bye food chain? http://bit.ly/cuzZ3B #
Captured: America in Color from 1939-1943: http://blogs.denverpost.com/captured/2010/07/26/captured-america-in-color-from-1939-1943/ #
RT @newscientist: Graphene bubbles mimic super-powerful explosive magnetic field. Yes that's right: *mimic* http://bit.ly/ccYKvg #
@andsoerinsaid There is enough innuendo in that tweet to be TMI. in reply to andsoerinsaid #
@andsoerinsaid: First he handles everything, then you suck at dating. What's next, an election or a dry-cleaner? in reply to andsoerinsaid #
RT @neilhimself: I LOVE these photos. Scottish landscapes, african wildlife: http://bit.ly/cqW8hD (thank you @olganunes) #
@ChrisTheCat Hansa Teutonica got more of a shrug here. in reply to ChrisTheCat #

Twitter Week: 2010-07-25

J C Lawrence — Sun, 25 Jul 2010 06:41:00 +0000

@brettspiel The analytical austerity of Corner Lot may well be it's greatest strength & its greatest weakness. in reply to brettspiel #
RT @jamesoreilly Thought this was an Onion headline "Earth's upper atmosphere collapses. Nobody knows why" Apparently not http://is.gd/dxGJ7 #
RT @newscientist: An evil atmosphere is forming around geoengineering http://bit.ly/9ZITxm #
@alizatw: AIR you were the one napping in that 18C2C game. in reply to alizatw #
♺ @chadaustin: Perspective: it takes 1000 pounds of coal to power a 100 W lightbulb for one year. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coal #
♺ @chadaustin: One reason to hire new people is that it breaks your organization out of local optima. #
RT @sciam: RT @mims: USDA: There's a clear link between the use of antibiotics in livestock & drug resistance in humans http://bit.ly/apsrWn #
@icheyne: League of Legends? I'm not that testosteronal any more. in reply to icheyne #
@GamesOnTheBrain 3.5hrs sounds about right for a first play of any member of the Riding Series. in reply to GamesOnTheBrain #

Anatomy of a three company dump

J C Lawrence — Thu, 20 May 2010 22:31:08 +0000

Three company dumps in 18xx are frequently discussed but far less often successfully executed. They are hard to pull off well. Additionally, according to my email, there’s also a fair bit of confusion on how to arrange a three company dump.

The minimal form:

You are the president of CompanyA, CompanyB and CompanyC.
When CompanyB runs it has no train and has to buy one.
CompanyB buys a train from CompanyA for face value or less¹
CompanyB doesn’t have enough treasury to buy the train for that much, and neither does the CompanyB president, so the CompanyB president sells shares in CompanyC to fund the train, sufficient to dump CompanyC on another player (who holds at least two shares of the company) in the middle of an Operating Round.

You’ll have to flesh out the details of how to arrive in this minimal state, and what related conditions you want to be true when you do. Presumably one of the pre-conditions is that CompanyC doesn’t (or won’t) have a train.

Getting all the details right is tricky. In several hundred 18xx games, I’ve seen two well-executed three company dumps. A well-executed three company dump can be devastating to the player the company is dumped on, especially if it lands them needing to buy a $1,100 diesel they were unprepared for (as it was for me in one of those two cases).

Notes:

The company selling the train (usually) can’t be the one being dumped as the sale/control-transfer happens before the presidential authorisation for the train sale and the new president is unlikely to authorise the train sale.
Some games explicitly disallow three company dumps. Check the rules for the game you are playing. The games that disallow, usually do so by requiring that forced train purchases must be from the bank and not from other companies.

Footnotes

The 1830 rules allow trains to be purchased for up to face value during forced emergency train purchases – so pick a value just high enough to accomplish the dump ↩

And upon the far horizon in the east

J C Lawrence — Thu, 22 Apr 2010 07:33:41 +0000

Kanga.nu and its services have been moved to a new host. This marks the final decommissioning of the box I built from parts while working at VA Research. It has been a long time..and it is somewhat sad to see her fade into scrap.

If you notice problems or inconsistencies, please comment below or email me.

Twitter Week: 2010-04-17

J C Lawrence — Sat, 17 Apr 2010 08:00:00 +0000

RT @alleyinsider:Steve Jobs responds to Adobe furor, tells you to go read John Gruber's post http://bit.ly/9B53Es [Doh!] #
@rholzgrafe: I dropped #Facebook. instead as I can find no use for #fb, but find Twitter extremely useful. Far more signal on #twitter. in reply to rholzgrafe #
@rholzgrafe: I don't use #FB or #Twitter (much) for friends. I do use Twitter for news, tech info, and professional interests. in reply to rholzgrafe #
@andsoerinsaid: I'm a less impressed with Samarkand. Stephen's Rocket is one of Knizia's two best games in my mind. Quite wonderful. in reply to andsoerinsaid #
@rholzgrafe: Oh, and you said to give you a shout when I'm dumping games toward the Endgame auction… Consider yourself yelled out. in reply to rholzgrafe #
@rholzgrafe Grab me on #bgdf_chat & I'll try & remember what I'm selling. in reply to rholzgrafe #
@BrenoKummel Historicity is clearly important to some. I don't know how dominant the trait is. I like it, but not critical to me. #18xx in reply to BrenoKummel #

Twitter Week: 2010-04-10

J C Lawrence — Sat, 10 Apr 2010 08:00:00 +0000

@scottsturn I'll take that as a solid reccomendation. Thanks. in reply to scottsturn #
@scottredracecar: Even more so because the iPad users are affluent early adopters, and that's a key market for much of the 'net. in reply to scottredracecar #
@jdludlow: There's no good way to support Flash on a (multii-)touch device. Interaction model too different w/o a multi-typed fine pointer. in reply to jdludlow #
@jdludlow: All the larger porn houses are converting all their content to work with the iPad. Most already have. They see the money. in reply to jdludlow #
@jdludlow Flash (games) reads the keyboard & mouse. It is inherent to the Flash UI model even with video. in reply to jdludlow #
@andsoerinsaid Yep, 1848 is a facinating game of capital control — & we're playing #18xx with Lonny Orgler here ATM! in reply to andsoerinsaid #
End of a 3P game of 18 FR-RCE with Lonny Orgler of Double-O games: http://twitpic.com/1dw2dt #
Lonny Orgler at the start of a 3P game of 18GL: #18xx http://twitpic.com/1dw35d #
Heading strong into the middle of 18GL: #18xx http://twitpic.com/1dw3o4 #
End-game track for 18GL: #18xx http://twitpic.com/1dw3wu #
@andsoerinsaid 1848 is a local & often played favourite. Lonny is visiting for three days, so we're playing #18xx every night with him. in reply to andsoerinsaid #
Lonny goes on his way & I am eviscerated in 1824 (DFL by 30%): #18xx http://twitpic.com/1e0wbr #

Twitter Week: 2010-04-03

J C Lawrence — Sat, 03 Apr 2010 08:00:00 +0000

RT @timoreilly: Racism at the heart of Tea Party rage? http://nyti.ms/br9RMC (via @Michael_Finberg) There's good evidence, says Frank Rich. #
@andsoerinsaid Woot! in reply to andsoerinsaid #

Twitter Week: 2010-03-27

J C Lawrence — Sat, 27 Mar 2010 08:00:00 +0000

@andsoerinsaid 20% error-rate outside of cheap questions (eg which hemisphere do you live in, north or south?) until I ran out of patience. in reply to andsoerinsaid #
Multiplying hummingbird: http://twitpic.com/1ap7ny #
RT @newscientist: The Bacteria Diet: For a trimmer figure, add an extra helping of gut bugs http://bit.ly/ajKvKR #
RT @GreatDismal: Dear Texas: Please shut up. Sincerely, History http://bit.ly/bFzNq1 (Praise be the choir) #

Twitter Week: 2010-03-20

J C Lawrence — Sat, 20 Mar 2010 08:00:00 +0000

@pontusnalle The problem I have with 2P 1889 is one player buys four 3-trains & mostly wins right there. #18xx in reply to pontusnalle #
@pontusnalle I'm only aware of one good 2P 1830-style #18xx & that's 1860, but it is a terrible newbie game. in reply to pontusnalle #
Wonderful 4P 18FR-RCE yesterday (Aliza $7,234 JCL $9,492 Jim $3,675 Daniel $7,620) #18xx http://twitpic.com/18rtnu #
@pontusnalle Confucius is about creating ties that resolve in your favour; that's what I expect to happen, esp with the admiral to win. in reply to pontusnalle #
@pontusnalle Eh, that just means that one player failed to create sufficient incentives for their direction. The struggle still happened. in reply to pontusnalle #