Honest Idea for fixing overly strong master cards!

bakija wrote:

That being said, player skill also has a lot to do with winning. Building a good deck, playing the cards you draw well, and doing what you can with the random position you end up in is just as significant. Being a good player in VTES means that you make the right moves at the right time, play the right cards that you happen to draw in the right circumstances. Being a good player in VTES means you build your deck well and know how to play it.

Exactly. I don't mean to say that VTES is purely a luck game. I'm saying it has a significant luck element that cannot be overcome with pure skill. I'm saying that very often any player has a 1/5 chance to sit in the winning position, it doesn't always happen, but it's common enough, and with that, to win a lot you need to play a lot.

Originally I was arguing that bit about master bloat forcing less toolboxy decks with less options, because that kind of a game is simply boring random chance to me. Well here's a thing, if we have a scenario where everybody is playing decks with options, and none of them are hard counters to the next, we play a game where skill matters much more - then I'm willing to say we see even great differences in skill.

Demnogonis wrote:

Exactly. I don't mean to say that VTES is purely a luck game. I'm saying it has a significant luck element that cannot be overcome with pure skill. I'm saying that very often any player has a 1/5 chance to sit in the winning position, it doesn't always happen, but it's common enough, and with that, to win a lot you need to play a lot.

Well, sure. But you can say that about lot of games--Poker, which is a very skill based game, is very influenced by luck. And yet the people who are good at poker win a lot more often than people who are not good at poker. And it has nothing to do with luck. I mean, yeah, if you only ever get dealt bad cards, even the best players in the world won't win much. But as luck tends to average out, the game is far more about skill then chance.

Agreed, well from what I understand of poker, you play so many hands over so many games in poker that the luck thing evens out, after all people wouldn't be able to earn their living with it otherwise. This is also why I say the top players win a lot of tournaments, because they enter a lot of tournaments.

However a single VTES game has one seating, and a single tournament has two-three + finals usually, so getting a win seat or suck seat even once is significant. Especially in the finals.

Demnogonis wrote:

This is also why I say the top players win a lot of tournaments, because they enter a lot of tournaments.

Well, yes. There are people who enter a lot of tournaments and win a lot. But there are also people who enter just as many tournaments who don't win at all.

Which, again, supports the idea that skill is more important than luck.

Yes. Sometimes you get a horrible seat and get killed due to a bad RPS issue. Sometimes you get a horrible shuffle and get killed due to your deck not working. And usually, skill won't save you from this. But over the long haul in VTES, skill is likely more important than luck is. As luck averages out. Skill doesn't.

bakija wrote:

Demnogonis wrote:

This is also why I say the top players win a lot of tournaments, because they enter a lot of tournaments.

Well, yes. There are people who enter a lot of tournaments and win a lot. But there are also people who enter just as many tournaments who don't win at all.

Which, again, supports the idea that skill is more important than luck.

Yes. Sometimes you get a horrible seat and get killed due to a bad RPS issue. Sometimes you get a horrible shuffle and get killed due to your deck not working. And usually, skill won't save you from this. But over the long haul in VTES, skill is likely more important than luck is. As luck averages out. Skill doesn't.

Neither luck nor skill averages out. And skill count, for a lot.

Lech wrote:

Neither luck nor skill averages out. And skill count, for a lot.

Well, no, luck does, in fact, average out. As that is what luck does.

If you roll a single 6 sided die and take the result, it will not seem average ("I got a 6! I win!"). If you roll a 6 sided die 100 times, you will roll each number about 1/6th of the time. And the more you roll it, the closer it will get to exactly 1/6th of the time.

Assuming 5 player games, on average, you will win 1 game in 5 (well, really, a little less if you consider 2-2-1 ties, but let's just go with it for now). And the more games you play, assuming you are completely average, you will approach winning 1 game in 5. If you are completely average (again, ignoring ties), you will win 1 game in 5 and average out to 1VP per game. That is middle.

People who are good win more often than that. People who are less good win less often than that. And as people do win more often than 1 in 5, and people lose more often than 4 times in 5, there is more to the game than pure chance.