The Perfect TR / Heat Engine - TERRAFORMING MARSterclass Ep. 17 part 2

[@BonelessDota]

I believe this video deserves a "like" for no other reason than the fact that I spend 6+ hours in editing inserting tiny heads of Jacob Fryxelius xD

[@jeffreyculbert2093]

Lol!

[@jeffreyculbert2093]

Gen 5, windmill that Eco Zone. One of your best outs as it helps you get closer to accessing the river rebates or teleport to access them if an opponent makes a green. No thinking required, this was one of your best outs here, it even adds some scaling oomph to your game plan.

[@jeffreyculbert2093]

Oh wow, and NRA as follow up, now you’re assured to win if you had taken Ecozone and used it for your third plant tag. Your opponents can ff at this stage, even without the most optimal line for your set up being played from gen 1.

[@BonelessDota]

@@jeffreyculbert2093 Yea the only reason I didn't take Eco Zone was because I could get investment loan instead. Considering investment loan was 0 cost and I had media archives, then eco zone would have cost me 12 + 11 so 23 M€ (if compared to investment loan). In this case I would rather build a city and place greeneries around them. Felt more urgent. I feel like you are correct on the other comments but in this case I'm standing firm on my decision ;) Minor thing here but to be fair I couldn't know I would get NRA next and besides I believe I already had 3 plant tags.

[@jeffreyculbert2093]

Loan is usually a perfect card for this type of tempo strategy, and with so few remaining plants in hand it’s a debatable point to pick one over the other. I’d have leaned toward taking the teleport I’d been desperate for after my Mohole placement trapped my ground position away from plant and cash rebates. I’d expect this line has a slight upside edge over loan since the rebates can replace the credit value from loan if I claim enough of them and we might turn on various outs like Advanced Ecosystems as additional scaling live hits if found, but it’s not the most clear cut case and having seen media archives certainly muddies the waters.

[@BonelessDota]

@@jeffreyculbert2093 I would argue the City I was able to make from the Loan-money solves some of the problems you are talking about. But I see your point. Tough choice for sure.

[@jeffreyculbert2093]

It certainly did, and we were always going to make at least one city at some point. Plus the opponents in this game are a lot less likely to punish you for an Eco Zone pass in that position than if they were all 2k players themselves (Eco Zone in 2k rated matches is such a dangerous pass that it’s very possible to outright lose games where you choose to pass it). In the end the problem that needed solving (finding better real estate to convert next to) was solvable in this spot with a variety of choices and having a huge lead gave a lot of flexibility to make each of the options feasible.

[@jeffreyculbert2093]

Gen 2, Bushes > Farming here, remember this is a tempo based set up, you’ll need the faster plant card to enable Ocean->convert for rebates play pattern sooner as this needs to be established by gen 3 in this setting. 60-65 points is good enough to win here against what your opponents did on gen 1 even though playing AM gen 1 was an error.

[@BonelessDota]

Yea it was an interesting choice this one. The way I see it is that Farming is effectively +2 TR and cost +6 M€. So this is a good deal except for the fact that the 2 generation delay before I would be able to play it could hurt my tempo. So I made the same call as you in this case. Bushes is to be preferred here.

[@jeffreyculbert2093]

Gen 4, Convoy from Europa, first pick 100% here. You have no good titanium targets in hand that fit your game plan and this card is your gamelan exactly. Free ocean is free, in some sense.

[@BonelessDota]

Yea looking at this, I think Convoy from Europa was slightly better than Heather. Agreed. However, I did have a plan for my titanium as I was planning to play Methane from Titan, so this is why I chose Heather instead. But then we are probably back to this difference in ideology I talked about in the other comment regarding AM (rush vs midgame strat). I imagin you would say that Methane from Titan is also too greedy at this point and would delay my goal of closing the game at 7 gen. I wanted Methane from Titan to get a little bit of VP and the 2 plant-production looked tasty for me considering the Oxygen was still at 0. I guess Heather + Methane would help me adressing the oxygen problem. Ultimately this is probably what guided my decision.

[@jeffreyculbert2093]

I think I’d have been much more hesitant to play Methane, but this probably comes from an information advantage I have knowing what the win rates for Methane are with respect given to the generation it’s played (post gen 3 win rates for playing Methane trend downward pretty quickly) and in this game’s specific state o2 lagged long enough that Methane would have come down a bit “late” to be a good contributor toward a win (according to the statistics, but this can be misleading at times). In the end everything worked out well with Methane, largely due to having played AM in gen 1, and given the benefit of hindsight we can absolutely see that your gen 8 score improved from what should be the expectation if neither of these jovs had been played. They prevented a gen 7 end, but improved your gen 8 scoring rate, and knowing that this trade off is possible has its own benefits moving forward into the future even if we won’t be able to play future games with the benefit of hindsight. We’ll know the trade off is possible and at least be able to account and calculate for similar future lines better.

[@BonelessDota]

@@jeffreyculbert2093 Yea I can certainly see why Methane is questionable this late in the game. I was actually hesitant playing it, but I guess the 2 plant-prod. and the 2 VP persuaded me.

[@jeffreyculbert2093]

Ok, gen 1 set up here, you should skip Asteroid Mining entirely. It’s too slow and is counterproductive to the primary game plan of monopolizing the heat track and claiming an early thermalist as the 8 cost award with Terraformer and Gardner being the Milestones you chase with this opening set up. Sub Res is fine, Arctic Algae paired with 8 heat prod at games start is a classic terraforming rush engine with an incredible win rate, even in 4p, and you’ve got Soletta for that 8 heat prod to open with Mohole as your teleport after placing your first greenery conversion so that you’ll be able to walk along both sides of the river for rebates as part of your play pattern. The only cards missing from this hand that are needed to win are oceans and plants, so those should be the only things you even bother to buy in drafts from the opening gen onward. This start should play absolutely no scaling production cards or card draw and should be able to force both the end and the win by gen 7 using basically nothing but your opening set up, particularly against opponents of such low rating. I’m inclined to believe that because you bought Asteroid Mining and intend to play it that you might encounter difficulty ending on time and probably get pushed back to a gen 8 end. Let’s watch now and see how you do!

[@BonelessDota]

I actually considered whether Asteroid Mining should be played or not. My reason for playing it is that I felt it was a little bit too all in to only play Mohole + Soletta. Considering I hadn't picked up Insulation yet I could be in risk of having the heat closed out quickly and then my game would slow down since the only engine I would have at that point would be the TR I got from the Heat. I still had a way to play Soletta gen 2 so I figured forfeiting 7 heat would be okay in this case. But then again I also delayed my arctic algae and resevoir so I'm aware it's not so simple as this. Asteroid Mining takes 5 gens to pay for itself and has the admittedly minor upside of having a Jovian tag + 2 VP. I agree with you that likely my decision to play Asteroid Mining probably caused me to end the game in gen 8 rather than gen 7 but the question is, is it so bad to end it in 8 rather than 7 provided you get a nice boost of VP to go with it? This is grounds for a very interesting topic which is Terraforming strat vs. midgame strat. Jacob Fryxelius mentioned his go-to strategy is the midgame strategy which is why I felt it could be fun to talk about this in a video. In other words, is it ever a good idea to play the socalled "midgame strat" where you close at gen 8 or 9 instead of 7 but you get more VP along the way. I feel it's dangerous playing the middle road like this as it opens up the possibility of greedy players beating you. On the other hand, I tend to favor a little VP along the way. (Hence my decision to play Asteroid Mining) Sometimes you close the game super early but you still only come in second due to the fact that you don't have enough VP. So is the midgame strat ever legit? Or is it a failed concept and a bad mindset to have?

[@jeffreyculbert2093]

There most certainly are some so called “mid range” strategic archetypes! There’s the rush archetypes that revolve around speed and tempo efficiency, the scaling archetypes that revolve around achieving maximum scoring efficiency potential, and then a handful of archetypes that try to split the difference and utilize a bit of a surprise factor as by hiding true intentions until a timely moment. Each has merits and weaknesses, they might be very all in or committal approaches, they be card and deck order dependent for a particular result, or have other various means of being exploited by the really strong players so being at least moderately versed in each can help a player better anticipate what an opponent wants to do and what the proper counter tactics might be in that situation. It’s usually easiest to pivot from a mid range approach into either of the others, but it’s also usually a bit less efficient to start down a mid range path from the opener. Some openers have really obvious game plans like this one where a particular high win rate card pairing shows up that defines a particular archetype (Soletta + Arctic Algae), but they are certainly very committal right from the start even if that typical play pattern from this game is pretty well established and very strong.

[@BonelessDota]

@@jeffreyculbert2093 Cool thanks, agreed.

[@jeffreyculbert2093]

Gen 3 business contacts is a no go here, it slows you down too much. Indentured is fine, it helps get your algae down and set up for your ocean walking play pattern. Unfortunately Mohole is already out and in the wrong location, so this game is already significantly harder to win than it otherwise could be, so Contacts might be useful to find your teleport to be near the oceans.

[@BonelessDota]

Yea you say that Mohole Area is in the wrong location but one of the 2 cards I got from this placement was Insulation ;) just saying. But joke's aside I get your point that I should be careful picking up card draw when I'm rushing. And I'm aware this placement of Mohole Area caused me to play an ugly greenery. I was hoping for a city card to help me to put down better greeneries but I didn't get one, so ended up using a city standard project instead. Out of curiosity where would you have put Mohole Area instead?

[@jeffreyculbert2093]

It’s actually hard to define “wrong” in this sense, as insulation turned out to be a fantastic hedge pick up and that might be an incorrect way of looking at things when perhaps the better mindset is also one we can borrow from chess and say that given plays are “inaccurate” or less helpful than the most ideal possible move (but sometimes still helpful in their own rights, or even still outright winning). I think with this opener on this map I probably would have waited til gen 3 to stick the Mohole and probably put it on the 1 plant elbow bend ocean. I’d have wound up giving some points to the opponents by converting adjacent to their cities early in the game just to deny them the rebates and push my tempo even faster (sacrificing some scoring potential efficiency to improve my tempo efficiency early on). It felt pretty safe to take this approach since the opponents in this game made some seriously inefficient opening plays that massively harmed their scoring rate potential in the short term. With that placement for Mohole to access the river walking rebates it’s pretty likely you could have closed in 7, but perhaps opponents would have played differently if you’d done this so it’s always tough to tell (though I’d wager any amount of money you’d care to bet that these opponents would still have played very sub optimally). Even without perfect play in this game the play was still solid, fundamentally sound, and forcing with you dictating terms the whole way through, so no matter what we look at to critique it’s gonna be a bit nit picky. But hey, that’s a great sign if all we have to think critically about in the post game are minor inaccuracies rather than missed wins, blunders, and outright mistakes. These types of things are really only going to matter against other top level players where a minor inefficiency could cost the game on occasion.

[@BonelessDota]

@@jeffreyculbert2093 Cool thanks for your insight. I agree that the nitpicky stuff is important and also fun to talk about. I play most of my games in real life vs. better opponents than the ones I face on the mars app, no question ^^ But the guys I face in real life (and myself) are still not on the level of you and the other top ranked players. So it's interesting to hear your perspective on my game.

[@jeffreyculbert728]

@@BonelessDota I'm pretty well removed from my prime these days, and competitive play has really improved across the board over the last 3 years so there are some players out there now that I think are truly impressive, but it doesn't really take that much to reach that level (aside from hard work, effort, practice, etc, but this kind of stuff always comes with the territory of trying to achieve high level performance) for a player around your skill level. A couple months just playing games against some top 5 players might be enough at times for some one on the edge of reaching 2k rated play to hit even a 2.1k rating by the end of that time span. Maintaining that kind of a rating on steam tends to be the harder part with the various bugs that happen.

[@BonelessDota]

@@jeffreyculbert728 Is it like chess where the higher you climb the fewer MMR points you get from a win? If it's like this, I imagin a game lose due to a bug is soul crushing.

[@jeffreyculbert2093]

So fast forwarded to gen 8, not much relevant to see for gens 6 and 7 unless it ended in 7 (it did not, as expected Asteroid Mining probably cost you any chance at an optimally efficient ending generation here) as your tempo lead and straightforward game plan with all priority targets now out of hand is pretty well known game state. Alright so an 88 in 8 for 4p finish is solidly above average, and a pretty well played game all in all. I’d estimate you probably managed to play with about 85% accuracy this game (if we think of things the way a chess engine for example would quantify the strength of your play) with a pretty nuts opener (AA+Soletta gen 1 has an insane win rate) and a strong conversion of scoring potential with this draw into actual acquired points. With perfect play you can definitely end this in 7 while scoring 75+, which would have increased the margin of your win as well, but a win is a win is a win and this was a good solid win here. They don’t all have to be perfect, and sometimes in games like this where you clearly outclass the competition it’s best to just end em quick so everyone can move onto the next game. Solid performance, good execution of a pretty typical terraforming engine and explanation of it as well as the thought process behind the decisions. Well done! Very enjoyable to watch.

[@BonelessDota]

Sweet, I'll take a 85% from you any day ;) Thanks I appreciate the feedback. Always fun to discuss possible misplays.

[@jeffreyculbert2093]

A very strong performance indeed. Some of our best players these days play with as much as 95%+ accuracy on average, but 85-90 is really strong and usually a good enough mark to quickly hit a 2k rating as long as you can manage to play in or above that range consistently. Very solid indeed. Thanks for the game mate! Was a pleasure to watch and discuss!

[@BonelessDota]

@@jeffreyculbert2093 My pleasure :)

[@BonelessDota]

@@jeffreyculbert2093 Perhaps I'll give ranked a serious chance sooner or later. Where do people play ranked mostly? On the mars app? or on terraforming-mars.herokuapp.com? or some other place? Also is the Mars app super buggy and unplayable after the last patch?

[@jeffreyculbert728]

@@BonelessDota Sure, people play in all those places for ranked! On TTS too, but I thought that community kinda died out and I haven't played much on TTS for 4 and half years or so. Most of the time a new patch comes out for Steam things get a little wacky. The programming has not been handled well dating all the way back to Beta, so we've been complaining about it for a long time. There are some tricks and work arounds, but mostly we all just suffer through it and try to play more often when it's stable than unstable.

[@jeffreyculbert2093]

Gen 5 sequencing, you have more than enough money for all your priority plays this gen, so letting opponents potentially fund any non thermalist 8 cost award is a mistake here as your first action. If you want to stall around the heat bump ocean you can, but it’s only Deimos you’d should fear and if they’d had it they would have already played it most likely since you’re last in turn prio here. Nuke zone and Big Asteroid are considerations, but the threat level seems low here to me. Slow play sequencing is to buy your award as one action, NRA as one action, double heat bump for ocean, or some permutation of this starting with your claim. Against skilled opponents they would have already bought an award to punish your over investment in heat production (no one knows you have insulation, random draw was lucky here as a hedge against early banker).

[@BonelessDota]

One of the opponents had 8 heat, so I didn't want to play NRA too soon as it would open him up to grab the bonus with 8 heat + standard project Asteroid. As for the Awards, I don't think I was interested in any of them at this point. Certainly not the Thermalist as I feel the 36 M€ I got from Insulation was more valuable than Thermalist.