Card Deck(s)

[Strider]

I saw a reference to Card Decks in another thread. I had been wondering about this. From that reference it seems that each player has their own seperate deck?

For the computer game...is a deck initially shuffled, then drawn top down only, without being resuffled during a game?

Once again, I take it the manual will answer most of my questions, but until it gets here, I guess I'll just have to pester whoever I can get to answer

[bartbert]

There is a single deck shared by all players. Cards are pulled randomly from the deck rather than shuffling and pulling from the top. When all the cards have been pulled, the deck is rebuilt and play continues.

[Stalin's Organ]

Random can be a pain - in one case I got 1 shooting card in 3 turns with 2 elements of fighters - and that 1 was on the last turn after combat

I had the other guy (AI) screwed afer 2 turns - all his planes damaged & leaders followed and then....must've run out of ammo!!

[BremerWeltmeister]

There is not any difference in shuffling and drawing the top cards, which are random then, and choosing a random card.

[Strider]

Ahhh...that's the type of thing I was wondering. If a card is drawn and used, does it go to a 'discard' area until the deck is used, or does it immediately go back into the deck?

Or are drawn cards, used or not, immediately replaced in the deck?

[bartbert]

They are marked as discarded, or unavailable, until the last card has been drawn. At that point, the deck is rebuilt.

[Strider]

Thanks for your patience.

Now I see that if I'd just paid better attention, that you'd already answered that in your previous post of this thread. At least I have the excuse of old age

[bartbert]

No problem. When you play a table top game such as the card version of Down in Flames, all the game mechanics are readily visible to all players, so it's much easier to get an intuitive feel for probabilities. Computer games tend to hide some of the details, so I understand that players are interested in gaining insights into how things work behind the scenes.

[Liebchen]

Is there any way to know the breakdown of the deck? Or is this something that will mutate over time, with the introduction of new cards?

[Bruce G.]

Originally posted by bartbert:

No problem. When you play a table top game such as the card version of Down in Flames, all the game mechanics are readily visible to all players, so it's much easier to get an intuitive feel for probabilities. Computer games tend to hide some of the details

That doesn't have to be the case, though. With a game like DiF, that hidden approach is more of a design and programming choice.

[bartbert]

Originally posted by Liebchen:

Is there any way to know the breakdown of the deck? Or is this something that will mutate over time, with the introduction of new cards?

There are 76 cards in the deck right now. If you right-click on a card during a game, it will pop up a card graphic which shows the cards rarity in terms of percent. I guess you guys can do the math.

[demoss]

So it's using a single deck? For what it's worth, I got two IMS 2:D in the same hand today, so either there's a bug somewhere in the demo or you've added one from the card game.

[bartbert]

While there could be a bug, it is actually possible to see two IMS 2:D cards because when the last card is drawn, the entire deck gets reset including the cards that are currently held in everyone's hand. It was easier to code that way, and seemed like it would also throw off the card counters out there.

[Liebchen]

But that really has an immense effect upon the odds, now, doesn't it? If a card is supposed to be 1 in 76, it should remain 1 in 76 and not suddenly double in frequency.

Card counters or not, no player should have to face an IMS:D twice. Imagine dodging that bullet, breathing a sigh of relief, and then seeing it again. That's just not right -- especially if the card is supposed to be a one-of-a-kind card.

Just my humble opinion.

[bartbert]

Well, you really won't be able to breath easy in the full version because players will be more likely to purchase cards, such as the IMS 2:D. In the demo game, these cards are too expensive to justify purchasing when you have a 100 XP limit, but in the full version, it is much more or a possibility.

[Pawlock]

Originally posted by bartbert:

While there could be a bug, it is actually possible to see two IMS 2:D cards because when the last card is drawn, the entire deck gets reset including the cards that are currently held in everyone's hand. It was easier to code that way, and seemed like it would also throw off the card counters out there.

Im gonna throw another fly in the ointment insofar you can explain 2 ims2destroy in 1 turn, well now Ive encountered 3 in 1 turn; I held 2 and enemy wingman played 1 on my teamate, while I still had 2 in my hand as leader. Surely that cant be right?

[kuroi neko]

Mmmm... I don't know the total number of OTS3:4 in the deck but since it's rarity is rated "1%" I assume it could not be more than 2, and I actually saw 2 in my own hands AND fell victim to a third in the same game (only one at a time, as I was in a situation where I could do little but discard them). At the time I simply assumed there were 2 in a deck, but now I wonder...

Is it just me, or do you also smell a slightly fishy scent emanating from the general direction of the random picking code? .

At any rate, it gives a completely new meaning to our "wrong cards picking special air force" .

[kuroi neko]

Shameless bump...

Games with 3 OTS3:4 or IMS2:D seem to be a common occurence, with Pawlock and Sixxkiller we witnessed about half a dozen now.

Now the games with something like 2 IMS2:D and 2 OTS3:4 in quick succession are much, much more frequent. I would say maybe one game out of 3 or 4, but of course this is subjective, measurement would have to be done.

Really something has to be done about it. In the hands of a leader, an IMS2:D+Ace pilot combo is a guaranteed fun killer. Well, wingie killer to be precise, but in turn 1 or 2 the fun usually follows the wingie down the drink. In the hands of a wingman, more than a single OTS3:4 or IMS2:D per game may soon become enraging for the victim and not so satisfying for the winner (if he values smart decisions over blind luck).

Frankly I dont think the increased number of cards (extra or redraws) in the full release will be enough to correct this apparent bias toward more randomness in comparison with the original card game.

As far as I understand it, IMS2:D or OTS3:4 are meant to keep you on your toes, with the downside of having this game-killing capability. Now if they can appear like 2 or 3 times in a game as wingie's free potshots, able to smoke or kill a plane with the only tactical merit to have bought "team work" to maximize the chances of getting these presents from lady luck, I think it's a strong deviation from the original game concept and it should be corrected to revert to the original intend.

Maybe implementing the exact simulation of a deck of cards will be the solution, at least the closest from the original, proven design. So much the better for card-counting players, but at least casual players would curse the computer less often

On the technical side of things, it appears cards drawing does not work as expected and/or explained.

First, I suspect a bug in the drawing routine. I would suggest a test : on the server, record all the cards drawn in every game (by batches of 76 cards) and verify that :

- exactly the 76 cards of the deck appear in a serie

- the statistical repartition of cards matches the expected percentages

Second, using the standard rand() random generator is dangerous, since it is well known for its limited statistical reliability, especially when used in very repetitive patterns like cards drawing. Depending on how the random seed is initialized, the system may produce very few distributions of cards among the possible factorial(76) ones.

[bartbert]

I'll take a look at the card deck logic. At a minimum, I can have it take into account cards currently in players hand when the deck gets reshuffled.

[Moon]

Or allow wingmen to purchase a one-off "card" skill, like Ace Pilot, Vertical Roll etc...

Martin

[Sixxkiller]

I think that maybe this is the most important issue affecting game play IMHO.

Its is my feeling that the Destroyed cards ratio should be lowered and shouldnt be a card you can purchase except maybe till you have earned it with major exp. OTS3: 4 CARDS require skill to some extent, but what would happen if someone got huge exp and bought like 25 extra draws and just happened to draw 3 or more in a 10+ card hand? Not very sporting...

But hey its your game and dare say I love it. I will buy it and love it no matter what design decisions you employ. Just your prompt response with the server disconnect issue sold me on your customer relations coupled with you being associated with Battlefront, and I know you have a customer for life with me.

[bartbert]

We will definitely keep an eye on this and will be listening to what you guys have to say once the full version of the game is being played.

Our experience during testing showed that most high level pilots do indeed carry with them a large number of "Draw Extra Card" skills. However, you will rarely have an opportunity to use more than 10 or 12 in one game. Purchasing 10 "Draw Extra Card" skills would cost you 110 XP, so you are definitely giving up the chance to purchase more permanent skills.

The other thing we found is that even though you may have a high level pilot with lots of "Draw Extra Card" skills, he is probably going up against pilots with similar capabilities. So if everyone is drawing extra cards, things tend to balance out.

[Guest Mike]

Originally posted by MantaRay:

Its is my feeling that the Destroyed cards ratio should be lowered and shouldnt be a card you can purchase except maybe till you have earned it with major exp. OTS3: 4 CARDS require skill to some extent, but what would happen if someone got huge exp and bought like 25 extra draws and just happened to draw 3 or more in a 10+ card hand? Not very sporting...

Can you actually do this?

I know I've faced AIO pilots with 3 x Draw extra card, but as far as I've seen I only ever get to buy 2 of them at a time - 1 at 4 points, the 2nd at 6 - if I buy both then there's no further options to buy more.

[Sixxkiller]

I know I've faced AIO pilots with 3 x Draw extra card, but as far as I've seen I only ever get to buy 2 of them at a time - 1 at 4 points, the 2nd at 6 - if I buy both then there's no further options to buy more.

[kuroi neko]

Ok, just an observation about cards drawing code:

I had an IMS2:D in my hand at turn one. Played it, got another at the first redraw.

This is clearly not a reshuffle issue since the deck of 76 cards could not have been emptied at the time.

Now if the logic allows to redraw any discarded card, then this is statistically catastrophic : the most interresting cards are usually played quicker than weak ones. Especially the attacks, played immediately by wingmen. So putting these cards back into the deck immediately will increase the chance of getting them back sooner than the usual deck system would allow. The net bias toward "hot attacks cards" will increase tremendously, considering the very limited probability of occurence of the IMS2:D, OTS, etc when usual drawing order is used.

I guess this also could explain the preposterous "luck" of bots with tons of redraws : as soon as a good serie of cards gets played, it has a good chance of being "recycled" immediately, giving an exponential advantage to the pilots who can redraw.

And by the way, I noticed countless times bots drawing more extra cards than listed on the briefing screen.

More precisely, when I counter a move from a wingman, he gets to draw a new card each time I play one. So far so good, but when I count the actual number of redraws, it looks more like the redraw limit is applied only once per turn. In other words, if the AI has 4 redraws at turn one, it will draw up to 4 cards at turn 1, up to 3 at turn 2, and so on, as if the max redraw count was only decremented once at the end of the turn instead of after each redraw.

Is that a special "player-killer" feature for demo limitation, me not understanding what "draw an extra card" does, or a general problem with redraw limitation logic?