Starvation strategy abusers

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admitted
Posts: 44
Joined: 01 September 2016, 13:20

Re: Starvation strategy abusers

Post by admitted »

In 4p, one player (most of the time p3 or p4) has no choice except to starve to keep the game competitive, or else it's a lost game for him. p1 starving is almost an inferior strategy, while p2 starvation can have merits in certain boards. Even then, it's not a guarantee that starver will win because starvers ignore green cards which allow others to grab green sets for much cheaper price, and everyone will fight for meeple and building multipliers which forces the starver to overpay. 10 point penalty per nonfeed round is just about right in 4p.

However, in 2p mode, -10 penalty is too harsh. I think I flat out starve in under 0.1% of my 2p games (in very rare board set ups) and I have a higher win rate against starvation. I actually don't think I starved a single game in my last 500 Stone Age games because it's such an unplayable strategy in high elo play. The main reason it's very easy to play against starvation is because a majority of cards are useless for starver that they need the near perfect card set up and decent dice to pull it off. Most notably, market cards (cards that gives one thing to everyone based on outcome of the dice) are neutral in early game but significantly favors nonstarver in mid/late game. As a nonstarver, I just let the useless cards sit there and end the game as soon as possible by drilling buildings that you won't be able to recoup the -10 investment loss from starvation. If you don’t take those cards, then you won’t be able to see the goodies like 2x meeple and help me dig through the buildings. If you take those cards then you give me a free resource and it helps me drilling buildings.

I only play base game 2p, which is how arena is played. I speak in the position as a 7x arena winner before I retired from arena. I also finished first place in Master of Masters round robin tournament (out of 16 700+ Elo players), finishing 12/15. I believe 10+ straight arena champions participated in that tournament. I have to concede that in certain expansion settings, starvation becomes a strong strategy.

If you are into competitive boardgame play, first thing you need to do is identify strong strategies and learn to gravitate toward those. Just because a strategy seems strong doesn’t mean you need to outlaw it, because then you are playing a different version of the game. But in this case, starvation isn’t even the dominant strategy.

Here’s my most recent game against starvation: https://boardgamearena.com/table?table=482090204. I used the drilling building strategy and ended the game in 10 rounds (average game length for normal games is 13.5 rounds). Game should have ended in 9 rounds but my opponent no takes the last building, dragging a hopeless game by 1 more round. I once finished a game against a starver in 8 rounds 😅.
Last edited by admitted on 09 March 2024, 08:02, edited 15 times in total.
Urgmurg
Posts: 5
Joined: 07 May 2023, 22:44

Re: Starvation strategy abusers

Post by Urgmurg »

More people should play starvation in 1vs1s (base settings), i like it. There is hardly ever an opportunity to play anti starvation here, or starvation vs starvation.
CaroI
Posts: 1
Joined: 06 January 2022, 13:59

Re: Starvation strategy abusers

Post by CaroI »

Hello everybody.
I like Stone Age a lot, and i think that the rules are nice as they are.
I am a "master", and i like to play with masters.
If you check, you will see that masters almost never play starving strategy.
It is generally weak, because many cards lose value for you when you use it. So there is no reason to forbid it.
Starving can help you against weak players, but don't use it against very strong players, it would help them in more than 90% of games. Take a strong strategy and hope good dices.
Starving is an original strategy, but don't hope to become a master by using it too much :D . Starving can be good if the cards come in a certain order ,but it's a rare case and you can't know it in advance.
Don't be afraid of starvation abusers, you can do better.
You can see that i agree with admitted, he is a master, he doesn't starve, and says that it is easier to win against starvers.
I also agree that it can be a desperation strategy when you are in bad position in a 4 players game.
Urgmurg
Posts: 5
Joined: 07 May 2023, 22:44

Re: Starvation strategy abusers

Post by Urgmurg »

In all seriousness, I've seen stronger starvation play than anyone here does it (granted not an art since hardly any stronger player ever plays it....), so I'd say the viability is not an entirely settled issue. Play just does not seem that developed, even in base settings (and that's fine, it's not really a game designed for super competitive play).
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Meeplelowda
Posts: 1214
Joined: 14 March 2020, 10:31

Re: Starvation strategy abusers

Post by Meeplelowda »

Urgmurg wrote: 10 February 2024, 01:45 In all seriousness, I've seen stronger starvation play than anyone here does it (granted not an art since hardly any stronger player ever plays it....),
Possibly true that not all or most strong players use it, but the player with the highest Stone Age ELO on BGA uses it.
Urgmurg
Posts: 5
Joined: 07 May 2023, 22:44

Re: Starvation strategy abusers

Post by Urgmurg »

I was talking about 1v1 in base settings. With the tusk trade expansion on, starvation tends to become the dominant strategy in 1v1s and with all expansions on, things just get weird. With iglo and hard winter only, starvation seems to get a lot weaker.
Elo ratings become rather weak indicators of player strength when people just play one type of setting that is rather exotic and unpopular with strong players. Those are not chess elos. The strongest players are probably the ones who have or had high elos and won an arena season or two at some point.
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Hail_TX
Posts: 3
Joined: 22 February 2017, 14:41

Re: Starvation strategy abusers

Post by Hail_TX »

Couldn't do it here but we house rule it when we play for real at home. Instead of losing 10 VP when you cannot feed your meeples, you lose 5VP and one of your workers dies. The stone age was rough!!! ;)
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