How did you learn to play well?

[ZenVee]

I am rated 140 and I get creamed by 95% of arena players.

Reviewing games doesn't help me that much because I don't understand what was a mistake. Watching channels like Alexey's channel I know he's a top player however I suck too much to fully understand his advice.

Anyone rated 300+ how did you learn how to play this game accurately? How important is it to memorize tiles left?

[Strode]

What would really help would for a strong player to walk through one of your games and point out the errors, move by move.

[Zmarty]

Just play 100's of games. And mostly....get lucky...I play Carcassonne for over 20 years now. I played it with friends, with family online here and before on other platforms. You can be very good and very strategic. But if you have no luck at all, then you are lost any way.

[Meeplelowda]

But if you have no luck at all, then you are lost any way.

You could say this about any game that involves randomness, i.e., something that isn't an abstract strategy game with perfect information. So without context saying "if you get unlucky you'll lose" is meaningless. The question is to what extent does skill dominate the outcome vs luck.

Note that the more a high amount of luck determines the outcome of a game due to randomness, the fewer very high ELOs you will see among active players. The less randomness in the game, the more populated the peak ELOs are. For example, the current peak rating among active Can't Stop players is 451. No one over 500! Luck clearly is a very big factor.

The current peak rating among active Carcassonne players is 871, with several over 700. There are also 12 players over 800 ELO in Azul, indicating that skill clearly dominates the outcome despite the randomness. Ticket to Ride: Peak 801, and several over 700. Can't Stop, Carcassonne, Azul, and TTR all have huge player bases, so this isn't simply a sampling error.

Moving to a pure strategy game with no randomness at all, Hive peaks at 1092, and there are six players rated over 800.

So Carcassonne obviously isn't zero luck, but luck plays less of a dominating role than people think it does. If you play one of the top rated Carcassonne players, you aren't just going to luck box your way into many (if any) wins.

It may seem like I've glaringly omitted chess, but its rankings have been removed by BGA (possibly due to the existence of engines that polluted the rankings).

[JohnnyCyclops]

I am rated 140 and I get creamed by 95% of arena players.

Reviewing games doesn't help me that much because I don't understand what was a mistake. Watching channels like Alexey's channel I know he's a top player however I suck too much to fully understand his advice.

Anyone rated 300+ how did you learn how to play this game accurately? How important is it to memorize tiles left?

I too wondered this. Only got my ELO to 87 so never ventured to Arena but even “play now” was tough enough. I didn’t find the game that engaging and placing/scoring farmers seemed to be some sort of ‘dark art’. So I didn’t play any more and moved on to other games, after winning 3 of 15. It’s supposed to be an all time popular game but I found the opponents on BGA to be too well honed for my limited beginner skills and the learning curve too steep. I sense experience, rather than skill, has a lot to do with results, but I don’t have the time to invest 100+ games just to get to a basic level of competitive competence.

I wonder if it’s gentler at 3 or 4 player, rather than the “duel” with just 2?

[CraftyRaf]

This post actually triggers me. Alexey is indeed a great streamer. It's interesting to hear that you don't really understand his advice. I already had some ideas for a beginners' guide with lots of useful examples. Maybe I should go and stream again (Twitch stream + Youtube videos) one day.

I didn't count tiles myself at first. Without counting ANY tiles, I would say you can get up to 400 ELO.
With SOME knowledge about the tiles, you can get up to 500 ELO. For example it's good to know there are 8 crossroads and 8 big city-tiles.
With FULL knowledge of the tiles , you can get up to 600 ELO.
If you combine full knowledge of tiles with the speed to count them quickly and statistical calculations, the sky is the limit.

To get to 400 ELO, it's extremely valuable to know what tiles DON'T EXIST (in the whole deck).
You should really know that there are 0 tiles like these (in the basic version):
- 1 roadside + 1 cityside + 2 fieldsides
- 1 roadside + 2 citysides + 1 fieldside

One basic idea to use this information, is that you can block meeples of your opponent. For example if they need a tile in the middle of the board with at least 1 cityside and 2 fieldsides, you can block that meeple by bending a curvy road into that opening (because a tile with 1 roadside + 1 cityside + 2 fieldsides doesn't exist).

Another idea based on that is that, if your opponent threatens to block one of your meeples, you should DEFEND in such a way that you can still get your meeple back. For example, if you need a tile in the middle of the board with at least 1 cityside and 2 fieldsides, and your opponent tries to block you (by threatening to bend a curve into it on the next move, see previous example), you can DEFEND (without knowing all remaining tiles) by putting a tile next to it so you don't need 1 of the 2 above tiles that don't exist. Of course, because you don't know ALL remaining tiles at this point, there is still a chance that these tiles are no longer in the deck, especially with only a few tiles remaining. But at least your winning chance in the long run will increase.

Hope this helps a bit!

https://www.twitch.tv/craftyraf
https://www.youtube.com/@craftyraf

[Meeplelowda]

One basic idea to use this information, is that you can block meeples of your opponent. For example if they need a tile in the middle of the board with at least 1 cityside and 2 fieldsides, you can block that meeple by bending a curvy road into that opening (because a tile with 1 roadside + 1 cityside + 2 fieldsides doesn't exist).

Careful! Someone is going to call the blocking police on you.

[CraftyRaf]

I know, but they should just stick to jigsaw puzzles: friendly game, no blocking and nice scenery at the end

[Barberserk]

Yeah I am not about to memorize the whole deck of tiles this damn game has, just to be able to play without getting slaughtered every game, no thanks. The learning curve is too brutal, to be able to challenge anyone I would have to spend a month losing and losing and losing... Not to mention there is no tutorial for the expansions. I tried a few games, it was not a pleasant experience, always running out of time while trying to figure out what can score and what can score later... I guess it's not for me. A shame I did not reach the arena mode, I wanted to know what settings it has, but even that knowledge is hidden, apparently we noobs are not supposed to know what awaits us down the line. Oh well.

[Meeplelowda]

Not to mention there is no tutorial for the expansions.

Links to PDFs of the rules for the expansions are in the Carcassonne lobby. Nekonyancer has made 100s of tutorials, but he's only human.

A shame I did not reach the arena mode, I wanted to know what settings it has, but even that knowledge is hidden, apparently we noobs are not supposed to know what awaits us down the line.

Cheer up friend. There's actually a solution. 1) Go the Carcassonne lobby. 2) Scroll down to "My Arena history," which will be shown even if you haven't played in Arena or even qualified for it. 3) Click on the link for Season 19, and the Arena page will open. 4) Click on Season 20 in the upper left. 5) Click on "+See season rules" in the upper right.

BTW, I didn't already know how to do that. I just figured it out. "You've always had the power, my dear. You've had it all along" -- The Wizard of Oz