Play by Play Analysis Thread

[Cheery Dog]

I will at least be watching this with interest. As part of a thought process for player B as well probably.

I know my game is slowly improving, and this should help it improve more I assume.

[Shobu]

Great idea!
Strategy ressources & discussions are always welcome.

[andycupid]

We have reached 10 players, let us begin! Whoever wants to join can join halfway through as well.

whatshisbucket will be player A, while T72on1 will be player B. We will play a set, so that we will be guaranteed to play the starting piece at least once. T72on1, may you post the opponent's moves in picture form for every move?

Regarding some previous questions:

Hello,
In Hanabi, a group of talking and playing was created some years ago.
For a while, it has became a place to improve, ask question, and a place to ask for people for 'high level' games.
(the recent more posts are mainly advanced post (but not all of them like reverses) but it doesn't mean you can't ask easy question on it)

I suppose groups has less visibility at the start, but is best to talk, because you can separate ths different subjects you wanna talk.

Having a group would be nice, but it doesn't seem to support posting pictures. Forums can very well do the work for a short game such as this.

I am currently away for a few days, but back next week and would be more than happy to join any initiative to make this game more popular though i dont think i would be brave enough to take on role A.

I find the game very intriguing, as its almost like an upside down simulation tree - complexity is at maximum at start, and keeps decreasing.

One could argue this is true for a lot of games, but i find its extremely prevalent in LITS.

I would also ask 2 generic question, regarding starting moves, that i always struggle with...

- do you prefer to start in the middle/at the border, or is this dependent on certain factors regarding X/O distribution?

- do you have a number in mind regarding the value of your starting move? To be more specific do you think there an ideal value, or is this again board dependent?

What i mean by that - lets say you are X, you cover up 2 Os and protect one of your Xs - thats a +3 move.

I know there are some deeper concepts one needs to consider, but wanted to see what the best players think about these two ideas.. or if they approach the starting move totally differently.

I'll talk about my perspective, and perhaps other players may add to that.
I like starting in corners or borders, because they have less adjacent spaces. If I start in the middle, since there are more possibilities to consider, I'm more likely to miss something, and screw up my opening. So it's a personal preference, I don't really think there is any downside to whichever you prefer.

As for opening power, what I consider would be the power of O's counter. Say, you place +2 with X, then O must match or at most net +3. Anything above or under is flawed.It's better to plan another full move ahead, about X's follow-up to O's counter. I like a balanced board after 4 total moves.
In terms of numbers, I do +2 or +3 for X, and in response +3 or +4 for O. I won't go over +4 for X even if there's an equally powerful counter, simply because I think X as a starting player can't be to advantageous. Then, regarding starting area, I'll give O a slight advantage since X going first is almost guaranteed to cover more area. In corners or borders, I give O a net (net O-net X) +1, while in the middle, O at least needs to have net +2, because X starting in the middle is very, very fast.

[T72on1]

So, to be clear: I post a picture after every move whatshisbucket does, ok? And I don't make a move myself, my move will be determined by the discussion here. But I can participate in that discussion?

Right?

[whatshisbucket]

So, to be clear: I post a picture after every move whatshisbucket does, ok? And I don't make a move myself, my move will be determined by the discussion here. But I can participate in that discussion?

Right?

That's my understanding. The game is here.

Good luck you guys!

[T72on1]

Ok, got it.

This is the opening position (is there an easy way to add pictures into a post instead of doing it as attachment?):

[T72on1]

I admit I just don't have the patience to search for the best opening position for minutes and minutes. I realize that this is one of the main reasons I'm not a top player like andycupid or whathisbucket. I was tempted to go out and search and search for that good opening spot now, but realized that, with the goal of this thread in mind, I should just do what I'd always do. So my suggestion would be this opening move. I usually start somewhere in the middle, because I feel that most of the times, starting at one side favours one symbol.

[andycupid]

Your opening is a bit straightforward so I'll directly leave a comment. (Normally I'd like other participants to comment)
A net +1 mid for X looks...okay, but the follow up L4 on the right looks nightmarish. Yeah, X can follow up with S4 which looks like a +6~7, but I'm afraid it might be a bit too big of a deficit at move 1.

L4 left mid (O)-S4 top left (X)-L4 top mid (O)

未命名.png (127.9 KiB) Viewed 1463 times

[nmego]

Furthermore, that play protects at least 2 in the O column to the left.
I don't feel like playing in the middle this game is gonna get us that far, although I usually tend to play in the middle.

How about a horizontal in the bottom-left? At row 3 from the bottom. Covering 2 Os and 1 X and if opponent swaps, we can go with a straight up to protect 3 Os

(Also, what's the terminology for the pieces? L4/S4 etc...)

[Cheery Dog]

Openings are still where I will struggle as well I feel. It's the hardest move in the game after all.

I'm okay with that Central position, or at least I don't feel like andycupid's suggested second move is one that would happen, that just looks painful for O. (If you play there and we end up going second, I think we'd play again on the right of the current piece)

I'd be tempted to put that starting piece just straight down to the bottom, I might not be able to analyse all that well what every future move is going to be, but it somehow feels safer. (Still keep it the current T shape)