Board Game Arena

Hello to all, i play Hanabi on BGA from maybe 1 year. Now i have 500 points, but i would like to improve my points and my level. I keep playing with multicolour, Black powder, finesse, Flaming, etc, but every play i can gain more than 1-2 points (or, worse, lose them).
Maybe i am not a good player, so how can i improve?
Or, is there something else i can do to improve my level and points?

You improve your ELO ranking faster by playing basic games with much lower ranked players than by playing with BP or avalanche of colours with other experts and masters. Of course it may be less fun for you...

The most effective way to level up beyond 500 is to abandon every game that is a loss and infinitely gain ELO, forever.

(I'm kidding -- this is a bad practice, but lots of people do it, which is why ELO beyond ~600 is pretty unreliable measure of "skill")

The thing about an ELO system is that it is designed to measure skill. After playing for long enough, you rating should reach an equilibrium; sometimes drifting up a little, sometimes down a little, but always around about a certain value.

If you’re getting a 1-2 points from your best scores, and losing 1-2 with your bad scores, it sounds like you’ve reached your equilibrium point. You now know roughly what your skill level is.

The only legitimate way - the only way that means something - to improve your ELO rating from there is to learn to play better.

(Now, if you regularly abandon games that are going badly, that will artificially inflate your rating, as others point out. Even that is only temporary, though. Once a player stops this practice, their rating will gravitate to that equilibrium again. More recent games matter more in an ELO system.)

So, how to improve your skill? Well, if you are rated ~500, you’re right at the bottom end of Expert. Many good players restrict their games to Expert and up, so you’ve just gained the opportunity to play with people who know the game better than you. Play with them, observe, learn. After a game is done, talk about it. There are players who will be willing to say what you missed, or describe how they knew to make a certain play. The best players (in many games, not just Hanabi) get that good through discussion and analysis in addition to play.

At 500, you should be prepared to show that you know the basics. As well as direct play clues, you should know basic finesse and reverse, and be able to respond to a bluff even if you aren’t confident enough to give one. You should know how to give a standard save clue, and when to do so. It’s you are going to attempt bluffs, you should know to only bluff the next player. You should be aware that each player is usually in the best position to clue the player who comes after them (but this is a loose guideline - you should also understand that there are often good reasons to clue out of turn, and not automatically play random cards or, worse, have a tantrum because somebody “stole” your clue); the point here is to allow your partners to clue, and not give every clue you can see just because you can see it.

To reach 600, I’d say you should be able to give a basic bluff, and you should understand long finesse. By now, you should be thinking about the consequences of your moves - “If I clue this bluff, what happens after the response?”

By 700, you should understand trash bluff. Getting to 800 is about good judgement more than individual techniques, and hopefully you can pick up advanced moves like double bluff and layered finesse somewhere in the 750-950 region.

The other thing is that increasing your rating requires demonstrating better skill consistently, and getting 25 in a basic game isn’t much of a demonstration of skill. By playing harder variants, if you still get max score or close to it consistently, you will demonstrate your skill and gain rating points faster. Be warned, though, this only works if you have the skill to back it up.

Two other points… Playing larger games tends to net points faster, although the downside is that you are relying on more people to all play well. Frankly, I think 3-player gives too few rating points for the difficulty of the game, compared to 4-player and 5-player. And 2-player is a whole other game, strategically speaking. Some players play 2-player most of the time and then are useless in 3-5 player, even if their 2-player games get them a high rating. So don’t just play 2-player if you want to be good (at anything other than just 2-player), not just be rated good. And likewise, I’m possibly not so skilled at 2-player, because I rarely play it.

segfaltnh wrote: ↑26 September 2021, 22:15 The most effective way to level up beyond 500 is to abandon every game that is a loss and infinitely gain ELO, forever.

(I'm kidding -- this is a bad practice, but lots of people do it, which is why ELO beyond ~600 is pretty unreliable measure of "skill")

600? Most really strong players will level out between 800-950 even with no abandoned games. This depends on the variants they are playing and skill/level of their teammates. If you are playing with a master who has started a new account, you can reach 1100-1200 without using abandon in 2p games, while that partner climbs to master. I am basing this on my 2-player experience, I don't play much 5-player. Travis' points are good. Good skill and judgement is what makes the game fun. Elo rating is not much of an indicator of anything, but it is fun to have it go up

Playing Avalanche gives the most positive points.
Playing with BP makes your game harder, but it doesn't give additional elo. (correct me if I'm wrong) = lower scores
Playing with flams will make your games easier (I rarely play with flams because it's all luck) = higher scores
Playing 2p or 5p games gives more elo than 3p games.

(Don't pay attention to my current elo as it is artificially high (1166) due to abandoned games and playing with very strong partners with low elo. But I was staying at 900+, and sometimes reaching 1000 without abandoning for a couple years playing with partners also in the 800-900s who also didn't abandon games.)

Wreckage wrote: ↑30 September 2021, 19:31 Playing Avalanche gives the most positive points.
Playing with BP makes your game harder, but it doesn't give additional elo. (correct me if I'm wrong) = lower scores

These two points do seem to be correct, unfortunately in the second case. There really should be some adjustment for Black Powder. (But I almost always play with it anyway, because what’s the point of being skilled if the game doesn’t provide enough challenge?)

Wreckage wrote: Playing with flams will make your games easier (I rarely play with flams because it's all luck) = higher scores

Actually, I’m not sure this is the case at about the 500 level. Flamboyants present temptations to sloppy play, and at lower levels of play too many players abandon discipline in the face of that temptation. Players ignore saves in difficult positions, or hold 5 plays their partners expect to be played because they think they might want the Flamboyant effects later. Undisciplined play using Flamboyants loses more cards than the Flamboyants retrieve.

If your group of players is all masters (and solidly so, not those who get to 702, join a masters-only game, and then triple-misfire to sink themselves back to expert) Flamboyants make the game easier, I think.

On the other hand, Flamboyants certainly aren’t all about luck. Good players can use their skill to leverage Flamboyants for better effect. I suspect that Flamboyants lengthen the upper tail of the ELO distribution slightly, further differentiating between skilled players.

My main motivation for playing with Flamboyants is just to persuade people to finish games even if someone makes a mistake. They are worth it just to cut down on abandonment arguments.

My main motivation for playing with Flamboyants is just to persuade people to finish games even if someone makes a mistake. They are worth it just to cut down on abandonment arguments.

This, so much. It really makes me mad when people want to stop the game as soon as there's a mistake, or play the game to the end then want to abandon because we didn't get a perfect score. I don't care much about my elo since i haven't been below master level in a while, but those people are the reason we sometimes get players >500 who don't know how to bluff/finesse/reverse.
It's a collaborative game, the point is that we get the score we deserve as a team, and the collaboration is what makes it fun.

So SaraGruppia, please just enjoy the game, you'll learn in time. There are plenty of resources on conventions in the forum as well if you want to learn a few new tricks.

The best thing to do is to ask yourself why you want to increase a number which has no meaning.

Learn to understand players on your table.
https://boardgamearena.com/forum/viewto ... 02&t=16773