Should this undo be granted?

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jdsdog10

There are 4 provinces left. Villain is down by 19 with 30 monies and 4 buys on his turn. I on the other hand have a very strong engine, and can easily generate at least 3 provinces.
He has the ability to put out all but 2 golds, leaving him with 24, to buy 2 provinces and enhance the other 2 golds into provinces, thus winning the game. Villain does not realize this at first. He buys 3 provinces, and tanks for 10 seconds or so to decide what to do with 6 monies. Instead of buying a gold, he requests an undo all the way back to beginning of buy. I ask why and he says so he can enhance gold. I deny.

I normally am very lenient with undo's. I tried to put into words why I veto'd, and wasn't able to articulate it well. Something doesn't seem right about going through with several buys on your last turn, and then after seeing your buys leaves you in a very unlikely to win state, reconsider and see if there was anything that you could do differently so to avoid said undesirable state, and then that "post-mortem" allows you to win out-right.

Needless to say, after I veto his undo, I go onto win.

Should this undo have been allowed? Who should have won this game given he bought 3 provinces and requested undos?

SkyHard

I probably would not grant it. I think that undos are there to compensate for the UI misclicks and not to simulate the turn and then backtrack. I think you were right in not granting it.

On the other hand, it is up to every player to grant or refuse undos.

santamonica811

I would have granted it...b/c I would have granted it in real life.  My personal rule:  If you have not gained any 'new' information (e.g., seen additional cards, seen your next hand, etc.), then I grant any Undo request.

But, on the other hand; you also acted perfectly reasonably.  Missing what to do with an unusual card combination is fairly common in Dominion, and is all part of the learning process.

But, on the other other hand  :), your opponent *did* notice this Enhance/Gold combo, just a few seconds too late.  So . . .

Do you feel guilty now? (If so, then that's a hint that you might have made the wrong call.)  Or are you still convinced that you did nothing wrong? (Which is a hint that you made the right call for you.) Was there a chat conversation during and after your refusal?  Did your opponent smile and say to you, "No big deal.  It was my oversight and therefore my fault."???

p.s.  I've never used Enhance (it hasn't even come up in any of my kingdoms.).  So, I could totally see overlooking that combo the first time I played with it.  >:(  ;D

jdsdog10

Yeah, I think skyhard is right when he said that the purpose of undo's is not to simulate a turn and then backtrack.

To Bornstein - I think that not allowing the undo is perfectly reasonable. I think the question I am really asking is more like is it better for the game as a whole to allow these kinds of undos. Or maybe like which results in being a better sport? Mixed with is this viewed by most players as being a poor sport. Something around there

Anyways, no I don't feel guilty. There was barely any chat other then me asking him why he wants an undo. We went on to play another game, so I assume he understood that it was iffy.

I almost never even consider not granting undo's. The only times I consider are when there are draws and when it's very late game. Otherwise, I like literally don't even stop to consider the reason for it, I just click grant. I think this for the most part is best for the game.

What was different about this is following through with your intended plan, and then only afterward realizing that said plan leaves you in a really bad spot likely to lose. At this point it doesn't seem right to be given another chance to reassess what you did after the consequences are laid out.

But then again, I am biased since it's my win at stake. Which is why I posted.

santamonica811

Yeah.  I would have done differently.  But as I hope I made clear; both responses are perfectly valid.  And since you and other guy played another match, you clearly did it in a way that did not cause offense.  Like you, my main goal here is to have fun.  I think that's a good thing.  (And I'm glad super-competitive people also are here, even if they and I would not be a great fit for playing a bunch of games together.) 

Water finds its own level.

bluey_the_bear

Firstly, I think it's strange that you are referring to them as a "Villain". It puts a negative light on them before you've even described anything. Something like "opponent" is neutral and more accurate. Throughout this post you make loaded statements and questions.

Secondly, you speak of your "very strong engine" that can generate 3+ provinces a turn. This is a strange statement to make, especially seeing as your opponent has just made $30 and 4 buys. That sounds like a pretty strong deck to me (after all, it can gain 4 provinces!). At any rate, the quality of your two decks is completely irrelevant to the discussion. By including this statement, it makes you sound as though you just think you're better than them.

I would both grant and ask for this undo in a heartbeat. If you actually stop to think about what they want to undo, they want to keep a single gold in their hand to enhance it. They're still planning on buying 3 provinces, they just want to keep a card in hand. There is no information gained from this undo, which is the criterion that most undo-deniers seem to use. It seems highly likely that they just clicked Autoplay treasures. It's happened to me plenty of times where I meant to keep a card in hand but my brain just went on autopilot and clicked "autoplay treasures". In those cases I don't always catch the mistake immediately since I'm trying to not be unbearably slow.

The experience of Dominion is, in my opinion, improved by the ability to undo. In addition to misclicks, allowing undos for straightforward things such as this lets people play the game at a faster pace, without having to painstakingly stop for every card to just to make abosolutely sure that there's no reason they'd ever regret it. If you spectate high level play, you'll see that undos are almost always granted and there's basically never a fuss about it.

This whole anti-undo philosophy really gets on my nerves. People act as though it somehow detracts from the game or makes it less fun or pure or something, and it always seems to come from a perspective of the people asking for undos somehow being weaker or less deserving. People make mistakes, that's why undos exist. Letting your opponent undo a few simple things is just a nice thing to do, and denying it isn't going to make you a better person.

skillwinlucklose

What? You can't refer to someone by their actual player name.  ???
I read it as "villain" not "a villain", bluey_a_bear   ;D :)

santamonica811

Skill,
Ha!  :) I also had wondered about the use of "Villain."  But, looking back at the OP, it does seem like it was the opponent's username, in which case it is, of course, perfectly fine to use.  It's a pretty funny username to choose, and it probably leads to many humorous misunderstandings.  (I guess we should be grateful that she/he did not pick the username "Cheater" or "Bad Sport" or something like that. LOL)

bluey_the_bear

Oh, oops. My bad. Just ignore that paragraph then.

michaeljb

In poker discussion, "Villain" just means opponent, I assumed OP was using it in that sense.

jdsdog10

Yikes! Lots of judgement from bluey, wasn't expecting that.
As michaeljb pointed out, villain is a super standard term to use when reffering to opponents in hand analysis with poker. I know this terminology (villain and hero) is used in other games too, but didn't realize it was quite so foreign to dominion at this point.
I think that adding how strong our decks are is completely relevant and also critical to the conversation. If our decks weren't strong, then there would be at least a somewhat descent chance for him to get another turn. With strong engines, this is pretty unlikely to happen in a game with 1 province left. In this game there was certainly less than %5. So no, that statement was not arrogant. It was meant to point out that villain was aware of being in dire straits after his buys.

It could have been an "autoplay treasures" accident, but I feel confident this wasn't the case. It wasn't an obvious play. It would have played out differently.

Yes, undo's are super important. Definitely a pet peeve of mine too.
"I almost never even consider not granting undo's. The only times I consider are when there are draws and when it's very late game. Otherwise, I like literally don't even stop to consider the reason for it, I just click grant. I think this for the most part is best for the game."

It's worth noting that I have been on the other side and asking for an undo does not seem right AT ALL. Around this same time, I was in a game where I had bought all provinces to tie game with 6 coins left and 3 buys. I bought a duchy but it was cancelled out by "wolf den". I could just have easily bought 3 estates to win. I'd argue that this is more grey than the other example since 3 estates vs 1 duchy accomplishes the exact same thing in most games at end of match, and it would only have been 1 buy undo. It didn't seem right to request it since I overlooked part of the scoring system; bad strategy on my part. I had the first turn, thus a tie was a loss for me.


dane

One reason that I freely allow undos (that haven't revealed new information) both online and IRL is that given the choice of:

  • My opponent plays quickly through to the point at which they can spot their error, and then requests an undo.
  • My opponent sits for the maximum permitted time working out what their optimum move is.
I prefer the former.  Refusing undos that haven't revealed new information forces the latter.

randomUserName

That undo should have been granted, or at least I would have granted it. You mentioned that after buying Duchy, and wolf den kicking in, asking for undo wasnt a fair request, and you were right, but you are doing an apples to oranges comparison when you bring in the case in question. Your opponent realized a better strategy and wanted to execute the same, few seconds after they made a buy....no new information was revealed, so I fail to understand the reason for denial, when you usually are okay granting undo requests. It seems that you were waiting for them to make one wrong buy and then use that as an argument to deny undo because you knew you could win on next turn. I bet that if you were winning by quite a margin, irrespective of their buys, you would have granted that undo right away. Anyway, as bluey pointed out, if you spec high level games, you will see that the undo request is immediately granted, given no new information was revealed. It makes the game fast as well. I generally just blacklist someone if they are not okay to grant a fair undo, that keep things simple for me.

Gold Subscrptn Chick

There's maybe 5% of the population who NEVER grants undos and maybe another 5% that says "no more" after like 1 undo. It seems you aren't of the former and inconclusive about being in the latter, so I'll assume you're of the 90%. Even within the 90%, how players grant undo varies a lot.

Myself, I 100% request and grant this undo. My rule, like many others have mentioned, is whether new info is revealed in the form of cards drawn. Even then, I would grant undo to drawn cards most of the time if they say they forgot to play a village first. To me, at the end of the day it's ONE game, and as far as things that annoy me about the game, undos are towards the bottom of the list.

Bottom line is, there is NO right answer. You're 100% within reason/ethics/or morals lol to do whatever. Just have fun!

jdsdog10

Randomusername. I definitely see it as very similar in the sense of "I now realize that I can't win after executing my INTENDED plan".

To anyone still following this, let me boil this down to a broader family of question. This is now not about justifying my previous game, but about how undo's should be handled late game.
Let's assume that in a different hypothetical hand, Villain is on his last turn and if he doesn't end the game, Hero will. Villain has different ways he can play out his last turn. One way would give him a 5% chance of victory, another 20%, another 50%, another 80%, and another immediate victory.
Villain, unaware currently of other plans, chooses to go with the 5% plan. After executing he realizes that this leaves him with roughly a 5% chance of victory.
He reconsiders and realizes there was a plan that would give him a better opportunity, and requests undo to go with the 20% plan. After executing he realizes that this leaves him with roughly a 20% chance of victory.
He reconsiders and realizes there was a plan that would give him a better opportunity, and requests undo to go with the 50% plan. After executing he realizes that this leaves him with roughly a 50% chance of victory.
He reconsiders and realizes there was a plan that would give him a better opportunity, and requests undo to go with the 80% plan. After executing he realizes that this leaves him with roughly a 80% chance of victory.
He reconsiders and realizes there was a plan that would give allow him to win immediately. He requests undo and goes on to win outright.

I assume most would agree that something is wrong with villain doing this (but maybe I'm wrong in that assumption). At what point does it become wrong? Should this maybe just be granted once (although that doesn't really seem justifiable)? Is this scenario different if the probabilities changed (such as changing 100% win to 70% win as the upper limit, or maybe even something low like 30%)?
Most people who have responded to this thread make it sound like the following information does not matter: villain only considering other options after he played out his entire buy phase as INTENDED to then realize that the victory counters looks very unfortunate for him winning.

randomUserName

#15
Quote from: jdsdog10 on 20 April 2020, 04:14:55 PM
Randomusername. I definitely see it as very similar in the sense of "I now realize that I can't win after executing my INTENDED plan".

To anyone still following this, let me boil this down to a broader family of question. This is now not about justifying my previous game, but about how undo's should be handled late game.
Let's assume that in a different hypothetical hand, Villain is on his last turn and if he doesn't end the game, Hero will. Villain has different ways he can play out his last turn. One way would give him a 5% chance of victory, another 20%, another 50%, another 80%, and another immediate victory.
Villain, unaware currently of other plans, chooses to go with the 5% plan. After executing he realizes that this leaves him with roughly a 5% chance of victory.
He reconsiders and realizes there was a plan that would give him a better opportunity, and requests undo to go with the 20% plan. After executing he realizes that this leaves him with roughly a 20% chance of victory.
He reconsiders and realizes there was a plan that would give him a better opportunity, and requests undo to go with the 50% plan. After executing he realizes that this leaves him with roughly a 50% chance of victory.
He reconsiders and realizes there was a plan that would give him a better opportunity, and requests undo to go with the 80% plan. After executing he realizes that this leaves him with roughly a 80% chance of victory.
He reconsiders and realizes there was a plan that would give allow him to win immediately. He requests undo and goes on to win outright.

I assume most would agree that something is wrong with villain doing this (but maybe I'm wrong in that assumption). At what point does it become wrong? Should this maybe just be granted once (although that doesn't really seem justifiable)? Is this scenario different if the probabilities changed (such as changing 100% win to 70% win as the upper limit, or maybe even something low like 30%)?
Most people who have responded to this thread make it sound like the following information does not matter: villain only considering other options after he played out his entire buy phase as INTENDED to then realize that the victory counters looks very unfortunate for him winning.


If no new information was revealed, villain/opponent can try whatever he/she wants (5%, 10%, 20% backtrack, 30% whatever), and I will grant the undo. Again, I want to emphasize because it seems you are conflicted about the definition of fair undo (which is subjective anyway, and a made up term according to consensus here on this platform), if no new information is revealed, undo grants are considered fair and should be granted.
Buying duchy and wolf den kicking in, is not acceptable, because you should have kept track of your buys..another example, buying gold thinking palace would give you 3vp but realizing that you should have bought silver instead is a kind of undo I wouldnt grant, because again, you should have kept track of those buys. In the last two cases, new information was revealed which wouldnt warrant an undo, and i have seen top players not even asking for an undo in those cases, because they realize it is not fair.

Let me give you another example, I was playing with a very good player who tried to do a 3-pile and would have won, but the game involved page, and page was one of those 3-piles, but by mistake he ended up returning pages in play so 3-pile case was not there anymore (auto exchange is tricky, very tricky), and he ended his turn. Now I could have won, but i knew this was a genuine mistake, so I immediately granted him the undo. Your opponent, similarly, realized he made a mistake with buys and he wanted to fix it. "Enhance" is a new card, we are all learning these new menagerie cards, and the interface is not super intuitive for some things, at least for people who have not spent hours on it. Is it too wrong to expect some slack? Trust me, if you continue to deny undos towards the end of a game due to one made up reason or the other, but those undos were fair ask, you will get blacklisted, and soon you wont have good players to play with. 

I feel i repeated myself a lot there. Sorry

jdsdog10

I was just about to reply to your first edition of your post before the new edits, about how I disagree with what counts as new information.
It seemed at first that you were advocating for new info meaning any information that could not possibly be attained in the current system. With this definition, the wolf den situation is exactly the same as the enhance in terms of new info. It's also the same as the palace scenario and the page scenario. It's almost like the standard is whether or not a completely competent player (or maybe just an AI) would have had the knowledge. This is a fine way to apply "no new information", and probably the most straight forward. 

Another way would be whether the knowledge is new to the player. In other words, did the opponent even realize something to be an option. With this more subjective version of new knowledge, both the wolf den scenario and the enhance scenario would not be ok, since the interactions and effects of enhance and wolf den were not understood at the time that the actions happened. This is very similar to palace and even similar to page. The difference is that page and wolf den were much easier for an average opponent to catch then would have been palace which requires you to keep a mental running tally of every single card in your deck. This version is much more subjective to what your opponent was considering and his intents.

Another option would be a variant of the subjective version just mentioned, which seems to be what you are advocating after the edits. That would be something like "how reasonable is it for my opponent to have been aware of this knowledge". For something like palace it is rather unreasonable (it is unusual for opponents to keep a mental running tally of their deck), but for something like wolf den, page, enhance these are far more reasonable. So if it is reasonable for an average opponent to have had this knowledge then we don't consider it "new". I would argue this is more messy than the second option.

Again, I normally don't even stop to consider whether undo's are justified before I grant them. Exceptions are very late game, card drawn, or we are in a later turn. I always give the opponent to make an argument for himself. I have maybe not allowed 3 or so undo's in late game ever, and the other two were far less grey. And when I did make not grant a more controversial one, I went to the forum to ask others for their opinions. Because of this I think it is really unlikely that all of my opponents will blacklist me leaving me with no one to play against.

PS. I have made that same mistake with page. I did not request an undo. It doesn't feel right to me to ask my opponent to let me do something different so I can go back and win a close game.

randomUserName

I am sorry in all that explanation I didnt really understand the point you are trying to make  :(
Normally I would stop replying after this point, but you seem like you genuinely want to understand others point of view so I will give it one last shot. Also, I would recommend joining the discord server, your post and replies will get more traction there and you will get much better answers to your question, because not every one checks forum, so the assumption that players will not BL you because they know your point of view from this post is not very solid.

Now coming back to your point, I dont understand at all how wolf den scenario and enhance scenario is similar. Sorry I cannot get it through my thick head. Wolf den gives you -3vp for a unique, and you as a player, is responsible to keep track of duplicates and unique, whereas, enhance is used to trash something that is already in your hand, and doing a trash with enhance and undoing that, doing enhance again on different card, with wolf den or palace NOT involved is completely fine, I dont understand the counter argument to that. I will try again, if no new information is revealed (no new cards drawn, triumphal arch, palace, wolf den and cards like these which involves tracking are not involved), undo requests are fair and should be granted. And you are well within your rights to refuse that, but chances are you will be BL after denying fair undo requests, irrespective of your stand here on this forum. Take care :)

jdsdog10

My point was in regards to how we define "new info". With palace, if a player cared enough (or was an AI), he could know (and maybe would know) the exact contents of his deck. In other words, the info from buying a Gold when Palace is in play is not information he could have attained otherwise. Or maybe more simply said, the player has the ability to go through the log and see exactly how many coppers/silvers/and golds he has. This is knowledge that any player COULD have if they cared enough to have it. So to me, strictly speaking it is not "new info" in that sense.
If we talk about "new info" in the sense that the opponent did not possess the knowledge initially (not that he couldn't have it, but that he doesnt have it), then yes the palace scenario would not be ok (which i agree with). With this understanding of "new info", the wolf den scenario would also not be ok. I easily could have had that knowledge(and should have), but I didn't consider the effect. *As an aside, I think I left out the fact that there were 8 duchies in the supply, so it was very obvious that I did not have one already, I just didn't consider how wolf den would effect*.

Thanks for pointing out that most use discord. This was pretty much my first post here, so I am rather ignorant on that matter.

My point about not being worried about being blacklisted was that in my 4000 games (I am not proud of that number lol), this would result in maybe 3 users blacklisting me, tops.

In sum, I understand (and even agree) that undo's should be veto'd only on the grounds of new info. We disagree on what constitutes as new info. If you have a game with goons/groundskeeper/vineyard, villain might buy the last village for a 3-pile thinking that all the effects of those 3 cards will give him the win. You can argue for both sides of an undo on the basis of "new knowledge". A perfect opponent (or an AI) would be fully aware of how many points he would have after the purchases. It's not that a player is incapable of having the knowledge of the consequences of his buy, it's that he wasn't careful enough throughout the game to keep track. Which is a different take than saying he was unaware of the consequences of his buy thus the knowledge was "new" to him.

jeebus

#19
Sorry for necroing, I just want to add my voice to those saying that the undo should be granted. IRL there is no reason to deny a player the opportunity to change their mind when no new info has been revealed - even on the last turn, obviously before you start counting points. The reason this is even a topic in online play is because some players confuse clicking buttons with playing Dominion. Clicking is not an integral part of playing Dominion.

Because of the online VP counter, there is some disagreement in this thread on what constitutes new info. When it comes to Wolf Den etc. - which rely on knowing the contents of your deck - you first have to realize that it matters, then you either have to remember the game state or go back through the log. If you didn't realize that it mattered (since you had forgotten to think about it), the score after your turn would alert you to it, and this would be new info for you (since you had forgotten). If you did realize, but you misremember the game state, or don't bother checking, the score after your turn would likewise be new info for you. (In any case, there is no way for the other player to know exactly why you made the mistake.)

If you played Treasures with a certain plan in mind, and realize during your turn that you shouldn't have, that is not based on new info. Maybe you could say that the point counter goes up as you're buying Provinces. I would not view this as new info, it's just that the VP counter is helping you add 6 to your score. You already knew that buying a Province would give you 6 VP. There is no way that is unforeseen or something you didn't think about. The reason you want to change your plan is based on your own brain power.

santamonica811

To continue on from what Jeebus was writing...

To use Wolf Den as an example (of why I'd always give an Undo there):  If I were playing you, and you wrote to me in chat, "I want to buy Card X, but not if it's my first such purchase.  I'm not remembering.  I can carefully go through the game log, and that will take 4 minutes to do.  Or, is it okay for me to buy it, and I'll do an Undo if I lose 3 points for it being my only X in my deck?" . . . I would *always* say, "God, save me and you the wasted time of searching the game log.  Buy the card and Undo it if it ends up being your first X." 

Since I would do the above, I see no reason why I would not grant the Undo if my opponent--at least partly in an effort to keep the game moving--bought the card without asking my permission in advance.  But then, I don't take the game particularly seriously, and I care not a whit about my ranking...and I know for sure that many players do not share my relaxed and strictly-fun-based approach.  :-)