Name your Price

MMaster · 2014-02-16 17:41:45

jere wrote:

It's people with tools, people without tools, people with greater than starting bounty. I don't get it.
It's almost makes sense if there's an unpowered trapdoor and maybe you think a clock or magic dance is going to save you.... but a pit!?!?!

I find it very funny, but I guess they just spent their $2000 and couldn't rob your house so their life has no meaning :-)

redxaxder · 2014-02-16 18:44:29

jere wrote:

but a pit!?!?!

The reason I started using safe move.

Blip · 2014-02-16 19:03:06

After being away for the weekend, I would like to say congrats to the man who took about 50K (more or less) plus tools off me at some point. I returned to a wrecked house and a wife still holding the 1000-ish dollars she had when I left. It seems like it was not a good idea to post my entryway deathtrap here and still continue using it, as the guy who ended up brute-forcing my place did that part, at least, legit. I didn't check the name of the guy who did it, I just sort of rage-quit.

Now it's time to try building a really nice, clean, modular place instead of the crazy cat based stuff I had set up earlier.

redxaxder · 2014-02-17 07:22:55

Don't mind me, Mr. Penn. I don't really know how to rob good houses yet. I'm just spending money exploring your house as an alternative to buying paintings :3. Those defenses are very nice. So very nice I might have to steal them for my own house.

PS: If you can tell me my in game name, that would be helpful. I brought five ladders five explosives and one crowbar.

Last edited by redxaxder (2014-02-17 07:27:03)

jere · 2014-02-17 07:54:57

Thank you for the compliment, Mr. Andrus.

I was watching some of that in near real time and at first you were just burning through cash while exploring dead ends. Then you got a bit deeper and started scaring the crap out of me. Make yourself at home, but please don't get too cozy. Otherwise I may feel obligated to pay you a visit.

P.S. I'll get you your whole name later. All I remember is Andrus.

redxaxder · 2014-02-17 08:33:49

Otherwise I may feel obligated to pay you a visit.

I'm starting to realize that this is an awful defense. The most valuable resource in this game isn't your own house full of cash and tools. It's your collection of maps of vulnerable houses full of cash and tools.

While I don't doubt you could break my house if you wanted (I'm not even using the full map), it isn't much of a defensive measure and it won't earn you money. I only have $4k in cash + tools; well below the break-in cost. If you want to hit my real resources, you'll need to guess which houses I've mapped and preemptively rob them [=.

That said... my goal in the game has become collecting tapes of good robberies (or good bloopers). If the small prize pool isn't a problem then take a look around .

P.S. Unless the thing I found is a decoy, you should probably make some changes to your house. The orientation of that trap is really suggestive; a lot of space must have already been used leading up to it. I have a strong suspicion about where your vault is.

Last edited by redxaxder (2014-02-17 08:46:29)

jere · 2014-02-17 08:49:12

You're right, I wouldn't profit. But it's not about profit at this point. It's about holding down potential threats. I've already lost money doing that this morning.

It's your collection of maps of vulnerable houses full of cash and tools...If you want to hit my real resources, you'll need to guess which houses I've mapped and preemptively rob them

That's an interesting way to look at the game. Diversifying your funds; storing them in other's people's houses. The question I have to ask myself is are you bluffing? There's a lot of risk in not robbing people when you have the chance. They could die, get robbed, change their house. Why wouldn't you have already done it if you could?

Let's say mapping knowledge is a valuable resource but one that is extremely volatile and tends to depreciate quickly.

P.S. Unless the thing I found is a decoy, you should probably make some changes to your house. The orientation of that trap is really suggestive; a lot of space must have already been used leading up to it. I have a strong suspicion about where your vault is.

We'll see what you can do before I get a chance to change it. Saying any more might leak too much info....

Last edited by jere (2014-02-17 08:59:19)

redxaxder · 2014-02-17 09:11:16

The question I have to ask myself is are you bluffing?

If I thought I could afford to get to your vault with my current resources, you'd have had more visits from me. So you can rest easy knowing that my house funds plus my accessible funds are not very high [=.

There's a lot of risk in not robbing people when you have the chance. They could die, get robbed, change their house. Why wouldn't you have already done it if you could??

Houses are indefensible. Information about your house leaks out with every visit and a robber with enough information will get to the vault.

The reason you shouldn't always rob every house you can is the same reason you shouldn't always bet your full bankroll in blackjack. Super high variance in outcome.

Last edited by redxaxder (2014-02-17 09:12:10)

jere · 2014-02-17 17:33:38

Gregory Jeffrey Andrus.

Ha! We share middle names.

Blip · 2014-02-17 17:53:32

Has anyone stayed at the top without destroying the competition? Because when I reached 250K a couple weeks ago and tried playing passively, I got brute forced pretty quick. And frankly, I think the "rob for a loss" strategy is really flawed and just ruins the game at the top level.

Pandamonium · 2014-02-17 17:59:19

Blip wrote:

I think the "rob for a loss" strategy

How is the financially sustainable?

Blip · 2014-02-17 18:02:23

Pandamonium wrote:

Blip wrote:
I think the "rob for a loss" strategy
How is the financially sustainable?

When you get enough money and tools via deaths, and probably have lots of tools in your vault already, its "worth it" to destroy the competition for a temporary loss, rather than risk them brute-forcing you.

redxaxder · 2014-02-17 18:12:36

Information still leaks out with every visit, and you can't really prevent an attack by someone who stockpiles maps (instead of pooling everything in their own house). It seems like the game was deliberately geared toward houses getting crunched.

jere · 2014-02-17 18:17:46

I have no idea if someone has stayed on top without knocking out competition. I haven't seen it happen lately.

When I started paying attention to this issue, it was when everyday someone at the top was wiping out several pages of their nearest competitors. I felt like this was a problem and made a few threads about it.

I posed the following question:

I'm just wondering if it's even possible with excellent play to stay at the top for more than a week. Unless that top house systematically wipes out all competition, it doesn't seem likely.

Price (jwg) took me up on the offer to stay on top for a week, but he stayed there for as long as he did (before being hacked) precisely by knocking out competition.

Wallace did the same thing Saturday night.

I'm there now and it looks like I'm going to have to play by those rules, whether or not that I think that is good for the game. I don't think there is an alternative. The problem is that money keeps going up linearly, but you see diminishing returns on fortifying your house. I've talked about how there is a actually a pretty low floor on the most you would ever need to brute force any house: $2.5 million. That's a lot of money, but maybe lower than you might expect. I'd say as you approach $200k of tools, you all but guarantee a brute force is going to be successful.

Besides fuel, I made another suggestion that might mitigate this somewhat: don't let a robber enter a house if the sell value of their backpack exceeds the house's value. Maybe add an exception for paintings. That would prevent both this rob at a loss strategy and griefing of low level houses.

We'll see what happens. Honestly, I'd be surprised if I make it a week even by taking out threats.

Pandamonium · 2014-02-17 18:59:58

redxaxder wrote:

Information still leaks out with every visit, and you can't really prevent an attack by someone who stockpiles maps (instead of pooling everything in their own house).

You've inspired me.

Once my home falls, I'm going to start designing a house that I can "change" a few settings each time I loggin, so that what lets you pass one day will kill you the next, etc.

redxaxder · 2014-02-17 19:16:23

Well, jere. You're going to be safe from me for a while now. I just died in a stupid way in a house I had practically solved =[. Although I wonder if welkin would be interested in the map I've compiled... he likes to stream himself breaking into top houses...

Panda: I suggest also including traps that robbers can accidentally disarm without realizing they did so. They will be less careful when they know it's safe to cross those grates; they never activated before; they must be a bluff.

Last edited by redxaxder (2014-02-17 19:17:41)

jere · 2014-02-17 19:20:10

Andrus, nooooo! I just saw his house a few minutes ago. Bummer.

But you know what? If you really believe that you have a bunch of stored mapping knowledge, you should bounce back easily.

redxaxder · 2014-02-17 19:40:03

jere wrote:

But you know what? If you really believe that you have a bunch of stored mapping knowledge, you should bounce back easily.

That's the goal, for sure. I haven't reached that level of stability yet. Yet.

Lord0fHam · 2014-02-17 19:41:42

jere check your email

Blip · 2014-02-17 19:44:45

jere wrote:

Besides fuel, I made another suggestion that might mitigate this somewhat: don't let a robber enter a house if the sell value of their backpack exceeds the house's value. Maybe add an exception for paintings. That would prevent both this rob at a loss strategy and griefing of low level houses.

Would that be just vault value or total house value? Because I currently have a house built with 20K, but with $64 in the vault.

Also, that brings up the strategy of spending arbitrarily to lower your value. I do it, as somebody who often has to not play for multiple days. What should we do about it? Is it a legit tactic, or exploitive?

joshwithguitar · 2014-02-17 19:57:47

Blip wrote:

Has anyone stayed at the top without destroying the competition? Because when I reached 250K a couple weeks ago and tried playing passively, I got brute forced pretty quick. And frankly, I think the "rob for a loss" strategy is really flawed and just ruins the game at the top level.

When I was at the top at price I would never "rob for a loss" - I only took out houses with above $50,000 value and I can tell you I spent much lower than an average of $50k on each successful robbery. Sometimes I would lose small amounts of money on a house, but only if I were to fail to get to the vault on the first run-through and have to return with a whole bunch of tools.

jere · 2014-02-17 20:20:53

^I don't necessarily mean doing it intentionally. I lost money this morning on a house because I made bad assumptions about how it worked and I had to come back an embarrassing number of times.

Regardless, it's a strategy that is on the table. If you think your house can be brute forced for $30k, it might be rational to use twice that to take out the people with $30k.

Would that be just vault value or total house value? Because I currently have a house built with 20K, but with $64 in the vault.
Also, that brings up the strategy of spending arbitrarily to lower your value. I do it, as somebody who often has to not play for multiple days. What should we do about it? Is it a legit tactic, or exploitive?

Total listed value (i.e. the amount a robber stands to gain). It's a simple comparison between how much they could potentially make and how much they are carrying with which to attempt it. It makes little sense to bring in $2k of tools on a $100 house or $100k on a $50k house (except for what we're discussing here).

And I'm fine with spending down... you lower your spot on what is essentially the leaderboard. You potentially reduce your income.

jere · 2014-02-17 20:35:28

Well, that's it folks.

Last edited by jere (2014-02-17 20:38:27)

Lord0fHam · 2014-02-17 21:02:03

how the actual balls do you solve it?

Pandamonium · 2014-02-17 21:28:38

Lord0fHam wrote:

how the actual balls do you solve it?

I've marked the more complex areas.

I have to say I'm really impressed Jere!

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