Shipwrecked 2 - Card 14

[EricBess]

Yes, the game isn't over yet folks. Spiderman stops the bidding at 3 gems, selling off his Cave (and his leverage in tan) to pay for it. If Jigglypuff had Struck right then, the game would have been over, but, not knowing when Spiderman was going to make his move, he didn't know when the best time to Strike would be, so he Passed right then.

Gerode: N/A
Spiderman: Stop
rkoelsch: N/A
Jigglypuff: Pass

Current turn: Gerode (income 2)

Gems-Income/Resources (color-points-income):
Gerode: 8-2 / Parrot (purple-30-1), Fruit (green-30-1) (60 pts)
Spiderman: 2-6 / Bugs and Slugs (green-10-2), Tree House (tan-50-0), Lizard (purple-20-2), Rats (green-20-2) (100pts)
rkoelsch: 8-2 / Palm Leaf (tan-10-2), Wild Boar (green-50-0) (60pts)
Jigglypuff: 3-3 / Monkey (purple-40-1), Artesian Well (blue-50-0), Dew (blue-10-2), People (purple-50-0) (140pts)

Sold to bank: Cave (tan-30-1)

Up next? A Cricket (purple-10-2). Strong income piece. This late in the game, the income may not add up much, but every little bit helps. I might also point out that, while the 10 points isn't very strong, it is still enough for Jigglypuff to win with.

Bids are due Wednesday.

One more comment. Keep an eye on the sold to bank cards. Also keep an eye on whose turn is coming up and who may need to sell something to the bank. At this point, the only sold card is the Cave, but both Spiderman and Jigglypuff are still under 5 gems, so they may need to sell resources. As such, if your turn is coming up (Spiderman, in this case), let me know what resource you would like to bid on. Your choices are 1) Potentially any card owned by someone who might need to sell 2) Any card already sold to the bank, 3) The top card of the deck.

If there is a card someone has that you might want to bid on, we will bid on that if it gets sold. If there are several cards you would be willing to bid on before either the Cave or the top card, list them in order of priority. Remember, you can always just bid for the top card and not worry about it.

One final note which applies right now. Remember that if your turn is coming up, you will get income. As such, you could potentially be in a situation where you might want to bid on the very card that you sell, assuming that you need to sell, that is.

 

[Spiderman]

I still don't understand... so the only time you can bid on "other cards" aside from the one you list is when your turn is coming up? Or can I bid on the card in the bank now?

If so, do I have to submit a bid for the Cricket? Or do I submit two sets of bids? Sorry...

 

[EricBess]

Okay, sorry I haven't been clear. You are only bidding on one card at a time.

Imagine you are sitting around a table playing. At the beginning of your turn, you do two things. First, you collect income. Second, you decide what card will be bid on.

In most cases, your only choice is to bid on the next card in the deck. Eventually, someone may need to sell a resource and you can bid on that.

Here's the part that may not have been clear. The person whose turn it is decides what card to bid on and then everyone bids on that card.

Now, all that is fine and good when you are sitting around a table. Since we are playing over the net, I could wait until a round is over and then ask the next person whose turn it is to choose a card. I'm guessing 90% of the time, it will be the top card of the deck, but I can't really make that assumption.

So, when your turn is coming up, I need you to tell me what card you want to bid on. Problem is, at that point, you don't know for certain which cards are available. However, you know which cards might be available.

So, basically what I need you to do is look over the cards that are potentially available and tell me which ones you would rather bid on over the top card, assuming that they are sold. If those cards don't become available, you simply bid on the top card instead.

If you want to see how the bidding goes before deciding, you can also do that, but if you know what you might want, this saves a bit of time.

Note that there is nothing wrong with requesting to wait. Even though you know which cards might be available, you can't know yet how many gems someone had to pay. Since everyone's remaining gems may impact your decision about which card to bid on, you may need to wait to have this information.

In addition, there are times when whether or not you win the bid will affect your decision.

Let me step through a hypothetical example. Say Gerode's turn were coming up and he wants to go after purple resources. He sends me a PM telling me that if Jigglypuff sells either the People or the Monkey, he would bid on that. Currently, we are bidding on something else (the Rats, for example). Spiderman wins the Rats and sells the Cave. Gerode had expressed that he wasn't interested in bidding for the Cave. Since neither the People or Monkey are up for bid, we flip over the top card and bid for a Cricket.

Now, had Jigglypuff won the bid and had to sell a resource, he might have sold the Monkey, for example. If he did, then Gerode had expressed an interest in the Monkey. So, instead of turning over a card, we simply announce that we are bidding for the Monkey this round.

Its really not that complicated. I think the confusion comes in because we are not sitting around a table and, to keep things moving, you let me know before the previous round is over what you want to do in the next round. IRL, you take things one round at a time.

 

[Spiderman]

I just wasn't sure if Gerode had already said he didn't want to bid on the Cave or if he had the opportunity to change his mind after he saw what had been sold, even if he initially said he didn't want to bid on it.

 

[EricBess]

Technically, he doesn't need to decide until he sees what is available. By this, I mean what has been sold. Once an item is up for bid, it doesn't change.

In this case, Gerode had PMed me with a list of cards that he would want to bid on. I won't say what was or was not on that list because it's all part of Gerode's strategy, but the Cave was not one of the cards he was interested in.

BTW, if you think you might be changing your mind, let me know so that I can post the result and wait for a response before starting the next set of bids.