Opening Shape

[Shmoo]

What opening shape should you strive for? Should you try to get neighbors advanced, or make the array more jagged by advancing non-neighbors to take the 4th rank? (Your powers may make a difference to this - recruit radial for example wants to be next to two enemies more than two friends - but this post will assume no powers).

My current answers to these questions are as follows (and if better players have different beliefs I would love to know)

First off, in some sense it is clear there is not too much difference because the set up is likely fairly symmetric. That is - if I think a jagged set up is an advantage, by making it I give you a jagged set up. If I think having my pieces being next to friendly pieces is best - by striving for that I make it easier for you to get that shape. So given two equal players I don't believe striving for a particular shape will make much difference.

However, if you advance your allies together there are less places you can bring an attack on your opponent. I am sure you have played a game where both players advanced their army from their left to right so that the board was 5 pieces in a row on rank 4 for both players. In these games there is only one place you can really exchange pieces - in the center, and with orbs in the wrong places you can easily be giving your opponent orbs in these exchanges. These games can't inherently favor one side or another because the set up is symmetric, but the nature is very different than games where every other piece of a player is advanced to the 4th rank. In these games there is a lot of opportunity to attack and make exchanges.

My current theory is that if you are against a player who is much stronger than you then you should try to make your pieces on the 4th rank have neighbors - because the more that is true the more the orb drops matter and less the skirmishing. If you are playing a weaker player you want to get lots of pieces neighboring enemies in the middle so you have lots of opportunity to stall and exercise your skills. If you are about equally skilled I think the 4th rank having friendly neighbors will make the game swingier.

This may not be understandable without diagrams - if so I apologize for being too lazy to figure out how to make them.

[Mammalman]

I think you nailed the most important tactical issue, namely the dynamic fluidity associated with staggered rather than 'blocked' openings. I suppose skill level is one reason to choose one over the other, but my chess background inclines me to assume the best about my opponent even if I have reason to suspect otherwise.

In the absence of powers you might also just have a style preference, but to me the important strategy is to let the powers dictate your choice of staggered vs. blocked. As I advocated earlier (http://quadradius.com/quadboard/viewtopic.php?t=1776) picking up the first orb (and other early orbs) can make the decision obvious. Pick up a radial attack power? 'stagger' that guy between two opponent's 4th row pieces. Early jump proof? form as many blocks elsewhere as you can to reduce your opponents opportunities to stall by exchanging and to have his 4th row pieces run away sideways (which would be better for him) rather than backward (which is worse for him).

If I pick up one of what i call 'hoarder' orbs, i.e. orbs that make me want to get the rest of my powers with that guy such as teach, 2x, GQ, others, then I prefer to establish blocks on the front lines rather than staggered formations for two reasons. One is just, again, to buy me more time to pick up powers with that guy rather than having to deal with exchanges he's forcing in the middle. The other is that the blocked formation on the 4th row (say, 3 guys in a row on the 4th row) creates a bigger contiguous space behind them that is easy to maneuver in and can save time picking up orbs.
You all know algebraic chess notation right? Like battleship's grid system? If I have a block of 3 in the first 3 columns, i.e. pieces at A4, B4, and C4...and then two orbs show up on A3 and C3...my GQ/2x/whatever hoarder guy can get one of the orbs, and then the other just two turns later. On the other hand, if I am 'staggered' in these 3 columns, with pieces on A4, B3, and C4...now when the orbs land on A3 and C3, it takes FOUR rather than two turns to get from one orb to the other, since my piece on B3 is in the way. And yes, this does actually come up often enough.

A question to pose: is it any harder or easier to go from a staggered formation to a blocked formation rather than back to a staggered formation? My first guess is its sorta a one way street, that the more blocked you get, the harder it is to get back to staggered, but I'm not sure I can defend that claim...
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[Shmoo]

Ahh! I always thought about the shape associated with powers to be a local piece phenomenon (like get enemy neighbors next to a recruit or swap radial) rather than a global (reduce avenues of attack if you have a hoarder or a jumpproof). That makes a lot of sense.

In answer to your posed question I think it easier to go toward "block" than toward "staggered" - not strictly a one way street but a probabilistic one way street. My reasoning is as follows:

Every diagonal enemy on the front line is a potential attack point. This attack might make more diagonal enemies (more staggered) or less (more blocked). Random stuff can happen to make an attack on these points less desirable (you might have to give up an orb), a one way choice (one player might have high ground) or impossible (the theoretical diagonal might disappear entirely because of acid for example). If some of this stuff happens on a jagged front there are probably other points of attack. On a blocked front there are less potential attack points to get messed up, and when they are ALL messed up the game will need powers to reenable aggressive moves - or a players willingness to sacrifice orbs to the opponent, for example.

[driven2sin]

Good to see you pick up on the subtle stuff Shmoo.. it does increase your chances of cashing in on opportunities

I found that doing somewhat odd, esoteric moves can throw off your opponent and make them waste moves and make mistakes..

since there hasn't been any new powers in years, just about everyone is on auto pilot.. so, an early trench or wall columns are great and then use centerpault and flat to spheres just to mix it up - especially if you have a acid/recruit row you are trying to move ahead.. give them wasteful targets and then jig and jag your way up

basically I'll do anything besides the stalemate orb hatchfest since most people won't use any powers unless they have to. That way they can wait longer for the combos.. but then, when you use a move again on them, shit - you can still here their screams crying from hell as they curse you for owning all the luck in the universe...

yet if they didnt horde 40 orbs, the move again recruit wouldn't of reaped as much rewards

[hardboiled]

I have recently discovered that there is a good timing to how you move up your orbs in the opening game. If the opponents torus is already in the 3rd row and yours is still in the 2nd, if you move up yours to the 3rd, the opponent will generally automatically move their's up to the 4th without thinking to defend their front line. If you do this just before an orb spawn, occasionally an orb will spawn in either 4th row. Your opponent may out of habit just move up their torus into the 4th and accidentally leave you free to gain a valuable 4th row orb. It is a long shot but as with most advanced strategy in QR anything that can just marginally increase your odds is valuable.

[Mammalman]

Yeah. More generally, it's always a good idea to make some kind of threat on the turn before the orb spawn, i.e. advance a piece he has to move to block (specially a powered one), capture a piece he has to re-capture, or just move next to an orb he has to guard. Even if your opponent is paying perfect attention, sometimes this gets you a free tile, or piece, or orb.

[Snoop]

I have recently discovered that there is a good timing to how you move up your orbs in the opening game. If the opponents torus is already in the 3rd row and yours is still in the 2nd, if you move up yours to the 3rd, the opponent will generally automatically move their's up to the 4th without thinking to defend their front line.

You recently discovered this ????
WOW !!! Does anybody else know ???
Shhhh... Don't tell anyone ! With this knowledge, we'll never lose another game !!!

Mwaaaa ha ha ha ha ha !!!

PS... I recently discovered that if you move your torus into the tile directly adjacent to one of your opponent's pieces, the opponent will more often that not attack that piece and will generally kill it, without even thinking. Spread the word.

[driven2sin]

which is a great move when dealing with a double switch... works everytime!!!

[47]

i tend to shy away from discussion about QR openings because i feel that the QR community needs a lot more improvement in their midgame and endgame relative to their openings. most players don't play the opening perfectly, but it only does negligible damage to their records compared to their play later on, where games are littered with mistakes. however, because the opening happens first and because it is so repeatable, it ends up getting a lot of attention, much more than it deserves.

with that said, Shmoo makes a number of good points. if i am playing against a player that i feel is below my skill level, i will always aim for a staggered formation. with this setup, the number of options available to both players quickly explodes to a very large number (as Shmoo noted). i feel that i will be able to make better use of these options than my opponent will. it induces stupid plays (like an opponent wasting a move again or destroy radial), while i can usually maneuver my pieces into a favorable position.

against the very few opponents against whom i am not as confident (sanzo), i will go for a more conservative formation, forcing us both to wait for powers, giving me a very good chance to win.

[NewGuy]

Why not just discuss the best weather to play quadradius in? The movement of men at the first of the game is not important. It is mutually exclusive to win rate.

Gee, move your men up to restrict the movement of opponents men, when you can not move an orb because it is blocked or if moving it will counterfeit the stopping power of one of your other orbs, find another orb to move. Don't worry about picking up orbs. If the other guy gets there first it is no big deal. The person that the game has picked to win will get all the orbs they need, they will be the correct powers and arrive when and where you need them.

If you worry about getting that extra space of territory then you will just over nit your way through the game and loose. Just enjoy the cool sounds of the game and keep moving quickly. You will win the games you should.

I used to think that people would try to get you to "move faster please", "can you hurry", etc was designed to get you to not think out moves and to make mistakes so they could win. It was sometime till I figured out that they knew that thinking about your moves could only delay the inevitable. If you were meant to win, you would win, it really did not matter where you moved. So they had learned a way to minimize the QRT/LS (Quad Radius Time/Life Suck), that is the biggest part of the game. Who ever makes the most moves wins or something like that.