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A guy at my Tuesday game night in Fresno told me to track my win rate by player count, and it exposed something bad
I have been playing board games with the same six people for about three years now, mostly at a shop in Fresno on Tuesday nights. I always felt like I was doing fine, maybe winning one out of every four games, nothing to worry about. Then a guy named Dev, who tracks everything in a little notebook, asked me how I do in 2 player games versus 5 player games. I had no idea. So I started writing down every game for two months, the player count and who won, 47 games total. What I found was rough. In 4 and 5 player games I was winning around 30 percent, but in 2 player games I was at like 8 percent, basically losing almost every duel. Turns out I just wait for other people to fight each other and then sneak in, which does nothing when there is only one other person at the table. I have been avoiding 2 player games for months without even knowing it. Has anyone else done a dumb little log like this and gotten surprised by what it showed?
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riverwhite19d ago
Man, this hits close to home but for a different reason. The thing nobody talks about is that player count changes what a "win" even means, because in a 5 player game a win is 20 percent by pure luck and in a 2 player game it's 50 percent. So your 30 percent in big games is actually above average and your 8 percent in duels is way below, but the gap looks smaller than it really is until you do the math. I bet if you tracked it you would find your duel losses are mostly in games with hidden info or direct conflict, because the sneak in late plan needs other people to absorb the heat for you.
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