by Race Bannon
ffroom wrote:
fuzzyfoot wrote:
This drastically complicates or renders moot the auctioning part of the game. If this is the case, why would I ever bid for a car? I'd just as soon let them have no owners so I'm not starting the race negative Money. As long as I keep betting on the right horse and it wins, my money is positive no matter what.
A quick explanation of why you would pretty much always want at least 1 car:
Range of end scores if you own 0 cars: 0 to 18
Range of end scores if you own 1 car that you bid $1 on: -1 to 29
The only scenario where you do worse with a $1 car than going carless is if you finish dead last and bet on 0 top-3 finishing cars. Even finishing 5th with the car elevates it above a carless strategy.
Not to mention you get a special power to control with your $1 car to help prevent it from being dead last.
And once you conclude that having a car is better than not having a car, if you're in this "no bid" mentality, you modify your position to the best case is getting a car for a bid of 1.
But if you wait until last, you can't be assured that you'll have a 1-card in the color left over. So the optimal play (again, if you're starting assumption is minimal auction price, but get a car) is to bid 1 whenever you can along the way. Not bidding is a risky strategy if you intend to get a car for cheap.
When you wait until the end and the only card you have is a 3, it doesn't feel great.