How will PN2's characters play? (Let's guess inside!)
Let's have a go at it and see! I have a feeling the "skill" and "aggression" thing they had going in the first one might have been overhauled, but nonetheless it's just easier to make vague comparisons to the PN1 cast.
I'll go first.
Brock: I'm thinking his cardinal weakness being that he's too honest and otherwise shows Tycho levels of early game aggression (read: little) and will generally go big only when he is absolutely certain he'll win. Might be surprisingly easy to intimidate, considering himself. He's the hardest to read from the get-go. I didn't watch all that much Venture Bros., cool as it was.
Claptrap: Strong Bad, full stop. Based on the trailer he seems to be more of his 'in-character' self from the games rather than the super primadonna of the behind the scenes stuff, even if the difference between the two isn't... great. So I imagine he won't be a very good player by any stretch but at least will play very fast and loose.
Ash: I'll admit I have never seen his movies, but if they're playing up the catchphrases and silliness and memes? I think he'll just play with the hand's flow more than anything, he'll try and check when people are playing conservative and if people are deciding to escalate, he probably wants to play big too so that his one-liners are loudest. If that makes sense, anyway - I don't think he'll instigate bluffs as much as Claptrap will but might see himself going out early as much as Claptrap might.
Sam: Something tells he he'll be of the 'try everything' variety as though he were treating this whole game as one extended sequence of a puzzle and is attempting to figure out the way through this particular segment of the imaginary episode in his head. So, probably a fair bit like Max in that he won't maintain the same particular strategy twice in a row (Max's aggression levels changed with every hand, which could make him do really silly things contrary to his actual hand strength). He may be sort of the straight man of his duo, but here I think he'll play just as unpredictably as he attempts to combine a 2 of hearts with a 7 of spades and hope for the best in advancing the story (spoilers: it won't, never play this hand).
What are your thoughts?
I'll go first.
Brock: I'm thinking his cardinal weakness being that he's too honest and otherwise shows Tycho levels of early game aggression (read: little) and will generally go big only when he is absolutely certain he'll win. Might be surprisingly easy to intimidate, considering himself. He's the hardest to read from the get-go. I didn't watch all that much Venture Bros., cool as it was.
Claptrap: Strong Bad, full stop. Based on the trailer he seems to be more of his 'in-character' self from the games rather than the super primadonna of the behind the scenes stuff, even if the difference between the two isn't... great. So I imagine he won't be a very good player by any stretch but at least will play very fast and loose.
Ash: I'll admit I have never seen his movies, but if they're playing up the catchphrases and silliness and memes? I think he'll just play with the hand's flow more than anything, he'll try and check when people are playing conservative and if people are deciding to escalate, he probably wants to play big too so that his one-liners are loudest. If that makes sense, anyway - I don't think he'll instigate bluffs as much as Claptrap will but might see himself going out early as much as Claptrap might.
Sam: Something tells he he'll be of the 'try everything' variety as though he were treating this whole game as one extended sequence of a puzzle and is attempting to figure out the way through this particular segment of the imaginary episode in his head. So, probably a fair bit like Max in that he won't maintain the same particular strategy twice in a row (Max's aggression levels changed with every hand, which could make him do really silly things contrary to his actual hand strength). He may be sort of the straight man of his duo, but here I think he'll play just as unpredictably as he attempts to combine a 2 of hearts with a 7 of spades and hope for the best in advancing the story (spoilers: it won't, never play this hand).
What are your thoughts?
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Comments
Brock is going to be like Heavy/Tycho, but slightly more ruthless.
Claptrap will bluff and sometimes be an idiot when he plays.
Ash is gonna be the tricky guy. He might bluff more than Claptrap, but be smart with his moves and have an ultimate strategy.
Sam would most likely be like Max, but more intelligent.
So, yeah, basically what you said.
According to a post by the guy who did the first game's poker AI stuff, Max was actually as smart as Tycho (who was the most "skilled" opponent, with Heavy in the middle and Strong Bad the least skilled), it's just the randomized aggression could make him do stupid things - from a code perspective he actually understands when he has a good hand but might fold anyway if his aggression is super low that hand, and so forth.
Ash: Ash is going to be loose-aggressive - he's like Brock with the aggression, but he doesn't have the discipline that Brock has had working for years as a member of the OSI.
Claptrap: Claptrap will be Mike Matusow. He'll play solidly, and then all of a sudden, he'll just go rando berzerk with his plays for a few rotations, raising with 72 and open folding aces preflop.
Sam: Sam's going to be loose-passive, for the most part. He'll call far too often and play too many hands.
I dunno. If their seats correspond to the playstyles of PN1, it'll be more like this:
Brock is the smartest at the table (like Max was) but the most undisciplined (random) in terms of aggression, leading him to be the hardest player at the table to beat.
Claptrap doesn't know what he's doing (like Strong Bad)- the Poker website even says so. Unlike SB, though, I think he'll be slightly less aggressive. Not really his personality.
Ash will be both fairly aggressive and fairly competent (like the Heavy).
Sam will be very competent (slightly less so than Brock), but very low aggression, like Tycho. This fits his personality pretty well, as it is VERY difficult to tick Sam off (but if you do, heaven help you....).
If he has more money maybe he will make another game...
http://blog.us.playstation.com/2013/04/17/telltales-poker-night-2-goes-all-in-brock-samson-ash-claptrap-glados-more/
More importantly, it sounds like there are more factors that'll affect how a character plays. I'd assume base skill and variable aggression is there, but now with moments that can affect one of the two. Unless that's just going to be folded into straight aggression modifications, I guess?
Stuff like Brock's aggression ramping up with every (consecutive?) successful hand, or Claptrap's play getting sloppy if you catch him in the middle of conversation with GLaDOS.
It's also sounding like there's a similar seating spectrum to the first game. Brock is considered very tight and Claptrap said to be very surprisingly skilled - do you think this means further left is where the more skilled players sit this time, where the looser and less skilled hang to the right? (This would be sort of opposite of PN1's, though Max technically was as smart as Tycho, he just had crazy aggression spikes.)
Seems I was right about Sam probably being the theoretical weak link of the table. Can't wait to see him bust me out for writing that.
Talk of between-tournament continuity is very interesting, wonder if that affects how well characters play too (like if someone gets more frustrated with every loss of a tournament and becomes better/tighter, and so forth).
Intriguing, exciting, and less than a week to go! Any other thoughts on playing AI?
Maybe Sam's conversations with Max will sometimes effect how he plays? It would make sense for Sam to listen to Max regardless of how bizarre his information is, because you already ask Max for hints in Sam & Max.
Maybe Claptrap somehow uses Mad Moxxi and Steve to distract other players. Steve shooting rockets at the players and them going to get their revenge would be a pretty good way for Claptrap to gain an advantage.
GLaDOS and her weight jokes will get her trouble if one of them is used against Sam.
Sam: "This forum is again slow as bicycle on sand eating a hotdog."
Claptrap is remarkably lucky whilst Brock goes out second usually...
Usually in my experience it is either a Claptrap or Sam final
I've only played a couple of hours but Brock and Ash are failures every time...
Claptrap: Tight Aggressive. So far, Claptrap IS the best player at the table, bar none. He really is smart, and he's not getting out of line with crazy cards, so far as I can see. His problem is that he can't read Ash and Brock well at all, and as a result is folding way too often to their (to me) obvious bluffs. Claptrap usually has it when he bets, and knows when it is profitable to chase draws, and when it's not. Claptrap is usually the one to beat.
Ash: Loose VERY Aggressive. Ash will bet it he's got a hand. Or if he doesn't have a hand. Or if he thinks you don't have a hand. Or if he thinks you have a hand that he can get you off of. Or if he sees a woman. Or if his evil hand twitches. Aggression leads Ash to build up a chipstack by stealing a lot of small pots. Sadly, you need cards to go up against Ash, and you need those cards to hold up, as he'll often call your all-ins down with hands like ace-high and spike his three-outer on the river. If he could find a fold once in a while, he'd be dangerous.
Sam: Tight Passive. Sam's waiting too long for good cards. If this were a deepstacked cash game, Sam would probably be cleaning up, but considering that this is a tournament, with only 50 big blinds to start, where players tend to wildly overbet the pot (rare even in NLHE, and just plain *stupid* in Omaha, which is why it's played pot-limit in most cases...) Sam is playing too tight. Sam probably plays closest to how recreational players who have read a few books start out playing, but doesn't make adjustments for blind size or the characteristics of his opponents. Sam needs to start raising preflop and 3-betting lighter against Brock and Ash.
He bluffs to the extreme
The game comes out today on Steam, so I can't wait.
Thanks. Poker Night at the Inventory 1 was the game that introduced me to poker - and I got into it in a big way.