Hey thanks Uber :) I actually didn’t know I won until you said that. I played early I think, like a bit after midnight, and wasn’t on here much or at all the next day so didn’t get to check.
I haven’t played HS much in a while before this week bc I used to waste a lot of time on it.* I get fixated on game time so I’d restart sometimes 20x, even 40x or more if I went over a certain limit. Without fail I’d always tire and leave final attempt at a much lower tally than previous attempts.
This week I kept my tally low, restarting only if I flubbed. When I played the 10x1, I checked the previous hot streak variant day before which I played only once and I came in second, which confirms what I think I already knew- my compulsive restarting of HS never did me any good.
*Still, can be a fun distraction during down time, and no true freecell enthusiast should ever fear wasting time, ha
Hey y’all- I have a HotStreak question for ya.
So, I check some threads occasionally when I’m not playing, but I’m not super great abt it. Happened to notice some of the CongratsEllie2 thread that I think got deleted, for reasons I neither know nor care to know really, if it’s to do with heated discussion or whatever. Not trying to stir anything up bc this is off topic to much of that thread prob, but related bc it deals with one of the few posts I saw, from I think rbw? (Tho can’t be sure.)
Anyway, rbw or someone posted something, not offensive at all , abt how yes he doesn’t think it’s fair when ppl use decks, but it’s Denny’s site and he should make the rules. He/she said they also felt similarly abt hotstreak when ppl play a lot and how he/she doesn’t think that’s v fair and proposed a limit, but that got nixed and he was fine with it bc again, it’s Den’s site.
To clarify, rbw wasn’t being rude and wasn’t singling anyone out, but I was confused because while I can see the using decks issue being controversial, I had no idea playing HS several times may be, and that’s something I do a lot, so pls lmk if it’s a faux pas.
I don’t use decks, my feeling is that cheats the player using them moreso than others, as to me the whole point of playing anything like this is simply to improve, learn, and think on your toes. However, I suppose it depends on what each is trying to improve. If ppl use them to study then I could understand that better I guess. Regardless, even if its fully decided by all that it’s wrong, there’d be no way of enforcing it. Not unless we all played via webcam and that’s not something I’d sign up for. There’s no way of knowing who does that—for all we know some who complain abt it could just as easily being doing it. It’s totally honor system, thus, it’s a moot point imo so to talk abt it seems only to stir the pot. (Not that I don’t get why it’s under discussion.)
However, with HS I often play several times. And I mean a whooole lot some days. I’m not actually trying to beat another person when I do it, but rather myself. As explained in above post, I can get kind of ocd abt it and I thought that the risk of doing worse on next attempt was part of the point of HS, bc it raises the stakes. It not like I think ppl can’t see my # of attempts, if anything it’s kind of embarrassing bc it’s like a big sign that says “this girl has ocd” ha (only with freecell, mainly) So I’m not trying to be devious abt it or anything.
My idea of healthy competition is that it doesn’t exist unless that competition is with yourself alone. It has little to do with other peoples scores. To single out another person and try to beat them isn’t healthy competition, that’s vendetta. I think the point of playing with other people is simply that if someone else can do it, it can be reasonably assumed I can too, within limit. Obvi if someone is super expert I’ll realize I’ll need quite a while to get to that level, but other than that, people’s scores only serve as an admirable goal- not something I actively try to beat them on, but rather when I play HS I’m constantly trying to outdo myself. Quite a few times I’ve made the top score and started all over only to make lower. Also, I like to set time limits with myself, and if I go even a few secs over on a game, I’ll restart, if I have nothing else to do.
However, I’m still fairly new on here and I don’t want to offend or upset anyone, so pls lmk if that’s rlly annoying.
When I see what the variant is I'll either have a number in mind I think I should reach or
if it's an easier variant I'll play until I go the full thirty minutes and I'll play until I get there.. If it's 10 x4 or 9x5 I'll stop at a couple , those just give me a headache.. You should probably stop around 100 tries but that's not the record I believe.
Go,
trying many times when really playing-to-solve HS games is not a problem
trying many times by quitting apparently difficult games after 1 sec is the problem . Because it counts as played and lost without trying to play it, the stats and game ELO are impacted (and not your ELO)
"trying many times by quitting apparently difficult games after 1 sec is the problem . Because it counts as played and lost without trying to play it, the stats and game ELO are impacted (and not your ELO)"
Hot streak does not change the game ELO.
I brought up the number of hot streak attempts because a top player took 72 tries one day and bumped me from 3rd to 4th for the day.
the top 3 spots are the only ones that matter to the record keeping that Hop maintains. My feeling was that there should be some kind of reasonable limit, but it's not that big a deal. The person who was quitting immediately said they were having some kind of technical issue, but there seemed to be a translation issue trying to understand them. I originally thought they were trying to get a small advantage by finding an easy first game.
Hops hot streak records. Players / Medals tracks the cumulative totals:
Hot Streak Records (neocities.org)
Seb-
I see. I wasn’t thinking abt game elo. Like Jackstraw, I tend to have an idea of how many I should get w a variant. But annoyingly, when it’s one I like to speed on, sometimes I’ll get weird abt it and set a time limit for myself per game. I haven’t rlly thought of it as a major competition bc it seems like not many play it, so I sort of just play around with it I guess
Let’s say it’s 11x0, depending on lvl, I may try to keep it at 2 mins or under. With a rlly easy one like 9x5 or so, I may try to keep each under a 1:00 or 1:15. So if it says I’ve played 50x or something, most of those I simply exit out of if I go over a min, or 2 mins, whatever limit I set per game.
That’s what I’ve been doing at least, but I hadn’t considered how tossing a game for no reason can affect the games elo, esp if I do it a lot.
That gives me a good reason to try to break that habit, bc often when I do that it’s rlly just a time waster anyway. And on final play I always end on lowest score bc by that point I’m just zonked.
Like a few days ago, I had 18, played more, got fixated on keeping under a minute, midnight comes, I think I landed on like 7 bc I was out of time. And the times I only play a few I always do better. So it’s a dumb habit anyway and was trying to quit just bc it rlly can suck up time. I’ll try to knock it off. And hey thnx for the info y'all :)
Rbw- yea my bad, was replying and my tablet died. Wanted to say, even if it doesn’t mess with game elo, I’m still srry bc I’m sure I’ve prob done that many before. Idk my record but I can totally see me playing 80x and exiting most after a min if I go over. Sometimes I’ve done it if I’m just taking long on a move.
I hope that wasn’t me that did that to you, but if it was I promise I wasn’t trying to be a jerk. Freecell checks all the boxes for things I can get fixated on. Some days I’m more abt solve, other days, speed, but almost always I make little mini challenges for myself and HS is rlly good to binge that with.
I only look at top score to gage if it’s something I should be able to get. If it’s a variant I’m no good at, I won’t even try to touch top place. If it’s one I know I can reach, I’ll try for it but I’ll get frustrated when I can’t do better than whatever I just got and I’ll zone out on trying for a while.
I’ve never exited right after start to get an easier game, but I’ve exited many times a few secs in if my dog interrupts me to give her a blanket. I try to only play HS when she’s settled, but she likes to psyche me out repeatedly bc she hates when I’m on my tablet ( / attending to anything other than her).
Anyway, thnx also for info. I didn’t know Hop had a record for top 3 hotstreak, but that’s cool.
I also get kind of ocd w daily comps, but not as bad as HS. The only thing I rlly note with others scores are tourneys. I’m never trying to best anyone rlly tho, I just gage my improvement. So like, if I were suddenly closer to some of y’all in time on tourneys, I’d know I’m doing something better. But I’m never like, cussing FGN for winning or anything, ha
there is no direct impact, true but there is ELO correction overnight per variant
we might need ElGuapo input here to give some insights on how it works
GoAdopt..... No it wasn't you. Feel free to play as many times as you want. I do it too sometimes. The person with the 72 tries was a top speed player that's been MIA a couple of months. I could tell they were going for 1st because they had 2 scores that day that beat mine, but only managed to get 3rd for the day.
Seb- gotcha. That makes sense.
Rbw- glad it wasn’t me, still sort of a newb here so want to make sure I don’t step on toes. And thanks :) recently I’d cut back on HS for a while anyway, just bc of how much time I waste on it, ha. I’ve played a bit past week or so but hopefully won’t keep being neurotic abt it just bc it’s so draining for me anyhow
CubicSprock came back to beat us all in hot streak.
I haven't checked those pages recently. When I switch to the first-attempt-only winners, I have noticed that jimmyp beats calicokid in Medals.
"not even the variant-level adjustments"
Question for ElGuapo if you have the time. Do the variant level adjustments take the player ELO's playing the games into account or do they just use an absolute number of wins and losses for that level to calculate the variant adjustments?
What’s your response mean, Uber? Caught all but that one. I’m not good with the site lingo yet so jw if that has specific meaning
The variant level adjustment (we call it a boost, although it can be up or down) isn't a once a day thing, it's continuous. We just update the "about" page once a day with the new averages. All that's happening is a fraction of every point exchange from rated play gets applied to the entire level. So if you beat a particular 5x7-6 game and it loses 1 point, the entire 5x7-6 set of games also loses a tenth of a point. Variants that already have a ton of play are assumed to have pretty accurate game ratings, so the boost fraction is small. That keeps things consistent and protects the system from one aberrant player making a mess by, say, intentionally losing. In variants with less play we're less confident that the ratings have reached parity so we boost them more.
"The variant level adjustment"
Thanks. Sounds reasonable and it does capture the player ELO.
"When I switch to the first-attempt-only winners, I have noticed that jimmyp beats calicokid in Medals."
I think jimmyp plays mostly 1 try each day. Yesterday was an outlier where he got the gold for 1 try and only won 1 game.
That doesn't take anything away from some of those lightning fast streaks he has.
That's a darn good score you've laid down early doors, Jack - already beating the previous record 👏
Thanks - I did not know that
we'll see if it holds
Impressive 5x6-1 today by the player with no name. Beat Uberman's record by 1. Lots of difficult games when 1 or 2 low cards are buried.
Yep, very impressive score, and with a much better ratio than usual! Only 67 unwinnables but, like you say, some of them can be tough to eke out.
I guess I'll take a break on this one til later. Not one easy game yet.
Great streak today Uberman.
| 6/8 | 11:48 | 5x6 20366-3 | HotStreak | 3:12 | Lost | 6.7% | 1 | 15 | |
| 6/8 | 11:44 | 5x6 15235-3 | HotStreak | 4:08 | Won | 14.3% | 1 | 7 | |
| 6/8 | 8:44 | 5x6 28285-3 | HotStreak | 3:06 | Lost | 0% | 0 | 15 | |
| 6/8 | 8:41 | 5x6 27273-3 | HotStreak | 2:54 | Won | 25% | 5 | 20 | |
| 6/8 | 8:38 | 5x6 31771-3 | HotStreak | 3:20 | Lost | 22.2% | 2 | 9 |
Thanks, I doubt it'll hold with the likes of calico on the scene but oh well.
Yeah, some of these games are tough - I had a 30/3 game I eked out, but I don't even think that was as hard as the earlier game that took me 5 mins plus. The daft thing was, I thought that it was the same variant that ! reached 28 in the other day, so I almost did away with the streak and started again, but realised that was level 1 instead 🤦♂️
Yesterday's 8x2 was one I struggled with . I thought I should be able to get in the 10 range
but never came close .
Hey, nice going today GAAD, a bit close there at the top!
"Hey, nice going today GAAD, a bit close there at the top!"
Probably even more impressive today with 18 in a difficult variant. I think you have a bright future in Freecell. You may become a first rate time waster!
Edit:
Looks like someone is trying pass you. They're up to 43 tries and previously had 3rd. Guess 3rd was not good enough.
Uber and rb- I must’ve missed this and only just saw it when I was searching for threads abt technical problems. Thank y’all both:) haha and yes- I’m a professional time waster, rb.
Hey but question for y’all and for Denny,
lately a lot of times I play HS I get an error message abt a server error and won’t progress until I hit refresh. (I’m usually in such a rush I instinctually refresh without copying error txt, srry denny) Anyway it usually just lags a bit, but today it’s been restarting the last bits of some games. Not just the last move, but restarts to abt 5-10 of last moves made. That’s happened before but not as often as today, and my tv and all other internet devices seem to be ok.
Then a second ago, after I won a game, it just straight up switched me from hot streak to standard variant. This happening to anyone else? Or is hot streak just sick of me 😬
One of my tries today I lost a few minutes due to the screen not advancing. One game needed a partial redo. Never had it switch modes unless the timer ran out on an unfinished game that I completed later.
yeah the screen not advancing is gen what happens to me. It intermingles with that and the error message. The former happens more frequently than the latter, but some days, like today, the latter happens a lot too.
Today was the only time I’ve ever had it switch tho, but it only did it the once.
I just stopped after a bit. It was frustrating but my dear ol’ dog had started up anyway, so it prob didn’t affect my game all that much anyway, haha
calico and rbw- good job on today’s hot streak. I couldn’t even get past 3 or 4 trying to hurry.
"calico and rbw- good job on today’s hot streak."
Thanks. Probably first and last time the 2 names will appear in the same sentence.
GAAD, Why are you restarting when you're #1 for the day? 18 (or 15) are really good scores.
Ha, rbw, had a feeling you may ask. You know how sometimes with a certain variant you can rip through ‘em more easily for some reason? But when I can, it oft takes me a bit to realize it..
When I started last night I didn’t realize how fast to go at first. 1st round I put too much thought into it, averaging abt 3 mins a game, more or less, &made it to 4 or so before flubbing I think. 2nd go I got to like 6 and think I had to get up for my stray cats hissing at something.
Finally on 3rd shot had time to myself and hit 18, but only realized well into it that I did better going very fast. Had wine and felt sleepy so went to bed but wanted to give it another stab today to see how many I can do. Noticed I was in 1st, and I do gage my speed to others but I try to be competitive mainly with myself and knew I can do more than I had.
So played another round but had to help dog twice for a min during that and so just hit same 18 again. Still didn’t know how many I could get in 30mins. Was averaging abt 1:17-1:30 on time but made some under a min so thought surely at least 20.
But alas, next few tries I was distracted or just not on my game so lost or quit. Got up for a while to do animal stuff, and when I settled back into it I was doing ok before a final flub with not enough time to catch up. No big tho, should prob stop using HS as a way to gage my speed at a variant and instead do practice ones before hand, but it’s habit I guess.
You were fast to do 14 in one shot without practice. Nice job!
Btw, it’s so odd to me that there are a few variants where I legit do better skill-wise the faster I go as opposed to considering them longer. It must be that automatic processing thing I’m always ranting about.
Are there any variants like that for you (or anyone else reading this) where you suspect your skill is actually better the less time you spend analyzing the cards? If you can think of any lmk because I like those.
With those I do better going fast with, it’s not like they’re completely thoughtless, I gen put a good 10-20 secs deciding first moves / strategy. But then after that it’s like the flow is necessary for best results.
A good idea would be to look at the record for the variant to gauge how you did. 9x2 -5 the record is 26. Your 18 was around 70% of the record. 1:17 to 1:30 gets into the elite player range. My thought is there are too many tough games to expect to run through 20 without hitting one or two that's going to take 2 or 3 times your average. A player like Calico can do 26 because there were probably a couple that took him 2 minutes, but he can solve the majority in about a minute.
I’m not as fast as calico obvi. His speed is inhuman, lol. Idk how his fingers move so fast but bet he’d be a master pianist! Still, I think each player has certain variants they excel at where they can hit closer to calico’s catlike speed (pun intended) 😉 tho I’d put calico in at 30 on these, possibly a few more. Maybe even 40. I know I can fly through 9x5s for instance (maybe the 9s are lucky for me) but I’m pretty sure on HS calico once roasted me with those, as he gen does on any timed games.
With these, I know I can get 20 no problem because both 18’s I hit consecutively even tho I wasn’t playing optimally and got my dog adjusted a few times during. 24 or 25 would prob be around my ideal top in 30 mins, but I’m guessing with no interruptions I’d get abt 21-23. But now I want to try and see. Is best way to just set a timer and play 9x2- lvl 5?
I find a good way to get faster on those I’m decent at, like 10x1 or 11x1, is to set climate at 10 or higher when I play casually during a week. I may lose some, but then lvl 5s and such become a breeze.
Ps- thnx for info on record variant. That’s a good idea.
Edit- aren’t winnable games usually set above 5? If so, I can try those to insure I don’t run into any UWs. I’ll try that first but if not and I get any under lvl 5 I’ll go to custom settings
"Edit- aren’t winnable games usually set above 5?"
Just do in in custom and don't check the count as streak box and you can do level 5's as long as you'd like.
I don't think it's hand speed that matters. Calico uses a mouse and if you use a mouse also you can optimize the mouse speed. From the discussion here speed players don't pause between moves and that seems to be the key to fast play.
There's a video of Calico playing hot streak linked on the about page:
Calicokid Playing Freecell - YouTube
There's also one by ForGotteNNapKiN around somewhere that has a better angle to see the cards.
Thanks rbw!
This’ll help me gage best time on them. Rn I’m practicing, (which I rlly should do pre-HS too and only start once I hit flow) but I’m only half through 1st coffee and I gen need 2 cups to do well, ha
I’ve played a few under a min but mostly rn am around 2 mins or more. Once coffee hits, hopefully I’ll be abt a min 1/2 or under. For 30 I prob can’t do it every time, but if I do most and have some at / just over 2 mins maybe I can hit 20.
Should be possible since I got todays HS at 20, and while zero’s are my current fave, I put more time into them than most variants, deciding almost my whole solve before 1st move or I’ll get anxious. I major flubbed my last game on HS tho, prob spent longest on it but still lost it 😞
That’s interesting abt mouse, wouldn’t have guessed that with calico! I’ve been a rlly fast typist since learning, but touch screens have spoiled me so idk if I’d be quick with a mouse, tho maybe could readjust to old ways.
I agree abt pause between plays. I rarely do once I hit flow and it helps me to spend the first seconds of game thinking solve, then speeding the rest.
"Once coffee hits, hopefully I’ll be abt a min 1/2 or under. "
No performance enhancing substances are permitted!!!
Haha, ah well then.
Farewell freecell! ‘Twas nice knowing you, but I knew coffee first.