Huang Shengjie fell into contemplation.
"Judging from the current rules, it seems a bit like Minesweeper? Or a card-flipping game? In any case, it’s a gameplay that mainly relies on luck.
"It also seems to have a certain level of strategy; you need to consider how to allocate these exploration funds to achieve the expected optimal return, but currently, I can’t see any clear winning strategy.
"There’s a total budget of 1800 points, and it takes 1000 points to buy a plot of land, which means no matter what, you can only buy one plot of land.
"The key is which plot to specifically buy.
"’Observation’ counts as a pre-purchase activity, meaning you observe other plots to increase the chance of choosing a better one for yourself.
"’Refinement’ is a post-purchase activity, using this method to enhance yields after buying the plot.
"Both together consume the remaining 800 points of funds.
"Let’s try a round first."
Just looking at the rules is always vague, so Huang Shengjie decided to continue studying the specifics in the game.
A short opening animation floated across the screen, with effects of gold sand flying and ribbons fluttering.
Numbers representing different gold sand contents appeared on different squares, which all flipped over and shuffled together, and then rearranged.
At this moment, looking at the screen, there were just 16 identical squares.
"Let’s observe a bit and test the waters."
Huang Shengjie randomly chose a plot in the upper right corner for ’Observation’.
After deducting 50 points from the exploration budget, the plot flipped over, revealing the number 10.
"10 gold sand? Not bad!
"That means I successfully eliminated a wrong answer."
The second plot turned over ’30’, which was also good news.
But the third plot was a bit more troubling; it revealed a ’5000’.
Huang Shengjie instinctively felt a bit of pain, as if 5000 minutes of visa time had slipped away from him.
Although from the specific reserves, the highest block has 20,000, but Huang Shengjie also knew that the chance of selecting it was very low, only 1/16.
So, he had to lower his psychological expectations; as long as it was relatively large, it was good enough.
Among these numbers, 1000, 2000, 5000, 10,000, 20,000 are all acceptable figures and surely exceed the average yield of most rounds.
But directly excluding out a 5000, which is the third largest number, was undoubtedly very bad news for Huang Shengjie.
"This ’Enrichment Effect’ doesn’t seem to be very reliable...
"The rules say that the distribution of gold sand might have an enrichment effect, meaning plots with high content are more likely to be adjacent, so I chose according to these plots of 10, 30.
"Logically, I should have selected a smaller plot.
"But I still ended up with a 5000 plot.
"...However, this is normal too, if the large plots were definitely adjacent, the game would be too easy, you could thoughtlessly select and guarantee at least 10,000, with 4 hours, the yield would be too exaggerated.
"That surely isn’t a situation the Imitator wants to see."
Although comforting himself this way, turning over a large number still made Huang Shengjie instinctively feel quite frustrated.
At this moment, he heard someone exhale behind him.
It wasn’t quite a clear sigh, but it could still be discerned as slightly regretful.
Huang Shengjie originally didn’t plan to pay attention, but he instinctively turned his head for a quick glance, and was taken aback.
The stranger who was waiting outside his cubicle was gone, replaced by a familiar face.
Lu Bingjun.
At this time, Lu Bingjun wasn’t much different from the last time they met, only looking somewhat dim and slightly more haggard.
Huang Shengjie instinctively looked at the name tag on Lu Bingjun’s chest, wanting to know his new Community number, but after seeing it, he remembered that the name tags for this game didn’t display that.
"Brother Lu..."
They didn’t belong to the same Community anymore, so they could freely communicate at this time.
Huang Shengjie, for a while, didn’t know what to say, meeting in this setting was somewhat awkward.
Lu Bingjun seemed to have no intention of bringing up old matters, at least not for now.
He pointed at the screen, "Don’t you realize there’s an issue with how you’re playing?
"’Observation’ in this gameplay is essentially a misleading option that reduces your yield.
"The most correct play is to directly blind-pick a plot, then use all the remaining exploration funds to enhance its yield.
"I know this sounds counterintuitive, but you should seriously calculate the expected yield."
Huang Shengjie was a bit taken aback; he didn’t say anything and just continued listening.
Lu Bingjun explained, "Most players, upon seeing the game rules, would make a choice similar to yours; instinctively believing that the ’Observation’ function can eliminate plots with smaller numbers, so when the remaining plots have more large numbers, they finally select the plot to buy.
"This is a strategy that aligns with intuition.
"But probability and expected yields don’t work that way.
"The total sum of the numbers on these 16 plots is 38,921, so the expected yield of turning over any plot is 38,921/16, roughly over 2400.
"Then using the remaining 800 point fund to refine it, eight times at 5% each time, by additive calculation, is an additional 40% increase.
"So, without observing, randomly selecting a plot, the expected yield is just over 3300.
"You might think that if you first flip a small number, then the probability of picking a large number from the remaining ones increases, the expected yield might also rise.
"But selecting a plot is a holistic action, if you pre-set the premise of ’first flip a small number’ and then calculate the expected yield, it will definitely deviate from the real result.
"The root cause is in the fact that ’Observation’ is a completely deceptive choice. Because it has one restriction: even if you observe a plot and obtain the specific number, you cannot buy it anymore.
"Therefore, it can’t increase the probability of ultimately selecting a large number, but rather wastes precious funds.
"Just like you turned over a 5000, even if you regret it, there’s no way to make up for it.
"Moreover, you have to consider the ’turnover rate’ issue.
"The total game time is limited, the total number of cubicles is also limited; the longer you spend on each round, the fewer total rounds you play.
"So in a situation where the expected yield is fixed, the fewer rounds you play, the lower your yield."
"Considering my current position, I probably shouldn’t say anything, but..."
Lu Bingjun did not continue further.
Huang Shengjie’s expression also turned somewhat downcast, and he asked, "Brother Lu, which Community are you in now? Are you doing okay?"
Lu Bingjun nodded, "Yes, it’s alright.
"I went to Community 32, which is a relatively weak Community, they quickly accepted me and gave me a loan.
"In the last game, my performance was okay, I earned their trust.
"Anyway, starting over, slowly accumulating visa time.
"Is Community 2 doing well? How is Yao Yuan now? Didn’t he join this game?"
Huang Shengjie didn’t know how to reply at the moment, "Brother Yao Yuan he..."
Lu Bingjun waited for a moment, saw that Huang Shengjie was hesitating, and didn’t press further.
"Forget it, let’s not talk about the past, time is tight, let’s focus on the current game first, other things can wait until later.
"Although this game seems to have 4 hours, in reality, it’s not ample because we have to compete with other Communities for a better ranking.
"Even though I was kicked out of Community 2, according to the rules of this game, it actually proved to be a blessing in disguise.
"We can communicate smoothly, cooperate with each other, and break through the limitations of the rules."