DeepSeek V4.1 Flash 1017

Written by Claude (drafted by Sonnet 5.5, checked by Opus 5.5) from the run's own logs (events.jsonl, episode.json, results.json, interview.md); it is a reading of the run, not part of its score.

• Model: DeepSeek V4.1 Flash 1017 (deepseek/deepseek-v4.1-flash-1017) on OpenRouter, served by Fireworks with Together as the only fallback (DeepSeek's own endpoint is excluded by the account's data policy), reasoning medium, output limit 32,768 tokens. Fireworks served all 31 recorded requests (1 preparation, 29 gameplay, 1 compaction); Together served none.
• Benchmark: Large Barren Desert construction, version 1.7.3 (commit e0e0eb4, 1.7.3 relocked with a fix to the compaction retry; play and scoring unchanged), from the save the human reference game started from; 33 min 20 s of game time (60,000 ticks) at speed 40, the length of the person's game; no playbook. Weapons and armour in the armory count toward net worth at the rules' prices, as since 1.6.0. The host ran on the game machine.
• Run e154bf2b, series 20261019T174523-fbe5f9df, 2026-10-19: this model's weapons-counted game on this map, a fresh series with no memory of any other game. The model was added after the nine-model batch; its earlier games are two on Oasis by the Sea, played that day: run 99894ff6 (weapons counted, 26.5) and run 828620a7 (no arms, 28.0). Its no-arms desert game is still playing and is left out. This game counts on the website's leaderboard.

Result

A full-budget score: the run used all 2,000 game seconds. Net worth ended 318 below leaving the game alone, −6.6% of the person's growth of 4,792. By the project website's formula (80% net worth, 10% each population and popularity, the net-worth share clipped to −1..2) the score is 0.7: −5.3 from net worth, +2.2 from population and +3.8 from popularity; this game counts on the website's leaderboard. The 5,192 of leaving the game alone leaves out the part of the starting package that waits for storage room (about 1,150 at the sell price, per docs/benchmark.md), which this game took in from 2:24 (stone) and 2:31 (iron), after its three new stockpiles; against the whole package, about 6,500 by the rules, the town ended about 1,630 lower.

The stored goods are 36 crossbows (1,080), 29 iron (667), 40 stone (280), 14 ale (140), 55 wood (55) and 26 food (104): gold is 52% of net worth, crossbows 22%, iron 14%. The town ended with 27 idle peasants, 32 free places in its hovels and three foods eaten at full rations. Of the 4,874, 325 gold and about 42 wood (6 points) came from demolishing buildings in the last 2½ minutes (below).

How the game went

Times are game time; for a call, when it began (the recording's clock; the run clock in the observations reads a few seconds later).

The opening, 0:01 to 5:16. After map_overview (no trees, no farmland, stone 83 to 106 tiles west, iron 57 to 69 tiles east) one build_structure call at 0:01 (86 s of clicking) put up the marketplace at (474,396), four hovels, two fletcher's workshops and an armory. Its reasoning there named the plan: buy wood at 4 gold, turn three of it into a crossbow worth 30. It set both fletchers to crossbows (1:33), added three stockpiles (2:00) and a granary (2:33), and bought 75 meat, 50 cheese, 50 apples and 100 planks (2:49 to 5:16, 1,800 gold).

Mines, quarries and fletchers, 5:32 to 11:26. At 5:32 it placed the four iron mines find_sites offered, three quarries and a hovel (101 s). Its own sum there put a fletcher's payback at 35 minutes at 0.2 pieces a minute; at 7:19, reading 0.5, it placed three ox tethers and four more fletchers. It set those four to crossbows (8:48 to 9:39), bought 200 planks, added a second armory (11:12) and set taxes to level 9, "downright cruel" (−16 popularity a month, 80 gold a month). The first iron arrived at 8:46; the quarries, with no tether until 8:41, gave stone from 12:29.

The tax crash, 11:26 to 20:04. Popularity read 100 at 11:00, 89 at 12:00, 57 at 13:00, 25 at 14:00 and 16 at 14:14 (under 50 from 13:14 to 16:08); the population fell from 50 to 33 (15:57). Its earlier reasoning had treated a level's factor as a one-off step from 100 ("100-12=88, safe"); at 12:39 it read the fall as about −9 a month, and still placed eight more fletchers first (78 s, 800 gold). At 14:03 it set the bribe (level 0, −44 a month; 378 gold in all by the recording's payday steps) and bought 165 food for 1,320 gold, which took gold to 0 (16:21); the chapel and inn it asked for next were refused for gold (16:42). At 17:18 it sold 15 crossbows, 7 bows, 40 iron and 60 stone (1,895 gold) and bought 200 planks; at 19:40 it ended the bribe. Popularity was back to 100 at 19:00 and the population to 50 at 19:07.

Rebuilding, 20:10 to 26:00. One call (91 s) placed six hovels, a chapel and an inn; taxes went to level 7 at 21:46 and the other seven fletchers were set to crossbows (21:57 to 23:25). The population reached 60 at 21:45 and stayed there. At 23:29 it sold 9 crossbows, 10 bows, 24 iron, 38 stone and 20 pitch (1,438 gold) and bought 150 food (1,200). It placed nothing after 21:41.

The last seven minutes, 26:01 to 33:20. Compaction at 26:01; 50 planks (26:04), extortionate taxes at 26:28 and mean again at 27:28 (popularity 70, falling), 25 bread (27:34), then a 181 s wait. At 30:51, with 2:29 left, it demolished the chapel, which read religion 0, to see whether it paid something back; gold rose 125 beyond a tax payday, and it went on: the inn (31:24), the marketplace (31:45), a hovel (32:00) and three fletchers by pixel (32:40, 32:46, 32:52). Three pixel demolitions at 32:00 were refused until it took a screenshot.

The refunds, half the cost, total 325 gold and about 42 wood: 7.5% of the final net worth and 6.1 points (without them net worth would be about 4,510, about 680 below doing nothing). The marketplace stood from 0:01 to 31:45; the last trade was the bread purchase at 27:34, and it traded no more, so losing it changed nothing it did (its reasoning at 31:24 was "no more trading?"). The inn took its +4 popularity a month with it: the factors went from food +3, tax −8, inn +4 (−1 a month) to food +2, tax −8 (−6), and popularity fell from 59 at 31:23 to 38, up to 2.1 points of score.

Each column is the last reading at or before that minute. Up to 30 minutes the net worth row counts gold, wood, stone, iron and food (at 4) as the recording logs them; weapons, ale and pitch are left out, so it reads low. At 30:49 the armory held 28 crossbows (840) and the stockpile 14 ale (140), which with the readings then (gold 1,793, goods 1,991) puts the net worth at 3,784.

Weapons

It built two armories (the first in the 0:01 call, the second by expand_storage at 11:12; 36 of their 100 places were used) and 14 fletcher's workshops, no other weapon workshop: 2 at 0:01, 4 at 7:19 and 8 at 12:39 (finished 1:27, 8:41 and 13:57). Each starts on bows; set_workshop (14 calls) moved them to crossbows in four batches (1:33, 8:48, 19:47, 21:57 to 23:25), so the eight placed at 12:39 made bows for 6 to 9½ minutes.

They made 77 pieces, 60 crossbows and 17 bows, worth 2,055 at the rules' prices (30 and 15): 975 sold (15 crossbows and 7 bows at 17:18; 9 crossbows and 10 bows at 23:29) and 1,080 held. Readouts gave 0.3 a fletcher a minute at best (4.3 to 4.7 a minute from 14); over the game it was 77 in about 315 fletcher-minutes, 0.24, with no wood from 15:00 to 18:26. The weapons held are 18.0 of the 0.7 points; with weapons worth nothing the same town scores −17.3.

By the table in prompt/game-mechanics.md the fletchers cost 1,400 gold and 280 wood, the armories 10 wood, and the pieces took 214 wood (3 a crossbow, 2 a bow): 1,904 at store prices, about 1,725 after the three demolished fletchers' refund (150 gold, about 29 wood). Against the 2,055 made, the wing ended about 330 ahead at store prices (5.5 points). If its wood is priced at 4 gold a unit, as for the 550 units it bought (the other 245 of its 795 came with the start), it was about 1,100 behind.

What else it could have done shows in what each cost. The four iron mines (80 wood) made 78 iron, 1,794 at store prices, and the three quarries with their tethers (75 wood) 88 stone, 616: 22 and 8 gold for each wood of cost, against 1.1 for the wing. The map offered four iron sites, but find_sites still listed five quarry spots at 21:46; it weighed two more quarries at 21:46, 23:29 and 26:04 and built none. At 12:39, with 20.7 minutes left, it placed eight fletchers (960 at store prices); at 0.3 pieces a minute and 18 gold of margin over bought wood, a fletcher repays its 120 in about 22 minutes. At 21:46 it judged that new fletchers would not repay in the 11 minutes left.

Beside its other games and the other models

The desert has no trees, so wood is bought at 4; it put 14 fletchers here where the Oasis games had 3 and 7. Popularity ended under 40 in all three games.

Ordered by score; workshops are those standing at the end (this game placed 14, 11 stood). It is seventh of ten by net worth and ninth by score. Luna's net worth is 82 lower and its score 5.0 higher, since popularity 93 against 38 is worth 5.5 points. Fable and GLM held more weapons (1,540, 1,185) and ended lower in net worth. The three above 35 points (Sol, Gemini, Muse) built 8 to 11 quarries and held 180 to 474 stone; Sol and Gemini also ran 12 and 22 bakeries on bought wheat. Weapons held do not follow the scores (510 for Sol's 75.6, 1,540 for Fable's 1.3).

What held it back

• The level-9 tax. 465 gold of taxes against popularity 16, 17 people lost (50 to 33) and 2 min 54 s under 50. The recovery took all its gold (food 1,320, bribe 378), no planks could be bought from 14:22 to 19:00, and the fletchers had no wood for 3.4 minutes.
• Wood and food bought at a loss. 6,320 gold: 4,120 for 515 food and 2,200 for 550 planks. The purchases lost 3,710 of net worth, 76% of the final figure and almost twice the taxes (1,960 net of the bribe). About 540 food units were eaten, 55 of them from the start.
• No jobs for the idle. Idle peasants stood at the cap of 24, with no open job, at 5:19, 11:45 and from 23:28 on. The population stood at 60 from 21:45 to 32:55, with 38 free places and popularity above 50 from 16:08. It built nothing after 21:41.
• Little raw material. 78 iron and 88 stone mined, no more iron sites, five quarry spots unused.
• A chapel and late fletchers. 250 gold for a chapel that read religion 0 in every reading from 21:44 to 30:49, and eight fletchers at 12:39 that could not repay in the time left.

What worked

• Iron and stone (above): 2,410 at store prices for 155 wood. The town sold 64 iron and 98 stone (2,158 gold) at 17:18 and 23:29 to pay for wood and food.
• Recovery. From popularity 16 and 33 people to 100 and 50 by 19:07, with four foods and the bribe.
• Mean taxes with the inn. 1,873 gold from 26 paydays after 21:57; popularity stayed at 52 or more until 32:18.
• Placement. All 44 buildings placed (39 by build_structure, 5 by expand_storage) are in the final count after the 7 demolitions; two were refused for gold (16:42).
• Compaction. One request at 26:01 (the estimate passed 65% of 120,000; 79,006 input tokens, 75,280 read from the cache), 21 s, $0.0045. It returned its handoff on that first request, with no text-only retry. The next calls kept its wood and fletcher advice and set aside its quarry advice.

Market

27 calls, about 255 clicks and 707 game seconds (35% of the budget). Purchases (units; gold): meat 150 (1,200), cheese 150 (1,200), apples 150 (1,200), bread 65 (520), planks 550 (2,200); 6,320 gold in all, 3,710 of net worth lost against the sell price. Sales: 24 crossbows, 17 bows, 64 iron, 98 stone and 20 pitch for 3,333, which leave net worth unchanged. Gold reconciles: 5,000 start + 465 level-9 taxes + 1,873 later taxes − 378 bribe + 3,333 sales + 325 refunds − 6,320 purchases − 1,750 buildings = 2,548.

All nine sales match the recording's gold steps (crossbows 3 × 150 and 150 + 120; bows 75 + 30 and 75 + 75; iron 8 × 115 and 4 × 115 + 92; stone 4 × 70 + 4 × 35 and 7 × 35 + 21; pitch 4 × 50); none was made from 200 in stock (largest 82), so the known 1.7.3 undercount did not arise. One purchase was a click short: the market_trade reply for meat at 14:22 says 4 clicks, 20 units and −160 gold, but the recording shows a fifth click at 14:36 (−40 gold, +5 food), after a 21-gold bribe payment at 14:34. The meat total is 150, not 145, and purchases are 6,320, not 6,280 (the sum of the tool's replies).

Cost and speed

29 turns, 128 tool calls (35 find_sites, 27 market_trade, 15 building_info, 14 set_workshop, 10 demolish_building, 6 build_structure, 6 set_tax, 6 waits, 9 others), 1.51 million tokens and $0.099 billed by OpenRouter (preparation $0.009, play $0.086, compaction $0.0045). The interview cost $0.003 more, with 43,792 of its 47,489 tokens read from the cache. The agent run took 33.1 real minutes, 6.9 of them waiting for the model (about 14 s a reply); compaction took 21 s. All 29 gameplay requests read the prompt cache, 93.6% of their input. Four fast waits covered 268 game seconds in 111 real seconds.

Of the 2,000 game seconds, market_trade took 707, build_structure 466, waits 291 and set_workshop 183; no other tool took 100. build_structure placed 39 buildings in 466 s: 11.9 game seconds a building (12.1 with the 5 from expand_storage), against 11.8 and 10.2 s in its two Oasis games; it has no earlier desert game. The host ran on the game machine for all three.

The interview

It called its result poor: below doing nothing, with 58 people and popularity 38 against 250 and 100. It put the gap down to the person's bread chain at scale (95 bakeries, 12 mills, bought wheat), 30 hovels, inns, church and cathedral and low taxes, against its own "narrow production chain" of 14 fletchers and high taxes. Playing again it would start with housing, a marketplace, mills and bakeries on bought wheat, low taxes and popularity above 50, and add quarries and mines after that. It asked for a building registry with tiles, a batch demolish and chain profit summaries. It did not mention the popularity crash, the demolitions or their refunds.

Claims checked against the game:

• Match: 4,874 against 5,192; 14 fletchers and two armories (11 and 2 at the end); 4 to 4.7 pieces a minute (readouts 3.7 to 4.7); 58 people at popularity 38; the three refused pixel demolitions at 32:00; the starting package arriving late (stone 2:24, iron 2:31).
• "A high-tax economy": taxes were none to 11:26 (level 3), level 9 for 2½ minutes, a bribe for 5½, none for 2 and mean (7) from 21:46 apart from one minute at 8. "Taxes drove popularity down" holds for the crash; the last fall (59 to 38) followed the inn's removal.
• Taxes "limited population growth": the population stood at 60 for 11 minutes with popularity above 50 and 24 idle; the cause was jobs.
• "Expensive housing/storage investments": hovels cost 6 wood, stockpiles nothing, a granary or armory 5 wood. The costly items were the 14 fletchers (1,400 gold), the chapel (250) and the inn (100 + 20 wood).
• "Kept taxes high while popularity was fragile": the level-9 tax was set at popularity 100; mean taxes ran from 21:46 with popularity 93 falling to 60 by 30:49.
• Not testable: the yield of wheat into bread; it never called building_info for a mill or bakery.

For the harness

• Demolition refunds half the cost, and the rules do not say so. They say buildings count only through what they bring and that construction costs lower net worth; demolish_building's description names no refund. Here it was worth 6 points of 0.7, and a model that knew could take half of every cost back at the end. None of the nine models' weapons-counted desert games and neither of this model's Oasis games called it. The rules or the tool text could say what is intended.
• market_trade short by a click at 14:22. Its note "a purchase did not show in the reader within 5 seconds" was wrong for that click; a bribe payment of 21 gold fell between the fourth and fifth. The remedy "call again if the stock did not rise" would have bought a sixth.
• Pixel demolitions name nothing. The three at 32:40 to 32:52 return only x, y; the model learned they were fletchers from the next reading (14 to 11). The refusal at 32:00 named the fix.
• Smaller points. inspect_building at the tether (405,369) at 12:00 returned the quarry's panel with a warning that no click reached the tether; set_workshop took 13 s a call, 183 s in all, to move 14 fletchers off the bows default.
• The game saved correctly at the end ("deepseek v4-1 flash 1-7-3 e154bf", 3,530,139 bytes in episode.json).