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« on: April 24, 2019, 06:21:14 pm »
Hi all, I was playing a Dark Ages + Base Set Kingdom in ranked recently and am curious on how you all would have played it. Here is the kingdom:
Urchin
Feodum
Wandering Minstrel
Bandit Camp
Knights
Graverobber
Junk Dealer
Scavenger (or Marauder maybe? We never bought this)
Bureaucrat
Remodel
It took me and my opponent somewhere around 30-40 turns (we're both ranked in high 40s--not highly ranked but decent). I don't remember the whole game but do remember most of the major points.
Opening: I opened Urchin + Silver and my opponent opened double Urchin. I was hoping to be able to get a Knight the next shuffle and use the attack property of the Knight to let me trash my Urchin to get a Mercenary.
Next phase: My opponent and I each get Knights to counter each others Knights. We both use Mercenary to trash most of our starting cards. We each buy Wandering Minstrels with most of our $4 hands and Bandit Camps with our $5 hand--in retrospect, the Wandering Minstrel may not have even been that great here since it kept discarding our silvers. My opponent gets 1 gold and spikes 2 provinces. I buy 1-2 golds, at least one of which gets trashed by a Knight. I buy Urchin on $3, hoping to more reliably draw my Knights--I figure silver is not great since it gets discarded by wandering minstrel and doesn't help me play my knights more often.
Next phase: Most of our Knights are trashed by other Knights, and I realize that I can buy Graverobber to get them back. All of our starting cards are trashed at this point, and we both have very little economy outside of spoils. I get Graverobber first and get back a couple of knights, which I am able to play each turn with my small deck--I trash some of my opponent's silvers, Wandering Minstrels, and Bandit Camps. My opponent realizes what's happening and gets a Graverobber a few turns after I get it. My opponent gets a bureaucrat some point around this phase to try to get more treasure in his deck.
Next phase: As I have a Knight's advantage by being the first to realize I can get them back from the trash, I maintain my deck contents better than my opponent. I now get some gold (now that it won't easily be trashed) and start buying a couple of provinces. I notice that piles are getting low (knights, wandering minstrel, and urchin, I think?), so instead of trying to get more gold at this point, I buy Remodel to Remodel my golds into provinces. My opponent couldn't quite keep up with his total economy and is not able to get enough treasure to buy a province.
Ending: I don't even remember quite how it ended, but I did end up winning. I either got the last couple provinces or emptied the piles when I was ahead in points.
My thoughts:
1. Knights + Graverobber is very strong; getting the first Graverobber and using it to get back Knights is what let me win in the end.
2. I didn't realize this until posting this, but I and my opponent missed the opportunity of getting Feodum to let it be trashed by an opposing Knight--a card with a decent on-trash benefit is usually worth taking in a game like this, isn't it?
3. Was it worth getting gold at all? Spoils cost 0 and don't get trashed by Knights, but Bandit Camps cost 5 and do get trashed by Knights. I thought about pulling Bandit Camps out of the trash with Graverobber but thought it might have been too slow to rely on Spoils only for economy.
4. Is Junk Dealer still worth getting alongside other 2+ card trashers like Mercenary and/or was 1-2 Junk Dealer the better trasher to go for here? Neither of us bought any the entire game.
5. I don't think this would have been better, but would it have been better to not trash all the copper here so that there is a lower chance of good cards getting trashed?
