Antonidas defeats dudeabides
4-1. We played with the default game rules but agreed to ban Ambassador, Possession, and Tournament. It was a really fun set of games, with unique strategies on each board and few dominatingly powerful cards. Oddly enough, there were no actual villages in any of the games. Instead, throne room and golem featured several times.
Game 1 (A 61 - D 49): This game probably came down to shuffle luck. We both built decks around heavy cycling to play monument frequently; golem was crucial since it cycles a ton and it was the only way to play extra monuments. dudeabides got an unlucky draw on turn 6 of $2P; I ended up getting my first golem earlier even though I picked up a potion a shuffle later than him. I was then able to play golem a bunch to secure an early province lead. dudeabides had a more powerful deck toward the end with menageries and the ability to triple-monument, and he had a very real chance of stealing the win on the last turn if I had another dud draw. But instead I got a very lucky draw on my last turn to cinch the deal. (I started the turn with golem, lab, and 3 victory cards and ended up playing 2 monuments for exactly $8.)
Game 2 (A 29 - D 34): I was definitely outplayed in this one. There were a ton of trashers, but with no real engine it was tough to decide what to go for. dudeabides opened chapel/spice merchant, clearly aiming for an ultra-thin deck. I decided to open silver/remake and add a spice merchant later, thinking that I would trash less but ramp much faster, and I'd be able to use jesters to counter his thin deck. What I failed to realize is that he could also incorporate the same cards and use them more effectively in his chapeled deck. He made a great play on turns 6 and 7 where he picked up a remake and saved 2 estates to trash with it, which jump-started his economy. I gave him some extra trashers with jester that didn't hurt him at all, since he could just remake them into more money. Since his jester also copied a bunch of my golds, there was no chance that he would stall out. Still, with a great draw at the end I could have been able to steal the game.
Game 3 (A 54 - D 38): A really fun and interesting game! It seemed like there had to be some kind of tactician engine present, but it was really unclear how to go about it. I opened silver/develop and dudeabides opened silver/silver, and the develop opening likely won me the game. It helped by trashing a bit while picking up needed silvers and schemes. The schemes would eventually let me alternate playing tactician while throning a harvest every turn. I also had one golem as basically a double-scheme village, which was incredibly useful since it I could play TR-harvest and tactician in the same turn and then top-deck the throne room and harvest. dudeabides went for a similar strategy but his deck was less consistent, so I was able to piledrive the provinces before he could make some kind of comeback with fairgrounds or saboteurs.
Game 4 (A 60 - D 46): There were no strong engine or BM possibilities here, but there
were a good number of non-terminals. I quickly decided to go all-in on vineyards, and even bought my first potion on turn 4 (with no other potion cards out)! Bridge would allow me to buy 2 action cards a turn and scheme meant that I could reliably play the bridge every turn; lighthouse and great hall could defend me against young witch. dudeabides played a BM strategy with monument and expand which probably didn't stand much of a chance against the incredible VP potential of vineyard. However, I did have to be careful not to let him buy out a third pile before I could buy enough vineyards to take the lead.
Game 5 (A 47 - D 33): Unfortunately the least interesting game, as we both immediately identified the power combo of governor/militia. We didn't do too much differently - I bought more militias and less treasure for extra consistency in hitting the attack, and I got some better shuffle luck earlier that more than compensated for his first player advantage. It ended up being enough for a comfortable win.
This was a great match with a really friendly and courteous opponent. We even had a great post-match discussion. I got lucky in a few spots, and the scores are more lopsided than they should be because of it; I'm very happy to be able to advance this far. Thanks again for the games, dudeabides! I would love to play with you more in the future.
Edit: Fixed the incorrect game logs, and also updated them all to link to CouncilRoom.