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351

Variants and Fan Cards / Re: Inflation

« on: July 19, 2011, 11:53:48 am »

At $5, this card is almost strictly superior to Merchant Ship (with the exception being a multiple-buy turn), which also costs $5 and gives a +$2 benefit but doesn't impede your opponents' purchases. So I think Inflation would have to be either a $6 card or only give a net $1 benefit.

I thought of a similar card (which I called Tariff):
"Now and at the start of your next turn: +$2
While this is in play, cards cost $1 more."

Note that this avoids the potential over-powered problem with KC/TR. I like your idea to use a common mat and coin tokens to track the current tariff/inflation level, but it seems like you could just as easily count the number of Tariff/Inflation cards in play.

352

Dominion Articles / Re: Dominion 101: The Village

« on: July 16, 2011, 01:49:44 pm »

Of course, this may depend on how useful Peddlers are for that particular game. If you can Remodel/Expand them or trash them for benefit, then getting the most Peddlers might be key and so the early village could be the right move. On the other hand, if you're just using the Peddlers as a free +$1, then you're probably better off with Silver.

You dont need such cards like Remodel/Expand/Bishop etc. to make Peddlers useful. Imo they are just icing on the cake.

Without those cards, Peddlers are just icing. And if you bypass silvers and golds for villages just so that you can get Peddlers, then you've got all icing and no cake. So unless there's a way to take advantage of the Peddler's $8 cost, you should really pick them up only as icing on the cake--i.e. when you've reduced the Peddler to $0 or $2 and have a spare buy.

353

Dominion Articles / Re: Dominion 101: The Village

« on: July 15, 2011, 01:22:42 pm »

Of course, this may depend on how useful Peddlers are for that particular game. If you can Remodel/Expand them or trash them for benefit, then getting the most Peddlers might be key and so the early village could be the right move. On the other hand, if you're just using the Peddlers as a free +$1, then you're probably better off with Silver.

354

Dominion Articles / Re: Dominion 101: The Village

« on: July 15, 2011, 05:11:01 am »

A little bit of testing makes me think that village/pirate ship strats are only marginally better than straight-up big money, and almost every kingdom is going to have something that helps money more than dedicated village/pirate ship. In the other example, it was probably the trashing and cursing attack that led you the victory more than the villages.

Hard for me to see how a big money strategy can survive against a dedicated pirate ship strategy. Certainly not with 3+ players.

As for the second example, the point is that I couldn't have cursed three or four times per turn without villages. And with Mountebank, the hits keep coming even after the curses are gone, making the extra time to buy all those villages worth it.

355

Variants and Fan Cards / Re: Make up your own card?

« on: July 15, 2011, 04:58:01 am »

I've been working on a few ideas, but I think these two are my best so far:

Revolutionary
Type: Action – Attack
Cost: $5
Effect:
“Each other player reveals cards from their deck until they reveal a Victory card, which they return to the supply. In exchange they gain a cheaper Victory card or a Curse, plus one Estate.”

Witch Doctor
Type: Action – Attack
Cost: $6
Effect:
“+2 Cards. Choose one: Trash any number of Curses from your hand, gain 1VP (token) per curse   
                                 OR
                                 Each other player -1VP (token) and gains a Curse.”

356

Dominion Articles / Re: Dominion 101: The Village

« on: July 14, 2011, 03:27:35 pm »

Another exception to the general principles your article outlines is a Pirate Ship game. If there are terminal actions that produce coin and villages available (and hopefully something to give you reliable and risk-free card draw like a tactician or a set of labs) then buying lots of villages to enable playing multiple terminal actions in place of buying golds can be a winning strategy.

As another example, I played a game once with villages (I don't remember what type), Mountebank and some moderate trashing available. Rather than buying treasure cards, after some initial trashing I focused on Mountebanks and Villages. I eventually was able to buy provinces using only the coin from Mountebank, and although this probably took longer than the Big-Money baseline of 14 turns, that was okay because my incessant Mountebank pummel bought me lots of time.

357

Dominion Articles / Re: Conspirator

« on: July 12, 2011, 03:35:26 am »

I actually think that the Conspirator's best friend is the Tactician (and possibly vice versa). Tactician gives you the plus buy, two actions to help you trigger your Conspirator chain, and plenty of cards to make sure you have lots of Conspirators to start with. Get two Tacticians and you're off and running.

358

Game Reports / Re: Tournament/Chapel - buy the second tournament?

« on: July 07, 2011, 03:50:46 pm »

Some cards are more heavily luck driven than others.  Tournament and black market are the ones that stand far and above the rest of the crowd.  They are the only effects in the game that translate random chance into an unmatchabe advantage.

Also, if early on your Swindler gets swindled away, or your Sea Hag gets discarded by your opponent's Sea Hag, you're pretty much done.

359

Dominion Articles / Re: The Reliable Engine Part 1

« on: June 25, 2011, 12:21:58 am »

Re: Reliable King's Court engine:

We all know the most frustrating part of a KC/TR strategy is the terrible draw with two King's Courts and no other actions. The probability of this can obviously be reduced by purchasing lots of action cards, but sometimes that just results in one hand of KC/KC/... and a second hand with four terminal actions. One nifty combo I noticed recently was KC/Treasury. Treasuries are decent, but usually won't win the game for you. A King's Courted Treasury is nothing to sneeze at, but there are lots of action cards I'd rather "play thrice". The beauty of this combo is simply that you can buy KCs without fear that they will ever come up in a hand without actions.

360

Game Reports / Re: Bureaucrat Success!

« on: June 17, 2011, 03:29:43 am »

Ever tried using thief in a Chapel game with no strong +coin actions?

361

Game Reports / Re: Bureaucrat Success!

« on: June 17, 2011, 01:09:54 am »

Every card has its moments. I played a game recently where the Explorer saved my bacon in a big way. Unlike Laboratory, which is incredibly straightforward and works along with virtually any strategy, cards like Explorer (and to a lesser extent Bureaucrat - in my opinion) take a certain amount of cleverness to determine when and how to use them. I find that much more interesting and good for the game of Dominion in general. Who would want to play if every combo or strategy was obvious and universally strong or weak?

362

Dominion General Discussion / Re: Pirate Ship in 3+ player games.

« on: June 16, 2011, 11:44:31 am »

I played a 3-player game recently with Pirate Ship, City and Saboteur. I got my Pirate Ships up to +8 coin and had no treasure in my deck, but the other players tried to overcome my early lead with Saboteurs. My provinces started turning into duchies and I was reduced to a single Pirate Ship. Every time I got the Pirate Ship I got a Province, but if it ever was sabotaged I was going to be in trouble. I won in the end, but it was a crazy game.

363

Game Reports / Re: A Cautionary Tale: Skipping the Witch

« on: June 15, 2011, 10:34:14 pm »

I once used Upgrades to outpace Familiars and built a commanding lead, only to lose to an early three-pile ending when I failed to pay attention to how low the curse pile was. My opponent dished out two curses and bought the last one to end the game. But the takeaway (other than to pay attention to piles!) is that cursing is not always a "can't beat 'em so join 'em" strategy.