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3001

Rules Questions / Re: Reactions are confusing, man

« on: November 21, 2011, 01:38:59 pm »

So why can't you reveal the same Tunnel more than once? (Note: I'm not claiming you can; I just don't understand why you can't.)

(...And to clarify again here, of course I understand why you can't in the sense of "because if you could, it would be terrible and mean the card would be broken". I agree! But given that it would be terrible and broken for the card to allow you to do it, why can't I figure out what in the rules of the game stops the card from allowing you to do that?)

3002

Rules Questions / Re: Reactions are confusing, man

« on: November 21, 2011, 01:35:41 pm »

Your point about Watchtower seems to be incorrect. If I am remembering the card correctly, it triggers on a card being gained. You only gain the curse once per Witch (or whatever attack have you) being played. Thus, you get to put the card in the trash or on top of your deck, but you are no longer gaining it. It has been placed somewhere else and you are no longer gaining it.

So it seems to me that ordinarily reactions take zero game time (as it were), right? That is, someone plays a Pirate Ship, and you reveal a Secret Chamber and spend five minutes fiddling with the top cards of your deck, and once you're done, it's still "when another player plays an Attack" and you can reveal the Secret Chamber again and start over, right? Why wouldn't this apply to Watchtower equally? You gain a card, you reveal the Watchtower and move the gained card somewhere; but once you're finished doing that, no time has passed and it's still "when you gain a card".

3003

Rules Questions / Reactions are confusing, man

« on: November 21, 2011, 12:30:08 pm »

So as we all know, you can reveal the same Reaction multiple times in response to the same event. So if you reveal Secret Chamber "when another player plays an Attack", and go through the whole draw-and-discard rigmarole, once you're done with that it's still "when another player plays an Attack" and you can reveal the Secret Chamber again if you want to (or some other when-Attack reaction).

Isotropic implements this correctly for Secret Chamber, Moat, and arguably Trader. For Horse Traders and Fool's Gold it's moot, because once you've used it to React once it's no longer available to be revealed again.

For Watchtower, should you be able to (pointlessly) reveal it multiple times for the same when-gain event, bouncing the gained card back and forth between the trash and your deck until you decide where you want it? Does this have something to do with the losing-track principle?

And perhaps more meaningfully, I can't figure out what in the rules prevents you from revealing the same Tunnel more than once as it's being discarded. The losing-track principle can't be involved here; if gaining a Gold caused you to lose track of the discarded Tunnel, it would (since Donald tells us discarding happens simultaneously) cause you to lose track of other discarded Tunnels as well, and we know that's not true since you can reveal multiple distinct Tunnels in reaction to the same discard event. So why can't you reveal the same Tunnel more than once? (Note: I'm not claiming you can; I just don't understand why you can't.)

3004

Dominion General Discussion / Re: Dominion cards in haiku

« on: November 18, 2011, 01:50:56 pm »

The Jack of All Trades
trashes, filters, draws, and gains:
stronger than he looks.

3005

Game Reports / Missed opportunity for Mandarin opening?

« on: November 18, 2011, 09:50:34 am »

So I'm not really complaining, since I did win this game, by a couple of points over someone who went for a heavy Silk Road strategy. But I realized afterward that maybe I missed an opportunity where a Mandarin opening would have been really strong?

The game's not on CouncilRoom yet, but key cards on the board included Mandarin, Festival, Inn, Menagerie, and Haven (plus Silk Road, Herbalist, Noble Brigand, and a couple more I don't remember). That's Menagerie and like four different enablers for Menagerie right there, so I figured I'd go for a Menagerie-based strategy, and I opened Festival/Haven.

But after the fact I realized, maybe with that $5 opening I should have picked up a Mandarin. Then on the repeat of the $5 I could grab an Inn and stick the Mandarin in my draw pile, and so instead of having a $2 turn I could have made it up to $5 again for a Festival—thus giving me a head start on having a variety of powerful Menagerie support. I'm so used to thinking of Mandarin as a weak card that it didn't even occur to me. I didn't end up buying a single Mandarin all game.

Thoughts? Would Mandarin/Inn/Festival have been a killer opening? What about the more general case, Mandarin/Inn/strong-$5?

3006

Puzzles and Challenges / Re: There hasn't been a "What's Missing?" in a while...

« on: November 18, 2011, 01:28:18 am »

I believe that they are in order of release, if I am not mistake. I would assume then that the card missing is from Hinterlands, but maybe Cornucopia.

They're not, unfortunately: Treasury is from Seaside.

3007

Dominion General Discussion / Re: First turn Embassy

« on: November 17, 2011, 02:05:26 am »

An interesting difference between Vault and Embassy is that the benefit Vault gives your opponent is actually less useful to an opponent who is also using Vault—if an opponent has Vault in hand, decreasing handsize is probably not worth the risk for them. The benefit your Embassy gives an opponent is at least as useful to an opponent who is using Embassy as it is to one who isn't.

3008

Rules Questions / Re: How do u use trade route???

« on: November 16, 2011, 11:36:20 am »

and may trash a card.

Must trash a card.

3009

Rules Questions / Re: How do u use trade route???

« on: November 16, 2011, 11:30:18 am »

Trade route kind of works the opposite of the way that City works. You know how City cares about whether supply piles are empty? Trade Route cares about whether supply piles are full—that is, about whether any cards have been gained out of them over the course of the game.

In particular, Trade Route is sensitive to the Victory card supply piles. When you play Trade Route, you get a certain amount of money and trash a card. The amount of money you get is equal to the number of Victory card piles that are not full—that is, the number of Victory piles that have been gained out of so far this game. For any type of Victory card in the supply, the first time someone gains a card out of that pile the value of Trade Route goes up, but gaining more cards out of the same pile doesn't have any further effect: all that matters is whether the pile is full or not.

The Trade Route mat is just for making it easier to keep track of how many Victory card piles aren't full.

Fine print: Yes, I know that Ambassador makes the definition of a "full" supply pile more ambiguous. For the purpose of this description, I'm just using "full" to mean "not having been gained out of"; Ambassador makes that a less satisfying definition, but notwithstanding that, I think thinking of Trade Route in terms of "full" piles the way City works in terms of empty piles is the easiest way to get an intuitive grasp of the way the card works.

3010

Puzzles and Challenges / Re: There hasn't been a "What's Missing?" in a while...

« on: November 16, 2011, 10:59:53 am »

So, can we have a hint?

3011

Variants and Fan Cards / Re: Really bad card ideas

« on: November 15, 2011, 11:00:43 am »

Remine - Action - $4
Do this twice: trash a treasure card from your hand, and gain a treasure card costing exactly $1 more than it, putting it into your hand.

3012

Rules Questions / Re: Trashing cards

« on: November 13, 2011, 08:18:08 pm »

The first one. You can't just trash a card whenever you want. You can only trash a card as a result of an instruction on some card telling you, or allowing you, to do so.

3013

Variants and Fan Cards / Re: Really bad card ideas

« on: November 13, 2011, 02:31:02 am »

Anyone else have a one-letter change?

Enjoy - $4 - Action
Reveal the top 5 cards of your deck. Play whichever one would be the most fun.

Gland Market - $6 - Action
+1 card
+1 action
+1 buy
+$1
+1 hormone

Mink - $5 - Action
You may reveal a small furry mammal. Gain a copy of it.

Fast - $4 - Action
Trash this card. Gain nothing.

3014

Variants and Fan Cards / Re: Notes About Set Design

« on: November 12, 2011, 11:59:45 pm »

Ghost Ship, Pirate Ship, and Ghost Ship.

Umm...

...Also Sea Hag, and Ghost Ship.

3015

Variants and Fan Cards / Re: Notes About Set Design

« on: November 12, 2011, 02:21:33 pm »

Intrigue has two Cursers (Swindler and Torturer); I think Seaside only has one? (Sea Hag)

Ambassador.

Embargo?

Interesting- would Embargo count?  You can't force another person to take the curse.

I mean, you can't force another person to take the curse with Torturer either. But obviously Embargo is a really oddball card; the "thing it does" in some sense is hand out curses, so in that respect it belongs in the same group as Witch and Ill-Gotten Gains; but it's clearly not very much like those, or even Torturer, and really belongs in a class by itself.

3016

Variants and Fan Cards / Re: Notes About Set Design

« on: November 12, 2011, 01:44:45 pm »

Intrigue has two Cursers (Swindler and Torturer); I think Seaside only has one? (Sea Hag)

Ambassador.

Embargo?

3017

Dominion Isotropic / Re: Bug with Scheme and with Inn

« on: November 11, 2011, 06:01:55 pm »

I agree that the instructions for the Scheme/Alchemist combo cleanup are confusing.... But they also do the wrong thing; if you had tried to put them back in your desired order it wouldn't have let you.

3018

Dominion General Discussion / Re: What cards are still unique?

« on: November 10, 2011, 09:28:11 pm »

I mean, I feel like the fact that the cards that you gain with Tournament have the 'Prize' type and the fact that the cards that you gain with Black Market don't isn't that much of a big deal (any more that that the cards you gain with University have the 'Action' type), so much as what they both do is introduce single copies of cards to the game that are gained from outside the Supply.

3019

Dominion General Discussion / Re: What cards are still unique?

« on: November 10, 2011, 07:58:13 pm »

I feel like someone had to have mentioned it, but I didn't see Tournament anywhere in this discussion. That one jumps out as pretty obvious. :-P

The obvious unique thing that Tournament does is also done by Black Market, essentially.

3020

Dominion Articles / Re: Three-sentence overview of each card in Hinterlands

« on: November 10, 2011, 09:55:14 am »

I'm sort of vaguely tossing around the idea of writing an article comparing the three main Extra Things that a card can do in addition to its main effect—i.e., +$2, +2 cards, or +1 card +1 action. A lot of terminals have a little money or a couple of cards tacked on in order to make sure they're worth buying; a lot of cards with not-overly-strong effects are cantrips in order to make sure they're worth playing. Occasionally there are cards with the same or similar main effects but different Extra Things—cf. Witch, Familiar, and to a lesser extent Mountebank.

From this perspective, Moneylender is the terminal-silver version of "trash a copper", and Spice Merchant is the cantrip version (with both of them also replacing the copper). It's interesting, because I usually think of a cantrip as being better than a terminal silver for the same main effect—but at the opening of the game that's less true because you're trying to build up your economy fast.

3021

Variants and Fan Cards / Re: Really bad card ideas

« on: November 10, 2011, 01:11:05 am »

Ghost Merchant Ship
$5 - Action-Duration-Attack
+$2. While this is in play, at the beginning of any other player's turn, they get –$2.

Y'know, I kinda wish this (or some well-playtested and balanced version of it) was an actual Dominion card.

...What, you didn't like Mining Mine?

I think I recall from the Secret Histories that something like this is more or less what Cutpurse started out as (although with $1; –$2 is really really strong, I think).

3022

Variants and Fan Cards / Re: Really bad card ideas

« on: November 10, 2011, 12:27:27 am »

Queen
$2 - Action
+1 action. Every player looks at the top card of his deck and either puts it back or discards it. Then, +1 card.
When you gain a King's Court, you may gain a Queen.

Ghost Merchant Ship
$5 - Action-Duration-Attack
+$2. While this is in play, at the beginning of any other player's turn, they get –$2.

Remodellands
$6 - Victory
Worth 2VP
When you buy this, reveal cards from the top of your deck until you reveal an action or treasure. Put the revealed action or treasure back on top and discard the other cards.

Mining Mine
$6 - Action
Trash a treasure from your hand and gain another treasure costing up to $3 more, putting it in your hand. You may trash this immediately; if you do, +$2.

3023

Variants and Fan Cards / Re: Really bad card ideas

« on: November 09, 2011, 12:52:33 pm »

Not sure yet what, say, Horse Bishops would do, though.

I guess it would have to be:
+$1. +1 Buy. Discard two cards. Gain an Estate.

...Well, this is the bad card ideas thread.

3024

Variants and Fan Cards / Re: Really bad card ideas

« on: November 09, 2011, 12:49:21 pm »

Horse Traders of All Trades
$5 - Action
+1 Buy.  +$3.  Gain a Silver.  Draw up to 5 cards in hand.  Discard 2 cards.
When another player plays an attack card, you may set this aside from your hand.  If you do, then at the start of your next turn, return this to your hand and you may trash a card that is not a Treasure.

Hmm, I guess Jack of All Salvages would be:
$4 - Action
+1 Buy. +$1. You may discard the top card of your deck. Draw up to 5 cards in hand. You may trash a card that is not a Treasure.

Not sure yet what, say, Horse Bishops would do, though.

Noble Pawn Steward
$6 - Action
Choose one: +1 Card, +1 Action, +1 Buy, +$1, +3 Cards, +2 Actions, +2 Cards, +$2, or trash two cards from your hand.

And the Trusty Noble Pawn Steward lets you choose two of them!

3025

Variants and Fan Cards / Re: Really bad card ideas

« on: November 09, 2011, 10:33:07 am »

I like combining existing cards based on analogies of the names.

Expanding Post
Action - $8
Trash two cards from your hand. If you do, gain a card costing up to $4, putting it in your hand.