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126

Dominion General Discussion / The Dominion Cards Lists 2012 Ed.2: Introduction and meta-discussion

« on: June 18, 2012, 05:56:56 pm »

Half a year passed, a lot of new knowledge gained and many requests came from all of you, that means it's time for version 2.0 of the Dominion Card List(s).
Here's a link to the last one: http://forum.dominionstrategy.com/index.php?topic=1134.0

What do you have to do?
If you like to contribute, send me a PM for one or the other list (or both) or fill in the respective online form.
Please be sure that you put each card in order and don't miss any.
Cards are only counted if they are kingdom cards, so no Copper, Silver, Gold, Platinum, Potion, Estate, Duchy, Province, Colony, Curse and Prize Cards are allowed.

If you've submitted the last time, I will not take your last submission into account, but of course you can just tell me you want to re-submit your list
And if you didn't save your last submission and you need it, feel free to PM me and I will send it to you.

1.) The best cards of each price level

Best Cards
Just arrange the cards for your ranking with the best card going first and the worst on the last position.
If you want PM me, this list should be subdivided into several lists, containing:
16 $2 cards, 26 $3 cards, 43 $4 cards, 48 $5 cards, 14 >$6 cards, 10 Potion cards = 157

Usual disclaimer: This list should cause discussion not hassle. Of course it's difficult to compare some of the cards because pretty much every card has some situations where it shines and situations where it doesn't. This isn't a scientific list, just a compiled list of the community's opinion of the best cards.

Card List:

Code: [Select]

16 $2 cards
Cellar
Chapel
Moat
Courtyard
Pawn
Secret Chamber
Embargo
Haven
Lighthouse
Native Village
Pearl Diver
Herbalist
Hamlet
Crossroads
Duchess
Fool's Gold

26 $3 cards
Chancellor
Village
Woodcutter
Workshop
Great Hall
Masquerade
Shanty Town
Steward
Swindler
Wishing Well
Ambassador
Fishing Village
Lookout
Smugglers
Warehouse
Loan
Trade Route
Watchtower
Fortune Teller
Menagerie
Develop
Oasis
Oracle
Scheme
Tunnel
Black Market

43 $4 cards
Bureaucrat
Feast
Gardens
Militia
Moneylender
Remodel
Smithy
Spy
Thief
Throne Room
Baron
Bridge
Conspirator
Coppersmith
Ironworks
Mining Village
Scout
Caravan
Cutpurse
Island
Navigator
Pirate Ship
Salvager
Sea Hag
Treasure Map
Bishop
Monument
Quarry
Talisman
Worker's Village
Farming Village
Horse Traders
Remake
Tournament
Young Witch
Jack of all Trades
Noble Brigand
Nomad Camp
Silk Road
Spice Merchant
Trader
Envoy
Walled Village

48 $5 cards
Council Room
Festival
Laboratory
Library
Market
Mine
Witch
Duke
Minion
Saboteur
Torturer
Trading Post
Tribute
Upgrade
Bazaar
Explorer
Ghost Ship
Merchant Ship
Outpost
Tactician
Treasury
Wharf
Apprentice
City
Contraband
Counting House
Mint
Mountebank
Rabble
Royal Seal
Vault
Venture
Harvest
Horn of Plenty
Hunting Party
Jester
Cache
Cartographer
Embassy
Haggler
Highway
Ill-Gotten Gains
Inn
Mandarin
Margrave
Stables
Governor
Stash

14 >$6 cards
Adventurer
Harem
Nobles
Goons
Grand Market
Hoard
Fairgrounds
Border Village
Farmland
Bank
Expand
Forge
King's Court
Peddler

10 Potion cards
Transmute
Vineyard
Apothecary
Scrying Pool
University
Alchemist
Familiar
Philosopher's Stone
Golem
Possession

2.) The favourite cards

Favourite Cards (ordered version)
Favourite Cards (rating version)
You can rank the cards, based on whatever you like: strength/weakness, originality in design, fun and "no-fun" factor, whatever.
As very few voted last time because ordering 157 cards can be very painful, I included a second option to rate the cards. I used the finest rating which was available (0-10) but you can also use 0-5 or 10-5 as long as the highest value means that you like it more. You can also send me a PM with a rating from 0-20 or any scale you like. Or just arrange the cards for your ranking with the favourite card going first and the least favourite on the last position. No matter what version you choose, all 157 cards need to be in the list.


What else?
Submission deadline is the 30th of June 11:59pm UTC.
Each card will get points based on the rank. So your favourite card gets 157 points and your least favourite gets 1 point. This will result in a compiled list of all of your lists.
Then I will post the rankings in 10-15 card blocks from worst to best to raise the tension.
I will also add some statistic data like "Saboteur #11, highest rank #1 (2 times), lowest rank #98, standard deviation: 10.23" and this time also the comparism to the last voting.
And I will also update the comments to each card if necessary.

So I hope we can get even more submissions this time after so many of you contributed in December. I can't wait to get your submissions.

Edit:  Deadline change and re-submission

Results:
$2 cards
$3 cards (Part 1)
$3 cards (Part 2)
$4 cards (Part 1)
$4 cards (Part 2)
$4 cards (Part 3)
$5 cards (Part 1)
$5 cards (Part 2)
$5 cards (Part 3)
$5 cards (Part 4)
$6+ cards
Potion cost cards
Favourite cards

127

Dominion General Discussion / The Favourite Dominion Cards List 2012 Ed.1

« on: June 14, 2012, 05:13:37 pm »

Finally, after I thought it wouldn't be too interesting to compile a list with only 9 people participating, but after a few of you asked about it, here it is now:
The list of your favourite cards you can find here:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0AjovnuYeeSkidHl2YnhHVVB5SWVOS0oxQWtCSUZVWFE

Like I said, it is still not very significant. One voter can still scramble the list.

But the Top 10 kingdom basically would be:
Fishing Village, Bishop, Menagerie, Wharf, Governor, Hamlet, Grand Market, Venture, Salvager, Laboratory
I'm a little surprised by Venture here, but beside of that, there is no really surprise IMHO.
I think it's also very intereting that so "basic" cards like Laboratory (10.) and Festival (12.) ranked so good.

The bottom 10 kingdom would be:
Duchess, Thief, Secret Chamber, Stash, Chancellor, Philosopher's Stone, Moat, Transmute, Counting House, Treasure Map
I think there are no big surprises, that these cards ranked very low, but I even expected some other cards like Saboteur in the bottom 10.

So, now go ahead and play those kingdoms with your friends or read some more statistics:

The 3 VP chip generating cards ranked all very good (Bishop 2., Goons 17., Monument 20.).

Duration cards also ranked very good, only one card is in the bottom half
(Fishing Village 1., Wharf 4., Tactician 27., Caravan 37., Haven 49., Lighthouse 68., Merchant Ship 69., Outpost 106.)

Terminal draw cards for Big Money ranked very low beside of Wharf.

Alternative VP cards were distributed from top to bottom with Tunnel being the favourite and I'm a little bit surprised by some low rankings.
(Tunnel 33., Vineyard 43., Fairgrounds 52., Island 58., Harem 62., Nobles 67., Farmland 83., Gardens 88., Silk Road 108., Duke 114., Great Hall 117.)

Reaction cards ranked all very low beside of Tunnel and Horse Traders
(Tunnel 33., Horse Traders 48., Watchtower 78., Fool's Gold 89., Trader 112., Moat 151., Secret Chamber 155.)

The favourite attacks were Goons 20., Jester 39., Minion 56. and Young Witch 70. as the best curser. So attacks were basically ranked very low.
The least favourite attacks were Thief 156., Saboteur 144., Bureaucrat 143. and Oracle 140.
Sea Hag (135.) was the least favourite curser. For me it was surprising to see it above Familiar (118.) as everybody complains about its swingyness.

Most Treasure cards ranked really low (Stash 154., Philosopher's Stone 152., Cache 139., Talisman 134., ...),
but there were a few which also ranked pretty high (Venture 8., Hoard 15., Horn of Plenty 26.)

The bottom cards also had the highest consensus with Transmute being a big outlier.
Other cards with high consensus were Nomad Camp, Woodcutter, Market, Rabble, Haven, Scout and of course Fishing Village.

On the other side there are the 10 cards which divide the community in two parts:
Farmland, Contraband, Fool's Gold, Ill-Gotten Gains, Harvest, Alchemist, Mountebank, Watchtower, Torturer and Ambassador as the most controversial card.

The favourite Potion cost cards were Apothecary (32.), Vineyard (43.) and University (71.) and the least favourite being Possession (137.), Transmute (150.), Philosopher's Stone (152.).

That leads to the compiled list of the favourite expansions:
1. Cornucopia    47.31
2. Prosperity     61.36
3. Seaside        82.58
4. Hinterlands    83.50
5. Intrigue        84.88
6. Alchemy       89.75
7. Base            90.40
(8. Promo         95.40)

=> a big lead for Cornucopia and Prosperity


Thanks for all the contribution, even though there were only 9 entries. I compiled a list for myself and I know that sorting 157 is very difficult and time consuming.
I'm planning for an update for both of my lists. And I have an idea for especially this list to get more entries and still being significant. You'll see...

128

Dominion General Discussion / The Best Dominion Cards List 2012 Ed.1: Potion cost cards

« on: May 03, 2012, 08:35:05 am »

Sorry for the loooong waiting. I just looked and found out that I've already finished this text, but just didn't post it here. I'm back and here it is.

The Best Potion Cost Cards

	#10 Transmute (Alchemy) Weighted Average: 9.98 / Median: 10 / Mode: 10 / Standard Deviation: 0.2 Highest Rank(s): #9 (1x) / Lowest Rank(s): #10 (29x) Which guy destroyed out unity? Only one player didn't rank Transmute last. That's the most obvious and consentient rank of all lists. Why is that card so bad? You need trashers early in the game. For Transmute you need to open Potion. Then you buy a Transmute in turn 3/4 and have your Transmute somewhere between turn 5 and 8! That is really slow. And what's the benefit? You can trash Estates to get Gold, ok that's really nice, but only for the 3 starting Estates and you have to draw them together. If you trash Copper you get another Transmute! Why does anyone want that? And trash actions to get Duchies could only ne nice in the end game, but still make no big difference. You can also trash a Curse, but you won't get anything for that. For a pure trasher it's too slow, for a trash-for-benefit card it's too weak. When do you really want to buy one? Yes, it's better with dual-type cards like Great Hall (for Duchy and Gold) and you can heavily trash for Gold->Transmute->Duchy and try to three-pile, but I think that's just too slow in the most cases. I think the only reason when you want to buy it, if you want that Potion anyway.
	#9 Philosopher's Stone (Alchemy) Weighted Average: 8.65 / Median: 9 / Mode: 9 / Standard Deviation: 1.1 Highest Rank(s): #5 (1x), #6 (1x), #7 (3x) / Lowest Rank(s): #9 (19x), #10 (1x) Two third ranked Philosopher's Stone second last, still no surprise here. It has the second lowest deviation. With Philosopher's Stone on the board and it is the only Potion cost card, it's often ignorable. And it anti-synergizes with all other Potion cards except for Familiar (with University you get a lot of cards, but mostly to build an engine). With a relative cost of ~5.5$ it's in direct comparism to Gold. This means you need 20 cards and no drawing power. With no +Buy you need 10 turns to achieve this. This is often way too late. This card gets better and better the longer the game lasts. But you want high value treasures early in the game. The only reason going for it, may be in Curse-heavy games where it's obvious you get big decks.
	#8 Possession (Alchemy) Weighted Average: 6.88 / Median: 7.5 / Mode: 8 / Standard Deviation: 2.3 Highest Rank(s): #1 (2x), #3 (3x) / Lowest Rank(s): #9 (5x) Possession has the highest deviation of all cards in this list. That shows the range going from first to second last. Possession seems so powerful, but in reality it isn't. It's just frustating. There's much to say about Possession, but I keep it short. First you have to realize, that it's really the most expensive kingdom card in the game so far as it costs ~8.5$. So, if you want it and it is the only Potion cost card on the board, don't open Potion. And the cost also means it's in direct competition with Province. When you've bought a Possession you mostly could have bought a Province instead. Its high cost makes it stronger in Colony games. When does it shine? Especially in 2-player games when your opponent opens with strong cards like Ambassador or Masquerade, you may look after an opportunity to send good cards (of course especially Provinces and Colonies) to you. With King's Court Possession is just madness. With Council Room or especially Governor you can boost the turn you get from your opponent and may even boost your own turn afterwards if he has them too. When your opponent has strong trash-for-benefit cards like Apprentice, you can even trash Provinces or Colonies to get the benefit. And if he has cards with choices like Envoy you either get stronger benefit or can mess his deck up. And if he has duration cards you can also profit from them. It may seem now that there are many situations where Possession is good. That's true, but still often ignorable because of its slowness.
	#7 University (Alchemy) Weighted Average: 6.43 / Median: 6 / Mode: 6 / Standard Deviation: 1.4 Highest Rank(s): #3 (1x), #4 (1x), #5 (2x) / Lowest Rank(s): #9 (3x) University was voted on #6 12 times, so it has a pretty low deviation. The effect of University is by far not bad. Unlike Workshop you don't need to spend an action to gain a card and you don't get weak $4 cards, you get strong $5 ones. And you are able to play all of them because of the +2 Actions. But, it has the same problem as all Potion cards have. It's very slow. If you go for University and open Potion/X you lose at least one reshuffle to get the critical $5 cards (and you need to get a Potion only to get strong non-Potion cards, what?). You you have to be sure to have enough time to catch up and this really depends if the cards on the board are really so strong that you want as many as you can get. So, it's very board dependant and is really nice with Library, Wharf, City, Torturer and any money producing cantrip. It has only few combination potential with other Potion cards. University/Scrying Pool looks nice but is even slower. Only University/Vineyard is really strong. Beware of 3-piling with University.
	#6 Apothecary (Alchemy) Weighted Average: 5.27 / Median: 5.5 / Mode: 8 / Standard Deviation: 2.1 Highest Rank(s): #2 (4x) / Lowest Rank(s): #8 (6x), #9 (1x) Apothecary has the second highest deviation, as many voted it on #2 and on #8 too. Apothecary seems very weak at first glance because of its profit of Copper. But unlike many other Potion cards it's very strong at the start at getting very strong cards very early in the game. Buy a early Forge and with your next big hand you can get rid of all your Coppers; or get an early King's Court or Goons. Later in the game it's almost never a bad card, because it's at least a cantrip and even if it draws no cards you can set the order of your next cards (basically a Cartographer without the ability to discard). It's also strong if you build your strategy around Copper. Apothecary/Coppersmith can easily net you Provinces. The problem still is, it leaves the junk on top of the deck. With Native Village you can use this as an advantage. With 8 Coppers, a few Apothecaries and at least one Native Village you are able to buy a Province each turn. With no strong 6+ card  or no synergizing card on the board, Apothecary often is not worth a Potion.
	#5 Golem (Alchemy) Weighted Average: 4.92 / Median: 5 / Mode: 5 / Standard Deviation: 1.9 Highest Rank(s): #2 (2x), #3 (6x) / Lowest Rank(s): #8 (3x), #9 (1x) Golem still has a high deviation and is only 0.4 points above Apothecary. It was voted #5 6 times. Like Throne Room, Golem's strength heavily depends from the action cards on the board, what makes it hard to rate. But it hasn't the drawback of Throne Room or King's Court to have at least one action card in hand. You can use Golem either in action-heavy decks and may be able to play more of them in your turns even with Curses or Victory cards in your deck. It acts also as a pseudo-village. Just beware of Golem+Trasher because you have to play the drawn action card and you don't want to risk trashing a Province. Or you use it to play your only 1-2 action cards in your deck everytime you play Golem. Counting House+X Golems guarantees to draw all Coppers in hand. Golem+Scheme+strong attack is also very nice because you can play your attack every turn. Even with those cards on board Golem is very expensive with a cost of ~6.5$. Don't fall into the trap to open Potion with Golem being the only Potion card on the board.
	#4 Vineyard (Alchemy) Weighted Average: 4.8 / Median: 4.5 / Mode: 4 / Standard Deviation: 1.5 Highest Rank(s): #3 (7x) / Lowest Rank(s): #7 (3x), #8 (2x) It was a close call, but Vineyard managed to beat Golem by 0.12 points. Relatively high consensus for an alternative victory card. It was voted #4 8 times. Vineyard is another card that heavily depends from the action cards on the board. You definitely want +Buy or at least gainers to get enough action cards to make it worthwhile. +Buy is also better in getting Vineyards, because you don't waant to "waste" $6P for a Vineyard. Beside +Buy and gainers, you definitely need Villages or many catrips to be able to play all of your actions, cheap cantrips like Hamlet or Pawn are very good. Like all alternative VP strategies, you can totally ignore Provinces what gives you more time getting more action cards. Unlika all other Potion cards you can delay buying the Potion until mid-game when you already have a good running engine. It has nearly no practical limit in the max VP you can get from one Vineyard what can make it really strong and often a clearly superior strategy over Provinces.
	#3 Alchemist (Alchemy) Weighted Average: 3.7 / Median: 3 / Mode: 2 / Standard Deviation: 1.7 Highest Rank(s): #1 (3x) / Lowest Rank(s): #6 (1x), #7 (2x) Alchemist is the second card that managed to get voted on #1. It was voted #2 8 times. Alchemist is strictly superior to Laboratory and if you have a lot of Alchemists to draw most of your deck, you're almost unstoppable. But how do you get there? First you have to buy Potion and then you have to spend the next turns to buy Alchemists. That's really slow and with no source of +Buy, you aren't able to build up your econmy at the same time. Alchemists are therefore very powerful in Colony games, but often weak in Province games unless you haven't any supporting card. That's the reason Herbalist was added in Alchemy. With Herbalist you're able to put your Potion back and get the needed +Buy. Cards that profit from big handsizes like Bank (if you have the +Buys) are great. Outpost also synergizes perfectly. Beware of opponents playing with Minions or Masquerade.
	#2 Scrying Pool (Alchemy) Weighted Average: 2.9 / Median: 3 / Mode: 2 / Standard Deviation: 1.7 Highest Rank(s): #1 (3x) / Lowest Rank(s): #6 (1x), #7 (1x), #8 (1x) With 10 players voting Scrying Pool second and a clear lead over Alchemist it has a deserved second place. Attacks that mess up the top of your deck are often weak. Scrying Pool is different because of its drawing power. It may draw your whole deck. Buy you mustn't a lot of treasure cards in your deck. Its power is therefore dependant of trasher on the board and action cards that net you money. Secret Chamber/Vault are especially nice, just discard all action cards and keep one Scrying Pool in hand to get a lot of money and draw them again with your Scrying Pool. Attacks that tend to be swingy because of the top card of your opponent, like Jester or Swindler, are gaining value with Scrying Pools, because you can choose which card to keep on top. If those cards are not in the supply, Scrying Pool is just a Spy (with draws sometimes an additional card) and not worth the Potion.
	#1 Familiar (Alchemy) Weighted Average: 1.4 / Median: 1 / Mode: 1 / Standard Deviation: 1.1 Highest Rank(s): #1 (22x) / Lowest Rank(s): #2 (6x), #4 (1x), #6 (1x) With the second lowest deviation and over two third voting it first, there's no doubt: Familiar is the strongest Potion card. Cursing attacks are the strongest cards in the game. A cantrip curser is just ridiculous strong. If you haven't a plan for defense to get no curses at all or easily deal with them (which is very rare), you can't skip over Familiar. What makes Familiar one of the most hated cards is its cost.

To the favourite cards
To the Edition 2

129

Dominion General Discussion / The Best Dominion Cards List 2012 Ed.1: $6 cards

« on: February 06, 2012, 09:00:17 am »

The Best $6+ Cards

Link to the win rates on Councilroom
Link 2 to the win rates on Councilroom

	#14 Adventurer (Base) Weighted Average: 13.81 / Median: 14 / Mode: 14 / Standard Deviation: 0.6 Highest Rank(s): #12 (2x), #13 (2x) / Lowest Rank(s): #14 (26x) A nearly "perfect" score for the Adventurer. Only 4 times it wasn't voted last with the best rank being third last. By all means Adventurer is no bad card. But all $6+ cards have the problem competing with Gold. And Adventurer is only superior to Gold in decks without Copper and even $5 cards like Harvest or Merchant Ship (can) give you $4 easily. The filter effect is nice and finds still 2 treasure cards if you are already heavily greening what is especially good with Platinum. But the same does Venture (you see the name sililarity?) without spending an action and for one coin less. So, most of the time, Adventurer is just overpriced, but can be nice in a chapelled deck with no better alternatives.
	#13 Farmland (Hinterlands) Weighted Average: 11.47 / Median: 12 / Mode: 13 / Standard Deviation: 1.8 Highest Rank(s): #6 (1x), #8 (1x), #9 (2x) / Lowest Rank(s): #13 (11x) One third voted it second last, but it still got four votes above #10. Farmland is definitely no power card, but still should be considered as a good buy in a handful of situations. At first it seems weak as it is more expensive and gives less VP than a Duchy. But the on-buy remodel effect can be very handy. You really have to calculate the benefits. If you have $7, you can remodel a Copper into an Estate, but then it would be better to buy a Duchy for the same VP. For $8 you could buy a Province directly, but if you're behind and there are only few Provinces left, just remodel a Silver into a Duchy for 5VP. For $9 Farmland is like an extra buy, if you remodel a Gold into a Province for 8VP total. In the middle game you even may prefer Farmland over Duchy, because with a Farmland in hand you only need $6 and a Farmland in hand to get a Province. Especially nice is Farmland in cursing games. For $6 and a Curse in hand, Farmland is worth 4VP. There are even more nice situations like getting 2 victory cards in Silk Road games or trashing a Potion to get a Gold.
	#12 Fairgrounds (Cornucopia) Weighted Average: 9.93 / Median: 10 / Mode: 10 / Standard Deviation: 2.2 Highest Rank(s): #6 (2x), #7 (3x) / Lowest Rank(s): #13 (4x), #14 (1x) The places #9-#12 were really close. Fairgrounds was 7 times on #10 and 12 times above #10. Copper, Silver, Gold, Estate, Duchy, Province and Fairgrounds and you have already 7 different cards. With 3 more cards, every Fairgrounds is already worth more than a Duchy. Especially in cursing and Potion games, this is easy to accomplish. This is still making it a mediocre card. But in games where you have many cantrips and a good source of buy, Fairgrounds can be really strong. Just buy 15 of the 19 different cards and every Fairgrounds is worth 6VP like a Province and this for $2 less. And with Black Market on the board it is even easier to get 15 or even 20 different cards and may be the board determining combo.
	#11 Harem (Intrigue) Weighted Average: 9.82 / Median: 10 / Mode: 10 / Standard Deviation: 2.3 Highest Rank(s): #6 (2x), #7 (5x) / Lowest Rank(s): #13 (4x), #14 (1x) Harem has a lead of 0.11 points and is the third victory card in a row. And no, the stats are no copy&paste error. It has almost the same stats as Fairgrounds. It was 6 times on #10 and 14 times above #10. $6+ Victory cards obviously have done poorly in this list. Like all cards in this list, Harem is by far no bad card, but it's another card that's not really game dominating. Especially in Big Money games where you rarely need more than 1-2 Golds you can pick easily pick up Harems in the mid-game if you still fall short for Provinces. This gives you -1VP in comparism to Duchies, but you will see this Harem still 2-3 times to make it worth a buy and give you enough money to win the Provinces split or make the 2VP difference to win this game. Harem is also good in Silk Road games and in combination with Hoard (don't buy Gold, just buy a Hoard and Harems), Mine (mine early Silvers into Harems) and Mints (extra money and VP is nice). In Colony games, Harem is really ignorable because neither Silver nor 2VP are worth a buy.
	#10 Forge (Prosperity) Weighted Average: 9.30 / Median: 9 / Mode: 12 / Standard Deviation: 2.7 Highest Rank(s): #4 (1x), #5 (2x) / Lowest Rank(s): #13 (3x) Forge is one of the cards in this list with the highest deviation. It was 7 times on #12. Forge is really hard to evaluate because it heavily depends from the cards on the board. Forge is like a much better Chapel because you can quickly trash many cards out of your deck and get an additional benefit, but has 3 big drawbacks. 1.) It's too expensive. If you get to $7 you mostly can't heavily trash anymore because you have too many cards in hand you want to keep. But with cards on the board that can give you $7 early like Baron, Apothecary or Tactician, Forge is really strong. 2.) Forge needs big hand sizes to be really worth it (comparing to other trash-for-benefit cards). Cards like Apothecary or Tactician accomplish this too, but if you have good draw engines, a Forge may also worth a buy to trash a few cards for a late Province. But with discarding attacks Forge is weak. 3.) The term "exactly" and the obligatory gain makes Forge swingy. With a Forge in hand heavy calculating goes on. If you just want to get rid of cards like Coppers or Estates you often have to gain at least a Copper or an Estate or another card you basically don't want. Only if you manage to reach $10 where no card exists you get rid of those. And if you want to forge a Province you often draw the wrong cards (e.g. only treasure cards). Summary: You have to really consider if Forge is a trap or worth a buy, like in Torturer engines where you can simply take all Curses in hand to forge them right away.
	#9 Expand (Prosperity) Weighted Average: 9.06 / Median: 8.5 / Mode: 11 / Standard Deviation: 2.6 Highest Rank(s): #4 (1x), #5 (3x) / Lowest Rank(s): #12 (1x), #13 (1x), #14 (1x) It was a close call between the trash-for-benefit cards. Expand has only a lead of 0.24 points. It was #11 6 times. Expand is a mix between Remodel and Mine, but is another card that has drawback of being too expensive. So if you want to trash treasure cards in the late game for victory cards, Remodel manages that too for $3 less. If you want trash treasure cards for better treasure cards, Mine does it even better for $2 less. Its best use is to trash victory cards for better ones. This is especially nice in Colony games. With 2 Expands you can start greening earlier and even buy Provinces to expand them later into Colonies for a benefit of 4VP. And if you have a good drawing engine this works even better. You only need one copy to expand a card into a (better) victory card each turn. And expanding Peddlers into Colonies may be its strongest combo.
	#8 Nobles (Intrigue) Weighted Average: 8.26 / Median: 9 / Mode: 11 / Standard Deviation: 3.2 Highest Rank(s): #3 (1x), #4 (3x) / Lowest Rank(s): #13 (2x), #14 (1x) Nobles has the by far highest deviation in this list with a range from third to last. It was #11 5 times. Nobles is behind Expand in the unweighted ranking. I like to call Nobles another trap card what the high deviation shows me too. Yes, Nobles is a self working combo when you use it for +2 Actions and +3 Cards alternating. But 2 Nobles still give you only a +1 Card Bonus what one Laboratory gives you too. So a Big Money player is going to outrace a "Nobles-Engine" player, it's just to slow. You should rather see it as a Village or a Smity with two extra VP just how you need it. Playing Big Money with Nobles instead of Smithy is nice, you just need to get to $6 early. And if you fall short for another Province you can easily buy another Nobles because two Nobles don't collide, you only can draw them dead. Still it is in direct competition with Gold. But after 1-2 Golds you can often easily switch to Nobles. However, in Colony games the 2VP from Nobles are ignorable. Only buy it in those games if you really really need the +2 Actions or the Smithy effect.
	#7 Bank (Prosperity) Weighted Average: 7.84 / Median: 7 / Mode: 7 / Standard Deviation: 2.7 Highest Rank(s): #3 (2x), #4 (2x) / Lowest Rank(s): #11 (3x), #13 (1x) Bank is another card with high deviation. It was #7 5 times and only 4 times below #10. Bank's value really depends from the board. That may be the reason of the deviation. Bank is dependant from big hand sizes and +Buy. On an average board, especially Big Money games, Bank is mostly worse than Gold. While 3 Golds allow you to buy a Province, 3 Banks don't. So it can really be a trap card. But with a drawer it can be also better than Gold (e.g. 4 Copper + Bank instead of 4 Copper + Gold). And with the addition of +Buy it can get incredibly powerful. Margrave/Wharf Big Money with Bank is great. And in combination with Tactician or Apothecary+Herbalist(or another +Buy) Bank is really powerful. In Colony games Platinum is still stronger in almost every situation, but still Bank is no bad card in Colony games and just depends of above mentioned scenarios.
	#6 Peddler (Prosperity) Weighted Average: 6.57 / Median: 6 / Mode: 5 / Standard Deviation: 2.7 Highest Rank(s): #4 (6x) / Lowest Rank(s): #11 (2x), #12 (1x), #13 (1x) The ranks #4-#6 were really close. Peddler has high deviation and loses this fight for #4. It was #5 6 times and 4 times below #10. Peddler basically don't belongs in this list as its effect is only worth $4. So if you spend $6 or $8 for a Peddler, this was mostly a waste. But in games with many +Buys like Grand Markets, Worker's Villages or Hamlets, you can easily pick up Peddlers for $0 or $2. Peddlers are also good in combination with duration cards as they count for price reduction in both turns. But it is in this list and it is so high in this list because it really shines in combination with trash-for-benefit cards and then its cost shows to advantage, e.g. - like above mentioned - expanding it into a Colony. As it is the only card for $8, its also worth mentioning how it works with Swindler. As long as there are still Peddlers left, there is the danger that it get swindled. But when the Peddlers are gone, you have a great defense against Swindler. Another quick note: Beware of three-piling in Peddler games with +Buy.
	#5 Border Village (Hinterlands) Weighted Average: 6.41 / Median: 6 / Mode: 5 / Standard Deviation: 2.0 Highest Rank(s): #3 (1x), #4 (3x) / Lowest Rank(s): #9 (4x), #10 (1x), #11 (1x) It was close, but Border Village is in the Top 5 with a 0.16 lead over Peddler. Nearly a third voted it exactly there, it was #5 9 times. For every good engine Border Village is great. Especially if you have $6 and there are strong terminal $5 cards on the board and you want the $5 card anyway, you get a Village for free. Do this a few times and you basically are guaranteed to have a Village in each hand. The uses are similar to when you want many Fishing Villages. Border Village + Torturer is maybe the strongest combo. Still this is in strong competition with Gold. It's really a trap in cases where you want a Big Money-like strategy. Especially with the first $6 you often rather buy a Gold than a Border Village in most cases. Border Village also very good on boards with trash-for-benefit cards because for every $6 you have you can buy a Border Village and the trash-for-benefit card. Later you can trash the Border Village for 4VP with Bishop, 6 cards with Apprentice, 6$ with Salvager or remodel it into a Province, etc. And in Gardens games Border Village is just another extra card for you.
	#4 Hoard (Prosperity) Weighted Average: 6.16 / Median: 5 / Mode: 4 / Standard Deviation: 2.6 Highest Rank(s): #2 (1x), #3 (1x), #4 (10x) / Lowest Rank(s): #11 (2x), #12 (1x) Hoard wins the battle for #4 very closely. Its 10 4th places still shows it deserves the spot. Hoard is really good if you play it right. If you use it to buy a Victory card every time you have it in hand, just to get a Gold, this is maybe not the right play because then your money average approximates to ~1.5$ what isn't enough for a Province and is even worse in Colony games. But it's great if you want go green anyway. Your deck doesn't clog up too much and you may keep buying Provinces or at least Duchies until the end of the game. So if you pick up a Hoard after your first Gold in Big Money games you can go green pretty early. Hoard is also good if you use the free Gold for trash-for-benefit cards, especially Apprentice. Just trash a Gold with Apprentice, buy a Province with a Hoard in hand to get another Gold and do the same in the next turns over and over. Hoard works also nice with dual-type victory cards especially Harem and maybe Great Hall. With Nobles it really depends if you not rather buy directly that Gold.
	#3 Goons (Prosperity) Weighted Average: 2.49 / Median: 2.5 / Mode: 3 / Standard Deviation: 1.3 Highest Rank(s): #1 (6x) / Lowest Rank(s): #4 (2x), #5 (1x), #7 (1x) This is huge gap: ~3.7 points. So the battle for #1 was another close call. I was really curious who would win. Goons now is only #3 where it was voted 11 times. Goons is a strong and board dominating card nearly every time. Yes, it gets quadratically (n^2+n) better the more Goons you can play per turn, so it gets big profit from good drawing engines, but is still great if played alone because of the discarding attack. It's also the only attack card that is so strong that it needs to cost more than $5. So you have a Militia that nets you VP for cards you would have bought either way, great! In the later game you can pick additional VP for Coppers (and with a Watchtower in hand you can even immediately trash them). And if you have that needed actions and set up a really nice engine with Goons and manage to play 3 or more Goons per turn, it is so insane powerful: You can achieve easily 100 or more points. Also a Goons engine has more time for setup as you don't necessarily need to buy Provinces/Colonies. Beside Watchtower, Inn+Goons is also a good combo  for a turn with at least 2-3 Goons. For clarification: King's Court + Goons doesn't triple the VP gaining effect, but you still get the extra money and buys you can use for more VP, so it isn't a so bad combo after all (especially if you have another King's Court and a Masquerade in hand )
	#2 Grand Market (Prosperity) Weighted Average: 2.15 / Median: 2 / Mode: 2 / Standard Deviation: 0.8 Highest Rank(s): #1 (8x) / Lowest Rank(s): #3 (8x), #4 (1x) Grand Market was 13 times second. So it's no surprise that this its final rank. The consensus was really high, only one player ranked it on #4. Grand Market is basically a $8-$9 card and is the dominating card on many boards. Often it's basically a race to get the first Grand Market faster. And with the first Grand Market you can easily buy more of them. You achieve that at best with Vault or any other Source of virtual coins like Baron or Horse Traders and of course with Gold. Grand Markets are very powerful, but still there are situations where it's just too slow to pick them up and other strategies are just quicker. They are great in nearly all decks, but Grand Markets really shine in thin decks where you can chain them. Then they are even better than Platinum! The same applies in combination with King's Court. But in Colony games with heavy cursing or other thick decks, Platinum is still the stronger card.
	#1 King's Court (Prosperity) Weighted Average: 1.74 / Median: 1 / Mode: 1 / Standard Deviation: 0.9 Highest Rank(s): #1 (16x) / Lowest Rank(s): #3 (6x), #4 (1x) King's Court is the best $6+ card. No surprise when you see that more than the half of all players voted it there. Just like Goons and Grand Market, when King's Court is on the board, there's nearly every time a race who gets it first with cards like Tactician, Baron or Apothecary. Throne Room does nothing for itself and just doubles the action, but still is often skippable, but tripling an action seems like no big difference, but it is a huge boost. If you triple a Curser the game is basically over; if you triple a card drawer like Wharf is really crazy; and with Possession or Saboteur it could get really mad. With King's Court you also need no Village, just triple a Cantrip for a huge benefit. And with King's Courting a King's Court it gets even crazier... Maybe only on Province boards that are already very quick without King's Court or have only terminal non-curse-givers you may skip it. PS: For everyone who has the same problems as I, calculating the actions you may play three times: For every King's Court you play on a King's Court you can play 2 more actions three times - or if you prefer a formula: 2n-1

Potion cost cards

130

Puzzles and Challenges / 2 Cards, 2 Turns, X Provinces

« on: January 26, 2012, 03:48:44 am »

According to the 3 Provinces, X Cards Thread:

Assume it's the first turn of a one-player non-Colony game where you start with any 2 different cards.
How many Provinces do you get at maximum after Turn 2.
(Outpost turns are no seperate turns)
The Provinces have to stay in your deck (or mats) and you aren't allowed to assume perfect shuffle luck (e.g. if you have more than 5 cards later).

And what would be the solution for less restrictions like:
a) not the first turn
b) 2+ player game without Possession
c) the 2 cards can be the same
d) it's a Colony game
e) perfect shuffle luck is allowed

131

Dominion General Discussion / The Best Dominion Cards List 2012 Ed.1: $5 cards

« on: January 23, 2012, 06:49:09 am »

Sorry for the delay. I was ill a few days ago. But now the lists continue.

The Best $5 Cards - Part 1/4

Link to the win rates on Councilroom
Link 2 to the win rates on Councilroom

	#48 Counting House (Prosperity) Weighted Average: 45.78 / Median: 46 / Mode: 46 / Standard Deviation: 2.5 Highest Rank(s): #37 (1x), #41 (1x), #42 (1x) / Lowest Rank(s): #48 (6x) Counting House is the card with the lowest deviation. With only one rank above #40, there's no doubt, this is the worst card of all $5s. But comparing it to the other last cards, it has really few last places (6, as many as on #46). All $5s are really strong cards, but some shine more often than other ones. Counting House is one that shines very rarely. The best use may be countering Mountebank. With massive Copper in your deck, you have a high probability to get many Coppers in hand even if you're only half through the deck. Then you can easily buy a Province or a Colony with the use of this card only. It also has some really nice synergies with Coppersmith (make all Coppers worth a Silver) and Chancellor (discard all Coppers and put them in hand). But then you need a village to play Counting House and one of these cards in one turn and the probabilities to draw these 3 cards together are low in a deck full of Copper. The better alternative and only real combo is Golem. Buy many Golems and only one Counting House. The Golem will always find the Counting House and discard all other cards. With a Golem in hand, you are now guaranteed to get all Coppers. Instead you can buy many Warehouses, cycle through your deck discarding all cards right before the reshuffle and then play your Counting House. It has some other nice synergies, but are very difficult to pull off. For a Bank you need additional buys to be worth it. With no real supporters, this card is mostly not worth the effort.
	#47 Stash (Promo) Weighted Average: 44.18 / Median: 46 / Mode: 46 / Standard Deviation: 3.7 Highest Rank(s): #35 (1x), #36 (1x), #37 (1x) / Lowest Rank(s): #48 (5x) Stash has already a 1.6 point lead over Counting House, but the stats are only slightly better. It was 4 times over #40 and only has one last rank less. It has the fourth least deviation. You need 4 Stashes to get a Province after the reshuffle for sure and in Colony games it's almost useless. But a sure Province that you can get only after a reshuffle needs you to trigger the reshuffle as often as possible. This means you need supporter cards too. The most obvious ones are Golem (with max. one other action) or a few Chancellors, but sifters or other good cyclers can work too. But if the cyclers are good, you probably want more of them and Stashes are losing their value. In all other cases, you probably find stronger cards than Stash, although if you have $5 and want a Silver anyway, you can pick up a Stash unhesitatingly most of the times.
	#46 Explorer (Seaside) Weighted Average: 43.78 / Median: 45 / Mode: 47 / Standard Deviation: 3.3 Highest Rank(s): #35 (1x), #38 (1x), #40 (4x) / Lowest Rank(s): #48 (3x) Explorer is slightly better although it has only two ranks above #40 and an even worse mode of 47 (6x). But it has only 3 last places and a better median. With the third least deviation its rank seems deserved. The problem with Explorer is: When you already have 2-3 Provinces and you have $5, you want a Duchy most of the times. When you have one or none, it only nets you a Silver in hand most of the times and then there are still other cards that are better getting you Provinces than just a Silver-generating machine. If you compare it to Jack of All Trades, it's better in the Silver-getting, but just worse on all the other parts. You want it in thin decks where you can draw it with a Province with high probability. Explorer/Chapel is therefore a #65 opening. And I forgot to mention, it's nearly useless in Colony games.
	#45 Saboteur (Intrigue) Weighted Average: 43.09 / Median: 44 / Mode: 48 / Standard Deviation: 5.3 Highest Rank(s): #30 (1x), #33 (2x) / Lowest Rank(s): #48 (4x) Here is a card that has a mode of 48; so its most frequent rank is last. But it's last still only 4 times and was 7 times above #40. This shows the higher deviation, although it's still the ninth least deviation of the $5 cards. Saboteur is the worst $5 attack. Why? There are similar reasons like Thief is bad. It trashes cards from your opponents deck without immediate benefit to you, so it's only destructive. And if you aren't able to play Saboteur in each turn at least one time, your opponent can catch up easily when he just continues and ignores it or re-buys the trashed card if it was essential. But, on the other side, it can lead to big outbursts if you play 1-2 Saboteurs each turn or if you can even play King's Court with it. In games with no mats and chips you are then able to trash the whole deck and all points from your opponent and can easily finish and win. But these cases are so rare, Saboteur is still a bad card for itself.
	#44 Cache (Hinterlands) Weighted Average: 42.55 / Median: 44 / Mode: 45 / Standard Deviation: 5.4 Highest Rank(s): #20 (1x), #36 (2x) / Lowest Rank(s): #47 (1x), #48 (2x) With a really big outlier, Cache is still very consistent in the ranks: Again 7 times above #40, but only 2 last places. Cache performs differently in different kind of decks. In engine decks with few money (Scrying Pool etc) it's just horrible. In Big Money decks, it's most of the time superior than just a Silver (like Stash, see above). But it only shines in big decks (Gardens) with many green cards (Silk Road), simply said in decks where Copper isn't a so bad card after all. Also nice is Cache in combination with Trader for a Gold and 2 Silvers for only $5. And Cache is like Silver not very good in Colony games.
	#43 Contraband (Prosperity) Weighted Average: 41.42 / Median: 42.5 / Mode: 48 / Standard Deviation: 6.1 Highest Rank(s): #23 (1x), #29 (1x), #30 (1x) / Lowest Rank(s): #47 (1x), #48 (4x) Contraband already has a few outliers, it was 9 times above #40. Just like Saboteur the mode is 48 with 4 times being last. But some higher places made it possible not being in the worst 5, so the deviation got up to 6.1 Another treasure card and another cheap Gold treasure card. Contraband can be very trappy. Buying it can be a nice early Gold and the +Buy is very important for finding a substitution for the prohibited card. If there are many good cards on the board and you want Gold and a card with +Buy anyway this can be very good. But most of the times you embargo yourself. And in the late game this is a dead card because everybody knows you want that Province. If you buy it, buy only one, because two or more can really shut you down. And beware of Venture + Contraband!
	#42 Mandarin (Hinterlands) Weighted Average: 40.82 / Median: 41 / Mode: 45 / Standard Deviation: 5.7 Highest Rank(s): #27 (1x), #31 (1x), #32 (1x) / Lowest Rank(s): #47 (3x), #48 (2x) Mandarin has still 2 last places, so there are only 4 last places left. With one almost the half of all players ranking it above #40, it's the last card with an average worse than 40. Mandarin is again a cheap Gold, but you need an action to play it. What makes it better than the last two cheap Gold-alternatives? The drawback of this card is to put back a card on your deck. But this can be also very nice, because you can prepare your next turn just like Courtyard does it. So, if you have more money than you need or you have colliding terminals, just put back a card. But with colliding terminals, the other card is mostly stronger and you want to play that this turn. The on-buy effect can also be very nice. With a 5/2 opening you can buy the wanted stronger card next turn too and get an additional Mandarin. Mandarin/Hunting Party or Mandarin/Mint are very nice openings and it's not that bad in Double-Tactician games. In the late game where you miss $8 or $11 you can just play one Platinum or two Golds, buy the Mandarin and have a higher chance to reach it in the next turn. That can be very effective. But, still it's a cheap Gold and there are many better alternatives on the board most of the times.
	#41 Mine (Base) Weighted Average: 39.66 / Median: 40 / Mode: 42 / Standard Deviation: 6.3 Highest Rank(s): #23 (1x), #24 (1x), #25 (1x) / Lowest Rank(s): #46 (3x), #47 (1x) Mine is the first card with no last place and it is the first card with 3 times above #30. Mine is one of the first trash-for-benefit card you probably got to know. It has the disadvantage of being limited to treasures, so you cannot trash them later into victory cards. But it has the advantage to get the new card immediately in hand. But Mine is still slow. A Moneylender doesn't get you a card, but is at least worth a Silver in the turn you played it, whereas Mine is only worth a Copper. But in the long term Mine can be better. The more often you play the new treasure card, the more Mine was profitable. So, if you want Mine, you want it early. It gets so much better in Colony games. First, Colony games last longer and you will probably see your treasure card more often and Mine is a Silver if you trash Gold for Platinum. For a 5/2 opening Mine/Fool's Gold is a pretty decent opening. PS: Don't confuse Mine with Mint.
	#40 Outpost (Seaside) Weighted Average: 39.33 / Median: 39 / Mode: 48 / Standard Deviation: 8.6 Highest Rank(s): #11 (1x), #21 (1x), #24 (1x) / Lowest Rank(s): #48 (4x) Outpost is the last card with last ranks and it even was last 4 times, so that the mode is 48 again. It's the first card with a pretty high deviation (13th) with one really big outlier and 4 values above #30. Outpost seems so nice for getting extra turns. But you only get a 3-card hand. It's like you Militia'd yourself, even worse, you cannot choose the 3 cards you want to keep. If you really need a +Buy Outpost can fulfill this need. But even in those cases it's not better than a Workshop, but it can work in Gardens/Silk Road/Duke games. If you want to use it to attack multiple times per turn, it can work, but still it is another terminal in your deck that can collide. It really can shine, in cases when you can guarantee a good card in your next hand. Treasury, Alchemist and Scheme are probably the best combos. Another case where your 3-card hand isn't that bad, may be with Minion, but this isn't very reliable too, because one of your 3 cards has to be one of your Minions. Another combo is Double Tactician/Outpost where you can get 8 cards. Generally it's pretty good with Duration cards, especially Wharf, Caravan and Haven. In all other cases you better skip Outpost.
	#39 Harvest (Cornucopia) Weighted Average: 37.89 / Median: 38 / Mode: 38 / Standard Deviation: 4.6 Highest Rank(s): #29 (2x), #30 (1x) / Lowest Rank(s): #43 (2x), #45 (1x), #47 (1x) Harvest is the next card after a 1.4 point gap and has a really small deviation. With only 9 ranks below #40, it's clearly better ranked than the previous cards. Harvest is very swingy. In games with very few different cards and a coherent strategy, this is mostly a Silver and rarely a Gold and really no good card. And it can discard all your good cards you wanted to play in the next turn. In games with many attacks, especially Cursers, Harvest can be really a better card. You can then make your Curses to money without having them in hand and Harvest can easily be worth $4. It's therefore not remarkable that the only above-average Councilroom opening is Harvest/Lighthouse. Harvest has also a nice synergy with Tunnel.
	#38 Tribute (Intrigue) Weighted Average: 37.69 / Median: 38.5 / Mode: 40 / Standard Deviation: 5.3 Highest Rank(s): #26 (1x), #27 (1x), #29 (1x) / Lowest Rank(s): #43 (2x), #44 (1x) Tribute hasn't a rank below #44, so it was only one time voted in the bottom 5 and it has only 7 votes below #40. Its deviation is pretty low again. Tribute is another swingy card and even depends on the opponents' deck. You can really bad luck, revealing the same card. Then Tribute is really bad. In action-heavy decks you get +4 actions what you only want if there isn't another village around (but then you probably don't want many action cards). All other combinations can really be nice, e.g. in BM games, giving you $4 most of the times and later in the game +cards). It only really shines in games with dual-type cards. Hitting a Harem and a Nobles and getting +4 Cards, +2 Actions and $2 with only one card is excellent. But the unreliableness still is Tribute's biggest problem. Forming your strategy around it not only depends on you, your opponent has to cooperate.
	#37 Royal Seal (Prosperity) Weighted Average: 35.10 / Median: 35.5 / Mode: 32 / Standard Deviation: 6.2 Highest Rank(s): #20 (1x), #21 (1x), #24 (1x) / Lowest Rank(s): #43 (1x), #44 (2x) Royal Seal is the first card after a really big gap of 2.6 points. It was 5 times above #30 and 6 times below #40. So, the deviation is still very low. I don't know if there's much to say about Royal Seal. It's another Silver with bonus card. You probably want it early in the game, as it will accelerate your strategy. It's strictly superior to Silver. So if you want a Silver anyway and have $5, you can pick it up unhesitatingly. But still it's very expensive for a $5 card and there are better cards for the same cost around most of the times.
	#36 Mint (Prosperity) Weighted Average: 34.27 / Median: 35 / Mode: 35 / Standard Deviation: 8.1 Highest Rank(s): #5 (1x), #23 (1x), #24 (1x) / Lowest Rank(s): #44 (3x) Mint is the last card before the biggest gap in this list. Just like Royal Seal, it was 6 times below #40, but was even 8 times above #30 with one really big outlier. Mint can duplicate a treasure card in hand. The problem still is, you need that Gold or Platinum in hand, so you really need to draw most of your deck with a good engine or need a small deck to accomplish this regularly. In the first case you probably don't want Mint because you don't want to many treasure cards. But for the latter case, Mint itself helps. Most of the time you buy Mint just to trash most of your Coppers. It really depends if you want Mint with your opening buy as you are now left with only 2 coppers, having no buying power. The only opening which is really powerful is Mint/Fool's Gold, currently #2 of all openings, because you have a small deck and get 2 Fool's Gold per turn most of the times. PS: Beware, don't confuse Mint with Mine.

To the second part

132

Help! / A Rock-Paper-Scissors type of game

« on: January 20, 2012, 05:55:39 pm »

Hi,

I'd like to ask you for some advice for this last game I played. It really got me thinking and is one of the most fun games I played.
Finally I've lost by 1 point. Both me and my opponent admitted, we had no idea how to play this ideally because of the RPS-like situation on that board.

Here's the log.

My coments:
Supply: Golem, Governor, Hunting Party, Moneylender, Nobles, Potion, Remake, Scheme, Tactician, Worker's Village, and Young Witch ( Embargo♦ )

The board has some really interesting strategies. Govenor, Hunting Party and Tactician are some really strong $5, Young Witch is a really good $4 with a really bad bane.
Then there's Nobles for some extra points and added flexibility and Scheme for supporting each strategy.

He openend Young Witch and I had a 2/5 start. I don't know if that's right, but thought that Govenor is bad against Young Witch and Hunting Party the better choice. But if go for Hunting Party I need many of them and then I have fear of Embargo. So I took the Embargo and he took Scheme. With him opening Young Witch I decided to open Remake and delay my strategy planning.
In turn 3 he had $5 and took Govenor and I had a Embargo in hand and $5 too. So I decided to embargo his Govenor and take the Hunting Party now. I knew he wouldn't buy more now and he would give me more Silver. With one added Gold I could build up a good Hunting Party deck.
In turn 4 we both picked up a Embargo.
In turn 5 I picked up my second Hunting Party and he bought a Tactician in turn 6 and embargoed my Hunting Parties.
I embargoed the Tactician immediately and bought a Young Witch. You see the action-reaction?
I turn 8 he picked up the first Nobles and I my first Gold.
Now it was a back and forth with him being in the lead (more Nobles and Provinces, but I was able to catch up.
In turn 19 with 2 Provinces left he buyed Double-Duchy for a 3-point lead and put Nobles, Scheme and a Tactician back.
So I decided to break PPR, as I was pretty sure he couldn' buy a Province next turn. I buyed Province and Estate for a 4-point-lead.
He couldn't buy it and played the Tactician. But I couldn't too and buyed another Estate. His Tactician turn worked out perfectly for exactly $8, the last Province and a 1-point-lead win.


My questions:
How would you have opened with 2/5 after his YW/Scheme opening? Would you have directly bought Govenor/Hunting Party or a Tactician? Was my Remake the wrong decision?
After my Hunting Parties got embargoed I switched to Young Witch. Would you have kept buying Hunting Parties beside getting the Curses because of my Remake?

133

Simulation / Simulation Challenge: Gardens vs. Silk Road

« on: January 17, 2012, 10:43:09 am »

I'm not very good with the simulator, so here a simulation challenge for you in 2 steps:

1.) There's a board with Gardens, Silk Road and Ironworks
One player is only allowed to buy Gardens, Ironworks and the base cards, the other player only Silk Road, Ironworks and base cards.
Optimize both strategies. Which one wins more often and do the strategies differ and if yes: how?

2.) There's a board with Gardens, Silk Road and any other cards
One player is allowed to buy all cards beside Silk Road, the other player all cards beside Gardens.
Which cards help the Gardens player more and which cards help the Silk Road player more?

134

Dominion General Discussion / The Best Dominion Cards List 2012 Ed.1: $4 cards

« on: January 11, 2012, 12:27:52 pm »

Here comes the first part of the $4 list. I look forward to hear your complains
I think this list will be the most discussed one, even more than the $5 list.
There seemed to be very difficult decisions, especially in the middle ranks you will see in the next part.

The Best $4 Cards - Part 1/3

Link to the win rates on Councilroom
Link 2 to the win rates on Councilroom

	#43 Thief (Base) Weighted Average: 41.22 / Median: 42 / Mode: 43 / Standard Deviation: 2.4 Highest Rank(s): #34 (1x), #35 (1x), #38 (2x) / Lowest Rank(s): #43 (13x) Thief is without doubt the worst $4 card in the game. The next card has a healthy margin and Thief has by far the lowest deviation of all $4 cards. Nearly the half of all players ranked it last. An attack on the last position may seem strange, but Thief has the big problem helping your opponent in the early game. Its a free trasher for your opponent and even later it's so risky hitting the Coppers of your opponent. Its only use may be in thin Chapel decks or if you manage to play it multiple times per turn. And it gets better in 3- or 4-player games, where you can minimize the risk of getting nothing and hitting Coppers. It can be a nice counter against a Ill-Gotten-Gains rush dealing out curses with it, but it is still swingy and therefore still a bad card. You don't want it early and in the later game it's almost never worth a buy.
	#42 Scout (Intrigue) Weighted Average: 39.12 / Median: 38.5 / Mode: 37 / Standard Deviation: 5.3 Highest Rank(s): #21 (1x), #28 (1x), #29 (1x) / Lowest Rank(s): #43 (4x) Although it has a higher median than the next card and a pretty high mode (it got #37 6 times), it still only is second last. Only four cards have a lower deviation, so the consensus is still high and it even got last 4 times and #42 6 times too. Scout has its uses. You don't need to spend an action, but it isn't a cantrip, so it really can hurt your deck. If you're massively greening this can be nice as it makes your next turn better, but is still not good. The best uses are: making Crossroads way better, it has a nice synergy with Wishing Well (making it a cheap Lab) and of course it's great with dual-type-victory cards like Harem, Great Hall and Nobles, making Scout a Lab or even better. There might be more edge cases when Scout shines, but those cases are rare and most of the times you can win without buying a Scout.
	#41 Coppersmith (Intrigue) Weighted Average: 38.27 / Median: 39 / Mode: 41 / Standard Deviation: 6.2 Highest Rank(s): #16 (1x), #22 (1x), #26 (1x) / Lowest Rank(s): #41 (11x), #43 (2x) Coppersmith is the third last card with a third of all players ranking it there. It has a below average deviation, but it's really high for such a low ranked card, because it has a few outliers in way higher rank regions. Yes, Coppersmith is very hard to rank, because it's either clearly the worst card on the board or it's very dominating. As a opener you may get to $6 or even $8, but you also can draw only one Copper, so it's very swingy as a opener and gets worse later. On the other hand King's Court + Coppersmith can become brutal and it has some nice synergy with Apothecary and Counting House. The cases where it shines may occur more rarely than with any other card, but then it's a must-buy.
	#40 Talisman (Prosperity) Weighted Average: 37.84 / Median: 38.5 / Mode: 40 / Standard Deviation: 4.2 Highest Rank(s): #28 (1x), #29 (1x), #30 (1x) / Lowest Rank(s): #42 (4x) Talisman is the card with the third least deviation, so no surprise here. No-one ranked it last, but 4 people ranked it second last and 5 people ranked it exactly on #40. There are very few cards for $4, you want in masses. Silk Road and Gardens may be a exception, but Talisman doesn't work with victory cards. So there are even less cards you want for free with Talisman. Caravan and in some cases Throne Room, Conspirator and Tournament came to my mind being the only cards which makes Talisman a good buy, especially as a opener. You can build a Village + Smithy/Envoy quicker too, but this is rarely worth a Talisman buy since you need money too. But it shines especially with cost reducers like Quarry, Bridge and especially Highway. Play Highway, play Talisman, buy Highway, get one for free, that's nice. Talisman is also nice for a quick 3-pile ending. This works well with Bishop for example: get many Talismans and then Bishops, trash Talismans for 3VP and try to three-pile. But Talisman also can hurt very badly since the free extra card is not optional, so only buy Talisman if you really want cheap card in masses. And don't forget: if you're buying more expensive cards you've spent $4 for a Copper.
	#39 Bureaucrat (Base) Weighted Average: 35.75 / Median: 37 / Mode: 39 / Standard Deviation: 5.3 Highest Rank(s): #22 (1x), #26 (2x) / Lowest Rank(s): #42 (4x), #43 (1x) We make the next big jump and can observe a close battle for not getting into the Bottom 5. Bureaucrat loses, maybe it got bad rankings more often with one last place, so that its high ranks couldn't save it. The attack of Bureaucrat is weak. Your opponent loses one card that he don't need anyway for him getting another 4 card hand in the next turn. And he might even be able to counter that easily by playing Farming Village of Cartographer for example. The attack gets better in multiplayer games, especially if there are dual-type victory cards like Nobles or Harem on the board. The benefit on the other side still isn't good either. Top-decked silvers are nice, especially in the beginning and you can get to $8 with 4 silvers too, but it's not easy. So it seems Bureaucrat is nice where you don't want to get to $8, like in Duke / Gardens / Silk Road games, but then Bureacrat is a good counter too. And you can play your Bureaucrat less frequently if your deck is already flooded with silvers. Bureacrat + Big Money is not bad on the other side as it doesn't seem to have synergies well with other cards.
	#38 Noble Brigand (Hinterlands) Weighted Average: 35.71 / Median: 36.5 / Mode: 41 / Standard Deviation: 5.6 Highest Rank(s): #24 (1x), #25 (1x), #26 (2x) / Lowest Rank(s): #41 (5x), #42 (2x) Noble Brigand wins against Bureaucrat with a 0.04 point lead. It didn't got any last place, but got third last 5 times in exchange. So the order of these two isn't fixed. Noble Brigand is the better Thief on many boards. It hasn't the disadvantage of trashing the opponents Coppers, making it a better opener. It even attacks on-buy. It deals out Coppers too which is nice playing against no-treasure decks. And it gives $1 too, so you have at least an immediate benefit. But it's worse in Colony games as it cannot steal Platinum, it cannot steal Ill-Gotten-Gains like Thief and cannot steal other Kingdom treasure cards. And most important: it's still too slow and doesn't hurt enough if you can't play one nearly each turn.
	#37 Navigator (Seaside) Weighted Average: 34.56 / Median: 35 / Mode: 32 / Standard Deviation: 5.7 Highest Rank(s): #21 (1x), #22 (1x), #29 (1x) / Lowest Rank(s): #43 (4x) Navigator is the card with the second most last places shared with Scout. But Navigator is the first card with a way higher mode with 7 times #32. It also has a worse unweighted average than Noble Brigand, so better players seem to rank Navigator higher than Newbies. Scout is at least non-terminal and therefore nice for Wishing Well to draw the top-decked cards. Top-decking the next 5 cards in a specific order is only nice if you have still an action left to draw a few of them. Because if you don't do that, you draw all 5 cards no matter in what order you put them back. The discarding option is nice to minimize shuffle luck and to get a half Chancellor effect, but still it is terminal and most of the time there are better terminal cards on the board. At least it gives you $2. The best use still may be to enable Tunnel's reaction.
	#36 Nomad Camp (Hinterlands) Weighted Average: 33.92 / Median: 33.5 / Mode: 32 / Standard Deviation: 5.3 Highest Rank(s): #21 (1x), #25 (1x), #27 (1x) / Lowest Rank(s): #41 (2x), #43 (2x) Nomad Camp has two last places too with 4 last places still to come. It has a pretty low deviation, the fifth least like Scout. With only 4 times #32, the mode has not much significance here. Woodcutter was the third worst $3 card. Here we have a Woodcutter with a on-buy top-deck ability. Is it worth costing $1 more? And how can it be that it ranks higher than Woodcutter? IMO there are only 2-3 reasons for that. You have a high chance to get a $5 card on turn 2 even with a 4/3 opening which is nice especially for Hunting Party and Cursers. Similar to that it is nice you need the +Buy either way and need multiple cheap cards as fast you can. But the only opening which is strong is IMO Nomad Camp / Fool's Gold / Fool's Gold. The last reason is  if you're really unlucky in the late game and only get $4 and want to maximize the chances to hit $8 in the next turn. Beside of that it's only an expensive Woodcutter.
	#35 Walled Village (Promo) Weighted Average: 32.86 / Median: 32.5 / Mode: 30 / Standard Deviation: 4.7 Highest Rank(s): #27 (3x) / Lowest Rank(s): #40 (2x), #42 (2x) Walled Village is the next promo in the list. Its low deviation (fourth least) shows the consensus in its rank. As we get nearer to the middle ranks, the mode gets less significance, it was #30 4 times. It is the worst of the four $4 villages. Why? Its only ability is top deck it if you weren't able to use both actions. So this is nice if you have only 2-3 terminal actions and really want to play them each time without taking the risk of colliding. The only reason opening with Walled Village could be if there's a $3 key card and you want a second one later too. Because of that Walled Village / Masquerade and Walled Village / Ambassador are Level 4 openings rankings on #91 and #114 on Councilroom respectively. In all other cases it is the same as the normal village.
	#34 Pirate Ship (Seaside) Weighted Average: 32.71 / Median: 33 / Mode: 33 / Standard Deviation: 8.6 Highest Rank(s): #6 (1x), #9 (1x), #19 (1x) / Lowest Rank(s): #40 (4x), #41 (1x), #43 (1x) Pirate Ship is only 0.15 points higher than Walled Village and has a clearly higher deviation than all cards before, but is still only 14th in the deviation ranking (that shows the big discussion I expect in the next part). It got last once (with three more to come) and is the first card that even got in the Top 10 twice. There's the third attack that trashes treasures (tongue twister). Pirate Ship is the best one, but still not good. Or is it? The high ranks may result from players mainly playing 3- or 4-player games where Pirate Ships can be devastating. In 2-player games it's too slow most of the times. The advantage over Thief and Noble Brigand is getting virtual money and therefore not clogging your deck so you can play Pirate Ship more often and get the coins more often. So, with Pirate Ship you really want to buy as many as you can, so you can play them multiple times, and with Throne Room or King's Court this card is really great.
	#33 Spy (Base) Weighted Average: 32.17 / Median: 32 / Mode: 31 / Standard Deviation: 6.7 Highest Rank(s): #17 (1x), #18 (1x), #23 (1x) / Lowest Rank(s): #42 (1x), #43 (2x) Spy got on the last place twice, so there's only one more last place left. It has two outliers in the Top 20. It's unweighted average is lower than Pirate Ship, so higher ranked players seem to rank Spy higher than Pirate Ship. An attack that is a cantrip, that seems nice at the first look. But Spy is an attack with a pretty bad attack and little benefit. It's very swingy as you can discard your victory card (or even your Tunnel) and discard the only Witch of your opponent, but you can hit a victory card of your opponent too that you put back. That's no change for your opponent and he even may use that additional info for the next turn. You can add a Spy in your drawing engine if you have a buy and money left, but is really rarely worth a buy. It may have ranked that high, because it's a cantrip and at least don't hurt (or hurts less than a few other cards already mentioned above may hurt). If we already cards with different costs (Warehouse and Cellar), the way better Cartographer comes into my mind.
	#32 Treasure Map (Seaside) Weighted Average: 31.57 / Median: 31.5 / Mode: 31 / Standard Deviation: 8.8 Highest Rank(s): #7 (1x), #9 (1x), #14 (2x) / Lowest Rank(s): #39 (3x), #40 (1x), #42 (1x) Treasure Map's stats seem similar to the Pirate Ship ones. Two outliers in the Top 10 too, similar high deviation, but no last place this time, only a second last place this time. I can already here the outcry of a card that ranks that high and is so luck-dependant. Its power is undeniable thou. An early enabling can already decide a game. But you can hardly call it strategy going for Treasure Map. You really need enablers for that, like Warehouse, Chapel, Tactician or the Watchtower/Talisman combo. If you go for Treasure Map without such enablers, you totally rely on your luck. And losing against a totally luck-based enabling can really be frustrating.
	#31 Feast (Base) Weighted Average: 30.25 / Median: 31.5 / Mode: 36 / Standard Deviation: 8.2 Highest Rank(s): #7 (1x), #12 (1x), #18 (1x) / Lowest Rank(s): #38 (1x), #40 (1x), #41 (1x) Feast is the last card before a big gap. So its the best card of the bad third of the $4 cards. It has two outliers again with one in the Top 10 and very low mode. Feast basically does nothing but being a one-shot balancing bad shuffle luck, especially at the start. If you really want a specific $5 card and have a 4/3 opening you can open with Feast and can be sure to get that $5 card soon. It also can be used with Throne Room and King's Court to gain multiple $5 cards.

To the second part

135

Dominion General Discussion / The Best Dominion Cards List 2012 Ed.1: $3 cards

« on: January 05, 2012, 12:37:16 am »

I just wanted to post the next article, but I couldn't because I exceeded the maximum allowed characters (20000). I think I have to split my post. But first I answer your posts.

As I said above, an unweighted ranking or using Median wouldn' have changed the order of the $2 cards. So I didn't mentioned that. I will mention that if it would be a difference, you will see.

I think the request was just to display the median and mode, not re-order the list. We just want to see as many stats as possible if it's not too much trouble.

It might be nice to see a graph of for each card, x axis is the isotropic level of the raters, and y axis is the rank.

Maybe you'll see trends with the under/overrated cards.

Nice idea. Let's see what I can do. But: All lists are still weighted by isotropic rank, so I think those graphs won't tell you anything new.

A weighted average is a nice summary statistic to get an overall rank, but it would also be nice to see if there is any correlation between card rank and iso level. If it's too much trouble to post a graph, maybe at least compute a correlation coefficient? Again, I'm not trying to be too demanding, as you're already doing a lot of work, but the more stats we see the better.

As I said above, an unweighted ranking or using Median wouldn' have changed the order of the $2 cards. So I didn't mentioned that. I will mention that if it would be a difference, you will see.

I think the request was just to display the median and mode, not re-order the list. We just want to see as many stats as possible if it's not too much trouble.

Yes, my point exactly. I think it would be nice if you (Qvist) put the median and mode everywhere (2 extra numbers for each card won't kill anyone) but only comment on them when they are interesting...or at least median, pleeeeeeease 

You all (I am too) are such geeks
In my next post I added median and mode. I think the mode is not very meaningful, but I added it like you want it to have. I will edit the $2 article too.
Regarding the graph, I still have to make a few tests if I can get a result I'm satisfied with.

From the text: "If there's Mountebank in the supply and you're playing a 4-player-game, Moat might be a good buy." Might? In that situation, I think Moat is a MUST-buy, and I probably open moat/silver most of the time. "But if you're playing a 2-player game, buying Moat is mostly superfluous. Buying a trasher more against Cursers...is mostly the better alternative." You might be surprised if you simulate it in geronimoo's simulator. Just add a single remake or a single moat to the witch bot. Which do you think is better? Witch+Moat beast Witch+Remake 53-43.   Now I'm not saying just getting a trasher instead is not better some (or even a lot) of the time, but it's not like witch games transitioning into big money is a major outliar situation.

You're wrong if you think Geronimoo's simulator proves that Witch+Moat beats Witch+Remake. The basic Witch+Remake bot plays extremely poorly: it doesn't trash Witch when Curse pile is empty, it doesn't trash Curse+Silver when there is no good buy on the hand, etc. Just read the documentation for Remake.

Hm, interesting. I was very confused reading HiveMindEmulators statement. Anon79, that might be a good explanation, thanks for that.

What format is the dataset in?  Why not just open the dataset and let people do whatever analysis they want?

I will not release the data before my articles are finished. Later I'm not sure if will do it. At least I have to make the users anonymous as I don't know if all of you agree to publish your lists.

136

Dominion General Discussion / The Best Dominion Cards List 2012 Ed.1: $2 cards

« on: January 03, 2012, 03:12:50 am »

Exactly 30 lists were sent in. Thanks for all your contribution.
You were waiting for the results, so let's get started. Feel free to comment.
I'm sorry for mistakes with the English language as I'm no native speaker.
And please let me know if you like my comments and the current format.

The Best $2 Cards

Link to the win rates on Councilroom
Link 2 to the win rates on Councilroom

	#16 Duchess (Hinterlands) Weighted Average: 15.05 / Median: 16 / Mode: 16 / Standard Deviation: 1.5 Highest Rank(s): #11 (2x), #12 (2x) / Lowest Rank(s): #16 (17x) Duchess is the worst $2 card. It was close, but more than a half of all players ranked it last, so it deserved its spot. Why is it so bad? It's a terminal silver with a spy-effect that has even a benefit for your opponents. Yeah, it's even so bad that it needs a clause to get it for free when you buy a Duchy. And mostly that are the only cases you want a Duchess. Rarely you want to spend $2 to buy one. Once in a while you want it for free, especially when you are trying to make a "green card rush" with Duke or Gardens and want to maintain the buying power and emptying the third pile as fast as possible.
	#15 Secret Chamber (Intrigue) Weighted Average: 14.59 / Median: 14.5 / Mode: 15 / Standard Deviation: 1.4 Highest Rank(s): #11 (1x), #12 (3x) / Lowest Rank(s): #16 (6x) The consensus was even higher with Secret Chamber. Only 3 other cards have a lower standard deviation. Also no-one has put it higher than #11, but it got not as many last places as Duchess. Why is it so bad? The action part seems not so bad. You can discard cards for money and in decks with many victory cards or curses it's guaranteed $4. But first: What do you want to buy with $4? As a opener it's bad, because mostly you want to get to $5 and later in the game you need $5 too to get at least a Duchy. So, basically it's a very bad Vault and you better buy a Silver. But there are rare cases, especially you can use it when you need virtual money like in Tactician turns or when you want to buy Grand Markets. It's reaction part is really bad. It has nearly no effect against the best attacks: Cursers and Handsize-Reducers, but you can use it against cards that mess up the top of your deck or trash cards from your deck, like Thief or Pirate Ship. But Thief is already bad. Why buy a reaction card against Thief?
	#14 Pearl Diver (Seaside) Weighted Average: 13.66 / Median: 14 / Mode: 15 / Standard Deviation: 1.5 Highest Rank(s): #10 (1x), #11 (1x), #12 (4x) / Lowest Rank(s): #16 (3x) No surprise here. Everyone agrees here too. Pearl Diver has a sure spot on #14 with enough space to #15 and #13. It's the first card which reached #10, but most players put it on #14 or #15. Why is it so bad? Pearl Diver mostly don't hurt in your deck as it is a cantrip. So, if you got $2 early and you don't want to buy an Estate, you can buy a Pearl Diver. Buying too much Duchesses or Secret Chambers hurts much more than too many Pearl Divers. But the benefit of Pearl Diver is lower than those cards. It's only use is to minimize draw luck a little bit and to let cards shine which interact with the top card of your deck (Native Village comes into my mind). OK, I admit, since Cornucopia it got a little boost as it can add more diversity into your deck and cards like Menagerie, Fairgrounds, Horn of Plenty can profit from it. But I think you all agree when I say it's weaker than Duchess and Secret Chamber per se, but it hurts less.
	#13 Herbalist (Alchemy) Weighted Average: 12.71 / Median: 13 / Mode: 13 / Standard Deviation: 1.1 Highest Rank(s): #11 (4x) / Lowest Rank(s): #14 (8x), #15 (1x) Even less surprise here. It's the card with the third least deviation. High consensus here, as no-one ranked it higher than #11 (even Pearl Diver managed that), but no-one put it in the last place too. If I know correctly it's a card that's widely hated, especially because it's the only non-potion-related card in the Alchemy set (Apprentice references Potion at least) and its bad too. Many liked to see it replaced with another potion-cost card. But I think it's bad reputation is only half-justified. Yeah, it's a terminal copper. How bad is that! So, mostly it hurts. Bad "scheming" your treasures is really nice. In the beginning you can use your newly buyed Gold twice if you have the luck to draw it with Herbalist. And even putting back a Silver is not so bad in the beginning. But especially if you're going for Potion (because of that it's in Alchemy) you can use it twice early on. The most important combo might be Alchemist+Herbalist. And - mostly forgotten - it's one of three $2 cards that gives the important +Buy and it's the only one which gives the +Buy without taking a disadvantage (either discarding one card or forfeiting an option). But if you have no +Actions this card is mostly not worth buying.
	#12 Moat (Base) Weighted Average: 12.24 / Median: 12 / Mode: 12 / Standard Deviation: 2.1 Highest Rank(s): #8 (1x), #9 (3x) / Lowest Rank(s): #15 (2x), #16 (2x) So, now the first card with higher deviation. The first time we have a card which reaches a single-digit rank, but at the same time reaches the last place two times. What could be the reason? Moat is very situational. It highly depends on the cards on the board and - more important - on the number of players. If there's Mountebank in the supply and you're playing a 4-player-game, Moat might be a good buy. It can prevent getting 3 coppers and 3 curses in one turn. But if you're playing a 2-player game, buying Moat is mostly superfluous. Buying a trasher more against Cursers or Library/Watchtower/Menagerie agains hand-size-reducing is mostly the better alternative. Even worse, if there's no attack card on the board, +2 cards with no other benefit is so weak, because that means a raw benefit of +1 card . Maybe only if your going for Big Money with bad other cards and you're getting unlucky and hit $2 early, this might be worth considering.
	#11 Embargo (Seaside) Weighted Average: 10.23 / Median: 10 / Mode: 11 / Standard Deviation: 2.2 Highest Rank(s): #7 (2x), #8 (5x) / Lowest Rank(s): #14 (2x), #16 (1x) We now make a big step of 2 points in the weighted average and are getting to the first middle-ranked $2 card. The middle-ranked cards are hard to rank, maybe because of that the deviation is higher. Every middle-ranked card has advantages and disadvantages. What thoughts might let you put that card into the 11th place? First, it's a terminal silver. Basically that's bad. But it's a one-shot. So if you get unlucky and hit $2 early you can buy it without much thinking as it only interferes once. But Embargo can be a game-changer, especially if you and your opponent(s) are taking different strategies. And it really shines if your opponent buys a Potion and you decide not to go for Potion. Just embargo the Potion-cost card and you are turns ahead. So, it's nearly never bad, but only shines situation-wise. And it might be the first card in the list that's worth to play with King's Court.
	#10 Cellar (Base) Weighted Average: 9.31 / Median: 9.5 / Mode: 11 / Standard Deviation: 2.7 Highest Rank(s): #4 (2x), #5 (2x) / Lowest Rank(s): #13 (3x) Now we get to the card with the second highest deviation. It started already heavy discussion in the worst $2 card thread. There seem to be Cellar Lovers (like me ) and haters (and those who just compare it to Warehouse ) It mostly ranked on #11 (7x) but got higher rankings more often than lower rankings. Why so different opinions? There are many cards that take profit from bad cards like Estate or Curses. Secret Chamber fails - as mentioned earlier - by just getting $1 per card. Cellar let you discard them and get you get your good cards in hand. Of course Warehouse is better in most cases as it let you draw your cards before discarding. If you want compare Cellar with another $2 card, Crossroads comes into your mind. Crossroads also lets you draw more cards for useless cards. But it is limited to green cards, so you get no benefit for Curses and Coppers. But you don't have to discard them and it gives you +3 Actions the first time. So it highly depends which card is better. In cursing games Cellar's great. And of course with Tunnel.
	#9 Native Village (Seaside) Weighted Average: 8.32 / Median: 8 / Mode: 8 / Standard Deviation: 2.4 Highest Rank(s): #5 (3x) / Lowest Rank(s): #12 (3x), #13 (2x) Native Village is also a mediocre $2 card with relative high deviation. It's the worst $2 village (with Hamlet and Crossroads to come). Why? The problem with NV is that you get no immediate benefit beside the +2 Actions. If you use it as a cheap village you only draw 1/2 card per play. But you can use it either as a pseudo-trasher by putting bad cards on the mat. But it fails that you cannot choose the card to put there. You need assistence with cards like Spy, Pearl Diver, Wishing Well or Lookout. The best use may be to use it for mega-turn with a lot of buys. NV+Bridge is the most effective combo.
	#8 Pawn (Intrigue) Weighted Average: 7.62 / Median: 8 / Mode: 9 / Standard Deviation: 1.7 Highest Rank(s): #5 (4x) / Lowest Rank(s): #10 (5x) No big surprise here. Pawn is THE mediocre card in my opinion. Thus the middle rank with little deviation. Pawn is the first card of 4 cards which are very close together and it lost the race for #5. Pawn is bad if you don't know how to play it and simply use it as a cantrip. But it can be very useful as a cheap source of +Buy and in the beginning it's mostly a cheap Silver if you use it for card + money. It's flexibility makes it good. But it's not great. It can win your game because you picked it up for +Buy but normally it's no game-changer. And if you use it for card + action it at least doesn't hurt. But nothing is more frustrating if you use if for card + money and you draw a Pawn dead.
	#7 Crossroads (Hinterlands) Weighted Average: 7.36 / Median: 7 / Mode: 7 / Standard Deviation: 2.4 Highest Rank(s): #3 (2x), #4 (3x) / Lowest Rank(s): #11 (3x), #12 (1x) Crossroads is the third card of four cards in the race for #5. It's also the first card which managed to get in the Top 3. But there seem many Crossroads haters too. So, it's high deviation was the problem not getting in the Top 5. Crossroads is the only card with +3 Actions which can be very useful. The problem is the luck factor you need with that card. If you buy it early and get a hand with 4 coppers, you wish it were a Silver or one of the above $2 cards. Later you draw it with 3 Estates and you draw now your Vault and you can buy a Province for sure. It combos well with cards that take advantage of big hands. So Crossroads + Vault is very good and of course it's great with your good $5 attacks, especially setting up a Torturer chain. IMO Crossroads is never a reason to go green earlier, but it helps a lot in the end game and can assure you won't lose your buying power. As mentioned above another problem is that it only synergizes with victory cards not with curses what makes it a worse alternative to Cellar in cursing games.
	#6 Haven (Seaside) Weighted Average: 6.78 / Median: 6 / Mode: 6 / Standard Deviation: 2.2 Highest Rank(s): #3 (1x), #4 (2x) / Lowest Rank(s): #10 (2x), #13 (1x) Haven lost the battle for #5 very close. 7 times it was ranked #5 and another 7 times #6, so it was clear it was a close call between those two ranks. What makes it above-average? At first Haven is a cantrip and never hurts. And it's ability to minimize draw luck is great. You have $11, just set a Gold aside. You have $7, just set a Copper aside. Two terminal actions in hand, no problem. You get your maximum out of your money and your actions. It's a very good card, but no game-changer what may be the reason why it didn't get into the Top 5. It supports every strategy but isn't a strategy on its own.
	#5 Fool's Gold (Hinterlands) Weighted Average: 6.52 / Median: 5.5 / Mode: 5 / Standard Deviation: 3.2 Highest Rank(s): #2 (3x) / Lowest Rank(s): #10 (3x), #11 (1x), #16 (1x) Welcome in the Top 5. It was very close, but FG managed to beat Haven. Also, welcome to the first card that got #2, and that even 3 times. But it also got last one time. So it's the card with the by far highest deviation. What may be the reason? Going for Fool's Gold is its on strategy what Haven isn't. If you buy just one or two, it mostly isn't worth it, because who wants a Copper what gets into Gold in the late game when you can't catch up anymore? You want FG in masses, in high density. With a card with money and +Buy and/or a card drawer it's really great and you have to go for it. Goal: Get as many FGs as you can. Margrave + FG or Nomad Camp + FG are good combos, but you can get even higher density with Mint. Mint + FG is the second best opening on Councilroom. That may reason enough that FG deserves to be in the Top 5. You really have to analyze when to buy it. On some boards it's the worst card on other boards the best card. Your rankings proved that.
	#4 Lighthouse (Seaside) Weighted Average: 4.48 / Median: 4 / Mode: 4 / Standard Deviation: 2.0 Highest Rank(s): #2 (3x) / Lowest Rank(s): #8 (1x), #9 (1x), #10 (1x) Let's make a huge step and let's get to the 4 good $2 cards. Lighthouse has the same high rankings as Fool's Gold, but is consistent. Its low ranks are rare and it got #4 11 times. With Lighthouse on the board, you really need to evualate if it's worth buying a attacking engine. It may the best Reaction that isn't even blue. Why? Most important: It's non-terminal. Unlike Moat, it cannot collide with other terminal actions or another copy. Second: It gives you money. It may look like a Copper, but after you play it, you are safe and get even another $1 the next turn. So on boards with heavy attacks, it's superior to Silver. You only have to make sure you play one Lighthouse each turn.
	#3 Courtyard (Intrigue) Weighted Average: 3.46 / Median: 3 / Mode: 3 / Standard Deviation: 2.3 Highest Rank(s): #1 (1x), #2 (8x) / Lowest Rank(s): #8 (2x), #10 (1x) Courtyard is the first card which reached the top spot. 10 times it got ranked on #3, so no surprise that it ranked here. Courtyard is really great with Big Money. Like Haven it minimizes shuffle luck by putting a card on top of the deck, so if you have too much money or a second Courtyard in hand, that's no problem. But you don't get a 6 card hand like with Haven. But the card draw makes it really nice with Big Money and very strong for a $2 card. It's not much worse than Smithy which costs $4. And Smithy itself is by far not the worst $4 card. Its concept is simple but very effective. Don't underestimate the power of Courtyard.
	#2 Hamlet (Cornucopia) Weighted Average: 2.52 / Median: 2 / Mode: 2 / Standard Deviation: 0.9 Highest Rank(s): #1 (1x), #2 (16x) / Lowest Rank(s): #4 (5x), #5 (1x) No surprises in the top 2 spots. Hamlet has the second lowest deviation and deserves the #2 spot without doubt. It even got #1 once. What makes it so great? It's one of the best villages around. Yes, you have to discard one card as "payment" for the second action, but if you really need the +2 Actions there's no problem for you to discard that Copper. And most important: Most engines lack +Buy. Hamlet may provide that for another card as payment. Even if you don't need the +2 Actions for your strategy, a non-terminal card with +Buy is always worth to buy. So, if you use both options, you have a Worker's Village for $2, but you have to "pay" for that options. And when you got your first Hamlet you can easily buy more Hamlets with that additional +Buy.
	#1 Chapel (Base) Weighted Average: 1.18 / Median: 1 / Mode: 1 / Standard Deviation: 0.5 Highest Rank(s): #1 (28x) / Lowest Rank(s): #3 (2x) Really, that's no surprise. A nearly perfect score. Only two times it didn't get first. Is it really that great? So, what's up with that uber-card? Even Donald X. admitted that Chapel is a little bit overpowered and he won't release another card so strong like Chapel in future expansions. Trashing is important in the beginning, and the cost of Chapel enables everyone to open with Chapel. As Councilroom shows it's veeery strong, but only if you open with it. You even want to start Chapel/Silver with 3/4. It's not every time a must-buy but in most occasions it is. It's so strong that you already can say you lost if your opponent opened Witch/Chapel and you have a 4/3 start. Mountebank/Chapel is the best opening on Councilroom and Govenor/Chapel, Tournament/Chapel and Witch/Chapel are currently on 4-6. So its power is undeniable. As a side note: Cards that are strong openers and bad in late game seem very difficult to rank for all of you. Those cards - as you will see - mostly have high deviation. But Chapel is such a game-changer that it is #1 without doubt.

To the $3 cards

137

Variants and Fan Cards / Type of Cards, Multi-type Cards and Color Questions

« on: December 15, 2011, 04:34:02 am »

I thought a little bit about the multi-type cards that we have.
I think you can differentiate between cards with subtypes and cards with 2+ types.
Attack cards are a subtype of Action Cards because a Victory-Attack Card doesn't make any sense I think. If you can't play the card, how can you attack?
The only thing that comes into my mind would be Treasure-Attack. But a Treasure card that attacks without spending an action would be very strong.
Theoretically this seems possible and must be a weak attack. But thematically an Attack Card fits better as a subtype of an Action card.
Ill-Gotten Gains attacks on-buy and not on-play so that might be the reason this is not an Attack Card.
Because of that Attack Card doesn't have an extra color, I think. But it would be nice if there were red.
So, it seems, that it won't be any Treasure-Attack Cards released.

Then there are Prize Cards. There are no subtype as Diadem is a Treasure-Prize Card while all other Prize Cards are Action-Prize Cards.
Normally this deserves its own color. But I understand that it's a special case as they come only in play if there is one speical card in the supply.
But isn't a Curse card also a special case and has a special color for only one card? This seems oversized if there weren't more Curse Cards coming. What do we expect Donald X?
I think, exactly that caused many to create expansions with curses as theme, containing Treasure-Curse cards etc. But many of you know that would require additional rules.

I think we can say there are 3 main types: Action (white), Treasure (yellow), Victory (green).
There are already 3 Action-Victory Cards with fitting white-green color.
Similarly there is 1 Treasure-Victory Card (yellow-green). These Cards are very straight-forward and are making no problems in what they do.

But there also the - very difficult to understand - Reaction Cards.
In the beginning everybody thought (ok, maybe only I did) that Reaction Cards are a subtype of Action Cards.
But with Hinterlands we now have a Treasure-Reaction and a Victory-Reaction Card.
What is a Reaction Card?
Let's first define the other types regarding when their effect comes into play.
An Action Card is a card you can play in the first phase of your turn and have to spend an Action.
A Treasure Card is a card you can play in the second phase of your turn without spending anything.
A Victory Card is a card that can't be played and counts only in the end.
A Attack Card is a card that, when triggered, affect other players.
A Reaction Card is a card that you can show (not play) when specific circumstances occur (even not in your turn).

So, a Reaction Card is totally independant from the Action part and I think the Action part was added that it isn't a dead card on some boards.
But, wait. A Treasure-Reaction Card is yellow-blue and a Victory-Reaction Card is green-blue. Reation Cards are therefore blue.
Why aren't Action-Reaction Cards white-blue? That doesn't make any sense to me and seems inconsistent.
Ok, there are still no vanilla Reaction Cards released, and I think there won't. But if they would come, there's no way to differentiate Action-Reaction Cards from pure Reaction Cards based on the color.
And I think a pure Reaction Card isn't a bad idea (see my other thread: Bargainer).

Some more examples without names and cost and all untested:
"If another player buys a card costing up to 5 Coins, you may reveal and discard this. If you do, gain a copy of it." (like Smugglers)
"If another player buys a card, you may reveal and discard this. If you do, +2 cards."
The last one seems interesting. It's like Laboratory, but a little bit worse; especially in multiplayer with handsize reducing attacks and of course you have to hold in your hand. If you draw it in your turn, it's dead.
And of course you can't scheme/throne/etc. it.
These may be examples of pure Reaction cards that are strong enough without an action part.

The last type would be the Duration Card.
Is it a subtype of Action or is it an independant type?
I think, it's designed as a subtype of Action (orange instead of white-orange again!), but I see no problems in having a Treasure-Duration Card.
For example (all untested):
$2 Tin Coin "Now and at the start of your next turn's buy phase: $1"
$5 Investment "0$. At the start of your next turn's buy phase: $3"
$4? Safe "When you play this and at the start of your next turn's buy phase, it`s worth $1 per Duration card you have in play (counting this)." (like Bank)

The last thing we haven't looked into: Does an Action-Treasure Card make sense? Why not?
We pointed out, that the difference between these two is the phase in which they are played and that playing an action card costs an action.
So if an Action-Treasure Card would exist a new rule has to exist: "If you play an Action-Treasure Card in the Action phase, you have to declare if you play it as an Action or as a Treasure Card and therefore starting the buy phase."
Then we could create cards, that have slighty different effects depending if you play it in the action or in the buy phase, e.g.:
Unnamed $4 "If played as an action: +2 Cards, $2, Discard 2 cards. If played as a treasure: $2 +1 Buy"

So what do you think?
Why the inconsistency in coloring the cards? Or do you think there's none?
Do you think there will be more and new 2-type Cards in the remaining 2 future expansions?
Will we ever see a pure Reaction card? Will we ever see another purple Curse card?

138

Dominion General Discussion / The Dominion Cards Lists 2012 Ed.1: Introduction and meta-discussion

« on: December 08, 2011, 07:09:40 am »

Hello folks,

inspired by the discussion on the Top 5 lists and the ranking of the $2 cards, I thought it would be nice to have a list, compiled by the votes of each one of you, so we get a balanced list. I don't know if anyone or that many of you are interested in this. But as I saw how much posted their ranking of the $2 cards after my post that quickly, I'll give it a try.

How will this work?
I think I will do 2 list contests. Before I open a second thread, I want to see how well the feedback is.
The first list will be one like theory wants to compile: The best cards of each price level.
I think it will be interesting to see if the community has the same opinion.
This list shouldn't be viewed as a replacement of theory's list. He's a very experienced player and his lists a very informative.
You should see it as an addition.
The second list is a big one: The favourite cards.
I know there are several threads and discussions, but there are no compiled lists.
You can rank the cards, based on whatever you like: strength/weakness, originality in design, fun and "no-fun" factor, whatever.

What do you have to do?
If you like to contribute, send me a PM for one or the other list (or both).
Cards are only counted if they are kingdom cards, so no Copper, Silver, Gold, Platinum, Potion, Estate, Duchy, Province, Colony, Curse and Prize Cards are allowed.
Just arrange the cards for your ranking with the best/favourite card going first and the worst/least favourite on the last position.
For reference: 157 cards should be in your Favourite card list and the Best card list is subdivided into several lists, containing:
16 $2 cards, 26 $3 cards, 43 $4 cards, 48 $5 cards, 14 >$6 cards, 10 Potion cards = 157
I don't make a difference between attack or non-attack cards, so put them togehter in one list as I can easily divide it later if it seems reasonable.
The criteria for the Potion cost cards IMHO should be: How often will I buy at least one Potion if this card is in the supply? But you can rank them in which order you like. We'll see what the result will be.

Card List:

Code: [Select]

16 $2 cards
Cellar
Chapel
Moat
Courtyard
Pawn
Secret Chamber
Embargo
Haven
Lighthouse
Native Village
Pearl Diver
Herbalist
Hamlet
Crossroads
Duchess
Fool's Gold

26 $3 cards
Chancellor
Village
Woodcutter
Workshop
Great Hall
Masquerade
Shanty Town
Steward
Swindler
Wishing Well
Ambassador
Fishing Village
Lookout
Smugglers
Warehouse
Loan
Trade Route
Watchtower
Fortune Teller
Menagerie
Develop
Oasis
Oracle
Scheme
Tunnel
Black Market

43 $4 cards
Bureaucrat
Feast
Gardens
Militia
Moneylender
Remodel
Smithy
Spy
Thief
Throne Room
Baron
Bridge
Conspirator
Coppersmith
Ironworks
Mining Village
Scout
Caravan
Cutpurse
Island
Navigator
Pirate Ship
Salvager
Sea Hag
Treasure Map
Bishop
Monument
Quarry
Talisman
Worker's Village
Farming Village
Horse Traders
Remake
Tournament
Young Witch
Jack of all Trades
Noble Brigand
Nomad Camp
Silk Road
Spice Merchant
Trader
Envoy
Walled Village

48 $5 cards
Council Room
Festival
Laboratory
Library
Market
Mine
Witch
Duke
Minion
Saboteur
Torturer
Trading Post
Tribute
Upgrade
Bazaar
Explorer
Ghost Ship
Merchant Ship
Outpost
Tactician
Treasury
Wharf
Apprentice
City
Contraband
Counting House
Mint
Mountebank
Rabble
Royal Seal
Vault
Venture
Harvest
Horn of Plenty
Hunting Party
Jester
Cache
Cartographer
Embassy
Haggler
Highway
Ill-Gotten Gains
Inn
Mandarin
Margrave
Stables
Governor
Stash

14 >$6 cards
Adventurer
Harem
Nobles
Goons
Grand Market
Hoard
Fairgrounds
Border Village
Farmland
Bank
Expand
Forge
King's Court
Peddler

10 Potion cards
Transmute
Vineyard
Apothecary
Scrying Pool
University
Alchemist
Familiar
Philosopher's Stone
Golem
Possession

For the best card list, I will add a variant of theory's disclaimer:
This list should cause discussion not hassle. Of course it's difficult to compare some of the cards because pretty much every card has some situations where it shines and situations where it doesn't.
This isn't a scientific list, just a compiled list of the community's opinion of the best cards.

What else?
Submission deadline will be the 31st of December 11:59pm UTC.
Each card will get points based on the rank. So your favourite card gets 157 points and your least favourite gets 1 point. This will result in a compiled list of all of your lists.
Then I will post daily the rankings from worst to best to raise the tension (maybe 5 cards per day).
I will also add some statistic data like "Saboteur #11, highest rank #1 (2 times), lowest rank #98, standard deviation: 10.23"
Based on the data, I will make a list to compare the expansions too.
And I will add some comments to each card, e.g. why I think it ranked there where it ranked. So if you have time, you can also add in your list some comments to some cards, explaining why you put it there in your list.

So, tell me if it's a good idea and if you want to contribute. Originally I wanted to wait until all expansions are out. But we can do it again then and compare the lists.

Edit: You can use these online surveys too:
Best Cards
Favourite Cards
Please be sure that you put each card in order on the right and don't miss any.
The best/favourite card goes on top.
If you have already submitted, you don't have to take the survey.
And if you don't like that survey, you can still PM me.

Results:
$2 cards
$3 cards (Part 1)
$3 cards (Part 2)
$4 cards (Part 1)
$4 cards (Part 2)
$4 cards (Part 3)
$5 cards (Part 1)
$5 cards (Part 2)
$5 cards (Part 3)
$5 cards (Part 4)
$6+ cards
Potion cost cards

Favourite cards

139

Variants and Fan Cards / Choice card mechanics

« on: November 04, 2011, 06:31:43 am »

I don't know if I should make a new thread for that.
If an admin feels that it better fit in my "Reaction Card" thread, than you can merge them. For now I keep them separate.
And this doesn't get so long as the reaction card post.

-----

I like cards that gives you the choice. They're flexible and nearly fit in each deck.
The basic one I mean is Pawn. I like to buy it if I have $2 left. In the worst case it's a cantrip.
But Steward and Nobles, Trusty Steed, Governor also fit in this category.
More complex examples would be Spice Merchant, Minion or Native Village.

I thought of a card that was like
"Employee $5 Action // Choose one: +3$; +2$ +1 Action; +1$ +2 Actions; +3 Actions"
or more compact:
"Employee $5 Action // Choose three times +1$ or +1 Action" (I don't know if it's worded right)
Each variant should be priced right.
For $5 you get either a terminal gold, an Minion-like card, a Bazaar without +1 card, or a massive Action-boost
Of course the choices are not equivalent in each situation, but sometimes you need that +3 Action-boost more than a terminal gold.
So if you have 2 Employees in hand, you have +$5. If you have 2 Employees and other terminal actions you can choose differently, but you'll have mostly no actions left and the maximum of +coins.
Would that be a good card?

Later I thought: Hm, I think we could expand that to other combinations.
"Another Employee $5 Action // Choose three times +1 Card or +1 Action"
So you have either a Smithy or a Laboratory or a Village or another time the massive Action-boost.
So each variant is already an existing card, but that card would be flexible and no variant is worth more than $5. But would that card be interesting? Is it worth more than $5 because of its flexibility?

I mean you can put that to extreme. Throw both cards together and add +buy and +VP token so you have.
"Ultimate Employee $5 Action // Choose three times +1 Card or +1 Action or +1$ or +1 Buy or +1 VP"
I'm not sure with the +1 VP (that seems overpowered) part but all different combinations can be useful on different boards and none of them would be worth more than $5.
But is the card worth more than $5 because of its flexibility?
Choosing is fun, but would such a extreme flexibility still be fun or would it get boring?
I'm not sure. I'd like to hear your thoughts. Do you like choice cards?

140

Variants and Fan Cards / Reaction cards mechanics

« on: November 03, 2011, 08:42:27 am »

Hi,

a lot of people are releasing their fan cards here and although I'm not such a fan reading those posts, I found there a few really good ideas for cards.
Especially those big posts with a whole expansion are difficult to grasp at first sight for me.
So for myself I think I won't make my own expansion, but a few ideas are in my mind which I haven't read anywhere yet.
I hope to hear some feedback if those ideas are well-thought and like to inspire those fan-card-making guys with new ideas.
So, for clarification: All of my ideas are untested and only examples!

With the release of Hinterlands and now the publication of the secret history from Donald X. the most interesting card type in the past month for me is the reaction card.
With the release of the basic set I never ever thought of cards that could react to anything different than attacks.
I like Watchtower very much for "trashing on-gain" or "putting-on-deck on-gain". But now there is Tunnel that triggers to discarding.
So what are the basic actions? 1) Playing, 2) Drawing, 3) Discarding, 4) Buying, 5) Gaining, 6) Trashing, 7) Attacking ... anything else?
Basically to all of these actions there could be reaction cards.

1) I thought of a reaction card that you could reveal when playing a card.
But that would slow the speed of the game down I think. So maybe it works if it is limited to a specfic card type. But nothing useful came to my mind. Maybe someone has an idea?

2) Next would be drawing.
A card could have the reaction text "When you draw this other than during a Clean-up phase, you may reveal it. If you do, + 1 card"
or "Meadow $4 Victory-Reaction // 2VP -- When you draw this other than during a Clean-up phase, you may reveal it. If you do, discard it, + 2 cards"
A bit expensive victory card that can be useful in cycling cards like Embassy or Warehouse
or "Sentinel $2 Action-Reaction // +1 card, $1 -- When you draw this other than during a Clean-up phase, you may reveal it. If you do, + 1 action"
Mostly useless unless you have cycling cards like Embassy or Warehouse so this is basically a cheap peddler. And it can trigger itself.
or "Purse $4 Treasure-Reaction // $2 -- When you draw this other than during a Clean-up phase, you may reveal it. If you do, + 1 buy"
So this can be a Woodcutter without spending an action.
or "Upgraded Workshop $4 Action-Reaction // Gain a card costing up to 4$ -- When you draw this other than during a Clean-up phase, you may reveal it. If you do, gain a card costing up to 4$"
This is a Workshop with the possibility to gain two cards up to $4 in one turn.
This are just basic examples that could be fun to play with. Of course you can expand this and make it more complicated and intriguing.
I just wanted to combine known formats with the reaction effect.
We just need the new rule that if the effects (+1 action, +1buy) are triggered by the opponents (e.g. Council Room) the gained bonus is kept in mind until your turn starts.
Or we define that these reactions can't be triggered by opponents. What do you think?

3) Next is discarding. We all know Tunnel, but what effects could also be possible? Just a few examples:
"Planchet $2 Treasure-Reaction // $1 -- When you discard this other than during a Clean-up phase, you may reveal it. If you do, +$2."
This is an expensive copper, but can be a cheap silver if you have cycling cards or if you're attacked from cards like Militia. Or in combination with Vault it's in fact a gold.
"Small Mine $3 Action-Reaction // Trash up to 2 cards from your hand -- When you discard this other than during a Clean-up phase, you may reveal it. If you do, trash a Treasure card from your hand. Gain a Treasure card costing up to 3 Coins more; put it into your hand."
This is a mine that can be triggered on discarding. I didn't know what could be the main effect so I decided to add a trash effect without benefit. So this can be a quite a good opener in some situations.

4) and 5) I combine gaining and buying because on-gain is the better effect of on-buy. Watchtower and Trader are the prototypes.
And we have the possibility to add trigger on your gain or on the gain of the opponents as shown on Fool's Gold.
So what about these?
"Bargainer $4 Reaction // When you or another player gains a card, you may reveal this from your hand. If you do, discard this and gain a card costing less than it."
This may be a dead card, but can be very powerful. Your opponent gets a colony, you reveal Bargainer and get the last Province and win the game.
"Arch $4 Action-Reaction // +2 cards, +2 Buys -- When you buy a card, you may reveal this from your hand. If you do, instead, gain a card costing $1 more."
Play Arch, buy 3 cards and reveal another Arch and get 3 cards costing $1 more each. So it's bridge-like. I don't know if it's priced right.
And what about this?
"Fraudster $5 Action-Reaction // + 1 Buy -- When you gain a card, you may reveal this from your hand. If you do, discard this and return the gained card to the supply. Each other player gains a copy of it.
Is it too strong? Buy a curse with an extra buy, reveal Fraudster. Each player gets a curse. But 2 of the other 3 players have a Fraudster in hand too: Curse explosion (just like the Haggler explosion, Donald X wrote about)
Or another player plays Witch. You reveal Fraudster and the player who played Witch gets a Curse (and of course each other player 2 Curses in total).
Maybe I have to change it in "When you buy a card" but I don't know if it's still interesting.

6) On-Trash is interesting. Let's see.
"Doctor $4 Action-Reaction // Trash up to two cards. Get +$1 for each trashed card. -- When you would trash a card, you may reveal this from your hand. If you do, discard this and put the trashed card aside. Put that to your discard pile in your clean-up phase"
This is my favourit card, I'd like to see. The trash effect itself is not that strong. But it is a good opener. But the on-trash-effect is interesting. It's like your possessing yourself. You get the profit from trashing but can keep the card if you want.
So you get for a trashed province from Bishop +4VP, +$8 from Salvager or +8 cards from Apprentice, but can keep the Province itself. Is it too strong? What price would be right?
I came up with Treasure-Reaction and Victory-Reaction too, but there is the problem if there's no card for trashing it is a dead card on the board.
For example "Borrowed Land $4 Victory-Reaction // 2VP -- When you trash this, +2VP tokens"
But it would be better a on-gain, on-draw or on-discard like
"Borrowed Land $4 Victory-Reaction // 2VP -- When you discard this other than during a Clean-up phase, you may reveal it. If you do, trash this, +2VP tokens"

7) On-Attack is already done often. But there might be more possibilities.
"Hurdle $2 Action-Reaction // +2 Cards, When another player plays an Attack card, you may reveal this from your hand. If you do, discard this, +3 cards."
So if an opponent plays a Militia-like card, reveal Hurdle, discard it, draw 3 cards and discard 2 cards from the attack, so you have still 5 cards. Or you gain a curse, but now you have 7 cards in hand.

Wow, what a long post. Thanks if you're still reading this. I'd like to hear some thoughts. Would that be good mechanisms? Would you like that in a future expansion?

141

Rules Questions / Possession + Ending condition

« on: October 14, 2011, 05:01:31 am »

I don't know if this question got already answered somewhere, but I just played a game where I could buy the last province but would've lost and had a possession in hand. I didn't know if I could buy the province and still get the possession turn. So I buyed two Duchies and I've had the luck that I could forge a Province with the hand of my opponent. So: Was it possible to buy the province anyway and get the possession turn or would I've lost?