Things your opponent didn't do so well:
- Bought two silvers - should have been shanty towns. He ends up having a couple more terminal collisions than you partly because of this.
- Bought third familiar - easily should have been apothecary, then there's a ripple effect of not buying enough apothecaries (can't access potions fast enough)
- Number 2 leads to not being able to get vineyards as easily.
- 2nd Wharf bought on T18, which I think was really key for easy access for +buys.
- Never really is able to get apothecary + other action in same turn (not his fault, and you get this like 3 times?).
I think also part of the problem was he didn't appear ready to transition over the vineyards as smoothly. Mainly because he doesn't load up on shanty, but it just seems like he followed you into vineyards. I think you win on the basis of number 1, 2, and 4.
Your overall luck isn't as horrible as you'd think. Clearly curse war sucked for you, but you had a lead on $5 cards all the way through (which looks mightly important with bazaars/wharf) and lead on apothecary (this is more on you as he buys familiar and stables over apothecary). Apothecary/Wharf on T3/T4 is pretty darn sick.
But how I exactly did I win this? I didn't bought a single Silver which was important for my Apothecaries. And I think my Wharves were very important, more important than Stables, even though it's terminal and Apothecary + Stables isn't a bad combo. But I'm still not exactly sure how I won this. Should I maybe totally skipped Familiar here and just load up on Shanty Towns (later Bazaars), Wharves and Apothecaries? Is Apothecary + Salvager a really good defense to Familiar on its own?
For overall strategy, familiar does not look skippable. Salvager as only trasher is not going to cut it. Especially since the end result needs to be vineyards anyways, it doesn't really make sense to start salvager/silver, silver/silver, to go bazaar/wharf?
Salvager is a great complement here because the ability to clear out non-coppers and provide neccessary +buy. Wharf and Familiars presence makes stables pretty skippable. That hand with stables/non-coppers was a lot more likely then any other normal game. Wharf just provides the consistency you'd want, especially when there are useable +actions here.
Only really works with vineyards or all the pieces you accumulate aren't really helpful to the end cause. Here though, it certainly adds to the final score.
Your strategy is pretty close to what I would do, of course familiar if 3P. I think I might go apothecary on second 3P but that's with hindsight. One or two salvagers, depending on if I grab wharf soon. Shanty towns all day.
tl;dr: Luck wasn't that bad, and your strategy was perfectly fine. Whole different story if vineyards isn't there tho.