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[KingZog3]

Rogue is better than Saboteur. Sab is only good when played at minimum 2 times a turn, and that's minimum.

It's the other way round, Saboteur is the one that's better than Rogue and Rogue is the one which is only good when played at minimum 2 times a turn.

If you're using Rogue as an attack, yes. But with tfb that's not needed as much. They're both weak though. But I stand my Rogue being better. I don't think of it as an attack though. It's a gainer.

[eHalcyon]

Rogue is better than Saboteur. Sab is only good when played at minimum 2 times a turn, and that's minimum.

It's the other way round, Saboteur is the one that's better than Rogue and Rogue is the one which is only good when played at minimum 2 times a turn.

If you're using Rogue as an attack, yes. But with tfb that's not needed as much. They're both weak though. But I stand my Rogue being better. I don't think of it as an attack though. It's a gainer.

Is it better to think of it as a gainer?  I suppose it's alright if TfB is present, but otherwise you have no control over what you are able to gain.  The gain is extremely unreliable because you don't know what will get trashed, or if it will even still be there by the time you play your Rogue again.

[scott_pilgrim]

Rogue is better than Saboteur. Sab is only good when played at minimum 2 times a turn, and that's minimum.

It's the other way round, Saboteur is the one that's better than Rogue and Rogue is the one which is only good when played at minimum 2 times a turn.

If you're using Rogue as an attack, yes. But with tfb that's not needed as much. They're both weak though. But I stand my Rogue being better. I don't think of it as an attack though. It's a gainer.

Is it better to think of it as a gainer?  I suppose it's alright if TfB is present, but otherwise you have no control over what you are able to gain.  The gain is extremely unreliable because you don't know what will get trashed, or if it will even still be there by the time you play your Rogue again.

I think the point is you only get Rogue if you know there's good stuff in the trash to gain, the attack is kind of a backup plan most of the time.  It can be great with TfB (especially Apprentice and Rebuild), I think that's it's main use.  The terminal silver is it's advantage over other gainers, in exchange for the limitation on what can be gained, though you can control that in a sense by trashing stuff you want to dig out.


There can be games where Saboteur is devastating, but those are a lot more rare than the times where Rogue shines, and I think Rogue shines nearly as brightly when it's good.  It might be harder to notice/remember, because you're not getting your deck blown to pieces by Rogue.

[Awaclus]

There can be games where Saboteur is devastating, but those are a lot more rare than the times where Rogue shines, and I think Rogue shines nearly as brightly when it's good.  It might be harder to notice/remember, because you're not getting your deck blown to pieces by Rogue.

But games where Saboteur is somewhat useful and worth getting are not that rare.

[KingZog3]

There can be games where Saboteur is devastating, but those are a lot more rare than the times where Rogue shines, and I think Rogue shines nearly as brightly when it's good.  It might be harder to notice/remember, because you're not getting your deck blown to pieces by Rogue.

But games where Saboteur is somewhat useful and worth getting are not that rare.

Im not sure about that. I mean yes if there aren't many $5's you need lots of, then Saboteur can be a nice pickup. But if the opponent has a bunch of Silver, so theres a lot of good lower cost cards then Saboteur isn't really that good.

And Rogue doesn't feel as devastating because you don't really hurt your opponent with it. But it is useful, and it benefits you this turn with the $2.

[Awaclus]

Im not sure about that. I mean yes if there aren't many $5's you need lots of, then Saboteur can be a nice pickup.

Or if you just need an attack, and it's the strongest one available.

[c4master]

Im not sure about that. I mean yes if there aren't many $5's you need lots of, then Saboteur can be a nice pickup.

Or if you just need an attack, and it's the strongest one available.

It won't lengthen the game for most of the times. Yes, hitting a good card can slow your opponent down, but it also doesn't provide anything. In RL, I used to hate it, because i mostly play 4-Player-games, where triple Saboteur just kills your deck, more or less regardless of what you're doing. Most of the time, it comes down to destroy the other Saboteurs and the one or two players, whose Saboteurs survive longest, will win the game. This is just so painful and no fun at all, even if you win (because it depends so much on luck).
In 2-player-games, Saboteur is not nearly as strong. Especially early on, it's mostly crap. You'd rather pick one (or two) up as a payload to your engine/cycling deck.
In 98% of all openings, I'd rather open Militia than Saboteur.

Btw, opening Rogue doesn't appear to be useful, either. But as gainer, it's quite nice. I agree with KingZog3 on this.

[Awaclus]

It won't lengthen the game for most of the times.

It doesn't necessarily have to make the game longer, as long as it makes your opponent's deck slower.

[Qvist]

Part 2

[hvb]

I love the list so far. Everything seems to be on the right place here. For me Outpost and Library could be a bit higher, Pillage could get down a bit, but thats just a personal flavor.

For me, the card which is so hard to rate in this list correctly is mint. It could be at any place between 30 and 60 and i would not be able to say its totally wrong there, neither on Rank 30 nor on 60. The card effect for its own is just bad and the card deserves to be at one of the last places. Most of the time you really want that card only for its on-gain effect. But then its such an outstanding card. Buying it very early with at least 4 Treasures, at best just coppers, in Hand, while your opponent isnt able to line up such a draw, regularily makes you a 90%+ favourite in that game. This single buy is simply a game changer that can rarely be found in buying just a 5 $ card. In this cases its just a #1 card, its just as good as dealing out 3 curses with one buy. So i can see that card as well slightly above average in this list.
Would be interestet, if others have this issues in valuing that card as well.

[Robz888]

Venture beats Pillage??? Oh, if only that were remotely correct.

[shark_bait]

Pillage is better than most people give it credit for.  In BM, it typically causes -$3 when played.  In engine it can frequently cause dud hands. 

[MarkowKette]

I am shocked to see Library still that low in the List.
Good Draw-up-to  engines arn't even close to as rare as most people think.
And Library is just awsome in such as it gives you strong sifting which is extremely  important in this type of engines.
And it totally doesn't rely on the presence of handsize decreasing Villages. Just vanilla Village Library and a strong terminal
(Bridge / Goons / Knights /Bishop etc) and a decent trasher already make a really strong engine.
When watching streams i often see people skip library in such cases if there is any other good draw aviable.

This card "nearly" made it into my personal top 10. (#16)
It still can hardly compete with Margrave, Wharf and Torturer
but is for me better than Rabble and at least on par with Catacombs.

[DG]

Does this make Merchant Guild the most over rated card?

[hvb]

Does this make Merchant Guild the most over rated card?

No 

[SCSN]

No, I'd put it a fair bit higher than Count and Vault and a bit below Market.

Rogue is definitely the most underrated card in this list. Not that it's super amazing, but I feel it deserves a top spot in Part 3, slightly below average.

[Awaclus]

No, I'd put it a fair bit higher than Count and Vault and a bit below Market.

Are you sure that Count is worse than Market? It's pretty much always very good.

[cayvie]

Man, it's fascinating--i took a break from the game right when Dark Ages came out, and am just coming back now. It's a weird feeling seeing people disagree over which of two cards is better and really having *no opinion* on who is right.

[c4master]

I think Library and Trading Post are both a little underrated being down here. Trading Post just helps you out so much in the beginning that I hardly ever skip it, if I can reach $5 before turn 5. Trashing 2 Estates into a silver is already good, but gaining that silver into your hand let's you buy another $3 or $4 card which basically saves you at least one turn. Later on, you can trash silver + x into silver to get rid of x or silver + silver into one silver to reduce the number of stop cards or "bad money" in Colony games.
Well, and Library is really good if there are non-terminals (or villages), that don't draw cards. MarkowKette has already pointed out, why Library is a really good card.
I wonder, why Treasury is still so "high". I can hardly imagine any game where it seemed to be worth buying. I'd surely take it for free, but it really only shines midgame, and then only very gloomy ;-)

[Jack Rudd]

Treasury is "so high" because +1 Card, +1 Action, +1 Coin is a generically useful and stackable ability: most decks will happily take any number of Treasuries, and each one will make the deck stronger.

It's particularly strong in decks where the greening stage comes very late (eg Megaturn Combo decks), or not at all (some forms of Goons deck).

[Beyond Awesome]

I think Library and Trading Post are both a little underrated being down here. Trading Post just helps you out so much in the beginning that I hardly ever skip it, if I can reach $5 before turn 5. Trashing 2 Estates into a silver is already good, but gaining that silver into your hand let's you buy another $3 or $4 card which basically saves you at least one turn. Later on, you can trash silver + x into silver to get rid of x or silver + silver into one silver to reduce the number of stop cards or "bad money" in Colony games.
Well, and Library is really good if there are non-terminals (or villages), that don't draw cards. MarkowKette has already pointed out, why Library is a really good card.
I wonder, why Treasury is still so "high". I can hardly imagine any game where it seemed to be worth buying. I'd surely take it for free, but it really only shines midgame, and then only very gloomy ;-)

I almost always skip Trading Post. I was surprised it wasn't lower. Nowadays, almost everything trashes better than TPost.

[Awaclus]

I think Library and Trading Post are both a little underrated being down here. Trading Post just helps you out so much in the beginning that I hardly ever skip it, if I can reach $5 before turn 5. Trashing 2 Estates into a silver is already good, but gaining that silver into your hand let's you buy another $3 or $4 card which basically saves you at least one turn. Later on, you can trash silver + x into silver to get rid of x or silver + silver into one silver to reduce the number of stop cards or "bad money" in Colony games.
Well, and Library is really good if there are non-terminals (or villages), that don't draw cards. MarkowKette has already pointed out, why Library is a really good card.
I wonder, why Treasury is still so "high". I can hardly imagine any game where it seemed to be worth buying. I'd surely take it for free, but it really only shines midgame, and then only very gloomy ;-)

I almost always skip Trading Post. I was surprised it wasn't lower. Nowadays, almost everything trashes better than TPost.

It trashes two cards, that's pretty good. Not for a $5 card, though, and if you don't want the Silver, it's pretty bad. But sometimes it's the only trashing, that alone makes it better than some other $5 cards, and sometimes you want the Silver.

[LastFootnote]

I almost always skip Trading Post. I was surprised it wasn't lower. Nowadays, almost everything trashes better than TPost.

It trashes two cards, that's pretty good. Not for a $5 card, though, and if you don't want the Silver, it's pretty bad. But sometimes it's the only trashing, that alone makes it better than some other $5 cards, and sometimes you want the Silver.

Trading Post is great as long as you can reliably increase your hand size and there isn't a better source of Coins than Treasure. The key is using the Silvers you get as your main/only source of income and spending all your buys on engine pieces. It's also a very specialized Torturer counter.

[Beyond Awesome]

I think Library and Trading Post are both a little underrated being down here. Trading Post just helps you out so much in the beginning that I hardly ever skip it, if I can reach $5 before turn 5. Trashing 2 Estates into a silver is already good, but gaining that silver into your hand let's you buy another $3 or $4 card which basically saves you at least one turn. Later on, you can trash silver + x into silver to get rid of x or silver + silver into one silver to reduce the number of stop cards or "bad money" in Colony games.
Well, and Library is really good if there are non-terminals (or villages), that don't draw cards. MarkowKette has already pointed out, why Library is a really good card.
I wonder, why Treasury is still so "high". I can hardly imagine any game where it seemed to be worth buying. I'd surely take it for free, but it really only shines midgame, and then only very gloomy ;-)

I almost always skip Trading Post. I was surprised it wasn't lower. Nowadays, almost everything trashes better than TPost.

It trashes two cards, that's pretty good. Not for a $5 card, though, and if you don't want the Silver, it's pretty bad. But sometimes it's the only trashing, that alone makes it better than some other $5 cards, and sometimes you want the Silver.

It trashes two, but gives you a card in return that sometimes you don't want. Plus, it's terminal.

[Awaclus]

It trashes two, but gives you a card in return that sometimes you don't want. Plus, it's terminal.

That's pretty much what I said. Sometimes you want the card.