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[AJD]

Following up on <a href="http://forum.dominionstrategy.com/index.php?topic=1080.msg17671#msg17671">a comment I made in another thread</a>—in a four-player Mountebank game, you can take a lot of punishment really fast between your turns. But this game has the interesting property that two piles will get depleted very fast: in a four-player game, there are only a couple more Coppers than Curses in the supply to begin with, and the Mountebanks are handing both out like hotcakes. This makes the four-player Mountebank situation not too different from the Ill-Gotten Gains situation: the must-have cursing attack (well, or whatever IGG is) causes a second pile to get depleted at about the same time as the curses, and your deck will have plenty of Copper in it.

With Ill-Gotten Gains the correct strategy is to rush the Duchies in that case; but with Mountebank, you'll probably have a slightly lower treasure density because you don't get the turn-boosting effect of the IGGs themselves. So I'm not totally convinced a Duchy-rush strategy in this case would be viable. But what do you think of an Estate-rush strategy in a four-way Mountebank game, with the intent of finishing off the Estates not too long after the Curses and Coppers are depleted—or even sooner? There are some cheap actions that could help with this and be relatively easy to pick up in a clogged deck, like Worker's Village and Baron. If your opponents get wise to what you're doing, other than competing with you for the Estates, what are they going to do? Stop playing their Mountebanks, to prevent the Curses and Coppers from being depleted? That may require reorienting your strategy, but that'll be a lot easier to do if you're not getting Cursed every turn.

Thoughts?

[popsofctown]

Doesn't 4p have extra estates?  When they see you buying estates they can just hope that you won't be able to buy all sixteen and buy silver so they can get to Duchies.  Estates just aren't efficient enough I don't think.  It's $-VP innefficiency means that it takes very few reshuffles for Silvers to have more VP power than Estates.

[Voltgloss]

In both 3P and 4P, there are 12 Victory Cards in each pile.  So there will be more Estates to power through than in 2P, but not as many as popsofctown is thinking.

I'd be more concerned about the Coppers.  There are, what, 60 Coppers in the stack at the start of the game, minus each player's starting 7?  That leaves a stack of 32 Coppers that the Mountebanks have to pound through before this strategy can three-pile. 

[Davio]

Since you're not really sure that the Coppers will actually be depleted (there are 30 more Coppers than Curses!) really fast (Mountebank has its notorious diminishing returns), I doubt whether it's a good idea to aim for the Estates from the get-go.

Sure, if you see that there are only a few Coppers left, it's not a bad idea to switch into blind VP mode. By this time, your deck will be so fat that those Greens won't hurt that much. I think I would aim for the highest VP card I can buy at any given point instead of just Estates. The key is to be the first to notice this and try to build an unassailable lead. Others, in blind panic, will probably join in and actually help you to 3-pile whatever comes first: Duchies or Estates.

So I would, depending on the kingdom of course, try to build a deck that has decent buying power in the end game, plain old BMU can be helpful, because you only need 2 or 3 good cards in your hand to buy a Duchy. Then just try to buy (Provinces,) Duchies and Estates.

With the IGG-rush I believe it's not a big mistake to grab a Province if you're able to. The same probably holds for this example.

[Qvist]

I don't think going to Estates from the beginning is a great strategy. One player needs only $5 to get a Duchy and equalizing 3 Estates.
But as you suggested, buying 1-2 additional Baron(s) could be great. Either you get an Estate for free and buy 1-2 more in the buy phase or you discard an Estate and buy 2 Estates or 1 Duchy. But in the end you must be sure that those VP can equalize the curses you may be behind.

[Octo]

@Davio - 28 of those coppers are gone with the starting decks, if I'm remembering it right. So there's 30 curses and 32 coppers. So if all the curses have gone due to mountebank, then so will all but 2 of the coppers. (Probably) If each Mountebank hits, that's only 10 mountebank plays between ALL of you (3/4 each). That's not all that much I reckon. Still, yeah, the Mountebank will slow down after a while of course, and with its +2$ I think you've a good chance of hitting $5 for a duchy. Let the others guys hammer the Estates if you want, Duchies will be much more worth it.

I played a five player game with Witch once (40 curses) and worked out that that's only 2 witch plays each before the curses are gone! Attacks go a bit mad with more than 3 players.

[sherwinpr]

I'm just confirming that there are indeed only 32 coppers (exactly 2 more than curses) in the supply in a four player game.  I remember this caught me by surprised and seemed like quite a "flaw," but I guess you just have to roll with it. 

I first encountered this (actually it was the only time) in an early real life Prosperity game, where my nine year old cousin who had just learned the game a couple days earlier beat her older sister, father, and myself in a four player game.  I went heavy cities thinking I could profit from the curse pile (and I guess eventually copper pile) running out, but I think other people bought treasure maps which made them more successful.  The Mountebanks were a big pain despite Lighthouse and Vault being in the game.  Then again, none of us had too much familiarity with the cards.

[WanderingWinder]

Actually, isn't it actually you have as many basic treasures in the supply as everyone agrees to at the start of the game? It's just isotropic's implementation that has those numbers (which are based on the number included in with the game?)?
I'm not 100% here though, and I don't have my physical copy of the game and rules with me to check.

[DG]

Oops. Geronimoo's simulator has 60 copper in the supply plus the 7 coppers for each starting hand. Nice easy fix for him there.

I suspect there could be a small amount of group think going on. If you are buying to many mountebanks ahead of gold then you probably won't save yourself many curses and will lose spending. Because curses can be discarded as a defence the decks tend to saturate to an even level.

[AJD]

Actually, isn't it actually you have as many basic treasures in the supply as everyone agrees to at the start of the game? It's just isotropic's implementation that has those numbers (which are based on the number included in with the game?)?
I'm not 100% here though, and I don't have my physical copy of the game and rules with me to check.

Hmm. The Intrigue rules say "The Treasure cards from Dominion and Dominion: Intrigue can be combined, since these cards are intended to be in abundant enough supply to not run out." So apparently it is at the players' discretion to use either 60 or 120 total Coppers in 2–4 player games, and this will have an effect on how four-player Mountebank games pan out.

[Octo]

@WW: perhaps technically true, but in pragmatic terms who really plays with anything other the full basic stack? To spot mountebank in 4P and then retroactively add more coppers would be odd. Also, does the game 'start' in some sense when you draw the random cards? (i.e. is it too late to add more to the basic supply) Or is it when the first cards are drawn from the deck?

Personally I wouldn't combine piles unless I was playing with 5 players or more. Coppers almost never run out, and that would make the game rare and interesting if it did.

[popsofctown]

Actually, isn't it actually you have as many basic treasures in the supply as everyone agrees to at the start of the game? It's just isotropic's implementation that has those numbers (which are based on the number included in with the game?)?
I'm not 100% here though, and I don't have my physical copy of the game and rules with me to check.

Hmm. The Intrigue rules say "The Treasure cards from Dominion and Dominion: Intrigue can be combined, since these cards are intended to be in abundant enough supply to not run out." So apparently it is at the players' discretion to use either 60 or 120 total Coppers in 2–4 player games, and this will have an effect on how four-player Mountebank games pan out.

Whoa.  Sounds like isotropic ought to double up on the treasures.  I've three piled the Golds in 2p using Tunnel.

I think I like the idea of unlimited treasure.

[HiveMindEmulator]

Actually, isn't it actually you have as many basic treasures in the supply as everyone agrees to at the start of the game? It's just isotropic's implementation that has those numbers (which are based on the number included in with the game?)?
I'm not 100% here though, and I don't have my physical copy of the game and rules with me to check.

Hmm. The Intrigue rules say "The Treasure cards from Dominion and Dominion: Intrigue can be combined, since these cards are intended to be in abundant enough supply to not run out." So apparently it is at the players' discretion to use either 60 or 120 total Coppers in 2–4 player games, and this will have an effect on how four-player Mountebank games pan out.

Whoa.  Sounds like isotropic ought to double up on the treasures.  I've three piled the Golds in 2p using Tunnel.

I think I like the idea of unlimited treasure.

I like the idea of limited treasure. Most of the time it doesn't matter, but when it does, it's cool, and leads to interesting situations.

[popsofctown]

Yeah.  Generally isotropic though has tried to be pretty true to the source material, like with scheme-fishing village, so it seems like the powers that be would have it with double treasure.

[glasser]

Plenty of people always play with double treasure because they own both Base and Intrigue, keep all of their expansions together in one box, and don't bother to keep the two halves of the coppers (etc) separate...

[mischiefmaker]

I usually just grab a big stack of each of the treasures when I play RL. If they run out, so be it. But I'd guess that that often means I'm playing with less than a full stack (self-pejorative pun not intended).

[Geronimoo]

With the simulator fixed (60 Coppers and not 60+7*nr of players) I can answer this question:

The pure Estate rush isn't a good idea, but a VP rush similar to the Ill-Gotten Gains rush is!

When the Mountebanks have all been bought, it won't be long before all the Coppers and Curses are gone. A rush strategy that starts greening as soon as possible will crush anything that tries to build an economy (=buying Gold).

Of course you should buy Provinces with $8 and Duchies with $5, but once the Mountebanks are gone, don't hesitate to buy Estates over Silver!!!

Here's a bot for the rush strategy:

Code: [Select]

<player name="Mountebank rush"
 author="Geronimoo"
 description="Mountebank might be the strongest attack. It's a better buy than Gold (so it will be bought with $6)">
 <type name="BigMoney"/>
 <type name="Bot"/>
 <type name="SingleCard"/>
 <type name="Province"/>
 <type name="UserCreated"/>
 <type name="Attacking"/>
 <type name="Competitive"/>
 <type name="TwoPlayer"/>
   <buy name="Mountebank"/>
   <buy name="Province"/>
   <buy name="Duchy"/>
   <buy name="Estate">
      <condition>
         <left type="countCardsInSupply" attribute="Mountebank"/>
         <operator type="equalTo" />
         <right type="constant" attribute="0.0"/>
      </condition>
   </buy>
   <buy name="Silver"/>
   <buy name="Estate"/>
</player>


[Karrow]

I don't think Mountebank is one of the better estate rush cards because it costs $5.  You only need 2.  In a 4-player game, everyone buys two, and that leaves 2 in the supply pile.  If you use $5 on two turns to empty the Mountebank's, another player who buys Duchies with their $5's instead will beat you.  But it can be done.

I think there are cards to watch for estate rushing, but they are mostly $3's and $4's.  Ironworks is obvious, as in this game where two opponents open 5-2 and they go with Ghost Ship & Saboteur.  Two opponents have a province on me.  But I easily win on turn 16 with 0 Province, 1 Duchy, & 15 estates.
http://councilroom.com/game?game_id=game-20110919-205648-673377b2.html

The big ones that can almost guarantee a fast 3-pile are cards like Swindler & Saboteur.  If all 4 players start buying those, it's going to go fast.

And then there's the situation where there is an obvious strategy, and everybody plays the same.  If all 4 players rush the the same 3 kingdom cards, the game ends with a 3-pile on turn 8.