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Author Topic: Counterfeit + Venture?  (Read 16442 times)

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Seprix

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Counterfeit + Venture?
« on: December 19, 2014, 02:01:56 pm »
+1

This combo seems really good if you look at it. You Counterfeit coppers, getting rid of bad coppers and giving an extra buy and bonus cash for it! Soon, as you buy Ventures and stuff, Venture gets more and more powerful as you draw better and better coins, and Counterfeit continues to trash obsolete Copper and soon Silver while adding a +buy to boot. It seems like a deck with this caliber can beat a Smithy+BM deck.

The problem is that you have to get to 5. Not hard, once you get to $5, get a Counterfeit and just trash away Coppers, buying card drawing actions and getting enough money to buy Ventures and Counterfeits. That money quickly adds up to Golds and Platinums even.

So my question is this. Is there a better BM option to be had? How many Engines can this combo beat? It looks really good on paper (even if it's a bit hard to get to), but is it really good? What about other Trashing decks? can it beat those?

« Last Edit: December 19, 2014, 02:07:57 pm by Seprix »
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Drab Emordnilap

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Re: Counterfeit + Venture?
« Reply #1 on: December 19, 2014, 02:06:06 pm »
+1

Venture plays the treasure it finds, and Counterfiet only works on treasures in your hand.
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Seprix

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Re: Counterfeit + Venture?
« Reply #2 on: December 19, 2014, 02:06:55 pm »
0

Venture plays the treasure it finds, and Counterfiet only works on treasures in your hand.

Ah. That's true. That lowers the value a bit, but my question still stands on how valuable this combo is.

Edited my first post, as you cannot use Venture to fish for Copper for Counterfeit to trash.
« Last Edit: December 19, 2014, 02:08:34 pm by Seprix »
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Gherald

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Re: Counterfeit + Venture?
« Reply #3 on: December 19, 2014, 04:39:14 pm »
+3

Venture benefits from copper being trashed, period, regardless of how that trashing takes place.  There's no special synergy between it and Counterfeit.

So you could pose the question: How good of a copper trasher is Counterfeit? And we all know it's pretty good.  I'm not sure there's a need for more detail but feel free to get into it guys :)
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popsofctown

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Re: Counterfeit + Venture?
« Reply #4 on: December 19, 2014, 05:41:50 pm »
+2

Venture fetches more Counterfeits to accelerate the trashing.  So there's a little synergy there.

5$ card plus 5$ card combos have to be good because they are mutually exclusive.  4$ and 5$ card combos tend to be more valuable
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Moneymodel

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Re: Counterfeit + Venture?
« Reply #5 on: December 20, 2014, 12:02:42 pm »
+2

Counterfeiting Ventures in the endgame could be pretty strong.
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TheOthin

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Re: Counterfeit + Venture?
« Reply #6 on: December 21, 2014, 08:54:37 pm »
0

Venture fetches more Counterfeits to accelerate the trashing.  So there's a little synergy there.

5$ card plus 5$ card combos have to be good because they are mutually exclusive.  4$ and 5$ card combos tend to be more valuable

Depends on how many Counterfeits you need, doesn't it? You can stock up on them better than their weaker counterpart Moneylenders, but still.
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Gherald

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Re: Counterfeit + Venture?
« Reply #7 on: December 22, 2014, 01:47:56 am »
0

Typically I think Moneylender/Venture is more powerful or viable than Counterfeit/Venture.

Sure Counterfeit is nice, but you usually can't buy it on T1/T2 and pretty reliably get 1 or even 2 ventures on T3/T4
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liopoil

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Re: Counterfeit + Venture?
« Reply #8 on: December 22, 2014, 07:39:09 am »
0

Make sure you play your ventures before the other treasures in your hand; unless of course you want to counterfeit the venture.
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mpsprs

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Re: Counterfeit + Venture?
« Reply #9 on: December 22, 2014, 09:15:39 am »
0

Make sure you play your ventures before the other treasures in your hand; unless of course you want to counterfeit the venture.

Counterfeit is a "may play".  Optional.  Still gives you the buy even!

qmech

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Re: Counterfeit + Venture?
« Reply #10 on: December 22, 2014, 09:46:00 am »
+3

Even if that's a misremembering of the card, it's still good advice because you have more information before you have to decide what to burn.
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Awaclus

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Re: Counterfeit + Venture?
« Reply #11 on: December 22, 2014, 09:48:26 am »
+1

But if you just played all of your Coppers, it's not super fun if your Venture hits a Counterfeit.
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qmech

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Re: Counterfeit + Venture?
« Reply #12 on: December 22, 2014, 10:07:00 am »
0

But if you just played all of your Coppers, it's not super fun if your Venture hits a Counterfeit.

I'm not sure what this is responding to: I don't think anyone advocates starting with Coppers from hand, and Coppers found by Venture are inaccessible to Counterfeit.
« Last Edit: December 22, 2014, 10:36:48 am by qmech »
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mpsprs

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Re: Counterfeit + Venture?
« Reply #13 on: December 22, 2014, 10:49:38 am »
0

Even if that's a misremembering of the card, it's still good advice because you have more information before you have to decide what to burn.

True.

Awaclus

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Re: Counterfeit + Venture?
« Reply #14 on: December 22, 2014, 02:53:35 pm »
0

But if you just played all of your Coppers, it's not super fun if your Venture hits a Counterfeit.

I'm not sure what this is responding to: I don't think anyone advocates starting with Coppers from hand, and Coppers found by Venture are inaccessible to Counterfeit.

I was responding to mpsprs.
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liopoil

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Re: Counterfeit + Venture?
« Reply #15 on: December 22, 2014, 07:25:23 pm »
+2

Awaclus and Qmech explain my post: you want to know how many coins you have when playing counterfeit, and you want all your treasures in hand in case you hit counterfeit. Sorry mpsprs ;)
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jomini

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Re: Counterfeit + Venture?
« Reply #16 on: January 01, 2015, 02:32:34 pm »
+1

Venture benefits from copper being trashed, period, regardless of how that trashing takes place.  There's no special synergy between it and Counterfeit.

So you could pose the question: How good of a copper trasher is Counterfeit? And we all know it's pretty good.  I'm not sure there's a need for more detail but feel free to get into it guys :)

There is a small bit of additional synergy:
1. It is a +buy that Venture can draw. While Venture decks tend not to benefit terribly much for more coin that a province or colony, you gain some end game options (e.g. Duchy + Estate) that you lack with something like Moneylender or Loan. Most trashing cards with Venture need to collide with your coppers before the Ventures are played, so green limits your ability to weed out the last few coppers. Counterfeit lets you collide the coppers and itself or collide coppers and venture & skip past the green.
2. It is a treasure so you can mix it with dead draw for no ill effects. E.g. Smithy/Venture/Counterfeit can do the normal Venture/trash options, just with a couple of bigger hands every so often.
3. Late game, you can Counterfeit golds & silvers for tiebreakers. With Plats or Banks you can get an extra duchy or better with a bit of late game luck for win in a PPR type situation.

I'm still with everyone else that the price points are hard and a cheaper trasher is usually more cost effective. Beyond the obvious choices (e.g. Chapel, Count), I can't think of too many cards I'd buy over Counterfeit on a Venture board (where Venture is dominant) if I opened 5/2.
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eHalcyon

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Re: Counterfeit + Venture?
« Reply #17 on: January 01, 2015, 07:19:26 pm »
+2

Venture benefits from copper being trashed, period, regardless of how that trashing takes place.  There's no special synergy between it and Counterfeit.

So you could pose the question: How good of a copper trasher is Counterfeit? And we all know it's pretty good.  I'm not sure there's a need for more detail but feel free to get into it guys :)

There is a small bit of additional synergy:
1. It is a +buy that Venture can draw. While Venture decks tend not to benefit terribly much for more coin that a province or colony, you gain some end game options (e.g. Duchy + Estate) that you lack with something like Moneylender or Loan. Most trashing cards with Venture need to collide with your coppers before the Ventures are played, so green limits your ability to weed out the last few coppers. Counterfeit lets you collide the coppers and itself or collide coppers and venture & skip past the green.
2. It is a treasure so you can mix it with dead draw for no ill effects. E.g. Smithy/Venture/Counterfeit can do the normal Venture/trash options, just with a couple of bigger hands every so often.
3. Late game, you can Counterfeit golds & silvers for tiebreakers. With Plats or Banks you can get an extra duchy or better with a bit of late game luck for win in a PPR type situation.

I'm still with everyone else that the price points are hard and a cheaper trasher is usually more cost effective. Beyond the obvious choices (e.g. Chapel, Count), I can't think of too many cards I'd buy over Counterfeit on a Venture board (where Venture is dominant) if I opened 5/2.

1. Most of these things aren't special synergies; they are just things that are true about each card individually.  The only one that seems OK is the last point (Counterfeit can trash Copper in hand when drawn by Venture), but I wouldn't really call that a special synergy.
2. That's not a synergy between Venture and Counterfeit; it's just a general synergy of treasures and terminal draw.
3. That doesn't even mention Venture.
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jomini

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Re: Counterfeit + Venture?
« Reply #18 on: January 01, 2015, 10:19:38 pm »
0

Venture benefits from copper being trashed, period, regardless of how that trashing takes place.  There's no special synergy between it and Counterfeit.

So you could pose the question: How good of a copper trasher is Counterfeit? And we all know it's pretty good.  I'm not sure there's a need for more detail but feel free to get into it guys :)

There is a small bit of additional synergy:
1. It is a +buy that Venture can draw. While Venture decks tend not to benefit terribly much for more coin that a province or colony, you gain some end game options (e.g. Duchy + Estate) that you lack with something like Moneylender or Loan. Most trashing cards with Venture need to collide with your coppers before the Ventures are played, so green limits your ability to weed out the last few coppers. Counterfeit lets you collide the coppers and itself or collide coppers and venture & skip past the green.
2. It is a treasure so you can mix it with dead draw for no ill effects. E.g. Smithy/Venture/Counterfeit can do the normal Venture/trash options, just with a couple of bigger hands every so often.
3. Late game, you can Counterfeit golds & silvers for tiebreakers. With Plats or Banks you can get an extra duchy or better with a bit of late game luck for win in a PPR type situation.

I'm still with everyone else that the price points are hard and a cheaper trasher is usually more cost effective. Beyond the obvious choices (e.g. Chapel, Count), I can't think of too many cards I'd buy over Counterfeit on a Venture board (where Venture is dominant) if I opened 5/2.

1. Most of these things aren't special synergies; they are just things that are true about each card individually.  The only one that seems OK is the last point (Counterfeit can trash Copper in hand when drawn by Venture), but I wouldn't really call that a special synergy.
2. That's not a synergy between Venture and Counterfeit; it's just a general synergy of treasures and terminal draw.
3. That doesn't even mention Venture.
1. Oh please

What is needed to make Venture work? A method to make it more cost effective than other options. What does that in general (against say engines, slogs, and everything except BM decks)? Copper trashing. What happens in a Venture deck late game? Quite often you play (maybe) a single terminal and then draw enough cash for a Province or Colony. What is bad about that? Well if you are down you can't recover unless the opponent whiffs. What would help give you more options? A +buy. What would help more - why a +buy that you could draw with Venture that doesn't have to start in your hand or require an action to play. I mean it is like the +buy from Counterfeit is going to be more useful because you will draw it more often with Venture and Venture will be more useful because you can actually make a viable play that yields for 2 VP cards a turn most turns. It is almost like the aspect of one card (the +buy) gets added use by another (the digging for card type "treasure" from venture). It is like the net interaction is more than the sum of its components.

What other card gives you +buy that Venture can draw and use when it doesn't start in hand? Contraband. Which doesn't trash copper, juice late game turns, or actually, you know, let you go for effective two VP card buys. The only card in the game that does this is somehow not "special"?

2. Funny thing is, cards of similar types tend to work well together. Crossroads, for instance, likes green cards. Baron, likes keeping estates around. If you are already using Xroads, the opportunity cost of keeping estates around for Baron goes down. Again, the net result is stronger than simple summation. What else offers trashing and +buy? A bunch of crap that collides with dead draw (or any other useful terminals like attacks when you don't have villages in deck) - Salvager, Spice Merchant, and Forager. Why all of those tend to collide with power terminals that help enable Venture and won't let you get +buy late game. Well what about actionless trashing that Venture can draw? There is Loan. Which is terrible in venture games at clearing out the last few coppers (and is worse at it when you draw more) and can create all manner of havoc if it flips your gold or plat into the discard forcing an untimely reshuffle. I mean it is like a whole freaking class of Venture enablers also make Counterfeit better (more likely to have targets in hand when you draw up to 7 cards) and that again there is a nonlinear effect in doing that. Again, it just happens to be just about the only card that works with dead draw (or any decent terminal action) without villages - but not special.

3. You are right, I had assumed that the readers weren't braindead and understand that when Venture is even borderline viable, you typically have some payload cards that are decent value treasures where you can flex around them to buy multiple VP. In a mirror, it generally is worth it to have 1 gold instead of taking two additional turns to get 3 Ventures. In this case, if you are coming up on typical 27-27 tie, you might be able to Counterfeit a Gold (or even a Silver) if you draw it on your last turn and break the tie. But isn't this just the odds that you'd get to Counterfeit the Gold even if you didn't have Ventures in deck? Of course not, the odds that you will draw Counterfeit and Gold simultaneously (in any non-engine deck) is much lower than that you will draw Gold & Ventures on your final turn and dig out the Counterfeit.


Venture is a +buy, copper trasher, potentionally +coin that venture can draw and play with all dead cards. I mean seriously, if that isn't synergy - what the hell does Venture have special synergy with? Tunnel - meh Tunnel just needs to be discarded & the gold played. Mint? Ehh - Mint just needs strong treasures in tight decks. Navigator? Just needs cards that work well with deck ordering (like Vagrant or Ironmonger).

At the end of the day. A Venture deck is generally a deck that is going to use high quality treasure and dig past green while rapidly reusing a handful of high cost cards to wrack up more green (which it then mostly ignores; I'm also not discussing much a deck when Venture is being bought as basically just a better Silver). Shockingly Counterfeit helps Venture do all that. Shockingly, other cards that can do that (e.g. Mint) cannot do the other things Counterfeit can (albeit Mint does something else that is much stronger typically) - like offer options for 2 VP cards to be gained a turn, be played with strong terminals (like say Monument), or cash out on the final turn for bonus cash (maybe).

Now sure the main value is in the copper trashing and that isn't the most cost effective; but there are not too many copper trashers I'd take instead if I opened 5/2. That bespeaks a certain amount of synergy.
« Last Edit: January 01, 2015, 10:24:02 pm by jomini »
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eHalcyon

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Re: Counterfeit + Venture?
« Reply #19 on: January 01, 2015, 11:07:39 pm »
+3

The +Buy from Counterfeit is not better because you can draw it with Venture.  The trashing from Counterfeit is not better because you can draw it with Venture.  The Copper trashing is good for Venture, but that's not special -- Venture benefits as much from other Copper trashing.

Your second point is just about terminal draw, which is not an interaction between Venture and Counterfeit.  Treasures can be better with terminal draw because they can't be drawn dead.  That's it.  You're saying that these two treasures have special synergy because they are both treasures?  That's nonsense.  Do Contraband and Cache have special synergy because they too can't be drawn dead with Smithy?

Your third point isn't a synergy either.  Even without Venture on the board, Countefeit still allows you to get extra VP by trashing your Gold and Silver or other treasures.  This is just what Counterfeit does, it has nothing to do with Venture.

Do Venture and Counterfeit have some synergy?  Sure, because Counterfeit can trash Copper, Venture can draw Counterfeit, and Counterfeit can be played on Venture.  But none of these qualities are special.  Venture can draw other treasures for other bonuses; you don't need Counterfeit for that.  Counterfeit is not the only viable Copper trasher for Venture.  And Venture is not a uniquely good target for Counterfeit.  Not to mention, all of these things had already been mentioned in the thread.

The fact that you'd open Counterfeit on 5/2 does not bespeak a special amount of synergy.  It just says that Counterfeit is a good Copper trasher that has a lot of other utility as well (non-terminal +Buy and a TfB-like ability for extra end game juice).  It isn't Venture that makes it a nice opening.
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Mic Qsenoch

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Re: Counterfeit + Venture?
« Reply #20 on: January 01, 2015, 11:36:58 pm »
+9

I know how to really kick this combo up a notch... remove Venture.
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jomini

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Re: Counterfeit + Venture?
« Reply #21 on: January 02, 2015, 12:41:25 pm »
+2

The +Buy from Counterfeit is not better because you can draw it with Venture. 

Oh please. Let's assume we have a Venture deck - lots of Ventures digging through things to buy green. + Buy is assumed to be useful. What are the odds that a simple +buy (like say Festival) is going to be an option on a turn? The same as the odds of drawing my +buy in my starting hand. Say I have exactly 1 +buy. If I have 7 green, 6 Treasures, and one other card, then I will have exactly 33% odds of hitting my +buy when I need to go for something like Duchy/Estate. If I have Counterfeit as my +buy and just one gold, well there is about a 60% chance of drawing at least 2 Ventures; which means that we are around a 75% chance of having a +buy on "final" turns of the game.

Well what about a deck with Counterfeit as my only +buy, but also averaging a province a turn with high reliability? Well again if we assume 7/6/1 for other cards. Then It only has a 33% chance of hitting a +buy.

So Venture with any +buy other than Counterfeit/Contraband - 33% odds of being useful (and going down as deck size increases, like if you have cursing in play)
Counterfeit without Venture in play in a similar treasure based deck - 33%.
Odds with both - 75%.

Why it is like the odds of this outcome happening are higher than with either card alone or even some nonsensical summation of the two scenarios. It is almost like the sum of each effect is insufficient to explain the resulting outcome.

Now, is this a big synergy, no it is not hence why I explicitly said that this was a small synergy.
 
Quote
The trashing from Counterfeit is not better because you can draw it with Venture.  The Copper trashing is good for Venture, but that's not special -- Venture benefits as much from other Copper trashing.
Bull.

Say I need to kill a final copper to get a reliable Venture deck. What are the odds of doing so with Moneylender? The odds that I draw Moneylender/C in one hand. What are the odds that I kill the Copper with a Counterfeit - the odds that I draw Counterfeit/C or that I draw Venture/C. Obviously the latter is more likely (having some non-zero increase in likelihood over Moneylender).

Does this sort of thing matter? At least at the margins. Take a similar case - Tunnel enablers. Sure Cellar can flip Tunnel, but it only has 4 chances to find the Tunnel. Warehouse gets 7. Similarly when you have a copper, you have 4 slots to hit a Moneylender to pair up. When you have a copper, you have 4 slots for a Counterfeit and some quite high chance of lining up C/Venture -> Draw Counterfeit -> Trash C.

The odds that an ability will be used is part of what defines synergy.


Quote
Your second point is just about terminal draw, which is not an interaction between Venture and Counterfeit.  Treasures can be better with terminal draw because they can't be drawn dead.  That's it.  You're saying that these two treasures have special synergy because they are both treasures?  That's nonsense.  Do Contraband and Cache have special synergy because they too can't be drawn dead with Smithy?
Please, read better. I'm saying that there is a synergy between A and B (Venture and dead draw), between B and C (dead draw and Counterfeit), and between A and C (Venture and Counterfeit). Call each of these values x, y, and z. I assert that the total synergy is > x + y + z.

For the set of boards where Venture is dominant or close thereto, a large percentage will be enabled by some form of dead draw. Counterfeit, when it is also an option will hence synergize with just about all the non-copper trashing enablers of Venture.


Quote
Your third point isn't a synergy either.  Even without Venture on the board, Countefeit still allows you to get extra VP by trashing your Gold and Silver or other treasures.  This is just what Counterfeit does, it has nothing to do with Venture.
For Pete's sake this isn't hard. Counterfeit without Venture is only useful in such circumstances when you draw it in hand with the treasures. This could be 100% with deck drawing engines or megadrawing megaturns - and virtually none of those instances are when Venture is worth a damn. If Venture is good (as in better than a Silver with a slight bonus), then we are looking at situations where we won't be drawing deck.

Okay so what are the odds that on a "final" turn you will line up Counterfeit and a say a silver in a deck that reliably hits 8? Could be fiendishly low (e.g. a Masterpiece deck where you might have below 20% odds). With a venture deck it is again the union of drawing a Silver with counterfeit directly and drawing the Counterfeit with a Venture. Venture decks, ceteris parabis, ALWAYS have higher odds of drawing the Counterfeit than a comparably reliable treasure deck.

Duchess allows you to activate Tunnel, yet somewhere we have to look at how often that "allowance" is made.


Quote
Do Venture and Counterfeit have some synergy?  Sure, because Counterfeit can trash Copper, Venture can draw Counterfeit, and Counterfeit can be played on Venture.  But none of these qualities are special.
I'm sorry, what makes something magically "special"? Do Tunnel and Warehouse have "special" Synergy - because you know there a bajillion cards that can discard Tunnel - like Duchess. I guess we should ignore that as not being "special".

Do me a favor and give me a rigorous definition of "special". As is you are just playing around with a giant no-true-Scotsman


Quote
Venture can draw other treasures for other bonuses; you don't need Counterfeit for that.  Counterfeit is not the only viable Copper trasher for Venture.  And Venture is not a uniquely good target for Counterfeit.  Not to mention, all of these things had already been mentioned in the thread.

However, Counterfeit is a uniquely good target for Venture. Exactly one other treasure can trash copper; it has a search space of 1 treasure excluding treasures in hand. Exactly oen other treasure offers +buy, but it is uniquely bad for Venture as forced play can utterly trash your end game. You could argue that HoP functions the same as +gain, but HoP really doesn't like the uniformity of most Venture decks (though it likes Venture as a cheap unique in other forms of decks).

What is is a uniquely good target for Venture? Not generally Talisman, Cache, Harem, Igg, Fg, Pstone, Spoils, or Contraband. Royal seal competes on price and doesn't do anything special when you buy a Venture or green. Hoard & Bank are maybes, but that puts Counterfeit in a fairly, what's the word, "unique" position.

I know how to really kick this combo up a notch... remove Venture.
And this is the big problem, though I would take Counterfeit over most other copper trashers to build a Venture deck, I would not take Venture as my payload when viable copper trashing is out. Counterfeit is normally at least decent at building engines and it needs to be a limited board or have some other Venture enabler to make me go Venture. Barring some other enabler (of which there are many that also support Counterfeit), then I don't see Counterfeit being enough to drive you to Venture.

If Venture is good enough for other reasons, I can see it driving you to Counterfeit.
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Re: Counterfeit + Venture?
« Reply #22 on: January 02, 2015, 12:50:47 pm »
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Hey, good point...
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eHalcyon

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Re: Counterfeit + Venture?
« Reply #23 on: January 02, 2015, 02:19:48 pm »
+1

Oh please. Let's assume we have a Venture deck - lots of Ventures digging through things to buy green. + Buy is assumed to be useful. What are the odds that a simple +buy (like say Festival) is going to be an option on a turn? The same as the odds of drawing my +buy in my starting hand. Say I have exactly 1 +buy. If I have 7 green, 6 Treasures, and one other card, then I will have exactly 33% odds of hitting my +buy when I need to go for something like Duchy/Estate. If I have Counterfeit as my +buy and just one gold, well there is about a 60% chance of drawing at least 2 Ventures; which means that we are around a 75% chance of having a +buy on "final" turns of the game.

Well what about a deck with Counterfeit as my only +buy, but also averaging a province a turn with high reliability? Well again if we assume 7/6/1 for other cards. Then It only has a 33% chance of hitting a +buy.

So Venture with any +buy other than Counterfeit/Contraband - 33% odds of being useful (and going down as deck size increases, like if you have cursing in play)
Counterfeit without Venture in play in a similar treasure based deck - 33%.
Odds with both - 75%.

Why it is like the odds of this outcome happening are higher than with either card alone or even some nonsensical summation of the two scenarios. It is almost like the sum of each effect is insufficient to explain the resulting outcome.

Now, is this a big synergy, no it is not hence why I explicitly said that this was a small synergy.
 

Your scenarios are contrived.  You cannot just assume that you already have a deck full of Ventures and so much green that Ventures are particularly good.  How did your deck get to that state?  If you are playing well, you'll probably never end up with a deck of "7 green, 6 Treasures and one other card", especially where many of those Treasures are Ventures.

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Bull.

Say I need to kill a final copper to get a reliable Venture deck. What are the odds of doing so with Moneylender? The odds that I draw Moneylender/C in one hand. What are the odds that I kill the Copper with a Counterfeit - the odds that I draw Counterfeit/C or that I draw Venture/C. Obviously the latter is more likely (having some non-zero increase in likelihood over Moneylender).

Does this sort of thing matter? At least at the margins. Take a similar case - Tunnel enablers. Sure Cellar can flip Tunnel, but it only has 4 chances to find the Tunnel. Warehouse gets 7. Similarly when you have a copper, you have 4 slots to hit a Moneylender to pair up. When you have a copper, you have 4 slots for a Counterfeit and some quite high chance of lining up C/Venture -> Draw Counterfeit -> Trash C.

The odds that an ability will be used is part of what defines synergy.

Moneylender is not the only Copper trasher.  Chapel is a much better Copper trasher for Venture than Counterfeit is, simply because it is such a fast trasher at a non-competing price.  Spice Merchant and Moneylender are arguably better simply because of their price point.  Mint is arguably better because of its ability to quickly gain more Venture.  And when you trash Copper, you are not always limited to the Copper that is in you hand.  There are villages, and there are even cards that draw non-terminally.  Imagine that!

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Please, read better. I'm saying that there is a synergy between A and B (Venture and dead draw), between B and C (dead draw and Counterfeit), and between A and C (Venture and Counterfeit). Call each of these values x, y, and z. I assert that the total synergy is > x + y + z.

For the set of boards where Venture is dominant or close thereto, a large percentage will be enabled by some form of dead draw. Counterfeit, when it is also an option will hence synergize with just about all the non-copper trashing enablers of Venture.

Please write better?  You wrote:

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It is a treasure so you can mix it with dead draw for no ill effects. E.g. Smithy/Venture/Counterfeit can do the normal Venture/trash options, just with a couple of bigger hands every so often.

Your point there is that there is synergy between Venture and terminal draw, and between terminal draw and Counterfeit.  In both cases, it seems merely because the non-draw card is a treasure and thus does not hurt when drawn dead.  The point says nothing about the interaction between Venture and Counterfeit, and if there is more to it, you did not explain it.

The set of boards where Venture is dominant is tiny, and Counterfeit does not increase it by much.  It probably decreases it, actually.  I'll talk about the comparison to Tunnel enablers at the end.

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For Pete's sake this isn't hard. Counterfeit without Venture is only useful in such circumstances when you draw it in hand with the treasures. This could be 100% with deck drawing engines or megadrawing megaturns - and virtually none of those instances are when Venture is worth a damn. If Venture is good (as in better than a Silver with a slight bonus), then we are looking at situations where we won't be drawing deck.

Okay so what are the odds that on a "final" turn you will line up Counterfeit and a say a silver in a deck that reliably hits 8? Could be fiendishly low (e.g. a Masterpiece deck where you might have below 20% odds). With a venture deck it is again the union of drawing a Silver with counterfeit directly and drawing the Counterfeit with a Venture. Venture decks, ceteris parabis, ALWAYS have higher odds of drawing the Counterfeit than a comparably reliable treasure deck.

Duchess allows you to activate Tunnel, yet somewhere we have to look at how often that "allowance" is made.

Sure the chance is higher!  Venture draws Counterfeit, so you have an added chance of drawing Counterfeit via Venture.  And Venture is a treasure, so that's an additional target that could appear in hand for Counterfeit to target.  But the increase is usually not significant enough to warrant calling out. 

In a Masterpiece deck, chances are that your Venture will draw Silver, not Counterfeit.  (And man, you usually would not want Masterpiece in a Venture deck at all.  Silver isn't good enough to want Venture pulling it in.)

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I'm sorry, what makes something magically "special"? Do Tunnel and Warehouse have "special" Synergy - because you know there a bajillion cards that can discard Tunnel - like Duchess. I guess we should ignore that as not being "special".

Do me a favor and give me a rigorous definition of "special". As is you are just playing around with a giant no-true-Scotsman

Dunno how rigorous I can be, but will do at the end.

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However, Counterfeit is a uniquely good target for Venture. Exactly one other treasure can trash copper; it has a search space of 1 treasure excluding treasures in hand. Exactly oen other treasure offers +buy, but it is uniquely bad for Venture as forced play can utterly trash your end game. You could argue that HoP functions the same as +gain, but HoP really doesn't like the uniformity of most Venture decks (though it likes Venture as a cheap unique in other forms of decks).

What is is a uniquely good target for Venture? Not generally Talisman, Cache, Harem, Igg, Fg, Pstone, Spoils, or Contraband. Royal seal competes on price and doesn't do anything special when you buy a Venture or green. Hoard & Bank are maybes, but that puts Counterfeit in a fairly, what's the word, "unique" position.

Counterfeit is not uniquely good for Venture.  Counterfeit is good when you particuarly need Copper trashing or +Buy, but those are often available through other means.  Hoard is good when you want a way to gain more Gold (and this can be good for Venture, because it means more good treasures to draw).  Bank is usually a good target because Venture in hand will become 2+ treasures in play, thus buffing Bank.  Platinum is usually a good target because of just how much it is worth.  It is funny that you put down Royal Seal for its price when Counterfeit also costs $5.




So here's the thing about "special" synergy.  When we talk about card combos, we talk about combos that are game defining, or cards that are particularly good at enabling another card.  Let's go back to Tunnel enablers now.  When you see Duchess and Tunnel on the board, you do not think, "hey, Duchess mean that Tunnel is viable".  But if you replace Duchess with Warehouse or Storeroom, suddenly that option is stand-out amazing.  Just by adding either of these two to the board, Tunnel can go from a waste of time to a competitive strategy.  That's the kind of synergy worth calling out.

Counterfeit is strong enough that you often want it on its own.  But on a board where you don't want Counterfeit, adding Venture is unlikely to change that.

Venture is usually ignorable.  Adding Counterfeit makes Venture a little more viable, but that's only because it adds Copper trashing.  Copper trashing is not unique to Counterfeit, Counterfeit does not do it significant better for Venture than other cards, and it was pointed out in this thread long before your post anyway.  Despite that, it still does not make Venture appreciably more attractive as a strategy because Counterfeit competes on price point and Venture would prefer earlier, faster trashing.  Moreover, Counterfeit could very well strengthen non-Venture strategies even more!

This was the point made by MicQ.  Counterfeit alone is often better than Counterfeit+Venture.  And you admit as much yourself:

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Barring some other enabler (of which there are many that also support Counterfeit), then I don't see Counterfeit being enough to drive you to Venture.

If Venture is good enough for other reasons, I can see it driving you to Counterfeit.

Like, you say right there -- you want another enabler.  Counterfeit is not enough for Venture.

Your last line is off though.  Venture doesn't push you to Counterfeit because Counterfeit is usually good on its own.





You know, maybe I misunderstood your original intention.  Maybe you were just trying to squeeze out tiny "synergies" just for the edge-case-y quality of them.  It just didn't make sense to me because your point 1 had as much synergy as, say, "Duchess synergizes with Market Square because it provides extra coin that you can spend with the +Buy".  And your points 2 and 3 didn't speak to the interaction between Venture and Counterfeit at all. 
« Last Edit: January 02, 2015, 02:25:24 pm by eHalcyon »
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liopoil

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Re: Counterfeit + Venture?
« Reply #24 on: January 02, 2015, 02:28:37 pm »
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jomini is not trying to argue that counterfeit/venture is a strong strategy. He is saying that the two synergize with each other, moreso than other copper trashers do. His scenarios are contrived, but that is to make the benefit more obvious. The benefit is still there even when you have 7 coppers and only a couple ventures, it is just less visible. Counterfeit/venture is stronger than moneylender/venture or spice merchant/venture. On a board with no real draw or a really strong BM/rush strategy, I'd be willing to bet that counterfeit/venture is often the right call.
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