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Author Topic: Most skilled card in Dominion?  (Read 26777 times)

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Elanchana

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Re: Most skilled card in Dominion?
« Reply #25 on: March 28, 2015, 01:12:48 am »
+5

I don't know about a single card, but I think the most high-skill mechanic has to be cost-based trash-for-benefit. Why? Because you have to get rid of your good cards! Seasoned players can use it really effectively, but it scares the pants off newbies. I'm kind of in the middle of that - I know all about the potential but I'm horrible at getting it to work.
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terminalCopper

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Re: Most skilled card in Dominion?
« Reply #26 on: April 10, 2015, 03:41:55 pm »
+1

Man, every card would be good with +1 Card added.

Indeed. However, Scout is the only nonterminal that would not be OP after adding "+card", which is a good illustration of how bad it is.
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Donald X.

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Re: Most skilled card in Dominion?
« Reply #27 on: April 10, 2015, 03:50:07 pm »
+1

Man, every card would be good with +1 Card added.

Indeed. However, Scout is the only nonterminal that would not be OP after adding "+card", which is a good illustration of how bad it is.
I'm going to lead with Secret Chamber.
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DG

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Re: Most skilled card in Dominion?
« Reply #28 on: April 10, 2015, 03:53:10 pm »
0

Man, every card would be good with +1 Card added.

Indeed. However, Scout is the only nonterminal that would not be OP after adding "+card", which is a good illustration of how bad it is.
I'm going to lead with Secret Chamber.

It's terminal, but I'll follow it up anyway with Tactician and Outpost.
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Re: Most skilled card in Dominion?
« Reply #29 on: April 10, 2015, 04:26:41 pm »
0

Man, every card would be good with +1 Card added.

Indeed. However, Scout is the only nonterminal that would not be OP after adding "+card", which is a good illustration of how bad it is.
I'm going to lead with Secret Chamber.

Isn't that just halfway to Vault now?
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LastFootnote

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Re: Most skilled card in Dominion?
« Reply #30 on: April 10, 2015, 05:40:00 pm »
+3

Man, every card would be good with +1 Card added.

Indeed. However, Scout is the only nonterminal that would not be OP after adding "+card", which is a good illustration of how bad it is.
I'm going to lead with Secret Chamber.

Isn't that just halfway to Vault now?

It's halfway to Vault in the same way that $5 is halfway to $6.
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TheOthin

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Re: Most skilled card in Dominion?
« Reply #31 on: April 10, 2015, 05:40:35 pm »
+2

Man, every card would be good with +1 Card added.

Indeed. However, Scout is the only nonterminal that would not be OP after adding "+card", which is a good illustration of how bad it is.
I'm going to lead with Secret Chamber.

Isn't that just halfway to Vault now?

For $2, though. And with a Reaction and no drawback.

Guaranteeing $5 rather than $4 is arguably more of a step up than guaranteeing $6 over $5, too.
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eHalcyon

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Re: Most skilled card in Dominion?
« Reply #32 on: April 10, 2015, 06:13:53 pm »
+4

Man, every card would be good with +1 Card added.

Indeed. However, Scout is the only nonterminal that would not be OP after adding "+card", which is a good illustration of how bad it is.

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pacovf

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Re: Most skilled card in Dominion?
« Reply #33 on: April 10, 2015, 06:34:35 pm »
+2

Honestly, Scout wouldn't be regarded as the worst card in Dominion if it just had +1 Card.  Now, that wouldn't really make it *good*, but it would solve one of its problems.  It would be in step with Apothecary, for one thing.

Scout would be a good card with +1 Card added.

I like LastFootnote's (?) suggestion of +1$.
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TheOthin

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Re: Most skilled card in Dominion?
« Reply #34 on: April 10, 2015, 06:42:04 pm »
0

Scout really just doesn't work. Cartographer and Vagrant take on its role but better. Adding +1 Card would make it too strong for $4 but too weak for $5. I feel like the best fix would be to take away the picking up Victory cards in exchange for the +1 Card, so that it becomes just cantrip deck viewing/arranging, but between Navigator and Cartographer and Apothecary it'd still be better to not even include it at that point.

In a sense, Cartographer is the "fixed" Scout, being everything it wanted to be while actually being a solid $5 card and a really cool one to boot.
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ehunt

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Re: Most skilled card in Dominion?
« Reply #35 on: April 10, 2015, 06:59:25 pm »
0

i think forge deserves a mention, in terms of both tactical and strategic skills. knowing when it will be good is one thing -- it's one of the hardest trashers to decide. the rare times you can build the "lots of pairs of cards that add up to 8" deck and then cannibilize it, you feel really great, and you take really long pauses during your turn to think. isn't that the best definition of skill?
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Donald X.

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Re: Most skilled card in Dominion?
« Reply #36 on: April 10, 2015, 06:59:59 pm »
+1

Man, every card would be good with +1 Card added.

Indeed. However, Scout is the only nonterminal that would not be OP after adding "+card", which is a good illustration of how bad it is.
I'm going to lead with Secret Chamber.

It's terminal, but I'll follow it up anyway with Tactician and Outpost.
I totally missed "nonterminal."
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Re: Most skilled card in Dominion?
« Reply #37 on: April 10, 2015, 07:05:34 pm »
0

I'm pretty terrible with Ambassador. Seems like most games I'm in with Ambassador (unless I'm playing with a noob), we both go for it and somehow it works much better for my opponent than it does for me.

liopoil

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Re: Most skilled card in Dominion?
« Reply #38 on: April 10, 2015, 07:11:07 pm »
+1

I'm pretty terrible with Ambassador. Seems like most games I'm in with Ambassador (unless I'm playing with a noob), we both go for it and somehow it works much better for my opponent than it does for me.
Yep. Guys, really, it's Ambassador. Or maybe something else, I don't know.


Of course, Scout actually is weak.

I will laugh when a new card is released specifically to give scout a purpose. I imagine a $4 cost combination of great hall and wishing well. Worth 1 point. Can trip. Wishing well effect. Scout draws it up. Auto laboratory.

Seems like it would make scout viable.
Ha, yeah right. Scout will always be awful, no matter how much support.

You do agree though that on a board with say, Great Hall, Ironworks, and the card I described (call it Wishing Great Hall),  you would probably want double ironworks and after a few turns of gaining obviously pick up a scout, right?.
Yes, sure, but this is still a weak strategy and can be beat pretty easily if there's something else on the board at all. And it's a 4-card combo, so yeah, never happens. That card you described is probably inheritance, and while inheritance is probably the best combo with scout, it still isn't really that great. Where you want to get scout is an edge case, and even then it still never really "shines" like most cards sometimes can.
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dghunter79

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Re: Most skilled card in Dominion?
« Reply #39 on: April 11, 2015, 04:40:52 am »
0


Of course, Scout actually is weak.

I will laugh when a new card is released specifically to give scout a purpose. I imagine a $4 cost combination of great hall and wishing well. Worth 1 point. Can trip. Wishing well effect. Scout draws it up. Auto laboratory.

Seems like it would make scout viable.
Ha, yeah right. Scout will always be awful, no matter how much support.

Scout is completely unstoppable as long as Great Hall, Silk Road, Scrying Pool, Vineyard, and Trade Route are in the kingdom.

c4master

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Re: Most skilled card in Dominion?
« Reply #40 on: April 11, 2015, 08:42:49 am »
+3

I will always remember Adams match against AI, where AI pulled off this crazy Procession-engine on a board that looked so terribly weak to me. It really showed me that Procession is a monster on most boards. Even knowing this, I still can't play with it. Lately, someone in the chat said: "It's never too early for a Procession." He's probably even right, but I'm just so bad with that specific card.

Oh yeah, and there are more cards that are hard to understand for newbies: almost all alt VP cards, and GOONS. But once you know about them, I find it relatively easy to go with it. So I would define high-skill cards as cards which are hard to master - just like Procession.

---

@discussion about Scout:
There would have been many ways to fix it:
1) +1 card, but only look at the next 3 cards afterwards (and pick the green).
2) Look through your draw pile and draw up to 4 green cards, then shuffle. (sounds pretty strong)
3) Make it cost only $3, so that it doesn't compete with Silk Road. (it still competes with silver, though)
4) Create more double type cards (green Peddler for $5 with 1 Point, for example).
« Last Edit: April 11, 2015, 08:49:27 am by c4master »
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LastFootnote

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Re: Most skilled card in Dominion?
« Reply #41 on: April 11, 2015, 08:43:05 am »
+2

Honestly, Scout wouldn't be regarded as the worst card in Dominion if it just had +1 Card.  Now, that wouldn't really make it *good*, but it would solve one of its problems.  It would be in step with Apothecary, for one thing.

Scout would be a good card with +1 Card added.

I like LastFootnote's (?) suggestion of +1$.

Thanks. I finally printed and sleeved that version. Initial plays suggest that it's a good card with this change. Not super-strong, but solid.
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Re: Most skilled card in Dominion?
« Reply #42 on: April 11, 2015, 08:45:54 am »
+1

I will always remember Adams match against AI, where AI pulled off this crazy Procession-engine on a board that looked so terribly weak to me. It really showed me that Procession is a monster on most boards. Even knowing this, I still can't play with it. Lately, someone in the chat said: "It's never too early for a Procession." He's probably even right, but I'm just so bad with that specific card.

Oh yeah, and there are more cards that are hard to understand for newbies: almost all alt VP cards, and GOONS. But once you know about them, I find it relatively easy to go with it. So I would define high-skill cards as cards which are hard to master - just like Procession.

Procession is, indeed, a very difficult card to play correctly, but I don't think it's a monster on most boards.
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Seprix

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Re: Most skilled card in Dominion?
« Reply #43 on: April 11, 2015, 01:54:38 pm »
0

I will always remember Adams match against AI, where AI pulled off this crazy Procession-engine on a board that looked so terribly weak to me. It really showed me that Procession is a monster on most boards. Even knowing this, I still can't play with it. Lately, someone in the chat said: "It's never too early for a Procession." He's probably even right, but I'm just so bad with that specific card.

Oh yeah, and there are more cards that are hard to understand for newbies: almost all alt VP cards, and GOONS. But once you know about them, I find it relatively easy to go with it. So I would define high-skill cards as cards which are hard to master - just like Procession.

---

@discussion about Scout:
There would have been many ways to fix it:
1) +1 card, but only look at the next 3 cards afterwards (and pick the green).
2) Look through your draw pile and draw up to 4 green cards, then shuffle. (sounds pretty strong)
3) Make it cost only $3, so that it doesn't compete with Silk Road. (it still competes with silver, though)
4) Create more double type cards (green Peddler for $5 with 1 Point, for example).

Hey, where is the video where Adam plays against an AI?
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Re: Most skilled card in Dominion?
« Reply #44 on: April 11, 2015, 02:23:18 pm »
0

Not sure if joking, but I think he means Andrew Iannaconne, also known as ragingduckd.
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Re: Most skilled card in Dominion?
« Reply #45 on: April 11, 2015, 10:48:30 pm »
0


Oh yeah, and there are more cards that are hard to understand for newbies: almost all alt VP cards, and GOONS. But once you know about them, I find it relatively easy to go with it. So I would define high-skill cards as cards which are hard to master - just like Procession.


I agree. Procession remains a total mystery to me (as you would expect from my very mediocre rating, I guess). But I think there are levels of mastery, too. So after one or two games where you got clobbered, most people would realize that Apprentice trashing Gold can definitely be a thing. And having Market Square in hand when you trash something to gain Gold is an obvious thing. But I think you have to be pretty highly skilled to control the implied chain reaction and do something like this:

http://www.gokosalvager.com/static/logprettifier.html?20150407/log.51201cbee4b04e88c8da4f9a.1428458758346.txt

Yes, that's just your ordinary "buy 7 Provinces in two turns" plan. (Note: Mic Q also streamed this game, and pointed out some sloppy play on his part...wish I could be so sloppy.)
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Re: Most skilled card in Dominion?
« Reply #46 on: April 11, 2015, 11:50:04 pm »
+1

I will always remember Adams match against AI, where AI pulled off this crazy Procession-engine on a board that looked so terribly weak to me. It really showed me that Procession is a monster on most boards. Even knowing this, I still can't play with it. Lately, someone in the chat said: "It's never too early for a Procession." He's probably even right, but I'm just so bad with that specific card.

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Mic Qsenoch

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Re: Most skilled card in Dominion?
« Reply #47 on: April 11, 2015, 11:58:32 pm »
+4


Oh yeah, and there are more cards that are hard to understand for newbies: almost all alt VP cards, and GOONS. But once you know about them, I find it relatively easy to go with it. So I would define high-skill cards as cards which are hard to master - just like Procession.


I agree. Procession remains a total mystery to me (as you would expect from my very mediocre rating, I guess). But I think there are levels of mastery, too. So after one or two games where you got clobbered, most people would realize that Apprentice trashing Gold can definitely be a thing. And having Market Square in hand when you trash something to gain Gold is an obvious thing. But I think you have to be pretty highly skilled to control the implied chain reaction and do something like this:

http://www.gokosalvager.com/static/logprettifier.html?20150407/log.51201cbee4b04e88c8da4f9a.1428458758346.txt

Yes, that's just your ordinary "buy 7 Provinces in two turns" plan. (Note: Mic Q also streamed this game, and pointed out some sloppy play on his part...wish I could be so sloppy.)

This is flattering, but trust me, it's not that hard to do. And it's definitely not original to me in any way. You can find a post in these very forums where I say something like "Apprentice / Market Square can't be fast enough without other trashing" and then AI says something like "Nope, you're wrong" (in a nice way probably) and so I played some solitaire games and I'm like "I'm a moron, Apprentice / MS works without support." And the rest is just practicing it once or twice.

Don't buy into the myth of the genius Dominion player, remember we're all morons.

Here are some things about Apprentice / MS (which I have been thinking about a bit because I played it in the game above, and WW-AdamH played it in their match)
- Don't activate Market Squares too early in the game, you only want early Golds if you are struggling to buy a few Apprentices. Otherwise just play the Market Squares so that you can cycle to your Apprentices faster, the most important thing is getting thin. This is also true of say Chapel/MS.
- Once your chain is set up, don't auto-activate MS. You won't cost yourself Gold gains unless one of your Apprentice plays is going to overdraw the deck. If you are going to play multiple Apprentices anyway, it's okay to wait to activate until right before a shuffle. By keeping the MS in hand you give yourself an out (playing them as cantrips for a few more cards) in case you haven't yet managed to draw your next Gold/Apprentice pair.
- Don't assume you need to win the MS split. You can see in the log above that 4 works just fine. You don't want to end up with 2-3 probably, but you don't need to rush to buy 6 of them. There might be other $3 cards which help you play Apprentice more often (like Sage or Warehouse). Of course you might opportunistically take the split 7-3 (or 8-2) in denial if the opportunity presents itself, but that seems unlikely.
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Deadlock39

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Re: Most skilled card in Dominion?
« Reply #48 on: April 12, 2015, 12:22:20 am »
+2

I know some people don't think Combo articles are worthwhile anymore, but that is one I hadn't seen before.  I think it is more worthy of a short combo article of anything I've seen mentioned in a while.  (Related also to the "Bring back the front page" discussion)

dondon151

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Re: Most skilled card in Dominion?
« Reply #49 on: April 12, 2015, 01:10:29 am »
+2

I know some people don't think Combo articles are worthwhile anymore, but that is one I hadn't seen before.  I think it is more worthy of a short combo article of anything I've seen mentioned in a while.  (Related also to the "Bring back the front page" discussion)

There aren't that many "true combos" in Dominion. There are a huge number of possible positive interactions between cards, but the ones that deserve a combo article are only the ones that can form a strategy all by themselves and are not substantially helped by the presence of another card.

So combos like Trader/Feodum, Hermit/MS, Ironworks/Gardens, etc. would qualify in my opinion, but positive interactions such as Goons/Watchtower or Horse Traders/Duke that used to get featured articles on the front page don't seem to be worth mentioning.
« Last Edit: April 12, 2015, 01:17:51 am by dondon151 »
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