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[-Stef-]

I assume this card has a quite interesting depth of openings, in that cards that you don't want multiples of become worse. Especially for player one.

I can imagine a game of Chapel Chicken: whoever buys one first opens himself to his opponent(s) sticking him with a second one.

I would certainly "solve" this by just buying chapel. Suppose we start out like...

I open Chapel ($3)
You buy Messenger, giving us both a Chapel ($4)
I buy messenger, giving us both a Silver ($4)
You buy Silver ($3)

... I wouldn't dare tell you who is in the better spot now. Second Chapel may be really bad if it collides with the first and a silver/messenger.
But it also may be a gift from heaven if they don't collide, as I still get to really trash down despite all the quick gains on the first shuffle.
Your "single chapel strategy" isn't near as good as normal either, because you already have 3 other cards you don't want to trash.

Off course a lot depends on the kingdom, but I assume we're talking about a kingdom where chapel is good in the first place.
Certainly interesting to think about though.

[jsh357]

Yes, I think stuffing someone with Chapels usually doesn't work out, at least in the opening.  A second Potion can be bad if you are trying to hit Familiar, though.  Also terminal cards you only want one of (like Moneylender). As the Messenger buyer, you have to take in to consideration how useful the gained card is to yourself as well, though. 

[WanderingWinder]

I need to do so much math for various openings, especially given how things can be different based on 4/3 vs 3/4.

Um, play effect of card is pretty mediocre, but not really that awful. Both woodcutter and chancellor give you some things you like, especially in engines.

Much more interesting for buy effect. Obvious thing is to get cards which are good for you but not them... too many terminals? If I'm playing a money deck, against their engine, silvers? In any case, you are probably going to be able to end the game pretty fast, not only because this slams piles down fast (really fast), but also because it gives both players bonuses... I guess maybe it gives penalties sometimes, huh? There isn't much reason not to just pick bad cards a lot? Well, you have to take one of these to do it, that's a reason. Probably usually bonuses then. Which can end the game fast as well - we've seen it on Governor, though I suspect this isn't as good as governor by a good margin. Well, maybe. Card is probably fairly good, because of that on-buy. But there is opportunity cost I guess. I doubt it's broken.

[Willvon]

So this would be like Ill-Gotten Gains, where you can give out curses and they can't use Moat or Lighthouse to stop it, right? But unless you have a Watchtower, (or perhaps a Trader depending on the ruling by Donald X), you will get a curse also. So would there ever be a rush to use this as a curser like Ill-Gotten Gains?

[SCSN]

So this would be like Ill-Gotten Gains, where you can give out curses and they can't use Moat or Lighthouse to stop it, right? But unless you have a Watchtower, (or perhaps a Trader depending on the ruling by Donald X), you will get a curse also. So would there ever be a rush to use this as a curser like Ill-Gotten Gains?

No, unless your deck can handle the cursing a lot better than you opponent's deck there's no reason to buy this turn after turn to share the curses. And since getting to a deck that can handle curses well takes time, you won't be seeing a IGG-like rush with this card.

[Just a Rube]

So this would be like Ill-Gotten Gains, where you can give out curses and they can't use Moat or Lighthouse to stop it, right? But unless you have a Watchtower, (or perhaps a Trader depending on the ruling by Donald X), you will get a curse also. So would there ever be a rush to use this as a curser like Ill-Gotten Gains?

No, unless your deck can handle the cursing a lot better than you opponent's deck there's no reason to buy this turn after turn to share the curses. And since getting to a deck that can handle curses well takes time, you won't be seeing a IGG-like rush with this card.

Not to mention that a lot of what makes the IGG rush so powerful is that it empties 2 piles at once, while giving something that can still buy things reasonably well. On the other hand, a Messenger Rush would involve buying a bunch of terminal Wood-Chancellors, and still only empty one pile (while not actually winning the curse split).

[joel88s]

yes, both messenger and ironworks hinge on what the meaning of "it" is. For ironworks, the ruling was that the "it" is the card ironworks tried to gain; since it wasn't gained, ironworks fizzles. Seems clear that "it" should mean the same thing on both cards.

The ruling was that "it" is the card ironworks DID gain, not the one it tried to gain. If it were the one it tried to gain, then you would still get the ironworks bonus with trader.

So are you saying if you mistakenly tried to Messenger a curse and then revealed Trader, everyone would get a Silver?
Or is the ruling with Ironworks/Trader (remind me) that Ironworks didn't gain that Silver, Trader did?

[joel88s]

I assume this card has a quite interesting depth of openings, in that cards that you don't want multiples of become worse. Especially for player one.

I can imagine a game of Chapel Chicken: whoever buys one first opens himself to his opponent(s) sticking him with a second one.

I would certainly "solve" this by just buying chapel. Suppose we start out like...

I open Chapel ($3)
You buy Messenger, giving us both a Chapel ($4)
I buy messenger, giving us both a Silver ($4)
You buy Silver ($3)

... I wouldn't dare tell you who is in the better spot now. Second Chapel may be really bad if it collides with the first and a silver/messenger.
But it also may be a gift from heaven if they don't collide, as I still get to really trash down despite all the quick gains on the first shuffle.
Your "single chapel strategy" isn't near as good as normal either, because you already have 3 other cards you don't want to trash.

Off course a lot depends on the kingdom, but I assume we're talking about a kingdom where chapel is good in the first place.
Certainly interesting to think about though.

I see, so if I try to overload you with Chapels, you say "Fine, I'll give you good cards so your Chapel won't work as well!"
Great stuff.

[eHalcyon]

yes, both messenger and ironworks hinge on what the meaning of "it" is. For ironworks, the ruling was that the "it" is the card ironworks tried to gain; since it wasn't gained, ironworks fizzles. Seems clear that "it" should mean the same thing on both cards.

The ruling was that "it" is the card ironworks DID gain, not the one it tried to gain. If it were the one it tried to gain, then you would still get the ironworks bonus with trader.

So are you saying if you mistakenly tried to Messenger a curse and then revealed Trader, everyone would get a Silver?
Or is the ruling with Ironworks/Trader (remind me) that Ironworks didn't gain that Silver, Trader did?

You would gain a card with Ironworks/Messenger.
You reveal Trader, gaining a Silver instead.
Ironworks/Messenger gives you a bonus based on the card that Ironworks/Messenger gained.
Ironworks/Messenger did not actually gain a card due to Trader interference, so the subsequent effects don't happen.  There is no "it" for them to work from.  Ironworks has no reference to determine its bonus and Messenger doesn't know what card should have copies distributed.

[TheOthin]

So Messenger/Trader can try to gain anything, then replace it with a Silver and not have to share?

Not ideal, but could be useful.

[joel88s]

yes, both messenger and ironworks hinge on what the meaning of "it" is. For ironworks, the ruling was that the "it" is the card ironworks tried to gain; since it wasn't gained, ironworks fizzles. Seems clear that "it" should mean the same thing on both cards.

The ruling was that "it" is the card ironworks DID gain, not the one it tried to gain. If it were the one it tried to gain, then you would still get the ironworks bonus with trader.

So are you saying if you mistakenly tried to Messenger a curse and then revealed Trader, everyone would get a Silver?
Or is the ruling with Ironworks/Trader (remind me) that Ironworks didn't gain that Silver, Trader did?

You would gain a card with Ironworks/Messenger.
You reveal Trader, gaining a Silver instead.
Ironworks/Messenger gives you a bonus based on the card that Ironworks/Messenger gained.
Ironworks/Messenger did not actually gain a card due to Trader interference, so the subsequent effects don't happen.  There is no "it" for them to work from.  Ironworks has no reference to determine its bonus and Messenger doesn't know what card should have copies distributed.

Right, so the Silver you gain is gained by Trader, the Ironworks/Messenger says "That's not what I ordered, I don't know where that came from."

So does that mean you could actually use that intentionally if for some reason you actually wanted to get both a Messenger and a Silver, without giving out the Silver to everyone else? "I buy Messenger, gaining a baloney sandwich. Oops, no, here's Trader, I'll take a Silver instead." And of course no one gains a baloney sandwich.

[Ninja'd more succinctly]

[Gherald]

The best part is you can reveal your Trader to also not gain a Messenger.

[eHalcyon]

So does that mean you could actually use that intentionally if for some reason you actually wanted to get both a Messenger and a Silver, without giving out the Silver to everyone else? "I buy Messenger, gaining a baloney sandwich. Oops, no, here's Trader, I'll take a Silver instead." And of course no one gains a baloney sandwich.

[Ninja'd more succinctly]

Yes.  You could even buy Messenger to gain Silver, then use Trader to replace that Silver with Silver.  Then nobody else gains a Silver but you do.  And I like Gherald's idea of also using Trader to replace the Messenger itself with Silver.  It still works because Messenger's thing is on-first-buy, not on-gain.  Then you just gain two Silver.

[werothegreat]

So does that mean you could actually use that intentionally if for some reason you actually wanted to get both a Messenger and a Silver, without giving out the Silver to everyone else? "I buy Messenger, gaining a baloney sandwich. Oops, no, here's Trader, I'll take a Silver instead." And of course no one gains a baloney sandwich.

[Ninja'd more succinctly]

Yes.  You could even buy Messenger to gain Silver, then use Trader to replace that Silver with Silver.  Then nobody else gains a Silver but you do.  And I like Gherald's idea of also using Trader to replace the Messenger itself with Silver.  It still works because Messenger's thing is on-first-buy, not on-gain.  Then you just gain two Silver.

Does this mean that there's no way to reveal Trader for Cache to get three Silvers instead?

[GendoIkari]

yes, both messenger and ironworks hinge on what the meaning of "it" is. For ironworks, the ruling was that the "it" is the card ironworks tried to gain; since it wasn't gained, ironworks fizzles. Seems clear that "it" should mean the same thing on both cards.

The ruling was that "it" is the card ironworks DID gain, not the one it tried to gain. If it were the one it tried to gain, then you would still get the ironworks bonus with trader.

So are you saying if you mistakenly tried to Messenger a curse and then revealed Trader, everyone would get a Silver?

No, definitely not.

Or is the ruling with Ironworks/Trader (remind me) that Ironworks didn't gain that Silver, Trader did?

Yes, this. The original gain never happened; so messenger/ironworks never gained a card.

[Jimmmmm]

I guess with Trader, it's useful to think that it's preventing you from gaining something and then gaining something itself, rather than changing what you gain.

[GendoIkari]

So does that mean you could actually use that intentionally if for some reason you actually wanted to get both a Messenger and a Silver, without giving out the Silver to everyone else? "I buy Messenger, gaining a baloney sandwich. Oops, no, here's Trader, I'll take a Silver instead." And of course no one gains a baloney sandwich.

[Ninja'd more succinctly]

Yes.  You could even buy Messenger to gain Silver, then use Trader to replace that Silver with Silver.  Then nobody else gains a Silver but you do.  And I like Gherald's idea of also using Trader to replace the Messenger itself with Silver.  It still works because Messenger's thing is on-first-buy, not on-gain.  Then you just gain two Silver.

Does this mean that there's no way to reveal Trader for Cache to get three Silvers instead?

Correct. You'll have to live with 2 Silvers and a Cache.

[GendoIkari]

I guess with Trader, it's useful to think that it's preventing you from gaining something and then gaining something itself, rather than changing what you gain.

Absolutely. Trader only causes these confusions because it still ends up gaining a card. But it could also say something like "when you would gain a card, you may reveal this. If you do, trash a card from your hand instead." The card that you gain is not being replaced; the entire gain is.

[Marcory]

Does this mean that there's no way to reveal Trader for Cache to get three Silvers instead?

No, there is. Gain the Cache, trash it with Watchtower, reveal and discard Market Square, gain a Gold, reveal Trader to gain a Silver instead, then gain the two coppers, reveal Trader, gain two Silvers instead.

Also Embargo, Border Village, Haggler.

[werothegreat]

Now I want to play Bridge, buy Messenger, and give everyone a Cache.  Just to be a dick.

[joel88s]

Now I want to play Bridge, buy Messenger, and give everyone a Cache.  Just to be a dick.

Yeah but don't you know they all have Trader in their hand?

[GendoIkari]

Does this mean that there's no way to reveal Trader for Cache to get three Silvers instead?

No, there is. Gain the Cache, trash it with Watchtower, reveal and discard Market Square, gain a Gold, reveal Trader to gain a Silver instead, then gain the two coppers, reveal Trader, gain two Silvers instead.

Also Embargo, Border Village, Haggler.

This is not revealing a Trader for Cache.

[GwinnR]

Oh, another Chancellor. I hope it won't get translated into german again as "discard your draw pile"!

[WanderingWinder]

First round of math. Chances of hitting 3p+ on turns 3-4 given various deck configurations. How you get to those with these cards is left up to the reader - there are lots of possibilities, but in a practical game, it's not THAT hard to work out.

One note before I start: I treated all terminal silvers as though they were actual silvers. If you have multiple silvers, then collision will lower these a little bit. Also, Messenger's Chancellor effect can help.

(What's listed are the cards in excess of the starting deck).


P: 60.6%
PP: 66.9%
PS: 65.4%
PSS: 65.7%
PSSS: 64.1%
PPS: 74.2%
PPSS: 77.9%

Please note this is the chances for hitting at least one - multi-potion openings give the chance for 2 hits as well.

tl;dr giving someone a second potion ups their chances of hitting the amount they needed


You can actually get the chances of hitting 4p to be quite reasonable on some of these (not super high), but that still seems like not a great idea usually.

If you only need to hit 2p, having a second potion is amazing, and reasonably often you should be hitting two.

So the thought of spamming them with another, an extra potion just seems pretty bad - you are just helping them. Taking a second for yourself may be reasonable.

I'll try to get 3x silver and 4x silver run for chances of hitting 5 at least once, 5 twice, 6 at least once, 6 twice, 7 at least once, run at some point soon. But if someone wants to beat me to it (or just check my math on these), that would be great.

[Mole5000]

I've thought about Messanger some more and decided it is the new Jester.

i.e. a card I got enormously excited about but is actually mediocre.