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[Flip5ide]

Are you more likely to hit $5 first on either turn 3 or 4 if you open:

Silver/Silver

or

Silver/Watchtower?

[SCSN]

With Watchtower, as the only way you're not hitting 5 on either T3 or T4 is if WT misses the shuffle, in which case it wouldn't have helped you had it been a Silver.

[liopoil]

Yes, Silver/Watchtower is a very powerful opening. You have an ~90% chance of hitting 5 (I estimate), and if they collide you can even topdeck it. And then surely your watchtower will combo with plenty of other cards in your deck as the game goes on, and you are only stuck with one silver.

[JW]

With Watchtower, as the only way you're not hitting 5 on either T3 or T4 is if WT misses the shuffle, in which case it wouldn't have helped you had it been a Silver.

Yes, Silver/Watchtower is a very powerful opening. You have an ~90% chance of hitting 5 (I estimate), and if they collide you can even topdeck it.

Silver-Silver has a 91.2% chance to hit $5 at least once on turns 3/4 (per http://dominionstrategy.com/2011/03/09/basic-opening-probabilities/), and Silver/Watchtower will be even higher than that.

[WanderingWinder]

With Watchtower, as the only way you're not hitting 5 on either T3 or T4 is if WT misses the shuffle, in which case it wouldn't have helped you had it been a Silver.

Yes, Silver/Watchtower is a very powerful opening. You have an ~90% chance of hitting 5 (I estimate), and if they collide you can even topdeck it.

Silver-Silver has a 91.2% chance to hit $5 at least once on turns 3/4 (per http://dominionstrategy.com/2011/03/09/basic-opening-probabilities/), and Silver/Watchtower will be even higher than that.

Silver/Watchtower gets you a 94.94949494....% chance of hitting 5 at least once.

It's worth noting that it gives you a 0% chance of hitting 5 twice. If you check the link here, you get a 14.9% chance of having 2 5s opening Silver/Silver.

So by opening Silver/Watchtower, you have a slightly better chance to hit 5 at least once, but by opening Silver/Silver, you expect to have slightly more 5s by the reshuffle.


But the biggest thing to note is that it doesn't make a very big difference at all, so in practice, you should go with whatever will be better for your deck otherwise the vast majority of the time.

[liopoil]

So by opening Silver/Watchtower, you have a slightly better chance to hit 5 at least once, but by opening Silver/Silver, you expect to have slightly more 5s by the reshuffle.

You draw silver, watchtower, 3 copper on turn 3 then you can topdeck your 5 and potentially get another.

[Flip5ide]

What about Silver/Warehouse? Is that a better alternative to these two?

[Venescas]

What about Silver/Warehouse? Is that a better alternative to these two?

If you're just trying to hit $5, then Warehouse/Silver has a slight disadvantage to Watchtower/Silver, as you will trigger the reshuffle on T4 assuming Warehouse doesn't miss, so it's possible your $5 purchase doesn't make it.

[Flip5ide]

What about Silver/Warehouse? Is that a better alternative to these two?

If you're just trying to hit $5, then Warehouse/Silver has a slight disadvantage to Watchtower/Silver, as you will trigger the reshuffle on T4 assuming Warehouse doesn't miss, so it's possible your $5 purchase doesn't make it.

But whats the odds that you will hit $5 before turn 5 with Warehouse/Silver?

[werothegreat]

Or just open Gear/Gear and buy a Gold on turn 4.

[Venescas]

What about Silver/Warehouse? Is that a better alternative to these two?

If you're just trying to hit $5, then Warehouse/Silver has a slight disadvantage to Watchtower/Silver, as you will trigger the reshuffle on T4 assuming Warehouse doesn't miss, so it's possible your $5 purchase doesn't make it.

But whats the odds that you will hit $5 before turn 5 with Warehouse/Silver?

If Warehouse doesn't miss T3 or T4, you'll hit $5 for sure, but if you draw three estates on T3, or play Warehouse on T4, your $5 (and technically your Warehouse too if played on T4) misses the next shuffle. If Warehouse + copper is on the bottom, then it's a 31.8% chance to miss $5 (same as Watchtower+Copper). Warehouse+Estate on the bottom and Warehouse+Silver on the bottom have the same chances as Watchtower+Estate and Watchtower+Silver on the bottom.

58.33% chance your Warehouse misses the shuffle, as opposed to 16.67% for Watchtower.

59.7% chance your $5 purchase makes the shuffle.

Long story short, Watchtower+Silver is more reliable overall.

(Someone may want to check my math on this; may be missing some edge cases, but I'm pretty sure what's up there is right...)

[WanderingWinder]

So by opening Silver/Watchtower, you have a slightly better chance to hit 5 at least once, but by opening Silver/Silver, you expect to have slightly more 5s by the reshuffle.

You draw silver, watchtower, 3 copper on turn 3 then you can topdeck your 5 and potentially get another.

This is a good point I didn't account for, partially because it's way dependent on what 5 you get, which means it's not practical to actually calculate the whole thing. The chances of hitting SCCCW on turn 3 are 4.42%, though, which means that even if that guarantees you getting $5 again (which, in practice, it rarely will), my conclusions above about number of 5s would be accurate.

You do get a bonus 4.4% chance of playing your 5 a shuffle early though, so that's not nothing... but it's not a huge thing, either.