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[werothegreat]

This week we'll be talking about Harry Potter's favorite Dominion card... Philosopher's Stone!

Starting questions:

* When is Philosopher's Stone strong?
* What's the most coin you've fielded from a Philosopher's Stone?
* Do you consider Philosopher's Stone to be a fun card to play with?
* Why is the apostrophe in its card name banner upside-down and reversed?

[michaeljb]

* Familiar slogs; you obviously need time to get a big deck, and you already got a Potion for something else. (Herbalist also helps)
* $6 or $7? Maybe $8...probably need to scrape some logs for that.
* The counting really sucks IRL, but I like the actual effect.
* Why have I never noticed this before? (Probably becaues I generally don't look at the art part of the cards in detail)

[werothegreat]

(Herbalist also helps)

The couple times I've tried PSTone/Herbalist, it's just seemed far too slow to actually work.  I might not be playing it optimally, though.

[AJD]

I feel like Philosopher's Stone can work well on a Goons board when there isn't adequate engine support to go for multi-Goons turns, since PS and Goons both reward you for using up all your buys. Real strategy, or wishful thinking?

[michaeljb]

(Herbalist also helps)

The couple times I've tried PSTone/Herbalist, it's just seemed far too slow to actually work.  I might not be playing it optimally, though.

Yeah, I'm not sure Herbalist alone is enough to make PStone worthwhile, but with some luck in your draws it at least helps you get more of them early and play them more often later.

It feels like it's been a long time since I've gone for PStone in a game...any recent game logs with PStone winning might be more informative than my posts

[FishingVillage]

* In my experience, PS is great if you're doing something similar to a simple Gardens strategy and don't mind filling up the deck asap. However in the absence of other cards this works against itself as you'll draw the PS less often. Then you'll need to buy more PS to compensate and that leads to more counting and whatever. I guess Vault, Secret Chamber and Storeroom can help toss cards out of hand to potentially increase the worth of the PS.

* I think $4? That was about 25 cards in total, so there was probably some extra buy in the kingdom, but it also wasn't a lot of fun waiting around to draw back my PSs.

* No.

* What?

[LastFootnote]

Ah, Philosopher's Stone. Consistently ranked second to last of the cards with Potion in their cost. Why are you so unloved?

The answer is pretty simple, actually. Philosopher's Stone needs you to not draw your deck, and drawing your deck is awesome. Drawing your deck is so strong that you will pretty much never opt to pursue Philosopher's Stone instead, given the choice. So, at minimum, you should only consider P.Stone when drawing your deck is either impossible or really impractical. For the rest of this post, let's take it as given that you can't draw your deck.

Even then, Philosopher's Stone is a tough sell without other Alchemy cards available. The kind of deck that wants Philosopher's Stone can't buy it very often because it takes several hands to make it through each shuffle, and you can buy at most one P.Stone per Potion per shuffle. And it's a risk because you may not have $3 in your hand with your Potion(s). And when do you buy your first Potion? Early on, Philosopher's Stone is worth $1 or $2. But if you wait too long, you won't be able to accumulate enough of them.

When do you go for Philosopher's Stone, then? Certain other Potion-cost cards make it a no-brainer. Familiar is chief among them. You deck is filling with Curses and you only want a couple of Familiars. After that, all your Potion buys should be P.Stones. University is another good one. Usually you only want so many of those for gaining $5 Action cards (remember, we're assuming that you can't draw your deck). Even Transmute can be enough, assuming you don't have another great way to trash your Estates. First buy the Transmute, then P.Stones.

Anything that allows you to play your Philosopher's Stones more often is good, especially if it doesn't lower P.Stone's value. Herbalist is the big one; it gives you +1 Buy and allows you to topdeck a played P.Stone. Warehouse and Cellar are nice. Cartographer removes a card from your deck/discard, but is still a good option. Scavenger is great.

Gaining cards is good, especially if the gainer gets you a benefit for your current turn. Think Beggar and Explorer.

When you are playing a Philosopher's Stone deck, buy Duchies and other cheap Victory cards much earlier than you normally would. Usually they would slow your deck down and prevent you from buying Provinces, but the P.Stones will let you spike $8 hands anyway and you may need those extra points to overcome more conventional decks.

[ehunt]

Sorry for the brevity, on a tablet. Herbalist + PStone, as a counter to cursing attacks, is aabsolutely a thing and will generally win unless the curser has a powerful reward for building an engine, like kc + bridge. See geronimoo's article for implementation. The main point is dont waste early buys on non herbalist cards.

[RobertJ]

Anything that allows you to play your Philosopher's Stones more often is good, especially if it doesn't lower P.Stone's value. Herbalist is the big one; it gives you +1 Buy and allows you to topdeck a played P.Stone. Warehouse and Cellar are nice. Cartographer removes a card from your deck/discard, but is still a good option. Scavenger is great.

I don't know how much of a thing this really is but Storeroom seems like it should be a good enabler to add to this list. The sifting helps find your Potion to buy Stones and then to find your Stones when you have them, the second discard maximises the number of cards that your Stones count, and it has a +buy.

[LastFootnote]

Anything that allows you to play your Philosopher's Stones more often is good, especially if it doesn't lower P.Stone's value. Herbalist is the big one; it gives you +1 Buy and allows you to topdeck a played P.Stone. Warehouse and Cellar are nice. Cartographer removes a card from your deck/discard, but is still a good option. Scavenger is great.

I don't know how much of a thing this really is but Storeroom seems like it should be a good enabler to add to this list. The sifting helps find your Potion to buy Stones and then to find your Stones when you have them, the second discard maximises the number of cards that your Stones count, and it has a +buy.

Agreed. Storeroom should be a great enabler.

[AdamH]

1. Harry Potter's favorite Dominion card is clearly Secret Chamber. There is no contest here.

He's basically featured on the art for Secret Chamber, the Sorcerer's Stone/Philosopher's Stone gave him nothing but trouble in the first book, and don't forget the Chamber of Secrets is where he first saved the woman he'd later marry from whatever was happening down there.

2. I think Phil Stone is usually only viable when it appears with Herbalist. If there's no Herbalist around, I've never seen a board where you go for Potion just to get Phil Stone, ever. If there's other Potion stuff you want anyways, Phil Stone can be a nice pickup later on in the game, say if Curses are out on a Familiar board. Yeah that might be the only thing actually.

I think Phil Stone + Big Money loses to just Big Money, right? I mean maybe you throw in Woodcutter and it gets better, but basically I'm never playing Phil Stone/Big Money. And in engines you don't want Phil Stone because

drawing your deck is awesome.

3. As for Herbalist/Phil Stone:

The main point is dont waste early buys on non herbalist cards.

This point is a big deal, and I don't think it's emphasized enough on the article -- this is the difference between winning and losing most of the time.

If you aren't mirrored, then yeah getting more Phil Stones is probably OK, you'll pile out the Herbalists soon enough. In a mirror, though, winning the Herbalist split is a big deal. It can sometimes be correct to get two Herbalists over a Phil Stone if it means the difference between winning and losing the Herbalist split -- this is how mirrors are won and lost. You pretty much want all ten Herbalists in your deck as quickly as possible.

When do you play Herbalist/Phil Stone? Well since Herbalist/Phil Stone doesn't really care about junk, you like to play it when there's junking around and there's no viable engine. There are very few times when I'll pick up the junker while playing Herbalist/Phil Stone. Yeah pretty much never. Maybe Familiar? I've never played a game with those three cards in it so I don't really know. But it feels a lot like Counting House -- you green much earlier than what normally feels right because that doesn't decrease your ability to spike Province hands (or Province-plus-something-else hands). The nice thing is that your terminal gives you +Buy so Single-Colony turns are not the limit for you.

The other application is slogs. This is rarer because usually those Alt-VP cards that push you towards a slog don't cost so much, so you don't *need* Herbalist/Phil Stone to get lots of point, but it's still pretty good. Double Duchy/Duke turns are pretty good, Fairgrounds is pretty good. But I should emphasize again that the board has to be really slow for this to work out.

[AdamH]

lol I have a +1 from Tonks 

[DG]

Philosopher's stone is balanced for 3 player games and there it is fine. It gives big treasure income in games where it hard to make anything else happen. In two player games there is usually something better that can happen.

[Beyond Awesome]

This card sucks almost always. I actually buy Transmute more than this

[werothegreat]

Philosopher's stone is balanced for 3 player games and there it is fine.

How so?

[markusin]

"When is Philosopher's Stone strong?"
Maybe with Storyteller when combined with other potion cost cards? The fewer cards you've drawn in your turn so far, the more you'll draw with PS when played through Storyteller.

[eHalcyon]

"When is Philosopher's Stone strong?"
Maybe with Storyteller when combined with other potion cost cards? The fewer cards you've drawn in your turn so far, the more you'll draw with PS when played through Storyteller.

It sounds like a nombo to me.  It's good if you collide PS and Storyteller early on, but otherwise Storyteller is just causing you to draw more cards, weakening each PS you play after.

[DG]

Philosopher's stone is balanced for 3 player games and there it is fine.

How so?

Generally, repeated attacks can make alternative strategies worse. Philosopher's stones do not become better, they can just be more resilient than other things. I suspect that in 4 player games the piles will empty faster and it will be riskier to wait for the philosopher's stones to pay off.

[pubby]

I think Phil Stone is usually only viable when it appears with Herbalist. If there's no Herbalist around, I've never seen a board where you go for Potion just to get Phil Stone, ever.

[...]

I think Phil Stone + Big Money loses to just Big Money, right? I mean maybe you throw in Woodcutter and it gets better, but basically I'm never playing Phil Stone/Big Money.

BM+JunkingAttack is played somewhat often and P.Stone is usually worth considering there. Big money with Mountebank, Familiar, or Cultist is improved by buying P.Stones. Big money with other junkers is improved but only on Colony boards. I'm not sure how BM+Ambassador fares.

[Gherald]

1. Herbalist alone is often enough to make P stone worthwhile. There are faster decks, but over 50% of the time when Herbalist and P. Stone are on the board, this is what you should go for.   But you have to do it right.

a) Buy one potion, and buy it on T1 or T2.
b) Buy as many P. Stones as you ever can if they will see at least one shuffle of use
c) Buy as many herbalists as you can.  Yes, 10 herablists if you can. Beginning with your first non-potion buy.
d) Buy as many coppers as you can.

2. Other good P Stone enablers are Storeroom and Gardens as mentioned. Count can help, but Count can do other things too so it's not as direct of an enabler (there's often better, non-P stone things to be done on a Count board)

Philosopher's Stone is a tough sell without other Alchemy cards available.

3. ^ That advice is exactly backwards. With the exception of Herbalist, the majority of alchemy cards are exactly the kind of cards you do NOT want to see on a board to make P stone viable.

When do you go for Philosopher's Stone, then? Certain other Potion-cost cards make it a no-brainer. Familiar is chief among them.

4. ^ Again, this is wrong.  Familiar and P stone is not worth any mention, there is practically nothing special about how they play on the same board

[AdamH]

I think Phil Stone is usually only viable when it appears with Herbalist. If there's no Herbalist around, I've never seen a board where you go for Potion just to get Phil Stone, ever.

[...]

I think Phil Stone + Big Money loses to just Big Money, right? I mean maybe you throw in Woodcutter and it gets better, but basically I'm never playing Phil Stone/Big Money.

BM+JunkingAttack is played somewhat often and P.Stone is usually worth considering there. Big money with Mountebank, Familiar, or Cultist is improved by buying P.Stones. Big money with other junkers is improved but only on Colony boards. I'm not sure how BM+Ambassador fares.

I'd like to see a simulation that shows a big money strategy that's improved by the use of Phil Stone. I'm not saying it doesn't exist, but I can't really think of anything like that. The only one I can think of is Familiar...

Philosopher's Stone is a tough sell without other Alchemy cards available.

3. ^ That advice is exactly backwards. With the exception of Herbalist, the majority of alchemy cards are exactly the kind of cards you do NOT want to see on a board to make P stone viable.

When do you go for Philosopher's Stone, then? Certain other Potion-cost cards make it a no-brainer. Familiar is chief among them.

4. ^ Again, this is wrong.  Familiar and P stone is not worth any mention, there is practically nothing special about how they play on the same board

4 is wrong if you assume 3 is wrong, but I think the point here is that Phil Stone is so weak that you don't want to get a Potion just for Phil Stone, unless there's Herbalist around. The reason people are bringing up Familiar is because in Familiar games, you're likely to have $3P hands later on in the game and you won't be too enthused about getting another Familiar because the Curses are out. Hey, what's this card that's better than Silver? Like, this is most of the time that I find myself buying Phil Stone, and its presence isn't what made me go for Familiar.

With other Potion cards like Scrying Pool or Apothecary, I'm usually happy to pick up another one of those and I'm usually drawing a million cards with them, which makes Phil Stone bad. Same thing with Golem or Possession, though in this case you are unhappy this time because maybe you didn't hit your price point and you're settling for a card you don't particularly want. But still you bought your Potion with the intent of hitting $4P or $6P, and the presence of Phil Stone probably didn't enter into the equation.

This is why Familiar is getting mentioned. It's the only one that works. We're scraping the bottom of the barrel to find situations where you are buying Phil Stone, and hey look we found Familiar! Wooooo! Look we found one, guys!

...but back to the original point, since you don't want Phil Stone in engines, and Big Money can be simulated reasonably well, I think simulation results are appropriate here. And I don't think I'm going to believe Phil Stone is any good without them.

[Mic Qsenoch]

I don't think Herbalist Pstone is very good at all. Sometimes it looks really good if you hit 3P a lot and line up the Herbalists, but it often does all of jack squat. It's an extremely low bar for something else to be better.

[werothegreat]

I don't think Herbalist Pstone is very good at all. Sometimes it looks really good if you hit 3P a lot and line up the Herbalists, but it often does all of jack squat. It's an extremely low bar for something else to be better.

That's what I was thinking.  It definitely seems like something that sounds good on paper, but just doesn't really work in practice.

[belugawhale]

That's what I was thinking.  It definitely seems like something that sounds good on paper, but just doesn't really work in practice.

So Philosopher's Stone is communist?

On a serious note, Philosopher's Stone is great when there is no good engine, ample +buy, and especially when there are junking attacks. I have gotten Philosopher's Stone to peak at $10 before. It is also one of the only two potion cards that you usually want more than one potion for (other is vineyards). Storeroom looks great with it.

[ehunt]

We have sims for herbalist pstone vs. hag/$, right?