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[pst]

I also think it has worked to find Fool's Gold for me, and I remember having bought it when I had lots of Golems and cantrips, so running out of actions was not often a problem.

[wachsmuth]

I remember this one game where I was playing the big City-Rabble-Mountebank engine versus someone doing Count-Adventurer big money on a colony board. I somehow lost and was very surprised by it. Anyway, if you can trash down just to Platinum and maybe Gold with Adventurer, that really counters Rabble pins. Best use I've seen of it so far.

[Awaclus]

To make it happen in an engine, you need a pretty specific environment.

- Treasures need to be part of your strategy, ideally a key part (Horn of Plenty?)
- Copper trashing must be available.
- ideally there is some sifting to ensure that you have enough treasures in your discard.
- Adventurer is usually only worth it if there is no better source of draw.

I think that Copper trashing not being available is more likely to make Adventurer worth it in an engine. If you can just trash your Coppers, either you're probably going to have enough draw anyway or it's not an engine board at all. When you can't trash them, at least Adventurer can help by removing them from your draw pile (and putting them into your hand instead).

How is it better than Moat then?

By virtue of being in the kingdom when Moat is not. It is pretty much worse than Moat in every way.

[Accatitippi]

I have this theory that goes: over time Dominion strategy has shifted towards later, faster greening as the player base got more experienced, and engines more viable.
Earlier on, you'd have to cope with green decks much longer than we usually do now, and this explains why early Victory skippers/sifters are on the pricy and (now) useless side of the spectrum (Adventurer, Scout). It also explains how Scrying Pool ended up being much cheaper than Golem.

That was all for me guessing what goes on in Donald's and the Dominion playtesters' minds.

[Jack Rudd]

As a $6 Action, Adventurer combos with Procession + $5 cost action  + trash for benefit.

Possibly as a stepping-stone to King's Court, too.

It does. But you'd still probably only get it in the absence of an actually useful $6 action.

[assemble_me]

It's pretty good with copper trashing and when there's Platinum/Colonies around and there's no strong engine to be build. The nice thing is that it sifts very well through green cards.
Just look at my greatest moments post:

When Mine into Adventurer beats Procession/Fortress:

http://gokosalvager.com/static/logprettifier.html?http://dominion-game-logs.s3.amazonaws.com/game_logs/20160317/log.0.1458246091735.txt

also as saved stream:

https://www.twitch.tv/assemble_me/v/56618442 (starting at 1:08:45) - the chat was not convinced it was correct. Anyways, it felt pretty good

Mostly it's good when its brother in yellow, Venture, would be good, but it's a little worse than that because it's a terminal

[Accatitippi]

It's pretty good with copper trashing and when there's Platinum/Colonies around and there's no strong engine to be build. The nice thing is that it sifts very well through green cards.
Just look at my greatest moments post:

When Mine into Adventurer beats Procession/Fortress:

http://gokosalvager.com/static/logprettifier.html?http://dominion-game-logs.s3.amazonaws.com/game_logs/20160317/log.0.1458246091735.txt

also as saved stream:

https://www.twitch.tv/assemble_me/v/56618442 (starting at 1:08:45) - the chat was not convinced it was correct. Anyways, it felt pretty good

Mostly it's good when its brother in yellow, Venture, would be good, but it's a little worse than that because it's a terminal

Venture also chains, which is pretty good at times.

[Davio]

It's pretty good with copper trashing and when there's Platinum/Colonies around and there's no strong engine to be build. The nice thing is that it sifts very well through green cards.
Just look at my greatest moments post:

When Mine into Adventurer beats Procession/Fortress:

http://gokosalvager.com/static/logprettifier.html?http://dominion-game-logs.s3.amazonaws.com/game_logs/20160317/log.0.1458246091735.txt

also as saved stream:

https://www.twitch.tv/assemble_me/v/56618442 (starting at 1:08:45) - the chat was not convinced it was correct. Anyways, it felt pretty good

Mostly it's good when its brother in yellow, Venture, would be good, but it's a little worse than that because it's a terminal

Sifters are awkward in the end game.

On one hand, they help find your good cards between those pesky VP cards, on the other hand they accelerate shuffling so you will draw them into your hand more often.

[assemble_me]

Sifters are awkward in the end game.

I think Sifters are pretty good in the endgame. They decrease the chance that you chocke. Discarting the green junk is just great.

[Chris is me]

Adventurer is very rarely good. Here are some things that make it better.

Copper trashing in the presence of junking attacks - think Spice Merchant, Miser, Counterfeit, or Moneylender. You can thin your deck but you will still have several additional stop cards at the end and need something to push you up over the slog. Soothsayer might be the best junker here since it gives you Golds that Adventurer loves to draw.

Ferry, actually, makes Adventurer an affordable anti-junking card as well. Especially if there is no +Buy (which would make buying more of a cheaper card better), Ferrying Adventurer makes it a perfectly reasonable $4 cost card.

Tunnel, duh.

[Seprix]

Adventurer is very rarely good. Here are some things that make it better.

Copper trashing in the presence of junking attacks - think Spice Merchant, Miser, Counterfeit, or Moneylender. You can thin your deck but you will still have several additional stop cards at the end and need something to push you up over the slog. Soothsayer might be the best junker here since it gives you Golds that Adventurer loves to draw.

Ferry, actually, makes Adventurer an affordable anti-junking card as well. Especially if there is no +Buy (which would make buying more of a cheaper card better), Ferrying Adventurer makes it a perfectly reasonable $4 cost card.

Tunnel, duh.

But Ferrying Adventurer versus anything else...

[Marcory]

I tried Adventurer/Tunnel (in a game with copper trashing) against a bot and it was decent. Probably wasn't the greatest strategy on the board, but I might try it IRL if it comes up.

[Kirian]

I think this could cost $5, have +1 Action on it and still be a mere "okay" card.

So yeah, it's really bad, the cost is too steep and it's not gamewarping enough to spend a precious action on.

That wouldn't be strictly better than Lab, but it would be quite good if your only payload is treasures.

[AJD]

I think this could cost $5, have +1 Action on it and still be a mere "okay" card.

So yeah, it's really bad, the cost is too steep and it's not gamewarping enough to spend a precious action on.

That wouldn't be strictly better than Lab, but it would be quite good if your only payload is treasures.

It would be close enough to strictly better than Venture to be questionable, though.

[iamsparticus]

Worst card in Dominion, maybe. Pirate Ship and They give this a run for its money.
[/quote]

Pirate Ship is far better. On boards where there is no source of virtual money (or strong virtual gain) Pirate Ship can utterly dominate. Adventurer has no such cases where it dominates.

[JW]

While Adventurer is not a good source of draw compared to other draw cards, it be a decent source of draw for the difficult to set up Mandarin-Horn of Plenty-Kingdom $2 treasure golden deck combo.

For those who haven't seen it, Stef pulls off the Mandarin-Horn of Plenty (+Harem) golden deck here (using Shanty Town for some draw).

[DG]

I see more games where people don't buy adventurer when they should, than games where people do buy adventurer when they shouldn't. People seem to ignore it even when drawing two treasures is perfectly fine.

[LastFootnote]

I bought (at least one) Adventurer in a game recently, and it was good for my deck. But those situations are quite rare.

As Donald has implied in the past, Venture is pretty much the fixed version of Adventurer.

[Donald X.]

I have this theory that goes: over time Dominion strategy has shifted towards later, faster greening as the player base got more experienced, and engines more viable.
Earlier on, you'd have to cope with green decks much longer than we usually do now, and this explains why early Victory skippers/sifters are on the pricy and (now) useless side of the spectrum (Adventurer, Scout). It also explains how Scrying Pool ended up being much cheaper than Golem.

That was all for me guessing what goes on in Donald's and the Dominion playtesters' minds.

While some of what you say is true, that isn't really the explanation for Adventurer.

In the early days cards often did not get tried in very many forms. After an initial period when cards were way off, there was a period where I would make a card, guess at what it should cost and how best to phrase it and all that, and then if we were buying it and it didn't seem unbeatable, it would never change. While I liked the idea of a card being as cheap as it could be, I did not actually test cards at cheaper costs if we were buying them.

Adventurer is one of those cards. It cost $6. We bought it. Done. Scout, same deal.

Those two cards also had shorter lifespans than some. Scout was one of the 5 cards added to Intrigue to get it to 25 cards; Adventurer was from a batch of new cards after RGG took the game.

You get better at these things as you go along. Seaside is more polished than the main set and Intrigue; Prosperity is more polished than Seaside. Still if you ask why say Trade Route doesn't cost $2, the answer is, I didn't even consider it. It cost $3 and we bought it. I wanted to have no $2's in Prosperity, but I never thought, "I would make Trade Route cost $2 but I don't want any $2's."

Gradually the cost of a working card got more scrutiny, perhaps in part due to the weight of all of the published cards. In Adventures there's nothing that just got a free ride based on us buying it. Some of the fiddling around involved things like, how many $2's should there be, but e.g. Coin of the Realm cost $3 once, Dungeon cost $4. And it's not like you wouldn't buy them at those costs.

[ehunt]

After this thread I ran to the simulator to prove how y'all are laughably underestimating this card on Platinum/Colony boards, where, in the absence of a good engine, it's a strong buy.

Anyway, turns out I was wrong. Very wrong. Adventurer is not a very good card.

[Seprix]

Now I'm curious. Is there any strategy at all where Adventurer is just legit OP with a simulator?

[Doom_Shark]

It is pretty good with TR. As long as you've gotten rid of (most) coppers, it almost guarantees you a province. Same deal with KC, except it can ramp you up to province more easily, and if you've bought platinum, even to colony. And it (sort of) works with plaza and makes miser better. and for those of you who said you don't like miser, try opening miser-copper, then getting villages, draw power, and misers. But I'm getting off topic.

[theJester]

I remember seeing an expert game where winning strategy was opening Chapel/Chapel, quickly trashing starting cards, and using Platina-hunting Adventurer as a payload. I don't remember any specifcs, though.

I really like one thing with cards such as Adventurer or Harvest: while they're weak most of the time, it's all more fun and a challenge to find a board where they're actually great.

[Seprix]

I remember seeing an expert game where winning strategy was opening Chapel/Chapel, quickly trashing starting cards, and using Platina-hunting Adventurer as a payload. I don't remember any specifcs, though.

Weird! That sounds hilarious and fun.

I really like one thing with cards such as Adventurer or Harvest: while they're weak most of the time, it's all more fun and a challenge to find a board where they're actually great.

I know, right?

[tripwire]

I just posted in the Chancellor thread about the value of cards in the base set that help teach new players to become better players. I think Adventurer has the opposite effect.

It costs a lot so people assume that it must be good, and worst of all, it actually is good when you are a bad player. It can be a life saver when your money density has become too low because you've over-terminaled and greened too early. As a result, it can get in the way of recognizing the mistakes you're making.

I think this is what bothers me the most about the card.