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Author Topic: Let's Discuss Dark Ages: Rats  (Read 9051 times)

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Seprix

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Let's Discuss Dark Ages: Rats
« on: May 21, 2016, 08:35:05 pm »
+4


Rats
"Play menagerie, reveal a hand full of Rats."
                           -schadd


Remember that friend you had as a kid who went off and took karate lessons? You and him would be frolicking in the meadows or whatever weird things you both would do, and suddenly he wants to show you this cool move he learned from the dojo his recently divorced mother pours hundreds into. You oblige, and your friend tells you to attack him.

You do, and he protests that he couldn't defend against that at all, that you have to attack in a certain way instead, and that also you must slow down too. So being the kind attacker you are, you do as he asks, and after he only messes up the move twice, he does it right finally.

Well, it was a very neat trick. But if you were anything like me, you begin to wonder how useful this special move really is in a realistic setting.

Rats is that one karate move. Man, it's brimming with potential. Visions of Golds from Remodeled Rats dance in your head instead of something normal like sugar plums or that one weird pimple your 3rd grade teacher had. You set up all twenty Rats in your Kingdom, you get to buying that Rats card. You play it. You're so excited. You can hardly contain yourself. Weirdo.

Long story short, Rats sucks.
  • When is the best time to get Rats?
  • Is Rats Scout Bad, or is it only Curse bad?
  • Why are you even reading these questions, you know what Rats does.

for more reading on Rats: Werothegreat's Article [2012]
« Last Edit: May 22, 2016, 04:02:04 pm by Seprix »
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math

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Re: Let's Discuss Dark Ages: Rats
« Reply #1 on: May 22, 2016, 12:04:59 am »
0

Most of the times when I want Rats, I want lots of Rats.  Usually that means that I open with it and then get the Rats trasher as soon as possible.

When Dark Ages was first released, I thought Rats was a pretty good card, and I was surprised to see it so low on the community rankings.  Over time, I've come to agree; it's just not useful very often.

I still buy it occasionally, though.  The most notable occasions are with Upgrade and Apprentice; if either of those are in the kingdom, I will almost always buy Rats.  Salvager and Bishop aren't bad either, although the fact that they're terminal makes it harder to have the +1 Card be useful.  Death Cart/Rats is one of those things that seems good at first but never quite works (that's pretty much a description of Rats by itself, too).

The biggest problem with Rats is that it's almost always better to buy the trasher directly rather than turning your junk into Rats first.  The extra bonuses you get usually just aren't worth the additional junk card you need to trash and the waste of a $4 buy.

I've never had a chance to try Rats with Butcher.  It seems like it might have some potential; turning Rats into $4 or $5 actions and keeping the extra coin tokens could be worthwhile.
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Infthitbox

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Re: Let's Discuss Dark Ages: Rats
« Reply #2 on: May 22, 2016, 01:02:12 am »
+4

Apprentice, Butcher, Forge, Watchtower.

None of those compare, however, to that feeling I get when I buy Rats out of the Black Market.
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Re: Let's Discuss Dark Ages: Rats
« Reply #3 on: May 22, 2016, 01:26:28 am »
+1

I find winning with a Rats strategy very satisfying. Unfortunately, I usually end up losing but I frequently can't help trying. I guess it's a Rats trap.
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Titandrake

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Re: Let's Discuss Dark Ages: Rats
« Reply #4 on: May 22, 2016, 02:07:12 am »
+2

Let me pull up my most recent games where Rats got used.

http://gokosalvager.com/static/logprettifier.html?http://dominion-game-logs.s3.amazonaws.com/game_logs/20160412/log.0.1460442457031.txt

I buy Rats because the only trashers are Counterfeit and Graverobber. I buy Rats when I'm close to drawing my deck. My plan is to only use Rats on Shelters, then Graverob them into what I want, in this case Golds. Opponent resigns before I finish that plan.

http://gokosalvager.com/static/logprettifier.html?http://dominion-game-logs.s3.amazonaws.com/game_logs/20160318/log.0.1458288163449.txt

Opponent buys Rats. Man, what? The only trashers are Count and Farmland. I guess you can Count them away later, but that doesn't seem great because you have to lose your whole hand. It doesn't work out.

http://gokosalvager.com/static/logprettifier.html?http://dominion-game-logs.s3.amazonaws.com/game_logs/20160213/log.0.1455350222153.txt

Procession/Rats/Fortress with Butcher as a $5 cost. My god, those poor Rats. They bred, then got Processed into Butchers and Butchered into Provinces.

http://gokosalvager.com/static/logprettifier.html?http://dominion-game-logs.s3.amazonaws.com/game_logs/20151225/log.0.1451009808517.txt

There's Remake and good $5 costs. Looks like I buy an early Rats, use Rats to trash Copper/Curse while Remaking Estate -> Silver and Silver -> Herald, then Remake Rats -> Bandit Camp or Duchy. Good thing Remake cares about cost, it made turning junk into $4 cost cards worth it.

Rats is that card that's super tempting, because if it works, it tends to destroy other strategies in the fanciest way possible. Unfortunately, that means you usually lose with it.
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schadd

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Re: Let's Discuss Dark Ages: Rats
« Reply #5 on: May 22, 2016, 02:58:51 am »
+5

the best way to get people to post about a card everyone likes is to pretend that not everyone likes it.

http://www.gokosalvager.com/static/logprettifier.html?http://dominion-game-logs.s3.amazonaws.com/game_logs/20160512/log.0.1463093948534.txt

i thought, okay, scrying pool, rats, storeroom, and then what. it turned out, there didn't need to be another thing.

rats is fine. it doesn't actually need that much setup—the appeal it has over fortress is that you'll pretty quickly end up with a lot of them, whereas with fortress you need to get a few of em and wait a minute to make sure you can line it up with remake or whatever.

but yeah, i mean, pretty much all of the remodelers become power cards with rats. with upgrade you can expect to win the game on piles by like turn 11 or something, with remake you get to gain two $5s, develop gains village and wharf on top of your deck, forge can trash two of them to get a province. expand and graverobber don't care for it as much but that's arbitrarity for you.
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Re: Let's Discuss Dark Ages: Rats
« Reply #6 on: May 22, 2016, 04:12:01 am »
0

Rats/Bot: the best combo of Dominion, since Androminion.

I don't have much experience with Rats, having never owned Dark Ages. But the few times I went for them, it turned out allright. I like them.
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Re: Let's Discuss Dark Ages: Rats
« Reply #7 on: May 22, 2016, 08:45:09 am »
0

I tried to use them yesterday. I think I bought my salvager too late. Because it was a port board I thought it could be useful. I was wrong. It was only a 5/3 split on the provinces though, so maybe better implementation could have worked.
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Seprix

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Re: Let's Discuss Dark Ages: Rats
« Reply #8 on: May 22, 2016, 04:00:46 pm »
0

new update: Added a further reading section. I also did this with the other Dark Ages post, and I may eventually get around to updating all of my written Let's Discuss cards.
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werothegreat

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Re: Let's Discuss Dark Ages: Rats
« Reply #9 on: May 22, 2016, 04:14:06 pm »
0

new update: Added a further reading section. I also did this with the other Dark Ages post, and I may eventually get around to updating all of my written Let's Discuss cards.

Do you have a particular order you're going for with these, or are you just picking them at random?
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Seprix

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Re: Let's Discuss Dark Ages: Rats
« Reply #10 on: May 22, 2016, 04:16:20 pm »
0

new update: Added a further reading section. I also did this with the other Dark Ages post, and I may eventually get around to updating all of my written Let's Discuss cards.

Do you have a particular order you're going for with these, or are you just picking them at random?

I'm trying to pick more interesting ones first, and I'll probably find a day to do all the boring ones. Thankfully, most of Dark Ages is NOT boring.

I also have a nagging urge to update all of the LD threads with the Elestan style (as I now call it), but I have no control over that obviously.
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Davio

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Re: Let's Discuss Dark Ages: Rats
« Reply #11 on: May 23, 2016, 04:43:40 am »
+1

Apprentice, Butcher, Forge, Watchtower.

None of those compare, however, to that feeling I get when I buy Rats out of the Black Market.
There should be a list of banned BM cards, because this is just silly.
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Haddock

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Re: Let's Discuss Dark Ages: Rats
« Reply #12 on: May 23, 2016, 07:03:46 am »
0

This was a suitably ridiculous Rats-heavy game I played a while back.  I've never seen a kingdom with as much TfB support, I don't think.

http://gokosalvager.com/static/logprettifier.html?http://dominion-game-logs.s3.amazonaws.com/game_logs/20160503/log.0.1462306395484.txt

I probably played it horribly wrong, but it was hella fun.
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Jack Rudd

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Re: Let's Discuss Dark Ages: Rats
« Reply #13 on: May 23, 2016, 08:01:27 am »
0

There should be a list of banned BM cards, because this is just silly.
I don't always play physical games with Black Market...

...but when I do, I make sure the Black Market doesn't contain

Cultist
Fairgrounds
Fool's Gold
Knights
Magpie
Page
Peasant
Peddler
Port
Rats
Tournament
Transmute
Treasure Map

(This list is probably not exhaustive and will probably increase tremendously with Empires. Also, it is meaningless until I actually get a Black Market.)
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Chris is me

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Re: Let's Discuss Dark Ages: Rats
« Reply #14 on: May 23, 2016, 08:24:28 am »
0

There's nothing wrong with Rats in the black market deck though? It just becomes a sweet $4 Junk Dealer lite. That's like most of the times when I buy Rats, since Remodelers aren't mega common.

Really looking forward to my first game with both Rats and Transmogrify though. Start with a 6 card hand and whatever engine component up to $5 you want.
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Accatitippi

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Re: Let's Discuss Dark Ages: Rats
« Reply #15 on: May 23, 2016, 08:41:14 am »
0

There should be a list of banned BM cards, because this is just silly.
I don't always play physical games with Black Market...

...but when I do, I make sure the Black Market doesn't contain

Cultist
Fairgrounds
Fool's Gold
Knights
Magpie
Page
Peasant
Peddler
Port
Rats
Tournament
Transmute
Treasure Map

(This list is probably not exhaustive and will probably increase tremendously with Empires. Also, it is meaningless until I actually get a Black Market.)

To avoid going too far off topic, I replied here:
http://forum.dominionstrategy.com/index.php?topic=15518.new#new
 :)
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Re: Let's Discuss Dark Ages: Rats
« Reply #16 on: May 23, 2016, 09:06:38 am »
+1

Is Rats/Remake a thing? I tried it a few times without much support and looked like Lord Bottington everytime.
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Re: Let's Discuss Dark Ages: Rats
« Reply #17 on: May 23, 2016, 09:10:20 am »
0

Rats isn't bad it just needs support that is not uncommon.
Rats, man its a good card.
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brokoli

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Re: Let's Discuss Dark Ages: Rats
« Reply #18 on: May 23, 2016, 09:17:16 am »
0

Rats is such a well designed card.
I remember the first days of Dark Ages, some people thought that card would be the worst card ever. It turns out that Rats are fine, you only need something else to combo rats with, and that something else appear in a reasonnable amount of games.

I think usually, Rats + Another trasher (when well played) is a little bit faster than the other trasher only. Ok, Chapel clearly don't need rats, but for something like steward or amulet, the answer is not that simple. Rats being a cantrip, it pair nicely with other trashers, you don't fear terminal collision.
So, if Upgrade is in the kingdom, I would often open Rats in 4/3. In 5/2, I will maybe skip rats and go for upgrade directly, but not always because upgrading rats is such a good move. If Junk dealer is in the kingdom instead of upgrade, I would more often skip rats because the fact junk dealer is not a remodeler makes a really big difference.
Also, Rats by itself trashes only 1 card, so you can still build your deck while trashing. It's not like other trasher where you always end up with $2 or $3 buys. With rats, you easily hit $5. Of course, at some point you can end up with crappy hands full of rats, but that doesn't happen early game, at least not before the third reshuffle. So, before being stuck with rats, you can prepare the following of the game, getting that other trasher and maybe some villages if that other trasher is terminal.

Also, I love forging two rats into province.
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Seprix

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Re: Let's Discuss Dark Ages: Rats
« Reply #19 on: May 23, 2016, 10:37:38 am »
0

Rats is such a well designed card.
I remember the first days of Dark Ages, some people thought that card would be the worst card ever. It turns out that Rats are fine, you only need something else to combo rats with, and that something else appear in a reasonnable amount of games.

I think usually, Rats + Another trasher (when well played) is a little bit faster than the other trasher only. Ok, Chapel clearly don't need rats, but for something like steward or amulet, the answer is not that simple. Rats being a cantrip, it pair nicely with other trashers, you don't fear terminal collision.
So, if Upgrade is in the kingdom, I would often open Rats in 4/3. In 5/2, I will maybe skip rats and go for upgrade directly, but not always because upgrading rats is such a good move. If Junk dealer is in the kingdom instead of upgrade, I would more often skip rats because the fact junk dealer is not a remodeler makes a really big difference.
Also, Rats by itself trashes only 1 card, so you can still build your deck while trashing. It's not like other trasher where you always end up with $2 or $3 buys. With rats, you easily hit $5. Of course, at some point you can end up with crappy hands full of rats, but that doesn't happen early game, at least not before the third reshuffle. So, before being stuck with rats, you can prepare the following of the game, getting that other trasher and maybe some villages if that other trasher is terminal.

Also, I love forging two rats into province.

The problem is that Rats doesn't actually "trash" at all. Yes it does technically, but it really just replaces a card with itself. If you have a Trash for benefit card like Forager, Rats *might* be okay to get, as you draw another card. Remake/Rats is alright, but it can't really be all that strong. The big card is Upgrade, which is Fantastic with Rats. You're also spending $4 on Rats instead of something else useful.
« Last Edit: May 23, 2016, 10:38:57 am by Seprix »
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Donald X.

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Re: Let's Discuss Dark Ages: Rats
« Reply #20 on: May 23, 2016, 03:36:39 pm »
+7

Apprentice, Butcher, Forge, Watchtower.

None of those compare, however, to that feeling I get when I buy Rats out of the Black Market.
There should be a list of banned BM cards, because this is just silly.
I don't think there's room on the card.
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ackmondual

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Re: Let's Discuss Dark Ages: Rats
« Reply #21 on: May 24, 2016, 12:53:10 am »
+5

There needs to be a promo card specifically designed to deal with Rats!.... Cats!
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Re: Let's Discuss Dark Ages: Rats
« Reply #22 on: May 24, 2016, 03:22:02 am »
0

A scrying pool/rats is best synergy there, if there is payload that you dont have to rely on silvers in economy using them gets you to drawing your deck in several turns even if there are curser on board and no other trashing.

Then there is transmorgify/rats which is sorta broken as one can first transmorgify rats into two more transmorgifies and then to 5 costs while you keep/increase hand sizes.
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