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[Asklepios]

Alright... lets presume that you draw $5 on your first hand and Mandarin is on the board, plus whatever kingdom cards you want.

One option you now have is to buy a Mandarin, then to buy abother $5 card.

Which card is going to give the best outcome here, and on what sort of board?

Personally, I'm thinking that if the optimal lucky situation is with Hunting Parties on a board that has no extra buys and no curses. Reason being is that odds are you'll be able to skip silver, go straight to gold, then just buy:
$6 for first time: 1 gold.
$5+ otherwise: Hunting Party
$8: Province
Any other situation: Don't buy.

The idea is that once you draw Mandarin and it'll take you to $8, you then play it to put a spare hunting party back on the deck, or even a spare copper.

What do you think?

More generally, on a $5/$5 Mandarin opening, what combos would YOU think would work?

((Edit: After suggesting the above combo have tried it out a few times, and I can't seem to get it to work... Maybe a second gold is needed? Or a silver? Or maybe just some trashing...)

[Davio]

Maybe Governor?

[Asklepios]

Mandarin/Governor seems pretty good. Is it better than just Governor/$2 though?

[DStu]

More generally, on a $5/$5 Mandarin opening, what combos would YOU think would work?

Not many...
http://councilroom.com/openings?card=Mandarin

Maybe I would think about Mandarin/Potion->Familiar if I start 5/2.

[Asklepios]

More generally, on a $5/$5 Mandarin opening, what combos would YOU think would work?

Not many...
http://councilroom.com/openings?card=Mandarin

Maybe I would think about Mandarin/Potion->Familiar if I start 5/2.

Ouch!

I wonder though, if these stats are skewed by several factors.

First, I suspect, many decent players regard Mandarin as a liability so avoid it, while many weak or average players buy anything just to try out cards. That might well result in Mandarin being played with less skill.

Second, I think a 5/2 split coming up where there isn't a better 5/2 starting option available are rare.

Having said that, I'm sure there must be a good 5/5 use for this card. Its just a case of working out what that is!

[Anon79]

Open Mandarin/Mandarin/Inn on a Forge board.

[DStu]

Ouch!

I wonder though, if these stats are skewed by several factors.

Yeah, I think that is true. Madarin/HP as you said should work quite well, it loses against HP/Baron but that of course is very good itself. It's still Level0 on this list, which probably is because you have to play it very consequent and not get distracted by shiny other cards.

But I don't see many others. The point is, either there are good $5s to start with, which are usually terminals themselves. Then you don't want another slow terminal Gold, because they collide and you can take fewer of the other $5s. The non-terminal $5s are usually not really good at the start.

Mint comes to my mind, which such a card which you normally don't want to start with because something is missing (like HP). Mandarin->Mint gives you a deck of 3 Estates, 2 Coppers, 1 Mint, 1 Mandarin. If from there there is some good continuation that profits from a small deck, that's might be worth a try.

[chwhite]

Mandarin/Mandarin/(Mandarin?)/Apprentice is the only one I'd be likely to actually go for.

[Asklepios]

Mandarin/Mint did cross my mind, though I wonder how good an idea that is, as you still need to get to gold to have something worth minting, and you'll still need to buy a silver to get to that stage.

Multi-mandarin followed by Apprentice is kind of cool, I agree, but if we're just getting Mandarins to trash for benefit, I wonder if +5 cards is really going to do much in such an unformed deck. I guess the turn following that chain would be a gold.

If we're on Mandarin chaining followed by Trash for Benefit though, do you think there's any mileage from chaining Mandarin a load of times, then taking a bishop and gunning for three piles plus VP counters?

[DStu]

Mandarin/Mint did cross my mind, though I wonder how good an idea that is, as you still need to get to gold to have something worth minting, and you'll still need to buy a silver to get to that stage.

I don't think its a good idea for BigMoney, the Mint is more a "I trash 5 Copper for a Mint"-move. So you now have a pretty slim deck, which additionally has great potential for trash-for-benefit (bonus to keep in mind). Can you do something with this slim deck? Big Money will take quite long and will then be quite volunable to greening, but add a Salvager or Apprentice or Remodel, and some (maybe Cantrip-)engine to built, Mandarin/Mint might be a good move.
It's in no way a non-brainer...

[ackack]

Mandarin/Mint did cross my mind, though I wonder how good an idea that is, as you still need to get to gold to have something worth minting, and you'll still need to buy a silver to get to that stage.

It's not bad, although usually when I'm playing it it's because the 5/2 options are not at all appealing.

[Fabian]

Mandarin/Mint/nothing as an opener on 5/2 seems to be losing to big money (on 4/3). It does beat BM when it opens 5/2 though, so I guess if there's literally no better strategy on the board and you open 5/2, Mandarin/Mint/nothing is preferrable to Silver/nothing at least. Either way, I'm not exactly convinced.

[LastFootnote]

I'm not certain of this, but it seems to me like a Mandarin/Hunting Party/nothing opening should work, assuming that you play your Mandarin well. Before Hinterlands (and the advent of Mandarin and especially Farmland), I would often unthinkingly play out by hand-size increasing cards first (unless I was trying to manipulate my shuffle timing, etc. If you already have enough money in hand to buy the car you want ($5 for a Hunting Party, $8 for a Province, etc.) without needing to play out all your Hunting Parties, use Mandarin to put one back onto your deck to give your next turn a boost.

It seems like a smart idea in theory, anyway. I haven't played enough games with Mandarin available to claim this with certainty.

[Smartie]

Inn and mandarin sounds good since one can draw, and the other puts back into the deck 

[Davio]

I'm not certain of this, but it seems to me like a Mandarin/Hunting Party/nothing opening should work, assuming that you play your Mandarin well. Before Hinterlands (and the advent of Mandarin and especially Farmland), I would often unthinkingly play out by hand-size increasing cards first (unless I was trying to manipulate my shuffle timing, etc. If you already have enough money in hand to buy the car you want ($5 for a Hunting Party, $8 for a Province, etc.) without needing to play out all your Hunting Parties, use Mandarin to put one back onto your deck to give your next turn a boost.

It seems like a smart idea in theory, anyway. I haven't played enough games with Mandarin available to claim this with certainty.

My not very scientific solitaire game clears out 8 Provinces in 18 turns with Mandarin/Hunting Party/Crossroads.
End result: 7 Coppers, 1 Gold, 5 HPs, 2 CRs, 1 Mandarin, NO Silvers.

[Asklepios]

I'm not certain of this, but it seems to me like a Mandarin/Hunting Party/nothing opening should work, assuming that you play your Mandarin well. Before Hinterlands (and the advent of Mandarin and especially Farmland), I would often unthinkingly play out by hand-size increasing cards first (unless I was trying to manipulate my shuffle timing, etc. If you already have enough money in hand to buy the car you want ($5 for a Hunting Party, $8 for a Province, etc.) without needing to play out all your Hunting Parties, use Mandarin to put one back onto your deck to give your next turn a boost.

It seems like a smart idea in theory, anyway. I haven't played enough games with Mandarin available to claim this with certainty.

On my practice games (a pain in the ass to do, as you need to restart till you get a $5 opening) I found that the main problem was that you rarely have two hunting parties in hand when you draw mandarin, as you don't tend to draw hunting party from hunting party unless its the last one in your hand...

It just didn't seem to pan out

[Asklepios]

My not very scientific solitaire game clears out 8 Provinces in 18 turns with Mandarin/Hunting Party/Crossroads.
End result: 7 Coppers, 1 Gold, 5 HPs, 2 CRs, 1 Mandarin, NO Silvers.

Crossroads. Hmmm. That could work. Will try it myself

[ackack]

Mandarin/Mint/nothing as an opener on 5/2 seems to be losing to big money (on 4/3). It does beat BM when it opens 5/2 though, so I guess if there's literally no better strategy on the board and you open 5/2, Mandarin/Mint/nothing is preferrable to Silver/nothing at least. Either way, I'm not exactly convinced.

Yeah, I think my memories are probably out of whack on this one. I've had them together 3 times (would have guessed it was more) and twice used it as an opening. In one case it nearly saved me against a JoaT/Fishing Village open - using 5/2 on JoaT/nothing seemed like a losing proposition so I gambled on Mandarin/Mint. It worked really well - I still got to 4 Provinces in 14 turns despite the delayed JoaT - but then JoaT and Fishing Village are practically ideal complements to that plan. The other game I played with it I have literally no idea what my plan was, as I appeared to be neglecting a Torturer/Farming Village setup.

[^_^_^_^]

http://dominion.isotropic.org/gamelog/201201/27/game-20120127-145537-027d5630.html

This is semi-off topic but I found a use for mandarin that doesn't involve using it as an opening, but as a main component of a King's Court chain. With 2 KCs, along with Mandarin and a Young Witch being the only targets of the KCs; I was able to get quick, easy golds where otherwise I might've just given my opponent 3 curses and had to wish for a lucky $8 draw after 3 Young Witch draw/discards(often leaving with $6-7 at most, rarely ever with $8). The Mandarin allows for you to get at least 1-2 "free" Provinces when combined with 1 KC in your hand. The key being to buy only a couple KCs and only 1-3 Mandarins so as not to end up with clashing KCs or Mandarins(possibility of 3 clashing is doubtful).

However, I am only level 19 so I may be completely wrong. I believe that KC/Mandarin is a great strategy and together with some other +Draw actions(lab, HP, etc.) you may be called a cheater (by your opponent who didn't see this combo ) for getting $9 from 1 card every turn. Only draw back is that KCing a Mandarin without having drawn other cards first will net you ONLY $9 from that turn. This means that in a Colony game there better be something like Tournament to get other useful cards or some "+2 cards"(or more if possible) actions or else you will be buying Provinces, not Colonies each time you use Mandarin. This makes Mandarin a good early-mid game card in Colony games but when the VP rush starts that Mandarin needs to be trashed or it may generate some problems, plus you need a back up plan for using the KC.

-Again, do not take this all for granted unless confirmed by a higher level player than I.

[HiveMindEmulator]

I think Madarin/Mint into a Mint/money deck is a bad idea, but it can perhaps lead into some good stuff with trash-for-benefit cards. For example, you could use Remake or Salvager to knock out your estates and turn the Mandarin into a mint-able Gold. Or you can grab a Bishop and work on a late "golden deck" with a few bonus points from trashing the $5 cards...

[Jorbles]

http://dominion.isotropic.org/gamelog/201201/27/game-20120127-145537-027d5630.html

This is semi-off topic but I found a use for mandarin that doesn't involve using it as an opening, but as a main component of a King's Court chain. With 2 KCs, along with Mandarin and a Young Witch being the only targets of the KCs; I was able to get quick, easy golds where otherwise I might've just given my opponent 3 curses and had to wish for a lucky $8 draw after 3 Young Witch draw/discards(often leaving with $6-7 at most, rarely ever with $8). The Mandarin allows for you to get at least 1-2 "free" Provinces when combined with 1 KC in your hand. The key being to buy only a couple KCs and only 1-3 Mandarins so as not to end up with clashing KCs or Mandarins(possibility of 3 clashing is doubtful).

However, I am only level 19 so I may be completely wrong. I believe that KC/Mandarin is a great strategy and together with some other +Draw actions(lab, HP, etc.) you may be called a cheater (by your opponent who didn't see this combo ) for getting $9 from 1 card every turn. Only draw back is that KCing a Mandarin without having drawn other cards first will net you ONLY $9 from that turn. This means that in a Colony game there better be something like Tournament to get other useful cards or some "+2 cards"(or more if possible) actions or else you will be buying Provinces, not Colonies each time you use Mandarin. This makes Mandarin a good early-mid game card in Colony games but when the VP rush starts that Mandarin needs to be trashed or it may generate some problems, plus you need a back up plan for using the KC.

-Again, do not take this all for granted unless confirmed by a higher level player than I.

This isn't terrible, but it's not great either. If it's on its own (with no draw support) you end up top decking the remaining three cards in your hand onto your deck, which is even worse than getting hit with a Ghost Ship. As with a Ghost Ship this might be good sometimes, but it's going to force you to draw your crap twice. If you use it with card drawers (let's say a Lab) in hopes of setting up some sort of super turn you need to draw enough cards before you KC the Mandarin that you can then redraw the cards you topdecked by saving Labs after. Seems terrible to me. Plus you need +buys to take advantage of it. I'd say in general you'd be better off KCing your drawer or if you want a comparative card that nets you $9 you'd be better off KCing a Horse Traders.

In that game specifically you had it locked down when your opponent decided to just take let you give him all the curses. Personally I probably would have tried to run some sort of Remake supported Venture variant on that board.

[WanderingWinder]

One use for Mandarin is in over-greened endgames. Once you get up to $5, a) you can buy it every turn, forcing a third pile in... admittedly probably too long a wait unless you're VERY over-green, but more importantly, b) use it to store your golds/silvers until you draw that last bit of money you need.

[Empathy]

mandarin/remake (not sure what the optimal number of mandarins is though.)

[thespaceinvader]

Mandarin/Mandarin/Mandarin/Mandarin/.../Apprentice   Or several other TFB cards including, as suggested, remake.

[DG]

Mandarin/tactician might open possibilities with the right kingdom.

[ratxt1]

Mandarin/Mandarin/(Mandarin?)/Apprentice is the only one I'd be likely to actually go for.

just tested this out even with out a 5/5 split this is really fast on a colony board. The strategy being on your first 5 dollar buy, get 3 or 4 mandarins and than an apprentice than go BM apprentice. you can get 4 colonies under 20 turns pretty easily without trashing colonies.

[WanderingWinder]

Mandarin/Mandarin/(Mandarin?)/Apprentice is the only one I'd be likely to actually go for.

just tested this out even with out a 5/5 split this is really fast on a colony board. The strategy being on your first 5 dollar buy, get 3 or 4 mandarins and than an apprentice than go BM apprentice. you can get 4 colonies under 20 turns pretty easily without trashing colonies.

Which is pretty good but not like super great. I'd probably want 3 Mandarins.

[ehunt]

M/m/inn on a board with a high power seven was mentioned above, but I think the math doesn't work - you get 6 if you draw the inn (handsize reduction means you can't play both mandarins and keep a copper) and 4 if you don't.

[ratxt1]

Which is pretty good but not like super great. I'd probably want 3 Mandarins.

yea it isn't super good but it was faster than i expected.

[Anon79]

M/m/inn on a board with a high power seven was mentioned above, but I think the math doesn't work - you get 6 if you draw the inn (handsize reduction means you can't play both mandarins and keep a copper) and 4 if you don't.

The 6 buys a Gold, I was not implying that you can purchase the Forge on the first reshuffle. It's just that Forge then has an easy time matching both 5+3 (Mandarin + Silvers) & 6+2 (Gold + Estates), and you can start greening immediately upon getting the Forge and maybe even before getting the Forge.

[rinkworks]

More generally, on a $5/$5 Mandarin opening, what combos would YOU think would work?

Not many...
http://councilroom.com/openings?card=Mandarin

Maybe I would think about Mandarin/Potion->Familiar if I start 5/2.

Ouch!

I wonder though, if these stats are skewed by several factors.

First, I suspect, many decent players regard Mandarin as a liability so avoid it, while many weak or average players buy anything just to try out cards. That might well result in Mandarin being played with less skill.

I think you're right, and not only because Mandarin/Feast is listed as one of the better Mandarin openings.

[WanderingWinder]

More generally, on a $5/$5 Mandarin opening, what combos would YOU think would work?

Not many...
http://councilroom.com/openings?card=Mandarin

Maybe I would think about Mandarin/Potion->Familiar if I start 5/2.

Ouch!

I wonder though, if these stats are skewed by several factors.

First, I suspect, many decent players regard Mandarin as a liability so avoid it, while many weak or average players buy anything just to try out cards. That might well result in Mandarin being played with less skill.

I think you're right, and not only because Mandarin/Feast is listed as one of the better Mandarin openings.

Ironically, Mandarin is actually a card which gives you a reason to buy a feast with $5. When you feast a mandarin, those coppers don't get stuffed back on your deck.

[Davio]

Just tried Mandarin/Festival/Pawn.

Worked out pretty well against a BMU-esque deck.

[ycz6]

Mandarin/tactician might open possibilities with the right kingdom.

Mandarin/Tactician/Secret Chamber, perhaps? With a village on the board this could set up double-Tactician crazy fast.

[Loschmidt]

Mandarin/tactician might open possibilities with the right kingdom.

Mandarin/Tactician/Secret Chamber, perhaps? With a village on the board this could set up double-Tactician crazy fast.

I got a 2/5 split in this game with Mandarin on the board and I thought about this thread:

http://dominion.isotropic.org/gamelog/201202/28/game-20120228-195006-3698861e.html

Mandarin, Market and Tactician were on the board. So I opened Mandarin/Mandarin/Tactician. First time I've ever tried to set up a Double Tactican deck but I managed to get it to work for a few turns running. As I was doing it I realised that Mandarin/Mandarin/Market would probably have been better, because you need at least 5 markets (it was the only action as money besides mandarin) to be able to buy a province  ever turn and still fit in the tactician (5xMarket+Mandarin+Tactician)

Anyway with better support on the board I think Mandarin/Tactician would be pretty super quick

[jomini]

I haven't actually tried any of these, having generally avoided mandarin, but how do the following sound?

1. Mandarin/upgrade on a goons board. The idea being to either get mandarin with the upgrade for an early goons or to use the mandarin to buy upgrades & goons.
2. Mandarin/library/hamlet, basically setting up a disappearing cash & cards library deck on the quick. Possibly this might work better with two mandarins and then a library.
3. Mandarin/Mandarin/Hamlet on a menage board. The idea being to set up a quick menage engine from selective discarding & top decking with some disappearing coin.
4. Mandarin/Governor on a forge or KC board. The idea being to either remodel the mandarin into the 7 coin power card or to use a 7 card hand with the mandarin to buy the big card.

[Asklepios]

Nice thoughts.

Actually I'm thinking Mandarin (x1 to x3) followed by an Upgrade could be pretty decent, as even if you can't immediately upgrade the Mandarins you're thinning the deck to get closer into doing so. A quick gold can be pretty valuable.

Mandarin, then Upgrade, then Big Money seems pretty solid to me, perhaps even avoiding buying silvers at any time. Andif you hit $5 again you could even buy later Mandarins, safe in the knowledge that you have means to dispose of them.

[Fabian]

I'm open to the possibility that I'm dead wrong and my hatred for Mandarin openings just shows how little I understand about this game, but opening Mandarin/Mandarin/Mandarin/Upgrade and then upgrading a Mandarin into a Gold (best case scenario) on turn 5 isn't a "quick gold". In my mind, in nearly all these scenarios you're losing a turn to put a card in your deck you don't want.

1. Upgrade/nothing seems a lot better to me the times your opening buys don't immediately collide, which is pretty often.
2. I guess there's something brilliant in putting terrible cards back on the deck so you can draw them again. I'd suggest Library/Hamlet is better so you can keep playing (hopefully good) action cards after the Library, though. And, not draw that Estate twice and stuff.
3. If there's no better $5 cards around, I guess this could beat BM on some boards? Or better $4 cards. Or just Silver maybe. Again there's something brilliant in going through lots of trouble setting up sweet Menagerie draws so you can draw those Estates again.
4. Governor/nothing seems good here. Forge is probably a joke on a Governor board, KC is probably too slow a fair amount of the time unless (again) your openers happen to collide immediately, and if they don't, you've wasted a turn and have a bad card in your deck.

I mean, like with nearly everything, I'm sure there's corner cases where these cards come up, and no other card in the kingdom makes anything else viable, and it might actually be good. But it seems to me that this would be pretty rare. Or, I'm just dead wrong about Mandarin of course. Anyway, rereading this it might come off as harsh, I didn't mean it like that and I hope you don't take it like that.

[kn1tt3r]

I'm open to the possibility that I'm dead wrong and my hatred for Mandarin openings just shows how little I understand about this game, but opening Mandarin/Mandarin/Mandarin/Upgrade and then upgrading a Mandarin into a Gold (best case scenario) on turn 5 isn't a "quick gold". In my mind, in nearly all these scenarios you're losing a turn to put a card in your deck you don't want.

I tend to agree. Opening Silver/Silver you also got a decent chance of such an early Gold, AND you still have your opening buys, which you sacrifice (= waste) completely with this Mandarin thing.

[RisingJaguar]

I don't know if this has ever been talked about, but theoretically mandarin + Mint/FG can't be that bad.  I suppose you're setting yourself up for 6/4 loss, but I think it works quite nicely with FG. 

1. It provides the $3 for two FG collision totaling to $8 easier as opposed to waiting for 3 FG to collide. 
2. Has the courtyard properties to set up FG together.  This allows mandarin and 1 FG hand to move the FG to next hand.  If there's mandarin and 3FG, you can move a FG to next turn. 
3. The opening isn't so luck base, you can gain FG more consistently (mandarin and moving Mint/FG early to be together). 
4. It's probably not bad as a late buy either (off-topic). 

With all of this said, you waste a turn, and that turn is HUGE.  This is also a very corner case, but I am curious.

[DG]

Simulator says delay the mandarin purchase until you want to return two fool's gold to the draw deck mid game. It goes wrong by playing the mandarin with a hand of mint/fool's gold/mandarin but that's bad for mandarin regardless.

[AJD]

Mandarin/Mint opening with Venture on the board also has possibilities.

[jomini]

I'm open to the possibility that I'm dead wrong and my hatred for Mandarin openings just shows how little I understand about this game, but opening Mandarin/Mandarin/Mandarin/Upgrade and then upgrading a Mandarin into a Gold (best case scenario) on turn 5 isn't a "quick gold". In my mind, in nearly all these scenarios you're losing a turn to put a card in your deck you don't want.

1. Upgrade/nothing seems a lot better to me the times your opening buys don't immediately collide, which is pretty often.
2. I guess there's something brilliant in putting terrible cards back on the deck so you can draw them again. I'd suggest Library/Hamlet is better so you can keep playing (hopefully good) action cards after the Library, though. And, not draw that Estate twice and stuff.
3. If there's no better $5 cards around, I guess this could beat BM on some boards? Or better $4 cards. Or just Silver maybe. Again there's something brilliant in going through lots of trouble setting up sweet Menagerie draws so you can draw those Estates again.
4. Governor/nothing seems good here. Forge is probably a joke on a Governor board, KC is probably too slow a fair amount of the time unless (again) your openers happen to collide immediately, and if they don't, you've wasted a turn and have a bad card in your deck.

I mean, like with nearly everything, I'm sure there's corner cases where these cards come up, and no other card in the kingdom makes anything else viable, and it might actually be good. But it seems to me that this would be pretty rare. Or, I'm just dead wrong about Mandarin of course. Anyway, rereading this it might come off as harsh, I didn't mean it like that and I hope you don't take it like that.

I don't think upgrade/nothing works out as well as Mandarin/Upgrade/nothing. Here's why.

Upgrade/null has a 4% chance of getting a second upgrade on T3 and less than an 8% chance of picking it up on T4. The only way to get a second upgrade is to draw exactly 5 coppers. Otherwise, you out of luck and buying silver unless you have another good card at 3 or 4. Until T5, there is a 0% chance of getting a goons.

Mandarin/Upgrade/Null has many ways to get high power cards on T4:
1. It can also hit 5 coppers - which unlike Upgrade/null means next turn you likely will be able to get something good (maybe even a third upgrade).
2. It can hit 2c/mandarin/whatever - a very statistically likely hand that gets you an upgrade.
3. It can hit mandarin/upgrade and get a killer early goons.
4. It can hit 3c/Mandarin/whatever and get a goons

I could be wrong on this, but I think Mandarin/Upgrade would lose tempo early to upgrade/nothing, but gain it back later through the purchase of additional upgrades or by upgrading the mandarin to a killer six coin card (i.e. goons).

For Mandarin/Library vs hamlet/library, yes you draw a "crappy" card again, but you have gotten 3 coin for the privilege. Hamlet/Library needs some a strong source of cash and playing Mandarin eats an action, lets you draw one additional card (to replace the mandarin), and takes an action. So if you have the actions, then Mandarin's next effect in library/hamlet engine is -1 action, +3 coins, +1 card. That is not bad. It is no worse than any other terminal silver you'd spam in a library/hamlet engine to keep the draw coming and argueably better if there is any trashing (e.g. forge or spice merchant) as you can double dip on cards to put back (e.g. play hamlet, mandarin, library, hamlet, mandarin and place the same estate back twice). Forge in particular would tempt me mandarin/lib/hamlet as I can quickly forge to a gold and toss all but a few coppers in one go.

3. So you draw the estate (more likely copper) again? Who cares? You now have +3 coin and +2 more cards. Yeah it isn't as good as festival, but playing you'd move through your deck more quickly, and get up to 8 without buying golds (though I'd likely get one).

4. Governor/KC is blindingly amazing. It's almost as good as hitting a TM (yeah I know the other players get silvers, the golds go into your discard, etc. - it still is almost that good). As an added bonus late game, anyone looking to remodel their gold into a province has to worry that you will remodel a KC into a province as well. KC/Mandarin is an assured province or plat; and you can get cards out of your hand and still play it. My only real question is, will governor/nothing be faster than the Mandarin. Like with upgrade you lose a turn, like with upgrade you have many more options on T4 to hit KC. Forge and governor work quite well togethor; the only real trouble is the opportunity cost of forge. Your opponents will likely increase your size, send you silver etc. and you can then forge silver + governor into a province or silver + estate into more governors.

[PerdHapley]

What I'm most curious about with Mandarin opens is $5 treasures, specifically Royal Seal and IGG. As far as IGG goes, in a 5/2 split I would think it could be a pretty awesome choice of opening terminal while still handing the opponent a curse before the first reshuffle, but I've never seen a set where this was actually a possibility. Has anyone tried this in practice?

And for Royal Seal, it seems right to me that in situations where you would already want to open RS then going Mandarin first would be practically automatic. For some reason I feel like I've seen this one a number of times and go for it without even thinking. The only sample game I could find is this one (http://councilroom.com/game?game_id=game-20120229-225011-b96bde07.html), where there are about a million other things going on and Mandarin is only a real force in the endgame. It certainly didn't hurt though, and I was happy to already have it when we got to that point. Related side note: this card can be an absolute beast in King's Court games if you set it up properly.

And, just throwing it out there, TFB stuff like remake and apprentice has been brought up a bunch already, but what about as a supplement to Chapel? Say, in the absence of cursing and with something like Festival/Bazaar/etc..

[^_^_^_^]

I wonder how often Mandarin was played in Donald X.'s testing, and how was it used?

[PerdHapley]

I wonder how often Mandarin was played in Donald X.'s testing, and how was it used?

A ton, I am sure. Play-testing for this game is pretty extensive, and Mandarin was one of the first cards Donald himself highlighted when previewing the set. It's one of the things that makes Hinterlands such an interesting set overall: many of the cards in it gave drastically different first impressions. Go look at the initial discussion of JoaT and IGG if you want a nice laugh. The community did pretty quickly figure those cards out, but Mandarin, along with, in my opinion, Develop, another underrated and frequently misused card, is still far from being well understood by even the top players. And the set came out MONTHS ago. I'm sure Donald's team had really good reasons for keeping it around, and they probably spent much more time collectively figuring out its uses than we have.

Seriously, it makes me wonder if Donald browses threads like this one and laughs at all of us. I hope that when Iso is gone and every expansion has been released he starts showing up on the official app and thoroughly crushing everyone.

[Fabian]

Perd,

Looking forward to you crushing everyone with any sweet Mandarin/x/x/x/x/x opening in the near future! Also Develop.

To be clear, if I had to put money on Donald+team being sort of decentish players vs super mega gods, I'd put my money on the former.

[PerdHapley]

Perd,

Looking forward to you crushing everyone with any sweet Mandarin/x/x/x/x/x opening in the near future! Also Develop.

To be clear, if I had to put money on Donald+team being sort of decentish players vs super mega gods, I'd put my money on the former.

Fair enough. I think you may be slightly exaggerating things though - the less wordy version of my point is that there is still possibly a lot of potential in these oddball cards and that the game's creator is probably more aware of that than we are. Whatever the rest of his team is like, I would bet that Donald, at least, is an excellent player.

It's not like I'm saying Mandarin/Develop are secretly incredible cards, just maybe not quite as bad as their reputations.

And whatever totally dominant Mandarin/x/x/x/x strategies there are out there, don't get your hopes up that I'll do something stupid next time we play  .... or at least, not on purpose

[jonts26]

Since Donald already had a good deal of the cards created before the base set was even released, you also need to keep cards in mind from future expansions which can potentially improve their effectiveness. Many cards have jumped or fallen in general effectiveness with the release of new expansions.

Maybe mandarin and develop have super combos with cards from Dark Ages.

[Fabian]

Perd,

I would agree there's still possibly a lot of potential in those oddball cards. I would disagree Donald probably knows more about it than the top players on this forum (baseless speculation is fun!)

As for my own opinion, I think both Mandarin and Develop certainly have their uses (and maybe more potential!), but both are generally very bad openers, and very much deserving of their reputations as such, Mandarin especially so. I would very much enjoy if you and/or Donald proved me wrong.

[PerdHapley]

Fabian, you're right about baseless speculation. Donald's abilities may just end up being a mystery forever!

I definitely agree about Develop being a pretty terrible opener most of the time, but that's not really what it's for, and I don't think it deserves its current reputation as the worst of the $3s. The thread over in Articles does a really good job of examining it.

But back to Mandarin.. I'm not claiming to be any kind of expert on it, but I definitely think there are some ideas in this thread worth trying at least once, and there are probably still more that haven't been brought up yet.

[jomini]

Given Donald's comments about masq pins, I highly doubt he exhaustively tested anything more than two card combos. There likely aren't any broken two card mandarin combos; but it is quite likely that there are three card combos which neither Donald nor his play testers have every touched.

That being said, mandarin tends to be a weak card because it delays deck advancement by a turn (minimum) and slows down the cycle rate once you start playing it. So of the potential combos out there for mandarin, they will almost certainly need to be combos that can either use mandarin to increase cycling (e.g. library/mandarin/hamlet) or have good odds of getting a killer card earlier (e.g. mandarin/upgrade/goons). While it does give you 3 coin, as an opening, it cannot break into 7 or 8 coin territory, making it weaker than many other options (afterall 2 silvers give pretty good chances at hitting 6 and baron/silver is good odds of 7). Thus you pay a turn in lost tempo, are unlikely to get appreciably more expensive cards most of the time, and move slower later in the game.

There are times when none of these apply. In chapel deck, mandarin can be good terminal that moves the dead chapel or green and gives you a good payout, generally, though I want to chapel first and acquire the mandarin later - chapel/mandarin is a collision risk and worse, makes you even more vulnerable to attacks. Late game you might draw a silver and a gold and know that your odds of winning are better if you buy the mandarin to put back the treasure & hope to hit the last province rather than painfully draw through a treasure deficient draw deck.

For openings, I can really only see potential for mandarin if you are going to use it to get some high power hands with it that you otherwise would miss. Apprentice mandarin trades some poor early hands for some extremely strong mid-game hands. I think you might see a similar thing with mandarin/upgrade/goons or mandarin/hamlet/lib (particularly if mandarin is the only virtual coin out there).

[cored]

It's been sort of hinted at with Upgrade, but the combo I'd like to play around with is Mandarin>Mandarin>Remake, especially with Grand Market or Goons on the board.

[Voltgloss]

Here's the hand I'd want to draw on a Mandarin board (assuming no hand-discard attacks are around):

- Copper
- Silver
- Gold
- Platinum
- Horn of Plenty

[blueblimp]

Here's the hand I'd want to draw on a Mandarin board (assuming no hand-discard attacks are around):

- Copper
- Silver
- Gold
- Platinum
- Horn of Plenty

Nice combo. Checking CouncilRoom, this has actually been done. nnn buys 5 straight turns of Colonies, starting turn 14... and loses anyway, go figure.

[Dsell]

Here's the hand I'd want to draw on a Mandarin board (assuming no hand-discard attacks are around):

- Copper
- Silver
- Gold
- Platinum
- Horn of Plenty

Nice combo. Checking CouncilRoom, this has actually been done. nnn buys 5 straight turns of Colonies, starting turn 14... and loses anyway, go figure.

He would have won if he had gained a duchy the second-to-last turn. :/

[WanderingWinder]

Here's the hand I'd want to draw on a Mandarin board (assuming no hand-discard attacks are around):

- Copper
- Silver
- Gold
- Platinum
- Horn of Plenty

Nice combo. Checking CouncilRoom, this has actually been done. nnn buys 5 straight turns of Colonies, starting turn 14... and loses anyway, go figure.

I'm curious as to how you checked for this...

[blueblimp]

Here's the hand I'd want to draw on a Mandarin board (assuming no hand-discard attacks are around):

- Copper
- Silver
- Gold
- Platinum
- Horn of Plenty

Nice combo. Checking CouncilRoom, this has actually been done. nnn buys 5 straight turns of Colonies, starting turn 14... and loses anyway, go figure.

I'm curious as to how you checked for this...

Searched games for Mandarin, Horn of Plenty, Colony. By luck, this one was top hit.

[Varsinor]

Nice Mandarin/Horn of Plenty combo indeed!

He would have won if he had gained a duchy the second-to-last turn. :/

He might have. But probably not as his deck was unlikely to be able to buy a Colony (or even a Province) after he had gained anything but a Mandarin for the first time.
It looks most probable that in that case Eli_k would have won by bishopping a Gold (instead of a Province) and buying a Province on turn 19 followed by buying the last Colony on turn 20 (jumpstarted by two Schemes on turn 19) or one of the following turns.

[Dsell]

Nice Mandarin/Horn of Plenty combo indeed!

He would have won if he had gained a duchy the second-to-last turn. :/

He might have. But probably not as his deck was unlikely to be able to buy a Colony (or even a Province) after he had gained anything but a Mandarin for the first time.
It looks most probable that in that case Eli_k would have won by bishopping a Gold (instead of a Province) and buying a Province on turn 19 followed by buying the last Colony on turn 20 (jumpstarted by two Schemes on turn 19) or one of the following turns.

Ah, you're right. I was just looking at the scores rather than looking at the game itself enough. I do think it probably would have been a better bet, though, considering that Eli_k had a very trim deck that was almost certainly going to get him another province+colony+whatever he bishopped. Risky, but worth the risk imo when your opponent looks likely to come back.

[popsofctown]

Upgrade+Mandarin+X is a good opening when I tried it.  It has a neat synergy with Mandarin being on the board too - you get 3 estate Silvers and trash some coppers so that you can buy Mandarin with just gold and silver lategame to "tactician" up a province.

[Powerman]

I had a game that worked nicely using Mandarin - Tactician:

http://dominion.isotropic.org/gamelog/201205/23/game-20120523-171829-ee0a74f0.html

I feel like the Mandarin was huge here, as Tactician as an opener isn't that great because you don't have much buying power, but Mandarin solves that.  Plus the ability to put back a card was useful more times than not.

[dondon151]

Something that I just thought of after reading WW's Mandarin-BM log against Marin:

We tend to focus on the utility of Mandarin at getting $5/$5 openings or getting to $8 on the subsequent turn lategame if the player happens to draw $5. But what about using Mandarin in the early- to midgame to secure a $6+ card prior to the next shuffle? In WW's log, he buys a Mandarin on turn 3 with a hand of 3 Coppers and a Silver, cycling an Estate out of his deck and increasing his odds of drawing $6 for a Gold on his subsequent turn.

[Varsinor]

In WW's log, he buys a Mandarin on turn 3 with a hand of 3 Coppers and a Silver, cycling an Estate out of his deck and increasing his odds of drawing $6 for a Gold on his subsequent turn.

That sounds like a nice buy of Mandarin indeed, I hadn't thought of that so far! Especially in cases where you didn't yet buy a terminal action on turns 1 or 2. I suppose most notably with a start of Tournament/Silver, Silver/Silver, Caravan/Silver or Spice Merchant/Silver. Tournament/Silver seems to be the most attractive variant as Tournaments can synergize nicely with Mandarin once the first Province was bought.
When Mandarin is the only terminal on the board you'll buy or you started with some sort of village + Silver (the most likely candidates are probably Fishing Village/Silver, Mining Village/Silver and Farming Village/Silver) you might even want to buy a second Mandarin on turn 4 if you happen to draw your Silver plus 3 Coppers with another Estate.