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[Limetime]

The way you build a deck that can play a bunch of terminal payload is similar. Also they both want the ability to but lot of things in one turn.

So does Bridge. Doesn't mean that it has a whole lot in common though with Merchant Guild except for providing coins and an extra buy,

In a goons game your goal is to buy a bunch of cards for points.
Merchant guild buys a bunch of cards so he can buy green cards.

[AJD]

The way you build a deck that can play a bunch of terminal payload is similar. Also they both want the ability to but lot of things in one turn.

So does Bridge. Doesn't mean that it has a whole lot in common though with Merchant Guild except for providing coins and an extra buy,

...Bridge has a ton in common with Merchant Guild though! "Cards cost 1 less" and "when you buy a card, take a coin token" are both ways of implementing "when you buy a card, +$1".

[mameluke]

Actually, I think it is similar to Bridge in that it provides something like cost reduction on a future turn (although Butcher can use the coins too). It's not exactly the same, no, but perhaps a similar type of payload.

[McGarnacle]

I was always a big fan of Merchant Guild. The Goons effect with coin token is nice, and can be handy when you start greening.

[Titandrake]

Mandarin has the on buy!!!

An almost always bad on-buy. How often do I even went treasures back on top of my deck?

When you buy Mandarin with 2 golds.

In just about any engine, having two golds on top prevents you from hitting key engine components.

Why are you buying Mandarin in an engine game?

[ConMan]

Mandarin has the on buy!!!

An almost always bad on-buy. How often do I even went treasures back on top of my deck?

When you buy Mandarin with 2 golds.

In just about any engine, having two golds on top prevents you from hitting key engine components.

Why are you buying Mandarin in an engine game?

Because Count isn't in the kingdom?

[Aleimon Thimble]

Similarities between Goons and Merchant Guild:

- They give +Buy.
- They give virtual money.
- They have a while-in-play clause.
- They provide you with tokens whenever you buy a card (VP or coin).
- They are best used when you can play multiples of them, because the extra +Buys give you more tokens exponentially.
- Therefore, they are best used as payload in a big engine.

Differences between Goons and Merchant Guild:

- Goons has an Attack.
- Goons gives more money.
- Goons gives VP tokens instead of coin tokens, which is more direct and stronger in general.
- Goons is slightly more expensive.
- Goons can be used in Big Money decks as well, whereas MG is pretty weak in most of those decks (you'd rather have a different terminal in most cases).

I don't think it's a stretch at all to call Merchant Guild a poor man's Goons, except it isn't really fair to MG since Goons is pretty damn overpowered and MG is still pretty okay.

Also, I agree, there are also similarities between MG, Goons and Bridge/Bridge Troll. The latter two are also strong payload cards that are better in multiples and best in big engines, and also give +Buy and an extra benefit. Bridge Troll even gives out a token, but only one and only to your opponent and it's a bad token. Out of these 4 payload cards, I think all of them are pretty cool but I like Merchant Guild best, even though it's probably the weakest.

(next write-ups later today )

[drsteelhammer]

Merchant Guild plays a lot differenly than Goons aswell. If you get four Goons in play, you'll most likely win. If you get four Merchant Guilds in play, your engine just started to do something- rather next turn is the first very good one.

[Chris is me]

Merchant Guild plays a lot differenly than Goons aswell. If you get four Goons in play, you'll most likely win. If you get four Merchant Guilds in play, your engine just started to do something- rather next turn is the first very good one.

Edge case: Villa + lots of cantrip +Buy to use both before and after you buy Villa.

I definitely understand the comparison. I see Merchant Guild as somewhat between Bridge and Goons in power level - though Bridge has a higher ceiling than MG.

[Awaclus]

I see Merchant Guild as somewhat between Bridge and Goons in power level

So you think it's better than Goons?

[Aleimon Thimble]

10. Peasant

When Adventures came out, I liked Page more than Peasant. Now Peasant has easily surpassed his sister in arms (Page is a girl, right?). His storyline is a lot cooler, which is one thing, but his effects are also more subtle. Probably not stronger, but definitely more interesting. Handing out those tokens is a wonderful feeling, it’s such a satisfying way of building an engine. And you’re not sad even if there are token Events, because that just means you can dump those tokens on a single pile and be done with it!

9. Highway

Now we’re really entering the high ranks. Or the high ways. When I see Highway on a board, my heart jumps with joy and I immediately start looking for the megaturn. Of course, you need a ton of +Buy or gainers to make it happen, but it’s there often enough. I already knew Bridge when I started browsing the Dominion Strategy Wiki, but when I found out about Highway’s existence I got especially excited. The cost reduction mechanic is so interesting that it definitely deserves a cantrip with that ability.

8. Jester

It’s the only Cornucopia card on this list. I don’t specifically dislike Cornucopia, there are just relatively few cards that stick out in a positive way. Jester is certainly the one though. It can be a gainer or a junker, and you don’t know which it’s going to be until you play it, but you’ll almost always be happy with the outcome. Well, maybe not in some rare cases where it hits Silver. Jester really lives up to its reputation and its name: it’s just a load of fun pretty much always. A small portion of kudos to McGarnacle for guessing Jester for #1, you were somewhat close. Although I suspect you only said it because it’s your favorite card…

7. Miser

Before I get to Miser, let me tell you something about Pirate Ship. When I spent countless hours browsing the Wiki, I slowly but surely learned about all the cards that existed. Pirate Ship was the final card I learned about. I had seen it a couple of times already, but I was always like ‘wall of text, people say it’s weak, never mind already’. Of course, in the end I learned what its gimmick was all about. I thought it was pretty cool, if a bit convoluted and weak in the same way Thief is. Well what do you know, Miser has a similar gimmick but it actually helps yourself instead of your opponent. Not a power card, but definitely one of the cooler ones. Yay Miser!

[Chris is me]

I see Merchant Guild as somewhat between Bridge and Goons in power level

So you think it's better than Goons?

Depends how you identify "better". Goons is always at least pretty good. Goons BM is a decently viable strategy. The better of an engine you can build, the more points you can amass with a Goons strategy. It has a pretty high ceiling with Watchtower strategies, but it's somewhat hard to get to those ridiculous 100+ point games, and many middle of the road Goons games become Provinces Plus Chips games.

Bridge is a lot more extreme. At its worst, in a BM strategy, Bridge BM is basically the same as Woodcutter BM. In a moderate engine with limited terminal space, Bridge can be pretty good but not earth shattering payload. In a small number of games (but a bigger number of games than Goons' ceiling), you can do a megaturn, using Throne Room variants or just winning the split with a ton of extra Actions. Bridge then becomes extremely potent, and can be faster at ending the game ahead than Goons, ergo better.

I think if you "averaged" all these games together, Bridge would be worse than Goons though. Goons is acceptably great payload more often, and defines games more often than Bridge.

Merchant Guild has a curve in between Bridge and Goons. It's closer to Bridge's curve, but a bit better at the bottom and a bit worse at the very top. Hope this explains what I mean. I think too often we think of cards in the paradigm of how they work in a near ideal engine, and not in all cases. That's the only way someone could think Bridge is better than Goons. Or you're just being Awaclus right now.

[Awaclus]

Depends how you identify "better". Goons is always at least pretty good. Goons BM is a decently viable strategy. The better of an engine you can build, the more points you can amass with a Goons strategy. It has a pretty high ceiling with Watchtower strategies, but it's somewhat hard to get to those ridiculous 100+ point games, and many middle of the road Goons games become Provinces Plus Chips games.

Bridge is a lot more extreme. At its worst, in a BM strategy, Bridge BM is basically the same as Woodcutter BM. In a moderate engine with limited terminal space, Bridge can be pretty good but not earth shattering payload. In a small number of games (but a bigger number of games than Goons' ceiling), you can do a megaturn, using Throne Room variants or just winning the split with a ton of extra Actions. Bridge then becomes extremely potent, and can be faster at ending the game ahead than Goons, ergo better.

I think if you "averaged" all these games together, Bridge would be worse than Goons though. Goons is acceptably great payload more often, and defines games more often than Bridge.

Merchant Guild has a curve in between Bridge and Goons. It's closer to Bridge's curve, but a bit better at the bottom and a bit worse at the very top. Hope this explains what I mean. I think too often we think of cards in the paradigm of how they work in a near ideal engine, and not in all cases. That's the only way someone could think Bridge is better than Goons. Or you're just being Awaclus right now.

BM is not a viable strategy, much less so when Goons is on the board.

Also, you can almost always build a near ideal engine. Especially when Bridge is present.

[Aleimon Thimble]

Or you're just being Awaclus right now.

Evidently.

[McGarnacle]

Yay! I knew Jester would be there somewhere. +1 for Jester being on the list.

[ThetaSigma12]

Yay! I knew Jester would be there somewhere. +1 for Jester being on the list.

+1 for +1ing jester on the list.

[McGarnacle]

Yay! I knew Jester would be there somewhere. +1 for Jester being on the list.

+1 for +1ing jester on the list.

All Jester-related posts should get +1. How about an F.DS extension which automatically gives posts which contain the word "Jester" followed by a positive adjective +1?

[Awaclus]

Jester is good at not being a very good card.

[tristan]

7. Miser

Before I get to Miser, let me tell you something about Pirate Ship. When I spent countless hours browsing the Wiki, I slowly but surely learned about all the cards that existed. Pirate Ship was the final card I learned about. I had seen it a couple of times already, but I was always like ‘wall of text, people say it’s weak, never mind already’. Of course, in the end I learned what its gimmick was all about. I thought it was pretty cool, if a bit convoluted and weak in the same way Thief is. Well what do you know, Miser has a similar gimmick but it actually helps yourself instead of your opponent. Not a power card, but definitely one of the cooler ones. Yay Miser!

Ehm, you never played with these cards? OK. ^^

About Miser, I think it is wrose than Pirate Ship. Not in terms of strength, it is probably better on average, and not in terms of being too different (both are slow build-up cards) but in terms of creating interaction and shaping the game. The very presence of Pirate Ship significantly influences the game and makes these Kingdoms often fun to play.

[traces Around]

The very presence of Pirate Ship significantly influences the game and makes these Kingdoms often fun to play.

Ehm, you never played with these cards? OK. ^^

The very few boards where Pirate Ship is relevant are decidedly not fun to play if both players realize it.

[tristan]

The very few boards where Pirate Ship is relevant are decidedly not fun to play if both players realize it.

It is the other way around, Pirate Ship is nearly always (unless there are ample of cards that provide virtual coins) relevant, independent of whether somebody goes for it or not. With 3 players it is even more interesting than with 2.
Miser on the other hand is not interactive and thus a boring card. Now if Miser had come along before Pirate Ship, in the base game or Intrigue, it would have been fine. But as it is I view it as a fairly bland card.

[drsteelhammer]

The very few boards where Pirate Ship is relevant are decidedly not fun to play if both players realize it.

It is the other way around, Pirate Ship is nearly always (unless there are ample of cards that provide virtual coins) relevant, independent of whether somebody goes for it or not. With 3 players it is even more interesting than with 2.
Miser on the other hand is not interactive and thus a boring card. Now if Miser had come along before Pirate Ship, in the base game or Intrigue, it would have been fine. But as it is I view it as a fairly bland card.

are you exclusively playing 4p+ games?

[NolanA]

The very presence of Pirate Ship significantly influences the game and makes these Kingdoms often fun to play.

Ehm, you never played with these cards? OK. ^^

The very few boards where Pirate Ship is relevant are decidedly not fun to play if both players realize it.

The very few boards where Pirate Ship is relevant are decidedly not fun to play if both players realize it.

In the old CouncilRoom game analysis, Pirate Ship was the card with the highest "win rate without" in all of Dominion, which suggests that a lot of people are over buying and/or playing it badly.  It can be decent with the right enablers and the right opponent strategy, such as a strong village enabler against Big Money.  For example, Pirate Ship + Fishing Village can beat just about any Big Money strategy, including ones using powerful attack cards, although with a Fishing Village available a lot of people are going to instead choose an  engine that uses FV as virtual coin, which it doesn't fare well against.  I think the key annoying Pirate Ship games are ones with more than 2 players.  Pirate Ship gets more powerful as number of players increases, so it becomes a more common strategy.  If you think 2 players doing Pirate Ship is annoying, you should see games with 3 or 4 .  However, overall I like the card because of the different style of attack, leading to different types of strategies.

[traces Around]

It is the other way around, Pirate Ship is nearly always (unless there are ample of cards that provide virtual coins) relevant,

This segment just isn't true. Whether or not Pirate Ship is viable against a treasure-payload engine has nothing to do with alternatives to to treasure and everything to do with the number of attacks going on. If you are playing a treasure-payload engine, a lot (read: almost all) of your terminal space is being spent on draw, meaning a Pirate Ship deck is going to have trouble playing high numbers, either because it can't draw them or it doesn't have the actions to play them.

If it manages to have an effect in low quantity, there is a severe luck disparity in favor of the Pirate Ship player.

It can be decent with the right enablers and the right opponent strategy, such as a strong village enabler against Big Money.

You don't play Big Money with a strong village enabler around.

Multiplayer: Awaclus is much better than me at telling you about this scenario.

[NolanA]

You don't play Big Money with a strong village enabler around.

Multiplayer: Awaclus is much better than me at telling you about this scenario.

In my earlier reply, I mentioned that many would go for a virtual coin engine in this case.  That said, a strong village enabler does not mean a strong engine is possible.  It's far more common than "an extremely rare edge case" to have a strong village in the kingdom without a strong engine that uses it.  The main times I'd play Pirate Ship + strong village in a 2 player game is when there is not a strong attack in the kingdom  (Witch, Ghost Ship, ...) or a strong drawing card to combine with the Village + a good source of multiple buys (Wharf, Smithy + Buys, ...).  Trashing, virtual coin sources, and opponent's opening also has an influence.  I'd link to some example Pirate Ship games, if gokosalvager was up. As I recall, I've won every 2 player game I've played using a Pirate Ship + Fishing Village strategy, which was a good portion of kingdoms in which the combo was possible.

I implied that Pirate Ship was overbought in my earlier comment about the CouncilRoom analysis.  The CR analysis also found that the majority of players bought at least one Pirate Ship when it was in the kingdom.  Having a multiple players buying Pirate Ships is far from "an extremely rare edge case" for kingdoms with Pirate Ships.