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[Seprix]

Cultist

Many cults start off with high ideals that get corrupted by leaders or their board of advisors who become power-hungry and dominate and control members' lives. No group with high ideals starts off as a 'cult'; they become one when their errant ways are exposed.
                          -Philip Zimbardo

The mighty Cultist. One of Dominion's strongest attack cards. I can see Donald X.'s thinking with Cultist. He started out with a noble idea for Cultist. He didn't want it to be eclipsed by Witch, and he wanted it to be different. In so doing, Donald X. created a monster out of a card. Very often when Cultist is on the board, it dominates the board and the attention of both players. To simply ignore Cultist is almost always a losing strategy. Therefore, it is almost always a must play strategy, controlling the play of the players. Cultist is too strong and game warping most of the time, and its errant ways have now been exposed. Now, Cultist's strength is even more apparent with the absolutely busted Pathfinding and Lost Arts interactions.

• How often do you defy the groupthink and cult-like mentality that often occurs when Cultist is on the board?
• Would taking away the spam ability of Cultist make it far too weak, or too much like Witch? What are your proposed fixes?
• What were your coolest interactions with Cultist's on-trash ability?

There is no current additional reading on Cultist. Get cracking on that article, people.

[Jack Rudd]

I think my favourite fix is to make the above-the-line text:

+2 Cards
You may play a Cultist from your hand. If you do not, each other player gains a Ruins.

That way, you can still chain the things, but you don't get to chain the attack as well.

[tailred]

Do you usually ignore or otherwise reduce buys of Cultist in a Vineyards slog?

[McGarnacle]

Possibly better than Mountebank. I can't think of a good way to fix it without changing it too much. Rarely skippable, but the chain ability rarely gives extra ruins, as by that time the pile is already empty. At that point it still gives good draw, though.

[DG]

I think there is an overestimation of cultists, or rather underestimation of the options for playing with ruins in a deck.

[Limetime]

What if cultist was like smithy instead of chaining?

[schadd]

I think there is an overestimation of cultists, or rather underestimation of the options for playing with ruins in a deck.

what $5 cards come to mind such that you would rather have 3 or 4 of them and a quickly increasing number of ruins than 3 or 4 cultists?

[schadd]

What if cultist was like smithy instead of chaining?

we would have something a little bit better than torturer

[trivialknot]

I tend to think that every card is perfect because Donald X is perfect and designs perfect games--at least at first.  Cultist lost some of its luster when I realized how often it produces one-sided games.  There's hardly ever a 5-5 ruins split, it's usually 3-7.  Afterwards, the losing player, left in ruins, reflects on how useless terminal draw is for their deck.

I wonder if the correct strategy is to go for Cultists, but give up as soon as you think you're going to lose the ruins split.  If your opponent has 3 cultists and you have none, don't bother with them.  Buy stuff that's actually good in a deck full of ruins.  Or maybe resign.

[mail-mi]

Afterwards, the losing player, left in ruins, reflects on how useless terminal draw is for their deck.

I see what you did there.

[Aleimon Thimble]

Cultist is the best and worst card in the game.

Best in the sense that it's the strongest. No other card is so immensely game-warping and completely eclipses every other card in the game.

Worst in the sense that you should 'never try anything fun in a Cultist game'. Cultist games are usually Cultist-BM, and even if they're not, the person to set up a Cultist chain more quickly is the only one that ever gets to play his engine. It's way, way worse than even Rebuild.

[Chris is me]

Part of the swinginess of Cultist is the combination of the weakish draw and the chaining effect. The combination makes it so you both buy 3 Cultists, one of you chains and the other one does not, and that decides your split. I feel like attempts to "fix" the card should deal with that in some way. I wouldn't mind +3 Cards, no chaining, everyone gets a Ruins, for example.

But really despite being stupid powerful and unfun and all that I don't think it desperately needs to be fixed? There's enough Cultist games where you can do something else that I don't really always hate it. Maybe that's just because I win Cultist games a lot.

[J Reggie]

Just Donate those ruins and you'll be fine!

[Beyond Awesome]

I agree with Aleimon that Cultist is the strongest card in the game, even stronger than Mountebank. Cultist games are almost always one-sided and very luck-dependent.

With that said, yesterday, I played a game where I ignored cultist and won despite getting all 10 ruins. The board included Menagerie, Travelling Fair, and Vineyards. But, that kind of board almost never ever comes up.

[Dingan]

I have no idea why DX added the below-the-line part.  I feel that most below-the-line stuff is intended to either (1) balance the card out, (2) make it not strictly better/worse than something else of the same cost, (3) be part of the primary intention of the card (Great Hall, Peddler, GM, etc.), or (4) remind you what setup you need to do.  Cultist's on-trash is none of these things.  If it weren't there, the card would still be Monty-level powerful.

Yeah, Dark Ages has a lot of trash-for-benefit (Graverobber especially neat with Cultist), so maybe DX was trying to fit Cultist into that theme.  But I just don't think that explains it.  Plus I'm pretty sure straight Cultist easily beats straight Junk Dealer.

[Seprix]

I have no idea why DX added the below-the-line part.  I feel that most below-the-line stuff is intended to either (1) balance the card out, (2) make it not strictly better/worse than something else of the same cost, (3) be part of the primary intention of the card (Great Hall, Peddler, GM, etc.), or (4) remind you what setup you need to do.  Cultist's on-trash is none of these things.  If it weren't there, the card would still be Monty-level powerful.

Yeah, Dark Ages has a lot of trash-for-benefit (Graverobber especially neat with Cultist), so maybe DX was trying to fit Cultist into that theme.  But I just don't think that explains it.  Plus I'm pretty sure straight Cultist easily beats straight Junk Dealer.

Donald did it because it was thematic. Sacrifice a Cultist.

[DG]

I win surprisingly many games after losing the ruins split, certainly more than I'd win when losing a curse split.

[Beyond Awesome]

I win surprisingly many games after losing the ruins split, certainly more than I'd win when losing a curse split.

Usually, if I lose the curse split, I often have other stuff going on in my deck

[Aleimon Thimble]

I have no idea why DX added the below-the-line part.  I feel that most below-the-line stuff is intended to either (1) balance the card out, (2) make it not strictly better/worse than something else of the same cost, (3) be part of the primary intention of the card (Great Hall, Peddler, GM, etc.), or (4) remind you what setup you need to do.  Cultist's on-trash is none of these things.  If it weren't there, the card would still be Monty-level powerful.

Yeah, Dark Ages has a lot of trash-for-benefit (Graverobber especially neat with Cultist), so maybe DX was trying to fit Cultist into that theme.  But I just don't think that explains it.  Plus I'm pretty sure straight Cultist easily beats straight Junk Dealer.

Donald did it because it was thematic. Sacrifice a Cultist.

Yeah, that's kind of the only cool thing about Cultist.

[AJD]

I have no idea why DX added the below-the-line part.  I feel that most below-the-line stuff is intended to either (1) balance the card out, (2) make it not strictly better/worse than something else of the same cost, (3) be part of the primary intention of the card (Great Hall, Peddler, GM, etc.), or (4) remind you what setup you need to do.  Cultist's on-trash is none of these things.  If it weren't there, the card would still be Monty-level powerful.

Yeah, Dark Ages has a lot of trash-for-benefit (Graverobber especially neat with Cultist), so maybe DX was trying to fit Cultist into that theme.  But I just don't think that explains it.  Plus I'm pretty sure straight Cultist easily beats straight Junk Dealer.

Donald did it because it was thematic. Sacrifice a Cultist.

I mean, according to the Secret History of Dark Ages, it was mainly because he was looking for a bonus to give it on top of the +2 cards, and thought of this before he thought of the chaining gimmick.