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Author Topic: If there were alternative terms for TfB, I'd switch over immediately  (Read 8955 times)

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Awaclus

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Re: If there were alternative terms for TfB, I'd switch over immediately
« Reply #25 on: July 11, 2017, 05:47:05 am »
0

If the point is to care about cost, the part about trashing isn't really relevant and stuff like Chariot Race should be included in the same category.
To my mind, scaling with cost is the most salient part. And it happens to be the case that, until the last expansion, the only cards that liked high costs were trashers. So people talk about 'trash for benefit' instead of 'cards that are better when you have high cost cards'.

The only non-trashing example I can think of other than Chariot Race is Patrician. Even that one is a bit of a stretch. Unlike Salvager/Bishop/Apprentice and the many Remodel variants that have been printed, it doesn't scale monotonically with cost. Neither Chariot Race nor Patrician is going to make me super-excited to go for overcosted cards like Peddler/Border Village/Rats, compared to most TfB cards.

Am I forgetting any others?

Chariot Race should make you super-excited to go for Peddler and Border Village, and Rats if there's no better way to get rid of your low-cost junk.
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Bomb, Cannon, and many of the Gunpowder cards can strongly effect gameplay, particularly in a destructive way

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Gherald

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Re: If there were alternative terms for TfB, I'd switch over immediately
« Reply #26 on: July 11, 2017, 10:32:42 pm »
+1

Cards like Remodel play fundamentally differently from cards like Forager.

If you define TfB to be just anything that gives some kind of benefit from trashing out of some misguided sophomoric attempt at literalism, the term is useless.

There are more precise ways to define what cards like Remodel do, however none of them roll of the tongue or make intuitive sense like TfB, so people say TfB.
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werothegreat

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Re: If there were alternative terms for TfB, I'd switch over immediately
« Reply #27 on: July 11, 2017, 10:46:32 pm »
+2

There are more precise ways to define what cards like Remodel do, however none of them roll of the tongue or make intuitive sense like TfB, so people say TfB.

Uhhhhh I just call them Remodels.
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Awaclus

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Re: If there were alternative terms for TfB, I'd switch over immediately
« Reply #28 on: July 12, 2017, 04:16:44 am »
+1

If you define TfB to be just anything that gives some kind of benefit from trashing out of some misguided sophomoric attempt at literalism, the term is useless.

The definition of "anything that gives some kind of benefit from trashing" is inherently one of the useful things to categorize, independently of the fact that it's what the term TfB literally means.
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Bomb, Cannon, and many of the Gunpowder cards can strongly effect gameplay, particularly in a destructive way

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Q

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Re: If there were alternative terms for TfB, I'd switch over immediately
« Reply #29 on: July 12, 2017, 07:26:02 am »
0

Cards like Remodel play fundamentally differently from cards like Forager.

If you define TfB to be just anything that gives some kind of benefit from trashing out of some misguided sophomoric attempt at literalism, the term is useless.

There are more precise ways to define what cards like Remodel do, however none of them roll of the tongue or make intuitive sense like TfB, so people say TfB.
This.
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ashersky

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Re: If there were alternative terms for TfB, I'd switch over immediately
« Reply #30 on: July 12, 2017, 08:36:58 am »
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If it's specifically cards that trash and gain (or gain and trash), you could go with a portmanteau:

Gasher or Trainer both work.
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Q

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Re: If there were alternative terms for TfB, I'd switch over immediately
« Reply #31 on: July 12, 2017, 04:17:53 pm »
0

Waht about Replace then? Junking, trashing and gaining; juasher, trunker or gunksher?
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jomini

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Re: If there were alternative terms for TfB, I'd switch over immediately
« Reply #32 on: July 12, 2017, 09:21:03 pm »
+4

A discussion about useful terminology gets weighed down by useless edge casing because no Dominion taxonomy can be both complete and useful.

Shocking.

The real benefit of "TfB" is that TfB's play differently than general trashers, outside of edge cases that I am sure someone will waste time delineating.

TfB's are cards you might consider playing for the rest of the game and get better with things like +buy/cheap gain (e.g. Beggar). Would you gain a card just to feed this trasher outside of edge-case-land? Then it is a TfB. Would I gain a copper to keep a Moneylender running? Yes, though rarely. That makes him TfB. Relatedly, would you gain multiple copies of this trasher? Yes, then it is very likely this is a TfB. TfB cares a bunch more about action balance, draw space, gains, etc. Are there edge cases (e.g. Pillage)? Yes. Does that actually matter? No.

Scaling TfB, like all TfB can care a lot about the stuff above - gains, action balance, duplicate copies. However it also cares about an additional constraint - card cost. This, again, plays differently. Sacrifice does not care if you are burning Estates (say from Baron) or Duchies (say from Duke). You can make Sacrifice work equally well (to a first order approximation) with any gain of green. Bishop can also work with gain of green, but Bishop does care about price. Using an action on Baron to fuel Bishop is 33% weaker than using Count. On the other hand, Bishop provides a much higher ceiling for VP gain. Scaling TfB cares almost as much about what you can gain as the fact that you can gain extra cards at all.

Isn't every trasher a trash-for-benefit card?  Even if it's the indirect benefit of getting rid of crappy cards?

If it's specifically for Salvager-style cards, why not something like "cost converter" - it turns the cost of a card into something else.
No.

For instance Mute is a trasher - it will trigger Tomb and leave stuff in the trash. By and large it does not get rid of crappy coppers even though it trashes them. Upgrade on a Poorhouse, Bandit Fort, Silver-only-$3, and Potion-only-$4 board likewise does not get rid of junk. Upgrade or Remake would still trash, but they would not get rid of junk they will instead just leave you with other things.

TfB is something that provides you with a benefit above and beyond deck thinning. That is why it is a useful way of looking at the board.
If the point is to care about cost, the part about trashing isn't really relevant and stuff like Chariot Race should be included in the same category.
To my mind, scaling with cost is the most salient part.
...

Am I forgetting any others?



Quarry  & Ferry are obvious choices for stuff that likes high cost more than low cost, but pretty much all the cost reducers scale geometrically with the cost of useful cards on the board. I am much more likely to build out to $7. Hop was also a big winning on expensive boards.

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GendoIkari

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Re: If there were alternative terms for TfB, I'd switch over immediately
« Reply #33 on: July 12, 2017, 10:27:37 pm »
0

Quarry  & Ferry are obvious choices for stuff that likes high cost more than low cost, but pretty much all the cost reducers scale geometrically with the cost of useful cards on the board. I am much more likely to build out to $7. Hop was also a big winning on expensive boards.

I would have thought the exact opposite. If a card is so expensive that you can only afford 1 of them, then Quarry is just a Gold (a Gold is pretty good, but still just a Gold). Whereas if there's cheap cards that you want a lot of, then Quarry makes it much easier to but a bunch of them, quite possibly even 1 for every buy you have. Basically, with all cost reducers, they get better the more cards you buy per turn. Expensive cards are harder to buy multiples of, even with cost reducers.
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jomini

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Re: If there were alternative terms for TfB, I'd switch over immediately
« Reply #34 on: July 13, 2017, 12:14:41 am »
0

Quarry  & Ferry are obvious choices for stuff that likes high cost more than low cost, but pretty much all the cost reducers scale geometrically with the cost of useful cards on the board. I am much more likely to build out to $7. Hop was also a big winning on expensive boards.

I would have thought the exact opposite. If a card is so expensive that you can only afford 1 of them, then Quarry is just a Gold (a Gold is pretty good, but still just a Gold). Whereas if there's cheap cards that you want a lot of, then Quarry makes it much easier to but a bunch of them, quite possibly even 1 for every buy you have. Basically, with all cost reducers, they get better the more cards you buy per turn. Expensive cards are harder to buy multiples of, even with cost reducers.

Timing. Ferry on a $5 means you can open a power card. Ferry/Quarry on a $6 (e.g. Altar, Artisan) or $7 (e.g. Forge) can knock whole shuffles off your build out time. Using a $4 to get a card on T3/T4 that you normally would not see until T7/T8 is often a 12 VP swing.

Additionally, playing around with things like Ferry and Quarry come in direct conflict with just buying the cheap thing you want anyways. Say the clutch card is $3. I drop a Ferry on it. If it does not come with a +buy itself I need a +buy to use my Ferry at all. This means that on T3/4 at best I end up with 3 copies of the card in my deck. My opponent most likely gets four just buying them every turn. At best then, I get my fourth and fifth copies while my opponent gains his fifth. I come out whatever the +buy is ahead at the risk of increased risk of losing the split very badly (e.g. my second shot of +buy comes later in the shuffle). $4 cards are even more dicey as I need to line up +buy and enough cash to use it.

We have another card that is phenomenal at getting many copies of cheap things. It is called Talisman and while I think it is undervalued in the main, it is nowhere near as versatile as say Quarry.

Ferry is not as good on lost cost boards as it only hits one pile at a go, typically low cost bulk is going to be a mix of draw, village, payload, attacks, thinning, etc. This means you burn several buys on moving the Ferry or only using the cost discount something like 5 times.

Quarry is better at the game you propose, but it is yet much better doing the same thing on a high cost board. Quarries stack and suddenly Quarry/Quarry/Market/Copper gains a Kc/Market turn 1, then 2 Kc & 1 Market and then you can pile all the markets the next turn.

So basically I look at it like this:
Cost reduction for "singleton" power cards (e.g. Altar, Forge, Expand) make Ferry/Quarry that much better because getting the big guns out on T3/T4 is so huge.

Cost reduction for "massed" power cards (e.g. Minion, GMarket, Kc, Nobles, Hparties, Possession) means that you can either hit them every turn with Ferry or stack them with +buy for mass gain with Quarry.

Obviously, you are completely correct that these cards let you bulk up on cheap stuff easy (e.g Ferry/Steward is an excellent opening for massing something like Caravan), but it is fairly rare that big cards both time insensitive AND not getting massed (often being the the key split to win). Of the times when that rarity occurs the big cards are most likely something you are ignoring ... and quite likely would ignore Ferry/Quarry as well for gaining cheap stuff (e.g. Silver flooding can make all cost reduction suck).

So no, I would totally stand by Quarry and Ferry working better on high priced things. Shaving off a shuffle is huge while being able to buy $5 on average starting hands/stacking +buy & cost reduction is way too powerful. Quarry's power grows linearly with each +buy you utilize (which is awesome on cheap boards), but grows grows mildly exponentially on high cost boards with +buy.



« Last Edit: July 13, 2017, 12:17:09 am by jomini »
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ackmondual

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Re: If there were alternative terms for TfB, I'd switch over immediately
« Reply #35 on: July 13, 2017, 12:38:06 am »
0

Remember... it's +2 cards, NOT draw 2 cards! :p
« Last Edit: July 13, 2017, 12:42:18 am by ackmondual »
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