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Águia Branca

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Tavern Mat Madness
« on: September 20, 2017, 05:28:01 am »
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This is about a weird idea I had when thinking about what I would change/customize about my copy of Dominion if I could do it save and reversibly. It's seems likely that someone else has come up with it, but a brief look around Google and this site has not found anything.

What if the tavern mat was used for all cards that require a mat? This would obviously affect Seaside and Adventures the most and introduce a bunch of interesting interactions. A few examples:

  • Island would put cards on your tavern mat.
  • Native Village would put cards on your tavern mat or pick up from the tavern mat. This would have some synergy with Wine Merchant, antisynergy with Island and a bit of both with the other reserve cards and Miser.
  • Haven, Gear and Save could have you put cards on your tavern mat and later choose cards from your tavern mat to pick up.
  • If you want more, why not Pirate Ship: Instead of using coin tokens, which is kind of confusing, you would put a treasure from the trash on your tavern mat. Would be somewhat interesting with Miser, Harem and Native Village

Do you think this would improve the game? Would it be fun or somehow broken?

Edit: For balance reasons, I don't think including Haven, Gear or Save would be a good idea anymore. Apart from that, these cards do not use mats anyway.
« Last Edit: September 21, 2017, 08:18:43 am by Águia Branca »
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josh56

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Re: Tavern Mat Madness
« Reply #1 on: September 20, 2017, 05:45:23 am »
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It's simple: all cards (except for Native Village which shouldn't be changed) would become stronger.
Wine Merchant and Miser would potentially become too good in the presence of other of these changed cards.
Haven, Gear and Save wouldn't behave any different unless there were other cards in the Kingdom that interacted with the Tavern mat.

Buffing Pirate Ship such that it quasi-plays the treasures you picked up from the trash (or, simpler: if an opponent trashes a Silver/Gold, put 2/3 Coin tokens on your Pirate Ship mat) is a good idea independent of "combine all mats into the Tavern mat" idea.

I don't think that this is overall a good idea. Either it does nothing or it makes one card too good.
I often use the Tavern mat for set aside stuff or to put Coin/VP tokens as visual aid but without it being rule-wise the actual Tavern mat.
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LastFootnote

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Re: Tavern Mat Madness
« Reply #2 on: September 20, 2017, 10:26:54 am »
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During development of Adventures, there was a card that let you put any card you gained on your Tavern mat. I think it was a Reserve that you called when you gained a card, to put that card on the mat. It was cute with other Reserve cards, but mostly you'd just use it to put all your Victory cards on the mat. That didn't end up being good times.
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Águia Branca

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Re: Tavern Mat Madness
« Reply #3 on: September 21, 2017, 03:36:57 am »
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It's simple: all cards (except for Native Village which shouldn't be changed) would become stronger.

Wine Merchant and Miser would potentially become too good in the presence of other of these changed cards.
I don't think this is true. Some of the cards in question would become stronger in combination, but I don't see anything broken. Why do you think Native Village shouldn't be changed?

Having a chance to put reserve cards on the mat with Native Village is definitely not overpowered, it makes it the equivalent of +1 card, +3 actions at the very best. If you mat Duplicate or Distant Lands, that is. But having those cards on the mat heavily disincentivizes you from ever picking up. Similarily, Island - Native Village would clearly antisynergize. I can see how matting cards for Miser or Pirate Ship could be strong, but then again, picking up would make those cards completely useless, so you're stuck with a Necropolis for most of the game

Picking up any number of Wine Merchants is worth an additional +2 $ at best, and storing them on the mat is a lot worse than storing Bridges because there is less megaturn potential.

Haven, Gear and Save wouldn't behave any different unless there were other cards in the Kingdom that interacted with the Tavern mat.
After thinking about that, if there are other tavern mat cards in the kingdom, these could easily cause problems. Namely, their interaction with Native Village is quite strong. You could manipulate your tavern mat almost at will, picking up the stronger cards you matted with Native Village and matting all the junk. You can already do that if there are topdeck interaction cards, but you have to be careful and get somewhat lucky to connect those. With Haven etc. it's just too easy.


Buffing Pirate Ship such that it quasi-plays the treasures you picked up from the trash (or, simpler: if an opponent trashes a Silver/Gold, put 2/3 Coin tokens on your Pirate Ship mat) is a good idea independent of "combine all mats into the Tavern mat" idea.
This is actually not what I intended. Playing the treasures from the mat would be highly confusing. Giving Tokens based on the kind of card(s) you trashed is wordy and wouldn't really work with kingdom treasures. As far as tweaks go, I prefer:

Original Pirate Ship:
Choose one: +1 $ per Coin token on your Pirate Ship mat; or each other player reveals the top 2 cards of their deck, trashes one of those Treasures that you choose, and discards the rest, and then if anyone trashed a Treasure you add a Coin token to your Pirate Ship mat.

My version:
Choose one: +1 $ per Treasure on your Tavern mat; or each other player reveals the top 2 cards of their deck, trashes one of those Treasures that you choose, and discards the rest, then you may gain a Treasure from the trash onto your Tavern mat.

This is still a stronger version, since, as long as there are treasures in the trash, you build the payload even if the attack whiffs.

During development of Adventures, there was a card that let you put any card you gained on your Tavern mat. I think it was a Reserve that you called when you gained a card, to put that card on the mat. It was cute with other Reserve cards, but mostly you'd just use it to put all your Victory cards on the mat. That didn't end up being good times.
Ya, that's pretty much why the Haven variant thing might be too strong. Other than that, I didn't suggest something like that, so I'm not sure where you're coming from. Native Village is still random most of the time.
« Last Edit: September 21, 2017, 03:41:35 am by Águia Branca »
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josh56

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Re: Tavern Mat Madness
« Reply #4 on: September 21, 2017, 08:05:32 am »
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It's simple: all cards (except for Native Village which shouldn't be changed) would become stronger.

Wine Merchant and Miser would potentially become too good in the presence of other of these changed cards.
I don't think this is true. Some of the cards in question would become stronger in combination, but I don't see anything broken. Why do you think Native Village shouldn't be changed?
As you pointed out, Native Village becomes weaker with Island. It also makes Miser not work. It would make a overpowered combo with Wine Merchant (but then again Wine Merchant would also be far too good in combo with Haven, Gear or Save).

About why this is broken, just pick the Wine Merchant combos. Instead of being weaker than "+$4, +1 Buy" Wine Merchant is now stronger as you can now sometimes put it in your hand without having to draw it.
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Chris is me

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Re: Tavern Mat Madness
« Reply #5 on: September 21, 2017, 08:32:17 am »
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It's simple: all cards (except for Native Village which shouldn't be changed) would become stronger.

Wine Merchant and Miser would potentially become too good in the presence of other of these changed cards.
I don't think this is true. Some of the cards in question would become stronger in combination, but I don't see anything broken. Why do you think Native Village shouldn't be changed?
As you pointed out, Native Village becomes weaker with Island. It also makes Miser not work. It would make a overpowered combo with Wine Merchant (but then again Wine Merchant would also be far too good in combo with Haven, Gear or Save).

About why this is broken, just pick the Wine Merchant combos. Instead of being weaker than "+$4, +1 Buy" Wine Merchant is now stronger as you can now sometimes put it in your hand without having to draw it.

Is it really all that game breaking if it's a bit easier to get $4 and a buy? As long as you can't go infinite with it, it's not really that crazy?
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Awaclus

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Re: Tavern Mat Madness
« Reply #6 on: September 21, 2017, 08:34:56 am »
+1

$4 and a buy is far from broken. It's weaker than Bridge.
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Águia Branca

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Re: Tavern Mat Madness
« Reply #7 on: September 21, 2017, 08:38:56 am »
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As you pointed out, Native Village becomes weaker with Island. It also makes Miser not work. It would make a overpowered combo with Wine Merchant (but then again Wine Merchant would also be far too good in combo with Haven, Gear or Save).

About why this is broken, just pick the Wine Merchant combos. Instead of being weaker than "+$4, +1 Buy" Wine Merchant is now stronger as you can now sometimes put it in your hand without having to draw it.
First of all, I would argue that having some strong synergies between otherwise comparatively weak cards can be very fun. On the other hand, having each Native Village be +8 $, +2 Buys is probably too much, so I agree there. I still think it would be fine if Wine Merchant said 'When you discard this from play, put it on your tavern mat'. Would still be very good in a sloggish strategy, while engines wouldn't profit quite as much.
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josh56

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Re: Tavern Mat Madness
« Reply #8 on: September 21, 2017, 02:05:28 pm »
+1

$4 and a buy is far from broken. It's weaker than Bridge.
Such an unconditional statement is wrong. Bridge is only better than +4$ +1 Buy if you buy 4 or more cards.

As you pointed out, Native Village becomes weaker with Island. It also makes Miser not work. It would make a overpowered combo with Wine Merchant (but then again Wine Merchant would also be far too good in combo with Haven, Gear or Save).

About why this is broken, just pick the Wine Merchant combos. Instead of being weaker than "+$4, +1 Buy" Wine Merchant is now stronger as you can now sometimes put it in your hand without having to draw it.
First of all, I would argue that having some strong synergies between otherwise comparatively weak cards can be very fun. On the other hand, having each Native Village be +8 $, +2 Buys is probably too much, so I agree there. I still think it would be fine if Wine Merchant said 'When you discard this from play, put it on your tavern mat'. Would still be very good in a sloggish strategy, while engines wouldn't profit quite as much.
As you pointed out, Native Village becomes weaker with Island. It also makes Miser not work. It would make a overpowered combo with Wine Merchant (but then again Wine Merchant would also be far too good in combo with Haven, Gear or Save).

About why this is broken, just pick the Wine Merchant combos. Instead of being weaker than "+$4, +1 Buy" Wine Merchant is now stronger as you can now sometimes put it in your hand without having to draw it.
First of all, I would argue that having some strong synergies between otherwise comparatively weak cards can be very fun. On the other hand, having each Native Village be +8 $, +2 Buys is probably too much, so I agree there. I still think it would be fine if Wine Merchant said 'When you discard this from play, put it on your tavern mat'. Would still be very good in a sloggish strategy, while engines wouldn't profit quite as much.
I wouldn't argue that it isn't fun to try out your suggested universalization of the Tavern mat as long as your are fine with the emerging whack combos.
« Last Edit: September 21, 2017, 02:07:04 pm by josh56 »
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Awaclus

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Re: Tavern Mat Madness
« Reply #9 on: September 21, 2017, 02:08:01 pm »
+1

Such an unconditional statement is wrong. Bridge is only better than +4$ +1 Buy if you buy 4 or more cards.

If Bridge and Native Village are present, you buy 4 or more cards.
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josh56

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Re: Tavern Mat Madness
« Reply #10 on: September 21, 2017, 02:13:54 pm »
+1

Such an unconditional statement is wrong. Bridge is only better than +4$ +1 Buy if you buy 4 or more cards.

If Bridge and Native Village are present, you buy 4 or more cards.
Another unconditional statement that is wrong. If Bridge and Native Village are in the Kingdom you need 3 Bridges in play to be able to buy 4 or more cards. It takes some time to achieve that so before that point in the game (and that moment will quickly pass as the other players might also wanna load up on Native Village and Bridge) Bridge is weaker than Wine Merchant 2.0.
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Awaclus

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Re: Tavern Mat Madness
« Reply #11 on: September 21, 2017, 02:22:14 pm »
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Such an unconditional statement is wrong. Bridge is only better than +4$ +1 Buy if you buy 4 or more cards.

If Bridge and Native Village are present, you buy 4 or more cards.
Another unconditional statement that is wrong. If Bridge and Native Village are in the Kingdom you need 3 Bridges in play to be able to buy 4 or more cards. It takes some time to achieve that so before that point in the game (and that moment will quickly pass as the other players might also wanna load up on Native Village and Bridge) Bridge is weaker than Wine Merchant 2.0.

If your opponent has to buy Bridges instead of Wine Merchant 2.0s just to prevent you from getting enough Bridges, that means Bridge is better than Wine Merchant 2.0.
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josh56

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Re: Tavern Mat Madness
« Reply #12 on: September 21, 2017, 02:30:01 pm »
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Such an unconditional statement is wrong. Bridge is only better than +4$ +1 Buy if you buy 4 or more cards.

If Bridge and Native Village are present, you buy 4 or more cards.
Another unconditional statement that is wrong. If Bridge and Native Village are in the Kingdom you need 3 Bridges in play to be able to buy 4 or more cards. It takes some time to achieve that so before that point in the game (and that moment will quickly pass as the other players might also wanna load up on Native Village and Bridge) Bridge is weaker than Wine Merchant 2.0.

If your opponent has to buy Bridges instead of Wine Merchant 2.0s just to prevent you from getting enough Bridges, that means Bridge is better than Wine Merchant 2.0.
On my box it says 2-4 players. I guess you only play online but then you might wanna amend your blunt, wrong, unconditional statements with some caveats. If you ignore issues like player count it simply makes no sense to discuss with you as something like cards strength varies with player count.

Also, the discussion started without the assumption that Native Village or any other village is in the Kingdom; it was a comparison between a cost reducer and a hypothetical card that says +$4 +1 Buy.
You need many of the former in play to beat the latter and this will rarely happen early in the game or when you play with more than 2 players.
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Re: Tavern Mat Madness
« Reply #13 on: September 21, 2017, 07:06:21 pm »
+2

Picking up any number of Wine Merchants is worth an additional +2 $ at best, and storing them on the mat is a lot worse than storing Bridges because there is less megaturn potential.
play 10 Wine Merchants, play Native Village to put them in your hand, play 10 Wine Merchants, play Native Village, ...
400 coins, 100 buys. With Lost Arts, Peasant, or Champion, this is not impossible. Still weak?
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Águia Branca

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Re: Tavern Mat Madness
« Reply #14 on: September 22, 2017, 01:39:23 am »
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Picking up any number of Wine Merchants is worth an additional +2 $ at best, and storing them on the mat is a lot worse than storing Bridges because there is less megaturn potential.
play 10 Wine Merchants, play Native Village to put them in your hand, play 10 Wine Merchants, play Native Village, ...
400 coins, 100 buys. With Lost Arts, Peasant, or Champion, this is not impossible. Still weak?
First, I never said it's weak. Second, playing 10 Bridges or 10 Goons is just as good as playing 100 Wine Merchants. Third, I already adressed this issue in this thread. If you were to change this, you would have to change Wine Merchant so that it puts itself on the mat when discarded from play, instead of immediately.
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