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The Reliable Engine Part 1

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Mean Mr Mustard:
The Reliable Engine Part 1

Let's face it:  Dominion is a deep strategy game but has a significant luck factor.  Learning to mitigate that luck factor is and important skill to learn and can be addressed most directly with proper deck composition.  The purpose of this article is to explore some of my favorite reliable engines, or combo decks that are almost guaranteed to produce some very strong turns. They will not win in every setup but I can promise you that they are all viable winners that can do some amazing things.

To begin, a few definitions:

Cantrip ~ non-terminal action; an action that gives +1 action.

Village ~ For the purpose of this article I will use Village to mean any of the Village-class cards: Cards that give +2
actions.

Linchpin ~ A card that doesn't function as part of an engine but is rather the thrust of the deck.  Just building an engine isn't enough;  It doesn't matter if you draw your whole deck if all it is is 7 coppers and 3 estates.  The linchpin cards are the cards that will win your game.

Strong Draw Card ~ A terminal action that draws 3 or more cards



The Reliable Minion Engine

A Dominon staple, the Minion deck is one that anyone who has played 20 games online will instantly recognize.  The raw cycling and attack power of this deck is offset by its obviousness.  Similar to playing Gardens any competent opponent will instantly know what you are doing and will most likely respond by mirroring your play. 

Minions disrupt a lot of strategies and an uncontested Minion buyer should have no fear moving into the end game.  Minions can be beaten but the right cards have to be on the board.  Beware of Ambassador, Saboteur, heavy cursing and other reliable engines.  Minions benefit from moderate trashing.  I like Bishop or Moneylender in this role but prefer Loan.

Open with silver and a trasher or +2$ attack card.  Buy as little treasure as possible while maintaining $5 buys.  On the hands where you draw <5$ try to acquire a +buy, some cantrips and some Village cards.  Village is a boon to a Minion deck and allow you to add other linchpins into your deck. Since this deck never draws blind Cantrip cards are a riskless complement.  Throne Room is an okay buy too.  The main focus though is to win the Minions race, and once you have $5 in your hand I think it is best to stop and buy unless your deck can produce $10 and an extra +buy.  Trashing during the middle game will addpotency to the end game and is an important component of a reliable minions deck.

Minions go strong into the VP stage but tend to stall before the Province pile is empty.  Often adding one Gold or one Platinum can help push you through, but to become a true reliable engine Minions must complement itself with strong economy cards like Grand Market/Conspirator or Market/Peddler/Tournament or by adding a Village engine. Adding liberal Villages and some +2$ attackers once the Minion stack is depleted is often a strong play;  use the Minions cycling ability exclusively and seek out the linchpins.  That cycling ability is a strong attack, and discarding spare Minions rather than getting $2 can help innoculate against SDS.

Present in other engine decks but featured here, SDS, or Sudden Death Stall, is the self-inflicted killer of Minions decks.  Just when it should be cruising to victory the deck absolutely dies; it start drawing handfulls of VP, a few copper and that old trasher.  Next hand, more junk.  SDS occurs when this deck had an awesome turn, played out all of its good cards and then triggered a reshuffle.  The Draw Deck has nothing but Minion droppings and is empty of engine and linchpin cards.  They are all in your discard pile.  Loan is a good way to force a reshuffle, and that is why it is preferred; With zero treasure in your deck it becomes a action-free Chancellor.  Just be aware of what you are doing and SDS shouldn't be a problem.



The Reliable Alchemist Engine

Some environments are too fast for an Alchemist chain; by the time you put the pieces of a reliable engine together many times an opponent already has a VP advantage.  In the face of Kingdom cards that support rapid economy growth an Alchemist deck may not be fast enough to keep up.  Both Minions and Masquerade wreak havoc on an Alchemist deck and Swindlers, Jesters and Saboteurs are potentially dangerous.

The strength in the reliable Alchemist engine is its abililty to power through the end game.  If this deck is set up properly it should never stall.  Having a trasher is the key to making this deck reliable, but Salvager or Trade Route are good enough.  Bishop is better.

Like the Minion Engine the Alchemist Engine has a built-in Achilles heel. This engine potentially falls apart on any turn in which a Potion isn't put into play.  Therefore use the one-in-one-out method, trashing a weak card for every strong card you buy.

To build a reliable Alchemist engine I recommend an economy of one or two Silver and at least two Potions.  Having two or more Potions going into the middle game speed up development double time, as it helps ensure more Alchemist chains while buying more than one Alchemist per shuffle.  Buy gold at $P6 once you are able to draw your whole deck.  In the turns leading up to this a typical turn is Alchemist>Alchemist>Alchemist/Trasher>$5P>Buy an Alchemist.  Once you have enough Alchemists to draw your deck, as you continue to trash one for one you may add whatever economy you want and go into VP stage in a stallproof deck.

The Reliable King's Court Engine

Fun and flashy, the reliable KC engine doesn't attempt to have a series of good hands, but rather one big one that wins the game.  The components are basically KC, any strong draw card and linchpin cards.  Rabble, Torturer, Smithy and Council Room are great for your engine, but avoid Envoy.  Bridge is the infamous linchpin of this type of engine, but it works with other actions as well.

I like to open this deck with an +$2 attacker and a silver.  It is important to ramp up the economy fast enough to buy at least 4 KCs without adding a deluge of treasure cards, and KC'ed Swindlers or Jesters are nasty.  If you can trash without disrupting steady $5 and $7 do so; Urgrade is my choice here because a KC'd Upgrade can trash 3 Coppers, leave you with a few cards and some extra actions.  Through the middle game strive for 4 KCs, 4 strong draw cards and 3 or 4 linchpins.  Avoid village cards as they collide too often with KC.

Once the reliable King's Court engine is built it becomes a waiting game, looking for a hand with KC/KC/strong draw.  Once this happens the deck explodes, KCing every KC it finds while drawing the whole deck in huge chunks.  Once the deck is drawn use the leftover KCs on the right linchpin cards.  Game over.   

Personman:
Solid article!

One nitpick -- I really disagree about your definition of 'Cantrip'. The term comes from magic and refers to a card that replaces *itself*, not just the action you used to play it. Spy is a cantrip. Lookout is not.

It's quite possible that Dominion needs a new word for +1 Action cards that don't replace themselves, as these are exactly the kinds of cards you want in Minion, Library, Watchtower, and Menagerie decks.

guided:
I would actually say trashers are specifically unnecessary for Alchemist engines. The one absolute necessity is at least one card with +buy, with a 2nd Potion being the next priority. Seriously, "don't bother with Alchemist without +buy" is right up there with "get a Witch as soon as possible" in my mental list of strategy heuristics.

It's funny, on Alchemist boards I'll happily open Potion/Herbalist, whereas on non-alchemist boards I'll often prefer to pass rather than ever buy an Herbalist for $2.

Eric Herboso:

--- Quote from: Personman on June 24, 2011, 10:52:04 pm ---One nitpick -- I really disagree about your definition of 'Cantrip'. The term comes from magic and refers to a card that replaces *itself*, not just the action you used to play it. Spy is a cantrip. Lookout is not.

--- End quote ---

I agree completely. Cantrip must mean +1 card & +1 action to make sense.

from: http://www.wizards.com/Magic/Magazine/Article.aspx?x=mtgcom/askwizards/0704

"In Dungeons & Dragons at the time, a ‘cantrip’ was a ‘zero-level spell’ that had a very minor effect and didn’t count against the limit of, say, three first-level spells and two second-level spells that a wizard of a certain level was allowed per day. So basically, your wizard could only cast five spells a day, but the cantrips didn’t count against this limit. You might have a separate limit on the cantrips you could cast per day, and you might not.

"In Magic, a cantrip refers to a spell that has a minor game effect with the text “Draw a card” added at the end so that it’s worthwhile to put in your deck. Everyone is familiar with Shatter. Cantrips ‘don’t count’ against that limit because you get to draw a new card to replace the one you used on the cantrip."

tlloyd:
Re: Reliable King's Court engine:

We all know the most frustrating part of a KC/TR strategy is the terrible draw with two King's Courts and no other actions. The probability of this can obviously be reduced by purchasing lots of action cards, but sometimes that just results in one hand of KC/KC/... and a second hand with four terminal actions. One nifty combo I noticed recently was KC/Treasury. Treasuries are decent, but usually won't win the game for you. A King's Courted Treasury is nothing to sneeze at, but there are lots of action cards I'd rather "play thrice". The beauty of this combo is simply that you can buy KCs without fear that they will ever come up in a hand without actions.

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