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Author Topic: Don't be fooled, nothing for you here  (Read 32938 times)

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Accatitippi

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Re: Another awful thread about nothing
« Reply #75 on: November 10, 2017, 05:52:27 pm »
+6

I'm bringin' synergy back (yeah)

This thread split is amusing, I did not think I was saying anything remarkable when I mentioned the analogy. It never occurred to me people would call things like Village+Smithy a synergy.

But if some want to debase the term to apply to a [Dominion Intrigue 1st Edition] Coppersmith working on coppers, or Village being a support card for generic terminals...I guess I can't stop them.

I'll just note that it does not relate to the greater-than-additive meaning I use when I talk about card synergies, and move on. Maybe I'll add an adjective like "multiplicative synergy" so it's clear that I'm talking about something more than just chaining one card's basic use with another's.

And on the subject of this being "an awful thread about nothing", to me this is actually key thought process when looking at an initial board and deciding what to do with it. Searching for synergy is like looking for known "combos", but more wide-encompassing.

Maybe the people who use synergy to talk about basic card interactions (meh) would be happy to call what I'm talking about with the word "strong synergy". I guess that works.

I think it would be helpful to have a few more examples of each category (whatever you want to call them).

"Examples" sounds good to me, but I guess you could also call them "instances", "cases", or even "prototypes".
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Gazbag

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Re: Another awful thread about nothing
« Reply #76 on: November 10, 2017, 07:02:09 pm »
+2

I'm bringin' synergy back (yeah)

This thread split is amusing, I did not think I was saying anything remarkable when I mentioned the analogy. It never occurred to me people would call things like Village+Smithy a synergy.

But if some want to debase the term to apply to a [Dominion Intrigue 1st Edition] Coppersmith working on coppers, or Village being a support card for generic terminals...I guess I can't stop them.

I'll just note that it does not relate to the greater-than-additive meaning I use when I talk about card synergies, and move on. Maybe I'll add an adjective like "multiplicative synergy" so it's clear that I'm talking about something more than just chaining one card's basic use with another's.

And on the subject of this being "an awful thread about nothing", to me this is actually key thought process when looking at an initial board and deciding what to do with it. Searching for synergy is like looking for known "combos", but more wide-encompassing.

Maybe the people who use synergy to talk about basic card interactions (meh) would be happy to call what I'm talking about with the word "strong synergy". I guess that works.

I still don't really understand why Village and Smithy don't have synergy, even using your overly specific definition. Smithy draws 3 more cards, this means that your deck can benefit from the effect of Village more often and with a lower action density than if you were to replace all the Smithies in your deck with a non drawing action like e.g. Militia. Basically the Smithies make your Villages more likely to do something and Villages make your Smithies better as they mean that you can play the action cards you draw with Smithy. It seems reasonable to me to describe this as an interaction producing a combined effect stronger than the sum of it's parts,  but this is obviously subjective. I wouldn't say that Village and Militia have synergy. I also have no idea what a "generic terminal" is.

What about the interactions of Secret Passage and Native Village? Secret Passage lets you position bad cards in your deck and Native Village can then remove them from your deck. This isn't multiplicative, it's essentially giving Native Village an entirely new function- that of a reliable deck thinner. What do you call this? A combo? A positive interaction? Not calling this a synergy seems like nonsense to me.
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enfynet

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Re: Another awful thread about nothing
« Reply #77 on: November 10, 2017, 07:07:18 pm »
0

I would contest that cycling cards and villages have synergy because they can't really be an engine on their own, but can create an engine together.
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Co0kieL0rd

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Re: Another awful thread about nothing
« Reply #78 on: November 10, 2017, 07:28:26 pm »
+5

You were right, this thread IS awful (except for page 4).

The question arising in my head is: Why? Why even start such an argument? What are you trying to achieve here? People have different opinions on what synergy is but so far they've been coming to terms on which cards synergize with each other just fine. Individual notions of "synergy" in general discussions on strategy have been completely sufficient for years. Why is it so important to you that people now assume yours?

What's the point in trying to define what Village and Smithy have going with each other, when all there is to know is that in an engine you want splitters and draw (which are provided by Village and Smithy) and the more copies you have of both, the more card you draw total? You can say, they have synergy, or they work well together in an engine, or you need both (or similar cards) to draw your deck.
The conclusion is always the same; they are both engine components, or, in broader terms, parts of a specific deck you need to build to pursue a specific strategy. If your strategy requires Apothecaries and Coppersmith, or alt-VP and Hoard, it doesn't matter whether they have synergy or just add their values, as long as you have a reason to include those cards in your strategy.

This is what this forum is about. It says it in its name: Dominionstrategy; not Dominionterminology!
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Re: Another awful thread about nothing
« Reply #79 on: November 11, 2017, 12:42:40 am »
+3

The definition of synergy being floated by many here is being called arbitrary by many others. It is not. A good definition of synergy is:

X and Y have synergy iff Strength of (X + Y) > Strength of X + Strength of Y.
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enfynet

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Re: Another awful thread about nothing
« Reply #80 on: November 11, 2017, 12:55:24 am »
+1

I think at least one person is using "synergy" to mean something along the lines of, "when X and Y are used together, extra function Z happens."
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theory

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Re: Another awful thread about nothing
« Reply #81 on: November 11, 2017, 01:33:51 am »
+13

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Gherald

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Re: Another awful thread about nothing
« Reply #82 on: November 11, 2017, 01:52:26 am »
+1

The definition of synergy being floated by many here is being called arbitrary by many others. It is not. A good definition of synergy is:

X and Y have synergy iff Strength of (X + Y) > Strength of X + Strength of Y.
The problem here is one of clarifying scope.

"Strength of X" all by itself? Strength of X on a typical board where you'd use X?

The latter is the one I'm interested in when I look for synergy. X typically brings a certain strength to the table, Y typically brings a certain strength. Those are fast priors I know from all my previous play experience. But here we have X+Y, so is that better or worse than what I typically use X and Y for?

If it's somehow noticeably better, that's a 2-card synergy I pay attention to and basically register as a possible option to execute as I'm reviewing initial strategy. Looking for this type of card synergy is a very fast first/second pass at evaluating a board, almost intuitive based on your priors of previous games. It's a way to quickly spot things that might well fall short of a "combo" but are clearly worth having in mind as options to execute.

Separately from noticing synergies -- a.k.a situations 2 things together are stronger than they'd usually be separately -- , you still do all your essential analysis of basic mechanics like trashing and +buys and action support for the terminals you'd like to play and draw support for the payload you'd like to have, etcetera.
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crj

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Re: Another awful thread about nothing
« Reply #83 on: November 11, 2017, 09:43:55 am »
+2

Well, I'm the one who said Village and Smithy have synergy. It takes two to tango, a dozen or so to line dance, but I can't help feeling slightly responsible.

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iguanaiguana

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Re: Another awful thread about nothing
« Reply #84 on: November 11, 2017, 10:18:00 am »
+2

I posit that the only reason everyone is doomsaying about this thread (which is a ridiculous thread!) is because of the title, which gives everyone an open invitation to call everything in it awful.
« Last Edit: November 13, 2017, 08:03:18 am by iguanaiguana »
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faust

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Re: Another awful thread about nothing
« Reply #85 on: November 12, 2017, 03:29:37 am »
+7

Also, I posit that the only reason everyone is doomsaying about this thread (which is a ridiculous thread!) is because of the title, which gives everyone an open invitation to call everything in it awful.
What an awful suggestion!
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Seprix

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Re: A beautiful thread about synergy and terminology
« Reply #86 on: November 14, 2017, 09:16:37 am »
0

An awful thread about nothing is at least better than a awful thread about something. I hope this thread turns into Random Discussion 4.
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Jeebus

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Re: Another awful thread about nothing
« Reply #87 on: November 14, 2017, 11:57:33 am »
+2

I saw coppersmith brought up multiple times, and that isn't even a card...

For playing what is ostensibly a card game, Dominion players sure like to deny that cards really are cards.

Seprix

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Re: Another awful thread about nothing
« Reply #88 on: November 14, 2017, 12:00:04 pm »
0

I saw coppersmith brought up multiple times, and that isn't even a card...

For playing what is ostensibly a card game, Dominion players sure like to deny that cards really are cards.

When people say something isn't a card anymore, they really mean it has been removed.
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Jeebus

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Re: Another awful thread about nothing
« Reply #89 on: November 14, 2017, 12:08:08 pm »
0

When people say something isn't a card anymore, they really mean it has been removed.

Yeah, I got that. I was also referring to the fact that people like to say that Event cards are not cards.

Coppersmith is removed from new printings, but not from the game. It's still an official card (unlike old versions of revised cards).

Awaclus

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Re: Another awful thread about nothing
« Reply #90 on: November 14, 2017, 12:31:16 pm »
+2

I was also referring to the fact that people like to say that Event cards are not cards.

That's because they aren't.
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Jeebus

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Re: Another awful thread about nothing
« Reply #91 on: November 14, 2017, 12:46:52 pm »
+2

I was also referring to the fact that people like to say that Event cards are not cards.

That's because they aren't.

You're actually claiming that cards are not cards. Just in case you didn't realize that. (But thanks for validating what I just said above!) If you actually wanted to say something sensible about the topic instead, I refer you to the other thread about this very matter. I'll locate it if you're interested and don't know where it is.
« Last Edit: November 14, 2017, 12:48:16 pm by Jeebus »
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chipperMDW

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Re: Don't be fooled, nothing for you here
« Reply #92 on: November 14, 2017, 01:54:57 pm »
+1

Actually, no card (printed piece of cardboard) is a card (a specific type of abstract game object).  It's just handy to use the former to represent the latter because that makes it easier to shuffle them.
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enfynet

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Re: Don't be fooled, nothing for you here
« Reply #93 on: November 14, 2017, 02:42:30 pm »
+2

If you put sleeves on Events and Landmarks, do you use card sleeves?

I love these discussions that don't actually go anywhere useful. :)
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Re: Don't be fooled, nothing for you here
« Reply #94 on: November 14, 2017, 03:24:58 pm »
+2

So who keeps changing the thread title, is the question I have.
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Re: Don't be fooled, nothing for you here
« Reply #95 on: November 14, 2017, 03:28:10 pm »
+3

So who keeps changing the thread title, is the question I have.

Gherald changed it to "A beautiful thread about synergy and terminology" and Donald X. changed it to what it currently is.
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crj

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Re: Don't be fooled, nothing for you here
« Reply #96 on: November 14, 2017, 03:56:51 pm »
+1

I guess the next question is: given we have standard-sized rectangular pieces of cardboard that aren't "cards", will Dominion ever get a "card" that's not a standard-sized rectangular piece of cardboard?

It's not a completely stupid idea. For example, a slim plastic deck box:

Secret Society, Action
  Shuffle the cards from this and put them on top of your deck. +1 Card, +1 Action.
  When you trash this, discard its contents
  When shuffling this, you may look through your remaining deck, put up to ten cards in this, then put this anywhere in the shuffled cards.
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Re: Another awful thread about nothing
« Reply #97 on: November 15, 2017, 03:46:07 am »
+1

It never occurred to me people would call things like Village+Smithy a synergy.
Of course it is synergy, you need two to tango and if they work smoothly together they are cheaper than a pair of Labs.
As Awaclus has pointed out, extra actions are worthless unless you use them to play terminals.

It is like having a deck that generated 16 each turn without any extra buys. You could argue that adding extra coin-generating cards like a Poacher to that deck is good but it isn't as you cannot do anything more with 17 coins and 1 buy than you could do with 16 coins and 1 buy.
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Re: Another awful thread about nothing
« Reply #98 on: November 15, 2017, 04:00:43 am »
+1

It never occurred to me people would call things like Village+Smithy a synergy.
Of course it is synergy, you need two to tango and if they work smoothly together they are cheaper than a pair of Labs.
As Awaclus has pointed out, extra actions are worthless unless you use them to play terminals.

It is like having a deck that generated 16 each turn without any extra buys. You could argue that adding extra coin-generating cards like a Poacher to that deck is good but it isn't as you cannot do anything more with 17 coins and 1 buy than you could do with 16 coins and 1 buy.
But... a deck of only Smithies and Villages is also worthless.
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Awaclus

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Re: Another awful thread about nothing
« Reply #99 on: November 15, 2017, 06:30:16 am »
0

It never occurred to me people would call things like Village+Smithy a synergy.
Of course it is synergy, you need two to tango and if they work smoothly together they are cheaper than a pair of Labs.
As Awaclus has pointed out, extra actions are worthless unless you use them to play terminals.

It is like having a deck that generated 16 each turn without any extra buys. You could argue that adding extra coin-generating cards like a Poacher to that deck is good but it isn't as you cannot do anything more with 17 coins and 1 buy than you could do with 16 coins and 1 buy.
But... a deck of only Smithies and Villages is also worthless.

Which is why there's also a synergy between that and payload.
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