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Author Topic: Is Harvest the New Scout?  (Read 6179 times)

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Trogdor the Burninator

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Is Harvest the New Scout?
« on: May 10, 2020, 02:07:05 am »
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Seriously, it's almost meme-worthy just how useless Harvest is. Is there any use for it at all?
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segura

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Re: Is Harvest the New Scout?
« Reply #1 on: May 10, 2020, 05:54:27 am »
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I don‘t see it. Sure, Harvest is weak and you would virtually always prefer any of the „terminal Gold plus something“ $5s over Harvest. But whenever you need virtual Coins (Tactician) or prefer Actions over Treasures (Herald) and got the terminal space for Harvest, it is OK.

There are far worse $5s, like e.g. Mine.
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pubby

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Re: Is Harvest the New Scout?
« Reply #2 on: May 10, 2020, 07:04:54 am »
0

Yes it's terrible and probably the worst card in the game. If it had a stupid character's face on the card art, it would be a meme.

The only relevant harvest combo I can think of is Capitalism. I don't recommend using it as virtual money in engines because of how little it gives you for the cost (and how awkward it is to play!)
« Last Edit: May 10, 2020, 07:07:50 am by pubby »
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Jack Rudd

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Re: Is Harvest the New Scout?
« Reply #3 on: May 10, 2020, 07:54:16 am »
+1

If you've also got Black Market, there's a good chance that you can reliably activate Harvest for +4 Coins.
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silverspawn

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Re: Is Harvest the New Scout?
« Reply #4 on: May 10, 2020, 08:09:50 am »
+1

Leaderboard has it as weakest 5$ but not as weakest card overall. Transmute and philosopher's stone are weaker. I think that's about right.

A bunch of the cards we that have been removed seem weaker - tribute, chancellor, scout, saboteur, maybe great hall. I buy harvest occasionally, mostly based on lack of competition. There are times where it has to compete with silver and it often beats silver.

NoMoreFun

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Re: Is Harvest the New Scout?
« Reply #5 on: May 10, 2020, 09:14:28 am »
+1

It's bad, especially now with several penalty free $5 terminal golds, but in any kingdom it can have its full effect and function as payload (though very rarely better than Gold).

Scout wasn't even that good when it was working well. Even the much stronger cards that use some of its effects don't get much love. Patrol is an unremarkable and relatively weak $5 smithy variant, Vagrant almost never gets bought as more than a "why not" cantrip, and Secret Passage is considered weak despite having all the same deck order combos on a stronger and safer card.

Pearl Diver is my current pick for least worthwhile, even though I buy it more than Transmute and Harvest.
« Last Edit: May 11, 2020, 02:44:27 am by NoMoreFun »
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spineflu

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Re: Is Harvest the New Scout?
« Reply #6 on: May 10, 2020, 09:44:33 am »
+1

Yes it's terrible and probably the worst card in the game. If it had a stupid character's face on the card art, it would be a meme.

The only relevant harvest combo I can think of is Capitalism. I don't recommend using it as virtual money in engines because of how little it gives you for the cost (and how awkward it is to play!)

it's good at revealing cards for Patron coffers.
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Awaclus

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Re: Is Harvest the New Scout?
« Reply #7 on: May 10, 2020, 01:57:42 pm »
+2

Leaderboard has it as weakest 5$ but not as weakest card overall. Transmute and philosopher's stone are weaker. I think that's about right.

At first, I thought this used data from games somehow but turns out it's just opinions.


Is Harvest the weakest card? That depends on what it means for a card to be "powerful", which is far from a trivial question to answer. trivialknot's impact analysis is, despite not being perfect, really good and probably the best method, but the results in his thread were done on an outdated data set. It puts Contraband and Counting House below Harvest, and we can be pretty sure that Counting House would be higher since the introduction of Travelling Fair. I feel like people overbought both Contraband and Harvest but the latter more so than the former in Isotropic days, so maybe if we did this with recent data and didn't count Potion cost cards towards Potions, junkers towards junk etc., Harvest could actually show up as the bottom card, but it could also be Transmute or Contraband.

Other methods would give different answers. E.g. the SamEthod (which is a cage match where players pick which card they want access to each game, and if they pick the same one, it's a win for that card) would most likely rank Harvest higher than Counting House, since most of the time the combo isn't there so you just pick Harvest since it's the stronger one just in case you somehow end up needing a weak $5 terminal that mostly just provides a random number of dollars.
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D782802859

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Re: Is Harvest the New Scout?
« Reply #8 on: May 10, 2020, 06:04:45 pm »
+1

It's not even a fun card to use, since it punishes you for drawing your deck, which is one of the most fun things to do in Dominion. Plus, you'd think that would make it decent with junkers, but those make it worse because the junk all has the same name most of the time. Harvest isn't really good at anything, and doesn't have the versatility to justify that.
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jomini

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Re: Is Harvest the New Scout?
« Reply #9 on: May 11, 2020, 09:22:12 am »
0

I would call Harvest the weakest card in the game, its biggest virtue is that it generates cash, which is always on the board. Mute, at least, has the virtue of being a trasher (e.g. can be used as the only option in a Familiar game to get rid of curses) and a VP gainer which are things that, rarely, can be worth spending a turn to buy if there is no other option on the board and also gets a lot less bad when you are already buying a pot for something like Familiar. Pstone is another very weak card, but it at least can be strong on 3 or 4 player games with lots of junking (e.g. Mountebank, Ambassador) and actually quite good with colonies on those boards.

Where Harvest actually gets useful is where it does something better than two silvers. Notably, it can be the only +$ option for a Lib, Owl, or other limited draw engine. These can be exceptionally powerful with strong attacks or alt-VP (e.g. Temple) allowing you to build for a long time. The discarding can also be helpful in its own right, for instance rare niches can include using it as a B-crat/Fortune teller/Rabble counter or activating Tunnels; in both cases it is normally too weak to bother but can get a lot a stronger with favorable setups (e.g. having a Squire/Lib engine against Rabble, using it with a Remodel/Courtyard/Village engine for enabling Tunnels).

I do think it might have a legitimate synergy with Village green. Search space is the same size as anything that discards from hand at start (e.g. Count), can discard multiples per play, and generates a respectable cash load while discarding. I have definitely used it as the only discarder in the game to good effect.

Ultimately though, a best case scenario for Harvest is discarding 4 cards for $4. This costs you one draw slot and one action for using up a single $5 gain. You can get the same $4 for no action, two draw slots and two $3 gains. On most boards actions are more valuable than draw slots and a single $5 gain is much more valuable than two $3s. Unless there is nothing else at $5 or I really need some specific function like discussed above, Harvest will only be a viable shot when +actions are not limiting and where I need the unreliable cash now more than whatever else is on sale at $5.


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D782802859

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Re: Is Harvest the New Scout?
« Reply #10 on: May 11, 2020, 09:55:49 am »
+1

I think this raises the question, would Harvest be balanced at a 4 cost? There are stronger payload options, such as Bridge and cards that give equal or greater coin amounts, like Baron and Death Cart, both of which you can actually control the activation of semi-consistently.
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Awaclus

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Re: Is Harvest the New Scout?
« Reply #11 on: May 11, 2020, 10:25:17 am »
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I think this raises the question, would Harvest be balanced at a 4 cost? There are stronger payload options, such as Bridge and cards that give equal or greater coin amounts, like Baron and Death Cart, both of which you can actually control the activation of semi-consistently.

It would be weak at a 4 cost.
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faust

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Re: Is Harvest the New Scout?
« Reply #12 on: May 11, 2020, 12:27:33 pm »
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I think this raises the question, would Harvest be balanced at a 4 cost? There are stronger payload options, such as Bridge and cards that give equal or greater coin amounts, like Baron and Death Cart, both of which you can actually control the activation of semi-consistently.

It would be weak at a 4 cost.
A little. But people buy Gladiator for $3 all the time, and this would be a slightly better Gladiator most of the time.
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D782802859

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Re: Is Harvest the New Scout?
« Reply #13 on: May 11, 2020, 12:33:42 pm »
+2

I think this raises the question, would Harvest be balanced at a 4 cost? There are stronger payload options, such as Bridge and cards that give equal or greater coin amounts, like Baron and Death Cart, both of which you can actually control the activation of semi-consistently.

It would be weak at a 4 cost.
A little. But people buy Gladiator for $3 all the time, and this would be a slightly better Gladiator most of the time.
They buy it to get to Fortune, mostly, not because it's particularly good, and there's something to be said for consistency. You can control what's in your hand much better than the top of your deck.
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ednever

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Re: Is Harvest the New Scout?
« Reply #14 on: May 13, 2020, 06:46:15 pm »
+1

I ban the following cards:
Philosopher's Stone
Transmute
Harvest
Royal Seal

At least when playing on random, all four are just a waste of a spot that could go to something else.

Harvest is only useful (1) as a discarder, or (2) as an action that makes $s. It is bad at both of those things - and it's not particularly good by combining them. Only purchased if you need one of those things and its the only option

Transmute and PStone are very weak. They have their rare uses, but so rare that I think it's fine I never play with them. I expect they would be more interesting if I played "two expansions" rather than fully random

Royal Seal is fine. It is often worth getting one instead of a silver, but it never makes the game more interesting.


There are other cards I dislike, but all of them make the game different. Those four just seem to sit there and take up space

Ed
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Vengil

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Re: Is Harvest the New Scout?
« Reply #15 on: May 13, 2020, 07:15:47 pm »
0

I ban the following cards:
Philosopher's Stone
Transmute
Harvest
Royal Seal

I prefer to play with all the cards. Otherwise there would be a lot of cards to ban.
Stach: there is always better
Bureaucrat: same
Rebuild: good, but boring, boring, boring ...
Scrying Pool: good but wastes real time.
Possession: °_°
...

(It's true that I have never used Transmute in eight years...)
« Last Edit: May 13, 2020, 07:18:29 pm by Vengil »
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Carline

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Re: Is Harvest the New Scout?
« Reply #16 on: May 13, 2020, 09:02:59 pm »
+2

I ban only Rebuild.
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silverspawn

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Re: Is Harvest the New Scout?
« Reply #17 on: May 14, 2020, 07:24:53 am »
+1

I think this raises the question, would Harvest be balanced at a 4 cost? There are stronger payload options, such as Bridge and cards that give equal or greater coin amounts, like Baron and Death Cart, both of which you can actually control the activation of semi-consistently.

It would be weak at a 4 cost.
A little. But people buy Gladiator for $3 all the time, and this would be a slightly better Gladiator most of the time.
They buy it to get to Fortune, mostly, not because it's particularly good, and there's something to be said for consistency. You can control what's in your hand much better than the top of your deck.

If you buy gladiator to get fortune, you're usually doing something wrong.

segura

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Re: Is Harvest the New Scout?
« Reply #18 on: May 14, 2020, 07:54:55 am »
0

I think this raises the question, would Harvest be balanced at a 4 cost? There are stronger payload options, such as Bridge and cards that give equal or greater coin amounts, like Baron and Death Cart, both of which you can actually control the activation of semi-consistently.

It would be weak at a 4 cost.
A little. But people buy Gladiator for $3 all the time, and this would be a slightly better Gladiator most of the time.
They buy it to get to Fortune, mostly, not because it's particularly good, and there's something to be said for consistency. You can control what's in your hand much better than the top of your deck.

If you buy gladiator to get fortune, you're usually doing something wrong.
Hard to get Fortune if nobody bought Gladiator.
Usually the Gold and the unlocking of Fortune is the main reason to get Gladiator whereas being a terminal Silver that is sometimes a terminal Gold is of minor relevance.
« Last Edit: May 14, 2020, 07:56:40 am by segura »
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Holger

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Re: Is Harvest the New Scout?
« Reply #19 on: May 14, 2020, 09:07:48 am »
+1

I think this raises the question, would Harvest be balanced at a 4 cost? There are stronger payload options, such as Bridge and cards that give equal or greater coin amounts, like Baron and Death Cart, both of which you can actually control the activation of semi-consistently.

It would be weak at a 4 cost.
A little. But people buy Gladiator for $3 all the time, and this would be a slightly better Gladiator most of the time.
They buy it to get to Fortune, mostly, not because it's particularly good, and there's something to be said for consistency. You can control what's in your hand much better than the top of your deck.

If you buy gladiator to get fortune, you're usually doing something wrong.
Hard to get Fortune if nobody bought Gladiator.
Usually the Gold and the unlocking of Fortune is the main reason to get Gladiator whereas being a terminal Silver that is sometimes a terminal Gold is of minor relevance.

You're unlocking Fortune for the opponent too, without him needing to buy Gladiator. At best you're getting Fortune half a turn earlier than him (plus a free Gold), after having "wasted" a buy on a card (that you don't need itself) at least four shuffles before.
« Last Edit: May 14, 2020, 09:11:29 am by Holger »
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segura

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Re: Is Harvest the New Scout?
« Reply #20 on: May 14, 2020, 09:22:53 am »
0

I think this raises the question, would Harvest be balanced at a 4 cost? There are stronger payload options, such as Bridge and cards that give equal or greater coin amounts, like Baron and Death Cart, both of which you can actually control the activation of semi-consistently.

It would be weak at a 4 cost.
A little. But people buy Gladiator for $3 all the time, and this would be a slightly better Gladiator most of the time.
They buy it to get to Fortune, mostly, not because it's particularly good, and there's something to be said for consistency. You can control what's in your hand much better than the top of your deck.

If you buy gladiator to get fortune, you're usually doing something wrong.
Hard to get Fortune if nobody bought Gladiator.
Usually the Gold and the unlocking of Fortune is the main reason to get Gladiator whereas being a terminal Silver that is sometimes a terminal Gold is of minor relevance.

You're unlocking Fortune for the opponent too, without him needing to buy Gladiator. At best you're getting Fortune half a turn earlier than him (plus a free Gold), after having "wasted" a buy on a card (that you don't need itself) at least four shuffles before.
If that analysis of Gladiator/Fortune would be correct, if the dominant strategy in most Kingdoms would be to never buy Gladiator, it would never happen. And yet it does.
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pubby

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Re: Is Harvest the New Scout?
« Reply #21 on: May 14, 2020, 09:33:02 am »
+3

Gladiator is bought when it's advantageous over buying silver.
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pubby

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Re: Is Harvest the New Scout?
« Reply #22 on: May 14, 2020, 12:00:49 pm »
0

Wow, I just played a board where harvest was *good*.

Quote
Kingdom: Coin of the Realm, Squire, Experiment, Fishing Village, Scheme, Dismantle, Marauder, Pirate Ship, Harvest, Idol, Aqueduct, Way of the Goat — Empty piles: Province, Ruins

Opponent played with a marauder and bought a pirate ship because of idol. I used the ruins as way of the goat to trash down, then pivoted into Harvests. Almost every time I played harvest I hit 4 uniques. They were the best card in my deck.

My end deck (That's a lot of points!):
Quote
a Curse, 4 Silvers, 5 Duchies, 6 Provinces, 5 Fishing Villages, 3 Harvests, an Abandoned Mine, a Marauder, 2 Spoils, 2 Squires, a Survivors, an Idol, a Will-o'-Wisp and an Experiment
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ednever

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Re: Is Harvest the New Scout?
« Reply #23 on: May 14, 2020, 01:55:51 pm »
+2

If your strategy needs Fortune more than your opponent does it can absolutely make sense to buy Gladiator. If he is going for a big money one province per turn strategy and you are building an engine to grab the whole pile, a fortune is far more valuable to you than it is to him.

Ed
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silverspawn

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Re: Is Harvest the New Scout?
« Reply #24 on: May 14, 2020, 01:58:34 pm »
+1

You're unlocking Fortune for the opponent too, without him needing to buy Gladiator. At best you're getting Fortune half a turn earlier than him (plus a free Gold), after having "wasted" a buy on a card (that you don't need itself) at least four shuffles before.

Exactly. There are cases when your and your opponents' deck are sufficiently different that the ability to buy fortune benefits you significantly more than them – in those cases, you buy gladiator to get to fortune. But those are rare. In the majority of cases, whether or not fortune is good should have zero influence on your decision of whether or not to buy gladiator.

But the powerlevel of gladiator itself is high enough to buy it reasonably often. You often open silver and therefore

Gladiator is bought when it's advantageous over buying silver.
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