Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[BaruMonkey]

I was a bit disheartened by something I just read elsewhere in these forums (and have seen at least once before): Apparently I'm in a "beginner phase" when it comes to Shanty Town, because I view it as a slightly-better-than Village.

One risk with Village is that you'll play it, not draw your terminal action(s), and now you've got spare actions left over (meaning, I guess, that you should have bought silver instead). As I've been reading it, Shanty Town minimizes that risk. Either you power the actions that are already in your hand or, if you don't have any, there's a little safety net that gives you a chance to draw one or two of them, springboarding your turn where it otherwise would have fallen flat.

My request: Prove me wrong, ideally in the form of an article!

[jonts26]

Well I'm not going to write an article but I'll just give you a quick explanation.

Assume you only have shanty towns and terminals for simplicity. A shanty town only triggers (gives +2 cards) if there are no other actions in hand. So you draw 5 cards, one of which is a shanty town. Now you have a 4 card space where you don't actually want another action (shanty town included) and a 2 card space (the draw) where you do. So you are essentially 2 to 1 in favor of not triggering. Though as long as you have another action in the space of 6 cards (either 4 in hand or 2 from draw) you will get to play it.

Compare to vanilla village. You get +1 card regardless. So the terminal you want to play has a 5 card space to be found (1 from draw, 4 in hand). This is slightly worse than shanty town. But you will draw more cards on average.

Now if you are building a +card/+action engine, you're going to want a high density of terminals and villages. Which means you are still pretty likely to hit your terminals in the 5 card space form vanilla village, while the overall lesser card draw is worse for shanty town. But it's really close. Which is why both cards are $3.

[ftl]

I'm actually going to point to your own analysis a little, BaruMonkey. You talk about the upside of shanty town - mitigating the risk of not having actions in hand to start your engine - but NOWHERE in your post did you mention the drawbacks! Shanty town can either be +2 cards, +2 actions, which is like a Level 2 city, better than a $5 card... OR, it can be +0 cards, +2 actions, which is WORSE than every single village in the game! Your post talked ONLY about the upside, whereas you have to weigh the upside against the downside, and estimate how often you'll get one or the other.

Shanty town is better than village in the case where you have no other actions in hand. However, if you have the sort of deck which consistently doesn't have any actions in hand, why on earth would that deck need villages at all? If you rarely have two actions in the same hand, then +2 actions is pretty useless! +2 cards is still nice. On the other hand if you DO have multiple actions in hand, then shanty town is just +2 actions, no other effect - and that's a pretty terrible card, that's worse than Native Village and Hamlet. I mean, it'll do as a village if you really want to build an engine and there's no other villages around, but it's pretty bad.

And if you draw Shanty Town with ONE action in hand - well, then that shanty town literally did nothing for your hand, it was a dead card.

It's sort of a beginner play because Shanty Town *appears* to shine in decks that are neither here nor there. In a good engine deck, you should have enough villages and actions that you basically always draw multiple actions in hand and so shanty town is bad. In a Big Money-ish deck, you should be avoiding collisions, and so you don't want villages, because it's so much more likely to draw one shanty town and one action rather than one shanty town and two actions. So really, Shanty Town can 'collide' with actions in much the same way as a terminal action does, it's a dead card if you draw it in the same hand as another action.

There ARE cases where shanty town is a good card. For example, in a deck with mostly money, a small number of shanty towns can act like cheap Laboratories for $3. But only as long as you don't get too many, because if you get too many then they'll start colliding, and two shanty towns in one hand just replace themselves. And really, if you only use one laboratory in a turn, it's more of a Moat than a lab... In a deck with only cantrips, a single shanty town can also act as a laboratory, not bad. 

But when you actually want to use Shanty Town as a Village and use it for its +2 actions? Not good at all. Sometimes necessary anyway, because, well, sometimes the other engine cards are good enough to make up for a bad village.

[Voltgloss]

And if you draw Shanty Town with ONE action in hand - well, then that shanty town literally did nothing for your hand, it was a dead card.

Not true all the time.  If that one action in your hand is terminal card draw, and as part of that draw you pull up another action card, you'll be glad you played that Shanty Town.  Of course, a vanilla Village is still usually better in this circumstance, because with that Village you're getting an extra card.

...why "usually" better?  Because there is one situation where Shanty Town's drawback vanishes:  when your terminal draw is of the "until you have X cards in hand" variety.  Library, Watchtower, Jack of all Trades.  Whether you played a vanilla Village or a Shanty Town, you're still getting the same drawing power.  With that sort of support, I suggest that Shanty Town becomes better than Village:  it gives the same results if drawn together with your draw action, and gives you +2 cards instead of +1 if drawn by itself.

One other minor point:

...because if you get too many then they'll start colliding, and two shanty towns in one hand just replace themselves.

Two Shanty Towns in hand gives the same end result as two Villages in hand (play 2 cards to draw 2 cards and get +3 actions).  It's only if you have three colliding that Village gets you better results than Shanty Town.

[O]

I've always believed that Shanty Town and Walled Village are consistently underrated by the community. This is because they improve the times where the village use fails- and people argue that should never happen. But in reality this happens to a degree in 85% of engines and in those cases the cards can be critically useful.

[philosophyguy]

Agreed that Shanty Town not activating the draw makes it a horrible village in most circumstances. But, it's phenomenal as a cheap Lab in BM games. As long as you only buy a couple of Shanty Towns to reduce the risk of collision, I love them in otherwise boring sets.

Shanty is also great for early game acceleration. Assuming it doesn't miss the first reshuffle, you get all your deck shuffled into the turn 5 shuffle. That's a huge help in Scrying Pool/Apothecary games (when Potion cycling is crucial). I haven't run the stats to compare Shanty/Potion to Silver/Potion for Familiar/Alchemist games; I'd guess it's probably slightly inferior on the first shuffle but better long term (as long as you have plenty of non-terminals).

[Robz888]

Compared to Village, it's really just a little worse, and better in certain situations. But neither Shanty Town nor Village are great in the types of decks where you want Village-esque cards. Fishing gives you money and more actions for the same price, Farming always draws a useful card, Worker's has buy, Hamlet is flexible and way cheap, Bazaar and Festival are expensive but come with big advantages, and Native slowly sets aside cards that you are guaranteed to play at the same time as the village. (Mining is good, but less so for action/draw style decks.)

[mnavratil]

This is actually maybe worth mentioning. While I would probably not open Village/Silver to start an engine, I very well Might open Shanty Town/Silver, knowing that the shanty town will be better later and the draw might be "good enough" for an opening now. Also I think there is a point when adding a shanty town to a smithy/village type of engine becomes better than another village if the engine is firing reliably enough, the extra shanty town can be played last for an extra +2 cards.

[rrenaud]

Now if you are building a +card/+action engine, you're going to want a high density of terminals and villages. Which means you are still pretty likely to hit your terminals in the 5 card space form vanilla village, while the overall lesser card draw is worse for shanty town. But it's really close. Which is why both cards are $3.

Fishing Village also costs $3, but I frequently buy it over $4 villages, and could really see myself buying it at $5.  So the same costs -> close abilities thing doesn't really hold in general.

I think a generic Village is much better than a Shanty Town in a classic +cards/+actions engine.  Shanty Town benefits from being a non-stackable lab in an chain deck, and also from Watchtower/Library, where you don't need the action fork to give cards, because the drawer will just make up the difference.

[greatexpectations]

first off, this is a relevant thread.  there is some discussion on shanty town as compared to the other villages in that there.

shanty town is one of my favorite cards.  but as is the problem with most people and their favorite cards, i do tend to overbuy it. that being said, i would say it is underrated. a few comments to add to the others...
- shanty town / silver open.  assuming the shanty town doesn't miss the shuffle, this opening guarantees you a $5 cost card and a reshuffle after turn 4.
- discard attacks.  i would easily prefer ST to other villages in response to most discard attacks, especially ghost ship. the flexibility offered by ST in these situations is quite useful.
- i think the card has a bit of a bad rep because it is far more difficult to play than the vanilla village.  there is little thought involved in how/when to play a village, but the order you play your hand with ST can be critically important. 
- a downside of the card is that you need to reveal your hand to gain the effect.  usually this is not a problem, but there are situations when the knowledge can be used by your opponent.

[Taco Lobster]

I've always believed that Shanty Town and Walled Village are consistently underrated by the community. This is because they improve the times where the village use fails- and people argue that should never happen. But in reality this happens to a degree in 85% of engines and in those cases the cards can be critically useful.

I don't think people argue that it never happens - I think the more common argument is that villages are a bit of a crutch for new players due to the opportunity cost in purchasing them.  Or, in other words, a terminal clash isn't a significant enough problem (in most instances) to justify purchasing a shanty town over a silver (or a Walled Village over silver or a good $4).

Plus, I'd rather have Scheme at $3 than Walled Village at $4, which provides a great deal of reliability and can be used on the terminal actions you really do want to play every turn.  Walled Village is very low on the power curve for $4.

[blueblimp]

Aside from the other situations already mentioned, Shanty Town seems pretty good with Minion, because then it doesn't matter as much if it doesn't replace itself, and it is good at recovering from the dreaded 4-card no-Minion hand.

The trick with Shanty Town, I think, is that it's good in quite different situations from other villages. If you try something like Shanty Town/Smithy, it's not going to be all that much better than Village/Moat or pure Nobles, both of which are pretty awful engines. Shanty Town seems better in the sort of engine where Festival would be good.

[ftl]

The trick with Shanty Town, I think, is that it's good in quite different situations from other villages.

Good point. I think most of the downsides of Shanty Town can be summed up as "If you try to use it the same way as you would use a regular village, it's bad at it because you'll often use it to get +0 cards". But it definitely has plenty of different ways to use it that aren't standard, and it can be a good card in the right situations, many of which have been pointed out here.

[DG]

I think your request for an article on shanty towns was very good since there has been a lot of talk about the problems of shanty towns and very little talk about how you use them. I'm not entirely sure myself sometimes. It's very tempting sometimes to play them just like a basic village and ignore the differences but it can become very frustrating to force the extra actions through. If they're not working then buying more will generally not solve the problem.

Shanty towns can be good when
- mixed with other villages (play the other actions out first)
- used with choice and selection (if a warehouse draws you a shanty town and a terminal action you can discard one of them)
- as a defence against discard attacks (since you can select the hand you keep)
- fixed size hand expansion such as a library, watchtower, or minion
- you can draw your deck even if shanty town provides no cards, such as with council rooms or alchemists
- played without any terminal actions in the deck at all (always giving +2 cards)

Choice and selection covers a lot and finding those opportunities can really make the shanty town worthwhile.

[randomdragoon]

Another thing to consider is that sometimes the action fork is mandatory and there's no other choice -- Torturer usually does this.

Shanty town really sucks with terminal non-draws: The hand shanty town-swindler-copper-copper-estate is very bad, and it's situations like this that beginners tend to forget about when they evaluate shanty town. shanty town-swindler-swindler-copper-estate is better, but is it that much better than silver-swindler-swindler-copper-estate that you will risk the first situation above?

[mnavratil]

A special note should be made that Shanty Town is an even better defense against Ghost Ship than other discard attacks, since you can often dump the actions in hand back on deck and use shanty town to redraw them.

[WheresMyElephant]

I've always believed that Shanty Town and Walled Village are consistently underrated by the community. This is because they improve the times where the village use fails- and people argue that should never happen. But in reality this happens to a degree in 85% of engines and in those cases the cards can be critically useful.

The problem is that sometimes you need that extra card to prevent the engine from failing later in the turn, even if you've already found the next card you need. If your hand starts with Shanty Town/Smithy and you draw three Coppers with the Smithy, that's engine failure too. Maybe a Village could have prevented it.

In fact, working from the general principle of "one great turn is better than two mediocre turns," one could argue the exact opposite of what you're saying.  Perhaps Village is better because it makes an already-good turn better, whereas Shanty Town just helps a bad turn limp along and maybe find one last Smithy. Honestly I don't know if I care for that argument, but I do know Shanty Town's draw is simply far too unreliable to merit serious consideration in any engine deck worth playing.

[RisingJaguar]

I've always believed that Shanty Town and Walled Village are consistently underrated by the community. This is because they improve the times where the village use fails- and people argue that should never happen. But in reality this happens to a degree in 85% of engines and in those cases the cards can be critically useful.

I agree.

I think the main problem in the view of the community, which includes me, with both of these cards is that we very much love to stack good cards.  Most of the best cards, especially those fit for engines, are stack-able and even get better when stacked.  I mean if it is good, it should be just as great when i get more!

These cards work the exact opposite for obvious reasons and easily diminish with each additional card.  Just building on the theme that ST is not to be used the same as a vanilla village. 

[Deadlock39]

Walled Village just gets a bad rap because it has (arguably) the worst bonus of the Village + a bonus cards.  But in the end, it is still strictly superior to Village (disregarding cost).  Walled Village is just a Village when it is doing what it is supposed to, and has a fail safe if it isn't. 

Shanty Town is similar in that it gets a bonus if it the engine isn't working right, but the problem is that it is worse than Village when it is doing what it is supposed to do.  If it was instead priced at 4 and gave 2 cards when you had no actions, and 1 card when you did have actions, it would probably be a pretty popular Village with a bonus. 

[jomini]

Too many people think of shanty town as a bad village. It is equally appropriate to say that it is an inferior lab. For a lot of situations, you will use shanty town more as a lab than a village, and that can be pretty good for its price.

For instance, dumping a shanty town into a deck without terminals makes it into a lab. Normally this is always better than silver. Going for a deck like shanty/loan/venture/gold(plat) is quite viable and certainly better than silver at 3. Multiple shanties start colliding and the lab effects tamper down as you stock up on them.

Likewise, crossroads works extremely well with shantytown. You can play the first cross roads for actions + cards, then more Xroads until you have only a shanty, then a shanty and maybe more Xroads. You can churn through huge decks quickly this way and get to some key card(s) much more quickly this way (xroads, shanty, hoard, and any non-terminal +buy works pretty well).

There are a number of other times where you can smooth out your hand to hand hit strong shanty setups. Cards like haven, apothecary, and cartographer can let you setup very nice chains of +2 cards and +2 actions that use both much of the time. Even something like mandarin can let you milk this. For instance say you have a spare action (e.g. from tactician) and you have mandarin/mandarin/shanty. You can place one mandarin back with the first, shanty, and then play the second.

So yeah, if you just want a village; shanty is not so good. But if you want a cheap lab that works - but only in some circumstances - if you don't overbuy it, then shanty can actually be good. Then, of course, there are the setups where shanty just gets to rock out - ghost ship, diadem, etc.

[HiveMindEmulator]

Apparently I'm in a "beginner phase" when it comes to Shanty Town, because I view it as a slightly-better-than Village.

The next phase is viewing it as a slightly-worse-than Village...

I think after you get through all that, you realize that it's actually pretty different from Village. It's weak when used just like village because, well, it's not really a village, but it has the versatility to sometimes actually function as a handsize-increaser. As with most cards that give conditional bonuses, Shanty Town is good when you have a high chance of satisfying the condition. Situations in which this can occur fit into 2 broad categories:
1. You don't have many terminal actions in your deck. In the absence of terminal actions, Shanty Town works a lot like Lab unless multiple Shanty's collide.
2. You have another source of +2 actions in your deck (even vanilla village). This way, it's possible to play your terminals before the Shanty Town, and use it as a level 2 City. Additionally, a hand with Village+Shanty and no other actions is better than 2 of either one since you get to draw 3 cards instead of 2.