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[philosophyguy]

Alchemists on their own lose fairly reliably to BM. My question is: what cards (or kinds of cards) are needed for Alchemists to be a viable part of a strategy, and under what circumstances are you happy to see your opponent race for Alchemists on his own?

I would make the following guesses, but they are only guesses:

• Actions that produce coin are essential
• Attacks are more valuable with Alchemist chains because you can cycle your deck more frequently and play them more often (assuming you don't trigger reshuffles during the turn and cause the attack to sit out a shuffle)
• Other cards providing draw power without additional benefits (e.g., Smithy) are less valuable than they would be on their own because of the potion cost to Alchemists (which delays those purchases relative to a Smithy).
• +Buys are not very valuable without the ability to generate coin (e.g., Wharf would not be a huge advantage, while Festival would be extremely useful)

Do these claims seem correct? Other considerations?

[guided]

+Buy is almost 100% required for Alchemist decks. You need to be able to buy an Alchemist -and- something else when you have enough coin. And once you can reliably draw your deck you need to be able to buy multiple cards per turn, especially multiple VP cards to catch up if the other player is ahead. Buying a 2nd Potion early is usually important also, to reduce the probability of being forced to discard your Alchemists. Getting hit with discard attacks is awful.

Not sure why you bring up +coin actions. Gold (or Platinum) is the key source of buying power in most good Alchemist decks.

[DG]

Alchemists work best when you can reach a point where you can draw the entire deck (or some other equivalent). If you can't keep the alchemists rolling for a number of turns in a succession then they're not providing enough value.

I like the concept of a trading post with alchemists. Cut your terminal cards down to the trading post, some silver, a potion, and your provinces. There are all sorts of cards that are improved by playing them every turn when you draw your whole deck, including outposts and mines for example. Cards like a wharf can be balanced so that you play one each turn to complete your deck drawing and provide the important extra buy.

[Zaphod]

Alchemist games can be short, and typically you'll need to buy at least two Potions, so you may not have time to get very many extra actions.  You want a +buy card if you can get one.  Market works very well.

The Forge can be devastating with an Alchemist chain.  The strong drawing power of the Alchemist allows you a number of options for Forging.  With a couple good turns, you can turn all the clutter from your deck into useful cards.  Suddenly you find yourself drawing your entire deck every turn, which means the Alchemists always go back on top of your draw pile, and you can Forge the two extra Potions into a Province...

Obviously, hand-thinning attacks like Militia and Goons will hurt the Alchemist, to the point where it may not be a good choice.

[dan11295]

I agree on needed 2 potions to prevent your deck from stalling. Have gotten away with only one the last Alchemist game I played, but I had trashed with chapel early to rid myself of extra cards and my opponent ignored the alchemists w/no extra buy. I mainly won by using the Alchemists to Montebank him every single turn.

[Glooble]

Saboteur and Swindler can also be quite brutal if you have more than five alchemists. And if there's a masquerade in play, don't bother.

Conspirator can combo well, since after five alchemists there's no chance of it not activating.

[AJD]

I've actually won a couple of Alchemist vs. Masquerade games just by only putting three or four Alchemists back on top and usually having a copper or something to pass; the three or four alchemists on top usually still gave me enough draw to find the remaining alchemists.

I also won an Alchemist vs. Rabble game even though I usually put more than five alchemists back on top and losing the remaining ones to the rabble, for the same reason.

[philosophyguy]

Not sure why you bring up +coin actions. Gold (or Platinum) is the key source of buying power in most good Alchemist decks.

But how does the Alchemist deck get to that level of buying power? If you need to draw 6 coin, you probably will need 3 Alchemists if there's no trashing. Even with almost perfect shuffle luck, you'll need 5 or 6 turns to get there, and in the meantime your deck is not improving its buying power substantially, unless I'm missing something.

[guided]

Not sure why you bring up +coin actions. Gold (or Platinum) is the key source of buying power in most good Alchemist decks.

But how does the Alchemist deck get to that level of buying power? If you need to draw 6 coin, you probably will need 3 Alchemists if there's no trashing. Even with almost perfect shuffle luck, you'll need 5 or 6 turns to get there, and in the meantime your deck is not improving its buying power substantially, unless I'm missing something.

I'm really not following here. Is there something wrong with Silver? If you think it's difficult to get buying power with treasure, why will it be less difficult to get it with +coin actions (which aren't free or anything last I checked)? +coin actions are by and large going to be more expensive to buy for how much buying power you get and/or eat up terminal actions that you likely don't have a surplus of. Why not just buy Silver and Gold instead? Festival's a decent card to have 1, maybe 2 copies of if there's some useful terminal action on the board that you need. Market is usually better (because it draws a card). One copy of Woodcutter is good. But what makes these cards really important is that they have the +Buy that is essential to all Alchemist decks. The +coin is an added bonus.

[philosophyguy]

There's nothing wrong with Silver, per se, but according to the simulator, BM without Alchemists handily beats Alchemists + BM (I've tried with 2 potions and anywhere from 3-6 Alchemists). So I'm trying to figure out what is needed in order to get the Alchemists over the hump. Just adding +Buy doesn't seem to work (I've tried buying 1-2 Herbalists, and the win rate drops vs BM).

I don't know if the simulator implements the Alchemist/Herbalist discard rules correctly, so there's some margin for error there. Even so, the best I can get the Alchemist deck to function is losing 69%-24% (BMU VP rules, buy Alchemist if <6 in deck, buy Potion if <2, buy Herbalist if <1 and at least one Silver in deck, buy Silver).

So what else is missing?

[DG]

There's nothing wrong with Silver, per se, but according to the simulator, BM without Alchemists handily beats Alchemists + BM (I've tried with 2 potions and anywhere from 3-6 Alchemists).

Why would you ever think alchemists work well with pure money? With pure money you're expanding a deck with treasures so your hands are filled up with so much generalised treasure that you'll eventually be able to buy green cards, lots of green cards. With alchemists you're adding cards with no treasure value (like potions) in order to get a specific draw (potions + alchemists) that sets up repeated plays of key cards, strong hands, card combinations, or cards that work well on large hands. The two strategies have very little in common and work against each other.

[Staples]

I recently played a couple matches that had Alchemist. I decided to roll with them. Neither me not my opponent played these perfectly, and 19 and 24 turns probably isn't like a 15 turn game, but here goes.
Game 1 (24 turns): Alchemist, Bazaar, Chancellor, Envoy, Laboratory, Market, Nobles, Potion, Trading Post, Vineyard, and Witch
http://councilroom.com/game?game_id=game-20110630-230225-faca2307.html

Game 2 (19 turns): Alchemist, Baron, Bishop, Expand, Hunting Party, Library, Lookout, Mining Village, Monument, Potion, and Throne Room
http://councilroom.com/game?game_id=game-20110630-172053-be294a34.html

From what I have seen, +Buy is a must, and a good stash of money, and at least one strong supporting card. I'm not very good at actually analyzing the game, but these might be helpful for someone.

[philosophyguy]

Why would you ever think alchemists work well with pure money?

I wouldn't. If you read the original post, I was asking what is necessary in order to support a successful Alchemist strategy. The discussion went as follows: guided said that the deck should be getting its buying power from Golds/Platinums, rather than +coin actions; I asked how the deck could ramp up that buying power; guided responded that you should just buy Silver to get up to Gold; I ran some simulations comparing that strategy to BM and saw that it was markedly inferior.

So, DG, I'll go back to my original question: what is necessary in order to make Alchemists a viable strategy, since Alchemist-BM is not going to cut it?

[ImperialStout]

It would seem that a fortune teller would be effective against an alchemist deck either in a game where there are no trashers, or after the player going alchemists has started purchasing provinces (obviously the fortune teller would be ineffective after the alchemist player had trashed all three estates but before he/she had purchased provinces).  Anyone have luck with this?  It would be very luck based, i.e., it would only work if the first green card in the deck came after all potions within the alchemist player's drawing range.

[DG]

So, DG, I'll go back to my original question: what is necessary in order to make Alchemists a viable strategy, since Alchemist-BM is not going to cut it?

I'll stick to my original answer. They work best when you can repeatedly put your alchemists on top your deck in the clean up phase. This is either because you have shrunk your deck or can manage your cards so that you always put a potion into play. Once you can do that, you can get maximum benefit from other cards that rely on card combinations or large hand sizes since the alchemists will provide a large hand every turn.

[WanderingWinder]

It would seem that a fortune teller would be effective against an alchemist deck either in a game where there are no trashers, or after the player going alchemists has started purchasing provinces (obviously the fortune teller would be ineffective after the alchemist player had trashed all three estates but before he/she had purchased provinces).  Anyone have luck with this?  It would be very luck based, i.e., it would only work if the first green card in the deck came after all potions within the alchemist player's drawing range.

The thing is, they're still going to be able to have up to the five alchemists in their hand, and most of the time, five is enough. It's like playing a 10 card hand every turn, which is almost as good as having a tactician for you every turn. Of course, the main way of combatting this is to just buy >~50% of the VP by the time their big stack gets going. The only ways of really hacking at an entrenched Alchemist chain are with Militia-style attacks (which will drop them to 6 card hands, hardly a great accomplishment, but then, their 6 cards might well be worse than 5 of yours with how much time they've given to buying alchemists), Possession (why thanks for a monster hand, and now I'll choose not to return the alchemists to the top of your deck for you), Masquerade (which is just much stronger than alchemists anyways), Torturer chains (again, stronger anyways) and of course, Minion's attack, which actually knocks their hand out.

[WanderingWinder]

I would note that Alchemists do beat big money once you get to colony games - but what else is on the board is really important.

[rogerclee]

You don't need +buy if it's a Colony board. Alchemist is a reasonably fast way to get to $11, and often you can play so that you are drawing your entire deck, which consists of about $11, for the rest of the game.

[guided]

Why would you ever think alchemists work well with pure money?

I wouldn't. If you read the original post, I was asking what is necessary in order to support a successful Alchemist strategy. The discussion went as follows: guided said that the deck should be getting its buying power from Golds/Platinums, rather than +coin actions; I asked how the deck could ramp up that buying power; guided responded that you should just buy Silver to get up to Gold; I ran some simulations comparing that strategy to BM and saw that it was markedly inferior.

This is getting rather frustrating. You have yet to answer this simple question: for buying power specifically what is it that you think makes +coin actions superior to treasure in an Alchemist deck? Your assertion was that you need +coin actions as opposed to treasure. If you really think that's true, tell me why Harvest (say) is better than Gold in an Alchemist deck. Good Alchemist decks notably do not generally have lots of surplus actions that you could use to play lots of strong +coin terminals.

To be worth building, an Alchemist deck needs to have a "payload" that requires you to consistently draw a lot of cards, be it 5 Banks and a bunch of buys or some brutal attacking combo. But there's no reason whatsoever to think that you can't be getting your buying power mostly from treasure. You need buying power from somewhere and it might as well be treasure unless those action cards that happen to have +coin on them also serve some other critical purpose. The common thread with all Alchemist decks is that there will typically be no reason you need to draw up to a 15 card hard (or whatever) every turn if you don't have any source of +buy, and if you bother to build that deck with no extra buys you'll get beaten by somebody who just rushed green cards with a simpler strategy.

[philosophyguy]

The reason I speculate (and it has always been speculation--if you look at the very first post in this thread you'll see that I explicitly stated that these were guesses) that +coin actions were needed for Alchemists to be effective is that Alchemists  + BM don't succeed against BM alone. Since Alchemist + BM didn't generate enough buying power on its own to overcome BM, I guessed that the missing piece was +coin actions. That may well be wrong, but if so I'd like to know what the missing piece actually is.

As for the mechanic by which +coin actions would be superior to plain-old treasure, it might be that there are auxiliary benefits from playing the action so that it would be superior to just the coin (e.g., Market replaces itself in the hand, Woodcutter gives an extra buy over Silver). I don't know--and part of my hope with this question was that people would explain why they pair Alchemist with specific cards, so I could get some insight into the interaction they wanted to set up. But, since coin alone wasn't doing the job, it seemed a reasonable hypothesis to wonder whether +coin actions were a better way to get buying power. If that's not true, I have no problem with that. I'm just trying to figure out what the Alchemists need in addition to money in order to compete against BM.

So, let's try this discussion again: Alchemists are on the board, and you are trying to decide if they are a viable strategy. What do you want to see in order for the Alchemists to be viable?

[philosophyguy]

So far, here are the factors I can see listed in the posts above:

• Strong trashing aids Alchemists because it makes it more likely they will end up on top of the deck through either shuffles or playing your Potion.
• Herbalist/Apothecary aid Alchemists because they make it easier to get the Potion that keeps the Alchemists on top of the deck.
• Cards that benefit from large handsizes--e.g., Secret Chamber and other discard-for-benefit cards--strengthen Alchemists by giving them a decent payoff even if you draw lots of junk
• Hand-size attacks make Alchemists weaker, especially Minion because it forces you to discard any Alchemists you placed on top of your deck last turn

[guided]

What do you want to see in order for the Alchemists to be viable?

Some good reason for drawing most or all of your deck every turn, specifically something good enough that it will beat simpler strategies that go straight for green cards. +Buy at minimum.

[philosophyguy]

Some good reason for drawing most or all of your deck every turn, specifically something good enough that it will beat simpler strategies that go straight for green cards.

Can you give some examples of what those reasons might be? I've already mentioned discard for benefit cards like Secret Chamber/Vault, but I'm sure there are others.

[Superdad]

There is some discussion on this in another thread: Opening of the Day #1 (I believe).

In that thread, I was trying to assess the very same problem. I spotted a board where the only 2 viable strategies were Big Money plus Council Room, or Alchemists + Council Room/Money. I was surprised to see that Big Money handily beat Alchemists (as shown my Geronimo's simulator).

I was shocked to see this. I know that Alchemists are slow, but very powerful. I would have thought (first impression) that since the only other viable strategy was Big Money (which is typically the bounding-case slowest opponent), that Alchemists would win there. They didn't. So if they can't even beat the defacto slowest strategy, what the heck do they beat? And what tools were missing on that board that alchemists need (which at the same time, doesn't help big money by just as much).

I postulated that trashing was the missing ingredient, but I was countered by some of the top players on isotropic who mentioned that the trashing would likely benefit Big Money greater. This surprised me, but I would concede that their opinion certainly trumps mine.

So what is the missing ingredient then? Best I can see is the missing ingredient was Colonies.

If I have time I can play some more solitaire games, or mess around with the simulator more... but I'm having a hard time justifying EVER going Alchemists on a province board. Big Money seems to be strictly superior.

In terms of Colony Games, I would think the presence of trashing plus filter would help alchemists over big money. For example, something like Vault would certainly help the alchemist deck more than the big money deck.


/edit....
For anyone feeling adventurous (I would but I have no time atm), I'd be curious to see what the simulator says for a province game of:

Chapel
Alchemist
Vault
Council Room, Then as options for greater analysis of what the lichpin is, cards such as:
Steward
Bridge
Warehouse
Worker's Villiage

could help analyse under which cercumstances (i.e. support cards) alchemist strategies beat big money on province boards.

For example, I would be surprised if a deck like

Steward/Silver, then Potion, then Alchemists, then Treasure and a +buy card, finishing with a vault when you start to green up.

I think a deck like that should be able to beat big money + council room, even on a province board.

I'd love to see some simulator analysis done on that board.

[DStu]

I'll add this game:
http://councilroom.com/game?game_id=game-20110705-235649-e2ec3b1c.html

where I claim I deservedly lost against the alchemist.

[ackack]

Some good reason for drawing most or all of your deck every turn, specifically something good enough that it will beat simpler strategies that go straight for green cards.

Can you give some examples of what those reasons might be? I've already mentioned discard for benefit cards like Secret Chamber/Vault, but I'm sure there are others.

Numerous examples are given through this thread. The presence of strong attacks is likely an encouraging sign - Alchemists will let you see them somewhat more often, usually function as somewhat of a defensive counter themselves, and will usually benefit from having an overall slower game. guided's mention of Bank and +buy is another big one.

I think Alchemist and City have a lot in common. They can both be very, very good, but a lot of the trick is judging correctly when you can use them. I've certainly guessed wrong on Alchemist many times.

[guided]

Personally, I err toward Alchemist decks (provided there is a source of +buy) like I err toward Minion and Torturer decks. Even when it's a marginal strategy, if you ignore it and it ends up working out for your opponent it is massively un-fun to sit there while they grind you under with their 5-minute turns, and then you buy like a Duchy in 3 seconds with your own crappy hand.

[ShuffleNCut]

For anyone feeling adventurous (I would but I have no time atm), I'd be curious to see what the simulator says for a province game of:

Chapel
Alchemist
Vault
Council Room, Then as options for greater analysis of what the lichpin is, cards such as:
Steward
Bridge
Warehouse
Worker's Villiage

I fired it up and got This on the first go through on Iso.  I didn't even bother counting bridges or anything;  I was just clicking buttons...

Pretty sure that's not idea but I seriously doubt alchemists add to the strategy.

[Superdad]

Indeed, small sample size of 1 is small.

I was thinking more of the simulation analysis threads that were created, and how someone simulates a game (thousands of iterations), then someone else tries to beat it.

I.e. start with bigmoney + Council Room to get the baseline.

Then go Alchemists + tweaks to try to beat it. Try and find what tweaks are required to beat BM + CR.


Going further, you could then go Chapel + BM + CR and then try to beat *that* with various Alchemist decks. This could help "discover" what the key support cards for alchemist are.

[ShuffleNCut]

This could help "discover" what the key support cards for alchemist are.

Hearkening back to to my days of playing Magic I compare Alchemist decks to various combo decks; it doesn't matter how you get there, you only have to do it one turn faster than the other guy.  Whether an Alchemist based strategy (or any strategy for that matter) is good or not on a given board depends entirely on how fast you will win vs how fast other strategies will win.

There is no one card or set of cards that Alchemists requires to be viable; it's simply a factor of "If I spend X+1 or 2 (remember Potion) turns buying X Alchemists will they draw me enough extra of whatever is available to win before my opponent can win by doing whatever he's doing?"  The longer you expect the game to last and the more times you can expect to play your Alchemists the better they become.  This is why Alchemists are a better strategy in Colony games; you have about four to five turns on average more to set up.

Alchemists also become better when you already plan on buying potions.  Alchemist>Possession will effectively buy you more turns to make up the lost VP you missed by spending turns not buying money and the extra draws from Alch will let you play the Posessions more frequently.  Buying Alchemist after you've bought your relevant familiars is just fine too (they essentially become Labs that need a special silver to purchase).

[dan11295]

Earlier today my opponent made the mistake of mostly ignoring Alchemists in a Colony game with Farming Village, Wharf and Watchtower all in play. Basically started drawing most of my deck and throwing stuff on top with the watchtower. Fun stuff. Maybe the watchtower isn't necessary in this setup but its nice to be able to deck your platinums and additional alchemists to made sure your draw them next turn. Only attack IIRC in this game was Ghost Ship, which is rather ineffective against an Alchemist deck (sure..I will just redraw the two alchemists I just put back...burning 1 alchemist in the process.)

I would imagine they would fail against certain engines if they are present. e.g. good Gardens decks, Village/Torturer, Warehouse/Treasure Map. These either end the game too quickly or grind your engine to a halt before you can really get going.