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[Forge!!!]

http://dominion.isotropic.org/gamelog/201209/12/game-20120912-115733-bc870203.html

A game with two very different strategies, and theirs managed to eek out the win. I have a particular dislike for Ambassador so I always look for ways to ignore it. A few questions:

Which strategy do you think will win more often here?

What turn would you have bought a Festival? I know I should have bought one, but I just didn't find a good time. Perhaps early on,
or perhaps when I bought the Nobles?

Do you think Hunting Party/Ghost Ship would have worked well here? It seems like his Wishing Wells would have been a reasonably effective counter against them.

[Obi Wan Bonogi]

I don't like how he built, but I will point out that ambassador should almost never ever be ignored.

[dondon151]

I see lots of engine potential here (though cards are expensive); he could reasonably expect to get to a point where he could lock you down with Ghost Ship every turn. HP counters that slightly but it's still rather difficult to get $8 in a bloated deck. If he had gotten a Festival at any point, he could get multiple engine pieces per turn and throw in Amb cursing as well.

[brokoli]

I don't like how he built, but I will point out that ambassador should almost never ever be ignored.

False. A lot of players tend to automatically buy it while they should not.

[HiveMindEmulator]

I don't like how he built, but I will point out that ambassador should almost never ever be ignored.

False. A lot of players tend to automatically buy it while they should not.

False. A lot of players tend to automatically buy it and then play it wrong (usually because they don't know why they bought it in the first place). It's probably something you want at least 85% of the time.

Here I think he made a mistake by going for Nobles. There are too many goodies at $5 that are better. If he can get to a state where he plays Ghost Ship and a couple Ambassadors every turn, you are completely dead, but he can only get there if he gets a Festival and Ghost Ship before going up to Nobles.

[Obi Wan Bonogi]

I don't like how he built, but I will point out that ambassador should almost never ever be ignored.

False. A lot of players tend to automatically buy it while they should not.

I buy it over 98% and is my highest % gained card.... also my highest winrate card.

[Davio]

I would go with HP's, 1 Festival + 1 Ghost Ship and an Ambassador.

I would also initially skip Ambassador here to focus on HP's first.
Maybe an Ambassador on the first reshuffle after 1 or 2 HP's.

@Obi Wan, do you use an Excel sheet or something? Councilroom has been down for some time. 

[Obi Wan Bonogi]

No just quoting old council room stats.  I suppose I should've used past tense.  Still in denial!

[Davio]

No just quoting old council room stats.  I suppose I should've used past tense.  Still in denial!

Yeah, I'm sad to see it go too.

Will be double sad when Iso goes black.

Maybe I'll be reporting ghost bugs to Goko for a couple of years, so they never go live (again).

[RisingJaguar]

Even setting aside that ambassador is a factor at some point (I would think at the start, but I can see why some would think later on), you approach this game very similarly to Hunting Party + X... except you have no X.  That's a trouble considering you do not easily hit $8... You hit $7 quite often. 

Unfortunately, the best "X" is festival, so I doubt festival + multiple HPs would win the game, even unless the opponent is loading up on nobles. 

To answer your question, I would have purchased a festival at Turn 10, 12, 13 and maaaaybe 14.  Then just gain all the pieces you need over and over with the economy/+buy.

[brokoli]

I agree that here you shouldn't ignore ambassador. But more generally, ambassador is a clearly overrated card and I laugh each time I win thanks to my opponent's ambassador who fed my gardens... (as an example).

[DG]

I've been playing a lot of three player games against the Goko bots who always do ignore ambassador and I can confirm that using an ambassador against them is no instant recipe for success. There needs to be some support for the ambassador in the kingdom, otherwise while you've been passing them extra copper they've been buying golds so they can just buy provinces with hands of copper and gold. Simple really, simple enough for a Goko bot.

For this kingdom here I like the ambassador/wishing well start but your opponent could have added festivals and then amassed nobles with some festival/ghost ship/noble combination. There's probably a sustainable province+island purchase each turn to finish, or just double province turns, and gifting curses while the engine build up. Libraries come into play if the opponent fights back.

[Forge!!!]

I don't like how he built, but I will point out that ambassador should almost never ever be ignored.

I agree, and in pretty much any kingdom where you can build an engine (like this one), I'll go for them, but I don't particularly like them, so sometimes I stray.

Even setting aside that ambassador is a factor at some point (I would think at the start, but I can see why some would think later on), you approach this game very similarly to Hunting Party + X... except you have no X.  That's a trouble considering you do not easily hit $8... You hit $7 quite often. 

Unfortunately, the best "X" is festival, so I doubt festival + multiple HPs would win the game, even unless the opponent is loading up on nobles. 

To answer your question, I would have purchased a festival at Turn 10, 12, 13 and maaaaybe 14.  Then just gain all the pieces you need over and over with the economy/+buy.

Yeah, those 7's really killed me, and I didn't think about it until just about right now, but with the Festival's +buy I could have definitely bought 2 hunting parties some turns and saved some time and definitely would have won against a try to draw your whole deck with just Nobles strategy. Oh well.

[thirtyseven]

So guys, what's a better opening...

Ambassador/Ambassador
Ambassador/Silver
Ambassador/Wishing Well (!?!?!)

(Did anyone notice Tohuwabohu's first few buys? Ambassador, then 2 Wishing Wells! Crazy, or does this somehow make sense?)

[Forge!!!]

The idea behind the wishing wells, correct or not, is that it's the best cycling option and allows you to play your ambassador faster, which is very important. This could be done better by ambassador/ambassador, but then when you're trying to draw your whole deck later on, you're stuck with 2 ambassadors clogging stuff up instead of one.

[eHalcyon]

The idea behind the wishing wells, correct or not, is that it's the best cycling option and allows you to play your ambassador faster, which is very important. This could be done better by ambassador/ambassador, but then when you're trying to draw your whole deck later on, you're stuck with 2 ambassadors clogging stuff up instead of one.

Well, you could pass one Amb to your opponent.

[Forge!!!]

Oh. Duh. That would be smart.

[Davio]

Call me crazy, but I would go with Silver/Silver hoping to spike an HP on T3/4 and an Ambassador on the non-$5 turn.

[-Stef-]

Call me crazy, but I would go with Silver/Silver hoping to spike an HP on T3/4 and an Ambassador on the non-$5 turn.

Tempting... but no .

However, I'm very convinced that would be a losing strategy.
Starting removing your cards with ambassador turn 5/6 on a kingdom like this is too late.
Your deck gets clogged up and you don't end up with enough hunting parties to make up for it.

So guys, what's a better opening...

Ambassador/Ambassador
Ambassador/Silver
Ambassador/Wishing Well (!?!?!)

(Did anyone notice Tohuwabohu's first few buys? Ambassador, then 2 Wishing Wells! Crazy, or does this somehow make sense?)

Call me crazy, but I would go with Ambassador/Wishing Well, and plan to add more Wishing Wells.

[polonkus]

Call me crazy, but I would go with Silver/Silver hoping to spike an HP on T3/4 and an Ambassador on the non-$5 turn.

Tempting... but no .

However, I'm very convinced that would be a losing strategy.
Starting removing your cards with ambassador turn 5/6 on a kingdom like this is too late.
Your deck gets clogged up and you don't end up with enough hunting parties to make up for it.

So guys, what's a better opening...

Ambassador/Ambassador
Ambassador/Silver
Ambassador/Wishing Well (!?!?!)

(Did anyone notice Tohuwabohu's first few buys? Ambassador, then 2 Wishing Wells! Crazy, or does this somehow make sense?)

Call me crazy, but I would go with Ambassador/Wishing Well, and plan to add more Wishing Wells.

Wishing well is awesome in this situation, with the card tracker and a bit of attention you should have an excellent chance of hitting your wish.
Helping cycle and increasing the chance you can return 2 cards per amb play is huge.
Would be interesting to see how a sim which always guesses correctly does, anyone know if that is possible to program?

[Davio]

Well, I don't really like to argue with players 10+ levels above me, but in my mind HPs could help set up turns where you can Ambassador 2 Estates or Coppers more easily.

And HPs don't like a lot of different cards, so that's why I would skip Wishing Well.

This being an Ambassador game with potential 3 card hands, it's going to be a slow game so I think you have time to come from behind in the Ambassador war if you can play it every turn from turn X onwards and you'll have lots of time buying HPs.

So we have one player getting parts first and the other cleaning his deck first. Normally, I'm with the deck cleaner, but because it's easy enough to get some traction with the HPs, I'm more inclined to go with HP.

But WW is not my best card and maybe I'm overlooking the fact that you can get to 5 with a couple of WW's pretty easily?

[thirtyseven]

Call me crazy, but I would go with Ambassador/Wishing Well, and plan to add more Wishing Wells.

But would you buy a second WW before your first Silver like the OPs opponent did? When I go Ambassador, I feel like I need to get an economy going ASAP, especially because with a hand of A-C-C-C-E I tend to Amb 2 Copper instead of the Estate, sacrificing a Silver buy for a thinner deck. With an Amb/WW strategy, I assume you would always Amb the Estate instead?

[dondon151]

Well, I don't really like to argue with players 10+ levels above me, but in my mind HPs could help set up turns where you can Ambassador 2 Estates or Coppers more easily.

You have a fair point, but the problem is that if your opponent manages to get even a single HP with his thin deck, then he'll also be Ambing bad stuff at you every single turn, plus he'll be more likely to draw the HP on any given turn, plus he'll be more likely to buy HPs on any single turn.

[HiveMindEmulator]

Call me crazy, but I would go with Silver/Silver hoping to spike an HP on T3/4 and an Ambassador on the non-$5 turn.

You're crazy I do really like fast HP in Ambassador games, but Silver/Silver is pushing it. Amb/Silver has not that much worse a chance of hitting $5, and doesn't cause you to fall so far behind to do it, so with HP around I usually go with Amb/Silver. However, here Wishing Well looks really nice. It's not quite HP, but it does part of the job for a lower price, potentially allowing you to skip Silver and get right into your Festival(s).

Amb/Silver or Amb/WW i could go either way.