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Author Topic: Copper... or not?  (Read 4585 times)

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Powerman

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Copper... or not?
« on: December 04, 2012, 12:19:49 am »
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This is inspired from a game I just finished playing, where both my opponent and I noticed how many cards synergized with copper.  However, a key component was missing from the board that caused us both to avoid it: +Buy.  But... can it still be the best strategy on the board?:

Apothecary, Colony, Coppersmith, Counting House, Jack of All Trades, Lookout, Pirate Ship, Platinum, Potion, Vault, Village, Wishing Well, Workshop

(Yes, I know Pirate Ship is useless in solo play, but oh well.)

I got to my 4th colony in a BM style on Turn 13 (albeit with aid of my opponents Vault).

Your challenge, should you choose to accept is EITHER get 4 colonies by turn 12, or get all 8 provinces by turn 14.  Good luck.
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thirtyseven

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Re: Copper... or not?
« Reply #1 on: December 09, 2012, 08:59:07 pm »
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After many tries, I can't even come close. :-[
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I'm only a mid-level player, so I may be wrong...

dondon151

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Re: Copper... or not?
« Reply #2 on: December 10, 2012, 09:17:45 am »
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I somehow misread the OP and thought it specified 4 Colonies by turn 14. Oops.

I can't imagine a Copper based strategy being able to buy Provinces consistently at turn 7 or Colonies consistently at turn 9 without some perfect shuffle luck. Apothecaries trickle into the deck way too slowly, even with tons of WW as support from Workshop. You yourself had some pretty nice luck as well, with Jack hitting Estate the first 3 plays and Lookout never hitting anything that you didn't want it to hit.
« Last Edit: December 10, 2012, 09:32:23 am by dondon151 »
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Powerman

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Re: Copper... or not?
« Reply #3 on: December 10, 2012, 05:40:11 pm »
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Alas, it can actually be done!  Someone has sent in a game report where they get their 4th Colony on turn 12!  They buy a colony on Turn 8, 10, 11, and 12.  There is still room for improvement, as they were pretty unlucky not to hit it on turn 9.  If no one gets another solution in a few days I'll post it :)
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HiveMindEmulator

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Re: Copper... or not?
« Reply #4 on: December 12, 2012, 03:18:15 pm »
+3

Alas, it can actually be done!  Someone has sent in a game report where they get their 4th Colony on turn 12!  They buy a colony on Turn 8, 10, 11, and 12.  There is still room for improvement, as they were pretty unlucky not to hit it on turn 9.  If no one gets another solution in a few days I'll post it :)
Or you could say they were pretty lucky to hit it on all those other turns :)
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Powerman

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Re: Copper... or not?
« Reply #5 on: December 18, 2012, 08:09:13 pm »
+1

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HiveMindEmulator

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Re: Copper... or not?
« Reply #6 on: December 19, 2012, 01:46:27 pm »
+4

I feel I should comment on my strategy, because it's a good example of developing a strategy, and I think it's actually the best strategy on the board, even if it does require a good deal of luck to hit 12 turns.

The obvious part is the draw engine. The only way you're going to be able to draw all those cards is Apothecary/Wishing Well. Vault just doesn't draw enough cards. Then there is the matter of how you're going to build the engine. Since there is no +buy, the only way to get enough Wishing Wells is with Workshop.

Then you also have to consider the payload. Since there is no way to get more than one VP card per turn (excluing Estates), the goal should be $11. You can do this with Plat or Coppersmith, each of which can buy a Colony when combined with 6 Coppers. Each has its own advantages and disadvantages. Platinum doesn't require an action, but it costs more, so you have to get either 2 more Coppers or a Silver. Coppersmith requires an extra action, but its cheap enough to be gained by the Workshop. All things considered, Coppersmith is the clear winner since there is no +buy to get 2 Coppers, Village is going to help your deck while Silver hurts it, and the fact that you can get Coppersmith without a buy saves you a buy.

Finally, is there anything else to add? Well, trashing is a big deal, especially for a very choke-prone engine. If you have 3 Colonies AND 3 Estates, you're going to be in a lot of trouble. Lookout actually fits very nicely with this deck for a couple reasons. First, the Apothecary helps it target down Estates, and second, if needed, it can be used blind to make sure you can get a card you need to the top spot, which I end up doing on turn 12.

Okay, so your deck wants a Potion, Workshop, Coppersmith, Village, and a bunch of Apothecaries and Wishing Wells. What's the order to get them? The natural order is to start with the Potion, since it's your limiting resource. Then the gainer, since it can gain the other cards. Then the trasher, because trashing early is important. And you can wait on the Village and Coppersmith until you're ready to use them. The Village should come first, because it's useful for drawing, and it can allow you to gain and play the Coppersmith on the same turn, as I did on turn 8.

So there's the plan: open Potion/Workshop, get a Lookout and start collecting Apothecaries and Wishing Wells. When you have enough, you can add in the Village and Coppersmith and go to town.

So how lucky do you have to be to get 12 turns? Pretty lucky. I probably tried close to 20 times. The biggest key is getting the Potion back early in the shuffle (turn 5) so you can get the Apothecaries fast enough. Otherwise you're going to cycle to slow to make it in time. Then you just have to hope for no terrible draws like a hand of all Copper, which is not that unlikely with 6-7 Coppers in the deck.

Powerman commented that I was unlucky to not draw the Coppersmith on turn 9, and that 11 turns is possible, but I think you'd need to get *really* lucky to actually hit 4 straight turns on 3 Apothecaries. The turn 9 "miss" allowed me to get a 4th, which made it easier to hit the next 3 turns. So sure I think 11 turns is doable, but would probably take too many tries to be worth it.
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D Bo

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Re: Copper... or not?
« Reply #7 on: December 19, 2012, 02:50:31 pm »
+1

Well, here is HME's solution.  It's very good :)

http://dominion.isotropic.org/gamelog/201212/04/game-20121204-215944-c3215cba.html

+1 for the username. Kindergarten Copper = awesome.
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dondon151

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Re: Copper... or not?
« Reply #8 on: December 21, 2012, 12:22:20 am »
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I tried literally the same exact strategy as HME and clocked 14 turns a couple of times, but nothing better. I guess I didn't try enough times.
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Powerman

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Re: Copper... or not?
« Reply #9 on: December 21, 2012, 01:13:10 am »
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I tried literally the same exact strategy as HME and clocked 14 turns a couple of times, but nothing better. I guess I didn't try enough times.

Yeah I have the same problems.   Too many hands that don't start with Apo.
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HiveMindEmulator

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Re: Copper... or not?
« Reply #10 on: December 23, 2012, 08:12:47 pm »
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I tried literally the same exact strategy as HME and clocked 14 turns a couple of times, but nothing better. I guess I didn't try enough times.

I'm a bit surprised that you said you "can't imagine a Copper based strategy being able to buy ... Colonies consistently at turn 9 without some perfect shuffle luck." Unless your definition of "perfect" is much looser than mine. I generally don't play these solo challenges, because I think they require too much luck, but I had a pretty good feeling this would work. The key is that you know a good deal of the key shuffle luck early on. You mentioned that the problem is the rate of acquiring Apothecaries. If you don't have 2 Apothecaries at turn 5, then there's probably very little hope of getting 4 Colonies in 12 turns. So just quit if you don't get the luck you need by turn 5. This way you don't waste your time on worse than 75 percentile shuffle luck. From here it only takes like 5 actual games where you have to think and make decisions to get into 95 percentile luck, which is probably what you need to hit the goal.
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