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Author Topic: So... I don't actually want to trash here?  (Read 1342 times)

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zahlman

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So... I don't actually want to trash here?
« on: January 16, 2013, 08:30:38 pm »
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http://dominion.isotropic.org/gamelog/201301/16/game-20130116-172505-1fd1273c.html

I figured the Mint would let me cycle to fun stuff (goons, wharf, MV) faster, but it seemed to leave me incapable of obtaining those things. Meanwhile my opponent was able to draw a much larger deck and play Goons consistently. :( (He also dragged the game on a couple extra turns, which I found really annoying.)
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philosophyguy

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Re: So... I don't actually want to trash here?
« Reply #1 on: January 16, 2013, 10:09:39 pm »
+1

Yeah, this was a trashing problem. The key early card is Wharf: that's what allows large handsizes, gets to your Goons, and recovers from Goon attacks. (Then Goons and Mining Villages). You opened with Caravan, which is worth nothing this turn and one card next turn (a little less valuable than Copper, on average, in your first shuffle), and Loan, which does not increase your buying power at all. So, you almost guaranteed you would not pick up a Wharf the first reshuffle, and only did so because you drew an extremely lucky hand on turn 3.

Wharfs draw really well. So well, that you almost don't need to thin your deck here. It's one thing if you line up an early 5 Coppers and mint them away, but Mint and Loan together are bad choices. If that Loan were a Silver, you would have an extra Mining Village turn 4. If you opened Silver/Silver, you would have picked up two Wharfs in your first two shuffles and been very likely to be able to Mint away Coppers sometime in the next shuffle or two if necessary.
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ddubois

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Re: So... I don't actually want to trash here?
« Reply #2 on: January 25, 2013, 04:11:47 pm »
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With this board, I'd guess Caravan/Silver > Silver/Silver > Caravan>Loan.  You gotta hit $5 to be in the game, and knowing Mint is out there (particularly with giant Wharf-fueled hands) makes Loan worse than usual.  You were really lucky to hit $5.  Given that you did, I don't think your turn 5 play is bad at all; I would probably buy Mint there too, and if it's wrong, it's only wrong by a tiny bit.

I actually think your big mistakes were after that.  You keep piling on terminals, passing up a chance at double village on turn 9 (to get a second goon you won't be able to play), and don't get a second village until the game is basically over on turn 16!
« Last Edit: January 25, 2013, 05:10:36 pm by ddubois »
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Forge!!!

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Re: So... I don't actually want to trash here?
« Reply #3 on: January 25, 2013, 04:26:50 pm »
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Yeah...as Ddubois said, the mint isn't the greatest thing, but it's definitely not what kills you.

At turn 11, you have one village, one Wharf, and THREE Goons. What are you going to do with all those goons? You're going to have a tough time playing more than one at a time because you only have one village and one wharf. And if you play the wharf you're gonna have a tough time playing the goons.

Then you buy three more wharves that you still aren't going to get to play, because you only have one village. So you have 7 terminals and only one village. That is not a good ratio. You needed more villages, a lot more.

You should have also prioritized wharf over goons. Getting a goons early is nice because it hurts your opponent, but Goons are not what make engines go, they are the end point of an already working engine. So you want an engine that is decently already up and running (Mining Village/Wharf in this case) before you start adding a decent amount of Goons.


Some parts of WW's engine article that I liked: "The biggest thing about playing the engine is to get the engine up and running first, before worrying about other things.  This means not focusing on Treasure — you will need a little amount of money to get this going but not all that much. And then just focus very very hard on getting the cycling up to speed before worrying too much about other things. You often will want to pick up one attack early on to slow your opponent down, and at some point you may start to get hampered in your ability to buy more components because you can’t generate enough buying power – this should be your cue to get more payload; usually, you want to prioritize a nice $5 (or even a $4 or a $3) engine piece over Gold, unless you really need extra money."

"As for Villages vs terminals, you generally want to get the a terminal before you get a Village to support it, while you are building up, though at some point you will switch over to over-villaging in order to make sure your initial hand can get off the ground."
« Last Edit: January 25, 2013, 04:30:25 pm by Forge!!! »
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