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[hsiale]

http://dominion.isotropic.org/gamelog/201301/17/game-20130117-135527-db4154c6.html

I killed his turn 1 Silver with Noble Brigand, which I thought will be enough to win the race. I got 6 Governors, got Spice Merchant as he did, trashed Coppers faster (and handed him some with my Noble Brigand), but still could do nothing in the end while he played all 4 Governors he had from a 13 cards hand on his last turn, getting a lead of 9 points I could not overtake. Did I make some endgame mistakes that costed me the win here?

[Powerman]

He used Governor for Gold more than you did.  Cards is (generally) weaker than gold.

[gman314]

For the Governor's abilities, consider this: Remodel costs $4, but could get to $5 if you had an extra action. +3 cards/+1 action doesn't exist, but would be a beast and would cost about $8. There is also nothing that lets you gain Gold straight up because it would be very expensive. So, the last 2 are pretty insane abilities

Now, consider what the other guy gets. He can get an upgrade if you remodel. That costs $5. Or, if you draw cards, he just played a Lab. That also costs $5. But if you gain gold, he gets a Silver. How else could he get that? Well, with Squire (from Dark Ages) he could gain a Silver, but he also has a choice, and generally choices are better than the straight up ability. Also, Squire gives him +$1 while he's at it. And how much does Squire cost? $2. And when you play Governor, he doesn't decrease his hand, like he did by playing Squire. So, gaining Silver is quite likely the worst gift that Governor gives, and since cards and gold are similar benefit for you, gaining Gold is in general the best play.

Of course, there are always edge cases. For instance, Governor/Goons, where if you know you can play the Goons there's very little penalty to playing Governor's draw. And, in a Goons engine you probably don't want the Gold that much. But, that's situational. With all three considered in a vacuum, gaining Gold is on average the best.

[hsiale]

I think I get the point. I played my Governors 3 times for Gold, 5 times for cards and 3 times for Remodel, while he did 5/2/2. Now I wonder why with similar deck sizes and me cycling faster (more Governor for cards) I played my 6 Governors 11 times in total and he played his 4 Governors 9 times in total.

But I'm not sure if I get your card cost comparisons. Upgrade is "cantrip, upgrade a card", Lab is "cantrip, +1 card", but Squire is not "cantrip, gain Silver" and I think such card would cost 4 at least if it existed, if not 5 (there are 4-cost cards that gain Silver and do some more, but they are terminals like Bureaucrat or Jack).

[ipofanes]

There is also nothing that lets you gain Gold straight up because it would be very expensive.

There is Bag of Gold which does it better, and which is less popular than Trusty Steed, Princess, or Followers. I think a simple gold gainer would be reasonably priced at about $6.

Also, while an Upgrade in my deck is usually worse than an Upgrade I didn't really ask for, and an uncalled for Silver gainer can actively hurt my engine, an extra Laboratory is almost never bad.

[dondon151]

When you have an engine that has other payloads (especially discard attacks), Governor for +cards is a strong option. But when all you're doing is remodeling Golds to Provinces, then Governor for Golds is a stronger option.

[Jerk of All trades]

I feel like the noble brigand hurt you more than it helped. It had the potential to steal a gold, which would have really helped. But the result of this game was that NB and the silver slowed you down. Where if you had gone spice merchant/oasis you would have ended up thinning/sifting your deck making your governor lead insurmountable.  I don't know what your draw order was, but in your final turn you could have possibly remodeled a gold for province, silver for duchy and bought an estate, but it depended on when you drew your governors. And that noble brigand, if i was a spice merchant you would have trashed for a buy and tied him (still losing on turns), but he had a guaranteed province+ duchy next turn

[ddubois]

Normally, I think spice merchant is the better open (although I'd be interested in knowing how often the Silver/Spice open is unable to hit $5... anyone?).  I'd also say after you yoink the silver and mill a copper on turn 2 that you'd expect to win going away, but he got pretty lucky to hit 4 copper/spice on turn 4, which kept him in the game.

On turn 7...
hsiale buys a Silver.
(hsiale draws: 4 Coppers and a Governor.)

Buying a silver seems pretty bad here.  Buy a Great Hall.  With the drawn hand, I might even get a gold and buy a second spice.

Silvers are like attacks in Governor wars.  I sure as hell don't want to steal them with NB (after turn 2 anyway); I guess it's a bit unlucky that you only attacked successfully once before the game was over.  This game was fast too, even by Governor war standards.

Also, it's perhaps a little bit unlucky that you had $7 on turn 10 while he had $8 on turn 10, but your deck had 7 silvers to his 2, even after remodeling one, and the former is probably a consequence of the latter.

[ipofanes]

Normally, I think spice merchant is the better open (although I'd be interested in knowing how often the Silver/Spice open is unable to hit $5... anyone?).

No numbers but from my personal experience I tend to miss $5 quite often with Spice Merchant, so I stay away from this card when power $5 are in the kingdom.

[WanderingWinder]

When on the spice merchant on turn 3, you quite often need to take the money/buy option to hit your $5 - drawing two can often mean they'd both need to be copper, which is really unlikely.

[ddubois]

When on the spice merchant on turn 3, you quite often need to take the money/buy option to hit your $5 - drawing two can often mean they'd both need to be copper, which is really unlikely.

Obviously, if you can guarantee $5 with ccccm or ccsme, you do that, sure.  That doesn't really answer the question though.  Sometimes you have t3 spice with less than $4, sometimes spice is in the bottom 2, etc.  I didn't bother to calculate all the ways you can get screwed; there might be others.  I was hoping someone already knew the probability offhand.