I played a few games last night with Nick, the guy I usually record videos with, but I didn't feel like recording. I sort of wish I had, though, because a few of them were pretty interesting. Not included here was a Possession+Masquerade Colony game where he Possesses me, giving himself a Colony, and buying the last Colony (because the drew the only Platinum left in my deck off the Rats he passed me to trash) for a 30-point swing where he won by less than 20 points.
Revenge can be sweet, eh? Yeah his last turn was pretty lucky but that whole game was SO swingy.
Here's the log. I usually title my games with a funny quote from the game; if I had recorded these, I would have used some titles for these games:
So I've just been feeding you points this entire time?Vineyard, Duchess, Herbalist, Lighthouse, Forager, Loan, Oracle, Baron, Marauder, Adventurer
He goes Marauder and I see a million cheap actions and Vineyards, so I decide to give it a shot. I wait on the Lighthouses because I want to make sure I get hit with ALL the ruins! I get a little excited and buy them with extra buys just to make sure I get them all, which wasn't necessary and did a number on my economy, but it's OK because all I really need are potions anyways. I didn't play this perfectly, but he asked me what I was doing halfway through the game and I was like "I'm going for Vineyards." I was buying Ruins; when I told him that Ruins powered up Vineyards, he said the title quote and lamented about his early Necropolis+Double Marauder turn ("I thought that was so awesome!").
...where your hand size is messed up and the green cards don't matter.Duchess, Lighthouse, Menagerie, Salvager, Treasure Map, Hunting Party, Stables, Border Village, Fairgrounds, Goons
This one is by far the most interesting game we played. With Lighthouse and Menagerie plus significant draw, the attack part of Goons doesn't shut down your opponent, so we both continued to build up until the end, where it all came down to first turn advantage. We both had 5/2 and I liked my Stables opening better than his Hunting Party opening and I get to Goons first, but he then takes a lead on me with both VP tokens and Goons (he's getting Double-Goons turns for a few turns while I'm not playing any). There has to be a little luck with my drawing two Stables and two Estates together, but I suspect it also has to do with my Salvager buy. However, I think the Salvager helped me continue to progress upward by enabling Menageries and allowing extra Copper buys not to hurt me as much (Stables was great for that too). I make a risky play leaving piles pretty low, but he's $1 short of ending it on his last turn with a win, and my extra turn was more than enough.
...I finally feel like I'm starting to get a grasp on Goons, but was there something I could have done better here?
Rats is clearly the key card here.Scrying Pool, Woodcutter, Familiar, Procession, Rats, Remodel, Salvager, Throne Room, Bandit Camp, Tactician
I wasn't kidding. In fact, I was a little sad when the Rats pile ran out, because Salvager+Rats was the source of my economy. An interesting little board with three massive Rats enablers. I agonized over my opening for a while, and once the Rats ran out I realized there wouldn't be enough money to go around for me to keep using Salvager, so I switched to Remodels. Unfortunate because there was no $6 action card for me use, so I had to deal with drawing Golds, but he resigned before that became a real issue (ignoring Familiar had to have been a mistake). Also amusing was the fact that Throne Room was a better Village than Bandit Camp here because I didn't want those Spoils junking up my deck.
