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[amalloy]

I've only been playing for a month or so, and mostly against friends who've played even less. I've noticed that I try to build an engine in every game, which is obviously wrong but a lot of fun. Anyway, tonight I played a kingdom that I'd like some feedback on.

• Vineyard
• University
• Watchtower
• Golem
• Apprentice
• Council room
• Venture
• Royal seal
• Library
• Counting house

Three player game, no shelters or colonies, and I'm last to play with 3 coppers. I thought I'd try my first vineyard game, with the general idea of using golem to play many universities, and libraries or council rooms to help me draw more golems, with a couple apprentices to pick up the slack when I can't draw enough, and then grab vineyards once I have all that working. I later realized I needed council rooms for the +buy, and my libraries were basically useless.

• Does that seem like a viable plan? It seems like a few too many different cards to work together well.
• If the plan is viable, how do I play the first few turns? I tried watchtower/potion, hoping to draw 4p earlyish, or maybe topdeck a university; but maybe silver/potion would be better, or maybe I should have built up something else for a while before trying for golems?
• How would you have approached this kingdom instead?

For the record, this worked once I switched to Council Room, but only barely: 1st player got the last province, ending the game tied on VPs but with one more turn taken than me. No log since it was an offline game, but I ended with 1 Estate, 3 Province, 3 Vineyard, some treasure, and 13 action cards that I was using for my engine.

[Beyond Awesome]

Vineyard is strong. And, really, the cards don't need to mesh too well. You just need a lot of actions in your deck. The key card really is University and Council Room is gravy on top. With University, you just gain tons of actions. I suppose you can get Golems as well, but not really necessary. You get around 4 or so Potions and then use the +Buys of Council Room to buy up Vineyards and load up on more actions. Without a doubt, that is a Vineyard board. The good thing about Vineyard is that they will be worth more than a Province.

Also, if you had 3 Provinces, you probably built up your economy somewhat. Those Buys could have probably been better spent either buying Potions or actions. The fact that you only had 3 Vineyards is telling.

[Robz888]

Amalloy, you identified the correct strategy, but slipped a bit in the execution.

I do agree with your opening: Watchtower/Potion. Watchtower actually combos specifically with University (it's one of those cool advanced player tricks). Having Watchtower and University in hand allows you to top-deck the Actions you are gaining, and then play Watchtower to draw them.

You are going to want tons of Actions, Actions, and more Actions. Watchtower is good (it's you cheapest option, and does the combo). Library actually goes really well with University, too, but Council Room has the all important +buy.

Watchtower, Library, and Council Room are all terminals, so you may wish to add Golems to your deck at some point so you can play your terminal Actions.

You probably will have a powerful deck that can turn for Provinces at some point, but hold off! The Vineyards are way, way more important. Think of them as your own personal Victory Points pile. You want lots of them--leave your opponents to fight over the increasingly difficulty to purchase Provinces. You probably can't get your Vineyards to be worth as much as Provinces, but you can still make them worth a lot of money. Tons of Actions (Universities, Watchtowers, Council Rooms and Golem), Vineyards, and maybe a few Provinces, make the winning deck here.

Apprentice isn't so hot because you don't actually want to trash your Actions, although trashing like a Golem or something gives you really good non-terminal draw, which could allow you to play more Universities... there may be a point at which you would prefer to add Apprentice over other things, but it's tricky.

[ftl]

Really! I would have guessed using Universities to gain Apprentices would work pretty well.

Here, the best draw is Watchtower and Library, you don't actually want too much of your draw to be CRs or you'll give all your opponents like million-card hands. But those choke badly on dead cards. Apprentice for trashing starting cards isn't great, but seems like it would help, especially since you gain them with university. And when two apprentices collide, then you apprentice and apprentice and get a huge turn. Or at least that's what I would have thought, I would have used Uni gains on a few apprentices first, then a council room, then libraries. At least, that seems viable to me, I know you're better than me so you're more likely to be right, but I think my plan would be viable too.

[amalloy]

Also, if you had 3 Provinces, you probably built up your economy somewhat. Those Buys could have probably been better spent either buying Potions or actions. The fact that you only had 3 Vineyards is telling.

Thanks - I think this is the biggest mistake I made, and it didn't even occur to me afterwards, until you pointed it out. I hadn't really thought about the possibility that there are decks/strategies where I don't want to build up my economy, at least a little. I knew I had too few vineyards (and probably too few actions), but didn't really realize how I could have gotten more; I think this makes it clear.

[dondon151]

I would also get 1 Apprentice before diving into CRs. I think I would ignore Library a little here in favor of the cheaper and more useful Watchtower.

[Kirian]

You get around 4 or so Potions and then use the +Buys of Council Room to buy up Vineyards and load up on more actions.

I want to highlight this line.  +Buy and Vineyards means more than one Potion.  It's so satisfying in the late game to pull off Province-2x Vineyard, or--given that you're drawing most of your deck--Golem/Uni/Vineyard/Vineyard with 4 Potions.

[DG]

You've had 3 different pieces of advice of already because this is quite a complicated kingdom. Once you have a university, silver and copper are not good cards in your deck. All you want are more universities, potions, action cards, and vineyards. Perhaps you could use watchtowers+apprentices+universities early on to trash, gain, and draw, gaining the council rooms as you get more potions.

What your opponents are doing here is important. Even if they just play a money strategy with council rooms and ventures they will push the game along very quickly. A vineyard deck is likely to fall behind on points then need time to catch up, so it might be wise to only use as many council rooms as you need for + buys. Apprentices can trash 5 cost cards for drawing, assuming that your universities will replace them later in the turn.