Round 4 Results:dudeabides defeates gman314 4-3 Sorry for the sheer length of this post. I thought that these were interesting games, so I went a bit overboard on my discussion.
All-in-all, this was an exciting, well-played match featuring a diverse set of cards. Making it more exciting was the fact that I won the first game, lost the next three, and won the last three. After my frustrating 2nd round loss in the main tournament, I was talking to TheSadPanda about how I psychologically lost it when my back was on the ropes at 3-1. He suggested taking a short break and grabbing a beer to calm the nerves. I followed that advice this set, and it worked out. Thanks, TheSadPanda! For the commentary, I omit 314 from gman314's name to make it easier to read. Also, I usually make a gender disclaimer, but the "man" in gman314's name suggests this is unnecessary.
Rules: Veto Mode, Identical Starting Hands, Point Tracker On.
Game 1: dudeabides 33 gman 24http://dominion.isotropic.org/gamelog/201301/10/game-20130110-131817-82b3a5b0.htmlKingdom: Apprentice, Bazaar, Cartographer, City, Conspirator, Ghost Ship, Potion, Scrying Pool, Shanty Town, Smugglers, and Transmute
Vetoed: Tournament and Young Witch.
This game demonstrates Transmute (yes,
that card) at it's best. With the actions on the board, Scrying Pool engine seems the way to go here. I open Shanty/Potion (thinking Shanty will help enable the +1 card +1 action on the Conspirators I intend to get) while Gman opens Silver/Potion. For a while, I think his opening is better, as he hits $5 on turns 7 and 8 (gaining Apprentice and Ghost Ship), while I don't hit $5 until turn 10 (buy Apprentice, likely unnecessary) and turn 13 (buy Ghost Ship, very necessary). Gman buys a Province on each of turns 14, 15, and 16. On turn 15, down by 9 points (2 Provinces to 3 Estates) with no +Buy available, I recognize I need to get creative, so I buy a Transmute, which is the third lowest card when ranked on "Win rate with", according to
http://councilroom.com/popular_buys. I get a second Transmute on turn 16 and buy a Province. Gman stalls a bit on turns 17 and 18, getting a Scrying Pool and nothing. Meanwhile, I get a 3rd and 4th Transmute on turn 17 and buy a Province. Failing to recognize my Transmute strategy, gman trashes a Province on turn 18 in order to draw enough to get the penultimate Province. On my turn 18, I am able to draw my deck with enough actions and Transmutes to get 3 Duchies from Transmutes and buy the last Province, ending the game up by 7 VP. Sorry for the length of this commentary; I think it illustrates how useful a relatively unused card (Transmute) can be. Even if gman hadn't had to trash the Province to draw, I still would have won by 3 Estates (which I probably shouldn't have had in my hand anyways).
Game 2: gman 20 dudeabides 17http://dominion.isotropic.org/gamelog/201301/10/game-20130110-133128-073b93a0.htmlKingdom: Baron, City, Colony, Embassy, Feast, Festival, Ironworks, Merchant Ship, Platinum, Rabble, Warehouse, and Watchtower
Vetoed: Mountebank and Cutpurse
A fast, low-scoring, 14.5-turn Colony game. I go Festival/Warehouse/Watchtower, while gman goes Festival/Rabble/Warehouse. With identical Baron/Warehouse openings, I figure this will be a mirror match, but then gman goes Rabble, while I go Watchtower. Also making this an interesting set is Ironworks and Feast, and both of us make use of Ironworks to get Feasts to trash for Cities, Rabbles, and Festivals. His Rabbles slow me down enough that he is able to win this one. Turn 12, I hit $14 and opt for 2 Cities and a Warehouse. In hindsight, that should have been a Colony and a Warehouse. On turn 14, gman buys the last City, making them worth +$1 and +1 Buy (which seemed risky to me), but he had just put 2 Greens on top of my deck. With fully enabled Cities, I hope that I will get the draws I need to buy a Colony and 2 Feasts, but I don't get that lucky (there were slim odds, given that I know I'll draw 2 Greens). On turn 15, gman gains an Estate with Ironworks (presumably for the +1 card), trashes 2 Feasts for Duchies, and is able to end the game on piles by buying the last 2 Feasts. Well played game by gman here, confirming that Rabbles are better than Watchtowers when there is no danger of gaining cards you don't want. In hindsight, I'm surprised that neither of us went Embassy for draws.
Game 3: gman 55 dudeabides 46http://dominion.isotropic.org/gamelog/201301/10/game-20130110-134628-178c8c74.htmlKingdom: Baron, Bishop, Embargo♦, Fairgrounds, Loan, Market, Menagerie, Potion, Transmute, Tribute, Vault, and Young Witch
Vetoed: Fool's Gold and Outpost.
Identical Loan/Young Witch openings on a board with Menageries, but no true +Action cards and a mostly worthless Bane card (Embargo). Gman hits Loan on turn 3, Young Witch on turn 4, and Loan again on turn 5, while I draw both of these on turn 5, missing the reshuffle. Furthermore, gman has a bane in hand when I play my Young Witch on turn 5. I get a curse on turns 4, 6, and 7. I had hoped that his Bishop would enable me to trash my curses, but this rarely happened. I struggle to come back, resorting to Fairgrounds and 15 unique cards on a board without +Actions. I don't like to chalk losses up to bad luck, but in this case, early bad luck snowballs for me, while gman makes no mistakes. He is able to finish me off in this one with no problems.
Game 4: gman 30 dudeabides 29http://dominion.isotropic.org/gamelog/201301/10/game-20130110-135644-fffd3e6d.htmlKingdom: Bank, Develop, Fishing Village, Forge, Goons, Great Hall, Moneylender, Pearl Diver, Witch, and Woodcutter
Vetoed: Trade Route and Treasure Map
Again, identical openings. On turn 3, I hit $6 and feel the need to spend all of it, going for a Goons, while gman hits $5 on turns 3 and 4, buying 2 Witches. My turn 3 purchase probably should have been a Witch, especially since it was the only draw card on the board. The game ends with me having 6 Curses to gman's 2, which is less than the 6 additional VP tokens I was able to get from Goons. As evident by the decks at the end of this game, I am buying Coppers like crazy for VP (I have 9 to gman's 4), while gman has a Silver and 4 fewer Curses. Well played by gman. My worst draw of the series came in this game (even worse than the Young Witch/Loan turn 5 draw in Game 3) came at the end of turn 12. With no Fishing Villages from my previous turn, I drew 2 Goons, a Witch, a Copper, and an Estate. At that point, I felt like the Dominion gods were against me. Anyways, his play was mostly flawless this game. I got dominionated.
5 minute break: Let's all go to the lobby, let's all go to the lobby, let's all go to the lobby, and grab ourselves a beer! My luck changes drastically. Apparently the Dominion gods like me drinking beer.
Game 5: dudeabides 74 gman 71http://dominion.isotropic.org/gamelog/201301/10/game-20130110-141829-a13925d2.htmlKingdom: Bank, Colony, Counting House, Envoy, Hamlet, Loan, Margrave, Mining Village, Platinum, Potion, Trader, Tunnel, and Vineyard
Vetoed: The Ships (Ghost and Pirate)
Perhaps our most interesting board. We both admit before the start of this one that we don't even know where to begin. With Vineyard and Tunnel on the board, I figure that Hamlets are likely to be valuable. So I open Envoy/Hamlet to gman's Loan/Tunnel. This is our first truly divergent opening. I figure I'm toast after his turn 3, where his Loan reveals a Tunnel and 2 Estates. A very close game that I feared would end on piles before I had a chance to catch up, this game illustrates how effective Envoy can be and how a Hail Mary Potion purchase for a single 5-point Vineyard can pay off in the end. In terms of treasure, at the end of the game, gman has 3 Banks, 4 Coppers, a Silver, and 10 Golds to my 1 Bank, 7 Coppers, and 12 Golds. Ultimately, I think this game was decided by the fact that I could draw more of my cards (5 Envoys and 2 Margraves to his 2 Envoys) and the fact that I was mostly able to draw to my Hamlets/Mining Villages and Envoys/Margraves together, while this was a serious problem for him late game. On my turn 18, I draw an Envoy with one of my 2 Hamlets,
mean to discard an Estate, but discard the Envoy instead. I feared this epic misclick might prove my undoing (especially after I see my next hand: 2 Envoys with no Hamlets/Mining Villages). Out of frustration, I buy a Duchy on turn 18. I win by 3 points. Chalk this one up to dumb luck. As I was still on the ropes this game, and gman could lose 1 more after this one, this was a very tense game for me. In hindsight, I probably should have grabbed a Loan to thin some of the Coppers out of my deck, but gman's Loan luck was pretty poor (given the 4 Coppers in his deck at the end of the game).
Game 6: dudeabides 105 gman 50http://dominion.isotropic.org/gamelog/201301/10/game-20130110-143801-cbd476c1.htmlKingdom: Bishop, Bridge, Develop, Duke, Inn, Jack of All Trades, Silk Road, Tactician, Throne Room, and Workshop
Vetoed: Witch and Margrave
What a powerful board this was. With Bridge and Throne Room, a double Tactician engine seems great, except there's no pure draw cards (Except for JOAT) thanks to our Witch and Margrave vetoes. Inn also provides some interesting possibilities by enabling top-decking discarded actions upon its acquisition. Gman opens Workshop, and I feared that he was going for a quick Silk Roads/Estates/Workshops game. As second player, I am at a distinct disadvantage in such a scenario, so I decide not to follow suit and plan to go for a Bridge/Throne Room/Inn/JOAT/Tactician "strategy." I open Silver/JOAT to his Workshop/Silver, planning to get a Bishop at some point to trash my Coppers and JOAT Silvers, but I never bothered. It soon became apparent that he was not going the Silk Road route, and I felt better about things. But when he got 3 Duchies on turn 9, I got a bit worried. Nonetheless, I stay the course and am able to grab a Duchy and 5 Provinces on turn 13, a Province and 2 Estates on turn 14, and 2 Provinces and 5 Silk Roads on turn 17. The several turns that I am able to use JOAT to draw 4 or 5 cards prove to be huge. In hindsight, incorporating a Workshop into my strategy might have sped things up (free Throne Rooms, gain an Inn to orchestrate draws if a Bridge had been played, etc.), but things worked out regardless.
Game 7: dudeabides 33 gman 22http://dominion.isotropic.org/gamelog/201301/10/game-20130110-145029-412fcfdd.htmlKingdom: Bazaar, Cache, City, Forge, Herbalist, Moneylender, Nomad Camp, Pearl Diver, Remake, and Smithy
Vetoed: Library and Venture
When I saw this board, I immediately recalled all of those games against Marin in which I felt so far ahead until the last turn or two. This kingdom has everything you need: Remake and/or Moneylender to facilitate thinning and/or improving the deck, Bazaar/City for actionsand Smithy for the draw engine, and Nomad Camp for extra buys. It's always nerve-racking to be behind by a couple of Provinces, as it is certainly possible (even with 7 Bazaars and 6 Cities) to draw 2 Smithies and 3 Golds when you need a 3 Province turn. Throughout this game, I asked myself "What would Marin do?" I basically followed the Marin prescription. The end-of-game decks pretty much tell the story. Down by 10 points at the beginning of my last turn, I draw exactly what I need to buy 3 Provinces and a Duchy to win by 11 points. After a series of games that seemed to prematurely end on piles, it was tempting to break from the Marin strategy and buy VP to be ahead at the end of each turn. However, I figured that gman had a maximum of 2 buys and 2 gains from Remake (which can't be used to get Pearl Divers without the $1 cards from Dark Ages or a cost reduction card), so the game ending on piles was never a real threat and it was safe to wait for mega-turn.
Thanks to gman314 for a good series of games! After his knocking out RisingJaguar in round 2 of the main tournament and MasterShuffler (=sup=) in round 3 of the loser's bracket, I was worried that I might meet my end against him. Furthermore, I had never played him in general play on Isotropic, so I didn’t know what to expect.