I love those engines too! So nice to draw a wodge of cards from a small or nonexistent hand.
Played an interesting game today that was pretty similar in concept, but which relied on disappearing villages (specifically fishing village) and drawing with menagerie. Also, the only attack (and the only +(>1)card in that game other than menagerie) was Ghost Ship, which Menagerie provided a very nice soft counter to.
Once councilroom scoops it up, I'll find the log and post a link here, but I'm pretty pleased with it. A 4/3 opening with talisman/fishing village gave me the buying power I needed to scoop up almost all the menageries, and also the buying power I needed to end the game on a 3-pile when I was 1:0 on provinces. This was against a 4/3 opening of lookout/fishing village, which I considered weaker as I expected a 3 pile ending, and in 3 pile endings, every estate is valuable. Also good was the presence of Outpost, which let me buy up the cheap stuff almost twice as fast, which was very welcome when the cheap stuff was fishing villages and menageries, as menagerie synergises beautifully with decks that cope well with small hands.
True, menagerie isn't quite the same as Watchtower or Library in how it draws cards, but there are some parallels there I think.