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[NoMoreFun]

You are playing a solitaire game. The following 4 cards are in the supply, all 10 available. It's your buy phase, and you have 1 buy.

Thief
Pirate Ship
Saboteur
Sea Hag

What situations would you be wise to buy one of those cards?

The following cards are not available:
Menagerie, Horn of Plenty, Harvest, Fairgrounds

Answer I can think of:
You have 9 Talismans in play, the Talisman pile and one other pile is empty, there are no cheaper kingdom cards. You buy Pirate ship, Sea Hag or Thief to end the Game.

[heron]

You forgot a few.
Conspirator, Gardens, Vineyards

[NoMoreFun]

You forgot a few.
Conspirator, Gardens, Vineyards

Vineyard maybe, but they're all terminal actions, so nothing here would help activate Conspirator more than Conspirator itself. Gardens you're better off buying a copper, silver or estate (unless they all got emptied during your turn; how edgy do we want these edge cases to be?

[florrat]

I can think of some possible scenarios. Now that I think of it, what does "wise" mean in a solitaire game? Ending the game as fast as possible? Ending the game with at most VP as possible?

1: (does not work for Saboteur) You have 2 quarries in play, at least 10 buys, 2 piles are empty and these are the unique cheapest action cards available. Then you can piledrive them.

2: You have forge/forge on top of your deck. If you can topdeck a $4-cost card with watchtower, you can forge a colony.

3: Let's do something far-fetched:
-You have a watchtower in hand
-You have 2 quarries in play, but no other +coin or +buy cards
-Nomad camp is in supply, but embargoed 10 times. (don't ask me why in a solitaire game)
-The Watchtower and conspirator piles are empty, and there is 1 colony left.
-You want to end the game with 1 more colony in 1 more turn.
-The kingdom doesn't have action cards except Thief, Pirate Ship, Saboteur, Sea Hag, Watchtower, Nomad camp, Conspirator and $7+ costing cards (the first four are not all needed in the kingdom, 1 of them is enough)
-You know that the top of your deck is: University, Conspirator, Platinum, Silver, Colony (in this order; you can know this if you just played Navigator or Cartographer, or just topdecked 4 of these cards).

Now you can buy any of the cards in {Thief, Pirate Ship, Saboteur, Sea Hag}, topdeck it, and then the following turn you can play university (gain nomad camp on deck), play the action card you've topdecked and play conspirator, draw nomad camp, play it, and reach $11 to buy colony.
As far as I see there's no other way to do this, because you can't buy the nomad camp since it's embargoed, you can't buy silver, because you just have $2 to spend, and you can't buy another action card.

@heron: with vineyards they're indeed viable sometimes, but with gardens it's not easy to come up with an scenario where you wouldn't have bought copper/silver instead, and with conspirator it's not easy to make them viable either. Playing a conspirator dead is about as good as playing a Thief and then playing a conspirator "alive". In fact, my third solution was the easiest I could think of using conspirator.

EDIT: another scenario: You have watchtower in hand, and you know you will have death card in hand on your next turn (and ruins are empty)

[cluckyb]

They are the only fours in the kingdom, and you want to Graverobber then into a 7. (or in general, you are at the point where you can draw your hand and have trashers for benefit that need food)

[NoMoreFun]

I can think of some possible scenarios. Now that I think of it, what does "wise" mean in a solitaire game? Ending the game as fast as possible? Ending the game with at most VP as possible?

1: (does not work for Saboteur) You have 2 quarries in play, at least 10 buys, 2 piles are empty and these are the unique cheapest action cards available. Then you can piledrive them.

I specified that you only have one buy.

[florrat]

I specified that you only have one buy.

Oops I'm lucky that the other three options still work.

[Powerman]

You want to get as many points as possible, and are doing a Bishop golden deck.  Buying from any other pile would end the game, but that pile still has many cards in it.

[Axxle]

You want to get as many points as possible, and are doing a Bishop golden deck.  Buying from any other pile would end the game, but that pile still has many cards in it.

You want to get as many Thiefs (Thieves?), Pirate Ships, Saboteurs, and Sea Hags in your deck as possible.

Serious one: It's embargoed enough times you can end the game ahead on piles by piling out curses.  One of these piles was embargoed just to use the embargo card without blocking key engine cards.

[GendoIkari]

You want to get as many points as possible, and are doing a Bishop golden deck.  Buying from any other pile would end the game, but that pile still has many cards in it.

You want to get as many Thiefs (Thieves?), Pirate Ships, Saboteurs, and Sea Hags in your deck as possible.

Serious one: It's embargoed enough times you can end the game ahead on piles by piling out curses.  One of these piles was embargoed just to use the embargo card without blocking key engine cards.

But why would anyone go for Embargo if it's not a question of blocking key engine cards?

Your opponent had already Embargo'd the Silver, making Embargo the only card that gets you +$2.

[Powerman]

You want to get as many points as possible, and are doing a Bishop golden deck.  Buying from any other pile would end the game, but that pile still has many cards in it.

You want to get as many Thiefs (Thieves?), Pirate Ships, Saboteurs, and Sea Hags in your deck as possible.

Serious one: It's embargoed enough times you can end the game ahead on piles by piling out curses.  One of these piles was embargoed just to use the embargo card without blocking key engine cards.

But why would anyone go for Embargo if it's not a question of blocking key engine cards?

Your opponent had already Embargo'd the Silver, making Embargo the only card that gets you +$2.

How many opponents do you have in a Solitaire game?

[Awaclus]

But why would anyone go for Embargo if it's not a question of blocking key engine cards?

$2 hands.

[Axxle]

But why would anyone go for Embargo if it's not a question of blocking key engine cards?

$2 hands.

Best source of money on an action card.  Plenty of reasons to go for that: Kings court, throne room, scrying pool

[DWetzel]

Fairgrounds, duh.

Also, this does not apply to Saboteur but

Upgrade needs fodder to obtain Duchies or a good $5 card, and they're the only $4s available.

[jomini]

Oh there are plenty of additional options here:
1. I have a Talisman and an strong draw engine with Forge, these are the only 4's so I can Forge them into Provinces. Quarry, from the Black market, is in play for the Sab case.
2. Like #1 only this time I have Embargoed them and revealed a Trader for the curse so I gain 4/4/3 in value to Forge a Colony.
3. I have Transmute in my deck and need actions to turn into Duchies, these are the only options that cost less than 4, Quarry in play for Sab.
5. I intend to Procession these into better cards, E.g. Prssn -> Sea Hag to get Governor, Prssn -> Sab to get Grand Market.
6. I have Quarry/Talisman out and am planning on Salvaging, Bishoping, or Apprenticing the cards
7. I need to activate Peddlers and there are no other actions costing <= 5. E.g. I have 3 Grand Markets in deck, Counterfeit, Silver x2, Estate x3, and I want a 4th action so Peddlers are free next turn.
8. I have top deck control (e.g. Count) and need spare actions to Tribute. These are the only ones <=5
9. I'm setting up a big Scrying Pool/Vault megaturn and I just need any action, these are the only ones that cost <5
10. I want to Trader this next turn (say for Feoda), but I'm running Hunting Party/Trader and don't want to burn a Feodum and can't collide Trader/Trader.
11. Like 10, but I want to Remodel a 4 to a power 6 (like say Altar).
12. I need something to Develop into a 5/3 combo.

[liopoil]

or more simply, to activate conspirator in the future and the conspirator pile is already empty, and 4$ is the cheapest action, and you only have 4$

[Qvist]

You trash 3 Coppers

From which deck? You're playing solitaire.

[Asper]

You trash 3 Coppers

From which deck? You're playing solitaire.

I'm such a moron. I didn't play iso solitaire, but i assumed your own attacks would hit you...
That was a weird idea, of course.