In my experience, Gold is better than $6 Masterpiece for BM strategies. The reason is that with Masterpiece, you'll get lots of mediocre hands, and with Gold, you'll get one better hand and another hand that's not as good. Getting that better hand is especially important in games with Masterpiece, since every extra dollar is an extra Silver and the more Silver you can get with a single Masterpiece, the less Masterpieces you will need in your deck.So you're saying you would buy gold over masterpiece in a terminal draw BM because then you can get better masterpieces? ??? I feel like in terminal draw BM I would want silver over gold. your gold coming up in a hand with all your VP kinda sucks, but having 3 silvers spread out will either give you the extra 1-2 you need for the province, or still make a good masterpiece buy. But your discard attacks portion is valid. I would still think masterpiece would be viable though because if you're doing terminal draw and have tons of silver, you can probably get to 6-8 by playing your smithy or margrave or whatever.
Also, I think you should mention that Masterpiece is mostly just a nice addition to decks like DoubleJack, but absolutely nuts with terminal draw BM, especially Council Room. Masterpiece benefits from the huge handsize and the +buy comes in handy a lot of time too, and additionally, unless your opponent goes for Masterpiece himself, any Council Rooms he plays will help you much more than the Council Rooms you play help him.
For the same reason, any discard attack on the board pretty much invalidates Province strategies featuring Masterpiece because a $6 hand doesn't buy a Province.
So you're saying you would buy gold over masterpiece in a terminal draw BM because then you can get better masterpieces? ??? I feel like in terminal draw BM I would want silver over gold. your gold coming up in a hand with all your VP kinda sucks, but having 3 silvers spread out will either give you the extra 1-2 you need for the province, or still make a good masterpiece buy. But your discard attacks portion is valid. I would still think masterpiece would be viable though because if you're doing terminal draw and have tons of silver, you can probably get to 6-8 by playing your smithy or margrave or whatever.Yeah. I think you're underestimating how much Masterpiece itself hurts your deck. You want to minimize the number of Masterpiece buys and maximize the number of Silver gains, therefore, you want as big Masterpiece overpays as possible. For $6, Gold is $3 of buying power in a single card, Masterpiece is $7 of buying power spread over four cards and while they both help you in reaching $8 for the Province buy, Gold obviously helps you more in getting a big Masterpiece buy and the big Masterpiece buy is what you want because that enables early greening. For example, in this (http://dom.retrobox.eu/?/20130828/log.5101a6c4e4b02b7235c3860f.1377681633719.txt) game, my turn 7 Masterpiece buy with overpay with 12 was lucky, but it was all thanks to the fact that I had two Golds in my deck instead of more Silvers and Masterpieces and after that, I could just buy some extra terminals to make up for the increased deck size and bought 6 Provinces and two Duchies on turns 10-14.
Fair enough. I forgot about the masterpiece itself. Although, nowadays, sets without some form of trashing are less common. But with BM you can't really afford trashing. So I guess I agree with you. Sorry for misunderstanding.So you're saying you would buy gold over masterpiece in a terminal draw BM because then you can get better masterpieces? ??? I feel like in terminal draw BM I would want silver over gold. your gold coming up in a hand with all your VP kinda sucks, but having 3 silvers spread out will either give you the extra 1-2 you need for the province, or still make a good masterpiece buy. But your discard attacks portion is valid. I would still think masterpiece would be viable though because if you're doing terminal draw and have tons of silver, you can probably get to 6-8 by playing your smithy or margrave or whatever.Yeah. I think you're underestimating how much Masterpiece itself hurts your deck. You want to minimize the number of Masterpiece buys and maximize the number of Silver gains, therefore, you want as big Masterpiece overpays as possible. For $6, Gold is $3 of buying power in a single card, Masterpiece is $7 of buying power spread over four cards and while they both help you in reaching $8 for the Province buy, Gold obviously helps you more in getting a big Masterpiece buy and the big Masterpiece buy is what you want because that enables early greening. For example, in this (http://dom.retrobox.eu/?/20130828/log.5101a6c4e4b02b7235c3860f.1377681633719.txt) game, my turn 7 Masterpiece buy with overpay with 12 was lucky, but it was all thanks to the fact that I had two Golds in my deck instead of more Silvers and Masterpieces and after that, I could just buy some extra terminals to make up for the increased deck size and bought 6 Provinces and two Duchies on turns 10-14.
Watchtower/Masterpiece sounds like a combo, you can trash the Masterpieces while getting all the Silver in your next hand, and the Watchtowers defend against discard attacks.
Watchtower/Masterpiece sounds like a combo, you can trash the Masterpieces while getting all the Silver in your next hand, and the Watchtowers defend against discard attacks.
Well yeah, Watchtower pretty much combos with or counters every card in the game. Or at least, it feels like that sometimes.
Watchtower/Masterpiece sounds like a combo, you can trash the Masterpieces while getting all the Silver in your next hand, and the Watchtowers defend against discard attacks.
Well yeah, Watchtower pretty much combos with or counters every card in the game. Or at least, it feels like that sometimes.
I was about to say it doesn't combo with JoaT, but then I remembered you could use it top-deck the Silver. But... then you have a spot in your hand taken up by Watchtower that could have been a Silver in the first place. So. Nombo with JoaT.
On a related note, I'm going to be updating the article.
Watchtower/Masterpiece sounds like a combo, you can trash the Masterpieces while getting all the Silver in your next hand, and the Watchtowers defend against discard attacks.
Well yeah, Watchtower pretty much combos with or counters every card in the game. Or at least, it feels like that sometimes.
I was about to say it doesn't combo with JoaT, but then I remembered you could use it top-deck the Silver. But... then you have a spot in your hand taken up by Watchtower that could have been a Silver in the first place. So. Nombo with JoaT.
On a related note, I'm going to be updating the article.
It can trash the incoming Silver. Sometimes you just don't want anymore Silver.
Masterpiece-Dukeany slog is really strong.
Other combos: Mine or Taxman. If you mine or tax a Masterpiece, it turns into gold, negating its disadvantage. Also, the silvers which come with Masterpiece are good mining targets if you don't have the Masterpiece itself, and even better taxing targets if your opponents don't have Masterpiece themselves.
Other combos: Mine or Taxman. If you mine or tax a Masterpiece, it turns into gold, negating its disadvantage. Also, the silvers which come with Masterpiece are good mining targets if you don't have the Masterpiece itself, and even better taxing targets if your opponents don't have Masterpiece themselves.
Other combos: Mine or Taxman. If you mine or tax a Masterpiece, it turns into gold, negating its disadvantage. Also, the silvers which come with Masterpiece are good mining targets if you don't have the Masterpiece itself, and even better taxing targets if your opponents don't have Masterpiece themselves.
I once used Taxman to turn a Masterpiece into a Gold, and as luck would have it, my opponent had his only Masterpiece in hand and had to discard it. Bonus!
I've had opponents open Masterpiece with 4...no Feodum on the board. Which, even if it was, is no excuse.Opponents? Wow.
I've had opponents open Masterpiece with 4...no Feodum on the board. Which, even if it was, is no excuse.
I've had opponents open Masterpiece with 4...no Feodum on the board. Which, even if it was, is no excuse.
I sure hope Gardens were in the kingdom.
Other combos: Mine or Taxman. If you mine or tax a Masterpiece, it turns into gold, negating its disadvantage. Also, the silvers which come with Masterpiece are good mining targets if you don't have the Masterpiece itself, and even better taxing targets if your opponents don't have Masterpiece themselves.
I once used Taxman to turn a Masterpiece into a Gold, and as luck would have it, my opponent had his only Masterpiece in hand and had to discard it. Bonus!
His hand was Taxman-Masterpiece-ThreeNoTreasureCards too...
I've had opponents open Masterpiece with 4...no Feodum on the board. Which, even if it was, is no excuse.
I've had opponents open Masterpiece with 4...no Feodum on the board. Which, even if it was, is no excuse.
I sure hope Gardens were in the kingdom.
Province was. So was Duchy. And Estate.
At any rate, does anyone have any issues with the article as it stands? If not, I'm going to post it to the wiki page.Well, I'd still like it if you mentioned that discard attacks are a pretty good counter to Masterpiece strategies that aim to Provinces. But other than that, I think it's good.
At any rate, does anyone have any issues with the article as it stands? If not, I'm going to post it to the wiki page.Well, I'd still like it if you mentioned that discard attacks are a pretty good counter to Masterpiece strategies that aim to Provinces. But other than that, I think it's good.
I've had opponents open Masterpiece with 4...no Feodum on the board. Which, even if it was, is no excuse.
I sure hope Gardens were in the kingdom.
Province was. So was Duchy. And Estate.
Not everyone on Goko is a Domin-spert. Probably most of them are not very familiar with Guilds cards.
I've had opponents open Masterpiece with 4...no Feodum on the board. Which, even if it was, is no excuse.
I sure hope Gardens were in the kingdom.
Province was. So was Duchy. And Estate.
Not everyone on Goko is a Domin-spert. Probably most of them are not very familiar with Guilds cards.
That's why your article is well-timed!
Also, I'd mention "don't open with Masterpiece except in edge case situations" to the article.
I've had opponents open Masterpiece with 4...no Feodum on the board. Which, even if it was, is no excuse.
I sure hope Gardens were in the kingdom.
Province was. So was Duchy. And Estate.
Not everyone on Goko is a Domin-spert. Probably most of them are not very familiar with Guilds cards.
That's why your article is well-timed!
Also, I'd mention "don't open with Masterpiece except in edge case situations" to the article.
Well, unless you have five coins and there are no other good $5s. I wouldn't call that an edge case. Maybe say "don't buy Masterpiece with $3 or $4 except in edge case situations" would be better.
You probably still want an important 4 with that 5 instead of two silvers and a copper, because your 2 coin hand can't afford Scout.
You probably still want an important 4 with that 5 instead of two silvers and a copper, because your 2 coin hand can't afford Scout.
The extra silvers help in your economy, and you could get a bunch of good $4 quickly then.
Let's say you're playing strictly Smithy-BM, and it's the mid-game phase (i.e. you got 2 Smithys but it's not Duchy time yet). For $5, do you get Silver or Masterpiece?Another Smithy. You need more than two for a Masterpiece game. But if you haven't been buying any Masterpieces yet, buy a Masterpiece.
Opening $5 Masterpiece is like opening Cache, it's not a bad move but almost always there are better options available.
I'm relatively sure that I did not come up with that myself, so at least someone has mentioned it before.Opening $5 Masterpiece is like opening Cache, it's not a bad move but almost always there are better options available.
Just now realized how similar those cards are.. surprised this hasn't been discussed before (or has it?) With $5, you can either have a Gold and 2 Coppers, or 2 Silvers and a Copper. Both purchase $5 worth of treasure split across 3 cards.
I'm relatively sure that I did not come up with that myself, so at least someone has mentioned it before.Opening $5 Masterpiece is like opening Cache, it's not a bad move but almost always there are better options available.
Just now realized how similar those cards are.. surprised this hasn't been discussed before (or has it?) With $5, you can either have a Gold and 2 Coppers, or 2 Silvers and a Copper. Both purchase $5 worth of treasure split across 3 cards.
Well What is it
In Big Money strategies, buying Masterpiece for $6 or more can sometimes be superior to Gold, but most engines will sputter and die with that many non-drawing cards in your deck.
So How Do I Use It
Cursers and Looters will make it much harder for your opponent to line up enough Silvers
The first paragraph is not emphasized enough. That first Gold is extremely helpful. Subsequent $6 should most often be Masterpiece buys.I almost agree with this now. Early on, Gold is superior, and as the game goes on, Masterpiece becomes better and better in comparison. However, I think that rather than buying 1 Gold and Masterpieces after that, you should buy Golds until you get your first big Masterpiece and Masterpieces after that, because the reason why the Golds are extremely helpful is that huge Masterpiece buy - you want to maximize the number of Golds before that, but after that, Golds aren't that useful any longer. Usually, this means getting 1-2 Golds in practice.