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1801

Dominion General Discussion / Re: Interview with Donald X.

« on: January 03, 2013, 08:59:50 pm »

I've got my name on the boxes, that's something. I had the game, I didn't need to be on a card. If I had to be on a card it would be the randomizer for the Knights.

Nice choice!

Follow up: Are the personalities or any other real life characteristic of the real persons that inspire the names of the Knights in any way related with the card "effect"? More precisely, are the assignments of names-effect purely random? If not, what were the criteria, assuming is something not too private to be told here?

1802

Variants and Fan Cards / Re: Early game trashers

« on: January 03, 2013, 08:55:15 pm »

When this reveals your $5 or a silver, you are put in an awkward spot. I don't understand why you can discard the top card of your deck last. If you move the discard before the reveal from your hand, like Scrying Pool, you can choose to get rid of the $5 to help your trashing.

The discard is so that you can past over your non-trashed card. If its your first Silver or a $5, you most likely won't trash nor discard it. Is mostly to have some consolation if you reveal a bad card but have no copy to reveal in order to trash it (likely, your first Curse, but also possibly an Estate if you are unlucky).

This rewards a 5/2 opening too much, I think. A player can trash 2 estates and a copper as well (a 4/2 opening). This is faster than Chapel and you don't need to even spend an action and the card added to your deck isn't as dead.

Actually, if you trash 3 estates, you gain a Copper-equivalent, and if you trash 2 estates and a Copper, you only trashed two estates, so its fast trashing for opening, but I don't think its super-incredible (at least, not a lot better than chapel, and it gets bad much faster, as it consumes your buy and your turn more often, while Chapel can still trash a missed Estate or Copper or Curse in the mid-game, while this is all-or-nothing).

I think this can work better after the opening. If you open with a drawer, I think trashing an extended hand is really useful, and you already have a good action and possibly a Silver to compensate. Moreover, if this collides with the Silver, you can just play it alone and trash everything else, so I think as T3 or T4 buy is less swingy than Chapel. Maybe it is overpowered as opening buy, but its hard to tell.

Finally, I think it can also work as a "clean this engine before getting green", similar to Forge, but is tricky to avoid trashing your good cards because you need to play them for that. But, for its cheap cost and the on-buy effect, it may be better on that task than forge if you have spare buys, because it saves a lot of tempo.

I'll comment when I finished testing them (currently I've only tested solo play, which I'm not good at), but I appreciate the early comments.

1803

Variants and Fan Cards / Early game trashers

« on: January 03, 2013, 08:08:56 pm »

Demolition      $2
Action
+1 Card
+1 Action
Reveal the top card of your deck. You may reveal one or two copies of that card from your hand. If you do, trash all revealed cards.
You may discard the top card of your deck.

Damned Copper   $2
Treasure
Worth $1
---
When you buy this, trash your hand.

1804

Variants and Fan Cards / Re: Traitor (Action-Attack)

« on: January 03, 2013, 07:01:33 pm »

I really like the card. Being a Terminal, it involves quite a bit of strategy the fact that you may get it without buying it. We are only used to get dead cards or Coppers against our wills, not terminals (Swindler, Ambassador and Jester may give out unwanted terminals, but with Swindler and Jester is usually only once in a while and with Ambassador is rare).

I would consider make it go to the player on your left at clean-up instead, just so you have it in play like normal actions through your turn (seems like it may cause strange interactions and lose track considerations, like Mining Village). It will also be clearer when you TR or KC it. Also, maybe trash it or return it to the supply first (for instante, what happens with the Traitor if the player to the left reveals Trader? Ambassador solves it nicely by letting it in the supply, and Masquerade does not involve a gain, so there is no Trader possiblity).

I strongly agree it needs some resource, more importantly, I think it needs to be coin (+$2 sounds fine). Otherwise, after the curses run out, this is almost like a dead terminal you want to give to your neighbor. The problem is, with Cursers like Sea Hag, the Curses eventually run out and you will not buy any new Sea Hag (barring edge cases that are of no interest). In this case, however, you can have a sort of stalemate situation of 10 Traitors going round and round with nothing else going on (especially in 2p, where 5 Traitors per player + 5 curses each is a lot of dead cards). If the Traitor gives +2, while you pass it, even without Curses, it will probably let you buy at least a Silver and make the game alive again. Also, you may consider some way of trashing the card if there is no Curse-giving.

I would price it at $4 to avoid opening double Traitor. I think that gives too much swingyness and first player advantage, possible putting 4 unwanted cards into the other player deck. Getting hit twice before the 2nd reshuffle by a double-Swindler or double-Ambassador opening is already really awful. Priced at $4 makes it slower for the Traitors to flood everyones deck. I think power attacks are nice, but is also nice that you can defend from them to some extent, at least in some boards, to allow diverging strategies, which are much more fun than mirrors. This considerations seem even worse for 3p, as one player getting Traitors means everyone will be getting them really soon, so there better be some barrier preventing doing that too fast.

1805

Dominion General Discussion / Re: You play too much Dominion when...

« on: January 03, 2013, 11:43:55 am »

You play too much Dominion when you can't stand scouts.

BTW, I know plenty of people that hate scouts without even knowing Dominion.

1806

Dominion General Discussion / Re: Interview with Donald X.

« on: January 03, 2013, 11:42:05 am »

Are you proposing using It as a neutral pronoun or sending an evil clown to hunt us down so we stop nagging about this?

1807

Loser's Bracket / Re: Losers Bracket - Structure Discussion

« on: January 03, 2013, 11:12:38 am »

Also, if we run into a last 3, I think we could go all-vs-all and the double winner is the champ, solving ties by game-difference and repeating in case of triple tie (which is not likely at all). This may make someone a Kingmaker in the third of this games, but we can agree to hold out on posting results until all matches have been played, or, if all 3 players can schedule simultaneous play, round-robbin the games of all 3 matches (this would be extremely cool).

1808

Dominion General Discussion / Re: Interview with Donald X.

« on: January 03, 2013, 11:03:24 am »

Donald's probably right that singular they is where the future's at. But, you know what's so amusing about these claims of sexism? Gender-neutral "he" was introduced by a feminist. e.g. see this NYT article.

Also of note from the article: "It’s a shame that grammarians ever took umbrage at the singular they. After all, they gave you a slide. It began life as a plural object pronoun and evolved into the whole enchilada: subject and object, singular and plural."

Its not the technicaly correct what matters in this case, but the impact on society's view. I think if they or one shock someone because of its technically improper use, that's not a bad thing, and its probably a good thing: people ought to think someone did their job to avoid following the usual male-oriented language, and that lead some people as to think why they would do that and that eventually reinforces the important debate over sexism, which of course exceeds language issues by far.

As for the they vs one vs other alternatives, I don't know which alternative is better, for the time being, any gender-neutral or non-sexist way is fine with me.

In any case, this debate, like all ideology ones, may quickly divert from the thread, and I know that can be really annoying, especially in a successful thread, so I don't want to get too into this, unless it entails cool questions for Donald, which does not seem to be happening.

1809

Dominion General Discussion / Re: Interview with Donald X.

« on: January 03, 2013, 09:25:50 am »

Why are you not depicted in a Dominion card art? Are you going to get depicted in a Guilds card? If you could redo the art of the existing expansions, in which card would you like to be? (cue Harem joke)

1810

Dominion General Discussion / Re: You play too much Dominion when...

« on: January 03, 2013, 09:19:00 am »

... you think the trash should be taken out in the morning, as early as possible.

... you start taking your bike to a Warehouse because you heard is good for cycling.

... when the day is too rainy or cloudy when you get up, you hope you get minioned.

... you think 2/5 < 3/4 is something that is true only sometimes.

... you get back from costume parties with someone else's wallet, and throw it out if it does not contain good value.

... you do not date on the final days of December, because your date would miss the reshuffle.

1811

Dominion General Discussion / Re: Tournament + Feodum

« on: January 03, 2013, 08:30:14 am »

Well, I didn't say it was useful, just fun. I'd love to Trader a Colony though, but a hand of 5 Silvers isn't enough to buy one.

There are some cards that you could throw in a Trader strategy that may eventually give you a Colony with some luck (Haven and Courtyard come to mind). In any case, who would pursue a Trader strategy in a Colony game? Maybe a 4p Mountebank slog?

1812

Dominion General Discussion / Re: Tournament + Feodum

« on: January 02, 2013, 11:16:42 pm »

I still do not own Dark Ages and Iso does not have it as well, but my belief is that Trader would be faster than anything else to get you lots of Silvers. Trader with some good +Buy especially. I played Wharf+Trader recently and did not need any Golds to buy 7 Provinces. I do not have the log, but I imagine Feodums in that game would easily be worth more VP than Provinces in my deck.

1813

Dominion General Discussion / Re: Interview with Donald X.

« on: January 02, 2013, 11:12:29 pm »

My two cents on the ego thing: I also have the impression of him giving egotistical answers, and I think this is primarily because through the interview there is almost none (sorry, but I do not have the time or energy to go read it all over again to check the fact) recognition to good things others do. On the flip side, the fact that there is a lot of mention of good things he did well, I here agree that is a direct consequence of him being the interviewed, so I do not find that annoying at all. But it would be good to recognize that other people does good things as well, and I think there is lack of such recognition. For instance, there is mention to Magic being good or innovative a couple of times, and also Richard Garfield is mentioned as a designer he trusts makes good games. However, this are minor comments and, more significantly, there is no mention to Magic nor Garfield as direct contributors to Dominion existence.

tl; dr: I don't think concluding DXV is egotistical from this interview is fair at all, although I, and apparently others as weel, would appreciate if he commented more on people or games or ideas he recognizes as really good, as we all recognize his game as really good.

Onto a more constructive part of the post:

1. Besides the obvious deck-building, do you feel there is something deeper or more detailed Magic contributed to Dominion? In particular, did you at some point considered other properties in Magic and how they would affect dominion (like different resources in costs, things that stay in play a really long time as opposed to instant effects, explicit combat)? I know this has been partially answered before here and there, so it is of course fine if you only go into new details.

2. How do you feel about identical starting hands? Would you consider including it as a suggestion or variant in a rule book? How often do you think a different opening has a too big impact on the outcome (by "too big" I mean "it would be better to avoid if it could be done in a simple manner, like arrange shuffle luck for particular kingdoms with god, nature, chance, or whatever has the "decision").

3. One of the two things that I hate most about Dominion (this sounds harsh, but after reading it, I think this is more a testimony that I love the game) is the fact that the text on the cards is sexist (it refers to individual players as "he"). Did you consider gender neutrality while making the game? Would you (if you happen to call the shots on such a thing) consider a request for gender neutrality for upcoming expansions/games?

[small skippable sidenote: this fact was something me, my girlfriend and a friend of mine all noticed individually, so it IS noticeable, at least to our kind of people]

4. How good were you at playing Dominion during development in comparison with the other playtesters? When playtesting, do you feel that you play to win as hard as possible, or are your decisions based on other things as well (from "I need to test this card, even if I do not

5. If you were to put a clock on Dominion to avoid people thinking forever, would you give a particular limit to the first move (i.e., some time to evaluate the board)? How much time do you think a person should take to play close enough to optimal (i.e., close to what he/she would play if given unbounded time)? Do you have any more general thoughts on how to clock Dominion games in general?

1814

Loser's Bracket / Re: Rats! Division (Losers Bracket) - Bracket and Results

« on: January 02, 2013, 05:26:58 pm »

[EDIT: I added the CouncilRoom log and score/supply details for Game 2]

Round 3 result: soulnet beats popsofctown (pops) 4-0.

The overall score definitely does not reflect the skill difference among us, we really are about the same skill level (which is reflected in the leaderboard, both at seeding time and now). This were all close matches and each could have gone either way. I think it was mostly luck what decided most games. For sure it was on games 2 and 3.

We played purely random sets, identical starting hands and with PCE.

Game 1: soulnet 64 - pops 48 http://dominion.isotropic.org/gamelog/201301/02/game-20130102-113233-a5816219.html

cards in supply: Adventurer, Colony, Courtyard, Fishing Village, Forge, Haven, Mandarin, Navigator, Platinum, Spy, Throne Room, and Vault

This is the only game in which I feel I made the better decision. We both open with CY/Silver, but I then go into a straightforward CY+BM while he tries to transition intro an engine throwing FV and TR. He does get to play two CYs and TR Mandarin a couple of turns, but I think the BM approach was faster all along. After all the net 2 cards from CY and the -1 Card from Mandarin are a huge downside for an engine, but are actually an asset for a BM player, especially in a Colony board were is all about managing your Plats. I think after we both got to Gold from a single Silver, the BM+CY strategy got even more powered, because Gold+CY means more Golds and Plats in no time, and then, with the good deck management from CY plus the support of Mandarin to put back lonely Plats and get a little more buying power while greening, the BM player (a.k.a me) smoothly goes into victory. It is my feel that the engine here would take too much time to setup, because of the lack of good draw to Forge things faster. I think with some simple good draw like Smithy the engine would have been feasible, getting to use Forge better. But still, without +Buy, it would have been close. We both got Forge (he much earlier than me, to get some trashing and smooth out his engine) and got pretty good use of it, but as he got to get rid of some Estates and Coppers while getting his cheap engine pieces, I got a great Forging of Province+Silver for probably the deciding Colony

Game 2: soulnet 40 - pops 30: http://councilroom.com/game?game_id=game-20130102-115738-e139f898.html
cards in supply: Bridge, Conspirator, Farmland, Ghost Ship, Horse Traders, Minion, Monument, Oracle, Stables, and Trader

This was the only authentic non-mirror, with me going hard on Minion plus some Conspirators against Stables+Horse Traders+Conspirators. At the beginning I thought I had it lost, as he was getting good play on the 3rd reshuffle thanks to me feeding his HT. I almost changed strategy by getting a Stables and trying to mirror him, but I quickly got back on track. After all, with Minions I may have a shot when I take off, mirroring him was a sure defeat, giving the huge loss on tempo I had. I ended up coming from behind and going into a head to head finish, as my uncontested race for Minions helped me get 8 which quickly give me Province and Province+Duchy turns with the +Buy from a single HT I got myself to defend from opposing Minions that never came. In the end I was way luckier getting several Minions close to the top of the deck on the final reshuffle while he got pretty bad hands (or so it seemed). I still think the Minion strategy, if applied properly, should have an advantage here because you don't need to balance getting money and engine components separately, although maybe some mixup would be superior to both.

Game 3: soulnet 60 - pops 56 http://dominion.isotropic.org/gamelog/201301/02/game-20130102-121001-d4dd3c9b.html 
cards in supply: Ambassador, Feast, Gardens, Hoard, Mining Village, Oracle, Spy, Treasury, Tunnel, and Warehouse

How often do you pass on Ambassador on 2p? Even without other power attacks and no defense? Even on 3/4 opening?
How often do you empty the Gardens and *then* go on to almost empty Provinces?
How often do you get to grow Gardens on Gold instead of +Buy Coppers or Silver gained from JoaT, Explorer, Bureaucrat, and such?

This was the Mirror Green Fest, and every greening-early-friend was invited. Warehouse+Tunnel to open, Hoard to follow and fill your deck with Gold and Gardens to make each Gold even get you points.

There was no strange trick here, he was way luckier at the beginning, while I had a terrible time making my Warehouses collide with my Tunnels. However, I was luckier afterwards, particularly in the last couple of turns, because I could catch up on Gardens and Provinces and get a lead, managing to be tied on points when he already passed the 40 card barrier and I did not. A hoarded Duchy let me get to exactly 40 for a +7 VP bust in my total and the win. I think I may have been a little more cautious with deck sizes, end game conditions and other tactical tweaks, but I cannot tell from the log. Even though the play is unimpressive in terms of strategy, it was funny to play the most golden+green deck ever. Also, my last turn was one of the greatest finishes I remember. I'll write it down for Dominion: The Movie.

Game 4: soulnet 45 - pops 15 http://dominion.isotropic.org/gamelog/201301/02/game-20130102-123150-57192a8f.html
cards in supply: Haggler, Harvest, King's Court, Margrave, Mine, Nomad Camp, Oracle, Outpost, Peddler, and Rabble

As usual, even on kind of ugly boards with no village and no trashing, KC makes an engine the only option. Actually Margrave and Peddlers with spare buys seem good if you get to play KC'ed Margraves fast, which was my plan from the beginning. We both open Silver/Oracle to get to 5 and try to deny the other. I surprisingly get 6 and choose to start with Gold and get to Margrave later to help me get KC faster. I do get to KC first, but he gets some Peddlers first, so I start having dead KCs on hand for a while and get a second Oracle and a second Margrave. While I stock on Peddlers he gets going and gets 6 KCs to my 4, but I got them and played them sooner and I thinkn that made some difference. In the end, we both have ver swingy hands getting a mega-turn with entire deck drawing from starting KC+KC+drawer, followed by a buy-nothing turn from our decks with too many treasure and green to run a reliable engine. I got two mega-turn hands sooner and that got me the win.

I think we both play badly -or at least, sloppily- on this one, not having really good control over the decks we were making. My second Margrave should have been a Rabble to help him less when KCing it (+3 Buys is plenty anyway) and he got a not too useful Outpost (getting KC+KC+Action or KC+Peddler on a 3 card hand is a Gamble with really bad odds). I was also careless with the ending condition, leaving only two provinces without a significant lead. Probably the partial 3-0 made us both loose focus.

Thanks popsofctown for the games!

1815

Rules Questions / Re: Politics and Bargaining

« on: December 25, 2012, 09:30:24 pm »

When someone has $1 to spend, I can't look all snug and say "Hey, you can always buy a Curse!" (Yeah, I'm not mentioning Copper) And no Bridges or Highways or Quarries, you pedantics! Shoo, shoo!

Princess. Remember this was specifically about Tournament play.

The problem with Shooing pedantry is that you actually attract it.

I can't stop, someone please correct me soon!

1816

Rules Questions / Lighthouse + Reactions

« on: December 25, 2012, 06:22:55 pm »

Hi,

I was wondering if it was legal to reveal a reaction X to an attack while I have Lighthouse in play, or do it AFTER revealing Moat (the second makes sense to allow to do things like reveal Moat to stop the attack and then reveal Secret Chamber to put back that moat, so it actually is the reverse of the usual Secret Chamber/Moat thing).

I'm inclined to YES on both, but the word "unaffected" may be stronger than I think. Allowing me to reveal a Reaction would be an "affection" the Attack is giving. On the other hand, it may be interpreted as the playing of the attack and not the attack itself is what allows me to reveal the Reaction.

Thanks!

1817

Game Reports / Re: Developing Grand Market to win

« on: December 24, 2012, 12:45:33 pm »

Of course this is incorrect extreme argument, but probably the thing is, if you have 10 IGG + Silvers and I've got 10 Curses, 8 Cities and a couple of golds (maybe a Plat?), I'm in way better shape than you to get a couple of colonies before piling out.

1818

Dominion Articles / Re: Cartographer

« on: December 18, 2012, 08:14:03 pm »

I think you may add that Cartographer anti-synergize with diggers (not that they render each other unuseful, but Farming Village, Golem and Venture lose some of its power if you Cartographer your top of the deck before playing them). Ok, maybe Cartographer-Venture may work a little bit, and Farming Village may also have some use for Cartographer to get to the actions or better treasure than Copper, but for Golem, it seems that unless you have pretty bad actions, Cartographer does not add much.

1819

2012 / Re: Losers Bracket RD 3 Sign-Ups 1/???

« on: December 17, 2012, 12:21:33 pm »

Sign me up please! (I lost in Chapel Division against Robz888)

1820

2012 / Re: Upsets

« on: December 11, 2012, 02:28:23 pm »

Chapel-1   witchdoctor83 d. kilgoretrout103 (30.148)

This was a no-show, so it should not count for any contest. I am not even sure if I would call that an upset.

1821

2012 / Re: Chapel Division: Bracket and Results

« on: December 10, 2012, 09:48:31 pm »

On game 3, University/Vineyard was the dominant strategy. No question about it. If your opponent had invested more heavily in potions, he would have won, I am pretty sure. University/Vineyard is a strong strategy period, but with Minion and such, yikes!

I've never bought a Vineyard in a game, and I also never saw a University-Vineyard game, so I do not yet have a good grab on how fast would it be. Since my feeling was just gut, I was more confident to go with a strategy I am familiar with.

1822

2012 / Re: Chapel Division: Bracket and Results

« on: December 10, 2012, 08:03:44 pm »

Round 2: soulnet 4 vs witchdoctor83 0

We played identical starting hands, totally random Kingdom except no Tournament, Black Market or Possession and point counter enabled (although I think we just used it to see the score, at least I did).

witchdoctor83 had the first player advantage for the first game, so he started all four.

I enjoyed the games, although I did not like how I played them. I also think witchdoctor83 did not play optimally, with some important mistakes, but definitely better than what I would expect for a level 6 on Iso. I had to mantain focus to be able to win, would have lost a couple of games if I just played fast and pseudorandomly, even followign the right strategy. Many mirror games make me think we may not be as differently skilled as our levels in the picking a strategy part. Also, I liked his opennes to post-game analysis, and his insights when doing it.


Game 1: soulnet 69 vs witchdoctor83 49 http://dominion.isotropic.org/gamelog/201212/10/game-20121210-151615-65afae98.html

cards in supply: Adventurer, Colony, Contraband, Counting House, Hoard, Horn of Plenty, Inn, Loan, Market, Nobles, Platinum, and Smugglers

No really exciting action, especially nothing that would take us up to Colonies. Strange game for Colonies, probably because had almost every prosperity card from the weaker part. Of course this was going to be BM plus support, and I chose the better support. We both open Loan/Silver and are lucky trashing mostly copper in the first turns. We diverged in the first $5 buy, I go for Contraband and he goes for Market. I think Contraband is fine because I want both Hoard and Gold, and later, he would not know weither to ban Plat or Gold or Plat or Colony. And if I get Hoard in play, I want to buy Nobles and gain Gold, but he does not know if I have Hoard when banning. This clearly helps, and I am able to pick Hoards, Golds and the first Platinum a lot before him. He does have an advantage on Markets which are great for the endgame in case of ties, but since I'm getting a lot more Nobles, I think I would mantain the upper hand here. He Smuggles a couple of my Golds but I smuggled back the Markets. I wanted to pickup Nobles+Gold instead of just Gold with $6 because the +3 Cards would really help me get to Colonies if I manage to get a lot of Golds (which I did) and not necessarilly a lot of Plats. Also, the fatter deck I have when builiding up to Colonies level makes collision less likely, and since colliding Nobles is not bad, I can stock up on them much more than Smithies in BM+Smithy, which is known to be good. In the end this was absolutely correct, and I end up buying 5 Colonies and a Province with only 1 Plat (and 11 Golds). In this game the small buy important difference in strategy prevailed, as the Contraband > Market snowballed a lot, because of a longer game than just Provinces.

1 - 0

Game 2: soulnet 18 vs witchdoctor83 4 http://dominion.isotropic.org/gamelog/201212/10/game-20121210-154157-2981c52d.html
cards in supply: Fortune Teller, Merchant Ship, Minion, Native Village, Oasis, Rabble, Salvager, Spice Merchant, Steward, and Torturer

Of course Torturer chain.
What about Minions?
Are you crazy! Torturer chain! Note the Steward!
But Minions are really good in a trim deck...
But is horrible to discard Minions! Go Torturer!

After doing this in my head for a while, I go NV+Torturer, and my opponent does the same (maybe with less Minion thought, I don't know). I open Steward/Spice Merchant and he SM/Silver. I want to get the first play of torturer ASAP, and if I draw badly, I can just buy NV. This proves to be a little better, since I get a good chain going quickly, and even when he gets his/hers, I'm already drawing my deck confortably so I just trash every Curse I need to take (and I'm pretty confortably drawing my deck, so I discard a few times but just to keep the Curses alive, because I feel I have a better chain).

However, we both fail on building an economy and I quickly run out of money when having only a Silver and the Steward for cash. Probably really bad play on my part. He still has some Coppers, but is not quite drawing his deck, so I get a Silver and then Immediatly start going Gold. After a while, I go green and buy a Salvager to accelerated and get +Buy (NVs and Torturers are low and Curses are gone, and I'm drawing my deck no problem, so if I get some more Golds, I probably can go double province). I start salvaging Torturers and buying more money and provinces, while he is struggling a bit, not a bad deck, but not as powerful as mine, since he had to eat up and trash more Curses (he does trash every Curse eventually). Here comes the Tactical game, I have >12 point advantage, and he has only 3 buys tops, so I leave just 1 Torturer and 1 NV (Curses are already gone) and afterwards he fails to notice the 3-pile (he said on the chat afterwards), which I do to close the game. I think I would have won confortably just draining the provinces, maybe salvaging provinces to accelerate, buy WanderingWinder told me that I should win in the first opportunity I see to do it, and I believe him.

2 - 0

Game 3: soulnet 39 vs witchdoctor83 23 http://dominion.isotropic.org/gamelog/201212/10/game-20121210-155655-27954bc9.html

cards in supply: Bazaar, Bridge, Highway, Menagerie, Minion, Nomad Camp, Potion, Remake, University, Vineyard, and Watchtower

This has a lot of engine potential. A lot. But the only drawer is Watchtower. I think about going Remake for cleanup, then maybe University, Highway, Bridge, Watchtower, but I feel its slow and Remake+Minions can be fast. After that, we get 5/2 openings, and I do not want to open Remake/-, so I go Minion. He goes with a Highway, which I think is a mistake because any engine here wants University, and with universities you want Bridges. And also, a Highway at the beginning is nothing useful. After that, I play a simple Minions + Remake + some money, to keep it simple, and it works. I eventually add Menagerie after I start greening, which also works nicely because Minions disappear and we cosntantly have 4 cards hands. He tries to build an engine without any +Cards, and fails, ending up with something similar to my deck, but smaller with a couple of not so useful cards like Highway, Nomad Camp and Potion. He almost gets 5 VP Vineyards, but not commiting to it, getting just one Potion and contesting me for the Provinces (which brings the end closer), which makes him lose the game.

I still feel like University + Anything + Vineyards may get 6 or 7 VP Vineyards easily and maybe even get a couple of Provinces by the end, but I still went for a deck full of Silver and Minions, trashing with Remake.

If you have any comments especially on this game, I would appreciate it.

3 - 0

Game 4: soulnet 33 vs witchdoctor83 32 http://dominion.isotropic.org/gamelog/201212/10/game-20121210-160923-ccab7b8f.html

cards in supply: Apprentice, Bishop, Cache, Hoard, Mining Village, Minion, Potion, Spice Merchant, Transmute, Treasure Map, and Wharf

I feel we both played this one really bad. We open 5/2, he opens Minion (probably biased from last game) and I go Wharf, because one Minion is not taking me anywhere, and Wharf will get me Minions. In retrospect, I think this was correct, but Wharf+Minion does not strike me as anything impressive. We race for Minions and I buy a Hoard on a 6, hoping to go Duchies soon and then Apprentice, but the game is fast and we never get to it. I buy a Bishop to have some advantage in the endgame, which works, and buy the penultimate province while being 1 point ahead. He does have a Wharf, but we do not have decks good enough to make Province+Duchy likely (I was second, so Province+Estate also makes me win). In the first opportunity, he suicides by buying the last Province. He said he wanted to put himself out of his misery, although I think there was a low but reasonable enough chance for he winning by buying a Duchy (I actually had a very bad draw and had only $1 in hand, so I had to pass).

I think the board was nothing too special, but also not that bad, but our game was horrible. I suspect we both felt that with the match 3 - 0 everything was decided, so we did not try as hard.

4 - 0

Thanks for the games!

1823

2012 / Re: Ranking, Seeding, and Skill Discussion

« on: December 10, 2012, 02:02:23 pm »

I do understand all the merits of seeding, I said as much in my original post.  I just think it has it's pros and cons and isn't strictly 'better' than a random draw.  I'm just gonna leave it at that.

You mean they can be worth the same in coins? Or would you just use Potion based cost for one of them so they are incomparable?

1824

2012 / Re: Kingdom Design Challenge Entry Form

« on: December 08, 2012, 10:40:03 pm »

Agghhh!  OK, fixed.

I imagine we do not need to resubmit previous submissions right? (at least submissions that contained a fourth kingdom card)

1825

2012 / Re: Re: Upsets

« on: December 07, 2012, 03:34:24 pm »

You can use Swiss without simultaneous plays. I don't think revealing previous results will make you want to lose or tie to change your next play, but even then, results may be kept hidden until the end of the week of the round.

By "too big to handle" I was thinking on the people running the tournament. 128 games on Isotropic is not too bad, and also, as I said, they do not need to be simultaneous.

Maybe Swiss with some time to forfeit in between rounds? That way, people who lost interest due to not performing as good may withdraw without giving a semi-random set of people free points and one game less.