You can buy a Ruins, you can't buy a Hex. I guess.
Luck, Event, 4$
Once per game: Take Lucky, but not from another player.
Incubator looks very cool but the combination of random targeting and "+2" remodeling might make it very swingy - both at the beginning (Estate vs Copper) and at the end (random Province gains).
What if it revealed 3, put two into hand, and remodeled the third (gaining to hand)? It's much more powerful, but 3p is pretty expensive. You could always make it a "up to +1 coin" remodel. The Transmogrify-like flexibility would more than make up for the more limited gaining.
I don't get why River's Gift is above Sun's Gift here. Sun's Gift at the end of the turn is basically duration draw when it discards green cards, and it can discard Coppers too. Sun's Gift does a much better job at preventing dud turns than River's Gift. River's gift is only going to be better when your next hand was already pretty perfect or if you got it at the start of your turn when your top of deck had no junk. That or you spam River's Gift with King's Court on Druid. You're more likely to lose a game due to a dud turn than not having your perfect hand be more perfect.
Edit: Well, River's Gift also has the edge when your next hand is all cantrips or something, to be fair.
River Gift is much much better when you are drawing your deck, which is big.
This is true, but Sun's Gift is a lot more relevant when you get it before you actually get to the point where you're drawing your deck, possibly speeding you up by a turn with its combined cycling and ability to help reach higher price points more easily. Bard, Tracker, Blessed Village, and Idol are all often seen in the early game where you still have a sizeable deck. Maybe Pixie is an exception where you don't want to trash it for Sun's Gift. Sun's Gift can also make up for the lack of draw compared to River's Gift later in the turn if received when you're trying to kick off, say after playing a Village.
Weighing the Boons solely in the context of massive engines seems like it doesn't give a complete picture of what these Boons are truly capable of.
10) =0 Summon (Promo)
9) ▼3 Dominate (Empires)
8) ▼1 Save (Adventures)
7) ▼2 Alms (Adventures)
6) ▼2 Inheritance (Adventures)
5) ▲3 Bonfire (Adventures)
4) ▲1 Lost Arts (Adventures)
3) ▼1 Ferry (Adventures)
2) ▲1 Pathfinding (Adventures)
1) =0 Donate (Empires)
Does the dissonance between the direction of the arrows and the ordering of the list bother anyone else?
I don't get why River's Gift is above Sun's Gift here. Sun's Gift at the end of the turn is basically duration draw when it discards green cards, and it can discard Coppers too. Sun's Gift does a much better job at preventing dud turns than River's Gift. River's gift is only going to be better when your next hand was already pretty perfect or if you got it at the start of your turn when your top of deck had no junk. That or you spam River's Gift with King's Court on Druid. You're more likely to lose a game due to a dud turn than not having your perfect hand be more perfect.
Edit: Well, River's Gift also has the edge when your next hand is all cantrips or something, to be fair.
Oh, and of course debt and the -coin token do the same thing, except one doesn't stack.
Every player without debt takes one debt works almost exactly like bridge troll, and ball could cost 4 coins and one debt and be just a tad weaker.
No, Ball could cost 5 coins and one debt.
There once was a poor Vagrant who wandered from town to town, accomplishing virtually nothing. One day, a kindly business owner with wares to sell took pity upon him and gave him some job Training. He's now very successful, gathering even more green than the other Peddlers.
When Vagrant + Training came up in an IRL game, I had to laugh at Vagrant + Training = Peddler. It's even something worth doing.
It is not too surprising to me that the Adventure card enhancer tokens have on average a better return on investment on cheap pedestrian cards than on the Grand Markets. Vagrants being able to draw themselves is an awesome bonus of course.
I do not dislike Fool. It's not even close to being one of the cards that I actually find annoying to play with (namely Cultist, Rebuild, Possession, Smugglers, Save, Scrying Pool, King's Court).Smugglers, Save, and King's Court are all pretty sweet as-is. I would drop the attack from Scrying Pool, and use the fix someone here suggested of having Cultist either play another or hand out Ruins, your choice. I would not do Rebuild and Possession; I don't think I would try to fix them up, I would just abandon those concepts.
How much of a problem a card is though depends a lot on what kind of players you have, and whether or not they're online. For a typical casual group IRL, Rebuild isn't a problem at all. It's some card, they might buy it or not, it doesn't dominate. You have to say, no no guys, read these threads, to cause a problem. Whereas Fool makes that group's first Nocturne game painfully slow.
I strongly believe you want a catapult here. I’m not sure about the optimal realisation; the best version I can spot is
T1 buy catapult
T2 donate, keep 5 coppers
T3 catapult copper, pay debt (granted, there‘s a 1/6 risk to miss catapult, but I think the extra coin is worth trying).
T4 catapult copper, buy silver
T5 catapult copper, buy silver
T6 catapult copper, buy goons
T7 play goons, buy artificer
In the next turns, we get diplomats/artificers/goons while catapulting the remaining copper and the silvers.
I think that this beats any non-catapult-strategy handily which will have a hard time to get a T6 goons under permanent attack, and still has some leftover coppers on top.
In practice, it will play out quite differently if both players get catapults, but that‘s the whole point: you need a catapult here.
We need more empire style expansions.
QuoteAstrologer
Cost 4 - Night / Victory
If you have more victory cards in play than tokens on your constellation mat and haven't put any tokens on the mat this turn, put a token on your constellation mat.
If you have no cards in your discard pile, take Clear Skies.
-
This is worth 1VP for every two tokens on your constellation mat.QuoteClear Skies
State
While you have this, you may play Estates, Duchies, and Provinces as if they were action cards with "+$1".
At the end of your buy phase, return this.
