I will admit that I'm curious if Donald saw the scavenger/stash combo in playtesting.
@eHalcyon:
As I said I agree that this is no power combo at all. But at least something to keep in mind to slightly improve your play (which I hadn't so far). If you happen to have a Stash because there is no good $5 or $4 alternative around and you also have one or more Wishing Wells, then it seems to be a good idea to put your Stash on 7th position after reshuffle. (I don't see why the fact that Wishing Well draws first would make it more difficult, just put Stash one position later.)
True, it gets more difficult to execute with more than one Stash (regardless if with Mystic or Wishing Well). But even with more than one Stash, there is an above average chance to connect it when putting it on, say, 12th position - just because you know the position of one of your cards for sure.
You are probably right that because Stash is so weak overall, you usually (if there is no Scavenger or Chancellor) don't want Stashes when Mystic is around as a $5 alternative. But at least one Stash might be good if you already have a few Mystics and there is no better $5 around.
The issue isn't counting down the right number of spots. It's getting WW in the right hand, just above your Stash. And yeah, I think it would be more difficult to coordinate multiples using WW as opposed to Mystic.
I'm looking forward to Scavenger/Stash because I almost never ever buy Stash. The only time I do is on money boards, and I hit $5 instead of $6 and Royal Seal nor Venture are present. So, in other words, I almost never buy Stash.
A bold prediction, Knights will SUCK if there is a card that has a beneficial when trashed effect (ie fortress) or Tunnel is on board.
Tunnel may not be the best defence to Knights. Tunnel/Copper means Tunnel is trashed and gains you no Gold.
I think Insomniac has the right of it here: Knights discard and then trash. So Knight hitting Tunnel/Copper trashes the Tunnel, but you do get the Gold.
I think the best part about Rats will be in assisting target limited trashers. By that I mean trashers that are limited to trashing only actions or trashing non-treasures. These cards can only clear your deck so far. Using Rats to convert your useless cards into cantrips means that Jack/Hermit will always have a useful target to trash and Death Cart just keeps on giving.
It obviously conflicts with Spice Merchant, though.
A bold prediction, Knights will SUCK if there is a card that has a beneficial when trashed effect (ie fortress) or Tunnel is on board.
Here's another one: TR/GR with border village. Gain a card up to $9 and a card less than $5 by trash bouncing the BV.
I don't think you get the on-gain bonus when you gain BV from the trash. I believe we had a long, long discussion in this forum about how Gaining (with a capital G) means from the Supply.
?!???!?!?!Village + Pillage + Graverobber/Rogue.
Works with Feast too of course. But a 3-card combo just to make a 5 gainer is probably too much effort.
Pillage is really, really good though - and you can use any village so there's a lot of different options. It feels like a pin, that's how strong it is (if you can play Pillage every turn).
Village + Pillage + Graverobber/Rogue.
If it's going to be strong, it's going to be because of the trashing (or because you're playing alt VP). Terminal gold or gain a duchy, WITH a penalty, just isn't a very strong card, early, endgame, whenever. I mean, harvest is not so great, mandarin not that good, just, yeah, it's not so good. Gaining duchies is hardly ever something that will win you the game, except in alt VP. I'm sure chwhite will agree with me here.
So how good is the trashing? Well, the issue is, how soon can you get it. If you can spike one on a 5/2, that trashing ought to be real good. Otherwise, trashing your whole hand becomes weaker and weaker and weaker. To the point where you get to use it once, maaaaybe twice. And for a $5, it just doesn't seem that great. I mean, nice card to have sure, but I am comparing it to other 5s here. And so, the ancillary benefits make it a bit better of a card than Mandarin overall (even though mandarin is more often good, if that makes any sense), but I don't think it will be an above-average 5. Maybe I'm crazy. Maybe I'm right. Time will tell.
We should call it "garbage in, garbage out."
Is that like "tides go in, tides go out"?
I want to coin a new term: the "trash bounce."
Can anybody come up with other strategies that use a trash bounce?
I think you guys are overestimating Sir Michael. Remember how everybody hates Saboteur? That's because Saboteur doesn't do anything for you -- it's just an attack, and a terminal at that.
Hmmm, if Chancellor, Scavenger and Stash are all on the board... Is the best opening Chancellor/Scavenger? Or does that limit your chances at $5 too much.
I'd definitely prefer opening Scavenger / Silver over Scavenger / Chancellor. The Chancellor doesn't do you much good to set up your 3 Stashes plus 2 Scavengers and the risk to have colliding terminals is much too high given the low expected benefit.
Eh, I'm not sure about this. If you guess right, the mystic only becomes a cantrip, not a lab. I mean, I see what you're saying about slimming a deck down to pure mystics, but I think it will be hard to get there, because until you do, the mystics you already have will basically just be silvers. Granted, they aren't terminal silvers, so that is a plus.
I can see how the mystic will be better than I thought, but we'll have to wait and see if it really is a card you can build a deck around.
Chancellor is the Chancellor I've always wanted.
Intrigue is such a natural compliment to the base set that I can't recommend anything else. Prosperity is awesome and Seaside has my favorite mechanic, the duration card, but the synergy between Base and Intrigue is so strong that I just feel like the two really belong together as the true core of the game.
I was hoping it's be very soon
