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76

Dominion Articles / Re: The 10 words card summary challenge

« on: April 09, 2015, 02:18:20 am »

OK, fair enough.  But I stand by what I said that just summarizing isn't useful.  The official cards themselves are already made to be succinct.  I think the OP implies that a strategic take should be applied, and strategy is certainly the purpose behind the inspiration for this thread.

Throne Room: Choose an Action card in your hand. Play it twice.

77

Dominion General Discussion / Re: CARD OF THE WEEK #3: Moat

« on: April 09, 2015, 01:29:20 am »

Man, if you're both buying Colonies at the same rate, the correct result is a tie, so what's the problem?

Because sometimes you're playing a tournament set and you want to get a win when your opponent has first player advantage.

Also, this is completely the wrong way to look at it. If michaeljb and I did not diverge strategically, then indeed the game would probably have ended in a tie (caveat below). But because I added Moat to my deck and he didn't, I swung the odds in my favor despite not having first player advantage.

I also explained in the previous post that in this situation where both players are buying Colony at the same rate, if second player gets a bad draw, he loses the game unless he hopes that first player also gets a bad draw, whereas first player needs to get two bad draws in order to lose.

78

Dominion General Discussion / Re: CARD OF THE WEEK #3: Moat

« on: April 08, 2015, 09:28:35 pm »

Good example.  Allow me to comment on a side point: at this point in the game "first player advantage" has become first player disadvantage, as you have to contend with the unfavourable tie break rule.  Any advantage from being first player is screened off by the game state and you having come out of the early Ambassador war ahead.

Right, except that michaeljb recovers from the Ambassador war and now his deck composition is slightly ahead. Suppose that michaeljb and I start getting Colony on the same turn, and suppose that both of us are capable of getting a Colony every turn for 4 consecutive turns. Once michaeljb gets his 4th Colony, if I want to win the game, I have to gamble on him not being able to buy a Colony and me being able to buy a Colony after adding a Province to my deck. Additionally, if michaeljb gets a Province instead of ending the game with his 5th Colony, I still can't win the game until I buy a lower VP card that michaeljb can't match and close out the game with my 4th Colony buy.

So assuming evenly matched and consistent decks, michaeljb can easily force the tie, and I lose if my deck falters.

Now suppose that michaeljb gets 3 Colonies and then doesn't make $11 on the next turn, so he buys a Province. If I buy my 4th Colony, michaeljb wins if he can buy his 4th Colony on his next turn. If I observe PPR and buy a Province, then michaeljb can still try to force the tie if he can buy his 4th Colony, even though his deck faltered once. This is basically what happened in the game, except I was confident in breaking PPR because I tracked his deck.

The only time where first player is disadvantageous to michaeljb is if I start buying Colony on the turn before he starts buying Colony, in which case he would lose on a VP tie.

79

Dominion General Discussion / Re: How to Teach People Dominion & Introduce New Expansions to Them

« on: April 07, 2015, 10:27:50 pm »

For the second game I asked what they wanted, and they told me to surprise 'em. So out came Witch (their first curser), Duke, Poor House, and other "wait, this game gets weird!" cards. They loved it.

So Ironworks, Great Hall, and Trader were in this kingdom? Did you get to exposit on blue dogs and pink elephants? That's how deep this game is.

80

Variants and Fan Cards / Re: Illusionist (Reserve card)

« on: April 07, 2015, 10:26:47 pm »

Would this counter Mountebank? Call it to add the Curse type to your Coppers, or something.

81

Dominion General Discussion / Re: CARD OF THE WEEK #3: Moat

« on: April 07, 2015, 06:50:35 pm »

I think the two biggest problems with Moat are its dead-ness and its lack of reliability. Moat being a dead card when drawn with another terminal means that it's usually not very good early in the game when you have few to no villages in your deck and literally almost every other terminal is better (usually this is the attack that Moat is supposed to be defending against). This also means that Moat is not a great defense against junking attacks much of the time because these attacks are most powerful near the beginning of the game and become weaker near the end of the game because the junk runs out.

There's also no way to ensure that Moat will even adequately defend against an opponent attack because it has to appear in the initial 5-card hand for its reaction to work. +card durations do not alleviate this at all because they don't draw in the clean-up phase. Cards such as Courtyard, Mandarin, or Count can top-deck Moat from hand to hand, but of course these are all terminal. Top-of-deck sifters such as Cartographer, Apothecary, or Scout can increase the likelihood of Moat being in the next hand. There's also Scheme, but that requires having played the Moat.

So when Moat is good, it's typically when these two problems get addressed. If your opponent is attacking you every turn with an attack that can do something every turn, and if the attack significantly decreases the likelihood of you reaching some goal either immediately or in the future, then Moat becomes more useful. Additionally, if there is a way to accommodate multiple Moats in your deck with low opportunity cost, or if one of the above interactions can be executed with low opportunity cost, then Moat becomes more useful.



The game that I posted above satisfied both criteria. Ambassador continues to attack throughout the entire game, and the attack threatens a player's ability to control the endgame. I could gain multiple Moats because its action component increased the reliability of my deck and it's the best purchase in low-economy hands where I used Ambassador to return Coppers. However, gaining the Moat early would have been a very poor decision because even though it would defend against the occasional Ambassador, it would also be a completely dead card otherwise.

82

Dominion General Discussion / Re: CARD OF THE WEEK #3: Moat

« on: April 07, 2015, 03:23:18 pm »

Here's an Iso-era log where Moat won me the game: http://councilroom.com/game?game_id=game-20130103-193234-02b55098.html

Summary: Colony game, Ambassador, no +buy or gainers, Platinum payload. At the beginning of turn 10, I'm ahead in the Amb war, as shown by substantially better deck composition. However, michaeljb picks up a third Amb on turn 12 and I get some Amb collisions, so at the beginning of turn 16 I've fallen slightly behind. michaeljb ends up getting Platinum a turn before I do, and he also has first player advantage.

Moat saves me in the endgame by blocking michaeljb's Amb numerous times. michaeljb, lacking Moat, is hit by my Amb every single time. His deck stalls from the green and he eventually becomes unable to return junk faster than it comes, and Moats not only help to keep my deck clean, but they also provide auxiliary draw in the presence of a glut of +actions from City. After michaeljb plays 4 of his Cities on turn 26 and triggers a reshuffle, I'm extremely confident that I can pick up the penultimate Colony and win on the next turn with the final Colony.

83

Dominion Articles / Re: The 10 words card summary challenge

« on: April 07, 2015, 05:17:33 am »

"Virtually never skippable" is a region populated by probably Chapel and maybe Ambassador... if anything. One step further is the land of Mountebank, Wharf, and Rebuild. One more step and you get to Witch and Sea Hag.

Three steps down the road, if you look to the right you will see the coveted Goons, on a lunch break.

This is, like, totally not true. Sea Hag is very skippable and Rebuild is skippable whenever there's a stronger engine. Goons is almost mandatory if there's a way to play more than one per turn, and if there are no splitters, chances are Goons is the strongest terminal in the kingdom.

84

Dominion General Discussion / Re: Neat and potentially useful card interactions

« on: April 06, 2015, 07:05:13 pm »

Even without trashing, if there's engine potential, Quarry + GM is just nuts.

85

Dominion General Discussion / Re: Put-in-your-hand...-ers

« on: April 06, 2015, 05:56:43 pm »

You could say similar things about several categories.

To echo AdamH, card categories are useful mostly for grouping cards that could function similarly if they replaced another card from that category in most given kingdoms. Splitters, terminal draw, light/heavy trashers, handsize attacks, etc. are useful categories. Disparate cards whose only commonality is putting (not even gaining) a card in hand cannot functionally replace each other, so it's not a useful category.

86

Dominion General Discussion / Re: Put-in-your-hand...-ers

« on: April 06, 2015, 02:03:12 pm »

A bunch of otherwise totally unrelated cards that have some sort of arbitrary characteristic in common? Not succinct, but adequately descriptive.

87

Dominion: Adventures Previews / Re: Event Speculation

« on: April 05, 2015, 11:20:17 pm »

You are probably wondering, is there also a +1 Buy token, a +1 Card token, a +$1 token? Yes, of course there are those too.

I'm calling 3 Lost Arts variants.

88

Dominion: Adventures Previews / Re: New mechanics

« on: April 05, 2015, 11:16:49 pm »

As far as I know, nothing has been specifically said about each version being (or not being) strictly better than the previous. But we do know that Hero is the 4th card in the line, so you'd need to find 3 other effects that are each strictly worse than "+$2, Gain a treasure". Seems quite unlikely. Possible, but probably redundant and boring.

The lowest one could just be a cantrip or something. But Hero does seem pretty weak for a card that has to be upgraded from Page, Treasure Hunter, and Warrior.

89

Dominion General Discussion / Re: Counter: Swamp Hag v. Goons

« on: April 05, 2015, 11:10:15 pm »

You might as well say that Swamp Hag counters all engines that rely on +buy to gain its components, but I doubt this is true. If there is support for an engine, then Swamp Hag won't stop the engine from being a better strategy. If you play BM with Swamp Hag vs. engine, there's no way to guarantee having a Swamp Hag out every turn. Conversely, the engine could have a Swamp Hag out every turn.

If both players go engine, then Swamp Hag is iffy payload in the early stages of the game. It occupies a competitive price point, provides zero benefit on play, and it's super likely to miss reshuffles because of the duration +3 cards.

EDIT: I'm dumb, I got Swamp Hag partially confused with Haunted Woods. It still has the duration problem of missing reshuffles though.

90

Dominion Articles / Re: Why Engine?

« on: April 05, 2015, 11:03:59 pm »

How about "Engine Economies and the Limitations of Money Density"?

I prefer "Beyond Silver."

91

Dominion General Discussion / Re: CARD OF THE WEEK #2: Talisman

« on: April 05, 2015, 12:30:28 am »

Philosophical question: Why is Talisman a Treasure, and Amulet an Action?

I recall Amulet having a different name in playtesting.

92

Game Reports / Re: Treasure Map collision vs. Scrying Pool...slog?

« on: April 04, 2015, 11:40:29 pm »

I don't think it's that obvious. The moats can be really good defense here.

Moats are rarely good defense in 2-player Dominion, and they are even less so when there aren't +actions in the kingdom.

93

Game Reports / Re: Treasure Map collision vs. Scrying Pool...slog?

« on: April 04, 2015, 08:48:44 pm »

Treasure Map is not viable in this kingdom. Even SP + Pirate Ship will beat it.

94

Dominion: Adventures Previews / Re: Previews #2 - Guide, Duplicate, Coin of the Realm

« on: April 01, 2015, 02:20:02 pm »

I remember playing with two of these cards! Coin I used in a terminal draw engine to increase reliability and Duplicate I used in the same engine just to gain the terminal draw card.

Reserve cards are delayed by nature; it's not likely that you'll be able to play Duplicate and gain a $5 or $6 cost card on that turn if it's early in the game. Similarly, I don't think it's possible to build an engine with Coin as the sole source of +action unless there's the strongest trashing.

95

Dominion General Discussion / Re: Many newbie questions Smugglers/Jack/HT/Minion/Forge

« on: March 17, 2015, 06:25:44 pm »

Also Vagrant.

I'm not sure if HT is worth going for when Jack is around. It's handy to have in hand vs. Minion, but if both terminals collide, you'd usually want to play Jack in this kingdom.

96

Dominion General Discussion / Re: Lack of quality posts

« on: March 01, 2015, 04:05:53 am »

What do you mean, lack of quality posts? There are plenty of Dominion memes and in-jokes.

97

Game Reports / Re: Philosopher's Stone is cool.

« on: February 26, 2015, 03:43:01 pm »

I'm confused. Doesn't PStone absolutely need big Masterpiece buys? PStone is worse or equal to Gold unless you have at least 25 cards in deck, and you're only gaining 1 card per turn without Masterpiece.

98

Dominion General Discussion / Re: The Golden Sombrero and other Dominion Slang

« on: February 24, 2015, 12:54:21 am »

Isn't that a bit like claiming that Alaska doesn't exist?  Or the Moon?

Or it could be like claiming that Taiwan doesn't exist. It's true depending on whom you ask, and also if you want to open a can of worms.

99

Dominion General Discussion / Re: The Golden Sombrero and other Dominion Slang

« on: February 19, 2015, 01:23:59 pm »

There's not much difference between cooked blood and cooked egg.

100

Dominion General Discussion / Re: The Golden Sombrero and other Dominion Slang

« on: February 18, 2015, 02:54:38 pm »

Man, don't bash it 'til you've tried it. A full English breakfast is bliss. Not something you can eat every day, I'll give you that.

It would be bliss while you're in the process of eating it, but I wouldn't feel so good after eating such a large amount of fatty food.