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26

Dominion Articles / Re: Island

« on: September 26, 2018, 10:00:06 am »

Some considerations for this article:

I think your main premise of Island having two different uses in different contexts is a fine one to begin examining the card with, but saying they excel on different kinds of boards is a little too general.

I think calling a board "strong" or "weak" is a little to vague to be useful so I'd just cut out talk of it entirely and focus on what the Island is actually doing for your deck. For instance, money decks certainly want Island's thinning, the difference is they only care about thinning the Estates (or other green cards later), so picking up an Island for that deck has a more specific purpose and you get fewer of them because of it.

"It basically works like other trashers, so you'll just have to rely on intuition. Opening Island is only advisable on really weak boards."

I understand what you mean by this, but Island does NOT work like trashers, and the reasons why are illuminating for why you almost never open with it:

- It's a terminal stop card you need to line up with what you want to thin
- It only works once

It's a tad misleading to say that Island thins your deck by one card. It's not wrong in the long-run, but there's a huge difference between that and, say Bonfire or Cemetery, or even Trade Route which is similar in terms of thinning capabilities, but a more common opener because it works more than once.
 I suppose the main point there is that Island's thinning is very weak in terms of getting control of your deck, so if that's the reason you're getting the Island, evaluate your other options and whether or not you need the effect at all.

As far as synergies go, I think you make a few points that either aren't actually good or don't have much to do with Island in particular.
For Workshop variants, I think you can just make this about Ironworks. The other ones are as true for every card under $5 are they are for Island. You make this just about Ironworks and I'm down with it.

Hoard- I'm down with it but I don't think you need to mention buying Duchies or Estates. When you have a Hoard out you usually just buy whatever green card you can (in decks where you wanted a Hoard in the first place anyway) and Island is a cheap one. It possibly disappearing from your deck later is just a bonus.

Copper Trashing- I'm not down with it. I don't think this section is great advice, or specific to island.

Menagerie- I'm not down with it. This is not a particularly strong synergy with Island, the decks you're talking about probably shouldn't have grabbed a Menagerie in the first place.

WW/Apothecary- I'm not down with it. This stuff is true of Island, yes, but it doesn't push you to buy either one of these cards.

Hovel- I'm down with it as long as you mention that this requires thinning the two shelters over the course of a shuffle to be better than just adding a Silver and hitting $5. This is true often enough to be worth a mention but I think you need to say it.

Procession- I'm not down with it. Mostly because it's just pretty weak.


Finally, similar to what I mentioned you should address with Hoard, I think one of the more common use cases for Island is when 2 points is as good as 3 points (you can't or don't want to buy a Province for some reason but you still need to increase your score) and it has the strict advantage over Duchy of maybe being able to disappear one day.

27

Variants and Fan Cards / Re: Brothel

« on: September 25, 2018, 09:02:39 am »

Btw, I actually don't think the card is weak. It certainly needs support, but with draw or thinning it could be pretty powerful. The endless VP tokens is a more valid complaint, hence my suggestion to give it something to push game end

28

Variants and Fan Cards / Re: Brothel

« on: September 25, 2018, 08:59:51 am »

The main problem people point to with non-terminal VP chip gainers is that they don't do anything to end the game, so you can build a deck that just plays them and does nothing else (which might actually be powerful with this one if you have draw or thinning). I think if you reduced the debt but had it trash something from the supply, or make the points happen every other play and give money instead of debt or something then this becomes a pretty interesting card.

It just needs some way to encourage game end.

Btw, I like it overall, it's interesting.

29

Dominion General Discussion / Re: When seating order matters - Chariot Race

« on: September 23, 2018, 10:02:56 am »

Turn order has always been an issue in Dominion.  In one tourney game, and on rare occasions, casual games, we actually did reverse the turn order from one game to another.   So instead of A, B, C, and D... D goes first, followed by C, B, A.

This can come up with things like Swindler too, particularly with less experienced players.

In a 3-player gameone opponent (who was newish) hit another opponent's 5-cost on T3 and considered what to do. I told him the "standard" play would be to give player C a Duchy but he can do as he likes. He immediately chose Duchy, as it was the obvious choice.

Player C was pretty ticked off at me for telling him what to pick but, eh, I consider that more of a rules clarification than strategy advice. If the player to your right doesn't know he's allowed to turn your copper into a curse, arguably, you're cheating by not telling him.

So seating order CAN matter in those cases but shouldn't.

Where 3p games with high skill disparity really get weird is Smugglers.

In tournament games, I generally don't offer strategy advice, nor even something like that.  In non-tourney games, I don't like to do this.  I could obliterate newbies with my knowledge, but I'd rather not.  As another example, I will tell players stuff like:
1) if there are Embargo tokens on a pile, you can gain the pile without also gaining the Curse (like via Workshop)
2) If resolving Torturer and there are no more Curses left, you are indeed allowed to gain a curse to no effect
3) I'll point out how much fun it is to abuse Villa 

We're saying the same thing. Pointing out that you can give Duchies and curses with Swindler isn't that far off from putting out that you can pile curses with Embargo.

30

Dominion General Discussion / Re: Neat card interactions that were useful in the game you found them in.

« on: September 21, 2018, 02:44:15 pm »

If you Procession a Hireling, the Procession is not discarded during Clean-up; it remains in play indefinitely.

(Forever, unless you pull a stunt like Bonfire, or you played Procession on the Procession you played on the Hireling, or...)

That's wrong: under current rules, Procession gets discarded immediately because Hireling leaves play. That's why it's a neat interaction to Procession Hirelings.

Yeah I remember something like that. You still get the plus card for the rest of the game, right? It doesn't make sense to me that you do, but I think there was a tournament board that had you track it with tokens or something.

You get plus two cards for the rest of the game.

Right, right. The Hireling happens to stay out for the rest of the game, but technically it's not the Hireling drawing you the cards, it's having played the Hireling. Dominion gets weird, man.

You also get to gain a King's Court so you can play more Hirelings.

31

Dominion General Discussion / Re: Neat card interactions that were useful in the game you found them in.

« on: September 21, 2018, 12:26:11 pm »

If you Procession a Hireling, the Procession is not discarded during Clean-up; it remains in play indefinitely.

(Forever, unless you pull a stunt like Bonfire, or you played Procession on the Procession you played on the Hireling, or...)

That's wrong: under current rules, Procession gets discarded immediately because Hireling leaves play. That's why it's a neat interaction to Procession Hirelings.

Yeah I remember something like that. You still get the plus card for the rest of the game, right? It doesn't make sense to me that you do, but I think there was a tournament board that had you track it with tokens or something.

32

Dominion General Discussion / Re: The bad luck thread

« on: September 20, 2018, 09:44:38 am »

Did I ever tell you about the time Swindler turned my Goat into an Estate on turn 3?
On a board with no other trashing?

Because I'm NOT over it.

33

Dominion General Discussion / Re: When seating order matters - Chariot Race

« on: September 17, 2018, 11:35:50 am »

This can come up with things like Swindler too, particularly with less experienced players.

In a 3-player gameone opponent (who was newish) hit another opponent's 5-cost on T3 and considered what to do. I told him the "standard" play would be to give player C a Duchy but he can do as he likes. He immediately chose Duchy, as it was the obvious choice.

Player C was pretty ticked off at me for telling him what to pick but, eh, I consider that more of a rules clarification than strategy advice. If the player to your right doesn't know he's allowed to turn your copper into a curse, arguably, you're cheating by not telling him.

So seating order CAN matter in those cases but shouldn't.

Where 3p games with high skill disparity really get weird is Smugglers.

34

Dominion General Discussion / Re: How much would non-supply cards fetch on the open market?

« on: September 07, 2018, 09:02:01 am »

At this point there's Secret Passage, so Fugitive would have to be a different card (and that card is Secret Passage) or have a weird cost (like it does).

Dark Ages tried "Gain an Estate, each other player gains a Curse" at $3, back when there was no Cornucopia. It's bad times.

Just curious, why was this bad times? Was it actually strong, or just unfun? My guess is the latter but I'd like to know!

35

Dominion General Discussion / Re: Most hated attacks?

« on: August 31, 2018, 11:18:38 am »

I really wish Urchin cost $4.

AMEN

36

Variants and Fan Cards / Re: Decadent Nobility

« on: August 31, 2018, 09:09:10 am »

There's also the idea of it having a debt cost and the cost reduction applying to next turn instead of this one? So you have to pay back the debt before you can use it?

37

Dominion General Discussion / Re: How much would non-supply cards fetch on the open market?

« on: August 30, 2018, 11:19:22 am »

Agree with Tracer and Gendo, I can't think of a way that Disciple wouldn't be opaf.

38

Variants and Fan Cards / Re: Decadent Nobility

« on: August 30, 2018, 10:29:52 am »

If we use Travelling Fair as a benchmark for the shadow price of an extra Buy you need to buy 2 cards to make up for the paying of Decadent Nobility and once you buy 3 you got the extra Buy for free. So at the first glance this seems OK for a one-shot Princess.
But due to the trashing this basically sucks. If you already got a megaturn this is unlikely to matter much. As you gotta trash everything that you buy afterwards this is only good for piling, Groundskeeper, Conquest and Goons.

Yeah having considered it more carefully I tried to delete this. I'm not sure why it didn't work

39

Variants and Fan Cards / Re: Decadent Nobility

« on: August 30, 2018, 09:54:33 am »

The cost makes no difference, seeing as you need to pay it off before you can buy anything.

Yeah I just realized that.

40

Variants and Fan Cards / Decadent Nobility

« on: August 30, 2018, 09:42:14 am »

Having thought about this a little more carefully it doesn't really work.

Here was my thought: I played a kingdom where Bridge Troll was the endgame payload and the only draw/village was City Quarter. It was really interesting because you got this powerful effect, but the card that enabled it didn't help you pay off the debt, so I was trying to brainstorm a way to emulate that in a card/event.

41

Dominion General Discussion / Re: How much would non-supply cards fetch on the open market?

« on: August 30, 2018, 09:10:06 am »

Princess - 7

Princess is an interesting because it would be BONKERS if a full ten of them existed. Still really good if you could only buy one, but probably fine at $6? Maybe even a strong $5?

If there's a full supply pile of them, though, then yeah $7, maybe even higher.

42

Rules Questions / Re: Noble Brigand: "You gain the trashed cards."

« on: August 29, 2018, 03:17:45 pm »

A+ for creativity though.

I don't know if that's quite fair. I think it's reasonable to wonder if any cards trashed during the "window" of Noble Brigand's execution would be gained.

Oh I didn't mean it to sound condescending or anything. I just wouldn't have thought about possible Copper junking with Watchtower. It would be kind of neat if it worked that way.

You could also reveal a Beggar, trashing the two Silvers with your Watchtower, then reveal your Diplomat (you still have five cards in hand because they played a Council Room earlier), discarding some Tunnels, trashing the received Golds with Watchtower, and then when the attack rolls around, you reveal a Market Square when your treasure is trashed to get a Gold, then reveal a Trader to get a Silver instead, then reveal your Watchtower to trash it, and then reveal another Market Square to get another Gold, then trash that with your Watchtower, reveal another Market Square, then topdeck that Gold it with your Watchtower.

What happens then?

Yu-Gi-Oh theme music starts playing in the background as you dramatically point to Bandit Fort and laugh.

43

Rules Questions / Re: Noble Brigand: "You gain the trashed cards."

« on: August 29, 2018, 12:01:19 pm »

A+ for creativity though.

I don't know if that's quite fair. I think it's reasonable to wonder if any cards trashed during the "window" of Noble Brigand's execution would be gained.

Oh I didn't mean it to sound condescending or anything. I just wouldn't have thought about possible Copper junking with Watchtower. It would be kind of neat if it worked that way.

44

Rules Questions / Re: Noble Brigand: "You gain the trashed cards."

« on: August 29, 2018, 09:46:51 am »

A+ for creativity though.

45

Dominion Articles / Re: Storyteller

« on: August 28, 2018, 08:54:02 pm »

Governor is an especially strong card with Storyteller, since it can both gain gold non-terminally and remodel them into Provinces in the late game. This being said, it’s still important to not over-gain treasures in a Storyteller deck. Thoughtlessly gaining loads of Silver or Gold will still clog your deck, making it hard to actually find...

I kinda made this point before about most of the "gainers" section, but I maintain most of it is just as true without Storyteller as with it. Particularly the part about Governor. Storyteller can help you play your Governors more, but midturn gain-and-remodel isn't the part of Governor Storyteller even helps with.

Without some non-money effect you're trying to draw into, feeding Storyteller money is kind of value-neutral for your turn anyway, other than for cycling. So to me the claims that treasure gainers have some special utility for cycling or that shoving more silver/gold into the deck with gainers helps you get it under control because of Storyteller are a bit dubious.

Governor + Storyteller is amazing and I'm baffled that you don't see this.  Storyteller is great in a Governor deck for the same reason that trashing is; the less you have to play Governor for draw, the more you can use it for payload and the less you help your opponent.  We can play some Governor + Storyteller games sometime if you're interested.

I mean Governor is a great card, yes. Being able to play your Governors other than for draw is also great, so it follows the two are good together, but Governor gaining gold and remodeling it midturn is not the part where Storyteller helps. Governor does that part just as well on its own.

What? How is this a useful thought - “Storyteller isn’t Remodel” essentially? That’s not the only thing Governor decks do - they also need to draw cards, and often have an excess of Coin and many treasures. There’s no need to qualify this advice with “well, it isn’t literally Remodel”

That's not even close to what I said.

46

Dominion Articles / Re: Storyteller

« on: August 28, 2018, 04:08:20 pm »

Governor is an especially strong card with Storyteller, since it can both gain gold non-terminally and remodel them into Provinces in the late game. This being said, it’s still important to not over-gain treasures in a Storyteller deck. Thoughtlessly gaining loads of Silver or Gold will still clog your deck, making it hard to actually find...

I kinda made this point before about most of the "gainers" section, but I maintain most of it is just as true without Storyteller as with it. Particularly the part about Governor. Storyteller can help you play your Governors more, but midturn gain-and-remodel isn't the part of Governor Storyteller even helps with.

Without some non-money effect you're trying to draw into, feeding Storyteller money is kind of value-neutral for your turn anyway, other than for cycling. So to me the claims that treasure gainers have some special utility for cycling or that shoving more silver/gold into the deck with gainers helps you get it under control because of Storyteller are a bit dubious.

Governor + Storyteller is amazing and I'm baffled that you don't see this.  Storyteller is great in a Governor deck for the same reason that trashing is; the less you have to play Governor for draw, the more you can use it for payload and the less you help your opponent.  We can play some Governor + Storyteller games sometime if you're interested.

I mean Governor is a great card, yes. Being able to play your Governors other than for draw is also great, so it follows the two are good together, but Governor gaining gold and remodeling it midturn is not the part where Storyteller helps. Governor does that part just as well on its own.

47

Dominion Articles / Re: Storyteller

« on: August 28, 2018, 03:35:48 pm »

Without some non-money effect you're trying to draw into, feeding Storyteller money is kind of value-neutral for your turn anyway, other than for cycling.

That's obviously wrong. If you have a hand of Storyteller, 3 Silver and a Province you can play Storyteller to temporarily transform those 3 Silvers into Laboratories. You end up with a hand of 8 cards which is more likely to hit $8 (assuming that you don' play badly and actually have 7 Silvers in your deck)
So even if your deck only consists of Silvers, Storytellers and Provinces and no cards that junk or provide extra Buys those Storytellers do something very useful.

Right, I'm with you and Aku Chi's point that the your $ per card should be greater than 1, so the cycling/draw/whatever isn't useless by itself. I still think the way it's presented framed by gainers is misleading.

48

Dominion Articles / Re: Storyteller

« on: August 28, 2018, 03:17:03 pm »

Governor is an especially strong card with Storyteller, since it can both gain gold non-terminally and remodel them into Provinces in the late game. This being said, it’s still important to not over-gain treasures in a Storyteller deck. Thoughtlessly gaining loads of Silver or Gold will still clog your deck, making it hard to actually find...

I kinda made this point before about most of the "gainers" section, but I maintain most of it is just as true without Storyteller as with it. Particularly the part about Governor. Storyteller can help you play your Governors more, but midturn gain-and-remodel isn't the part of Governor Storyteller even helps with.

Without some non-money effect you're trying to draw into, feeding Storyteller money is kind of value-neutral for your turn anyway, other than for cycling. So to me the claims that treasure gainers have some special utility for cycling or that shoving more silver/gold into the deck with gainers helps you get it under control because of Storyteller are a bit dubious.

49

Dominion Articles / Re: Groundskeeper-- Draft

« on: August 23, 2018, 04:37:14 pm »

If I think back to when Groundskeeper was new, the three main questions I had were:

1. How strong is it?  Is it a centralizing force, a niche card, or something in between?
2. Suppose I'm playing a good stuff deck, and I'm lucky enough to draw most of my groundskeepers (say, 3 or 4).  Do I take the opportunity to green, even if it's a bit early?
3. Sometimes we played Groundskeeper slogs, in which we start with provinces, but switched to duchies and then to estates, eventually ending the game on piles.  Is this good or were we just playing wrong?

Saying Groundskeeper is a cantrip worth N VP is not the right way to think about it, because having groundskeepers in play can affect your decision to gain victory cards.  For instance, maybe a single Groundskeeper gives you 6 VP, which sounds amazing at first, but maybe most of that VP was from Estates that you wouldn't have gained otherwise, and which are really hurting your deck.  Groundskeeper also enables you to gain and trash victory cards, a strategy that you didn't even mention.

That's true, I thought about mentioning the ability to trash the vp but I figured that's niche enough and the article is already long enough that it could get the axe. I might be wrong there.

50

Dominion Articles / Re: Groundskeeper-- Draft

« on: August 23, 2018, 04:07:14 pm »

Okay, made some changes based on your feedback. It goes into more of the questions it was suggested I answer, but it's also longer. Does it make sense? Is it clear what I'm saying?

I welcome suggestions for cuts and revisions.