And now for a
Round 2 match!
michaeljb vs [UWSFFS] I Eat Tables, seeds
12 vs 44 in the
Chapel Division.
michaeljb 4-1 [UWSFFS] I Eat TablesGame 1:
michaeljb 37-33 [UWSFFS] I Eat Tables
Mountebank was the dominant card here. We both picked up some Tournaments which for the most part acted as Peddlers, but Tables did end up getting Followers. The most divergent aspects of our decks was I picked up a Loan and a second Mountebank, Tables passed on the Loan and picked up Governors after his one Mountebank. My Loan did a decent job at thinning and lessening the hurt of the Mountebank. Tables went for some self-synergy with the Governors, picking up some Golds and late trashing them for Provinces. It wasn't looking great for me when that happened, but a late Mandarin buy actually proved useful; top-decking the Treasure let me buy a Province the next turn, and the one time I played it, it provided the coin I needed for the last Province and the win.
Game 2:
michaeljb 37-31 [UWSFFS] I Eat Tables
Torturer was on the board, but City was the only +Actions; I figured Minion was the way to go, since it's a decent enough counter to Torturer and is certainly strong on its own anyway. It seems Tables had the same idea, and so the Torturers went entirely neglected. There were some Remakes, Menageries, and a Haven for each of us. Most significantly, Tables got his Treasure down to a single Silver, I had a Gold and 2 Silvers and didn't manage to trash all of my Coppers. We were pretty close as the Provinces went down, which led to a Duchy dance; I had a one Province advantage, and once the Duchies were out I bought the final Menagerie for the win (Minions had been the first pile gone).
Game 3:
michaeljb 54-39 [UWSFFS] I Eat Tables
The only game of the match where each Kingdom card got some serious attention, even though non of them were attacks. The cards were
Adventurer, Develop, Envoy, Governor, Potion, Remake, Royal Seal, Shanty Town, Silk Road, Vineyard, and Worker's Village.
We both opened Remake/Silver and that's about where the similarities end. I was looking to buy an Envoy, an Adventurer and Worker's Villages, counting on Remake to get me to a high Treasure density. I picked up a few Royal Seals, but looking through the log again I realized I never used the top-decking ability, as I actually bought a Victory card every time I played a Seal. While I was working on my money+draw deck, Tables went for a Vineyard deck, trying to use Remake and Develop to convert Silvers and Estates to action cards. He took all 8 Vineyards, but just didn't have enough action cards in the deck to win. Silk Road was a key card because it gave me something to do other than trying to buy all 8 Provinces on my own; on one turn I even bought 2 Silk Roads instead of a Province, which I think was the right move--it ended up being worth the same number of points, it drove the game closer to its eventual 3-pile ending, and it denied Tables a chance at those points he could actually afford.
Game 4: michaeljb 49-67
[UWSFFS] I Eat TablesIn the only Colony game of the match, we get the 5/2 split on a board where the 4/3 looks like it's probably better, with Baron, Salvager, Horse Traders and Steward on the board. We both open Library/Pawn (so 5/2 wasn't really that bad) and mostly go Library+money. I bought a Salvager at first opportunity, but I was too aggressive with it, trashing a Gold and Platinum to enable Colony buys, which hurt my deck's economy too much, allowing Tables to take the game with his simpler Library+money deck.
Game 5:
michaeljb 30-24 [UWSFFS] I Eat Tables
My deck design pretty much from the start: 2 Witches, a Trader, a Warehouse, Hamlets and money. Tables picked up an Oasis (I figured it might conflict with the already small hand sizes I would get from Warehouse and Hamlet), a Cellar, and a Great Hall late. Looking through the log again I think I may have got pretty luck this game--Tables drew quite a few more hands of $3 and the like than I did despite our similar deck builds and fairly even Curse split (5-4 my favor at the end, 1 left in the Supply). I hit hands that enabled Gold buys far more frequently (my deck ended with 5 Golds to Tables' 1) and that kept my deck going until I hit the last Province.
Overall it really was a good series with some pretty tense moments. I Eat Tables was certainly a worthy opponent and I had a blast playing him. Thanks again for the great match.