Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[popsofctown]

Every board I see, I try to see if it can be played Big Money.  If it's close at all, I will play Big Money.  Only when an engine is clearly and obviously very dominant will I play the engine.

How can I cure myself? How is my rating still above 5k?  Why do I hang a poster of Mandarin on my ceiling and look at it at night as I fall asleep?

I need help.

[KingZog3]

Every board I see, I try to see if it can be played Big Money.  If it's close at all, I will play Big Money.  Only when an engine is clearly and obviously very dominant will I play the engine.

How can I cure myself? How is my rating still above 5k?  Why do I hang a poster of Mandarin on my ceiling and look at it at night as I fall asleep?

I need help.

Your rating is still above 5k because there are still players above 5k who open Pirate Ship just because there is no Copper trashing. And you cure yourself by always playing engine even when it's close.

[LastFootnote]

I think this Big Money/Engine dichotomy should end. There's a big spectrum there, but we talk about it like it's either "two or three terminal Actions and Treasure" or "draw your deck every turn and completely control the endgame".

[KingZog3]

I think this Big Money/Engine dichotomy should end. There's a big spectrum there, but we talk about it like it's either "two or three terminal Actions and Treasure" or "draw your deck every turn and completely control the endgame".

Of course there's lots of in between. its not black or white. But at the same time, analysis of a board should always start by looking for action cards that can lead to constant attacks, buys, or something that more money oriented decks can't pull off.

[theright555J]

Thanks for making this thread. I enjoy and own all the physical and Goko expansions, but I find myself irritated with the dominance of engines in the game today as well as the notion that playing Big Money is a sign of weaker play.

Naturally, I'm adapting by learning to play engines.

I think it has to do with how long it takes to play an engine turn, the magnification of first turn advantage, and the loss of "linear" greening (meaning each player taking approx 1 province a turn in the greening phase to help predict endgame). It is just a totally different game.

[popsofctown]

I tend to call anything that doesn't get a village big money.  Anything that gets a village is aiming to play 2 terminals a turn instead of 1 and is engine.  To me that's usually a pretty clear dichotomy, Villages tend to be a do or don't thing.  Gray areas include when crossroads is a good enough village for your BM but repeatable villages aren't, and Walled Village, but Walled Village is dead, and the crossroads thing is rare, so.

That's just how I personally sort the things in my mind.  To me Hunting Party stack into Margrave is still Big Money, you just like Hunting party more than Silver.

I know there are probably tweener decks out there, decks that use Journeyman to find treasures unless they have a village in hand so they find more actions instead and stuff like that, but really the 1 terminals or 2 terminals goal has few exceptions.

Big Money decks can almost always green earlier, and with the advent of dark ages I love pressuring engine opponents to start greening with me because my Trader deck or Rabble rouse is ready to handle it

[florrat]

So we can play a treasureless BM? That sounds weird to me, but in your definition this happens often enough: Minion, Conspirator, some cantrip "engines". I agree with LastFootnote: there are just a lot of things in between Big Money and Engine.

[SirPeebles]

So we can play a treasureless BM? That sounds weird to me, but in your definition this happens often enough: Minion, Conspirator, some cantrip "engines". I agree with LastFootnote: there are just a lot of things in between Big Money and Engine.

There is certainly a sense in which, say, a pure Minion deck is more like Big Money than an Engine.  For instance, the Minion deck lack multiple buys, gaining, or just about an other means of endgame control.

[popsofctown]

So we can play a treasureless BM? That sounds weird to me, but in your definition this happens often enough: Minion, Conspirator, some cantrip "engines". I agree with LastFootnote: there are just a lot of things in between Big Money and Engine.

I'm arguing the terminology is upgradeable, I'm not arguing that my twisting of it works with conventional taxonomy.  Like Peebles says, cantrip-cantrip-cantrip terminal is more closely related to Smithy BM than it is to Village Smithy Market buy Province buy Province. 

[KingZog3]

So we can play a treasureless BM? That sounds weird to me, but in your definition this happens often enough: Minion, Conspirator, some cantrip "engines". I agree with LastFootnote: there are just a lot of things in between Big Money and Engine.

I'm arguing the terminology is upgradeable, I'm not arguing that my twisting of it works with conventional taxonomy.  Like Peebles says, cantrip-cantrip-cantrip terminal is more closely related to Smithy BM than it is to Village Smithy Market buy Province buy Province.

What about Highway-Market? Is that BM? Or KC-Bridge?

[Axxle]

Objective: Buy one province a turn: BM
Objective: Anything else: Engine or Slog.

[popsofctown]

So we can play a treasureless BM? That sounds weird to me, but in your definition this happens often enough: Minion, Conspirator, some cantrip "engines". I agree with LastFootnote: there are just a lot of things in between Big Money and Engine.

I'm arguing the terminology is upgradeable, I'm not arguing that my twisting of it works with conventional taxonomy.  Like Peebles says, cantrip-cantrip-cantrip terminal is more closely related to Smithy BM than it is to Village Smithy Market buy Province buy Province.

What about Highway-Market? Is that BM? Or KC-Bridge?

Highway Market is BM.  KC-bridge invariably has KC hitting KC, which is a village by another name, enabling multiple terminals in your hand to be used.  So engine.

[brokoli]

I tend to call anything that doesn't get a village big money.  Anything that gets a village is aiming to play 2 terminals a turn instead of 1 and is engine.  To me that's usually a pretty clear dichotomy, Villages tend to be a do or don't thing.  Gray areas include when crossroads is a good enough village for your BM but repeatable villages aren't, and Walled Village, but Walled Village is dead, and the crossroads thing is rare, so.

Another edge case : Bandit camp. Sometimes you want bandit camp only for the spoil, and never play two terminals using it.

[Asper]

I think this Big Money/Engine dichotomy should end. There's a big spectrum there, but we talk about it like it's either "two or three terminal Actions and Treasure" or "draw your deck every turn and completely control the endgame".

Of course there's lots of in between. its not black or white. But at the same time, analysis of a board should always start by looking for action cards that can lead to constant attacks, buys, or something that more money oriented decks can't pull off.

I just came to think, could it be that this applies much less to games with 3+ players? Attacks hit more often and you are more likely to have junk in your deck which stops your engine, also very good cards will be less easy to get many of. In a 4 player game, getting more than 3 Fishing Villages is hard to do, but being hit by Militia or Witch becomes a piece of cake...

[HiveMindEmulator]

If it's close at all, I will play Big Money.  Only when an engine is clearly and obviously very dominant will I play the engine.

The issue here is that depending on who you play, you will have different perceptions of the actual strength of some engines. Because of the kind of exponential growth of engines, small mistakes early on can dramatically effect the end result. So if you have some sub-5000 player going for the same engine as a 6000+ player, you might see a difference of 3+ turns of speed. Big money, on the other hand, is much more linear in growth, so even when you make wrong choices, you don't get set back as far. Thus if you're playing more lower ranked players, you may see a lot of engines and think they're too slow, when in fact they're not when played correctly (though this won't affect the game if your opponent cannot play it properly).