This article is, of course, inspired by Donald X's article, "Your Guide to Beating Attacks". I thought it would be fun to have something in table format, as unwieldy as it may seem, because (1) I hear new players IRL ask why a particular reaction card like Secret Chamber is actually useful and maybe this can help them compare various defenses, and (2) because I like tables and spreadsheets.
I've never played with some of these cards (e.g. Possession, Market Square), and I'm still learning a lot, so I appreciate lots of feedback on the article. I wrote it for fun, so I don't expect it to actually go up anywhere except here, though I'd be happy for some or all of it to go on the wiki if others think it would be useful there.
In the table below, "Protection" doesn't necessarily mean perfect protection. In most cells of the table, it just means "pretty good protection in most cases". "Some protection", on the other hand, means that the attack is much more likely only weakened, not nullified.
Edit 12/28/14: Added cards with on-trash benefits and cards that sequester other cards out of your deck as new categories.
Direct defenses that weaken or nullify the direct effects of the attack: | HANDSIZE ATTACKS | | | JUNKERS | | TRASHERS | | DECK MUCKERS
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| Discard-down-to-X (e.g. Militia), discard X cards (e.g. Torturer) | Remove specific card or card type (e.g. Bureaucrat, Cutpurse) | Discard hand and draw new (smaller) hand (Minion) | Junkers (e.g. Witch, Ambassador, Looters) | Non-attack cursers (Ill-Gotten Gains, Embargo) | Trash indiscriminately (e.g. Swindler) | Trash specific card types (e.g. Thief, Saboteur) | Get low-quality cards to top of your deck (e.g. Spy, Rabble)
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Moat's reaction | Protection | Protection | Protection | Protection | No protection | Protection | Protection | Protection
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Lighthouse's duration | Protection | Protection | Protection | Protection | No protection | Protection | Protection | Protection
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Beggar's reaction | Some protection; gain silvers | Some protection; gain silvers | Some protection; gain silvers and avoid discarding whole hand by voluntarily discarding | No protection; gain silvers | No protection | Protection; gain silver | Mixed protection | Some protection: attack targets silver instead of another card
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Secret Chamber's reaction | Some protection; helps turn attack into sifting | Protection: topdeck cards that would be targeted | Some protection: Topdeck cards you want to draw in your new hand | No protection; shape your hand | No protection | Some protection: choose which card will be targeted | Some protection: choose which card will be targeted | Some protection: choose which cards will be targeted
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Market Square's reaction | No protection | No protection | No protection | No protection | No protection | No protection; gain gold | No protection; gain gold | No protection
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Tunnel's reaction | No protection; gain gold | No protection; gain gold (unless it's a non-discard attack like Bureaucrat/Ghost Ship) | No protection; gain gold | No protection | No protection | No protection | No protection; gain gold if Tunnel is discarded as part of attack | No protection; gain gold if discarded (which is unlikely)
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Watchtower's reaction | No protection | No protection | No protection | Protection | Protection | No protection | No protection | No protection
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Horse Traders' reaction | Protection | Protection | Protection | No protection; handsize increase | No protection | No protection; handsize increase | No protection; handsize increase | No protection; handsize increase
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Trader's reaction | Protection | Protection | Protection | Protection | Protection | No protection | No protection | No protection
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Indirect defenses: cards that get stronger in the face of attacks | HANDSIZE ATTACKS | | | JUNKERS | | TRASHERS | | DECK MUCKERS
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| Discard-down-to-X (e.g. Militia), discard X cards (e.g. Torturer) | Remove specific card or card type (e.g. Bureaucrat, Cutpurse) | Discard hand and draw new (smaller) hand (Minion) | Junkers (e.g. Witch, Ambassador, Looters) | Non-attack cursers (Ill-Gotten Gains, Embargo) | Trash indiscriminately (e.g. Swindler) | Trash specific card types (e.g. Thief, Saboteur) | Get low-quality cards to top of your deck (e.g. Spy, Rabble)
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Jack of all trades | Protection | Protection; helps turn attack into sifting | No protection if Jack in hand; protection if in your next hand | No protection; helps trash junk in general | No protection; helps trash junk in general | No protection; gain silver | No protection; gain silver | Some protection: Discard or trash bad cards left on deck
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Draw-up-to-x | Protection; turns attack into sifting | Protection; helps turn attack into sifting | No protection if draw-to-x in hand; Protection if in your next hand | No protection | No protection | No protection | No protection | No protection
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Menagerie | Protection if it increases hand variety | Protection if it increases hand variety | Protection if it increases hand variety | No protection | No protection | No protection | No protection | No protection
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Seeking cards (e.g. Hunting Party, Adventurer, Golem, Hermit) | No protection | No protection | No protection | Most offer no protection; some offer protection (e.g. Hermit) | Most offer no protection; some offer protection (e.g. Hermit) | Weakens attack, as the card you're trying to draw doesn't have to be near the top of your deck | Weakens attack, as the card you're trying to draw doesn't have to be near the top of your deck | Weakens attack, as the card you're trying to draw doesn't have to be near the top of your deck
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Self deck inspection and/or topdeck control (e.g. Spy, Scrying Pool, Lookout, Scout, Cartographer) | No protection | No protection | No protection | No protection | No protection | No protection | No protection | Protection
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Sifters | No protection | No protection | No protection | Protection from earlier junk | Protection from earlier junk | No protection | No protection | Protection
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Cards with on-trash benefits (e.g. Hunting Grounds, Feodum, Squire, etc.) | No protection | No protection | No protection | No protection | No protection | Some protection | Some protection | No protection |
Cards that sequester your cards out of your deck (e.g. Island, Native Village) | No protection | Some protection | No protection | Some protection | Some protection | Some protection | Some protection | Some protection |
Proactive strategies to weaken/nullify attacks | HANDSIZE ATTACKS | | | JUNKERS | | TRASHERS | | DECK MUCKERS
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| Discard-down-to-X (e.g. Militia), discard X cards (e.g. Torturer) | Remove specific card or card type (e.g. Bureaucrat, Cutpurse) | Discard hand and draw new (smaller) hand (Minion) | Junkers (e.g. Witch, Ambassador, Looters) | Non-attack cursers (Ill-Gotten Gains, Embargo) | Trash indiscriminately (e.g. Swindler) | Trash specific card types (e.g. Thief, Saboteur) | Get low-quality cards to top of your deck (e.g. Spy, Rabble)
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Deck thinning | Excellent protection | Excellent protection | Excellent protection | Excellent protection | Excellent protection | Mixed protection | Mixed protection | Protection
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Deck-drawing engine (or close to deck-drawing) | Excellent protection | Excellent protection | Excellent protection | Excellent protection, if with trashing | Excellent protection, if with trashing | No protection; vulnerable to trashing key cards | No protection; vulnerable to trashing key cards | Mixed protection
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Big Money (probably including some other cards too) | No protection | No protection | No protection | Some protection | Some protection | Some protection | Some protection | Some protection |
Slog deck | Excellent protection | Mixed protection | No protection | Some protection | Some protection | Mixed protection | Protection | No protection
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Some closing notes:Remember that sometimes the best defense is good offense.
In the proactive strategies section, I wasn't able to elaborate on the "Mixed protection" cells, where sometimes the strategy offers great protection, and sometimes it actually helps the attacker do more damage (or benefit more from you). For example, is deck thinning good against trashers? Well, clearing out coppers sure helps against Swindler and Pirate Ship, but can hurt against Thief. Clearing all your treasures helps against thief, but might hurt against Saboteur once you no longer have all those silvers for Sab to target. Many of those cells have whole articles already. And anyway, that's beyond the scope of this article.
Masquerade and Possession are special cases. First, they're not attacks (and are much less like attacks than Ill-Gotten Gains or a curse from an Embargoed pile) and they usually don't really hurt you much. Masquerade usually lets you swap out one piece of junk for another, and Possession is usually just like a more powerful Outpost for your opponent. And second, there's usually not a lot you can do to counter these directly.
There are times when they can hurt you, though. Masquerade can hurt if you've trashed all your junk, and of course there's the Masquerade Pin. Possession can be evil if they spend your coin tokens, empty your Native Island mat, remove your valuable cards from your deck via Island/Masquerade/Ambassador, weaken your next play by moving weak cards to the top of your deck, etc.
So, if you do want to counter them, how? If the likelihood is small that Masq or Posssession can be used as a pseudo-attack, don't worry about defense. If the chance is high, is it worth it to adjust your deck to make them more resistant (don't trash too much in the face of Masq; maybe lean toward a slog deck in the face of Possession)? Or maybe you should consider that the best defense is a good offense. Or maybe you can just blow past your opponent with a fast strategy before their Masq/Possession can actually hurt you much.
I didn't include non-attack, indiscriminate discarders, such as Tribute, even though they can occasionally be used as a weak attack - for example, force the opponent to reshuffle when they're about to play Counting House or Hermit. But very few things protect against that specifically, though some cards do help you get more stuff into your discard pile - sifters, Chancellor, seeker cards like Venture.
In the "Proactive strategies" section, I obviously couldn't include every separate strategy (including a separate strategy for each combo?!). I tried to include a few very general strategies that have can proactively protect against a broad range of attacks.