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[teasel]

hello,i'm new here,i've played a lot of games on isotropic and i really like the game.....

...apparently according to some people,too many silvers are a bad thing,so i was wondering,how many silvers should a deck hold in general? and also can buying only golds hurt your deck? everytime i feel i have to choice between a gold and a 5$ action,i end up going for the gold as to not waste the 1$ but of course this lead to more money,which leads to the scenario repeating itself and somehow this doesn't feel like it's the best way to play the game

[DrHades]

Something not from my head:

Famous article by theory: http://dominionstrategy.com/2011/01/17/beyond-silver/

Comparison Silver vs. +1 Action/+1 Card $3 cards (because link in the article doesn't work): http://councilroom.com/win_weighted_accum_turn.html?cards=Silver%2CCost%3D%3D3%20%26%26%20Actions%3E%3D1%20%26%26%20Cards%3E%3D1

Something from my head:

I always think twice before...
...I buy 4th (or more) Silver.
...I play a strategy without even 1 Silver.
...I buy 1st Province while having less than 2 Golds (in simulations, BM is optimal with Provinces after first Gold, but I don't play BM so I think it is not optimal for me).
...I buy 4th (or more) Gold (either it is time for buying Duchies by now or my deck is not working as I want and another Gold probably won't change it).
This does not mean that I don't do stuff like this - I do and in many situations, but I don't do it automatically, I need a good reason to do that.

How I handle the "Silver dillema" (generally):

My deck is working fine, but now I have $3 or $4 and it is too early for buying Estates. I procede like this - Is this a bad luck or a situation that is going to repeat again? If bad luck - I don't need a Silver and I will buy a cantrip or nothing if there isn't any. If repeating scenerio - is this because lack of money? Yes - Silver. No - cantrip. Kinda - Will the cantrip help me? Yes - cantrip. No - Silver.

I never thought about this deeply, I do all of this naturally, this is just some advices that poped in my mind 

[Tables]

Both of these questions are very difficult to give a solid answer to, because both depend on what's out on the board. If there's a solid $5, like say Mountebank, it wouldn't be surprising for you to pass up Gold twice to pick a few up. On the other hand, if the only $5's on the board are Explorer and Counting House, well, you're probably making the right choice grabbing Gold every time. Most boards of course are somewhere in between, and really it's judging those which is half the skill of the game. A good start is to get out of the habit of $6 instantly meaning Gold: Consider if one of those $5's might be more useful, and if you're likely to reach $5 again before shuffling.

As for Silvers, it depends on what kind of deck you're building. A deck which is treasure heavy (such as any 'big money' engine) should never stop buying silvers unless you're going for Colonies, and even then, I don't think you'd be going too wrong picking up more Silvers. On the other hand, if you're building an engine, you need to weigh the options carefully: Will an extra silver help with your buying power, or will it just clog up your engine? Some engines want Silvers pretty much indefinitely (e.g. a Cellar-Festival-Library engine would like Silvers to the end, I suspect) while others don't care or outright dislike them beyond the earlygame (e.g. most chapel engines would like to stay at about 1-2 silver, so they can grab those golds/good actions more often)

[play2draw]

A note about the addition of Hinterlands; it seems that Silver has become less of a liability. This is not so much a result of silver being made a relatively better card. Rather there are now additional strategies that force a game-state where mass Silver-gaining and rapid pile depletion is a stronger, more viable strategy (or even in the case of Ill-Gotten Gains, a forceful Copper strategy).

[Geronimoo]

I'd advice a less experienced player never to stop buying Silvers in a Province game. Once you have a better feel of the game you'll know when it's time to stop buying them.

[WanderingWinder]

Silvers never were a liability unless you're going for a super extreme action-filled deck. Basically never stop buying silvers, unless: you're really sure you need a massive number of actions (for like KC or TR filled decks or a scrying pool deck); you somehow have an extremely thin deck in a colony game and silver is actually worse that your average money card - I don't think this has actually EVER happened to me. Also, there are a number of reasons you'd prefer other cards to silver; Fishing Village is great if you're playing like any terminals, great hall is fantastic if you want some VP, monument gives you VP chips, militia knocks your opponent out, villages give you actions, smithy draws stuff for you - there are all situations where each of these cards is better or worse than silver, but that's not really because you don't want silver. You just want the other stuff more.

But the whole 'you don't want too many silvers' thing is way overblown. You basically can't have too many silvers except for real edge cases.

[ftl]

i end up going for the gold as to not waste the 1$

I'll also just comment that this sort of thinking is a trap, one that I also find myself in too often - buying the most expensive thing rather than the thing that'll fit best in your deck.  Be wary of it!

[DG]

If you look at the reasons why you don't want to buy copper then those reasons can occasionally apply to silver. They clog your hands when you'd rather draw better cards, they don't help you buy what you want to buy (or you'd rather gain cards), they slow down the cycling of your deck, you can add quality cards to your deck faster without the treasure. However, because a hand full of silver can buy a province (or a platinum) the silver is far less often an obstacle and far more often a help.