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[werothegreat]

Let's get some discussion going about... Horse Traders!

Starting questions:

* Which is more useful - the on-play effect, or the reaction?
* Under what instances would you not want a Horse Traders?
* How does it compare to Wine Merchant?
* Why are these Traders at a Dutch angle?

[jaketheyak]

* Which is more useful - the on-play effect, or the reaction?

Well, if you use the reaction you also get to use the on-play effect, so... both?

But, really, it depends on the attack.
The reaction is a clear winner against discard attacks and more like a consolation against other attacks.

* Under what instances would you not want a Horse Traders?

The requirement to discard two cards when you play it means that it's not very good in thinned-down engines.
Much better in a rush or a slog.

* How does it compare to Wine Merchant?

I guess Wine Merchant is better at hitting high totals?
Haven't had a chance to see how it plays yet.
Horse Traders has much better art.

* Why are these Traders at a Dutch angle?

Ooh, I know this one.
It creates a sense of unease and tension, helping to portray these characters in a sinister light.

[assemble_me]

* Which is more useful - the on-play effect, or the reaction?

I guess I get this most of the time for the +Buy or to hit 4$-5$ even if my deck is full of junk, so I think the on-play effect is more useful.

* Under what instances would you not want a Horse Traders?

As said before, sometimes all you need is +Buy and there can very well be better sources of +Buy available that don't have you discard or are non terminal.
Also, Horse Traders are not pretty good in big money as they make it hard to hit 8$ and you can have more useful cards for your terminal slots.

* How does it compare to Wine Merchant?

I haven't played with Adventures yet and can't really tell. It seems like HT is best to hit 5$ and WM is good for hitting higher price points like 6-8$ but more expensive.

* Why are these Traders at a Dutch angle?

I've never heard about that, maybe you want to ask Stef or SCSN ?

[SCSN]

* Why are these Traders at a Dutch angle?

I've never heard about that, maybe you want to ask Stef or SCSN ?

I was told it's a tribute to the world champions.

[brokoli]

Horse traders is very good, I always think of its on-play effect and tend to forget the reaction sometimes. It's one of my favorites opening cards, to reach $5 and have an early source of +buy so you don't have to worry about that later. Also good with Alt VP and Fool's gold. I have a hard time thinking of cases where I do not want to open horse traders (4/3) actually, I think it's just when there is something better to do with $4, like Tournament, Conspirator chain, Scrying Pool / Familiar or when I don't want to have an early $5.
I usually don't like Horse traders after the opening though. About the reaction, it's not enough to make you ignore the attacks.

[assemble_me]

I have a hard time thinking of cases where I do not want to open horse traders (4/3) actually, I think it's just when there is something better to do with $4, like Tournament, Conspirator chain, Scrying Pool / Familiar or when I don't want to have an early $5.
[...]
I usually don't like Horse traders after the opening though.

Also trashing costing 4$ comes to mind, like Spice Merchant or Doctor (which you usually don't want to buy without overpay on the opening).
Also Quarry comes to mind which you often want early, because you also can hit 5$ with it. On the other hand, often you want the Quarry and the +Buy, which is a case for when you want HT after your opening. (Though, it's a tough call which one you want on the opening and which one later). Sometimes you're getting HT after the opening because you simply want mutliples for extra +Buys or you're playing a Draw-to-X/Menagerie engine where discarting can be helpful instead of a drawback.

[jsh357]

Horse Traders is a card I try to buy only when absolutely necessary.  If you're having to discard money to make the $3, it's usually bad (this happens a lot) and you'd prefer to use terminal space on other things.  The +Buy usually only comes in to play in big engines for me.  The reaction, while OK against various attacks, doesn't -really- counter anything besides Minion and Urchin.  I guess Soldier too.  You still gain Curses, you can just do more with them, that kind of thing. 

Horse Traders is most useful for two things: it practically guarantees you get a $5 card in your first shuffle, as long as HT itself doesn't miss.  It's also very good in Draw to X and Minion engines when you're swimming with actions.

[AdamH]

Horse Traders as defense really shines against only two attacks: Minion and Pillage.

With Minion you get the choice of keeping your current hand and drawing an extra card (usually not relevant in Minion games, but the choice often is) or pitching your current hand if it sucks.

With Pillage, you not only get to draw an extra card, but you've dodged a one-shot attack that had a huge opportunity cost for your opponent. Such a huge swing. If you're playing IRL you even get to laugh right in your opponent's face! Few things in Dominion allow you such an opportunity and it feels so, so good.

But otherwise the defense isn't terribly important most of the time. If you have HT in your engine, then it kind of cancels out the fact that you were unfortunate enough to draw one of your payload cards in your opening hand, so it's "meh" at best. If you're playing in a slog it can sometimes be nice to draw that extra card, but you were probably getting HT anyways so again it's usually "meh".

[ipofanes]

The reaction is a clear winner against discard attacks and more like a consolation against other attacks.

If the attack in itself is weak (Spying Pool), the consolation can outweigh the attack and be a winner, too.

[jomini]

Some of this seems really wrong.

The biggest advantage of Horse traders it is that virtually ensures $5 regardless of what happens on T3/4. Get hit with Militia - set aside Htr, draw an extra card, have 5 in hand. Pretty much the only way you miss on 5 is CEEEHtr or the ever present T5 delay of your opening buy. This is extremely important for $5 cards where winning the split will be key (e.g. Hunting parties).

Regarding the value against attacks, ehh I'd say it is strongest against weak attacks. Sure it is brutal against Pillage to completely wiff on the attack, but that normally just means that people avoid Pillage once you've gone Htr or that you play a low odds bet of colliding their attack with the Htr in your hands. In contrast, when Spy is worth getting, it is normally worth getting quite a few so the odds of getting the bonus draw is pretty nice. Htr is likewise good against classic Minion strategies, but I think the huge benefit in Minion games is that Htr converts draw, which is quite cheap with Minion, into coin, which is a bit harder to come by.


Regarding the utility of Htr in engines. Htr, as noted is good at getting your key $5 early (e.g. trashing, gainers, draw, etc.) and it is not a bad way to generate cash either. Say you build a classic engine - it draws the entire deck and aims to buy two Provinces or Colonies a go. A single Htr is fine in a lot of these engines. The final turn before you draw provinces you play Htr as you last card with an empty hand - it is a terminal Gold with a +buy that helped you get a lot of $5 components early. This works with no hitches for things like Merchant Ship, Count, Festival, etc. where you don't need to keep any treasures around.

But even if you have treasures to keep around, you need precisely 2 dead cards to discard. This is quite common. For instance if your trashing comes from Spice Merchant or Counterfeit, the Estates or Shelters will still be in hand and Htr again becomes a terminal gold with +buy. Even with stronger trashing and needing to keep treasures in hand, you still often can work Htr - Chapel, Remake, Lookout, Trading post, etc. often are dead cards late game that you will have to draw anyways; leaving exactly 1 copper around to discard to Htr isn't that bad. Worst case scenario here is that you don't play Htr for a turn, buy exactly one province, and then next turn discard the trasher & the province.

Beyond that, you can have a lot of situations where you can leave junk so that your trasher can hit it the next turn. E.g. I time my copper depletion for things like Junk dealer so that I can Htr away some coppers and then Junk them for another $1. Again you need one turn for this to work before you can just discard provinces.

Beyond all of that, there are many, many engines where draw is low opportunity cost (e.g. Library, Menage, etc.) and Htr works wonders with all of those. Even with more common +cards, part of building engines tends to be making the +draw low opportunity cost (e.g. Tr->Armory can net you a Village/Oracle pair for a net +1 card). Yeah Htr becomes more situational here, but you don't need that much draw to make the discard not hurt too much. But any time you will have a slight amount of overdraw to be green tolerant at all, one Htr is not bad payload.

So where is Htr bad for engines? In the middle build up. You will get hands with Htr before you can draw deck that be Gold/Gold/Htr/draw and you won't be able to hit a sweat $9 and 2 buys, but a lot of boards make up for those by either having a stronger opening (hey I can hit $5 really reliably and don't have to burn a turn one picking up some other +buy later) or by having having cheap draw. It feels terrible to have to leave Htr unplayed in the mid game, but it is much, much better than drawing EECCS on T3 on any board that really cares about $5.

Beyond that there are a lot of places where you really care about managing what is in your hand or discard. Menage is absolutely huge here as Htr can let draw a lot more while generating everything needed for another Menage buy. Library, Jack, and Wt can all benefit for removing stop cards from hand and tossing them in the discard (where you might even draw them at turn end). Tunnel is also nice for using Htr in an engine, buy out something simple like village/smithy, buy two Tunnels, and then power through the Gold. Htr can also be good once you've drawn a hand to ensure that you get the right cards in the discard - e.g. 4 uniques for Harvest, two identical cards for Mystic/Wishing well, cards you want to trash for Doctor/Lookout, making Herald/Golem an assured village, dropping green into the discard for Rebuild (mostly a Necropolis -> Htr -> Rebuild thing), setting up something for Nv (e.g. discard 2 Provinces -> Tr -> Nv). Even something simple like discarding two villages, play a +1 card and setting up for next turn can be very helpful for engine play.

In short, Htr is very good for boards that care about the $5 price point. In extreme cases (like Duke), this is enough to mass spam Htr. In other cases where $5's determine games (like Highway or Rabble), Htr is a solid opening and good engine addition for the end game. It also has a lot of tactical options for when what you discard is important or when draw is low opportunity cost.

[TheOthin]

Even if you get CEEEHt on your third or fourth turn, that means that you have six Coppers you haven't drawn yet. Unless you bought something that produces neither coin nor cards as your other buy and draw it with four Coppers, you should still hit $5.

Nothing to do about drawing Horse Traders on Turn 5, though.

[jomini]

Even if you get CEEEHt on your third or fourth turn, that means that you have six Coppers you haven't drawn yet. Unless you bought something that produces neither coin nor cards as your other buy and draw it with four Coppers, you should still hit $5.

Nothing to do about drawing Horse Traders on Turn 5, though.

In addition to opening something Like Smugglers/Htr, you also have to worry about attacks. Something simple like Militia next turn can also ruin your $5 buy off copper.

Htr is a reliable $5 on T3/T4, a bit less than Feast (which is also more likely to hit double $5) ... but Htr gives you value for the long haul. I'm pretty certain that the biggest whiff risk is Htr missing the shuffle, but that CEEEHtr is a non-negligable risk.

.

[Dingan]

I always call it "Horseradish", even when I'm talking out loud.

The guy on it looks like he's taking a selfie.

It make it highly probably of hitting $5 on T3 or T4.

[xyz123]

Is it a good card for treasure less decks? If you play it as your last action you get the goodies without discarding anything or only discarding victory cards. This also opens up the possibility of Throning or KCing which would otherwise be difficult because of the need to discard either four or six cards. I did play such a game once and my last action each turn was a King's Courted Horse Traders.

It is also useful for gaining Grand Markets as you can remove Coppers from your hand without reducing the amount you have to spend.

[convolucid]

* Which is more useful - the on-play effect, or the reaction?

This is the wrong question, because the reaction and the action are joined at the hip (compare Caravan Guard, contrast Moat). Horse Traders needs to discard stuff; its reaction gives you an extra card as fuel. I don't think it really matters what type of Attack you are "blocking," outside the super cases like Pillage. It's tempting to think that Horse Traders is better against Discarders because it nullifies the attack, but it's really just a reset; you still get -2 cards from the HT itself. Against Junkers you get 6 cards, and your HT can discard the junk for cash.

Anyway, HT gets much better in the presence of Attacks. Otherwise I think it's only worth considering for a $5 slingshot or if it's the only buy.

* How does it compare to Wine Merchant?

Horse Traders has much better art.

You take that back this instant!

[jomini]

Is it a good card for treasure less decks? If you play it as your last action you get the goodies without discarding anything or only discarding victory cards. This also opens up the possibility of Throning or KCing which would otherwise be difficult because of the need to discard either four or six cards. I did play such a game once and my last action each turn was a King's Courted Horse Traders.

It is also useful for gaining Grand Markets as you can remove Coppers from your hand without reducing the amount you have to spend.

Htr is great in treasureless decks and fine in treasured decks as long as draw is cheap enough. For instance, Village/Lib/Htr is a good way to generate cash & draw. You can add in two plats (that Htr might discard) that you will draw at the end with Lib in a colony board. Lib in particular makes discarding 4 cards easy stuff.


Drawing cards is a board dependent cost. Sometimes it is trivially cheap (Pool, Lib, Wharf, Tac) sometimes it is non-existent or very high in opportunity cost (Xroads/Hunting grounds).

Using 3 cards to make $3 and an action is a terminal copper on average, but that isn't so bad if you improving from Estates to coppers, you do Htr last, you get additional value from discarding (Menage), or draw is cheap (so like above you can discard two Plats, and then draw them back with a Lib play afterwards).

Anyway, HT gets much better in the presence of Attacks. Otherwise I think it's only worth considering for a $5 slingshot or if it's the only buy.

Htr is fine without attacks. It is a perfectly reasonable way to convert dead cards into coin. For instance, in a Shelters game I would most like want to take Htr over Baron even with no $5's on the board and only copper trashing. Yes Baron will eventually net me an extra $1 and I only have to discard one card ... but my Oge isn't going anywhere and until the engine really starts hitting I won't be lining up Baron + Estate.

I'd also be inclined to take Htr for the +buy over Woodcutters, Nomad camp, or any number of expensive terminals (e.g. Merchant guild is good +buy, but I might prefer to save my >= $5 hands for more important things than coin and +buy ... like say stacking on Torturers more quickly).

Sure without $5s mattering, Htr is not great, but I'm really wondering when you think Woodcutters will be better.

[eHalcyon]

It's tempting to think that Horse Traders is better against Discarders because it nullifies the attack, but it's really just a reset; you still get -2 cards from the HT itself.

It is better against discard attacks (other than Torturer).  Compare Horse Traders with hypothetical Donkey Traders, which is the same as HT except without the reaction.

No attack: HT and DT function identically.
Non-discard attacks: HT starts with an extra card in hand.
"discard down to 3" attacks: HT starts with 5 cards in hand, DT starts with 3.
"discard down to 4" attacks: HT starts with 6 cards, DT starts with 4.

HT has a bigger benefit against discard attacks (2 card advantage vs. 1 card).  The discard from playing HT doesn't factor into the comparison; it's there whether you get attacked or not.

[convolucid]

I wasn't comparing HT to a version with no reaction, I was comparing its utility against different sorts of attacks. Earlier in the thread a few people mentioned that the reaction is only a consolation prize against something like Witch. I disagree, because due to the nature of HT as an action, you are guaranteed to get something out of the extra card.

So rather
No attack: 5 cards
Down to 3: 5 cards
Down to 4: 6 cards
Non-discard attack: 6 cards

Yes, it's good against discard attacks, that's pretty obvious. I think it's also good against Junkers despite not blocking incoming junk.

[Awaclus]

Down to 4: 6 cards
Non-discard attack: 6 cards

But you still get attacked by the non-discard Attack. You don't get attacked by Urchin or Minion.

[eHalcyon]

Down to 4: 6 cards
Non-discard attack: 6 cards

But you still get attacked by the non-discard Attack. You don't get attacked by Urchin or Minion.

Exactly this.  You're getting the extra card either way (equal reward against all attacks), but setting aside HT serves to mitigate discard attacks (extra reward against discard attacks).

[drsteelhammer]

It is really good against Haunted Woods!

[convolucid]

Right. Down to 4 is best, duh! You got an extra card, and didn't suffer at all from the attack. Why did your opponent go for these cards with HT on the board?

Let's get constructive. Do you think HT is generally worth buying against, say, Witch?

[jaketheyak]

Right. Down to 4 is best, duh! You got an extra card, and didn't suffer at all from the attack. Why did your opponent go for these cards with HT on the board?

So, you wouldn't buy Minion or Urchin because HT is on the board? 

Let's get constructive. Do you think HT is generally worth buying against, say, Witch?

Yes, absolutely.
It doesn't defend against the attack, of course, but it means that getting attacked improves your current hand.
And, as others have pointed out, the junk gives HT something to discard.

[convolucid]

Pillage- probably not!
Admittedly, you don't buy Urchin for Urchin.

  Dammit, all I was trying to say was that HT is good against Junkers too.

[Awaclus]

Let's get constructive. Do you think HT is generally worth buying against, say, Witch?

Well, HT is often worth buying even when there are no Attacks, so it's definitely often worth buying against Witch. It's something you can take into account when deciding if or not you want a Horse Traders, but it's rarely going to make the difference between buying the Horse Traders and buying something else. You usually do want Horse Traders for the on-play effect when you have lots of Curses in your deck though.