IntroductionThe combo deck aims to set up a particular combination of cards which can either immediately win, lock the opponent out of the game, or quickly and consistently gain VPs. Unlike most other decks, combo decks completely neglect VPs until they are set up, then ignore everything else afterwards.
Building a combo deck nearly always requires strong trashing. Chapel is the best way to achieve this. Remake or Steward are decent. Bishop is good if your opponent is also Bishoping. Single-card trashers like Upgrade and Lookout are good enough only if the combo is extremely powerful and other potential decks are weak.
Ambassador has an interesting place in combo decks. It can be a good trasher, and decks set up to play multiple Ambassadors transition well into combo, but your opponent's Ambassadors can really shut you down. When trying to play combo on an Ambassador board, focus purely on an Ambassador strategy, and go for the combo cards if and when you win the Ambassador wars.
The Mega-TurnMega-Turn decks tend to rely on strong trashing to work. Failing that, strong draw such as Scrying Pool, Apothecary, Governor, Council Room, or Wharf can get you everything you need. Mega-turn decks can typically win from a 3-5 Province/Colony deficit if they have enough buys, but have difficulty winning 2-6 unless they use Goons.
BridgePlaying 7 Bridges in a single turn lets you buy out the Province stack and win the game; 5 or 6 are enough when combined with other sources of money. Bridge decks require extra sources of actions and cards to play all their Bridges. Most Bridge deck rely on cards that help get a mega-turn: King's Court, Mining Village, or Native Village.
When building a Bridge deck, trashing is extremely valuable, and Silvers aren't very good. You might need one or two to build up the deck, but you want to trash them before you combo off. A sufficiently good draw engine can replace trashing, but will slow you down considerably. Never buy green cards before your combo turn. If you're going for a combo with lots of cards, be wary of your opponent sneaking a 3-pile ending.
Good support cards:King's Court/Throne Room - These cards are immensely important to a Bridge deck. Bridge combo is the best strategy on most boards which include KC and trashers.
Scrying Pool - If you trash all your victory and treasure cards, Scrying Pool draws your entire deck.
Council Room/Governor-for-cards - The downsides of these cards don't matter if you end the game on a single turn.
Library - If you have enough sources of actions, you can play Bridges down to only a few cards, then draw a lot from Library.
Counters:Cursing attacks are devastating to most of these decks, especially those relying on Scrying Pool. A combo deck that can set up a good actions/draw engine with Chapel before being cursed too heavily can fight through curses, though.
Discard attacks are very good against the Ironworks-Mining Village-Bridge deck, terrible against Scrying Pool or Library, and bad against most of the rest.
Masquerade is very good against these decks because they try to get rid of everything they don't want.
Sample decks:2 Steward, 3 King's Court, 3 Bridge, 3 Laboratory, 2 Village - Trash heavily at the start; it's fine to spend your turn trashing instead of buying. A KC/Bridge turn can get you a lot of your support cards and allow you to win shortly afterwards. Your aim is to play KC->KC->3xBridge on a single turn, giving you +$9, +9 buys, and -9 cost so you can get all the Provinces or even Colonies.
Chapel, 3 Ironworks, 6 Mining Village, 3 Bridge, 3 Throne Room, 1 Smithy - Ironworks for Ironworks, then Ironworks for Mining Villages and a Smithy, then Ironworks for Bridges, all while trashing heavily. On the combo turn, play some MVs trashing them and Bridges, Ironworks for Nobles, play all the Bridges and buy a pile of Provinces.
Sample game.
8 Native Village, 6 Bridge, 1 Silver, 7 Copper, 3 Estate - NV/Bridge is fast and doesn't require trashing.
Sample game and
article (credit to WanderingWinder).
Chapel, 2 Scrying Pool, 2 University, 7 Bridge, 6 Bazaar - Scrying Pool for your entire deck, play all the Bazaars, play all the Bridges. University isn't necessary, but it helps.
Sample game.
10 Festival, 8 Goons, 7 King's Court, 6 Library, 4 Bridge, 1 Chapel, 1 Worker's Village - The overkill deck; good for gaining vast quantities of VP.
Sample game (but it
can be risky).
HighwayUnlike Bridge, Highway replaces itself, so a sufficiently trashed deck can play all of its Highways on a single turn without +actions or +cards. Highway needs extra buys to combo; Market or Grand Market are the best ways to accomplish this. Laboratory effects, especially Apothecary, can be used in place of trashing, at the cost of some speed. Highway decks can make fairly good use of Upgrade as a trasher; it cycles and after 4 Highways you can upgrade Copper or Estate into Highway.
When building a Highway deck, get a 2:1 ratio of Highways to Markets, then buy a few extra Markets before your combo turn, then buy all the Provinces.
Highway decks are resilient to discard and top-of-deck attacks (e.g. Rabble), but weak to Curses.
Good support cards:University and Ironworks (after a Highway) can get you your Highways and Markets easily.
Festival+Library works well with a Highway deck as an alternative to Markets.
Counters:Buying 5 Highways. Highway decks need at least 6 Highways to work well, and are slowed down slightly by their trashing. Buying 4 Highways will slow down the Highway deck slightly. In Colony games, getting 3 Highways can be enough to stop the combo.
Cursing attacks.
Gardens, Silk Road, or any other strategy that can quickly empty 2 piles and pick up a few Highways along the way.
Sample deck:6 Highway, 4 Grand Market, 3 Border Village, 2 Steward, 1 Worker's Village, 2 Copper -
Sample game.
GoonsGoons plays quite similarly to Bridge. The buy from each Goons gives you a point for each Goons, so the total points is proportional to the square of the number of Goons you play. This leads itself perfectly to mega-turn strategies. Goons decks have to be able to combo off with 3 cards in hand, as the opponent is very likely to be playing Goons of his own. You typically want to end the game on a 3-pile of Goons/Village/Estate.
Good support cards:Watchtower - Goons decks buy a lot of copper on their critical turn, Watchtower means it won't clog up your deck and you can do it again next turn. Unnecessary if you can win the game in one turn.
Anything that's good with Bridges, except for Throne Room/King's Court, which don't double the VP gain of Goons. They're still not bad for building your draw engine and getting more buys.
Festival/Library draw engines are especially good against opposing Goons.
Apothecary - Helps get Goons faster, lets you combo off without trashing, goes through your deck after you spam Copper.
Worker's Village - The best Village to pair with Goons, it gives you more buys to use your Goons with.
Council Room/Margrave/Wharf - Card draw which gives +buy is also good with Goons.
Highway - A few Highways let you buy more useful cards with all your Goons buys instead of just copper, and can accelerate getting to your combo.
Counters:Cursing attacks
Library/Watchtower - Goons decks will be playing Goons every turn, Library mitigates the damage.
Sample deck:Chapel, 2 Scrying Pool, 6 Village, 7 Goons, Watchtower - This looks a lot like the Bridge deck, and for good reason. Scrying Pool negates the discard from enemy Goons by drawing your deck.
CopperThe Copper deck relies on Tactician, Counting House, Cellar, and lots of Copper to draw a huge pile of cards thanks to the interaction between CH and Cellar. A bunch of Coppersmiths make those Coppers valuable. Worker's Village helps play all these cards and get more coppers in the meantime. The deck is good against Mountebank, especially with more players. Copper works best in Colony games, which are a bit slower. Copper decks are very resilient to all attacks.
Sample deck:6 Cellar, 3 Coppersmith, 4 Worker's Village, 2 Counting House, 2 Tactician, 22 Copper, 6 Curse -
Sample game. I mistakenly bought a 4th Coppersmith over the 4th WV in the sample game.
The LockThe Lock aims to stop your opponent from doing anything, or at least from doing much of use. It relies on consistently playing a lot of attacks or pseudo-attacks.
King's Court + Discard + MasqueradeCredit goes to jomini for most of the information about this combo.
Trash down to 2 King's court, 1 Goons, and 1 Masquerade, preferably using Chapel. Play KC on KC, use one of the KCs on Goons, then the other on Masquerades. The opponent has to pass you his remaining 3 cards, which you trash. You pass them nothing, as you've got nothing left in your hand, deck, or discard.
Article and
sample game. This works only in 2-player games, unless you specifically want to destroy the player to your left.
Village effects are a cheaper alternative to one King's Court. Goons, Militia, Ghost Ship, Margrave, and Outpost all work as the second piece of the combo; Cutpurse can occasionally work. Throne Room instead of King's Court gives you a softer lock, leaving the opponent with one card, but is easier to set up. The 2-card King's Court + Masquerade deck still trashes 3 cards per turn from the opponent's hand, which can be good enough in the absence of +buy cards, especially against an opponent who is trashing heavily.
Opposing Masquerades can be countered by having any one nonterminal (a card which gives at least +1 action) as your 5th card. You pass it to them when they Masquerade you, then pass their card back to them and buy a new nonterminal on your turn. Discard attacks can be beaten by any cantrip (a card which gives at least +1 card and +1 action); KC, KC, Courted Pearl Diver gets you your Goons and Masquerade back. Cursing attacks aren't a problem, you can just trash the curses with Masquerade.
Counters:Moat - Stops the lock cold, though you'll still lose cards when you fail to draw Moat. Lighthouse works so long as you can play one every turn for the rest of the game; when you miss you're gone.
Discard attacks - Wrecks the vanilla combo, but can be stopped without much difficulty.
King's Court + Bridge - Faster than some versions of the lock.
Possession - Possess the locking player and steal his valuable cards with Masquerade.
Double Tactician - Double Tactician decks (see below) can withstand Goons/Masquerade, but lose if they ever miss a Tactician. Unless they have en extra source of +buys, they lose three cards for every two they gain, so they need to deplete 3 piles before running out of cards.
2 Tunnel - Doesn't beat Goons, but can gradually deplete the Golds, Coppers, and Curses and force a 3-pile ending against Militia.
Swindler - Can slow down the lock combo considerably, but doesn't stop it once it's in place.
Sample decks:Village, Militia, King's Court, Masquerade - Cheaper than the 2 King's Court version, and no less effective. Any Village effect works.
2 King's Court, Outpost, Masquerade - This version isn't stopped by reactions; trash 3 cards on your regular turn and 3 on your Outpost turn.
2 King's Court, Goons, Pearl Diver, Masquerade - Beats discard attacks. Any card which gives +1 card/+1 action can be used in place of Pearl Diver. Still has difficulty against discard combined with Masquerade.
2 Throne Room, Minion, Outpost, Masquerade - Works without King's Court; can be faster because it doesn't need to hit $7.
King's Court, Masquerade, Haven - Trash down to KC+Masq and trash your opponent's deck. Slowly buy up 2 coppers and 2 Havens, comboing on the turns where your coppers are Havened. Buy an Estate. Each turn, Haven the Estate, then trash. Repeat to get 4 Havens and 2 Estates. Grind through the Coppers, Curses, and Estates until the game ends. Doesn't work if there's enough +buy for your opponent to fight through the trashing.
Sample game (the opponent conceded).
Mass Saboteur/ThiefMass Saboteur operates similarly to Bridge decks, except instead of winning you're trashing all the useful cards in your opponent's deck. Works best in a Colony game where the opponent is less likely to end the game before you can combo.
Good support cards:Quarry - Makes it easier to buy your key cards, which are all actions.
Baron - Gets you to KC money faster.
Outpost - Lets you sabotage twice as much post-combo.
Minion - Prevents the opponent from hiding cards in his hand.
Counters:Moat/Lighthouse - Stops Saboteur, can't be sabotaged, can easily be sabotaged into.
Island/Native Village/Haven - Hides points away where they can't be sabotaged.
Peddler - Sabotaging a peddler sucks, but peddlers alone aren't enough to beat the deck.
Minion - Forcing a discard gets rid of Scheme's benefits.
5-card decks - Saboteur does nothing against someone with no deck. Adding discard fixes this problem.
Sample deck:4 King's Court, 3 Scheme, 2 Saboteur, 2 Mountebank (optional), 1 Outpost (optional), 2 Quarry (optional), 2 Silver, 7 copper, 3 estate - Play 4 KCs, courting each of your other actions, then play Outpost. Do it again on your Outpost turn. 12 Sabotages per turn is more or less impossible to recover from.
Sample game.
2 Scrying Pool, 2 Haven, 5 Bazaar, 5 Saboteur, Outpost - Havens let you ensure you get Scrying Pool every turn, Scrying pool draws your deck. Bazaar gives you enough actions to play Saboteurs and enough money to buy more. Scrying Pool and Saboteur are the only necessary cards in this deck; everything else can be replaced. Credit to jomimi for the deck.
2 King's Court, 3 Scheme, 2 Thief, money - Uses Thief instead of Saboteur, but the principle is the same. If there's no actions which give +money, you can lock your opponent out of the game.
Sample game credit to ecq.
Possession + Ambassador/MasqueradePossession decks try to use Ambassadors on their opponent's Possessed turns to steal valuable cards from their opponent's deck. The obvious counter of "don't buy Ambassador" doesn't work, as the Possession player can simply Ambassador his Ambassadors. This deck is very slow, but brutal when it hits.
To make the deck work, you have to win the Ambassador wars by reducing your deck to a state where you can draw most if not all of your deck and Ambassador at least once every turn, cancelling out opposing Ambassadors and filling their deck with junk. Once that's done, you buy a Potion and some Possessions, then start Ambassadoring Ambassador and playing as many Possessions as you can each turn. On your Possession turns, steal and buy cards which help you buy more Possessions, Provinces, and Colonies. Avoid getting money, though stealing Potions might be worth it to keep your opponent off of Possessions.
Masquerade is basically a slightly worse version of Ambassador in this deck; it's more likely to hit Province but will never hit 2 Provinces. It's much worse if you've trashed all the junk in your deck.
Good support cards:Inn - The "discard 2 cards" part of Inn doesn't matter that much when you don't care about money only want to play a few cards each turn. The on-buy effect is very useful, allowing you to get your engine running more easily.
Council Room/Governor - The +1 card to your opponent is amazing when you're going to be using it yourself.
Colony - Slower games make this combo easier to pull off in time.
Tactician - Tactician helps you get to 6P for Possession, you can afford to Tactician a Tactician hand after playing Possession a bunch, and Possessing a Tactician turn is awesome.
King's Court/Throne Room - Being able to get extra possessions using relatively cheap cards is great. KC-KC-Possession-Possession-Possession should cause a resignation.
Counters:Chapel/Watchtower/Lighthouse+Possession - If you can fight through Ambassador, being able to Possess the combo player first and Ambassador his Possessions to you pretty much gives you the game.
Trash most of your money, buy Estates and Coppers - If you can't do anything, he can't do anything when possessing you. Only works if you can get a 3-pile ending before the Possession player takes enough of your greens. Diluting your deck reduces the risk of Ambassador colliding with important cards.
Sample decks:8 Inn, 6 Council Room, 5 Possession, 3 Ambassador -
Sample game. Includes one beautiful turn where I Ambassador 2 of his Provinces then buy another Province.
2 King's Court, 2 Scheme, Possession, 2 Ambassador, (any support cards) - KC->KC->(courted Scheme)->(courted Scheme)->(courted Possession) lets you Possess your opponent 3 times every turn. If you have enough support cards to reliably draw both your Ambassadors, so much the better.
2 Tactician, 2 Possession, 2 Ambassador, Crossroads, Chapel - After playing all your actions you can Tactician, so you can start with 10 cards each turn. Once you start greening heavily, buy more Crossroads so you can draw both your Possessions.
Honorable Mention: Pirate ShipIf there's no other cards which give +money, enough Pirate Ships can take all the money out of your opponent's deck and leave him stranded. However, Pirate Ship is a card which gives +money, and these games nearly always turn into a Ship mirror match. Buy villages.
The Consistent DeckThe consistent deck aims to get to a point where it can do the exact same thing every turn for the rest of the game. Unlike other combo decks, consistent decks need to be set up relatively early.
BishopBishop decks trash everything except Bishop, some money, and one Province/Colony. Each turn they trash Province, buy Province. It's not difficult to build the deck using only Bishops for trashing, especially in 4-player, but Chapels make it faster. Bishop decks are very good against deck attacks (Saboteur, Swindler, Rabble, etc), as they have no deck to attack.
Counters:Discard attacks - The deck can't function on 3 cards.
Cursers - The deck can't function on 6 cards either.
Masquerade - The deck needs all of its cards.
Sample decks:Bishop, 2 Platinum, Copper, Colony - Platinum, Gold, Silver as the money also works. 2 Platinums lets you trash Copper, buy Colony on your last turn for 5 more points than otherwise. With 2 Platinums you're safe from Masquerade.
Sample game in which I buy a superfluous Lab because I can.
Bishop, Gold, 2 Silver, Province - Slightly worse than the above, but Colonies aren't available every game.
Bishop, 2 Platinum, Moat/2 Lighthouse, Colony - Immune to attacks. Watchtower is another option against curses. Laboratory or similar is an option against discard. Credit to petrie911.
Bishop, 2 Gold, 2 Lighthouse, Province - Immune to attacks, Province version. Play Lighthouses on alternating turns. Credit to jonts26.
Bishop, Outpost, Fishing Village, Market, Peddler - Each turn, Fishing Village, Market, Bishop a Peddler, Outpost, buy 2 Peddlers. On the Outpost turn, Market, Bishop Peddler, buy 2 Peddlers. Orange cards count as in play for the purpose of Peddler on both turns. Once the Peddlers run out you should be able to play enough Peddlers to start buying Markets, then with enough Markets you can play FV, 6 Market, Bishop Province, Outpost, buy Province. Any village can be used in place of Fishing Village, and Grand Market can substitute for Market. Most of the time you're not going to get down to 5 cards, here's a
sample game where I play a close approximation of this deck.
Double TacticianDouble Tactician decks try to play a Tactician every turn, using non-treasure means of gaining money. This means they can draw 10 cards per turn. Pure Double Tactician is vulnerable to discard and cursing attacks, but adding some card draw negates this.
Good support cards:Spice Merchant/Upgrade - These cards let you trash one card per turn without costing an action, preventing your deck from getting too large.
Laboratory or similar cards - Labs let you bounce back from discard, deal with cursing, and provide an alternative to trashing in finding your Tactician every turn.
Counters:Possession
Sample decks:2 Tactician, Black Market, Upgrade, 7 money - Black Market lets you play all your money before Tactician, even if you buy nothing from it.
Sample game. Credit to Jack Rudd.
2 Tactician, Vault, 2 Spice Merchant, 4 Copper/Silver, 3 Estate - Each turn, you draw 10 of your 11 cards, Spice Merchant a copper (you have 2 Merchants so you're sure to draw one), Vault drawing two and discarding 8 cards, Tactician. Once you run out of coppers you aren't as consistent, but by that point you have 4 Provinces, so it doesn't matter.
Sample game.
Island/Native VillageThese decks buy a Province each turn, then set it aside so they don't have to draw it. Trashing down to 5-6 cards is required to get the deck to work.
Counters:Discard attacks
Curse attacks
Bureaucrat - These decks can't function without their victory cards in hand.
Sample decks:(Chapel), Hamlet, 2 Gold, Silver, Native Village, Province - Each turn, Hamlet discarding Province, Native Village setting Province aside, buy Province. It's 6 cards, so sometimes you won't draw the Hamlet. Buying a Lab reduces the odds of this happening. You'll need to set aside your trasher(s) on Native Village before starting.
Sample game.
(Chapel), Ironworks, 2 Gold, Silver, Province, (Island) - Each turn, Ironworks for Island, draw the Island, play the Island on Province, buy Province. You'll need to Island your trasher(s) before starting. Has the downside of petering out when the Islands are depleted.
King's Court + SchemeCourting a Scheme lets you play a particular action every turn. Most of the time this leads to a strong non-combo deck, but it's also good for combo. Using this with attacks is described in the lock section above.
Counters:Minion - Forcing a discard gets rid of Scheme's benefits.
Sample deck:King's Court, Scheme, Chancellor, 3 Stash (5 for Colony) - KC-Scheme lets you Chancellor every turn, Chancellor lets you get your Stashes every turn, Stashes let you get a Province every turn. Against discard attacks, place your Stashes in slots 6-8; you'll draw them off of Scheme. I'm not sure that this deck is better than vanilla Chancellor/Scheme, though.
Sample game.
King's Court, Scheme, Herbalist, 5 Venture, Silver - Herbalist every turn lets you guarantee Venture, which guarantees $8. Rarely actually worth it; Ventures are reliable enough by themselves.