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[Awaclus]

Of course it's a combo when that event is available. It's not a combo when the event is not available. Just like getting a bunch of Hermits isn't a combo when there's no Market Square (or Bridge, Goons, etc.) to go with it.

Well, I would say that it's still technically a combo, since you are clearly not building your deck, but setting things up. It's just that even when you have the things set up, you won't really gain any benefit from it. Just like getting a bunch of Hermits actually even accomplishes just a tiny little bit for you even when there's nothing to go with it, it's just not enough to win the game, which is why it's a bad strategy, but that doesn't mean it's not a combo strategy.

[Seprix]

Well, I would say that it's still technically a combo

What about a wombo? Is that a combo?

[eHalcyon]

It's worth noting that while both Zakharov and WW mention a combination of cards, they both also include the traditional Bishop golden deck in their list of combo decks even though that's a single-card combo.

As has been discussed in this thread, it's a combo between Bishop and a strong trasher.



As for the Gunpowder Plot, I wouldn't consider it "setting up" if you're sitting around doing nothing, and I wouldn't call it a combo even with that event.  As I said before, that kind of thing should really get its own name.  The word "combo" explicitly refers to a combination of cards.  A single thing isn't a combo.

Otherwise, yeah, I agree that "set it up and knock it down" is a good way to think of combo decks.

[pacovf]

Hold on, hold on...did Awaclus just change his mind on something? In a way that actually gets his position closer to the common consensus?

[Awaclus]

As has been discussed in this thread, it's a combo between Bishop and a strong trasher.



As for the Gunpowder Plot, I wouldn't consider it "setting up" if you're sitting around doing nothing, and I wouldn't call it a combo even with that event.  As I said before, that kind of thing should really get its own name.  The word "combo" explicitly refers to a combination of cards.  A single thing isn't a combo.

Otherwise, yeah, I agree that "set it up and knock it down" is a good way to think of combo decks.

Bishop is a trasher, and I'm pretty sure I have done the golden deck with Bishop as the only trasher (I certainly have done it with Bishop and another weak trasher, namely Apprentice).

How else would you set up for Gunpowder Plot if not by sitting around doing nothing?

The word "combo" does not explicitly refer to a combination of cards. In fighting games, for instance, there are no cards at all, but there are still combos, which are (sometimes very specific) sequences of moves. In Magic, Belcher is a combo deck, but it's not a combination of two or more cards, you just win as soon as you play Goblin Charbelcher, which is a single card. Additionally, there are a lot of different varieties of storm combo decks, which hardly ever rely on any particular card interaction, but rather, they're kind of like engines in Dominion in how they play out (i.e. cards that give you more mana are kind of like Villages and cards that draw you more cards are kind of like Smithies and there are tons of different kinds of both), except all cards in Magic are one-shots (inb4 edge cases) so your payload has to kill the opponent immediately and instead of deckbuilding, the game consists of trying to get the right cards in your hand, so they're more like Madman megaturns. I don't see why the terminology for Dominion should be any different in that regard.

[eHalcyon]

Bishop is a trasher, and I'm pretty sure I have done the golden deck with Bishop as the only trasher (I certainly have done it with Bishop and another weak trasher, namely Apprentice).

I think that would be the exception, not the rule.

How else would you set up for Gunpowder Plot if not by sitting around doing nothing?

You don't set up for it.  You wait.  That's why it should have its own name, if it ever became a thing in Dominion (which is highly unlikely).

The word "combo" does not explicitly refer to a combination of cards. In fighting games, for instance, there are no cards at all, but there are still combos, which are (sometimes very specific) sequences of moves. In Magic, Belcher is a combo deck, but it's not a combination of two or more cards, you just win as soon as you play Goblin Charbelcher, which is a single card. Additionally, there are a lot of different varieties of storm combo decks, which hardly ever rely on any particular card interaction, but rather, they're kind of like engines in Dominion in how they play out (i.e. cards that give you more mana are kind of like Villages and cards that draw you more cards are kind of like Smithies and there are tons of different kinds of both), except all cards in Magic are one-shots (inb4 edge cases) so your payload has to kill the opponent immediately and instead of deckbuilding, the game consists of trying to get the right cards in your hand, so they're more like Madman megaturns. I don't see why the terminology for Dominion should be any different in that regard.

But in Dominion, combo does refer to card combinations.

I'm not familiar enough with MtG, but a quick Google search suggests that the terminology in Magic matches what I've been saying all along.  From the MtG Salvation wiki:

Combo

Short for "combination".

1. Card combination: Any combination of two or more cards which produces a beneficial effect, designed to gain an advantage over the opponent.

2. Combo deck: A deck or archetype which uses a combo as its victory condition. The deck is designed entirely for the purpose of setting up and protecting the combo.

My best guess at this point is that you misuse or misunderstand the Magic terms too.

[Awaclus]

I think that would be the exception, not the rule.

I don't really think that it's that uncommon (probably still less common though). The viability of the golden deck is much more dependent on factors other than the presence of a strong trasher such as Chapel.

You don't set up for it.  You wait.

How is that difference in any way relevant?

But in Dominion, combo does refer to card combinations.

Q: Combo doesn't refer to card combinations in these other games. Why should it refer to card combinations in Dominion?
A: Because it refers to card combinations in Dominion.

Pretty solid reasoning there, can't argue with that.

My best guess at this point is that you misuse or misunderstand the Magic terms too.

I don't think you can find anyone who doesn't think that Belcher is a combo deck. The last time I was playing Magic actively, it probably would have been considered the most combo of all decks in Legacy, since it had the least amount of disruption and the highest rate of winning the game before the opponent gets to play his first turn (the latter especially being something that Magic players generally associate with combo decks). Also, MTGSalvation is good for exactly one thing and that is spoilers for upcoming sets.

[eHalcyon]

You don't set up for it.  You wait.

How is that difference in any way relevant?

"Setting up" means you're actually doing something.

But in Dominion, combo does refer to card combinations.

Q: Combo doesn't refer to card combinations in these other games. Why should it refer to card combinations in Dominion?
A: Because it refers to card combinations in Dominion.

Pretty solid reasoning there, can't argue with that.

I was pointing out the irrelevance of you bringing up fighting games.  In Dominion and Magic, "combo" refers to cards.

My best guess at this point is that you misuse or misunderstand the Magic terms too.

I don't think you can find anyone who doesn't think that Belcher is a combo deck. The last time I was playing Magic actively, it probably would have been considered the most combo of all decks in Legacy, since it had the least amount of disruption and the highest rate of winning the game before the opponent gets to play his first turn (the latter especially being something that Magic players generally associate with combo decks). Also, MTGSalvation is good for exactly one thing and that is spoilers for upcoming sets.

My guess is that most people are thinking of Belcher in combination with other cards.  They're not thinking "yeah, Belcher and 59 of whatever other cards, doesn't matter what they are".

I invite you to provide some better sources where the definition of a combination includes a single card.  I've checked in a few other places and they all seem to agree that a combo is 2+ cards.

[Donald X.]

The word "combo" does not explicitly refer to a combination of cards. In fighting games, for instance, there are no cards at all, but there are still combos, which are (sometimes very specific) sequences of moves. In Magic, Belcher is a combo deck, but it's not a combination of two or more cards, you just win as soon as you play Goblin Charbelcher, which is a single card. Additionally, there are a lot of different varieties of storm combo decks, which hardly ever rely on any particular card interaction, but rather, they're kind of like engines in Dominion in how they play out (i.e. cards that give you more mana are kind of like Villages and cards that draw you more cards are kind of like Smithies and there are tons of different kinds of both), except all cards in Magic are one-shots (inb4 edge cases) so your payload has to kill the opponent immediately and instead of deckbuilding, the game consists of trying to get the right cards in your hand, so they're more like Madman megaturns. I don't see why the terminology for Dominion should be any different in that regard.

First, we are talking about Dominion, and Dominion is a card game. If Dominion introduced tiles with rules text in an expansion, then for sure you could have a combo between a card and a tile. But people talking about Dominion combos are naturally talking about cards.

Second, a combo, in these contexts, is where the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. That's the secret for identifying them.

Third, Belcher is 100% full-on flat-out a combo deck. The combo is Belcher and cards that produce mana without being lands. The deck isn't about getting two cards into play and then scoring off of their interaction; it doesn't have to be.

[Awaclus]

"Setting up" means you're actually doing something.

Which is relevant how?

I was pointing out the irrelevance of you bringing up fighting games.  In Dominion and Magic, "combo" refers to cards.

Great examples of which are the Golden Deck and Belcher.

My guess is that most people are thinking of Belcher in combination with other cards.  They're not thinking "yeah, Belcher and 59 of whatever other cards, doesn't matter what they are".

Well, "Belcher and 59 of whatever other cards, doesn't matter what they are" isn't all that far from the truth, really. If you look at the primer for Belcher on The Source (which is to the Eternal formats pretty much what f.ds is to Dominion, except The Source is somewhat more competitive-oriented), it showcases three cards from the deck as images. Obviously Belcher is one of those cards. Another one is Empty the Warrens, which is an alternate win condition just in case you don't draw Belcher; it doesn't serve any other purpose in the deck, i.e. you actually don't want to draw both Empty the Warrens and Belcher during one game. The third one is Burning Wish, whose main purpose is to search for another Empty the Warrens in the situation where you didn't draw Belcher and you didn't even draw an Empty the Warrens. The three cards that the guy who wrote the article considers the main cards of the deck are cards that you don't ever want to draw together.

Naturally, it also matters what the rest of the cards do. Some of them always have to give you mana regardless of the deck you're playing, because otherwise you can't really do anything. In Belcher's case in particular, all of them have to give you lots of mana really fast because that's what allows you to generate enough mana to win on turn 1. There aren't really any of those cards that have any particular positive interaction with Belcher, Empty the Warrens or each other, so you just put in the best ones. The exception is Lion's Eye Diamond which is a strong card with a drawback that combo decks usually doesn't have to care about at all, so that's obviously automatically included in the deck, but it's still just a card that's really good at giving you lots of mana very fast, which means that you definitely don't need it in your hand in order to win, as long as you can get enough mana from other cards. Also they can't be lands, because Belcher antisynergizes with lands.

There exists also a related combo deck called the Spanish Inquisition. As you can see, the deck list is almost entirely different (and it's actually based on combinations of cards), but you can still just stick Goblin Charbelcher into the deck, and it still works, and it still kills your opponent on turn 1 way over 50% of the time. Or you can play almost the same deck without Goblin Charbelcher and it's very slightly slower and very slightly more resistant to counters. The only thing that these decks have in common with the more popular deck known as Belcher is that they run very few lands and a lot of ways to generate lots of mana very early, and well, the fact that they're extremely fast combo decks. Running very few lands and a lot of ways to generate lots of mana very early in general is a common characteristic of combo decks, because the extra mana is what makes them so fast, and because they're so fast, they don't need a lot of lands (you can play only one per turn, and if you're only ever going to have two turns, why have 20 lands?).

I invite you to provide some better sources where the definition of a combination includes a single card.  I've checked in a few other places and they all seem to agree that a combo is 2+ cards.

http://www.starcitygames.com/magic/legacy/24745-Eternal-Europe-Fundamentals-What-Is-Combo.html

There. "A combo deck in Magic terms is a deck that is fully dedicated to setting up a line of plays that will if left undisrupted either end the game on the spot or move it into a position that all but guarantees a win in the next one to two turns." After that definition, he then goes on to categorize combos into one-card combos, traditional combos and engine-combos. Response to this article on The Source: http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/showthread.php?20560-SCG-Article-On-Combo — i.e. pretty positive. What is especially noteworthy about this is that it's a rather high-level strategy article talking about tournament decks.

Meanwhile, the article from Wizards features a card that says that it gets a bonus if you have an Island in play. And then the article explains how it can be beneficial to have Islands in play while you have that card in play. Granted, that's not the main focus of the article and they do say that it's just a synergy and not a combo, but it does reveal that the target audience for this article are the kind of Magic players who need to have it explained to them that when you have a card that benefits from having Islands in play, you might want to try to play it in a deck with lots of Islands. It's a "hey, check out these cool card interactions!" article for newbies. Nothing wrong with that, but you don't want to start an article like that explaining why this deck that kills you before you get to play anything is considered a one-card combo, you want to start it by showing off something fun and easy to understand. Like the SplinterTwin combo and its variations that actually are on the article.

The TappedOut definition is horrible. "A combo is an interaction between two cards that leads to game-ending advantage through a self-sustaining repeatable loop, an infinite loop, or a lock." That's arbitrarily restrictive, and according to this definition, the only combos in Dominion would be the Masquerade pin and that one thing with King's Court and Ironworks where you can keep gaining cards until the Supply runs out of them (which is a self-sustaining repeatable loop). It also excludes almost all tournament-viable Magic combos.

And that Wikipedia article contradicts its own definition by including the Belcher deck, which, even according to Wikipedia, is literally just playing and activating Goblin Charbelcher as long as your deck doesn't have too many lands in it.

[Jack Rudd]

I'm now amusing myself trying to think of how to maximize your probability of reliably winning a Gunpowder Plot game. Events could come in quite handy.

[Haddock]

http://www.starcitygames.com/magic/legacy/24745-Eternal-Europe-Fundamentals-What-Is-Combo.html

There. "A combo deck in Magic terms is a deck that is fully dedicated to setting up a line of plays that will if left undisrupted either end the game on the spot or move it into a position that all but guarantees a win in the next one to two turns." After that definition, he then goes on to categorize combos into one-card combos, traditional combos and engine-combos.

I'm actually fine with this definition of "combo deck".  I think it's a good one.



I maintain, however, that a "combo" (not a combo DECK, just a combo) can (and does) absolutely refer to a set of some cards that work really well together, like Watchtower/Goons.  (Which is the point you originally contested:

A much better combo would be Watchtower/Goons.

Which is still not a combo, but engine payload.

)
I don't know if you're still standing by this position, but I'm convinced it's not the right position.



A combo deck may or may not be centred around a combo of cards - for instance it might actually only involve one card (your belcher example) or indeed might just fit the definition given above in some other way. 

[Awaclus]

A much better combo would be Watchtower/Goons.

Which is still not a combo, but engine payload.

)
I don't know if you're still standing by this position, but I'm convinced it's not the right position.

I most certainly stand by the position that on a kingdom with Watchtower and Goons, the the first thing you should notice is that the kingdom has great engine payload in Goons+Watchtower, not that the kingdom has a great "combo".

[Aleimon Thimble]

A much better combo would be Watchtower/Goons.

Which is still not a combo, but engine payload.

)
I don't know if you're still standing by this position, but I'm convinced it's not the right position.

I most certainly stand by the position that on a kingdom with Watchtower and Goons, the the first thing you should notice is that the kingdom has great engine payload in Goons+Watchtower, not that the kingdom has a great "combo".

True, but that's a different discussion.

I believe top players have said before that, by default, you should ask yourself 'how can I make an engine work on this board', and that you should generally go for the engine unless a) the engine is too weak (no good trashing/villages/draw/payload) or b) something else is too strong (Ironworks/Gardens rush, for example).

If the kingdom has Goons and Watchtower, that's absolutely amazing payload, but you won't be sure if the engine is playable until you look at the other 8 cards. Still, noticing the combo Goons/Watchtower is useful - if you don't notice that it's a combo, how else are you going to find the awesomeness of the payload? A newbie might just say 'oh, yeah, Goons is +Buy and an attack, and Watchtower can draw and topdeck good cards you just bought', and they'd be absolutely correct, but they'd also be completely overlooking the potential of the Watchtower/Goons combo.

[Awaclus]

A much better combo would be Watchtower/Goons.

Which is still not a combo, but engine payload.

)
I don't know if you're still standing by this position, but I'm convinced it's not the right position.

I most certainly stand by the position that on a kingdom with Watchtower and Goons, the the first thing you should notice is that the kingdom has great engine payload in Goons+Watchtower, not that the kingdom has a great "combo".

True, but that's a different discussion.

I believe top players have said before that, by default, you should ask yourself 'how can I make an engine work on this board', and that you should generally go for the engine unless a) the engine is too weak (no good trashing/villages/draw/payload) or b) something else is too strong (Ironworks/Gardens rush, for example).

If the kingdom has Goons and Watchtower, that's absolutely amazing payload, but you won't be sure if the engine is playable until you look at the other 8 cards. Still, noticing the combo Goons/Watchtower is useful - if you don't notice that it's a combo, how else are you going to find the awesomeness of the payload? A newbie might just say 'oh, yeah, Goons is +Buy and an attack, and Watchtower can draw and topdeck good cards you just bought', and they'd be absolutely correct, but they'd also be completely overlooking the potential of the Watchtower/Goons combo.

No, that's precisely this discussion. I'm trying to shift the focus from individual card interactions to the overall strategy, because the latter is super more important.

When Goons and Watchtower are in the kingdom, the engine had better be playable. I don't think it's super useful to look at a kingdom with no payload and try to figure out how you can make the engine work with Tribute as the only splitter and Counting House as the only other draw when the best payload is Gold; you can just look at the kingdom, see that there's no payload and move on to figuring out what other strategies you can make work. When Goons and Watchtower are there, though, you do want to give the engine with Tribute and Counting House as your engine components a little bit more thought.

You don't need to notice the "combo", you just need to know that you can buy Coppers and trash them with Watchtower and that gives you a bunch of VP tokens, which makes for great engine payload. At no point does it benefit you to know that this is referred to as a "combo" by some people, or to make the connection between that concept and what you're doing. This is because it doesn't matter how many different cards you need to achieve what you want to achieve. In contrast, it is hugely beneficial to make the connection between the concept of engine payload and what you're doing, because the fact that you're playing an engine strategy has a lot of implications regarding what kinds of plays you should actually make during the game.

[Haddock]

A much better combo would be Watchtower/Goons.

Which is still not a combo, but engine payload.

)
I don't know if you're still standing by this position, but I'm convinced it's not the right position.

I most certainly stand by the position that on a kingdom with Watchtower and Goons, the the first thing you should notice is that the kingdom has great engine payload in Goons+Watchtower, not that the kingdom has a great "combo".

True, but that's a different discussion.

I believe top players have said before that, by default, you should ask yourself 'how can I make an engine work on this board', and that you should generally go for the engine unless a) the engine is too weak (no good trashing/villages/draw/payload) or b) something else is too strong (Ironworks/Gardens rush, for example).

If the kingdom has Goons and Watchtower, that's absolutely amazing payload, but you won't be sure if the engine is playable until you look at the other 8 cards. Still, noticing the combo Goons/Watchtower is useful - if you don't notice that it's a combo, how else are you going to find the awesomeness of the payload? A newbie might just say 'oh, yeah, Goons is +Buy and an attack, and Watchtower can draw and topdeck good cards you just bought', and they'd be absolutely correct, but they'd also be completely overlooking the potential of the Watchtower/Goons combo.

No, that's precisely this discussion. I'm trying to shift the focus from individual card interactions to the overall strategy, because the latter is super more important.

When Goons and Watchtower are in the kingdom, the engine had better be playable. I don't think it's super useful to look at a kingdom with no payload and try to figure out how you can make the engine work with Tribute as the only splitter and Counting House as the only other draw when the best payload is Gold; you can just look at the kingdom, see that there's no payload and move on to figuring out what other strategies you can make work. When Goons and Watchtower are there, though, you do want to give the engine with Tribute and Counting House as your engine components a little bit more thought.

You don't need to notice the "combo", you just need to know that you can buy Coppers and trash them with Watchtower and that gives you a bunch of VP tokens, which makes for great engine payload. At no point does it benefit you to know that this is referred to as a "combo" by some people, or to make the connection between that concept and what you're doing. This is because it doesn't matter how many different cards you need to achieve what you want to achieve. In contrast, it is hugely beneficial to make the connection between the concept of engine payload and what you're doing, because the fact that you're playing an engine strategy has a lot of implications regarding what kinds of plays you should actually make during the game.

The bolded part - a very noble cause and definitely a good thing for the community.  Great.  (EDIT: in rereading this post-post, I realise this looks sarcastic.  It's not meant as such, I'm quite sincere about it.)
I don't disagree with any of this post. 

Except the part in italics.  What has happened here is that you have made a bold and hard-to-defend claim (that the term "combo" has a different definition to the one that I and apparently many other here are familiar with.), in a typically brusque and confrontational manner.   When we've made points to argue with your position on that matter, you've started talking about something else entirely, and are now claiming that the other thing is what the discussion was about all along.   I'm happy to have this other discussion, and your points on that front are very good and make a lot of sense.  But before we get to that I would like you to actually state whether or not you actually agree with what we've been trying to get you to agree with all along - ie. that Watchtower/Goons (for example) qualifies as a "combo".

[Awaclus]

Except the part in italics.  What has happened here is that you have made a bold and hard-to-defend claim (that the term "combo" has a different definition to the one that I and apparently many other here are familiar with.), in a typically brusque and confrontational manner.   When we've made points to argue with your position on that matter, you've started talking about something else entirely, and are now claiming that the other thing is what the discussion was about all along.   I'm happy to have this other discussion, and your points on that front are very good and make a lot of sense.  But before we get to that I would like you to actually state whether or not you actually agree with what we've been trying to get you to agree with all along - ie. that Watchtower/Goons (for example) qualifies as a "combo".

I'm not going to call it a combo and I don't think people should be calling it a combo.

[Haddock]

Except the part in italics.  What has happened here is that you have made a bold and hard-to-defend claim (that the term "combo" has a different definition to the one that I and apparently many other here are familiar with.), in a typically brusque and confrontational manner.   When we've made points to argue with your position on that matter, you've started talking about something else entirely, and are now claiming that the other thing is what the discussion was about all along.   I'm happy to have this other discussion, and your points on that front are very good and make a lot of sense.  But before we get to that I would like you to actually state whether or not you actually agree with what we've been trying to get you to agree with all along - ie. that Watchtower/Goons (for example) qualifies as a "combo".

I'm not going to call it a combo and I don't think people should be calling it a combo.

And thus the conversation has gone full-circle.

Ugh.

<goes to smash his own head against nearest wall>

[eHalcyon]

"Setting up" means you're actually doing something.

Which is relevant how?

At this point you should just check a dictionary.  You're being intentionally obtuse.

I was pointing out the irrelevance of you bringing up fighting games.  In Dominion and Magic, "combo" refers to cards.

Great examples of which are the Golden Deck and Belcher.

Which are being discussed because they are relevant.  Doesn't explain why you brought up fighting games.

My guess is that most people are thinking of Belcher in combination with other cards.  They're not thinking "yeah, Belcher and 59 of whatever other cards, doesn't matter what they are".

Well, "Belcher and 59 of whatever other cards, doesn't matter what they are" isn't all that far from the truth, really. If you look at the primer for Belcher on The Source (which is to the Eternal formats pretty much what f.ds is to Dominion, except The Source is somewhat more competitive-oriented), it showcases three cards from the deck as images. Obviously Belcher is one of those cards. Another one is Empty the Warrens, which is an alternate win condition just in case you don't draw Belcher; it doesn't serve any other purpose in the deck, i.e. you actually don't want to draw both Empty the Warrens and Belcher during one game. The third one is Burning Wish, whose main purpose is to search for another Empty the Warrens in the situation where you didn't draw Belcher and you didn't even draw an Empty the Warrens. The three cards that the guy who wrote the article considers the main cards of the deck are cards that you don't ever want to draw together.

Naturally, it also matters what the rest of the cards do. Some of them always have to give you mana regardless of the deck you're playing, because otherwise you can't really do anything. In Belcher's case in particular, all of them have to give you lots of mana really fast because that's what allows you to generate enough mana to win on turn 1. There aren't really any of those cards that have any particular positive interaction with Belcher, Empty the Warrens or each other, so you just put in the best ones. The exception is Lion's Eye Diamond which is a strong card with a drawback that combo decks usually doesn't have to care about at all, so that's obviously automatically included in the deck, but it's still just a card that's really good at giving you lots of mana very fast, which means that you definitely don't need it in your hand in order to win, as long as you can get enough mana from other cards. Also they can't be lands, because Belcher antisynergizes with lands.

There exists also a related combo deck called the Spanish Inquisition. As you can see, the deck list is almost entirely different (and it's actually based on combinations of cards), but you can still just stick Goblin Charbelcher into the deck, and it still works, and it still kills your opponent on turn 1 way over 50% of the time. Or you can play almost the same deck without Goblin Charbelcher and it's very slightly slower and very slightly more resistant to counters. The only thing that these decks have in common with the more popular deck known as Belcher is that they run very few lands and a lot of ways to generate lots of mana very early, and well, the fact that they're extremely fast combo decks. Running very few lands and a lot of ways to generate lots of mana very early in general is a common characteristic of combo decks, because the extra mana is what makes them so fast, and because they're so fast, they don't need a lot of lands (you can play only one per turn, and if you're only ever going to have two turns, why have 20 lands?).

I defer to Donald X. on this:

Third, Belcher is 100% full-on flat-out a combo deck. The combo is Belcher and cards that produce mana without being lands. The deck isn't about getting two cards into play and then scoring off of their interaction; it doesn't have to be.

Moreover, this makes me realize that even if you are correct about the meaning of "combo deck" in MtG, it doesn't really apply to Dominion simply because of the sheer scope.  The combo seems to be Belcher + X, where X is special but there are still many options to fill that role.  Moreover, due to the nature of deck construction, you have access to most of those options when you don't in Dominion.

http://www.starcitygames.com/magic/legacy/24745-Eternal-Europe-Fundamentals-What-Is-Combo.html

There. "A combo deck in Magic terms is a deck that is fully dedicated to setting up a line of plays that will if left undisrupted either end the game on the spot or move it into a position that all but guarantees a win in the next one to two turns." After that definition, he then goes on to categorize combos into one-card combos, traditional combos and engine-combos. Response to this article on The Source: http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/showthread.php?20560-SCG-Article-On-Combo — i.e. pretty positive. What is especially noteworthy about this is that it's a rather high-level strategy article talking about tournament decks.

Thank-you.  Now we're getting somewhere.

The introduction implies that the definition that the author proposes is not the traditional one.  He makes that explicit later on:

Since almost none of the single-card combos are legal what is one to do? Well for one thing we can approach combo the way it has traditionally been conceived: setting up a combination of multiple pieces to win the game.

So the traditional definition is exactly the definition that everyone else here has been using.  No doubt a large portion of the MtG community still uses the traditional definition as well (as evidenced by previously provided links).  You can decry those other sources as non-competitive, newbies, whatever, but it doesn't change the fact that they are a significant portion of the MtG community.  So your argument that we should use the same definition as used in MtG doesn't mean much, when that community has a few differing definitions themselves.


Mr. Kotter is proposing a better definition, and he makes a compelling case as to why it is better... for Magic.  But that doesn't mean it carries over to Dominion.

...the reason this is a much better definition is that it describes the way a combo decks wants its games to play out instead of focusing purely on deck construction.

Generally speaking this is the correct approach to identifying strategies and deck types because what informs your decision making in a particular matchup and allows you to find cards and strategies that are effective against your opponent isn't which cards (or colors for that matter) are in their deck—it's what they're trying to do.

This is a key difference from Dominion.  The Magic player is concerned with how the game plays out, not as much on deck construction.  MtG has thousands upon thousands of cards, and since there isn't a kingdom of just 10 cards, you can't really predict the specific cards in their deck.  So the approach to strategy is about learning high level approaches, "what they're trying to do", rather than how to respond to super-specific cards or card combos.

But Dominion is a deck-building game.  You need to focus on the deck construction here.  There is a small set of cards in each game.  You can improve your game by considering specific cards and card combos.


Kotter considers three categories of the Combo Deck archetype.  First, the one-card combo.

One-card decks are in a way the holy grail of combo deckbuilding. They are decks that win as soon as they manage to resolve (or activate) their single key card.

All well and good for Magic, but is this applicable to Dominion?  Not really, IMO.  There is no single card in Dominion that just wins you the game when you play it.  The closest thing you've brought up is Bishop in a golden deck, and you usually need trashing support for it to work so it doesn't really function as a one-card combo.  You've argued this lightly, but I'm sure you know deep down that trying to reach Golden Deck status with only Bishops is a painful path.

Well, I guess there's Rebuild.  Do you consider Rebuild as a one-card combo deck?

Second, Kotter mentions the traditional definition with a combo of 2+ pieces.  I've already addressed this above.  It's a good definition, it's one that everybody uses.

Kotter's third category is the engine combo:

Engine Combo. These decks are what totally demolish the intuitive definition of a combo deck. Instead of trying to set up a particular combination of cards they try to achieve a "critical mass" of interchangeable pieces that all perform one or both of two critical functions: drawing cards or producing mana. What they aim to do is to accumulate the resources to fuel one big turn of constant resource exchange cards into mana into cards into mana and so on.

I'm not sure what the Dominion analogue for this would be, because games of Dominion don't end the same way as games of Magic.  As far as "interchangeable pieces" go, the best I can come up with is how engines in Dominion seek trashing, +cards, +buy, etc. and can get them from a variety of sources.  But are you proposing that we fold the Engine Deck archetype into the Combo Deck archetype?


Overall, the article you've linked has done a fantastic job at convincing me that it's far more intuitive and far more strategically useful to use the traditional definition of "combo deck" in Dominion.

A much better combo would be Watchtower/Goons.

Which is still not a combo, but engine payload.

)
I don't know if you're still standing by this position, but I'm convinced it's not the right position.

I most certainly stand by the position that on a kingdom with Watchtower and Goons, the the first thing you should notice is that the kingdom has great engine payload in Goons+Watchtower, not that the kingdom has a great "combo".

Sure, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't call Watchtower+Goons a combo.  Even Carsten Kotter makes a distinction between "combo" and "combo deck":

After all combo comes from "combination" so we expect a combo deck to be one that tries to set up a certain combination of cards that then has a powerful effect on the game.

The whole point of his article is to expand the understanding of "combo deck", not to usurp the de facto definition of "combo".  They are two different terms that have different uses.  For convenience you may say "combo" to refer to the deck archetype if you provide the proper context (as Kotter does later in his article), but that doesn't change that "combo" also legitimately refers to a small set of cards with strong synergy.

[Seprix]

Remind me to never post a combo thread ever.

[Deadlock39]

Remind me to never post a combo thread argue with Awaclus ever.

FTFY

[singletee]

Remind me to never post a combo thread ever.

Unfortunately Merchant Guild/Goons is a nombo, in the sense that it's way worse than the Goons/Goons self-synergy. In a Goons engine, you want all your terminal space to go to Goons, to something necessary to set up multi-Goons (draw, trashing), or, if you think the attack will be effective enough, to stop your opponent from doing so (junking, trashing attack). The only exception perhaps is Bridge, which enhances your Goons by enabling you to make more non-Copper (and thus non-stop-card) buys.

[Awaclus]

At this point you should just check a dictionary.  You're being intentionally obtuse.

How is a dictionary going to educate me about what kind of strategic implications in Dominion the difference between not doing anything in order to prepare for a very specific situation and doing something in order to prepare for a very specific situation has?

Which are being discussed because they are relevant.  Doesn't explain why you brought up fighting games.

You said that the word "combo" refers explicitly to a combination of cards. However, it clearly does not explicitly contain the word "card" anywhere in the word "combo", and I brought up fighting games as an example to demonstrate that it doesn't even implicitly refer to a combination of cards.

I defer to Donald X. on this:

Third, Belcher is 100% full-on flat-out a combo deck. The combo is Belcher and cards that produce mana without being lands. The deck isn't about getting two cards into play and then scoring off of their interaction; it doesn't have to be.

Moreover, this makes me realize that even if you are correct about the meaning of "combo deck" in MtG, it doesn't really apply to Dominion simply because of the sheer scope.  The combo seems to be Belcher + X, where X is special but there are still many options to fill that role.  Moreover, due to the nature of deck construction, you have access to most of those options when you don't in Dominion.

Okay, let's use Donald's definition for combo then. Guys, I found this cool new combo! Province+$8. When you have $8, you can buy a Province. The combo is $8 and a Province.

Belcher is exactly like that. Except instead of gaining a Province, you kill your opponent.

Thank-you.  Now we're getting somewhere.

The introduction implies that the definition that the author proposes is not the traditional one.  He makes that explicit later on:

Since almost none of the single-card combos are legal what is one to do? Well for one thing we can approach combo the way it has traditionally been conceived: setting up a combination of multiple pieces to win the game.

So the traditional definition is exactly the definition that everyone else here has been using.  No doubt a large portion of the MtG community still uses the traditional definition as well (as evidenced by previously provided links).  You can decry those other sources as non-competitive, newbies, whatever, but it doesn't change the fact that they are a significant portion of the MtG community.  So your argument that we should use the same definition as used in MtG doesn't mean much, when that community has a few differing definitions themselves.

It's not that he's proposing a new definition to include more decks under the name "combo"; it's that he's proposing to new definition that actually includes the decks that people already perceive to be combo.

After all combo comes from "combination" so we expect a combo deck to be one that tries to set up a certain combination of cards that then has a powerful effect on the game. And while that definition is correct for some decks we refer to under the combo moniker a lot of them actually do something rather different.

It has been common for people to define combo in some way, and then proceed to talk about combos that don't fall under that definition (like that Wikipedia article still does).

This is a key difference from Dominion.  The Magic player is concerned with how the game plays out, not as much on deck construction.  MtG has thousands upon thousands of cards, and since there isn't a kingdom of just 10 cards, you can't really predict the specific cards in their deck.  So the approach to strategy is about learning high level approaches, "what they're trying to do", rather than how to respond to super-specific cards or card combos.

But Dominion is a deck-building game.  You need to focus on the deck construction here.  There is a small set of cards in each game.  You can improve your game by considering specific cards and card combos.

You can actually predict the specific cards in your opponent's deck in Magic, especially the Legacy format which this article is talking about, because the deckbuilding aspect of Magic consists of going on the Internet and copying the exact deck from someone who placed high in a big tournament. Sometimes they might have one or two surprising cards, but generally, after you've seen their first turn, you can have an extremely good idea what the exact 60 cards in their deck are, and usually, it's the maximum 4 allowed copies of each of 12 different cards. Even when the opponent has something other than the most common cards for their type of deck, the cards that change are support cards, not the core of the deck. That's not very different from the 10 different cards in Dominion, and it is a huge mistake to believe that you can improve your game by considering specific cards and card combos rather than what you're trying to do in Dominion.

Kotter considers three categories of the Combo Deck archetype.  First, the one-card combo.

One-card decks are in a way the holy grail of combo deckbuilding. They are decks that win as soon as they manage to resolve (or activate) their single key card.

All well and good for Magic, but is this applicable to Dominion?  Not really, IMO.  There is no single card in Dominion that just wins you the game when you play it.  The closest thing you've brought up is Bishop in a golden deck, and you usually need trashing support for it to work so it doesn't really function as a one-card combo.  You've argued this lightly, but I'm sure you know deep down that trying to reach Golden Deck status with only Bishops is a painful path.

This is not really applicable to Dominion. In Magic, a combo needs to actually win the game immediately, because otherwise you're going to lose against the aggro decks that beat you down in like 4 turns. In Dominion, it doesn't need to win immediately, because a lot of the time you're still faster than big money.

Trying to reach Golden Deck status with only Bishops under the right circumstances is a far less painful path than trying to do so with Chapel and the wrong circumstances. Like I said, I have done so with Apprentice as the only trashing, and Apprentice is hardly any better at helping you get super thin than Bishop itself. I also won that game. I'm also pretty sure that I have done it with just Bishop, but that game I don't remember as vividly so I can't be 100% sure it actually happened. I have certainly done Bishop golden decks every now and then (probably less than 10 games total), and I don't think any super strong trashing was in any of those games. Sometimes something like Throne Room helped make the Bishop faster at getting rid of my cards though, I think. I can honestly say that based on the experiences I have had with Bishop golden decks, I believe that it is not the case that strong trashing is necessary for the Bishop golden deck.

Well, I guess there's Rebuild.  Do you consider Rebuild as a one-card combo deck?

No, it's a rush.

Second, Kotter mentions the traditional definition with a combo of 2+ pieces.  I've already addressed this above.  It's a good definition, it's one that everybody uses.

It's not a good definition because it is completely irrelevant from a strategic point of view how many differently named cards your deck needs to do what it does, in both Magic and Dominion, and the definition doesn't include all the decks that people intuitively feel are combo decks.

Kotter's third category is the engine combo:

Engine Combo. These decks are what totally demolish the intuitive definition of a combo deck. Instead of trying to set up a particular combination of cards they try to achieve a "critical mass" of interchangeable pieces that all perform one or both of two critical functions: drawing cards or producing mana. What they aim to do is to accumulate the resources to fuel one big turn of constant resource exchange cards into mana into cards into mana and so on.

I'm not sure what the Dominion analogue for this would be, because games of Dominion don't end the same way as games of Magic.  As far as "interchangeable pieces" go, the best I can come up with is how engines in Dominion seek trashing, +cards, +buy, etc. and can get them from a variety of sources.  But are you proposing that we fold the Engine Deck archetype into the Combo Deck archetype?

The Dominion analogue for this would be Madman megaturns. Except with tons of different kinds of Madmen. As it turns out, the most prominent example of a Madman megaturn in Dominion is Hermit/Market Square, which is most certainly a combo by any imaginable definition (except for the one you found at TappedOut).

Overall, the article you've linked has done a fantastic job at convincing me that it's far more intuitive and far more strategically useful to use the traditional definition of "combo deck" in Dominion.

Well, have fun and don't complain to me when you lose games against players who focus more on the overall strategy than you do.

Sure, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't call Watchtower+Goons a combo.  Even Carsten Kotter makes a distinction between "combo" and "combo deck":

After all combo comes from "combination" so we expect a combo deck to be one that tries to set up a certain combination of cards that then has a powerful effect on the game.

That's not what that means. It just means that since the word "combo" is etymologically related to the word "combination", you would expect "combo" to contain of combinations of different cards.

but that doesn't change that "combo" also legitimately refers to a small set of cards with strong synergy.

Fine, but you shouldn't use the word to legitimately refer to a small set of cards with strong synergy.

[Donald X.]

Okay, let's use Donald's definition for combo then. Guys, I found this cool new combo! Province+$8. When you have $8, you can buy a Province. The combo is $8 and a Province.

Belcher is exactly like that. Except instead of gaining a Province, you kill your opponent.

$8 and "Provinces in the pile" isn't what people mean by a combo, as if you didn't know. A huge thing here is that Province is almost always there, given the rules of the game. It would not be a combo in any sense if it were not possible to have no Provinces in the pile - something you always have is not part of a combo, it's just part of how the game works. It's like saying "I have a bunch of Chess pieces on the board and it's my turn, combo." Province and $8 are technically a combo in a very narrow way because actually there may be no Provinces in the pile at a point in your turn at which you could buy one if only there were. But it's not a way anyone uses the term.

A more correct basic example like that is, Gold and Gold and Silver are a combo. Together they let you get a Province! And I mean, when people talk about Dominion combos obviously they don't mean stuff like that, because it's so basic. If you use "combo" like that you will just have miscommunications. It's a combo but not what people are talking about when they use the word.

If a Magic article on the Wizards site says "Kird Ape and Forest are a synergy, not a combo," well that's nonsense. They're a combo, and the kind anyone talks about; an easy one to get but still a combo. You don't always have the Forest. A synergy is a subset of combos in which the cards just pursue the same direction, like Stone Rain and Sinkhole. Those are actually a combo in the Donald X. sense, because destroying two lands is more significant than twice the value of destroying one land. But people don't use the term there, they say synergy. It's obviously very distinct from Kird Ape plus Forest, which are much different by themselves.

Belcher, meanwhile, is a classic combo in the way game-playing humans use the term. They could reprint Goblin Charbelcher in the next set and the deck wouldn't exist in Standard. Recent sets do not have Elvish Spirit Guides and Chrome Moxes to let you cast Charbelcher without having lands in your deck. Without such cards, there is no deck. It absolutely depends on card interactions. Belcher isn't remotely like $8 and a Province, or like Gold Gold Silver.

Theory please move this thread to a forum where I can edit posts and close threads.

[Haddock]

Fine, but you shouldn't use the word to legitimately refer to a small set of cards with strong synergy.

You know what, I'm fine with that.  It's possible we agree.