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[jotheonah]

Stop me if we've done this one before.

In a two-player game, what is the largest number of VP tokens you can accrue in a single non-game-ending turn? Show your work. To keep it simple, no Outpost or Possession.

3+ players? Without the non-game-ending stipulation?

I don't have my own answer for this, but I think it ought to be an interesting to diversion for some.

[WanderingWinder]

This basically just gets you down to how many buys you can get, since you can easily have 10 goons in play, and by the rules, any number of treasures, so you've got an unlimited number of coppers. More or less. Well, as many as you need, anyway. And I guess you can grab a bunch more cards and actions and bishop stuff too, but I'm guessing you're better served getting more buys.

[jotheonah]

Well it's not exactly either or. Unless it is because Goons so hopelessly outclasses the other two. Which it probably does.

[Kirian]

Are there alternate green cards available?  That can seriously mess those calculations up.

[WanderingWinder]

Are there alternate green cards available?  That can seriously mess those calculations up.

Puzzle says only in chips, so...

[Kirian]

Are there alternate green cards available?  That can seriously mess those calculations up.

Puzzle says only in chips, so...

I used to have reading comprehension.  Then I took an arrow to the knee.

[WrathOfGlod]

Standard 9x Tactitician trick with additional 9 wharves played=19 buys
10 goons and 9 cities (fully powered) also 9 markets, herbalists,10kcs,9trs=~111 buys
9 contrabands=+9 buys
So we have at most ~140 buys (more if we includde young witch in black-market deck with herbalist bane and +buys in bm deck)
That gives us ~1400 points from goons

[WanderingWinder]

Standard 9x Tactitician trick with additional 9 wharves played=19 buys
10 goons and 9 cities (fully powered) also 9 markets, herbalists,10kcs,9trs=~111 buys
9 contrabands=+9 buys
So we have at most ~140 buys (more if we includde young witch in black-market deck with herbalist bane and +buys in bm deck)
That gives us ~1400 points from goons

You're forgetting that you can play those golems again, no?

[Deadlock39]

Playing the Golems again doesn't gain you any additional buys does it?  Not any over playing the cards on their own.  If there are enough +buy cards available and the actions to play them by using KC and TR on Cities, Worker's Villages, Markets, ect., then I don't think you want the Golem trick anyway.  Just get 9 each of 8 cards that give +buy (or 7 and Throne Room), 10 Goons, 10 King's Courts.  As long as it is all playable, you should have more buys than if you tried to fool around with Golem.

Edit: Playing out all the King's Courts gets us 19 cards tripled, 9 of them are Throne Rooms, which gives 27 cards Doubled and 10 cards Tripled, which gives 47 buys from the KC/TR clones.  We have 10 buys from Goons, and 7 x 9 = 63 buys from whatever +buy cards are left that make it the easiest to play them all.  Perhaps I did something wrong, but I get +120 buys without Black Market.  I'm not sure how many +buy cards there are in the game at this point, but BM is going to give you that number minus the 8 +buy cards that are already out (Young Witch in the BM keeps us at 8 +buy cards, KC, TR and BM.

Without BM, I get 120 buys for 1200 VP chips (assuming everything is playable).

[ghostofmars]

There are 23 cards that give +buy:
If 8 of those + KC + TR + BM are in the kingdom and the rest in the BM I get:

TR + KC = 9x (2buy) + 20x (3buy) = 78 buys
rest of the buys in the kingdom = 51 buys
rest of the buys in BM = 15 buys
+1 buy (default)
=145 buys
=> 1450 VP with Goons
+6 VP (Bishop Colony)
+1 VP (Monument)

= 1457 VP

[Davio]

Did you count Princess (Tournament in BM)?

[Deadlock39]

I think you counted all 10 buys of the kingdom stacks that are not Goons instead of nine (you did stack the KCs/TRs in the right order unlike me to get 78 buys out of 29 cards (49 extra) instead of 84 buys out of 37 cards (47 extra)).  You should start the turn with 10xGoons, 9x7 other buy cards in the Kingdom, so that is 73 total buys and your rest of the buys in the Kingdom line should be 44 instead of 51.  We can get 3 of those mid turn with Workshop, Ironworks and University, so would leave you at only 4 too many (are there any gaining cards I missed?)

4 less buys would be 40 less VP or 1417 (or 1427 if you didn't count Princess).

[jotheonah]

There are 23 cards that give +buy:
If 8 of those + KC + TR + BM are in the kingdom and the rest in the BM I get:

TR + KC = 9x (2buy) + 20x (3buy) = 78 buys
rest of the buys in the kingdom = 51 buys
rest of the buys in BM = 15 buys
+1 buy (default)
=145 buys
=> 1450 VP with Goons
+6 VP (Bishop Colony)
+1 VP (Monument)

= 1457 VP

(1) I am genuinely surprised at how few +buy cards total there are. Totally makes sense how often you get kingdoms without it.

(2) A lot of those cards are terminals. The only ones that are granting you extra actions I can think of are WV, activated Cities, Hamlets, and Pawns (though I'm sure Ive left something out).  KCs and TRs help, but I wonder if you can really play all those cards, much less get them into your hand (BM Native Village? BM Scrying Pool?)

[Deadlock39]

I don't think it will be an issue to play them all.  We have in total, 10 Goons, + 9 x 7 = 63 other +buy cards + 15 in the Black Market, which comes to 88 cards to play.  To kick start things, we are obviously going to play 9 Wharfs on the previous turn instead of the current one (79 cards left). We will put Worker's Village, Hamlet, and level 3 Cities in the Kingdom, for 27 of the cards and 27 extra actions. (52 cards left, 27 extra actions) Put Market in the kingdom for 9 more free cantrip buys (43 cards left 27 extra actions). 29 of the cards are played off of the massive KC/TR chain that starts from a single action (14 cards left 26 extra actions).  We already have enough actions without any Villages from the Black Market.  We can include 9 Margraves and the level 3 Cities in the KC/TR chain to draw an obscene amount of cards and gain tons of actions.  With perfect shuffle luck, you will start your Wharf-powered 23 (24 if you want to use 1 Caravan too) card hand with all 10 King's Courts, all 9 Throne Rooms, and 4 Margraves, which will easily chain into the rest of the Margraves and level 3 Cities.

[Axxle]

I don't think it will be an issue to play them all.

Especially if you use the king's courts to play the level 3 cities.

[ghostofmars]

Did you count Princess (Tournament in BM)?

yes

I think you counted all 10 buys of the kingdom stacks that are not Goons instead of nine [...]

I think, it would be possible (in principle) to gain all cards prior to starting the engine. If you play with the canonical Black Market and not the isotropy one, you have sufficient cards that allow you to gain more cards and then draw them into your hand.

More extensive example:
BM: Scrying Pool, Remake, Develop, Workshop, Ironworks, University, Feast, Young Witch, Monument, Bishop, +15 buys (so it would work on isotropic )
Kingdom Cards: King's Court, Goons, Grand Market, Wharf, City, Festival, Market, Throne Room, Worker's Village, Black Market, Hamlet (Bane)
Setup: I bishoped/salvaged/trade route all starting cards and buy 9 of each card except for KC and Wharf, where I have 10 (~125 cards). Last turn I played Tactician, 10xWharf so that I start with 30 cards in hand.

This turn: (2 actions left/30 cards)
play 9x festival, develop BM -> Throne Room,Hamlet (10/19)
remake YW -> market,City (9/17)
feast -> festival (8/16)
university -> worker's village (9/15)
bishop -> colony (8/13)
bridge,princess (6/11)
IW -> great market (6/10)
Workshop -> goons (5/9)
now start TR-KC engine
play TR-KC into City, Worker's Village, and Hamlet = +79 actions
play all cards which require to discard cards
play scrying pool (draw all cards)
-> play rest of buys (only goons and cards in BM cost actions < 30)

PS: perhaps I have to replace market with bridge, so that everything costs nothing and I can actually use all my buys

[WanderingWinder]

Did you account for black market giving you extra buys? Like, a kinged BM is actually 3 buys. You just have to have played the 10 goons beforehand.

[Deadlock39]

I'm sure you are right there.  I was only thinking of pure gainers (Ironworks, Workshop, University), but there is Develop and Remake to get the last 4. 

I think WW is right that no one thought of Black Market yet, so that will add one more buy.  (There are better things to King since it isn't inherently better than any other +buy card.)  That adds one more buy to get you up to 1467. 

I don't think the card cost is important.  (I was thinking there weren't enough cards in the kingdom without using extra treasures, but I ran the numbers and realize with just basic treasures and VP there are over 160 cards which is plenty for your buys.)  If we use the rule option of as many treasures as you want, we can just buy all Copper and ignore cost, but having 10 Bridges in the Kingdom and doing it with a standard deck is better.