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[Chris is me]

Just posting to point out that a $4 cost card that's usually "only a Lost City with an auto play clause" is a really good card. Lost City costs $5 and has a significant on gain penalty.

[AdrianHealey]

Just posting to point out that a $4 cost card that's usually "only a Lost City with an auto play clause" is a really good card. Lost City costs $5 and has a significant on gain penalty.

Sure, I am not saying that lost city overall is strictly better or anything.

But it seems to me that herald is just a 'not always functioning' lost city when you have it. If you reveal an action, you can play it. But so does lost city: if you draw an action, you always have an action to play it. if you don't reveal an action, it's just a cantrip with herald. In lost cities case, you have the additional card in your hand, which is a-ok. So, sure, pricing and on gain effects matter for the total evaluation of the card and all, but the actual on play effect, herald is just a pretty bad lost city. Or am I missing something?

[McGarnacle]

Just posting to point out that a $4 cost card that's usually "only a Lost City with an auto play clause" is a really good card. Lost City costs $5 and has a significant on gain penalty.

Sure, I am not saying that lost city overall is strictly better or anything.

But it seems to me that herald is just a 'not always functioning' lost city when you have it. If you reveal an action, you can play it. But so does lost city: if you draw an action, you always have an action to play it. if you don't reveal an action, it's just a cantrip with herald. In lost cities case, you have the additional card in your hand, which is a-ok. So, sure, pricing and on gain effects matter for the total evaluation of the card and all, but the actual on play effect, herald is just a pretty bad lost city. Or am I missing something?

I rate Herald quite well. It can be better than a village, and with any sort of deck inspection, it can be even better. Oracle/Herald, Cartographer/Herald, Gear/Herald, etc.

[LaLight]

Just posting to point out that a $4 cost card that's usually "only a Lost City with an auto play clause" is a really good card. Lost City costs $5 and has a significant on gain penalty.

Sure, I am not saying that lost city overall is strictly better or anything.

But it seems to me that herald is just a 'not always functioning' lost city when you have it. If you reveal an action, you can play it. But so does lost city: if you draw an action, you always have an action to play it. if you don't reveal an action, it's just a cantrip with herald. In lost cities case, you have the additional card in your hand, which is a-ok. So, sure, pricing and on gain effects matter for the total evaluation of the card and all, but the actual on play effect, herald is just a pretty bad lost city. Or am I missing something?

I rate Herald quite well. It can be better than a village, and with any sort of deck inspection, it can be even better. Oracle/Herald, Cartographer/Herald, Gear/Herald, etc.

Don't forget amazing Scout/Herald combo!

[Aleimon Thimble]

I rate Herald quite well. It can be better than a village, and with any sort of deck inspection, it can be even better. Oracle/Herald, Cartographer/Herald, Gear/Herald, etc.

Apothecary/Scout/Herald!

Are you kidding me, ninja'd by like 15 seconds

[AdrianHealey]

Just posting to point out that a $4 cost card that's usually "only a Lost City with an auto play clause" is a really good card. Lost City costs $5 and has a significant on gain penalty.

Sure, I am not saying that lost city overall is strictly better or anything.

But it seems to me that herald is just a 'not always functioning' lost city when you have it. If you reveal an action, you can play it. But so does lost city: if you draw an action, you always have an action to play it. if you don't reveal an action, it's just a cantrip with herald. In lost cities case, you have the additional card in your hand, which is a-ok. So, sure, pricing and on gain effects matter for the total evaluation of the card and all, but the actual on play effect, herald is just a pretty bad lost city. Or am I missing something?

I rate Herald quite well. It can be better than a village, and with any sort of deck inspection, it can be even better. Oracle/Herald, Cartographer/Herald, Gear/Herald, etc.

But whatever herald does when it's in your deck, lost city does it better, no?

[McGarnacle]

Just posting to point out that a $4 cost card that's usually "only a Lost City with an auto play clause" is a really good card. Lost City costs $5 and has a significant on gain penalty.

Sure, I am not saying that lost city overall is strictly better or anything.

But it seems to me that herald is just a 'not always functioning' lost city when you have it. If you reveal an action, you can play it. But so does lost city: if you draw an action, you always have an action to play it. if you don't reveal an action, it's just a cantrip with herald. In lost cities case, you have the additional card in your hand, which is a-ok. So, sure, pricing and on gain effects matter for the total evaluation of the card and all, but the actual on play effect, herald is just a pretty bad lost city. Or am I missing something?

I rate Herald quite well. It can be better than a village, and with any sort of deck inspection, it can be even better. Oracle/Herald, Cartographer/Herald, Gear/Herald, etc.

But whatever herald does when it's in your deck, lost city does it better, no?

In most cases, yes, but LC does cost more, plus it has the on-buy penalty. Lost City is also very strong, Herald I think is high mid-level power-wise.

[Aleimon Thimble]

Herald I think is high mid-level power-wise.

Last year, the community voted Herald #7 out of 66 $4 cards. I personally feel that's still too low - I voted it #1 myself. I might be slightly biased because I like playing with it too much, but I don't understand why Wandering Minstrel and Ironmonger are above it - Herald is clearly the better engine card to me, and all of these splitters are fairly mediocre if there's no engine.

[McGarnacle]

Herald I think is high mid-level power-wise.

Last year, the community voted Herald #7 out of 66 $4 cards. I personally feel that's still too low - I voted it #1 myself. I might be slightly biased because I like playing with it too much, but I don't understand why Wandering Minstrel and Ironmonger are above it - Herald is clearly the better engine card to me, and all of these splitters are fairly mediocre if there's no engine.

I think Ironmonger might be a tad overrated, but Wandering Minstrel is great. It also combos with Herald very well.

[Chris is me]

Just posting to point out that a $4 cost card that's usually "only a Lost City with an auto play clause" is a really good card. Lost City costs $5 and has a significant on gain penalty.

Sure, I am not saying that lost city overall is strictly better or anything.

But it seems to me that herald is just a 'not always functioning' lost city when you have it. If you reveal an action, you can play it. But so does lost city: if you draw an action, you always have an action to play it. if you don't reveal an action, it's just a cantrip with herald. In lost cities case, you have the additional card in your hand, which is a-ok. So, sure, pricing and on gain effects matter for the total evaluation of the card and all, but the actual on play effect, herald is just a pretty bad lost city. Or am I missing something?

I rate Herald quite well. It can be better than a village, and with any sort of deck inspection, it can be even better. Oracle/Herald, Cartographer/Herald, Gear/Herald, etc.

But whatever herald does when it's in your deck, lost city does it better, no?

Yeah, ignoring opportunity costs to get both cards, obviously you would rather have a Lost City. But $5 and the draw thing makes it so much more difficult to get than $4. Gainers work with Herald, $8/2buy is less costly than $10/2cards/2buy, etc.

[allanfieldhouse]

Ironmonger and Wandering Minstrel both have the advantage that they don't care as much about trashing. Both actually help out a lot when there isn't any good trashing, but they're still awesome when you've trashed down.

[drsteelhammer]

tristan, do you play on MF? I'd like to examine your herald games.

[Awaclus]

tristan, do you play on MF? I'd like to examine your herald games.

Yes, his user name is horatio83.

[Chris is me]

Ironmonger and Wandering Minstrel both have the advantage that they don't care as much about trashing. Both actually help out a lot when there isn't any good trashing, but they're still awesome when you've trashed down.

Ironmonger isn't better at being a Village than Herald; it's pretty much strictly worse because it doesn't "draw" (play) the 2nd card. It just does other useful things when it misses.

[AdrianHealey]

Ironmonger and Wandering Minstrel both have the advantage that they don't care as much about trashing. Both actually help out a lot when there isn't any good trashing, but they're still awesome when you've trashed down.

Ironmonger isn't better at being a Village than Herald; it's pretty much strictly worse because it doesn't "draw" (play) the 2nd card. It just does other useful things when it misses.

Ironmonger is either a village (when it meets an action), a peddler (with it meets a treasure) and a lab (when it meets a victory card) + the option of cycling.

Herald is either a cantrip (bad) or a lost city (pretty good).

Herald seems more like the high risk/high reward kind of a guy, while ironmonger is the more solid one overall, where at it's best it's pretty good, but at it's worst it's also pretty good. Herald at it's worst is just bad.

[Awaclus]

Ironmonger and Wandering Minstrel both have the advantage that they don't care as much about trashing. Both actually help out a lot when there isn't any good trashing, but they're still awesome when you've trashed down.

Ironmonger isn't better at being a Village than Herald; it's pretty much strictly worse because it doesn't "draw" (play) the 2nd card. It just does other useful things when it misses.

Ironmonger is either a village (when it meets an action), a peddler (with it meets a treasure) and a lab (when it meets a victory card) + the option of cycling.

Herald is either a cantrip (bad) or a lost city (pretty good).

Herald seems more like the high risk/high reward kind of a guy, while ironmonger is the more solid one overall, where at it's best it's pretty good, but at it's worst it's also pretty good. Herald at it's worst is just bad.

Ironmonger at its worst (when you reveal an Action you want to keep and you don't have two more terminal Actions in your hand) is also just a cantrip.

Also, a Lost City is not "pretty good", it's insanely good considering that you only paid $4 for it.

[AdrianHealey]

Or when you reveal a curse or hovel.

[tristan]

Ironmonger is useful in every deck. Herald isn't.

[Limetime]

Ironmonger is useful in every deck. Herald isn't.

Ironmonger is pretty much village in engines with trashing .

[Chris is me]

Ironmonger is useful in every deck. Herald isn't.

Herald has a higher effectiveness ceiling, Ironmonger has a lower ceiling that is more consistently achieved. In a very thinned engine, Ironmonger is actually not that great because it is even more often just a Village. For Ironmonger to be better than Herald, you need to not be able to thin all the Treasure and Victory cards out of your deck, and you need to not be relying on it as the sole source of +Action.

Ironmonger is definitely the better card on many boards, it's just a question of how much better Herald is on the boards where it's good. And it's not like it's a particularly bad card when it's just OK.

[tristan]

Ironmonger is useful in every deck. Herald isn't.

Ironmonger is pretty much village in engines with trashing .

Sure. As I said, Ironmonger is useful in every deck whereas Herald is only useful in decks with a sufficiently high Action density.
I never claimed that Herald is not better than Ironmonger in a deck with a high Action density, only that the former is situational whereas the latter is a broad card.

[Limetime]

Ironmonger is useful in every deck. Herald isn't.

Ironmonger is pretty much village in engines with trashing .

Sure. As I said, Ironmonger is useful in every deck whereas Herald is only useful in decks with a sufficiently high Action density.
I never claimed that Herald is not better than Ironmonger in a deck with a high Action density, only that the former is situational whereas the latter is a broad card.

Ironmonger is pretty overrated.
Herald is situational but the situation it is good in is the most common situation.

[tristan]

Ironmonger is useful in every deck. Herald isn't.

Ironmonger is pretty much village in engines with trashing .

Sure. As I said, Ironmonger is useful in every deck whereas Herald is only useful in decks with a sufficiently high Action density.
I never claimed that Herald is not better than Ironmonger in a deck with a high Action density, only that the former is situational whereas the latter is a broad card.

Ironmonger is pretty overrated.
Herald is situational but the situation it is good in is the most common situation.

I totally disagree. Ironmonger is, at least to me, on average the superior card.

[Chris is me]

I do think lots of people here overstate the proportion of all games where an engine is actually possible. I think they just selectively don't remember the BM and Slog games.

[allanfieldhouse]

I do think lots of people here overstate the proportion of all games where an engine is actually possible. I think they just selectively don't remember the BM and Slog games.

Quite possibly true, but the simple presence of Ironmonger or Herald does push that balance toward an engine.