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[AJD]

So I played a game with Nomad Camp / Fool's Gold, but no trashing or Warehouse-style filtering or whatever. In a situation like that, I feel like you have to buy Fool's Gold, since if your opponent gets all ten they'll probably dominate and can do it pretty fast; but a 5/5 Fool's Gold split (which is what we got) leaves neither deck with enough to be able to line them up reliably. So—once the Fool's Gold stack is empty, you've got a pretty weak deck. I spent a while not buying Silver after that, since I didn't want to further reduce the probability of my Fool's Golds lining up, but should I have given it up as a lost cause and started buying Silver immediately to pivot into, say, an Oracle/Big-Money deck? (Actually, what I probably should have pivoted into was Nomad Camp / Silk Road, but that won't always be on the board.)

This is actually an actual example of the Prisoner's Dilemma in Dominion: if neither of us buys Fool's Gold, we'll both have better decks than if both of us buy Fool's Gold; but if one buys Fool's Gold and the other doesn't it's very powerful. Or am I wrong about the value of even ten Fool's Golds in an untrimmed deck?

[ackack]

No, conceding all the Fool's Gold is a bad idea.

I think this is the sort of spot where you plan on converting the FGs to Golds whenever given the opportunity.

[Davio]

Ah yes, the prisoner's dilemma, I have it with Nobles as well. Sometimes my opponent decides to dip into them and I know I must follow, because I can't allow my opponent to get all 8, even though Gold often is better for my deck.

[Asklepios]

Nobles not so much so, I'd say, as there's no accumulative effect. In fact, if your opponent over commits to Nobles, you'll probably outpace them with money.

[LastFootnote]

Nobles not so much so, I'd say, as there's no accumulative effect. In fact, if your opponent over commits to Nobles, you'll probably outpace them with money.

Would that this were true, but I have not found it to be the case. Once they can draw their whole deck, they only need a Gold or two to start buying Provinces every turn. Even if you split the Provinces 5/3, their 16 point from Nobles will make up the difference.

[Davio]

Yeah, I thought that in theory the Nobles wouldn't be that much of an advantage, but in practice they really are.

[Robz888]

I've found that the Fool's Gold dilemma is greatly exacerbated in three person games. I played a non-isotropic game recently where two of us ignored Fool's Gold, so the other person got all of them. That person won easily. But had either me or the other guy contested the Fool's Golds, the non-Fool's Gold person would have probably had the strongest deck.

[tlloyd]

Yeah, I thought that in theory the Nobles wouldn't be that much of an advantage, but in practice they really are.

A money-heavy deck beats a deck using two Nobles in the place of one Laboratory. But in a game with other sources of actions and/or other decent drawers, Nobles is pretty strong. However, it's going to take a while to buy all 8 Nobles and get the other villages/drawers to create a deck that draws itself each turn. So either you need decent trashing as well (in which case drawing the whole deck still produces a relatively small payout) or you need +buy and virtual money from the other engine components (fishing village, bazaar). That's a lot of conditions that need to be met before I start fearing a Nobles strategy.

[Razzishi]

I've found that the Fool's Gold dilemma is greatly exacerbated in three person games. I played a non-isotropic game recently where two of us ignored Fool's Gold, so the other person got all of them. That person won easily. But had either me or the other guy contested the Fool's Golds, the non-Fool's Gold person would have probably had the strongest deck.

I mainly play 4 player games live, and Fool's Gold tends to be a non-strategy except that everyone buys a few and turns them into Gold at the first opportunity.  Given that there are many more players out there that can purchase Provinces and that players have very good incentive to not put off Province purchases (there are less to go around in 4 player), they get converted to Gold rather quickly and thus aren't really wasted purchases if you only manage 1 or 2.

[Asklepios]

Yeah, I thought that in theory the Nobles wouldn't be that much of an advantage, but in practice they really are.

A money-heavy deck beats a deck using two Nobles in the place of one Laboratory. But in a game with other sources of actions and/or other decent drawers, Nobles is pretty strong. However, it's going to take a while to buy all 8 Nobles and get the other villages/drawers to create a deck that draws itself each turn. So either you need decent trashing as well (in which case drawing the whole deck still produces a relatively small payout) or you need +buy and virtual money from the other engine components (fishing village, bazaar). That's a lot of conditions that need to be met before I start fearing a Nobles strategy.

This.

Nobles is one of those cards that I'll usually pass up, unless there's other cards in kingdom that really synergise with it. Fishing Village / Nobles is awesome, naturally, but stuff like Village / Nobles? Meh.

The point being, of course, that 16 VP across eight buys isn't that much, so Nobles really has to add to your engine in a strong way to be worthwhile. Same logic applies to Tunnels as well. Sure, the VP is nice, but it can't interfere with your overall pace, so only take those 2VP cards if they work your engine.

Harem is the exception to that rule, of course, as being a money card it works as an almost-gold, and is a decent trade off in almost any province game. I'll almost always start buying Harems over golds as soon as I have one gold in deck.

[DStu]

Harem is the exception to that rule, of course, as being a money card it works as an almost-gold

... also known as "Silver"...