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[Aleimon Thimble]

Because only two Nocturne cards have their own topic and that's kinda sad. Let's add some more topics now that we've had a bit of time to try these shiny new Nocturne cards.

So Tragic Hero. What do you think about it?

- With the mandatory trashing if you have 8 or more cards, is it more of a BM card than an engine card?
- How do you circumvent the drawback of having to trash it in an engine?
- When is the drawback actually a boon?
(- If the answer is 'almost never', is it strictly worse than Margrave?)

[Holunder9]

- With the mandatory trashing if you have 8 or more cards, is it more of a BM card than an engine card?

Not necessarily, you just need to constantly buy more if you play a draw engine. You need some payload after all and the situational advantage of Tragic Hero is that you can sometimes draw into the gained Gold.

- How do you circumvent the drawback of having to trash it in an engine?

Buy more, resurrect it via Lurker, Graverobber or Rogue, play it via Necromancer.

- When is the drawback actually a boon?
(- If the answer is 'almost never', is it strictly worse than Margrave?)

If Fortune and Platinum are in the Kingdom or if your only source of decent payload is Gold.

[aku_chi]

- With the mandatory trashing if you have 8 or more cards, is it more of a BM card than an engine card?

The amusing thing is that you usually can't activate the trash condition in a non-engine even if you would want to.

- When is the drawback actually a boon?
(- If the answer is 'almost never', is it strictly worse than Margrave?)

Whenever there is supplemental draw and treasures are good.

[faust]

You can quite easily circumvent the drawback by playing it late if you have an engine with few treasures. You're going to play your deck and then hopefully there will be less than 8 cards left that you cannot play. The fact that you can play it both early (for the draw) and late (mainly for the buy, but also you can probably utilize the overdraw) makes it quite decent.

[faust]

And the drawback is actually a boon when you have an engine and want to add Gold as payload. Then getting a Tragic Hero to trash it and use the Gold in the next turn can easily be better than outright buying the Gold, and is also cheaper.

[4est]

Tragic Hero can set up some powerful mega-turn endings, even just with Golds.  If you're careful about when you play them during the game, you can build until the moment is just right and then pop them all on your last turn for a nice payout.  In these cases, each of your remaining Tragic Heroes basically reads +3 Cards, +1 Buy, +$3, which is excellent for finishing off the Provinces or emptying a third pile.  In the presence of more exotic treasures like Platinum or Horn of Plenty, Tragic Hero mega-turns are even more potent. 

When used as your only draw in an engine, the trashing "drawback" can make playing with Tragic Hero tricky, but rarely unworkable.  Cantrip villages keep your first Tragic Hero each turn safe, and non-drawing villages like Festival, Squire, and Conclave play very nicely (these make Tragic Hero work sort of like a draw-to-X).  With its +Buy and payload generation, Tragic Hero also is a great source of supplemental draw alongside something else.

I feel like the biggest thing with Tragic Hero is: don't be afraid of trashing it or think it's a bad card because it might get trashed.  While you obviously need to be careful not to just mindlessly play these and suddenly lose all your draw midgame, Tragic Hero's treasure gaining is absolutely a feature, not a bug.  Yeah, it's no Margrave, but I mean come on, Margrave is crazy.

[markusin]

The +3 cards and +1 buy you get off Tragic Hero helps you get what you need in hand to accomodate the treasure gain you get when trashing Tragic Hero e.g. strong trashers lining up with the junk it needs to trash. Tragic Hero can basically be used as a delayed Gold for $5 with a one-shot effect that is better than just playing the Gold right away.

[trivialknot]

When Tragic Hero triggers, you trash it and gain a treasure, but gaining a treasure is not contingent on trashing.  In other words, the hero didn't need to die!  It truly is a tragedy.

[crj]

- When is the drawback actually a boon?

The time may have come to start saying "advantage" rather than "boon" in general conversation. /-8

[Cave-o-sapien]

Yeah, it's no Margrave, but I mean come on, Margrave is crazy.

This is the big takeaway for me: Margrave is nuts.

[Chris is me]

No but really, it plays just like a Draw To X card with a fun suicide clause for the endgame.

[Awaclus]

No but really, it plays just like a Draw To X card

No it doesn't, unless you mean X=3 in which case it still doesn't.

[Aleimon Thimble]

Yeah, it's no Margrave, but I mean come on, Margrave is crazy.

This is the big takeaway for me: Margrave is nuts.

Very true.

I like the comparison of Tragic Hero to Draw-to-X cards. They both play well with multiple disappearing Villages, strong trashing, discard for benefit, and being able to play terminal payload cards mid-turn. The difference is that with Draw-to-X you want to diminish your handsize as much as possible and with Tragic Hero you just want it to stay below 6 before playing Tragic Hero. Whether it's 0 or 5 doesn't matter.

The idea of a Tragic Hero megaturn is interesting, it's not as potent as say a Bridge or Hermit megaturn but it could work. Haven't tried it yet.

[Holunder9]

When Tragic Hero triggers, you trash it and gain a treasure, but gaining a treasure is not contingent on trashing.  In other words, the hero didn't need to die!  It truly is a tragedy.

I guess this was an intentional choice by DXV to enable the Necromancer interaction.

[Donald X.]

When Tragic Hero triggers, you trash it and gain a treasure, but gaining a treasure is not contingent on trashing.  In other words, the hero didn't need to die!  It truly is a tragedy.

I guess this was an intentional choice by DXV to enable the Necromancer interaction.

I care more about having the best wording than I do about incidental interactions.

[Holunder9]

So you are saying that the Necromancer and TR interactions were irrelevant and the fact that Tragic Hero did not have
Pixie's wording, i.e. "trash this to gain a Treasure", which looks fine as well is purely coincidental?

[trivialknot]

Pixie's trashing is optional, so it makes sense for it to have an "if you do" clause.

I played a game where Necromancer triggered Pixie (because we initially misread the rules).  It was really strong, but it was fine.

[Chris is me]

So you are saying that the Necromancer and TR interactions were irrelevant and the fact that Tragic Hero did not have
Pixie's wording, i.e. "trash this to gain a Treasure", which looks fine as well is purely coincidental?

“To” is generally used for when you have the choice to do something, to make clear that the effect happens because of your choice. If the effect absolutely must only happen once, like Madman, there tends to be an “if you did”.

You’ll see a lack of “to” in a lot of places with trashing, like Altar.

[Holunder9]

So you are saying that the Necromancer and TR interactions were irrelevant and the fact that Tragic Hero did not have
Pixie's wording, i.e. "trash this to gain a Treasure", which looks fine as well is purely coincidental?

“To” is generally used for when you have the choice to do something, to make clear that the effect happens because of your choice. If the effect absolutely must only happen once, like Madman, there tends to be an “if you did”.

You’ll see a lack of “to” in a lot of places with trashing, like Altar.

Sure, I just thought that it was an intentional design choice to make the Boon-receiving of Pixie un-throneable (and un-necromancable which would be pretty crazy) and the Treasure-gaining of Tragic Hero throneable.

[Donald X.]

So you are saying that the Necromancer and TR interactions were irrelevant and the fact that Tragic Hero did not have
Pixie's wording, i.e. "trash this to gain a Treasure", which looks fine as well is purely coincidental?

Is your guess that I was trying to be intentionally misleading with my reply to your post? Because otherwise, you should know the answer.

A small number of cards actually go out of their way to stop Throne. Tactician, Outpost, Madman, probably a few more. Tragic Hero had no need to do that and so does not. Its wording is just the best wording.

[Commodore Chuckles]

So you are saying that the Necromancer and TR interactions were irrelevant and the fact that Tragic Hero did not have
Pixie's wording, i.e. "trash this to gain a Treasure", which looks fine as well is purely coincidental?

Is your guess that I was trying to be intentionally misleading with my reply to your post? Because otherwise, you should know the answer.

A small number of cards actually go out of their way to stop Throne. Tactician, Outpost, Madman, probably a few more. Tragic Hero had no need to do that and so does not. Its wording is just the best wording.

About Tactician: I've been wondering for a while, why doesn't it just say "if this is the first time you have played Tactician this turn"? I feel like this would simultaneously make it less confusing, eliminate the cheats with Golem and the +Card Token, and also eliminate those annoying times when you forget to leave stuff in your hand. This would also be similar to the way Outpost already does it.

[Holunder9]

So you are saying that the Necromancer and TR interactions were irrelevant and the fact that Tragic Hero did not have
Pixie's wording, i.e. "trash this to gain a Treasure", which looks fine as well is purely coincidental?

Is your guess that I was trying to be intentionally misleading with my reply to your post?

No, I just did not get it after you said that you did not care about incidental interactions so thanks for clarifying that the way Tragic Hero interacts with Throne Room is intentional whereas the Necromancer interaction is a mere coincidence.

[Donald X.]

No, I just did not get it after you said that you did not care about incidental interactions so thanks for clarifying that the way Tragic Hero interacts with Throne Room is intentional whereas the Necromancer interaction is a mere coincidence.

The way Tragic Hero interacts with Throne Room is not intentional, it is random. It is "whatever it turns out to be." Throne Room was not a consideration at all. Tragic Hero has the best wording to communicate the concept of Tragic Hero, absolutely failing to care what that means for Throne Room. It could have gone either way and it would have been fine by me.

[Donald X.]

About Tactician: I've been wondering for a while, why doesn't it just say "if this is the first time you have played Tactician this turn"? I feel like this would simultaneously make it less confusing, eliminate the cheats with Golem and the +Card Token, and also eliminate those annoying times when you forget to leave stuff in your hand. This would also be similar to the way Outpost already does it.

I do not get to consider every hypothetical wording for an effect, and spent less time on considering wordings back then. The premise of Tactician was, discard your hand, but next turn is doubled. Throne Room was too much. Checking to see if you discarded did the trick of making it not Throne-able, yes except when it is. I did not look further.

I am not sure "If this is the first time" is good there, as it looks like you can't possibly play two, so it makes people wonder, what are they missing. There might be a better wording though. I don't care about the Golem / Pathfinding stuff, it's rare enough.

Outpost does not have an optimal wording. If time had permitted I would have tested versions that said e.g. "at the start of that turn, discard down to 3." That's a much simpler way to get the smaller hand into the extra turn, and clarifies various interactions. Time did not permit.

[McGarnacle]

I think people are correct that the key is to realize that the trashing effect is not supposed to always be a drawback. Still, I think this card is weak, especially when it is so similar to Margrave.