Man, I'm out of touch with both real life games and 3p games, got 2nd on both accounts.
First game was: Chapel, Sea Hag, Witch, Lab, Merchant Ship, Remodel, Throne Room, Pearl Diver, Cutpurse, Smithy (in order of remembrance).
I opened first Chapel/Sea Hag and bombarded my opponent with Curses. Even got a couple of Throne Rooms to really hammer them.
Opponent behind me went with Chapel/Remodel and nr. 3 opened Chapel/Cutpurse.
I still don't get why I lost, but basically the game went on for so long that my opponent to my left had plenty of time to trash his Curses and his Remodel somehow found his Gold every time so he inched a Province ahead of me. I had a gazillion Pearl Divers, because they were often the only thing I could buy and they were decent TR targets. I ended with 33 points and my nemesis had 36.
I probably misjudged the length of the game. With two opponents not actively helping to drain the Provinces all too quickly and with me taking a long time to build up my economy, my opponent just got the better of me.
Second game was: Ambassador, Festival, Bazaar, Council Room, Chancellor, Island, Gardens, Embargo, Bureaucrat, Smugglers
I opened Ambassador/Silver with a second Ambassador on my first reshuffle. I saw the Gardens/Bureaucrat/Festival sort of combo, but thought it would be just better to Ambassador stuff away. My opponents both had one Ambassador so I felt pretty good. My nemesis double Embargod Gold, but I took one thinking I could return them with Ambassador anyway. After my right opponent (the noob) grabbed an early Gardens I thought they would just contest for them and this would give me a better shot with just the Provinces. I was wrong; he embargoed them and never took a Garden again, leaving my opponent to get 10 with a 69 card deck in the end. With all his Curses he still ended up with 56 points to my 53.
So two losses with 3 points behind due to a couple of miscalculations on my part and probably some awkward shuffling.
We love blaming the Isotropic RNG, but my simple overhand shuffle isn't any better. My Ambassadors always ended up together.
Need to learn to adjust my shuffling not for speed, but for randomness.
Anyway, playing real life Dominion is still much more fun than online and I don't mind losing. It just shows me that both real life and 3p are a different beast than what I'm used to.
