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[rinkworks]

Thanks Rinkworks that's so helpful! 
Could I possibly ask the same question about libraries please?

I've been beaten to it, but I'll second the motion to try out a Festival/Library engine sometime.  They work better still if you have Cellars to toss in too.  I think the conventional wisdom is to have more Festivals than Libraries.  Anyway, they work roughly like a Village/Smithy engine, with two important differences:  (1) Festival awards money, so you don't have to supplement this engine with (as many) Treasure purchases; (2) Festival does NOT offer +Cards, which is why this works better than with a simple Village -- because playing a Festival (or two or three) means that the next Library will draw more cards.

I like Library engines a lot.  They're different.  They don't come up very often, because unlike Village and Smithy there are not lots of alternatives to Library, but they're a lot of fun.  Some of the expansions have other great enablers, like Hamlet and Inn and Warehouse, but Festival and Cellar are perfect for it.

In the absence of engine potential, Library is nice to have as a defense for when Militia and Minion are on the board.

[qmech]

Festival does NOT offer +Cards, which is why this works better than with a simple Village -- because playing a Festival (or two or three) means that the next Library will draw more cards.

This is why Festival is better with Library than with Smithy.  The reason Library is better with Festival than with Village is that they result in the same final hand size but the Festivals provide money—which is your reason (1).  (Or because you get the chance to filter the cards through Library's draw mechanic, but this is less likely to be important if you're only using Base Dominion.)

Whispering to avoid inflaming old arguments.

[ftl]

Dr Who, try this thought experiment with Villages and Smithies: try to imagine a situation where you draw your hand of 5 cards, look at it, and say "Damn, I bought too many of these, I wish some had been money instead!"

Pretty easy, right? If you draw more villages than you have useful actions, well, some of those villages would have been better off as silvers, they did nothing useful for you. If you draw a bunch of smithies, that's even worse, some of them are deadweight. You have to be careful about your balance of villages and smithies, and have to decide whether maintaining that balance is worth it at all or whether it's just better to go pure-money with 1-2 smithies.

Now, try and imagine the same situation with lab. Pretend you've drawn your hand of 5 cards, and you see TOO MANY LABS! Can you imagine actually thinking that in a real game? ...not so easy then, is it. I mean, it'll happen, we can certainly come up with situations like that, but they're exceptions rather than the rule, and in most cases you're happy to see an extra lab in your hand. THAT's why lab costs 5. It would be such a no-brainer to pick up lots and lots of them if they were $4, they have to be in competition with some pretty darn good cards for there to be any hesitation at all about picking them up.

[ftl]

Allow me to throw a tantalizing wrench into the discussion:

I think there's only one card in the main set for $5 that you can argue should cost $4. The others are clearly $5's, they would be $5's today, no question. That other card, I would have to test it, it might just be stuck being a weaker $5, or it might be okay at $4.

Could it be Council Room? Council Room is like "everybody, including yourself, plays a Lab; then, you play a Smithy". It also gives you the +1 buy to make use of your huge hand, but still, would it be overpowered at 4?

I think Mine at 4 would would turn out to be a little bit of a must-buy. Whether you're going for Big Money or an engine, if you can get it as your opener, and it's not competing with the power 5s... I suspect it would be a pretty amazing t1 buy.

[Robz888]

I don't think it could be Council Room. A $4 Council Room has got to be just about a better BM strategy than Smithy. And better for engines.

[Dsell]

I was wondering if it could be market? It's nice but not a power $5. I don't think it would be broken at $4. Obviously it would never work now since it's strictly better than peddler (which didn't exist, and doesn't technically cost $4 but that's what it'd be if the price weren't adjustable) and similar to bazaar and treasury. While it's strictly better than peddler, it's not WAY better.

Other options could be mine or maaaaybe library. Library is usually better than smithy but doesn't stack as well.

[Dsell]

I was wondering if it could be market? It's nice but not a power $5. I don't think it would be broken at $4. Obviously it would never work now since it's strictly better than peddler (which didn't exist, and doesn't technically cost $4 but that's what it'd be if the price weren't adjustable) and similar to bazaar and treasury. While it's strictly better than peddler, it's not WAY better.

Other options could be mine or maaaaybe library. Library is usually better than smithy but doesn't stack as well.

Actually, maybe it did.   

[Robz888]

I'm not so sure it can be Mine, either. Library is not a bad suggestion. It's similar to Smithy, though a little better (cuz it sets aside Actions) and sometimes not as good (doesn't stack the same way).

[jonts26]

I'm almost positive it's Mine. Library is too good for $4.

[blueblimp]

I doubt it's Library, as it also is a really nice counter to handsize reduction, in addition to all the other good things about it.

Compare Mine to Jack: the flavour is similar. Jack trashes Estates, while Mine trashes Coppers. Both give Silvers. Jack replaces itself (usually with a Copper early on), while Mine effectively gives +$1. Even if Mine costs $4, Jack is probably still a better opener overall since I'd rather trash Estates than Coppers.

[Eevee]

Yeah cant be library, no way.

My guess would be mine (cant really be anything else), but I definitely think 5 was the right call.

[iangoth]

If it's not mine (my guess, too) it'd have to be market. If you don't need the +buy, it's an overpriced $4 card.

[Eevee]

If it's not mine (my guess, too) it'd have to be market. If you don't need the +buy, it's an overpriced $4 card.

Thats like saying witch should cost 2 cause if the curses are out, you're just paying for +2 cards.

To be fair, if you are only playing with the base set, +buy is rather weak. 

[blueblimp]

If it's not mine (my guess, too) it'd have to be market. If you don't need the +buy, it's an overpriced $4 card.

Even a no-buy Market would be too good for $4. It'd be a total no-brainer to open Market/Silver on many, many boards. Money-giving cantrips are reserved for higher price points. Tournament is close, but you need to hold back a bit because they become dead later.

[iangoth]

Tournament's prize-gaining ability more than balances the fact they can be blocked later on. A peddler for $4 is a pretty good buy, but it's too weak for $5. Think how often you ignore market and treasury even with their bonuses. Peddler/silver would be a good opening, but you might even prefer silver/silver as an opener if you really needed a strong $5 (peddler's expected $ production is less than silver early on, so your chances of hitting $5 should be less.)

[DStu]

Tournament's prize-gaining ability more than balances the fact they can be blocked later on. A peddler for $4 is a pretty good buy, but it's too weak for $5. Think how often you ignore market and treasury even with their bonuses. Peddler/silver would be a good opening, but you might even prefer silver/silver as an opener if you really needed a strong $5 (peddler's expected $ production is less than silver early on, so your chances of hitting $5 should be less.)

I think nobody denies that it is a strong card for $4. You just don't load up with 10 Tournaments without thinking about it, because you don't need 10 of them to collide (depending on your deck 1-2 might be enough), and they might become dead in the endgame.
A $4 market is much more a no-brainer.

[iangoth]

True enough, but whether you buy one or five, tournament dominates most of the games you see it in because the prizes are so good. A $4 market would be good in most games, but not game winning on its own.

[rinkworks]

I think Tournament is $4 more for fair accessibility than power level.

Anyway, count me among those who are basically positive the card Donald was talking about was Mine.  It's still a $5 card, but it's definitely the weakest of the $5 cards in the base set and the only one I don't think would break at $4.

[Powerman]

Could it be Witch?  While it is already an extremely strong card at $5, does it really get that much stronger at 4?  I mean, a player still will only want 1 or 2 of them, and it eliminates a lot of the luck in getting one.  It doesn't make it any more of a "must-buy" and it doesn't seem to break it (within the base set).  I mean, it's perfectly acceptable at 5, but is it less acceptable at 4?

[WanderingWinder]

Could it be Witch?  While it is already an extremely strong card at $5, does it really get that much stronger at 4?  I mean, a player still will only want 1 or 2 of them, and it eliminates a lot of the luck in getting one.  It doesn't make it any more of a "must-buy" and it doesn't seem to break it (within the base set).  I mean, it's perfectly acceptable at 5, but is it less acceptable at 4?

It can't be witch. It's really strong at 5, it would be stupid at 4.

[zahlman]

It can't be witch. It's really strong at 5, it would be stupid at 4.

Definitely. In fact I think I recall something from the secret history about it being tried at 4 and everyone really, really hating it.

Anyway, count me among those who are basically positive the card Donald was talking about was Mine.  It's still a $5 card, but it's definitely the weakest of the $5 cards in the base set and the only one I don't think would break at $4.

Hmm. We can change cost parameters etc. with the simulators, right? I'm thinking, hack in a $4 Mine and test BM+Mine vs BM+Smithy on a 4/3 opening...

[popsofctown]

Vote: Mine

Not a real 5, just a 4 who wants to catch us with our backs turned.

[blueblimp]

Could it be Witch?  While it is already an extremely strong card at $5, does it really get that much stronger at 4?  I mean, a player still will only want 1 or 2 of them, and it eliminates a lot of the luck in getting one.  It doesn't make it any more of a "must-buy" and it doesn't seem to break it (within the base set).  I mean, it's perfectly acceptable at 5, but is it less acceptable at 4?

I'm going to take the existence of Young Witch, a $4 that is on most boards strictly worse than Witch (except in special cases where you want the discard, like Tunnel), to mean that Donald X. still considers Witch appropriately priced.