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[Davio]

Dominion can be a highly complex game.
Cards that are worthless in one setup, can be golden in another.

Recognizing these differences and grabbing these opportunities is what makes good players great.
I don't strive to be a great player, but I try to be a good one.

There are some cards which tend to be in my blind spot more than others and which I undervalue almost always.
I reckon more players have this weakness and they ask themselves: "How can he buy that card?" Only to get clobbered by it in that very game.

I will tell you some of my weaknesses (hey, you can exploit them when you play me!) to learn something myself and to see who else has trouble with what.


I generally have the most problem with Alchemy cards and judging their value correctly, especially Scrying Pool. I see this getting bought when there are no trashers and think to myself "why?". Sure enough, early game, it's no better than a regular Spy, but come mid / end game, it regularly draws 6 cards! I guess it's good in setups with action cards that provide money and with other cantrips. I got creamed by this, Alchemist and Apothecary recently. I only had Alchemists...

Another game with this and Golem didn't end well for me either...


Sometimes, I misjudge the power of Goons. I see my opponents diving into the Copper pile head first and I get a wry smile on my face: "He's polluting his deck, look at him!" I try to get enough good cards to buy a Province with just 3 of them while slowly but surely the cheap piles are emptying... By the time I'm even in Province territory, I'm up against an insurmountable lead. I go Goons myself from time to time, but I'm always hesitant with the Coppers, maybe too hesitant...


Horn of Plenty can be placed here. I guess I just have a hard time with these variable cards. I also disregard Bank often in favor of Gold.

[Razzishi]

Swindler.  I absolutely refuse to buy them, as they are way too high variance for me.  Then today my opponent gets 3 of them, turns my early Hunting Party into a Duchy right after I buy it and eventually turns most of my Copper into Curses in a game without any trashing or other cursing attacks.  It was the major reason behind my loss.

Workshop.  I usually just ignore it without Gardens, but today I faced someone who opened with one and used it to gain a Caravan every time.  I ended up way behind without any really powerful terminals, while he had exactly one that kept raking in the Caravans.

[drg]

Talisman.  I tend to ignore this most of the time, and occasionally it can do sick things.

If you're refusing to buy swindler... better to refuse to play with them, because your opp will crush you with them.

[DG]

I had a problem with pirate ships for a while, generally buying cards which were resilient to pirate attack only to find that my opponent ignored the pirate entirely and made more money. The temptation was then to buy a pirate and cause them trouble, but by that time the game had progressed and there never time for the pirate to work.

[Davio]

Swindler.  I absolutely refuse to buy them, as they are way too high variance for me.  Then today my opponent gets 3 of them, turns my early Hunting Party into a Duchy right after I buy it and eventually turns most of my Copper into Curses in a game without any trashing or other cursing attacks.  It was the major reason behind my loss.

Workshop.  I usually just ignore it without Gardens, but today I faced someone who opened with one and used it to gain a Caravan every time.  I ended up way behind without any really powerful terminals, while he had exactly one that kept raking in the Caravans.

I like Swindlers a lot when there are a lot of good $5 cards that make prime Duchy targets. Swindling to disrupt Minion chains is also pretty nice.

[Superdad]

For swindler, it also depends on what other terminals are options for your deck. If there's no other solid terminal then it's strictly better than silver.

I'll also have a higher propensity to open swindler if I've already seen my opponent open with a 5/2 start. Swindlering a copper into a curse is a pretty solid play, but the potential to swindle his $5 into a duchy is just so devastating it's well worth it IMO.

A combo I really like with Swindler is Upgrade. Swindler gives you $5 just as easily as a silver does, and having a non-terminal $5 to buy is great. Loading up on upgrades also allows you to upgrade any duchies to golds (if he swindles your upgrades into duchies). It also allows you to upgrade your swindlers into $4's if you need to later. Other than that though, I will usually avoid $5's on boards with swindlers if my opponent is swindling too.

[Superdad]

On the topic of blind-spots, I tend to ignore cards like Horn of Plenty and Fairgrounds (possibly to my detriment). For Horn of Plenty, I'm not typically a fan of Workshop-type cards unless there are tons of solid 3/4's to buy and a lack of +buys on the board. I've seen some pretty sick Horn of Plenty decks though.

Beside those, I have a tendency to ignore bad cards that can sometimes be outstanding, such as Coppersmith, Counting House, Chancellor, etc. Then I'll see a Warehouse/Tactician/Coppersmith deck slam down 4 provinces in 10-12 turns. Or a Golem/Chancellor/Counting house deck just wreck face.

My biggest "blind spot" is recognizing when terrible cards are actually very good.

[ackack]

For swindler, it also depends on what other terminals are options for your deck. If there's no other solid terminal then it's strictly better than silver.

Not really, because it often becomes unplayable (or at least highly risky) in the late game, which Silver doesn't. I'd agree that if you don't have other actions you'll want it's a better opener than Silver.

Making your deck somewhat Swindler resistant is usually a good thing, but I think wholesale avoiding of 5s in response to it is throwing the baby out with the bathwater. That's giving up a lot of strength, and unless you're pretty unlucky (or running a deck built on dense population with something like Minion, as Davio points out, or City) you're not going to suffer too much having a normal amount of 5s in your deck. And I've also had several games where the 3 VP from the early Swindler into Duchy have proved to be strategically important, so while it's a good result for the Swindling player, I also don't think it's resignation time if an early 5 gets hit.

[Epoch]

Talisman.  I tend to ignore this most of the time, and occasionally it can do sick things.

Oh god, me too.  I was playing a game which had Caravan, Tournament, and Talisman (and no $5's, I believe, or at least none that stood out), and I opened Silver/Caravan while my opponent opened Silver/Talisman.  My thought process was like, "Haha noob Talisman is weak...  wait...  oh shit."

[Superdad]

Actually, on that board, I would suspect that opening talisman is paramount to conceding the tournament game to the opponent. The talisman opening will be explosive, but will sacrifice a lot of tempo to get going, and will certainly have a hard time producing $8 any time soon.

Talisman/Caravan is solid, but I don't think Talisman/Tournament is very good.

Ideally, Talisman decks want to buy another talisman with their first talisman.
For example,
Turn 1, Silver
Turn 2, Talisman
Turn 3,  Play Talisman gaining 2x talisman
Turn 4, Caravan or Silver
Turn 5, Caravan or Silver
Turn 6, Play triple talisman, gaining four caravans

This is cute and all (and likely devastating, especially if there is a +buy somewhere, or a cheap source of +action/$), but the province deck just bought a turn 6 province, making tournaments a very risky buy.

[WanderingWinder]

Probably you don't want to wait around to have a deck that has 3 talismans in it. 1 is enough.

[Thisisnotasmile]

Yep. And even if you have 3 Talismans, good luck drawing them together with 7 Coppers, 3 Estates, 1 (or 3) Silvers and 2 (or 0) Caravans also in your deck.

[ackack]

I'd agree with the last two posts. The time I've found for Talisman on Talisman action is if you're going Gardens or Vineyards and those are the only options you have for gaining. But those strategies (especially Talisman/Gardens) are quite marginal.

[Superdad]

Talisman doesn't work on Gardens. You'd only get it if there was workshop on the board.

You also don't need to draw triple talisman for it to be strong. Simply drawing them on separate turns will be strong. Going $4 double caravan, $4 double caravan, $4 double caravan is pretty good.

Looking at buying talisman/caravan on your first talisman:

First time through your deck you are down 2 caravans and up 2 talismans.
Second time through your deck you are back to even on caravans and up 2 talismans.
Every time afterwards you are ahead on both.

So I guess it just depends on how fast the board is, and if those talismans are dead cards after the caravan pile is empty. It should be noted that the tempo loss in the first time you buy the talisman is quickly made back up. Note that this is providing you hit $4, so in the event you hit $3 with your talisman the 2nd time through your deck, it is obviously a dangerous play if there are no good $3's to purchase (there's always silver though).

I do think that it's closer than first glance though.

I would lean towards 3 talismans (buying a talisman off your first talisman) if there are good $3's, and/or if there is another good $4. I would lean away from it if there is only one good $4 - at which point I may not even pick up a single talisman though!

[WanderingWinder]

1. The point isn't to talisman gardens, it's to talisman other stuff to make gardens fat. It's not so good by itself, but with other stuff... possible.
2. Most boards are faster than that. Heck big money/caravan by itself might be about as fast.
3. Being ahead on Caravans and talismans is not such a great thing - you really don't want to be ahead on talismans after the caravan (or whatever other stack) runs out - would you want to be ahead on copper?

[Zaphod]

Talisman is also good in conjunction with Bridge or Quarry, where you can buy multiple copies of more expensive cards.  You need a good trasher or a draw engine to ensure they will be played together.

In one game I used Talisman to buy several Worker's Villages and a couple Bishops, thinned my deck out with Bishops so the Worker's Villages were drawn together, used the Talisman to get all the Peddlers in a couple turns, then gradually played the Bishops to trash the Peddlers for five coin apiece.  That was fun.

These are special situations, of course.  In many games, there's nothing costing $4 or less that you would want in abundance, and Talisman is only useful if you use its ability several times.  Furthermore, it usually becomes a fairly worthless card at some point in the game.  I don't buy it often, but can sometimes be valuable.

[Superdad]

1. The point isn't to talisman gardens, it's to talisman other stuff to make gardens fat. It's not so good by itself, but with other stuff... possible.
2. Most boards are faster than that. Heck big money/caravan by itself might be about as fast.
3. Being ahead on Caravans and talismans is not such a great thing - you really don't want to be ahead on talismans after the caravan (or whatever other stack) runs out - would you want to be ahead on copper?

1) Is this still a good idea though? Most turns you'll be buying a gardens, so it doesn't trigger off that. How much excess money is there (in a hand with a "copper") that you can now spend on other cards? Either you are buying a gardens and not triggering the talisman, or you are buying a gardens and two coppers with the talisman provided you have a +buy. I dunno, it seems "okay" at best to me.

2) Sure some are, but some aren't. It's not uncommon to get 6 caravans by turn 7-8, and that's pretty strong and pretty fast, despite the fact that you now have 3 talismans in your deck. This is doubly so if there is a trash for value card that can "upgrade" those talismans after. I do agree with you that most times you want 1 at most... but I think specifically, Caravan is a time when it's okay to pick up three (others likely being stuff like Village/Conspirator, Village/Bishop (lots of food for the bishops), cantrip/peddler - especially a +buy card such as worker's village).

3) I 100% agree with you, and is why I put similar statements into my post (such as "talisman opening will be explosive, but will sacrifice a lot of tempo to get going, and will certainly have a hard time producing $8 any time soon" and " I would lean away from it if there is only one good $4 - at which point I may not even pick up a single talisman though!"


If feels to me like we mostly agree with eachother, and yet are having an argument? haha

[dan11295]

Talisman can also be explosive with Bridge as this allows you to get multiple $5 cards. But beyond this is certain $4 cards as mentioned below, Talisman can often be ignored.

My weakness has been Scrying Pool. Had many games where I ignored it only to have an opponent drawing his deck on me in short order, Have gotten a bit better as of late regarding when to ignore it and when to go for it. Had one game wher a high ranked play (~lvl 38) went for Scrying pool w/Ironworks & Great Hall. Was well and good until the Great Halls were empty.

[ackack]

My weakness has been Scrying Pool. Had many games where I ignored it only to have an opponent drawing his deck on me in short order

Yeah, I often tend to ignore it when it's not an obvious powerhouse (trashing, lots of +$ actions) and get burned on the fairly frequent occasions where it is merely pretty good. On a related note, I think I also undervalue the Spy style attack.

[DG]

The other day I upgraded a couple of my silvers to talismans, drew them into hand and used them to empty a massive number of cards from three supply piles to end the game. That would have been really clever if I hadn't inexplicably left one card in the last supply pile.