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[jotheonah]

http://dominion.isotropic.org/gamelog/201208/20/game-20120820-194015-1ae218cc.html

Thought I'd post this because it's a more intentional strategy than normal for me. Buy all the Labs to draw my deck, Salvager for +Buy and deck thinning, and grab the Treasure Maps for an instant economy. Only squeaked the win, but it did run pretty much as planned.

[philosophyguy]

Your opponent not going for Mountebank had more to do with the win than Treasure Map, IMO. Mountebank is deadly for draw-your-deck engines, and Lab is particularly vulnerable to MB because it only draws 2 cards.

[jotheonah]

Mountebank's not that bad with 4 trashers on the board. There were plenty of ways to get rid of those coppers and curses when I was drawing my whole deck.

But I didn't mean to say Treasure Map was the decisive win, just that it's so often ignorable that it's sort of cool when there's a good way to use it.

[Tdog]

I think a serious Mountebank attack would of killed your engine.

[jotheonah]

How serious a Mountebank attack can you mount with no villages?

[gman314]

Of the four trashers on the board, only one can get rid of two cards at a time. Mountebank gives out two pieces of junk at a time. That means that in order to keep up with a single Mountebank being played once per run through the deck, you need a Trading Post. If your opponent gets two Mountebanks and has no collisions, you would need two Trading Post plays each time through to keep up. Basically, since Mountebank can give 2 pieces of junk per reshuffle, you need some very serious trashing to keep up with it. So, a serious Mountebank attack could be simply two Mountebanks with a bit of trashing support to play them more frequently.

[thirtyseven]

I wonder how good a combo TM/Adventurer would be, on the right (read: weaker) board of course...

[ftl]

You need to get the Treasure Maps to collide somehow.

[jotheonah]

Of the four trashers on the board, only one can get rid of two cards at a time. Mountebank gives out two pieces of junk at a time. That means that in order to keep up with a single Mountebank being played once per run through the deck, you need a Trading Post. If your opponent gets two Mountebanks and has no collisions, you would need two Trading Post plays each time through to keep up. Basically, since Mountebank can give 2 pieces of junk per reshuffle, you need some very serious trashing to keep up with it. So, a serious Mountebank attack could be simply two Mountebanks with a bit of trashing support to play them more frequently.

Except that a lab deck can handle some junk - I was drawing my deck even with seven coppers. And if you have a Curse in hand the Mountebank gives you nothing at all. And as long as I am drawing my deck, I can play my Trading Post every turn, whereas he can only play his Mountebank every reshuffle.

And the Mountebank deck is not really doing that much for the person playing in (his one terminal slot is going to a terminal silver and sometimes they collide, so he only sees them once per reshuffle).

Basically if my opponent had bought a Mountebank, I would have been able to adapt my deck to deal with it pretty easily.

[ftl]

Yeah, once you can draw your whole deck, you can keep drawing it even if mountebanking starts. But I'm not convinced you'd be able to ever get to the point where you draw your whole deck if your opponent spent his first two $5s on two mountebanks, and then labs afterwards to draw them more of ten. You'd just never get to that point. Something simple like mountebank/money with a few labs is pretty brutal at shutting down engines with weak trashing. 

Also, for what it's worth, Trading Post replaces two cards with one, so in terms of drawing your whole deck, it only decreases deck size by 1. Good because it avoids making you spend buys on silver though.

Dunno. I suppose I'd have to try it or sim it to know for sure, but I'd definitely lean towards something based on mountebank+money rather than a draw-your-whole-deck lab engine.

[gman314]

But the junk doesn't come once you have your deck set up. It comes as you're building your deck. Your opponent bought a Trading Post on turn 3, a Lab on turn 4 and played the TP turn 5 and the Lab turn 6. Had those both been Mountebanks, you would have seen 4 pieces of junk in your deck before you really got something nice going (unless you drew your curse after your 6th turn). Your opponent wouldn't have got his turn 6 Gold, but he would still have attacked you quite significantly and you aren't yet in a position to draw your deck. This task of drawing your deck would have been made more difficult by the junk filling it up.

EDIT: Ninja'd by ftl.

[jotheonah]

I have to imagine if my opponent had come out of the gate buying Mountebanks I would have gone for a different strategy entirely.

[ftl]

True, true. Well, it worked and was pretty cool as it was