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[() | (_) ^/]

I never EVER use Talisman.  Even in situations that I probably should.  Something about buying a Copper-gainer-of-cheap-non-VP-cards just doesn't sit well with my style.

-- Even when there are cheap engine parts (Watchtower, Workers Village, Menagerie, Warehouse, Hamlet, whatever).

-- Even when there are Alt-VPs that like extra Silver and Copper (Duke, Gardens, Silk Road).

I mean seriously, I can handle getting the Quarry, Copper-as-good-as-a-Gold-when-buying-action-cards because when it works, it REALLY works!  Grand Markets!  Markets!  Border Villiage with a sub-$6 Smithy variant!  Governor!  Excellent...

And I actually buy Loan quite a bit... something about the Copper-trasher-of-Copper moves me more than the Copper-gainer-of-cheap-non-VP-cards.

...

And then today, I look at a board and think: oh laud, there's no way I can avoid Talisman on this board.  Throne Room, Workers Villiage, Courtyard, Peddler, Menagerie, Hamlet, Oasis, and VINEYARD!

Menagerie being my favorite card, and the card which (according to CouncilRoom as it is currently constituted) is my highest win-rate-when-bought (prove me wrong!), I had a field day.

Thanks for a good time, Talisman.

How about anyone else?  Does anyone else avoid this card 99% of the time?  (Yes, I know, "it depends.")  Any Talisman lovers out there want to expound on its great merits and help those heathens like myself?

[popsofctown]

Talisman is pretty bad.  I actually don't avoid it a full 99% of the time, more like 85% of the time, but I regret it 14 of those percent points.

[shark_bait]

I just played a game where I *planned* on using Talisman to fuel a Duke Strategy.  I had high hopes that my greater influx of Silver would provide me a more money dense deck that wouldn't stall out on those last few Dukes.  And then I drew my Talisman with a hand that generated $2 the first 3 times.... Yeah, didn't work out so well.

[() | (_) ^/]

I just played a game where I *planned* on using Talisman to fuel a Duke Strategy.  I had high hopes that my greater influx of Silver would provide me a more money dense deck that wouldn't stall out on those last few Dukes.  And then I drew my Talisman with a hand that generated $2 the first 3 times.... Yeah, didn't work out so well.

Bad luck for sure... but did you at least get double coppers?  Not saying that's great, just wondering what you did.

[shark_bait]

Pearl Diver was available and Sea Hag was also a factor, so I went with that in hopes of greater cycling.  Perhaps I should have just went double Copper, but at the time it didn't occur to me to do that. 

[() | (_) ^/]

Pearl Diver was available and Sea Hag was also a factor, so I went with that in hopes of greater cycling.  Perhaps I should have just went double Copper, but at the time it didn't occur to me to do that.

Outside of Gardens and late-game Goons, Double Copper rarely occurs to anyone.

And (as you already know) with the Hag in the game, Copper's value in getting you to $5 each time is severely diminished.  If you were going for Duchy-Duke, so many dead cards are really going to cut into Copper's effectiveness, though not completely.

[Empathy]

Talisman bridge with cantrip 3$ and 5$ come to mind. Definitely fueled more than one bridge combo-deck with stuff like talismaned  apprentice/village or city/wishing well. They key is to get the cards in the right order (depending on how the cards fit, that means bridge or talisman first) and often get 2 talismans to threaten 3-piling or building up to a super-bridge turn. If the other player does not have sufficient +buy and cannot take advantage of the three-piling potential, this dual threat of just 3-piling *or* dragging on the game really makes this shine.

[blueblimp]

Talisman/Quarry is a crazy combo in the right kingdom. I agree that it's usually awful.

[verikt]

talisman quarry (talisman quarry border village!) talisman highway or talisman tactician bridge make for crazy games. Damn shame councilrooms down, I can thing of two or three games I would link to, if I could just remember them.

[verikt]

In a standard province big money game talisman is crap. BUT. That's really the wrong way to look at it. The question is when is buying a $4 card worth one better than silver? What you have to look at is best case scenario vs. worst case scenario.  First question: Are there cards you want more than one of? Then:Are there +buys? Are there decent 3 and two cards? If the only decent 5 card is city or stash, and you have a decent chance of getting two caravans or 2 conspirators for the same price, it definitely makes sense. If you bought a market or a wharf, 2 havens +double silver can also be worth more than a gold, especially with apprentice or spice merchant. Are you going for a specific engine? If you draw talisman 2 c 2 e will buying a  double silver screw you? Do you have any cost reducers? i.e highway/quarry/bridge /princess? Or some way of migitating a bad draw? like develop? (Worst case, develop the talisman) Or apprentice?  I won't say I buy it every time it's there but most of the times I did buy it I didn't regret it.

[aaron0013]

I'm one of the 99.9% guys. The .1% is accounted for in my first few Prosperity games in which I decided not to buy it again unless absolutely necessary. I like the idea of using it with cost reducers. Have to try that sometime!

Edit: somebody want to fill me in on how Talisman, Quarry, Border Village works? I thought the cost reduction worked for the cards gained by the BV too...

[Davio]

I'm also one of the 99.9%.

In fact, I actively look for ways not to buy it as opposed to the other way around.

[dor]

Edit: somebody want to fill me in on how Talisman, Quarry, Border Village works? I thought the cost reduction worked for the cards gained by the BV too...

Quarry reduces the cost of action cards gained by Border Village, but Talisman won't gain you extra cards this way since it triggers on buy, not gain.

[Lekkit]

You'd still get two Border Villages and two Torturers for your Quarry, Talisman and Silver.

[DStu]

Actually, I'm not a big friend of Talisman+Quarry (on their own). When you go for one important card at >$4, you usually are better off with just two Quarries than Talisman+Quarry. Otherwise, the Talisman is just not worth anything if it doesn't collide with the Quarry. And after you have two Quarries and have something to draw them in hand, it's usually too late to go for the Talisman, as you also want to attack that pile of >$4 card, and you only have that much time.

Talisman is usually good if there are >1 piles that you want to race for, because then you have the time for the Talisman to really pay off.  Of course, Quarry can bring that second pile into the region of <=$4,  but more often than not, on these boards, "real" buys are far more valuable than a Talisman. Double Quarry does make any action that cheap that you don't have a problem with paying for many cards, and buys are better massed than Talismans. Now, when you have many buys, and everything is cheap, Talisman is also strong, and I think this is really the only situation where Tallisman is an important investment. But I think it comes after the combo Quarry+"mass buys" and is just the icing on the cake, as all your mass buys are doubled.
But without mass buys, the Talisman usually does not help much, or better said, on such a board I would prefer having a Market or a Worker's Village over a Talisman and a Woodcutter without Villages.

[() | (_) ^/]

...

I guess that is the heart of my gut-level reaction to Talisman... so rarely is it a MUST buy.  I mean, we're here talking about those situations that it is good in, but there are rarely (note my word choice here) situations where it is a MUST buy.

In the end, I'd rather just go the route of buying a copy of the sub-$5 card straight up instead of a Talisman.  Quicker.  In the long-run it might be slower, but it doesn't feel like it too often.

[DStu]

...

I guess that is the heart of my gut-level reaction to Talisman... so rarely is it a MUST buy.  I mean, we're here talking about those situations that it is good in, but there are rarely (note my word choice here) situations where it is a MUST buy.

In the end, I'd rather just go the route of buying a copy of the sub-$5 card straight up instead of a Talisman.  Quicker.  In the long-run it might be slower, but it doesn't feel like it too often.

I overall agree that Talisman is rarely a good buy.  Just one addition to my post above: That was mainly about Quarry+Talisman. I think without Quarry, Talisman can even be important more often. If you are on a board with lots of important $3s and $4s, it might be more difficult to amass that much money that you can mass buys and use every buy to get a $3/4 card. So in this situation, a single Talisman might really double your buys more easily than just buying more Worker's Villages will do.  Because here, you don't only gain the +gain, but also the +$4/3 that the gained card costs. While with double Quarry, the cards usually only costs $1 or even $0 anyway, and as you also need to build up some economy to get these Victory cards later, you should have more $ than you can spend on actions anyway.

[verikt]

Actually, I'm not a big friend of Talisman+Quarry (on their own). When you go for one important card at >$4, you usually are better off with just two Quarries than Talisman+Quarry. Otherwise, the Talisman is just not worth anything if it doesn't collide with the Quarry. And after you have two Quarries and have something to draw them in hand, it's usually too late to go for the Talisman, as you also want to attack that pile of >$4 card, and you only have that much time.

Talisman is usually good if there are >1 piles that you want to race for, because then you have the time for the Talisman to really pay off.  Of course, Quarry can bring that second pile into the region of <=$4,  but more often than not, on these boards, "real" buys are far more valuable than a Talisman. Double Quarry does make any action that cheap that you don't have a problem with paying for many cards, and buys are better massed than Talismans. Now, when you have many buys, and everything is cheap, Talisman is also strong, and I think this is really the only situation where Tallisman is an important investment. But I think it comes after the combo Quarry+"mass buys" and is just the icing on the cake, as all your mass buys are doubled.
But without mass buys, the Talisman usually does not help much, or better said, on such a board I would prefer having a Market or a Worker's Village over a Talisman and a Woodcutter without Villages.

Fairly often I open talisman silver to my opponents quarry silver. With a drop of luck, talisman comes up with 4 and you get double quarry for it. Although I agree that it usually doesn't pay to get as a 3rd 4 coin buy, unless you have very good draw or no +buy.

[Drab Emordnilap]

Fairly often I open talisman silver to my opponents quarry silver. With a drop of luck, talisman comes up with 4 and you get double quarry for it. Although I agree that it usually doesn't pay to get as a 3rd 4 coin buy, unless you have very good draw or no +buy.

Hitting $4 with Talisman misses just as often as hitting $3P for Familiar/Alchemist (although at least you get a consolation prize more often with Talisman).

[jomini]

Talisman is not bad if you need to setup a lot of cheap components in a trimmed deck. It actually works fairly well as something to buy when trashing down if you need to mass a lot of cheap stuff. For instance, chapel/highway/talisman makes for a good shot at winning the highway split as you can buy a talisman on a 4 coin hand and then play it twice for double highway turns. Once you've won the Hwy split, you can rapidly inflate to a massive power engine. This illustration covers two of talismans biggest weaknesses - it loses you buying power early (you don't care as much because you are going to hit 5 coin and double Hwy and then keep trashing) compared to silver and you can't stock up on power cards (like gold, goons, provinces, or strong 5's). Other options can include menage (it is a unique treasure and you like mass menage buys), conspirators (especially if you have decent trashing), things like Hamlet/Watchtower/Baron

Talisman also has a niche use for vastly increasing the 3-pile threat. Suppose you have 6 coin and 3 buys. Normally this means that you can only snap up 3 pawns, adding a single talisman increases this to 6 pawns and adding 2 talisman increases this to 9. Very few cards in dominion can truly multiply both your buys and your coin, talisman is one as long as you buy below 4 coin. Once you have a clear 3 pile threat, your opponent must immediately green to a lead while you can either keep building or pile out. Doing something like Iw for two Talisman can vastly change game tempo.

[aaron0013]

How does Talisman fare in a Duke game? Opening Talisman/Silver would guarantee a bunch of silvers in the future which are great for Dukes.

Talisman is also great in Gardens games (maybe SR games?) with the drawback that you can't gain victory cards with them. It is a great pile to run out because the more you have, the more you can gain.

[Octo]

For some reason this has made me ponder the possibilities of using Talisman to drain the coppers pile, before moving on to Gardens. I wonder how doable that would be.

[Davio]

For some reason this has made me ponder the possibilities of using Talisman to drain the coppers pile, before moving on to Gardens. I wonder how doable that would be.

It takes forever.

There are diminishing returns; the fatter your deck gets, the less often you play your Talismans, the longer it takes.
Are you really going to spend 5 Copper hands on a single Copper or one Gardens?

I believe Talisman/Gardens is futile, unless you include Workshop or Ironworks, but that's cheating.

[Tables]

A little messing around on the simulator, and I have Tailsman/Gardens winning about 12.6/84.9 against BMU. I'm sure I could optimise this quite a bit, and there might be some obvious changes to try that would shoot the winrate up quite a bit, but I haven't spotted them. Draining the coppers seems to be a pretty bad move, it has about a 4% winrate, and that's if you let it grab Woodcutters as well.

Best buying order I could find:
Talisman
Silver if >=2 Talismans
Gardens
Duchy
Silver if >=1 Talisman
Copper if >=2 Talismans
Silver
Copper

Having said that... If you grab 5 Woodcutters between the Talisman and Silver line, the winrate shoots right up to 88%. So I think what makes a big difference is +buy support (no surprise really)

[dondon151]

What if BMU competes for Gardens?