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[flies]

Does the presence of cursing generally make you want to go for an engine more or less? Early cursing makes getting the engine off the ground a lot more difficult, but some engines are only viable because they're able to deliver a lot of consistent attacking. I'm often conflicted when there's an engine on the board but something like Witch there too...do I try to build the engine or just stick with Witch-BM?

Cursing makes for long games which makes it easier to get a high density of cheap engine parts.  Of course, that density is screwed by the curses, but even weak trashing can help a lot over the course of a long game.  (Even transmute can be worth it to trash curses. http://dominionstrategy.com/2012/06/07/alchemy-transmute/ )

Plus, if your draw engine is partly functioning, that can help put the curser in your hand more often so that you win the curse race.

[Drab Emordnilap]

On a related note, it's interesting that olneyce put +actions last on his list.  It seems to me that +Buy is least valued when pricing cards -- consider Knights.  The one with +2 Buys is the only one that costs $4.

Higher price != better. For example: Chapel.

In general, sure.  But what about in the specific case of the Knights?

Buys are valued because they're so essential to build engines. However, if the only +buy on the board is a Knight, you (probably) can't use it to build your engine with. So usually in these cases, players will build decks that don't need +buys.

Now, if Sir Plusbuys does happen to show his face in this game, he's not going to be that valuable, since we've build our decks around not needing extra buys. We'd much rather have a Knight who gave us money or cards. Therefore, he's only worth $4.

EDIT: In the opposite case, where there are other +buys and a deck to build with them, well, you've already got your +buys taken care of, right? Is two more buys really worth $5 to you at that point?

[eHalcyon]

On a related note, it's interesting that olneyce put +actions last on his list.  It seems to me that +Buy is least valued when pricing cards -- consider Knights.  The one with +2 Buys is the only one that costs $4.

Higher price != better. For example: Chapel.

In general, sure.  But what about in the specific case of the Knights?

Buys are valued because they're so essential to build engines. However, if the only +buy on the board is a Knight, you (probably) can't use it to build your engine with. So usually in these cases, players will build decks that don't need +buys.

Now, if Sir Plusbuys does happen to show his face in this game, he's not going to be that valuable, since we've build our decks around not needing extra buys. We'd much rather have a Knight who gave us money or cards. Therefore, he's only worth $4.

EDIT: In the opposite case, where there are other +buys and a deck to build with them, well, you've already got your +buys taken care of, right? Is two more buys really worth $5 to you at that point?

Can't you make the same argument about Action Dame or Sir Cards?

[HiveMindEmulator]

The way I see it, the costing one less thing is just one of the unique aspects of Sir Martin. I don't think there would be anything wrong with having +2 Buys on a knight that costs $5, but they probably wanted to make one cost $4 and thought low cost wasn't enough of a unique benefit to have it be the only unique thing on the card. So they just added it onto the weakest-looking knight.

[eHalcyon]

Which, again, suggests that +Buy looks weakest? That's the question. I don't know the answer.

[aaron0013]

I just like the thought of +2 buys on one card.  But you are right in the aspect of it not being reliable.  Sometimes you will have to go through the entire Knight pile to get him, and even then another Knight can take him out.

[ipofanes]

I don't think that "always buy attacks" is a good rule of thumb, but I do think that it's important to be aware of all the attacks when you plan your strategy. One easy pitfall to fall into when you're new to the game is to only think about your own deck and your own turns and ignore the effects of interaction. At the start of the game, it can be useful to think, for each attack card, "what will I do if he buys this attack?". If you can't think of something good, maybe you should go for that attack in your strategy.

Especially keep in mind that Minion makes end-of-turn top-deckers like Scheme, Herbalist, Alchemist, Inn look ugly.
 

[Davio]

Also note that getting (non-stacking) attacks yourself is progressively worse in multiplayer games if the attacks have a limited benefit to you (they usually do since they're attacks).

I mean, if you played the second Militia of the round right after another guy, you're only hitting the guy who just played the first. Curses also tend to spread less dramatically. If you don't Curse along in a 2p game, it's going to be 10-0. If you don't join in in a 3p game, it's more likely 5-5-10 or 6-6-8. So you only have a 2:1 or 1.3:1 disadvantage instead of infinite:0.

2p is a 0 sum game, meaning: If I attack an opponent, the disadvantge to his deck is a direct advantage to mine. If I give my opponent a Curse, that's pointwise the same as gaining an Estate (without having a dead card in your deck of course). If you give one opponent the last Curse in a 3p game, the other opponent has gained an Estate as well without even doing anything.

[dondon151]

If you don't use a cursing attack in 3-p, you're going to get 10 Curses no matter which way you skew it, barring Moat and Trader. That still makes them more ignorable; however, and I will postulate that the vast majority of the time, where you would go with 2 cursing attacks in 2-p, you should only go with 1 in 3-p.

[HiveMindEmulator]

If you don't use a cursing attack in 3-p, you're going to get 10 Curses no matter which way you skew it, barring Moat and Trader. That still makes them more ignorable; however, and I will postulate that the vast majority of the time, where you would go with 2 cursing attacks in 2-p, you should only go with 1 in 3-p.

I'm not so sure I agree. In 2-p, the second cursing attack card already doesn't buy you that much in terms of Curse split, so the only reason you should really go for it even in 2-p is if there is really nothing else that can be more useful than a 2 curse swing. If that's the case, then it should also be the case at least a fair amount of the time in 3-p. Of course, I feel like you shouldn't go for 2 cursing attack cards that often in 2-p anyway (other than Familiars, which often don't have anything else good at that price point), so it's hard to say what "the vast majority of the time" means...

[DG]

After playing the Goko bots in quite a lot of 3-player cursing games I've revised my opinion on multi player cursing. The bots play some quite ordinary and predictable strategies when it comes to cursing so when you lose to them you can often take stock of what's going on. I'd essentially say that the timing of your purchases, the number of cursing attacks in the various decks, and the remaining curses in stock are more important than a solid rule about buying or one or two cursing attacks. From there you can make better judgements on whether you need one, two, or more.