Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[Nukatha]

I was playing some PlunderXCornucopia and had a thought:
Is Sack of Loot just a stealth revision to Bag of Gold? http://forum.dominionstrategy.com/index.php?topic=5799.msg368773#msg368773

[Donald X.]

I was playing some PlunderXCornucopia and had a thought:
Is Sack of Loot just a stealth revision to Bag of Gold? http://forum.dominionstrategy.com/index.php?topic=5799.msg368773#msg368773

The premise wasn't that it was replacing Bag of Gold, but they're sure both uh cloth that you have in a shape that lets it hold treasure for you.

[Joshua]

Any news about a possible new expansion Donald X GOATnnarino

[Donald X.]

Any news about a possible new expansion Donald X GOATnnarino

I expect a new expansion next year.

[NoMoreFun]

Would you support "insurmountable VP lead" being programmed as a win condition in Dominion Online?

[faust]

Would you support "insurmountable VP lead" being programmed as a win condition in Dominion Online?

It is technically possible to have an insurmountable VP lead while being unable to end the game (e.g. you bought Annex with a deck that produced no $), so in some fringe cases this would actually change the game.

More importantly though, this would probably be very annoying to maintain. You have to take trashing attacks into account, and also probably forced play of trashers (e.g. with Golem), and how all this interacts with cost reduction... seems like a signifcant amount of coding would have to be done for each new expansion. I don't think this is realistic even if Donald X. approves.

[Donald X.]

Would you support "insurmountable VP lead" being programmed as a win condition in Dominion Online?

There would be a lot of situations where it would look insurmountable but technically wouldn't be. Or situations where it wouldn't be reasonable to expect the program to figure it out.

It doesn't seem worth pursuing, when the upside is, you don't need to play through your victory, or it breaks ties. I might support an "offer a tie" feature.

[NoMoreFun]

The main thing I had in mind is after you secure more than half the available VP with a megaturn (and there's nothing the other player can do about it), your remaining deck could be awful and you could be slogging for quite a while to get to the end. I try to resign if I notice that I'm behind by more than the available VP and there aren't any trashers etc. that can change that, but sometimes I don't notice.

Speaking of which, has your opinion on VP tracking changed over time?

[Wizard_Amul]

The main thing I had in mind is after you secure more than half the available VP with a megaturn (and there's nothing the other player can do about it), your remaining deck could be awful and you could be slogging for quite a while to get to the end. I try to resign if I notice that I'm behind by more than the available VP and there aren't any trashers etc. that can change that, but sometimes I don't notice.

I see what you mean--it would be a nice feature if possible, but I think this would be hard to program because what about things like Ritual, Wall, Keep, etc. that can change the points without being directly tied to specific VP/curses in the supply?

I like Donald X's suggestion of "offer a tie," since I was thinking about the potential issues with something like Collection+Stampede where the game can be unending (are there any other two card combo cases?).

[GendoIkari]

I might support an "offer a tie" feature.

A drastic change of opinion from the "you must play until you starve" days. 

[Donald X.]

Speaking of which, has your opinion on VP tracking changed over time?

I don't have earlier Donald X. with me, but it's fine; aside from Gardens etc. it's not hard to track it yourself, but I don't need to make people do that. It doesn't so much change how you play, as it means you aren't mumbling scores to yourself.

[Ethan]

The main thing I had in mind is after you secure more than half the available VP with a megaturn (and there's nothing the other player can do about it), your remaining deck could be awful and you could be slogging for quite a while to get to the end. I try to resign if I notice that I'm behind by more than the available VP and there aren't any trashers etc. that can change that, but sometimes I don't notice.

I see what you mean--it would be a nice feature if possible, but I think this would be hard to program because what about things like Ritual, Wall, Keep, etc. that can change the points without being directly tied to specific VP/curses in the supply?

I don't think this is a problem, if any card regarding with changing points, the program may simply not make the judge.

[Holger]

I like Donald X's suggestion of "offer a tie," since I was thinking about the potential issues with something like Collection+Stampede where the game can be unending (are there any other two card combo cases?).

You can replace Stampede by another Horse gainer for another (usually weaker) unending two card combo. There are also older two-card combos that can lead to unending "infinite VP" situations, e.g. Fortress/Bishop and King's Court/Monument. (The latter needs a trasher in the kingdom, but so does Collection/Stampede).

[Will(ow|iam)]

How strong did you think Frigate was during playtesting? How strong do you think Frigate is now?

[faust]

I like Donald X's suggestion of "offer a tie," since I was thinking about the potential issues with something like Collection+Stampede where the game can be unending (are there any other two card combo cases?).

You can replace Stampede by another Horse gainer for another (usually weaker) unending two card combo. There are also older two-card combos that can lead to unending "infinite VP" situations, e.g. Fortress/Bishop and King's Court/Monument. (The latter needs a trasher in the kingdom, but so does Collection/Stampede).

All of your examples tend to benefit from more engine-building however, it is basically never optimal to stop gaining cards. This is different with Collection/Stampede, which is the main problem with that combo.

Also you can Collection/Stampede without a trasher. 10 Horses is enough to draw all your starting cards plus 5 Collections.

[Donald X.]

How strong did you think Frigate was during playtesting? How strong do you think Frigate is now?

During playtesting my guess was that it was on the weak side, though fine. Now, more or less the same. Some people are scared of it, but I endlessly saw tracer build engines despite Frigate being in play every turn. It's an attack card; it's intentionally bothering the other players, that's what attacks do.

[Holger]

I like Donald X's suggestion of "offer a tie," since I was thinking about the potential issues with something like Collection+Stampede where the game can be unending (are there any other two card combo cases?).

You can replace Stampede by another Horse gainer for another (usually weaker) unending two card combo. There are also older two-card combos that can lead to unending "infinite VP" situations, e.g. Fortress/Bishop and King's Court/Monument. (The latter needs a trasher in the kingdom, but so does Collection/Stampede).

All of your examples tend to benefit from more engine-building however, it is basically never optimal to stop gaining cards. This is different with Collection/Stampede, which is the main problem with that combo.

With a golden deck of 5 Fortresses and 4 Bishops, gaining other cards does not help you at all once the Bishops are all gone. Gaining any VP card or terminal card hurts you since it increases the risk of not being able to play all your Bishops each turn. (Adding e.g. a Lab and a 5th Bishop may increase your average VP/turn, but if both players do this, you just get another stalemate.) Of course there are boards where building an engine from the start can win before the golden deck is ready, but not every board supports a stronger engine.

Also you can Collection/Stampede without a trasher. 10 Horses is enough to draw all your starting cards plus 5 Collections.

Right, but only if you manage to buy 5 Collections without a single Silver or other support card in your deck, which would take a very long time without shuffle luck. I suppose you can buy two Silvers in the opening and only get three Collections instead of five, for a 30VP/turn golden deck.

In the end, Collection/Stampede is clearly the strongest unending two-card combo (due to Stampede's anti-engine clause and  the highest VP gain per turn), but it's not the only one.

[Snorka]

When playtesting non-Dominion games, do you feel a need to use external blind playtesters? Or do you trust the people you know to give good feedback? Or some third option I didn't think of?

[Donald X.]

When playtesting non-Dominion games, do you feel a need to use external blind playtesters? Or do you trust the people you know to give good feedback? Or some third option I didn't think of?

It's a good idea to have people who haven't been playtesting the game the whole time try out the intended-to-be-final version. Usually I manage this at least a little.

[Snorka]

Adventures added +1 Card, +1 Action, +1 Buy, +$1 tokens. It added a permanent +Card Duration (Hireling) and a permanent +Action Duration (Champion).
To me, the obvious extension of those new ideas is permanent +Buy and +Coin Durations[..]

Reading through the backlog and this post from 5 years ago predicted Endless Chalice. Cool.

[Nukatha]

Is there any plan for physical reprints of Captain/Prince with the 'Command' type?
I've held off on buying them from BGG because I don't want to cause confusion with new players when using Flagship or Maroon.

[Donald X.]

Is there any plan for physical reprints of Captain/Prince with the 'Command' type?

From my perspective, yes, I'd like the up-to-date wording used the next time they're printed, for all cards. The promos aren't intended to be limited edition; they get reprinted as needed. I don't know what the current stock is though. And the next time they get reprinted, it's possible that we'll miss the step where I say, here is the up-to-date wording.

[Jeebus]

Is there any plan for physical reprints of Captain/Prince with the 'Command' type?
I've held off on buying them from BGG because I don't want to cause confusion with new players when using Flagship or Maroon.

Just play with the text you have. That has always been the way to play Dominion. If someone manages to pull off some loop with Flagship and Captain, great for them - it will surely not happen often, if at all.

[Will(ow|iam)]

To my knowledge, the difference between the prototype version of the game that you play, and the version that we got, is different in the following ways
* Different art, font, icons, aspect ratio, stuff that doesn't matter functionally
* The new expansion(s) you're working on
* Tweaks to a bunch of Hinterlands cards ($2 Mandarin, moving the +Buy from Margrave to Cache, etc.)

Are there any other tweaks? Do your throne rooms secretly say "non-duration"?

[Donald X.]

To my knowledge, the difference between the prototype version of the game that you play, and the version that we got, is different in the following ways
* Different art, font, icons, aspect ratio, stuff that doesn't matter functionally
* The new expansion(s) you're working on
* Tweaks to a bunch of Hinterlands cards ($2 Mandarin, moving the +Buy from Margrave to Cache, etc.)

Are there any other tweaks? Do your throne rooms secretly say "non-duration"?

I don't have those tweaks to the Hinterlands cards - I took them out when I made Hinterlands 2E. My prototype is functionally the same as published cards, except you know, when there's upcoming errata and I already printed it out for myself (and any new cards I have that aren't published yet). In a few cases there was a non-functional wording change I never bothered to print, like an "including this" or something. And I never printed out City with that name (my copies say Boomtown); I think that's the last one of those. At one point I had several wrong names, but finally printed some of them.