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[popsofctown]

No shelters, no plats.

Cache, Market, Rogue, Ill-gotten gains
Throne Room, Silk Road, Spy
Woodcutter, Sage
Lighthouse

What I actually did was somewhat modified by trying to go easy on a newbie.

IGG goes through Lighthouse, and can often be the answer to something like this.  But one strat for beating that is de-syncing the IGG pile and the curse pile, which is possible here, although difficult.  Spy can support a Rogue to try to find an IGG, desyncing the curses by one.  If you are super lucky, by 2.  You can slow the IGG players 3 pile even more if you pick between Duchies and Silk Roads based on whichever one the rusher is trying to empty.  I think IGG rush is not quite the answer. 

I think you do want some IGGs, but you want them later.  I think you definitely pick up a Market because picking up Lighthouses is pretty sweet.  And I think you want to get like, 2 Provinces, maybe 3, then after that, start buying Coppers, IGGs, and Silky Roads. 

But if your opponent tries to IGG rush, you punish him using Sage, Spy, Throne Room, and Rogue to desync the IGG stack and steal victory cards.  Another important factor is that it's hard for the IGG player to pick up lighthouses, although Rogue is the best terminal.

[Mic Qsenoch]

Your Rogue/Spy plan sounds like it's putting way too much effort into getting a marginal effect. How many Spys are you willing to buy over money? And then you draw them without Rogue and they've done basically nothing for you. The "de-syncing" of one or two curses will not hurt the IGG player significantly (if you are even able to do it at all). The real scare from Rogue is stealing Duchy/Silk Road, and so I agree that Rogue can play a part in a winning deck here, but you have to contest the IGGs (and contest them early). You can't afford to take all that junk while they gain so many copies of IGG (which is great for these long Silk Roads slogs). Your dream of getting 2 or 3 Provinces before buying IGG is unrealistic. You won't be buying Provinces with all those Curses in your deck.

[popsofctown]

One spy.  But I might Throne Room it sometime

[Mic Qsenoch]

One spy.  But I might Throne Room it sometime

I would love to see my opponent buy a Throne Room on this board.

[microman]

Your Rogue/Spy plan sounds like it's putting way too much effort into getting a marginal effect. How many Spys are you willing to buy over money? And then you draw them without Rogue and they've done basically nothing for you. The "de-syncing" of one or two curses will not hurt the IGG player significantly (if you are even able to do it at all). The real scare from Rogue is stealing Duchy/Silk Road, and so I agree that Rogue can play a part in a winning deck here, but you have to contest the IGGs (and contest them early). You can't afford to take all that junk while they gain so many copies of IGG (which is great for these long Silk Roads slogs). Your dream of getting 2 or 3 Provinces before buying IGG is unrealistic. You won't be buying Provinces with all those Curses in your deck.

Thank you Mic Qsenoch for basically summing up what I was going to say.  One thing to add though is if you buy enough lighthouses, with help from having a few markets, you could mostly avoid the attack of the rouge, hopefully preventing your apponent from stealing any of your silk roads.  Not to mention the fact that the will probably picking up cards from the trash that aren't silk roads before it even has a chance to steal silk roads.  Defiantly a long shot strategy if I have ever seen one.  I think IGG is a much safer and better strategy.

[popsofctown]

If you buy lots of Lighthouses as a safety net I don't see why Throne Room is very bad.


I disagree with microman about Lighthouse, if I bought into the IGG strategy Mic Qsenoch proposes, I would definitely want to go whole hog.  I would never buy a Market, because that could be an IGG instead.  And I wouldn't buy a 3$ Lighthouse until my opponent actually picks up an attack because until then it's strictly worse than Silver.

[WanderingWinder]

If you buy lots of Lighthouses as a safety net I don't see why Throne Room is very bad.


I disagree with microman about Lighthouse, if I bought into the IGG strategy Mic Qsenoch proposes, I would definitely want to go whole hog.  I would never buy a Market, because that could be an IGG instead.  And I wouldn't buy a 3$ Lighthouse until my opponent actually picks up an attack because until then it's strictly worse than Silver.

I don't think $2 split over two turns is strictly worse than having it all at once, and this may be one of those situations where the flip would be an improvement - and indeed, I think it would if you could discount the extra missings of the shuffle. However, if you thought spy/rogue were a serious possibility, I would think it would probably do well to get lighthouse from the outset.

The questions I have on this board are whether it's useful to get rogue before your first IGGs (I think it probably isn't, but it wouldn't shock me if it is - you can maybe steal an IGG or two, duchy/SR later), and if it isn't, whether it's worth it to get on your next 5 (I quite doubt it - you are unlikely to hit and even unlikelier to actually steal). So I think largely IGGs, and then planning Duchy/SR and copper gain based on how things are going, how aggressively you need to province, etc.
The spy/rogue thing seems very weak here - you are going to skip their bad cards to try to hit something? And this is supposed to be better than silver in this deck where you are so choked?

[SCSN]

I think Rogue plays no role here whatsoever. Getting it over an IGG early is terrible because it delays getting that Curse into their deck by at least two shuffles, and likely by a whole lot more, and by the time it's even possible for you to trash a Duchy or SR, their deck should be so full of junk that you're unlikely to hit (if not you've likely lost regardless of what you hit).

I don't see why you'd want to "desync" the Curse and IGG piles either. That can be decent as support to a  strategy already superior to IGG, but cannot in itself be a counter to IGG.

And getting a Market sounds even worse than getting a Rogue.

[microman]

If you buy lots of Lighthouses as a safety net I don't see why Throne Room is very bad.


I disagree with microman about Lighthouse, if I bought into the IGG strategy Mic Qsenoch proposes, I would definitely want to go whole hog.  I would never buy a Market, because that could be an IGG instead.  And I wouldn't buy a 3$ Lighthouse until my opponent actually picks up an attack because until then it's strictly worse than Silver.

You make a good point, however The purchases of lighthouses and market would be be completely dependent on when and how many rouges you bought.  IGG would definently be my main focus.  If rouge gave you the choice to attack or gain a card, that would probably change my mind.  It is just to risky otherwise.

[microman]

I think Rogue plays no role here whatsoever. Getting it over an IGG early is terrible because it delays getting that Curse into their deck by at least two shuffles, and likely by a whole lot more, and by the time it's even possible for you to trash a Duchy or SR, their deck should be so full of junk that you're unlikely to hit (if not you've likely lost regardless of what you hit).

I don't see why you'd want to "desync" the Curse and IGG piles either. That can be decent as support to a  strategy already superior to IGG, but cannot in itself be a counter to IGG.

And getting a Market sounds even worse than getting a Rogue.

Yeah, I got to agree the IGG deck should be so junked up that the rouge probably wouldn't hit anything that important,  making it not important to buy any lighthouses in the first place.

[DG]

I'd say that a woodcutter+igg's+silver+lighthouses would be a baseline and I'm not sure that rogues will beat that. The rogue isn't going to get played that many times during the game so the attack isn't going to trash much and the gaining comes too late. One rogue isn't enough and two rogues means skipping two iggs or silk roads.

I don't see any advantage from breaking of the link between the iggs and curses here. That seems to imply that you will be behind on points and unwilling to let your opponent end the game early. The endgame could be pretty complicated in a mirror match but I still don't think that you should be planning to be in a weaker end game position.

[popsofctown]

If you buy lots of Lighthouses as a safety net I don't see why Throne Room is very bad.


I disagree with microman about Lighthouse, if I bought into the IGG strategy Mic Qsenoch proposes, I would definitely want to go whole hog.  I would never buy a Market, because that could be an IGG instead.  And I wouldn't buy a 3$ Lighthouse until my opponent actually picks up an attack because until then it's strictly worse than Silver.

I don't think $2 split over two turns is strictly worse than having it all at once, and this may be one of those situations where the flip would be an improvement - and indeed, I think it would if you could discount the extra missings of the shuffle. However, if you thought spy/rogue were a serious possibility, I would think it would probably do well to get lighthouse from the outset.

The questions I have on this board are whether it's useful to get rogue before your first IGGs (I think it probably isn't, but it wouldn't shock me if it is - you can maybe steal an IGG or two, duchy/SR later), and if it isn't, whether it's worth it to get on your next 5 (I quite doubt it - you are unlikely to hit and even unlikelier to actually steal). So I think largely IGGs, and then planning Duchy/SR and copper gain based on how things are going, how aggressively you need to province, etc.
The spy/rogue thing seems very weak here - you are going to skip their bad cards to try to hit something? And this is supposed to be better than silver in this deck where you are so choked?

Spy is one of my best winrates given available, last I knew of.  One thing that is important to remember about Spy is that in junked decks, it is very likely to be a Lab.  Discarding a junk card from the top of your deck is largely the same as drawing it.  If you would get excited about Vagrant, then you should also get excited about Spy.

I'm not saying Rogue+Spy is definitely definitely a thing here, I just dislike the idea that "choke" is a major contraindication for Spy.  Choke makes the cantrip aspect suck, but it makes the spying effect better, so it's kind of a wash, if not a full on point in Spy's favor.

[WanderingWinder]

If you buy lots of Lighthouses as a safety net I don't see why Throne Room is very bad.


I disagree with microman about Lighthouse, if I bought into the IGG strategy Mic Qsenoch proposes, I would definitely want to go whole hog.  I would never buy a Market, because that could be an IGG instead.  And I wouldn't buy a 3$ Lighthouse until my opponent actually picks up an attack because until then it's strictly worse than Silver.

I don't think $2 split over two turns is strictly worse than having it all at once, and this may be one of those situations where the flip would be an improvement - and indeed, I think it would if you could discount the extra missings of the shuffle. However, if you thought spy/rogue were a serious possibility, I would think it would probably do well to get lighthouse from the outset.

The questions I have on this board are whether it's useful to get rogue before your first IGGs (I think it probably isn't, but it wouldn't shock me if it is - you can maybe steal an IGG or two, duchy/SR later), and if it isn't, whether it's worth it to get on your next 5 (I quite doubt it - you are unlikely to hit and even unlikelier to actually steal). So I think largely IGGs, and then planning Duchy/SR and copper gain based on how things are going, how aggressively you need to province, etc.
The spy/rogue thing seems very weak here - you are going to skip their bad cards to try to hit something? And this is supposed to be better than silver in this deck where you are so choked?

Spy is one of my best winrates given available, last I knew of.  One thing that is important to remember about Spy is that in junked decks, it is very likely to be a Lab.  Discarding a junk card from the top of your deck is largely the same as drawing it.  If you would get excited about Vagrant, then you should also get excited about Spy.

I'm not saying Rogue+Spy is definitely definitely a thing here, I just dislike the idea that "choke" is a major contraindication for Spy.  Choke makes the cantrip aspect suck, but it makes the spying effect better, so it's kind of a wash, if not a full on point in Spy's favor.

It makes it like lab-ish in a situation where lab would be terrible. Still not as good as lab if there's a good card on top, and if you never have a good card on top, you aren't winning anyway..... Seriously, I don't get how rogue and spy is a thing here - you think you will have a high enough spy density to be able to set rogue up reliably? And even then, you only set it up on half the plays, because the other half you are gaining something from the trash? Wouldn't you be better off with silvers?

[popsofctown]

If you buy lots of Lighthouses as a safety net I don't see why Throne Room is very bad.


I disagree with microman about Lighthouse, if I bought into the IGG strategy Mic Qsenoch proposes, I would definitely want to go whole hog.  I would never buy a Market, because that could be an IGG instead.  And I wouldn't buy a 3$ Lighthouse until my opponent actually picks up an attack because until then it's strictly worse than Silver.

I don't think $2 split over two turns is strictly worse than having it all at once, and this may be one of those situations where the flip would be an improvement - and indeed, I think it would if you could discount the extra missings of the shuffle. However, if you thought spy/rogue were a serious possibility, I would think it would probably do well to get lighthouse from the outset.

The questions I have on this board are whether it's useful to get rogue before your first IGGs (I think it probably isn't, but it wouldn't shock me if it is - you can maybe steal an IGG or two, duchy/SR later), and if it isn't, whether it's worth it to get on your next 5 (I quite doubt it - you are unlikely to hit and even unlikelier to actually steal). So I think largely IGGs, and then planning Duchy/SR and copper gain based on how things are going, how aggressively you need to province, etc.
The spy/rogue thing seems very weak here - you are going to skip their bad cards to try to hit something? And this is supposed to be better than silver in this deck where you are so choked?

Spy is one of my best winrates given available, last I knew of.  One thing that is important to remember about Spy is that in junked decks, it is very likely to be a Lab.  Discarding a junk card from the top of your deck is largely the same as drawing it.  If you would get excited about Vagrant, then you should also get excited about Spy.

I'm not saying Rogue+Spy is definitely definitely a thing here, I just dislike the idea that "choke" is a major contraindication for Spy.  Choke makes the cantrip aspect suck, but it makes the spying effect better, so it's kind of a wash, if not a full on point in Spy's favor.

It makes it like lab-ish in a situation where lab would be terrible. Still not as good as lab if there's a good card on top, and if you never have a good card on top, you aren't winning anyway..... Seriously, I don't get how rogue and spy is a thing here - you think you will have a high enough spy density to be able to set rogue up reliably? And even then, you only set it up on half the plays, because the other half you are gaining something from the trash? Wouldn't you be better off with silvers?

I think it takes LOTS of gunk for Lab to be worse than Silver.

And I said max 1 Spy.  The filter effect antistacks.

[SCSN]

I think it takes LOTS of gunk for Lab to be better than Silver.

I assume you mean worse, and you are wrong, since you already start with 10 junk cards. Lab is great for engines, very mediocre for BM and awful for slogs (like most IGG games are).

And I said max 1 Spy.  The filter effect antistacks.

Spy is terrible here. I'd gladly take -10 of them if that were possible.

[popsofctown]

I think it takes LOTS of gunk for Lab to be better than Silver.

I assume you mean worse, and you are wrong, since you already start with 10 junk cards. Lab is great for engines, very mediocre for BM and awful for slogs (like most IGG games are).

And I said max 1 Spy.  The filter effect antistacks.

Spy is terrible here. I'd gladly take -10 of them if that were possible.

Your deck's money density would have to be so poor that you can't even afford Duchy for Lab to be worse than Silver. 

[SCSN]

I think it takes LOTS of gunk for Lab to be better than Silver.

I assume you mean worse, and you are wrong, since you already start with 10 junk cards. Lab is great for engines, very mediocre for BM and awful for slogs (like most IGG games are).

And I said max 1 Spy.  The filter effect antistacks.

Spy is terrible here. I'd gladly take -10 of them if that were possible.

Your deck's money density would have to be so poor that you can't even afford Duchy for Lab to be better than Silver.

This sentence makes so little sense to me that I can't even come up with one plausible suggestion for what you're trying to say.

In any case, the two cards aren't really comparable: in games where you want many Labs you don't want many Silvers, and vice versa.

[scott_pilgrim]

I think it takes LOTS of gunk for Lab to be better than Silver.

I assume you mean worse, and you are wrong, since you already start with 10 junk cards. Lab is great for engines, very mediocre for BM and awful for slogs (like most IGG games are).

And I said max 1 Spy.  The filter effect antistacks.

Spy is terrible here. I'd gladly take -10 of them if that were possible.

Your deck's money density would have to be so poor that you can't even afford Duchy for Lab to be better than Silver.

This sentence makes so little sense to me that I can't even come up with one plausible suggestion for what you're trying to say.

In any case, the two cards aren't really comparable: in games where you want many Labs you don't want many Silvers, and vice versa.

I think what he meant was this:
If your money density is such that you consistently can't afford Duchy, then you have less than $1 per card in your deck.  If you are at that density, playing a lab will get you less than $2 on average, so it will be worse than Silver.

I agree that they aren't comparable.

[SCSN]

I think it takes LOTS of gunk for Lab to be better than Silver.

I assume you mean worse, and you are wrong, since you already start with 10 junk cards. Lab is great for engines, very mediocre for BM and awful for slogs (like most IGG games are).

And I said max 1 Spy.  The filter effect antistacks.

Spy is terrible here. I'd gladly take -10 of them if that were possible.

Your deck's money density would have to be so poor that you can't even afford Duchy for Lab to be better than Silver.

This sentence makes so little sense to me that I can't even come up with one plausible suggestion for what you're trying to say.

In any case, the two cards aren't really comparable: in games where you want many Labs you don't want many Silvers, and vice versa.

I think what he meant was this:
If your money density is such that you consistently can't afford Duchy, then you have less than $1 per card in your deck.  If you are at that density, playing a lab will get you less than $2 on average, so it will be worse than Silver.

Yeah, that's what I figured at first, but he said "better than", not "worse than" Silver.

[popsofctown]

Yeah I'm freudian slipping the opposing viewpoint

[SCSN]

I see. In that case: in slogs your money density often is less than $1/card, especially once you enter the greening stage. This doesn't mean you can't buy Duchies, as variance will often kick you to 5 or more. In fact, buying big VP cards often requires upwards variance (if you have a money density of $8/hand in a BM game, you've overbuilt by alot). This is also why you don't always want to take the Copper in an IGG game: even though it might increase your money density, it will decrease your money variance and thus your potential to get a Province or two and later Duchies.

[eHalcyon]

I think I would go for IGG-Woodcutter with a strong tendency to switch to VP. It would depend on what the opponent is doing. I just don't want to get completely swamped by Curses. Woodcutter is there so I can sometimes get double VP in a turn to go with SR. If my opponent goes Rogue then I may start raking extra Copper with IGG to bloat and make Rogue miss more.

The hardest part for me is when to take SR versus Duchy.