I played this set last night with my father and brother.
$6 Farmland
$5 Ill Gotten Gains, Embassy, Bazaar
$4 Trader, Noble Brigand, Caravan
$3 Ambassador, Smugglers
$2 Embarbo
I opened Ambassador/Noble Brigand for some reason. I planned to open Ambassador/Silver, but decided to pick up the Noble Brigand with the expectation that it would be Embargoed very soon (My dad *really* hates that card).
My Dad opened silver/embargo I think. My brother, lucked out with a 5/2 split and opened Ill-Gotten-Gains, Embargo. Ouch.
The game quickly devolved into the worst slog I think I've ever played. As expected, my dad Embargoed Noble Brigand like 4 times. My brother went for smugglers, and Embargoed Gold 3 times. After my dad started buying Traders, I embargoed those, but later realized that it probably would have been a good idea to get at least one myself before embargoing them.
My brother bought I think 4 IGG before I embargoed them, leaving my father and I riddled with curses, while he remained relatively curse free. Embargos ran out, and with 2 Ambassadors--I got rid of all my curses and coppers, Ambassadoring my deck down to a couple silvers, some caravans, Bazaars, 1 noble brigand and an Embassy.
My opponent's decks were grossly large and inefficient. At one point, my dad bought a Gold despite the Embargo, gaining
three curses. My brother smuggled the Gold on his turn
This game lasted a *long* time, and at some point I remembered that I should be trying to end it. So, on a whim, I started buying Farmlands. Keep in mind that my deck probably only had 15-20 cards in it, and with the Embassies and Caravans, I could consistently draw it every turn.
So, long story short, I bought out almost all the Farmlands. And after drawing my whole deck every turn, I said the same thing "Buy a Farmland, Trash a Farmland, Gain a Province" This went on for about 7 provinces, at which point my opponents gave up. The game probably would have ended soon anyway, but it was pretty clear who was going to win.
So postgame analysis, I'm wondering what you guys would have done differently. With the triple Embargo on Golds, it was almost impossible to get my economy up to the point where we could buy Provinces consistently. And at the point where the game was at, I think Farmlands was the best way to go, but I'm just thinking things would have turned out different if I had been more vigilant in the early game.