The Board Game Thread

[Jason Waddell]

I played Dominion for the first time last night. I was absolutely abysmal the first game, but won my second. It would have been a landslide victory if I hadn't once forgotten I had a Moat in my hand.

It's a little surprising that I haven't played it sooner, but I quite liked the game. It felt to me like the interaction was a little limited, and that the cards that affected your opponents were generally weaker than the cards that affected your economy. Does this hold at higher levels of play? Are the expansions worth getting?

To me it felt mostly like just building an engine with the right balance of +Actions and +Cards and gold. I enjoyed it, certainly, but am wondering what breadth of strategies exist.

 

[Onderzeeboot]

Attack cards can be really good as well, the Witch really messes up the flow of your opponent's deck and is great for your own deck if you happen to have a few action doublers (Village, etc.)

Imo Seaside is definitely worth getting because of the awesome duration mechanic. It feels a bit more like you're planning. It's full of interesting cards otherwise as well.

In the end though, Dominion is and always will be an engine building game, and you're right that there's a limited breadth of strategies. The only expansion that really solves that a bit is the latest, Empires, I think, as it gives alternate scoring rules that can make games deviate from the usual patterns in a big way. Stuff like (see http://wiki.dominionstrategy.com/index.php/Empires#Events for more)

The developer of the game recommends playing with up to two of these. You can see that these really enforce different play patterns. Where normally you would try to thrash the useless Copper and Estate cards and build a lean deck using Silver and Gold as money and a tight set of actions that work well together, these encourage you to stray from that strategy in different ways from game to game.

 

[Jason Waddell]

Is it tedious to keep track of effects that carry over to the next round?

 

[Aston]

You leave the cards out when you clear your play area so it's not difficult at all.

I love Dominion, it's in my view one of the best and most tightly designed games of the modern era. The interaction seems fairly limited at first to the attack cards, and this is emphasised in the base set because the cards are so straightforward, but with some expansions you have to also keep track of who's winning the splits on piles, what strategy your opponent is going for and any cards available that might help to block it, and timing going for victory cards so that you don't go so early that your deck is clogged up and you can't buy the last few, but not so late you end up too far behind to catch up.

I would also say that although building an engine is a common route, it's not the only route and often not the best on any given kingdom.

 

[Onderzeeboot]

I would also say that although building an engine is a common route, it's not the only route and often not the best on any given kingdom.

I'm curious as to what other routes you are talking about. I mean, some people like to just buy random stuff, but that's hardly a strategy, and certainly not a consistently succesful one. There's of course the famous Silver strategy, I'll concede that that one's not about building an engine, and you could make a case for Gardens and other alternate victory cards, but 9 out of 10 games you're building on interactions between kingdom cards in my experience.

 

[Diakonov]

I think Aston means that it's not purely an engine building exercise (correct me if I'm wrong). I agree with Onder that almost always there are at least 2 or 3 cards that you want to synergize together, but oftentimes it can be better to spend some energy buying a few other cards--particularly disruptive ones--instead of completely focusing on making your engine run more efficiently. For example, if Witch is in the kingdom, then it's often still worth buying a couple even if doesn't integrate very well with the rest of your engine.

Seaside is my favorite Dominion expansion. For the Duration cards, I tap the ones that are from the previous round to distinguish the old from the new.

 

[Aston]

I'm basing it mostly on this dominon strategy article https://dominionstrategy.com/2013/01/21/the-five-fundamental-deck-types-introduction/

Depending on how wide your definition of "engine" is, you could describe decks that fit into some of the other categories as engine decks as well - something like Workshop/Village/Gardens for example, which would otherwise be a rush deck.

 

[Onderzeeboot]

Yeah, I would definitely categorize Workshop/Village/Gardens as an engine deck. And slog decks... well, in my experience I would lable most decks he defines as slog decks failed engine decks (because your opponent's attack cards fuck up your strategy) or engine decks (Duke/Duchy is just another available combo). For me it's like with Magic, just because Ad Nauseam and Amulet Bloom play wildly different games doesn't mean they're not both combo decks. Everything in Dominion revolves around exploiting certain combinations of kingdom cards, except the big money deck. Actually, the big money strategy is my biggest pet peeve in Dominion, because it blatantly ignores (most of) the kingdom cards that make each game of Dominion a new experience. I really dislike that buying two silvers on your first two turns is a valid strategy that will beat buying two kingdom cards most of the time.

 

[Aston]

Big Money might not be all that interesting but it's kind of necessary. It means there's always a baseline route to victory and your goal is to outrace/disrupt it.

The slog decks aren't necessarily failed combo decks. One example is Gardens with I think Beggar, which gives you Coppers when you play it so your goal is to fill your deck with Coppers and outscore your opponent's Provinces with your Gardens. That's not really an engine, as you're just playing one action.

 

[Diakonov]

I really dislike that buying two silvers on your first two turns is a valid strategy that will beat buying two kingdom cards most of the time.

I don't think that's really true most of the time. A 3-cost card may or may not be as strong as a silver in the early game, but many 4-cost cards are stronger than a silver.

 

[FlowerSunRain]

Generally people refer to an engine as a deck with the goal of drawing all of its card every turn. Gardens/Workshop/Village does the exact opposite of this: it bloats the deck and attempts to play as many workshops as possible through virtue of sheer redundancy. An engine doesn't need redundancy in its payload, because if it is working correctly it always always going to draw your entire payload: adding redundancy to your payload just increases your chances that your engine doesn't work.

A lot of the bad experiences with dominion come from the fact that the first set as a self-contained unit hasn't aged well. The expansions are absolutely worth getting.

There are plenty of times building an engine is not the best play on the board. I personally love slogs, because I find it hilarious when people take 3 minute turns trying to build a non-viable engine just because they insist the engine is always viable, then lose by 20+ points. The more expansions you add, they more likely an engine is going to be the right path (because specific combos are less likely to show up and later expansions have more engine friendly cards), but you still have to make sure your engine can get up fast enough to race powerful big money enablers. Also it is very embarrassing when you build an awesome engine before noticing there is no +buy (or other powerful gainers) and can't catch up to your opponent who just bought 2 smithies and money.

Besides the obvious strategic factors of "what's the best deck" and "how do I build it fastest", the biggest strategic concern that develops as you improve in dominion is definitely controlling the end game. The number of games I've won or lost with scores like 3-0 or 7-6 are far from trivial.

 

[Aston]

The most recent "expansion" to Dominion was a patch to the first two expansions, which kind of shows how they haven't aged all that well. I think 5 cards from each have been replaced with similar but better designed versions.

 

[FlowerSunRain]

They each take out 6 cards and give you 7 new ones. Had it been me I would have kept coppersmith and taken out torturer instead, but otherwise they definitely make the game better, even if a few of them aren't inspiring designs.

 

[Diakonov]

Coppersmith is a cool card but pretty weak in only the base set, which I'm sure they assume a lot of people will buy as a standalone game.

 

[FlowerSunRain]

Yeah, its a narrow niche, but its unique. I still keep it in my rotation. It should have +buy though, that would easily double the number of games it gets taken.

 

[Onderzeeboot]

The most recent "expansion" to Dominion was a patch to the first two expansions, which kind of shows how they haven't aged all that well. I think 5 cards from each have been replaced with similar but better designed versions.

Oooh, I missed that one! Nice cards!

 

[Diakonov]

I've been considering an attempt at 18xx. The major issue for us is game length since many of them take 6 hours. GMT recently reprinted 1846, however, which is supposedly a good introduction and should last 3-4 hours. Anyone have any advice?

 

[FlowerSunRain]

1) Poker chips. No excuses for this one.
2) Calculators, paper, and pencil for everyone. Or a spreadsheet on your tablet if you are so inclined.
3) Do no take your first game seriously at all. You are going to make some rules mistakes (probably with share limits, but also possibly with track placements or route calculations). Someone is probably to get buried by an early strategic error (probably with the buying of the first 4 train). The game will probably feel strangely interaction light as each player tunnel visions into making the most money for themselves. Just use your first play to learn the rules and decide if its worth playing again and really delve into figuring out how it works. At least half the people I've played 18XX with never want to play it again. Its about as nichy a game as you can get.
4) Be organized. Spread out the tiles in a sensible array so that its easy to see which are available. Have everyone's shares (including the banks) in clear view so you don't need to waste time asking people what they have. Stagger the train cards so people can see how many are left. Stack the chips so its easy to eyeball the treasuries. The game is long no matter what, but you can easily add an unnecessary hour by not doing things like this.
5) Help each other out. Not within the actual gameplay: 18XX is a cutthroat knifefight. But with the non-gameplay parts of playing the game. Help people add up their routes. Stack their income for them while they are counting their second route. Keep all relevant information you have in front of you clear. Don't tell people what to do, but the rules are complicated and it doesn't hurt to remind people of about ones that they clearly seem to be forgetting (Hey, you know we can upgrade to grey now or Hey those shares are out of the yellow so you're going to have to sell something).

I've never played 1846. A decent intro is 18GA, which is a print and play if your up to slicing tiles.

 

[Diakonov]

Awesome, thanks so much for this. I know it's a pretty serious undertaking for an entire group of first-timers. How does 18xx compare to Indonesia in fun, heaviness, fiddliness, etc? I almost bought Splotter's new printing of that but between the high play time and complaints about components I've hesitated.

 

[FlowerSunRain]

The most fiddly thing about Indonesia was the routes. Routes are easier to do in 18XX because you are only paying one person and finding the ideal route isn't mandatory. I never played 5 player Indonesia, but I imagine its a form of torture. Its harrd to exactly compare them, but when I played Indonesia, I found myself actively noticing and minding all of the fiddly things, I think, because there are fewer conflicts going on to consider so its easier to notice all of the downtime. What leads me to believe this is a good comparison is the fact that the only time I get a similar feeling during 18XX is during the last operating set when all the decisions are done and you're just going through the motions to get the final scores. 18XX has so many little conflicts going on that your mind wanders and even so long with relatively large amounts of downtime, between helping people take their turns and trying to figure out where you can get ahead next turn you don't get bored.

But I'll be fair and just say there are fans of Indonesia and I'm sure they could tell you why its great.

 

[Jason Waddell]

Anyone here play Dominion Online? I bought a 1 month subscription to try out the different sets. Dark Ages (especially Rats) is pretty fun so far.

 

[Aston]

I've played a bit of it, I'm a big fan of Dominion. What's your username? Hit me up in Discord if you want to play.

 

[Diakonov]

I haven't played online since isotropic got squashed. What's the monthly cost?

 

[Jonas]

I played too much Dominion for a while and the game felt pretty solved somehow. There was always and ultimate tactic with the cards on the table. But I haven't played with the new cards, they might make it a better game?

 

[Diakonov]

I haven't played with Adventures or Empires, but the other later expansions did improve the game. "Solvable" kingdoms still come up, but it feels less common than it did with the base set/early expansions. Dark Ages in particular does make the game very different.