Nathan (JJ) Shankar | Notes on Dominion

Notes on Dominion

I’m baffled that so many people believe the Dominion base game to be boring. Granted, I haven’t played any of the expansions, so I don’t know how much better they are in comparison. But the Dominion base is an exhilarating and highly-complex game in its own right. I mean, in theory, there are 26 choose 10 possible games that come with the base set, which is somewhere over five million. Mastering it may very well take several years, if not a lifetime.

I was introduced to Dominion by a professor of mine over the summer, and I’m embarrassed to say how many hours I’ve put into it. While my win rate is still quite disappointing, I’ll list some notes from my experience here, mostly aimed at myself.

GENERAL OBSERVATIONS

Fundamentally, the goal of Dominion is to get rid of bad cards and rack up lots of good cards, then use these good cards to buy lots of Provinces. And to do all this quicker than your opponent.
To the above end, it's going to be important to hire the services of a powerful trasher (i.e., Chapel/Sentry) and extra buying power (i.e. Market/Festival) very early on, if possible. Cards such as Moneylender and/or Poacher will help expedite the timeline for nabbing that buying power.
Careful inspection of the kingdom at the start may be the most important part of the game. Based on the cards available, it's crucial to choose a coherent strategy and STICK TO IT. The games where I waver and dabble into multiple kinds of cards usually end up as routs.
That being said, sometimes by midgame (due to either bad luck or subpar execution) you'll find yourself falling behind. In such cases, a pivot in strategy may be warranted. For me this often means stacking up on Gardens and Duchys, trying to go for a three-pile ending.
The ideal outcome of base Dominion is self-propogating. Good cards and buying power beget more buying power and more good cards, which beget more buying power and more good cards, and so on...
Of course, lots of great cards mean nothing if they can't be converted to Provinces. Deciding when to go green can be quite tricky. Unless you have a strategy that can lead to 2 or 3 Province buys in a turn, it usually is best to be the first mover (especially with some Sentries and lots of non-terminals in the hand).
The person who buys the third-to-last Province usually seems to be the one who wins.
While you'll want to trash them early, Estate is actually not a bad card. Late in the game, having a couple more than your opponent can make all the difference. So don't neglect to buy them down the road.
Two silvers (or two Merchants/Vassals, etc.) seem to be superior to one gold the vast majority of the time (I'll need to verify this in simulation, however).

CHAPEL

Becomes pretty useless after the first few rounds, but invaluable in the early game.
Don’t pass up the opportunity to trash weak cards when a Chapel appears in your hand. It will be tempting if you, say, have a hand with a Chapel/3 Coppers/1 Estate to just trash the estate and use the remaining coppers to buy a Silver. But just think: as the game goes on – and you buy more good cards – you’ll have fewer and fewer opportunities to trash so many weak cards in one shot. Trash those coppers!
Don’t overtrash, though. There have been a few embarrassing instances where I trashed all of my coppers without buying enough Silver to compensate, leaving me in the awkward position of having to use a turn to buy a copper.

VASSAL

Another one of my favorites.
It’s quasi-terminal, and can be absolutely deadly in large numbers with a few deck-control cards like Sentry, or a few double action cards like Throne Room or Festival that essentially gives you $4 as well as two cracks at triggering an additional action card.
A strategy with lots of Vassals will probably mostly forgo treasure cards. It’s probably only worth it if there are action-giving buy cards like Festival or Market in the mix. That way, you won’t be stuck being able to buy 1 Province per turn – with a well-executed strategy, a 2 or even 3 Province turn is possible.

GARDENS

Good for the aforementioned “Gardens Rush” strategy, also a discount Duchy (or better!) in many situations.
Therefore, it constitutes a nice pivot strategy. If you’re down by quite a bit in the midgame, stacking up on Gardens can be a good (if somewhat desperate) way to salvage the game and pull out ahead.
Also an interesting card from a defensive standpoint. If your opponent seems to show signs of a Gardens strategy, is it good to start buying them yourself to shut out their source of points? Or better yet: if your opponent seems to have a powerful hand, is it worth buying a Garden just to bait them into buying some Gardens of their own, thus weakening their deck power?

REMODEL

This is the card that I fear most in the Dominion base game.
In the early game, it can serve a similar purpose to Moneylender, but with Estates instead of Provinces. In kingdoms with Villages/Festivals, it can continue to be an effective mechanism for deck improvement.
The late game is when the Remodel is absolutely fearsome. With a few Remodels and Golds in the deck, as well as a couple Villages or Throne Rooms, 2 or 3 Provinces can be gained in rapid fashion.
For this reason, Remodel can be potent in combination with Bandit and Village/Throne Room.
My favorite usage of the Remodel is as follows: if you have a lead over your opponent with only 1 outstanding Province, and you have a Province in your hand, you can remodel the Province for a …. Province. This secures the win. It has to be the most stupid way to end a game of Base Dominion.

ARTISAN

Another card I don’t have very much experience with. I tend to group it in the same category as the Mine – only good with Throne Room/+2 action cards in the deck. In such a case it can be an effective rally-sustainer, as you can buy a $5 non-terminal card and play it in the same turn (at the cost of discarding another one of the cards in your hand, of course).
Of course, if there aren’t many $5 cards in the kingdom to begin with, it’s a ridiculously-overpriced Workshop and there’s no reason to buy it.