Dominion Cards 017 - Moat

[@tonberryking42]

Something worth noting with Mote, is if attacks are present, even if you would normally ignore it, it might be worth picking up anyways if you're on a 5 and 2 start. It's not optimal, but most of the time, being on those starts are generally less than optimal. Granted, in a 2 player game, if you're on the 5/2 or 2/5 split, you might just not buy anything on the 2 money turn, and pick up a Witch on the 5 money turn, and then take advantage of your (functionally, if Witch isn't the 11th card) 9 card deck to catch up on silvers or 3/4 cost cards.

[@DominionCards]

When it comes to Moat I'm not so sure if opportunistic purchases are actually a good idea compared to a card like Cellar. The problem being that as Moat is a weak terminal it can make your hand worse if drawn with other terminals, or even worse you choose to play it and then draw your other better action card dead. Protecting against attacks is not so good if you have to essentially junk yourself with a useless card you'll never play in order to protect against it. As it also needs to be in your starting hand to do any defending, soon you will reach the state where the odds of your one Moat being in your starting hand get low enough that it's unlikely to ever actually do any defending for you.

[@tonberryking42]

It seems most is only really useful for itself when you have other, better reactions that happen to draw you into it, which really just means Diplomat, since Secret Chamber was removed. Which just comes back to the problem that Moat is only as good as the attacks are devastating, and only as useful as other cards in your deck can make it, doesn't it?

[@DominionCards]

Moat can be used as weak terminal draw, but terminal draw is common and almost all other terminal draw is better in some way, so it really struggles to be an action card you want to play compared to its peers. It's true that to use the defensive part of it you really need some way of supporting it. Diplomat's reaction is an interesting one, but Diplomat is also a card that draws you 2 cards, sometimes terminally, but it can also give +2 Actions too so it's often way better than Moat. Blocking attacks in general is often not something you care about. Usually there are no attacks, or the attacks are weak. Generally if attacks are too dominant then the game can stop being interesting so usually there are ways to deal with them other than outright defense cards. Moat is just weak in general, but hey, they can't all be the strongest card ever.

[@BigOllieSpin]

Will you be doing every expansion? Btw this channel deserves more subs and likes

[@DominionCards]

The plan is to do a video on every single card and landscape. But the reality is that this would take forever, so we'll see how far I get.

[@BigOllieSpin]

@@DominionCards If you would do a video a week it would take about 10 years.🤣🤣 If we consider every 2 years a new expansion comes out with max.30 cards each it would take about 3 years more. It's a lot for sure

[@jacobwansleeben3364]

What are your thoughts on opening with Moat alongside a special Treasure Card other than the base Treasure Cards? For example, what about Moat alongside Potion, Investment, or Quarry on a 3/4 split? Or Moat alongside Contraband, Royal Seal, or Sunken Treasure on a 2/5 split?

[@Drecon84]

Moat should also work against Corsair (not sure if it even existed yet when you made this video, but it's there now). The problem with that of course is that you need to have the Moat in hand at the time when you're actually playing treasures, which means you're not drawing cards. That said, maybe there are boards where it's a viable strategy. Never really thought of that.

[@DominionCards]

Corsair did not exist when this video was made (Corsair has only been released for about 6 weeks now). However you are wrong about how Moat works against Corsair, you need Moat in your hand when Corsair is played by your opponent on their turn, not when you are playing treasures on your turn. If you only had to have a Moat in hand when playing treasures, it would be easier to block with Moat as you have a chance to draw it in the middle if your turn, instead Moat is just as bad at blocking against Corsair as it is all other attacks, as it needs to be in your starting hand to block it.

[@Drecon84]

@@DominionCards I see. Thank you for the explanation.