Festival
Festival | |
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Info | |
Cost | |
Type(s) | Action |
Kingdom card? | Yes |
Set | Base |
Illustrator(s) | Marcel-André Casasola Merkle |
Card text | |
+2 Actions +1 Buy + |
Festival is an Action card from the Base set. It gives +2 actions, and so is a village. Since it gives both +actions, +, and +Buy, it's got most of the components of an engine all in one card, just needing to be paired up with a Smithy or other terminal card draw!
Contents |
FAQ
Official FAQ
- You get +2 Actions, +1 Buy, and +.
Other Rules clarifications
Strategy Article
There's no strategy article for Festival.
Festival is a pretty strong and flexible card, but the lack of +1 Card is a significant drawback which makes it into a bit of a finesse card. It becomes very cost-inefficient if you only make use of one of its abilities, and this is a problem which is not always easy to avoid.
A Festival is like a Village, a Silver, and a Market Square
If you were to play Village, Silver, and then Market Square, the end result would be the same. So you need to get the best of one or two features for it to be worthwhile.
- If you're playing Festival as an overpriced Silver, you're not getting your $5 worth.
- If you're just trying to draw your deck and then play a few Gold or a couple Platium, then it's worse than Village at this job.
- If it's the only +Buy on the board, you might want a single Festival if you otherwise have a working engine without it.
If you have strong terminal draw cards, then any time you would benefit from a Village and a Silver, you could benefit from Festival about the same amount on average, with an added +Buy as a bonus. This would normally cost $6 and two buys, or $9 and three buys for all three, making Festival a worthwhile purchase when you can get your money's worth. It can complement ordinary Villages any time you didn't have enough Treasure yet anyway, such as when you trash your Copper. Once you have enough Treasure and +Buy in your deck, you should prefer Village variants over Festival when available.
As another comparison, Festival-Smithy isn't half as reliable as a Laboratory-Grand Market, but it's a lot cheaper. A Cellar or Warehouse can help with this somewhat, but then you lose the extra card. For this reason, it might even take Council Room to make an engine with sifting run reliably with Festival. Still, Festival-Warehouse-Smithy is still handsize-neutral and cycles three bad cards which you couldn't do with Grand Market alone.
Festival in standard deck-drawing engines
As it provides +2 Actions, Festival is often considered a form of village. Like other Villages, it can be used to build action-rich engines, especially deck drawing engines. Because it provides +, +Actions, and +Buy, it can be paired with +Cards to produce a standard deck-drawing engine, and these engines require less coin than usual. Although it does not draw any cards, an engine built around Festival and another card offering +3 Cards will typically be smoother than one built around Village+Draw+Coin, because the +Actions and coin are consolidated into a single card. Unlike Treasures, the of Festival can be magnified with Throne Room or King's Court.
One of the downsides of Festival is its high cost: at it competes with a lot of other strong cards. Since it can be harder to reach than cheaper engine components, it is important to not just consider whether or not a Festival engine is theoretically possible, but whether or not it is reasonable for you to build the engine fast enough to win. Usually, buying the first couple festivals is the key issue: once you have some of them, they will provide enough virtual coin that you're set. The high cost can sometimes make Festival engine strategies a little swingy, as if you are unlucky enough to stay under for several turns, it can cause you to permanently fall behind. Festival also is just too expensive to be gained by gainers under most circumstances.
Festival in other decks
Unlike most other villages, Festival is sometimes even a good buy in a Big Money deck, especially when there are no other desirable cards costing and you are not playing a terminal draw card. The + is as good as Silver, the +Buy is useful, especially in the endgame, and the +Actions can even be helpful in the case of drawing multiple Actions.
Because it decreases your handsize, Festival combos exceptionally with Library, Scholar, and Watchtower. It is also one of the few Action cards that fits well into a deck with Jack of all Trades: Jack decks often struggle with what to buy on a draw of , and Festival is a non-terminal Action providing + without drawing a card, making it better than Gold when drawing it with Jack. The +Buy also helps in the endgame.
Synergies/Combos
- Library, Watchtower, and even Jack of all Trades.
- The usual suspects that disappearing money Actions combine well with: Menagerie, Tactician, Minion
Antisynergies
- Terminal draw Big Money
Versions
English versions
Digital | Text | Release | Date | |
---|---|---|---|---|
+2 Actions. +1 Buy. +. | Dominion 1st Edition | October 2008 | ||
+2 Actions. +1 Buy. +. | Dominion 2nd Edition | October 2016 |
Other language versions
Language | Name | Digital | Text | |
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Chinese | 慶典 (pron. qìngdiǎn, lit. celebration) | |||
Czech | Jarmark | |||
Dutch | Festival | |||
Finnish | Juhlat | |||
French | Festival | |||
German | Jahrmarkt | +2 Aktionen +1 Kauf + | ||
Hungarian | Fesztivál | |||
Italian | Fiera (lit. fair) | |||
Japanese | 祝祭 (pron. shukusai) | +2 アクション。 +1 購入。 +。 | ||
Korean | 축제 (pron. chugje) | |||
Norwegian | Festival | |||
Polish | Festyn (lit. picnic) | |||
Romanian | Festival | |||
Russian | Ярмарка (pron. yarmarka, Smart Ltd) Фестиваль (pron. fyestival, Dominion Online) |
+2 Действия. +1 Покупка. +. | ||
Spanish | Festival |
Trivia
Secret History