Plunder

Plunder
Info
Cost
Type(s)	Treasure
Kingdom card?	Yes
Set	Empires
Illustrator(s)	Jessi J
Card text
+1

You may be looking for the 15th expansion, Plunder (expansion)

Plunder is a Treasure card from Empires. It is a Silver variant that also provides a   token. It belongs to a split pile; five copies of Plunder sit under five copies of Encampment.

FAQ

Official FAQ

• This gives you a   token every time you play it.

Strategy

For discussion of Plunder's interaction with Encampment, refer to the Encampment strategy section.

In games where Encampments are desirable and retained, Plunder is likely to be uncovered. This is usually the case in Kingdoms with sources of gains or +Buy, and decent thinning. Plunder offers a theoretically unbounded but slowly accumulating source of alt-VP, bottlenecked by both the number of copies you possess and how consistently you can play them all. As with all stop card payload, playing all of your Plunders consistently is usually dependent on a strong engine, particularly one with good draw. In Kingdoms that offer a megaturn or a fast pileout, Plunder is often too slow to matter.

Because there are only five copies of Plunder, players will end up with an unequal distribution of copies if the pile empties. In Kingdoms where Plunder is important, this may make winning the split more of a consideration than it is with other cards. If your engine can consistently play three Plunders every turn to your opponent’s two, you’ll outscore them in the long run.

Versions

English versions

Print	Digital	Text	Release	Date
		+1	Empires	June 2016

Other language versions

Language	Name	Print	Digital	Text	Notes
Dutch	Plunderen
Finnish	Ryöstösaalis
French	Saccage (lit. pillage)			+1
German	Diebesgut (lit. stolen goods)			+1 -Marker	(2016)
German	Diebesgut (lit. stolen goods)			+1	2. Edition (2021)
Japanese	鹵獲品 (pron. rokakuhin, lit. stolen goods)			+1
Polish	Zdobycz			+1
Russian	Награбленное (pron. nagrablyennoye)

Trivia

Official card art.

Secret History

Plunder meanwhile started out as a treasure giving +1 Buy, and + per Buy you have. It had been its own pile and had seemed cool for a while, but it dominated games, you buy them up as a combo with each other. It's like Bridge but different in lots of ways and in the end stronger. Even the half-pile version bugged me, and finally I replaced it with a straight treasure version of Monument. It cost first but then seemed like it could be . I had already tried a similar card in the set that could sometimes go on your deck when discarded from play, but left that part out for this version.

—Donald X. Vaccarino, The Secret History of the Empires Cards

Relevant outtakes

One of the most significant outtakes was a treasure that gave +1 Buy and produced per Buy you had. So by default it made and a Buy. But with other sources of +Buys it made more . You could just play multiple copies of it and build up. If you think about it, it's like Bridge, but gives you the up front to divide how you want, instead of assigning $1 per purchase. It turns out that's strong. For a long time the card seemed on the edge of acceptable; gradually I got sick of it. I put it in the Plunder slot and then killed it.

—Donald X. Vaccarino, The Secret History of the Empires Cards

Why does it cost 5?

It was initially below Encampment, but being buried felt like it meant it could be . I think it would be too good as a straight but don't really know, we didn't test that.

—Donald X. Vaccarino, Interview with Donald X.