Silver

Silver
Info
Cost
Type(s)	Treasure
Kingdom card?	No
Set	Base
Illustrator(s)	Ryan Laukat
Card text

Silver is a basic Treasure card included in all games of Dominion. At a cost of and providing , Silver sits between Gold and Copper. Each standalone set comes with 40 Silver cards, and therefore a typical game begins with 40 Silvers in the supply.

Strategy

Silver’s role in a deck fluctuates from moderately effective Treasure payload to actively harmful stop card. Its strength depends on the alternative payload options and how feasible deck control is. In the absence of better alternatives, Silver is best in engines with strong deck control that can tolerate many stop cards, or in money decks that do not attempt to get full deck control.

Silver’s most notable impact is in the opening, where it is an important option because it can help you afford a card on turn 3 or 4. Opening Silver/Silver gives you very good odds (around 91%) to be able to buy a on either turn 3 or turn 4 and a 15% chance to be able to buy a on both turns. If there is a strong card (e.g. Witch) in the Kingdom and no better card to help you afford it (e.g. Stockpile) or more important objective (e.g. trashing with Chapel), opening with Silver(s) can be good, even if you don’t necessarily want them in your deck long-term.

There are several factors to consider when using Silvers in an engine. The general problem with using Treasures as payload is that they’re stop cards, which actively impede deck control, and Silver is no exception. Correctly timing when to obtain them is therefore important: outside of the opening or an attempt to hit a particular early price point (e.g. for Inheritance), Silver is usually gained after deck control has been established. Compared to other stop cards, Silver is not explosively stackable (e.g. Bridge), nor does it offer any flexibility (e.g. Ironworks) or any additional benefit (e.g. Militia); however, it doesn't stress your terminal space like some of these competitors. Another advantage of Silver is that its price of means that many gainers can gain it (including several such as Wayfarer that gain Silver specifically), so gaining and playing a Silver is fairly common. In summary, if there are no better options in the Kingdom for payload, Silver can be serviceable: although it is less efficient in terms of per stop card than Gold, it has a lower opportunity cost.

Silvers are often much better for money decks than for engines, mostly because money decks don’t aim for deck control but just to reliably generate enough for greening. Thus, when playing a money deck, you usually don’t mind the stop card nature of Silver and typically use it as a cost-effective way of increasing the money density of your deck, or expected per stop card. Buying Silvers early and often helps you to afford important cards and Golds in the midgame, further increasing money density enough to afford Provinces. In some cases (e.g. with Delve), Silvers are very easy to gain in bulk and it may be possible to quickly achieve a money density high enough to start greening without adding many other cards. This is known as “Silver flooding”. More commonly, flooding is not a goal, but you’ll still typically add multiple Silvers to your deck over the course of the game for the consistent boost to your money density at a low price. Lastly, Silver is stronger in Kingdoms with strong draw. In Kingdoms with weaker draw, you’ll often need non-Silver cards (often Golds) to get the money density required to green, but with increased hand sizes this money density requirement is lower, meaning Silvers are more impactful.

Notable synergies

• Conquest
• Feodum
• Merchant

Notable anti-synergies

• Bandit Fort

External strategy articles

Note: Article(s) below are by individual authors and may not represent the community's current views on cards, but may provide more in-depth information. Caveat emptor.

• "Beyond Silver", an influential response to the widely criticized "Silver test"

Cards which interact with silver

Since Silver is available in every game of Dominion, several other cards specifically name and interact with it. Most of these allow players to gain Silver, as a way of providing a decent but not overly-powerful benefit.

Cards in italics have been removed.

Silver gainers

• Dominion: Bureaucrat
• Intrigue: Trading Post
• Seaside: Explorer
• Cornucopia: Trusty Steed
• Hinterlands: Jack of All Trades, Trader, Weaver, Embassy
• Dark Ages: Beggar, Squire, Feodum
• Guilds: Masterpiece
• Adventures: Amulet, Treasure Hunter, Trade, Raid
• Empires: Crumbling Castle, Rocks, Delve, Conquest
• Nocturne: Lucky Coin, The Mountain's Gift
• Menagerie: Scrap, Wayfarer, Groom
• Allies: Town Crier
• Plunder: Rich
• Promo: Governor

Other interactions

• Dominion: Merchant
• Seaside: Corsair
• Hinterlands: Noble Brigand, Trader
• Dark Ages: Feodum
• Empires: Aqueduct, Bandit Fort, Palace
• Nocturne: Envious
• Promo: Sauna

Versions

English versions

Print	Digital	Text	Release	Date
			Dominion 1st Edition	October 2008
	never implemented		Base Cards 1st Edition	June 2012
			Dominion 2nd Edition	October 2016
	never implemented		Base Cards 2nd Edition	June 2018

Other language versions

Language	Name	Print	Digital	Text	Notes
Chinese	銀幣 (pron. yínbì)
Czech	Stříbrňák
Dutch	Zilver
Finnish	Hopearaha (lit. silver coin)
French	Argent
German	Silber				(2008)
	Silber				(2019)
Greek	Ασημένιο (pron. asemenio)
Hungarian	Ezüst
Italian	Argento
Japanese	銀貨 (pron. ginka, lit. silver coin)
Korean	은 (pron. eun)
Norwegian	Sølv
Polish	Srebrnik				(2009)
	Srebrniki				(2016)
	Srebrniki				II Edycja (2017)
Romanian	Argint
Russian	Серебро (pron. syeryebro)
Spanish	Plata

Trivia

Official card art.

Secret History

These cards are unchanged from day one. You could argue that the actions got tweaked to fit the treasures. The treasure pile sizes changed to match different estimates for the total set size, and ended up generous on all counts. In development the issue of the names for these came up - is it simpler if it's Copper Mine rather than Copper? In the end you can see that Copper won out. It just makes it a lot easier to name action cards if the treasures are treasures rather than mines.

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