Candlestick Maker

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Candlestick Maker
Info
Cost
Type(s)	Action
Kingdom card?	Yes
Set	Guilds
Illustrator(s)	Kelli Stakenas
Card text
+1 Action +1 Buy +1 Coffers

Candlestick Maker is an Action card from Guilds. It provides Coffers and non-terminal +buy.

FAQ

Official FAQ

• You get +1 Action and +1 Buy, and add a token to your Coffers mat.

Strategy Article

There is no strategy article yet for Candlestick Maker. Feel free to add your thoughts!

Candlestick Maker is a fairly solid card that is beneficial to most kinds of decks. While it doesn't draw anything, it's non-terminal, so one or two Candlestick Maker rarely get in the way of your engine. The Coin token is a very useful perk that helps add consistency between turns. You can't just buy as many Candlestick Maker as you want - after all, since it doesn't draw anything, it's a "dead" card in your hand in a way, but they're useful as seasoning.

Decks that don't care about, or even value, a reduced hand size are particularly good for Candlestick Maker. Draw-to-X cards, such as Watchtower or Jack of all Trades, work well with CSM. Library in particular works very well as you can bypass further CSM draws if Library used your last Action. Minion decks can nab a +Buy and a Coin token, then discard the current hand to keep cycling.

It is one of the best enablers of a Gardens rush in Dominion. Unlike traditional Gardens enablers, such as Workshop or Woodcutter, Candlestick Maker is non-terminal. You can play Candlestick Maker multiple times per turn, allowing you to gain cards extremely quickly, and in the early game you can buy a or Attack card (such as Militia) to slow your opponent down. Being able to save coin tokens between turns is very useful, as a hand with or in it doesn't make your rush hiccup. Since having more Candlestick Maker is strictly better than Copper, you should buy several (5 or more) Candlestick Makers before rushing the Gardens pile, ensuring ample +Buy and a very large deck very quickly. With Candlestick Maker, it's very possible to hit a 50 card deck well before the 20-turn mark.

Synergies

• Library / Watchtower
• Gardens
• Minion

Antisynergies

• Terminal draw Big Money, to an extent.
• Opposing handsize reduction attacks

Versions

English versions

Print	Digital	Text	Release	Date
		+1 Action. +1 Buy. Take a Coin token.	Guilds 1st Edition	June 2013
		+1 Action. +1 Buy. +1 Coffers.	Guilds 2nd Edition	March 2018

Other language versions

Language	Name	Print	Digital	Text	Notes
Dutch	Kandelaarmaker
Finnish	Kynttilänvalaja (lit. candlemaker)
French	Cirier (lit. candlemaker)
German	Leuchtenmacher			+1 Aktion +1 Kauf Nimm eine Münze.	(2013)
German	Leuchtenmacher			+1 Aktion +1 Kauf +1 Taler	(2019)
Japanese	蝋燭職人 (pron. rōsoku shokunin, lit. candlemaker)			+1 アクション。 +1 購入。 コイントークン1枚を得る。
Korean	촛대제작자 (pron. chosdaejejagja)
Russian	Свечной Мастер (pron. cvyechnoy mastyer, lit. candle master)

Trivia

Official card art.

If you look closely at the art, you'll notice the man depicted is making the candelabra featured on Masterpiece. The cards' art share the same artist.

Secret History

For Alchemy I wanted a single , with a +Buy, and tried "+1 Action +1 Buy +." Some people preferred this to Herbalist, but some people felt like, hey what does this have to do with Potions. And I could make that card later. So I put Herbalist in Alchemy. I next tried the card out in Hinterlands, with "when you gain this, +1 Buy." As recounted in that secret history, some people though it was hilarious that two Highways let you just buy out the pile, but some people abhorred it. I couldn't tell you why, I thought it was hilarious. But the card was just not sufficiently hilarious to live with the hate. I bumped the card out again. Then it seemed like a great fit for Guilds, where the + could become a more exciting "take a Coin token." And here it is.

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