Governor

Governor
Info
Cost
Type(s)	Action
Kingdom card?	Yes
Set	Promo
Illustrator(s)	Harald Lieske
Card text
+1 Action Choose one; you get the version in parentheses: Each player gets +1 (+3) Cards; or each player gains a Silver (Gold); or each player may trash a card from their hand and gain a card costing exactly () more.

Governor is a promotional Action card. It can be a remodeler, a gainer, or a Laboratory variant—it gives you three options, each of which gives you a powerful benefit but gives your opponent a smaller version of the benefit.

FAQ

Official FAQ

• You always get +1 Action.
• Then you either
  • draw three cards and each other player draws a card;
  • or you gain a Gold and each other player gains a Silver;
  • or you may trash a card from your hand and gain a card costing exactly more and each other player may trash a card from his hand and gain a card costing exactly more.
• Go in turn order, starting with yourself; this may matter if piles are low.
• The gained cards come from the Supply and are put into discard piles; if there are none left, those cards are not gained. For example if you choose the second option and there is only one Silver in the Supply, the player to your left gets it and no-one else gets one.
• For the third option, you only gain a card if you trashed a card, and only if there is a card available in the Supply with the exact cost required.
• If you do trash a card, you must gain a card if you can.
• You cannot trash a Governor you played to itself, as it is no longer in your hand when you play it (though you can trash another copy of Governor from your hand).

Other Rules clarifications

• If you play this with Way of the Chameleon and choose the first option, you get +, and each other player gets +1 Card.
• If another player trashes a card and gains a Gondola, that may let them play a Governor. Since it's still your turn, you will get the bonuses from their Governor play first.

Strategy

Governor is a very powerful and flexible card that dominates most Kingdoms where it appears. It provides a source of draw, money, and trashing, for yourself as well as for your opponents. Governor offers all the tools necessary for a megaturn, and games involving it often end quickly on Provinces.

A simple Governor strategy involves gaining 4-6 Governors, gaining several Golds with them, then turning those Golds into Provinces. This becomes much stronger with various types of support.

Using other draw cards, such as Laboratory or a village/terminal draw engine, you can use more of your Governors for Gold-gaining and remodelling. Usually, drawing is the least desirable use of Governor, because it benefits your opponents the most. Despite this drawback, sometimes you’ll need to use Governor’s draw option to kick off your turn. If this is the case, if you have multiple Governors in hand, consider trashing with your Governors before drawing with them, as after drawing a card, your opponents will have more options for cards to trash. Notably, the extra card draw for your opponent can be mitigated with a handsize attack such as Militia, and Governor can be exceptionally strong draw with such effects. In the early and mid-game, you'll typically want to use your first few Governor plays to draw, as free trashing for your opponent is even stronger than free draw and your deck is likely not yet ready to add Golds.

Using Governors to trash your starting cards is often undesirable, both because of the free trashing (usually of Coppers) you provide to your opponents, and because it doesn’t necessarily thin your deck, but instead remodels your cards, thus requiring useful target cards at or . You should therefore aim to trash your Coppers and Estates with other trashers. Turning Golds into Provinces is the main function of Governor’s trashing effect, but you can also turn the Silvers your opponent gives you into more Governors.

The Gold-gaining option of Governor is best used for material to convert into Provinces with Governor’s trashing option. Gaining Golds to help your economy is usually less efficient, but they can help you buy more Governors. The Silver that your opponent gains is usually less impactful than the free trash or free draw from the other Governor options.

For the above reasons, Governor is most effective when viewed as a payload card. Getting other cards before Governor, such as Sentry and Laboratory, can help you first establish deck control. This allows your Governors to operate in a clean deck, using a minimal amount of Governor plays to draw. Ideally, every two plays of Governor yield a Province.

In the endgame, you will want to watch out for your opponent scoring on your turn when you give them the option to trash, usually as a result of you trashing your Golds into Provinces. Common situations to be aware of are cards converting into Duchies and cards such as King's Court converting into Provinces. One way to play around this is to avoid drawing with Governor, as drawing gives your opponent more chances to find cards to trash into Victory cards.

External strategy articles

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

• Robz888's 2012 article
• slides from 2021 coaching session

Versions

English versions

Print	Digital	Text	Release	Date
		+1 Action Choose one; you get the version in parentheses: Each player gets +1 (+3) Cards; or each player gains a Silver (Gold); or each player may trash a card from his hand and gain a card costing exactly () more.	Governor	October 2011
		+1 Action Choose one; you get the version in parentheses: Each player gets +1 (+3) Cards; or each player gains a Silver (Gold); or each player may trash a card from their hand and gain a card costing exactly () more.	Governor (2016 printing)	February 2017

Other language versions

Language	Name	Print	Digital	Text	Notes
Dutch	Gouverneur
Finnish	Kuvernööri
French	Gouverneur			+1 Action Choisissez (vous obtenez la version entre parenthèses) : tous les joueurs obtiennent +1 (+3) Cartes; ou tous les joueurs reçoivent un Argent (Or); ou tous les joueurs peuvent écarter une carte de leur main pour recevoir une carte coûtant exactement () de plus.
German	Gouverneur			+1 Aktion Wähle eins (deine Mitspieler erhalten, was in Klammern angegeben ist): +3 Karten (+1 Karte) oder Nimm dir ein Gold (Silber) oder Jeder Spieler darf eine Karte aus seiner Hand entsorgen und nimmt sich dafür eine Karte, die genau () mehr kostet.	(2011) "...nimmt sich dafür eine Karte,…"
	Gouverneur			+1 Aktion Wähle eins (alle Mitspieler erhalten, was in Klammern angegeben ist): +3 Karten (+1 Karte) oder Nimm dir ein Gold (Silber) oder Jeder Spieler darf eine Handkarte entsorgen und sich dafür eine Karte nehmen, die genau () mehr kostet.	Sammler-Box 2019 "...und sich dafür eine Karte nehmen,…"
	Gouverneur			+1 Aktion Wähle eins, für dich gelten die Angaben in Klammern: Jeder Spieler bekommt +1 (+3) Karten; oder jeder Spieler nimmt sich ein Silber (Gold); oder jeder Spieler darf eine Karte aus seiner Hand entsorgen und sich eine Karte nehmen, die genau () mehr kostet.
Japanese	総督 (pron. sōtoku)			+1 アクション 次のうち1つをあなたが選ぴ、プレイヤーは全員が実行する(あなたは()内の効果を得る):「1(3)枚カードを引く」:「銀貨(金貨)1枚を獲得する」:「手札1枚を廃棄してもよく、廃棄した場合、それよりコストが()高いカード1枚を獲得する」。
Norwegian	Guvernør
Polish	Gubernator			+1 Akcja Wybierz jedną z opcji (otrzymujesz wersję w nawiasie): Każdy z graczy dobiera +1 (+3) kartę; lub każdy z graczy dodaje Srebrnika (Złocisza); lub każdy z graczy może wyrzucić na śmietnisko kartę z ręki i dodać kartę o koszcie wyższym dokładnie o ().
Russian	Губернатор (pron. gubyernator)
Spanish	Gobernador (unreleased)

Trivia

Official card art.

Card Art

The art continues art used for Puerto Rico: Anniversary Edition; the expansion symbol is from its cover.

—Donald X. Vaccarino, 'Art Trivia'

Secret History

So Jay wanted a Carcassonne-related promo for its anniversary and got Walled Village. Then he wanted another promo. The idea behind this promo was, that Stash had gone up at the BGG store paired with blanks, and well let's not do that again. So we needed another promo so it could be paired with Walled Village.

Jay initially thought, well, Power Grid was coming on its 10th anniversary too, or at least the original German version was (Funkenschlag), so how about something that tied in with Power Grid. He wanted it to be a green card of course. And we sat down and talked with Friedemann Friese about what could possibly be done. It wasn't sounding great. The flavor for Power Grid is not medieval, and then there wasn't an obvious mechanical thing to do that connected the games.

I said, are there any other games with anniversaries coming up? And Jay said, as a matter of fact. Puerto Rico was also having an anniversary. And well simulating Puerto Rico on a Dominion card was easy; the only issue was making the text fit, which I cleverly managed via "you get the version in parentheses." So while the previous promos were expansion outtakes, this one is a new card.

The first version of the card had +1 Card +1 Action, with the first option only giving you +2 Cards, i.e. it worked out the same as now if you wanted the cards, but gave you an extra card if you picked one of the other two things. The idea had been, that the bonus the other players get does not involve them spending a card or using an action, so it would be easier to balance the card if it also didn't cost you a card or an action. But the three options were not sufficiently balanced; the Remodel was especially crazy. So now you still get the same total number of cards if you pick cards, but you don't get a free card with your Gold or Remodel.

Governor will show up in the BGG store someday. I don't know if it will be paired with Walled Village, but as you may know, Walled Village has already been available for a while by itself, so it seems unlikely. There's a lesson there for all of us.

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

Why does Governor combo so well with itself?

It was no secret that that combo was there. But the point was really just to provide three good options that worked when it wasn't your turn. The card is imitating Puerto Rico (and has art from Puerto Rico), and came out for some anniversary of Puerto Rico. So it's got that "we all get it but it's better for me" mechanic and then had to do things that actually worked. Drawing cards and gaining silver/gold were automatic, they were terse and compelling. And then what else was there? I hadn't done Remodel yet and it sounded better than Bishop or Duchess.

—Donald X. Vaccarino, Interview with Donald X.

Retrospective

Governor is one of the worst of the powerful cards, but well it's a promo, I can't replace it, I could just try to get Jay not to print them.

—Donald X. Vaccarino, Dominion Discord, 2020