Storyteller
Storyteller | |
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Info | |
Cost | |
Type(s) | Action |
Kingdom card? | Yes |
Set | Adventures |
Illustrator(s) | Claus Stefan |
Card text | |
+1 Action + Play up to 3 Treasures from your hand. Then pay all of your (including the from this) and draw a card per you paid. |
Storyteller is an Action from Adventures. It is a Lab variant that turns the you've generated so far this turn into card draw. It also lets you play up to 3 Treasures first to rack up some , which can allow for some interesting tricks with Kingdom Treasures.
Contents |
FAQ
Official FAQ
- This lets you play Treasures in your Action phase. They go into play and produce , just like Treasures played in the Buy phase.
- Then Storyteller turns all of your into +Cards; for each you have you lose the and get +1 Card.
- For example if you had , you lose the and draw 4 cards. This makes you lose all you have so far that turn, including the you get from playing the Treasures, the + Storyteller gives you directly, and any you made earlier in the turn.
- You can track that the Treasures have been "spent" by putting them under the Storyteller.
- Potions from Alchemy, is not and so is not lost and does not get you any cards. , produced by
Other rules clarifications
- Treasures that play other Treasures (Venture and Counterfeit) allow you to play more than three Treasures for Storyteller.
Strategy
Storyteller offers two primary things:
Storyteller is best in Kingdoms that reward good draw with strong engine payload. Compared to other draw options, Storyteller-based draw can more easily tolerate a lack of Copper thinning. Storyteller also works well in Kingdoms in which Treasures are easy to gain, or when there are Kingdom Treasures that have an important synergy with Storyteller.
Storyteller is a flexible card that lets you convert into draw as needed. In Kingdoms without a source of virtual coin, Storyteller can be thought of as a cantrip that converts Treasures it collides with into sifting or draw. More specifically, Coppers become cantrips, Silvers become Labs, and Golds become double Labs. Storyteller as primary draw is best in decks that can thin out Coppers and other junk and ensure Storyteller collides with more valuable Treasures, either by gaining those Treasures in bulk or through careful shuffle management and deck tracking. Compared to more standard methods of draw, Storyteller lags behind in two aspects:
- dud potential: Laboratories don’t require collision to function, whereas Treasures are stop cards without a Storyteller and a deck with many Treasures has some potential to dud.
- payload alternatives: Engines often have better payload options than Treasures, and would prefer to spend their and gains accordingly. If Storyteller is your primary source of draw, affording all of the Treasures needed alongside normal engine payload can be expensive, especially since you may need to add excess Treasures to reliably draw.
The first problem usually requires specific Kingdom support, with other sifting or topdecking effects being most effective. The second problem can be somewhat mitigated if Treasures are very cheap to gain, with Gold gainers such as Treasure Trove being most effective. If these problems are unaddressed, you might want to look to other options as your primary draw. In the absence of other alternatives, though, Storyteller can still be sufficient for deck control.
Storyteller also allows you to play Treasures outside of the Buy phase, which can lead to interesting synergies. Notably, Capitalism and Crown allow Storyteller to act as a village; Bank can generate large amounts of with Storyteller putting lots of Treasures into play; Horn of Plenty allows gain-and-play strategies, often around copies of itself; and Quarry can lower the of key Action cards for your gainers.
Storyteller is best in the mid- and endgame when you can use more valuable Treasures with it to draw, and usually it is not the first card you should gain. You should add more Storytellers to your deck as you add more Treasures and other cards, to keep your odds of collision high enough to keep your deck functioning.
There are a number of tactical decisions to keep in mind when playing with Storyteller. First, given the tradeoff between drawn cards and your economy, it’s important to keep track of how much draw is left in your deck to avoid accidentally overdrawing with Storyteller. Second, when deciding how many Treasures to play for your Storyteller, you should consider your shuffle situation and whether you’re looking for a particular card. If neither is a concern and you’re simply trying to maximize generated, you should generally play as many Treasures as possible, while still avoiding accidental overdraw. Third, play order of your other -generating Actions is important. For example, playing a Festival before your Storyteller may draw you more cards or be necessary (e.g., to play your terminal gainers), but you might also waste that by accidentally overdrawing. As such, you may prefer to play your Action-based payload after your Storytellers where possible.
Notable synergies
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 or give historical perspective. Caveat emptor.
Versions
English versions
Digital | Text | Release | Date | |
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+1 Action. +. Play up to 3 Treasures from your hand. Pay all of your ; +1 Card per paid. | Adventures 1st Edition | April 2015 | ||
+1 Action. +. Play up to 3 Treasures from your hand. Then pay all of your (including the from this) and draw a card per you paid. | Adventures 2nd Edition | August 2017 |
Other language versions
Trivia
Secret History
Paying coins
Also, originally there was no Buy phase, and buying meant being able to play Treasures. This is why Black Market has a messed-up phrasing that assumes you can play Treasures.
Black Market confuses some people, though again part of that is just a bad phrasing. Also you need extra text to allow Treasures to be played. After Black Market I decided I would just do "discard a card" or "discard a Treasure" in place of "pay ," depending on how generous I was feeling.
"Pay to draw" started out in Prosperity; the card as I had it seemed crazy and I didn't try to fix it up. Stables does it, in a version that only lets you pay once. Then in Adventures I tried "discard Silvers for +2 Cards per," which seemed promising for a bit, and then somehow convinced myself to go for playing treasures and spending again.
So, it was initially a thing, but for the most part I personally find "discard some cards/Treasures" to be simpler and close enough.
Paying has tracking issues, but often you can turn the spent sideways. And there's doing it in the Buy phase.