Dominion – Renaissance

About This Content

Renaissance is the twelfth expansion to Dominion. It includes twenty-five new Kingdom cards. There are tokens that let you save coins and actions for later, Projects that grant abilities, and Artifacts to fight over.

It’s a momentous time. Art has been revolutionized by the invention of “perspective,” and also of “funding.” A picture used to be worth a dozen or so words; these new ones are more like a hundred. Oil paintings have gotten so realistic that you’ve hired an artist to do a portrait of you each morning, so you can make sure your hair is good. Busts have gotten better too; no more stopping at the shoulders, they go all the way to the ground.

Science and medicine have advanced; there’s no more superstition, now they know the perfect number of leeches to apply for each ailment. You have a clock accurate to within an hour, and a calendar accurate to within a week. Your physician heals himself, and your barber cuts his own hair. This is truly a golden age.

Mechanics

Renaissance includes some firsts for Dominion such as a Reaction that reacts to being revealed, ways to play Actions during the Buy phase, even a way to keep playing after the game has ended.

Engines

The game is very engine friendly especially with Projects and Artifacts. Here are some of the enginey cards:

• Acting Troupe – Village with flexibility
• Cargo Ship – Handsize boost
• Experiment – Inexpensive drawer
• Hideout – Village and trasher
• Inventor – Discounter and gainer
• Mountain Village – Village with draw from discard
• Priest – Trasher
• Seer – Non terminal drawer
• Academy – +Villagers
• Piazza – Ongoing extra Action
• Innovation – Speeds up Action play
• Citadel – Ongoing doubles and Action

Big Money
Some cards push toward Big Money:

• Spices – Versatile Treasure
• Cathedral – Quick games
• Pageant – Helps odd $ turns
• Guildhall – Rewards Treasure buying

Theme

• 15 unique card-shaped things use tokens
• 9 things produce Coffers: Ducat, Exploration, Guildhall, Pageant, Patron, Silk Merchant, Spices, Swashbuckler, Villain
• 8 things produce Villagers: Academy, Acting Troupe, Exploration, Lackeys, Patron, Recruiter, Sculptor, Silk Merchant
• 1 thing uses tokens in another way: Sinister Plot
• 4 cards get Artifacts: Border Guard, Flag Bearer, Swashbuckler, Treasurer
• 13 things involve trashing: Acting Troupe, Cathedral, Ducat, Flag Bearer, Hideout, Improve, Old Witch, Priest, Recruiter, Research, Sewers, Silk Merchant, Treasurer

Digital Optimizations and Custom Settings

• Old Witch – You can opt to automatically always trash a Curse
• Pageant – You can opt to automatically spend a remaining coin on Coffers
• Sinister Plot- You can opt to automatically add a token to Sinister Plot if it’s empty