First impressions of Dominion: Intrigue

Last night I played a couple of games of the new edition of Dominion: Dominion: Intrigue. I hesitate to call it an expansion because it's really a stand-alone game with an all-new set of 25 kingdom cards as well as complete sets of treasure, curse, and victory cards. Still, it's not completely wrong to call it an expansion either, as the new game has the same rules as the first and the 25 new kingdom cards can be mixed with the original 25 kingdom cards to create nearly endless deck-building possibilities.

As I said, I played twice last night and both games were very enjoyable. The new cards are different enough from the original 25 that, while the game still feels very familiar, it played very differently. Some of the new cards are (how shall I put it?) rather wicked. In our first game, everyone loaded up their decks with the Saboteur, who forces your opponents to flip through their decks until they come upon a card with a cost of 3 or more, trash it and then replace it with a card worth 2 less. One of the effects of this was that it was nearly impossible for players to get Province cards. I believe that the winner of that game only had something like 8 victory points, which is a very low amount. Our second game wasn't quite that extreme but it still felt quite different from games we'd played with the original edition.

My initial impression of the new game is very favorable. While the rules are basically identical, the new cards made for a very different experience, which in my opinion is a great thing. I'm really looking forward to mixing the new cards in with the original cards to see what crazy combinations people come up with. By the way, if you're worried about getting cards from the two sets mixed up: don't be. If you'll look closely on the lower-right of all your Dominion cards, you'll see a small symbol. That symbol identifies which box the cards came from so if you've mixed them, it's very easy to separate them out again when you're done.

If you haven't played the original game then I'd still recommend you pick that one up first, as this edition makes for a slightly more brutal experience, but if you've enjoyed the original and are looking to take it to the next level, then you definitely should pick this one up!