So I just got Dominion: Alchemy, the new expansion for Dominion and had to try it out. The cards look great and add a couple new things to the series, including potions. Potions are a treasure type and most of the cards in Alchemy require a potion plus some regular treasure to buy. Potions themselves cost four treasure to buy.

Another interesting card is Philosopher’s Stone which is worth one treasure for every five cards in your deck and discard piles (rounded down). Waiting for the opponent to count their deck is a little annoying, but the mechanic is still interesting.

Having only played one game I can’t say too much else, but I will write a more comprehensive review once I have had more time to play Dominion: Alchemy and used more of the cards.

I will say potions add to some of the complexity when it comes to cards like Remodel or Workshop (or anything dealing with cost). There is even a decent size write-up about how this works in the rules. Pretty much if there is no potion in the cost of a card you can’t add one. It takes a couple times to get a hold of this, but once you grasp it, it isn’t too bad to translate into game play.

So Kim and I tried the suggested deck – Chemistry Lesson.

The Supply consisted of:
Alchemist, Bureaucrat, Golem, Market, Moat, Philosopher’s Stone, Remodel, University, Witch, Woodcutter

Looking at this Supply and starting with the 2/5 split I bought a Moat and a Market. In the next couple of rounds I bought a potion another Moat and a Golem. It was then that things started to click. I bought a University and each time it came up I grabbed a Market I was pretty much going through most of my deck and drawing between six and ten treasure each time. I added some Gold a couple Silver and even tried the Alchemist (which was probably a mistake).

Kim had a Philosopher’s Stone and some Silver and Gold working for her, but the Golem/Market/Moat combo was helping me churn through my deck and buy Provinces a bit faster then her.

Scores:
Me – 34
Kim – 27