Should I trash Copper or Silver with Mine?

Question

Assuming I've got both Copper and Silver in my hand, which is better to trash in general and why?

Answer 1

I'm going to have to disagree with Pat; I hate having Copper in my deck, and rather have a consistent deck of Silvers. Yes, it's nice if you get Gold - Copper - Copper in your hand, but Silver - Silver - Copper will buy the same amount. Once you start running out of Coppers (or if you only have a Silver in your hand along with the mine), then you can start upgrading to Golds.

It's kind of hard to answer this question in vacuum, because there are so many different possibilities that could make one answer better than the other; for example:

• If you're running an early Moneylender, upgrade the Silver to Gold, and use Moneylender on the Coppers to really ramp up.
• If someone is playing multiple Thiefs, I may not even bother with the Mine. Or if I do get a mine, I'll upgrade Copper to Silver since losing a Silver isn't as bad as losing a Gold.

Answer 2

In general, my preference is to favor upgrading the silver to gold.

My rationale is that I am trying to scale the value pyramid to get to the useful values of coins (5,6,8 typically). With one gold I am likely to reach a good total coin value when the gold is drawn. With the two silver, I'm more likely to have two mediocre hands instead of one good one (if the two silver come in the same hand).

Answer 3

If you have Platinum cards in play, your best bet is to mine Gold ($3) to Platinum ($5). This also applies to mining Silver to Gold so you have the Golds to mine to Platinums.

However, with Prosperity, you may also have other options, such as Silver to Royal Seal or Hoard. Like Gold, Hoard can be mined directly to Platinum, but it also gives you the opportunity to get golds by buying Victory cards.

For the others, most of the time you'll want to mine Silvers to Golds first. Here are just a few cards this applies to:

Trash Coppers:

• Moneylender
• Trading Post
• Mint (to purchase)
• Spice Merchant

Give Coppers to other players:

• Masquerade
• Ambassador

Play specific actions related to Coppers:

• Coppersmith
• Apothecary
• Counting House

Silver/Gold work better with:

• Mint (to play)
• Herbalist

You'll want to mine Copper to Silver first if these cards are in play:

• Saboteur (Silvers prevent other cards from being trashed)
• Swindler (avoid gaining Curses)
• Cutpurse (only discards Copper)
• Forge (Copper is worth 0 for Forging)
• Jester (Enemy gains a Silver instead of you gaining a Copper)

Don't bother with a Mine at all and concentrate more on action cards that give you money if one of these is in play with no defense cards:

• Thief (Trashes up to 1 treasure, opponent has option to gain)
• Pirate Ship (Trashes up to 1 treasure)
• Noble Brigand (Trashes up to 1 Silver or Gold, opponent gains)

Noble Brigand can only steal Silvers and Golds, so mining to non-standard treasures or Platinums is OK.

Answer 4

Statistically, the difference is in the variance of how much money will be in your hand. Assuming no other cards swaying you one way or another (and no Platinum), as other answers have pointed out, regardless of whether you upgrade Copper to Silver or Silver to Gold

• the total money in your deck is increased by 1

• the number of treasure cards in your deck is unchanged

• therefore the average amount of money you'll have in your hand is the same in both cases.

However, the variance of your hands will be different. If you upgrade all your coppers to silvers, the money you draw in hand will be much more consistent than if you upgrade all the way to gold when possible. Keeping some coppers in your deck increases the chances that you won't draw any higher-value treasures -- and increases the chances that you'll draw 2 or 3 golds at once. If all your treasures are silvers, you'll only draw silvers.

It boils down to what distribution of hand values you want. If you want consistent 3-4-5 hands, do copper to silver first, but if you're okay with some 2 hands to also get more 5-6-7-8 hands, go all the way to gold. I'm sure we can all imagine card pools where you'd want to go one way or the other. If you're trying to get a Province or other expensive card (Witch, Goons...) ASAP, go for Golds. If there's 4-cost cards you want to buy several of (maybe Caravan, Bridge, etc.), go for Silvers.

In the realm of unlikely but possible, if you go to Gold first, you run a risk of drawing your Mine with a Gold or two, but no Copper or Silver to trash, but this is a pretty small risk, and you probably won't be unhappy with nothing but Gold in hand anyway.

Answer 5

The decision boils down to a few things, at least for me...

1. extant gold, silver and copper ratio
2. number of remodels in the deck

If I have a lot of copper, I mine the copper into silver.
If I have a lot of silver, I mine the silver into gold.

If I have a remodel, and am near the top of the VP race, having the gold to remodel into a province trumps having more silver.

Another consideration is whether or not there's platinum in play. If platinum is available, moving the silver to gold is more valuable in that it gives me gold to mine into platinum.

Answer 6

If there's the Swindler around, then getting rid of the coppers is of first priority!

Answer 7

In a vacuum, I will always mine Copper to Silver before Silver to Gold. My reasoning is simple: if I have Mines, Silvers can be further Mined and Golds cannot. Since the short-term gain is one coin for that turn either way, I'd rather not dead-end myself by having a Mine with no actionable treasures later on.

Needless to say, the preference is so slight as to be a tie-breaker. Many other circumstances may change my strategy. E.g.:

• I'll always Mine Gold to Platinum if the option is available, since the two-coin gain can have very useful short- and long-term benefits
• Money Lender benefits from having Coppers linger a bit, so if I'm using them, I'll favour Silvers for Mining
• Various other circumstances which other people have already commented on, and which there's no point me rehashing here

Answer 8

I like to trade my coppers to silvers early in the game so I have a more consistent set of resources. Later in the game, I prefer exchanging my silver for gold.

Answer 9

I'd do copper to silver, but I also don't usually buy mine if there aren't any other treasure cards available.

Answer 10

I would argue copper to silver before silver to gold. The copper to silver trade doubles the value of that card, while silver to gold is only a 50% increase.