General Strategy/Tips

Here are some basic strategies and tips I've learned playing Dominion that may help you master the game (in no particular order)

1. Most beginners to Dominion think it's a good idea to just buy lots of cards and fill up their deck. But this is perhaps the worst thing you can do in Dominion. As your deck gets thicker and thicker, it becomes increasingly difficult to get the cards you want. If you find anything useful to buy with the coins you have, just don't buy anything; It's that simple.
   
   
2. The order of the cards you play is very important.  Don't make the mistake of playing cards that give you more cards, but no actions.  In general, you want to play the cards which give you more actions first and then play the ones which allow you draw additional cards.  There are exceptions to this rule of course which you will learn as you play the game more.
   
   
3. Remember the 8 coin rule.  I got this philosophy that if you got at least 8 coins in your hand when it comes to the buy phase then you should probably buy yourself a province 99% of the time.  There are some rare occasions where you might not; For example, if you had two buys and you need to pick up more actions cards.  But generally it is a good idea to pick up provinces as soon as possible.  Remember that there are only a handful of provinces in the supply, and each province you pick up means that your opponents can't pick it up!  So essentially each province is worth 12 victory points for you!
   
   
4. Deck thinning cards, like chapel, are incredibly powerful. Beginners will find it silly to trash 4 cards for no reason, but this allows you to keep your deck very thin.
   
   
5. When you first start playing the game, you might be thinking I can't trash my estates as I will be losing victory points!  I am going to be blunt with you right now; Estates are pretty useless.  How often do you seen games won by a lone estate?  I hope you said "RARELY!" You get three estates in the beginning of the game which don't do ANYTHING until the end of the game.  What this means is they will be cluttering your deck and making your hands harder to play.  If you consider the fact that they exist in your deck the entire game, it's pretty pointless to have them in your deck right?  My philosophy is always try to get rid of my estates with cards like remodels or chapels as soon as possible.
   
   
6. Learn to shuffle because you will be doing a whole lot of shuffling in Dominion!
   
   
7. When playing games where they are lots of actions, to keep track of the actions you have left it is a good idea to say it out loud.  For example, say "Village 2 actions, Smithy 1 action, Village 2 actions, Village 3 actions" etc.  It really does help!