congrats to Something_Smart with Crumbling city 
As X-tra's comments on Dark Path are very long I have the wish to add the idea although I thought that it is clear.
[...]
Dark Path (Traveller)
The two Vanilla effects are: 
and +1 Buy.
Well this is pretty exotic. I mean, I know what you’re doing here, but this is very hard to play it in my head. It messes a lot with the Curse givers like Witch since you can now choose to take a Dark Path instead. It’s not too hard to exchange these since they are all non-Terminal… Still I’ll just say that I’m not too big of a fan of the last guy in this Traveler line, Atman, which might as well not have the 2
printed on it. This is the Dame Josephine syndrome all over again.
Also, it is weird that Crossroad has a +1 Buy slapped on it as opposed to the rest of this line. Like, why that one in particular? I mean, at least this is that one effect that makes this set of cards eligible for this week’s contest.
I wonder why Jungle, Crossroad and Loophole don’t have a Curse label on the bottom. I mean, they’re out-of-Supply cards anyway, not like you can gain them when being attacked by a Witch anyway.
Lastly, I’ll just say I’m not the biggest fan of cards with 2 dividing lines. A card with 2 dividing lines is a good indicator to see if your design is stepping too far into card weirdness; I feel like it screams to be streamlined at this point.
But yeah, this is too different from anything I’ve seen in Dominion for me to truly comprehend what’s going on there (non-terminal Curse Traveler line which ends on a self-trash instead of an overpowered card).
[...]
Well I think this contest is made to give new ideas a chance nevertheless conform to Donald's idea. I chose a traveller's line because I like to have decisions while playing a strategy.
Dark Path is a decision on their way. The two important cards here are in the middle
Crossroad and at the end
Atman.
First as you said
Dark Path is a curse which is an alternative to Donald's curse. So the decision is to get it by a witch or maybe by yourself with a buy at the lowest possible costs.
Why are jungle, crossroad and loophole no curses? hm - I bet that there would have been a discussion why you cannot get them by a witch or a buy although it is clear as you mentioned: as traveller they are not in the supply. I add the colour of a curse because I want to remember that they are used at the end of the game for calling victory points. That i need to add two lines in text is Donald's decision, I don't like two lines too, especially here as the symbol of -VP is big enough
.
But now to the
Crossroad and
Atman.
The principle is at every step in this line: you get a better treasure but more -VP. So you don't know whether you end up with the whole line. As they are non terminals you can always exchange them to the next traveller.
In the middle of the dark path there is
Crossroad, better than gold because of +1 Buy but -3. So perhaps your decision is: it is a powerful treasure but is it worth the Minus-Victory points? It depends on the game: perhaps it will be a short game ( <18 turns? ) or is it a long game, so you can travel through the whole line? - your decision. While play testing I got the impression, that you can play both buying or getting two lines.
Now after your decision the second important card is
Atman (BTW it is not a guy, but philosophical expression). Indeed it is another decision. It is clear after exchanging from Crossroad to Loophole you want to get Atman. Loophole is much money but has no
+1 buy like Crossroad. So your goal is to exchange it to Atman, mostly near the endgame.
Once you played Loophole you loose the Minus-Victory point and get +2 VP instead
. So it is like getting a province instead (loosing -4VP and getting +2 VP) but with much money while traveling.
But there is another interesting decision effect of
Atman: There are
but
you have to trash it when playing and you loose 2VP! On the other side maybe you have at your last turn(s) a +1 buy (perhaps with Crossroad!) and you can empty province pile or other attractive winners. But the other player have a chance too. As Atman is a treasure perhaps there is a treasure-trasher in the supply
.
So it is your decision. There are many interferences to other Dominion cards - try and have fun.
Dark Path is an interesting decision-strategy and gives a new idea.
