The only way I see this being really disgusting is Swindler, so I'll probably add a "you can't gain this if it's not your turn" clause.
Most of the answers you gave were rather convincing, but maybe you can get around the "you can't gain this" more elegantly somehow... Not that I have any better idea, but that seems just so clunky.
Uh, I don't know, maybe some stipulation that like "if you gain this during another player's turn, you may trash it". Or...
What if you just had the option of trashing a Rebellious Province instead of topdecking it? That way you can always get out of a pin.
That is a good idea.
[lots of cool feedback]
as with others, if i don't respond to your feedback i probably agree with it
Accountant -- yes, drawing instead of discarding is extremely powerful. That's why this card costs $7. I think it's not more game-breaking than, say, KC or Expand.
Alley -- yup, it's weak, that's why it costs $2. it's nice with villages and gainers (or nonterminal gainers), and it's pretty great with +buy (or, even better, villages with +buy).
Custom House -- seeing as you can field $6 while you're being Custom Housed, without any alt-treasure or Action money, I don't think it "ruins everything". It certainly isn't always going to be a strong attack, but that's why it costs $3.
Deserted Village -- yep, it needs to be +1 Card.
Drought -- is an okay trasher with some bonus ("trash one card" is not a great card, but seeing as you can incur some negative benefit towards your opponent in doing so, it makes it better.)
Dysentery -- you're like the fourth person out of four to claim that the optimal strategy with Dysentery on the board is to buy Dysentery. Am I missing something obvious? Do you not realize that Dysentery gives a Curse to the person who buys it as well (and in fact gives them that curse first)? Seriously, I thought of this as a flavorful event that you wouldn't usually want to buy but would be situationally useful (say, if your opponent has a Swindler and you do not).
Emigration -- yeah, you can do that, but you'd need to draw it with four golds first, which is probably harder to do than KC-KC-Bridge-Bridge-Bridge, since it requires four 6-cost cards.
Homestead -- would making it $2 for the first two and $1 for further be better, or still too good?
Liege -- this is more like Overlord, since you can play Duchies as $5 cards, but yes. (also, I'm probably going to change the estates to coppers, since there aren't many $2 actions, and +4VP and 2 junk cards is already pretty good for $5)
Mendicant -- yeah I'm starting to think that this is too strong. Perhaps if you gain the cards not to your hand, and then trash from one to three cards? Then it irrevocably junks you without really strengthening the trashing.
Orphan(age) -- I think picking up an Orphan with an extra buy will usually be the right decision, unless there are lots of good terminals and no splitters. Also, Orphanage is quite powerful with cost reduction. Just something to consider. (also, an Orphan and an Orphanage give +1 Card +$4, which is a pretty good payoff for two cards with a combined cost of $3.)
Posse -- I had not considered the multiplayer aspect of things. Perhaps "discard any number of cards, every other player discards until they have the same handsize as you" is better, since it makes you pin yourself to pin your opponents?
Prairie Schooner -- Wharf draws 4 cards and gives 2 buys over two turns. Wharf costs 5. I think Prairie Schooner and Wharf are of very comparable power. Therefore, I think Prairie Schooner is also worth 5. If one more card is really that much more powerful than 2 buys, then maybe this should be 6, but I don't think so.
Public Assembly -- I think that +5 cards is a good enough bonus that you don't care if you draw one out of five, or even two out of five cards dead. If your deck is 40% Actions, then Public Assembly is like a Smithy-Library hybrid. I think it is reasonably priced at 3, and I think there are definitely situations in which buying more than one is a correct decision.
Purchase/Territory -- yep, I didn't mention this, but as a Victory split pile this would be 4/4 or 6/6 depending on # of players.
Royal Marriage -- this was deliberately made terminal after originally being what you proposed, because of the fact that "nonterminal action that lets you choose the best 4-card hand out of 5 cards" is probably less or similarly harmful than "draw one fewer card next turn", so it'd be hard to justify giving $3 or even $2 for it when Borrow only gives $1.
Salt Pan -- so the vibe I'm getting is that this should say "a card that is not a Province or Colony". With that caveat, is this a good card?
Shopkeeper -- I wanted some simple cards to balance out the complicated ones. I do think that maybe this should say "costing up to $7".
Standard Bearer -- alright, so the flavor behind this card is that standard bearers make your army more triumphant, so your victories are more glorious, etc. do you think it's a bad card, or do you just think it's a non-intuitive combination?
Tax Collector -- yeah, this should probably be <1>.
Demolition with 5vp seems good to me. Interesting decisions on Provinces; and although it seems strong for Gold; it's pretty similar to using Remodel on Gold.
I do think I'm going to bump this down to 5. 8 is too much. Maybe "+8 if it costs $9 or more" so that trashing Platina and Colonies is something you at least consider.
