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[market squire]

Hi, I really like how thematic the Traveller mechanic is. Very tempting to create own ideas. Here is now a technological implementation of the concept, culminating in a crazy one-shot:

INVENTION (Action - Traveller) - $2
+2 Actions
+1 Buy
When you discard this from play, you may exchange it for a Draft.

DRAFT (Action - Traveller) - $3*
Trash a card from your hand.
Gain 2 cards each costing up to $1 more than it.
When you discard this from play, you may exchange it for a Construction.
(This is not in the supply.)

CONSTRUCTION (Action - Traveller) - $4*
+1 Action
+$3
Trash a Treasure from your hand (or reveal a hand without Treasures).
When you discard this from play, you may exchange it for a Test Flight.
(This is not in the supply.)

TEST FLIGHT (Action - Traveller) - $5*
+1 Card
+1 Action
Reveal the top card of your deck. If it is a Victory, put it back and put this on top. Otherwise, put the revealed card into your hand.
When you discard this from play, you may exchange it for a Flying Machine.
(This is not in the supply.)

FLYING MACHINE (Action - Traveller) - $6*
+1 Action
Trash this. Draw your deck and discard pile.
(This is not in the supply.)


I have trouble finding good free images for the cards, so here are just the ideas.
What do you think? Any image suggestions?

[tailred]

By the time you get Flying Machine, if you're playing an engine deck, you should be drawing or near to drawing your deck already. It might not be that strong for the amount of investment required.

[faust]

On the cards:

I like Invention. Arguably, it'sstronger than the other starting Travellers, but that okay, since when it's strong, you want to keep it,and as a $2 cost, it's not overpowered. It's actually worse than Squire, the same way Page/Peasant are worse than Pawn.

Draft might be too strong. Comparisons are Remodel (gets a better card, but only one of them) and Trader (also can transform an Estate into 2 Silvers, but is less flexible). Both of these cost $4. And the card is absolutely nuts with $7 costs on the board. If it turns out to be too strong, I suggest putting "two differently named cards" in there. That at least gets rid of the double Province problem.

Construction is basically a nonterminal Moneylender? Thus already better than a $4 cost, but that's okay. By the time you get this, it's probably rather bad. Well, if you're going moneyless, it's strong, but not in a broken way. This is probably okay.

Test Flight I don't get. It's strictly worse than Lab, and you have to wait that long to get it? I think each stage in the Traveller chain should at least have some scenario where you'd rather keep the card, but I don't see myself ever keeping Test Flight.

Flying Machine - it's situational, but obviously good with the right board (KC/Bridge?). I like that it gives you megaturn options on boards that usually lack that potential. It has some similarities to Madman megaturns, and man these are cool.

Overall, I like most of the cards. I also like Flying Machine and don't think it's too weak. But one problem I see is that Flying Machine is probably best on decks that lack trashing or drawing - and two of the cards in the chain provide trashing. So this may end up a self-counter in a way. I think you might want some other effects there, preferably some that go well with big hands, because I think Flying Machine could use a little self-combo. Maybe keep Draft because it's fun, but I would switch construction by something else.

[market squire]

Thanks for your comments! Still awaiting more.

By the time you get Flying Machine, if you're playing an engine deck, you should be drawing or near to drawing your deck already. It might not be that strong for the amount of investment required.

I don't think you need a classical engine for Flying Machine.

Draft might be too strong. Comparisons are Remodel (gets a better card, but only one of them) and Trader (also can transform an Estate into 2 Silvers, but is less flexible). Both of these cost $4. And the card is absolutely nuts with $7 costs on the board. If it turns out to be too strong, I suggest putting "two differently named cards" in there. That at least gets rid of the double Province problem.

Maybe it just "non-victory cards"?

Construction is basically a nonterminal Moneylender? Thus already better than a $4 cost, but that's okay. By the time you get this, it's probably rather bad. Well, if you're going moneyless, it's strong, but not in a broken way. This is probably okay.

Construction wants to ensure that you don't simply play BM into Flying machine with some Buys on hand. Maybe it should even be a bit harsher, like "reveal your hand, trash all Treasures from your hand" instead of only one.

Test Flight I don't get. It's strictly worse than Lab, and you have to wait that long to get it? I think each stage in the Traveller chain should at least have some scenario where you'd rather keep the card, but I don't see myself ever keeping Test Flight.

Test Flight itself is just the steppingstone to Flying Machine. But maaybe you could even want this as a Lab when you want a permanent Engine going, with bad draw on the board?
Maybe make it a better Lab and a bit harder to success by revealing more cards?

TEST FLIGHT (Action - Traveller) - $5*
+1 Action
Reveal the top 3 cards of your deck. If you reveal a Victory, put them back in any order and put this on top. Otherwise, put the revealed cards into your hand.
When you discard this from play, you may exchange it for a Flying Machine.
(This is not in the supply.)

But one problem I see is that Flying Machine is probably best on decks that lack trashing or drawing - and two of the cards in the chain provide trashing. So this may end up a self-counter in a way. I think you might want some other effects there, preferably some that go well with big hands, because I think Flying Machine could use a little self-combo. Maybe keep Draft because it's fun, but I would switch construction by something else.

Well, Draft provides Trashing but increases the number of your cards (2 for 1). And as I said, Construction is the anti-BM-thing. If you have other ideas for punishing BM, feel free to share. I guess it could be something like Poor House?
Invention itself is the ultimate card for Flying Machine, as it gives you additional Actions and Buys without drawing.

[GendoIkari]

Draft is too strong, but I think making it "exactly $1 more" might fix it. That eliminates the possibility to trash a Province and gain 2 Provinces. Trashing a $7 would still be very powerful, but it would be pretty rare.

[GendoIkari]

Flying Machine is probably weak as a one-shot; given how long it will take you to play one. Probably too strong just without the one-shot part though, so how about something in between?

FLYING MACHINE (Action - Duration - Traveller) - $6*
At the start of your next turn, draw your deck and discard pile.
(This is not in the supply.)

So this does a couple thing to weaken it instead of making it a one-shot. The turn you play it, it's really bad. It also delays the effect even more, like Teacher does. And finally, as a Duration, you can't play it every turn. If you wanted to make it just slightly stronger than that, make it a reserve just like Teacher. Though like with Teacher, I think it will be extremely rare that you don't call it the turn after you play it every time.

[AJD]

But one problem I see is that Flying Machine is probably best on decks that lack trashing or drawing - and two of the cards in the chain provide trashing. So this may end up a self-counter in a way.

Is that a big deal? Champion is presumably best in terminal Action–heavy decks, and two of the cards in its chain are Treasure gainers.

[faust]

But one problem I see is that Flying Machine is probably best on decks that lack trashing or drawing - and two of the cards in the chain provide trashing. So this may end up a self-counter in a way.

Is that a big deal? Champion is presumably best in terminal Action–heavy decks, and two of the cards in its chain are Treasure gainers.

Well, but Champion is really really good, and Flying Machine is only situational. So it makes sense for Champion to have predecessors that weaken the card, but for Flying Machine, they should be support cards.

[faust]

Construction wants to ensure that you don't simply play BM into Flying machine with some Buys on hand. Maybe it should even be a bit harsher, like "reveal your hand, trash all Treasures from your hand" instead of only one.

I dont see this as a thing that needs to be punished. It's not a very great strategy, because it's hard to lock your opponent out of the game with that kind of megaturn. Sometimes it will be best, but is that really a problem?

Test Flight I don't get. It's strictly worse than Lab, and you have to wait that long to get it? I think each stage in the Traveller chain should at least have some scenario where you'd rather keep the card, but I don't see myself ever keeping Test Flight.

TEST FLIGHT (Action - Traveller) - $5*
+1 Action
Reveal the top 3 cards of your deck. If you reveal a Victory, put them back in any order and put this on top. Otherwise, put the revealed cards into your hand.
When you discard this from play, you may exchange it for a Flying Machine.
(This is not in the supply.)

Hrm. This is already a megaturn enabler (big draw as long as your deck doesn't green). I'm not sure how much that weakens Flying Machine. But I have a feeling it should be okay. The biggest problem is that you always can get rid of Estates (because Draft can trash them), and then this might be too strong.

But one problem I see is that Flying Machine is probably best on decks that lack trashing or drawing - and two of the cards in the chain provide trashing. So this may end up a self-counter in a way. I think you might want some other effects there, preferably some that go well with big hands, because I think Flying Machine could use a little self-combo. Maybe keep Draft because it's fun, but I would switch construction by something else.

Well, Draft provides Trashing but increases the number of your cards (2 for 1). And as I said, Construction is the anti-BM-thing. If you have other ideas for punishing BM, feel free to share. I guess it could be something like Poor House?
Invention itself is the ultimate card for Flying Machine, as it gives you additional Actions and Buys without drawing.

Yeah, well, but if I turn my Estate into two Villages, I still got a lot closer to drawing my deck. And again, BM doesn't need to be punished. If Flying Machine doesn't work for classical engines, and it doesn't work with BM, which decks should it work with?

[market squire]

Draft is too strong, but I think making it "exactly $1 more" might fix it. That eliminates the possibility to trash a Province and gain 2 Provinces. Trashing a $7 would still be very powerful, but it would be pretty rare.

I still prefer "no Victory cards". It shouldn't be a potential $0 thinner like Develop is.
You could convince me for "one exactly $1 more, one up to $1 more". But that is not as elegant.

Flying Machine is probably weak as a one-shot; given how long it will take you to play one. Probably too strong just without the one-shot part though, so how about something in between?

FLYING MACHINE (Action - Duration - Traveller) - $6*
At the start of your next turn, draw your deck and discard pile.
(This is not in the supply.)

So this does a couple thing to weaken it instead of making it a one-shot. The turn you play it, it's really bad. It also delays the effect even more, like Teacher does. And finally, as a Duration, you can't play it every turn. If you wanted to make it just slightly stronger than that, make it a reserve just like Teacher. Though like with Teacher, I think it will be extremely rare that you don't call it the turn after you play it every time.

I really like that! I guess it wouldn't be fun to trash Flying Machine when you draw it having quite a lot of cards in hand already. So as Duration it should be much more fun.
And being able to make a Flight every other turn sounds okay to me. (Although I liked thematically that the Flying Machine gets broken...)

Construction wants to ensure that you don't simply play BM into Flying machine with some Buys on hand. Maybe it should even be a bit harsher, like "reveal your hand, trash all Treasures from your hand" instead of only one.

I dont see this as a thing that needs to be punished. It's not a very great strategy, because it's hard to lock your opponent out of the game with that kind of megaturn. Sometimes it will be best, but is that really a problem?

But one problem I see is that Flying Machine is probably best on decks that lack trashing or drawing - and two of the cards in the chain provide trashing. So this may end up a self-counter in a way. I think you might want some other effects there, preferably some that go well with big hands, because I think Flying Machine could use a little self-combo. Maybe keep Draft because it's fun, but I would switch construction by something else.

Well, Draft provides Trashing but increases the number of your cards (2 for 1). And as I said, Construction is the anti-BM-thing. If you have other ideas for punishing BM, feel free to share. I guess it could be something like Poor House?
Invention itself is the ultimate card for Flying Machine, as it gives you additional Actions and Buys without drawing.

Yeah, well, but if I turn my Estate into two Villages, I still got a lot closer to drawing my deck. And again, BM doesn't need to be punished. If Flying Machine doesn't work for classical engines, and it doesn't work with BM, which decks should it work with?

So maybe I would change Construction to a discard for benefit like Plaza. This is obviously strong in the Megaturn (as you can keep redrawing the same card).

CONSTRUCTION (Action - Traveller) - $4*
+1 Action
You may discard a Treasure. If you do, +$3 +1 Buy. Otherwise, put this on top of your deck.
When you discard this from play, you may exchange it for a Test Flight.
(This is not in the supply.)

I'm not sure about the bonus though.