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[Doom_Shark]

At one point my sister and I were going to create our own cards, but then decided against it. Later, I came across this forum, and did my failed alchemy: the second half. Well, then my sister decided that we could indeed do those card ideas. We haven't totally figured out the theme, but a lot of the cards include choice and/or player interaction. Many of these cards are as yet unnamed, and only one has ever been playtested. And even then only once. So with that out of the way, here's what we've come up with:

Secluded Township
Action $4
+1 Card
+2 actions
               
When you buy this, you may gain a curse. If you do, put this on top of your deck.

Every set needs a village, right? Upon further review, I think this would do better at $3, but the original idea is set at four.

(Unnamed)
Action-Reaction $4
+$2
               
When you would trash a card, you may reveal this card in your hand. If you do, discard that card instead. Then discard this card.

We wanted something different that hadn't been done. So here it is. I think the top could be better to warrant the $4, though.

Toll Booth
Action-Duration $4
+$2
Until your next turn, during each other player's turn, cards in the supply cost $2 more.

(Unnamed 2)
Treasure-Attack $4
Worth $1
When you gain this, each other player may gain a curse. If no one does, gain a Gold.

This was the only card to be playtested. Seemed fine at four, but further playtesting may or may not change that.

Mill
Action $5
+2 Cards
+1 Action
Choose one: Trash a card from your hand, or discard two cards.

This one's interesting. It's not strictly better than lab, but it isn't strictly worse either. It all really depends on how you want to use it and when.

(Unnamed 3)
Action $6
+2 cards
+1 coin
Choose one: either all cards cost $1 less this turn, or gain a gold.

The gold was originally a duchy, but I wasn't sure about that on posting and changed it here.

(Unnamed 4)
Action-Attack $5
+1 card
+1 coin
Choose 1: Each other player gains a curse, or each other player discards down to three cards in hand.

It's strictly better than militia, and around the same as witch, since it can still attack after the curses are out, but you would usually rather have the second card than the coin.

(Unnamed 5)
Action-Attack $6
+2 cards
Each other player gains a curse. You may gain a curse. If you do, each other player gains a second curse.

Appears strictly better than witch, so it can't cost $5. Not sure how that will work out in playtesting though.

Extortionist
Action-Attack $6
Each other player gains a curse. Any player may gain a second curse. For each player who does not, gain a treasure card costing up to $6

This originally got you silver, but then I thought that people would almost never take the curse unless there were feodums (never figured out how that was pronounced) or gardens. However, there are situations where people want silver or even copper (ex. Counting House and/or Coppersmith engines) over gold, so I just added variable cost, which also allows for the gaining of kingdom treasures as well. sot sure if I should just limit it to the base cards though. My sister came up with the original effect, I just tweaked it a bit and gave it an awesome, flavorful name.

Bribe
Action-Duration $5
Until the start of your next turn, once during each player's buy phase, that player may have +$3. At the start of your next turn, for each player who did, gain a gold, putting it on top of your deck.

We were looking for interesting things to do with durations, and I really liked the name bribe, so we put them both into one card.

There was another attack that was going to be here, but after reading the fan card creation guide, (http://forum.dominionstrategy.com/index.php?topic=699.0) I decided against it since it gave no benifit to the attacker, and we have plenty of attacks already. Please help name the unnamed cards, and feedback is welcome. Also, if anyone is wiling to do the images for me or knows of what happened to the Magic Set Editor Dominion template (or even both), that would really be appreciated. Discuss!

[wachsmuth]

Secluded Township: This has to cost 4, since it's strictly better than Village. On the other hand, it's worse than every other 4-cost village, so significantly that I think it would never be bought if any of the others are on the board. I don't think there's a price point where this card is really comfortable at.

Unnamed: The bottom seems super situational. Obviously good with Knights. Sometimes good with Swindler, Saboteur or Rogue. I guess it has some synergy with some trash-for-benefit cards. It's nice for milling Provinces. Outside of that though, it's a Duchess, a card people often don't even get for free! So it seems quite weak.

Toll Booth: Strictly better than Cutpurse (other than some pin-related situations and trash-for-benefit) on most boards. This card seems very strong, and it may also have some other issues as to why it shouldn't exist.

Unnamed 2: This one probably works? I dunno. It doesn't really excite me. Seems like a less interesting IGG-variant. I think it is very unfortunately political in multiplayer games, which probably kills it in the current wording.

Mill: So it's an Upgrade/Junk Dealer/Laboratory thing that later on turns into a Warehouse. Seems really, really strong.

Unnamed 3: The effects seem to have nothing to do with each other. A host of mediocre effects put together. The best part is probably the Gold-gaining, because hey, Mint gets bought, and this just outright gains Gold without having to collide them.

Unnamed 4: Seems pretty strong. I'd expect that one would have difficulties getting an engine running on boards with this, since it's a very shoddy engine itself and also really slows down the other players.

Wiccan: Not different enough from Witch to be worth doing I don't think. Also the naming is a bit unfortunate. I don't think naming cards after actual religions is a great idea.

Extortionist: In practice, this is gonna be a Soothsayer without the opponent drawing the card, except for how bonkers it is in multiplayer. A card that just outright gains 3 Gold seems crazy.

Bribe: Seems very bad. If your opponent decides to ignore it, this card does nothing for you. Even if they do, presumably they would only use it in situations where it's better than you gaining a Gold.

[Roadrunner7671]

Maybe a more minor penalty on Secluded Village, such as gaining a Copper?

[Awaclus]

Secluded Township: This has to cost 4, since it's strictly better than Village.

Not necessarily. If you don't gain the Curse, it's exactly as good as Village and most of the time you don't want to gain the Curse.

[Jimmmmm]

Secluded Township
Action $4
+1 Card
+2 actions
               
When you buy this, you may gain a curse. If you do, put this on top of your deck.

Every set needs a village, right? Upon further review, I think this would do better at $3, but the original idea is set at four.

Since this is strictly better than Village, $4 is the correct price. But I think taking the Curse would happen rarely enough that it would essentially simply be a more expensive Village most of the time. I imagine an unconditional topdeck on gain would work at $4 (ala Nomad Camp).

(Unnamed)
Action-Reaction $4
+$2
               
When you would trash a card, you may reveal this card in your hand. If you do, discard that card instead. Then discard this card.

We wanted something different that hadn't been done. So here it is. I think the top could be better to warrant the $4, though.

The problem with this is that without trash-for-benefit the reaction is useless, and with it it's potentially crazy. It's a concept that I think a couple of people have tried to do before. You probably want some kind of trash for benefit involved in the card action, and also some limiter on the reaction (eg trashing the card itself instead of the card that was trashed).

Toll Booth
Action-Duration $4
+$2
Until your next turn, during each other player's turn, cards in the supply cost $2 more.

This looks really nasty, especially since it stacks. I'd reduce the price increase increase to $1, and probably bump the price up to $5.

(Unnamed 2)
Treasure-Attack $4
Worth $1
When you gain this, each other player may gain a curse. If no one does, gain a Gold.

This was the only card to be playtested. Seemed fine at four, but further playtesting may or may not change that.

This seems weird in a 3-4 player game. I imagine the decision to take a Curse or not will fall to the player to your right, since they are the last to choose. In a 2 player game it's either a worse IGG or a better Cache. Seems interesting, but the weirdness with more players is a hard sell.

Mill
Action $5
+2 Cards
+1 Action
Choose one: Trash a card from your hand, or discard two cards.

This one's interesting. It's not strictly better than lab, but it isn't strictly worse either. It all really depends on how you want to use it and when.

Interesting, but I'd say it needs to cost more. It's like a way better Upgrade or Junk Dealer that is still okay when you have nothing to trash.

(Unnamed 4)
Action-Attack $5
+1 card
+1 coin
Choose 1: Each other player gains a curse, or each other player discards down to three cards in hand.

It's strictly better than militia, and around the same as witch, since it can still attack after the curses are out, but you would usually rather have the second card than the coin.

It's not strictly better than Militia. I don't like the terminal +1 card, there's a reason it's not done elsewhere in Dominion.

Wiccan
Action-Attack $6
+2 cards
Each other player gains a curse. You may gain a curse. If you do, each other player gains a second curse.

Appears strictly better than witch, so it can't cost $5. Not sure how that will work out in playtesting though.

Hmm. The choice to take a Curse or not doesn't seem that interesting. People don't like taking Curses; I think this will just be Witch a lot of the time.

Extortionist
Action-Attack $6
Each other player gains a curse. Any player may gain a second curse. For each player who does not, gain a treasure card costing up to $6

This originally got you silver, but then I thought that people would almost never take the curse unless there were feodums (never figured out how that was pronounced) or gardens. However, there are situations where people want silver or even copper (ex. Counting House and/or Coppersmith engines) over gold, so I just added variable cost, which also allows for the gaining of kingdom treasures as well. sot sure if I should just limit it to the base cards though. My sister came up with the original effect, I just tweaked it a bit and gave it an awesome, flavorful name.

Hmm. I don't think any other card can give out multiple Curses to one person with just one play, and one Curse per play of a Curser is how Curses are designed. Maybe try some other bonus instead of the first Curse?

Bribe
Action-Duration $5
Until the start of your next turn, once during each player's buy phase, that player may have +$3. At the start of your next turn, for each player who did, gain a gold, putting it on top of your deck.

We were looking for interesting things to do with durations, and I really liked the name bribe, so we put them both into one card.

This could be difficult to track. More importantly, this is strictly worse than a card that does nothing at all.

Actually on second thoughts it seems you can take the $3 yourself, in which case, "+$3, topdeck a Gold at the start of your next turn" is probably too strong, even with the nerf.


PPE 3

[AdrianHealey]

Secluded Township
Action $4
+1 Card
+2 actions
               
When you buy this, you may gain a curse. If you do, put this on top of your deck.

(Unnamed)
Action-Reaction $4
+$2
               
When you would trash a card, you may reveal this card in your hand. If you do, discard that card instead. Then discard this card.

Combine these two cards into one.

+1 Card
+2 Actions
------
When you would trash a card, you may reveal this card in your hand. If you do, discard that card instead. Then discard this card.

Price: I think 4 or 5 seems reasonable. It's generally bad to put a 'penalty' on a card. For example: in a chapel kingdom, I doubt I'd really care about the curse, but I do care about using a new village asap. So forget that idea; and combine these two in this way, would be my suggestion.

Toll Booth
Action-Duration $4
+$2
Until your next turn, during each other player's turn, cards in the supply cost $2 more.

There is a fan card that's called 'prima donna', which I think is a better version of this card. If different people play this card at the same time, it's going to get iffy. Also: what if you throneroom it? I'd make a 'when a version of toll booth is in play' kind of clause, so that it doesn't stack. Or 'when toll booth is in play'.

(Unnamed 2)
Treasure-Attack $4
Worth $1
When you gain this, each other player may gain a curse. If no one does, gain a Gold.

This is almost always better than IGG?

Mill
Action $5
+2 Cards
+1 Action
Choose one: Trash a card from your hand, or discard two cards.

I like this one. Would definitely use in my fan cards deck.

(Unnamed 3)
Action $6
+2 cards
+1 coin
Choose one: either all cards cost $1 less this turn, or gain a gold.

Seems reasonable. I like that both effects are money based, but that it needs other cards to really shine.

(Unnamed 4)
Action-Attack $5
+1 card
+1 coin
Choose 1: Each other player gains a curse, or each other player discards down to three cards in hand.

Sea Hag's big sister is apparently unnamed 4. I don't like the Cantrip effect, though. It means it's never a dead cart, so you can always put a curse into other people's deck. I wouldn't do it. I have a similar card, combining cursing with village, but it only gives a curse the first time it's played in a turn. A second time it gives a copper and the third time, other people can draw a card. So it looses power the more it's played.

Wiccan
Action-Attack $6
+2 cards
Each other player gains a curse. You may gain a curse. If you do, each other player gains a second curse.

This is interesting.

Extortionist
Action-Attack $6
Each other player gains a curse. Any player may gain a second curse. For each player who does not, gain a treasure card costing up to $6

Don't like it. Not sure why.

Bribe
Action-Duration $5
Until the start of your next turn, once during each player's buy phase, that player may have +$3. At the start of your next turn, for each player who did, gain a gold, putting it on top of your deck.

I personally like this in two player games. Not sure about the price. Potentially political in 3-4 player games, which is bad.

[J Reggie]

A lot of interesting ideas here.  I'd just like to note that, as a whole, this set has so many cursers.  Like most sets of 25 or so cards have 1 or maybe 2 junking attacks.  Half of these cards deal with curses, and 3 are forced cursers.  If you like junking games, that's fine, but I feel like the balance is way off here.

[Drab Emordnilap]

(Unnamed 2)
Treasure-Attack $4
Worth $1
When you gain this, each other player may gain a curse. If no one does, gain a Gold.

This is almost always better than IGG?

This is much worse than IGG, because it lets opponent choose whether it's IGG or not. Giving the opponent a choice between two options is weaker than either of the two options alone would be. For example, Torturer would be super-broken if it had either attack option locked in; it's balanced by letting the opponent choose which attack is preferable.

[AdrianHealey]

(Unnamed 2)
Treasure-Attack $4
Worth $1
When you gain this, each other player may gain a curse. If no one does, gain a Gold.

This is almost always better than IGG?

This is much worse than IGG, because it lets opponent choose whether it's IGG or not. Giving the opponent a choice between two options is weaker than either of the two options alone would be. For example, Torturer would be super-broken if it had either attack option locked in; it's balanced by letting the opponent choose which attack is preferable.

But you get a nice gold on top of it, it he doesn't, which is... pretty nice .

[beri]

Secluded Township
Action $3
+1 Card
+2 actions
               
When you buy this, you may gain a Copper. If you do, put this on top of your deck.

(Unnamed)
Action-Reaction $4
+$2
               
When you would trash a card, you may reveal this in your hand. If you do, discard that card instead. Then discard this.

Nice idea, not sure how often you would need the reaction part though (saboteur, swindler, knights), so the action part has to be nice enough. And the action part is not very exciting.

Toll Booth
Action-Duration $4
+$2
Until your next turn, during each other player's turn, cards in the supply cost $2 more.

Sounds really nasty, too nasty, and can get harsh with more players. There should be some kind of limitation.

(Unnamed 4)
Action-Attack $5
+1 card
+1 coin
Choose 1: Each other player gains a curse, or each other player discards down to three cards in hand.

Sounds a bit strong despite the +1 coin instead of an additional card. Having it draw only one card also reduces the chances of drawing a dead copy of it.

Wiccan
Action-Attack $6
+2 cards
Each other player gains a curse. You may gain a curse. If you do, each other player gains a second curse.

Appears strictly better than witch, so it can't cost $5. Not sure how that will work out in playtesting though.

not sure either.

Extortionist
Action-Attack $6
Each other player gains a curse. Any player may gain a second curse. For each player who does not, gain a treasure card costing up to $6

Cards not scaling well with more players (like Thief!) should be avoided.

Bribe
Action-Duration $5
Until the start of your next turn, once during each player's buy phase, that player may have +$3. At the start of your next turn, for each player who did, gain a gold, putting it on top of your deck.

Same comment.

--> "if at least one player did, gain a gold..." this will encourage all players to use the bonus. And you can price this down to 3 or 4.

[Drab Emordnilap]

(Unnamed 2)
Treasure-Attack $4
Worth $1
When you gain this, each other player may gain a curse. If no one does, gain a Gold.

This is almost always better than IGG?

This is much worse than IGG, because it lets opponent choose whether it's IGG or not. Giving the opponent a choice between two options is weaker than either of the two options alone would be. For example, Torturer would be super-broken if it had either attack option locked in; it's balanced by letting the opponent choose which attack is preferable.

But you get a nice gold on top of it, it he doesn't, which is... pretty nice .

 Gaining a gold and Dan effective copper is about the same as gaining two  silvers. Which, isn't awful for four dollars, but it's not beating down the doors either. And this card is strictly worse than just gaining a gold, because your opponent has the option to make it ill-gotten gains instead.

 I guess the general point I'm trying to make is, if you take an effect that's about on power level for the cost, but give your opponent a choice between that and another really strong effect, the card looks really strong, but actually plays weaker then the weaker of the two effects.

 If you play Magic the gathering, a good example is the card titled vexing devil.  It's a 4/3 creature for a single mana, but it gives the opponent the option to take for damage to have it be destroyed. For damage for a single mana  but it gives the opponent the option to take for damage to have it be destroyed. For damage for a single mana is a good rate, and agreed to that size for a single Manna is absurd. But because the opponent has the option of which one would be better for them, the overall card is weak to balanced, even though at first glance it looks ridiculously broken.

[461.weavile]

(Unnamed)
Action-Reaction $4
+$2
               
When you would trash a card, you may reveal this card in your hand. If you do, discard that card instead. Then discard this card.

We wanted something different that hadn't been done. So here it is. I think the top could be better to warrant the $4, though.

The problem with this is that without trash-for-benefit the reaction is useless, and with it it's potentially crazy. It's a concept that I think a couple of people have tried to do before. You probably want some kind of trash for benefit involved in the card action, and also some limiter on the reaction (eg trashing the card itself instead of the card that was trashed).

Hey, I did that! Mine is a Knight, so there is always trashing that you might want to undo, and there's only one copy, so it's not hopelessly broken. Oh, and it can only save things that a Knight could trash to prevent horsing around with Provinces.

Anyway, about the cards. I don't have a lot of things to say that haven't already been said, but here it is:

The way it's currently worded, unnamed 2 shouldn't have Attack as one of its types, since it doesn't do anything harmful when you play it. You might get confused because of Noble Brigand, but you can't Moat the effect when somebody buys it, only when they play it. Ill-Gotten Gains has a harmful effect that isn't an Attack.

I'm going to skip saying anything about problems with more than 2 players, because everybody is good at pointing that out.

But how about some positive suggestions! You have some interesting ideas, but you don't have the practice with implementing them. I know you said that you didn't test the cards, so don't take anything you read in this thread too hard; practice makes perfect. If you want your set to revolve around Curses, you can use that as a theme, but you don't want the theme to be "All these cards are mean," or "All these cards have penalties." If you want to have cards that give out Curses, you might want twice as many cards that make Curses fun! Try a card that says "Reveal the top 4 cards of your deck. If you revealed a Curse, +(3). Otherwise, each other player gains a Curse. (something something any order)." I don't know how much that should cost, or if it's hopelessly broken, but it makes seeing that Curse in your deck not heart-wrenchingly sad and it stays useful when the Curse pile runs out. Or something like "+4 Cards, +1 Buy. Trash a card from your hand. Discard a number of cards equal to its cost in ( )." I don't know if this one is broken either, but it gives Curses a valuable place in your hand and is still useful if there are no cards that give out Curses; plus it gives a way to get more fuel, (but that might need to be cut after testing it.) So there are plenty of ways to make Curses useful, you just need those cards to make a Curse theme fun. If you need some more ideas, try checking out cards like Ironmonger, Vagrant, and Fortune Teller.

[Doom_Shark]

Thank you all for your feedback.
To address a few specific points:

Wiccan:...the naming is a bit unfortunate. I don't think naming cards after actual religions is a great idea.

I had no idea that this was a religion. It was something I heard somewhere that sounded cool. reminded me of the word witch (after a bit of googling just now, I discovered that this indeed stems from that word) so I used it for a witch-like card. That will definitely be changed.

But how about some positive suggestions! You have some interesting ideas, but you don't have the practice with implementing them. I know you said that you didn't test the cards, so don't take anything you read in this thread too hard; practice makes perfect. If you want your set to revolve around Curses, you can use that as a theme, but you don't want the theme to be "All these cards are mean," or "All these cards have penalties." If you want to have cards that give out Curses, you might want twice as many cards that make Curses fun! Try a card that says "Reveal the top 4 cards of your deck. If you revealed a Curse, +(3). Otherwise, each other player gains a Curse. (something something any order)." I don't know how much that should cost, or if it's hopelessly broken, but it makes seeing that Curse in your deck not heart-wrenchingly sad and it stays useful when the Curse pile runs out. Or something like "+4 Cards, +1 Buy. Trash a card from your hand. Discard a number of cards equal to its cost in ( )." I don't know if this one is broken either, but it gives Curses a valuable place in your hand and is still useful if there are no cards that give out Curses; plus it gives a way to get more fuel, (but that might need to be cut after testing it.) So there are plenty of ways to make Curses useful, you just need those cards to make a Curse theme fun. If you need some more ideas, try checking out cards like Ironmonger, Vagrant, and Fortune Teller.

Other people had pointed out that a lot of these use curses, but you are the first to try to make that work. So, thanks.

As for the reaction, I had said in the original post that the top needed to be better. We'll see what happens with that.

Lastly, the stuff about the treasure: during the one playtesting game, we randomized with the base set, and it turned out to be really useful with remodel. Buy it, either dish out a curse or get gold, remodel it for (more) gold. Dunno yet how it'll stack up with other cards. I'm particularly interested in how it will work out with prosperity and/or dark ages (dark ages mostly because of counterfeit). And one last thing that I just thought of: talisman. Gain it. trigger effect. talisman lets me get it again. trigger effect again. Interesting, and now I need to playtest that to see if it's horribly broken. anyway, thanks again.

[GendoIkari]

Secluded Township: This has to cost 4, since it's strictly better than Village.

Not necessarily. If you don't gain the Curse, it's exactly as good as Village and most of the time you don't want to gain the Curse.

If most of the time it's exactly the same as Village, but it has an option that makes it sometimes (rarely) better than Village, then it's strictly better than Village.

[GendoIkari]

(Unnamed)
Action-Reaction $4
+$2
               
When you would trash a card, you may reveal this card in your hand. If you do, discard that card instead. Then discard this card.

We wanted something different that hadn't been done. So here it is. I think the top could be better to warrant the $4, though.

The problem with this is that without trash-for-benefit the reaction is useless, and with it it's potentially crazy. It's a concept that I think a couple of people have tried to do before. You probably want some kind of trash for benefit involved in the card action, and also some limiter on the reaction (eg trashing the card itself instead of the card that was trashed).

I don't think this works with TFB like you're thinking. If you reveal this in response to Remodel, you shouldn't gain any card from Remodel, as there's no "trashed card" to get a cost from. This card should basically just protect you from trashing attacks and that's all.

[LibraryAdventurer]

(Unnamed)
Action-Reaction $4
+$2
               
When you would trash a card, you may reveal this card in your hand. If you do, discard that card instead. Then discard this card.

The problem with this is that without trash-for-benefit the reaction is useless, and with it it's potentially crazy. It's a concept that I think a couple of people have tried to do before. You probably want some kind of trash for benefit involved in the card action, and also some limiter on the reaction (eg trashing the card itself instead of the card that was trashed).

I don't think this works with TFB like you're thinking. If you reveal this in response to Remodel, you shouldn't gain any card from Remodel, as there's no "trashed card" to get a cost from. This card should basically just protect you from trashing attacks and that's all.

Just change the reaction to "When you trash a card, you may reveal this card from your hand. If you do, gain the trashed card from the trash. Then discard this card."

[singletee]

(Unnamed)
Action-Reaction $4
+$2
               
When you would trash a card, you may reveal this card in your hand. If you do, discard that card instead. Then discard this card.

We wanted something different that hadn't been done. So here it is. I think the top could be better to warrant the $4, though.

The problem with this is that without trash-for-benefit the reaction is useless, and with it it's potentially crazy. It's a concept that I think a couple of people have tried to do before. You probably want some kind of trash for benefit involved in the card action, and also some limiter on the reaction (eg trashing the card itself instead of the card that was trashed).

I don't think this works with TFB like you're thinking. If you reveal this in response to Remodel, you shouldn't gain any card from Remodel, as there's no "trashed card" to get a cost from. This card should basically just protect you from trashing attacks and that's all.

I looked into this and not all TFBs are worded the same.

The following refer to "the trashed card":
Remodel, Expand, Remake, Farmland

while the following refer to "it":
Upgrade, Rebuild, Bishop, Apprentice, Graverobber, Develop, Trader, Salvager, Transmogrify, Stonemason, Procession, Transmute

Taxman uses both. There's also Governor, which is so verbally dense that space could not be spared for even a "than it", and Mine, which isn't, but omits "than it" anyway, so uh I guess it's implied. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

But with all of those except Rebuild and Procession, the wording is like Ironworks so the gain should still fail. With Rebuild and Procession, however, "it" seems to refer to "the Victory card you revealed" and "the Action card you played" respectively, so you should be able to gain without trashing in those two cases.

Finally, the ever-careful Butcher watches and makes sure you really did trash a card so there's no room for funny business there.

In fact, he watches you right now reading this post. His cleaver is ready. It hungers for flesh.

[Awaclus]

If most of the time it's exactly the same as Village, but it has an option that makes it sometimes (rarely) better than Village, then it's strictly better than Village.

But it doesn't matter because the choice is on-buy. Sure, kingdoms with that card in it are more powerful than kingdoms with Village instead, but that's not a bad thing or a good thing, it's just a thing. Buying Secluded Township is essentially the choice of buying Village vs buying Secluded Township and gaining the Curse, and none of those options are strictly better than the other, so it doesn't matter that there's also another card in the kingdom which is just the choice of buying Village. You're still just choosing between Secluded Township gaining the Curse and buying Village.

[tristan]

If most of the time it's exactly the same as Village, but it has an option that makes it sometimes (rarely) better than Village, then it's strictly better than Village.

But it doesn't matter because the choice is on-buy. Sure, kingdoms with that card in it are more powerful than kingdoms with Village instead, but that's not a bad thing or a good thing, it's just a thing. Buying Secluded Township is essentially the choice of buying Village vs buying Secluded Township and gaining the Curse, and none of those options are strictly better than the other, so it doesn't matter that there's also another card in the kingdom which is just the choice of buying Village. You're still just choosing between Secluded Township gaining the Curse and buying Village.

Nope. The card provies more options so it is simply strictly better than Village (not much, but it is better) and thus has cost (slightly) more than 3$. Pricing a card which is strictly superior to an existing card in any way, even if it is just a medicore on-buy option, at the same cost as the existing card is bad design (unless the existing card is clearly too strong/weak but then a direct change of that card might be wiser).
The problem is that the on-buy thingy is too weak to justify a price of 4$. So this card suffers the problem of being balanced between two prices and one has to tweak it further to balance.

Something I once used was to adress a card which was also between 3 and 4 was "When you gain this, take your -1 Coin token.". It is slightly artifical but works well for a 3$ card as it only strikes one if you gain several of them in one turn. I think that for this card, which is IMO far closer to 3 than to 4, something else would have to be done though.

[Awaclus]

If most of the time it's exactly the same as Village, but it has an option that makes it sometimes (rarely) better than Village, then it's strictly better than Village.

But it doesn't matter because the choice is on-buy. Sure, kingdoms with that card in it are more powerful than kingdoms with Village instead, but that's not a bad thing or a good thing, it's just a thing. Buying Secluded Township is essentially the choice of buying Village vs buying Secluded Township and gaining the Curse, and none of those options are strictly better than the other, so it doesn't matter that there's also another card in the kingdom which is just the choice of buying Village. You're still just choosing between Secluded Township gaining the Curse and buying Village.

Nope. The card provies more options so it is simply strictly better than Village (not much, but it is better) and thus has cost (slightly) more than 3$. Pricing a card which is strictly superior to an existing card in any way, even if it is just a medicore on-buy option, at the same cost as the existing card is bad design.

Yep. The card doesn't provide more options on-play so there is no reason why it has to cost more than $3.

[spiralstaircase]

Yep. The card doesn't provide more options on-play so there is no reason why it has to cost more than $3.

Port is a village that doesn't provide more options on-play, but it can't cost $3.

[Awaclus]

Yep. The card doesn't provide more options on-play so there is no reason why it has to cost more than $3.

Port is a village that doesn't provide more options on-play, but it can't cost $3.

Port also isn't strictly better than Village, it's just simply too strong for $3.

[spiralstaircase]

The problem is that the on-buy thingy is too weak to justify a price of 4$. So this card suffers the problem of being balanced between two prices and one has to tweak it further to balance.

It feels more like this card needs buffing up to $4, than that we need to find a really weak nerf to bring it back down to $3.  The concept of the card seems to be "Either you take a curse on because you need a good turn next turn, or you just get a village".  So how about:

Secluded Township
Action $4
+1 Card
+2 actions
You may discard a curse.  If you do, +1 card, +$1.
----
When you buy this, you may gain a Curse. If you do, put this and the curse on top of your deck.

[spiralstaircase]

Port also isn't strictly better than Village, it's just simply too strong for $3.

Ah, I was misremembering that Port's gain was optional too.  But if it were, it would be strictly better than village.

[Awaclus]

Port also isn't strictly better than Village, it's just simply too strong for $3.

Ah, I was misremembering that Port's gain was optional too.  But if it were, it would be strictly better than village.

Regardless of the fact that it would be strictly better than Village, it would still be just simply too strong for $3. A Secluded Township whose Curse-gaining isn't optional isn't too strong for $3, so making it a choice between that and another thing which has been proven to be not too strong for $3 is fine.