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[Aquila]

You could call this a fan set, as it's kind of designed to be such. The reality is it's an exploration into different mechanics. I made these cards through being an enthusiastic observer of the design of Dominion, not because I have a play group who wanted them. That said, most of the cards have been tested to some extent.

Revolution takes the actions one needs to play Action cards and makes them more like a currency. You can collect tokens to get +actions whenever you need them, and you can also be 'owing' an action, so you have flexible control of your Action phase. There are also Treasure focuses, and the mix of the two aims to make a set that gets players to adapt to each individual turn carefully, as they can be very different.

Mechanics: Action tokens, a -1 action State, a set of cycling start-of-turn effects.
There are also Duration cards, Night cards, and something like a Traveller.

TL;DR
Here's the set so far in miniature. Click a card to enlarge it.

Kingdom cards:






A shuffled pile of 12 landscape cards that give their effects immediately at the start of each player's next turn, then change for the next one the following turn. More rules later:


(A note on the use of internet images: the only intended purpose of these card mock-ups is to present the ideas on this forum thread in an easy to understand format. I do not intend to print them out or post them anywhere else online. If I later do, I will create my own artwork.)

Explaining the new mechanics

Action tokens - there are cards that let you collect Action tokens. They're just like coin tokens from Guilds, only when you spend one, you get +1 Action. You can do this in the same manner as Coin of the Realm, after playing an Action or before you play any during your Action phase. When you spend one, you can keep it in the play area after the Action you last played, for ease of tracking your action count, then put it back in the box at Clean-up.

The -1 action State, Exhausted

Exhausted - State
When you next have unused actions during your Action Phase, immediately return this and -1 Action.

There would be 6 of these IRL, 1 per player. Some cards in this set take Exhausted as a setback to being extra powerful, so the Action cards effectively use 2 actions. After taking Exhausted, whenever you next have actions left during your Action phase, this gets immediately returned and you have 1 less action. If you end your Action phase still having Exhausted, it will stay over to next turn, and be returned at the start to take away your starting action.
You'll notice all of the cards that take Exhausted check that you do take it. This is because of Thrones - you can't take more than 1 Exhausted to get the extra effects more than once.

Cycling start-of-turn effects, Weather
They are a pile of 12 landscape cards which you shuffle before each game, and keep face down except the top one. Before each of his turns, the player going first discards the top Weather (just as you discard Boons), and each player gets the effect of the Weather immediately at the start of their next turn (they do not get it for extra turns through Outpost or its variants), before any other 'at the start of your turn' effects. The Weather for next turn is turned over at the same time, so players know what's coming. When the pile is empty, it is reshuffled into a new pile: the last card of the pile is set aside, then discarded when the new deck is made.
Including them in a game would follow the same rules as Shelters, Platinum and Colony; if the first card randomly selected is a Revolution, or the majority of them are Revolutions, include them. (Though of course they're fan cards, and you can use them anyhow.)

So here they are:

Sunny - +1 Card, +1 Action

An extra action for a bigger Action phase. +1 card to help more.

Stormy - take Exhausted

The opposite, -1 action. But if you're already Exhausted from last turn you get nothing.

Cloudy - +2 Cards, put 2 cards from your hand onto your deck

Card movement will always have an effect on your turn. This gets you to plan a bit.

Windy - discard 2 cards, +2 Cards

A Cellar fixed at 2 cards. Could be good, could be bad.

Rainy - if you have 4 or more cards in your hand, take one and put it anywhere in your deck

1 less card in your hand by Secret-Passaging something.

Showery - +1 Buy, + $1

Buying vanilla.

Snowy - this turn, cards (everywhere) cost $1 more

And the opposite, sort of.

Dry - this turn, cards are gained onto your deck

Mostly good, but bad for Victories.

Foggy - +1 Card, take Diverted, put a card from your hand onto Diverted

Diverted comes up later as well. Basically, whatever non-Victory you buy for the rest of this shuffle will miss the next shuffle, and the card you put on Diverted from hand will miss the next shuffle as well. It's a negative.

Mild - no effect

And two blank cards to make things, well, milder.

Changing - set this and the next two Weathers aside, then discard them. For this turn, each player gets both Weathers in the order they were set aside in

This one basically makes two Weathers appear at once, to make things a bit more different each game. You don't know what's coming, though. There are 12 cards, but with this the pile will run through on average 10 turns.

Example:

Alice starts her turn with a hand of Village, Colliery, 2 Estates and a Copper. She plays Village, drawing a Copper. Then she plays Colliery, getting + $2 and discarding an Estate. She chooses to take Exhausted; because she currently has 1 action left, Exhausted is immediately returned and she now has no actions left. Continuing the instructions, she discards the other Estate and gets a total $4. Entering her Buy phase, she has $6 to spend.

Bob has a hand of Colliery, Smithy, 2 Estates a Copper. He hasn't used the action token he got from when he bought the Colliery. Like Alice, he plays the Colliery, taking Exhausted and discarding both Estates for $4. He had no actions left when he took Exhausted, so it stays. He next chooses to spend his action token for +1 action, placing it to the right of his Colliery. But he can't play his Smithy; Exhausted takes priority and is returned, leaving him again with 0 actions. He really should have played them the other way round... If he did, he would have Exhausted carry over to the start of next turn, which would hurt or not depending on whether he draws any Actions.

INDIVIDUAL ANALYSIS

I explain each card, then give my thoughts on positives (+) and negatives (-) in its design.

Advancing Village - Action Reaction, $3 cost.
+1 Card
Take an Action token.
-
When this enters your hand outside of your Action Phase, you may play it immediately. (Discard it at your next Clean-up.)

Basically, this becomes a Village it enters hand outside of your Action phase (so including methods that aren't drawing too. There are plenty of ways to do this in the set, including of course the most likely case of drawing it at Clean-up), as you will start your next turn with the starting action and an action token. But even better than a Caravan Guard variant giving +1 action at the start of your next turn, you can use the action token on a later turn if you wish. Played in your Action phase, it has the lesser ability to convert a spare action into a token, or be a plain cantrip.
+: I feel it achieves difference with a Village card, in that, for one thing, it's good to open with it.
-: It's not a direct variant on any other card, so rules complications could deter people, such as interaction with Teacher tokens. Whatever the rules are for Caravan Guard should also apply to this.

Barometer - Action Duration, $4 cost.
Now and at the start of your next turn: name a type (Action, Attack, etc). Reveal the top 5 cards of your deck. Put the cards with the named type back in any order and discard the rest.

This one is yet to be tested. A sifter that lets you adapt your next draw to what you need now. And what you choose next turn won't always be the same as what you choose this turn.
+: It seems highly diverse in its utility yet not so much that it's useful in every kingdom. It would enhance this set very nicely if testing shows no problems.
-: Having 2 sort effects to do, and 2 decisions to call, it may be slow to play. It could also suffer from the same weakness as Navigator in being non-terminal. Hopefully the next turn effect balances this out.

Canal - Action, $6 cost.
+1 Buy
This turn, cards you haven't yet gained a copy of cost $2 less, but not less than $0.

Bridge variant. All Supply piles cost less until something is gained from them, no matter when and how many Canals you play or Throne during your turn.
+: Simple to read. That some piles can have their costs reduced and others not opens up a few new tricks.
-: A cost reduction of $2 is very powerful. It may be that this is dominant in too many kingdoms.

Colliery - Action, $3 cost.
+ $2
Discard a card.
You may take Exhausted. If you do, discard a card and + $2.
-
When you gain this, take an Action token.

Modest discard for benefit. Terminally discarding a card for $2 is very weak, but Colliery can do this twice, and the second time is stronger than the first (1 less handsize rather than 2). The discarding is not necessary for getting the $2, so you can get it with an empty hand. Colliery also comes with an action token, which can help its first play or be used for something else, something you don't mind paying $3 for.
+: It fills distinct niches rather than be good all the time, so isn't an automatic buy.
-: It could be too automatic as an opener, even if it is less useful later.

Components - Action, $3 cost
+1 Action
Return this and another Components from your hand to the Supply. If you return two Components, gain a Prototype from its pile.
-
When you gain this, gain a Silver onto your deck.

The first stage of a 'Traveller' that's hard to upgrade. It needs two copies to connect like Treasure Map, which would seem doable at $3 cost if not for the mixed bonus and hindrance of a top-decked Silver thickening the deck. If it should be that you don't connect them in good time, they can easily be returned so you can take your deck in a different direction. Or maybe you want the Silver and don't mind the extra card in your next shuffle.
+: I feel compelled by a Treasure Map that rewards you with a central engine piece.
-: The top-decked Silver could be too generous for $3 seeing what Components can later become. Or it could make them too situationally viable or swingy.
(I explain the upgrades after the kingdom cards.)

Diary - Treasure, $5 cost.
$2
When you play this, you may put a card from your hand onto your deck. If you do, take an Action token.

Two things you can find useful to do in your Buy phase, thinking about your next turn.
+: To quote what others have said, elegant.
-: Very good very often, it may be too cheap. At least it isn't much good in decks that draw themselves.

Diversion - Action Attack, $5 cost.
+ $2
Each other player takes Diverted. Those who already have it put a non-Victory from their hand costing from $3 - $6 onto their Diverted (or reveal they can't). Those who do draw a card.

Diverted - State
Non-Victory cards you buy are gained onto this. After you shuffle your deck, if there are any cards on this, discard them and return this.

This is a newer one, not tested in this form but I've arrived at it through testing. I was trying to make a different Attack, and since Exhausted is in the set I thought I could use a State. One that hits the Buy phase whilst the other Attack, Revolters, hits the Action phase. Delayed buys, a concept considered often on this forum, is what I first came to (although with the wording 'gained onto this' you can bypass it if you can get other gain locations specified, so you get the choice where a card goes). Non-Victories they buy miss the next shuffle. Additional plays make it a pseudo-Knight that delays cards from other players' decks.
+: I feel it would achieve difference if it's successful.
-: the Knight-like part could easily prove to be broken; actually, a fix comes to mind, which I'll get to later.

Entrepreneur - Action Reaction, $2 cost.
+1 Action
+ $1
If the Entrepreneur Supply pile is empty, +1 Card and +1 Buy.
-
When any other player trashes a card, you may return this to the Supply to gain a card costing up to $5.

A card that captures risky investment and opportunity, and adds potential mind games. It's a mere Copper to start with, but it can become a $5 cost card when its pile is empty (Market) or if an opponent trashes something. If it reacts to trashing, other Entrepreneurs are hindered in getting to their Market level.
+: The main thing I wanted to try and do was a card that reacts to trashing, as a means of 'nerfing' how good trashing is. It does achieve this, but it's better for adding player interaction.
-: for a card that benefits from other sources of +buy, it's a bit strange that it can later give lots of buys itself.

Foreign Art - Treasure, $5 cost.
$4
+1 Buy
When you play this, take Diverted and put this on it.

A big spike of money that delays what you buy from entering the deck (except Victories). It gets delayed as well.
+: Simple and effective.
-: Taking Diverted like this detracts from the card Diversion.

Furnace - Action, $4 cost.
+1 Buy
You may trash a card from your hand for + $2. If it wasn't a Treasure, trash up to 2 more cards from your hand.
-
When you buy this, you may take Exhausted. If you do, play this.

Principally a trasher that targets non-Copper junk. It can be payload with its +buy, but you need to trash a card in order to get the $2. But, when you buy the card, you can play it instantly for those times when your hand is set up just right to trash lots of stuff, and also buy something else with $2 less to spend. Yes, you're playing an Action in your Buy phase, but it's all safe as far as I can see. All of this immediate power in exchange for your next turn's starting action, because trashing is that good.
+: I feel it's a compellingly different trasher.
-: It's not a simple card to read and understand.

Innovator - Action, $5 cost.
Choose one: discard any number of cards, + $1 per card discarded; or draw up to 6 cards in hand.
You may take Exhausted. If you do, get the other choice.

Not yet tested. Handsize changing payload. Choose to discard for benefit, draw to 6, or take Exhausted for both either way round.
+: The format of choose one or Exhaust for both gives effective, balanced flexibility.
-: Could be too weak, it's only significantly good when Exhausted is taken.

Night Shift - Night Duration, $5 cost.
Take Exhausted. If you do, and the previous turn wasn't yours, take another turn after this one.

An Outpost variant that starts your bonus turn without the initial action. You could 'unlock' your Action Phase with Duration Villages or an action token, or simply skip it.
+: Simple, elegant, and a nice card to build around.
-: There are enough ways around the setback that this could be too strong.

Parade - Victory, $5 cost.
Worth 8VP - VP equal to the difference in the number of Actions and Treasures in your deck.
-
When you gain this, if you have a different number of Actions and Treasures in play, trash it.

Alt VP aiming to reward players who build their deck in a defined way. It's hard to actually gain, but when you do it should be worth it.
+: If it's successful, it will add a compelling way to win the game.
-: It may be so hard to get that it's irrelevant in most games. Or it makes for a strategy too heavily dependent on chance. I can't be confident in whether the maximum VP is balanced.

Potteries - Action, $5 cost.
Trash a card from your hand.
You may take Exhausted. If you do, gain a card costing up to $5 more than the trashed card, putting it into your hand if it costs up to $2 more.

Remodel variant going big if you take Exhausted. You can gain a cheaper card straight to your hand, or a much more expensive one.
+: It's strong payload, a good reason to build a deck to use 2 actions on it.
-: A Remodel going this big a cost increase could be uninteresting, particularly when compared to Altar.

Purist - Action Treasure, $4 cost.
If it's your Action phase, +3 Actions.
If it's your Buy phase, this is worth $1, and if you haven't played any non-Treasures this turn, +1 Card.

A newer one. A card that either supports a (mostly) pure Action phase turn or a pure Buy phase turn. Wanderers are card-shaped things you can play that aren't Treasures, so they would stop the Buy phase bonus as well as Actions.
+: It's simple to understand but not always simple to use.
-: Having said it's not simple to use, that could mean it's too weak. Or it could be uninteresting.

Revolters - Action Attack Duration, $4 cost.
Until your next turn, when another player starts their Buy phase with no unused actions, they gain a Curse.
At the start of your next turn, take an Action token.

A -1 action Attack. If it handed out Exhausted, it could pin everyone else out of every Action phase, which would be too strong. So it implies -1 action by giving the opponents the choice between it or a Curse. And so it becomes this set's Curser.
+: It's a different way to attack. It gives more reasons for Action tokens over +Actions.
-: Generally, Attacks are payload cards, and their self bonus reflects this. An Action token is a bit strange here, even though it is the opposite of what the Attack does.

Steelworks - Action Night, $4 cost.
If it's your Action phase, gain a card costing up to $4, or if you have used 3 or more actions this turn it may cost $5.
At Night, you may trash this, to take an action token for every card you've gained this turn.

Untested in this form. Put simply, a Workshop variant that can let each gain for the turn come with an action token. If you play it as an Action, what it gains depends on the number of actions you've used since playing it, so like Conspirator for played Action cards but instead actions. Returning Exhausted does count as a used action, as do played Wanderers.
Being the Night type, you can play this at the Night phase. But no matter which phase you play this in, 'at Night' (rather than 'otherwise' like that card called Werewolf) means you can trash it to take action tokens regardless. You'll get one more token if you play it as an Action, but you need to have the action to play it.
+: The cost upgrade I find a compelling goal to reach with this set. I wanted to fit taking tokens for gained cards somewhere in the set and it fits nicely here.
-: It feels like it falls between the price brackets of $4 and $5, so costing it $4 could be too cheap. Two new mechanics in one card makes it both extra unfriendly to new players and vulnerable to future cards (unless I miss something about the present ones?).

Taskmaster - Action, $4 cost.
+1 Card
+1 Action
When you play an Action from your hand, you may first turn an unturned Taskmaster you have in play sideways and take Exhausted. If you do both, play the Action twice.

As Royal Carriage is a Throne that looks 'backward' to any Action played, this Throne looks 'forward' to anytime later in the turn. You turn the card on its side when you Throne something, to indicate that it's been used. If you Throne a Duration, the sideways Taskmaster stays in play with it. This is also a cantrip, which is counterbalanced by taking Exhausted. If you Throne a Taskmaster, you will get 2 cards 2 actions (-1 action if you Taskmaster itself, so a chain of them will all be Labs except for the first one), but it won't change how many times it can Throne things; it can still only be turned once.
+: It applies Exhausted boosts to every Action in the game, to make more different ways to play an engine.
-: Nothing else turns cards in play like this, so could come against future rules issues. It can't turn itself face down like that card called Necromancer does, as face down cards in the play area aren't 'in play'. And for all this complication, is it different enough from Royal Carriage?

Textile Mill - Action, $5+ cost.
+3 Cards
You may take Exhausted. If you do, +2 Cards.
-
When you buy this, you may overpay for it. Take an action token per $1 overpaid.

Smithy that you can double (another +2 handsize) by taking Exhausted. Because this is short text, it has overpay for Action tokens added on, which for one thing can let it be a draw card for Big Money decks with the advantage of different price points.
+: Simple yet effective.
-: Perhaps too strong. An overpay effect on a $5 may not see much use.

Tutor - Action Duration, $3 cost.
+1 Card
+1 Action
You may set aside a card from your hand. At the start of your next turn, if the card is an...
Action, play it;
Treasure, trash it;
neither type, discard it and +1 Card.

Duration that sets aside a card, then to do something with it that benefits the typical engine. Useful, but slow. For Crown (and Purist) you follow the instructions in order, play then trash them.
+: Simple and diverse in its use.
-: It could be too strong, or relevant too often, being both an early trasher and late cycler.

Wastelands - Victory, $5 cost.
Worth 5VP if you have 10 or fewer non-Victory cards in your deck, otherwise 2VP.
-
When you gain this, trash up to 3 cards you have in play.

Alt VP that rewards you for working with few payload cards, which you can do well in this set. Careful timing is needed to play it well. Or it can be a way you trash down to make an engine.
+: I feel it makes for a compelling different way to play the game.
-: 10 non-Victories could be too generous, or trashing 3 cards too generous. It's questionable if both this and Parade should be in the same set.


Components upgrades
There are 5 copies of each.

Prototype - Action Machine, $0* cost.
Take two action tokens. You may trash a Treasure from your hand, to gain a Treasure to your hand costing up to $3 more. Exchange this for a Machine.
(This is not in the Supply.)

The first of only 2 upgrade stages, as Components are a fair bit harder to upgrade than Page or Peasant. On play, you get two Action tokens and Mine, then you can upgrade it into a Machine, a type shared by the 3 different final stages. Each of these takes a powerful step in different directions. Prototype also is a Machine; this means you can, instead of upgrade it, choose to essentially discard it for a chance to draw and play it again on the same turn, and there's nothing to track if you do.
+: I believe it achieves self-discard without any problems. It makes for a smooth transition between Components (it can Mine the Silvers) and the final upgrades.
-: You can play Components and the Prototype on the same turn, which adds potential swinginess. The self-discard being on the middle upgrade rather than a final one could make some players sad to have to lose the ability.

Spinning Mule - Treasure Machine, $0* cost.
$1
While this is in play, after you play a Treasure (including this), +1 card.
(This is not in the Supply.)

If your deck is taking more of a money direction, you can take this upgrade to improve your Treasures immensely. After you play a Treasure, so after you resolve all a Treasure's effects (which are 'when' you play it), you draw a card. It looks strong, but it's delayed, and it's one card in a likely big deck. It needs to not have a buy on it to balance it further.
+: Simple, suitably powerful, a nice contrast to Steam Engine.
-: Very daring; it can so easily become broken in the future, and it arguably changes the whole game of Dominion to let Treasures draw the deck.

Steam Engine - Action Machine, $0* cost.
Discard up to 3 cards. Take an Action token per card discarded.
While this is in play, after an action token you spend gives +1 Action, you may use that action to play an Action card from your hand twice.
(This is not in the Supply.)

An upgrade for Actions as opposed to Spinning Mule for Treasures. Massively improve playing Actions by turning your Action tokens into Throne tokens while this is in play, but Exhausted still takes priority if it's there when a token is spent. You can put the token on the card when you Throne it, and if it's a Duration it can stay on over the other turns. If you use Taskmaster on a Steam powered card, it is played four times (you play it twice twice).
+: Tokens are a clean way to make a multi Throne Room. Both this and Spinning Mule are similar in being single power cards that need to be in hand each run through the deck.
-: Taskmaster and this are very similar. And the rule for both interacting on the same card may be technically questionable.

Patent - Action Machine, $0* cost.
Choose one: +2 Cards, +2 Actions or + $2, then this becomes the card on your Patent mat until it leaves play.
-
When you get your first Patent, move an Action card from the Supply that isn't on any other Patent mat onto your Patent mat.
(This is not in the Supply.)

Make your own power Action card, and prevent anyone else copying you. You get a copy of an Action in the Supply and add a vanilla bonus to it. The Patent mat could be like a mat from Seaside. If a game turns out to be a race for the best Patent, the players who lose can likely do well with a Steam Engine.
+: The added sense of uniqueness can feel nice to some, and it's a different way to get ahead in a game.
-: It's wordy. It's hard to tell if it's balanced.


And that's everything. I hope you found this an interesting read, whether you're an observer into Dominion design, or you're looking for inspiration for your own fan cards, or any other reason. Feel free to leave comments; I don't mind criticism, as it's essential to perfecting any design.

And thank you for reading.

[Asper]

I suggest to post less cards at once. I understand why you would want to share all of your ideas at once with us, but given there are no pictures, this is an incredibly long wall of text. Many people won't even start reading it, as they will get tired of it before finishing. I'm saying this before taking any look at your actual cards, just as a friendly tip: Less at once means more detailed feedback, and probably more altogether.

Now I'll check some random cards and give my 2 cents:

Taskmaster - Action, +1 card +4 actions. If there are any unused actions at the end of your turn, draw 2 less cards for your next turn’s hand, down to 3. $4 cost.

On a German forum I already encountered something like this, where spending all your Actions was necessary to achieve something. I think it's not too great to punish somebody for overproducing, though. As I said about LastFootnote's Charlatan already, overproduction is in itself a punishment, as you waste something you put effort in. That said, it doesn't look unbalanced. With +3 Actions it'd maybe even pass as a regular 4$? I don't know. Or just give the penalty every time. Just, I'd suggest to not punish for failing to use your potential.

Potteries - Action, +4 cards. You may use a second action on this. If you do, +1 buy, + $2. $6 cost.

You might like to check out my Town/Road (click the link in my signature) on how I did spending two Actions on one card. It seemed easier to me back then. And I'd say it is if you only do one card with that ability, but here of course you made it a recurring thing. Which means that yes, you have to learn something new, but you get a whole new bunch of cards that use that thing. That said, I'm not sure how good or bad Potteries is. It seems better than Hunting Grounds, but I'm not sure how much better.

Advancing Village - Action, +1 card, +2 actions. If this was played from your hand, take an Action Token. $5 cost.

I don't get what you say about "replaying itself infinitely". If the +1 Action token just gives you +1 Action, however would you play this card again?

Executive - Action, +1 card. Discard any number of Treasure cards. Take an Action Token per card discarded. While this is in play, when you spend an Action Token you may use the action on the last one you played.

I don't get the last part. Is the +1 Action Token supposed to be something like Royal Carriage? Because if it's just "When you play an Action card, you may use an Action token to get +1 Action", what would "use it on the last one you played" even mean?

[navical]

I suggest to post less cards at once. I understand why you would want to share all of your ideas at once with us, but given there are no pictures, this is an incredibly long wall of text. Many people won't even start reading it, as they will get tired of it before finishing. I'm saying this before taking any look at your actual cards, just as a friendly tip: Less at once means more detailed feedback, and probably more altogether.

Definitely this.

Executive - Action, +1 card. Discard any number of Treasure cards. Take an Action Token per card discarded. While this is in play, when you spend an Action Token you may use the action on the last one you played.

I don't get the last part. Is the +1 Action Token supposed to be something like Royal Carriage? Because if it's just "When you play an Action card, you may use an Action token to get +1 Action", what would "use it on the last one you played" even mean?

I assume it's meant to be

While this is in play, when you spend an Action token, you may replay the last Action you played instead of getting +1 Action.

Although I can't find a perfect wording either, I think that's clearer?

[Aquila]

I suggest to post less cards at once.

Good call. I should thank you both for reading what you have.

Edit: so I split them up according to their mechanics. Reverted as they looked more clumsy dotted around. I am slowly working on images for each card.

Executive - Action, +1 card. Discard any number of Treasure cards. Take an Action Token per card discarded. While this is in play, when you spend an Action Token you may use the action on the last one you played.

I don't get the last part. Is the +1 Action Token supposed to be something like Royal Carriage? Because if it's just "When you play an Action card, you may use an Action token to get +1 Action", what would "use it on the last one you played" even mean?

So you play Executive, and discard some Treasures to get some action tokens. If there are no actions left after this, you would pay a token to gain +1 action in the usual way. You can choose to play an action from your hand at this point.
Or you can use the action you just got from the token on the Executive, since it is the last action you played. So it would still count as using an action, and you would again have none left.
Now the difficulty with wording; suppose after the Executive you play Potteries, then pay another token and use the action on the Potteries. You are using 'a second action' on it and would get the Woodcutter effect. If you were to 'replay' the Potteries like with Royal Carriage you would replay the card and get 4 cards again.

I hope this makes sense since it helps to explain this:

Advancing Village - Action, +1 card, +2 actions. If this was played from your hand, take an Action Token. $5 cost.

I don't get what you say about "replaying itself infinitely". If the +1 Action token just gives you +1 Action, however would you play this card again?

I should explain that when I wrote the commentary for each card in my own notes, the rule on Executive was always what action tokens did. I changed them for simplicity and then made Executive to keep the effect. I just forgot to update this.
So with an Executive in play, you'd play Advancing Village, gain a token, which you use on Advancing Village, gain another token, etc.

Edit: adjusted the comments on each card.

[Asper]

Hum, I'm really not sure I like the idea of being allowed to re-play cards that are already in play. It seems wonky with Durations, at least. If you want to keep that ability, you should fix up Executive instead of altering other cards that give out the token: "While this is in play, when you play an Action card from your hand, you may first spend any number of +1 Action Tokens to play that card that many additional times."
That would stack with several, though. An alternative would be to just introduce an own type of token: "Take that many Executive Tokens..."

[Aquila]

Some adjustments thanks to your feedback.

I guess a lot of confusion arises with this whole 'second action' idea. If we remove that things should be easier. I can do what I did to the unnamed remodeler, 'choose one... You may use two actions on this'.

Glassworks - action. Choose one: return up to 2 cards from your hand to the piles they came from, and you may gain a card costing exactly the sum of the returned cards; or draw up to 6 cards in your hand. You may use two actions on this. $5 cost.

Should play just the same, only Thrones let you do one then the other too.

Potteries - Action, choose one: +3 cards; or +1 buy, + $2. You may use two actions on this. $6 cost.

I feared that playing Village-this to draw 4 cards twice would be too strong, so it's down to 3 but hopefully a lot simpler. I'm toying with adding 'when you gain this, take 2 action tokens.'

Steelworks - Action. Choose one: draw up to 9 cards in hand, then put 3 cards from your hand on the bottom of your deck; or reveal your hand, and if there are… 3 or more Treasures, + $2; 3 or more Actions, +2 actions; 1 or more Victory cards, +1 buy. You may use two actions on this. $5 cost.

This is quite a bit stronger; you can reveal your hand twice for 3 actions and/or $4, but it'll be harder to get with a 4 card hand.

Textile Mill - Choose one: +1 card per card in your hand, discard up to 3 cards then put your hand on top of your deck in any order; or gain a card costing up to 4 into your hand. You may use two actions on this. $5 cost.

The Workshop part gains to hand to work better with the first part, but would two 4s to hand be too strong?

A change to Taskmaster to be similar to Lost City's balance:

Taskmaster - Action, +1 card +4 actions. When you gain this, draw 2 less cards for your next turn’s hand, down to 3.

The skill element is still there. There could be some complex reason to gain one just for the effect.

These changes should make Executive and Expert much simpler:

Executive - Action, +1 card. Discard any number of Treasure cards. Take an Action Token per card discarded. While this is in play, when you spend an Action Token you may replay the last action you played instead of +1 action. $6 cost.

Expert - Action. Choose one: +1 card, +1 action, +1 coin or +1 buy, then replay the last action you resolved that is not an Expert. $5 cost.

About replaying durations, the instructions for Royal Carriage seem to imply you can only do so on the turn you play them, and not on their later effects. If you do so the card stays out with it for easy tracking. It wouldn't make sense with Hireling otherwise. And it can't replay reserves as they're never in play after they're resolved. So, with the cards changed to be like this, the same rule would apply, the action token (Executive) or Expert card staying with the duration.

Hopefully improvements.

[Chris is me]

It's not at all clear what "you may use 2 actions on this" means. To me, it reads "you may play this card and have it consume 2 actions instead of 1", with no additional effect.

Do you actually mean "You may use an additional Action to play this card a second time"?

[faust]

Consumerist - Action attack duration. Each other player reveals their hand at the start of their turn and plays all Treasure cards, then pays all their $. They may gain a card costing up to the amount. At the start of your next turn: +1 card + $2. $5 cost.

Split your opponents' total coins for the turn in two. It has them gain a card to save Black Market-like confusion, particularly involving debt, and it prevents on-buy effects too. This may be strong, or at least swingy in its impact.

This has serious problems with Crown. You are forced to play Crown, but it's your Action phase, so uh I suppose you can throne an Action. What if I draw more Treasures? Do I have to play them? Am I allowed to play them? And what if I discard some of the Treasures in my hand? Am I still required to play them?

Similar problems, to a lesser extent, occur with Counterfeit - did I play the counterfeited card and have thus fulfilled the requirement to play it, or does Consumerist line up the cards in your hand for play and you have to play them even when they stop being in your hand? And if I Counterfeit Rocks to gain a Silver in hand, what about that?

Unfortunately, I do not have a good idea of how to fix these issues while keeping the premise. Other than that, I would add that gaining a card at the start of your turn rather than at its end is usually considered a bonus, so I'm not sure the attack is strong enough to be worth it.

[Shvegait]

It's not at all clear what "you may use 2 actions on this" means. To me, it reads "you may play this card and have it consume 2 actions instead of 1", with no additional effect.

Do you actually mean "You may use an additional Action to play this card a second time"?

These cards give you an extra optional effect, if you pay Actions. Think of how Butcher lets you pay Coin tokens, and then that gives you an extra benefit. Here, you pay Actions for the extra benefit.

Take Potteries for example (using the version from the first post). When you play it, it's just like Hunting Grounds. Then, you can pay another Action (if you have one) for +1 Buy, +$2.

I find the wording on these cards a bit confusing, especially considering the explanation on how Action tokens work. The card texts themselves should be enough to explain how the card works. The alternating back and forth between 1st action part and 2nd action part seems too complicated. The concept of "using two actions" is certainly ambiguous and should be reworded.

I think the concept could work somehow like this, for example:

Potteries - $6 Action - +3 Cards, You may pay an Action. If you did, +1 Buy, +$2.

This wording would be consistent with Storyteller, but still might be a little ambiguous on its own because Action is an overloaded word in Dominion (see Diadem). Actually, if you want to be consistent with Diadem, you may want to say "You may pay an unused Action", but I'm not sure that's necessary.

As for Action tokens, you could make them work just like Coin tokens from Guilds. Instead, you would have, during your Action phase, you may spend an Action token, for +1 Action. I think that is what you intended, though I'm not sure. I would think, though, to prevent some rules problems or confusion, you would want to limit when Action tokens can be spent to after completely resolving an Action, or whenever you "may pay an Action".

Unfortunately, by Executive changing Action tokens into Royal Carriage effects, the only reasonable time to be able to spend Action tokens is after completely resolving an Action, which doesn't work nicely with the "may pay an Action"/"use two Actions on this" cards. Honestly, though, Executive is overpowered and probably needs to change anyway. A single Executive and a single Bridge can end the game in just a few turns, as soon as you can get 7 or 8 Action tokens and collide Executive and Bridge.

Some interesting card effects here. Haven't even looked beyond the Action theme yet.

[Aquila]

Some good observations, thank you all.

Consumerist - Action attack duration. Each other player reveals their hand at the start of their turn and plays all Treasure cards, then pays all their $. They may gain a card costing up to the amount. At the start of your next turn: +1 card + $2. $5 cost.

Split your opponents' total coins for the turn in two. It has them gain a card to save Black Market-like confusion, particularly involving debt, and it prevents on-buy effects too. This may be strong, or at least swingy in its impact.

This has serious problems with Crown. You are forced to play Crown, but it's your Action phase, so uh I suppose you can throne an Action. What if I draw more Treasures? Do I have to play them? Am I allowed to play them? And what if I discard some of the Treasures in my hand? Am I still required to play them?

Similar problems, to a lesser extent, occur with Counterfeit - did I play the counterfeited card and have thus fulfilled the requirement to play it, or does Consumerist line up the cards in your hand for play and you have to play them even when they stop being in your hand? And if I Counterfeit Rocks to gain a Silver in hand, what about that?

Unfortunately, I do not have a good idea of how to fix these issues while keeping the premise. Other than that, I would add that gaining a card at the start of your turn rather than at its end is usually considered a bonus, so I'm not sure the attack is strong enough to be worth it.

This may skew game mechanics too far, but:
"Each other player starts their next turn with a Buy Phase, in which they keep their hand revealed and play all Treasures. (They still have a Buy Phase after their Action Phase.)"
The potential this has is when a player can hit 8 but only with the actions he has. Instead he gets two buy phases with less than 8 to spend.

It's not at all clear what "you may use 2 actions on this" means. To me, it reads "you may play this card and have it consume 2 actions instead of 1", with no additional effect.

Do you actually mean "You may use an additional Action to play this card a second time"?

These cards give you an extra optional effect, if you pay Actions. Think of how Butcher lets you pay Coin tokens, and then that gives you an extra benefit. Here, you pay Actions for the extra benefit.

Take Potteries for example (using the version from the first post). When you play it, it's just like Hunting Grounds. Then, you can pay another Action (if you have one) for +1 Buy, +$2.

I find the wording on these cards a bit confusing, especially considering the explanation on how Action tokens work. The card texts themselves should be enough to explain how the card works. The alternating back and forth between 1st action part and 2nd action part seems too complicated. The concept of "using two actions" is certainly ambiguous and should be reworded.

I think the concept could work somehow like this, for example:

Potteries - $6 Action - +3 Cards, You may pay an Action. If you did, +1 Buy, +$2.

This wording would be consistent with Storyteller, but still might be a little ambiguous on its own because Action is an overloaded word in Dominion (see Diadem). Actually, if you want to be consistent with Diadem, you may want to say "You may pay an unused Action", but I'm not sure that's necessary.

How does this read:
"Choose one: +3 cards; or +1 buy +$2. You may use a second action on this to replay it."

As for Action tokens, you could make them work just like Coin tokens from Guilds. Instead, you would have, during your Action phase, you may spend an Action token, for +1 Action. I think that is what you intended, though I'm not sure. I would think, though, to prevent some rules problems or confusion, you would want to limit when Action tokens can be spent to after completely resolving an Action, or whenever you "may pay an Action".

I never did explain did I? Well this is exactly what I thought.

Unfortunately, by Executive changing Action tokens into Royal Carriage effects, the only reasonable time to be able to spend Action tokens is after completely resolving an Action, which doesn't work nicely with the "may pay an Action"/"use two Actions on this" cards. Honestly, though, Executive is overpowered and probably needs to change anyway. A single Executive and a single Bridge can end the game in just a few turns, as soon as you can get 7 or 8 Action tokens and collide Executive and Bridge.

Ah yes, I had kept my Canal in mind but I suppose a Bridge-Silver opening would be too fast. If I limited the number of Treasures it could discard to 2?

[faust]

Consumerist - Action attack duration. Each other player reveals their hand at the start of their turn and plays all Treasure cards, then pays all their $. They may gain a card costing up to the amount. At the start of your next turn: +1 card + $2. $5 cost.

Split your opponents' total coins for the turn in two. It has them gain a card to save Black Market-like confusion, particularly involving debt, and it prevents on-buy effects too. This may be strong, or at least swingy in its impact.

This has serious problems with Crown. You are forced to play Crown, but it's your Action phase, so uh I suppose you can throne an Action. What if I draw more Treasures? Do I have to play them? Am I allowed to play them? And what if I discard some of the Treasures in my hand? Am I still required to play them?

Similar problems, to a lesser extent, occur with Counterfeit - did I play the counterfeited card and have thus fulfilled the requirement to play it, or does Consumerist line up the cards in your hand for play and you have to play them even when they stop being in your hand? And if I Counterfeit Rocks to gain a Silver in hand, what about that?

Unfortunately, I do not have a good idea of how to fix these issues while keeping the premise. Other than that, I would add that gaining a card at the start of your turn rather than at its end is usually considered a bonus, so I'm not sure the attack is strong enough to be worth it.

This may skew game mechanics too far, but:
"Each other player starts their next turn with a Buy Phase, in which they keep their hand revealed and play all Treasures. (They still have a Buy Phase after their Action Phase.)"
The potential this has is when a player can hit 8 but only with the actions he has. Instead he gets two buy phases with less than 8 to spend.

A hopefully simpler solution I thought of:

"While this is is play, when another player starts their turn, they reveal their hand and set aside all Treasure cards. Then they play the cards set aside in any order."

This still has weirdness with Crown, but the rules should be clear; any additional Treasures are not played. It nerfs Counterfeit since you don't get to trash anything, but that's fine.

On power level: I get that, but hitting $8 is only really important late-game; maybe the attack hurts very early as well if you would reach $5 with Action + Treasures. Mid-game, gaining the card and being able to play it the same turn may well be a bonus; providing virtual +buy may be a bonus too. Attacks that are sometimes beneficial can work (see Haunted Woods) and it's an interesting way to attack a player, but I think the other effects of the card are too weak.

[Shvegait]

How does this read:
"Choose one: +3 cards; or +1 buy +$2. You may use a second action on this to replay it."

I think this might be OK, but I would drop the word "second" because it's confusing (or re-word depending on what you want the card to do). Consider the case where you do use a second action to replay it. Then you are faced with the same choice: "You may use a second action on this to replay it". But what does that mean now? Are you not allowed to, because it would be a "third" action? Or are you allowed to? For that particular play of the action card, it's only your "second" action. That's the reason I think something like "You may pay an Action to replay this" would be more clear.

Also keep in mind that as written, this lets you pick +3 Cards each time, if you want. Note that the first play is a Smithy, but each subsequent play is a Hunting Grounds (because you don't have to play another card from your hand for the effect). So this might be too strong, when there are cheap villages.

[Asper]

How does this read:
"Choose one: +3 cards; or +1 buy +$2. You may use a second action on this to replay it."

You're running into a few of the troubles I tried to avoid with my Road (yes, this is shameless self-advertizing in a way, but maybe it'll be insightful, after all):
First, it's a hard to track how many buys and coins you have. Admittedly, my Road can't track the Actions it used, either - but here you're counting 3-dimensional: Coins, Buys AND Actions.
Second, my card isn't in the supply as a +1 Action token on it would draw your deck. That still works with Champion, though that's a bit harder to achieve and kinda over the top either way. Here it's worse, because the card actually generates unlimited amounts of coins and buys, which means putting the token here and drawing one=Victory.
Third, Road comes with a Village for the reason that it gets easier to balance without being useless from time to time.
Lastly, the wording: If I played this at first with a Herold, Throne Room or something like that, I never spent a "first" action on it, so may I actually use a "second" one?

[Aquila]

OK, so the wording is still misleading. What it needs to convey is when you play the action, you have the option of using one extra action on it to replay it, but avoid 'replaying' it for such cases as Champion. Maybe...
"You may use an action to do this twice."

Tracking which effect you choose each time is a valid point. When it comes to the number of times you replay an action with Executive or Expert or if you 'use it twice' you can put an action token on the card for each extra time. An idea for indicating which effect you chose is put the token on the picture for one effect and on the text for the other. For some tracking cases (such as maybe KC-Pawn or Courtier) you just have to be creative.

[Asper]

Other suggestions:

"Choose one: A; B
You may pay/expend/use up/lose one of your Actions, to choose a second time (the choice may be the same)."

or:
"Choose one: A; B
If you have unused actions, you may choose a second time (the choice may be the same). If you do: -1 Action"

[Aquila]

Appreciate the suggestions, but I think I like the 'do this twice' format the best. It already exists on Remake. And I think it should go first, so that running through the effects in order one doesn't think they can use an extra action to then choose two more times. So like this:

Action. You may use an extra action to do the following twice. Choose one: trash a card from your hand and gain a card costing up to 2 more than the trashed card; or look through your discard pile and put a card from it into your hand. 5 cost.
Canal - +1 buy. You may use an extra action on this. If you do, cards everywhere cost 2 less this turn, but not less than 0. For the first time Canal is played on your turn, when you gain a card, you may gain a Treasure costing up to 4. 5 cost.
Colliery - +1 card. You may use an extra action to do the following twice, or two extra actions for three times: +2 coins, discard a card. 4 cost.
Glassworks - You may use an extra action to do the following twice. Choose one: return up to 2 cards from your hand to the piles they came from, and you may gain a card costing exactly the sum of the returned cards; or draw up to 6 cards in your hand. 5 cost.
Potteries - You may use an extra action to do the following twice. Choose one: +3 cards; or +1 buy, +2 coins. 6 cost.

Does this make complete sense? Do they need the 'extra' there?

And two other proposed tweaks:

Cameo - Treasure, +$2. Take an Action Token. You may put a card from your hand on top of your deck. $4 cost.

Generally more playable.

Patency - When you first gain this, set aside 2 different Action cards other than Patency from the Supply costing up to a total of $8. When you play this, it becomes the action on the left until it is resolved, then, unless this has left play, the one on the right. $7 cost.

Wording adjustment that should play durations and reserves in a balanced way. Put a Reserve on the left and the right card never gets played as Patency goes to the Tavern mat, leaving play.
If a Duration is the left card, then we follow on from what was discussed earlier with Royal Carriage's interaction with durations; it is resolved after the immediate turn's effects are completed, not the later ones. Patency will then become the right card, thereby cancelling the next turn effects. So no shenanigans with Tactician or Hireling.
And if either are on the right, they play normally.
Well, that was wordy... I hope you get it.

[Shvegait]

Appreciate the suggestions, but I think I like the 'do this twice' format the best. It already exists on Remake. And I think it should go first, so that running through the effects in order one doesn't think they can use an extra action to then choose two more times. So like this:

Colliery - +1 card. You may use an extra action to do the following twice, or two extra actions for three times: +2 coins, discard a card. 4 cost.

Does this make complete sense? Do they need the 'extra' there?

A problem with this wording is that it's not clear what happens if you choose not to use an extra action. I know you intend it to mean that you do the part that follows a single time, but it's not clear from the wording. The way it reads, you don't actually get any benefit from playing the card at all unless you spend additional actions. Something like "Otherwise, do it once" is needed, which could be in parentheses.

I like Asper's suggestion of "If you have unused Actions, you may ... -1 Action". It doesn't require any additional rules and it's not too wordy. The only problem is that it doesn't work nicely with every possible clause you have after it, but if you have something like discard a card, it's pretty clean.

How about this?

Colliery - +1 Card, +1 Action. Do this three times: If you have any unused Actions, you may discard a card, for -1 Action, +$2.

[Aquila]

Updated the OP with wording changes and hopefully clearer commentary on each card.

Appreciate the suggestions, but I think I like the 'do this twice' format the best. It already exists on Remake. And I think it should go first, so that running through the effects in order one doesn't think they can use an extra action to then choose two more times. So like this:

Colliery - +1 card. You may use an extra action to do the following twice, or two extra actions for three times: +2 coins, discard a card. 4 cost.

Does this make complete sense? Do they need the 'extra' there?

A problem with this wording is that it's not clear what happens if you choose not to use an extra action. I know you intend it to mean that you do the part that follows a single time, but it's not clear from the wording. The way it reads, you don't actually get any benefit from playing the card at all unless you spend additional actions. Something like "Otherwise, do it once" is needed, which could be in parentheses.

I like Asper's suggestion of "If you have unused Actions, you may ... -1 Action". It doesn't require any additional rules and it's not too wordy. The only problem is that it doesn't work nicely with every possible clause you have after it, but if you have something like discard a card, it's pretty clean.

I went with do it once, since as you said the format wouldn't work very well for all the multiple action cards, so I decided to keep them all the same. That said, it could work (now I notice Diadem says 'unused actions'). Here they both are:

Colliery - +1 card. You may do the following once, use an extra action to do it twice, or two extra actions for three times: + $2, discard a card.

Colliery - +1 Card, +1 Action. Do this three times: If you have any unused Actions, you may discard a card, for -1 Action, +$2.

Potteries - Action, You may use an extra action to do the following twice. Choose one: +3 cards; or +1 buy, + $2.

Potteries - choose one: +3 cards; or +1 buy, + $2. If you have any unused actions, you may choose again for -1 action.

I could even try the second use format again:

Potteries - +4 cards. If you have any unused actions, you may do: -1 action, +1 buy, + $2.

I would appreciate opinions as to what format is best.

And so this isn't all just a discussion on how to word cards properly, I'll put the question out:

Consumerist - Action attack duration. Each other player reveals their hand at the start of their turn and plays all Treasure cards, then pays all their $. They may gain a card costing up to the amount. At the start of your next turn: +1 card + $2. $5 cost.

Split your opponents' total coins for the turn in two. It has them gain a card to save Black Market-like confusion, particularly involving debt, and it prevents on-buy effects too. This may be strong, or at least swingy in its impact.

...

This may skew game mechanics too far, but:
"Each other player starts their next turn with a Buy Phase, in which they keep their hand revealed and play all Treasures. (They still have a Buy Phase after their Action Phase.)"
The potential this has is when a player can hit 8 but only with the actions he has. Instead he gets two buy phases with less than 8 to spend.

A hopefully simpler solution I thought of:

"While this is is play, when another player starts their turn, they reveal their hand and set aside all Treasure cards. Then they play the cards set aside in any order."

This still has weirdness with Crown, but the rules should be clear; any additional Treasures are not played. It nerfs Counterfeit since you don't get to trash anything, but that's fine.

On power level: I get that, but hitting $8 is only really important late-game; maybe the attack hurts very early as well if you would reach $5 with Action + Treasures. Mid-game, gaining the card and being able to play it the same turn may well be a bonus; providing virtual +buy may be a bonus too. Attacks that are sometimes beneficial can work (see Haunted Woods) and it's an interesting way to attack a player, but I think the other effects of the card are too weak.

I realised making Consumerist start turns with buy phases gets really wonky with Villa, so before bothering to get the wording sussed, is his attack too weak based on faust's reasoning?

[Aquila]

Having got some good playtesting done, I thought I'd post some updates. Here are the main ones:

• I've put all the cards that use multiple actions under the type 'Multi'. It's a clean solution that makes wording much shorter and simpler. All Multi cards call for -1 action to do extras in various ways, and the rule simply is you can't do such effects of you have none left.
• Advancing Village (was 5 cost 1 card 2 actions take token) now gives tokens when you gain cards. It seemed better to not simply give tokens out on a simple cantrip, but to make it a bit more challenging to get them.
• Cameo similarly gives its token if you do top-deck a card. It's bumped up to 5 like the other silver+ Treasures.
• Glassworks now trashes cards rather than returns them to the Supply. It actually progresses to the game end now, and plays nicely.
• Consumerist is now called Hawker, actually a thing, and reads:

  each other player reveals their hand and sets aside all Treasure cards. They take another Buy Phase after their next one with them, with +1 buy. At the start of your next turn: + $3.
• Entrepreneur now gives +1 buy on pile empty. It basically takes what Labourer ​tried in being a delayed Market, so Labourer can now go.
• Executive is now called Magnate:

  discard up to 2 cards. Take an action token per card discarded. While this is in play, when you spend an action token, instead of +1 action you get: +1 card, and you may play an Action card from your hand twice.
• Patency is now Patent, again actually something real, and it needed​ to become a Multi. You choose one set aside Action, and can then do the other for -1 action.
• Revolters was weak, and easily stopped by BM. It's now:

  At the start of each other player's Buy Phase during their next turn, they get -1 action. If they have no actions left, they gain a Curse. At the start of your next turn, +1 action.

  It doesn't quite seem right as is, it'll need a bit more work.
• Steelworks is now:

  draw up to 8 cards, then discard down to 5; or reveal your hand, and if there are... 2 or more Actions, +2 actions; 2 or more Treasures, +1 buy; 2 or more Victories, + $2.
• Textile Mill is now:

  +2 cards and gain a Silver to hand; or look at the top 5 cards of your deck, discard any number, then put the rest back with any number from your hand in any order.

And there are outtakes:
Labourer (+1 action, +1 buy, if 3 or more actions have been used this turn +1 card +1 coin) didn't look very interesting alongside Entrepreneur, as explained above.
Taskmaster (+1 card +4 actions, on buy draw 2 less cards for next hand) lost its appeal once I started thinking action tokens.
Toxic Waste (while in play cards not in supply cost 1 less, when other player plays a card costing 1 or less they gain Curse) tried too hard to be different, and was potentially too strong. I could make Revolters a much simpler curser.

The OP has had an overhaul to make it a hopefully simpler read.

[ThetaSigma12]

I haven't really read through everything, but kudos for updating an expansion based on playtesting! That doesn't happen a lot.

[Aquila]

Some more definite updates.

Just by putting each Multi with Fishing Village it was clear which ones looked balanced and which weren't:

• Colliery was insane, but removing the +card has reined it in. I'm now trying it as an overpay card, $2 +1 action token per 1 overpay. Looking fine at the moment.
• Glassworks got decks going too fast, with trash and good draw together. It's an outtake.
• Potteries was so good it's silly. Straight to the outtakes.
• Textile Mill was in the same boat as Potteries, with +2 cards +2 coins (in the form of to hand silver) together. But with Potteries gone, I'm trying +3 cards on it instead.

No problems with the others yet.

And Hawker's been weak. I've got an idea in line for a fix, but it hasn't been tested yet.

And three promising new cards:

Incinerator - Action, $3 cost.
+1 buy
Trash up to 2 cards from your hand. If you trashed a Curse, trash up to 2 more cards from your hand and + $1.

Innovator - Action Multi, $5 cost.
Choose one, or do both in either order and -1 action:
+ $3 and play up to three Treasures from your hand; or pay all your $ to buy a card immediately, gaining it to your hand.

Locusts - Action, $4 cost.
+1 card
+1 action
Set this aside. Trash a card from your hand and one from the Supply costing up to $5 other than Locusts.
At the end of your turn, trash this and gain a Locusts.

[ThetaSigma12]

Incinerator - Interesting. Reminds me of Plastic Brain's Medicine. It might be a tad too good with curses or a bit swingy.

Innovator - IDK about the -action, but the rest should be just gaining. "Spend all of your $, then gain a card to your hand costing up to the total $ spent." I don't think you need the option to do only one, right now the card seems too good. I could really be underestimating the -action though.

Locusts - Looks really good. A cantrip trasher for 4, that gives you a free $5? Sure, it has limited uses but it's a guaranteed opener. Even with 5, you need to grab one to at least contest the pile.

[Aquila]

Innovator - IDK about the -action, but the rest should be just gaining. "Spend all of your $, then gain a card to your hand costing up to the total $ spent." I don't think you need the option to do only one, right now the card seems too good. I could really be underestimating the -action though.

Playtesting hasn't been that thorough like this, but it's come a long way to get to something close to balanced. It's fair at buying Treasures, as you lose out on total coins for the Buy Phase, it's buying Actions that's been the trouble. You either need enough virtual coin played before and 2 actions left, or enough Treasure in hand and 3 actions, to play the Action card of choice straight away. Both involve a bit more than just a Village, so it's not so scary an opener.

I think you have a card similar to this on your thread, one called Munitions, that buys a card like this onto your deck for $3 cost. Maybe I should test it for strength.

Locusts - Looks really good. A cantrip trasher for 4, that gives you a free $5? Sure, it has limited uses but it's a guaranteed opener. Even with 5, you need to grab one to at least contest the pile.

Hmm, it doesn't gain the card costing up to 5 but trashes it from the Supply. That would of course be too strong.
Did you maybe misread it because it says '...costing up to 5' and not '5 or less'?

[Asper]

Here's a more boring version that doesn't need a Village in the kingdom to work (which would be my main critizism of the "spend several actions" mechanic, and one of the reasons my Road always comes with a Village):

Innovator, Action, 5$
+1 Action
+2$
Lose any amount of $. Gain a card costing at most the amount you lost to your hand.

Obvious comparisons are Minion and Royal Seal. Royal Seal can use its effect later in your turn and can't be drawn dead, but it's topdecking is quite a bit weaker, lacking both the implicit +1 Card and the implicit +1 Buy.

[ThetaSigma12]

About Multi cards, I am against the subtype. You don't need a new type for each mechanic, intrigue didn't come with "choosing" type cards. You say it's for simplicity but it doesn't make things simpler. Even if you want to keep the type, I'd change it.

Regarding the multi cards, I think you should have -1 Action tokens. Whenever you would have to spend an action (other than playing a card), if you have no actions you may take a -1 Action token. These are basically the same as debt. You can't take more -1 Action tokens if you have some and you have to play them off with Actions.

[spiralstaircase]

Innovator, Action, 5$
+1 Action
+2$
Lose any amount of $. Gain a card costing at most the amount you lost to your hand.

Without support from other +Action +Money cards, one copy of this card gains you a card costing up to $2, which seems *really* weak for a $5.  Multiple copies let you gain a bigger card, but at the cost of also copper-stuffing yourself.  I think at least it needs "You may".

[GendoIkari]

I'm not getting why you would ever buy Banner. It does nothing for you at all on play, compared to Embargo's $2. And then, while Embargo can hurt or shut down an opponent's strategy if it's different from yours, Banner only affects the first time they purchase the card, and even then instead of giving them a Curse, it gives them a one-shot terminal.

Or you could put it on the pile you want to buy to make it only cost $4 instead of $5 or something, maybe that was the intent? Although then it's just a terminal Copper. I'm not sure when you would ever actually want to spent the money and action space to get one.

[Aquila]

Here's a more boring version that doesn't need a Village in the kingdom to work (which would be my main critizism of the "spend several actions" mechanic, and one of the reasons my Road always comes with a Village):

Innovator, Action, 5$
+1 Action
+2$
Lose any amount of $. Gain a card costing at most the amount you lost to your hand.

Obvious comparisons are Minion and Royal Seal. Royal Seal can use its effect later in your turn and can't be drawn dead, but it's topdecking is quite a bit weaker, lacking both the implicit +1 Card and the implicit +1 Buy.

This is coming back to how it first was, though without the Treasure playing. I hadn't considered that was why it was too good, so I will give this a go. Thanks.

I have looked at Town and Road, and they are good. Champion as you say is the main snag, so my only real question with them is, is a Town-Page opening broken?

Just saw your last post, agree with 'you may'.

About Multi cards, I am against the subtype. You don't need a new type for each mechanic, intrigue didn't come with "choosing" type cards. You say it's for simplicity but it doesn't make things simpler. Even if you want to keep the type, I'd change it.

So what are your thoughts on the Gathering type? I find the text on the cards to be self-explanatory, but I suppose it's easier for players to see 'gathering' and think 'we put VP tokens on this pile then'. This is what led me to do the Multi type. It's easier for newer players to read 'Multi' and think 'this is a card we can use more than 1 action on' than read the text. I can also save card space by not having to write common rules about applying -1 action on each card.

But, having said all of this, what you say next is interesting:

Regarding the multi cards, I think you should have -1 Action tokens. Whenever you would have to spend an action (other than playing a card), if you have no actions you may take a -1 Action token. These are basically the same as debt. You can't take more -1 Action tokens if you have some and you have to play them off with Actions.

Make this turn strong with actions to sacrifice the next? I think you can implement this mechanic in a Reserve:

Textile Mill
Do these in either order: +3 cards; look at the top 5 cards of your deck, discard any number, then put the rest back with any number from your hand in any order.
Put this on your Tavern mat.
-
At any time during your Action Phases, you may discard this from your Tavern mat for -1 action.

If this works it can save using tokens at all.

@Gendo: I've only just got to playtest banner, I'll reply later if it doesn't work. Your thoughts are fair; I guess ultimately the card came from groping with the idea of putting cards on different Supply piles. This was kind of a final possibility before fully concluding the idea doesn't work at all.

[Asper]

Here's a more boring version that doesn't need a Village in the kingdom to work (which would be my main critizism of the "spend several actions" mechanic, and one of the reasons my Road always comes with a Village):

Innovator, Action, 5$
+1 Action
+2$
Lose any amount of $. Gain a card costing at most the amount you lost to your hand.

Obvious comparisons are Minion and Royal Seal. Royal Seal can use its effect later in your turn and can't be drawn dead, but it's topdecking is quite a bit weaker, lacking both the implicit +1 Card and the implicit +1 Buy.

This is coming back to how it first was, though withou the Treasure playing. I hadn't considered that was why it was too good, so I will give this a go. Thanks.

I have looked at Town and Road, and they are good. Champion as you say is the main snag, so my only real question with them is, is a Town-Page opening broken?

First of all, I see no good reason to open with Town in this case. Except maybe that you don't mind losing Town to Warrior as much, and Road can't be trashed. For a moment after writing this I thought that costing Road at 3$ might solve the issue, but either you'll just get it after you have Champion out, or a player might try to drain the pile before you get one, at which point you also get one, and Warrior does what it does best, namely ruin the game by trashing your key cards. If I'm at that, I'll admit that I hate Warrior with passion, so Road/Champion never shows up for me as I have come to veto the Page line.

Champion is part of a card that, in my opinion, is a terrible play experience either way. Call it apologetic, but I can't help but feel this makes the problem less dire. However, not everybody sees it that way. So, if you DO like the Page line, does Road ruin the game? I don't think so. First of all, all Road does is draw your deck. But drawing your deck isn't exactly something only Road can do. True, you can draw a deck of any size with a single Road. But how many times do you have to spend 4$ to make it halfway likely to draw one regularly? It's a super strong combo - but Champion is super strong regardless of Road, and as Road does NOTHING but draw, perhaps you can get something better instead? As I said, drawing your deck isn't exactly impossible without Road, so maybe I can have all of this with a deck that's better in the meantime, possibly gets me to Champion faster? Even if Road WAS a must-buy in Page games, just like with Chapel, there's still plenty of wrong decisions to make besides this one. Road/Champion is not Rebuild. I hope this sheds some light on my view on this.

The only thing that irks me is that, technically, Road allows for infinite turns. To fix this, I could add a condition to the wording: +2 Cards. If you drew any cards this way, put this in your hand."

[GendoIkari]

Wanderers feel like they should be events. I like the idea of a rotating event pile, though. But making them events follows naturally from the rules that exist, instead of thinking of them as a new type of card that "can't be gained or trashed".

[Asper]

Innovator, Action, 5$
+1 Action
+2$
Lose any amount of $. Gain a card costing at most the amount you lost to your hand.

Without support from other +Action +Money cards, one copy of this card gains you a card costing up to $2, which seems *really* weak for a $5.  Multiple copies let you gain a bigger card, but at the cost of also copper-stuffing yourself.  I think at least it needs "You may".

It certainly should be "you may". An alternative would be a version that takes debt:

+1 Action
+2$
(If you have no <dept>,) you may gain a non-victory card costing up to 8$ to your hand. Take <1> per $ the card costs.

[Aquila]

Wanderers feel like they should be events. I like the idea of a rotating event pile, though. But making them events follows naturally from the rules that exist, instead of thinking of them as a new type of card that "can't be gained or trashed".

Yes, I do agree with this, because the Wanderers are a bit too swingy as they are. Making them rotate so each player can access them during a full round of turns is fairer. The current cards would need a revamp, and, well, what would they do that current events don't? Or would they still be bought? Could they be things to use actions on, or could they be passive effects? I have these ideas going around at the moment.

[faust]

So what are your thoughts on the Gathering type? I find the text on the cards to be self-explanatory, but I suppose it's easier for players to see 'gathering' and think 'we put VP tokens on this pile then'. This is what led me to do the Multi type.

The Gathering type exists only so that Defiled Shrine can refer to these cards. Unless you need to refer to such cards specifically, there is no need for an extra type.

[ThetaSigma12]

So what are your thoughts on the Gathering type? I find the text on the cards to be self-explanatory, but I suppose it's easier for players to see 'gathering' and think 'we put VP tokens on this pile then'. This is what led me to do the Multi type.

The Gathering type exists only so that Defiled Shrine can refer to these cards. Unless you need to refer to such cards specifically, there is no need for an extra type.

Ditto. Cards should not have a type solely based on their on-play effect.

[GendoIkari]

So what are your thoughts on the Gathering type? I find the text on the cards to be self-explanatory, but I suppose it's easier for players to see 'gathering' and think 'we put VP tokens on this pile then'. This is what led me to do the Multi type.

The Gathering type exists only so that Defiled Shrine can refer to these cards. Unless you need to refer to such cards specifically, there is no need for an extra type.

Ditto. Cards should not have a type solely based on their on-play effect.

Reserve says hi. Though I'm on record as stating that reserve really shouldn't be a type. Or at the very least, Distant Lands shouldn't be one. The rest of them should have probably been reactions. But as it stands, reserve means nothing other than "has the on play effect of moving to your tavern mat in addition to other effects."

[ThetaSigma12]

So what are your thoughts on the Gathering type? I find the text on the cards to be self-explanatory, but I suppose it's easier for players to see 'gathering' and think 'we put VP tokens on this pile then'. This is what led me to do the Multi type.

The Gathering type exists only so that Defiled Shrine can refer to these cards. Unless you need to refer to such cards specifically, there is no need for an extra type.

Ditto. Cards should not have a type solely based on their on-play effect.

Reserve says hi. Though I'm on record as stating that reserve really shouldn't be a type. Or at the very least, Distant Lands shouldn't be one. The rest of them should have probably been reactions. But as it stands, reserve means nothing other than "has the on play effect of moving to your tavern mat in addition to other effects."

Yeah, Reserve type is a stretch. But I think we can all more or less agree that Multi should not be a type.

[Q]

Great cards, especially the playtesting&updating and the Action token concept. It could be implemented via a one-shot non-Supply Reserve card but the token is simpler in practice.

About Advancing Village, I like the cap but think that it still so good that it might have to cost 4. Its main advantage over Coin of the Realm is that the later frequently stays on the Tavern mat when you shuffle wheras Advancing Village accumulates tokens. Because of that you might even open with it in some Kingdoms.

Incinerate does not need an extra buy. All the trashers that do have one, Forager, Trading Route and Salvager, are also (conditional) payload cards which can make use of the extra buy whereas a multitrasher rarely does. I like that Incinerate makes Cursers slightly weaker.

Locusts runs into scaling issues. Assuming that every player only buys one Locusts you can use it on average 5 times in a 2P game, 3.3 times in a 3P game and so on. So perhaps use 4x # players Locusts per pile in a game?
It is hard to judge though what x should be in the case of an 'on average x times and then self-destruct' cantrip trasher that costs 4.
I like how thematic the card is with the pile eating.

[Aquila]

About Advancing Village, I like the cap but think that it still so good that it might have to cost 4. Its main advantage over Coin of the Realm is that the later frequently stays on the Tavern mat when you shuffle wheras Advancing Village accumulates tokens. Because of that you might even open with it in some Kingdoms.

Agree with everything here. First I compared AV to Village, sometimes it looked worse when it gave no immediate actions, but in balance an action token is better than a +action. Then that it can give 2 of them makes it good in the games you can do so. Yes, it feels like it should cost more, and testing showed no problems with that.

Incinerate does not need an extra buy. All the trashers that do have one, Forager, Trading Route and Salvager, are also (conditional) payload cards which can make use of the extra buy whereas a multitrasher rarely does. I like that Incinerate makes Cursers slightly weaker.

Take the +buy off and it looks weak compared to Chapel. It isn't there to try making it a later payload card, trying to get the $1 often wouldn't be a good idea. It's there so players can simply buy a Curse if they want to try accelerating their trashing, especially for the games with no cursing Attack, and if not it gives reason to choose it over Chapel in such a game, something for it to do after the deck is trimmed. It was +action and gain a Curse on buy at first, but a) this set didn't need an extra non-terminal and b) who wants to be forced to get junk with their trasher?

Locusts runs into scaling issues. Assuming that every player only buys one Locusts you can use it on average 5 times in a 2P game, 3.3 times in a 3P game and so on. So perhaps use 4x # players Locusts per pile in a game?
It is hard to judge though what x should be in the case of an 'on average x times and then self-destruct' cantrip trasher that costs 4.
I like how thematic the card is with the pile eating.

Too many Locusts I feared would empty the piles too fast, but that was during the first version when they gained and trashed on play rather than end of turn. They may be slow enough now to merit several. They could always be a 12 card pile like Port though, so everyone can get an even share of them in any size of game.


And I'll put this one out as well - I hope thanks to Theta's post above I have revived Potteries. Playtesting at present seems to show as much:

Dairy - Action Reserve, $5 cost.
+2 cards
+1 buy
+ $2
At the start of your Buy Phase, put this on your Tavern mat.
-
At any time during your Action Phases, you may discard this from your Tavern mat and -1 action.

I put Textile Mill in this format, but it's a really tight squeeze on cardspace. This feels similar to Wine Merchant but plays differently enough. For the issue of theme, I renamed it Dairy, you send the produce to your tavern.

[ThetaSigma12]

Incinerate does not need an extra buy. All the trashers that do have one, Forager, Trading Route and Salvager, are also (conditional) payload cards which can make use of the extra buy whereas a multitrasher rarely does. I like that Incinerate makes Cursers slightly weaker.

Take the +buy off and it looks weak compared to Chapel.
[/quote]
Doesn't everything look weak compared to Chapel?

[Q]

I doubt that Incinerate makes you want to buy Curses. It is a net extra trashed card plus a Coin at the cost of having to draw an additional, dead card and match it with Incinerate.
Note that the net extra card that you can trash if you trashed a Curse is only something you opt to do if you have Incinerate and 4 junk cards in your hand and this no earlier than after the 2nd shuffle. You rarely have lot of nonterminal draw at this point to increase your handsize so you are more likely to draw Incinerate with only 2 or 3 junk cards.

This is why Incinerate is probably more of a hedge against Cursers than a card that incentives you to buy Curses.

[Aquila]

I'm not getting why you would ever buy Banner. It does nothing for you at all on play, compared to Embargo's $2. And then, while Embargo can hurt or shut down an opponent's strategy if it's different from yours, Banner only affects the first time they purchase the card, and even then instead of giving them a Curse, it gives them a one-shot terminal.

Or you could put it on the pile you want to buy to make it only cost $4 instead of $5 or something, maybe that was the intent? Although then it's just a terminal Copper. I'm not sure when you would ever actually want to spent the money and action space to get one.

I'm going to take out the problematic Banner. Seeing that it's a variant on a principle that has come up more than once on this forum, that of putting a supply card onto a different pile, I thought it good to write my thoughts against it for any fan card creators who come to the same idea. With the introduction of split piles I anticipate this being more likely.
Banner was this:

Banner - Action Victory, $4 cost.
Return this to the supply. Move a Banner onto a different Supply pile that doesn't have a Victory on top. Cards on that pile cannot be gained or bought before it is.
-
When you buy this, gain the card under it.
-
1VP

It wouldn't just change 5-costs into 4, but any cost; Platinum, and even Fortune and the other Debt-cost cards could all be bought for $4, with the intention that the player would get a junk card with it for balance. With hindsight, Banner isn't really a junk card. You can use an action to remove it from your deck and put it on a pile irrelevant to the game, even if that's Curse, and you can then run the risk of giving the same power to your opponents.

Besides this, you could use it aggressively to try denying piles to your opponents, like those that cost cheaper or those that depend on being bought like Mint. This denies the pile to yourself too, which you may not always want to work around.
I'd like to use a card mocked up on these forums as a reference to what would happen with a card that makes large on this denying effect, being of less benefit to the buyer's deck:


Both Rabbits and Banner have in-built ways to still allow gaining cards from the piles they sit on. With a card that doesn't, a game with it and no extra buys would see any chosen pile completely denied, taken out the game. No player will want to use a precious buy and turn on that card just to open up the cards underneath, as it will not progress the deck's payload.

Rabbits' impact on a game will vary depending on the presence of other sources of +buy. If there are no others, the only way to gain a card from a pile it sits on, and avoid the total denial problem, is by playing another Rabbits. This boils down to two outcomes: either there are few Rabbits out because few are bought, and a player is likely denied a key card to their strategy because they don't have a Rabbits on a turn they can afford it; or there are many out because many are bought, and that leads seamlessly to my conclusion. And if there are other buys, Rabbits become more like attempts at junking the opponent, but that eventually come right back at you.

My conclusion with all such kingdom cards that move onto other piles is this: they may add extra variety to games, but, with the greatest respect to kru5h and his Rabbits, I do not personally feel they are a welcome addition. They take away from all the central strategy elements of the game and instead make it more a mindless process of 'buy whatever's available and see what happens'.

And from there I find it's impossible to balance Banner. No cost is fair yet effective, for if it's too low it's too powerful at letting players buy whatever they want, if it's too high you can totally eliminate more piles, and if it's in the middle like at $4, as Gendo said it has little point.

[Holger]

Innovator, Action, 5$
+1 Action
+2$
Lose any amount of $. Gain a card costing at most the amount you lost to your hand.

Without support from other +Action +Money cards, one copy of this card gains you a card costing up to $2, which seems *really* weak for a $5.  Multiple copies let you gain a bigger card, but at the cost of also copper-stuffing yourself.  I think at least it needs "You may".

It certainly should be "you may". An alternative would be a version that takes debt:

+1 Action
+2$
(If you have no <dept>,) you may gain a non-victory card costing up to 8$ to your hand. Take <1> per $ the card costs.

This version is far too strong; it's better than a Grand Market and a Capital (minus 1 buy) put together on one card.

[Asper]

Innovator, Action, 5$
+1 Action
+2$
Lose any amount of $. Gain a card costing at most the amount you lost to your hand.

Without support from other +Action +Money cards, one copy of this card gains you a card costing up to $2, which seems *really* weak for a $5.  Multiple copies let you gain a bigger card, but at the cost of also copper-stuffing yourself.  I think at least it needs "You may".

It certainly should be "you may". An alternative would be a version that takes debt:

+1 Action
+2$
(If you have no <dept>,) you may gain a non-victory card costing up to 8$ to your hand. Take <1> per $ the card costs.

This version is far too strong; it's better than a Grand Market and a Capital (minus 1 buy) put together on one card.

I admit that the +2$ together with the gaining to hand are too much and one should be dropped.

[Aquila]

I'm finding it hard to decide which Innovator variant is better at the moment, the one I have on the OP with Treasure play and needing 2 actions, or Asper's variant not involving debt at $4 cost. Neither show themselves imbalanced, but the former is certainly hard to work out when throned.

But one card I have plans to change is Expert. Look at the card and you might at first think 'that's nice, a really flexible card', like me. But, what does it actually add to a game? How does it impact a kingdom/board? Someone else's first impression of the card was 'boring' and now I see why - it's nearly always just a strictly better version of another card, nothing different.

So I thought about fusing it into Patent, so that it could become thematic:

Patent - Action, $6 cost.
Choose one: +1 card, +1 action, +1 buy or + $1 , then treat this as the card on your Patent mat.
-
When you first gain this, choose an Action card from the Supply costing up to $4 that is not on any other player's Patent mat. Put it on your Patent mat.

Functionally, it might play better at $7 cost allowing $5-costs on the mat. More usability, but maybe more problems with it.

[Aquila]

More updates which may be of interest:

Hawker interferes with Buy Phases following a different premise:

Hawker - $5 cost
Until your next turn, each other player may only buy 0 or 2 cards during their Buy Phases.
At the start of your next turn:
+1 buy
+ $2

The vanilla might be on the weak side for $5. Or it could be balanced like this for $4, a bit more playtesting needed yet. It does do more consistent damage though, unlike before.

Magnate and Advancing Village have had a swap around in how they gain action tokens:

Magnate - $5 cost
While this is in play: the first two times you gain a card, take an action token; when you spend an action token, instead of +1 action play an Action card from your hand twice.

Advancing Village - $3 cost
+1 card
+1 action
You may discard a card. If you do, take an action token.

Each can now be cheaper. +cards on Magnate-d tokens seems unnecessary by how it now plays out, but it may be that its gaining and playing tokens are to be separated so that you choose one or the other. It can collect quite a horde of them.
AV is kind of boring, and I may add some kind of on-trash ability to make it interesting; first that comes to mind is gain a card costing up to $4.

Blueprints is queer and doesn't add anything interesting to the game after all, returning Victories to the Supply. It's really narrow. And Incinerator doesn't seem to quite make sense, and it's likewise narrow. So I'll take those out and add this:

Blueprints - $3 cost
+1 buy
+ $1
Trash a card from your hand. + $1 per $2 it costs. If it isn't an Action or Treasure card, trash up to 2 more cards from your hand.

Revolters can give an action token on its second effect instead of +1 action, don't see why not. It should help the card more.

And I think I have a solution coming together for the Wanderers, but I'll leave that for later.

[Holger]

Innovator, Action, 5$
+1 Action
+2$
Lose any amount of $. Gain a card costing at most the amount you lost to your hand.

Without support from other +Action +Money cards, one copy of this card gains you a card costing up to $2, which seems *really* weak for a $5.  Multiple copies let you gain a bigger card, but at the cost of also copper-stuffing yourself.  I think at least it needs "You may".

It certainly should be "you may". An alternative would be a version that takes debt:

+1 Action
+2$
(If you have no <dept>,) you may gain a non-victory card costing up to 8$ to your hand. Take <1> per $ the card costs.

This version is far too strong; it's better than a Grand Market and a Capital (minus 1 buy) put together on one card.

I admit that the +2$ together with the gaining to hand are too much and one should be dropped.

Even if you drop the "to hand", it's still close to strictly better than Grand Market.
If you only drop the +$2 instead, it's far better than Capital when used on non-Victory cards, but can't be used on Provinces, which might or might not be balanced.
Either way, the card seems too similar to an existing card to me; thus I'd rather stay closer to Asper's original card. What about adding a Storyteller-like clause to it?

Innovator, Action, 5$
+1 Action
+2$
You may play a Treasure from your hand. Pay any amount of $. You may gain a card to your hand costing at most the amount you paid.

This would be close to a non-terminal Armory even if you only play a Silver, and potentially far better with more virtual $.

[Aquila]

The new Wanderers

Randomiser card:

Shuffle the Wanderers pile at the start of each game. During their Action Phase a player may use an action to play the top Wanderer, moving it to their play area until they are returned to the bottom of the pile at the stated time.

They are a pile of landscape cards that players may or may not want in their games, and for those who want it sometimes there can be this randomiser card. Whether the general rule of only 2 events/landmarks/Wanderers piles would be followed or if they would be separate from this I'm undecided.

The cards:

Warband - put 2 cards from your hand onto your deck. Each other player with more than 4 cards in hand does the same. Return: end of your turn.

Roadshow - each player draws up to 6 cards in hand, and looks through their discard pile and puts a card from it into their hand. Return: end of your turn.

Circus Troupe - each player reveals their hand to the player on their left, and they choose a card. Each player then draws a card and puts the chosen card onto their deck. Return: end of your turn.

Forger - move a Copper from the Copper pile onto a different Supply pile of your choice. Cards under it cannot be gained or bought before it is. Return: end of your turn.

Yes, I said what I did earlier about moving cards onto other piles, but most of the problems come from the feature being usable multiple times and throughout the game when on a kingdom card. On this Wanderer I think it works.

Scrounger - each player trashes up to 2 cards from their hand. Return: end of your turn.

Caravaneer - while this is in play, if a player has at least $2 unspent at the start of Clean-up, they draw 2 extra cards for their next turn's hand. Return: start of your next turn.

Secret Dealer - each player puts their deck into their discard pile and gets +1 buy at the start of their next turn. Return: end of your next turn.

Roadblock - while this is in play, after cards are drawn or gained into a player's hand other than at Clean-up, they are immediately discarded. Return: end of your next turn.

Royal Visit - while this is in play, after cards are discarded or trashed from a player's hand other than at Clean-up, they are returned to their hand. Return: end of your next turn.

Refugees - +1 action. Each player takes an action token. Reveal the Wanderer that is second from top. Return: end of your turn.

You can keep it constantly revealed, so you could move the top card up to make the second card's instructions visible.

So this set is all about card movement, including several things you couldn't see on an Action card. Each one will have a very different impact depending on its timing and the kingdom, to hopefully provide many new experiences.

[Asper]

Innovator, Action, 5$
+1 Action
+2$
Lose any amount of $. Gain a card costing at most the amount you lost to your hand.

Without support from other +Action +Money cards, one copy of this card gains you a card costing up to $2, which seems *really* weak for a $5.  Multiple copies let you gain a bigger card, but at the cost of also copper-stuffing yourself.  I think at least it needs "You may".

It certainly should be "you may". An alternative would be a version that takes debt:

+1 Action
+2$
(If you have no <dept>,) you may gain a non-victory card costing up to 8$ to your hand. Take <1> per $ the card costs.

This version is far too strong; it's better than a Grand Market and a Capital (minus 1 buy) put together on one card.

I admit that the +2$ together with the gaining to hand are too much and one should be dropped.

Even if you drop the "to hand", it's still close to strictly better than Grand Market.
If you only drop the +$2 instead, it's far better than Capital when used on non-Victory cards, but can't be used on Provinces, which might or might not be balanced.
Either way, the card seems too similar to an existing card to me; thus I'd rather stay closer to Asper's original card. What about adding a Storyteller-like clause to it?

Innovator, Action, 5$
+1 Action
+2$
You may play a Treasure from your hand. Pay any amount of $. You may gain a card to your hand costing at most the amount you paid.

This would be close to a non-terminal Armory even if you only play a Silver, and potentially far better with more virtual $.

Saying this was almost strictly better than Grand Market is like saying Candlestick Maker was close to strictly better than Market. You can't just ignore a +1 Card on a nonterminal Action card. That's not to say I don't like the Treasure suggestion.

[Q]

Innovator, Action, 5$
+1 Action
+2$
Lose any amount of $. Gain a card costing at most the amount you lost to your hand.

Without support from other +Action +Money cards, one copy of this card gains you a card costing up to $2, which seems *really* weak for a $5.  Multiple copies let you gain a bigger card, but at the cost of also copper-stuffing yourself.  I think at least it needs "You may".

It certainly should be "you may". An alternative would be a version that takes debt:

+1 Action
+2$
(If you have no ,) you may gain a non-victory card costing up to 8$ to your hand. Take  per $ the card costs.

This version is far too strong; it's better than a Grand Market and a Capital (minus 1 buy) put together on one card.

I admit that the +2$ together with the gaining to hand are too much and one should be dropped.

Even if you drop the "to hand", it's still close to strictly better than Grand Market.
If you only drop the +$2 instead, it's far better than Capital when used on non-Victory cards, but can't be used on Provinces, which might or might not be balanced.
Either way, the card seems too similar to an existing card to me; thus I'd rather stay closer to Asper's original card. What about adding a Storyteller-like clause to it?

Innovator, Action, 5$
+1 Action
+2$
You may play a Treasure from your hand. Pay any amount of $. You may gain a card to your hand costing at most the amount you paid.

This would be close to a non-terminal Armory even if you only play a Silver, and potentially far better with more virtual $.

Saying this was almost strictly better than Grand Market is like saying Candlestick Maker was close to strictly better than Market. You can't just ignore a +1 Card on a nonterminal Action card. That's not to say I don't like the Treasure suggestion.

You potentially gain a card to your hand, hence Holger's comparison to Grand Market.

[Aquila]

It would be great if I find this Innovator to be balanced:

Innovator - $4 cost
+ $2
You may play a Treasure from your hand. You may pay any number of $ to gain a card costing the amount to your hand.

Doing all your buying in the Action Phase might be too broken with Mission, so it may need Black Market's wording.

And here are some ideas that seem so simple I wouldn't be surprised if I saw them on these forums somewhere.
A better Canal:

Canal - $5 cost
+1 buy
Cards (everywhere) you haven't gained copies of this turn cost $2 less, but not less than $0.

The more interesting AV:

Advancing Village - Action Reaction, $4 cost
+1 card
Take an action token. You may discard a card, to take another action token.
-
When this enters your hand, you may play it immediately. (Discard it at your next Clean-up.)

And this Workshop variant:

Steelworks - Action Attack, $5 cost.
Gain a card costing up to $4; or if you have used 3 or more actions this turn (counting on this) it may cost $5. Each other player reveals the top 2 cards of their deck, trashes one costing the same as the card you gained, and discards the rest.

The current Steelworks would be called Glassworks if this turns out well. I was looking for something that would work as a Conspirator variant counting used actions during a turn, and saw how a Workshop could potentially do. Fairly boring by itself, I then added the Attack.

[Aquila]

Implementing -1 action as a State
There are several things to keep in mind when you want a card to have -1 action, and I think having a State (6 copies, 1 per player) makes things work almost perfectly:

Exhaustion - State
When you next have actions left, return this and -1 action.

You need to explain that you must have actions left for it to work, and you don't want to take up lots of card space on it. But even better, the absence of Villages isn't an issue, because you just lose the action whenever you can.

So the changes to my cards would be:

Colliery - Action, $2+ cost
+ $2
Discard a card.
If you don't have Exhaustion, you may take it to do this again.
-
When you buy this, you may overpay for it. Take an action token per $1 overpaid.

After resolving this, you can use an action token (same manner as CotR) to remove Exhaustion.

Dairy - action, $5 cost
+2 cards
+1 buy
+ $2
Take Exhaustion.

This is a bit beastly when Throned.

Innovator - Action, $4 cost
+ $2
Play up to 3 Treasures from your hand. You may buy a card immediately; if you don't have Exhaustion, you may take it to gain the bought card to your hand.

Perhaps the 'bigger' Innovator could work like this. You can acquire immediate power, but it's only useable if you have 2 actions left afterward.

Refinery - Action, $5 cost
Choose one: trash a card from your hand and gain a card costing up to $2 more than the trashed card; or look through your discard pile and put a card from it into your hand.
If you don't have Exhaustion, you may take it to do the other choice.

Glassworks - Action, $5 cost
Choose one: draw up to 8 cards in hand, then discard down to 5; or reveal your hand, and if there are…
2 or more Treasures, +1 buy;
2 or more Actions, +2 actions;
2 or more Victories, +$2.
If you don't have Exhaustion, you may take it to do the other choice.

Textile Mill - Action, $5 cost
Choose one: +3 cards; or look at the top 5 cards of your deck, discard any number, then put the rest back with any number from your hand in any order.
If you don't have Exhaustion, you may take it to do the other choice.

The choice element still works nicely on these.

Revolters - Action attack duration, $4 cost
Each other player gets -1 action at the start of their Buy Phase next turn, but not less than 0. If they have 0 left, they gain a Curse; if there are no Curses left, a Copper.
At the start of your next turn, take an action token.

This one can't change. I don't think it's possible to make a -1 action Attack without making it hit at the Buy Phase (and Exhaustion always hits the Action Phase) because of a certain Enchantress. Such an Attack played with her every turn would lock everyone else out of playing any Actions altogether.

[Aquila]

I've overhauled the OP again with updates, and I've done some mock-ups. Here are the changes explained:

Exhaustion - State
When you next have unused actions and it's your Action Phase, return this and -1 action.

Finalising what Exhaustion actually does. It only hits at the Action Phase.


Advancing Village doesn't have the option to discard on play, for simplicity and balance. It also can't be instantly played if it enters hand during your Action Phase, as making terminal draw non-terminal is crazy. It also calls for a little bit more play skill.


No changes to Blueprints, a neat enough trasher for the set. There's been a curious Actions and Treasures sub-theme developing, so it does fit.


No mechanical change to Canal, this hasn't been imbalanced yet though I've still to put it with Cornucopia.


Colliery needed to change when it took on Exhaustion. You can choose to carry Exhaustion over to your next turn to wait and see if you draw any Actions to play, and if you do you can spend an action token then to play them. If not, you keep your tokens. With the overpay it had, you could get too big a store of them, and that meant too many early Provinces.

Here's a new idea, making Colliery the top of a split pile. I had the idea of this Treasure, since action tokens could make it work well. Tried it, but it was too much like a cheap early Platinum as a plain kingdom card. The fix I came to was this:

New Element - $5 cost.
When you play this, it's worth $5 -$1 per card in your hand, down to $0.
-
You may only buy this if you have a Colliery in play. When you buy this, return the Colliery to the Supply.

It seems to gel together with Colliery fine, I just wonder if the bottom part couldn't be better.


Cameo takes on the name Diary, it seemed better thematically. No change otherwise, it works well.


Entrepreneur is great, I see no need to change it.

Glassworks - Action, $5 cost.
Draw up to 8 cards in hand, then discard down to 5.
If you don't have Exhaustion, you may take it to reveal your hand and gain a card costing exactly $1 per type (Action, attack etc.) in your hand.

I did rename Steelworks to Glassworks, and with the Exhaustion change it needed a rebalance. You could do the draw and discard and make it non-terminal if you then revealed 2 Action cards, that as well as the possibility of +coins and buys. Too much power. Now you have to do the sift first, and the second part works with types in a different, hopefully interesting way.


Hawker makes the 0 or 2 cards buying work across the turn, because of Black Market and Innovator below.

Innovator - Action, $5 cost.
Choose one: + $2, play up to 3 Treasures from your hand, and you may buy a card, gaining it onto your deck; or +2 cards.
If you don't have Exhaustion, you may take it to do the other choice.

Dairy has gone for now, because I noticed how similar it was to Innovator (and hence I felt better about renaming Cameo to Diary, would be silly to have both names). This gets exactly the same vanilla with Exhaustion, though the buy is a little different. Perhaps now there's too much going on and it's too complex a card?


As Locusts are now a hex, I renamed the card Pigeon. No other change.


I renamed Refinery Potteries. It's prettier and feels a bit more Dominion-y. It's the same, complex like Innovator.

Revolters - Action Attack Duration, $4 cost.
Until your next turn, if each other player has 1 or fewer unused actions at the start of their Buy Phase, they gain a Curse; or if there are no Curses, a Copper.
At the start of your next turn, take an action token.

A wording change for Revolters, including giving out Coppers when the Curses run out. Diadem isn't attacked by this anymore.

Steelworks - Action Attack, $5 cost.
Gain a card costing up to $4; or if you have used 3 or more actions this turn it may cost $5.
Each other player reveals the top 3 cards of their deck; if one costs the same as the card you gained (they choose one if there are 2 or more), they may trash it or gain a Curse.

Steelworks's attack looks deeper into the other players' deck, 3 cards that are put back afterwards, and gives the option to gain a Curse instead of trash the card, because Knight attacks aren't popular.


No changes to Textile Mill. It gives a lot of control over your cards, but Exhaustion is a significant setback.


Tutor's discard and draw now applies just to cards neither Action nor Treasure, not 'Victory or none of these types'. It's shorter, simpler, and saves potential tracking issues like with played then discarded Nobles.


No change to Wastelands yet. In some games it's added a very nice rewarding challenge, trying to keep your deck small enough by the game end. But sometimes someone concentrating on them will 'seal themselves in' and make themselves unable to do any more until the game ends. The other players need only wait until they get more points before ending, a pretty boring wait.

As cards have left, I thought of new ones and given them a little testing.

Night Shift - Night Duration, $5 cost.
Take Exhaustion; if you do, and the previous turn wasn't yours, take another turn after this one.

Thinking of Exhaustion has really helped me think of simpler cards that use them. How about a really good one that takes it for the start of your next turn? From there, this just followed on. It has such a natural feel to it, right down to its theme.

Parade - Victory, <8> cost.
Worth 8VP - VP equal to the difference in the number of Actions and Treasures in your deck.
-
You may only buy this if you have the same number of Actions and Treasures in play.

This one accentuates the Actions and Treasures thing in this set. There are Action-heavy engine strategies, and there's big money, but this encourages a balance of the two.

And finally, a big group that makes even more of Actions and Treasures, and tries out a bunch of different mechanics:

Components - Action Traveller, $3 cost
Return this and another Components from your hand to the Supply. If you do return 2 Components, gain a Prototype.
-
When you gain this, gain a Silver onto your deck.

A Traveller that upgrades Treasure Map style. Though you may choose to buy this just for a top-decked Silver at the same cost.

Prototype - Action Traveller, $5* cost.
Take two action tokens.
Trash a Treasure from your hand. Gain a Treasure costing up to $3 more to your hand.
You may discard this. If you don't, then at Clean-up exchange this for a Patent, Spinning Mule or Steam Engine.
(This is not in the Supply.)

A card that discards itself on play, so it can be played several times in the same turn. This mechanic can run into several issues, but Prototype should be safe from most of them. It has no issues with tracking, and it's impossible to make infinite turns with this as it's a non-Supply card.
It's only a 3 stage Traveller as Components are hard enough to upgrade. But the final step is a choice of three.

Patent - Action, $6* cost.
Choose one: +1 card, +1 action, +1 buy or + $1, then this becomes the card on your Patent mat.
-
When you first gain this, put an Action card from the Supply that isn't on another player's Patent mat onto your Patent mat.
(This is not in the Supply.)

Yes, Patent has moved. It created too much first-buyer advantage as a Kingdom card. Here, it can afford to go for any card cost as the timing and difficulty to get 1 of them balances it out, and the Patent mat banning can be fair as if there's a good target for it, probably one of the alternative upgrades will be good too, Steam Engine. So a Patent race won't leave the loser hopeless.

Spinning Mule - Action, $6* cost.
+1 card
+1 action
While this is in play, after you play a Treasure, +1 card.
(This is not in the Supply.)

The Treasures upgrade. It started as a permanent duration but you could get it so soon in some games that it dominated. You get the cards after resolving for no other reason than working better with New Element above.

Steam Engine - Action, $6* cost.
While this is in play, the next 3 times you gain a card take an action token, and when you spend an action token, instead of +1 action you may play an Action card from your hand twice.
(This is not in the Supply.)

And here's Magnate, moved, renamed and buffed a little. When it was a kingdom card, really you just wanted one of them. I already had Spinning Mule as an idea I was testing, and when I noticed how it upgraded Treasures similarly to this with Actions, this whole group happened.

And that's the lot. Wanderers I'll do later. (Is this still tl;dr?)

[Co0kieL0rd]

Aquila, you have very interesting and original ideas. Such shall be graced with my coveted commentaries!

The action tokens and Exhaustion state are cool concepts and I can see them work out in general, even though Exhaustion is a pretty harsh restriction in engines but shouldn't matter too much in the early game where most cards you play are treasures.

I'll comment on your cards individually and also point out some wording issues.

Advancing Village: This introduces the action token and its benefits perfectly. The card might have some accountability issues with its reaction but you made them rare enough and that's fine for a fan card. I find it hard to assess its power. Doesn't it suck when you draw it during your action phase? It's just a cantrip when you play it, then. And in an engine, where most cards are drawn during your action phase (as opposed to only the 5 cards in your starting hand) and you rarely have any spare actions, this should be hardly better than Village. I see it on the same power level as Ghost Town. What makes this cost $4?

Blueprints: Seems like a decent card. It needs a "(rounded up)" or "(rounded down)" clause.

Canal: This is a great Bridge variant that can't be used to drive piles in a megaturn, cleverly implemented, powerful but limited. I like it.

Colliery/New Element: These two have a cute synergy but I fell like it's not enough to make New Element good. It's even weaker than Poor House with its very harsh penalty for any cards in hand (no just treasures). How many games did you play with it where you found, "wow, this is a power card that needs to cost $5"?
Besides, you can improve the wording of both cards. Colliery should say "you may take it to play this again", otherwise it's unclear what "do" refers to.
New Element could go with a sleek "You can only gain this if you have a Colliery in play, and when you do, return it to the Supply." It also doesn't need "When you play this" in its instructions. For reference, look at Fool's Gold, or any other kingdom treasure for that matter; they don't need that clause to say what they're worth.

Diary: Doesn't seem strong to me but I probably can't accurately asses how much an action token it worth. Design-wise it's very elegant, though.

Entrepreneur: I like how this card becomes like five times more powerful when its pile is empty, but the case where the player who wins the split dominates the game can be mitigated by the other players. Another clever idea.

Glassworks: Why does it care about card types? Since it has nothing to do with your set's theme, this seems like an unnecessary limitation to its gaining power. Its draw is not even stronger than Embassy and taking Exhaustion is a harsh penalty. To compensate for that, Glassworks could care for differently named cards instead.

Hawker: If an opponent only has 1 buy (which is most of the early game, sometimes the whole game) you can lock them out of the game with an egine that plays a Hawker every turn. That would be very bad. Also there's an edge case with Villa: Your opponent has Hawker in play. You buy a Villa, return to your action phase but then don't play the Villa and end your turn so you can't buy another card. What happens? Do you have to return the Villa? That would make no sense. The problem with this kind of card that wants to restrict players to certain actions is that in Dominion there's usually another option that's somehow ambiguous and allows them to exploit a loop-hole.

Innovator: A very potent and flexible engine enabler and component! I find it difficult to fully wrap my head around it so I'll need to play with it to find out how to best use it.

Night Shift: I like this card a lot! Zero actions is an adequate drawback for an extra turn. You were bold to put this card out here so shortly prior to Nocturne's release. I can imagine there being a similar card in it. There might even be a State that does the exact same thing as Exhaustion.

Parade: This rewards a "good stuff deck" probably more than any other card. My intuition says 8 VP per card (whose cost you can spread over two turns) is enough to forego building a treasure-less deck. But you need a lot of buying power to keep up with the engine that reliably gains 1-2 Provinces each turn, if there's one available.

Pigeon: Eh, doesn't thrill me particularly. From an thematic perspective, I would rather have the card named "Pigeons" and show a swarm of those gray-black city dwellers, than the charming bird in the current artwork.

Potteries: Seems decent but is it really that strong? I would have said it's one of the weaker $5-cards.

Revolters: I have several problems with this. First, its wording is ambiguous. "If each player has..." sounds like a condition referring to all other players counted together. Instead it should simply say "if another player has". Second, it's a curser for mere $4, and a Village on your next turn. On top of that, it gives Coppers once the Curses are out. There's only one official card that does that, and probably for good reason; it's the strongest attack in Dominion and it costs $5. Revolters seems broken to me. I advise you reword it as follows:
Until your next turn, if another player has used up their actions at the start of their Buy Phase, they gain a Curse. At the start of your next turn, take an action token.
This is simpler, unambiguous, and more balanced.

Steelworks: A gainer that gets very powerful in engines and has a brutal attack as well. This is vastly overpowered and my initial suggestion is to drop the cursing part. I would also give your opponents less options to make the card less wordy:
Each other player reveals the top 3 cards of their deck, trashes one costing the same as the card you gained and puts the rest back in any order.

Textile Mill: It's a fine Smithy variant regarding its power level. But I'm afraid there will be way too much looking and sorting going on (I hated that in my first games with Secret Chamber) so it will become obnoxious.

Tutor: This is probably your most balanced card. A premium engine enabler for $3 whose slowness should balance it somewhat.

Wastelands: This card's theme is very cleverly implemented. I like how it takes late greening to another level. Still, 15 cards total might be a bit harsh. OTOH, 5VP for $5 is a lot and it takes some skill to estimate if going for Wastelands is gonna work out in a game, as well as to make sure you can take the weight of a high green card densitiy in your deck towards the end. If you're going for Wastelands, watch out for Mountebank, Greed, Embassy, Messenger, Governor etc.

Now I feel quite exhausted myself. Gonna look at the Travellers another day.

[Asper]

Colliery seems a lot like like the card Donald has described Diadem had started out as.

[Aquila]

Wow, what great feedback. Thank you!

Advancing Village: This introduces the action token and its benefits perfectly. The card might have some accountability issues with its reaction but you made them rare enough and that's fine for a fan card. I find it hard to assess its power. Doesn't it suck when you draw it during your action phase? It's just a cantrip when you play it, then. And in an engine, where most cards are drawn during your action phase (as opposed to only the 5 cards in your starting hand) and you rarely have any spare actions, this should be hardly better than Village. I see it on the same power level as Ghost Town. What makes this cost $4?

It started out being able to react all the time, and it just looked very scary with terminal draw, especially seeing how other Villages are drawn dead. I suppose that is its forte over the others, so I may carry on with it, but I just fear it's too automatic. Like with all of these cards, concentrated playtesting will tell.

Blueprints: Seems like a decent card. It needs a "(rounded up)" or "(rounded down)" clause.

Just adding (round down) to what I have is in-keeping with the 2E Bishop, I'll go with that.

Colliery/New Element: These two have a cute synergy but I fell like it's not enough to make New Element good. It's even weaker than Poor House with its very harsh penalty for any cards in hand (no just treasures). How many games did you play with it where you found, "wow, this is a power card that needs to cost $5"?
Besides, you can improve the wording of both cards. Colliery should say "you may take it to play this again", otherwise it's unclear what "do" refers to.
New Element could go with a sleek "You can only gain this if you have a Colliery in play, and when you do, return it to the Supply." It also doesn't need "When you play this" in its instructions. For reference, look at Fool's Gold, or any other kingdom treasure for that matter; they don't need that clause to say what they're worth.

Being a Treasure, New Element can be played after all the other Treasures have been (except Fortune and sometimes Bank). It's nearly always yielded at least $3; I've hardly ever trashed with a deck going for this pile, and the Coppers really help. But maybe this is a disadvantage in itself, and it merits a cheaper cost. Perhaps you should be able to keep your Colliery.
I like the wording changes, except for 'playing' Colliery again. You could end up playing one of them several times over, especially with Champion. So it needs one of these:
'Discard a card for +$2. If you don't have Exhaustion, you may take it to play this again'
+$2. Discard a card. If you don't have Exhaustion, you may take it to discard a card and + $2.
Basically, the latter lets you get the coins even if your hand is empty, and the first doesn't.
Though Asper's comment is interesting. I've always seen this as changing a card in your hand into a Silver, and if it would be too similar to Diadem I would choose the second of my suggestions so it can only work twice in one play.

Glassworks: Why does it care about card types? Since it has nothing to do with your set's theme, this seems like an unnecessary limitation to its gaining power. Its draw is not even stronger than Embassy and taking Exhaustion is a harsh penalty. To compensate for that, Glassworks could care for differently named cards instead.

Truth be told it's yet to be properly tested in this form, but it certainly needed a change. Indeed looking for types isn't in-keeping with this set. I chose it because it holds potential to gain expensive cards when put in the right kingdom, which looked appealing. But yes, how often would you want to go Exhausted to gain a ~$5 when you only have a 5-card hand? Maybe it isn't the best second part.
Edit: Or could it start non-terminal then become terminal if you gain something?

Hawker: If an opponent only has 1 buy (which is most of the early game, sometimes the whole game) you can lock them out of the game with an egine that plays a Hawker every turn. That would be very bad. Also there's an edge case with Villa: Your opponent has Hawker in play. You buy a Villa, return to your action phase but then don't play the Villa and end your turn so you can't buy another card. What happens? Do you have to return the Villa? That would make no sense. The problem with this kind of card that wants to restrict players to certain actions is that in Dominion there's usually another option that's somehow ambiguous and allows them to exploit a loop-hole.

Yes, all good points. Perhaps the best fix could be something like this?
Until your next turn, when another player buys their first card during their turn, they gain a card costing up to $2.

Pigeon: Eh, doesn't thrill me particularly. From an thematic perspective, I would rather have the card named "Pigeons" and show a swarm of those gray-black city dwellers, than the charming bird in the current artwork.

Cantrip trashers don't feel that thrilling, I agree. The Supply trashing was the fun bit, some interesting interactions with some piles. It's emptying out other cards as this pile empties itself, and if you don't like the speed of that just make yours hit Silvers. It just needed a benefit to the buyer and well the trash just seemed to fit best. Yeah, I guess a monarch could buy a flock of pigeons for himself, rather than one carrier pigeon.

Potteries: Seems decent but is it really that strong? I would have said it's one of the weaker $5-cards.

I noted that Donald tried a card that got anything from the discard, and found it too strong to do. I think it might have been on a card doing Militia as well? When it worked well, like getting a Gold, I kinda felt what Donald meant, but on a terminal $5 the effect should be balanced.

Revolters: I have several problems with this. First, its wording is ambiguous. "If each player has..." sounds like a condition referring to all other players counted together. Instead it should simply say "if another player has". Second, it's a curser for mere $4, and a Village on your next turn. On top of that, it gives Coppers once the Curses are out. There's only one official card that does that, and probably for good reason; it's the strongest attack in Dominion and it costs $5. Revolters seems broken to me. I advise you reword it as follows:
Until your next turn, if another player has used up their actions at the start of their Buy Phase, they gain a Curse. At the start of your next turn, take an action token.
This is simpler, unambiguous, and more balanced.

All sound words here, great wording, though I'd like it to hit with 1 action left if someone just plays pure money (a newer player may be scared into it). But would that bump it up to 5 or make it too plain strong? This is almost an Attack Village after all.

Steelworks: A gainer that gets very powerful in engines and has a brutal attack as well. This is vastly overpowered and my initial suggestion is to drop the cursing part. I would also give your opponents less options to make the card less wordy:
Each other player reveals the top 3 cards of their deck, trashes one costing the same as the card you gained and puts the rest back in any order.

Yes, your outside perspective has helped me see sanity here. The cursing option was really shooting myself in the foot.

Textile Mill: It's a fine Smithy variant regarding its power level. But I'm afraid there will be way too much looking and sorting going on (I hated that in my first games with Secret Chamber) so it will become obnoxious.

True. Card control isn't for everyone. I suppose by and large this isn't an easy set to play.

Food for thought here.

[jonaskoelker]

Nice cards, would play, 10/10.

A few comments:

Canal - Action, $5 cost.
+1 buy
This turn, cards you haven't yet gained a copy of cost $2 less, but not less than $0.

This can be Throned for great cost reduction, but the once-per-name clause limits the abuse. You may want to consider "<separating horizontal line> While this is in play, cards [...]", in the style of Highway. You did mention Bridge, so probably you're already aware of the abuse potential.

New Element - $5 cost.
When you play this, it's worth $5 -$1 per card in your hand, down to $0.
-
You may only buy this if you have a Colliery in play. When you buy this, return the Colliery to the Supply.

If I play two Collieries, what do I return to the Supply? Suggestions "When you buy this, return a Colliery from play to the Supply." Alternatively, "When you buy this, return all Collieries from play to the Supply." — then you can only buy one per turn (edge case Villa). Maybe it should say "all your Collieries"—though the only card you can play outside of your own turn is Caravan Guard, IINM.

Glassworks - Action, $5 cost.
Draw up to 8 cards in hand, then discard down to 5.
If you don't have Exhaustion, you may take it to reveal your hand and gain a card costing exactly $1 per type (Action, attack etc.) in your hand.

If I have Village and Militia, does 'Action' count once or twice? That is, do I gain a $2- or $3-cost card? There's probably not room on the card for any clarifying text.

The same wording is unambiguous on Courtier because no single card has the same type twice.

Night Shift - Night Duration, $5 cost.
Take Exhaustion; if you do, and the previous turn wasn't yours, take another turn after this one.

If you already have Exhaustion, do you take an extra turn? I think not.

Prototype - Action Traveller, $5* cost.
Take two action tokens.
Trash a Treasure from your hand. Gain a Treasure costing up to $3 more to your hand.
You may discard this. If you don't, then at Clean-up exchange this for a Patent, Spinning Mule or Steam Engine.
(This is not in the Supply.)

If you draw your deck, including two of these and a treasure, and you have your +1 card token on this, you can trash the Copper, Silver and Gold piles. That seems a bit explosive; but on the other hand, this scenario isn't something you achieve on shuffles one through four, I guess. I would encourage playtesting with this scenario in mind to evaluate how broken it is.

(I didn't read the wall-of-text cards.)

[Aquila]

Thanks jonas.

Canal - Action, $5 cost.
+1 buy
This turn, cards you haven't yet gained a copy of cost $2 less, but not less than $0.

This can be Throned for great cost reduction, but the once-per-name clause limits the abuse. You may want to consider "<separating horizontal line> While this is in play, cards [...]", in the style of Highway. You did mention Bridge, so probably you're already aware of the abuse potential.

Throning it is fine. The worst abuse you could do is with different alt VP cards.
... Which at first seems safe, until I remember the Castles. I'm thinking it would take sufficiently long setup to save this from being broken, and instead a good combo?

New Element - $5 cost.
When you play this, it's worth $5 -$1 per card in your hand, down to $0.
-
You may only buy this if you have a Colliery in play. When you buy this, return the Colliery to the Supply.

If I play two Collieries, what do I return to the Supply? Suggestions "When you buy this, return a Colliery from play to the Supply." Alternatively, "When you buy this, return all Collieries from play to the Supply." — then you can only buy one per turn (edge case Villa). Maybe it should say "all your Collieries"—though the only card you can play outside of your own turn is Caravan Guard, IINM.

Oh yeah, that's true. I may end up changing the bottom bit anyway.

Glassworks - Action, $5 cost.
Draw up to 8 cards in hand, then discard down to 5.
If you don't have Exhaustion, you may take it to reveal your hand and gain a card costing exactly $1 per type (Action, attack etc.) in your hand.

If I have Village and Militia, does 'Action' count once or twice? That is, do I gain a $2- or $3-cost card? There's probably not room on the card for any clarifying text.

The same wording is unambiguous on Courtier because no single card has the same type twice.

I meant to say 'different type', but it never happened. Oops.

Night Shift - Night Duration, $5 cost.
Take Exhaustion; if you do, and the previous turn wasn't yours, take another turn after this one.

If you already have Exhaustion, do you take an extra turn? I think not.

The intention is not, 'if you do' I hope makes that clear. Every card should check you take Exhaustion before giving bonuses, so they're never free.

Prototype - Action Traveller, $5* cost.
Take two action tokens.
Trash a Treasure from your hand. Gain a Treasure costing up to $3 more to your hand.
You may discard this. If you don't, then at Clean-up exchange this for a Patent, Spinning Mule or Steam Engine.
(This is not in the Supply.)

If you draw your deck, including two of these and a treasure, and you have your +1 card token on this, you can trash the Copper, Silver and Gold piles. That seems a bit explosive; but on the other hand, this scenario isn't something you achieve on shuffles one through four, I guess. I would encourage playtesting with this scenario in mind to evaluate how broken it is.

Prototype isn't a Supply card, so it should never see any token on it.

[jonaskoelker]

Thanks jonas.

You're more than welcome

Throning [Canal] is fine [but what about Castles?]

Even if you KC a Canal you only have 4 buys, so it's not bonkers broken, merely very, very good—but if you can KC it once you can probably do it thrice. But that's a 3-card combo (Canal, Castles, TR/KC/RC/&C) which is merely very, very good, so nothing to worry about I'd say.

I might be taking a minority position, but I don't think strategic gravity wells* are a bad things per se. I think what makes many strategic gravity wells unappealing is that they make games formulaic. I don't think this would happen with Canal.

(*) cards or combos which you basically have to build your deck around when they show up, and such that you evaluate all other cards only in relation to the key card/combo—Rebuild, Page, Cultist, Hermit/Market Square and (sometimes) Tournament are examples.

My conclusion: I successfully brought to your attention something you were already aware of

I meant to say 'different type' [on Glassworks], but it never happened. Oops.

'Glad I could help and I think 'different type' is an elegant solution.

[The intention is that Night Shift doesn't give you an extra turn if you already have Exhaustion. I hope 'if you do' makes that clear.]

I think all other cards that take Exhaustion say "if you don't have Exhaustion, you may take it and <do conditional effect>". I think consistency is good—deviation raises the question "why?", and the only answer I can come up with that I like is "all the consistent phrasings are awful", which I think is not true. I think the following is fine: "If you don't have Exhaustion, take it; if you did and the previous turn wasn't yours, take another turn after this one."

The thing that pushes the wording in a clunky direction is that's it's tricky to elegantly convey the parenthesis structure of "if condition 1 then ((do thing 1) and (if condition 2 then do thing 2))".

Alternatively, you could say "if (condition 1 and condition 2) then (do thing 1 and do thing 2)"—i.e. "if the previous turn wasn't yours and you don't have Exhaustion, take Exhaustion and take an extra turn after this one".

Note that this way, if you want to play Night Shift just to take Exhaustion but for no "other" benefit, you can only do so if the last turn wasn't yours—that is, condition 2 also has to be true for you to do thing 1. That seems about as strategically relevant as the addition of "you may" to Throne Room, probably even less.

It could matter if you could be possessed in such a way that the turn prior to your possessed turn was yours, but I think that's impossible.

Prototype isn't a Supply card, so it should never see any token on it.

Derp.

[Aquila]

The Wanderers, revamped and mocked up.

The randomiser card:

Shuffle the Wanderers pile. Keep them face down except for the top one. During the Action Phase a player may use an action to play the top Wanderer, moving it to their play area then returning it to the bottom at the end of their turn.

They join events and landmarks, and IRL you could shuffle this randomiser into their deck to decide when they're used, or include them freely by choice. (This card is portrait mainly so the instructions are easier to read).
To explain the concept: the Wanderers are a set of cards that cycle as they're used, each one giving something extra you can do in your action phase. I thought mechanically this could open up a lot of new possibilities, those that you couldn't do on a kingdom Action card because playing them every turn or more than once in a turn wouldn't work. Also, each card affects every player to reduce swinginess.

I came up with several different ideas that could work, but saw that a set of them should follow a mechanical theme. This makes them a bit easier to understand, softens swinginess further and helps form synergies between each card. This set is about card movement.

The result: a pile that has very varied impact on each game depending on the timing and order of each card, and adds the challenge of players considering everybody when deciding to go for one, whether or not they will get a better deal than anyone else.

The cards, 10 of them:

Each player sets any number of cards aside from their hand, draws that many, then puts the set aside cards onto their deck in any order.

Swap cards in your hand with the top of your deck. It would get a bit redundant done more than once in a turn, but it's fine on a Wanderer. Opens up a few tricks.

Each player discards down to 3 cards in hand, and gains a copy of a non-Victory card they discarded.

Everyone must decide whether to get a better turn now and take some junk, or make this turn weaker and gain something good.

Each player looks at the top card of their deck and may discard it, then draws a card from the player to their right's deck.

A new one not yet tested. Card movement affecting everyone pointed me towards a Masquerade variant.

Each player draws up to 6 cards in hand, and looks through their discard pile and puts a card from it into their hand.

Potentially a great boost. But who will get the most benefit?

Each player trashes up to 2 cards from their hand.

Timing and what each other player has are both crucial factors to this one.

+1 action. Each player puts their deck into their discard pile.

Looks a bit boring, but there are times when this is golden, especially with some interactions in this set.

Put 2 cards from your hand onto your deck. Each other player with 4 or more cards in hand does the same.

Almost a pure attack, but sometimes this will be helpful to you.

While this is in play, after cards are discarded or trashed from a player's hand, they are returned to their hand. (Keep until next turn).

Very likely a Wanderer will adopt a duration effect, hence their orange colour (though as it turns out, there's only one here). This mostly prevents your hand getting smaller, good if you're discarding, bad if you're trashing junk. 'After' cards are discarded or trashed for Militia effects, so you aren't endlessly discarding and putting back. The user gets it for two turns; the times this could be an unfair advantage I hope are rare enough...?

Move this onto any Supply pile. Cards that enter or leave the pile are immediately trashed. A player may play this even if it leaves the Wanderers pile. (This is never returned.)

When this card is used, it leaves the Wanderers pile, so its timing will be the only thing that varies (as well as making each other Wanderer more frequent). Having groped with the idea of blocking Supply piles for ages I've come to this, making players use actions rather than buys to get around the effect. Moving things to the trash hopefully saves any confusion and is clean with existing mechanics, and well it's card movement.

+1 action. Each player takes an action token. Reveal the Wanderer second from top.

Turn the next card down over and keep it visible. Perhaps those next two Wanderers make a neat combo you want to use. If that's so, you've got an action token to make it happen.

(For those who read the Wanderers before, some cards left because they didn't fit the card movement theme. Another, which discarded cards that entered your hand, left because it was a pure attack, and more often than not it was a stop card.)

And there they are. I'll get to the amendments suggested above later.

[Asper]

Revolution is a pretty well-made set in my opinion. I'll just single out a few cards that I felt I could say something relevant about:

I like Diary. Comparing it to Festival, which has a +buy but can be drawn dead and doesn't have its action staying around, it seems more than decent. I feel that often the topdecking will be useful instead of a downside. A very elegant design.

Advancing Village seems weird. Often the only way to play it as a Village will be when drawing it during cleanup, which is usually equal to it being in your hand at the start of your turn. After that it's a cantrip basically. I think you could have had a similar functionality much more easily, like:
"+1 Card
Take an Action token. If you have no Action cards other than Advancing Village in play, you may play an Action card from your hand."

[Aquila]

Big update
I went off doing this, then came back to it with a fresh look. A look at how the cards combine together as a set, as well as individual improvements. I saw fit to make a lot of changes. The OP has had another overhaul with them and improvements to presentation.

If you're interested, a list of the changes:


Exhaustion - changed to Exhausted to fit the tense of the other States. You 'immediately' return it to make its priority to your next action clearer.


Advancing Village - down to $3 cost. This distinguishes it more as a Village you can open with.

Advancing Village seems weird. Often the only way to play it as a Village will be when drawing it during cleanup, which is usually equal to it being in your hand at the start of your turn. After that it's a cantrip basically. I think you could have had a similar functionality much more easily, like:
"+1 Card
Take an Action token. If you have no Action cards other than Advancing Village in play, you may play an Action card from your hand."

This is certainly easier to get your head around at first. I kept it the same as it can do what this does and more, in particular with interactions in this set.


Blueprints - changed the $ you get to a flat $2, and I've tried to make it more exciting by letting you play it straight away when you buy it by taking Exhausted. Yes you're playing an Action in the Buy phase, but I don't think there's anything broken in that with this card. If nothing else it justifies the +buy on it.


Colliery - removed New Element. Split piles are not what this set is about, and Colliery isn't so bad as a pile of its own. It also repeats the instructions when you take Exhausted; it looks clumsy, but the interaction with Champion and other things that count 'playing' actions is foolproof.


Components - has +1 action so it's easier to return them if they fail to connect in good time.
   Prototype - So that the text can be bigger, I give the type 'Machine' to all of its upgrades. I can also make another Machine if it needs to be there.
   Spinning Mule - is now a Treasure itself.
   Steam Engine - gets action tokens on discarding cards, up to 3, and has a wording change that ensures Exhausted takes priority if you spend a token with 0 actions left.

Glassworks is an outtake, as neither types nor differently named cards are a theme the set wants to focus on.

Hawker is an outtake, it just doesn't work as an Action card.

Innovator is an outtake for now, it's too hard to get your head around.


Night Shift - up to $6 cost, because you're happy to pay $6 for it and it feels strong enough.


Parade - no longer costs debt as nothing else in the set does, and changed the bottom to get around gaining it; you trash it if you don't meet the criteria.

Pigeon is an outtake for similar reasons to New Element, to lessen the Supply interaction going on in the set. It's still there, but it's subtle.


Potteries - is no longer get a choice or Exhaust for both. You trash a card, then Exhaust to make it a big Remodel. If the new card is cheap enough, it goes to hand.


Revolters - as suggested, it no longer gives out Coppers after Curses, and it only hits with 0 actions left, not 1 as well.


Steelworks - costs $4, and is no longer an Attack; instead, you can trash it at your Night phase to take an action token for every card you gained in the turn. You can do this whether you play it as an Action or a Night card.


Textile Mill - it made the mistake of draw and sort together, a combo that takes forever to play. Its now a Smithy you can double play by taking Exhausted. Because this is short text and because it fits, it also has the overpay for action tokens that Colliery used to have.


Tutor - corrected a typo.


Wastelands - instead of triggering 5 VP with few cards in the deck, it triggers with few non-Victories in the deck.

Onto some Wanderers changes:

Circus Troupe draws first, then puts cards back. Much easier.

Royal Visit is an outtake; it was the only Duration effect in the set and didn't belong.
In its place, a new one:

Botanist - discard up to 3 cards, then draw that many. Each other player discards then draws the same number of cards.

A Cellar where the user chooses how many cards everyone changes.

And the other new ones:

Barometer - Action Duration - $4 cost.
Now and at the start of your next turn: name a type (Action, Attack, etc). Reveal the top 5 cards of your deck. Put the cards with the named type back in any order and discard the rest.

A now and next turn sifter that lines up cards of the same type for your next draw. What you choose when will depend on your current situation, something that changes often in this set.

Diversion - Action Attack, $5 cost.
+ $3
You may put your deck into your discard pile.
When you gain this or play it, each other player takes Diverted.

Diverted - State
Non-Victory cards you buy are gained onto this. After you shuffle your deck, if there are any cards on this, discard them and return this.

As one Attack, Steelworks, left, another needs to take its place. This one uses a State and delays the opponents' buys from entering their deck until a shuffle later.
Looking at the forum now, I admit this is rather similar to principles other fan cards follow, especially Gazbag's freezing mechanic.

Local Art - Treasure, $5 cost.
$2
When you play this, if you have any unused actions, you may play the top Wanderer.
-
Setup: include the Wanderers.

A Treasure that can play Wanderers, provided you saved an action from your Action phase. This makes it different each play, and can make each Wanderer be better or worse. It's certainly risky and needs a fair bit of testing.

Purist - Action Treasure, $4 cost.
If it's your Action phase, +4 actions.
If it's your Buy phase, this is worth $1, and if you haven't played any non-Treasures this turn, +1 card.

It makes big either the Action phase or a pure Buy phase.

Taskmaster - Action, $4 cost.
+1 card
+1 action
When you play an Action from your hand, you may first turn an unturned Taskmaster you have in play sideways and take Exhausted. If you do both, play the Action twice.

Basically a Royal Carriage that looks 'forward' to Actions played later rather than 'back' to one just played, delaying the action it uses for then. Nothing else does this turning thing, but I didn't know how else to implement one use per card.

[Asper]

Aquila, you wrote that Advanced Village as is was harder to wrap your head around but could do tricks which my suggested version can't. At the risk of sounding like I tried to push my wordings on you (which I'm probably doing, so feel free to ignore me), I think that if you change my suuggestion to check for cards played instead of those in play, multi-card combinations like Farmlands-Rats, Summon on non-drawing cards, Inherited Advanced Villages and your 2 card-drawing Treasures become the only cases where it makes any difference. Or am I wrong here? Main purpose of the change is to eliminate the interaction with Durations and self-trashers like Mining Village, btw.

So my tweaked suggestion would be:

Advanced Village, 2$, Action
+1 Card
Take an Action Token. If you played no cards other than copies of Advanced Village before, +1 Action.

[Aquila]

I find that you read Advancing Village at first and it puzzles you, but when you get it, it's fairly intuitive. Your version doesn't have that initial puzzle so much Asper. As well as what you include for triggers, my thoughts were that 'outside of your Action phase' also means outside of your turn, so Minion, Council Room, Lost City, Margrave, and within this set the Wanderers.

But I do get why you're suggesting your change now; your pushing has helped so thank you! Ultimately, if this is better played outside of the Action phase, why is it an Action? That Ghost Town is a good comparison, you draw it any time and it can do similar.
I still think this reaction fits well in the set, so I'm thinking the card could be improved by moving the taking an action token to just the reaction and having a different top. Maybe:

Advancing Village - Action Reaction, $3 cost.
+3 cards
Discard a card.
-
When this enters your hand outside of your Action phase, you may discard it to draw a card and take an action token.

The set could do with some more draw too. But anyway, between this and Asper's suggestion, which is the nicer card?

[Gazbag]

Yo, I like these cards! Here's a few thoughts...

Barometer: This seems pretty weak to me, a terminal stop card that gives no immediate bonus has to be really powerful to be worth getting and I'm not sure this gets there. I think this really wants +1 action or +$1 or something.

Diversion: If I changed how Ice tokens worked to trigger off shuffles I'd probably use a state like this instead of tokens, so that's great. I'm not sure this should be a Chancellor itself though, I get that the idea is that it lets you get past diversions faster but I think it's pretty easy to do that anyway and it kind of just trivialises the attack, maybe?

Local Art: Wanderers come from miles around to see the local art! A lot of the Wanderers seem like they wouldn't be as helpful during the buy phase as they are for your opponents so I'm not sure about that, maybe the Wanderers don't affect other players when played with this? That could be neat. There are few problems I have with certain Wanderers too, maybe I'll get to that later.

Purist: A treasure-action being a purist is strange to me, but I guess he wants a pure deck of either all actions or all treasures or maybe it's a bronze dude or something? +4 actions is a lot of actions, whoo boy! It's probably balanced at $4 - Port basically gives +3 actions and +1 card, but it does add a ton of +actions to the game so it lets you build really big. The treasure part seems much weaker, it's basically a bad Peddler. I guess it means you can open this with Silver and it'll be good on the first shuffle before transitioning into a big Necropolis, I think the top of this is good enough on it's own though.

Taskmaster: Exhausted means this basically does nothing if there's no village right? And it's basically a throne room with +1 card when it works? I don't know, I think it needs a way to always do something. Am I understanding it right?


Err what was up with the wanderers? Oh yeah the courier seems like a bad thing to have in the game, I don't think a single spy effect is enough to make this not miserable for someone often enough. I think it needs either a much bigger search space or to be from hand or be something else. I don't think any current wanderers gain cards, that could be an okay replacement? Fits the messenger like theme too so could keep the same name. I also feel like Warband should be 5 or more cards, randomly taking people down to a 2 card hand occasionally doesn't seem like much fun to me, I can't really see the benefit of it. That's just a small tweak though.

[Chappy7]

Nothing else does this turning thing, but I didn't know how else to implement one use per card.

I'd just do it like Necromancer does

[Asper]

I find that you read Advancing Village at first and it puzzles you, but when you get it, it's fairly intuitive. Your version doesn't have that initial puzzle so much Asper. As well as what you include for triggers, my thoughts were that 'outside of your Action phase' also means outside of your turn, so Minion, Council Room, Lost City, Margrave, and within this set the Wanderers.

Yeah, but all of these will (usually) be identical to the card being in your hand at the start of your turn, except perhaps for Margrave and Minion, so my wording actually does do the same in those cases.

[Aquila]

More great feedback!

Barometer: This seems pretty weak to me, a terminal stop card that gives no immediate bonus has to be really powerful to be worth getting and I'm not sure this gets there. I think this really wants +1 action or +$1 or something.

Truth be told, this is untested. At first it had +1 action then I thought let's try it non-terminal first. Your first impression may make me change my mind here.

Diversion: If I changed how Ice tokens worked to trigger off shuffles I'd probably use a state like this instead of tokens, so that's great. I'm not sure this should be a Chancellor itself though, I get that the idea is that it lets you get past diversions faster but I think it's pretty easy to do that anyway and it kind of just trivialises the attack, maybe?

I'm with you here. If I can think of another nice way to fast buys that doesn't trivialise this that's what I'll do. Because Diverted makes cards be 'gained onto' it, doing Tracker or Armory wouldn't work as by specifying another gain location you can choose to avoid Diverted...

Local Art: Wanderers come from miles around to see the local art! A lot of the Wanderers seem like they wouldn't be as helpful during the buy phase as they are for your opponents so I'm not sure about that, maybe the Wanderers don't affect other players when played with this? That could be neat. There are few problems I have with certain Wanderers too, maybe I'll get to that later.

You actually commented on the Wanderers. I worried they'd be dismissed as too confusing or random. The main changes that occur are with the handsize ones after you play other Treasures first - Warband and Collector can be played to purely Attack, and Roadshow could be insane. Though to play them just for yourself may be worth exploring.

Purist: A treasure-action being a purist is strange to me, but I guess he wants a pure deck of either all actions or all treasures or maybe it's a bronze dude or something? +4 actions is a lot of actions, whoo boy! It's probably balanced at $4 - Port basically gives +3 actions and +1 card, but it does add a ton of +actions to the game so it lets you build really big. The treasure part seems much weaker, it's basically a bad Peddler. I guess it means you can open this with Silver and it'll be good on the first shuffle before transitioning into a big Necropolis, I think the top of this is good enough on it's own though.

+4 actions is what Exhausted cards like, balanced with no draw. The Treasure part helps reflect the Actions or Treasures sub-theme of the set. Maybe I'm too afraid of the Treasure part drawing a card and could make the setback easier than skipping the whole Action phase.

Taskmaster: Exhausted means this basically does nothing if there's no village right? And it's basically a throne room with +1 card when it works? I don't know, I think it needs a way to always do something. Am I understanding it right?

If you have Exhausted with 0 actions left, it will carry over to next turn and take away the starting action. So it doesn't strictly need a Village, it would make spiky play. A Village will of course help though.
My wording on the update post is probably confusing. It's a cantrip on play, then it waits until a good target is played. It then gets turned to indicate that it gets 'used', and you take Exhausted to Throne the target.
It started as 'while this is in play, when you play an Action you may Exhaust to play it twice', but felt it should be only work once per card.

Nothing else does this turning thing, but I didn't know how else to implement one use per card.

I'd just do it like Necromancer does

This is a funny thing. Face down cards in your play area do not count as 'in play'; you can't trash cards set aside by Haven with Bonfire. So I think this would come to unnecessary complications if not now then easily in the future.

Err what was up with the wanderers? Oh yeah the courier seems like a bad thing to have in the game, I don't think a single spy effect is enough to make this not miserable for someone often enough. I think it needs either a much bigger search space or to be from hand or be something else. I don't think any current wanderers gain cards, that could be an okay replacement? Fits the messenger like theme too so could keep the same name. I also feel like Warband should be 5 or more cards, randomly taking people down to a 2 card hand occasionally doesn't seem like much fun to me, I can't really see the benefit of it. That's just a small tweak though.

Everything here is sensible, Courier I'm thinking should pass from hand, and draw a card first so there's some self bonus and to avoid the 'next such player' thing on Masquerade. Warband probably shouldn't try to go down to 2 cards. Collector can gain cards, as its reason to be played.

[quoting me on Advancing Village]
Yeah, but all of these will (usually) be identical to the card being in your hand at the start of your turn, except perhaps for Margrave and Minion, so my wording actually does do the same in those cases.

Ah yes, this is true. Another difference comes to mind as I read this: played immediately in these situations, the starting action token next turn could let you play an Action after a carried-over Exhausted is returned.

[Gazbag]

Oh right yeah I totally misread Taskmaster, I thought you had to take Exhausted before you played another action but wouldn't be able to unless you had a village but I see now that you take it after you play another action, my bad! Look I do it too Asper!

I also forgot that collector gains a card but I'll forgive myself on that because Wanderers are a little confusing and there could totally be a more standard gaining one too.

[Aquila]

The more I think about them and play with them, the less I like the Wanderers. They do seem to take away from the game of Dominion, using actions for power from outside the deck. And well as said above, they're weird. So take away the actions they use and make them work automatically, the simplest way being right at the start of the turn, change what they do so that they're simple but effective, then change the theme, and I arrive at this idea: Weather, global effects that change each turn.

Rules
They are a pile of 10 landscape cards which you shuffle before each game, and keep face up. Before each of his turns, the player going first discards the top Weather (just as you discard Boons), and each player gets the effect of the Weather immediately at the start of their next turn (they do not get it for extra turns through Outpost or its variants), before any other 'at the start of your turn' effects. The Weather for next turn is revealed at the same time, so players know what's coming. When the pile is empty, it is reshuffled into a new pile. The last card of the pile is set aside, then discarded when the new deck is made.
Including them in a game would follow the same rules as Shelters, Platinum and Colony; if the first card randomly selected is a Revolution, or the majority of them are Revolutions, include them. (Though of course they're fan cards, and you can use them anyhow.)

So here they are:

Sunny - +1 card, +1 action

An extra action for a bigger Action phase. +1 card as well as it didn't seem enough of an impact.

Stormy - take Exhausted

The opposite, -1 action. But if you're already Exhausted from last turn you get nothing.

Cloudy - +2 cards, put 2 cards from your hand onto your deck

Card movement will always have an effect on your turn. This gets you to plan a bit.

Windy - discard 2 cards, +2 cards

A Cellar fixed at 2 cards. Could be good, could be bad.

Rainy - if you have 4 or more cards in your hand, take one and put it anywhere in your deck

1 less card in your hand by Secret-Passaging something.

Dew - +1 buy, + $1

Buying vanilla.

Snowy - this turn, cards (everywhere) cost $1 more

And the opposite, sort of.

Frost - this turn, cards are gained onto your deck

Mostly good, but bad for Victories.

Fog - +1 card, take Diverted, put a non-Victory card from your hand costing from $3 - $6 onto Diverted (or reveal you can't)

A fairly significant card is removed from your deck for a shuffle, and cards you buy are delayed with it. Could be too swingy, but it's there because it works as a one-off effect.

Changing - set this and the next two Weathers aside, then discard them. For this turn, each player gets both Weathers in the order they were set aside in

This one basically makes two Weathers appear at once, to make things a bit more different each game. You don't know what's coming, though. There are 10 cards, but with this the pile will run through 8 turns.

My main reason for having landscapes like this is to make the set's play theme about adaptation; action tokens and Exhausted don't just mean engines, they mean flexibility in your Action phase, and adding reasons to adapt your turn makes hopefully interesting use of that flexibility.

Does this work?

[Commodore Chuckles]

I really like this.

My first impulse was "blech" because this seemed similar to Boons and Hexes... but this is way better than those, actually.

The fact that the Weather just happens, without having to buy anything, avoids the potential of introducing weak cards the way the Boons did. It's also nice that it happens to everyone, which avoids swinginess. Finally, the fact that you know what's coming introduces strategy instead of just pure randomness. This is what Boons and Hexes should have been.

Nitpicks on the cards themselves:

It's awkward that most of them are adjectives but a few aren't. "Fog" should be "Foggy." I admit that "Dewy" and "Frosty" sound awkward, though.

Frost could maybe be "Dry" instead, since dry weather is something that could be positive or negative, like the effect.

Fog definitely looks obnoxious! Getting deprived of an important card will always be frustrating, and possibly game-deciding.

I like Snowy. It's cool that you found a way to make a cost-increasing effect work without problems with stacking or other things.

[Holunder9]

The fact that the Weather just happens, without having to buy anything, avoids the potential of introducing weak cards the way the Boons did. It's also nice that it happens to everyone, which avoids swinginess. Finally, the fact that you know what's coming introduces strategy instead of just pure randomness. This is what Boons and Hexes should have been.

Totally agree, this is a cool idea that is less random than Boons/Hexes (although the effects of Boons/Hexes are admittedly more elaborate).

[Gazbag]

These seem pretty sweet! I think they do a much better job of doing the symmetrical effect than Wanderers, because you had to use an action to play Wanderers and could play them in the Action phase you'd only ever use them when you could break the symmetry. I imagine these will have a similar effect on the game to Heirlooms like Goat and Lucky Coin. But whether they speed the game up or slow it down will depend on the order of the weathers.

I'm not sure on a few of these effects though. Cloudy and Windy are pretty similar, I think one of those could be replaced. Stormy is quite swingy early and just kills turns later on so I'm not sure how fun that would be and Foggy seems a bit much, I think it could just give Diverted. Of course because of the nature of these it's not about making them "balanced" like normal cards, it's more about whether the weather is fun.

Also Dew isn't a weather, that's the biggest problem. You could have something like clear or mild or maybe like hail or sleet.

[Chappy7]

These are really cool! Well done!

I agree that Fog and Stormy could be too swingy/unfun.  Maybe fog could let you divert a card from your hand or discard pile? That way it's less likely to nab your only Upgrade/Wharf/other important card.

I admit, I came late to this party and haven't thoroughly read through this whole thread, but if I'm understanding right, when stormy comes up neither player can use any actions this turn, correct? (Barring Villa or other shenanigans) I spose that is balanced, but maybe it would be more fun if it didn't make you lose your turn.  I'm guessing you don't want to use the -card token in your expansion, or else that might work.  It could do what Envious does? Idk, I guess I don't have great suggestions, I just think Stormy might not be very fun.

I love Snowy, Rainy and Frost.  Those look like they'd be really interesting to play with

[Aquila]

Yeah, Fog can easily be Foggy, and dew isn't really weather itself, is it? Come to think of it, nor is frost. These can easily be changed.

Certainly both Stormy and Fog(gy) as they are can make things swingy. It's good to have a distinctly bad Weather, one to watch out for and keep in mind. In Revolution, Stormy is just that, and there are enough ways to adapt to it. But sure, in a random game with no Revolutions it may not be the best. Chappy7's suggestion of the -card token is a great one (and indeed a lot of Adventures things work - you could probably make a Weather set to go with the expansion, and you could have exotic weather too), and I'd probably change Stormy to that to make the Weather something players can freely choose to add. Then again, not every kingdom calls for adaptation.

So, Fog. The only reason I made it divert a card at first is because Diverted was worded to let it happen. But now I see that it also means Diverted will definitely be returned after the next shuffle, which suits the flow of the Weather better. So it could just not have a cost range or type limit at all. There should then just be the interest of working around the delayed buys for a time.

Are these sound answers?

[Awaclus]

As worded, Frost has pretty bad antisynergy with junkers, given that all cards are gained onto your deck.

[ThetaSigma12]

(First of all, this has been bugging me for a while, it should be +1 Bonus, not +1 bonus. Capitalize the word.)

I like your take on LaLight's weather cards. What I would suggest though is having about half of them be "Clear Skies" or so that has no effect. Constant changing effects every turn will make the game far too unpredictable and probably too much to handle, whereas the occasional scattered effect would be nice. Also, maybe have it so you can see ahead so nothing comes upon you too fast. And probably try to keep the effects simple and not game-changing, like the Vanilla Boni ones could just have one bonus apiece, a free Lost City/Grand Market might be too much to give.

[Commodore Chuckles]

As worded, Frost has pretty bad antisynergy with junkers, given that all cards are gained onto your deck.

Well, it says "this turn," which... maybe implies it only affects you if it's your turn? I'm not sure what "this turn" means, actually, because, if I understand the rules correctly, each Weather remains in affect for n turns, where n is the number of players, right?

[Aquila]

Good catches here.

As worded, Frost has pretty bad antisynergy with junkers, given that all cards are gained onto your deck.

True. So 'this turn, cards you gain are put onto your deck.'
Each card is written like an Action is, directed to the individual player. Otherwise it's a case of putting 'each player gets' on each card, which is a bit clumsy looking imo. So 'this turn' here follows Bridge.

(First of all, this has been bugging me for a while, it should be +1 Bonus, not +1 bonus. Capitalize the word.)

You're right... That makes the distinction between Action cards and actions less clear. I'll get to changing this as I update them. Seeing this is the case, what about 'action token' Vs 'Action token'?

I like your take on LaLight's weather cards. What I would suggest though is having about half of them be "Clear Skies" or so that has no effect. Constant changing effects every turn will make the game far too unpredictable and probably too much to handle, whereas the occasional scattered effect would be nice. Also, maybe have it so you can see ahead so nothing comes upon you too fast. And probably try to keep the effects simple and not game-changing, like the Vanilla Boni ones could just have one bonus apiece, a free Lost City/Grand Market might be too much to give.

I thought this seemed familiar as I came to it. Well, I can at least say these aren't direct rip-offs of LaLight's cards, I'd forgotten about them. Sorry nonetheless.
The Clear Skies idea: this was my thinking when I did both Cloudy and Windy, to dilute the bigger changes a bit. But going with what Gazbag said earlier about both together being uninteresting, one (Windy) could leave for a blank. I could also/instead add 2 more blanks to bring them up to a 12 card pile cycling through 10 turns, for rounder numbers.
You can see the Weather coming for the next turn; the top one is discarded, then it's 'active' for the round of turns, and the next one becomes visible as well. You get a turn to think about it. Current rules are the pile's face up, so that probably means players can look through the whole thing. Perhaps it should be face down and the top turned over when one is discarded.
Sunny may be too much, I suppose, but Dew (Market) seems okay. It's getting the balance between effects not breaking the fun of games and their making a definite impact every time.

[Awaclus]

As worded, Frost has pretty bad antisynergy with junkers, given that all cards are gained onto your deck.

Well, it says "this turn," which... maybe implies it only affects you if it's your turn? I'm not sure what "this turn" means, actually, because, if I understand the rules correctly, each Weather remains in affect for n turns, where n is the number of players, right?

This turn means this turn, and it doesn't imply anything. Each Weather gets "activated" again at the start of each player's turn.

[Aquila]

So here are the changed Weathers, and shortly the OP will be updated with them.

Bonuses capitalised, Frost is now Dry and wording corrected, Fog is Foggy and any card can be diverted, Dew is Showery, and there are 2 added blanks called Mild.

I have other ideas for changes, here are the first two:
Old New

Advancing Village - Action Reaction, $3 cost.
+3 Cards
Discard a card.
-
When this enters your hand, you may discard it to take an Action token.

It's already been considered, but here it is again, fixed up. The new idea feels more like an Action, can react with terminal draw somewhat safely, the top and bottom combine quite nicely, and it doesn't seem imbalanced. But perhaps it's too useful too often.

And if there's Weather, surely a card called Barometer has to do something with it:
Old New

Barometer - Action Duration Forecast, $4 cost.
+1 Action
Name a type. Reveal the top 5 cards of your deck. Put the cards with the named type back in any order and discard the rest.
You may leave this in play and discard it at the start of your next turn, to be unaffected by Weather.

I'm not exactly confident here; you'd first think a barometer would let you see the Weather in advance, but with already being able to see next turn's, will it help much to see the turn after next's? So I thought a Lighthouse might work, choose to opt out of next Weather, but you have this weird optional Duration-ish thing that finishes before your turn, really just for tracking. Sure, a start of next turn bonus would help tidy it up, but I don't want to detract from the sort effect, I think that's nice. And there's this Forecast type just to indicate that the game definitely includes the Weather.
So, can this go somewhere, or should the name Barometer go?

[Asper]

Fun fact: Weather cards that change conditions of play every turn for all players also are an expansion to my favourite non-Dominion board game, Lifeboat.
I think the conditions there were Stormy, Rough Seas, Foggy, Dead Calm, Rain, Muggy, Hot, Windy and, for reasons that I'm not entirely sure of, Sunday. Clear Sky did nothing but shuffle the discards back into the pile.

Also, I'm not entirely sure whether this is coincidence, but my Edicts both have a similar color scheme and look as your weather cardss, being blue sideways cards that define rule changes. Most basically do things like your weather cards, but as Edicts don't change mid-game, I also made a few of them just alter the setup. Check them out if you like.

[Aquila]

Fun fact: Weather cards that change conditions of play every turn for all players also are an expansion to my favourite non-Dominion board game, Lifeboat.
I think the conditions there were Stormy, Rough Seas, Foggy, Dead Calm, Rain, Muggy, Hot, Windy and, for reasons that I'm not entirely sure of, Sunday. Clear Sky did nothing but shuffle the discards back into the pile.

This is nice. So Clear Sky makes things a bit more random than the Weather here and sometimes there will be a weather that never shows up? I don't know the game Lifeboat, but I imagine in Dominion you'd prefer to have an idea what's coming and strategize, than have it fully random. Changing may be unpleasant for this reason.

Also, I'm not entirely sure whether this is coincidence, but my Edicts both have a similar color scheme and look as your weather cardss, being blue sideways cards that define rule changes. Most basically do things like your weather cards, but as Edicts don't change mid-game, I also made a few of them just alter the setup. Check them out if you like.

I did bear your Edicts in mind and tried to make them different. I just thought sky blue was the colour for Weather cards. But yes, Edicts make more definite impacts on kingdoms than Landmarks, which only imply them with VP, and you achieve different things to them too. It's a nice way to make the various strategies available in Dominion more and less relevant, and they should improve the game

I went ahead and put all my current updates on the OP at once. The changes:

Advancing Village - that new version I thought of is broken, it can go on infinitely with draw to X. The old version stays.


Blueprints - theme change to Furnace. Remodel basically is blueprints. For the most part, all the Exhausted cards now involve an industrial building.


Canal - it's strong enough to go to $6 cost. It's rather easy to make a Province-Duchy deck with it.


Purist - down to +3 Actions, 4 was too many and now the Action and Treasure parts look more comparable.


Components - a general cleanup of the group. This is no longer a Traveller and specifies gaining a Prototype from its pile.
Prototype came to confusion when it was Throned before. Now it works cleanly by being a Machine itself (and not a Traveller) and saying 'exchange this for a Machine'; you can either get a final upgrade, or another Prototype to essentially make self-discard.
Patent no longer has +Buy as an option, but the +Cards, +Actions and +$ are doubled to 2 each. This makes it more consistently the power card it should be.

Two new ones:

Foreign Art - Treasure, $5 cost.
$4
+1 Buy
When you play this, take Diverted and put this on it.

Local Art's out, of course, as the Wanderers are. But the name can come back if I can think of something good for it. This works fine, you delay your big buys with it, or if you go for Victories it's like a Treasure Wine Merchant.

Innovator - Action, $5 cost.
Choose one: discard any number of cards, + $1 per card discarded; or draw up to 6 cards in hand.
You may take Exhausted. If you do, get the other choice.

The name's something of a placeholder, he isn't an industrial building. As yet untested, but it has that instinctive feel that it will work. Unlike the last Innovator, this one is quite easy to track.

[Asper]

Fun fact: Weather cards that change conditions of play every turn for all players also are an expansion to my favourite non-Dominion board game, Lifeboat.
I think the conditions there were Stormy, Rough Seas, Foggy, Dead Calm, Rain, Muggy, Hot, Windy and, for reasons that I'm not entirely sure of, Sunday. Clear Sky did nothing but shuffle the discards back into the pile.

This is nice. So Clear Sky makes things a bit more random than the Weather here and sometimes there will be a weather that never shows up? I don't know the game Lifeboat, but I imagine in Dominion you'd prefer to have an idea what's coming and strategize, than have it fully random. Changing may be unpleasant for this reason.

Sorry, meant to reply to this earlier. Clear Skies also has the effect that there are more rounds without weather effects, without having to print more than one blank. But yes, there absolutely can be games where one weather never comes up. It's not as much of an issue in Lifeboat, because the game is heavily communication based and randomness can be cancelled out by convincing others to backstab somebody, but I certainly see that people might dislike the fact that a card they wait for fails to appear in Dominion (or another appears too often). It wasn't so much of a suggestion, more like an interesting anecdote, or so I thought.

[Gazbag]

Seems like good fan cards aren't getting much attention at the moment, I'll try and do my bit to fix that I guess...

Advancing Village: That new one did look busted, I agree with going back to the other one.

Furnace: This cards seems like Remake level strong to me, even ignoring the exhaust to play it immediately mechanic. Personally I don't think cards that can trash 2 or more cards at once and give economy at the same time should cost less than $5. It's not like broken trashers are particularly uncommon among the official cards though so maybe it isn't a problem. I do think that the exhaust to play immediately mechanic isn't the best fit for a $4 cards though, just because if you get it on turn 1 the exhaust doesn't do anything because you aren't playing any actions turn 2 regardless. 

Canal: I like this, $6 seems like a good cost for it. It's still probably broken half the time because cost reduction, but at least you can't accidentally buy out the Provs in one turn like with Bridge/Troll. This is thronable, I assume the wording is annoying as an in-play effect or something?

Purist: Good change, 4 actions seemed bonkers on this.

Components: Seems hard to trigger considering it adds 2 Silvers to your deck, I guess that balances being able to open with 2? Are Spinning Mule and Steam Engine in the OP the other machines? Steam Engine might have tracking problems? Maybe not? Patent and Steam Engine both seem much stronger than Spinning Mule to me, I guess that's fine.

Foreign Art: Wow seems really strong, in an engine this diverting itself is basically a bonus because you want to draw it at the end of the turn. Diverting other things does make this less good in earlier parts of the game but I'm not sure it matters all that much considering how good this is as endgame payload? Less good in money, there the diverting actually matters. Insane engine payload though, should probably just be +$3 to be honest.

Innovator: So individually these two effects are Watchtower and Secret Chamber. Two weak effects, is being able to exhaust for both really enough to make this worth $5? I know there's some self synergy there but I think this is really weak and could probably cost $3?

[Aquila]

Fun fact: Weather cards that change conditions of play every turn for all players also are an expansion to my favourite non-Dominion board game, Lifeboat.
I think the conditions there were Stormy, Rough Seas, Foggy, Dead Calm, Rain, Muggy, Hot, Windy and, for reasons that I'm not entirely sure of, Sunday. Clear Sky did nothing but shuffle the discards back into the pile.

This is nice. So Clear Sky makes things a bit more random than the Weather here and sometimes there will be a weather that never shows up? I don't know the game Lifeboat, but I imagine in Dominion you'd prefer to have an idea what's coming and strategize, than have it fully random. Changing may be unpleasant for this reason.

Sorry, meant to reply to this earlier. Clear Skies also has the effect that there are more rounds without weather effects, without having to print more than one blank. But yes, there absolutely can be games where one weather never comes up. It's not as much of an issue in Lifeboat, because the game is heavily communication based and randomness can be cancelled out by convincing others to backstab somebody, but I certainly see that people might dislike the fact that a card they wait for fails to appear in Dominion (or another appears too often). It wasn't so much of a suggestion, more like an interesting anecdote, or so I thought.

I found it an interesting anecdote, though I admit that didn't come over very clearly. I thought it would be good to draw the comparisons for general game design theory, and I appreciate seeing here how the Weather affects Lifeboat, how the same idea differs to add fun to a different kind of game.

Furnace: This cards seems like Remake level strong to me, even ignoring the exhaust to play it immediately mechanic. Personally I don't think cards that can trash 2 or more cards at once and give economy at the same time should cost less than $5. It's not like broken trashers are particularly uncommon among the official cards though so maybe it isn't a problem. I do think that the exhaust to play immediately mechanic isn't the best fit for a $4 cards though, just because if you get it on turn 1 the exhaust doesn't do anything because you aren't playing any actions turn 2 regardless. 

I get what you say about economy. I guess the $ are there to justify the +Buy from an earlier version; for some reason a multi trasher with +Buy appeals, and that's the basis for this card. Now I've got this exhaust-to-play on it, that justifies the +Buy and the $ could go.
And about turn 1, it still seems OK despite Exhausted doing nothing, as you typically only trash an Estate, and this hinders its trashing ability later.

Canal: I like this, $6 seems like a good cost for it. It's still probably broken half the time because cost reduction, but at least you can't accidentally buy out the Provs in one turn like with Bridge/Troll. This is thronable, I assume the wording is annoying as an in-play effect or something?

Wording should be fine as a while-in-play, I just haven't come to the conclusion of needing it yet. If it needed to go to $6, then likely it could need a further nerf and this would be it. +1 Buy + $4 is already hefty, but Throning it to 2 Buys + $12 is rather generous.

Components: Seems hard to trigger considering it adds 2 Silvers to your deck, I guess that balances being able to open with 2? Are Spinning Mule and Steam Engine in the OP the other machines? Steam Engine might have tracking problems? Maybe not? Patent and Steam Engine both seem much stronger than Spinning Mule to me, I guess that's fine.

All correct. From the feel as I've tested them, it wouldn't surprise me if the whole group was proven flawed because Components are too swingy and luck dependant. Or if they're only reliably enabled with sifters, or the Weather. Some games have seen a Spinning Mule played on turn 7 get a runaway victory (keep the Coppers, and you can draw them, the Components Silvers, the $1 on this and whatever you do with Prototype to get at least $13), other times something like a turn 17 Prototype.
Steam Engine should track OK, you can put the Action tokens on the card instead of beside them, and leave them on there for Durations.

Foreign Art: Wow seems really strong, in an engine this diverting itself is basically a bonus because you want to draw it at the end of the turn. Diverting other things does make this less good in earlier parts of the game but I'm not sure it matters all that much considering how good this is as endgame payload? Less good in money, there the diverting actually matters. Insane engine payload though, should probably just be +$3 to be honest.

This is sensible. I twigged how the engine makes Diverted almost a non-issue, but not how diverting Treasure would actually be a benefit. My thinking with $4 over $3 is that it wouldn't really have much to set it apart from Gold except its +Buy, and it could go to $6 if it needed to, but that's not the best reasoning to go with.
If this were an Action, might there be something more to it?

Innovator: So individually these two effects are Watchtower and Secret Chamber. Two weak effects, is being able to exhaust for both really enough to make this worth $5? I know there's some self synergy there but I think this is really weak and could probably cost $3?

Yeah, an untested idea, full discard then draw just seemed strong at first.

Thanks for the feedback and the compliment.

[Kudasai]

[[[MACHINE SERIES]]]
Components - Cool concept. On a competitive level I'm not a big fan of cards that have to line themselves up (Urchin, Treasure Map) due to how swingy they can be, but they are fun. The top decking Silver could make for some interesting openings and with calculated play you can setup your Prototype cards nicely. I just wonder if the Silver gaining could be optional. Without sifting cards, the extra Silvers just hurt your chances of your Components hitting.

Prototype - This is a nice jumping off point that empowers both Action based strategies (Steam Engine/Patent) and Treasure based strategies (Spinning Mule). I like the option to keep a Prototype to get more plays out of it in order to better hone future Machine cards.

Spinning Mule - Seems pretty strong, but only with pure Treasure decks. Once you have just 1 Spinning Mule you can probably draw your deck every time it's in play. So the on play is pretty one dimensional, but there is a lot of subtly in how you get to that point. Do you trash down (if able) so your Components hit more frequently, but at the cost of Treasure drawing power later? Seems like a sound and fun decision making process. I would also add that this card is pretty worthless without a +Buys on the board, so maybe this needs a +Buy? It does after all take a while to get it and it would distinguish it even more from Patent, which is great, but also does not have a +Buy. Then again, if Spinning Mule is the only source of +Buys, it would probably be the only Machine a player would buy. Maybe both need a +Buy? In terms of formatting, there should be a line separating the above Coin and the lower text.

Steam Engine - I really enjoy the other cards in this "Traveler-like" line. They seem to fit in well with when you get them and their purpose seems clear. Unfortunately I cannot say the same for Steam Engine. The wording is a bit awkward and it doesn't seem to fit in with what the other cards are and are not doing. Components is a nice little colliding game; Prototype builds up either Spinning Mule or Patent nicely (nice thematic choice by the way!); Spinning Mule is good with Money; and Patent is good with Engines. Steam Engine gives Action tokens, so the Prototype phase seems less important and it's just kind of a hard to interpret Throne Room. I think it could be good on it's own, but I just wonder if it needs to be a part of this Machine series.

Patent - Really cool idea! Being the 1st player to get Patent will certainly be beneficial, but the additional choices are broad enough that even coming in 2nd or 3rd shouldn't be too much of a heart-ache. Seeing how getting this first is highly dependent on your Components colliding, I again think the Silver gaining should be optional. There are a few wording issues here though. As it's currently worded, the Patent card only becomes the card on your Patent mat in name only; it doesn't actually play it. I made a mockup of how it could be worded. I also cleaned up the bottom portion to be more in-line with official card wording. It plays exactly the same though!



[[[ACTION TOKENS]]]
Have you considered changing "Take an Action token" to something like "+1 Power"? Kind of how "Take a Coin token" was changed to "+1 Coffers". It could go a long way in terms of clearing the wording up. In your cards there's a lot going on with "Actions", "Action cards" and "Action Tokens". Personally my brain stops registering the difference if I see "Action" too much.

Also, has there every been a version where Action tokens could only be cashed in at the start of your Action phase? Would make for some hard, but interesting gameplay.

[Aquila]

This feedback is inspirational, Kudasai. I'll get right back to it, but first a few things from before:

Foreign Art - maybe as it is but giving $3 would be an interesting card as either late game or engine payload? The original intent was very strong payload with self divert as a setback so it plays well every other shuffle through the deck. So here's another go:

Dairy Farm - Action, $5 cost.
+2 Cards
+1 Buy
+ $2
At Clean-up, instead of discarding this, take Diverted and put this on it.

Now it draws cards and is a very strong bonus. But if you do end up drawing the whole deck, getting Your Dairy Farms at the end of the draw will see some of them not much more than Woodcutters, so they play less effectively. Instant self Divert can lead to multiple plays of the same card with enough cycling, so it needs this funny wording to avoid that.

Diversion - It wasn't used very often, since handing out Diverted as an Attack can be rather mild for the cost of a terminal Action. But, I twigged that it was a one-off Attack, and so:

Lose one Treasure, put another in. This set wants a few Treasures in it, and hopefully this one's interesting.
Diverted doesn't look so good a name now so much as Delayed.


Back to Kudasai:
Power - why not indeed? Cards would be simpler to read, and just by thinking of Power tokens on a mat, there's a feeling straight away that a card or two could care for the amount of Power you have (like Gazbag's Barbarian/Warlord in Ice Age with Coffers, but it feels more fitting to me to do it with Action tokens, you can sacrifice playing Actions now for doing bigger things later). And that would give some reason for both Power and Villages in the same game.

Components' Silver gain being optional makes interesting choices with Mule whilst retaining its individual function. With your other suggestions I'm seeing how opening with 2 of them won't be so broken as with 2 Treasure Maps, which was my worry.

Actually using Prototype's self-discard as something you want to do rather than just because you can do self-discard safely makes so much sense. Honestly, that's all my thinking was here.

Your wording for Patent is definitely better, but I think it needs to 'be the card until it leaves play' like Overlord? It's going to be wordy, and I see no way round it. Short of putting the bottom instructions on the Patent mat itself or something.

You question Steam Engine's place in the series; I put it there for the contrast with Mule at first, then Patent joined in because some games would be a pretty sad race for the standout best Patent, and Steam Engine could be a fine consolation prize for the losers. Patent is a lot more flexible now than what it used to be though.
But, I put together your thoughts on Prototype and the idea of Power count and came up with this:

Steam Engine - Reveal a number of cards from the top of your deck equal to your Power. Discard the non-Actions, then play the Actions in any order.

Prototype would give +2 Power, which could either go to playing better Patents or be stored up for this. Is this an improvement?

Spinning Mule did have a Buy on it but it was dominating when you could get it early. So, taking the Buy off this and Patent I was toying with this new idea:

Replica - Action Duration Machine, 0* cost.
When you play your first Replica this turn, if you have 3 or more Power, gain a Machine from its pile.
At the start of each of your turns for the rest of the game: +1 Buy and + $1.
(This stays in play. This is not in the Supply.)

If you want Buys, wait a bit longer. I put the $ with it to make it feel more worthwhile, and last minute made it count Power to be a bit harder to continue.

[Kudasai]

Back to Kudasai:
Power - why not indeed? Cards would be simpler to read, and just by thinking of Power tokens on a mat, there's a feeling straight away that a card or two could care for the amount of Power you have (like Gazbag's Barbarian/Warlord in Ice Age with Coffers, but it feels more fitting to me to do it with Action tokens, you can sacrifice playing Actions now for doing bigger things later). And that would give some reason for both Power and Villages in the same game.

Components' Silver gain being optional makes interesting choices with Mule whilst retaining its individual function. With your other suggestions I'm seeing how opening with 2 of them won't be so broken as with 2 Treasure Maps, which was my worry.

Actually using Prototype's self-discard as something you want to do rather than just because you can do self-discard safely makes so much sense. Honestly, that's all my thinking was here.

Your wording for Patent is definitely better, but I think it needs to 'be the card until it leaves play' like Overlord? It's going to be wordy, and I see no way round it. Short of putting the bottom instructions on the Patent mat itself or something.

You question Steam Engine's place in the series; I put it there for the contrast with Mule at first, then Patent joined in because some games would be a pretty sad race for the standout best Patent, and Steam Engine could be a fine consolation prize for the losers. Patent is a lot more flexible now than what it used to be though.
But, I put together your thoughts on Prototype and the idea of Power count and came up with this:

Steam Engine - Reveal a number of cards from the top of your deck equal to your Power. Discard the non-Actions, then play the Actions in any order.

Prototype would give +2 Power, which could either go to playing better Patents or be stored up for this. Is this an improvement?

Spinning Mule did have a Buy on it but it was dominating when you could get it early. So, taking the Buy off this and Patent I was toying with this new idea:

Replica - Action Duration Machine, 0* cost.
When you play your first Replica this turn, if you have 3 or more Power, gain a Machine from its pile.
At the start of each of your turns for the rest of the game: +1 Buy and + $1.
(This stays in play. This is not in the Supply.)

If you want Buys, wait a bit longer. I put the $ with it to make it feel more worthwhile, and last minute made it count Power to be a bit harder to continue.

Power - Well I am certainly glad you like the idea, and boy did you take it and make it something way more exciting then a simple wording choice! I really, really like the idea of cards caring about how much Power you have. This is a complex mechanic that probably would take careful planning, but I think it can be done. I think the first big question would be if the cards that care about Power have to use the Power to get the bonus, or if it just simply checks for it.

Patent - I don't actually think this needs "This is that card until it leaves play." In my opinion (and it is often wrong) all this does is rename the Patent when it's in play to whatever is on your patent mat. It does nothing to execute the patent mat card's instructions. Overlord renaming itself only matters for gainer cards like Disciple and Changeling, which care about name. Gaining a bunch of Overlords this way would be quite powerful, but with Patent it is a non-issue because it is not in the Supply and cannot be gained.

Steam Engine - Now this is an exciting card! I read it once and immediately had a good sense of what to do with it. Works a lot better with Prototype now as well. To me this now has a clear place in the Machine series. Spinning Mule is great Treasure draw, Patent makes one card very powerful, and now Steam Engine is great Action draw. Again, using Power to do cool stuff will likely need a lot of balancing, but it's such a cool idea.

Replica - I'll have to spend some more time thinking about this one to give worthwhile analysis, but I think you made the right call by making a Machine that gives +Buys and is not one of the already very powerful cards. This also makes your Prototyping stage more relevant. I also like how it's not trying to compete with Spinning Mule, Steam Engine and Patent; it's just there if a player needs +Buys.

I am a bit confused on the wording. Is it saying if this is your first Replica played this turn you can check your Power and gain a Machine? If so, you can use something like the Crossroads wording. I don't think there really needs to be a condition though seeing that these are permanent Duration cards. The chances of playing multiple Replica's is unlikely. Removing this text streamlines it quite a bit. Here is a quick mockup:



Really exciting stuff! Can't wait to see how it all comes together!

[Aquila]

Another fresh look and run of solo playtests leads me to another large list of updates. Here are a few:

Parade:

Parade - Victory, $5 cost.
Worth 8VP - VP equal to the difference in the number of Actions and Treasures in your deck.
-
When you gain this, if you have a different number of Actions and Treasures in play, trash it.

I felt with this that working to gain it was interesting, but building the deck so as to get the best points wasn't. Too easy to get too many points. Rather than work to balance the VP, I thought I could work this into the adaptation theme I had going on in the set. A pile of different cards with different gain conditions to work for. At the moment they're like this - each has:

Names? - Action Victory, $5 cost
+1 Card
+1 Action
-
4VP

with four different conditions:

When you gain this, if you have a different number of Actions and Treasures in play, trash it.

When you gain this, if you have any duplicate cards in play, trash it.

When you gain this, discard your hand. If you didn't discard exactly 3 cards, trash this.

When you gain this, reveal 3 cards from your hand with no matching type. If you don't, trash this.

A pile of 12 with 3 of each, and you use 2 of each for 2 players. Each is a cantrip so that when you can gain them, you don't mind adding them to your deck. It's possible to have a turn where you can get several different ones at once; I'm not sure if that's a good thing or not.

Steelworks:

Steelworks - Action Night, $4 cost.
If it's your Action phase, gain a card costing up to $4, or if you have used 3 or more actions this turn it may cost $5.
At Night, you may trash this, to take an action token for every card you've gained this turn.

This strange mix of mechanics isn't that interesting for all its complication. It's out. But the name Steelworks I've attached to a fresh new idea that develops the Power mechanic:

Steelworks - Action, $4 cost.
+1 Power
You may gain a card costing exactly your Power in $. If it's a Victory, -2 Power.

It would be silly to go with +$, as you could go unlimited and need unlimited tokens with it. This makes a cap whilst retaining the feel of Power as currency. Seems balanced in testing.

Weather:
It's been more pleasant playing without it than with it. I get the sense it's one of those ideas that looks pretty on paper but actually isn't good in practice. All too often it's granting players bonuses or screwing them over by pure chance, and there's nothing they can do to actually adapt to the situation as intended. The idea may be nice for casual players, but it's not suiting what Revolution tries to be. With the change to Power, the set is heading towards encouraging skill and resource management, probably suiting more advanced players.
So, it seems best to disassociate the Weather with this set.

More to come later.

[Kudasai]

Parade - Very thematic! Parades often showcase different things and now this card does as well. I've been trying my hand at a VP card that cares about Action and Treasure density being the same and boy is it tough. I think you're making the right call to just make this a flat VP amount and retaining the idea through an on-gain effect. So is there a reason you're not going with Grand Market wording? Like, "You can't gain this if the number of Action and Treasure cards you have in play are not the same." The wording would be a bit more clean, but then I guess your wording allows for a Salt the Earth type effect. You can trash Parades simply to deny the points to your opponent if you think they will have an easier time satisfying the on-gain. Very cool stuff!

Steelworks - Nice to see the new card with the Power mechanic. First impression is this might be a bit slow on it's own as a gainer. But it also acts as a kind of Coin of the Realm. Seems very versatile, but requires good play to really make it worthwhile. It could make an amazing, non-terminal, non-Victory card gainer once you get your Power level up to 4-6. I imagine in most games you can only get about one Province gain off of this.

Weather - I'm sure there's a way to make this both fun and rewarding to play with, but it's late and nothing is coming to mind. I'd hate to see all those cool mock-ups go to waste!

[Holunder9]

With Renaissance around the corner and Action tokens becoming "official" I just wanted to give a quick thumbs up for the hitherto most comprehensive fan card design involving Action tokens.

[Aquila]

Parade - Very thematic! Parades often showcase different things and now this card does as well. I've been trying my hand at a VP card that cares about Action and Treasure density being the same and boy is it tough. I think you're making the right call to just make this a flat VP amount and retaining the idea through an on-gain effect. So is there a reason you're not going with Grand Market wording? Like, "You can't gain this if the number of Action and Treasure cards you have in play are not the same." The wording would be a bit more clean, but then I guess your wording allows for a Salt the Earth type effect. You can trash Parades simply to deny the points to your opponent if you think they will have an easier time satisfying the on-gain. Very cool stuff!

Heh, that denying would be seriously hard to pull off, if you get $5 to casually spend like this. To tell the truth, I thought that 'you may only gain this if...' could cause some to think they can still buy it, and what happens then. Self trash is safe from this, and it conveniently gets itself around Lurker.

Steelworks - Nice to see the new card with the Power mechanic. First impression is this might be a bit slow on it's own as a gainer. But it also acts as a kind of Coin of the Realm. Seems very versatile, but requires good play to really make it worthwhile. It could make an amazing, non-terminal, non-Victory card gainer once you get your Power level up to 4-6. I imagine in most games you can only get about one Province gain off of this.

Decks concentrated purely on playing Steelworks often, with trashing and thrones, have seen them get Provinces at an average rate, 3-4 in 15-17 turns. So it seems beatable but a viable option.

Weather - I'm sure there's a way to make this both fun and rewarding to play with, but it's late and nothing is coming to mind. I'd hate to see all those cool mock-ups go to waste!

Oh, I don't mean throw them away, only take them out of this set. If they're liked I could put a separate post up for them, or try them with the tribes set. Anyway, I've come to some replacements for them, but first some other updates that need explaining:

Diverted:
I made those two changes with the machines post, but having looked again I wasn't really happy with Diverted itself. It only emphasised the speed control effected by cycling and trashing. Thick and slow decks would make Diverted very significant, thin and fast irrelevant. It wasn't really adding anything new. Taking the premise of holding cards I've come to:

Diverted - State
Non-Victory cards you buy are set aside onto this. After your Buy phase, for every $1 you have unspent, you may discard a card on this. When the last card is discarded, return this.

Making large on Wine Merchant's delay. It fits the resource control theme better, involving money and timing skill. Is the 'set aside' bit sensible? What would technically happen if you have Tracker in play?
That leads to the cards that use it. Pretty much a complete turnround from before, Foreign Art as before is more elegant than Dairy Farm in diverting itself together with what you buy for the turn. With the money you need to buy them off Diverted, $4 is fine.
Timepiece isn't so effective now as one version of Diversion I had in the works before, a Knight variant:

Diversion - Action Attack, $5 cost.
+ $2
Each other player takes Diverted. Those with 4 or fewer cards on their Diverted reveal the top 2 cards of their deck, put one costing from $3-$6 onto Diverted, and discard the rest.

It has the limitation of working on only up to 5 cards. It's softer than trashing the target cards, but with the addition of buys being diverted too.

Night Shift:
It's a 'natural' card, but it's probably the only Night card that'll be in the set and it's potentially too strong. With Power the cost of having a whole extra turn really isn't much. Nothing like a 3 card hand. So first I thought it could be an event, then about balancing it, and I landed at...

One-use Events:

Night Shift - Event, $0 cost.
Once per game: take Exhausted. If you do, and the previous turn wasn't yours, take another turn after this one.

One free resource to time carefully. It fits the resource management theme.
This would ideally need each player to have a token to put on this to track they've used it. Could that token be used more? Here are some more ideas:

Event, $0 cost.
Once per game: draw extra cards for your next hand equal to your Power.
-
In games using this, when you gain a Silver, +1 Power.

Event, $0 cost.
+1 Buy
Once per game: discard all cards on your Diverted.
-
Setup: each player takes Diverted. When you return it, take it again.

Event, $2 cost.
Once per game: if you have at least 2 Actions in play, gain a non-Victory Action card to your hand, return to your Action phase, and +1 Action.

Counts Actions in play to help prevent crazy openings.

I've seen one-use events on the forum somewhere, haven't I? Again though, I've forgotten them and these are of my own originality.

[Commodore Chuckles]

I've seen one-use events on the forum somewhere, haven't I? Again though, I've forgotten them and these are of my own originality.

You've seen them in the actual game with Inheritance.

[Aquila]

I've seen one-use events on the forum somewhere, haven't I? Again though, I've forgotten them and these are of my own originality.

You've seen them in the actual game with Inheritance.

Yes; these are trying to play differently from Inheritance so I never mentioned it. Inheritance has to be once per game for what it does. You strategise if it's worth going for and build up to it quickly. These are easy to get but call for good timing.

Still, Renaissance is exciting news. Looking forward to seeing how Action tokens 'should be done'. I've tried to make them as different as possible from +Actions here, that was one of my aims, but my views could be wrong.
Seems best to postpone this until it's out.

[Kudasai]

Diverted - Big fan of this version where you essentially have to pay $1 Coin to get your card back. Mechanics seem much more solid than relying on some-what swingy reshuffles. If this turns out to be too harsh you could remove the 1 card per turn restriction.

Tracker might allow cards to be top decked instead, but I just consider that a niche counter to Diverted.

One-shot Event - I have a one-shot Event called Treaty. Not sure if you were thinking of it. Anyways, I really like the first two options, but think the Power one takes the cake. Makes for an interesting game where Silvers both enable and clog up engines.

Should all of these give a Buy back to ensure maximum flexibility when bought?

Really cool editions!