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Author Topic: Kudasai's Random Dominion Cards  (Read 59903 times)

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Kudasai

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Kudasai's Random Dominion Cards
« on: May 20, 2018, 12:52:38 am »
+9

[CARDS - RANDOM]
               

               

           

               

               

               

                 

   


[CARDS - COMMANDERS]
       


[EVENTS]



[LANDMARKS]
« Last Edit: July 14, 2020, 12:53:07 pm by Kudasai »
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Doom_Shark

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Re: Kudasai's Random Dominion Cards
« Reply #1 on: May 20, 2018, 01:26:09 am »
+1

Army looks horribly broken to me. It's not clear what blockade is trying to do, I reread it three times and I'm still not sure how it's supposed to work, it clearly needs a rewording.
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Aquila

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Re: Kudasai's Random Dominion Cards
« Reply #2 on: May 20, 2018, 04:19:00 am »
0

I like how these are trying to do different things. Most of them look like they have good potential.

Army - there are so many anti-synergies to keep in mind, like Goons then a Reserve, that this won't always be an easy card to play, so many new rules to keep in mind. But when you get it going it can be way too strong, so that it's always the optimal strategy in any kingdom. You lessen the need for +Cards, +Actions, and trashing all at once. I feel this would do with capping the number of Actions you can play at once to say 2 or 3?

Commander - definitely too strong; with just one other nonterminal card played, this does the same as lab, but it will do better than one as the turn progresses. And consider how multiples of this played stack up. So raising the cost I don't think would be enough to balance this. It probably needs a way to make it hard to gain as well.
Oh, and while I think of it, this 'breaks' Tactician.

Heir - volatile; it rewards a condition you want to meet even more. +Buy of course works, but +$3 feels too generous.

Royal Decree - with the current cost you can open with it and it be beneficial early on. On buy you can get $4 from other players' Coppers (note how the number of players affects the strength of this) so make this cost $3 <4>, and the rest of the debt can be paid turn 2. The next shuffle will see it at worst a silver with +Buy, not bad, and much more later on. Or if you first buy a Silver then this, and line then up next shuffle, it's $4 +Buy, which is hard to better.
So it does scale better later, like the other 8 debt cards, but the early advantage may make this too strong.

Out of time right now to look at the others in depth, but Moon Shrine and Slumlord do look interesting and balanced.
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ThetaSigma12

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Re: Kudasai's Random Dominion Cards
« Reply #3 on: May 20, 2018, 07:27:23 am »
+2

Army looks horribly broken to me. It's not clear what blockade is trying to do, I reread it three times and I'm still not sure how it's supposed to work, it clearly needs a rewording.

Here's how I interpret Blockade: At the start of the game, both players secretly name 3 action cards, and their positions in the deck, i.e. "The 10th lab", "The 3rd Baron". When the 10th lab in the pile is gained or the 3rd baron is, the player gets VP equal to what number card it was. So 10 VP for calling that the labs will empty.
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Puk

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Re: Kudasai's Random Dominion Cards
« Reply #4 on: May 20, 2018, 09:29:00 am »
+7

But you always gamble "Scout" and "0", yes?
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Aquila

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Re: Kudasai's Random Dominion Cards
« Reply #5 on: May 20, 2018, 12:38:26 pm »
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Moon Shrine - thinking about it more, it may be that $3 is too cheap. Nonterminal 2 coffers may make it too similar to a Silver+, so could push the cost to at least $4. Or it could be too easy to buy many moon shrines, stockpile VP on the Provinces and use the coffers to buy them up before the opponent does.

Slumlord - maybe you intend for it to work on Treasures and Nights, maybe you don't. The concept is interesting, the theme fits well, and there's not a lot you can do to balance it other than taking the +Card off, should it need it. This is my favourite.

Stadium - another interesting concept, it's nice how it scales as your deck progresses. If there is a problem with it, perhaps it can be too volatile as a cantrip, many of them in play needing only 1 card in your next hand. But there's no +buy, it could be fine.

Lost Temple - it should be distinguished enough from Steward. Its use of buys may or may not be broken; being a Chapel that can later be a cantrip (or Lost City) may be too strong. Certainly one to test with Seaway.

Industrious Village - it requires treasure trashing or several cantrips to be worthwhile (save the only-Village scenario), things that indirectly benefit the standard Village anyway. It might be fun, or it might be uninteresting, I don't really know.

Blockade - going with Theta's interpretation, I guess you use this according to personal taste. It can be nice to get rewarded for kingdom analysing skills, including the speed of the game, but most times the game can be well defined, and then there isn't much VP difference to be had.

Gamble - what Puk said. But trusting that you mean you only want Kingdom cards to be named, it's an infinite source of VP, so when you can know your next hand you almost always do it. (So I'd encourage a flavour change, when the situation calls for it it's always right to gamble? So yeah, and gambling shouldn't give VP anyway.)

Overall, playtesting will tell a lot about whether the cards are balanced. Maybe you've done some, in which case it'll be good to see what you've found.
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Kudasai

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Re: Kudasai's Random Dominion Cards
« Reply #6 on: May 20, 2018, 03:02:50 pm »
0

Thank you all for the great comments and feedback (especially Aquila). You have already pointed out a few problematic issues. For the sake of being concise, I'll try and reply to all the comments thus far in one post.

Card Explanations/Personal Thoughts:

Army - I'm still inclined to say this card is not broken or overly powered. It can certainly be powerful late game, but it does take a while to get to that point. Sometimes the very cards in your Army can accomplish the same thing played individually and at a faster pace. Army may take center stage in a lot of games, but some cards are just like that (Tournament, Governor, Chapel, etc). Army at least requires the other Kingdom cards to be involved to work.

Commander - Yes, this card does need a price increase (thinking $6 or $7). Unfortunately this card does lead to an issue with Tactician (good catch Aquila!), but I'm torn if that means I should rework the mechanics for one single card interaction. I could roll this back to a version that required a card to give +Actions in order to draw, but the wording gets a bit funky. Also it is worth noting that 3 Commander cards in play equals the draw of 3 Laboratory cards in play; it's only the 4th Commander played that overcomes Lab.

Heir - I view this as a mini-Dominate type. Dominate is certainly strong, but if you can't build for it fast enough, you're probably better off just Province rushing. I think the same applies to Heir. By the time you get 5 or so Heirs and you're consistently hitting $9, your opponent may have 4-5 Provinces. The payoff has to be good enough to warrant the risk of over-building.

Royal Decree - My thinking is that this has to be strong enough early to warrant an early buy. This then entices people to buy Silver and Gold, which leaves them open to being used by their opponents. If Royal Decree is too weak I don't think anyone would ever buy it given the risk. A cool interaction is leaving a Treasure card in your hand when you buy Royal Decree. If you hit another players Royal Decree you get to then play it three times, otherwise not at all. It's power scaling with more players in unfortunate, but other cards like that exist. I did my best to make the on-buy effect powerful enough on a two player game to warrant to risk of buying it.

Moon Shrine - I think this outshines Silver early, but falls off quickly mid to late game. You can surely pick up an early Province with 2-3 extra VP early, but that's not likely later on when $8 is an easy price point to hit. I don't see a mass Moon Shrine deck working.

Slumlord - Yes, the villainous Slumlord can work with Treasure and Night cards, but effectively ends your Action phase. Better than Throne Room early, but probably falls short late game.

Stadium - Out played by Silver early, but amazing late game with a reliable engine. Definitely needs +Buys to shine. Massing Stadiums also doesn't really work since they anti-synergize.

Lost Temple  - Another strong trasher that should be priced higher, but I kept artificially low to ensure every player had a shot to open with it (consider Chapel's cost to power level). The Seaway interactions is making me think it should be $5 though. 

Industrious Village - You nailed it! Won't always be great, but when it is, it's really great (maybe that's the definition of swingy though). In my opinion that's the fun of Dominion; trying to figure out what card interactions work and when to go for them.

Blockade - You also nailed this one. It basically rewards players who can see how a board will play out and who are willing to risk high card positions. Of coarse you have to be very careful not to gain your own card, because you will not gain VP points. Also, if two or more players pick the same position/pile, that pile is essentially blocked for those players unless someone wants to give their opponent points. There's a lot of subtly here and I recommend a 10x10 grid chart (for most boards) to keep track of gains and where your card/positions are.

Gamble - Kodos to 'Puk' for pointing out a card flaw in hilarious fashion. This needs to be changed to "Name an Action card and amount of 1 or more". It's reliable early, but giving up $2 at that stage is tough. Even late game in a close match, $2 might not be available, especially since you might whiff. Best in decks with variety. Play testing has found this card to be balanced, but fun is another question. Included it for those players who really enjoy card counting (Yuck!).

Thanks again for the comments and insights. I'll update some of these and post version changes in the comments soon.
« Last Edit: May 20, 2018, 03:49:49 pm by Kudasai »
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Holunder9

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Re: Kudasai's Random Dominion Cards
« Reply #7 on: May 20, 2018, 03:25:23 pm »
0

Moon Shrine is good but I'd tweak the vanilla stuff: 2 Coin tokens on a non-terminal card is too good for $3 and potentially also too good for $4.

Slumlord is a great Throne Room variant.

Stadium will probably yield most of the time 2. 3/4 is risky unless you play a thin money deck with a high likelihood of Gold/Province in your hand. So this will mostly be a delayed double Peddler, early in the game with some risk that you have no $4 card in your hand. But even then I think this is pretty / too good for a $4.

I like Lost Temple and the thematic hint at Lost City.

Industrious Village could get away with only caring about your Action cards in play. Not for the sake of balancing but simplicity. At the first glance it looks like a reverse Shanty Town. Often the first Shanty Town you play in a turn is the best one and Shanty Town is pretty bad for draw engines whereas with Industrious Village it seems to be the other way around.

About Old Witch, I love the idea of out-of-deck Curses that land in your deck on some condition (and greening is probably one of the best conditions!). But I would hesitate to put this Attack, or Attacks in general, on an cantrip/Oasis.
Even though it is weaker than ordinary Cursers it still a junker, with the junk coming delayed but all at once. And for a cheap price of $3 it might often be best to open Old Witch/Old Witch.
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Kudasai

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Re: Kudasai's Random Dominion Cards
« Reply #8 on: May 20, 2018, 04:18:16 pm »
0

Thanks for the comments! It's been fun reading people's thoughts on cards I've spent a lot of time on.

Moon Shrine is good but I'd tweak the vanilla stuff: 2 Coin tokens on a non-terminal card is too good for $3 and potentially also too good for $4.
Certainly powerful for it's cost, but mid to late game it usually turns in to +2 Coffers, one other player takes 1VP, which is a bit weak. Of coarse niche scenarios probably exist.
Stadium will probably yield most of the time 2. 3/4 is risky unless you play a thin money deck with a high likelihood of Gold/Province in your hand. So this will mostly be a delayed double Peddler, early in the game with some risk that you have no $4 card in your hand. But even then I think this is pretty / too good for a $4.
Stadium would actually be stronger at $4 since amassing Stadiums would almost guarantee $2 Coin out of it. Cost $3 slows it down and makes you think hard about how many you want. In my test it's about as good as a Silver overall when no +Buys exist.
I like Lost Temple and the thematic hint at Lost City.
Thanks! Also a reference to Chapel.
About Old Witch, I love the idea of out-of-deck Curses that land in your deck on some condition (and greening is probably one of the best conditions!). But I would hesitate to put this Attack, or Attacks in general, on an cantrip/Oasis.
Even though it is weaker than ordinary Cursers it still a junker, with the junk coming delayed but all at once. And for a cheap price of $3 it might often be best to open Old Witch/Old Witch.
Yeah, this is a tough one. If your opponent opens double Old Witch and you don't, they will surely win the Curse split, but what are they giving up? They won't hit $5 until after their second shuffle; you hopefully will have at least once or twice. I think a strong trasher + Silver opening will beat double Old Witch.
« Last Edit: May 20, 2018, 04:20:42 pm by Kudasai »
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Kudasai

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Re: Kudasai's Random Dominion Cards
« Reply #9 on: May 20, 2018, 06:10:21 pm »
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Going to do some basic play testing on some of the more contentious cards (Moon Shrine, Army, Commander) over the next few days and I'll post results.
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Re: Kudasai's Random Dominion Cards
« Reply #10 on: May 20, 2018, 11:59:45 pm »
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Army - Generally, I think you really only need two cards on your Army mat for this to become overpowered. Even two $2 cost cards could very easily be extremely broken for a $5 cost card. I would nerf it by making it so that the second choice removes a card (of your choice) from your Army mat. After all, Armies hardly ever fight with zero casualties, no?

Moon Shrine - Considering that Night cards are non-terminal, I think that just the +2 Coffers is too strong for a $3-cost card, as it's essentially a slow Silver that gives you its money on any turn you want it to.

Stadium - Just a nitpick, but Stadium should either say "you may reveal a card..." or replace "this for +$1 per Coin token" with "this. If you do, +$1 per Coin token" to be consistent with official cards. This is because the [condition] for [reward] wording always starts the condition with "you may." I recommend the "you may" wording, because otherwise, we have the no accountability problem that Throne Room used to have.

Industrious Village - The condition to trigger +2 Cards seems to difficult for this to cost $4. It's easy to trigger when Duration cards are in use, sure, but most of the time, Duration cards aren't even in the Kingdom, and it's fairly rare to have less than 2 Treasures in hand, which would require Ind. Village to be the 3rd or later Action played for it to trigger.

Old Witch - Since Curse cards can't be trashed when they're set aside, I would actually argue that Old Witch's attack is stronger than just giving Curses. Especially since Old Witch is currently cheap enough that players will be playing them long before players would normally be ready to start greening, so I think Old Witch definitely needs to either be nerfed further or cost $5.

Blockade - As others have said, Blockade definitely needs a rewording; I needed to read it 3 times before I even remotely understood what it was trying to say.

Gamble - If you can get your deck down to 5 cards with at least one Action card and the ability to produce at least $2, you'll be able to get +2VP every turn without gaining any cards, which makes the game go on forever if everybody does it.
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Holunder9

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Re: Kudasai's Random Dominion Cards
« Reply #11 on: May 21, 2018, 03:33:10 am »
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Certainly powerful for it's cost, but mid to late game it usually turns in to +2 Coffers, one other player takes 1VP, which is a bit weak. Of coarse niche scenarios probably exist.
I don't think that you always necessarily gift a VP to the other player. Early you can pick Province if you don't want to make Moon Shrines attractive and in the endgame you can always pick Duchy or Estate.
But even if you did, the other player would do the same for you. So the net effect is that the card can come with some VPs on gain and that it provides 2 Coin tokens on play which is too strong (even though it is like Merchant Guild, i.e. you cannot use the Coin tokens this turn). It is hard to play around with this though, one Coin token is too weak and a conditional amount of Coin tokens, like with Stadium, would make the card too complicated.


Quote
Stadium would actually be stronger at $4 since amassing Stadiums would almost guarantee $2 Coin out of it. Cost $3 slows it down and makes you think hard about how many you want. In my test it's about as good as a Silver overall when no +Buys exist.
Thanks for pointing this out, I totally did not see that.


Quote
Yeah, this is a tough one. If your opponent opens double Old Witch and you don't, they will surely win the Curse split, but what are they giving up? They won't hit $5 until after their second shuffle; you hopefully will have at least once or twice. I think a strong trasher + Silver opening will beat double Old Witch.
I have my doubts. Assuming that you don't green early buying a Victory card implies that you will have 11 extra dead cards in your deck once you start to green. That's a pretty harsh discontinuity and even good trashers might have a hard time to deal with that.
Again, I think that the idea is brilliant but I would follow the usual rule of not putting an Attack on a non-terminal or cantrip unless there are very good reasons for it (like Urchin being a weak Attack, Familiar being gained late, Relic not-stacking or Idol just being a "half-Attack"). I think it would be "safer" to test it with ordinary vanilla stuff like terminal Silver or putting it on a $5 Silver+ like Relic/Idol.
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Kudasai

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Re: Kudasai's Random Dominion Cards
« Reply #12 on: May 21, 2018, 02:53:02 pm »
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Stadium - Just a nitpick, but Stadium should either say "you may reveal a card..." or replace "this for +$1 per Coin token" with "this. If you do, +$1 per Coin token" to be consistent with official cards. This is because the [condition] for [reward] wording always starts the condition with "you may." I recommend the "you may" wording, because otherwise, we have the no accountability problem that Throne Room used to have.
I guess I assumed there would never be a situation where you could have money and not reveal a card to take it. Maybe some weird Storyteller situation where you don't want to draw? Perhaps a card will one day come along where this will matter more. But you're right, best to be official. It's been updated per your recommendation. Thanks for the input!
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Kudasai

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Re: Kudasai's Random Dominion Cards
« Reply #13 on: May 21, 2018, 02:56:08 pm »
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I don't think that you always necessarily gift a VP to the other player. Early you can pick Province if you don't want to make Moon Shrines attractive and in the endgame you can always pick Duchy or Estate.
But even if you did, the other player would do the same for you. So the net effect is that the card can come with some VPs on gain and that it provides 2 Coin tokens on play which is too strong (even though it is like Merchant Guild, i.e. you cannot use the Coin tokens this turn). It is hard to play around with this though, one Coin token is too weak and a conditional amount of Coin tokens, like with Stadium, would make the card too complicated.

I have my doubts. Assuming that you don't green early buying a Victory card implies that you will have 11 extra dead cards in your deck once you start to green. That's a pretty harsh discontinuity and even good trashers might have a hard time to deal with that.
Again, I think that the idea is brilliant but I would follow the usual rule of not putting an Attack on a non-terminal or cantrip unless there are very good reasons for it (like Urchin being a weak Attack, Familiar being gained late, Relic not-stacking or Idol just being a "half-Attack"). I think it would be "safer" to test it with ordinary vanilla stuff like terminal Silver or putting it on a $5 Silver+ like Relic/Idol.

I'll be testing both of these soon and post the results. I can only do basic play testing, but it should help shed some light on whether they are just strong or broken. :)
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Holunder9

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Re: Kudasai's Random Dominion Cards
« Reply #14 on: May 22, 2018, 12:54:52 pm »
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The new Old Witch is interesting. Self-Milita-ing makes trashing less relevant so this will lead to an interesting decision about when to go heavy for trashers in a mirror match.


Commander is very similar to Sleigh, a joke card DXV and/or LastFootnote did for Christmas:

While it is easy to argue that the card is broken I think it is worth nothing that Commander only becomes a Lab if you play 2 cards afterwards; the first one retroactively makes Commander into a cantrip. This shouldn't be hard to do in an Action-dense deck but it is probably not as explosive as e.g. City Quarter due to the simple fact that the first Commander played doesn't draw. For the very same reason an engine like Festival+Smithy is less reliable than Village+Smithy.

It seems kind of trivial but the fact that Commander is conditional non-terminal draw matters. So why not give Commander a Debt cost? The current cost seems too high and Debt is justified given that the card, like City Quarter, becomes only good once the density of non-terminals is large enough.
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GendoIkari

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Re: Kudasai's Random Dominion Cards
« Reply #15 on: May 22, 2018, 01:20:12 pm »
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I'm surprised that Commander hasn't been compared to Pathfinding yet. It seems like mostly a weakened version of Pathfinding.

Disadvantages compared to Pathfinding:

- The +1 card only works if you have any actions remaining after playing the action (though you aren't generally using Pathfinding on a terminal action if you don't have extra Villages anyway).
- The +1 card is after the action, not before. Before is better for most things; after is only better for draw-to-x.
- You have to buy multiple copies, and play it multiple times; as opposed to just buying once and being done.

Advantages:

- Works on more than 1 kingdom pile. Huge advantage to be sure; but I think Pathfinding is already going to make you very likely to draw your deck anyway; so even more draw isn't going to matter as much.
- Potential to stack with multiple in play.
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GendoIkari

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Re: Kudasai's Random Dominion Cards
« Reply #16 on: May 22, 2018, 01:24:28 pm »
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I don't see Army as being broken or strong at all... it's super weak the times that you choose the first option; costing you an action and 2 cards from your hand.

Compare it to Native Village... if anything, I think that Native Village is often stronger. Native Village gives you 2 actions the turn you play it, and only costs 1 card from your hand instead of 2. Also, it gets rid of junk from your deck. Army requires you to remove good cards from your deck in order to get a benefit from it. Army gives you basically unlimited +actions for the turn you pull stuff off your mat, but a handful of Native Villages works just as well.

*Edit* Oh, I totally missed the "leaving them there" part. That makes it quite different. No idea how to judge the power, then. I guess it works kind of like Pirate Ship or Miser; quite weak the first several times you play it, but then possibly super strong after that.
« Last Edit: May 22, 2018, 04:07:26 pm by GendoIkari »
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GendoIkari

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Re: Kudasai's Random Dominion Cards
« Reply #17 on: May 22, 2018, 01:25:26 pm »
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While it is easy to argue that the card is broken I think it is worth nothing that Commander only becomes a Lab if you play 2 cards afterwards; the first one retroactively makes Commander into a cantrip.

No, Commander by itself is a cantrip; as it is in play when you finish resolving Commander.
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Holunder9

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Re: Kudasai's Random Dominion Cards
« Reply #18 on: May 22, 2018, 04:13:53 pm »
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While it is easy to argue that the card is broken I think it is worth nothing that Commander only becomes a Lab if you play 2 cards afterwards; the first one retroactively makes Commander into a cantrip.

No, Commander by itself is a cantrip; as it is in play when you finish resolving Commander.
Thanks, I missed that. Now it seems fair to say that this is too strong, respectively, as you pointed out, too expensive to be bought en masse and thus comparing unfavourably to Pathfinding (although Pathfinding is a bit weaker if you play multiplayer or with Cornucopia or Cornucopia 2.0 aka Nocturne cards).
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Kudasai

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Re: Kudasai's Random Dominion Cards
« Reply #19 on: May 22, 2018, 07:52:05 pm »
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The new Old Witch is interesting. Self-Milita-ing makes trashing less relevant so this will lead to an interesting decision about when to go heavy for trashers in a mirror match.

Haha, the "New" Old Witch. Interesting wording. Yes, discarding 2 cards seems to be more in-line with two of my goals with the card. If you go early Old Witch (or double Old Witch), your ability to (1) trash and (2) hit $4 and $5 reliably are both diminished early game. It seems a fair trade off for early cursing and cycling.   
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Kudasai

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Re: Kudasai's Random Dominion Cards
« Reply #20 on: May 22, 2018, 08:15:01 pm »
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No idea how to judge the power, then. I guess it works kind of like Pirate Ship or Miser; quite weak the first several times you play it, but then possibly super strong after that.

Quite right! By end game it is extremely powerful, but it often takes many turns to get to that point. Here is a recent test I did using Village, Smithy and Market. For brevity I've omitted some unnecessary details. 

Turn 6 - First Army, Turn 7 - Placed Village on Army mat, Turn 8 - Second Army, Turn 10 - Placed Smithy on Army mat, Turn 12 - First Army Play for Village+Smithy; Province, Turn 13 - Placed Market on Army mat, Turn 14 - Province, Turn 15 - Province x2, Turn 16 - Province x2.

You can see it ramps up slowly then is quite devastating, but someone running Smith Big Money could have beaten this. So you can build the the biggest and bestest card you can think of, but will you have enough time to play it in the end? It seems concise Army play or even a little deck managing before Army will likely always win.

Also Army is a card that needs all the other Kingdom cards to function. So it may often be the best strategy on the board, but that it no way means the other cards aren't involved. This is the case with some of the more powerful cards in Dominion (Goons, Chapel, etc); they need other cards to perform optimally. Army is very strong, but not in any way broken as some have claimed. Broken implies it's the only card you need to buy on a board.
« Last Edit: May 22, 2018, 08:23:07 pm by Kudasai »
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Kudasai

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Re: Kudasai's Random Dominion Cards
« Reply #21 on: May 22, 2018, 08:25:22 pm »
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I'm surprised that Commander hasn't been compared to Pathfinding yet. It seems like mostly a weakened version of Pathfinding.

Disadvantages compared to Pathfinding:

- The +1 card only works if you have any actions remaining after playing the action (though you aren't generally using Pathfinding on a terminal action if you don't have extra Villages anyway).
- The +1 card is after the action, not before. Before is better for most things; after is only better for draw-to-x.
- You have to buy multiple copies, and play it multiple times; as opposed to just buying once and being done.

Advantages:

- Works on more than 1 kingdom pile. Huge advantage to be sure; but I think Pathfinding is already going to make you very likely to draw your deck anyway; so even more draw isn't going to matter as much.
- Potential to stack with multiple in play.

Yes, comparing it to Pathfinding it seems to add little to the game. Sure it's a bit different, but I'm thinking not enough to warrant a new card. I'll likely remove Commander and try to reuse to base mechanic in another card.
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Kudasai

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Re: Kudasai's Random Dominion Cards
« Reply #22 on: May 22, 2018, 08:48:04 pm »
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Certainly powerful for it's cost, but mid to late game it usually turns in to +2 Coffers, one other player takes 1VP, which is a bit weak. Of coarse niche scenarios probably exist.
I don't think that you always necessarily gift a VP to the other player. Early you can pick Province if you don't want to make Moon Shrines attractive and in the endgame you can always pick Duchy or Estate.
But even if you did, the other player would do the same for you. So the net effect is that the card can come with some VPs on gain and that it provides 2 Coin tokens on play which is too strong (even though it is like Merchant Guild, i.e. you cannot use the Coin tokens this turn). It is hard to play around with this though, one Coin token is too weak and a conditional amount of Coin tokens, like with Stadium, would make the card too complicated.

Tested Moon Shrine versus Big Money at +2 Coffers and it was quite strong! 6 Provinces, 3 Estates, and 14 VP tokens in 16 turns. Wowzah! Clearly a nerf was needed, so I made it +1 Coffer with the second +1 Coffer conditional upon adding VP tokens to a pile that does not already have it. Also you can now only add VP tokens to Victory Supply piles. This still allows it to be powerful early, but it really reigns it in mid game. Late game it picks back up again, but VP piling needs to be managed well. In this version versus Big Money it netted 3 Provinces, 3 Duchies, 3 Estates and 10 VP in 19 turns. Very poor outcome, but this was the outcome I was hoping for. Essentially a few Moon Shrines will go a long way, but if too many people are grabbing them, they fall a part. I'm hoping this creates interesting game play.

It's power level is also now directly tied to how many Victory Supply piles there are. More Moon Shrines producing +2 Coffers will speed the game up, but the access to more VP should slow it back down. It should also make alt-VP strategies versus Province rushes more viable. You can load up VP tokens on Victory Supply piles that help you and not your opponent.

So you were right; +1 Coffer wasn't good enough and +2 Coffers was too good. Hopefully this conditional version (v0.2) is straightforward enough. I think it is, but I'd like to hear your opinion.
« Last Edit: May 22, 2018, 08:49:24 pm by Kudasai »
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Aquila

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Re: Kudasai's Random Dominion Cards
« Reply #23 on: May 23, 2018, 05:09:18 pm »
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Army:
Here is a recent test I did using Village, Smithy and Market. For brevity I've omitted some unnecessary details. 

Turn 6 - First Army, Turn 7 - Placed Village on Army mat, Turn 8 - Second Army, Turn 10 - Placed Smithy on Army mat, Turn 12 - First Army Play for Village+Smithy; Province, Turn 13 - Placed Market on Army mat, Turn 14 - Province, Turn 15 - Province x2, Turn 16 - Province x2.
Did you try this without using Army? It would be interesting to see if it adds any definite impact; 16 turns seems about average, and the same deck without Army could do the same? Also, if I understand correctly, you don't need to put Village on Army for its actions, as 1 Market by itself makes Army nonterminal ('playing' all the cards won't use actions).
As worded, playing all the cards on the Army mat leaving them there, is confusing with Reserve cards; if they don't go to the Tavern mat, they can't be called.

A little thing I note with Royal Decree that's probably only rules errata, but you play Treasures from opponents' hands, then buy Mandarin or Bonfire. Even though they are now on your deck or trashed, they still would get returned? Certainly snatching some Heirlooms away could get a bit unpleasant.

Moon Shrine - so this version has competition to get the bonus coffers, and it encourages spreading the VP around a bit more. Did you try raising the cost of the first version, or is $3 cost necessary to you? I just feel it would play better, but it's only a feeling.

Crane - this is probably a $5 cost card. It's a more flexible Lab. The setback is a bit questionable since if you make this the last Action you play it'll do nothing, and with multiple Cranes that won't be hard to do. Also, something I learned from a card I tried is that having leftover actions is something of a punishment in itself, your investments in the nonterminal Actions are less effective.

Difficult to call with Mimic, I've never played Alchemy. It could have the power to persuade players to buy potions? It first looks like a better Overlord for less cost, but comes at a different time so would play differently, and also can't be the card it was under as the would-be empty pile has now left the Supply. They slow down a 3 pile ending and encourage an engine instead. It feels like it will either be interesting, or make games annoyingly slow.
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Gazbag

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Re: Kudasai's Random Dominion Cards
« Reply #24 on: May 23, 2018, 05:36:44 pm »
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Hey, cool cards!

Army: The opportunity cost here is huge, but the effect gets insane when you start playing multiple Armies per turn. My worry is that getting to the point where your deck is all Armies and your turns are just playing Armies doesn't seem particularly interesting.

Heir: It isn't very difficult to build a deck that consistently makes $9 per turn, and that's also something that you often want to do anyway, at which point these are just way too good. It seems quite similar to Grand Market in that you have to build up payload before they do anything, except these are easier to gain and give a bigger payoff than GM and it's arguably easier to hit $9 that to hit $6 with no Copper (that depends on the board I guess). I think this could give +$2 and cost $6 and it'd still be quite strong.

Royal Decree: This reminds of Fortune, nowhere near as crazy as Fortune but these do stack really well so they have that going for them. Looking at the player to your left will reduce the effect of multiple opponents and this should probably use wording similar to Necromancer and Army (playing the cards but leaving them in opponent's hand) to avoid nasty interactions with Bonfire/mandarin etc. I'm not sure this really needs the on-gain bonus though? All it really does is make this pay off some of it's debt immediately and it seems strong enough without it. Also I'm npt sure $3+8D is really different enough from 11D to be worth the weird cost?

Moon Shrine: My first reaction was that the +2 Coffers is too good on a non-terminal $3 next to Silver. Although the Vp part is probably more of a drawback than a bonus given that the opponent will have the 1st chance to buy the card with a token given that this is a Night, and this isn't as good as Silver at hitting $5 on the 1st shuffle because you need to draw this turn 3 to be able to make use of the Coppers before you shuffle on turn 5. I guess play testing showed that it was in fact too good though, although I don't think playing things vs big money is particularly useful. Edit: Much to the chagrin of the dominion discord community it's +1 Coffers not +1 Coffer.

Slumlord: Cool card, might end up being too strong though, even just playing something as weak as a Pearl Diver after this is basically giving you a Lost City effect. Perhaps having to draw your cards in the correct order will keep it in check but it seems much easier to do than herald or Diplomat (similar $4 conditional Lost City type things). That isn't even taking into account playing stronger actions with it.

Stadium: This should perhaps tell you to remove the tokens when you discard it from play? My concern with this is that it's basically a guarantee that you can make +$1 with this. That baseline of +$1 is already a Caravan Guard, and the upside of potentially being able to make +$2 or more once you've built up a bit seems much better than the Caravan Guard reaction.

Lost Temple: I think without the using up a Buy part this would be a strong card, but in line with Steward. With the playing it twice thing this becomes pretty crazy I think, it's basically Chapel that becomes a cantrip later, because if you're trashing 4 then you weren't using that Buy anyway. If there are abundant extra Buys then this can basically become a Lost City later too, yikes. I think that's enough to push this up into $5 territory? If you couldn't choose the same option twice then I think it might be okay at $4 though.

Industrious Village: Hmm a lot of conditional Lost Cities here, also I've noticed a lot of these cards that involve jumping through some sort of hoop are rewarding you for doing things that Dominion rewards in general - e.g. Heir rewarding you for building big, Stadium for adding expensive cards to your deck/trashing starting cards and now this for trashing your Coppers and buying lots of Actions. Not that this is necessarily a bad thing, just thought it was interesting to point out.

Old Witch: Now as opposed to rewarding you for what you're doing anyway we're punishing people for doing something you didn't want to do anyway  :P. It's perhaps worth noting that this doesn't actually hurt the opponent's deck until they choose to buy a Victory and let the Curses in, that makes this quite weak imo. Well I prefer weak Cursing attacks where it isn't obvious when to go for them to Mountebank-esque things so that isn't really a problem in my book.

Crane: This has to be at least a $5 right? And probably a $6 really, the top part is strictly better than Lab and even lets you use all unused Actions you have so I can't really see the drawback coming into play very often. And really this is just looking at it on its own, taking into account how well this plays with other sources of +Action and it seems clear that $4 is way too low of a cost?

Mimic: Well the setup here is weird, makes games almost impossible to 3 pile for one. I guess that there would have to be 72 Mimics to account for a 6 player game with Young Witch+Ruins (12 action supply piles!). I'm not sure whether the on-play of this actually works within the rules, Band of Misfits things are always a bit of a danger zone. I think it needs an "this is that card until it leaves play" too to match Band/Overlord. Being able to be any Action is probably dangerous too, might want to put a limit on that. Potion cost is a clever way to make it difficult for the player uncovering these to buy them all up before other players have a chance.

Blockade: I personally don't think I'd enjoy playing with this, having to make this decision once at the start of the game seems like it could take a while to think through, doing it 3 times will slow the start of the game to a halt. I don't much care for the gameplay either, with the choices being hidden it'll be impossible to play around and just come down to the shuffles whether you get the points for it. If you got the points for gaining one of your choices at least you could play towards it. But if you enjoy that kind of thing then go for it!
« Last Edit: May 23, 2018, 06:37:08 pm by Gazbag »
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