Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[gambit05]

I have tried to explorer the design space of Debt tokens a bit further. I have a total of 8 cards so far, with 3 of them being conceptually similar (Serf is shown below). Those cards deal with Debt in rather unusual ways.
I will present them in two rounds with four cards each.

Part 1:

Serf $2 – Action +1 Card +2 Actions +1 Buy Choose one: Return this to        the Supply; or take 1 Debt and        discard this from play at the start of Clean-up.

Feldscher $2 - Night            Take up to 5 Debt to look at            that many cards from the top of your deck. Trash or discard any number of them and put the rest back on top in any order.

Lady Godiva $4 – Action +$2 You may add 1 of your Debt to a Supply pile. When a player buys a     card, they take the Debt from its pile.    ---------------------------- While this is in play, when you buy a card, you may take 1 Debt from the general supply to pay $1 less for it.

Connoisseur 5 Debt – Action Trash a card from your hand. Choose one: Gain a card costing up to $2 more         than it; or take 2 Debt and gain          a card costing exactly $3 more than it.

Serf. The idea is to combine a one-shot feature a la Experiment with the opportunity to keep the card by taking Debt. Serf’s ability is that of a Worker’s Village but for half the cost. After playing it, the player can keep it for a little extra pay.

Feldscher. This has the features of Night Watchman (range) combined with Sentry (power) and the flexibility to choose the number of cards to be inspected. This resembles a bit the overpaying effect of Doctor, though unspent $ are not a limiting factor here.

Lady Godiva. When this is in play, it alters the costs of other cards when bought by taking 1 Debt token instead of paying $1 of their cost, basically allowing the player to buy a card that is more expensive than they can afford with the money available. Then when Lady Godiva is played, a Debt token can be placed on any Supply pile. This has two effects: The debt does not have to be payed back in the next Buy phase and the Debt added to the piles work like Tax. Debt tokens taken by other means can be used the same way.

Connoisseur. This is a Remodel variant either allowing a standard trash-for-benefit or, for some Debt, to gain a more expensive card. This can be helpful for getting some key cards and also late in the game for remodeling $5 cost cards into Provinces.


→  Part 2

[segura]

This is a plain brilliant, I like all the cards.

About the details, Serf is the most sound and „anchored“ as we have a close benchmark with Hamlet.

Feldscher looks strong and will likely play similarly to Chapel and Donate, i.e. very quick thinning with the need to  get payload/gainers to compensate.

Connoisseur is perhaps too strong. Opening with Expand sounds pretty sweet and the Debt is a small price to pay to trash and gain a $5 at the same time.

[gambit05]

I just realised that Serf's wording can be a lot simpler:

Serf
$2 – Action

+1 Card
+2 Actions
+1 Buy
Choose one: Take @1; 
or return this to the Supply.

[LibraryAdventurer]

I just realised that Serf's wording can be a lot simpler:

I was just about to point that out.

Connoisseur is my favorite of these. I'm going to try it out in some games.

EDIT/PS: I didn't like how much Encampment seems to help the person who's already ahead, so I modded it for our use so that you have to reveal a Gold or Plunder and take <1> debt in order to keep it. (But I haven't actually played with my modded version yet.)

[Jonatan Djurachkovitch]

Connoisseur has the problem that DXV already has mentioned. If you get a few of these you may not need to buy anymore cards, so the debt doesn't matter. Maybe make it only be able to Expand if you started the turn w/o debt.

[gambit05]

Connoisseur has the problem that DXV already has mentioned. If you get a few of these you may not need to buy anymore cards, so the debt doesn't matter. Maybe make it only be able to Expand if you started the turn w/o debt.

Good point and I think that can be easily implemented:

Connoisseur
5 Debt – Action

Trash a card from your
hand. Choose one: Gain a
card costing up to $2 more
than it; or, if you don’t have
Debt, take 2 Debt and gain
a card costing exactly $3
more than it.

This hopefully also addresses segura's criticism:

Connoisseur is perhaps too strong. Opening with Expand sounds pretty sweet and the Debt is a small price to pay to trash and gain a $5 at the same time.

Connoisseur is my favorite of these. I'm going to try it out in some games.

That would be great. Please note that it will change a bit at least, maybe more if it is still too strong. If you indeed play with it, please give feedback on how the card performed.

It seems overall, you (plural) like the cards. Thank you all for your help!

[gambit05]

Part 2

Here are the remaining 4 cards that in some way deal with Debt:

Ransom $3 – Action - Reaction Discard a card, for +3 Cards. ---------------------------- When another player plays an Attack card, you may first play     this from your hand, to take 1 Debt      and not be affected by it.

Passage $3 – Action - Duration +2 Cards Gain a Horse.         At the start of your next turn,          choose one: Take 2 Debt for +3 Cards and discard a card; or exchange this for a Horse.

Covenant $4 – Action +4 Cards             Choose one: Take 1 Debt; or            return this to the Supply, for +1 Villager.

Curfew $4 – Night +$2           You may buy a card costing            up to $6, taking 1 Debt for each $1 it costs. You may pay off Debt.

Ransom. The idea here is to get Debt for successfully blocking the consequences of an opponent’s Attack card. Ransom also draws some cards just like when it’s played on the player’s own turn.

Passage. This is based on the same idea as that for Serf (see Part 1), i.e. a powerful card can be bought for little money, but in order to keep it, players get some Debt later. If a player doesn’t want to keep a Passage, they get a Horse as consolation.

Covenant. Again, the same principle as with Serf. If a player chooses not to take Debt for keeping Covenant, they are rewarded with a Villager, which can be useful after drawing a lot of cards.

Curfew. This is basically a Night-Silver that allows buying a card in the Night phase for Debt. Any unspent money from the regular Buy phase can be used as well. Like in the Buy phase, a player who is already in Debt cannot buy a card via Curfew, but they can at least use the +$2 for paying off the Debt.

I hope you enjoy them and of course that you give some feedback on these cards.

[LibraryAdventurer]

Ransom's reaction seems weak, especially in multiplayer, because it can only block one attack until your next turn, but it does let you play it without using an action so maybe that makes up for it (unless your opponent has more than one Militia or the next player has one). Maybe the reaction could give you <1> to play it when someone plays an attack, and then the attack defense could be "While this is in play."

Passage has an effect that would be worth $5, but it makes you take <2> to keep it which seems fine. Covenant has an effect worth $6, but it only makes you take <1> to keep it. I'd suggest making it <2> for Covenant as well. +4 Cards is strong.

Curfew is weird. I don't see any good reason for it to be a night card rather than an Action or Treasure. I also think it should cost $5, as it's mostly stronger than Capital (Curfew limits you to using debt to buy cards up to $6, but Curfew also gives you $2 to pay off debt. Capital gives you $0 net coin.)

[silverspawn]

Covenant is even more busted than stray cat, for similar reasons. +4 Cards +1 Debt is already too strong for 4$, and the optional part is super good.

Sounds about balanced (and pretty good tbh, design-wise) if you make it +3 cards instead.

Passage is also busted (man cards are so much more important than $), though not nearly as much.

[segura]

Covenant is even more busted than stray cat, for similar reasons. +4 Cards +1 Debt is already too strong for 4$, and the optional part is super good.

Sounds about balanced (and pretty good tbh, design-wise) if you make it +3 cards instead.

I agree that the card is too good but at +3 Cards it would be weaker than Smithy.

[silverspawn]

I agree, but what's wrong with a 4$ being weaker than smithy? Most 4$s are.

[gambit05]

I see this needs some work and you already helped me a lot. To not write a too extensive wall of text, I think I will focus today on the most controversial Covenant card.

Covenant is even more busted than stray cat, for similar reasons. +4 Cards +1 Debt is already too strong for 4$, and the optional part is super good.

Sounds about balanced (and pretty good tbh, design-wise) if you make it +3 cards instead.

That would be the same effect and with the same initial cost as Smithy (as segura has pointed out), but for each time playing a Covenant one has to take 1 Debt for keeping it. That can’t be right. Having differently strong cards for the same cost is fine, but not with the same basic effect. Wouldn’t that be a quite expensive Villager gainer? If so, it would be better to remove the Debt part and make the card a mandatory one-shot, i.e. +3 Cards, +1 Action, return this to the Supply. Is that worth $4 (compare this with Experiment, which costs $1.5)?

Comparing Covenant with Stray Cat is interesting. Stray Cat can wait for the right moment (i.e. for having an extra Action available), while Covenant can be abandoned to get the Villager and that would be indeed stronger than Stray Cat. Since +3 Cards doesn’t seem to be an elegant option (for a cost of $4 of a card that has to be maintained via Debt), the best option would be to remove the “+1 Villager” part and increase the Debt to 2 for keeping it, as suggested by LibraryAdventurer:

Covenant
$4 – Action

+4 Cards
Choose one: Take 2 Debt;
or return this to the Supply.

Would that look balanced?

Another possibility could be to play with the cost, e.g. having itself a Debt cost, e.g. 5 Debt.

[silverspawn]

With +3 cards, you have a smithy with a mandatory insurance policy. Returning a smithy to the supply in exchange for not having a dead turn is an amazing deal. The problem is that you don't want to do it most of the time, so it is weaker in raw strength, but less risky. That's interesting. Don't talk yourself out of the good part of the card! That's like a card that looks like a weekly design contest winner to me.

I'm not worried about similarity. Destrier has literally identical effect as Laboratory and Donald X didn't see a problem with printing it.

Your 4 card version might be an ok powerlevel but I think it's much less interesting.

[gambit05]

With +3 cards, you have a smithy with a mandatory insurance policy. Returning a smithy to the supply in exchange for not having a dead turn is an amazing deal. The problem is that you don't want to do it most of the time, so it is weaker in raw strength, but less risky. That's interesting. Don't talk yourself out of the good part of the card! That's like a card that looks like a weekly design contest winner to me.

I'm not worried about similarity. Destrier has literally identical effect as Laboratory and Donald X didn't see a problem with printing it.

Your 4 card version might be an ok powerlevel but I think it's much less interesting.

You have some very good points. I understand the Lab-Destrier comparison you made, but one difference is that the newer card is more attractive than the older one. One thing that could make Smithy and Covenant more distinct is to give the latter a Debt cost. At least it would fit nicely to the general theme of my card to deal with Debt. What do you think?

[LibraryAdventurer]

I don't like a card having a debt cost for no reason. The three <8> cards in Empires have a debt cost so you can buy them before you have an $8 turn. Engineer costs debt to keep it from gaining itself.

I think with +3 Cards and having to take <1> to keep it, you could make it cost $3 to make it more different from Smithy.

[gambit05]

I don't like a card having a debt cost for no reason. The three <8> cards in Empires have a debt cost so you can buy them before you have an $8 turn. Engineer costs debt to keep it from gaining itself.

I think with +3 Cards and having to take <1> to keep it, you could make it cost $3 to make it more different from Smithy.

You are right, that was a desperate idea. The comparison with Smithy and Stray Cat makes the whole thing a bit tricky. Below I have visualized your ideas and 2 more possibilities for dealing with this.

Covenant versions
A (silverspawn)
B (LibraryAdventurer) A with $3 cost
C Cost split, otherwise ~A
D ~Original version, but with 2 Debt for keeping it and no Villager option.

A $4 – Action +3 Cards Choose one: Take 1 Debt; or return this to the Supply, for +1 Villager.

B $3 – Action +3 Cards Choose one: Take 1 Debt; or return this to the Supply, for +1 Villager.

C $3 – Action +3 Cards +1 Debt You may return this to the Supply, for +1 Villager.

D $4 – Action +4 Cards Choose one: Take 2 Debt; or return this to the Supply.

What do you think which one looks the most interesting?

[segura]

I agree, but what's wrong with a 4$ being weaker than smithy? Most 4$s are.

The 1 Debt you have to pay to keep your Smithy alive matters far more than the blow-up option of 1 Villager.
Mining Village is the obvious benchmark. A Village plus double Peddler sounds pretty sweet for a one-shot yet it is rarely used during the game.

[silverspawn]

Mining village does not seem analogous since there is no risk of drawing action cards dead

[faust]

I don't like a card having a debt cost for no reason. The three <8> cards in Empires have a debt cost so you can buy them before you have an $8 turn. Engineer costs debt to keep it from gaining itself.

I think with +3 Cards and having to take <1> to keep it, you could make it cost $3 to make it more different from Smithy.

You are right, that was a desperate idea. The comparison with Smithy and Stray Cat makes the whole thing a bit tricky. Below I have visualized your ideas and 2 more possibilities for dealing with this.

Covenant versions
A (silverspawn)
B (LibraryAdventurer) A with $3 cost
C Cost split, otherwise ~A
D ~Original version, but with 2 Debt for keeping it and no Villager option.

A $4 – Action +3 Cards Choose one: Take 1 Debt; or return this to the Supply, for +1 Villager.

B $3 – Action +3 Cards Choose one: Take 1 Debt; or return this to the Supply, for +1 Villager.

C $3 – Action +3 Cards +1 Debt You may return this to the Supply, for +1 Villager.

D $4 – Action +4 Cards Choose one: Take 2 Debt; or return this to the Supply.

What do you think which one looks the most interesting?

B is too strong; the one-shot power is already usually better than Experiment, and it has the non-one-shot in addition.

I imagine that D is a bit too punishing to be fun; I like that you get the Villager when you return it. Balance-wise it's probably okay.

So it's at A vs C. Both work quite nicely I think; ultimately it comes down to whether you want this to be mainly an Experiment or a Smithy variant.

[gambit05]

I agree, but what's wrong with a 4$ being weaker than smithy? Most 4$s are.

The 1 Debt you have to pay to keep your Smithy alive matters far more than the blow-up option of 1 Villager.
Mining Village is the obvious benchmark. A Village plus double Peddler sounds pretty sweet for a one-shot yet it is rarely used during the game.

This was so far my way of thinking about Covenant.

Covenant versions
A (silverspawn)
B (LibraryAdventurer) A with $3 cost
C Cost split, otherwise ~A
D ~Original version, but with 2 Debt for keeping it and no Villager option.

A $4 – Action +3 Cards Choose one: Take 1 Debt; or return this to the Supply, for +1 Villager.

B $3 – Action +3 Cards Choose one: Take 1 Debt; or return this to the Supply, for +1 Villager.

C $3 – Action +3 Cards +1 Debt You may return this to the Supply, for +1 Villager.

D $4 – Action +4 Cards Choose one: Take 2 Debt; or return this to the Supply.

What do you think which one looks the most interesting?

B is too strong; the one-shot power is already usually better than Experiment, and it has the non-one-shot in addition.

I imagine that D is a bit too punishing to be fun; I like that you get the Villager when you return it. Balance-wise it's probably okay.

So it's at A vs C. Both work quite nicely I think; ultimately it comes down to whether you want this to be mainly an Experiment or a Smithy variant.

Thanks, these comparisons are very helpful. I also start to understand the logic behind silverspawn’s arguments for the one-shot Smithy.
The focus is on one-shots with the possibility to keep the cards (via Debt). Ideally, both options should be attractive. I also prefer to have the Villager option. So, I would say version A and thus silverspawn’s suggestion is the winner. I will keep version C as a backup in case I need more $3 cost cards (I am a little short of them right now).

[segura]

Mining village does not seem analogous since there is no risk of drawing action cards dead

As Mining Village is the only official card which features a blow-up option, it is a relevant benchmark.

The main lesson from Mining Village is that what looks so strong at first glance (blow up for Double Peddler) is rarely used.

[gambit05]

Mining village does not seem analogous since there is no risk of drawing action cards dead

As Mining Village is the only official card which features a blow-up option, it is a relevant benchmark.

The main lesson from Mining Village is that what looks so strong at first glance (blow up for Double Peddler) is rarely used.

I think you are both right and the main problem may be that Covenant in its current version cost something like $3.5. If so, one could add an on-gain effect, e.g.:

---------------------
When you gain this,
you may take 1 Debt,
for +1 Villager.

[silverspawn]

Putting aside the fact that you should use Mining village trash in every game (namely in your last turn), I don't get the similarity at all. Yes, mining village has a blow up option, but they're obviously different. If mining village gave +10$ on trash, they would also both have a blow-up option.

[Jack Rudd]

Putting aside the fact that you should use Mining village trash in every game (namely in your last turn), I don't get the similarity at all. Yes, mining village has a blow up option, but they're obviously different. If mining village gave +10$ on trash, they would also both have a blow-up option.

Vineyard says hi.

[gambit05]

After discussion and feedback and some time I spent to think about the last four cards, here is their present status:

Covenant
I will follow silverpawn’s suggestion to give it +3 Cards; and let it otherwise unchanged (version A in reply #15).

Passage
I will make some substantial changes; its effects will be weaker and it will probably Exchanges for something else. I am still working on a new version.

Curfew
LibraryAdventurerer wasn't happy with this card (reply #7) and he is right. Before writing a lengthy essay here, just in brief: I increased the costs to $5 (considering $6) and will move the card to the "pile of low priority".

Ransom
Again, LibraryAdventurer mentioned that the defense ability is too weak (see reply #7). That is true, but my intention was to have a Reaction card that is reasonably strong in the absence of attacks, and thus concluded that the defense part of the Reaction has to be relatively weak, e.g. immunity to a single attack only. But who knows, maybe something better and more interesting is out there.

For easier evaluation, here is Ransom again:

Ransom $3 – Action - Reaction Discard a card, for +3 Cards. ------------------------------ When another player plays an Attack card, you may first play this from your hand, to take 1 Debt and not be affected by it.

Maybe, someone can give their opinion about this card?