Print

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

[Aquila]

The Border mat, a space for tracking gains and trashes each turn. Each player gets one. Every gain goes to Incoming, unless something moves it somewhere else, so cards will come into the deck after Clean-up draw rather than before it, so a bit slower. Every trash goes to Outgoing, to be put in the trash pile start of next turn; they don't interact with effects concerning the trash until then.
Other rules:

• When-gain abilities trigger when the card goes to Incoming. When-trash abilities trigger when the card goes to Outgoing.
• If a card moves off or onto a Border for any reason other than gaining or trashing, it does not count as a gain or trash (like Exile isn't gaining).
• Discarding from Incoming and moving Outgoing to the trash are two separate effects to do once each first thing at start of turn. If Donate is in the game, choose the order you do the three effects in.
• The Border mat is included whenever a card's instructions refer to the "Border", "Incoming" or "Outgoing". I might be persuaded by using a type though.

So, its main purpose is a tracking aid, enabling effects that would otherwise require memory that not everybody has or wants in their games of Dominion. Abilities concerning your own Border are fine, but ones concerning the other players could be an interesting area. Or a card could move around Borders somehow, if that's interesting?

An example:

A Smugglers that can work on any player, both gains and trashes. The card it gains goes on your Incoming, so all the other players' Smuggler cards can gain a copy of it until your next turn.

I haven't tested any card ideas out for this mechanic, only brainstormed. Your ideas, should you wish to enter, could easily be more interesting than mine.
I will close the contest in 7 days, January 17th 04:00pm forum time. Until then...

[Gubump]

I assume gained cards to go the Border no matter where they would've been gained to, so e.g. Sculptor still gains to your Border?

[Aquila]

I assume gained cards to go the Border no matter where they would've been gained to, so e.g. Sculptor still gains to your Border?

I think the cleanest and least disruptive rule is to treat it like other gain locations; if multiple locations are given choose, otherwise the default is Incoming instead of the discard pile, and that's where card effects like Watchtower expect to find them. I don't think spoiling cards like Blockade or Buried Treasure would be a fun interaction to create.
Nor Fortress for trashing, for that matter.

For sure, it's a flaw with this mechanic, quite a big one.

[czzzz]

Workshop with a buy, or a cantrip (if you "gained" a card this turn) -- you decide.

[BryGuy]

Desert Coyote
Night - $5
Trash a card in play or in your hand to gain a Treasure costing up to $3 more. You may gain a card, as if buying, using the Treasures on the Border and in play.

Trash a card in play or in your hand to gain a Treasure costing up to $3 more. If the gained card cost $3 or less, you may gain another copy of it. You may gain a card, as if buying, using only the Treasures on the Border.

[fika monster]

The Border mat, a space for tracking gains and trashes each turn. Each player gets one. Every gain goes to Incoming, unless something moves it somewhere else, so cards will come into the deck after Clean-up draw rather than before it, so a bit slower. Every trash goes to Outgoing, to be put in the trash pile start of next turn; they don't interact with effects concerning the trash until then.
Other rules:

• When-gain abilities trigger when the card goes to Incoming. When-trash abilities trigger when the card goes to Outgoing.
• If a card moves off or onto a Border for any reason other than gaining or trashing, it does not count as a gain or trash (like Exile isn't gaining).
• Discarding from Incoming and moving Outgoing to the trash are two separate effects to do once each first thing at start of turn. If Donate is in the game, choose the order you do the three effects in.
• The Border mat is included whenever a card's instructions refer to the "Border", "Incoming" or "Outgoing". I might be persuaded by using a type though.

So, its main purpose is a tracking aid, enabling effects that would otherwise require memory that not everybody has or wants in their games of Dominion. Abilities concerning your own Border are fine, but ones concerning the other players could be an interesting area. Or a card could move around Borders somehow, if that's interesting?

An example:

A Smugglers that can work on any player, both gains and trashes. The card it gains goes on your Incoming, so all the other players' Smuggler cards can gain a copy of it until your next turn.

I haven't tested any card ideas out for this mechanic, only brainstormed. Your ideas, should you wish to enter, could easily be more interesting than mine.
I will close the contest in 7 days, January 17th 04:00pm forum time. Until then...

would this mat exist even if a player didnt have "new unique cads from a expansion" with it? is it intended to be there for vanilla users?

[Aquila]

...

• The Border mat is included whenever a card's instructions refer to the "Border", "Incoming" or "Outgoing". I might be persuaded by using a type though.

...

would this mat exist even if a player didnt have "new unique cads from a expansion" with it? is it intended to be there for vanilla users?

If no effect in the game needs it, there's not a lot of point slowing the gains and trashes down. So, it could be added to any game, but...why is it there? Perhaps if the tracking is useful for something like 1E Bonfire?

[emtzalex]

My Submission:

	Culper Ring • Action • $9* +3 Cards +1 Action Discard a card. This costs $1 less per card on any player's Border mat. Heirloom: Silver Dagger
	Silver Dagger • Treasure - Heirloom • $4 $2 +1 Buy. Trash a card from your hand.

[LibraryAdventurer]

Desert Coyote
Night - $5
Trash a card in play or in your hand to gain a Treasure costing up to $3 more. You may gain a card, as if buying, using the Treasures on the Border and in play.

Trash a card in play or in your hand to gain a Treasure costing up to $3 more. If the gained card cost $3 or less, you may gain another copy of it. You may gain a card, as if buying, using only the Treasures on the Border.

I like the idea, but the 2nd part would be a lot clearer if it said something like "Play the treasures on your Border, leaving them there. Then you may buy a card."


On that note:

Shipping Village
$5 - Action
+1 Card
+2 Actions
You may play an Action card on your Border. If it is Outgoing, leave it there.

FAQ: If the Action you play is Incoming it moves into play.

[NoMoreFun]

IMO this should have a type as it impacts the game whether you buy a relevant card or not, so it has "in games using this" rules.

Anyway, my entry (no extra type included).

Infiltrate
Action - $5
Trash a card from your hand. You may play an Action from your Border twice

It's a Throne Room that can also trash if it misses an Action, expedite an Action you gained this turn, or salvage one you trashed earlier (for benefit?).

[grrgrrgrr]

• The Border mat is included whenever a card's instructions refer to the "Border", "Incoming" or "Outgoing". I might be persuaded by using a type though.

I think you should CERTAINLY use an extra type. The setup is fully determined by the card's typing. Looters also have an extra type; it doesn't rely on the word "Ruins" in the card's instructions. Heck, even Fate and Doom cards have an extra type, even if it is for something as superfluous as shuffling the Boon and Hex piles (which Loot gainers strangely do not).

Cool mechanic though

[Aquila]

Loot not using a type was why I just went with the words. Unprecedented with its unique rules. Events use Loot; maybe that's why? If landscapes use the Border, there would be the same issue with types on them; but, a type would let portrait cards exist that don't refer to the mat directly, say they just needed the start of turn discard behaviour.

Anyhow, 24 hours left

[Aquila]

With the snag of cards being gained to other places, I wondered if this mechanic was worth doing. These entries show interesting things it can do, so maybe it was.

czzzz		Workshop that can pick up gains earlier in the turn to hand. +: Putting a card gained this turn to hand is a new effect that the Border accomplishes. It can potentially be interesting too. Unlike other Workshops, having multiple copies is often meaningful. -: sad when there are no Villages. The +Buy does compensate for this situation, but feels tacked on; Workshops enable gaining multiple cards per turn anyway. Overview: the premise feels like a simple card that should exist, but the execution could be a bit better.
BryGuy	Desert Coyote Night, cost. Trash a card in play or in your hand to gain a Treasure costing up to more than it. You may gain a card, as if buying, using the Treasures on the Border and in play.	Expand/Mine a card into a Treasure, then buy a card including the Treasures on the Border. +: Nights checking your Border work well. Building up to big gains or Provinces can be achieved in different ways, which is interesting and replayable. -: it needs to check that cards in play to trash would be discarded this turn. It feels very strong; an unspent Silver can be made at least into a Gold and a , non-terminally. Overview: with a bit of power tweaking this could be a great card. One possibility is to fix the gained Treasure to a Silver.
emtzalex		Cycling Lab that cheapens with more gains and trashes on a single turn, with an Heirloom that adds trashing and +Buy for multiple gains. +: The Heirloom enables Culper Ring well. Forced trash makes using it later game a little tricky, unlike Goat. -: the player interaction works negatively here, when one player works to cheapen these the other players don't have to for that round of turns. The Heirloom is a radical speedup to the game that probably narrows the number of viable strategies. Overview: speeding up a Border game might be a good move, but I fear that Silver Dagger will script most of them. The cost reduction is probably better looking at just the player's own Border.
LibraryAdventurer	Shipping Village Action, cost. +1 Card +2 Actions You may play an Action card on your Border. If it is Outgoing, leave it there.	Village that plays Actions gained or trashed during the turn. +: interesting to build around, especially with tfb-ing an Action. Being a Village helps terminal gainers or trashers set up the extra play effect. -: this will need the Command treatment to stop infinitely playing Outgoing Shipping Villages. Overview: it loves having Action gainers and trashers in the Kingdom, so much so that without them it may be best to select another Village to make an interesting game. Because it's inconsistent even when such cards are present, my overall excitement is lukewarm.
NoMoreFun	Infiltrate Action, cost. Trash a card from your hand. You may play an Action from your Border twice.	Regular Throne that can thin instead, or do both with an Action previously trashed or gained during the turn. +: the function of weak thinning lets this be a reliable Throne+. There are other little uses like keeping hold of a trashed Action for later in the turn. -: only little negative things. The use of the Border isn't so interesting here, as this is almost 'trash a card from your hand. If it's an Action, you may play it twice' with a few hard-to-pull-off extra functions. Overview: weak trashing on a Throne is nice, a card I'm happy to see on the table. The other things it can do may as well be there, they don't take elegance away. Safe design.

Runner-up: Desert Coyote by BryGuy

Winner: Infiltrate by NoMoreFun

The Coyote was innovative! I did not think of treating the Treasures on the Border like they were in play. But, I felt the design that was safest in its presented form should take the win.

[NoMoreFun]

Thank you Aquila for judging and apologies for missing the judging. I will post a new contest shortly.