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[Rush_Clasic]

Blood Diamond -
Treasure
$3
When you buy this, gain a Curse card.

• I wanted to make a flavorful, simple card. I feel that a lot of the expansions get bogged down with too many complex cards for their own good.
  
• I considered costing it at , but that seems like it pushes the power level a bit. I'd want to playtest it a bit to find out.
• I wanted to just make this a "Curse(d?) Treasure", as that just sounds way neater, and I would have were the wording on cards like Witch different. As is, if I understand the rules well, "Curse card" refers to its card type, not its name. I could jump through hoops to make a "Curse Treasure" version work, but the card above seemed more elegant.

[Grujah]

Seems too much like Cache.
Whats with the magic mana costs?

[Rush_Clasic]

This post is for storing all my CC threads, good or bad. Posterity and all that jazz.

• Blood Diamond
• Vampire
• Investigator
• Zombie
• Catapult
• Scarecrow
• Tilted Scales
• Hanging Gardens
• Trickster
• Junkyard
• Scavenger
• Trick Coin
• Coal
• Lost City
• Brokerage
• Digger
• Clubhouse
• Ruins
• Barge
• Wrecking Crew
• Casino
• Werewolf & Moon
• Ghost Town
• Factory
• Trust Fund
• Plaza
• Blockade
• Studio
• Viaduct
• King Midas
• Overflowing Landfill
• Investor
• Senator
• Groves
• Embezzler
• Vagabond
• Refinery
• Reserve
• Metallurgist
• Scam Artist
• Coffers
• Assembly Line
• Tithe
• Bunker
• Inventor
• Peacekeeper
• Dividends
• Stockholder

[eHalcyon]

I think this Fan Card idea is usually called "Blood Money".

If you follow the link to the original post, there is MUCH more and is definitely worth the read.  But here is the relevant bit:

(5) Powerful cards that incur negative VPs or gain Curses.

This comes up a lot, perhaps more than any other idea on this list. Examples are numerous. Basically you invent a cheap but powerful card and attach a negative VP penalty to try to balance it. On the surface, this idea presents an intriguing dilemma to the player: Do you take the hit to your score in the hopes that the extra power will enable you to overcome the deficit?

The problem is that there is essentially no way to make such a card balanced. In a kingdom where trashing is possible, the correct play is probably to buy these cards, reap their benefits, and trash them before the game ends, circumventing the penalty entirely. To balance the card in such a kingdom, the VP penalty would have to be quite steep, to offset the likelihood that the card will be trashed before the game ends. But if the VP penalty is steep enough to balance that situation, it will be way too steep in kingdoms without trashing available, as then the VP penalty would be too great to risk.

Many people try to correct this problem by adding a clause to the card such as "This card cannot be trashed" or "If this card is trashed, place it in your discard pile instead of the trash pile." This kind of special-case rule rubs me wrong (there's a section on special-case rules later), though it might be workable in this case. Another workaround people use is "When you buy this card, gain a Curse." Or, since the Curse pile can run out and gained Curse cards can be trashed, the concept of a "curse token" is employed: "When you buy this card, gain X curse tokens." A curse token would be worth -1 VP at the end of the game, similarly to how Prosperity's Victory Tokens are worth +1 VP at the end of the game.

Regardless, these solutions still come up short, although they're improvements on the original idea. The problem is that a power card can't be balanced with a fixed VP cost, for the simple reason that VP totals vary wildly from game to game, depending on the board. Dominion games can be won with 5 points and lost with 100. The difference between scores can be very small, meaning a -2 VP penalty could be decisive, or very large, making it insignificant.

A counterargument to this is that one of the basic strategic principles of Dominion is recognizing that every card is good in some situations and bad in others, so a card that is powerful sometimes and weak at other times is no problem at all. But this kind of card seems to be usually either dominant or suicidal and only rarely in between.

The best solution seems to be to cause a VP penalty to be incurred upon each USE of the card, rather than merely on the purchase of it. Then the VP penalty is directly proportional to the benefit you get from using it. In games with heavy-trashing, where the card would be used more often, the penalty is steeper. In no-trashing games, where the card would be used less often, the penalty is smaller.

Seemingly the two best ways to incur a penalty upon use of the card are (1) "Gain X curse tokens," and (2) "Gain a Curse. If you do...." The former incurs an irreversible VP penalty. The latter puts a stop to free power plays when the Curses run out. Both deal damage in proportion to the use you get out of the card.

Here's a bit more on the specific cursed treasure idea:

http://forum.dominionstrategy.com/index.php?topic=1735.0

[Rush_Clasic]

A set that cares about costs:

Wheelhouse - 1
Action
+1 Action
+$1
Reveal the top card of your deck. If it costs more than the combined cost of cards you have in play: +1 card.

Bad Village - 2
Action
+1 Card
+2 Actions
-----
As an additional cost to buy this, discard a victory card.

Barter Village - 2
Action
Choose one: +2 Cards; or +2 Actions.

Dumper - 2*
Action
+1 Card
+1 Action
+1 Buy
-----
This costs $2 more while being trashed.

Match Maker - 3
Action
+1 Action
Reveal a card from your hand, then reveal cards from the top of your deck until revealing one with the same cost in coins. Put that card into your hand and discard the rest.

Molder - 3
Action - Reaction
Trash 2 cards from your hand. If they have different costs: +1 Card, +1 Action.
---
If you would gain a card, you may reveal this from your hand. If you do, gain that card putting it in your hand.

Inspector - 3*
Action - Attack
Each player (including you) reveals the top card of his deck and either discards or puts it back, your choice. For each card revealed, if its an...
Action, +1 Action.
Treasure, +$1
Victory, +1 Card.
-----
This costs $1 more for each other player in the game.

Panhandler - 4
Action - Attack
+$2
Each other player reveals the top 2 cards of his deck and discards each costing more than $0. If he discarded exactly 1 card, he gains a Copper. If he discarded exactly 2 cards, he gains a curse.

Sifter - 4
Action
You may trash a treasure card from your hand. If you do, cards cost $ less this turn equal to the $ that card could have produced.

Urban Village - 4
Action
+1 Card
+2 Actions
---
When you buy this, trash a card from your hand. If it's an...
Action, put this on top of your deck.
Treasure, +1 coin token.
Victory, +1 VP token.

Sanctuary - 4
Action
Trash any number of differently costed cards from your hand. +$1 per card trashed.

Orchard - 4
Victory
Worth VP equal to the most common cost in coins among cards in your deck. If two or more costs are tied for most common, use the highest cost.

Stockroom - 4*
Action
+1 Card
+1 Action
Discard any number of cards. +1 Card per card discarded.
-----
As you buy this, you may gain up to 2 coppers. This costs $2 less per copper gained.

Factory - 4
Action
Choose one - Gain a card costing up to $4; or gain 2 cards with combined costs equaling up to $5.

Scam Artist - 5
Action - Attack
+1 Action
Each player (including you) trashes a card from his or her hand. You gain a card costing exactly $1 more than your trashed card, putting it into your hand. Each other player gains a card costing exactly $1 less than his or her trashed card, putting it into his or her hand.

Hanging Gardens - 5
Victory
Worth 1 VP for every 3 cards in your deck costing $5 or more.

Metropolis - 5
Action
+2 Cards
+2 Actions
-----
As an additional cost to buy this, discard 2 cards.

Ravager - 5
Action - Attack
+3 Cards
Each other player with 5 or more cards in hand reveals his hand and discards the highest costing card from it.

Dividends - 7
Treasure
When you play this, its worth $1 per different cost among cards you have in play.

Groves - 7
Victory
Worth 4VP
-----
Rather than buy this, you may trash any number of cards from your hand with total costs exactly equal to this card's cost.