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[ChaosRed]

SILVER LINING - A NOOB'S EXPANSION
This is really just a strange way for a noob to become more familiar with how Dominion works, not just for victory strategies, but what makes the game compelling and interesting. Feel free to review the progress of this thread and offer feedback.

RIP THIS APART
As I reveal the cards in the expansion, feel free to rip them apart. I have no ego to bruise here. I am more interested in a discussion of what makes cards interesting and fun to play. This "expansion" is really more about igniting a discussion about balance and what makes for compelling play, than me actually attempting to design a decent expansion.

Some of the cards have gone past "peer review", in which case they are not listed here, they are instead  listed in this thread. I've done this so this this OP can stay "clean" with only cards currently up for review/discussion (it was getting a big long to read and load otherwise).

THE CARDS
I will unveil these cards incrementally, look at feedback (if any) for each card I post. I will modify the thread to add new cards and of course, respond to criticism. So this OP always has the latest cards for peer review, (usually just two at at time) while the others are listed in the beta test thread.

Cards currently under review...

[DsnowMan]

The Servant's Quarters card could be discarded by any discard-for-benefit card on your turn for some nice combos. Discard it to secret chamber, vault, horse traders, HAMLET, etc, and draw a card.

Let's see, a deck made of SQ and Hamlet. Play hamlet, discard a SQ for +1card and +action. Not bad.

Weird things would happen if your deck was small and you could play vault or secret chamber multiple times. You could discard a bunch of SQ and draw them right back through their own discard effect. Then play another vault. Not entirely broken, you can do that with a scrying pool anyway.

[jsh357]

I think the Pauper's Feast would be more worth it if it also gave +1 Action (And would help differentiate it from Feast further).  May be a little overpowered with Golem/KC/TR, though that could be said of many cards.  As you have written it, I would personally buy that card about as often as Adventurer unless it gave some kind of bonus. (same for Embargo if it didn't give the $2)

The others look okay to me, but it's more out of the game currently being starved for more Reaction cards.

[biopower]

Bailey feels strictly superior to Moat, as it has the same effect and is nonterminal, at the cost of being able to draw one fewer card. One fewer card isn't that much of a penalty in exchange for being nonterminal, as it means you can buy as many as you want without clogging your deck.

[ChaosRed]

The Servant's Quarters card could be discarded by any discard-for-benefit card on your turn for some nice combos. Discard it to secret chamber, vault, horse traders, HAMLET, etc, and draw a card. Let's see, a deck made of SQ and Hamlet. Play hamlet, discard a SQ for +1card and +action. Not bad.

Yeah, thanks. I think that card is okay right now, in particular I think the name of the card seems to match its abilities. Serfs are often used as "fodder" to protect against attacks and serfs are often disposable for nobility, which explains why when you discard it you get a small benefit.

I think the Pauper's Feast would be more worth it if it also gave +1 Action (And would help differentiate it from Feast further).  May be a little overpowered with Golem/KC/TR, though that could be said of many cards. The others look okay to me, but it's more out of the game currently being starved for more Reaction cards.

Yeah the card does need something, if it had +1 Action, it might help it. It seems like a flimsy add-on perhaps? What if you could trash the card or any other card worth 2 or less to gain a card worth 3? You could still only trash one card, but it could the Pauper's Feast or any other card worth 2 or less. Too powerful? It would be a very slow trasher...but gives you the option of trashing the card itself if nothing in your hand is worth trashing, which means it gets rid of itself when you no longer need it.

It would add a decent theme to the card too, where you are "feasting" off cheap cards, but really not getting too much in return.

Bailey feels strictly superior to Moat, as it has the same effect and is nonterminal, at the cost of being able to draw one fewer card. One fewer card isn't that much of a penalty in exchange for being nonterminal, as it means you can buy as many as you want without clogging your deck.

Yeah I feel Bailey is broken too. It's a Pawn without one option, but is also a reaction. Perhaps if I remove the +1 Action, and replace that option with just a +1$? It weakens the card significantly, but right now I feel like Bailey is one of the best defenders out there right now and it was my intention to go rather conservative with the set. I wanted one or two "wow" cards, but most of the set I want to be very balanced and fair and to err on the side of "under-powered" rather than broken.

Thanks guys for the feedback, greatly appreciated.

[Davio]

What if you could trash Pauper's Feast to gain 2 cards costing $3?

In that case, it may be bought sometime beyond the 5/2 opening.

[Fangz]

I can't see pauper's feast being at all useful unless you are drowned in + buys. Even with the action. Would you really do the equivalent of doubly cursing yourself for a turn to get two silvers instead of a $4 card you can use immediately? And get a + buy for this purpose?

How about this as an alternative:

Trash this card, gain a card costing $3 or less. Put it in your hand.

I think this will be rather more interesting...

[Tydude]

The problem with Servant's Quarters and Bailey is that they're just so useless when there's no attacks out there. Moat at least gives you something no other 2 cost card gives, while Bailey is just a weaker Pawn at the same cost and Servant's Quarters, if there's no discard for benefit, would be the worst card in the game. These cards need to give some bonus that's not completely dependent on the other cards in the Kingdom.

[rinkworks]

First, a minor point:  If you want to emulate the look and feel of the official cards, go Times New Roman for the interior text.  That font is great for the name of the card and its type, but hard to read when it's used for the instructions.

Another technicality:  the official cards all have a horizontal line dividing "on play" behavior with behavior that happens at other times (e.g., all reactions; "while in play" for Goons and Lighthouse; "setup" for Young Witch and Trade Route).  This is useful whenever there is doubt about which parts of the card get doubled with Throne Room.

Ok, enough of the nitpicky stuff.

Servant's Quarters

Servant's Quarters is quite interesting.  My concern, I guess, is that it will be interesting on too few boards.  How often are cards discarded during the Action phase?  Hamlet, Horse Traders, Cellar, Warehouse, Secret Chamber, Young Witch, Tactician.  Can't even think of any others off the top of my head.  This probably is not enough to justify that card behavior.  That said, when it *does* activate, it's really cool.  With some finagling, you could use it to get double Tactician turns.  (Play Village, play Tactician, discard Servant's Quarters, draw Laboratory, play Laboratory, draw Tactician + one other card, play Tactician.)

However, here's a question:  Do you mean that the Servant's Quarters should be discarded from your hand, or is it not important where it's discarded from?  If it counts if the card is discarded from anywhere, suddenly now it activates when Adventurer skips over it (because those set-aside cards get discarded when Adventurer has found its two treasures), when Harvest turns it up, when you choose the discard option on Navigator, and so on.  Offhand, I can't think of any problems with this, but you'll want to consider all the official cards very carefully for rules complications or broken game states before allowing this.  But if it can work that way, it might be a much more interesting card.  But I would still expect that particular feature to be usable on only a minority of boards, so it's a good thing that it does more than that too.

Still, the card needs to be usable on ANY board, not just these.  And if all you get is +1 Card, then that is strictly worse than nothing.  Maybe add a +1 Buy onto it?  I'd still be worse than Herbalist, but at least then there would be situations you'd want one.

Pauper's Feast

Any reason you don't want to gain a card up to $4?  Workshop does and only costs $3.  A one-shot Workshop would be fine at $2.  I know (and appreciate!) that you are concerned about powering up your cards too much, but honestly I think even with this boost, Pauper's Feast would still be generally undesirable.  But it would at least be "better than nothing" in a wider variety of situations.  It's an okay consolation prize, for example, in Gardens and Conspirator races.

I really can't think of any non-contrived situation where it's worth using a buy and a subsequent action just to get a Silver.  Why wouldn't I just buy nothing?  Then, on the turn where Pauper's Feast *would* have turned up, I'll have both a card and an action I wouldn't have had -- and, therefore, be better able to raise $3 naturally AND preserve the chance I'll be able to raise MORE than that and buy something better.

If you really don't want to raise the limit to $4, then Davio's idea of gaining TWO $3 cards is pretty good.  If you don't like that either, then I'd suggest not only +1 Action but +1 Card as well.  Still weak, but at least then I wouldn't feel like it's basically ALWAYS a bad buy.

Bailey

This one's fine.  A weaker Pawn in exchange for attack immunity is a fair trade.  But it's unfortunate that in non-attack games, which are common, Pawn is strictly superior.  If you can offer a nuance that Pawn doesn't, that would improve the card.  It doesn't even have to be something particularly good, just something slightly different.

For example:

Choose two:  +1 Card, +1 Action, +1 Buy.  The choices may be the same; if they are, discard a card.

Come to think of it, that particular version would make it another card that could activate Servant's Quarters.

[ratxt1]

my thoughts on the expanssion so far
Servants Quarters: quite an interesting card wtih a lot of nuansce if you consider it to include all times when tis discarded (not just from your hand) as ther are a decent amount of times when this happens the cards that havn't been mentioned previously are: sea hag, jeseter, hunting party, chancelor, spy, library, minion sabotauer, tribute, lookout, navigator, scrying pool, loan, rabble, venture, and fourtune teller.

Paupers Feast: needs to be alittle stronger either trash for a 4 cost card or trash for 2 3 cost cards. and even then its still only mediocre. maybe trash for 2 4cost cards?

Bailey: ok i just dont like this it's to similar to pawn and to similar to moat. at something that makes it different.

[DStu]

(Play Village, play Tactician, discard Servant's Quarters, draw Laboratory, play Laboratory, draw Tactician + one other card, play Tactician.)

Or even easier:
Have played Tactician, discard 2x Servante's Quarters, draw Tactician + 1 card, play Tactician.

Still, the card needs to be usable on ANY board, not just these.  And if all you get is +1 Card, then that is strictly worse than nothing.  Maybe add a +1 Buy onto it?  I'd still be worse than Herbalist, but at least then there would be situations you'd want one.

Don't think that has to be the case. On how many boards is Moat usefull? If the on-Discard-feature is powerfull enough when it triggers, and if it also triggers on Adventurer etc you would have interactions with certanily 25* cards + attacks, which should be enough to have an interaction on most random boards.
And I think because of this it's probably more interesting to get the reaction part good enough that it's worth considering with say Loan.

*You mentioned 7 from hand, rarXt named 16, including some attacks where it works not only from hand but also when drawn, I would add Adventurer and Vault.

Bailey
This one's fine.  A weaker Pawn in exchange for attack immunity is a fair trade.  But it's unfortunate that in non-attack games, which are common, Pawn is strictly superior.  If you can offer a nuance that Pawn doesn't, that would improve the card.  It doesn't even have to be something particularly good, just something slightly different.

Also here it's only strictly superior in games without Attacks and with Pawn. Without Pawn it doesn't matter. I think the boards without Attacks where I even feel I should consider thinking about Moat are less common than having no Pawn.
And this one here it way better than Moat when there are attacks. There is no cost to have this on hand, there is just the opportunity cost of buying it, but it also gives an maybe important buy for no cost. And so helping buying more of itselfes.

[Jimmmmm]

I don't think it would be practical for Chancellor to activate Servants Quarters, as you don't generally see what you're discarding, and you would have to look through your deck to find how many SQs you have, which you're not usually allowed to do. And under what conditions would you be allowed to look through your deck when playing Chancellor? If you've gained at least one SQ? If SQ is in the game? I don't think it works. There should be some distinction between Chancellor type discarding, and regular discarding, when you see what you're discarding.

[rinkworks]

Still, the card needs to be usable on ANY board, not just these.  And if all you get is +1 Card, then that is strictly worse than nothing.  Maybe add a +1 Buy onto it?  I'd still be worse than Herbalist, but at least then there would be situations you'd want one.

Don't think that has to be the case. On how many boards is Moat usefull?

Small, I admit, but tough to say exactly.  Which is my point.  It's potentially useful on any board, because +2 Cards is, after all, a benefit.  You have to weigh the opportunity cost against how meager a benefit it is, but it's still a benefit.

+1 Card, however, eats an action, and all it does for you is give you the hand you would have drawn anyway had you not bought the card in the first place.  In other words, it is mathematically impossible to derive a benefit from using the +1 Card.*  Again, it's strictly worse than nothing at all.  [*Fodder for Forge/Remodel, lowering the cost of Peddler, increasing the power of Horn of Plenty, etc, doesn't count.  Any action card does those things.]

It's fine to have a card that's situational, but even a bad card ought to do something.

I agree that the problem is not so severe, though, if the on-discard effect works even if you discard from somewhere besides your hand, allowing Adventurer, etc, to activate it.  Still, there will be boards where it is truly a dead pile.  Not just a weak pile.  A dead one.  In terms of game design, that kind of sucks.

Bailey
This one's fine.  A weaker Pawn in exchange for attack immunity is a fair trade.  But it's unfortunate that in non-attack games, which are common, Pawn is strictly superior.  If you can offer a nuance that Pawn doesn't, that would improve the card.  It doesn't even have to be something particularly good, just something slightly different.

Also here it's only strictly superior in games without Attacks and with Pawn.

It still bothers me.  It's not a big deal, which is why I only said it's "unfortunate."  And if the OP doesn't care, that's fine; I was just pointing it out so he'll be able to consider that.  But my opinion, for whatever it's worth, is that you don't want cards at the same cost that are strictly superior to others at the same cost under ANY circumstance.  "Usually superior" is fine.  Inevitable anyway, but fine.  Strictly superior -- as in, "in this game, it's mathematically impossible for this card to be a more advantageous buy than this other card," kind of sucks.  Note, by the way, that none of the 100+ official Dominion cards fit this category.  Not even Hunting Party/Laboratory.  Even though, at this point, the chance of any particular card showing up with any particular other one is small and will only decrease as further expansions come out.

These are more aesthetic issues than game balance issues.  Dominion isn't broken if one card is strictly superior to another at the same cost.  But they're aesthetic issues that impact the strategy space of the game.  If Bailey can be subtly altered so that, while still weak, it isn't strictly inferior to Pawn under any circumstance, the strategy space is expanded -- because now, in those games where it would have been a no-brainer, you have to think strategically about which one to pick up.  That's a good thing.

[Jack Rudd]

But my opinion, for whatever it's worth, is that you don't want cards at the same cost that are strictly superior to others at the same cost under ANY circumstance.  "Usually superior" is fine.  Inevitable anyway, but fine.  Strictly superior -- as in, "in this game, it's mathematically impossible for this card to be a more advantageous buy than this other card," kind of sucks.  Note, by the way, that none of the 100+ official Dominion cards fit this category. 

In a game where none of the ten kingdom cards are terminal actions, Bazaar is strictly inferior to Market and Treasury, yesno?

(I'll admit this is probably a rarer circumstance than a game with no Attacks.)

[DStu]

... and of course by "any cirumstances" you mean "any board", as Witch is strictly worse than Rabble/Ghostship or at most equal to Moat while more expensive once that all curses have run out.

But it's ok, I see your point and I see that you see that's mostly an idiological point. I just wanted to add that Bailey deviates from this principle by about the smallest amount that I can imagine, as it only happens on some boards, and even if it happens you are only limited in your choices, while the card does exactly what Pawn does given you choose the same options with Pawn.

[guided]

In a game where none of the ten kingdom cards are terminal actions, Bazaar is strictly inferior to Market and Treasury, yesno?

No: Diadem But, the point stands. There are cards that will in rare circumstances be dominated by some other card, and that's OK. But a card that is dominated any significant fraction of the time is IMO a bad card.

The most irksome fan cards for me (and they pop up like weeds, in this thread and so many threads on BGG that the Variant forum for Dominion was one of the first I unsubscribed from) are Reaction cards with the same reaction effect as Moat that are otherwise either plain cantrips (+1 Card +1 Action) or simple copies or near-copies of other cards. I understand that new players don't like being attacked and wish they could buy some cheapo Moat-like card (but one that weighs their deck down less than Moat) on every attacking board, but listen, that's boring. There are much more interesting ways to compensate for being attacked than adding more Moatlike reaction cards, and if you're going to make fan variants there's a whole universe of potentially interesting reaction effects you could invent rather than just copying Moat. And even if you insist on having a cheapo card that's stupidly strong against attacks, there's Lighthouse already!

[Thisisnotasmile]

In a game where none of the ten kingdom cards are terminal actions, Bazaar is strictly inferior to Market and Treasury, yesno?

No: Diadem

I was going to say the same thing, but then I realised that for Diadem to be in the game, you've also got 2 and a half terminal actions (Followers, Princess, Trusty Steed) which WERE excluded. But yeah, if you take the quote literally, none of these are kingdom cards, so they don't count. If we're amending the quote to make it correct, it should read:

In a game where none of the ten kingdom cards are terminal actions or Tournament, Bazaar is strictly inferior to Market and Treasury, yesno?

[guided]

It's not important, and the "or Tournament" addition was obvious; I was just being cheeky. Winky-face!

[DStu]

But I think guided is right concerning the "more Moats", and I also think that's the real problem with Bailey. Not that it is dominated on < 1/12 of the boards, but that it's just too strong on boards with attacks.

When we don't want more Moats, still the Servant's mechanic is interesting I think, and I think one could make a strong card out of it even without the Moateffect. For example, one could at first drop the "not during discard"-condition and make it a Duration-Reaction (despite the fact that there will be no more Durations) that is triggered whenever it is discarded, and gives +1 Card now +1 Card "next turn" (where the next-turn-mechanic is implemented by the reaction on discarding. Ok, you have to find a wording that this is only triggered once, which might be difficult).
The Reaction would move it to the Durationpile directly.
So it's a Caravan without the +1Action now regularly, which is kind of weak, but defends against Militia et al by redrawing 1 card. And interacts with all the discard-for-benefit, discard-for-whatever-reason cards by strenghtening the next turn.

Might be a little weak still...

[rinkworks]

... and of course by "any circumstances" you mean "any board", as Witch is strictly worse than Rabble/Ghostship or at most equal to Moat while more expensive once that all curses have run out.

I did, yes.  Sorry about that.

...are Reaction cards with the same reaction effect as Moat that are otherwise either plain cantrips (+1 Card +1 Action)...

Actually, now that you've drawn my attention to it, that's actually the larger problem with Bailey.  The "choose one" mechanic disguised it enough that I missed it at first, but as a rule of thumb, you probably don't want a non-terminal Moat-like reaction and definitely not a cantrip Moat-like reaction.  The reason is that then it's cheap and easy (especially if you have spare +Buys) to load up on them without damaging your deck.  Get enough, and you're immune to attacks the majority the time, thereby dissuading others from investing in attacks, thereby devaluing your Moat-like reaction.  The tendency, then, is for players to avoid both the attacks AND the reaction.

Swapping out the +1 Action for +$1 in the bonus list would be the easiest way to fix that.  But as guided says, changing the nature of the reaction itself might be a more interesting change.

[Jimmmmm]

Feel free to ignore this as unimportant, but because it's more fun than going to bed...

I count 58 Kingdom cards which, when on a board together, can never be terminal actions (including Throne Room, King's Court and Golem, since these are only terminal if you have other terminals, and including non-action Kingdom cards, and excluding cards like Pawn which are sometimes terminal).

So for a given game:

Pr(no terminals) = 58 * ... * 49 / (129 * ... * 120) = 58! * 119!/(48! * 129!) ~ 0.0002122

Pr(Bazaar given no terminals) = 1 - 57 * ... * 48 / (58 * ... * 49) = 1 - 57! * 48!/(47! * 58!) ~ 0.1724

Pr(Market or Treasury given Bazaar and no terminals) = 1 - 55 * ... * 47 / (57 * ... * 49) = 1 - 55! * 48! / (48! * 57!) ~ 0.9997

=> Pr(no terminals, Bazaar and Market or Treasury) ~ 0.00003657 or 1 in 27343.

So the situation in which Market or Treasury is strictly superior to Bazaar is very unlikely to happen to any given player, but in the 2612290+ games that have been played on Isotropic since December, it has probably come up somewhere around 95 times.

Just so you know.

[DStu]

So the situation in which Market or Treasury is strictly superior to Bazaar is very unlikely to happen to any given player, but in the 2612290+ games that have been played on Isotropic since December, it has probably come up somewhere around 95 times.

Probably more, as in the beginning there were less cards. On the other hands, you ignore people vetoing on Posession etc., which are mostly terminals.

[Davio]

Mixing Choice AND Reaction can be fun.

Example:

When an opponent plays an attack card, you may reveal this card once and...
Let the attack happen and gain a Silver, put it on your deck; or you are unaffected by the attack and must discard one card.

Options can be tweaked of course, Silver is often a somewhat harmless middle card that doesn't tilt the game too much either way.

I know the wording is a bit awkward and the mechanics may be too, but it seems like fun to be able to choose whether to be attacked and get a bonus or not be attacked and get a penalty.

[rinkworks]

=> Pr(no terminals, Bazaar and Market or Treasury) ~ 0.00003657 or 1 in 27343.

Excellent work!  A few observations about the cards proposed here:.

Bailey

Bailey and Pawn will appear together in about 0.5% of all games, or 1 in 200*.  Of these, 76.9% will have at least one attack card.  This means that Bailey is strictly inferior to Pawn in 0.37% of all games, or 1 in 271.  This is two orders of magnitude more frequent than the Bazaar counterexample.

Still, I was technically wrong about my earlier claim.  It is indeed possible for Bazaar to be strictly inferior to another official card.

* I've disregarded Young Witch's 11th pile from this calculation.  As both these cards could be the Bane card, the real frequency that these cards will appear on the same board is slightly higher.

Servant's Quarters

I might easily have miscounted, but here's what I have for the 136 official cards:

- 22 attack cards
- 9 discard-from-hand cards (Cellar, Secret Chamber, Minion, Warehouse, Tactician, Vault, Hamlet, Horse Traders, Young Witch, but NOT Baron, Tournament*)
- 11 discard-from-set-aside-land cards (Spy,  Library, Adventurer, Lookout, Navigator, Scrying Pool, Loan, Venture, Harvest, Hunting Party, Envoy, but NOT Chancellor, Golem, Possession, Farming Village**)

* Baron and Tournament can only discard Estates and Provinces, respectively, and so could not discard Servant's Quarters.
** Chancellor doesn't discard from "set aside land," and the specific cards it discards are unknowable per the rules.  Golem and Farming Village can't discard Servant's Quarters.  As for Possession, while an opponent could trash Servant's Quarters from your hand, causing it to eventually wind up in your discard pile, the card doesn't say that trashed cards are discarded, only that they are "returned to your discard pile."  While this is an arguable distinction, its inclusion or exclusion in the list probably doesn't change the outcome of the calculation much.

Disregarding how Young Witch's 11th pile changes the numbers up, my calculations (which might well be wrong; if someone wants to double-check, please do) are that Servant's Quarters that only activates on discard-from-hand will be a dead pile in 9% of the games in which it appears.  That is, 91% of games will include at least either an attack card or a discard-from-hand card.

Allowing discard-from-set-aside-land, Servant's Quarters is a dead pile in 3.2% of the games in which it appears.

Servant's Quarters would appear in 7.3% of all games, by the way, so that translates to the discard-from-hand version being a dead pile in 0.67% of all games, or 1 in 152.   The discard-from-hand-or-set-aside-land version would be a dead pile in 0.23% of all games, or 1 in 428.

[ChaosRed]

I want to thank you all for the kind analysis and feedback.

I am a little stuck on what to do with all the feedback. For now, I'll leave Bailey as it stands. I think the card is useful enough, as a defender with just enough utility that it can stand on its own. It is a conservative card, but I wanted the design to be generally conservative, with a few really "stellar" cards in the expansion.

Pauper's Feast is too weak. It needs more. I will make an adjustment to it.

Servant's Quarters needs a rule clarification, but it might have to be just a clarification the way Throne Room is clarified in the rules and other notations in the game. The only time the discard mechanic does not kick for the card is during cleanup, so in the case of the cards that filter or mill through your deck and the card is discarded, it would still draw a card, (for example when playing an Adventurer card, it could draw another card). That makes it a little more useful. I think it is arguably still weaker than Moat, (and admittedly +1 card just makes it a clog on its own), but the discard mechanic gives it a least a little intrigue, if not outright practical usage in most circumstances.

It also brings up a rule issue though. If you play Adventurer, reveal a Servant's Quarters, you draw a card and that card happens to be a treasure card, does that also count as one of the two treasure cards that Adventurer tutors for, or since it was not the Adventurer that directly drew the card, could you still keep tutoring for two more treasures?