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[Newcomer]

Gargoyle

I wish I could make this give 1/2 a VP. I liked the thought, but on reflection it does seem strong. But seeing as I don't think any other reactions even offer + coin, I could do that instead. How's this?

Gargoyle
REACTION   $4
---
When another player plays an Attack card, you may set this aside from your hand. If you do, then at the start of your next turn, discard this, +$1, and you may draw until you have 5 cards in hand.
---
When you gain this card, if there are no Attack cards available in the Supply, +2 VP.

The thing that bothers me about this is the "if there are no Attack cards" clause tagging on VP. It seemed unified enough when the reaction effect also gave you VP, but without that it seems a little random.

The other direction I could go is to make the reaction VP conditional on something. Like "at the start of your next turn, discard this, and you may draw until you have 5 cards in hand. For every 2 cards you draw this way, +1 VP." But against Militia, Goons, etc., it still works the same way. Completely neuters Torturer chains. So, that doesn't quite work, any suggestions?

Haggle

Okay, I can make Haggle require the reveal. There's still strategy in deciding which card to reveal. Also, if it wasn't clear, "you may gain a different card costing up to the cost of the revealed card" is supposed to mean you can't gain the same card that was revealed. Meaning if he reveals Copper you can only gain a Curse.  If he reveals the only $2 action, you can only get Estate, Copper, or Curse. Which is to say, it definitely needs a bonus, as it won't get much.

Haggle
ACTION   $4
---
+$2
Each other player must reveal a card from his hand. For each revealed card, you may gain a different card from the Supply costing up to the cost of that card. If you do, he gains a copy of his revealed card. If you do not, +1 Action.


How's that? I started to realize that maybe it was overpriced, but with a consolation bonus maybe it makes more sense. I can change the bonus if need be.

Pageant

Good point on Nobles. I made this card because I wanted more +Actions cards in the set, especially with the -1 Action mechanic. So I like having it, but I'll think about more interesting ways to get those actions instead.

Patrol

I thought I'd get away with the special case since the card wasn't hidden in your hand, but even so, your suggestion is much cleaner. And it probably doesn't take away much, because once it was revealed, opponents would be avoiding their attacks until it got trashed. So the new version:

Patrol
ACTION-DURATION-REACTION   $4
---
+1 Action
+2 VP
Leave this card in play indefinitely
---
When another player plays an Attack card, you may trash this from play. If you do, +2 Cards and you are unaffected by that Attack.

Thanks for the feedback.

[Newcomer]

The last set of $4 cards:

Portrait
ACTION-VICTORY   $4
---
-1 Action; if you do, +1 VP.
---
2 VP

-Here's one of those -Action cards I've been talking about. In the complete absence of +Actions, it is a simple 2 VP card. I'm probably overusing the $4, 2 VP slot. Anyway, if you have spare actions, play this for more VP. -1 Action means that essentially the card uses 2 Actions instead of 1. Now, really, it uses the normal 1, then it tries to use another, and if that's not available, then it doesn't activate the "if you do" clause of the card.

I had this as +2 VP, but I'm changing it to alleviate the never-ending game concerns. Seeing as it requires 2 actions to play this, you need to buy other cards to enable it, and it would be pretty hard to chain up since you'd need a LOT of actions. You could chain with the Sorcerer card, but you'd have to deal with the Curses. Let me know if you're concerned about it, all the same.


Reward
ACTION-DURATION   $4
---
Place the top card of your deck face up on your Reward mat.
---
While Reward is in play, at the start of each turn, you may reveal the top card of your deck. If it matches a card on your Reward mat, place both copies of the card into your hand, gain a Province, and trash this from play. If it does not, discard the revealed card.

-I'm not sure if this is too strong. Essentially, for $4, you get a Province, if you wait around long enough. And if you open with it, chances are you turn up Copper, which will be pretty easy to match. I thought about changing it to a Duchy, but that doesn't seem very worth it, since you paid $4 then you waited around until your cards lined up. Maybe if you discard Reward instead of trashing it, then a Duchy makes sense and it balances better. But I sure like having the Province prize.


Next is Shrine, which I introduced earlier in response to another card's discussion. Since I didn't see any responses, I was guessing it got buried between posts, so I'll re-post what I said then.

I'm actually going to prematurely introduce one of my $4 cards now to see what you think of it. I wrote this description before your last post, but it captures my thought process a little. This card can play as a weaker Monument, but a) that might be bad, since there's less incentive to buy cards, and b) it enables itself and could work as a never-ending engine. I still like the choice aspect to it, but it might just be too dangerous (because of endless games) to work.

Shrine
ACTION   $4
---
Choose one: +1 Card and +2 Actions; or +$1 and +1 VP

-A village if you need it, and if that's useless to you, there's a consolation benefit. I wanted another village for the set, and I thought a + VP village was an unexplored direction. +1 VP every time you played a village seemed way too strong, but as part of a choice I think this is fun. Thematically, a village sprang up around the shrine to trade with the pilgrims.
Okay, in re-reading rinkworks's guide, I've figured out why this might be bad.. trim your deck down to 3 Shrines and you get +2 VP every turn and don't buy anything. The +$ might make it useful not to do that, but with 6 Shrines you'd get 4 VP. Still, you had to buy 6 Shrines, and a good trasher, and trim your deck down. Hmm..

I think my understanding of the +VP danger was shallow, and a little knowledge is a dangerous thing. Perhaps a simple fix would be to make the second half "trash a card and, if you do, +1 VP." But that seems like a really nice card, a mini-Bishop that reverts to a Village when you're out of starting cards.

Basically I like the idea enough to look for ways to make it work.

So that other option would play out like this:

SHRINE 2.0
ACTION   $4
---
Choose one: +1 Card and +2 Actions; or trash a card and, if you do, +1 VP.

[ChaosRed]

First off, I love the names of your cards, they all fit nicely with Dominion as a whole and with what the card actually does.

I look at cards that are similar to mine and I am jealous, because they are usually cleaner and more interesting than mine. That isn't an accusation of plagiarism by the way, I totally understand how these things are usually conceived well in advance of putting them here, and also, a lot of Dominion cards have similarities with one another.

One rules question I have relates to the card that mentions "the top card in your discard pile". What are the rules of what order cards are discarded during cleanup phase? Do you literally specify which order treasure is played in Dominion? And do the last cards played wind up on top of the discard pile? I was just curious how the actual rule mechanics function here.

[Newcomer]

ChaosRed: thanks for the compliments. I've enjoyed a lot of your card ideas, too. One thing I'd noticed with a lot of custom cards was un-Dominionish names, and so that's something I was striving to make fit. Where you were concerned about the proper proportions of cards and conservative powers, I was concerned about having the right feel and exploring the possibilities to find cards that make you go hmmm. And I downloaded the Dominion Vault app for iPhone, and I'm constantly scrolling through the cards and reading the card texts of any similar cards. I'm almost more concerned that they read right than that they do anything. :-P

According to the Dominion rules, you discard the cards in play and the cards in your hand, and it doesn't matter what order you discard in. I don't intend to change any of those rules. So you can order all of your cards, the ones you played and the ones you kept in hand, however you want to. What this means in person usually is you can hide the cards you didn't play under the cards you did, so your opponents don't know that it was in your hand. This also matters, if I understand correctly, for cards like Alchemist (or Herbalist). If you discard the Potion before the Alchemist, then technically the Potion isn't in play any more and you can't put Alchemist back on your deck. I don't know if people would enforce that in person, but I wonder if it might create interesting interactions with my cards...

The one rule to be careful about is that when you gain a card, it goes immediately on your discard pile. Before the Clean-Up phase. In person people will sometimes grab the card they're buying and mix it in with the cards they played in a big jumble on the discard pile, so that's the only special thing to be careful about with these cards. But again, it's in the rules, just hasn't mattered yet.

However, you DO specify which order you play your Treasure cards in Dominion. This matters for cards like Bank, which only count the cards in play so far, not the ones about to be played, or Horn of Plenty, etc. You should aim to play Contraband first so your opponents don't know how much you can afford to spend on the turn, leaving them to guess which card you'll most want to buy. But none of that matters for discarding.

P.S. In case you couldn't tell from all of that, when I was introduced to Dominion, my friend started to explain it to me. Then I grabbed the rulebook and said I'll be back in 20 minutes or so. I've read the rules straight through several times, just 'cause I enjoy knowing them precisely even when it doesn't matter. When a game feels simple but needs a good rulebook to cover all of the technicalities, my eyes light up. So ask away if you have any more rules questions.

tl;dr: discard order doesn't matter, but as a matter of fact you do play treasure cards in a particular order in dominion, but you can usually ignore that unless there are special cards in play.

[rinkworks]

Portrait
ACTION-VICTORY   $4
---
-1 Action; if you do, +1 VP.
---
2 VP

-Here's one of those -Action cards I've been talking about. In the complete absence of +Actions, it is a simple 2 VP card.  I'm probably overusing the $4, 2 VP slot. Anyway, if you have spare actions, play this for more VP. -1 Action means that essentially the card uses 2 Actions instead of 1. Now, really, it uses the normal 1, then it tries to use another, and if that's not available, then it doesn't activate the "if you do" clause of the card.

I had this as +2 VP, but I'm changing it to alleviate the never-ending game concerns. Seeing as it requires 2 actions to play this, you need to buy other cards to enable it, and it would be pretty hard to chain up since you'd need a LOT of actions. You could chain with the Sorcerer card, but you'd have to deal with the Curses. Let me know if you're concerned about it, all the same.

The infinite game state is as much about the 5-card deck as chaining.  Village-Village-Village-Portrait-Portrait could be played ad nauseum.  I suspect that it's a pretty small risk in this case, but doubling the VP bonus would certainly increase that risk.  But I see what you mean about wanting to reward the user a little better for burning up two full actions.  Whereas Throne Room+Monument offers +$4/+2VP, Village+Portrait offers a mere +1 VP.  Almost any other single action card will do more for you than Portrait does and only use up a single action.  So maybe you could add other stuff?  "If you do, +3 Cards and +1 VP."  Or whatever.

Reward
ACTION-DURATION   $4
---
Place the top card of your deck face up on your Reward mat.
---
While Reward is in play, at the start of each turn, you may reveal the top card of your deck. If it matches a card on your Reward mat, place both copies of the card into your hand, gain a Province, and trash this from play. If it does not, discard the revealed card.

I don't really get this one.  You play this only once, setting aside a single (mostly non-determinable) card when you do?  Playing multiple Rewards would be the only way to get multiple cards on the mat?  Thereafter, each turn you get a free shot at pairing up a (mostly non-determinable) card with whatever is on your mat.

If I understand this correctly, it feels like shuffle luck could win or lose the game for you right away.  Draw a Copper onto the mat, and you've probably got a Province (or whatever the reward will be) in one more turn, maybe two.  Draw the Mountebank you opened with, and you've probably lost the game, because now your critical early purchase is out of play until when and if you can afford a second Mountebank AND have the terribly good fortune of drawing it to pair up.  (Note that if you only have one other copy of a card in your deck, there's only about a one-in-six chance per shuffle that you'll be able to pair it up.)

There are a few ways you can reduce the variance:  Allow the mat card to be chosen from your hand, for example.  You can also simplify the mechanics and make it not a duration; for example:

Reward
$4 - Action
- If there is a card on your Reward mat, reveal a copy of it from your hand.  If you do, place the card from your Reward mat in your hand, gain a Province, and trash this card.
- If there is no card on your Reward mat, choose a card from your hand and place it on your Reward mat.

Then you can choose both cards, but the difficulty is in drawing what you need when the Reward card comes up.  Other tweaks worth considering:  disallowing Copper (and maybe Estates) from being pairable, since otherwise I think you're pretty much always going to want to do this with Copper.  Whereas if you require non-Copper, there's more of a decision to make there.

Finally, if a Province is too great a prize (and it probably depends on the final version of the card to know for sure), consider simply gaining one of the Tournament prizes (or "a Prize or a Duchy").  I really think a great opportunity was missed, only having one official card use the Prize cards.

Shrine

No real comment here.  Seems like a pretty good village-with-a-bonus idea, to have the Village effect as one option of multiple.

[rspeer]

I think cards that depend on the order of cards in your discard pile would have serious problems with playability. Every turn during cleanup, you'll have to make extra decisions that will only matter if you happen to draw an Arbitrator.

Imagine playing that kind of card on Isotropic. It would have to ask you about your discard order every turn. (Not just after you have an Arbitrator: what if someone passes you one in a Masquerade?) Isotropic already plays a slightly modded version of Dominion where your top discard isn't revealed, precisely to avoid the non-fun that this kind of decision would involve.

[Newcomer]

First, to rspeer: I agree this mechanic would implement very poorly on Isotropic, but then again I'm not writing for Isotropic. I also agree there is the potential that it could slow down the game a lot. I'll have to try playing it with more people, but I feel like those decisions won't be as big of a problem as you suspect. Certainly I may be wrong. I feel like the first few games with the cards, that might be the case, but people will quickly figure out their usual discarding strategies and add them to their routine when appropriate. I will say I haven't made any cards that attack the discard pile, so you only have to look at which cards could benefit you and not worry about having those cards attacked.  I respect your concerns, and play-testing will tell me whether that's enough of a problem for me to change things or if it's something I can deal with.

If anyone would like to use some of my cards, they certainly may, and they can always omit or edit the discard-based cards if they wish.

---

Now responding to rinkworks

Portrait

It is an Action-Victory card. A $4, 2 VP card should be bought sometimes just for the VP. So I'm not terribly worried about making it stronger, but I could add a little to it. I think of it like a simple Victory card that increases in value (by adding chips) when you have lots of actions to spare.

+3 Cards in particular I'm not sure about, as if you used up 2 Actions to play it, you'll feel really burned when you draw dead Action cards. Maybe +$2? Then it's a Monument that uses two actions to activate, but it has a 2 VP head start.. I don't really like the feel of mixing in other kinds of benefits. But if it feels weak, I'll keep thinking.

Reward

While I could use the Prizes, that would also tie this to Cornucopia, which I'm not sure I want to do. I have Cornucopia, so it would work, I just envisioned it as an independent set. I know it uses VP chips, but that seemed easy enough to include in another expansion. What did you think about the Duchy/discard alternate idea? A reusable Reward with a lesser prize.

At first I looked at your suggestions for the card mechanics, and wanted to find a compromise position, but after more reflection I'm really starting to like your suggestions better.

Reward
ACTION   $4
---
Choose one: Place a card from your hand costing at least $2 on your Reward mat; or reveal from your hand a copy of any card on your mat. If you do, trash either this or the card from your mat and gain a Duchy. If you trashed this, place the card from your mat into your hand.

How does that sound? I'm not sure yet about that last twist. And I can probably come up with a more elegant wording in time.

[Newcomer]

The first batch of $5 cards:

Banquet
ACTION   $5
---
+1 Action
Choose one: gain a card costing up to $4; or trash a Banquet from your hand and, if you do, gain 2 cards costing up to $6 each.

-Somewhere between Workshop, Ironworks, Feast, and Treasure Map. I've tweaked the benefits and the trash requirement, and I can tweak them again if this doesn't seem properly balanced.

Cavalry
ACTION-ATTACK   $5
---
-1 Action; if you do, +$3 and each other player discards down to 2 cards in his hand. If not, +2 Actions.

-WW came out with a Cavalry card the other day and it made me think now my card won't sound very original. :-P
In the presence of +Actions, this is a stronger Militia that will really cripple your opponents' hands. And in the absence of +Actions, it enables itself. It would be very inefficient to try to chain them like that, but with a very small deck, or with Golem or Throne Room, it could be more effective.


Convent
ACTION   $5
---
Reveal 2 cards from your hand. Trash one of them. If you do, gain a copy of the other revealed card. If it costs more than $5, trash Convent.

-Seeing this right next to Banquet makes me realize how similar they've become. Not that they're the same card by any means. This combines trashing and gaining in a unique way that should create a lot of interesting choices.

[rinkworks]

Banquet
ACTION   $5
---
+1 Action
Choose one: gain a card costing up to $4; or trash a Banquet from your hand and, if you do, gain 2 cards costing up to $6 each.

Too much going on here for me to be able to predict how it will play.  It sounds very possibly balanced as is, however.  I'd be curious to hear what you think after you've tried it.  It's a very interesting idea, having a sort-of Treasure Map mechanic on a card that isn't totally useless if you don't draw it with a copy.

Cavalry
ACTION-ATTACK   $5
---
-1 Action; if you do, +$3 and each other player discards down to 2 cards in his hand. If not, +2 Actions.

Another good idea that I suspect the parameters are wrong on.  Since it costs you two actions, it really ought to be powerful, but +$3 AND discarding down to 2 cards is probably too much.  Down to 2 cards is an ugly attack, exponentially worse than down to 3.  I would suggest a down-to-3 attack and see how that plays.  I suspect the card will still be plenty powerful enough.

The +$3 makes me nervous, but since Cavalries would be hard to spam even when Villages are plentiful, that part might be fine.

Convent
ACTION   $5
---
Reveal 2 cards from your hand. Trash one of them. If you do, gain a copy of the other revealed card. If it costs more than $5, trash Convent.

Also a neat idea.  You could trash a Copper and gain a Gold, though that would rely on drawing your Convent with both of those cards.  Usually, however, you'll have a hand with a strong card and a weak card, so it will work out.

I wonder if it's too strong for $5, though.  Compare with Mint, which costs $5 and is (1) very constrained on what trashing it can provide, although, admittedly, it does trash earlier; (2) only duplicates Treasure cards.

This can duplicate anything, trash anything, and is more flexible about the cards it trashes.

The self-trashing constraint is significant, though.  I'm not sure if it's enough to counterbalance its strength, but certainly it might be.   The likelihood of being able to duplicate a Province with it makes me nervous, but as you could only do that once, maybe it's fine?  Playtesting will be particularly important with this one.

[Newcomer]

Cavalry

Well, if I lowered both the +$3 and the discard to 2 cards, then it obviously becomes worse than Militia. If I weaken the attack but keep it at +$3, then basically it has a Diadem-like Action-into-coin mechanic built into a Militia, but you need to pull it off in order to attack. I want this attack to be worthy of a $5 cost and stronger than Militia.

In previous versions of the card, I toyed with the idea of having a lesser benefit at the top of the card, before the -1 Action. I'm not sure if that would improve it, though. Here's one possibility:

Cavalry
ACTION-ATTACK   $5
---
+$2
-1 Action; if you do, +1 Card and each other player discards down to 3 cards in his hand. If not, +2 Actions.

What do you think? It's hard to judge the strength with the -1 Action in there. Right now it would kind of bounce back and forth between a buyless Festival and a Militia plus a Moat (you use 2 actions, but only 1 card from your hand, so the extra spot in your hand and the +1 Card act like a Moat played after a Militia). Does that sound reasonable? I could switch the coins and cards.

Convent

I thought about adding restrictions to Convent, but I like being able to gain a Province with it. And even if you gain a single Gold, you'd have to trash Convent, so that makes it a little weaker in comparison to Mint. While it might be really easy to trash for a Province sometimes, often you'll have to give up something useful AND trash the Convent to get a Province. I'll leave it as is for now, and see if I want to change it later.

[rinkworks]

Cavalry

What do you think? It's hard to judge the strength with the -1 Action in there. Right now it would kind of bounce back and forth between a buyless Festival and a Militia plus a Moat (you use 2 actions, but only 1 card from your hand, so the extra spot in your hand and the +1 Card act like a Moat played after a Militia). Does that sound reasonable? I could switch the coins and cards.

As you say, it's hard to judge the strength with the -1 Action in there.  I see what you're saying about wanting a stronger attack than Militia; I just think down to 2 cards is SO much better as to be mostly broken.  Your new version shows promise.  Another way to make a stronger discard attack would be to use Ghost Ship's attack and return cards to the top of the deck.  You can also take a cue from Followers and try to combine a cursing attack with a discard attack, though I suspect the specific Followers mix is too strong.  Maybe the Minion attack with a curse?

But again, who knows.  I'm very interested in hearing how variations of this card actually play out.  Maybe all these ideas are workable, or maybe they're all slightly off the mark.

[Newcomer]

The remaining $5 cards (after I culled a couple):

Patron
ACTION   $5
---
+2 Coins
-1 Action; if you do, + 3 coins and +1 Buy. If not, +1 Action.

-It's either a Silver or a doubly-terminal Platinum with a Buy. I can bump it down a few ways, or bump the cost up to $6.


Portfolio
ACTION-DURATION   $5
---
Now and at the start of each of your subsequent turns: +$1.

-I talked about this card on another thread, in response to a nearly identical card. The price is the difficult point on this card. One of them would be a nice little benefit, but if you take the time to collect several, then your buying power will explode. Which is why it might need to be more expensive than I thought. How much should this cost?

And I just realized that I hadn't considered what happens with Throne Room or King's Court on an indefinite duration. Seems like a relatively fair trade, though: triple the benefit every turn, but now your KC is out of the game.


Tax Collector
ACTION-ATTACK   $5
---
Each other player with 4 or more cards in hand reveals 3 cards from his hand and discards one of them that you choose. If they discarded any Treasure cards, you gain a copy of each and put them into your hand.

-Not much to say, except maybe gaining each Treasure in hand is too strong? How about this: "If they discarded any Treasure cards, you gain a copy of one of them and put it into your hand."?

[spoiler: this next card is more of a jokethought experiment than anything, but I'm curious if it is viable. I tried to make it so.]

Viceroy
ACTION-ATTACK-REACTION-TREASURE-VICTORY   $5
---
When played as an Action-Attack, each other player reveals his hand, discards one card that you choose, then draws 2 cards.
---
When played as a Treasure, $1.
---
When another player plays an Attack card, you may reveal and discard this from your hand. If you do, +2 Cards.
---
1 VP

-Another card name that WW presented shortly before me. I really thought this name was original. :-P
A few notes on how the card works. a) In the FAQ, I'd love to special-case it so that playing Viceroy only counts as playing an Attack card when played during the Action phase, since that's the only time it can be an Attack card. But it still is an Attack type card, no matter how you play it, so no, that won't work. Which means you can react to it. b) The Attack will vary in strength. You'll try to break up their turn, but they'll end up with a bigger hand. It's meant not to be the strongest attack; in fact, since the card has so many functions, I tried to make each of them pretty weak. c) The Treasure, due to the card type, is a Copper that other players can react to. Not very good. But realize that it will only be used as a Treasure when you didn't have an Action to spend on the attack, or you really needed that $1. d) The Reaction effect is nice if you're being cursed, but a rather small bonus for a hand-size attack. You'll beef up your hand just in time to discard down to 3 or something. It'll give you a wider choice of cards to keep, but that might not mean much. e) 1 VP. Woohoo.

[rinkworks]

Patron
ACTION   $5
---
+2 Coins
-1 Action; if you do, + 3 coins and +1 Buy. If not, +1 Action.

-It's either a Silver or a doubly-terminal Platinum with a Buy. I can bump it down a few ways, or bump the cost up to $6.

Might be too much.  +$4 and +$1 buy is probably stupendous enough, especially since Silver is a pretty decent consolation prize.  (Compare with Royal Seal and Stash, which are Silver-with-a-bonus cards.  The bonus on this one is much much stronger, though admittedly not one you can always use.)  But net +$5 seems crazy, even on something difficult to enable.

Another note on this is that it's impossible to activate on a good percentage of boards.

Portfolio
ACTION-DURATION   $5
---
Now and at the start of each of your subsequent turns: +$1.

This is strictly superior to Treasury, which has the same effect until you buy a Victory card, at which point Treasury gets reshuffled, while Portfolio stays out.  So I think it needs a cost increase to $6, but it's probably fine at that price.  I don't think TR/KC will be a problem, either:  as you say, there's a significant downside to using them on this card that balances it out.  I like how that works.

There are probably a lot of nice, simple cards of this sort you could make:  Now, and at the start of each of your subsequent turns...

* +1 Buy
* +1 Action
* You may discard a card; if you do, +1 Card.
* Look at the bottom card of your deck.  You may move it to the top of your deck.
* +1 Card.  Put a card from your hand on top of your deck.

Tax Collector
ACTION-ATTACK   $5
---
Each other player with 4 or more cards in hand reveals 3 cards from his hand and discards one of them that you choose. If they discarded any Treasure cards, you gain a copy of each and put them into your hand.

-Not much to say, except maybe gaining each Treasure in hand is too strong? How about this: "If they discarded any Treasure cards, you gain a copy of one of them and put it into your hand."?

I made and playtested a card that's exactly like this except that the opponent revealed all but one card, rather than any three, and instead of the "If they discarded..." clause, the card offered a flat +$2.  I think I'm happy with that card, although I want to playtest a version that requires 5+ cards to be vulnerable to attack, rather than merely 4+.

Despite the similarities, I think this would play very differently, mostly being weaker.  The attack portion is weaker, because opponents will usually be able to save 2 cards rather than just 1.  And the benefit to the player will often be weaker, since (1) it would be unusual to ever get a Gold from this; (2) it would be common not to even get a Silver from this; and (3) there's a real danger, especially early on, of being forced to gain Coppers, as sometimes a player will reveal 3 Coppers from his hand.

In fact, on average the benefit to the player is probably weaker than Thief.  It's hard to compare the success rates, since (1) with Tax Collector, the opponent gets to choose which cards are offered up as candidates for the attack, but (2) the opponent may well prefer to offer up good Treasure than risk a good Action card being discarded from his hand.

However, unless the success rate turns out to be dramatically better in playtesting, there is still the matter of Tax Collector hitting weaker treasure cards.  Additionally, the attacker must gain copies of the Treasure instead of optionally gaining them.

All told, I think this needs some serious strengthening.  Offhand, I'm not sure how to make a "gain a copy" effect work with this attack, since you'll frequently (perhaps usually) only have the opportunity to gain a junky card.  You could try "You may gain a copy of any non-victory card discarded this way."  That might work, but I still suspect the card won't be worth playing without a more certain benefit for the player.  Like the +$2 I put on my own card.

[spoiler: this next card is more of a jokethought experiment than anything, but I'm curious if it is viable. I tried to make it so.]

Viceroy
ACTION-ATTACK-REACTION-TREASURE-VICTORY   $5
---
When played as an Action-Attack, each other player reveals his hand, discards one card that you choose, then draws 2 cards.
---
When played as a Treasure, $1.
---
When another player plays an Attack card, you may reveal and discard this from your hand. If you do, +2 Cards.
---
1 VP

LOL.  Excellent.

You've thought more about this than I have, so consider these thoughts as merely first impressions.  But I think that having lots of weak things still adds up to a weak card.  It's kind of a Dominion principle, that one good thing is better than two mediocre things.  That's why one Gold is better than two Silvers, and Tactician is a great card.  So my fear here is that even though this card does a lot, it's still not much more than a very marginal improvement on its strongest single effect.  I think that makes this a $4, maybe even just a $3 card.

[Newcomer]

Okay, it's been a busy week. Now right back to it..

Patron

Balancing this -1 Action dynamic is not easy, I can see. Sometimes actions are abundant and the ability will trigger easily. Other times there are no plus actions and so the "if not" ability is the only one that's relevant. So I guess I should weaken the big ability and make the lesser one more unique, at least, so there will be reasons to consider buying it without + Actions. And I didn't want to overuse the Cavalry mechanic of "if not, +2 Actions" to ensure Actions on the board.

My justification to myself for the +$5 was that since you're using 2 actions, it's not that unusual to get $4 out of those actions, if you played 2 terminal Silvers. True, this is just one card that you have to buy, but since it's weaker when it doesn't hit, I felt like that would work. Maybe net +$4 is good.

Okay, how does this version sound?

Patron
ACTION   $5
---
+$2
-1 Action; if you do, +$2 and +1 Buy. If not, +1 Card and +1 Action.

Now it becomes a Market variant. And it seems like most of the expansions have one, so why not this set?

Portfolio

I keep forgetting about Treasury. Oh well. I guess I'll just up Portfolio to $6 and leave it at that for now.

Tax Collector

I meant to have a "you may" in there. You don't have to gain a Copper with this card.

I originally had Tax Collector make you reveal 3 cards, or all but one card. So it had a a de facto restriction of anyone with 2 or more cards, but that was it. But I think that makes it too strong of an attack, so I'll leave it as is there.

The other thing I thought about was "if they discarded any Treasure cards, you may gain a copy of one of them and put it into your hand." Or, and I'm thinking this might be best, "if they discarded any Treasure cards, gain a Gold and put it into your hand." Or maybe you may gain a Silver in hand.

Orrr..:

Tax Collector
ACTION-ATTACK   $5
---
Each other player with 4 or more cards in hand reveals 3 cards from his hand and discards one of them that you choose. If they discarded any Treasure cards, choose one: gain a Silver and put it into your hand, or gain a Gold.

That almost seems too convoluted, though.  Let me know what you think.

Viceroy

I think the attack is weak enough that this card will usually be used more for its Treasure, Victory, and Reaction components. The attack may be worth playing when you have no other action cards, but even then you'll want the $1 instead as often as not. Though it would be a nice counter to Tournament.

So, it's typically an Estate/Copper hybrid with a Reaction ability. I'm comfortable calling it $3. I don't see it being brokenly powerful no matter how cheap it is.

Thanks for all of your feedback. Anyone who wants to, chime in. I don't take offense easily. :-)

[Newcomer]

The first set of $6 cards:

Accession
ACTION   $6
---
Trash 2 Victory cards from your hand. If you do, for each card trashed, gain a Victory card costing up to $3 higher.

-A familiar mechanic. Perhaps it's too difficult to trigger to be feasible at $6, but I don't want to make this power too cheap. Load up on Estates and Duchies and churn them into Provinces instead of choking on them. Games could end very quickly when this card gets going.

Blackmail
TREASURE   $6
---
$2
When you play this, the player to your left names a type of card: Action, Treasure, or Victory. Cards of that type cost $2 less, but not less than $0.

-A Quarry effect on whichever card type your opponent thinks is least useful. But when it stacks, they have to decide whether to make that type super-cheap or spread the effect around. And it's on a Silver, to boot.

Blight
ACTION-ATTACK   $6
---
+3 Cards
Trash a card from your hand. If you do, each other player must trash a non-Victory card of equal or greater cost from their hand, or reveal a hand with no such cards.

-Is this too much? I built in some nerfs-they can't trash Victory cards (though you can), and if they don't have as expensive a card, they don't have to trash anything. Of course, that means they can't use the chance to trash a Copper, but still. If you trash a cheap card, they won't miss what they trash as much. If you trash an expensive card, a) it is less likely to hit and b) you're trashing a pretty good card to make this work. It's a very interesting combination card-drawer and trasher, with varying interactions. It will be somewhat swingy, though.

[ChaosRed]

I like Blackmail a lot, both in its mechanics and its name/theme.

[Newcomer]

More $6 cards, including my favorite. I probably built too many cards at the $6 level (assuming they stay there), but oh well. I can always cut the least popular ones or add some more cheaper cards later.


Credit
TREASURE-DURATION   $6
---
$1
---
While this is in play, you have an additional 2 coins of credit. If you buy a card on credit, place it face up on your Credit mat. Then, on your next turn, -$2. If you do, gain the card from your mat. If not, return it to the Supply.

-This is a card that requires a full FAQ section to clarify, but I think it's easy enough to grasp once you see how it works. Basically, each Credit card gives you $1 and $2 credit. You can buy cards that cost more than the actual money you have, using the coins of credit. If you use $3 more than you have in "real" coins, you need to leave out 2 Credit cards. If you play multiple Credit cards, but only use $2 of credit, then you only need to leave out one. I would state in the rules for the card that you buy the card on the first turn, but don't gain it then (for "when you buy," "when you gain" effects.) So with Possession, it goes on the Possessed player's mat. I also decided that the pile is not empty for game-ending and City purposes while there are cards from it on Credit mats. Those cards haven't been gained yet and may still be placed back in their piles. It feels right that way, but I could be convinced to change that I suppose.

I previously wrote out a lot more than that, but the card changed since then. Buuuut, the biggest question is.. is it worth it? Does this card pique anyone else's interest? I think it would be fun, and the rules issues don't bother me. If a future expansion makes these rules even less viable, then fine, I have no problem dropping the card. But it's an interesting idea, and that's why I made most of these cards.


Enchanted Treasure
TREASURE-REACTION   $6
---
$2
When you play this you may trash a Copper from play or a Curse from your hand.
---
If another player plays an Attack card, you may set this aside from your hand. If you do, then at the start of your next turn, return this to your hand and choose one: +1 Card, +1 Action, and +1 Buy; or place the top 2 cards of your discard pile into your hand.

-I think this is my favorite of my custom cards. I've changed it a bit to make it valuable when there are no attacks. Originally the trashing was part of the Reaction choice, but I like the changes. Note that you can trash a Copper AFTER you play it, so you keep the $1 this turn. It's magic! :-P


Healer
ACTION   $6
---
+1 Action
+1 Card
You may look through your discard pile and reveal exactly 3 cards costing no more than $2 each. If you do, trash them.

-Very simple idea. A great deck-cleaning trasher when it works. A cantrip when it doesn't. Perhaps it's overpriced, but in a heavy cursing game it can gain you back 2-3 VP at a time while cleaning your deck.

[Deadlock39]

Unless I am not understanding something correctly, Credit is strictly inferior to Gold.  (and significantly inferior to Gold at that.)  It gives you a total of 3 coins to spend, but then you have to pay two of them back on your next turn, and it delays the acquisition of your card.  You could just buy Gold for the same price and have your 3 coins with no penalty.  I would say it needs to give you significantly more credit, more coins or both.  (I would say $4 or $5 total with $2 or $3 being credit.)  Either that, or it needs to be cheaper.  It might work at $5.  I think it might be better at $4.  $3 for 5 is strong, but I would say the $2 pay back is a heavier penalty than the ones on Contraband or Cache.  (Possibly put it at $5 and only have $1 of credit.)

[Newcomer]

Good call. This is what happens when I shift prices and benefits around; I miss out on the obvious things, like $6 needs to be comparable to Gold, etc. :-P Thanks.

Credit
TREASURE-DURATION   $5
---
$2
---
While this is in play, you have an additional $2 of credit. If you buy a card on credit, place it face up on your Credit mat. Then, on your next turn, -$2. If you do, gain the card from your mat. If not, return it to the Supply.

How does that sound? $4 might seem like a lot, but really it's not that it's giving you $4. It's giving you $2 and letting you use money from next turn now to secure a card you might not afford in either turn alone. It lets you put a down payment on a more expensive card.

[ChaosRed]

I like the idea of Credit, but it seems to be both expensive and slow.

I draw 3$ and Credit, I get to buy a Nobles. But I have to put Nobles to the side, wait a turn and then take a -2 penalty to actually gain it or I lose it. So my next turn of a Silver and a Credit, gains me actually 1$ ((2+1)-2) + 2$ possible Credit.

It's literally like a credit card, in that the more you buy with it, the more you kind of lose, but in-game I just wouldn't bargain this way. The concept is cool, I just think the penalty is too steep to warrant a 5$ purchase.

[Newcomer]

Yeah, I see that now. It is a slow card. It's more a card that would help you when your deck starts to green, or your deck is full of curses, and you can't seem to piece together $8 turns. And delaying the acquisition of a Victory card isn't a bad thing, as long as the game doesn't end in between, but that's part of why the pile isn't considered empty until its cards are off of Credit mats.

With the new version, you'd have a straight $2 to start with. So it's a Silver, and if you want you can borrow a Silver from your next hand. Makes the $7 hand less annoying. You can grab that last Province and hope you still have enough to buy a Duchy when you end the game next turn.

Does the newer version work better for you? I want to make the card worth buying.

[ChaosRed]

Yeah that works, it is useful to buy Victory cards with, I assume if the game ends, any cards on the Credit mat don't count, but that's something you could add to a supplementary rule that doesn't have to be on the card itself.

[Newcomer]

Right, cards on your Credit mat do not go into your deck at the end of the game, as you haven't gained them yet. But if you used it to buy a Province, then the game won't end on Provinces until you've gained your Province. It could only end on piles.

[rinkworks]

Catching up after a week away.  Just wanted to note that if you don't reshuffle between the turn you buy a non-victory card on credit and the turn you actually gain it, then it still enters your deck just as quickly -- it still gets shuffled in at the same time.

Now, if you do miss a shuffle, it enters your deck potentially much later than a single turn later.  But this timing can usually be determined and considered at the time you first play the card.

[Newcomer]

The last of the cards, $6, 7$ and $?:

Minstrel
ACTION-ATTACK   $6
---
Each other player must reveal and discard either a Treasure card or a Victory card from his hand, or reveal a hand with no Treasure or Victory cards. If they discard any Treasure cards, +$1. If they discard any Victory cards, +$2.
You may discard at least 2 cards from your hand. If you do, +$2.

-That ending effect can be changed to +$1, or made conditional on the other players' discards, if that seems too strong. Originally I just had it as "For each Treasure card thus discarded, +$1." etc. But that seemed too much.
Here's another version:
"Each other player must reveal and discard either a Treasure card or a Victory card from his hand, or reveal a hand with no Treasure or Victory cards. For each Victory card thus discarded, +$2." Either way, the idea is to give your opponents a reason to discard their Treasure instead of Victory cards. You'll either hurt their hand or help yours.


Mage
ACTION-ATTACK   $7
---
+3 Cards
Each other player gains a Curse card.
-1 Action; if you do, each other player gains another Curse card. If no Curses remain in the Supply, they gain a Copper instead.

-Stronger than Witch even without excess Actions, though then it's probably a bit expensive. Still, if it's the only Curser on a board without +Actions, it will probably be bought, especially if there's not much card-draw.
With +Actions, it becomes a beast of an attack. A double-curser, that still gives out 1 Copper when the Curses are out. When there are +Actions available, Mage is meant to be a power card. It's hard to activate on TR or KC, but it's still potent enough. +9 Cards, each opponent gains 3 Curses? Sounds tasty. And it creates the sidequest on the right boards of trying to pull off +9 Cards, each opponent gains 6 Curses. I'm willing to bet that would be difficult enough to not be a problem, and at any rate the Curses will run out super quickly if you're trying that.


Gemstone
TREASURE   $0*
---
When you play this, $1 for each Gemstone in the Supply, but at least $1.
---
This costs $1 for each Gemstone in the Supply, minus $1, but not less than $0.

-This is one of 2 variable-cost cards I designed, and the only one to make the cut for the current version of the set. Okay, so it sounds complicated. It's a card whose cost and power depend on how many are left. So it starts out super expensive, as the first one costs $9. But it'll be a $9 Treasure until someone else gets one, way better than Platinum. Then it's still at $8, then $7, until when the pile's half-depleted it still functions as a Platinum. The later you buy it, the less it's worth to you, but it depletes the value of your opponents' copies. The last one's free, but then it's only a Copper. Buy it if your opponent has lots of Gemstones.
The goal is to strike as early as possible and wield it as often as possible before it diminishes in power.