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[eHalcyon]

Pilgrimage
Types: Action
Cost: $3
+1 Action. +2 Buys.
While this is in play, when you gain a Victory card, Victory cards cost $1 less this turn, but not less than $0.

Clarification: Buying this multiple times in a turn does reduce costs each time.

So, this quickly snowballs. Other people have already done the math. But that's a big problem, and not one that can really be fixed without making the card completely uninteresting.

If it only had +1 Buy, or if it was non-terminal, is it still such a big problem?  Or would that make it uninteresting?  Right now the problem I see with it is that non-terminal means it's easy to play multiple in one turn, and 2 extra Buys lets it explode too easily because multiple stack so well.  But even dropping to +1 Buy would slow it down a lot, and removing the +1 action would make it more difficult to play multiples and thus mitigate the scary potential.  Would the potential still be too great?

Ring Leader
Types: Action – Attack
Cost: $3
+2 Cards.
When you buy or play this, each player (including you) reveals the top 4 card of his deck, discards one that you choose, and puts the rest back in an order he chooses.

EDIT: Added +2 Cards to Ring Leader's on-play effect.

Super-Spy. I don't like the added decisions/AP. On the other hand, it's terminal, so it's less likely to stack than Spy. In some ways, it's  like a Pillage for the next turn, in other ways it's a weakened Rabble.

I don't really think it's comparable to Pillage.  Pillage removes the best card from your hand.  This replaces your second best card with an average card.  The other player will still get a 5 card hand next turn, so it's actually not that bad.  But I do worry that it could be very unfun to play against, as victims keep getting key cards discarded.  It can happen with Spy or Scrying Pool and that hurts, but it's way more likely with Ring Leader because it searches 4 cards instead of just 1.

Wayfarer (A)
Types: Action
Cost: $2
+1 Card. +1 Action. +1 Buy.
When you buy this, you may trash a card from your hand. If you do, +$ equal to its cost in coins.

So, a Market Square with an on-buy Salvager effect (without the buy). Too strong for $2, especially since it synergizes strongly with itself (giving cantrip plus buy, which means this card is easy to amass and use to clean out your junk quickly). Not sure what the right cost is, but on-buy trashing, even without being able to spend the coins right away, seems very strong early on.

Gonna disagree here.  On-buy trashing can be nice, but Wayfarer would not be that powerful early on.  You only get to trash a single card, and unless you only have $2 in hand, you're skipping on Silver or something else.  It's worth doing once, maybe twice just so you have +Buy (and you use the trashing opportunistically) but you can't just buy this -- you also need to get some good cards to build economy.

The real strength of the card is in allowing you to Salvage something in an odd situation.  With that purpose in mind, the cost of the card reduces the effectiveness of the Salvage effect.  If you use Salvager on Gold, you get +$6.  If you buy Wayfarer and trash Gold to it, you only have a net gain of +$4.  Not to mention you need +Buy to take advantage of that money, so you'll need to have already played a Wayfarer (or other +Buy) that turn for it to do any good.

A potential problem is simply that it provides cantrip +Buy for $2.  I think this could work, but I think Tables said in his video that he's tested that before and it's not good for the game.  Presumably too good to get for $2?  I don't know.  But I think the on-gain Salvage effect would be too weak if it cost any more than $2.

[Titandrake]

I haven't had the time to go through all the cards yet, but food for thought. From Donald X secret history of Dark Ages,

Hovel is the only one that changed. Originally it was an action you could trash by discarding your hand. It turned out that trashing it turn 1-2 usually seemed like the correct play, even if you drew it with four Coppers. So that was no good. Hovel as printed has nice flavor going for it; you move out of your old Hovel and into a nice Duchy.

So if you consider Wayferer as an empty card (it's a cantrip), it has the potential to degenerate openings kinda badly. However, when you consider that opening Doctor by $1 gives a similar effect, I'm not sure. On-buy Salvager is an interesting effect; I'm just not sure how balanceable it is.

Edit: So hey, I actually have time. So let's review cards now! Once again looking at every other card here. I've skimmed some analysis beforehand, but I haven't read all of it.

Palanquin
Types: Action
Cost: $5
+1 Action. You may discard an Action card. If you do, +1 Card per $ it costs.

I don't think it's as good as it looks, the restriction is a bit tougher than it looks. At the same time, I still think the effect is far too strong and impossible to balance to make it worth it.

Quagmire
Types: Victory
Cost: $3
Worth 1 VP.
When you gain this, trash 3 cards from a Supply pile.

I think this gives too much pile control. I mean, it doesn't sound too bad, until you get behind on a Wharf or Duchy split from luck and then suddenly that pile's empty.

Pilgrimage
Types: Action
Cost: $3
+1 Action. +2 Buys.
While this is in play, when you gain a Victory card, Victory cards cost $1 less this turn, but not less than $0.

Clarification: Buying this multiple times in a turn does reduce costs each time.

So, in theory, it's +$1 for each Victory card you buy. It looks scary, but 1 copy is okay. And then I realize wait this stacks, and now it's dangerously good. Still, neat idea.

Trade Agreement
Types: Action
Cost: $5
+3 Cards.
While this is in play, when you gain a Trade Agreement, gain a card costing up to $5.

Needs tweaking to avoid draining a pile immediately. Feels like a retread of Border Village to me, with an explicit cost. BV has a "less than" clause for a reason.

Emerald Vein
Types: Action – Victory
Cost: $5
+1 Action. Reveal your hand. +$1 per Victory card revealed.
Worth 1 VP.

I can just imagine having this in hand, and nothing else, and going oh come on I can't get +$1 off this to hit $8? Not inherently bad to act that way, but it hurts fun levels. Anyways, I can see it being very strong in engines and not really worth it otherwise.

Vendor
Types: Action
Cost: $1
+1 Action
When you buy this, +2 Buys.

No, I think trying to add a strong bonus to an on-buy with a useless top half is the "Blood Diamond" problem all over again.

Ring Leader
Types: Action – Attack
Cost: $3
+2 Cards.
When you buy or play this, each player (including you) reveals the top 4 card of his deck, discards one that you choose, and puts the rest back in an order he chooses.

The attack seems a bit too good, actually. 4 cards is a lot to look through. Think of Cartographer, and how often you want to keep a card in the 4 you reveal. Now imagine you don't get that. If the sample space was smaller, maybe.

Factory
Types: Action – Reaction
Cost: $4
+1 Action. You may discard a card that is not a Victory card. If you do, gain a copy of it.
When you gain a card, you may reveal this from your hand and put it onto your deck. If you do, put the gained card into your hand.

You can't Factory loop but you can sure gain a lot of copies, which actually start hurting you at some point. I like how it all comes together, it's a cool effect, but gaining with such low conditions is heuristically very worrisome.

Workers' Co-operative
Types: Action
Cost: $5
+1 Buy. +$3.
While this is in play, when you buy a card, each other player may gain a card costing less than it.

Oh it's the fixed card! Although I'm going to pretend it's a Contraband variant for variety. Like Contraband, you play it, and then buy two cheap cards instead of the big card you wanted. Fills a similar niche, not bad, I think similarly weak but not all cards can be Ambassador.

Witch Doctor
Types: Action
Cost: $4
+$1. Look through your deck; reveal and discard any number of Victory and Curse cards from it. Shuffle your deck.
When you gain this, put your deck into your discard pile.

I like the on play effect, the on-gain effect is a bit odd but I suppose it mechanically lets you get Witch Doctor earlier? It's not the best synergy; I play Witch Doctor, now I can't buy one or else I just shuffle all that stuff back in. Gains during turn would be interesting though.

Shoreline
Types: Victory
Cost: $6
Worth 4 VP.
When you gain this, +1 Buy.

It's kind of boring but it's subtly game-warping. Does that make it a good card? Well, it's interesting to me.

Travelling Salesman
Types: Action – Reaction
Cost: $5
Discard any number of Treasure cards from your hand. +2 Cards per card discarded.
When another player gains a Victory card, you may discard this. If you do, gain a card costing less than the gained Victory card.

Reaction seems too annoying, just conceptually. Even if limited to non-Victory, it's so strong.

Oicho-Kabu
Types: Action – Victory
Cost: $5
+1 Buy. +$2.
Worth 1 VP. While this is in play, when you buy a card, +$2 and discard the top card of your deck. If it's a Victory card, trash this.

I'm probably missing a reference. +$2 sounds strong, I suppose it's supposed to balanced out by the trash clause, but I'm not convinced it makes it any better. Pretty good in the building part of engines, very good actually if you pick it up around the middle.


Okay actually this is going to take a while, I'll start from Sultan later.

[markusin]

Fence
Types: Action
Cost: $5
While this is in play, when you buy a card, gain a card costing exactly $1 more than it.

Though it looks like a worse Haggler, it's at least better for gaining cards at the $2 and $3 price range. I'm sure it can be rebalanced if needed. The real question is if Haggler makes it superfluous.

I didn't notice the similarity to Haggler before, but it's been pointed out several times and it seems obvious now.  How is Fence better for gaining $2-$3 cards?  To do that, you need $2 in your hand.  With Haggler, you only need $1 in hand to do the same thing.  Haggler is almost always better.

The edge case where Fence is better is when the cheaper card that you want is a Victory card.  Haggler can't gain VP, but with Fence you can buy a green card and gain anything, including another green card.  So with Fence, you could buy Silk Road and gain a Fence or a Duchy.  With Haggler, you can buy Haggler or Duchy but you can't gain Silk Road off of that.

I meant that, with Fence, you gain a $3 cost card if you buy a $2, not a Curse/Copper/Poor House like you would with Haggler.

But Haggler comes with +$2 while Fence has nothing.  When you can afford a $2 card with Fence, you would have been able to afford a $4 card with Haggler.  If you have to buy a $2 card with Haggler, you would only be able buy a Copper if you have Fence instead.

With the clarity that comes with a nice long sleep, I now understanding and fully agree with what you're saying. I had this vision in my head that you'd be buying a whole bunch on $2s with multiple buys, but most of the time you'd just get a gold or something. The cases where you get 2 victory cards off 1 buy would be very rare.

[Schneau]

Here are some comments on some of my favorite cards or card ideas. None of these are mine. Also, none of these are Mine; that would be just silly.

Tribe
Types: Action
Cost: $3
+2 Actions. +$1. Look at the top 2 cards of your deck. Discard one and put the other anywhere in your deck.
When you buy this, you may discard a card. If you do, +1 Buy and +$2.

I really like the top of this card -- sort of like Fishing Village meets Wandering Minstrel. But, I really dislike the "When you buy this, +Buy" cards. So, I'm borderline here.

Consulate
Types: Action
Cost: $4
+3 Cards. +1 Action. Discard 2 cards.
When you gain this, each other player gains a Copper, putting it into his hand.

This probably has to cost $5 to be balanced, but I like both the top and bottom. The bottom helps your opponents now, but hurts them later. I like that effect, and I think it works especially well on-gain.

Mountain Dwellers
Types: Action
Cost: $5
+1 Card. +1 Action. Reveal your hand. If you revealed 3 or more Treasure cards, +$1.
When you buy this, you may trash a Treasure card you have in play. Gain a Treasure card costing exactly $3 more than it.

This card seems awfully weak, and I'd prefer if you only have to reveal 1 or 2 Treasure cards to get the +$1 to even it out a bit. But, I like the bottom, and it works on a sometimes-Peddler.

Troglodyte Caves
Types: Action
Cost: $5
+1 Card. +1 Action. Discard any number of cards. +1 Card per card discarded.
When you gain this, you may reveal a card from your hand costing less than this. Gain a copy of it.

This card seems solid and interesting and Hinterlands-y. Good!

Artefact
Types: Action
Cost: $2
+1 Card. +1 Action. Choose a card from your hand. Trash it, discard it, or put it on top of your deck.
When you buy this, set it aside instead of gaining it. Discard it after you next shuffle your discard pile (or when the game ends).

Optional cantrip trashing is quite strong, but I think the penalty here is really interesting. If this were to win, I might suggest making the top force you to trash a card, which would even it out slightly.

Ring Leader
Types: Action – Attack
Cost: $3
+2 Cards. When you buy or play this, each player (including you) reveals the top 4 card of his deck, discards one that you choose, and puts the rest back in an order he chooses.

I like it. Now with the added +2 cards, this might be a little strong for $3, but I guess it's comparable to Oracle. The only bad part is that it could be a little slow to play.

Mill
Types: Action
Cost: $5
+1 Action. Each other player draws a card. Gain a card costing up to $5.
When you gain this, each other player discards down to 3 cards in hand.

This is one of my favorites. It has interesting synergy, and doesn't seem overpowered.

Travelling Salesman
Types: Action – Reaction
Cost: $5
Discard any number of Treasure cards from your hand. +2 Cards per card discarded.
When another player gains a Victory card, you may discard this. If you do, gain a card costing less than the gained Victory card.

Both parts of this card seem solid. I'm a bit worried about the top being too strong, but right now I don't think it's OP or terribroken.

Tinker's Wagon
Types: Action
Cost: $4
Gain a card costing up to $4.
When you gain this, move a card costing between $3 and $6 from the top of one Supply pile to the top of another.

I think this plays very differently from Embargo, and I like the concept. The card itself might need some tweaks, but the idea is there.

[Just a Rube]

Ring Leader
Types: Action – Attack
Cost: $3
+2 Cards.
When you buy or play this, each player (including you) reveals the top 4 card of his deck, discards one that you choose, and puts the rest back in an order he chooses.

EDIT: Added +2 Cards to Ring Leader's on-play effect.

Super-Spy. I don't like the added decisions/AP. On the other hand, it's terminal, so it's less likely to stack than Spy. In some ways, it's  like a Pillage for the next turn, in other ways it's a weakened Rabble.

I don't really think it's comparable to Pillage.  Pillage removes the best card from your hand.  This replaces your second best card with an average card.  The other player will still get a 5 card hand next turn, so it's actually not that bad.  But I do worry that it could be very unfun to play against, as victims keep getting key cards discarded.  It can happen with Spy or Scrying Pool and that hurts, but it's way more likely with Ring Leader because it searches 4 cards instead of just 1.

Sure, but early on that isn't too dissimilar to Pillage; the power level of a key card missing the shuffle and being replaced by an average card (probably Copper or Estate) is not too much worse than just making you discard it. Add that it isn't a one-shot, and has +2 cards to help my economy when I play it; this seems degenerate. It also oddly has 2nd player advantage; I open Chapel, you buy a Ringleader, you have a 2/3 chance of my Chapel missing the shuffle. Admittedly it's a shortened shuffle, but I can play this again as a normal action. If Player 1 tries that on Player 2, s/he only gets a 1/3 chance.

[eHalcyon]

Ring Leader
Types: Action – Attack
Cost: $3
+2 Cards.
When you buy or play this, each player (including you) reveals the top 4 card of his deck, discards one that you choose, and puts the rest back in an order he chooses.

EDIT: Added +2 Cards to Ring Leader's on-play effect.

Super-Spy. I don't like the added decisions/AP. On the other hand, it's terminal, so it's less likely to stack than Spy. In some ways, it's  like a Pillage for the next turn, in other ways it's a weakened Rabble.

I don't really think it's comparable to Pillage.  Pillage removes the best card from your hand.  This replaces your second best card with an average card.  The other player will still get a 5 card hand next turn, so it's actually not that bad.  But I do worry that it could be very unfun to play against, as victims keep getting key cards discarded.  It can happen with Spy or Scrying Pool and that hurts, but it's way more likely with Ring Leader because it searches 4 cards instead of just 1.

Sure, but early on that isn't too dissimilar to Pillage; the power level of a key card missing the shuffle and being replaced by an average card (probably Copper or Estate) is not too much worse than just making you discard it. Add that it isn't a one-shot, and has +2 cards to help my economy when I play it; this seems degenerate. It also oddly has 2nd player advantage; I open Chapel, you buy a Ringleader, you have a 2/3 chance of my Chapel missing the shuffle. Admittedly it's a shortened shuffle, but I can play this again as a normal action. If Player 1 tries that on Player 2, s/he only gets a 1/3 chance.

I guess that depends on the disparity between your good cards and average cards. If it were to win, maybe a good tweak would be to look at top 3 instead of 4. 2 would be boring though.

[HeavyD]

I really enjoy all the feedback and critique, but I feel that once we find a flaw in a card, we bash it rather than try to give some feedback on how to improve the card. If we are voting on cards we feel have a cool mechanic and fit the theme(s) of their set, I feel we should try to improve the ones we are interested in. For example, I will pick on eHalcyon (cause I know eHalcyon likes the extra attention)...

Mountain Dwellers
Types: Action
Cost: $5
+1 Card. +1 Action. Reveal your hand. If you revealed 3 or more Treasure cards, +$1.
When you buy this, you may trash a Treasure card you have in play. Gain a Treasure card costing excatly $3 more than it.

On-buy Mine.  Once in your deck, it's a cantrip that is sometimes a Peddler.  Looks alright, and the name fits (recalling Mine).  Maybe "Mountaineer" would be better.

Witch Doctor
Types: Action
Cost: $4
+$1. Look through your deck; reveal and discard any number of Victory and Curse cards from it. Shuffle your deck.
When you gain this, put your deck into your discard pile.

Takes the niche effect of Chancellor and gives it on-gain, allowing greater control of when trigger it.  That's cool.  Epic-level filtering, but swingy because it's onl good if you draw it early in the shuffle.  Mediocre effect.

Possible broken combo: Tunnel.  If I do not vote for it, Tunnel will be the reason.

I like the name a lot though.  Saw it recently (in the Bad Ideas thread?) but it actually works very well for this concept and this expansion.

For Mountain Dwellers, there is a nice short summary with a suggested name change that I am all for. (Great job!)

For Witch Doctor, there is a noted broken combo with tunnel, but is there any way we could reword WD so it works?

LastFootNote told us that the winning card will likely go under revision/playtesting/etc., I haven't submitted a ballot for Hinterlands yet, and I don't want to nix WD if there are ideas for how it could be reworded.

[nopawnsintended]

For Witch Doctor, there is a noted broken combo with tunnel, but is there any way we could reword WD so it works?

Easy enough.  Instead of "reveal and discard any number of Victory and Curse cards from it." you could say "reveal any number of Victory and Curse cards, and place them in the discard pile."  that's a Chancellor-esque fix, but it might be a confusing subtlety. I think some people are confused by this existing distinction, anyway.

[markusin]

For Witch Doctor, there is a noted broken combo with tunnel, but is there any way we could reword WD so it works?

Easy enough.  Instead of "reveal and discard any number of Victory and Curse cards from it." you could say "reveal any number of Victory and Curse cards, and place them in the discard pile."  that's a Chancellor-esque fix, but it might be a confusing subtlety. I think some people are confused by this existing distinction, anyway.

I was about to suggest something similar. Instead of just "place them in the discard pile", you can write "reveal any number of Victory and Curse, setting them aside. Put the set aside cards into the discard pile.". Although, I'm not even sure it's a broken combo, considering you still have to draw it early in the shuffle. I mean, have you seen what happens when Rebuild names Tunnel?

[eHalcyon]

For Witch Doctor, there is a noted broken combo with tunnel, but is there any way we could reword WD so it works?

Easy enough.  Instead of "reveal and discard any number of Victory and Curse cards from it." you could say "reveal any number of Victory and Curse cards, and place them in the discard pile."  that's a Chancellor-esque fix, but it might be a confusing subtlety. I think some people are confused by this existing distinction, anyway.

I was about to suggest something similar. Instead of just "place them in the discard pile", you can write "reveal any number of Victory and Curse, setting them aside. Put the set aside cards into the discard pile.". Although, I'm not even sure it's a broken combo, considering you still have to draw it early in the shuffle. I mean, have you seen what happens when Rebuild names Tunnel?

This is part of the reason why I didn't suggest a fix.  The other reason is that there are too many cards to suggest changes for everything.

I only said it was potentially broken.  Golem can also flip a bunch of Tunnels.  If you don't have 2 Action cards in you deck, it can flip all of them.  Golem is tempered by an expensive Potion cost (not to mention you aren't getting full use out of it if you use it to flip Tunnels) while Rebuild is tempered by stalling on other VP cards.  This may be tempered by the Counting House issue where you draw it too late in the shuffle.

[SirPeebles]

I think Witch Doctor is pretty cool.  I find it interesting that you generally won't want to buy a Witch Doctor after you've played one, since it will shuffle your junk back into the deck.  I like the idea of Swindling someone a Witch Doctor just after they cleaned out their deck.

[eHalcyon]

Here are my favourites.  I will probably vote for most of these, probably not all.  Some cards I like but haven't included here for various reasons, e.g. others have pointed out how similar they are to existing cards when I didn't notice before.  I will not guarantee that one of these isn't mine.

Courier (B)
Types: Action
Cost: $2
+1 Action. +1 Buy.
When you discard this from play, if you bought no more than one card this turn, you may put this on top of your deck.

Many people have complained that this is too weak.  I like it for that very reason.  It's a $2 card, so weakness is perfectly acceptable.  I think that it can provide some nice benefit to certain deck archeypes.  Keep in mind that one, maybe two of these is likely all a deck needs.  That in itself makes it play differently than Walled Village.  Usually engines want 1, maybe 2 extra buys; any more are wasted.  Walled Village anti-synergizes with itself because you rarely want to play just two terminals; if you want a village, you probably want several, but multiple Walled Villages are liable to collide and get discarded.  But you don't need that much +Buy in most cases, so this works a bit better. 

Yes, Courier is very niche.  But it's neat to have weak cards that are sometimes helpful, and I think this is such a card.

Used Land Salesman
Types: Action
Cost: $5
+4 Cards.
While this is in play, when you buy a card, gain a Victory cards costing less than it.

I really do think the in-play clause is neat.  It's a penalty that sometimes is a bonus.  It could support unusual early-greening strategies.  Not much to say about it -- I just like it a lot.

Travelling Salesman
Types: Action – Reaction
Cost: $5
Discard any number of Treasure cards from your hand. +2 Cards per card discarded.
When another player gains a Victory card, you may discard this. If you do, gain a card costing less than it.

I still think the main action is very interesting.  It's fresh but it feels classic, very simple and elegant.  I will probably vote for this based on the top part alone (and note that it dos hit a minor theme via filtering).

I am not sure about the reaction.  I like that it reacts to others gaining a Victory card, hitting a minor theme and a major theme.  Gaining a card costing less than it... that feels too swingy to me.  Maybe if it was non-Victory cards only?  But an important consideration is that the reaction does require discarding this, which is close to Pillaging yourself.  That helps to balance the reaction.

Ring Leader
Types: Action – Attack
Cost: $3
+2 Cards
When you buy or play this, each player (including you) reveals the top 4 card of his deck, discards one that you choose, and puts the rest back in an order he chooses.

The card has been updated with +2 Cards.  I think that makes this a decently powerful card, maybe enough to warrant a $4 cost.  I really like the attack concept.  It's a Spy/Oracle variant, but I think it feels fresh.  It's also nice that it can combo with Mystic and Wishing Well.

One concern with this is that it could potentially be very slow to resolve.  You're looking at 4 cards for each player and picking out the worst one.  Not sure how much time that would take; I suppose it depends on the players.  It is terminal, which makes it more difficult to play a bunch of these in succession.  And it's good that it has each player choose the order for their own cards, just like Oracle -- if the attacker had to choose for everyone, it would be much slower.

Another concern is that the card may be extremely annoying and too painful for the victims.  It stings a little when Spy flips a good card and makes it miss the reshuffle.  Ring Leader is 4 times as likely to flip that key card.  A possible tweak is dropping it to 3 cards.  2 cards would be too few, and at that point it feels too similar to Oracle.

Huntsmen
Type: Action
Cost: $0*
+1 Action. +1 Buy.
When you gain this, +2 Buys. During your Buy phase, this costs $2 more for each card you've gained this turn.

The on-gain +Buy is a very popular fan card concept, and it's one that I think could work.  This is one of the most elegant implementations I've seen.  It very nicely mitigates any auto-pile issues.  The biggest issue I have with it is how it interacts with cost reduction.  To elaborate:

Suppose I have 1 Highway and 1 Bridge in play.  That's "while in play" cost reduction from Highway and just straight up cost reduction from Bridge.  Huntsmen starts at $0 anyway, so there it remains.  I buy a Huntsmen.  Now it should cost $2 more.  But what about Highway and Bridge?  Since Highway is "while in play", I think that it would apply and reduce the cost of Huntsmen to $1.  But the Bridge is not "while in play" so I am unsure about what happens there.  I believe that it would have no further effect, but it's not really intuitive.  So the next Huntsmen costs $1.  If I buy it, then the third Huntsmen would cost $3.

As long as this is clarified, I think this card works pretty well.

Witch Doctor
Types: Action
Cost: $4
+$1. Look through your deck; reveal and discard any number of Victory and Curse cards from it. Shuffle your deck.
When you gain this, put your deck into your discard pile.

I like the idea of on-gain Chancellor, as the effect can be good but takes skill to utilise.  As an on-gain, it is not as luck-dependent as Chancellor itself.  A measure of luck is still needed for the top action to be beneficial.  But similar official cards do exist, so it's not like it's broken.  I imagine that this could be an interesting niche card.

[Asper]

I really, really don't get where all the love for Mill comes from. The only thing hinterlands-y about this card is at the same time the biggest first player advantage you can imagine. Picture having a 5/2 opening with the first player buying a Mill and tell me you still think it's a good idea.

[Schneau]

Here are my favourites.  I will probably vote for most of these, probably not all.  Some cards I like but haven't included here for various reasons, e.g. others have pointed out how similar they are to existing cards when I didn't notice before.  I will not guarantee that one of these isn't mine.

Courier (B)
Types: Action
Cost: $2
+1 Action. +1 Buy.
When you discard this from play, if you bought no more than one card this turn, you may put this on top of your deck.

Many people have complained that this is too weak.  I like it for that very reason.  It's a $2 card, so weakness is perfectly acceptable.  I think that it can provide some nice benefit to certain deck archeypes.  Keep in mind that one, maybe two of these is likely all a deck needs.  That in itself makes it play differently than Walled Village.  Usually engines want 1, maybe 2 extra buys; any more are wasted.  Walled Village anti-synergizes with itself because you rarely want to play just two terminals; if you want a village, you probably want several, but multiple Walled Villages are liable to collide and get discarded.  But you don't need that much +Buy in most cases, so this works a bit better. 

Yes, Courier is very niche.  But it's neat to have weak cards that are sometimes helpful, and I think this is such a card.

You've convinced me that this is more interesting than I had thought, but here are two things against it:
1. This card is almost always significantly weaker and less interesting than Candlestick Maker, let alone other $2 cards like Squire and Hamlet. The topdecking not only isn't that strong, but is probably the wrong move in many situations even when you need the +Buy. Having an essentially dead card to start your hand hurts engines a lot -- you'd much rather draw your +Buy dead card much later in your turn. You could potentially make this cost $1 to make it a bit more interesting, but then you run into issues with it being too easy to empty this pile, since it also offers +Buy. Either way, I don't see buying this in a game that doesn't have Gardens or Counting House in it.
2. It's not very Hinterlandsy. The closest you could come to arguing it is that it does something when you don't buy a card. But, that's a stretch.

[eHalcyon]

Here are my favourites.  I will probably vote for most of these, probably not all.  Some cards I like but haven't included here for various reasons, e.g. others have pointed out how similar they are to existing cards when I didn't notice before.  I will not guarantee that one of these isn't mine.

Courier (B)
Types: Action
Cost: $2
+1 Action. +1 Buy.
When you discard this from play, if you bought no more than one card this turn, you may put this on top of your deck.

Many people have complained that this is too weak.  I like it for that very reason.  It's a $2 card, so weakness is perfectly acceptable.  I think that it can provide some nice benefit to certain deck archeypes.  Keep in mind that one, maybe two of these is likely all a deck needs.  That in itself makes it play differently than Walled Village.  Usually engines want 1, maybe 2 extra buys; any more are wasted.  Walled Village anti-synergizes with itself because you rarely want to play just two terminals; if you want a village, you probably want several, but multiple Walled Villages are liable to collide and get discarded.  But you don't need that much +Buy in most cases, so this works a bit better. 

Yes, Courier is very niche.  But it's neat to have weak cards that are sometimes helpful, and I think this is such a card.

You've convinced me that this is more interesting than I had thought, but here are two things against it:
1. This card is almost always significantly weaker and less interesting than Candlestick Maker, let alone other $2 cards like Squire and Hamlet. The topdecking not only isn't that strong, but is probably the wrong move in many situations even when you need the +Buy. Having an essentially dead card to start your hand hurts engines a lot -- you'd much rather draw your +Buy dead card much later in your turn. You could potentially make this cost $1 to make it a bit more interesting, but then you run into issues with it being too easy to empty this pile, since it also offers +Buy. Either way, I don't see buying this in a game that doesn't have Gardens or Counting House in it.
2. It's not very Hinterlandsy. The closest you could come to arguing it is that it does something when you don't buy a card. But, that's a stretch.

It definitely hits a minor theme in that it lets you deal with a large deck.  It's like Scheme that way, although it's always self-Scheming in this case.  Since it has +Buy, it also helps you increase the size of your deck.

I believe it does hit the minor theme of "donig something when you buy another card".  I don't think it's a stretch at all.  It's subtle though, sure.

As far as weakness goes... well, maybe it is too weak.  But I think the Walled Village effect is underrated and interesting, and it is a great fit for +Buy.  Walled Village loses out on it a bit because multiple WVs anti-synergize.

[scott_pilgrim]

I really, really don't get where all the love for Mill comes from. The only thing hinterlands-y about this card is at the same time the biggest first player advantage you can imagine. Picture having a 5/2 opening with the first player buying a Mill and tell me you still think it's a good idea.

If player one opens 5/2 (a 1/12 chance of happening), then there's only a 1/2 chance it even affects player 2.  Only 1/6 of that 1/2 chance will actually hit a 5 opening (granted that does really suck).  The other 5/6 of the 1/2 chance that it matters will only change a 4/3 opening to a 3/3 opening, which usually is not a huge difference (especially considering how big of a difference the opening draws often make with things like Mountebank, Chapel, etc.).  If player 2 opens 5/2 and player one 2/5, then that also hits it down to a 2/3 opening (again, really sucks), but that's also only a 1/144 chance of happening.  Actually, this is the worst case, because then player 2 knows (usually) to get a Mill since his opponent opened with $2.  The other case is that player 2 gets 5/2 and player 1 gets 3/4, which reduces player 1's split to 3/3.

The opening discard attack only matters in 1/12 games with Mill in them, and in 5/6 of those 1/12 games (5/72 games total), it only reduces a 3/4 opening to 3/3.  Often times that doesn't make a difference at all, even in those 5/72 games; opening double $3's on a 3/4 split is not uncommon.  It's only 1/72 games where one player can have a 5/2 split crushed to 3/2.

Remember that cards can be tweaked as well.  It would be easy to fix it with "When you gain this during your action phase", or something similar.  Then you also don't have weird things like Swindler making you discard during your own turn (although that would be funny).

[eHalcyon]

Remember that cards can be tweaked as well.  It would be easy to fix it with "When you gain this during your action phase", or something similar.  Then you also don't have weird things like Swindler making you discard during your own turn (although that would be funny).

IMO, changing from "when you gain" to "when you gain this during your action phase" is a really big difference.  Maybe it's OK for Mill because it itself is a gainer, but it's a stretch.

As for Swindler, you can usually just toss them a Duchy instead.

[Warfreak2]

Ultimately, even if you can balance an on-gain discard attack, it still isn't a good idea. Cards are supposed to be fun to play with, not just balanced.

[markusin]

Used Land Salesman
Types: Action
Cost: $5
+4 Cards.
While this is in play, when you buy a card, gain a Victory cards costing less than it.

I really do think the in-play clause is neat.  It's a penalty that sometimes is a bonus.  It could support unusual early-greening strategies.  Not much to say about it -- I just like it a lot.

So your attention to this card has enhanced my own interest in this card. I find it fairly balanced as is in the context of an early-greening card in Terminal Draw BM. Gaining a Duchy every time you gain a Gold bloats your deck with a card that gets in the way of the draw, quickly making this as effective as Smithy for drawing treasure. Without good deck filtering, you choke hard.

But, I want to talk about its endgame potential now. Seen in another way, this is a Hunting Grounds fused with a Haggler that forces you to gain Victory cards. The Massive draw looks great for an engine, but the Haggler effect looks great for payload. So I see a big balance issue regarding its megaturn potential. In games using this, I'll want to build up a strong engine, then get a whole bunch of these. The next turn, I put 3 or 4 of these in play, and now I get a bunch of Duchies if I buy a card over $5 and a bunch of estates when I buy a card over $2. It could be bonkers. Just like with Bridge, Goons, and Merchant Guild, this is a terminal action that you want as many copies of in play as possible. But Bridge, Goons, and Merchant Guild act as obstacles to your draw. This is the opposite; it gives 4 cards on play! That's enough to make you Throne your village over this to ensure you have the actions to get as many of these in play as possible.

So I'm thinking that the part below the line is ill-suited for a card that draws more cards, at least as many as this one does. If this must be a draw card, it should give at most 3 cards on play. +2 cards might end up being the balanced number in the end, with a drop in cost if necessary.

With all that said, I like the bottom effect enough to consider voting for this.

[WanderingWinder]

Cross-posted: One thing I'd like to note is about themedness. I think rather than trying to shoehorn into the noted themes, just make the card feel like it belongs in the expansion. Someone made a comment that they didn't vote for one of the prosperity cards because it only had the two minor themes. Well, this may be more than enough for me, but the point is, it used VP tokens, and to my mind, any card using VP tokens is Prosperity-feeling, even if that was only originally on three cards. Likewise, any duration card will feel seaside, most choice cards are going to feel intrigue, on-gain or on-buy stuff will feel Hinterlands; of course, whether these effects feel like they fit on the card or have been tacked on is another important issue, but I don't think some strict 'it isn't on the list' thing makes for a fun game. Just my two cents.

[Asper]

I really, really don't get where all the love for Mill comes from. The only thing hinterlands-y about this card is at the same time the biggest first player advantage you can imagine. Picture having a 5/2 opening with the first player buying a Mill and tell me you still think it's a good idea.

If player one opens 5/2 (a 1/12 chance of happening), then there's only a 1/2 chance it even affects player 2.  Only 1/6 of that 1/2 chance will actually hit a 5 opening (granted that does really suck).  The other 5/6 of the 1/2 chance that it matters will only change a 4/3 opening to a 3/3 opening, which usually is not a huge difference (especially considering how big of a difference the opening draws often make with things like Mountebank, Chapel, etc.).  If player 2 opens 5/2 and player one 2/5, then that also hits it down to a 2/3 opening (again, really sucks), but that's also only a 1/144 chance of happening.  Actually, this is the worst case, because then player 2 knows (usually) to get a Mill since his opponent opened with $2.  The other case is that player 2 gets 5/2 and player 1 gets 3/4, which reduces player 1's split to 3/3.

The opening discard attack only matters in 1/12 games with Mill in them, and in 5/6 of those 1/12 games (5/72 games total), it only reduces a 3/4 opening to 3/3.  Often times that doesn't make a difference at all, even in those 5/72 games; opening double $3's on a 3/4 split is not uncommon.  It's only 1/72 games where one player can have a 5/2 split crushed to 3/2.

Remember that cards can be tweaked as well.  It would be easy to fix it with "When you gain this during your action phase", or something similar.  Then you also don't have weird things like Swindler making you discard during your own turn (although that would be funny).

I forgot this forum doesn't care about games with more than two players...

If you change it to "during your action phase", Mill itself will usually be the only card that triggers that. Just a few cards can make you gain a 5$ during your action phase, and all of them either make you trash a non-starting card for it or are difficult to get (edit: Or need cost reduction/need opponent to gain Mill/need to save up Coin tokens). So effectively, "when you gain this during your action phase" equals changing Mill's action part to:
"+1 Action. Each other player draws a card. Gain a card costing up to 5$. If it is a Mill, each other player discards down to 3 cards.".
The real difference is that this would at least give it the attack type and make it possible to use reactions against it.

Everything else is just trying to make it a hinterlands fit.

[XerxesPraelor]

I did some playtesting, and Shaman actually seems balanced when its cost is boosted to $5. I used it as a way to get to Margraves all the time, someone else used it as an enabler of crossroads/embassy, and the third person ignored it completely and went for spice merchant / IGG. The third person won. It's only one game, but it doesn't seem too powerful, and I think it's different enough from sage in that it lets you choose which you get to be interesting.

Playtesting inn now.

[Gveoniz]

Clairvoyant
Types: Action
Cost: $3
+1 Action. Look at the top card of your deck. You may put it into your hand. Otherwise, +$1 and either discard it or put it back. Look through your discard pile and put a card from it or your hand at the bottom of your deck.

I play tested this and set up a KC-KC-bridge-bridge-bridge hand in about 17 turn with minor support from cellar, but no trashing. All of the card used are non hinterland cards so I don't know how it work in the set itself. In a trimmed deck it is not so useful though so I think it can be said to fit hinterland for dealing with larger deck.

I think it is more complicated than necessary, It can be fix if it is just cantrip or some other simple effects. The first half as it is now seems to be slightly weaker than oasis but with more flexibility to put back cards or use it as cantrip. The bottom part seems to be mainly for setting up combo but I can't think of any more major use s for that.

(The putting back thing is also useful for shuffle control, so as not to draw 2 KC with one bridge and draw the rest of the bridge next hand which misses the reshuffle when I forgot to count the deck the first time I tried it.)

[scott_pilgrim]

I really, really don't get where all the love for Mill comes from. The only thing hinterlands-y about this card is at the same time the biggest first player advantage you can imagine. Picture having a 5/2 opening with the first player buying a Mill and tell me you still think it's a good idea.

If player one opens 5/2 (a 1/12 chance of happening), then there's only a 1/2 chance it even affects player 2.  Only 1/6 of that 1/2 chance will actually hit a 5 opening (granted that does really suck).  The other 5/6 of the 1/2 chance that it matters will only change a 4/3 opening to a 3/3 opening, which usually is not a huge difference (especially considering how big of a difference the opening draws often make with things like Mountebank, Chapel, etc.).  If player 2 opens 5/2 and player one 2/5, then that also hits it down to a 2/3 opening (again, really sucks), but that's also only a 1/144 chance of happening.  Actually, this is the worst case, because then player 2 knows (usually) to get a Mill since his opponent opened with $2.  The other case is that player 2 gets 5/2 and player 1 gets 3/4, which reduces player 1's split to 3/3.

The opening discard attack only matters in 1/12 games with Mill in them, and in 5/6 of those 1/12 games (5/72 games total), it only reduces a 3/4 opening to 3/3.  Often times that doesn't make a difference at all, even in those 5/72 games; opening double $3's on a 3/4 split is not uncommon.  It's only 1/72 games where one player can have a 5/2 split crushed to 3/2.

Remember that cards can be tweaked as well.  It would be easy to fix it with "When you gain this during your action phase", or something similar.  Then you also don't have weird things like Swindler making you discard during your own turn (although that would be funny).

I forgot this forum doesn't care about games with more than two players...

If you change it to "during your action phase", Mill itself will usually be the only card that triggers that. Just a few cards can make you gain a 5$ during your action phase, and all of them either make you to trash a non-starting card for it or are difficult to get (edit: Or need cost reduction/need opponent to gain Mill/need to save up Coin tokens). So effectively, "when you gain this during your action phase" equals changing Mill's action part to:
"+1 Action. Each other player draws a card. Gain a card costing up to 5$. If it is a Mill, each other player discards down to 3 cards.".
The real difference is that this would at least give it the attack type and make it possible to use reactions against it.

Everything else is just trying to make it a hinterlands fit.

Hmm...For reference, here are the probabilities that at least one player has a 5/2 opening (or 2/5 opening) reduced to a 3/2 (or 2/3) opening:

2-player: 2*(1-(11/12)^1)/12=0.013889
3-player: 3*(1-(11/12)^2)/12=0.039931
4-player: 4*(1-(11/12)^3)/12=0.076582
5-player: 5*(1-(11/12)^4)/12=0.122472
6-player: 6*(1-(11/12)^5)/12=0.176386

I don't really think any cards were designed taking 5-6 players into consideration.  The 3-4 player odds still seem very low to me, not something that I would hate the card for.  The 13.9% chance that only one player opens 5/2 (in a 2-player game) on a board with a dominating $5 card is much more common, and I feel like that's almost always a bigger concern than getting a $3 card rather than a Mill.

The suggestion to only trigger the gain during the action phase was probably a bad one, I didn't really put much thought into it.

Used Land Salesman
Types: Action
Cost: $5
+4 Cards.
While this is in play, when you buy a card, gain a Victory cards costing less than it.

I really do think the in-play clause is neat.  It's a penalty that sometimes is a bonus.  It could support unusual early-greening strategies.  Not much to say about it -- I just like it a lot.

So your attention to this card has enhanced my own interest in this card. I find it fairly balanced as is in the context of an early-greening card in Terminal Draw BM. Gaining a Duchy every time you gain a Gold bloats your deck with a card that gets in the way of the draw, quickly making this as effective as Smithy for drawing treasure. Without good deck filtering, you choke hard.

But, I want to talk about its endgame potential now. Seen in another way, this is a Hunting Grounds fused with a Haggler that forces you to gain Victory cards. The Massive draw looks great for an engine, but the Haggler effect looks great for payload. So I see a big balance issue regarding its megaturn potential. In games using this, I'll want to build up a strong engine, then get a whole bunch of these. The next turn, I put 3 or 4 of these in play, and now I get a bunch of Duchies if I buy a card over $5 and a bunch of estates when I buy a card over $2. It could be bonkers. Just like with Bridge, Goons, and Merchant Guild, this is a terminal action that you want as many copies of in play as possible. But Bridge, Goons, and Merchant Guild act as obstacles to your draw. This is the opposite; it gives 4 cards on play! That's enough to make you Throne your village over this to ensure you have the actions to get as many of these in play as possible.

So I'm thinking that the part below the line is ill-suited for a card that draws more cards, at least as many as this one does. If this must be a draw card, it should give at most 3 cards on play. +2 cards might end up being the balanced number in the end, with a drop in cost if necessary.

With all that said, I like the bottom effect enough to consider voting for this.

I like this card a lot as well, but I agree that the endgame potential could make it too strong.  In particular, I think Colony games make it dominating; the ability to gain a Province when buying Colony seems like too much.

I understand the problem with it being a big draw card, but if it becomes a terminal money card as you suggest, then it may be too similar to Haggler.  So here's something else that I'm thinking: "While this is in play, when you buy a card that is not a victory card, gain a victory card costing less than it."  Then you can't rake in quite as many victory points by having multiple of them in play.  With four of them in play, you could still get a Gold and four Duchies, but this doesn't feel nearly as bad as a Province and four Duchies (12 VP instead of 18).  Or compared to maybe the double Province turn you would have had which could have been 36 VP, it's only 24 VP.  Actually that's a lot still, so maybe that's not the best fix...just a thought.

Another interesting case to consider is Duke, where you really want as many $5 victory cards as you can get.


Edit: My probabilities can't be right, because a 50-player game has higher than 100% chance that that happens...I'll try to fix that (I think what I did is an overestimate though).

Edit 2: The probabilities I gave are definitely overestimates, but I don't think they overestimate by much (there are a few cases that get counted multiple times).  I can't think of a clever way to count those cases, but I don't think it affects my argument...

[eHalcyon]

Commenting on two other cards.  I also want to talk more about Used Land Salesman, since many people here still say it's too strong but I am still unconvinced about that.  Hm.

Thrift Shop
Types: Action
Cost: $6
+1 Action. +$2. If this is not the first time you played Thrift Shop this turn, you may gain a card from the Thrift Shop mat.
When you gain or play this, place a card costing up to $5 from the Supply onto the Thrift Shop mat.

Clarification: There is only one community Thrift Shop mat. Each player does not have his own.

I previously said that this was interesting and that I'd have to think more on it.

So, this is an action Silver.  It lets you gain $5s, but to do that you need at least two Thrift Shops (or TR/KC/Proc) and you need to line them up together.

There is some confusion for me on timing.  Suppose I am playing Thrift Shop for the second time this turn.  It says "when you gain or play this"... so can I place a card on the mat first, because executing the top portion of the card?  I guess it doesn't matter so much in the long run.  If I am playing TS for the second time, I could have used the first time to mat the card I want.

I'm thinking now that the chance to gain $5s is great, but you have to jump through too many hoops with Thrift Shop.  Make it $5, maybe?

Pilgrimage
Types: Action
Cost: $3
+1 Action. +2 Buys.
While this is in play, when you gain a Victory card, Victory cards cost $1 less, but not less than $0.

I really liked the concept at first.  It's wacky, but I felt like it could work.  Not with +1 Action and +2 Buys, as I and others have pointed out, but maybe as a terminal or with just a single Buy.

Recent comments have me rethinking it though.  Tables called it a "win more" card in his video.  The player who is already winning gets this card and just wins more by being better able to use it.  The player who is behind gets this and can't do anything with it.  I am not fully convinced though.  I can see one player ignoring this and pulling ahead while another player falls behind, with the intention of using this later to jump back in with a big turn.

But overall, maybe the power curve is just too much.  The in-play effect stacks spectacularly.  I don't think this is "terribroken" but maybe it's just too narrow an effect and not as interesting as I first thought.  Since it only helps with buying Victory cards, maybe it doesn't really change strategies in general.  Pilgrimage would play best in engines geared towards a megaturn that can play multiples of these with enough +Buys to close out the game.  It doesn't really do much else... in games where only 1 copy or two helps you out, existing cost reducers already fill the same niche.