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[LastFootnote]

Danse Macabre
Types: Action
Cost: $4
You may play an Action from your hand for none of its effects. If you do, +4 Cards and +1 Action.
When you buy this, trash it.
When you trash this, gain 2 cheaper cards of different costs.

"Play an Action from your hand for non of its effects" seems like unnecessary wording confusion. Why not simply "You may discard an action card. If you do.." Very slightly more powerful, because you have a chance of drawing that action card again, but I doubt that would make the difference between balanced and overpowered.

I strongly agree and I suggested this change to the card's author before the ballot was posted. No dice.

But a a big drawer, having to "play" another action is actually a significant check to its power.

Sure, but "playing it for none of its effects" is so inelegant.

[SirPeebles]

Danse Macabre
Types: Action
Cost: $4
You may play an Action from your hand for none of its effects. If you do, +4 Cards and +1 Action.
When you buy this, trash it.
When you trash this, gain 2 cheaper cards of different costs.

"Play an Action from your hand for non of its effects" seems like unnecessary wording confusion. Why not simply "You may discard an action card. If you do.." Very slightly more powerful, because you have a chance of drawing that action card again, but I doubt that would make the difference between balanced and overpowered.

I strongly agree and I suggested this change to the card's author before the ballot was posted. No dice.

But a a big drawer, having to "play" another action is actually a significant check to its power.

Sure, but "playing it for none of its effects" is so inelegant.

That I agree with.  It is also confusing.  If you "play" an Attack, does it trigger Moats?  Does it trigger Urchins?  Does it count towards Conspirator or Peddler?  Can you top deck it with Scheme?  Do the "While in play" effects count?

[GendoIkari]

Danse Macabre
Types: Action
Cost: $4
You may play an Action from your hand for none of its effects. If you do, +4 Cards and +1 Action.
When you buy this, trash it.
When you trash this, gain 2 cheaper cards of different costs.

"Play an Action from your hand for non of its effects" seems like unnecessary wording confusion. Why not simply "You may discard an action card. If you do.." Very slightly more powerful, because you have a chance of drawing that action card again, but I doubt that would make the difference between balanced and overpowered.

I strongly agree and I suggested this change to the card's author before the ballot was posted. No dice.

But a a big drawer, having to "play" another action is actually a significant check to its power.

You make a good point... how about "set aside another action card from your hand.... at the end of your turn, discard all actions set aside this way." Maybe a few more total words than "Play an Action from your hand for none of its effects", but a lot cleaner.

[eHalcyon]

Stronghold
Cost: $6
Worth 1 VP for every 2 Spoils in your deck (rounded down).
When you gain this, gain 3 Spoils.

If you never use your Spoils, each Stronghold adds 4 dead cards to your deck.  IIRC there are 15 Spoils total, so it can be worth up to 7VP.  Seems like you'd stall pretty quickly if you tried to make Stronghold worth anything significant.  This seems like it would be better used just for some quick cash injection, and then the Stronghold can be fodder for TfB.  The VP might be nice near the end of the game if you can quickly gain 2 or more Strongholds, making each Stronghold a Duchy or better.  It does other interesting things to end game Duchy dancing, in that you can grab Strongholds for potential VP as well as adding economy to your deck to give you a better chance of grabbing that last Province.

I really like this.  There is a surprising amount of strategy packed into a very simple card.

I want to discuss this card a bit more.  Almost everyone seems to have dismissed it.  The issue that people are bringing up is that it turns Spoils into dead cards.  But I can think of plenty of ways that Stronghold is useful.  There will certainly be times when you need an economic boost, where 3 Spoils and a dead card are better than just 1 Gold -- particularly in the end game when you're not likely to see that Gold more than once anyway.  Stronghold itself can be given over to TfB.

It's also interesting during end game Duchy dancing.  Instead of getting a Duchy, maybe you grab a Stronghold to greatly improve your Province-buying ability.  With various Spoils-gainers, you can maintain the number of Spoils in your deck so that Stronghold is still worth points.

Then there may be games where you can play a Stronghold-specific strategy, aiming to mega-turn and get a bunch of them at once.  A single Stronghold is just 1VP, but the second one makes them 3VP each, the third 4VP each, the fourth 6VP each (unless the Spoils run out, of course).  And even if you aim to get VP out of Stronghold, you can still use your Spoils because you can gain them back with future Stronghold purchases.

If it really is too weak, a simple price adjustment might be all that is needed.  Make it cost $5.  But here's something to consider -- with $6, you can buy Masterpiece and get 3 Silvers.  This gives Stronghold and 3 Spoils.  That's actually pretty close on par, I think.  Spoils and Silver are very roughly on par, and I think the potential VP and higher value for TfB make Stronghold itself better than Masterpiece, which is just a $3 Copper.

[Nic]

"Play an Action from your hand for non of its effects" seems like unnecessary wording confusion. Why not simply "You may discard an action card. If you do.." Very slightly more powerful, because you have a chance of drawing that action card again, but I doubt that would make the difference between balanced and overpowered.

I strongly agree and I suggested this change to the card's author before the ballot was posted. No dice.

But a a big drawer, having to "play" another action is actually a significant check to its power.

You make a good point... how about "set aside another action card from your hand.... at the end of your turn, discard all actions set aside this way." Maybe a few more total words than "Play an Action from your hand for none of its effects", but a lot cleaner.

Oh c'mon.   

Okay, I get why you can't discard the action. But what's wrong with "You may set an Action aside . . . discard it at the end of your turn."? Also, this is pretty much better than Palanquin at a cheaper cost, especially if there are Ruins about. I'm not sure the inability to buy it is a strong enough restriction. Maybe push it up to $5, so you can't Workshop them or Remodel Estates.

[scott_pilgrim]

If it really is too weak, a simple price adjustment might be all that is needed.  Make it cost $5.  But here's something to consider -- with $6, you can buy Masterpiece and get 3 Silvers.  This gives Stronghold and 3 Spoils.  That's actually pretty close on par, I think.  Spoils and Silver are very roughly on par, and I think the potential VP and higher value for TfB make Stronghold itself better than Masterpiece, which is just a $3 Copper.

I feel like this comparison is too rough to be meaningful anyway, but even if it's not, it still doesn't work.  I thought that people generally say Gold is preferable to Masterpiece at $6, so if Stronghold is supposed to be roughly equal to a $6 Masterpiece, then it's worse than Gold.  The whole point of Masterpiece is that the benefit scales with the price.  If Masterpiece was just a $6 Copper that said "When you buy this, gain three Silvers", it would be a pretty bad card, so you're not doing much to convince me of the power level of Stronghold by comparing it to that.

Anyway, I think my main issue with Stronghold is not that it's weak, just that it doesn't feel exciting to me.  In most games I expect you just get it for 3 Spoils.  Pillage already gives us the one-shot Spoils-gainer aspect, and I doubt the victory points amount to much in most games.

[nopawnsintended]

Most concerning: One problematic card that you missed is Stonemason. Hitting $6 for a Stonemason and two DMs seems pretty darn strong. Talisman is also! You'd trash the first one, but gain the second. I definitely think that Band of Misfits should be counted, since it can act like DM easily. Rogue is also pretty easy combo, since DM trashes on-buy.

I knew I had missed some, and I was thinking about how strong Stonemason's interaction would be.  Rogue is a pretty easy combo, but you do have to wait for it for a while.  Good point on BoM.

Otherwise, you make good points. But, I think I end up with a different conclusion. The way I see it, DM could be WAY overpowered with cheap gainers like Workshop, Ironworks, and Armory. And, it could be mildly OP with some other gainers. To me, it goes beyond "combo" territory and into "broken interaction" territory. But, that's not to say it's not salvageable -- with some minor tweaks of vanilla bonuses, it could be a very reasonable card.

I think we reach the same conclusion.  Not sure if I expressed like this anywhere, but this is exactly my sentiment.

[AJD]

Anyway, I think my main issue with Stronghold is not that it's weak, just that it doesn't feel exciting to me.  In most games I expect you just get it for 3 Spoils.  Pillage already gives us the one-shot Spoils-gainer aspect, and I doubt the victory points amount to much in most games.

A possibility is to up the points-to-Spoils ratio? That might make it overpowered with Bandit Camp, but more than Feodum is overpowered with Masterpiece? I dunno.

[AJD]

Possession says "any cards of his that are trashed." "Of his" is not a clearly defined term in Dominion as far as I know. Is a card that he bought, but hasn't yet gained, "his"? One could easily argue either way. Pretty sure Possession is the only card to say "cards of his", and it never matters in the official cards exactly when it becomes "his."

Market Square, I think? Presumably worded that way just-in-case Donald ever wrote a card that allows you to trash from the supply, so you couldn't use that just to activate your Market Squares.

[eHalcyon]

If it really is too weak, a simple price adjustment might be all that is needed.  Make it cost $5.  But here's something to consider -- with $6, you can buy Masterpiece and get 3 Silvers.  This gives Stronghold and 3 Spoils.  That's actually pretty close on par, I think.  Spoils and Silver are very roughly on par, and I think the potential VP and higher value for TfB make Stronghold itself better than Masterpiece, which is just a $3 Copper.

I feel like this comparison is too rough to be meaningful anyway, but even if it's not, it still doesn't work.  I thought that people generally say Gold is preferable to Masterpiece at $6, so if Stronghold is supposed to be roughly equal to a $6 Masterpiece, then it's worse than Gold.  The whole point of Masterpiece is that the benefit scales with the price.  If Masterpiece was just a $6 Copper that said "When you buy this, gain three Silvers", it would be a pretty bad card, so you're not doing much to convince me of the power level of Stronghold by comparing it to that.

Anyway, I think my main issue with Stronghold is not that it's weak, just that it doesn't feel exciting to me.  In most games I expect you just get it for 3 Spoils.  Pillage already gives us the one-shot Spoils-gainer aspect, and I doubt the victory points amount to much in most games.

My point was not to say that the card is powerful.  People tend to favour cards that are strong and dismiss cards that are weak, as well as shooting down cards that are too strong or too weak.  The first two are bad ways to find interesting cards and the latter two are inappropriate for this particular contest, where we should vote with the understanding that cards will be tweaked.  My point was simply that the card is reasonable.

As far as "interesting" goes, I think that's mostly a matter of personal taste.  I find Stronghold quite interesting because I do think it can have an impact on end game decisions in a way that other cards do not.  The closest is probably Harem.  Only 2VP, but could the Silver make a difference?  Would you be better served buying Gold or Duchy rather than taking the middle ground?  I think Stronghold creates a similar decision for players.  The feel is still different though -- the economy boost is bigger but short-lived, whereas the points are lower but with greater potential. 

[scott_pilgrim]

If it really is too weak, a simple price adjustment might be all that is needed.  Make it cost $5.  But here's something to consider -- with $6, you can buy Masterpiece and get 3 Silvers.  This gives Stronghold and 3 Spoils.  That's actually pretty close on par, I think.  Spoils and Silver are very roughly on par, and I think the potential VP and higher value for TfB make Stronghold itself better than Masterpiece, which is just a $3 Copper.

I feel like this comparison is too rough to be meaningful anyway, but even if it's not, it still doesn't work.  I thought that people generally say Gold is preferable to Masterpiece at $6, so if Stronghold is supposed to be roughly equal to a $6 Masterpiece, then it's worse than Gold.  The whole point of Masterpiece is that the benefit scales with the price.  If Masterpiece was just a $6 Copper that said "When you buy this, gain three Silvers", it would be a pretty bad card, so you're not doing much to convince me of the power level of Stronghold by comparing it to that.

Anyway, I think my main issue with Stronghold is not that it's weak, just that it doesn't feel exciting to me.  In most games I expect you just get it for 3 Spoils.  Pillage already gives us the one-shot Spoils-gainer aspect, and I doubt the victory points amount to much in most games.

My point was not to say that the card is powerful.  People tend to favour cards that are strong and dismiss cards that are weak, as well as shooting down cards that are too strong or too weak.  The first two are bad ways to find interesting cards and the latter two are inappropriate for this particular contest, where we should vote with the understanding that cards will be tweaked.  My point was simply that the card is reasonable.

As far as "interesting" goes, I think that's mostly a matter of personal taste.  I find Stronghold quite interesting because I do think it can have an impact on end game decisions in a way that other cards do not.  The closest is probably Harem.  Only 2VP, but could the Silver make a difference?  Would you be better served buying Gold or Duchy rather than taking the middle ground?  I think Stronghold creates a similar decision for players.  The feel is still different though -- the economy boost is bigger but short-lived, whereas the points are lower but with greater potential. 

I definitely agree that weak cards can be good, my point was just that your comparison didn't show that Stronghold wasn't too weak.  I suspect that it is fine balance-wise, but not because of the comparison to Masterpiece.

And yes, personal taste is a huge component of "interesting", but there is some objectivity in it as well.  I just wanted to try to point to why I personally don't find Stronghold to be exciting.

[SirPeebles]

Possession says "any cards of his that are trashed." "Of his" is not a clearly defined term in Dominion as far as I know. Is a card that he bought, but hasn't yet gained, "his"? One could easily argue either way. Pretty sure Possession is the only card to say "cards of his", and it never matters in the official cards exactly when it becomes "his."

Market Square, I think? Presumably worded that way just-in-case Donald ever wrote a card that allows you to trash from the supply, so you couldn't use that just to activate your Market Squares.

Market Square says "your cards" so that it doesn't activate when opponents trash their cards.

Now, it is also true, as far as I can remember, that the only way any of my cards ever get trashed is if I trash them.  So in that sense, Donald could have said "when you trash a card".  I think one reason he would have avoided this is because many players mistakenly interpret trashing attacks as one player trashing another player's card.  So a player would attack with Saboteur and then try to reveal Market Square.  But with Market Square specifying "your card" it makes those scenarios easier to parse for casual players.

[ConMan]

And now for something completely different - reviews by category!

This time, "VP for cards in trash".

Cultivate
Types: Action – Victory
Cost: $5
+1 Action. Choose one: Trash a Victory card from your hand and gain a Treasure card costing up to $1 more; or trash a Treasure card from your hand and gain a Victory card costing up to $2 more.
This is worth 3 VP if there are at least 4 differently named Victory cards in the trash; otherwise it's worth 1 VP.

So, mainly it's designed to turn Estates into Silvers into Duchies (or more Cultivates) into Gold into Provinces, so it's a cross between Rebuild, Remodel and Upgrade. It's not quite as overpowered as Rebuild, but still probably ok at the $5 mark. However, for it to be worth much in your deck, there need to be 4 different Victory cards in the trash, which in most non-DA games will be this+Estate+Duchy+Province which it's probably not going to be worth doing, and in most DA games will be this+Estate+Duchy+Overgrown Estate, but trashing OE to this will net you a Copper which is just going to be counterproductive. Even with the numbers tweaked, I think this is not that great.

Cemetery
Types: Victory
Cost: $5
Worth 2 VP plus 1 VP for every 2 differently named Action cards in the trash.
When you gain this, trash a card from your hand other than a Cemetery.

Doesn't need the "other than" clause. Has a very slight "original Duke" problem in that the more of them you buy, the more each of them will be worth, although the exponential growth of that is curtailed by the trashing of Action cards and the restriction of differently named. Will be nice in a Looter game, combos madly with Death Cart. But without another trasher, this might be occasionally nice to get some of the early-game Actions out of your deck in exchange for what will effectively be a Duchy, but otherwise quite weak.

Junkyard (B)
Types: Action – Victory
Cost: $5
Choose one: Trash a card from your hand; gain up to 2 cards from the trash with a total cost of up to $5 and trash this.
Worth 1 VP for every 3 Victory cards in the trash.

Can only gain cheap cards from the trash, counter to Graverobber and Rogue, which will probably not be hugely useful (maybe if the total cost were tweaked). Will presumably mostly be used to try to game the point value of itself - so if you lose the Junkyard split, you sacrifice one of yours to make someone else's worth a point less? Still, in an Estate game it will probably scale poorly with number of players, and in a Shelters game it's still probably of marginal use (slight trick of buying it to trash Hovel, then playing it to trash Overgrown Estate). Possibly the best of a mediocre lot.

Clearly one of the things that people expected from DA was a victory card that scaled with cards in the trash, but just as clearly Donald couldn't make it work and the combined minds of f.DS aren't doing that much better. I still think there's a possibility there, but we're still not hitting the mark yet.

[HeavyD]

Quote
Bargain
Types: Reaction
Cost: $1
When you would gain a card, you may discard this. If you do, instead, gain a card costing exactly $1 more than it.

I really like the concept of this card. I would want it to cost $2 if it won, but I like its interaction with junkers, workshop variants, and remodel variants. As far as DA goes, I think this would be fun with Armory, Procession, and especially Rats.

[GeoLib]

Given the volume of submissions in this contest and people complaining about being unable to really give them all enough thought, and especially playtesting, to have an informed opinion, I was thinking that perhaps the next time someone does this they should have a preliminary round in which people vote for the cards they think have the coolest ideas that could be balanced and interesting after playtesting and tweaking. Then the the top ten(?) from this round could be further examined, discussed, and playtested by the community with the focus only on these cards. Tweaks could happen during this time. Finally, people could vote again to determine a winner that would already have proven itself. This seems like a better way to make sure that the winner is a truly interesting and vetted card.

[ConMan]

Reviews by category 2 - Ruins for Benefit:
In this category, I am including any card that directly tries to make it desirable to collect or otherwise use Ruins (e.g. by playing them multiple times or playing the top Ruins), but also cards that seem designed to combo well with Ruins without naming them (e.g. wanting a large number/variety of Action cards, or cards that cost less than a small amount). Also, in each category, I will skip over any cards reviewed for a prior category.

Junkyard (A)
Types: Action – Looter
Cost: $5
+1 Action. You may gain a Ruins, putting it into your hand. Discard any number of cards. +1 Card per card discarded. +1 Card per Action card discarded. You may trash this.
When you trash this, +2 Cards.

So it's like a Cellar, but turns into a Lab for every Action card you chuck, and lets you boost it by taking a Ruins. Almost certainly overpowered, especially in a decently thinned deck in which case it's comparable to Scrying Pool.

Robber Baron
Types: Action – Attack – Looter
Cost: $4
You may discard a Ruins. If you do, +$3 and each other player discards down to 3 cards in hand. Otherwise, gain a Ruins.
When you gain this, gain 2 Ruins.

It takes the principle of Baron, but works on Ruins and has an attack instead of a buy. Cute idea, but I don't know how it would work in practice.

King of the Slums
Types: Action – Looter
Cost: $5
Look at the top 3 cards of the Ruins pile. Gain any number of them, putting them into your hand. Put the rest back in any order. Choose up to 3 Ruins from your hand. Play the first one three times, the second one twice, and the third one once.

A bit too complicated. I think it would be better to make it just Throne Room all three Ruins, and even then you're very much at the mercy of the order of the pile. Also probably needs a means of getting rid of Ruins when you really don't want them any more, otherwise you're going to have far too many of them in your deck. (Also, "Slumlord" is a much more efficient name.)

Archaeologist
Types: Action – Looter
Cost: $5
+1 Card. +1 Action. You may trash the top card of the Ruins pile.
While this card is in play, when you play an Action card, play a copy of the top card of the Ruins pile.

Like the previous, way too dependent on the order of Ruins, even if it has the ability to adjust them. And then if you do, the tracking could become a nightmare. But the idea that with this in play, every Market Square becomes a Market, or every Village an activated City, or every Smithy a Village/Smithy combo? Scarily powerful. This is one of those ideas that I *want* to work, and I have a half-idea about how to do so which is not quite as crazy as this but still slightly so, but I don't think it can every really work as intended.

Raid
Types: Action – Looter
Cost: $3
Choose one: Play and trash up to 2 Action cards from your hand; or gain any number of Action cards from the trash costing up to $3 and play them in any order.
When you trash this, each other player gains a Ruins.

Actually, this is not too bad, although I *think* that it may be possible to create an infinite (or at least annoyingly large and hard to track) loop with these somehow. Also, it needs some clarification on two points: first, do you (play 2 cards) then (trash the 2 cards), or do you (play and then trash) 2 cards; second, is the cost restriction per-card or total?

Angry Mob
Types: Action – Attack – Looter
Cost: $4
+1 Action. +1 Buy. Each player gains a Ruins, putting it into his hand.
While this is in play, when you buy a Ruins, you may trash this. If you do, gain a Mob Boss from the Mob Boss pile.

Mob Boss
Types: Action
Cost: $0*
+1 Buy. Reveal your hand. For each Ruins revealed, +1 Card and +$1. You may return a Ruins from your hand to the Supply. If you do, +1 Action. (This is not in the Supply.)

I ... think this works, although as far as self-upgrading cards go it's not quite as great as Madman or Mercenary. Self-comboes reasonably decently, and also self-counters to some small extent.

Garderobe
Types: Action – Looter
Cost: $2
+1 Action. +$2. Gain a Ruins, putting it into your hand. You may play an Action card from your hand costing up to $3.

Eh. Kind of cute in that once you've picked up a couple of Ruined Markets it can keep getting more of itself. Also, a hand of these and a Watchtower would be a terrifying experience. I don't mind this.

Drug
Types: Action – Victory – Looter
Cost: $5
+1 Card. +1 Action. +$1. You may gain a Ruins. If you do, +1 Card. You may gain a Ruins. If you do, +1 Action.
Worth –3 VP if every other player has fewer Ruins than you.

Terrible name. Interesting effect. Probably a little too weak to work though - in order to be particuarly useful, you have to really flood your deck with junk.

Blood Feud
Types:
Action – Attack – Looter
Cost: $4
Choose one: +1 Action, +$1, and each player (including you) gains a Ruins, putting it in his hand; or reveal up to 3 cards from your hand, play the revealed Action cards in any order, then trash all the revealed cards.

In a similar vein to Raid, but again with a pretty dodgy name. The second choice is a bit odd - clearly the aim is to let you play the Ruins before trashing them, as well as trashing a bunch of random junk. I think it's ok, although I feel like there's a powerful combo that I'm missing.

Mendicant
Types: Action – Looter
Cost: $2
+1 Card. +1 Action. Gain a Ruins, putting it into your hand. You may play any number of Ruins from your hand. If you played two or more, +1 Card.

[/quote]
Similar to Garderobe. Probably about as ok as it too. More useful when there's an Attack/Looter around though.

[Nic]

If I had my druthers, it would look like [cantrip or whatever] + "Gain and play a Ruins from the Supply [or trash?]. At the end of your turn, you may return any number of Ruins cards from play to the Supply in any order." Here you can play Ruins from your hand as well, and then toss them back into the Supply to clear out junk from your deck. I think that alone makes it a little more interesting than Hatter, with fewer tracking issues than Ironmonger, but otherwise it stays faithful to the Archaeologist that was submitted. I don't mean to tweak the card in the middle of the contest; I'm just saying that it can be tweaked, and people would come up with more clever things to do with this. It's definitely in the 'Indulgence' rather than the 'Hinterland' category, and if people like the idea they should vote for it with a clear conscience.

That could work, except you probably wouldn't have Ruins in your hand unless there another looter on the Board. I'd tweak it so that it can play up to 3 Ruins from either the top of the Ruins pile or your hand (and combinations of those), but only lets you return 1 of them. It's kind of unfair to ignore that the other RfB cards are actually a lot closer to the fixed Archaeologist than Archaeologist. Plus, the fixes all seem to detract from the original purpose of Archaeologist.

Now that you mention that, it looks like more like Mendicant now than anything. I may not be a very good tweaker. 

I think we're just going to get a community designed RfB card that improves on Hatter in the end.

That would make me very happy, actually. From the secret history, I get the impression that DXV had a card like that in mind when he created the Ruins. If we come out of this contest with a card that makes Ruined Village feel mechanically different from a Confusion, I'll consider this a success.

Raid
Types: Action – Looter
Cost: $3
Choose one: Play and trash up to 2 Action cards from your hand; or gain any number of Action cards from the trash costing up to $3 and play them in any order.
When you trash this, each other player gains a Ruins.

Okay, this guy actually isn't RfB, but I was going to say something about it anyway. I like it, and I think the cost is appropriate (comparable to a Throne Room with some severe restrictions). I like it, but I'm leery of the tracking issues. I have trouble keeping track of my coins when playing a lot of Ironworks, and here you have to keep track of coins, buys, number of Bridges played &c. without any reference to look at.
Because of the cost restriction, you have an incentive to use cheap cards, and to keep your cards from being stolen you have an incentive to play them in multiples. That means you want a deck with quite a few Raids, and that means the most attractive target for your Raid could easily be other Raids. With a '. . . from your hand other than Raid' clause, it's probably too weak. Without one, it has the same binary tree issues as a Golem that can Golem other Golems. Probably even worse than that, since Raid plays cards when trashing and retrieving.

Angry Mob
Types: Action – Attack – Looter
Cost: $4
+1 Action. +1 Buy. Each player gains a Ruins, putting it into his hand.
While this is in play, when you buy a Ruins, you may trash this. If you do, gain a Mob Boss from the Mob Boss pile.

Mob Boss
Types: Action
Cost: $0*
+1 Buy. Reveal your hand. For each Ruins revealed, +1 Card and +$1. You may return a Ruins from your hand to the Supply. If you do, +1 Action. (This is not in the Supply.)

This one is also in the Death Cart vein, so I'm personally not that interested in it. I am curious as to why it needs to be upgraded from something else, especially when the base card can be upgraded the first time you play it, with less opportunity cost than Hermit. It's easy to see why Mercenary and Madman can't be Kingdom cards, but if you added some Ruins-gaining to Mob Boss, the base card is unnecessary.

Given the volume of submissions in this contest and people complaining about being unable to really give them all enough thought, and especially playtesting, to have an informed opinion, I was thinking that perhaps the next time someone does this they should have a preliminary round in which people vote for the cards they think have the coolest ideas that could be balanced and interesting after playtesting and tweaking. Then the the top ten(?) from this round could be further examined, discussed, and playtested by the community with the focus only on these cards. Tweaks could happen during this time. Finally, people could vote again to determine the winner that would already have proven itself. This seems like a better way to make sure that the winner is a truly interested and vetted card.

We have an entire week to playtest. If no one's going to do it in one week, I doubt they'll do it in two. That preliminary round is happening right now, informally. The cards that have the coolest ideas are the cards that are getting talked about the most, and if someone thinks a card is underappreciated, they type up a paragraph or two and post it. I'm also worried about the bias towards safe cards, but I don't think the solution is to double the amount of work LFN has to do. (Of course, the safest card this week is Mortuary, so that's pretty dope.)

[GendoIkari]

"Play an Action from your hand for non of its effects" seems like unnecessary wording confusion. Why not simply "You may discard an action card. If you do.." Very slightly more powerful, because you have a chance of drawing that action card again, but I doubt that would make the difference between balanced and overpowered.

I strongly agree and I suggested this change to the card's author before the ballot was posted. No dice.

But a a big drawer, having to "play" another action is actually a significant check to its power.

You make a good point... how about "set aside another action card from your hand.... at the end of your turn, discard all actions set aside this way." Maybe a few more total words than "Play an Action from your hand for none of its effects", but a lot cleaner.

Oh c'mon.   

Okay, I get why you can't discard the action. But what's wrong with "You may set an Action aside . . . discard it at the end of your turn."? Also, this is pretty much better than Palanquin at a cheaper cost, especially if there are Ruins about. I'm not sure the inability to buy it is a strong enough restriction. Maybe push it up to $5, so you can't Workshop them or Remodel Estates.

Hey I'm not about to read through 10 pages of replies just to make sure my thoughts are unique! But I'm glad to see that I'm not alone in thinking that way. I think it would be a good improvement to the card. Also a tiny bit of a nerf, as it will combo less with Scheme, Horn of Plenty, Peddler, and Conspirator.

[Titandrake]

General comments about all the cards:

I'm not a big fan of counting the trash, or Ruins for benefit. I don't know, it just doesn't seem that interesting to me? It's so hard to make a trash counter work nicely, by design you need some reason to pick it up, and somehow the ways in which people have done that feel so clunky. The ruins for benefit cards have been more interesting, but it's such a nightmare to make it actually work balance wise. I'm thinking, if I were to actually play this card, do I feel accomplished when I make it work, and is the fun I'm getting out of the effect worth it when balanced out with knowing I'm hurting my deck? Somehow very few of the cards have made me feel good in that way.

Secondly, it might just be me, but there's so much complexity everywhere. I know it's Dark Ages, it's to be expected, but still. I call it the Procession problem. What you're doing works mechanically, you can tell there was a reason, but it still feels like a lot of effects tossed together. I think the real issue is that Dark Ages is very synergistic, which makes evaluating an extra card that is to be tossed in a lot harder. In DA it's okay for a card to be a somewhat dud if it contributes; in a fan contest the card needs to pull its own weight.

Anyways. That's the long version of why I feel like the cards in this contest aren't as good as previous rounds. Not because people are designing worse, but because Dark Ages is a really hard set to design well. It breaks all the rules, so it's a lot easier to go over a rule you shouldn't...

[ConMan]

Anyways. That's the long version of why I feel like the cards in this contest aren't as good as previous rounds. Not because people are designing worse, but because Dark Ages is a really hard set to design well. It breaks all the rules, so it's a lot easier to go over a rule you shouldn't...

This is very true. One thing I've noticed with many of these cards is that they either don't work really well with either Shelters or Ruins in the mix, or they *only* work well with them, and while you can argue for non-DA cards to be fairly Shelter/Ruin-agnostic, a card designed to be part of Dark Ages needs to take both sides into account.

[Nic]

Anyways. That's the long version of why I feel like the cards in this contest aren't as good as previous rounds. Not because people are designing worse, but because Dark Ages is a really hard set to design well. It breaks all the rules, so it's a lot easier to go over a rule you shouldn't...

This is very true. One thing I've noticed with many of these cards is that they either don't work really well with either Shelters or Ruins in the mix, or they *only* work well with them, and while you can argue for non-DA cards to be fairly Shelter/Ruin-agnostic, a card designed to be part of Dark Ages needs to take both sides into account.

Ooh. Just noticed that Bricklayer is a beast of an opening buy in a Shelters game. I certainly don't think it's broken, but you make a good point.

[Titandrake]

Anyways. That's the long version of why I feel like the cards in this contest aren't as good as previous rounds. Not because people are designing worse, but because Dark Ages is a really hard set to design well. It breaks all the rules, so it's a lot easier to go over a rule you shouldn't...

This is very true. One thing I've noticed with many of these cards is that they either don't work really well with either Shelters or Ruins in the mix, or they *only* work well with them, and while you can argue for non-DA cards to be fairly Shelter/Ruin-agnostic, a card designed to be part of Dark Ages needs to take both sides into account.

Ooh. Just noticed that Bricklayer is a beast of an opening buy in a Shelters game. I certainly don't think it's broken, but you make a good point.

It's not broken but it has so much more variance in a Shelters game that I'm not sure it can work nicely. Chapel, Steward, and Remake all have opening variance, but you always trash/upgrade 2 cards. If Bricklayer hits 3 or more cards, it's so much better, because you've both trashed your Shelters and drawn some Coppers. I like the idea a lot, but I don't think it's easily fixable.

[SirPeebles]

And now for something completely different - reviews by category!

This time, "VP for cards in trash".

Cemetery
Types: Victory
Cost: $5
Worth 2 VP plus 1 VP for every 2 differently named Action cards in the trash.
When you gain this, trash a card from your hand other than a Cemetery.

Doesn't need the "other than" clause. Has a very slight "original Duke" problem in that the more of them you buy, the more each of them will be worth, although the exponential growth of that is curtailed by the trashing of Action cards and the restriction of differently named. Will be nice in a Looter game, combos madly with Death Cart. But without another trasher, this might be occasionally nice to get some of the early-game Actions out of your deck in exchange for what will effectively be a Duchy, but otherwise quite weak.

Quadratic growth, not exponential.  There really is a tremendous difference.

[ConMan]

Quadratic growth, not exponential.  There really is a tremendous difference.

In the limit, sure. At these scales ... yeah still probably enough that I spoke terribly wrongly. As someone who normally prides himself of using accurate terminology in cases such as this, mea culpa.

[markusin]

Given the volume of submissions in this contest and people complaining about being unable to really give them all enough thought, and especially playtesting, to have an informed opinion, I was thinking that perhaps the next time someone does this they should have a preliminary round in which people vote for the cards they think have the coolest ideas that could be balanced and interesting after playtesting and tweaking. Then the the top ten(?) from this round could be further examined, discussed, and playtested by the community with the focus only on these cards. Tweaks could happen during this time. Finally, people could vote again to determine the winner that would already have proven itself. This seems like a better way to make sure that the winner is a truly interested and vetted card.

We have an entire week to playtest. If no one's going to do it in one week, I doubt they'll do it in two. That preliminary round is happening right now, informally. The cards that have the coolest ideas are the cards that are getting talked about the most, and if someone thinks a card is underappreciated, they type up a paragraph or two and post it. I'm also worried about the bias towards safe cards, but I don't think the solution is to double the amount of work LFN has to do. (Of course, the safest card this week is Mortuary, so that's pretty dope.)

Yeah, most of us don't have time to playtest our favourites. Even if we do, we might get the feeling that we're being unfair to all the cards we didn't playtest. Making the contests 2 weeks long can solve some of those issues, but it just makes the contest drag, doubling its length. This setup seems alright for now.

As a side note, I wouldn't consider Mortuary the safest card on the ballot. It looks like a simple, 1 card non-terminal trasher, but its "while in play" clause can provide you with additional card draw if you trash cards later on in your turn. That will often be from other Mortuaries, yes, but with the right mix of DA cards things might get pretty crazy. Heck, just playing a Pillage makes it give you card draw. It depends on the board in a really DA kind of way.