Twelve entries, an appropriate number for the theme!
Alright I've tweaked the card a bit:
Now each individual effect is reasonably a $4.5, which is nice because it offers a way to bring those 4 cards into the game where right now they can't be standalone. A mix of cards that could have been. Spring is inspired by Wind's gift, Summer by Fire's gift, Autumn was Earth's gift inspired but now its more Field's gift, and now Winter is Snowy Village inspired.
A nice strong card, and I think fairly-priced. All four of its effects are definitely good cards. My only concern is with the Winter effect. Since you can only get the +3 Actions in about 1/4 of the game, it would be hard to take full advantage of that. If there are other villages in the game, then a lot of the time you'll end up with enough extra Actions anyways, so that those +Actions would be redundant - while if there aren't any other villages, then you have a case where extra Actions are only available in Winter, so you wouldn't want a whole lot of non-terminal Actions anyways. Still, it's a good card, and the seasonal theme works nicely
Finalist
Compost • $4 • Action - Season
Trash a card from your hand.
In Spring, you may also trash a Copper from your hand.
In Summer, gain a card costing exactly $1 more than it.
In Autumn, gain a card that shares a type with it; if it costs more, trash this.
In Winter, gain a Victory card that costs less than it.
Power remodeler/trasher. Designed with a 4-turn season (16-turn year) in mind, starting with T1/2 being in winter, T3 starting spring.
the autumn one might be a little too bananas. idk.
Tried to color-match one of segura's old season cards, which iirc used asper's original colors.
I think Autumn is definitely overpowered without some limitation. You could turn an Estate into a Province or Colony, or a Copper into a Gold or Platinum, and with Fortress you could gain any Action card. And there are also times when gaining equal- or lower-cost cards would be beneficial too. It would be especially strong in games with Lurker, Graverobber, and Rogue, where you could rescue Compost and/or the card you trashed from the trash - and since you don't have "differently-named", you could just trash a card for another copy of itself, then rescue the original card. The other three seasons, though, are good effects. Works nicely with a 16-turn year too. In Spring you'll be trashing your Estates and Coppers. Summer is essentially a non-Cantrip version of Upgrade. With Spring starting on turn 3, Winter would start on turn 14. At that point, turning Golds into Duchies would often be a good move
The Autumn effect is the only part that I'm really iffy on. Does the fact that it has to trash itself to upgrade a card compensate for the fact that it can upgrade without any cost-limitation? I think in the end I'm going to have to say that the Autumn effect is too strong for this to be a finalist
My Submission:
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WEREBEAR $5 ACTION - RESERVE - SEASON +4 Cards In Fall and Winter, put this on your Tavern mat.
At the start of your turn, in Spring, Summer, or Fall you may call this for +1 Card in Spring or +2 Cards in Summer.
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A take on Werewolf, it does not do anything different at Night, but instead hibernates during Winter.
Interesting use of the Reserve mat here. The on-play effect is strong, the same as Hunting Grounds. Hunting Grounds has an additional when-trash benefit and doesn't send itself to the Reserve mat, so the fact that it costs a little less than Hunting Grounds is justified. The effect of calling is interesting. I suspect most of the time you'd want to call it at the start of Spring rather than wait until Summer. I would drop the ability to call it during Fall. But, overall, a good card
Finalist
Granary - $4
Victory - Season
1VP
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When you gain this, if it is...
Spring, trash 3 cards you have in play.
Summer, gain a non-Victory card costing up to $5.
Fall or Winter, +1VP, +1 Coffers.
A victory card that has a variable on-buy effect. Encourages early purchases of what amounts to an Estate. Late game it is pretty much a $3 cost 2VP card, but with trash for benefit cards it could be a good purchase.
Definitely a card you'd buy for the on-gain effect. Assuming the 12-turn, starting in Spring version, this would make an interesting opening. You could easily trash 3 Coppers right away in the opening. Maybe even 6 Coppers if you buy it on both T1 and T3, but trashing that many Coppers that soon is often a bad move. Buying it in Summer would essentially be the equivalent of an Event costing $4 that said "Gain a non-Victory card costing up to $5 and an Estate" (unless there's trash-for-benefit of course, which would make this more useful than an Estate). I wouldn't say that late game is equivalent to a $3 cost card, since, if you gain it in your buy phase you can't use the Coffers until your next turn (barring Villa or Calvary), but still, 2 VP for $4 wouldn't be a bad buy near the end of the game. And gaining it during your Action phase would let you use that Coffers on the same turn
FinalistI haven't posted a card in the fan mechanic contests in a while! But that Season idea is very appealing, so I'll take a crack at it. My card is tied with this version of Seasons:
The table show what Season it is for each turn. An average game of Dominion thus ends on the last day of Winter, which is kind of neat. Turn 3, when you have your first deck shuffle and actual cards in it you can use, marks the first day of Spring, to make better use of that Season.
With that being said, here is my card:
This is an interesting take - and also means that if the game extends out to a second "year" (and games longer than 14 turns are by no means uncommon), then it's different in the second Spring vs the first Spring. In the first Spring it's basically a Copper that
double curses - a really strong attack! But the fact that the attack only happens in Spring ameliorates that. Double-cursing would be far too strong if it could happen every turn. In Summer it becomes a slightly-overpriced silver, but then in Fall it's a cheap Gold, and in Winter its even stronger. If you get to a second Spring, it becomes a Platinum that double-curses!
This is a tricky one to judge. I think it's also a bit swingy. Spring lasts from T3-T5. This means that a player who bought this in the opening is guaranteed to be able to play it at least once - but there's also a chance of being able to play it a second time, on T5, with a lucky reshuffle. Furthermore, if the game reaches T15 (start of second Spring), then player 1 will have a really strong advantage, if there are no other cursing attacks or moats. Assume that both players opened with Four-Leaf Clover and both played it only once during first spring. That means there's six Curses left going into T15. Since this is at least as strong as Gold from Fall on, you'll probably have bought up several of these during the game. So, on T15, with Spring starting anew, player 1 is likely to be able to play more than one of these. If they're able to play 3 or more, they'll run out the Curse pile with Platinum-equivalents! Of course, if there are other cursing attacks, then the Curse pile will likely be empty by that point
Overall, I fear this is broken
Going with the original 20 turn year.
Thematically the idea is that the loot diminishes over time with all the Pirates plundering it.
Obviously a controversial card with non-terminal Coffer yield and potentially too strong. You can get the sweet Spring bonus only once but then this is still a powerhouse in Summer. In Fall it is a lousy Ducat and in Winter it does nothing.
One obvious way to nerf it would be to use a 16 turn year.
You could get that Spring bonus twice with a lucky reshuffle on T5, but yes, most of the time you'd only get it once. With the original 20-turn year, it's also pretty uncommon that you'll end up in a second Spring, so you can basically write it off as useless after T15 (well, if this is the only +buy, it might still be useful just for that), but there are plenty of Action cards that become less useful in the late game, so I don't think a Treasure card doing the same thing is bad. I rather like this idea. It kind of reminds me of a reverse Fool's Gold, in that Fool's Gold tends to become more valuable later in the game when it becomes easier to line up multiple copies. An unconditional +1 Buy +3 Coffers at $4 would be massively overpowered, but since you're only going to get that effect once, or twice if you get lucky, that's not a problem. I think this is an interesting card, and well-balanced
Finalist
Like emtzalex's Werebear, this also requires two mats for one card (counting the season tracker as a mat), so that's an interesting bit of extra set-up. The gaining might be fairly weak in a lot of games, since you can typically only accumulate tokens during T3-T6, assuming you're going with the 12-turn year, so it would probably be hard to accumulate enough tokens to make its gaining worthwhile. If the game extends past Winter, it would basically be just a simple +2 Cards - you'd have to go all the way to a second Fall - T19! - to use any tokens accumulated after Winter. Overall, I fear this is a bit weak
EDIT: This (also) uses X-tra's 12-turn version of the season mechanic.
I don't think you need (this is a season card) on the project itself. Technically, it's not even accurate to call it a card, but also, it seems unnecessary to me to reference that at all. I'm not so sure that the project would be useful. Ice Queen is very strong in Winter, but the rest of the year, it becomes a junk card, like a Ruined Village that topdecks itself, and since the gaining is not optional once you buy the project, your deck could end up with lots of these. So, a card that's junk 3/4 of the time and strong the other 1/4 doesn't seem like something I'd want to go for in most games. Although, in games with trash-for-benefit, the $5 cost could be useful, and its auto-topdecking would make it easier to line up with trash-for-benefit cards. But, in most games, I think this would end up being one to avoid
Wrangler
Action/Season - $5
+1 Card
+1 Action
Gain a Horse...
In Summer: to the bottom of your deck
In Autumn: onto your deck
In Winter: to your hand
Rules clarification: In Spring, you Gain a Horse (to your discard pile)
I agree with The Alchemist's comment that it's probably best to explicitly state what happens in Spring. But that wording won't affect the judging. This is definitely a good card. A cantrip Horse-gainer is rather strong. Indeed, just non-terminal Horse gaining in general is - note that none of the official Horse-gainers are unqualified non-terminal - and I like how it works with the season mechanic, with each season bringing the Horse closer to you. In Winter, you have it right away, allowing this to function as a double-lab - or you can save the Horse if you don't need to draw any more cards (or have already drawn your deck), so the added flexibility makes it stronger than a simple +1 Action +3 Cards would be. In Autumn it will often be available on the same turn you play it, but if not, then in your next hand. Summer's is interesting. Gaining to the bottom of your deck is a space not used in any official cards. If you play several of these during a Summer turn (or Throne/KC it), then you'll have a lot of draw lined up for a later turn!
Finalist
I'm in favour of X-tra's 3 turn cycle starting with 2 winters, so that's what this card uses. $4 might be too cheap.
Edit: a better-coloured mock-up.
This is an interesting one. Spring's effect is weaker than Bridge, which adds +$1. Winter is like a Sleigh or Calvary with an extra buy added, and no reaction or on-gain effect. Summer and Autumn's effects are also pretty good for $4. So, overall, I think that this is probably a decent card at $4
This uses The Alchemist's version of Seasons, where we start in winter. To explain the debt cost, I was afraid of weird interactions possibly with cost reducers, but there are no debt cost reducers so it's good. Also, I'm doing a debt-based expansion, so debt cost seemed fun.
Since most games end before turn 15, this is usually at most a +1 card/+4 Action card with an average of about 2 actions across the game. Even in slog games that last, like, 30 turns, sure you'll have that one turn with 10 actions, but that doesn't do much so it doesn't really become oppressive. Now, if it gave cards instead of actions that would be something... but it doesn't. In fact, the main drawback seems to be the fact that even if it gives a lot of actions you need to still rely on drawing it (where with something like Port, drawing is more reliable), so I feel like it's pretty balanced.
Hope it looks interesting, too!
I'm making it cost one less:
So this is basically a free card in the opening. But since it's just a simple cantrip in Spring, and doesn't become a village until Summer, you're probably not going to open with it, unless you have a 5/2 opening with no good $2 cards, making that not a serious issue. It's interesting in that it allows more non-terminal actions to be purchased later in the game, since it automatically becomes a stronger village over time. A simple idea, but very cool. The only part I'm not crazy about is the debt cost, which feels kinda weird, and prevents the use of any gainers for this. The format of the cost icon also looks a bit weird to me, having "0 debt" as the stated cost, but since the variable cost is in debt and not coin, that's probably the best solution. Also, the name is a bit out of place in Dominion, but that's a minor nitpick
Finalist
$4 - Night
In Spring: Gain a card costing up to $4.
In Summer: Exile a card from the Supply costing up to $5.
In Autumn: Gain a gold.
In Winter: Look at the top 6 cards of your deck. Discard any number and put the rest back in any order.
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This is gained to your hand
(instead of to your discard pile)
This submission uses the original 12-turn season (starting with 3 spring turns). The gain to hand helps accommodate it. I wanted it to be a Night card, but also match the cycle through the seasons - starting growth in the Spring, continued growth in the Summer (but it doesn't always grow the way you intended in poor weather, like if you can't gain another of that card to get the one out of Exile), cashing in when you sell crops in the Autumn, and cleaning out the field in Winter.
I'm not overly tied to the name/image of the card, but it's all I've got for now. Maybe you had a strange encounter at night that helped you with your crops! (I had initially called it Crop Circles, but that tied in to the theme of what the card does even less).
Edit: the Summer should be "from the Supply" for the Exile. I'm on mobile at the moment and can't update the picture.
There's one major issue I see here: the fact that you gain this to your hand in Spring would let you instantly pile it out. Then in Summer you could pile out the Duchies, putting them into Exile. Now you only need one more pile to end the game. That seems rather broken. I'd suggest adding "non-Night" to the Spring gaining. I'd also add "non-Victory" to Summer's Exiling, because being able to Exile Duchies seems rather strong for $4. It's a cool idea, but I think that, as it is, it doesn't really work
A lot of good entries in this contest! It was very hard to choose a winner
Winner: Emtzalex's Werebear
First runner-up: Nomorefun's Wrangler
Second runner-up: Segura's Pirate Treasure
Third runner-up: Xen3k's Granary