EMPIRES EXTENSION CONTEST - RESULTS
Lots of cool ideas here. But there can be only one winner. These are the results.
Lease (Action, $3)
+2 Cards
Play a Treasure card from your Lease mat and pay its $. +1 VP per $ you paid.
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When you gain this, put up to two Treasure cards from your hand onto your Lease mat.
First of all, the phrasing. More specifically, the phrase
Play a Treasure card from your Lease mat and pay its $. There is a reason you don't see this on official cards, as this gets very confusing when there are Treasures that let you play other cards. And although Capitalism didn't exist on Empire's release, Crown did and is even part of Empires. As such, it's better to base the effect on the price of the Treasure.
About the effect itself, it looks rather underpowered. If the Lease mat only contains Coppers, playing a Lease yields +2 Cards +1 VP; not very inspiring. And if you wanna use Lease on better Treasures, well, you you have to forego the effect of the Treasure itself for one turn. Not to mention that if you buy a Lease and want to use the below-bar effect in its fullest, you have to forego a $5 purchase.
It still can be nice in niche situations, especially in the presence of Ironmonger or Villa, but overall, it looks a little too underwhelming. The fact that there are only 10 of those also limits its capability in being a pseudo Bishop.
Colossus (Landmark)
When scoring, count your Action and Treasure cards. -2VP per 1 difference between them.
This one looks pretty nice. It is decent at discouraging the spam of Villages and Caravans. On the other hand, crafting a nice engine is part of the fun in Dominion, and discouraging that leads can lead to the more boring/luck dependent kind of games.
Another thing is that this landmark will probably render Duchies and Estates obsolete as late game points, and Golds and Silvers (and even Coppers) also get the job done for a while, transforming the dynamics even further. Luckily, this works only temporarily (an not until THESE piles run out) as you don't want Treasures to outnumber the Actions.
Lastly, in the absense of Copper trashing, this could very well just act as a Bandit Fort that penalizes the likes of Platina and Relics as well. Overall, it looks like a respectable Landmark.
FINALISTOfferings (Action - Reaction, $4)
+$2
Each player (including you) may discard a card to draw a card.
-
When you discard this other than during Clean-up, you may trash this for +1 Action and +2VP.
I think you kinda messed up the above the part by making it apply to all players, since this effect is generally going to be way more useful for the opponent than the player. And given that this is just a $4 costing terminal Silver, I don't see why this couldn't just apply to the user itself. With the current effect, it's going to be an extremely hard sell.
The below-the-line effect looks OK-ish; as VP without taking a spot in your deck is quite nice, but Emporium looks so much more appealing in that regard. And for making discarders non-terminal, the newly introduced Village Green outclasses this by a severe margin (although Island is also pretty badly outclassed by several Menagerie cards).
Garrison (Action, $4@4)
+5 Cards
+1 Buy
You may trash this and an Action card from your hand, for +1 Action.
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When this leaves play, take 5 Debt. If it is your Clean-Up phase, you may then pay off Debt.
Overall, the last minute change is an improvement. However, at this state, it is a more expansive Royal Blacksmith. Although it doesn't have the annoying property of discarding Coppers, the 5 Dept most definitely compensates for that in the long run. It also severely limits this card's early game potential, considering getting this card probably mandates debt as well.
The comparisons to Storyteller are cut short thanks to this card being terminal. The "extra" ability to get +1 Action barely seems to be worth including as removing this card AND an other action is an extremely tall order.
Lastly, does it even make sense for this card to be in the same set as Royal Blacksmith?
Gallery (Action, $3)
Take up to 3 Debt to discard that many cards. Draw until you have 6 cards in hand.
Hey, it's Watchtower that exchanges its Reaction for an optional ability to get more out of this card. With Festival or Fishing Village, this extra ability can turn this card into a pretty fierce drawing machine. However, Debt can be pretty costly and trying to replace your Estates with Coppers is not going to be very meaningful. Overall, a very nice way to get a new version of Watchtower and use de Debt mechanic in a method that isn't present in any of the official cards.
FINALISTTribune (Action - Gathering, $3)
+1 Action
+$1
You may discard a Victory card for +1 Card. Add 1VP to the Tribune Supply pile.
Tribe (Victory - Gathering, $5)
$5 - Victory - Gathering
2VP
--
When you gain this, if you have any Tribunes in play, take the VP from the Supply pile.
Tribune is a VP card that is fairly closely related to Monument and Wild Hunt in that it "unlocks" 1 VP token per play. Unlike these cards, however, Tribune has a very weak on play effect. This means that even if you do manage to snatch in all 5 Tribunes, you are very likely at a disadvantage, by the fact that you have wasted 5 gains on weak stop cards. The situation is even more painful at a 4-1 split (you are now forced to pick up Tribes), and if both players pursue this pile, than players will be discouraged to unlock the first Tribe. As such, picking this up is pretty much guaranteed to be a bad choice. The only case I can see this being worthwhile is with Scrying Pool and maybe with City Quarter or Tactician, although even there it seems lackluster (especially in comparison to Patron).
Lictor (Action, $4)
+1 Card
+1 Action
You may return any number of VP tokens, for +1 Card each.
---
When you gain this, +2VP tokens.
This draws many parallels with Experiment in that it temporary lets you boost your draw before disappearing. The disadvantage is that Experiment is more spread, while the advantage is that the "first" time you draw this, you can immediately get the DoubleLab effect if you want. Another advantage is that if your turn is already shaping to be good, you can go for a blank +1 Card, +1 Action, without needing Way of the Pig.
The interaction with other +VP sources can be quite insane. It is alright with Monument, and probably even Wild Hunt. On Goons boards, it will be extremely powerful. The biggest kicker will be on Dominate boards, where your engine becomes extremely reliable when the first Lictor lets you draw 10 cards.
The +2VP gain is questionable as well for a $4 costing cantrip, especially when it works with pretty all gainers.
Dragonrock (Landmark)
At the end of each turn, +1 VP if you took any VP tokens or gained any Estates this turn.
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At the end of the game, -1 VP for each Province you have.
The premise of making Provinces less worthwile and other VP sources more is interesting, but the execution seems rather sloppy. I don't think giving VP tokens for earning VP tokens is interesting; it's narrow and too automatic in many cases (especially with other Landmarks). The interaction with Estates feels very tacky as well.
Barbarian (Action - Attack - Gathering, $5)
+2 Cards
Add 1VP to the Barbarians Supply pile. Each other player with 4 or more cards in hand discards a Treasure (or reveals they can't). If no players discard any Treasures, take the VP from the pile.
I am not sure if this is intentional, but the attack almost always hits only once. This means that whenever you manage to play this a second time, you will likely get 2 VP, and each subsequent play is equivalent to +2 Cards, +1 VP. This is alright, but not very inspiring, especially for a $5 cost. As a drawing card, it is severely outdone by Wild Hunt.
A very important design philosophy of VP giving cards is that they have to work towards the end. Monument does that by giving +2$ (and lacks spammability by being a terminal stop card). Barbarians only draws a bit, thus not providing any economy. The attack slows down the opponent, thus giving the card an opposite effect. And the attack can be quite nasty at that when Gold is the main source of economy. The card is going to be especially problematic with Champion.
Carpenter (Action - Attack, $5)
Gain a card costing up to $4. Each other player may reveal a copy from it form their hand. Each player who doesn't discards down to 3 cards in their hand.
Carving (Treasure, $4)
$2, +1 Buy
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When you gain this during your Action phase, put it into your hand.
An unconditionally non-terminal Workshop variant; we haven't seen that before. An extra effect is definitely necessary, although I am not quite sure if this is the right approach. The Carving looks pretty nice, although this this could turn the attack into a non-terminal Militia, which I am not sure if I want to see that. Carving also doesn't add a whole lot over Spices and Charm (the latter of which is in this set). I like the idea of a splitting pile with the cheaper card on bottom.
Salesman (Action, $3)
Trash a card from your hand. You may gain a card costing up to $1 more. You may trash this to gain a Gold.
Merchant Village (Action, @5)
+2 Cards
Reveal the top 2 cards of your deck and put the Action Cards into your hand. Put the rest back in any order.
--
You can't buy this unless you have a Gold in play.
Merchant Village is an inferior Lost City and it will be likely be outclassed by pretty much any Village, as Merchant Village makes your deck stall easily when the Greening phase is in full swing. The card is technically "cheaper" by virtue of being a debt card but mandating Gold and being second in a split pile more than make up for that.
The first card, Salesman, looks pretty underwhelming: the on-play effect is essentially a worse Develop, with the ability to "eject" itself for a Gold. Having to get through that pile for a village sounds extremely painful. Compare this with Bustling Village, which is greatly diminished by being part of a split pile. However, that card at least has synergy with its upper counterpart (Settlers), and also has +3 Actions to boot.
End resultsRunner up: Colossus by Aquila
Winner: Gallery by Gambit05
Congratulations to Gambit05 for winning this contest! Also many thanks for the rest of the submissions!