Dominion Strategy Forum
Dominion => Variants and Fan Cards => Topic started by: mborda on June 22, 2011, 10:27:06 am
-
I would like to trigger a brainstorming session about creating card ideas to make the basic randomizer cards useful (Copper, Silver, Gold, Estate, Duchy, Province, Curse).
For example:
Cup Game ($5)
-------------------------------
Trash a card from your hand, costing $3 or more.
Reveal 1 Card of the Basic deck per $2 in its cost.
Either you or the other players gain a copy of one of them.
Return the revealed cards to the Basic deck and shuffle it.
-------------------------------
Setup:
Before the game, make a Basic deck with the randomizer cards of the basic Treasure, Victory and Curse cards.
-
I've played a match before where we did not use Province cards nor Gold cards. We also only used five kingdom cards valued at $5 or less. The Duchy took on the province rule of if that single pile is gone, the game is over. This was a very interesting game since after set up, we played with "standard" rules.
That said, you could do something similar to that using those randomizer cards. You could either have a single pile and remove two of them and see how the game plays, or count Curse as a Victory card and remove one "Victory" card and one Treasure card.
Doing this can fundamentally alter the game. A Witch isn't nearly as useful without Curse cards, it is impossibly hard to buy a Province without Silver or Gold, and the game is also very interesting without Coppers and Estates (the only ones being in your starting deck).
Other than that, I think they are just included so you can tell when a pile is empty. I doubt Donald ever intended for you to actually use them to randomize something (not that I want to put words in his mouth).
-
Yes, I've read that they were intended to mark the empty piles, that's why they were included in Dominion.
But no one use them for that (it's better to use blank cards...).
That's why they didn't do the same for other cards, in the expansions (e.g. Platinums and Colonies).
I just don't like to have useless cards, so I'm looking for a Dominion gaming use for these cards. :)
-
My game group and I tried a variant where we used the randomizer cards (including the ones you mentioned) shuffled in with the others. If you happened to have the card with the dark blue backing, it did different things. We tried that if it were a treasure, it'd give you double the money, and if it were a victory card, it'd give you double the points, and for the actions, we tried to make them into super version of themselves.
-
Try this: Separate all your randomizers into 3 piles: Pure treasure (not including copper and potions), pure VP, and Actions/Hybrid cards.
- Draw 10 from the actions pile for use as the Kingdom Cards.
- Next draw 3 VP cards at random. These are the ones you'll use instead of the default VP piles. The most expensive VP card is the one that ends the game when depleted (if there's a tie in value, then either pile).
- Copper is in the supply. Draw 2 treasure cards. These cards replace Gold and Silver (or, of course, the Gold and Silver can be drawn randomly too). If one of these piles runs out, silver is added back to the supply. If the 2nd one, then Gold is added back too.
Probably if there are any cards that causes one to gain a specific treasure or VP card, then that card is gained even if it's not in the supply (e.g. using transmute can gain a dutchy even though dutchies are not in the supply or Bureaucrat to gain a silver). Add potions only if necessary to purchase a card. Everyone still starts with 7 coppers and 3 estates.
-
I like this idea... you'll always have action heavy kingdom boards (no pure vp or treasure on board), but on the other hand the strategy for the game will change depending on the 3 choices.
I might play with more treasure options than 2 (since prosperity has so many treasure cards)
-
I like the idea, too, but of course there are some problems.
- What about ambassadoring an estate when there is no estate pile? How many estates can be gained this way?
- What about dukes without duchies?
In addition, there can be some boards which are totally unbalanced, for example a colony game with, say, loan and silver as treasure cards, or, the other way around, bank and platinum in a game where gardens are the most expensive victory cards.
There are other things which could be mentioned, but there is no major issue that is a problem for most games played this way.
-
A couple play tests in and we think you should keep a big VP card in the mix, either Provinces or Colonies. You can randomize the other 2 or 3, but there has to be a big VP to go for to make the game interesting. Otherwise, you just grab some money, one action and race for the cheap VP cards.
Also, don't play with Smugglers. :o