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1
I agree it's more interesting. I also think this effect is very weak in most games, though that may be fine

The Attack may be situational, but don’t forget that it’s also a Treasure village for the person who played it, which is comparable to Squire’s first option.  It’s also a lot like Lute from previous contest.

2


This needs to have the Command type and non-Command wording.  Otherwise Band of Misfits could play it, and if there are 3 actual Sentinels in play, it can loop playing itself.  Then just add the pesky Adventure tokens.

3
Sorry again this took so long, but here are Finalist judgments with in some Kingdoms. Randomly generated with 9 official cards (excluding 1st edition) and up to 2 landscapes.

Kingdom 1

Scheme, Duplicate, Villa, Band of Misfits, Horn of Plenty, Mining Road, Recruiter, Vampire, Farm, Mirror, Basilica

So yeah, this random Kingdom already has a strong source of Villagers, Villa when for more Actions when you need it, next turn setup, and strong payload in Horn of Plenty and maybe Duplicate, although there isn't good draw.  It's going to be difficult for our unusual Villages to compete here.  In fact, if you don't use Duplicate, you don't even need villages.

Social Climber only has 3 Action card costs to work with.  Band of Misfits can loop back to the beginning if you're willing to play it as Scheme.  Plus Scheme helps make sure that it is in your starting hand, so you don't need multiple copies.  Duplicate gaining Golds or Farms to feed to Recruiter gives 6 Villagers, so that probably provides better yield per stop-card.  Social Climber's low cost does mean it could be relevant for a pile-out alongside Villa.

Lute can easily play payload like Duplicate during the Buy phase, but 2 Actions per stop-card isn't very good value here.  Likewise, Marina can only net +1 Action here.  It provides $2, but you would rather be drawing Horn of Plenty than Silver here.

Midas Touch is interesting here, as it can turn Villagers into Coffers.  I still feel that a Horn of Plenty megaturn is better than hoarding Villagers and cashing them out on the final turn.  But maybe you can do a little bit of both.

Kingdom 2

Caravan Guard, Familiar, Conspirator, Ironmonger, Port, Priest, Berserker, Haunted Woods, Wayfarer, Academy, Way of the Mule

I swear these are random.  This time there's Academy, along with Port and a couple of Workshop variants that can gain them.  But there are key terminals like Priest and Haunted Woods that need played.  And importantly, there is no +Buy, so there is a limit of 1 Province per turn.

Social Climber has a chain of 3 concrete card costs, but you might be able to tack in Wayfarer somewhere along the way.  The lack of +Buy is really rough here.  You could use one of the gainers, but I'd probably just gain Ports at that point.

Lute is nice for playing Haunted Woods and Priest, but other villages are better for drawing with Wayfarer and then playing the cantrips.  Although, if you just draw with Haunted Woods, that's not an issue.  Alternatively, you just play without the cantrips.  I think I like a mix of Ports and Lutes most.

Marina can get +3 Actions by playing a Wayfarer at start of turn.  Something I missed during my initial judging; it needs to specify whether the +Actions are given first or after playing the next Action.  That matters here as Wayfarer would cost $3 if after playing it, if you gained the Silver.  I missed it because Flagship doesn't have that specification, but it doesn't need it.  Back to judging Marina's usefulness in the kingdom, between Villagers, Haunted Woods Duration draw, and Port's redundancy, it seems unlikely that Marina's Duration +Actions would be able to save an otherwise dud turn.

Again Midas Touch can convert Villagers to $.  The +Buy is also handy here too, so it will see use for that alone.  Plus, being able to convert redundant Ports into non-stop-card Silvers is really nice.

Kingdom 3

OK, this time I'm going to re-roll all but 1 official village that shows up; I'll keep the most boring village available.  Nothing we've already seen, and no Villagers.

Re-rolled: Capital City, Royal Galley, Merchant Camp, Duplicate

Border Guard, Faithful Hound, Amulet, Village, Armory, Idol, Journeyman, Pendant, Souk, Travelling Fair, Inherited (and let's have your entry be Inherited).

There's some good trashing, and Souk makes nice payload if you can get real thin and build a good engine.  Alternatively Big Money could be nice using Idol, Pendant, and Journeyman.

Social Climber can chain up to 4 Actions, beginning with a Border Guard retained with Horn or a Faithful Hound with it's Reaction.  You'll want to be sure you have one in your starting hand, and Travelling Fair or Armory can achieve that.  Although you probably don't want many redundant copies in your deck, so you'll either just need to trash them, or just stick with Villages.  Plus, you'll want Villages for playing the Souks at the end of turn.

Lute gets to have the simplicity of a Big Money strategy, alongside the power of an Engine.  Early on, use Amulet to thin down.  Pick up some Jouneymen to draw the deck, and eventually pick up Souks.  Best of all, the Souks can be played in your Buy phase, after playing all your other Treasures.

Marina provides the largest Inheritance bonus, but you probably still want to get an Amulet in the opening.  The most it can provide is +2 Actions.  Start of turn +Actions could be helpful here, but with Border Guard it shouldn't be too difficult to find a Village.  Souk appreciates the disappearing payload.

Midas Touch struggles a little to be relevant here.  Your terminal space is better served playing Journeymen and Souks.

Kingdom 4

One last* Kingdom, this time with no other Villages, and still no repeats.

Re-rolled: Journeyman, Travelling Fair, Lackeys, Mining Village, Farm

Patrician, Cargo Ship, Importer, Sheepdog, Bridge, Treasure Map, Pickaxe, Stables, Keep, Worker's Guild.

Loot + Keep game.  Stables, Sheep Dog, and Importer are probably the only Actions worth getting.  Bridge can actively hurt Pickaxe gaining Loot.  Few outside cards could be relevant here.  Re-rolling the kingdom.

Kingdom 5

Re-rolled: Royal Galley, Coin of the Realm, Hideout, Shelters

Lighthouse, Rats, Research, Courtier, Emissary, Graverobber, Jester, Marchland, Soothsayer, Order of Masons

This one is interesting.  All the Kingdom cards have a chance to be useful.  If I use villages, I probably want to score with Graverobber into Province, with some Marchlands use toward the end.  Or just Soothsayer into Emissary Big Money.

Social Climber once again only has 3 card costs it can work with.  The +Buy is also pretty awkward to get early on.  I think I might just stick to no Villages here.

Lute can easily play payload. but it needs to be careful playing Emissary, otherwise there may be too many rats or Research to be playable.

Marina is pretty straightforward +$2 and later +2 Actions here.  Importantly , this is a situation where I think it is better than Flagship, as Courtier is the only non-terminal without negative side effects that you could Throne to keep your turn going.  Although it's still not great, and I question if a no-village strategy might be better.

Midas Touch works here, but it's a little awkward.  It's as nice as any village for playing payload, and the +Buy is appreciated.  But with Emissary you risk drawing a bunch of non-terminals and being unable to play them.



And now the results:

Honorable Mention - Marina by LTaco:

It's just really similar to Flagship, and most of the time Flagship is just better, except where otherwise noted.  Having the +Actions vary with the cost of the card played seemed interesting, but in practice it's usually just +2 Actions.  There is also the timing issue that I missed in my previous judging.

3rd Place - Midas Touch by NoMoreFun:

While technically a village, this card is more about payload.  But usually there should be better or at least more interesting things to use your terminal space on.  The exception we discovered is Villagers, where you can hoard them like Coffers.  But when you need Midas Touch to actually be a Village, it's just a worse Snowy Village, much like the Snow Village from Donald X's Christmas kingdom.

2nd Place - Social Climber by faust (Finalist):

The mechanics are interesting to think about, but in practice it's usually just a Necropolis+, as discussed previously.  The looping shenanigans are fun, but could be overly confusing for average players.  I kind of want it to do something else interesting, but that could mess with the power, and there are already so many words.  It's still a fun entry, and in most kingdoms with a strong possible engine just lacking a village, I would probably try to get this to work.

Winner - Lute by 4est

As I mentioned before, it's simple with a strong Dominion theme.  It feels like it could be a real card.  I've enjoyed the Loot Staff, and it's surprising that there's no Kingdom card that does that, as most of the Loot are modeled after effects done by Kingdom cards or Landscapes.  I've also had some fun games with Inspiring on a Kingdom Treasure as the only villager, and it was usually worth it to make that work.

4
Sorry this is taking a while.  There were a lot of entries this time around, but I've narrowed things down to the finalists.



Cohort by Doom_Shark

I agree with the assessment that the first version was strong.  Putting junk back onto the deck is a good solution.  I'd also probably remove the empty supply pile part for simplicity and to make it even weaker.  It's great if you can remove the junk from your deck, and greening hurts a lot, so you probably want to work up to a megaturn or two.

Copy Editing: Courier uses "Action or Treasure." so simply "Actions or Treasures" works here. Fortune Hunter uses "from them."  Golem says "play the Action cards in either order," while the more recent Prepare says "play those Actions and Treasures in any order," so something like that would be appropriate here too.

Untitled action by fika monster

It's kind of like a card form of Toil, which is neat.  It could also be classified as a Peddler variant; you can spend $2 of what you just made to get your action back.  But if you don't need the +Action, or if you have village support, having the option to just keep the terminal gold non-stop card makes it too good when compared to the other $5 peddlers. As is, it should probably cost $6, but I agree at that cost it is awkward to get a lot of them.  Or make it $4 and only provide $2?  I don't know for sure.

Copy Editing: Saying "instead of spending an action, you may instead..." makes it seem like you have to have a remaining Action to pay in order to use the effect, so it would be useless without the support of another village.  So assuming that is not the intent, here is a more Domonion-like wording that does something similar (borrowing from Inspiring): "For the rest of this turn, after playing an Action, you may take 2 debt to play an Action from your hand."

Explosion by Will(ow|iam)

An interesting event in line with Seize the Day and Journey, and Launch.  You want to get this one when you have enough good cards in your deck/discard to take full advantage of a pseudo- extra turn.  The trouble is that you don't want to have extra payload terminals just for this one turn, and it will be difficult to get extra value out of terminal draw on top of the +10 cards.  Could be useful for setting up duration effects like Mastermind, or just drawing a key card on the right turn.  So this effect isn't really a sustainable village, and just not a great fit for this contest.

Social Climber by faust (Finalist)

This one is super interesting.  Like First Mate it can play many cards, but this time they're all different.  It also lacks First Mate's draw, making it significantly weaker. The low cost is functional; with it you will be able to start the Action playing chain with almost any other Action.

There's also an interesting rules question here:  What exactly counts as the "last Action card you played?"  And does playing Social Climber even count as played when it first makes that check?  The phrase "last Action" is never found in the Card List, so I'm assuming no official cards make this check, meaning there's no easy official ruling.  Wayfarer uses "the last other card gained this turn" to clarify that it doesn't count itself, so Social Climber could use "other" if it didn't want to count itself. I reviewed the wording, Official FAQ, and other rules clarifications for Conspirator, Harbor Village, Kiln, Landing Party, Inspiring, and Scepter.  Scepter's Other rules clarifications gave the most insight:  "Scepter can replay an Action that isn't finished resolving, such as a Storyteller that played Scepter in the first place." So by extension, that means Social Climber can count itself on initial play.  For exotic stuff, like Social Climber plays Conclave which plays Hamlet then Hamlet finishes playing then Conclave finishes playing, we don't have a super nice example for what the "last" card played was, but I'm going to assume it's "the last card that entered play," which in this case would be the Hamlet.

There was some discussion about it being strong or weak, but I think it's good as is. It's really just a fancy Necropolis, but there are times you would buy even an ordinary Necropolis for $1.  And you'll also want multiples making it reasonably likely you get a copy in your starting hand.  The suggestion of using "This is gained onto your deck" helps make it more reliable and usable, but for simplicity I'm fine with it as is.

Copy Editing: No cards use "do this any number of times," although Remake uses "Do this twice."  It's fine as is, but I think I prefer "Repeat as desired" found on Cave Dwellers etc.  I don't think "this turn" is needed here.

Lute by 4est (Finalist)

A nice, simple submission that fits well in the Dominion theme. It kind of reminds me of Night Festival from a few contests ago.  This is simpler by not visiting the Night Phase.  But didn't we say that that playing 2 Actions was too strong?  The difference here is $1 and the +Buy, and that is huge.  Now it's comparable to Coin of the Realm.  While that can be saved for when you need it and keeps you in your Action phase, this can be used every turn instead of usually only every other turn.  So I think this is fine at $3.

Lawless Village by LibraryAdventurer

The reverse village is an interesting idea, but the weak discard attack definitely does not make up for not drawing a card yourself.  The possible bonus to the opponent isn't helping things.  The villagers may help to make up for it, but at the end of the day, this is still a stop-card that just lets you start your turn with terminals later in the game.  Villagers also isn't really all that unusual of a way to play lots of terminals.  Instead, I kind of want this to be Reaction like Clerk that lets you play it from your hand after playing an Action on some condition, maybe having 0 Actions remaining.  So instead of the normal Village+Smith combo where you play Village and then Smithy, with this you have to play Smithy first and then Lawless Village, doubling down on how it's like a reverse village.

Copy Editing: It needs something like Villain's "(or reveals they can't)."

Helper by Zoyarox

Really this is a non-Potion Golem that only plays one card but gives you +1 Action.  I agree that it's far too expensive, but even then it's difficult to place a price on it. Aside from Golem's potion price, the fact that Golem does nothing once all your Actions are in your hand, and it playing random Actions, are both major downsides over the comparable Lost City.  That is somewhat alleviated with Helper thanks to the innate +1 Action, and having the choice of 2 Actions to play.  A cost of $4 is probably fine.  It's weird that it names another Action that will most likely not be in the kingdom.  Sure Helper+Golem would be busted, but there are lots of busted 2-card combos in Dominion.

Carnival by BryGuy

Fun fact, we now have an official card named Carnival, but it's all good.  This has some of the same rules considerations that I discussed in the Social Climber entry.  The way I see it, Carnival's effect happens by the time it is done playing.  There are even hints to an alternate Priest wording in the retrospective which would have worked just like this. But because the Action playing applies to this too, it is essentially a double Laboratory where you can only follow it up with a card costing $4 or less, which should be that difficult to achieve.  That's way too powerful, and we haven't even touched on the stacking effect by playing more than 1 copy.

Ballroom by n_sanity

An easy comparison can be made to Border Village  The only downside I can see is that you can't gain Duchies or Treasures with this. Meanwhile, Throne Room costs more than Village even before the Night shenanigans.  That said, once the card is that expensive, the difference between $6 and $7 isn't that crucial.  In the end, this really just Thrones Actions normally.  There's the option to use it at Night, but I see more use happening in the day, so it isn't a great fit for this contest.

Midas Touch by NoMoreFun (Finalist)

A Worker's Village with something extra for the same cost; how can that be right?  Well, just like in the ancient legend, that blessing can quickly become a curse.  It will be difficult for this to make it as the only village, although it's still possible.  Instead Midas Touch is best used in kingdoms with other sources of +Actions.  In a deck with only cantrips, a Midas Touch played toward the end of the cantrip train is effectively +1 Card, +$2, +1 Buy, which is fair.  Alongside other villages, you can play the village idiot, having many redundant villages, but play Midas Touch partway through to start getting the payload you need.

Copy Editing:  The updated wording mirrors Way of the Chameleon fairly well.  It just needs to end the sentence with a period.

Construct by sumrex

It's a lot like the original version of Cohort (see judging above).  Playing and/or drawing the top 3 cards of the deck is way too strong for $5, and that's before you get to the Harbinger effect.

Beaver by petamatt

Getting the effect of a card without actually gaining the card is an interesting concept, but the execution needs work.  The fact that you just discard Beaver instead of playing it opens up the possibility for loops.  An alternative to playing Beaver would be to do what Joust does and set this aside, then discard it during cleanup.  It uses Trader's old "would gain, ... instead" wording, which is "super crazy confusing." And it's not like you can use "Exchange" here to fix things.  The other thing is that I wish the top did something besides being a village, like maybe being a terminal silver.  It's not just for the contest requirements; it would be reasonable to gain a Beaver early on for the Silver effect, and then use the other effect later in the game.

Dragon Pit by silverspawn

Dragon Pit is a double Barracks that also requires Action fodder.  It needs to be limited to once per turn part because Fortress is a thing. But I don't care for the "your first Buy phase each turn" wording because nothing else does that.  I'm also not a fan of entering and the Buy phase only to immediately return.  Maybe it could use wording like Innovation: "Once during each of your turns, after playing an Action card, ..."  But in the end, it's just too close to Barracks to be interesting.

Maid (edited) by D782802859

Regarding the first version, -Actions is a mechanic that feels like it belongs in Dominion.  And a gainer that uses gives -Actions per $ of the card gained is a straightforward application.  But as you figured out, it's difficult to make a card that is not too under-powered or too overpowered.  Gaining $4 cards is just vanilla Workshop; $3 is usually worse than Ironworks or Carpenter, and gaining cards costing $2 or less for the Village effect is usually just bad.  I thought out a few scenarios for re-balancing, including doing a $5-cost gainer, but none of them worked.

The other version assigns a fixed bonus based on card cost.  I feel like this version has better balance.  You can get the Village effect by gaining $3 cards.  There's always Silver, but a Necropolis Silver gainer isn't going to be super effective.  Still, engines can be powerful, so in the absence of other Villages, you take what you can get.  The other issue is that now a fixed +2 Actions is no longer a great fit for this contest.  So you have a better card than your first version, but it's just not as unusual as some of the other entries.

Marina by LTaco (Finalist)

A Plunder "next time" duration that gives Actions based on the cost of the next Action you play.  It uses wording mirroring Bishop.  The closest comparison is Flagship another $4-cost terminal silver next time Duration.  And while Throning seems like it would always be better than a Necropolis-ish, that isn't always the case.  If you use a Smithy at the start of the turn, Flagship draws more cards, but Marina lets you continue your turn.  So I think that Marina is a perfectly reasonable balanced card worth consideration.

Pastoral Village by anordinaryman

Another entry like Snowy Village, where you get a lot of Actions up front and then fewer later on.  This one lets you keep getting +Actions afterward, but every Action played costs more.  I don't really like the spend an extra Action wording though.  Paying more for Action plays is confusing.  You use "When you play an Action card," but it sounds like you need to have the extra Action before you actually play the card, which is a little bit of a contradiction.  The stacking effect also becomes confusing.  For example, I think you messed up the Action count when playing Smithies; it should be -3 per Smithy played; -1 for each Pastoral Village played, along with the ordinary -1 Action from playing a terminal Action.  As an alternative, this is another place that I feel -1 Action could be utilized: "For the rest of this turn, when you play an Action card, you first get -1 Action (you can't go below 0 Actions)."  It borrows wording from Champion and cards with -$, like Souk.  It still stacks, but you are able to play Actions before the -Action penalty goes into effect, and after the -1 Actions are subtracted, any +Actions from the card are still available, so this is more forgiving.  Or an "after playing an Action card, -1 Action" timing could be used to make things a little more restrictive.

Witches Coven by RovingBear

An interesting friendly Curser that turns your Curses into Villages.  It isn't an "in games using this" effect; that would be too good.  Instead you have to keep playing the Witch's Coven.  Because it's a Duration, it's possible to make use of the Curse villages without the help of another Village.  In fact, gaining the Curse onto your deck ensures that you will be able to use the effect.  Just know that all "While this is in play" effects have been removed from the game and turned into "On this turn and your next turn" effects (see Bridge Troll version history).  Turning to power level, I actually kind of think this one is too strong.  It's effectively +$2 this turn and +1 Action +2 Cards next turn.  And that doesn't even factor in that with each play you add another permanent Village to your deck.  Even with the negative points, there are plenty of times I would be fine paying $5 for this.  There's also the issue of what happens when both Charlatan and this are in the Kingdom.

Copy Editing:  Action should be capitalized in the last sentence.  Use lower case for card name and types; the card mock up font will display it in all caps, but the first letters will be a little bit bigger.

Hire by Freddy10

Hire is pretty similar to Launch, Delay, Toil, and March.  It's mostly fine, but I don't really like how it returns you to your Action phase without any way to get your Buy back, unlike Launch, Villa and Cavalry.  That and the fact this is so similar to many other Events makes this a no from me.

Esplanade by grep

This one is pretty interesting.  It reminds me of Inventor, except you are playing cards instead of gaining them.  Because you also get to play another Esplanade, this counts as a Village even when there are no cheap non-terminals. For simplicity, I kind of wish it didn't work with Treasures.  In fact it loops with Scepter if Treasures are allowed because Scepter does not have the Command type.  The power level really depends on what options are available at $3.  Like other sources of Cost Reduction it has the potential to enable a megaturn.  Other cost reducers come with +Action, +Card, or +Buy.  This could have none of those, but it also could have all of them at once if something like Market Square is around, and on top of the Esplanade chaining, that's a little too good.

Copy Editing:  This can use wording like Cultist: "You may play an Esplanade from your hand."

Ancient City by Cutepelican126

I think this is supposed to be like a bigger Landing Party.  The trouble is that discarding a Duration from play doesn't actually cancel the future Duration stuff from happening.  Sure the Lose Track rule kicks in to prevent further setting aside and quadruple play, but the attempts at setting aside a second and duplicated time still happen anyway.  Also, I would prefer that cards with Village effects remain in play as a visual indicator that you have those extra actions.  Throne Room + Horse kind of has this issue, but you still have the solo Throne Room as an indicator.

Copy Editing:  Treasure should be capitalized.  Like Landing Party it needs to address whether the next-time effect happens before or after resolving the Treasure play; for instance with "set this aside afterwards."  That matters if Ancient City is a Treasure due to Capitalism and it's the first card you played on your turn.



I'll try to have the judging of the finalists completed in the next few days.

5
Contest Closed

I’ll do judging over the next few days.

6
There’s still a lot of activity and I’m busy tonight, so here’s your

24 hour warning

If you haven’t submitted yet, there’s still time.  And have submitted, please check that your entry is listed in the OP.

7
Weekly Design Contest #211: Not Your Ordinary Village

Village is one of the most iconic Dominion cards.  Villages usually don’t do much on their own, but without one, you have to be extremely picky with the other Actions your deck can contain, limiting the potential of the deck and outcome of the game.  This time your task is to design something* that allows you to play 2 or more Terminal Actions in an unusual way. 

That’s kind of vague, so let’s look at some examples from the official cards.  Among all the cards that contain “Village” in their name, only Snowy Village would rate highly in this contest, due to its restriction on further +Actions.  Other cards that rate high are Taskmaster, Conclave, and First MateThrone Room is another good example, but the fact that it exists means that Throne Room variants need to be more unusual to rate well.  Something like Crown rates poorly, while Mastermind is better.  Landscapes like Toil also count, but you'll have to be careful to make your entry different enough from existing Landscapes.

Contest Guidelines:

Judgment Details:
  • The contest will close roughly a week from today.
  • I will judge entries based on balance, wording/mechanics, simplicity, creativity, and how fun the entry is to play with.

Entries:

8
Sounds good.  I’ll have the next contest up soon!

9
Signerror hasnt answered the dm, could roving bear do the judgement?

Just saw this.  Roving Bear, if you would rather do it, that’s OK, with me.  Just let us know by the end of the day, or I’ll get things rolling again.

10
Im dming falsepriest to ask if he can judge next competition

Yeah, I can judge the next contest.  I’ll have it up later today.  It will be something along the lines of what fika monster suggested.

11


Quote
False Priest
$5 - Action - Attack

+1 Buy
+$3
Trash a card from your hand. For the rest of this turn, when you trash a card, each other player gains a Curse.
-
Heirloom: Goat

Edit:  added weird ass art.

12
Devil's Cellar
$5 Night
Look at the top 5 cards of your deck and discard any number of them. If the number of cards you've discarded is:
5, gain a Plunder.
0, gain an Imp.

Instead of gain a Plunder, did you mean gain a Loot?

13
That makes sense. I already understood about the flexibility (I didn't articulate that well in my post), I just wasn't convinced that ActionSilver would be stronger than $3 (my main thinking was that you couldn't price it at $4 because it's strictly worse than Patron, but it's probably just one of those unpriceable cards like a pure peddler). I'm going to update my card/OP.

I mean Taskmaster is worse than Silver until it’s not.  Swamp Shacks is a Necropolis until it’s not.  The stacking effect is super powerful, so I think the $4 price is justified.

Even a single copy could be a Merchant Camp or an Action Pouch, and that flexibility is valuable.

14
Could we modify an official card that already has a modifier?

For example Night Watchman could become “Day Watchman.”  “Day Night Watchman” strictly meets the contest requirements, but that’s just silly.

15
Farmers
$4 - Action - Duration

The next time you gain a Victory card, +1 Buy and choose one: +$3; or +2 Cards, +1 Action, and if it's your Buy phase return to your Action phase.

This is meant for Intrigue, fitting with the themes of choices and VP cards that do something.

16


This one is for intrigue, a twist on a victory card and the choice.

It needs the Duration type

17
Conscripts
- Action - Duration - Attack
+
Each other player with 5 or more cards in hand discards a card.
The next time any player plays an Attack card, +2 Cards.

It either needs wording like Kiln or wording like Landing Party / Inspiring to know whether the Duration +2 Cards happens before or after the Attack finishes playing.

Also for reference, here’s my entry from the last “next time” contest which is similar:



Quote
Reinforcements - $5
Action - Duration - Attack

+$2

Each other player discards down to 3 cards in hand.

The next time anyone plays an Attack, draw until you have 6 cards in hand afterwards.

I think I like that your card costs $4 so it is easier to spam, and of course there are some other differences.  But maybe check out the feedback I was given over in that contest.

18
Updated entry



Quote
Scavenger Dog | Action - Looter | $3
+2 Cards
You may play a Ruins from the Supply or your hand.
-
When you trash this, play it.

You may want to add "other than in in cleanup" about the trash-play part to mimic trail

Trail needed it so that the trigger didn’t happen when-discard during cleanup.  Fortress is fine without the non-cleanup clause, so Scavenger/Junk Dog should be too.

Edit: Fortresses probably isn’t the best comparison here because it doesn’t play itself.  There could be some really exotic combo like WotMouse Improve Tomb that generates infinite VP.  Still, there are infinite combos amoung the official cards, and making Junk Dog more complex just to kill a rare combo doesn’t seem good.

19
Awesome analysis  :D

Remember not to make the card a 3$ if you think it's stronger than the average 4$.

Like I said, it’s easy to think of the Labs and Smithies and Peddlers and forget all the other junk that’s possible.  If you tally the weighted value it’s about $3.  Weighted value of everything above the line (with +Cards) is about $4, and weighted value of everything below the line (without +Cards) is about $2.

Hm I thought the sarcasm would be obvious in the context of my previous posts lamenting the misuse of the overpowered concept. What I meant to say was: the idea that you have to figure out whether your card is above or below a certain powerlevel to figure out whether to price it at 3$ or 4$ is extremely silly. Imo you'd do better just not thinking about card strength at all when deciding this. The major thing you should think about is whether it would be fun if people can open with two of the thing. After that, I mean 3$ will allow people to buy it slightly more situations later in the game.

I made the reference to Donald X because he's released tons of busted 3$'s that are much stronger than 4$s. In fact it was sort of loosely held that the average 3$ is stronger than the average 4$ at some point (this probably isn't true nowadays), but in any case, it was common knowledge that "weaker cards cost 3$ and stronger cards cost 4$" isn't a thing. Apparently that's not common knowledge anymore, but it's still true.

In fact I vividly remember being a very nooby person in this forum and someone was indicated that 3$s are stronger than 4$s, and I was like, that can't be right, and then they were like, no literally, and I was like huh, but I didn't write it because back then I didn't admit mistakes.

Anyway your analysis convinced me that it's weaker than the average 4$, which has precisely zero bearing on how I would price it. (I'd price it at 3$ so you can open with two of them.)

I absolutely agree with this, but mostly did the analysis for others who seemed more fixed on $4 cost.

The greatest difference between $4 and $3 is the double open, and this is fine there. You would rather have a cheap trasher or a guaranteed Silver to afford a good $5, and early Redoubt is a huge risk, given you don’t know what the cards below the top one are.

20
^ I don't know how the rules work here; can you gain Curses once Ruins are out?

From the Trader Official FAQ 2022:

Quote
You can only exchange if both cards are available to be exchanged; you have to be able to return the gained card to its pile (only possible if it came from a pile), and you have to be able to take the Silver.

So once the Ruins are out you can no longer do the exchange, and you gain the Curse



On a side note Squatter with lots of cost reduction means your Provinces turn into Ruins.  I actually think that’s neat; you just have to make sure what you want costs at least $1.

21
I wasn’t expecting this much discussion.  I originally had this at $4, but realized pretty early on it cannot cost $4.  An easy, quick comparison is Ironmonger.  You get a fixed +1 Card, +1 Action, and half Survivors, along with one of +1 Card, +1 Action, and +$1, which are the best bonuses to spam.

But in case you want to go into all the details, the following is a list of all the raw possibilities along with their probability of occurrence and estimated value.  You might notice that certain individual effects are valued higher than you would think; we’ll get into more of that later.


+3 Cards (0.612%) Smithy, but better (~$5.5)*
+2 Cards +1 Action (2.296%) Lab ($5)
+2 Cards +1 Buy (2.296%) Silk Merchant, but better?!? ($5.3)*
+2 Cards +$1 (2.296%) Fortune Hunter, but better (~5.6)*
+2 Cards Survivors (2.296%) Oracle, but better (~$5.4)*
+1 Card +2 Actions (2.296%) Village ($3)
+1 Card +1 Action +1 Buy (5.102%) worse than Market Square (~$2. 8 )
+1 Card +1 Action +$1 (5.102%) peddler (~$4.5)
+1 Card +1 Action Survivors (5.102%) most comparable to Spy (~$3.6)
+1 Card +2 Buys (2.296%) multiple +Buy bad (~$3.3)*
+1 Card +1 Buy +$1 (5.102%) not a lot of reference (~$3. 8 ) *
+1 Card +1 Buy Survivors (5.102%) not a lot of reference (~$3.4)*
+1 Card +$2 (2.296%) could maybe justify this as a terminal Silver+ (~$3.9)*
+1 Card +$1 Survivors (5.102%) not a lot of reference (~$3.6)*
+1 Card Survivors x2 (2.296%) not a lot of reference (~$3.2)*

+3 Actions (0.612%) strictly worse than Port, comparable to Snowy Village and Crossroads (~$3)
+2 Actions +1 Buy (2.296%) not a lot of reference (~$2.5)
+2 Actions +$1 (2.296%) worse than Merchant Camp (~$2. 8 )
+2 Actions Survivors (2.296%) not a lot of reference (~$2.3)
+1 Action +2 Buys (2.296%) multiple +Buy bad (~$1.5)
+1 Action +1 Buy +$1 (5.102%) worse than Candlestick Maker (~$1.9)
+1 Action +1 Buy Survivors (5.102%) bad, but not a lot of reference (~$1.7)
+1 Action +$2 (2.296%) Silver-ish (~$3)
+1 Action +$1 Survivors (5.102%) bad, but not a lot of reference (~$1. 8 )
+1 Action Survivors x2 (2.296%) bad, but not a lot of reference (~$1.5)
+3 Buys (0.612%) multiple +Buy bad (~$1.2)
+2 Buys +$1 (2.296%) worse than Squire (~$1.9)
+2 Buys Survivors (2.296%) multiple +Buy bad (~$1.5)
+1 Buy +$2 (2.296%) Woodcutter ($3)
+1 Buy +$1 Survivors (5.102%) bad, but not a lot of reference (~$1. 8 )
+1 Buy Survivors x2 (2.296%) bad, but not a lot of reference (~$1.3)
+$3 (0.612%) probably slightly better than Fortune Hunter (~$4.2)
+$2 Survivors (2.296%) Worse than Navigator, which was already bad (~$2.7)
+$1 Survivors x2 (2.296%) (~$1.4)
Survivors x3 (0.612%) Bad (~$1.1)

Remember not to make the card a 3$ if you think it's stronger than the average 4$.

Like I said, it’s easy to think of the Labs and Smithies and Peddlers and forget all the other junk that’s possible.  If you tally the weighted value it’s about $3.  Weighted value of everything above the line (with +Cards) is about $4, and weighted value of everything below the line (without +Cards) is about $2.

A lot like Knights, the value of Redoubt fluctuates based on what the top card of Ruins is at the start of the game.  Ruined Library and Ruined Mine provide the most value.  Ruined Village is good in the absence of a Village, and Ruined Market is great in the absence of +Buy.  Survivors is only good if the kingdom has no trashing and little draw.  So you can use the knowledge of the top card to adjust the probabilities and be more informed about the value of the card.

For example, say it’s a 2-player game without Ruined Library on top.  The chance of NOT having Ruined Library in the next 2 cards is about 80%, so if you want your Redoubt drawing cards (the most valuable effect), then you have to get decently lucky.  If you really want to dig into the Ruins pile for that Ruined Library, you need to gain 3 Redoubts and collide them in the same hand (difficult in itself). You’re most likely to get 1 Ruined Library (43%), with the next likely outcome being no Ruined Libraries (34%).  That leaves a (23%) of hitting 2 Ruined Libraries and those spicy $5+ effects.  Not very good odds.

Any combo using Ruined Library and other terminals is actually better than its face value because you can play some Ruined Libraries to potentially draw more villages before playing your last terminal card.  I already adjusted the card values for that above. (*)

Everything below the line doesn’t have +Cards, so it tends to be worth a lot less.  You may notice I rate the bad terminal stop-card combinations a little higher than they deserve face value.  That’s because you always have the option to not play the Ruins and keep the innate +3 Actions, which I’m valuing at about $3.  Then you could play other terminal draw for the chance at drawing more villages while risking junking yourself.  Or you could just play terminal payload and take the junk.

The notion that the opponent might gain and trash Ruins seems dubious, self-junking is after all a heavy price to pay.

Removing Ruined Library as an option lowers Redoubt’s value to about $2, so it’s worth it if your opponent has a ton of them and is using the draw a lot.  It’s kind of like when you have 1 Poacher and the opponent has 8; you just gain the last Poacher to turn them into Oasis.  But here you don’t need to gain extra Redoubts or Ruins.  Just play one Redoubt (you probably got one early on), get the Ruined Library that’s 3 cards down, and that’s it.

And at worst you still got a Double-Necro whereas he had to self-junk & trash for little benefit.

To get the double Necropolis effect for ~$3, the opponent has to trash or keep in their deck the Survivors and other terminal Ruins, so that’s not free either.

On a serious note, I'd consider returning the card to the bottom of the pile

Returning the ruins to the bottom of the pile is something I hadn’t considered, and could probably work.  My worry is that it makes it too unpredictable early and too uncontrollable late.  Remember the average effect is actually $3, and you have to work to make it worth more than that.  Also Black Market is supposed to put cards on the bottom of the pile, but dominion.games doesn’t do that because then you have to track the pile (I think TGG lets you see the card order, but I’ve never been in a game that when through the whole pile to find out for sure).  But the Ruins pile is smaller unless you have a ton of players, so tracking is less of an issue here.  I’d probably want to playtest it both ways to see how it works.

22


Quote
Redoubt
$3 - Action - Looter

+3 Actions

Gain 3 Ruins to your hand. This turn, after playing a Ruins, return it to its pile.

It uses “after” instead of “when” in the same way that Inspiring does.  The timing of the return to pile matters for Way of the Mouse using Redoubt as the set aside card.

Redoubt is a friendly Looter like Death Cart.  You are tempted by the possibility of Peddler or a Lab.  But some combinations are comparable to $2-cost cards (e.g. Ruined Village x2 + Ruined Mine ≈ Squire). The best effects hinge on Ruined Library.  Careful play order is needed so that the desirable Ruins don’t get buried deep.  Lean too heavily into Redoubt, and the opponent may just gain and trash the Ruined Libraries, leaving you with a mess of stop-cards.  It’s still a double Necropolis if you can get draw elsewhere and have a way to deal with the undesirable terminal Ruins.  And it helps counter the unfriendly Attack - Looters.

Redoubt could partially replace Beggar as a card that gains a lot of cheap cards to your hand.  It has strong synergies as does Beggar, but Redoubt is more usable in a normal kingdom without those specific combos, while Beggar usually just sits there.   Another 2E card can replace Beggar’s defensive Reaction.

23
Alright, now let's investigate the Finalists in a few different kingdoms. Randomly generated with 9 official cards (excluding 1st edition removals) and up to 2 landscapes.

Kingdom 1

Merchant Camp, Enchantress, Acting Troupe, Landing Party, Recruiter, Haunted Woods, Guild Master, Cursed Village, Crown, Fellowship of Scribes, Way of the Chameleon, Fountain.

A lot of good things here, but no gainers or +Buy is a big limitation.  In particular Fountain is shut down, especially if you trash Coppers with Recruiter.  So this will probably be a Province rush using Recruiter, Haunted Woods, and Gold.  There will be little room to use anything else.  Interestingly, all the Finalists add extra gains, but no extra Buys.

Horse Lord competes directly with Crown.  Horse Lord helps you cycle through your deck to your key cards or provides Recruiter fuel, while Crown paired with Gold is most of a Province.  I kind of prefer Horse Lord to keep getting to my Haunted Woods, and you have the option of topdecking Horse to counter the opponent's Haunted Woods.  That said, it may be tricky to find a time to buy Crown or Horse Lord here when Recruiter, Haunted Woods, and Gold take precedence.

Portorosso's Villagers get overshadowed by Recruiter unless you have more than a couple Action cards, and you probably won't have time to accumulate lots of Action cards.  Likewise, you won't have time to get multiple copies of Portorosso, and you probably can't wait for 2 Seafolk to collide with your Portorosso.

Artifact Dealer allowing an extra Action gain could be decently strong.  You still have to collide it with Forgery or Gold, but Recruiter can help with that.  When paired with Forgery I probably gain and play Enchantress, and with Gold I probably gain and play Haunted Woods, unless it's my last turn.  I don't think I would get Artifact Dealer before Gold, but I probably get it before Haunted Woods.  It can also gain fuel to feed to Recruiter and support more Action cards, which is useful if the game goes into Duchy dancing.

Magi Workshop hurts your ability to get Recruiter, which is the main thing to be doing turn 3 and 4.  There isn't a lot of draw midgame, so it is easy to get the Horse, but Imps probably won't be gained.  Will-o'-Wisps are useful but have a high opportunity cost given how good Coppers are here, and that hinders Spoils gaining too.  I just don't see Magi Workshop working here.

Kingdom 2

Poor House, Supplies, Guardian, Wizards, Ghost Town, Clashes, Remake, Blessed Village, Displace, Family of Inventors Desperation, Commerce.

Some brutal attacks that can be countered by Guardian.  Early access to Gold with Desperation + Commerce, but Remake, Battle Plan, and Student are probably higher priorities.  Poor House is normally bad for Remake, but Family of Inventors can disable the gain.  While there are multiple gains, there is still no +Buy (I swear I'm doing this randomly). Lich when-trash is only useful if you use Family of Inventors on the Wizards.  Displace alternating between Territory and Province could be a good source of VP, although that can be disrupted with Family of Inventors. (I don’t think I’ve ever seen so many Family of Inventors interactions.)

Horse Lord can use Horses from Supplies or double Battle Plan or Displace.  It's mostly an expensive Throne Room with a dud consolidation here, which can still be nice.

Portorosso has some cheaper alternatives for Villages. Villagers are usually good dud insurance, but there's no terminal draw, and Ghost Town can also help avoid duds.  Gold could be nice here with Displace, but I kind of like the Province & Territory combo, and either way, Family of inventors can ruin things.

Artifact Dealer is quite nice here.  Gold can be made cheaper by Family of Inventors, but not Forgery.  Blessed Village is a good target, as well as Battle Plan and Warlord (if it is cheap enough).  Limited draw means the two card combo is a downside, but early trashing with Student and/or Remake can help.

Magi Workshop might pair nicely with Student.  You could get your draw from Will-o'-Wisps, Horses, and eventually Imps.  Except for Overlord, which locks you out of the Imp requirement.  You can counter with Guardian, but that locks you out of Will-o’-Wisp gaining next turn.  I think Battle Plan and control of the Clashes is more important early on.

Kingdom 3

Hermit, Villa, Trail, Mastermind, Livery, First Mate, Crypt, Apprentice, Wayfarer, Way of the Sheep.

A kingdom with strong draw, trashing, and +Buy.  No Attacks or alt-VP, so you have to move quickly.  Hermit has no extra cards costing up to $3, so I might skip it in favor of Apprentice, especially with the Trail combo.  Livery is nice payload paired with Villa. The next cycle Villas’ +Buys can get Trails played as WotSheep. And Crypt can help keep Coppers away.  The only thing missing is a solid opening buy, although there’s always Silver, and on 4/3 maybe you open Trail and trigger an early reshuffle.

Livery is a powerhouse Horse gainer, and Mastermind makes exceptional use of those Horses, so I think Horse Lord gets edged out here.

Villa diminishes the value of Villagers, and Livery is better payload than Gold, so I don’t think Portorosso has a place here.

Artifact Dealer paired with Forgery isn’t that great here.  Trail already plays itself, and it can’t play Villa (which has the same timing as Siren, while Artifact Dealer has the same timing as Spell Scroll), although you can still play the Villa later.  Artifact Dealer paired with Gold has far more options, but you have to get the Gold separately.  Still, the kingdom has a lot of draw, so I think there’s room to play with Artifact Dealer here.

While there is no alternative $4 opener to compete with Magi Workshop, I think I want to do everything possible to afford either Apprentice or Livery turn 3 or 4.  Plus draw from Will-o’-Wisp and Imp gets edged out here.  Crypt removing Coppers from play can enable the Will-o’-Wisp and Spoils gain, so picking this up in the mid-late game could provide a slight benefit, although I think just getting another Livery probably outscales that.

Kingdom 4

Squire, Bauble, Taskmaster, Enchantress, Swamp Shacks, Fortune Hunter, Livery, Crew, Possession, Architects’ Guild.

No trashing, but it’s still possible to build a deck that can draw itself and play Possession each turn (thank goodness it’s only one Possession per turn now).  Possession shuts off Taskmaster, eats up Enchantress draw, and uses previously gained Horses.  But on a Possessed turn the opponent doesn’t actually gain cards, so Favors can’t be used up, and Livery can’t gain Horses for anyone.  The question is if you can get enough Provinces before a Possession opponent can set up.

Once again, Horse Lord must compete with Livery, although this time Livery isn’t as good as before with the lack of exceptional $4 gains.  If you think the opponent may Possess you soon, using the Horse gain option isn’t great.

Possession messes with Portorosso’s Villagers and existing Seafolk.  However, Seafolk and Gold gained on a Possessed turn go directly to their discard, making a Portorosso a Necropolis on a Possessed turn.  Especially when paired with only a couple of Crew, this could be a decent but expensive defense against Possession.  Possession aside, Also, Squire is a cheap alternative Village, and a Livery Horse can provide the draw needed to get to your Crew.

A possessed Artifact Dealer can’t play the Action gained, limiting its effectiveness.  Meanwhile, on your own turn, you could gain Swamp Shack for guaranteed draw.  But the lack of trashing means combo cards like Artifact Dealer / Forgery, and Swamp Shack / Swamp Shack are pretty ineffective.  Swamp shack could be boosted by Taskmaster and Enchantress, but those are already vulnerable to Possession.

Lack of trashing and reusable non-terminal draw, paired with the low cost Squire are great conditions for Magi Workshop.  You delay Livery, but that’s probably fine here, given the lack of spamable $4s.  Bauble can topdeck Horse and later Imp, but never Spoils and Will-o’-Wisp.  Horse and Spoils are vulnerable to Possession, but you probably just don’t get those later in the game.

Kingdom 5

The previous kingdoms were randomly dominated by game-warping cards (Recruiter, Clashes, Livery, and Possession).  So now lets get one final kingdom without any of the cards previously selected.  I was planning on re-rolling any other powerful cards, but I didn’t really get any here.

Settlers, Shanty Town, Marauder, Baron, Wheelwright, Mystic, Mint, Jester, Bank, Barracks, Tireless (on Wheelwright)

Mint is the only trashing, and there’s also not a lot of draw.  Marauder has a chance to shine here.  Tireless makes Wheelwright the target for Jester and Mystic.  Barracks probably gets some use since Ruins don’t play nice with Shanty Town, although Bustling Village might show up later on.  Baron or Ruined Market is +Buy.  Not a lot of draw options.

Horse Lord providing the only guaranteed draw  makes it pretty valuable here.  I probably get it early on to set up for Mint trashing and then transition to Wheelwright + Mystic.

Portorosso’s Villagers work well with all the Ruins.  Seafolk could also be a defense against Jester if you don’t have Wheelwright.  The endgame could just be Gold into Province, but I kind of like Wheelwright + Mystic better.

Artifact Dealer is hurt by the lack of trashing and draw.  Plus there aren’t really any spamable cards costing up to $4.  Wheelwright can more reliably gain $5s, and Jester can gain Wheelwrights if the other player is using them.

The kingdom’s lack of draw and trashing is nice for Magi Workshop, and once again the non-Supply piles are a deterrent for Jester.  It competes with Marauder in the opening, but I value Spoils + Horse + Will-o’-Wisp more than Spoils + maybe a Shanty Town + Ruins to Opponent.  It’s also safe to open with Shanty Town as guaranteed draw.

Results

Magi Workshop with Spoils and Horse by anordinaryman: Honorable Mention

It’s really good when the kingdom lacks reasonable draw or trashing, but that is rare.  Usually there is a $4 card you want to use more in the opening, or a $5 card you want to afford turn 3 or 4.  And other sources of draw don’t have such a high opportunity cost.  My suggestion would be to limit the card to 3 gains, eliminating the Horse gain.  This has a thematic connection to the 3 gifts of the wisemen, and it frees up space to add something like “For the rest of this turn, when you gain a card, set it aside and put it into your hand at end of turn.”  That’s even more wordy, but it doubles down on draw being the benefit of Magi Workshop, and you see the benefit of your sacrificed turn much earlier.

Horse Lord with Horse by NoMoreFun: 3rd Place

Not a lot to say here.  Often I’m paying for a Specialist just for the Throne Room effect, so $5 Throne Rooms are perfectly reasonable. Horse gaining is a nice side hustle.  Draw is powerful, so this is valuable in kingdoms without draw, although that doesn’t make me less sad that I have to pay $5 for it, and I have to be careful that simple big money doesn’t beat out whatever I’m trying to do.

Portorosso with Seafolk by emtzalex: 2nd Place

I really liked the theme of this one, but it just didn’t fit with most of the randomly generated kingdoms.  It goes back to that Renaissance Secret History; cantrip villager at $5 is a hard concept to make work.  Usually there are cheaper alternatives for Villages or better payload than delayed Gold, even when gained to the hand.

Artifact Dealer with Forgery by 4est: Winner

It’s very dependent on the rest of the kingdom, but as a gainer that comes with the territory.  It was able to stay relevant in kingdoms with powerhouse cards like Recruiter and Possession.  I kind of still wish that Forgery did more than just Copper, but it’s in the name, and the interaction with Artifact Dealer is more than enough to keep it interesting.

24
Weekly Design Contest / Re: Weekly Design Contest #207: Vanilla on the Side
« on: December 31, 2023, 06:34:48 pm »
I'll try to have the final judgment finished tomorrow, but for now, here is the individual feedback and finalist list.

Bee Keeper with H-Bee (and Clover Honey) by BryGuy:

This one kind of misses the mark of the contest.  Bee Keeper is non-Vanilla and H-Bee is Vanilla, but Bee Keeper doesn't ever gain H-Bee.  Instead Clover Honey does, but it has Vanilla +$2.  H-Bee replacing Curses seems like something better done as an expansion mechanic instead of having "in games using this" on a non-Supply card.  And I think that means H-Bee is in the Supply like Curses would be, so it's no longer a non-Supply card.

The H-Bee trashing option on Bee Keeper returns the trashed H-Bee to play, so you don't actually get rid of it.  So especially as the game progresses, it will be easier to collide Bee Keeper with H-Bee, to great benefit.  I'm not a fan of the non H-Bee route saying you can play a Supply H-Bee, but dictating that you pick different option, although something is necessary because otherwise Bee Keeper is strictly better than Laboratory.  My solution would be to simplify things by removing the play H-Bee from supply fallback and playing the trashed H-Bee 4 times "leaving it there."  Then you have a flexible Pooka that works with the Bee Clover Heirloom instead of against it like Cursed Gold.

Cryptid Hunter with Bigfoot by Cutepelican126:

There's a lot going on with Cryptid Hunter.  At it's core it's like a terminal Loan that can't hit itself, plays your good Treasures instead of discarding them, and becomes non-terminal once you have Gold or some other semi-expensive Treasure; which are all good things.  Like Loan it needs to say "Discard the other cards" or give some other instructions.  I don't really like it allowing you to buy non-Supply cards, but I guess Black Market allows something like that.  You don't need "immediately," although that reveals some of the confusion players could have.

Bigfoot is a Peddler that gives extra draw when you buy a card.  Normally you wouldn't be able to play the drawn cards, but Cryptid Hunter gets around that.  Most of the official on-buy triggers have been removed in an errata, but the usual replacement "gain a card in your Buy phase" doesn't work here, and that's Bigfoot and Cryptid Hunter's main gimmick.  I really do like Cryptid Hunter's Loan functionality.  Maybe remove the buying interactions and pair it with a $4 cost Treasure non-Supply pile.

Horse Lord with Horse by NoMoreFun:

Strictly better than Throne Room, so that deserves the $5 cost.  Yet playing it as the Horse gain option seems sad considering it's the same benefit as the $2 cost Sleigh.  However, thinking of it another way, a Kingdom with Horse Lord always has a Throne Room variant and a Horse gainer, which is a very valuable combo.  Putting it into perspective, a hand with Horse and the Throne Room variant provides a similar benefit as a hand with Horse and Lost City.  My initial thought is still that this is a little weak, but it does what this contest requires and is perfectly reasonable.

Finalist

Saddle with Horse by JW:

On the same page as Horse Lord, but this is exceptionally weak.  Putting it into perspective, Rope is like a combined Market and Junk Dealer, with the added benefit that the trashing is optional.  And yet it can cost $4, because those effects are spread across two turns.  Similarly, Saddle does the job of a bad Supplies and a non-terminal Throne Room, spread across two turns, so there's no way it deserves the $5 price, even taking the Horse + Throne Room combo into consideration.  Alternatively you could increase the power.  putting the contest rules aside I might make it a Silver variant on the turn you play it and call it good.

Portorosso with Seafolk by emtzalex:

I love this one.  Getting Villagers is a clear substitute for +Actions, and gaining a cantrip to your hand is a neat way to get around the +Cards restriction.  It reminds me of the cantrip Villager card mentioned in the Renaissance Secret History.  That would have probably needed to cost $5, but would be boring.  The interaction with Seafolk and Gold gaining is a nice way to make it more interesting and let it do other things. I don't particularly like the wording for removing Villagers from the mat.  You can get around this by giving +1 Villager unconditionally and +1 Villager alongside the Seafolk gain.  If you need to trim power, it would simplify things to not get Villagers with the Gold and 2 Villagers with the Seafolk.

I wouldn't have expected a Vanilla cantrip would end up in the contest, but the interactions with Portorosso are really interesting.  The "return to pile" clause is a little bit of a grey area.  As I mentioned in the contest guidelines, being a one-shot is usually a clear downside, but if it is optional, it can only be a benefit.  In this case the benefit is clear; you can control whether you get Seafolk or Gold from further Portorosso plays.  More subtly, maybe you want to empty the Seafolk pile (I'm assuming a pile of 10) or there are Vineyards or something.  It's something minor, but one way you could change it is by forcing a return to pile at the start of Clean-up. It has the benefit of being thematic; all the Seafolk return to the sea at the end of the turn. But aside from the contest prompt, I prefer the version with the optional return to allow more interactions.

Finalist

Fruit Market with Coster by grep:

Fruit Market provides +1 Action and +$1 per X, which are Vanilla effects against the contest rules. As mentioned earlier I don't particularly like letting cards buy from non-Supply piles.  And varying the non-Supply pile size with the number of players is unprecedented.  Fruit Market gives me Miser vibes.  It starts exceptionally weak, but the more you play it and the more Costers you get, the better it becomes.  It's also non-Terminal, so it can grow exponentially.  It seems like a strong source of payload once you're overdrawing your deck, probably shutting out other payload.  With overdraw and assuming no other +Buy, 3 Fruit Markets gaining Costers each turn make $3 the first turn after gained, then $12 the next turn, then $21 the next turn.  You're probably adding more Fruit Markets as you go.  That assumes the other player doesn't go for it so there are enough Costers to gain, but this is obviously too good to ignore.  Of course, with other sources of +Buy things can get even crazier, so I don't think there's a way to make this "+$1 per Buy you have" idea work. Merchant Guild fills a similar space, but it costs $5, is terminal, the payload is delayed, and you actually have to use the Buys.

Gambling Hall with Gambler (and Drunkard) by RovingBear:

Starting with Gambler, I was wondering if "turn your Journey token over" should count as Vanilla.  In the context of Gambler it's fine because it can only give Vanilla bonuses, and even if Ranger is around, that's still only a Vanilla bonus.  But Gambling Hall also uses the Journey token, for non-Vanilla effects.  Aside from that Gambler being a double Lab at the start of the turn if you set up the Journey token correctly, while also providing payload when you flip it around, is probably too good.

For being the lesser prize of Gambling Hall, Drunkard is still quite good.  At worst it's a cantrip that can set up the Journey token and give payload next turn.  Maybe you even save the +Action or +Card for next turn if you don't need it now.  But "choose the other 2" has tracking issues to avoid, just like how the Secret History for WotChameleon mentions it added "this turn" to avoid tracking issues.  Maybe just fix which bonus you get which bonus you get which turn.

Gambling Hall's "you may play an Action you gained this turn" also has tracking issues.  If you gain the card to hand or you use Harbinger to put a card onto your deck, you may no longer know where the card you gained is.  Take that away, and it's probably still OK, especially given how strong Drunkard and especially Gambler are.  There's definitely an interesting idea here, but it needs some polishing.

Cannibalism with Horse by Will(ow|iam):

A simple effect that meets the contest prompt.  Aptly named, as trashing a Horse to gain 3 is a cheap way to add draw to the next cycle, although drawing and not playing the Horse on the current turn is a decent opportunity cost, unless you already are drawing the deck, and then the Horses may not be that valuable.  Regarding some of the discussion, I agree that it's a little weak. +1 Buy would be a nice solution, except for the contest prompt.  Letting it trash Estates is far too powerful in the opening.  Even if it cost $4, that would be too automatic.  But at $5 you no longer want to trash Horse or Silver to it.  Maybe with a Gold gainer and source of +Buy it could be a nice source of draw.  The balancing on this one needs work.

Artifact Dealer with Forgery by 4est:

Artifact Dealer is an Action gainer comparable to Wheelwright and Hill Fort.  The effect of gaining and playing is strong, but you have to collide with an expensive Treasure.  The part about playing a Treasure to do something else could be a little confusing.  Do you still get the effect of the Treasure? (Yes, but it's not worded like any official Dominion card, so the confusion is justified.)  "If you do" wording like Conclave could help.  Either way, Artifact Dealer needs to say whether the gaining happens before or after the Treasure playing (see Kiln, Landing Party and Inspiring).

Forgery is an expensive Copper that comes with Artifact Dealer.  It's a really simple effect, but it makes sense to enable you to do something with Artifact Dealer before you have Gold.  You still have to collide the Artifact Dealer with the Forgery, which could require some luck mid-game.  Silver could also be an enabler if there are spamable $2 Actions in the Kingdom.  Forgery is also a deterrent for gaining and playing the entire Artifact Dealer pile, unless this will be your last turn.  I kind of wish it did something other than Vanilla Copper.  One way to solve both issues is by having Artifact Dealer discard a Treasure instead of playing it, and then giving Forgery a when-discard Reaction (like maybe "when you discard this, other than in Clean-up, +1 Card").  But these are really minor opinions, and Artifact Dealer is overall a very solid concept.

Finalist

Magi Workshop with Spoils and Horse by anordinaryman:

I agree that the previous version gaining Ghosts was too strong.  In fact, maybe even monolithic.  Because Horse and Spoils disappear, you can continue gaining Ghost, Horse, and Spoils each play.  Ghost is guaranteed to hit Horse, for a duration +4 Cards.  And once the Ghosts run out, other Actions can safely join in.

The Will-o'-Wisp condition seems too restrictive.  You can't have Copper in play, and once you start playing the Will-o'-Wisps, it will be impossible to get more.  So especially in the early game, you have to look at it as skip your Buy phase to get a Spoils, a Will-o'-Wisp, and a Horse.  That's better than using Devil's Workshop to get a Gold.  But unlike Devil's Workshop, you have to be committed because playing your Coppers to buy something means you only get a Horse.  My intuition is that this version will be weak due to the limitations you have to play around.  It has to cost $4 because it might be too good as a double open.  And it's already fairly wordy, so adding something else is out of the question.  Maybe change some of the conditions to be easier; although I get that's the card's inspiration.  But draw is strong, so maybe it could be worth it?

Finalist

25
Weekly Design Contest / Re: Weekly Design Contest #207: Vanilla on the Side
« on: December 28, 2023, 09:23:47 am »
24 hour warning

Please check that your entry is listed in the OP.

I won't disqualify anyone, but there are a few entries that are missing a mockup, or that aren't following the main prompt of Vanilla on the Side.  Also, some entries are missing the number of cards in the custom non-Supply pile, but I'll make a guess.  Those details will play into judging, but can be offset by doing well in other areas.



Contest is closed

I’ll get judging done over the next couple of days.

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