1
Variants and Fan Cards / (mainly) some hybrid cards
« on: July 25, 2015, 01:59:59 pm »
Some card ideas, all but one based around the idea of (hybrid) Victory cards. Once they are moderately balanced (respectively eradicated) I will provide images. All names are preliminary.
I think that the first 3 cards are moderately OKish but I am not too happy with the last three cards.
Seneschal - 5$ - Action - +1VP or +2 Action tokens
You may discard up to 3 times ...
... a VP token for +2 cards.
... an Action token for +2 actions.
... a Coin token for +2$.
About the wording, not sure about whether "discard" or "spend" are better as both are slightly confusing.
About the card, it is a Tribute variant with tokens instead of cards and thus provides more control as well as the possibility to save and set up a megaturn. On average (assuming that you spend all tokens and do not just accumulate the VP tokens which I guess is bad) the card provides 2 actions and 1 card. But it is just a village on average, most often it will be used 2 out of 3 times for +2 actions, +2 card which is worth 6 or more.
The Coin improvement happens rarely but if there are Coin token gainers in the deck this ability is pretty strong.
About the pricing, I am not totally sure that it is worth 5$ so I also consider 4$ and "When you gain this put your -1 Card token on your deck."
Mathematician - 4$+P - Victory - X VP: worth X VP if you at least X copies of X different cards in your deck
Now the wording is obviously aweful and preliminary.
The quadratic scoring should lead to VP values between 3 and 5. The more players there are the harder it is to get a lot of copies of an action card whereas with curses/ruins it is easier to get several (but this is nothing one should strive for
) and with treasure cards it is practically mostly irrelevant (unless there are Feudum silver rush games; Platinum rarely runs out; Potion rush in the endgame to improve this card seems far-fetched).
6: I don't see how you can get 6.
5: Unless there is a lot of trashing you could probably aim for 5 Copper, 5 Silver, 5 Gold and gotta live with 5 curses and/or 5 ruins and then you might get 5 of one action card or five of one victory card.
4: With trashing keeping coppers/ruins/curses in your deck just to improve this card seems unwise so here the maximum is probably 4, via 1-2 treasure cards, 1-3 action cards and 1-2 victory cards.
3: These are just the maximum goals you strive for so sometimes you can only reach 3.
I guess that the average value is slightly beneath 4 so 6$ would also be a fair price. But due to the quadratic scoring I want to tie the theme of the card into something science-y (Mathematician is just a preliminary name), hence the Potion in the costs.
If it is too expensive I will drop the Potion and use 6$.
Charlatan – 5$/6$ - Victory/Action/Attack/Looter - worth 1 VP per empty supply pile
Each other player discard the top card of his deck. If it is ...
... a Victory card he gains a Curse.
... an Action card he gains a Ruins.
... a Treasure card he gains a Copper.
Swindler, Mountebank and now a Charlatan.
This card is a variant of Asper's Iron Maiden (far better name than Charlatan). I used the flexible-spammer part of Iron Maiden but substituted the upper part for VPs. Thus the card has become self-synergizing in two ways: via playing it you make it more likely that the Curse or ruins pile runs out and via having it in your deck you also make it more likely as you get double-spammed when another player hits this hybrid card with his own.
Unlike other self-synergizing card like Minion or Fool's Gold this is a Victory card so it has the potential to ruin the game if the dominant strategy is to rush for these cards (buy them early and play a spamming game in which decks are crappy enough that nobody can acquire other decent Victory cards anymore). I do not think that this is very likely, not at least because of the price, but as it would make the card unplayable I have to test it well.
About the pricing, again this will depend on playtesting. If the card is strong enough to often trigger 3-pile endings I consider 6$ to be an appropriate price whereas if it just empties one spam pile and leads most often to 2-pile endings I’d say 5$.
Harlot - 5$ - Victory/Treasure - 2VP/ worth 1$ per 4 cards in play
This is based on a weaker form of Harem which has been discussed on this forum some time ago and provided 1$. This is better but still slightly weaker than Harem as you are more likely to hit 1$ than 3$ . The idea is obviously that of a treasure card which works well in draw-intensive engines.
'Per 3 cards' is another option I considered but here the average coins the card provides would be above 2 so the price would have to be above 6 and for mechanical as well as thematic reasons I did not want a stronger Harem.
Cavalry - 4$/5$ - Action - Reveal the top 6 cards of your deck. Put the revealed Victory cards into your hands, discard 2 cards and put the other cards on top of your deck in any order.
As my motivation was to make some more hybrid cards I also wanted a better Scout and this is a simple terminal mixture between Scout and Cartographer. The other version I considered was to switch the order ("Look at the top 6 card of your deck. Discard 2, reveal any Victory cards, put them into your hand and put the other cards on top of your deck in any order.") but I felt that this would be too strong. It obviously requires testing as 6 cards is a lot.
Golden Necropolis / Ghost Town - 3$ - Action/Duration –
+2 Actions, +1$ per (pair of) Victory card in your hand.
At the start of your next turn: +1 Action, +1$ per (pair of) Victory card in your hand.
First I wanted to make a Duration-Victory card (similar to this: a duration necro with 1 or 2 VPs) but as I have no card template which features this weird combo I decided to just go for a duration card. The theme is once again Victory card interaction and the card is a Crossroads / Fishing village variant.
Not too happy yet with this as 1$ for each Victory card seems too strong whereas 1$ per pair seems too weak and '1$ for each Victory card in your hand besides the first one' is awkward. Perhaps the easiest solution is to provide the $ only during the first turn (or to just delete the card).
I think that the first 3 cards are moderately OKish but I am not too happy with the last three cards.
Seneschal - 5$ - Action - +1VP or +2 Action tokens
You may discard up to 3 times ...
... a VP token for +2 cards.
... an Action token for +2 actions.
... a Coin token for +2$.
About the wording, not sure about whether "discard" or "spend" are better as both are slightly confusing.
About the card, it is a Tribute variant with tokens instead of cards and thus provides more control as well as the possibility to save and set up a megaturn. On average (assuming that you spend all tokens and do not just accumulate the VP tokens which I guess is bad) the card provides 2 actions and 1 card. But it is just a village on average, most often it will be used 2 out of 3 times for +2 actions, +2 card which is worth 6 or more.
The Coin improvement happens rarely but if there are Coin token gainers in the deck this ability is pretty strong.
About the pricing, I am not totally sure that it is worth 5$ so I also consider 4$ and "When you gain this put your -1 Card token on your deck."
Mathematician - 4$+P - Victory - X VP: worth X VP if you at least X copies of X different cards in your deck
Now the wording is obviously aweful and preliminary.
The quadratic scoring should lead to VP values between 3 and 5. The more players there are the harder it is to get a lot of copies of an action card whereas with curses/ruins it is easier to get several (but this is nothing one should strive for
) and with treasure cards it is practically mostly irrelevant (unless there are Feudum silver rush games; Platinum rarely runs out; Potion rush in the endgame to improve this card seems far-fetched).6: I don't see how you can get 6.
5: Unless there is a lot of trashing you could probably aim for 5 Copper, 5 Silver, 5 Gold and gotta live with 5 curses and/or 5 ruins and then you might get 5 of one action card or five of one victory card.
4: With trashing keeping coppers/ruins/curses in your deck just to improve this card seems unwise so here the maximum is probably 4, via 1-2 treasure cards, 1-3 action cards and 1-2 victory cards.
3: These are just the maximum goals you strive for so sometimes you can only reach 3.
I guess that the average value is slightly beneath 4 so 6$ would also be a fair price. But due to the quadratic scoring I want to tie the theme of the card into something science-y (Mathematician is just a preliminary name), hence the Potion in the costs.
If it is too expensive I will drop the Potion and use 6$.
Charlatan – 5$/6$ - Victory/Action/Attack/Looter - worth 1 VP per empty supply pile
Each other player discard the top card of his deck. If it is ...
... a Victory card he gains a Curse.
... an Action card he gains a Ruins.
... a Treasure card he gains a Copper.
Swindler, Mountebank and now a Charlatan.
This card is a variant of Asper's Iron Maiden (far better name than Charlatan). I used the flexible-spammer part of Iron Maiden but substituted the upper part for VPs. Thus the card has become self-synergizing in two ways: via playing it you make it more likely that the Curse or ruins pile runs out and via having it in your deck you also make it more likely as you get double-spammed when another player hits this hybrid card with his own.
Unlike other self-synergizing card like Minion or Fool's Gold this is a Victory card so it has the potential to ruin the game if the dominant strategy is to rush for these cards (buy them early and play a spamming game in which decks are crappy enough that nobody can acquire other decent Victory cards anymore). I do not think that this is very likely, not at least because of the price, but as it would make the card unplayable I have to test it well.
About the pricing, again this will depend on playtesting. If the card is strong enough to often trigger 3-pile endings I consider 6$ to be an appropriate price whereas if it just empties one spam pile and leads most often to 2-pile endings I’d say 5$.
Harlot - 5$ - Victory/Treasure - 2VP/ worth 1$ per 4 cards in play
This is based on a weaker form of Harem which has been discussed on this forum some time ago and provided 1$. This is better but still slightly weaker than Harem as you are more likely to hit 1$ than 3$ . The idea is obviously that of a treasure card which works well in draw-intensive engines.
'Per 3 cards' is another option I considered but here the average coins the card provides would be above 2 so the price would have to be above 6 and for mechanical as well as thematic reasons I did not want a stronger Harem.
Cavalry - 4$/5$ - Action - Reveal the top 6 cards of your deck. Put the revealed Victory cards into your hands, discard 2 cards and put the other cards on top of your deck in any order.
As my motivation was to make some more hybrid cards I also wanted a better Scout and this is a simple terminal mixture between Scout and Cartographer. The other version I considered was to switch the order ("Look at the top 6 card of your deck. Discard 2, reveal any Victory cards, put them into your hand and put the other cards on top of your deck in any order.") but I felt that this would be too strong. It obviously requires testing as 6 cards is a lot.
Golden Necropolis / Ghost Town - 3$ - Action/Duration –
+2 Actions, +1$ per (pair of) Victory card in your hand.
At the start of your next turn: +1 Action, +1$ per (pair of) Victory card in your hand.
First I wanted to make a Duration-Victory card (similar to this: a duration necro with 1 or 2 VPs) but as I have no card template which features this weird combo I decided to just go for a duration card. The theme is once again Victory card interaction and the card is a Crossroads / Fishing village variant.
Not too happy yet with this as 1$ for each Victory card seems too strong whereas 1$ per pair seems too weak and '1$ for each Victory card in your hand besides the first one' is awkward. Perhaps the easiest solution is to provide the $ only during the first turn (or to just delete the card
).
