Judging
Sorry for the delay.
Middleman by TiagoSalavger by way of Priest. It does cleave a bit too close to Priest though, with the use cases for the two overlapping a lot on the average board. It does have some potentially interesting tricks with other trash for benefit cards, not dissimilar to Rats, but I'm not sure if it justifies itself without those tricks.
Granary
Project
At the start of your turn, discard a card from your hand. If it costs 
, 
, or 
, +2 Cards.
Granary by JWA 2-cost project, with its cost being outweighed by being pretty unbuyable early. Compared to the superficially similar Crop Rotation, it’s live for a lot more of the game but also requires you to discard a real card. It also has potential to hurt more than help, but that seems pretty rare once you’ve built a little. An overall interesting card, but it does feel a bit undercosted, even taking the downside into account.
Oenologist
Action/Duration - $3
The next time you play an Action on your turn, +1 Action, +$4 and +1 Buy instead of following its instructions.
Oenologist by NoMoreFun
A wonky bit of payload. The effect is similar to “Discard an action for +1 Action, +$4 and +1 Buy” except of course in all the ways that it’s different. It reads as very powerful but it does seem like it would ask enough of your deck that it justifies the power. I really like the risk/reward aspect of the “next time” side of things, you can potentially spike a price point early, but poor planning can cause you to miss out on playing a key card for a shuffle.
Magician by 4est
An odd intersection of Masquerade and Advisor. Getting to be a Masquerade early and a Lab on the midgame is pretty powerful, even with the randomness. Of course, it does also become too risky to use in the lategame, since it trashes Provinces. That aspect of the card I’m not too fond of, though I don’t know how to fix it without killing the card’s elegance.
Mirage • $3 • Action
+1 Action
Set aside your Deck's top three cards face-down. The right-player chooses one to discard. Reveal and turn the rest. If the discarded card is ...
an Action or Night, +1 Action and +1 Card,
a Treasure, +1 Buy and play the Treasure before discarding,
costs $0, trash it,
costs at least $5, +$1.
Mirage by BryGuy
Somewhat of an Ironmonger variant. The “opponent randomly chooses a card” mechanism seems not very useful here. If it just always hit the top card the end result wouldn’t be that different, other than disallowing setup with Cartographer and the like, and allowing that seems more interesting than preventing it. The mix of caring about both card types (but not Victory cards) and the card’s cost makes the whole package a bit messy.
Midas Touch by Augie279
A Gold gainer and trasher. The $7 price point is well chosen, since a lower price point could enable money decks a bit too well.
Kookaburra by HorazVitae
A Lost City or payload, with a fairly killer downside. “Trash the top card of your deck” is a very swingy effect, the difference between hitting Copper and Province (or even Silver and Village) in terms of power level and of fun level is pretty big. The rider locking you out of using it once you’ve drawn your deck seems tacked on, I think it’s fine if you can get a “free” +$3 +1 Buy.
Con Artist by infangthief
A unique attack that also provides duration draw and extra buys. It reminds me of cards like Highwayman or Lost Woods where the attack is relatively low impact but the card’s baseline is still worth buying.
Industrialization by faust
A card that completely changes the way you’d play the game. The board would need a lot of draw to offset the card’s downsides but you could also build some extremely interesting decks. It does have the potential to lock you out of the game, so some sort of backup mechanism there could be worth considering.
Grand Roundabout
8debt duration-action
Now or at the start of your next turn, discard any number of cards, then draw until you have ten cards in hand. Reveal your hand and put all non-Action cards onto your deck in any order.
Grand Roundabout by fika monster
A duration draw-to-x card. Like Royal Blacksmith or City Quarter, it’s an 8 Debt card that isn’t very good early on. In fact, it’s similar to a bigger Royal Blacksmith, with a harsher downside to match. Drawing 5 as a duration, plus filtering, is definitely worthy of that downside.
Delegate
+
+1 BuyDiscard a card per 2 cards you have in your hand.
Action
|
Delegate by J410
An odd little payload card that’s often better if you can play it in the middle of the turn. It does seem a bit on the weak side, but it’s an interesting kind of weak.
Runners Up:
Delegate by J410
Midas Touch by Augie279
WINNER: Oenologist by NoMoreFun
