Suppliers are a new card type that gives a player
additional buying options during their Buy phase. Having a Supplier in play is like adding an
Event to the game (or more than one). Each Supplier card will have at least one
Purchase, which is indicated by a price (in coins, debt, etc.), followed by a colon, followed by the effect the Purchase generates. Buying a Purchase means
paying the cost indicated on the Supplier and then
doing the effect next to it. Just like when you buy an Event,
buying a Purchase uses up a Buy. Also, the price of a purchase can use pricing mechanics like costs less (e.g. Peddler) or overpay (e.g. Doctor).
Example: | Matchmaker is a Supplier that allows a player to pay $6 and use a buy to gain two cards, a Victory card that costs up to $5, and a different card costing the same as that Victory card. |
The act of buying a Purchases works
exactly like buying an Event. Thus, a Purchase can be bought
multiple times in a turn if the player has the Buys and $ available to do it, unless the Supplier specifically states otherwise (e.g. by saying "once per turn"). Similarly,
a player may buy different Purchases from the same Supplier (if they can afford it). Some Purchases give +Buys and so let the player buy further cards/Events/Projects/Purchases afterwards. Players cannot play further Treasures that turn after buying a Purchase. Buying a Purchase is not buying a card and so does not trigger cards like Swamp Hag, and the costs of Purchases are not affected by cards like Bridge. Each Supplier creates its own "virtual Event", meaning that if a Supplier has a Purchase that says "Once per turn" and a player plays two copies of that Supplier, they can buy that Purchase once from each.
Example: | Work Camp's one Purchase provides +1 Buy in addition to the three Villagers it gives. That means that a player can buy this Purchase as many times as they can afford to spend the coins, or buy it then buy something else (even if they only have 1 Buy). |
The Purchase(s) on a Supplier card are available
during a player's Buy phase while that card is in play. If a Supplier leaves play (for example, by being trashed with Bonfire), it's Purchases are no longer available. Similarly, if a Supplier with another type (such as an Action - Supplier card) is played by a Command card that doesn't put it in play (like Overlord), the Purchase(s) are not available. Conversely, if a Supplier - Duration remains in play on the following turn, its purchases would still be available then. Buying the purchases isn't part of resolving the card (as, for example, paying your coins to Storyteller to draw cards is), so a player can play a Supplier, take other actions, then later buy a Purchase (so long as the Supplier is still in play).
Example: | Wet Market's second ($5) Purchase self-trashes the card. After that happens, a player cannot buy that Purchase again, or buy the other Purchase. However, the player could first buy the $1 Purchase as many times as they wish, then buy the $5 Purchase (if they still have enough coins) and trash the card. |
Generally, Suppliers will be Kingdom cards, purchased from the Supply to go into a player's deck. Suppliers are
played during your Buy phase. Unlike Treasures, they may be played at any point during your Buy phase, even after you buy something. Suppliers may have some additional effect when they are played, which can including giving vanilla bonuses. Supplier cards can have other types (e.g. Treasure, Action, Reaction, Duration, Victory) as well; such cards behave like all other dual-type cards.
Example: | Silversmith is an Action - Supplier card, which is a Peddler variant when played during the Action phase, and provides the same effect as Delve if it is in play during a player's Buy phase. |
I think that the Supplier type has the potential to create a lot of interesting strategies and interactions. Below are some of the cards I created.
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Quartermaster -- $2 Supplier $1: +2 Buys $3: Gain a card onto your deck costing up to $4.
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Quartermaster is a relatively simple Supplier with two Purchases. The first converts coins into Buys. The second gains and topdecks a card. You can use it to get extra Buys. You can use it to get the mid-range cards you buy onto your deck (or get $4 cards when you only have $3). Even if you're buying a Silver, you can gain it onto your deck, accelerating your payload. If you hit $7 (or $6 and 2 Buys), it can enable next-turn combos of two cards costing up to $4, some of which are quite potent (e.g. village-Smithy or 2 Treasure Maps).
As I discussed in the opening post, Suppliers have some systemic weaknesses. One of the thing that means is that they can have pretty powerful effects without being totally overpowered (because they are so hard to use).
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Conquistador -- $13 Supplier $10: Exile a Colony from the Supply. ----- In games using this, play with Colonies and Platinum
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Exiling a Colony from the Supply is absurdly powerful. However, the need to buy this at $13, then line it up with $10 on one turn make it challenging enough to justify the powerful effect (although it does create an extremely simple Golden Deck with very efficient trashing, e.g. Donate).
One advantage Suppliers have over Events is actually also one of their weaknesses. The fact that the Purchase isn't always available to all players means that effects that could be easily countered by a subsequent buy by another player (like taking an Artifact) can be more effective with a Supplier, as the player who buys the Supplier is much more likely to be able keep that Artifact for multiple turns (especially if they are the only one who buys it).
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Curio Shop -- $5 Supplier +1 Buy $2: Choose one: take the Sextant; or take the Censer; or take the Scroll. $3: gain an Treasure costing up to $5 onto your deck.
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Sextant Artifact At the start of your turn, you may discard your hand and draw 5 cards.
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Censer Artifact At the start of your turn, you may trash a card from your hand.
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Scroll Artifact At the start of your turn, you may discard two cards to look through your discard pile and put a card from it into your hand.
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Curio Shop's first Purchase allows a player to take one (at a time) of three Artifacts. Each of them are pretty useful (if not equally so), but they also compliment one another: you can trash a card from your hand then trade in for a full (5 card) hand; you can discard two Victory cards to pull a Curse from your discard pile to trash; if you swap your hand with Sextant (and don't hit the shuffle), you can discard two of the new cards to gain one of the cards you discarded (say, swapping a Copper and a Province for a Gold). The second purchase can give access to Kingdom Treasures (or discounted Golds) onto the deck at a discounted rate (or, in the worse case scenario, topdeck Silvers you buy to accelerate getting them into your hand).
There is a lot of potential for dual-type Supplier cards. I had previously posted a Supplier - Duration, but given the modification I made to the rules, that card needs to be changed as well.
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Summoner -- $3 Supplier - Duration +1 Buy $4: Gain an Action card costing up to $5. Set it aside face up (on this). At the start of your next turn, play it, then discard this from play.
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The new version is similar to the old one, but because it needs to discard itself I limited it to a single Purchase. I think most Supplier - Durations will need to self-discard after playing their start-of-turn effect, or else their Purchase could be constantly bough on every turn, keeping them in play. Of course, that function could be made an intentional part of the card's design.
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Exchequer -- $5 $2: Once per turn: +1 Buy, at the start of your next turn, +$3.
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Exchequer can function as a kind of Hireling variant that gives $1 each turn instead of a card (albeit one that requires spending $2 to get started). However, it offers a second option, as a player can opt not to rebuy the Purchase, and take the $3 on a turn instead (an easy decision if doing allows them to buy a game winning card).
Edit: This was originally called Bank, which I somehow forgot was an official card. Thanks to Gubump for pointing that out and suggesting the new name.
Another combo with a lot of potential (recognized by Aquila with his card Caravaneer) is Supplier - Gathering.
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Wet Market -- $3 Supplier - Gathering $1: +2 Buys, add 1VP to the Wet Market supply pile. $5: Trash this. If you did, take the VP from the Wet Market Supply pile.
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This card is the closest among the ones I designed to any of the contest submissions (I made this prior to the contest). I initially conceived of Wet Market as a variant on Farmers' Market. It can be used for extra buys, adding VP tokens to its pile, then trashed to take those tokens. It is less useful than Farmers' Market, failing to provide any coins, but it has a significantly increased capacity to Gather VP tokens.
There are several other potential dual type combos that I have experimented with.
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Cursed Wanderer -- $4 Action - Supplier If it's your Action phase, you may discard any number of cards; for each card discarded, +$1 per $2 it costs (round down). $1: Take the Monkey's Paw.
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Monkey's Paw: At the start of your turn, you may gain a card costing up to $6 to your hand. If you did, gain a card named by the player to your left.
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Cursed Wanderer is an Action - Supplier card. The Action allows a player to discard cards for coins based on the cost of the discarded cards. While this can yield substantial benefit when a Province is discarded, it gains nothing when a player discards Coppers or Curses. The Purchase gains an Artifact, Monkey's Paw (partially inspired by Commodore Chuckles
Bottle Imp, but based on a different story of an Evil object that gives people what they want at a terrible cost).
Monkey's Paw functions as a Wish at the start of each turn, but at the cost of getting junked a card by an opponent. This will normally be a Curse, but I wanted it to continue to give junk even if those runs out, and to build in the flexibility for a player to decide what the most disadvantageous piece of junk would be (could Coppers, Ruins, Silver in a game with Bandit Fort, a unique card in a game with Wolf Den, or just a card that helps the other player win, perhaps by emptying a pile).
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Dauphin -- $4 Supplier - Victory $4: Gain a Dauphinate. ----- Worth 1VP per Dauphinate you have.
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Dauphinate -- $4* Victory 2VP (This is not in the Supply.)
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Supplier - Victory cards have a couple of point of appeal. First, it provides an answer to the question of why the Supplier is not an Event. Second, as Victory cards default as being dead cards, any functionality is a positive (which is why Tunnel is the only Kingdom reaction that cannot be played for an effect).
Dauphin is a self-contained Duke/Duchy variant, being the source of the card that increases its value. The cards are cheaper than their official counterpart, but the Dauphinate is only worth 2VP, and harder to get. On the other hand, it's harder for other players to interfere by grapping one of the cards (as Dauphin with any Dauphinates is worthless, while a Duchy is always worth something for a player).
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Donkey Trader -- $4 Supplier - Reaction $1: +1 Buy; gain a Donkey. ---- When you gain a card, you may reveal this from your hand, to exchange the card for a Donkey.
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Donkey -- $3* Action +1 Card +1 Action +$1 Return this to its pile.
(This is not in the Supply.)
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A variant of Trader, this card's Purchase converts coins into Donkeys. Donkeys are almost always worse than Coffers (except when you can take advantage of them being Action cards, for example by Throning them), but they're almost always better than cards that junkers give you, so the reaction is still useful.
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Tavern Lodging -- $3 Supplier - Reserve $2: +1 Buy. Put this on your Tavern mat. Gain an Action card costing up to $4 and set it aside face up under this. ----- At the start of your turn, you may call this to play the card under it.
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A twist on the Summoner card, this gains and sets aside an Action card until the Reserve is called. This can help guarantee certain beneficial collisions (e.g. Treasure Map) by letting a player hold an Action until they want to use it. Way of the Turtle can be used the same way.
I was also interested in seeing if I could do a Supplier - Heirloom.
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Pardoner -- $5 Action - Gathering +1 Card +1 Action +$1 Add 1% to the Pardoner Supply pile.
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Indulgence -- $2 Treasure - Supplier - Heirloom $1 $4: Return a Pardoner from your hand to the Supply. If you did, take the % from the Pardoner Supply pile.
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I like this card/heirloom combo a lot, but I don't know that Indulgence really makes the best use of the Supplier mechanic. It could easily give the option of returning the Pardoner without paying.
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Mercante -- $4 Action +1 Card +1 Action When you play a Silver this turn, if you then have an odd number of Silvers in play, +1 Buy; if an even number, +$1.
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Cassone -- $2 Treasure - Supplier - Heirloom $1 $4: Gain 2 Silvers.
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Cassone feels more like a Supplier card, and I like the way it interacts with Mercante. My big concern with this is that only if a player opens $4/$3 or $3/$4, with Cassone in the $4 hand, can they open with three Silvers. I tried to do the math and believe that would happen just under 50% of the time, which might make games using this a lot more dependent on an opening hand.
I hope people found these interesting. I would appreciate any feedback you all have.