A lot of comments ! Thanks a lot.
Do you think it's still so good that people would always open with Tomb no matter what ?
In the early game you might be able to compare it to Smithy. Early on you don't care that Smithy is terminal; it's not going to likely draw other actions anyway. So Smithy draws you 3 cards, mostly copper Tomb draws you 2-4; all Copper. So based on that, it doesn't sound overpowered as an opener. It's not doing much more than Smithy anyway. Of course you can't double-open Smithy, and even if you could you wouldn't want to. With this, double-opening is probably a pretty good opener most of the time. But I don't think it's automatic.
Besides, this can always happen:
(Bad Luck Brian)
Thanks for the comparison with Smithy. It's not an automatic opening for sure, but I think your comparison is another reason to price it at $3 : at $4 it's just a dangerous smithy in the beginning (and at $3 you can open Tomb-Tomb, and it doesn't discard itself, like I said earlier).
The Bad Luck Brian thing isn't likely to happen, because you'd need a hand of Tomb-Copper-Copper-Copper-Copper. If I had that in hand I probably wouldn't even play my Tomb, since my deck would be full of estates. Or in fact I would probably play it and name Estate, as to not draw a hand with three estates, a copper, and something. As soon as you have at least one estate in hand, Tomb becomes less swingy, because there is at least one Copper on top of your deck in such a case.
I think it's an interesting concept, but there are some issues with it.
1. Swinginess: Yeah, it's incredibly swingy. Assume a game where both players open Tomb/X. It's already so much better to draw it T3 because it won't cause a reshuffle. Then, if I play it T3, draw 3 Coppers, get a Goons, and you play it T3, reaveal 3 Estates/X, it's already game over.
2. Punishing yourself: I guess that's in the very concept, and I don't mind it much, but there are definitely players who don't like cards that punish you.
3. Power level: Opening Tomb/nothing already guarantees hitting $5 during the second shuffle; I don't think any other $3/$4-cost can do that. As such, I think it's close to a must-buy, at least in kingdoms with key $5/$6 costs (and these are common)
4. Encouraging uninteresting strategies: Which strategies work best with this card? Those who rely on spamming the same card over and over - Minion, Governor, that kind of stuff.
Overall, I think I like the concept, but maybe it could be better with a little twist... I'll think of something.
A great reply.
I'll address each or your point :
1. As I said earlier, the player naming copper and revealing 3 Estates/X is playing dangerously, he's supposed to know that it can happen. However, you are right that it may be to swingy in the beginning of the game.
2. You are right, but it's the whole point of the card. And we don't mind doing that, the people I play with thinks it's a fun concept.
3. Like someone pointed earlier : Death Cart guarantees you a lot of money soon enough, Feast guarantees a $5, Count is pretty good at it too... Etc.
4. You are right. However, I think it mostly encourages strategy based around $3-cost cards, since it doesn't discard those. I can't say I'm particularly concerned by this as most power cards that you want in multiple are of $5 cost.
I think "matches" is perfectly clear. There are other wording problems though. It's better if you finish describing a process before you get to something else, if possible. In this case, first say what you do with the cards, then describe the penalty.
I would suggest this wording:
+1 Action
Name a card. Reveal the top 4 cards of your deck. Put the matches into your hand. Put the cards costing less than 4$ back in any order. Discard the rest. If you didn't draw any cards this way, gain a curse.
Thanks, definitely a better wording.
I believe the card is too strong without the penalty. To do it without penalty, I'd suggest something like this:
+1 Action
Name a card. Reveal the top 4 cards of your deck. Put one of the revealed card that is the named card into your hand. Put the rest back in any order.
As I said earlier, the point of the card is to punish yourself, so nope. Good idea though.
For the penalty, I think it would be much more interesting if it punished you for guessing "too good" instead of "too bad" (because having guessed bad already is a penatly). I imagine something like this:
+ 1 Action
Name a card. Reveal the top 4 cards of your deck. Put the matches into your hand. Discard the rest. If you put more than 2 cards into your hand that way, gain a Curse.
That's not a bad idea actually, but it kind of goes against the point of the card too. The idea of this expansion is that you have a lot of interaction with your deck or your discard, so in order to play optimally, you need to know what's in your deck. It's like if the point behind Chancellor (which is not a really good card, if I might add) became a whole expansion. So. For Tomb, I wanted a card that :
a. Rewarded good players, players paying attention to what's in their deck;
b. Punished players playing too randomly;
c. Didn't cost much.
That's the three main points. One might say that the whole ''anti-sifter'' thing of discarding the $4+ cards seems to be one of my goals too, but not really. It was more something I added to balance the card and, even if I like the idea, if it doesn't fit here I can always re-use it later as a penalty somewhere else. What I like in your last idea, faust, is the fact that it reduces swinginess a lot by punishing players who are having a lot of luck. However, it's going against my main objective (the a) by punishing someone playing well.
My idea would be to make it a one-shot when it's too good :
Tomb
Action - $3
+ 1 Action
Name a card. Reveal the top 4 cards of your deck. Put the matches into your hand. Discard the rest. If you put more than 2 cards into your hand that way, trash this card. If you didn't draw any cards, gain a Curse.
So opening Tomb/Tomb is still a good opening, but if you name Copper and draw a bunch of them (as in 3 or 4), you lose your Tomb too. And it still punishes the player who play without thinking and just name randomly. What do you think ?
