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[MainiacJoe]

Scavengers – 3 – Action/Reaction
+1 Action
While this is in play, when you gain a card, you may put it on the bottom of your deck.
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When another player trashes a card, you may reveal this from your hand.  If you do, gain the trashed card.

-or a more multi-player friendly version-

Scavengers – 3 – Action/Reaction
+1 Action
While this is in play, when you gain a card, you may put it on the bottom of your deck.
----------
When another player trashes a card, you may reveal this from your hand.  If you do, return the trashed card to the supply and gain a copy of it.




I've lurked for a while, this is my first post.  Please tell me what you think about this card idea.  The inspiration is the Reaction, and the Action is just meant to fit the card name.

This Reaction is meant to be a soft counter to trash-for-benefit cards and a way to boost the trashing Attack cards.  It must disallow reaction to your own trashing or it would be broken.  I checked all the trashing Attacks and each is worded so that the attacked player is the one that does the trashing, so this strengthens these attacks (and they need it) instead of countering them.  So for instance, someone ahead in Provinces would be disinclined to Remodel one of them into another, or you can play Pirate Ship and get both the token and the treasure you stole.  Swindling a Province becomes, in effect, “gain a Province.”  It doesn’t unbalance the early game trimming, though, because who wants to gain those Coppers?

I’m wondering how much of a problem it is that only one player in a multi-player game can gain the trashed card.  I figure that the opportunity to gain the trashed card would go around the table from the player doing the trashing.  The second wording above is intended to address this issue.

The first Action I thought of was, “+1 Action, Put the top card of your discard pile on the bottom of your deck.”  The Fan Card Creation Guide killed that one, and I can see why.  What I have now is similar to Royal Seal, which when I compare it to Silver says that putting a gained card on top of the deck is worth $2.  I have a reaction, give +1 action but no money, and am putting cards on the bottom of the deck, so that’s how I came up with the 3 cost for the card.

[rinkworks]

I like the idea of bottom-decking cards, but this doesn't seem like a strong enough way to do it.  If you draw this early in a shuffle, the benefit is extremely marginal.  If you draw it late in a shuffle, it's comparable to a Royal Seal that offers no money at all, which, if you think about it, makes it a worse card than Copper.

The reaction component could be great in certain circumstances, but how often does someone trash something you might actually want to have?  Most cards that go to the trash belong there.  The exceptions:  Bishop, Apprentice, Salvager, Trader.  In most games, those cards aren't present -- and when they are, the presence of Scavengers on the board may mean that optimal play is not to use them anyway.

You could make a case for adding the Remodel family to this list, but if you're willing to gain the cards your opponent is replacing with better cards, that's a sign you're already losing.  And Lookout might cause Provinces to get trashed, but it doesn't happen often enough to buy a card on the off-chance you could turn a freak event that will greatly benefit you into a freak event that will greatly benefit you more.

So I'm not sure how to make the reaction portion work.  The action portion would be cool if you grafted it onto a stronger card.   For example, this would be a harmless pick-up with extra buys (and combo nicely with Pearl Diver, which usually gets bought under the same conditions):

Scavengers
$2 - Action
+1 Card
+1 Action
--
While this is in play, when you gain a card, you may put it on the bottom of your deck.

And this, while a pretty weak $3 card, would probably not be too weak:

Scavengers
$3 - Action
+$2
--
While this is in play, when you gain a card, you may put it on the bottom of your deck.

This ought to work, too:

Scavenger's Village
$4 - Action
+1 Card
+2 Actions
--
While this is in play, when you gain a card, you may put it on the bottom of your deck.

Caveat: The non-terminal versions of these actually might be slightly too strong in multiples (because you could manufacture a power hand as you go) and might need a $1 price increase depending on how they playtest.