This contest focuses on
card costs.
Instead of paying $, debt or Potions, you pay with the cards you own. It's another type of currency to mess Chariot Race around. There's a card icon (you can type it like [ ]) in the bottom left, and a description of the cost in the card's text.
Campsite - Action, [ ] cost.
+1 Card
+2 Actions
-
[ ]: discard 2 Victory cards, revealing them.
So at the Buy phase, you declare you use a Buy on Campsite. You first pay the price, reveal and discard two Victories. If you did,
then you buy the card (when-buy effects trigger, -1 Buy) then gain a Campsite (when-gain effects trigger). You can't pay the price of an empty card-cost pile.
To clear up Chariot Race: each different card cost counts as a different currency, so they can't be compared. If there are two cards with the same card cost (e.g Campsite and a Smithy with '[ ]: discard two Victories...'), then they tie. I.e., pure card costs never win!
And so, nothing that gains cards costing up to $, debt or Potion can gain a card cost card. (And since the expensiveness of card costs vary so greatly - like Campsite is cheap and 'trash a Gold from your hand' is expensive - I don't recommend creating one.)
Let's bring Animal Fair into this too. It could easily have been '[ ]: trash an Action card from your hand'. Because it costs $7*, it can be made into a Province with Way of the Butterfly and also be bought with $7, extra functions that it benefits from.
So, it would be nice to see designs that benefit from being limited to just the card cost. With Campsite, I feel it benefits in that it's distinguished from the standard Village and calls for a different kind of engine.
Discarding and trashing your cards will be the most likely costs, but technically, you could also make a card cost out of a certain condition your cards in play need to meet, like '[ ]: have 5 Actions in play'; think how much of a cost it will actually be.
You can combine the card cost with other currencies! With Chariot Race, imagine the hypothetical Smithy with a cost of $1[ ] 'discard two victories'; that would beat Campsite. Also, you could Remodel/Upgrade/Butterfly a Campsite into it.
I think that's everything mechanics wise. I won't ask for mock-ups nor will I favour those who use them, but
here is a link to the generator with the card cost icon set up if you so desire. (Just copy and paste the custom icon symbol.)
Contest closes on:
Wednesday 28th July 20:30 forum time.
Please enjoy!
Edit: added more to $[ ] costs.