Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[LTaco]

Weekly Design Contest #188: Make a Wish



For this week´s contest, design a card-shaped thing that uses the Wish pile. You may incorporate any official components or mechanics. Your entry may encompass multiple components (split-piles, traveller lines, other non-supply piles etc.).


Choose a compelling theme for your entry that justifies the inclusion of Wishes. Draw inspiration from various sources, such as classical fairy tales, folklore, ancient myths, or even contemporary works.
Your primary focus should be on using Dominion mechanics to support your chosen theme. The mechanics should be intricately woven into the story you are portraying.

The challenge should be exactly that, evoking your chosen theme in only a few concise instructions on a card, so if you choose to submit a set of cards/card-shaped things instead of a single one, this should be represented in more detailed mechanics accompanying your theme.

Keep in mind that Wish is a powerful card that shouldn't just be handed out on a whim. So you might want to limit the amount of Wishes one can receive in a game and/or tie the Wish-gaining to some exotic criteria.

Your submissions will primarily be judged on how well the instructions mirror the theming and on creative use of limitations and challenges in attaining Wishes.


Although plain text entries will be accepted, I encourage you to submit your cards as images with card-art.
In order to judge your submission, I´ll obviously need to know what you theme is based on. So make sure it is possible do discern from the card(s) alone what one might need to google in order to find out. A fitting name should be enough in most cases.


This is my first time hosting a contest, so I hope I didn't bite off more than I can chew with this prompt.
I´m looking forward to seeing your creations.

[anordinaryman]

Monkey's Paw | Victory | $5
Worth 1% per Wish you have.
-
When you gain this, take 3 hexes. At the start of your next 3 turns, receive one of those hexes to gain a Wish.

The Monkey's paw is a mythical artifact that grants three wishes -- but each wish is corrupted and it turns out bad for the wisher. Perhaps the wisest thing is to not use the Monkey's paw at all.

The best way I could make this fun and theming is to pair the wishes with hexes. I do note that in the real story it takes your specific wishes and turns them rotten, but I couldn't do that easily in span of card, so instead you just get hexed first. Seems fun. You also get some choice in what hex you get when, so you may be able to make a wiser choice based on your hand. They do hit hardest, hexes are strongest at the beginning of your turn.

There's another fun play, perhaps it is wisest not to use those wishes at all. Then your Monkey Paws could become quite valuable -- there are up to 12 wishes in the deck to get 12VP per MP. But be warned, going a victory strategy means you have tolerate all the hexes that come along (even if all wishes are gone you still get hexed).


Doing the math of some situations for fun.
(2MP, 6 wishes) = 12 VP, 8 junk cards (1.5VP/card), 6 hexes. Spent a "junk" wish and lose 2VP
(3MP, 9 wishes) = 27VP, 12 junk cards (2.25VP/card),  9 hexes. Spent a "junk" wish and lose 3VP
(4MP, 12 wishes) = 48VP, 16 junk cards (3VP/card), 12 hexes. Spent a "junk" wish and lose 4VP
(6MP, 12 wishes) =  72VP, 18 junk cards (4VP/card), 18 hexes. Spent a "junk" wish and lose 6VP
Of course this requires your hoarding of the wishes to be uncontested. Especially tough since the 3 wishes or gained once a turn starting the turn after you play a monkey's paw


I'm open to suggestions. I was considering costing it at $4 since if you spend the wishes it's self junking and that balances decently with the hex at start of turn for a delayed wish -- but I don't like War being able to kill Monkey Paws. I could be convinced though, it's tricky to balance.

Rules clarification 1: you can only receive a hex you have "taken." So if you first take Bad Omens, Delusion, and Envy, next turn you receive Bad Omens, then the turn after that you can only choose to receive Delusion and Envy.

Rules clarification 2: if you have bought multiple Monkey Paws that still have hexes, you treat the hexes piles as separate. So if MP 1 has Delusion and Envy left, and MP2 has Fear left, you can't choose to receive Delusion and Envy, you'd have to get one of those and Fear.

[NoMoreFun]

Birthday Party
Event - $0
Once per turn: If your deck has exactly 10 cards in it, gain a Wish

Rules clarification: Just the deck, not including the discard pile or your hand or cards in play etc.

[grep]

Wonderland
Action - Victory - $5
+2 Cards
You may reveal and discard three differently named Victory cards to gain a Wish onto your deck.
-----
2VP


*edit Reveal and discard for accountability

[BryGuy]

Forest Hike • $5 • Action
+1 Action
You may discard a Victory card for +2 Cards.
You may play up to two Treasure cards.
If you have exactly eight cards in play, gain a wish, otherwise you may gain a silver.

This offers a small path towards gaining a Wish in addition to a path to gain a Wish.

[xyz123]

Hopeful
Trait

When you gain a Hopeful card, you may reveal and discard two differently named Treasures to gain a Wish.

[LTaco]

End of the Road
3P
Action

Use the following effects if you have more than 6 cards:
in your hand: gain a gold to your hand.
in play: each other player recieves the next hex.
in your draw pile: +3 cards.

Your submission is not eligible since it doesn't make use of Wish.

[grrgrrgrr]

[4est]

Can we pretend that airplanes in the Night sky are like Shooting Stars? I could really use a Wish right now, Wish right now, Wish right now.

A Night-Reaction that can gain and play exactly one Wish per turn but only if you didn't gain any cards beforehand (and playing Wishes during your Night phase usually isn't as helpful). However, if you catch sight of a Shooting Star before Nighttime (via revealing), you can get your Wish early.

No idea on cost, $5 felt like too much, but maybe that's right? You don't really want these in multiples.

[segura]

Looks like a $5 to me. Brilliant non-terminal everything-gainer in the opening that goes well with quick trashing.

[czzzz]

v1

v2

A villager told me there was some kind of spirit in the woods. It grants you a Wish if you Offer something to it!

Take that, 5/2 opening. Now we all get Wishes and trashing faster than you. 
Edit: God forbid 3/4 opening has an edge.  Jk, thanks for the feedback

[silverspawn]

^ now anyone with 5/2 basically loses the game before it even starts. Trashing 2 estates to Top deck a wish is such a monumental advantage, it makes fisherman blush

[segura]

It has to cost $2, then it is fine. With this, fix 2/5 would also not be that much better than 3/4.

[sumrex]

End of the Road 2P
Action- Treasure
+2 Cards
Once this turn, when you play a treasure or night card: you may reveal your hand, then use the following effects, depending on how many unique cards are in it:
0: Gain a Action costing up to 5
1-3: Gain a Gold
4-6: Gain 2 Cards costing up to 4
7: Gain a Wish

This brings a lot of interesting choices, of course the best effects are the hardest to get. You can use it as a action or treasure, so you arent really dependign that much on village support. Let me know whaat you think, i think this concept is pretty hard to balance.

[segura]

This is too good. Figurine compensates for the disadvantages of being a TreasureLab by converting dead Actions into Pouches.
This offers flexibility and is always at least a nonterminal Workshop which is better than Figurine‘s extra.

[Augie279]

A famous fable about those who got greedy and killed the goose for the Gold inside. Maybe you'll be different, but maybe you'll slaughter the Goose yourself in the hopes of getting something greater.

[sumrex]

This is too good. Figurine compensates for the disadvantages of being a TreasureLab by converting dead Actions into Pouches.
This offers flexibility and is always at least a nonterminal Workshop which is better than Figurine‘s extra.

You are right, thanks. I changed it up quite a bit, even tho it might be a bit too weak now. But we will see.

[faust]

Fairy Godmother - $3

Gain one Wish per other player in the game.

At the end of your next turn, each other player may return a non-Duration card you have in play to the supply.

She can grant useful boons... just make sure to be back before midnight!

Scales with player count because a) I didn't want only one opponent to get to choose and b) you're going to need more help if you have more evil stepsisters!

[Holger]

Can we pretend that airplanes in the Night sky are like Shooting Stars? I could really use a Wish right now, Wish right now, Wish right now.

A Night-Reaction that can gain and play exactly one Wish per turn but only if you didn't gain any cards beforehand (and playing Wishes during your Night phase usually isn't as helpful). However, if you catch sight of a Shooting Star before Nighttime (via revealing), you can get your Wish early.

No idea on cost, $5 felt like too much, but maybe that's right? You don't really want these in multiples.

I think $4 is a better cost than $5 for this, as it is strongest in the opening, and a $5 cost would give 5/2 openings a huge advantage. This is very strong in the early game but usually becomes a dead card later in the absence of "reveal" triggers.

[Will(ow|iam)]

Shooting Star
$4 Event
Gain 2 Wishes. Each other player may discard 2 cards to gain a Wish.

[LTaco]

24 Hour Warning

[X-tra]

[faust]

Shooting Star
$4 Event
Gain 2 Wishes. Each other player may discard 2 cards to gain a Wish.

This is most certainly too good. Even if the other players didn't need to discard, you still have a net gain of a $6 card for $4. And if you buy this multiple times, or have a discard attack, it becomes completely ridiculous.

[emtzalex]

My Submission:

Lucky Dragon • $6 • Action +6 Cards Discard 4 cards. Return this to the Supply. If you did, gain a Wish.

My submission is Lucky Dragon. A strong terminal draw/sift, it turns into a Wish after you play it. You can use the Wish to get your Dragon back, or turn it into something else (e.g. a Gold or a Duchy). This creates the slight possibility of getting the card back faster, either because the Wish hits a shuffle (although this being a terminal draw card, that's fairly unlikely), or if you can topdeck it.

It also creates various on-gain interactions (e.g. Sheepdog, Labyrinth, etc.) with Academy being particularly strong (turning it from a terminal card to, in effect, a village). There is also the potential to create a chain if you have 2 copies of LD, the ability to play them non-terminally, and a way to topdeck cards--you play 1 LD, gain the Wish onto your deck, play the other LD (drawing, among other things, the Wish) and putting the next Wish onto your deck, then repeat the process. But given the rarity of the other 2 elements, it's pretty difficult to pull that off.

[silverspawn]

[JW]

Fairy Assembly

Action
+1 Card and +2 Actions.
In games using this, at the start of your Clean-up, you may exchange two Fairy Assemblies and a Gold you have in play for 3 Wishes.

Notes: If it’s the only source of +Actions, by the time you can reliably convert it to Wishes, you might find that the trade is not that beneficial because the pile is empty and doing so gives opponent the chance to gain the Fairy Village you returned.

[LTaco]

Contest Closed

Results will follow later today.

[LTaco]

Results

Winner Golden Goose by Augie279 This card captures the core of the Fable of The Goose that Laid the Golden Eggs really well. The mechanics used serve as good metaphors for the happenings in the Fable. Apart from that the card seems well balanced. Alone, it is quite slow and you need some engine support for it so it isn't immediately overpowered as soon as another Gold gainer is in the kingdom. Overall, Golden Goose earns the winning spot by being both a well thought out card as well as having a good theme to match. As a note: The Fable "The Goose that Laid the Golden Eggs" is not to be confused with the fairytale "The Golden Goose". From the art it is clear, which one is referred to here and I don't blame you for taking the shorter name. 2nd Place Monkey's Paw by anordinaryman Monkey's Paw scores very high on the theming aspect. Your Wishes come with a penalty. Very intriguing to me is attaching VP to not spending Wishes, which also matches the theme very well. However, I think the mechanics here are a little wonky. Using Hexes to track how many wishes you are still to receive runs into the problem, that you can run out of hexes. Apart from that it might be too slow in most cases to even consider. Because it is so slow, you need to start buying Monkey's Paws very early if you want to use it as a viable source of Alt-VP, which doesn't seem like an enjoyable strategy to go for. 3rd Place Wonderland by grep Wonderland embraces the aspect of using a challenging criterion to gain Wishes. With shelters some Alt-VP or on the board. Wonderland becomes a very reasonably priced gainer, that still is basically impossible to solely rely on. Even without you, it is still not out of the question whether Wonderland is worth the investments. Unfortunately, you missed the mark on the theming part of the contest. As far as I'm aware, and I tried to research some, there are no works in which a Wonderland or similar is connected to granting wishes. Perhaps I simply overlooked something. But even if there were, the connection to the mechanics is tenuous at best. Birthday Party by NoMoreFun Birthday Party Event - $0 Once per turn: If your deck has exactly 10 cards in it, gain a Wish Very straight forward. Blow out the candles and make a Wish. I think the condition is not worth actively going for. You can only get the wish if you have at least 10 unplayed cards, which only really happens by accident, you wouldn't ever sacrifice your turn for that. The only way to go for this is to either have ways to get back to the Action Phase or you are in a situation in which you don´t draw much anyway. Forest Hike by BryGuy Forest Hike • $5 • Action +1 Action You may discard a Victory card for +2 Cards. You may play up to two Treasure cards. If you have exactly eight cards in play, gain a wish, otherwise you may gain a silver. Forest Hike has basically the same condition as Leprechaun. It is also non-terminal, makes fulfilling the condition way easier by allowing to play treasures, and doesn't mete out punishment for failing. Hopeful by xyz123 Hopeful Trait When you gain a Hopeful card, you may reveal and discard two differently named Treasures to gain a Wish. Hopeful is a very solid Trait. The condition has a reasonable opportunity cost and the amount of wishes is therefore limited. Pact by grrgrrgrr I like the theming, especially the use of the number 7. However, I think Pact suffers from the fact, that on a given board it is either a mistake to buy or, if it is good, the first to spike $7 just wins. Shooting Star by 4est The theming is nice and straight forward, being a night card and all. It needs a rewording to account for what happens when you reveal multiple copies of it on an opponents turn. Offer by czzzz This is just too good. The difference between 2/5 and 3/4 is too significant here. Also, just keeping two of your estates around is in no way challenging, if your reward is a Wish a turn. End of the Road by sumrex End of the Road 2P Action- Treasure +2 Cards Once this turn, when you play a treasure or night card: you may reveal your hand, then use the following effects, depending on how many unique cards are in it: 0: Gain a Action costing up to 5 1-3: Gain a Gold 4-6: Gain 2 Cards costing up to 4 7: Gain a Wish This is too strong. The way to go here is to get as many EotR as possible, get enough differently named cards and then get easy wishes out of it. Since it is a (also) treasure, it is trivially easy to first play all the treasures that get in the way of uniqueness and then activate all EotRs at the same time. Fairy Godmother by faust Fairy Godmother does not scale well with more players. In a four player game you can just open double FG, ideally get them on T3 and T4 and by the start of T6 you have 6 wishes in deck and don't need to return anything any more. Fairy Godmother generally are not portrayed as wish granters. Shooting Star by Will(ow|iam) Shooting Star $4 Event Gain 2 Wishes. Each other player may discard 2 cards to gain a Wish. This is too good. You pay $4 for two $6 Cards, while your opponent my pay by discarding 2 cards for a $6 card. The discarding is most likely to occur when their turn is not that great anyway. Also very problematic is that you can buy this several times in a turn. The more players are in a game, the more pronounced these problems become. Enchanted Forest by X-tra I really like this as an Event. I feel it would be a tough call when to use this. Considering you might trash a Province to get 3 Duchies out of this is just the beginning. Unfortunately there is not much to say about the theming. Lucky Dragon by emtzalex As a card, this seems fine. Though I can´t make Heads or Tails of how this fits with the theming. Aviary by silverspawn The condition to get the wish is certainly hard but you have next to no control over whether you succeed. The best way would be to get your hand size low. Fairy Assembly by JW Fairy Assembly Action +1 Card and +2 Actions. In games using this, at the start of your Clean-up, you may exchange two Fairy Assemblies and a Gold you have in play for 3 Wishes. I like the idea of condition. The net gain is fairly low though. Additionally, other players might steal your villages and never give them back. So as it is, the card is fairly weak.

[Augie279]

Nice, I won! Thanks for running a good contest! New one up soon.

[infangthief]

Fairy Godmother - $3

Gain one Wish per other player in the game.

At the end of your next turn, each other player may return a non-Duration card you have in play to the supply.

She can grant useful boons... just make sure to be back before midnight!

Scales with player count because a) I didn't want only one opponent to get to choose and b) you're going to need more help if you have more evil stepsisters!

What non-Duration cards are there that you might have in play at the end of your next turn? Could be Throne Room variants that stay out to track Durations that have been played multiple times; but are there any others? I feel like I must be missing something here.