Print

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

[Diving Pikachu]

Since at least one village-type card has been included in each released expansion--even the small ones--I'm curious as to what the last few expansions have left to add. I'm also curious if anyone feels like they can make up a village that rivals the official ones! I'll start with mine:

Villas/Manor ($4)

+2 Actions
Reveal cards from the top of your deck until you reveal a Victory Card. Put that card into your hand and discard the other cards. If there are no Victory Cards in your deck, you may put this on top of your deck.


At the beginning, this integrates gained cards faster and makes your next draw a bit better. In a board with dual-typed Victory Cards, it pairs awesomely with any of them. In a board with heavy trashing, it becomes a pseudo-Walled Village+chancellor until the endgame, which hopefully isn't too powerful because you still need a source of draws. In the endgame, it consistently makes subsequent draws much better. Flavor-wise, I guess noblemen's villas are placed away from cities so they don't deal with many exciting things, but the larger the land (Victory Card), the nicer it can be built. A manor is a self-sustaining economy which depends upon whatever yield the serfs manage to coax from the ground.
---

Here's another.

Monastery ($4)

+2 Actions
Reveal the top card of your deck. You may discard it, trash it, or place it back on top.


I think we've yet to see a non-terminal trasher that costs $4 (there's Lookout and Upgrade, but they're $3 and $5). You get no draws with this one for obvious power issues, even if it's a $4. I think it also plays nicely into the flavor of a Monastery, as monks busy themselves with spiritual things and preserving ancient knowledge, but they don't have any influence outside their own walls.

[Michaelf7777777]

Here are some more ideas of mine for village type cards.

Settlement ($4) Action-Attack

+2 Actions
Reveal the top card of your deck. If it is a victory card put it in your hand. Otherwise choose whether you gain a copy of the revealed card or all opponents do.

Retirement Village ($2) Action

+2 Actions
+1 Buy

Haunted Village ($6) Action-Attack

+1 Card
+2 Actions
Every other player gains a curse

[grep]

Frontier Village
$3
+2 Actions, +2 Cards, discard 2 Cards

Very fast in the beginning, but reducing the hand size might be harmful in the midgame.

And a more versatile version:

Busy Beaver
$5
+2 Cards
Discard any number of cards. For each discarded card, +1 Action.

The latter is a good helper for unpopular "no trash" strategies.

[minced]

Anarchists
+1 card
+2 actions
Trash a card from your hand. Gain another anarchists.

(note that after anarchists run out you trash *every time you play this* with no benefit, destroying your deck)

[Axe Knight]

Soldiers' Village $4

+2 Actions

When you play this card, you may reveal the top three cards of your deck.  If you do, discard two, put the other one back on top, then, +1 Card.

[Censure]

Frontier Village
Action ($5)

+2 Actions

Reveal the top four cards of your deck. Pick one to add to your hand and discard the rest.


Heretical Village
Action ($4)

Choose one - Gain a Curse, adding it to your hand; or add all curses in your discard pile to your hand.

Then - Gain +1 Card and +2 Actions for each Curse in your hand.



Barbaric Village
Action - Reaction ($4)

+1 Card
+1 Coin

Reveal your hand. If you have at least one attack card, +2 Actions.

When another player plays an attack card, you may reveal and discard this card. If you do so, the attack has no effect on you and you must trash a card from your hand.



Pious Village
Action ($4)

+1 Card
+2 Actions

Trash or discard a card from your hand.

[danshep]

Guarded Village ($4)

+1 card
+2 actions

When another player plays an Attack card, you may reveal this from your hand. If you do, you are unaffected by that Attack.

(actually, I'd been thinking of a moat cantrip, but I think a moat village may be a better cost $4).

[minced]

Villas/Manor ($4)

+2 Actions
Reveal cards from the top of your deck until you reveal a Victory Card. Put that card into your hand and discard the other cards. If there are no Victory Cards in your deck, you may put this on top of your deck.

I don't really see why a card that usually searches your deck for junk would be worth $4. At $2 it would be a fun buy because it cycles your deck quickly and has fun interactions with nobles/ironworks.

Come to think of it, you could play several of these to fish all the crap out of your deck and strategically trigger a reshuffle.

Here's another.

Monastery ($4)

+2 Actions
Reveal the top card of your deck. You may discard it, trash it, or place it back on top.

It's a much, much better lookout. Not a bad card, but feels somewhat redundant.

Frontier Village
Action ($5)

+2 Actions

Reveal the top four cards of your deck. Pick one to add to your hand and discard the rest.

This card would probably be best in curse games, where you have a few good cards and a lot of crap. However, I think it's (almost) strictly inferior to hunting party. I almost think it would be better at $4 with "discard the rest" replaced by "rearrange the rest."

Heretical Village
Action ($4)

Choose one - Gain a Curse, adding it to your hand; or add all curses in your discard pile to your hand.

Then - Gain +1 Card and +2 Actions for each Curse in your hand.

With five curses, this card becomes a +5 cards +10 actions whenever you have two in hand, so it's fairly broken. I'd remove the curse-fishing and require the user to discard a curse to get +1 card +2 actions.

Barbaric Village
Action - Reaction ($4)

+1 Card
+1 Coin

Reveal your hand. If you have at least one attack card, +2 Actions.

When another player plays an attack card, you may reveal and discard this card. If you do so, the attack has no effect on you and you must trash a card from your hand.

Reactions are usually terminal for a reason: flooding your deck with reactions is not meant to be a winning strategy. Free trashing, attack immunity, *and* a setup for a counterattack? I think this card needs some work.

Pious Village
Action ($4)

+1 Card
+2 Actions

Trash or discard a card from your hand.

This card is ridiculously good as a trasher in a curse game - you just need to end the game before you have a thin deck and the pious villages become a liability, which is quite easy in curse games.

Guarded Village ($4)

+1 card
+2 actions

When another player plays an Attack card, you may reveal this from your hand. If you do, you are unaffected by that Attack.

(actually, I'd been thinking of a moat cantrip, but I think a moat village may be a better cost $4).
Once again, reactions are specifically built so you *can't* build your deck around them: lighthouse has a weak benefit, moat's +2 cards is insufficient for a drawing engine, and secret chamber can easily get you stuck at $4 or below. I think a non-terminal reaction would have to provide a much weaker benefit than complete attack immunity, otherwise attacking games would get boring very quickly.

Soldiers' Village $4

+2 Actions

When you play this card, you may reveal the top three cards of your deck.  If you do, discard two, put the other one back on top, then, +1 Card.

Similar to frontier village. I think $4 and three cards makes it a little more useable. The cycling is a very strong benefit and not to be underestimated.

[Censure]

Frontier Village
Action ($5)

+2 Actions

Reveal the top four cards of your deck. Pick one to add to your hand and discard the rest.

This card would probably be best in curse games, where you have a few good cards and a lot of crap. However, I think it's (almost) strictly inferior to hunting party. I almost think it would be better at $4 with "discard the rest" replaced by "rearrange the rest."

Heretical Village
Action ($4)

Choose one - Gain a Curse, adding it to your hand; or add all curses in your discard pile to your hand.

Then - Gain +1 Card and +2 Actions for each Curse in your hand.

With five curses, this card becomes a +5 cards +10 actions whenever you have two in hand, so it's fairly broken. I'd remove the curse-fishing and require the user to discard a curse to get +1 card +2 actions.

Barbaric Village
Action - Reaction ($4)

+1 Card
+1 Coin

Reveal your hand. If you have at least one attack card, +2 Actions.

When another player plays an attack card, you may reveal and discard this card. If you do so, the attack has no effect on you and you must trash a card from your hand.

Reactions are usually terminal for a reason: flooding your deck with reactions is not meant to be a winning strategy. Free trashing, attack immunity, *and* a setup for a counterattack? I think this card needs some work.

Pious Village
Action ($4)

+1 Card
+2 Actions

Trash or discard a card from your hand.

This card is ridiculously good as a trasher in a curse game - you just need to end the game before you have a thin deck and the pious villages become a liability, which is quite easy in curse games.

I completely agree with most of this. Keep in mind, these were spur-of-the-moment ideas for village-type cards.

For frontier village, how about a reveal of 6 cards instead of 4, while remaining at the same cost. In effect, it'd be a Chancellor Jr. while giving you a decent enough card and being a village all the while. Perhaps this is too strong at $5?

Heretical village is the hardest to salvage of these, but I've been hard at thinking about cards that benefit from curses for a while. I don't want to give up the concept completely, but I don't think a village-type card is the way to go, so I won't redeem this card at all.

For Barbaric Village, the card would not be able to do all of the above unless you have multiple versions of it. This is actually a modified version of a blue card I have playtested in 3-player games, so I will not attempt to salvage it as I think the baseline card works better:


Plague Doctor ($3)
Action-Reaction

+3 Actions

If another player plays an attack card, you may reveal and discard this card and ignore its effect on you. If you do so, you may trash a card from your hand.


Pious Village is meant to be above-average or even amazing in curse games, that's the entire thematic point. Yes, it is possibility a liability in late-game non-cursing game, but at $4 and being essentially a village I think it is quite well balanced. I would like to note this card is not playtested.

[play2draw]

Megalopolis: $5

+1 card
+2 actions

Gain a card with the word "village" in the name.

[grep]

Homestead $2
+1 Card, +1 Action
You may gain a Homestead or an Estate

[HLennartz]

Slum $2
Action - Attack
+2 Actions.
Each opponent gains a copy of Slum.

[jonts26]

Frontier Village
$3
+2 Actions, +2 Cards, discard 2 Cards

I was thinking of a similar village which is:

+2 Cards, +2 Actions
Discard 1 Card
$4

This maintains your hand size like a normal village would but gives a touch more flexibility. Alternatively, you could try a stronger variant like +3 cards and discard 2 and cost it at $5.

[jonts26]

Actually, now that I think about it, the stronger variant might be under-costed at $5 since it is essentially village+warehouse+lab. Maybe it should be $6.

[WanderingWinder]

I would guess it's probably a 5. You can do a lot with 5.
Make the discard first, and you it's either a 4 or a 5, but it might be too strong at 4 and too weak at 5 in that case.

[kn1tt3r]

What about this:

GHOST TOWN

+2 Cards
+2 Actions

Each player (including you) with 4 or more cards in hand puts cards from his hand on top of his deck until he has 3 cards in his hand.

Costs: $5


Basically a modified City Level 2 (= "Town") / Ghost Ship hybride.

[guided]

That is definitely not worth $5

It completely gut-shoots you. It's not a viable part of any draw engine that doesn't involve Library.

[jonts26]

Idiot Village

+1 Card
+2 Actions

+1 Card for each card in play with Village in it's name.

Now you CAN spam villages for great effect!

[kn1tt3r]

That is definitely not worth $5

It completely gut-shoots you. It's not a viable part of any draw engine that doesn't involve Library.

Well, compared to Ghost Ship, this one is +2 Actions instead of +2 Cards, with the additional Secret Chamber reaction benefit. Quite comparable I think.

I once had a City level 3 there (+2 cards, +2 actions, +1 buy, +1 coin) but this is too strong for $5.

[rinkworks]

That is definitely not worth $5

It completely gut-shoots you. It's not a viable part of any draw engine that doesn't involve Library.

Well, compared to Ghost Ship, this one is +2 Actions instead of +2 Cards, with the additional Secret Chamber reaction benefit. Quite comparable I think.

I once had a City level 3 there (+2 cards, +2 actions, +1 buy, +1 coin) but this is too strong for $5.

Are you sure Ghost Village does what you think it does?  You draw 2, then put 4 back, leaving yourself with a 3-card hand.  I can't even imagine how this would be a good thing under any circumstances.  Even if you had a Library, which you could then use to draw back up to 7, you'd only be drawing what you would have without having Ghost-Shipped yourself.  From your Secret Chamber comment, I wonder if you intended the player of the card to only return 2 cards rather than "down to 3."  If that's what you meant, I can see it being $5.  As written, it's probably worse than useless most of the time.

[kn1tt3r]

Argh, you're right. The reason was is it was "put 2 cards on top..." instead of "down to 3" but this is just insane (or you have to add a curse option like Torturer).

[Deadlock39]

You could simply say:

GHOST TOWN

+2 Cards
+2 Actions

Put two cards from your hand on top of your deck.

Each other player with 4 or more cards in hand puts cards from his hand on top of his deck until he has 3 cards in his hand.


You get the Secret Chamber reaction for yourself, and the Ghost Ship attack on your opponents.  It just takes a little more text.

[guided]

Make it one card back on your deck instead of two and maybe we'll talk. If it's two cards, it's probably substantially worse than Ghost Ship, but the attack is simply too strong to price it at $4.

[rinkworks]

Soldiers' Village
$4 - Action
+2 Actions.  When you play this card, you may reveal the top three cards of your deck.  If you do, discard two, put the other one back on top, then, +1 Card.

Frontier Village
$5 - Action
+2 Actions.  Reveal the top four cards of your deck. Pick one to add to your hand and discard the rest.

Intrigued by this idea, I did some playtesting with the Solders' Village version of this idea.  It's a fun card!  It's really nice to be able to get some bonus cycling in with the Village effect.  I was somewhat surprised, even in light of minced's warning not to underestimate it, how good that cycling is.  While in theory you might have to skip past a good card or two on occasion, this is unusual.  Usually you're plucking out a great card among mediocre ones.  Even if you have to pick one bad card out of three, you do still get to skip over two of them.

After some thought, I realized why it seems so strong.  It's almost always superior to Farming Village at the same price.  Farming Village will only really be better late in the game, when you're likely to have more than three green cards in a row.

At the same time, $5 feels too expensive, even with the (dubiously) stronger 4-card version.  I say "feels" rather than "is."  Maybe it's actually fine at $5.  Heck, if it means drawing a Silver instead of a Copper -- which seemed to happen quite often in my testing -- then it's effectively a Bazaar.  Actually it's still better, because you got to skip past the Copper.

An alternative would be to return the remaining cards to the top of your deck, rather than discarding them.  This would be quite balanced at $4, I think, but also quite a bit more boring.  The effect would be similar to Courtyard, but the best part about that card is the ability to rescue a dead action.  But since this is a village, you won't have dead actions (usually), and so the decision boils down to saving extra treasure for the next hand.  Useful, sometimes, but not nearly as interesting.

But why choose?  There's no reason we can't have a $4 version that returns the unused cards and a $5 version that discards them.  Either way, fun idea -- thanks for sharing it.

[Jimmmmm]

Homestead $2
+1 Card, +1 Action
You may gain a Homestead or an Estate

I like it the idea of building up a mass of essentially no-effect cards before clean-sweeping the Estates in one go. It could be an interesting game of chicken if both players decide to go for them: both players want the Estates, but don't want to clog up their deck too early.

I assume once the Homesteads are gone, you can choose to take a Homestead and therefore nothing?