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[WanderingWinder]

I want to say that Epona is, I think, too strong. If it were just actions and money, it would be too strong in comparison to festival. That it has even more versatility is just worse. I was meaning to post on more of these, but most of my comments have already been made. Still, I'll probably have a few more comments yet.

[rinkworks]

I want to say that Epona is, I think, too strong. If it were just actions and money, it would be too strong in comparison to festival. That it has even more versatility is just worse. I was meaning to post on more of these, but most of my comments have already been made. Still, I'll probably have a few more comments yet.

You think so?  "+2 Actions, +$2" is right between Silver (sort of equivalent to "+1 Action, +$2") and Festival, so $4 seems fine.  But that's a good point about the versatility:  if one of the options is balanced at $4, then adding additional options, even weaker options, should probably boost the price up another notch.

[WanderingWinder]

I want to say that Epona is, I think, too strong. If it were just actions and money, it would be too strong in comparison to festival. That it has even more versatility is just worse. I was meaning to post on more of these, but most of my comments have already been made. Still, I'll probably have a few more comments yet.

You think so?  "+2 Actions, +$2" is right between Silver (sort of equivalent to "+1 Action, +$2") and Festival, so $4 seems fine.  But that's a good point about the versatility:  if one of the options is balanced at $4, then adding additional options, even weaker options, should probably boost the price up another notch.

Well, +1 Action, +$2 is just stronger than silver basically. In any board where you want a significant terminal card draw, you just buy silver. On any board where you have conspirator, peddler, library-esque effects, throne room, king's court, etc. Action-silver better. And giving the extra action makes THIS better to boot. Having said that, I think that $2, 2 actions at 4 wouldn't be game-breaking, especially in light of fishing village, but the presence of festival would make me not want to print it, either.

[rinkworks]

I want to say that Epona is, I think, too strong. If it were just actions and money, it would be too strong in comparison to festival. That it has even more versatility is just worse. I was meaning to post on more of these, but most of my comments have already been made. Still, I'll probably have a few more comments yet.

You think so?  "+2 Actions, +$2" is right between Silver (sort of equivalent to "+1 Action, +$2") and Festival, so $4 seems fine.  But that's a good point about the versatility:  if one of the options is balanced at $4, then adding additional options, even weaker options, should probably boost the price up another notch.

Well, +1 Action, +$2 is just stronger than silver basically. In any board where you want a significant terminal card draw, you just buy silver. On any board where you have conspirator, peddler, library-esque effects, throne room, king's court, etc. Action-silver better.

Yes, but these are all board-dependent situational things, and there are other situational things that counterbalance, a very significant one being that Silver can't be drawn dead.  I think that alone compensates for all you say, just because it applies to nearly all boards.  Then there are a few other interactions that also favor Silver over action-Silver:  Bank, Spice Merchant, Stables, sometimes Adventurer.

Even if I were to concede that action-Silver is better on balance (not something I'm currently convinced about either way, so I'll give you the benefit of the doubt), I'm highly skeptical that the difference is great enough to warrant a cost difference.

Still, I sympathize with the notion that having vanilla cards that are too similar to each other feels kind of unnecessary.  It's like it dilutes the pool of possibilities for kingdoms rather than enhancing it, even though that cannot be mathematically true.  Maybe if a vanilla card like this came in a custom set featuring otherwise complex cards, it would be good to have it just to keep the balance of simple and complex cards intact.  But it would still feel somewhat redundant.

To play devil's advocate, though, +Buy is a scarce enough resource that it can make a huge, huge difference sometimes.  How many times have we all played Peddler, Treasury, or Bazaar stacks and wished we could slip in a Market or two just for the +Buy?  Festival's +Buy is game-changing when used in Library, Minion, or Conspirator engines, for example.  Having a buyless version (which would be welcome due to the scarcity of money-earning but non-drawing action cards that come in handy in a variety of situations) wouldn't obviate Festival one little bit.

Anyway, regarding Epona itself, I think you've convinced me that +$1 would have been better for the money option.

[Thinkaman]

Time for the obligatory text-dump.  Then I'll post a "secret-history".


Aphrodite
---------
So it's a Monument bank, with a crazy cost and wacky type-changing mechanics.  This card feels like a trap; "Man, if I get a lot of these $9 card, golly--you are in for it now!" This card is too slow for Colony games, much less normal ones.

Bacchus
-------
So uh, this applies during Cleanup (whether intended or not), so it's basically "skip a turn, get 5 VP."  Which is simultaneously incredibly lame and overpowered.

Let's assume it doesn't work that way.  So this card does nothing on boards without a draw engine?  And it makes cantrips kinda sort terrible?  And it's terminality clashes sharply with everything you would ever want to play it with?  This just doesn't work like anyone wants it to.

Ceres
-----
What a curious, attractive, and obviously well-tested card.

Demeter
-------
I've done a lot of testing with alternative Victory Point stuff, and I can tell you immediately that this is way too exponential, way too fast.  All competing strategies can't compete with this; I buy 6 of these with 10 Curses and hey that's 110 VP.  4 with 6 curses is already 42 VP.  That's 4 $6 cards, matching 7 Provinces.  All other victory conditions are made obsolete.

It's a good design in isolation but way too good as currently formulated.  I also dislike how exclusionary it is to all other strategies; even Fool's Gold tolerates other cards way more than this.

Playtest!

Epona
-----
Simple enough.  A flexible opening--Village greatest hits?  I was going to say it's interesting, except it isn't.  But that's okay!  Contrary to popular belief, the point of cards is not to be interesting, but to make Dominion a fun game.  This Village, like Pawn, contributes modestly to that. 

It might be best to think of this card as an alternative, mostly superior Silver.  I bet it would be bought by winning decks at a rate even higher than Fishing village.  I'm a tad worried that such a flexible, potent Village would have a negative impact on the Action economy.

Fortuna
-------
Targetted attack, super political, requires all Treasure playing to be one-at-a-time with awkward mindgame consequences.  This sort of gameplay might be interesting in a 2-player game built entirely around it, but it's totally foreign to Dominion.

Did I mention it's a targetted attack?  Do not pass Go, ect.

Glycon
------
Okay so, I like the idea a lot, but man.  While I haven't playtested it, this just seems like it would be absurd.  Market for $2?  Market might be the single card that would be most broken at $2; an economic cantrip with +Buy?  Never hurts in any quantity and enables bulk buying of 2s.

So every game people buy as many of these as they dare, and then wait to see who takes a leak in the punch bowl.  In a 2 player game, I don't know if I see this happening?  You buy 4, maybe 5 or 6 if they are uncontested, and neither side has much incentive to invest in hurting you both equally.  So we're all just playing this game with bonus Markets.  Hm.

It's pretty political in 3-4 player, or at least can be in a non-trivial number of games.

You could word it like an inverted City to clean it up, maybe.  Is discard a card at 1 empty pile really needed?  Also, how much does it hurt the card if you take away the +Buy so it doesn't feed itself in a really demanding way?  I mean, cantrip +$1 for $2 is still biscuits and gravy.

As it stands, this makes 2/5 really strong.  I'd buy this at $3 for sure.

There's a really good design going on here, but I think it's facing some non-trivial development hurdles.

Hermes
------
I have two reactions to this. "This is interesting." and "Oh God no, please no." Like, has this been playtested?  I can't imagine it being fun, in 80% of games you are just going to have this obnoxious lame duck phase tacked on.

Iris
----
Why isn't this an Attack?  This is a really, really obnoxious card with Minion.  It's basically a better Militia for $3...  Obnoxious opening implicaitons.  The fact that it can hit you is odd since it normally won't apply, and when it does it will often be trivial?

Jupiter
-------
Basic, elegant, and almost cute.  Dual-purpose modest trasher and basic village, at a fair price.  It's one of the best Villages as it stands, but maybe that's okay? 

I do have one gripe though.  Non-terminal trashing, especially early, is a non-decision.  Normally the pursuit of trashing has certain implications, both buying the trasher and playing it has an opportunity cost and thus they add interesting decisions to the game. (Upgrade achieves smilar by being a different kind of trasher, and being a powerful expensive card competiting with other powerful expensive cards.) This card bypasses most trashing decision-making.

Why not "when you gain this"?  It makes the card marginally stronger, but who cares.  It allows cute combos and I see no reason not to.

Kratos
------
Whoa!  Now I like crazy and bold, but this might be crossing the line.  It's cute with trashers and dangerously powerful with drawers, but attacks are where this really gets in trouble.  Like, just look at Witch, Torturer, or something cheap like Masquerade.  Abolishing the Action economy is just too significant here, way too many boards are going to degenerate.  It's very centralizing, like a certain other $7--but King's Court gets away with it because it's less consistent and thus takes a little longer to hit critical mass.

I feel like this card should get some alternate award, like "Most Crazy".  It made me think pretty hard about the implications, more than any other!

Luna
----
Interesting.  Modestly powerful but mostly end-game; seemingly cost well.  The only hang-up is that a lot of the decision making it creates isn't really compelling; discard something I'd like to play, for an economically decent reward?  Compare that to Salvager, where the stakes are way higher and the decisions are thus more awesome.  Helping the winners win more (even more than most cards) is also kinda annoying.  Still, good.

Minerva
-------
This is good but I feel I'd want to playtest it.  I'm worried about the end-game power, but appreciate that the set-aside mechanic is covering the crazy cases.  It's just so powerful late game, in spite of being decent early game.

It's slightly unclear, as worded, if "otherwise gain as Estate" refers to not electing to set aside a Victory card, setting aside one that isn't an Estate/Duchy/Province, or both.

Nox
---
Let's see...  Targetted, political attack?  Anti-fun mechanic?  Really nasty implications with Gold?  Your own attack hits you twice?  Really silly degenerate cases involving Copper?  I elect to Nox Nox, forever.

This is why we playtest things!

Osiris
------
So this is really interesting, but a big concern; getting into an Osiris war is an indefinite game state.  So red flags go up before I can even start to analyze this.  Why not trash it, why does it have to go back to the Supply?

As a $0 no-benefit terminal, this is kinda uninspiring.  Why not make it $2-4 and give it a modest benefit, so people get at least somewhat excited about it and start fighting over it?

Pluto
-----
I like this, but suspect it isn't very good as stands.  "Lab for everyone" is not something I'd ever pay for, sans Militia/Ghost Ship/Possession shenanigans.  The option to give everyone a Lab to give yourself a Village is pretty dubious, but I guess it can't hurt.

This could cost $2 and it'd be fine; still weak and usually unattractive, actually.  I like the premise and it's elegant as stands, but it needs to offer some more concrete relative benefit.

Quirinus
--------
Super Thief!  Problem is, I don't like Thief.  This card is less dubious--it clogs your enemy's deck rather than thin it.  But uh, how fun is that?  Thief games are, for all their faults, wet and wild, willy and wacky.  Everyone's deck is thinned of Copper, and you start throwing good Treasures around!  Here everyone just sits around with their increasingly bloated Copper decks.  Since Quirinus is afforable with Copper-based decks, and the money it provides is a small defense against itself, so hey guess what everyone is gonna be buying more of.  This just doesn't sound fun, regardless of the card's power level.

Roma
----
So we've got a big set of effects that I don't really care about.
-Discard a victory card, okay great, but gain a cheaper Victory card?  On top of my deck?  Ew.  And I have to do this?
-Discard an action, ew.  Why would I want to do that?  Actions are for having fun!  Playing a $5 card to discard an action you don't want to gain a Silver is not exciting.
-Discard a Treasure, alright I better get something awesome.  Curse attack?  Wait, Witch does this except you get +2 Cards; here I have to discard a treasure?  Weak!
-Discard a curse to draw +1 Card and give out Coppers?  Again, how is this not a terrible version of Witch?

The effects aren't fun and the cost is way off.  I wouldn't buy this card as written at $4.

Sol
---
Uh, what.  This is silly nonsense; an arms race that leaves us back where we started, but with terrible un-fun decks?  A bonus point for comedy at least.

Terra
-----
Fun alternate draw engine.  Problem is, you normally need a surprisingly high critical mass of them to work; 1 out of 3 cards?  I mean, to chain you need 2 in your 6 cards.  And unlike traditional raw drawing power, the cards you are cycling are going back into the draw source as you reshuffle, so it's diluted.  I'd want to playtest this to see just how much slower mid-game it is than Lab.

It's also crazy with TR (and KC) in a fun way Minion could only dream of.  Really attack resistant, really trasher dependant.  Loves Cellar, Warehouse, SC/Vault, I think I'm starting to warm up to this card, its presence on a board is interesting--even if it's not as cool or elegant as Menagerie... none of these cards are!

Of these cards, the only ones that I could really justify voting for were Epona, Luna, Terra, and Jupiter--the rest either had some cardinal sin, too narrow of a scope, or had some development concerns (and named Glycon).  I think I put Jupiter in honorable mention due to the lack of gameplay it brought to the table, Epona in 3rd for being too centralizing, Luna in 2nd by default, and Terra in 1st because it creates more gameplay than Luna.

Time to talk about my card!

[Thinkaman]

Code: [Select]

Village Riot: Action, $4
+1 Card
+2 Actions
Reveal a card from your hand.  Trash a copy of it from the Supply.
----------
When you trash this, gain a Duchy and a Curse.
Secret History

Since this card is all about brevity, I'm going to be ironic and try to write an entire secret history for a single card.  The good news is that this card does have a history, since it's been playtested a lot and given a ton of attention.

I wanted to make a card that trashed stuff from the Supply, to have fun implications with the termination conditions.  After all, a lot of the value various Dominion cards have varies based on how long the game lasts (just look at Colony) so a general-purpose card that potentially shortens the game sounded very interesting.

The top half the of card has never changed, and initially that's all there was to the card.  This quickly proved to be too weak and too niche.  It's pointless to invest in game termination control if you don't have an early VP lead, so the card was only attractive on boards featuring such tools. (Village Riot heavy decks could normally end piles on turn 13-15.) In fact, the only single-card combo that was able to consistently beat big money in early playtesting was Baron.

I wanted this to remain a $4 Village for sure, which drastically narrowed options for improvement.  For example, it can't generate VP tokens, and it can't have any serious economic power without obtuse conditionals.  So it needs to somehow allow you to get early VP by itself, at an appropriate power level.  Basically, the card needs to be at some limited level a self-sufficent strategy.

Thus began the long development of the mono-Riot deck.

The first train of thought was making the card worth one VP.  This was never seriously tested because it made no sense: "This is a riot, all about destroying stuff!" The problem with this route is that the early game advantage is moot, since other players can trivially grab them in their deck regardless of your shenanigans.

A $4 1VP Village is still a cool idea though.  Someone go get on that.

So the first *real* train of thought was a VP benefit for trashing itself--get a big riot going, make a big mess of the Supply, and get some VP.  Boom, there's your strategy.  We tried handing out Estates, and it was the worst thing ever.  Pitifully weak/slow, and it felt so redundant because half the time you are trashing Estates anyway; it clashed with itself.

Obviously we moved on to Duchies, suspecting it would be way too good.  Surprise: It was!  Simple riot decks just ran over everything, consistently hitting ~16-20 VP on turn 13/14.  Sure, lots of combos can beat that, but this is still too good for a *single card*.  Furthermore, the first-player advantage proved to be pretty big--not enough to be a fundamental problem, but enough to require a more exact balance target than usual.  The good news was, playing the deck was fun and had some non-trivial optimization decisions--so we're on the right path.

I thought a Duchy+Curse would be a clever solution: 2 VP, double the deck clogging!  This moderated the mono-deck slightly (poor decisions were more harshly punished), but it was still a serious threat.  It could consistantly beat BMU and was doing well against simple stuff like Smithy.  Strong cursing attacks actually lost to it consistently in testing! (The Riot deck could just deplete the Curses extra fast in place of Estates, and then end the game even sooner--sometimes with even more VP!) Cards that could beat the deck were an odd bunch.  Saboteur just destroyed it over and over, which was hilarious.  Bureaucrat always did well.  Ghost Ship won more than it lost, I think.  Cutpurse went 50-50 or so.  Bishop and Island were good, and Council Room did okay.  Duchy rush sometimes worked, and sometimes sealed one's doom.  Once in a blue moon the Village Riot player would face some non-sustainable early strategy meant to head him off, and just go build a normal engine with his Villages instead.

Now we're getting somewhere, but I wasn't comfortable with a Village being this dominant.  I kept thinking of Bureaucrat, and how it beat the deck by slowing it down.  The big problem with this deck was the one two-punch of getting 5 Villages Riots by turn 9 and then having lucky runaway turns where you play a bunch of them and get a 6+ VP swing as you end the game.  So maybe we need to slow the card down naturally?

Thus for awhile the card had an extra "putting your choice of the two on top of your deck." added to slow it down.  It moderated the deck slightly, but some of the testers complained.  Maybe it wasn't so bad as a potent strategy.  After all, it is sort of fun to play, certainly more-so than most rush strategies.  The final decision point for me was reverting to the simple version and playing some games against Monument--the Monument chips made the exact difference between winning and losing.  I figured hey, how perfect can you get.

So that's that.  At least, for mono-Riot.

But you can also use the card as a catalyst for an existing early strategy, like Gardens, Baron, Bishop, or what-not.  You can also use it in a competing deck to sabotage these strategies, although this is dangerous. (Trash Duchies from the Supply to cut off a Duke strat.)

And of course the elephant in the room is that the card's primary purpose is to trash Provinces or Colonies when you are ahead.  This is both really fun to do and really devestating, but there really isn't much to say about it.  It just is what it is, and the card did it from day 1.  How was the card considered weak then?  The catch is that buying a $4 basic Village is not generally condusive to getting significantly ahead, unlike say Salvager.  It feels super powerful, but it doesn't actually change the outcome in a high number of games.

Oh yeah.  You can also use it to play 2 terminal actions.  Huh, look at that.

[ChaosRed]

I liked this card, as I said earlier in my comments, I was miffed, because it was similar to an idea I had. My reaction was, "hey, that was my idea". Mine was simpler, it was essentially:

SPITE - Action - 4$
Reveal a card from your hand, gain a copy from the supply and then trash it immediately.

I had no idea if the costing was right, but I left it terminal. But I knew the card could be interesting and require play testing. I then wanted to add 2 other cards, that did something when they were trashed, to give it some complementary cards.

Your card is more interesting however, probably another reason my initial reaction was a bit miffed, as it was more accurately, "hey that's my idea, oh wait, but its a much better idea".

Your post makes me wish card names were included in the contest. I think naming and theming a card is important. Real Dominion does this to great effect. Lookout, really is a lookout, for example, so the card name not only fits, it helps you remember what the card does.

One frustrating thing about the post-contest discussion is the names are all meaningless, making some of the conversation confusing, I am constantly going back to review what the cards do. Village Riot, on the other hand, immediately reminds me what the card, and does.

It's a cool card and I enjoyed reading the history of it.

[rinkworks]

Code: [Select]

Village Riot: Action, $4
+1 Card
+2 Actions
Reveal a card from your hand.  Trash a copy of it from the Supply.
----------
When you trash this, gain a Duchy and a Curse.
Secret History

This was a great read.  My interest is piqued, even though I still can't quite envision it playing on a generic board.  But it sounds like you've had a lot of fun with it and certainly put a lot of thought into it, so now I want to try it out.

[Thinkaman]

And responses!

First, thanks for everyone who spent the time to write up reviews, of all the card.  It's a non-trivial amount of work!

Ceres (Village Riot): Speeds up the game if you have the right cards, and could be turned into an endgame 2 VP (net) if you decide to get rid of it. Didn't hate it, didn't quite love it enough.

Ceres:
I liked this one too. It's basically a pure stack depleter. But it seems too specific to certain situations.

Normally I'm not a fan of supply-trashers, but here it's interesting that you have to have a copy of it in your hand in order to do it.  That suggests you'd tend to use it when you're rushing a pile, because you're more likely to have copies in your hand and, therefore, more likely to want to deprive your opponents of them.  Still, I think this would be an extremely situational thing to want to do, and I'm not sure I understand the synergy between the supply-trashing, the village piece, and the on-trash piece.

Ceres - Thought it was a nice take on the "end game accelerant for $4". I don't know how often you'd use the trashing clause though. 2 dead cards is a lot for a net gain of 2 vp. Seems a tad weak, but I still like it a lot.

I like this a lot and I think I voted for it. I like the idea of a "spiteful" card, where you depleting a pile of a useful card. It could be used, for example to ruin a Gardens deck. It's a way to fight certain card hoarding, while you could - perhaps - pursue another strategy. The trick is, of course, how many do you buy of the card you with to spite? I voted for this one, because I thought it was interesting. I don't think the card's tactics could work effectively (but perhaps it could, I'd need to test it), but it would be fun to try. I had a similar card in mind at one point and might revisit this concept at another time.

The overall feedback was pretty straight forward: "Depleting piles is weak and situational, regardless of how novel it is."

Man, my playtesters are gonna crack up when I tell them this.

So, I've played/watched about 80 games with this card, with the majority of other standard cards.  Long story short, this card is really powerful!  As the secret history mentioned, the card actually got nerfed beyond it's listed entry for being too powerful, but I submitted the pre-changed text because I figured it was more elegant and no one would be able to tell.  Heh, irony.

So, what does this card do?  Hint: It's not really about depleting random piles to prevent people from getting stuff, any more than Chapel is really about trashing Curses.

When two people play who haven't seen the card, they largely ignore it (with sentiments like you guys expressed) besides just fitting it into their engine.  Then in the end game someone realizes there are 3 Provinces left and they can burn 2, buy 1 this turn.  So the game suddenly ends, and both players are like "whoa".

And man, this still isn't the real point of the card.  That's just the generic value it brings to any deck, terminal end-game control.

Then the first time people play against someone who actually knows the card, they again ignore it and then just get destroyed when their opponent rushes 5, depletes the others for 10 VP, finishes the Duchies (Estates died ages ago) and wins the game turn 13 score 16-3.  Sometimes the victim panics and tries to buy Duchies or the remaining Villages, but this only seals the deal.  They are just blown away, they can't believe it happened.

So then they try cursing attacks... and the Riot deck wins even more!  It just depletes all the Curses instead of Estates, sometimes speeding up more than it slows down.  At this point some think the card is just way too good.

So they try other stuff against it.  Obviously really crazy fast+powerful strategies beat it, those god-tier combos.  Gardens and Island beat it, and can use Village Riot to their own ends.  Ghost Ship beats it most the time.

Then they start trying weird cards against it, and the Riot strategy just chokes and falls apart.  A wide array of misfit cards crush attempts to Riot-rush, Saboteur being the undisputed king.

So now you've got this end-game accelerator that creates a large number of counter-based scenarios.  While the card itself is a big one-player advantage due to its speed, the counters it creates are a huge 2-player counter-advantage. (Especially since Riot-rush pretty much demands using your opening; it can't wait.)

The good news too is that Riot-rush is actually really fun to play, way more than most single-card strategies.  Knowing whether to buy/trash 4/5/6 and how many Duchys to trash are really key decisions that must be made correctly!  Select cards like Warehouse, Baron, Workshop, Ironworks, Great Hall, or others can also amplify it moderately. (Less than you might think, but some! Enough to re-evaluate your planned counter.)

Simply put, I submitted this card for a reason--the same reason we've played with the card so much: it's really powerful, totally shakes up boards, is really flexible. (It has a really potent focused strategy and yet general value to every deck via Province trashing option.)

Ironically, this "path of discovery" that makes this card so good made it a pretty awful choice for an at-a-glance contest.  Oops, my bad.

Anyway, props again to Davio for doing this!
   
Edit:

This was a great read.  My interest is piqued, even though I still can't quite envision it playing on a generic board.

Just to be clear, the core Riot-rush algorithm is really basic: Buy 5 Village Riots ASAP, with Silver when you have to.  Trash Supply Estates as you do this.  Once you have 5 Village Riots, trash the Remaining Village Riots.  Then/otherwise buy/trash Duchies.  Hey look, the game is over and I won!

Edit 2:
Oh yeah, funny story that's worth a laugh.  So in one playtest game, one guy starts a Riot-rush and his savvy opponent immediately committed some counter-strategy, rushing early VP faster than the Riot deck could match.

...so... the Riot-rush guy gets up to 5 Village Riots, shrugs, and uses them to build a typical draw engine for buying Provinces.  Trollolololol...

[chwhite]

I want to say that Epona is, I think, too strong. If it were just actions and money, it would be too strong in comparison to festival. That it has even more versatility is just worse. I was meaning to post on more of these, but most of my comments have already been made. Still, I'll probably have a few more comments yet.

So, here was my thinking on Artisan's Village.

Yeah, it's strong.  That was intentional.  I like cards with choices, and I like Village-with-a-bonus, especially when that bonus includes cash, and I don't particularly mind cards that make Silver look silly, because Silver is a silly and boring card.  And I wasn't looking to do something untested and wacky that shakes up all sorts of strategies, for this exercise I was more interested in making a card that plays well with most engines ('cuz engines are fun), I deliberately wanted to do something that looked simple.  So Artisan's Village, I guess the flavor is supposed to be Renaissance-themed, its a village full of merchants and traders and craftsmen and whatnot, and they have the freedom to do their own thing, so you get choices and it's a prosperous village, better than the usual.  Okay.

So, why the choices I made, in particular, why $2 instead of $1?  Basically, while it may be true that this card as written might need some toning down, I couldn't disagree more that +2 Actions +$2 for $4 is "too strong" compared to other cards- the problem is that it is simply too *weak* compared to Fishing Village.  (It's also too similar, of course).  A +2 Actions +$2 card at $4 would IMO still be worse than Festival, because +Buy matters a lot.  Let's also say you eliminate Epona's +1 Card: that's strictly worse than Festival, but also too similar.  So I felt it was necessary to have all three vanilla bonuses available so that is was sufficiently differentiated from current cards.  I also considered getting rid of the +Buy option, which would probably be the least-taken, but then I remembered that the whole point of this card is to have a Pawn-like Village, and Pawn is best on boards where you occasionally take the +Buy when you need it.  So I figured it would be too boring without the Buy.

If we were allowed to give fractions of money, it would probably be just fine giving $1.5 as one of the options. Maybe +$2 but discard a card from your hand, that might weaken it ever so slightly most of the time?  But then it becomes even more insane with Library/Watchtower.  Giving just $1 as one of the options feels weak, but I guess maybe it's necessary.

tldr: okay, perhaps it's a bit strong, but that's because I was specifically worried about making something that didn't look too weak compared to Fishing Village.

[Thinkaman]

So wait, your primary concern was making sure your card wasn't worse than Fishing Village--the same Fishing Village that is used in winning decks more frequently than any other card?

[Titandrake]

Nice comments on Village Riot. From what I got, the main thing to notice was that as a Village, it's easily chainable, and as a $4 cost card, it isn't terribly difficult to rush.

As for Iris, I still like the card, but it's either way too good or way too bad, and that is a huge strike. You can look at my previous post to see me figure out how ugly the double opening is... Don't see how it's good with Minion though, they'll only have a 4 card hand and won't be affected by the attack. Just falls into the non-terminal non-replacing synergy camp. Which happens to literally be the only synergy the card has. Interestingly, I basically designed the card in ~5 minutes, submitted it because I thought it was cute, and then went through the implications. In hindsight, that might not have been the best idea.

Well, not every design can be good.

[Karrow]

Secret history of Fortuna

Early play is obvious.  You can hurt & gain early, but you know payback will come.  Preventing a province buy can be a game changer, but a 4-vp score swing to do it?  If they can still buy a Duchy they have +5vp while you have gotten -2.  That's a 7 point swing which is more than a province.  But preventing them from winning on that turn gives you that coin in your hand to buy what you need to win.

I knew I would not win the contest simply because it is an attack.  I know too many players who dislike attacks to expect to win.  And a targeted attack too?  Whoa, the anti-meta players will flood us with their tears if they actually have to choose who to use it on.

I've longed for actual player interaction, for a counter-spell.  No, not an "ew, don't touch me you big meanie" Moat.  A real, targeted, direct, personal interaction.  Like a real counter-spell.  A real "Hell no you are not going do that!" interaction card.

But alas, the "Care Bears" will not have it.  So we need to work our way up to it.  How about a steal treasure from play?  They put up with Thief, this one only gains you one card in multi-player.

But oh the humanity!  We have to play our cards one at a time?  Yes, and you did before this card.  Carefully choosing only few treasures from your hand to play before Contraband can be lots of fun for bluffing.  And no, you can't just play your Loan and Venture at the same time and decide what your doing after you see the first treasure in your deck.  No that HoP gained card does not count for your Philosopher's Stone if you played Horn after the Stone, and no you can't count that Philosopher's Stone as a differently named card for the Horn if you play Horn before the Stone.  Actions are no different.  No, I'm not going to continue my play until after you've decided on the cards to put back for my Ghost Ship.  No I'm not telling you if I'm holding a Possession, although I probably would not Ghost Ship you if I did have a Possession.  But then again, maybe the only reason I told you that is to trick you because I do have a Possession?  (anti-meta gamer opponent then proceeds to break into tears.)

[ftl]

I knew I would not win the contest simply because it is an attack.  I know too many players who dislike attacks to expect to win.

Attacks are fun. Targeted attacks in a multiplayer (>2p) game are often stupid.

But alas, the "Care Bears" will not have it.  So we need to work our way up to it.  How about a steal treasure from play?  They put up with Thief, this one only gains you one card in multi-player.

Thief is not a targeted attack, it affects all opponents.

But oh the humanity!  We have to play our cards one at a time? 

Most of the time, no, we don't. In Big Money + stuff, I'd usually lay down all of my non-active treasures. "I play smithy, then I have 9 coin total (lay down gold, silver, silver, copper, copper), I buy a province. "

Yes, and you did before this card.  Carefully choosing only few treasures from your hand to play before Contraband can be lots of fun for bluffing. 

Again, even with Contraband you don't need to play all the treasures individually. You play as many as you feel like (no need to wait for a reaction from the opponent), then you play Contraband (wait for reaction/answer), and then play the rest (again, no pauses). You wait for reactions only after playing cards that specifically ask for them.

And no, you can't just play your Loan and Venture at the same time and decide what your doing after you see the first treasure in your deck.  No that HoP gained card does not count for your Philosopher's Stone if you played Horn after the Stone, and no you can't count that Philosopher's Stone as a differently named card for the Horn if you play Horn before the Stone.

Of course not. But in none of those cases do you need to give your opponent to see what you're doing and react to it. I can say "I put down all these treasures, then I play a loan [resolve the loan] and a venture [resolve the venture]." No need to look up at the opponent and check whether you've given him enough time to voice his reaction if he has any.  (Or did you really think that the people objecting to this were just the sort of newbies who would just put down a Stone, Horn, Loan, and Venture, and then sort of mish-mash their effects together?)

Actions are no different.  No, I'm not going to continue my play until after you've decided on the cards to put back for my Ghost Ship. 

Exactly. You need to wait for a reaction from the opponent specifically after you play cards that require a reaction of some sort. Attacks and so forth. The card you presented would make *every single treasure card* have that effect, and require a pause for a reaction (or at least to confirm that none was happening). A vast majority of actions don't require that. "I play a village, and then a smithy, and then a throne room on a market" - nowhere in that action sequence do I have to pause and check that my opponent isn't reacting to one of my plays.

No I'm not telling you if I'm holding a Possession, although I probably would not Ghost Ship you if I did have a Possession.  But then again, maybe the only reason I told you that is to trick you because I do have a Possession?  (anti-meta gamer opponent then proceeds to break into tears.)

And that bit is just irrelevant, I have no idea why any player would tell another player whether he's holding a Possession.

But just for a moment, imagine playing the most common type of game  - Big Money plus one or two support cards one of which might be your Fortuna. It would make every single buy phase tedious - after every treasure card played, you have to wait and get confirmation from your opponent that they're not gonna steal that one.

[Titandrake]

Dominion is a very unpolitical game. You can look at the Donald X. post on it, but I believe this is because whenever you add politics, you increase game time. You have people deciding whether to use a card, whether to try to ally with someone, pretending to think about using a card while not having it to try to give no tells, and so on.

Sorry to say it Karrow, but in your rant you generalized way too much. And it didn't help that your card wording wasn't exactly polished

[WanderingWinder]

I want to say that Epona is, I think, too strong. If it were just actions and money, it would be too strong in comparison to festival. That it has even more versatility is just worse. I was meaning to post on more of these, but most of my comments have already been made. Still, I'll probably have a few more comments yet.

So, here was my thinking on Artisan's Village.

Yeah, it's strong.  That was intentional.  I like cards with choices, and I like Village-with-a-bonus, especially when that bonus includes cash, and I don't particularly mind cards that make Silver look silly, because Silver is a silly and boring card.  And I wasn't looking to do something untested and wacky that shakes up all sorts of strategies, for this exercise I was more interested in making a card that plays well with most engines ('cuz engines are fun), I deliberately wanted to do something that looked simple.  So Artisan's Village, I guess the flavor is supposed to be Renaissance-themed, its a village full of merchants and traders and craftsmen and whatnot, and they have the freedom to do their own thing, so you get choices and it's a prosperous village, better than the usual.  Okay.

So, why the choices I made, in particular, why $2 instead of $1?  Basically, while it may be true that this card as written might need some toning down, I couldn't disagree more that +2 Actions +$2 for $4 is "too strong" compared to other cards- the problem is that it is simply too *weak* compared to Fishing Village.  (It's also too similar, of course).  A +2 Actions +$2 card at $4 would IMO still be worse than Festival, because +Buy matters a lot.  Let's also say you eliminate Epona's +1 Card: that's strictly worse than Festival, but also too similar.  So I felt it was necessary to have all three vanilla bonuses available so that is was sufficiently differentiated from current cards.  I also considered getting rid of the +Buy option, which would probably be the least-taken, but then I remembered that the whole point of this card is to have a Pawn-like Village, and Pawn is best on boards where you occasionally take the +Buy when you need it.  So I figured it would be too boring without the Buy.

If we were allowed to give fractions of money, it would probably be just fine giving $1.5 as one of the options. Maybe +$2 but discard a card from your hand, that might weaken it ever so slightly most of the time?  But then it becomes even more insane with Library/Watchtower.  Giving just $1 as one of the options feels weak, but I guess maybe it's necessary.

tldr: okay, perhaps it's a bit strong, but that's because I was specifically worried about making something that didn't look too weak compared to Fishing Village.

You must have missed my later explanatory post where I say 2-action/$2 isn't too strong by itself at 4 (I reference fishing village), it's just that in comparison to festival, it's not cutting the mustard. 'Cause man, so often it's just better than festival, even where you might like the buys, because, well, buys just don't usually mean all that much. I mean, there's the edge case where you're dying for lots of buys, but that's not really the difference between a 4-cost and 5-cost most of the time. In general, it's closer to the difference between 3 and 4 (see village, worker's village), which is a lot smaller.

[Jimmmmm]

Can I just say I love attacks, hate when the only or best attacks are vetoed, but dislike Fortuna. Also the wording is a paradox. Play treasure => reaction => prevent playing treasure => no reaction => can play treasure => play treasure => ...

[Thinkaman]

I just saw a playtester, and told him some other players found Village Riot to be "weak and situational".

Wait... You mean the unstoppable demon machine?

Not the words I would have used, but pretty funny.

[WanderingWinder]

I just saw a playtester, and told him some other players found Village Riot to be "weak and situational".

Wait... You mean the unstoppable demon machine?

Not the words I would have used, but pretty funny.

I'll stand up and say I STILL think it's situational, and sorta weak. I mean, if villages don't fit into my strategy, I'm really wasting a lot of tempo to buy this, so I probably really won't have that lead to try to end the game with. And villages don't fit into my strategy that often. Not that I think this would be the worst card, mind you, but... well, engines are usually playing catch-up against me anyway.

Having said that, the reason I really don't like the card is that it's most-of-the-time ineffectual, and when it is useful, it degenerates the game in a way. I mean, with remodel and salvager and apprentice, you're really paying a price to get that tempo. With this, you can do it at will.

[rspeer]

Ha. I just learned that I sent my votes to the wrong person. Fortunately, it wouldn't have changed the top of the results. But one dark-horse card would have been ranked considerably higher if not for my incompetence, so sorry about that.

I'll make up for it by putting comments here, and I'll try not to duplicate too much what other people have said.

Aphrodite (Escalator Link): It's not an actively bad card. I just don't really see this card's niche, or basically why choosing bank or monument is so good it needs to be worth $9. I wouldn't buy it over platinum in a colony game, and I wouldn't buy it over Province in a province game. I realize I'm saying pretty much the opposite of Tejayes here.

Bacchus (Port): I like the fundamental idea of turning card drawing engines into something else... but not at the cost of non-terminating games of Dominion. This is why you playtest. I think you should try something like this card again.

I think the VPs that you get while nothing else happens are the culprit, not just the fact that you didn't consider the interaction with Library. Even if you patched that and the unintended cleanup effect, you could still have non-terminating games. You could have two players playing a trim Bacchus deck for, say, 18 points per turn, each overtaking the other one in score every time. If you break the pattern and add cards to your deck, you lose. So the game goes on forever.

Ceres (Village Riot): thanks for the explanation of the history behind the card! The emergent tactics of it were lost on me too. Now you've made me want to try it out.

Epona (Artisan's Village): I'd have to see how it plays to see if it's balanced, but the idea is interesting while being simple. Kind of a mega-pawn, and I already like Pawn.

Fortuna (Swiper): ... I wouldn't have said anything about this card until Karrow's recent post. Come on. "Take that!" cards are dumb, and Donald X has explained why repeatedly. Defending such a card (one that has playability problems as well) by calling everyone else "care bears", everyone else in the forum where you might want to propose new cards in the future, is also dumb.

Glycon (Closing Market): I gave this one second place. I see interesting game-theoretical interactions when the pile is just about to run out, especially in 3+ players when it creates a sort of mutually-assured destruction.

Jupiter (Abbey) - Neat. Almost made my list.

Kratos (Drums of War) - This card made me think of Ascension, unfortunately.

Luna (Pawnbroker) - Sounds like it would create interesting play decisions through a very simple effect, as long as it's balanced.

Osiris (Lower School Courts) - I actually gave this card first place. That would have bumped it up to 10th in the final standings instead of 15th. Sorry about my misplaced vote! Anyway, I like that this card could be used for a surprise comeback at the end of the game, or as a strategy that you play from the beginning. Maybe other people are right and it's too weak, but I'd have to see it played.

Where does the name "Lower School Courts" come from, anyway?

Quirinus (King of Thieves) - Hey, maybe this is a Thief that's actually reasonable to play, unlike Noble Brigand which sounded like one but wasn't.

Sol (Chaos Orb) - You took this card from We Didn't Playtest This At All, didn't you? (It has a card that says something like "if you lose, you win!")

Shuffling WDPTAA cards into a Dominion deck might be an entertaining thing to do while drunk. They would be terminal actions, of course. And the "I lose" card would be a very terminal action, one that plays well in the "screw this, I'm getting more beer" strategy.

...I'm not really talking about your card anymore, am I.

Terra (Archivist) - Well, now I know why this card sounded familiar. But it still sounded like a very well-thought-out and well-tested card, and I gave it third place.

[DStu]

But oh the humanity!  We have to play our cards one at a time?  Yes, and you did before this card.  Carefully choosing only few treasures from your hand to play before Contraband can be lots of fun for bluffing.  And no, you can't just play your Loan and Venture at the same time and decide what your doing after you see the first treasure in your deck.  No that HoP gained card does not count for your Philosopher's Stone if you played Horn after the Stone, and no you can't count that Philosopher's Stone as a differently named card for the Horn if you play Horn before the Stone.  Actions are no different.  No, I'm not going to continue my play until after you've decided on the cards to put back for my Ghost Ship.  No I'm not telling you if I'm holding a Possession, although I probably would not Ghost Ship you if I did have a Possession.  But then again, maybe the only reason I told you that is to trick you because I do have a Possession?  (anti-meta gamer opponent then proceeds to break into tears.)

The difference is that, with Venture, Loan, Contraband, you have to play part of your treasure seperatetly, when these cards arise in your hand. Often (Venture+Loan) only when certain combination arise.
Here, you have to play all of your treasure seperately, as soon as a Fortune was purchased. And you have to give your opponent the time to react inbetween.

[Davio]

Concerning Lower School Courts: The entrant had sent an image of the card which I will share with you:



Now that the contest is over, I'll share my opinion.

At first I haven't put much thought into which cards I liked and which I didn't (was too busy with running the contest and putting in your votes), but I like cards that do something different. I like cards that try to actively change or add something to the game. That being said, I don't like cards that are too situational or complex. A card that deals with Curses should have a use when there are no Curse-dealers. Besides that, I require the cards to be in line with the governing Dominion principles, which it sometimes doesn't adhere to itself. I like cards that new player can understand without much difficulty.

I liked the reverse Closing Market effects and would have probably voted for that one. It just stands out to me.

I think Archivist is a fine card and I wonder how you can play it best. Going solo Archivist seems a less successful venture than Minion only. I think it shines as a single card soft counter to the discard Attacks. Instead of keeping a Village and a Smithy in hand, you keep this card and continue with even more cards than you started with (barring Tactician/Caravan/Wharf/Haven of course)!

[rspeer]

You're telling me I voted for -- rather, failed to vote for -- a card written in Comic Sans?! Whyyyyyyyy

I kid. I presume we have a young Dominion card designer, and that's great. It's not like that disturbing incident where Valley Games printed the whole 3rd edition of Die Macher in Comic Sans for no reason.

[Thisisnotasmile]

rspeer you missed out my card =[

Oh well.

I came to make a comment on Aphrodite, since most people here are (understandably) missing its point. It's not my card so don't quote me on this, but Aphrodite (Escalator Link) is a joke card (and it has come up on this forum and at BGG before). On the London Underground there are stations called "Monument" and "Bank". They are physically very close together, and as such there is an underground "Escalator Link" between them. That is the point of the card. It's a joke. Don't take it so seriously.

[biopower]

rspeer you missed out my card =[

Oh well.

I came to make a comment on Aphrodite, since most people here are (understandably) missing its point. It's not my card so don't quote me on this, but Aphrodite (Escalator Link) is a joke card (and it has come up on this forum and at BGG before). On the London Underground there are stations called "Monument" and "Bank". They are physically very close together, and as such there is an underground "Escalator Link" between them. That is the point of the card. It's a joke. Don't take it so seriously.

Do you also happen to know if there's a significance to the number 9 at all for the Monument and Bank stations?