Honestly, I don't really like the idea of getting (an) extra trade card(s) for WotW, since I'm afraid it will be too powerful.

- In case the extra card is 'higher' then you otherwise would get, the card counts as and extra city (unless you would have nine cities in play, but it doesn't make sense to build a 9th city while having WotW), which is very powerful.

- I even think that free cards form the first two stacks is very powerful. I can remember many occasions at the end of the trading phase where I would have liked to accept another offer from an opponent, but not being able to make the deal because of 'lack of singles' in my hand. Breaking up a good set in the hand is often not worth that last deal. Getting free cards from the lower stacks provides extra 'singles', that are very important in trade.

- The idea of revealing a (non-tradable) calamity and drawing a card from that stack (after all players have acquired their normal trade cards) still feels like a good idea to me. The most balanced one in case of 'getting extra trade card(s)' for WotW.

One more thing that I really like is the idea of WotW counting as a city during the 'Alter AST' phase. The AST requirements remain the same, there is no messing with the AST itself, but the wonder can help to absorb impact from loss of cities by calamities or attacking opponents. Not especially the 'game winning card', but a quite good feature.

In my opinion, either the 'calamity for trade cards' or 'counts as city during AST alteration' abilities are the best ones. Although WotW may be spiced up a little, it doesn't need to be the best card in the game...

For a card costing 280, I don't think it is, as long as we are careful about what cards we give (not allowing more than 11 cards total, with purchases, nor making it too easy to get two identical valuable cards).


Yea, this would be powerful, but for a cost of 280 it's supposed to be. I don't think it's too powerful, but we would have to play test to be sure.


Yes, there seams to be a general shortage of "crap cards" when trading. But still, while giving you the ability to do that last trade, it still don't give you anything to actually trade.


Perhaps, but also the most complicated one.


Actually, that might be a "game winning card" as it makes it WAY harder for other players to halt the progress of the holder, a quite common strategy amongst the elite AdvCiv players in the Swedish Championships. Also note that it would make the player IMMUNE to regressing on the AST due to having no cities...


No, but it should be at least the second best card, as it ties with Cultural Ascendancy of being the most expensive card, and Cultural Ascendancy is generally considered the best card (though not necessarily the most cost effective one).

In real life, A wonder of the world mostly means cultural ascendancy.

I was on the phone with gerart today, and we discussed this thing.

I told I wouldn't find it wrong to make Wotw 290 or 300 points. But only when it does something that's really worth 290. (it not the current attribtues which would make it 260-270 in my opinion)

I mean ADDING an ability to the current usage should make it more expensive if it's something like an extra city or extra cards.
Keeping the current card should lower its price to 260-270 in my opinion.

gerart complained about the fact that a 300 card would make an exception to to 1-3VP rule.

I replied, Evertjan opted again for giving extra VP's. Maybe (if that one's still not off) making the card 300 only would have slight change, giving it 4VP's , but this cannot be WITH the extra city/card/AST option if you ask me.

therefore 290 would be best price to me if you give the card this axtra ability.

Question is, wether you keep
1. The additional credits
2. The 'nullifies' Trade Empire.

or loose (guess the additional credits)

I've also thought of this, but given the name of the card I rather increase the cost and make it special.


Yea, 290 or 280 would be the best price. I'd not go with 300 unless we made it a super-special-card (such as in the proposal where it was required to enter the finish square).


I'd keep the "Nullifies Trade Empire", but loose the additional credits.

In fact I'd move down the credit bonuses, so Monument gives 20 and Written Record gives 10, as those cards are really lame now (especially since they are dual-colour cards, and thus gives 5 less normal credits than single coloured cards). Can't do that while keeping the credit bonus of WotW though, as that would result in either too little difference between Monument and WotW, or too much credits from WotW...

agree on all.

For the card-creating THIS week:

I will make no changes for now, cause all should be playetested anyway.
Or do you want this to be playtested THIS round.

No change for 2.10.
First some play tests of whatever change we go for and then we make the change official for 2.11 (which hopefully won't take another year...).

Jonno, I did not get the meaning of this line. Can you explain what you meant with 'cards we give', and '11 cards total'?

Okay, spicing up WotW in order to make it a very interesting card (if not the most interesting one) is good to me.

In that case I also agree on dropping the 'extra credits' feature (while raising the credits for 'Monument' and 'Written Record').

I wouldn't mind raising the cost to 290, making it the single most expensive card in the game. Since it is a multi color card, it will still be in the same price range of 'Cultural Ascendancy', which is single colored. (If you, theoretically, would own all cards giving credit tot WotW, it adds up to 175 discount, while the same approach leads to 165 discount for CA.)

The 'counts as city during alter AST'-feature would indeed make a civilization immune to end-of-turn regression due to the fact of having no cities on the map. However, in the (imited) occasions that I saw someone regress in this way, that player was always far away from winning anyway; he/she did not lose the game due to the regression, but regressed due to a bad position in the game. In other words, I doubt if this would have serious impact on the game.

If the general opinion is that it is too powerful (even for 290) we can drop this possible ability, but actually I still like it. And it's not very complicated either

With "what cards we give" I mean that we shouldn't give the advance an ability to give to valuable commodity cards.
The 11 cards total is the maximum amounts of commodities a civilization can acquire during Trade Card Acquisition. You get 9 cards for 9 cities, and then you get two more by purchasing cards according to §22.5. I don't want WotW to increase this current maximum (thus it has to work within either the 9 cities limit or the two purchases limit, or else replace another card).

We currently have three suggestions that fit those requirements:
1. Draw cards as if you had one city more than you actually have. You also need city support as if you had one city more than you actually have.
2. You can purchase cards from first and second stack for free.
3. If you reveal a calamity you have drawn you may draw an additional trade card from the same stack.

Of these I prefer the second alternative, with the first as a close second.


Great. We are getting somewhere...


You are right.


I don't think it is too powerful in general (though it could be very powerful in some situations), I just don't like the idea as much as the free trade card idea.

At this stage, I'm for nr1, Provided the card is 290 and loses the add.credits.
This extra city gets you an extra card, AND counts as city during AST, AND requires 2 extra support.

My second choice is the free 1 and 2, provided that the card is 290 and loses the add. credits. You should never get more than 11 cards a turn. (should be clarified in the rules)

My third choice now is nr. 3 provided that the card is 290 and loses the add. credits. Once you reveal a calamity, you get a free card of the same stack number at the moment of purchasing extra cards. If that stack is empty, you get no other card. You can never get more than 11 cards.
After revealing the calamity, that particular calamity remains unchanged as it was. (NT or not)

My nr. 3 IS nr.3 because it can get more powerfull than imagined at first sight. You could reveal your Piracy, get another gold AND trade you piracy to anyone. If you say you should return the calamity, it's too powerfull to in my opinion.

So you want both extra cards and easier AST. I'm quite sure that will be overpowered, even for 290.


Already is:

A 22.5 is the only rule allowing you to get extra trade cards, that gives you a max of 11. If we go for option 2 we'll just make sure that WotW is covered by 22.5.1.


Returning the calamity is not an option, but making it NT for the purpose of trading (but not calamity resolution) would stop you from trading it to anyone, thus making it slightly less powerful. If we would go for option 3 (which is third on my list too) I would prefer it NT.

It is importent in this discussion also to look at the cost and at the discounts.

A card that can be bought near the start of the game can be used a lot longer (thus the advantage should be smaller) than a card that can only be bought near the end of the game. Where the wonder of the world that expensive (and/or needing a lot of dscounts) that it could only be bought neer the end of the game (like mathematics in the advanced game) it would be more importent that it gave sufficient victory points. After all

(as i mailed earlier:
"1. the card gives extra VP. In that case it must be compared with the normal final turn purchauses. Generaly people will buy as many points, which generaly means that a lot of <100 point cards are bought or at least cards that have a lot of discount. You should see what the average amount of points is people get in the last turn. I would expect between 5-10 points for 300 credits (and more likely 7-10). ")

the last (second to last or third to last) turn it is more interesting to buy a llot of small cheap cards than one expensive card.

I personaly would (for simplicity's sake) prefer that it counts as a virtual city (with all the effects of such a city, an extra trade card (provided that the player does not have 9 city's), the need for two more tokens in support, the need to raise taxes and the influence on the AST) however as the city is not on the board it could not be the target of a disaster/special ability nor would it count for a disaster.

If this effect is seen as very strong the cost of the card can be changed (see the start of this reply/end of this reply).

Alternatively, it could be argued that a world wonder agravates certain disasters (the influx of foreign people could agravate epedemics, it would certainly atract more barbarians (though they might call themselves tourists ) and the influx of foreign people could introduce new ideas (thus a positive or negative influence on civil war, civil disorder or iconoclasm)

However the first question must remain when do you want to be able to get the card (and thus what must be the cost and what must be the discount).

One final thought:
Imagine that any advance gives a discount to wonder of the world though only a small one. Wonder of the world then could easily rise to a cost above the 300. (if for instance any advance would give credits based on its cost. <100 is 5 credit, between 100 and 200 is 10 credits and above 200 is 15 credits. the cost of the card could easily rise to 400-500. of course the added victory points would mean that the advantage needs to be smaller)

Evertjan van de Kaa

Well,

I certainly wouldn't want to make a card as good that it should cost 400.

I think 290 is fine, and we should fit the card to be worth 290.

I like the idea of the card aggravating a calamity.
Looking at all calamities, in m yopinion these fit best and in this order of preference


1. Corruption (as the card gives you more trade goods)
(an additional five would be the right 'punishment')
2. Slave revolt (Slaves building the Wonder)
(an additional five or maybe some destruction of tokens)
3. Tyranny (a leader wants to have the honour)
(since it creates another city, this one is aggravated anyway)
4. Iconclasm and Heresy (as a lot of wonders are build to honour One god)
(reduce one additional city on favour of another (the wonder-city))





Does not aggravate Volcanic Eruption or Earthquake (could only be destroyed by it)
Does not influence Treachery
Could aggravate Famine (cause money and food is saved for the project and not for the citizens)
Could reduce Superstition (not aggravate)
Could aggravate Civil War (people against the wonder could fight against people for the wonder)
Does not influence Flood (could only be destroyed by it)
Could aggravate Barbarian Hordes (as concentration on the wonder grows, and concentration on defense decreases)
Could aggravate Epidemic (caouse it attracts foreign people holding deseases)
Does not influence Cyclone
Shouldnt aggravate but reduce Civil Disorder, (cause the wonder is making people happier.)
Does not influnce Piracy.
Does not influnce Regression, (shouldn't)


The minor calamities should stay out of here.

actualy i just thought that the world wonder i describe comes very close to saying one of your cities cannot be destroyed (by disasters) or attacked and also does not count against disasters (does not influence civil war).

With regard to the cost, using my easy reduction sceme, where all advances give a (small) discount the cost o the world wonder can easily be moved up by 50-100 credits. after all if all advances give 5 discount then ten advances will give a total of 50 discount. thus moving the buying of the world wonder to the middle part of the game.

With regard to disaster influence, I prefer to look at the long term effects of a world wonder. Thus agravating slave revolt (how logical when building a world wonder) is not something i would do.

I would then prefer agravating epedemic and barbarian hordes.

Evertjan van de Kaa

I think you two are over engineering things right now.
While spicing WotW a bit is fine, even desirable, we do not need it to become the most complex card in the game with hundreds of effects...

Also, first you speak of it indirectly aggravating tyranny because it counts as an additional city, and then that it doesn't affect civil war...

By no means will WotW be considered a city for ALL purposes, as that could turn quite ugly (I want to replace your WotW with mine due to Treachery)...
If we go with the city option it will still ONLY be counted as a city for some very specific purposes, including at least trade card acquisition and city support, and optionally also taxation and movement of succession markers. It will NOT count as a city for calamity effects or victory determination.

I think i always indicated that the wonder of the world city could not be targeted by disasters Nor would it count for disaster (civil war) . and what is an easier solution that indicating one city on the board that cannot be attacked/removed by disasters (just turn the city to the other side).

As i indicated before i do think the question is when you want the wonder of the world to be available and how much it must cost.

once those two properties are known aagravation/reduction of disasters can be used to finetune the card to make sure that it is not to strong.

If you would want to be able to "reduce" a world wonder what you could do is:
Make the world wonder an extra area connected to all of your area's. This area could contain a city site. However in this case it more becomes a great work (a wonder that can easily be destroyed and rebuild).

Evertjan van de Kaa