Village (card category)

Revision as of 08:08, 11 July 2022

Village, the archetype for this category.

Village is the informal generic name for the family of cards which offer the ability to play more than one terminal Action in a turn—so called because many of them have "village" in their names. The simplest village card is Village itself. Typically, these cards offer +2 Actions, but there are some village cards which give this effect in other ways.

The presence of villages in a given Kingdom is important because having a cap on the number of terminal actions that can be played in a turn is a significant limiting factor in the potential of decks that can be built; Kingdoms with villages and Kingdoms without villages play very differently. Without the presence of villages in a Kingdom, the focus of most decks shifts to the non-terminals, plus the most desirable terminal available.

Every small Dominion expansion has at least two villages, and every other expansion has at least three.

List of villages

Cards in italics have been removed.

Villages with no restrictions

Typically, these cards offer +2 Actions, but there are some cards which give this effect in other ways.

Throne Room and its variants (Crown, Royal Carriage, Specialist, King's Court) are definitely villages, even though it may not be obvious at first. The effects of these cards will enable the same types of decks that other villages do. For more detailed insight into this concept, see here.

Villages that need a little support

These cards are definitely villages, but you have to jump through some hoops to get the effect.

For some people it may be useful to think of these cards separately than the above list because you have to go through an explicit check to make sure it actually works on a given kingdom, other people don’t see it that way.

With Prince and Summon, there has to be an action that can cost or less, or else the effect doesn’t work. Additionally, Summon requires Buys and significant for continued use.
With Diplomat, there needs to be a way to have 5 or fewer cards in hand after playing it, or else the effect doesn’t work.
With Golem, there needs to be some other non-terminal on the board for the effect to work past the first play of Golem.
For Herald, Ironmonger, and Piazza, you need to have enough Action cards in your deck to reveal an Action card often enough to get the effect a useful amount of times.
With Lost Arts and Teacher you typically need a non-terminal Action to apply the +1 Action token, otherwise you are restricted to extra copies of only one type of terminal (the one you apply the token to).
Conclave only gives a village effect if you can play an Action you do not have a copy of in play, so in practice, it only works if you have enough different Actions in your deck.
With Royal Galley, there needs to be some non-terminal, non-Duration card on the board.
Academy gives villagers whenever actions are gained and so usually requires a way to gain non-terminal actions which is often difficult but can be easy to achieve with some Horse gainers like Cavalry.

Villages with some restrictions

These cards are definitely villages, but they have some limiting factor that should probably be taken into account when considering the decks that can be built with them.

When given a kingdom with only these villages, it can be useful to go through the line of reasoning for when there are no villages, but modify it with the limiting factor — “What can I do when I can only play 2 terminals per turn?” instead of just one per turn, for example.

Crossroads will only allow two additional terminal actions per turn.
Necropolis and Trusty Steed are villages you can (usually) only get one copy of, allowing you only one additional terminal action per turn. Similarly, you can have only one Barracks which therefore lets you play only one extra terminal.
Procession, Sacrifice, Recruiter, and Broker can require you to trash cards you might prefer to keep in order to get the village effect.
Tactician gives an extra action but only in a single Tactician deck, which requires discarding your hand.
Sauna/Avanto, as a split pile, is difficult to get a lot of, so the number of terminals that can realistically be played is limited by that and the fact that sometimes it can be difficult to line them up properly and get maximum value.
Disciple and Ghost can be hard to get in multiples and there is a limited supply of them.
Madman works great when played, but it’s a one-shot and in order to get more of them, you have to not buy any cards on a turn, which is a very high cost.
With Tribute the player on your left needs to have enough Action cards in their deck to reveal an Action card often enough to get the effect a useful amount of times.
Acting Troupe is a one-shot; it gives you a bunch of villagers that can be used for +Actions whenever you want, but once you've used them up, you're out of +Actions.
Snowy Village gives you a lot of actions, but prevents you from getting any more Actions after that.
Paddock only becomes a village when two supply piles are empty and so the game is likely nearly over.
Lich always gives +2 Actions, but playing it makes you lose a turn, so it should rarely be used for this effect.
Toil, Scepter, and Market Towns allow you to play additional Actions, but only in your Buy phase.

Villages that don't work out in practice

These cards fit the definition of village used here, and with just the right circumstances can be useful for this effect. However, it is almost never worth building a deck that relies on getting the village effect from these cards alone.

Dame Molly only allows for one additional terminal action per turn; and on top of that she can sometimes be lower in the pile or your opponents could get her instead. Plus, she dies to other Knights.
Pixie is also a one-shot and only gives a 1/12 chance of actually getting the village effect each time it's played (The Field's Gift).

Additionally, the card Ruined Village has the word village in its name, but only gives +1 Action and so is not in fact a village that lets you play additional terminals.