Distant Lands

Distant Lands
Info
Cost
Type(s)	Action - Reserve - Victory
Kingdom card?	Yes
Set	Adventures
Illustrator(s)	Matthias Catrein
Card text
Put this on your Tavern mat. Worth 4  if on your Tavern mat at the end of the game (otherwise worth 0 ).

Distant Lands is an Action-Reserve-Victory card from Adventures. It's an alt-VP card worth more than Duchy at the same cost, but has to be played (and put on your Tavern mat) before you can get those  .

Unlike other Reserve cards, Distant Lands stays on your Tavern mat permanently once played; there is no way to call it or otherwise return it to your deck.

FAQ

Official FAQ

• This is a Victory card. Use 8 for games with 2 players, or 12 for games with 3 or more players.
• This is also an Action card; when you play it, you put it on your Tavern mat. It will stay there the rest of the game; there is no way to call it.
• At the end of the game, Distant Lands is worth 4  if it is on your mat, or 0  if it is not. It counts as part of your deck either way (for example it can contribute to how many   a Gardens is worth).

Strategy

Distant Lands is a dense Victory card—that is, it offers a good ratio of   to price and number of stop cards added to your deck, making it a fairly strong source of alt-VP—but as a tradeoff there’s a one-time cost in terms of draw and terminal space. Distant Lands is therefore best supported by an engine, where it can be somewhat thought of as a terminal one-shot payload card. In Kingdoms with stronger payload such as Bridge Troll, the draw and terminal space consumed by Distant Lands may be too high a cost.

Distant Lands needs to be played in order to provide any  . When you play it, it removes itself from your deck, meaning that it doesn’t hurt your subsequent ability to draw; this makes it particularly useful in scenarios that encourage early greening (e.g. Kingdoms with Battlefield) or in which you want to make many Victory card purchases (e.g. with Groundskeeper). The fact that Distant Lands needs to be played also means it works especially well in a gain-and-play scenario, e.g., with Wish, Innovation, or Artisan as this allows you to score without hurting your deck at all. Otherwise, to ensure that you can play it relatively soon, you need an engine that allows you to cycle through your deck quickly (which usually means good thinning and/or strong draw, with sifting also being potentially useful) and some spare terminal space. The latter is particularly important: if you lack the terminal space to play your Distant Lands when you draw it, it will continue to clog up your future shuffles without even providing  .

The fact that Distant Lands needs to be drawn and played to provide   means it can be a worse choice than Duchy for the endgame (when you would like to buy Province but lack the , or in a Duchy dancing scenario), as even though it provides more   at the same price, you may not get a chance to play it before the game ends.

Versions

English versions

Print	Digital	Text	Release	Date
		Put this on your Tavern mat. Worth 4  if on your Tavern mat at the end of the game (otherwise worth 0 ).	Adventures 1st Edition	April 2015
		Put this on your Tavern mat. Worth 4  if on your Tavern mat at the end of the game (otherwise worth 0 ).	Adventures 2nd Edition	August 2017

Other language versions

Language	Name	Print	Digital	Text	Notes
Dutch	Verre landen			Leg deze kaart op je Herbergtableau. Deze kaart is aan het einde van het spel 4  waard als hij op je Herbergtableau ligt (anders 0 ).	(2015)
Finnish	Kaukomaat (lit. far countries)
French	Terres lointaines			Placez cette carte sur votre plateau taverne. Cette carte vaut 4  si elle est sur votre Taverne à la fin de la partie (0  sinon).
German	Ferne Lande			Lege diese Karte auf dein Wirtshaustableau. Wert 4 , falls diese Karte bei Spielende auf deinem Wirtshaustableau liegt.	(2015)
German	Ferne Lande			Lege diese Karte auf dein Wirtshaustableau. Wert 4 , falls diese Karte bei Spielende auf deinem Wirtshaustableau liegt (ansonsten Wert 0 ).	(Nachdruck 2021)
Japanese	遠隔地 (pron. enkakuchi)			これをあなたの酒場マットの上に置く。これが酒場マットの上にある場合、4 。それ以外の場合、0 。
Russian	Дальние Земли (pron. dal'niye zyemli)

Trivia

Official card art.

Secret History

How about a  -Reserve card? It's a   card that isn't worth anything unless you manage to play it once. A simple concept that just immediately worked.

—Donald X. Vaccarino, The Secret History of Dominion: Adventures

Relevant outtakes

Some of the mentioned outtakes eventually became Landmarks (specifically Wall, Orchard, and Triumphal Arch.

I tried an Action-Victory card that was cost , trash a card from your hand, worth 13  minus 1  per 2 cards in your deck. "What huh," I hear you say. We had some fun playing around with it but it was too hard making it be fair but not awful both in 2-player games and 4-player games. Some versions could trash cards from supply piles, an old concept that has never worked out. When I was giving up on this, I tried a Victory card that was worth 1  per Estate or Gold you had, whichever was less. This was an old idea that I planned to try if I ever needed another   card. It's uh not awful. It had no special joy though. Briefly I tried an Action-Victory card that put a card on your mat, and was worth   based on the number of cards there. It just didn't give a new-enough experience; there's Island. It sounded like it would be a strategy but it usually wasn't, it was usually Island but maybe not worth the 2 . I tried a   card that rewarded you for having the most of something, and stopped the game from ending until its pile was empty; man, who has the time to empty an extra pile these days. I tried a   card that wanted you to have 3+ of as many cards as possible; it wasn't the same as Fairgrounds but didn't have a good new feeling. I tried 1  per copy you have of the Action card you have the 2nd most copies of - you want a lot of two things. Man there isn't much to say about any of these. I tried a bunch of Victory cards, and in the end there's just Distant Lands, which I had for most of the time, but I like it so hooray.

—Donald X. Vaccarino, The Secret History of Dominion: Adventures

Donald X.'s opinion

This is exciting for serious players. It's a nice way to get a lead in   while continuing to build up. We already had that with e.g. Nobles, but well Distant Lands is different all the ways it's different. And it's a lot of points, man, it's not stingy there.

—Donald X. Vaccarino, Let's Discuss Adventures Cards: Distant Lands