Non-terminal draw

Laboratory, a non-terminal draw card.

Cards that can increase your handsize without depleting your number of available Actions are referred to as non-terminal draw cards. They make a welcome addition to almost any engine strategy, in which large handsizes allow you to find and line up your key engine components.

The simplest vanilla non-terminal draw card is Laboratory; cards that have similar effects are therefore sometimes referred to as Lab variants.

Non-terminal draw is closely related to duration draw: playing a duration-draw card on one turn provides an effect similar to playing a non-terminal draw card on your next turn.

List of non-terminal draw cards

These draw a specified number of cards—typically a total of +2 Cards, occasionally more—and can draw any card. Cards in italics have been removed.

• Dominion: Laboratory
• Seaside: Tide Pools
• Alchemy: Alchemist
• Dark Ages: Madman
• Guilds: Advisor
• Adventures: Lost City
• Empires: Encampment
• Renaissance: Experiment
• Menagerie: Destrier, Horse, Way of the Horse
• Allies: Distant Shore, Lich, Sibyl
• Plunder: Landing Party
• Promos: Governor

Conditional effects

These cards are restricted by only being able to increase handsize in certain circumstances; if the condition is not met, most will be simple cantrips, or even reduce handsize.

• Intrigue: Wishing Well -- you need to guess the top card of your deck after drawing one card to draw another one.
• Alchemy: Apprentice provides non-terminal draw if you trash a card costing or more.
• Prosperity: City -- Only if a supply pile is empty.
• Cornucopia: Menagerie -- Only if you have no duplicate cards in hand.
• Hinterlands: Stables -- If you can discard a Treasure from your hand.
• Adventures: Storyteller -- You need to have to spend to increase your handsize.
• Adventures: Teacher, Lost Arts, Pathfinding can all upgrade Action cards to draw extra cards or generate extra Actions, generating non-terminal draw from suitable targets.
• Empires: City Quarter -- Variable amount of draw. You need at least two other Action cards in hand to increase your handsize.
• Nocturne: Cursed Village -- Variable amount of draw. Only increases handsize from a sufficiently small starting handsize.
• Allies: Capital City -- You need to have generated before.
• Allies: Battle Plan -- If you can reveal an Attack card from your hand.
• Plunder: Swamp Shacks -- If you have six or more cards in play.
• Plunder: Shy -- only works at the beginning of your turn, and only once per turn.

Specific-card drawers

A subset of conditional non-terminal draw. These non-terminal cards only draw cards of a specific type or other category, and increase handsize if they find such cards.

• Scout draws Victory cards.
• Sea Chart draws a card you already have in play.
• Apothecary draws Coppers and Potions.
• Scrying Pool draws Actions.
• Hunting Party digs for a card not already in your hand.
• Vagrant draws certain junk cards.
• Magpie draws Treasures.
• Settlers draws Coppers from your discard pile.
• Bustling Village draws Settlers from your discard pile.
• Patrician draws cards costing or more.
• Will-o'-Wisp draws cards costing or less.
• Seer draws cards costing from to .
• Hunter draws cards of different types.

Non-terminal duration draw

These non-terminal cards increase handsize on future turns, not immediately.

• Seaside: Caravan
• Empires: Archive
• Nocturne: Den of Sin, Crypt

Unreliable non-terminal draw

These cards are not usually considered Lab variants, but can play that role in some decks:

• Ironmonger can act as Lab variants depending on what card is on top of your deck.
• Shanty Town acts as a Lab variant if you have no Action cards in hand, but otherwise decreases handsize.
• Diplomat acts as a Lab variant if your handsize is small, but otherwise is terminal.
• Native Village hides away cards, rather than drawing them, but can non-terminally add them to your hand.
• Trusty Steed and Courser are difficult to gain and you can generally only get one copy of them, so they're hard to use as the basis of an engine.
• Crossroads provides non-terminal draw the first time you play it on a turn, if there are multiple Victory cards in your hand.
• Cultist is technically terminal, but will allow you to play additional Cultists after it.
• Imp allows you to play an Action that you don't yet have a copy of in play, which can make it non-terminal if the other Action you play also is.
• Avanto allows you to play a cantrip Sauna if you have one in your hand after drawing, giving you back the Action you used to play Avanto.
• Sheepdog can provide draw without using up an Action if you gain a card while you have it in hand.
• Goatherd provides non-terminal draw if your opponent trashed multiple cards on their last turn.
• Emissary is only non-terminal if it makes you shuffle while drawing.

Related cards

These cards draw multiple cards but overall only maintain handsize rather than increasing it.

• Secret Passage is a non-terminal source of +2 Cards, but then you return a card to your deck, so it maintains handsize rather than increasing it.
• Fugitive and Ferryman are non-terminal sources of +2 Cards, but its required discard means it maintains handsize, rather than increasing it.
• Forum is a non-terminal source of +3 Cards, but its required discard means it maintains handsize, rather than increasing it.
• Recruiter gives you Villagers if you trash a card with a non-zero coin cost, allowing you to recover the Action you used to play it if you want to. However, since trashing is mandatory, this doesn't actually increase handsize.

Gallery

Unconditional

Conditional

Only specific cards