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
• Rising Sun: Litter, Root Cellar
• 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 net 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.
• Rising Sun: Artist -- if you have two or more unique cards in play..
• Rising Sun: Rice Broker gives net non-terminal draw if you trash an Action card.

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.
• Poet draws cards costing or less.

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

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Conditional

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Only specific cards

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