Trading Post

Trading Post
Info
Cost
Type(s)	Action
Kingdom card?	Yes
Set	Intrigue
Illustrator(s)	Martin Hoffmann
Card text
Trash 2 cards from your hand. If you do, gain a silver card; put it into your hand.

Trading Post is an Action card from Intrigue. It is a trasher which lets you trash 2 cards from your hand and gain a Silver card; this enables you to trash cards while still having enough to buy something. It only decreases the number of cards in your deck by 1 when you play it, so it doesn't trash very fast, but it is still an excellent opening buy on a 5/2 start.

FAQ

Official FAQ

• If you have 2 or more cards, you must trash exactly 2 cards and gain a Silver card.
• The gained Silver card goes into your hand and can be spent the same turn.
• If the Silver pile is empty, you do not gain a Silver card (but still trash cards if possible).
• If you only have one card left in your hand and you play Trading Post, you trash the one remaining card but you do not gain a Silver.
• If you have no cards left when you play this, nothing happens.

Strategy Article

There's no strategy article for Trading Post.

It's a pretty nice trasher which gives you Silvers in exchange for your Estates and Coppers and maybe Curses, Ruins, and Shelters. It doesn't get you as slim of a deck as Chapel or Steward, and it doesn't have quite the versatility of Remake, but it gives you money while trashing, which is pretty good. Like most trashers, it's best early, and it's pretty great on a 5/2 start.

Trivia

Secret History

This was originally in the main set, from way back when. When the main set went from 25 cards down to 20 cards, I cut this as being somewhat redundant with Mine. When we went back up to 25, I didn't add this back in; I wanted more variety. It does not seem nearly as redundant here. It's not the Smithy / Envoy problem; Trading Post and Mine are plenty different, they're just both ways to improve your money. It's more of a Smithy / Library / Council Room deal. But you know there was only so much space in the main set.

This card started out as "trash a card from your hand; gain another card with the same cost." That's incredibly weak, which was immediately obvious. After a few quick iterations I ended up with Trading Post as it exists today.

—Donald X. Vaccarino, The Secret History of the Intrigue Cards