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OK, thanks, I haven't seen those cards yet but it makes sense to force the user to make the choices in order.

Still, the current interface is needlessly confusing.

Would something like the following work?

Have the choices listed left to right, each with a couple of card slots below and a confirmation button. The user can select one or two (or zero) cards for trash, they'd move to the slot under confirm trash (perhaps with a trash icon) as they're selected, and the user confirms with the button. The cards move to Trash. Then the middle slot with "discard" works the same way with the remaining cards. If two cards are left, the Topdeck option would allow ordering, and would have a confirmation button too.

That would preserve the order, and still be clear and obvious (I think) to players.

Maybe put in some sort of "Don't trash any cards" message on the confirmation button if zero cards are chosen, just to be clear.

By the way, the current reordering does require card dragging. Maybe there's another way. I certainly wasn't a fan of dragging on MF but that was in part because it was not implemented consistently.

Edit: To be clear, there would be a confirmation button under each choice, so the user can see the options. Only the current choice's button would be active, so the user is forced, for instance, to trash first.

I don't like the big red on white X for empty piles though. It doesn't fit the Dominion aesthetic at all. I assume that's for all intents and purposes a placeholder until they do better graphics.

I agree. Perhaps a monochrome card face could convey the same message. Something like the cards in "familiar cards" that have not been selected?

A dark monochrome, like a shadow, would be great. You don't want anything in the least bit ambiguous. I still would like the lighter, easily read monochrome (like in Familiar Cards) for non-buyable during the buy phase. But who knows, a UI designer might come up with something better too.

Actually, I really liked Woodcutter in some situations - if you are going for a big cheap garden deck it was a good buy. Also Thief: when you see opponents buying Mines or getting gold-generating cards it can pay off, especially with Throne Room. But then I'm a base set player for the most part, online and IRL. Maybe I'd play better without those cards on the table though!

I was pretty far ahead, but Lord Rat bought the last Province and ended the game with me in the lead. He could have hoped to buy a couple of Duchies to close the gap before I got to the last Province. Then it would have been a race to that last card.

Even more mystifying, he used a Chapel to trash an Estate on that last turn, the one where he ended the game.

#132612 (I think... that's at the bottom of the list)

Sentry is in the base set so this is a card that newcomers to this platform and/or the game itself will see.

Currently the interface pulls two cards, puts them in a box, and asks you to confirm trashing - it's not clear whether those cards are selected yet or not. Then, same process for discard, asking for confirmation, then that action ends automatically unless you still have two unselected cards, in which case you need to choose the order. I've messed this up as often as I've gotten it right.

A simpler and more intuitive interface would be to have the player "physically" move the two selected cards into the desired destination and then confirm all at once. Basically, have a slot for trash, slot for discard, and slot for topdeck. Each slot actually would have room for two cards, and if two cards are in the topdeck, it would be clearly indicated which is on top and which is on the bottom. The other option would be to have the player "physically" slide each card to its actual destination one at a time in which ever order they want, with no confirmation necessary. If they wanted a particular card on the top they would move it second, like in a real life game.

I don't know what other cards in other sets do that would affect how this is implemented, but I do see that Sentry's interface is confusing as it is. If it's important to always do the trashing before the discarding before the topdecking, then at the very least the dialog should show that you are on the first of those three steps when you start.

It's an interesting card, and it works as advertised, but it reminds me of my awful, awful kitchen range interface, where the buttons make sense to a programmer but not to a cook.

I agree 100% on the right-clicks. Using them should be an option for advanced players but the game should not depend on those in any way. It's a real head-scratcher for new players, especially when their usual methods don't work, and it's not mobile-friendly.

As far as the number of cards changing color, it didn't on MF and then it did. It was useful to call attention to piles being almost empty, but not a big deal. I don't like the big red on white X for empty piles though. It doesn't fit the Dominion aesthetic at all. I assume that's for all intents and purposes a placeholder until they do better graphics.

I'd just like to add that it would be nice to see the last turn instead of being dumped unceremoniously into the scoring spreadsheet.

Also, I'd like to see what victory condition was met - some message about whether it was emptying the Province pile or three empty supply piles. That's very important to people learning the game.

It would also be useful to be able to replay the same kingdom, as that's a good way to try out different strategies, especially for those new to the game.

A few more...

1. It confusing to have the same cross-out icon for discard, trash, and topdeck. Yes, I know the text tells me. And wouldn't it be better to move those cards out of my hand somehow before confirming the action? Like in a real game.

2. I don't know what I'm being asked to react to or why I'm discarding cards without looking over to the log to figure it out. It would be nice to have a card and/or a message in the center of the gameplay area to make that clear - like in real life games. (For what it's worth the text on MF that I think explained that was too small for me to read, but I could see there was some reason being given.)

3. If there's a way to play with more than one bot I haven't figured it out. There are settings for number of players at a table, and a separate menu for matching to bots, but all I have gotten so far is Lord Rat as my only opponent. I can't tell if the bot setting is sticking or if the number of players setting is sticking when I move from one area to another. Obviously whatever order I'm trying here isn't working for me. The whole thing is a mystery and I have no guidance.

4. As far as number of players, it would make sense to have simple check boxes for two and for three players and then the range for those who want the bigger numbers. You can do this kind of thing in printer dialogues so I know it's possible.

5. I miss some of the old cards. Sorry Donald X., I really do. I'm not seeing where e.g. Vassel is an improvement on e.g. Woodcutter, but maybe I just need the right set up. That's pretty low on the list for me though.

Yeah, the MF and Shuffleit methods are opposite, aren't they. I'm using Windows for the first time in a dozen years so right-click is a foreign concept for me. I keep double-tapping like I do on the mac but that doesn't work. That's not to say that right-clicks shouldn't be part of the interface, but it seems like a more universal design would take into account that most users will eventually be coming in from mobile platforms and will keep issues like that in mind. The rank beginner stuff should not rely on problematic right-clicks.

I like the idea of a customizable options. People do that all the time with gestures and clicks on their computers, and being able to do that is usually a sign of an interface that can grow with you as you learn.

But the defaults should be for the beginners, who aren't going to mess with those settings yet, not the power users who will.

Long press is working for me now on my Windows 10 touchscreen too. Yeah!

Viewing and buying is still awkward even on the big screen though. It might be awhile before I can get the iPad set up again (teenagers, grrrrr) but that's where I'd prefer to play, so maybe I'll get to that sooner now.

Witherweaver, I think there was a button near the top. Honestly I can't remember exactly how it worked. There was toggle so it could either show all cards (with some sort of icon for the buyables) or just the buyable ones. Basically it created a dark band across the screen and you could view the entire cards by scrolling left to right, from cheapest to most expensive.

I think the way the clicking worked, at least on mobile, was that clicking on the card zoomed it, and clicking on the buy icon itself (a square with a plus in the lower left corner?) actually made the purchase. I had a hard time clicking on the correct card sometimes, so the zoom & buy feature was super useful as well as providing me with a reminder of the available options for unfamiliar cards, or ones I tended to mix up like Moneylender and Bureaucrat :-)

Thank you w. for those comments. There's always going to be some tension between text-based and graphical, isn't there? Both are useful in different circumstances.

I grew up using text-based (primarily) computer systems, and agree that for power users that's often much faster and more convenient. There's a reason we click on icons instead of relying on command lines these days, though. Especially for newcomers, it's more intuitive, and there's less room for mistakes. I like the idea of being able to turn features off and on. If someone wants to play in text-only mode, more power to them. I've actually got a bit of experience helping blind and visually impaired people trying to use various computer systems, back in the early days of graphical user interfaces in fact, and know how important that can be for many people, not just expert users.

On the other hand, a wall of text without explanation is intimidating, especially to newcomers.  If the goal is to provide a platform for those who already are frequent players, who know the rules and the lingo and have memorized the cards, then this interface is probably close to what they are looking for. From my understanding that is the market Isotropic aimed for.

But if you don't know the cards, it is very useful to be able to look at all the cards on the table, including their text, with a single click (MF did this). It's good to be able to quickly get a magnified view with all the information, and unfortunately the right-click mechanism isn't doing that for many people, even when they figure that out. A button that zooms out the table cards would be useful, especially when buying. I made a lot of use of the scrolling side-by-side magnified cards on MF's platform. Almost all my experience last year was on mobile devices, in particular when I began to play, so this was an important feature as I was still learning the various cards and was having some vision difficulties which made reading text laborious.

Shuffleit is doing a better job of letting the user know what they need to do next. I'd like it to be more obvious that an opponent is playing Militia, and that's why I have to discard.

One thing in particular that is ambiguous and confusing is the "+" is the corner of cards during the buy phase. My first instinct, trained by various map programs and so on, was that this was a "zoom in" feature and would magnify the card for me. Of course, it's simply an "add" button, showing only on cards that are buyable. What would make more sense to me is for Shuffleit to do as they do in the "Familiar Cards" section - grey out the unbuyables. That's clear, graphical, and unambiguous. It would be great to have some sort of obvious zoom in feature too, so I'm not buying a pig in a poke.

Once again, I have great hopes for this platform. It's a great game and has a lot of potential in the simpler lower levels, if the interface is more welcoming to new players.

I had the same problem with Gardens, two games in a row. The VP column shows points per card (for Gardens) instead of the total. The other cards were correct, and the score in the top box were correct.

I can't find a game number at the top of the log. There are some numbers and locations at the bottom but I don't know which (if any) applies to this game.

You are right that what's intuitive is subjective, but there really is such a thing as intuitive design. I guess it's like teaching - you can know your subject really well, but that doesn't mean you can easily see it from the viewpoint of someone trying to learn it, who doesn't know the words or how things fit together yet.

It does seem to me that this interface is only obvious if you have played a lot of Dominion already, and in particular a lot of online Dominion. I've played a couple of games now and one thing that jumped out at me is how the game just seems to stop in the middle. I guess the other player took a last turn that wasn't animated, but suddenly I'm in the middle of a spreadsheet instead of the game.

I haven't figured out how to hide the log. I'm sure some people like it, but I have some visual problems and I don't like any movement on the side. It seems to take up a lot of space.

I don't like that I can't see the full text on the cards on the table. Right-clicking on an individual card is slow and awkward on my laptop. And having the end turn button way over in the log is strange. Surely there is a more logical place for that.

Note: I haven't even tried to play a game yet. I have just now gotten to that point.

I thought it might be useful for the developers to see what this looks like from the viewpoint of a more casual user. I missed the Isotropic era, was frustrated by early Goku, then MF, but several months ago started being able to play on my iPad and then my phone. The last couple of months I played it daily, almost always against bots, going through the campaign (up to the paid part) and then going back to favorite game setups. I've played Dominion IRL for a few years, seen a few cards from the early expansions when playing with friends, played with family mostly during holidays with a base set we own, but never seeing most of the cards or newer mechanisms. I've also read posts on BGG over the years.

So today, I've got a brand-new computer and decided to try this out. First stop was to search google for Dominion, and the hits were for the old game. Going there I get the message about MF losing the contract but no link to find my way to the new site. So I googled ShuffleIT (I knew that was the new company) and got this forum. Luckily there's a link to the game in the announcement post. Yeah! I found it! It's hard to find, though, unless you are already deep in the Dominion ecosystem.

The background artwork is very nice and looks like a Dominion box. I like that a lot.

But, other than the art and the URL, no indication that I had found the game I was looking for: the message was simply that my browser was not supported. I'm on a brand new computer, so I was using MS Edge. Thank you for providing the link to Chrome, which I downloaded. But for anyone not already familiar with Dominion, there's nothing to let them know they should bother.

So, in the new Chrome browser, I find the proper url again. Finally, I'm in the right place, with the right browser.

However, I'm met with an unfriendly login/register screen, no welcome text explaining what the user would be logging in to, no explanation of what Dominion is. If I didn't already know I would have left without signing up. This is another point where newcomers could be sold on giving it a try - or not.

I tried logging in with what I thought was my old MF login, and that didn't work. No such user existed. No link back to the login for another try, either - I had to go back in my browser and then forward again to reset it. I tried with a different password or two, then tried to register for a new account and got a message that my username was reserved. Okay...

Eventually I found an email in my spam folder from Shuffleit. Followed that link, and with a few more frustrating errors where it wanted me to try fixing the passwords, I gave up and went back to the login page. This time it took my info, in spite of the previous error messages. Somewhere in there -I can't remember for sure where - I was directed to Discord for help, started to set up an account, and decided that it wasn't where I should be anyway (I knew about this forum).

Now I'm finally logged in!

And....

...what a disappointment. There's a row of black boxes marching across the top, with labels that leave me scratching my head. I'm not familiar with the term "table" although it's not hard to figure that one out. "Familiar Cards" made sense once I clicked on it, even if many of the cards weren't familiar even in the base set. I like that you can turn individual cards on or off. I'd like it better if I could easily read the text on the cards - if I tap on my laptop trackpad, it's a left click that toggles between color and gray, but I have to physically depress the right corner of the trackpad to do a right click. (Oh how I miss my mac!) There's no way to get that information via the touch screen, no combination of keys and clicks or long clicks that seem to work. I don't care much about turning individual cards on and off but I sure would like to easily see what they do.

For that matter, I see no reason why that text should be hidden. Why not show the whole card and let me scroll up and down? There are several new cards, and I'd like to see which ones give extra money or buys or whatever. It's just nice to see that information all out there at once. You get to do that with real life games.

I have no idea what most of the Options do, and you're not helping me out with explanations either. Maybe it will be more clear after I start a game. Meanwhile, they look like some sort of advanced settings

Oh yeah, how do I start a game? I'm guessing that "New Table" will do it, whatever that does. Or do I pick one of those match options on the top row of the big empty gray box that shows up under "Matching"? What's a bot, what's a good match, what's a quick match? Are there real people out there too? (I know the answers to some of these questions, but that's only because I found this forum when I had a long wait with my phone last week.)

Basically, I have no idea what I should do next. If I didn't already know, I have no idea what this game is. I have no idea how to play it, no idea how to learn. Yes, I know that there is virtue in simply jumping in and flailing around but I suspect most people won't want to when there are lots of other options available on other sites.

That said, personally I love Dominion and I really hope this all works out - soon. But my initial impression is that the developers did this only for the people who are already heavily invested in the game, to the point of being bored with learning the initial cards and mechanisms, and that a casual newbie would not be welcome even if they stuck around trying to figure it out. On top of that, I won't be able to kill time on my phone waiting for my kid to finish practice, or waiting for my coffee, as I need to be on the "big" computer to play. I do hope mobile becomes available soon.

That was a lot, but I have high hopes for this project. I was very excited to hear about the new developers. I'm not looking for a way to play all the latest most complicated variations. I just want a good experience for players like myself who don't want to be overwhelmed right off the bat.

Now for my first game! I'll let you know how it goes. :-)