I would like to put together a project that creates a tiered list of all the Dominion kingdom cards. This would be different than anything done in the past when considering card ranking.
It would be similar to list created by ehunt found here:
http://forum.dominionstrategy.com/index.php?topic=13822.0, but with key difference. In ehunt’s list, he focused on “key cards”. I would rather have a focus more on the perceived cost to benefit ratio.
A few of problems with ehunt’s list. First, it was created in August, 2015, so it doesn’t incorporate Adventures, Empires, the new cards added to Dominion: Base and Intrigue, a couple of Promos, nor the soon to be released Nocturne set. Second, it was created by one user, and adjusted by responses made in that specific thread, so it didn’t incorporate a lot of community input. Third, it has three of the tiers in the common tiered system for ranking, but it is missing the crucial “S” tier.
This would also offer better card power understanding than currently found in the Qvist ranking system found here:
http://forum.dominionstrategy.com/index.php?topic=16373.0. Although the Qvist ranking system is very thorough and informative, it too is missing some key aspects.
First, it does compare cards to each other that are of the same cost, but has no way of comparing cards to each other if they have different costs. So a Remodel can be ranked against Smithy, both of which are 4 cost cards, but cannot be ranked against Cellar, which is a 2 cost card. Second, it is very arbitrary. Is Smithy actually a better card overall than Remodel, or Poacher, or some other 4 cost card. In a recent article written by Adam Horton found here:
http://adamhorton.com/flog/?p=538, his view of the card ranks differed by around 30% from the communities ranking. His point was that “A bunch of different people rated Dominion cards using whatever criteria they felt was appropriate.” I agree; this is a problem. Third, it is very hard to maintain. With each new expansion, a whole new poll needs to be completed incorporating new cards. This is both time consuming and tedious.
I would like to take a different approach than both ehunt’s and Qvist’s approach. I would like to create a tiered system that has 4 tiers. Each card would be assigned a tier, as voted on by the community. The 4 tiers would include an “S” tier, an “A” tier, a “B”, tier and a “C” tier.
The “S” tier would include those cards that are clearly overpowered. The ones whose cost to benefit ratio is very good. It would probably include ~3-7% of the cards overall. These would be the cards that cannot be ignored in any given kingdom. A prime example would be Chapel.
The “A” tier would be those cards that offer better than average cost to benefit ratio. It would probably consist of the upper 30% of total cards. Cards that fit well in most decks and synergize with many cards. I would rate Sentry as an “A” tier card.
The “B” tier would include those cards whose cost to benefit ratio of pretty accurate. It would probably consist of the middle 30% of total cards. Those cards that can fit well in a lot of decks, but may not be the main players all the time. They synergize well with some cards, but fall flat with others. Festival would be a prime example in my opinion.
The “C” tier would include those cards that are underperformers. It would probably include the bottom 30% of total cards. Those cards that may well synergize really well some few specific cards, but otherwise can usually be ignored in most kingdoms. Scout would easily fit in this category.
What I need is help defining the 4 groups. What is the wording to use in each of the four groups to most represent the cards found within each group? After the groups are defined, I would like to create a poll that the community can participate in that gives each card a tier designation. If we have enough participants, the cards can even be given a (-) or (+) to the tier they belong to.
