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Author Topic: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards  (Read 76998 times)

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Qvist

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The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« on: March 22, 2014, 12:38:22 pm »
+14

The Best $4 Cards - Part 1/6

121 votes on this list.

#57 =0 Scout (Intrigue) Weighted Average: 4.5% ▲2.8pp / Unweighted Average: 5.9% / Median: 0% =0pp / Standard Deviation: 11.7%

Scout is the worst $4 card again. There's still no doubt about it as it has the lowest deviation in this list again. But its weighted average is a bit higher than last year. It was voted last 62 times, that's about the half of all votes. But it was also voted above average 2 times.

Scout has its uses. You don't need to spend an action, but it isn't a cantrip, so it really can hurt your deck. If you're massively going green this can be nice as it makes your next turn better, but is still not good. It has a nice synergy with Wishing Well and Mystic and of course it's great with dual-type-victory cards like Harem, Great Hall and Nobles, making Scout a Lab or even better. There might be more edge cases when Scout shines, but what makes Scout really bad is that even when it's good you often do better skipping Scout, because you waste a turn marginally improving your deck.
#56 =0 Thief (Base) Weighted Average: 8.8% ▲5.7pp / Unweighted Average: 10.6% / Median: 3.6% ▲1.7pp / Standard Deviation: 13.2%

So, Thief is still as bad as before. And again, there's no doubt. It has the second lowest deviation again as it was voted last 10 times and only 3 times above average.

An attack on such a low position may seem strange, but Thief has the big problem helping your opponent in the early game. It's a free trasher for your opponent and even later it's so risky hitting the Coppers of your opponent. Its only use may be in thin Chapel decks or if you manage to play it multiple times per turn. And it gets better in 3- or 4-player games, where you can minimize the risk of getting nothing and hitting Coppers. In these games it can be very good with Gardens for example. In theory it can be nice in an Ill-Gotten-Gains rush dealing out curses with it, but it is still swingy and a bad card and you rather buy Silver. You don't want it early and in the later game it's almost never worth a buy.
#55 ▼8 Feast (Base) Weighted Average: 13.1% ▼9.0pp / Unweighted Average: 15.1% / Median: 10.7% ▼8.3pp / Standard Deviation: 13.4%

Feast is a big loser as dropping 8 ranks is quite a lot. It has the third lowest deviation in this list, so there's not really a big doubt about its position. It has no last ranks and was voted above average 3 times.

Feast basically does nothing but being a one-shot balancing bad shuffle luck, especially at the start. If you really want a specific $5 card and have a 4/3 opening you can open with Feast and can be sure to get that $5 card soon. That's especially good if you don't want any Silvers in the first place. It also can be used with Throne Room and King's Court to gain multiple $5 cards. It's only other use is gaining Duchies, especially in Duke games, but Feast is basically never a game-changer.
#54 ▲1 Coppersmith (Intrigue) Weighted Average: 15.3% ▲2.7pp / Unweighted Average: 16.6% / Median: 12.5% ▲2.9pp / Standard Deviation: 15.0%

Coppersmith is now one rank higher as Feast dropped that much. It has a pretty low deviation and won a little bit pointwise. It was voted last 4 times and above average 5 times.

Yes, Coppersmith is very hard to rank, because it's either clearly the worst card on the board or it's very dominating. As a opener you may get to $6 or even $8, but you also can draw only one Copper, so it's very swingy as a opener and gets worse later. On the other hand King's Court + Coppersmith can become brutal and it has some nice synergy with Apothecary, Counting House and Tactician. The cases where it shines may occur more rarely than with any other card, but then it's a must-buy.
#53 ▼1 Treasure Map (Seaside) Weighted Average: 16.2% ▲0.8pp / Unweighted Average: 19.0% / Median: 14.3% ▲0.8pp / Standard Deviation: 16.1%

Even though Treasure Map has a slightly better average value, it lost one rank. It would be one rank higher in the unweighted list. It was voted last 2 times and 9 times above average.

Treasure Map's power is undeniable. An early enabling can already decide a game. But you can hardly call it strategy going for Treasure Map. You really need enablers for that, like Warehouse, Chapel, Tactician or the Watchtower/Talisman combo. If you go for Treasure Map without such enablers, you totally rely on your luck. And losing against a totally luck-based enabling can really be frustrating. Of course it's strong, but it's hard to make it work, what makes it weak in general. With Baker on the board you can now open Double Treasure Map what makes it slightly stronger.
#52 ▼1 Navigator (Seaside) Weighted Average: 17.5% ▲0.4pp / Unweighted Average: 18.3% / Median: 14.3% ▼1.1pp / Standard Deviation: 17.6%

Just like Treasure Map, Navigator lost a rank despite having a slightly better average. It would be one more rank lower in the unweighted list. It was voted last 8 times and 6 times above average.

Scout is at least non-terminal. Top-decking the next 5 cards in a specific order is only nice if you have still an action left to draw a few of them. Because if you don't do that, you draw all 5 cards no matter in what order you put them back. The discarding option is nice to minimize shuffle luck and to get a half Chancellor effect, but still it is terminal and most of the time there are better terminal cards on the board. At least it gives you $2. One of the few good uses may be to enable Tunnel's reaction.
#51 ▲3 Spy (Base) Weighted Average: 17.5% ▲4.6pp / Unweighted Average: 19.1% / Median: 14.3% ▲2.8pp / Standard Deviation: 14.7%

Spy is 3 ranks and nearly 5pp better. It has the fifth lowest deviation in this list and only a small 0.03pp lead over Navigator. It was voted last 2 times and 6 times above average.

An attack that is a cantrip, that seems nice at the first look. But Spy is an attack with a pretty bad attack and little benefit. It's very swingy as you can discard your victory card (or even your Tunnel) and discard the only Witch of your opponent, but you can hit a victory card of your opponent too that you put back. That's no change for your opponent and he even may use that additional info for the next turn. You can add a Spy in your drawing engine if you have a buy and money left and don't want more Silver, but is really rarely worth a buy. It's a cantrip that doesn't hurt your engine and can really shine in an engine with Jester (or any other engine that takes profit from knowing the top card of the opponent's deck), but the benefit it gives you is marginal, similar to Scout. And regarding the benefit of knowing your own top card, you rather have a Cartographer for that.
#50 ▼1 Bureaucrat (Base) Weighted Average: 17.8% ▼2.5pp / Unweighted Average: 20.1% / Median: 19.6% ▲0.4pp / Standard Deviation: 14.6%

Bureaucrat is already the fourth card from the base set in this list. It's one rank worse than last year. It has the fourth lowest deviation in this list. It was voted last twice and 3 times above average.

The attack of Bureaucrat is weak. Your opponent loses one card that he don't need anyway for him getting another 4 card hand in the next turn. And he might even be able to counter that easily by playing Farming Village for example. The attack gets better in multiplayer games, especially if there are dual-type victory cards like Nobles or Harem on the board. The benefit on the other side still isn't good either. Top-decked silvers are nice, especially in the beginning and you can get to $8 with 4 silvers too, but it's not easy. So it seems Bureaucrat is nice where you don't want to get to $8 and Silver is a good card, like in Duke / Silk Road / Feodum and especially Gardens games, but then Bureaucrat is a good counter too. And you can play your Bureaucrat less frequently if your deck is already flooded with silvers. Bureaucrat + Big Money is not bad. On the other side as it doesn't seem to have synergies with other cards.
#49 ▼1 Pirate Ship (Seaside) Weighted Average: 19.3% ▼1.5pp / Unweighted Average: 23.3% / Median: 16.1% ▼0.6pp / Standard Deviation: 21.6%

Pirate Ship dropped one rank and is slightly worse than last year. It's the first card with a significantly higher deviation. It was voted last once and 13 times above average.

There's the next attack that trashes treasures. Again, hitting Coppers even helps your opponent. And when there are cards with virtual coin, you can defend pretty well. The high ranks may result from players mainly playing 3 or 4-player games where Pirate Ships can be devastating because if 3 players go for it in a 4-player game you really are forced to get those too. In 2-player games it's too slow most of the times. And, with Pirate Ship you really want to buy as many as you can, so you can play them multiple times, and with Throne Room or King's Court and +Buy this card can be really great.
« Last Edit: April 01, 2014, 10:05:03 am by Qvist »
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #1 on: March 22, 2014, 12:38:35 pm »
+8

The Best $4 Cards - Part 2/6


#48 ▲5 Talisman (Prosperity) Weighted Average: 21.3% ▲8.3pp / Unweighted Average: 23.7% / Median: 17.9% ▲6.4pp / Standard Deviation: 18.9%

Talisman made a big jump of 5 ranks and over 8pp. It was voted 4 times last and 10 times above average.

There are not that many cards for $4, you want in masses. Silk Road and Gardens may be a exception, but Talisman doesn't work with victory cards. So there are even less cards you want for free with Talisman. Fool's Gold, Caravan, Ironmonger and Tournament came to my mind being cards which makes Talisman a good buy, especially as an opener. You can also build a Village + Smithy/Envoy engine quicker too, but it depends if this is worth a Talisman buy. But it shines especially with cost reducers like Quarry, Bridge and especially Highway. Play Highway, play Talisman, buy Highway, get one for free, that's nice. But Talisman also can hurt very badly since the free extra card is not optional, so only buy Talisman if you really want cheap card in masses. And don't forget: if you're buying more expensive cards you've spent $4 for a Copper.
#47 ▲3 Rats (Dark Ages) Weighted Average: 23.4% ▲4.7pp / Unweighted Average: 25.2% / Median: 19.6% ▲2.3pp / Standard Deviation: 19.7%

Rats is 3 ranks higher and nearly 5 percentage points better. It was voted last 4 times and 11 times above average.

Rats is DXV's favourite card. It can replace bad cards with... bad cards. So why do you want them? If there are trash for benefit cards, Rats trash the Copper, Estates and Curses while the TfB cards can trash the Rats. But you really have to evaluate if it isn't still better ignoring the Rats and go straight for the Trash-for-Benefit card. But this is still the trap card for Beginners. Just don't play a Rats if you don't want to trash anything!! Rats is also good with cards than benefit from having many action cards, like Scrying Pool, Vineyard and Death Cart.
#46 =0 Nomad Camp (Hinterlands) Weighted Average: 28.0% ▲4.4pp / Unweighted Average: 29.9% / Median: 21.4% ▲0.2pp / Standard Deviation: 22.6%

Nomad Camp is on the same rank as before even though it has over 4 percentage points more. It has a pretty high deviation with 3 last ranks and 21 ranks above average.

Woodcutter was the second worst $3 card. Here we have a Woodcutter with an on-buy top-deck ability. Is it worth costing $1 more? And how can it be that it ranks higher than Woodcutter? IMO there are only 2-3 reasons for that. You have a high chance to get a $5 card on turn 2 even with a 4/3 opening. Similar to that it is nice you need the +Buy either way and need multiple cheap cards as fast you can. But the only opening which is strong without $5s is IMO Nomad Camp / Fool's Gold / Fool's Gold. The last reason is if you're really unlucky in the late game and only get $4 and want to maximize the chances to hit $8 in the next turn. Beside of that it's only an expensive Woodcutter.
#45 Taxman (Guilds) Weighted Average: 28.0% / Unweighted Average: 33.5% / Median: 26.8% / Standard Deviation: 23.7%

Taxman is the first Guilds card and only 0.04pp better than Nomad Camp, a close call. It has a way higher unweighted average, it would be 3 ranks higher in the unweighted ranking. It was ranked last twice and 12 times above 70%.

Taxman is slightly worse than Mine, but has an attack as extra benefit. Similar to Mine, Taxman can be powerful in an engine where you draw a big portion of your deck, but where your money has to come from treasure cards. The disadvantage that the gained treasure goes on top of the deck instead of in your hand, isn't that big as you can often draw it right away. And if you play a non-mirror against a BM player, your opponent has a hard time getting to $8 if you keep trashing Silver or even Gold for Gold. Taxman also plays well with IGG as you can upgrade Silvers to IGGs and IGGs later for Gold while preventing that your opponent gets to $5. But other than that, Taxman isn't all that great as there are usually stronger terminals you want to play.
#44 ▼1 Noble Brigand (Hinterlands) Weighted Average: 26.1% ▲3.5pp / Unweighted Average: 31.5% / Median: 28.6% ▲9.4pp / Standard Deviation: 20.0%

Noble Brigand has a better average value, but still lost a rank. It is one rank lower in the unweighted ranking. It has 2 last ranks and 5 voted above 70%.

Noble Brigand is the better Thief on many boards. It hasn't the disadvantage of trashing the opponents Coppers, making it a better opener. It even attacks on-buy. It deals out Coppers too, which is nice playing against no-treasure decks. And it gives $1 too, so you have at least an immediate benefit. But it's worse in Colony games as it cannot steal Platinum, it cannot steal Ill-Gotten-Gains like Thief and cannot steal other Kingdom treasure cards, but that doesn't matter most of the times. And most important: it's still too slow and doesn't hurt enough if you can't play one nearly each turn. But Noble Brigand + Big Money is pretty decent on weak boards and a good counter to many strategies.
#43 ▼1 Walled Village (Promo) Weighted Average: 30.4% ▲2.5pp / Unweighted Average: 32.7% / Median: 28.6% ▲2.6pp / Standard Deviation: 22.8%

Walled Village is one rank lower despite having a slightly better average value, just like Noble Brigand. It has one last rank and was voted 10 times above 70%.

It is the worst of the now seven $4 villages. Why? Its only ability is top deck it if you weren't able to use both actions. So this is nice if you have only 2-3 terminal actions and really want to play them each time without taking the risk of colliding. That's especially useful with Torturer and Ambassador. But a lot of the times the bonus doesn't even matter.
#42 ▼5 Feodum (Dark Ages) Weighted Average: 31.9% ▼13.6pp / Unweighted Average: 34.3% / Median: 30.0% ▼12.3pp / Standard Deviation: 23.3%

Feodum is another big loser from this list. It's 5 ranks and over 13 percentage points worse. In the unweighted ranking it would be still one rank higher. It has 3 last ranks and was voted 13 times above 70%.

While Gardens rushes want to deplete 3 piles as fast as possible and Silk Road strategies are often rushes too, Feodum games work a bit differently as they have problems to deplete 3 piles because you can't deplete the Silver pile as easy. That makes it weaker. But Trader can easily get 3 Silvers a turn and even trash a Feodum for 7 Silvers and easily deplete the Silver pile. Masterpiece/Feodum is even stronger and can deplete the Silver pile really fast. So it often isn't a rush, but this isn't bad because with that many Silvers you can easily buy Duchies or even Provinces and play a mixed Rush/BM strategy. Big Money games with Silver gainers like Squire, Bureaucrat, Explorer or Jack of All Trades can all also work decently with Feodum where you might prefer it over Duchies. Jack of All Trades also let you trash a Feodum to boost the other Feoda if you want to. You want to do this late in the game if your Feoda are each worth at least one more as the number of Feoda you have in your deck or early to boost your economy. Regarding trashing: Feodum/Chapel is a nice opening just to trash everything down and still have a decent economy of 3 Silvers or if you have a Watchtower in hand and $3-$5. Then you can basically buy 3 Silvers instead of just one. And Graverobber or Rogue can be very strong if you can trash Feoda for a big benefit and get them right back.
#41 ▲3 Armory (Dark Ages) Weighted Average: 33.7% ▲8.2pp / Unweighted Average: 32.6% / Median: 30.3% ▲5.3pp / Standard Deviation: 18.6%

Armory is the next Dark Ages card in this list, but it is much better than last year, being 3 ranks higher and over 8pp better. In the unweighted ranking it would be 3 ranks lower. It was voted 6 times above 70%.

Armory is another Workshop/Ironworks variant. It's the weakest one for Gardens rushes, but it's way better in setting up an engine with cheap engine cards than Workshop. It's still hurts that it is terminal which means that Ironworks is mostly preferred. But if there aren't any strong terminals then Armory can even be better. It can also be used to put a Potion on top of your deck which can be great in Vineyard games.
#40 ▼15 Death Cart (Dark Ages) Weighted Average: 36.0% ▼22.9pp / Unweighted Average: 40.7% / Median: 35.7% ▼20.1pp / Standard Deviation: 22.8%

Sometimes cards just get misranked by the community. Death Cart seems to fit this case now. It is now ranked 15 ranks lower and over 22 percentage points worse, that's a huge change. In the unweighted ranking it would be still one rank higher. It was voted 16 times above 70%.

A terminal $5 seems very powerful, but is it really? If you take it as one-shot, it's still often a more powerful version of Feast, especially if you use it to get an early Forge or even Platinum. But when you buy it, you gain 2 Ruins. That's something you really don't want. I mean it's not that big of an disadvantage because they are great targets for Death Cart. But still you're not guaranteed to draw it with a Ruin and in the worst case it's a one-shot and has even clogged up your deck. And often that's not worth the risk. So, when does it shine? It does shine if you can gain cheap action cards like Pearl Diver, that you don't mind trashing to Death Cart in engines that draw the whole deck. Action cards that you don't mind trashing are also Fortress and Rats. Death Cart can also be a good "defense" against Marauder or Cultist when the Ruins are gone anyway and you can trash the Ruins you already have. Death Cart loves +Buy because that helps picking up cheap targets for Death Cart and mitigates the effect of overpaying by a lot when you get $5.
#39 Advisor (Guilds) Weighted Average: 38.5% / Unweighted Average: 40.3% / Median: 35.7% / Standard Deviation: 22.7%

Advisor is the second Guilds card in this list. It would be one rank lower in the unweighted ranking and was voted 14 times above 70%.

Advisor shines in games with good trashers because early in the game you don't mind drawing bad cards because you want to trash them and later in the game you have only good cards in the deck so you don't care which ones you draw. But even in games without strong trashing but with gainers where you can amass Advisors and/or other cheap cantrips you can get a high action density where Advisor can be enough to draw you the cards you need. The problem is though that as soon as you green the engine falls apart faster than ususal so that you ususally have to build longer. And in BM games Advisor is just terrible.
« Last Edit: March 25, 2014, 08:16:41 am by Qvist »
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #2 on: March 22, 2014, 12:39:16 pm »
+8

The Best $4 Cards - Part 3/6


#38 =0 Trader (Hinterlands) Weighted Average: 42.4% ▼2.1pp / Unweighted Average: 43.4% / Median: 41.1% ▼1.2pp / Standard Deviation: 19.1%

We're making a jump of around 4pp. Trader is slightly worse, but still on the same rank. It has 14 votes above 70%.

Trader is - like all Reaction cards - very situational. It's Silver gaining defense is mostly stronger than Watchtower's trashing, so you have to think twice if you really want to play that Curse-giving attack or another card that deals out junk and give your opponent a free Silver, especially with Mountebank on the board for 2 Silvers. Trader is a good opener in non-Colony Big Money games too, so you can trash Estates for 2 Silvers. But it's a real powerhouse with Feodum as it can trash Feoda for 7 Silvers or eventually trashing a Silver to 3 Silvers, easily emptying the Silver pile and give a lot of points. It's also good if you have some extra buys, for example with Squire, to get some extra Silvers. But in many other boards Trader is simply a no-go.
#37 ▼4 Island (Seaside) Weighted Average: 42.5% ▼7.4pp / Unweighted Average: 45.9% / Median: 44.6% ▼3.5pp / Standard Deviation: 18.7%

Island is 0.1pp better than Trader, it was very close. It lost quite a bit in value and also 4 ranks. It would be 2 ranks higher in the unweighted ranking. It was voted 14 times above 70%.

Island does pseudo-trashing with the addition of giving additional points. So you can use it for pseudo-trashing the Estates without losing the points and later in the game you can pick it up and take your Provinces out of your deck. It can really be great with Silk Road on the board. It is rarely a game-changer, but can be a nice addition to some decks to keep them clean, especially if you can buy Province+Island and remove both of the cards in the next turn and then rinse and repeat every turn. And even in cursing games with no trashers, you can take Curses out of your deck for a total net of +1 point. The problem is that you don't build up your economy if you open with it and if there important cards for $5 or $6 you often have to skip Island. Getting Islands with Ironworks can also be very nice because then the Ironworks is a cantrip that gives you 2VP.
#36 ▼7 Baron (Intrigue) Weighted Average: 43.1% ▼9.3pp / Unweighted Average: 43.6% / Median: 41.1% ▼10.8pp / Standard Deviation: 21.8%

Baron lost even more points, over 9pp, and is therefore 7 ranks lower than last year. It would be even one rank lower in the unweighted ranking. It was voted 15 times above 70%.

Baron is very interesting as it gives you a very high probability getting Gold early and even get a very early King's Court or Forge, but is very swingy too. If you cannot draw your Baron with an Estate, this is a dead card in the beginning, because you mostly don't want another Estate (and getting Estate for feeding your Baron is mostly no good idea). But as the game goes on, the probability decreases drawing an Estate with Baron. It has also a nice synergy with Crossroads. In the middle game Baron is most of the time no good card, but later in the game it can you net another point and gives you a +Buy too. If you're going to trash your Estates, don't buy a Baron and if you have a deck that can guarantee an Estate in every hand, like multiple Hunting Parties or Stables or engines with big card draw, Baron can very powerful. In Shelter games Baron is unfortunately mostly pretty much useless.
#35 ▼8 Procession (Dark Ages) Weighted Average: 44.5% ▼8.1pp / Unweighted Average: 45.9% / Median: 39.3% ▼14.5pp / Standard Deviation: 24.9%

Procession is the next card that lost quite a lot of ranks and points, 8pp and 8 ranks. It has the second highest deviation in this list. It was voted 24 times above 70%.

Procession is even harder to rank than Throne Room because it's even more board dependant. You want strong Action cards in the kingdom that are worth playing them twice and strong Action cards in a specific consecutive price range so that you can get a bonus out of the trashing. Of course it's best with on-trash benefits. Procession+Fortress is a real powerhouse and to play it on Cultist or Catacombs on the right moment can be really great.
#34 ▲6 Remodel (Base) Weighted Average: 46.1% ▲8.1pp / Unweighted Average: 44.3% / Median: 44.6% ▲8.1pp / Standard Deviation: 20.9%

Remodel on the other hand is way better than last year; it's 8pp and 6 ranks better. It would be 2 ranks worse in the unweighted ranking. It was voted 13 times above 70%.

Remodel introduced us to the cards that trash for a better card. As an opener it has big problems trashing the Coppers, because you need either good $2 cards on the board you want in masses like Fool's Gold (Remodel / Fool's Gold is a great opening) or Lighthouse or you need to remodel in 2 steps (Estate to Silver or another $3-$4 card) which is not really a good idea. But Remodel is good in the later game. Just remodel your money in the respective victory card, that's especially great with Gold gainers like Hoard.
#33 ▼7 Mining Village (Intrigue) Weighted Average: 48.5% ▼4.5pp / Unweighted Average: 48.2% / Median: 48.2% ▼5.6pp / Standard Deviation: 20.2%

Mining Village is now the sixth of seven $4 villages, it was the second best last year. It dropped 7 ranks and over 4pp.

Mining Village is a normal Village with a one-shot Silver possibility and the second best village for $4. If you need a Village you can use that one-shot self-trashing option later in the game when you give up your engine and fully commit on going green or have bad luck late in the game and only hit $6 or $7. And even if you doesn't have a engine and are going basically big money, you can buy this in the mid-game when you miss $6 for a Gold and don't want another Silver in your deck, because this still gives you the additional card and the $2 of a Silver. And if you have enough money and no additional buy you can save the one-shot Silver for later. Mining Village / Ambassador is the #109th ▼33 best opening.
#32 ▲2 Cutpurse (Seaside) Weighted Average: 50.2% ▲0.8pp / Unweighted Average: 49.0% / Median: 48.2% ▼1.8pp / Standard Deviation: 22.2%

Cutpurse is the first card with over 50%. It has nearly the same average value, but is 2 ranks higher than last year.

Cutpurse is a pretty solid opener. It's a terminal Silver that can even hit harder than Militia. In the beginning where every coin is important to get to $5, Cutpurse can be really annoying. And it is even worse in games with more than 2 players where you can lose multiple Coppers in one turn. Yes, later it gets worse and worse and is nothing but a terminal Silver where you can see your opponents hand. It's especially strong against a Stables draw engine.
#31 ▼13 Silk Road (Hinterlands) Weighted Average: 52.7% ▼10.1pp / Unweighted Average: 49.9% / Median: 51.8% ▼10.1pp / Standard Deviation: 24.3%

Victory point cards are hard to rank always fluctuate a lot, but Silk Road does drop by quite a lot: 13 ranks and over 10pp. It's this time lower than Gardens. It's the first card in a bunch of cards that are very close together. It has the fifth highest deviation in this list.

Silk Road plays often similarly to Gardens. You can rush them, with support of Workshop/Ironworks and/or additional buys for double Estates in the end game. Baron and Crossroads are great supporting cards, but Silk Road can work in slogs too. While it's mostly easier to make Gardens worth 3VP than Silk Roads, it's much easier to get Silk Roads to 5VP than Gardens, so it scales much better. Silk Road is especially great with a board with dual-type victory cards like Island, Nobles, Great Halls or Harem. With Dark Ages Silk Road loses a bit of power because only one of the Shelters is a Victory card.
#30 ▲1 Fortress (Dark Ages) Weighted Average: 52.7% ▲0.5pp / Unweighted Average: 53.3% / Median: 53.6% ▼0.2pp / Standard Deviation: 21.2%

Fortress is 0.01pp better than Silk Road, so it was close. It has nearly the same average value and is one rank higher. It would be 3 ranks higher in the unweighted ranking. Fortress is the fifth best $4 village.

This is the Dark Ages village variant with an on-trash ability that does crazy stuff. The are many trashers that could trigger its ability, but you rather use them to trash junk. But you can use trash-for-benefit cards for it. The best one might be Bishop. 4 Fortesses and 4 Bishops guarantee you 12VP per turn. Procession/Fortress is also crazy as it let you basically draw 3 cards, gives you 5 Actions and a free $5 Action card. Fortress is also a very good defense against trashing attacks like Knights or Swindler and also a decent defense against Governor for free Duchies. So, when there are trashing attacks or trash-for-benefit cards, it really shines, but otherwise it's only an expensive vanilla village.
« Last Edit: March 28, 2014, 02:19:48 pm by Qvist »
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #3 on: March 22, 2014, 12:39:22 pm »
+6

The Best $4 Cards - Part 4/6

#29 ▼6 Gardens (Base) Weighted Average: 53.2% ▼6.0pp / Unweighted Average: 52.1% / Median: 53.6% ▼5.9pp / Standard Deviation: 21.2%

Just like Silk Road, Gardens lost a bit in ranks, but is now higher than Silk Road.

Gardens is another card from the base set, introduced us to alternative victory cards. The Gardens rush is still a very good strategy on many boards and there are a lot of supporting cards for it. Gardens is on non-trashing boards easily worth a Duchy and can be worth even more. The Ironworks/Gardens rush is well known and one of the best existing combos, but there are also other great supporting cards like Beggar. Gardens gets even better in cursing games or other slogs where 3-piling gets faster and is harder to get to $8. But you could even transition out of an engine to Gardens, so Gardens is on every board at least worth a consideration and is only weak in Big Money.
#28 ▲4 Farming Village (Cornucopia) Weighted Average: 53.3% ▲2.5pp / Unweighted Average: 55.0% / Median: 53.6% ▲3.6pp / Standard Deviation: 19.8%

Farming Village is 0.03pp better than Gardens, very close. It's the fourth best out of seven $4 villages. It's 4 ranks better and would be even 4 ranks higher in the unweighted list.

The additional ability of this village is always useful and a good counter in cursing games and against top-decking attacks like Rabble. And later in the game where you are heavily greening its additional ability is very useful too. You may even pick it up if you don't necessarily need the actions and just want to have its filter ability. But in games without cursers or even good trashing, it's in the beginning often only an expensive "normal" village.
#27 ▼6 Envoy (Promo) Weighted Average: 53.5% ▼7.1pp / Unweighted Average: 55.8% / Median: 55.4% ▼4.2pp / Standard Deviation: 25.6%

Again it's close: Envoy is only 0.28pp better. Envoy is the card with the highest deviation in this list as it has 6 votes on the first rank. But these votes are not enough that it dropped 6 ranks and 7pp. It would be 4 ranks higher in the unweighted list.

Envoy is a very good Big Money card. In a deck full of silver and an Envoy in hand, you're almost guaranteed a Province. In a Envoy Big Money deck you don't necessarily need Gold, as it will get discarded from your opponent either way. Smithy draws 3 cards, of course this is stronger in BM games for drawing 4 cards. In engine games this is usually worse, as your opponent will discard your key card. But if you have a deck with a density of high quality, Envoy can be a very good addition too as you may draw the discarded card later again if you can draw your whole deck. So, while Advisor shines in engines, Envoy shines in Big Money.
#26 ▲2 Moneylender (Base) Weighted Average: 53.6% ▲1.1pp / Unweighted Average: 53.7% / Median: 53.6% ▲1.7pp / Standard Deviation: 19.3%

After a huge drop last year, Moneylender is slightly better this time. Again it was close in this area; it was 0.07pp better than Envoy.

Moneylender is another card that falls into the category "Great opener, bad afterwards". It's like a Silver but with the trash ability at the same time. The comparism to Spice Merchant is obvious. Moneylender is a much better opener with the deficit of not being so flexible later in the game. You mostly only want one of it (maybe only on Mountebank boards you would maybe buy a second), but this one can really fasten the game. It's less important as it used to be, but still great for building an engine with high cost cards.
#25 ▲10 Scavenger (Dark Ages) Weighted Average: 53.9% ▲5.6pp / Unweighted Average: 50.5% / Median: 50.0% ▼1.9pp / Standard Deviation: 23.6%

The next card close together; Scavenger is 0.28pp better than Moneylender. It is underrated by newer players as it would be 5 ranks worse in the unweighted ranking.

Chancellor is the worst $3 card and Scavenger is similar, but so much higher ranked. Does its bonus really justify it? In short, yes. It's not the best Big Money card, but even a Big Money - like approach is not that bad; putting back a Gold or even a Platinum is great. But also in engines with cheap villages like Hamlet of Fishing Village where you often have spare Actions, you can - similar to Scheme - setup your next turn or even mid-turn top-deck the card you need what is very strong - and of course you cycle faster. It's also very powerful if you have non-terminal key cards that you like to play every turn, like Hunting Party or Rebuild which you can seed for the next turn. There are still often more powerful terminals, but Scavenger can be pretty effective, don't underestimate it. And it combos even better with Stash. 2 Scavengers and 4 Stashes guarantee you a Province each turn.
#24 ▼2 Horse Traders (Cornucopia) Weighted Average: 55.6% ▼3.7pp / Unweighted Average: 57.6% / Median: 57.1% ▼4.4pp / Standard Deviation: 18.1%

Horse Traders is a bit worse than last year, exactly 2 ranks and 3.7pp. It would be 2 ranks higher in the unweighted list.

Horse Traders is one of the few Reaction cards that is useful on many boards. Yes, it is still situational, but the situations occur very often. It's great against discarding attacks, restoring the hand size - especially against Minion for a hand of 6 cards. Especially with weak attacks this card is good, because the benefit from Horse Traders is bigger for the opponent than the benefit for yourself playing a weak attack. But, the action part is very useful too. It's useful in decks full of green cards and curses, so it's a good supporting card for Gardens or Silk Road rushes, or buying Dukes. And it's a good addition to Hunting Party, a good starter for getting $5 early or early Grand Markets and so on... many possibilities. Still, as it is a Reaction card, it's very situational and skippable when there are stronger terminals on the board.
#23 ▲14 Quarry (Prosperity) Weighted Average: 56.2% ▲11.6pp / Unweighted Average: 54.0% / Median: 51.8% ▲11.4pp / Standard Deviation: 24.6%

Quarry is one of the 2 big winners close to each other. It is 14 ranks and over 11pp better, that's a big change. It would be 2 ranks worse in the unweighted list and has the fourth highest deviation.

Quarry is just designed for engines. For action cards, this is basically a Gold you can pick up in the opening turns. So if you want many action cards and have additional buys too, Quarry is a must buy, especially with Goons or Grand Market. It can also be very good to get an early Forge or King's Court. And as long as you're still building this is great, but don't forget that in the later game when you're picking up victory cards, you wish this weren't only a Copper. Yeah, and of course this is horrible for Big Money, no doubt.
#22 ▲17 Ironworks (Intrigue) Weighted Average: 56.8% ▲16.4pp / Unweighted Average: 52.6% / Median: 53.6% ▲17.1pp / Standard Deviation: 20.2%

Ironworks is even a bigger winner than Quarry: 17 ranks and 16pp better, that's quite a change. It's also underrated by newer players as it would be 6 ranks worse in the unweighted list.

Ironworks is the superior Workshop which was pretty low on the $3 list and is better than Armory. Does it deserve a higher rating? The biggest bonus for getting a lot of wanted action cards like Caravan is: Ironworks is non-terminal. So you can get Ironworks with Ironworks and then quickly get Caravans or other $4 cards. Being an Intrigue card it also combos nice with dual-type cards, so getting Great Halls or Islands makes Ironworks a cantrip. And it also works better in Gardens or Silk Road games for getting an additional card and increasing the probability getting to $4. So, it's great in getting cheap engine pieces without having to spend an action, but still the most important cards cost $5 and Ironworks doesn't help you to get to $5 which makes Ironworks still ignorable on many boards.
« Last Edit: March 28, 2014, 02:56:05 pm by Qvist »
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #4 on: March 22, 2014, 12:39:29 pm »
+7

The Best $4 Cards - Part 5/6

#21 ▼7 Salvager (Seaside) Weighted Average: 63.8% ▼7.4pp / Unweighted Average: 61.7% / Median: 66.1% ▼10.8pp / Standard Deviation: 22.1%

We're making a jump of over 7pp and Salvager is now the first tier 2 card. It was voted 14 times below 30% and once on the first rank.

Salvager is one of the best trash-for-benefit cards. It's not that a great starter, but still a good card to pick up early. Later in the game you generally want to trash your best card, so you can trash a Gold for an easy Province, maybe even for a double Province. Then you have a significant lead and can salvage your Province for another one, accelerating the game, so that your opponent can't come back. So, it's useful on many boards.
#20 ▼4 Conspirator (Intrigue) Weighted Average: 64.7% ▼0.1pp / Unweighted Average: 63.8% / Median: 64.3% ▼4.7pp / Standard Deviation: 19.3%

Conspirator has basically the same average value, but is still 4 ranks worse than last time. It would be one rank higher in the unweighted list. It was voted 7 times below 30% and on the first rank twice.

Conspirator is so strong, but heavily depends on supporting cards that have to be non-terminal. Cheap action cards like Wishing Well, Pearl Diver or Hamlet that you can pick up in masses, especially with additional buys are great with Conspirator. You want thin decks with high action density. With that big support, this is a Grand Market just without the additional buy. In all other cases, you have to skip over Conspirator, because it's just a terminal Silver then.
#19 ▲1 Smithy (Base) Weighted Average: 65.1% ▲4.3pp / Unweighted Average: 63.4% / Median: 62.5% ▲2.9pp / Standard Deviation: 18.7%

Smithy is only 0.4pp better than Conspirator, but would be worse than it in the unweighted ranking. It's one rank and over 4pp better than last year. It was voted only 4 times below 30% and has one vote on #1.

This is maybe the simplest card when you're learning Dominion. It has so few text, but is yet very powerful. It introduced us to the card drawing mechanism, the key card for Big Money and engines. In the base set Double-Smithy was still good, but the value dropped down. BM-Smithy is still the way to go on many boards, and if you need a card drawer for a good working engine, Smithy is still a good pick.
#18 Herald (Guilds) Weighted Average: 65.3% / Unweighted Average: 63.9% / Median: 67.9% / Standard Deviation: 24.7%

Herald is the second best Guilds card in this list and only 0.2pp better than Smithy. It has the third highest deviation in this list with 4 first ranks and 17 votes below 30%.

Herald digs for Action cards just like Golem, but while Golem is great to find your few key action cards and play them more often, Herald is great when you have a high action density. Herald itself doesn't enable engines, but just makes them stronger because when Herald suceeds in hitting an action cards, it's just like an activated City. The overpay effect only makes it stronger and can be neat sometimes to setup some nice turns or to trigger your Treasure Maps, but the on-play effect is what makes it strong.
#17 ▼1 Throne Room (Base) Weighted Average: 65.7% ▲1.0pp / Unweighted Average: 64.3% / Median: 67.9% ▲2.5pp / Standard Deviation: 22.8%

Throne Room is only 0.4pp better than Herald, is 1pp better than last year, but still lost one rank. It was voted 12 times below 30% and has 2 first ranks.

As already mentioned in the Procession summary Throne Room for itself basically does nothing and is highly dependant on the other cards on the board, so it's hard to rank. It can be so strong, especially with strong attacks and with terminal card drawers too. But nothing is more depressing than drawing Throne Room with no other action card. So you need a high action density and hope to draw it with that card you really want to double. You can also use it as a pseudo-village if there's no-one available and really need one, if you double a cantrip. Throne Room can really be a game-changer, especially if you have the luck and draw it with the right cards, but it can also be a trap if the engine really has no payload that would be worth it to "double play" it.
#16 Plaza (Guilds) Weighted Average: 66.3% / Unweighted Average: 66.1% / Median: 67.9% / Standard Deviation: 17.1%

Plaza is the best ranked Guilds card and the third best village in this list. It would be one rank higher in the unweighted list. It was voted 16 times below average and has one first rank.

Plaza is the new $4 village variant that generates you coin tokens. As coin tokens are very powerful, there is no doubt Plaza is very strong on its own. It's especially strong if you have an engine that draws itself, then you can discard treasure cards and draw them again what makes Plaza stronger than Bazaar. But it also shines in weaker engines where your money has to come from treasure cards to smooth out your buys early on, hit Province regularly later on, and prevent you from stalling while Duchy dancing as you can save tokens for the late Province.
#15 ▲8 Spice Merchant (Hinterlands) Weighted Average: 66.8% ▲13.7pp / Unweighted Average: 65.0% / Median: 66.7% ▲14.8pp / Standard Deviation: 19.3%

Spice Merchant was one of the big winners in the last list and is one of the big winners in this list again: It's 8 ranks and over 13pp better, not bad at all! It would be one rank lower in the unweighted list. It was voted 21 times below average and has 2 first ranks.

Spice Merchant is a very flexible trasher and the comparism to Moneylender is obvious. It produces less money for the cost of an additional buy. It can really shine if you want a non-terminal trasher for example in combination with Minions (its option +2 cards, +1 action basically restores the hand size) and if there's no other +Buy and you really need one. It's therefore more flexible (not limited to Copper and two options to choose from) but a slower opener as it's harder to get to $5 early on. It may be still useful later on, but it can lead to very hard decisions if you really want to trash that Silver. Spice Merchant / Ambassador used to be the third best Ambassador opening on Councilroom, because you can trash coppers you get from your opponent and still play your Ambassador with a full hand what is very strong.
#14 ▲3 Worker's Village (Prosperity) Weighted Average: 69.1% ▲6.8pp / Unweighted Average: 66.4% / Median: 69.6% ▲10.0pp / Standard Deviation: 19.7%

Worker's Village is three ranks and nearly 7pp better than last year and the second best village in this list. It was voted 19 times below average and on the first rank once.

If you build an engine, you need villages, draw, money and buys. Fishing Village is good because it is reliable and gives you money. Worker's Village gives you the additional buy - you have it included in your village so you don't need a separate card for that. So, a lot of the times when this is available an engine is possible. It's also great picking up additional Peddlers in masses, comboes great with Highway and is excellent with Goons where you need as many buys as you can get. There is no doubt that it's one of the best villages in this list.
#13 ▼2 Marauder (Dark Ages) Weighted Average: 71.6% ▼0.5pp / Unweighted Average: 71.0% / Median: 78.6% ▼2.2pp / Standard Deviation: 22.7%

Marauder is not the best Dark Ages card anymore. It has nearly the same average value, but dropped 2 ranks. It was voted 26 times below average and has 2 first ranks.

Maruder is the Dark Ages variant of Sea Hag. The attack isn't that bad. Curses are worse than Ruins and of course Curses on top of your deck are really nasty. But Marauder gives you Spoils which are very useful to get to a crucial $5 or even a Gold. So, ignoring Marauder can be devastating, but Sea Hag is still the better attack.
#12 ▼4 Caravan (Seaside) Weighted Average: 71.9% ▼3.6pp / Unweighted Average: 72.6% / Median: 75.0% ▼3.8pp / Standard Deviation: 19.9%

Caravan is only 0.3pp better than Marauder, it was close. But it lost a bit in points and is 4 ranks worse than last year. It was voted 13 times below average and has 2 first ranks.

Caravan is the worse Laboratory, because it has a delayed benefit and can miss the reshuffle and therefore you cannot play it that often. But still a bigger hand size from a nonterminal card is great. Only Big Money decks don't necessarily profit from it, so almost all decks can need a Caravan. Getting all Caravans is still not key to win the game, but if you get them quick (e.g. from Talisman or Ironworks), this can really make a huge difference. So this is almost a must-buy for all good engines. And that a slightly weaker Laboratory costs $4 and therefore easy to pick up makes it a great card. Caravan / Ambassador and Caravan / Masquerade used to be high-tier openings on Councilroom and was only beaten by the respective Tournament openings.
#11 ▼2 Bishop (Prosperity) Weighted Average: 72.9% ▼1.8pp / Unweighted Average: 73.9% / Median: 76.8% ▼2.0pp / Standard Deviation: 18.4%

Bishop is slightly worse than last year and dropped 2 ranks. It would be 3 ranks higher in the unweighted ranking. It was voted 14 times below average and 2 times first.

Bishop is very strong, but the problem is the free trashing your opponent gets. So, it's questionable as an opener and really depends on the board. What makes it strong? A trashed Estate nets you already 1 point more without having it in your deck. You can also buy Duchies and trash them for the same VP or Provinces for one point less, but they aren't in your deck anymore which is great. In other scenarios you can trash a Gold late for additional 4VP. That's especially great if you get the Gold for free through Hoard, Tunnel or Market Square (which Bishop itself can activate). There is also a strategy called "Golden Deck" where you trash down to 4 cards (Bishop and 3 Treasures which give at least $7), buy a Province and trash it in the next turn, buying the next province, etc. what gives you 5 VP per turn guaranteed. With 4 Bishops and 4 Fortresses you get even 12 VP per turn without having to buy Provinces. But if you're building an engine, use the free trashing of your opponents and get the Bishop later in the game. And discarding attacks like Militia really hurt Bishop too.
« Last Edit: March 31, 2014, 07:49:54 am by Qvist »
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #5 on: March 22, 2014, 12:39:35 pm »
+7

The Best $4 Cards - Part 6/6

#10 =0 Bridge (Intrigue) Weighted Average: 76.4% ▲1.9pp / Unweighted Average: 73.8% / Median: 78.6% ▲1.7pp / Standard Deviation: 20.2%

Bridge stayed on the same rank and is slightly better than last year. It was voted 14 times below average and 5 times on the first rank. It would be one rank higher in the unweighted ranking.

Bridge is a very nice card. If you buy only one card, it's not more than a terminal Silver. If you use both buys, it's a terminal Gold for $4, pretty solid, but still not so exciting. But its power rises the more you can play in one turn. With 2 Bridges and you use all 3 buys, they are worth $8, so $4 per Bridge. Its value increases quadratically. With n Bridges you have n²+2n coins if you use every buy. So if you manage to play 7 Bridges and an additional copper, you can buy all 8 Provinces in one turn. The problem is still how to do that. You need enough actions and/or enough drawing power. You definitely need supporters. With a 5-card hand of 2 King's Courts and 3 Bridges, you can accomplish this easily. But also other cards like Tactician and Native Village are great supporters. If there aren't good supporters for 3-piling or mega-turning, Bridge can be a trap card. But if there are cheap engine components and you have enough Actions available Bridge can still be a very important card.
#9 ▼2 Militia (Base) Weighted Average: 76.6% ▲0.4pp / Unweighted Average: 73.1% / Median: 80.4% ▼0.4pp / Standard Deviation: 21.1%

Militia has nearly the same average value, but still dropped two ranks. It was voted 15 votes below average and on the first rank once. It would be 2 ranks lower in the unweighted list.

Militia is another card from the base set and it's the best in this list. Discarding attacks are really annoying and can really hurt some decks. It's great against decks with trashers as the opponent mostly has to choose between buying a good card and discarding the trasher or trash 1-2 cards and buy nothing. Militia is also a good opener as it is also a terminal silver and stops your opponent getting to $5 or $6 early. And if you can play it each turn, this is great. You can combo this with Council Room / Governor and your opponent doesn't get the benefit of the additional card, or play Militia and Masquerade afterwards what could really hurt. But there are situations when Militia isn't that strong, especially if there are cursers on the board, or if there are effective counters like Watchtower, Horse Traders, Library, Jack of All Trades or Menagerie on the board.
#8 ▼2 Monument (Prosperity) Weighted Average: 76.7% ▼5.6pp / Unweighted Average: 74.8% / Median: 78.6% ▼7.1pp / Standard Deviation: 19.6%

Monument is only 0.07pp better than Militia, very close. It lost 2 ranks as well, but lost significantly more percentage points. It was voted 14 times below average and has 3 first ranks. In the unweighted list it would be one rank higher.

You want to pick up Monument early in the game, because the more you play it, the more it's worth it. It's good in quick games without good additional buys, where it can help you to force your opponent to a 5/3 Province split to win the game. And it's good in decks where you can guarantee to play your Monument regularly. So, one Monument is a great addition to a Hunting Party deck. Monument is also the only infinite VP generating card in the game. With a 5 card hand of 2 King's Courts and 3 Monuments you are guaranteed 9 VP per turn. But as it is terminal and when there are very good attacks on the board, then you have to ignore it.
#7 ▲21 Wandering Minstrel (Dark Ages) Weighted Average: 77.1% ▲24.8pp / Unweighted Average: 73.5% / Median: 80.4% ▲30.4pp / Standard Deviation: 20.4%

Wandering Minstrel is now the best $4 village and what a big change to last year! It's 21 ranks and nearly 25 percentage points better, that's a huge change. It was voted 16 times below average and 3 times first. It would be 3 ranks lower in the unweighted list.

Wandering Minstrel is the best village you can get if you want your engine to be reliable. It's great if there is only weak trashing available, so that can still find your key Actions regularly. You might even want to pick it up only for the cycling effect, even if you don't need the actions. True, in games with Cultist or Marauder, it's terrible, but that's one of the few cases where you prefer a different $4 village over it. Also, you might top-deck terminal actions for your next turn without having a village in the next hand, but then that's just a sign that you don't have enough Wandering Minstrels yet. It's great if your money comes from action cards (like a Conspirator chain, even with mediocre trashing) or if your money comes from Treasure cards, because you still want to play your Wharves or other draw cards first before you get the treasure cards in hand. Also Wishing Well or Herald combos very well with it.
#6 ▼1 Young Witch (Cornucopia) Weighted Average: 78.1% ▼12.0pp / Unweighted Average: 76.0% / Median: 83.9% ▼8.4pp / Standard Deviation: 22.6%

Young Witch did only lose one rank, but it did lose quite a bit in points as it's 12pp worse than last time. The deviation is also pretty high for a such high ranked card as it was voted 22 times below average and has 4 first ranks at the same time.

Young Witch is a curser which generally is very strong and only costs $4, so this is huge! But you are guaranteed that there's a Moat-like bane card in the setup. If you would have bought this card either way, YW is mostly not worth it and skippable, especially if the bane is Lighthouse (it defends now in hand and in play) or Scheme (just return it again and again). But with a weak bane like Embargo YW is very strong as a curser and has still the draw-and-discard filter advantage. This leads to one of the most-fun synergies: Young Witch and Tunnel. Giving out curses and getting Gold at the same time is great.
#5 ▲8 Ironmonger (Dark Ages) Weighted Average: 81.4% ▲15.2pp / Unweighted Average: 78.8% / Median: 83.9% ▲17.9pp / Standard Deviation: 18.9%

Ironmonger is now the best Dark Ages card in this list. It's 8 ranks higher and over 15pp better, not too shabby. It was voted 11 times below average and on the first rank twice.

Ironmonger is good when the top card is a Victory card because you can discard it and draw a new card, in this case a better Laboratory. If you reveal a Treasure card it's also good, then you have a Peddler that even discards Coppers. If you reveal an Action, it's mediocre because then it's a Village. But still this can be neat when there's no village available. You get no bonus with Hovel or Curses, but you can still discard them which is not ignore. So mostly Ironmongers are just great. But it's even better with dual-type cards like Great Hall, Nobles and Harem.
#4 ▼2 Jack of all Trades (Hinterlands) Weighted Average: 87.4% ▼4.9pp / Unweighted Average: 85.5% / Median: 92.9% ▼1.3pp / Standard Deviation: 16.6%

Jack of All Trades, a former #1, is now only #4, losing 2 ranks and nearly 5pp. It was voted 8 times below average and 12 times on the first rank. In the unweighted ranking it's one rank higher.

Nobody saw that coming when Hinterlands came out. JoaT seems so weak, but it isn't. It seems he does nothing good, he's slowing in trashing, draws few cards and let you get a Silver and has a Spy effect. But it is so strong because it's a very good counter against nearly all attacks. Just buy 2 JoaT and you can skip the cursing attack while you're going for Big Money. Yes, it's boring, but effective. It's weaker in Colony games because of the Silver and there are still situations where a thin deck with an obvious engine or a rush is stronger, but if you feel unsure, JoaT is always a good buy, if you stick to it. It has also some nice synergies with cards that decrease hand size like Warehouse, Fishing Village, Oasis, Forager, Candlestick Maker, Squire to just name a few and also Copper trashing in Spice Merchant or Lookout are great with Jack. And you even can include it in your engine for your draw and money generation. It's therefore a versatile card that you can rarely ignore.
#3 =0 Remake (Cornucopia) Weighted Average: 87.5% ▼3.5pp / Unweighted Average: 81.7% / Median: 92.9% =0pp / Standard Deviation: 23.0%

Remake is on the same rank, but lost a bit in points. It has a pretty high deviation for a card ranked so high. It was voted 13 times below average and also 13 times on the first rank.

If you compare Remake to Chapel, it can only trash 2 cards at a time but at the same time let you get 3 Silvers in your deck. And if there are good $2 cards on the board, you can buy a good card for the last two Copper in your hand too. You can get high quality decks really fast. Later it gets nearly as useless as Chapel, but even sometimes you could do cool tricks later (for example especially with Fortress) and also at that time this doesn't bother you too much. With Shelters and Poor House the interaction changes a little bit and makes it a little bit weaker, but it's still a must buy on many boards.
#2 ▲2 Tournament (Cornucopia) Weighted Average: 88.5% ▼2.0pp / Unweighted Average: 86.2% / Median: 91.1% ▼1.2pp / Standard Deviation: 14.9%

Tournament is 2 ranks higher despite having lost a bit in points. It was voted only 4 times below average and 14 times on the first rank.

Many hate Treasure Map for being so luck-based. Tournament is also very luck-based as you have to pair a Province and a Tournament. If you manage to do that you get one of 5 prices that are so strong that Donald X. didn't want to realize these ideas as "normal" cards. So, Tournament is in fact a very good card. The prizes will be part of a different ranking, but how do you manage to get a Tournament and Province in hand? It's the same as with Treasure Map. Either trash down to few cards (e.g. Chapel), get a big hand size (e.g. Tactician), or cycle through your deck with sifters (e.g. Warehouse). Also there is the possibility to spam Tournaments which are at least nonterminal and good cards for themselves - at least until your opponent gets Provinces. It's not surprising that Tournament had 3 spots in the Top 10 with Ambassador, Chapel and Masquerade on the Councilroom best openings list.
#1 =0 Sea Hag (Seaside) Weighted Average: 88.5% ▼9.0pp / Unweighted Average: 87.1% / Median: 94.6% ▼3.5pp / Standard Deviation: 17.1%

Like in the $3 list: What a nail-biter. Sea Hag only won by 0.006pp, basically nothing. But Sea Hag is #1 again. It dropped a lot in points, but it was enough. It was voted 6 times below average and 26 times on the first rank.

Sea Hag is a curser that has a big first-player advantage as you may discard your opponents Sea Hag in turn 3 and because the curse goes on top of the deck, this hurts your opponent even more than all other cursers in the game. Upgrade, Junk Dealer and Lookout trash from the top of the deck and counter Sea Hag well, but if they aren't present the top-decked Curse hurts a lot and makes the game very slow, but you can rarely skip Sea Hag. The biggest problem of Sea Hag is: it hurts your oppenent more, but it doesn't give you any benefit (like most of the other attacks do). So every Sea Hag is later a dead Sea Hag if the Curse pile is empty (and is basically a Curse for itself too), so if your deck can handle the Curses you might be able to ignore it. And don't forget to build up your economy as Sea Hag doesn't help you now to accomplish this. That may be the reason that Sea Hag / Fool's Gold is one of the best Sea Hag openings because you get a lot of $2-$3 hands for more Fool's Gold and with at least 2 Fool's Gold it's even better as Silver.
« Last Edit: April 01, 2014, 10:03:56 am by Qvist »
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #6 on: March 22, 2014, 01:28:22 pm »
+2

Scout has its uses.

Not sure I agree with this, simulation suggests 0 is almost always the optimal number of Scouts.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #7 on: March 22, 2014, 01:38:37 pm »
+1

Wow, how is Taxman not in the bottom?  Really?  I don't think I'm even underestimating it here, it seems actively bad for your deck a lot of the time.  In fairness, a lot of $4 cards are pretty bad on average.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #8 on: March 22, 2014, 01:52:51 pm »
+3

Pirate Ship, overrated as always. I'm not even convinced that it is better than Thief.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #9 on: March 22, 2014, 02:24:37 pm »
+1

I'm shocked to see treasure map here. I didn't expect that at all. Lower than navigator? Lower than freaking pirate ship? wow, that's... i don't know. it's so much better than either of those. it's also better than some cards who aren't even in this list, like death cart and talisman. it may become most underrated card of the year in my book...
« Last Edit: March 22, 2014, 02:27:43 pm by silverspawn »
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #10 on: March 22, 2014, 03:41:35 pm »
+3

Scout has its uses.

Not sure I agree with this, simulation suggests 0 is almost always the optimal number of Scouts.
Simulation doesn't suggest that it's almost always the optimal number of Scouts. Simulation suggests that if you always have the same number of Scouts, that number should be 0. Scout does have its uses, and in specific situations, those uses can be a reason why you want to buy it, but simulators don't take into account specific situations.

Pirate Ship, overrated as always. I'm not even convinced that it is better than Thief.
I agree it's overrated, definitely worse than Bureaucrat. But I'm convinced that it is better than Thief; it functions as an attack and as a payload for an engine in a single stop card, Thief does the same thing but with extra stop cards.

I'm shocked to see treasure map here. I didn't expect that at all. Lower than navigator? Lower than freaking pirate ship? wow, that's... i don't know. it's so much better than either of those. it's also better than some cards who aren't even in this list, like death cart and talisman. it may become most underrated card of the year in my book...
Well, what's the last time you went for Treasure Maps and your opponent didn't and you won?

Then, take into account that it's mostly useful in situations where you probably were winning anyway. Pirate Ship and Death Cart can turn games you would have lost into victories (usually they don't, but at least it's possible), and Talisman is actually worth buying pretty often (for picking up engine pieces faster in the early game, for example). Navigator is very bad, but... it really just is very bad. But it's pretty good with Rebuild, it counters Ghost Ship as long as you have the extra actions available and there's the Magical Royal Seal/Navigator combo that I still can't explain, but somehow it just works.

EDIT: Also, I think Coppersmith is better than Treasure Map or Navigator.
« Last Edit: March 22, 2014, 04:18:44 pm by Awaclus »
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #11 on: March 22, 2014, 03:42:40 pm »
+2

you forgot to mention feast Procession, it can be very good getting 3 $5 cards
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #12 on: March 22, 2014, 06:18:50 pm »
0

Well, what's the last time you went for Treasure Maps and your opponent didn't and you won?

By this standard, Mountebank isn't very good, either. I mean, okay, treasure map is pretty bad. But it can be good, it can be so obviously good that my opponent goes for it, too. I play against good players. Doesn't mean the card wasn't good there. The other thing about treasure map is, while sometimes you boom, go for it right away, generally it's more suited to: Build an engine, get two maps, boom economy. Now this isn't that great, because there's usually some better topper for your deck than 4 golds, but hey, it can work.

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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #13 on: March 22, 2014, 06:25:30 pm »
0

Wow, how is Taxman not in the bottom?  Really?  I don't think I'm even underestimating it here, it seems actively bad for your deck a lot of the time.  In fairness, a lot of $4 cards are pretty bad on average.

Yeah, I'm really curious why people didn't put it down here.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #14 on: March 22, 2014, 08:27:16 pm »
+2

Wow, how is Taxman not in the bottom?  Really?  I don't think I'm even underestimating it here, it seems actively bad for your deck a lot of the time.  In fairness, a lot of $4 cards are pretty bad on average.

There are a lot of cases where Taxman is good. It has its uses on engine boards. It disrupts your opponents turn and also increases your economy while not adding extra treasures to your deck. I admit that it is not much better than Mine, but it still is a little bit better.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #15 on: March 23, 2014, 12:30:45 pm »
+1

Wow, how is Taxman not in the bottom?  Really?  I don't think I'm even underestimating it here, it seems actively bad for your deck a lot of the time.  In fairness, a lot of $4 cards are pretty bad on average.

There are a lot of cases where Taxman is good. It has its uses on engine boards. It disrupts your opponents turn and also increases your economy while not adding extra treasures to your deck. I admit that it is not much better than Mine, but it still is a little bit better.

I agree that Taxman is a card you usually rather want to skip, but it certainly has its uses so I understand why it's not in the bottom cards. I'm quite sure it will follow in the next 10 though. Let's compare it to Bureaucrat which is one of the highest cards at the bottom here: In the early game Both have a small attack that will most likely decrease your opponents buying power by 1 at the turn it kicks in. But Bureaucrats attack kicks in one turn later than Taxmans which is a big difference. The second advantage of Taxman is that it also trashes a copper in early game. Both cards then put a silver on top of your deck. The major advantage of Bureaucrat is that it doesn't hurt your current turn as much as Taxman does but i think the trashed copper usually about makes up for that. Later in the game Bureaucrat might oftern fail its attack part completely if estates are thinned out or just the deck size increases without green cards being added, while Taxmans attack can still be a little more stable and you always have the choice which treasure you want to upgrade. Also Taxmans power increases a lot if it is a colony game, where Bureaucrat is usually a really bad card. For those reasons i totally agree that Taxman should be higher than Bureaucrat and therefore not be in those bottom cards.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #16 on: March 23, 2014, 12:38:39 pm »
0

Wow, how is Taxman not in the bottom?  Really?  I don't think I'm even underestimating it here, it seems actively bad for your deck a lot of the time.  In fairness, a lot of $4 cards are pretty bad on average.

There are a lot of cases where Taxman is good. It has its uses on engine boards. It disrupts your opponents turn and also increases your economy while not adding extra treasures to your deck. I admit that it is not much better than Mine, but it still is a little bit better.

I agree that Taxman is a card you usually rather want to skip, but it certainly has its uses so I understand why it's not in the bottom cards. I'm quite sure it will follow in the next 10 though. Let's compare it to Bureaucrat which is one of the highest cards at the bottom here: In the early game Both have a small attack that will most likely decrease your opponents buying power by 1 at the turn it kicks in. But Bureaucrats attack kicks in one turn later than Taxmans which is a big difference. The second advantage of Taxman is that it also trashes a copper in early game. Both cards then put a silver on top of your deck. The major advantage of Bureaucrat is that it doesn't hurt your current turn as much as Taxman does but i think the trashed copper usually about makes up for that. Later in the game Bureaucrat might oftern fail its attack part completely if estates are thinned out or just the deck size increases without green cards being added, while Taxmans attack can still be a little more stable and you always have the choice which treasure you want to upgrade. Also Taxmans power increases a lot if it is a colony game, where Bureaucrat is usually a really bad card. For those reasons i totally agree that Taxman should be higher than Bureaucrat and therefore not be in those bottom cards.
Also, Taxman's attack is brutal in engines vs. Big Money if you're drawing your entire deck and the card you topdeck with Taxman anyway.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #17 on: March 23, 2014, 05:04:25 pm »
+1

Quote
Well, what's the last time you went for Treasure Maps and your opponent didn't and you won?
today :)

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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #18 on: March 23, 2014, 06:23:53 pm »
0

Quote
Well, what's the last time you went for Treasure Maps and your opponent didn't and you won?
today :)
Then, take into account that it's mostly useful in situations where you probably were winning anyway.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #19 on: March 23, 2014, 06:58:11 pm »
+1

Quote
Well, what's the last time you went for Treasure Maps and your opponent didn't and you won?
today :)
Then, take into account that it's mostly useful in situations where you probably were winning anyway.

i bought it turn 3-.-

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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #20 on: March 24, 2014, 07:12:47 pm »
0

Coppersmith, Treasure Map, Spy, Bureaucrat and Navigator are all hands-down better than Pirate Ship.  I had PS at #54, ahead of Feast but now that I think about it I should have had PS at #55 and Feast at #54.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #21 on: March 24, 2014, 07:28:15 pm »
0

I think there is a big gap between scout and thief, and another big gap between Thief and all the others. Overall, I agree with the list. But besides Scout and Thief, I would agree with any order between the other cards. It's really hard to compare all these, their uses are so much different.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #22 on: March 24, 2014, 08:42:11 pm »
0

Pretty much agree with the bottom. I have Pirate Ship at #46 and Feodum at #49, but all the others are in my bottom, as well.

I suspect Taxman won't be too far out of the very bottom..... I have it at #48.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 2/6)
« Reply #23 on: March 25, 2014, 08:19:24 am »
0

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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 2/6)
« Reply #24 on: March 25, 2014, 08:39:58 am »
0

First !

Even though I didn't post (I didn't even play DA and guilds) I wondered about Advisor and Feodum a lot...
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 2/6)
« Reply #25 on: March 25, 2014, 08:41:54 am »
0

I have Armory way higher,#17. Man, I just love those Workshop variants. Given all this talk about how important plus buy is, I can't understand the under-appreciation of gain. Ironmonger, Menagerie, Harold, Throne Room, Bridge, Caravan, villages,.... you often want lots of these. Armory puts free copies of them on your deck! That's good!
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 2/6)
« Reply #26 on: March 25, 2014, 09:11:27 am »
0

I am confused with Death cart. I don't have so much experience with this card, and I must admit that the games where I used it, it was not always a spectacular card. But on the other hand, I still think it's underrated because for me this card seems still very powerful. Let's compare with tactician : tactician has a drawback, you discard your hand when you play it. But the benefit is so strong that it worth it, and it shows that a very bad hand and a very good hand is better than two average hands. For Death cart, I feel it is more or less the same… +$5 worth the pain of gaining two ruins.

For me, Death cart seems like a very good support for good engines (with +buy), $5 is just a lot. And for alt-VP, or slogs, or games where you want to three pile, DC is useful too… I really don't think it is well ranked here.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 2/6)
« Reply #27 on: March 25, 2014, 09:49:33 am »
+2

In my experience Death Cart is only good when you can draw your deck anyway to make sure it collides with Ruins or actions you want to trash (and so the Ruins aren't hurting your deck), and you have the +buy to take advantage of it.  Usually in those cases it's a strong board and there's better stuff to be doing than getting Death Carts.  +$5 sounds like a lot but it has to be split over two cards, and those two cards also have to collide, so it's pretty bad.

Nomad Camp seems really high, the only explanation I can think of as to why it's so much "higher than Woodcutter" is that there's a lot more bad $4's than bad $3's.

Walled Village is low.  I mean it's really bad in comparison to other villages, but it's still a village and sometimes you just need a village.  It's important more often than the other cards down there.

And I don't know why Armory is so low.  It's not the best but it can be nice in a lot of situations.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 2/6)
« Reply #28 on: March 25, 2014, 10:16:09 am »
+3

I am confused with Death cart. I don't have so much experience with this card, and I must admit that the games where I used it, it was not always a spectacular card. But on the other hand, I still think it's underrated because for me this card seems still very powerful. Let's compare with tactician : tactician has a drawback, you discard your hand when you play it. But the benefit is so strong that it worth it, and it shows that a very bad hand and a very good hand is better than two average hands. For Death cart, I feel it is more or less the same… +$5 worth the pain of gaining two ruins.
Two Ruins can ruin more than one hand and +$5 isn't as good as +5 cards, +1 action, +1 buy.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 2/6)
« Reply #29 on: March 25, 2014, 10:29:01 am »
0

Quote
Nomad Camp seems really high, the only explanation I can think of as to why it's so much "higher than Woodcutter" is that there's a lot more bad $4's than bad $3's.
nomad camp is too low i think. you can topdeck it to get to $5. that's just such a huge advantage over woodcutter. it's like comparing scavanger and chancellor.

vv is too low, agree. talisman is too high. death card is eh, 5$ looks like a lot, but in reality it's at best 2,5$ for two of your cards, and terminal on top. worst case it's a one shot and the ruins are ruining your other turns... that's what they're good at.
« Last Edit: March 25, 2014, 10:31:20 am by silverspawn »
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 2/6)
« Reply #30 on: March 25, 2014, 10:54:16 am »
+4

Quote
Nomad Camp seems really high, the only explanation I can think of as to why it's so much "higher than Woodcutter" is that there's a lot more bad $4's than bad $3's.
nomad camp is too low i think. you can topdeck it to get to $5. that's just such a huge advantage over woodcutter. it's like comparing scavanger and chancellor.

It only gets you to $5 40% of the time. The rest of the time, it's just getting you to $4, which means you're basically opening Woddcutter/4, which is pretty bad. It's a good opening for rushing down some $2 cards like Fool's Gold, but typically it's not worth opening Woodcutter to maybe get an early 5 less than half the time.

And later in the game, when you actually want to buy a terminal +buy card, Nomad Camp's on gain effect is actually a negative a lot of the time, since you don't really want your terminal +buy on top. You want your drawing cards and villages so you draw into the +buy card to play last.

Overall, I think Nomad Camp is slightly worse than Woodcutter, but it gets a higher rank because the 3s are generally better than the 4s.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 2/6)
« Reply #31 on: March 25, 2014, 10:58:59 am »
0

Quote
Nomad Camp seems really high, the only explanation I can think of as to why it's so much "higher than Woodcutter" is that there's a lot more bad $4's than bad $3's.
nomad camp is too low i think. you can topdeck it to get to $5. that's just such a huge advantage over woodcutter. it's like comparing scavanger and chancellor.

It only gets you to $5 40% of the time. The rest of the time, it's just getting you to $4, which means you're basically opening Woddcutter/4, which is pretty bad. It's a good opening for rushing down some $2 cards like Fool's Gold, but typically it's not worth opening Woodcutter to maybe get an early 5 less than half the time.
i disagree, i think that's often worth it. woodcutter/4 is only bad if there are other, stronger terminals which you wanna play and a lack of +actions. often it's a good opening, and woodcutter/5$ is usually an amazing opening.

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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 2/6)
« Reply #32 on: March 25, 2014, 11:34:56 am »
0

There's also the issue of slowing down your cycling in the early game, which is sometimes a good thing, but usually isn't.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 2/6)
« Reply #33 on: March 25, 2014, 12:10:45 pm »
0

Quote
because the 3s are generally better than the 4s

this is a paradox btw. saying that 3$'s are better than 4$'s is like saying that the difference between a 4$ card and a 3$ card is smaller than the difference between having 4$ and having 3$, but the latter is defined by the former: 4$ to 3$ is the exact same thing as having a 4$ card to having a 3$ card, because 4$ let's you buy a 4$ card and 3$ let's you buy a 3$ card. this isn't exactly true anymore once you have several buys, but early on it is.

it would be a different thing if you meant they are actually better, not just better relative to their cost, but you said that NC is worse than woodcutter, so I assume that's not what you meant.

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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 2/6)
« Reply #34 on: March 25, 2014, 12:28:59 pm »
+2

it would be a different thing if you meant they are actually better, not just better relative to their cost, but you said that NC is worse than woodcutter, so I assume that's not what you meant.
They are actually better. And NC is actually worse than Woodcutter, not just worse relative to its cost. EDIT: This is my opinion, which HME doesn't necessarily share.
« Last Edit: March 25, 2014, 12:30:25 pm by Awaclus »
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 2/6)
« Reply #35 on: March 25, 2014, 01:07:39 pm »
0

There's also the issue of slowing down your cycling in the early game, which is sometimes a good thing, but usually isn't.
How does Nomad Camp slow down your cycling? You still shuffle at the end of turn 2, with the only difference that the first card of your hand in turn 3 is either copper or estate. So there is a slightly bigger chance that your opening buys miss the reshuffle (but that is probably negligible, the difference is only 1.5pp), but it doesn't slow down your cycling: you have shuffles in exactly the same turns.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 2/6)
« Reply #36 on: March 25, 2014, 01:17:03 pm »
+2

There's also the issue of slowing down your cycling in the early game, which is sometimes a good thing, but usually isn't.
How does Nomad Camp slow down your cycling? You still shuffle at the end of turn 2, with the only difference that the first card of your hand in turn 3 is either copper or estate. So there is a slightly bigger chance that your opening buys miss the reshuffle (but that is probably negligible, the difference is only 1.5pp), but it doesn't slow down your cycling: you have shuffles in exactly the same turns.
The reshuffle that you normally get at the end of turn 6 will be delayed by one turn.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 2/6)
« Reply #37 on: March 25, 2014, 01:45:49 pm »
0

I fully agree that Nomad Camp is worse than Woodcutter, even if they cost the same. On top of your deck is not generally where you want a terminal silver to be. You want your village and your draw card on top of your deck.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 2/6)
« Reply #38 on: March 25, 2014, 02:00:11 pm »
+1

Quote
Nomad Camp seems really high, the only explanation I can think of as to why it's so much "higher than Woodcutter" is that there's a lot more bad $4's than bad $3's.
nomad camp is too low i think. you can topdeck it to get to $5. that's just such a huge advantage over woodcutter. it's like comparing scavanger and chancellor.

It only gets you to $5 40% of the time. The rest of the time, it's just getting you to $4, which means you're basically opening Woddcutter/4, which is pretty bad. It's a good opening for rushing down some $2 cards like Fool's Gold, but typically it's not worth opening Woodcutter to maybe get an early 5 less than half the time.
woodcutter/4 is only bad if there are other, stronger terminals which you wanna play and a lack of +actions.

Or if something like Silver/4 is available.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 2/6)
« Reply #39 on: March 25, 2014, 04:07:25 pm »
+2

this is a paradox btw. saying that 3$'s are better than 4$'s is like saying that the difference between a 4$ card and a 3$ card is smaller than the difference between having 4$ and having 3$, but the latter is defined by the former: 4$ to 3$ is the exact same thing as having a 4$ card to having a 3$ card, because 4$ let's you buy a 4$ card and 3$ let's you buy a 3$ card. this isn't exactly true anymore once you have several buys, but early on it is.

I'm so confused by this. It just looks like a bunch of words.

I do think it's true that given some random set of $3 and $4 cost cards, if I had $4, I would rather buy a $3 card because it's stronger. Obviously this doesn't apply to all cards costing $3 or $4.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 2/6)
« Reply #40 on: March 25, 2014, 04:13:50 pm »
0

this is a paradox btw. saying that 3$'s are better than 4$'s is like saying that the difference between a 4$ card and a 3$ card is smaller than the difference between having 4$ and having 3$, but the latter is defined by the former: 4$ to 3$ is the exact same thing as having a 4$ card to having a 3$ card, because 4$ let's you buy a 4$ card and 3$ let's you buy a 3$ card. this isn't exactly true anymore once you have several buys, but early on it is.

I'm so confused by this. It just looks like a bunch of words.

I do think it's true that given some random set of $3 and $4 cost cards, if I had $4, I would rather buy a $3 card because it's stronger. Obviously this doesn't apply to all cards costing $3 or $4.

if 3$ cards are actually stronger, and not just relative to their cost, it doesn't apply, so don't bother.

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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 2/6)
« Reply #41 on: March 25, 2014, 06:04:35 pm »
0

Walled Village should not be so low. It is still a village. Death Cart seems better ranked this time. Most of the time, that card sucks! It usually just junk your decks and without a source of +Buy, is almost never worth getting. I mean, yah, it is worth getting when the Ruins are out, but usually, it is just a bad  card.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 2/6)
« Reply #42 on: March 26, 2014, 01:47:46 pm »
0

I expect Death Cart to be pretty nice with shelters, since you can at least trash your Necropolis, if you miss the ruins. I haven't played it enough to be clear about this, though.

Chances of missing the ruins is roughly 50% in non-shelter-games.
Chances of missing the ruins and the necropolis is roughly 33%.

(Assuming turn 3/4 with Death Cart and 2 opening buys one of which is DC)
« Last Edit: March 26, 2014, 01:53:47 pm by c4master »
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 2/6)
« Reply #43 on: March 26, 2014, 02:11:44 pm »
0

(Assuming turn 3/4 with Death Cart and 2 opening buys one of which is DC)
I think that opening Death Cart is always a bad idea. You want to trash your cards and get an engine running in the early game, not gain more junk cards. If you're not going for an engine, then you probably don't want a Death Cart at any point.

The ideal use for Death Cart is when you have an engine that draws more cards than there are in your deck and need an effective way to get more coins. Keeping the Necropolis around for that long might or might not be a good idea, but if you have it and don't need it anymore, it's obviously nice Death Cart fodder, so Shelters do make Death Cart a little stronger, but only in situations where you would have gotten it anyway.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 2/6)
« Reply #44 on: March 26, 2014, 02:21:22 pm »
0

Sure. Especially when there are attacks to be played as often as possible, the ruins really hurt.
Anyways, there is still a small chance of hitting $9 by turn 3/4 even without a silver (but then really tiny). Anyways, even this might not be enough to even out the slowdown.
Maybe Rats-> Death Cart can be of some use.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 2/6)
« Reply #45 on: March 26, 2014, 02:32:12 pm »
0

I think ´Death cart opening might be good to get a quick forge.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 2/6)
« Reply #46 on: March 26, 2014, 03:37:04 pm »
0

I think ´Death cart opening might be good to get a quick forge.

eh, i doubt it. there are several problems, #1 you may not get to $7 with it, #2 you may draw death cart without ruins and #3 even if you get the forge its not that amazing. you can just go double silver into a strong $5 or a gold and get a quick forge. and if there is anything smithy-like you'll get to $7 just as quickly
« Last Edit: March 26, 2014, 04:42:56 pm by silverspawn »
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 2/6)
« Reply #47 on: March 26, 2014, 04:29:10 pm »
+2

The best use I've found for Death Cart so far is as a partial answer to the other Looters.

Edit: Or when I want to gain oodles of actions fast, e.g. for vineyards, occasionally gardens, or just to empty a pile

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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 2/6)
« Reply #48 on: March 26, 2014, 04:46:49 pm »
+2

I have found it useful for winning Tournaments early, but even then it's a little risky.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 2/6)
« Reply #49 on: March 26, 2014, 04:52:50 pm »
0

Very risky I think, best-case scenario is you play DC, trash one of the Ruins, buy Province.  You still have an extra Ruins clogging your deck, making it a little less likely to line up that Province with a Tournament.  And that's the best-case scenario which isn't even especially likely.

I like DC in a Scrying Pool deck too, since the extra Ruins won't really hurt and SP loves actions that generate coin.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 2/6)
« Reply #50 on: March 26, 2014, 04:56:06 pm »
+2

The best use I've found for Death Cart so far is as a partial answer to the other Looters.

Edit: Or when I want to gain oodles of actions fast, e.g. for vineyards, occasionally gardens, or just to empty a pile

I agree with these. Deathcart is not so good as an engine payday, unless you can Throne/King/or Procession it. You have to work a little too hard to fit it into the engine usually, I think. The Vineyard, Gardens, and pile-draining aspects are nice enough when they come up, though.

I've also found that it's a good card for when you and your opponent have both gone heavy greening, and you're in that situation where you just like need the last Province, or something. And your deck is terrible, and you have bad economic chances at getting it. Well, you can pick up Deathcart and hope. I think Deathcart is pretty good in this function as a last resort card. You occasionally see this with like Mandarin or Nomad Camp or something, but Deathcart is nicer, really.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 2/6)
« Reply #51 on: March 26, 2014, 05:13:35 pm »
0

I expect Death Cart to be pretty nice with shelters, since you can at least trash your Necropolis, if you miss the ruins. I haven't played it enough to be clear about this, though.

Chances of missing the ruins is roughly 50% in non-shelter-games.
Chances of missing the ruins and the necropolis is roughly 33%.

(Assuming turn 3/4 with Death Cart and 2 opening buys one of which is DC)

I don't think you're accounting for the fact that Death Cart balloons your deck to 14 cards, so there's a 4/14 (28.6%) chance that Death Cart, and whatever you buy with it miss the turn 4 shuffle. And then (assuming you buy something and don't trash anything on turn 3 and 4) you don't shuffle again until turn 7. Maybe Death Cart + trasher has some hope to speed up this cycling, but otherwise, there's really nothing fast about it.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 2/6)
« Reply #52 on: March 26, 2014, 05:51:29 pm »
0


I've also found that it's a good card for when you and your opponent have both gone heavy greening, and you're in that situation where you just like need the last Province, or something. And your deck is terrible, and you have bad economic chances at getting it. Well, you can pick up Deathcart and hope. I think Deathcart is pretty good in this function as a last resort card. You occasionally see this with like Mandarin or Nomad Camp or something, but Deathcart is nicer, really.

I have wondered a few times about that, but I'm still not sure whether it is.

I have also tried getting an early DC for a big masterpiece quite early in the game, not sure how effective that is.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 2/6)
« Reply #53 on: March 27, 2014, 02:59:47 pm »
+1

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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 3/6)
« Reply #54 on: March 27, 2014, 03:26:53 pm »
+5

I'm shocked at how much Silk Road dropped. What's the cause of this? I guess rushes are worse with Shelters, but the main use as an extra pile of Duchies+ remains as strong as ever if not stronger with increasing engine and mega-turn possibilities.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 3/6)
« Reply #55 on: March 27, 2014, 04:28:53 pm »
+4

okay, forget treasure map, procession is the most underrated card here. i understand why, it's hard to use correctly, maybe the most difficult to use card in the game, but it can also be the strongest card in the game. without this card you could never emtpy the supply in 4 turns, and while that doesn't happen in real games, it can still be insanely good.

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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 3/6)
« Reply #56 on: March 28, 2014, 09:36:09 am »
0

I agree that silk road is underrated, but I decided to not care anymore about victory cards because they are always too low. :P

Mining village is the one that shock me here. Actually I think mining village should be close to farming and worker's village, because their powers are comparable. If both mining and worker's are in the kingdom, you probably want both because you really don't need 6 +buy every turn, except edge cases like three piling on estates. And mining village is really better than fortress. I don't know the percentage of games where fortress is just a $4 village, but it is probably very high.

Otherwise I'm glad to see remodel higher.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 3/6)
« Reply #57 on: March 28, 2014, 09:58:30 am »
+2

I agree that silk road is underrated, but I decided to not care anymore about victory cards because they are always too low. :P

Mining village is the one that shock me here. Actually I think mining village should be close to farming and worker's village, because their powers are comparable. If both mining and worker's are in the kingdom, you probably want both because you really don't need 6 +buy every turn, except edge cases like three piling on estates. And mining village is really better than fortress. I don't know the percentage of games where fortress is just a $4 village, but it is probably very high.

Otherwise I'm glad to see remodel higher.

Actually I think Fortress is much better than Mining. Not only is it amazing with TfB, but even regular trashers no longer take up space in your deck. That Junk Dealer is now a Peddler, Forager isn't dead, Masq is +2 cards. It just makes transitioning out of trashing super easy with no tempo lost.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 3/6)
« Reply #58 on: March 28, 2014, 10:32:56 am »
+1

I agree that silk road is underrated, but I decided to not care anymore about victory cards because they are always too low. :P

Mining village is the one that shock me here. Actually I think mining village should be close to farming and worker's village, because their powers are comparable. If both mining and worker's are in the kingdom, you probably want both because you really don't need 6 +buy every turn, except edge cases like three piling on estates. And mining village is really better than fortress. I don't know the percentage of games where fortress is just a $4 village, but it is probably very high.

Otherwise I'm glad to see remodel higher.

Actually I think Fortress is much better than Mining. Not only is it amazing with TfB, but even regular trashers no longer take up space in your deck. That Junk Dealer is now a Peddler, Forager isn't dead, Masq is +2 cards. It just makes transitioning out of trashing super easy with no tempo lost.

Because trashing a fortress from your hand is so much stronger than choosing not to trash :P? But yeah, Fortress is probably just a $4 village a decent amount of the time, but the times it can do it's thing, it's often really good - and I'd say it does its thing fairly often as well. Being a village even means you can play one Fortress to get an extra action, do T4B stuff on the second Fortress, then play that one, ensuring it isn't even dead in your hand. Of course requires two Fortresses to line up so not always possible.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 3/6)
« Reply #59 on: March 28, 2014, 11:11:35 am »
0

I agree that silk road is underrated, but I decided to not care anymore about victory cards because they are always too low. :P

Mining village is the one that shock me here. Actually I think mining village should be close to farming and worker's village, because their powers are comparable. If both mining and worker's are in the kingdom, you probably want both because you really don't need 6 +buy every turn, except edge cases like three piling on estates. And mining village is really better than fortress. I don't know the percentage of games where fortress is just a $4 village, but it is probably very high.

Otherwise I'm glad to see remodel higher.

Actually I think Fortress is much better than Mining. Not only is it amazing with TfB, but even regular trashers no longer take up space in your deck. That Junk Dealer is now a Peddler, Forager isn't dead, Masq is +2 cards. It just makes transitioning out of trashing super easy with no tempo lost.

Because trashing a fortress from your hand is so much stronger than choosing not to trash :P? But yeah, Fortress is probably just a $4 village a decent amount of the time, but the times it can do it's thing, it's often really good - and I'd say it does its thing fairly often as well. Being a village even means you can play one Fortress to get an extra action, do T4B stuff on the second Fortress, then play that one, ensuring it isn't even dead in your hand. Of course requires two Fortresses to line up so not always possible.

Right, that was totally silly, lol. But the other examples are good!
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 3/6)
« Reply #60 on: March 28, 2014, 12:30:03 pm »
0

Actually I think mining village should be close to farming and worker's village, because their powers are comparable. If both mining and worker's are in the kingdom, you probably want both because you really don't need 6 +buy every turn, except edge cases like three piling on estates.

This is a really bad way of evaluating a card's strength.  Most boards won't have both Worker's Village and Mining Village, so that should have very little impact on how you evaluate them.  On boards with only one of WV and MV, WV is a lot more likely to make a difference than MV.  Or to put it another way, if we play a bunch of games of Dominion with 9 random kingdom cards each time, and then I'm allowed to buy WV and you're allowed to buy MV (and we ignore the weird rule cases that probably come up), I will win a lot more than you.  That may not be the perfect measure of a card's strength, but it's a lot more accurate than just looking at the cases where both come up together.  You wouldn't say that Smithy is roughly equal in strength to Village just because when they come up together you get a roughly equal number of each.

Both +actions and +buy are super important for engines, and Worker's Village gives you both in one card.  I don't know how powerful the +$2 on Mining Village is, I still don't really understand that card, but it seems to me like it's a lot less important than the +buy on WV, since +coin is not really a critical aspect of the engine (money is always at least available in the form of treasures anyway, whereas +buy is not necessarily available).
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 3/6)
« Reply #61 on: March 28, 2014, 12:41:49 pm »
0

I'm shocked at how much Silk Road dropped. What's the cause of this? I guess rushes are worse with Shelters, but the main use as an extra pile of Duchies+ remains as strong as ever if not stronger with increasing engine and mega-turn possibilities.

I'm actually not that shocked. I use to think Silk Roads were just as good as Gardens or better. I'm not so sure anymore. I mean, in the strict comparison to Gardens, Silk Roads is one card that actually really suffered with the introduction of Dark Ages. Shelters, yeah, but also Beggar is one of the best Garden enablers, and does nothing for Silk Road.

I understand that alt-VP is good for engines, but I don't know if Silk Roads is the right kind of alt-VP. You actually have to have a lot of Green cards to make them worth Duchies! And nowadays, we're often looking at engines that get a bunch of the Provinces, or somehow get a bunch of Province equivalents, like Fairgrounds and Vineyards under the right circumstances.

I think Silk Road now rightly occupies a middle ground between a typically unusable alt-VP strategy of Feodum, and the superior alt-VP strategy of Gardens.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 3/6)
« Reply #62 on: March 28, 2014, 02:56:33 pm »
+1

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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 4/6)
« Reply #63 on: March 28, 2014, 03:06:03 pm »
0

Man, the $4 cards are just Dominion's weakest group by a mile.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 4/6)
« Reply #64 on: March 28, 2014, 03:12:26 pm »
0

As far as the rankings go, this looks fine to me. Although maybe Quarry and Ironworks are still being underrated a bit? I know WW put Quarry ahead of Sea Hag, which seemed a bit dramatic to me, but obviously they should probably be in sort of close proximity, and yet I have a felling we won't see the Hag for a while yet.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 4/6)
« Reply #65 on: March 28, 2014, 05:47:28 pm »
+1

Really surprised that Gardens also dropped so low. It quite often defines the strategy on a board and in other situations it's still usually a nice pickup toward the end of the game. I ranked Gardens a lot higher, on #10.

The rise of Scavenger is well deserved, in my opinion. I'm still not sure how strong that card really is, but my estimate of this card has steadily increased.

Interesting to see Quarry and Ironworks move up so much - they are "old" cards, after all.

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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 4/6)
« Reply #66 on: March 28, 2014, 07:15:41 pm »
+2

Ironworks is pushing the top third of the $4s? That's pretty impressive. I feel more and more reading these lists like I don't really know Dominion any more...
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 4/6)
« Reply #67 on: March 29, 2014, 08:14:42 am »
0

Interesting to see very big changes in ranking his year. (And not just one, but FOUR changes>10, and about 8(?) rank changes of 5-10)
« Last Edit: March 29, 2014, 08:18:54 am by dominator 123 »
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 4/6)
« Reply #68 on: March 29, 2014, 09:08:46 am »
0

I prefer the rank of last year for moneylender. It's probably the card that suffered the most of the expansions.
Scavenger deserves its rank. Such a good card…
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 4/6)
« Reply #69 on: March 31, 2014, 07:50:14 am »
+1

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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 5/6)
« Reply #70 on: March 31, 2014, 10:44:59 am »
0

I'd say bishop is way too high. I also think it's noteworthy how far the villages are from each other.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 5/6)
« Reply #71 on: March 31, 2014, 11:04:11 am »
0

Herald is not high enough. For sure it's 15. It's better than Ironmonger by a long shot.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 5/6)
« Reply #72 on: March 31, 2014, 12:39:58 pm »
0

I'd say bishop is way too high. I also think it's noteworthy how far the villages are from each other.

The villages are almost certainly too far apart. I think because they're all so similar and vanilla, people focus too much on their extra ability. The main purpose is still the village though, and they should be clumped a lot tighter.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 5/6)
« Reply #73 on: March 31, 2014, 12:42:36 pm »
0

Part 5 is a disaster.

Herald is not high enough. For sure it's 15. It's better than Ironmonger by a long shot.

I don't know if that's true (mainly the "by a long shot" part), but for sure Herald is too low.

Smithy is overranked! It's outmoded by so many superior drawing cards.

Caravan is NOT better than Throne Room.

Bishop and Marauder ahead of Conspirator and Plaza? Hardly.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 5/6)
« Reply #74 on: March 31, 2014, 12:46:28 pm »
0

Part 5 is a disaster.

Herald is not high enough. For sure it's 15. It's better than Ironmonger by a long shot.

I don't know if that's true (mainly the "by a long shot" part), but for sure Herald is too low.

Ok, not by a long shot. And I meant to say top 15. I would put it in the top 10 though. It really good.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 5/6)
« Reply #75 on: March 31, 2014, 03:36:56 pm »
+2

Ok, not by a long shot. And I meant to say top 15. I would put it in the top 10 though. It really good.
I'm not so sure between Herald and Ironmonger. Ironmonger is good for almost all decks (the major exception being terminal draw big money), while herald really requires an almost treasure-less deck. Sure, Herald is epic when you can hit action cards consistently, but Ironmonger is good when there's weak trashing. Revealing Coppers and Estates (or Ruins or other green) is very nice, and even revealing a Curse is decent.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 5/6)
« Reply #76 on: March 31, 2014, 03:46:58 pm »
+1

Ok, not by a long shot. And I meant to say top 15. I would put it in the top 10 though. It really good.
I'm not so sure between Herald and Ironmonger. Ironmonger is good for almost all decks (the major exception being terminal draw big money), while herald really requires an almost treasure-less deck. Sure, Herald is epic when you can hit action cards consistently, but Ironmonger is good when there's weak trashing. Revealing Coppers and Estates (or Ruins or other green) is very nice, and even revealing a Curse is decent.

I don't even really buy the "except for terminal draw" exception, because how often do you even play terminal draw BM anymore? And the presence of Ironmonger is going to present a strong alternative to the already weak strategy of terminal draw BM.

Ironmonger is great. It almost never hurts you, and the more you have the better.

Herald is less consistent, but generates a bigger effect when it works. I think it's a misnomer that you need like *really* strong trashing to make Herald work. It helps of course, but so does just having lots of Heralds and buying lots of actions (it's a bit like Menagerie in this way).

I do give the edge to Herald, but both are very powerful. It's interesting--I think Herald and Ironmonger are essentially the quality of card that weaker players *think* they are getting with Caravan.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 5/6)
« Reply #77 on: March 31, 2014, 05:21:24 pm »
+5

Herald better than Ironmonger? That's Blasphemie in my eyes :)

Ironmonger is #1 on my personal $4 card list without any doubt.

Ironmonger is the only $4 card that that i can't remember
ever not having bought in a game it was present.
The only other card that may compete that is JoaT but i'm sure Ironmonger still wins.
Herald for sure has the bigger impact on boards you want it, but you always want ironmonger and often don't want herald(e.g. you usually don't want herald without any trashing, or when junking is stronger than trashing).
And the same is to say about the $4 Cursers, there are just so many good trashers in Dominion
that you can often ignore them.

And like Robz said i would even go Ironmonger-(X)-BM over most terminal draw-BM strategies
where X can be another decent Terminal but can slo be left out.
I mean early on it's a Peddler + sifting or even as powerful as an activated menagery.
And once you started heavy greening Ironmonger decks really dont stall very fast at all.
 
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 5/6)
« Reply #78 on: March 31, 2014, 05:25:57 pm »
0

Salvager is too low.

Spice Merchant is too high--it should be down closer to Moneylender.  They do different things but they're of comparable strength, I'm not sure which is better but I'm pretty sure one isn't significantly better than the other.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 5/6)
« Reply #79 on: March 31, 2014, 05:59:40 pm »
0

Herald better than Ironmonger? That's Blasphemie in my eyes :)

Ironmonger is #1 on my personal $4 card list without any doubt.

Ironmonger is the only $4 card that that i can't remember
ever not having bought in a game it was present.
The only other card that may compete that is JoaT but i'm sure Ironmonger still wins.
Herald for sure has the bigger impact on boards you want it, but you always want ironmonger and often don't want herald(e.g. you usually don't want herald without any trashing, or when junking is stronger than trashing).
And the same is to say about the $4 Cursers, there are just so many good trashers in Dominion
that you can often ignore them.

And like Robz said i would even go Ironmonger-(X)-BM over most terminal draw-BM strategies
where X can be another decent Terminal but can slo be left out.
I mean early on it's a Peddler + sifting or even as powerful as an activated menagery.
And once you started heavy greening Ironmonger decks really dont stall very fast at all.
 

I like ironmonger, but not quite that much.  I would rank it above herald, though.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 5/6)
« Reply #80 on: March 31, 2014, 09:35:37 pm »
+1

Um, I for sure ranked Ironmonger above Herald. Sorry, Ironmonger is almost always good. There are a lot of times where ignoring Herald is the right call. Ironmonger is without a doubt one of the most powerful $4 cards in Dominion, and Robz may be correct ranking it #1. With that said, Herald is underrated. So, is Plaza. You can even use Plaza in a BM deck and save the coin tokens for when you start greening. It is the only village that you can buy in BM. Well, I guess you can also buy MV, but Plaza is so much better.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 5/6)
« Reply #81 on: March 31, 2014, 09:39:28 pm »
0

eh, ironmonger is unreliable. it's the same problem like with tribute. 's alright

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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 5/6)
« Reply #82 on: March 31, 2014, 09:47:27 pm »
0

Robz may be correct ranking it #1.

That was MarkowKette
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 5/6)
« Reply #83 on: March 31, 2014, 10:01:47 pm »
0

Um, I for sure ranked Ironmonger above Herald. Sorry, Ironmonger is almost always good. There are a lot of times where ignoring Herald is the right call. Ironmonger is without a doubt one of the most powerful $4 cards in Dominion, and Robz may be correct ranking it #1. With that said, Herald is underrated. So, is Plaza. You can even use Plaza in a BM deck and save the coin tokens for when you start greening. It is the only village that you can buy in BM. Well, I guess you can also buy MV, but Plaza is so much better.

Walled Village.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 5/6)
« Reply #84 on: April 01, 2014, 01:59:32 am »
0

Robz may be correct ranking it #1.

That was MarkowKette

I was tired when typing that.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 5/6)
« Reply #85 on: April 01, 2014, 02:37:59 am »
0

Roses are red, violets are blue, herald's too low, and plaza is too
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 5/6)
« Reply #86 on: April 01, 2014, 02:42:59 am »
+4

Roses are red, violets are blue, herald's too low, and plaza is too

Depends on the rose.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 5/6)
« Reply #87 on: April 01, 2014, 04:37:41 am »
0

I'm really not that convinced by Herald. I haven't played many games with it, but often I expected it to be better than it really was. I have no idea how to use the overpay, because often there is a better card to buy instead overpaying for Herald. And in the strong decks where I could easily overpay, I have usually nothing in my discard pile.
Herald seems more like a trap to me, or maybe I don't know how to use it.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 5/6)
« Reply #88 on: April 01, 2014, 09:31:22 am »
0

I'm really not that convinced by Herald. I haven't played many games with it, but often I expected it to be better than it really was. I have no idea how to use the overpay, because often there is a better card to buy instead overpaying for Herald. And in the strong decks where I could easily overpay, I have usually nothing in my discard pile.
Herald seems more like a trap to me, or maybe I don't know how to use it.

You don't know how to use it. The overpay is more of a bonus that you can use sometimes, but usually you just pay $4 for it. Herald decks become these unstoppable machines that pretty much just play themselves. Yes, sometimes it's a trap, but it really is very strong.

I get all the arguments for Ironmonger being better. I can't really disagree with them because they are right. I think both cards are essentially as good as each other and it's a hard call to say which should be higher ranked.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 5/6)
« Reply #89 on: April 01, 2014, 09:41:05 am »
0

Almost no major disagreements on this list, and a whole bunch of cards exactly where I ranked them (including Taxman). I don't like seeing Silk Roads drop in ranking, and I seem to have underrated Quarry.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards (Part 5/6)
« Reply #90 on: April 01, 2014, 10:04:50 am »
+1

No April's Fool: Part 6

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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #91 on: April 01, 2014, 10:14:53 am »
+1

My main disagreement here is Sea Hag, really.  It's so much weaker nowadays that I'm not sure it even deserves to be as high as I personally ranked it.  Tournament as #2 is also a surprise; it's definitely nowhere near as centralizing as it used to be.  Personally, I think Remake and Jack should be #1 and 2 with little question about it. 
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #92 on: April 01, 2014, 11:19:45 am »
0

I'm suprised Spice Merchant jumped so much. It suffers from the same issues as Loan, and Loan is rated quite low.

Conspirator continues to be rated way too highly. Yes it's very good money for an engine since it doesn't take up space (which in turn means you don't need much hand-size increasing). But money for an engine isn't the biggest thing in the world. There are plenty of other ways to do it that are less good, but not by so much that Conspirator deserves to be a top 20 $4 card, imo.

The Marauder-Sea Hag gap is too large. I used to think Sea Hag was much better because it has a more pronouced effect on game pace with the topdecking part of the attack. However, now I think all the 4 major $4 attacks (Militia, Marauder, Sea Hag, Young Witch) are all pretty close (and around the rank 5-10 range). They are all good enough at slowing the game that they force you to play even a marginal engine. The fact that the Sea Hag attack is more powerful is ofset by the fact that you often don't bother adding it into the engine since the attack is not so good in the engine mirror.

Ironmonger I think is too high. I don't give much credit for stuff that "never hurts". It has to actually provide a strong benefit for me to care. But maybe I'm underrating it for big money. Is that really a thing? The way I look at Ironmonger is that it's first and foremost a village, with the potential to do other stuff. With good trashing, it's basically just a typical $4 village with its bonus being a little sifting, but with slightly slower trashing it has the benefit of being a sifting Peddler until you've trashed enough, which is great for that part of the game. As with Shanty Town, you can sometimes take them early and transition into another village later. It also has the benefit that if you might get the super-lab effect when you start greening (hopefully you still have enough that you can get the village effect off of another one). All in all I think it comes out better than Herald, but not as good as Wandering Minstrel.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #93 on: April 01, 2014, 11:41:13 am »
+1

lol monument is so overrated. sea hag is overrated too. but look at these two:

spice merchant: #15, moneylender #26
militia #9, cutpurse #32

there's just no way that's accurate. cutpurse so gud. so gud!

and i dont buy joat being #4 either. that card just has such a ridiculous powerlevel.
« Last Edit: April 01, 2014, 11:43:37 am by silverspawn »
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #94 on: April 01, 2014, 12:11:24 pm »
+1

I am not a big fan of young witch.  I probably ranked it way too low (it was in my bottom half), but I just don't see it at #6.  There are so many cards that make it unnecessary (at least on the first buy).  When I look at the top cards on this list, I want to look at those cards that you can't pass up on your 4/3 opening.  Any decent trashing is a good counter, and also any decent bane card prevents its attack.  Basically, it has the good sifting and combos well with tunnel, but that is about it.  I just really don't view it as a strong enough curser to rank it so high. 
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #95 on: April 01, 2014, 12:13:51 pm »
+2

I guess people haven't come to their senses on Sea Hag yet.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #96 on: April 01, 2014, 12:16:06 pm »
+4

I really don't get Sea Hag being #1. I am pretty sure i have a better win-rate-without than win-rate-with .
I'd say you can ignore it more than 50% of the time. Even lookout which is considered one of the weakest trashers is by far enough to ignore Hag. Yes top-decking the curse hurts But Having to play a Sea Hag that provides no benefit hurts yourself just as much. Whenever you can reliably get rid of the Curse later  i'd rather not buy a Hag.
I don't think it deserves a place in the Top 5.

The other four top 5 cards i agree very much on. (Not completely with the order though)

@HME
I think you are using Ironmonger wrong. You rarely want to buy it as a Village. Its main use is to speed up your early turns and make your deck persistent to late game issues. Ironmonger increases the chance of hitting 5 on your Turns 3 or 4 by more than any other $4- card there is. And it helps you cycle early. Those are huge benefits. Saying "it almoast never hurts"
is a big understatement.

@Silverspawn
Yes Cutpurse is just as good as Militia early on maybe even a slight bit better, but still Militia is the MUCH better card all in all.
1. It synergizes with cards like Councilroon,Covernor and Soothsayer
2. It hurts trimmed decks which are really common so much more than cutpurse.

Cutpurse is actually a little better in games that are a rush to $5 cost cards like Cultist, Rebuild, (Minion)
but not so much.

Maybe a difference of 23 ranks is too much, but they should still be far away from each other in my eyes.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #97 on: April 01, 2014, 01:17:30 pm »
0

I'm legitimately surprised to see Ironmonger at #5.  It's good but is it really that good?

For the people who are saying Sea Hag shouldn't be #1, where would you rank it?  Just wondering.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #98 on: April 01, 2014, 01:23:16 pm »
0

I'm legitimately surprised to see Ironmonger at #5.  It's good but is it really that good?

For the people who are saying Sea Hag shouldn't be #1, where would you rank it?  Just wondering.

#7 for me, though my opinion on the list has changed some since I made it. (I had Marauder at #3 which is just wrong)
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #99 on: April 01, 2014, 02:11:55 pm »
0

i have Hag on #8 Marauder on #9 and young Witch on #11 (but i'm really bad with young witch and the card might be just better)
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #100 on: April 01, 2014, 02:14:03 pm »
0

Ironmonger is where it deserves to be, but Bridge is overrated. And, why is Tournament ranked #2?
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #101 on: April 01, 2014, 03:00:23 pm »
+1

And, why is Tournament ranked #2?

That IS ridiculous. It should be #1.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #102 on: April 01, 2014, 04:17:45 pm »
+1

Markow, I think it is misleading to state that Sea Hag is so skippable that even the lowly Lookout is enough to pass it up.  Sea Hag is the prototypical example of where Lookout shines.  That and Ghost Ship, perhaps.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #103 on: April 01, 2014, 05:34:13 pm »
+1

I'm confused, can someone explain why Envoy is so much lower than Smithy?  It seems like there are many situations where Envoy is better, yet few where Smithy would be a clear cut winner. Am I missing something?
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #104 on: April 01, 2014, 05:37:05 pm »
0

Markow, I think it is misleading to state that Sea Hag is so skippable that even the lowly Lookout is enough to pass it up.  Sea Hag is the prototypical example of where Lookout shines.  That and Ghost Ship, perhaps.

Eh, I'm not so jazzed about Lookout when I'm playing 3-card hands.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #105 on: April 01, 2014, 05:38:53 pm »
0

I'm confused, can someone explain why Envoy is so much lower than Smithy?  It seems like there are many situations where Envoy is better, yet few where Smithy would be a clear cut winner. Am I missing something?

In essence, giving the opponent a choice of what you discard matters a lot of the time.  Smithy tends to be useful in more decks.  That said, I think they are too far apart on the list myself. Had them at 20 and 22. 

Speaking of which, I just noticed I had Quarry at 21, which is totally not where I put it so I guess the program messed up on me after all.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #106 on: April 01, 2014, 08:33:22 pm »
+1

Markow, I think it is misleading to state that Sea Hag is so skippable that even the lowly Lookout is enough to pass it up.  Sea Hag is the prototypical example of where Lookout shines.  That and Ghost Ship, perhaps.

Eh, I'm not so jazzed about Lookout when I'm playing 3-card hands.

One way to combat Ghost Ship is to build a slim, reliable engine.  Lookout is still not the best trasher, but it is certainly better against Ghost Ship.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #107 on: April 01, 2014, 08:38:13 pm »
0

I'm confused, can someone explain why Envoy is so much lower than Smithy?  It seems like there are many situations where Envoy is better, yet few where Smithy would be a clear cut winner. Am I missing something?

I ranked Envoy higher.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #108 on: April 02, 2014, 11:20:48 am »
0

Sea Hag is very good, but not as good as Tournament or Jack. Wandering Minstrel is not that good and I'm not even convinced that it's better than Worker's Village or Plaza, and Young Witch should probably be better than Ironmonger. Also, Caravan is not better than Marauder. Other than that, I pretty much agree with this list.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #109 on: April 02, 2014, 01:34:12 pm »
0

Sea Hag is very good, but not as good as Tournament or Jack. Wandering Minstrel is not that good and I'm not even convinced that it's better than Worker's Village or Plaza, and Young Witch should probably be better than Ironmonger. Also, Caravan is not better than Marauder. Other than that, I pretty much agree with this list.

If you can build a reliable engine with trashing, yes Worker's Village is better. But Wandering Minstrel can make engines happen with even the lightest trashing, or non at all sometimes. With WM, it's nearly impossible not to have an engine running quickly.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #110 on: April 02, 2014, 02:32:08 pm »
0

yea, man, wm is ridiculous. it's like a cartographer and a village combined. in an engine, a hand with 2 wm is almost guaranteed not to be dead, and it helps so much wth cycling. i even think #7 is too low, it's way better than wv

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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #111 on: April 06, 2014, 08:51:13 am »
+3

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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #112 on: April 06, 2014, 09:13:39 am »
0

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c4master

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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #113 on: April 06, 2014, 11:32:34 am »
+1

Can anyone explain to me, why Conspirator is so high?
It seems to be a "win more" card. Obviously, it's only some kind of payload to an engine. But if your engine works with conspirators, it would also work without them, or am I wrong? Plus, they still need a gaining/buy/attack to be able to catch up later on. And since you don't want your stop cards like Coppers and estates, you probably need at least decent trashing. I can't see how this card changes a game or makes me go engine where I wouldn't do it otherwise. Something like Warehouse/Worker's Villag/Conspirator must be kind of an edge case, or am I totally wrong here?
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #114 on: April 06, 2014, 04:08:45 pm »
+1

Can anyone explain to me, why Conspirator is so high?
It seems to be a "win more" card. Obviously, it's only some kind of payload to an engine. But if your engine works with conspirators, it would also work without them, or am I wrong? Plus, they still need a gaining/buy/attack to be able to catch up later on. And since you don't want your stop cards like Coppers and estates, you probably need at least decent trashing. I can't see how this card changes a game or makes me go engine where I wouldn't do it otherwise. Something like Warehouse/Worker's Villag/Conspirator must be kind of an edge case, or am I totally wrong here?

you're thinking way too complicated. there are a lot of boards on which you play 2+ action cards every turn, and on each of these boards conspirator is an extremely cost efficient card, basically a grand market for $4. so it's good.

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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #115 on: April 06, 2014, 05:13:09 pm »
0

Can anyone explain to me, why Conspirator is so high?
It seems to be a "win more" card. Obviously, it's only some kind of payload to an engine. But if your engine works with conspirators, it would also work without them, or am I wrong? Plus, they still need a gaining/buy/attack to be able to catch up later on. And since you don't want your stop cards like Coppers and estates, you probably need at least decent trashing. I can't see how this card changes a game or makes me go engine where I wouldn't do it otherwise. Something like Warehouse/Worker's Villag/Conspirator must be kind of an edge case, or am I totally wrong here?

you're thinking way too complicated. there are a lot of boards on which you play 2+ action cards every turn, and on each of these boards conspirator is an extremely cost efficient card, basically a grand market for $4. so it's good.
Conspirator doesn't have to be the star of the show. It let's you add money to a deck without reducing the decks reliability by all that much.

It's harder to have a deck centered around Conspirator, but again you don't need to go for such a deck on every board with Conspirator.

That said, I don't see it being as strong as I used to think it was.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #116 on: April 06, 2014, 05:14:57 pm »
+1

I'd like to add, however, that Grand Market without the +Buy is missing a key part of Grand Market's power: end game control.
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c4master

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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #117 on: April 07, 2014, 10:15:34 am »
0

I'd like to add, however, that Grand Market without the +Buy is missing a key part of Grand Market's power: end game control.
That's exactly what I mean. Plus, a grand market can work on it's own. Two Conspirators in your hand without a village/cantrip is just one dead card.

Ok, so Conspirator is pretty useful on many boards without being the key card. So I guess, it's a little bit overrated. Is that ok?
« Last Edit: April 07, 2014, 10:17:55 am by c4master »
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #118 on: April 07, 2014, 10:29:47 am »
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Conspirator is that good in engines. Outside of them, it's a card that might work, depending on the board.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #119 on: April 07, 2014, 08:31:27 pm »
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You know, I won't complain at Conspirator being 20th. I had it a bit lower, but it's still a good card. Great with Treasury.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #120 on: April 18, 2014, 04:26:19 am »
+1

Reflections and lessons learned on $4 cards.

(see my comments on the $1-$2 cards for my process of analyzing my rankings versus the new 2014 consensus rankings)
http://forum.dominionstrategy.com/index.php?topic=10578.msg368900#msg368900

The $4 cards for me were a real eye-opener in how different my rankings were than the new 2014 rankings.  I had more deviation in the $4 cards than I did in the $1-$2 or $3, or even the $5 cards as of today.  I’m still trying to digest this, but I’m thinking it may indicate I have a bit to learn on priorities of buys for early to mid game cards.  In some cases though I think I just had a hard time ranking the $4 cards appropriately.

My top 3 most overrated cards were:
Taxman - I had it in the middle of the pack.  On further consideration it belongs lower, but I think it is better than #45.
Death Cart - Yeah…I probably overrated it, and those ruins are bad, but sometimes the quick $5 spend is just so helpful…
Walled Village - Again I probably overrated it a few spots, but I still see all of the villages as enablers which are critical to making the engines work since a terminal draw without a village is an engine stopper.

My top 3 most underrated cards were:
Monument - A real surprise to me as I like the card, and use it a lot as an opener on a 4/3 draw.  I just felt there were some other stronger cards in mid to late game.  I would probably change my ranking on this if I were to do it again.
Ironworks - Another card I buy a lot…just a matter of how I ranked them.
Quarry - I have played a lot of Prosperity since it is one of the 4 sets I own IRL.  I certainly have used it a lot, but just didn’t consider it quite as much of a game changer as some of the other cards, but perhaps I need to reconsider.

After review, I decided my most underutilized $4 cards were:
Wandering Minstrel - Wow have I changed my mind on that!!  So much so that I just adopted it for my profile picture (more appropriate to my ID I think ; )  I simply had not explored its potential enough after a couple games where it bypassed golds or platinums.  Now I think of it as one of the real powerhouse engine cards.  I would definitely rank it a lot higher now.
Scavenger - I’ve certainly used it, but probably not as often as I should have.
Procession - I still need to explore this card more.  Just so hard to find a situation where I want to trash/upgrade an action card…or more likely I just need to get better at spotting the opportunities.

Where I still differ:
Sea Hag - A powerful card, but I just don’t see it at #1.  I had it at #4 personally.  Without an ability to trash or remodel it later, it too often becomes a dead card.
Young Witch - Likewise, a good card, but too often foiled by bane cards, and having to discard 2 cards is a pretty big penalty unless you are looking to do some sifting.  Was not in my top 10.
Tournament - I love this card.  Cornucopia is one of the IRL sets I own, and I have played a lot of it in 2, 3, and 4 person games.  The prizes are just so much fun, and so powerful that they are often game changers.  But…if you don’t quickly get to the first couple prizes, and your opponents get a few Provinces, they are often dead action cards.  I may be biased from 4 player games where that happens a lot more often, but I don’t see Tournament at #2.
Jack of All Trades - This was my #1.  I can see it might not deserve #1 since it can fade in later game, but it is just such a strong all-around opener and after-the-fact counter to attacks.  Just a lot of fun to play, so it got my fun vote!
Caravan and Militia - probably deserve to be a few spots higher in my humble opinion.  Oh…and Trader as well for both the silver generation when that is valuable, and for the reaction to turn curses into silvers.
« Last Edit: April 18, 2014, 04:28:36 am by 7string »
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Awaclus

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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #121 on: April 18, 2014, 04:51:52 am »
+1

Walled Village - Again I probably overrated it a few spots, but I still see all of the villages as enablers which are critical to making the engines work since a terminal draw without a village is an engine stopper.
You probably aren't overrating it, I think the villages should be a lot closer to each other on this list.
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serakfalcon

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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #122 on: April 18, 2014, 05:06:01 am »
0

Walled Village - Again I probably overrated it a few spots, but I still see all of the villages as enablers which are critical to making the engines work since a terminal draw without a village is an engine stopper.
You probably aren't overrating it, I think the villages should be a lot closer to each other on this list.

The standard deviation on all the cards is so high that you can't put too much emphasis on specific rankings, especially within 1 or 2 spots. If you look at ±1σ which is hardly a strong criteria the ranking is something like Workers Village & Plaza > (All other Villages) >= Walled Village.

At ±3σ we can basically be sure that Tournament is better than scout, and not much else.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #123 on: April 19, 2014, 02:40:58 am »
+3

At ±3σ we can basically be sure that Tournament is better than scout, and not much else.
The standard deviations listed here are the standard deviations of the votes given (at least, I assume so). The standard deviation of the mean of the votes is sqrt(n) times as small (where n is the number of votes), so on this list 11 times as small. This means that small differences are already quite significant on this list (which is not that strange with a sample size of >100).

For example, if we take "statistical significant" to mean ±3σ, then Tournament (#2) is statistical significantly rated higher by our community than Ironmonger (#5) (and also higher than all cards below Ironmonger1).

 >>> WARNING: MATH AHEAD <<<


This is because their difference in weighted average is
88.5 - 81.4 = 7.1
and the standard deviation of the difference (of the average) is2
σ = sqrt(14.9^2+18.9^2)/sqrt(121) = 2.2
So 0 is 3.2σ away from the mean, which means that Tournament is statistical significantly higher than Ironmonger.

----------
1 this does not follow automatically, since the standard deviations can be higher.
2 here I'm assuming that they are independent (or at least that their covariance is 0), which is not entirely correct, but close enough
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terminalCopper

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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #124 on: April 19, 2014, 04:32:32 am »
+5

Good analysis.

For example, if we take "statistical significant" to mean ±3σ

... which is a lot - as far as i can remember, in a gaussian distribiution, a corridor of ±2σ already covers roughly 95%. (Though, I haven't worked with concrete numbers for a while, feel free to correct me.)

>>> WARNING: MATH AHEAD <<<

I really like the delayed warning. Everything written above it is supposed to be trivial common knowledge, right? ;)
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serakfalcon

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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #125 on: April 19, 2014, 12:28:16 pm »
0

At ±3σ we can basically be sure that Tournament is better than scout, and not much else.
The standard deviations listed here are the standard deviations of the votes given (at least, I assume so). The standard deviation of the mean of the votes is sqrt(n) times as small (where n is the number of votes), so on this list 11 times as small. This means that small differences are already quite significant on this list (which is not that strange with a sample size of >100).

For example, if we take "statistical significant" to mean ±3σ, then Tournament (#2) is statistical significantly rated higher by our community than Ironmonger (#5) (and also higher than all cards below Ironmonger1).

 >>> WARNING: MATH AHEAD <<<


This is because their difference in weighted average is
88.5 - 81.4 = 7.1
and the standard deviation of the difference (of the average) is2
σ = sqrt(14.9^2+18.9^2)/sqrt(121) = 2.2
So 0 is 3.2σ away from the mean, which means that Tournament is statistical significantly higher than Ironmonger.

----------
1 this does not follow automatically, since the standard deviations can be higher.
2 here I'm assuming that they are independent (or at least that their covariance is 0), which is not entirely correct, but close enough

I spent some time thinking about it (much more time than I spent thinking about my previous post) and your point can't possibly be correct. For one, intuitively we know that all of the rankings are dependent on one another-- if you rank a card #1 you cannot possibly rank any other card #1 so the covariance cannot be zero-- every single mean is related to each other by virtue of the fact that no sample can give two cards the same rank... They are ranked lists and your math is treating each card rank as independent samples, which they most certainly are not...

My napkin-math can't be right either, because I was assuming the same thing you were (except I don't think your formula is right but I'm not a statistician). Now I'm not sure what the standard deviation means or how to use it to compare cards, just that it seems high for most cards relative to the means.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #126 on: April 19, 2014, 03:55:55 pm »
+1

>>> WARNING: MATH AHEAD <<<

since when do we give math warnings on this forum?
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #127 on: April 19, 2014, 04:31:05 pm »
+1

@serakfalcon: sure, my math wasn't exactly right, but my conclusion still stands. If we say that the correlation between the weighted average of two cards is approximately ρ = -0.1 (and I think it's closer to 0 than that), then the standard deviation of the difference is σ = 2.3, so that hardly matters, and Tournament is better than Ironmonger with a difference of more than 3σ's. Even in "the worst case", where the averages are perfectly anticorrelated, i.e. if ρ = -1, then σ = 3.1. Sure, then Ironmonger isn't 3σ's below Tournament anymore, but still more than 2σ, which is still a lot (as terminalCopper said), and this worst case is a ridiculous assumption.
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c4master

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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #128 on: April 22, 2014, 04:16:44 am »
0

So let's just consider every difference of more than 7% to be significant. ;)

Anyways, I really don't like sea hag on number 1.
Just yesterday, I had a game, I basically lost due to sea hag being so swingy. Both players started silver/sea hag. Bothe played their sea hag on turns 3 or 4. Both bought another sea hag. Well, my two sea hags collided on turn 6, my opponent's didn't. Since there was no trashing AND it was a duchy/duke game, I basically lost this on that moment. I was just pushed to a 6-4 or even 7-3 curse split. My opponent then picked up 5 duchies, and even if I managed to buy 5 dukes I would have lost (due to curses). If I would have been able to get 7 provinces I would still lose the game, bescause his dukes are worth 5 points and all he needed to do was buy one province to settle the game. Besides, it's really easier to buy 8 dukes than 7 provinces even if both had 5 curses.
I really prefer young witch as $4 curser except the rare cases where the bane card is a powerhouse.

Anyways, I underestimated quite some cards (like ironmonger).
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dondon151

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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #129 on: April 22, 2014, 05:49:19 am »
+1

I'd imagine that YW is even swingier than Sea Hag as a curser. Barring one Hag flipping the other, at least Sea Hag doesn't usually have a chance of missing entirely.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #130 on: April 22, 2014, 02:27:57 pm »
0

I feel like Sea Hag is one of the less swingy power cards in the game. In games where you buy it, it slows the game down, which makes each individual turn less impactful. Something like Wharf, on the other hand, makes the game like 10 turns long, so if you have one bad turn you lose.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #131 on: April 22, 2014, 03:05:53 pm »
0

I feel like Sea Hag is one of the less swingy power cards in the game. In games where you buy it, it slows the game down, which makes each individual turn less impactful. Something like Wharf, on the other hand, makes the game like 10 turns long, so if you have one bad turn you lose.

i agree, minus the claim that sea hag is a power card

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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #132 on: April 22, 2014, 04:41:07 pm »
+3

I feel like Sea Hag is one of the less swingy power cards in the game. In games where you buy it, it slows the game down, which makes each individual turn less impactful. Something like Wharf, on the other hand, makes the game like 10 turns long, so if you have one bad turn you lose.

i agree, minus the claim that sea hag is a power card

Sea Hag is absolutely a power card. Maybe not one of the very top $4 cards (although the group consensus says otherwise, but argument by majority means very little), but it's one of those cards you can't just ignore on a board without a good reason. If you leave Sea Hag and your opponent goes for it, you need something to deal with it, be it trashing, a fast(er) engine even in the face of cursing, or a Sea Hag of your own, or some other method to deal with it. If you don't have one of those things, and your opponent goes for Sea Hag, you will very likely lose.
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...spin-offs are still better for all of the previously cited reasons.
But not strictly better, because the spinoff can have a different cost than the expansion.

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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #133 on: April 22, 2014, 05:48:50 pm »
+1

I feel like Sea Hag is one of the less swingy power cards in the game. In games where you buy it, it slows the game down, which makes each individual turn less impactful. Something like Wharf, on the other hand, makes the game like 10 turns long, so if you have one bad turn you lose.

i agree, minus the claim that sea hag is a power card

Sea Hag is absolutely a power card. Maybe not one of the very top $4 cards (although the group consensus says otherwise, but argument by majority means very little), but it's one of those cards you can't just ignore on a board without a good reason. If you leave Sea Hag and your opponent goes for it, you need something to deal with it, be it trashing, a fast(er) engine even in the face of cursing, or a Sea Hag of your own, or some other method to deal with it. If you don't have one of those things, and your opponent goes for Sea Hag, you will very likely lose.

last time we had this argument you told me that sea hag is definitely one of the 4 best $4 cards. we're getting somehwere :P

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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #134 on: April 22, 2014, 05:58:56 pm »
0

I feel like Sea Hag is one of the less swingy power cards in the game. In games where you buy it, it slows the game down, which makes each individual turn less impactful. Something like Wharf, on the other hand, makes the game like 10 turns long, so if you have one bad turn you lose.

i agree, minus the claim that sea hag is a power card

Sea Hag is absolutely a power card. Maybe not one of the very top $4 cards (although the group consensus says otherwise, but argument by majority means very little), but it's one of those cards you can't just ignore on a board without a good reason. If you leave Sea Hag and your opponent goes for it, you need something to deal with it, be it trashing, a fast(er) engine even in the face of cursing, or a Sea Hag of your own, or some other method to deal with it. If you don't have one of those things, and your opponent goes for Sea Hag, you will very likely lose.

last time we had this argument you told me that sea hag is definitely one of the 4 best $4 cards. we're getting somehwere :P

Yeah, knowledge of the game has improved, based on what I've seen there's a few more ways to deal with it now, be it faster engines and stuff. Which means at the time, what I said was still correct relative to the metagame, and what I say now, I think is still correct relative to the slightly more advanced metagame. I'd say it's still very likely one of the top 4 $4's though.
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silverspawn

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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #135 on: April 22, 2014, 06:16:53 pm »
0

I feel like Sea Hag is one of the less swingy power cards in the game. In games where you buy it, it slows the game down, which makes each individual turn less impactful. Something like Wharf, on the other hand, makes the game like 10 turns long, so if you have one bad turn you lose.

i agree, minus the claim that sea hag is a power card

Sea Hag is absolutely a power card. Maybe not one of the very top $4 cards (although the group consensus says otherwise, but argument by majority means very little), but it's one of those cards you can't just ignore on a board without a good reason. If you leave Sea Hag and your opponent goes for it, you need something to deal with it, be it trashing, a fast(er) engine even in the face of cursing, or a Sea Hag of your own, or some other method to deal with it. If you don't have one of those things, and your opponent goes for Sea Hag, you will very likely lose.

last time we had this argument you told me that sea hag is definitely one of the 4 best $4 cards. we're getting somehwere :P

Yeah, knowledge of the game has improved, based on what I've seen there's a few more ways to deal with it now, be it faster engines and stuff. Which means at the time, what I said was still correct relative to the metagame, and what I say now, I think is still correct relative to the slightly more advanced metagame. I'd say it's still very likely one of the top 4 $4's though.

metagame is majority, if majority means little, it means little that your opinion was correct in the past metagame

aside from that, i am almost certain that sea hag isn't top 4. there are so many trashers, and almost all of them are enough to deal with sea hag. it is beyond me why anyone would rate it over JOAT

c4master

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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #136 on: April 23, 2014, 03:19:53 am »
0

I'd imagine that YW is even swingier than Sea Hag as a curser. Barring one Hag flipping the other, at least Sea Hag doesn't usually have a chance of missing entirely.
At least, YW does something for your economy AND it does some filtering which makes you see your witches more often, even if they collide.
Sea hag is swingy because it can collide for no benefit at all and it can be skipped by your opponent.

@silverspawn: I agree on Jack being much stronger than sea hag.

With Steward or Jack on the board, I might ignore both of the cursers. Depends a little bit on what you're planning to do.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #137 on: April 23, 2014, 10:44:16 am »
0

aside from that, i am almost certain that sea hag isn't top 4. there are so many trashers, and almost all of them are enough to deal with sea hag.
The following trashers have no way of dealing with Sea Hag:

Mine, Moneylender, Counterfeit, Rebuild, Procession

The following trash-for-benefit cards gain you very little for trashing curses (and significantly more for trashing Sea Hags):

Remodel, Remake, Salvager, Apprentice, Transmute (Expand does at least get you a Silver, but again it gets you far more when used on a Sea Hag).
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #138 on: April 23, 2014, 11:00:13 am »
+1

aside from that, i am almost certain that sea hag isn't top 4. there are so many trashers, and almost all of them are enough to deal with sea hag.
The following trashers have no way of dealing with Sea Hag:

Mine, Moneylender, Counterfeit, Rebuild, Procession

The following trash-for-benefit cards gain you very little for trashing curses (and significantly more for trashing Sea Hags):

Remodel, Remake, Salvager, Apprentice, Transmute (Expand does at least get you a Silver, but again it gets you far more when used on a Sea Hag).
Well, chapel and forge get you very little for trashing curses, too - at least remake here definitely deals with the curses fine. The main point of being able to deal with curses is just getting them out of your deck, and so while I grant you that some of these don't do it very effectively (remodel is the big thing here), the point isn't how many trashers DON'T deal with them effectively, it's how many that DO. You can treat the bad trashers like any other kingdom card. The question is how many effective ways exist in the game, or more specifically how likely one of them is to be on the same board with your Sea Hag. Chapel, Masquerade, Steward, Upgrade, Ambassador, Lookout, Forge, Remake, Jack, Forager, Hermit, Junk Dealer, Mercenary all deal with the Hag quite well, and then there are several others that are so-so. Even if we just take these, that's 13 good ways of dealing with it, or close to 50% of full random kingdoms right there. Throw in that most any other curser also tends to outshine hag, you can occasionally outrace or slog it, and there are lots and lots of partial answers (rats, T4B, even things like trade route, develop et al in good engines), and Hag is usually not going to be amazing.

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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #139 on: April 23, 2014, 02:22:30 pm »
+3

Chapel, Masquerade, Steward, Upgrade, Ambassador, Lookout, Forge, Remake, Jack, Forager, Hermit, Junk Dealer, Mercenary all deal with the Hag quite well
It's true that these cards deal well with hag ... but only few of them really turn it into a bad card (namely: masq, amb, jack, forager, lookout). With all the others, I will often buy both the hag and the trasher; it's a 50-50-decision with Remake, Hermit, Junk Dealer, Upgrade or Mercenary on board; and with Steward, Chapel or Forge being the only (decent) trasher I will mostly go for the hag anyway. Let me explain these three:

- Steward/Hag was one of the strongest openings on councilroom, as far as I can remember ahead of Steward/Silver or Steward/Steward.
- If chapel is on board, hagging late is great: Just wait till your opp has trimmed his deck.
- Forge is brilliant after the curse war. But if it's the only decent trasher and you plan to ignore sea hag to trash the curses later - well, good luck.

Hag is usually not going to be amazing.


Depends on the meaning of "usually": I'd say that hag is skippable 40% of the time, quite good on 30% of all boards, and the board-dominant powerhouse in 30% of all games. That's a lot.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #140 on: April 24, 2014, 09:09:05 am »
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There has been very few times where I've regretted opening hag when my opponents does.  No matter what is on the board.
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c4master

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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #141 on: April 24, 2014, 10:35:14 am »
+1

There has been very few times where I've regretted opening hag when my opponents does.  No matter what is on the board.

Almost any 3-player-game.
Losing the curse split 10-5-5 is not halfway as bad as losing it 10-0. ;)

@terminalCopper:
What about Watchtower or maybe even Horse Trader?
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #142 on: April 24, 2014, 10:41:15 am »
0

Quote
Almost any 3-player-game.
Losing the curse split 10-5-5 is not halfway as bad as losing it 10-0. ;)

That is true however you are taking a gamble. If the curses split 10-7-3 then there's usually only one winner.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #143 on: April 24, 2014, 11:48:43 am »
0

There has been very few times where I've regretted opening hag when my opponents does.  No matter what is on the board.

That doesn't really mean anything. You can say the same thing about Scout. In the rare game where we BOTH buy Scout, it's probably actually non-terrible. And even if it is, we're both making the same mistake, so I can't blame a loss on that purchase.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #144 on: April 24, 2014, 12:01:50 pm »
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Yes my statement could be made about any card, this is true.  But it points out how rare a situation there is where not opening hag when your opponent does is the right play.

Making the same mistake as your opponent is not always the same across the board.  It hurts much less to make a wrong sea hag opening then lets say a wrong silver opening because there are many more choices with the latter later on in the game.  Sea hag has one purpose.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #145 on: April 24, 2014, 12:09:57 pm »
+1

^It doesn't really point to how rarely it occurs. You conditioned on the fact that you both opened Hag.

What you should be talking about are times when one player opened Hag and the other didn't. This will say more about the strength of Hag.
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silverspawn

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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #146 on: April 24, 2014, 12:14:57 pm »
0

^It doesn't really point to how rarely it occurs. You conditioned on the fact that you both opened Hag.

What you should be talking about are times when one player opened Hag and the other didn't. This will say more about the strength of Hag.

this happens a lot actually, even against good opponents. it used to happen even more often. i don't have stats about it, but i'm pretty sure i won the majority of these games. sea hag - just - isnt - good

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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #147 on: April 24, 2014, 12:33:50 pm »
+2

^I would imagine it happens a lot in 2 skill regions, with differing results.
1. At very low levels, some people don't respect the strength of cursing, and the player with the curser wins easily.
2. At some medium-high level, people are aware of these rankings, and one player buys Sea Hag because it's #1, while the other player thinks about the actual strategy and realizes you can just trash the curses, so it's not worth opening a negative-tempo card. In this case, the Sea Hag loses.

Now you will see good players say Sea Hag is "terrible" because they only play in situation 2 when they play down to someone who thinks Sea Hag is the best $4 card, and in mirrors. So in all the non-mirrors, Sea Hag is bad. And there's a lot of them since it's overrated.

But really Sea Hag is not that bad *overall*. You still actually have to buy it well over half the time, to avoid ending up in situation (1), which is worth something.

My statement 2 posts ago isn't quite correct. I meant that you should *also* consider non-mirror situations, not that you should consider them exclusively, as that has the same kind of pitfalls as only looking at mirrors.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #148 on: April 24, 2014, 03:27:06 pm »
+6

That is true however you are taking a gamble. If the curses split 10-7-3 then there's usually only one winner.
Even if the Curses split 0-0-0, there's usually only one winner.
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c4master

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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #149 on: April 25, 2014, 05:28:21 am »
0

^I would imagine it happens a lot in 2 skill regions, with differing results.
1. At very low levels, some people don't respect the strength of cursing, and the player with the curser wins easily.
2. At some medium-high level, people are aware of these rankings, and one player buys Sea Hag because it's #1, while the other player thinks about the actual strategy and realizes you can just trash the curses, so it's not worth opening a negative-tempo card. In this case, the Sea Hag loses.

Now you will see good players say Sea Hag is "terrible" because they only play in situation 2 when they play down to someone who thinks Sea Hag is the best $4 card, and in mirrors. So in all the non-mirrors, Sea Hag is bad. And there's a lot of them since it's overrated.

But really Sea Hag is not that bad *overall*. You still actually have to buy it well over half the time, to avoid ending up in situation (1), which is worth something.

My statement 2 posts ago isn't quite correct. I meant that you should *also* consider non-mirror situations, not that you should consider them exclusively, as that has the same kind of pitfalls as only looking at mirrors.

That would mean, there is a board with at most light trashing an no other junking than sea hag, since I would prefer almost any other junking attack. Man, I don't think that's more than 50% of all Sea Hag boards. Not even close. And that's only true for 2-player-matches.

Taking into account that Sea Hag can be a real trap, people are more often buying it when they shouldn't than not buying it when they should. That's probably true for most attacks...

I don't see Hag being so strong. ;)
« Last Edit: April 25, 2014, 05:29:25 am by c4master »
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terminalCopper

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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #150 on: April 25, 2014, 06:56:08 am »
+1

I would prefer almost any other junking attack.

If so, you are probably underestimating the topdecking. For example, I think, in average, Sea Hag is stronger than a card saying "Each opponent gains a curse and discards down to three" would be.

A comparison to other junk attacks:

- I can hardly imagine a game where I would prefer Marauder or Young Witch, even without a bane.
- If Soothsayer/Witch/IGGs is on board, om 4/3, I might open Hag anyway, and get the "better version" at the next opportunity.
- if there are no other potion cards, I prefer to get two hags than a potion and three familiars.

The ones I agree are Mountebank and Cultist.
Cultist is so terrible that getting 5$ has absolute priority. Mountebank is imho slightly weaker, but it antisynergizes with hags cursing, so it's probably wrong to get both.

Man, I don't think that's more than 50% of all Sea Hag boards. Not even close.

 
You still actually have to buy it well over half the time, to avoid ending up in situation (1)

Let me try to provide an analysis as a starting point:

If I skip the Hag

95% in the presence of Lookout, masq, forager, amb, jack, mountebank, cultist (7 cards),

otherwise, 50% in the presence of hermit, remake, junk dealer, upgrade, Urchin, Trader, Lighthouse (7 cards),

otherwise, 20% in the presence of Soothsayer, Witch, familiar, Watchtower, Moat (5 cards),

and in 5% of the rest of all kingdoms,

according to this -barring edge cases with black market or young witch-

I will skip the hag in

0.95* (1-( (197 choose 9) / (204 choose 9))
+ 0.5* ( (197 choose 9 / 204 choose 9) )* (1- (190 choose 9 / 197 choose 9))
+ 0.2* (190 choose 9 / 204 choose 9) *  (1- (185 choose 9 / 190 choose 9))
+0.05 * (185 choose 9 / 204 choose 9)

=0.95*27.43+0.5*20.52+0.2*11.32+0.05*40.72= 40.6 % of all games <=>

buy at least one hag in 59.4 % of all games.

That makes me curious to know: where are the major disagreements? :)
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c4master

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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #151 on: April 25, 2014, 07:53:39 am »
0

Good point. ;)

I would also skip Sea Hag on boards with Marauder or Young Witch, maybe Trading Post.

And on boards with Junk Dealer, Hermit, Upgrade or Steward I'm more likely than 50% to skip the Hag. But still, this would be roughly 50% of all boards with Hag, right?

So I guess, I had a wrong estimation of the frequency of these boards.

edit: And there's the opening. Yet, I'm not sure whether opening splits encourage or disencourage Sea Hag.
« Last Edit: April 25, 2014, 07:55:33 am by c4master »
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silverspawn

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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #152 on: April 25, 2014, 09:23:48 am »
0

sea hag is kind of terrible at what it does, but what it does is dealing out curses, and that alone is enough to domninate quite a few boards. so, in terms of this list, it's still fairly high, but i refuse to call it a power card. if it's good, it's only good because the board is msising crucial elements.

I guess, if "good" means "above average among all 4$ cards" and if "above average" means "you buy it more often than a random other 4$ card", then it's a good card, slave to the defition.
« Last Edit: April 25, 2014, 09:25:30 am by silverspawn »
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #153 on: April 25, 2014, 11:13:11 am »
+7

Sea Hag is not 'kind of terrible' at what it does. It's kind of incredible at what it does, which is choking up the opponent, second to probably only Mountebank. The thing to argue against it compared to other cursers is that it gives you no benefit.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #154 on: April 25, 2014, 05:51:07 pm »
+2



I would also skip Sea Hag on boards with Marauder or Young Witch, maybe Trading Post.



Why would you skip Sea Hag because of Marauder?
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c4master

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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #155 on: April 26, 2014, 03:58:26 am »
0



I would also skip Sea Hag on boards with Marauder or Young Witch, maybe Trading Post.



Why would you skip Sea Hag because of Marauder?

Marauder gives me a bonus (Spoils), Sea Hag doesn't.
Also, the Sea Hag player is not faster than the Marauder player, because Sea Hag discards one card.
So they are both at equal Speed except that the Marauder player has the  pretty good chance to hit $5 or $6 with his Spoils on turns 5-7 or so. Maybe I'm wrong, but my intuition says, that's usually better than the Hag.

----

edit:

Of course, Sea Hag could also skip Marauder or the Spoils in less then 20% of all cases. That would be really bad, espacially if the Marauder was skipped. But I'd go for the risk and be pretty save in more than 80% of these cases. On the other hand, Sea Hag could skip the curse which is very good for the Marauder player.
Spoils being a one-shot-gold is actually helping the Marauder player to play his Marauder more often. If it was a gold, he might be more weakened by not junking the opponent than strengthened by the gold. Again, I'm not sure about that.
« Last Edit: April 26, 2014, 04:04:28 am by c4master »
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terminalCopper

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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #156 on: April 26, 2014, 07:54:38 am »
0

So, let's have a look at "Marauder vs. Hag".

If you play one marauder per turn, it gives you "+3$" at the expense of one random card each turn - starting with the next turn. Hag immediately discards a random card and replaces it with a useless curse (Ignoring the huge variance between discarding marauder or a curse, which probably helps the hag player by a margin).
Taking the different junk attacks into account, one might summarize the differences as follows:

1.) Marauder has +3 instead of two random cards

2.) Maurauder has slight speed downsides  (+3 is delayed by one turn, while one of the random cards is discarded right now)

3.) Marauder doesn't deal curses but ruins

To analyze these effects, consider two extreme cases, the very good and the very bad kingdom.

In a very strong kingdom, both players tend to have strong decks with an average above 1.5$ / card. Thus, point 1 is enough to prefer the hag.

In a very weak kingdom - example given, a two-card kingdom with nothing but the hag and the marauder - it's a little more complicated. Looking exclusively at point 1 favors marauder, as the average buying power might stay below 1/card during the whole game.
On the other hand, there's two big downsides.
The first one is that there won't be many shuffles, the spoils obtained in the last turn will be useless, and if e.g. 2 out of 10 spoils you gain throughout the game are dead, this decreases their value by 20% (or even more than 20% because of the missed compound interest dominion offers).
The second one is, that in a slog the difference between curses and ruins is BIG. On the one hand, ruins can provide small advantages; and more important, 1 VP in a slog is A LOT. Just compare duchess to monument ... or take into account the following example: If one player gets -10 VP, and he ends the game with 6 duchies, while his opponent grabs only 2 duchies and 3 estates, he will be down by one point anyway.

I agree that marauder's "+3 next turn" might have more economic impact than two missed random cards; and it is possible, that this economic advantage is even stronger than the downsides by
"-20% on spoils" and "curses never help, ruins do so occasionally". But all in all, I can hardly believe that the small remaining economic advantage for the marauder player compensates 10 VP.

In a middling kingdom, I can't fully guarantee that the interpolation between "very strong" and "very weak" kingdom works correctly in favor of Sea Hag; there might be some rare exceptions.

But in most scenarios, I think that the Hag is clearly better than Marauder.
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c4master

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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #157 on: April 26, 2014, 08:22:58 am »
0

To deal all the curses/ruins in this example, you would have to play like 30 turns or so. Apparently this doesn't happen very often. Even if it does, it would easily mean a lead of 1-2 Provinces for the Marauder player.

So, we have to rather compare kingdoms where you don't play just a junk and money slog. I just feel better about the economy provided by Marauder. You could buy such a nice $5 card as a Carthographer, for example. This will make a huge difference. Other examples are INN, Stables, Labs, or maybe even Vault or Hunting Party. Most of them are really crucial to get ASAP, either to play your Marauder more often or to get use of your junk.

It's not easy to evaluate, but I feel like hitting $5 or more is very important in many kingdoms.
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silverspawn

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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #158 on: April 26, 2014, 03:54:11 pm »
0

So, let's have a look at "Marauder vs. Hag".

If you play one marauder per turn, it gives you "+3$" at the expense of one random card each turn - starting with the next turn. Hag immediately discards a random card and replaces it with a useless curse (Ignoring the huge variance between discarding marauder or a curse, which probably helps the hag player by a margin).
Taking the different junk attacks into account, one might summarize the differences as follows:

1.) Marauder has +3 instead of two random cards

2.) Maurauder has slight speed downsides  (+3 is delayed by one turn, while one of the random cards is discarded right now)

3.) Marauder doesn't deal curses but ruins

To analyze these effects, consider two extreme cases, the very good and the very bad kingdom.

In a very strong kingdom, both players tend to have strong decks with an average above 1.5$ / card. Thus, point 1 is enough to prefer the hag.

In a very weak kingdom - example given, a two-card kingdom with nothing but the hag and the marauder - it's a little more complicated. Looking exclusively at point 1 favors marauder, as the average buying power might stay below 1/card during the whole game.
On the other hand, there's two big downsides.
The first one is that there won't be many shuffles, the spoils obtained in the last turn will be useless, and if e.g. 2 out of 10 spoils you gain throughout the game are dead, this decreases their value by 20% (or even more than 20% because of the missed compound interest dominion offers).
The second one is, that in a slog the difference between curses and ruins is BIG. On the one hand, ruins can provide small advantages; and more important, 1 VP in a slog is A LOT. Just compare duchess to monument ... or take into account the following example: If one player gets -10 VP, and he ends the game with 6 duchies, while his opponent grabs only 2 duchies and 3 estates, he will be down by one point anyway.

I agree that marauder's "+3 next turn" might have more economic impact than two missed random cards; and it is possible, that this economic advantage is even stronger than the downsides by
"-20% on spoils" and "curses never help, ruins do so occasionally". But all in all, I can hardly believe that the small remaining economic advantage for the marauder player compensates 10 VP.

In a middling kingdom, I can't fully guarantee that the interpolation between "very strong" and "very weak" kingdom works correctly in favor of Sea Hag; there might be some rare exceptions.

But in most scenarios, I think that the Hag is clearly better than Marauder.

yea, it's a nice try, but not a complete abstraction of real games. firstly, the difference between ruins and curses can be anywhere between huge and non existent, depending on how you deal with them and how much usage you can take out of the ruins. but more importantly, the "2 random cards for $3" thing just doesn't work; with marauder you get to 5$ faster and then things become way more complicated

terminalCopper

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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #159 on: April 28, 2014, 01:26:31 am »
0


yea, it's a nice try,
Thx :)
but not a complete abstraction of real games.
Of course.
firstly, the difference between ruins and curses can be anywhere between huge and non existent, depending on how you deal with them
Yeah, that's the huge question. Whenever it's easy to get rid of curses, Hag is clearly worse than Marauder. In other words:

So, we have to rather compare kingdoms where you don't play just a junk and money slog. I just feel better about the economy provided by Marauder.
If you have Hag and Marauder, but no slog, there has to be strong trashing. Given this, I agree, that Marauder is the better card.

However, I was analysing a two-card-kingdom, or more general, a kingdom without trashing, where Hag and Marauder are the dominant cards. Usually, I will buy two hags asap, and if I don't get mirrored, throw in a third one later to make sure I give you all the curses. I suppose if someone prefers Marauder he will likely do the same.
With such a brutal junking performance, both ruins and curses will be out before T20, and both players will go for the duchies much earlier.


2 random cards for $3" thing just doesn't work; with marauder you get to 5$ faster and then things become way more complicated
 

Yeah, "2 random cards for $3" is just approximating the average, not the variance. I agree that the Marauder player has the higher variance and will yield $5 more often; but on the other hand, hag is excellent in reducing an opponents hand to $2. If you doubt about that just look at

http://forum.dominionstrategy.com/index.php?topic=9913.0
where Robz produces 2$ for 15 turns in a row ...

So, I'd like to show that in a slog, the increased chance of Marauder to get to $5 won't matter a lot, for the following reasons:

- it won't be useful that soon.
Say, after T4 you have gained two silvers, two Marauders, a spoil and a curse. You will use the curse in T5-T7 to get a $5-card, and you will use it for the first time in T8-T11...
if nothing goes wrong. If the spoil or the Marauder misses the shuffle or gets discarded, if the spoil shows up with less than two coppers (not that uncommon with 3 estates, 2 marauders, one curse and a 4-card-hand after being hagged), your first play will be delayed to T12 or higher. Every shuffle takes a long time, briefly: You can't swap the game because of a $5-card you will use three times.

-the chance to hit $5 is not THAT much higher
Example given, the hag player that gains one ruin, 2 hags and 2 silvers in T1-T4 will have a total of  $11 for T5-T7. It sounds way better to have a spoil leading to §14 (for 16 cards); but during T3-T7 you will suffer from three hag attacks. There's so many ways it can damage your economy, but let me just pick out a seemingly harmless examle: If I replace a copper in T3 by a curse, what will that do? If your hand goes down from $5 to $4, it sucks. If it goes down from $3 to $2, you don't get that silver. If you have $3 instead of $4 you might not get your second marauder ...

- the Hag player will get $3 more reliably
The simple reason is that he will never play a 4card-hand. But there's some other little helping friends, namely abandoned mine, ruined library, survivors or even ruined market (for a free copper).
Well, if you get to 5$ on one hand, but only 2$ on the other, this might be fine in an engine. But in a slog, having 2 silvers is often stronger than a 5$ card, and if it's weaker, not by that much.

I agree that if it wasn't for the curse/ruins thing, Marauder would be the better card. But in a slog, even if there remains a small economic advantage, i am sure that it won't be enough to compensate -10 VP.
 

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c4master

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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #160 on: April 28, 2014, 09:43:11 am »
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@terminalCopper:
1) The example-game has been discussed and I think Robz has made some mistakes (too less coins, too many action cards). Plus, what really hurt was the Lookout that only trashed good cards (copper) instead of bad ones. With a marauder, this would have been no big deal, since you would have some economy due to the spoils. So I guess, this example shows nothing about Sea Hag.

2)Let's assume a slog like you did. I'm not quite sure about that second marauder, but I guess it will help. By turn 5 you have 11 coppers, 2 silver and a spoils totalling $19 of buying power in your deck. Your deck probably has 16 cards, maybe 17 if the Hag player got a bit lucky. That's more than $1 per card! I really don't want to calculate the variance here, but getting $5 or more within the next 3 turns should be more than likely at least two times. I really can't believe that getting two $5 cards by turn 7-9 won't change A LOT compared to two silvers (also the hag player might stall into $2 hands...but let's not assume this). For convenience, just name five $5 action cards that won't change this slog game enough, if you get two and your opponent none.

3) You will need $5 hands (or better) to win the game unless there is $3 or $4 VP cards. Of course, the hag player could aggressively buy estates to end the game befor turn 20. But then, the Marauder player could just stop playing his marauders when there are 4 ruins left. These extra turns will probably be enough to spike two provinces later on. Even worse: the hag player probably needs 3 hags to deal all 10 curses before turn 20 if there is no support.

With any kind of sifting, the marauder will do even better: Discarding real crap (curses) into some maybe really good cards (spoils) is much better than discarding mostly crap (ruins) into some decent cards like silver.
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terminalCopper

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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #161 on: April 28, 2014, 11:25:59 am »
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By turn 5 you have 11 coppers, 2 silver and a spoils totalling $19 of buying power in your deck. Your deck probably has 16 cards, maybe 17 if the Hag player got a bit lucky. That's more than $1 per card! I really don't want to calculate the variance here, but getting $5 or more within the next 3 turns should be more than likely at least two times. I really can't believe that getting two $5 cards by turn 7-9 won't change A LOT compared to two silvers (also the hag player might stall into $2 hands...but let's not assume this). For convenience, just name five $5 action cards that won't change this slog game enough, if you get two and your opponent none.
I don't get that ... ?!
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c4master

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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #162 on: April 28, 2014, 03:16:11 pm »
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By turn 5 you have 11 coppers, 2 silver and a spoils totalling $19 of buying power in your deck. Your deck probably has 16 cards, maybe 17 if the Hag player got a bit lucky. That's more than $1 per card! I really don't want to calculate the variance here, but getting $5 or more within the next 3 turns should be more than likely at least two times. I really can't believe that getting two $5 cards by turn 7-9 won't change A LOT compared to two silvers (also the hag player might stall into $2 hands...but let's not assume this). For convenience, just name five $5 action cards that won't change this slog game enough, if you get two and your opponent none.
I don't get that ... ?!

Math. Let's do it. Well, I just miscalculated. But anyways, it's $18 which is still more than $1 per card.

Btw. There are more than five $5 cards that won't change a lot (e.g. Stash), but still the majority does change things.
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #163 on: April 28, 2014, 03:36:51 pm »
+4

Both Marauder and Sea Hag are good cards.  In fact, if I were to play a game with both Marauder and Sea Hag I would actually want both of them!  Why both?  If you ignore 1 of them you are likely to be exceptionally more bogged down in junk than your opponent.  With 2 piles then empty your opponent is in a significantly better position to opportunely 3-pile.

In this type of game, I open Marauder.  Why, I want to get that Spoils ASAP.  In most cases it will lead to a power $5 or Gold.  Either of those will help your future buys be better than Silver.  In turns 3 or 4, I get a Hag.  You can't ignore cursing because the -VP is very significant.  If you get it later than turns 3 or 4 you look to lose the curse split quite significantly (assuming opponent opened Marauder).

Marauder and Sea Hag are functionally different in what they bring to a Kingdom but when together they both function to provide endgame 3-pile control.  Marauder both Junks and gives you a spike in buying power.  Sea Hag does nothing to help you but gives your opponent -VP.  If you ignore 1 of them you will probably lose.  Even though they are both $4-cost junkers they are significantly different in what they bring to a deck.  To ignore one would be perilous.

« Last Edit: April 28, 2014, 03:58:40 pm by shark_bait »
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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #164 on: April 28, 2014, 04:28:00 pm »
+3

Seems like people are arguing 2 different things. The original statement that started this discussion was that you should skip Hag when Marauder is on the board. This is not the same as Marauder > Hag. I think Marauder is probably better than Hag, but alone is not a reason to skip Hag.
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terminalCopper

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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #165 on: April 28, 2014, 04:29:04 pm »
0

By turn 5 you have 11 coppers, 2 silver and a spoils totalling $19 of buying power in your deck. Your deck probably has 16 cards, maybe 17 if the Hag player got a bit lucky. That's more than $1 per card! I really don't want to calculate the variance here, but getting $5 or more within the next 3 turns should be more than likely at least two times. I really can't believe that getting two $5 cards by turn 7-9 won't change A LOT compared to two silvers (also the hag player might stall into $2 hands...but let's not assume this). For convenience, just name five $5 action cards that won't change this slog game enough, if you get two and your opponent none.
I don't get that ... ?!

Math. Let's do it. Well, I just miscalculated. But anyways, it's $18 which is still more than $1 per card.

Your 1$-error irritated me less than the idea to have 11 coppers at T5. I will probably have to ask Celestial Chameleon how that could happen ... ?! :)

I want to get that Spoils ASAP.  In most cases it will lead to a power $5 or Gold. 

I know there has been previous discussions about Marauder being slow or not ... as I could not believe that there's a meaningful economic difference between marauding and hagging early on, I went for some calculations again:

The chance on hitting $5 till T3/4


a) Assume that P1 opens marauder/silver and P2 opens hag/silver. Obviously, on T3/4 the economics are completely symmetric.
b) Assume the same with P1 being the hag player. Now, there's a 5/12 chance that a card P2 wants to play will be replaced by a curse, which disables gaining a 5$, if

- a silver is discarded, and there are 3 coppers (probability: 1/12 * [   (7 choose 3)* (4 choose 1) ] / (11 choose 4)) = 0.03535
- a silver is discarded, and there are 4 coppers (probability: 1/12 * [   (7 choose 4)* (4 choose 0) ] / (11 choose 4)) =  0.0088
- a copper is discarded, and there are 4 coppers (probability: 7/12 * [  (6 choose 4)* (5 choose 0) ] / (11 choose 4)) = 0.0265
- a copper is discarded, and there is silver +2 coppers (probability: 7/12 * [  (6 choose 2)* (4 choose 1) ] / (11 choose 4)) = 0.106

all in all, it's 5/12 *(0.03535+0.0088+0.0265+0.106) =0.0736 =>
the chance of P1 to disable gaining a $5 on T3 with the hag is 7.36%. In other words, if P1 goes for the hag, his chance to hit $5 on T3/4 is 7.36% higher.

The chance of hitting $5 before T8 (after the second reshuffle)

It's way too complicated to wade through all the imaginable outcomes of T1-T4, so, for the sake of simplicity, let's say that no hag or marauder will collide or be discarded, and one player gained 2hags + 2silvers + a ruin, the other gained 2 marauders + 2silvers + a curse+ a spoil.
That is a total economy
for the hag player: 11$ in 15 cards = 0.733.. per card
for the marauder player: 14$ in 16 cards = 0.875 per card.

Sounds like a huge difference, right?

Well, stopping the analysis for T3/4 right here would be almost as wrong as analysing militia without the attack. Once again, the discard attack should not be mitigated... if the hags don't collide  in 3 turns(we've made that assumption for the marauders as well, so that's quite fair), 2 out of 15 cards will be discarded. That means that every card has a chance to "survive" of roughly 13/15, and so, the marauder player will rather face an average buying power of 0.875 * 13/15 = 0.75833.. per card. Yeah, that's a little more than the hag player has - namely 3.79.. vs. 3.666.. coins per hand...

but we haven't finished yet. By now, we have only taken into account the risk of destroying a $5-purchase at T3/4, not the  risk of discarding the marauder in the first shuffle (not huge, but 8.33% is more than 0). If a hag on T3 cuts down a hand from $3 to $2, calculations would have worked differently as well ... and we also didn't look at the small advantages abandoned mine or survivors might provide (even ruined library could help, if it's worth to take the risk). I am not really sure how well the sum of these subtle differences compete the difference between 3.79.. vs. 3.666. If you want me to guess,  the risk of a discarded marauder on its own is more than enough economic compensation for the small difference in average buying power without these subtleties.

Conclusion:
Before T8, two marauders don't have better buying power against two hags. If P1 has the hags, he is even more likely to hit $5 before T8. In a nutshell: Marauder's benefit is slow, Sea Hags topdecking is immediate.

After the third reshuffle

Finally, if no marauder was discarded, the marauder player will start this round with one more spoil. This adds +3$ at the expense of one slot, so it might add +2$ to the hand. So yeah, this might give a $5-card instead of a silver...

Just remember, there's very heavy junking, about 22 cards have been shuffled, and before the next shuffle, it's going to be like 27....thus, before the game ends, there might be only 2 or 3 occasions to benefit from that spoil; and only 1 or 2 occasions to play a $5 instead of a silver. That won't compensate -10 VP, regardless how strong the 5$-card is.



3) You will need $5 hands (or better) to win the game

Of course, the hag player is able to get $5 on its own. Example given, as mentioned, we have $11 in 15 cards, and the only way to distribute 11 coins among 3 hands without getting a 5$ is to split them 4$-4$-3$. Hitting 5$ gets even more probable with every shuffle.

  In fact, if I were to play a game with both Marauder and Sea Hag I would actually want both of them!

You might be right that getting one of both is the best strategy. And you are definitely right, that if both players open hag, the next thing to purchase is a marauder (and vice versa). However, the original discussion arose from c4masters thesis that one should skip Sea Hag on (most) boards with marauder.




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c4master

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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #166 on: April 29, 2014, 01:59:35 am »
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@terminalCopper: Your calculations are pretty well and they nearly convinved me...
I am still missing the high variance vs. low variance thing. And the Hag player being P1 makes a significant difference. If it was P2, things would change in favor of P1 again.

I do accept your point: The game might end on a three-pile when the Marauder player has still not enough points to catch up.

You should absolutely be aware of that.
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shark_bait

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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #167 on: April 29, 2014, 09:59:44 am »
0

.... lots of math

For Marauder, it's more about Variance and less about a measely $0.1/card higher than Hag.  The entirety of that difference is in a single Spoils.  Yeah, the average isn't much higher but you can be sure that whatever hand has the Spoils will be better than any hand in the Sea Hag's deck.

And yes, I actually didn't read through everything.  I skimmed and saw tons of discussion on Marauder/Sea Hag stuff.  So I decided to just chime in.
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c4master

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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #168 on: April 29, 2014, 10:18:08 am »
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Now that I've got the "thyme" ;) to answer not as short as last time, I'll explain a little bit.

First, my error counting the $s was a result of this: You've got 7 Coppers and two silvers, that's $11. I actually counted the silvers twice by thinking these $11 would all be Coppers. Well, and after that, I just added $8 instaed of $7 for two silvers and a spoils.

Second, I'm not sure whether I would get a second Marauder over a third silver. Nor is it clear, that I want that silver instead of any $2 or $3 action card. I think, a Marauder player is more likely to do well with a sifting card such as Cellar or Warehouse than a Hag player. So strictly saying, both players get 2 attack cards and two silvers is surely not the best idea.
the Hag player really needs to buy at least two silver in order to get his economy running. The Marauder player doesn't necessarily have to do so. So, if there is cool stuff at a level of $3 or $2, the Marauder player might be favorised. If there is no easy card, I want to get, hitting $5 is still easier for the Marauder because then he buys only one Marauder and 3 silvers  netting him roughly 90% chance to hit $5 at least once before turn 8.

Third, why is the Hag player going first? Most of it's advantage is due to first player advantage, that he would get no matter what P2 does. I don't believe that mirroring would be a good idea as it basically settles this advantage.

As shark bait pointed out, there is still the comparison of high variance vs. low variance.
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terminalCopper

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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #169 on: April 29, 2014, 11:24:30 am »
0

Second, I'm not sure whether I would get a second Marauder over a third silver.

Almost in any scenario, you should. Falling back in the junking race voluntarily sounds very weak.

So strictly saying, both players get 2 attack cards and two silvers is surely not the best idea.

Well, I just picked the most common example...

the Hag player really needs to buy at least two silver in order to get his economy running. The Marauder player doesn't necessarily have to do so. So, if there is cool stuff at a level of $3 or $2, the Marauder player might be favorised. If there is no easy card, I want to get, hitting $5 is still easier for the Marauder because then he buys only one Marauder and 3 silvers  netting him roughly 90% chance to hit $5 at least once before turn 8.
Almost any of the 203 other cards changes smth in favor of marauder or hag, but where's the significant relevance?


Third, why is the Hag player going first?
He does so in every second game. If the Marauder player goes first, there is just no difference in the chance of hitting 5$, I said so (see a)).


As shark bait pointed out, there is still the comparison of high variance vs. low variance.

Yeah, but I am almost sure, that doesn't change a lot ... maybe I'll explain that later.

I don't want to calculate the exact chance of hitting 5 neither for marauder nor the hag, that's way too complicated. Though, I am persuaded that variance won't help the marauder player much, let me try to construct some kind of upper bound:

i) The overall chance to hit $5 is very similar

I guess that before T8 the odds...
for the marauder player to get $5 (at least once) are close to 85%, at most 90%.
for the hag player to get $5 (at least once) are close to 80%.

I am almost sure that the difference is lower than 10%.

ii) If you agree with my argumentation that the average economy is pretty similar before T8, a huge variance would mean both more strong and more weak hands

Even if the difference wasn't 10% but 15%, it would have a reason, namely some other bad moves the marauder player has to expect. This includes the disastrous 1/12 chance that the marauder gets discarded before the first play, but the most common accident will be a $2-hand. Thus, for every time the marauder player gets a $5 instead of a silver, he will often get a weak card instead of a silver in another hand.

iii) If so: in a slog, two silvers is a brilliant thing

Now, let's stick to the expected difference of 15%, and let's say that in these cases, the Marauder player gets 5-2, while the hag player gets 4-3. Will that change the game? Usually, it won't:
4-3 provides at least two silvers, which is great in a slog; to get advantages from bigger variance,
there has to be strong 2's and 5's, but no strong 4's and 3's.
If so, you will probably use that advantage only up to three times; compound interest is virtually negligeable in a slog.
Now multiply these advantages by an optimistic three and  an exaggerated  0.15, and even then, the resulting advantage won't be impressive:

0.45 * (strength of two cards costing 5$/2$ - strength of two cards costing 4$/$3).

That's either negative or almost nothing.

PS: There's also a kind of meta-argument that makes me so certain about the hag's strength in this scenario. Thinking about good game design, comparing two 4$-cards, there has to be some moments where the one outshines the other and vice versa. Now, whenever the junk can be trashed, marauder is better than the hag; example given, in the presence of forager, upgrade, junk dealer ...
So, there has to be some other moments where the hag outperforms marauder - and i really wonder:

Where do you expect the hag to be stronger than marauder, if not in a game without trashing?


« Last Edit: April 29, 2014, 12:33:16 pm by terminalCopper »
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c4master

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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #170 on: April 30, 2014, 10:30:33 am »
0

Second, I'm not sure whether I would get a second Marauder over a third silver.

Almost in any scenario, you should. Falling back in the junking race voluntarily sounds very weak.
Even if the Hag player archieves 2 attacks per shuffle, he needs 5 shuffles (plus two initial ones to get hte hags) to deal all the curses. That's 7 shuffles. Without trashing or sifting that is quite impossible. Assuming an average of 25 cards (10 starting cards, 4-5 junks, 2 sea hags, rest silver and other bought cards) that would be 7*25/5=35 turns.
So, I'm pointing out, that without any kind of sifting or trashing, you would need to much time, to deal all the curses. The difference between dealing 4 curses and dealing 7 curses is not that amazing, I think, especially, since your not dealing them more quickly with 3 hags than with 2 and only slightly more quickly with 2 than with only 1.
I've played many games, where I found myself buying one junk card, but not the second. Even if I lose the split 7-3, it might be worth it not haven a dead card in your deck.
This said, I might be tempted to get a hag after the Marauder, just in order to not get all the curses, if that is possible in the first place (say, there is sifting by Cellar).

So strictly saying, both players get 2 attack cards and two silvers is surely not the best idea.

Well, I just picked the most common example...
OK. It's most common, but it might not always be correct play.

the Hag player really needs to buy at least two silver in order to get his economy running. The Marauder player doesn't necessarily have to do so. So, if there is cool stuff at a level of $3 or $2, the Marauder player might be favorised. If there is no easy card, I want to get, hitting $5 is still easier for the Marauder because then he buys only one Marauder and 3 silvers  netting him roughly 90% chance to hit $5 at least once before turn 8.
Almost any of the 203 other cards changes smth in favor of marauder or hag, but where's the significant relevance?
You do not play a 2-card-kingdom. You play with 10 (or 11) kingdom cards and I believe, it's hard to find a combination of cards, where both, Hag and Marauder are present and I would not prefer Marauder over Hag.
My point here is: Marauder is more flexible and allows more combination with other kingdom cards than hag does - in general. This is because a Sea Hag doesn't provide any benefit, espacially no economy.


Third, why is the Hag player going first?
He does so in every second game. If the Marauder player goes first, there is just no difference in the chance of hitting 5$, I said so (see a)).
Ok, I got this wrong.
Still, if the second player opened Hag instead of Marauder, there would be no better chance for him to hit $5, but a worse!
If you're trying to explain: "As P1 I would rather get Sea Hag than Marauder because it hurts P2 so much.", I'm pretty fine with that. I believe by now that P1 has kind of an equally well choice - or nearly as good as Marauder at least. Thank you for making this clear.


As shark bait pointed out, there is still the comparison of high variance vs. low variance.

Yeah, but I am almost sure, that doesn't change a lot ... maybe I'll explain that later.

I don't want to calculate the exact chance of hitting 5 neither for marauder nor the hag, that's way too complicated. Though, I am persuaded that variance won't help the marauder player much, let me try to construct some kind of upper bound:

i) The overall chance to hit $5 is very similar

I guess that before T8 the odds...
for the marauder player to get $5 (at least once) are close to 85%, at most 90%.
for the hag player to get $5 (at least once) are close to 80%.

I am almost sure that the difference is lower than 10%.
"At least once" is not the same as "on average". By the way, to counter this:
- Whenever you have a Hag in your hand, you need either two Silvers and at least one Copper or one Silver and three Coppers to hit $5. So, chances are pretty high, that these hands don't provide $5.
- You could also look it at that way: Whenever I have a Spoils in my hand, my chance of hitting $5 is roughly 90-95%. Without a Spoils, my chances are as good as those from the Hag player if I was not attacked the turn before and slightly lower if I have been attacked.
- Getting a good card early can really change anything. I'd say those cards will be important: Laboratory, Library, Witch, Adventurer (Spoils are treasures!), Minion, Trading Post, Upgrade, Ghost Ship, Merchant Ship. Tactician, Wharf, Mountebank, Rabble, Vault, Venture, Goons, Hoard, Hunting Party, Carthographer, Embassy, IGG, Inn, Margrave, Stables, Border Village, Farmland (for trashing and province spiking), Catacombs, Count, Counterfeit, Cultist, Junk Dealer, Rebuild, Altar, some Knights, Baker, Butcher, Journeyman, Merchant Guild and Governor. And these are only those cards, that obviously change things.

ii) If you agree with my argumentation that the average economy is pretty similar before T8, a huge variance would mean both more strong and more weak hands

Even if the difference wasn't 10% but 15%, it would have a reason, namely some other bad moves the marauder player has to expect. This includes the disastrous 1/12 chance that the marauder gets discarded before the first play, but the most common accident will be a $2-hand. Thus, for every time the marauder player gets a $5 instead of a silver, he will often get a weak card instead of a silver in another hand.
While a Cellar is not such a strong card for the Hag, it's awesome for the Maurader. Marauder/Embargo embargoing silver seems nice. Marauder/Duchess is a soft counter for this hag stuff. A few Candlestick Makers don't hurt. Squire, Beggar, even Poor House all seem fine. There's hardly any $2 card I wouldn't get if I missed $3 with a Marauder.

iii) If so: in a slog, two silvers is a brilliant thing

Now, let's stick to the expected difference of 15%, and let's say that in these cases, the Marauder player gets 5-2, while the hag player gets 4-3. Will that change the game? Usually, it won't:
4-3 provides at least two silvers, which is great in a slog; to get advantages from bigger variance,
there has to be strong 2's and 5's, but no strong 4's and 3's.
If so, you will probably use that advantage only up to three times;
That's wrong. Just assume Stables, Carthographer or Adventurer.
And also, 15% is wrong. You'll get both, $5 cards earlier and more of them.

compound interest is virtually negligeable in a slog.
Now multiply these advantages by an optimistic three and  an exaggerated  0.15, and even then, the resulting advantage won't be impressive:

0.45 * (strength of two cards costing 5$/2$ - strength of two cards costing 4$/$3).

That's either negative or almost nothing.
I don't think so. You're doing this wrong.

PS: There's also a kind of meta-argument that makes me so certain about the hag's strength in this scenario. Thinking about good game design, comparing two 4$-cards, there has to be some moments where the one outshines the other and vice versa. Now, whenever the junk can be trashed, marauder is better than the hag; example given, in the presence of forager, upgrade, junk dealer ...
So, there has to be some other moments where the hag outperforms marauder - and i really wonder:

Where do you expect the hag to be stronger than marauder, if not in a game without trashing?
When is Scout better than Sea Hag? When is Thief better than Marauder? When is Thief better than Noble Brigand?

It was really cool, if these arguments held, but I fear, some cards shine only very rarely.

The answer is: I expect Sea Hag to be almost anytime minor to Marauder. That's just what I try to explain the whole time. ;)

btw: I do have changed my mind a bit: If there is no junking and no other cursing I might pick up a Sea Hag on the second shuffle. Maybe.
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terminalCopper

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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #171 on: April 30, 2014, 11:07:47 am »
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@c4master:
Basically, I am saying that you wildly overestimate both the economic difference between +spoil and the topdecking and the impact of a $5 in a slog with multiple junking and no trashing. If you want, don't believe me.

There's always complex details, and so, I can't prove my thesis. The only way of using mathematical approximations in a useful way is to have a kind of common sense which are the important aspects and which aren't. Obviously, we are far from having a common sense about variances, 10 VP's, compound interest in slogs, the values of $5's compared to silver in slogs, and maybe dominion in general...
So please, don't feel offended: but this is one of the cases where I believe that following the discussion is no longer fruitful for the community (probably it already isn't, we just didn't see it yet). I will stop the strategical argumentation about hag-vs-marauder-without-trashing right here, but maybe the meta-argumentation might make you wonder a little:

I expect Sea Hag to be almost anytime minor to Marauder.

It happens that I'm wrong, yeah.
It also happens, that community votings are wrong, that's true.
Theoretically, a community might also vote a card on No.1 that is "almost anytime minor" to another.
It might also happen, that Donald X. designs a card that is too weak compared to another...
And theoretically, it is possible that this underpowered card gets voted on No.1 by a stupid community.

So, either all of these five things happened, or you are wrong.

If you think it's the former, your self-confidence is truly enviable ... ;)





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silverspawn

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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #172 on: April 30, 2014, 02:31:05 pm »
+1

#1 It happens that I'm wrong, yeah.
#2 It also happens, that community votings are wrong, that's true.
#3 Theoretically, a community might also vote a card on No.1 that is "almost anytime minor" to another.
#4 It might also happen, that Donald X. designs a card that is too weak compared to another...
#5 And theoretically, it is possible that this underpowered card gets voted on No.1 by a stupid community.

#5 being weaker than another card doesn't make that card underpowered at all. you rarely ever pick journeyman when there's wharf, but journeyman is still really good.
#4 that happens all the time... what about scavanger and chancellor? what about pretty much any terminal silver and swindler? any terminal draw and wharf? any 5$ junker and mount?
#2 that also happens all the time. what about rebuild on the last list?

I don't like these kind of lists, because they make it sound llike your counerpart has to admit that he's wrong unless he wants to be a complete outsider. i peronally don't think that hag is that much worse than marauder, but i don't see why the opinion isn't legit. #3 is a fair point, but also not that hard to believe. procession is... #35 on this list, and i think it's a lot better than sea hag, which is #1, even though they're very different cards. and if that's not enough, WW has voted quarry over sea hag, which is higher than procession, but still lower than marauder
« Last Edit: April 30, 2014, 02:37:00 pm by silverspawn »
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terminalCopper

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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #173 on: April 30, 2014, 03:22:02 pm »
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I don't like these kind of lists, because they make it sound llike your counerpart has to admit that he's wrong unless he wants to be a complete outsider.

Uhh, that's not my intention. If it sounds like that, I'm sorry.

What I'd like to emphasize is, that there is a huge difference between being weaker than another card and being (almost) dominated. Example given, it's perfectly legit to think that Hermit is better than masquerade in general/in the majority of all games. But if someone says that hermit is superior to masq in almost every game, I will question myself whether the person has fully understood masq's abilities.

Only few cards face are almost dominated by a second one - you mentioned some good examples. However, I am almost sure that no Top 10-card is ever close to be dominated by another card. Sure, my opinions are wrong in many situations, and Qvist rankings make errors as well- but I think that cards which are almost dominated like thief, scout or chancellor don't appear in the top spots of the rankings. At least, I think that this is very unlikely; that's what my list wants to say, just my two cents.
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c4master

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Re: The Dominion Cards Lists 2014 Edition: $4 cards
« Reply #174 on: May 01, 2014, 03:20:50 am »
+2

Hey, I really didn't want to offend anyone, nor did I intend to have such an intense discussion about two cards which are both strong ones. :)

Let's just say, we have different opinions about these cards and none can prove the other to be false, nor the own opinion to be correct. If it's possible to create a kingdom with only two fixed cards, I might playtest it against the bots just for myself to figure out a bit.

Anyways, I think these lists have fulfilled their task in making us think and discuss about certain cards. So, thanks again, Qvist, for creating them. :)
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