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How Should Empires Cards be Ranked

Split Piles Should be Ranked for both Cards and Debt Should Be $6+ Cost
- 31 (41.3%)
Split Piles Should Only be Ranked for Top Card and Debt Should Be $6+ Cost
- 9 (12%)
Split Piles Should be Ranked for both Cards and Debt Should Only be Ranked Debt
- 23 (30.7%)
Split Piles Should Only be Ranked for Top Card and Debt Should Only be Ranked Debt
- 5 (6.7%)
Other (please state)
- 7 (9.3%)

Total Members Voted: 74


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Author Topic: Qvist Rankings and Empires  (Read 42040 times)

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Qvist

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Re: Qvist Rankings and Empires
« Reply #100 on: June 21, 2016, 06:45:20 am »
+1

Here's the thing - you're going to rate the Castles as a single pile all together, right?  It would be silly to rank them all individually. But the same logic you're using on Split piles can be used on them.  They all have different costs, you don't need to buy one to get another one, and there are even multiples of some of them with more than 2 players! While we're at it, why don't we rank all of the Knights individually as well, putting Sir Martin on the $4 list for good measure?

We also really need a list for all the $0-cost cards, and why the heck doesn't Poor House get its own list? Also for years people have been talking about cards passing 'the Silver test', so why isn't Silver in the $3-list? And why don't we rank the other basic Supply cards for that matter?

The last time we talked about this the majority didn't want basic treasures being included in the lists. I don't know, maybe this has changed.

werothegreat

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Re: Qvist Rankings and Empires
« Reply #101 on: June 21, 2016, 07:50:44 am »
0

Please tell me it was understood that I was being sarcastic about including Knights, doing so as a method of hyperbole to get my point across.  Please don't actually put each individual Knight on the ranking.
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Donald X.

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Re: Qvist Rankings and Empires
« Reply #102 on: June 21, 2016, 09:09:16 am »
+3

That's why I proposed dumping all the 2P and 3P cards with the 5-costs, since you can't often open with a 5er either. LastFootnote's suggestion of treating Potion as +3$ also works and it is less arbitrary, but it raises Vineyards and Transmute to the 3$s, while I feel they fit better in the 0-2$ group.
When Vineyard didn't have P in the cost, it cost $4.
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crj

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Re: Qvist Rankings and Empires
« Reply #103 on: June 21, 2016, 09:56:16 am »
+2

Thing is, you can't open Familiar. You can open a $4-cost
You can open a $7-cost.

Fundamentally, once upon a time some people tried working out the "value" of +1 Card, +1 Action, etc. then costing cards accordingly; deliberately Dominion's not as simple as that. Now we have potions, and conditions on buying a card, and effects on buy/gain, and overpay, and debt, and split piles and Castles and Knights and Prizes and Travellers and things you can't cost-reduce...

What is the cost of purchasing a card is now every bit as thorny a question as what is the value of purchasing it. I'm not sure there's a good answer to this question any more, and I'm pretty sure that's deliberate.
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Deadlock39

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Re: Qvist Rankings and Empires
« Reply #104 on: June 21, 2016, 10:10:34 am »
+2

You can open Familiar with this opening:
(Borrow-Travelling Fair-Potion)/(Borrow-Familiar)

Seprix

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Re: Qvist Rankings and Empires
« Reply #105 on: June 21, 2016, 10:20:06 am »
+1

This whole debacle is like the American Federalists and Anti-Federalists. It's great. Fun thing to try: Read all of these arguments over cards as if they were arguing for or against a major event to be decided, like the formation of the F.DS State.
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JThorne

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Re: Qvist Rankings and Empires
« Reply #106 on: June 21, 2016, 10:28:25 am »
+4

Quote
when you have $5, what's a good thing to buy?

You know, maybe this is my problem with this whole ranking vs. rating system. I think this statement, from Donald X of all people, underscores a significant problem with gauging the usefulness of the system.

Ranking the cards by cost encourages this sort of thinking (what should I buy with $5) and this sort of thinking is fundamentally flawed.

I've watched people in my playgroup plunk down $5 on the table and then, one by one, stare at the $5-cost cards trying to figure out what to buy next. That's after having bought six or seven cards already. And time and again, I berate them: "Don't you have a plan?"

Sometimes (well, a LOT of the time, actually) the best buy for your deck with $5 is a $4-cost card, or even a $3-cost card. (Or that Herbalist you forgot to get earlier for the extra buy. Don't wait and pay $10 for it. Better yet, pay attention to the fact that it's the only +buy and open with it if you're engine-building.)

Cards simply shouldn't be compared to other cards at the same cost. Cards should be compared to other cards, PERIOD. A strong $5 on the board means that opening with at least one Silver might be more important than a strong $4 and a strong $3. When you look at a kingdom, the first thing you need to do is make note of the power cards, then look for special combos, then figure out what the kingdom wants to do (engine/rush/slog/other.) Don't wait until you have money on the table, then look at the most expensive cards you can buy and figure out which ones are better. If that's how you're making your decisions, you've already lost.

Now, you might say, yes, Dominion is a complex game and you can't just rate cards in a vacuum, so why do we even bother having ratings and rankings at all?

Because the cards really do have different power levels that are not immediately obvious to all players, even ones with some experience. Certain cards are very situational. Certain cards seem like they should be good, but no matter how many different combinations of strategies you throw at them, they just don't seem to get you there (I'm looking at you, Counting House.)

And for the record, I do think that split piles, castles and knights should all be rated separately, in that they have the same problem as every other Dominion card: They are only good when you take other cards into account, and they have a cost that can be measured in more than just coin. (Even a simple card like Village can measure its worth only in terms of the Terminals available in a Kingdom, and has a cost that can be measured in coin and opportunity.) Some castles are useful even if you're not trying to piledrive the castles. The bottom split pile cards should be downgraded somewhat if the top card isn't that great, in the same way that potion cards should be downgraded if potion is a prohibitive opportunity cost.

If the presentation of the data were user-selectable, allowing users to sort cards by cost, type, etc., and filter by a number of other parameters, then it would be possible to do things like look at a whole stack of knights or castles and see their ratings relative to each other. Maybe you're planning on playing a knight or two, but the top knight is one of the weaker ones; it might be better to allow your opponent to buy it so you can buy the second one. This is useful information. It might also be worth knowing that Bridge is such a colossally game-warping card in the right kingdom that wasting terminal space on any knight at all would be foolish.

But maybe I'm putting the cart before the horse.

Perhaps I should simply ask the question: Why rate the cards? What exactly are we trying to accomplish here, and who is the information for, and for what purpose? I may be misunderstanding the entire exercise.
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Awaclus

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Re: Qvist Rankings and Empires
« Reply #107 on: June 21, 2016, 10:36:51 am »
+3

(Or that Herbalist you forgot to get earlier for the extra buy. Don't wait and pay $10 for it. Better yet, pay attention to the fact that it's the only +buy and open with it if you're engine-building.)

Even better yet, pay attention to the fact that it's a stop card that doesn't do anything for you in the early game aside from slowing down your cycling, and only buy it when you can actually utilize the +buy. Even if it means paying $10 for it when the time comes.
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Seprix

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Re: Qvist Rankings and Empires
« Reply #108 on: June 21, 2016, 10:58:56 am »
+1

...

All of this is very well thought out. I will have to put this into consideration, and question myself what the goal of the ranking is. The endpoint of the ranking will determine the method used, or whether I even bother at all. If there is no point to ranking cards, then why do it?
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Accatitippi

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Re: Qvist Rankings and Empires
« Reply #109 on: June 21, 2016, 11:00:55 am »
+1

That's why I proposed dumping all the 2P and 3P cards with the 5-costs, since you can't often open with a 5er either. LastFootnote's suggestion of treating Potion as +3$ also works and it is less arbitrary, but it raises Vineyards and Transmute to the 3$s, while I feel they fit better in the 0-2$ group.
When Vineyard didn't have P in the cost, it cost $4.

And it sounds like a fine price for it, if a bit low. I'm not arguing that Vineyards' value converts to 0-2$.

What I'm saying is that after you got a Potion, Vineyards won't compete for your coins but only for your Buys. Other P-cards should get a group accounting for the fact that the Potion will make it slower to get your first copy of them. That's not an issue for Vineyards, because you don't want it early and I think it plays much more like a 0$ than like a 3$.

Transmute, I think it actually would be fine with the 2P cards in the 5$ group, because that's what you're probably giving up if you open Potion for your Transmute plan (we've all done that once).

As I said, it's a bit arbitrary, but that's how I'd like it. :)
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Donald X.

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Re: Qvist Rankings and Empires
« Reply #110 on: June 21, 2016, 11:07:47 am »
+8

Quote
when you have $5, what's a good thing to buy?

You know, maybe this is my problem with this whole ranking vs. rating system. I think this statement, from Donald X of all people, underscores a significant problem with gauging the usefulness of the system.

Ranking the cards by cost encourages this sort of thinking (what should I buy with $5) and this sort of thinking is fundamentally flawed.
Donald X., of all people, was not saying in that quote that people should buy the highest ranked card they can afford each turn, or any such nonsense. Perhaps those words did not gain as much clarity from the other words around them as he intended, but man.

Ranking everything is too much work. To me that's the core idea behind ranking the $5's, as opposed to everything together. It's a more manageable list, and the similar costs make it easier to compare the cards (even if costs can include "your deck needs high action density" or whatever other thing). Ranking $5's makes the categorization easier than say ranking villages, although ranking villages sounds interesting too.

Sometimes (well, a LOT of the time, actually) the best buy for your deck with $5 is a $4-cost card, or even a $3-cost card. (Or that Herbalist you forgot to get earlier for the extra buy. Don't wait and pay $10 for it. Better yet, pay attention to the fact that it's the only +buy and open with it if you're engine-building.)
Donald X., of all people, actually flat-out cited the possibility of buying a $4 with $5, noted directly that ranking the $5's already gives up on that comparison.

Perhaps I should simply ask the question: Why rate the cards? What exactly are we trying to accomplish here, and who is the information for, and for what purpose? I may be misunderstanding the entire exercise.
The point is to have fun ranking cards and then seeing how they ended up.

It should be obvious to anyone that "card A ranked better than card B" doesn't mean "therefore always buy card A over card B." People are so aware of this at f.ds that there is a saying that encapsulates it: it depends on the board.
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Accatitippi

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Re: Qvist Rankings and Empires
« Reply #111 on: June 21, 2016, 11:11:28 am »
+2

You can open Familiar with this opening:
(Borrow-Travelling Fair-Potion)/(Borrow-Familiar)

You can also open (Travelling fair-Watchtower)/(Squire->Familiar) (pretty unlikely: 5/2 split, then 3/5 chance of lacking the money to get the squire.)
Or a much more viable option is (Travelling Fair-Squire)/(Bonfire), which can also thin away one Copper.

Edit: ack, I forgot to mention the two-card combo that will always let you open Familiar: Squire/Donate! (also, probably a very bad idea)
« Last Edit: June 21, 2016, 11:44:14 am by Accatitippi »
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Donald X.

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Re: Qvist Rankings and Empires
« Reply #112 on: June 21, 2016, 11:14:17 am »
+1

What I'm saying is that after you got a Potion, Vineyards won't compete for your coins but only for your Buys. Other P-cards should get a group accounting for the fact that the Potion will make it slower to get your first copy of them. That's not an issue for Vineyards, because you don't want it early and I think it plays much more like a 0$ than like a 3$.
It doesn't at all though. Vineyard competes for your Potions and buys.

If Vineyard cost $0 you could suddenly gain a bunch with extra buys sans money. It would have been a worse-for-gameplay cost than $4. It didn't cost $0. It cost $4.

Vineyard at $P costs a buy... and a Potion, there it is, I see it there. You can't just buy a bunch at once because you don't have that many Potions.

Vineyard does not play at all like a $0. It plays more like a $3 than like a $0, if we have to compare those things; it requires resources to buy, not just a buy.
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crj

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Re: Qvist Rankings and Empires
« Reply #113 on: June 21, 2016, 11:15:17 am »
0

Sometimes (well, a LOT of the time, actually) the best buy for your deck with $5 is a $4-cost card, or even a $3-cost card.
Similarly, novices seldom open with two $3 purchases.

After a couple of recent games, I've begun to think that new players would find it instructive to play with Alms early on, in the same way that Chapel can be an eye-opener. Many times, you have no further use for $4-and-under cards, so if you can't reach $5 you don't buy anything. Having Alms just sitting there, tempting people to load up on cheap stuff is a valuable excercise in self-control. (-8
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crj

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Re: Qvist Rankings and Empires
« Reply #114 on: June 21, 2016, 11:18:50 am »
+4

A sudden incidental thought...

A new candidate for "least likely expansion ever": Alchempires. Introducing potion-debt tokens that can only be paid off with Potions, and cards with potion-debt costs.
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Accatitippi

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Re: Qvist Rankings and Empires
« Reply #115 on: June 21, 2016, 11:40:23 am »
0

What I'm saying is that after you got a Potion, Vineyards won't compete for your coins but only for your Buys. Other P-cards should get a group accounting for the fact that the Potion will make it slower to get your first copy of them. That's not an issue for Vineyards, because you don't want it early and I think it plays much more like a 0$ than like a 3$.
It doesn't at all though. Vineyard competes for your Potions and buys.

If Vineyard cost $0 you could suddenly gain a bunch with extra buys sans money. It would have been a worse-for-gameplay cost than $4. It didn't cost $0. It cost $4.

Vineyard at $P costs a buy... and a Potion, there it is, I see it there. You can't just buy a bunch at once because you don't have that many Potions.

Vineyard does not play at all like a $0. It plays more like a $3 than like a $0, if we have to compare those things; it requires resources to buy, not just a buy.

What can I say, you fail to see my point, probably due to excessively literal understanding.
For the purpose of choosing how to use your resources every turn*, the fact that a Vineyard buy doesn't consume coins makes its competition for your resources more similar to that of a 0$ than of a 3$. The fact that the number of buys you can spend on it is limited by the number of Potions you played is pretty evident, as is the fact that you're not spending any coins when buying it.

*which is the approximation we've chosen to divide the cards into groups for practical reasons.

That said, I'm fine wherever it ends up. It will still feel like a 0$ to me. :)
« Last Edit: June 21, 2016, 11:44:34 am by Accatitippi »
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Donald X.

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Re: Qvist Rankings and Empires
« Reply #116 on: June 21, 2016, 11:53:38 am »
+3

What can I say, you fail to see my point, probably due to excessively literal understanding.
For the purpose of choosing how to use your resources every turn*, the fact that a Vineyard buy doesn't consume coins makes its competition for your resources more similar to that of a 0$ than of a 3$. The fact that the number of buys you can spend on it is limited by the number of Potions you played is pretty evident, as is the fact that you're not spending any coins when buying it.
The fact that Vineyard consumes income, in the form of Potion as it happens instead of $, makes its competition for your resources more similar to $3 than to $0.
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crj

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Re: Qvist Rankings and Empires
« Reply #117 on: June 21, 2016, 11:56:21 am »
0

Ah, but maybe you should instead Save your Potion for next turn?

Even having a Potion to spend ain't so simple these days.
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LastFootnote

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Re: Qvist Rankings and Empires
« Reply #118 on: June 21, 2016, 11:58:19 am »
+3

A sudden incidental thought...

A new candidate for "least likely expansion ever": Alchempires. Introducing potion-debt tokens that can only be paid off with Potions, and cards with potion-debt costs.

As you can read in the secret history, Capital's ability was once to just make all cards "Debt" cards. So at least conceptually, if you bought e.g. Golem, you'd have 4 Debt and 1 Potion-Debt. Obviously that was less than ideal.
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aku_chi

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Re: Qvist Rankings and Empires
« Reply #119 on: June 21, 2016, 01:26:10 pm »
0

You can open Familiar with this opening:
(Borrow-Travelling Fair-Potion)/(Borrow-Familiar)

You can also open (Travelling fair-Watchtower)/(Squire->Familiar) (pretty unlikely: 5/2 split, then 3/5 chance of lacking the money to get the squire.)
Or a much more viable option is (Travelling Fair-Squire)/(Bonfire), which can also thin away one Copper.

Edit: ack, I forgot to mention the two-card combo that will always let you open Familiar: Squire/Donate! (also, probably a very bad idea)

Also, (Summon-Squire)/(Bonfire).
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Beyond Awesome

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Re: Qvist Rankings and Empires
« Reply #120 on: June 21, 2016, 01:40:09 pm »
0

You can open Familiar with this opening:
(Borrow-Travelling Fair-Potion)/(Borrow-Familiar)

You can also open Travelling Fair/Squire. Play Squire next turn and Bonfire it.

Edit: Looks like someone beat me to this one.
« Last Edit: June 21, 2016, 01:51:41 pm by Beyond Awesome »
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JThorne

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Re: Qvist Rankings and Empires
« Reply #121 on: June 21, 2016, 02:11:54 pm »
0

Quote
Donald X., of all people, was not saying in that quote that people should buy the highest ranked card they can afford each turn, or any such nonsense.

Indeed! Sorry if that sounded like a criticism. It probably didn't read as I intended. I realize you were saying that the ranking system doesn't answer that question (what should I buy with $5.) My point was that the ranking system that groups by cost encourages the thinking that that question should be answered by consulting the rankings, and that the question itself should be re-framed simply as "what should I buy" which should really be reframed "what do I want my deck to look like when all is said and done, and how do I get there?"

Quote
The point is to have fun ranking cards and then seeing how they ended up.

If that's the case, I'll stop harping. I thought part of the point was to take the vast experience of this community and share it in a format that can be useful to other players in evaluating cards and considering their power level. I've been playing less than a year, mostly IRL, and it didn't take me long before I found the wiki, and by extension this forum, and started reading, eventually reading every card/combo article, and a great deal of the forum threads discussing strategy, including the rankings.

It may be that a rating system would be more useful for this purpose, but I would be hard-pressed to argue that it would be less work or more fun!
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Re: Qvist Rankings and Empires
« Reply #122 on: June 21, 2016, 02:16:05 pm »
0

Quote
Donald X., of all people, was not saying in that quote that people should buy the highest ranked card they can afford each turn, or any such nonsense.

Indeed! Sorry if that sounded like a criticism. It probably didn't read as I intended. I realize you were saying that the ranking system doesn't answer that question (what should I buy with $5.) My point was that the ranking system that groups by cost encourages the thinking that that question should be answered by consulting the rankings, and that the question itself should be re-framed simply as "what should I buy" which should really be reframed "what do I want my deck to look like when all is said and done, and how do I get there?"

Quote
The point is to have fun ranking cards and then seeing how they ended up.

If that's the case, I'll stop harping. I thought part of the point was to take the vast experience of this community and share it in a format that can be useful to other players in evaluating cards and considering their power level. I've been playing less than a year, mostly IRL, and it didn't take me long before I found the wiki, and by extension this forum, and started reading, eventually reading every card/combo article, and a great deal of the forum threads discussing strategy, including the rankings.

It may be that a rating system would be more useful for this purpose, but I would be hard-pressed to argue that it would be less work or more fun!

If it makes you feel better, you've effectively stated my first video in fewer words!
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Re: Qvist Rankings and Empires
« Reply #123 on: June 21, 2016, 02:40:38 pm »
0

Sometimes (well, a LOT of the time, actually) the best buy for your deck with $5 is a $4-cost card, or even a $3-cost card.
Similarly, novices seldom open with two $3 purchases.

Opening with $2/$3 isn't so uncommon for me with a 3/4 split either.
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