~34 votes for Nocturne cards, as many as 39 votes for the rest.
| #111 =0 Harvest (Cornucopia) Weighted Average: 3.8% ▼1.4pp / Unweighted Average: 4.0% / Median: 0.9% ▼1.3pp / Standard Deviation: 6.4%
Harvest wins the Bilbo Baggins award for eleventy-first place. Harvest was ranked last by 12 people. Harvest is weak in a moneyish strategy, usually generating - terminally. Harvest is also poor as engine payload: you have to play it before you draw your deck and a terminal - isn't very exciting. Sometimes, you absolutely need coins from actions, and Harvest is the best/only source.
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| #110 ▼2 Stash (Promo) Weighted Average: 5.7% ▼3.4pp / Unweighted Average: 8.5% / Median: 4.6% ▲0.4pp / Standard Deviation: 15.0%
Most of us haven't played with Stash in a while, and it has a high standard deviation to back that up. It was ranked last by 5 people. Stash is quite weak. It has a powerful combo with Scavenger, but is otherwise an unexceptional addition to moneyish strategies that aren't relying on other cards.
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| #109 ▲1 Cache (Hinterlands) Weighted Average: 6.0% ▼0.9pp / Unweighted Average: 5.6% / Median: 2.7% ▼1.5pp / Standard Deviation: 7.5%
Cache remains near the bottom of the rankings with high agreement. It was ranked last by 5 people. Cache is only good when you want Coppers, which doesn't happen very often. But, sometimes you only need to hit - to green in a slog, or you want fodder to trash in an engine. In these situations, Cache is okay.
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| #108 ▼3 Mine (Base) Weighted Average: 8.0% ▼3.6pp / Unweighted Average: 10.7% / Median: 8.2% ▼1.3pp / Standard Deviation: 9.3%
Mine falls a little in the rankings, even being ranked last by 2 people. Most of the time, there are better things to be doing than using Mine to upgrade your treasures. Mine can be good in games where you can play it a lot and treasure is good payload. It's stronger with Platinum and some kingdom treasures.
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| #107 ▼1 Mandarin (Hinterlands) Weighted Average: 8.1% ▼2.3pp / Unweighted Average: 9.8% / Median: 7.1% ▼1.0pp / Standard Deviation: 10.9%
Mandarin remains near the bottom of the pack, receiving one last-place vote. Mandarin's on-play ability is pretty weak; occasionally, you can use the top-decking to your advantage, but it's usually a hindrance. Mandarin's on-gain ability is also usually a disadvantage, but it does enable some golden decks - the fastest of which involves Capital.
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| #106 ▼2 Royal Seal (Prosperity) Weighted Average: 9.3% ▼2.4pp / Unweighted Average: 14.6% / Median: 8.2% ▼1.6pp / Standard Deviation: 14.8%
Royal Seal falls a couple ranks, but avoids any last place votes. Royal Seal has a pretty powerful effect, but it's very awkwardly priced. Ordinarily, the most important cards in the kingdom cost or less, so buying Royal Seal forces you to forgo one of those purchases. Royal Seal can be handy if a key card costs or more: like Altar.
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| #105 ▲4 Counting House (Prosperity) Weighted Average: 10.4% ▲2.8pp / Unweighted Average: 8.9% / Median: 4.6% ▲0.4pp / Standard Deviation: 13.6%
Counting House, so long in last place, rises once more! Not everyone is convinced; it still received 3 last place votes. Counting House is an extremely narrow card. It has a very strong combo with Travelling Fair, a few other combos with Night Watchman, Scouting Party, Banquet, and Beggar. Outside of specific combos, it is very difficult to make Counting House useful. Colonies help.
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| #104 ▲3 Contraband (Prosperity) Weighted Average: 10.6% ▲1.0pp / Unweighted Average: 12.5% / Median: 5.6% ▼1.3pp / Standard Deviation: 13.6%
Contraband rises a few ranks, mostly due to some highish outliers. Contraband is often a trap card; the opponent can lock you out of the card you really need. However, events and alternative VP make Contraband more viable - which Adventures and Empires provided in large quantities. Still, it's hard to get too excited about a card that is a Gold with a +buy at its best.
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| #103 =0 Explorer (Seaside) Weighted Average: 10.9% ▼1.1pp / Unweighted Average: 10.6% / Median: 9.1% ▼0.7pp / Standard Deviation: 7.9%
They can't all be the best ever. Explorer stays near the bottom with a lot of agreement. Explorer is pretty poor in a moneyish game, but it has some utility as payload in engines that have at least one Province and appreciate Gold. It may not be the best gainer, but sometimes it's the only gainer.
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| #102 =0 Raid (Adventures) Weighted Average: 11.4% ▼4.8pp / Unweighted Average: 13.1% / Median: 9.1% ▼3.5pp / Standard Deviation: 13.1%
Raid stays at the same rank. Raid is a pretty situational event; it's a reasonable buy in moneyish games when you get 2+ Silvers in play. Be aware, the handsize attack of Raid makes Silver worse than usual. Rarely, Raid can be part of a potent Silver flood strategy, with Tower or Feodum.
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| #101 ▼2 Merchant Ship (Seaside) Weighted Average: 11.9% ▼10.5pp / Unweighted Average: 16.6% / Median: 10% ▼7.1pp / Standard Deviation: 19.3%
Merchant Ship falls again in the rankings. Terminal coin payload is rarely exciting, and Merchant Ship is no exception. If there's available terminal space, it's usually a little better than Gold, but there's almost always something better to do.
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| #100 ▼2 Venture (Prosperity) Weighted Average: 13.2% ▼9.7pp / Unweighted Average: 18.7% / Median: 10% ▼7.9pp / Standard Deviation: 19.0%
Venture also continues to fall year after year. It is rated higher by less skilled players. Venture is exceptionally weak in engines where you draw your entire deck. In most other decks, it's rarely much better than Gold. Venture has a role in games where you can remove your Copper, you can't draw your deck, and treasure is the best payload.
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| #99 ▲1 Pillage (Dark Ages) Weighted Average: 15.3% ▼6.1pp / Unweighted Average: 20.3% / Median: 12.7% ▼5.2pp / Standard Deviation: 19.1%
Pillage stays around the same position. Pillage is strong engine payload, but it requires a lot of draw to support. If you can't draw and play the Spoils on the turn you play Pillage, your engine might fall apart. Pillage also demands that you regain it each turn, which is a lot to ask.
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| #98 ▲3 Rogue (Dark Ages) Weighted Average: 20.5% ▲0.4pp / Unweighted Average: 22.4% / Median: 13.9% ▼2.0pp / Standard Deviation: 17.6%
With a big gap of 5.2%, Rogue distances itself from the bottom tier of cards. Rogue has two functions: trasher and gainer. As a gainer, it works nicely with trash-for benefit and powerful one-shot cards. As an attack, Rogue usually disappoints. If any mediocre cards like Silver are added to the trash, Rogue will stop attacking. But, sometimes the trash remains clean and you can punish your opponent's engine with consistent Rogue attacks.
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| #97 ▼3 Mystic (Dark Ages) Weighted Average: 24.2% ▼8.1pp / Unweighted Average: 26.4% / Median: 19.1% ▼7.2pp / Standard Deviation: 17.4%
Mystic falls a little in back-to-back years, but is still clearly outside of the bottom tier (being 8.9% higher than #99). Coin payload continues to be unexciting at . Mystic is at its best when you know what the top card of your deck is, and there are several ways to get that information. Without that, Mystics just clog up an engine.
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| #96 ▼23 Duke (Intrigue) Weighted Average: 26.2% ▼21.8pp / Unweighted Average: 26.5% / Median: 20.9% ▼24.4pp / Standard Deviation: 18.5%
Duke is a huge loser in this list, down 23 ranks and 21.8%. Duke was only rated above average four times. A Duchy + Duke greening strategy competes with a Province-greening strategy most of the time. The Duke strategy generally has the edge if the game lasts long enough and the extra victory cards are manageable. There are two common cases for this: in a low-powered non-engine board, and when a slow-to-build engine needs to contest a faster strategy. As the average power level of Dominion kingdoms rise and players get better, Duke becomes less and less relevant.
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| #95 =0 Graverobber (Dark Ages) Weighted Average: 26.3% ▼2.7pp / Unweighted Average: 28.6% / Median: 25.5% ▼0.4pp / Standard Deviation: 14.2%
Graverobber stays around the same spot with a lot of agreement. Graverobber is primarily an engine payload card which lets you convert actions into Provinces. Graverobber can also gain cards from the trash, which provides some self-synergy. If you have enough +actions, Graverobber as payload is generally better than just buying Provinces, but it can't compete with the best payload cards.
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| #94 Tormentor (Nocturne) Weighted Average: 27.6% / Unweighted Average: 27.5% / Median: 18.2% / Standard Deviation: 22.5%
Tormentor is the first Nocturne card to make an appearance. Tormentor begins the trend of Nocturne cards that are awkward in some way. As an attack, Tormentor is below-average. The Imp-gaining is most valuable in an engine, but it's very difficult to play Tormentor first in an engine. In the kind of decks that do regularly play Tormentor first, Imps are least valuable. Tormentor is a pretty strong opening buy, and sometimes you need attacks to slow down the opponent, so Tormentor has a role.
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| #93 ▼2 Windfall (Empires) Weighted Average: 27.6% ▼5.6pp / Unweighted Average: 27.4% / Median: 22.7% ▼3.6pp / Standard Deviation: 18.9%
Windfall stays in about the same place, and with more agreement. Windfall is a great influx of money for decks that have thinned down. Some games, though, you can't activate the condition. Sometimes, you only have one buy and the three Golds are superfluous. In yet other games, by the time you could get Windfall, it's more valuable to work towards a 3-pile ending.
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| #92 Bandit (Base - 2nd Edition) Weighted Average: 28.3% / Unweighted Average: 29.5% / Median: 28.6% / Standard Deviation: 17.6%
Bandit was added in the second edition of base Dominion. Bandit is a pretty good engine payload card if Gold is desirable. The attack is usually minor, but it can punish money-centric decks pretty hard. Bandit is also sometimes the strongest terminal in a moneyish game. Bandit is one of the likeliest culprits for emptying the Gold supply.
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| #91 ▼4 Giant (Adventures) Weighted Average: 29.1% ▼6.9pp / Unweighted Average: 35.8% / Median: 31.5% ▼3.2pp / Standard Deviation: 21.1%
Giant continues to fall, but there is significant disagreement. Less skilled players tend to rate it higher. Giant is pretty strong engine payload, provinding both money and a powerful attack. But Giant is slow to get going, so it doesn't play a role in some games. Giant is spikey, so there's an incentive to play at least two per turn. Giant's spikiness can be a benefit in low-powered single-terminal games. Every other Giant play is very likely to lead to an + hand for Province.
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| #90 ▼1 Cartographer (Hinterlands) Weighted Average: 30.1% ▼4.7pp / Unweighted Average: 31.5% / Median: 25.5% ▼6.1pp / Standard Deviation: 18.6%
After last year's big drop, Cartographer has stabilized. Cartographer provides lategame utility in both engines and non-engines alike. But is a tough price point for utility cards; there's usually a lot of competition.
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| #89 ▼4 Library (Base) Weighted Average: 30.9% ▼6.2pp / Unweighted Average: 35.4% / Median: 29.6% ▼4.1pp / Standard Deviation: 18.3%
Library continues to fall a few ranks. Library has a really high ceiling, but it's tricky to build a deck to capitalize on Library's draw. Library engines struggle with greening and with reliability in general. Still, sometimes it all comes together and Library is a great card.
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| #88 ▲7 Mint (Prosperity) Weighted Average: 31.0% ▲4.0pp / Unweighted Average: 28.9% / Median: 29.6% ▲7.9pp / Standard Deviation: 18.3%
Mint makes a solid jump up 7 ranks. Mint's main appeal is trashing Copper on-buy. This is a powerful effect that is tricky to time and take advantage of. Mint's on-play ability is less exciting, but Platinum and kingdom treasures make it better.
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| #87 ▲7 Treasury (Seaside) Weighted Average: 31.5% ▲3.3pp / Unweighted Average: 33.5% / Median: 27.3% ▲1.5pp / Standard Deviation: 20.6%
Treasury also rises 7 ranks. Treasury is the least exciting of the Peddler variants. The top-decking helps a little bit. It has synergy with some cards that appreciate a high action density, like Throne Room and City Quarter. Empires introduced a lot of ways to get points while still top-decking Treasury, which might explain its rise this year.
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| #86 ▼3 Wine Merchant (Adventures) Weighted Average: 31.7% ▼6.2pp / Unweighted Average: 34.3% / Median: 29.1% ▼12.0pp / Standard Deviation: 22.0%
Wine Merchant falls a few ranks and a massive 12% in median. Coin payload is unexciting, but Wine Merchant's contagious laughter and +buy make it a little more appealing. Wine Merchant is best in an engine with plentiful +actions, so you can play multiple Wine Merchants and minimize the downside. Wine Merchant is also handy for spiking high price points.
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| #85 ▼4 Band of Misfits (Dark Ages) Weighted Average: 31.9% ▼6.3pp / Unweighted Average: 38.7% / Median: 32.7% ▼4.1pp / Standard Deviation: 23.6%
Band of Misfits drops a little, but it has a lot of disagreement. Stronger players are less fond of the card. The value of Band of Misfits depends heavily on the board. Sometimes, the key cards cost and there's no value in picking up the Misfits. Other times, multiple engine components are all or less, and Band of Misfits is a versatile card. The former is more common than the latter.
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| #84 ▼16 Treasure Trove (Adventures) Weighted Average: 32.4% ▼16.1pp / Unweighted Average: 33.3% / Median: 29.1% ▼14.1pp / Standard Deviation: 22.1%
After Treasure Trove's big jump last year, it's back a little below where it started. Treasure Trove is a strong addition to most non-engines, especially those with sub- terminals like Gear or Masquerade. Sometimes, a single Treasure Trove is a good addition to an engine - if the engine wants the Gold and can deal with the Copper, but this is not common.
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| #83 Pooka (Nocturne) Weighted Average: 32.9% / Unweighted Average: 33.7% / Median: 27.3% / Standard Deviation: 21.8%
Pooka is the next Nocturne card on the list. Trashing Copper and increasing one's handsize are both great, but this particular combination is a little awkward. In games with Pooka, you'll have 4+ non-Copper junk cards (thanks Cursed Gold!), so you probably want another action that can clean those up. Early on, Pooka might draw your trasher and other actions dead, until you have sufficient village density. Later in the game, Pooka can once again become awkward as you run out of Copper to trash. Still, Pooka is powerful, so it's often worth it to try to work around its limitations.
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| #82 Sacred Grove (Nocturne) Weighted Average: 33.2% / Unweighted Average: 34.2% / Median: 32.7% / Standard Deviation: 17.6%
Sacred Grove is the next Nocturne card on the list, and it has relatively high agreement. Terminal coin payload with +buy reminds us of Wine Merchant, and Sacred Grove seems to have a similar power level. The boons one gets from Sacred Grove sometimes help the opponent more, but high-rolling a + boon is great.
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| #81 ▼7 Vault (Prosperity) Weighted Average: 33.5% ▼10.0pp / Unweighted Average: 38.6% / Median: 30.9% ▼12.3pp / Standard Deviation: 20.6%
Vault is a big loser once again, especially among more skilled players. A simple Vault + money strategy is pretty decent (as far as single-card strategies go) and is resilient to junking and greening. But this is very rarely the strongest strategy in the kingdom. Vault can also be used as supplemental engine payload that increases in strength while greening, but it's ignorable much of the time.
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| #80 ▲6 Ball (Adventures) Weighted Average: 33.9% ▼1.1pp / Unweighted Average: 29.1% / Median: 22.7% ▼8.9pp / Standard Deviation: 19.1%
Ball is a statistical oddity with a abnormally low median, but 6 votes above average. Ball's value is highly dependent on the board. If the important kingdom cards cost or more, Ball might not ever be purchased, but if there are strong cards costing or , Ball is a great way to get them. Ball works especially well with cost reduction - especially Highway.
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| #79 ▲10 Emporium (Empires) Weighted Average: 35.0% ▲2.8pp / Unweighted Average: 32.3% / Median: 29.1% ▼2.5pp / Standard Deviation: 15.4%
Emporium rises 10 ranks from last year and has more agreement. Emporium is deceptively attractive. Patrician is just good enough that Emporium is likely to be exposed by the time you're thinking about greening. And Emporium allows you to slightly improve your deck while getting some victory points. Emporiums tend to empty in games in which they appear, but they're only marginally better than the next-best option.
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| #78 Tragic Hero (Nocturne) Weighted Average: 35.2% / Unweighted Average: 34.1% / Median: 28.7% / Standard Deviation: 19.3%
Tragic Hero rounds out a trio of awkward Nocturne cards. Tragic Hero is solid terminal draw - with a twist! If you're relying on Tragic Hero for your engine's draw, you will most likely want to hold onto your Tragic Heroes and have a difficult time doing so. In non-engines, you'd be happy to have a terminal draw card that turns into a Gold, but you're not likely to activate the self-trashing. Sad! Tragic Hero is at its best as supplemental draw in kingdoms with Platinum or strong kingdom treasures.
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| #77 Crypt (Nocturne) Weighted Average: 35.2% / Unweighted Average: 36.9% / Median: 38.2% / Standard Deviation: 18.5%
And here's another Nocturne card: Crypt. Crypt has a surprisingly low deviation for such an unconventional card. Crypt can help you get control over your deck by removing a bunch of Coppers at once and giving them back one turn at a time. This approach is best if you can get Crypt in an abnormally large hand somehow. Crypt is also a solid support card in moneyish strategies, helping one smooth out coin from one hand to the next and allowing good treasures to be played multiple times per shuffle. But is a steep price point for a utility card.
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| #76 ▼21 Ill-Gotten Gains (Hinterlands) Weighted Average: 36.4% ▼15.5pp / Unweighted Average: 42.6% / Median: 44.6% ▼9.1pp / Standard Deviation: 25.2%
Ill-Gotten Gains is another big loser, falling even further than it did last year. There's a lot of disagreement on its rank, and less skilled players still tend to value it highly. There is a monolithic Ill-Gotten Gains strategy that involves buying them until they pile and then buying Duchies. Some flavor of this still occasionally comes up if there is no other (good) way to trash or distribute Curses. More often, it's possible to build an engine that can deal with the occasional Curses from Ill-Gotten Gains and can spend their buys more productively. Ill-Gotten Gains sometimes has value in an engine; especially when there is a productive way to trash the Ill-Gotten Gains.
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| #75 =0 Capital (Empires) Weighted Average: 37.1% ▼3.2pp / Unweighted Average: 38.8% / Median: 37.3% ▼3.8pp / Standard Deviation: 20.8%
Capital's ranking remains mostly unchanged. There are a few ways to cheat Capital's downside, like Mandarin, Counterfeit, and Crown; Capital is usually dominant on these boards. Capital can be valuable to a lesser extent as the only source of +buy, a way to spike a high price point early, or a way to spike to a big turn to end the game.
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