Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[GendoIkari]

In my opinion, overpay cards need to be in their own list, just like potion-cost cards. I don't think it makes much sense to compare Stonemason to the other $2 cards, when it's obviously stronger than most $2s, because it has an effect that make you want to pay $5 or more for it. Or look at Masterpeice... It's a TERRIBLE $3 card... But it's an ok $6 or $7 card. In other words, you don't consider buying Masterpeice with $3, so you don't have the same decision to make as you do with the other $3s.

Was Peddler always in the $6 or more cost? Maybe it should be on the overpay card list as well.

[Schneau]

I disagree. You just take overpay into consideration when ranking them. I don't see how this is different than, say, taking into consideration that Highway is awful without +Buy, but amazing on other boards.

[WheresMyElephant]

Well, the question is, what's the purpose of ranking cards of the same cost? To the extent that the exercise is meaningful, it's because it helps you choose what to buy at a given price point, or at least gives you a starting point for that discussion. Saying "Stonemason is a better card than Cellar, but you will almost always buy Cellar over Stonemason at $2" seems just as meaningless as saying King's Court is better than Cellar: exactly the sort of apples-to-oranges comparison which these lists are designed to avoid.

Personally I say, put Stonemason on the $2 list and "Overpaid Stonemason" on the $7 list, and the same for the others. "$6 Stonemason" and "$5 Stonemason" aren't important enough to be worth clogging up those lists, but the $7 list is so short it's already sort of silly anyway; maybe it would be enriched by adding comparisons like "Is Forge better than Overpaid Doctor?" And on the other hand we definitely need a comparison of $2 Stonemason against other $2 cards: that is simply essential for discussing openings.

[GendoIkari]

Well, the question is, what's the purpose of ranking cards of the same cost? To the extent that the exercise is meaningful, it's because it helps you choose what to buy at a given price point, or at least gives you a starting point for that discussion. Saying "Stonemason is a better card than Cellar, but you will almost always buy Cellar over Stonemason at $2" seems just as meaningless as saying King's Court is better than Cellar: exactly the sort of apples-to-oranges comparison which these lists are designed to avoid.

Exactly. The point of the lists it to help you consider what you should buy when you have $x to spend. But if Masterpeice ends up as a "strong" $3 card... that has a completely different meaning than saying Ambassador is a strong $3 card. Ambassador being a strong $3 card means that it's often the correct thing to buy when you have $3 to spend. Masterpiece would not be the correct thing to buy if you have $3 to spend, so it's an unfair comparison.

Personally I say, put Stonemason on the $2 list and "Overpaid Stonemason" on the $7 list, and the same for the others. "$6 Stonemason" and "$5 Stonemason" probably aren't important enough to be worth clogging up those lists, but the $7 list is so short it's already sort of silly anyway; maybe they can enrich that conversation.

Well I don't think you can quite do this, because you would really have to put each overpay card on every list; I don't think you can arbitrarily say that Stonemason for $7 belongs, but Stonemason for $5 doesn't.

[SirPeebles]

Doctor and Herald will likely be purchased without overpay at times.  It would be rare for Stonemason, and extremely rare for Masterpiece.  Similarly, one is unlikely to use gainers for Stonemason or Masterpiece.

[WheresMyElephant]

Well, the question is, what's the purpose of ranking cards of the same cost? To the extent that the exercise is meaningful, it's because it helps you choose what to buy at a given price point, or at least gives you a starting point for that discussion. Saying "Stonemason is a better card than Cellar, but you will almost always buy Cellar over Stonemason at $2" seems just as meaningless as saying King's Court is better than Cellar: exactly the sort of apples-to-oranges comparison which these lists are designed to avoid.

Exactly. The point of the lists it to help you consider what you should buy when you have $x to spend. But if Masterpeice ends up as a "strong" $3 card... that has a completely different meaning than saying Ambassador is a strong $3 card. Ambassador being a strong $3 card means that it's often the correct thing to buy when you have $3 to spend. Masterpiece would not be the correct thing to buy if you have $3 to spend, so it's an unfair comparison.

Personally I say, put Stonemason on the $2 list and "Overpaid Stonemason" on the $7 list, and the same for the others. "$6 Stonemason" and "$5 Stonemason" probably aren't important enough to be worth clogging up those lists, but the $7 list is so short it's already sort of silly anyway; maybe they can enrich that conversation.

Well I don't think you can quite do this, because you would really have to put each overpay card on every list; I don't think you can arbitrarily say that Stonemason for $7 belongs, but Stonemason for $5 doesn't.

I'd say it's silly to pretend like these lists have such great intellectual rigor that we can't make any sacrifices to pragmatism. If we were so devoted to rigor, we would just concede that these rankings are basically meaningless, and not make them. That doesn't mean we just give up and say anything goes, but if we're so wrapped up in this that we refuse to discuss whether Doctor is a better $3 opener than Lookout or a better late-game trasher than Forge, then we're failing to extract whatever value is to be had from card rankings.

[theory]

This is an interesting dilemma.  My gut instinct is that you cannot possibly compare Stonemason to the $2's.  It is not even close: obviously a $2 Stonemason is going to be gimped compared to a $2 Crossroads.  But the problem is that it doesn't make much sense to compare it to Doctor/Peddler either, since they share little in common.

[eHalcyon]

Pick some price points.  It's impractical to include them on every list, but 2-3 might be OK?

How terrible is a $2 Stonemason?
How good is it at $6 (gaining 4s, and for the sake of the list also consider gaining 3s and 2s)?
How good is it at $8 (gaining 6s or cheaper)?

When you evaluate the costlier option, you can also consider the cheaper options that were not included in the lists.

Price points will probably be chosen arbitrarily in some cases.  Not quite sure where to put Doctor.  $3 certainly.  Maybe $4, $5 and $6 since those are the potential openings?

[WheresMyElephant]

This is an interesting dilemma.  My gut instinct is that you cannot possibly compare Stonemason to the $2's.  It is not even close: obviously a $2 Stonemason is going to be gimped compared to a $2 Crossroads.  But the problem is that it doesn't make much sense to compare it to Doctor/Peddler either, since they share little in common.

I suspect $2 Stonemason on a 5/2 is comparable to Secret Chamber, Moat, Duchess. It might be worse than all these but the question is nontrivial enough to be worth publishing an answer.

[jsh357]

edit: nm

[Qvist]

How will the Qvist rankings work for these 'overpay bonus' cards.... you can rank this as a $4, but that would imply no overpay bonus, a big reason for buying this card. At $5, you can grab one card from your discard and put on top of your deck... and at $6, you can grab two cards and so forth. So I think there are meaningful comparisons to be made at each price point. How does paying 6 for this compare to gold, when you factor in the overpay bonus? Yes, I realize that the price is technically 4, but if you are paying 6 for it to get a specific bonus, then the price is essentially 6, same as gold, adventurer, etc.

We'll see. First I have to finally finish the old list.
Then after some playtesting we'll find out. But I guess it will be ranked as a $4 cost card because that's what it is. Other cards from Hinterlands also have on-buy or on-gain bonuses and they are ranked how important they are (see IGG). So if a card has an overpaying bonus that will be used very often, that makes it stronger, but it's still a $4 card that you can buy for its on-play effect.

I'm not sure. I think we're overvaluing the overbuying effect so far. We have to wait.
IGG's on-play effect isn't worth $5 either and you buy it only for the on-gain effect. Still it's a $5 card.
Even if you buy a Stonemason with $7 just to get two $5s you have it in your deck and can play it and can use it. It's also still a $2 card.
You just have to take into account how often you will overpay for it and how the presense of this card changes the landscape of the board.

Also, let's assume you put Stonemason into the $6+ list. I would have a hard time ranking it (and I guess I still would in 2-3 months when I'm familiar with the cards). I'm not sure how to solve this, but I'm not convinced not to put them into their respective lists (Stonemason to the $2 list and so on, so forth)

[mith]

It's impractical to include them on every list

Is it? We're talking about four cards, which would appear on 5/4/4/3 lists respectively (with 6+ cards already lumped together).

[SirPeebles]

It's impractical to include them on every list

Is it? We're talking about four cards, which would appear on 5/4/4/3 lists respectively (with 6+ cards already lumped together).

Stonemason would need to be in the Potion cost list too.

[Robz888]

I really think they should just be put on whatever their regular price list is. So Stonemason at $2, Masterpiece at $3, etc.

Why? Look, we do this exact same thing for Peddler already. It's in the $6+ range. But if you are paying $6+ for Peddler, then really it should be worst card on that list. But it's not, it's in the top half of $6+ cards. Why? Because when we rank it, we make mental note of the different prices aspect of it. We can do the same for these cards.

[sudgy]

Why don't we rank Stonemason by comparing it to Warehouse?

[HiveMindEmulator]

Well, the question is, what's the purpose of ranking cards of the same cost? To the extent that the exercise is meaningful, it's because it helps you choose what to buy at a given price point, or at least gives you a starting point for that discussion. Saying "Stonemason is a better card than Cellar, but you will almost always buy Cellar over Stonemason at $2" seems just as meaningless as saying King's Court is better than Cellar: exactly the sort of apples-to-oranges comparison which these lists are designed to avoid.

Is this really the point of the lists? I mean, you don't really play by just picking the best card at your given price every turn. You make some strategy based on combinations of cards. I think the point of the lists is just to give us something to argue about (we love to argue) and allow us to hear other people's opinions of cards we have may have underrated ourselves so that we can learn to use them better. It almost doesn't really matter how we group the cards. We could probably have just as well grouped them alphabetically. What's better Chancellor or Counting House? I guess it's useful to have all the 5s together because generally the strategy-defining cards live at $5 (though this does exclude potion cards and some other big key cards like Menagerie), but how big is the difference between most 2s 3s and 4s anyway? From a functional standpoint it would be better to group sub-$5 cards by terminal and non-terminal, but we don't do that.

Now I'm not saying we shouldn't have this discussion. It's something else to argue about! But I don't think it matters all that much which list you throw these cards on. It's just 4 cards... I'm fine with them being on the lists with the base price or in "other" (the 6+ category). I would prefer not to have yet another list with only 4 cards in it.

[jonts26]

It's just 4 cards... I'm fine with them being on the lists with the base price or in "other" (the 6+ category). I would prefer not to have yet another list with only 4 cards in it.

This is probably the most important point. A list containing only a few cards is just not very instructive for anything. I mean, we can create whatever subcategories we want. There are probably better ways to categorize than cost. Rank the cursers would probably be a very interesting list. Rank the discard attacks is probably a lot less interesting, but still maybe a little. But that is perhaps why we do separate by cost. There are a lot of cards which would just be leftovers that didn't fit too neatly into any category (or fit into more than 1 category). Cost is a very easy way to include everything only once and have enough other cards to compare with and still have interesting comparisons.

A ranking of overpay cards is extremely uninteresting. There's just not enough of them. So the question remains, where do they go? Well, it seems so unnatural to place them in a higher cost category because you COULD overpay for it. It's way too clunky to include them in multiple cost tiers. Really the most natural place for them is their base cost categories. And we can rationalize it easy enough by saying lots of cards have on gain effects. Overpaying isn't so different.

[Witherweaver]

The best comparison is probably Border Village, which you can almost consider to be an X-Cost card with an on-buy effect that you can overpay 6-X to obtain a card worth X.  Okay, so, you're forced to make this overpayment, but functionally it's similar, 'cause that makes it feel like Stonemason. 

The cost of the overpay cards is not variable.  Doctor is a $3 card and nothing can change that.  Once you buy it (for $3) you may choose to spend coins to get an effect.  It should be in the $3 card list because, well, it's a $3 card.

Notably, the overpayment can not happen when a card is gained.  Even if in your head Stonemason is a $7 card because you'd always overpay $5 (or whatever, the example is arbitrary), it's a $2 card for all purposes.  And I'd say the cases where you gain cards instead of buy them is pretty significant.  And, the overpayment can only happen once.  Once it's in your deck that effect no longer matters, just like Nomad Camp, IGG, Border Village, etc.  I think trying to include the potential overpayment amount as part of the cost is neglecting all of these factors.

[eHalcyon]

I'm with WheresMyElephant on this.  The lists help evaluate cards at a given price point because you will often be choosing between cards of a given price point depending on how much money you have on your turn.  Certainly cards are better or worse depending on the board, and you will of course sometimes buy a cheaper card than you could have, but it's pretty rare (though not unheard of) to buy an Herbalist for $11.

An argument for putting overpay cards on higher cost lists is that you can end up paying MORE for them.  Border Village always costs $6, no matter what you gain with it.  And even if you end up having more than $6 available, you always get the same benefit out of BV.  Peddler never costs more than $8, so it still makes sense to compare it to the other $6+ cards.  If you have $6+, chances are you can pay for Peddler.  No matter what you pay for Peddler, the benefit will be the same.  I admit, Peddler is more of a stretch here because you usually end up paying $0 or $2 for it, but at least you can afford to buy Peddler when you are considering the other cards on the list.

The overpay cards are different because you will often be paying MORE than the listed cost and the benefit scales up as you pay more.  When you overpay $3 for Doctor, you have effectively purchased a $6 card with an on-buy bonus of trashing cards from the top of your deck.  Yes yes, edge cases with TfB, Haggler, what have you.  But Doctor-at-$6 is not meaningfully comparable with Woodcutter.  It compares with other $6s.  When I have $2 available, I am choosing between Squire and Stonemason, not Squire and Stonemason-that-also-gets-me-two-GMs.

Another issue is that if you don't separate the overpay effects in some manner, people are going to evaluate these cards in wildly different ways.  This very discussion is proof of it.  There is already some difficulty with the lists as they are -- some people value potential impact while others prefer consistency.  Should I rank a card higher because it is always a useful addition, or should the top spots be reserved for potential high impact game changers, even if they are terrible 90% of the time?  But whatever, that's fine.  With the overpay cards, OTOH, some people may put little emphasis on the overpay (man Stonemason is bad at $2) while others will focus on it entirely (heck yes double Possession with $8p, what an awesome $2 card).

I guess what I'm trying to say is, this is all very confusing and let's argue some more.

[kn1tt3r]

In my opinion, overpay cards need to be in their own list, just like potion-cost cards. I don't think it makes much sense to compare Stonemason to the other $2 cards, when it's obviously stronger than most $2s, because it has an effect that make you want to pay $5 or more for it. Or look at Masterpeice... It's a TERRIBLE $3 card... But it's an ok $6 or $7 card. In other words, you don't consider buying Masterpeice with $3, so you don't have the same decision to make as you do with the other $3s.

Was Peddler always in the $6 or more cost? Maybe it should be on the overpay card list as well.

In the end of the day there is always a reason to the ultimate cost. So yeah, Masterpiece is bad if you pay $3, but it's an average - maybe below average - $3 card. Stonemason without the overbuy would be TERRIBLE, but as it is it's fine at $2.

No need to change anything in my oppinion.

[Qvist]

In my opinion, overpay cards need to be in their own list, just like potion-cost cards. I don't think it makes much sense to compare Stonemason to the other $2 cards, when it's obviously stronger than most $2s, because it has an effect that make you want to pay $5 or more for it. Or look at Masterpeice... It's a TERRIBLE $3 card... But it's an ok $6 or $7 card. In other words, you don't consider buying Masterpeice with $3, so you don't have the same decision to make as you do with the other $3s.

Was Peddler always in the $6 or more cost? Maybe it should be on the overpay card list as well.

In the end of the day there is always a reason to the ultimate cost. So yeah, Masterpiece is bad if you pay $3, but it's an average - maybe below average - $3 card. Stonemason without the overbuy would be TERRIBLE, but as it is it's fine at $2.

No need to change anything in my oppinion.

Totally agree with kn1tt3r here. Also, we want to evaluate the strength of a particular card.
Let's say Masterpiece is the worst $3 card, the third worst $4 card, the 43th best $5 card, and the 6th best $6+ card (just examples), what does it say about its strength? (Nearly) Nothing!

[microman]

I really think they should just be put on whatever their regular price list is. So Stonemason at $2, Masterpiece at $3, etc.

Why? Look, we do this exact same thing for Peddler already. It's in the $6+ range. But if you are paying $6+ for Peddler, then really it should be worst card on that list. But it's not, it's in the top half of $6+ cards. Why? Because when we rank it, we make mental note of the different prices aspect of it. We can do the same for these cards.

And the truth shall set you free!!!!!
Spot on my good chap! :

[golden_cow2]

Totally agree with kn1tt3r here. Also, we want to evaluate the strength of a particular card.
Let's say Masterpiece is the worst $3 card, the third worst $4 card, the 43th best $5 card, and the 6th best $6+ card (just examples), what does it say about its strength? (Nearly) Nothing!

It says that a $3 copper is awful, a $4 Copper + Silver is still awful, a $5 Copper + 2 Silvers is okay, and a $6 Copper + Gajillion Silvers is amazing.  It's impossible to value Masterpiece's overall strength, as it (and other overpay cards to a lesser extent) is an entirely different card if you buy it at $3 or #6.

[Fuu]

I really think they should just be put on whatever their regular price list is. So Stonemason at $2, Masterpiece at $3, etc.

Why? Look, we do this exact same thing for Peddler already. It's in the $6+ range. But if you are paying $6+ for Peddler, then really it should be worst card on that list. But it's not, it's in the top half of $6+ cards. Why? Because when we rank it, we make mental note of the different prices aspect of it. We can do the same for these cards.

And the truth shall set you free!!!!!
Spot on my good chap! :

So the guy with the Scout avatar agrees with Robz888. Something fishy going on there...

[microman]

I really think they should just be put on whatever their regular price list is. So Stonemason at $2, Masterpiece at $3, etc.

Why? Look, we do this exact same thing for Peddler already. It's in the $6+ range. But if you are paying $6+ for Peddler, then really it should be worst card on that list. But it's not, it's in the top half of $6+ cards. Why? Because when we rank it, we make mental note of the different prices aspect of it. We can do the same for these cards.

And the truth shall set you free!!!!!
Spot on my good chap! :

So the guy with the Scout avatar agrees with Robz888. Something fishy going on there...

Mwahaha!!! 

[HiveMindEmulator]

It's impossible to value Masterpiece's overall strength, as it (and other overpay cards to a lesser extent) is an entirely different card if you buy it at $3 or #6.

And it's equally "impossible" to value the overall strength of Village, since it's entirely different depending on what terminals are available. But we rank it anyway. If cost were actually the most important variable in evaluating the value of cards, then it might make sense to do something special with these cards, but it's not. There are a ton of variables that affect the value of cards that are not related to cost and we just deal with them, so it doesn't seem like this needs any special treatment.

Another argument is that can actually overpay for any card. There are just 4 cards which also give you an added benefit if you do. You can say the value of a card X is something like:
\sum_i Pr(buy X for $i) * (value of X when bought for $i)
For cards without overpay bonuses, (value of X when bought for $i) is independent of i, so it comes out of the sum and you just get (value of X when bought for $i)*Pr(buy X).

[Beyond Awesome]

From my experience so far, you want to overpay for Stonemason and Masterpiece. But, most often, I don't find myself overpaying for Herald all that much. So, where would we put Herald then? And, what if you really did want to buy Masterpiece for $3?

Really, I think we should look at overpay as a special ability these cards have. When you buy a Stonemason, you are still paying $2 for it. Then, if you overpay by $5, you are really just using its special ability. Yes, you spent $7 total, but really, you spent $2 on the card, plus $5 on the special ability.

[Hockey Mask]

A $2+ Stonemason that you pay two extra coins for is now a $4 card.  Different cost, different ability.  Just the way it is.

[HiveMindEmulator]

A $2+ Stonemason that you pay two extra coins for is now a $4 card.  Different cost, different ability.  Just the way it is.

No it's not. If you Salvage it, you still only get $2. It's a $2 card.

What if Stonemason instead just cost $2 and had an on-buy ability to the effect of "When you buy this, you may buy another card without using a buy and without applying any on-buy effects. If you do, gain another copy of that card"?

This is nearly enough the same thing as Stonemason without the variable cost. Would you argue that this card should go anywhere other than the $2 list?

[SirPeebles]

Alright HiveMindEmulator, that pretty much settles it for me.  Similarly, Masterpiece could have been a $3 card which says "when you buy this, you may buy as many Silvers for $1 a piece as you please" and it would be roughly equivalent (edge cases like Goons or Merchant Guild aside).

[WanderingWinder]

The only reason the lists are grouped by cost is that it is generally the most convenient way of grouping, since in order to make interesting choices happen, there tends to be a correlation between cost and strength (though this is a tendency and not at all a hard-and-fast rule). You could really break the list down however you want, even alphabetically.

Ideally, we would rate all the cards on a single list, but 200 kingdom cards is unwieldy to work with.

[Schneau]

A $2+ Stonemason that you pay two extra coins for is now a $4 card.  Different cost, different ability.  Just the way it is.

No it's not. If you Salvage it, you still only get $2. It's a $2 card.

What if Stonemason instead just cost $2 and had an on-buy ability to the effect of "When you buy this, you may buy another card without using a buy and without applying any on-buy effects. If you do, gain another copy of that card"?

This is nearly enough the same thing as Stonemason without the variable cost. Would you argue that this card should go anywhere other than the $2 list?

This. And it's not just theoretical. The Guilds rules say that the card itself "still has its normal cost for all purposes," and then gives the examples that overpaying for Masterpiece with a Haggler in play doesn't allow you to gain a card costing more than $2.

[Mic Qsenoch]

A $2+ Stonemason that you pay two extra coins for is now a $4 card.  Different cost, different ability.  Just the way it is.

No it's not. If you Salvage it, you still only get $2. It's a $2 card.

What if Stonemason instead just cost $2 and had an on-buy ability to the effect of "When you buy this, you may buy another card without using a buy and without applying any on-buy effects. If you do, gain another copy of that card"?

This is nearly enough the same thing as Stonemason without the variable cost. Would you argue that this card should go anywhere other than the $2 list?

For your next trick, do the same thing for Doctor and Herald. Playing word games to obscure the variability of the cost isn't convincing. It doesn't address the main argument in favor including overpayers in multiple lists which is that buying a Stonemason for $2 and for $7 gives a dramatically different on buy effect. And yes, I realize that not all the overpayers change as dramatically as Stonemason.

To those who are opposed: why not include them on multiple lists? It just provides more information for very little extra effort. Four cards isn't a lot more to rank and it potentially informs decisions about how much you want to overpay for the various cards.

[Tables]

The only reason the lists are grouped by cost is that it is generally the most convenient way of grouping, since in order to make interesting choices happen, there tends to be a correlation between cost and strength (though this is a tendency and not at all a hard-and-fast rule). You could really break the list down however you want, even alphabetically.

Ideally, we would rate all the cards on a single list, but 200 kingdom cards is unwieldy to work with.

Rating all the cards on a single list has it's own issues, although it's not ones we entirely avoid already. It's downright weird to try and say things like, "Which is better, Fairgrounds or Squire"? What does it even mean to say that Fairgrounds is better/worse than Squire? They're just so totally different cards. Of course we still have a similar issue with things like, Duke against Vault, but at least similar cost limits the weirdness in most cases (and potion costs, there's few enough of that we can still do meaningful comparisons).

Although, if we DID want to do an all cards list, I reckon it'd be viable, but you'd probably want to put things through maybe two-three rounds. Two of preliminary rough sorts, then from that create maybe ~10 lists of about 25-30 cards with overlap, and use those to make a master list. Not saying it's a good idea, but... it's possible to limit the unwieldiness.

As for the argument at hand: I'm kind of indifferent. I've seen good arguments on both sides. When it comes to having $6 in my buy phase and 1 buy, Masterpiece is there as an option, giving me 1 psuedocopper and up to three silvers. $5? It's there again. I'm comparing it to the other $5's and considering it's worth. But then again you can consider it to just be another quirk of the $3 card. Like, you could decide to put Ambassador in with the $5's to see how it does. The fact it's cheaper and thus more available, but worse with TfB is just an oddity it has in the comparisons.

Ultimately I think it comes down to what WW said. Grouping by cost is an arbitrary convenience we chose. Now that there are things to challenge our (mostly) fixed notion of cost, we might want to consider other relevant groupings, but I doubt we'll find anything quite so encompassing as cost, even with the slight issue of overpay effects.

[WanderingWinder]

A $2+ Stonemason that you pay two extra coins for is now a $4 card.  Different cost, different ability.  Just the way it is.

No it's not. If you Salvage it, you still only get $2. It's a $2 card.

What if Stonemason instead just cost $2 and had an on-buy ability to the effect of "When you buy this, you may buy another card without using a buy and without applying any on-buy effects. If you do, gain another copy of that card"?

This is nearly enough the same thing as Stonemason without the variable cost. Would you argue that this card should go anywhere other than the $2 list?

For your next trick, do the same thing for Doctor and Herald. Playing word games to obscure the variability of the cost isn't convincing. It doesn't address the main argument in favor including overpayers in multiple lists which is that buying a Stonemason for $2 and for $7 gives a dramatically different on buy effect. And yes, I realize that not all the overpayers change as dramatically as Stonemason.

To those who are opposed: why not include them on multiple lists? It just provides more information for very little extra effort. Four cards isn't a lot more to rank and it potentially informs decisions about how much you want to overpay for the various cards.

The issue is, I can't break the card up into parts. The-part-of-stonemason-I-get-on-a-7-cost-card, or on a 5 cost card, or on... whatever it is you are paying for it can't be easily separated from each other. And even if they could, you still aren't actually ever ranking the card itself - flexibility to do those different things is a big part of its strength.

[Schneau]

A $2+ Stonemason that you pay two extra coins for is now a $4 card.  Different cost, different ability.  Just the way it is.

No it's not. If you Salvage it, you still only get $2. It's a $2 card.

What if Stonemason instead just cost $2 and had an on-buy ability to the effect of "When you buy this, you may buy another card without using a buy and without applying any on-buy effects. If you do, gain another copy of that card"?

This is nearly enough the same thing as Stonemason without the variable cost. Would you argue that this card should go anywhere other than the $2 list?

For your next trick, do the same thing for Doctor and Herald. Playing word games to obscure the variability of the cost isn't convincing.

There is no variability of the cost. The cost is fixed, as described in the rules. You may then pay more than the cost to get an effect. In fact, Peddler's cost is less fixed than these, but no one has ever suggested it should be on the $2 list and the $4 list.

[Just a Rube]

Wouldn't the value of overpaying for stone mason at any given cost depend on the value of the cards in the kingdom at that cost? If we assume we are averaging over all kingdoms, then stone mason comes out at essentially average on every list (since buying stone mason is essentially buying a $2 copy of another card, which comes with a free stonemason, a la duchess; I'm assuming the utility of the stone mason in your deck is cancelled out by having another terminal you don't want). And if a stonemason appears on the $3 list, do we assume it's gaining 2 poor houses, wasting money, or undergoing highway shenanigans?

It's very similar to band of misfits in that way, but band of misfits isn't competing with the cards that it mimics.

More broadly, the cards are already unwieldy to rank; having to rank additional cards (esp. ones where the overpayment effect makes ranking tricky; what is the ranking difference between a doctor that overpays by 2 vs. 3?) adds work without much gain. Sure, it's only 4 cards (times the number of lists each could appear in), but it's exceptionally tricky. Assessing the new Guild cards will already be tough (just look at how badly the Dark Ages cards were judged in the current list), there is no need to break that up further.

[jonts26]

To those who are opposed: why not include them on multiple lists? It just provides more information for very little extra effort. Four cards isn't a lot more to rank and it potentially informs decisions about how much you want to overpay for the various cards.

Having a ranking for a $2 SM, a $3 SM, a $4 SM, a $5 SM, a $6+ SM is more than a little cumbersome (and do that for the others as well).

Four cards isn't a lot more to rank and it potentially informs decisions about how much you want to overpay for the various cards.

And here's the real issue. If you're using these lists to inform your strategy on a given board, you are doing it so wrong. These ratings give general sense of card strength over all boards. The decision to overpay and by how much has nothing to do here.

[Mic Qsenoch]

A $2+ Stonemason that you pay two extra coins for is now a $4 card.  Different cost, different ability.  Just the way it is.

No it's not. If you Salvage it, you still only get $2. It's a $2 card.

What if Stonemason instead just cost $2 and had an on-buy ability to the effect of "When you buy this, you may buy another card without using a buy and without applying any on-buy effects. If you do, gain another copy of that card"?

This is nearly enough the same thing as Stonemason without the variable cost. Would you argue that this card should go anywhere other than the $2 list?

For your next trick, do the same thing for Doctor and Herald. Playing word games to obscure the variability of the cost isn't convincing. It doesn't address the main argument in favor including overpayers in multiple lists which is that buying a Stonemason for $2 and for $7 gives a dramatically different on buy effect. And yes, I realize that not all the overpayers change as dramatically as Stonemason.

To those who are opposed: why not include them on multiple lists? It just provides more information for very little extra effort. Four cards isn't a lot more to rank and it potentially informs decisions about how much you want to overpay for the various cards.

The issue is, I can't break the card up into parts. The-part-of-stonemason-I-get-on-a-7-cost-card, or on a 5 cost card, or on... whatever it is you are paying for it can't be easily separated from each other. And even if they could, you still aren't actually ever ranking the card itself - flexibility to do those different things is a big part of its strength.

The flexibility as strength thing is a very good point, and I hadn't considered it. I still don't think it's impossible to rank each price reasonably though, you just have to consider what the effect would be at each price and evaluate its usefulness (plus the usefulness of the Stonemason you've got). This will be hard to do right now, but once everybody has played with the card more I think it's doable.

And I think it will be strange if Stonemason is ranked as the #2 or #3 best $2 card whenever it's only strong if purchased for at least $4.

[WanderingWinder]

A $2+ Stonemason that you pay two extra coins for is now a $4 card.  Different cost, different ability.  Just the way it is.

No it's not. If you Salvage it, you still only get $2. It's a $2 card.

What if Stonemason instead just cost $2 and had an on-buy ability to the effect of "When you buy this, you may buy another card without using a buy and without applying any on-buy effects. If you do, gain another copy of that card"?

This is nearly enough the same thing as Stonemason without the variable cost. Would you argue that this card should go anywhere other than the $2 list?

For your next trick, do the same thing for Doctor and Herald. Playing word games to obscure the variability of the cost isn't convincing. It doesn't address the main argument in favor including overpayers in multiple lists which is that buying a Stonemason for $2 and for $7 gives a dramatically different on buy effect. And yes, I realize that not all the overpayers change as dramatically as Stonemason.

To those who are opposed: why not include them on multiple lists? It just provides more information for very little extra effort. Four cards isn't a lot more to rank and it potentially informs decisions about how much you want to overpay for the various cards.

The issue is, I can't break the card up into parts. The-part-of-stonemason-I-get-on-a-7-cost-card, or on a 5 cost card, or on... whatever it is you are paying for it can't be easily separated from each other. And even if they could, you still aren't actually ever ranking the card itself - flexibility to do those different things is a big part of its strength.

The flexibility as strength thing is a very good point, and I hadn't considered it. I still don't think it's impossible to rank each price reasonably though, you just have to consider what the effect would be at each price and evaluate its usefulness (plus the usefulness of the Stonemason you've got). This will be hard to do right now, but once everybody has played with the card more I think it's doable.

And I think it will be strange if Stonemason is ranked as the #2 or #3 best $2 card whenever it's only strong if purchased for at least $4.

I find it strange that Border Village is close to the best 6+cost when it is just a middle-of-the-road $3 effect. Or the peddler issue. Or duchess, since you usually gain it for free. Or that conspirator is good when sometimes it's absolutely useless. I mean, okay, I am paying more for it. So what? I usually don't buy fool's gold or chapel or ANY 2-cost for 2, really. That I need to spend more on it is something I think people can handle, much like grand market's buy restriction.

[HiveMindEmulator]

To those who are opposed: why not include them on multiple lists? It just provides more information for very little extra effort. Four cards isn't a lot more to rank and it potentially informs decisions about how much you want to overpay for the various cards.

I don't think it provides "more" information. It provides different (and imo less useful) information. If we "split" the card into different lists, each version of the card is weaker than the card as a whole, and more importantly is not an actual Dominion card. On the $5 list, are we putting some version of Stonemason that can only be bought for $5? Such a card does not exist, and by ranking it, you start to open up a pandora's box. Why aren't we ranking other cards that don't exist, like $4 vanilla village?

[Mic Qsenoch]

To those who are opposed: why not include them on multiple lists? It just provides more information for very little extra effort. Four cards isn't a lot more to rank and it potentially informs decisions about how much you want to overpay for the various cards.

Having a ranking for a $2 SM, a $3 SM, a $4 SM, a $5 SM, a $6+ SM is more than a little cumbersome (and do that for the others as well).

Four cards isn't a lot more to rank and it potentially informs decisions about how much you want to overpay for the various cards.

And here's the real issue. If you're using these lists to inform your strategy on a given board, you are doing it so wrong. These ratings give general sense of card strength over all boards. The decision to overpay and by how much has nothing to do here.

Well, I disagree on the added effort, you are effectively adding 11 more cards to rank then you would normally. But I suppose that will depend on the person. Shouldn't require much extra effort from Qvist, since I imagine he has a good system in place.

Somebody who is just starting to play Dominion competitively can learn a great deal about strategy from the ranking lists. Particularly about which cards are reasonable openings, which attacks are too strong to ignore, which cards are so weak that not buying them is generally sound strategy. This won't take you to the top, but I sure do see 5000+ rated people on Goko still buying Scout/Coppersmith/Pirate Ship and other worthless junk frequently and it blows my mind. A good ordering of the card strengths is a necessary foundation upon which to build more important strategic considerations. People will be out there buying $4 Masterpieces, and they will lose, but maybe if $4 Masterpiece is at the bottom of the $4 list someone will think twice about doing it.

[Schneau]

To those who are opposed: why not include them on multiple lists? It just provides more information for very little extra effort. Four cards isn't a lot more to rank and it potentially informs decisions about how much you want to overpay for the various cards.

I don't think it provides "more" information. It provides different (and imo less useful) information. If we "split" the card into different lists, each version of the card is weaker than the card as a whole, and more importantly is not an actual Dominion card. On the $5 list, are we putting some version of Stonemason that can only be bought for $5? Such a card does not exist, and by ranking it, you start to open up a pandora's box. Why aren't we ranking other cards that don't exist, like $4 vanilla village?

Or put Silver on the $4 and $5 lists, where it is often bought?

[SirPeebles]

I mean, okay, I am paying more for it. So what? I usually don't buy fool's gold or chapel or ANY 2-cost for 2, really. That I need to spend more on it is something I think people can handle, much like grand market's buy restriction.

I see your point that you usually have more than $2 when you buy the $2 card.  But it's also true from a strategy point of view that you are aware that all you need is $2.  It's pretty common to be considering, say, buying that Squire you need for some +buy, but then deciding not to spend $4 on it since you are confident that you'll make $2 again before the end of this shuffle, and right now the $4 needs to go towards Conspirators.

On the other hand, that Stonemason might be completely worthless for your strategy until you make $6 or even $7.  And there is a huge difference between $2 and $6.  You probably don't spend $6 on a $2 card often.

[Mic Qsenoch]

A $2+ Stonemason that you pay two extra coins for is now a $4 card.  Different cost, different ability.  Just the way it is.

No it's not. If you Salvage it, you still only get $2. It's a $2 card.

What if Stonemason instead just cost $2 and had an on-buy ability to the effect of "When you buy this, you may buy another card without using a buy and without applying any on-buy effects. If you do, gain another copy of that card"?

This is nearly enough the same thing as Stonemason without the variable cost. Would you argue that this card should go anywhere other than the $2 list?

For your next trick, do the same thing for Doctor and Herald. Playing word games to obscure the variability of the cost isn't convincing. It doesn't address the main argument in favor including overpayers in multiple lists which is that buying a Stonemason for $2 and for $7 gives a dramatically different on buy effect. And yes, I realize that not all the overpayers change as dramatically as Stonemason.

To those who are opposed: why not include them on multiple lists? It just provides more information for very little extra effort. Four cards isn't a lot more to rank and it potentially informs decisions about how much you want to overpay for the various cards.

The issue is, I can't break the card up into parts. The-part-of-stonemason-I-get-on-a-7-cost-card, or on a 5 cost card, or on... whatever it is you are paying for it can't be easily separated from each other. And even if they could, you still aren't actually ever ranking the card itself - flexibility to do those different things is a big part of its strength.

The flexibility as strength thing is a very good point, and I hadn't considered it. I still don't think it's impossible to rank each price reasonably though, you just have to consider what the effect would be at each price and evaluate its usefulness (plus the usefulness of the Stonemason you've got). This will be hard to do right now, but once everybody has played with the card more I think it's doable.

And I think it will be strange if Stonemason is ranked as the #2 or #3 best $2 card whenever it's only strong if purchased for at least $4.

I find it strange that Border Village is close to the best 6+cost when it is just a middle-of-the-road $3 effect. Or the peddler issue. Or duchess, since you usually gain it for free. Or that conspirator is good when sometimes it's absolutely useless. I mean, okay, I am paying more for it. So what? I usually don't buy fool's gold or chapel or ANY 2-cost for 2, really. That I need to spend more on it is something I think people can handle, much like grand market's buy restriction.

I'm failing to understand the relevance of BV or Conspirator (you can just evaluate these cards for what they do with on gain and play effects, the effects are fixed). I would love to see Peddler on the $2 and $4 list. For the FG/Chapel thing. You spend $3 or $4 on those cards pretty often, but it does not change the actual effect of the card. In the case of Stonemason you are explicitly getting a different effect at each price point, and you can distinguish between the usefulness of each of these different effects.

The points about not segmenting the cards into multiple prices because it misrepresents what the card is capable of (all the effects at different price points) is a really good one. Calling $5 Stonemason a single card is a misrepresentation, you are all right about that. But I think calling it a $2 card is a misrepresentation as well.

[ashersky]

This whole thread personifies the f.ds motto: it depends on the kingdom.

You are arguing about how Stonemason with Sea Hag on the board makes SM a 6, so maybe we should rank it against Gold.  Or Stonemason with Wharf on the board makes it a 7.  Etc.

Don't we (you) take kingdom into account when ranking all the other cards?  I don't see a difference here.  Stonemason's overpay ability is dependent on the kingdom, just like Highway or Tunnel.  Just keep it in mind when comparing it to Pawn.

[Tables]

The points about not segmenting the cards into multiple prices because it misrepresents what the card is capable of (all the effects at different price points) is a really good one. Calling $5 Stonemason a single card is a misrepresentation, you are all right about that. But I think calling it a $2 card is a misrepresentation as well.

This is pretty much what I said earlier. Our divisions into costs are arbitrary. If we put it into the $2 list it's because that's the list where it's most reasonably represented. It just means we have to be more careful with how we talk about that particular list.

One notable thing about putting cards at every price is that the combined effect of the card will be better than the sum of the whole. If we talk about "Stonecutter at $5", "Stonecutter at $6",... and consider each of their effects, sure, they can gain two $3's or two $4's, but are then a $2 card in your deck, oh well, and the gain effect is limited to X Y Z. But really, we have a lot more choice than that. If we could buy "Stonecutter for $7" then "Stonecutter for $2" through to "Stonecutter for $6" were also options, which is a subtlety that I think putting them into other lists would obfuscate.

[Mic Qsenoch]

The points about not segmenting the cards into multiple prices because it misrepresents what the card is capable of (all the effects at different price points) is a really good one. Calling $5 Stonemason a single card is a misrepresentation, you are all right about that. But I think calling it a $2 card is a misrepresentation as well.

One notable thing about putting cards at every price is that the combined effect of the card will be better than the sum of the whole. If we talk about "Stonecutter at $5", "Stonecutter at $6",... and consider each of their effects, sure, they can gain two $3's or two $4's, but are then a $2 card in your deck, oh well, and the gain effect is limited to X Y Z. But really, we have a lot more choice than that. If we could buy "Stonecutter for $7" then "Stonecutter for $2" through to "Stonecutter for $6" were also options, which is a subtlety that I think putting them into other lists would obfuscate.

Right, WW and HME mentioned this, and it's true. The question is: will we get a better idea of the overall strength of Stonemason by a) ranking it in several price classes and then forming a composite in our heads, or b) forming a composite image in our heads and then comparing it to the $2s.

[WanderingWinder]

The points about not segmenting the cards into multiple prices because it misrepresents what the card is capable of (all the effects at different price points) is a really good one. Calling $5 Stonemason a single card is a misrepresentation, you are all right about that. But I think calling it a $2 card is a misrepresentation as well.

One notable thing about putting cards at every price is that the combined effect of the card will be better than the sum of the whole. If we talk about "Stonecutter at $5", "Stonecutter at $6",... and consider each of their effects, sure, they can gain two $3's or two $4's, but are then a $2 card in your deck, oh well, and the gain effect is limited to X Y Z. But really, we have a lot more choice than that. If we could buy "Stonecutter for $7" then "Stonecutter for $2" through to "Stonecutter for $6" were also options, which is a subtlety that I think putting them into other lists would obfuscate.

Right, WW and HME mentioned this, and it's true. The question is: will we get a better idea of the overall strength of Stonemason by a) ranking it in several price classes and then forming a composite in our heads, or b) forming a composite image in our heads and then comparing it to the $2s.

I don't think this is a relevant question, and we won't get a very good idea of the overall strength of stonemason either way.

I'm failing to understand the relevance of BV or Conspirator (you can just evaluate these cards for what they do with on gain and play effects, the effects are fixed). I would love to see Peddler on the $2 and $4 list.

How are these effects more fixed than that of stonemason? Conspirator gives you $2 with or without cantripping... dependent on what you've played so far this turn, which is dependent on what is on the board. BV gains you a card costing up to 5... which absolutely depends on what's on the board. Stonemason bgives you extra paying extra for it... the strength of which is entirely dependent on the board.

The biggest point is the one Tables is making. The lists aren't some kind of buying guide, they're a very general gauge of the usefulness of different cards. Breaking them up by cost isn't at all about which card I would rather buy for a certain amount of money, it's just a way of grouping them. We happen to choose this because of a loose connection between price and power level, but it is a mostly arbitrary choice.
Furthermore, portraying the lists as a buying guide is I think mostly hurtful, as virtually every board has an exception, because you have to build a strategy which revolves around the set of cards rather than buying a collection of good cards.

[ftl]

Is there a reasonable other way to split up the cards? Maybe for the next edition of the list, we should do a "rank the villages" and "rank the gainers" or "rank the terminal draw" or "rank the alt-vp" or something.

That seems like it would be hard to split up, but could be interesting.

[WanderingWinder]

Somebody who is just starting to play Dominion competitively can learn a great deal about strategy from the ranking lists. Particularly about which cards are reasonable openings, which attacks are too strong to ignore, which cards are so weak that not buying them is generally sound strategy. This won't take you to the top, but I sure do see 5000+ rated people on Goko still buying Scout/Coppersmith/Pirate Ship and other worthless junk frequently and it blows my mind. A good ordering of the card strengths is a necessary foundation upon which to build more important strategic considerations. People will be out there buying $4 Masterpieces, and they will lose, but maybe if $4 Masterpiece is at the bottom of the $4 list someone will think twice about doing it.

Such people don't read the forums. WE read the forums. Not to mention, if they are just getting from a list, and not understanding *why* it's good or bad, then they haven't really learned anything, and it's not actually very useful to them.

Finally, sure people who have decently high-looking rankings play poorly (I had a guy over 5000 last night who bought some weird stuff, I thought he was going for a not-too-good but at least somewhat interesting try, and then... starting buying lots of duchies and estates, just leaving me to piledrive provinces with relative ease and no opposition). I don't understand what this has to do with the card lists though. It's more to do with Goko's ranking system not being all that good.

[SirPeebles]

I agree that it would be interesting to find other categories.  Of course, the categories will tend to overlap, and there are some real oddball cards out there that don't fit so well.  Of course, now even categorizing by "cost" has that problem 

By the way, I've seen some people mention that "$5 Stonemason" -- meaning a card a Stonemason where one must overpay by exactly $3 -- is not a real card and misses sight of some flexibility.  The flexibility argument is fair.  However, the idea is that $5 Stonemason is one of the options that you will consider when you have $5.  Therefore, $5 Stonemason should be understood as overpaying by up to $3, not exactly $3.  Just as you will sometimes use a hand of 5 Coppers to buy a Young Witch, you will sometimes use that hand to buy a Stonemason with two Hamlets.

[Mic Qsenoch]

The points about not segmenting the cards into multiple prices because it misrepresents what the card is capable of (all the effects at different price points) is a really good one. Calling $5 Stonemason a single card is a misrepresentation, you are all right about that. But I think calling it a $2 card is a misrepresentation as well.

One notable thing about putting cards at every price is that the combined effect of the card will be better than the sum of the whole. If we talk about "Stonecutter at $5", "Stonecutter at $6",... and consider each of their effects, sure, they can gain two $3's or two $4's, but are then a $2 card in your deck, oh well, and the gain effect is limited to X Y Z. But really, we have a lot more choice than that. If we could buy "Stonecutter for $7" then "Stonecutter for $2" through to "Stonecutter for $6" were also options, which is a subtlety that I think putting them into other lists would obfuscate.

Right, WW and HME mentioned this, and it's true. The question is: will we get a better idea of the overall strength of Stonemason by a) ranking it in several price classes and then forming a composite in our heads, or b) forming a composite image in our heads and then comparing it to the $2s.

I don't think this is a relevant question, and we won't get a very good idea of the overall strength of stonemason either way.

I'm failing to understand the relevance of BV or Conspirator (you can just evaluate these cards for what they do with on gain and play effects, the effects are fixed). I would love to see Peddler on the $2 and $4 list.

How are these effects more fixed than that of stonemason? Conspirator gives you $2 with or without cantripping... dependent on what you've played so far this turn, which is dependent on what is on the board. BV gains you a card costing up to 5... which absolutely depends on what's on the board. Stonemason bgives you extra paying extra for it... the strength of which is entirely dependent on the board.

The biggest point is the one Tables is making. The lists aren't some kind of buying guide, they're a very general gauge of the usefulness of different cards. Breaking them up by cost isn't at all about which card I would rather buy for a certain amount of money, it's just a way of grouping them. We happen to choose this because of a loose connection between price and power level, but it is a mostly arbitrary choice.
Furthermore, portraying the lists as a buying guide is I think mostly hurtful, as virtually every board has an exception, because you have to build a strategy which revolves around the set of cards rather than buying a collection of good cards.

Sure it's mainly a convenient organization thing, but that doesn't take away entirely its usefulness as a buying guide. I'm not sure why you are insisting that the lists aren't "at all" about buy preferences, since that's certainly one part of how the rankings are determined. Most strategic players prefer to buy cards which are more useful. You don't need to explain to me that Dominion strategy depends on the kingdom, I figured that one out at some point. I'm not insisting that the lists are great teachers of strategy, I've never said anything like that. But they really really do help beginners learn about powerful openings, and which cards you should seriously consider buying, and about which cards you should avoid like the plague. These concepts are important to beginning Dominion strategy, and even experienced players ignore strong cards at their peril. The lists also lead people to exploring the higher strategies involved in appropriate engine building by encouraging them to purchase cards which enable engines.

And just so it's clear, I think ranking the overpayers at their listed price point is a reasonable way to do it. I also think ranking them at more than one price point is reasonable and would be an interesting thought exercise which might give some extra information regarding those cards (plus more discussions/arguments!).

[Mic Qsenoch]

Somebody who is just starting to play Dominion competitively can learn a great deal about strategy from the ranking lists. Particularly about which cards are reasonable openings, which attacks are too strong to ignore, which cards are so weak that not buying them is generally sound strategy. This won't take you to the top, but I sure do see 5000+ rated people on Goko still buying Scout/Coppersmith/Pirate Ship and other worthless junk frequently and it blows my mind. A good ordering of the card strengths is a necessary foundation upon which to build more important strategic considerations. People will be out there buying $4 Masterpieces, and they will lose, but maybe if $4 Masterpiece is at the bottom of the $4 list someone will think twice about doing it.

Such people don't read the forums. WE read the forums. Not to mention, if they are just getting from a list, and not understanding *why* it's good or bad, then they haven't really learned anything, and it's not actually very useful to them.

Beginners come to these forums all the time, people who want to start playing strategically visit this site all the time. The lists help because they encourage people to buy and play with strong cards, and this lets players gain experience/improve with strong cards.

Also, the *why* of card strength i.e. the analysis and tawk and articles are largely overrated. People just have to go out and play with the cards, and they will get better faster if they are not buying crap. You add the crap back in once you become competent with the good stuff. Lots of people add the crap back in way too soon.

[WanderingWinder]

By the way, I've seen some people mention that "$5 Stonemason" -- meaning a card a Stonemason where one must overpay by exactly $3 -- is not a real card and misses sight of some flexibility.  The flexibility argument is fair.  However, the idea is that $5 Stonemason is one of the options that you will consider when you have $5.  Therefore, $5 Stonemason should be understood as overpaying by up to $3, not exactly $3.

Then they should all be on a list at about several thousand, because the 'up to' clause would then encapsulate the whole card. However, I don't really see the point of that. I mean, I don't think it's a bad idea per se, just not any better than calling out, I dunno, cards that draw two as a group.

[eHalcyon]

By the way, I've seen some people mention that "$5 Stonemason" -- meaning a card a Stonemason where one must overpay by exactly $3 -- is not a real card and misses sight of some flexibility.  The flexibility argument is fair.  However, the idea is that $5 Stonemason is one of the options that you will consider when you have $5.  Therefore, $5 Stonemason should be understood as overpaying by up to $3, not exactly $3.  Just as you will sometimes use a hand of 5 Coppers to buy a Young Witch, you will sometimes use that hand to buy a Stonemason with two Hamlets.

I think this is actually a potential argument for ranking Stonemason on a high cost list ONLY, instead of at $2 (and likewise for the other overpay cards).  I feel that the $2 list should not encompass effects that are only accessible when you pay more than $2.  But a higher cost list still makes sense to me for considering cards that let you pay less.  That's why I have no issue with Peddler being on the list where it is.  Ranking Stonemason against $6+ cards feels more useful to me than ranking it against $2 cards, where this $6+ Stonemason card has a negative quality of being worth less to TfB but a bonus of allowing you to pay less for it in return for a smaller on-buy benefit.

It's hard to explain, but I think it is better to compare potentially-cheaper cards against expensive cards than potentially-expensive cards against cheaper cards.  Can someone who feels similarly explain this better?

PPE: WW points out accurately that even ranking it at, say, $5 does not encompass the whole card because you can overpay far more.  However, those mega-purchases are (probably) rare enough that it's OK to omit them.  Moreover, we don't have a list for $1000 cost cards anyway.  For Stonemason specifically, you will never pay more than $10 for it because the most expensive card you could gain via the overpay is Peddler, and that's super unlikely to ever happen anyway.

My current vote is to stick the overpay cards on the list that ranks the most expensive cards.  Not that we are voting or anything.

[Taco Lobster]

Count me among those who would include overpay cards with their nominaly priced cousins.

As an aside, does anyone else feel dirty liking a post by Robz that isn't a Scout joke?  It feels like I'm doing something wrong.

[SirPeebles]

By the way, I've seen some people mention that "$5 Stonemason" -- meaning a card a Stonemason where one must overpay by exactly $3 -- is not a real card and misses sight of some flexibility.  The flexibility argument is fair.  However, the idea is that $5 Stonemason is one of the options that you will consider when you have $5.  Therefore, $5 Stonemason should be understood as overpaying by up to $3, not exactly $3.  Just as you will sometimes use a hand of 5 Coppers to buy a Young Witch, you will sometimes use that hand to buy a Stonemason with two Hamlets.

I think this is actually a potential argument for ranking Stonemason on a high cost list ONLY, instead of at $2 (and likewise for the other overpay cards).  I feel that the $2 list should not encompass effects that are only accessible when you pay more than $2.  But a higher cost list still makes sense to me for considering cards that let you pay less.  That's why I have no issue with Peddler being on the list where it is.  Ranking Stonemason against $6+ cards feels more useful to me than ranking it against $2 cards, where this $6+ Stonemason card has a negative quality of being worth less to TfB but a bonus of allowing you to pay less for it in return for a smaller on-buy benefit.

It's hard to explain, but I think it is better to compare potentially-cheaper cards against expensive cards than potentially-expensive cards against cheaper cards.  Can someone who feels similarly explain this better?

PPE: WW points out accurately that even ranking it at, say, $5 does not encompass the whole card because you can overpay far more.  However, those mega-purchases are (probably) rare enough that it's OK to omit them.  Moreover, we don't have a list for $1000 cost cards anyway.  For Stonemason specifically, you will never pay more than $10 for it because the most expensive card you could gain via the overpay is Peddler, and that's super unlikely to ever happen anyway.

My current vote is to stick the overpay cards on the list that ranks the most expensive cards.  Not that we are voting or anything.

That seems reasonable to me for Stonemason and Masterpiece, but then I feel like Doctor and Herald somehow make more sense right at $3 and $4 respectively.  I don't have a good way of explaining it, but it's my gut feeling.

[theory]

The only reason the lists are grouped by cost is that it is generally the most convenient way of grouping, since in order to make interesting choices happen, there tends to be a correlation between cost and strength (though this is a tendency and not at all a hard-and-fast rule). You could really break the list down however you want, even alphabetically.

Ideally, we would rate all the cards on a single list, but 200 kingdom cards is unwieldy to work with.

I don't think this is true.  It makes a lot more sense to compare Spy and Caravan than Caravan and Lab, even though Caravan is closer in concept to Lab.  We say Spy is a "bad card" not because it's actually harmful, but because at the same price point you can usually do a lot better. 

To put it another way, how would you all rank Doctor and Lookout?  Do you rank Lookout better because it has a better on-play effect?  (Assume this point is true for now.)  Do you rank Doctor higher because you can pay $6 for it?  If so, I would imagine that the overpay cards should dominate all of the top $X lists.

OTOH I don't like the idea of putting cards on multiple lists.  That seems so unwieldy and inelegant.

[SirPeebles]

[theory expousing the virtues of comparing equally priced cards]

Oh, you're one to talk 

[WanderingWinder]

The only reason the lists are grouped by cost is that it is generally the most convenient way of grouping, since in order to make interesting choices happen, there tends to be a correlation between cost and strength (though this is a tendency and not at all a hard-and-fast rule). You could really break the list down however you want, even alphabetically.

Ideally, we would rate all the cards on a single list, but 200 kingdom cards is unwieldy to work with.

I don't think this is true.  It makes a lot more sense to compare Spy and Caravan than Caravan and Lab, even though Caravan is closer in concept to Lab.  We say Spy is a "bad card" not because it's actually harmful, but because at the same price point you can usually do a lot better. 

This in no way conflicts with my statement. If you are evaluating a card by *anything*, of course its cost comes into account because of opportunity cost (among other reasons). This doesn't, however, imply that we must rank them against only other cards of their cost. I mean, you yourself posted the 'rank the villages' article, and of course to do that ranking, you had to take cost into account. (Well, and you also broke out $5 attacks separately).

I'm not actually suggesting that alphabetically is a *good* way to rank things, just that it's not all that much different/worse from cost.

I still think the optimal way is to do everything in a single list, it's just that nobody wants to do that. Maybe we still do it that way, all together, just instead of having lists be sent in, somebody sets up that program which was written before the last list to compare cards. So people just do that constantly, and there is a reference page which is the list of ratings based on those matchups. I don't know how much technical problem that poses, but it's an idea.

[Hockey Mask]

If you have a Village and a Worker's Village in the same kingdom the only thing you are adding with a WV purchase is +1 Buy for an additional coin.    You are "overpaying" your Village in order to add a Buy.  They are very different benefits at very different costs.  Stonemason is no different.

[Beyond Awesome]

By the way, I've seen some people mention that "$5 Stonemason" -- meaning a card a Stonemason where one must overpay by exactly $3 -- is not a real card and misses sight of some flexibility.  The flexibility argument is fair.  However, the idea is that $5 Stonemason is one of the options that you will consider when you have $5.  Therefore, $5 Stonemason should be understood as overpaying by up to $3, not exactly $3.  Just as you will sometimes use a hand of 5 Coppers to buy a Young Witch, you will sometimes use that hand to buy a Stonemason with two Hamlets.

I think this is actually a potential argument for ranking Stonemason on a high cost list ONLY, instead of at $2 (and likewise for the other overpay cards).  I feel that the $2 list should not encompass effects that are only accessible when you pay more than $2.  But a higher cost list still makes sense to me for considering cards that let you pay less.  That's why I have no issue with Peddler being on the list where it is.  Ranking Stonemason against $6+ cards feels more useful to me than ranking it against $2 cards, where this $6+ Stonemason card has a negative quality of being worth less to TfB but a bonus of allowing you to pay less for it in return for a smaller on-buy benefit.

It's hard to explain, but I think it is better to compare potentially-cheaper cards against expensive cards than potentially-expensive cards against cheaper cards.  Can someone who feels similarly explain this better?

PPE: WW points out accurately that even ranking it at, say, $5 does not encompass the whole card because you can overpay far more.  However, those mega-purchases are (probably) rare enough that it's OK to omit them.  Moreover, we don't have a list for $1000 cost cards anyway.  For Stonemason specifically, you will never pay more than $10 for it because the most expensive card you could gain via the overpay is Peddler, and that's super unlikely to ever happen anyway.

My current vote is to stick the overpay cards on the list that ranks the most expensive cards.  Not that we are voting or anything.

That seems reasonable to me for Stonemason and Masterpiece, but then I feel like Doctor and Herald somehow make more sense right at $3 and $4 respectively.  I don't have a good way of explaining it, but it's my gut feeling.

I agree about Doctor and especially Herald. Herald really feels like a $4 card because my experience has been to mostly buy it at $4 and occasionally use its overpay ability.

[eHalcyon]

By the way, I've seen some people mention that "$5 Stonemason" -- meaning a card a Stonemason where one must overpay by exactly $3 -- is not a real card and misses sight of some flexibility.  The flexibility argument is fair.  However, the idea is that $5 Stonemason is one of the options that you will consider when you have $5.  Therefore, $5 Stonemason should be understood as overpaying by up to $3, not exactly $3.  Just as you will sometimes use a hand of 5 Coppers to buy a Young Witch, you will sometimes use that hand to buy a Stonemason with two Hamlets.

I think this is actually a potential argument for ranking Stonemason on a high cost list ONLY, instead of at $2 (and likewise for the other overpay cards).  I feel that the $2 list should not encompass effects that are only accessible when you pay more than $2.  But a higher cost list still makes sense to me for considering cards that let you pay less.  That's why I have no issue with Peddler being on the list where it is.  Ranking Stonemason against $6+ cards feels more useful to me than ranking it against $2 cards, where this $6+ Stonemason card has a negative quality of being worth less to TfB but a bonus of allowing you to pay less for it in return for a smaller on-buy benefit.

It's hard to explain, but I think it is better to compare potentially-cheaper cards against expensive cards than potentially-expensive cards against cheaper cards.  Can someone who feels similarly explain this better?

PPE: WW points out accurately that even ranking it at, say, $5 does not encompass the whole card because you can overpay far more.  However, those mega-purchases are (probably) rare enough that it's OK to omit them.  Moreover, we don't have a list for $1000 cost cards anyway.  For Stonemason specifically, you will never pay more than $10 for it because the most expensive card you could gain via the overpay is Peddler, and that's super unlikely to ever happen anyway.

My current vote is to stick the overpay cards on the list that ranks the most expensive cards.  Not that we are voting or anything.

That seems reasonable to me for Stonemason and Masterpiece, but then I feel like Doctor and Herald somehow make more sense right at $3 and $4 respectively.  I don't have a good way of explaining it, but it's my gut feeling.

I agree about Doctor and especially Herald. Herald really feels like a $4 card because my experience has been to mostly buy it at $4 and occasionally use its overpay ability.

Yeah, I'll agree with this too.  With Stonemason, you will almost always be overpaying heavily.  Masterpiece is so much better when overpaid (and so weak at $3 or $4) that it also makes sense to compare it with other expensive options.  I'm not sure about Doctor though.

I think Herald might make more sense to rank with $4 cards because its overpay effect is more of a temporary boon.  Overpaid Stonemason and Masterpiece both add a lot to your deck.  Overpaid Doctor potentially changes your deck drastically as well.  But Herald doesn't -- it just improves your next turn.  That might be game-changing, of course, but it is a fleeting bonus rather than a permanent one.  Put another way, the overpay effects of Stonemason and Masterpiece are generally more important and impactful than their on-play effects.  Herald seems to be shaping up the other way.

With that in mind, I'm not sure about Doctor.  Right now I believe that Doctor's on-play effect is much stronger than it's overpay effect, but I am not sure.  Quick trashing by overpaying for Doctor may actually be very important.  If so, it would be worth it to compare it to other expensive options.

[Robz888]

Cards can be ranked in a variety of ways. You can rank the villages. If you do so, you just have to consider cost as part of the overall goodness of the card. Like, Bazaar is a real good village-type card, but it's a bit pricey. So it ends up in the mid-to-upper tier on the village rankings.

You can rank the cards based on cost (as we do here). If you do that, you are taking into account the other elements of the card when you rank it. Think of, whatever way you set up the ranking, that thing is the thing you are holding constant. When we ask "What are the best $3 cards?" we are saying, let's disregard cost, look at all these things with the same base cost, and compare them. Lookout is fine, it does some nice trashing and sifting and it's non terminal, but sometimes you hit good stuff and it doesn't replace itself so it's kind of meh. Doctor is terminal, which is not so good, but hey, it's trashing is stronger in the early game and also you can overpay for it and do this cool thing. The overpay aspect is just an aspect of the card we are looking at here as we hold cost constant.

Or else, I demand a Duchess category. It's the only card that's price is "You bought a Duchy." It's the best card with the price "You bought a Duchy"!

[StrongRhino]

Have to agree with Robz. Just keep doing what we've been doing. I don't see why we need to put a card in multiple sections. Think of it as an on-buy effect that only triggers with a certain circumstance (overpay).

That being said, I think it's silly/funny (and actually kind of sad) that we are actually arguing about how to organize cards to rank on a list that honestly, doesn't really mean anything.

(Also, Qvist, it would be nice to have a village ranking next time)

[eHalcyon]

Cards can be ranked in a variety of ways. You can rank the villages. If you do so, you just have to consider cost as part of the overall goodness of the card. Like, Bazaar is a real good village-type card, but it's a bit pricey. So it ends up in the mid-to-upper tier on the village rankings.

You can rank the cards based on cost (as we do here). If you do that, you are taking into account the other elements of the card when you rank it. Think of, whatever way you set up the ranking, that thing is the thing you are holding constant. When we ask "What are the best $3 cards?" we are saying, let's disregard cost, look at all these things with the same base cost, and compare them. Lookout is fine, it does some nice trashing and sifting and it's non terminal, but sometimes you hit good stuff and it doesn't replace itself so it's kind of meh. Doctor is terminal, which is not so good, but hey, it's trashing is stronger in the early game and also you can overpay for it and do this cool thing. The overpay aspect is just an aspect of the card we are looking at here as we hold cost constant.

Or else, I demand a Duchess category. It's the only card that's price is "You bought a Duchy." It's the best card with the price "You bought a Duchy"!

Yes, you are right -- when we rank cards based on cost, you are saying, "let's compare all the attributes of these cards, disregarding cost".  I guess this is where the disagreement is coming up.  Yeah overpaying is separate from the cost, but not entirely.  It still requires payment, so it is intrinsically linked to cost.  If you categorize by the cards by their base costs without regard for the overpay, you might as well just rank them all together regardless of cost.

[SirPeebles]

Or else, I demand a Duchess category. It's the only card that's price is "You bought a Duchy." It's the best card with the price "You bought a Duchy"!

Really?  If the rest of the community agreed upon some cost-related categorization for Stonemason which you disagreed with, you would demand Duchess be in a separate category?  I don't believe you.

[Robz888]

Or else, I demand a Duchess category. It's the only card that's price is "You bought a Duchy." It's the best card with the price "You bought a Duchy"!

Really?  If the rest of the community agreed upon some cost-related categorization for Stonemason which you disagreed with, you would demand Duchess be in a separate category?  I don't believe you.

Well, I'm obviously being facetious. I mention Duchess because everyone is acting like this has never come up before. "Oh my God, how do we rank these cards with weird cost bonuses???!!!" Just rank them with the other cards of the same base price, like we do for Peddler, Border Village, Grand Market, and Duchess.

[SirPeebles]

Border Village doesn't have a weird price.

Grand Market has a bit of a weird price, but its weird price is unambiguously $6+.

Peddler has a weird price.  I have no doubt that the most common price paid for a Peddler is $0, but what on Earth could it have meant to compare Peddler with Curse and Copper?  Edge cases aside, we would unanimously rank them Peddler > Copper > Curse.

Duchess usually isn't paid for.  In some ways it is like a Prize or like Madman/Mercenary/Spoils.  But sometimes you do buy it.  Crucially, it is one of your buy options when you have at least $2.

So of these cards, the only one that I agree really challenges the cost framework is Peddler.  With just one exception, you make do.

[AJD]

I demand a Duchess category. It's the only card that's price is "You bought a Duchy." It's the best card with the price "You bought a Duchy"!

I dunno, Duchy might be better. Depends on the kingdom.

[Robz888]

Border Village doesn't have a weird price.

Grand Market has a bit of a weird price, but its weird price is unambiguously $6+.

Peddler has a weird price.  I have no doubt that the most common price paid for a Peddler is $0, but what on Earth could it have meant to compare Peddler with Curse and Copper?  Edge cases aside, we would unanimously rank them Peddler > Copper > Curse.

Duchess usually isn't paid for.  In some ways it is like a Prize or like Madman/Mercenary/Spoils.  But sometimes you do buy it.  Crucially, it is one of your buy options when you have at least $2.

So of these cards, the only one that I agree really challenges the cost framework is Peddler.  With just one exception, you make do.

Doctor doesn't have a weird price. It costs $3. If you pay more for it, something interesting happens. Still, it's a $3 card, and it can be compared logically and intuitively to other $3 cards. Like Lookout. I think it's better than Lookout, one reason being its overpay thing, but yeah, they are both $3 cards.

[SirPeebles]

Border Village doesn't have a weird price.

Grand Market has a bit of a weird price, but its weird price is unambiguously $6+.

Peddler has a weird price.  I have no doubt that the most common price paid for a Peddler is $0, but what on Earth could it have meant to compare Peddler with Curse and Copper?  Edge cases aside, we would unanimously rank them Peddler > Copper > Curse.

Duchess usually isn't paid for.  In some ways it is like a Prize or like Madman/Mercenary/Spoils.  But sometimes you do buy it.  Crucially, it is one of your buy options when you have at least $2.

So of these cards, the only one that I agree really challenges the cost framework is Peddler.  With just one exception, you make do.

Doctor doesn't have a weird price. It costs $3. If you pay more for it, something interesting happens. Still, it's a $3 card, and it can be compared logically and intuitively to other $3 cards. Like Lookout. I think it's better than Lookout, one reason being its overpay thing, but yeah, they are both $3 cards.

Firstly, I've already stated that I feel like Doctor ought to be ranked as a $3 card.  Similarly Herald as a $4 card.

However, what myself and a few others have argued in this thread is that there was a reason for ranking by cost.  Cost tells you what the competition is. 

I have $3 to spend, what will I get? I could get Masterpiece, but Masterpiece is almost always a stupid purchase when I only have $3.  Likewise, even with $3, I doubt I'd want a Stonemason.  Alright, I'll buy a Silver.

Next hand.  I have $6.  I have four compelling options now.  I could buy a Gold.  Or I could buy a Masterpiece, overpaying by $3 to gain three Silvers.  Or I could buy Stonemason, overpaying by $4 to get two Smithies.  Or finally, I could buy a Border Village and take a Smithy with it.

Notice that when I had more money to spend, suddenly Masterpiece and Stonemason became more attractive options.  Border Village didn't do that, it had a fixed cost.

A player doesn't rack her brain choosing between Masterpiece and Silver for $3, but rather choosing between Masterpiece and Gold for $6.

[Robz888]

Border Village doesn't have a weird price.

Grand Market has a bit of a weird price, but its weird price is unambiguously $6+.

Peddler has a weird price.  I have no doubt that the most common price paid for a Peddler is $0, but what on Earth could it have meant to compare Peddler with Curse and Copper?  Edge cases aside, we would unanimously rank them Peddler > Copper > Curse.

Duchess usually isn't paid for.  In some ways it is like a Prize or like Madman/Mercenary/Spoils.  But sometimes you do buy it.  Crucially, it is one of your buy options when you have at least $2.

So of these cards, the only one that I agree really challenges the cost framework is Peddler.  With just one exception, you make do.

Doctor doesn't have a weird price. It costs $3. If you pay more for it, something interesting happens. Still, it's a $3 card, and it can be compared logically and intuitively to other $3 cards. Like Lookout. I think it's better than Lookout, one reason being its overpay thing, but yeah, they are both $3 cards.

Firstly, I've already stated that I feel like Doctor ought to be ranked as a $3 card.  Similarly Herald as a $4 card.

However, what myself and a few others have argued in this thread is that there was a reason for ranking by cost.  Cost tells you what the competition is. 

I have $3 to spend, what will I get? I could get Masterpiece, but Masterpiece is almost always a stupid purchase when I only have $3.  Likewise, even with $3, I doubt I'd want a Stonemason.  Alright, I'll buy a Silver.

Next hand.  I have $6.  I have four compelling options now.  I could buy a Gold.  Or I could buy a Masterpiece, overpaying by $3 to gain three Silvers.  Or I could buy Stonemason, overpaying by $4 to get two Smithies.  Or finally, I could buy a Border Village and take a Smithy with it.

Notice that when I had more money to spend, suddenly Masterpiece and Stonemason became more attractive options.  Border Village didn't do that, it had a fixed cost.

A player doesn't rack her brain choosing between Masterpiece and Silver for $3, but rather choosing between Masterpiece and Gold for $6.

Maybe this is some "how is your brain wired?" sort of thing. I see Masterpiece, a $3 card, and I say how good is it compared to other $3 cards? Pretty bad, well, except I can do this overpay thing that's sort of nice, and I would want to do that in X, Y, and Z situations, meaning on average here's how good it is, relative to other $3 cards. I still say its overpay component is an aspect of an otherwise $3 card.

[HiveMindEmulator]

Regarding beginning players and the lists:

I think the lists are actually very useful to newer players to help the recognize the cards that are stronger, so they are more likely to try them out and learn about them. Focusing in on a few cards rather than being drowned by 200 different cards can definitely help people get better faster. I think the best way to do this is to just recognize the "best" X number of cards (where X increases as you get more comfortable) and focus on building strategies around those cards -- NOT making decisions turn-by-turn using the list as a reference. Yes some people may end up doing that. But we're not doing them a huge disservice by not putting cards on multiple lists. By employing this strategy, they're missing enough already that a few cards being on multiple lists is not going to make a noticeable difference.

[ycz6]

If you have a Village and a Worker's Village in the same kingdom the only thing you are adding with a WV purchase is +1 Buy for an additional coin.    You are "overpaying" your Village in order to add a Buy.  They are very different benefits at very different costs.  Stonemason is no different.

Well, if we wanted to be as thorough as possible, we could have one list for each price point. That is, one list containing all cards costing $2 or less, one list containing all cards costing $3 or less, and so on, and we would rank all the cards at every price point. So Village and Worker's Village would both be on the "$4- Dominion Card Ranking."

Obviously this is a terrible idea in practice, and the entire point of this thread is figuring out how to best summarize the information from these inflated lists. I'm on the side of listing the overpay cards on every list, since I think that's the most useful thing to do, and I don't have any moral objections to comparing a card with the number 3 in a little coin on it to a card with a number 5 in a little coin on it.

Such people don't read the forums. WE read the forums.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1%25_rule_(Internet_culture)

[werothegreat]

Your right parenthesis is outside your URL box, ycz6.

I'm going to agree with Robz that we should just rank the overpay cards by their given cost.  Otherwise it would just be ridiculous.  $3 and $4 Masterpiece would obviously be at the bottom of their lists, and then it would slowly crawl up.  Better to just factor everything into the card and put it on one list.

[eHalcyon]

Border Village doesn't have a weird price.

Grand Market has a bit of a weird price, but its weird price is unambiguously $6+.

Peddler has a weird price.  I have no doubt that the most common price paid for a Peddler is $0, but what on Earth could it have meant to compare Peddler with Curse and Copper?  Edge cases aside, we would unanimously rank them Peddler > Copper > Curse.

Duchess usually isn't paid for.  In some ways it is like a Prize or like Madman/Mercenary/Spoils.  But sometimes you do buy it.  Crucially, it is one of your buy options when you have at least $2.

So of these cards, the only one that I agree really challenges the cost framework is Peddler.  With just one exception, you make do.

Doctor doesn't have a weird price. It costs $3. If you pay more for it, something interesting happens. Still, it's a $3 card, and it can be compared logically and intuitively to other $3 cards. Like Lookout. I think it's better than Lookout, one reason being its overpay thing, but yeah, they are both $3 cards.

Firstly, I've already stated that I feel like Doctor ought to be ranked as a $3 card.  Similarly Herald as a $4 card.

However, what myself and a few others have argued in this thread is that there was a reason for ranking by cost.  Cost tells you what the competition is. 

I have $3 to spend, what will I get? I could get Masterpiece, but Masterpiece is almost always a stupid purchase when I only have $3.  Likewise, even with $3, I doubt I'd want a Stonemason.  Alright, I'll buy a Silver.

Next hand.  I have $6.  I have four compelling options now.  I could buy a Gold.  Or I could buy a Masterpiece, overpaying by $3 to gain three Silvers.  Or I could buy Stonemason, overpaying by $4 to get two Smithies.  Or finally, I could buy a Border Village and take a Smithy with it.

Notice that when I had more money to spend, suddenly Masterpiece and Stonemason became more attractive options.  Border Village didn't do that, it had a fixed cost.

A player doesn't rack her brain choosing between Masterpiece and Silver for $3, but rather choosing between Masterpiece and Gold for $6.

Maybe this is some "how is your brain wired?" sort of thing. I see Masterpiece, a $3 card, and I say how good is it compared to other $3 cards? Pretty bad, well, except I can do this overpay thing that's sort of nice, and I would want to do that in X, Y, and Z situations, meaning on average here's how good it is, relative to other $3 cards. I still say its overpay component is an aspect of an otherwise $3 card.

I think of it differently.  I think, "I have $3.  On average, which of these cards is a better buy?"  In that case, Masterpiece is a terrible card compared to other cards.  Alternatively, if I have $6, Masterpiece might look like a pretty good buy in comparison to other $6 cards.  Yeah it depends on the board and yo deck and all, but this is still the way I look at these rankings, and it's why I don't think it's a fair comparison to rank Masterpiece with the other $3s when you'd pretty much never buy it at that price.

I'm going to agree with Robz that we should just rank the overpay cards by their given cost.  Otherwise it would just be ridiculous.  $3 and $4 Masterpiece would obviously be at the bottom of their lists, and then it would slowly crawl up.  Better to just factor everything into the card and put it on one list.

I agree with that (though I don't think it's really that ridiculous to put them on multiple lists) but I think the cards should be put on the list corresponding to the price where they are most likely to be purchased.  For masterpiece, that has to be at least $5, probably $6+.

[Just a Rube]

I agree with that (though I don't think it's really that ridiculous to put them on multiple lists) but I think the cards should be put on the list corresponding to the price where they are most likely to be purchased.  For masterpiece, that has to be at least $5, probably $6+.

How should that be determined? Stats or first principles? Do we even have ready access to stats for that? And do we include all-gains or just buys (e.g. I swindle your $3 into a masterpiece)?

[hockeysemlan]

I read the whole thread now and my 2 cents as a non-writer at this forum would be:

Isn't it weirder that we allow only-victory kingdom cards, such as Duke, in the rankings? I mean they are goals I reach for in a certain kingdom, very rarely something I use to improve my deck. How can it help beginners to include them in a "buy-guide-ranking-sortathing"? Same thing with the cursers alywas coming so high up in the rankings. Yes, they are always good game-changing cards - ignoring a curser is almost always a disaster- but in those quite rare kingdoms when cursers are easy to get rid off, the cursers become even more awful than a down-nerfed Scout.. I mean Sea Hag is "make your opponent discard a card".. In my rankings cursers comes a bit down than the average because of this matter. 

I mean with all this that not only "over-pay"- cards are tricky to rate. If we go for sorting by price Stonemason cost 2, no more no less, that is not up for discussion even. I would gladly see a ranking on other permissions but if not- to argue about this is quite silly. They ARE what they cost, not what you pay for them.

(Still an interesting thread, I must say- you workdealyers)

[Schneau]

Border Village doesn't have a weird price.

Grand Market has a bit of a weird price, but its weird price is unambiguously $6+.

Peddler has a weird price.  I have no doubt that the most common price paid for a Peddler is $0, but what on Earth could it have meant to compare Peddler with Curse and Copper?  Edge cases aside, we would unanimously rank them Peddler > Copper > Curse.

Duchess usually isn't paid for.  In some ways it is like a Prize or like Madman/Mercenary/Spoils.  But sometimes you do buy it.  Crucially, it is one of your buy options when you have at least $2.

So of these cards, the only one that I agree really challenges the cost framework is Peddler.  With just one exception, you make do.

Doctor doesn't have a weird price. It costs $3. If you pay more for it, something interesting happens. Still, it's a $3 card, and it can be compared logically and intuitively to other $3 cards. Like Lookout. I think it's better than Lookout, one reason being its overpay thing, but yeah, they are both $3 cards.

Firstly, I've already stated that I feel like Doctor ought to be ranked as a $3 card.  Similarly Herald as a $4 card.

However, what myself and a few others have argued in this thread is that there was a reason for ranking by cost.  Cost tells you what the competition is. 

I have $3 to spend, what will I get? I could get Masterpiece, but Masterpiece is almost always a stupid purchase when I only have $3.  Likewise, even with $3, I doubt I'd want a Stonemason.  Alright, I'll buy a Silver.

Next hand.  I have $6.  I have four compelling options now.  I could buy a Gold.  Or I could buy a Masterpiece, overpaying by $3 to gain three Silvers.  Or I could buy Stonemason, overpaying by $4 to get two Smithies.  Or finally, I could buy a Border Village and take a Smithy with it.

Notice that when I had more money to spend, suddenly Masterpiece and Stonemason became more attractive options.  Border Village didn't do that, it had a fixed cost.

A player doesn't rack her brain choosing between Masterpiece and Silver for $3, but rather choosing between Masterpiece and Gold for $6.

The problem I see here that it ignores the fact that you frequently "overpay" to get a card you need. For example, you're likely not just deciding between Masterpiece and Gold for $6, but also Wharf for $5 and Sea Hag for $4. You can "overpay" to get Wharf if that's what you need at the time; you just don't get a bonus benefit for overpaying. If you are going to put Masterpiece on the $6+ list, you probably also have to put Wharf (and every other $5 card, etc.), as ycz6 suggests.

[theory]

But Wharf isn't a better card when you pay more for it.

Suppose you had an overpay card that cost $2 that was -1VP.  And suppose that for each $1 you overpaid, you gained 1 VP token.  What list would you put this in, and how would you rank it? 

Presumably it is by far the best out of all cards that cost $2.  But it is only better than other $2's in the sense that Gold is a better card than Silver.  Is that fair?  Shouldn't we really be wondering whether this card is better than Gold, rather than wasting our time comparing it to Haven?

FWIW, though, I've been convinced that the overpay cards belong on their price point list and nowhere else.  Just seeing if there are other alternatives.

[eHalcyon]

But Wharf isn't a better card when you pay more for it.

Suppose you had an overpay card that cost $2 that was -1VP.  And suppose that for each $1 you overpaid, you gained 1 VP token.  What list would you put this in, and how would you rank it? 

Presumably it is by far the best out of all cards that cost $2.  But it is only better than other $2's in the sense that Gold is a better card than Silver.  Is that fair?  Shouldn't we really be wondering whether this card is better than Gold, rather than wasting our time comparing it to Haven?

FWIW, though, I've been convinced that the overpay cards belong on their price point list and nowhere else.  Just seeing if there are other alternatives.

What argument convinced you of that?  The counterargument you present is basically why I'd rather see the overpay cards against other expensive cards.

[Qvist]

Ok. I've read this for a while and thought about that a bit. hockeysemlan made a good point and I'm going to summarize my thoughts in the following.

- This isn't the list of the cards with the best openings.
- This isn't the list of cards with the best on-play effect (IGG, Border Village, Any Alt VP).
- This isn't a buy priority list if you have $X to spend (Duchess, Peddler)

This is more a rating of the cards and its general strength - and more important - general impact on the board.
How does the presence of this card changes my strategy? Stronger cards have a bigger effect and weaker cards are more ignorable.
It makes no sense to divide a card into several effects and rate them individually, just because you get no answer to that question.
This isn't of course an easy task, but we managed to that well in the past and some cards already are veeery occasional and hard to rank, for example Trading Post which can be huge on a 5/2, but sub-par otherwise, or ranking Duke or Horn of Plenty on the $5 list is really hard too.

Of course this might change with more experience after playing with Guilds, but I suspect we shouldn't change our approach here and rank those cards based on their actual cost.
If someone is going to buy Masterpiece for $3 because it well end up high on the $3 list (just an example) this is his fault and I'm going to say it again: This isn't a buy priority list if you have $X to spend. If you don't understand the strengths and weaknesses of a card, then this list won't help at all. That's why I found it important from the start to give some sentences along the line to tell everyone why it's ranked where it's ranked, to at least understand the position and not just give a plain rating. Some of you said before I started this thing, that it's not necessary, but I felt it was, just from the beginning and many appreciated that.

Also, on a side note. Stonemason is a $2 cost just ruleswise. Salvaging it gives you $2 and even if you overpay for it with a Haggler in play, you have to take a Copper. Overpaying doesn't change the cost of the card.

[Davio]

I've thought about doing lists by category instead of price, but that is actually quite hard.

The least of the problems is comparing cards at different price points, that's doable, like comparing Sea Hag to Witch. You just have to take the price into account. Is Sea Hag a better $4 than Witch is a $5?

The main problem is that there are so many crossovers. If we're looking at "terminal drawers", how do you compare a card which' main function is to draw with a card which also attacks? How do you compare Smithy to Ghost Ship?

So even if we do define categories with strict definitions, there will be cards which do a lot of things and don't fit very well, while they're still a good card.

The only "solution" is just to create a list with all cards at all price points and compare them against each other. Good luck with that. And if you're done, you haven't even began to solve Dominion. Is Hoard a better $6 than Hamlet is a $2? Who knows?

[Witherweaver]

Next hand.  I have $6.  I have four compelling options now.  I could buy a Gold.  Or I could buy a Masterpiece, overpaying by $3 to gain three Silvers.  Or I could buy Stonemason, overpaying by $4 to get two Smithies.  Or finally, I could buy a Border Village and take a Smithy with it.

Or you could get Witch because it happens to be a better option for you than Gold. Or Market because you need a +buy more than anything else.  Or maybe you have to get a Gardens for some reason.  Or any number of cards that cost less than $6 and don't have an overpay effect.  I'm sure the constituents of this forum could come up with an edge case for every possible card.  Grand Markets is a weird case, too.  You're often "overspending" for it by not playing coppers that are in your hand.  If you're thinking of the lists as "I have $X to spend, what can I buy for $Y <= $X," then (as someone else said) you'd have to create a cumulative ranking list of cost <= $X for all $X.  And we'd probably all agree that's not what the list is for.  You wouldn't play by laying down all your money, counting it as $X, going to the "Best Cards at Cost $X$ list and choosing the highest.

The overpay effect simply adds to the utility of the card when considering buying it.  You have to pay more for that utility, but that's just part of the dynamics.  It doesn't change the cost of the card.  It is something that you would take into account when raking it against other cards, and it can be considered both a strength and a weakness (in the case of Masterpiece.. it's priced at $3 because of its overpay ability, but you would hate to gain it from a Swindler or Haggler, or anyway except buying with the option to overpay).

[Witherweaver]

But Wharf isn't a better card when you pay more for it.

Suppose you had an overpay card that cost $2 that was -1VP.  And suppose that for each $1 you overpaid, you gained 1 VP token.  What list would you put this in, and how would you rank it? 

Presumably it is by far the best out of all cards that cost $2.  But it is only better than other $2's in the sense that Gold is a better card than Silver.  Is that fair?  Shouldn't we really be wondering whether this card is better than Gold, rather than wasting our time comparing it to Haven?

FWIW, though, I've been convinced that the overpay cards belong on their price point list and nowhere else.  Just seeing if there are other alternatives.

Well not exactly Gold, because then you've paid $6 for a Duchy.  And for $5 you gain 2 VP, which is worse than other options and probably only viable in some rare edge cases, and you could have just bought a Duchy.  At $7 you get 4VP and that could actually be useful.  So maybe you should compare it to King's Court~~.  Otherwise, it's actually only viable to buy at $10 or more (or $13 or more in Colony games).

In which case, you'd probably agree it's a pretty limited $2 card.  It's only real use is when you have a lot of extra money or an awkward $7 hand late.  The cases when you can pay $50 and get 47 VP are pretty rare, so that would hurt the utility of the card.  This would make you value it less at $2, or at any price, really, since you could easily shift the base card so it is $2+x, +x-1VP tokens, you may overpay for 1VP token for each $1 overpaid. 

So compare that card $2+x, +x-1VP tokens, overpay for 1VP token each $1 overpaid for different x.  While this is equivalent in terms of VP/cost, the cards are still different depending on what x is.  When x=0 (your card) you have different options than when x=4, even though those options may not be any good.  (I.e., you don't have the option to spend $3 for 0VP when x=4).  The base cost does change the mechanics and so it should be taken into account. 

[mith]

I demand a Duchess category. It's the only card that's price is "You bought a Duchy." It's the best card with the price "You bought a Duchy"!

I dunno, Duchy might be better. Depends on the kingdom.

Obviously Scout is the best card with the price "You bought a Duchy" (when Haggler is in play).

[AdamH]

Some observations:

I've skimmed over a majority of this discussion. I apologize if something I say has already been mentioned. Consider it my agreeing with you.

Perhaps some of us have lost sight of what we're actually talking about. AFAIK nobody asked Qvist to do these rankings, he thought it would be a good idea and did the work of collecting data from everybody, compiling it, computing all the relevant statistics he could think of, AND putting together a write-up of EVERY card given those statistics. The write-ups are thoughtful and insightful not only for people new to the game (I recommend the lists in my Dominion video tutorial series for people who want a starting point for which cards are more likely to shape the course of a game) but also for experienced people to say "RAWR I THINK SCOUT SHOULD BE HIGHER!" and express the different ways the view the game. The different ways we can interpret the data, agree/disagree with it, and still all end up agreeing that it's a great thing goes to show the awesome thing that Qvist has put together and put so much work into.

I'm worried that he might be put into a position where no matter what he decides to do with the +cost cards, some people will think it's wrong. I'm not saying that's happening because there's a lot of text here that I haven't read, but none of us are entitled to any of this. It's Qvist's decision what to do and pretty much no matter what he does, I'll probably support it and continue to try and find good conclusions to make from it, as I have done in the past.

If you want my opinion: card costs, what these categories attempt to distinguish by, are a "cost to entry." What does it take to get these cards? If you can do more to get them then sometimes you get a benefit on top of that (this goes beyond overpaying, like Fool's Gold doesn't work well unless you have a lot of them. That means that $2 and 1 Buy is not the "cost to entry" for FG, it's higher. Chapel is different. We already take that into account in the rankings). I don't understand how overpaying is any different. Of course cards like Masterpiece and Peddler are going to be awkward, but Qvist is already able to paint the broad strokes just by compiling stats from tons of people with different opinions, and he does a good job of going a step further buy inferring situational cards by high deviation and other stuff.

I think the list works, and we should let it continue to work and show nothing but support.

I like fish.

[WanderingWinder]

I agree with what you're saying AdamH. The only thing I would add, and I hope pretty much everyone here more or less agrees is... it doesn't really matter. So, I think it should just be with their actual cost (e.g. masterpiece at 3), but if it's different... I won't really care that much. This is all mostly for fun and of course an entirely free and voluntary service.

[Hockey Mask]

If you include a $2 SM, a $3 SM, a $4 SM etc...

Everyone gets what they want.  If you only want to recognize a $2 SM then you get ignore the others.  Very simple really.

[jonts26]

If you include a $2 SM, a $3 SM, a $4 SM etc...

Everyone gets what they want.  If you only want to recognize a $2 SM then you get ignore the others.  Very simple really.

I don't want multiple costs of SM on different lists. It is, in fact, my least favorite option.

[Hockey Mask]

Then ignore it.

You're kinda taking your ball and going home.

[Robz888]

Then ignore it.

You're kinda taking your ball and going home.

But the goal isn't to include like absolutely everyone's preferred state of affairs. Some people may want Variant cards and Fan cards included. I do not, and will argue emphatically that they should not be included.

[jonts26]

Then ignore it.

You're kinda taking your ball and going home.

I was simply correcting your false statement "everyone gets what they want." Perhaps I'm the only one who feels that way, which I doubt, but even it I was, it still wouldn't be correct. However, I would cede my position if there was overwhelming support for that method. But again, I doubt there is. I'm not trying to be unreasonable here. And really, my feelings aren't all that strong on the issue in general.

I can see the argument for putting SM at various price points, but the argument for putting it at multiple price points is much less compelling and I find it to be actually somewhat misleading to do so since as its been said, you are no longer representing any particular dominion card.

[Hockey Mask]

Why are you choosing your piece of mind over fellow Dominion Strategy members and Dominion lovers by choosing not to ignore 16-20 extra cards.  Unfortunately, my situation doesn't allow me to "sacrifice" for you. 

Seems selfish.

Edit: post in response to robz888 comment.

[werothegreat]

I like fish.

I don't.  It tastes nasty and salty.

[Hockey Mask]

I like fish.

I don't.  It tastes nasty and salty.

Then nobody should be allowed fish. 

[AdamH]

I like fish.

I don't.  It tastes nasty and salty.

<-- His name is Sarge.

[HiveMindEmulator]

No matter what happens, some people aren't going to be happy. The fundamental problem is that the "best cards" lists aren't well defined. We never agreed on what information it's really meant to convey. If the way you rank the cards is based on how often you buy them at that price point compared to other cards at the same price point, putting Masterpiece at $3 seems pointless. If you rank cards by their overall strategic value, splitting up a card makes no sense. Then there's the issue that if you put a card on all the lists, some people are going to think about "splitting up" the value of the card, and some people are going to rank the full card on each list, which leads to even more confused rankings.

[AdamH]

No matter what happens, some people aren't going to be happy. The fundamental problem is that the "best cards" lists aren't well defined. We never agreed on what information it's really meant to convey. If the way you rank the cards is based on how often you buy them at that price point compared to other cards at the same price point, putting Masterpiece at $3 seems pointless. If you rank cards by their overall strategic value, splitting up a card makes no sense. Then there's the issue that if you put a card on all the lists, some people are going to think about "splitting up" the value of the card, and some people are going to rank the full card on each list, which leads to even more confused rankings.

No matter what happens, EVERYBODY should be happy. Period. There's no excuse for anything else, especially the saying of anything negative at all. Including negative things about Sarge.

If someone feels strongly enough that this isn't worth it, I don't see anyone stopping them from doing their own list.

[WanderingWinder]

Then ignore it.

You're kinda taking your ball and going home.

I don't understand how this analogy works. 'taking your ball and going home' would be don't rank the overpay cards at all. But he's advocating for something (putting them at their own costs - let's make it analogous to soccer). Others are advocating for other things (putting them on their own list - let's call this footie; putting them with the most expensive cards - we'll call this rugby). You are saying that everyone is happy if we play some game that has rules from soccer, football, and rugby. But I actually think that it's closer to the opposite - nobody is happy!

And actually, I already described why this is a bad idea - in ranking bits of the card, you never rank the card itself as a whole. This is HUGE! A big part of the strength of a lot of these cards is their flexibility, which you're never taking into account. And there's other specific issues too.

Why are you choosing your piece of mind over fellow Dominion Strategy members and Dominion lovers by choosing not to ignore 16-20 extra cards.  Unfortunately, my situation doesn't allow me to "sacrifice" for you. 

Seems selfish.

Edit: post in response to robz888 comment.

What? This makes no sense - not ignoring things is generally good, not bad; it is, however, incredibly difficult to *force* someone to not ignore something; there aren't 16-20 cards in discussion; your argument seems to more or less boil down to 'you are being selfish for asking for what you want, instead of yielding to me so that I can get what I want' which isn't prima facie an argument that either side can use. I also don't see how, in this way, your positions are any different at all.

[Hockey Mask]

Then ignore it.

You're kinda taking your ball and going home.

I don't understand how this analogy works. 'taking your ball and going home' would be don't rank the overpay cards at all. But he's advocating for something (putting them at their own costs - let's make it analogous to soccer). Others are advocating for other things (putting them on their own list - let's call this footie; putting them with the most expensive cards - we'll call this rugby). You are saying that everyone is happy if we play some game that has rules from soccer, football, and rugby. But I actually think that it's closer to the opposite - nobody is happy!

And actually, I already described why this is a bad idea - in ranking bits of the card, you never rank the card itself as a whole. This is HUGE! A big part of the strength of a lot of these cards is their flexibility, which you're never taking into account. And there's other specific issues too.

Why are you choosing your piece of mind over fellow Dominion Strategy members and Dominion lovers by choosing not to ignore 16-20 extra cards.  Unfortunately, my situation doesn't allow me to "sacrifice" for you. 

Seems selfish.

Edit: post in response to robz888 comment.

What? This makes no sense - not ignoring things is generally good, not bad; it is, however, incredibly difficult to *force* someone to not ignore something; there aren't 16-20 cards in discussion; your argument seems to more or less boil down to 'you are being selfish for asking for what you want, instead of yielding to me so that I can get what I want' which isn't prima facie an argument that either side can use. I also don't see how, in this way, your positions are any different at all.

I don't have the luxury to ignore anything.  If the $5 Stonemason isn't included I can't add it.  Why wouldn't a $5 power be compared to other $5 powers?  That seems to be the whole point of the lists.

[jonts26]

I don't have the luxury to ignore anything.  If the $5 Stonemason isn't included I can't add it.  Why wouldn't a $5 power be compared to other $5 powers?  That seems to be the whole point of the lists.

The problem is there's no such card in dominion as a $5 Stonemason. There's just stonemason.

EDIT: and of course you're not wrong to want to compare a stonemason to a power $5 card. You often have to make the decision between the two when buying. But that's also true when comparing Steward to Wharf. And no one seems to be objecting to them being on separate lists.

[Hockey Mask]

I don't have the luxury to ignore anything.  If the $5 Stonemason isn't included I can't add it.  Why wouldn't a $5 power be compared to other $5 powers?  That seems to be the whole point of the lists.

The problem is there's no such card in dominion as a $5 Stonemason. There's just stonemason.

A Stonemason that costs me $5 and give me a power that can't be bought at $2, $3 or $4.

[Witherweaver]

I don't have the luxury to ignore anything.  If the $5 Stonemason isn't included I can't add it.  Why wouldn't a $5 power be compared to other $5 powers?  That seems to be the whole point of the lists.

The problem is there's no such card in dominion as a $5 Stonemason. There's just stonemason.

A Stonemason that costs me $5 and give me a power that can't be bought at $2, $3 or $4.

But it didn't cost you $5, it cost you $2.  The extra power cost you $3. 

Another analogy is Black Market, which has an "on-play" overpay effect of letting you buy 1 of three cards (chosen randomly from a separate deck).  Sure, it costs $3 to buy, but its use technically costs money, so its like a $3+x card where x is paid in arrears.  If Black Markets wording was like Noble Brigands ("when you buy this or play this"), would you want to rank it at a different price point?

I also wonder if this entire discussion isn't motivated mostly by a bias with the word "overpay".  If Stonemason were worded "When you buy this, you may take -X coin, to a minimum of 0 coin.  If you do, gain two cards, each costing no more than X," would we consider Stonemason anything but a $2 card?

[Hockey Mask]

I don't have the luxury to ignore anything.  If the $5 Stonemason isn't included I can't add it.  Why wouldn't a $5 power be compared to other $5 powers?  That seems to be the whole point of the lists.

The problem is there's no such card in dominion as a $5 Stonemason. There's just stonemason.

A Stonemason that costs me $5 and give me a power that can't be bought at $2, $3 or $4.

But it didn't cost you $5, it cost you $2.  The extra power cost you $3. 

Another analogy is Black Market, which has an "on-play" overpay effect of letting you buy 1 of three cards (chosen randomly from a separate deck).  Sure, it costs $3 to buy, but its use technically costs money, so its like a $3+x card where x is paid in arrears.  If Black Markets wording was like Noble Brigands ("when you buy this or play this"), would you want to rank it at a different price point?

I also wonder if this entire discussion isn't motivated mostly by a bias with the word "overpay".  If Stonemason were worded "When you buy this, you may take -X coin, to a minimum of 0 coin.  If you do, gain two cards, each costing no more than X," would we consider Stonemason anything but a $2 card?

Overpaying isn't a mechanic that presides over the entire game.  I can't overpay a Witch and gain extra power.  The Stonemason's overpay is on the card.

[Witherweaver]

I don't have the luxury to ignore anything.  If the $5 Stonemason isn't included I can't add it.  Why wouldn't a $5 power be compared to other $5 powers?  That seems to be the whole point of the lists.

The problem is there's no such card in dominion as a $5 Stonemason. There's just stonemason.

A Stonemason that costs me $5 and give me a power that can't be bought at $2, $3 or $4.

But it didn't cost you $5, it cost you $2.  The extra power cost you $3. 

Another analogy is Black Market, which has an "on-play" overpay effect of letting you buy 1 of three cards (chosen randomly from a separate deck).  Sure, it costs $3 to buy, but its use technically costs money, so its like a $3+x card where x is paid in arrears.  If Black Markets wording was like Noble Brigands ("when you buy this or play this"), would you want to rank it at a different price point?

I also wonder if this entire discussion isn't motivated mostly by a bias with the word "overpay".  If Stonemason were worded "When you buy this, you may take -X coin, to a minimum of 0 coin.  If you do, gain two cards, each costing no more than X," would we consider Stonemason anything but a $2 card?

Overpaying isn't a mechanic that presides over the entire game.  I can't overpay a Witch and gain extra power.  The Stonemason's overpay is on the card.

It's a mechanic that's specific to the card.  But so are many other mechanics that happen on particular cards.  Lots of cards have special mechanics (Island, Noble Brigands, Mandarin, Black Market, etc.).  The on-buy effect is something you take into account when you choose whether or not to buy the card.  Other cards have on-buy effects (but it doesn't cost more coin).

[Hockey Mask]

I don't have the luxury to ignore anything.  If the $5 Stonemason isn't included I can't add it.  Why wouldn't a $5 power be compared to other $5 powers?  That seems to be the whole point of the lists.

The problem is there's no such card in dominion as a $5 Stonemason. There's just stonemason.

A Stonemason that costs me $5 and give me a power that can't be bought at $2, $3 or $4.

But it didn't cost you $5, it cost you $2.  The extra power cost you $3. 

Another analogy is Black Market, which has an "on-play" overpay effect of letting you buy 1 of three cards (chosen randomly from a separate deck).  Sure, it costs $3 to buy, but its use technically costs money, so its like a $3+x card where x is paid in arrears.  If Black Markets wording was like Noble Brigands ("when you buy this or play this"), would you want to rank it at a different price point?

I also wonder if this entire discussion isn't motivated mostly by a bias with the word "overpay".  If Stonemason were worded "When you buy this, you may take -X coin, to a minimum of 0 coin.  If you do, gain two cards, each costing no more than X," would we consider Stonemason anything but a $2 card?

Overpaying isn't a mechanic that presides over the entire game.  I can't overpay a Witch and gain extra power.  The Stonemason's overpay is on the card.

It's a mechanic that's specific to the card.  But so are many other mechanics that happen on particular cards.  Lots of cards have special mechanics (Island, Noble Brigands, Mandarin, Black Market, etc.).  The on-buy effect is something you take into account when you choose whether or not to buy the card.  Other cards have on-buy effects (but it doesn't cost more coin).

and that is why I am not arguing for them to be listed mor e than once.

[jonts26]

and that is why I am not arguing for them to be listed mor e than once.

If you include a $2 SM, a $3 SM, a $4 SM etc...

Everyone gets what they want.  If you only want to recognize a $2 SM then you get ignore the others.  Very simple really.

[werothegreat]

I like fish.

I don't.  It tastes nasty and salty.

<-- His name is Sarge.

Fish in a tank I can do.  Once I'm settled in my own house, I'm going to get a saltwater tank and put lionfish in it.

[Witherweaver]

I think he meant the cards that have on-buy effects that don't cost money. 

Anyway, Stonemason shouldn't be on the $5 card list because it isn't a $5 card.  I can't upgrade a Scout into a Stonemason.  (He refuses to change vocations, because Scouting is cooler than building.)

[jonts26]

Oh, my bad. I misunderstood. Ummm. Well actually I have nothing to say that hasn't been said at least once already. All these arguments are starting to repeat. I'll just see myself out.

[Hockey Mask]

I think he meant the cards that have on-buy effects that don't cost money. 

Anyway, Stonemason shouldn't be on the $5 card list because it isn't a $5 card.

Yes, thank you.  That is what I meant.


  I believe Stonemason is a $2, $3, $4, $5, $6 card.  It says so in the bottom left side of the card itself.  2+.

[Witherweaver]

I think he meant the cards that have on-buy effects that don't cost money. 

Anyway, Stonemason shouldn't be on the $5 card list because it isn't a $5 card.

Yes, thank you.  That is what I meant.


  I believe Stonemason is a $2, $3, $4, $5, $6 card.  It says so in the bottom left side of the card itself.  2+.

But you're simply wrong.  At least, from what I've heard from the discussion that is not how it works.  If you pay $2+$3 you did not buy a $5 card, you bought a $2 card.  If you had played a Talisman, you would gain two of them, regardless of how much you overpaid.

Someone can correct me if I'm wrong, but we had this discussion during the preview week.

[Witherweaver]

Found the rulebook online:

Some cards in Dominion: Guilds can be "overpaid" for. The costs for these cards have a "+"
next to the coin symbol. A player may pay any additional amount for such a card, and then
gets an effect based on how much extra was paid. Potions (from Dominion: Alchemy) may
be used in overpaid amounts if desired, although this is not always meaningful. A player
may choose not to overpay, even if she has extra coins, but cannot choose to overpay (0); to
overpay, a player has to actually pay more than the cost. The coins used to overpay are gone
after spending them to overpay; they cannot be then used to buy something else.
Overpaying happens when a card is paid for, which is before it is gained. Players can only
overpay for a card when buying it, not when gaining it some other way. The "+" is just a
reminder; a card with "+" in the cost still has its normal cost for all purposes. For example
if a player plays Haggler (from Dominion: Hinterlands), then buys a Masterpiece,
overpaying, Haggler will still gain her a card costing less than (3), the cost of Masterpiece.
Similarly, Masterpiece could be the Bane card for Young Witch (from Dominion:
Cornucopia), since it costs (3) . Reducing the costs of cards via cards like Bridge (from
Dominion: Intrigue) or Highway (from Dominion: Hinterlands) does not interact with
overpay; for example, if you play five Bridges and have (5) total to spend, Herald would cost
(0), but if you bought one the most you could overpay for it would still be (5).

http://dominiongame.info/dominionguildsrules.pdf

Edit: Notably, your argument would also require all overpay cards go on the Potion list, because you can overpay Potions (even if it's meaningless).

[ftl]

The + is just there as a reminder of the card's ability, just like the "*" on the "0*" cost of Prizes, Spoils, Madman, Mercenary.

Anyway, the discussion is a little academic for now, since I think we should wait a while to get a handle on guilds cards before making a new list.

BTW, Qvist, we'll all continue to think you're awesome for doing the lists no matter how you end up classifying the overpay cards!

[jonts26]

BTW, Qvist, we'll all continue to think you're awesome for doing the lists no matter how you end up classifying the overpay cards!

Unless he doesn't do it my way. Then he's pretty much hitler.

[Hockey Mask]

In the end.  It doesn't really matter.  A list will come out that I'll glance at for a minute or so and I'll be done with it.

[Robz888]

Found the rulebook online:

Some cards in Dominion: Guilds can be "overpaid" for. The costs for these cards have a "+"
next to the coin symbol. A player may pay any additional amount for such a card, and then
gets an effect based on how much extra was paid. Potions (from Dominion: Alchemy) may
be used in overpaid amounts if desired, although this is not always meaningful. A player
may choose not to overpay, even if she has extra coins, but cannot choose to overpay (0); to
overpay, a player has to actually pay more than the cost. The coins used to overpay are gone
after spending them to overpay; they cannot be then used to buy something else.
Overpaying happens when a card is paid for, which is before it is gained. Players can only
overpay for a card when buying it, not when gaining it some other way. The "+" is just a
reminder; a card with "+" in the cost still has its normal cost for all purposes. For example
if a player plays Haggler (from Dominion: Hinterlands), then buys a Masterpiece,
overpaying, Haggler will still gain her a card costing less than (3), the cost of Masterpiece.
Similarly, Masterpiece could be the Bane card for Young Witch (from Dominion:
Cornucopia), since it costs (3) . Reducing the costs of cards via cards like Bridge (from
Dominion: Intrigue) or Highway (from Dominion: Hinterlands) does not interact with
overpay; for example, if you play five Bridges and have (5) total to spend, Herald would cost
(0), but if you bought one the most you could overpay for it would still be (5).

http://dominiongame.info/dominionguildsrules.pdf

Edit: Notably, your argument would also require all overpay cards go on the Potion list, because you can overpay Potions (even if it's meaningless).

The rulebook makes it even more clear that Masterpiece belongs on the $3 list.

[Beyond Awesome]

Honestly, I think it would be confusing if we rank Stonemason but multiple costs. How the hell am I supposed to know the value of a $5 Stonemason. You can get 2 $3 for that, but how often do I want two $3's? And, on that same board, I also have the choice of paying $7 for Stonemason, and sometimes even $9. Honestly, the overpay is an effect of the card, but not the cost of the card.

Anyway, the rule book makes it clear that Stonemason is a $2 card.

[Qvist]

Please keep the discussion friendly, it's only a list and not someone's personal life.

If you include a $2 SM, a $3 SM, a $4 SM etc...

Everyone gets what they want.  If you only want to recognize a $2 SM then you get ignore the others.  Very simple really.

No, it's not that simple. If I have to rank a $3 Masterpiece and a $4, $5 and $6 one in different lists, the $3 version will be on a different spot than if I only can rank it at $3 because I have to consider the other versions in the strength of the card. I won't be able to make everyone happy and I totally understand jonts26 here.

[Hockey Mask]

I'm not surprised you understand jonts26.  From what I can tell he is with the majority. Not necessarily right but the majority.

I guess I don't understand the purpose of the lists. Are we comparing cards, cost, or value?  Is this to promote discussion or education?

[Qvist]

I guess I don't understand the purpose of the lists. Are we comparing cards, cost, or value?

I made a long post about this already. We are comparing the general impact of cards on the board and for easier measure we group them by cost before.

Is this to promote discussion or education?

Both.

[Powerman]

It makes little sense to rate the same card multiple times... it's one card.  I personally think Chapel would be one of the best $3 cards, but I didn't put it in that list either.

[Hockey Mask]

I guess I don't understand the purpose of the lists. Are we comparing cards, cost, or value?

I made a long post about this already. We are comparing the general impact of cards on the board and for easier measure we group them by cost before.

Is this to promote discussion or education?

Both.

The impact of cards on the board?  Not sure exactly what is meant by this or it's usefulness to a typical Dominion player.  It seems the most useful list would be one that would compare each card by cost and their value/strength.  If I have four coins to spend what is typically my best purchase? 

[Qvist]

If I have four coins to spend what is typically my best purchase?

That's exactly not how it can work. I almost never buy a Duchess for $2. I get it for free most of the time, but the free gain has an impact on the board if Duke is there. Also, Alt VP cards have a different big impact on the board, for example Gardens. It has a big impact on the board, but that doesn't necessarily mean I should go for it every time. Chapel is the best $2 card and I have $2 turn 9, that means I should get it, right? There's a reason that Chapel is a top card and Trading Post is not, although both are often the way to go if you can open with it.

[StrongRhino]

Um guys, Qvist already chose what is happening. What are we arguing about?

[Witherweaver]

Also (because I like to beat dead horses), I believe considering a Stonemason to be worth more than $2 is greatly undervaluing the fact that the on-buy effect can only occur when you buy a card.  There are many games where most of your deck is not bought, but gained (Border Village, Remodel, Remake, Stonemason itself, Haggler, Butcher, Develop, Expand, Swindler, Saboteur, Workshop, Ironworks, Armory, Mine, Taxman, Rebuild, etc.).  If you rank it as, say, a $5 card because of its overpay ability, you're neglecting that you don't get the $5 worth out of it when you gain it in any other way.

On a side note, I played a neat game against a bot with Swindler and Masterpiece where the bot overpaid Masterpiece with two or three $6+ hands, and I Swindled his Silver into more Masterpieces.  It was cute

[Hockey Mask]

Um guys, Qvist already chose what is happening. What are we arguing about?

This would be the discussion part of education and discussion.

We all know that Dominion is anything but consistent but if we keep making exceptions for different situations.  A $2 Chapel is a horrible purchase if it is the fifth one in my deck.

To actually make a useful list it should go from the cheapest card to the most expensive.  In the end, the list would generally go from $2 to $7 with some blurring of costs.  It would provide better education...what is typically the best use of $4?  Overspend for Chapel?  And discussion...pull Chapel from the $2 dregs and compare it to other power cards.

[eHalcyon]

Also (because I like to beat dead horses), I believe considering a Stonemason to be worth more than $2 is greatly undervaluing the fact that the on-buy effect can only occur when you buy a card.  There are many games where most of your deck is not bought, but gained (Border Village, Remodel, Remake, Stonemason itself, Haggler, Butcher, Develop, Expand, Swindler, Saboteur, Workshop, Ironworks, Armory, Mine, Taxman, Rebuild, etc.).  If you rank it as, say, a $5 card because of its overpay ability, you're neglecting that you don't get the $5 worth out of it when you gain it in any other way.

On a side note, I played a neat game against a bot with Swindler and Masterpiece where the bot overpaid Masterpiece with two or three $6+ hands, and I Swindled his Silver into more Masterpieces.  It was cute

You are overselling that fact, I think.  In some games you gain more than you buy, but that is actually extremely rare.  With BV, you are usually still BUYING the BV.  In the majority of other cards you name (Remodel family, among others), you still need to BUY fodder for them.  Several of the cards are ATTACKS, so they don't really work for this argument. 

The workshop-family cards are straight up gainers and are a point FOR valuing overpay cards more highly.  How is the fact that Stonemason can be gained by Workshop a point against comparing it to $5 cards?  Not only can I get a $5 effect from SM, but bonus! -- I also have the option of gaining the card from Workshop if I'm more interested in its on-play effect than its overpay effect.

Probably the only card that really fits your argument is Develop, where developing your card gives you MORE fodder.  But a board where a pure Develop strategy is viable is pretty rare.


I personally believe that it would be most useful to rank the overpay cards at whatever cost they are most likely to be purchased.  I don't know how this other piece of info would be determined, but I guess it doesn't matter because most people would prefer to just rank them at their base costs.  And you know what?  I'm perfectly fine with that.  In the end, it really doesn't matter that much.

But I would hope that everyone can see the merits to the different suggestions that have been put forward.  It is not completely ridiculous to rank Stonemason against $5 or $6+ cards; there is value in that.  It is not bad to rank it against $2 cards; there is value in that too.

[Witherweaver]

Also (because I like to beat dead horses), I believe considering a Stonemason to be worth more than $2 is greatly undervaluing the fact that the on-buy effect can only occur when you buy a card.  There are many games where most of your deck is not bought, but gained (Border Village, Remodel, Remake, Stonemason itself, Haggler, Butcher, Develop, Expand, Swindler, Saboteur, Workshop, Ironworks, Armory, Mine, Taxman, Rebuild, etc.).  If you rank it as, say, a $5 card because of its overpay ability, you're neglecting that you don't get the $5 worth out of it when you gain it in any other way.

On a side note, I played a neat game against a bot with Swindler and Masterpiece where the bot overpaid Masterpiece with two or three $6+ hands, and I Swindled his Silver into more Masterpieces.  It was cute

You are overselling that fact, I think.  In some games you gain more than you buy, but that is actually extremely rare.  With BV, you are usually still BUYING the BV.  In the majority of other cards you name (Remodel family, among others), you still need to BUY fodder for them.  Several of the cards are ATTACKS, so they don't really work for this argument. 

The workshop-family cards are straight up gainers and are a point FOR valuing overpay cards more highly.  How is the fact that Stonemason can be gained by Workshop a point against comparing it to $5 cards?  Not only can I get a $5 effect from SM, but bonus! -- I also have the option of gaining the card from Workshop if I'm more interested in its on-play effect than its overpay effect.

Probably the only card that really fits your argument is Develop, where developing your card gives you MORE fodder.  But a board where a pure Develop strategy is viable is pretty rare.


I personally believe that it would be most useful to rank the overpay cards at whatever cost they are most likely to be purchased.  I don't know how this other piece of info would be determined, but I guess it doesn't matter because most people would prefer to just rank them at their base costs.  And you know what?  I'm perfectly fine with that.  In the end, it really doesn't matter that much.

But I would hope that everyone can see the merits to the different suggestions that have been put forward.  It is not completely ridiculous to rank Stonemason against $5 or $6+ cards; there is value in that.  It is not bad to rank it against $2 cards; there is value in that too.

Okay, maybe overall you don't gain more than you buy, but for a given card (or set of cards with a given cost) you may gain more than you buy.  In particular, with Border Village, Haggler, Remake, Develop, etc., you may gain many more $4-$5 cards than you buy. 

I don't follow your argument for workshop being for valuing overpay cards more highly.  You're considering it a $5 because the $3 overpay is a plus.  When you gain it, you don't get that effect.  You only get $2 worth.  If you're more interested in its on-play effect than its overpay effect, why are you comparing it to $5 cards in the first place?

[eHalcyon]

I don't follow your argument for workshop being for valuing overpay cards more highly.  You're considering it a $5 because the $3 overpay is a plus.  When you gain it, you don't get that effect.  You only get $2 worth.  If you're more interested in its on-play effect than its overpay effect, why are you comparing it to $5 cards in the first place?

When you overpay for an overpay card, you get a bonus effect depending on how much you overpay.  The value you get from buying a $6 Stonemason is very different from the value you get for buying a $2 Stonemason.  We can all agree on that, right?

Now, let's say we compare $7 Stonemason to King's Court and Expand.  Is the fact that you can gain Stonemason with Workshop a negative here?  It really isn't.  You can't gain King's Court with Workshop, so this is something you can do with Stonemason that you can't with King's Court.  Moreover, the fact that you can gain Stonemason with Workshop does not mean you can't buy Stonemason for $7.



I guess my overall line of thought is that, yes, you can compare overpay cards to other cards at their base cost and still account for the fact that you can pay more and reap some additional reward.  That's true, that's fine.  But you can also do that if you put those cards on higher cost lists, taking into account that you can pay less to reap a smaller reward.  I would prefer to put them on the lists corresponding to the cost people are most likely to pay (e.g for Masterpiece, $5 or $6+) because I feel that it would be a more useful and informative comparison than comparing it to something like Woodcutter.  Stonemason is a much more powerful card than Secret Chamber... but that's because you can pay $7 for it and get value from it worthy of that price, whereas you can't do the same with Pawn.  That seems trivial to me.

But if the lists go the other way (and it sure seems like they will), that's fine.  No skin off my back.

[ashersky]

While we're doing this, can we please add Border Village to the $7, $8, $9, $10, and $11 cost lists?  After all, when you buy it, you gain a card costing less, so it is a variable cost card, too.

Same for Haggler--needs to be on the $5, $6, $7, $8, and $9 cost lists.

Oh, and Workshop should be on the $3, $4, $5, $6, and $7 cost lists, since it's card text power actually includes other cards.

This is important guys, really.  We need to be able to compared the $6 Workshop to Adventurer.

[werothegreat]

Um guys, Qvist already chose what is happening. What are we arguing about?

This would be the discussion part of education and discussion.

We all know that Dominion is anything but consistent but if we keep making exceptions for different situations.  A $2 Chapel is a horrible purchase if it is the fifth one in my deck.

To actually make a useful list it should go from the cheapest card to the most expensive.  In the end, the list would generally go from $2 to $7 with some blurring of costs.  It would provide better education...what is typically the best use of $4?  Overspend for Chapel?  And discussion...pull Chapel from the $2 dregs and compare it to other power cards.

Education?  What, are we all supposed to go to Dominion School now?  For fuck's sake, man, it's a game.

[NoMoreFun]

We need to be able to compared the $6 Workshop to Adventurer.

I'd take the Workshop

However the reason we may need to include the Guilds cards is because of their different function when you pay a different cost.

Personally I'd make a list out of the 4 overpay cards in isolation. They're not a reasonable comparison to cards of any cost. For whatever purpose there is to comparing the $3 cards, Masterpiece doesn't belong there. Even if the function is actually comparable, like $5 Masterpiece vs Cache, that's not doing the fact that you can pay other costs justice. This also becomes problematic if you're going to put them in the "6+" list. The way around that is to make different "6" and "7" lists, and include Peddler in the "6" list arguing that you're likely to have at least 1 action in play, but then things are getting kind of hackneyed.

[eHalcyon]

While we're doing this, can we please add Border Village to the $7, $8, $9, $10, and $11 cost lists?  After all, when you buy it, you gain a card costing less, so it is a variable cost card, too.

Same for Haggler--needs to be on the $5, $6, $7, $8, and $9 cost lists.

Oh, and Workshop should be on the $3, $4, $5, $6, and $7 cost lists, since it's card text power actually includes other cards.

This is important guys, really.  We need to be able to compared the $6 Workshop to Adventurer.

Uh, not at all.  BV only costs $6, no matter what you gain with it.  You never pay more.  Haggler and Workshop arent even close because those are effects from playing it, not from buying/gaining it.  These are not at all the same as overpaying, where you actually PAY MORE.  Yeah yeah it's an on-buy effect that just has a restriction on it, but when we are comparing cards by cost, an extra payment is actually relevant.  It costs $5 or more to buy a reasonably powerful Masterpiece.  At $3, it's terrible.

I mean, your last line -- compare $6 Workshop to Adventurer?  $6 Workshop is the same as $3 Workshop, which is a card of a strength that is costed at $3.  $6 Masterpiece is completely different from $3 Masterpiece; the former is an expensive card that is reasonably powerful for silver flooding while the latter is just a really bad $3.

[ashersky]

While we're doing this, can we please add Border Village to the $7, $8, $9, $10, and $11 cost lists?  After all, when you buy it, you gain a card costing less, so it is a variable cost card, too.

Same for Haggler--needs to be on the $5, $6, $7, $8, and $9 cost lists.

Oh, and Workshop should be on the $3, $4, $5, $6, and $7 cost lists, since it's card text power actually includes other cards.

This is important guys, really.  We need to be able to compared the $6 Workshop to Adventurer.

Uh, not at all.  BV only costs $6, no matter what you gain with it.  You never pay more.  Haggler and Workshop arent even close because those are effects from playing it, not from buying/gaining it.  These are not at all the same as overpaying, where you actually PAY MORE.  Yeah yeah it's an on-buy effect that just has a restriction on it, but when we are comparing cards by cost, an extra payment is actually relevant.  It costs $5 or more to buy a reasonably powerful Masterpiece.  At $3, it's terrible.

I mean, your last line -- compare $6 Workshop to Adventurer?  $6 Workshop is the same as $3 Workshop, which is a card of a strength that is costed at $3.  $6 Masterpiece is completely different from $3 Masterpiece; the former is an expensive card that is reasonably powerful for silver flooding while the latter is just a really bad $3.

Someone doesn't read sarcasm well.

[NoMoreFun]

While we're doing this, can we please add Border Village to the $7, $8, $9, $10, and $11 cost lists?  After all, when you buy it, you gain a card costing less, so it is a variable cost card, too.

Same for Haggler--needs to be on the $5, $6, $7, $8, and $9 cost lists.

Oh, and Workshop should be on the $3, $4, $5, $6, and $7 cost lists, since it's card text power actually includes other cards.

This is important guys, really.  We need to be able to compared the $6 Workshop to Adventurer.

Uh, not at all.  BV only costs $6, no matter what you gain with it.  You never pay more.  Haggler and Workshop arent even close because those are effects from playing it, not from buying/gaining it.  These are not at all the same as overpaying, where you actually PAY MORE.  Yeah yeah it's an on-buy effect that just has a restriction on it, but when we are comparing cards by cost, an extra payment is actually relevant.  It costs $5 or more to buy a reasonably powerful Masterpiece.  At $3, it's terrible.

I mean, your last line -- compare $6 Workshop to Adventurer?  $6 Workshop is the same as $3 Workshop, which is a card of a strength that is costed at $3.  $6 Masterpiece is completely different from $3 Masterpiece; the former is an expensive card that is reasonably powerful for silver flooding while the latter is just a really bad $3.

Someone doesn't read sarcasm well.

You are implying, with your sarcasm, that there's no difference between this and putting the overpay cards on multiple lists.

[Hockey Mask]

Um guys, Qvist already chose what is happening. What are we arguing about?

This would be the discussion part of education and discussion.

We all know that Dominion is anything but consistent but if we keep making exceptions for different situations.  A $2 Chapel is a horrible purchase if it is the fifth one in my deck.

To actually make a useful list it should go from the cheapest card to the most expensive.  In the end, the list would generally go from $2 to $7 with some blurring of costs.  It would provide better education...what is typically the best use of $4?  Overspend for Chapel?  And discussion...pull Chapel from the $2 dregs and compare it to other power cards.

Education?  What, are we all supposed to go to Dominion School now?  For fuck's sake, man, it's a game.

Real pleasant.

[ashersky]

While we're doing this, can we please add Border Village to the $7, $8, $9, $10, and $11 cost lists?  After all, when you buy it, you gain a card costing less, so it is a variable cost card, too.

Same for Haggler--needs to be on the $5, $6, $7, $8, and $9 cost lists.

Oh, and Workshop should be on the $3, $4, $5, $6, and $7 cost lists, since it's card text power actually includes other cards.

This is important guys, really.  We need to be able to compared the $6 Workshop to Adventurer.

Uh, not at all.  BV only costs $6, no matter what you gain with it.  You never pay more.  Haggler and Workshop arent even close because those are effects from playing it, not from buying/gaining it.  These are not at all the same as overpaying, where you actually PAY MORE.  Yeah yeah it's an on-buy effect that just has a restriction on it, but when we are comparing cards by cost, an extra payment is actually relevant.  It costs $5 or more to buy a reasonably powerful Masterpiece.  At $3, it's terrible.

I mean, your last line -- compare $6 Workshop to Adventurer?  $6 Workshop is the same as $3 Workshop, which is a card of a strength that is costed at $3.  $6 Masterpiece is completely different from $3 Masterpiece; the former is an expensive card that is reasonably powerful for silver flooding while the latter is just a really bad $3.

Someone doesn't read sarcasm well.

You are implying, with your sarcasm, that there's no difference between this and putting the overpay cards on multiple lists.

I was trying to imply that there are many different cards that "compete" at many different price points; so many in fact, that it strikes me as silly to want to list cards over and over at different price points as if they are different cards.

To me, the argument for putting overpay cards on all possible lists comes down to the fear that having it only on the $2 list means you can't take into consideration Stonemason + Caravan vs. Goons.  But in reality, you can.  I believe someone said it best on f.ds once: it depends on the kingdom.

[DStu]

relevant xkcd

[Witherweaver]

I don't follow your argument for workshop being for valuing overpay cards more highly.  You're considering it a $5 because the $3 overpay is a plus.  When you gain it, you don't get that effect.  You only get $2 worth.  If you're more interested in its on-play effect than its overpay effect, why are you comparing it to $5 cards in the first place?

When you overpay for an overpay card, you get a bonus effect depending on how much you overpay.  The value you get from buying a $6 Stonemason is very different from the value you get for buying a $2 Stonemason.  We can all agree on that, right?

Now, let's say we compare $7 Stonemason to King's Court and Expand.  Is the fact that you can gain Stonemason with Workshop a negative here?  It really isn't.  You can't gain King's Court with Workshop, so this is something you can do with Stonemason that you can't with King's Court.  Moreover, the fact that you can gain Stonemason with Workshop does not mean you can't buy Stonemason for $7.

I guess I should clarify.  I'm not saying that you can get it with a Workshop is a negative.  I'm saying that  if you include it on the $7 card list, you're inherently giving it a +$5 boost that simply doesn't exist in certain cases (e.g., when you get it from a Workshop).  So you're not accurately valuing its use, because you did not get a $7 card.  You got a $2 card and spent $5 for a special ability.  Moreover, that you can gain your "$7" card with a Warehouse is fallacious, because you did not gain a $7 card.  You gained a $2 card, and you didn't get the option to "up its value".

I'm basically saying that considering it to be worth a higher price isn't accurate, because, well, that extra price isn't inherently tied into the card.  You only get it when you buy the card and pay extra.  You don't get it when you play the card, or gain the card.  So if it's on the $5 or $7 list, its value is inflated.  Or you have to correct for that and value it lower. 

I guess my overall line of thought is that, yes, you can compare overpay cards to other cards at their base cost and still account for the fact that you can pay more and reap some additional reward.  That's true, that's fine.  But you can also do that if you put those cards on higher cost lists, taking into account that you can pay less to reap a smaller reward.  I would prefer to put them on the lists corresponding to the cost people are most likely to pay (e.g for Masterpiece, $5 or $6+) because I feel that it would be a more useful and informative comparison than comparing it to something like Woodcutter.  Stonemason is a much more powerful card than Secret Chamber... but that's because you can pay $7 for it and get value from it worthy of that price, whereas you can't do the same with Pawn.  That seems trivial to me.

But if the lists go the other way (and it sure seems like they will), that's fine.  No skin off my back.

Stonemason is a more powerful card than Secret Chamber, but I would say that would be true if it didn't have an overpay ability, because I think its play ability is better than Secret Chamber's.  I also think we're undervaluing that you can only overpay once.  If you want to overpay again, you have to purchase another copy of the card, and the opportunity cost for that only goes up.  You can't just piledrive overpayed Stonemasons unless you have a way to deal with them.  You're also (in general) neglecting to buy something else, though Stonemason's overpay ability takes care of that for you.

Well anyway, we basically agree on all the facts, we just view them differently. 

[eHalcyon]

I don't follow your argument for workshop being for valuing overpay cards more highly.  You're considering it a $5 because the $3 overpay is a plus.  When you gain it, you don't get that effect.  You only get $2 worth.  If you're more interested in its on-play effect than its overpay effect, why are you comparing it to $5 cards in the first place?

When you overpay for an overpay card, you get a bonus effect depending on how much you overpay.  The value you get from buying a $6 Stonemason is very different from the value you get for buying a $2 Stonemason.  We can all agree on that, right?

Now, let's say we compare $7 Stonemason to King's Court and Expand.  Is the fact that you can gain Stonemason with Workshop a negative here?  It really isn't.  You can't gain King's Court with Workshop, so this is something you can do with Stonemason that you can't with King's Court.  Moreover, the fact that you can gain Stonemason with Workshop does not mean you can't buy Stonemason for $7.

I guess I should clarify.  I'm not saying that you can get it with a Workshop is a negative.  I'm saying that  if you include it on the $7 card list, you're inherently giving it a +$5 boost that simply doesn't exist in certain cases (e.g., when you get it from a Workshop).  So you're not accurately valuing its use, because you did not get a $7 card.  You got a $2 card and spent $5 for a special ability.  Moreover, that you can gain your "$7" card with a Warehouse is fallacious, because you did not gain a $7 card.  You gained a $2 card, and you didn't get the option to "up its value".

I'm basically saying that considering it to be worth a higher price isn't accurate, because, well, that extra price isn't inherently tied into the card.  You only get it when you buy the card and pay extra.  You don't get it when you play the card, or gain the card.  So if it's on the $5 or $7 list, its value is inflated.  Or you have to correct for that and value it lower. 

I guess my overall line of thought is that, yes, you can compare overpay cards to other cards at their base cost and still account for the fact that you can pay more and reap some additional reward.  That's true, that's fine.  But you can also do that if you put those cards on higher cost lists, taking into account that you can pay less to reap a smaller reward.  I would prefer to put them on the lists corresponding to the cost people are most likely to pay (e.g for Masterpiece, $5 or $6+) because I feel that it would be a more useful and informative comparison than comparing it to something like Woodcutter.  Stonemason is a much more powerful card than Secret Chamber... but that's because you can pay $7 for it and get value from it worthy of that price, whereas you can't do the same with Pawn.  That seems trivial to me.

But if the lists go the other way (and it sure seems like they will), that's fine.  No skin off my back.

Stonemason is a more powerful card than Secret Chamber, but I would say that would be true if it didn't have an overpay ability, because I think its play ability is better than Secret Chamber's.  I also think we're undervaluing that you can only overpay once.  If you want to overpay again, you have to purchase another copy of the card, and the opportunity cost for that only goes up.  You can't just piledrive overpayed Stonemasons unless you have a way to deal with them.  You're also (in general) neglecting to buy something else, though Stonemason's overpay ability takes care of that for you.

Well anyway, we basically agree on all the facts, we just view them differently.

It doesn't matter that you only get it once. Again, consider IGG. Without the on-gain, it would cost far less.

[Witherweaver]

etc.

It doesn't matter that you only get it once. Again, consider IGG. Without the on-gain, it would cost far less.

Well, that's a good point.  But, I think a $5 IGG and a $2+$3 stonemason don't exactly compare.  That is, I don't think IGG would be the same as $2 for IGG-curse effect, you may overpay by $3 to give each player a curse.  Either the $2 base would be useless since everyone would just pay $5, or it would actually make it too powerful, because then it becomes much easier to rush the IGG pile in the cases when curses run out before IGGs, letting you three pile earlier.  Or it would break it the strategy and make it not a good card, because the defender could buy a couple for $2 and prevent you from emptying the curse pile.

I'm think in general a $X+(N-X)overpay card is not the same as an $N card.  Aside from all the cards that care about costs (from which there are many), a $5 card should in general be (slightly) more valuable than spending $X+(5-X) on an $X card, because there should be some opportunity cost for that extra utility.  A Stonemason and two $3 cards is usually not as good as a power $5 attacker, though of course there are some cases where those options turn out to be better.  It is very situational, of course, but we have a general principle of convexity of use vs. cost.   That Stonemason has this extra ability makes it, in my view, a valuable $2 card.  Kind of like Fool's Gold is a valuable $2 card, but hey you can't just spend $2 and grab one.  You need to be buying all of them, ideally with +buys.  It's almost as if an effective overpay is built into the mechanics of Fool's Gold.

And anyway, if Stonemason cost a fixed $5 it wouldn't be a great card.  Good in some cases, but not as useful.  It's the variability that gives it its value.  And its cost of $2 is tied into its balance; it would be much different if it cost $1 or $3 or $4. 

[eHalcyon]

etc.

It doesn't matter that you only get it once. Again, consider IGG. Without the on-gain, it would cost far less.

Well, that's a good point.  But, I think a $5 IGG and a $2+$3 stonemason don't exactly compare.  That is, I don't think IGG would be the same as $2 for IGG-curse effect, you may overpay by $3 to give each player a curse.  Either the $2 base would be useless since everyone would just pay $5, or it would actually make it too powerful, because then it becomes much easier to rush the IGG pile in the cases when curses run out before IGGs, letting you three pile earlier.  Or it would break it the strategy and make it not a good card, because the defender could buy a couple for $2 and prevent you from emptying the curse pile.

I'm think in general a $X+(N-X)overpay card is not the same as an $N card.  Aside from all the cards that care about costs (from which there are many), a $5 card should in general be (slightly) more valuable than spending $X+(5-X) on an $X card, because there should be some opportunity cost for that extra utility.  A Stonemason and two $3 cards is usually not as good as a power $5 attacker, though of course there are some cases where those options turn out to be better.  It is very situational, of course, but we have a general principle of convexity of use vs. cost.   That Stonemason has this extra ability makes it, in my view, a valuable $2 card.  Kind of like Fool's Gold is a valuable $2 card, but hey you can't just spend $2 and grab one.  You need to be buying all of them, ideally with +buys.  It's almost as if an effective overpay is built into the mechanics of Fool's Gold.

And anyway, if Stonemason cost a fixed $5 it wouldn't be a great card.  Good in some cases, but not as useful.  It's the variability that gives it its value.  And its cost of $2 is tied into its balance; it would be much different if it cost $1 or $3 or $4.

Stonemason's on-play effect is about as valuable as IGG's on-play effect.  Both are niche and usually weak.  If IGG is worth comparing at $5 (and it is), then it's also worth looking at the value of a $5 SM with the on-buy effect of gaining two $3s.  And hey, you say that SM+two $3s is not as good as power $5 attack... that is not obvious.  Not at all.  That is an interesting thing to discuss, to compare.  That is a reason why it would be interesting to rank SM at $5 with other $5 cards.

But let's be even more clear about this.  Let's look at Masterpiece again.  This is a card that is obviously useless at its base cost.  It is a $3 Copper.  Why would you ever get this over Silver?  Why would you ever get this over a real Copper, which costs less and has interaction with cards like Apothecary, Counting House and Coppersmith?  There are the usual name-caring edge cases (Menagerie, Fairgrounds, etc.) but those apply to everything.  No, there is no way to argue otherwise -- you would pretty much never buy a base cost Masterpiece.  Not even if it cost $1.  Given the popularity of Copper, you would rarely buy it even if it were free.

Masterpiece's function and power is ENTIRELY in its overpay effect.  That's it.  That's all.  That's what should be ranked.  Who is going to buy Masterpiece with only $3?  Nobody.  Who is going to use a gainer on Masterpiece?  Nobody.  And, let's face it, it's also terrible at $4 -- with rare exception, you would prefer to buy Silver and not have to take this Copper junk.  In the end, you are almost always going to be buying Masterpiece for a minimum of $5.  That's why I believe that Masterpiece should be put with the $5 cards, or maybe even $6+.

With Doctor and Herald, I don't know.  I expect Herald's on-play to be the main attraction, and Doctor is sort of mixed.  But the overypay is the star for Stonemason and especially Masterpiece.



So yeah, I would put Masterpiece with the $5 cards, maybe $6+.
I would put Stonemason with the $6+ as well.
Doctor I have no idea.
Herald probably $4 as I expect that the overpay would be used rarely.

And while we're at it, I now think I would move Peddler to the $2 category (that's also where PH is, right?) because that is usually the price you pay for it; when ranking it, one would account for the fact that you have to jump through hoops to get it at that reduced price, as well as the fact that TfB performs much better with it than with the other cheap cards in that tier.




I recognize that ranking by base cost is a fine option.  It is the simplest method.  It means people don't have to take into account that TfB will be less effective with it than other cards in the category.  In exchange, they have to account for the overpay.  I, on the other hand, think it would be easier, more appropriate and altogether more useful to compare overpay cards at the total cost they are likely to be paid for.  If I rank Masterpiece against $5 cards, I would account for the fact that TfB is less effective with it because of its nominal $3 price.  I find that far easier to factor in that it would be to rank Masterpiece against $3 cards and try to account for all the other prices I might pay for it.  But like, that's just my opinion. 

[Qvist]

Ill-Gotten Gains - Treasure - $2+
-----------------------------------
$1
When you play this, you may gain a Copper, putting it into your hand.
-----------------------------------
When you buy this, you may overpay for it by $3. If you do, each other player gains a Curse


Duchess - Action - $2+
----------------------------------
+2$
Each player (including you) looks at the top card of his deck, and discards it or puts it back.
---------------------------------
When you buy this, you may overpay for it by $3. If you do, gain a Duchy.

[Witherweaver]

Well, fair enough.  I'm still hung up on, well, if you're going to rank cards by cost, then they should be by the cost, which is a well-defined mechanic of Dominion.  So Masterpiece is a $3 and nothing can ever change that.  That you'd never pay $3 for it is something you take into account as you consider it's usefulness. 

Of course, the ranking could certainly done by something other than the card's cost, but then it's no longer a "Best $X Card" list.

The other point, $2+$3overpay (=, <, >, <=, >=) $5 is interesting.  I think *in general* it should be < 5, because you should be giving something up to have that flexibility.  That just makes sense to me.  I say in general because, of course, there are many situations when, for instance, you're going to want to $3 (plus having Stonemason in your deck) over a $5.  But I think that shouldn't be the dominant situation.  A discussion like this probably merits its own more general topic.. when is $X+(N-X)overpay better than $N?  And of course that's what (I think) the point of those that want it on the $N list.

Maybe each overpay card should each have its own separate list/discussion for every possible price point. 

[eHalcyon]

Ill-Gotten Gains - Treasure - $2+
-----------------------------------
$1
When you play this, you may gain a Copper, putting it into your hand.
-----------------------------------
When you buy this, you may overpay for it by $3. If you do, each other player gains a Curse

Yup, I would put that with the $5s because that's the price at which it is most likely to be purchased.  I would rank this lower than the real IGG though, because people can screw with the double piling by buying it on the cheap.

Duchess - Action - $2+
----------------------------------
+2$
Each player (including you) looks at the top card of his deck, and discards it or puts it back.
---------------------------------
When you buy this, you may overpay for it by $3. If you do, gain a Duchy.

This is iffier to me, for a different reason.  If ranking this with the $5s, it seems more akin to ranking Duchy-with-a-bonus, but we've already declined to rank Duchy, Province, etc. in the lists.

[Witherweaver]

But I think what is interesting with those is that the mechanics are fundamentally different.  I mean Duchess doesn't matter much, but I think IGG would actually play much differently, because the standard IGG strategy almost relies on curses and IGGs going together.  Plus it also has implications with Gardens. (Can you ignore cursing and just get $2 IGG and $4 Gardens?)

Anyway, interesting, though in my mind it makes IGG not a $5 card, since it's a $2 card.  Though it's easier to put this on the $5 list, because $2/$5 are the only options, unlike the variable pay cards.  You'd have to have a whole separate ranking/discussion on figuring out whether a given card should be most often $5, $6, whatever.

[eHalcyon]

OK, let's try a simple exercise, for the sake of interest.  Consider the overpaid IGG.  Since it is like a mini-version of IGG, I will now call it Li'l-Gotten Gains (LGG).

Li'l-Gotten Gains - Treasure - $2+
-----------------------------------
$1
When you play this, you may gain a Copper, putting it into your hand.
-----------------------------------
When you buy this, you may overpay for it by $3. If you do, each other player gains a Curse.

For the sake of completeness, let's also consider a version without the cursing at all.  Let's call it Nil-Gotten Gains (NGG).

Nil-Gotten Gains - Treasure - $2
-----------------------------------
$1
When you play this, you may gain a Copper, putting it into your hand.

Now, here is the 2013 list for $1-$2 cards, and here is the 2013 list for $5 cards.  Assume that you agree with those two lists.  Now, where would you rank NGG and LGG in the $2 list?  Where would you rank LGG in the $5 list?  Please try to do this objectively, and provide reasoning for your placements (or reasoning for why you cannot make an adequate placement).

I will try.

On the $5 list, LGG is of course most similar to IGG.  However, it is inferior in two ways.  First of all, it does worse with TfB.  Second, and more important, the potential lower cost interferes with certain IGG strategies.  Normally I would say that the lower cost is a bonus, because if you cared more about the on-play then there is less opportunity cost for you.  With LGG, the big example is of course Gardens.  But this small advantage is outweighed by a disadvantage -- one of the most powerful aspects of IGG is that it runs out two piles at once.  With LGG, an opponent can easily counter by buying cheap LGGs, leaving extra curses in the supply.

IGG is ranked #5 on its list, so I cannot put LGG higher than that.  Therefore, I think I will put it at #9, below Torturer.  LGG is still very powerful, as all Cursers tend to be.  The disadvantage caused by the potential disruption as described above hurts it, but not terribly much.  You can still curse your opponent, and if your opponent is buying LGG at $2, well, they're just getting a poor card and they aren't really hurting you at all.  Maybe you can't 3-pile as easily, but there are other things you can do.  Overall, it is far more likely for both parties to buy IGG at $5.




OK, what about on the $2 list?

NGG is a terrible card in all but the most niche circumstances.  Although it is a Treasure, I would say that Beggar is better.  It provides an extra $1 on play and it has a snazzy reaction.  Moreover, in decks where you like the Copper gaining, Beggar is probably better for providing that third Copper, terminal or not.  Therefore I would put NGG below Beggar, which is at #14.  The next few cards below that are Vagrant, Moat and Herbalist.  I think all of these have decent use cases that are more common that NGG's.  Next is Pearl Diver... although PD is generally harmless in any deck, it has very little value.  At least NGG is worth up to $2 on play and has a decent use case with Gardens.  I will rank NGG at #18, pushing Pearl Diver down.

Great.  Now for the tough one -- LGG.  It is better than NGG for sure, so it has to be above #18.  Can I put an upper bound?  It doesn't beat Chapel in my book.

The next several cards on the list are Hamlet, Courtyard, FG, Lighthouse and Squire.  These are all strong $2 cards for different reasons.  I think LGG actually deserves a place among them.  After all, it junks the opponent's deck.  But it also costs an extra $3 to get that ability, which is a non-trivial cost.  How do I weigh that cost now?  By gut instinct, I think I would put LGG below FG and above Lighthouse -- so, #5.




The difficulty I experience is how to weigh the power of the overpay effect against the extra opportunity cost it incurs compared to the other $2 cards which have no such extra cost, nor such extra power.  There is a tension here that makes my head spin when trying to rank it.  It is even more difficult with the real overpay cards because you have to consider the opportunity cost/increased benefit for each amount you overpay from the base cost.

How would you guys do it?

[heron]

Why don't we just rate all of the cards from 0-10 (or 0-100 if you felt like it).
Then you can arrange them into a ranking however you like. Also it is way easier for the participants to do.

[werothegreat]

The difference between LGG and all the real overpay cards is that the real ones have no specified overpay amount.  LGG is just begging you to spend exactly $5 on it.  To me, your LGG and NGG are just further evidence that we should just rank the overpay cards by their stated cost, rather than putting them on every list, of trying to guess at some "optimal" cost for them.  Remember that you can also Workshop or Ironworks these, and in that case they will cost what they say they cost, and there will be no overpay.

[eHalcyon]

The difference between LGG and all the real overpay cards is that the real ones have no specified overpay amount.  LGG is just begging you to spend exactly $5 on it.  To me, your LGG and NGG are just further evidence that we should just rank the overpay cards by their stated cost, rather than putting them on every list, of trying to guess at some "optimal" cost for them.  Remember that you can also Workshop or Ironworks these, and in that case they will cost what they say they cost, and there will be no overpay.

The real overpay cards should be even more difficult to rank.  LGG is begging you to spend $5 on it, so when you evaluate it for the $2 list you only have to consider it at $2 and $5.  And even that is tough.  With the real overpay card, you are going to have to keep in mind its base cost, the effect when you overpay $1, the effect when you overpay $2, etc.  That just seems bonkers to keep straight and rank fairly.

The Workshop argument means nothing to me.  You are pretty much never going to Workshop a Masterpiece.  Again, the whole reason for its existence is in the overpay.  You only ever buy Masterpiece, and you only ever do it at $4+ (and rarely at $4 anyway).

Again, I invite you to try the exercise.

[Witherweaver]

I had to upvote your post for the sake of the IGG variant names.

I'd probably agree with the NGG analysis.  Maybe being a treasure instead of an action makes it better, but Beggar is still probably better.

The LGG on $5 I'm not so sure about.  I think the lack of simultaneous piling could actually hurt it more here.  I think you'd have to play with it a lot to see if it still plays the same.  If your opponent picks up two LGG they may not hurt him that much, where you have to either pick up two curses yourself or empty a different pile.  On the other hand, if there is another curser on the board and you want to 3-pile this could actually be a bonus.  You could buy a couple at $5 to try to win the curse split, then empty the pile more easily for $2 once the curses are gone, then use the $2 worth to get Duchys.  I don't know, hard to say here.

The $2 list is the list ...  I would say it's a pretty powerful $2 card, precisely because it gives you the option to spend $3 to curse your opponent.  I would probably put it right around Fool's Gold, maybe one above or one below.  Having to pay $3 for the effect is not that dissimilar to having to buy a bunch of Fool's Gold and enable their collision, and it seems better than the cards ranked below Fool's Gold. Though this also depends on the same kind of issues comparing it to $5. 

Of course as Werothegreat said, the analogy is lacking since the overpay if fixed. 

[Hockey Mask]

Why don't we just rate all of the cards from 0-10 (or 0-100 if you felt like it).
Then you can arrange them into a ranking however you like. Also it is way easier for the participants to do.

Or from 1-205.   

[WanderingWinder]

Why don't we just rate all of the cards from 0-10 (or 0-100 if you felt like it).
Then you can arrange them into a ranking however you like. Also it is way easier for the participants to do.

Or from 1-205.   

The thing is, a point scale gives us not only an ordering of cards (ranking), but also a chance to say how big the differences are. I like this a lot.

[eHalcyon]

I had to upvote your post for the sake of the IGG variant names.

I'd probably agree with the NGG analysis.  Maybe being a treasure instead of an action makes it better, but Beggar is still probably better.

The LGG on $5 I'm not so sure about.  I think the lack of simultaneous piling could actually hurt it more here.  I think you'd have to play with it a lot to see if it still plays the same.  If your opponent picks up two LGG they may not hurt him that much, where you have to either pick up two curses yourself or empty a different pile.  On the other hand, if there is another curser on the board and you want to 3-pile this could actually be a bonus.  You could buy a couple at $5 to try to win the curse split, then empty the pile more easily for $2 once the curses are gone, then use the $2 worth to get Duchys.  I don't know, hard to say here.

With LGG, if your opponent just buys two to disrupt you, you still put 8 Curses into their deck.  That's still powerful, even though you don't empty two piles.  That's why I still put it high.

The $2 list is the list ...  I would say it's a pretty powerful $2 card, precisely because it gives you the option to spend $3 to curse your opponent.  I would probably put it right around Fool's Gold, maybe one above or one below.  Having to pay $3 for the effect is not that dissimilar to having to buy a bunch of Fool's Gold and enable their collision, and it seems better than the cards ranked below Fool's Gold. Though this also depends on the same kind of issues comparing it to $5.

For the latter list, the problem I have is that the jump from $2 to $5 to trigger the overpay is big.  How costly is that jump?  How much should I knock down its rating to compensate for that?  I have trouble doing that, and I am interested in hearing how others do it.  You seem to take it for granted, even though you ultimately end up ranking it right where I did.  Well, I guess you say that you consider it an extra cost, sort of like the need to buy lots of FG to make it worthwhile.  Fair enough, though "buy more" and "pay more" feel fundamentally different to me.

Of course as Werothegreat said, the analogy is lacking since the overpay if fixed.

I believe the analogy holds because it is a simplified case.  I mean, imagine this:

Adequatepiece - Treasure - $3+
$1
-----------------------------------
When you buy this, you may overpay for it by $2. If you do, gain 2 Silvers.

This is certainly weaker than Masterpiece.  MP does everything AP does, except you could ALSO pay $4 for it to get 1 Silver, or $6+ for it to gain 3+ silvers.  Now, rank AP against the $3 cards.  You have to keep in mind the overpay ability.

Now rank MP.  You have to keep in mind all the things you do when ranking AP, but you also have to think about MORE things on top of that.  It only gets more difficult to account for those extra options.



If it is tough to rank when the overpay is limited, it is infinitely more difficult when the overpay is unlimited.  If you still find it easy, hats off to you.  That is why I proposed my exercise -- I'm interested in how you finagle that evaluation, because it may very well help me with my own thought process.

[Schneau]

Why don't we just rate all of the cards from 0-10 (or 0-100 if you felt like it).
Then you can arrange them into a ranking however you like. Also it is way easier for the participants to do.

Or from 1-205.   

The thing is, a point scale gives us not only an ordering of cards (ranking), but also a chance to say how big the differences are. I like this a lot.

Agreed. But at the same time, it makes it harder to compare the list to your personal list, which is a lot of the fun.

Plus, people tend to be really bad at rating things on scales. The distributions of ratings tend to be way wackier than they should be.

At the same time, I like the idea too! I'm torn.

[Witherweaver]

I had to upvote your post for the sake of the IGG variant names.

I'd probably agree with the NGG analysis.  Maybe being a treasure instead of an action makes it better, but Beggar is still probably better.

The LGG on $5 I'm not so sure about.  I think the lack of simultaneous piling could actually hurt it more here.  I think you'd have to play with it a lot to see if it still plays the same.  If your opponent picks up two LGG they may not hurt him that much, where you have to either pick up two curses yourself or empty a different pile.  On the other hand, if there is another curser on the board and you want to 3-pile this could actually be a bonus.  You could buy a couple at $5 to try to win the curse split, then empty the pile more easily for $2 once the curses are gone, then use the $2 worth to get Duchys.  I don't know, hard to say here.

With LGG, if your opponent just buys two to disrupt you, you still put 8 Curses into their deck.  That's still powerful, even though you don't empty two piles.  That's why I still put it high.

The $2 list is the list ...  I would say it's a pretty powerful $2 card, precisely because it gives you the option to spend $3 to curse your opponent.  I would probably put it right around Fool's Gold, maybe one above or one below.  Having to pay $3 for the effect is not that dissimilar to having to buy a bunch of Fool's Gold and enable their collision, and it seems better than the cards ranked below Fool's Gold. Though this also depends on the same kind of issues comparing it to $5.

For the latter list, the problem I have is that the jump from $2 to $5 to trigger the overpay is big.  How costly is that jump?  How much should I knock down its rating to compensate for that?  I have trouble doing that, and I am interested in hearing how others do it.  You seem to take it for granted, even though you ultimately end up ranking it right where I did.  Well, I guess you say that you consider it an extra cost, sort of like the need to buy lots of FG to make it worthwhile.  Fair enough, though "buy more" and "pay more" feel fundamentally different to me.

Of course as Werothegreat said, the analogy is lacking since the overpay if fixed.

I believe the analogy holds because it is a simplified case.  I mean, imagine this:

Adequatepiece - Treasure - $3+
$1
-----------------------------------
When you buy this, you may overpay for it by $2. If you do, gain 2 Silvers.

This is certainly weaker than Masterpiece.  MP does everything AP does, except you could ALSO pay $4 for it to get 1 Silver, or $6+ for it to gain 3+ silvers.  Now, rank AP against the $3 cards.  You have to keep in mind the overpay ability.

Now rank MP.  You have to keep in mind all the things you do when ranking AP, but you also have to think about MORE things on top of that.  It only gets more difficult to account for those extra options.



If it is tough to rank when the overpay is limited, it is infinitely more difficult when the overpay is unlimited.  If you still find it easy, hats off to you.  That is why I proposed my exercise -- I'm interested in how you finagle that evaluation, because it may very well help me with my own thought process.

Well, the analogy breaks because to put the overpay cards on one of the $X above its actual cost first involves figuring out which one it should be at.  Should Doctor be on the $6, $5, $4 list?  It may get bought most often for $4 but there's something really unintuitive about it, especially since $4 is, well, not its cost.  What I meant is, if we had decided that L'il-Gotten Gains should be on the $5 list, that would not imply that Doctor should go on a list other than the $3 one.

But your purpose was to wonder how we'd rank a more simplified version and use that to help us learn how to rank the more complicated versions, and for that the exercise works.  Though it still seems more natural to consider LGG on the $2 list instead of the $5 list there.  For the variable ones, it's even more more natural, since there's no natural target list other than its base cost.

[eHalcyon]

Well, the analogy breaks because to put the overpay cards on one of the $X above its actual cost first involves figuring out which one it should be at.  Should Doctor be on the $6, $5, $4 list?  It may get bought most often for $4 but there's something really unintuitive about it, especially since $4 is, well, not its cost.  What I meant is, if we had decided that L'il-Gotten Gains should be on the $5 list, that would not imply that Doctor should go on a list other than the $3 one.

But your purpose was to wonder how we'd rank a more simplified version and use that to help us learn how to rank the more complicated versions, and for that the exercise works.  Though it still seems more natural to consider LGG on the $2 list instead of the $5 list there.  For the variable ones, it's even more more natural, since there's no natural target list other than its base cost.

Ahh, OK.

I think LGG naturally belongs on the $5 list rather than on the $2, but we can agree to disagree on that.

But as to what list to put overpay cards on, if not the base cost -- yes, you are correct.  There is no obvious contender as there is with LGG.  That is a discussion worth having only if a majority of people are amenable to putting the overpay cards on a higher cost list.  But we can discuss it anyway. 

Masterpiece clearly has to go on the $5 or $6+ list.  I tend towards $6+ actually.  At $5 it is quite similar to Cache, so we can just look at that ranking.  The $6+ list already encompasses cards of different prices, so it will naturally hold a card that has flexible price all its own.  Moreover, at $6+ Masterpiece is a very compelling card.

Likewise, Stonemason should go on the $6+ list because at $5, it only gains $3 cards (and $2 cards and Poor House, if you account for that as you should).  While certainly useful at times, it is pretty much the bottom of what SM can do.  It naturally belongs in the $6+ category because the most likely use cases with SM will be to rapidly gain $4 engine components, power $5s, and occasionally other $6+ cards.

It is tougher with Herald.  However, its overpay benefit is arguably less impactful than the above two cards (temporary setting up the next hand vs. permanently adding cards to the deck) while its on-play effect is arguably much more useful in general.  While the overpay can be very useful in the right situation (e.g. stacking KC-KC-Bridge-Bridge-Bridge), it will probably be a minor bonus more often.  Therefore it is easier to account for the overpay when evaluating Herald at its base cost.  Herald will actually be worth buying at its base cost pretty often, and overpaid not as much (and even less for a high overpayment).

Doctor is where it gets tough.  The community has already shown itself to have some difficulty coming to a consensus on this card.  Initial comments in the f.ds preview thread were praising the power of the overpay and considered the on-play to be weak.  I thought it would be the other way around, and sentiment definitely turned when WW posted his opinion -- that the overpay was weak but the on-play to be decently fast trashing, perhaps on par with Steward.  More recently, I've read reports of massively overpaying Doctor for major trashing, and this seems like it might be a fairly common use case as well.  So yeah, in the end, I don't know where Doctor should go.  Right now I think (and note: this is all pure conjecture now) it would be most commonly bought at base cost or at $4, but not so much at $5 because that's a more significant jump.  Higher overpayments would be rare as well, until you get to really really big situations where you get LOTS of trashing out of it.  But man, I don't know.  Maybe it's too hard to puzzle out.  Just toss it on the $3 list by default, OK.

But Stonemason probably shouldn't be on the $2 list, and Masterpiece definitely shouldn't be on the $3 list.

[Tables]

Why don't we just rate all of the cards from 0-10 (or 0-100 if you felt like it).
Then you can arrange them into a ranking however you like. Also it is way easier for the participants to do.

This has a number of issues of it's own. 0-10 is far too granulated (assuming integers). You'd have Witch vs. Mountebank win based on which got the most non-10 votes. But then 0-100 is probably a little too big to work with. So you'd need to compromise somewhere between I think, maybe 25. But yeah, that could well work, and you could do the entire list that way.

[Witherweaver]

Likewise, Stonemason should go on the $6+ list because at $5, it only gains $3 cards (and $2 cards and Poor House, if you account for that as you should).

Technically, at $5 a Stonemason can't gain $2 and Poor House.  Stonemason gains a card of the amount overpaid, not up to the amount.  Not what you meant, but I think it's relevant because you actually do have to consider each possible price.  Sometimes you want to spend $4 or $5 for special cases.  Not to mention the specialist of cases, overpaying $2+P (or $3+P or $4+P, probably not $6+P but maybe) for Scrying Pool and the rest.  In fact that latter case seems like the biggest one.. perhaps not the most common since Potions aren't in most games, but probably a bigger deal when you can do it since the opportunity cost of buying extra potions is high.

Edit: Oh, and you might sometimes buy Stonemason for $2.  The on-play ability is not useless, and on some boards the overpay ability may not be relevant.

[ftl]

Overpaying 6+P for stonemason seems entirely reasonable. I'd do it if I got an 8+P hand!

[markusin]

if it wasn't for Masterpiece being so horribly awful when bought at $3, I'd have argued that all the overpay cards be evaluated at their base cost. I mean, you'd buy Doctor at $3 and Herald at $4, but bought at $3 Masterpiece would go straight to last place.

Similar to the LGG example, you can imagine a card that reads like this:

Rare Collectible - $5
$1
-----------------------------------
When you buy this, gain 2 Silvers. While this card is not in the supply, it costs $3.

That's not too far off from Masterpiece, and that would probably be rated as a $5, seeing as how Cache like it is.

Why not just have all the overpay cards on 2 lists: their base cost list and the 6+ list. You can pay $6+ coins for all of them, and they all have good utility when purchased at that price point. But then the question of Peddler complicates it all.
Behold the 0$ list: curse < (the 5 ruins) < copper < Peddler

[eHalcyon]

Likewise, Stonemason should go on the $6+ list because at $5, it only gains $3 cards (and $2 cards and Poor House, if you account for that as you should).

Technically, at $5 a Stonemason can't gain $2 and Poor House.  Stonemason gains a card of the amount overpaid, not up to the amount.  Not what you meant, but I think it's relevant because you actually do have to consider each possible price.  Sometimes you want to spend $4 or $5 for special cases.  Not to mention the specialist of cases, overpaying $2+P (or $3+P or $4+P, probably not $6+P but maybe) for Scrying Pool and the rest.  In fact that latter case seems like the biggest one.. perhaps not the most common since Potions aren't in most games, but probably a bigger deal when you can do it since the opportunity cost of buying extra potions is high.

Edit: Oh, and you might sometimes buy Stonemason for $2.  The on-play ability is not useless, and on some boards the overpay ability may not be relevant.

I know it's not "up to".  But if you have $5 to spend, you can choose to withhold some of that to buy SM and gain two PHs.  It's included.  OTOH if you have just $2 to spend, you have no access to SM's special power at all.  It is excluded.

Yeah you have to consider each possible price.  But this is why I am advocating putting overpay cards in whatever cost tier is most commonly used, i.e. absolutely not $3 for Masterpiece.  I have to consider the other use cases, but they are less impactful.  If I rank Masterpiece against the $3s, it is awkward because I will never buy it at a mere $3.  The biggest consideration is actually how powerful the card is when I buy it for $5 or $6 or whatever.  Since that's the case, why not compare it to the other cards that I also buy at $5 or $6 or whatever?  Isn't that more natural?


Edit: Oh, and Potions are neat for SM but Potions are rare enough that I would be happy to fold that into the regular ranking.  SM on-play isn't useless, but it is bad in most cases.  Come on -- in many games you will buy SM to gain two of something awesome, GM or whatever, and the SM that you gain will be seen as a freaking penalty.

[Witherweaver]

and Masterpiece definitely shouldn't be on the $3 list.

I still can't find myself convinced of this.  Masterpiece is basically a bridge that only works on silver.  But you don't have to buy a Bridge and play it every time.  You just have to pay $1 for each one-shot Bridge on top of the entry fee at $3.  The fact that you need to pay for this effect is, well, something you take into account when you figure out if you want to buy it.  You may need to spend $5 on it for it to be useful, but you really didn't spend $5 on Masterpiece.  You spent $3, and hey you got 2 buys that can only be used to buy Silver at a discounted price, and you spent $2 on that.  Is that all that different from, say, a Village?  You spend $3 on a Village, but you didn't buy that Village unless you're spending money (this turn or another one) on actions that makes use of it.  Or any other card that requires a helper. 

And there exist edge cases where you'd buy Masterpiece for $3.  Sure, they're rare and may never come up for you, but just the fact that they exist tells me that, well, it matters that it's a $3 card.

Edit: Oh, and Potions are neat for SM but Potions are rare enough that I would be happy to fold that into the regular ranking.  SM on-play isn't useless, but it is bad in most cases.  Come on -- in many games you will buy SM to gain two of something awesome, GM or whatever, and the SM that you gain will be seen as a freaking penalty.

It seems like almost every time Stonemason is in the same game as Scrying Pool you'd want to do this.  Sometimes for Apothecary, Golem, and Familiar as well.  You play more games without Potions than with Potions, but I think they come up enough for it to be relevant. 

As for the on-play effect.. I could be overvaluing it.  I've only played with Stonemason a few times (interestingly enough, it seemed like a more relevant card the times it came up with Potions), so I may be overvaluing the effect.  I'm mostly thinking of its use towards the ends of games for gaining Duchys or Estates (and in rarer cases, Provinces)

I know it's not "up to".  But if you have $5 to spend, you can choose to withhold some of that to buy SM and gain two PHs.  It's included.  OTOH if you have just $2 to spend, you have no access to SM's special power at all.  It is excluded.

Yeah, I'm just saying you really bought a "$3 SM" and why didn't you compare it to the $3 cards instead of the $5 cards?  The lists don't take into account that you could purchase cheaper cards. (Where does the best $4 fit into the best $5?  It doesn't, really, that's not how the list is set up.)

[SirPeebles]

The more I think about this, the more I feel that we ought to just put all four of these cards into $6+, just like we do with Peddler.  It's not perfect, but it seems to be simplest.

As an aside, perhaps we should rename that $6+ category to "$6 and up" or "$6 or more", since $6+ now has a formal meaning as a Dominion price, namely a card with cost $6 for which one may overpay.  Also, I just noticed that Possession costs $6+ by the "$6 or more" convention, despite not being on that list.

[SirPeebles]

and Masterpiece definitely shouldn't be on the $3 list.

I still can't find myself convinced of this.  Masterpiece is basically a bridge that only works on silver.

I'm sorry, but this is absurd.  It plays absolutely nothing like Bridge.  It is a treasure flooder, specifically of Silver.  Bridge decks involve villages for actions, drawers to get bridges together, and someone quoting me with some comment about Bridge the card game.  Masterpiece involves none of that, and gives you a bunch of Silvers immediately (indeed, before even gaining the Masterpiece itself)!

[Witherweaver]

and Masterpiece definitely shouldn't be on the $3 list.

I still can't find myself convinced of this.  Masterpiece is basically a bridge that only works on silver.

I'm sorry, but this is absurd.  It plays absolutely nothing like Bridge.  It is a treasure flooder, specifically of Silver.  Bridge decks involve villages for actions, drawers to get bridges together, and someone quoting me with some comment about Bridge the card game.  Masterpiece involves none of that, and gives you a bunch of Silvers immediately (indeed, before even gaining the Masterpiece itself)!

I mean the effect of it.  Buying a Masterpiece is equivalent to having played a (noncommulative) bridge for each $1 extra you play, but you can only use the Bridge for Silver.  The mechanics of how you get to that point are entirely different.  So maybe I spoke poorly.  My point wasn't that Masterpiece plays like Bridge, it was that we can evaluate Masterpiece as a $3 card by taking the overpayment into account. 

But your point is kind of what I'm trying to say.  For Bridge to be a sensible card to buy, you have to be buying cards that draw and cards that give extra actions (and have a deck of playing cards lying around).  These things you take into account when you rank Bridge as a $4 card.  When you buy Masterpiece, you have to spend some extra money, or else you bought a $3 Copper.  You need to spend more money and get more cards to make it worthwhile, but you have to do that for almost every other card as well (possibly on different turns).  This you would take into account when you rank it as a $3 card. 

The basic question is what kind of analysis would you go through to rank overpay cards.  I'm saying you can guide yourself by thinking of overpay cards in a similar way as cards that require you to buy other cards to make that purchase not useless (FG, Bridge, Villages, etc.)

[SirPeebles]

There are certainly more than two viewpoints in this thread, but it seems to me that the mechanism for comparing cards is pretty much in agreement despite whatever linguistic games we are playing.

The sticking point seems to be one of categorizing.  Roughly speaking, we currently organize cards by cost.

Some here are saying that there is some meaningful reasoning behind this.  Others say it is entirely arbitrary, and that if it weren't for translation issues we would be just as well off organizing alphabetically.

I'm personally leaning towards cost meaning something.  Sure, we could rank Mastetpiece alongside $3 cards, keeping in mind all of the usual intracasies.  But why?  Because there's a 3 in the bottom corner?  Really?  Why not reflect a bit on why cost was a sensible (if crude) means by which to subdivide our list.

From a practical perspective, there is no more logic behind including Masterpiece as $3 card as there is as a $2.  Forget all of these obfuscating edge cases.  Forget about trash for benefit -- while vital for Rats or Peddler, it is plainly not relevant in a Silver flooded deck.

If you really believe that cost is irrelevant and arbitrary, why argue that Mastetpiece ought to be ranked with the $3 cards?

Edit:  Apparently I misspelled Masterpiece as Mastetpiece at some point, and my phone now believes that the latter is a word and has been autocompleting to Mastetpiece.  Sorry.

[Tables]

We could always have a list of cards with funny costs. Peddler, Overpay, perhaps Potion costs OR expensive cards.

[WanderingWinder]

There are certainly more than two viewpoints in this thread, but it seems to me that the mechanism for comparing cards is pretty much in agreement despite whatever linguistic games we are playing.

The sticking point seems to be one of categorizing.  Roughly speaking, we currently organize cards by cost.

Some here are saying that there is some meaningful reasoning behind this.  Others say it is entirely arbitrary, and that if it weren't for translation issues we would be just as well off organizing alphabetically.

I'm personally leaning towards cost meaning something.  Sure, we could rank Mastetpiece alongside $3 cards, keeping in mind all of the usual intracasies.  But why?  Because there's a 3 in the bottom corner?  Really?  Why not reflect a bit on why cost was a sensible (if crude) means by which to subdivide our list.

From a practical perspective, there is no more logic behind including Masterpiece as $3 card as there is as a $2.  Forget all of these obfuscating edge cases.  Forget about trash for benefit -- while vital for Rats or Peddler, it is plainly not relevant in a Silver flooded deck.

If you really believe that cost is irrelevant and arbitrary, why argue that Mastetpiece ought to be ranked with the $3 cards?

Edit:  Apparently I misspelled Masterpiece as Mastetpiece at some point, and my phone now believes that the latter is a word and has been autocompleting to Mastetpiece.  Sorry.

Because you are mis-categorizing the opposing argument. "Others say it is entirely arbitrary, and that if it weren't for translation issues we would be just as well off organizing alphabetically." This isn't something that anyone is really claiming. Cost has a weak correlation with strength and ergo some functional use as a grouping mechanism - but it's not a hard-and-fast thing. Spelling would be possible, yes, and only somewhat worse, as the cost thing doesn't make *so* much of a difference. But of course, it is a little worse, because there is zero relevance of name, as opposed to modest relevance of cost. However, some kind of functionality division would be equally valid to cost - rank the villages, or the T4B cards, or whatever - the cost isn't INTEGRAL to the ratings. And in any case, you want to rank the card as an overall package, not for a piece of it. So Border Village should be reasonably high on 'rank the villages', even though AS a village, it's not very good.

[Witherweaver]

However, some kind of functionality division would be equally valid to cost - rank the villages, or the T4B cards, or whatever - the cost isn't INTEGRAL to the ratings. And in any case, you want to rank the card as an overall package, not for a piece of it. So Border Village should be reasonably high on 'rank the villages', even though AS a village, it's not very good.

I was thinking about this and wondering if it would work.  What would the functionality categories be?

Maybe something like:

Hand-Size Increasers
Junkers
Villages
Gainers
Trashers
Buyers (cards that give +buy since that doesn't fit into anything else except sort of Gainers)
Money-Generators
Deck Inspection (your own)
Pace-Reducing Attacks (that are not Junkers.. so Discarding, messing with opponent's top deck to give him bad cards, etc.)
Alternate VP cards
Alternate Treasures

A good deal of cars have to go in multiple categories, but maybe that's a good thing.  It lets you evaluate the same card against different aspects.  And coming up with a mutually disjoint collection of sets would probably be tough, and there would probably be too many of them that are too specialized. 

[eHalcyon]

There are certainly more than two viewpoints in this thread, but it seems to me that the mechanism for comparing cards is pretty much in agreement despite whatever linguistic games we are playing.

The sticking point seems to be one of categorizing.  Roughly speaking, we currently organize cards by cost.

Some here are saying that there is some meaningful reasoning behind this.  Others say it is entirely arbitrary, and that if it weren't for translation issues we would be just as well off organizing alphabetically.

I'm personally leaning towards cost meaning something.  Sure, we could rank Mastetpiece alongside $3 cards, keeping in mind all of the usual intracasies.  But why?  Because there's a 3 in the bottom corner?  Really?  Why not reflect a bit on why cost was a sensible (if crude) means by which to subdivide our list.

From a practical perspective, there is no more logic behind including Masterpiece as $3 card as there is as a $2.  Forget all of these obfuscating edge cases.  Forget about trash for benefit -- while vital for Rats or Peddler, it is plainly not relevant in a Silver flooded deck.

If you really believe that cost is irrelevant and arbitrary, why argue that Mastetpiece ought to be ranked with the $3 cards?

Edit:  Apparently I misspelled Masterpiece as Mastetpiece at some point, and my phone now believes that the latter is a word and has been autocompleting to Mastetpiece.  Sorry.

Because you are mis-categorizing the opposing argument. "Others say it is entirely arbitrary, and that if it weren't for translation issues we would be just as well off organizing alphabetically." This isn't something that anyone is really claiming. Cost has a weak correlation with strength and ergo some functional use as a grouping mechanism - but it's not a hard-and-fast thing. Spelling would be possible, yes, and only somewhat worse, as the cost thing doesn't make *so* much of a difference. But of course, it is a little worse, because there is zero relevance of name, as opposed to modest relevance of cost. However, some kind of functionality division would be equally valid to cost - rank the villages, or the T4B cards, or whatever - the cost isn't INTEGRAL to the ratings. And in any case, you want to rank the card as an overall package, not for a piece of it. So Border Village should be reasonably high on 'rank the villages', even though AS a village, it's not very good.

But that's the point, isn't it?  We organize the lists by card cost.  Either that is an arbitrary categorization, in which case it shouldn't matter that a couple overpay cards are moved into a different category, or there is some meaning ascribed to the categorization.  I think most of us would concede the latter.

So what is the meaning of the lists?  Well, absent other knowledge, cost is an adequate approximation of a card's power.  We rank $5 cards against other $5 cards because we expect them to be in the same neighborhood of power.

How do overpay cards fit into this framework?  The more you overpay, the more powerful these cards become.  Just as we would expect a $5 card to be more powerful than a $3 card, a Doctor overpaid by $2 is more powerful than a doctor purchased at just $3.  Therefore there is a reason to include overpay cards on multiple lists at different prices.

The problem with that approach is that it gets pretty messy.  Eventually you'll have to collapse them into each other anyway, on the $6+ list.  It would be mad to try to rank every possible cost because overpay is unbounded.  I think most people would prefer to put each individual card on a single list.

So the question is, which list does Doctor belong on?  Masterpiece?  Stonemason?  Herald?  Regardless of the little number in the corner, these cards can effectively be purchased at different costs, and the card you buy is of a proportional power level.  A $6 Masterpiece is vastly different from a $3 Masterpiece.  If you put it on one list or the other, you still have to account for the other potential costs and powers of the card.  Personally, I find it easier for me to consider the possible "lesser" effects while comparing at the higher cost.

But again, no matter where you put the card, you have to keep in mind that you could pay more for it (or less for it, if it goes on a higher list) to get a proportionally better (or worse) ability.  Given this, you could put it pretty much anywhere.  But the best place to put it is, I think, the cost at which the card is most commonly purchased.  By doing so, we would minimize the impact of all that extra stuff we have to account for.  We compare the cards to their usual competition.

I admit that it is not trivial to determine the most common purchase price for overpay cards.  But at the very least, Masterpiece is not a $3 and Stonemason is not a $2!

[eHalcyon]

and Masterpiece definitely shouldn't be on the $3 list.

I still can't find myself convinced of this.  Masterpiece is basically a bridge that only works on silver.

I'm sorry, but this is absurd.  It plays absolutely nothing like Bridge.  It is a treasure flooder, specifically of Silver.  Bridge decks involve villages for actions, drawers to get bridges together, and someone quoting me with some comment about Bridge the card game.  Masterpiece involves none of that, and gives you a bunch of Silvers immediately (indeed, before even gaining the Masterpiece itself)!

I mean the effect of it.  Buying a Masterpiece is equivalent to having played a (noncommulative) bridge for each $1 extra you play, but you can only use the Bridge for Silver.  The mechanics of how you get to that point are entirely different.  So maybe I spoke poorly.  My point wasn't that Masterpiece plays like Bridge, it was that we can evaluate Masterpiece as a $3 card by taking the overpayment into account. 

But your point is kind of what I'm trying to say.  For Bridge to be a sensible card to buy, you have to be buying cards that draw and cards that give extra actions (and have a deck of playing cards lying around).  These things you take into account when you rank Bridge as a $4 card.  When you buy Masterpiece, you have to spend some extra money, or else you bought a $3 Copper.  You need to spend more money and get more cards to make it worthwhile, but you have to do that for almost every other card as well (possibly on different turns).  This you would take into account when you rank it as a $3 card. 

The basic question is what kind of analysis would you go through to rank overpay cards.  I'm saying you can guide yourself by thinking of overpay cards in a similar way as cards that require you to buy other cards to make that purchase not useless (FG, Bridge, Villages, etc.)

"The mechanics of how you get to that point are entirely different."  You act like it doesn't matter, but it does.  It is an extremely complicated way to compare the cards, especially because you are now bringing in a restricted version of a $4 terminal action card to help you evaluate a $3 treasure.  That's a lot of hoops to jump through and it makes it more difficult to evaluate, not less.  I mean, I'm not going to evaluate Workshop by saying, "Workshop is like playing Contraband with $1 extra value except you have to use the extra Buy with only the money you get from Contraband and any coin left over from it can't be used with other buys".  It's nominally true, but it is not a useful poin of comparison.

[WanderingWinder]

But again, no matter where you put the card, you have to keep in mind that you could pay more for it (or less for it, if it goes on a higher list) to get a proportionally better (or worse) ability.  Given this, you could put it pretty much anywhere.  But the best place to put it is, I think, the cost at which the card is most commonly purchased.  By doing so, we would minimize the impact of all that extra stuff we have to account for.  We compare the cards to their usual competition.

I agree with most of what you are saying. But the bolded bit is incorrect, largely because... well, okay, herald and doctor probably will most commonly be bought right on their cost (well, maybe doctor more often for 4, but it will be close), and the real question is the other two, where the on-buy is the heart of the card. So to finish my sentence, the bolded bit is largely incorrect for those cards because there is *no* cost where they will be bought particularly often, or more than 50% or anything (also keeping in mind that e.g. 2s are usually bought for more than 2, 5s are often bought for more than 5, etc. even though that gives you no extra power). I think trying to determine these costs is not only practically difficult but actually impossible. Masterpiece won't play like a 5, it will play like a sometimes-5, sometimes-6, sometimes-7. You can't eliminate that out, so you stick it somewhere and have to deal.

I also don't think that these cards suddenly skyrocket to the top of their lists, because you take the price into account. Masterpiece isn't inherently stronger than masquerade because it CAN have a stronger effect, because to have that stronger effect, you have to pay more, which is something you take into account based on evaluation.

Again, we largely agree here, and I think it doesn't make so much a difference. And when I say that Masterpiece costs 3 coin and Stonemason costs 2, I am the best kind of correct - technically correct

[SirPeebles]

But again, no matter where you put the card, you have to keep in mind that you could pay more for it (or less for it, if it goes on a higher list) to get a proportionally better (or worse) ability.  Given this, you could put it pretty much anywhere.  But the best place to put it is, I think, the cost at which the card is most commonly purchased.  By doing so, we would minimize the impact of all that extra stuff we have to account for.  We compare the cards to their usual competition.

I agree with most of what you are saying. But the bolded bit is incorrect, largely because... well, okay, herald and doctor probably will most commonly be bought right on their cost (well, maybe doctor more often for 4, but it will be close), and the real question is the other two, where the on-buy is the heart of the card. So to finish my sentence, the bolded bit is largely incorrect for those cards because there is *no* cost where they will be bought particularly often, or more than 50% or anything (also keeping in mind that e.g. 2s are usually bought for more than 2, 5s are often bought for more than 5, etc. even though that gives you no extra power). I think trying to determine these costs is not only practically difficult but actually impossible. Masterpiece won't play like a 5, it will play like a sometimes-5, sometimes-6, sometimes-7. You can't eliminate that out, so you stick it somewhere and have to deal.

I also don't think that these cards suddenly skyrocket to the top of their lists, because you take the price into account. Masterpiece isn't inherently stronger than masquerade because it CAN have a stronger effect, because to have that stronger effect, you have to pay more, which is something you take into account based on evaluation.

Again, we largely agree here, and I think it doesn't make so much a difference. And when I say that Masterpiece costs 3 coin and Stonemason costs 2, I am the best kind of correct - technically correct

You have a good point that there probably isn't a particularly good "usual" cost for these cards, most especially for Stonemason.  Stonemason to pick up double $2s and double $3s definitely happens, as well as double $2Ps and double $3Ps.  However, consider that we currently have $6+ as a category.  I think sticking Stonemason there is fine (so, going double $4+).  Is it perfect?  No.  But I think it's a better representation of Stonemason than $2.

[Witherweaver]

and Masterpiece definitely shouldn't be on the $3 list.

I still can't find myself convinced of this.  Masterpiece is basically a bridge that only works on silver.

I'm sorry, but this is absurd.  It plays absolutely nothing like Bridge.  It is a treasure flooder, specifically of Silver.  Bridge decks involve villages for actions, drawers to get bridges together, and someone quoting me with some comment about Bridge the card game.  Masterpiece involves none of that, and gives you a bunch of Silvers immediately (indeed, before even gaining the Masterpiece itself)!

I mean the effect of it.  Buying a Masterpiece is equivalent to having played a (noncommulative) bridge for each $1 extra you play, but you can only use the Bridge for Silver.  The mechanics of how you get to that point are entirely different.  So maybe I spoke poorly.  My point wasn't that Masterpiece plays like Bridge, it was that we can evaluate Masterpiece as a $3 card by taking the overpayment into account. 

But your point is kind of what I'm trying to say.  For Bridge to be a sensible card to buy, you have to be buying cards that draw and cards that give extra actions (and have a deck of playing cards lying around).  These things you take into account when you rank Bridge as a $4 card.  When you buy Masterpiece, you have to spend some extra money, or else you bought a $3 Copper.  You need to spend more money and get more cards to make it worthwhile, but you have to do that for almost every other card as well (possibly on different turns).  This you would take into account when you rank it as a $3 card. 

The basic question is what kind of analysis would you go through to rank overpay cards.  I'm saying you can guide yourself by thinking of overpay cards in a similar way as cards that require you to buy other cards to make that purchase not useless (FG, Bridge, Villages, etc.)

"The mechanics of how you get to that point are entirely different."  You act like it doesn't matter, but it does.  It is an extremely complicated way to compare the cards, especially because you are now bringing in a restricted version of a $4 terminal action card to help you evaluate a $3 treasure.  That's a lot of hoops to jump through and it makes it more difficult to evaluate, not less.  I mean, I'm not going to evaluate Workshop by saying, "Workshop is like playing Contraband with $1 extra value except you have to use the extra Buy with only the money you get from Contraband and any coin left over from it can't be used with other buys".  It's nominally true, but it is not a useful poin of comparison.

Man I didn't think it was that complicated or required that many hoops.  I just thought we could perhaps consider the overpay cost as being similar to having to purchase extra cards to make use of a given card when trying to evaluate the rank of the overpay card at its base cost.

[eHalcyon]

But again, no matter where you put the card, you have to keep in mind that you could pay more for it (or less for it, if it goes on a higher list) to get a proportionally better (or worse) ability.  Given this, you could put it pretty much anywhere.  But the best place to put it is, I think, the cost at which the card is most commonly purchased.  By doing so, we would minimize the impact of all that extra stuff we have to account for.  We compare the cards to their usual competition.

I agree with most of what you are saying. But the bolded bit is incorrect, largely because... well, okay, herald and doctor probably will most commonly be bought right on their cost (well, maybe doctor more often for 4, but it will be close), and the real question is the other two, where the on-buy is the heart of the card. So to finish my sentence, the bolded bit is largely incorrect for those cards because there is *no* cost where they will be bought particularly often, or more than 50% or anything (also keeping in mind that e.g. 2s are usually bought for more than 2, 5s are often bought for more than 5, etc. even though that gives you no extra power). I think trying to determine these costs is not only practically difficult but actually impossible. Masterpiece won't play like a 5, it will play like a sometimes-5, sometimes-6, sometimes-7. You can't eliminate that out, so you stick it somewhere and have to deal.

I also don't think that these cards suddenly skyrocket to the top of their lists, because you take the price into account. Masterpiece isn't inherently stronger than masquerade because it CAN have a stronger effect, because to have that stronger effect, you have to pay more, which is something you take into account based on evaluation.

Again, we largely agree here, and I think it doesn't make so much a difference. And when I say that Masterpiece costs 3 coin and Stonemason costs 2, I am the best kind of correct - technically correct

You have a good point that there probably isn't a particularly good "usual" cost for these cards, most especially for Stonemason.  Stonemason to pick up double $2s and double $3s definitely happens, as well as double $2Ps and double $3Ps.  However, consider that we currently have $6+ as a category.  I think sticking Stonemason there is fine (so, going double $4+).  Is it perfect?  No.  But I think it's a better representation of Stonemason than $2.

Yes, this is what I'm getting at.  There is no obvious perfect place, but $6+ is a better place for Stonemason than $2, and $5 or $6+ is a better place for Masterpiece than $3 or $4.  Like you, I would put Herald at its base $4.  Unlike you, I think Doctor would be the most difficult to find a real good place (I explained earlier), in which case I throw my hands up and say "yeah ok, just stick it with the $3s then".

[Robz888]

But again, no matter where you put the card, you have to keep in mind that you could pay more for it (or less for it, if it goes on a higher list) to get a proportionally better (or worse) ability.  Given this, you could put it pretty much anywhere.  But the best place to put it is, I think, the cost at which the card is most commonly purchased.  By doing so, we would minimize the impact of all that extra stuff we have to account for.  We compare the cards to their usual competition.

I agree with most of what you are saying. But the bolded bit is incorrect, largely because... well, okay, herald and doctor probably will most commonly be bought right on their cost (well, maybe doctor more often for 4, but it will be close), and the real question is the other two, where the on-buy is the heart of the card. So to finish my sentence, the bolded bit is largely incorrect for those cards because there is *no* cost where they will be bought particularly often, or more than 50% or anything (also keeping in mind that e.g. 2s are usually bought for more than 2, 5s are often bought for more than 5, etc. even though that gives you no extra power). I think trying to determine these costs is not only practically difficult but actually impossible. Masterpiece won't play like a 5, it will play like a sometimes-5, sometimes-6, sometimes-7. You can't eliminate that out, so you stick it somewhere and have to deal.

I also don't think that these cards suddenly skyrocket to the top of their lists, because you take the price into account. Masterpiece isn't inherently stronger than masquerade because it CAN have a stronger effect, because to have that stronger effect, you have to pay more, which is something you take into account based on evaluation.

Again, we largely agree here, and I think it doesn't make so much a difference. And when I say that Masterpiece costs 3 coin and Stonemason costs 2, I am the best kind of correct - technically correct

You have a good point that there probably isn't a particularly good "usual" cost for these cards, most especially for Stonemason.  Stonemason to pick up double $2s and double $3s definitely happens, as well as double $2Ps and double $3Ps.  However, consider that we currently have $6+ as a category.  I think sticking Stonemason there is fine (so, going double $4+).  Is it perfect?  No.  But I think it's a better representation of Stonemason than $2.

Yes, this is what I'm getting at.  There is no obvious perfect place, but $6+ is a better place for Stonemason than $2, and $5 or $6+ is a better place for Masterpiece than $3 or $4.  Like you, I would put Herald at its base $4.  Unlike you, I think Doctor would be the most difficult to find a real good place (I explained earlier), in which case I throw my hands up and say "yeah ok, just stick it with the $3s then".

I disagree absolutely. On the "Cards Ranked By Cost" List, there IS an obvious perfect place. Stonemason belongs with his friends Chapel, Courtyard, Hamlet, et al on the $2 cards list. This is because he is a $2 cost card. The instruction manual, and common sense, make this overwhelmingly clear. You can overpay for him, and get some benefit, and it's a function of his cost, but it's not the essence of his cost.

Now you could also ask "Is cost the best way to arrange card rankings?" Perhaps it isn't. It's the one theory and Qvist used, and I happen to like, and I do think it's helped improve our understanding of the cards more so than the "Best Villages" list, which was also a lot of fun, so more lists is always good. A straight list (1. King's Court 2. Goons ? 3. Chapel?? 4. Witch? Masquerade? Wharf? Rebuild? tough stuff) might be interesting, or even better, sure.

[eHalcyon]

But again, no matter where you put the card, you have to keep in mind that you could pay more for it (or less for it, if it goes on a higher list) to get a proportionally better (or worse) ability.  Given this, you could put it pretty much anywhere.  But the best place to put it is, I think, the cost at which the card is most commonly purchased.  By doing so, we would minimize the impact of all that extra stuff we have to account for.  We compare the cards to their usual competition.

I agree with most of what you are saying. But the bolded bit is incorrect, largely because... well, okay, herald and doctor probably will most commonly be bought right on their cost (well, maybe doctor more often for 4, but it will be close), and the real question is the other two, where the on-buy is the heart of the card. So to finish my sentence, the bolded bit is largely incorrect for those cards because there is *no* cost where they will be bought particularly often, or more than 50% or anything (also keeping in mind that e.g. 2s are usually bought for more than 2, 5s are often bought for more than 5, etc. even though that gives you no extra power). I think trying to determine these costs is not only practically difficult but actually impossible. Masterpiece won't play like a 5, it will play like a sometimes-5, sometimes-6, sometimes-7. You can't eliminate that out, so you stick it somewhere and have to deal.

I also don't think that these cards suddenly skyrocket to the top of their lists, because you take the price into account. Masterpiece isn't inherently stronger than masquerade because it CAN have a stronger effect, because to have that stronger effect, you have to pay more, which is something you take into account based on evaluation.

Again, we largely agree here, and I think it doesn't make so much a difference. And when I say that Masterpiece costs 3 coin and Stonemason costs 2, I am the best kind of correct - technically correct

You have a good point that there probably isn't a particularly good "usual" cost for these cards, most especially for Stonemason.  Stonemason to pick up double $2s and double $3s definitely happens, as well as double $2Ps and double $3Ps.  However, consider that we currently have $6+ as a category.  I think sticking Stonemason there is fine (so, going double $4+).  Is it perfect?  No.  But I think it's a better representation of Stonemason than $2.

Yes, this is what I'm getting at.  There is no obvious perfect place, but $6+ is a better place for Stonemason than $2, and $5 or $6+ is a better place for Masterpiece than $3 or $4.  Like you, I would put Herald at its base $4.  Unlike you, I think Doctor would be the most difficult to find a real good place (I explained earlier), in which case I throw my hands up and say "yeah ok, just stick it with the $3s then".

I disagree absolutely. On the "Cards Ranked By Cost" List, there IS an obvious perfect place. Stonemason belongs with his friends Chapel, Courtyard, Hamlet, et al on the $2 cards list. This is because he is a $2 cost card. The instruction manual, and common sense, make this overwhelmingly clear. You can overpay for him, and get some benefit, and it's a function of his cost, but it's not the essence of his cost.

Now you could also ask "Is cost the best way to arrange card rankings?" Perhaps it isn't. It's the one theory and Qvist used, and I happen to like, and I do think it's helped improve our understanding of the cards more so than the "Best Villages" list, which was also a lot of fun, so more lists is always good. A straight list (1. King's Court 2. Goons ? 3. Chapel?? 4. Witch? Masquerade? Wharf? Rebuild? tough stuff) might be interesting, or even better, sure.

What is the difference between "essence of cost" and "function of cost" as you define them?  They are the same to me. 

Why do you like ranking by cost?  I have discussed this above, and the only conclusion I can draw is that, if categorizing by cost is to have any meaning, then overpay cards like Masterpiece and Stonemason need to be put in higher cost lists.

The only real counterargument I see is, "Stonemason costs $2 according to the little number in the corner, therefore it should be with other $2 cards".  That's just stubborn.

I invite you to try the exercise I proposed.  The only one who has is Witherweaver.

[Witherweaver]

The only real counterargument I see is, "Stonemason costs $2 according to the little number in the corner, therefore it should be with other $2 cards".  That's just stubborn.

It's also technically correct    Because "cost" is defined in the rulebook.  It has a precise meaning in the mechanics of the game.  You simply can't argue that Stonemason does not cost $2, because it does.  You'd have to rewrite the card, or the rules, to change that.  You can argue that the cost of a card isn't the best way to rank them.  You can also argue through an "effective cost," but that's different than the cost.

[Robz888]

What is the difference between "essence of cost" and "function of cost" as you define them?  They are the same to me. 

Why do you like ranking by cost?  I have discussed this above, and the only conclusion I can draw is that, if categorizing by cost is to have any meaning, then overpay cards like Masterpiece and Stonemason need to be put in higher cost lists.

The only real counterargument I see is, "Stonemason costs $2 according to the little number in the corner, therefore it should be with other $2 cards".  That's just stubborn.

I invite you to try the exercise I proposed.  The only one who has is Witherweaver.

By "essence of cost" I mean the cost itself. Masterpiece costs $3. Grand Market costs $6. Peddler costs $8.

By "function of cost" I mean something else that happens that is related to the cost. Masterpiece gains you Silver per coin you overpaid. Grand Market can't be bought if you have Copper in play. Peddler costs less if you have actions in play.

When I rank Peddler, I consider the fact that intelligent players will only buy it under conditions where the "function" aspect makes it more appealing. It's still an $8 card that we can rank against the other $6+ cards.

[Robz888]

What exercise?

[eHalcyon]

What exercise?

Top of page 7, here.

[eHalcyon]

The only real counterargument I see is, "Stonemason costs $2 according to the little number in the corner, therefore it should be with other $2 cards".  That's just stubborn.

It's also technically correct    Because "cost" is defined in the rulebook.  It has a precise meaning in the mechanics of the game.  You simply can't argue that Stonemason does not cost $2, because it does.  You'd have to rewrite the card, or the rules, to change that.  You can argue that the cost of a card isn't the best way to rank them.  You can also argue through an "effective cost," but that's different than the cost.

Sure thing.  But I believe effective cost is what matters most.  I mean, you could take it to extremes:

Switch - Action - $2
-----------------------------------
+2 Cards
Each other player gains a Curse card.
-----------------------------------
During your Buy phase, this costs $5.

This is Witch with a Peddler spin on it.  Switch technically costs $2.  But really, come on, it costs $5.  There are a few weird cases (TfB and Blackmarket to name a couple) but, generally speaking, it is a $5 card.

And I will touch on Robz' comments here as well.  For me, the "essence of cost" is the effective cost; it's what people actually pay for a card.  It includes changes caused by the functions of the card.  This is the cost that matters.  The "technical cost" or "nominal cost" is what is written on the card, and that's what TfBs and such care about.  But generally speaking, it is less important.

Switch is technically $2.  But it is essentially and effectively $5.  It should be compared with other $5s, not $2s.

Likewise, I do think Peddler could be moved to the $2 list, but it is noteworthy that Peddler only fluctuates in cost.  The overpay cards fluctuate in cost AND power.

[LastFootnote]

It's funny that this is quickly becoming the longest thread in the Guilds subform. Funny in a very, very sad way.

[eHalcyon]

It's funny that this is quickly becoming the longest thread in the Guilds subform. Funny in a very, very sad way.

Well, I find it an interesting discussion.

[Robz888]

The only real counterargument I see is, "Stonemason costs $2 according to the little number in the corner, therefore it should be with other $2 cards".  That's just stubborn.

It's also technically correct    Because "cost" is defined in the rulebook.  It has a precise meaning in the mechanics of the game.  You simply can't argue that Stonemason does not cost $2, because it does.  You'd have to rewrite the card, or the rules, to change that.  You can argue that the cost of a card isn't the best way to rank them.  You can also argue through an "effective cost," but that's different than the cost.

Sure thing.  But I believe effective cost is what matters most.  I mean, you could take it to extremes:

Switch - Action - $2
-----------------------------------
+2 Cards
Each other player gains a Curse card.
-----------------------------------
During your Buy phase, this costs $5.

This is Witch with a Peddler spin on it.  Switch technically costs $2.  But really, come on, it costs $5.  There are a few weird cases (TfB and Blackmarket to name a couple) but, generally speaking, it is a $5 card.

And I will touch on Robz' comments here as well.  For me, the "essence of cost" is the effective cost; it's what people actually pay for a card.  It includes changes caused by the functions of the card.  This is the cost that matters.  The "technical cost" or "nominal cost" is what is written on the card, and that's what TfBs and such care about.  But generally speaking, it is less important.

Switch is technically $2.  But it is essentially and effectively $5.  It should be compared with other $5s, not $2s.

Likewise, I do think Peddler could be moved to the $2 list, but it is noteworthy that Peddler only fluctuates in cost.  The overpay cards fluctuate in cost AND power.

Switch should be on the $2 list. It would be, by far, the Best $2 Card. As such, it's heinously unbalanced and should never exist. Still, it's a $2 card.

[eHalcyon]

Bah, OK, loophole with gainers.  Let's try a slightly more complicated version that is closer to what I wanted:

Switch - Action - $2*
-----------------------------------
+2 Cards
Each other player gains a Curse card.
-----------------------------------
During your Buy phase, this costs $5.
When you would gain this other than during your Buy phase, gain a Curse instead.

Now what?  Still a bit crazy with HoP, but I could finagle it even more to get rid of that if necessary.  The point is, this will only ever be bought for $5.  It technically costs $2 because that's what it says on the card.  It essentially costs $5 because that's what you'll pay.

[SirPeebles]

So for those who are concerned with which price is technically correct, why isn't Possession ranked alongside its fellow $6+ cards?

[Robz888]

Bah, OK, loophole with gainers.  Let's try a slightly more complicated version that is closer to what I wanted:

Switch - Action - $2*
-----------------------------------
+2 Cards
Each other player gains a Curse card.
-----------------------------------
During your Buy phase, this costs $5.
When you would gain this other than during your Buy phase, gain a Curse instead.

Now what?  Still a bit crazy with HoP, but I could finagle it even more to get rid of that if necessary.  The point is, this will only ever be bought for $5.  It technically costs $2 because that's what it says on the card.  It essentially costs $5 because that's what you'll pay.

I agree that it functionally costs $5. Just liked Peddler is functionally unbuyable, decent, or lucrative depending on how many actions you have played. Grand Market "functionally" costs virtual coin, Silver, and Gold.

If there were a ton of cards like Switch, my guess is cost would end up being a faulty way of basing these rankings.

As for your thought exercise, LGG is almost identical to IGG, so it's just slightly worse on the $5s list. On the $2s list... you manage to underscore the reason we organize things by cost Because it's really hard to rank it there. I mean, it's just IGG. Let's design a new list, "The Best Cards That Either Cost $2 or Are IGG." Is IGG number 1? Well, it's not better than Chapel, right we all say that. Maybe not Courtyard either? I don't know, it's like top 3 or 4 probably definitely. But it ends up being kind of hard to compare the relative goodness of IGG vs. the relative goodness of, say Squire, because you also have to say, well IGG is so much harder to buy than Squire, because of cost. Is Goons better than Masquerade? Is Ambassador better than Cultist? Is Margrave better than Fishing Village? Are Nobles better than Silk Roads? There are objective answers to these questions. One of Goons/Masquerade IS better than the other. However, I think it's hard to tell, and more importantly, I think in a community-based ranking the community would be more likely to commit errors (possibly just always ranking the stronger cards better despite their steeper costs).

So we remove cost as a consideration, by only comparing like-costed things. In doing so, we can make intelligent considerations on the margins, for cards like Peddler and Duchess and such. And I think it's perfectly reasonable to do the same for Masterpiece. It's also technically correct. So I stand by it.

[Witherweaver]

So for those who are concerned with which price is technically correct, why isn't Possession ranked alongside its fellow $6+ cards?

Huh?  I took 6+ to mean it has a cost that is an element of (x,0) for x>=6, where (x,y) is the (coin,potion) cost of a card.  The $X card lists only rank cards with costs of the form (X,0).  Cards of costs (x,y) for nonzero y are on their own list, right?

[SirPeebles]

One of Goons/Masquerade IS better than the other.

 

[eHalcyon]

Bah, OK, loophole with gainers.  Let's try a slightly more complicated version that is closer to what I wanted:

Switch - Action - $2*
-----------------------------------
+2 Cards
Each other player gains a Curse card.
-----------------------------------
During your Buy phase, this costs $5.
When you would gain this other than during your Buy phase, gain a Curse instead.

Now what?  Still a bit crazy with HoP, but I could finagle it even more to get rid of that if necessary.  The point is, this will only ever be bought for $5.  It technically costs $2 because that's what it says on the card.  It essentially costs $5 because that's what you'll pay.

I agree that it functionally costs $5. Just liked Peddler is functionally unbuyable, decent, or lucrative depending on how many actions you have played. Grand Market "functionally" costs virtual coin, Silver, and Gold.

If there were a ton of cards like Switch, my guess is cost would end up being a faulty way of basing these rankings.

As for your thought exercise, LGG is almost identical to IGG, so it's just slightly worse on the $5s list. On the $2s list... you manage to underscore the reason we organize things by cost Because it's really hard to rank it there. I mean, it's just IGG. Let's design a new list, "The Best Cards That Either Cost $2 or Are IGG." Is IGG number 1? Well, it's not better than Chapel, right we all say that. Maybe not Courtyard either? I don't know, it's like top 3 or 4 probably definitely. But it ends up being kind of hard to compare the relative goodness of IGG vs. the relative goodness of, say Squire, because you also have to say, well IGG is so much harder to buy than Squire, because of cost. Is Goons better than Masquerade? Is Ambassador better than Cultist? Is Margrave better than Fishing Village? Are Nobles better than Silk Roads? There are objective answers to these questions. One of Goons/Masquerade IS better than the other. However, I think it's hard to tell, and more importantly, I think in a community-based ranking the community would be more likely to commit errors (possibly just always ranking the stronger cards better despite their steeper costs).

So we remove cost as a consideration, by only comparing like-costed things. In doing so, we can make intelligent considerations on the margins, for cards like Peddler and Duchess and such. And I think it's perfectly reasonable to do the same for Masterpiece. It's also technically correct. So I stand by it.

I don't understand how you seem to completely agree with the difficulty of ranking a card like LGG on the technically correct $2 list and still go the other way with it.  Masterpiece is just like LGG, except the benefit scales to more costs and you get Silver instead of cursing others.  It is hard to rank Masterpiece at $3 for the same reasons you say it is hard to rank LGG at $2.

What list would you put the new Switch on?  $2 or $5?  It technically costs $2 but it functionally costs $5.

Masterpiece technically costs $3 but it functionally costs more because you will almost never want to buy it at $3.

If it helps, you could say that my suggestion is to rank cards by functional cost rather than technical cost.

[Robz888]

Bah, OK, loophole with gainers.  Let's try a slightly more complicated version that is closer to what I wanted:

Switch - Action - $2*
-----------------------------------
+2 Cards
Each other player gains a Curse card.
-----------------------------------
During your Buy phase, this costs $5.
When you would gain this other than during your Buy phase, gain a Curse instead.

Now what?  Still a bit crazy with HoP, but I could finagle it even more to get rid of that if necessary.  The point is, this will only ever be bought for $5.  It technically costs $2 because that's what it says on the card.  It essentially costs $5 because that's what you'll pay.

I agree that it functionally costs $5. Just liked Peddler is functionally unbuyable, decent, or lucrative depending on how many actions you have played. Grand Market "functionally" costs virtual coin, Silver, and Gold.

If there were a ton of cards like Switch, my guess is cost would end up being a faulty way of basing these rankings.

As for your thought exercise, LGG is almost identical to IGG, so it's just slightly worse on the $5s list. On the $2s list... you manage to underscore the reason we organize things by cost Because it's really hard to rank it there. I mean, it's just IGG. Let's design a new list, "The Best Cards That Either Cost $2 or Are IGG." Is IGG number 1? Well, it's not better than Chapel, right we all say that. Maybe not Courtyard either? I don't know, it's like top 3 or 4 probably definitely. But it ends up being kind of hard to compare the relative goodness of IGG vs. the relative goodness of, say Squire, because you also have to say, well IGG is so much harder to buy than Squire, because of cost. Is Goons better than Masquerade? Is Ambassador better than Cultist? Is Margrave better than Fishing Village? Are Nobles better than Silk Roads? There are objective answers to these questions. One of Goons/Masquerade IS better than the other. However, I think it's hard to tell, and more importantly, I think in a community-based ranking the community would be more likely to commit errors (possibly just always ranking the stronger cards better despite their steeper costs).

So we remove cost as a consideration, by only comparing like-costed things. In doing so, we can make intelligent considerations on the margins, for cards like Peddler and Duchess and such. And I think it's perfectly reasonable to do the same for Masterpiece. It's also technically correct. So I stand by it.

I don't understand how you seem to completely agree with the difficulty of ranking a card like LGG on the technically correct $2 list and still go the other way with it.  Masterpiece is just like LGG, except the benefit scales to more costs and you get Silver instead of cursing others.  It is hard to rank Masterpiece at $3 for the same reasons you say it is hard to rank LGG at $2.

What list would you put the new Switch on?  $2 or $5?  It technically costs $2 but it functionally costs $5.

Masterpiece technically costs $3 but it functionally costs more because you will almost never want to buy it at $3.

If it helps, you could say that my suggestion is to rank cards by functional cost rather than technical cost.

The problem is LGG is just an illogical card. If there were lots of cards like LGG, then yes, cost would be mostly meaningless for setting baseline rankings.

[Robz888]

But "functional" cost is interpretive and vague. Our baseline ranking device should be neither of these things.

[Witherweaver]

If it helps, you could say that my suggestion is to rank cards by functional cost rather than technical cost.

That helps me, but I'm pedantic.  Though you couldn't call it the "$X Card List" any more.. you'd have to call it the "Effective $X Card List" or something.

However, the argument can probably be made that some $2 cards have an effective cost of $3, given that they're more often bought when you actually have $3 in your hand and not $2 (like Chapel).

[Robz888]

Again, Duchess has a functional cost of "you gain a Duchy." It's criminal to rank it against the other $2s... or should be, according to you people!

[Robz888]

I mean, look, I agree that the most accurate and effective way to rank Masterpiece would be to put it on a list of all 300 or however many Dominion cards. It's just going to be fairly difficult to actually figure out where it should fit in there. And it's going to be even harder for other cards.

[eHalcyon]

Our ranking device is by definition interpretive and vague.  Some people rank cards higher because they are absolutely amazing 10% of the time even though they are terrible otherwise.  Some people rank cards higher if they are always reliable, even if never amazing.  Most people probably weigh a bit of both, to varying degrees.

The overpay cards will also add in these elements no matter where you slot them.  But as you yourself say this:

But it ends up being kind of hard to compare the relative goodness of IGG vs. the relative goodness of, say Squire, because you also have to say, well IGG is so much harder to buy than Squire, because of cost.

Your difficulty there is the same you would face when ranking a card like Masterpiece, because base Masterpiece is crap and $6 Masterpiece is awesome.   

"It ends up being kind of hard to compare the relative goodness of $6 Masterpiece vs. the relative goodness of, say Loan, because you also have to say, well $6 Masterpiece is so much harder to buy than Loan, because of cost."

And then repeat that for $5 and $4 Masterpiece as well.

And I note that in that quote, you just say "IGG" instead of my made-up LGG.  You recognized that LGG would not really get purchased at $2; it is effectively $5 IGG, technical cost be damned.  Masterpiece is like that too.  It would not really get purchased at $3, it is effectively $5 or $6 Masterpiece, technical cost be damned.

[sudgy]

So for those who are concerned with which price is technically correct, why isn't Possession ranked alongside its fellow $6+ cards?

Huh?  I took 6+ to mean it has a cost that is an element of (x,0) for x>=6, where (x,y) is the (coin,potion) cost of a card.  The $X card lists only rank cards with costs of the form (X,0).  Cards of costs (x,y) for nonzero y are on their own list, right?

Ha, in my dominion program the costs are arrays where it's [coin, potion]...

[eHalcyon]

The problem is LGG is just an illogical card. If there were lots of cards like LGG, then yes, cost would be mostly meaningless for setting baseline rankings.

There are at least four cards like LGG -- the four overpay cards.  That was the whole point of the illustration.  Peddler might count too, as a fifth.

If it helps, you could say that my suggestion is to rank cards by functional cost rather than technical cost.

However, the argument can probably be made that some $2 cards have an effective cost of $3, given that they're more often bought when you actually have $3 in your hand and not $2 (like Chapel).

No, that's only because you draw $3 more commonly than you draw $2.  The functional cost is not merely the cost at which a card is most commonly bought.  It is more like the minimum cost in order to get the full function of the card.  For Chapel, that's still $2.  For Masterpiece, it is certainly above $3 because the full function of the card is "gain a bunch of Silver" and that just doesn't happen at $3.  It gets a bit tough because that function keeps getting better the more you overpay, which is why it is at THAT point a "most common" cost should be considered, and then you can consider all the other costs from that point of reference.

[Witherweaver]

The problem is LGG is just an illogical card. If there were lots of cards like LGG, then yes, cost would be mostly meaningless for setting baseline rankings.

There are at least four cards like LGG -- the four overpay cards.  That was the whole point of the illustration.  Peddler might count too, as a fifth.

If it helps, you could say that my suggestion is to rank cards by functional cost rather than technical cost.

However, the argument can probably be made that some $2 cards have an effective cost of $3, given that they're more often bought when you actually have $3 in your hand and not $2 (like Chapel).

No, that's only because you draw $3 more commonly than you draw $2.  The functional cost is not merely the cost at which a card is most commonly bought.  It is more like the minimum cost in order to get the full function of the card.  For Chapel, that's still $2.  For Masterpiece, it is certainly above $3 because the full function of the card is "gain a bunch of Silver" and that just doesn't happen at $3.  It gets a bit tough because that function keeps getting better the more you overpay, which is why it is at THAT point a "most common" cost should be considered, and then you can consider all the other costs from that point of reference.

Huh?  The minimum cost in order to get the full function of the card?  I think you're going to have a really hard time trying to evaluate any of the overpay cards that way.  Especially since it sounds eerily like trying to find the minimum element of an unbounded set.  It seems a lot easier to evaluate it at $3 than to argue whether $4, $5, or $6 is the "functional cost".

[WanderingWinder]

The only real counterargument I see is, "Stonemason costs $2 according to the little number in the corner, therefore it should be with other $2 cards".  That's just stubborn.

It's also technically correct    Because "cost" is defined in the rulebook.  It has a precise meaning in the mechanics of the game.  You simply can't argue that Stonemason does not cost $2, because it does.  You'd have to rewrite the card, or the rules, to change that.  You can argue that the cost of a card isn't the best way to rank them.  You can also argue through an "effective cost," but that's different than the cost.

Sure thing.  But I believe effective cost is what matters most.  I mean, you could take it to extremes:

Switch - Action - $2
-----------------------------------
+2 Cards
Each other player gains a Curse card.
-----------------------------------
During your Buy phase, this costs $5.

This is Witch with a Peddler spin on it.  Switch technically costs $2.  But really, come on, it costs $5.  There are a few weird cases (TfB and Blackmarket to name a couple) but, generally speaking, it is a $5 card.

And I will touch on Robz' comments here as well.  For me, the "essence of cost" is the effective cost; it's what people actually pay for a card.  It includes changes caused by the functions of the card.  This is the cost that matters.  The "technical cost" or "nominal cost" is what is written on the card, and that's what TfBs and such care about.  But generally speaking, it is less important.

Switch is technically $2.  But it is essentially and effectively $5.  It should be compared with other $5s, not $2s.

Likewise, I do think Peddler could be moved to the $2 list, but it is noteworthy that Peddler only fluctuates in cost.  The overpay cards fluctuate in cost AND power.

The only problem I have with this is that there isn't somewhere to stick these guys. Having their own list is possible, sure, but they don't fit anywhere else, and a 4 card list is pretty lame - I mean, the ruins list and Knights list are, well, reasonably pointless as is. So they don't fit well anywhere, effectively, which is why I say to drop in on the nominal cost. But again, not a big deal.

The only real counterargument I see is, "Stonemason costs $2 according to the little number in the corner, therefore it should be with other $2 cards".  That's just stubborn.

It's also technically correct    Because "cost" is defined in the rulebook.  It has a precise meaning in the mechanics of the game.  You simply can't argue that Stonemason does not cost $2, because it does.  You'd have to rewrite the card, or the rules, to change that.  You can argue that the cost of a card isn't the best way to rank them.  You can also argue through an "effective cost," but that's different than the cost.

Sure thing.  But I believe effective cost is what matters most.  I mean, you could take it to extremes:

Switch - Action - $2
-----------------------------------
+2 Cards
Each other player gains a Curse card.
-----------------------------------
During your Buy phase, this costs $5.

This is Witch with a Peddler spin on it.  Switch technically costs $2.  But really, come on, it costs $5.  There are a few weird cases (TfB and Blackmarket to name a couple) but, generally speaking, it is a $5 card.

And I will touch on Robz' comments here as well.  For me, the "essence of cost" is the effective cost; it's what people actually pay for a card.  It includes changes caused by the functions of the card.  This is the cost that matters.  The "technical cost" or "nominal cost" is what is written on the card, and that's what TfBs and such care about.  But generally speaking, it is less important.

Switch is technically $2.  But it is essentially and effectively $5.  It should be compared with other $5s, not $2s.

Likewise, I do think Peddler could be moved to the $2 list, but it is noteworthy that Peddler only fluctuates in cost.  The overpay cards fluctuate in cost AND power.

Switch should be on the $2 list. It would be, by far, the Best $2 Card. As such, it's heinously unbalanced and should never exist. Still, it's a $2 card.

Switch, if it's the only such card, would be a $2, I agree. I strongly disagree that it is by far the Best 2-cost card. I mean, is witch really better than chapel? I don't actually think so. Anyhow, if many cards had this issue, it would just be a reason to not use cost to group - similar to how if we try to list by functionality now, not everything fits nice. The overpay cards are bringing up this problem now.

So for those who are concerned with which price is technically correct, why isn't Possession ranked alongside its fellow $6+ cards?

This would be technically correct, but it isn't *required*. I wouldn't have a problem with it, though.

Our ranking device is by definition interpretive and vague.  Some people rank cards higher because they are absolutely amazing 10% of the time even though they are terrible otherwise.  Some people rank cards higher if they are always reliable, even if never amazing.  Most people probably weigh a bit of both, to varying degrees.

The overpay cards will also add in these elements no matter where you slot them.  But as you yourself say this:

But it ends up being kind of hard to compare the relative goodness of IGG vs. the relative goodness of, say Squire, because you also have to say, well IGG is so much harder to buy than Squire, because of cost.

Your difficulty there is the same you would face when ranking a card like Masterpiece, because base Masterpiece is crap and $6 Masterpiece is awesome.   

"It ends up being kind of hard to compare the relative goodness of $6 Masterpiece vs. the relative goodness of, say Loan, because you also have to say, well $6 Masterpiece is so much harder to buy than Loan, because of cost."

And then repeat that for $5 and $4 Masterpiece as well.

And I note that in that quote, you just say "IGG" instead of my made-up LGG.  You recognized that LGG would not really get purchased at $2; it is effectively $5 IGG, technical cost be damned.  Masterpiece is like that too.  It would not really get purchased at $3, it is effectively $5 or $6 Masterpiece, technical cost be damned.

You keep saying that it's hard to rank the overpays. Sure is. But this doesn't have an effect on the cost debate.

The problem is LGG is just an illogical card. If there were lots of cards like LGG, then yes, cost would be mostly meaningless for setting baseline rankings.

There are at least four cards like LGG -- the four overpay cards.  That was the whole point of the illustration.  Peddler might count too, as a fifth.

No, because LGG has ONE fixed alternate cost. The overpay cards have a large (possibly infinite) number of options. This changes things.

If it helps, you could say that my suggestion is to rank cards by functional cost rather than technical cost.

However, the argument can probably be made that some $2 cards have an effective cost of $3, given that they're more often bought when you actually have $3 in your hand and not $2 (like Chapel).

No, that's only because you draw $3 more commonly than you draw $2.  The functional cost is not merely the cost at which a card is most commonly bought.  It is more like the minimum cost in order to get the full function of the card.  For Chapel, that's still $2.  For Masterpiece, it is certainly above $3 because the full function of the card is "gain a bunch of Silver" and that just doesn't happen at $3.  It gets a bit tough because that function keeps getting better the more you overpay, which is why it is at THAT point a "most common" cost should be considered, and then you can consider all the other costs from that point of reference.

You *never* get the 'full function of the card' then though, for the overpay cards. Well, stonemason would be 10. But the rest are basically unbounded (Doctor is bounded by the money you can play in a turn, herald by the actions you can have in your deck, masterpiece by the size of the silver pile...)

[eHalcyon]

The problem is LGG is just an illogical card. If there were lots of cards like LGG, then yes, cost would be mostly meaningless for setting baseline rankings.

There are at least four cards like LGG -- the four overpay cards.  That was the whole point of the illustration.  Peddler might count too, as a fifth.

If it helps, you could say that my suggestion is to rank cards by functional cost rather than technical cost.

However, the argument can probably be made that some $2 cards have an effective cost of $3, given that they're more often bought when you actually have $3 in your hand and not $2 (like Chapel).

No, that's only because you draw $3 more commonly than you draw $2.  The functional cost is not merely the cost at which a card is most commonly bought.  It is more like the minimum cost in order to get the full function of the card.  For Chapel, that's still $2.  For Masterpiece, it is certainly above $3 because the full function of the card is "gain a bunch of Silver" and that just doesn't happen at $3.  It gets a bit tough because that function keeps getting better the more you overpay, which is why it is at THAT point a "most common" cost should be considered, and then you can consider all the other costs from that point of reference.

Huh?  The minimum cost in order to get the full function of the card?  I think you're going to have a really hard time trying to evaluate any of the overpay cards that way.  Especially since it sounds eerily like trying to find the minimum element of an unbounded set.  It seems a lot easier to evaluate it at $3 than to argue whether $4, $5, or $6 is the "functional cost".

Not at all... But whatever, forget about all that then.  It boils down to this:

- For most cards, functional/effective/essential cost (whatever you want to call it) is the same as the technical cost, which is listed on the card.  These cards don't have any mechanisms that change their own cost when you buy it.

- For the overpay cards, the effective cost and the technical cost do not necessarily match because (for at least Masterpiece and Stonemason) the real power, the primary purpose, the full function of the card comes from overpaying.

- As you increase what you pay for these cards, the power increases.  To be fully comprehensive, you would put these cards on multiple lists because their EFFECTS change at different costs.  They might as well be different (albeit similar) cards at different costs with different on-buy effects.

- It would be messy to rank (for example) Masterpiece on four different lists.  Which version of Masterpiece is most common?  Certainly not the $3 version.  Probably not the $4 version.  Maybe $5, maybe $6+.  So rank one of those, and adjust for the others.  It will be easiest that way because you are dealing with the most common case.

- I know that "common case" is hard to determine for Doctor and Herald.  Fine, put them on the base cost lists.

[eHalcyon]

The only problem I have with this is that there isn't somewhere to stick these guys. Having their own list is possible, sure, but they don't fit anywhere else, and a 4 card list is pretty lame - I mean, the ruins list and Knights list are, well, reasonably pointless as is. So they don't fit well anywhere, effectively, which is why I say to drop in on the nominal cost. But again, not a big deal.

Stonemason fits into the $6+ list pretty well.  Masterpiece would fit in with $5 or $6+.

The most minimum argument I can make is: Masterpiece doesn't get bought at $3, so why rank it with $3 cards?

You keep saying that it's hard to rank the overpays. Sure is. But this doesn't have an effect on the cost debate.

How not?  By moving the cards to another list, they are easier to rank and the results are more meaningful.

No, because LGG has ONE fixed alternate cost. The overpay cards have a large (possibly infinite) number of options. This changes things.

That was the whole point!  LGG has one fixed alternate cost and that's already weird to rank.  The overpay cards are even more difficult to rank because there are many more possibilities. 

You *never* get the 'full function of the card' then though, for the overpay cards. Well, stonemason would be 10. But the rest are basically unbounded (Doctor is bounded by the money you can play in a turn, herald by the actions you can have in your deck, masterpiece by the size of the silver pile...)

Yes, I discuss that in what you quoted.  That's why we turn to finding a common case.  But even in the extreme case, we would just put them in $6+.  As it is, I think it is reasonable to put Herald in $4, sure.  But it just doesn't make sense to put Masterpiece with $3 because at that price you are effectively buying a Copper.  Comparing Masterpiece with the other $3s is like comparing Witch or Goons or IGG to the $3s.  You can do it, but it's difficult and weird and the results don't mean as much to me.

[eHalcyon]

Maybe I should try another analogy?

Masterpiece - Treasure - $3+
-----------------------------------
$1
-----------------------------------
When you buy this, you may overpay for it. If you do, gain a Silver per $1 you overpaid.

Adequatepiece - Treasure - $3+
-----------------------------------
$1
-----------------------------------
When you buy this, you may overpay for it by $3. If you do, gain 3 Silvers.

Tolerablepiece - Treasure - $6
-----------------------------------
$1
-----------------------------------
When you buy this, gain 3 Silvers.

Failpiece - Treasure - $3
-----------------------------------
$1

Here we have four cards.  MP is the regular Masterpiece.  AP is a Masterpiece that is restricted to only overpaying by $3, no more, no less.  TP is a Masterpiece where you are forced to always overpay by $3.  FP is Masterpiece without overpaying at all.

Should we even bother ranking FP on the $3 list?  It is pointless because Silver does everything Failpiece can do better and at the same price.

TP is obviously ranked with the $6+ cards.  That is simply what it costs.

Now, AP.  Now it's getting tough.  AP:TP::LGG:IGG, so some of the earlier discussion applies here.  But anyway, AP is just FP and TP rolled into one.  FP was not worth ranking and TP should clearly be ranked with $6+ cards.  So shouldn't AP be ranked with $6+ cards as well?  If not, why not?

Finally, MP.  MP is AP with a slew more options.  Since FP is not worth ranking, then MP shouldn't be ranked at $3 either.  But should it go on the $4 list?  $5?  $6+?  Maybe all of them, because MP is different at all those costs, but for simplicity we could just pick the most common one.  What is most common?  Probably $5 or $6+, because $4 MP is almost as terrible as Failpiece.  $6+ encompasses more.

If it helps, I could make analogues for all the other costs too.



The argument for this example comes down to this: if it's not worth buying Masterpiece at $3 in a game, why would we rank Masterpiece at $3 on a list?

[sudgy]

...Why do I keep checking this thread when I don't read any of it...

[Mic Qsenoch]

I can't wait for the release of eHalcyon's expansion Dominion: Thought Experiment

[eHalcyon]

I can't wait for the release of eHalcyon's expansion Dominion: Thought Experiment

Nobody wants to playtest it with me!

[WanderingWinder]

The only problem I have with this is that there isn't somewhere to stick these guys. Having their own list is possible, sure, but they don't fit anywhere else, and a 4 card list is pretty lame - I mean, the ruins list and Knights list are, well, reasonably pointless as is. So they don't fit well anywhere, effectively, which is why I say to drop in on the nominal cost. But again, not a big deal.

Stonemason fits into the $6+ list pretty well.  Masterpiece would fit in with $5 or $6+.

The most minimum argument I can make is: Masterpiece doesn't get bought at $3, so why rank it with $3 cards?

Because it doesn't fit elsewhere either. You don't really buy it at 4, you might at 5, but you also might at 6, or 7, or whatever higher numbers. You can make the 'You usually get a different effect for it at a different price' argument for ANY price you give it. So sure, it's an argument to not make it 3, but you fail to give an alternative which isn't dogged by the same problem.

You keep saying that it's hard to rank the overpays. Sure is. But this doesn't have an effect on the cost debate.

How not?  By moving the cards to another list, they are easier to rank and the results are more meaningful.

I disagree that it's at all easier to rank them. All the points you are making just make them harder to rank overall.

No, because LGG has ONE fixed alternate cost. The overpay cards have a large (possibly infinite) number of options. This changes things.

That was the whole point!  LGG has one fixed alternate cost and that's already weird to rank.  The overpay cards are even more difficult to rank because there are many more possibilities. 

But the thing is, LGG has a specific alternate cost, so you can make an argument FOR that specific alternate cost. THESE have many different costs, so you can't do the same thing.


This is the big issue. You can of course make the case that they (well, stonemason and masterpiece) don't really function as having a cost equal to that printed on the card. Fine. They don't. I agree. But you can't come up with a single concrete place to put them. Whatever price you pick, you can make THE SAME argument that they don't really function as having THAT cost either. This is the problem.

[Mic Qsenoch]

This is the big issue. You can of course make the case that they (well, stonemason and masterpiece) don't really function as having a cost equal to that printed on the card. Fine. They don't. I agree. But you can't come up with a single concrete place to put them. Whatever price you pick, you can make THE SAME argument that they don't really function as having THAT cost either. This is the problem.

Right, so now we can play a second (third?) level game: rank the possible price points for appropriateness. Which one is best? Maybe this is too hard to decide, maybe not.

[WanderingWinder]

This is the big issue. You can of course make the case that they (well, stonemason and masterpiece) don't really function as having a cost equal to that printed on the card. Fine. They don't. I agree. But you can't come up with a single concrete place to put them. Whatever price you pick, you can make THE SAME argument that they don't really function as having THAT cost either. This is the problem.

Right, so now we can play a second (third?) level game: rank the possible price points for appropriateness. Which one is best? Maybe this is too hard to decide, maybe not.

Right, but as I've stated above, I think this is a question without an answer, most principally because you always have to consider them all wherever you put it. But okay, whatever, it is all academic, and I don't really have much interest in noting the most important cost gameplay-wise. For Doctor, it's just $3, Herald, just $4, Stonemason dependent on kingdom actions available, and Masterpiece is the worst, as it's really irreconcilable - slapping any fixed cost on it hurts it substantially in more or less every game.

[eHalcyon]

But the thing is, LGG has a specific alternate cost, so you can make an argument FOR that specific alternate cost. THESE have many different costs, so you can't do the same thing.


This is the big issue. You can of course make the case that they (well, stonemason and masterpiece) don't really function as having a cost equal to that printed on the card. Fine. They don't. I agree. But you can't come up with a single concrete place to put them. Whatever price you pick, you can make THE SAME argument that they don't really function as having THAT cost either. This is the problem.

Maybe my latest (and probably last) thought experiment helps address this?

I concede on Doctor and Herald, mostly because they do function at the cost printed on the card.  But as you say, SM and MP don't.  If people agree on that, then we have progress, hooray!

So you say that you the problem is that there is no other place to put them.  I disagree.  It may be hard to pin down, but we don't have to shy away from that.

MP at $3 is rubbish, we have agreed on that.
MP at $4?  I suggest that this is also rubbish and, once again, Silver is just better.  Silver costs less and is better in most circumstances for not being tied to a junky Copper.
MP at $5?  Maybe.  We'll get back to that.
MP at $6+?  Also maybe.  And those are all the (relevant) lists we have.

So, $5 or $6+?  I think arguments can be made for either, but I push $6+.  $5 Masterpiece is pretty much like Cache anyway.  Wherever Cache lands, $5 MP should be just below or just above.  Ranking it just isn't as interesting.  $6+ is a natural fit because it covers the spectrum from $6 and up.



If you think $4 MP is worth ranking too, well OK.  Then we have like three mediocre category choices that are difficult to pick between and one really bad choice that we agree simply does not work. 

You simply won't buy MP at $3.
You'll maybe buy it at $4, $5, or $6+.

It makes no sense to rank MP at $3.
It might make sense to rank it at $4, $5, or $6+.

Just because it's hard to pick among the other three possibilities doesn't mean we should default to the worst one.

[michaeljb]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lilliput_and_Blefuscu#History_and_politics

[Witherweaver]

Maybe I should try another analogy?

Masterpiece - Treasure - $3+
-----------------------------------
$1
-----------------------------------
When you buy this, you may overpay for it. If you do, gain a Silver per $1 you overpaid.

Adequatepiece - Treasure - $3+
-----------------------------------
$1
-----------------------------------
When you buy this, you may overpay for it by $3. If you do, gain 3 Silvers.

Tolerablepiece - Treasure - $6
-----------------------------------
$1
-----------------------------------
When you buy this, gain 3 Silvers.

Failpiece - Treasure - $3
-----------------------------------
$1

Here we have four cards.  MP is the regular Masterpiece.  AP is a Masterpiece that is restricted to only overpaying by $3, no more, no less.  TP is a Masterpiece where you are forced to always overpay by $3.  FP is Masterpiece without overpaying at all.

Should we even bother ranking FP on the $3 list?  It is pointless because Silver does everything Failpiece can do better and at the same price.

I think this is the crux of our different views.   

I'm saying you can rank MP against $3 cards by considering the extra mount you have to pay to be a limitation in its ability.  Or as its strength, depending on which direction you start looking at it form. (If you're thinking, "Sweet I can more Silver!" then it's limiting because there is a cost and you're giving up more expensive cards.  If you're thinking, "Man this is a really bad $3 copper" then it's a boon because, hey, it's much better than that.)

You don't like thinking of it that way because, hey, you could have bought a more expensive card for that amount.  But I say you just take that into account when you give it a rank.  You say that's hard to do, but I say you're really already doing pretty similar tradeoff type estimations when you ranked all the other cards. 

I don't think ranking <Fixed>P on the <FixedCost> list is relevant*, because when you're ranking MP (on the $3 card list, of course) you ought to be taking into account its entire functionality---it's the variable and optional overpay that makes the card.  It doesn't make it a $6 card, even if you spend $3+$3 on it in 62% of the situations.

If it's going to go on a list other than $3, it has to go on all of them.  Otherwise you're picking arbitrarily and inaccurately.  Okay, so say you do that, just like you're doing with your <clevername>Pieces.  You consider each fixed overpayment and add $3 and keep track in your head that the cost is only $3 for purposes of stuff that cares about cost. You rank it last on the $3 list, obviously.  You make up a witty name for the $4 version and rank it there, same for $5 and for TolerablePiece, and for all the >=$7 versions. (How does $6 MP compare to $7 MP compare to $8 MP and beyond?  We'll get back to that.)  Okay so you've ranked it for all $X>=3. 

Now, what do you know about the strength of Masterpiece?  Well its effectiveness is a function of the overpay amount, and we've basically listed out the function for each element in its domain.  What do you get from looking at one list?  Not much, because you're only looking the value of the function for one point in the domain.  You're not going to get a complete picture.    Okay so you look at all the lists.  So, you know it's a bad $3 card, a mediocre $4 card, a good $5 card, a pretty awesome $6+ card (does it fall off?  probably.  Are $20 MPs relevant in situations other than Feodum?)

(some edits to the end of this paragraph):
Now what does that tell you about Masterpiece over all?  Well that depends on where you put it in the lists, but hey you probably have some kind of ballpark "goodness" estimate in your head from all that valuing you did in your thought experiment.  But none of those individual lists told us anything about Masterpiece as a whole.  We only evaluated its image for each element in its domain, we didn't value the function itself as the object.  We should do that and put it somewhere.  Where?  Well it can't go on a list of any fixed price, because it's not a fixed price.  Well, the $6+ list looks promising because it includes cards of different costs.  Though really it does this because there are only a few $7 cards and one $8 card and putting them on their own list isn't enlightening enough.  But it shouldn't go on the $6+ list because, hey, that's misleading---it can be bought for $3, $4 and $5 and those facts are relevant, or else we'd be looking at a $6 card in the first place and not a $3 card.  And also because, on the $6+ list it still has different costs.  Is $6 MP better than $7 MP?  $8MP?  $3+N MP where N is the number of silvers left in the supply?  Is a $10MP better than a King's Court?  These judgements are now hard because you have variable prices.  So then you say, well, you take that variability into account when you rank it.  It's on the $6+ list but you have to note that it could be bought for less and it can be bought for more, so you know these things when you give it a rank.  But that's my whole point in the first place---the variable cost is what you use to give the card a rank. 

So put it on the $3 list, because we've ranked the cards by cost and it costs $3.  Yes it has a wonky ability in its overpay, but lots of cards have wonky abilities and that's, well, the entire point of the whole ranking thing, right? 

TP is obviously ranked with the $6+ cards.  That is simply what it costs.

Now, AP.  Now it's getting tough.  AP:TP::LGG:IGG, so some of the earlier discussion applies here.  But anyway, AP is just FP and TP rolled into one.  FP was not worth ranking and TP should clearly be ranked with $6+ cards.  So shouldn't AP be ranked with $6+ cards as well?  If not, why not?

Finally, MP.  MP is AP with a slew more options.  Since FP is not worth ranking, then MP shouldn't be ranked at $3 either.  But should it go on the $4 list?  $5?  $6+?  Maybe all of them, because MP is different at all those costs, but for simplicity we could just pick the most common one.  What is most common?  Probably $5 or $6+, because $4 MP is almost as terrible as Failpiece.  $6+ encompasses more.

If it helps, I could make analogues for all the other costs too.

The argument for this example comes down to this: if it's not worth buying Masterpiece at $3 in a game, why would we rank Masterpiece at $3 on a list?

Because it is $3; that's what its cost is, and that cost is not an arbitrary number and it does matter.  It's also not worth buying Duchess at $2, or Peddler at $8. 


*Okay, I really mean "relevant by itself for a given fixed cost".  Taking all the costs together and considering the mapping is relevant.

[Powerman]

I think the problem with the LGG vs. IGG (or any of the like arguments) is the lack of variability.  When given 2 natural points, it is natural to group with either.  I think a more apt comparison is:

Ill-Gotten Gains
$5 Treasure
Worth $1
When you play this, you may gain a Copper, putting it into your hand.
______________
When you gain this, each other player gains a Curse.

vs.

Partial-Gotten Gains
$2+ Treasure
Worth $1
When you play this, you may gain a Copper, putting it into your hand.
______________
When you buy this, you may overpay for it. If you do, your opponents gain a confusion; your opponents gain a -1/3 VP chip per $1 you overpay.

At times, it is better, at times worse.  But, where should this card get grouped?  $5?  $8?

[theory]

You could think about Cache.  Its coppers are something we have to weigh in knocking it lower accordingly. Similarly, buying Masterpiece at >$3, well, it's just another disadvantage of the card, much like how Cache has a cost associated with it beyond the $5.  Weigh that disadvantage with all the others.  Now, it'll be difficult, and uncertain, but we can just accept that especially since so much of that exists already.

[eHalcyon]

You don't like thinking of it that way because, hey, you could have bought a more expensive card for that amount.  But I say you just take that into account when you give it a rank.  You say that's hard to do, but I say you're really already doing pretty similar tradeoff type estimations when you ranked all the other cards. 

The reason why I don't like this argument (that you can just take into account MP at higher costs) is that this is tantamount to saying that we could very well rank IGG on the $2 list.  Why can't you just take into account that it costs more?  As Robz earlier demonstrated when he began trying the LGG exercise, it's just hard.  The trade-off estimation for cost is something that we've attempted to abstract away by the very method of dividing the lists according to cost.

If it's going to go on a list other than $3, it has to go on all of them.  Otherwise you're picking arbitrarily and inaccurately.

I disagree with this.  The choice is not neccesaarily arbitrary nor inaccurate.  In the example with Masterpiece, I have provided reasoning again and again for why I feel $6+ is the best place for it.  I could do the same for Stonemason.  I CANNOT do it for Doctor, which is why I concede there.  And Herald I would put on $4 anyway, so there's no disagreement there.  As far as accuracy goes, I am willing to bet that Masterpiece would be bought a negligible number of times at $3, and also very rarely at $4.  So, $5 or $6+?  I don't know, you got me there.  But either one is more accurate that $3.

In the end, your argument seems to be "rank Masterpiece on the $3 list because that is what it says on the card".  But my argument is, yes, that's what it says on the card, but that is not the cost at which it is bought.

I think the problem with the LGG vs. IGG (or any of the like arguments) is the lack of variability.  When given 2 natural points, it is natural to group with either.  I think a more apt comparison is:

Ill-Gotten Gains
$5 Treasure
Worth $1
When you play this, you may gain a Copper, putting it into your hand.
______________
When you gain this, each other player gains a Curse.

vs.

Partial-Gotten Gains
$2+ Treasure
Worth $1
When you play this, you may gain a Copper, putting it into your hand.
______________
When you buy this, you may overpay for it. If you do, your opponents gain a confusion; your opponents gain a -1/3 VP chip per $1 you overpay.

At times, it is better, at times worse.  But, where should this card get grouped?  $5?  $8?

I've addressed this concern in the X-Piece thought experiment.  PGG is not a good parallel though.  I believe it would have to be ranked at $3 because I expect that will be most common.  It is the cheapest you can get it and still inflict damage on opponents, in the form of a Confusion card.  The -VP is gravy, and probably people would be willing to overpay more to cause more damage, but yeah, it gets tough from that point on.  It will still almost never get purchased at $2, like poor NGG, so it shouldn't be on the $2 list.

[eHalcyon]

You could think about Cache.  Its coppers are something we have to weigh in knocking it lower accordingly. Similarly, buying Masterpiece at >$3, well, it's just another disadvantage of the card, much like how Cache has a cost associated with it beyond the $5.  Weigh that disadvantage with all the others.  Now, it'll be difficult, and uncertain, but we can just accept that especially since so much of that exists already.

My point is that the disadvantage of having to pay extra for Masterpiece is more difficult to weigh than the other things, and moreover, it is something we try to remove on the rankings by the very act of dividing the list by cost.  If we compare Masterpiece to the other $3 cards and have to take into account that you have to pay >$3 to unlock its potential, why do we not just rank King's Court on the $3 list too and take into accont that it costs an extra $4 compared to other things on the list?

I mean, people have suggested that we just rank one giant master list.  Were those suggestions serious?

I think we have to draw lines somewhere, and cost is a good property to use for that.  The effective cost for Masterpiece is >$3, so it should be put on some >$3 list.




This may be a good time to note that, in the end, I am happy to go with whatever Qvist decides to do.  He's already posted in this thread that he'd just use the base cost.  Maybe he'll change his mind!  But if he doesn't, that's OK.  But the decision still perplexes me.  Through the discussion, it seems like the only deciding factor for those people is the technical price as listed on the card.  That just doesn't strike me as adequate.  WW has admitted as much, that Masterpiece and SM don't function at their technical costs, but he favours using the base cost because he doesn't think they can really go anywhere at all (hopefully I have not misrepresented him in this summary).  But I say that we CAN find an appropriate place.  At the very least, we can do better than judging Masterpiece at a cost where it never gets purchased.

<Insert tension-alleviating joke about Scout being a card at a cost where it never gets purchased.>

[WanderingWinder]

I mean, people have suggested that we just rank one giant master list.  Were those suggestions serious?

Yes. I mean, this is actually quite clearly the best thing to do, except that people won't do it out of laze and/or unwieldiness.

[eHalcyon]

I mean, people have suggested that we just rank one giant master list.  Were those suggestions serious?

Yes. I mean, this is actually quite clearly the best thing to do, except that people won't do it out of laze and/or unwieldiness.

Well I could toss my vote in for that.  If I'm going to be baffled by comparing cards of different [effective] costs, I might as well be in for the whole shebang.

[ftl]

Man, I'd vote against that. It's just too big and too unweildy a list, and I'd end up having no idea where to compare cards.

If we're using the overpaying mechanic as a reason to to ditch cost-based card segregation entirely, I'd instead suggest more limited lists by function - "rate the villages", "rate the terminal draw", "rate the cursers", "rate the cards with on-buy/on-gain abilities", etc.

[Powerman]

I think the problem with the LGG vs. IGG (or any of the like arguments) is the lack of variability.  When given 2 natural points, it is natural to group with either.  I think a more apt comparison is:

Ill-Gotten Gains
$5 Treasure
Worth $1
When you play this, you may gain a Copper, putting it into your hand.
______________
When you gain this, each other player gains a Curse.

vs.

Partial-Gotten Gains
$2+ Treasure
Worth $1
When you play this, you may gain a Copper, putting it into your hand.
______________
When you buy this, you may overpay for it. If you do, your opponents gain a confusion; your opponents gain a -1/3 VP chip per $1 you overpay.

At times, it is better, at times worse.  But, where should this card get grouped?  $5?  $8?

I've addressed this concern in the X-Piece thought experiment.  PGG is not a good parallel though.  I believe it would have to be ranked at $3 because I expect that will be most common.  It is the cheapest you can get it and still inflict damage on opponents, in the form of a Confusion card.  The -VP is gravy, and probably people would be willing to overpay more to cause more damage, but yeah, it gets tough from that point on.  It will still almost never get purchased at $2, like poor NGG, so it shouldn't be on the $2 list.

I wouldn't be so quick to assume that.  Look at the difference in Cultist and Witch.  Cultist has to have a trash bonus and lets you play more Cultists, and people STILL consider Witch to be better than Cultist because of the negative VP effects of curses.  I'd suspect higher priced PGG is better than lower priced PGG.

And what about for Border Village:

Border Village
Action 6
+1 Card
+2 Actions
When you gain this, gain a card costing less than this.

vs.

South of the Border Village
Action 3+
+1 Card
+2 Actions
When you buy this, you may overpay for it.  If you do, you may buy a card costing up to $5 for $2 less than it's normal cost.

What price do you rank SotBV with?  Still on the 6+ list?  Or 5?  4?  3?  I think it has to be $3.

[eHalcyon]

I wouldn't be so quick to assume that.  Look at the difference in Cultist and Witch.  Cultist has to have a trash bonus and lets you play more Cultists, and people STILL consider Witch to be better than Cultist because of the negative VP effects of curses.  I'd suspect higher priced PGG is better than lower priced PGG.

And what about for Border Village:

Border Village
Action 6
+1 Card
+2 Actions
When you gain this, gain a card costing less than this.

vs.

South of the Border Village
Action 3+
+1 Card
+2 Actions
When you buy this, you may overpay for it.  If you do, you may buy a card costing up to $5 for $2 less than it's normal cost.

What price do you rank SotBV with?  Still on the 6+ list?  Or 5?  4?  3?  I think it has to be $3.

Higher priced PGG is certainly better than lower priced PGG.  My point was that it would still get purchased at $3.  A junker is still a junker.  It would also get purchased at higher costs, but $3 is worth it too.  I mean, I won't argue too hard about where it should be.  $3?  $5?  Dunno.  But I would say that this $2+ card would not be worth getting at $2, so it should NOT be on the $2 list.

Your phrasing for SBV is a bit confusing.  So I overpay any amount, then I can buy something else?  So if I want a $5 card, I overpay $1 (total cost now $4) and then I can buy a $5 for $3 instead.  So I pay total a total of $7?  Probably not quite what you intended, but I get your drift.

And yeah, I would agree -- SBV would have to cost $3.  The reason is that it is STILL WORTH GETTING at $3.  At $3, it is just a regular old village.  Maybe you say the gain is mandatory, so if you bought $3 SBV then you have to gain a $2 or something.  Still, it would be pretty commonly worth getting at that price.

The difference betweeen this and cards like Masterpiece or LGG is that they are NOT worth getting at their base cost.  That is the key thing here.

Man, I'd vote against that. It's just too big and too unweildy a list, and I'd end up having no idea where to compare cards.

If we're using the overpaying mechanic as a reason to to ditch cost-based card segregation entirely, I'd instead suggest more limited lists by function - "rate the villages", "rate the terminal draw", "rate the cursers", "rate the cards with on-buy/on-gain abilities", etc.

Also cool.  But there would be cards on multiple lists, which people seemed not to like wrt overpay cards.

[Hockey Mask]

$3 Masterpiece
$4 Masterpiece
$5 Masterpiece
$6 Masterpiece

$2 Stonemason
$3 Stonemason
$4 Stonemason
$5 Stonemason
$6 Stonemason

$3 Doctor
$4 Doctor
$5 Doctor
$6 Doctor

$4 Herald
$5 Herald
$6 Herald

Pretend we got a large expansion after all.

[Powerman]

$3 Masterpiece
$4 Masterpiece
$5 Masterpiece
$6 Masterpiece

$2 Stonemason
$3 Stonemason
$4 Stonemason
$5 Stonemason
$6 Stonemason

$3 Doctor
$4 Doctor
$5 Doctor
$6 Doctor

$4 Herald
$5 Herald
$6 Herald

Pretend we got a large expansion after all.

So $7 Masterpiece doesn't exist?  What about the $13 Masterpiece I purchased the other game with a Tac deck?  It seemed pretty strong.

[NoMoreFun]

$3 Masterpiece and Stonemason would come at the bottom of the $3 cards.

Mind you, I think Stonemason is a really interesting card, and not just some pseudo junk card that's only good for trashing coppers and helping with late game greening. I don't even think it will be the worst $2.

I wish Masterpiece was more than just a copper.

[Hockey Mask]

$3 Masterpiece
$4 Masterpiece
$5 Masterpiece
$6 Masterpiece

$2 Stonemason
$3 Stonemason
$4 Stonemason
$5 Stonemason
$6 Stonemason

$3 Doctor
$4 Doctor
$5 Doctor
$6 Doctor

$4 Herald
$5 Herald
$6 Herald

Pretend we got a large expansion after all.

So $7 Masterpiece doesn't exist?  What about the $13 Masterpiece I purchased the other game with a Tac deck?  It seemed pretty strong.

If it is important to you we can include a $13 Masterpiece with the other $13 cards.

[Qvist]

$3 Masterpiece
$4 Masterpiece
$5 Masterpiece
$6 Masterpiece

$2 Stonemason
$3 Stonemason
$4 Stonemason
$5 Stonemason
$6 Stonemason

$3 Doctor
$4 Doctor
$5 Doctor
$6 Doctor

$4 Herald
$5 Herald
$6 Herald

Pretend we got a large expansion after all.

You forgot $2P Stonemason, $3P Stonemason, $4P Stonemason, $5P Stonemason, $6P Stonemason and $8P Stonemason.

[Hockey Mask]

You can do whatever you want with potions. I don't think many pay much attention to that list anyway.

[ashersky]

You can do whatever you want with potions. I don't think many pay much attention to that list anyway.

Fixed.  Qvist does all the work.  They're his lists.  Damn right he can do whatever he wants.

[Hockey Mask]

I thought they were provided for the community.  My bad.

[ashersky]

I thought they were provided for the community.  My bad.

I guess my point is, if you dislike what Qvist is doing, for free, out of the kindness of his heart, don't complain.  You are free to do your own.  But don't be surprised that fellow f.dsers rally to defend him.

This whole argument feels like the "entitled to iso" thread.

[Hockey Mask]

I appreciate everyone's contributions to the site. What Qvist provides must be very time consuming and is something beyond my compiling capability.  That said, I am sure you agree I have a right to give feedback and input on what he is providing.  I hope Qvist and you do not misconstrue my intent to improve the lists as ungratefulness.

[WanderingWinder]

I appreciate everyone's contributions to the site. What Qvist provides must be very time consuming and is something beyond my compiling capability.  That said, I am sure you agree I have a right to give feedback and input on what he is providing.  I hope Qvist and you do not misconstrue my intent to improve the lists as ungratefulness.

It's all about tone. When you say, 'you can do what you want with potions', it implies that you feel you are in a position to give orders, and out of the kindness of your sweet heart, you're letting him make his own decision this one time here. It comes across as demanding of a service that you are getting for free, and which even if he is doing for other people, they have no right to be demanding of. Now, suggestions are fine, yes. "I don't care about what you do with potions" would have been a much friendlier way to phrase what I think is the same sentiment anyway.

In any case, I assume you didn't actually mean to be bossy, and things just came out wrong - benefit of the doubt.

[Hockey Mask]

It's all about tone...

and out of the kindness of your sweet heart

I see now this going nowhere.  Excuse me if I offended anyone.

[Witherweaver]

You don't like thinking of it that way because, hey, you could have bought a more expensive card for that amount.  But I say you just take that into account when you give it a rank.  You say that's hard to do, but I say you're really already doing pretty similar tradeoff type estimations when you ranked all the other cards. 

The reason why I don't like this argument (that you can just take into account MP at higher costs) is that this is tantamount to saying that we could very well rank IGG on the $2 list.  Why can't you just take into account that it costs more?  As Robz earlier demonstrated when he began trying the LGG exercise, it's just hard.  The trade-off estimation for cost is something that we've attempted to abstract away by the very method of dividing the lists according to cost.

But IGG does not have a variable cost.  The "effective cost" of MP is defined on an infinite (okay, effectively infinite) domain.  There is no reason to put IGG on the $2 list, while there is a reason to put Stonemason on the $2 list (namely, it doesn't belong on any other list.  The presence of Stonemason on any particular list of given cost does not tell you its strength as a $2 card that allows you to overpay any amount, because you've fixed the amount of overpay.  So then you say, well, you take that into account when you put it on whatever list you decided to put it on, and then I say that's my point, you take the variable overpay amount into account when you decide how good of a card it is.

If it's going to go on a list other than $3, it has to go on all of them.  Otherwise you're picking arbitrarily and inaccurately.

I disagree with this.  The choice is not neccesaarily arbitrary nor inaccurate.  In the example with Masterpiece, I have provided reasoning again and again for why I feel $6+ is the best place for it.  I could do the same for Stonemason.  I CANNOT do it for Doctor, which is why I concede there.  And Herald I would put on $4 anyway, so there's no disagreement there.  As far as accuracy goes, I am willing to bet that Masterpiece would be bought a negligible number of times at $3, and also very rarely at $4.  So, $5 or $6+?  I don't know, you got me there.  But either one is more accurate that $3.

In the end, your argument seems to be "rank Masterpiece on the $3 list because that is what it says on the card".  But my argument is, yes, that's what it says on the card, but that is not the cost at which it is bought.

I can't see how Masterpiece being on the $5 or $6+ list is more accurate than $3.  You seem to be considering all cases of gaining a card other than when you by them during your buy phase (or Black Market) an edge case, but I think there are way too many of those cases to be considering them all edgey.  Masterpiece at $3 plays differently than Masterpice at $5, even if "you'd never by it at $3," as you say.  But it matters.  For Swindler, for Forager, for Forge, for every trash-for-benefit card, for possible three-piling scenarios, etc.  It's cost is simply $3, and that matters during the game. 

Peddler has a cost of $8, but no one has ever bought a Peddler for $8 (okay, maybe it's happened about as often as Halley's comet comes).  It's most often bought for $2 or $0.  But it really matters that it's an $8 card.. it's very important in a non-trivial amount of cases.  Heck, the article on dominionstrategy about Peddler specifically keyed in that it's $8 price point was a big deal for trashing-with-cost-consideration scenarios.  Now even moreso with Butcher and Stonemason (turning a Peddler into two Grand Markets is cool). 

I don't agree with your premise that "that number on the card" is just a technicality.  It's an important part of the mechanics of the game.

[Awaclus]

But IGG does not have a variable cost.  The "effective cost" of MP is defined on an infinite (okay, effectively infinite) domain.  There is no reason to put IGG on the $2 list, while there is a reason to put Stonemason on the $2 list (namely, it doesn't belong on any other list.

It doesn't belong on any other list, but it doesn't belong on the $2 list either. It doesn't really matter which list it goes to, you will always have to rate it differently from the other cards, since for the other cards you just look at how powerful they are, but with Stonemason, you have to take into account the cost/power ratio.

[Kirian]

It's all about tone...

and out of the kindness of your sweet heart

I see now this going nowhere.  Excuse me if I offended anyone.

It's almost as though reading comprehension isn't one of your stronger skills.

----

I don't really have an opinion here other than "Qvist is the benevolent dictator of these lists; if you think it ought to be done differently, no one, including Qvist, is stopping you."

[AJD]

But IGG does not have a variable cost.  The "effective cost" of MP is defined on an infinite (okay, effectively infinite) domain.  There is no reason to put IGG on the $2 list, while there is a reason to put Stonemason on the $2 list (namely, it doesn't belong on any other list.

It doesn't belong on any other list, but it doesn't belong on the $2 list either. It doesn't really matter which list it goes to, you will always have to rate it differently from the other cards, since for the other cards you just look at how powerful they are, but with Stonemason, you have to take into account the cost/power ratio.

Stonemason : Talisman :: Border Village : Haggler?

[AJD]

(That is to say, Stonemason's cost/power ratio is really always constant: cost is $2, power is Stonemason itself plus one-time on-buy Talisman effect. Just like Border Village's cost is $6, power is Village plus free up-to-$5 gain.)

[Mic Qsenoch]

(That is to say, Stonemason's cost/power ratio is really always constant: cost is $2, power is Stonemason itself plus one-time on-buy Talisman effect. Just like Border Village's cost is $6, power is Village plus free up-to-$5 gain.)

It isn't a Talisman, you can get two different cards.

[heron]

heron's comprehensive card list plan:

Participants give each card a rating from 0-100 based on what percentage of the time they think it is a good idea to gain that card.
Then, Qvist averages out the ratings with some method or another, and publishes his lists of cards by cost. Overpay cards are not posted in lists above their cost, but there is instead a note like the following:
          47. Outpost
                If doctor was on the $5 list, in would be here.
          46. Witch
When Qvist is done with all of his rankings, he publishes the full list, and people make their own rankings of villages or terminal drawers or whatever. You could compare the list to the councilroom %Gain list. Whatever you want to do.

Note that this keeps the benefits of a full 1-205 list, (no concerns with overpay cards, can compare cross-cost) but removes the unwieldiness of ordering 205 cards.
As far as I can tell, the only way you would be unhappy with this method is if you would rather rank the cards instead of rate them, but you can still sort of do that, just rate them as 0-2-4-6-8 etc.

[WanderingWinder]

Participants give each card a rating from 0-100 based on what percentage of the time they think it is a good idea to gain that card.

I generally like your plan, but this metric is not what you want to use to determine how good a card is. There are cards you want a lot, because they help, but maybe they don't help *that much*, and there are other cards you don't want that often, but are very very strong when they are useful.

[Awaclus]

Participants give each card a rating from 0-100 based on what percentage of the time they think it is a good idea to gain that card.

I generally like your plan, but this metric is not what you want to use to determine how good a card is. There are cards you want a lot, because they help, but maybe they don't help *that much*, and there are other cards you don't want that often, but are very very strong when they are useful.

What about a rating from 0-100 based on how often they win a game because they gained it and their opponent didn't? Gaining a Pearl Diver is often a good idea, but rarely makes people win or lose games so it would be pretty low. Gaining a Bridge is not always a good idea, but when it is, it's often a mistake that costs you the game if you ignore it, so it would be pretty high but not among the top cards.

[AJD]

(That is to say, Stonemason's cost/power ratio is really always constant: cost is $2, power is Stonemason itself plus one-time on-buy Talisman effect. Just like Border Village's cost is $6, power is Village plus free up-to-$5 gain.)

It isn't a Talisman, you can get two different cards.

True enough, and only Actions. But you see what I mean?

[eHalcyon]

(That is to say, Stonemason's cost/power ratio is really always constant: cost is $2, power is Stonemason itself plus one-time on-buy Talisman effect. Just like Border Village's cost is $6, power is Village plus free up-to-$5 gain.)

It isn't a Talisman, you can get two different cards.

True enough, and only Actions. But you see what I mean?

And it also lets you do it for cards that cost more than $4.

Regardless, that's the best way of framing it I've heard so far.  That would help me figure out how to rank Stonemason amongst the $2 cards.  I still don't think there's any good way of doing it for Masterpiece at $3 though.

[AJD]

Regardless, that's the best way of framing it I've heard so far.

Thanks!

That would help me figure out how to rank Stonemason amongst the $2 cards.  I still don't think there's any good way of doing it for Masterpiece at $3 though.

Masterpiece
Treasure : $3
$1
---
When you buy this, you may buy any number of Silvers for $1 each.

Like Border Village, it's a card whose play effect is much weaker than what you pay for it; you buy it at the inflated price because when you do, you get other cards for cheap. Border Village gets you only one other card, but you get it for free and you can choose what; Masterpiece can only get you Silver, and you still have to pay for it, but you can get many of them.

[SirPeebles]

Regardless, that's the best way of framing it I've heard so far.

Thanks!

That would help me figure out how to rank Stonemason amongst the $2 cards.  I still don't think there's any good way of doing it for Masterpiece at $3 though.

Masterpiece
Treasure : $3
$1
---
When you buy this, you may buy any number of Silvers for $1 each.

Like Border Village, it's a card whose play effect is much weaker than what you pay for it; you buy it at the inflated price because when you do, you get other cards for cheap. Border Village gets you only one other card, but you get it for free and you can choose what; Masterpiece can only get you Silver, and you still have to pay for it, but you can get many of them.

But Border Village we are ranking at that inflated price, whereas Masterpiece we are not?  This appears to be an argument for ranking Masterpiece at a high price.

[AJD]

Regardless, that's the best way of framing it I've heard so far.

Thanks!

That would help me figure out how to rank Stonemason amongst the $2 cards.  I still don't think there's any good way of doing it for Masterpiece at $3 though.

Masterpiece
Treasure : $3
$1
---
When you buy this, you may buy any number of Silvers for $1 each.

Like Border Village, it's a card whose play effect is much weaker than what you pay for it; you buy it at the inflated price because when you do, you get other cards for cheap. Border Village gets you only one other card, but you get it for free and you can choose what; Masterpiece can only get you Silver, and you still have to pay for it, but you can get many of them.

But Border Village we are ranking at that inflated price, whereas Masterpiece we are not?  This appears to be an argument for ranking Masterpiece at a high price.

The inflated price for Masterpiece is $3. It's a $3 copper with an on-buy bonus, just as Border Village is a $6 Village with an on-gain bonus.

[eHalcyon]

Regardless, that's the best way of framing it I've heard so far.

Thanks!

That would help me figure out how to rank Stonemason amongst the $2 cards.  I still don't think there's any good way of doing it for Masterpiece at $3 though.

Masterpiece
Treasure : $3
$1
---
When you buy this, you may buy any number of Silvers for $1 each.

Like Border Village, it's a card whose play effect is much weaker than what you pay for it; you buy it at the inflated price because when you do, you get other cards for cheap. Border Village gets you only one other card, but you get it for free and you can choose what; Masterpiece can only get you Silver, and you still have to pay for it, but you can get many of them.

But Border Village we are ranking at that inflated price, whereas Masterpiece we are not?  This appears to be an argument for ranking Masterpiece at a high price.

The inflated price for Masterpiece is $3. It's a $3 copper with an on-buy bonus, just as Border Village is a $6 Village with an on-gain bonus.

No, I'm with Peebles on this.  With Stonemason, I can accept the comparison with Talisman.  When you play Talisman, you get an effect that occurs when you buy something.  When you buy Stonemason, you get a similar effect that lets you "buy" something at that time.  Sure.

But I just don't see a similar comparison for Masterpiece.  Saying that $3 is the inflated price doesn't work because then you are ignoring the overpay portion of the cost.  That was abstracted away for Stonemason as a separate "buy", but you can't do that with Masterpiece.

Or put another way -- comparing Stonemason with Talisman was clever because they actually are pretty similar.  But BV and Masterpiece are not similar at all.  You have to twist it so much in the comparison, it just doesn't work.

[SirPeebles]

The best way of comparing overpay cards with Border Village is to think of Border Village as a $3 Village with an option "When you buy this, you may overpay by $3.  If you do, gain a card costing up to $5".  In other words, as a Village with an on-buy Feast effect if you overpay.  I know, this isn't exactly the same.  Border Village doesn't let you cheap out and take just the BV for $3, the real BV activated on-gain, the real BV goes nicely with trash-for-benefit, and the real BV gains something costing less than BV rather than up to $5.  But those all feel like minor changes which could have gone either way based on which wording Donald felt best captured the main idea.

[AJD]

But I just don't see a similar comparison for Masterpiece.  Saying that $3 is the inflated price doesn't work because then you are ignoring the overpay portion of the cost.  That was abstracted away for Stonemason as a separate "buy", but you can't do that with Masterpiece.

Why not? You're "buying" Silver for $1 each.

[eHalcyon]

But I just don't see a similar comparison for Masterpiece.  Saying that $3 is the inflated price doesn't work because then you are ignoring the overpay portion of the cost.  That was abstracted away for Stonemason as a separate "buy", but you can't do that with Masterpiece.

Why not? You're "buying" Silver for $1 each.

Too many hoops. Too many differences from the existing cards.

[WanderingWinder]

By the way, it is possible to rank *all* the cards; I just did all the kingdom cards plus Colony, Province, Duchy, Estate, Platinum, Gold, Silver, Copper, and Curse. Yeah, that's right, I'm stickin' to the Ruins, Shelters, Potion, Prizes, and upgrade-into cards. Of course, this took me a couple of hours, so it's really not reasonable for a large group - would need something like a comparer app, where you vote one over the other, etc. But maybe I will give out my 'power rankings' at some point, then watch as I end up revising them a lot by the time September rolls around.

[Just a Rube]

By the way, it is possible to rank *all* the cards; I just did all the kingdom cards plus Colony, Province, Duchy, Estate, Platinum, Gold, Silver, Copper, and Curse. Yeah, that's right, I'm stickin' to the Ruins, Shelters, Potion, Prizes, and upgrade-into cards. Of course, this took me a couple of hours, so it's really not reasonable for a large group - would need something like a comparer app, where you vote one over the other, etc. But maybe I will give out my 'power rankings' at some point, then watch as I end up revising them a lot by the time September rolls around.

So did Scout beat Curse?

[SirPeebles]

By the way, it is possible to rank *all* the cards; I just did all the kingdom cards plus Colony, Province, Duchy, Estate, Platinum, Gold, Silver, Copper, and Curse. Yeah, that's right, I'm stickin' to the Ruins, Shelters, Potion, Prizes, and upgrade-into cards. Of course, this took me a couple of hours, so it's really not reasonable for a large group - would need something like a comparer app, where you vote one over the other, etc. But maybe I will give out my 'power rankings' at some point, then watch as I end up revising them a lot by the time September rolls around.

So did Scout beat Curse?

I honestly buy Curse more than I buy Scout.

[WanderingWinder]

By the way, it is possible to rank *all* the cards; I just did all the kingdom cards plus Colony, Province, Duchy, Estate, Platinum, Gold, Silver, Copper, and Curse. Yeah, that's right, I'm stickin' to the Ruins, Shelters, Potion, Prizes, and upgrade-into cards. Of course, this took me a couple of hours, so it's really not reasonable for a large group - would need something like a comparer app, where you vote one over the other, etc. But maybe I will give out my 'power rankings' at some point, then watch as I end up revising them a lot by the time September rolls around.

So did Scout beat Curse?

It did, but well, none of the basic cards is really credible. Colony and Platinum, maybe. But a game without silver, without silver being an option ever, is just really different. And the same goes for all those. So while I HAVE rankings for them, they don't really mean anything.

By the way, it is possible to rank *all* the cards; I just did all the kingdom cards plus Colony, Province, Duchy, Estate, Platinum, Gold, Silver, Copper, and Curse. Yeah, that's right, I'm stickin' to the Ruins, Shelters, Potion, Prizes, and upgrade-into cards. Of course, this took me a couple of hours, so it's really not reasonable for a large group - would need something like a comparer app, where you vote one over the other, etc. But maybe I will give out my 'power rankings' at some point, then watch as I end up revising them a lot by the time September rolls around.

So did Scout beat Curse?

I honestly buy Curse more than I buy Scout.

So do I, but a lot of that is because the scout pile is rarely in danger of running out, and the rest is because curse is worse than scout (Ambassador).

[Schneau]

According to CouncilRoom, on Isotropic Peebles bought Scout more than Curse, given availability. Not sure bout WanderingWinder, since he played too many games and the page won't load

[Davio]

We could just include the overpay cards in every list upwards from their listed cost.

So Stonemason at $2, $3, $4 etc, up to and including $7.
I mean, what do we do with Peddler? Buying Peddler at $0 is great! Buying Peddler at full price, not so much.
But when you're using Remodel or something you're glad it costs $8 again.

[HiveMindEmulator]

According to CouncilRoom, on Isotropic Peebles bought Scout more than Curse, given availability. Not sure bout WanderingWinder, since he played too many games and the page won't load

If you don't condition on availability, I probably buy Curse more than Sea Hag!

[shMerker]

This thread taught me that in Dominion, "cost" has a technical definition that is subtly different from what is usually meant by "cost" in other contexts, including the discussion of Dominion Strategy.