Dominion Strategy Forum
Dominion => Dominion General Discussion => Topic started by: Roadrunner7671 on May 30, 2015, 10:33:42 am
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Hello all! I am hoping that you could take a few minutes of your time to help me out. If you could say what the best $1-$2 costing card from Seaside, Base, Intrigue, Daek Ages and Hijterlands are, that would be great! However, it would be even better if you were to say what the three best cards are, or even ranking them all! Thanks!
(There are 19 cards as I am including Estate.)
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All the opinions you could want circa 2013:
http://forum.dominionstrategy.com/index.php?topic=6060.0
My opinion (from best to worst):
Tier 1
Chapel
Peasant
Stonemason
Page
Alms
Tier 2
Borrow
Courtyard
Hamlet
Crossroads
Lighthouse
Raze
Ratcatcher
Fool's Gold
Save
Candlestick Maker
Traveling Fair
Tier 3
Squire
Native Village
Coin of the Realm
Cellar
Moat
Vagrant
Quest
Pawn
Haven
Poor House
Embargo
Tier 4
Scouting Party
Beggar
Pearl Diver
Herbalist
Tier 5
Duchess
Secret Chamber
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All he opinions you could want circa 2013:
http://forum.dominionstrategy.com/index.php?topic=6060.0
My opinion: Chapel, Peasant, Stonemason
Thanks for saying Chapel...but I didn't include Guilds or Adventures.
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All he opinions you could want circa 2013:
http://forum.dominionstrategy.com/index.php?topic=6060.0
My opinion: Chapel, Peasant, Stonemason
Thanks for saying Chapel...but I didn't include Guilds or Adventures.
I updated my post so you can pretend I only said whatever sets you like.
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All the opinions you could want circa 2013:
http://forum.dominionstrategy.com/index.php?topic=6060.0
My opinion (from best to worst):
Tier 1
Chapel
Peasant
Stonemason
Page
Alms
Tier 2
Borrow
Courtyard
Hamlet
Crossroads
Lighthouse
Raze
Ratcatcher
Fool's Gold
Save
Candlestick Maker
Traveling Fair
Tier 3
Squire
Native Village
Coin of the Realm
Cellar
Moat
Vagrant
Quest
Pawn
Haven
Poor House
Embargo
Tier 4
Scouting Party
Beggar
Pearl Diver
Herbalist
Tier 5
Duchess
Secret Chamber
Thanks a ton!
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Tier 3
Squire
Native Village
Coin of the Realm
Cellar
Moat
Vagrant
Quest
Pawn
Haven
Poor House
Embargo
I wouldn't put Squire, Native Village, Haven and Coin of the Realm (usually useful) in the same tier as Cellar, Moat and Poor House (situationally useful).
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Tier 3
Squire
Native Village
Coin of the Realm
Cellar
Moat
Vagrant
Quest
Pawn
Haven
Poor House
Embargo
I wouldn't put Squire, Native Village, Haven and Coin of the Realm (usually useful) in the same tier as Cellar, Moat and Poor House (situationally useful).
I sort of agree with that, but Squire isn't very useful with limited draw. However, I made this topic expecting opinions, so I'm not suprised you don't agree.
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Tier 3
Squire
Native Village
Coin of the Realm
Cellar
Moat
Vagrant
Quest
Pawn
Haven
Poor House
Embargo
I wouldn't put Squire, Native Village, Haven and Coin of the Realm (usually useful) in the same tier as Cellar, Moat and Poor House (situationally useful).
So you agree with the rest? I mean, I didn't consult anyone before making that post. I did think pretty hard about it, though it's not perfect at all. I think Haven is one of the most overrated cards in Dominion and Moat is way better than it's given credit. COTR is still a little hard to evaluate but I think it's weaker than it looks at first.
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So you agree with the rest? I mean, I didn't consult anyone before making that post. I did think pretty hard about it, though it's not perfect at all. I think Haven is one of the most overrated cards in Dominion and Moat is way better than it's given credit. COTR is still a little hard to evaluate but I think it's weaker than it looks at first.
Pretty much.
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Haven is terrible, and I'd put it even with Secret Chamber. It synergizes with Treasure Map, and that's it. Gear is a much, much better way to do what it's trying to do.
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Haven is terrible, and I'd put it even with Secret Chamber. It synergizes with Treasure Map, and that's it. Gear is a much, much better way to do what it's trying to do.
Would you like to do a rating yourself?
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Haven is terrible
Strong disagreement! Haven is a descent 2-cost. I believe it can be used effectively in at least 50% of the games. Usually you just don't want to spam 'em.
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Haven is terrible
Strong disagreement! Haven is a descent 2-cost. I believe it can be used effectively in at least 50% of the games. Usually you just don't want to spam 'em.
I agree
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I strongly disagree about Fool's gold in Tier 2. For me Fool's gold is Tier 1 for sure. So many boards including FG are Fool's gold games, where the FG split really matter.
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Raze and Ratcatcher in tier 2? But they're not even good!
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Raze and Ratcatcher in tier 2? But they're not even good!
Both are cantrip one card trashers, but they have other effects too. Both have the ability to remove themselves from your deck once they are not needed. Raze accelerates your deck by sifting, and can trash itself after you have finished trashing. It also has a psuedo-Demonic Tutor effect, where you can look ahead and take a card you want out of a selection of cards. Ratcatcher has the nice effect of being there when you need it, and does not take up space in your hand. It is nice for games with junkers, because you can use it whenever you draw junk in your hand.
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Well, yeah, I get that they do those things, but it well all cards do something and those two seem weaker than others.
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Raze and Ratcatcher in tier 2? But they're not even good!
Both are cantrip one card trashers, but they have other effects too. Both have the ability to remove themselves from your deck once they are not needed. Raze accelerates your deck by sifting, and can trash itself after you have finished trashing. It also has a psuedo-Demonic Tutor effect, where you can look ahead and take a card you want out of a selection of cards. Ratcatcher has the nice effect of being there when you need it, and does not take up space in your hand. It is nice for games with junkers, because you can use it whenever you draw junk in your hand.
Well, Raze isn't a cantrip trasher when it's trashing Coppers, and that's pretty important. Personally I think it looks really weak, but I haven't played with it and certainly could be wrong. Ratcatcher, on the other hand, looks great simply by virtue of it taking up no space in your deck and removing itself once you're done with it.
I'll do a ranking soon. Why only those sets?
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Well, Raze isn't a cantrip trasher when it's trashing Coppers, and that's pretty important. Personally I think it looks really weak, but I haven't played with it and certainly could be wrong. Ratcatcher, on the other hand, looks great simply by virtue of it taking up no space in your deck and removing itself once you're done with it.
To be fair, Raze also removes itself once you're done with it. It can trash itself. As I've said before, I think Raze is sort of a waste of a slot in Adventures because it's so redundant there. I would have preferred to see it in a theoretical later set or as a promo.
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Well, Raze isn't a cantrip trasher when it's trashing Coppers, and that's pretty important. Personally I think it looks really weak, but I haven't played with it and certainly could be wrong. Ratcatcher, on the other hand, looks great simply by virtue of it taking up no space in your deck and removing itself once you're done with it.
To be fair, Raze also removes itself once you're done with it. It can trash itself. As I've said before, I think Raze is sort of a waste of a slot in Adventures because it's so redundant there. I would have preferred to see it in a theoretical later set or as a promo.
True, it can remove itself. Honestly I just think it's a super boring card, and that probably distorts my view of its strength. I'm starting to come around on it, but it still doesn't look that great. Idk.
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Raze and Ratcatcher in tier 2? But they're not even good!
Both are cantrip one card trashers, but they have other effects too. Both have the ability to remove themselves from your deck once they are not needed. Raze accelerates your deck by sifting, and can trash itself after you have finished trashing. It also has a psuedo-Demonic Tutor effect, where you can look ahead and take a card you want out of a selection of cards. Ratcatcher has the nice effect of being there when you need it, and does not take up space in your hand. It is nice for games with junkers, because you can use it whenever you draw junk in your hand.
Well, Raze isn't a cantrip trasher when it's trashing Coppers, and that's pretty important. Personally I think it looks really weak, but I haven't played with it and certainly could be wrong. Ratcatcher, on the other hand, looks great simply by virtue of it taking up no space in your deck and removing itself once you're done with it.
I'll do a ranking soon. Why only those sets?
Those are the only sets I have, so I can only judge the rankings by experience playing with the cards. Feel free to say all the sets though, if you wish.
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Stonemason is not really Tier 1 if you're actually paying $2 for it though. It almost should be compared more to $6+ cards
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Stonemason is not really Tier 1 if you're actually paying $2 for it though. It almost should be compared more to $6+ cards
Likewise, Alms, Quest, and Borrow are weird things to list at all; they're just alternate ways to buy other cards.
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I don't think you can count Stonemason outside of the $2 range. It's a $2 card, and its play effect alone is really good. Obviously the overpay is the most significant part of it, but the two work together to accomplish what you're generally going for with Stonemason: a fast pile-out.
I can understand not including Events in rankings, but understand that my list is in no way official and I am not an authority on these things. I just do it for fun. (I have full rankings of all the cards on a spreadsheet I update now and then) I did not mean to derail this thread (hardly anyone even responded to the OP's question) but well, this is f.ds.
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Some Events make sense to list. Scouting Party, for instance. You buy Scouting Party instead of or in addition to something else. But the Events I listed are just alternative ways to buy other stuff.
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Stonemason is not really Tier 1 if you're actually paying $2 for it though. It almost should be compared more to $6+ cards
Stonemason is a $2 card. For $2, you get the Stonemason card along with a sweet deal on other Action cards. That sweet deal is part of the Stonemason card. The extra money you're paying isn't for Stonemason, it's just money spent in conjunction with what is essentially an on-buy effect to gain cards more easily than you otherwise could. True, it doesn't directly compete with $2 cards, but it doesn't really directly compete with anything given its unique gaining ability, so we might as well rank it with the $2's.
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I don't think you can count Stonemason outside of the $2 range. It's a $2 card, and its play effect alone is really good. Obviously the overpay is the most significant part of it, but the two work together to accomplish what you're generally going for with Stonemason: a fast pile-out.
I can understand not including Events in rankings, but understand that my list is in no way official and I am not an authority on these things. I just do it for fun. (I have full rankings of all the cards on a spreadsheet I update now and then) I did not mean to derail this thread (hardly anyone even responded to the OP's question) but well, this is f.ds.
You should make a similar ranking for the card art!
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Not sure if it was mentioned yet, but...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FwqL4vBe5zo
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We should really do a new one of these rankings soon. Maybe after a bit of Adventures playtime
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I don't think you can count Stonemason outside of the $2 range. It's a $2 card, and its play effect alone is really good. Obviously the overpay is the most significant part of it, but the two work together to accomplish what you're generally going for with Stonemason: a fast pile-out.
I can understand not including Events in rankings, but understand that my list is in no way official and I am not an authority on these things. I just do it for fun. (I have full rankings of all the cards on a spreadsheet I update now and then) I did not mean to derail this thread (hardly anyone even responded to the OP's question) but well, this is f.ds.
You should make a similar ranking for the card art!
You mean an incomplete one?
WW already did his, and his rankings are probably more accurate than mine. It would be retreading old ground.
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Stonemason is not really Tier 1 if you're actually paying $2 for it though. It almost should be compared more to $6+ cards
Stonemason is a $2 card. For $2, you get the Stonemason card along with a sweet deal on other Action cards. That sweet deal is part of the Stonemason card. The extra money you're paying isn't for Stonemason, it's just money spent in conjunction with what is essentially an on-buy effect to gain cards more easily than you otherwise could. True, it doesn't directly compete with $2 cards, but it doesn't really directly compete with anything given its unique gaining ability, so we might as well rank it with the $2's.
You're not telling me anything I don't know--my point was that for its on-play ability alone I consider it far from Tier 1. It's a terminal one-card trasher that can't trash estates and/or a situational gainer that requires having expensive cards you're willing to trash. And it does compete with 6s and 7s since that's what you normally spend on it. It's primary function is more similar to Border Village than anything else.
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Stonemason is not really Tier 1 if you're actually paying $2 for it though. It almost should be compared more to $6+ cards
Stonemason is a $2 card. For $2, you get the Stonemason card along with a sweet deal on other Action cards. That sweet deal is part of the Stonemason card. The extra money you're paying isn't for Stonemason, it's just money spent in conjunction with what is essentially an on-buy effect to gain cards more easily than you otherwise could. True, it doesn't directly compete with $2 cards, but it doesn't really directly compete with anything given its unique gaining ability, so we might as well rank it with the $2's.
You're not telling me anything I don't know--my point was that for its on-play ability alone I consider it far from Tier 1.
So why are you only considering its on-play ability? Every other card is ranked based on its on-gain, on-buy, on-trash, etc. abilities. Inn would be a lot worse if not for its on-gain ability; Farmland would be strictly worse than a Duchy if not for its on-buy effect. These cards are priced to include those effects, you should consider them in the rankings.
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Stonemason is not really Tier 1 if you're actually paying $2 for it though. It almost should be compared more to $6+ cards
Stonemason is a $2 card. For $2, you get the Stonemason card along with a sweet deal on other Action cards. That sweet deal is part of the Stonemason card. The extra money you're paying isn't for Stonemason, it's just money spent in conjunction with what is essentially an on-buy effect to gain cards more easily than you otherwise could. True, it doesn't directly compete with $2 cards, but it doesn't really directly compete with anything given its unique gaining ability, so we might as well rank it with the $2's.
You're not telling me anything I don't know--my point was that for its on-play ability alone I consider it far from Tier 1.
So why are you only considering its on-play ability? Every other card is ranked based on its on-gain, on-buy, on-trash, etc. abilities. Inn would be a lot worse if not for its on-gain ability; Farmland would be strictly worse than a Duchy if not for its on-buy effect. These cards are priced to include those effects, you should consider them in the rankings.
Because you pay $5 for Inn together with its on-gain ability. You pay $6 for Farmland, and perhaps more relevantly for Border Village, with its on-gain ability. You most often pay $7 for Stonemason with its on-gain ability.
I'm mostly playing devil's advocate here, but I think it's an interesting question. If you're going to rank it against the other $2s, you maybe should only be considering the part that you can actually get for $2, which is not an elite ability.
Someone better than I am can maybe argue that I'm underestimating Stonemason's on-play effect, which is possible, but for me it often becomes a dead card.
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We had this discussion when Guilds first came out. Ranking overpay cards at every possible cost is just silly. Better to have them in their nominal cost zone, while taking into account the fact that you can spend more on them for other stuff. I mean, if we ranked Masterpiece at every cost, it would be the worst $3, hands down, and probably the worst $4 as well. But it doesn't cost $4, or $5, or any other cost. It costs $3. You might spend more on it, but once it's in your deck, it costs $3, and every card that cares about cards' costs is going to see it as a $3. Border Village is a great $6 not just because it gives you more options for it's when-gain ability, but because it can be Remodeled into a Province, and so on. There's more to cost than just how much you paid for it.
EDIT: Here's another way to think of overpay cards - as +Buy events.
Stonemason - $2
+1 Buy
Gain a Stonemason. If your next buy is an Action, gain another Action of the same cost.
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Someone better than I am can maybe argue that I'm underestimating Stonemason's on-play effect, which is possible, but for me it often becomes a dead card.
The on-play effect is something that I still underestimate. It has lots of situational uses, some of which can be very powerful. Trashing Coppers or Curses is usually bad; the big plays are Gold -> $5 action or Duchy and surprise 3-piles in the end game.
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I guess it depends on the context in which you're comparing cards. If you have exactly $2 and are deciding what if anything to buy, Stonemason will normally be fairly low on the list. On the other hand, if at the start of the game you look at the $2 cards available, Stonemason will often be pretty high on the "How much attention should I pay to this card being available?" list.
On the other hand, I used Stonemason to turn a Platinum into two Provinces the other day - not bad for a $2 card.
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To respond to Cuzz, I should explain my intent was not to rate the $2 cards together. I actually just rated every card on a 1-20 scale, and Stonemason happens to be in the high end because I think it's one of the most powerful cards in the game. In this thread, I listed it with the $2 cards. If you prefer it not to be there, you can always pretend it isn't; the metric you use can be whatever if all cards are rated on the same scale, which is the beauty of it. Personally, I think grouping by cost isn't all that important or necessary. Ambassador is a better card than Explorer etc
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These are all great points!
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Stonemason is not really Tier 1 if you're actually paying $2 for it though. It almost should be compared more to $6+ cards
Stonemason is a $2 card. For $2, you get the Stonemason card along with a sweet deal on other Action cards. That sweet deal is part of the Stonemason card. The extra money you're paying isn't for Stonemason, it's just money spent in conjunction with what is essentially an on-buy effect to gain cards more easily than you otherwise could. True, it doesn't directly compete with $2 cards, but it doesn't really directly compete with anything given its unique gaining ability, so we might as well rank it with the $2's.
You're not telling me anything I don't know--my point was that for its on-play ability alone I consider it far from Tier 1.
So why are you only considering its on-play ability? Every other card is ranked based on its on-gain, on-buy, on-trash, etc. abilities. Inn would be a lot worse if not for its on-gain ability; Farmland would be strictly worse than a Duchy if not for its on-buy effect. These cards are priced to include those effects, you should consider them in the rankings.
Because you pay $5 for Inn together with its on-gain ability. You pay $6 for Farmland, and perhaps more relevantly for Border Village, with its on-gain ability. You most often pay $7 for Stonemason with its on-gain ability.
I'm mostly playing devil's advocate here, but I think it's an interesting question. If you're going to rank it against the other $2s, you maybe should only be considering the part that you can actually get for $2, which is not an elite ability.
Someone better than I am can maybe argue that I'm underestimating Stonemason's on-play effect, which is possible, but for me it often becomes a dead card.
Stonemason's on-play ability is extremely useful. I agree that it would be a pretty weak card if that were all there was to it, but it's not. I just think it's misleading to rank only the overpay cards based on their on-play effects alone when we take on-gain and on-buy effects into account for everything else. I agree that they present a bit of a conundrum for ranking purposes since you pay so many different amounts for the same card, but at the end of the day it's still essentially an on-buy effect, and as such should be factored into the rankings. I see your issue with ranking it with the $2's, but I don't think it makes any more sense to rank it with other costs, and card rankings will ultimately be flawed no matter what system we use. I just think completely ignoring a component of the card, especially a major component that is usually the card's main purpose, is a bad system.
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I just think it's misleading to rank only the overpay cards based on their on-play effects alone when we take on-gain and on-buy effects into account for everything else. I agree that they present a bit of a conundrum for ranking purposes since you pay so many different amounts for the same card, but at the end of the day it's still essentially an on-buy effect, and as such should be factored into the rankings.
Overpay is totally an on-buy effect. I recently asked Donald whether overpay was something along the line of
"When you buy this, you may pay any amount of $[...]"
and he said it was the same mechanically. It's not like overpay would be the only on-buy that asks you to do something before you get something (Farmlands, for example).
(Except i forgot that 0$ is excluded and P allowed, but that's solved by "any amount bigger than 0$" or something like that).
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Stonemason is not really Tier 1 if you're actually paying $2 for it though. It almost should be compared more to $6+ cards
Stonemason is a $2 card. For $2, you get the Stonemason card along with a sweet deal on other Action cards. That sweet deal is part of the Stonemason card. The extra money you're paying isn't for Stonemason, it's just money spent in conjunction with what is essentially an on-buy effect to gain cards more easily than you otherwise could. True, it doesn't directly compete with $2 cards, but it doesn't really directly compete with anything given its unique gaining ability, so we might as well rank it with the $2's.
You're not telling me anything I don't know--my point was that for its on-play ability alone I consider it far from Tier 1.
So why are you only considering its on-play ability? Every other card is ranked based on its on-gain, on-buy, on-trash, etc. abilities. Inn would be a lot worse if not for its on-gain ability; Farmland would be strictly worse than a Duchy if not for its on-buy effect. These cards are priced to include those effects, you should consider them in the rankings.
Because you pay $5 for Inn together with its on-gain ability. You pay $6 for Farmland, and perhaps more relevantly for Border Village, with its on-gain ability. You most often pay $7 for Stonemason with its on-gain ability.
I'm mostly playing devil's advocate here, but I think it's an interesting question. If you're going to rank it against the other $2s, you maybe should only be considering the part that you can actually get for $2, which is not an elite ability.
Someone better than I am can maybe argue that I'm underestimating Stonemason's on-play effect, which is possible, but for me it often becomes a dead card.
Stonemason's on-play ability is extremely useful. I agree that it would be a pretty weak card if that were all there was to it, but it's not. I just think it's misleading to rank only the overpay cards based on their on-play effects alone when we take on-gain and on-buy effects into account for everything else. I agree that they present a bit of a conundrum for ranking purposes since you pay so many different amounts for the same card, but at the end of the day it's still essentially an on-buy effect, and as such should be factored into the rankings. I see your issue with ranking it with the $2's, but I don't think it makes any more sense to rank it with other costs, and card rankings will ultimately be flawed no matter what system we use. I just think completely ignoring a component of the card, especially a major component that is usually the card's main purpose, is a bad system.
I think that ranking cards by cost has become less and less significant.
I'd love to see the result of a collective tierization of the cards from the f.ds for. This would be regardless of cost, and mostly based on how deeply their presence affects your strategy.
Tiers could be something like:
F: you could remove this from the kingdom, I'd play exactly the same 99% of the time (eg: Scout)
C: Weakish card, can be useful and even shine, but rarely. (eg: Pirate Ship)
B: Decent card, can be useful and even shine in the right conditions (eg: Village)
A: Strong card, defines a Kingdom and good players will have to consider seriously whether they really want to pass on this. (eg: Witch)
Ü: Almost always a must but, need an excellent reason to pass on this (eg: Rebuild)
This would also have to take into account how some cards (like Thief and Possession) shape the players' strategies even without ever being bought.
(just a random thought, since OP got answered already and the reign of Off Topic has thus begun)
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Stonemason is not really Tier 1 if you're actually paying $2 for it though. It almost should be compared more to $6+ cards
Stonemason is a $2 card. For $2, you get the Stonemason card along with a sweet deal on other Action cards. That sweet deal is part of the Stonemason card. The extra money you're paying isn't for Stonemason, it's just money spent in conjunction with what is essentially an on-buy effect to gain cards more easily than you otherwise could. True, it doesn't directly compete with $2 cards, but it doesn't really directly compete with anything given its unique gaining ability, so we might as well rank it with the $2's.
You're not telling me anything I don't know--my point was that for its on-play ability alone I consider it far from Tier 1.
So why are you only considering its on-play ability? Every other card is ranked based on its on-gain, on-buy, on-trash, etc. abilities. Inn would be a lot worse if not for its on-gain ability; Farmland would be strictly worse than a Duchy if not for its on-buy effect. These cards are priced to include those effects, you should consider them in the rankings.
Because you pay $5 for Inn together with its on-gain ability. You pay $6 for Farmland, and perhaps more relevantly for Border Village, with its on-gain ability. You most often pay $7 for Stonemason with its on-gain ability.
I'm mostly playing devil's advocate here, but I think it's an interesting question. If you're going to rank it against the other $2s, you maybe should only be considering the part that you can actually get for $2, which is not an elite ability.
Someone better than I am can maybe argue that I'm underestimating Stonemason's on-play effect, which is possible, but for me it often becomes a dead card.
Stonemason's on-play ability is extremely useful. I agree that it would be a pretty weak card if that were all there was to it, but it's not. I just think it's misleading to rank only the overpay cards based on their on-play effects alone when we take on-gain and on-buy effects into account for everything else. I agree that they present a bit of a conundrum for ranking purposes since you pay so many different amounts for the same card, but at the end of the day it's still essentially an on-buy effect, and as such should be factored into the rankings. I see your issue with ranking it with the $2's, but I don't think it makes any more sense to rank it with other costs, and card rankings will ultimately be flawed no matter what system we use. I just think completely ignoring a component of the card, especially a major component that is usually the card's main purpose, is a bad system.
I think that ranking cards by cost has become less and less significant.
I'd love to see the result of a collective tierization of the cards from the f.ds for. This would be regardless of cost, and mostly based on how deeply their presence affects your strategy.
Tiers could be something like:
F: you could remove this from the kingdom, I'd play exactly the same 99% of the time (eg: Scout)
C: Weakish card, can be useful and even shine, but rarely. (eg: Pirate Ship)
B: Decent card, can be useful and even shine in the right conditions (eg: Village)
A: Strong card, defines a Kingdom and good players will have to consider seriously whether they really want to pass on this. (eg: Witch)
Ü: Almost always a must but, need an excellent reason to pass on this (eg: Rebuild)
This would also have to take into account how some cards (like Thief and Possession) shape the players' strategies even without ever being bought.
(just a random thought, since OP got answered already and the reign of Off Topic has thus begun)
This would be interesting, but ultimately even that would be problematic. It's just difficult to define what makes one card better than another when you almost always need a variety of kingdom cards to win, as they complement each other. For instance, I hesitate to say Village is a top-tier card because it doesn't do much on its own, but it is very often extremely important and as such it feels wrong to rank it below top-tier. It's just a difficult thing to quantify, and any criteria we establish will have problems.
That being said, I like card rankings, so we should still do them.
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Stonemason is not really Tier 1 if you're actually paying $2 for it though. It almost should be compared more to $6+ cards
Stonemason is a $2 card. For $2, you get the Stonemason card along with a sweet deal on other Action cards. That sweet deal is part of the Stonemason card. The extra money you're paying isn't for Stonemason, it's just money spent in conjunction with what is essentially an on-buy effect to gain cards more easily than you otherwise could. True, it doesn't directly compete with $2 cards, but it doesn't really directly compete with anything given its unique gaining ability, so we might as well rank it with the $2's.
You're not telling me anything I don't know--my point was that for its on-play ability alone I consider it far from Tier 1.
So why are you only considering its on-play ability? Every other card is ranked based on its on-gain, on-buy, on-trash, etc. abilities. Inn would be a lot worse if not for its on-gain ability; Farmland would be strictly worse than a Duchy if not for its on-buy effect. These cards are priced to include those effects, you should consider them in the rankings.
Because you pay $5 for Inn together with its on-gain ability. You pay $6 for Farmland, and perhaps more relevantly for Border Village, with its on-gain ability. You most often pay $7 for Stonemason with its on-gain ability.
I'm mostly playing devil's advocate here, but I think it's an interesting question. If you're going to rank it against the other $2s, you maybe should only be considering the part that you can actually get for $2, which is not an elite ability.
Someone better than I am can maybe argue that I'm underestimating Stonemason's on-play effect, which is possible, but for me it often becomes a dead card.
Stonemason's on-play ability is extremely useful. I agree that it would be a pretty weak card if that were all there was to it, but it's not. I just think it's misleading to rank only the overpay cards based on their on-play effects alone when we take on-gain and on-buy effects into account for everything else. I agree that they present a bit of a conundrum for ranking purposes since you pay so many different amounts for the same card, but at the end of the day it's still essentially an on-buy effect, and as such should be factored into the rankings. I see your issue with ranking it with the $2's, but I don't think it makes any more sense to rank it with other costs, and card rankings will ultimately be flawed no matter what system we use. I just think completely ignoring a component of the card, especially a major component that is usually the card's main purpose, is a bad system.
I think that ranking cards by cost has become less and less significant.
I'd love to see the result of a collective tierization of the cards from the f.ds for. This would be regardless of cost, and mostly based on how deeply their presence affects your strategy.
Tiers could be something like:
F: you could remove this from the kingdom, I'd play exactly the same 99% of the time (eg: Scout)
C: Weakish card, can be useful and even shine, but rarely. (eg: Pirate Ship)
B: Decent card, can be useful and even shine in the right conditions (eg: Village)
A: Strong card, defines a Kingdom and good players will have to consider seriously whether they really want to pass on this. (eg: Witch)
Ü: Almost always a must but, need an excellent reason to pass on this (eg: Rebuild)
This would also have to take into account how some cards (like Thief and Possession) shape the players' strategies even without ever being bought.
(just a random thought, since OP got answered already and the reign of Off Topic has thus begun)
This would be interesting, but ultimately even that would be problematic. It's just difficult to define what makes one card better than another when you almost always need a variety of kingdom cards to win, as they complement each other. For instance, I hesitate to say Village is a top-tier card because it doesn't do much on its own, but it is very often extremely important and as such it feels wrong to rank it below top-tier. It's just a difficult thing to quantify, and any criteria we establish will have problems.
That being said, I like card rankings, so we should still do them.
I hardly think I'm a serious enough player to do card rankings, but I'm glad that those are being considered again.
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In tier lists, isn't the rank better than A usually S?
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A
Chapel
Stonemason
Peasant
Page
Courtyard
B
Hamlet
Lighthouse
Ratcatcher
Candlestick Maker
Fool's Gold
C
Crossroads
Squire
Raze
Native Village
Pawn
Coin of the Realm
D
Cellar
Vagrant
Moat
Embargo
Poor House
E
Haven
Beggar
Herbalist
Pearl Diver
F
Secret Chamber
Duchess
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A
Chapel
Stonemason
Peasant
Page
Courtyard
B
Hamlet
Lighthouse
Ratcatcher
Candlestick Maker
Fool's Gold
C
Crossroads
Squire
Raze
Native Village
Pawn
Coin of the Realm
D
Cellar
Vagrant
Moat
Embargo
Poor House
E
Haven
Beggar
Herbalist
Pearl Diver
F
Secret Chamber
Duchess
Thanks so much!