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[Seprix]

Let's talk about Peasant, why it is my number one candidate for most hated card in Dominion, and why it will be my first official selection for the Banlist once ShuffleIT implements it.

1. Centralizing

We all know you can't often play a Peasant board without buying one. In fact, it's often a cause for celebration when you don't have to! Peasant offers the same song and dance every time, and there's nothing you can do about it but play it the way you always do. Now this is not reason enough to ban a card, as there are plenty of cards that do in fact do this.

2. Incredibly Swingy

Oh, what's that? You bottomdecked your traveller and now you're toast. Oh, what's that? You took a calculated gamble drawing 2 cards dead with a 15 card shuffle and you drew your Traveller. Oh, what's that? You drew Disciple without any actions? Oh, what's that? You drew Teacher on the very bottom of the shuffle, and despite your opponent getting Teacher much later than you, he drew it on his first turn and activated before you. Oh, what's that? You lost to a mediocre player for no reason other than how your shuffles went. My heart races with fear every time I roll Peasant on a board. Will I likely lose for no reason at all other than a random arrangement of cards?

3. Ease of Play

But you might remark, "but you can outplay a bad build! You can outplay a mediocre player." And indeed, you certainly can. But real talk, how hard is it to play Peasant, really? You buy Peasant more than once, mass up a ton of a single kind of card, and then slap on +Card and +Action, and if you at any point falter due to a bad shuffle, you're probably just straight up toast. There's no such thing as a bad Peasant build if you play with common sense (please don't make Treasure Map jokes, you know exactly what I mean). There's only more efficient builds, and less efficient ones.

4. Super Long Turns

All of the previous points are claims you can make about Rebuild, or Money strategies. Here's one you can't make: Length of time. Seriously, for all of the annoyances Rebuild and Money games provide, at least they end quick. You're waiting for a century when your opponent calls his teacher, places his token on a card, and then proceeds to play out his turn, optimizing all of the way (either in ways that are actually optimization or ways that are not, which only annoys you further) and eeking out extra plays, while he's up by a trillion and you still didn't play your first Teacher yet. Like why continue at that point?

5. False Hope

Always play out the games. Always play to your outs. Don't give up. You might just win. Yeah, that'll never happen. Peasant gives you false hope that you might be able to crawl back. "WOW, he put that token THERE???" And yet it doesn't matter. He's drawing his deck, and you're not. You can optimize all you like, but the man is up 4 Provinces and will never dud again.

6. A Realization

With all of this in mind, you roll a Peasant board and win easily. And then you have a chilling thought. Did you win because you outplayed your opponent, or because your opponent missed a shuffle with his traveller? Boy, that blows. You won a game for no other reason than RNGesus decreed it.

Closing

Is Peasant the worst, most unfair, most unbalanced card in Dominion? No. But when you get whacked by it, you'll scramble for answers. You'll look at everything you did. You'll agonize for weeks on that loss, that one loss that could have been. And as it turns out, you did nothing wrong. You just didn't shuffle right.

[mameluke]

Will I likely lose for no reason at all other than a random arrangement of cards?

I mean, this is a good chunk of Dominion in general.

[Seprix]

Will I likely lose for no reason at all other than a random arrangement of cards?

I mean, this is a good chunk of Dominion in general.

Not nearly to the extent of Peasant.

[Holunder9]

You could say the same about many cards in the game. Play a Chapel game, one player manages to trash 3 Estates and 1 Copper on turn 3 or 4 while the other manages to draw Chapel on turn 5. Arguably the game is already over.
I cannot judge Renaissance yet but if you play with Nocturne there is some serious speeding up going on with some Heirlooms, the game becomes a bit more moneyish and and Peasant becomes on average slighty weaker. Of course ou are totally right that the number of Kingdoms in which Peasant can be ignored is smaller than the number of Kingdoms in which it can but it is not an autobuy. That Teacher dude is slow, education takes a long time.

[Awaclus]

Not sure if [Serious]

[Commodore Chuckles]

Peasant offers the same song and dance every time, and there's nothing you can do about it but play it the way you always do.

The statement I disagreed with most. Peasant offers lots of interesting choices more often than not. Do you put +Action on the terminal draw to make a Lab or on the cantrip because there's no villages? Etc. All the new choices it opens up make up for the fact that the choice of buying the card itself it is trivial, in my opinion. It is also not "centralizing", because you cannot win just by buying it and nothing else, unlike e.g. Rebuild. The whole source of its power, in fact, is the way it interacts with other cards. It's for these reasons that I love Peasant despite its OPness.

[avorian]

It is also not "centralizing", because you cannot win just by buying it and nothing else, unlike e.g. Rebuild. The whole source of its power, in fact, is the way it interacts with other cards. It's for these reasons that I love Peasant despite its OPness.

Obviously precise definitions for things are in short supply, but at least as "centralizing" was used in jsh's tier listings of cards it doesn't mean that you only buy that card. It means that you almost always "build the strategy around this card".

This is certainly not universal, but I think people tend to refer to the rebuild type of things as "monolithic".

[connorbr011]

What about Page? It’s at least as centralizing as Peasant, and at least in my experience, makes for less interesting games. Page has more autoplay than Peasant, while having the same degree of reliance on shuffle luck. Just my two cents.

[Seprix]

Peasant offers the same song and dance every time, and there's nothing you can do about it but play it the way you always do.

The statement I disagreed with most. Peasant offers lots of interesting choices more often than not. Do you put +Action on the terminal draw to make a Lab or on the cantrip because there's no villages? Etc. All the new choices it opens up make up for the fact that the choice of buying the card itself it is trivial, in my opinion.

Man I hope Peasant offers more interesting choices than that. (spoiler: it does) but it's more like, you do pretty similarish stuff with only a tiny amount of things for optimization. Maybe you delay the Teacher a shuffle.

It is also not "centralizing"

lol

What about Page? It’s at least as centralizing as Peasant, and at least in my experience, makes for less interesting games. Page has more autoplay than Peasant, while having the same degree of reliance on shuffle luck. Just my two cents.

I knew this one would come up, and hilariously enough I have about the opposite take on it. I know, it makes no sense. It makes no sense to me either. But it's how I currently feel. It has its nonsense games though. I feel like somehow, the swingy nonsense is much less likely for the Page line than the Peasant line.

[Beyond Awesome]

On my two cost cards, I have Peasant ranked number one. It is very swingy, but I don't hate it.

[Chappy7]

Peasant offers the same song and dance every time, and there's nothing you can do about it but play it the way you always do.

The statement I disagreed with most. Peasant offers lots of interesting choices more often than not. Do you put +Action on the terminal draw to make a Lab or on the cantrip because there's no villages? Etc. All the new choices it opens up make up for the fact that the choice of buying the card itself it is trivial, in my opinion.

Man I hope Peasant offers more interesting choices than that. (spoiler: it does) but it's more like, you do pretty similarish stuff with only a tiny amount of things for optimization. Maybe you delay the Teacher a shuffle.

It is also not "centralizing"

lol

What about Page? It’s at least as centralizing as Peasant, and at least in my experience, makes for less interesting games. Page has more autoplay than Peasant, while having the same degree of reliance on shuffle luck. Just my two cents.

I knew this one would come up, and hilariously enough I have about the opposite take on it. I know, it makes no sense. It makes no sense to me either. But it's how I currently feel. It has its nonsense games though. I feel like somehow, the swingy nonsense is much less likely for the Page line than the Peasant line.

While I think peasant is definitely more OP, I also think it is more fun.  I hate Page.  I hate the Warriors can trash Warriors, which is just begging for trouble.  I hate the abilities of the whole page line.  I'd much rather see peasant on the board than Page.

[greybirdofprey]

With how many players do you usually play?
In 2-player games I usually ban Peasant because you almost always won't be able to win without it and must style your deck around the line.
In 3- and 4-player games it's a different case. The game ends more quickly so you may not be able to get enough benefit out of token'd cards before the game ends to be worth the build-up. I remember a 4-player game where I tried to reach Teacher as fast as I could, but the game ended the turn after I placed a token.

[markus]

Peasant stands out as one of the cards that favour the better player the most in my sample of logs.

If you usually beat your opponent in 60% of the games, you'll win 63.5% of the Peasant boards.
(Page also favours the better player but not as much, Chapel on the other hand makes the weaker player win more than expected.)

[Aleimon Thimble]

Peasant stands out as one of the cards that favour the better player the most in my sample of logs.

If you usually beat your opponent in 60% of the games, you'll win 63.5% of the Peasant boards.
(Page also favours the better player but not as much, Chapel on the other hand makes the weaker player win more than expected.)

Myth busted.

Maybe you just suck with Peasant? Everyone has cards they're not good with. I always lose Black Market games somehow.

[Oyvind]

Peasant stands out as one of the cards that favour the better player the most in my sample of logs.

If you usually beat your opponent in 60% of the games, you'll win 63.5% of the Peasant boards.
(Page also favours the better player but not as much, Chapel on the other hand makes the weaker player win more than expected.)

Interesting, that actually surprises me too.

[markusin]

I find Peasant games rather fun. I mean, Donate is centralizing too, but it leads to a different sort of games. There are still a lot of important choices to make with the Peasant line: When do you get the second/third Peasant? What do I put my first token on, and how does it work with Disciple? Is the Soldier stack a thing here?

That said, Page is perhaps more interesting in that there is a clear downside to pursing the line, as before you reach champion you get bloated with a bunch of Treasure. The upside is that the Page line is great for ramping up treasure payload quickly.

[ackmondual]

If nothing else, I've used Peasant to get alternatives to Labs and Throne Rooms

[Titandrake]

Let's talk about King's Court, why it is my number one candidate for most hated card in Dominion, and why it will be my first official selection for the Banlist once ShuffleIT implements it.

1. Centralizing

We all know you can't often play a King's Court board without buying one. In fact, it's often a cause for celebration when you don't have to! KC offers the same song and dance every time, and there's nothing you can do about it but play it the way you always do. Now this is not reason enough to ban a card, as there are plenty of cards that do in fact do this.

2. Incredibly Swingy

Oh, what's that? You bottomdecked your King's Court and now you're toast. Oh, what's that? You took a calculated gamble drawing 2 cards dead with a 15 card shuffle and you drew your King's Court. Oh, what's that? You drew KC without any actions? Oh, what's that? You drew KC on the very bottom of the shuffle, and despite your opponent getting KC much later than you, he drew it on his first turn and activated before you. Oh, what's that? You lost to a mediocre player for no reason other than how your shuffles went. My heart races with fear every time I roll King's Court on a board. Will I likely lose for no reason at all other than a random arrangement of cards?

3. Ease of Play

But you might remark, "but you can outplay a bad build! You can outplay a mediocre player." And indeed, you certainly can. But real talk, how hard is it to play King's Court, really? You buy King's Court more than once, mass up a ton of the right cards, and then slap a King's Courted King's Court on it, and if you at any point falter due to a bad shuffle, you're probably just straight up toast. There's no such thing as a bad KC build if you play with common sense (please don't make Treasure Map jokes, you know exactly what I mean). There's only more efficient builds, and less efficient ones.

4. Super Long Turns

All of the previous points are claims you can make about Rebuild, or Money strategies. Here's one you can't make: Length of time. Seriously, for all of the annoyances Rebuild and Money games provide, at least they end quick. You're waiting for a century when your opponent plays his King's Court, picks what action to triple, and then proceeds to play out his turn, optimizing all of the way (either in ways that are actually optimization or ways that are not, which only annoys you further) and eeking out extra plays, while he's up by a trillion and you still didn't play your first King's Court yet. Like why continue at that point?

5. False Hope

Always play out the games. Always play to your outs. Don't give up. You might just win. Yeah, that'll never happen. KC gives you false hope that you might be able to crawl back. "WOW, he tripled THAT Action???" And yet it doesn't matter. He's drawing his deck, and you're not. You can optimize all you like, but the man is up 4 Provinces and will never dud again.

6. A Realization

With all of this in mind, you roll a KC board and win easily. And then you have a chilling thought. Did you win because you outplayed your opponent, or because your opponent missed a shuffle? Boy, that blows. You won a game for no other reason than RNGesus decreed it.

Closing

Is King's Court the worst, most unfair, most unbalanced card in Dominion? No. But when you get whacked by it, you'll scramble for answers. You'll look at everything you did. You'll agonize for weeks on that loss, that one loss that could have been. And as it turns out, you did nothing wrong. You just didn't shuffle right.

[LastFootnote]

You buy Peasant more than once, mass up a ton of a single kind of card, and then slap on +Card and +Action, and if you at any point falter due to a bad shuffle, you're probably just straight up toast.

Teacher won't let you put two tokens on a single pile. It doesn't invalidate your opinions, but you might want to update your rant. 

[Simon Jester]

4. Super Long Turns

All of the previous points are claims you can make about Rebuild, or Money strategies. Here's one you can't make: Length of time. Seriously, for all of the annoyances Rebuild and Money games provide, at least they end quick. You're waiting for a century when your opponent plays his King's Court, picks what action to triple, and then proceeds to play out his turn, optimizing all of the way (either in ways that are actually optimization or ways that are not, which only annoys you further) and eeking out extra plays, while he's up by a trillion and you still didn't play your first King's Court yet. Like why continue at that point?

Well, I appreciate the comparison but this part ain't really true. If you're behind with KC it will mostly be over before you know it.

But yeah, power-cards are fine, as long as they need support or power up other cards they are not at all "centralizing". How often is the peasant-line the ONLY thing you buy? Comparing with Page, it's not too uncommon to only rely on it since it provides both draw and payload, with peasant you always need to find a way to use the line optimally somewehere else. You may of course dislike the card how much you want, but to call it centralizing is merely plain wrong..

[Seprix]

...

Not clever.

You buy Peasant more than once, mass up a ton of a single kind of card, and then slap on +Card and +Action, and if you at any point falter due to a bad shuffle, you're probably just straight up toast.

Teacher won't let you put two tokens on a single pile. It doesn't invalidate your opinions, but you might want to update your rant. 

You know what I mean.

I find Peasant games rather fun. I mean, Donate is centralizing too, but it leads to a different sort of games. There are still a lot of important choices to make with the Peasant line: When do you get the second/third Peasant? What do I put my first token on, and how does it work with Disciple? Is the Soldier stack a thing here?

That said, Page is perhaps more interesting in that there is a clear downside to pursing the line, as before you reach champion you get bloated with a bunch of Treasure. The upside is that the Page line is great for ramping up treasure payload quickly.

Yes, those are all real things, and if annoying shuffles don't happen those certainly come much more into focus. The really fun stuff is the Soldier stacks.

Peasant stands out as one of the cards that favor the better player the most in my sample of logs.

If you usually beat your opponent in 60% of the games, you'll win 63.5% of the Peasant boards.
(Page also favors the better player but not as much, Chapel on the other hand makes the weaker player win more than expected.)

Huh. Well there you have it.

With how many players do you usually play?
In 2-player games I usually ban Peasant because you almost always won't be able to win without it and must style your deck around the line.
In 3- and 4-player games it's a different case. The game ends more quickly so you may not be able to get enough benefit out of token'd cards before the game ends to be worth the build-up. I remember a 4-player game where I tried to reach Teacher as fast as I could, but the game ended the turn after I placed a token.

Anything that isn't 2 Player is something I typically never do.

Maybe you just suck with Peasant? Everyone has cards they're not good with. I always lose Black Market games somehow.

Yes, I suppose I could suck with Peasant. I think I am perfectly competent with Peasant. Markus will probably have stats on me though that could prove otherwise.

But yeah, power-cards are fine, as long as they need support or power up other cards they are not at all "centralizing". How often is the peasant-line the ONLY thing you buy? Comparing with Page, it's not too uncommon to only rely on it since it provides both draw and payload, with peasant you always need to find a way to use the line optimally somewhere else. You may of course dislike the card how much you want, but to call it centralizing is merely plain wrong..

You buy other cards with Goons, with KC, with just about anything else. I guess they're not "centralizing". I do not understand this point at all. Dominion rewards diversity like nothing else, but you are always picking up a Peasant unless the board absolutely sucks, and even then sometimes devil magic makes it work.

The complaint isn't really just that it's centralizing, it's one tiny part of the complete package that is "wellp I'm a goner now on this no trash board with no outs".

[Holunder9]

I do not understand this point at all. Dominion rewards diversity like nothing else, but you are always picking up a Peasant unless the board absolutely sucks, and even then sometimes devil magic makes it work.

Hunting Grounds, Minion, Sauna/Avanto, there are numerous cards in Dominion which support mono-card strategies.

Adventures indeed does not but events like Lost Arts or Pathfinding are far more radical than Peasant-Teacher here. Teacher sometimes spreads around more than 1 token in which case you need several copies of more than just one card in your deck. Sometimes it makes sense to keep a Peasant around as source of extra Buys, sometimes you can afford to gift the Buy token to a pile.

Compared to a Minion game this really is anything but "centralizing".

[markus]

Yes, I suppose I could suck with Peasant. I think I am perfectly competent with Peasant. Markus will probably have stats on me though that could prove otherwise.

I could look that up, but it would only be around 15 Peasant games that I have for you. So probably, there's not going to be anything statistically significant there - unless you really suck and lost like almost all of them.

[trivialknot]

I felt like I understood Seprix's argument better and felt more sympathy towards it, when Peasant was replaced with King's Court.

[Simon Jester]

But yeah, power-cards are fine, as long as they need support or power up other cards they are not at all "centralizing". How often is the peasant-line the ONLY thing you buy? Comparing with Page, it's not too uncommon to only rely on it since it provides both draw and payload, with peasant you always need to find a way to use the line optimally somewhere else. You may of course dislike the card how much you want, but to call it centralizing is merely plain wrong..

You buy other cards with Goons, with KC, with just about anything else. I guess they're not "centralizing". I do not understand this point at all. Dominion rewards diversity like nothing else, but you are always picking up a Peasant unless the board absolutely sucks, and even then sometimes devil magic makes it work.

The complaint isn't really just that it's centralizing, it's one tiny part of the complete package that is "wellp I'm a goner now on this no trash board with no outs".

Yes, but the fact that you have to buy it is not an argument for calling it centralizing, it's only admitting that it is a power-card and I think no one would argue you on that. Some cards are on the level that you must buy it and yeah, it sucks if you're not found of the card. If you would argue that Peasant is perhaps the strongest card in the game in that regard I would understand you, but it's not centralizing the game because of it. There is plenty of decisions to be made after opening with peasant. 

To argue about it's swingyness is a bit silly to me, isn't that just.. Dominion? The KC-comparison is relevant especially in that regard. Falling behind in a power-card game is devastating. Yes, we know. And..?

But hate on. And please ban-list, you can't come sooner. *stares at Sauna*