Banlist Discussion!

[Graey]

Personally, I am much more lenient on cards that allow for unique strategies and varying play.

For this reason, the only cards I would support banning immediately are cross-cut wood and carriage trip. Cross-cut wood is pretty strong and game warping in general, and busted with freemason. Carriage trip I personally don't especially care about, but it can be annoying and some people very strongly dislike it. The key thing for me is that the existence of both of these cards doesn't really add to the experience of playing the game, only detract.

FW and Clay supports I can definitely see being banned at some point, but I'm not convinced an instant ban is warranted. In the case of FW especially, if the thing that makes it worthy of a ban is cards that will come at a later date I don't see why we shouldn't allow people to play with it until those cards arrive. Right now I think the only card that is potentially problematic with it is Straw thatched roof, and that combo has existed in EIK without being too strong. I don't think the idea of unlockable plows is especially threatening with all the plows added in CD, and factors such as the plentiful food in revised as well as more playable grain cards applying pressure on the ovens weaken it somewhat compared to EIK. I'm not especially concerned about the early reno cards with clay supports, the one card I think could be problematic is roof ballaster. However, with half timbered house as the only stone house payoff I'm not sure it's game breaking.

Bookcase, Lantern Wonder, and Begging student all fall into the same category for me. I think they are definitely not bannable in draft 7 format, and while they are quite strong in draft 9 even then I'm not convinced they're ban worthy. I would just keep an eye on them.

[Lumin_S]

I think Field Watchman and Clay Supports are too strong in Revised formats and should be banned. To respond to part of MasterOfWar's comment, not only do plow cards in the Revised decks show up at lower frequencies, but the amount of building resource injection and Clay House support is also considerably larger compared to EIK games, where these cards existed and were good but not ban-level. If those two are not banned now, they will surely need to be banned later assuming the rest of the ABCD decks show up:

Regarding Clay Supports - aside from Cottager there's no currently implemented card that allows early renovation, but in the A deck there's one more (Renovation Company) and in the B deck there are four (!) more (Upscale Lifestyle, Final Scenario, Established Person, Plumber.) With 6+ cards allowing possible early renovations, I have seen Clay Supports have too strong a game, too often in IRL plays (these are mostly base+CD+A+B.)

Regarding Field Watchman - I think there could maybe be a case where it's not quite too strong with the currently implemented cards, but later expansion cards that enable strong grain conversion to food and/or bonus points will surely put the card into ban-worthy territory. There are a lot of these cards, for example in the A deck Beer Keg, Baking Sheet, and Ale Benches all give a way to convert grain into bonus points and sometimes food too.

I think Carriage Trip is probably over the line on annoyance: once it shows up in the draft, it never goes away - it will always be in someone's hand and the possibility of it being played is a continuous concern. Especially in the growth queue. I think there's a good amount of skill in how and when to use it, but it's not fun to keep track of at all IMO.

I think Cross-Cut Wood, Lantern House, and Carrot Museum are worthy of ban consideration due to annoyance (if you get annoyed at high-variance, which I'd say is a valid thing to get annoyed by) and haven't made up my mind if I think those are too much or not.

I think Begging Student might be too strong, because it just ends up on the winner's farm so, so often. But would really like to have stats to back that one up and don't feel super confident about that claim. Bookcase could be too strong and seems to me like it should be, but I don't see it win annoyingly often.

My current stances:
Ban for power: Field Watchman, Clay Supports
Ban for annoyance: Carriage Trip
Watchlist, consider banning for power if people see the cards winning too much: Begging Student, Bookcase
Watchlist, consider banning based on how many people find it annoying: Cross-Cut Wood, Lantern House, Carrot Museum

[EconSean]

Here is where I'm at after a lot of discussion, observation, and some additional experience (especially playing some games with only high rated players recently):

Should be banned (in order of importance):

Carriage Trip: This card is incredibly annoying. The better of players that you play against, the worse things you can expect from this card. You can essentially use it as a get-out-of-jail free card with family growth queue early on, but then it can also be used later to hold starting player for an irritating amount of time. It's not too powerful, but leads to a more negative experience playing agricola because it breaks the game flow too badly.

Field Watchman: In draft 7 a card that is this powerful by itself is incredibly problematic. In higher draft formats field watchman isn't as oppressive due to the ability of other players to take advantage of the extra actions on the board to better set up their strategies. However in draft 7, those strategies are far less coherent due to a lesser card selection, leading to the one-card combo of field watchman being good enough to take over a game by itself. Additionally, this card will need to be banned later when more cards get added, so it's safe to ban this card now.

Cross-Cut Wood: I have had too many games where this adds an insane amount of wood. It's too easy for a person with the right cards to use this for 7-9 wood later on in the game to build fences, and then it adds even more wood. In games where it is played it can add upwards of 16 wood late in the game, which completely warps the wood economy of the game when played around in a way that is even more impactful than something like mini pasture. It feels very bad to cut a players who is doing stone house things off of wood to have them get insane wood from a minor improvement, and destroys a lot of the counterplay that exists in agricola. For that reason I really hope that the community can find it in their hearts to see how warping this card can be and ban it.

Clay Supports: I still think this card is slightly too good. I haven't played with this card on this site in a while, but this card singlehandedly unlocks an insane point ceiling with very little effort, and I still think that it should be banned, especially if new cards get implemented in the future that unlock early reno.

There are other cards that have been flagged by people that are worth watching, but at this point, this list of cards is what my gut tells me would lead to a better competitive experience for everyone without reducing the diversity of strategies that are available in CD.

[Mirmydon]

Hello fellow agricola players,

I'm clearly not that good nor that experienced a player as you are but I'd still comment on this banlist.

Field Watchman : very strong indeed but you have to delay your first room, your first family growth or maybe lose the oven race if you want to unlock its true potential early imho, this can be very risky against competent opponents. As for combos with cards that could be implemented later, let's see when they are because there are already other cards that can give you lots of grain if played well : Grain Harvester, Seasonal Worker, Childless, etc. I'd be more inclined to ban the cards that gives huge benefits with grain than Field Watchman. And for the free plow action, I'd still think Assistant tiller is more powerful considering the 2 food of Daily Laborer as there's lots of occupations nicely comboing with for getting grains, the 3 already cited obviously but also Animal Tamer, Conjurer, Pet Lover, Seed Seller or even Over Winterer, Thresher and Livestock Feeder. And we should not forget that there are also Plowman Driver, Plow Maker and Plowman. Finally I have to admit that I'm more a baker than anything so banning it doesn't suit my playstyle...

Clay supports : very strong but is this better than Carpenter's Parlor or Clay Plasterer ? I'm not sure, if you can renovate early for sure it gives the player an advantage, otherwise I don't think so. So I'm not in favour of banning it and if it were to be banned then I'd like to see Clay Plasterer and Carpenter's Parlor banned too, they give the same discount for room building more or less (2c+1w+1r vs 3c+1r vs 2w+2r). And I'd also strongly consider banning Wooden Hut Extender also. But cheap rooms are fun, aren't they ?

Carriage Trip : annoying and powerful imho. It can mess the growth queue but also in the 3 last turns when it's a huge advantage to be first player and so being guaranteed of 2 excellent or needed action spaces. So definitely worth a ban.

Begging Student : extremely powerful, it gives 5-6 free actions, but then compared to a quickly played Childless I'm not sure which is the most powerful : 5-6 actions along the course of the game or 3-4 early actions that really can set your plan easily, obviously a combo of those two is deadly. With Patron, Bookshelf or even Bookcase this is stupidly strong food wise. But you get a begging marker and cannot get Constable points, 6 points is a huge swing at your expense if those two are played. Could be worth a ban but again Like Lumin said, I'm not sure this is always on the winner's side and stats would be interesting to see.

Bookcase/Bookshelf : they can be stupidly strong food wise with the good occupations alongside : Begging Student, Patron, Scholar, Tutor and Schnaps Distiller. Bookshelf's 3 occs prerequisite might make it a bit less strong. Manservant in an early reno strategy is also exceptionally strong for feeding, Big Country also and with nice ceiling points. Not in favour of banning them.

Cross-Cut Wood : It can for sure mess up the economy, it still needs support for getting a lot of stone. Rammed Clay with Clay Embankment which is clearly not a first pick can also be a very good combo, an exceptional one if you add the Clay Hut Builder in the mix or Hard Porcelain (not first picks either), considering clay might be easily abundant in some games. In the same type of minors with a food cost offering you a discount Field Fences in combo with a good plow enabling occupation or minor can also be very strong, fencing on Start Player with less wood to pay and a breeding pair or even better as first action next turn if played in the right tempo, as a farmer/baker sign me in. This is a lot stronger than Mini Pasture as it doesn't get passed around the table. Not sure Cross-Cut Wood is worth of a ban but wood and stone are indeed very valuable points wise.

Lantern House : can be very strong but this needs a lot of help. to get 7 points this means 7 actions for occupations and in the best case 2 renovations, 2-3 family growths, 2-3 Start Player. This is a lot considering that you need to grab resources, feed, etc and while you're doing that your opponents can buy majors, work on making a beautiful farm. For points ceiling, I don't think this is stronger than Tutor or Big Country. And Mantlepiece if I read well might be worth a ban if there is a lot of early reno cards that will be implemented. For now there's only Cottager with which it is stupidly strong as a turn 3 mantlepiece is perfectly doable for a nice 8 points's swing but if there's 6 cards allowing it, I think we should consider to ban it. As for Lantern House, don't ban it imho.

Carrot Museum : This is a weird card, can be very strong with good support but what are the odds ? You need an early vegetable provider, plow enabling cards and a lot of dedication to the plan or you'll only get trickles of stone and wood. Imho this is too card dependent to be worth a ban.

So I would only be in favour of banning Carriage trip, Mantlepiece if there's more early reno cards and maybe Begging Student and Cross-Cut Wood but that's all. I do like the variety of combos available, they're what makes the fun and endless replayability of this excellent game. If we consider the drafting format, I think that for the arena mode only the brutal draft 7 should be used imho. With more cards in the mix and only 28 available for the players in a 4-er, very good combos should be diluted in the pool and not often available, even more so in 3-er and 2-er. Sometimes one player might get a very lucky draft but it already happens, doesn't it ? And banning some cards would also make others better. Take Carpenter's Parlor, Clay Plasterer and Clay Supports out of the mix, Carpenter, Clay Hut Builder and Frame Builder gets a lot more stronger and might become first picks ; remove Field Watchman, Assistant Tiller and the other plowing cards available gain strength, etc.

[Ranior]

With Lumin's latest announcement that we have card statistics for plays coming in https://boardgamearena.com/forum/viewto ... 46&t=23574 I think this conversation can take a slightly more interesting turn. We'll have real data for some of these things, although some work is still required to discuss what formats/filters are needed in the data.

However, based on the early numbers, there is nothing as obvious as Caravan for example that requires an immediate ban for power. I still think there's a very strong chance Field Watchman in particular will prove to be too good but for now I'm alright just saying we're reviewing it for a few more weeks. (If next season's arena includes CD, I'd like the banlist to be updated and in place PRIOR to the start of the season though. I hate games changing formats during a season, and even something minor like the banlist during the middle of a season I'd rather mostly avoid, although this is a minor thing). Regardless, I'm on board with just saying quite a few things we'll be paying attention to how they fare in the next several weeks/months.

My only card at the moment I would ban and I think there is enough support for based on this thread, is to just get rid of Carriage Trip for annoyance reasons. It is really annoying to keep track of dumb Furnisher/Carriage Trip combos, annoying to worry about Carriage Trip + Build actions around the grow queue, and annoying to deal with in the late game. It doesn't unlock particularly interesting strategies or counterplay. It just is an annoying card that breaks the usual flow of the game in a way that isn't good. Let's add it to the ban list for annoyance.

I'm still okay with banning Cross Cut Wood for annoyance reasons. I think it severely warps the wood/stone economy in some games. It is a card you can't draft with many hands as it doesn't do much, but then some players can make quite a bit of use out of it and it allows them to play pretty oddly and game warping. As Lumin says, this is partially just how much variance you're also willing to tolerate in some cards, but the combination of game warping, annoyance, and variance is too high for me. However it isn't clear there is enough universal support for this one.

Other annoying and high variance cards include Carrot Museum but I am not as concerned about this one. I don't think it needs a ban. It can be pretty fun to set up and abuse, but it requires a decent number of cards and actions to get working, so I'm not convinced it is too strong. It is annoying how variable it is since a lot of hands can't use it, but something like Straw Thatched Roof is also extremely variable in how it's useless for many hands, but very strong for Field Watchman, etc.

The new stats Lumin has provided also bring up an interesting thing to watch: Assistant Tiller is showing up as extremely strong, and certain ban worthy. I don't know if that will hold, but it's a card we'll need to pay attention to. For the record if Assistant Tiller does wind up getting banned, lots of things will shift around that, particularly anything helping with plows. The other card that we've seen around for awhile and I know some have wondered about banning is Big Country and it does look like that too needs to stay on the watch list. It is hovering in that area of being too strong--it's tough for some of these about just how strong of cards are we willing to allow, but Big Country appears on that edge. Finally while I don't think it probably is ban worthy, Carpenter's Parlor also looks to be in the realm of needing to be on the watchlist.

I continue to remain entirely unconcerned about Lantern House and the early returns from the stats seem to back up that it isn't even approaching too strong. It is somewhat variable for various hands, and I admittedly tend to mostly play lower draft counts, where if you play draft 10 it gets better, but I still just don't ever expect that it is worth banning. I think Bookcase is very good, will be curious how the stats on that one continue to evolve but at the moment there seems to be no worry. Bookshelf also is good, especially if you play higher draft counts, but again I don't think there is a worry about the moment and I doubt it needs to be banned. Clay Supports is a card I'm still concerned about in the long term, but the current stats picture we got don't have it as a concern for power, and I'm not worried about it for annoyance reasons. If the stats say it isn't overpowered I'll listen to them, but I still think in time players may learn how to abuse that card to ban worthy levels. Begging Student is a mild concern to me on raw power--and the stats do somewhat back this one up too. However there isn't enough evidence at the moment he should get banned, I personally think Begging Student should be allowed and we keep him even long term--but again we can see how the stats develop on it for now.

**************************************************************

Phew, that was a lot. In summary here are my thoughts:

Ban Now: Carriage Trip (too annoying)

Ban Watchlist (continue seeing how they perform and what stats say over the next several weeks/months, along with personal experience): Field Watchman, Assistant Tiller, Big Country, Begging Student, Carpenter's Parlor (all for strength reasons)

Potential Concerns (cards that aren't currently even suggesting they are too strong but merit some attention because of potential strength): Bookshelf, Bookcase, Lantern House, Clay Supports

Annoyance Watchlist (cards with high variance that possibly warp the game too much and aren't fun/good to have in competitive play): Cross Cut Wood, Carrot Museum

[EconSean]

After looking at the data, my opinion is changed on two things:

I do not think Clay supports should be banned. It's simply not powerful enough according to the data. I do think field watchman poses enough of a problem in draft 7 that it will likely take over arena games.

I DO think that Big Country should be banned. Let me explain:

Big Country is a card that is unlike many other cards in agricola, which is that, in order to play the card prior to round 9, you have to not build rooms, plow 4/5 fields and fence 12-15 covering your farm. This is something that you CAN accomplish in all games if you want to, since plowing early via the plow space is seldom used, and if you want to you can easily get 12 wood to fence by round 6-8. This means that PWR, which is a ranking that weights on how often the card is played, is a bad metric to analyze a card like big country since PWR takes into account how often a card is played, since if you play the card this way you can ALWAYS play it prior to round 9, but that decision has to be made before the first round of the game since your first 7 rounds are going to play out very similarly. One of the strengths of how PWR works is that it balances how often it is played with how often it wins when a card is played, which takes advantage of the fact that in agricola many cards are situational. For analyzing post round-8 big country PWR does an incredible job, since when you do get to play big country, you have a completed farm which already gives you a ton of points, and so when you are able to play it you are going to be winning a lot, so we need to factor in how often it can be played. However, with pre round-9 big country it is an entirely different story, since every player CAN play the card that way, they just may not choose to for many reasons: maybe they do not know that the card can be played in that way, or maybe they do not enjoy playing the card that way. PWR also does a poor job at measuring stats when a card is hatedrafted, which I personally will hatedraft big country quite frequently so that others cannot play it in arena.

I have asked Lumin to sort the stats for big country by whether it was played in round 8 or before, versus whether it was played in round 9 or after in the arena dataset. In round 8 or before, the card is played 152 times and wins 70 times, which amounts to a win rate of ~46%. This means that, if a player decides to play big country early, which I argue you are always able to do if you choose to, you win 46% of games that you do this in. I think that number is far too high to be acceptable. A card that single-handedly wins you 46% of games if you play it in one way is far too powerful, and I believe it should be banned solely for that.

For non-statistical arguments, 2-room big country is too powerful in games where other players cannot put together cohesive plans, and the win rate does fall significantly when looking at the 200+ ELO sample down to 40% overall (although I do not know the win rate of pre round-9 big country). Big country plans also allow you to sidestep a lot of what other people are doing: You spend early actions plowing and taking wood when only wood is contested. You take one food action to cover feeding, and then if you are able to drop big country in round 6/7 you are able to get 14-16 food which, since you only have 2 members, covers you for 3 harvests. Then, while everyone else is fighting over grow and food sources, you get to take animal pairs to breed, take crops to sow in your fields to create a point engine, or take resource piles to build improvements/reno. Additionally, in rounds 11/12/13 you have a bunch of late minors that you want to play, and so it's very easy to justify starting player for FG without room, which other players may have trouble justifying due to the fact that when you fight over grows you end up having to play many minors. This is heavily benefited by certain cards that are just insane on two rooms. Pastor is always incredibly efficient. Small scale farmer is just worth a wood each round. Manger is worth 3 points. Bottles is very cheap even later into the game. These cards are not very good on normal farms and so they will frequently get passed to the person who is trying to play big country.

This data pushes this analysis over the top for me. I am a very vocal hater of big country, but did not believe it to be too strong before looking at this data since higher ELO players have an easier time combating it due to playing in a more efficient way and being more likely to try to set up blocking the big country, which is hard to do. However, 45% win rate is just far too insane for a single strategy, and for that I think it should be banned.

If you haven't played the small house big country before, try it in your next game. I guarantee you'll be shocked at how good it is, even if your draft isn't perfect for it.

[jooool]

I have not been playing too much on Board-game-arena yet, maybe 50-60 games total with around half of the games with AB and half with ABCD.
In total I have played maybe 1000 games and with that maybe around 150 games with revised edition (almost only draft 9-7 4players and some 3players)

To me it's hard to decide how to base decisions on what cards to ban or not as cards will be stronger/weaker depending on how strong players are at the table. I have been playing quite many games with players all the way from 100 up to 550 ELO and the games feels often like it's very random and very hard to predict (family growth ques are not prioritized nor respected) which makes it very hard to plan your game in a good way.
I see many posts on fields watchman being too strong, which to me could be true if you play a game where you have no idea what your opponents will do, as you always will have a strong move to fall back on if you get unpredictably blocked out of your "planned safe move".

If looking into games with only slightly higher ranked players (350-400+) cards like field watchman, lantern house, carpenters parlor etc. are still strong cards but is not enough to win a game, you still need to make a good game and make use of the cards in a good way and therefore to me a ban is not necessary.

To me the list of absolute ban-worthy cards is very short:

Begging student

This card is so generically extremely good which saves you at least 6 food and 6 actions and can be played at any time during stage one, and the surprise effect when you can get food/building resources/discounts/play house steward or constable after r14 workphase is so strong. and not to talk about if you combo this card with bookcase/patron/bookshelf/lantern house/(sometimes tutor) and more.
however I like this card and would rather change it than remove it, a suggestion would be to either forbid the player to play occupations manually or make the occupation cost 1/2 food or both of these.


Cards I would like to see banned not because of pure strength but other reasons are:
Carriage trip (absolutely annoying card that often ruins someones game due to sitting last for the entire stage 5).
Cross-cut wood (this card can ruin the economy of a game by introducing up to 20+ wood which to me isn't a good designed card. also it is too strong and bad interaction together with roof balaster).

When discussing cards like big country I tend to see that it maxes out around 48-49 points (unless you get an extremely good draft or play with players that let you do whatever you need) which often tend to be too little to win at least at higher ranks (you basically have to roll the dice for late FG- which makes it so i would almost never play this line with additional action spaces). I'm assuming many of the thoughts about banning this card came from when only AB was available where I can agree the card could be too strong as you almost always got the generic good minors to go with it.

EDIT: I am not a big fan of draft 7 and I'm not sure how the strength will vary in this format and I have not taken that in to consideration in my thoughts.

[msclark]

I'm not as experienced as many of the players here so don't really feel qualified to offer my own opinion, but I thought it would be interesting to collate the responses on this thread so far to see where there was consensus. These are (I believe) all the cards that have so far been considered for banning, with some quotes from everyone who mentioned them. I hope I haven't missed anything, or misrepresented anyone's opinions. If so, let me know and I'll edit this.


Clay Supports

EconSean - "I'm fine seeing it banned." However, after later seeing the stats, "I do not think Clay supports should be banned."

Ranior - "I think I do lean towards banning this."

torvaldur_makan - "While strong I don't think it should be banned."

fiscused - "I'm for keeping [it]."

MasterOfWar - "Clay supports by itself is a good, but not over-powered card."

Graey - "I'm not convinced an instant ban is warranted."

Lumin_S - "too strong in Revised formats and should be banned."

Mirmydon - "I'm not in favour of banning it."


Field Watchman

EconSean - "I don't think this should be banned." Then, after some further thought: "Additionally, this card will need to be banned later when more cards get added, so it's safe to ban this card now."

Ranior - "I think I would ban him."

torvaldur_makan - "No ban, at least not initially."

fiscused - "I'm for keeping [it]."

MasterOfWar - "I would hate to see [it] banned."

Graey - "I'm not convinced an instant ban is warranted."

Lumin_S - "too strong in Revised formats and should be banned."

Mirmydon - [generally not in favour of a ban]


Begging Student

EconSean - "... with the current format as is I see this card being strong, but not overbearing."

Ranior - "For now I'd rather not [ban it]."

torvaldur_makan - "Definite ban."

fiscused - "I'm for keeping [it]."

MasterOfWar - "I guess I would take a wait and see approach with begging student."

Graey - "definitely not bannable in draft 7 format."

Lumin_S - "Watchlist, consider banning for power."

Mirmydon - "Could be worth a ban but [...] I'm not sure this is always on the winner's side."

jooool - on "the list of absolute ban-worthy cards."


Carriage Trip

EconSean - "While I do not believe this card is too powerful, if people wanted this card to be gone I would be completely on-board with it."

Gyorgy - "I would ban carriage trip."

Ranior - "I'm very open to banning this."

torvaldur_makan - "Ban, it's annoying."

MasterOfWar - "I say keep it."

Graey - "I would support banning immediately."

Lumin_S - "Ban for annoyance."

Mirmydon - "definitely worth a ban."

jooool - "I would like to see banned"


Lantern House

torvaldur_makan - "This card is extremely strong." (doesn't explicitly wish for a ban, only a discussion)

EconSean - "... in formats with more cards it's probably too powerful [...], but in draft 7 your last 2 minors/occs tend to be harder to play."

fiscused - "I'm for keeping [it]."

Ranior - "I actually don't have an issue with Lantern House."

MasterOfWar - "I don't see lantern house as inherently over-powered."

Graey - "definitely not bannable in draft 7 format."

Lumin_S - "worthy of ban consideration due to annoyance."

Mirmydon - "don't ban it"


Cross Cut Wood

Ranior - "I think I'm personally on the end of banning it."

Graey - "I would support banning immediately."

Lumin_S - "worthy of ban consideration due to annoyance."

EconSean - "I really hope that the community can find it in their hearts to see how warping this card can be and ban it."

Mirmydon - "Not sure Cross-Cut Wood is worth of a ban."

jooool - "I would like to see banned"


Bookcase

Graey - "definitely not bannable in draft 7 format."

Lumin_S - "Watchlist, consider banning for power."

Mirmydon - "Not in favour of banning [it]."

Ranior - "at the moment there seems to be no worry."


Carrot Museum

Lumin_S - "worthy of ban consideration due to annoyance."

Mirmydon - "this is too card dependent to be worth a ban."

Ranior - "I don't think it needs a ban."


Bookshelf

Mirmydon - "Not in favour of banning [it]."

Ranior - "I doubt it needs to be banned."


Assistant Tiller

Ranior - "is showing up [in the stats] as extremely strong, and certain ban worthy."


Big Country

Ranior - "it does look like that too needs to stay on the watch list."

EconSean - "I DO think that Big Country should be banned."


Carpenter's Parlor

Ranior - "in the realm of needing to be on the watchlist."

[MasterOfWar]

I suspect that some of the posts in this thread are influenced by something akin to observation bias (for the researchers out there, I am using this term loosely). In other words, what we think we see may not actually be what is happening. For example, if we believe that lantern house (or big country or clay supports, etc.) is too powerful, every time the winning player has played this card we say, "See. There's another lantern house/big country/ clay supports win. This card is too powerful." It is easy to do that with cards like these because they pull for a style of play or way of gaining points that diverges from standard play and, therefore, stands out. We tend not to notice the other cards played or tactical decisions made by the winner that also contributed to his or her victory. On the other hand, how many of us have ever said, "See. There's another lettuce patch win. Lettuce patch is too powerful." This is because lettuce patch fits neatly and unobtrusively with standard play. Lumin's stats, however, suggest that it is every bit as powerful, if not more powerful than many of the cards we have been discussing.

I say we hold off on banning any cards for power until we have more data. I'm sure that one of you who is more mathematically adept than I can tell us when we have a n large enough to be statistically significant. In the meantime, draft lettuce patch first!

[David_Pearce]

Hi everyone,

Carriage Trip (free passing minor: Immediately place another person) I don't believe this card is too powerful, but it is insanely annoying when the starting player in round 12 goes starting player carriage trip into round 12 action (only to have the next player do the same play in round 13), or when a person on 4 rooms can go FG+start in order to bypass the room queue. I immediately feel bad every time I see this card in a draft, and it feels very bad to be blown out by this card (similar to caravan). While I do not believe this card is too powerful, if people wanted this card to be gone I would be completely on-board with it.

I am arriving at this discussion late (but I did mention it in a bug report as an aside)

I would actually disagree with the original description of why cards get banned. It is not annoyance factor but whether or not they are game breaking.

Anything that breaks the starting player action or anything that allows family growth (wish for children)

The issue with carriage trip arises most strongly and seen in games as such:

is:

* scholar allows a player to bypass start player including turn 14.

* As does furnisher + mason

Also
* I had a game where a player rage quit when I built a room and carriage trip grew in order to queue jump family growth
* round 14 a player 2x renovated when another player played carriage trip in round 13 to renovate.

This card should not be down to a vote it just needs to be added to a banned list