Banlist Discussion!

[Lumin_S]

I hope that the revised edition has been blessed bye Uwe himself before publishing (and as far as I know this is the case).

There is a huge difference between the creator and the gamers. The creator knows exactly the intrinsic value for each card/action. The gamers just know how their intrinsic value become more or less juicy in an opportunistic way, i.e. tactically.

Banning cards from the gaming community implies a forced coordination in the tactical way in which we should play the game, which restricts a lot the variety of the game itself. And variety is the real fun in agricola.

Did you read this large section in my original post? Especially the last 2 points? Lookout Games is the publisher. I also strongly disagree about the creator knowing best... but please confirm that you read the below first.

Is a banlist necessary for competitive play?
Banlists have been a part of competitive Agricola for many years, both online at Boite-a-Jeux (BaJ) and Play-Agricola (PA), and in publisher-sanctioned tournaments.

• BaJ refers to their banlist option as "Tournament Mode" with discussion thread on their forum. (I think the discussion in the thread is inaccurate - all of the 2011, 2013, and 2017 world championships did not use decks available on BaJ. So there's not much productive discussion there.)

• PA has banlist options for a variety of deck sets: "-11" for EIKGCOZ decks, "-18" for NFW decks, and "-3" for ABCD decks. The community there has agreed (through a mostly mathematical process sometimes referred to as 'PWR' calculation) that for those groups of decks, it's appropriate to ban that number of cards.

• 2011 and 2013 World Championships held by Lookout Games both used the Wm deck only; to this date no cards from that deck have been banned.

• During the 2017 World Championship held by Lookout Games, Caravan was banned between the preliminary and semifinal rounds. Many players were unhappy about the lack of ban during preliminaries, and before the semifinals the judge and publisher representatives agreed that the card was affecting winning chances to an undesirable degree. Note that this tournament used the exact deck set that's currently available on BGA.

• Lookout Games has commented that a card in the C expansion should be banned from tournaments.

Based on these factors, I think it's clear that a banlist is a valid consideration for competitive play on BGA.

[Almicantarat]

I hope that the revised edition has been blessed bye Uwe himself before publishing (and as far as I know this is the case).

There is a huge difference between the creator and the gamers. The creator knows exactly the intrinsic value for each card/action. The gamers just know how their intrinsic value become more or less juicy in an opportunistic way, i.e. tactically.

Banning cards from the gaming community implies a forced coordination in the tactical way in which we should play the game, which restricts a lot the variety of the game itself. And variety is the real fun in agricola.

Did you read this large section in my original post? Especially the last 2 points? Lookout Games is the publisher. I also strongly disagree about the creator knowing best... but please confirm that you read the below first.

Is a banlist necessary for competitive play?
Banlists have been a part of competitive Agricola for many years, both online at Boite-a-Jeux (BaJ) and Play-Agricola (PA), and in publisher-sanctioned tournaments.

• BaJ refers to their banlist option as "Tournament Mode" with discussion thread on their forum. (I think the discussion in the thread is inaccurate - all of the 2011, 2013, and 2017 world championships did not use decks available on BaJ. So there's not much productive discussion there.)

• PA has banlist options for a variety of deck sets: "-11" for EIKGCOZ decks, "-18" for NFW decks, and "-3" for ABCD decks. The community there has agreed (through a mostly mathematical process sometimes referred to as 'PWR' calculation) that for those groups of decks, it's appropriate to ban that number of cards.

• 2011 and 2013 World Championships held by Lookout Games both used the Wm deck only; to this date no cards from that deck have been banned.

• During the 2017 World Championship held by Lookout Games, Caravan was banned between the preliminary and semifinal rounds. Many players were unhappy about the lack of ban during preliminaries, and before the semifinals the judge and publisher representatives agreed that the card was affecting winning chances to an undesirable degree. Note that this tournament used the exact deck set that's currently available on BGA.

• Lookout Games has commented that a card in the C expansion should be banned from tournaments.

Based on these factors, I think it's clear that a banlist is a valid consideration for competitive play on BGA.

I never wrote that the author of the game, aka creator, knows best. I wrote a different thing. Please confirm that you read my posts as well and interpret them as they are.

[Tisaac]

I still want to play competitive in Arena without any banlist.

I hope that the revised edition has been blessed bye Uwe himself before publishing (and as far as I know this is the case).

There is a huge difference between the creator and the gamers. The creator knows exactly the intrinsic value for each card/action. The gamers just know how their intrinsic value become more or less juicy in an opportunistic way, i.e. tactically.

Banning cards from the gaming community implies a forced coordination in the tactical way in which we should play the game, which restricts a lot the variety of the game itself. And variety is the real fun in agricola.

Then vote for it if you are a guru. Arena format is decided by the community. So if you find enough gurus agreeing with you, then why not. I would doubt so though, since that's the first time i hear such an opinion around the seasoned players.

[Wonderboat]

I hope that the revised edition has been blessed bye Uwe himself before publishing (and as far as I know this is the case).

There is a huge difference between the creator and the gamers. The creator knows exactly the intrinsic value for each card/action. The gamers just know how their intrinsic value become more or less juicy in an opportunistic way, i.e. tactically.

Banning cards from the gaming community implies a forced coordination in the tactical way in which we should play the game, which restricts a lot the variety of the game itself. And variety is the real fun in agricola.

Did you read this large section in my original post? Especially the last 2 points? Lookout Games is the publisher. I also strongly disagree about the creator knowing best... but please confirm that you read the below first.

Is a banlist necessary for competitive play?
Banlists have been a part of competitive Agricola for many years, both online at Boite-a-Jeux (BaJ) and Play-Agricola (PA), and in publisher-sanctioned tournaments.

• BaJ refers to their banlist option as "Tournament Mode" with discussion thread on their forum. (I think the discussion in the thread is inaccurate - all of the 2011, 2013, and 2017 world championships did not use decks available on BaJ. So there's not much productive discussion there.)

• PA has banlist options for a variety of deck sets: "-11" for EIKGCOZ decks, "-18" for NFW decks, and "-3" for ABCD decks. The community there has agreed (through a mostly mathematical process sometimes referred to as 'PWR' calculation) that for those groups of decks, it's appropriate to ban that number of cards.

• 2011 and 2013 World Championships held by Lookout Games both used the Wm deck only; to this date no cards from that deck have been banned.

• During the 2017 World Championship held by Lookout Games, Caravan was banned between the preliminary and semifinal rounds. Many players were unhappy about the lack of ban during preliminaries, and before the semifinals the judge and publisher representatives agreed that the card was affecting winning chances to an undesirable degree. Note that this tournament used the exact deck set that's currently available on BGA.

• Lookout Games has commented that a card in the C expansion should be banned from tournaments.

Based on these factors, I think it's clear that a banlist is a valid consideration for competitive play on BGA.

I never wrote that the author of the game, aka creator, knows best. I wrote a different thing. Please confirm that you read my posts as well and interpret them as they are.

You said "The creator knows exactly the intrinsic value for each card/action." which, given this is the subject, you essentially did say they know best.

Also I think Lumin was genuinely checking if you read what he referred to, so I don't think your snarky reply was warranted.

[Acerbic]

I'd like to circle back to the real purpose of this thread (the contents of the banlist, rather than its existence) and weigh in on the recent discussion of a few cards.

Big Country: I'd really like to see this card banned, since it's an almost mandatory pick at any point in the draft. If played with 2 rooms, it usually sets a baseline of at least ~50 points for your game. If played with 3 (or even 4 rooms) it still gives you a very high value action later in the game -- getting 2-3 points and 4-6 food on your SP action at no further cost is incredible. That kind of power and flexibility makes it incredibly hard to pass up, and I find that it wins disproportionally often, even in very competitive tables. Even when it doesn't win, it very often guarantees a 2nd place, which is very relevant within the context of a competitive environment with this ELO system.

Begging Student: Definitely needs to be banned. Just an incredible card that gives unprecedented action advantage. Even mediocre occs often shine when they're being put out for free and with the right timing and there are several noteworthy combos (tutor, patron, paper maker, bookshelf, bookcase) that really amp it up. Like Big Country, it's almost always wrong to pass it during the draft, and I don't think that's good for the game.

Assistant Tiller: I recognize its strength, but would not personally clamor for its ban. It's certainly insane when you hit the critical amount of day labor cards, but I personally don't find it too oppressive on its own. That being said, I would not oppose a ban or be overly sad about it if that's the majority opinion.

Potter Ceramics: At this time, I would not support a ban. It's certainly a very strong card, but only when combined with other combo pieces (primarily baking support, but also clay injection), which means an early draft can backfire. On top of that, I think there is often a significant cost and tempo price to setting it up, which can really impact your position in the growth queue. Overall, I think it's fine to have 2-3 card combos that can be costly to set up and do nothing but give you an efficient feeding plan.

[Almicantarat]

Did you read this large section in my original post? Especially the last 2 points? Lookout Games is the publisher. I also strongly disagree about the creator knowing best... but please confirm that you read the below first.

I never wrote that the author of the game, aka creator, knows best. I wrote a different thing. Please confirm that you read my posts as well and interpret them as they are.

You said "The creator knows exactly the intrinsic value for each card/action." which, given this is the subject, you essentially did say they know best.

Also I think Lumin was genuinely checking if you read what he referred to, so I don't think your snarky reply was warranted.

The are two different levels of understanding in Agricola. The first one is the intrinsic value of each card/action. The second one is the opportunistic way of getting such cards/actions, i.e. tactics.

You all are focussing just in the tactics. That's why you banned carriage trip, caravan, cross-cut wood and braggart. The first two (barriage trip, caravan) ruin brutally the growth queue, which is just tactics. Cross-cut wood ruins the wish to have control on wood resources which drive the growth queue. Then comes the poor braggart which is an improved version of lantern house: but obviously, since you care only on growth queue, you banned braggart only, since lantern house implies a slow entrance in the growth queue.

And when you want to speak about cards which are intrinsically good, i.e. big country, you refer to statistics even though you know 0 about statìstics. You know 0 about bias, distributions, randomiciy etc.

[Acerbic]

Almicantarat, you've said your piece -- you don't like the banlist. That's fine. You're welcome to play without it, and if you're sad about not being able to play arena with your preferred settings, that's a different topic. As pointed out before, if there are enough like-minded people, you can try to rally people to vote for a different format next season.

In the meantime, this conversation isn't going anywhere and it's derailing the topic of this thread.

[Thamoo]

Personally i'm very happy with the current banlist. It seems obvious that agricola is a much better competitive game without caravan, braggart and carriage trip (I will not comment on cross-cut wood as I have never played it).

I think it's dangerous to only consider power level (even though it is the most important factor) when considering which cards to ban. I'm very happy with big country, begging student and assistant tiller as the ''best'' cards as they both :
1. Don't seem too overpowering.
2. Open up interesting lines of play or strategies.

Regardless of where we draw the line, some card will come up on top. Might as well place that line in a way that preserve the most diversity.

[Wonderboat]

I'm on board with the Big Country, Begging Student, and Assistant Tiller ban.

[MasterOfWar]

Let me see if I can find some middle ground here. I am a highly ranked competitive player and I understand the desire to have an as close to level playing field as possible for matches. I also understand that this site is here for players of all skill levels and competitive temperaments. I hope that we can all agree that we are here to have fun. I am relatively new to this site but my sense is, judging simply from its name, that the arena seasons are this site's centerpiece. Any banlist that we generate will almost certainly apply to the arena seasons and therefore affect players of all skill levels.
I worry that we competitive players are pinpointing certain cards for banning more because we don't like losing to them than because they make the game less fun. Over time we will all have a chance to draft them and therefore, in the long run, the playing field will be more or less level. Less competitive or less skilled players will also be able to enjoys them and over time learn to use them more powerfully. If data show that one or a small number of cards are markedly more powerful than others I won't argue against banning them. However, we now stand at the point of having already banned four cards with considerable campaigning for further bans. I find it interesting that, according to Lumin's post, PA has banned only three cards from the entire ABCD card pool.