Banlist Discussion!

[alexwjb]

We need to finalise a banlist before the new arena season starts, which is less than two weeks away. My list would be:

occs
C102 Tree Guard
A131 Craft Teacher
D092 Child Ombudsman
A097 Freshman
B162 Forest Clearer

minors
D074 Royal Wood
B015 Carpenters Bench
A014 Carpenters Hammer
E022 Guest Room
C028 Teachers Desk (unless we move to Draft 7 or Draft 8, in which case keep because it is fun when not broken)


Both in descending order of how strongly I feel about them. All the arguments against these cards have been made in the last few posts.

I haven't included Pulveriser Plow, because in a world without the above cards, my hope is it wouldn't be as strong (since taking clay actions late game is not normally a great move, and without the above we should see fewer games with loads of big families). But I have no problem with it being banned.

Recruitment is already banned and for the record I think it should stay banned.

In summary this is Siv's list of Definite Banning + Prefer Banning, but I have included Tree Guard and taken out Pulveriser Plow.

[JustYellow]

Making a new list. Same format as before - cards that definitely should be banned, cards that I think should be banned but think I could be convinced otherwise, cards I think could be banned but I don't have a strong preference either way, and cards I think have arguments to ban (i.e got mentioned in this thread) but personally feel definitely do not belong on the banlist. I have more explanations besides cards here.

Definite Bans: D092 Child Ombudsman (grows too easily. massive action advantage it can give means you win by 10+ points, not the 4-6 this card makes you pay for growth), A131 Craft Teacher, A097 Freshman, C028 Teachers Desk (these cards enable occs far too easily, freshman with combos, craft teacher by just growing first then building guilds, teachers desk by playing the other half of your hand or all the majors), D021 Recruitment (the latest update said the devs want to unban it with errata. Please don't. The growth is too simple even if it only happens in r5).

Prefer Banning: B015 Carpenters Bench (enabling alternative fencing actions is a strong minor. netting 3 wood for free is a strong minor. this is both), D019 Pulverizer Plow (easy plows, and can wreck the clay economy for other players), D074 Royal Wood (10+ wood on a 1f minor for playing the way you should with a lot of wood), A014 Carpenters hammer (decent alone, absurd combos), E022 Guest Room (looks like it might be better than lover), B162 Forest Clearer (giving extra wood on wood actions is decent. helping feeding with these better wood actions is very strong).

All of carpenters bench, forest clearer and pulverizer plow to me seem to incentivize pushing growth and then farming with late moves, which I feel removes one of the bigger tensions in the game (that having lots of actions to use does not mean you have lots of good actions to take).

Neutral: C023 Job Contract, E075 Stone Axe, E116 Fir Cutter, D014 Hammer Crusher, (strong cards that I don't think get into ban power) A093 Bed Maker, C092 Autumn Mother, B092 Little Stick Knitter (i believe alternative growth space enablers are fine when it's this awkward, but combos can make it not awkward), A074 Stable tree (very strong combos, mediocre alone),

Some older cards I don't feel strongly about: C102 Tree guard (attacks a very specific area of the game (stone) very strongly, while being weak on wood. On power I don't think it deserves a ban, but it does have a large warping effect on the game. The combos with strong wood don't especially scare me given that strong wood is probably game winning alone.). B117 Informant (Gives an absurd amount of wood, but I find the requirement to have stone and not have clay frequently makes things very awkward, especially given that many cards and strategies flat out do not work with informant).
C104 collector (I love collector, but it enables you to do basically anything which strong players will probably turn into a win somehow.)

Against banning: B032 Kettle, A010 Wooden shed, B076 Ceilings, E102 Acquirer,(strong cards that I am sure don't get into ban power) D030 Artisan District, (high variance, but difficult to pull off).

Dont know if the banlist is being updated for the next arena season, but I completely agree with everything in this post.
Hope both the definite and the prefered bans are implemented.
And Tree Guard too. Not for the power but for making it a "different" game.

[alexwjb]

Is the plan to impement a banlist before the new season? It would be nice to have a consistent cardset for it, and everyone who has posted in this thread agrees on at least some cards.

It seems like everyone wants these banned:

A131 Craft Teacher
D092 Child Ombudsman
B162 Forest Clearer
D074 Royal Wood
B015 Carpenters Bench
E022 Guest Room
C028 Teachers Desk (since the new season will be Draft 9 or Draft 10)

and these cards have most people wanting them banned:

A014 Carpenters Hammer
A097 Freshman
D019 Pulverizer Plow
C102 Tree Guard


If you're reading this and have a view please post! Let's get this sorted in the next few days.

[Smoo]

F Craft teacher. That is all.

Don't feel strongly towards anything else either for or against, unless people bring up unbanning Big Country and Little Peasant again.

[SabinL]

My 2 cents on the bans I would like to see for next season:

Craft Teacher
Child Ombudsman
Tree Guard

Royal Wood
Teacher's desk
guest room

[Lumin_S]

My current ban opinions assuming next arena season is 9/7 or 10/7:

Too Strong
- Craft Teacher
- Informant
- Lover
- Royal Wood
- Carpenter's Bench
- Child Ombudsman
- Recruitment (this needs to be re-campaigned for due to translation issues)

Mix between Too Strong and Too Annoying
- Freshman
- Pulverizer Plow

Too Annoying
- Tree Guard
- Archway
- Artisan District (I'm annoyed by its existence more than its play patterns tbh)

And I'm definitely watchlisting most of the other cards mentioned but am trying to suggest fewer bans than I might have previously.

[Swathe]

Played a sizable amount of games in draft 10, and with the season now moving to draft 9 here are the cards I'd like to see banned:

Too Strong/Definite Bans:
-Craft Teacher (If you don't fall into the trap of rushing a guild before your first room, this card is obscenely powerful and generates free actions)
-Child Ombudsman (Growing on command is strong. Who knew?)
-Freshman (If you get a Steam Machine or Baking Course you generally win on the spot, still good even on Grain Utilization for free occ's)
-Royal Wood (Pay 1 food to get 10+ Free Wood)
-Carpenter's Bench (The discount on fences is great, but getting free fence tempo is just nuts)
-Recruitment (Even With Errata)

Preferred Bans:
-Teacher's Desk (In Draft 9/10 it enables powerful occ's too easily. In Draft 8 it's probably barely okay)
-Pulverizer Plow (Enables Big House with late game farming strategies too easily in addition to ruining the clay economy)
-Carpenter's Hammer (As Siv said, it's good on its own and has absurd combos)
-Forest Clearer (Extra Wood - Good. Food w/ Extra Wood - REALLY Good)

Too Annoying/Please Ban for the Sake of Fun Games:
-Tree Guard (Completely warps the game in a very unfun manner and can result in seat position nightmares)

Currently Neutral:
-Informant (Like Siv said, it makes it pretty awkward when you want to try and get clay for a hearth or a renovation)
-Guest Room (Extremely powerful card, but needs a lot of food up front to make it work. Would want to see stats before looking at banning)
-Lover (In the current meta, food can be relatively difficult to come by because people tend to play a lot of powerful occ's early. Maybe look into a ban in draft 8 or lower)

Definitely No Ban:
-Stone Axe (Good card but paying stone for wood is an actual cost and doesn't win you the game on its own)
-Fir Cutter (Getting wood on animals is cool, but if you're getting the actions required to get the most out of this card you were probably winning anyway)
-Job Contract (The most annoying part of this card is when someone re-ups start in round 1 to play it. It's typically a slightly better Patron)
-Collector (Strong but has high skill ceiling and typically requires you to have some amount of point ceiling in your hand to win)
-Little Stick (Easily blockable if it really matters)
-Stable Tree (It's good but even with combos it's nothing game winning on its own)

[ategev]

Given the ratings posted on reddit, I recommend banning Carpenter's Bench, Craft Teacher, Forest Clearer, Grocer, Informant, Task Artisan, and Teacher's Desk.