What is a "good" rating?

[Jacob Marley]

I'm pretty much in the high 40's and lately have tended to play opponents in the low to mid 40s.  They are not bad players, and certainly don't just buy random cards, but I still see a lot of what I consider fairly elementary mistakes.  Not thinning enough (or at all), overloading terminals, missing key cards, etc.  I don't play much, and if I did, I might crack level 50 (I've been close a few times), but I see a big jump in skill there, and while I have a pretty good record against under 50 players, I lose most often when I play 50+.

[Martin plays Piano]

The initial question was about "what's a good rating" – and of course there is no fixed red line to say: these are the good and those are the poor players in the leaderboard. Nevertheless the view on the Top 200 (which is level 55+) might indicate the pool of excellent strategists, league-proofed winners and some mathematical wizards. I would say beyond 55 all players can beat each other – below 55 the ratio tends to be more and more the David and Goliath story – and the component of additional fortune becomes more important to get a lucky punch.

But again, being in the level 50s shows the Top1000 of the Dominion world, that's about the top 10% of our community, which deserves the tag of a "good rating" as well.

Changing the initial question to "what's a good player", this becomes much more relative – so here I am with Stef saying, this really depends from your perspective, because it should try to fade out all the ranking stuff as the one and only benchmark.

I like playing the piano, my family says, I am a good pianist – ok, that's nice to know and makes me happy. Compared to the stars in Carnegie Hall I am nothing more than a little piece of shit ... - ok, let's say, I am a little piece of shit playing the piano quite well.

I leave it up to you to transfer this example to Dominion – but being level 50 can say, I am the best Dominion player in my home town, and perhaps I am in the Top50 of Germany – anyway, who cares about that? However, there are not so many things coming into my head of which I am sure being within the Top50 from the whole of Germany. This alone might be nice to know as well and can make you happy, but finally in our nice leaderboard you end up somewhere as a little piece of ...

By the way, "good player" implies to me being supportive to other players, not being an arrogant nerd due to my better ranking, having some decency in the chat by saying Hello and avoiding all that stuff, of which this forum is more and more flooded with complaints and bans.

The main thing is, to be aware of yourself with an open mind set for all the "off-leaderboard" things , this community is offering to you. Have you ever played an unrated game with others ? – it's unbelievable, but it can be very recreational. I am assuming, that "good players" are great in balancing out the fun factor versus their burning ambition to climb up the leaderboard - bad players show some gaps with that by having poor sportsmanship, and there might be some of them even in the top 1000.

So finally, I am still playing my piano in my Carnegie Hall living room at home – and I am still playing the Dominion daily, even though I am aware that the global ranking says, you are nothing more than a little piece of ...

But I am happy with that – so have fun
Rachmaninoff

[SkyHard]

Well said Rachmaninoff. As long as the fun is there, I am happy whereever I stand in the global ranking.

A good rating is a rating I am happy about (i.e. every rating) :)