Favorite level one deckbuilder: "After The Virus" plus "The Long Cold" Expansion. So tight and sweet and thinky, with a portion of luck.

I ❤ Imperium and Captain’s Chair. Can’t wait until Kirk comes out.

If someone is using this to maybe start deck-building, I'm not sure it's expected that someone else will be managing the boss and sharing rules overhead. I will very much the one learning and teaching the game, so Aeons is probably lv 3 for me. Probably more fair to rate it that way. I mean, if someonelse is running or teaching, than any game is considerably less complex.

Not mentioning Ascension when talking about deckbuilders should be a crime

Mage Knight was my jumping in point to deck building in board games, as an adult. I already knew I liked deck builders from growing up playing games though. Imperium Classics and Legendary was my second deck building board game. My favorite right now is Star Trek: Captain's Chair.

Cool list and thanks for sharing these games. Was a bit surprised to see Dominion as level 3 though as I've always considered that a good 'beginner-friendly' deckbuilding game. Also would say that Aeon's end feels like level 3 to me, so I'd swap those two games around personally.

I made the silly mistake of diving in head-first into Mage Knight. Whilst I still loved the game, I got absolutely wrecked in all my playthroughs (still do even now).

The list for quick reference after watching:
1: Legendary Marvel / Chemical Overload
2: Clank Catacombs / Aions End
3: Lost ruins of Arnak / Dominion
4: Revive / Slay the spire
5: Mage knight / Imperium Horizons

Thanks for showcasing some interesting looking games. I personally disagree with some of the difficulty ratings (I would swap aions end and dominion for example), but it was very nice seeying some new games to check out and hear some thoughts on them!

I personally recommend tyrants of the underdark (deckbuilding + area control), dune imperium (workerplacement + deckbuilding + betting?) and hero realms (pvp deckbuilding).

I’m also curious if you consider deckbuilders and bagbuilders different catagories (like quaks and wonderland wars)?

Definitely going to get Imperium: Horizons now! Have been thinking about getting another deck builder for a while but didn't know that IH was one.

Imperium (Classics, Legends, Horizons) is absolutely fantastic for solo play.

As soon as I saw the title of this video I thought "Imperium an Mage Knight must be at level 5".In my opinion, Dominion should stand by itself (if you count 20 expansions for any game... Sure it'll be more complicated). As a system, Dominion is not more complex than Clank. As I haven't played Revive, Aeon's End or that level 1 with beautiful cards, I'd say Star Realms at level 1; Viscounts of the West Kingdom and Dune Imperium at 3; and Great Western Trail at 4 (New Zealand could be at 5, though). Nevertheless, great list man.
New subscriber here!

Agree that Imperium series is your level 5.  It is the most complex deck builder I have played.

I have played Mage Knight.  As a game with overall difficulty, I would say it is a level 5.  It's just that there is a lot of game outside of building your deck that it doesn't feel like a deck builder to me.  It's like Blood Bowl Team Manager.  It is a deck builder, but the deck building mechanic is subtle that it doesn't feel like a deck builder.

Great video!
I would put Harry potter hogwarts battle in tier 1 or 2.
And then put Astro Knights in tier 2 and bump Aeon End to tier 3. As Astro Knight is "Aeons end light".

Can you also rank the deck building aspect of Black Rose wars Rebirth or Revised as well?!

Where would you rate Dark Pact?

Nah. After you learn deck building mechanic, each of them plays the same.
Ruins of Arnak or Dune Imperium are much more than that, but that's exactly why they shouldn't be just one of the "5 levels of difficulty for Deckbuilders". In those games deckbuilding mechanic is not even 50% of the entire game.
Not even mentioning the Revive, which, to be fair, is just big fat euro monster, where deckbuilding is just one small piece inbetween dozens of other mechanics.