In Redemption, even if two players play the same offensive and defensive themes and/or concepts, there's few areas of card selection that can create vast differences in deck performance. One of the most crucial areas this occurs in dominant selection. There are 15 playable dominants in Redemption. You may play as many of them in your deck as you'd like, but you can't play more dominants than lost souls in your deck. For most decks, that means you get to play 7 dominants.
The question then hearkens back to the last article I wrote - what costs and benefits does each dominant bring? That's what this article is here to discuss! I'm going to assume you are playing a 50-56 card (which most people will. I will discuss each dominant starting with the weakest (spoiler alert: It's Doubt). The rating number is somewhat subjective, except that 10 is good and means you should play it in every deck.
Doubt
Doubt is pretty terrible. It's designed to be able to give you an EC to block with that has big numbers (0/12) aka good against fight by the numbers, and that's hard to target (it doesn't have any identifiers). Unfortunately, the card is too balanced, and it got printed to have a terrible brigade (orange) to play enhancements with. Additionally, it's never even going to get initiative. It's pretty terrible and should never be played.
Rating: 1/10
Glory of the Lord
Glory of the Lord is probably the most situational dominant. It only works at protecting one card (Solomon's Temple) that's only recently become playable (with a reprint), but is still probably outclassed by other variants (specifically Herod's Temple). Probably the best thing it can do is protect your Lampstand of the Sanctuary from Fortify Site. Essentially, it's a terrible Guardian of Your Souls (spoiler: that's a dominant).
Rating: 1/10
Strife
One of the two new dominants got the short end of the stick as far as power creep goes. It can withdraw all but one hero from battle, so it's pretty good against banding decks (which is pretty much every deck these days), but if you have that much of an issue with multiple heroes, it seems like Household Idols would be a better counter. Strife can occasionally capture some stuff when comboed with Herod Agrippa II, but that's really reaching for playability.
Rating: 2/10
Guardian of Your Souls
Finally we are getting into dominants that get played! Unfortunately, Guardian probably shouldn't get played - contrary to populat belief, it's actually pretty bad. It counters exactly one card: Falling Away. It's entirely predicated are being drawn first. Overall, that's a recipe for bad things. Additionally, it's use is entirely replicated (but done better) by Lampstand of the Sanctuary. It's really lost its luster with time.
Rating: 3/10
Falling Away
Guardian's partner is in the same boat. It can do one thing, and it can't do that if your opponent has drawn the two commonly played counters. You can't afford that kind of inefficiency at your dominant slots. It's slightly better than Guardian of Your Souls simply because it actually helps you win - Guardian just theoretically helps you win. If you guarantee yourself to draw one of the two in the first hand, I'd want Falling Away every time.
Rating: 3/10
Harvest Time
This is going to be a little bit controversial of a choice. Harvest Time just got replicated by two huge enhancements, Fishers of Men and Gideon's Call, and it was already a cusp dominant. However, it can do something those two can't - counter a Death of Unrighteous. That alone gives it average playability. Harvest Time is basically an insurance policy. You don't need it, but when things go wrong, it can save you a lot of time getting back what you lost immediately.
Rating:4/10
Mayhem
Another controversial rating incoming: Mayhem just isn't actually that good. Without the ability to "first turn Mayhem", it turns out hand refresh is actually really lackluster in general in Redemption. Ironically enough, one of the things that should make it really good in Redemption (1 ofs for every card) actually makes it really bad - it's incredibly inconsistent at giving you what you want. Also, it's completely shut down offensively by Nazareth. It's going to get played a lot, but I'm not totally sure why.
Rating: 5/10
Burial
I actually like Burial a lot. I won't pretend it's super powerful - but it enables some really interesting lock out scenarios. It takes the 2/3-liner from average to great. But, not matter how many cool tricks you do, it's still just not overly powerful, and there's quite a few dominants still to go that are. Burial is basically the definition of a 50-50 playstyle/deckstyle choice (even though I gave it a 6 technically).
Rating: 6/10
Destruction of Nehushtan'
Artifacts are arguably the best card type in the game in terms of power, and Destruction of Nehushtan directly counters (and negates) them. In a meta filled with Magic Charms, Darius' Decree, Holy Grail, or even just a pesky Gifts of the Magi, that can be priceless. There's a few other effective artifact counters, but none of them are as effective as Destruction of Nehushtan.
Rating:7/10
Christian Martyr
While last meta, the super banding in the world made this card dead more often than not, the new set has brought this former staple back to prominence. It really helps a lot of defenses function by being that extra battle winner that isn't conditional and can't be negated. I'd probably play it in every deck, even though power wise, it can't keep up with the next 5 dominants.
Rating: 8/10
Grapes of Wrath
Grapes of Wrath is a really cool toolbox dominant. It can discard evil characters. It can get you blocks. It can do both at once if you banded to an opponent's character. It can delay that huge banding chain. All around, it's super versatile, and that makes it a lot more functional and better than it actually should be.
Rating: 9/10
Angel of the Lord
Hate your opponent's evil character? Ok, its discarded. Angel of the Lord is simply as that. Since less evil characters usually means more redeemed souls for you, you should probably be playing it.
Rating: 9/10
Vain Philosophy
I was really wrong on this card. It's incredibly. It wins games. It has two main functions in my experience. IT can underdeck a Son of God or New Jerusalem to stop your opponent for a long time (super dirty with a Nazareth around) or it can underdeck a battle winning enhancement to get a block. Both directly help you win a game. Oh, and it also looks at your opponent's hand - the most broken ability in the game (in my opinion). I was so wrong.
Rating: 10/10
New Jerusalem
This dominant mainstay's power is simple: get closer to winning. While there are some decks in the world (even at 56 cards) that might not play it, you can't deny that power wise, it's the second best, purely because it can get your 20% closer to winning. That seems really broken.
Rating: 10/10
Son of God
Son of God can rescue any soul your opponent has in play (and now that it can negate it too, it really can!). I don't think that requires much explaining. It should be in your deck.
Rating: 10/10
To sum up, that means, in general, that I think the best 7 dominants in the game are:
Son of God
New Jerusalem
Vain Philosophy
Angel of the Lord
Grapes of Wrath
Christian Martyr
Destruction of Nehushtan
Realistically, almost any dominant is playable in a deck style suited for it - except Doubt. Don't be that guy playing Doubt.
-Alex
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