Villager Tier List for Animal Crossing: New Horizons (Updated: 5/19)

[IndoX]

I have to agree with this. Outside this forum, Apollo's popularity is insane. But then I have to ask you, should we take that into count?
The amount someone pays here for a villager would differ a lot from other websites/discord servers.
I think we should only take into count the popularity of villagers within this forum. Otherwise it will have a huge discrepancy of values like that.

Part of the reason I created the google docs was to share this information with anyone outside of TBT. I think it's important to know where the villagers rank in the grand scheme of things and not just in a bubble. I was also considering expanding it to NMT prices but I don't think I'll post that on TBT as the prices here are vastly different from everywhere else I don't want to mess with the economy here. If I did take TBT only the list would be vastly different.

 

[monsieurberry]

Not that it really matters or does any harm, but this is why I think the whole tier system is flawed to begin with.

At some point—often very quickly—the list itself starts swaying people’s desire for certain villagers. They begin viewing the high- or low-tiered villager differently, and might decide for or against ones based on the perceived popularity. Even just subconsciously.

I’d love to see an experiment where a lower-tiered but cute villager—say Dotty—is falsely put into the top tier. I’m pretty sure that soon enough actual demand for her would increase significantly.

There’s no doubt to me that a lot of the drive for certain villagers is generated by perceived desirability rather than personal taste. I do think it’s somewhat sad as I would love if the community put an emphasis on diversity rather than popularity. This is a single-player game you shouldn’t make up your villager on what other people will think of it.

But this isn’t unique to AC. Put perceived desirability behind something and people want it whether they would have otherwise or not. It’s just the way people work.

Sherb has been moved from A tier to S tier. Sherb and Judy kinda suffer the same fate. They aren't nearly as popular as Audie or Raymond - or even as popular as some villagers in their respective tiers but because of the lack of amiibo their popularity is temporarily inflated.

I would argue that all the new villagers popularity has been temporarily inflated due to the lack of amiibo. I don’t know why Sherb and Judy would be particular to that.

 

[Farfle_Productions]

This is great! Thanks so much!

I think it would be really cool if you could add their sprites in

 

[IndoX]

This is great! Thanks so much!

I think it would be really cool if you could add their sprites in

That's a work in progress!

 

[IndoX]

I would argue that all the new villagers popularity has been temporarily inflated due to the lack of amiibo. I don’t know why Sherb and Judy would be particular to that.

It is indeed a factor but Judy and Sherb trend differently. To put it into perspective: Raymond is almost 4x more popular than Audie, who is 1.5x more popular than Marshal, who is the most popular villager in the game. Raymond and Audie will most likely still be trending in S tier by the end of the games life cycle. Judy and Sherb are the ones most likely to move across tiers as the dust settles - which is what I meant by my comment.

 

[austin9880]

This is actually a really great list now that you've rearranged some things. Regarding Apollo specifically, I think Pocket Camp helped his popularity surge higher, but for some reason TBT undervalues him. That being said, I would agree that A tier is the place for him. I know that you said you checked a variety of websites before you crafted this list, but I was wondering if you could delve into and divulge some of your methodology for crafting the list. Like I agree with a whole bunch of your list just based off of what I'm seeing on various websites and whatnot, but I am curious if you used any more quantitative methodology or if you simply went off of overall feeling of consensus amongst these various online communities.

 

[ctar17]

Now Raymond has his own tier! The Mega Rayquaza of Animal Crossing.

Also my girl Vivian is only C tier??? Wow she's underrated af
Wasn't too big of a fan of her until I met her on a mystery island (I was searching for a Peppy to replace the one that left) and I just couldn't NOT invite her. She's gorgeous and really nice!

 

[monsieurberry]

It is indeed a factor but Judy and Sherb trend differently. To put it into perspective: Raymond is almost 4x more popular than Audie, who is 1.5x more popular than Marshal, who is the most popular villager in the game. Raymond and Audie will most likely still be trending in S tier by the end of the games life cycle. Judy and Sherb are the ones most likely to move across tiers as the dust settles - which is what I meant by my comment.

Of course, we are just debating on theoretical ground here but I'm not so sure that's correct. For example, Raymond is largely getting boosted by the hype surrounded by him getting memed early on and then people paying large amounts for him (which is largely due to no amiibo being available). This is exactly what is currently starting to happen with Sherb, from what I can see in various communities. I think a lot of the "value" will go down if two things happen: one, Nintendo releases new amiibos; and two, if they fix the Villager trade glitch permanently. This will affect the value of every villager and by turn, based on my assumption that lack of supply is increasing desirability, will decrease popularity. I'm not so sure about any of them outside of Audie (who has a large contextual value) maintaining their massive popularity throughout the games life.

That's just my opinion though. I just didn't get where you were basing your commentary on. Only time will tell!

 

[Sami]

Where is Cookie?

 

[ctar17]

Of course, we are just debating on theoretical ground here but I'm not so sure that's correct. For example, Raymond is largely getting boosted by the hype surrounded by him getting memed early on and then people paying large amounts for him (which is largely due to no amiibo being available). This is exactly what is currently starting to happen with Sherb, from what I can see in various communities. I think a lot of the "value" will go down if two things happen: one, Nintendo releases new amiibos; and two, if they fix the Villager trade glitch permanently. This will affect the value of every villager and by turn, based on my assumption that lack of supply is increasing desirability, will decrease popularity. I'm not so sure about any of them outside of Audie (who has a large contextual value) maintaining their massive popularity throughout the games life.

That's just my opinion though. I just didn't get where you were basing your commentary on. Only time will tell!

I've already started to see it happen with Judy as well on Facebook...
My friend calls this phenomenon "FOMO" (Fear of Missing Out) everyone wants Raymond because well, everyone else wants Raymond too... Getting Raymond has now become like the ultimate bragging rights in a way

 

[IndoX]

Also my girl Vivian is only C tier??? Wow she's underrated af
Wasn't too big of a fan of her until I met her on a mystery island (I was searching for a Peppy to replace the one that left) and I just couldn't NOT invite her. She's gorgeous and really nice!

Vivian was hard to place. The discrepancy in some of the tiers can be fairly large from most to least popular where occasionally someone may belong in between tiers. Vivian is one of the villagers, along with Lolly and Diana. The latter aren't quite S tier but also aren't quite A tier either. Other examples include Rosie and Pietro. Cats in particular are weighted differently. They are immensely popular compared to other species they kinda have to be compared within themselves rather than everyone else.

Where is Cookie?

Tier A.

 

[N a t]

I personally really like having villager lists, and I actually like knowing that some of my villagers are low tier because no one can ever complain that my town or island is too similar to everyone else's. I'm happy with my villagers regardless of their tier but I like to watch the villager economy and also see what most people have or don't have in their games. Even if Cleo is low on the list she is my baby forever <3

 

[IndoX]

This is actually a really great list now that you've rearranged some things. Regarding Apollo specifically, I think Pocket Camp helped his popularity surge higher, but for some reason TBT undervalues him. That being said, I would agree that A tier is the place for him. I know that you said you checked a variety of websites before you crafted this list, but I was wondering if you could delve into and divulge some of your methodology for crafting the list. Like I agree with a whole bunch of your list just based off of what I'm seeing on various websites and whatnot, but I am curious if you used any more quantitative methodology or if you simply went off of overall feeling of consensus amongst these various online communities.

Absolutely! Research for the list took a few days while the construction of it took over 12 hours. First and foremost I constructed a list of prices (in NMTs) comparatively across all platforms for each villager. Once I got all of that I averaged it out. This may seem like a lot of work but most of the tier D and untiered villagers were either less than 5 NMTs or free. I then sorted them accordingly in a list that is just based on prices.

Once I had that information I started looking up individual amiibo prices for each villager across ebay and amazon. Those prices were also inserted into my list next to the NMTs average price.

After that I started going into each individual community and started researching general consensus, individual hits and overall psychological value. Reddit, discord, TBT, facebook - you name it.

Once I gathered all the information I started placing villagers accordingly. I decided early on that ranking in quantifiable numbers isn't really feasible and it was just better to rank them into Tiers in no specific order. I did this because when I did all my research the #2 villager behind Marshal is Bob and some people wouldn't even consider him S tier in TBT. Since I didn't have to worry about ranking them individually I just had to worry about what standard each tier needed to be.

It gets harder as you go down the list because many villagers don't have a lot of information on them. That's why I created untiered. It doesn't necessarily mean they're bad or ugly or unpopular - it could just mean there isn't enough data on them at this moment.

Some things I noticed while I was creating the list:

- Cats are by far the most popular species. Some cats in A tier are as popular as some villagers in S tier. I had to start comparing cats between themselves rather than other villagers because they are weighted very differently amongst the communities compared to other species.
- @ctar17 will appreciate this one the octupuses in general are very popular but have the lowest average sale price (in NMTs) compared to other popular villagers. Marina is one of the most popular villagers in the game but doesn't sell for as much as Julian, for example. They seem to be very common and their price point reflects that.
- Popularity and sell value aren't mutually exclusive. As is the case with Marina, there are villagers who's popularity isn't directly reflected in sell prices. Such villagers include Judy being more expensive than Audie but not being as popular overall. Marina as mentioned before. Merengue is also one of the villagers as well given her popularity.
- Apollo is VERY popular outside of TBT. Like, it's insane how popular he is.

 

[primandimproper]

Hey, nice to see my boy Beardo moving on up. Great list, OP.

 

[ctar17]

Absolutely! Research for the list took a few days while the construction of it took over 12 hours. First and foremost I constructed a list of prices (in NMTs) comparatively across all platforms for each villager. Once I got all of that I averaged it out. This may seem like a lot of work but most of the tier D and untiered villagers were either less than 5 NMTs or free. I then sorted them accordingly in a list that is just based on prices.

Once I had that information I started looking up individual amiibo prices for each villager across ebay and amazon. Those prices were also inserted into my list next to the NMTs average price.

After that I started going into each individual community and started researching general consensus, individual hits and overall psychological value. Reddit, discord, TBT, facebook - you name it.

Once I gathered all the information I started placing villagers accordingly. I decided early on that ranking in quantifiable numbers isn't really feasible and it was just better to rank them into Tiers in no specific order. I did this because when I did all my research the #2 villager behind Marshal is Bob and some people wouldn't even consider him S tier in TBT. Since I didn't have to worry about ranking them individually I just had to worry about what standard each tier needed to be.

It gets harder as you go down the list because many villagers don't have a lot of information on them. That's why I created untiered. It doesn't necessarily mean they're bad or ugly or unpopular - it could just mean there isn't enough data on them at this moment.

Some things I noticed while I was creating the list:

- Cats are by far the most popular species. Some cats in A tier are as popular as some villagers in S tier. I had to start comparing cats between themselves rather than other villagers because they are weighted very differently amongst the communities compared to other species.
- @ctar17 will appreciate this one the octupuses in general are very popular but have the lowest average sale price (in NMTs) compared to other popular villagers. Marina is one of the most popular villagers in the game but doesn't sell for as much as Julian, for example. They seem to be very common and their price point reflects that.
- Popularity and sell value aren't mutually exclusive. As is the case with Marina, there are villagers who's popularity isn't directly reflected in sell prices. Such villagers include Judy being more expensive than Audie but not being as popular overall. Marina as mentioned before. Merengue is also one of the villagers as well given her popularity.
- Apollo is VERY popular outside of TBT. Like, it's insane how popular he is.

(eyes emoji) it's almost as if a specific octopus has a higher chance of being found than a specific cat... Yeah I figured that the consequences of the species rolls, is that some specific villagers will be more common than others based on their species. I did think about how if more people found out that Raymond IS actually rarer statistically on those islands, then his price will increase even more...

I do find it interesting that the prices of Marina and Zucker were reflective of them being more common before people started looking at the data.

 

[PajamaCat]

I'm going to start calling my island the Island of Misfit Animals since most of my villagers are low tier or not even on the list. I still love them though.

 

[Chachamaru]

Is dom really A? I thought I was one of his few fans. I was betting on b. He's s+ in my eyes though hehe

 

[IndoX]

Is dom really A? I thought I was one of his few fans. I was betting on b. He's s+ in my eyes though hehe

Yes, he's up there with the likes Punchy and Maple, comparatively.

Made some more changes after some reflection:

Genji has been moved from Tier A to Tier B.

Ruby has been moved from Tier A to Tier B.

Tia has been moved from Tier A to Tier B.

For all three above, the current trend shows that they are in popularity consistent with Tier B rather than Tier A. Cookie is also one I will be keeping an eye on closely.

 

[lucitine]

Omg, nate moved up in the world! <3

 

[Farobi]

Zucker has to go down I think, to A or even B tier. In fact, i think the whole octopus group has to shift down, Octavian to C and Marina to stay at or move at A I can't pinpoint yet. I see more of Zucker being sold than bought if anything, and the prices do not come anywhere close to that of Judy, Ankha, Audie etc. Although they were popular in ACNL, this downtrend of value probably is the case because of their higher frequencies in mystery islands.

Also, Nookazon prices could be a useful resource as well since it's one of the bigger AC trade-based sites (but you did mention discord so maybe that's already included!). Other than that, it is pretty accurate.

And #BringPunchytoStier /s

Edit: another angle for this though is that since Octopuses appear more frequently, more people can find them and possibly grow an attachment and let them stay at their islands. This is harder for some villagers with more variants within their species since it'll be harder for them to be singled out in a mystery island to begin with.

Post automatically merged: Apr 19, 2020

I used this as a resource btw! Not confirmed accurate but seems legit https://www.belltreeforums.com/thre...tern-solved-with-data-and-stats-tests.511329/