Ratings symbology

As Nick L. laid out in the last post, we are going to stick to a straight 0-10 scale, to get away from the whole 100-point scale that everyone else uses. I mean, seriously, when was the last time you saw a cigar rated under 80?

So to help you get a quick review at a glance, we are going to implement these fine cigar rating images . Each image represents a person or character of the quality denoted by the number rating. Here they are, starting at 0:




That's quite a crew, I have to say! And before your internet rage comes bubbling out over the fact that Mr. Belvedere is ranked higher than Captain Kirk, just keep in mind that I am not changing these!

Well, until we get tired of them, and then we will come up with new ratings.

And, if we encounter that once-in-a-blue-moon cigar, that smoke that makes all others seem, well, Urkel-ish, then they get the special honor of the coveted "11" rating. And there's only one man for that position:



So those are the ratings symbols you will see from now on. I hope that you either enjoyed them or were at least entertained by the pretty colors.

See you soon...

Rating Methodology

1-10 - A simple 1-10 scale. But why? Things as rich and complex as cigars, simplified down to a single number? What about flavor, what about intensity? Ash quality? Build? Draw?

See, here's the thing - remember when we said we had "average Joes" in mind when we thought up this idea? (We weren't too drunk at the time, we assure you). We wanted to keep it simple. Our 1-10 is basically a "would I smoke it again" rating. Nothing more, nothing less. We'll talk about qualities of the smoke (or drink) in the review/tasting notes, but that's about as far as it goes.

One other note: price. We'll talk about price (since it can be a deciding factor), but price won't weigh in to our actual rating.

Obviously, a simple 1-10 scale alone doesn't tell you everything you need to know about a cigar. Type comes into play as well, a mild cigar that's good at being mild could presumably also be a spicy cigar that's terrible at being spicy... this is where tags come in.

Tags - we'll be tagging works "Mild, Wild or Medium" - based on where the cigar generally falls - a "10" mild and a "10" wild will both be good cigars, but will be so for vastly different reasons. We may need to add a few more for drink tasting notes, but those will be discussed as they arise.