1.Shylmagoghnar - Transience

2.Ostura - The Room

3.The Ocean - Phanerozoic I: Palaeozoic

4.Rivers Of Nihil - Where Owls Know My Name

5.Orphaned Land - Unsung Prophets & Dead Messiahs

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1.Slugdge - Esoteric Malacology

2.Antimatter - Black Market Enlightenment

3.Amorphis - Queen Of Time

4.Hamferð - Támsins Likam

5.Riverside - Wasteland

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2000-2004 list: http://www.metalstorm.net/users/list.php?list_id=5844
2005-2009 list: http://www.metalstorm.net/users/list.php?list_id=5838
2010-2014 list: http://www.metalstorm.net/users/list.php?list_id=5828

I sure do love this site and it's rating system, it makes finding great music so easy and, even more importantly, when an album is overlooked for a while but starts getting a buzz a few months later, boom, there it appears in the top 20.

All that being said, I still wish there was some way to get a weighted ranking that not only takes the rating of the album into account, but also the number of votes that were cast. For example, an album with a rating of 8.8 and 1000 votes would rank higher than an album with a rating of 8.9 and 20 votes. So, I scraped all the albums on the site with at least 1 vote into a database. Then, taking a leaf out of IMDb's book, I used Bayesian estimation (like the IMDb's Top 250) to calculate a weighted rating for each album based on its Metal Storm rating and the number of votes it had received.

The formula for calculating the Top 100 Albums gives a true Bayesian estimate:
Bayes rating (BR) = ( C × m + R × N ) ÷ ( m + N ) where:
C = average expected rating given...
m = minimum number of votes
R = average rating for the album = (Metal Storm rating)
N = number of votes for the album = (votes)

The way the Bayesian estimator works is that all albums in the database are given and additional m fake votes with an average rating of C, irrespective of how many true votes it already has. Then a new weighted rating is calculated...
If the album has no true votes ( N = 0 ), then BR = ( C × m + R × 0 ) ÷ ( m + 0) = C × m ÷ m = C (the average expected rating).
If the album has a number of true votes equal to the minimum ( N = m ), then BR = ( C × m + R × m ) ÷ ( m + m ) = ( C + R ) × m ÷ 2m = ( C + R ) ÷ 2 (halfway between the two ratings).
If the album has a very large number of true votes ( N >> m ), then BR = ( C × m + R × N ) ÷ ( m + N ) ≈ R × N ÷ N = R (the Metal Storm rating).
This means that the Bayes rating will never equal the Metal Storm rating but will approach it as the true votes grows arbitrarily large.

Now that the maths bit is out of the way, here was my methodology:
Only Studio and EP album types, from the years 2015 to 2019, with at least 1 vote, were included.
The average expected rating (C) was determined by averaging all the Metal Storm ratings from 2015-2019.
The minimum number of votes (m) was determined by calculating the 75th percentile of the votes, rounded to the nearest 10.
I also decided that if an album's Bayes rating was within 0.005 of #100, it would be included too; hence the +2.

C for 2015-2019 = 7.422
m = 20

Number of albums from each year in the list:
2015 - 31
2016 - 24
2017 - 18
2018 - 12
2019 - 17

Ratings are accurate as of 30/10/2023

1.Mgła - Exercises In Futility

2.Insomnium - Winter's Gate

3.Amorphis - Under The Red Cloud

4.Vektor - Terminal Redux

5.Trees Of Eternity - Hour Of The Nightingale

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Trophy Goats for 2018 B)

1.Beartooth - Disease

2.Alkaloid - Liquid Anatomy

3.Obscura - Diluvium

4.Bad Wolves - Disobey

5.Wolf King - Loyal To The Soil

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1.Mors Principium Est - Embers Of A Dying World

2.Allegaeon - Elements Of The Infinite

3.In Vain - Ænigma

4.Obscura - Omnivium

5.Wolfheart - Shadow World

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1.Faceless Burial - Speciation

2.At The Gates - Slaughter Of The Soul

3.Death - Symbolic

4.Entombed - Left Hand Path

5.Necrot - Blood Offerings

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jesus this is out of date, gotta take some time and update this

1.Lykathea Aflame - Elvenefris

2.Immolation - Close To A World Below

3.Cryptopsy - None So Vile

4.Dragged Into Sunlight - Hatred For Mankind

5.Nile - Annihilation Of The Wicked

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Each band featured once, except one.

1.Amorphis - Queen Of Time

2.Be'lakor - Of Breath And Bone

3.Burzum - Filosofem

4.Children Of Bodom - Hate Crew Deathroll

5.Dark Tranquillity - Atoma

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Favourite albums of 2018 (including only those which I would rate 7+)

1.Deafheaven - Ordinary Corrupt Human Love

2.Slugdge - Esoteric Malacology

3.Rolo Tomassi - Time Will Die And Love Will Bury It

4.Between The Buried And Me - Automata I

5.Berried Alive - Bearies Alive

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1.Amorphis - Queen Of Time

2.Judas Priest - Firepower

3.Black Label Society - Grimmest Hits

4.Ghost - Prequelle

5.Obscura - Diluvium

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1.Dimmu Borgir - Eonian

2.Pestilence - Hadeon

3.Mantar - The Modern Art Of Setting Ablaze

4.Amorphis - Queen Of Time

5.Obscura - Diluvium

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Well, here I put my personal top with which to me have been the best albums of 2018. They are not all they are, but if they all are.

1.Rivers Of Nihil - Where Owls Know My Name

2.Obscura - Diluvium

3.Slugdge - Esoteric Malacology

4.Judas Priest - Firepower

5.Necrophobic - Mark Of The Necrogram

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Heavy, Doom, Black, Death, Thrash, Prog, Power...these are my favorite 100 albums of 2018... STAY METAL!!!

25 Honorable Mentions:

Mortuous - Through Wilderness
Arkheth - 12 Winter Moons Comes the Witches Brew
Lychgate - The Contagion In Nine Steps
Wolfheart - Constellation Of The Black Light
Cosmic Church - Täyttymys

1.Imperial Triumphant - Vile Luxury

2.Shylmagoghnar - Transience

3.Altars Of Grief - Iris

4.Horrendous - Idol

5.Sepulcher - Panoptic Horror

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1.Yob - Our Raw Heart

2.Obscura - Diluvium

3.Horrendous - Idol

4.Imperial Triumphant - Vile Luxury

5.Behemoth - I Loved You At Your Darkest

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These are 10 death metal albums from 2018 that I think were the best. This is just my opinion and it is subject to change.

1.Autokrator - Hammer Of The Heretics

2.Psycroptic - As The Kingdom Drowns

3.Obscura - Diluvium

4.Tomb Mold - Manor Of Infinite Forms

5.Terrorizer - Caustic Attack

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