After the first continent...

[Hatchman]

I've been losing a pile of games lately in which I start off very strong, usually grabbing a continent with a few turns. After that it all goes downhill. My problem is, I am always torn between fortifying the front lines of that first continent, and trying to grab a second continent. Are these objectives mutually exclusive? What ends up happening is that while I hold on to one continent, another player grabs two or more, and I am left trying to eliminate the weaker guys until it's just me against the guy with multiple continents. Should I worry less about the front lines of that first continent and focus on moving my strength to new frontiers?

Signed,
Frustrated

[Bad Speler]

well, my general strategy especially in flat rate and no cards, is slowly expanding on the 1st continent. The only time i dont really do that is if I grab that continent really early, already have strong reinforcements then go for a 2nd continent. ex. Have South America in the first 2 rounds, then go for Austrailia...its rare to have such a good deployment so the 2nd strategy wont be used as often

[tahitiwahini]

It matters which continent you grab first. How hard is it to hold? How many borders to defend? On the classic board, only Australia and South America are easy to hold early on because they have respectively one and two borders.

I think the problem is that you may be letting the dominant player in the game get too far ahead. If a player has more than twice the armies of any other player or has sustainable control of two or more continents, then danger bells need to be going off. If they aren't yet, then a nice remark congratulating the dominant player in game chat will sometimes do the trick.

But it should also be part of your strategy to chip away at the dominant player. Can you ruin one of his continent bonuses? Can you pick up some of his countries held by only one army to reduce his armies/turn by one or more?

Don't let him solidify and then face a formidable behemoth when it's just you two. The time to do something about the behemoth is while you still have allies (officially or unofficially -- essentially the weaker players are always in a tacit alliance against the dominant player). Maybe you don't want to eliminate one of the weaker players just to get his cards (especially if he just has one or two cards). Maybe his presence in the game as a counter-weight to the behemoth is worth more to you than eliminating him would be.

You don't have to attack the behemoth all out, just chip away at his resources. Another thing that some players seem to forget is that you can attack a country occupied by a lot of enemy armies without expecting to conquer the country. The purpose of such an attack is attrition, not conquest. As long as you are attacking with at least 4 armies (meaning you will be attacking with 3 dice), you will have a statistical advantage over your the defender who at best can muster only two dice. In such an attack you get the 3 v 2 dice odds meaning: the defender will lose 2 armies 37% of the time, you'll both lose 1 army 34% of the time, and you'll lose 2 armies 29% of the time. In other words, you have an 8% higher chance than your opponent of coming out of such an exchange losing less armies than your opponent. That's the attacker's advantage when attacking with 3 v 2 dice odds. Know when to say when, remember you don't have to conquer the country, we're just whittling here.

Finally, here's a tactic I learned from a post by sully. You don't always have to defend your borders. Sometimes, leaving the borders undefended and piling all your armies in the interior (where you can still reach all your borders) will set up a trap for your opponents. Yes, they could easily breach your continent, but then they unleash the waiting hoards you have for a devastating counterattack. Under some conditions they may leave you alone.

One last thing. If you aren't able to hold one continent, does it make sense to go for the second continent? Probably not, unless going for the second continent means that each continent is actually less likely to be attacked individually. This can happen, but it's probably the exceptional case. If you can see how both of your continent bonuses could be stolen on the next turn then in most cases you're better off defending a single continent either with a stronger border defense or sully's defense.

[bigbullyweedave]

Sometimes going for that second continent too soon can be a killer because you become a threat and standout. As a result people attack you. I took 2 continents in a Middle Earth game in the first round or two. Reasonably well defended borders. Next round every other play on the board attacked me! Sometimes a slow, well fortified expansion is the way to go.

[boberz]

there the tried and tested keep a low profile let the others kill themselves and romp all over

[Hatchman]

there the tried and tested keep a low profile let the others kill themselves and romp all over

But the minute you grab a continent your opponents are all over you like a cheap suit. It's hard to stay "quiet" while advancing and getting stronger. If you're too quiet, you'll get swamped, right?

The Sully tactic mentioned in Tahiti's post is interesting. In yet another recent loss, I held Gondor for a few turns. I had 10-15 armies on all four entry points. But ultimately the eventual winner broke through. If I had put my 40-60 armies in a territory within striking distance of the contient's borders, and also poised to venture into other continents, I might have given myself more life and more options. Instead, I spent half of my armies padding the four entry points of Gondor. I divided and conquered myself I'd say.

[detlef]

Sometimes going for that second continent too soon can be a killer because you become a threat and standout. As a result people attack you. I took 2 continents in a Middle Earth game in the first round or two. Reasonably well defended borders. Next round every other play on the board attacked me! Sometimes a slow, well fortified expansion is the way to go.

+1. Sometimes, I'll expand and put myself in a position, but not take my second continent. Just so everybody continues with their own business and leaves me alone. Then, on my next turn, I'll have 3 more armies to use and they might be more spread out because they've been going after their own spots.

[GrazingCattle]

I have found that using the sully defense, I like that name for it, and slowly placing armies on my borders while taking lands that NO ONE wants and that serve me little or no purpose works really well.

I know it seems odd, but try it. Asia is a great place to keep taking one territory from and place your extras around your borders. 2 turns later you have 20 or so in the middle and 3 on each border. Few will hound you, and you can send expiditions into other people's cont.s. This works really well on central cont.s. Like europe or Africa.

[Hatchman]

Just another thought that occurred to me. I'm of the "expand and strengthen slowly and steadily" camp. But don't you all find that even if you've made yourself strong over the course of the game, there's usually an equally strong or more strong player who'll wipe you out with a final kamakaze move?