Conquer Club

I'd like to hear some thought on continents that are cetralized or largly drawn that look very impressive, but might not be aspwerful as they seem. Is it strategic to stay away from trying to hold such continents. An example would be Africa in World 2.1, it is in the middle of the map and is quite large but is far less powerful than someone controling other continents on that map. I believe this happens frequently and want to know what you think about it.

Yeah it happens a lot, but just dont go for that continent. Try a smaller one thats not as scary.

Germany on the Europe map and Central USA in North America I have found to be the most difficult places in CC to try to play from. Europe on the classic map is a close third. The Downtown area on the San Fran map is different because the bonus is so large that just being able to hold it for one turn can easily give you the win.

Another interesting thing occours on two of the maps that I already mentioned. On North America and the Classic map the two areas worth the largest bonus (Canada and Asia respectively), are not the hardest to keep. This is because they are both connected to easy areas to conquer, especially Canada with the Artic Circle and French Canada, and Asia with Oceania. You can reduce points of entry on the North America map to Canada to 4 and on the classic map to Asia to 3 if you control the lesser areas. Rarely does anyone keep control of these monsters without holding the lesser areas.

KennyC wrote:Germany on the Europe map and Central USA in North America I have found to be the most difficult places in CC to try to play from. Europe on the classic map is a close third. The Downtown area on the San Fran map is different because the bonus is so large that just being able to hold it for one turn can easily give you the win.

Another interesting thing occours on two of the maps that I already mentioned. On North America and the Classic map the two areas worth the largest bonus (Canada and Asia respectively), are not the hardest to keep. This is because they are both connected to easy areas to conquer, especially Canada with the Artic Circle and French Canada, and Asia with Oceania. You can reduce points of entry on the North America map to Canada to 4 and on the classic map to Asia to 3 if you control the lesser areas. Rarely does anyone keep control of these monsters without holding the lesser areas.

A good point about Asia - but the sheer scale of it makes it harder to gain in the first place? But if you hold Ukraine, Middle East & Kamchatka with good armies then you should hold it... (Obviously you have Australia!)

C.

Eriador in Middle Earth is another that I cant comprehend holding.

yeti_c wrote:

KennyC wrote:Germany on the Europe map and Central USA in North America I have found to be the most difficult places in CC to try to play from. Europe on the classic map is a close third. The Downtown area on the San Fran map is different because the bonus is so large that just being able to hold it for one turn can easily give you the win.

Another interesting thing occours on two of the maps that I already mentioned. On North America and the Classic map the two areas worth the largest bonus (Canada and Asia respectively), are not the hardest to keep. This is because they are both connected to easy areas to conquer, especially Canada with the Artic Circle and French Canada, and Asia with Oceania. You can reduce points of entry on the North America map to Canada to 4 and on the classic map to Asia to 3 if you control the lesser areas. Rarely does anyone keep control of these monsters without holding the lesser areas.

A good point about Asia - but the sheer scale of it makes it harder to gain in the first place? But if you hold Ukraine, Middle East & Kamchatka with good armies then you should hold it... (Obviously you have Australia!)

C.

you'd be better holding alaska than putting armies on kamchatca, with regards to asia i sometimes like to take africa and feint that i want asia but take most of it and leave it undefended with big armies on siam. you have a bonus from oceania that is very secure and you get many armies just for the sheer number you hold in asia.

Ham wrote:Eriador in Middle Earth is another that I cant comprehend holding.

Well actually I think it is rather like Asia on Classic. In a three player game especially, assuming you can keep the other two players balanced, it is easy to build up troops on Oceania with the others not doing too much about you. At the same time you can slowly take territories in Asia but withdraw from them to appear less of a threat. Once you've amassed enough armies, Asia can be taken for 3 borders and 9 bonus armies (including Oceania). Quite often, the other two won't know what has hit them and it is too late to do anything about it. A couple of rounds later and the game is won.

It is the same for Lindon and Eriador - you can have both for three borders, assuming that you can put up a decent defence.

Of course, the problem with this is that the dice could leave you with insufficient numbers to defend the continents or you may have underestimated the strength of the other players, especially if its a flat rate game. (In escalating this strategy wouldn't work at all)

Bodmanbod wrote:

yeti_c wrote:A good point about Asia - but the sheer scale of it makes it harder to gain in the first place? But if you hold Ukraine, Middle East & Kamchatka with good armies then you should hold it... (Obviously you have Australia!)

C.

you'd be better holding alaska than putting armies on kamchatca, [...]

Not in all situations. Consider there are two opposing players in US. One holding Alberta and one NWT. By extending your land to Alaska you have achieved a buffer zone, but at the cost of openening a second front. A co-ordinated play between the two other players would have double the chance of breaking you, where as, by only holding Kamchatca you ensure only one player can attack you at a time, thus requiring a smaller defence force.

Ham wrote:Eriador in Middle Earth is another that I cant comprehend holding.

Hold Enedwaith, Rivendell and Forodwaith and you have a 9 bonus for 3 borders and have probably own the game unless there's a guy in Gondor+Mordor who's been well established.

flashleg8 wrote:

Bodmanbod wrote:

yeti_c wrote:A good point about Asia - but the sheer scale of it makes it harder to gain in the first place? But if you hold Ukraine, Middle East & Kamchatka with good armies then you should hold it... (Obviously you have Australia!)

C.

you'd be better holding alaska than putting armies on kamchatca, [...]

Not in all situations. Consider there are two opposing players in US. One holding Alberta and one NWT. By extending your land to Alaska you have achieved a buffer zone, but at the cost of openening a second front. A co-ordinated play between the two other players would have double the chance of breaking you, where as, by only holding Kamchatca you ensure only one player can attack you at a time, thus requiring a smaller defence force.

Yep - the same is true for all maps with those sort of borders - it is often best to sit further back so that they have to attack through eachother rather than straight into you. However, even if you do hold Kamchatka, you should leave some on Alaska as a second defense

sfhbballnut wrote:I'd like to hear some thought on continents that are cetralized or largly drawn that look very impressive, but might not be aspwerful as they seem. Is it strategic to stay away from trying to hold such continents. An example would be Africa in World 2.1, it is in the middle of the map and is quite large but is far less powerful than someone controling other continents on that map. I believe this happens frequently and want to know what you think about it.

I really enjoy World 2.1 map. Somehow, I always end up taking and holding all of Africa. When randomly placed at the beginning, i was placed well in Africa for a couple games. Since then, I've just felt comfortable snatching up and holding Africa. So, perhaps getting comfortable fortifying and attacking from a specific continent as a 'base' works.

It has for me in the same way on a few maps. ...but I'm still a newbie.

KennyC wrote:Germany on the Europe map and Central USA in North America I have found to be the most difficult places in CC to try to play from. Europe on the classic map is a close third. The Downtown area on the San Fran map is different because the bonus is so large that just being able to hold it for one turn can easily give you the win.

I bolded the part where I think you're completely wrong. Europe on the classic map is actually quite easy to hold if you play correctly. Firstly, defending Europe is not so hard as one would think, despite 4 borders. 3 of those borders are next to Northern Europe, this means that you can get away with keeping smaller defensive forces on the borders and a larger backup force on nE which you threaten retaliation with, few thinking players will want to kill 20 armies just to see 100 more retake the territory and break their bonus.
Then there's the diplomacy as well, you're right next to NA, a seemingly tricky situation if someone's holding it, but you're acting as a balancing force, if the other players attack you the one in NA will grow disproportionately strong and vice versa, so there's a good chance they won't. Getting a deal about not starting an arms race on Iceland/Greenland isn't hard either since it'll free up resources for both you and the NA-player.

MeDeFe wrote:

KennyC wrote:Germany on the Europe map and Central USA in North America I have found to be the most difficult places in CC to try to play from. Europe on the classic map is a close third. The Downtown area on the San Fran map is different because the bonus is so large that just being able to hold it for one turn can easily give you the win.

I bolded the part where I think you're completely wrong. Europe on the classic map is actually quite easy to hold if you play correctly. Firstly, defending Europe is not so hard as one would think, despite 4 borders. 3 of those borders are next to Northern Europe, this means that you can get away with keeping smaller defensive forces on the borders and a larger backup force on nE which you threaten retaliation with, few thinking players will want to kill 20 armies just to see 100 more retake the territory and break their bonus.
Then there's the diplomacy as well, you're right next to NA, a seemingly tricky situation if someone's holding it, but you're acting as a balancing force, if the other players attack you the one in NA will grow disproportionately strong and vice versa, so there's a good chance they won't. Getting a deal about not starting an arms race on Iceland/Greenland isn't hard either since it'll free up resources for both you and the NA-player.

Well, few thinking players will kill 20 to cost you 5, but perhaps we're talking about those very rare situations where people haven't amassed 100s of armies yet.

To get to the point where you have 20 on each border and 100 in the middle, you need to start with 3 on each country. As in, the beginning of the game. Chances are, when you first take it, you're lucky to have 4-5 on each. At that point, it is worth busting up.

Obviously if we're evaluating continents based on how they pay-off once everyone has amassed huge defenses, then SA and Aussie aren't as advantageous. However, their value comes in due to the fact that you can actually take and hold them relatively easily at the beginning of the game and go from there.

#1) less countries to take and borders to hold
#2) People are less likely to mess with you because they're not going to waste themselves against 6 armies protecting a bonus of 2.

detlef wrote:

MeDeFe wrote:

KennyC wrote:Germany on the Europe map and Central USA in North America I have found to be the most difficult places in CC to try to play from. Europe on the classic map is a close third. The Downtown area on the San Fran map is different because the bonus is so large that just being able to hold it for one turn can easily give you the win.

I bolded the part where I think you're completely wrong. Europe on the classic map is actually quite easy to hold if you play correctly. Firstly, defending Europe is not so hard as one would think, despite 4 borders. 3 of those borders are next to Northern Europe, this means that you can get away with keeping smaller defensive forces on the borders and a larger backup force on nE which you threaten retaliation with, few thinking players will want to kill 20 armies just to see 100 more retake the territory and break their bonus.
Then there's the diplomacy as well, you're right next to NA, a seemingly tricky situation if someone's holding it, but you're acting as a balancing force, if the other players attack you the one in NA will grow disproportionately strong and vice versa, so there's a good chance they won't. Getting a deal about not starting an arms race on Iceland/Greenland isn't hard either since it'll free up resources for both you and the NA-player.

Well, few thinking players will kill 20 to cost you 5, but perhaps we're talking about those very rare situations where people haven't amassed 100s of armies yet.

To get to the point where you have 20 on each border and 100 in the middle, you need to start with 3 on each country. As in, the beginning of the game. Chances are, when you first take it, you're lucky to have 4-5 on each. At that point, it is worth busting up.

Obviously if we're evaluating continents based on how they pay-off once everyone has amassed huge defenses, then SA and Aussie aren't as advantageous. However, their value comes in due to the fact that you can actually take and hold them relatively easily at the beginning of the game and go from there.

#1) less countries to take and borders to hold
#2) People are less likely to mess with you because they're not going to waste themselves against 6 armies protecting a bonus of 2.

I notice you didn't mention the part about diplomacy, I take it you agree with me there then.

Even in the early stages where you might have only 4 or 5 on each of the southern borders a backup of 10-15 is easily attainable. A player in Africa will often be wary of spending any armies at all attacking you if someone's sitting in SA, he's getting 6/turn, has to spend 5 to break you and you will retake the country immediately with a larger force, it doesn't pay off, neither in the long run, nor in the short run.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying it can't be done. However, the problem with relying on diplomacy is the fact that it can be hard to establish a, "I don't hurt you, you don't hurt me" relationship with somebody you're out-earning because, over the long haul, you get the better end of the deal.


So no, I don't exactly agree with the diplomacy part. There are other maps that have adjoining bonus areas that pay roughly the same that I'm more often seeing that sort of deal.

OK, so now you've backed down from 20 army borders with 100 backing them up to 5 or so with 20. That still ignores the very first turn you took it where you only had 3-4 with nothing behind. That is, unless you slow played it and built up. Of course, by then the guy who locked down SA by turn 3 has been out earning you for some time and likely has a big army on North Africa ready to bitch-slap you the moment you take it the first time, knowing damn well that you'll catch up to him in armies in no time if he plays nice.

Of course, this is all theory and, to be honest, most games I play on that map against top players are escalating anyway where nobody may even hold Aussie, let alone anything bigger. None the less, in all the flat rate games I've played on that map, I can remember maybe one or two where somebody held Europe for any time at all.

It has happened practically every time I've played on the classic map.

MeDeFe wrote:It has happened practically every time I've played on the classic map.

I was bored, so I went back 1 year to check your games on that map. I only bothered with 4 or more players (that only excluded one game) and, frankly, most were 5 or 6.

For the sake of this argument, I just went back to look at the first continent the eventual winner was able to hold without being broken often.

All in all, you played 16 games on the classic map. Mind you, that was only on page 1. Perhaps earlier on things were different. Again, however the oldest game I checked was started in January of 2007, so I figured I had a decent sample. Especially when you consider the trends.

Here's the results:
Oceania-7
Africa-4
SA-3
NA-1
Europe-1 (Well, sort of, you ended up winning from this position but hardly held it without being broken, often. You got your first bonus from there in round 9, did not get the Europe bonus again until 19, then not again until 26, then 30, and then you pretty much ran the board.

Now, I understand that this doesn't prove that somebody wasn't able to hold it for a while during these games since I only checked where the eventual winner started. However, that' some pretty overwhelming odds that holding Europe is hardly the fast track to victory and certainly flies in the face of "practically every game I've played on the classic map"

Did I say I was bored? Sorry, it was pretty slow tonight (Spring Break and all). At any rate, 10 more games (first 10 on page 2), 6 more for Oceania, 1 more for South America, 2 more for Europe (nice comeback!), and 1 that never really held anything until the very end (though the first one technically was NA).

So, now it's
Oceania 13
Africa 4
SA 4
Europe 3
NA 1

To be honest, I'm impressed that Europe is even holding it's own for 2nd place as far as chances of winning are concerned. None the less, it's still way off the pace.

Equally strange to me is how ineffective SA is. If these 26 games are any indication at all about flat rate games played among skilled players (the ranks were certainly at least above average as a whole), it's a pretty ringing endorsement for Oceania.

Perhaps it's because you can lock it down, forget about it, and go f with people all over the board. I noticed quite often that Siam wasn't typically where those who had Oceania attacked from. People make too big a deal about expansion, perhaps. Especially on a small map like classic.

i personally like taking germany in europe map but have only done so twice first...

I never said I was the one to hold Europe in all of those games. Just that "it" happens that someone gets to hold it.

MeDeFe wrote:I never said I was the one to hold Europe in all of those games. Just that "it" happens that someone gets to hold it.

Well, truth be told, you were actually the only one to win the game doing so (I think).

None the less, I'm assuming that showing that somebody is actually able to get a hold of Europe for some stage of a game but rarely is able to win from that position is hardly a ringing endorsement for "it can be done". What I did see from your games (the one's you said someone is able to hold Europe in "practically every game") was that, in fact players rarely could. Well at least not long enough to parlay that into winning the game.

On the contrary, as I expected, anyone who grabbed Europe got hit, then they grabbed it again, and got hit again, and so on. Of the 3 games in 20 that they were able to win, in one they did so despite only getting the bonus 3 times before round 30.

This sort of flies in the face of what you were talking about, be it through diplomacy or the fear of retaliation. Neither seemed to work very well. At least not nearly as well as locking down Oceania and going from there.

Once again, I have trouble buying theories on why something should work when I have a rather broad amount of personal experience that it doesn't. Now that I've looked into the games of somebody who assures me that it does work only to see more of the same...

I checked out some of my old games on the classic map, in the majority of the games that didn't immediately degenerate into slaughter-feasts within a few turns where people were either desperately going for each others cards in the hope of a mixed set or where two people were taking turns conquering half a dozen or more territories of each other and everyone else while the rest was scraping by on 3 or 4 countries apiece, someone managed to get and hold Europe, usually even in the initial stages of the game. This player didn't necessarily win in the end, but Europe was taken and held.

About grabbing and retaking you might, due to the way the log works, be missing that the person trying to get Europe at that point is accumulating armies and cards over a few turns and leaving only 1 army on the peripheral territory getting grabbed until he can cash in.


Sad thing my last game on the classic map was about 1.5M games ago...