Howlingwolfpaws General FFA strategy guide

[howlingwolfpaw]

General Strategy tips for FFA


Many of these come from examining the psychology that happens in FFA games that is unlike other game types. These are just some general things I have noticed over the years. Nothing is definitive and subject to change with player meta.


Get as many TPs as you can. Use them to get a few cards ahead and then for coin to age up fast. If you do not have them then someone else does and that puts you in disadvantageous situation. ATP will dissuade people from stealing them. If they do, then they have shown their army, and make counter army and protect it! If they go for the TPS they will give you time to react, if they go for your base then you can sustain off the TP with stage coach.

Get native post even if you do not plan on making units or techs right away. trying to steal it later will create acts of war, sometimes you can ask to trade your post for others as well.

Examine player personality or deck choices to decide whether to go full TR deck or hybridized deck. Especially for neighbors.

Get your market upgrades as soon as possible (once your ready to collect that type of resource). You need to get that resource collected graph at its maximum potential,

If you have an extra spot in your deck, an advanced Balloon can be helpful to scout factories, best wall entrances and your enemies FB so you can see what they are building.

Attacking age 3 (and 4 for power spike) are the best times for early attack. You may have easy success with an age 2 rush but it will patter out. A well macro'd age 3-4 fight though will give you more XP for maxing cards and can still maintain an economy to advance in age.

Waiting too long to attack just means your enemy is massing as much and having more time for defenses. There is a balance between optimal times to attack.

Generally it is better to attack than be in the defensive position as after time they may whittle away the defenses. But a good defenders advantage can also help to drain the enemy and put you in a position to push out and take it back to their base.

Scout enemy general locations after scooping up TPs so you know where to counter attack if disturbed.

Build TCs spread out to take advantage of map resources.

Never steal a treasure unless you plan to go to war. Some treasures might be worth it, but if you do not act further on it then they likely will.

Politeness gets noticed. When you have an explorer in base or accidentally attacking a settler, say something!
People will remember if you are polite or deceitful so keep it classy.

Age slow and keep from being noticed.... being a strong age 3-4 is often better than being a weak age 5. Staying under the radar can have its advantages. Pure booms are risky but if you get caught in one upgrade 1 unit to imperial first, skip the economic uprgades and spam that 1 unit as your defense. You might have a shot that way.

Pick lower tier civs.... they are as much fun but are under rated so not seen as primary targets. Ports, France and Russia people know to rush and not let get too big.

Do not have a set plan pregame or hold grudges vs players. That can blind you to signs of problems within the game and cause mistakes to happen so treat each game as new. (though keep in mind people may still be gunning for you)

You do not have to attack your neighbors if signs of peace are present or they are in battle. Attack the highest scores so they do not get too big. Getting drawn into a lesser priority can put you further behind.

Water play--- can be very OP, schooners in FFA is very strong. Be prepared to protect the sea. Best to rush someone once you see they have invested a lot in the sea. You may not survive but if they have no base defenses and spent it all on water then can put them in a tougher spot. If they get to age 4 though, its likely too late.

If someone one it in a battle, respect it! When players are in a good battle and it gets unfairly interrupted they sometimes turn on the player who thinks its OK to team someone. When you respect battles or stop attacking when you find out, players will also respect you.

Do not let aggression go unpunished. If someone raids you, find the right time to make your move.

Mercenary rushes--- can be very good, most players decks are not geared to full on rushing so having age 3-4 units in age 2-3 can be tough to deal with.

Walling: see post viewtopic.php?f=29&t=20995 for walling tips. Do not be one of those players that over does it, people will rally against it.

Try to bring the battle to them. If your base in under siege send a vill to their and build a FB, try to find a moment to start sending units to their base, they will then have to start to defend, lessening the amount of attack on your side. Then you can send more....

If you are not making head way and in stale mate battle, try changing the location. Plan out where that will be, build a FB and transition with a strong emphasis on siege to get through while catching them off guard.

If you are caught off guard and a big army is at your base either delete your army or a number of vills, It is better to lose some eco on your terms and use it to defend with rather than have them in your base killing vills with no defense. (20-30 max)

Resist a base trade, you can make it appear like you are going to do that, but always try to defend what you have. Cheaper mills and plantation cards are helpful to relocate your economy in such events.

Do not get spies too early. It can be tempting but if people are booming and you spent all your economy on coin for spies players will know that is the best time to knock you out, as they will have more fighting eco..... Conversely, if someone gets spies really fast and your scores are similar, attack them immediately.

Blockade is lame and ruins games, people will team up vs those players and then often just quit themselves.

If you attack multiple people before any of them go out, expect that they will try to get revenge, but do not be angry can call it teaming.

In trying to scout for other players that ran, look for open areas between other players, destroyed bases, edges of the map, look for the direction vils are going, but also importantly build in their old base so if they return to reclaim any walls you will see it and have something to stop it.

If you want a fair fight at the end because players are resistant to fight a big score, use market manipulation to trade your resources down to a more fair advantage.

NEVER GIVE UP! you may be surprised what can happen if you find a new home to rebuild at. and come back with a awesome eco after most players have fought it out. If you get stuck in a lower age even some players will resign to give "endurance survivors" the win

A Peaceful Victory--- is the ultimate win in my book... when everyone is so polite they decide there is no need for conflict. Practicing world peace!




KING OF THE HILL

A nearly forgotten but really fun game mode. The more players playing, the less time you need to hold the fort. The great thing about it is once you get a lobby going players tend to want to play several rematches of 10-20 minute games. Its a great place to practice rush strategies. Played on Standard Maps. usually the TC is in the center but some maps is a little offset.

Revolts in general can win, but only if other players are battling it out. Being too greedy will end the game to someone with little contesting forced. it is not a boomy game.

Use Sioux for a no villager build, use the 3 vil shipment age up fast and send 4 axe riders next, run away if you see a army you can't handle. This can be so quick it can win you the match or give you so much time under it, that you can fall back and build up economy from there and only need to capture it again for a short while.... its still pretty risky but nice to see people sweat when they are no where near aging. Its risky though as you might not recover enough depending on how the rest of it goes.

Use New England and the fort will be on the sea at the end of the trade line, and fast revolt, build iron clads to protect your units from the shore. Very strong.

A cloaked unit sitting under it will still hold the fort for the win, so have an explorer with your army or use a spy yourself.

Walling the fort--- very annoying, and expensive for the player trying. You need to do this early age 1 and it sets you back enough that what end up happening is someone takes over your walls and walls the gaps other people made, so it is not advisable.

Build your FB closer to the fort but not too close. You do not want to get too much attention or start getting hit from the sides of someone elses FB. but too far and you will also lose time to reinforce or stop a last second countdown.

Deleting the fort--- I wish this were not an option, it is a NO NO to do this and just turns the game into a regular mode.... in which I just rehost

Attacking your neighbors--- Not advisable but it happens.. and then those 2 end up just continually attacking each other in next games. It can be good to stop a power house player from reinforcing, but will cost you the win too, and likely the person winning has little contesting forces, so its not really true to the game. Sometimes you need to raid for hunts.

There are many numerous ways to play this and the winner is never certain. The only down side is that it is more fun with more players but we can't change the hold time, so big player games can also end very quickly.


TREATY FFA--- Sometimes played but not as fun in my opinion. There is just too many good things like TP to want to capture. and lacks the depth of play from the various play styles and deck options in regular games. It can be a nice break to play once in a while though just so everyone is at a equal level and good practice for booming.

Also the trade line can severely impact some players base building so keep that in mind.



DEATHMATCH FFA-- I have only played a couple games on this mode as not many people play it and one needs a whole new home city to level up to get good deck options. It was kind of fun though and worth investigating more.



REGICIDE FFA--- Another mode I have only played a couple of games on. It wasn't too appealing to me, and rarely if ever gets hosted. Just hide him!



WHACKY "Things you can only do in FFA"

Some what trolley strats to break the monotony of daily FFA life. Note you may not be too popular after some of these.



Ram spam with Iros---- Only make rams and attack as many players as possible even if you do not kill them, just attack the buildings of every player. but the havoc and random damages will be worth it.

Legend of Aztec Gold Strat--- This I have had mixed results with but still fun to see what happens. Basically the objective is to turn your economy into full XP mode and save most if not all of your shipments to get to age 4 (a few economic boost helps to speed things up) Firepit will be on XP whole time except to make Priest. Then send all your shipments as 1000 coin to a proxy TC hidden on the map and start dropping 10k+(usually the XP and shipments patters out around 20 shipments) worth of shipments. Soon announce that you have done this and give the location of the TC. Then see what happens next!

***This would also work well with Iros but a little less XP but better 1500 resource card.

Age 1 win--- I have not personally done this but have heard from a Clan member he won this way. Going totally under the radar staying in age 1 the whole game pretending to be a noob. Meanwhile only building Town centers and then making minute men and deleting the town centers again. He said he got around 500 and then swarmed the last players base to overwhelm them....

Jaguar Cloak--- build a team of jaguar prowl knights in early age 3 and see if you can cloak them and set them in a base near their factories or hide them for later. They will hopefully not notice them and wall them in. At the right moment then strike! leaving people totally befuddled as to how that happened! On another note sometimes when besieging a wall I already have a cloaked group ready to sneak in the gap. The player might think they have won the battle and re wall but the stealth jags are soon to reveal themselves.

Native Scout Rush--- use card that unlocks scouts and mass them. They have good stats and are hard to counter early game. (I guess this happens in SUP games too?)

Indias revolt--- Build an army of mahouts and siege elephants etc... but no Sepoy. Then send the card that turns all villagers into Sepoy. At same time send consulate army. You may over whelm and wreck a few bases this way with nearly 240 military pop. Its actually really effective to use at the final player who boomed all game while you were fighting and then get the last push. It can be used any age, and new villagers can be made after. its really good under rated card because in revolt situation Sepoy are much better than MM. (note this could be done in other game types)

Villager rush--- kind of effective on maps like Deccan where people have lots of crates that they should only be using a few vills to collect and are close together, you can end up stealing a bit of resources this way....

Dymo play--- use Tokagawa to build mortars at random places around the walls and run him in and hide in the fog of war and build more mortars ever where.... so annoying!



Other FFA guides by Howlingwolfpaw:

viewtopic.php?f=29&t=20995 Walling guide

viewtopic.php?f=19&t=21014 Civ overview

viewtopic.php?f=19&t=21010 FFA map review


Thats it for now, maybe will think of things to add later, have a GG!