Eggs in one basket

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Decar
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Eggs in one basket

Post by Decar »

During a recent game on BoardGameArena, I had the opportunity to witness a series of unfortunate events that could have been avoided.

I think it serves as a good example of tactical play by demonstrating what to avoid and how control it during games! I know I've done it several times and certainly would have benefitted if I knew about it earlier:

The game starts like most games, very early on Yellow plays to join onto Red's pretty small road, in doing so a stack of cards (or tiles) becomes precariously balanced:

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Some points to consider here:
  • If Yellow does join this road, it would take 2 turns to gain 3 points (that's only a net gain of 1 point)
  • By playing this Red's not too inclined to complete the road, or help complete it, doing so would result in 4 of their turns for 1 of Yellow's (not ideal)
  • Having said that, Red's meeple is a little stuck here as the map is expanding fast, making the opportunity to expand in a controlled way difficult.
A Devilish plan forms in Red's mind:
  • If Red were to play a road edge towards Yellow's city, that would make it difficult to complete.
  • There are only 3 tiles in the game that have XRFC needed to complete the city.
  • If Yellow does join the road, and Red plays a common FFRR tile towards that city. The net result is Yellow has 2 busy meeple, for Red's one busy meeple.
The next tile in the game Yellow uses a FFRR to join Red's road, Red decides to use the CRRR tile to complete a road and unfortunately Yellow gets the CFFF tile to complete the city. Annoyingly Red's next card was a FFRR!

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Although this attack wasn't successful, it's the basis of this particular topic. It's very easy for meeple in different features to become depedant on each other.

A few turns later:
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  • Yellow really wants that 3 point road from Red.
    They use 2 meeple and eventually 5 tiles to steal it.
  • Yellow's also started farming, this was probably a good idea given all the green space, but Red responded for now.
  • The city looks like it may become quite large and set to contain 2 meeple. :x
A couple more turns sees this play from Yellow:
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  • It's a good way ensure that the Yellow farmer will join the larger segment of farm.
  • BUT, in doing so leaves the edge of that rather large city exposed to attack.
And a few turns later sees the stack of tiles reach it's pinnacle:
You'll see a Yellow cloister has joined the fray.

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Let's check here:
  • 2 Yellow meeple on the road. 2 Yellow meeple in that city. 1 Yellow Meeple on the cloister. 1 Red meeple on the road.
  • All of these meeple rely on 1 tile being played
  • It's now Red's TOP priority to TRAP those meeple on that square
That's a lot of eggs in one basket!

At this very moment the following tiles could fill that square:
  • 2 x splitters
  • 4 x
  • 2 x - Pretty good for road.
  • 2 x
  • 2 x - Probably ideal for road.
Those seem like pretty good odds. It's pretty lucky that Red is holding a CRRF tile.

Reducing the possible tiles for that square to: only 4 tiles:
You'll see that Red played a meeple on the CRRF tile, and I think this distracts from the potential attack too.

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It comes to no surprise that Red managed to trap those 5 meeple a few turns later.
This it what it looked like:

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So some lessons learned
  • The main takeaway here, is it can be very easy for a lot of meeple to all rely on a single tile, when it wasn't what you intended.
  • Generally, this is easier to do at the beginning of the game because the number of free spaces is limited. Your meeple density is higher.
  • So don't put all your eggs into one basket!
  • It can be very efficient using 1 tile to complete several features, but it can leave you exposed.
  • It can often be exciting to attempt to join onto other people's features, but timing is very important. Because the incentive to complete things shifts, especially on small point-value features.
  • Remember to check your odds and give yourself the best chance to get the tile you need.
  • Remember to use your tiles to defend, it might reduce your odds, of getting it finished, but that's better than no odds when it's trapped.
As a side note, at this point Yellow has played 2 tiles to join into a 2–tile city with their last meeple. Red has no insensitive to finish that city to give Red back a meeple!

Below is the sequence of tiles :

Here are the subsequent moves:
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Yellow's tile could ensure that a CCCR tile could complete the city and road.

Place to allow

Also Red chose to use RRFF, with the farm edge rather than a road edge to mount the trap. I've not counted to determine if waiting for an XXRC, or CCFC tile was more likely.


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Yellow's tile could ensure that the CCRR tile could be used to complete the city and extend the road.

Place to allow

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Yellow's tile could ensure that a CCCR tile could complete the city and road.

Place to allow

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Yellow's tile could ensure that a CCCR tile could complete the city and road.

Place to allow

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Yellow's tile could ensure that the CCRR tile could be used to complete the city and extend the road.
Place to allow

It took 5 turns to trap those 5 meeple and Yellow had 5 opportunities to defend!
So the last take away is Use your tiles to defend otherwise you're left with this:

Image


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