by Cadellon
Knowing how to analyze the map has a huge impact impact on your success at Runewars. It will determine how well you plan your opening turns, and that will in turn determine which resources and positions will be available to you during the remainder of the game.When placing Home Realms there are many things to take account of:
1. Food: Food is one of the most important resources of the game. A player who is unable to secure a decent supply of food is doomed to failure (well at least in any game longer than the standard non-revised rules that is, a lot of what is said here is irrelevant in these games since everything happens so quickly). There is a significant difference between a player with 6 food and a player with 8 food as the latter will be able to defend his areas much better and will have more flexibility in unit placement. In that regard, areas providing 2 or !3! food are very precious. You should always look out for these, especially when they are close to your home realm. My goal is usually to have at least 7 food (home realm included) within 2 hexes of my home realm.
2. Terrain: look out for mountains and to a lesser extent water that provide easily defendable locations, and if you see a chokepoint between two mountains, jump on it and build a stronghold with defenses that will easily protect the rest of your empire. These positions are even more valuable in a Road to Victory as you will have to defend your runes much more.
3. Runes: runes placed on the map prove quite valuable as they are essentially free. Look for positions with easily defendable runes, mostly if you know if they are true or false (ignore this if you are playing with normal rules in case this isn't obvious
)4. Cities: Having cities will ease your early development as they are not defended and provide a lot of flexibility with Rally supports as they give many options. Cities also have a great synergy with heroes as Heroes are provided by Rally support (and it would not be productive in a lot of situations to use Rally support just for a hero) and allow to refresh quests (which can be great in some situations). You can gain a lot of flexibility from having many cities as they let you choose between influence, tactics and units. On the other hand, cities are much harder to defend as you cannot build a stronghold on them (and in consequence, recruit there) and cities can be viewed as a doubled edged sword: they allow to conquer quicker early on, but will also allow your opponent to do so. So cities are often much better when far from the border.
5. Ore: many people will be surprised that ore is so low on my list of priorities coz ore means hex units and hex units mean more power right? I do not think so. In the early game if I have to make the choice between a hex and a stronghold(as a stronghold depletes ore) I usually choose the stronghold as it strengthens your position much more than a hex unit puts much more pressure on your opponent with the menace of recruiting there quickly. Also, ore only become important later on where armies, already maxed out on the 8 units per tile limit, need to gain more quality vs quantity and only there you might find yourself in need of ore. I have won games without ever placing a hex unit on the board due to good stronghold placement and spamming small units (think about it, if you lack ore, it means that someone else is lacking another resource like wood (that often unlocks intermediary units which they will lack or more importantly food)
6. Wood. Wood is usually less important than the rest. It is the last resource you should seek out as it usually does not give you your core unit(s) except if you are Latari (even them do not need wood as much as you would think. Wood often gives you the intermediary units, but these are most often spread across several dials so wood isn't crucial for that). If you have wood, good for you. Otherwise, you don't care.
So what you are basically looking for is a position that will allow you to take easily 3 areas by the second winter with 6-8 food and a stronghold in a strategic position.
On last important note: small lacks in one resource 3ore or 7food can be compensated by a development but no not rely to much on that (famine) and try to not have any area essential to you (a area with a lot of food or ore) adjacent to three areas owned by the same enemy as it is quite hard to defend(see below):
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Hope you enjoyed this guide!
Links to my other Runewars strategy articles:
http://www.boardgamegeek.com/thread/1211128/influence-farmin...: Influence farming