https://www.warlight.net/MultiPlayer?GameID=10512084

How should I have picked that? Should I not have assumed he had 5 income turn 3? If turn 4's prediction went awry did I have any hope? If not, did I make bad picks, or were the stars just aligned against me this game?

I feel my picks were far superior to my opponents under normal circumstances, yet I'm also fairly confident with their picks that I'd beat my picks, but I'd never expect someone to pick the shit they did.

Edited 2/13/2016 03:31:35

I don't like a lot your first pick, Australia is safe, but I wouldn't go for it as first (actually, I wouldn't go for it at all).
2nd and 3rd picks are fine
4 is a good counterpick
5th is probably the safest bonus on this board, it's hard to expect someone at WC and the Southeast Asia warlord is far away. You could use it as your first pick.
6th pick at WC is a fine counter for EC and could be used to take Southeast Asia if it's empty, but I think I'd prefer a good counter for AA, such as South Africa. Plus EC is heavily wastelanded and indonesia also have a wasteland, soo if you end up with two picks on the region, your growth can be limited.

Your opponent picks at
-AA for first is fine,
-Scandinavia as second will do,
-Europe as third is awful, West Russia is simply just better and you shouldn't put a counter to your second pick as third...
-South Africa as 4th isn't bad as counter
-Central Russia as 5th isn't very good, I think he should have gone to a safe bonus
-Caucasus as 6th is awful, he already has 3 picks on the region, in worst case scenario, he gets 3 of his picks there and you get one, and he's owned...


For the gameplay, you started really on an awful position, your oponent has a pick at AA and one at europe blocking your expansion, if I had to bet on a winner, I would have put all my money on him xD (there's the importance of a safe bonus at WC)

You go for australia, it's really pretty much your only choice there apart from going all-in on Europe. You use your income of australia to clean europe, it's a good move, I like it. You then blockade australia and go full expansion, fine move. Then you over expand him, and you get a victory at africa.



So my advice is to really improve your picking phase, it would have prevented a lot of headache and provided an easy win against your opponents not very good picks. You played well and it compensated your awful starting position, but it won't work against better opponents.

Good luck on improving, and I hope my advice helped you.

I think TeamGuns covered most of the points about the game.

Personally, I think your gameplay was as good as you possibly played it and you had luck on your aide with your opponent abandoning which was proved a key area of expansion, The fact it was 5v11 at one stage and you turned it to 31 v 23 showed the importance of the area though Hardcore lost what should've been easy win game.

I think your picks need improving to avoid positioning like that because as TeamGuns said you simply will not getaway with such positions, That said I think you have solid gameplay and if you work on your picks their is no doubt that you can be a solid player and improve from there :)

I'm willing to play some games where we can discuss the board about picks, I think having two minds talk about the board is highly beneficial regardless of what skill level. So feel free to invite me or TeamGuns I'm sure and we or I can help just pop me a mail and we can organise a game.

Edited 2/13/2016 01:52:16

Can you just develop "you shouldn't put a counter to your second pick as third..." does it make a difference if its 4th for example ?

Can you just develop "you shouldn't put a counter to your second pick as third..." does it make a difference if its 4th for example ?

Yes, absolutely. You use counters to avoid the opponent to take valuable positions on early game. So you probably wanna pick counters likely to block your ennemy's expansion. If you put a counter to one of your picks as your main 3, you're just wasting a pick that could be used in a another place in case you take both provinces.

If you're pretty sure the ennemy will go there, just put is as fourth and it's likely that you'll be able to avoid him taking the bonus.

Worst case scenario, you take your pick in the bonus and it's counter because you lost another pick, but that's the worst case scenario, if you pick a bonus and it's counter as 2nd and 3rd, it's likely that you get both, and that's bad if the picks don't assist each other very well.

The only exception to this rule is then an FTB or a combo, then it's good to pick a bonus and it's counter as the picks can assist each other.