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Solo: Ocean' s Hungry Grasp - Board D. Is it even possible ?

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Hankroyd
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Solo: Ocean' s Hungry Grasp - Board D. Is it even possible ?

Hi

I got the digital version of the game (just base game) and right now I'm trying to win a basic game (difficulty 0) with each spirit on each board.

With Ocean, Board A, B, C were OK, but I don't see how I could win on D. Unless heavy stacking of the cards in my favor.

 

If the invaders don't explore wetland, it is impossible to prevent them to ruin the land since you cannot defend.

Especially in sand, since they is no way (again barring pure luck) to prevent the city build.

 

I usually go with growth three : putting presence of the coastal lands, trying to get something to draw explorer/city away from explored lands, doesn't get it, try to prevent the build in one land and drown a stupid explorer because there is nothing else to do.

On turn two, see that I can use growth three to get another power I can't use while the lands I'm not allowed to protect are ravaged and the blight card kill the game or I can use growth 2 to implement myself in the ocean with useless third card play, or pointless symbol at this time, see the land I'm not allowed to protect being ravaged and the game killed by the blight card.

 

 

Does anyone has any idea how to win this setup?

Ameena
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Off the top of my head I can't remember which board is which, but as Ocean it's really incredibly useful if you can get hold of Reaching Grasp to give yourself a +2 to all Range whenever you use it. Doesn't help your innates/starting powers which only work on Coastal lands, but get yourself a few more generally-targeted cards (very easy to do as Ocean) and you should find you can reach any problem sites eventually. Sky Stretches to Shore is useful to let yourself reach the coast even if all your Presence is in the sea. I had a solo game of Ocean once, a couple of years ago I think, in which the furthest land from the sea was a Wetland and had got pretty crowded with Invaders. I believe the turn in which I comboed Sea Monsters with Reaching Grasp was the one which ended the game because suddenly that land became considerably less crowded. Possibly even empty, I can't remember now >:).

So you might be somewhat reliant on the luck of the cards, but it's certainly possible to solo as Ocean. It just might become a bit of a Fear race as it does with Bringer, if you can't reach the furthest end of the board.


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dpt
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Board D is the board with two coastal Wetlands, as mentioned in the original post. This does make some things more difficult if they don't explore Wetlands, but yes, it's possible to win. The biggest thing that I see reading your post is that you're treating it as a lost cause as soon as the Island gets Blighted. You have not lost at that point! Have you been playing your games to their conclusion?

With solo Ocean, you need powers that can reach inland, and it may take some turns to find suitable Powers; indeed it's quite possible the Island will Blight in that time, but keep working on it!

Hankroyd
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I have tried this particular game a five times so far : I went on the first times until the expected defeat.

 

But on the third try, seeing it will be the same game again, I just left the game when I saw I can't draw correct cards or exploration doesn't go as I need. So yeah ... maybe one of those game might have been possible to win, but I doubt it.

I guess I'll will increase the difficulty a little to have more things to destroy ... or launch the game again and again until I got a playable opening.

Ameena
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The original post didn't say anything about the distribution of Wetlands, it mentioned those and Coastal lands in separate sentences but didn't specify otherwise ;).

But yeah, getting some reach is useful as Ocean, especially if you can get something that's Range 3 and has no land type specification. As I mentioned, Reaching Grasp is amazing but if you can't get hold of that then you can maybe get some Powers with a little Range and maybe try to Gather the Invaders in a bit. You'll hahve some issues if you can't reach the far end of the island and they manage to put a City there, but all is not lost even if that end gets pretty messed up - just murderise as much stuff as possible...you can even deliberately let them build stuff you know you can deal with just so you can crush it in the Slow phase and get some extra Fear. I've certainly done that before a bunch of times - play a Slow card that will destroy a Town in a Coastal land when there are none but I know they're gonna build one that turn, let that happen, then om nom nom >:D.


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TakeWalker
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Funnily, I tried out this scenario myself, got Reaching Grasp on my first Minor Power draw, and proceeded to have a very easy time until I still lost somehow. XD

AdamH
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I went and tried this once with ocean (I actually did it twice and didn't record it)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f_L9iS74TXw

But this is one example of what it looks like for ocean to do stuff on that map. Maybe it helps out?

dpt
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AdamH wrote:
I went and tried this once with ocean (I actually did it twice and didn't record it) ...

One thing I noticed on your playthrough is that you were placing your Presence before deciding which cards to gain. You can do Presence options in any order, and I always pick the cards first myself.

TakeWalker
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I'll be darned, the decks are even flashing. :O Never knew you could do that!

FrivYeti
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Just for the heck of it, I gave this a try and won on my first go-around. The wetlands explore didn't happen until Turn 3, but I did get a Coastal Lands explore on Turn 5 that was easy to unravel. 

My big win was getting the card whose name I can't recall that creates Fear and stops Invaders from taking action. That sped up my Fear generation and let me block city construction.