Favorite Strategy

[jacksonslade]

What's your favorite strategy? Species type, continent, etc.

[Kmcjackerino]

I am fairly new the game and also wonder what other people are doing! Like what they choose to upgrade first? Or pick first from the “shield” bonuses. There are so many different mechanics! It’s really interesting to hear what others do!

[Camzeee]

My favorite strategy is a winning strategy.

I'm not very good at this game still but what I've noticed is that good players are very flexible in their approach and can win in all sorts of creative and interesting ways.

That said, I love sponsor heavy games. Chaining them together esp science tags is my favorite way to win.

[David314]

Best tags are typically whatever matches the starting projects, or maybe whatever other projects you can get early.

I've been playing for a while, but even now I'm still not sure about card flips and shield bonuses.

Thoughts on shield bonuses:
- Standard answer for best shield bonuses seems to be the extra worker, the card snap, and the 5 income early
- X's late are good usually to power another association action in endgame
- The size 2 enclosure bonus seems underrated; my first thought was that it's like a really inflexible 4 money income, but I've come to realize that not spending X's on build is nice and that putting size-1 animals in size-2 enclosures isn't actually that bad anyway. I'm starting to like it, especially if not upgrading build early (or at all)
- I'm not sure I like the worker as shield bonus early. I've been messing around with taking the worker with 2 CP, letting me typically take the shield bonus worker in endgame for points. This is weird since I lose out on the fourth card flip (so typically I'll get animals, cards, and something else, the safe option being build), but I don't think I hate it. Not convinced it's better than standard, though, especially if breaks happen quickly.
- 5 money income reward seems essential if you're doing a release project in the first two break cycles; otherwise, you're essentially spending about half your starting money buying a few CP and you just don't have enough money to keep up with building your zoo
- Snapping is good even if there's not something you want in the card row right now, since it gives you the first chance to take new cards that show up during break cycles. Typically, once people start getting that bonus, the card row starts getting a lot worse since the good cards just get snapped immediately. And if your opponent has snapping while you don't, this typically means they get all the good cards and you're just drawing randomly and hoping.

Thoughts on card flips:
- Typical setup seems to be animals, cards, build, and one of association or sponsors. Typically animals is early, cards is sometime before you hit 10 rep, and the others are whatever order makes sense
- Standard start seems to be both reputation universities into flipping animals, then using level 5 upgraded animals for a 5th rep to upgrade something else (safe option being cards so you don't have to worry about going past 9 rep, but anything else can be good if you have a plan and/or the right cards). This is usually pretty good unless starting cards have a specific requirement or you're targeting an early project
- Early partner zoos in random stuff (often Australia) can be good for rushing 5 CP Habitat Diversity (typically late break cycle 2 or early break cycle 3), and this might actually be the best play in that case, especially if you have sponsors or cheap animals to get extra continent tags quickly. (Granted, if you play for 5 CP Habitat Diversity and your opponent beats you to it, you then have to settle for 2-3 CP and that's really bad, especially since 5 CP gives an extra bonus on the CP track letting them further snowball ahead of you.) Partner zoo + animal can be good for "XYZ breeding program" projects or just a straight habitat project (ideally in first slot in 2 player games where the only other option is 4 tags for 3 CP, which is usually just sad if you weren't already going for it).
- Interestingly, I got completely crushed one time by some high ELO player who didn't upgrade build and used a combination of the size-2 enclosure reward and release projects to keep playing 2 animals each time. I've been messing around with that, and I don't think I hate it, though you can end up short on money (due to lack of kiosks) and space (especially for large enclosures if you don't plan well), which makes it really important to get lots of points off projects so you can end the game before you get massively outspent by a standard kiosk engine.
- I don't love upgrading associate, especially if the opponent upgrades it first and beats me to the cheap donation spots. Then again, I've been sad about being locked out of a third partner zoo before (typically as CP reward or Outdoor Areas map), so that might be something to look out for and plan ahead for.
- A weird tactical option to be aware of is that hypnosis on the opponent's upgraded association lets you take a third partner zoo (plus gets you an extra worker) even if you yourself didn't upgrade association, though often at that point in the game it's better to just spend some X's, use the opponent's association action to do a project, do another one with your associate action, and plan to break quickly. I've not seen hypnosis used on upgraded sponsors to play a level 2 sponsor card (mostly because it'd require a weird combination of cards that you wouldn't necessarily plan to keep around, plus the opponent having upgraded sponsors), but that should also work.
- Having Talented Communicator on its own is usually enough to justify upgrading Sponsors for me (my general theory is I want the ability to get the fourth worker, either from taking the worker instead of the card flip at 2 CP, Associate plus third partner zoo, Sponsors plus talented communicator, or very rarely some full-throated animal that I know I want to play later).

I'm also thinking these end up being somewhat map-dependent (ex: upgrading sponsors on Hollywood Hills is good because you get more and cheaper sponsors; the size-2 enclosure income is good on Commercial Harbor so you can get the doubler on associate right before the last break cycle; not upgrading build is less punishing on Ice Cream Parlors due to the kiosk bonuses), but I don't have solid map-specific strategies yet and the cards you draw might end up mattering more here anyway.

[Suoivax]

You have to be extremely adaptive in this game. No single strategy will work, until you see what projects are up, and what cards you have access too.

Even what action card to flip first depends on the state of the game.

[sdi1231]

Spotted hyena compound

[BlanketAddict]

I really think the best strategy is being flexible and knowing how to adapt to different situations, but some particular combos I find really fun are native farm animals + diversity researcher, as well as barred owl hut + penguin pool

[JDansp]

empty petting zoo-strat

[pjt33]

- The size 2 enclosure bonus seems underrated; my first thought was that it's like a really inflexible 4 money income, but I've come to realize that not spending X's on build is nice and that putting size-1 animals in size-2 enclosures isn't actually that bad anyway. I'm starting to like it, especially if not upgrading build early (or at all)

The other thing it can be useful for is timing the bonus tiles. Later you mention using it with Commercial Harbor to set up 2x Association in the endgame, but it can also be convenient for draw-in-range right at the start of the break cycle, and other more niche actions.

- A weird tactical option to be aware of is that hypnosis on the opponent's upgraded association lets you take a third partner zoo (plus gets you an extra worker) even if you yourself didn't upgrade association, though often at that point in the game it's better to just spend some X's, use the opponent's association action to do a project, do another one with your associate action, and plan to break quickly. I've not seen hypnosis used on upgraded sponsors to play a level 2 sponsor card (mostly because it'd require a weird combination of cards that you wouldn't necessarily plan to keep around, plus the opponent having upgraded sponsors), but that should also work.

Hypnosis on an upgraded Build can be very convenient for the three (usually) restricted tiles on your map if you haven't upgraded build but want to fill the map.

[calvaria]

empty petting zoo-strat

gotta get that sweet map bonus