Could the Crows also be banned?

[Ze Monstah]

I actually agree that a wetland focused strategy is usually somewhat weaker. For that reason, I actually prefer the tuck and draw over tuck and lay eggs, because you end up with more cards. This means you can take the wetland action less often and focus on playing birds & laying eggs more. I actually like a tuck-and-draw bird in the wetlands early for the first couple of draws (to find the right synergy) and then a mid-game tuck-and-draw bird in the grasslands - it allows you to take the preferred action (lay eggs) and still cycle through your cards a bit to find some nice cards.

There are quite a few birds that let you get food through some other means (crows, vultures, some others), but it's much harder to draw cards through bird powers (like net end up with more cards than you started with, so not tuck and draw). For that reason, I actually like to boost my wetlands action early, so I can draw the cards I need more effectively, and limit the number of times I have to take that action. And if I can combine that with a tuck and draw to both see more cards AND get a couple VPs I really like that.

Great.

Do you really think someone would actually play/activate their Raptor birds, if they saw you build up a Vulture-kind of bird?
Or do you simply keep them (the Vultures) from the start and play them IF/WHEN you see the other one goes for a Raptor?

Asked above because I personally never activate my Raptors if/when I see the foe goes for a Vulture (for whatever reason).
I consider it a bad luck and move along and I only activate the raptors in the last round (4/4), usually the Raptors in the Grassland, making sure my bad luck (Bad Luck=the foe having Vultures played after I decided to go for some Raptor strategy) will only bring the Foe Food at the very end, when it can't help her/him too much.

[donkeykong66]

I likely wouldn't play a vulture before any such birds are played as it might discourage some people. As for the other part, it also depends on player count. If it's a 4p game we both benefit from it, so we gain compared to the 2 other players. Also, if I don't activate mine, maybe some other opponent will. In 2p, you can tactically choose not to use them if you feel like they might gain more from it than you will. But that might still be a reason to play the Vulture -> it's free to play and if it makes your opponents game worse it's still a good choice

[pjt33]

Do you really think someone would actually play/activate their Raptor birds, if they saw you build up a Vulture-kind of bird?
Or do you simply keep them (the Vultures) from the start and play them IF/WHEN you see the other one goes for a Raptor?

Asked above because I personally never activate my Raptors if/when I see the foe goes for a Vulture (for whatever reason).

In my experience, most people activate them.

[Ze Monstah]

Do you really think someone would actually play/activate their Raptor birds, if they saw you build up a Vulture-kind of bird?
Or do you simply keep them (the Vultures) from the start and play them IF/WHEN you see the other one goes for a Raptor?

Asked above because I personally never activate my Raptors if/when I see the foe goes for a Vulture (for whatever reason).

In my experience, most people activate them.

Sometimes, in mine, too.
I don't, especially in games of 2.

[kloaf11]

This with point scoring in grass is obviously the better end game engine because they naturally generate points. So you get more just in general.

As far as the on topic subject on crows. The issue with ravens is its 1 resources for any 2 from supply. If ravens were only from bird feeder. They might even be much closer. Since the rng gets thrown in. Crows aren't that op cause there's plenty of other cards that give you 1 resource for nothing. So a 1 for 1 isn't generating anything like a raven does. You can ignore wetlands outside of high scoring birds with a strong draw engine in forest or grasslands. There are comparative birds to crows. Ravens are so strong just because of the generating more of the resource you need then the resource you spend.

I play with the strong 4. And maybe it's cause of my middling ego atm while I climb but they need to have a real solid strategy to win with them still imo. I've seen plenty of raven gull guys barely beat or lose to me due to strats and planning. Of course at a higher elo. The strong 4 especially multiple can end a game fast where the strats are all pretty strong. But I don't think crow would contribute to that even at high elo

[Ze Monstah]

Crows aren't that op cause there's plenty of other cards that give you 1 resource for nothing. There are comparative birds to crows.

I play with the strong 4. And maybe it's cause of my middling ego atm while I climb but they need to have a real solid strategy to win with them still imo. I've seen plenty of raven gull guys barely beat or lose to me due to strats and planning. Of course at a higher elo. The strong 4 especially multiple can end a game fast where the strats are all pretty strong.

Which birds exactly are COMPARATIVE to the Crows? Birds that give you the EXACT resources you need for the future birds, while also laying eggs (generating points)? So you play Forest and Grass at the same time, if the precious Crow is in the Grass...

From my experience, there's only the 9-points Heron, but that's in the Wetland. So... really not that overpowered.

The Towhee and the other Worm/Seed/Fruit birds that can also be built in the Grassland (apart from the classical Forest), give you just that... Worm/Seed/Fruit.
So they're Feeder-dependent (all except the Towhee), unlike the Crows and their annoying Cousin-ish Ravens that help you boost your Ego, like you said above.

I understood all of your pieces of opinion, but IMO, The Strong 4 and the Crows shouldn't be available for competitive play, as they are at the moment; I really don't understand why there's no point (or half-point) given to the foe(s) every time 1 of the Strong 4 or 1 of the Crows gets activated.
I guess the Game designer wanted to have some random strong-luck criteria included.

[SluggerBaloney]

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