I don't actually know if there's much value in initiating them though when in the time it takes to set up a battle you can probably do quite a bit of sweeping on the map
14:55
I'm a bit worried about other people initiating them though
I think part of the reason my team won on the first game was because the route we picked was just really efficient. We did get some slow challenges in the start, but we planned to go to all the areas where you could very quickly walk between stations and getting those as a streak was really good.
Monument-Bank-Mansion House are really close together. Regent's Park to Kings Cross via Great Portland Street, Warren Street, Euston Square, and Euston is so good
15:09
we caught up at that point while you were taking your time going station by station around the Circle line
I think a lot of this is going to be situational. Battle challenging is going to be easier now, so if another team takes one of those power spots and then is in the lead, we might be well served by walking that way and stacking battle challenges against them
17:03
no point battling teams that are behind, but teams that are in the lead, fair game
a lot of the strategy involve, as ratt discussed earlier getting to areas where you can do quick clusters of stations and routing
22:54
the challenges are all pretty quickly solveable (or at least have been previously) so i wouldn't be too worried about them upon opening the challenge list
22:55
i am a bit worried that there's an extra team this time around and also the changes to how battles work, now you only need one adjacent station to initiate a battle which sounds like it could be really hectic
22:56
it also means that there's not really 'safe, uncontestable' stations now which i know the team i was on played around those
22:59
i'm gonna pull this stupidly oversimplified map i stole and then edited out of the gutter
23:01
i really don't like how easy it potentially is to just rock up on one team's station now and continue advancing along the line and battling
23:02
i don't think there's any real reason to try keeping your stations safe from contestion now for this reason unless any of you think any differently
Barry Heck
i'm gonna pull this stupidly oversimplified map i stole and then edited out of the gutter
not going to be easy to win the battles sure, but if you get the first one it's gonna be hella annoying if you do keep advancing and initiating those battles
14:56
i don't think it's too much of a concern
14:56
but if a team's in the lead it's certainly a way to try and slow them down
Players aren't going to be able to see the status of the queue, and the current ruling is that you can't initiate a battle if you're not already connected
and if it turns out it's one you can actively participate in? great
14:59
i think this actually could be quite a good strategy if it's used once or twice on a winning team just to get them to slow down but if you do it too much i think they'll catch on and actively not participate either
especially in those so important clusters you can walk between and get claims relatively quickly i think it'd be quite a good play
15:03
it's not like you have anything to lose by initiating them
15:04
...other than them potentially locking that station, this is true but i'm not sure that's enough of a negative
15:05
i actually wonder if something like this has been thought up in game design because it's certainly a reason why i think the changes to the amount of adjacent stations you need to initiate a battle are somewhat questionable
15:12
it also something potentially annoying enough to end up getting us hard targetted so... maybe that's the balance tool?
It was changed because there's a suspicion that we're going to run out of stations before the end, and there just aren't enough double adjacent stations
15:13
it will be interesting to see how it works out in practice
i would like to potentially look at starting south of the river because i don't think it's going to be an area anyone's going to try to go for at the start
if we want to grab as many stations as possible then we either probably want to go north or go Waterloo-Southwark-London Bridge and then take the triangle by Monument
15:18
Monument-Bank-Mansion House are all very close together
I think the consensus is that we at least want London Bridge or Waterloo
1
09:55
That north east section of the map is the most heavily contested so we want to set ourselves up for a position where we can battle into that region later on if needs be
09:56
I don't want to head straight up there because it's been such a hotly contested region in the past, I believe it's what won all the other games but I'm just worried about it becoming a bit of a bloodbath
09:57
There's a lot of stations up there within very short walking distance you can quickly knock out(edited)
09:59
Everything south of the Thames has historically been pretty untouched in this game so I think it's a pretty good area to just play clean up on the map without worrying about other people but I'm not sure @ratt feels the same as I do
09:59
There's an extra team this time which is where the majority of my concerns come from
10:01
The no public transport curses also make that side of the map more powerful because you just don't really need it
10:02
(outdated but relevant)(edited)
10:04
Buses are also incredibly valuable
10:05
We have, in the first game, (and we did consult on this one so didn't break any rules) started a claim by sending our selfie while on the bus
10:05
and then carried on towards the challenge while on the bus
I want to sweep the southern side of the map particularly because it's relatively safe
11:43
ideally I'd like to do as much of it as possible while getting some safer stations that are positioned for us to be able to battle up north
11:43
I like Waterloo because it gives us reach
11:45
I don't know what going straight to vauxhall and starting there would get us because it's not really a power starting position other than being safe
11:46
Unless you wanna go for Waterloo, jump on a train to vauxhall and then romp back up the bank northern(edited)
11:47
Does seem rather time inefficient though
1
Barry Heck
Everything south of the Thames has historically been pretty untouched in this game so I think it's a pretty good area to just play clean up on the map without worrying about other people but I'm not sure @ratt feels the same as I do
Hm, I like the idea of going to London Bridge, but those stations to the north of the river are just so valuable
17:03
They're a very short walk, and if we end up there before the other teams I don't think that's an advantage we should pass up
17:04
The name of the game early on is speed, and the advantage of the eastern stations north of the river is that they're just so close together
17:05
I wouldn't even be entirely against just skipping London Bridge and getting first dibs on that area
17:07
There's also the issue of the 12 public transport block curses in the challenge deck(edited)
17:08
If we can burn those while in a spot where we can walk between stations, that won't be hanging over us for the rest of the game
17:11
I think it's risky going for the valuable stations and risking a fight, but skipping them is also very risky. They're a target for a reason, they've been part of the winning runs of both teams because they give you a lead that's difficult to overcome
I mean yeah, that's more or less what I was thinking. Waterloo, walk to Southwark, train to London Bridge, then snap up as many of Monument/Cannon Street/Mansion House/Bank as possible before continuing north
17:52
There's more good stations to the north like Moorgate/Liverpool Street, and the mass of stations up by Euston
17:52
There's also the two Aldgate stations further east
17:55
Buses are a good strategy and I think it's a good idea especially in the middle game before rush hour, but they've got nothing on single digit walking times between stations
17:57
Unless the strategy is to make ourselves as small a target as possible and try to win on spamming battle challenges, I just think that going for the far apart stations to begin with is going to make us play catch-up the entire game
do we want to bother with those first few stations then because I think it might honestly be faster to jump on a train at embankment and then ride it to the cluster
17:59
i am of the belief that if we want to do it we need to get there first
17:59
It's a known strategy at this point that as you say has won games
I don't really mind which strategy we go with, I just think anything where we intentionally go for slower stations because we're wary of the other teams would be self-defeating. Straight to Regent's Park or straight to Mansion House would both be good, and I don't have any particular objection to going for Southwark and London Bridge first, because that still keeps our options open with all the walkable stations to the north we could target
19:40
If we get a really easy challenge at the first station we get to we should probably even consider doing that(edited)
The only thing that really worries me about this is that a bunch of the challenges seem like things that would be easier in higher density areas with naturally more stations especially around by bank and later in the game when we've finished in that region and are more on the outskirts we're in a much more disadvantageous position
20:19
Especially given you only need 1 adjacent it's a lot easier for a team to just stroll up and change the map
The other thing as well with starting mansion house I think it's a much stronger opening move but I also think it's going to be contested from game start so I'm only really 100% happy to do that if everyone's willing to leg it to embankment
either way we have to absolutely book it but i'm now starting to think london bridge because we'll have more time to try and claim it versus embankment where we're starting the claim and then jumping straight onto a train
I mean we could do that but it's a decent risk only to get us to a station in the same amount of time as if we'd just travelled to Mansion House or Regent's Park
21:57
and we miss out on potentially being able to claim Embankment/Waterloo
I just have that feeling we're not going to be strolling there uncontested and based on how much connectivity to other stations there is bank is the clear one for me
05:39
if other teams come from embankment it also means we won't be contested there
05:39
i just think they're gonna go straight for mansion house or monument first
05:41
either they come from embankment or they come from waterloo and if we get to waterloo east we're faster
05:41
it's too much of a speed difference not to pass up
05:42
by my estimations if we get the train from waterloo east we can get to bank by 9:20 at the earliest
05:43
i just don't see mansion house as that powerful of a start move
05:46
oooh i'm gonna look like a right idiot if we're the only ones there
05:50
i also think we need to be pretty on it with battles early on
even if we don't win them we're going to lock stations which even if not in our favour and we lose might disincentivise other teams from trying to play in that area later on(edited)
I think if we're going directly for the triangle then Embankment > Mansion House > walk to Cannon Street ect. is the play. If we're going to London Bridge then walking to Monument then to Bank is what we should do
05:51
If we skip Monument then why are we even going to the triangle?
Please make sure that one team member (who has a Google Account) shares their Google Maps tracking with [email protected]
This tracking will only be seen by the helpdesk and helps us verify challenges and see your location in case of emergencies.
The app
Challenges will be assigned in the app. You will receive an introduction to the app on location from Fahmi Sack. Click here to open the app.
Communication with helpdesk
Please remember to post all challenge-related communication with the helpdesk (selfie to start a challenge and result of a challenge for verification) in #team-4-verification only.
Helpdesk reactions
When posting in your verification channel please give us a minute to react. We will use the following reactions:
= We have seen your message and are working on it (Especially when verifying tasks this will remain under the message for a moment)
= Check your app (Refresh the page if required), we have assigned your station a challenge
✅ = Challenge result is verified and approved
❌ = Challenge result is not approved (An explaination will follow)
Stay safe, stay hydrated and have fun!