Thread: Barony:: General:: Strategy help

by sh4mike

We're currently playing our first game but ended up pausing so we could think about how the strategy should flow.

The first 15VP for conversion was easy. Just push 3 pairs of knights to the plains, convert to village, then turn in the 15VP for a title.

But now we're at a Mexican standoff, with pairs of knights hanging out around each other's villages, and no one wants to construct because the earned VP tile will immediately go to the opponent.

My naïve interpretation is that we should be doing 2 things better:
1) converting exposed villages to cities (sort of a 2-time get-out-of-jail free card for exposed villages)
2) blocking off territory more effectively to prevent existing villages from being attacked

That #2 is likely the more important point and where I'm most troubled, because it seems pretty damn hard to lock down territory in this game. Players have only 7 knights, so blocking has to be done with other assets. Strategies include:
1) putting villages in mountains
2) strongholds in place of cities in a chokepoint when the 2 cities can be better placed elsewhere

But still, it seems pretty damn hard to block off territory in a more permanent fashion. In addition, there are so many cities starting out on the board at game start, and we dispersed them reasonably well, that if a player appears to be setting up a blockade then another players city is close enough to deploy a pair of knights, slip inside the blockade, and convert 1 to a city before the territory can be locked down. It isn't like we're starting at far edges of the board expanding territory, this game makes that initial strong placement difficult to achieve.

Any general advice on how to play more effectively?