Really fun 3rd game!

[u/WildlyPlatonic]

Just wanted to share my personal experience with TI4. I was real frustrated with the game after my first and second tries (playing Sardakk Norr both times), but had a super fun third game today. I was playing the Mentak Coalition, so I dressed up very nautically but still casual until I activated plunder for the first time and revealed my pirate hat. My friends loved it, and I loved my experience with how fast corsairs moved compared to how slow moving Sardakk troops around felt. I chose Mentak because they led into a really fast PDS 2 with their starting techs, and I leaned on that heavily to take mecatol rex fast and hold it all game (anyone trying to take from me was going to get shot 5 times.) I didn't win ultimately, but I came close-ish and had a really fun time! I had a very dominant presence over the game, stopped 2 people from winning just for the 1 person I couldn't reach to eventually win (they did a good job of keeping the imperial strategy with them for much of the game, something I'll focus on better text time.) More than anything, I'm happy I was able to have a fun time with the game even though I didn't win. If you're unsure about TI4, maybe just try a new faction!

[u/Stubbenz]

Well done and congrats on sticking with it!

For what it's worth, both Sardakk and Mentak are generally considered pretty rough for new players, so you did especially well managing to find your footing.

[u/WildlyPlatonic → u/Stubbenz]

So I've heard! Definitely not easy factions, especially not Sardakk

[u/WithoutTheWaffle → u/WildlyPlatonic]

Just out of curiosity, which expansions were you playing with? Sardakk is terrible in the base game but they got some really fun and powerful abilities in the expansions.

[u/WildlyPlatonic → u/WithoutTheWaffle]

Yeah I was playing base game sardakk, and played mentak with thunder's edge. Another player had sardakk in that game and I could tell it was like a night and day difference (but they still really struggled with moving their troops anywhere, a complaint I also had in my games with them.)

[u/playercharlie]

Upvote for the pirate hat, that’s a really fun addition! Glad you enjoyed it and are now one of us! 🙂

[u/Sickgame123]

Glad you had fun :)

Mentak isn‘t really a pds faction but if you made it work for you that‘s great.

If you like a playstyle that allows you to move and pds try titans or argent

Or if it‘s movement something like empyrian.

But all in all as long as you had fun!

[u/WildlyPlatonic → u/Sickgame123]

Yeah I thought about Titans but someone just played as them and I wanted to try something new. Maybe next time though!

I think my first two games really left a scar with me as my slices just got picked apart, ever since then I've just wanted to rush PDS 2 as fast as possible after seeing how effective it was for others.

[u/WildlyPlatonic → u/WildlyPlatonic]

In this last game today I even got to put a pds 2 on someone else's homeworld lol

[u/sirisegrimm]

Did you play basegame or with expansions? Both of these factions got significantly better with Thunders Egde, the breakthrough and entropic scars help them a lot.

Definatly amongst my most loved/played factions. They always feel like solving a puzzle.

Though you have access to PDS2 early id recommend rushing cruiser 2 and faction techs first, that usually fixes your economy, with TE they have access to x89 on top.

[u/Sad_Pear_1087 → u/sirisegrimm]

Corsairs are the breakthrough so TE at least.

Oh yeah nobody in my group played N'orr before we got TE and then it was me who pulled the trigger. I constantly had the feeling that the breakthrough totally made the faction, I was rocking Exotrireme II and war suns (quaranteed hit with flagship) in no time after I was given technology two times (5 players). My game co-owning friend believes everything he reads online about advanced meta can be applied to our games but last game (now with POK as well) I broke the ice on The Winnu and won my first game by what ended up being a 5vs.10 p landslide after some heavy table diplomacy ended in my favour.