Wanted to post about this, but didn't want to make a whole new thread.
Played a 3 player game of Small World last night. My friend wanted to try out his new expansions, so he shuffled the races and powers to have more of the new ones at the top.
Small World is a weird game for me. I like the idea of it a lot for the sheer variations you can see. However, I have a lot more trouble grasping the strategy in it than I do with other games. I end up near last place every time.
I was first player this game. The free race was Lava Shrubmen, a thematically amusing combination. All forest regions occupied by Shrubmen are untouchable by others even in decline. "Lava" lets you put one lava token in a region adjacent to each mountain region. The lava would clear out any attackable region and make it untouchable to others. I thought that these powers conflicted, but I chose the race anyway because the Shrubmen had really nice art. And it was amusing! And free!
The combo was amazing on the 3 player board. As first player, I was able to settle 2 forest regions and 2 mountain regions all on the edge of the board. I used the lava to block off another forest region and some random space. In future turns, the lava from the 2 mountains would act as an impassable wall next to the central lake. I even managed to reach a fourth forest before I went into decline.
There was a disappointing moment for me when we realized that the Lava itself did not score for occupying a region. When we realized this, I had to return about 10VP that I wasn't supposed to have gotten. I immediately went into decline the turn we realized it because I already had gotten myself to 4 forests and the fifth was out of reach.
The player to my left had the Commando Fauns. Commando lets you conquer any region for 1 fewer token. Fauns were strange -- when they destroy a piece, both the Fauns and the destroyed get one race token back. In this way, the Fauns can multiply but can't really whittle down others. The player made good use of them and managed to take many regions.
The third player had the Aquatic Ice Witches. Aquatic makes coastal regions worth +1 but makes non-coastal regions worth -1. Ice Witches have these weird snowglobe tokens ("winter markers" officially) that can be placed permanently (while the witches are active) on the board (1 per magic source at the end of your turn). The snowglobes are defensive but they can also make regions worth -1 to other players. Early on the snowglobes did not mean much, but by the time all 6(?) were on the board and we were all bringing in our second races, the snowglobes really got in the way. By the end, they were making 12 points per turn (he managed to get 6 coastal regions under his control, most of them on mountains).
My second race was the Corrupt Igors. Corrupt grants me 1VP every time one of my regions is conquered. Igors collect body parts. That is, they collect all Race tokens lost on conquests, which can be traded at the start of my turn for more of my own race tokens. In a 3 player game, it's a 3:1 rate. This was incredibly powerful. I was at liberty to stretch myself very thin, not worrying about defending territories. Even defeated Igors returned to me as 1/3 of a new future Igor. Hilarious. It was an even better return when the Fauns defeated an Igor! Corrupt did not come into play that much, though it did discourage the others from attacking my near-defenseless regions. By the end, I was making 14+ points per turn (including my shrubmen).
My early turns with the Igors weren't that great though, because I ran into the line of Ice Witch snowglobes simultaneously making regions more difficult to defeat and also making them worthless to control. Luckily, they went into decline soon after that.
The Commando Fauns were replaced by the Soul-Touch Skags. Skags get 1 random Loot Crate in each region they conquer. If they are conquered, the Loot Crate is reveal. Some crates grant the conqueror bonus VP, while others actual cancel the conquest and repel the attacker. When they go into decline, the Skags collect all loot crates they still control. Soul-Touch lets you go into decline and immediately revive your previous in-decline race, then play a full turn with them almost as if they were new.
The player made pretty good use of them. He activated Soul-Touch on the second last round (collecting +4 from his loot crates) and got some decent use out of his Commando Fauns again too.
The Ice Witches went into decline after 2 of their regions were conquered by the entrance of the Skags. The new race was Copycat Pygmies. Copycat allowed the player to mimic one of the special powers from the list of 6 choices (of future combos) next to the board, and this could be changed at the start of his turn. Pygmies have a chance to multiply when conquered (roll the reinforcement die for each pygmy lost and receive that many pygmies, deploying them at the end of the current player's turn).
The Ice Witches that remained were actually in great positions. They were all around the central lake. Several of them were actually protected by my own in-decline Shrubmen and their indomitable forests.
The pygmy power didn't really come into play. The pygmies came in later than the rest and weren't really attacked much. The one time it happened that I recall, a blank was rolled. Copycat was pretty good though. It allowed them to make a splashy entrance using the Flying power. Of note -- the first drop was into a region in the center of the Skag regions. It was relatively undefended because it was supposed to be protected by the reinforced regions around it. The Flying drop-in was unexpected, and it turned out that the loot crate there was a +3 bonus. Later on, they made use of the Heroic and Swamp special powers.
In the end, the third player had 87 points, the second player had 91, and I had a stunning 101. The in-decline shrubmen drew a solid 6 points every round on their own (4 untouchable forests and 2 tough-to-access mountains) which was a good augment to the wildfire that was Corrupt Igors.
Actually, now that I look more carefully, the second player's score probably should have been slightly lower. They activated my Corrupt power at least once, but I just took my coin from the bank when it should have come from the player. Wow.
