Great video and I generally agree with all the strategy around the maps. One thing I'd like to point out is that 'Diversity Researcher' allows you to build over rock and water spaces, effectively giving you more of the special hexes that are influenced by the 'Observation tower' or the 'Outdoor Area' special abililties, as well as making it easier to reach all the Kiosks on the 'Ice Cream Parlor' map and giving 1 potential extra 'Park Restaurant' money.
Diversity Researcher has to be the most fun card in the game. Cool interactions on the maps you mentioned and a slightly better reason to upgrade Sponsors on them.
Diversity Researcher also great to enable Cable Car and Aquarium. Allows you to skip Build II on Park Restaurant as the locked build spots are less problematic and the aviary/reptile house map reward makes up for it.
Nice guide, good understanding of where to start building and bonus priority. My only nitpick is Hydrologist and Geologist are so good I'd play them on any map. Add up the appeal, conservation, and money, it's so much value. Still important to know how high to prioritize snapping them so I appreciate you counting the spaces.
That’s a good point, I might have been a bit too dramatic saying I wouldn’t play them on certain maps. Any playable sponsor early is usually good. I hadn’t counted the hexes before and was surprised to see such a huge difference between the maps though. How would you rate Archaeologist among them?
@@NoWondersTV Map 2 #1, Map 3 #2, Map 1 #3, Map 6 #4 (not counting beginner maps). If you get a partner zoo or university from Archaeologist I'd say it immediately pays for itself, and everything else you get after that is bonus upside. On map 2 starting with 2 rep university, playing Archaeologist, and getting 2 partner zoos in round 1 is insane. You could even get a 2nd worker from 3rd partner zoo in round 1 some games. You can reasonably upgrade all 4 action cards round 2 by getting 3 partner zoos from the left side, taking 2 universities, and supporting 1 conservation project. Map 6 is not nearly as good because Archaeologist requires a research tag, so normally you have to take a university before you play it, which means it's only useful for playing research synergy (ex: round 1 Medical Breakthrough). If you can get your first research tag from a sponsor card, then it's similar to Map 2 giving you faster upgrades.
Nice, didn't expect this so soon ! I really like the format with emphasis on Arche-/Geo-/Hydrologist. Would have liked a remark on how broken Archeologist is on the beginner maps (although i understand that one should simply move on from them once such considerations arise). What i'm wondering though is how the maps affect card upgrade path if at all. In particular, that thought arose for me on map 4 Commercial Harbor. You got into it when talking about card evaluations a bit. My thought then would be whether an early(/ier) cards upgrade would be disproportionately beneficial. I can't say i had much success when actively trying it out, but that might be due to all kinds of reasons. So i'd be interested whether those upgrade paths vary depending on map or it's just an afterthought if one at all. I get the feeling that while it's not terrible, it's an extra action that one might simply not have against better opponents and sometimes you just hit cards you don't necessarily want to sell, not to mention that Build, Association and Animals usually just seem more impactful. Thoughts ?
I'm planning on making many videos to cover the wide range of different topics there are :) I think maps 4 (Cards) and 8 (Sponsors) have the biggest impact on upgrade path as I touched on, I don't really think the other maps affect it too much (or at least not in my thinking). I will typically upgrade Build and Animals as 1/2 and then Association and Cards as 3/4, order depending on game situation. This is not set in stone, but I am known to be a bit inflexible in my playstyle. How early you upgrade Cards on map 4 is an interesting discussion and I'm not sure I know the right answer either. I finished a game 20 minutes ago where I upgraded Cards 2nd (after build), but it did feel a bit slow. I had plenty of money but my reputation was crawling up the track. Cards is generally not a good action to be taking late game, but is one you will usually upgrade before the end of the game anyway. So I think it comes down to whether you need more money or reputation at the time.
@@NoWondersTV I just checked out the game. Very odd in many ways imo. I think i am leaning toward the conclusion that as an income source/supplement on that map an early Cards upgrade is not viable in the majority of cases. I might be getting a bit dramatic about it now, but i wonder if the main utility of the upgrade is the reputation track tbh. In cases where you only sell a card here or there, i feel like saving on an early donation or building an additional kiosk/playing another animal achieves the same, but more efficiently, even more so if one considers that those actions don't just give you more money, but also contribute to your points (assuming the odd pavillon here and there).
@@spacemonkeyentertainment6413 That is usually the benefit of an upgraded Cards action, to allow reputation past 9. Without that I think Sponsors would be a better upgrade 9/10 times. I think you are right though. I just had another map 4 game where I found the early upgrade quite underwhelming. I'll probably just upgrade it last from now on like usual in all my other games.
Great video! All maps are interesting and unique in their own way, which gives the game a lot of replay value. That said, I feel like Map 3 is so ludicrously overpowered that it should be banned from competitive play. I guess it doesn't matter when both players play the same map. But I like having asymmetric player powers (which is what the maps basically are), and then the Silver Lake is just a big headache. The money alone would make Map 3 very strong already, but an in-built determination is just game-breaking and shouldn't exist. Maybe I am just too bad, but whenever my opponent has Map 3 and I don't, I feel that I am at a great disadvantage. And even when I have Map 3 myself, it doesn't feel challenging because the map pretty much plays itself. It just has everything: Great economic snowball power, 2 reputation on the ground, wide building areas, no restricting Build II spots, and the best late-game ability in the game. On the other hand, I really dislike Map 8. Hollywood Hills certainly has a decently high ceiling, but if the sponsor draws whiff, you are pretty much left without any map ability. It's too much variance and too little information for my taste. Also, the unique conservation project reward feels very weak to me due to its anti-synergy with the rest of the map. As you said, Map 8 should incentivize you to upgrade Sponsors for once. But as Build, Animals and Cards upgrade is pretty much mandatory, this comes at the sacrifice of the Association upgrade, which also means that you can't get more than 2 zoos anyway and have no ways to gain the 1 extra CP for the last partner zoo and for the last worker (full-throated aside).
I have a feeling most people would agree that Map 3 is the best and Map 8 is the worst. I would love to see some stats on the win rates of each map. Thankfully it's not really a problem I've had to deal with as the current arena season is same maps for all.
If you're playing with a little less competative player in a more experienced group, it can help giving them Silver lake, to give them a bit of an easier time. Ark Nova is an extremely fun and deep game, but it can be brutal to players that are not very familiar with it, or don't really tend to plan ahead or optimize their gameplay. It is also what Map A or Map 0 can be used for, but they feel more like having an actual handicap for the other players as they are really strong across the board. That said, with my playgroup of 3 players, we've played almost weekly ever since release and Silver Lake for sure has come out on top more than any other map. We use the '2 maps, choose one of them' start, which at this point I don't even know is a rule in the game, but we like it so much that we always use it. It allows you to always play a map that you haven't played the last time, or go for a stronger map if you haven't won in a long time, or want a bit of an easier time.
I'm only at point learning the basics. But game seems interesting for me. if in some game exist 90%+ winrate players this is means this game has a lot of skill fundamentals
The paying money for sponsor card rewards on map 2, 3, 5, and 7 are all quite valuable as they can accelerate your building process with special buildings, which helps you reaching the bonuses faster too. The reward on map 2 can be used to bring out a powerful special building early and reaching the partner zoo at the same time. On map 5 it helps you build around the restaurant and on map 7 connect you to the next kiosk reward. I actually have played once with map 3, using a hillside playground to cover the sponsor reward to play the cable car, which led me right next to the lake and started normal construction. However, me and my friends generally agree that map 3 is overpowered (great amount of early money, crazy reputation gaining potential, card bonus on boarders to gain important cards in early turns, powerful determination reward for conservation, easy gameplay for nearly all beginning hands), and have removed the map from drafting after map 9 and 10 were added to the gameplay.
@@NoWondersTV Haha seems that we are not alone in feeling map 3 OP! I think the big problem with the lake is that it can come close without much efforts when all other maps have their hand “archetypes”, and significantly outplay the others when the others don’t get a good draw. For instance, map 1 relies on migration records and release to the wild, map 2 and 6 on money-generating sponsor cards, map 7 on special buildings, map 8 on good quality sponsor cards, map 9 on small animals with easy conditions and good continent combination, etc. But the lake can still play with all these lucky cards and build similar competitiveness. If you play following the official rules (picking map before everything else), then the lake is a no-brainer to go if only numbered maps are played.
@@NoWondersTV Absolutely agree. I always suspect the designer hasn’t conduct thorough play testing when designing the maps, as the number of player really going for competitive playing may be a question
@@caesarzhang1778 I heard something pretty cool about the Lake map yesterday. The designer, Mathias Wigge, was playing a game with it at the recent WSBG event. He "balanced" it by removing all the 2 money spots around the lake and instead making them free to build on. This removes the threat of Archaeologist and means you can't get the money by covering the spots with sponsor cards. He also removed one of the reputation spots. I think those changes fix a lot of the issues with the map and I'd love to try them out irl to see if they work.
The second time I played Hollywood Hills my initial card draw was all sponsors besides one conservation card. It did make the focus quite sponsor- heavy. Who needs those pesky animals anyway? 😂
Very usefull video. I checked out the currently strongest bga player statistics. Some intresting data there. Currently 171 game 160 win number of break triggered: 2.75 (avg 1.9 winavg 1.63) built pavilions: 4.17 (avg 2.02 winavg 2.03) also more association and sponsors action and less for the other type. Most surprising to me is the break trigger. If i just see the avg and winner statistic i think oh less time i trigger better because after break i can take the first action. What do you think?
The amount of breaks triggered seems slightly higher than usual because the overall stats are diluted by solo games and 4p games. I guess most 2p games end after 4 or 5 breaks, so 2.75 is still more than half which is interesting. Mine is 2.95 for reference. Number of sponsor actions did surprise me a bit being that high. I guess good sponsors do win games. Association makes sense. I also noted he releases an animal in more than 4/5 games which seems very high! Comparing my stats though I immediately saw that I am building too much, and not upgrading Sponsors enough. He upgrades Sponsors in about 20% of games. Very informative exercise, thanks for sharing!
Triggering breaks is mostly about identifying when it's good for you and bad for your opponents. I'd probably take an educated guess that he regrets upgrading sponsor in half of those 20% games
Hola, muchas gracias por tus videos! Tips poara mejorar: usar un mejor micrófono; también, que no hables en un tono llano, liso, porque evita prestar atención; modula bien para los que somos de otros idiomas. Gracias!
So if 1 million dollars is on the line in the final round of a best of 3 two-player tournament, where you have to change maps each game, would you rather choose your own 3 maps or choose your opponent's 3 maps?
Great question! I would choose my own. I think the maps generally are well balanced, but there are some I would prefer not to play with (1, 6, 8). That’s more a personal preference than being based on power. I assume the beginner maps are not included or it would be an easy decision to pick them 😉
@@NoWondersTV That is a good way to look at balance. If I chose my opponent's wonders in 7WD they would all lack extra turns. For Ark Nova, a game I'm trying to learn, I'd probably pick Hollywood Hills for my opponent but I guess if it is balanced then an opponent could just play their best game regardless of the map.
Just a quick comment to say that I’ve been enjoying and appreciating your videos! Good stuff!
Great video and I generally agree with all the strategy around the maps.
One thing I'd like to point out is that 'Diversity Researcher' allows you to build over rock and water spaces, effectively giving you more of the special hexes that are influenced by the 'Observation tower' or the 'Outdoor Area' special abililties, as well as making it easier to reach all the Kiosks on the 'Ice Cream Parlor' map and giving 1 potential extra 'Park Restaurant' money.
Diversity Researcher has to be the most fun card in the game. Cool interactions on the maps you mentioned and a slightly better reason to upgrade Sponsors on them.
@@NoWondersTV One of the better ones indeed :)
Diversity Researcher also great to enable Cable Car and Aquarium. Allows you to skip Build II on Park Restaurant as the locked build spots are less problematic and the aviary/reptile house map reward makes up for it.
Nice guide, good understanding of where to start building and bonus priority. My only nitpick is Hydrologist and Geologist are so good I'd play them on any map. Add up the appeal, conservation, and money, it's so much value. Still important to know how high to prioritize snapping them so I appreciate you counting the spaces.
That’s a good point, I might have been a bit too dramatic saying I wouldn’t play them on certain maps. Any playable sponsor early is usually good. I hadn’t counted the hexes before and was surprised to see such a huge difference between the maps though. How would you rate Archaeologist among them?
@@NoWondersTV Map 2 #1, Map 3 #2, Map 1 #3, Map 6 #4 (not counting beginner maps). If you get a partner zoo or university from Archaeologist I'd say it immediately pays for itself, and everything else you get after that is bonus upside. On map 2 starting with 2 rep university, playing Archaeologist, and getting 2 partner zoos in round 1 is insane. You could even get a 2nd worker from 3rd partner zoo in round 1 some games. You can reasonably upgrade all 4 action cards round 2 by getting 3 partner zoos from the left side, taking 2 universities, and supporting 1 conservation project.
Map 6 is not nearly as good because Archaeologist requires a research tag, so normally you have to take a university before you play it, which means it's only useful for playing research synergy (ex: round 1 Medical Breakthrough). If you can get your first research tag from a sponsor card, then it's similar to Map 2 giving you faster upgrades.
We have 2 new maps now! Looking forward to another video like this for them!
Will have to play them a bit first!
Thank you Kurt for your wise input
😖
"I hope this doesn't stick", he said. How naive 🤭
just start to play, very useful guide
Nice, didn't expect this so soon ! I really like the format with emphasis on Arche-/Geo-/Hydrologist. Would have liked a remark on how broken Archeologist is on the beginner maps (although i understand that one should simply move on from them once such considerations arise).
What i'm wondering though is how the maps affect card upgrade path if at all. In particular, that thought arose for me on map 4 Commercial Harbor. You got into it when talking about card evaluations a bit. My thought then would be whether an early(/ier) cards upgrade would be disproportionately beneficial. I can't say i had much success when actively trying it out, but that might be due to all kinds of reasons. So i'd be interested whether those upgrade paths vary depending on map or it's just an afterthought if one at all. I get the feeling that while it's not terrible, it's an extra action that one might simply not have against better opponents and sometimes you just hit cards you don't necessarily want to sell, not to mention that Build, Association and Animals usually just seem more impactful. Thoughts ?
I'm planning on making many videos to cover the wide range of different topics there are :)
I think maps 4 (Cards) and 8 (Sponsors) have the biggest impact on upgrade path as I touched on, I don't really think the other maps affect it too much (or at least not in my thinking). I will typically upgrade Build and Animals as 1/2 and then Association and Cards as 3/4, order depending on game situation. This is not set in stone, but I am known to be a bit inflexible in my playstyle.
How early you upgrade Cards on map 4 is an interesting discussion and I'm not sure I know the right answer either. I finished a game 20 minutes ago where I upgraded Cards 2nd (after build), but it did feel a bit slow. I had plenty of money but my reputation was crawling up the track. Cards is generally not a good action to be taking late game, but is one you will usually upgrade before the end of the game anyway. So I think it comes down to whether you need more money or reputation at the time.
@@NoWondersTV I just checked out the game. Very odd in many ways imo. I think i am leaning toward the conclusion that as an income source/supplement on that map an early Cards upgrade is not viable in the majority of cases. I might be getting a bit dramatic about it now, but i wonder if the main utility of the upgrade is the reputation track tbh. In cases where you only sell a card here or there, i feel like saving on an early donation or building an additional kiosk/playing another animal achieves the same, but more efficiently, even more so if one considers that those actions don't just give you more money, but also contribute to your points (assuming the odd pavillon here and there).
@@spacemonkeyentertainment6413 That is usually the benefit of an upgraded Cards action, to allow reputation past 9. Without that I think Sponsors would be a better upgrade 9/10 times. I think you are right though. I just had another map 4 game where I found the early upgrade quite underwhelming. I'll probably just upgrade it last from now on like usual in all my other games.
Great video! All maps are interesting and unique in their own way, which gives the game a lot of replay value.
That said, I feel like Map 3 is so ludicrously overpowered that it should be banned from competitive play. I guess it doesn't matter when both players play the same map. But I like having asymmetric player powers (which is what the maps basically are), and then the Silver Lake is just a big headache. The money alone would make Map 3 very strong already, but an in-built determination is just game-breaking and shouldn't exist. Maybe I am just too bad, but whenever my opponent has Map 3 and I don't, I feel that I am at a great disadvantage. And even when I have Map 3 myself, it doesn't feel challenging because the map pretty much plays itself. It just has everything: Great economic snowball power, 2 reputation on the ground, wide building areas, no restricting Build II spots, and the best late-game ability in the game.
On the other hand, I really dislike Map 8. Hollywood Hills certainly has a decently high ceiling, but if the sponsor draws whiff, you are pretty much left without any map ability. It's too much variance and too little information for my taste. Also, the unique conservation project reward feels very weak to me due to its anti-synergy with the rest of the map. As you said, Map 8 should incentivize you to upgrade Sponsors for once. But as Build, Animals and Cards upgrade is pretty much mandatory, this comes at the sacrifice of the Association upgrade, which also means that you can't get more than 2 zoos anyway and have no ways to gain the 1 extra CP for the last partner zoo and for the last worker (full-throated aside).
I have a feeling most people would agree that Map 3 is the best and Map 8 is the worst. I would love to see some stats on the win rates of each map. Thankfully it's not really a problem I've had to deal with as the current arena season is same maps for all.
If you're playing with a little less competative player in a more experienced group, it can help giving them Silver lake, to give them a bit of an easier time. Ark Nova is an extremely fun and deep game, but it can be brutal to players that are not very familiar with it, or don't really tend to plan ahead or optimize their gameplay. It is also what Map A or Map 0 can be used for, but they feel more like having an actual handicap for the other players as they are really strong across the board.
That said, with my playgroup of 3 players, we've played almost weekly ever since release and Silver Lake for sure has come out on top more than any other map. We use the '2 maps, choose one of them' start, which at this point I don't even know is a rule in the game, but we like it so much that we always use it. It allows you to always play a map that you haven't played the last time, or go for a stronger map if you haven't won in a long time, or want a bit of an easier time.
I'm only at point learning the basics. But game seems interesting for me. if in some game exist 90%+ winrate players this is means this game has a lot of skill fundamentals
Absolutely agree. I think we will have Master Ark Nova players within the next month or two.
Incredible! Such a new game and already Masters 7 Wonders Duel took years for that!
The paying money for sponsor card rewards on map 2, 3, 5, and 7 are all quite valuable as they can accelerate your building process with special buildings, which helps you reaching the bonuses faster too. The reward on map 2 can be used to bring out a powerful special building early and reaching the partner zoo at the same time. On map 5 it helps you build around the restaurant and on map 7 connect you to the next kiosk reward.
I actually have played once with map 3, using a hillside playground to cover the sponsor reward to play the cable car, which led me right next to the lake and started normal construction. However, me and my friends generally agree that map 3 is overpowered (great amount of early money, crazy reputation gaining potential, card bonus on boarders to gain important cards in early turns, powerful determination reward for conservation, easy gameplay for nearly all beginning hands), and have removed the map from drafting after map 9 and 10 were added to the gameplay.
The next step is to ban the Silver Lake from BGA arena and everyone (me) will be happy! Down with the Lake!
@@NoWondersTV Haha seems that we are not alone in feeling map 3 OP! I think the big problem with the lake is that it can come close without much efforts when all other maps have their hand “archetypes”, and significantly outplay the others when the others don’t get a good draw. For instance, map 1 relies on migration records and release to the wild, map 2 and 6 on money-generating sponsor cards, map 7 on special buildings, map 8 on good quality sponsor cards, map 9 on small animals with easy conditions and good continent combination, etc. But the lake can still play with all these lucky cards and build similar competitiveness. If you play following the official rules (picking map before everything else), then the lake is a no-brainer to go if only numbered maps are played.
@@caesarzhang1778 Right. It's strong for any game plan and if you delay against the Lake too much you will just lose to free Determination.
@@NoWondersTV Absolutely agree. I always suspect the designer hasn’t conduct thorough play testing when designing the maps, as the number of player really going for competitive playing may be a question
@@caesarzhang1778 I heard something pretty cool about the Lake map yesterday. The designer, Mathias Wigge, was playing a game with it at the recent WSBG event. He "balanced" it by removing all the 2 money spots around the lake and instead making them free to build on. This removes the threat of Archaeologist and means you can't get the money by covering the spots with sponsor cards. He also removed one of the reputation spots. I think those changes fix a lot of the issues with the map and I'd love to try them out irl to see if they work.
The second time I played Hollywood Hills my initial card draw was all sponsors besides one conservation card. It did make the focus quite sponsor- heavy. Who needs those pesky animals anyway? 😂
That sounds like a fun time! Hopefully they were good ones 😜
Very usefull video. I checked out the currently strongest bga player statistics. Some intresting data there.
Currently 171 game 160 win
number of break triggered: 2.75 (avg 1.9 winavg 1.63)
built pavilions: 4.17 (avg 2.02 winavg 2.03)
also more association and sponsors action and less for the other type.
Most surprising to me is the break trigger. If i just see the avg and winner statistic i think oh less time i trigger better because after break i can take the first action. What do you think?
The amount of breaks triggered seems slightly higher than usual because the overall stats are diluted by solo games and 4p games. I guess most 2p games end after 4 or 5 breaks, so 2.75 is still more than half which is interesting. Mine is 2.95 for reference.
Number of sponsor actions did surprise me a bit being that high. I guess good sponsors do win games. Association makes sense. I also noted he releases an animal in more than 4/5 games which seems very high!
Comparing my stats though I immediately saw that I am building too much, and not upgrading Sponsors enough. He upgrades Sponsors in about 20% of games.
Very informative exercise, thanks for sharing!
Triggering breaks is mostly about identifying when it's good for you and bad for your opponents.
I'd probably take an educated guess that he regrets upgrading sponsor in half of those 20% games
Hola, muchas gracias por tus videos! Tips poara mejorar: usar un mejor micrófono; también, que no hables en un tono llano, liso, porque evita prestar atención; modula bien para los que somos de otros idiomas. Gracias!
So if 1 million dollars is on the line in the final round of a best of 3 two-player tournament, where you have to change maps each game, would you rather choose your own 3 maps or choose your opponent's 3 maps?
Great question! I would choose my own. I think the maps generally are well balanced, but there are some I would prefer not to play with (1, 6, 8). That’s more a personal preference than being based on power. I assume the beginner maps are not included or it would be an easy decision to pick them 😉
@@NoWondersTV That is a good way to look at balance. If I chose my opponent's wonders in 7WD they would all lack extra turns. For Ark Nova, a game I'm trying to learn, I'd probably pick Hollywood Hills for my opponent but I guess if it is balanced then an opponent could just play their best game regardless of the map.
Great work as ever did you by chance get maps 9 and 10? are you going to do something on them? sorry if i missed it
I've played map 10 a couple of times now, not map 9 yet. I'll make a video for them soon!
And this is why Silver Lake is banned in French Tournament 😅
SIGN ME UP! I hate the Lake!
Understandable. It's damn near broken
You look like you are in prison. 😂
Great job. Thanks!