My take on the three dominant strategies of GG4.

[Maniacal_cackle]

On the Constructive Criticism discord (invite here), Rosmarus asked me about dealing with summoners as Bayou.  Before I answered that, I wanted to delve into some base strategic theory for GG4.  At the moment I would argue we have a bit of rock-paper-scissors of strategy (except when certain crews can dominate multiple strategies). And so I am posting those thoughts here so share them a bit more widely.

I believe we have durdle-value, high tempo, and brick strategies as the current dominant strategies.  I'll delve into each a bit.

Durdle Value

This is the classic summoner - they sit back and generate value.  Nekima 2, McMourning 2, and pre-nerf Asami are good examples of being able to do this at a brutal level. You can also generate value in other ways, like replacing into higher cost models or attaching upgrades.

The gameplan here is that if you get some time to prepare in rounds 1/2, you will be so far ahead of your opponent on the board that they cannot keep up with you and you win the board and take control of the objectives.

This strategy is weak to having its strategy-relevant models killed early in the game.

High tempo

This is a gameplan that tends to be very aggressive - often aiming to delete 5-15 stones of enemy models turn 1.  Crews like Molly or Neverborn are good at this style. They pick their fights and murder key scoring pieces as early as possible.  This in turn means they have a scoring advantage for the rest of the game.

Ever seen me use Dead Rider to reap Archie 6 inches up the board after the enemy is done activating so I can leap and murder a scheme runner? That's an example of a high tempo play.  Often works best when you can hit and run - leaving the combat when needed so you are not trading your alpha strike model for their scheme runners.

Tanky bricks

This is the defensive gameplan. Create a crew where every important model is too protected to be murdered, and then just go stand on the objectives.  Arcanist, Ten Thunders, and Guild are good examples of factions that excel at this strategy. 

For example, a Ten Thunders crew with several tanky models and the weaker models are protected by Thanh or Terracotta is a good example of a crew that can just go stand on objectives and fight off most attacks.

How do they interact?

Durdle crews are vulnerable to early pressure, so they tend to lose to high tempo crews that can start murdering turn 1.

High tempo crews see their gameplan fall apart when they cannot murder key pieces, and struggle to outfight the tanky brick crews that are just standing on objectives.

Tanky brick crews can't put that early pressure on a durdle crew, and then see the value generated mean that the durdle crew is better in a fight.

This forms a nice rock-paper-scissors effect that we can see in the game and judge some matchups by. This of course is not the only metric - a durdle value summon crew is also going to be countered by the exorcism trigger. Some crews are just so powerful they can dominate multiple categories - Linh Ly 2 is able to dominate both as a tanky brick crew and a high tempo crew in a single game. But this basic framework can help us understand the basic matchups of the game and how we need to tackle them. If a crew we are playing is not in any of those categories, we have to ask what the gameplan is for winning.

In GG4, board dominance is very important. The objectives are in relatively predictable and close locations. You can score all your points without ever crossing the centreline until turn 4. Such ease of scoring leads to dominating the board being the core concern, so that's why I think we see the above game plans being dominant.  I think high tempo might be the weakest currently, but am not sure.

Bonus strategy: outscore/denial

This is a gameplan that focuses on points. In M3E this can be tricky as 75% of the points can be scored on turns 4 and 5. Developing a points lead and then winning after being tabled is very rare at high level play (it does happen in games where people are just embracing their bloodlust).

It has been viable in the past.  Essentially you need scoring to be in unpredictable locations or hard to reach locations. With Symbols, Public Enemies, Reckoning, Recover Evidence, etc, it was difficult to predict where scoring would happen or it was difficult to reach scoring locations. This allowed for strategies that focused primarily on points or point denial.

So in future GGs look for strategies that fit this format, and then embrace your denial/scoring crews once again.