TH1/.codex/skills/polytopia-strategy-design/references/polytopia-strategy-playbook.md

Polytopia Strategy Playbook

This is a practical strategic model. Always adapt to mode, tribe, map type, spawn resources, opponent distance, and current patch.

Strategic Thesis

Polytopia is mostly won by compounding small tempo advantages:

• reveal villages earlier,
• capture cities earlier,
• buy useful tech before city-count cost increases,
• convert city upgrades into SPT or decisive units,
• build roads that create captures/kills one turn sooner,
• avoid tech and unit purchases that do not change the next few turns.

The strongest move is often not the biggest move; it is the move that makes the next turn much stronger.

First Principles

• Stars are tempo. Do not spend them unless the spend creates immediate city growth, expansion, defense, or a tactical breakthrough.
• Tech is a tool, not progress. Buy tech when you can use it now or next turn.
• Vision is economy. Scouts, explorers, mountains, and fast units are valuable because they find villages and choose wars.
• Villages are snowball points. Capturing a village usually matters more than a low-value skirmish.
• Roads are delayed movement. A road is worth it when it changes capture timing, attack reach, defense rotation, or trade connection.
• Unit trades are positional. A "good" kill can still be bad if the attacker dies on a key tile or opens your city.
• Defense buys time; economy wins if time is used well.

Opening Plan

Turns 0-3

Goal: identify the nearest village route and first city upgrade path.

• Move starting unit to maximize revealed tiles, not just toward visible resources.
• Check capital resources before buying tech.
• If a tech upgrades the capital immediately, it is often correct.
• If no immediate upgrade exists, consider saving stars for a unit, tech after exploration, or a village timing play.
• Avoid training units that cannot reach useful tiles before a cheaper or faster alternative would matter.

Turns 4-7

Goal: capture villages and set the economy curve.

• Compare "research before capture" vs "capture first." Researching before a new city can save stars because tech cost rises with city count; capturing first can still be correct if the city immediately increases SPT or produces a needed unit.
• Use city upgrade choices to solve the next bottleneck: SPT if star-starved, Explorer if blind, Border Growth if it unlocks several resources, Wall if contested.
• Start roads only when they create a concrete one-turn swing.

Turns 8-12

Goal: convert expansion into military or unstoppable SPT.

• Identify the main front and backfill economy in safe cities.
• Research counters only when the enemy composition requires them.
• Do not overbuild slow units if fast units can fork cities.
• Start planning super-unit timing if a city can reach it without starving the rest of the empire.

Tech Timing

Ask these questions before every tech:

1. What can I do with it this turn?
2. How many city upgrades does it enable?
3. Does it save a unit or capture a city within two turns?
4. Will capturing a village first make this tech meaningfully more expensive?
5. Does this tech commit me to a branch I cannot afford to exploit?

Good early tech usually unlocks local resources or movement. Bad early tech is a nice future idea with no immediate spend path.

City Upgrade Choices

• Workshop/economy: default when the city is safe and the extra SPT accelerates future actions.
• Explorer: strong when fog hides villages, ruins, enemies, or map shape; weaker when vision is already solved.
• Resources/population: good when it creates another upgrade soon or supports a super unit.
• Border Growth: high value when it captures multiple resources, unlocks a port/market/forge/sawmill/windmill plan, or reaches a critical tile.
• Wall: choose when a city is under credible threat or must hold a choke/front.
• Park: Perfection/score priority, rarely the conquest default.
• Super Unit: evaluate not just the unit, but whether you can protect and project it.

Roads And Movement

Roads are best when they:

• let a unit capture one turn earlier,
• let riders/knights threaten multiple cities,
• let defenders rotate into a siege,
• connect front cities for reinforcement,
• turn a city into a launch point.

Roads are bad when they:

• spend stars without a timing change,
• give an enemy the same route,
• stop at a tile blocked by zone of control,
• support a front you are not actually fighting on.

Always account for zone of control. A road route that passes adjacent to an enemy may not produce the movement you expect.

Combat

Attack Rules Of Thumb

• Kill units that open city captures, protect your siege, or prevent enemy counterplay.
• Chip high-value units before committing melee attackers.
• Screen fragile ranged units and bombers.
• Avoid leaving fast enemy units with chain-kill opportunities.
• A city siege is only valuable if the opponent cannot cheaply unsiege or kill the sieger.

Defender Mindset

• Hold cities with durable units, walls, terrain bonuses, or enough counter-damage.
• Block road access and landing tiles.
• Force enemy units to end turns in kill zones.
• When losing a city is inevitable, trade for time, stars, or a stronger recapture.

Naval Play

On water-heavy maps, naval tempo is often expansion tempo.

• Get on water early when villages, lighthouses, starfish, or enemy coasts demand it.
• Use Rafts for transport and upgrade into the naval role needed by the front.
• Scouts find coastlines and targets; Rammers contest ships and landings; Bombers break clustered fronts but need protection and setup.
• Bridges can convert "almost connected" land into surprise attack routes.
• Ports and Markets are economy pieces, but only if the city has enough adjacent support to justify the investment.

Diplomacy And Cloak-Like Pressure

Diplomacy tools add a hidden-front layer:

• Peace can buy economy time but may give opponents freedom elsewhere.
• Embassies convert information and opponent count into stars, but patch cost scaling matters.
• Cloak/Moth-style infiltration punishes undefended large cities and weak vision.
• Counter infiltration with city walls, patrols, fast finishers, splash, and not leaving core cities empty.

Tribe Archetypes

Use these archetypes when giving advice:

• Resource-economy starters: rush the starting resource tech payoff, then expand.
• Mobility starters: convert early reach into villages and pressure before slower tribes stabilize.
• Naval starters: exploit water if map supports it; pivot if spawn is landlocked.
• Military starters: pressure early, but do not ignore economy or tech-cost timing.
• Defensive/diplomatic starters: use survivability or diplomacy to buy SPT and information.
• Special tribes: learn their exception mechanics first; generic build orders mislead.

Common Mistakes

• Buying tech because it is "next" rather than immediately useful.
• Capturing cities before buying a planned tech, making the tech more expensive for no reason.
• Upgrading a city for score/elegance while the front needs units.
• Building roads that do not change a timing breakpoint.
• Sending super units unsupported.
• Fighting over units while ignoring empty villages.
• Letting fast enemy units chain kills.
• Choosing Explorer when visible map already answers the next three turns.
• Delaying naval on maps where water controls expansion.

Strategy Answer Template

When asked "how should I play this?", answer in this order:

1. Mode/map/tribe assumptions.
2. First 5 turns.
3. First tech priorities.
4. City upgrade priorities.
5. Unit composition and road plan.
6. Midgame pivot.
7. Specific mistakes to avoid.