Cats feel a bit powerless

[Joaco]

I don't really get this faction. I only play against bots so it's not like I can make deals with other players and I can't use domination cards because bots don't recognize them (which makes the victory feel like cheating).

I feel like as the cats I don't have the power to do anything after the first turns. Even if I try to control some clearings, the lizards and the otters can take them away at any time they want. Attacking feels really costly but I can't just craft the extra action cards because they require 2 workshops. Even if I attack, there's a good chance I won't deal enough damage. But I also feel like the only one in the position to attack, so if I don't attack someone else will win.

Do I have to pray that I get many bird cards every turn? Or do I really have to abandon my buildings and feed the other players just so I can rebuild them?

[[FAUCᴇT] Psychopath]

Cats have good initial control of the woodland but its not very stable, instead your initial focus should be on establishing wood income and then solidify your control over key clearings. You score by building, so your overall goals will often rely on taking control of clearings with your superior numbers rather than outright destroying your opposition. Your actions are limited, so any sctions that dont score or secure control so you can score later are going to put you behind.
If youre struggling with lizards and otters specifically, stop feeding them. Their action economy is starved if you never give them acolytes and funds respectively. If you do find a situation where it becomes necessary to do so, make sure you're gaining more out if the exchange than they are.
Abandoning a building in endgame to be rebuilt is a real strategy since an opponent gains 1 per building but you can gain significantly more, all it takes is marching a big stack of warriors to reclaim rule of the clearing as well as an open building slot.

[devxx]

--- "do I really have to abandon my buildings"
--- "Abandoning a building in endgame to be rebuilt is a real strategy"

i'm new to root and if either of you are still around could you please explain what you mean by abandoning buildings? not in the literal sense but as a strategy. thanks

[[FAUCᴇT] Psychopath]

Originally posted by devxx:

--- "do I really have to abandon my buildings"
--- "Abandoning a building in endgame to be rebuilt is a real strategy"

i'm new to root and if either of you are still around could you please explain what you mean by abandoning buildings? not in the literal sense but as a strategy. thanks

Especially in endgame, Cats gain more points from building than opponents gain from smashing them. Often you'll want this to be the workshop since those have a more efficient wood:point ratio.
Building and then marching away to let someone else attack the building without dealing with your warriors is enticing to players who don't know to not enable this behavior. Using your superior warrior count and efficient march action can let you take over a clearing to establish rule so you can build again.
Eventually you will need to do something along these lines either intentionally or as a result of being forced out of a clearing, there are only so many building slots on the map so you'll need to muscle for space eventually. The only faction this doesn't work on in the same way is the Lizards since you'll never be able to establish rule if they have any amount of gardens, you're going to need to fight through them to re-establish rule.
Despite being labeled as a militant faction, you actually don't need to do a lot of fighting. Fighting is a means to an end, and that end is more building. Cats dominate the board through being numerous, field hospitals, and being able to move twice per move. Although if your board presence is threatened you should absolutely stomp out supporters and setup Marshall law, and bolster your line in the sand so the Eyrie can't actually cross it without turmoil.

[fazimodo]

Yes, Cats are the weakest faction that rarely can win, and ROOT in its roots (pun intended) as a boardgame is unbalanced hell.
When your tactics for victory is purposefully loosing buildings and rebuilding them you should ask yourself - who the hell designed this crap?

[Heikai]

There's also the incorrectly working field hospital.

[VeeJay]

Well to be fair, Root is purposely unbalanced. It was designed to be self-balancing, or in other words, it's up to the players to provide the balance. It's more a game of keeping other players in check as you struggle to close in on victory. The actions (or more often inaction) of any one player can drastically tip that precarious balance. That being said, Cats are generally considered weaker in comparison to most factions, and the changes to Field Hospital don't necessarily improve their standing. At least with Advanced Setup they've been given a slight buff.

[fazimodo]

Originally posted by VeeJay:

Well to be fair, Root is purposely unbalanced. It was designed to be self-balancing, or in other words, it's up to the players to provide the balance. It's more a game of keeping other players in check as you struggle to close in on victory. The actions (or more often inaction) of any one player can drastically tip that precarious balance.(...)

That's lazy designer answer to his lack of ability to balance game.
Well you know the game is 1v1v1v1 and one faction is overpowered, while one gets attacked from all sides due to its mechanics and really have almost no chances to win, so to balance other players need to attack this strong faction and not attack this weak faction - this is self balancing! Yay! Complete and utter ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥!
It is just bad design. There are a lot of board games with unique factions that end up in kingsmaking, but are still balanced so you do not attack certain faction/player from the beginning as a precaution due to bad design of game mechanics giving some factions unfair advantage. ROOT is just unbalanced crap with cute graphics and brainwashed playerbase which cannot see the truth of badly designed balance of the game and call this bug a feature.

[Cheesepizza2]

like the crows and the lizards, the cats are just kind of weak. ordinarily, people modify the game to make up for these downsides (e.g ADSET giving more starting resources, Workshop Marquise [build before craft, overwork-per-clearing, additional utility to workshops], more plot tokens for the crows, etc), but with this digital implementation there's not much you can do

[ZimZam100]

The Cats are probably the simplest faction in terms of rules and learning, but undoubtedly one of the hardest factions to master when it comes to winning.

One thing that may help is that the Cats actually have a pseudo-passive scoring (not unlike the Eyrie): wood is generated every turn, and remains there for future turns if you don't use it. This means some turns you may take non-point scoring actions like March and Battle, bank the Wood, and then next turn do 3+ builds with all your banked wood. So it can appear Cats fall behind if they don't build each turn, but the passive Wood generation actually allows them to catch up if this happens. Hence the importance of getting at least a 2nd Sawmill. Cats essentially passively generate future points without doing anything!

Another thing is you should save Birds cards for a big final point swing to close out a game. No one expects Cats to burst to victory from a low 20s score.

[Joaco]

But even if you have the wood you can't do anything if you don't control an empty clearing, right? It's not like you can keep building in the same spot.

[Puddles]

Most of the cat victories I've seen have been from domination. Nearly everyone I play with (including myself) has a tough time doing well with the cats. I do have that one friend though that plays them REALLY well. They aren't unbalanced, just hard to master.

[ZimZam100]

> But even if you have the wood you can't do anything if you don't control an empty clearing, right? It's not like you can keep building in the same spot

Well if the Cats control no clearings with empty building slots, it either means their existing infrastructure is healthily in place, or very unlikely scenario they are about to be board wiped. So Cats should be spending actions on moving to new clearings and possibly abandoning less essential buildings (workshops and extra recruiters generally).

[batofara2005]

In original development, cats were mainly designed to be good in 2-3 player games, which is how much of the game was tested.

Then they added a 4th player because why not. Turns out everyone prefers the 4 player game, which favors insurgent factions, and the cats just don't have enough actions to deal with everyone.

[Joaco]

That's interesting, where did you learn that? Do you think 3-player games are better?

[batofara2005]

From the Boardgamegeek website, the creators regularly posted posts while developing the game and giving their thought processes. Google "Root development diary" and you'll see a bit.

They also interact quite a bit with the community every once in a while, which is where I gathered that Cole Wehrle (lead designer) prefers the game at 3-players, while Patrick Leder (2nd main designer, company owner) prefers the game at 5-players. Cole seems to focus on more of the strategic, head-to-head side, while Leder seems to be more focused on the fun of lots of interactions. 4 players is that middle point.

A lot of the development games involved Cole, Patrick, and whoever else they could get to play with them, so typically 3 players.

From the development point, the game was originally designed with the cats first, as their starting point. They then developed the birds as an antagonist to the cats for 1v1 games. Then they added the Woodland Alliance as a 3rd faction that is weaker than the other 2 factions, but can spiral out of control if not kept in check, based off the COIN (COunterINsurgencies) series of games.

Then Patrick requested that Cole adds in an adventurer character, because he thought an RPG character would be cool. Cole was pretty against the idea of the Vagabond because he wanted a wargame and the Vagabond was really out of place, but he did his best to make that happen.

At the end of it all, after they later introduced otters and lizards, that is when Patrick Leder mentioned at some point that Cole still prefers 3 players, which Leder prefers 5 players.

I personally have not played many 3-player games, but I've always found it interesting that the lead designer prefers the game at 3 players still.