Tips santorini

Introduction

There are in total 42 gods in BGA Santorini. It does not mean there are only 42 strategies for the god matchup. Every matchup is composed of two gods. You not only need a specific strategy on your gods, but also on how to use your god well to counter the opponent’s god. A good example is Pegasus vs Hades, in this situation, Pegasus should never jump to an alone level-3 or it will immediately lose 1 worker (because Pegasus can never win the game by that level-3 worker). Also, attempting to win by moving from the corner is never good against Hippolyta (because she can block it and you will immediately lose 1 worker).

In this review, I would write a comment on every god, on how to use it well, and the strategy to counter it well. Beware that Santorini is a two-player two-god game, simply reading “how to use” could not help you much on that god, since you need to know how to counter different gods under different matchup.

The link for the reviews is here: en.doc.boardgamearena.com/Fullguidesantorini

Basic strategy

• Don’t fall (Unless you have Pan or Pegasus)

The biggest advice I can give is to not let yourself be in a position where you have to jump down. If you lose height in this game it can be extremely difficult to get it back. Your opponent will try to keep you pinned down, and you can only build after moving. Dropping levels in this game is a quick way to give away an advantage to your opponent and likely lose the match. However, we recommend falls from level 2 if your god is Pan, and it doesn't matter much to fall if your god is Pegasus.

• Building on the diagonal

This is more of a defensive move, but it’s important to watch the diagonal. When the player builds that third level, it’s often the build from a diagonal that is left open or wasn’t seen – this can cap the third level and stop the win! Building on the diagonal is often less obvious and hence powerful.

• Trapping a player

It sounds like an obvious one, but putting this in to practice is difficult. You can trap a player if

• (a) there is no equivalent level or one higher for them to step on to, or
• (b) if all the towers around have a dome (best if used with Atlas), or
• (c) if all the levels nearby are lower (used with Hades) or higher (used with Athena).

This is tough, but if you can create a gap between the player’s two pieces – and get both your pieces in between, your build options are vastly superior and they can almost certainly not out run you. Many early players will focus on building up with just one character and cutting them off with both of yours will likely trap them in a corner and leave you with 2-1 and the rest of the board to play.

• Using your piece to block

Another key trap is to use your own builder to block. Sometimes it’s worth keeping them on a lower level just to block that tile being accessible to your opponent. That might be just before building the third level (so your opponent cannot cap it), or it might be to stop your opponent being able to move before they can build. It’s a little trick that can reduce your opponents otherwise pretty open set of options.

• Keeping them on the floor

The other noteworthy strategy is to build to the second level a lot before focusing on the third. This is equivalent to trapping in the other player or at least making it take them a lot of time to get to you! Building to the second level whenever your opponent builds to the first keeps them on the ground floor. This is helpful even if you are on the ground floor as well as you are probably filling up their side of the board with unusable space before rushing off to build behind you builder! This however does not work with Atlas, since he can stop you before you build the third floor!

• Using the edge

Lastly, as with the second level, the edge is unusable and finding yourself backed into an edge can be dangerous. That being said, I have seen this used against me with that back corner being only accessible from three other squares – if your opponent doesn’t stay close, the corner is the perfect place to build for the win!

God powers

The powers can be classified to these catorgies:

• Opponment blocking: Blocking the opponment from moving, building, winning or using their god power.
• Opponment forcing: Forcing the opponment to move, build or lose.
• Player move: Give more options for the player to move, change their times of moving or increase their number of workers.
• Player build: Give more options for the player to build or change their times of building.
• Winning conditions: Provide more winning methods for the player or steal the opponment's win.
• Others: Not mentioned catorgies, such as Chaos.

All above contents are adopted from https://elusivemeeple.com/2017/09/03/san-torini-strategy-tips/ by user Ariel Friedrich Gauss.