5 Tips for Twilight Struggle

Five tips for playing the board game, Twilight Struggle! Not really aimed at either beginners or advanced players, but simply a few conclusions I've reached after many hours of playing the game.

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Hopefully you'll find something that interests you!

[ferzllq]

Good tips but definitely aimed at intermediate/advanced players, since while watching this as a beginner last week (before reading lots of stuff on twilightstrategy) I didn't understand any of the advice.

[woprbrothers]

I'd argue that while generally the best strategy for the USSR is to play Destal into south America alone, there are exceptions to the rule. If you have no access to Africa (Decol not played) and CA (No Fidel, or successful coup of Panama) then playing Destal into Algeria / Nigeria / Panama / Mexico is not a bad play

[jakemyhill]

nice to see you back playing twilight struggle, more games on the way?

[videopostrrr]

Hey Mr File. Would it be possible for you to do a short vid focused on the possible ways that entering Asia can play out in turn 1? ie what to do if Iran gets couped, what to do if Iran doesn't get couped, when to drop points in Afghanistan as US etc

I'm learning twilight struggle and learning a lot from your vids against real humans. so thank you for posting them.

[Samuel]

Good advice. I would say not to emphasize Asia too much as it is very difficult to dominate and better to try to maintain a stalemate with total country count by grabbing SEA NBG and use your points elsewhere in most games. Europe can be dominated by US if they have Marshall Plan turn 1 HL or by USSR will a socialist gov HL and italy takeover (this also depends on if you have US +1 or +2) . So Europe can be dominated and give many points if you get the right card turn 1 and is better investment than trying to dominate Asia, which is a point sink and hotly contested all game. of course it all depends on the card both sides get and your opponent to determine the best strategy

[vincentadultman]

This game looks interesting, and sneaky-educational on the theaters of the Cold War.

[dodec]

Space Decolonization and Destalinization after Turn 3, after the first reshuffle. But that's a well known tip.

[Fjantarik]

the fifth tip is the really solid one. overcommiting to an area loses you the game superfast. this is the same reason that the first tip is not an universial truth, 4 global ops may VERY well be worth more than 7 ops in europe and the non-battlegrounds, even the 2 ops ones, in europe are generally considered a trap-option. but as in EVERYTHING in Twilight Struggle there are exceptions. and strong USSR-players generally play for 3 battlegrounds draw in Europe even without marshal plan.

2. thailand is indeed key battleground

3. getting the chinacard is often worth more than pakistan/thailand. China is worth 2 points in end scoring, meaning its a 4 point swing plus the ability to avoid deafconsuicide. think HARD before you use china.

4. DO NOT PLAY DE-STAL as US. here there are no exceptions. venezuela and chile are indeed the two most important ones, the other 2 have great diminishing returns in south america as chile/venezuela gives acess to those. if thailand is still open it is a solid choice, so is battlegrounds in africa if US is holding on to decolonization.

5. as stated above: do NOT overcommit to a region. knowing when to let your opponent have a region and take something else is very important, so is knowing when to to score a region for a draw

Hope to see more Struggle Videos!

[brunaldo]

Thanks for the video! I just need to win as US without +2! Always loosing to the chess card. I think Us really needs to know how to handle soviets cards...

[misomiso]

Hello Pensky
In one of your twilight vids you asked for requests for things to try, and i was wandering if next time you played the Soviets you could try playing hard 'sankt-style'?

On reddit this is supposed to be a style that reasons the soviets should go ALL OUT for points, as the long game alwasy favours the USA.

This means lots of coups, wars for VP, and not spending precious OPs looking for the long game.

It would be interesting to see if this works!

Mny thks

Mm

[nlangenfeld]

FYI for beginners, if you're playing as the Soviets, your first move after the first headline phase will be an attempted coup in either Italy or Iran.
Iran only starts with 1 US influence, which makes it easier to succeed; it also stunts the US progress in the Middle East\South Asia.
Italy almost always starts out with 3 influence, because it is an extremely tempting target for the Soviets. It gets protected by NATO once that comes into effect, and launching coups in Europe is rarely possible. Unlike France and Germany, there is no exception to the NATO rule.

[kjimbo]

Hey Pensky! what other board games do you play? have you seen any other games translated from board to digital as well as twilight struggle?

[HRhuffnstuffe]

Why can't the US place influence into Asia until Defcon drops to 3? I thought turn 1, AR 1 I could technically put influence there since it's adjacent.

[Phoneyjoker]

Why is the card art different then what I am used to?

[davidwilliams]

So excellent, but too, too fast. At least for me I could barely keep up and some graphics were visible for only a second. Thank you though.

[OnBrkenWngs]

Turn 1 round 1 is the best place for us to trigger destalin for the americans because USSR uslaly opens wwitha coup in iran to block you out of Asia unless they rolled well on the iraq coop they dont rly have many points to move usnless they want to give up EU. sometimes it can hurt if they have the right cards in hand but i feel its a risk worth going for because its so powerful mid war to let them shift points from a previous scored country to try to force a win ill just remove that win condition at the start

[leroyjs]

How did you get the Turn Zero unlocked? Mine is X'd out.

[bgm-]

Sorry, but you talked way too fast for me to keep up with the lessons you were teaching.

[pgpegxp]

Too much luck in this game. Luck when a player plays India-pak card with less than 50% chance of success but wins. Luck in the type of cards you get.