Board Games 101: Tactics vs. Strategy

Tactics and strategy: two easily confused terms, but it's good to know the difference! Ryan explains what each one is about, and tells you why it should matter to you.

View the full course syllabus here:

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Email Ryan: nightsaroundatable [at] gmail (dot) com

[zaneemerson]

Love your videos! You definitely deserve more subscribers. Keep it up, and hope to see you at 10K!

[Eothr]

Lol, I'm bad at both, and I enjoy playing RTS/TBS games like C&C and Fire Emblem. Lmao fml.

[fwj]

Dominion seems like a great mix of both. You have those long term goals of how you plan to win, but every hand you draw offers a decision space that you must deal with. For example, drawing $2 when the card that best fits costs $3; The incredibly tactical decision of buying nothing in order to keep your deck thin is also has a highly strategic motive.

[Stu__SEmelb]

I think that Lost Cities might be a good example of a game that is a good mixture of tactics and luck.

[nitsguy]

I enjoy both! My favourite tactical game as of late has been Everdell, strategic would have to go to Terra Mystica.

[Krsnik]

Favourite tactical leaning game is definitely Five Tribes 😍

[TabletopGamesBlog]

Another great 101 video. Thank you. I think strategy vs tactics is a very hard topic, which you handled amazingly well. :)

[guillaumechalifour]

Great, thanks Ryan. I would go with Point Salad for tactics and Paladins for strategy as examples 😎

[DMExplains]

I prefer strategic games, but there are a fair amount of tactical decisions necessary in most of those games. In fact, many 'zero randomness' games have a lot of player interaction, and so the tactical decisions are wrapped around reacting to the other player (or trying to outmaneuver them in advance). I think Food Chain Magnate and Age of Steam fits this bill. Another game that is much like 7 Wonders Duel in terms of multiple strategies is Race for the Galaxy, whether you take a military strategy, development heavy strategy, goods/shipping/trading heavy strategy, which depends on a lot on the cards you get and the cards you start with.

[juanpablozabala]

Santorini is my choice for a tactical family game.

[kalebhudson]

I love playing overwatch, I feel its a good example of a pure tactical game, where the main goal is to always win. At its best its like 6 man chess where everyone its actively doing there job to its fullest to win the game. All the different team comps, characters, and individual playstyles make it one my favorites by far.

[Johannes_W]

I love you for doing this video and I want to force feed it to all those people talking about board games and using the terms wrongly. I know I got a pedantic vein, so this is pure heart-balm to me :-D

When I look at my favourite games I would guess I prefer tactics a bit more, or at least a good mix. I find heavy strategy games tend to have higher push-your-luck moments which make people play high risk- high reward or conservatively when the game does not include quick tactical decisions to change your path without falling behind too much. So for example I really dislike Terraforming Mars for those given reasons (far too much luck included in drawing the right cards at the right time) and I love Great Western Trail, Maracaibo and Rajas of the Ganges because there is much more room for quick change of tactics, but still a need for a long-term strategy. Actually Village is also a good classical example of a game with this great balance between tactics and strategy I like.
At the moment I also love Bruxelles 1897 (the card game) which is close to pure tactics I'd say.

[dave]

Reading Sun Tzu also helps a lot to win board games 🙂

[antgerfitz]

I find it interesting that some people think Pandemic is a tactical Ameritrash game, and others think it's a strategical Euro. Amazing that the design make the game either to certain groups. 7 Wonders Duel is similar. Before it starts I plan out my entire game based on my wonders, the resources required by my wonders and theirs, and the science rewards. That will tell if a military, science, resource starvation, or a points victory is best. For example, one Wonder allows you to take a card from the discard pile. If there is a science icon token reward available too, then a surprise science victory is easy to pull off later in the game if you made sure to discard a science card earlier. However, sometimes I can only pull off my plans by about 80% and I almost don't win :(. I hope to lose someday, so I can have a intense rematch. Vinhos Deluxe (2010 bank mode) is my favourite strategy game. I don't enjoy most tactical games but I do love Stockpile at the 2 player count. That game allows strategic players to reasonably predict the future using probability, and employ risk management, to reduce bad luck and chaos.

[jrobinson]

Strategy games seem to be those games with a wider range of being able to improve at the game with more experience. And, tactical games seem to be those that no matter how much experience a person has, their score or ability to win don’t increase that much. For instance my score doesn’t improve that much with roll and writes over time, and it never will. But, on the other hand, the more I play chess the better I become at winning. Also, I feel that a lot of board game designers aren’t going toward skill based games as much. Sometimes I feel that euro games are so balanced that there is no way to get skilled at the game. The strategy is lost or too balanced. For instance, if I go for one strategy then I get one point per round. My opponent goes for a different strategy and gets 2 points every 2 rounds. It ends up the same. The winner sometimes wins because of turn order. I do wish their were more strategy games to choose from.