Tips & Strategies (33)

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Tips & Strategies (33)

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2
Check Out My Favorites
33 of 33 gamers found this helpful
“No cards... no chance to win!”

Beware the player who has not been gaining many points throughout the game, but owns the stack of cards. Sure, you can gain a lot of in game points collecting huts, but without a strong showing of cards in the end, you will not win.

Make your cards work with your in game strategy. Collecting lots of tools, then get the tool multiplyer cards. Collecting huts, get the hut multiplyers, etc. Green bottom cards add up, so look to build a complete set.

Have fun, Stone Age is a great game from the 1st time you make a baby, to the end of the game when the points are totalled.

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7
Knight-errant
Cooperative Game Explorer
Amateur Advisor
Gamer - Level 6
47 of 48 gamers found this helpful
“Watch out for resource lockdown”

It doesn’t happen too often, but sometimes clever players can utilize their population to retain a monopoly on a specific resource, like gold, where there aren’t a whole lot of places to put people. This can be a problem if you need a specific resource to get a hut. When you’re establishing your population, this isn’t so much of a big deal, but towards the endgame when everyone is scrambling for points, it can make a difference.

To combat this, try to save a small stockpile of valuable resources so that you can focus on the more plentiful resources later and not be slowed down if someone locks down a slot.

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3
Noble
I Got What I Wanted
35 of 36 gamers found this helpful
“Go For Two Things ”

Everyone in my circle has gotten a good feel for taking the card route in this game. Our focus has been to be flexible and play for cards in two different areas. It usually ends up being different every game. If an opponent snags some of the early tool multipliers, start grabbing the food and people multipliers instead. Just make sure your card grabs are focused and intentional.

The one exception to this rule (it comes up often for us) is the house multiplier. If you can find a way to be the only house card buyer, you’re in pretty good shape and don’t have to worry too much about your secondary scorer, because you can get a higher multiplier with houses than any other group.

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7
Pet Lover
Treasure Chest
The Gold Heart
Novice Advisor
15 of 15 gamers found this helpful
“Pull Hammer First, Place on Food Last”

If you place a worker on hammers always pull that worker back first giving you better odds on your rolls. Same goes for if you have them on cards that give hammers and can afford the resource for the card up front.

Always if going to place workers to gather food do this last! You can pull them whenever in the order that suits you best but placement should be last as anyone can go to this spot.

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3
Critic - Level 2
BoardGaming.com Beta 1.0 Tester
34 of 36 gamers found this helpful
“Personal Strategy: Build Food First”

I have tried this only on a 2 player game, don’t know how it will work in 3-4 player games.

I tried out this theory last night and it served me very well. My first objective was to build farms and raise my food production to 8. At this point I only went after wood and food resources. If a green civ card came out for 1 or 2 resource, I took it (careful to avoid duplicates).

After reaching my food production goal, I started to add people to my tribe, continued to go after wood and instead of food, went after brick. I started collecting other civ cards at this point that cost 1-2 resource.

After obtaining 8 meeples, I alternated food production and “baby making” until I had reached the max 10 of each. During this time I continued to go after brick, and went after stone. I also would buy building, as long as they were cheap (2 brick/1 stone, etc) making sure not to buy building with the resource multiplier effect. I also began to add tools if possible.

At this point, my meeples and food production were maxed out, and I longer had to worry about hunting. I went after stone and gold for 2 rounds, then back to wood (which I use to buy the civ cards I want). I suck as much gold as possible into buildings with the resource multiplier, and went after the rest of the civ cards, going after unique green civ cards first. I continued to add tools (a good place for me is around 7 tools).

I was careful about how many buildings I bought, because in a 2 player game, there are only 14 buildings available before the game ends. When I was happy with the number of points I had, I went after the rest of the buildings in a single pile, in an attempt to end the game.

This strategy resulted with a score of 379 in a 2 player game vs. a score of 184.

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5
USA
Knight
BoardGaming.com Beta 1.0 Tester
32 of 34 gamers found this helpful
“A small observation”

Collecting farms, via the civilization cards is a quick way to lower your population’s requirement on food. By doing so quickly and frequently, you can expand your population without having to devote much time towards hunting and gathering food. Instead use your villagers to collect valuable resources to purchase cards.

A typical strategy I use is to collect the cards that provide farms, and then gather resources and tools. From here I can continue collecting the resources to purchase cards, and huts as well as lower my need to collect food. Food is useful, but not valuable for winning the game.

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8
Canada
Z-Man Games fan
I play red
Indie Board & Cards fan
21 of 22 gamers found this helpful
“Build huts last”

Remember, while it is fun to shoot off to an early lead, Stone Age is a game that requires long term planning. Use the early rounds to stockpile resources.

As other’s have said, you need to farm as much as you can early on. Obviously the field option in the village is the easiest way, but the cards can also result in farms. The quicker you get to 5+ on the food track, the quicker you can get to building your score.

So why not build a hut on a turn where you can not take the field spot in the village or through a card? Because it’s more valuable to build an early supply of resources and cards.

Odds are you will end up with 5+ meeples, farms, and huts. Picking up x2 or x3 specialist, farmer or shaman cards will result in 10-15 points during the end of game scoring. Repeated early investment in these cards will result in 20-30 points per group. Additionally, by avoiding the desire to build huts early you can avoid going after stone and gold. This will give you the ability to stockpile resources quicker, and in turn buy more cards quicker. As an added bonus you will also be able to spend 3-4 resources for a more attractive card without having to regroup the next turn. And by the time you do start to build huts you will be able to focus on the huts you want, maximizing your in game scoring.

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7
Advanced Grader
Movie Lover
I'm Completely Obsessed
48 of 52 gamers found this helpful
“Multipliers can point you in the direction of the win!”

Others have said that flexibility is the key to success with Stone Age, and I absolutely agree, but specifically you want to wait and define your strategy based on the multiplier cards. Seeing what becomes available can determine your focus and put you on the path to victory.

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2
Gamer - Level 2
28 of 30 gamers found this helpful
“Synergies”

quickly find a synergy to latch onto early on if you can (Tools plus large tool modifier, Building huts plus large Hut Modifier) and then you’ll have something to focus on for the rest of the game.

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8
Canada
Movie Lover
Comic Book Fan
28 of 30 gamers found this helpful
“Tools”

I agree that the best strategy is to have no unique strategy for this game, as adaptability is your best bet. Still, I tend to have real bad luck with dice rolling in general, so I usually go for tools every chance I get. Then of course I try to grab as many tool-multiplying cards I can for the end-game scoring.

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5
Gamer - Level 5
BoardGaming.com Beta 1.0 Tester
27 of 29 gamers found this helpful
“Go for Wood”

Wood is the easiest resource to obtain and once you have a stockpile of it you should have no problem getting cards, building cheap huts, or even substituting for food – it is extremely versatile. Also look for opportunities to block others, either filling up remaining placement spaces or maxing out the total player count. If you’re only down one food, don’t waste a meeple in the hunter & gathers space, go for wood and steal the spot from someone else.

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6
I'm Completely Obsessed
Viscount / Viscountess
Champion
BoardGaming.com Beta 1.0 Tester
32 of 35 gamers found this helpful
“The best strategy is no strategy..”

Not exactly, but in general, the person who wins focuses on the key – “Stay flexible”. Each turn new opportunities will present themselves. New cards, new huts, different positions on the board.

It may seem like the best way to go is to focus on one thing, but I usually win this game by remaining open to whatever I can get on a given turn for the lowest costs.

Generally, always grab agriculture if you can get it. If not, go for tools. If the village is filled, grab wood if you need it, or cards if you don’t. If a hut happens to be something you have the resources for, ****** it up.

Usually you can take a quick glance through your cards and see what will benefit you the most. If you earn five bonus points per tool but only 2 for an agriculture level, and you already have enough to feed your people, go for the tool. It’s all about breaking the game down into each turn, and making sure you get more points that turn than anyone else.

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2
Gamer - Level 2
31 of 35 gamers found this helpful
“Huts without required resources”

There are some huts that allow you to use any resource you want to build them. If you use Gold to build this type of hut you’ll score a LOT of points. plus you get to live in a golden hut!

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6
Platinum Supporter
Mythic Kingdoms Backer 2020
I play blue
37 of 42 gamers found this helpful
“Don't Forget About the Cards !!!”

After a few times through the game, it is clear to me that collecting the cards is a very important strategy. For example, if you are working on building huts, make sure to collect the cards that give you more points for the huts.

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8
Norway
Book Lover
I play blue
Paladin
35 of 40 gamers found this helpful
“Cards for the end score”

The cards give you a prize during the game, but at the end of the game it also helps boost your score. If you build many huts, try to get hold of as many as you can of the cards that give bonus per hut,if you work on the grain level, or perhaps the workers, get hold of those cards. But don`t forget to collect the culture cards (green background) The bigger sets of different culture images you get the more points you recieve. You get the gist of it. Let the cards be part of the strategy you lay for the game!

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9
USA
Platinum Supporter
Petroglyph
BoardGaming.com Beta 1.0 Tester
47 of 54 gamers found this helpful
“The Three Cs... Cards, Cards, Cards”

It’s important to collect cards,as the score compounds with the more matching cards you have. New players almost always neglect the cards… not wanting to spend their valuable resources. If you skip collecting cards… you will lose.

Tip: Buy the cheaper cards if they lead to a good set, but do not be afraid to shell out more to get a good card ahead of someone else.

If you do this, you will not regret it.

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7
Intermediate Reviewer
Professional Grader
Tomahawk
5 of 5 gamers found this helpful
“If we want a quick game ”

Sometimes we want to play a quick game because we have multiple games to get to during the night, or the kids had way to much homework but still want to get some gaming in. Sometimes we are introducing the game to new people and feel that a shorter game would keep them hungry for more.

An easy solution is to limit the amount of huts and cards that are used. Instead of 7 huts in each pile put only 5, or have one less pile to choose from. You can be selective in the huts that you use. Use more of the huts that have more options of resources instead of having to collect specific resources for huts.

It also works limiting the amount of cards in the deck. When the deck runs out the game is over.

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7
Intermediate Reviewer
Professional Grader
Tomahawk
“One of many strategies...”

I think the beauty of this game is multiple ways to win. I think that it keeps everyone engaged til the end. One of the strategies I like best is to load up on tools. Why? It allows me to maximize my rolls and not commit two people on a turn to growing my tribe or worrying about food. If I can’t get a tool and the farming is open I will take that. The “love shack” I hardly even choose.

I also early and often in the game load up on wood. Why? Because it is cheap, I can then use those resources to buy cards. The cards are where the real points come in. I especially like the cards that allow you to roll dice depending on the number of people to receive food/tool/gold/stone/brick/wood. With four people my chances of getting food or tool are pretty high allowing me to improve if I didn’t get a chance to select one of those areas on my turn. Then I focus on multipliers tools and huts usually. If I get hut multipliers I then race to buy huts to finish the game quickly before others can occur points other ways.

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8
Gamer - Level 8
Expert Recruiter
Count / Countess
BoardGaming.com Beta 1.0 Tester
37 of 43 gamers found this helpful
“Kids variant!”

Stone Age is an excellent light worker placement game. If you want to pay this with the under 8 crowd, here is a variant that you can use to scaffold up to the full game.
1. No cards. Eliminate them for now, and make these the last thing you introduce.
2. Half the tiles. Cater to and expect a shorter attention span.
3. No worker placement for tile buying. Just have a phase after collecting resources, starting with the player with the starting token. Buy one, then keep going around until nobody wants to buy more.
4. No tools.
5. No food income; all food from hunting.
6. Start with all 10 workers, and no worker acquisition.

Introduce one new thing each playthrough. I highly recommend making the cards last, due to the math of then symbols. Pretty soon, your little person will be playing the full game!

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7
Canada
Novice Advisor
The Gold Heart
Pick a Favorite LGS
31 of 36 gamers found this helpful
“Commonly Misplayed: Scoring Unused Resources”

This is a rule that I misplayed for a long time, and in fact, had never seen anyone else use it until fairly recently. The rule is “Each resource that a player has on his player board scores 1 point” found under “Final Scoring & Winner” but for some reason is often overlooked (at least that’s been my experience). I wonder if perhaps people just forget about it.

There may have been games I’ve played in the past where this could have altered who won the game. Well, at least going forward we’ll play it. And if you’ve been playing correctly, well done!

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