by Deano2099
AMartin56 wrote:
In the example where I was within reach of winning in turn 2 it was due to an available mission (One star for conquering a continent...easy since I was in S. America by myself...one player called it my 'participation award' :)). On turn two I was within easy reach of THREE HQs but only barely enough armies to attack the two I needed.
Oof that's wrong - conquer means 'take from another player' - if they don't have anyone in them, they're not conquered.
AMartin56 wrote:
In another case the 'has never won player' had two stars to start...was the benefit of multiple 'free army' events...and then used all the freebies to grab the mission where you get a star for taking 6 minor cities.
You must have 6 minor cities fairly close together then, in which case when that mission comes up you need to keep a close eye on that area. You're also aware of the events in the deck, at this point, the rewards for highest pop player will crop up quite a bit (as your event deck is fairly small), but that will change, in the meantime if you know this (and you have a lot of territories with 2 or 4 coins on them) then the fight for highest pop should be a bigger deal.
It's worth grabbing the rule book from the Hasbro site and checking the FAQs here, as you've missed a couple of important rules, so there may be other factors. You are remembering to lose a troop when expanding into empty cities right?