Tips bloodrage

General tips

The following points apply to thinking about the value & cost of both actions and cards.

• Try to keep the rage costs in mind. It's very common for newer players to run out of rage too soon in 1st age, having to pass the rest of the age.
• Another resource to keep in mind are the cards themselves. In every age, only 6 cards per player enter the game, and every won battle makes you discard one card or sometimes even more. If you run out of battle cards too early, it's often easy to beat you in a battle even if you seem to have a lot of power in some province. Pillaging without opposition gives you the pillage reward without having to discard a card, so it's often preferable in the early game.
• One more important resource is time/opportunity. If you find yourself likely to be at a disadvantage in terms of cards and possibly also rage, it might be good to prioritize doing quick, successful pillages over spending turns for invading, clan upgrades and quests. If the age ends quickly and if there won't be many unsuccessful pillages, card advantage and rage don't matter as much.
• Stat increases are generally highly valuable. Increasing rage in ages I and II should be a high priority for all strategies, while the value of the 2 other stats depend a lot on your gameplan. Even so, the 10 glory for the two lasts steps in each stat can make a huge difference.

Drafting

For the types of cards to draft, a good general guideline could be to take 0-2 clan upgrades, 1-4 quests, and 1-4 battle cards.

• Upgrades generally cost rage and/or an action, and have limited slots available, so don't overdo taking them. New players often overvalue upgrades and undervalue quests.
• Quests are usually good, since you get both a nice amount of glory and a stat increase. Taking 2 or even 3 copies of the same quest is a very good idea, since the same province / same Valhalla units count for each copy. On the other hand, many different kind of quests are hard to fill at the same time, and overdoing quests can leave you with such a weak board presence that you can't fulfil area control quests.
• It's usually a good idea to take one (or sometimes more) battle card that gives some benefits even when you lose the battle. That could be either in the form of direct benefit to you (e.g. rage, glory or opponent's card) or just losses to opponent (e.g. each player destroys all but one figure). Their strength lies in card advantage: you can reuse them over and over again as long as you always lose when playing them. Keep in mind, however, that opponents might get you to discard the card by playing Heimdall's Watch (a combat card of ages II and III with text "discard all and play new cards") in some combat.

Loki strategies

Strategies that rely on losing battles and/or getting lots of figures into Valhalla are often called "Loki strategies", since many of the best cards for such strategies are attributed to Loki. The main strength of Loki strategies is card advantage, since there is no need to discard cards used in battle if you just lose the battles. The two main disadvantages are speed and difficulty to raise stats.

Tips for using a Loki strategy

• Draft cards with Loki in their name and other cards that give benefit from losing battles or figures. Glorious Death quests are also good pick, multiple if you can. And of course all of the battle cards that give benefits when losing.
• Pillage with the intention of losing the resulting battle. The winning player won't get the pillage reward, but still has to discard their battle card. This becomes a bit less of a good move though if the other player gets a high amount of glory for winning or can buy back their battle card with Tyr's Prowess (2nd age clan upgrade).
• It might sometimes be good to catch opponents by surprise by playing a big battle card and winning a battle.
• As mentioned earlier, your main disadvantage is speed. If other players are pillaging provinces quickly, you might be able to buy some time by completely filling a province without pillaging it. Opponents would then have to try to pillage the province with a lone ship, if they wish to end the age by pillaging.
• Ragnarok can be a good source of glory, especially if you have Odin's Inspiration (double glory award from dying in Ragnarok) or those Loki clan upgrades that give points for units in Valhalla.
• Ideal way to end the game would be spending your last 3 rage of the whole game for dropping the age 3 Loki upgrade (3 glory for each figure in Valhalla at age end). If you already have 3 clan upgrades, just place it on top of something else.

Tips for beating Loki strategies

• Pillage quickly (and successfully).
• Don't let the Loki player to pillage unsuccessfully. Either pillage the province before they have the time to do so or make them actually win the battle and lose their annoying battle card.
• Pick some of the key cards for Loki strategies yourself. Many of them can be quite useful even if you plan to win most of your battles and do some area control stuff.
• When battling against a Loki player, play a combat card that provides additional benefits when winning, like gaining a stat point, rage, glory.
• Use Tyr's Prowess to even out the card advantage.
• Play Heimdall's Watch or Thor's Primacy to get rid of or cancel their annoying combat cards.
• Raise your axes stat high early to milk points from the Loki player's losing battles.