Tips daybreak

List of cards: https://daybreakgame.org/explore-cards

First, you want to do something with all 5 of your stacks, though powerful cards, such as one that produces one tree per turn, can stay in place the whole game if you don't need that stack for something else. Once per turn effects can be used at the end of a turn and at the start of the next turn.

Don't forget to play cards above your stacks. Synergies are great, but playing a card under a stack is immediate value.

This game is pretty well balanced. You have several different strategies to pursue:

- You can go for a very fast game, where all players try to reduce emissions as quickly as possible; in this case, resilience and energy generation doesn't matter. If you pursue this strategy, you should try and win in turn 2 or 3.

- You can go for a slow game, in which case you want to increase your resilience to be able to take a big hit from the crisis cards, have good energy generation (taking care to be nearly always above your energy demand), and take advantage of card draw. As the game advances, you should have more cards in play, which allows for more powerful synergies later on. Even if it seems like you aren't making any progress, the end game should go pretty smoothly

But most of the time, you will pursue a mix of these two strategies. Ultimately, you need to be able to adapt. If you see you can get lots of resilience early on, let the other players know of your plan. Having one player who goes for a fast game and another one who goes for a slow game will lead to one player getting many drawbacks, and while it's still possible to support them, this is not an ideal situation.

At best, you want to reduce emissions to not make the game snowball on you while producing clean energy. Then, increase your resilience to survive the crisis. Finally, reduce your emissions to -1.

When looking at my hand, I would use any card that gives me at least 0.6 points:

- +1 point per energy produced I need (0.5 point if you lack one energy OR if you lack two and don't have the most dirty energy)

- +0.5 per resilience you gain below what you will need next turn (less if you don't have much time left, or more if you don't produce much carbon per turn)

- +1 point per net carbon removed (i.e.: minus emissions, tree, sea, and (1 energy produced and 1 green dirty energy removed)

- global projects

- same number of points for what you would gain next turn

- +0.5 per extra draw next turn

- for experienced players +0.5 for each choice between 3 cards next turn (note that doing that can make you gain 1 point this turn thanks to the new card and 0.5 next turn)

If I don't have any of those, I would ask for help, look at global projects, or find creative ways to make it work (like using two cards to remove one factory every turn. That gives 1+0.5 points with my ranking, so +0.75 per card). And if I still find nothing useful, I will keep my cards, hoping for a better turn later. Having more cards gives more possibilities too, so it's very unlikely that you won't be able to do anything next turn. It could happen if you go for energy (because you don't have a power grid or you covered your first stack, which I would only do for a good reason i.e. it gives you at least +1.5 points for one card or a secondary way to produce energy).

Don't hesitate to keep some cards at the end of the turn. It's not ideal, but you may have more options to use them on your next turn, as you draw 5 extra cards each turn.

Having -1 energy isn't a big deal. I personally prefer early on to have -1 energy (so +1 star) but -1 emission if I'm sure I will be able to produce energy in my second turn.

Most crises are similar. The two you want to look out for in the late game are the one that removes one social resilience for every 2 stars you have, and the one that removes two dirty energy and triggers again the malus of star on energy (so if you are at -2 energy, and it triggers on you, you first gain 2 stars, and then gain up to 4 stars, which is a lot).

You sometimes have the option to go for a big reduction in energy to be at exactly -1 emission and end the game at the end of the turn.

If reducing your carbon by 1 or 2 would make you not reach the next threshold, it's usually really good to try to do so. It's similar to making all players gain +1 on all resilience for the turn. For that reason, you should try to produce at least -1 emission during the first turn.

If you only gain 1 house per turn, you shouldn't try to force trying to get energy. In the worst case scenario, you should gain 1 star at the end of the second turn and 2 more at the end of the third one, which is totally manageable. You have lots of other cards that let you produce energy or remove houses. If you are playing USA or have a way to give a card that could produce energy, it's usually better to give it to someone else who gains +2 or +3 houses each turn.

Color & Cards specificity:

Many cards can be good in specific situations. For example, some cards can remove some emissions but add more houses. If you have good energy generation, then it has the potential to be a good card, but if you don't have synergy, energy, or the type of emission, then it's bad.

Other cards can make you draw cards; these are all good because they can help you build synergies, and they can be used again next turn; sometimes using one extra card to make that stack go from 3 to 4 cards is really good. They are really good, but I do not consider them to be great.

The great cards are the ones you should be looking for in most games, and nearly all of them work well alone on a stack. Keeping them on their stack the whole game is usually a strong option.

1) Grid (blue): every nation starts with a card that lets you gain one energy per power grid you have. If you don't have a good source of energy, keeping the option of having two power grids to produce 2 energy per card discarded is pretty good. You have some cards that add one power grid while doing something else, and they are nice to transition into cards that require 3 power grids.

Great cards: Energy Infrastructure R+D (draw)

2) Energy (green): the worst color in my opinion. There is one good card that lets you remove a building, then a car, then factories, but it requires some social icons (blue/purple). I would recommend you mostly ignore it.

3) Nuclear (blue): most of the nuclear cards are an alternative way to produce energy. Most of them require two nuclear power to be good, so they are more situational. The nuclear project is very expensive for what it does.

Great cards: Nuclear R+D (draw), Fourth Generation Nuclear (energy)

4) Wind/Solar (light blue/yellow): the main source of energy. When you begin the game, it's very nice to have a stack to produce at least 3 energy per card discarded, but you don't have to have that to get good energy generation. Cards that produce energy over time are free, so you don't have to discard cards to generate energy.

Great cards: Solar R+D & Wind R+D (draws)

5) Regulation (pink): best color in my opinion, the pink project is amazing, and the great cards can remove emissions, add resilience, or draw more cards, and they both synergize really well with that color.

Great cards: Green Energy Transition (x2) (-1emission when you produce 2 energy), Luxury Consumption Tax (draw), Circular Economy (-1 emission)

6) Social (blue/purple): the primary focus for social resilience. Outside of that, it has lots of support, which is pretty nice, as many nations start with that symbol. The community cards let you slowly gain the number of infrastructure resilience you want in most games while giving you one energy per turn too.

Great cards: Systemic Risk Planning (+2resilience), Community Solar & Community Wind (3: +1energy & +1resilience)

7) Ecology (green): the primary focus for environmental resilience. Many cards can produce one tree per turn, which are really good alone on a stack. Contrary to many other colors, it has some ability to reduce emissions that don't make other cards less impactful. I really advise you to build one green stack if you can.

Great cards: Tree Farms & Indigenous People's Tenure & Wetland Restoration (+1/2 trees/seas), Forest Restoration & Peatland Rewetting & Mangrove Restoration (+1tree/sea), Pollution Reduction & Wilderness Protection (resilience), Soil Education (draw)

8) Infrastructure (brown): the primary focus for infrastructure resilience. They never shine, but they let you increase some resilience and remove emissions.

Great cards: Distributed Energy Storage (resilience)

9) Incentive (gray): USA starts with a stack that can draw cards depending on your coin, which isn't bad to play around. Outside of that, many cards are pretty cheap and require 2 to 3 gold. So it's not usually something you play around, but in the right circumstance, it can be pretty good.

10) Innovation (orange): the orange stack focuses on two different things: managing the crisis and getting to see new cards. I would not advise that beginners use it, but as you became better at the game, having a stack that lets you see 6 or 9 extra cards every turn to find what you need is really powerful. The crisis ones aren't that good in my opinion.

Great cards: Clean Energy R+D (x5) (dig / need experience)

11) Geoengeering (white): Stratospheric Sulfur is amazing, but it shines mainly in turns 2 & 3: if you manage to reduce the maximum damage of crisis between 0 and 1, having extra crises is not a big deal. Cloud Brightening is nice on a stack by itself. Ocean Fertilization requires ecological resilience or a stack of clouds. But overall, it's pretty good. I advise you to get used to other stuff first though.

Great cards: Stratospheric Sulfur (x2) (reduce damage / need experience), Geoengeering R+D (draw)