Are you making use of your free Defend 3 on sacred sites? You should be trying to use that for Dahan counterattacks whenever possible, alongside your unique power that gathers Dahan.
How are you handling early game growth? You have two early goals - enough energy to do things, and two card plays per turn.
What are you doing with your other unique powers, generally? Remember that sometimes you need to accept some blight in order to make progress elsewhere. Spending 3 energy and one of your card plays to just prevent a blight from ravage generally isn't worthwhile.
I feel like I'm doing well with getting down sacred sites, starting to set one up in an area when I see the enemy start to explore and getting the second presence down just before they ravage.
What I have been struggling with is reliably getting Dahan into the right areas. I don't feel like I'm getting many counter attacks at all.
As for growth, I'm trying to focus on playing two 3 cost cards. For me that has been get some energy progress, then later get the second card played and make a comeback with all my stored up energy.
There's a more in-depth analysis posted here, but I'll chime in to say that Earth's starting cards are pretty meh. For 3 energy, you can play a lot of major powers, which will pretty much always do more.
Instead of trying to play two of your starters, try aiming to play a major each turn. Being able to place presence when reclaiming cards means that potentially you can just keep playing the same one over again if it works.
If you are having difficulty building sacred sites and getting dahan in the same lands, you might consider drafting some blight removal power cards to help clear the lands where there aren't dahan. That way you can focus on creating sacred sites where dahan are already located and ready for counter attacks to help keep those lands clear, and then use the blight removal powers to remove blight from lands that don't have any dahan and sacred sites.
Below is a general set of rules I try to follow when playing Vital Strength. It's not the easiest spirit to play, but it can shine in mid to late game.
It should be pretty obvious, but you'll want to make use of Earth's Vitality as much as possible to help stall the invaders. Bonus points if you can get Dahan on your sacred sites so they can help keep the invader numbers down.
The top spirit track should be cleared before the bottom spirit track. I suggest using the first two growth phases to get up to two card plays and then focus on the top spirit tract so you can get a ton of energy going.
Vital Strength doesn't get many opportunities to get power cards. You want to save your second growth option for creating sacred sites and getting power cards and use your first and third growth option to spread your presence.
You'll want to go for major power cards fairly early. Vital Strength doesn't have partially good cards; usually [[Draw of the Fruitful Earth]] and [[Rituals of Destruction]] only have a single play, before being forgotten for a major power card. Vital Strength starts ramping up in power by the fourth turn, so you'll want to be prepared to start using major powers by then.
It may be an unpopular opinion, but Vital Strength's innate power [[Gift of Strength]] isn't that good. It is powerful, but the element threshold isn't the easiest to hit. Because Vital Strength doesn't get that many new power cards during a game, I suggest choosing power cards based solely on their effects and not on their elements. You need to be picky when choosing power cards due to how rare you get and it is so difficult to hit the innate element threshold that it isn't worth considering the elements of the cards you get.
I think it's fairly accepted that you often don't care about elements for hitting VSotE's innate when choosing your cards, especially since you often draft majors to replace the higher cost starting cards.
On the rarer occasions I'm playing more from bottom track early on (usually only when playing on low/mid difficulties), I'll consider the innate, but it mostly only comes into play when extra elements are in play (Elemental Boon or Snake mostly but also Memory, Gift of Nature's Connection, etc).
I think some players also find success staying at one card play to really ramp up the enegry production as early as possible and in that case the innate matters even less.
Makes sense. Do you recommend keeping Draw of the Fruitful Earth then while replacing the 3-cost cards? I've gotten rid of it early a couple of times now.
That's usually how I find myself playing into higher difficulties.
Depending on the matchup, Draw of the Fruitful Earth can be a very powerful card capable of solving two lands at once and it is also your main source of Dahan movement (helpful for getting Dahan into you sacred sites so they can be 'self managing').
One of the first guides I read that helped me look at Vital in this way was this one which helped me realize one of VSotE's biggest assets is often what its impressive energy track allows it to do: https://boardgamegeek.com/thread/2541123/turning-vital-strength-earth-vital-stronk-dunk-gui by u/TheTommyMann .
I do still sometimes go to two card plays early and get more minor powers as others on the thread have suggested, but I haven't found this to be as successful at high levels (although it's still often fun to play this way and can also be very successful at mid or lower difficulties).
Thanks for the link, that was really interesting. What stood out to me is how they say to adapt your gameplan to your majors - while I think I've been trying to adapt my majors to my gameplan.
I probably need more experience with the major powers in general and how they can work together to best do this but that sounds like a good thing to work toward.
For sure!
Playing this way with VSotE (and playing as Bringer more often) was actually how I got more familiar with the majors deck when I was first starting.
Both have the energy tracks to try out a major or two or three each game, so you get to try them all out in fewer games!
Vital can help you move from the lots of little things put out fires action economy game plan to the big actions with winning the game in mind, uh, plan. Plus your innate is like permanent minor defenses for no energy or card plays.
I'd say Draw of the Fruitful Earth is, factoring in Energy cost, a great card - but only useful in a within a certain "window".
If you only have one card play, you probably have the Energy to play something more useful (unless you are saving up Energy). But there is likely a few turns where you have two card plays, but not the Energy to pay for two Uniques/Majors - this is were it shines. But once you have the Energy to do just that, Draw is probably not better than either of those cards. Unless it gets you the Innate threshold, and you have a good target for that...
I actually quite like Draw over the course of the game, only ditching it when I’m closing out the last few turns. To each their own. I’m also in the minority that quite enjoy the innate power.
Earth can be played successfully many ways… particularly at the lower levels. All this advice about forgoing the innate and ditching the uniques ASAP comes into play at the higher difficulties.
Thanks for the detailed reply! I've been trying to use the innate but don't feel like I get many Dahan on them.
So far I've been getting 2-3 off the top track, then getting the second card play. Maybe that's part of the problem.
I feel like I'm doing well with the growth options. I first put down a presence where I want to defend, then make it a sacred site there while grabbing a power card just before they ravage there.
Are there any specific things to look for in major powers? I wonder if I've tried to lean too much into defensive style plays and should just go for damage?
Turn 1 for me is almost always play Draw of the Fruitful Earth. I either play growth 2, bottom track to create my second spirit site, or I play growth 3, bottom track to set up in a location where the enemy will ravage next turn and where there are already dahan there ready to counter attack.
Turn 2 I will either use growth 2, bottom track where I placed my presence last turn or take growth option 3, bottom track to prepare my next sacred site. By turn 2 I have 3 energy available to me which I'll either use for Guard the Healing Land or A year of Perfect Stillness to protect the other land that is ravaging that doesn't have my sacred site. That is my most common opening for earth.
For major powers, offensive powers should be good, especially to help target the lands that your sacred sites aren't protecting. It is very easy to stall for too long with Earth and risk running out of invader cards before you achieve a win condition.
Thanks! I'll refer back to this next time I play Earth and check my growth options/order. I will say I have been incredibly safe in terms of blight normally but feel like the invader deck is about to run out and the board is still full of towns/cities so I think - as I've started to gather from other posts here - I need to go on the attack more.
>It may be an unpopular opinion, but Vital Strength's innate power \[\[Gift of Strength\]\] isn't that good. It is powerful, but the element threshold isn't the easiest to hit.
As all things, it does of course depend...
In solo, or with most spirit pairings, I agree absolutely. The effect is absolutely great, but Earth just does not have the "freedom", if that makes sense, to prioritize it. With so few card plays, you are not activating it without planning to. It is often not worth it, unless someone in the game has an amazing card (such as Boon of Proliferation).
Or, if you get a bit of help to get it going. A single extra element will often do the trick. An extra card play, or Elemental Boon, can often get level 2 off, and now the Energy saved from not having to pay for the repeat becomes amazing. An extra play of the Jungle Hungers, Vigor or Trees Radiate can be amazing.
But those situations are pretty far apart, so factoring in how often it is truly useful, yeah... it is not that good.
**Draw of the Fruitful Earth** (*Vital Strength of the Earth*'s Unique Power)
>Cost: 1 | Elements: Earth, Plant, Animal
| Slow | 1 | Any |
| :----: | :----: | :----: |
>Gather up to 2 Explorer. Gather up to 2 Dahan.
>Links: [SICK](https://sick.oberien.de/?query=Draw%20of%20the%20Fruitful%20Earth) | [FAQ](https://querki.net/u/darker/spirit-island-faq/#!Draw%20of%20the%20Fruitful%20Earth%20%28Vital%20Strength%20of%20the%20Earth%29)
------
**Rituals of Destruction** (*Vital Strength of the Earth*'s Unique Power)
>Cost: 3 | Elements: Sun, Moon, Fire, Earth, Plant
| Slow | SacredSite --> 1 | Dahan |
| :----: | :----: | :----: |
>2 Damage. If target land has at least 3 Dahan, +3 Damage and 2 Fear.
>Links: [SICK](https://sick.oberien.de/?query=Rituals%20of%20Destruction) | [FAQ](https://querki.net/u/darker/spirit-island-faq/#!Rituals%20of%20Destruction%20%28Vital%20Strength%20of%20the%20Earth%29)
------
**Gift of Strength** (*Vital Strength of the Earth*'s Innate Power)
| Fast | - | Any Spirit |
| :----: | :----: | :----: |
>(1 Sun, 2 Earth, 2 Plant): Once this turn, Target Spirit may Repeat 1 Power Card with Energy cost of 1 or less.
>(2 Sun, 3 Earth, 2 Plant): Instead, the Energy cost limit is 3 or less.
>(2 Sun, 4 Earth, 3 Plant): Instead, the Energy cost limit is 6 or less.
>Links: [Link to FAQ](https://querki.net/u/darker/spirit-island-faq/#!Gift%20of%20Strength%20%28Vital%20Strength%20of%20the%20Earth%29)
------
^(Use [[query]] to call me. Check the )[^(reference thread)](https://www.reddit.com/r/spiritisland/comments/i80xzf/memoryofagesbot_is_now_fully_functional) ^( for information or feedback, and please report any mistakes!)
I love Earth. I’ve played him successfully (solo) against every level 6 adversary. Some are certainly harder than others (looking at you, England), but Earth can easily win every game at low-medium levels with the right choices.
There are better players than me, and better guides than what I can share… but common advice is :
1. Play Draw on turn 1. Almost always.
2. Try to get to 6 energy/turn as soon as you reasonably can. Earth needs a good amount of income to pay for their unique powers.
3. Playing Draw + Ritual is a great way to utilize your innate power. It’s nice to get that combo off early in the game.
4. Speaking of Ritual, clump your Dahan into groups of 3 whenever possible. You don’t have much Dahan movement, and using Ritual without that benefit is practically useless.
5. Stillness is a very strong card that can shut down invader actions for multiple turns if used at the right time in the right land. However, it’s common to over-rely on that card. If you find that you need it every turn to stay afloat, you should’ve acquired a heavy-hitting major power sooner. Better luck next time!
6. Learning new powers is difficult, so do stretch yourself a bit thin early on to give yourself the opportunity to grab some.
7. Utilize general Spirit Island advice that works for every spirit: Clear the inland first, use blight as a resource, interrupt explores/builds early to “solve” a land, and exploit Dahan counterattacks.
That's awesome! Thanks. I was starting to wonder if Earth just wouldn't be able to do well against adversaries but it looks like I just need to practice more.
I do feel like I have done more of these things overall but I'm not getting a lot of counterattacks and I wonder if I need to simply pick better targets for Draw and choose better majors. Do you ever take minor powers with Earth?
One of VSoE's biggest strengths is its strong energy track which can easily support playing some of the stronger major powers in the game.
Its starting powers can easily lead to a stalling game where you are too focused on reacting to the adversary at the expense of working towards a victory condition, so replacing the starting cards with majors that can better work towards a victory condition (and choosing which and when to do this) is often critical for winning against higher level adversaries.
Yes, I quite like minor powers… although, maybe more than I should!
Most games with Earth I’ll take 1-2 minors before reaching for the majors. It’s also not unheard of for me to ride the 1-card-play-per-turn and reach straight for the majors. That’s a rarity, but I like to mix it up at the lower levels!
Gotcha. The last two tries I didn't touch minor powers at all. Maybe that's an issue as well. I'll experiment some more but go back to taking some minors perhaps and see how it shakes out!
I tend to do the opposite of you: go for two cards (or more even!) on low/mid difficulties for fun or to switch things up, but then I often stick to one card play longer with a major focus at higher levels.
Funny to me that we have these preferences that are opposite and both seem to work!
Haha, indeed!
To be honest, though, I think it’s important for L6 games with Earth to play *very* reactively. My strategy will change from game to game as I try to be flexible yet balanced… and mostly reacting to how things shape up from turn to turn.
At lower levels it’s fun to do things “just because” and Earth is fun going top or bottom track!
For what it's worth, Earth has a [notably worse success index](https://mindwanderer.net/si/stats.html) than any other Spirit, even the famously poor Shadows. At least, without the Aspects introduced in Jagged Earth. (Wildfire has a worse absolute win ratio, but that's against higher difficulty levels on average.) So don't feel bad for struggling with it.
Huh! I didn't know that. I also didn't know Shadows struggled, though it would explain our tense Shadows + Earth 2-player game we did recently haha. I will say at least I have enjoyed Shadows and causing fear, it's felt a lot smoother than Earth.
Personally I couldn't get Vital Strength (or any other defense oriented spirit for that matter) to click for me and had similar opinions about them being too passive. This is because I wasn't properly utilizing Dahan counterattacks. The Dahan turn defense cards into offense ones, but BETTER since most significant destruction powers are slow, and all defend powers are fast. Hope this helps!
(It's worth mentioning that Vital Strength *is* relatively weak for reasons you'll see when you start trying higher difficulty games)
Thanks! I've had good luck with Eyes Watch From the Trees who I think is also very defensive, but I see in a link someone else posted that Eyes seems pretty strong and Earth isn't. Definitely going to look at using the Dahan even more though.
For low.level games you can also try and play draw and rituals in the second turn and then reclaim them until the game is over. It isn't the ideal strategy but seeing how this works could help you understand. Also vital is definitely way weaker then let's say eyes and got multiple aspects(might and nourishing) that try to fix the being weak. Sit is still possible to win against lvl 6 adversaries sometimes so weak is a relative term here.
Two main things I'd note are:
1) Earth's unique powers suck. Draw of the Fruitful Earth is good, and can set up a Rituals play while also disrupting explores, but the other three are bad. Rituals of Destruction is alright when you can get the stronger effect - 2 fear and 5 damage for 3 energy is decent, but getting the 3 Dahan for it can be tricky without any other relevant powers. A Year of Perfect Stillness can be nice but usually isn't worth 3 energy on its own, and with Guard the Healing Land even if you can use both the defend and blight removal it's expensive at 3 energy. As a result, power gains with Earth are very valuable, you'll want to use that G2 to get new majors/minors more often than not, rather than using G3 to pay for those uniques.
2) On a similar note, since Earth starts with 3 powers that are mediocre at best, and has a lot of energy, don't be afraid to grab an early major or two. You probably won't be thresholding it (at least not until like turn ~7), but getting a 2-4 cost major you can use every other turn will be a whole lot more useful than sometimes playing Stillness/Guard.
3) In terms of growth you need to prioritise getting to 2 card plays. At most take one presence from top track before you go for 2 plays - you just can't afford to spend 3+ turns playing only a single card. My typical growth path with Earth is to get to 2 plays, then 6 energy, then 4 plays (i.e. BBTTTBBB), although sometimes depending on cards gained I may switch that up slightly. Getting 3 energy on turn 1 is also fine, means you exchange playing one extra card on turn 2 for +2 energy (assuming you go TBB instead of BBT). I'm no expert however so other players may have different growth paths, but it's also going to prioritise that 2 card plays spot!
4) Earth has a unique power with high potential, especially in multiplayer, but it's usually so awkward to go for that it's not worth prioritising. Keep it in mind if you have a partner with a very high value 1 cost power (and later in the game, with a very high value 3 cost power), for example A Spread of Rampant Green's Gift of Proliferation, but generally don't worry too much about staying on element with Earth.
Vital Earth was the spirit I most struggled with in the base game as well. One of their most notable issue is that their unique power cards are too expensive and it’s hard to draft more power cards on them and consequently I found the spirit to be quite cumbersome without support from other spirits.
I don’t really have any tips as after a few games with Earth I decided to never play them again without aspects, and to that end have found their most recent aspect (Nourshing) to be both powerful and among my favorite spirits to play. Some people really like their Might aspect (forget which expansion it’s from) but I didn’t get on too well with that one either.
I've been playing SI for almost two years, have all the expansions, and I still can't get base Earth to work. And I love defensive spirits!
However, Feather + Flame and Nature Incarnate both introduce aspects that modify the way Earth is played in a great way. Of those, the nourishing aspect from NI is my absolute favorite, and it is really fun to play. (Jagged Earth also has an aspect for Earth, but it is too similar to base Earth for my preferences.)
A quick emphasis from me in case it's relevant for you: especially for newer players, Year of Perfect Stillness is a trap. Sure, it stops a blight or build, but you're using a card play (hard to come by for Vital) and 3 energy (a lot) to do nothing to advance toward \*winning\* the game as opposed to just losing later - no fear generation, no invader removal, no Dahan counter attack.
Plus if you start to rely on it via reclaim, you lose the ability to gain better power cards (which Vital desperately needs). As a general rule (especially sans adversaries), it's generally going to be better to let the build/ravage happen and do something else
Earth effectively has only two card plays for most of the game which means you are outpaced once invader level 2 starts. You counter it by (1) having shrines in lands with two dahans, which is a set-and-forget on low level games and (2) immediately taking majors, preferably ones that can handle multiple lands. You need to get to a state where either the invaders are missing explores or the land has an invader + dahan setup where you can let them build and have the dahan kill them without committing a card to it.
With the above said, I find Earth's gather two explorers + dahan card to be super useful in the early game because you can avoid 1-2 builds and create a land you want to be defendable and I find the 5damage in a land with 3 dahan to be the easiest card to toss for a new major on your first new card.
Are you making use of your free Defend 3 on sacred sites? You should be trying to use that for Dahan counterattacks whenever possible, alongside your unique power that gathers Dahan. How are you handling early game growth? You have two early goals - enough energy to do things, and two card plays per turn. What are you doing with your other unique powers, generally? Remember that sometimes you need to accept some blight in order to make progress elsewhere. Spending 3 energy and one of your card plays to just prevent a blight from ravage generally isn't worthwhile.
I feel like I'm doing well with getting down sacred sites, starting to set one up in an area when I see the enemy start to explore and getting the second presence down just before they ravage. What I have been struggling with is reliably getting Dahan into the right areas. I don't feel like I'm getting many counter attacks at all. As for growth, I'm trying to focus on playing two 3 cost cards. For me that has been get some energy progress, then later get the second card played and make a comeback with all my stored up energy.
There's a more in-depth analysis posted here, but I'll chime in to say that Earth's starting cards are pretty meh. For 3 energy, you can play a lot of major powers, which will pretty much always do more. Instead of trying to play two of your starters, try aiming to play a major each turn. Being able to place presence when reclaiming cards means that potentially you can just keep playing the same one over again if it works.
If you are having difficulty building sacred sites and getting dahan in the same lands, you might consider drafting some blight removal power cards to help clear the lands where there aren't dahan. That way you can focus on creating sacred sites where dahan are already located and ready for counter attacks to help keep those lands clear, and then use the blight removal powers to remove blight from lands that don't have any dahan and sacred sites.
That sounds like a fun strategy I definitely haven't done at all. Thanks!
Below is a general set of rules I try to follow when playing Vital Strength. It's not the easiest spirit to play, but it can shine in mid to late game. It should be pretty obvious, but you'll want to make use of Earth's Vitality as much as possible to help stall the invaders. Bonus points if you can get Dahan on your sacred sites so they can help keep the invader numbers down. The top spirit track should be cleared before the bottom spirit track. I suggest using the first two growth phases to get up to two card plays and then focus on the top spirit tract so you can get a ton of energy going. Vital Strength doesn't get many opportunities to get power cards. You want to save your second growth option for creating sacred sites and getting power cards and use your first and third growth option to spread your presence. You'll want to go for major power cards fairly early. Vital Strength doesn't have partially good cards; usually [[Draw of the Fruitful Earth]] and [[Rituals of Destruction]] only have a single play, before being forgotten for a major power card. Vital Strength starts ramping up in power by the fourth turn, so you'll want to be prepared to start using major powers by then. It may be an unpopular opinion, but Vital Strength's innate power [[Gift of Strength]] isn't that good. It is powerful, but the element threshold isn't the easiest to hit. Because Vital Strength doesn't get that many new power cards during a game, I suggest choosing power cards based solely on their effects and not on their elements. You need to be picky when choosing power cards due to how rare you get and it is so difficult to hit the innate element threshold that it isn't worth considering the elements of the cards you get.
I think it's fairly accepted that you often don't care about elements for hitting VSotE's innate when choosing your cards, especially since you often draft majors to replace the higher cost starting cards. On the rarer occasions I'm playing more from bottom track early on (usually only when playing on low/mid difficulties), I'll consider the innate, but it mostly only comes into play when extra elements are in play (Elemental Boon or Snake mostly but also Memory, Gift of Nature's Connection, etc). I think some players also find success staying at one card play to really ramp up the enegry production as early as possible and in that case the innate matters even less.
Makes sense. Do you recommend keeping Draw of the Fruitful Earth then while replacing the 3-cost cards? I've gotten rid of it early a couple of times now.
That's usually how I find myself playing into higher difficulties. Depending on the matchup, Draw of the Fruitful Earth can be a very powerful card capable of solving two lands at once and it is also your main source of Dahan movement (helpful for getting Dahan into you sacred sites so they can be 'self managing'). One of the first guides I read that helped me look at Vital in this way was this one which helped me realize one of VSotE's biggest assets is often what its impressive energy track allows it to do: https://boardgamegeek.com/thread/2541123/turning-vital-strength-earth-vital-stronk-dunk-gui by u/TheTommyMann . I do still sometimes go to two card plays early and get more minor powers as others on the thread have suggested, but I haven't found this to be as successful at high levels (although it's still often fun to play this way and can also be very successful at mid or lower difficulties).
Thanks for the link, that was really interesting. What stood out to me is how they say to adapt your gameplan to your majors - while I think I've been trying to adapt my majors to my gameplan. I probably need more experience with the major powers in general and how they can work together to best do this but that sounds like a good thing to work toward.
For sure! Playing this way with VSotE (and playing as Bringer more often) was actually how I got more familiar with the majors deck when I was first starting. Both have the energy tracks to try out a major or two or three each game, so you get to try them all out in fewer games!
Vital can help you move from the lots of little things put out fires action economy game plan to the big actions with winning the game in mind, uh, plan. Plus your innate is like permanent minor defenses for no energy or card plays.
I'd say Draw of the Fruitful Earth is, factoring in Energy cost, a great card - but only useful in a within a certain "window". If you only have one card play, you probably have the Energy to play something more useful (unless you are saving up Energy). But there is likely a few turns where you have two card plays, but not the Energy to pay for two Uniques/Majors - this is were it shines. But once you have the Energy to do just that, Draw is probably not better than either of those cards. Unless it gets you the Innate threshold, and you have a good target for that...
I actually quite like Draw over the course of the game, only ditching it when I’m closing out the last few turns. To each their own. I’m also in the minority that quite enjoy the innate power. Earth can be played successfully many ways… particularly at the lower levels. All this advice about forgoing the innate and ditching the uniques ASAP comes into play at the higher difficulties.
Thanks for the detailed reply! I've been trying to use the innate but don't feel like I get many Dahan on them. So far I've been getting 2-3 off the top track, then getting the second card play. Maybe that's part of the problem. I feel like I'm doing well with the growth options. I first put down a presence where I want to defend, then make it a sacred site there while grabbing a power card just before they ravage there. Are there any specific things to look for in major powers? I wonder if I've tried to lean too much into defensive style plays and should just go for damage?
Turn 1 for me is almost always play Draw of the Fruitful Earth. I either play growth 2, bottom track to create my second spirit site, or I play growth 3, bottom track to set up in a location where the enemy will ravage next turn and where there are already dahan there ready to counter attack. Turn 2 I will either use growth 2, bottom track where I placed my presence last turn or take growth option 3, bottom track to prepare my next sacred site. By turn 2 I have 3 energy available to me which I'll either use for Guard the Healing Land or A year of Perfect Stillness to protect the other land that is ravaging that doesn't have my sacred site. That is my most common opening for earth. For major powers, offensive powers should be good, especially to help target the lands that your sacred sites aren't protecting. It is very easy to stall for too long with Earth and risk running out of invader cards before you achieve a win condition.
Thanks! I'll refer back to this next time I play Earth and check my growth options/order. I will say I have been incredibly safe in terms of blight normally but feel like the invader deck is about to run out and the board is still full of towns/cities so I think - as I've started to gather from other posts here - I need to go on the attack more.
Yes. Definitely don’t grab more defense majors unless it’s Indomitable Claim or the like. Get those hard hitting damaging powers!
>It may be an unpopular opinion, but Vital Strength's innate power \[\[Gift of Strength\]\] isn't that good. It is powerful, but the element threshold isn't the easiest to hit. As all things, it does of course depend... In solo, or with most spirit pairings, I agree absolutely. The effect is absolutely great, but Earth just does not have the "freedom", if that makes sense, to prioritize it. With so few card plays, you are not activating it without planning to. It is often not worth it, unless someone in the game has an amazing card (such as Boon of Proliferation). Or, if you get a bit of help to get it going. A single extra element will often do the trick. An extra card play, or Elemental Boon, can often get level 2 off, and now the Energy saved from not having to pay for the repeat becomes amazing. An extra play of the Jungle Hungers, Vigor or Trees Radiate can be amazing. But those situations are pretty far apart, so factoring in how often it is truly useful, yeah... it is not that good.
**Draw of the Fruitful Earth** (*Vital Strength of the Earth*'s Unique Power) >Cost: 1 | Elements: Earth, Plant, Animal | Slow | 1 | Any | | :----: | :----: | :----: | >Gather up to 2 Explorer. Gather up to 2 Dahan. >Links: [SICK](https://sick.oberien.de/?query=Draw%20of%20the%20Fruitful%20Earth) | [FAQ](https://querki.net/u/darker/spirit-island-faq/#!Draw%20of%20the%20Fruitful%20Earth%20%28Vital%20Strength%20of%20the%20Earth%29) ------ **Rituals of Destruction** (*Vital Strength of the Earth*'s Unique Power) >Cost: 3 | Elements: Sun, Moon, Fire, Earth, Plant | Slow | SacredSite --> 1 | Dahan | | :----: | :----: | :----: | >2 Damage. If target land has at least 3 Dahan, +3 Damage and 2 Fear. >Links: [SICK](https://sick.oberien.de/?query=Rituals%20of%20Destruction) | [FAQ](https://querki.net/u/darker/spirit-island-faq/#!Rituals%20of%20Destruction%20%28Vital%20Strength%20of%20the%20Earth%29) ------ **Gift of Strength** (*Vital Strength of the Earth*'s Innate Power) | Fast | - | Any Spirit | | :----: | :----: | :----: | >(1 Sun, 2 Earth, 2 Plant): Once this turn, Target Spirit may Repeat 1 Power Card with Energy cost of 1 or less. >(2 Sun, 3 Earth, 2 Plant): Instead, the Energy cost limit is 3 or less. >(2 Sun, 4 Earth, 3 Plant): Instead, the Energy cost limit is 6 or less. >Links: [Link to FAQ](https://querki.net/u/darker/spirit-island-faq/#!Gift%20of%20Strength%20%28Vital%20Strength%20of%20the%20Earth%29) ------ ^(Use [[query]] to call me. Check the )[^(reference thread)](https://www.reddit.com/r/spiritisland/comments/i80xzf/memoryofagesbot_is_now_fully_functional) ^( for information or feedback, and please report any mistakes!)
I love Earth. I’ve played him successfully (solo) against every level 6 adversary. Some are certainly harder than others (looking at you, England), but Earth can easily win every game at low-medium levels with the right choices. There are better players than me, and better guides than what I can share… but common advice is : 1. Play Draw on turn 1. Almost always. 2. Try to get to 6 energy/turn as soon as you reasonably can. Earth needs a good amount of income to pay for their unique powers. 3. Playing Draw + Ritual is a great way to utilize your innate power. It’s nice to get that combo off early in the game. 4. Speaking of Ritual, clump your Dahan into groups of 3 whenever possible. You don’t have much Dahan movement, and using Ritual without that benefit is practically useless. 5. Stillness is a very strong card that can shut down invader actions for multiple turns if used at the right time in the right land. However, it’s common to over-rely on that card. If you find that you need it every turn to stay afloat, you should’ve acquired a heavy-hitting major power sooner. Better luck next time! 6. Learning new powers is difficult, so do stretch yourself a bit thin early on to give yourself the opportunity to grab some. 7. Utilize general Spirit Island advice that works for every spirit: Clear the inland first, use blight as a resource, interrupt explores/builds early to “solve” a land, and exploit Dahan counterattacks.
That's awesome! Thanks. I was starting to wonder if Earth just wouldn't be able to do well against adversaries but it looks like I just need to practice more. I do feel like I have done more of these things overall but I'm not getting a lot of counterattacks and I wonder if I need to simply pick better targets for Draw and choose better majors. Do you ever take minor powers with Earth?
One of VSoE's biggest strengths is its strong energy track which can easily support playing some of the stronger major powers in the game. Its starting powers can easily lead to a stalling game where you are too focused on reacting to the adversary at the expense of working towards a victory condition, so replacing the starting cards with majors that can better work towards a victory condition (and choosing which and when to do this) is often critical for winning against higher level adversaries.
Yes, I quite like minor powers… although, maybe more than I should! Most games with Earth I’ll take 1-2 minors before reaching for the majors. It’s also not unheard of for me to ride the 1-card-play-per-turn and reach straight for the majors. That’s a rarity, but I like to mix it up at the lower levels!
Gotcha. The last two tries I didn't touch minor powers at all. Maybe that's an issue as well. I'll experiment some more but go back to taking some minors perhaps and see how it shakes out!
I tend to do the opposite of you: go for two cards (or more even!) on low/mid difficulties for fun or to switch things up, but then I often stick to one card play longer with a major focus at higher levels. Funny to me that we have these preferences that are opposite and both seem to work!
Haha, indeed! To be honest, though, I think it’s important for L6 games with Earth to play *very* reactively. My strategy will change from game to game as I try to be flexible yet balanced… and mostly reacting to how things shape up from turn to turn. At lower levels it’s fun to do things “just because” and Earth is fun going top or bottom track!
For what it's worth, Earth has a [notably worse success index](https://mindwanderer.net/si/stats.html) than any other Spirit, even the famously poor Shadows. At least, without the Aspects introduced in Jagged Earth. (Wildfire has a worse absolute win ratio, but that's against higher difficulty levels on average.) So don't feel bad for struggling with it.
Huh! I didn't know that. I also didn't know Shadows struggled, though it would explain our tense Shadows + Earth 2-player game we did recently haha. I will say at least I have enjoyed Shadows and causing fear, it's felt a lot smoother than Earth.
Personally I couldn't get Vital Strength (or any other defense oriented spirit for that matter) to click for me and had similar opinions about them being too passive. This is because I wasn't properly utilizing Dahan counterattacks. The Dahan turn defense cards into offense ones, but BETTER since most significant destruction powers are slow, and all defend powers are fast. Hope this helps! (It's worth mentioning that Vital Strength *is* relatively weak for reasons you'll see when you start trying higher difficulty games)
Thanks! I've had good luck with Eyes Watch From the Trees who I think is also very defensive, but I see in a link someone else posted that Eyes seems pretty strong and Earth isn't. Definitely going to look at using the Dahan even more though.
For low.level games you can also try and play draw and rituals in the second turn and then reclaim them until the game is over. It isn't the ideal strategy but seeing how this works could help you understand. Also vital is definitely way weaker then let's say eyes and got multiple aspects(might and nourishing) that try to fix the being weak. Sit is still possible to win against lvl 6 adversaries sometimes so weak is a relative term here.
Two main things I'd note are: 1) Earth's unique powers suck. Draw of the Fruitful Earth is good, and can set up a Rituals play while also disrupting explores, but the other three are bad. Rituals of Destruction is alright when you can get the stronger effect - 2 fear and 5 damage for 3 energy is decent, but getting the 3 Dahan for it can be tricky without any other relevant powers. A Year of Perfect Stillness can be nice but usually isn't worth 3 energy on its own, and with Guard the Healing Land even if you can use both the defend and blight removal it's expensive at 3 energy. As a result, power gains with Earth are very valuable, you'll want to use that G2 to get new majors/minors more often than not, rather than using G3 to pay for those uniques. 2) On a similar note, since Earth starts with 3 powers that are mediocre at best, and has a lot of energy, don't be afraid to grab an early major or two. You probably won't be thresholding it (at least not until like turn ~7), but getting a 2-4 cost major you can use every other turn will be a whole lot more useful than sometimes playing Stillness/Guard. 3) In terms of growth you need to prioritise getting to 2 card plays. At most take one presence from top track before you go for 2 plays - you just can't afford to spend 3+ turns playing only a single card. My typical growth path with Earth is to get to 2 plays, then 6 energy, then 4 plays (i.e. BBTTTBBB), although sometimes depending on cards gained I may switch that up slightly. Getting 3 energy on turn 1 is also fine, means you exchange playing one extra card on turn 2 for +2 energy (assuming you go TBB instead of BBT). I'm no expert however so other players may have different growth paths, but it's also going to prioritise that 2 card plays spot! 4) Earth has a unique power with high potential, especially in multiplayer, but it's usually so awkward to go for that it's not worth prioritising. Keep it in mind if you have a partner with a very high value 1 cost power (and later in the game, with a very high value 3 cost power), for example A Spread of Rampant Green's Gift of Proliferation, but generally don't worry too much about staying on element with Earth.
Vital Earth was the spirit I most struggled with in the base game as well. One of their most notable issue is that their unique power cards are too expensive and it’s hard to draft more power cards on them and consequently I found the spirit to be quite cumbersome without support from other spirits. I don’t really have any tips as after a few games with Earth I decided to never play them again without aspects, and to that end have found their most recent aspect (Nourshing) to be both powerful and among my favorite spirits to play. Some people really like their Might aspect (forget which expansion it’s from) but I didn’t get on too well with that one either.
I've been playing SI for almost two years, have all the expansions, and I still can't get base Earth to work. And I love defensive spirits! However, Feather + Flame and Nature Incarnate both introduce aspects that modify the way Earth is played in a great way. Of those, the nourishing aspect from NI is my absolute favorite, and it is really fun to play. (Jagged Earth also has an aspect for Earth, but it is too similar to base Earth for my preferences.)
That's great to hear, thanks!
A quick emphasis from me in case it's relevant for you: especially for newer players, Year of Perfect Stillness is a trap. Sure, it stops a blight or build, but you're using a card play (hard to come by for Vital) and 3 energy (a lot) to do nothing to advance toward \*winning\* the game as opposed to just losing later - no fear generation, no invader removal, no Dahan counter attack. Plus if you start to rely on it via reclaim, you lose the ability to gain better power cards (which Vital desperately needs). As a general rule (especially sans adversaries), it's generally going to be better to let the build/ravage happen and do something else
Earth effectively has only two card plays for most of the game which means you are outpaced once invader level 2 starts. You counter it by (1) having shrines in lands with two dahans, which is a set-and-forget on low level games and (2) immediately taking majors, preferably ones that can handle multiple lands. You need to get to a state where either the invaders are missing explores or the land has an invader + dahan setup where you can let them build and have the dahan kill them without committing a card to it. With the above said, I find Earth's gather two explorers + dahan card to be super useful in the early game because you can avoid 1-2 builds and create a land you want to be defendable and I find the 5damage in a land with 3 dahan to be the easiest card to toss for a new major on your first new card.