Well Yun, I think Haze is right. SA is good if you can get it with little to no opposittion. You have 24 income, and little worries border wise. You load up your army and hit the Ant player in his central provinces while his army is out and about trying to take the rest of ant.
A good SA player can get SA in 3-4 turns. By then a good Ant player has the 3b + the 4b, and either eastern or most of west central ant. A good sa player lands 3-4 transports full of men with a small reserve of gold on the 3b + the 4b. The ant player is caught off-gaurd and with his income cut. If the SA player has a base in Ant after taking SA, he can effectively stand an antartica player off, while moving to cut income.
I am an Ant player, and I like to think a damn good one at that. I rarely have to struggle with SA, but once in awhile it happens. 9/10 tho, the sa player isnt smart. lol
My personal preference ranking of starting continents is
Antartica - Fact: fewer opponents if any to gain a continent, and great position.
SA - Fact: Ussually one or 2 opponents to fight through, but otherwise great position/income.
Europe: Fact: Easy to take, not so fast. Ussually no more than 1 opponent to obliterate.
Asia: Fast income. Ussually 1 or 2 opponents to kill. If your good, or lucky, you can take it by turn 6, and have almost double the income of other players. Big border to worry about.
Africa: Easy to take, but in the center of the world. Ussually one or 2 opponents to fight through. As a beginning continent, it has too many borders to worry about for an agressive player like myself.
NA: Last resort continent. Almost always 2 opponents to fight, along with SA as a threat. Slow to take.
Islands: The shat on spawn last resort. Just to get 6 or more income in hopes of breaking into a desired continent.
I always expand to 2 or 3 continents or 2 continents and a bunch of islands. What I take is strictly on the game board situation.
