Mermaids

Mermaids (Lakes) - Preferred faction when playing against:

Dwarves

Engineers

Chaos Magicians

Giants

Fakirs

Nomads

Cultists

Halflings

Ability

You may skip one River space when Founding a Town. (You decide if and when you want to use this ability. When founding a Town in this fashion, put the Town tile on the skipped River space. Of course, you may build Bridges as usual.)

Stronghold

After building the Stronghold, immediately and only once move forward 1 space on the Shipping track. Neither pay 1 Priest, nor 4 Coins for this movement. (Take the rewards associated with the new level as indicated on your Faction board.)

Story

Mermaids are lovely water creatures inhabiting the waters of Terra Mystica and traveling by its rivers. Deceived by their charm, many landsman has forgotten that the Mermaids preferably would like to transform Terra Mystica into a world of water. Mermaids are able to split their fishtail into two legs and traverse through land; however, they only do so when going to flood it with water, or when they need building materials for their floating cities.

Common Strategy: Aim to build 3 towns in the game, built with a balanced number of structures (and at least two Temples) to earn all types of resources. Try to put up your Stronghold and Sanctuary, on rounds where relevant Scoring Tiles and Bonus Cards are in play. Build a Temple and a few Dwellings (2-3 if possible) in round 1. This is possible if you have the +1 shipping (level) bonus card or with the Priest Power Token Action followed by advancing your shipping (level). Make sure to prep up your structures to secure enough resources on the second round. Wait for the Town-founding relevant Scoring tile and use your faction's special ability to found your towns on that same round (to maximize victory points).

Common Start Positions

Notes:

Green tile + Combo Green/Red tile = preferred starting dwelling positions

Red tile + combo green/red tile = Alternative starting dwelling positions