Wingspan – The Definitive Achievement Guide

 

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Hello all.

I recently full-achieved Wingspan on 1/6/2021. Subsequently, this is an in-process guide that I will be adding different achievements to as I can. Please let me know if you have any questions or suggestions.

Introduction

I know what you’re thinking: An achievement guide for Wingspan?

Wingspan, of all games. Beautiful for its simplicity, the peaceful gaming environment, and above all else, the fact that it is essentially noncompetitive in many ways.

But if you’re one of the few, the proud, the achievement obsessed who can’t fully enjoy a game until every single achievement has been granted, then keep reading.

I know that some purists will say that grinding for achievements ruins the experience and point of the game, but truthfully, I feel as though grinding to get achievements ends up being one of the best ways to appreciate the game, and complicate one’s understanding of how it works. I guarantee that achievement grinding will make you a better, more accomplished player, very quickly.

The achievements in Wingspan are fairly straightforward. Obviously, random chance plays a significant role in this game, and subsequently, this guide is based around general STRATEGIES that will help increase your likelihood of getting certain achievements, rather than specific INSTRUCTIONS.

I can’t promise that you’ll get every single achievement in a day, nor can I promise that the means by which some achievements can be earned is as “true” to the game as some may prefer, but if achievements are your thing, and you desperately need the dopamine hit from seeing that 100% completion pop up, what follows is for you. So, without further ado:

The most important thing to note is that the best way to earn achievements is by learning the game, which only comes through playing the game, a lot. I guarantee that you would earn most of the achievements simply by playing through the game anyway over the course of a few months.

Basic Strategies

Below is a description of the basic types of strategies utilized to earn different types of achievements, as well as some general tips about how to be successful in the game.

General

The first and most important thing to remember when grinding for these achievements is that, in most cases, you are not playing to win the game. I’ll repeat, you are NOT playing for the victory, you are playing for a brief, multicolored pop-up on the corner of your screen. The temptation to make decisions that will help you to win the game will be strong, especially when you’ve learned to play the game well. If you see an opportunity for a fun game in the midst of earning achievements, by all means, have at it. But for a few of the harder achievements, I would strongly encourage you not to squander the opportunity to earn them if you’ve put yourself in a decent position to do so. Additionally, there may be times where you take actions that seem counter-intuitive, such as not activating a bird’s power, but that may be essential to better performance.

Important Game Tips

Being successful at this game requires a sort of basic understanding of “engine-building”. While this term is applied differently to various types of games, I will explain how it is used in the context of Wingspan.

I will assume that you have gone through the tutorial of this game, and at least have a basic working knowledge of how the game works. If not, I strongly encourage you to go through the tutorial in game, as it is incredibly well-done (and also earns you the easiest achievement in the game). There are also numerous youtube videos available for basic gameplay and functionality. Regardless, however, if you have some familiarity with this game, you know that on your turn, you can do one of four different things; you can play a bird, or activate one of your three habitats. In essence, on each turn, you can do one of the following:

1. Play a bird.
2. Gain food (activating the green habitat)
2. Lay eggs (activating the yellow habitat)
3. Draw more bird cards (activating the blue habitat)

Engine Building

Engine building, understood in the context of this game, is strategically acquiring and playing birds with specific powers that allow you to do one of two things:

1. Gain multiple types of “resources” by activating a single habitat.
2. Gain an excess of a particular resource (eggs, food, or bird cards) which allow you to exchange resources easily, or don’t need to be activated very often.

In essence, in the habitat that allows you to gain food, you would want birds with “when activated” powers that allow you to draw cards, or lay eggs on the same turn. In the habitat that allows you to “lay eggs”, you want birds that allow you to gain food or draw cards. In the habitat that allows you to draw new bird cards, birds with powers that allow you to draw food and lay eggs are ideal.

Playing Birds

Generally speaking, it isn’t plausible to max out all three habitats in the game. Subsequently, a decent basic strategy involves focusing heavily on one or two habitats, playing birds with powers that allow you to supplement not playing birds in the other habitats. Typically, I will seek to max out the egg habitat, playing the most birds there if possible, as laying eggs becomes an easy way to earn a few points in the end game, and that habitat seems to have the most types of birds that can be played in it which also will grant you food or cards. The food (green) habitat only seems to have a few cards that allow you to lay eggs also, and even fewer which allow you to draw cards. Thus, this habitat is the one which I max out the least often when trying to engine build. The exception to this would be if I was attempting to build the second type of engine, giving me a massive excess of resources to use for say, the remainder of the game, as it is quite feasible to gain 6-8 resources from a single activation of the green habitat if the appropriate birds have been played.

End-of-Round Goals

Also, it is a tendency for newer players to focus very heavily on end-of-the-round goals, when many times, these points, especially for the first two rounds, often aren’t worth going for. These points can be a nice addition to one’s strategy, but only in addition to engine construction, which should be prioritized before meeting any other goals.

Communal Powers

Playing with others – You may be tempted to avoid playing birds or activating powers that benefit other players, however, especially when playing against the A.I., these powers are essential to scoring high. In short, playing communal powers benefits everyone, and benefiting from them is how to score ludicrously high points in this game.

Helpful Birds

A few birds that allow you to diversify and engine build easily, and ones which you should always take when playing a game if available, especially early and mid-game, are the ravens (there are two), Franklin’s gull, and the killdeer. The former two allow you to exchange a single egg for two resources of your choice (from the supply, not the feeder), and the latter two allow you to discard a single egg for 2 bird cards. Crows have similar power to ravens, but only allow you to draw one food. These birds are rarely worth the cost of play, but can be useful in certain contexts where one has an excess of eggs and not enough resources. Should you have a raven and the killdeer/FGull in the egg habitat, you can effectively gain eggs, 2 food, and 2 card on every single turn, basically breaking the game and making it hard for you to lose. Additionally, I will often pick up the Gray Catbird or the Northern Mockingbird, which allow you to repeat another bird’s power in the same habitat, allowing you to double your card tucking, egg exchanges, etc. I almost always pick up hummingbirds because of their easy playability in any habitat, low cost, and high point value relative to their play cost. These are especially useful in the early game. Also helpful early game are birds with the “if this bird is on the right of all other birds, move to another habitat,” as you can sort of “bounce” them around for better resource harvesting until you have more birds come along. Also worth mentioning are a few of the low-cost, decent point value birds in the water habitat such as the Osprey and the Spotted Sandpiper. Finally, underrated in this game are birds that allow you to discard one resource to tuck two cards, such as the double-crested cormorant, Canada goose, etc. These birds, especially when paired with resource generating cards, can help you to rack up points very quickly.

Game Progression

Early Game

In the early game, choose your birds carefully. Ideally, you want birds for the water, and possibly food habitat. Given that one usage of the egg habitat with no birds can gain allow you to play up to five birds, and subsequently, playing egg birds is not a priority in the early game. Exceptions to this are if one has the opportunity to start with or pull early a hummingbird or raven to play in the middle section, or any other low-cost bird that has a power to gain food that can be played in the egg habitat. Ideally, you want to pick up 2-3 low cost birds that cost a single resource, but are worth more than 2 points. This should allow you to play 1-2 birds without having to gain more resources.

Mid-Game

After you’ve established roughly two birds in a habitat, you want to play higher scoring birds with useful powers. These birds are usually in the 4-8 range of play. Birds that are worth less than this generally aren’t worth playing after the early game unless they allow you to meet specific end of the round goals or bonus cards, and even then, should be used sparingly. Exceptions to this are some of the “always take” birds such as the killdeer, and perhaps a hummingbird.

Late Game

In the late game, eggs are really king. More often than not, if you’ve built up your egg habitat, using the last few terms to gain eggs may actually leave you with more points than playing even decent birds. This is largely because the egg cost of playing new birds automatically takes away 1-2 potential points, which should be factored into the cost of playing a bird. For example, if you have four slots filled in the water habitat, and are looking to play a fifth bird worth 5 points, understand that playing this bird will actually only earn you a net of 3 points, which is the same as activating the egg habitat with only 2 birds played in it. In almost all cases, my final move or two of the game is opting to lay eggs. Most of the round goals are often egg-based anyway, so I typically plan to finish out a round by laying eggs as well, when possible. Strategically watching my opponents to see how they are doing on meeting the egg goals as well to see if it is worth trying to tie or surpass them.

Basic Achievement Strategy Types

Here are some of the basic strategies utilized to earn various achievements which will be referenced at various points throughout this guide. Some achievements use combinations of these strategies.

Perfect Position Strategy

These strategies involve obtaining certain birds at certain times, often at the start of the game. In order to put oneself in a “perfect position,” it may require continuously starting and restarting games without finishing.

Water-Grinding

The water-grinding habitat strategy involves playing a few, low-cost birds, regardless of power, into the water habitat as soon as possible, and then continuously activating the habitat until the required birds for the achievement are acquired. The remainder of the game is devoted to deploying these birds as quickly as possible.

Context Strategies

These strategies involve playing the game in a particular way, often weird, abnormal, and counter-productively. The usually involve specific birds in specific habitats in specific combinations.

Bird Types Strategy

These strategies require obtaining and playing a number of birds in a specific category. Most of these birds are obtained through water-grinding.

Reload/Selection Strategies

These strategies involve reloading the game from a specific point so that the A.I. will make a different decision. To “reload” the game means to exit to the main menu before taking your turn and simply continuing the game where you left it off.

Better Luck Nest Time

Better Luck Nest Time – Score at least 80 points in a game when one of your opponents has a raven in the same habitat.

I personally found this achievement the most difficult. Playing with only A.I. increases the likelihood that they won’t combine the raven and killdeer. The more A.I., the lower the chance that one will end up with both. In theory, one could water grind and hope that a raven and FG/KD popped up in the tray, at which point one could monitor to make sure the same A.I. picked up both. But even then, the odds of the A.I. actually playing it are low. Subsequently, it seems like the best way to get this achievement is by playing multiplayer, or online. I got it by chance playing against someone who ended up with both at the end of the game. The tricky part can be scoring 80 points without using a raven or FG/KD, as you will have likely not chosen to take them even if available in order to encourage your opponent taking them. Thus, make sure you have enough experience in the game to score 80 points consistently without using ravens or FG/KD. Often, at least one of these birds will have been played by the mid game. If you have hit half-way through round 3 without an opponent playing either of the birds, it is probably wise to start over. One strategy, when playing against the A.I., may be to start a new game against one A.I., and continuously start new games until either a raven or KD/FG is available in the tray (3 visible cards). If one appears, (this could take dozens of tries), wait until the A.I. chooses to draw a card. If they do not draw the raven/FG/KD, reload the game before playing your turn, and on occasion, the A.I. will make a different decision, especially when set to lower difficulty levels. Truthfully though, the simplest way to earn this achievement will be playing multiplayer games with friends that can help you to get this achievement, or by simply playing against the A.I. a lot. As I said though, this is arguably the hardest achievement to grind for, and a large part of it is chance. It was the last achievement I obtained after weeks of trying.

ILL EAGLE

ILL EAGLE – Succeed in 10 or more predator hunts in one game.

This one is pretty straightforward. You want a predator (one of the hunting birds) early-ish in the game. A larger predator, such as the golden eagle, is preferable, as it hunts birds under 100cm instead of 75cm, a single-mouse cost bird is probably the easiest to play in at the start of the game. Start a new game over against a single, easy-level A.I. (the easy level ones play the fastest). Keep restarting until a predator bird is in your first five choices at the start of the game, or is in the tray that you can take initially. You should set the game so that you go first each round to ensure the A.I. character won’t take it. If it does somehow, simply reload the game from that point. In either case, get the bird, and the resources needed to play it. You don’t need any other birds. Play the bird in any habitat, and activate that habitat repeatedly until you’ve hit 10. There are 26 turns in the game. You should be able to play this bird on your first or second turn. Subsequently, you should statistically succeed at 10 hunts without issue, if not the first try, certainly within a few.

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