I had won a couple games on the German online site and had really started learning some key factors, like how to bork your opponents city building plans with the right card face to the blank spot, and how to effectively farm with road pieces (Especially bends) so I decided to test it in an arena where pretty much all bets are off. Some of these people would sooner sell their mother than their game console so I imagined some stiff competition. And boy howdy did I get it.
It was a battle for the true city of Carcassonne. When the city was only 5 tiles, we had both put followers into it and connected them. My opponent then started to play one off tiles, placing meeples in an unfinished city section and connecting it to the main bulk. I was content to counter how I could with the same strategy, willing to settle on a tie in the city. I figured I could make up for it due to the roads I had already completed, and that I had two farmers out in pretty expansive areas. We were at a standstill and we never figured the city would complete. I had only 2 meeples in the contiguous area whilst he had 3. I had one in a potential but unlikely connection point that would have tied us up, and one who's chances of connection were microscopic at best.
With the last 10 or so tiles remaining, I get the card that connects the likely meeple (City on 3 sides with a narrow dip of field on the other, and he plays trying to extend the contiguous area with his next card (for reasons unknown since we were tied in there at that point). One card later, I'm able to connect my lone meeple to the rest of the monolithic city and score around 80 points for it. It was huge because I won the game and my total score was only around 130.
I'll post a link to a picture of the city:
(Yeah I took a picture, I was proud OK?)
http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y71/GameJunkieJim/Carcassonne/CarcBigCastle.jpg
