I totally get it when you say “There’s also the matter of evaluating your tableau of symbols as they relate to your ability to actually win the game. A beefy tableau acts as a kind of soft power on your opponent–it makes their lives harder and gives you more flexibility, but it’s tangential to scoring points and gaining achievements. ”

I was playing a game on BGA, and he had double digits in all but one of the symbols. He outclassed me in all of those. But I’d been hanging with him in achievements, and we were tied 5-5. The one symbol that I was ahead of him on, I had a card that would let me whittle down his top cards and his scoring cards, and it also allowed me to score enough to get the 6th achievement.

When I was looking at it each turn, seeing that he had (for example) 24 light bulbs, I figured I was going to just play the game out until it ended.

So it is possible.