Apologies… didn’t read the last part of your post
When I’ve played it would be rare that you would get to the point where you run out of houses and one player hasn’t already run away with the game. The massive jump in rents at 3 houses means the first player to get there on the orange/red/yellow neighborhoods tends to wipe out the other players in a hurry.
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Orange and red are good because they’re what people land on when getting out of jail.
Green is only good if you’re flush with cash and can trade for it with a strapped player, because it’s overpriced.
Dark blue is not good. It’s even more overpriced and there are only two spaces to land on. Buy it (buy land at every opportunity) but don’t develop it. Trade it willingly to complete almost any other group.
Creating a housing shortage is a key point. A hotel is almost never an advantage because it lets your opponents build houses.
Watch your opponents’ board position and your own. Build when they’re approaching you; keep money in reserve when you’re approaching them. Don’t spend all your money on houses or paying rent will kill you.
Mike? Is that you?
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If you’re building hotels you can also buy those four houses at the same time and plop them down on other properties. But honestly if you’re doing this you have probably already won the game. Plus you can’t maintain a housing shortage forever because as other players are forced to mortgage their properties to make rent those houses get put back in the bank.
Maintaining more than one viable player in the 3+ house era is a tricky balancing act, it doesn’t tend to last very long.
The problem with Monopoly is that after 20 minutes it is clear who will win and then the game continues for another hour or two.
Frankly it used to be pretty cool for a while when we were kids but nowadays there are many board games which are actually entertaining. I don’t think I’ve touched a Monopoly set for the last 30 years or so, and I have no intention whatsoever of changing that.
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My strategy is “go broke first and don’t look back.”
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Now, I have nothing against friendship-ending games, but it has to be Illuminati. Nothing like a proper double-dealing back-stab as a winning move to truly make your best friend seethe.
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Username checks out!
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Yes, but I am reasonably sure you’re not my brother. The box with his ashes does not have Internet access.
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You could try this strategy.
- Find the player most likely to flip the board over in anger - (suppose he is TopHat).
- Give the bulk of any properties etc and money you earn to every other player but TopHat.
- Watch TopHat flip the board over in anger
- Winning!
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I recommend Monopoly Junior. The costs are all payable in $1 increments so less time is spent making change, games last less than 30 minutes, and you have agency to advance to any unowned property on some rolls making earning monopolies faster.
I haven’t tried this yet, but plan to next time I’m forced into Monopoly: https://ourpastimes.com/monopoly-speed-die-game-instructions-8449350.html
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They say the only way to truly win Monopoly is to not play it.
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My Monopoly bidding technique is to offer one more dollar than the previous bid until my opponent gives up. This has frustrated my wife and kids to the point that Monopoly is 86’d. We have so many other good board games, so it isn’t the end of the world, but sometimes I miss playing Monopoly…
@atl since you mentioned the Weimar Republic and its fabulous inflatable currency, here are pics of the Weimar 1000 Mark note I bought, which they overprinted with “Eine Milliarde Mark” which means one billion Marks.
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Illuminati is certainly in contention, but I think Diplomacy is still king of destroying friendships.
Even playing among those with those with the personality not to take things personally, there will come that time when you have that utterly perfect moment of play with your ally. Together, you have managed the impossible, beat the odds, created a story for the ages, and… wait… why is there a dagger in my chest?
But…
Your ally, whom moments ago had been chuckling with you over the cleverness of your combined exploits, had cheered as you both had avoided annihilation at the hands of the other players, had saved your bacon a dozen times and you had saved his, smiles sadly.
“You knew it couldn’t last. We both knew it. Good game.”
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Whenever Monopoly was played in my family, we would always grow weary and decide to go to bed way before any long term strategy could play out. Knowing you this, I wouldn’t make any investments so I would end up with the most cash.
We were poor back then and this is how poor people often rationally avoid investment.
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Apologies… just wanted to say, in a snarky way, that I was that kind of sore loser as a kid.
| anonotwit
31 August |
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Yes, but I am reasonably sure you’re not my brother. The box with his ashes does not have Internet access.
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No need to apologize! In retrospect I was excessively dark for the thread.
(My name is Mike, although I prefer Michael. But when I was a kid everybody and his brother was named Michael.)
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The Monopoly Deal card game is prob the best version of Monopoly, achieving the “feel” of Monopoly in under 30 mins.
If you want a modern board game experience that feels like Monopoly, I highly recommend a game called Boomtown. It’s a tight blend of Monopoly and Catan, built around a western gold rush theme. Plays in about 45 mins. Bonus: If someone’s property is really getting on your nerves, get some dynomite and blow it up!
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I used to actually like playing Monopoly, though it was always difficult to find others that wanted to play.
One thing I realized just recently about the game was that once someone got more than just a little bit ahead, the result of the game was already decided at that point, and the hours playing after that only resulted in an ever accelerating disparity between players. The game ended when one of the about-to-be-bankrupted players flipped the board.
With that realization about the game and then looking at the current state of the US, our economy is operating just like the game. And I feel like we are quickly approaching the point where the board gets flipped.
Edit: One fine point I just remembered - 7 times out of 10, whoever was the banker was cheating.
tl;dr: I am now terrified by the game Monopoly.
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