As was foretold, we've added advertisements to the forums! If you have questions, or if you encounter any bugs, please visit this thread: https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/240191/forum-advertisement-faq-and-reports-thread/
Options
How do I world domination? (RISK)
John Matrix
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
A couple my wife and I hang out with are into the board game Risk, and although we've never played it we agreed to play over the coming MLK weekend.
Here's the problem - I may have touted my Risk prowess a little too high when I really have no idea what I'm doing. We do own a copy, so we'll sit down and play a game or two to get the rules down, but does anyone have good tips on playing, etc?
I'm not a good loser, so I'd like to crush my foes with decisive authority. PA, I leave it in your hands to make me the next Patton.
Here's the problem - I may have touted my Risk prowess a little too high when I really have no idea what I'm doing. We do own a copy, so we'll sit down and play a game or two to get the rules down, but does anyone have good tips on playing, etc?
I'm not a good loser, so I'd like to crush my foes with decisive authority. PA, I leave it in your hands to make me the next Patton.
John Matrix on
0
Posts
North and South America are my favorites, with Africa coming in third. Look for land that is attackable from the least number of positions.
Just some thoughts.
The mechanics of Risk traditionally reward aggressive play. Rather than look for choke-points like Indonesia<->Australia, look at the map like a series of phase lines. My ideal phase line has a limited number of territories that I'll hold while also having a lot of different territories on the border held by my opponents hold. The benefit of this is it's easier to consolidate your defense in a limited number of territories, while your opponent has to try and defend more territories with a limited number of armies.
Or maybe my friends just take Risk to seriously.
I'd rather pay $7 than $40 for another board.
But mostly I would suggest forgeting about risk and getting a real strategy game, like "Settlers of Catan"
but they're listening to every word I say
Risk without cards is just playing candyland. the cards are the whole strategy.
but they're listening to every word I say
very well sir, I accept your challenge. I think I can take you.
Australia is really the best continent to go for, but only in the first couple turns. If you don't have it by the third turn, give up on it. You also need to break up other people's continents without leaving yourself open. For example, the proper way to take and hold South America would be to control all the territories adjacent to it and use them both as buffers and as ways to prevent your opponents from getting armies from Africa or North America. And yeah, be aggressive. If you take someone out you get their cards, so you should be more worried about killing weak players than weakening strong players. Never go after Europe or Asia until the end of the game, they will just frustrate you and get you killed while the smart players accumulate armies by holding Australia and the other easier continents.
Also, I don't like using cumulative card rewards. It makes any good preformance in the early and middle game worth significantly less because any chump with 2 territories at the end can play a set and all the sudden become a world power with 80 armies or some bullshit. Use card but make them worth a static 5 or 10 armies. That way you will still need cards to win but they will not allow somebody who barely hung on to turn around on the last turn and win the game.
In about 8 turns I turned the game from "Let's torture my son and your brother-in-law" into "Hahaha you both suck and I'm the ruler of the world."
To this day my father still won't play Risk with me. Axis and Allies either.
The cards play a significant part in this game. But not as significant as luck.
Yes Mister Kamchatka, that three sets of sixes in a row is bullshit.
This is straight truth right here. The best Risk-players I've ever met all have these sort of personality traits. They would have half the board and still convince other players the little guy contained and barely holding onto South America is the devil. Know the kind of people you're playing with, who you can and can't shit-talk to. With games between acquaintances you have to know how to successfully manipulate the social order the group usually maintains.
As far as some simple board strategies for someone who hasn't played much if at all...
There are more important chokepoints to consolidate than others. Specifically places like the barrier created by Ukraine and Middle East: Hopefully you fully own one of the continents they belong to, and holding the other both allows you to consolidate defenses and to disrupt the other players bonus from holding an entire country.
Whatever continent you've consolidated, there will be one place that you'll need to push as a single chokepoint to again disrupt their bonuses. Ex.: If you own North America, don't stop at Mexico and amass troops, stop at Venezuela and amass troops.
Otherwise, play a bit more defensively than you think you're playing at any given time.
Edit: I see Smurph has mentioned similar, but he recommends being aggressive. My recommendations come from playing the majority of the time without cards.
Yes, yes you will.
If you can't get ahold of a continent within the first turn or so, put some armies on a territory that in a continent that no one cares about, and take over one territory a turn to build up cards. Turning in cards will help you win the game.
My strategies as follows:
Never go for Asia early, as it is too big and you will spread yourself hopelessly thin.
North America was always my stronghold, and I always did my best to conquer it first. You can hit Europe, Asia and South America, and it's small enough so that its easily fortified.
And as far as I'm concerned, Australia is a useless trap. It only gets you 2 armies per round and you can only hit Asia (If I remember correctly, I apologize if I'm wrong.) I always let my opponents get it first because they think they have some huge advantage. Maybe I'm wrong, but I never went for it until I at least had two other continents.
I liked aggressive play, especially if you get a territory in an enemy's continent even if they will take it back the next round and here's why - they don't get the army bonus for that round. I loved, loved running guerrilla attacks to take just one single adjecent enemy territory just so they would not get the army bonus.
xbl - HowYouGetAnts
steam - WeAreAllGeth
fucky. that means no Risk for me.
I like to attack till I get to choke pts, and then loading all my soldiers there. This is assuming you're playing with official rules.
North America is pretty easy to get a hold of and hold on to.
Try to take a territory every turn to get a card. Trade in your cards for more armies. More armies = winning.
As for general gameplay tactics... something that may not be evident to the beginner player is this. Say you have a territory, bordered by an enemy with 1 troop on that territory and next to his 1 army territory there is a large army. You don't want to take that 1 troop country unless you absolutely have to for your strategy. Even if you take his 1 troop, and leave 1 troop there of your own. You have just created a pathway for the enemy to steamroll through you.
And remember. Its not about what you can take. Its about what you can hold.
Isn't it?
The last line is important. Being aggressive in Risk is good. But being overly aggressive leads to being so thin that you just get picked off in penny packets. Have an objective, go for the objective, but understand that getting the objective is only a single battle in the war. I'm sure every risk player has a story like "Well one time my group of six South African armies held off a force of thirty East Africans and at the end, there was one army in each country" which is a prime example of a pissing away good armies after bad.
Also note that if you find yourself in a cold war like situation in which two players have an even edge...it's always better to be the guy who pulls the trigger. The attacker has a small advantage in dice rolls.
uhhh don't defenders get ties?
Defenders get ties, but the attacker gets a third dice.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Risk_(game)#Dice_probabilities has a breakdown of the win probabilities. In a situation in which both sides are rolling their maximum number of dice, the odds of the attacker getting two victories is ~4% higher then a one loss each. If the attacker only rolls two dice, then the defender gets the advantage.
Most of the game is decided in the beginning, when people place their pieces. People experienced with the game understand good spots and know attack points (see above). People less experienced don't, so typically end up just putting pieces wherever (and then ignoring them).
My criticism of the game is that you could then play by just rolling dice for 3 hours, taking a person out of the game every half-hour to sit by themselves, until there's enough people for them to start their own game that's actually fun while the remaining two people roll dice back & forth for another hour. The only way to make the game interesting is table talk, which in Risk is simply a good way to make a group of friends hate each other by the end of the night.
The major problem is that the cards are a fix for bad game design -- with the cards, whoever goes last gets a huge advantage, and the game would never end without a major influx of troops once players are spread relatively thinly in their interior sections.
I would suggest any number of other games that are much more fun, have more player involvement in between rounds, and don't have player elimination as the major gameplay element. However, if you are bent on playing Risk, I would strongly suggest acquiring Risk 2210, which does a much better job at game balance -- and lets you conquer the moon, too.
wtf.
I get the impression I shouldn't drink while playing this, we could lose these friends in a hurry.
Generally the sober guy will win. There are a couple rules variations for dealing with the cards. You can either do a fixed amount for turn in based on what's on the cards. Or the escalating value, which I believe is the normal rule. The fixed amount makes the game last longer. The escalating value can get pretty insane when the game has gone on long enough. It depends on the group of players. I prefer flat values but my family prefers escalation.
There is a rule option for army placement in which the cards are shuffled and then dealt out. The cards you get are your starting areas.
Breaking up continents is a good way to keep other people from getting too powerful. You don't have to conquer the whole thing, just take one country and retreat. It's even better if you can convince someone else to do it for you.
Risk rewards being a dick.
Instead of taking a single territory try taking two or three if they are only defended by lone armies. Then as you retreat, leave a small force deep in their territory. Quite often it can draw off re-enforcements that would be used to counter attack you.
As for actually what to do and where to go. Go for South America first. It is worth the same or 1 more point than australia, but has 2 countries it can go to. If it is possible get into Africa next. If you can get these 2 continents, you can Just take territories for Cards and pull back, making your army strong for a few rounds(noone else will have continents if you can take these 2, maybe australia but that is so damn far away you dont have to worry and you get many more units per turn than they do). Someone may occupy Europe for a bit during this. If this happens explain to whoever has most of their troops in NA or Asia that the Europe threat can much more easily be weakened before their next turn than the SA/Africa strongholds. This works great on the NA player cause NA is a natural progression for Europe during mid game. After occupying South America and Africa for a while, it doesn't matter where you go next.
As you are turtling you pit the other players against eachother. This is easy because you can explain to them that attackign you is futile because you have so many units guarding your borders. They will weaken their own army in which case the person on the other side of them can take them out easily. They will scramble to occupy territory letting you amass a large army. When you can easily take out someone without thinning your troops too much do so, you will gain all of their cards for taking them out of the game.
If you are really good at manipulating other players decisions on the board you will have them saying "God! I know you just trying to get me to do this, but I have to do it anyway."
Whatever you do, don't go for Europe first. Since it's in the middle of the map, everybody is attacking it, thus it's almost impossible to defend it.
And I agree about downplaying your strenght. My whole diplomatic strategy is basically '' Hey look at me and my tiny armies, im so pitful! You really think I'm a threat? I think you should go after red instead, look how much territories and armies he hold! He'll be very hard to stop if we dont do anything about it soon!'
Be sure to maintain a couple of velcro territories, wherein you each keep a single guy on it to kick around for cards and let your bonuses build up. (So named because their flag changes often enough that they ostensibly get sick of taking it up and down and just use velcro for easier access.) Territories are doled out at random at the outset, as God intended.
Also, do not allow that shit where whoever knocks another player out gets all their cards. That ends the goddamn game 8-9 times out of 10. Just give them an extra card.
World in Flames
Paths of Glory
These are two games that I think are are the best at being as close to a historical representation of the actual conflict, but remain fun to play. World in Flames take a couple days to play it through, while Paths of glory takes a little less time to play, but you won't find better games out there.
Personally I always play that you take their cards.
Heres a standard rule breakdown of what i usually play.
Start off with random country deal. Roll dice to see who goes first then go clockwise from that person.
Put one guy on each country you own, then each guy takes turns placing 5 men until ~60% of your men are placed, then its just a free for all to place the rest (at this point it should be obvious what everyone's strategy is anyways).
Horses count as 5 soldiers.
When you kill a guy you get their cards. Depending on the rules you decide on, if you get more than 5 cards as a result of this you must cache either now, as in, in the middle of your turn, or you must cache at the beginning of next turn; which would probably be more along the lines of the traditional rules. Personally I like making people wait till their next turn as it means they can't suicide their armies to take a guy out, then just parade around during the same turn.
Also; people who say caching ruins the game... no. It makes the game. If you lose because of the cards, then you aren't using valid strategies. I always keep track of the number of cards my opponents have. I take care to stockpile defensive armies if i think an opponent will cache and try to fuck me over, or I will take some other method to weaken them; such as depriving them of a continent, or i might try weakening another opponent to make a tempting target other than myself.
At the same time if a weak opponent has some cards... maybe its time for his empire to die?
People are definitely right about the psychological and manipulative aspects of the game. My personal strategy however it to attack the motherfuck that tries to manipulate me. Like, I'll agree with them. For example, blue tries to convince me red is bad. "yeah man, red is looking dangerous. look at that. Oh well, fuck you blue you're dead"
Rules are in the game manual. There are some "Advanced" ones they suggest after mentioning making up your own. (Like a commanding roll where you can add one to your dice score once per turn, so you can defeat that player that has 1 army and keeps rolling double 6's).
Play by those rules, any home made rules will bring up arguments when people forget the rules and think you are cheating cause your beating their ass with these new rules you all agreed on.
Each person claiming a territory at the beginning, in a round-robin fashion, until each territory is claimed
Once a person is eliminated, all of their cards go to the winner, who must immediately cash them in if the total number of cards they contain is 6 or more.
Now, of course you can modify it in an attempt to make the game actually fun, but then it's not Risk. Monopoly is almost as bad -- the original game is actually rather quick, with specific rules for how everything is handled. None of this "Free Parking" shit (it's just an empty space, all funds paid out for cards return to the Bank) and none of this "I'll give you free rent so I don't have to sell anything" (no, sell your shit, bitch). Not to mention this often-overlooked aspect of the game:
Last time I played, I played by the actual rules, and the game took 45 minutes. It's not any better of a game, but at least it's less painful.
Personally, I always favor Europe for my first continent, even if it has the most vulnerable fronts, it also gives you the most access to push on someone else, and provided you can convince the others that person deserves to die first, you shouldn't get in too much trouble.
Then you shouldn't be playing board games like RISK. Seriously, fix your "sore loser" problem now, or you're not going to enjoy that evening with that other couple, and neither will your spouse or guests.
That said, about rules: there's one thing I've done multiple times that always seemed to me to make for a more fun game (especially against seasoned players who usually know what the good spots are) : at the very start, you deal an equal number of cards to each player (first make sure to remove the wild cards.) Then, players put one army on each of the territories on their cards. After that, players take turns adding one army at a time to whichever territories they own. Feel free to change this to more than one army per turn, as long as you place all those armies on just one territory.
Then you play the rest of the game normally.
As for redeeming your cards, the rules are: At the end of your turn, if you have 5 cards, you have to redeem them for armies at the beginning of your next turn. If, during your turn, you end up with 6 or more cards, you have to redeem your cards immediately. That's how the official rules go.
Anyway, I definitely prefer Monopoly to RISK, when it comes to classic Parker Brothers games.
And Settlers of Catan is better than both of those, way more strategic while remaining simple to play, and a complete game can be played fairly quickly, instead of lasting into the early hours of the morning. I've played games with people who enjoyed it enough that after playing one game that lasted a little over an hour, they wanted to play a second game.
Check out my new blog: http://50wordstories.ca
Also check out my old game design blog: http://stealmygamedesigns.blogspot.com