You're Playing Cards Wrong!

[Mistwell]

I've been playing in large game day conventions for a long long time. It's been once a month for years now (though I miss some months here and there), and at times in my life it's been once a week or even more.

Yes, people argue about board game rules just as much as people argue about D&D game rules. Sometimes more, since there is less guidance from others on boards and FAQs and errata for many games. And since there is a specific winner in board games, who sometimes wins valuable prizes, the stakes are higher and thus the incentive to dispute rules even higher.

I once saw a public screaming match over a Palabra game at a game convention in front of at least a hundred spectators and players. For those who don't know, Palabra is sort of like scrabble and poker combined in a card game.

Board games are serious business, mang!

 

[Wormwood]

I've seen it more among folks who are playing variations of the same game - there are more poker variants than you can shake a stick at. And the folks who I know that play for fun and tactics look at the variant most played in casinos these days ("Texas hold-em") with a level of disdain rpg players would normally reserve for FATAL.

I play in a monthly poker game.

Turns out some Poker players are more narrow-minded and inflexible as the hoariest grognard could ever be.

Having my sexuality and parentage openly questioned because I suggested we play "night baseball" once in a while? Yeah, that makes internet nerd rage like Romper Room.

 

[rkwoodard]

yep

By the Monopoly RAW, there's no money in Free Parking. When you land on a property you don't want to buy, it's auctioned immediately, and anyone can buy it if they bid the most. Oh, and some people skip the "must build evenly on all properties" rule.

Of those three common house rules, I've never played in a game where every space was auctioned if the person landing there didn't snap it up immediately, and only rarely played a game where there wasn't cash in Free Parking.

(Ironically, people complain about Monopoly taking too long, when playing by the RAW and dumping those first two common house rules would dramatically speed up play.)

In collage, many many years ago, I tried to insist to play by the RAW in terms of Free Parking and Auction of unbought properties. Sometimes I won, sometimes I was told to hush and play nice. It is an incredibly different game. I have also seen these house rules:

You can't purchase property till you have been around the board once (HUH?)
You can't make any trades until everybody has been around the board once.
You can buy houses when you don't own all of the color property (a very very different game).

Heck, I bet at the dawn of time, Castling in Chess was someone's houserule (probably a munchkin).

RK

 

[VoidAdept]

I play in a monthly poker game.

Turns out some Poker players are more narrow-minded and inflexible as the hoariest grognard could ever be.

QFT.

Try reading the chat in an online poker room when someone "sucks out"...

 

[Raven Crowking]

Um, okay... And that would be...?

OD&D. How many times does diaglo have to say it?

 

[Raven Crowking]

I've seen it more among folks who are playing variations of the same game - there are more poker variants than you can shake a stick at. And the folks who I know that play for fun and tactics look at the variant most played in casinos these days ("Texas hold-em") with a level of disdain rpg players would normally reserve for FATAL.

Indeed, there is a good reason why Hoyles Rules still sells, and it has rules for all sorts of card games, chess games, checkers games, dominoes games......

I believe that, in the Way Back When, D&D cribbed the term House Rules from Poker......

 

[Stone Dog]

Wow... I've never even HEARD of some of these monopoly house rules. I know that people do it, but I've never been in a game that wasn't a by the numbers game of monopoly complete with fact checking on a regular basis.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Wow... I've never even HEARD of some of these monopoly house rules. I know that people do it, but I've never been in a game that wasn't a by the numbers game of monopoly complete with fact checking on a regular basis.

Please let me play with you. Six hour Monopoly games with the in-laws at Thanksgiving (with lots of money in Free Parking and no one ever buying property, so we go around and around endlessly) may eventually cause me to take my own life.

 

[Huw]

Heck, I bet at the dawn of time, Castling in Chess was someone's houserule (probably a munchkin).

Yup. As was the double step for the pawn's first move (necessiting the additional en passant rule), the extra moves of the queen and bishop and the concept of a stalemate being a draw.

Oh, don't forget the elimination of the dice. That really changed how it was played

 

[Scribble]

Ever try playing the game A__Hole without a rules argument starting at some point??? Everyone has their own way of playing, plus everyone is drunk...

"Hey... sh'err nu s'poshedta put that card down."