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Comment by aggieben | Hacker News Reader

risk. What could be better than psychologically manipulating 5 guys sitting next you into letting you dominate the world?

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Ah, the memories. A true game of Risk is not played on a board alone. If that were the case, then it would be a simple exercise in random dice throws. Rather, the majority of Risk strategy takes place in the psychology of the participants.

In college, we used to play an internet version of Risk. There were six of us that lived in a four room suite sharing a common hallway. The plots, betrayals, and backstabbing were epic. You could guess at which alliances existed by watching who was sneaking into whose room, although since IM was available as a stealthier method of communication sneaking around was often done for misdirection. There was always a risk, though, that if you tried to plot over IM that the other person would betray your plans to his roommate to gain leverage or trust.

I enjoy Monopoly for much the same reasons. I love to make various financial derivatives using various characteristics of my properties. If it could be imagined, I sold or bartered it, including X-turn immunities, partial property cashflows, and dozens of other goods.

Not having your success hinge on random chance. Try Diplomacy for a less hollow victory.

Diplomacy is easily the most evil game known to mankind. I remember playing in a large group in high school, and the best proponents were the two most devotely Christian members of my year. These two, butter wouldn't melt in their mouths, so when they proposed an alliance, you believed them. The wopping great big dagger that you subsequently found in your back always came as a big surprise.

The worst was that one of them even had the ability to explain to you that it was all a strategic move to make the guy he had sided with to trust him. Evil guy would then backstab erstwhile ally, using YOU as the hammer. And of course you'd happily go along with it.

But that's not what's really evil about Diplomacy. What's really evil is that you NEED alliances just to survive, so you can't just blow these guys off if they are on your borders.

Evil.

Ah, but see...that's life. That's the beauty of a great Risk strategy - it takes into account probabilities that bad (or good) things will happen.

Good and bad unpredictable things happen in Diplomacy too, with the advantage that its randomness generator is entirely carbon based ;). After the powers are adjudicated, there is absolutely no dice rolling, and still you are on your toes until the last minute, and every game is different and surprising at some point. That is beauty.

Risk doesn't have that much dependence on chance, except inasmuch as particular diplomatic relationships adjust to circumstance. Games among equally strong players are quite balanced, and the strongest player will generally win.

You may like Dice Wars if you like Risk: http://www.gamedesign.jp/flash/dice/dice.html

You might like KDice if you like dice wars. Same game, but multiplayer. http://kdice.com

Nothing quite as satisfying as having your 2 army country successfully defend against 10 or 15 attackers.