What board game brings out the worst in you?

[screwDriver]

The Calculus Blackboard game. Where the professor calls me to solve a Calculus problem on the board. I hate Calculus.

Kidding aside, I'll have to say Chess. I used to love it and was pretty good with it when I was a kid. Even got to represent the school in junior category a few times. Now, I get bored and impatient with it. Usually ended up making a string of bad moves. And the bad moves were simply because I didn't want to analyse things further or simply because I just wanted to end the match.

[LilMoochie]

While I've never played the sports games you've mentioned, I can sort of understand where it's coming from from my Fantasy Football experiences. I never lost my temper, but I did finally have to give it up because I was losing sleep over it.

Originally Posted by lefton4ya

When playing multiplayer Free-For-All games, I do NOT play to win, but to be "the equalizer" by screwing with whoever is in the lead at the time.

I'd much rather lose quickly by a great margin than drag out a slow, painful loss for hours. Most games aren't well-designed for players who aren't actively trying to win. If you really want to play that way choose a game like BSG or Shadows over Camelot with a traitor mechanic. If you're just playing both sides against the middle to make a 2 hour game last 4 hours then that might bring the worst out in me. One exception might be those that play with children, unskilled, or otherwise violent opponents. In that case I advocate a strategy known in some circles as the "let the wookie win" strategy.

Originally Posted by screwDriver

The Calculus Blackboard game. Where the professor calls me to solve a Calculus problem on the board. I hate Calculus. .

Calculus is one of those subjects that it always seemed hard to parse it out into easily-understood nuggets (like algebra). It makes it hard to learn initially but once you finally wrap your head around it the work gets much easier. Keep at it and ask lots questions. I say all this, of course, having forgotten 95% of my college calculus...

Chess is a weird game because there's no chance to it. I've experienced the heartbreaking frustration when the Heroscape Dice just won't go your way but I think I prefer that to the soul-crushing, self-loathing of unwittingly exposing your queen to a knight fork.

[Agent Minivann]

For me it isn't an individual game (so far at least), but it is any game where the people I am playing with refuse to play correctly. I think that is half the reason people don't like Monopoly, but I digress. I don't do well with a game that is being played wrong, and there is no way of convincing them that it is being done wrong. It isn't a board game, but I ran into that in a really bad way with a kind of casual volleyball league. I was an assistant volleyball coach at a college for a couple years, and I couldn't convince the guy that ran the league that what we were doing was not only legal, but it is the only legal way to play the game. We were the only team playing a particular rule correctly, and we were being penalized for it.

[screwDriver]

@Agent Minivann, just curious, in what way do people played Monopoly incorrectly?

[Agent Minivann]

Money in the middle for Free Parking for one. Also there is a rule about auctioning properties that are landed on but not purchased.

[Phaethon]

Originally Posted by Agent Minivann

Money in the middle for Free Parking for one. Also there is a rule about auctioning properties that are landed on but not purchased.

Those are examples of optional rules, and not, in my view, incorrect rules.

If everyone agrees to an optional rule, I have no problem playing that way. That said, if someone disagrees, then the rule can't be implemented.

An "incorrect" ruling would be that when landing on "go to jail", on the way you pass go and collect $200. Also embezzling from the bank... that's an "incorrect" yet common way of playing...

[LilMoochie]

Agree with Minivann... I have no problem with house rules, but you have to understand that they aren't always better. All the Monopoly misconceptions are why the game takes 6 weeks instead of 2-3 hours. As a child, you LOVE the idea that free parking= winning the lottery but it makes the game interminable. It's also not in the rules to give loans to other players. This also makes the game go on forever. As a child, you love the idea of a game that never ends. As an adult- not so much. Still- as a "rich-get-richer" game I don't think Monopoly has aged well compared to newer games.

Apparently the Royal Family in Great Britain is not allowed to play Monopoly when they get together because they get too competetive. I bet the Queen is pretty ruthless. (She definitely plays the Top Hat)

[Jim]

Originally Posted by Phaethon

Those are examples of optional rules, and not, in my view, incorrect rules.

Looks like you found someone who plays Monopoly with the money on Free Parking and doesn't auctioned unpurchased property!

These are not "optional" rules, they are house rules. Optional rules would listed as such be in the rule book. In fact, the rules from my copy of Monopoly (Here and Now) state:

Originally Posted by Monopoly Rules

"Free Parking"
This is just a free resting place. You receive no money, property or reward of any kind for landing on this space.

[Onacara]

(I think I mentioned this before) I recall there being a book all about rule variants for Monopoly that was out back when I was a kid. Don;t think it was anything "official" but maybe just a collection of house rules the author(s) collected and/or devised.

One of these rule changes included collecting $400 for landing exactly on GO

[Dad_Scaper]

Can't believe nobody's mentioned Diplomacy yet, or Risk, the two games that come up often in these conversations on BGG.

I haven't played FTF Diplomacy in a looong time... I don't think it brought out the worst in me, but others who were there might say it did.

I'm tempted to say, like Onacara, Scrabble just because I get very Paralysis by Analysis about it. I do love it, I am pretty good at it, but people playing against me tend to get, erm, impatient.

[Phaethon]

Originally Posted by Jim

Looks like you found someone who plays Monopoly with the money on Free Parking and doesn't auctioned unpurchased property!

These are not "optional" rules, they are house rules. Optional rules would listed as such be in the rule book. In fact, the rules from my copy of Monopoly (Here and Now) state:

I equated "optional" and "house", so you're right. I'm talking about house rules.

Speaking of Monopoly, do you allow those who decline to buy the property to bid on it during the auction? We never did, but one computer game I have allows it.

Oh, and the iPod-touch monopoly allows money to collect on Free Parking and $400 if you land directly on Go (plus several other optional/house rules). Since it's a licensed product of Hasbro, this equates to some level of tacit approval of those rules...

[vikinglad]

Seems like "brings out the worst" has come to mean two things in this thread: most competative and poorest sportsmanship. I am relatively new to boardgaming, but the one I have that is both most frustrating and the funnest to be completely cut-throat in is a zombie game called Last Night on Earth. Very satisfying to set the Heroes up for a horrible trap. Very frustrating when dice are against you. My wife and I have both had minor meltdowns with eachother whilst playing this, yet it remains one of our favorite games. Worst was when I hit the table with my fist after whiffing on an important roll, which shook our little table so much it spilled my wife's red wine all over her. Sorry baby!

Thankfully, we have both learned that the more you play, the more you both win and lose, the less important it seems to become. Scape has helped us quite a bit with this.