Kingmaking: When It’s Tricky
Posted by Rob Herman at June 18th, 2007
Take this hypothetical but non-farfetched situation. It takes the form of a Settlers of Catan game but should generalize without much trouble.
It’s your turn. You have 7 points and a hand full of resources, but only enough to get you to 8 points. With reasonable trading you could have 9. Opponent A, to your left, has 9 points and several resources, but not in the right combination to win without trading. Opponent B, to A’s left, will certainly win on his turn (say 8 points, 2 soldiers and 2 face-down cards, or whatever.)
Your options are:
- Build your 8th VP and wait to lose to Opponent B
- Trade with Opponent A for your 9th point and wait to lose to Opponent A
- Trade with Opponent A for enough resources to buy 3 development cards and hope for the 1-in-1000 shot at victory (if all 3 are VP cards)
I don’t think any one of these answers is particularly bad. My instinct is to go with Option 3–my objective is to try to place first and unfortunately for Opponent B, only by handing A the victory can I have even a hope of this. But some players might feel that “maximize your expected score” is a better goal and choose Option 2. And some might feel that they should try not to be a kingmaker at all and choose Option 1.
My argument here is not that one of these is better, but that it’s a good idea to think about what you would do beforehand. If you have a goal going in, your actions will look less like kingmaking to the other players, reducing the potential for indignation.
We can also pose two more questions:
- What if Opponent B also is willing and able to trade? (He’ll match any trade Opponent B will or even donate resources to keep you from trading with A)
In this case, if you want to maximize your score or play for the long shot win, you have to explicitly decide which opponent will win. Trading with B goes against the principle of not trading with the runaway leader, but this rule seems worthless if trading with the other player would just reverse their roles.
- What if Opponent A denied you important resources via Robber or Monopoly earlier in the game? (Or B, without loss of generality)
Some would argue that retribution is unjustified. I disagree, especially if it costs you nothing to enact it. If it helps, don’t think of A as your enemy–just think of B as a closer friend. It makes sense to help those who have done you no wrong first.
Obviously I don’t expect everyone to start a Web page just to put down their own kingmaking policy, but in the interest of disclosure and discussion, I’ll codify mine here:
- Play for the best chance to win.
- If this is not possible, play to maximize score.
- Other options being equal, favor an opponent who has not acted towards me with betrayal or aggression.
- As a final tiebreaker, choose the most passive option.
In addition to the priorities you list, I might be more inclined to favor an opponent who is new to the game, or doesn’t usually win. Besides seeming like a nice thing to do, this may increase the likely hood that they will play the game again.
Alyx
I look at the situation a little differently. The way to win Catan is to be the first person to ten points on your turn, not get the most points by the end of the game. While we never play beyond that point in firendly play, in tournaments second place often goes to the second player to reach ten points.
I would chose to try to get the ten points (option 3) in friendly play, but I would probably try to play for second place in a tournament. Going for option 3 is perfectly acceptable though as the best chance to win.
I do not like kingmaking situations in any situation where the kingmaker has no chance of winning. If the kingmaker acts to give the win to someone who would have ohterwise lost it makes the game unsatisfying. The previously leader will often feel cheated of having played better but still lost and the winner will often feel that the victory is unearned and hollow. Having something given to you is not the smae as winning or earning it. I feel much better about cashing a paycheck than I do about a check for my birthday.
If the only reason you are trading with someone is because you know you cannot win and it will let them win the game inastead of someone else, do not do it. This may not apply to a game where the win condition is not the first to reach a certain point, but to accumulate the most points or some other victory condition.
You both bring up good points.
Beaker’s point is particularly interesting because it puts the game in the context of a metagame that I had not previously considered. If reaching 10 second is worthwhile, then goals certainly need to be adjusted to account for that–in the example I posted, I would trade as much as possible with the inevitable winner and hope the dice brought me the luck needed to reach second.
(When playing for second place, is the first place winner allowed to continue to trade? What happens to his resources and buildings?)