What Makes It Tick

What Makes It Tick: Twilight Imperium Part II

In our next TI3 article we are going to be talking about some theorycrafting surrounding this amazing epic.  We are going to talk about the meta game, table action, some do’s and don’ts and a few strategy tips to get you started all built around the theory of the Revenge Factor.

The Revenge Factor

The revenge factor is a concept that applies to a lot of games but no place is the theory more prevalent than in Twilight Imperium thanks to its rich political environment where everything is connected in one way or the other.

First lets talk about the theory itself, what is the “Revenge Factor”.  It basically breaks down like this.  In Twilight Imperium, almost every action you take is going to negatively effect someone at the table in some way.  Its a very confrontational game.  In a game of TI3 every player always has a general status of either being in contention or out of contention for the win.  While this status can change over the course of the game, the later the game becomes the less likely someone that is out of contention for the win will make a comeback and be back in contention.  This is important to understand because the revenge factor effectively kicks in when a players status changes from in contention to out of contention, whether imagined or real.

Lots of games have Revenge Factor elements, GoT The Card Game is another good example, in particular in multiplayer games. Be weary of injuring people in this game, if you put them out of contention, it doesn’t take much for someone to take you with them.

Another property of the Revenge factor is understanding that in Twilight Imperium, barring very unusual circumstances, you can always sacrifice yourself to take someone with you.  Basically if you realize that you are not going to win, you are likely still in a position to target someone and make sure they don’t win either through a wide range of actions, from playing cards, the way you vote in political rounds, using special abilities or just outright attacks, self-destructive or otherwise.

The Revenge Factor thus is the act of realizing that you are out of contention, identifying the person who caused you to be out of contention and then actively pursuing him/her and ensuring, while you won’t win, neither will they, aka, getting your revenge.

Anyone who has ever played a confrontational game like TI3 knows what this is, perhaps they call it something else but that element of “getting even” is always a prevalent force.  In TI3 this is amplified by the fact that there are so many ways to negatively effect someone at the table.

The phenomenon takes different shape depending on the player count, typically the higher the player count the more likely two players will find themselves in a pointless conflict that will put them both out of contention for the win.

The “Revenge Factor” is a very real thing and I find in almost every TI3 game I have ever lost, its been as a result of this table phenomenon.  In a lot of ways, its really not possible to win a game of TI3 entirely on your own in most circumstances, external events, alliances and political maneuvering in which you end up getting help, either willing or unwittingly is an absolute must to secure a win.  If someone is really gunning for you, willing to sacrifice their own potential victory,  victory for you is very unlikely.  Again, in most circumstances, their are obviously often exceptions but to really come to grips with this phenomenon you must both understand it, embrace it and vigilantly prepare for it.

There are many different ways to deal with the “Revenge Factor”.

First and foremost, be conservative in how you negatively impact people.  Simply lashing out randomly or negatively effecting someone just because you can, in particular if there is no benefit to you (no way to earn points for it yourself) is a sure fire way to become a target of someones revenge.  Avoid this.

A good way to do this is to always ask yourself a simple question.  How does this action help me.  If the answer is not “I will get a victory point as a result”, its usually not worth it, at least not during the early and mid game.  Things change a lot in late game where there might not be enough time to get revenge but we will talk about how to manage the end game very specifically in a later article.

This is a game about victory points, never forget this, this IS the only way to win. Swapping plastic in a war that does not yield VP’s out of spite is a sure fire way to lose the game.

The second way to avoid being the target of revenge is to anticipate and prepare for it.  Holding coveted cards like Sabotage, sitting on a Diplomacy Strategy card, creating neutral zones using military units, simply having a much larger military or even arranging a negative action through diplomatic talks with the player so he knows “ok he is going to do this so he can get a point, in trade for X or Y”.  All these things and much more can be done to anticipate or curve someone lashing out.  Understanding what a player could potentially do in response and being ready for it is important but be weary of screwing with a player who has a hand full of action cards, is within striking distance of a system you need, has more command tokens than you or is in position to help one of your other enemies at the table.  Action cards in particular can create a lot of chaos, you never want to be the target of someones action card wrath.  They can do a lot of damage and its a common strategy to stack your hand for just this purpose.

Finally and perhaps most importantly hold out negative actions for the end game.  A typical game of TI3 doesn’t end with a player getting that last and final point in the final round of the game.  It more often happens that a player scores 2, 3 or even 4 points in a single round.  Often referred to as “making  your play”, essentially the act of setting up a way to score multiple points in a single round so that players don’t have time to respond and are caught of guard.  If your sitting on 8 or 9 points in the final round, odds are you are about to play a round in which every person at the table is going to be trying to stop you, but if your sitting on 6 points people will assume there is plenty of time to deal with you.  Hence sitting on those big Fuck You actions until the right moment and then unloading to score big in a single round is the most effective way to ensure no one ever gets a chance to get revenge on you.

The golden rule in TI3 is that at 6 points you’re a threat in contention for the win. At 9 points, you’re just the guy about to get his ass handed to him by 5 other players.

Now that is not to say you should not make plays against people throughout the game, but remember the first part of this theory.  Players aren’t going to suicide it on you just because you play a Local Unrest on them in round one because they will still feel in contention for the win and won’t want to risk too much, but if you do something that really knocks them on their ass and they perceive that they are going to lose the game because of it, in particularly early or mid game, its a good chance you will have brought the wrath upon yourself and you will be dealing with a player taping your resources for the rest of the game on a suicide mission to take you with them,  making it difficult if not impossible to win.

Building political and economic power is a far better way to advance, then taking it away from someone else.

That is in a nutshell the revenge factor, know it, learn to love it and of course always be prepared to institute your own revenge should someone foolishly go after you.  Stack those action cards, arrange your military on the borders of your enemies and always be ready to pay them back 10 fold for their foolishness.  You really want to set this precedence at the table.  Everyone should know that, to screw with you is to unleash the demon, make them pay for coming after you and let them know that if they take you out of contention, your going to take them with you.

That’s it for today, hope you enjoyed the article and good luck!