That I'm developing. Comments and criticisms are welcome:
The Free Market Game by Cavalier973 Each player has the opportunity to meet the needs of themselves and, potentially, that of other players. There are eight products/services that players can produce to either consume themselves, or provide to other players. The goal is to have the most happiness points at the end of the game. Happiness points are acquired through consumption of goods and services. Goods: Food Clothes Luxuries Capital Good: Tools Services: Health Care Shelter Entertainment Capital Service: Education Each player rates, from 1 to 3 the importance of each (non-capital) good, and then of each (non-capital) service, with 3 being the best (he derives the most happiness from having this need or want fulfilled). Each player gets 10 action points each turn. To produce any one good or service requires 4 action points. To make the next unit of that good or service only takes 3 action points; a third unit 2 action points, and the fourth unit only takes 1 action point. This represents the player’s ability to “get in the groove” of production; that is, the longer the player engages in that good’s production, the better he is in producing it. When a player switches to producing a different good or service during a turn, then he must use 4 action points to produce it. Any action points not used are lost. However, a player may sell, lend, or give action points to other players. Each player’s action points reset at the beginning of the next round. He must start over with the number of action points required for production of any good or service. The Trading: after production, players may trade goods to each other as they see fit. Happy points: after all trades have been made, the players consume what they have in order to buy happy points. Multiply the number of goods and services of each type by the rank the player gave it at the beginning of the game. If any good or service need is not met, then the player must subtract the number of points equal to the rank he assigned the good or service from his next turn’s allowance of action points. Players do not have to use all goods or services they have produced or obtained through trade. Capital Goods and Services: These goods/services do not directly provide happy points. They rather are conduits to production of the other goods. The Capital Goods/Services also require greater resources to produce: each tool or education level costs 10 action points x the level the player wants to attain. For example, a player who has no tools can spend all 10 action points to buy a tool. The next turn, he will has 11 action points to spend. If he wanted to buy a second tool, then he would have to spend 20 action points. Each new tool he buys adds to the production capacity of the player. The same goes for education. If tools and education are used in tandem, then the production capacity grows even greater. Add the tools and education level together, then square the result. Thus, two tools and a level 1 education would actually result in 9 action points. 3 tools and a level 3 education would bring the player 36 action points, in addition to his original 10, bringing his total to 46 action points. Winning after a pre-determined number of rounds, the player with the most happiness points wins the game.
The Free Market Game by Cavalier973
Each player has the opportunity to meet the needs of themselves and, potentially, that of other players. There are eight products/services that players can produce to either consume themselves, or provide to other players. The goal is to have the most happiness points at the end of the game. Happiness points are acquired through consumption of goods and services.
Goods:
Food
Clothes
Luxuries
Capital Good: Tools
Services:
Health Care
Shelter
Entertainment
Capital Service: Education
Each player rates, from 1 to 3 the importance of each (non-capital) good, and then of each (non-capital) service, with 3 being the best (he derives the most happiness from having this need or want fulfilled).
Each player gets 10 action points each turn. To produce any one good or service requires 4 action points. To make the next unit of that good or service only takes 3 action points; a third unit 2 action points, and the fourth unit only takes 1 action point. This represents the player’s ability to “get in the groove” of production; that is, the longer the player engages in that good’s production, the better he is in producing it. When a player switches to producing a different good or service during a turn, then he must use 4 action points to produce it. Any action points not used are lost. However, a player may sell, lend, or give action points to other players. Each player’s action points reset at the beginning of the next round. He must start over with the number of action points required for production of any good or service.
The Trading: after production, players may trade goods to each other as they see fit.
Happy points: after all trades have been made, the players consume what they have in order to buy happy points. Multiply the number of goods and services of each type by the rank the player gave it at the beginning of the game. If any good or service need is not met, then the player must subtract the number of points equal to the rank he assigned the good or service from his next turn’s allowance of action points. Players do not have to use all goods or services they have produced or obtained through trade.
Capital Goods and Services: These goods/services do not directly provide happy points. They rather are conduits to production of the other goods. The Capital Goods/Services also require greater resources to produce: each tool or education level costs 10 action points x the level the player wants to attain. For example, a player who has no tools can spend all 10 action points to buy a tool. The next turn, he will has 11 action points to spend. If he wanted to buy a second tool, then he would have to spend 20 action points. Each new tool he buys adds to the production capacity of the player. The same goes for education. If tools and education are used in tandem, then the production capacity grows even greater. Add the tools and education level together, then square the result. Thus, two tools and a level 1 education would actually result in 9 action points. 3 tools and a level 3 education would bring the player 36 action points, in addition to his original 10, bringing his total to 46 action points.
Winning after a pre-determined number of rounds, the player with the most happiness points wins the game.
Cavalier, I actually like this idea. I'm surprised no one replied to it. Do you have to rank the consumer goods and services 1,2, and 3, or could you rate them all ones, or 3,3,1, etc.?
The way to win seems obvious to me: build up as much capital as possible, and consume as little as possible, until the end of the game when your income is just ridiculously high and you can make 500 happiness points all in one turn.
So, since anyone is going to figure that strategy out pretty quickly, you need to add in some other elements, I think, to give it variety. Some chance and community chest cards.
Yeah, you need to randomize things in like disasters, and allow for insurance in order to spice it up a bit.
To represent the division of labor, you might want to have players select a dominant skill at the beginning of the game, giving them an advantage in that area if they choose to use it. Also, changing environmental conditions are pretty much a must. In fact, instead of abstract happiness points, perhaps the goal could be to reach somewhere on the map, or something like that.
Why anarchy fails
Thanks for the comments. My intent was to make the rules as simple as possible (ideally, the rules should fit on one page), so people could get into the game quickly. Perhaps a quick-start set of rules to begin with, and then add layers of expanded rules as the game progresses? (As in, you just follow the instructions on the first page until some milestone is reached, then you move to the second page, and so forth). So, I have thought up a bunch of rules that added to complexity, but kept paring them away so that I could keep them to one page as much as possible.
I've considered making it a game playable with an ordinary deck of cards, with spades - tools, clubs = basic necessities, diamonds = luxuries, and hearts = energy points. But I can't get it to work right.
You're right about the winning strategy being fairly obvious or readily learnable. That's part of the goal of the game, though, since I plan to play some version of this with my children when they get old enough as an educational exercise (we homeschool). But maybe some sort of rule could be implemented whereby players must pursue some course of action regardless whether it benefits them or not (for example, they live in a communist village, so they must share everything they produce, or something like that. Maybe the game changes after a certain number of turns, with a new government taking over and instituting new rules for the production and distribution of goods). As to end game possibilities, I've considered setting the game on an island, with the idea that the players are castaways, and must build a boat big enough to return to the mainland. They must gather food for energy (action points), but also harvest the necessary resources for building a boat. There are a set of boat-building instructions, but each player only has a portion of the instructions, and must find a way to gain the rest of them. This brings up another element that could be included--use of force. Adding a "weapons" card to the goods, and a "Martial Arts" card to the services, and allowing players to specialize in those areas. Oh, the idea of each player starting out with advanced skills in one area is a good idea, too. I think I was intending the education/capital service to fit that role, so that players that spent points in educating themselves became better at producing some good.
Regarding random events, perhaps a player draws from a card pile each turn that provides an unexpected reward or punishment that he must deal with.
The "Happiness Points" is based on Prof. von Mises' concept of "unresolved uneasiness" as a motivation for man to act. "Happiness" is a more user-friendly term than "resolved uneasiness", I think.
Thanks again for the ideas; I wanted a better version of Monopoly, which is considered by the populace at large as a "business game" when it is really nothing more than a fancy version of roulette (see the excellent article on this website about the game). However, Monopoly itself was not created overnight, and its history involved many named and anonymous contributors over several years before Charles Darrow sold it to Parker Brothers. If I have given impetous to anyone to make some version of these rules into a marketable product, I am content.
Relevant...
I have no good ideas, but if you get it figured out, it sounds like something I'd definitely do with my hs classes.
It might be cool to add a chance aspect like die throws, to simulate the uncertainty inherent in entrepreneurship.
Conza88: Relevant...
haha! thank you conza
Where there is no property there is no justice; a proposition as certain as any demonstration in Euclid
Fools! not to see that what they madly desire would be a calamity to them as no hands but their own could bring
One aspect of the free market in real life that I think needs to be added to the game is innovation; both in consumer products and in production tools/methods.
I'm reading the P.I.G. to The Great Depression and The New Deal, and am at the part where Dr. Murphy describes the incredible increase in quality of life do to innovations such as the radio, and innovative production techniques that brought the price of automobiles down from around $600 each to $240 each in just a few years.
Perhaps the "die rolling" idea could relate to developing new products and production techniques, ala "Axis and Allies"...