monopoly

[Urban Ranger]

Finished a whole bunch of Monopoly and Risk! games.

[lord of the mark]

Originally posted by rah


Boats were the nickname for the 10 army counters.
Old, but not that obscure.

yep. i remember them being called boats.

[lord of the mark]

Originally posted by rah
Actually the versions we played back in the old days had wooden squares for single armies and longer pieces rounded with three sides as 10-army pieces. But yes, they were nicked as boats.

only version i ever played.

[rah]

I'm glad someone else remembers them being called boats. I'm not sure where the nick came from, but I remember playing in college and people from other parts of the country called them boats also. Maybe they were called that somewhere in the rules, since there were no risk websites back then. If not in the rules, I don't know how it would have become common usage. It's not like they looked like boats.

[lord of the mark]

Originally posted by rah
I'm glad someone else remembers them being called boats. I'm not sure where the nick came from, but I remember playing in college and people from other parts of the country called them boats also. Maybe they were called that somewhere in the rules, since there were no risk websites back then. If not in the rules, I don't know how it would have become common usage. It's not like they looked like boats.

Not in the rules, im quite sure. just spread around, thats all. It was a multiplayer game after all, and things just spread - person to person.

Contrary to what some young uns might believe, we were not all hermits before the internet.

[rah]

You may be right, but........

When we got to college back in the early 70's, and started gaming with people from all over the country, different things had different nicks or rules depending on where people came from. D&D and Euchre being the most varied. Heck euchre rules seems to vary by neighborhood. EVERYONE I played with in college called them boats, so it would lead me to believe that it was published somewhere. The rules would have been the most logical place. But, as always, I'm probably wrong.

[rah]

And yes I am.
I just downloaded older versions of the rules, and not once are they referred to as boats. they had rules for 1959, 1963, 1975, 1980 and 1999. It was interesting to note that 1959 was the only one that referred to the pieces as squares and oblongs. Every other one refers to the plastic style pieces.

[lord of the mark]

Originally posted by rah
You may be right, but........

When we got to college back in the early 70's, and started gaming with people from all over the country, different things had different nicks or rules depending on where people came from. D&D and Euchre being the most varied. Heck euchre rules seems to vary by neighborhood. EVERYONE I played with in college called them boats, so it would lead me to believe that it was published somewhere. The rules would have been the most logical place. But, as always, I'm probably wrong.

let me speculate.

DnD and Euchre were not quite mainstream - er Euchre? Like I vaguely recall having heard of it - quite sure i never played it, and im willing to bet no one on MY block played it

DnD - well what can i say I mean of course DnD rules would be vary - I mean think of the kinds of folks (hope im not insulting anyone) who liked to play DnD - sure they were making up their own rules, and just about everything else i suppose.

Risk OTOH, was a standard commercial game, that one could play with most friends, brothers, etc. Im sure i played with lots of people from lots of different social networks, and in my case lots of widely scattered parts of NYC. I suspect RISK nicknames were much more likely to become "epidemic" than DnD rules.

[rah]

As I said in the next post, you must be right since it wasn't in the rules. But it's weird. Where did we get if from? That's what we called them from the beginning, in the mid 60's. We hadn't played anybody from outside our neighborhood. Obviously we weren't the originators, so it had to come from somewhere.

[Frozzy]

Please esplain how you can have a boat in Afghanistan

[rah]

That's exactly my point. It's not a common sense derived nickname, so it must have come from somewhere. I can't believe kids across the country all had the same inspiration to call it a boat.

[flipside]

It sounds cultural, like there was something that united a lot of you in the U.S at the time, that you associated with this game; or maybe the rulebook answer you gave was correct.It sounds interesting though.

[The Rusty Gamer]

I hate it when people cheat at games like Monopoly and then when you complain they say "It's only a game. What are you so upset about?". Well, if it's only a game, why do they cheat, that's what I want to know?

Many people get bored with Monopoly after a while. I think there needs to be an official update to drag it into the 21st century. Perhaps one of the easiest things to do would be to update the Chance and Community Chest cards by creating some extra ones. I have a few ideas for these that I might post if anyone is interesting in discussing ideas for enhanced rules.

One idea that would be easy to implement - I thought of this a while ago but haven't had a chance to try it yet - is to use four dice instead of two, three white and one red. The red die would be interpeted as negative. This means you could throw anything from -3 to +17. You can even throw a 0 then! Think of the devastation if you happen to be on someone else's property with a hotel; you've just struggled to pay them the rent and then...you get hit again! A double, for the purpose of knowing when to throw again, would be seen as two pairs of numbers on the dice - a triple would not be interpreted as a double therefore. Apart from this, all standard rules would apply. A special note for the GO square - you only get $200 for getting onto or passing GO by moving forward. You would not get an additional $200 by moving backwards onto the square or by throwing a 0 when on the square.

[lord of the mark]

Originally posted by rah
As I said in the next post, you must be right since it wasn't in the rules. But it's weird. Where did we get if from? That's what we called them from the beginning, in the mid 60's. We hadn't played anybody from outside our neighborhood. Obviously we weren't the originators, so it had to come from somewhere.

I dont recall calling them boats in neighborhood games in say, 1972. (called them tenners, or whatever) - first heard boats in High School, I think (circa 1975 ) - possibly playing with someone more "networked" - a friend whose brother attended a major national university - maybe thats where he got it from. One could attempt to trace the origins, asking around, checking websites, etc. Quite a reseach project.

[rah]

You did get me thinking if we really started calling them boats at home or was it until we got to college. It was over 30 years ago so memory is always suspect.

I tried a little google research and was not rewarded. It will obviously require too much more research.