The S.O. Complication

[Inkeyes22]

I currently do not have a play group, but I have had several that included significant others, brothers, etc. and that added a level of board complexity. How do you handle the "I would attack my spouse as s/he is the biggest threat, but instead I'll attack you so I am not in the dog house" type of scenarios?

Is there a correct answer? I know this is somewhat subjective.

Let's say you are playing a fairly casual game, everybody has relatively the same power decks and similar experience but Adam frequently wins because Brian doesn't attack him. You and Caleb frequently have to either play kingmaker by attacking Adam and thus throwing the game to either Brian or the other person (you or Caleb) or ignoring the "poor" threat assessment by Brian and giving the game to Adam.

What types of ethical implications do you see? How frequently would this have to happen to bother you?

I know some people are thinking "Who cares who wins?" and I do agree that who wins isn't as important, this question is more centered on "how" the win is accomplished. If the person wins not because of skill or luck rather because of external pressure does that bother you?

[Dunharrow]

When I play any board games with my spouse, I usually play to win...but I will take Settlers of Catan as my example. I will not help her win the game unfairly. But, I will not cut her roads off unless it is absolutely necessary. If she isn't in a winning position, I will trade with her when the trade is neutral to me, which I won't do with other players.

So.... a little favouritism, but not the point of helping her win the game and not helping in any way that is bad for me. I will steal from her too.

But it was not always like this. She accuses me of being cutthroat with her because when I teach her games, I try to play properly and will beat her. This happened with Magic. I built her some decks and I would play correctly. I would not give her the win freely. And maybe that was wrong, because we were just playing 1 on 1. I think I emphasize playing correctly too much over the person I am teaching just having a good time.

Now, for 4 player magic, I have experience playing with a couple at an LGS, and it was miserable. I remember one game the guy played a Grave Pact and we were clearly all in terrible position. Then his girlfriend casts Harmonic Sliver and doesn't blow it up - and we all berated her for helping her boyfriend win. She gave in and blew up his Grave pact, but it put a bad taste in our mouths. It was obvious, game after game, week after week, that they would help each other win so they could get more prize packs, and it is one of the reasons I stopped playing at that store.

If my wife was playing commander with me, I would not help her win. I would roll dice to decide who to attack. I would try to stay as impartial as possible - but I would still do little things to help her have a good time. I would not play stax. I would choose decks that are more fun.
Now, I don't know what he magic equivalent of 'a neutral trade' is, but imagine she casts Fact or Fiction and reveals good cards, but not cards that will give her a big advantage - I would probably make her a good pile... but I might do that for anyone who is not ahead.


Playing the game strategically should not mean going into the doghouse for doing something. If your partner plays a combo piece, you should destroy it if you can. They should not punish you outside the game for this - and if they do, you should stop playing 4-player games with them.

[Inkeyes22]

Awesome examples Dunharrow. When I first got married my wife got really upset if I would steal from her in Catan or Shock her Llanowar Elves. Even when we were playing 1v1.

When we were stationed in WA we would play at a place that gave prize support to the top 4, usually it was T2 (standard) but occasionally they would have commander nights. If someone attacked my wife or blew up her Wort, Boggart Auntie she would attack them relentlessly for weeks. It made it so that many people would leave her alone until she had a critical mass of goblins. This frequently meant that at least one of us was in the top 4 every week.

I found myself choosing lines of play that were like you said, at least nuetral towards my S.O. rather than pursuing other lines that might have been better tactically. Knowing that if I blew up her thing it would effect several games/days versus blowing up another person's artifact that was of similar strategic value to that person could have cost me a game and could easily have been seen as favoritism.

I know that it caused some feel bads, but it is hard to say that what she did or what I did was "unethical."

[Shabbaman]

My spouse just wants to win, and expects me to be a griefer. She's very competitive. She doesn't care about magic though. In games with others I've seen the "I don't want to attack you because of reason ABC through Z", not only with spouses but also between siblings and friends. Sitting around a table with strangers and a friend? Don't attack the friend. That kind of stuff. After a while it's okay to call it out, but I've heard the "but I don't know you" a lot. It is s just an aspect of casual multiplayer.

[tstorm823]

That depends on the circumstance:

If it's one person really involved in the game bringing along an SO because they want to enjoy the time together, I see no problem with casual cooperation, the other people just have to adjust to more of a 2-headed giant. That can still be fun.

If it's two people heavily involved who just happened to be related and they aren't trying to beat each other, then it's kind of dishonest to be playing free-for-all regularly in the first place. And kind of a shame if two people play all the time and feel they need to give each other special treatment.

Like, I understand the desire to make sure someone you care about is having fun, but if you can't enjoy losing a game it's unclear whether you enjoy the game to begin with. That's why I would judge differently depending on whether the players were playing together because they both love the game or both playing the game so that they could spend the time together. If you both love the game, you can both have fun being beaten up like anyone else.

[Sinis]

When I was married, my ex and I were cutthroat. There were plenty of board games -- especially ones involving lying, like Battlestar Galactica -- that would sometimes strain things the slightest bit. Stuff like "I can't believe you're capable of lying to me that well."

We're (amicably) divorced now, but I can safely say none of that impacted our relationship. We were both good sports about games, and one of us besting the other was not a cause for a night on the couch or whatever. If that were to happen, I would venture that one or more of the following is the case: Your partner is a sore loser, your partner would rather win than play on a level playing field, or there is some element of insecurity where you believe that your partner might consider a loss at your hands a significant blow to your relationship (i.e. there are other way more salient problems afoot).

I'm the same way with my daughters; I don't throw games outside of teaching scenarios, they will only get better if they win on a level playing field. When they win -- and they will -- they will have earned it. No empty victories.

[pokken]

Most of the s/o's I've seen play are extra suspicious of their spouses and go out of their way to be even handed. I think if I saw a lot of weird favoritism in the politics (consistently) I would avoid those people going forward. I can't say that I've ever seen it though so hard to know how I'd react.

My guess is that there is a bit of a learning curve though when they first start playing together so I'm inclined to give people the benefit of the doubt. That is, I think over time people are going to work into a groove where they're balanced out, but at the beginning playing together with their s/o's you might have some growing pains.

[Airi]

I am the first person at the table who will swing out at my boyfriend in EDH. I know better than anyone what kind of shenanigans he's up to, and what's going to happen if his board state goes unanswered and he's just left alone to do his thing. Anything that happens at the table, stays with in the table. It's a game, and it's not going to be brought into our relationship outside of the table.

[Sinis]

I know better than anyone what kind of shenanigans he's up to,

That's just threat assessment, lmao

[Airi]

That's true, but the point being: There is no mercy from me at a table. Only aggro.

[Segrus]

When my wife does play, if I give any leniency towards her then I try to afford everyone else the same leniency. She does the same. It robs other people of fun to play any other way, and ultimately robs me of some fun too.

[toctheyounger]

It's a strange one. My wife is super competitive - not in the decks she builds per se, but she doesn't half step. She'll go for your throat no matter if you go easy on her. That's just how she games. Like any meta, there's lines you don't cross, and mostly they're pretty fair. For her it pretty much stops at MLD and I'm ok with that.

Playing with other close friends, I know with other board games there's one particular close friend that gets pretty salty with, like, competitive gaming. It can make for an uncomfortable experience. Thankfully, she has zero interest in playing MtG. That being said we've had games of Catan and Carcassonne that got really awkward.

Ultimately I think you've gotta just do like you normally would and make sure you're managing the social arrangements of the game, decide what's ok for play and what's too griefy. And just make it clear that being in the dogbox for anything that happens during the game isn't ok. Because to my mind unless you're genuinely treating someone like dirt and being a total ass you shouldn't have to wear that. It's just a game after all, and holding your relationship over your head like the sword of Damocles to gain board superiority is pretty lame.

[ilovesaprolings]

"I would attack my spouse as s/he is the biggest threat, but instead I'll attack you so I am not in the dog house"

Honestly that really sounds like an awful relation.
Unless you are really being jerk, like "i attack my spouse even is s/he isn't a relevant threat just tilt her/him", i don't why s/he would get mad.

I never have this problem, my gf in magic used to hurl giant fireballs at me, while in D&D se always endured my caotic cleric trying to gib items and attention from her.

[hyalopterouslemur]

I'll be frank: Sportsmanship is everything. Once you start letting your game interfere with real life, that's a problem. And, well, if I have 50+ points of power on my side of the table, I expect everyone to attack me.

[Outcryqq]

I'd probable avoid playing against couples when prizes are on the line. I've had something similar where two brothers were playing in prize pods, and the "feel bads" happened because you could tell they were showing each other favoritism. If you don't want to stop playing with that couple, maybe suggest only playing for fun?

[DirkGently]

My ex never got into commander, but did play draft and we once played conspiracy: take the crown. I seem to remember her constantly casting aspersions along the lines of "he's going to have some tricky way to win; don't ever help him." Just to remind you, this is in a draft. Eventually other players became too threatening and she was forced to work with me.

Anyway yeah I won (with some tricky tricks).

I think I may have gone a little easier on her, but part of that is because I knew her as a player, and I knew she wasn't adept at multiplayer. She's mostly a 1v1 player, so if she's got a threat, she's going to throw it down, and if she's not throwing down a threat, she doesn't have one. Since she wasn't doing anything super scary, I felt pretty safe assuming that she didn't have anything "tricky" that was going to blindside me. I think knowing another player well can definitely change the way you play, and sometimes that means going easier on them if you think they're less of a threat. So it's kind of a fine line between that, and actual collusion.

You've just posted two of these very similar topics, and I think my opinion is roughly the same - it's hard to know precisely what's happening without firsthand experience. Especially since you've done it twice, for me it tilts the "who's is the wrong" meter a little towards me thinking maybe you're seeing collusion where it doesn't really exist. If you're confident that there's actual collusion going on, then you'll probably just have to content yourself with knowing that, because no one on the internet is really going to be able to confirm it without a video or something.

[Inkeyes22]

You've just posted two of these very similar topics, and I think my opinion is roughly the same - it's hard to know precisely what's happening without firsthand experience. Especially since you've done it twice, for me it tilts the "who's is the wrong" meter a little towards me thinking maybe you're seeing collusion where it doesn't really exist. If you're confident that there's actual collusion going on, then you'll probably just have to content yourself with knowing that, because no one on the internet is really going to be able to confirm it without a video or something.

I guess I should clarify, I am working on a MEd - Instructional Design, my capstone project is using EDH to help teach topics such as Ethics, Social Skills etc. So I am kind of using this platform to refine some ideas and some topics for discussion in the course. While there is certainly some real previous experiences discussed, I didn't change the names to protect the innocent. This isn't a current issue as I rarely get to play at all right now. I really appreciate the feedback and indulging me on these topics.

[Hawk]

Hello old friend!

I do play with my SO more or less constantly. It's a tricky balance for sure - she makes no bones about naming me as the biggest threat, as I've played Magic the longest, whether I'm playing an actually threatening deck (say, Gitrog Monster endless durdles, or my Sevinne deck which has both a great token plan A and the infinite copy + Ral, Storm Conduit plan B to win on the spot) or I'm playing a precon or my terrible Darigaaz build.

On the flip side, my wife tends to end up the actual strongest board position (manipulating other players + playing my best work in terms of tuned up 7/10 decks). I usually ship early attacks towards her, and nuke her stuff if she's actively harassing me. But as she starts building up steam, I absolutely find myself mindful of not hammering her when the rest of the table already is, even when it's clearly in my best interests to use the way paved for me by those three removal spells to swing in for 10 while her shields are down (or to counter her counter to help player C resolve their boardwipe, or whatever). I also tend to kingsmake towards her when forced to kingsmake at all - but, due to her "threat assessment" I'm usually too dead for that to be an issue.

I've also taken to just talking more openly about threat assessment as of late as this dynamic has definitely rubbed some folks in our playgroup the wrong way, to lay out my logic for why I'm targeting her or choosing not to. But it is tricky, subjective, and situational.