My trouble with Trouble
For many of the people that know me, I am near the top of the list of people to beat in a game. My combination of trash talk, competitive play, and over-exuberance create a potent recipe that makes friends and family take extra joy in beating me.
That doesn’t offend me. In fact, I usually take pride in that fact. I take it as a badge of honor, confirming my competitive excellence. In multiplayer games, I find others teaming up against me as a sign that I am truly the best. Why wouldn’t I – their only way to compete is to gang up against me? I truly am the greatest.
For 33 years, I’ve carried this notion of success around proudly, announcing this to anyone and everyone who crossed my gaming path. It took a few games of Trouble to realize just how wrong I was.
The best-laid plans
Our family has recently become Trouble addicts. Our older daughter can play the game without help and it’s a fun activity during meals. I consider these competitive activities an important part of my education for my daughter. I want to teach her how to play to win, how to refuse to lose, and how to be gracious in defeat (I still haven’t learned how to be gracious in victory so can’t teach that).
Other members of my family like to let my daughter win. I make no such concessions. I’m willing to adopt any handicap in terms of the setup of a game, but once the game begins, I’m playing to win.
So, as we started Trouble, I thought this would be the perfect opportunity to show my daughter what it takes to win. Her other family members would go easy and I would crush all of them. My daughter would learn quickly that in the domain of game-play, there’s no role for kindness.
Things didn’t go to plan.
Trouble Game #1
I’m out there sniping. Getting sixes and knocking off my daughter and my wife. Every time I have a choice to be kind or show no mercy, I show no mercy. Meanwhile, my wife avoids killing my daughter’s pieces at every turn and I remind my daughter, “You’re going to learn. Nice guys finish last.”
My daughter is getting upset as I cackle my way to victory.
Suddenly, a strange thing starts to happen. My wife and my daughter start focusing on killing my pieces. A few incredibly lucky rolls later and I end up in last place. My wife finishes in first and my daughter in second. My daughter starts making Lego trophies for first and second place as I try to remind myself…
Don’t measure successful strategies by outcomes alone. Trouble is a game of luck. These fools got lucky.
Or so I thought.
Trouble Game #2
The best competitors have short-term memory loss. I’ve forgotten the mishaps of the last game as I immediately jump out to an early lead. I’m on the warpath and reminding my daughter that everyone’s luck runs out. She looks like she’s about to cry as my first two pieces wreak havoc on their easy path home.
Again, my third and fourth pieces start to struggle. The two of them continue to get lucky rolls to kill me at inopportune times. I curse my poor fortune as the game comes to an end – this time, my daughter in first and my wife in second, but me still in last.
I start to wonder to myself…here I am, with a pure heart….only trying to teach my daughter an important life lesson…why is God doling out all the luck to these other two at my expense? Alas, even the best of luck can’t overcome the best strategies. The law of large numbers. It’s time to play more Trouble.
Maybe not.
Trouble Game #3
My mother-in-law has entered the fray. An even better chance to show off my strategy. She takes kindness too far, never killing anyone else’s pieces unless she has to. What she calls kindness I call weakness.
The game starts and yet again, I’m a one-man wrecking crew. All three are near tears as I crush each and every one of them. My first piece sails home, killing pieces along the way. In fact, my wife’s side looks like she’s not playing as I’ve killed all her pieces. Finally…my daughter is about to see what a true winner looks like.
For a third time, the world seems to be conspiring against me. All three of them take turns killing my advancing pieces, some just as I am about to get to the safety of my home. My jaw drops open as the game ends with my daughter in first, my wife in second, my mother-in-law in third, and me in last.
I struggle with a sense of existential despair as the three of them joyfully dance around my final Trouble piece that has yet to find its home.
The Aftermath
Hours later, I was still licking my wounds. How could my perfect playing strategy have performed so poorly in three games? It’s not just that I didn’t win – I came in last in all three games! Has there ever been a soul so unlucky?
Suddenly, a realization dawned on me. What if I wasn’t unlucky? What if my strategy was wrong? My competitive fire had been forged in the fires of a tennis court, where there was zero benefit to kindness. You win a match based on your skill and strategy alone. I had brought this mentality to every other game I’d played.
What if that was wrong? What if there was a fundamental difference between a single-player game and a multi-player game? Maybe there were benefits to kindness. I replayed the Trouble games in my mind, seeing all the times they could have killed each other but didn’t. All the times they chose to kill my pieces despite having other options. This wasn’t luck. This was cooperation. Their kindness wasn’t weakness. Their kindness was a selective skill that I had ignored.
The truth is…you can’t bring a single-player mentality to a multi-player game.
It took coming in last place in several straight games of Trouble to correct me of this notion. I learned this lesson 33 years too late. It may be too late for me as my game-playing reputation now precedes me. My friends and family take too much joy in my suffering.
I still have my younger daughter. With her, I'm hoping she'll come to know me as a kind, soft-spoken competitor that knows the value of cooperation. Until we get on the tennis court.
Postscript
I was so excited when this struck me that as soon as I wrote the above, I ran downstairs to tell my daughter the exciting news. The conversation took such a funny turn that I recorded half of it (for evidence), and am going to retell it here.
Dad: Guess what, babe? I figured out a way to win more at Trouble.
4yo: *skeptical look* How?
Dad: I’m going to start being nicer. I’m going to start killing everyone’s pieces less.
4yo: No. Then you won’t win.
Dad: Why?
4yo: Killing pieces is good?!
Dad: I used to think that, too! But then I realized…if I kill other people’s pieces, they try to kill my pieces. So it actually hurts me when I do that.
4yo: OK…you can try that…but I don’t think you’re going to win?!
Dad: Why?
4yo: I always kill pieces when I can. It’s better. They have to go back to the start and I get to keep going.
Dad: But then won’t they kill your pieces if you kill theirs?
4yo: You don’t have to kill my pieces. You can choose what you want. I think that’s fine. I think I’m going to win, though. Killing pieces helps you a lot...when they go back, they keep rolling and they can’t move until they get a 1 or a 6. So if you are still out, you can keep moving and finish getting home and get first place. You can go as fast as you want. Or you can go slow because they can’t move until they get a 1 or a 6.
Dad: But what about Mom? She sometimes doesn’t kill your pieces even though she can. Like. what if Mom has a choice to kill your piece and doesn’t do it and then the next turn, you have a choice to kill her piece - are you going to do it?
4yo: Yes! I like to kill pieces! No one else likes to kill pieces as much as I do. Mommy only likes a little bit of killing in Trouble.
Dad: Why do you like killing pieces so much?
4yo: Because…I like to win.
The student has become the master.
Post-Postscript
I promise you. I did extremely well at Game Theory as an Economics major in undergrad. I often think about things using game theory principles when evaluating business decisions. Yet, despite the name so evident in the title, this is the first time I’m realizing that game theory ought to be applied to my game playing.
My new Trouble parenting strategy: Employ generous tit-for-tat. Evolutionary biology and computer simulations suggest it works. I start cooperative with everyone, avoiding killing others. If my daughter (or anyone else) kills my pieces, I retaliate. Otherwise, I play it safe. Over repeated gameplay, this strategy has been proven to be the best. And once my daughter sees I’m the best Trouble player, she’ll realize she was wrong.
There’s no way this doesn’t work.