Monopoly Strategy

This post is not about odds and probabilities. If you look out for monopoly strategies based on numbers, you will find great analysis on the subject. If I may suggest, you should take a look at How to Win at Monopoky - a Surefire Strategy and at Probabilities in the Game of Monopoly. They both describe how long it will take to get a return on your investment, expected incomes, probability of landing on a square... you get the picture. Both article are based on numbers, so what I would like to do here, is to take a different approach. Instead of using numbers to drive my strategy, I will focus on the element of the game, more precisely the monopoly chance card and use them to my advantages.

Just for the fun of it, the next time you go to the bathroom, bring the monopoly chance card with you to take a deeper look at them. Some cards are more interesting than the other. For example, the "Advance To Illinois Ave." chance card. Imagine if you already had the red set of property in your possession and that the Illinois avenue property is improved with houses or hotel... If you count the amount of chance card in the deck, you will find out that there's 16 of them. So every 16 chance card drawing, a monopoly player will end up on the Illinois Ave! If you're still sitting in the bathroom and looking at the chance card, you will soon find out that there is eight other chance card that will give a little bonus like the Illinois Avenue card. So let's go through the whole deck of card to illustrate my monopoly strategy based on the chance card.

"Advance to Illinois Ave."

Ok, we already saw this one, so the next time you have a chance to buy this property don't miss your chance. Even if "Kentucky" and "Indiana" are in someone else hand, the Illinois avenue will worth a lot more when trading and selling time will come. Keep it like a good old bottle of red wine. With the jail very close to it, the number of time monopoly players will land on it is higher than some other property.

"Advance to St. Charles Place"

Like the Illinois avenue card, St. Charles Place is a sure buy. The price to improve the property on the purple set is cheaper than the red set, so you will make money faster.

"Advance token to the nearest Railroad and pay owner Twice the Rental to which he/she is otherwise entitled. If Railroad is UNOWNED, you may buy it from the bank"

You need to know that there is two chance card like this one, so this card will come up every eight card. The more railroad you have, the more money you'll make.

"Take a ride on the reading, IF YOU PASS GO COLLECT $200"

Railroads are definitely my favorite. They let you make money as soon has you buy one and the rent increase when you have more. This chance card will bring even more traffic if you bought the Reading Railroad. With the previous chance card description (move to the nearest railroad...), the Reading railroad property is even more interesting.

"ADVANCE TOKEN TO NEAREST UTILITY, If UNOWNED, you may buy it from the bank. If OWNED, throw dice and pay owner a total ten times the amount thrown.

The reasons to buy the monopoly "Electric company" and "Water Works" properties is obvious. Like the railroads you start making money right away (no need to improve them) and if you have both, the total paid by other player is increased. Add to that the fact that every 16 chance card draw, someone will pay you ten times the amount!

"Take a walk on the boardwalk ADVANCE TOKEN TO BOARDWALK"

Like the "Illinois avenue" and "St. Charles place" property, the boardwalk square is another property you should keep your eyes on. It is more expensive, but if you already have Park Place in your hand and that you know that this chance card haven't been draw yet, you should consider buying it and improving it as fast has possible. You will have a return on investment real fast (if you don't draw the card yourself of course).

"GO BACK 3 SPACES"

Ok, this one is less obvious but still give a chance to land on your property if you buy the right ones. Take a look at the monopoly gameboard and pay attention to the chance squares. Now, go back three spaces from there and check the property. There is three monopoly chance square on the board but only one of them is interesting. The chance spot inside the red set of property. The one beside "Park Place" brings you back on a community chest square and the one inside the light blue set is even worse since it brings you back on the "INCOME TAX" square. The only interesting chance square in my monopoly strategy is the one besides Kentucky avenue. If you draw this chance card when standing there, it will bring you back on the New York Avenue property. This one won't give a lot of extra incomes but buying New York is not a lost case since it's not expensive and player will land there more often because of the jail.

To exploit this strategy, you need to pay attention to these properties

Reading Railroad, Pennsylvania Railroad, B&Q railroad and Short Line


Illinois Avenue


St. Charles place


Electric Company and Water Works


Boardwalk


New York Avenue

My other post on Monopoly board game

Monopoly alternative rules part 1
Board changes, railroad tracks to short-circuit some part of the planchette, new monopoly chance cards.

Monopoly alternative rules part 2
New game element like the toll and the taxi, new uses of the monopoly free parking and GO spots.

Monopoly alternative rules final part
Auction revisited, new token to add more strategy, new powers to the owners of the electric company and water works properties.

Monopoly rules

Find out why you should always read the monopoly rules before playing this board game. A list of links to the monopoly rules in various language.

Alternative Monopoly rules and game elements (final part)

More monopoly rules and game elements!

I hope you're not tired yet of those alternative monopoly rules and game elements because I have some more for you readers! In general what I found is lacking in the monopoly game board is the power you get when you purchase something. Except for making more bucks, buying a property and putting buildings won't give you much more power. Same thing goes when you buy a railroad or a service like the Electric Company or the Water Works. The new monopoly toll token described in a previous post is a good example of an extra power you get when you have all monopoly property of the same color. In that way of thinking, I would give extra power when you buy the Electric Company or the Water Works monopoly properties. My last game design idea is for auction when players are trying to buy a property that a monopoly player didn't want to buy during is turn. I don't really like the way it's suppose to be done and I'm proposing a new one here.

Monopoly Electric Company

Every time the owner of the electric company land on it, he can roll the dice to get the right to shut down the electricity on one, two or three property anywhere on the monopoly board. So if the electric company owner rolls a double-one, double-two or double-three he can shut down one, two or three property. What that means is that the shut down properties won't be able to ask the rent of an improved properties but only the basic rent without improvement. We put the monopoly hotel and houses on the side of the game board until the owner of those properties land on it to repair it or he uses the monopoly chance card that gives immediate electric problem repairs. Instead of putting houses and hotel aside, we could have a nice token looking a big like this (picture on the right).

Monopoly Water Works

In real life, when the water pipe system is broken, the street is closed to make some repair and you need to make some detours. To give a little more power to the owner of water works, I propose that like the Electric Company alternate monopoly rule, when the owner land on the Water Works property, he rolls the dice and if he gets double-1, double-2 or double-3, he can block the route (except for him) to other player on different property of the monopoly game board. He can strategically put road blocks on his improved property to force someone to stop on it and make some extra monopoly cash! There could be three road block on the game board depending on what the player rolled. On the picture you can see that the player put one road block on the boardwalk property. A player cannot cross this block even if the dice score was higher. Once a player bumped into the block, the block is removed. A block could also be removed by a player using is community check card.

Monopoly property auction

If you read the monopoly rules, you can see that when a player land on a property that doesn't belong to any other player and that he refuses to buy it, that other monopoly player can buy it from the bank. The way rules are written, a verbal auction is taking place and the biggest offer wins the property. What I'm proposing has an alternative to this monopoly rule is that every player takes is "monopoly envelope" and put the money he's willing to pay for this property. The monopoly player that puts the biggest amount of money wins the auction.This way of doing the auction creates a bigger suspense in my opinion and his more fun. Imagine buying the boardwalk for 10$ !

So this is where this series of alternative monopoly rules and new game element ends for now. If you missed part 1 and part 2, you can find them here:

My other post on Monopoly board game

Monopoly alternative rules part 1
Board changes, railroad tracks to short-circuit some part of the planchette, new monopoly chance cards.

Monopoly alternative rules part 2
New game element like the toll and the taxi, new uses of the monopoly free parking and GO spots.

Monopoly rules

Find out why you should always read the monopoly rules before playing this board game. A list of links to the monopoly rules in various language.

Monopoly strategies
Forget about the odds, think about how to buy the best monopoly property. An analysis of all monopoly chance and community chest cards to help you choose the best property to buy.

Alternative Monopoly rules and game elements (part 2)

Following my first set of alternative rules and game elements, here's some more...

The Toll (monopoly game element)

A new token called "the toll". This new monopoly token would be another way of financing some project on your property. There would be only one monopoly toll in the game and it would be controlled by only one player at a time. To get control of it you need to stop on the "GO" spot and roll a double at your next turn. You could also get control of it by drawing the monopoly community chest card that gives control of "The toll". The alternative monopoly rules are the following.

• You need a complete set of property (all monopoly property of the same color)
• You can't put a toll if some of those property are already improved.
• Every time a player passes through the toll he needs to pay is right to pass and that even if
  he doesn't stop on it. See the legend on the right to find the price.
• The toll must be set on the last property of a set.
• The player still need to pay the rent when stopping on the property where the toll is placed.

The Taxi (monopoly game element)

Like the toll, the new monopoly token called "the taxi" is unique and can be controlled by only one player at a time. The taxi token is placed on the free parking spot when the game starts. To make use of the taxi, you must land on the same spot as the taxi. When it's your turn to play, instead of rolling the dice, you can "take the cab" anywhere on the monopoly game board. Every spot traveled will cost you ten monopoly dollar (10$). The alternative monopoly rules for the new taxi token are the following.

• The ride will cost 10$ per monopoly spot traveled
• You can't reuse the taxi the next turn
• The starting position of the taxi is the monopoly free parking spot

Parking spot (Alternative monopoly rule)

1. 

You just found some money on the ground! To get this money, you need to roll a double. The money you win is the money paid by monopoly player when drawing community chest card or chance card that says something like: "You need to pay the bank...". So all the money paid normaly to the bank is put on the parking lot space instead of the bank chest. Every player landing on the monopoly parking spot will have a chance to make some extra money. See the images to find out examples of what monopoly cards will have you put some money there.

GO spot (alternative monopoly rule)

When a player stop exactly on the monopoly GO spot he have the choice to send the traffic counter-clockwise (or clockwise) if he wants. To do so, he must roll the dice and get a double. If he succeed, the monopoly game board will now be a one way in the direction indicated by this player. We could probably add a new monopoly token in the shape of an arrow to indicate the current traffic direction to make sure no one goes in the wrong direction.

My other post on Monopoly board game

Monopoly alternative rules part 1
Board changes, railroad tracks to short-circuit some part of the planchette, new monopoly chance cards.

Monopoly alternative rules final part
Auction revisited, new token to add more strategy, new powers to the owners of the electric company and water works properties.

Monopoly rules

Find out why you should always read the monopoly rules before playing this board game. A list of links to the monopoly rules in various language.

Monopoly strategies
Forget about the odds, think about how to buy the best monopoly property. An analysis of all monopoly chance and community chest cards to help you choose the best property to buy.

Alternative Monopoly rules and game elements

Greatest classic board game of all time, Monopoly is on the top of my favorite game list. I like this game so much, that sometimes I'm dreaming of a Monopoly sequel. I would love to see something like "Monopoly 2 coming this summer" somewhere on the net. While waiting for this (if it ever happens) I have come up with a list of alternative monopoly rules and game element just for the fun of it.

Changes to the monopoly game board

1- Railroad routes from one railroad to all the other. The player owning more than one railroad, can go freely from one station to the other if he owns both ends of it. Otherwise, if he owns only one, he'll have to pay the destination railroad's owner a fee to stand there. If you don't own any railroad, you can still use the railroad routes but you'll have to pay the rent for both of them. Note that you cannot use a railroad route if one of the two ends are not own by a monopoly player. Sorry about the art in this picture, I definitely need some drawing skills.

Alternative Monopoly chance card


Forest Fire destroyed houses and hotels on some properties, roll the dice to find out where. The player with the highest score decide what property color got the fire disaster. The owner must remove 1 hotel or 3 houses from any of the property of that color.


Property has too much pollution on it. You lose possession of it and need to return houses and hotel to the bank.



A bank goes bankrupt and loses track of one of your mortgage. You can chose the mortgaged property of your choice.


Alternative Monopoly Community Chest card


Train collision on one of your railroad track, accident will be repaired the next time you step on it. If you don't have a railroad property you choose the one of another player.




Some land are getting values, price of rent is doubled the next time someone step on it. Place the card in front of one of your monopoly in until someone step on it.

My other post on Monopoly board game

Monopoly alternative rules part 2
New game element like the toll and the taxi, new uses of the monopoly free parking and GO spots.

Monopoly alternative rules final part
Auction revisited, new token to add more strategy, new powers to the owners of the electric company and water works properties.

Monopoly rules

Find out why you should always read the monopoly rules before playing this board game. A list of links to the monopoly rules in various language.

Monopoly strategies
Forget about the odds, think about how to buy the best monopoly property. An analysis of all monopoly chance and community chest cards to help you choose the best property to buy.

german monopoly rules

One of my favorite board game of all time, the monopoly. Everybody knows the monopoly game board but not everyone plays this game with the same rules. I guess most of my friends bought the german version and read the german monopoly rules. Nobody's playing this fantastic board game the same way and of course nobody's understand german! The german monopoly rules are great but I prefer when we stick to what's written in black and white, in english of course. So for all game board monopoly player out there, here's a list of links to monopoly's rules (german monopoly rules included).

Monopoly rules in different languages

The good old classic monopoly game rules in english
(english monopoly rules)

The rules of monopoly board game for juniors
(english monopoly jr rules)

The french classic monopoly board game rule
(french monopoly rules)

The spanish monopoly rules
(spanish monopoly rules)

And the very famous german rules of the classic monopoly board game
(german monopoly rules)

So I hope that from now everybody will play by the book! No more under the table illegal transactions. But just for the fun of it, here's a bunch of rules that I had the chance to experience over the time.

Special non german monopoly rules.

1. Every time you pick a card and you need to pay some money (tax, services), you put it in the center of the board. The players that stops on the parking spot will roll the dice and if they get (6 - 6) , they take the money.
2. When you pass GO (and stop on it), you get 300$ instead of 200$
3. If you roll a double, it's still your turn. But if you roll a double three time in a row, then you go to jail.

If you have more "special" monopoly game board rules, then leave a comment and I will add them to the list. And on another note, I have nothing against german and their german monopoly rules :)

My other post on Monopoly board game

Monopoly alternative rules part 1
Board changes, railroad tracks to short-circuit some part of the planchette, new monopoly chance cards.

Monopoly alternative rules part 2
New game element like the toll and the taxi, new uses of the monopoly free parking and GO spots.

Monopoly alternative rules final part
Auction revisited, new token to add more strategy, new powers to the owners of the electric company and water works properties.

Monopoly strategies
Forget about the odds, think about how to buy the best monopoly property. An analysis of all monopoly chance and community chest cards to help you choose the best property to buy.