Die Macher
A game for 3-5 players designed by <PERSON>
Introduction
"Politics: A strife of interests masquerading as a contest of principles. The conduct of public affairs for private advantage."
<PERSON> The Devil's Dictionary
Die Macher is a 3-5 player game pitting different political parties against one another in an attempt to win seats in German elections. Originally released in 1986 by Hans im Glück as a 4 player game with only West German states, it was re-issued in 1997 by Moskito Games. In 2006, Valley Games published a reprint.
This year marks the 25th anniversary of this simply brilliant election game.
Note: this review is based on the 1997 Moskito edition, which in my opinion is the nicest of the three. I've owned the first edition and played the Valley Games edition.
Components
The game comes in a nice large box and contains six boards, four of which are election board, one is the national board, and one is a handy holding area for the various decks of cards and bits.
The decks of cards in the game are for the various states being contested, party and regional issues, and opinion polls. There are also some counters
Each player gets a set of cubes and wood markers representing meeting markers, status markers, and media cubes. In addition, they get one set of seven shadow cabinet cards, five party donation cards, and coalition and party markers.
The game in progress.
Rules and Game Play
Each player takes on the role of one of the major German parties: the CDU (Christian Democrats); FDP (Free Democrats); Green; SPD (Social Democrats); and PDS (the Socialist Left).
Die Macher is a procedural game. By this I mean that the game follows a strict sequence of events, and every player will perform each of the steps in player order. There are seven elections to be contested through the course of the game, but the final one is resolved immediately after the sixth one meaning that in reality that this game last six complete rounds.
The Set Up
As noted above, one board is to hold all the cards used in common, and another is the national board showing party membership levels, the issues of national interest, and a placeholder for media cubes for those who've won elections.
The main playing area is a propeller of four identical boards showing four elections to be contested. At the start of the game, the first four states are drawn randomly and each player begins with one meeting marker in each of the four states to be contested and their polling trend set to the centre space (0). Each board represents one state to be contested (drawn randomly) and then platform issues are dealt out to each state. 597
The current state has all four face up, the next state three of four face up, then two, then one. This allows for some pre-planning, but also for surprises to pop up. Duplicates and opposites are not allowed, and in those cases the cards are put face up on the board for use later.
The largest state with 80 seats. The next largest has 60, and the smallest state has only 15. As each game will have a random set of states, no two games will be the same.
Everyone gets their 5 media cubes, 5 party donation cards, 7 shadow cabinet cards, their supply of meeting markers, and €25.000 to start the game.
Each party then has two choices to make for their set up. One determines some level of starting influence (column 1) and the other determines starting media influence and party membership (column 2).
The planning starts immediately.
In column one you're choosing a combination of popular trend (the thumbs up), votes (the X symbol), or meeting markers (the balloon). You need to write the name of the state (or the number of the election if you can't read the German names) in the space next to each selection.
In column two you're choosing a combination of media markers and party members. Party members aren't tied to any particular state.
Everyone makes their choice in secret and reveals and resolves together. Then you're all set to go.
The winner of the game is the player who earns the most victory points, which can be gained in the following ways:
- seats won in each election
- winning the hearts and minds of the people (party membership)
- national media attention (placement of media cubes)
- matching your party platform to the national interest
The following is simply a summary of how the turn proceeds and is not intended to be a rules rehash. However, because of the interdependence of actions, I have highlighted the important aspects of each phase.
Each round is broken into the following phases:
1. Bid for choose the starting player: Player order will be important throughout the game. If you're first, that confers advantages in some phases but disadvantages in others. 597