Monopoly Deal Strategies

Monopoly Deal is an enjoyable, easy-to-learn card game based on the original board game Monopoly. The game is ultimately 75% luck, which makes it a light-hearted game to play. There are a few strategies you can implement to increase your chances of winning. You can read the full rules here or play the game online.

Smaller Cash Denominations are Powerful

You should always give up a $2M instead of 2 $1Ms.

Keep your $1Ms and avoiding placing full sets (all of the stacks on the right are one card short!)

Avoid Placing Full Sets

You need three full sets to win so I recommend placing down properties until you are only one card away from reaching a full set. You have three moves per turn and can win by securing the last card with each move.

Don’t Feel Pressured to Use All of Your Moves

This is especially true in the beginning if you don’t have a lot of money. It is important to not leave properties unguarded/without a cash shield.

Debt Collector

Debt collector is a very powerful tool in the beginning. You can use it to steal properties because most people won’t have deep pockets yet. During late game, I advise you play debt collector on whoever has the least amount of money to weaken them and increase your likelihood of obtaining properties in the future. (Like a true monopoly, the rich get richer).

Debt collector can be used to shatter people’s dreams. The best usage is on players with few cash options (mostly large denominations) and those with little cash protecting their properties. I recommend you hold on to your “Just Say No!”s.

Just Say No

I would save your “just say no” cards for

1. deal-breakers
2. game changing sly deals/forced deals
3. exorbitant rent payments.

There are 3 just say no cards in play and 2 dealbreakers. If you can, wait to play the dealbreaker until you have a “just say no” card for reinforcement.

Bonus Story

Last night, I was playing with three other friends and we came across a neat scenario. My brother had 3 railroads (4 for full set), 1 waterworks (2 for full set), and a wildcard. The wildcard must be attached to one of the sets so regardless where he placed it, he was exposed to having a full set stolen through the deal breaker card.

My brother then played debt collector on another friend, which asks for $5M. She had $4M in money and had to forfeit one of her properties, either pink (3 for full set) or brown (2 for full set). In 99% of cases, I would recommend giving up the pink property because it is harder to turn into a full set. However, this was the case of the 1%.

My brother’s hand with a full set and my friend’s hand (she’s short on cash).

In my friend’s hand, she also had a deal breaker. She ended up giving up the pink card but my brother moved the wildcard to the pink property so he had no full sets. If she had given up the brown property, then regardless where he put his wildcard, he would have a full set! This deal breaker could have been very powerful because she had the potential to steal a wildcard.

Even though Monopoly Deal is quite a deterministic game, depending on which cards you draw, there are still cool strategy plays that can be made.