Blog Post 2: Secret Hitler Session Review



Link to Secret Hitler Boardgamegeek.com review:
https://www.boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/188834/secret-hitler
In class today I played Secret Hitler for the first time. This Session Review of the game shows my growing understanding of the game. This was the most interesting part of playing for me because after this I felt that I got a better grip on how to play both sides of the game.
Started with 6 people = 4 liberals, 1 facist, 1 hitler
Everyone gets two cards. Party and secret role.
Everyone closes eyes, someone announces, and Hitler + fascists open eyes to know who is who
Alex is Hitler. Sarahi is fascist. Everyone else is liberal. (UNKNOWN TO ME AT THE TIME. This would have been helpful but obviously this was a secret.)
The game starts and I have no idea who is good or bad. Everyone is looking around at each other.
Begin by electing a president that rotates
President elects a chancelor
Vote if the person is chancelor or not.
Randell is president and picks Alex as chancellor.
President Randell (Liberal) picks 3 policy cards, throws away one, give it to chancellor (Alex, Hitler).
Chancellor picks one and shows everyone. Fascist or liberal
Alex was given 2 fascist cards. Forced to pick fascist policy. (so he said)
So we learn that the President can frame the chancellor and only give fascist cards.
Rotate. Sarahi is president (Fascist), Madison (Liberal) is chancellor
Picked Liberal policy (1/5 to win)
Madison (Liberal) is president. Picked Wesley (Liberal) is chancellor.
Picked Liberal (2/5 to win)
Wesley (Liberal) is president. Picked Randell (Liberal) is chancelor.
Picked Facist. (HERE I GOT TO WITNESS FIRSTHAND HOW I COULD BE FORCED AS PRESIDENT TO GIVE THE CHANCELLOR 2 FASCIST CARDS because I got 3 fascist cards when I drew them :( everyone looked at me and thought I was a Fascist)
Alex (Hitler) is president. Picked Sarahi (Facist) as chancelor.
Picked Fascist. All 3 cards were fascist.
Calvin (Liberal) is president. Picked Madison (Liberal) as chancelor.
All cards were fascist. Alex knows because he was president last time.
Fascist is picked.
Since 4 fascist cards were picked, the board says the president gets to kill someone.
Calvin (Liberal) gets to kill someone. Calvin picked Alex (Hitler).
Alex was Hitler. Liberals win! (Us liberals got pretty lucky here.)
After this initial game, I felt that I had a better understanding of how to play the Liberal side, and how different the Fascist side is. I realized that a Fascist President could frame a Liberal Chancellor and make everyone think he was the Fascist one. I started to not trust people and what people were saying after that and during the next game, Randell was saying that he was being framed because he had to pick a Fascist bill, but at the end of the game we realized he was the Fascist! He sold us pretty well on his act and now I feel that if I were to play it again, I would want to be a Fascist because all of the times we played I was a Liberal.
It was also interesting playing with some people that I knew and some people I didn’t know. I wasn’t sure I could trust the people that I didn’t know before we started playing, and felt that I could trust the people I knew. Then I realized that lying is the name of the game and that I really couldn’t trust anyone over anyone else. I would probably be more weary playing with all new people, but I also think it would be easier to tell who was lying if I was playing with all my friends, especially the ones who are bad at lying. Overall it was a fun and very interesting experience and I would be very interested in buying a version of the game for my house to play with my house-mates!