Politics is a field of many interests and limited resources. Convincing your local congressman to do something about something takes a lot of convincing—you're not the only one, after all. Influence is the name of the game, and it's a matter of who is the most convincing, bar other factors that ensure this game will always be rigged.
ACE Lobbyist is Eric Miller's simulation of the process where you play as a lobbyist trying to tilt at least three out of four representatives in your favor. Your adversary has a few advantages up his sleeve, and it's up to you to save your firm by thwarting his plans.
The game takes place in five turns representing days. While not wholly necessary jokers represent the two lobbyists, with your adversary the one with a pile of aces near him. Four kings/queens represent... representatives whose majority you're trying to snag. A starting value is given for each representative by dealing a card of matching suit or two. Your enemy has his five cards, the last one being a random ace.
Your turn consists either of playing cards on a representative in an attempt to win their favor or by spending them in investigating what ace isn't in your enemy's hand. A card can be played on a representative if it matches suit or color: matching suit is worth its face value and a card of the same color but differing suit is half rounded down. The cards on your side must be greater than the cards on the other side plus twelve. An investigation costs 21 points of the same color, but unused cards carry over until the costs are covered. Once paid for you turn over one of the unused aces.
If you draw a jack you gain at most an extra turn, as you can only have up to five cards in your hand. Unused cards are discarded, so are spent investigation cards and activated jacks.
Designing a solitaire game with an imaginary enemy is a mix of algorithm and randomness. In this case the enemy's unguided racketeering is supposed to be offset by a final decisive play that can be countered through foresight. The idea has merit, but in this game is done with some weaknesses.
The amount needed to flip a lobbyist in your favor is 12 plus the value laid on the opposing side, not an intuitive number to calculate. While I understand needing an offset in favor of the other guy, an offset of 10 is more intuitive and can be easily balanced out.
Investigating is meant to be an extra play one has to consider when playing out his cards, how to distribute his resources between immediate and long-term concerns, i.e. whether to lobby immediately or acquire enough information to plan a reaction to the last play. The problem I've experienced is that overloading a couple of lobbyists as much as possible in my favor can make any strategizing moot.
Amid these issues, the game is playable and the gameplay is easy to follow once the issues are ironed out. Here are some notes I put up during gameplay that I've posted on the game's BGG forums:
- Jack mechanic unclear over what to do when another jack is drawn from a jack draw. If read as is jack power becomes moot in this situation. Can it be said that one jack is activated per turn which then increases hand capacity to five cards in that turn?
- Pet bill setup is unclear: It's not worded well that if any first card is four or less an additional card will be placed on it regardless of value.
- Can cards of both colors be played for an investigation? The rule as it is written implies only one color maybe be used for investigation at a time.
- Ace value might need tweaking to justify needing to spend on investigations as overpreserving on a lobbyist seems to work as well.
