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We were playing Monopoly.

  • One of the players drew a ”Get out of jail free”-card.

  • On the next turn he landed on the ”Go to jail”-square and went straight to jail.

  • On the turn after that he decided to NOT use his ”Get out of jail free”-card.

We had an argument about whether he was required to use the card or not?

Is he free to not use it and to stay in the jail for the next three rounds as usual?

Joe W
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Hossam Shafie
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    Not only can you stay in jail voluntarily, in many cases you should. Starting somewhere around the mid-game in Monopoly (when most of the properties have been bought and people have started building houses), moving on the board becomes a liability (net negative expected value), and staying in jail gives you three turns of not needing to do that. // As far as I can tell, there is no coherent flavor justification for this. That landlords should/do routinely go to jail is in keeping with the game's communist origins, but why they would want to go to jail and stay there makes no flavor sense. – Zags Feb 06 '23 at 16:20
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    @Zags The game's origins are not communist, they are from a now relatively obscure economic / tax reform movement. This is a bit of a nitpick, but there is an unhelpful tendency (particularly in US politics) to label anything more left-wing or liberal than the status quo as "communist", completely erasing the meaning of that term. – IMSoP Feb 06 '23 at 17:51
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    The problem is we started to build houses and hotels and he decided not to get out of jail cuz he don’t want to pay any rent and get bankrupt .. that’s why I asked about this situation – Hossam Shafie Feb 06 '23 at 19:11
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    @IMSoP Fair point. Georgist origins. – Zags Feb 06 '23 at 19:21
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    Turns out Jail was supposed to be a punishment. Per this article, the original inventor of the game (Elizabeth Magie) once said "The rallying and chaffing of the others when one player finds himself an inmate of the jail, and the expressions of mock sympathy and condolence when one is obliged to betake himself to the poor house, make a large part of the fun and merriment of the game.” – Zags Feb 06 '23 at 19:21
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    @HossamShafie Right, staying in jail to avoid landing on houses/hotels is the optimal way to play. – Kosaro Feb 06 '23 at 20:12
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    @Zags People in real life sometimes intentionally get themselves sent to jail to have a place to stay the night. And flavor-wise, we already have the question of why someone who owns several hotels would be paying rent to other people. – Acccumulation Feb 07 '23 at 03:43
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    @Acccumulation: This is getting off topic, but, as a Georgist allegory, Monopoly's "rent" is an abstraction over all kinds of economic rent, not just the "rent" that you pay your landlord. For example, if someone owns an oil well, and exploits it, then some portion of their profits can be attributed purely to the fact that they own a well and most people don't - that's rent, and everyone buying the oil is paying for it. (Incidentally, the fact that it can be profitable to sit in jail says a lot about the behavior of modern corporations...) – Kevin Feb 07 '23 at 08:23
  • @Zags: Prison is not there to signify that landlords have to go to jail - the limited amount of players just leads to inevitably every player needing to be a landlord of some variety. You've fallen prey to the law of small numbers The existence of prison on the board is making a comment on the notion that prison can be looked at as "free housing" when the supposed "free" outside world becomes capitalistically hostile to reside in. – Flater Feb 08 '23 at 22:17

1 Answers1

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Yes. You do not have to use the "Get Out of Jail Free" card. Although there is not a specific rule stating this, you don't have to do anything in the game unless there is a rule that says you have to do it (I.E., there is a specific rule that says that if you land on the Go to Jail space, you must move to Jail).

The rules about the "Get Out of Jail Free" card simply state:

You get out of Jail by… (1) throwing doubles on any of your next three turns; if you succeed in doing this you immediately move forward the number of spaces shown by your doubles throw; even though you had thrown doubles, you do not take another turn; (2) using the “Get Out of Jail Free” card if you have it; (3) purchasing the “Get Out of Jail Free” card from another player and playing it; (4) paying a fine of $50 before you roll the dice on either of your next two turns.

If you do not throw doubles by your third turn, you must pay the $50 fine.

Using the card is simply listed as a way that you can get out of Jail, just like paying the $50 is. Note that paying the $50 is mandatory if you don't get out of Jail for free (with the card or by rolling doubles) within 3 turns.

Cohensius
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GendoIkari
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    Does this mean that if you fail to get double 3 times you must pay the $50, even if you have a Get Out of Jail Free card you would prefer to use? Would you have to use the card before the 3rd role? – Kosaro Feb 06 '23 at 20:12
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    @Kosaro Yes, that is correct. If you do not throw doubles by your third turn, you must pay the $50 fine. Since you've thrown the dice a third time and failed to get doubles, you are required to pay. – Drise Feb 06 '23 at 20:49
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    Wow, I was always the kid chastising others for playing by whatever silly house rules instead of the actual rules, and even I missed that you still have to pay after serving your time. Counterintuitive, frankly. – Karl Knechtel Feb 07 '23 at 14:21
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    I also always played that you could use the card after the third non-doubles roll. Truly not intuitive. – manassehkatz-Moving 2 Codidact Feb 07 '23 at 17:41
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    To be fair the language is ambiguous... 1) " if you succeed" implies you WANT to. But you might throw 3 and "oh hell I have to". 2) "using the “Get Out of Jail Free” card if you have it" - using implies will, maybe 3) purchasing - obviously not compelled 4) " paying a fine of $50 " [ implied voluntary] 5) "by your third turn, you must pay the $50 fine." compelled I say. The trick is, game suggests you want to get out, but, you (probably) don't - : maybe the solution is , agree house rules before playing? – lessthanideal Feb 07 '23 at 23:59
  • Also rather counterintuitively, the rules appear to say that (1) you have three turns to roll a double; (2) on the first two turns, you can pay $50 before you roll to pay your release; (3) but on the third turn, you can’t. So if you don’t have a card available and don’t roll a double on your first two turns, you have to use your third attempt at a double and then (assuming you fail) pay $50. I suppose this is to prevent players from deliberately extending their stay in jail to four turns. – Janus Bahs Jacquet Feb 08 '23 at 15:54
  • @JanusBahsJacquet I interpret the intention differently. In the first two turns, you can't roll and only if the roll fails then decide to just pay the fine. Assuming players want to be released as soon as possible, which is how the rules were written, either pay the fine and be guaranteed to get out early, or roll the literal dice and maybe you can get an early release. In the third turn, however, there is no more early release, so the negative effect of rolling the dice (= chance of not getting released) dissipates and the positive effect of not needing to pay the fine is all that remains. – Flater Feb 08 '23 at 22:30
  • @JanusBahsJacquet: I do agree that the rules seem to imply that this is a rule to be enforced against the player's will rather than something that the players would want (thus not needing to make it an enforced rule), but the slight difference in how the third turn works actually describes the optimal player strategy, given how the first two turns are mandated to work (all under the assumption that a player wants an early release, which is how the rules were originally written) – Flater Feb 08 '23 at 22:34
  • @Flater Well, to an extent, yes. If a player wants to be released from jail, there’s very little incentive to pay the $50 before rolling the dice on the third turn – the only thing you’d be doing is throw away a potential chance to get out without paying. It’s still odd that the rules actually forbid you from doing this, though – it’s your money, after all, and if you want to waste it, that’s your choice. The only way that part of the rules makes sense is if you want to prevent the player from obtaining a fourth turn in jail. – Janus Bahs Jacquet Feb 08 '23 at 23:10
  • @JanusBahsJacquet I think there is a difference… if you pay to get out of jail before rolling, the rolling doubles means you get an extra turn after. If you don’t pay to get out; then getting doubles doesn’t allow you to go twice. – GendoIkari Feb 08 '23 at 23:42
  • @GendoIkari You can’t pay and then roll in the same turn – paying ends your turn just like rolling does (at least according to these rules). If you pay and then roll a double on your next turn, that will indeed be a regular double – but still on your next turn. That’s what I mean by preventing a fourth turn in jail: if you could pay before rolling on the third turn, you would use your turn on that and wouldn’t be able to roll until your fourth turn. – Janus Bahs Jacquet Feb 09 '23 at 00:23
  • @JanusBahsJacquet The rules I quote in my answer specifically refer to paying the $50 fine before you roll on your turn. – GendoIkari Feb 09 '23 at 01:44
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    Yes, right you are. I got myself confused by the different rule sets which actually contradict each other. But the third turn is still ‘special’ in the rules you quoted, in that you cannot pay and then potentially get a double turn by rolling a double the way you can on the first two turns. – Janus Bahs Jacquet Feb 09 '23 at 02:06