RULES & REGULATIONS

INTRODUCTION

The Commonspoly you are holding in your hands is the result of many
efforts combined to repair history; a misunderstanding that has lasted a
century. In 1904, Lizzie Maggie patented The Landlords Game, a board
game to prevent about the dangerous effects of monopolistic practices.
Years after that, she sold the patent to Parker Brothers, company which tur-
ned the game into the Monopoly we know nowadays: a board game that
celebrates the huge economic accumulation and the bankruptcy of anyo-
nebut yourself.

The proposal brought to the table in the hackcamp of the 17th ZEMOS98
Festival was turning upside down the game as we know it today: instead
of playing to ruin everyone, the idea was playing to get to a general state of
welfare for all of the participants; to redistribute the goods in order to com-
monize them; to share the access to material and immaterial resources for
the purpose of building a common world in which everyone of us fit. You
may be wondering why to play if there is no competition at all; as Carmen
Lozano put it: The challenge is in the ability to preserve the commons in
general without losing ones individual well-being.

Commonspoly has been inspired by hundreds of practices, agents and

projects working on the commons everywhere. From the starting point,
in the 17th ZEMOS98 festival on April 2015, Commonspoly has landed in
spaces like the Commons Fest in Greece, ECFs Idea Camp or Remix the
Commons in France. We hope you enjoy the game. Copy it, hack it, create
forks from it but dont privatize it ;)

www.commonspoly.cc

GOAL

- You have to cooperate with others to avoid privatisations and to try to

liberate as much as Goods as you can. You win if you cooperative to avoid
privatisations.
- You play against time. You will have between 10 and 20 turns (this is exp-
lained in Setting the Game) the Goods are going to be privatised.
- Be aware of the Police, cooperate and have fun.
BEFORE TO START - SETTING THE GAME

Step 1 - Set the number of players

Ideally the Commonspoly should be played between 4 and 6 people.

Step 2 - Prepare your pencil and check the documents and the cards

During the game you will need to update many times different type of
points. Prepare that and be sure you do that in the documents you have in
the Commonspoly box.

Also, you will find in the Commonspoly box 3 type of Cards:

- Global Cards: These Cards will affect all the players during one turn.
- Situation Cards: These cards will affect only one player during their turn.
- Blank Cards: In case you want to innovate and to invent your own Global
or Situation Cards.

Step 3 - Set the time

You need to establish how many turns you will have to play. The turns you
are going to set work for all the group and mean the time you have before
the game is over and everything is privatized. Roll the dice once to set the
time left

1-2: 10 turns to privatization

3-4: 15 turns to privatization
5-6: 20 turns to privatization

Step 4 - Set the type of Goods

The game have 4 type of Goods.

- Urban Goods.
- Ideas-Goods.
- Body-Goods.
- Environmental Goods.

Now we are going to define the initial status of privatization of this 4 Goods.
Roll the dice 4 times, one for each Good, once again and write down the
results.
1-2: Private
3-4: Public
5-6: Commons

Once you have defined the type of Goods you have, you need to use the
color dots you highlight in every box that. Use:

- Black for Private

- Grey for Public
- White for Commons

Step 5 - Set the Mode of the Game

Sum all the points you have wrote down for the 4 type of Goods. Write
down the result. You will have a number between 4 and 24 (F.E. You have
rolled the dice and you obtained 2 for Urban Goods, 3 for Ideas- Goods, 5
for Body- Goods and 3 for Environmental Goods you have in total 13).

According to these points there are 3 type of Mode of the Game:

- MODE Pure Mad Max Terror - If the total is from 4 to 10.

- MODE Transition - If the total is from 11 to 17.
- MODE Commonsfare Utopia - If the total is from 18 to 24.

Step 6 - Set you character

To set the profile of your character, roll the dice 4 times so you will define
gender, class, citizenship and skills. This is important because apart from
knowing who you are, you will define how many Welfare Points you have
to play. The Welfare Points are very important when you try to do an action
in the game.

Gender:
1-2: Male (this adds 2 Welfare Points)
3-4: Female (this adds 1 Welfare Point)
5-6: Queer (this doesnt add any Welfare Point)

Class:
1-2: Low (this doesnt add any Welfare Point)
3-4: Middle (this adds 1 Welfare Point)
5-6: High (this adds 2 Welfare Points)
Citizenship:
1-2-3: Yes (this adds 1 Welfare Point)
4-5-6: No (this doesnt add any Welfare Point)

Sum all to check how many Welfare Points you have (Minimum= 0, Maxi-
mum: 5). During the game, you can lose or even gain more Welfare Points.

Now, you have to set your Skills. There are 4 type of Skills you will need to
change the status of a Good. These are:

- Occupy Skill - Its for Urban Goods.

- Share Skill - Its for Ideas- Goods.
- Care Skill - Its for Body- Goods.
- Reconstruct Skill - for Environmental Goods.

Roll the dice 4 times and write down the results. You should have between
1 and 6 points for every Skill. During the game, you will have always the
same Skill Points.

Finally, roll the dice to set your initial Legitimacy points. You should start
with a number of 1 to 6 points of Legitimacy.

DURING THE GAME

1. The turn

- Pick a Global Card. What this Card says will affect the whole turn and all
the players.
- You are in the box called GO. Roll the dice to move or decide to rest
(Resting gives you 2 Welfare points).
- Move (you can move in any direction you prefer).
- You arrive at a box. Check the type of Good (from the 4 there are) and the
status (Private, Public or Commons).
- If it is private you dont receive any point.
- If is is public you receive 1 Legitimacy point.
- It if is commons you recibe 2 Legitimacy points and 1 WP.
- Perform and action.The options are:
-To Unlock a good if it is Private or Public. Its important to
mention that you can change the status of a Good step by step.
- From Private to Public.
- From Public to Commons
- Maintain a Good if it is Common already.
2. Managing the status of a Good

You have rolled the dice.

Now you have to pick and read a Situation Card and you have applied what
the card says.
If your decision has been to try to change the status of a Good, you have to
follow these steps:

- Look what kind of Good is the box you are in. If its private, you dont re-
ceive any point. If its public, you receive 1 Legitimacy Point.

- You have certain skills to change every type of Good. Remember that if
you want to change the status you need 8 Skills Points (if you use the Skill
for its related Good). If you use a Skill different that the one assigned to the
good (for example: Care on a urban goods) the difficult raises + 2 (so 10 Skill
Points in total).

-Occupy Skill - Its for Urban Goods.

- Share Skill - Its for Ideas- Goods.
- Care Skill - Its for Body- Goods.
- Reconstruct Skill - for Environmental Goods.

You probably dont have enough Skill Points. If thats the case,
you have two options:

You can transfer Welfare points to Skills points to achieve the

change of status. But then, you lose the Welfare Points you
invest on that. So, for example, if you want to make public a
private Urban Good and you only have 6 points of Occupy
Skill, but you have 5 Welfare Points, then you can use 2 points
to complete the action. At the end of the turn you would have
still 6 points of Occupy Skill but 3 of Welfare Points).

Or, you can roll the dice to obtain extra Welfare Points (and to
transfer them again as Skill Points). But this decision will cost
you 3 Welfare points. So in fact, you only can achieve to have
3 extra Welfare points (only if you get 6). If you get 1 or 2 then
you lose Welfare Points. IF you get 3 you finish
the turn with the same Welfare Points.

- If you achieve to change the status of a good, then you obtain 2 Legi-
timacy Points.
 - Finally and as we said before: if you have arrived to a box with a
Good which is already Commons, then you receive 2 Legitimacy Points
and 1 Welfare Point.

3. Police!

Depending on the MODE of the game, you will have 1, 2 or 3 policemen

on the game:
- MODE Pure Mad Max Horror scenario is played with 3 policemen.
- MODE Transitionnis played with 2 policemen.
- MODE Commonsfare Utopia scenario is played with 1 policeman.

At the end of the whole turn (after all the players have done their individual
turn) you will roll the dice to move the Police. The Police will move always
on the right. If the Policeman arrives into the same box you are on, you will
roll the dice to check how many Welfare Points you lose:
1-2 You lose 1 Welfare point
3-4 You lose 2 Welfare points
5-6 You lose 3 Welfare points
Also, if you are non-citizen, you cant move in one turn. Another player
who is a citizen can spend 1 Welfare point to liberate you (so you can con-
tinue moving in the next turn) and this player will receive also 1 Legitimacy
Point.

4. Special situations and special boxes

4.1. Go Choose!

From this box, you can go wherever you want without losing one turn and
without rolling the dice again. So, if you arrive at that box: decide where to
go, go and perform an action!

4.2. Assembly/Bureaucracy box + Advocacy Action

There is a special box called Assembly/Bureaucracy. Every time you arrive

here you can choose to participate in the Assembly. Participating in the
Assembly means to stay in that box for a time to participate actively in this
real democracy mechanism and so you might:
- To Lose 1 turn, which gives you 1 extra Welfare point.
- To Lose 2 turns, which gives you 2 extra Welfare points and
1 Legitimacy point.
- To Lose 3 turns, which gives you 3 extra Welfare points and
2 Legitimacy points.
It is not allowed to stay in the Assembly for more than 3 turns since you
will be considered to be trolling the Assembly and, therefore, you will be
punished losing all your points Legitimacy points.

But, if when you arrive to the Assembly/Bureaucracy box, you have unloc-
ked a half of one type of Goods, you can try to block privatization through
the Advocacy Action. In this action, from that box one will perform the
action and the others need to help this player. The rules of the Advocacy
action are:

- You cannot advocate alone. So ask players to join you, at least two of
you need to do it. The ones who do that spent their turn helping you.
- To make an Advocacy Action you need to Add all the Legitimacy
Points together and to check if you can make the Advocacy Action by
using:

15 points of Legitimacy in MODE Pure Mad Max Terror.

13 points of Legitimacy in MODE Transition
11 points of Legitimacy in MODE Commonsfare Utopia.

- But there is a special rule here: once you decide how many points
you want to gather, you will roll the dice. And the number you receive
is the points you are going to lose as part of the action. So, be smart
playing your cards here, you can fail advocating!

- Finally there are two options:

If you win, you spend all the Legitimacy points you have used,
but then all the players win 3 Welfare Points. Also, all the goods
which were private are now Public, all the goods which were
Public are Commons, and no one of those can be privatised
again in the game (neither with the Tragedy of the Commons
box).

If you lose, you all lose 2 Legitimacy points and 1 Welfare point.

4.3. Agora Central Box / Uprising action

The whole central space of the board game is meant to pressure and ad-
vocate for the releasing and commonization of goods. In the Agora Cen-
tral Box you can make the Uprising Action. Through this action, you will
achieve to make Commons all the goods of one type. But you need to fo-
llow certain rules:
- First of all, you need to arrive at that box after you roll the dice.
 - Secondly, you can stay for 3 turns there. Every turn, you spend one
Welfare point but you obtain one Legitimacy point.

- At least another player has to join you to perform the Upraising

Action.
- Once you are 2 players, you can invite 2 more players directly, wi-
thout rolling the dice.
- Now, you probably are prepared to perform the action. If you want
to change the status of a Good and to make all the goods as Com-
mons, you all need to spend together 30 Welfare points.
- But again, there is a special rule here: once you decide how many
points you want to gather (it can be more than 30), you will roll the
dice. And the number you receive is the points you are going to lose
as part of the action. So, again, think about it.
- Finally there are two options:
If you win, you spend all the Welfare points you have used, but
then all the players win 5 Legitimacy. Also, all the goods will be
now Commons and they cant be privatised.
I
f you lose, you all lose 3 Welfare points and 2 Legitimacy
points.

4.4. The Tragedy of the Commons:

During your turn, you can get into the Tragedy of the Commons box. As
you now exhaustion of common resources is very bad stuff, so if you get
into here, 2 goods of your choice go 1 status down (which is: Commons
goes Public and Public goes Private).

4.5. Commons infrastructures

Commons infrastructures boxes are Coops, Hacklabs, Social Centers and

Urban gardens. When you get into one of this 4 boxes, you get 3 Welfare
points + 1 Welfare point to share with any other player. If two player are in
one of these boxes at the same time, you will all get 1 extra Welfare Point
for each player is in a common infrastructure box. It is not allowed to rest
in these boxes.
4.6. Supplies

Supplies boxes are P2P communication networks and Cooperative con-

sumption
collectives. Whenever a player gets into one of these boxes, they work on
this valuable Commons and so, they lose 2 Welfare points and gain 2 Legi-
timacy points. However, if a non citizen player gets into a Supply box, they
dont lose Welfare points and they gain 2 Legitimacy Points as well.

4.7. Crowdfunding box

If during your turn you get into the Crowdfunding Box, you can donate the
amount of Welfare points you choose to any player. If you do so, you gain
1 Legitimacy point for every 2 Welfare Points you give.

CREDITS

From the very first version at 17festival ZEMOS98:

Virginia Benvenuti, Carla Boserman, Vassilis Chryssos, Francisco Jurado,
Jos Laulh, Carmen Lozano, Rubn Martnez, Peter Matjai, Mara G. Pe-
rulero, Natxo Rodrguez, Igor Stokfisiewski, Menno Weijs, Mario Munera y
Guillermo Zapata.

Development at CommonsFest:
Dimitris Daskarolis, Sergios Daskarolis.

Development at Remix the Commons encounter:

Thierry Pasquier, Frdric Sultan, Irene Favero, Sylvia Fredriksson, Quitte-
rie Largeteau, Claire Broissaud, Denis Pansu, Claude Henry, Sybille (Valeu-
reux).
With the support of the European Cultural Foundation (ECF)

Latest version by ZEMOS98:

Re-design: Guillermo Snchez
Re-illustratin: Pablo Navarro
Coordinated by ZEMOS98

LICENSE
Peer Production License

www.commonspoly.cc
PRODUCED BY

WITH THE
SUPPORT OF

The European Comission support fot the production

of this publication does not constitute an endorse-
ment of the contents wich reflects the views only of
the authors, and the Comission cannot be held res-
ponsible for any use wich may be made of the infor-
mation contained therein.