Mousetrap: Trivial Pursuit Edition

This is the third installment of the series of Mousetrap. In the first article Mousetrap: A Metaphor for Dating we established the modes of play, objective of game, and rules. In the second article Mousetrap: Prepare for Dating we covered preparing the board, and yourself, for the game and filling your bait box to attract players. Well if you know all the rules, have prepared your board, and most importantly found another player; now what?

Strategy

So there you are sitting at the game table with a new player, ready to embark or at least willing to move one square on the board. But that’s the problem, you both are sitting there. Who makes the first move. The easiest way to tell who should move first and will subsequently be the leader is who used ‘live bait’ first. That means, someone who showed a side of themselves, took a risk, in order to get the other player to sit at the table with them. Be prepared though, it is likely that the first to use live bait and the first to make a step to the next square will most undoubtedly be the one the other is “chasing.”

Chasing

We have all heard the antiquated phrase “chasing tail” or “the love of the chase.” But now, chasing doesn’t mean quite what it used to. Chasing now-a-days is much like the chasing done in Mousetrap. No one is playing hard to get in mousetrap, but someone has to play the risk-taker. Someone has to be the one who reaches their hand out when approaching a task or trap. It is the natural role for risk-takers to be, but rest assured that if you are the one chasing it doesn’t mean you can’t take risks or jump ahead a square or two in the game! Well we have the leader and the chaser on the board, so now what?

Trivial Pursuit Edition

Lucky for our generation Mousetrap: A Metaphor for Dating, in an unbelievable move, joined forces with Trivial Pursuit: Question Yourself and created a very unique game. Once you know the object of the game, modes of play, and rules all that is left is to learn how to play the game. There isn’t dice in this game as one of the rules is to stay closely in sync with your playing partner. This game, much like in life, everything is taken one step, or one square, at a time. The leader moves one square and has to answer a personal question and if the ’chaser’ likes the answer they can elect to move one square as well. The ‘chaser’ now must answer the same personal question, if they do not they remain on that square until they answer an equally personal question. So on and so forth. Be aware that the questions not only become increasingly personal, but at times they can become loaded this is usually a sign that a task or trap square is approaching. Also you must remember the very important rule that each player needs to be within 2 squares of each other. Too many refusals and you will forfeit the game.

Chaser Becoming Leader

As it was mentioned before the chaser can become the leader on the board; not by answering questions but outwitting or outshining during a task or trap. Basically if a task or trap is completed first by the chaser, they become the leader. This gives the chaser not only a chance to advance an extra square with the original leader by helping them, but it helps them to become in sync again on the board. Role reversals are very common in Mousetrap: Trivial Pursuit Edition, but they are actually very essential if and when they land on the relationship square. Sometimes a leader becoming a chaser or vice-versa will end the game if such role reversal is unsavory to the promoted or demoted player. Unfortunately role reversal will most likely become a task or trap on the new game board if the game ends due to role reversal.

Conclusion

As you can see, the game has a lot of rules to remember but becomes pretty easy once you memorize them. The best strategy to playing thisgame is choosing the other players wisely. Each game loss could potentially add more tasks and traps to your game board, and literally make or break the game play. In the next Mousetrap article we will discuss tasks and traps, a very important part of the game.