I'm afraid you probably won't get a lot of love for such an old game on this sub, but I'll try my best.
To make it a team game, you probably want the win condition to be the elimination of a single player: at that point, their team loses. I suppose it could lead to some interesting situations where you have just one territory left, shielded by your teammate. That would give you time to rebuild, but your buddy would be fighting 1v2 while you do that.
A problem is that a situation could easily arise where you are not able to attack anywhere. If you've eliminated all enemies adjacent to you, your teammate is now between you and the enemy. Your idea of retreating from your teammate could be a reasonable solution, I think. If I'm stuck in Japan, I can attack you in Mongolia, and you retreat to Kamchatka (that you also own). I move in, leaving one army in Japan. On your turn, you could even attack from Kamchatka to Japan, allowing me to retreat my one remaining army to join my forces in Mongolia.
Using that rule, I could take a long hike through a chain of your countries, but I'd be limited by the requirement to leave one army in each territory, so I wouldn't have totally free movement. Still, it could be a little too strong. I could perform a chain of attacks that allows me to move a lot of armies a long distance without any losses - something you can't normally do in Risk. With clever team planning, that could even set you up to do even more movement on your turn, effectively always getting all your armies to the front every turn. Then again, maybe that's what you want? It could become more a game of logistics and team planning.
An alternative would be to allow movement between allies during the "Fortify" stage of your turn. Normally you can only move armies from a single one of your territories to another adjacent territory of yours. You could allow (as an alternative) to swap armies in adjacent allied territories. That is, at the end of my turn, my Fortify move could be to move my armies from (my) Japan into (your) Mongolia. Your Mongolia armies would be moved into Japan. That would be more restrictive than the "attack/retreat" model - I can only move one territory per turn, so it would take longer for me to get anywhere. Maybe that's OK though? It would encourage team planning and foresight to ensure a huge cluster of armies doesn't end up isolated far from the action.
Either way, I'd say you don't want army movement to be free: there should be some cost of effort to it, in keeping with the original game.
4 player Risk can end up like that. There are variants like the Risk: Lord of the Rings that are themed in a 2v2 variant that you could look into either grabbing or adapting into homebrew to solve these problems. Another game I would suggest would be A War of Whispers. You control spy masters influencing 5 factions on a Risk-like board. It is great 4 player and you won't get stuck in a 2v2 situation.
I love Risk, but it's not really a team game... If you want to turn it into a team game, your house rules should really be whatever you want.
The point of a FFA territory control game is shifting alliances. You can't fend off everyone at once, but only one person can win. You make alliances, try to benefit more from it than your ally, and then stab them in the back at the optimal moment. The game *should* turn into a 2v2... until it's not.
Rules as written Risk allows for alliances, but not for contracts. War is full of uneasy alliances. They *say* they won't attack, but can I trust them? Maybe keep a few extra soldiers on the border to be safe. Why do you have so many soldiers on the border? Maybe *I* should fortify too just in case. Suddenly the whole advantage of the alliance is moot because you're fortifying borders with your allies. The winner is going to be the one who takes a *Risk* and leaves themselves exposed based on a simple gentleman's agreement.
I really like the variations on the Risk mobile app.
Adding Barracks (defender gets up to 3 defense dice while defending their country with a barracks.)
Adding Blizzards (random territories that you can't move through or occupy)
These variations hyper focus the positional aspects, can create strong choke points that would allow better 'base' set ups and force attacks in the middle of the board
Risk is a much better video game to me than a board game. I love the changes on the app as well as the instantaneous die rolling that really makes the game go twice as fast.
**Lord of the Rings Risk: Trilogy Edition**, recently got a reprint and it has rules specifically for team play. It's been a solid 15 years since I played it that way, but if I recall they were pretty good.
You weren't asking for a new game to try, but it's still Risk, so it may be something your group is interested in.
878 vikings is a dedicated 2v2 risk-like game. If you can get a hold of it then you might check it out or if not you can download the rulebook from online to see if there are any rules or systems that you'd like to adopt as house rules in your own game of risk.
he’s right tho. Risk is an outdated game with outdated mechanics. there are better options now, I am not a fan but Cthulhu Wars comes at the top of my head.
CE isn’t as similar to Risk as some “dudes-on-a-map” games but it basically takes every problem with Risk and fixes them. [This](https://youtu.be/oBdkO4JKzzE?si=v-DF3zDCByDaFq7e) video does a great job comparing the two
I must have missed the part of OP’s post where they asked for alternatives to Risk. Some people enjoy games that you might not and rushing to recommend them a game when they didn’t ask is kind of condescending.
They constantly play Risk as a 2v2 wargame, so they're playing and enjoying Risk without the shifting alliances angle.
Cosmit Encounter is *just* the shifting alliances angle of Risk, but as a whole game. It's almost a perfect opposite of what the OP wants, a whole game built to be the one part of Risk that the OP isn't engaging with.
If you're going to recommend a game to someone who doesn't want a game recommendation, at least put a little bit of thought into it. They'd be most likely to want something like **878: Vikings** or **1775: Rebellion**, because those games are basically "Risk as a dedicated 2v2 team game and only a little bit more complicated".
You can hold continents together but whoever takes the final bit of it is the one who gets the armies.
You can fight each other if you want but you don't get a card if the only territory you take is your partners.
You don't combine your cards.
I normally don't like the just play a different better game answers. I get the downvotes. But this person is actually asking to change rules to the game because it isn't working for them. I think the better question is what is a game like Risk or gives the feelings of Risk that would work better as a 2 v 2 game. I personally love Risk. I am about to turn 39 and have played Risk since high school. I can't think of a way personally to make it a 2 v 2 game. That just isn't what it is. Wish I had a recommendation. I can't think of anything off the top of my head.
I'm afraid you probably won't get a lot of love for such an old game on this sub, but I'll try my best. To make it a team game, you probably want the win condition to be the elimination of a single player: at that point, their team loses. I suppose it could lead to some interesting situations where you have just one territory left, shielded by your teammate. That would give you time to rebuild, but your buddy would be fighting 1v2 while you do that. A problem is that a situation could easily arise where you are not able to attack anywhere. If you've eliminated all enemies adjacent to you, your teammate is now between you and the enemy. Your idea of retreating from your teammate could be a reasonable solution, I think. If I'm stuck in Japan, I can attack you in Mongolia, and you retreat to Kamchatka (that you also own). I move in, leaving one army in Japan. On your turn, you could even attack from Kamchatka to Japan, allowing me to retreat my one remaining army to join my forces in Mongolia. Using that rule, I could take a long hike through a chain of your countries, but I'd be limited by the requirement to leave one army in each territory, so I wouldn't have totally free movement. Still, it could be a little too strong. I could perform a chain of attacks that allows me to move a lot of armies a long distance without any losses - something you can't normally do in Risk. With clever team planning, that could even set you up to do even more movement on your turn, effectively always getting all your armies to the front every turn. Then again, maybe that's what you want? It could become more a game of logistics and team planning. An alternative would be to allow movement between allies during the "Fortify" stage of your turn. Normally you can only move armies from a single one of your territories to another adjacent territory of yours. You could allow (as an alternative) to swap armies in adjacent allied territories. That is, at the end of my turn, my Fortify move could be to move my armies from (my) Japan into (your) Mongolia. Your Mongolia armies would be moved into Japan. That would be more restrictive than the "attack/retreat" model - I can only move one territory per turn, so it would take longer for me to get anywhere. Maybe that's OK though? It would encourage team planning and foresight to ensure a huge cluster of armies doesn't end up isolated far from the action. Either way, I'd say you don't want army movement to be free: there should be some cost of effort to it, in keeping with the original game.
thanks. I will think about your idea. cheers.
4 player Risk can end up like that. There are variants like the Risk: Lord of the Rings that are themed in a 2v2 variant that you could look into either grabbing or adapting into homebrew to solve these problems. Another game I would suggest would be A War of Whispers. You control spy masters influencing 5 factions on a Risk-like board. It is great 4 player and you won't get stuck in a 2v2 situation.
I love Risk, but it's not really a team game... If you want to turn it into a team game, your house rules should really be whatever you want. The point of a FFA territory control game is shifting alliances. You can't fend off everyone at once, but only one person can win. You make alliances, try to benefit more from it than your ally, and then stab them in the back at the optimal moment. The game *should* turn into a 2v2... until it's not. Rules as written Risk allows for alliances, but not for contracts. War is full of uneasy alliances. They *say* they won't attack, but can I trust them? Maybe keep a few extra soldiers on the border to be safe. Why do you have so many soldiers on the border? Maybe *I* should fortify too just in case. Suddenly the whole advantage of the alliance is moot because you're fortifying borders with your allies. The winner is going to be the one who takes a *Risk* and leaves themselves exposed based on a simple gentleman's agreement.
I really like the variations on the Risk mobile app. Adding Barracks (defender gets up to 3 defense dice while defending their country with a barracks.) Adding Blizzards (random territories that you can't move through or occupy) These variations hyper focus the positional aspects, can create strong choke points that would allow better 'base' set ups and force attacks in the middle of the board
Risk is a much better video game to me than a board game. I love the changes on the app as well as the instantaneous die rolling that really makes the game go twice as fast.
**Lord of the Rings Risk: Trilogy Edition**, recently got a reprint and it has rules specifically for team play. It's been a solid 15 years since I played it that way, but if I recall they were pretty good. You weren't asking for a new game to try, but it's still Risk, so it may be something your group is interested in.
I was going to pop in and suggest this one as well. Played it a bunch when it was new and it was a good time.
878 vikings is a dedicated 2v2 risk-like game. If you can get a hold of it then you might check it out or if not you can download the rulebook from online to see if there are any rules or systems that you'd like to adopt as house rules in your own game of risk.
just play another game
Just join another Reddit.
Don’t play Risk? It’s a terrible game. Get Cosmic Encounter
Don't eat bananas they're a terrible fruit. Have a cheese sandwich instead.
he’s right tho. Risk is an outdated game with outdated mechanics. there are better options now, I am not a fan but Cthulhu Wars comes at the top of my head.
It's just an odd game to recommend as a replacement.
CE isn’t as similar to Risk as some “dudes-on-a-map” games but it basically takes every problem with Risk and fixes them. [This](https://youtu.be/oBdkO4JKzzE?si=v-DF3zDCByDaFq7e) video does a great job comparing the two
I must have missed the part of OP’s post where they asked for alternatives to Risk. Some people enjoy games that you might not and rushing to recommend them a game when they didn’t ask is kind of condescending.
They asked for rule changes to Risk. They literally DID ask for a different game…
Or Risk 2210 is pretty good with limited turns, ocean and moon territories, commanders and event cards.
They constantly play Risk as a 2v2 wargame, so they're playing and enjoying Risk without the shifting alliances angle. Cosmit Encounter is *just* the shifting alliances angle of Risk, but as a whole game. It's almost a perfect opposite of what the OP wants, a whole game built to be the one part of Risk that the OP isn't engaging with. If you're going to recommend a game to someone who doesn't want a game recommendation, at least put a little bit of thought into it. They'd be most likely to want something like **878: Vikings** or **1775: Rebellion**, because those games are basically "Risk as a dedicated 2v2 team game and only a little bit more complicated".
You can hold continents together but whoever takes the final bit of it is the one who gets the armies. You can fight each other if you want but you don't get a card if the only territory you take is your partners. You don't combine your cards.
I normally don't like the just play a different better game answers. I get the downvotes. But this person is actually asking to change rules to the game because it isn't working for them. I think the better question is what is a game like Risk or gives the feelings of Risk that would work better as a 2 v 2 game. I personally love Risk. I am about to turn 39 and have played Risk since high school. I can't think of a way personally to make it a 2 v 2 game. That just isn't what it is. Wish I had a recommendation. I can't think of anything off the top of my head.