Conflicted Card Game - Review

While scrolling along on the internet I came across this card game, Conflicted. Always looking for items which can be useful I went ahead and ordered the first deck of cards. Using Amazon the cards came a few days later.

Below is the 'about' section from their website

"Conflicted: The Survival Card Game was born from friends debating why the world is the way it is. Discover where you will draw the line between your morals and your humanity.

Know Your Self
Conflicted was designed to help you think about life in a post apocalyptic world. After playing it, you'll be more aware of your own strengths and weaknesses and areas needing improvement. How far are you willing to go in order to survive, when the choice is life versus your own morals?

Know  Your Friends
When you play Conflicted: The Survival Card Game with your friends and family, their answers will tell you all about their philosophy on prepping and survival. What they say or don't say, their body language - it all matters.  You will probably re-think who you'll bugout with after the first game.

Know  Your Enemies
By playing Conflicted: The Survival Card Game you'll realize that the thin veil of civilized behavior our current modern society portrays is easily torn apart. We all have a breaking point where our will to live speaks louder than our own morals. That breaking point is at a different place for everyone."

I thought this could be interesting and went through each card to see what the questions were like. To be honest the questions, for the most part, are extreme. They set up situations which almost no one will find themselves in, hopefully! Of course the entire idea of the game is these situations take place after an extraordinary incident has happened, a post apocalyptic situation. Which gives them the setting and ability to ask some of these extreme questions. Even in this setting some of the questions are........ just ........ heck I do not know the word, extreme doesn't seem to fit right.

People are asked to make life or death decisions.  On first read it appears they could simply give an answer, with no reference point to make the decision in their life to draw from. A lot of the questions ask about helping others but helping others would cause your family to starve. It is easy to say you would turn children away who are starving to allow your family to survive longer when the kids are not in front of you. Especially if you have never seen starving children or been to places where people are going hungry. Other questions ask about killing people for one reason or another. Again it is easy to say you would kill someone who is a threat to your family or group. Especially if you have never hurt someone else or had to use deadly force against another person. Some of the questions seem to give you only one way to answer the question but leave out other options. Here is an example;

"The airplane you stole lost 30% of it's power in mid air and is about to crash" The question goes on to say you have dumped everything you can to lighten the load and are now faced with two of your six person group having to "...... leave the plane... suffer an excruciating fall to their deaths." Did I forget to mention there are no parachutes? Your supposed to decide who is sacrificed for the greater good............

Here is an issue with this question, if you have a pilot in the group wouldn't they know how to land the plane? Why would you dump supplies, fuel and other items you stole? Why would you then sacrifice two of your group?

Completely understanding the concept here is to start a conversation with people and to get an idea of how they think. The question would seem to lead people into thinking the only answer was to have two of your group willingly or unwillingly sacrifice themselves. Which seems to guide people into a thought pattern where they are preprogramming themselves to think death is the only answer in a apocalyptic situation. Seems to embed what some folks call "training scars" into people which could lead someone to make what could be interpreted as poor decisions under pressure.

My personal answer is to land the plane as soon as the pilot thinks they can no longer stay airborne. What was the point if you lose all the supplies and people? Of course there could be other variables but given the question as it is written, landing the plane seems to be the one answer you are not lead toward. Once on the ground you could see about repairing the plane or lightening the load by having some of your group walk. Maybe they can take enough supplies with them the flight can be completed and the plane might even be able to come back to get them somewhere along the line?

Some questions are really good ones;

".... What do you think you could offer any community in exchange for food, water and shelter?" They narrow down the answers nicely by saying the community "...already have enough security and caretakers." The best part of this question states "This must be a skill you currently have."

Think about that question for a minute................. What skills do you have which would REALLY be needed after a total collapse? Think of the situation as they have framed it. The world is closer to all out Mad Max than Sex In The City..............

Well these sound like good skills to have at work tomorrow! How would they help if people are struggling to feed themselves?

We all know people who would believe this is the right answer!!!!

What can you do? Most of us have become specialist in our daily lives. You are a lawyer, how is that going to work out if people are reduced to scavenging for food? Maybe you do odd jobs, manual labor kind of stuff, a few times a week, then spend the rest of your time surfing and smoking as much dope as you can? How is that going to translate over?

Let's not even start discussing Human Resource types or folks with jobs like Life Coach...... And if I just made you mad because you are one of these, do not fear there are lots and lots of people out there who have less useful skill sets.

If the community has enough guys dressed like this I personally had to stop and think about my answer to the question. My go to thing is security, weapons, military and stuff like that. If the billet is already filled I would be hard pressed to make myself useful!! Sure I got some skills but not enough to sell myself as an expert farmer, healer or wizard! If the community needs male strippers I might be able to pull that one off!!!!!

What could you function as if the world went south? Be realistic about your answer since you are only answering the question to yourself!

Alright, last question from the deck of cards. This is a good question with multiple answers due to the open ended way the question is asked. This might be the best question in the deck to figure out how someone thinks they will respond.

"You are behind on rent and now that the Electromagnetic Pulse went off and the banks aren't open, your landlord came trying to collect. He said either pay up in cash or in goods, or he will evict your family and put them on the street in three days with the help of armed security. You were not prepared to bug out at all..... in three days he will bring armed men to take you out of the house, but right now he is standing in front of you, alone. How would you handle this situation?"

The parts in the question which just repeat the same situational information were cut out.

Let's start the answer with some thoughts about avoiding the question. Preparing for a bad day does not focus solely on the actions you take after something has happened. You shouldn't only focus on having gear, food and solar panels for after something happens. What you do before an event directly affects how you can respond during and after an event. This is one reason I think this question is one of the better ones in the deck.

If we square away our finances and put some cash away inside a safe in the house we have avoided this question for a moment. A moment which might buy us time to better our position. Having our finances squared away could allow us to buy a house. A house which would allow us to not be living under the rule of a LAND LORD. Taking these actions before an event would help us cover several problems at once and we try to cover as many issues with the least amount of resources. Moving back to the situation laid out by the question.

For these of this discussion let's say we are in the position the question has us in. Your options seem to be 1) find a way to pay the Landlord, 2) leave your home, and 3) do something to the Landlord? Going in reverse order to answer this question.

3) Do you assault or even kill the Landlord? He is threatening to put your family in a position of grave danger? If so how? Do you threaten him back? Can you threaten him? Do you have the ability to put 'the fear of god' into him? Do you have the ability to back up any threats you make? No really do you? If he comes back with armed men do you have the ability to resist? Are you willing to take the chance with your families safety you will be able to deal with him and others later, still keeping your family safe?

Do you assault or kill her now? Right now, when she has no back up? Is the situation so bad you need to end this threat right now to protect your family? Do you have the ability to killer her? Put your ego aside........ no really take an honest look at your life experience and skill set. Someone is at your door right now, can you kill them where they stand? I'll answer the question for you, no. Most people are not prepared for this kind of action. Nothing wrong with this! Most of us are not programed to be able to do this and not being able to easily kill another human is a GOOD THING! While your yelling at me insisting you could do this to protect your family I'll ask another question. You start to take action against the Landlord.... did you check to see if there are any witnesses to report your actions? If you kill the Landlord in the doorway are you going to get away with it? Are others going to come looking for her? Did you think about any of that before you thought of killing the Landlord in the doorway? Remember, life is more complicated than black and white answers.......

2) Leaving, could you? How would you pack up? Are you walking or driving? Where are you going? Can you get there in the situation the question is asked? Let's take the worst case and say you have to walk. Where is the closest place you could go? Are you and the family prepared to walk that far? No really (I keep repeating this on purpose)? Five miles to grandma's house is nothing in the car. Could you and the family make that walk carrying, pulling or pushing everything you could take from the house? What would you take from the house? When was the last time you walked a mile under weight?

1) Coming up with money or goods to pay the Landlord. Do you have money or goods on hand to do this? If you do this are you just delaying the time until your family is starving? Once you pay how too till they come back for more? If you pay are you letting them know or think they know you have enough to pay and have more inside? Do you have another way to pay? Are you skilled at negotiating or sweet talking your way out of things?

If you go into a situation with nothing you have greatly limited your options......

Take a moment and seriously consider your options in this situation. The situation does not have to be after an EMP, this can occur if someone loses their job tomorrow! Remember we are not just planning for the end of the world we are planning for everyday emergencies also!

At the end of the day I find myself really neutral about the deck of cards. I understand what they were trying to do and commend them for trying it! I feel some of the questions are to extreme. They lead people to much especially if people are new to preparedness. Will I be spending any more resources or time on this deck of cards, no.

I realize they have made other decks of cards with other questions. Maybe someone has read other decks? I would love to hear about what you thought about the other decks. As for me I can go without investing any more in these.

https://www.conflictedthegame.com


As always,

Stay Safe!!