They never forget

What starts a grudge

Each rival keeps a running grudge against every other player at the table, you included. It goes up when you do the things people resent at a real game night:

• Refusing their trade. Once is fine. Twice in a row, and Otto starts keeping a tally.
• Robbing them, or parking the robber on a tile they share with someone else.
• Taking the corner they were building toward, or cutting their road off.
• Snatching Longest Road or Largest Army from them (or, in Knights & Barbarians, a metropolis).
• Playing Monopoly and emptying everyone's hands.
• Breaking a promise. Promise to keep the robber off someone and then rob them, and it isn't only the victim who remembers. Everyone at the table trusts you a little less.

Personality matters. Otto has a short fuse, so the same insult hits him harder than easy-going Pip.

What a grudge does

• Worse prices. A rival with a grudge asks more for the same cards, or flatly refuses: “Ask me again when I’ve forgiven you.”
• The robber comes for you. When a rival rolls a 7, the person they're angry with is near the top of the list.
• They talk about it. The rivals react at the table, out loud. They bring up old wrongs, rally others against you, and gloat when it comes back around.

How to get back in their good books

• Time. Grudges cool off a little every turn.
• A generous deal. Offer something actually worth their while and the grudge drops fast.
• A kept promise. Promise to leave someone alone for two rounds and keep your word. They notice.
• Letting them get even. Rivals feel a lot better after they've taken a title back from you.

Things every rival agrees on

Nobody trades with a player who is about to win: “Help the leader? No.” And they only know what you could know at a real table, which is what's been rolled, built and traded in the open. They don't see your hand. Ask what they're holding and they might tell you the truth, or they might bluff.