According to the rules, Conglomerate players could seize buttons.
Of course, since each community could occupy at most 2 sets of buttons, when Han Mengying seized Community 17’s buttons, one of their original sets of buttons also became vacant.
Community 12’s players naturally swiped their identity cards to occupy it.
At this point, with 4 sets of buttons, Community 4 and Community 12 each occupied two sets, Community 17 had none, and had no way to seize any.
Han Mengying looked at Fan Zehui, "First, let me apologize. I did mislead you, but I must defend myself a bit.
"The strategies I told you were indeed all true and correct.
"You overlooked the rule details of this game yourselves. You can’t blame others for that, and our seizing the Conglomerate identity was completely within the rules.
"Whether you consider this deception or not is your freedom.
"Now I’ll continue telling you the optimal strategy to win this game. You can think it over carefully.
"Each round of this game has income limits. Work income is at most 12,000, investment income at most 130,000. After our two communities accumulate certain wealth, we can quickly maximize these.
"As for Community 17, let them fend for themselves.
"Either way, two people splitting a cake is always better than three people splitting it, isn’t it?
"You’d better consider quickly. We could also implement the same strategy with Community 17."
After Han Mengying finished speaking, she gave Fan Zehui a meaningful smile.
Fan Zehui’s eyes carried anger. After all, being tricked and losing the Conglomerate identity was unacceptable to anyone but he didn’t immediately explode, having to submit to reality.
After Community 4 gained Conglomerate identity, they could actually distribute work opportunities at will.
If they wanted to cooperate with Community 17, Han Mengying only needed to deliberately yield 2 sets of work buttons for Community 17 to press.
Community 12 could occupy at most 2 sets of buttons, Community 17 would occupy the remaining 2 sets, then Han Mengying could bring Community 4’s Conglomerate players to seize all of Community 12’s buttons.
They could even directly prohibit Community 12 from occupying work buttons through the management room.
In that case, it would be Community 12’s turn to get nothing.
Fan Zehui didn’t represent just himself, he had to consider the other three players too.
Just then, Lin Sizhi’s voice came through.
"Are you trying to create a prisoner’s dilemma between us? Unfortunately, the premise of prisoner’s dilemma is that prisoners cannot communicate with each other. Obviously, this game has no means to block player communication."
Han Mengying turned around with interest, looking Lin Sizhi up and down, "Oh? So what if you can communicate? There are only 4 sets of buttons in total.
"Our 8 players from Communities 4 and 12 are enough to occupy all buttons. We don’t need Community 17’s participation at all to reach the total wealth goal.
"Does Mr. Lin have any insights? I’m all ears."
Lin Sizhi didn’t continue talking to Han Mengying, but looked at Fan Zehui instead.
"You’ve already been fooled once. Do you want to be fooled a second time?"
Lin Sizhi’s question somewhat stung Fan Zehui, who remained silent.
Han Mengying smiled, "They’re no longer Conglomerates. As long as they’re willing to remain Civilians forever, they have nothing left to lose."
Lin Sizhi sighed, "Fan Zehui, think carefully. Do you really have nothing left to lose?
"The visa time you’ve already earned, can the Conglomerate community seize it?
"Let me tell you what I would do if I were Community 4 right now:
"At the beginning, I’d happily earn visa time together with you.
"But when I’m certain the total wealth can reach 500,000 minutes before the game ends, I’d start using various methods to tax Civilians.
"Work tax, investment tax, inheritance tax, all Civilian tax rates would be raised.
"Especially ’inheritance tax’: in the upcoming games, each player will experience 2-3 more deaths. As long as Civilian inheritance tax is raised to 100%, most of your wealth can be easily seized.
"In the end, even if the 500,000 minute total wealth goal is completed, Conglomerates will take the absolute majority.
"If you dare resist, they can turn to cooperate with Community 17 instead.
"From the game mechanism perspective, this is completely feasible. Do you think Community 4 would do this?"
Fan Zehui was stunned and fell into deep thought.
Han Mengying couldn’t immediately refute because she knew Lin Sizhi was indeed right.
Regardless of whether she and Community 4 actually planned to do this, just pointing out this possibility meant that having already deceived Community 12 once, they could never win trust again.
Han Mengying thought for a moment and said, "Fine, I won’t refute this possibility for now.
"But Fan Zehui, you should also know that even if we deceive you, you can at least get some scraps in the end.
"You can retain some wealth by continuously investing in each other.
"But if you don’t cooperate, we can go cooperate with Community 17 instead, and you won’t even get those scraps.
"Do you think this Mr. Lin is truly considering your interests, or does he want to trick you and then seize the opportunity to cooperate with us?"
Lin Sizhi said meaningfully, "Fan Zehui, do I look like someone who would fight for scraps?
"The rules of this game are actually more like ’Fight the Landlord.’
"The two communities with Civilian identities are naturally disadvantaged. To fight against the Conglomerate community, they must unite. The rıghtful source is 𝙣𝙤𝙫𝙚𝙡•𝓯𝓲𝓻𝓮•𝕟𝕖𝕥
"Two against one is the optimal solution for this game.
"Fan Zehui, if either of our communities abandons the other to play with the Conglomerates alone, there’s only one result: being completely devoured with no chance of winning.
"Community 17 would never be so short-sighted. What about you?"
Han Mengying’s smile faded somewhat, but she still shook her head slightly, "You make it sound easy, but don’t you think cooperation built purely on mutual trust is very fragile?
"No matter how much you two Civilian communities unite, you absolutely cannot seize the Conglomerate identity from us.
"We still control all work opportunities and taxation."
Lin Sizhi nodded, "That’s right, but Civilian players aren’t completely powerless to fight back.
"For instance, we can choose to lie down and not cooperate.
"If we don’t cooperate, you can occupy at most 2 sets of work buttons, losing half the work income each round.
"The loss of work income would greatly delay reaching maximum investment returns. Moreover, only one investment transaction can occur between two players. Even under ideal conditions, your 4 people can’t maximize investment return limits.
"This means that by round 10, you cannot complete the 500,000 total wealth goal with just one community.
"From round 11 onward, if 4 sets of buttons aren’t occupied by 8 players, total wealth shrinks by 20% each round.
"After that little visa time you’ve saved is deducted for ten consecutive rounds, how much will be left?"