Power Player Guide

Becoming a dominant force in A House Divided requires coordinating political, economic, and organizational power simultaneously. This guide covers the specific systems — party leadership, stacking offices, coordinating with other players, running a corporation — and how they interact when all running at once.

Phase 1: Building a Foundation (Turns 1–20)

Before you can dominate, you need baseline stats:

• Political Influence (PI) 40+ — Required for competitive primaries. Campaign aggressively in-state, at least 3–4 Campaign actions per turn.
• Favorability 60+ — Required for reliable primary wins and general election polling. Run ads on your strongest demographics.
• Party membership — Join the dominant party in your target state to access the largest candidate pool.
• Funds cushion ₳500k+ — Required to sustain canvassing, ads, and a campaign when elections open.

Do not declare for office until PI reaches 35+ and favorability is at least 55. An early loss tanks favorability and costs you actions with nothing to show.

Controlling Party Leadership

Party leadership is the multiplier on everything else. The party chair controls:

• GOTV budget allocation — Which demographics get turnout boosts across all party members' states
• Party organization growth — Org levels feed into every member's primary score
• Whip directives — How NPP legislators vote on bills (affects legislation success rates)
• Party platform position — The econ/social coordinates all members are scored against in primaries

To win a party leadership election:

1. Build favorability within the party (these are internal elections — party member favorability matters most)
2. Accumulate Political Influence; party leadership elections use the same influence scoring as regular primaries
3. Time your run — leadership elections spawn on a schedule; watch for the opening

Once chair, use GOTV strategically: concentrate budget on states where your candidates are running, not spread evenly. A concentrated 20% turnout bump in three swing states beats 3% everywhere.

Stacking Offices

Office stacking means holding multiple offices simultaneously when the rules allow it. In the US:

• You can hold a Governor seat while being a Senator (elected to both)
• You cannot hold both House and Senate simultaneously (you resign one on winning the other)
• Cabinet positions can be held alongside nothing else — accepting a Cabinet role vacates your elected seat

The highest-action combination in the US is Senator + Federal Reserve Chair: 4 (base) + 2 (Senate) + 3 (Fed Chair) = 9 actions per turn. The Fed Chair role also gives you influence over interest rates, which flows into bond yields and currency strength.

In parliamentary countries the equivalent is the lower-chamber seat paired with the central-bank chair — MP + Bank of England Governor (UK), Shūgiin member + Bank of Japan Governor (JP), or Member of Bundestag + ECB President (DE).

Running a Corporation Alongside a Political Career

Corporations generate passive income without requiring per-turn actions after setup. The action cost comes at setup: acquiring sectors, upgrading them, and managing corporate strategy.

The political-corporate cycle:

1. Found a corporation (one-time action cost + startup capital)
2. Acquire sectors in industries that benefit from your legislative agenda (e.g., healthcare sector if you're pushing healthcare bills)
3. Legislation that passes in your home state raises sector revenue in aligned industries
4. Revenue flows to your character as dividends, funding future campaigns and ads

This is a long-term play — corporations take 10–20 turns to generate significant revenue. Start early, run it passively, and reinvest into higher-margin sectors as your political power grows.

Influencing NPP Behavior

NPPs (Non-Player Politicians) fill empty seats and vote autonomously. At scale, they control the legislative outcomes of entire chambers. There are three levers for influencing them:

1. Whip Directives (Party Chair) — As party chair, you issue whip directives that NPP legislators in your party follow when voting on bills. This is the most direct control mechanism.

2. Ideology Convergence — NPPs vote based on ideological alignment with bills. If you know the NPP ideology distribution in a chamber, you can craft bills to align with the plurality of NPPs regardless of party.

3. NPP Endorsements — In primaries, NPPs with aligned ideology are willing to endorse you. Collect endorsements from NPP-heavy chambers for presidential primaries (player endorsements only count for presidential races).

Coordinating With Other Players

In a world with continuous turns, coordination is time-sensitive. The most effective coordination patterns:

Legislative coordination — Player A proposes a bill, Player B endorses it, Player C coordinates whip votes in the other chamber. Bills die from lack of action more than active opposition; coordinated action gets bills through in 2–4 turns rather than stalling indefinitely.

Electoral coordination — Two players in the same party can split their campaign efforts: one focuses NE states, one focuses SW, so neither cannibalizes the other's ad spend or primary slots.

Economic coordination — Players in different countries can synchronize central bank actions and legislation to create favorable exchange rate conditions for shared investments.

The "hold the line" role — In close party competitions, sometimes the right play is to hold your existing seat while another player pushes for a promotion. A sitting Senator maintaining their seat is often more valuable to the team than two players competing for the same Senate race.

Measuring Dominance

There is no win screen, but you can track dominance through:

• Party seat count in key chambers (majority = control)
• National approval rating of your executive (president/PM favorability)
• State-level metrics trending in your preferred direction
• Corporate revenue as a percentage of national GDP
• NPI ranking on the politicians page

The real measure of a power player is whether the game world responds to your actions — legislation passing, elections going your way, national metrics shifting toward your policy goals.

Common Power Player Mistakes

• Overextending into too many elections at once. Spreading thin across 3 simultaneous primaries means none gets enough action investment. Pick your races.
• Neglecting party org. It's invisible but compounds over time. A neglected state party org drops below 50, costing every party member 12+ primary-score points.
• Burning infamy on low-stakes votes. Save whip-breaking for legislation you actually care about. Constant defiance tanks your party standing and your own favorability.
• Ignoring small offices. State Senator seats generate actions and block NPP accumulation of state legislative power. Don't cede the sub-national tier.

Related

• Advanced Strategy — Strategic frameworks and career arc planning.
• Multi-Country Play — Cross-border economic coordination.
• Reference: Offices — All office action bonuses.
• Endgame Goals — What to aim for long-term.
• Reading the Game — Using available data to make decisions.