Junta

About this board game

Junta is a political negotiation and coup game for 2–7 players, with play lasting about 240 minutes. Players represent powerful families in the Republica de los Bananas, competing to accumulate the most pesos in their Swiss bank accounts before the money runs out.

At the start, a president for life is elected. The President assigns roles to the other players, then draws eight money cards from the foreign aid deck and proposes a budget. Players vote on the allocation, while the President may keep some foreign aid undisclosed and can choose not to include everyone.

Votes are shaped by each player’s office and cards. With money and influence at stake, every budget becomes an opportunity for negotiation, self-interest, and betrayal. Each turn contains between seven and nine rounds, including card drawing, role assignment, budgeting, location selection, assassination attempts, banking, and possible coup proceedings.

• Assassinations: Players can target opponents, including the President, by guessing which of five locations they occupy.
• Swiss banking: A successful assassin takes a victim’s unbanked money; deposited funds remain safe.
• Family survival: A killed player returns as another member of the same family with new cards, while retaining the family’s Swiss bank funds.
• Coups: Armed forces fight for control of five power centers before a final vote decides whether the President remains or the Junta takes over.

Players may launch a coup when they have a coup excuse, whether driven by anger, opportunity, or ambition. Rebels use the forces of their previously assigned roles, while loyalists defend the President. When the coup ends, control of the power centers determines the vote—and someone is sent to the firing squad.

In Junta, surviving long enough to reach the bank can matter as much as winning the latest political struggle. The winner is the player with the most pesos safely deposited in Switzerland when the money supply is exhausted.