Yesterday a female friend -- Girl A -- wanted to get some ice cream, so I offered to go with her. She brought along a lot of friends, mostly female, and one male. He seems like a nice enough guy, I've spoken with him before.

So we go to the ice cream place. I'm first to sit down, which was my first mistake. I should be actively engaged in conversation the whole while, picking a seat is only a confident gesture if your with the group when you make that decision.

Group sits down, I make an active effort to engage myself in the conversation. I can tell I have low social pull in the situation, but I'm doing everything I see possible to do. When I get into big groups, my anxiety spikes pretty high so I manage the best I can.

The guy has a strong pull, and its me, him and three females all seated at one table. After about 15 minutes and no real hits into the conversation, he stumbles on his words and I make fun of him a bit for it. The girls laugh and he does too. I do it again when he slips up, and I think this one was a bit of a mistake. I should be aiming more for positive energy than negative, but I'm mostly at a loss of words.

Eventually, he leads the conversation into a game about State Capitals. I don't know many and I find the game boring, but I suppose it's useful information. It goes on for 10-15 minutes and I see two options: I can either absorb the information because it might be useful later, or say fuck it and start my own game.

Girl A is seated right next to me. She's a great connector with people and laughs at everyone's jokes, but I can tell her friends hold most the influence over her. She's very willing to please the other person. So I spot some board games, and ask her if she wants to play chess. She said she'd never played before and I told her I hadn't played in a while either. Looking back, I would've picked up connect 4 or some other game which more people are entertained by.

So now it's two girls and him in one bubble and me and girl A in another. Obviously, he wants more social dominance and I've just cut out 2 people from his bubble. He crosses over after a good 10 minutes, I offer: "Hey buddy, want to be my advisor?" He goes back to the other 2 girls.

Games over and put away, and we are ready to head out. I'm going to give him and the girl a ride back. He picks up the other girl and says "I'm going to put you on the hot hood of his car." She's laughing and a little nervous.

I put the radio on and he starts instantly singing along to the rap song I'm playing. We get back to school, I drop them off and leave. He played a good game, but I'm trying to frame the positive in the situation:
I couldn't beat him, but I did my own thing and brought one of the girls into it -- and had more fun than I would have.

If some of you seasoned vets want to poke some holes in my game theory or offer some suggestions, have at it.

Why are you trying to beat him in the first place? You said he's a nice guy so why not work with him? This isn't a zero sum game. It's not like if he has more charisma than you that you lose. There isn't even any winning or losing.

Also you said you didn't have much to say because you get nervous. I don't really know your personality so this might not work for you, but whenever I'm with a group I like to say something really outrageous just to get a conversation started, because let's be honest, regular conversations suck. State capitals? Really?

Anyway for example one of the gems I came up with today at lunch was, "Did you know people get their lower ribs removed so they can suck their own dicks?" Pretty crude I know but at least its more interesting than regular conversation and it puts the spotlight on you because you said something interesting.

Other than that good job on isolating the one girl to play chess. Are you actively gaming her?

_________________
"Why do we feel it's necessary to yak about bullshit in order to be comfortable?"- Mia Wallace

I actually really like that frame, but I'm not quite sure how to put it into action. For a lot of years I've been a competitive video gamer, and it's pretty recently I've actually tried to be social and make friends, so when I enter the situation I mostly see "the objective is to gain the attention and direction of conversation in a way that attracts the females. He is the AMOG and is thus my direct competitor."

So basically, what you are suggesting is to just acknowledge him as a friend and say outlandish shit with him?

Girl A is basically a pivot. She's pretty sweet and down-to-earth, but she's got a bf and I'd rather game singles.

Thanks for the feedback man.