Double strike and trample, dealt lethal damage during first damage step. Does the rest go through? I have a 6/6 double strike, trample dealing damage to a 6/6 first strike, indestructible. As the double striker dies during the first damage, does the rest of the remaining 6 damage go through, or does it fizzle?

No, it does not. Your creature will not be alive during the second damage step, it will be in the graveyard and not able to deal damage.

Normally double strike would work this way, if all blockers of the double striking creature are dealt lethal damage in the first strike step, the regular damage step tramples onto the player completely. However in your case your double striker was also dealt lethal damage during the first strike step. Between these steps state based actions are checked, and rule 704.5g gets applied.

  704.5g If a creature has toughness greater than 0, and the total damage marked on it is greater than or equal to its toughness, that creature has been dealt lethal damage and is destroyed. Regeneration can replace this event.

This causes your double striker to be destroyed and move to the graveyard. The regular damage step will begin and, assuming there's only those two creatures involved in combat, there will be no creatures on the battlefield attacking to assign any damage during this step, so no damage is done.

If the creature that was blocking your 6/6 was instead a 5/6 first strike, indestructible, your double striker would live through the first strike damage step and would assign all 6 points of it's power for the regular damage step to the defending player, as the blocker already has lethal damage marked on it, even though it didn't die due to indestructible. It wouldn't need to do any damage to the blocker again.


Teysa, Orzhov Scion sacrificing one creature multiple times to exhile I have a rules question for you all. I run Teysa, Orzhov Scion and many black/white creatures in my decks, and I'm wondering if I can sacrifice a black/white creature for her exile ability, and then sacrifice the white spirit token that I get for having a black creature go to the graveyard towards that same instance of her exile ability.

If not, do I have to sacrifice all of the creatures at the same time, or can I, for example, sacrifice two, play a third, and then sacrifice that one?

The cost must be payed all at once.

The triggered ability that provides the Spirit token would not be placed on the stack, much less resolve, before you finish activating the ability. This happens the next time a player would get priority.

As such, you will not have a Spirit token to sacrifice before you finish activating the ability, which means you won't have a Spirit token to sacrifice to activate the ability, which means you are unable to activate the ability.


Neighing the active effect of Special Delivery in unstable unicorns So the neigh card states you can only neigh a card that is played, so the debate is does the active effect of "You may bring a baby unicorn card from the nursery into your stable" count as playing a card?

No, this does not count as "playing" a card.
From the rules:

Play vs. Bring Directly into Your Stable
"Play" specifically refers to playing a card from your hand
during your Action phase or playing an Instant card at any
time. If you "bring a card directly into your Stable," you
do not "play" that card. This means that any card that is
brought directly into your Stable cannot be Neigh'd.

Note that there are two print runs, and the earlier version included a different rulebook without this clarification.


Does the "Disease Zones Expand" emergency event only apply to cities with cubes of more than one color? The Disease Zones Expand emergency event card states to

  Add 1 cube of every non-matching color to each city with different colored cube(s).

Does this mean to add cubes to cities which have cubes of non-native colors (e.g. LA has a blue cube but no yellow cube, so it gets a second blue cube, and Mexico City has a blue and a yellow, so it only gets a second blue), or add cubes to cities which have cubes of 2 or more colors (e.g. LA has a blue cube but no yellow, so it gets no new cubes, whereas Mexico City has both a blue and a yellow, so it gets one extra of each)? Or is it something in between?

In this thread on BGG, game designer Tom Lehmann addresses this concern. User joekeck posted this as a reword:

  "if any cities contain any cube(s) (other than purple) that do not match that city's color, then add an additional cube of that cube color"

and Tom responded:

  In spirit, yes. The problems with this wording (which is similar to the wording I originally submitted to Z-Man) are: A) "that cube color" could conceivably be read as a cube of the city's color ("that" isn't unambiguous here) and B) it's too long for the card text area.

So in your example, both Los Angeles and Mexico city receive an additional blue cube, but no yellow cubes are added.


How does Charmed Pendant interact with Reaper King? Charmed Pendant has the ability

  {T}, Put the top card of your library into your graveyard: For each colored mana symbol in that card's mana cost, add one mana of that color to your mana pool. Activate this ability only any time you could cast an instant.

Reaper King has a mana cost made entirely of colorless hybrid symbols. If I turn over Reaper King with Charmed Pendant, can I add any mana to my mana pool? If so, do I have to add one mana of every color? Can I add any colorless mana to my mana pool instead of colored mana?

You have to add WUBRG to your mana pool.

From the Comprehensive Rules:

  107.4e Hybrid mana symbols are also colored mana symbols. Each one represents a cost that can be paid in one of two ways, as represented by the two halves of the symbol. A hybrid symbol such as {W/U} can be paid with either white or blue mana, and a monocolored hybrid symbol such as {2/B} can be paid with either one black mana or two mana of any type. A hybrid mana symbol is all of its component colors.

Colorless is not a color, so you cannot add colorless mana to your pool in this case.

  105.4. If a player is asked to choose a color, he or she must choose one of the five colors. “Multicolored” is not a color. Neither is “colorless.”

Also note the rules clarification on the card's Gatherer page:

  If you flip over a hybrid card, you get one of either color mana, not both, for each mana symbol.

This is just in cases where you flip other, "proper" hybrid cards with 2-colored hybrid mana symbols. In this case, you don't even have a choice as you can't pick colorless for a color.


Are gods treated as creatures before they enter the battlefield? Gods, such as Purphoros or Mogis, are not creatures if your devotion is not high enough.

Does this count when casting them? If, for example, an opponent tries to counter with Essence Scatter when the player casting a god doesn't have the required devotion, is the god a valid target?

Or, if Purphoros is on the battlefield and the controller tries to cast another god, for which they don't have the required devotion, do opponents suffer the 2 damage?

Yes. It always has the creature type when on the stack (though that makes it a creature spell or a creature card, not simply a creature).
No. ETB abilities check the appearance of the object as it exists on the battlefield.

The first question boils down to "When does As long as your devotion to red is less than five, Purphoros isn't a creature work?"

If it were a characteristic-defining ability, it would function in all zones, including on the stack[CR 604.3]. Mistform Ultimus has such an ability. But Purphoros's isn't a characteristic-defining ability because it sets the type conditionally[CR 604.3a]. As such, it only works when the card is on the battlefield[CR 112.6].

So, Purphoros has the creature type while on the stack regardless of your devotion, and Essence Scatter can target and counter it regardless of your devotion.

The second question boils down to "When does Whenever another creature enters the battlefield under your control check the object's type?"

First of all, it's not casting a creature spell that triggers Purphoros's ability; it's a creature entering the battlefield.

We know the God is always a creature card on the stack, but it might not be on the battlefield, so the second question boils down to when does the triggered ability inspect the God's types. ETB abilities check the object as it exists immediately after it enters the battlefield to see if the ability triggered[CR 603.6d].

In other words, Purphoros's ability checks if the God entering the battlefield is a creature as it exists on the battlefield, and that depends on the your devotion to the God's color. If it's low, it won't be a creature and your ability won't trigger.

Referenced Rules

  604.3. Some static abilities are characteristic-defining abilities. A characteristic-defining ability conveys information about an object’s characteristics that would normally be found elsewhere on that object (such as in its mana cost, type line, or power/toughness box). Characteristic-defining abilities function in all zones. They also function outside the game.

  604.3a A static ability is a characteristic-defining ability if it meets the following criteria: (1) It defines an object’s colors, subtypes, power, or toughness; (2) it is printed on the card it affects, it was granted to the token it affects by the effect that created the token, or it was acquired by the object it affects as the result of a copy effect or text-changing effect; (3) it does not directly affect the characteristics of any other objects; (4) it is not an ability that an object grants to itself; and (5) it does not set the values of such characteristics only if certain conditions are met.

  112.6. Abilities of an instant or sorcery spell usually function only while that object is on the stack. Abilities of all other objects usually function only while that object is on the battlefield. The exceptions are as follows:

(The exceptions are all common sense, such that an ability that requires you to discard a card to activate only function in your hand.)

  603.6d Normally, objects that exist immediately after an event are checked to see if the event matched any trigger conditions. [...]

(The exceptions are leaves-the-battlefield and similar abilities. Again, stuff that's obvious without knowing the rules.)


How does Terraforming work in Eminent Domain? Terraforming says you attach it to a planet, and if it would be enough to satisfy the printed colonization cost, settle the planet. How does this work? Does this count colonization reductions from settled planets or Fertile Ground? If not can it only settle starter planets?

The Terraforming action states:

  Add this card to a planet as 2 colonies. If that fulfills the printed Colonize cost, Settle that planet.
  Note: Ignore Colonize discounts in your Empire.

As far as I understand, the following occurs:

Firstly, you can play it onto an unsettled planet to count as two colonies (much like playing a Colonize counts as one).

In addition, if once you've played it the planet has sufficient colonies to settle, you can settle it immediately (discarding the Terraforming and any other Colonizes and flipping the planet).

e.g. If you have an unsettled planet with a Colonize cost of 3 and one Colonize card already on it, you can play Terraforming to double-Colonize and then immediately settle that planet.

For Terraforming, all discounts are ignored, mostly for game-balance.

i.e. In the same example as above, if you had an unsettled planet with a Colonize cost of 3 and NO Colonize cards on it (but a discount to Colonize from, say, another planet) then you could double-Colonize, but you would NOT be able to immediately settle, since you do not reach the requirements while ignoring discounts. You COULD however settle it later without further Colonizes required, since the action remains on the planet and still counts as two colonies.


Do coin tokens accumulate on squares? When I gain a coin token through a gold mine on a mountain, through a famous person tile or through a "bank" tile, does that token remain on that square? If my opponent captures that square by beating me in a battle, do I lose the tokens I already gathered there?

Your question is a little bit confused. Coin tokens do not accumulate on map squares. Coin tokens are used only to track coins gained through technologies. Your economy dial tracks the total of coin tokens on your technologies, plus the current number of coins you control on the map. From p. 26 of the rulebook:

  A player may acquire economic power in the form of coins – either coins printed on building markers and map tiles, or coin tokens placed on certain tech cards (such
  as Code of Laws) as a reward for accomplishing particular tasks.

Coins that are lost because of your opponents' interference are indeed lost until/unless you recapture them:

  If an enemy figure blockades the square containing the coin, it is lost while the enemy figure remains there. Similarly, if a building granting a coin to a player is destroyed, the coin is lost.

By contrast, the coin tokens that you earn on your technology cards are yours forever:

  Coin tokens advance the economy dial when gained and cannot be lost.


How long do you keep the rattlesnake card in Bang! I just bought the Valley of Shadows extension for Emiliano Sciarra's game Bang!
I can't find anywhere in the rules (or the internet) if you're supposed to discard the card after being bitten by the snake.
Does it work like the Dynamite or like the Jail card? Do you keeep it until you can self "cat balou" it ?

Thanks

It stays in play and checks every turn until someone (most likely yourself) either Cat Balou's or Panic's it away.

Edit:

This thread on Boardgame geek has the same answer.


Can I cast a spell multiple times in one round across different investigators if I trade it? Can I cast a spell and then have it traded to another investigator to cast that round?
This would work great with Blessing of Isis to ensure blessings all around.

Some spells say "once a round you may etc" so my thinking is that these cannot be cast more than once, but the wording literally could still mean each investigator can cast it once per round right?
After all, it would seem like they are meant to keep an investigator from preventing healing or stamina loss from all attacks all the time, which is sensible.
Passing it to another to cast once themselves sounds like a reasonable ruling.
Is there an official ruling?

A component can only be used once per turn.

  Although an investigator cannot perform a component action from a
  single component more than once each round, he can perform component
  actions of different components

It's not a specific 'investigator' but 'any' investigator that cannot use the component more than once.

So the "use" of a card kind of "sticks" to the card and cannot be used by another investigator.


Can the Wonder that pulls from the discard pile be used multiple times? One of the Wonders earns the player, in its second stage, the right to go through the discard pile of previously played ages, choose one card and build it for free.  Is this a one time deal, to be done at the conclusion of the age during which the player completes the stage, or can the player now "dumpster dive" in the discard pile at the end of every subsequent age as well?

You can use this ability one time only: exactly at the end of the turn in which this stage is built (not at the end of the Age!).

(And note that it’s not only for cards from the "previously played ages". The discard pile may also contain cards from the current Age and even the current turn.)

The relevant explanation is on page 8 of base game rules, "The Mausoleum of Halicarnassus":

  Clarification: this special ability takes place at the end of the turn in which
  this stage is built.


When survivors get knocked back from a range attack, do they get pushed in the cardinal direction closest to the vector from monster to survivor? The rules say knockback occurs directly away from the monster, so if the vector from monster to survivor is more Southward than Eastward, is the knockback wholly Southward?

There's no official answer to this from the FAQ, or anywhere in the rest of the community, unfortunately.  Most people play that you would do it in the rough direction of the vector, alternating moving horizontally and vertically in a way as to match the line between the survivor and monster.

This makes some of the monster abilities work more sensibly - there is a monster that does knockback towards itself, pulling the survivors to it (ostensibly to then beat them to a pulp).  Doing the knockback in a cardinal-direction line would prevent this from working as intended, and potentially leave the survivors out of reach.


Is a Wild Card a match to a Wild Draw Color Card in Uno Flip When the "Wild Draw Color Card" is played, the next player must start drawing cards.
If they draw a "Wild Card", does it qualify as the selected Color?

No. A Wild Card has no color. It can be played on any card regardless of color, number, or symbol, but it doesn't have a color itself.

From the rules:

  you must match a card from your hand to the
  card on the top of the DISCARD pile, either by number, color or symbol [...] Alternatively, the player can put down a Wild card (See FUNCTIONS OF ACTION CARDS).

The "Draw Color" card specifies that the target draw cards until they draw one whose color is the named color.


Can abilities with a [Click] cost be used during a run? Some abilities have a [Click] cost to them, such as Crypsis' ability to add a virus counter to it.

Does it count as a "paid ability" for the purposes of the Run Timeline? I.e. could I, mid-run, add a virus counter to Crypsis for the cost of one [Click]?

No. If an ability has a [Click] as part of its cost, it can only be used as a main action in the controlling player's turn. It cannot be used on the other player's turn or during a run.

From the rules (PDF) page 21, under Paid Abilities (emphasis mine):

  Paid abilities can be triggered at the beginning of each turn,
  before and after each player action, and at certain points during
  a run, unless the ability requires a click, in which case it must be
  triggered as an action.


When is three of a kind a valid set in Indian Rummy? Is the following a valid set in Indian-Rummy when we're using three decks of cards? What about when we use two decks?
6♠ - 6♠ - joker

That set is acceptable only in Indian Rummy's three deck variant. (I'll call Indian Rummy by its name Paplu here for some better clarity.)
Two-deck Paplu and regular Rummy only has sets (same card value, different suites) and runs (same suit, sequential card values) and that move isn't legal in this format.
Three-deck Paplu allows the set type you describe, called a tanala:

When three decks are used it is customary also to allow an additional type of combination consisting of three identical cards - such as ♣10-♣10-♣10. This is known as a tanala, and is treated as equivalent to a straight run.
— Pagat's definition of Indian Rummy

The joker is a wild card that can stand in for any other card at all, which means it's legitimate for completing the tanala.


When does the 'Your turn begins' phase end? Does a "when your turn begins" action trigger if the card is not in play during the "turn begins" phase but comes into play during the phase?

For example "the supplier" hosting a "drug dealer".

The "turn begins" trigger happens only once (at step 1.2 of the corp/runners turn according to the timing structure chart). So a card installed when the triggers resolve would not itself trigger.
This is also separately clarified for The Supplier in the official FAQ (https://images-cdn.fantasyflightgames.com/ffg_content/android-netrunner/support/FAQ/Android-Netrunner%20FAQ.pdf) in the card clarification section.

56 The Supplier
The Runner cannot use any “when your turn begins”
abilities on cards that are installed by The Supplier until his next
turn


Identify similar Game to Achi We in childhood played game called Bead 12 and a smaller version with 3 Beads. It is called in our local language Bara Tehni or Teen Tehni. A Bangladesh version of this game also called Baroguti and with 16 beads it is called Shologuti.
My main question is, Is there any variant of this game presented in literature? I know Achi is something similar to this game but Achi is more like tic tac toe, But in case of 3 Beads game main focus is to remove opponents bead from the board instead of making a row of our own beads. There is an Application on Google Playstore called Bead 12 which is the same game we use to play which says this game is played in South East Asia. So if other countries also play this game then what they call it? Why no information over internet? Am I missing the right keyword to search with?
Thanks

Predominantly games of this style fall under either the Alquerque or Zamma families.

There are a number of variants played globally, with the board shape and number of stones varying considerably depending on region.
Games typically grouped in the Zamma family tend to have larger boards and stone counts, where Alquerque variants tend towards the smaller.
Though the grouping into families for this style of game is relatively arbitrary, and is mostly dependent on which game the individual doing the grouping first came into contact with.

As far as I can ascertain the 3 bead variant was developed by the Gujaratis, but as with a lot of these games there's no clear literature as to when the variant came into favor, or even of it's actual origin.

For similar games, the closest I'm aware of  in terms of board size would be Four Field Kono from Korea, but that has a modified capturing mechanism.
There are a number with almost identical rule-sets, so just searching for Alquerque is probably a good option.


In Broadside, what methods are most effective for probing and/or circumventing the fixed defenses? I asked a question about strategies for deploying the fixed defenses in Broadside. As the attacker, how do you deal with the cannons and mines?

The cannons can't be defeated. The best you can do is try and probe the setup to determine where the decoys are, but how do you do this?

What class of ship do you use?
Do you pick a channel to send the fleet through and hope both guns aren't located there, or do you send scout ships ahead and then move the rest of the fleet based on what you find?

The mines are single use so once they're revealed they're cleared from the board.

Do you move around the mines or do you try and clear them out?
What class of ship do you use to clear them with?
Do you ever just try and completely avoid them?

As I remember, the British had several ships with a "mast" of 1. These ships are the best for. first, scouting the cannon, and if they survive, hitting a mine, because you lose the least sail.

The British have something like 25 sail to 20 for the Americans. Basically, the task of the British is to "figure out" the American defenses while losing less than 5 sail.

(I last played the game over 40 years ago, yes, I'm that old.)


Am I able to use rolled hearts when attacking a monster in Tokyo? When attacking a monster in Tokyo, do I get to keep any of the hearts that I rolled if that monster leaves, or are they forfeit?

You heal because movement into Tokyo only happens after the dice have finished resolving.

There are five phases to a turn.

Roll Dice
Resolve Dice
Enter Tokyo
Buy Power Cards
End of Turn

Monsters yield Tokyo when resolving dice in the second phase.

  If you are outside of Tokyo and you roll {Claw}, all  Monsters  who  are  in  Tokyo  lose {Heart} (Tokyo City and Tokyo Bay). These Monsters can then decide to Yield and leave Tokyo or stay. Monsters who Yield Tokyo still lose {Heart}.

But the active player only enters in the third phase.

  If no one is in Tokyo, you must enter and place your Monster in Tokyo City.

Even if attacking somehow forced you to enter Tokyo, you could still Heal by applying the effect of the hearts before applying the effect of the claws.

  You can resolve your dice in any order, but you must resolve all of them.


What happens in Hive if you cannot lay a piece? In the game of Hive, envision the following sequence of turns to start the game:

White plays Beetle
Black plays Queen
White moves Beetle on top of Queen

At this point, Black cannot lay any pieces, since every potential spot on the Hive touches White, and Black's only played piece (the Queen) cannot move since it is covered by the Beetle.

I know the rules say that if one side cannot move, then the other player continues to play until the game ends or until there is a legal move for both players.  Is this just a degenerate version of that scenario, and White wins in a ridiculously fast manner by placing all of its pieces around the Beetle/Queen stack?

The rules say you can't move any pieces until you've played the queen. I don't know, it may still be possible to have no legal moves, but the scenario you gave isn't legal.


How would it change the game play style if players can see each other's racks in Scrabble? I've always been curious, and wanting to try this with a friend, but I don't know any real life friends that would play me. Also no apps that I know support it afaik, and you'd have to manually tell the person your rack each turn, which I doubt anyone is willing to try with me. I think it would make it more strategic although a prolonged game.
I was thinking a few things would change:

Each turn would take longer because each player is trying to counter the other one's moves.
In a game of 2 players, trying to block scoring opportunities for your opponent will have about as much weight as scoring high or rack management.
In a game of 3+ players, it won't have much of an effect until the endgame, because it takes a long enough time to figure out the best scoring or highest value play (a play that leaves with good tiles for next turn).
"Fishing" for letters may become a thing. If you notice all your opponent's racks contain no o's, the board contains few o's, but you need an o to make a bingo, you can probably assume there's a high chance of drawing an "o", so you use up only 1 tile or you exchange a tile when making a move now but score low points on the next turn would be less than exchanging tiles and scoring big next turn.

It would make gameplay more frustrating
There is very little to gain, and a lot to lose from this tweak.

Because players have more information available, it will take longer to decide what the optimal play is.

Because other players can see what you have, they are more likely to make moves that will block your best possible play.

Rather than encouraging strategic play, open information would instead encourage tactical play - you've added more information about what your opponents have right now, while adding comparatively little information about what will happen in the future.


What are good resources or techniques to improve one's offence or finishing game? I'm a moderately skilled chess player; I can beat most casual players and survive quite a while against class A, expert, or master players. Unfortunately, virtually all of my skill is in control of the center and defense. I have almost no ability to then pin someone down and actually win the game; if a person is close to my skill level or above, they will likely ultimately win.

Are there any resources for learning more offensive strategies? Even if the techniques are a little heavy handed, I could learn from seeing them. Most guides I've seen focus on a balanced style, but I feel with such an unbalanced one already, those wouldn't help as much.

Get a book of checkmate problems, and go through the whole thing.  Then find another, and do the same thing.  When you are done, you will have no problem attacking.

Once your feel comfortable with simpler checkmate problems, get a book of general problems.  After all, in a real game, not every move is forced checkmate :) One of my favorites (which is extremely challenging) is Winning Chess Tactics Illustrated by I.A. Horowitz.
Another very good site for these is chesstempo.com, which will adjust the difficulty of the problems it shows you based on how well you do.

After you get a bit better (after, say, 5000 problems), if you are still interested in improving your attacking skills, I highly recommend Vladimir Vukovic's book Art of Attack in Chess.  Also, study the games of World Champions Tal and especially Alekhine, widely considered to be the greatest attackers of all time.


In Axis and Allies, should the UK Build a factory in Australia? Compared to South Africa and India, Australia, is, or can be made safer from, Axis occupation. It also has the potential to be "relevant." This may be more true in the newer versions, such as AA revised, where there are four Asian "victory" cities, How does the introduction of victory cities in Axis & Allies revised change gameplay and strategy? but is somewhat true even in the second edition, with which I am more familiar.

In this variation, I'd move the fighter from India to Australia, and the Indian transport with one of two infantry to Australia. Here, I could make a case for leaving NO infantry in India, in line with a question by another gamer. When retreating from a compromised territory should you always leave one infantry? But I prefer to leave one in India on the theory that it would tie up a Japanese offensive unit (a fighter or battleship) that might attack otherwise be used to attack Australia. Otherwise, the transfer of the UK fighter and infantry more or less safeguards the continent from amphibious attack by Japanese infantry in e.g., the Philippines supported by the battleship located in the Caroline islands.

There are two plausible plans that follow a  first turn build of a factory.

Under plan 1, the second turn build would be an aircraft carrier and an infantry, followed by an "island hopping" campaign with the fighter (on the carrier) and amphibious infantry  against the East Indies, Borneo, and New Guinea, followed by the Philippines. This increases the UK's IPCS and reduces Japan's.

Under plan 2, I'd build infantry and another transport or two for a shuttle service to Madagascar and ultimately Africa (with one transport as a "bridge" between that island and the continent. This would be a particularly worthwhile strategy if the US builds a factory in Brazil. In Axis and Allies, Should the U.S. Build a "Factory" in Brazil?

If you are the type of UK player that likes to build a factory in South Africa or India, would you build it in Australia instead? If you don't like to build those factories because of the possibility that the Axis can capture them, and make them Axis assets, would Australia's greater safety tip the balance in favor of this strategy? And perhaps the answer does matter from one edition of the game to another?

I would also echo the India first, mainly to fortify Asia from Japanese expansion on the mainland (what else is there, some infantry in China?). Australia is isolated and would need to build vulnerable transports to move anything to island hop.

In games that I've played, the second factory has depended on what the enemy has done in the first two turns or so. If Germany makes a hard push for Africa, I look more to build in India. If Japan makes a hard push in Asia and is successful in taking China, South Africa is more my choice. And if by sheer (bad) luck Germany takes over most of northern Africa and Japan is powering through Eastern Asia, then I look at Australia and try to get the US player to help put pressure on Japan's Eastern flank.


Would Restore the Peace affect a hexproof creature? Would restore the peace affect creatures with hexproof?

I have Archetype of Endurance (all creatures you control have hexproof, your opponent cannot have hexproof). I attack and then my opponent plays Restore the Peace, would this affect my creatures since they have hexproof?

Yes.

Hexproof means that the creature with Hexproof cannot be the target of spells or abilities an opponent controls. Restore the Peace does not target creatures, it's a global effect, so Hexproof does not offer any protection in this case.


Timing a backstab in Diplomacy When is a good time to backstab an ally in Diplomacy?

Should I backstab if I can grab a Supply Centre or two, or should I wait for an opportunity to eliminate an enemy?

There are lots of good (and bad) times to back stab, I'm not sure there is an out and out correct answer. This is one of the fun aspects of Diplomacy: its variation.

However, early back stabbing is probably almost always best avoided, as you will probably lose credibility with the other players if they think you are unreliable.

Sometimes the best back stabs are against players you have had very long alliances with, when they least expect it.

I also sometimes wait until I have a (usually hidden) alliance with another player, against the same player I am planning to back stab. That way they get hit with a double whammy and you have an extra level of insurance.

Finally, just past the 5th playing hour, as the tiredness and alcohol kicks in, if my experiences are anything to go by, is usually a good time to back stab and lose friends ;)


show and tell, gilded drake and primeval titan I cast Show and Tell and with it play Primeval Titan. My opponent plays Gilded Drake and takes over my Primeval Titan. I assume I'm the one who gets to use the land search ability and not my opponent?

Yes, you will get to search for lands with the Titan's ability; similarly to your other question, the key here is that both Primeval Titan and Gilded Drake have triggered abilities.  Both of those triggers are put onto the stack after Show and Tell has finished resolving, and the controller of the ability is locked into place when the ability is put on the stack:

  112.8. The controller of an activated ability on the stack is the player who activated it. The controller of a triggered ability on the
  stack (other than a delayed triggered ability) is the player who
  controlled the ability’s source when it triggered, or, if it had no
  controller, the player who owned the ability’s source when it
  triggered. To determine the controller of a delayed triggered ability,
  see rules 603.7d–f.

When Primeval Titan's triggered ability is put onto the stack (which will generically be just before Gilded Drake's ability is put on the stack, since the active player's triggers are placed on the stack before any inactive players', and it's hard but not impossible to cast Show and Tell outside your turn), the controller of the land-search ability is locked in as the controller of the titan; at this point you still control the Titan, since Gilded Drake's ability hasn't even gone on the stack yet, much less resolved.  The fact that you don't control the Titan when the ability resolves is moot.


What are the differences between the four editions of The Settlers of Catan base game? I haven't played Settlers of Catan yet, but I've been considering asking my gaming group if they want to try it.

As I understand it, Settlers of Catan is now in its fourth major version.  If I do get a Catan box, should I just get the current (fourth) edition, or is there some reason to look for used copies of earlier editions?

Edit: I forgot to mention, we will also be getting the 5-6 player extension.

The new fourth edition has a few minor changes in appearance, and the biggest change is a new set of border pieces that surround the hexagon tiles to keep them together.

The most important thing to know is that they do not mix and match very well: if you have the 3rd edition of Settlers, you should buy the 3rd edition of the expansions.  If you have the 4th edition of the base game, you should buy the 4th edition expansions.  So if you're just getting into it, I would suggest buying the new edition, since the corresponding expansions will be easier to find.


Can you add a wild card to a completed book? In Hand and Foot, after completing a melded book, can you add a wild card to it?  For example, once you have completed a book, but have a wild card left in your hand, can you add the wild card to a previously completed book, in order to go into your Foot or to go out?

According to Pagat.com:

  A meld cannot contain more than seven cards, and a partnership is not allowed to have two incomplete melds of the same rank, but if you complete a pile, you can then start another meld of the same rank.

So not only can you not add a wild card, you cannot add any card. You'll need to attach it to another meld in progress, or make a new one.


Monopoly deal - double the rent I have a full blue property set and ask the rent (8million) and play a double the rent card, which would make it 16 million in total.

Do they have to pay me 2 x 8 million or 1 x 16 million?

Arguments made by us were: it are two separate cards, so payments should be separate. or the cards should be played simultaneously, so the payment is combined in one.

Which is correct?

Looking at the rules here the rules clarification for Double the Rent says (emphasis mine)

  Play with a standard rent card to double the amount

The FAQ link to here it says

  Does the Double The Rent card count as a turn? Does it count as one of your three plays? Yes. An example would be a player lays a property
  card, a rent card, and a double the rent card during their turn. This
  would be all three of their card plays.

So based on that i would says that 'Double the rent' is playing with (ie simultaneously) with the rent card.  The payment is 1 x 16 million lump sum because 'Double the Rent' and 'Rent' are played at exactly the same time.

I'm confused as to why asking for 16 million once over 8 million twice makes a difference as I've only played this once many years ago under duress and just checked the rules to answer this.


Saboteur 2 - How many saboteur cards do you take out for 4 players? I'm playing with 4 players in total in Saboteur 2 and we are not sure whether we are supposed to remove the other 2 Saboteur cards so that there is only 1 Saboteur.  I guess what I'm really asking is what's the exact preparation with 4 players in regards to which cards to leave in or take out for the Miners and the Saboteurs.

The way I understood it was to take out 2 of the 3 Saboteurs and leave the other miner cards in but there may be a chance that no one is a saboteur.  We then thought of taking out 2 of the 3 saboteurs but leave in only exactly 3 miners but the question then is how do you choose between 2 blue dwarves and 1 green or 2 green and 1 blue?

As far as I can see, in Saboteur 2 you never change the available roles based on the number of players. So in your 4 player game, you could have 3 Saboteurs and 1 Geologist, and a completely ridiculous mine in the end. The rules just say "Shuffle the 15 role cards together".


What is the average number of turns in a game of Monopoly? I can't find any research or public information on this topic.

Edit: It was requested that I clarify the specifics of my request (e.g. the number of players and rule specifics). Rather than pigeon-hole people into a specific category (e.g. 3 players and tournament rules) I prefer to leave it open-ended, so that any and all relevant information will be provided.

Edit edit: For the sake of simplicity, let's say that we are playing with 4 players and tournament rules.

Playing online against 3 computer opponents, one of my games would typically last 30-45 turns. I used the standard rules (i.e., no money on Free Parking, limited number of houses and hotels). Because it was me against computers, the games would take ~15 minutes to play.

Playing against human opponents would certainly extend the actual playing time, and may likely increase the number of turns for a game as well. House rules which inject money into the players' hands (e.g., money on Free Parking) will increase the number of turns, and thus playing time, too.


What happens in these end-game situations? This is intended to be a canonical question regarding possible endings of the game.

For each question, assume a single proper strike was made, and note where an improper strike would change the game outcome (beyond an additional point for the opponent).

If the Queen has been covered:

What happens if I pocket my last C/m and the Striker?
What happens if I pocket my opponent's last C/m?
What happens if I pocket my opponent's last C/m and the Striker?
What happens if I pocket both players' last C/m?
What happens if I pocket both players' last C/m and the Striker?

If the shot covers the Queen:

What happens if I pocket my last C/m and the Queen?
What happens if I pocket my last C/m, the Queen and the Striker?
What happens if I pocket my opponents' last C/m and the Queen?
What happens if I pocket my opponents' last C/m, the Queen and the Striker?
What happens if I pocket both players' last C/m and the Queen?
What happens if I pocket both players' last C/m, the Queen and the Striker?

If the Queen is left on the board:

What happens if I pocket my last C/m, leaving the Queen?
What happens if I pocket my last C/m and the Striker, leaving the Queen?
What happens if I pocket my opponent's last C/m, leaving the Queen?
What happens if I pocket my opponent's last C/m and the Striker, leaving the Queen?
What happens if I pocket both players' last C/m, leaving the Queen?
What happens if I pocket both players' last C/m and the Striker, leaving the Queen?

From the ICF Laws of Carrom. Bracketed numbers in italics refer to specific rules that cover the questions.

If the Queen has been covered:

1. What happens if I pocket my last C/m and the Striker?

You lose by 1/3* (+1**).

2. What happens if I pocket my opponent's last C/m?

You lose as normal.

3. What happens if I pocket my opponent's last C/m and the Striker?

You lose as normal (+1**).

4. What happens if I pocket both players' last C/m?

You win by 1/3*. For an improper stroke, you lose by 1/3* (+1**).

5. What happens if I pocket both players' last C/m and the Striker?

(110/112) You lose by 1/3* (+1**).

If the shot covers the Queen:

6. What happens if I pocket my last C/m and the Queen?

(97) You win as normal, having covered the Queen. For an improper stroke, you lose by 3* (+1**).

7. What happens if I pocket my last C/m, the Queen and the Striker?

Unsure! You lose by 3* (+1**).

8. What happens if I pocket my opponents' last C/m and the Queen?

(103) You lose as normal, and the Queen is considered covered by your opponent.

9. What happens if I pocket my opponents' last C/m, the Queen and the Striker?

You lose as normal (+1**), and the Queen is considered covered by your opponent.

10. What happens if I pocket both players' last C/m and the Queen?

(102) You win by 1/3*. For an improper stroke, you lose by 3* (+1**).

11. What happens if I pocket both players' last C/m, the Queen and the Striker?

(109) You lose by 3* (+1**).

If the Queen is left on the board:

12. What happens if I pocket my last C/m, leaving the Queen?

(107) You lose by 3*.

13. What happens if I pocket my last C/m and the Striker, leaving the Queen?

(108) You lose by 3* (+1**).

14. What happens if I pocket my opponent's last C/m, leaving the Queen?

(106) You lose as normal, and the Queen is considered covered by your opponent.

15. What happens if I pocket my opponent's last C/m and the Striker, leaving the Queen?

(111) You lose as normal (+1**), and the Queen is considered covered by your opponent.

16. What happens if I pocket both players' last C/m, leaving the Queen?

(105) You lose by 3*.

17. What happens if I pocket both players' last C/m and the Striker, leaving the Queen?

You lose by 3* (+1**).

* This is the value of the Queen: if the winning player did not cover the Queen, or is at 22+ points, they get 1 point. Otherwise they get the 3 points for covering the Queen.

** The opponent may claim 1 additional point as Due (you pocketed the Striker) and/or 1 additional point as Penalty (you made an improper stroke).


Redirecting counterspells to Redirect itself If I cast Redirect on a some kind of counter spell can I choose the Redirect as new target for the counterspell?

Yes.  From the Gatherer rulings:

  If you cast Redirect targeting a spell that targets a spell on the stack (like Cancel does, for example), you can’t change that spell’s target to itself. You can, however, change that spell’s target to Redirect. If you do, that spell won’t resolve when it tries to resolve because Redirect will have left the stack by then.


How to protect a tribal deck from Extinction? I put together a Legacy Elfdrazi deck relying on Elvish Piper, Concordant Crossroads, some mana dorks and a bunch of tutoring like Green Sun's Zenith and Worldly Tutor to get Emrakul, the Aeons Torn and Progenitus out by turn 3-6 depending on how I draw.

Problem is that if things go poorly and I don't get Emrakul out til turn 5 or 6, my friend has managed to start playing Extinction which he recently acquired in response to my Elfdrazi deck. He's started winning nearly all our games with this.

I am unsure how to respond. It's a mono-green deck and splashing blue to get my hands on Unnatural Selection or Standardize (cheap blue cards that allow me to change all my creatures' creature types at a moment's notice, protecting them from Extinction) would slow me down a lot, most likely.

What effective ways are there to protect a tribal deck from black type-specific board clear? Is my best choice to buy more concordant crossroads and more pipers and try to make the deck faster so he never gets a chance?

Playing Around Board Wipes

For your purposes, Extinction is just a board wipe, like Supreme Verdict. In fact, at CMC 5, it's a slow board wipe. In a no-holds-barred Legacy environment, you'd be having to deal with faster sweepers like Perish and Terminus.

So you could try to get cute with instant-speed creature-type changing here, but nothing really prevents your friend from switching to more conventional mass removal to get the job done — even a card like Marsh Casualties will clean out mana dorks very efficiently.

So, what do you do if you're unprepared for a sweeper? General strategy is to be faster but don't overextend. Aggro decks commonly try to put a lot of pressure on their opponents right out the gate, forcing opponents to scramble to stabilize. "Curve-toppers" (especially creatures with haste or evasive abilities) and burn spells (like Lightning Bolt) help get the last few points of damage in after that Supreme Verdict has dropped.

But, in your case, you're playing a combo deck that uses creatures for mana instead of constantly pressuring life totals, so racing the sweeper is a bit of an all-or-nothing arrangement: if you fail, you've lost a lot of resources with basically nothing to show for it.

So, what do you do?

Combo Deck Fundamentals

Most combo decks want to be fast. That's basically their whole value proposition: devote most of your deck to doing weird, kinda useless-seeming stuff in order to quickly work your way up to a devastating finish.

So, can you tune up your combo engine to make your deck faster? For example:

Tournament-grade elf decks often use Heritage Druid+Nettle Sentinel as a mana engine. Heritage Druid will help speed up hands where you didn't get a Concordant Crossroads.
Tournament-grade elf decks tend to use Glimpse of Nature (or Beck) to chain lots of cards quickly.

Replacing some of your slower elves with these cards might help you gain a turn or more.

You can also speed up your deck by improving its consistency. If you're "going off" on turn 3 50% of the time and turn 4 50% of the time, then getting that ratio down to 90%/10% is effectively the same as speeding your deck up by half a turn. Card filtering, tutors (not just for your endgame piece but for the cards you need to get there), and better access to redundant cards will all help get you there.

But, unless you're playing a truly degenerate format, your opponents will be able to interact with you, and your deck needs to be able to go off despite their best attempts at disruption — especially in post-sideboard games where they might bring in specific countermeasures against you. Some tried-and-true strategies here:

Lots of redundant pieces. Elf decks usually naturally have this covered, since they play a lot of highly interchangeable cards.
"Plan B." A second combo (e.g. slower but simpler), going offensive with your creatures, or the ability to play for the endgame like a control deck.
Disruption. Protect your combo with disruptive elements of your own.

Deckbuilding Suggestions

Your deck already has a fair bit of redundancy to it. "Plan B" is pretty easy: go on the offense with your little elves, perhaps using Ezuri's Overrun ability.

Let's focus on that third pillar: disruption. The best colors for this are blue and black, which are the colors of counterspells and targeted discard, respectively. I prefer targeted discard for true combo decks, because it allows me to go after my opponent's disruptive resources on my own schedule rather than having to wait and hold open counterspell mana (if you want to do that, build full-on combo-control, or play an instant-speed combo deck). Targeted discard also works well in combo decks because oftentimes your opponent only has a few cards that can truly interact with yours — you don't need to deal with all of their cards, just the handful of reactive cards or hosers they're using to slow down your combo.

So, let's just use targeted discard to rip our opponents' hands apart before they can nuke our elves away. As a bonus, we'll get the ability to see their hands, which makes it much easier to play around whatever they still have in hand. The optimal targeted discard cards are Thoughtseize, Cabal Therapy, Duress, and Inquisition of Kozilek; in your case, IoK is suboptimal (you care about some CMC 4+ spells, but in a pinch you can chump-block with an elf or two, so you don't particularly need discard spells that can hit cheap creatures), but all the other ones have their appeal:

Play Cabal Therapy for maximum value, if you're comfortable guessing strategically.
Play Thoughtseize if you want a targeted discard spell guaranteed to hit something.
Play Duress if you're budget-limited or you think Thoughtseize exposes you to too much risk from aggro deck.

Going green/black, even if it's just a splash, also opens up access to a number of other interesting options:

Shaman of the Pack lets you turn elves into life drain.
Black/green gives you access to a lot of great removal, including Abrupt Decay and Maelstrom Pulse (and Pernicious Deed, but that's suicide for your deck).
Golgari Charm is a multifaceted spell that can protect your elves from some (but not all!) sweeper effects.
Black is a great color for digging stuff out of the graveyard. You've even got some mass revival options like Patriarch's Bidding (perfect for a "tribal" deck). Since such spells are costly, I don't really recommend them for one-on-one, but they may be a good addition to a deck for multiplayer.

These are all secondary to the pure defensive benefit or running discard spells to protect your combo, though.


Is my black-bordered foil from 8th edition a counterfeit? Where can I find more copies? I have a black-bordered 8th edition foil Thorn Elemental. I really like this card, and I tried to find a place where I can buy it again. However, I can only find white-bordered versions of this card in the 8th edition.

Does this mean I have a counterfeit card, or is there a black-bordered foil version in the 8th edition? I have not coloured in the border as other questions have suggested. I just can't seem to find a black border 8th edition foil, even on the main Magic wizards site.

I know that white-bordered cards can be played. I'm just a bit confused as to how my black-bordered card cannot be found anywhere.

According to MTG Salvation:

  All foil cards are black-bordered, even those from the last white-bordered core sets, except those from Unhinged which are silver-bordered.

A black-bordered foil Thorn Elemental is valid anywhere any other Thorn Elemental is. You can find it, for example, here. Some sites just don't show separate images for foil versions of cards.


Stream of Thought/Creeping Chill Interaction? What happens stack-wise when Stream of Thought mills Creeping Chill?

My understanding is that the triggered ability of Creeping Chill gets put on the stack but doesn't happen until Stream of Thought is finished resolving. So if you choose to shuffle back Creeping Chill with Stream of Thought, then would the triggered ability fizzle?

Any thoughts?

Creeping Chill's ability triggers and goes on the stack if Stream of Thought puts it into the graveyard. If you then shuffle it into your library, the ability will still resolve (it won't "fizzle") but it won't do anything because you can't exile the Creeping Chill. The Handling Triggered Abilities rules section has these rules:

603.2. Whenever a game event or game state matches a triggered ability’s trigger event, that ability automatically triggers. The ability doesn’t do anything at this point.
603.3. Once an ability has triggered, its controller puts it on the stack as an object that’s not a card the next time a player would receive priority. See rule 117, “Timing and Priority.” The ability becomes the topmost object on the stack. It has the text of the ability that created it, and no other characteristics. It remains on the stack until it’s countered, it resolves, a rule causes it to be removed from the stack, or an effect moves it elsewhere.

Then rule 118.12 says

Some spells, activated abilities, and triggered abilities read, “[Do something]. If [a player] [does, doesn’t, or can’t], [effect].” or “[A player] may [do something]. If [that player] [does, doesn’t, or can’t], [effect].” The action [do something] is a cost, paid when the spell or ability resolves. The “If [a player] [does, doesn’t, or can’t]” clause checks whether the player chose to pay an optional cost or started to pay a mandatory cost, regardless of what events actually occurred.

The bolded part matches the wording on Creeping Chill:

When Creeping Chill is put into your graveyard from your library, you may exile it. If you do, Creeping Chill deals 3 damage to each opponent and you gain 3 life.

This is a choice you make while the ability is resolving, so the ability will start to resolve whether or not Creeping Chill is still in the graveyard, but if it's not in the graveyard to be exiled, you can't pay that cost and the rest of the effect won't happen.


Can you stop casting a spell? Ok, I was playing an EDH game with my friend and I had 8 mana available to me. In order for me to win the game, I had to destroy one of his permanents with a Spine of Ish Sah (7 mana). Now I planned to play a Mana Vault (1 mana and produces 3 mana) so that I'd have enough mana for a Spell Crumple (3 mana) to protect my Spine of Ish Sah.

How I played the turn out is I try to cast Spine of Ish Sah, but I forgot to play Mana Vault first. By the time I've realized that I forgot a very important part in my plan, I've already tapped for 5 mana. At this point I stop tapping for mana and I am unable to pay for the Spine of Ish Sah and it should return to my hand (where I cast it from) and my lands should untap (rule 717). My opponent said that's not the game works. He says that since I started paying for the spell, I have to finish paying for the rest of it. Now, is my friend correct, that if you pay for part of a spell, if you are able to pay for all of the spell, then you must finish paying its cost?

Answer must have rules referencing this.

Your friend is right, though he should let you do it anyway outside of a tournament.

You cannot be forced to produce mana to pay for a spell.

  117.3c Activating mana abilities is not mandatory, even if paying a cost is.

And if a spell becomes uncastable, its casting is undone.

  601.2 [...] If, at any point during the casting of a spell, a player is unable to comply with any of the steps listed below, the casting of the spell is illegal; the game returns to the moment before that spell started to be cast (see rule 717, “Handling Illegal Actions”). [...]

So it would seem that you can choose to abort the casting of any spell by not producing the mana required to cast it (assuming your mana pool doesn't already have the necessary mana in it).

BUT

When this came up on Wizards's Rules Q&A board recently, it was declared[1] that the intention of the rule is to handle the situation where the casting of a spell becomes illegal after it has started being cast (and possibly other situations), but it's not meant to be used to voluntarily rollback the casting of a spell. While the rule can be used to avoid casting a spell at all, you are committed to completely cast a spell you've decided to cast.

So, deciding to abort casting your spell wouldn't be legal in a tournament, and my friends wouldn't allow and such douchebag rule lawyering in casual. (They could very well allow me to rollback the action if I asked, but not because of 601.2.)

By general consensus among the rules-saavy, by bimmerbot (a very level-headed level 2 judge), and confirmed by Natedogg (the only person on that board capable of making official rulings).


Will Yixlid Jailer negate Snapcaster Mage's flashback-giving ability? Yixlid Jailer makes all cards in graveyard lose their abilities while Snapcaster Mage giveths a card in graveyard the flashback ability.

In this scenario, Yixlid Jailer's ability prevails, correct? As it is a 'negative buff' which precedes other abilities? Or can someoone explain this interaction better please?

Actually, in this scenario, if Yixlid Jailer was already on the field when Snapcaster Mage's "enter the battlefield" ability resolves, the card does have flashback until end of turn. This is mainly because, generally, when continuous effects that modify the same kind of thing (type, color, abilities, etc.), they are applied in timestamp order. Yixlid Jailer removes abilities, and Snapcaster Mage adds abilites, so when we consider how the effects are applied, first Yixlid Jailer removes all abilities of all cards in graveyards (because it entered the battlefield first), then Snapcaster Mage adds flashback to one card. So the net result is that that card has flashback.

If instead Snapcaster Mage's ability resolved first, it would give the card flashback and then Yixlid Jailer would remove the abilities, so the card would not end up with flashback. However, in most cases you can either cast the targeted spell in response to the Jailer or simply cast it before they have the opportunity to cast the Jailer (in the case where you cast Snapcaster on an empty stack and you are the active player).

The comprehensive rules say:

  613.1. The values of an object's characteristics are determined by starting with the actual object. For a card, that means the values of the characteristics printed on that card. For a token or a copy of a spell or card, that means the values of the characteristics defined by the effect that created it. Then all applicable continuous effects are applied in a series of layers in the following order:

  613.1f Layer 6: Ability-adding effects, ability-removing effects, and effects that say an object can't have an ability are applied.

and

  613.2. Within layers 1-6, apply effects from characteristic-defining abilities first (see rule 604.3), then all other effects in timestamp order (see rule 613.6). Note that dependency may alter the order in which effects are applied within a layer. (See rule 613.7.)
  613.6. Within a layer or sublayer, determining which order effects are applied in is usually done using a timestamp system. An effect with an earlier timestamp is applied before an effect with a later timestamp.

  613.6a A continuous effect generated by a static ability has the same timestamp as the object the static ability is on, or the timestamp of the effect that created the ability, whichever is later.
  613.6b  A continuous effect generated by the resolution of a spell or ability receives a timestamp at the time it's created.

One important thing to note is that Yixlid Jailer doesn't say "Cards in graveyards lose all abilities and can't have or gain abilities," so it doesn't stop the card from gaining flashback.


Chess client for e-(g)mail I'm looking for something that would let me store the board setup and move the pieces manually so that I can play with a friend via email/msn. It doesn't have to handle mailing or anything for me as long as I can move the pieces around :)

GamesByMail

Scott Michtell just introduced me to GamesByMail to play Axis & Allies, and I noticed that it has chess as well.

All you need is an e-mail address to create a small profile, same thing for your opponent, and you're ready to play.  You should get e-mail reminders when it is your turn.

I haven't tried chess there yet, but if it's anything like A&A was, you should be in good shape.


How prohibitive is Glory to Rome's complexity to new players? I've heard a lot of good things about Glory to Rome, but I've heard many people classify it as extremely complex. I asked around at my FLGS and they said it was more complex than Race For The Galaxy and Puerto Rico, both of which my family and I have enjoyed. How bad is it really? I don't mind reading and explaining a 20 page rulebook as long as its well written, and its also fine if we don't really grasp some of the strategy until 7 or 8 plays. However, if it truly is much worse than that, I should probably think twice before buying it.

How prohibitive is Glory to Rome's complexity to new players? Approximately how long will it take to learn the rules and have a general conception of the strategy? As an aside, how well does it play well with 2 players?

Disclaimer: Glory to Rome is one of my all time favorite games, I may be biased in encouraging others to try it :)

I would say the chief source of complexity and challenge to people new to this type of game is multiple roles for the same card.  Players who are able to reconcile in Race for the Galaxy that the same physical piece of cardboard can be a planet or development, a good, or a payment for a cost, should not be too challenged by this.  The same physical piece of cardboard filling different purposes in different contexts is fundamental to Glory To Rome.

The overall complexity of the game rules is mitigated by the fact that for each turn a player leads a role and everyone else must follow.  So in any given turn everyone has basically the same reduced set of options available to them, and you all learn together.

My opinion, anyone who's not intimidated by the insane information density of Race for the Galaxy cards, and has wrapped their head around the context-sensitivity, will have no issues with Glory to Rome.  (and can master its functionality, if not strategy, in one playthrough.)

My only negative comment might be it may become more luck based with only two players who have mastered the fundamentals, similar to Race with 2 players where it is close to being two solitaire games.  (That is speculative based on the observation that in larger games players can get boosted back in by people who needed the same lead they did, or held back by conspiring social forces.)


Do subtype changes remain after a card is transformed? Say I have an Olivia, Mobilized for War on the field, who has this ability:

  Whenever another creature enters the battlefield under your control,
  you may discard a card. If you do, put a +1/+1 counter on that
  creature, it gains haste until end of turn, and it becomes a Vampire
  in addition to its other types.

I play a Werewolf and discard a card to pay for Olivia's ability. The Werewolf is also a Vampire now.

A turn passes without anybody playing spells, so the Werewolf transforms. Is it still a Vampire? Or is it only the subtypes written on the card's new face?

Yes.
From the Comprehensive Rules:

711.7. When a double-faced permanent transforms, it doesn't become a new object. Any effects that applied to that permanent will continue to apply to it after it transforms.

So your Werewolf will keep its Vampire subtype.


If a Planeswalker transforms into a creature during the main phase, but it is suddenly killed, is it still able to attack? A player summons Sarkhan, the Dragonspeaker. After entering the battlefield, keeping priority, the player activates the first loyalty ability, to immediately transform Sarkhan into a creature.

At this point the priority passes to the opponent, who responds to Sarkhan's activated ability by casting a Lightning Bolt on the Planeswalker, and then, keeping priority, he also cast a Clockspinning choosing one of Sarkhan's loyalty counters as his target , and announcing he wants to remove one of them, since Sarkhan is not yet a creature and therefore can lose its loyalty counters.

The priority is still to the opponent, who, having noticed how the number of Sarkhan's loyalty counters has,in the meantime,increased by one unit (since his controller paid the cost of his loyalty ability, or +1), he realizes that Sarkhan should still survive by still having (in theory):
 4 + 1 - 3 - 1 = 1 loyalty counter still on it.

So, keeping priority, the opponent pays 3 colorless mana to use the Clockspinning's buyback ability, and taking it back in his hand.

(However, as I was pointed out by expert players - see comments below the question, for more details -  the just defined passage is not entirely correct: unlike as just explained, it is necessary to pay the Clockspinning mana cost and its buyback cost at the same time, so that it is possible to take this card back into your hand immediately after its resolution. In any case, as regards the explanation of the situation from which the question asked emerges, nothing changes.)

Then, keeping priority, he cast Clockspinning again, targeting Sarkhan's loyalty counter once again.

At this point,the question starts -

the two players say they don't want to cast more spells, and the stack resolves: 2 clockspinnings, lightning bolt, Sarkahn's first loyalty ability, thus bringing the number of Sarkhan's loyalty counters to 0.
In the end, of course, Sarkhan's ability must also be resolved, which therefore still allows them to transform into a creature, which can also attack immediately, because he has Haste among his abilities.
At this point, since Sarkhan is now a creature, the active player goes to the attack phase and says he wants to attack with the just obtained legendary 4/4 red Dragon with haste.

Since the number of Sarkhan's loyalty counters is now 0, and since the active player has just completed the main phase (there is a phase shift in between main and combat phases), I'd like to know if Sarkhan:
1) has still time to join to the attack phase, because the transformation has resolved; or,
2) ends up in his owner's graveyard before the attack begins,because Sarkhan's loyalty counters are equal to 0,and therefore the Dragon simply does not exist anymore,and unable to participate to the combat phase.

There's a few small issues here:

Buyback needs to be used while the spell is cast - it's an additional cost so the opponent will pay  for the first casting of clockspinning all at once, not  to cast and then decide to pay  for buyback.
Buyback happens when the spell resolves - the card does not immediately return to hand, but goes to hand instead of grave when it resolves. This means Clockspinning will need to resolve before the opponent can re-cast it. At no point will both copies of clockspinning be on the stack together.

These don't change what happens in the end in this case, but there are cases where it will matter, for instance you don't get the chance to decide to buy back or not after you see if the opponent is countering.

For your actual question, Sarkhan's ability will resolve, but it will do nothing. The order of events and the actions of the Active Player (player) and Non-active Player (opponent) are this:

Player casts Sarkhan, both players pass priority, he resolves and his +1 is activated, putting it on the stack and leaving Sarkhan with 5 loyalty.
Active player passes priority, Non-Active Player casts lightning bolt, targeting Sarkhan.
Non-Active Player keeps priority, Non-Active Player casts clockspinning with buyback, targeting Sarkhan.
Both players pass priority, Clockspinning resolves and removes a counter then returns to Non-Active Player's hand due to the buyback replacement effect.
Active player passes priority, Non-Active Player casts clockspinning without buyback, targeting Sarkhan.
Both players pass priority, Clockspinning resolves and removes a counter then is put into Non-Active Player's graveyard.
Both players pass priority, Lightning bolt resolves, doing 3 damage to Sarkhan, removing the last 3 loyalty counters.
Sarkhan is put into the graveyard under rule 704.5i for having no loyalty counters. This is a state based action and cannot be interrupted.
Both players pass priority, Sarkhan's ability resolves and tries to turn the planeswalker into a creature, however the object that used the ability no longer exists (the card is not in the same zone) so it fails to do anything.

Note how both players pass priority every time something resolves - the whole stack doesn't resolve when both players choose not to use their priority to cast a spell or activate an ability, only the top of the stack resolves and after that each player gets priority again.

As an interesting aside - Sarkhan is unusual among planeswalkers that animate in that he becomes only a creature, not a creature in addition to being a planeswalker. This means he cannot lose loyalty from damage as a creature, however clockspinning can still remove loyalty counters from him. If the last counter was removed from Sarkhan by clockspinning when he was already a creature, he would be able to attack and still on the field until the end of the turn, where he stops being a creature, becomes a planeswalker again and 704.5i puts him into the graveyard. Most of the planeswalkers that turn into creatures (mostly every copy of Gideon) stay planeswalkers while they are creatures, so removing counters from them with clockspinning after animation would still apply 704.5i would kill those immediately.


Minimizing Agricola setup/clean up time I enjoy playing Agricola, but the box the game comes in doesn't lend to keeping the pieces organized, and I generally spend a fair amount of time taking everything out, and even more time putting everything back so it's not a complete mess the next time I play.

Any good suggestions for alternative storage that minimizes the set up/tear down?

How about a foamcore insert?  I just finished my Agricola foamcore yesterday. I haven't benchmarked the setup and breakdown times (yet). There are no zip top bags to open, it should only take a minute.

I have friends who get a little tacklebox organizer for each game.  This takes more effort than that, but it's much more customizable.

For a crash course on how to make something like this, check out this video series: Using Foamcore by The Esoteric Order of Gamers.

Updated with a new version:
v1 v2


In Smash Up, can you "destroy" a card from your hand? Here are the definitions from their rulebook located here: Smash Up Rules

  Discard: When a card gets discarded, it goes to the discard pile of the player whose deck it came from, no matter who played or controlled it.

  Destroy: When a card
  says to destroy another card, put the destroyed card in its
  owner’s discard pile.

If I can destroy one of my minions to draw the same number of cards as its power, would I be able to destroy one from my hand? I'm thinking no, but would like to appeal to others who may have broader experience with other games that might use this terminology commonly or might simply know a ruling on this.

No.

I don't know if this is explicitly mentioned anywhere in the rules, but destroying a minion refers to destroying a minion card on a base.

This is akin to Magic: The Gathering, which has concepts of discarding cards from one's hand and destroying permanents on the battlefield.


In Bridge, When and Why Do People Sacrifice Overtricks to Be Sure of Making Game? Most players I've seen will often sacrifice potential overtricks in "rubber" bridge to be sure of making game. Apparently, that's not the case in "duplicate." Why is that?

There are three popular methods of scoring, each of which treat overtricks with different value:

Rubber - Here the priority is making game (or multiple partscores) to finish the rubber.  Points earned for your contract go "below the line", and count towards winning the game and the rubber.  All other points (setting contracts, slam bonuses, hundred honors, etc) go "above the line", and do not count towards ending the rubber.  Since ending the rubber is worth 500 or 700 points depending on whether or not your opponents scored a game or not, you can see how sacrificing a 20-30 point bonus trick could be worthwhile.

Matchpoint Duplicate - This is the form of the game most often played at bridge clubs in partnerships.  Here, you score one point for each other partnership's score you beat when they played the same hands.  Since the scoring here is more absolute, there is value in winning an overtrick if you think the rest of the partnerships playing this hand would not.  For example, if you are in 4S, but feel that most people might be in 3NT making 4, you're going to want to try to make 5.  If you do, your 450 will beat everyone else's 430, and you'll get the maximum amount of points on that board.  Conversely, if you only make 4, you'll only score 420 on the hand, and your score will be worth nothing.  Since your 4S making 4 is worth nothing, you can see that 4S going down would also be worth nothing, so in this case it is worthwhile to risk the contract to get the overtrick.

International Matchpoints (or IMPs) - This is the form usually played in teams, where you and another partnership play against another foursome, and your results are compared directly.  Much like in rubber, in IMPs overtricks are not worth a whole lot. (see the scoring chart for the ugly details)  If you score an overtrick that your opponents do not, you get 1 IMP.  On the other hand, if you fail to make game while your opponents do, you lose 10-12 IMPS.  Here, securing the contract is priority #1.


Legion's Initiative vs Day of Judgment Can I save my creatures from Day of Judgment with a Legion's Initiative ability of exile? Day of Judgment is on top of the stack for this example (I don't know if that will matter).

You sure can.

The stack will also matter for this because otherwise your creatures will go poof. Basically in response to them casting DoJ, you pop your Legion's Initiative to exile your guys. There's no timing restriction on Legion's Initiative so as long as you can pay for it, you can do it.

Or in listed steps:

Day of Judgement is cast and opponent passes priority (most likely onto an empty stack because it's a sorcery but there's ways to make it instant speed but that's irrelevant here.)
You get Priority and pop your LI, putting the ability on the stack
Priority Wave
LI Ability resolves, all your dudes go away until the next combat
Priority Wave
DoJ resolves, blowing up the remaining dudes on the battlefield.


How can I compete against the unit armies tactic in Risk? How to I avoid one player getting too strong by playing just to defend a small area or continent and only gaining territories just to obtain Risk cards to trade in for more armies.

Convince the other players of the power of his tactics and the need to 'break his continent' before he 'runs away with the game'.  Lead the coalition against his evil ways.  Use this coalition to mask your own strategy, as you set yourself up to emerge most powerful from the ashes.

Risk is all about controlling the perceptions of the rest of the table.


What does the Skaven-themed expansion to Chaos in the Old World add? What does The Horned Rat expansion add to the game? How is play different to the original?

The rats are interesting:

They are actually very well balanced to my opinion. While giving more locations for Korne to attack, the rat king can easily kill korne's units if he pleases.

They don't really ruin a region considerably faster, but seem to be balanced in their ability to score points.

That said I'd play with the default 4 powers if I only had 4 people.

Additionally, the expansion adds more difficult old world cards, as well as alt decks for the normal powers.

My players haven't liked the alt-decks, except the alt-korne one (you're supposed to use all of the alt decks or nothing). We haven't tried the more difficult old world cards (which are supposed to make mutual loss much more likely).


How does trample work against infect? My opponent attacks me with say, a 6/6 trample generic Wyrm of some sort, and I block with a Whispering Specter, a 1/1 infect with flying. When damage is dealt the Specter will deal it in the form of a -1/-1 counter from its infect ability. Well, the Wyrm would normally deal me 5 leftover trample damage, so is this damage lowered by -1 from the counter given by the Specter?

No, you would suffer up to 5 damage if the opponent choose to assign the trample damage to you.

When two creatures deal combat to each other, it's simultaneous. So, for example, a non-trampling 6/6 would deal 6 damage to your 1/1, causing 6 damage to become "marked" on it, while, concurrently, your 1/1 would deal 1 point of infect damage to the 6/6, causing a -1/-1 counter to be put on it. The counters are the damage.

Trample doesn't add an extra step to damage resolution, it just changes how damage is assigned. So, a trampling 6/6 allows its controller to assign 1 damage to your 1/1 (since that's enough to kill it) and as much of the remaining damage as he wants to you. You, your blocker, and the attacking creature all take damage simultaneously.

If you blocked the 6/6 trampler with a 1/1 creature that had both infect and first strike, then its infect damage would be applied first, giving the 6/6 a -1/-1 counter, and then you'd only take a maximum of 4 trample damage.


Which, if any, colored cards can be made colorless after being cast? Which, if any, colored cards can be made colorless after being cast?
I'm not interested in cards that use some factor to determine color at moment of casting (such as Devoid).

No spell has an inherent way to become colorless after it has been cast while it's still on stack. There are ways to do this however, but it requires using other cards. This means that almost all spells can be made colorless, the only ones that can't are spells that can't be targeted or prevent using the stack until they resolve (split second).

Change target spell to colorless:

Ersatz Gnomes is an artifact creature that a tap ability to turn a targeted spell on the stack colorless.
Moonlace is a one cost blue spell that will turn a target spell on the stack colorless.

Permanents that change themselves to colorless. (all red creatures)

Ancient Kavu 2 cost activated ability to turn itself colorless.
Blazing Blade Askari 2 cost activated ability to turn itself colorless.
Raging Spirit 2 cost activated ability to turn itself colorless.

Turns another permanent colorless.

Ersatz Gnomes has a second tap ability to turn a targeted permanent colorless until end of turn.
Moonlace can also target a permanent to turn it colorless. This effect is permanent.
Xathrid Gorgon is a black creature that has a tap ability costing 3 mana that will permanently turn a target creature into a colorless artifact and gives it defender (flavored turn to stone gorgon ability).

Change everything to colorless.

Thran Lens this 2 cost artifact makes all permanents colorless, this applies to all permanents controlled by all players.
Mycosynth Lattice this changes everything to colorless, in play, on the stack, in the hand, in the deck, etc.
Ghostflame Sliver this 2 cost black and red creature doesn't apply to everything, but it applies to all slivers, regardless of who controls them.


What happens when I blink a Manic Scribe multiple times? If I have a Manic Scribe and 2 Momentary Blinks, is it possible to use Momentary Blink on Manic Scribe multiple times, and if so, does his ability trigger again?

What you are describing is possible, but I will go over various interpretations of what you described. We will assume that you already have a Manic Scribe on the battlefield.

The most likely way you will accomplish what you're trying to do is by casting Momentary Blink on the scribe, letting the spell resolve so it can come back and trigger its "enters the battlefield" ability, and then casting your second Momentary Blink on it. This will cause it to leave and re-enter twice, triggering its ability twice, and overall making each opponent put 6 cards in their graveyard.

You could also cast Momentary Blink on it, then hold priority and cast the second Momentary Blink on it before the first one resolves. This is a Bad Idea, because after one of them resolves, the other will not have a valid target and be countered (fizzle) on resolution (as the scribe left the battlefield and came back, so is a new object). Then, you wasted one of your blinks! Your opponent will only put 3 cards into their graveyard, because Manic Scribe only entered the battlefield once.

Manic Scribe has a triggered ability that triggers on your opponent's upkeep (if you have Delirium) in addition to the one that triggers when it enters the battlefield, however you cannot cause this trigger to repeat in the same way. Your opponent's upkeep happens and the trigger is put on the stack. At this point, if you blink the scribe, it will leave and re-enter, and the "enters the battlefield" trigger will go on the stack too, but there is no way to get a second "beginning of upkeep" trigger to occur.


Number of possible hands in last two rounds of Texas hold-em In the paper for the Poker AI, Libratus, the following is said:

The last two betting rounds, which are exponentially
larger, are more coarsely abstracted. The 55 million different
hand possibilities on the third round are grouped into 2.5 million buckets, and the 2.4 billion different possibilities on the
fourth round are grouped into 1.25 million buckets.

I don't understand how the 55 million and the 2.4 billion hand possibilities in the third and fourth round are calculated. This seems like it would be obvious, but the calculations I'm doing give me different numbers, and I'm unsure what I'm doing wrong. I also know very little about Poker, so it's very possible I'm missing something.
Any help would be appreciated.

An explanation of how these numbers were derived is available in Johanson, Michael. (2013). Measuring the Size of Large No-Limit Poker Games.
Essentially those are the number of card combinations from one player’s point of view in a heads-up limit Texas hold’em game after merging strategically identical combinations.
How to count different card combinations with isomorphism? over on the Mathematics stack has more information on the combinatorics used to losslessly merge isomorphic card combinations.


How can I find games based on Caesar's campaigns in Gaul and Britannia? I like Caesar's Gallic War by Worthington games.

How can I locate similarly themed games that focus on Caesar's campaigns in Gaul and Britannia?

One great way to find similarly themed games is to consult the GeekLists on BoardGameGeek.

Find your game on Boardgamegeek
Scroll to the bottom, look for the "GeekList" section
Check out GeekLists that sound interesting.

For Caesar's Gallic War, I found this GeekList, Bellum Gallicum (58-51 BC) - Caesar Against the Gauls which appears to be a well curated list of 20 games dealing with Caesar and the Gauls.


Do Flash Duel character abilities supplant main actions? Many of the character cards in Flash Duel contain what might be considered a main action (e.g. Jaina Stormborne's Charged Shot stipulates a push).  Does using this character ability prevent me from exercising a main action?  The rules state you can play exactly one "main action" on your turn.

For example, can Jaina use Charged Shot to push her opponent, who is 3 spaces away, back 2 and then immediately attack with a 5?

Jaina's Charged Shot ability is used at the start of a round, and doesn't supplant the normal attack during your turn. The designer, David Sirlin, answered this question here,

  Q: After using DeGrey's ability Spectral Pull or Push or Jaina's charged Shot, do you still take a normal action for this round or is the special ability your action for this round?

  A: Those trigger at the start of your turn, so you do them then you do the rest of your turn. Nothing says it replaces or prevents a combat action, so you can still move or dashing strike or whatever. Using Spectral Pull and then attacking during the same turn is legal and a powerful way to use it. It's especially good in the dragon raid mode.

  Note that the dragon does have a card that triggers "instead of his main action," so that ability really does prevent him from doing a main action later in the turn.


In Dos when is it too late to shout "Dos"? If a player lays out all their cards during their turn without calling Dos (technically ending the game), can another player call Dos on the player if they don’t notice during the time they are laying down the cards?

The game specified exact steps for when to move cards over and when to lay down bonus cards. We’ve been playing that we have until discarding to call Dos, but this doesn’t really give the other players an opportunity to call Dos in this situation. It’s happened a couple times now that Dos hasn’t been called because we’ve allowed that leeway for all other plays.

Now some feel this is unfair even though that was what was agreed in the beginning. However, cards are not moved to discard until the laying down is done so it really doesn’t work when going out. We see that needs to change, but the real question we are asking is:

Can someone call Dos after the game is technically over?
If they don’t call before the cards are laid down is it too late?

From the way I am reading the rules you can call dos on another player up until the point that the round ends. As soon as a player plays their last card it is to late to call dos as that would cause the player to get more points.

Offical Rules

Rules

Rules for calling dos

  Here is where Dos and Uno are similar. Once you have exactly TWO cards in your hand, remember to yell out “Dos". If you forget to shout “Dos" and are caught by another player (who says “Dos" before you do), you must draw 2 cards from the Draw pile as a penalty, but take note that you only draw the two cards at the END of your turn (when you are just about to end it).

End of round rules

  The first player who discards all his/her cards is the winner of the round. If the player earned any Double Color Match Bonuses during his/her turn, then all the other players should draw cards as well, before tallying up the points. The winner of the round gets to score points from all the cards in other player’s hands and become the dealer for the next round.


In Elder Sign, can I free a focused die? If I focus a die, can I free it and reroll it later in the same turn?

The only reference I see in the rules is the following (with something similar in the faq as well):

  Note: A player can focus a die only after a failed roll, and he can focus only once during each of his turns.

This, combined with the "Elder Sign: Omens" iOS game's inability to unfocus a focused die makes me feel it may be set in stone once you focus and bar you from freeing it. Is there any supporting ruling otherwise?

No.  Once focused, a die may only be used to complete a task using its locked side.

This is not specifically mentioned in the rules or the FAQ sheet - however, based on other rulings in the FAQ, it is clear that not being mentioned in the RAW is not considered proof positive that a rule doesn't exist by the creators.  Focused dice are especially limited in usage, and they seem to be intended to be used only in a very specific way.  I believe you should go with the same ruling as the video game.


Should opener's NT rebids after 1-of-a-Major have different HCP ranges than with 1-of-a-Minor? With a balanced 15-17 HCP and 5-card major, I will usually open 1M instead of (strong) 1NT. The traditional balanced HCP for bids are as follows:

12-14 HCP: Rebid 1NT
15-17 HCP: Open 1NT
18-19 HCP: Rebid 2NT
20-21 HCP: Open 2NT

No problem exists for having 5-3-3-2 shape with a 5-card minor, but with a 5-card major and 15-17 or 20-21 HCP, there is no suitable bid (I think) when responder bids a new suit. Should the ranges be more lenient after a 1M opening, such as

12-15 HCP: Rebid NT at lowest level
16-21 HCP: Jump rebid NT

or is there a better way to describe these types of hands?

Probably most experts these days open 1NT with a balanced hand with a 5 card major in their NT range (whatever that is).  Many of them play conventions that allow their partner to ask if they have a 5-card major; probably the most common is for 3C to ask for a 5 card major, but some roll it into their 2C responses or use some other bid.
A few people still that 1H-1S-1N is a wide ranging bid, usually 12-bad17, and use a 2C artificial bid after the 1N to ask about strength and spade support.  (Crowhurst, or variants of Roudi)
Some experts play Gazilli, where 1H-1S-2C (as well as 1H-1N-2C and 1S-1N-2C) is forcing and shows either clubs as a second suit or 16+ points, over which 2D is an artifical response showing game values opposite the 16+ option and everything else denies that strength.  This eliminates the problem since 1H-1S-1N is now limited to 15.
Most somewhat advanced American players now play that 1M-2newsuit is game forcing, so there is never a need to jump to 3N at that point, though it's still useful to play 3N as a specific point range and 2N as other point ranges.  (My preference is that 1M-2X-2M can include a balanced minimum, saving more bidding space.)
If you don't want to learn any of these (or come up with your own), you just have to lie as best as you can.
As usual, agree whatever you want to do with partner.


When can protection from creatures be played The other day I was in a situation where my opponent had 3 creatures on the board (4/4, 3/3, 1/1) and I had one creature on the board (6/6). My opponent attacked with all three creatures and I chose to block the 4/4 with my 6/6. Then my opponent played Divine Verdict on my 6/6 then also tried to play  Crypsis on the 4/4 that I blocked.

Am I correct in assuming that it was too late for the protection from creature card to be played because the combat damage had already been done?

They can play a card that gives their creature protection, but it is probably pointless if they are playing a card that destroys the blocking creature anyway.

In the combat phase there are 5 steps

Begining of Combat
Declare Attackers
Declare Blockers
Combat Damage
End of Combat

During each of these steps each player gains priority and can cast spells/activate abilities if they want to. In your example the card giving protection must be cast at the latest in the Declare Blockers step, because the first thing that happens in the Combat Damage step is combat damage being assigned, which would deal lethal damage to the 4/4 and send it to the graveyard. However casting the card giving protection is pointless since with the 6/6 being destroyed there is nothing that will deal damage to it. Even though Protection prevents blocking once a creature is blocked removing the blocker or giving the attack protection does not stop the attacker from being blocked.


Does kicker make my spell multicolor? An opponent was playing with a Rewards of Diversity, which makes him gain 4 life each time one of his opponents plays a multicolored spell.

I played Probe ({2}{U}) and paid the kicker cost (an extra {1}{B}).

Does Probe count as a multicolored spell? Does my opponent gain 4 life?

No.  Probe is not a multicolored spell, regardless of whether it was kicked.
The color of a card is based solely on the mana cost defined in the top-right corner.  Using a Kicker ability (or anything else that modifies the cost of the card) does not change the color of the card.

Relevant entries from the comprehensive rules (emphasis mine):

105.2. An object can be one or more of the five colors, or it can be no color at all. An object is the color or colors of the mana symbols in its mana cost, regardless of the color of its frame. An object’s color or colors may also be defined by a color indicator or a characteristic-defining ability. See rule 202.2.
202.1. A card’s mana cost is indicated by mana symbols near the top of the card. (See rule 107.4.) On most cards, these symbols are printed in the upper right corner. Some cards from the Future Sight set have alternate frames in which the mana symbols appear to the left of the illustration.
202.4. Any additional cost listed in an object’s rules text or imposed by an effect isn’t part of the mana cost.


Painter's Servant vs Emrakul What happens in the following situation?

My opponents got the Painter's Servant and Grindstone lock going on but I have a Emrakul, the Aeons Torn in my deck that keeps me shuffling my graveyard back into my deck when it gets milled.

DO I just keep on shuffling untill the 45 minutes is up and the games end in a draw? How is this situation resolved?

DO I just keep on shuffling untill the 45 minutes is up and the games end in a draw?

The fact that you asked this makes me suspect you might have the wrong idea about how Grindstone's milling ability works with Emrakul's reshuffling ability.

When you mill an Emrakul with Grindstone, you don't reshuffle immediately. Instead, you schedule the reshuffling trigger to be put on the stack after Grindstone's ability is done resolving - in particular, after your library is empty.
Then, when Emrakul's reshuffling trigger goes on the stack, both players have to have a chance to respond to it before it resolves.
After that happens - both players respond, or pass, and then the triggered ability resolves - only then do you actually shuffle your graveyard into your library.
And at this point, Grindstone's milling effect is over and done.
Nothing else gets milled until your opponent is able to activate Grindstone's ability again, most likely during their next turn.

The net effect of this is that, as long as you have Emrakul in your library, your opponent's Grindstone ability does very little (assuming, as I do throughout this answer, that no other relevant spells or abilities are used). Yes, they can mill your entire library once per turn cycle, but it gets reshuffled right afterwards, before you draw your card at the beginning of your draw step. So you wind up continuing the game pretty much as normal.

Of course, once you draw Emrakul, if it was the only one in your deck, then Grindstone can mill your entire library. So you should try to win before that happens.

To address the question you probably thought you were asking, if there is a mandatory loop of actions that keep coming back to the same game state, the game ends in a draw.

  716.4. If a loop contains only mandatory actions, the game is a draw. (See rules 104.4b and 104.4f.)

Obviously, you don't actually have to carry out the loop, as long as all players are satisfied that the loop exists and is, in fact, mandatory.
So if these cards somehow did create such a loop, you wouldn't keep shuffling for 45 minutes, you and your opponent(s) would just declare the game a draw and move on to the next one.

There is the question of whether it counts as the same game state if the ordering of your library is random.
If I remember correctly, there was once a deck (or at least the idea for a deck) where you would use an infinite combo to repeatedly shuffle your library until whatever card you wanted at the time happened to be on top.
While this is effectively just stacking the deck, because any ordering you want will eventually occur with probability 1, I believe the official word as announced by some high-level judges is that you can't just skip the shuffling and stack the relevant cards on top of your deck.
Similarly, it might be held that reshuffling changes the game state - perhaps depending on whether the positions of any cards were known beforehand.
But I'll have to leave that to other people to resolve.


Can you eradicate a disease without finding a Cure first? If you eradicate a disease in Pandemic without finding a cure first (ie remove all of one colour from the board) does it remain eradicated or can it still come back unless it has also been cured?

The rules are a bit unclear on this point ... Or I missed the rule that explicitly states this.

From the rules, page 4, when describing the Discover a Cure action:

  At any research station, discard 5 City cards of the same color from your
  hand to cure the disease of that color. Move the disease’s cure marker to its
  Cure Indicator.

  If no cubes of this color are on the board, this disease is now eradicated.
  Flip its cure marker from its “vial” side to its “blocked” side.

And, in the sidebar on that same page:

  Removing the last cube of a disease that is not cured has no effect.

Eradication is described as part of discovering a cure, so a cure is necessary for the disease to be eradicated. If you remove all of the cubes of the color, but don't have a cure, it is not eradicated and you place new disease cubes normally.

See also this thread on BGG, where Matt Leacock (one of the game's designers) weighed in:

  Eradicating a Disease

  If a cure for a given disease has been discovered and there are no disease cubes of that color on the board, immediately flip the Cure marker for the disease to the “Sunset” side. From now on, cards of this color have no effect when drawn on the Infector’s turn.

  Take all of the cubes of the eradicated color and place them back in the box—they will not be used again for the rest of the game.