Strategy for succeeding at Crisis skill checks I've played my first real BSG game last week with three players and the humans got wiped out before we even jumped once...

I did some calculations to figure out if things get easier or harder with more players. What I found out made me wonder how player manage to beat the crisis cards at all.

Average difficulty of a crisis is 9.95 points.
Average value of a skill card is 2.14 points.
Average chance of a skill check in a crisis card is 58.6%.

Every human player gets 5 cards in his turn.
Every cylon player gets 2 cards in his turn (when revealed).

Assuming every card can be put to good use in a skill check we can calculate the amount of points the humans can field and the amount of points the cylons can field in every full round (where every player had his turn). The difference is the amount of points in favor of the humans. That divided by the number of players and 58.6% is the amount of points in favor of the humans per skill check.

Depending on the number of players/cylons the points in favor of the humans are:

2:1 ...  9.75
3:1 ... 11.89
2:2 ...  5.49
3:2 ...  8.05
4:2 ...  9.75
3:3 ...  5.49

Aside from the best case scenario at 3:1 there is no situation where it reaches the average of 9.95 points per skill check. The destiny deck is roughly balanced (average of -0.1 points per check) so we can ignore this.

Conclusion: Aside from somehow drawing more cards the humans cannot win every skill check even if they were to play their cards perfectly.

Question:

So how should the humans approach the skill checks on the crisis cards to win as much as possible?

Option 1: Discuss which ones to fail and which ones to beat. Doesn't work so well since the cylons will also know when they need to fight a check and when they can save their cards. Thus the ratio of cards remains the same.

Option 2: Use XO's exclusively to draw additional cards. One additional card per turn would be enough statistically.

Option 3: Try to undercut every crisis just a little in the hopes that the destiny deck will make at least some of them pass...

Other Options?

Crisis Deck Management

You haven't put much emphasis on crisis deck management, which is important.

You can scout to bottom deck crisis cards.
Roslin can select one crisis out of two on her turn.
Boomer gets to see the next crisis before it is revealed.

All of these abilities can mitigate the damage caused by failing a crisis.

Track Destiny

You can keep track of destiny, so you can avoid playing when its stacked against you.

Evil and clever brig hack

If you can get around the players personal objections to this, having a player (even human) in the bring increases the number of skill cards drawn per crisis.

Imagine everyone is in the brig.  Then you can cycle through the skill deck, getting all of the best cards into players hand before ever having a crisis check.


Will Enduring Ideal and Dovescape played together leave Enduring Ideal countered? I play Enduring Ideal and search and play Dovescape.

On the next upkeep Enduring Ideal should be cast again.

Is Enduring Ideal countered by Dovescape, or can I search for other enchantments?

No, a copy of Enduring ideal won't be countered by Dovescape because the copy isn't cast.

The reminder text for Epic says:

  At the beginning of each of your upkeeps, copy this spell except for its epic ability.

However, copies are not cast and thus are not affected by Dovescape:

  706.10. To copy a spell, activated ability, or triggered ability means to put a copy of it onto the stack; a copy of a spell isn’t cast and a copy of an activated ability isn’t activated. [...]


When using the Burning Scimitar, must you remove exactly 2 meeples? When playing the Artisans of Naqala expansion for Five Tribes, an interesting scenario came up. One player wanted to use the Burning Scimitar magic item and remove 1 meeple to empty a tile and claim it. The wording on the card indicates

  Remove two meeples of any color(s) from a Tile of your choice...

Does this wording mean that you must remove exactly 2 meeples, or can you remove up to 2 meeples?

Yes you can remove just one meeple.

The designer Bruno Cathala answered this question himself on BGG questions here, here, and here


Can I always sacrifice a permanent whenever I want, without anything telling me to do so? Can one sacrifice any permanent at any time for any reason, or is "permission" to sacrifice only granted by other cards?

You can't spontaneously sacrifice a permanent. Even if you have a permanent with an ability of the form "whenever a creature dies" or "whenever a creature is sacrificed", you need to find some means of sacrificing it.

There's no rule forbidding it; there's simply no rule allowing it. CR 116 itemizes what actions you can perform. When you have priority[1], you can do the following[2]:

116.1a Cast a spell.
116.1b Activate an activated ability.
116.1c Perform certain Special Actions.

115.2a Play a land.
115.2b Turn a face-down creature face up.
115.2c Take an action an effect previously permitted you to take at a later time (usually to end a continuous effect or to stop a delayed triggered ability from triggering).
115.2d Take an action a static ability allows you to take to ignore the effect of that static ability for a duration.
115.2e Exile a card with Suspend.
115.2f Role the Planar Die.
115.2g Turn a face-down conspiracy card face up.

116.1d Activate a mana ability.

As you can see, sacrificing a Permanent is not an option (unless it's part of one of the above actions (e.g. The cost to activate an ability)).

There are other actions you can take (e.g. Drawing a card in your Draw Step), but they aren't actions you chose to do, so I won't bother listing them. They are itemized by CR 116.2.
Conditions may apply.


Discarding after picking up discard pile in Canasta Today we had a situation.   Player legally picked up discard pile. All he had left in hand were dead cards and wild cards.  Is there a rule about which should be discarded first?

There is no rule specifying what type of cards you discard so it is up to the player to decide if they want to discard a dead card or a wild card.

Canasta Rules

  When a player has melded his cards, he ends his turn by discarding a card. At that point, his melded cards are checked to see if they conform to the canasta rules. Discarding a card is not necessary if the player can go out by melding all of his cards.


What is the difference between countering spells and exiling spells? If a given spell, or a given effect, is able to exile other spells - not simply countering them - is it able to exile even uncounterable spells?

It is useful to give a couple of examples.
If the opponent is summoning Pearl Lake Ancient, but  I cast  Mindbreak Trap ,which is able to exile any spell, in response to the summoning, will Leviathan go into exile?

Or - (second example) - if the opponent cast Overmaster, and after his resolution cast a Fireball - which should be uncounterable at this point - but I cast the Trap (the same one, as above) in response, will the Fireball go into exile?

is it able to exile even uncounterable spells?

Yes.
When a rule, spell or ability refers to a keyword action (a verb with a rule definition), it strictly refers to that action.
Pearl Lake Ancient can't be countered (a keyword action), but it can be exiled.

Difference between countering spells and exiling spells

To counter a spell, move it to its owner's graveyard.
"Exile" isn't a keyword action. It's simply short for "move to the exile zone".[1]
In both cases, the spell will never get a chance to resolve since it will never be the topmost item on the stack after all players have passed in succession.

"Move" also isn't a keyword action. That's why many different verbs are used for the action. The verbs include: "move", "put", "place", "return", "exile" and "die".

Keyword Actions

701.1. Most actions described in a card’s rules text use the standard English definitions of the verbs within, but some specialized verbs are used whose meanings may not be clear. These “keywords” are game terms; sometimes reminder text summarizes their meanings.
701.5. Counter
701.5a To counter a spell or ability means to cancel it, removing it from the stack. It doesn’t resolve and none of its effects occur. A countered spell is put into its owner’s graveyard.
608.1. Each time all players pass in succession, the spell or ability on top of the stack resolves. (See rule 609, “Effects.”)


How many times can you use hero ability? For hero abilities bought with XP is there a limit to how many times they can be used?

For example can Diala use her Force Adept: 1 strain: Use while you or a friendly figure is performing and attack or attribute test. That figure may reroll 1 die.
to let a player rerolling dice?

Or will Weapon Expert: 1 strain: use while attacking to gain Pierce 1 and apply +2 Accuracy to the attack results. make Fenn be able to shoot accross the map and just pay with strain/health for whatever accuracy he is missing?

From pg. 2 of the Rules Reference:

  If an ability is “used,” it can be triggered multiple times each round, but it can only be triggered once per timing instance. For example, an ability that says, “Use while attacking to apply +1H to the attack results,” can only be triggered once during each attack.


Help identify a ~1984-1986, D&D-ish, chit/card + dice, battle game One summer back in the mid-1980s, a friend and I played a simple, fantasy, tabletop, war game. I barely remember it, but I am hoping someone else knows it. I am not positive, but I believe it came out of a magazine of the time, like, what? Dragon or White Dwarf magazine. It seemed cut-out. We each arrayed an "army" of cut-out cards, each representing some kind of high fantasy figure, having a cartoon-ish image on it and numbers corresponding to attack and defense bonuses or something like such. The only one that I vaguely recall was either an Elf or a Ranger, which I only recall because it was labelled as having range, meaning it attacked first in the order of operations.

One of us would declare something like "My Elf attacks your Orc!" and we would roll dice, adding each card's various bonuses and whatnot, to determine the victor of that battle. Again, the ranged characters stand out in my memory because I remember that, having the power to strike first, if they inflicted sufficient damage to kill the opponent, then no return damage was dealt to them.

This all stands out to me now, because many, many, many years later I discovered Magic: the Gathering late in life, and when I first played I thought, "Wait a dang minute, I have played this before."

I hope someone else out there remembers that game. I asked my childhood friend, but he has no memory of it whatsoever.

This sounds like King of the Tabletop to me, published in issue 77 of Dragon Magazine.  I played it many times as a teen.


Clever Impersonator copying Liliana Heretical Healer I'm copying my opponent's non-transformed Liliana, Heretical Healer with Clever Impersonator. Then one of my other creatures dies. Does my Clever Impersonator come back as Liliana non-transformed again or does it come back as Clever Impersonator with a possible new choice? If it comes back as Liliana do I get a zombie? It says "If you do, put a 2/2..." is it saying if I do return her, or if I do return her transformed?

You will get the 2/2 Zombie token and a fresh Clever Impersonator.

The copied Liliana's ability triggers on the other creature's death, the copied Liliana gets exiled and returns to the battlefield. However, the Impersonator only copied the front side of Liliana, the Impersonator itself can not and will not be transformed:

  701.25a Only permanents represented by double-faced cards can transform. (See rule 711, “Double-Faced Cards.”) If a spell or ability instructs a player to transform any permanent that isn’t represented by a double-faced card, nothing happens.

In this case, the "If you do..." part of Liliana's ability is sufficiently satisfied as long as the card is exiled due to the effect, so a 2/2 zombie will be created. (see this post)

Upon leaving the battlefield, the Impersonator also forgot all memory of its previous existence:

  400.7. An object that moves from one zone to another becomes a new object with no memory of, or relation to, its previous existence. There are seven exceptions to this rule:

The exceptions don't apply here. You exile the Liliana, but return the Impersonator. Therefore, after the exile it enters the battlefield as a fresh Impersonator, ready to copy another permanent.


What is the name of the little humanoid figure used as player token or resource in some Euro games? I used to play a lot of games during my childhood and the "player token" had a pattern: A cylinder/cone with a sphere on top of it. Pawn, start token, player token, we used a lot of names to define it. I have never bothered about naming or knowing what the name of this piece was, cause it was only used as player token.

But now, I can see that a number of newer games (post-2000) use this little humanoid figure as player token or as resource on some games:

Carcassone-meeple.jpg from Wikimedia - You must be asking yourself: And what about this filename? Read the spoiler if it bugs you

   I was searching using the words that are at the answer, finally found the Meeple term, and searching for "Meeple" at Google Images leads to a lot of images, including this one that is at the Carcassonne Wikipedia and ocasionally is called Carcassonne-meeple (with a better license to use at StackExchange sites). Acessed Carcassonne's wiki and double-checked the Meeple name, found the wikitionary definition, searched for another reference online using that definition, and the HappyMeeple pointed to wikitionary. But before that, I didn't know that it was one of its players that coined the term and since there is an older game called Europa 1945-2030 that have a similar-but-not-equal humanoid figure i couldn't be sure if there was possibly an older game also using Meeple design, of if the Europa humanoid design was also called Meeple or a variant of it and therefore, other older game using Europa's design. Then I have asked and answered at the same time to spread knowledge. But believe me, I was not aware of the term until i wrote this question+answer, and the image used at this question was decided when I was posting :)

Ok, back to the question. Examples:

Carcassonne: This figure is used as player points counter and a resource that will be turned into 4 different classes(base game) like a pawn;
Terra Mystica: This figure is a multi-purpose resource(Priest), depending on your race;
Tiny Little Quest: You have 3 of these figures in your control, but they are not minions neither resources;

My Question: Is there an official or de facto name I can call this little guy on my image? I am specifically interested in what this particular design of token is called.

After some searching, the Meeple term was prominent on lot of online resources (filenames, sites and boardgame spare parts sellers). Searching for "Meeple Origin", this definition was found and helped me to track the origin of the name and what games are using this piece.
At HappyMeeple.com:

Origin of the Meeple word
A meeple is a little wooden character representing the player in many
modern board games.
Over time, the meeple has become the symbol of modern board games.
According to Wiktionary, the origin of the term “Meeple” is the
following:
“Coined in November of 2000 by Alison Hansel during a game of Carcassonne when she fused "my" and "people" to describe the wooden
figures each player uses in that game.

Searching for Meeple Games we have the following list:

BoardGameGeek - Games featuring "The Meeple"

Interesting Stuff:

First board game to use 'Meeples' - This is an interesting topic and it goes beyond of what i have posted about Europa 1945-2030 at the question.
Poll: What exactly is a meeple? - And this thread is a discussion about what could be actually considered a meeple inside all existing variants of these figures.


Crazyhouse Chess: is it possible to get all eighteen queens? Over here it was previously discussed whether one can end up with all nine queens.

There is a variant of chess called Crazyhouse in which captured pieces may be reintroduced as the capturer's. In theory, then, a player may have two queens and sixteen pawns which all may be promoted.

Is it possible to get eighteen queens without checkmating before that, or else putting the opponent into a draw?

If that is the goal of both players, should be easy to achieve.  Simply move weak side king away from his 1st rank and build a wall of minor pieces between him and the passed pawns.  With a little more effort a player with a huge lead could force the king out and achieve the same thing.


How do V.I.R.s interact with the Barker? This Q/A requires both Steam Park expansions:
Play Dirty rulebook
Robots rulebook

First, we need to have a definition of "wrong", here. That will define if it's even possible for a V.I.R. to be allowed on the Barker tile.

When you draw Visitors of the wrong color, put them on the Barker tile
instead of the Visitors pool.

If you want e.g. a red robot , but you draw a V.I.R., the V.I.R. can go to the red spot, but you may not want it to—hence, I think the V.I.R. can be considered "right" or "wrong", per the player's decision.

Given that, imagine that there is a V.I.R. on the Barker tile already. I interpret the rules, then, to be that…

You may only gain that V.I.R. when you spend only one visitor die for your Attract action.
You then can either take another non-V.I.R. Visitor off of the Barker tile, or throw one more into the bag, and draw one.

Correct?
Relevant rules:

When you Attract Visitors, for each that you spend, you can choose to
directly take a Visitor from the Barker tile instead of the normal
action. You immediately gain 1 Dirt token for each Visitor you take
from the Barker tile.

When you perform the Attract Visitors action by spending only 1, you
may choose and take 1 regular Visitor AND one V.I.R. Visitor from the
Visitors pool and put them both in the bag. If you do, when you draw
Visitors to complete the action, you must draw out TWO Visitors
instead of only ONE.

Judging by the rules for the wild visitor type that the V.I.R belongs to and the stingy one from the same rules as the barker these types of visitors have their own color and qualify for all rides and can't be considered the wrong type of color.

When you draw a Stingy Visitor out of the bag, you can place
them on any Ride regardless of its color, and they will stay
there until the end of the game giving you money each turn
like a regular Visitor. But, during the Income Phase, each Stingy
Visitor only pays you 2 Danari (instead of the normal 3 Danari
per Visitor). Moreover, during the Dirt Phase, you don’t gain
any Dirt token for any Stingy Visitors you have in your park.

When you draw a Wild Visitor out of the bag, you can place them on any Ride, regardless of its
color, and they will stay there until the end of the game. There are also special rules for how
to attract them and How they behave (see next page).


Turning in cards when you have five or six cards In regards to turning in Risk cards, the rule book says if you have five or six cards you must turn in at least one set.

My question is why do they give you the option of five or six?
If you have five cards you will have a set of three. You can only get one card per turn so you would never move from 4 to six in one turn. It seems a bit confusing.
I was playing with a group and there was a disagreement about this and my opponent said he was going to wait until he got six.

You can only get one card per turn so you would never move from 4 to six in one turn.

Not true. The rules of Risk state that you get the cards held by an opponent if you eliminate them from the game. There is the additional condition: When you get enough cards from an opponent that brings you to six or more cards you must immediately turn in sets until you have four or fewer cards left over. (You must stop if you have four or three cards and have another set to turn in.)

But consider the case where you start your turn with four cards, then eliminate someone with one card. You gain the card, giving you five cards. At the end of the tern, you've captured new territory so you draw another card. This gives you six cards at the start of your next turn!

So therefore it's possible to have up to six cards at the start of your turn, but no more than that. The rules explicitly state that if you have five or six cards, you must turn in a set. Having five cards and waiting for the sixth isn't playing by the rules.


Where do you put the reward you gain when attacking Draco/zombies? When you attack a zombie or Draco, you earn some ressources.

Do you store them immediately (or on the Town hall building if you don't have storage room)?
Do they stay "somewhere in your gaming zone" (for instance witht he units you used to attack) waiting for the storage phase to be added to the storage building?

The latter would mean than no-one can get them by attacking you or by stealing them...

Sorry if I don't use the correct wording for game elements, I have the French version of the rules...

Just got the answer straight from the Publisher on BGG:

  If you have a container, straight there. If you don't it goes on top of your Town Hall and has to be used this turned otherwise you will have to discard it!
  Indeed, it means that this resource is vulnerable to an attack this turn. Unless you have a defense and that could be a nice lure


Can We Play Pathfinder Society Adventure Card Guild Seasons With Normal Characters? Suppose that I have a box of Pathfinder Adventure Card Game: Mummy's Mask with adventure packs 1-6.  I've already played through Mummy's Mask but I'd like to play more Pathfinder Adventure Card Game.

I've noticed that "Pathfinder Society Adventure Card Guild" has what looks like an alternate adventure path, Season of Factions' Favor.  There seems to be a lot of alternate rules around this -- everyone has to buy a class deck and get upgrades from their class deck instead of the box.  I don't need these rules, because I just want to play the game with my friends, and I'm happy to get upgrades directly from the box.  (Also, I'd rather avoid spending $80 on class decks if that's not necessary.)

If I play through Season of Factions' Favor using standard Mummy's Mask characters (not Class Decks), will everything work properly?  Will it be easier or harder than using Class Decks?  Is there anything I should watch out for?

My playgroup did this for both Skulls and Shackles and Wrath of the Righteous. We enjoyed it.

Technically, yes, the playthrough is slightly easier if you are ignoring the class deck restrictions (which are not very fun). You can't count it as an organized play game, however.

One recommendation if you want to maintain some of the challenge of the character deck version: Restrict players to changing one card per scenario from their decks. This is the biggest part of the difficulty in using the character decks.

[The other part is that the character decks are not very well constructed to support all their characters. One glaring example is the warrior who can use 1 spell in her deck. So the warrior character deck has spells in it (which is useless for the other warriors), but only a few (which means very little selection for her). One recommended change for a home game that does want to use the character decks is to allow characters to dip into a second deck that fits their character's theme. Another would be to just allow a player to use all the decks they have.]


Can a creature sacrifice itself? Say I have Quagmire Druid as my only Creature. My opponent has Curse of the Bloody Tome. Can I use Quagmire Druid to destroy Curse of the Bloody Tome, sacrificing itself?

Since it doesn't say "sacrifice another," like Blazing Hellhound, you are permitted to sacrifice Quagmire Druid to pay for its effect.


Rally The Ancestors and 3 Lilianas I cast Rally The Ancestors and bring back 3 Liliana, Heretical Healer and 2 Jace Vryn's Prodigy and 1 Clever Impersonator from the graveyard. How many zombie tokens can I get? Am I allowed to make the Jace die first? There's no other nonland permanents on the battlefield, do I have a target for Clever Impersonator?

Short Answer
You can only get 1 Zombie token. One Jace and 2 Lilianas die simultaneously. And the Clever Impersonator can't copy anything, so it dies immediately.
The Details
I'll go through those in reverse order: First, Clever Impersonator has a ruling that says

If Clever Impersonator enters the battlefield at the same time as another permanent, it can’t become a copy of that permanent. You may only choose a nonland permanent that’s already on the battlefield.

So, 3 Lilianas, 2 Jaces, and 1 0/0 Clever Impersonator enter the battlefield. Then state-based actions are checked. The specific relevant rules are

704.5f If a creature has toughness 0 or less, it’s put into its owner’s graveyard. Regeneration can’t replace this event.

704.5k If a player controls two or more legendary permanents with the same name, that player chooses one of them, and the rest are put into their owners’ graveyards. This is called the “legend rule.”

So, when you apply those, the result is that the Clever Impersonator dies from the first rule, and 2 of the Lilianas and 1 of the Jaces die. Then, the living Liliana's ability triggers 4 times (twice for the other Lilianas, once for the Jace, and once for the Clever Impersonator), and each of the others' trigger 3 times.
Then, you have a total of 10 copies of that ability on the stack. However, we can ignore the ones from the dead Liliana. That's because she is no longer on the battlefield, so you can't choose to exile her, which means that you don't get a zombie. So we are left with the 4 abilities from the one that survived.
First, one of the abilities resolves. You exile her and return her to the battlefield, and you get one Zombie token. Then the next one resolves. But the Liliana, Heretical Healer creature is no longer on the battlefield, so you can't exile her. So none of the rest of the abilities give you a Zombie. Liliana has a ruling that backs this up:

If multiple nontoken creatures you control die, then Liliana, Heretical Healer’s ability will trigger that many times. However, since Liliana can be exiled and returned to the battlefield only once, only the first ability to resolve will create a Zombie token. The other abilities will resolve but won’t do anything.

Liliana's Ability
To see exactly why Liliana's ability works the way it does, we can break it down into parts. First, it is a Triggered Ability, with trigger condition

Whenever another nontoken creature you control dies

and effect

exile Liliana, Heretical Healer, then return her to the battlefield transformed under her owner's control. If you do, put a 2/2 black Zombie creature token onto the battlefield.

Now, the effect part can be further split up. Rule 117.12 says

Some spells, activated abilities, and triggered abilities read, “[Do something]. If [a player] [does or doesn’t], [effect].” or “[A player] may [do something]. If [that player] [does or doesn’t], [effect].” The action [do something] is a cost, paid when the spell or ability resolves. The “If [a player] [does or doesn’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.

This means that the ability's effect can be split into the cost:

exile Liliana, Heretical Healer, then return her to the battlefield transformed under her owner's control

and the (sub) effect:

put a 2/2 black Zombie creature token onto the battlefield.

This is important because rule 117.3 says

A player can’t pay a cost unless he or she has the necessary resources to pay it fully. [...]

Now, you might ask "What about the Lilianas in the graveyard? Why can't I exile them to get more Zombies?" The answer to that depends on a few different rules. Rule 112.6 says

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

(None of the exceptions apply). And the rules regarding zone-change triggers say

603.6c Leaves-the-battlefield abilities trigger when a permanent moves from the battlefield to another zone, or when a phased-in permanent leaves the game because its owner leaves the game. These are written as, but aren’t limited to, “When [this object] leaves the battlefield, . . .” or “Whenever [something] is put into a graveyard from the battlefield, . . . .” An ability that attempts to do something to the card that left the battlefield checks for it only in the first zone that it went to. An ability that triggers when a card is put into a certain zone “from anywhere” is never treated as a leaves-the-battlefield ability, even if an object is put into that zone from the battlefield.

603.6d Normally, objects that exist immediately after an event are checked to see if the event matched any trigger conditions. Continuous effects that exist at that time are used to determine what the trigger conditions are and what the objects involved in the event look like. However, some triggered abilities must be treated specially. Leaves-the-battlefield abilities, abilities that trigger when a card leaves a graveyard, abilities that trigger when a permanent phases out, abilities that trigger when an object that all players can see is put into a hand or library, abilities that trigger specifically when an object becomes unattached, abilities that trigger when a player loses control of an object, and abilities that trigger when a player planeswalks away from a plane will trigger based on their existence, and the appearance of objects, prior to the event rather than afterward. The game has to “look back in time” to determine if these abilities trigger.

From these rules, we can see that Liliana's ability only functions while she is on the battlefield, and it triggered based on her existence before she died.
Then, rule 201.4 says

Text that refers to the object it’s on by name means just that particular object and not any other objects with that name, regardless of any name changes caused by game effects.

The use of the word "object" here is important, because rule 400.7 says

An object that moves from one zone to another becomes a new object with no memory of, or relation to, its previous existence. There are seven exceptions to this rule

This means that the "Liliana, Heretical Healer" in the ability's text refers to the Liliana that was on the battlefield while the ability is on the stack, and that reference does not transfer to the object she becomes when she moves to the graveyard.
Therefore, you can only choose to exile Liliana to get a Zombie if she is still on the battlefield, as a creature, when the ability resolves.


Does Seeds of Strength trigger Heroic three times? Seeds of Strength has the following text:

  Target creature gets +1/+1 until end of turn.

  Target creature gets +1/+1 until end of turn.

  Target creature gets +1/+1 until end of turn.

Sage of hours reads

  Heroic — Whenever you cast a spell that targets Sage of Hours, put a +1/+1 counter on it.

So would Seeds of Strength trigger the heroic once or three?

Only once. The actual trigger condition is "whenever you cast a spell...". And there was only 1 instance of "cast a spell" happening.

IF the ability said "whenever a spell targets Sage of Hours..." then it would happen 3 times.

See the Gatherer ruling on Sage of Hours:

  Heroic abilities will trigger only once per spell, even if that spell targets the creature with the heroic ability multiple times.


Do multiple return to battlefield effects "stack"? If a creature I control without flying has a coin counter from Athreos, Shroud-Veiled dies, and I have Luminous Broodmoth and Athreos on the field.  What happens?

Do I only get the original creature back? With or without flying counter? Does this cause me to get a copy of the creature since both cards say return to battlefield?

Both Athreos and Broodmoth's abilities create a triggered effect ("Whenever ...") when the creature dies. As the controller of the effects, you choose the order in which they go on the stack.

Whichever effect resolves first (the second one you put on the stack) finds the card it's looking for and returns it to the battlefield, with a flying counter if it was Broodmoth's effect.

The second effect to resolve looks for the card, can't find it in the zone it expects it to be in (because it's already been returned to the battlefield) and fizzles.

Or in other words: you get one creature back, with your choice as to whether it has a flying counter on it or not. As an aside at this point, you're never going to get a copy of something unless an effect explicitly says "create a copy" or similar.


In MTG what happens to equipment after playing "Temporary Insanity" A friend of mine and I were playing the Knights vs Dragons duel deck.  He had a Kinsbaile Cavalier
 upon which he equipped the Loxodon Warhammer.  On my next turn, I proceeded to play Temporary Insanity to attack him with his knight.  I then followed that up by summoning a Voracious Dragon and using its ability to devour the Kinsbaile Cavalier.

I was hoping for a couple of rule clarifications, to ensure that the sequence we did was valid.

By playing "Temporary Insanity", I gain control of his creature and any equipment or creature enchantments applied to it.
If my friend wanted, he could pay the 3 colorless equipment cost, to equip the hammer on another one of his creatures (even before the creature returned to his side of the field.)
Since the knight is on my side of the field (if only for a turn), I am able to devour it.
After devouring the knight, the Warhammer returns to my friend's side of the field.

Just to enhance @thesunneversets's answer, here are the answers from the Comprehensive Rules:
Answer 1:  No, you only gain control of the creature, not the equipment.  From 301.5d:

An Equipment’s controller is separate from the equipped creature’s controller; the two need not be the same. Changing control of the creature doesn’t change control of the Equipment, and vice versa. Only the Equipment’s controller can activate its abilities. However, if the Equipment grants an ability to the equipped creature (with “gains” or “has”), the equipped creature’s controller is the only one who can activate that ability.

Answer 2: Not in this case.  While he has control of the equipment, you can only equip as a sorcery, and you can't play sorceries on someone else's turn.  Again from 301.5d:

An Equipment’s controller is separate from the equipped creature’s controller; the two need not be the same. Changing control of the creature doesn’t change control of the Equipment, and vice versa. Only the Equipment’s controller can activate its abilities. However, if the Equipment grants an ability to the equipped creature (with “gains” or “has”), the equipped creature’s controller is the only one who can activate that ability.

And then from 702.6a:

Equip is an activated ability of Equipment cards. “Equip [cost]” means “[Cost]: Attach this permanent to target creature you control. Activate this ability only any time you could cast a sorcery.”

Answer 3:  This is valid.  Devour has you sacrifice creatures, and you can only sacrifice creatures you control.  The creature you devour would go back to its owner's graveyard (in this case, your opponent's graveyard).

702.80a: Devour is a static ability. “Devour N” means “As this object enters the battlefield, you may sacrifice any number of creatures. This permanent enters the battlefield with N +1/+1 counters on it for each creature sacrificed this way.”
701.13a To sacrifice a permanent, its controller moves it from the battlefield directly to its owner’s graveyard. A player can’t sacrifice something that isn’t a permanent, or something that’s a permanent he or she doesn’t control. Sacrificing a permanent doesn’t destroy it, so regeneration or other effects that replace destruction can’t affect this action.

Question 4:  Yes, the Equipment would return to your friend's side of the table:

701.3d To “unattach” an Equipment from a creature means to move it away from that creature so the Equipment is on the battlefield but is not equipping anything. It should no longer be physically touching any creature. If an Aura, Equipment, or Fortification that was attached to something ceases to be attached to it, that counts as “becoming unattached”; this includes if that object and/or that Aura, Equipment, or Fortification leaves the battlefield.
403.1. Most of the area between the players represents the battlefield. The battlefield starts out empty. Permanents a player controls are normally kept in front of him or her on the battlefield, though there are some cases (such as an Aura attached to another player’s permanent) when a permanent one player controls is kept closer to a different player.


What's the difference between "target creature" and "target creature you control"? Ok I'm confused. I have a Built to Last card, it says "Target creature gets +2/+2 until end of turn. If it's and artifact creature it gains indestructible until end of turn."

My opponents tell me that I'm not allowed to use this on my own cards, and I have to use it on my opponent cards, because it doesn't say "in my control." Is this true? My thought was that it could go on any target creature including mine, since there are other cards that say "target creature your opponent controls." Catch my drift?? Help!

You can pick anything matching the targeting condition.

If the targeting condition is "target creature", you can pick any creature. Period.

If the targeting condition is "target creature you control", you can pick any creature you control. Period.

If a characteristic (e.g. Green), status (e.g. Untapped), controller or owner isn't specified, it's not a factor. You could even pick a tapped creature for "Tap target creature" (even though it's impossible to tap a tapped creature) because the only part that's important when picking a target is "target creature". There is only one implicit limit to targeting: It's illegal for a spell or ability to target itself.[CR 114.5]

Keep in mind that there are many cards that add other limits. In particular, those with Shroud, Hexproof or Protection.


In chess, if a player ran out of time, how to determine if his/her opponent has the 'possibility of checkmating'? From English Wikipedia, article 'Rules of chess':

If a player delivers a checkmate, the game is over and that player
wins, no matter what is subsequently noticed about the time on the
clock.
If player A calls attention to player B being out of time while
player A is not out of time and some sequence of legal moves leads to
B being checkmated then player A wins automatically.
If player A does not have the possibility of checkmating B then the game is a draw.

Can anyone provide a more detailed explanation what is 'possibility of checkmating' and who or what governs it? For example, I know that a king and a knight can checkmate a king with a rook.

However, I don't think a king and a knight can checkmate a king with a queen. I didn't find a single checkmate position for that case (for weakest side, of course).
So, after exactly one of players had run out of time, who or what determines if his or her opponent has the possibility of giving a checkmate? I think it's quite essential because it means difference between a win and a draw.

If in doubt of being able to by player B, player A now plays both sides towards a checkmate of his choice.

In your example, player A would be able to prove it if he comes to the said checkmate somehow.

I think checkmating against King-Queen with King-Knight is impossible. The shown position (with the rook being switched to a queen) is no checkmate because the queen can just capture the knight.


Can I use Deathwind with Isochron Scepter? My question is twofold.

1) Can I imprint Death Wind with Isochron Scepter

2) If I can, what is the maximum -X/-X I can give a creature by imprinting Death Wind and tapping Iscochron Scepter?

Thanks

Yes, you can. When a spell is in your hand any {X} in its mana cost is interpreted as 0, so the card counts as having a CMC of 1.
-0/-0, sorry. This combo isn't very lethal. Isochron lets you cast a copy of that card without paying its mana cost (and that's the only circumstances under which you're allowed to cast it; you don't get to opt to pay mana for it), and in these circumstances, {X} is always given a value of zero. That requirement to pick 0 is reflected in a ruling on Isohron Scepter:

  6/8/2016  If the exiled card has X in its mana cost, you must choose 0 as the value for X when casting it.

At least it'll trigger Heroic and kill Phantasmal Bears.


Does relieving the "volatility" of supply rolls make Afrika Korps better for the Germans? The last time I went out to play this game (four decades ago), someone offered me the following proposition. Given that the Germans get their supplies two times out of three during the game, why don't we just "stipulate" that every third German supply convoy gets sunk? I'll let you play Rommel under that rule." (We never did get around to playing that game.)

That proposition seems "fair" with regard to "mean value" but not with regard to volatility. Isn't it true that if the Germans "knew" exactly when their supplies would be sunk, they would gain an advantage by adjusting their strategy accordingly? Or is the "quantitative" factor of how many supplies the Germans get the more important consideration in victory and defeat?

You narrowly avoided a massive hoodwink.

The game runs in fortnightly turns from March '41 through October '42, a total of 20 months and 40 turns.

By the Supply Rules, the German supply expectation is:
- Apr. '41 through Jun. '41 ( 6 turns @ 4/6) =  4
- Jul. '41 through Nov. '41 (10 turns @ 3/6) =  5
- Dec. '41 through Oct. '42 (24 turns # 5/6) = 20
for a total expectation of 29 supply.

Your friend offered you a guaranteed schedule for only 40 * 4/6 = 26.7 supply.

You would have found yourself in supply difficulty through the final turns of the game, deprived of 2.3 supply relative to a normal supply expectation.

I doubt that a 1.6 additional supply expectation from July through November '41 would have compensated for the reduction by 4.3 through the final half of the game.

Yes, I have simplified the arithmetic slightly by ignoring the guaranteed supply on April '41 I turn - which adds 0.33 to the expectation in both scenarios - a wash


How are vehicles costed, and how do I tell if the crew cost is worth it? The Kaladesh expansion vehicle cards are artifacts that have a cost to turn them from artifacts into artifact creatures.

I'm trying to understand how to factor in the crew cost with the converted mana cost, when deciding if the card is good or not.

For instance, Irontread Crusher is 4 colourless, 3 to crew and is a 6/6, whereas Consulate Dreadnought is 1 colourless, 6 to crew and is 7/11!

That last one seems unbelievably cheap. How do I figure out if it's a great card or if I've underestimated the cost of crewing?

How does crew cost affect CMC?

Evaluating the vehicles like they're creatures is a mistake. As @JonTheMon says, vehicles are very analogous to equipment; they're worthless without creatures (or one of the other, fringe-ier enablers), and they can be "moved around". A good first step is then comparing the statline to the crew cost.

Another major consideration is the crew cost, just on its own. A Crew 1 vehicle will almost always have a creature capable of crewing it alone. A Crew 2 vehicle is usually safe too, but Crew 3 and above gets difficult. Crewing vehicles with multiple smaller creatures is ill-advised, as now you're tapping out a lot of your board for smaller gain. The best vehicles printed in Kaladesh block are Heart of Kiran and Smuggler's Copter (the latter being strong and pervasive enough to be banned). Copter had crew 1, which made it very good. Heart of Kiran is much harder to crew, but it makes up for it by being able to use planeswalkers as crew instead.

When a vehicle has a high crew cost, you need a larger creature to use it effectively. If you have such a huge creature (for example, one with 6 power to crew Consulate Dreadnought), you are in a strong position anyway, and the 7/11 is likely not that much stronger (we call cards like this "win-more" cards, and they're generally bad). Again, maybe you crew it with a bunch of small creatures, maybe tokens, but this is bad; a major source of value from tokens is their ability to clog up the board, and tapping a bunch of them down for one large creature is very unappealing, unless that card literally wins the game.

To properly evaluate vehicles, you have to do a little more than look at their statlines. Instead consider this; when does having this card on the board, or in my hand, help me? If a card is at its most useful when you're already winning, like Consulate Dreadnought, it is probably not a good card; the Dreadnought comes down on turn 1, but you're unlikely to be able to crew it until turn 4 or 5 at the earliest, and you're either tapping down an already large creature, or giving up on your entire board to do it. It lacks trample or any evasion, so it can be stopped by 1/1s, and on top of all that it adds only 1 power on top of what damage your crew could do normally. It is at its best when the board is clogged with large creatures, so it's 11 toughness can shine. This is a very specific situation that is not even likely to come up most games. Comparatively, see limited all-star Renegade Freighter. At Crew 2, it's likely that by turn 4, when it's able to attack, you'll have one or more creatures capable of operating it on its own. Landing on turn 3 means that it arrives early enough to be relevant, but it has an aggressive enough statline to remain useful late in the game, if that comes to it. It's great at developing your board, it closes out games that you're already winning, and it is beefy enough to block for you if you're losing.

This idea of evaluating when cards are useful, instead of just looking at their stats, is a very good philosophy for evaluating magic cards in general, but it's particularly useful for weird, newer types of cards like vehicles.


In MTG, what happens when a player loses in multiplayer? In Magic: The Gathering, the rules for a player losing in a multiplayer game are quite complex, so I'd like to try to understand them by example. I would be happy to ask each of these situations as a separate question if that is preferred, but they all seem related, and I would love to have one place to look up all of these answers.

Let's say I'm playing with two friends, Bob and Chloe, in a simple free for all. Unfortunately, I lose. When I lose, suppose the following:

I controlled an Oblivion Ring which has exiled Bob's Runeclaw Bear, does he get his bear back?
I have a Shock on the stack targeting Chloe, does Chloe take the 2 damage still?
Earlier in the turn I cast Healing Salve to prevent damage to one of Bob's Runeclaw Bears. If it later takes 3 damage, will that damage be prevented?
Something I controlled gave Bob a 1/1 soldier token. What happens to the token?
Something Chloe controlled gave me a 1/1 soldier token. What happens to the token?
I had a Mind Control enchanting one of Bob's army of Runeclaw Bears. What happens to the bear?
I had also played Act of Treason on Bob's final Runeclaw Bears. What happens to the last bear?
Chloe had Cloned my Raging Goblin. What happens to the Clone?
Are there any other situations specifically addressed by the rules?

First, the source: section 8 of the Comprehensive Rules covers multiplayer games, and rule 800.4a deals with the consequences of one player being eliminated:

  800.4a. When a player leaves the game, all objects (see rule 109) owned by that player leave the game, any effects which give that player control of any objects or players end, and all spells and abilities controlled by that player on the stack cease to exist. Then, if there are any objects still controlled by that player, those objects are exiled. This is not a state-based action. It happens as soon as the player leaves the game. If the player who left the game had priority at the time he or she left, priority passes to the next player in turn order who’s still in the game.

This is clarified by several other rules, among them

  800.4c If an object that would be owned by a player who has left the game would be created in any zone, it isn’t created. If a triggered ability that would be controlled by a player who has left the game would be put onto the stack, it isn’t put on the stack.

Applying this to your examples:

  I controlled an Oblivion Ring which has exiled Bob's Runeclaw Bear, does he get his bear back?

Rule 800.4a provides for the Ring to leave the game when you lose. Ordinarily that would result in a triggered ability that returns the Bear to the battlefield, but rule 800.4c overrides that. So no, Bob does not get his bear back. Note that if the card is Banishing Light, the Oblivion Ring equivalent with "until" rather than a separate triggered ability for removing, Bob would get the Bear back, as there's no "returning" trigger to interact with 800.4 (see the final gatherer ruling)

  I have a Shock on the stack targeting Chloe, does Chloe take to 2 damage?

No, because the Shock leaves the game when you lose according to 800.4a.

  Earlier in the turn I cast Healing Salve to prevent damage to one of Bob's Runeclaw Bears. If it later takes 3 damage, will that damage be prevented?

This one is a little tricky, but as far as I can tell, there is nothing in rule 800.4 that says your effects are terminated when you leave the game. (Note that an "effect" is something separate from a spell or ability) So I believe that yes, the damage would be prevented. Prevention effects are described in rule 615.

  Something I controlled gave Bob a 1/1 soldier token. What happens to the token?

Rule 110.5a states that "a token is both owned and controlled by the player under whose control it entered the battlefield." So this token is Bob's and has no connection to you; thus nothing happens to it.

  Something Chloe controlled gave me a 1/1 soldier token. What happens to the token?

This token, on the other hand, is owned by you, so rule 800.4a specifies that it leaves the game.

  I had a Mind Control enchanting one of Bob's army of Runeclaw Bears. What happens to the bear?

Bob gets the bear back because your Mind Control leaves the game. (I realize I'm pretty much bolding random words now)

  I had also played Act of Treason on Bob's final Runeclaw Bears. What happens to the last bear?

Bob gets the bear back again, but this time because rule 800.4a explicitly causes control-changing effects to end.

  Chloe had Cloned my Raging Goblin. What happens to the Clone?

I can't find an explicit reference for this one (yet) but I believe the Clone continues to exist as a copy of Raging Goblin, independent of the original. Clone says it "enters the battlefield as" a copy of the Goblin, but once it has entered the battlefield, the copying is complete and Clone doesn't maintain any connection to the Goblin.

  Are there any other situations specifically addressed by the rules?

Of course ;-) Rule 800.4 alone has 9 subsections; I'd recommend that you take a look at them.


Can I use "De Vermis Mysteriis" every round? The "De Vermis Mysteriis" card seems very strong. The card does not have any rules for discarding after use. Is it really possible to keep it an improve a skill round after round? Combined with some sort of sanity replenishment it seems almost too strong.

Short answer: Yes.

Longer answer: Note, you can only improve each stat a total of two times (thus there's only +1/+2 tokens).  You also cannot perform the same action in a round (so can only use the item once a round).  This is also balanced by the check, which you may not pass.

So yes you can spend 10 rounds maxing out your guys stats (if you roll well/pass the checks), but likely you'll need to rest as well, so you've basically spent 10-11 rounds doing nothing if you do that.  Since the difficulty of the game is dependant upon the # of players and things happen every round, taking this action especially repeatedly actually makes the game MORE difficult for your team (in my opinion, it'd be better to have no player playing doing this for 10 rounds and the game be easier than to have a player doing this).

In my limited experience with this game, if you have 10 rounds to sit around doing this, you probably need to find a harder game for yourself (or you're being carried);)  I have not had such a luxury in multiple play attempts.  I have had this item and recall using it when my health is down but my sanity is not and I'm going to rest anyway or when I have a skill I want to bump to try and forward the game.


What happens when this situation occurs in Tsuro? There are two empty sepetated spaces left and the person going does not have a card to play but the next person does.

Does the first person lose because they are out of cards to play or does the second player lose because they still have a card to play afterwards that will move them off the board?

It's impossible to get into that situation.

Please review how to handle the situation when you run out of cards.


Bohnanza Fan Edition I bought the Bohnanza Fan Edition by mistake and I can't return it (long story) how can I alter the cards to make them more readable/playable like the original edition?

I think the biggest issue with the fan cards is that they don't contain the quantity of that type of bean in the deck.  If you're prepared to mark the face of the cards, then adding "12" to all your Soy Beans would improve the playability greatly.

The second thing that's missing from the fan cards is the bean name.  Having the numbers alone would be fine to identify which beans are from the same set (as well as the icons in the top corners), but the negotiation is helped along by everyone using the same names.  If you have room on the cards you could try adding this information too, but I would prefer to print off a few crib sheets to have in the centre of the table, showing the bean icon, the quantity and the name.

On a side note, I love the gameplay in Bohnanza, but quite dislike the artwork.  I think the fan edition may prove to be a good investment once you've got used to it!


Can the Herald put itself on top of your draw deck? Herald from Dominion Guilds says that you can over pay for it and if you do, you may put X Action cards from your discard on top of your deck, where X is the amount you overpaid.

Can you place Herald on top of your deck if you overpay?

(Note: This question comes down to a matter of timing. Does the "when you buy this" clause occur before or after you place Hearld in the discard pile)

No, Herald cannot put itself on top of the deck by overpaying.
From the designer, Donald X. Vaccarino on BGG.

Q: OK, so when the "when buy" effect kicks in, is the herald you just bought in the discard pile yet? Or would it have to be a "when gain" like Inn to do that? i.e., can you pay 5 to buy a herald and put it on top?
A: When-buy, which includes overpay, triggers before gaining, so you can't buy a Herald and use its overpay to put that very Herald on top of your deck.


Aligned Hedron Network and Ulamog's Despoiler If I was to use Aligned Hedron Network against an Eldrazi deck to exile big creatures, am I then able to send these creatures to the graveyard with the likes of Ulamog Despoiler to give him the 4 +1/+1 counters? I'm not sure if the cards exiled this way can be targeted by these types of abilities...

If this works and my Aligned Hedron Network was to be destroyed afterwards, the creatures would not return from Exile as they were placed in the graveyard, Correct?

Ulamog's Despoiler makes no limitations as to what cards can be moved from exile to graveyard except the cards' owners. Therefore, you can move any of your opponent's exiled cards, no matter how they got exiled. Note, however, the rulings on the Despoiler's Gatherer page regarding face-down exiled cards.

If the Aligned Hedron Network was destroyed after Despoiler has had its effect, the Network's effect would end and return all cards exiled with it to the battlefield. Unless a few specific exceptions apply (which they don't here), effects do not track objects across zones, and the Network would not return the cards put into the graveyard by Despoiler.


Do spells continue to use hand(s) on following rounds of combat? If I use a spell in combat (eg: Shriveling) on one turn of combat, and it succeeds, on a subsequent round of combat, does the spell still use up any "hands" for combat?

OR

After casting a spell, on a subsequent round of combat, is that hand(s) free to use other weapons/spells?

From the rulebook, page 16:
A spell or weapon that gives you a bonus (even one that says it lasts until the end of combat) only continues to give you the bonus while you devote the required number of hands to it. You can choose to switch weapons/spells in later combat rounds, but as soon as you “release” a spell or weapon, it stops working for you. Similarly, spells that are refreshed (such as at the beginning of each combat round in the final battle) cease to work and must be re-cast.


Different color cubes in one city If we had a blue city with one black disease cube due to an outbreak and we pull that blue city card during epidemic infection phase, is it an outbreak?
We thought that 3 was the max #of cubes one city can have (even if they are of different colors), but I just read one of the thread here that mentioned a city with 2 red cubes and 2 black cubes, total of 4 cubes in one city.

An outbreak only occurs due to cubes of a single color:

  If the city already has 3 cubes of this color, do not place a 4th cube. Instead, an outbreak of this disease occurs in the city (see Outbreaks below).

And therefore a city can have up to three cubes of each color, not just three cubes overall:

  As a result of outbreaks, a city may have disease cubes of multiple colors on it; up to 3 cubes of each color. This does not affect infections.


Does Raving Dead deal damage before halving opponent's life? Does Raving Dead deal damage before halving opponent's life i.e. is two damage subtracted first?

Yes, Raving Dead deals combat damage, then the defending player loses half their life total. This is explicitly stated in one of the official rulings for the card:

The last ability triggers and resolves after combat damage has been dealt. For example, if an opponent has 17 life and Raving Dead deals 2 combat damage to him or her, he or she will end up at 8 life.

The rules section regarding the Combat Damage Step has the following rules:

510.1. First, the active player announces how each attacking creature assigns its combat damage, then the defending player announces how each blocking creature assigns its combat damage. This turn-based action doesn’t use the stack. [...]

510.2. Second, all combat damage that’s been assigned is dealt simultaneously. This turn-based action doesn’t use the stack. No player has the chance to cast spells or activate abilities between the time combat damage is assigned and the time it’s dealt.

510.3. Third, the active player gets priority. (See rule 116, “Timing and Priority.”)

510.3a Any abilities that triggered on damage being dealt or while state-based actions are performed afterward are put onto the stack before the active player gets priority; the order in which they triggered doesn’t matter. (See rule 603, “Handling Triggered Abilities.”)

Raving Dead's ability says

Whenever Raving Dead deals combat damage to a player, that player loses half his or her life, rounded down.

So the ability triggers in the third part of the combat damage step, after damage has been dealt.

More generally, trigger abilities always resolve after the event that caused them to trigger. The rules section regarding Triggered Abilities has the following rules:

603.1. Triggered abilities have a trigger condition and an effect. They are written as “[When/Whenever/At] [trigger condition or event], [effect].”

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. [...]

So any triggered ability goes through the following process:

First, the triggering event occurs.
Second, the ability triggers.
Third, the ability gets put on the stack (when a player would receive priority).
Last, the ability eventually resolves.

In this particular case, the triggering event is "Raving Dead deals combat damage to a player" and the effect (which happens) on resolution is "that player loses half his or her life, rounded down". Clearly, the triggering event must occur well before the ability's effect.


Chess: Move 2 pawns one space each as first move When I was young I remember that it was usual to move 2 pawns one space each on your first move, instead of one pawn two spaces. (ie b3 and g3 at the same time). I'm not sure if the 2 pawns had to be mirrored or not, but moving the knight's pawns was the most usual move of this type.

Was this ever legal? If not, would that be a major advantage to the player playing this way?

This was never legal. Rule 1.1. of the FIDE rules clearly states that the moves have to alternate. This was probably more of a house rule. Of course you can advance a pawn two spaces on it's first move (Rule 3.7b).


Is there a free site to play Yu-Gi-Oh? Anything fairly priced will also work. Any suggestions?

http://www.duelingnetwork.com/

I used to hit problems with the intro and needed to block the music file they use (it's not a part of the flash file for some weird reason), but it works well for what it does.


Is Metallic Mimic the chosen creature type when it enters the battlefield? If I have Thalia's Lieutenant in play and resolve a Metallic Mimic choosing "Human" does Thalia's Lieutenant get a +1/+1 counter?

Yes
Metallic Mimic

As Metallic Mimic enters the battlefield, choose a creature type.
Metallic Mimic is the chosen type in addition to its other types.

When you are asked to do something "As X enters the battlefield", you are doing it immediately before it enters. This does not use the stack; when Metallic Mimic resolves you choose a type and it enters as that type, triggering any appropriate ETBs, and no one can do anything in between you choosing the type and Mimic hitting the battlefield.
If it instead read:

When Metallic Mimic enters the battlefield, choose a creature type.

Then it would be a triggered ability; Metallic Mimic would enter the battlefield as a "Shapeshifter", this ability would be put on the stack, and when it resolved you'd get to choose a type (like "Human") and it would become that type. Thalia's Lieutenant's ability would not be triggered.


Is it possible to use ritual effects to pay for Propaganda? Is it possible to use ritualistic effects, i.e. instants that add mana to your mana pool, to pay for combat costs incurred by Ghostly Prison, Propaganda, etc.?

For example, if I have two copies of Battle Hymn in my hand and my opponent has a Propaganda, I could generate the two mana per creature needed to attack with all of my creatures. But if I cast them during Beginning of Combat, my understanding is that the mana drains before I can pay as I declare attackers. Is this correct, or am I missing something?

No, you cannot use rituals or other instant speed effects that gain mana to pay for Propaganda or similar effects, and your reasoning for why this would be the case is correct.

First, as mentioned, rule 106.4 says

  When an effect produces mana, that mana goes into a player’s mana pool. From there, it can be used to pay costs immediately, or it can stay in the player’s mana pool. Each player’s mana pool empties at the end of each step and phase.

So, any mana you produce in the Beginning of Combat step would empty from your mana pool before you declare attacks. Then, the Declare Attackers step is actually multiple sub-steps. The first step, described in rule 508.1, is to declare your attackers. This includes activating mana abilities and paying costs for declaring attackers (508.1i,j). After that, the active player gains priority, which would be the first time they have the opportunity to cast rituals or similar spells during the declare attackers step.

So, there is no opportunity between the mana pool emptying at the end of the Beginning of Combat step and paying to declare attackers during the Declare Attackers step to cast rituals.


Best way to improve ourselves when playing against a computer It's often said by world-class Backgammon players that the best way to improve one's play is to analyse one's games with a computer program such as gnubg, JellyFish or Snowie.

gnubg has a "tutor mode" that evaluates the quality of the player's proposed move, to know before making a move if this one is bad. I assume the same exists for chess programs (hence the tag).

Alternatively, it's also possible to do all the analysis at the end and walk through our moves to look at the errors. My question is whether one of the two methods is better.

A third way I often use is to play normally and ask the computer to analyse the move when I'm unsure of the best answer. I do this just after my thoughts, but without following the computer's advice (to stay motivated).

Do you know of any public statement from top Backgammon or Chess players, or a study regarding the best way to improve oneself by playing against a program, using these or other methods?

I have no sources to cite, but I think it depends a lot on your own learning style. You will certainly not learn well if the computer just tells you the best play and you follow it, but if you can carefully think through your move before being told by the computer if it's bad, and if the computer has a better move you can reason out why it's better, immediate feedback is fine. However, if you find yourself getting impatient and cutting back on your thinking time, perhaps you should wait until the end.

I do Go problems on the computer a fair bit. With Go problems, usually the first move is the key, and often is the hardest move to find. Some programs will tell you immediately if the first move you've made is correct, but I much prefer the ones that will let me play out a bad sequence without telling me it's wrong until the end. That way I see exactly why it doesn't work, and it reduces the temptation to just try something that looks promising to see if it's right.


Multiple Ordeals of Nylea on one creature I have 2 counters on a creature, with 3 Ordeal of Nylea attached, and then attack, what in all (preferably step by step) happens next?

The basic answer is that the creature gets 3 more counters (for a total of 5), you sacrifice all 3 Ordeals, and you search your library for 6 basic lands and put them onto the battlefield tapped.

Step by step, here's what happens:

You attack with the creature.
Abilities that trigger when you attack are put on the stack. In this case, that is the first ability of each of the 3 Ordeals attached to the creature.
The first ability of the first Ordeal resolves. You put a counter on the creature. It has 3 or more counters, so you sacrifice the Ordeal. The Ordeal's second ability triggers, and is put on the stack.
Each player gains priority, and has an opportunity to respond.
The second ability of the first Ordeal resolves. You search your library for 2 basic lands, and put them on the battlefield tapped.
Each player gains priority, and has an opportunity to respond.
Steps 3-6 repeat for each of the second and the third Ordeal. In each of those iterations, you put another counter on the creature, sacrifice that Ordeal, and search for 2 more lands.


What is the name of this game with temples, volcanos and stacking tiles? You build the board with tiles that are 3 hexes joined together, each has a volcano on it. You  stack them, and build stuff on them. Temples on tiles that are 4 high, villages need to have a certain size and there's a third building I can't remember.

Looks like you might be talking about Taluva.


How to deal with a player who showed his hands to influence the robber? As per the Catan FAQ:

  Resource Cards - Do I always have to keep my Resource Cards face down?

  Yes.

With this in mind, consider this scenario that I've encountered occasionally when playing Catan with my friends:

  Adam has just rolled a 7 and has placed the robber on a hex occupied
  by both Brad and Charlie.  Adam has been receiving plentiful sheep
  throughout the game and would prefer to gain a different resource.
  Brad also has been receiving plentiful sheep, and currently has only
  sheep cards in his hand.  Charlie has more diverse resources.

  While Adam is deliberating about who to steal from, the clever Brad
  proudly reveals his entire hand to the group, showing that if he is
  robbed Adam will certainly gain a sheep.  Adam, not wanting to gain a sheep from
  the robber, elects to rob Charlie, who is now infuriated at Brad for
  breaking the rules to sway Adam's decision and avoid getting robbed.

I believe it would be legal to say "I have only sheep", and allow that to influence the robber's choice, but revealing cards in this way is clearly a violation of the rules for personal advantage.  My question is what can/should be done in the event a player breaks the rules in this way. I feel some sort of penalty is due, but what?  It seems unfair to allow such play to influence the robber's choice, but it also seems unfair to force the robber to choose from the player with the more undesirable resource (this could be used strategically).  So how, then, should I handle this (other than choosing players with more integrity)?

Note: This question is different from
Can I show my resource cards to other players in Settlers of Catan?

My main focus is on what penalty (if any) can/should be given for this violation. Or, what incentive can be given to prevent it.

First off, yes, what he did was cheating. However, there's more details we need to know. Most importantly, did he know about this rule; and thus was cheating on purpose? Or did he not know, and it was an accident?

If it was on purpose, then the question I linked in comments probably covers it: How can I play games with closed information with players who cheat?

If it was an accident, then simply telling him about the rule so that he doesn't do it again is probably sufficient; at least for a non-tournament friendly game. The advantage that he gained was very small. Without cheating, he could have told Adam that he had nothing but sheep, and provided pretty good evidence of that fact by reminding him of what resources were given out over the past few turns. It seems more likely than not that the outcome would have been the same either way.

Ultimately, it's going to be a question of how you and your group generally handle mistakes during game play; not something that's specific to this scenario. For example, my group is very lenient about allowing players to take back / change their move if no one else has done something based on what they did yet. Some groups, however, may prefer strict rules enforcement over being casual.


If a card becomes cloned while another text-modifying effect is on the stack, what is the result? Here is the scenario:

I have Shapesharer and Quicksilver Elemental in play.
I activate and resolve Artificial Evolution to make Quicksilver Elemental a Shapeshifter.
I activate Quicksilver Elemental's ability to have it gain the activated abilities of some other 3rd creature (doesn't matter which.)
While that is on the stack,  I target Quicksilver Elemental with Shapesharer's ability, making it a copy of some other 4th creature (doesn't matter which.)

Is the end result that Quicksilver Elemental becomes a copy of creature 4 with the abilities of creature 3 tacked on, as I intend?

Your stack after step 4 is (top to bottom):

Shapesharer's activated ability
Quicksilver Elemental's activated ability

Shapesharer's ability resolves first. Quicksilver becomes a copy of Creature 4. Per rule 706.3, Quicksilver's abilities become those of Creature 4. This also means that Quicksilver loses its original ability.

  706.3. The copy’s copiable values become the copied information [...]

Quicksilver's ability resolves second. Quicksilver (who is now a copy of Creature 4) gains all activated abilities of Creature 3 until end of turn. It does not lose any abilities it already had. The fact that Quicksilver changed names before the ability resolved does not matter per rule 201.4.

  201.4. Text that refers to the object it’s on by name means just that particular object and not any other objects with that name, regardless of any name changes caused by game effects.

The result is that Quicksilver will end up a copy of Creature 4 with the abilities of both Creature 3 and Creature 4, but not its own original ability.

If Quicksilver were to become a copy of another creature, it would still retain the abilities of Creature 3. This is because the effect granting it abilities is not a copiable characteristic (per rule 706.2), and thus is not overwritten when it becomes a copy of something else.

  706.2. [...] The “copiable values” are the values derived from the text printed on the object (that text being name, mana cost, color indicator, card type, subtype, supertype, rules text, power, toughness, and/or loyalty), as modified by other copy effects, by its face-down status, and by “as . . . enters the battlefield” and “as . . . is turned face up” abilities that set power and toughness (and may also set additional characteristics). Other effects (including type-changing and text-changing effects), status, and counters are not copied


What is this blank purple UNO card? When I was playing UNO earlier, I found two strange cards: they were purple and blank, with no number or special sign on them. What is this card for? Is it like a Wild Card or +4 Wild Card? It wasn't mentioned in the instructions.

These cards are mentioned in Uno instructions — you can use one if you lose or damage one of the other cards, or you can use it to include custom house rules card into the deck. See reference in manual:

What Are These Extra Cards For?
Blank Card - This is a special card that you may use in one of two ways. If a card from your UNO deck is lost or damaged you may use the Blank Card as a replacement. Example: If you find that your deck is missing one of the yellow 7's you would simply replace it by taking the yellow Blank Card, marking a "7" on it and adding it back into the deck.
If you family has a special UNO rule you prefer to play with you may write that rule on the Blank Cards and add them straight to the deck

It says also that you should have 4 of these; maybe you have lost the other two?

4 Blank Cards in each color [new decks]


Can flute of the outer gods be used against epic monsters? This card allows one to "defeat all monsters." Epic monsters cannot be discarded but can they be defeated with this card?

No, they can't.

  An Epic Monster cannot be defeated by any effect except losing
  Health equal to or greater than its toughness.

Source: Reference Guide, "Epic Monster" (page 6)


Can Thraben Heretic be used on creatures with undying? Thraben Heretic says:

  {T}: Exile target creature card from a graveyard.

Undying says:

  Undying (When this creature dies, if it had no +1/+1 counters on it, return it to the battlefield under its owner's control with a +1/+1 counter on it.)

So, when a creature with Undying dies, can I use Thraben Heretic to exile that creature from the graveyard before Undying resolves?

Yes.

Undying is a triggered ability, not a replacement effect. That means Undying creatures still "die" -- meaning that the card is placed into the graveyard from the battlefield. Then its Undying ability goes on the stack. You can activate Thraben Heretic in response to exile the creature card from the graveyard. The Undying ability do nothing when in resolves because the card it's supposed to fetch back to the battlefield is no longer in the graveyard.


Returning tokens for the 10 token limit: which ones? Splendor rules regarding tokens (gem coins) state:

  A player can never have more than 10 tokens at the end of their turn (including jokers). If this happens, they must return tokens until they only have 10 left. A player can return all or some of those they’ve just drawn....

That phrase "those they've just drawn" is used ambiguously.

1) Does the phrase "those they've just drawn" mean you can return only those drawn on that turn?  That doesn't make sense, but the phrase could be interpreted that way (or not). Or does it simply mean that you aren't required to hold newly acquired coins for a turn?

2) Does the phrase "return all" mean that the player can return literally any number of their coins to the bank without purchasing, no matter when they were acquired?

3) Can you return coins without purchasing, even if you are below the 10 token limit?

You may return any of the tokens currently in your possession.

When you collect gems and/or gold, you may collect fewer tokens than you are entitled to collect. It would be a little weird to collect tokens and immediately return them, but that addendum indicates it's perfectly valid to do so.

It doesn't mean you can only return those you've drawn.

It doesn't mean you can return more than would be necessary to avoid exceeding the limit.

The Splendor rules are quite poorly written. What follows is the complete rules (except the setup instructions) rewritten in much clearer language.

Rules of Splendor

[These rules are found here as text and as images suitable for printing on 3.5" x 2.5" cards.]

Setup:

 Players     Gems       Gold     Dev Cards   Nobles
---------  ---------  ---------  ---------  ---------
    2      4 of each      5      4 of each      3
    3      5 of each      5      4 of each      4
    4      7 of each      5      4 of each      5

On your turn, perform the following steps:

Take one of the following actions:

Collect up to three different gems.
Collect two gems of a type of which at least four gems are available.
Reserve a face-up or face-down development card and take up to one gold,
but only if you have fewer than three development cards currently reserved.
Reserved cards are kept private.
Purchase an available or previously-reserved development card.

Replace any missing development cards if possible.
Discard down to ten gems and/or gold.
Form a permanent alliance with an unallied noble whose requirements
you meet (if possible). Nobles are not replaced.
The game ends if any player has 15 or more points, and if all of the players
have had the same number of turns. Those with the fewest development cards
win ties.


Who is the male investigator on the cover of Arkham Horror, Elder Sign, and Eldritch Horror? The 30- or 40-something dark-haired male on the cover of these games appears to be the same character, but it's not clear to me which. Is it one of the in-game characters?

Honestly, I think it's just 'Generic 1920's stereotype'.  While I agree that he's got a tommy gun in both pictures, his facial structure looks wrong for being Michael McGlen.  He actually looks closer to Joe Diamond, if it wasn't for Joe Diamond having a blue suit.  Michael McGlen would be closest, without going over, but I think the cover art characters are just generic characters and no actual investigator.


Challenging an Ambassador Exchange A couple nights ago while playing Coup for the first time. During one of our games we came across the situation of someone challenging an Ambassador Exchange action. Given that both the   Ambassador's Exchange and the challenge are going to require the swapping of active influence cards, what is the proper sequence to change them in?

The following sequence is what we ended up using.

Claim to be an Ambassador and state intent to perform an exchange.
Leave current influence cards face down on the table.
Draw two (or one if only one influence left) new cards  from the court deck.
At this point the challenge was issued.
The player then revealed their Ambassador card to the table.
The Ambassador card was then reshuffled back into the court deck and a replacement was taken.
The player then continued on with the Exchange and could swap with either his existing influence card and the newly drawn card which replaced his Ambassador.

This seemed like the most sensible way of doing it. However the rules themselves didn't explicitly define this situation.

After claiming Ambassador, the player should pause for a few seconds and confirm that there are no challenges before drawing new cards. The reason is so that, if successfully challenged, the player does not gain any improper information about the cards remaining in the deck. (For example, seeing two Dukes in the deck can be a powerful suggestion that the players claiming it are lying!)

(According to the rules, you always check for no challenge before proceeding with a claimed action. But for the Assassin and Captain, you're waiting for the victim to take the hit (or claim a blocker) anyway, and for the Duke, it's easy enough to just return the coins. Only for the Ambassador is it important to deliberately pause.

It is also worth mentioning that you seem to have a slight detail confused. A player using Ambassador always draws 2 and returns 2, even if they have only one influence remaining.


Can I prevent a "You lose the game" event by countering the ability that creates it? If I cast Chance for Glory, can I use Stifle, Tale's End, Disallow, or Voidslime to counter the game loss at the end of said extra turn?

Chance for Glory's "At the beginning of that turn's end step, you lose the game" ability is a delayed trigger, so anything that counters triggered abilities will stop it. Hence yes, all four of the cards you mentioned will stop the game loss.


Change in "can't be countered" wording Wizard's somewhat recently changed the wording of uncounterable spells to be:

  "This spell can’t be countered."

The old wording was:

  "[Card name] can't be countered."

For example, Emrakul, the Aeons Torn has changed between Modern Masters 2015 and Ultimate Masters.

This change seems to have happened as part of the April 2018 rules change where spells and abilities with invalid targets changed from being countered by game rules to just fizzling.  As a result of this, they needed to change the wording on cards that said "[Card name] can't be countered by spells or abilities."  But this doesn't explain the change from "[Card name]" to "This spell", nor does it explain why they needed to issue errata for cards that didn't have the "by spells or abilities" component.

So why did they make this change?

Also, the Gatherer Oracle for Nezahal, Primal Tide appears not to have been changed.  Is this an error?

The reason for this change was to "clarify that a card's ability is used at the time you cast it", according to Aaron Forsythe.

This change was not only limited to "can't be countered", but to all abilities that matter when the card was being cast (when it is a spell). See Talara's Battalion, which went from "Cast Talara's Battalion only if you've cast another green spell this turn." to "Cast this spell only if you've cast another green spell this turn."

You can read about it here.

I can't give a definitive answer about Nezahal, Primal Tide. But we know from past history that sometimes in large Oracle updates, certain cards have been missed, and they get updated in future updates. You can find an example of that in this article, where it explains that Decree of Annihilation should have been updated previously, but was missed and was updated later.


What's an effective Small World strategy for new players? I've played one game of Small World.  I thoroughly enjoyed it, despite losing badly.  For one, I had no game plan, and was sort of just trying things randomly.  Is there an effective, yet basic, strategy I can use next time to at least play with a sense of purpose?  At the risk of asking too many questions at once...

Should I always spend coins to get a race with more troops?
How do I know when to decline an active race?
Is there a good VP target to earn per turn?

One thing I'm discovering about Small World (especially in games with smaller number of players) is that it's not inherently balanced - your opponents can easily snap up amazing race/ability combos for cheap, leaving you with much less attractive options, just by random virtue of the seating order.

As such, you simply have to play a competitive game.  Don't just look at your race/ability combo in isolation: look at it also in terms of how much it can do to hamper the efforts of the player currently winning the game (or the player most likely to stop you from winning).

Barring special circumstances, you will generally have two races on the go at once: one Declined race in as defensible a position as possible, and one Active race doing things.  The Active race has a lot of work to do: it needs to take lots of territory (to get points here and now); take defensible territory (to keep getting points while in decline); and also, crucially, mess with the opponents: oust them from defensible areas and force them to go into Decline at points that are disadvantageous to them.

In short, I'd agree with everything the other answers have said about this being a game about adapting to circumstances - Small World is nothing if not a game of taking advantage of opportunities as they arise - but I'd add that it's not a game you can play without reference to how well the other players are doing.  If they have some good race/power combos going, then grab an aggressive race, get in there and do them over, as quickly as possible!  Defensive powers and play is all very well, but save it for when you're obviously in the lead...


How should I approach teaching Magic:The Gathering to a new player? I've been playing MtG since Ice Age (mostly with friends) so I'm now sitting on a massive duffle bag of cards, plenty of decks, and quite some experience of the game.

I want to teach the game to someone completely new. I know there once was a set called Portal which was designed exactly for that purpose, is it a good resource for teaching?

It seems like a lot to explain mana, phases, the stack, capabilities, planeswalkers, and all that at the same time using a full compliment of modern cards :-)  Which terms are key and must be taught?  Which can be avoided for a few games while I get them hooked?

I'm happy to buy starter decks or to print out some proxies to get my friends started.

So, what's the "recommended" way to teach someone MtG starting from the basics ?

Have to say, I hated Portal.  If someone can't cope with the word "block" (Portal used "intercept" instead) or the concept of playing a spell at instant speed, they're not going to get on with Magic in the long run.  So why even bother with a watered-down version?

Modern Magic Core sets, like M11, are pretty well designed so that they contain everything that makes the game great, while remaining pretty accessible to a beginner.  Sure, there are some moderately advanced concepts in the set... but they tend to be restricted to uncommon or rare cards.  The commons are pretty straightforward, and have important rules clearly reiterated on the cards, in the form of reminder text.  You don't have to worry about explaining at great length how Flying works: it says so on every common card.

Sure, Magic is a pretty complicated game. However, it's gotten a lot easier from the worst bad old days of interrupts, mana burn, damage on the stack and the subtle difference between "destroy" and "bury".  Anyone who can cope with Settlers of Catan shouldn't have a problem getting their head around Magic!  All you really need to explain is one land a turn, sorceries only in your turn outside of combat vs. instants at any time, and the fact that you have a window to do things after attackers are declared, and then after blockers are declared, and you've explained 90% of the "intricacies" of the game.

Don't sell your friends short - let them into the full and wonderful game.  If you must simplify it, then build some decks with only simpler cards in them, and play with those, gradually introducing more concepts as you go along.  But I really don't think there's any call for Portalizing the game.  Anything that is in a modern Core Set has been proven to be "grokkable" even by beginning players by extensive WotC market research.  I think people respond better, in general, to you giving their intelligence the benefit of the doubt, rather than patronizing them with a vastly reduced experience!


Are there any good white and/or blue token generators? I’m looking for something that’ll summon 1 or more tokens per turn so I can use Soul Warden and Ajani's Pridemate at full power. Can be in modern, legacy, or standard but I prefer modern. Thank you :)

If you accept planeswalkers as your tool to generate tokens multiple turns you may use one of these:

Dovin, Grand Arbiter as a Blue and White option
Karn, Scion of Urza as a Colorless option
Nahiri, the Lithomancer as a Mono White option
Ugin, the Ineffable as a Colorless option
Tezzeret, Artifice Master as a Mono Blue option

Now if you want creatures, these are the two best options I've got:

Mycologist as a Mono white option
Pallid Mycoderm also as a Mono White option


Jadzi, Oracle of Arcavios and Spells with X mana cost Let's say that I have Jadzi, Oracle of Arcavios on the battlefield.
What happens if I cast some instant or sorcery spell, reveal the top card of my library and it happens to be Ingenious Mastery?
According to Jadzi, I can cast a nonland card by paying 1C rather than paying its mana cost. But what does it mean to Ingenious Mastery? Will my opponents create two Treasure tokens, and do Scry 2, and how many cards will I draw, and why?

Ingenious Mastery has a Gatherer ruling that says

If you choose to pay one alternative cost, you can’t pay any other alternative costs. For example, if an effect lets you cast a “Mastery” spell “without paying its mana cost,” you can’t also choose to pay its given alternative cost.

The ability of Jadzi to pay 1 to cast a spell is an alternative cost just like "without paying its mana cost" is. If you cast the Mastery that way, you won't cast the Mastery by paying the 2U alternate cost, so you do not get to draw three cards, and your opponent does not get to scry or create tokens.
And X is necessarily set to zero, as per Jazdi's Gatherer ruling:

If you cast a spell with X in its mana cost using Jadzi’s magecraft ability, you must choose 0 as the value of X.

So ultimately, the Ingenious Mastery doesn't do anything as it resolves.


Bonded Horncrest and Prey Upon interaction If Prey Upon is used on Bonded Horncrest, will it be able to "attack alone" ?
Is this the same for Bonded Horncrest being the target of Savage Stomp and the Cherished Hatchling's ability?

p.s. If Prey Upon is used on Snapping Sailback, will it get a +1/+1 counter? and I assume the +1/+1 counter enters after the fight/dmg has been dealt, right?

If Prey Upon is used on Bonded Horncrest, will it be able to "attack alone"?

No, it won't. Prey Upon is a spell that makes creatures fight each other. Fight is a keyword:

  701.12. Fight

    701.12a A spell or ability may instruct a creature to fight another creature or it may instruct two creatures to fight each other. Each of those creatures deals damage equal to its power to the other creature.

I assume you got confused by the wording on the cards, but fighting has absolutely nothing to do with the combat phase. If a creature (such as Bonded Horncrest) cannot attack alone, it means that it cannot be the only creature declared as an attacker in the "declare attackers" step of the combat phase.

  p.s. If Prey Upon is used on Snapping Sailback, will it get a +1/+1 counter?

Assuming Snapping Sailback survives the damage it was dealt, then yes, it gets a +1/+1 counter.

  and I assume the +1/+1 counter enters after the fight/dmg has been dealt, right?

That's correct.


When playing Phase 10 with 2 or more players, how do we conclude the hand? Why keep score for the points if on phase 10 there will be only one winner? I assume as soon as one person lays the phase 10 and goes out first he or she will be the winner regardless of the previous scores? No one can lay out phase 10 at the same time, right? How will there be a tie? In what situation?

Score is used when more than 1 player completes Phase 10 in the same hand. Completing a phase doesn't end the hand immediately; a player must go out by getting rid of all his or her cards. So a second player can complete Phase 10 after the first player has done so. Once a player goes out by getting rid of all of his or her cards; then if multiple players have completed Phase 10; score is used to determine winner.

  GOING OUT: The player who gets rid of the last card in hand, by discarding or hitting, is said to go out. This player wins the hand. The winner of the hand, and any other players who also complete their Phase, will advance to the next Phase for the next hand.

and

  If two or more players complete Phase 10 in the same hand, then the player with the fewest total points is the winner.

http://www.natlassoc.org/fun/games/phase10/phase10r.htm

Note that the terminology is a little confusing, because the rules say that whoever goes out "wins the hand", but "winning" the hand doesn't really mean anything other than getting 0 points for that hand. Anyone who completed the Phase moves on; and "winning" Phase 10 doesn't mean that you will win the game.


Is it legal to announce results of an opponent's hidden card? I was playing a round of Love Letter with my friends. When it came to my turn I had a Princess and King. I was forced to play the King and trade the Princess with another player.

My question is, is it legal to then announce to the other players that I had the princess, so it is known that my opponent now has that card? The announcement allows other players to potentially take advantage of this information, saving me from being a target in the next round.

Some of my friends think this violates the spirit of the game, but we couldn't find any rules one way or another. What do you guys think?

Because it is not explicitly mentioned in the rules  what you can or cannot talk about, there are two interpretations for this. I suggest that you agree with each other which interpretation you will follow before starting the game. (as this really can divide people's opinions)

Option 1: Do not reveal a card = do not even talk about the card

Interpret the verb "reveal" as "to make something known". Keep the hidden information hidden, and do not even talk about it. This is pretty simple rule, and it is the way-to-go, if any player disagrees with the other option.

However, it also might be hard to define that how much information someone may give on someone elses (or his own) card: Is a surprised face too much? How about saying "Whoaa!"? What about "Whoaa! I should bow to You"? Or "I should bow to You, Sir/Miss"?

Option 2: Do not reveal a card = do not show a card

Interpret the verb "reveal" as "to show". Now you can say anything about anyone's cards, but it is on the other player's decision that will they believe you or not. This gives people the opinion to bluff and make tactical moves e.g. when playing the Priest or the King.


How do extra imprinted cards work? If I control a Panharmonicon, I can have more cards imprinted on an artifact than was intended. For most cases, it seems that you would just select one card from the exiled cards (for example, Isochron Scepter. What if I have a Prototype Portal with a 2 drop and a 4 drop? What is the cost to activate the ability? Could I pay 2, then get a copy of the 4 drop?

Anytime a card with Imprint (or other cards that have a triggered ability that is linked to a second ability) refers to 'the exiled card' it really refers to both cards. In cases like Prototype Portal (where it looks at properties of exiled card) you would have to look at both cards, and add their CMCs together. You would then get to make tokens of both cards.
From the Gatherer rulings on Panharmonicon:

If a triggered ability is linked to a second ability, additional instances of that triggered ability are also linked to that second ability. If the second ability refers to “the exiled card,” it refers to all cards exiled by instances of the triggered ability. For example, if Isochron Scepter’s enters-the-battlefield ability triggers twice and two instant cards are exiled, both will be copied when its second ability is activated. You may cast either or both of the copies in any order.
In some cases involving linked abilities, an ability requires information about “the exiled card.” When this happens, the ability gets multiple answers. If these answers are being used to determine the value of a variable, the sum is used. For example, if Elite Arcanist’s enters-the-battlefield ability triggers twice, two cards are exiled. The value of X in the activation cost of Elite Arcanist’s other ability is the sum of the two cards’ converted mana costs. As the ability resolves, you create copies of both cards and can cast none, one, or both of the copies in any order.


Can you play a Progress Card even when you get nothing from it? If I have a Progress Card for which initial preconditions do not hold, will I still be able to use it in order to discard it back to the pile? The goal is to prevent a spy from stealing it.

A few examples:

I am leading in victory points but I want to use Wedding card.
I have Irrigation but I don't have any wheat hexagons.
I have Blacksmith but I don't have any ore hexagons.

It appears the FAQ addresses this kind of situation, and the answer is no.
See question number 3 on this page of official catan FAQ:

Progress Cards: General - May I play a Progress Card if playing it has no effect?
If you know beforehand that playing the card will have no effect (e.g., the Foundry card, provided that you are not settling adjacent to a mountains hex): no.
If you have no way of knowing it (e.g., Trade Monopoly): yes.