What interesting 3-player strategy games are available? In my apartment there tend to be 3 of us wanting to play board games regularly, and we're fond of strategy games. Unfortunately, 3 is not the optimal number for most of the more interesting ones that we've come across.

We're familiar with Carcassone, Cataan, and Forbidden Island, but we've been wondering if there are games that are more towards the Quorridor, Blokkus, etc style of game that are somewhat quicker to play and where moving and/or placing pieces is the main part of the game. And, for that matter, if there are games like this that explicitly work optimally with 3 people (We've tried 3 person Blokkus and it's messy).

I really, really recommend Ticket to Ride: Nordic Countries as an interesting and balanced three player game. Its unique selling point, over the other Ticket to Ride games, is that it is specifically designed for three! You can play a two-player variant, but you can't for four or more. So you're genuinely getting a game that works best for three.

The other game that is universally acclaimed to be amazing, and is very good for different number of players, is Agricola.  Agricola gives you a different initial board layout for three players, and has many Occupation cards that are specially designed for 3+ players (in addition to the standard ones for 1+ players, and some for 4+ players).  You really feel like the designer paid lots of care and attention to making sure the game would work amazingly for 2 and 3 player games, as well as for larger groups.  (And indeed there's even a serviceable solitaire option!)


What house rules/modifications have you adopted to make a board game work well over webcam? During enforced isolation we're seeking social activities: what board games work well with others over webcam (ie in video chat; Skype, Jitsi, Zoom, etc.)?

If you've played over webcam, was it better with one board, or multiple? Did everyone need to own the game in order for it to work?

Feel free to precis house rules that make any game work well this way. Thanks.

We played Monopoly with a single board.

It was useful to have dice, money, and property cards for the remote player at their location. Locally we ghost played them - they rolled remote dice, we trusted their reported roll and moved their counter on our local board. We also did their money for them so local players could see it, but they duplicated that at their end. When doing transactions, they picked out the money from their remote stash and showed it to the camera (the bank acted as interchange).

Money and property names differed in the versions we had so we went through before hand to check the money was "normalised" (used an exchange rate of 1000). Properties were named by colour Brown1 being the first space after, and Purple2 being the last space before Go. Mention of a property at the local end was followed always by its list price.

Worked well, 2 local and 1 remote player using meet.jit.si for a 4hr game (including setup).


Can you throw animals into the stewpot if you don't have enough pasture room for any of them? In Agricola, the Fireplace and Cooking Hearth both allow you to convert animals to food "at any time." Can you use this ability to cook animals if you don't have room in your pastures?

In particular, if you have zero pastures and grab four sheep, can you cook three of them and keep the fourth as a pet (or cook all four), or do you only get to keep/cook one of them, while the other three presumably wander off and get eaten by wolves as you dither over which one to eat first?

Yes, you can cook them directly. From the rulebook, p.9:

  1 Sheep (Stage 1): Place 1 Sheep on this space in the Replenish phase (Phase 2) of each round. A player who selects this action takes all the Sheep from the Action
  space and must either put them into his farmyard or use an Improvement
  to turn them into food. Sheep that cannot be pastured or turned into Food are returned to the general supply.

The same applies to the other animal spaces.

This is an important tactical option. The threat of having all the sheep grabbed and devoured often forces a player with pastures to pick the sheep up sooner than they might like.

So in your example, yes you may cook three and keep one, or cook all four immediately, at your discretion.

On the other hand, during harvest you may not send a newly bred animal straight to the stew pot if you don't have room.

On p.4 of the rules:

  Baby animals and parent animals may not be converted into Food immediately after the birth(for example, if you only have room for two animals of that type); they simply run away if they cannot be accommodated.


What are common contracts in Catan? Players in my Catan groups never reneg on deals, so we have a number of common contracts. For example, we often sell each other a "Not-Hit," the right to be avoided the next time the seller gets to move the robber. We also often sell future cards -- I give you my wheat now in exchange for your next two rock.

It took us a while to commoditize these now-ordinary contracts, though. What are other common contracts people use in Catan?

We don't use contracts with the group of friends I play Catan with.  While it's an interesting idea, trading resources for nothing in return during the trade is explicitly against the rules of the game.  Also, the player who's turn it is has to be involved in all trades being made during that turn.  So, a player giving resources to a player they promised them to previously would break two rules in the game.

I could have some of same problems as allows players to bribe off the robber if players start trying to extort resources from each other..  It would be easy to abuse, and adds complexity in the game since you would have to track contracts.  Players would have to be to surrender the resources promised when they generated them in order for this to work.  I personally don't think the added complexity would make the game better.  It would certainly deepen the trading aspect of the game though.

For those not familiar with the topic of bribing off the robber, we discussed this previously in, Is bribing off the robber a good addition to Settlers of Catan?


What sequence of moves in Solo Caverna result in the maximum score? The solo game of Caverna is completely deterministic.  There is no luck.  There are no opponents to mess up your strategy.  So, a particular sequence of moves will always result in the same score.

Which means that there is a particular sequence of moves that will result in the maximum possible score.

Now, I'm not actually expecting anyone to put forth each and every choice that you would have to make--though that would be very cool.  As a computer geek, I've spent a few minutes musing about how to design a program that will do the search; but, I'd rather spend my time playing Caverna than to write such a simulator.

But, surely there are some good Solo Caverna players out there, who could at least talk about their particular strategies for maximizing points.  Are there particular furnishings that you get?  Ruby maximization?  Weapons?  6 Dwarfs?  What do you do that breaks the "magical 100 point mark?"

The key to maximum points for my solo endeavours has been to use the Office which allows overhangs, and the Guest room for multiple actions.  I then work to get many tunnels inside, and overhang tunnels.  After the overhang tunnels are placed, I also place Ore mines, for even more overhang bonus, and use the double action to place two ruby mines at once.  For this to work, you need extra dwarfs, preferably 5.  You should be pulling in about 30ish gold.

All in all, because of the possibility of a 'optimal' strategy based on card layout, I also tend to use some dice to add some random blocking, so the game has some more replay-ability solo.

I usually score around 140.


Can I redirect a spell that targets an "opponent" back to the caster? Scenario 1:

My opponent casts Appetite for Brains, and in response I cast Redirect. Can I target him and redirect spell back at him?

Scenario 2:

I have a creature enchanted with Snake Umbra. My opponent gains control over my creature through some effect. My opponent attacks me with that creature and deals damage with it. Does he get to draw a card?

In scenario 1, your opponent is still controlling Appetite for Brains, and since they aren't their own opponent, they are not a valid target for the spell. So you can't Redirect that spell back to them.

  102.2. In a two-player game, a player's opponent is the other player.

In scenario 2, Snake Umbra bestows an ability on the creature, which is now controlled by the opponent. You are the opponent's opponent, so they do get to draw a card.

Note that if Snake Umbra would've read "Whenever enchanted creature deals damage to an opponent, you may draw a card.", nobody would draw a card; you control the trigger, but you're not your own opponent.

Only if Snake Umbra would've read "Whenever enchanted creature deals damage to a player, you may draw a card.", you would have drawn a card.


Pandemic Special Orders Can player A play the Special Orders card during player B's turn, allowing B to then move the character of A or some third party C, or can it only be used on player A's turn?

See also this other question, although it is a distinct question so no need to merge.

The Special orders card says "Play at any time." which seems pretty clear to me. Whoever has the event card can play it on any player's turn. Then, the player whose turn it is can use their actions as normal, or to move the piece of one other player. So if A plays it on B's turn, then B may choose A or C, and move that player's piece as if it were B's.


Responding to partner's double in Party Bridge The dealer bid 1♣.

I am the second chair and had no high card points and no 5 card major. My highest card was a ♥9 therefore, I passed.

The dealer's partner raised her bid to 2♠. My partner doubled the 2♠ and the dealer re-doubled.

Recap:
  1C   P   2S   Dbl
  RDbl ?

Based on 0 high card points and no 5 card major I pass or bid. If I bid what should I bid?

The analysis at bottom was based on an incorrect reading of Opener's first call, as being 1S rather than the current 1C. This doesn't actually change the response structure much, but it does make a big difference in the understanding of what is going on. Before, Opponents were in a confirmed Spade fit and headed to either a nine or ten contract in that suit, with the slight chance of doubling your side for a modest penalty. That's no longer the case, but there are two possibilities.

LHO has made a Strong Jump Shift into 2S

Ouch! Opponents are very likely to get a good score on this hand. The goal is to entice them to try for their slam, while making as few bids as possible on your side, as uninformatively as possible. Then hope they go down one in their slam, or pass on it when it might have made. Be prepared to lose a telephone number if opponents double, but hope that number, but that that number (800, 1100 or 1400) is less than their slam might have been (920 not vulnerable, 1430 vulnerable).

To do this:

Bid a five card Minor suit if you have one;
Bid a four card Heart suit if you have it;
Bid a four card minor if you have shortness in any other suit;
Pass - informing partner you have no preference on the escape suit.

LHO has made a Weak Jump Shift into 2S.

This call typically shows 5-9 HCP with a decent 6 card suit containing most of the points. Opener's Redouble suggests they have about 22 points to your side's 18, give or take. The goal is to quickly find a three-level fit where you might get out for down 1 doubled.

To wit:

Bid a five card Minor suit if you have one;
Bid a four card Heart suit if you have it;
Bid a four card minor if you have shortness in any other suit;
Pass - informing partner you have no preference on the escape suit.

Notice - both bidding structures are the same. Opener's Redouble has removed the burden of a forced call from you, by ensuring Partner another call. Thus you suggest an escape suit only if you have a distinct preference.

Also, in all cases Opener's Redouble is suggesting that their side collect a penalty; but at the cost just noted. It likely suggests a doubleton Spade holding. This means you are not showing values with any call, but just distributional preference.

To finish, a little follow up:

Pass any and all bids by partner, whether you bid or passed.
Pass any and all future Doubles Partner might venture. If it is a Double of a slam reached by Opponents assume it is lead directing and act accordingly.
If Partner Redoubles a Double of your suit it is SOS, asking you to choose between the other two suits not being Spades. Making a Takeout Double with a two suiter hand is an abominable call - but somehow partners occasionally decide to do it anyways
If Partner Redoubles his own suit, he is either brilliant or a dunce. In either case Pass and keep out of his way - it's all on him.

And finally, if you end up as Declarer, expect bad breaks and protect against them if you can. For this much action on the hand I expect two or three singletons and voids to show up around the table.

The general agreement, across a wide variety of systems, is that this Redouble will not be left in by your side because Opener has shown a better than minimum hand, probably 16+. (If Opponent's agreement is different, then the following may not apply.)

In consequence, knowing that Partner has asked you to assume a three-suiter, you should make a minimal call in any suit other than Spades precisely when you have a preference. Generally this would mean showing:

a four card Heart suit;
a five card minor suit; or
a four card minor suit with shortness (singleton or doubleton) in either the other minor or in Hearts.

If you fail to make a bid you have assured him that you have none of the hands above, and he will then make a final call for your side based on that knowledge.

The goal in this auction is to quickly find a fit good enough that the opponents are not sure of a set - and so re-enter the auction with a bid rather than a double. It's Poker Time. Keep a straight face; don't agonize over your call; don't give away any tells; and of course don't react to whatever Partner chooses to do.


Silver Key and Shining Trapezohedron How do the cards "The Silver Key" and "The Shining Trapezohedron" from Lovecraft Letter interact with each other? Specifically, if you are not insane and have both cards in your hand, do you need to discard both of them?

The rules for both cards state:"If you ever have the Silver Key/Shining Trapezohedron and another card, that has a number higher than 4, in your hand, you must discard the Silver Key/Shining Trapezohedron." Both cards have a value of 7, so they seem to trigger their abilities respectively and you need to discard both of them, thus losing the round.

There is no mention of an order of play within your turn or any specific rule in the book. I also looked around on the Internet and didn't find anything concerning this interaction.

Discard one of your choice.
Official answer from AEG posted on BGG by Ryan Dancey:

When you're not insane, both cards read: "You must discard this card if you have another card with a number higher than 4 in your hand".
Since you can't play 2 cards at once in Love Letter, you need to choose which you will be discarding.
If you discard The Silver Key, that's ok. You remain sane.
If you discard The Shining Trapezohedron, that's ok as well. Although since you weren't insane, you now become so (you have a card with an insane effect in your discard).


Can I attempt to activate an equipment's equip ability without a valid target? Say I have a Mycosynth Wellspring on the field and a Piston Sledge. The equip cost for piston sledge is "sacrifice an artifact". If I control no creatures, can I sacrifice the Mycosynth Wellspring to the Piston Sledge to benefit from its ability, or does the equip ability require a valid target in order to pay its cost?

No you may not, you need a target to activate the equip ability. Equip means from the Comprehensive Rules

  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.”

Activating an ability is very similar to casting a spell, and most of the same steps need to be followed to activate an ability. If you cannot comply with all the steps, then you have performed an illegal action, and the game backs up the game state to just before that illegal action.

  602.2. To activate an ability is to put it onto the stack and pay its costs, so that it will eventually resolve and have its effect. ... Activating an ability follows the steps listed below, in order. If, at any point during the activation of an ability, a player is unable to comply with any of those steps, the activation is illegal; the game returns to the moment before that ability started to be activated (see rule 717, “Handling Illegal Actions”). Announcements and payments can’t be altered after they’ve been made.

  602.2b The remainder of the process for activating an ability is identical to the process for casting a spell listed in rules 601.2b–h.

This is the important step that you are incapable of complying with. You cannot announce a valid target for the equip activated ability.

  601.2c The player announces his or her choice of an appropriate player, object, or zone for each target the spell requires. ...

BTW, if you did have a single creature that the Piston Sledge was already attached to, you could sacrifice an artifact to Equip the Piston Sledge to the already equipped creature. If the creature was an Artifact Creature, you could sacrifice the creature to pay the costs of the activation since costs are paid after targets are chosen.


What are the uses of holding priority? I've recently learned about holding the priority after playing a spell or ability.

I understand this can be used for beneficial effects affecting your own spells, for instance copying your own instant/sorcery with Twincast or Reverberate.

But since the stack resolves it's content 1 by 1, I don't see how playing two spells back to back without passing priority would differ from playing one, let it resolve, then play another.

Apart from spell copying/redirecting/etc... effects, what would holding the priority allow a player to achieve ?

You hold priority when you need to take additional actions before a previous action resolves, and those additional actions depend on the previous actions.

That is the general answer to your question. The list of specific examples would be endless, and so I'll only provide one example that falls outside of the "spell copying/redirect" category.

Example:

You have four cards in your graveyard.

Activate Jace, Vryn's Prodigy and hold priority.
Activate and resolve Minamo, School at Water's Edge to untap Jace.
Activate Jace.

If you had not held priority after activating Jace's ability, then Jace would have transformed before you had a chance to activate him a second time. By holding priority, you got a "bonus" activation out of Jace.

Note that in order for any spell or ability to resolve, both players must pass priority without taking any other actions. At Competitive and Professional REL, when a spell or ability is added to the stack, its controller is assumed to have passed priority unless they explicitly state otherwise. That explicit statement is what most players call "holding priority".

This answer to another question goes into far more detail about not only why holding priority matters, but why priority in general matters.


Resource about strategy in makruk? Makruk is a Thai board game related to chess. According to former world chess champion Vladimir Kramnik, who developed an interest in the game,

  Makruk Thai is more strategic than International Chess. You have to plan your operations with total care since Makruk Thai can be compared to an anticipated endgame of International Chess.

Since the game is so strategic, are there are books or other resources that teach some aspects of strategy in makruk? They need not be in English; German and French also work for me.

The only detailed (non-Thai) resource on Makruk I could find so far is the book "Thai Chess & Cambodian Chess (Makruk & Ouk Chatrang)" by Gary Gifford. Besides the rules of both games including a dedicated chapter on counting rules with some endgame problems, the largest part of the thin book (<100 pages) is about openings and annotated games.

I think it is a good book to get started with Makruk, since it gives some basic idea of the strategy, but given the limited scope you can of course not expect deep analyses.

One side note: The author claims in several places that it is not possible to checkmate with 3 queens/met even if they cover both colors. This is not the case, and in one case where he even gives a specific position, Stockfish in fact finds a mate in 20 (where the counting rules would allow up to 59 moves).


Thrashing Wumpus and Keen Sense If I control a Thrashing Wumpus, with Keen Sense on it and I spend 3 black mana to activate the ability of the Thrashing Wumpus, I get to draw 3 cards right? (If I have only one opponent that is) It doesn't matter if I tap all the mana in the same phase of my turn does it? The 3 black mana spend is still considered 3 individual activations of the Thrashing Wumpus' ability right?

Yes, Keen Sense will trigger three times. Thrashing Wumpus' ability only costs one black mana to activate, so if you've spent three black mana, you've activated it three times. There's nothing weird in the rules about combining identical spells/abilities. When you activate an ability, you simply pay the cost (one black mana in this case) and put it on the stack.

You can choose to let the first activation resolve before activating it a second (and third) time, drawing your card before deciding whether you want to activate it again. Most likely this is the way you want to do it, in case you draw something you'd rather spend your mana on.

But even if you use the ability three times consecutively (without letting the previous ones resolve first), they still all go on the stack separately. If you then let everything resolve, the stack would evolve like this:

{deal 1 damage} {deal 1 damage} {deal 1 damage}
{deal 1 damage} {deal 1 damage} {draw a card}
{deal 1 damage} {deal 1 damage}
{deal 1 damage} {draw a card}
{deal 1 damage}
{draw a card}


What is the easiest way to play DarkForest, probably the strongest publicly available go AI? The strongest publicly available go AI is probably this: https://github.com/facebookresearch/darkforestGo, since there is currently no way to play AlphaGo.  Is there any way to play this without building it on a local machine?  Is it available on a server somewhere?  Looks like the name on KGS is darkfmcts3 .

Hactar go https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=net.gowrite.hactarLite (android application) offers darkforest as opponent (darkforest running on server side). Not free, but 2€/3 month subscription.


Recurring nightmare-Pia's Revolution If I have a Recurring nightmare and a Pia's Revolution in play, can I sacrifice an artifact creature and then return it to my hand along with the Recurring Nightmare and an additional creature card from my graveyard?

That's more or less right, though things happen in a specific order.

First you activate the ability on Recurring Nightmare. To do this, must choose the target creature that you wish to return to the battlefield. Note that the artifact creature you plan to sacrifice is not in the graveyard at this time, so it is not a legal target.

You pay the cost of sacrificing a creature (choosing an artifact creature) and returning Recurring Nightmare to your hand. This places the ability on the stack.

Then the triggered ability on Pia's Revolution triggers because a non-token artifact was put into your graveyard from the battlefield. At this time you must choose a target opponent, and then the Pia's Revolution's ability goes on the stack.

Assuming both players choose to pass priority now, the Pia's Revolution ability will resolve. The target opponent chooses whether to take 3 damage or allow you to return your artifact creature to your hand. Whichever they choose will happen.

Then, assuming both players choose to pass priority again, the Recurring Nightmare's ability will resolve, which will allow you to return a creature card from your graveyard to the battlefield.

The end result will be 1 of 2 things, depending on your opponent's choice:

You have Recurring Nightmare in your hand, the artifact creature you chose to sacrifice in your hand, and another creature that was in your graveyard is now on the battlefield.
You have Recurring Nightmare in your hand, and another creature that was in your graveyard is now on the battlefield. The artifact creature you chose to sacrifice is still in the graveyard, but your opponent takes 3 damage.


What to do with multiple invulnerable saves? My friend has built a dire avenger exarch with a shimmer shield which gives it a 5+ invulnerable save. However it has the ability Battle fortune which gives the exarch a 4+ invulnerable save.
How does this work? Is the shimmer shield just a waste on the exarch?

(Note: I am assuming you are playing 9th edition here since it is the latest ruleset)
The Shimmer Shield is definitely redundant on the Exarch.
From the rules (page 19 under Invulnerable Saves):

If a model has more than one invulnerable save, it can only use one of them – choose which it will use.

So the player would never have a reason to choose the Shimmer Shield unless the player (for some reason) wanted the Exarch to have a higher chance of dying.


How much damage does Acolyte of the Inferno's ability deal? Acolyte of the Inferno has this ability:

  Whenever Acolyte of the Inferno becomes blocked by a creature, it deals 2 damage to that creature.

Does that mean it deals 2+current power to blocking creature?

No, it does exactly what it says: it deals two damage. This ability will trigger in the declare blockers step, when your opponent declares a blocker for the Acolyte.

If the creature isn't already dead from that two damage, then in the combat damage step, it will also deal damage equal to its power to the blocking creature. (Of course, if the blocking creature has first strike, it would kill Acolyte of the Inferno before it got to deal its combat damage.) So in some cases the total damage dealt will be two plus its power, but it can also easily be just two damage.

A creature's power is the amount of damage it'll deal when it deals combat damage, to your opponent or a blocking creature when you've attacked, or to your opponent's attacking creature when you've blocked. Any abilities like this are completely independent of the creature's power.

Beyond that, if a card cares about a creature's power, it'll explicitly say so. For example, Tail Slash:

  Target creature you control deals damage equal to its power to target creature you don't control.

There's also the "fight" mechanic, for example on Savage Punch; when two creatures fight, each deals damage equal to its power to the other creature.

Some creatures even have abilities built in that do things like this, for example Spikeshot Elder. But again, everything like this explicitly mentions the creature's power.


Tapping land for mana with free cast and X in cost If I have Galvanoth out and the card that is revealed is Skyscribing, am I able to tap lands to pay for the X amount?  Would this be any different with Jeleva, Nephalia's Scourge?

No, in both cases, you cannot tap additional lands to pay for the X. X, if it's not specified on a card, is always considered to be zero. In both cases, the spell's cost is not being paid for, it's being replaced. Galvanoth and Jeleva aren't saying "Add mana to your mana pool equal to the casting cost", they are replacing the cost altogether. So you can't add anything addional to the spell.

Relevant Gathering rules for Galvanoth:

  If the card has an X in its mana cost, you must choose 0 as its value.


Bruvac: Specifying Mill With the new card Bruvac, the Grandiloquent, and the reformatting of mill as a keyword, I have a couple questions.
It specifically defines "if an opponent would mill one or more cards." Are they errataing things such as Tome Scour, which is clearly "mill?"
In the case that they are errataing, what about cards that are a little more unclear? For example, Tunnel Vision reads "If it is, that player puts the rest of the revealed cards into his graveyard." Because this does not directly read "puts the top N cards of their library into their graveyard," does that mean this is not "mill," and won't be affected by Bruvac?

Yes, there's a planned errata to introduce the “mill” keyword to earlier cards.
You can already see it in eleven mill cards reprinted in Jumpstart. For example Thought Scour's Jumpstart print says “Target player mills two cards”; it used to say “Target player puts the top two cards of their library into their graveyard”. Tome Scour uses the same template as Thought Scour except it says “five” instead of “two”, so it will assuredly receive errata to say “Target player mills five cards.”
Eli Shiffrin, the rules manager, tweeted guidelines about what to expect with the new mill errata and says it should arrive in Gatherer on Tuesday (meaning the 23rd of June):

Handy rule of thumb on the upcoming "mill" errata (in Gatherer Tuesday): If you look at the cards and then move those specific cards to the yard, it's not "mill." If you move cards and then look at them (or don't look at them at all), it's probably "mill." #WotCStaff

He confirms as an example that Mind Funeral will not say “mill” but Traumatize will. This makes it fairly clear Tunnel Vision will not receive errata to say “mill”.


Why is "slow play" a thing in Magic? I keep getting warnings for "slow play" in Magic. Yet being an avid chess player I consider fast playing a crime.

Why does the Magic community have a problem with "slow play"? Looking back at chess, slower play with more thinking ahead is also good for spectators; long games typically have much more interesting plays.

So what is the reason to have such short games in Magic by default? Why not play fewer games but in more depth at things like Friday Night Magic?

And why does the game typically award "faster plays" by giving points per game instead of a true Elo?

The prohibition on "slow play" is more than just a community norm, it is a tournament rule described in section 5.5 of the tournament rulebook, and it says this:

  Players must take their turns in a timely fashion regardless of the complexity of the play situation and adhere to time limits specified for the tournament. Players must maintain a pace to allow the match to be finished in the announced time limit. Stalling is not acceptable. Players may ask a judge to watch their game for slow play; such a request will be granted if feasible.

In other words, it is considered "slow play" if a player takes an unreasonable amount of time to take individual game actions or make individual game decisions. In most cases, the rule is only enforced if a player exhibits a pattern of playing like that. Stalling is the extreme limit of this, when a player clearly does not intend to do anything, but also does not allow their opponent to act, simply to run down the match clock.

Why is the "reasonable pace" so fast?

In Magic, most decisions should not require much time. You are working with a relatively limited set of information, and most of that information does not change much from turn to turn. In addition, any attempt to plan more than a turn or so ahead would be limited by the unknown information about the cards in your opponent's hand and both libraries.

Why is slow play a problem in tournaments?

In Magic tournament play, the match as a whole has a limited amount of time. This means that players using match time is essentially a zero-sum game: the more time one player uses to think while not acting and also not allowing the opponent to act, the less time the other player has to act when they get the opportunity. This means that a player gains an advantage by thinking through their moves during their own turn, instead of while their opponent is acting.

An unscrupulous player could abuse this fact by winning the first game, and then slowing down their pace of play in the second game enough to prevent their opponent from having an opportunity to make a comeback.

Why not play fewer games for longer?

The standard best-of-three structure is very important to Magic tournaments because it allows for "sideboarding", which is the ability to swap out cards with a pre-chosen sideboard in games after the first in order to counter your opponent's deck. Sideboarding is commonly considered to be integral to the depth of tournament-level Magic strategy, because it requires a deep understanding of the current metagame.

Why not play fewer matches for longer?

Generally, the goal of a Magic tournament is to find a winner among a large number of people, and to more generally rank the players by their performance in the tournament. In order to correctly determine a single winner based on match win rate alone, a tournament needs to contain at least log2(number of players) matches. Most tournaments do run approximately that many matches.

Why not make the whole tournament longer?

Magic exists in a larger context, and people have other things to do. If I go to play Magic at a Friday Night Magic event, I will likely not have the energy or inclination to stay for several hours and leave well after midnight.

Why does chess not have this problem?

The most important difference between chess and Magic that makes this problem virtually nonexistent in chess is the game clock. In chess, each player is timed separately, and a player loses if they spend too long on their own moves. In Magic tournaments, a game clock would be entirely infeasible, because control over the flow of the game switches between players much more frequently, and often in ways that are informal and shortcut in order to play at a reasonable pace.

In contrast, Magic: the Gathering Online does play with a real game clock, where each player's clock runs as long as they have priority or a decision to make, and in that game slow play is generally not considered a problem, entirely because in that case the player who plays slowly is the one who is disadvantaged by doing so.


Where can I purchase replacement parts for Battleship Galaxies? My boys and I still enjoy Battleship Galaxies in spite (and because of!) some rather bizarre abilities and the strange "activate only one ship" mechanic.

My younger son was setting up the board for a recent game and was a bit too overly enthusiastic when he disconnected the vertical piece of the base from one of the ship miniatures (it's a ball and socket press-fit attachment).  That snapped the tip off at a point that almost certainly doesn't have enough surface area to glue back together.

Is there a source for replacement parts?

For this specific situation, what we really need is hex bases of various configurations (1, 2 and 7 hex), with a vertical piece to hold up the ship mini and holes for the shield and hull pegs.

I did manage to find some replacement pieces from here.  As you see in the image below, the bases do arrive unassembled.  I'll use the plastic cement (that I ordered at the same time) to attach the vertical column into those center holes.

The part number at this vendor appears to be AFS062-CLR.

Note that, due to trademark restrictions (almost certainly), they have to refer to their pieces as "Galaxy Battle" and make them visibly different from the original.


How does Hypnotic Specter work in Two-Headed Giant? If I attack with Hypnotic Specter and the defending team does not declare a blocker, should I "target" who is going to discard a card randomly? Or do they decide?

This is covered by the following two-headed giant specific rule:

  810.7f As the combat damage step begins, the active team announces how each attacking creature will assign its combat damage. If an attacking creature would assign combat damage to the defending team, the active team chooses only one of the defending players for that creature to assign its combat damage to. Then the defending team announces how each blocking creature will assign its combat damage. See rule 510.1.

Thus, when an attacking creature is not blocked, you choose which player the combat damage is dealt to (and cause the Specter's triggered ability to affect).


Is it legal to take advantage of my opponent's priority mistakes? Suppose I attack with a creature with infect, and then my opponent tells me he won't block.

My intent is to use Giant Growth on my infect creature regardless of whether or not my opponent blocks.

HOWEVER, my opponent forgets that I have priority and goes straight for the Lightning Bolt.

Now it seems as though my opponent has just made a game-play error by casting that bolt when he didn't have priority.  Is it legal for me to take advantage of that, and play Giant Growth in response, thus benefiting from the error?

Your opponent attempting to cast Lightning Bolt when they don't have priority is a legal shortcut as outlined in the comprehensive rules:

  716.1. When playing a game, players typically make use of mutually understood shortcuts rather than explicitly identifying each game
  choice (either taking an action or passing priority) a player makes.

and also:

  716.1a The rules for taking shortcuts are largely unformalized. As long as each player in the game understands the intent of each other
  player, any shortcut system they use is acceptable.

Clearly your opponent's intent was to cast Lightning Bolt assuming you just planned to pass priority. Therefore, after your opponent has tried to cast Lightning Bolt, you have the option of either:

Telling your opponent that he doesn't have priority and forcing him to undo the casting of Lightning Bolt
Allow the shortcut to happen at which point you can still cast Giant Growth as you should now have priority

Yes, it is legal for you to cast Giant Growth in response to your opponent ignoring your priority.

Edit

Some people claim that only the player with priority can propose a shortcut. While the rules do state this, they also state that any shortcut method that is understood and unambiguous is acceptable. Since players in every magic game I have ever seen (including MTG pro tour and similar high level play) ignore their opponent's priority when moving from their upkeep to their draw phase it seems to me that this behavior should be acceptable during other phases as well. Players may also go into the declare attackers phase by just tapping some of their creatures effectively skipping their opponent's priority. This is fairly common and took me no more than about one minute to find this example and this example. Skipping your opponent's priority in this manner is exactly the same as skipping it after they declared attackers so you can cast Lightning Bolt.

What is not okay is saying you are going to do something and then not actually doing it after your opponent decides to not respond to it. (I'm not really sure how this situation came up as it isn't in the original question, but some answers have addressed it)


Does Conspiracy remove non-creature subtypes from a creature? This is inspired by this question, and specifically point 3 in this answer.

Let's say I control a Gideon of the Trials and I've activated his second ability.

0: Until end of turn, Gideon of the Trials becomes a 4/4 Human Soldier creature with indestructible that's still a planeswalker. Prevent all damage that would be dealt to him this turn.

Gideon is now a Legendary Planeswalker Creature - Human Soldier Gideon.
I then cast Conspiracy naming, let's say, Dragon.
From the rulings on Conspiracy

Affected spells, cards, and creatures lose all of their other creature types.

Does my Gideon lose his Gideon subtype?  Or because Gideon isn't a creature type he doesn't lose it from Conspiracy?  Does this change at all if Gideon is turned into a creature by other means (Mycosynth Lattice + March of the Machines or Enchanted Evening + Opalescence)?

You would retain the Gideon subtype.
Gideon is not a creature subtype, but rather a planeswalker subtype:

205.3j Planeswalkers have their own unique set of subtypes; these subtypes are called planeswalker types. The planeswalker types are Ajani, [...] Gideon, [..], and Yanling.

205.3m Creatures and tribals share their lists of subtypes; these subtypes are called creature types. The creature types are [long list that doesn't include "Gideon"]

Setting the creature type would not interact with the planewalker type:

205.3c If a card with multiple card types has one or more subtypes, each subtype is correlated to its appropriate card type.

If Gideon had become a creature through means that didn't make him retain the planeswalker card type, then he would also lose the gideon subtype:

205.1a Some effects set an object’s card type. In such cases, the new card type(s) replaces any existing card types. Counters, effects, and damage marked on the object remain with it, even if they are meaningless to the new card type. Similarly, when an effect sets one or more of an object’s subtypes, the new subtype(s) replaces any existing subtypes from the appropriate set (creature types, land types, artifact types, enchantment types, planeswalker types, or spell types). If an object’s card type is removed, the subtypes correlated with that card type will remain if they are also the subtypes of a card type the object currently has; otherwise, they are also removed for the entire time the object’s card type is removed. Removing an object’s subtype doesn’t affect its card types at all.


Die of Malice: use freely every turn? We played Seasons for the first time and a player got the Die of Malice:

  instead of performing the action(s) of your season die, reroll it; perform the new action(s) of the die roll and gain 2 crystals

The card does not seem to have any activation cost (it is written: 0 crystal).

Does this mean this card can be activated every turn, making sure the player will gain 2 crystals each time?

This seems too powerful for such a cheap card, especially when combined to the Dragon soul (-1 crystal and you can reuse the Die of Malice, giving 2 more crystals).

Thanks for your answers, cheers!

The "0 crystal" you see is the summoning cost, not the activation cost, though since it's 0 it makes no difference: you can summon this card for free and also use it for free. Yes this means you can get 2 crystals for "free" every turn, though there is a cost: you have to work with totally random die rolls instead of the ones you chose. Unless you really think all 6 sides have the same net value to you (or you think the dice you were forced to choose from were on the low end of the value scale), this is a real cost.

I'm not a great Seasons player myself but note that this kind of cost/benefit tradeoff may affect new players and experienced ones differently. While you are less familiar with the strategy and hence which side of the die you should be picking anyway, you'll take the 2 free crystals every time and it will seem very powerful. An experienced player however may be more likely to have good reasons for needing a particular side of the die right now and so will not want to take those "free" crystals as often.

(There is also the same "opportunity cost" as with any power card: If you kept this card then in many cases you didn't keep some other card, and if you played this card then you have to increase your summoning gauge again to play some other card.)


Help me identify this card game with secret, changing rules A while ago, I played this card game with a handful of my friends. We used regular poker cards. We started playing the games without being told the rules. The only thing we were told was that it was like UNO in that:

You wanted to get rid of all your cards in your hand
When it was your turn you can put a card down
You put cards down corresponding to their suit and/or number.

Any time we did something wrong we were penalized with a card. The point of the game was to figure out the rules of the game, by seeing how everyone was penalized. At the end of the game, when someone won, that winner got to make up his own rules which would be added to the next game. The rules would not be announced and would have to figured out by everyone who didn't know the rules.

Here are some of the penalties that I remember:

Being an idiot
Asking about the rules
Touching your cards in "Court of Order"

Here were some of the rules (that I remember):

When a Jack was placed, the next card had to be the same suite.
When a Queen was placed, you had to stand up and say "Hail the Queen"

I know there were more rules, but I can't remember them. I also can't remember the name of the game. I want to know what the normal default rules that you start out with, but I can't remember them all/I would like to introduce this game to some of my friends who haven't played it. I would Google it and get information online, but I can't remember the name of the game.

Does someone know the name of the game and/or some of the rules used in the beginning of the game?

Sounds a lot like Mao (which I was introduced to as Chairmen).

It's a card-shedding game (i.e. like Uno) with secret rules that can vary by playing group. As the game goes on, more rules are added but not directly explained. The game typically goes on until everyone gives up.

EDIT:
Some sample starting rules might include these ones that are fairly common when I've played it:

Ace skips the next player's turn
Jack reverses the play order
8 allows anyone to play a card of the same suit immediately. Play continues from that person onwards.
Spades must be named out loud
7 must be followed by saying "That's the badger" (after saying "7 of spades" if appropriate)
Kings and Queens must be saluted
You must say "last card" when you have one card remaining
You must say "Mao" when you go out ("Taking the Chairman's name in vain" at any other time faces a hefty three-card penalty)


Effect of "keep in play" on "Thirty-Three" crisis card? The crisis card 'Thirty-Three' has the following special rule:

  Relentless Pursuit: Keep this card in play until a civilian ship or basestar is destroyed. If this card is in play when the fleet jumps, shuffle it back into the Crisis deck.

What exactly does this mean? My gaming group has come up with 3 possible interpretations so far:

the card is kept in play, and has no effect, other than to be shuffled back into the deck afterwards -- in other words, the special rule is simply that "there's a chance it may reappear later in the game", but that just seems a really weak rule, partly because the odds of it ever reappearing within the same game are pretty low, and partly because it's just not a very strong attack (place one basestar, no raiders and no heavy raiders)
the card is kept in play, and all instructions on the card are repeated every turn. This seems to match the actual episode which the card is named after (the fleet is attacked every 33 minutes until they lose a civilian ship), but means a lot of ships are put on the board every turn (two vipers, 4 civilians and a basestar), and that raiders are activated
the card is kept in play, and the raider activation is repeated every turn. This seems a bit milder than the previous interpretation, in that new ships aren't put on the board.

is there an official explanation somewhere? Or just some kind of consensus on which interpretation makes sense?

We've always played it as option #1, and I've only ever seen it played as option #1.  I agree its 'weaker' than the effect in the show, but its the only interpretation that is supported by hard-and-fast rules-as-written logic.


Shuffling cards causes uneven mana distribution - ways to fix that? I am a newbie Magic player who is suffering from frequent bad luck with mana distribution in the deck.

I am shuffling cards regularly between rounds and matches, and I use mixture of overhand and pile shuffle (4x2). After game, I drop 1-2 cards from graveyard or play on each land in play, and I put the block in the library. I do few overhand shuffles, and before match I do pile shuffle. However, having multiple lands at the bottom of my library after a mana-screw game has happened twice in two weeks.

What am I doing wrong, and is there a better way to ensure land randomization in the deck?

The only thing you're doing wrong is trying to "fix" uneven mana distribution.

If your deck is shuffled correctly — that is to say, if it's actually randomized — there's almost always going to be clumps of lands. You will sometimes have games where you're mana-screwed, and you will sometimes have games where you're mana-flooded. That's normal; it's supposed to happen.

That 1-2 cards per land card thing you're describing is called mana weaving. It's the only way to really "fix" clumping — and it's a form of cheating because it's trying to fix your deck with an even spread and make your deck less random and not properly shuffled. You can see here where I asked about that a few years ago: Is Mana Weaving ok if it's followed by a thorough shuffle?. The explanations I received were pretty helpful in understanding what is really meant to happen with shuffling a deck.

In general pile shuffling (when you're not using it to mana weave) is fine and all, but it's not regarded as an effective way to randomize your deck. Tournament rules say pile shuffling alone is not a good enough way to do a shuffle. Here's what I'd recommend:

Sleeve your cards.
Do overhand and riffle shuffles.
If you can't do riffle shuffles, try mash shuffles. However they'll damage your sleeves if you do it poorly and force your cards, and sufficient damage will eventually mark a card, letting you know where it is in your deck — marked cards aren't permitted so you'll need to replace the sleeve.
Accept that you're going to get lands clumped in your deck; it's supposed to happen.
Use land fetches, tutors, draws, scrying, shuffle, and other forms of card advantage — they help you move past clumping.


Exchanging Cards in Pandemic When exchanging cards between two players in Pandemic, does it matter which player's turn it is? I have seen this rule played two ways:
- The active player can only give a card.
OR
- The active player can give or receive a card.

Both actions would still cost 1 point each, but the latter allows the active player to use an action point to take a card from another player sharing the same space.

From the rules:

  Share Knowledge Sometimes it’s hard
  for one player to get the cards
  necessary to discover a cure. The Share
  Knowledge action (while difficult to
  perform) can be useful in these cases.
  Transfer a card from one player to
  another. Every card transferred costs
  1 action. Both your pawn and your
  fellow player’s pawn must be in the
  same city, and you may only transfer
  the card of the city that you are in
  together. (For example, if you are
  together in Moscow, only the Moscow
  card may be transferred from one
  player to the other.) If either player
  holds more than 7 cards as the result
  of a transfer, the excess cards must
  be immediately discarded to the Player
  Discard Pile.

Special for the Researcher:

  The Researcher may give a
  fellow player any card from his hand
  when involved in a Share Knowledge
  action. He is not restricted to giving
  the card of the current
  jointly-occupied city, like other
  players are. is freedom only applies
  when the Researcher is giving a
  card—he always receives a card with
  the same restriction as other players.
  e Researcher can utilize this ability
  when involved in Share Knowledge
  actions on any player’s turn.

It does NOT matter what player's turn it is. Either play can initiate the transfer and either give or take a card from the other player. The Researcher only gets to use his special ability of transferring any card when the card is being transferred from the Researcher to another player. In order to transfer a card from another player to the Researcher, they must be in the same city as depicted on the card being transferred.

This will make the game a fair bit easier as you don't have to wait for the right players turn to transfer cards. You could play the other way if you wanted a bit more difficulty with 2 or 3 players, but playing it with 4 can be almost as bad as adding another epidemic card. :D


Non-Legendary Planeswalkers If a Planeswalker in Magic the Gathering wasn't Legendary when it was printed (before Dominaria in 2018, e.g. Liliana, Death's Majesty), would you be allowed to have two of that same Planeswalker card in gameplay?

No, because even if it's not printed on the card, they're still Legendary due to errata:

  306.4. Previously, planeswalkers were subject to a “planeswalker uniqueness rule” that stopped a player from controlling two planeswalkers of the same planeswalker type. This rule has been removed and planeswalker cards printed before this change have received errata in the Oracle card reference to have the legendary supertype. Like other legendary permanents, they are subject to the “legend rule” (see rule 704.5j).

If you look at the Oracle text of Liliana, Death's Majesty, it says

  Types: Legendary Planeswalker — Liliana

instead of just "Planeswalker — Liliana" so it is legendary and you can only have one of her in play. But there could be newer planeswalkers printed in the future which aren't legendary, and of those you would be able to have multiple at the same time.

A few currently existing options to make non-legendary or at least multiple copies of planeswalkers (thanks to @AlexP and @ArcanistLupus for the suggestions):

Jace, Cunning Castaway
Helm of the Host for a planeswalker turned into a creature (e.g. with Memnarch and March of the Machines)
Mirror Gallery


Can I counter a creature by invalidating the target of its “comes into play” effect? For example, consider Akoum Boulderfoot. It says:

  When Akoum Boulderfoot enters the battlefield, it deals 1 damage to target creature or player.

At what point does the player have to decide on the target? Specifically, is the following sequence of events correct?

Player announces the casting of Akoum Boulderfoot and declares my 1/1 creature the target
I cast Unsummon on my 1/1
Akoum Boulderfoot resolves, but its target is invalid, so the spell fizzles.

Or is the following sequence correct?

Player announces the casting of Akoum Boulderfoot
I cast Unsummon on my 1/1
Akoum Boulderfoot resolves, enters the battlefield, and then the player chooses a valid target

Easy answer is the second scenario you propose. Akoum Boulderfoot's ability is a triggered ability, with the trigger for the ability being 'Akoum Boulderfoot has entered the battlefield'. Targets for spells and abilities are chosen when the spell or ability is put onto the stack. Triggered abilities do not go on the stack until the trigger for the ability is true. Permanents are not actually on the battlefield until the spell resolves.

Answer to your primary question though is no, you can't counter a creature by invalidating the target of its 'come into play effect', due to the come into play effect not going on the stack until the creature has fully resolved.


What are the blue-backed cards in Dominion for? There is a set of one of each card, but with blue inner border on their backs instead of beige.

What are they for?

The blue backed cards are the randomizer cards.

They are listed among the contents (on page 2) and the main use is detailed on pg 5 of the rules.

  For example, the players can shuffle the
  Randomizer cards for all Kingdom cards and
  draw 10 to select the cards for the game.

  Or,
  players can take turns selecting cards.
  Players may also use the Randomizer cards
  as Placeholders to mark the card piles so
  empty piles are easily seen.

A lot of folks use a random deck generator, we have a list here at B&CG.  If you use sleeves, it may be helpful to use a different color sleeve for the randomizer cards so that they catch your eye easier.

Do not add them into the piles unless you want to change the balance of the game.  There are supposed to be 10 of each card, not 11. Some game strategies revolve around depleting piles fast or unexpectedly and you would impede those by having 11 cards in each stack.  Also, since they have a different back, they will be noticeable unless you are using opaque sleeves.


What happens in Desert Island if no fate tokens are in play at the end of the round? In Desert Island, the rules state

  FATE  –  the  event  that  appears  the  most  happens  to  the  character(s)  with  the  most  fate  tokens

and

  Each week something bad happens to somebody. (Boar!, Illness, Monkeys,
  Rats, Tsunami).The character (or characters if 2 or more are tied)
  with the most total fate tokens on them and their location will be the
  target.

If no players or locations with living players have any fate tokens at the end of the round, is no fate applied? Or does a the prevalent fate apply to all living characters?

EDIT

Having tried both approaches extensively, we now play with no fate tokens => no fate event.

If fate applies to a lone player every round, they die pretty fast. Players are more likely to sneakily sabotage each other if they think there's some hope of lighting the fire on their own... and sabotage is what makes this game fun!

As the rules you quoted say, all characters with the highest number of tokens (in your case, zero) will get a bad event. "The highest number" is mathematically defined as "no number is higher than this". If the highest number is zero, then that's it.


Does adding a subtype to a creature count as entering the battlefield? I have Seraph Sanctuary in play, which lets me gain life when an Angel enters the battlefield. If I play Call to Serve on a creature, turning it into an Angel, does adding the subtype like that count as an Angel entering the battlefield, so that I gain life?

No, attaching Call to Serve to a creature you control will not trigger Seraph Sanctuary's ability. A permanent triggers "enters the battlefield" abilities when it transitions from not being on the battlefield to being on the battlefield, whether it be from the resolution of a creature spell, from the creation of a creature token, or from some other instruction. However, Call to Serve just changes the type of a creature that is already on the battlefield.


Minimum score for 7 letters and what beats it My girlfriend and I got into a discussion about scrabble the other day and we were wondering what the smallest score you could get for a 7 letter word is, presuming the board is empty. The word can be placed anywhere and all other scrabble rules are adhered to.

And then what would be the smallest scoring word that would be able to beat said 7 letter word.

Is there a way you can work this out? I could probably work out the first bit if I had a scrabble board but I wouldn't know where to start with the second part.

The minimum score for a seven letter word if you can place the word anywhere is 55.

e.g.

  RETiNAs C2 across. (lower case indicate blanks)

The score is 5 for RETNA, 0 for the blanks, and 50 bonus for using all 7 letters. The word would lie on a TL square, but since this is covered by a blank, it gives no bonus since 3x0 = 0.

This could be beaten by a three-letter word e.g.

  ZAX A1 across

The score is 19 x 3 = 57. I can't think of any common three letter word that would fit here, but ZAX is valid in both TWL and SOWPODS dictionaries. For common words, I suspect you'd have to go to four letters and something like QUIZ.

The largest possible score for a two-letter word, before bonus squares, is 11 (QI, ZA or ZO), so you couldn't get higher than 33.

While these match the criteria in your question, they could never occur in isolation in a real game since they would either have to be opening moves across the central DW square, or joined onto existing words.


Solution to Avalon board game Question: If players are able to discuss strategy before playing Avalon, does the game have an optimal solution?

The strategy can be as convoluted as you want.  I just want to know if in principle this is a "solved" game.

The game rules are fairly simple and for reference the details of number of good vs evil players, and rounds can be read here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Resistance_(game)

If there are G good and E evil players, at the end of the game team evil can always just randomly guess Merlin to win.  So an optimal solution will be defined as:

for team good, a strategy in which (regardless of what team evil chooses to do) they can guarantee succeeding at least 3 missions and team evil can't do any better than 1/G chance of choosing Merlin
for team evil, a strategy which (regardless of what team good chooses to do) maximizes their chance of winning the game, with a chance greater than the trivial solution of guessing with chance 1/G

As far as I know, the rules are not entirely clear on what communication the players may do (besides forbidding just directly showing their character cards), for the purposes of this question, consider the following rule on communication (if playing by email, it would be equivalent to every message must be sent to all):

Cannot rely on 'under the table' note passing, texting, etc.  All statements made by a player must be public, in the sense that the every player has the raw message (even if not all players have enough context to derive the same meaning - ie. an Evil person stating he is Merlin is never confusing to an evil character since the evil characters all know each other, but can be misleading to a good character. Only the raw message itself must be public, asymmetric knowledge of intentions gained from a message is fine.)

I have a suspicion that despite not being able to trust any particular character is telling the truth, there might be a solution in favor of the good characters which takes advantage of the inherent asymmetry caused by the character Merlin and there always being more good characters than evil.

Can anyone think of a solution?

Despite not being able to trust any particular character is telling the truth, in some circumstances there appears to be a solution in favor of the good characters which takes advantage of the inherent asymmetry caused by the character Merlin and there always being more good characters than evil.

Here is an attempted mathematical solution for team good.

This relies on Merlin knowing all the evil characters. So will not work if the character Mordred is included (an evil character Merlin does not know about). If other special characters are used, it should not affect anything.  It is also a work in progress in that this strategy gives quite a bit of extra information to "team good", but there may still be some details that need working out. (For example, I've already had someone point out to me that one must be careful to pad out messages appropriately or just knowledge of the length is enough context to figure out who Merlin is with this strategy.)

After dealing character cards, a good person suggests:

the following strategy will allow good to win, so provably deviating from these rules will indicate you are evil
whoever is the first mission leader will be now referred to as player #0
players clockwise from #0 get numbered accordingly
each player (i) comes up with a secret phrase: phrase_i
from this, each player (i) generates a secret number for other player (j) as secret_ij = HASH( phrase_i + string(j) )
use these secret_ij numbers along with public key exchange to generate a crypto key between each player:  Key_ij = Key_ji = result of public key exchange between player (i) and (j)

Now with that setup, the good player goes on to suggest the following:

Special round of discussion: all players openly/publicly give encrypted messages to the other players stating one of the following:

7a) declaring themself as not-merlin

7b) declaring themself as merlin, stating who all is good, and providing his phrase_i so all keys and therefore messages from him can then be read by that person
Merlin should declare "merlin" to all good guys, and "not-merlin" to all evil. Normal loyal servants should just declare "not-merlin" to everyone.
if a good player gets a message deviating from this rule, they can immediately release the related key used for that communication to out the evil person.  So evil effectively must pretend to be normal good or merlin.
More generally, a good person should immediately expose any fake merlin (release his secret phrase) if they can prove they are fake without giving information about merlin.

For example, if a fake merlin ever claims another person claiming to be merlin is good, this outs themselves as fake, as the real merlin would never do this.  Unfortunately, a good person might need to keep this to themself, as revealing this could reveal information about Merlin.  However if multiple merlins choose groups such that there is no consistent way for one to be real (for example two merlins claiming each other as good, or three merlins claim such that it makes a cycle), then the entire group is fake and should be exposed.
Now a round of plaintext discussion (no encryption). Each player states which groups of good guys were declared to them by people declaring to be merlin. (Note: only the groups are released, not who claimed the group.)
If there is a group declared such that not everyone in the group states they were told they are in the group, then that group is clearly false (as good has no reason to deviate from the plan).

Since the number of good > the number of evil, any group with the correct number of people will necessarily include at least one good.  This means evil cannot usefully mislead here.
If there is a player who appears in all proposed sets of good players, he must be good.  All good players should release all secret phrases they know to this player.  Now even more restrictive than before, this player then can expose fake merlins whose group selections include each other in a revealing manner.
If there is enough information that every one should be able to deduce a guaranteed good team without revealing merlin, someone can just explain it.  Good, having superiority in numbers, can now ensure the correct group is sent each time.
If there is not enough information for everyone to determine good/evil, the mission leader picks a team which will eliminate as many proposed "good groups" from consideration as possible.  If Merlin was the mission leader, he could purposely pick a correct or incorrect group here, so no information about Merlin is lost here.  If the mission wouldn't actually eliminate a possible "good group", and the person still insists on this mission team anyway or calls a vote before discussion, it outs themselves as evil and good can vote the mission team down. (Note this of course does not indicate good/evil for the team they suggested though.) So evil has to play along here to try to help narrow down a team.
If the mission fails, it should by design eliminate at least one, if not more, proposed "good groups".  If the mission succeeds, it provides no information.  Proceed to pick the next one.

I may be missing something, but I do not believe team evil gains any information about merlin from this strategy.  I also am not sure how to prove it, but it appears to me there is enough information to always have good win.

First note that if every time a mission fails, at least one possible "good group" is eliminated, there have to be at least 3 fake merlins for team evil to have a chance.  So the only potential issue is in the 7-10 player version.

Second, note that the intersection of all proposed good sets must actually be good.

Third, if the intersection between two proposed sets has only one person, that person must be good.

This along with previous information and other simple deductions is quite restrictive.

For a concrete example, consider the seven person game: 3 evil, 4 good.

All three evil characters need to successfully claim to be merlin to have a chance. So if we can eliminate one by deduction, good wins.

If no fake merlins include an additional evil member in the proposed group, then there are E+1 people that have only been included in one group. The complement of this must be good.

If all fake merlins include an additional evil member in the proposed group, then there will be a cycle of fake merlins claiming other fake merlins are good, and thus out each other.

So at least one fake merlin must include G-1 good members in the proposed group.  Thus if there is a proposed group that doesn't have an intersection of size G-1 with at least one other group, it can be discarded. (Taking the number of groups down to 2, thus allowing the good to win.)

For a seven player game, there are three missions requiring <= G-1 people. So if no proposed group can be eliminated only with deduction, then always choose for the mission the intersection of at least two groups.  If evil fails the mission, they eliminate more than one group, and thus good again wins.


What game is this die from Please help me identify this die.

Thank you.

It looks to be from Marvel Battleworld - here's an image of a very similar dice on its BoardGameGeek listing (and certainly one in the same style).


How do creature that exile themselves interact with Whip of Erebos? I've recently been told that a revived Obzedat, Ghost Council can escape Whip of Erebos's exile effect because you can exile it while the whip's effect's is on the stack, but wouldn't that trick (or the activate ability on Aetherling that can theoretically be used in the same way) merely run afoul of the whip's continuous effect that applies to the revived creatures?

  If [the returned creature] would leave the battlefield, exile it instead of putting it anywhere else.

The reason you can dodge the whip with an ability like that is the "instead of putting it anywhere else" clause in the whip's rule.  That ability only applies if the card is going somewhere besides exile, it is fine with allowing the Ghost Council to be exiled by their own ability.  So the Ghost Council is considered to have been exiled by its own ability, not by the whip, and its own ability will return it.


Are the yellow roof buildings inns? In the new 2015 edition of Carcassonne Inns and Cathedrals, there are yellow roof buildings on some of the road pieces. Are these inns?

No, that's just scenery. The inns all have lakes next to them.

This copy of the rules appears to be for the new edition (it says ©2002, 2015 and it doesn't look quite like my copy of the original edition) and the inns all have an obvious lake right next to them. For example:


How do I complete the immunologist's request? [spoilers] My gaming group is playing through Pandemic Legacy Season:1.  We've just completed August and located the immunologist.  Now, we have a card full of items to retrieve for the immunologist.  We can't figure out how to get them.

Should we be able to tell how to locate these items? Or will this be revealed in future months?  It feels strange to be given a task that we can't attempt yet.

For a spoiler free answer, I will say that you should expect how to do them to be revealed later if you don't know how to do them now.

Why shouldn't there be objectives that you cannot do. Remember that you only need to complete a specified number of objectives each month NOT all of them.

If that is not satisfying then below is a spoiling hint:

   You get the item for the immunologist by doing the search objectives


Is a Regenerated Creature Removed from Combat? Say my opponent attacks me with a creature.  I use a burn spell to deal lethal damage, then he regenerates it.  Is it removed from combat at that point or does it still deal damage?

Yes, when a creature is regenerated, it is removed from combat.

The exact wording of the rule (701.12a) is

  If the effect of a resolving spell or ability regenerates a permanent, it creates a replacement effect that protects the permanent the next time it would be destroyed this turn. In this case, “Regenerate [permanent]” means “The next time [permanent] would be destroyed this turn, instead remove all damage marked on it and tap it. If it’s an attacking or blocking creature, remove it from combat.”


What happens with continous trap/spell cards when they get negated by Light and Darkness Dragon? I'm pretty sure they would get destroyed, but people have argued that they stay on the field negated, since the card does not explicitly state "the card gets destroyed and sent to the graveyard."

In my defense I state that it makes no sense that a card never be activated (since LaDD prevents activations) and still remain face up on the field.

They respond that since it never got activated it gets set again, and therefore they think they can get away with activating it every turn to weaken my LaDD.

I'm looking for hard evidence that I can show these kids the next time we have this comes up.

These rulings come from yugioh.wikia.com, and note:

These TCG rulings were issued by Upper Deck Entertainment and have since been deemed unofficial by Konami.[18] They were previously considered official and can still be correct, as long as they follow the official gameplay rules, or unless Konami has issued a ruling that says otherwise. References: [19][20][21][22][23][24][25][26]

The relevant rules are:

“Light and Darkness Dragon” cannot negate the activation of the Ignition-like effect of Continuous Spell or Trap Cards (“Ultimate Offering”, etc.) or Field Spell Cards (“Ancient City - Rainbow Ruins”, etc.). “Light and Darkness Dragon's” second effect activates when a Spell or Trap Card is first activated (placed face-up onto the field or flipped face-up).17
When “Light and Darkness Dragon” negates the activation of a Continuous Spell or Trap Card, the Continuous Spell or Trap Card is sent to the Graveyard. When “Light and Darkness Dragon” negates the activation of “Swords of Revealing Light”, the “Swords of Revealing Light” is sent to the Graveyard.17


What is the maximum score in Ticket to Ride USA, and how to aim towards it? My wife has been playing Ticket to Ride on her iPod, and has achieved what seems to me a very impressive score of nearly 250 in the 2-player game.  Naturally, nothing now matters to me except trying to beat her...

Even assuming a terrible computer opponent, it seems to me to be quite difficult to get much above 200 points in a normal game.  But I thought if I enlisted the help of the BG:SE brain trust, we might be able to work out the maximum possible score for the US board.

And if we can find out or approximate that information, from there I'm guessing it should be easy to work out which routes or combination of routes are the best to aim for for racking up a top score...

Straight from Board Game Geek:

  In order to get 295 you must get one of the most important cities Miami! You end up sacrificing New Orleans and Sault St. Marie to do so.

  Follow the same route from Vancouver to Santa Fe, but then you deviate from there:

  Santa Fe -> Denver -> Kansas City -> St. Louis (Splitting Point Here)
  St. Louis -> Nashville -> Atlanta -> Miami
  St. Louis -> Chicago -> Pittsburg (Splitting Point Here)
  Pittsburg -> Toronto
  Pittsburg -> New York -> Boston -> Montreal

  This route will give you the same 62 points for train length, but 223 for destination cards resulting in 295!

  Dropped Destinations: Dallas to NY; NO to Vancouver; NO to Chicago; Sault St. Marie to OKC; Sault St. Marie to Nashville (48 points)

  Added Destinations: Denver to Pittsburg; Miami -> LA; Miami -> Boston; Miami -> Montreal (51 points)

Following this as close as possible, you should be able to beat 200, and eventually eclipse your wife's score of 250. It's going to take a little luck, but this seems like the best blueprint.


Can routed ships retreat to port in the same sea area? Playing the Game of Thrones board game and using the Clash of Kings Port rules expansion, I was Stark and my ships in the Narrow Sea were attacked by Baratheon and lost. Baratheon didn't have any swords, so my two ships were still alive, but routed. However, there were no rules describing whether routed ships could enter the port of the same sea, in which I had just lost the battle, or whether I was required to retreat to another sea area.

It's difficult because the port in the Narrow Sea is controlled by the land area of White Harbor, which I owned, so there's an argument that the routed ships could limp into port. But I could also see Baratheon's view that he won the sea battle and it was a little unfair that I could limp into port in the sea area he has just taken, only for me to recover and attack in the next few rounds, especially after he just defeated me. In fact this is exactly what happened next turn, because there was a mustering and I reclaimed the sea. Baratheon wanted me to retreat into the Shivering Sea, as the ships would have fled the battle after losing.

As the decision would affect the whole game and the deciding player didn't want to decide, we flicked a coin.

Any suggestions? Can routed ships limp into a port of the same sea area, or do they have to retreat to another sea area?

The port is never considered "part" of the sea area; control of a port depends on whoever controls the land area, and the sea area is merely adjacent.  The ability to use a port despite the adjacent sea area being occupied is probably the most important aspect of ports.

From the FAQ:

  Q: Can a fleet that is defeated in a sea area retreat to a friendly Port touching that sea area?

  A: Yes.


Two Headed Giant Sealed Events Card Trading Origins is being released soon, and I plan on going to the THG prerelease for the first time. Me and my partner have been running pull simulations to see what deck strats come up often. We are noticing that we often get cards necessary for the other's strategy.

Is it legal to trade them cards before the rounds start?

Not only are you allowed to share cards, you are as a team considered to have a single card pool that you build your decks from. Section 9.6 of the Tournament rules says

Two-Headed Giant Limited Rules
All the rules for Limited Tournaments (Section 7) apply, except as described below.
The DCI recommends that each team receive eight boosters per team for Two-Headed Giant Sealed Deck tournaments and six boosters per team for Two-Headed Giant Booster Draft tournaments. For the recommended product mix for the current block, refer to Appendix D.
Cards not used in a team’s starting decks are considered a shared sideboard by the two players that both players can access.


Rabid Bite mechanics When a creature is summoned I understand this card has “Summoning Sickness”, where the card is not “tapped” but just cannot attack or use any abilities until the next turn.

How does this work with Rabid Bite? If I play a creature, can I then immediately use Rabid Bite with that creature to have it use that damage as the damage it assigns to the target creature?

"Summoning sickness" does exactly two things: it prevents the creature from attacking, and it prevents the creature from using abilities with the tap symbol.

Nothing else.

If a creature has other abilities, those are all usable.  If the creature is targeted by a spell the spell takes its normal effect (unless it was trying to force the creature to attack).

The creature can even be tapped to pay for costs that read "tap an untapped creature you control", since the cost isn't using the tap symbol instead.

Rabid Bite will behave as normal.


Problem with lifelines in "Who Wants To Be A Millionaire" board game I have found an issue with playing the board game Who wants to be a millionaire 2nd edition, and the rules do not cater for the problematic scenario.

The rules can be downloaded from www.fgbradleys.com/game_rules.asp#w
(Click the "Who Wants To Be A Millionaire" link to download PDF.)

The problem

The problem is with the "Ask the Audience" lifeline.

In the TV show, the audience are not playing the game and do not need to answer the question themselves. So they simply vote on which ever answer they think is correct.

In the board game, the "audience votes" are the answers which players are going to choose for themselves. They pass their answer via a card (either A, B, C, or D) to the host who adds a card with the correct answer, and then passes them all to the player using the "Ask the audience" lifeline.

The problem comes when a player uses their "Ask the audience" but one (or more) of the other players do not yet have an answer, and possibly/likely were going to use a lifeline themselves.

This means the other player(s) don't have a legitimate answer to choose, and so cannot pass an "Ask the audience" card based on an answer they are choosing.

Solution we're using

As there's nothing in the rules to resolve this, we decided that any players needing to provide an "Ask the audience" card but do not yet have an answer, randomly selects a card to pass to the host.

This isn't always terrible, as the host always provides a card with the correct answer, and another player might have an answer.

But if no other players have an answer this lifeline becomes quite hit-and-miss.
The lifeline cards the player receive from other players without an actual answer of their own are now just randomly chosen, 1 out of 4 chance, and not based on knowledge of the other players in any way.

And the point is supposed to be getting what other players are answering themselves as they might know the answer (arguably it's more than "chance/random").

It also changes the potential outcome. As a card which a player passes at random might not end up being the answer that player chooses for themselves.
So if the card they passed is chosen by the receiving player (using the lifeline) and the answer is wrong, but the player who passed the card ends up with a different answer themselves which is correct, they go through to the next question.

Whereas if they pass the answer they were choosing themselves, if that answer is chosen by the receiving player and wrong they both go out, if it's correct they both stay in.

Which is how it's designed - to avoid passing a card which you know is the wrong answer, as on the TV show which the board game is based on, the audience have no reason to give any answer other than the one they believe to be correct.

I know there are other parameters at play there, but essentially I'm saying it causes a few issues and alters potential outcome.

Can anyone think of a better solution to manage this scenario?

The hit-and-miss nature of the Ask The Audience seems like it is right.  There is no mention in the rules that the answer that a player gives for Ask The Audience must match the answer they ultimately decide to go with.  If you look at the rules for Phone A Friend (which appears to work similarly) it states

  this card does not have to match what the “Friend” may have answered
  on his/her own Console

Since in the real game show asking the audience is really just asking a bunch of random people what they think, I believe the "problem" you have encountered in many ways actually approximates how a real random audience would work.  You have some that know the answer (and are helpful people), some who aren't sure, some who are trolls and saboteurs (even the Phone A Friend lifeline could be used to mess somebody up on purpose, which is partially why I believe that sabotage is ok).

Also, just like in the game show, there is no guarantee that what the audience says is the right answer is really correct.  The contestant has to decide how much they really want to believe the audience and then make their decision.


Bet process when 2 players and Big blind is all in on the Pre-Flop as I understand when 2 players playing no Limit Hold-em

dealerButton is smallBlind
bigBlind goes All-In at the preflop.
smallBlind opens the game and he CALL.

how does the game move forward? (does the smallBlind have the option to see the flop-turn-river by keeping checking or betting on his own sidepot?) or does the game end as soon as the smallBlind makes his first choice?

When the big blind goes all in that leaves the small bline with one chose if they would like to continue and see the hand and that is to call the bet by either going all in if they don't have enough to cover the bet or call it by betting the required amount. This is similar to if the big blind did a raise on the pre flop as the small blind would still need to match the difference.

In this case betting would end, both players would reveal their cards and the dealer would play the deck until all 5 cards have been played and a winner has been determined. There would be no side pot as in a two player game there is no other player to bet against so the only money that could be in the side pot would be the small blind's.


Why is Modern Affinity called "Affinity"? Affinity is an ability that has been printed on a small number of cards.  The only one of these that the current Modern Affinity decks seem to run is Thoughtcast and even that does not appear in all of them.  So, why is this deck called affinity when it potentially runs no cards with the "affinity" ability?  Why not "metalcraft", calling out Mox Opal, Etched Champion, and Galvanic Blast?  Why not "robots", which seems to be another name for the affinity deck that hasn't caught on?

It is almost certain that the deck is meant to be the spiritual successor to the old Mirodin-era affinity deck that also used Thoughtcast, Arcbound Ravager, Cranial Plating, Darksteel Citadel, and Blinkmoth Nexus (pretty much everything else about the Modern affinity deck is different), but in what way is it the spiritual successor?

In what the deck does in general.  The name "affinity" at this point refers to the "for each artifact you control" aspect of the "affinity for artifacts" ability, leveraged by Cranial Plating and Master of Etherium.  At this point, players think of affinity as just being more powerful for having more artifacts rather than the literal affinity ability.
Card overlap.  There are enough key cards in common that players think of the decks as the same thing.  Arcbound Ravager and Cranial Plating are enough for people to say, "Yup, that's an Affinity deck."
There was actually a somewhat continuous evolution of the Mirodin-era affinity deck into the deck's current form (as new sets were released and Modern replaced Extended), and no one happened to rename the deck when Frogmite and Myr Enforcer got cut.

The answer is #3.  i.e. There was a deck long ago, that exploited affinity.  That deck has slowly changed over the years as the card pool has changed.  As those changes have occurred, the original reliance on affinity as a mechanic has reduced, but the name has stuck.

References:

https://www.mtgsalvation.com/forums/the-game/modern/established-modern/aggro-tempo/219590-affinity

https://www.channelfireball.com/articles/deck-of-the-day-true-affinity-modern/

https://blog.cardkingdom.com/deck-week-modern-affinity/


Does Spark Double on Muldrotha allow for additional plays from the graveyard? Muldrotha, the Gravetide is on the battlefield:

  During each of your turns, you may play up to one permanent card of each permanent type from your graveyard.

I play Spark Double:

  You may have Spark Double enter the battlefield as a copy of a creature or planeswalker you control, except it enters with an additional +1/+1 counter on it if it's a creature, it enters with an additional loyalty counter on it if it's a planeswalker, and it isn't legendary if that permanent is legendary.

Since I now have two creatures on the field that say I can play up to one permanent of any type from the graveyard, could I play up to two permanents of any type from my graveyard? Could I, for example, play two creatures instead of one during my turn? Or am I missing something?

The rulings only mention other effects that allow me to play additional permanents from the graveyard, but they don't address the same effect:

  4/27/2018. If multiple effects allow you to play a card from your graveyard, such as those of Gisa and Geralf and Karador, Ghost Chieftain, you must announce which permission you’re using as you begin to play the card.

Yes, You may play additional cards for each Muldrotha you control.
From the Card specific rulings in Gatherer:

If you play a card from your graveyard and then have a new Muldrotha
come under your control in the same turn, you may play another card of
that type from your graveyard that turn.
If multiple effects allow you to play a card from your graveyard, such
as those of Gisa and Geralf and Karador, Ghost Chieftain, you must
announce which permission you’re using as you begin to play the card.

This is written under the assumption that you can only control one Muldrotha at a time, but it remains true if you control multiple Muldrothas. Each instance of Muldrotha only checks if you already played a permanent of the same type with the permisssion of that specific Muldrotha.
You may still only play one land per turn unless another effect states otherwise.
To be precise the rulings mention multiple effects, this includes other effects as well as multiple instances of the same effect. You will still have to announce which Muldrotha you are using for each card played.


Largest Army in Settlers of Catan: Cities and Knights We were playing Cities and Knights at the weekend and halfway through the game realised that no one had earned the largest army card.  The reason behind this was that no one knew what it was earned for.  A couple of us scanned through the rule book in search of the answer, but to no avail.

Having since looked at the Wikipedia page (linked above) I see that it's the player with the most knight points, but do the knights have to be active, and is there a minimum requirement?

The Largest Army card is not used in Cities and Knights.
See the rulebook p2, under "What you need from your Settlers game"

Set aside  ...

The Largest Army card


Can a king capture an opposing queen? A Beginner's Scenario:  I castle kingside prior to ever being in check. Then, my son positions his queen and on a subsequent turn, takes out the middle pawn of three (see diagram below), thus exposing my king, and declares "checkmate".  Is this a legal move on his part? Or, may I take out his queen with my king?

Yes you can capture the Queen, unless capturing the Queen would put the King under check again. See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rules_of_chess#Check


When both players have the same 2 pair, can a 3rd pair be used as a valid kicker? player A : 4,4
player B : A,10
board : K,K,Q,Q,2

Which player wins? I guess Player B but player A claims he has a pair of 4 which is a bigger kicker. who is correct?

Player B wins. All that matters is the best 5 card hand you can make with the combined 7 cards. So player A does NOT have a pair of 4 as a kicker... player A has K,K,Q,Q,4. Player B has K,K,Q,Q,A. Both identical 2 pairs, but player B has A which beats 4.


When can I scramble? In Axis and Allies Pacific, What constitutes an adjoined sea space for a scramble? Sea space in square contains the fighters or all sea spaces that touch that square?

Up to three fighters/tactical bombers can be scrambled into each sea zone adjacent to a territory that contains a functional airbase.  Any aircraft that are used in this way cannot be used for any further combat operations for the remainder of the round.  You may select units to be scrambled after the attacking player has finished all of his combat moves and you may do so any time the appropriate sea zone in attacked by either air or sea units and that included defending the territory against amphibious assaults.
An example is sea zone 109 and 110 are adjacent to United Kingdom territory.


Can I activate abilities in the middle of declaring blockers? The field is set up as such:
Opponent has Aerial Responder (2/3), Sun Sentinel (2/2) and Child of Night (2/1) in play.

I have Ravenous Harpy(1/3, +1/+1 counter) and Doomed Dissenter (1/1) in play.

She attacks with all three of her monsters, I declare Doomed Dissenter as a blocker, then use Harpy's effect ({1}, Sacrifice another creature: put a +1/+1 counter on Ravenous Harpy) to sacrifice the doomed Dissenter.  This activates Doomed Dissenter's effect (When Doomed Dissenter dies, create a 2/2 black Zombie creature token), and then I finish declaring my blockers on the other two creatures.  If I'm thinking correctly that would mean that Child of Night stays blocked but takes no damage because the creature (Doomed Dissenter) died before combat, Sun Sentinel dies as a result of being blocked by the 2/2 Zombie creature token (who also dies) and Aerial Responder dies as a result of a twice pumped up Harpy.

Was that legal or did I not think about a rule during all that, which would make that play illegal?

No, that sequence of actions is not legal. You declare blockers all at once; you can't declare some blockers, then do something else, then declare other blockers. So, if you want to active the Harpy's ability, you have to either do it before declaring any blockers, or after declaring all of your blockers.


Civilization A New Dawn: How may additional control tokens be placed when resolving the Civil Service focus card I recently played Civilization A New Dawn for the first time, and during play the question arose as to how Control Tokens purchased using Trade Tokens on the Civil Service card should be allocated, as the card provides two methods of placement. The text on the Civil Service card reads the following:

Place 2 control tokens on spaces matching this slot's terrain or lower that are adjacent to friendly cities.
Then, place 1 control token on a space matching this slot's terrain or lower that is adjacent to a friendly space.

The Trade Tokens section under Additional Rules in the rule book does not specify any constraints on how the additional control tokens must be placed. The general rule in the culture section under Focus Cards does say the following:

the player takes one of his or her unused control tokens and places it on a space adjacent to a friendly city

But it makes no mention of any exceptions existing to this rule, of which the Civil Service card is.
My gut feeling is that the additional tokens should be placed adjacent friendly cities, but I can see room for arguing more freedom in the placement of control tokens. Is there anything close to an official statement on how this should play out?

The FAQ's got your back:

  Civil Service: Trade tokens spent with this card allow the player to place additional control tokens following the usual rules for placing control tokens, not the special rule for Civil Service’s secondary effect.

Source: Official FAQ (as of 03-JUL-2018)