What strong draft decks exist for Innistrad-Innistrad-Dark Ascension draft? Innistrad has a decent amount of archetypes that you can build.  In draft, what tier 1 deck types exist?

Loosely speaking, I think strong Dark Ascension Limited (i.e. the official format, DKA-INN-INN) decks fit into one of three strategies corresponding to the three stages of play (which I have given these semi-descriptive labels):

"Aggro": Try to win before your opponent can really get rolling.
"Midrange": Build up a crushing advantage with powerful two-for-ones.
"Control": Hope to take over the game by making your opponent's stuff irrelevant, usually with a big bomb.

Decks that don't do at least one of these -- such as a deck full of mid-sized creatures but no way to actually turn them into card advantage -- tend to be at a disadvantage. Note that there's a lot of overlap here, probably much more so than in Constructed decks. You really can't classify most cards as belonging to just one strategy. Instead, the goal here is to view the card differently, and prioritize it accordingly, based on your particular gameplan; and to adjust your gameplan and later picks based on your cards. Darkthicket Wolf is a primo aggro card and a good midrange card, for instance; your "Human Sacrifice" deck may turn into a more controlling deck if pick up a really good late-game bomb.

I've never drafted with the pros and I don't play MTGO (where you can draft til you pass out from exhaustion), so I can't speak for the subtleties of "tier 1" vs. "tier 2", but I can list what I've found effective. Names in quotes below are those that are widely used, to my knowledge; I've made the other ones up based on whatever described a deck acceptably. Colors are suggestions rather than set in stone; each archetype has good cards in some of the other colors.

Aggro

These are decks that aim to win with an explosive start. Drafting them involves careful attention to your mana curve.

I think the top-tier decks in this category are:

White-weenie-style (W/G): Attack fast with dudes; keep attacking with lots of dudes. "White weenie" is a proven strategy in any format where white has strong low-cost aggressive creatures. Thalia, Champion of the Parish, and Cloistered Youth definitely fit the bill, as do Darkthicket Wolf and Hamlet Captain. Basically this deck depends on its low curve to win with speed. In addition to the usual pillars of efficient creatures and a bit of removal, these decks can benefit greatly from Travel Preparations. I think it's good to have at least one of Faith's Shield, Spare from Evil, or Feeling of Dread in the deck -- a card you can use to either push through damage or stop an opponent's attack while creating an opening for a decisive counter-blow. Be careful with CC cards like Loyal Cathar and Strangleroot Geist, since it's not always easy to actually cast these on turn 2.
Red-Deck-Wins-style (R/B): Attack fast with dudes; sacrifice board position to push your dudes through if needed; use burn to finish the job. The big difference from white weenie here is burn, with the standout card being Brimstone Volley. Evasion is usually part of the game plan: cards like Vampire Interloper, Crossway Vampire, Wild Hunger, and Feral Ridgewolf.

Midrange

These are decks that build up card advantage Jund-style. Dark Ascension has been good for this style of deck, with many of its premier cards having some component of built-in card advantage: Huntmaster of the Fells, Strangleroot Geist, Lingering Souls.

Some examples of good decks are:

"Human Sacrifice" (W/B): Trade your value-added weenies for your opponent's strongest creatures to build an advantageous position on the field. The "ideal" version of this deck starts with Skirsdaag Flayers; you feed them cards like Doomed Traveler, Loyal Cathar, and Elder Cathar. This deck also benefits from Human-token-makers like Gather the Townsfolk, and death-trigger cards like Wakedancer and Thraben Militia. Easy access to expendable dudes also makes cards like Demonmail Hauberk and Falkenrath Torturer better than they are in other decks. I like the Hauberk in particular because it's a good "escape plan" if you've picked up the relevant white cards but black has dried up: you can turn your deck into a pretty solid W/R or W/G morbid deck with potential for really crushing attacks.
Morbid two-for-one (G/B): Pressure your opponent with mid-sized creatures; when your trade, use morbid and undying two-for-ones to come out ahead. There are two morbid Grey Ogres I absolutely love in Dark Ascension Limited: Wakedancer and Ulvenwald Bear. Both of these are easy-to-pick up cards with a lot of mid-game power. A mixture of these guys, undying beaters (basically all the Strangleroot Geists you can grab), and quality combat tricks allows you to build up card advantage and superior board position; Victim of Night and Tragic Slip are also very desirable to help answer your opponent's biggest threats. Outside of rare bombs like Vorapede, the ideal big creature for this deck is Galvanic Juggernaut. Try to avoid the bad undying creatures -- 2/2 can't-block four-drops and 3/2 flying six-drops are not what you need to win the game. And don't just focus on morbid and undying: any source of incremental advantage is great; good rares for this plan are cards like Mayor of Avabruck or Gutter Grime, for instance.
"Werewolves" (R/G): Play dudes that become better than your opponent's dudes. Werewolves are a lot better with the additional cards from Dark Ascension. The key card here actually isn't Huntmaster: he doesn't really care about the creature types or colors of the rest of your deck; it's Immerwolf. The werewolves plan has always been to punish an opponent's slow development with a crushing tide of big creatures. Immerwolf and Moonmist make it much easier to consistently ride that plan to victory. As with all decks, don't get hung up on creature types; any card that fits the gameplan will work fine for this deck. Also, be choosy! Not all the werewolves are good.

Control

These are decks that want to waste time until they can play something that trumps your stuff, like a big Spider Spawning or a Reaper from the Abyss. Basically my standard for determining whether a deck is "control"-y in Limited is "Will this deck ever want to cast Think Twice?" Control gains some defensive power in Dark Ascension with the addition of quality defenders like Headless Skaab and Nephalia Seakite, but it loses a lot due to pack dilution. In particular, the "Mill Yourself" decks -- like Burning Vengeance or Spiders -- are weaker in Dark Ascension because their key cards are less likely to show up now that you're drafting from 2 Innistrad boosters instead of 3.

So far, I think the most consistently draftable deck in this category is actually a rather boring one:

Flyers (U/W): Clog up the ground, beat your opponent to death with evasive guys. I'm calling this a control deck for Limited purposes because it's really hoping to make most of an opponent's creatures irrelevant with some huge defenders and tricky plays, then grind out a win with evasion. Cards like Nephalia Seakite and Dungeon Geists are representative of your gameplan: they're basically flyers that double as removal. A big advantage of drafting this archetype is that you can often late-pick "big backside" cards for your defense.


What happens if I have two different cards that give me an extra turn after this one? For example, I play Emrakul, the Aeons Torn. That gives me an extra turn after this one. Then I activate Ral Zarek's ultimate and only get one extra turn (one) heads. Will the Emrakul's extra turn meld with Ral Zarek's so I only get 1 extra turn, or will I get two?

You get two extra turns.

  500.7. Some effects can give a player extra turns. They do this by adding the turns directly after the current turn. If a player gets multiple extra turns or if multiple players get extra turns during a single turn, the extra turns are added one at a time. The most recently created turn will be taken first.


Bonus troops from controlling continents and trading cards for troops in Risk I have a few questions on the lovely game :-

In my current turn I've conquered a continent and keep it conquered for the following 3 turns. Do I get bonus troops in every turn that I have conquered it in ?
If I am trading cards for troops, and I have a territory on the face of the card too. Do I still get my base troops that we get ( the whole count and divide by 3 ones )

Per the rules

You gain bonus troops for each of your turns you start while in control of the continent

  In  addition,  at  the  beginning  of  your  turn  you  will  receive
  armies  for  each  continent  you  control.

Yes, you get the base count, plus any continent bonus, plus the value of the cards you trade in, plus 2 bonus troops for trading in a territory card you occupy.

  At the
  beginning of each turn, calculate how many new armies you’ll add to your territories based on ...

  The  number  of  territories  you  occupy;
  The  value  of  the  continents  you  control;
  The value of the matched sets of RISK cards you trade in;
  The  specific  territory  pictured  on  a  traded-in  card.


Who choses the targets of the Exotrireme II's ability in Twilight Imperium? In Twilight Imperium 4th Edition, the Sardakk N'orr have a special version of the Dreadnaught called the Exotrireme.  The upgraded version of this, the Exotrireme II has the ability:

  After a round of space combat, you may destroy this unit to destroy up to 2 ships in this system.

Who chooses the targets of this ability?  The Sardakk N'orr, or the player they are fighting in combat?

Note that if the Sardakk N'orr can chose the targets, this means they can sacrifice a Dreadnought (4 cost) to kill an enemy War Sun and a Flagship (12 and 8 cost respectively).

The Sardakk N'orr chooses the targets.
This thread on BoardGameGeek has an official answer from FFG on the subject:

I do have another questions about some of the "destroy abilities " in game.
Exotrireme II - sacrificial ability , Assault Cannon, Yin Flagship.
1.) Am I correct to assume that for any Destroy ability sustain damage cannot be used ?
2.) Who select unit destroyed for Exotrireme II ability? Norr player or Opponent?

Hey Fedor,
Exotrireme— 1) That is correct, sustain damage cannot be used against
abilities that ‘destroy’. 2) The N’orr player selects the units to be
destroyed.
Let me know if I can help further, –––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––
Dane Beltrami Game Developer dbeltrami@fantasyflightgames.com

This is also consistent with the "Exotrireme" upgrade from 3rd edition, which read:

At the end of a round of Space Battle, you may destroy 1 of your Dreadnoughts present to destroy 2 present enemy ships of your choice.


Can Pandemic Legacy be played as "vanilla" Pandemic? I've never played Pandemic, but thinking of getting the Legacy edition. Is it possible to play it without the legacy elements a few times first, and get an experience that is same or similar to that of the regular Pandemic?

In fact, the Legacy rules themselves suggest playing a few games if you aren't familiar with Pandemic.

IF YOU'VE NEVER PLAYED PANDEMIC...
We recommend that you play a few games without any of the special
"Legacy" rules to get a feel for the decisions you will have to make.
Read this rulebook then play without using the following rules:
•Game Months, Legacy Deck, Dossiers
•Objectives, Funding, Game Calendar, Panic Level
•Scars and Lost Characters
•Game End Upgrades
The object of these warm-up games is to cure four diseases before any of
the game-losing conditions are triggered (noted on page 14 of these rules).
You should play at least two games this way to get a feel for the game before
adding the additional rules.


Does my opponent need to prove his creature has morph? I'm playing against an opponent who, for whatever reason, doesn't want to give away more information than they have to. (Perhaps they're trying to limit what is known about their strategy, their decklist, or their tells)

My opponent is one damage off lethal, but any creature will get him there. (Let's say I know he has a Might of the Masses in hand.) He plays a morph creature face down, swings (and casts his might of the Masses) and wins. Can I demand he prove the card had morph? Doing so gives me information in our next round that I shouldn't have, but it also proves that he didn't put just any card face down for {3}

Is the only solution to get a judge involved? What if he already started scooping his cards back into his deck? Should I have asked a judge to verify that the facedown creature had morph before it resolved? If so, it seems unreasonable to call over a judge every time a morph creature is played. In this instance it's clear the creature was crucial in the moment, but in other cases the creature could have been on the field for several turns, and it didn't look so conspicuous when it was played.

Rule 707.9 says this:

  If a face-down permanent moves from the battlefield to any other zone, its owner must reveal it to all players as they move it. If a face-down spell moves from the stack to any zone other than the battlefield, its owner must reveal it to all players as they move it. If a player leaves the game, all face-down permanents and spells owned by that player must be revealed to all players. At the end of each game, all face-down permanents and spells must be revealed to all players.

There is no way for a game to end without one of these things happening to each face down permanent, so every face down permanent must be revealed one way or another by the end of the game.


What is a four-wind game called in Japanese mahjong? In Japanese mahjong generally the longest game most people play is a hanchan (半荘), where the han part (半) implies that it's "half" of something, presumably a full four-wind game with 16 hands.

But is there a name for a four-wind game in Japanese? I can't find a reference for it anywhere if it does.

According to WWWJDIC, the word is イーチャン, or 一荘 in kanji - read as iichan (although it's unusualy in that it appears to be written in katakana, which I'm guessing could mean that it's a fairly new loanword from Chinese?). There's a JMdictDB entry on it here.


How can I tell which cards or sets are currently legal in various formats? I haven't played Magic: the Gathering since the days of Onslaught and Mirrodin, and I would like to try to catch back up. Since all my cards are quite dated now, I may be more interested in formats other than the most up-to-date one.

Rather than ask what is currently legal in various formats (since that is likely too localized), I would rather pose the question of how can I tell which sets/cards are legal in each format.

I would refer you to the following page:

http://magic.wizards.com/en/game-info/gameplay/rules-and-formats/formats

I think you'll find everything you need there!  Both lists of legal sets for each format, and lists of individual cards that are banned or restricted in those formats.


Replace exploration by skill, and then exploring in Pathfinder If I use Kyra's skill (instead of the first free explore, I shuffle cards from the discard pile into someone's deck)

can I explore afterwards by discarding BotG?

According to the rule book, the free given exploration

  must be your first exploration for the turn.

If I don't do it, then I can't explore?

Note that the power is worded "instead of your first exploration". This is referring to the first FREE exploration you get on every turn. So you may either explore or use the cure power. Once that is done, then discarding BofG grants you an additional exploration. If you have a multiple blessings in your hand, you may explore many times in a turn.


Does anyone recognize this monster family board game? I am gonna drive myself nuts because I can not remember the name of a board game from my childhood. It would have been between 1993–1999.

The box was shaped like a creepy castle or house and there was a laughing skull piece (like it's eyes glowed and it had this evil laugh). All your player pieces were tiny brightly colored skulls and the family of the house was all these monsters (granny mummy, Lord Skull?, a little girl vampire, I think a cousin or uncle was a werewolf) I think there was a rubber spider too. You had to go through the house (which may have been the box) and there was a goop soup monster. It Actually came with a book explaining how the soup monster was made.

It had the same humor of The Addams Family or The Munsters but was like a niche or indy game.

The game is called Creepy Towers.

The box was shaped like a creepy castle or house and there was a
laughing skull piece
and you had to go through the house (which may
have been the box)

From the publisher's description:

  Includes light-activated laughing skull

and all your player pieces were tiny brightly colored skulls
I think there was a rubber spider too…

From the publisher's description:

  Includes ... two rubber creatures

It would have been between 1993-1999

The game was published in 1995

Actually came with a book

From the publisher's description:

  as kids read Creepy Towers

And from the BoardGameGeek entry (linked above)

  Within Creepy Towers there is a board game, short story


Is it possible for an Othello / Reversi game to end without the board being filled? Is there any case where an Othello (reversi) game would need to no more moves allowed?
This happen to one of the two players leading to the other to play again is a common thing. Has it ever happened simultaneously to both in the history of the game while leaving positions blank? I mean one cannot move, the other cannot move but there is still room on the board.

EDIT
I understand that when no moves are available the game is scored. What I am asking (as it has never occurred to me in the last 3-4 years I am playing the game is

Is there a possibility in which while the board is not yet full no more moves are available by neither of the two players?

How is this possible? Any examples of boards in which this is possible?

Yes, it is possible for neither player to be able to make a move without the board being full. The Wikipedia article for Reversi has this example from a competition:

There are also simpler examples where all the pieces are turned to the same colour (YouTube video).


Can Necron Deathmarks shoot in your opponents turn? Necron Deathmarks get to intercept an enemy unit when they deepstrike, deepstriking themselves.

Because they appear in the other player's turn, I've heard arguments to say that this means the Deathmarks can fire immediately. The reasoning I've heard is anything from 'Why else would you play death marks', to very special readings of the turn phase in the master rulebook.

This video is what got me thinking about this.

How should this be played?

That video is rules lawyering at its best(as in worst).

You can't shoot Death Marks in your opponent's turn.  Something that against the normal mechanics would be spelled out explicitly.  Yes, units may fire the turn they come in from reserve as normal, but it's still the other players turn.  Normally a player can only fire their own units on their own turn.  The deep strike rules don't override that; they're written for the 99% of the time where units are coming in on their controlling player's turn.

You can't in good faith make the argument that you can shoot Death Marks in your opponents turn.  A seasoned 40k player would know the intent here.  Any time you are jumping between 3 or more disparate rules in this rules system your are stretching the credulity of your argument.  I know that that's not a perfect answer, but the 40k rules are not written to the same precision as some other miniature games.  If someone pulled this argument on me, I'd argue back that I should be able to chose the target, since it's my shooting phase.

And there are effective ways to use Death Marks without resorting to this.  Try combining a unit with a despair Cryptek in a Nightscythe.  The Death Marks allow the abyssal staff to wound on a 2+, and the Nightsythe give them the mobility to drop that template anywhere on the table.

Yeah, the Ethereal Interception rule is only situationally useful, but it's not the main draw of the unit anyway.


What combination of kingdom cards makes for the fewest number of turns to end the game? I am wondering in a 2 player game, what is the fewest number of turns each players could take to end the game.  Lets assume both player are working together to make this happen and have prefect luck, so stacking your deck each shuffle is allowed.

You can end the game, even buying/gaining every single card in the entire supply, on turn 1! There are multiple possible ways to do this, but here is one:

The Kingdom:

Fortress
Villa
Pixie
Pooka
Tracker
Overlord
Lurker
King's Court
Bridge
Library
Travelling Fair
Advance

I'm not going to go into all of the details here, because it gets quite long and complex, but the final step is to have bought a Travelling Fair, and a Villa to return to action phase. Then have a hand of:

King's Court, King's Court, Lurker, Lurker, Overlord

Play King's Court (a)

Play King's Court (1)

Play Lurker (1), trash Overlord from supply
Play Lurker (2), gain Overlord from the trash (put it on your deck because of Travelling Fair)
Play Lurker (3), do anything, doesn't matter

Play King's Court (2)

Play Overlord(1) as Pixie, draw next Overlord, trash it to get the Boon
Play Overlord(2) as Lurker, gain Overlord from the trash
Play Overlord(3) as King's Court (a)

That last step wraps back to the first... you have the same hand, same card on top of your deck, same cards in the trash. Except you have received a Boon.

With the infinite Boons, you will have received every Silver in the game from The Mountain's Gift, drawn them all into hand from The Sea's Gift, and gained all of the cards with The Earth's Gift.

The full details of this combo are written out in this forum post. All credit goes to Mith and other f.ds members.

There is also a video of this combo being demonstrated on Dominion Online:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pbWdV9H2SKk

So that particular combination requires a very convoluted setup and an extremely lucky starting hand, with the exact right Heirlooms. So here's a very short game that happened in a real, regular randomized game:

Turn 3, draw Quarry + 4 Copper.
Stonemason -> 2 Villas (5 times).
Stonemason -> 2 Trade Route (4-5 times).
Win off Museum points

Empties the Villa, Stonemason, and Trade Route piles to end the game.

Details in this forum post.


Cribbage - Total score please My son and myself have just started playing Cribbage.
In our game this evening the following cards were played with me leading -
My cards - 2,3,4,5. His cards - 5,2,3,A
My understanding was that that the maximum you could score in Cribbage was 29 but I think he scored 40 when he played the Ace - am I correct or am I adding up incorrectly?

Assuming you're talking about the "Pegging" phase of each hand of cribbage, and assuming that the cards you types in order were played in that order, here is the order of events.

Pegging Phase Answer

You lead with a 2. Currently, the count is at 2 and no point are scored.

Your son plays a 5. The count moves to 7 (2+5=7). No points are scored.

You play a 3. The count is at 10. No points are scored.

Your son plays a 2. The count is at 12. No points are scored.

You play a 4. The count is at 16. The last four cards played were a 4, a 2, 3 and a 5. That is a consecutive run of 4. You get four points.

Your son plays a 3. The count is at 19. The last three cards played were a 3, a 4 and a 2. That is a consecutive run of 3 cards. Your son gets three points.

You play a 5. The count is at 21. The last four cards played were a 5, a 3, a 4 and a 2. That is a consecutive run of 4 cards. You get four more points.

Your son finally plays an A. The count moved to 22. The last five cards player were a A, a 5, a 3, a 4, and a 2. That is a run of 5 cards. Your son scores 5 points for the run, and an additional 1 point for last card played.

Note these special scoring rules:

A player scores two points in the pegging phase when they play a pair. So if Player A plays a 4, and player B plays a 4 to bring the count to 8, Player B receives 2 points for playing a pair. Like all scoring in the Pegging Phase, the played cards must happen sequentially to count.

A player scores 6 points for playing triplets, and 12 points for four-of-a-kind. Again, these must happen sequentially. So Player A plays a 4, B plays a 4 to bring the count to 8 and scores 2 points, A plays another 4 to bring the count to 12 and scores 6 points, and B plays the last four to bring the count to 16 and scores 12 points.

Similarly, a sequential run scores points equal to the number of cards in the run.

Someone scores two points in the pegging phase when they play a card that makes the count equal 15 or 31. The count can never exceed 31.

There are special rules concerning what happens if a player cannot play a card without making the count exceed 31. For now, just know that the player who last played a card without going over 31 receives 1 point, called a "go" and then continues to play until they also can no longer play cards without exceeding 31.

Scoring Phase Answer

If you're talking about the scoring phase, wherein both players count up the number of points in their hand, your son still has not scored 40 points. We would need to know the cut card to determine how many points he did score, but at the moment, 5,2,3,A scores three points- for the run of A,2,3. If all four cards were also all of the same suit, they would score 4 additional points, bringing the hand's total up to 7 points.


It was the end of the world...but we didn't know it! We played our first game of Arkham Horror last night with the new Miskatonic Horror expansion.  Pretty much all the new stuff was used, and we were playing along.  All the usual stuff was going wrong:

Doom track only had 1 free space left
Terror level was 5
Kingsport rifts were close to opening
4 tokens on the Deep Ones Rising track

The only thing going right was that we were still in Act 1 of the King in Yellow.  Of course, Bokrug wasn't done toying with us as the right environment card showed up and we had to go to Act 2, unless we were willing to pay the price and remove an Gate Seal.  We opted not to.  We had 3 seals, and two investigators off world with good odds of sealing.  Not to mention the doom track was filling up and we figured there would only be a couple turns left before the final battle anyways.

Naturally for the very next Mythos card, the King in Yellow decided it was time for Act 3 and the end of the world.  We lost without even a fight with Bokrug.

What factors weigh into deciding whether to delay the Act 1 and 2 cards from showing up?  In your experience how often do you need to pay the price?

I'm going to assume that since you mentioned the Miskatonic Horror expansion and environments you're using the Act cards from that expansion and not the one originally present in King in Yellow.

For those that don't know the differences between the two: Originally in the King in Yellow expansion, the Acts only advanced when 'The Next Act Begins!' was drawn as a mythos card. The Miskatonic Horror expansion adds an alternative Act deck to use. This deck, in addition to advancing when 'The Next Act Begins' is drawn, advances when specific types of Environment Mythos Cards are drawn. Act I Begins when an Environment (Mystic) is drawn, Act II begins when an Environment (Urban) is drawn, and Act III begins when an Environment (Weather) is drawn. Another important difference between the two decks is the price that has to be paid to prevent an Act from beginning. In the original expansion, the price to prevent Act I and Act II from entering play was (respectively) by adding two doom tokens to the doom track and removing two elder sign tokens from the board. The MH version of the Act deck requires adding a single doom token and removing a single elder sign token from the board.

So, using the MH version or not makes a difference because the Act Cards are more likely to enter play, but the cost is less when they do.

Now, actually getting around to the question. For us, preventing an Act or not is a factor of how many expansions are in play, how many investigators are playing, who the Ancient One is, how far along the path to victory we are, and most importantly how lucky we're feeling.

First off, the large majority of the Act stopping we do is with Act I. Act II is really painful to stop. In a game where gate bursts already happen too often for comfort, choosing that voluntarily is just depressing.

With the original Act deck, the number of expansions is important. If we're using a lot of expansions, the odds of hitting a 'Next Act' card are pretty low since there's only ~7 of them, so we'll just let 'em pass. I don't know what the odds of of drawing specific types of weather cards, but I'll assume the chances are more or less the same regardless of how many expansions are in play, so when we're using the MH deck the expansion count doesn't really influence our decision.

The Ancient One you're up against is also important. You'll have to weigh a combination of doom track length, in-game effects, and difficulty of the final fight. If it's someone we think we can stomp in a fight, we'll stop Act I. Otherwise, if we're up against someone that wakes up quickly we'll let all of the Acts pass by. If they can eat us without blinking, since there's no chance for us later, we'll probably opt to stop Act II once. With Ancient Ones that have a longer track we'll look at what in-game effects they cause. We definitely won't stop Act II against AOs that make getting seals harder (Hastur, Yog).

If we're doing really well clue-token wise, or we have some Elder Signs to burn, or we've sealed some low-frequency locations, we'll feel pretty safe about stopping Act II. The penalty for removing seals is that the game goes on longer, but if you're fairly confident the additional mythos cards won't add doom tokens it may not be a bad choice. We'll have to be doing pretty well though if we're confident enough to get rid of a seal or two. We'll never stop Act II more than once.

TL;DR: Is the Ancient One going to eat you? Don't speed up the doom track! Don't remove a seal unless you're feeling pretty good! Do you have a shot at winning if it wakes up? Stop an Act once or twice! Find yourself thinking 'What are the odds'? Definitely stop an Act.


Is the four move checkmate the fastest way to win a game of chess? Is the four move check mate (1. e4 e5 2.Qf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Bc5?? 4.Qxf7#) the fastest way to win a game of chess, or is there a quicker way?

There is a quicker checkmate called the Fool's Mate which only takes 2 moves.

The moves that demonstrate the checkmate are:

1. f3 e5
2. g4 Qh4#


Brass: Are shipyards "industries"? At the end of the canal phase all 'level 1 industry' tiles are removed.  Does this include level 1 shipyards?

If so - then why does the level 1 shipyard tile not have a canal marker on it, like all the other canal-phase-only tiles?

(EDIT for future clarity: The canal symbol is missing on first edition copies of the game. Thanks to Xi Huan for this info.)

I know that level 0 shipyards need to be developed before any can be built, and that level-2 shipyards can only be built during the railway phase.  Level-1 shipyards seem to fall into an ambiguous hole.  Only one can ever actually be built, the Liverpool one, because of the coal connectivity requirements.  This half suggests it could stay there when the railway phase is started.

It's just a mistake that the canal symbol is missing. If you look at the second edition rule book, you see the canal symbol on a level 1 shipyard:

The rules also say

  If you have just completed the Canal Period then remove all canal
  and Tech level 1 Industry counters, along with any cubes on them,
  from the map.

No mention of the canal/rail road symbols. They a just reminders.

Since level 1 shipyards are also tech level 1 industries (they look and behave like the other industries and the shipyard counters are listed in the rules as industries counters), they are removed as well when the canal period is completed.

So the short answer is: yes.


When moving an Agent from a non-local Faction, what is the correct orientation? This came up in a three player game, but I think it'd be even worse in 4 or 5.  One of the Free Agents ("The Interloper" maybe?) has the power "Move one Agent from any Faction into a neighboring Faction."  I think it was neighboring, it might have been to any other one.

Since you could (and probably would) be moving from a non-adjacent faction, how would you preserve the orientation?  If the command faces a player on one side and you move it to a neighboring faction, the command still has to face that player, yes?

What if the card did say move from "any faction to any faction?"  How would orientation be preserved then?

Yes, the command would still face the same player

The rules state the following on the very last page, FAQ section:

  When swapping two Agents, their orientation must remain the same! I.e. players cannot turn Agents when swapping them. For example, if an Agent‘s command was facing you before the swap, it must still be facing you after the swap.

Cards only have two orientations, Commands towards you or data-token halves towards you.

  Each Agent card features a command giving the player a special ability. When placing an Agent onto a Faction, you choose whether to face the command towards yourself or towards another player. [...] The other end of the card features data-token halves (either black or white). When these halves are joined together, they award intel points to whomever their arrows are facing. Your decision when placing a card on a Faction, therefore, is in which direction to place the card - whether to keep the command for yourself, or try to give yourself intel points by completing data tokens.

There is no way to preserve orientation if you move an agent to a non-adjacent faction, since a non-adjacent faction would not be shared by player it was being moved into. The only way for such a card to exist would likely be if you were allowed to turn the agents orientation to whichever way you wished after moving it.


Does a unique collection give 4 or 7 points? In Gloria Picktoria, does a unique collection give 4 points because it is unique, or does it give 7 points because it is unique (4) but also the longest collection of that type in the game (3)?
Logically I would say that it gives just 4 points, but my rulebook is not clear on this point. What is the correct rule?

It only gives 4 points for being unique. Unfortunately, the English version of the rules dropped the nice scoring example in the German version of the rules.

  Ronja: 8 Punkte - Niemand außer Ronja besitzt Masken. Das bringt ihr 4 Punkte ein. Bei den Statuen geht sie - wie Max - leer aus. Auch bei den Zahnketten bekommt sie keine Punkte, denn Max und Lea besitzen mehr davon. 4 Punkte bringt Ronja ihre konkurrenzlose Hutsammlung.

Roughly, this translates to. Ronja 8 points. No one but Ronja owns Masks. That brings her 4 points. As with Max, the statues score her nothing. Also, for the necklaces she scores no points, because Max and Lea have more of them. 4 points for Ronja's unrivaled collection of hats.

It is clear from the images in the rulebook, that Ronja is the only player with Dark Green Mask cards, and Yellow Hat cards. Since she only scored 4 + 4 = 8 for her two unique collections, you don't score those sets for longest of that type as well.


Do I have to physically cut into my Necron Overlord's Staff of Light to upgrade it to Warscythe? I'm just double checking so that I don't ruin a $20 model.

Clarification:

I don't plan on playing in tournaments, however, I would like to stick to the rules as far as my army is concerned just to make casual games smoother. I'm new to 40K and I figure if I skimp too much on the rules that I won't actually learn the game.

My Necron Overlord finecast box did not come with a Warscythe, which the codex says I can upgrade him to in place of a Staff of Light. The model box does come with a Staff of Light, and the codex depicts a Warscythe as roughly a Staff of Light with one of the blades removed. If possible, I would like to keep the whole Staff of Light just in case I later decide to not use the Warscythe upgrade in my roster.

Well, it depends.

40K by the rules is WYSIWYG(What you see is what you get).  This means that if you give a guy an ax, he needs to be modeled with something vaguely ax shaped.  If you give him a bolt pistol he needs to be holding something bolt pistol like(a holster at his hip works too)  This holds true for the war scythe as well.

There's some wiggle room on this because the game doesn't always specifically say what advanced alien melee weapons are supposed to look like.  So if you can squint your eyes and the thing the Overload is holding is two handed and sorta scythe shaped, your're probably good.

In most friendly games, telling your opponent what the character is armed with before the start of the game is generally sufficient.  Often people like to try out different combinations of wargear, and a certain amount of proxying is tolerated.

This is all dependent on the group of guys you play with.  Some groups may be stricter about the application of WYSIWYG than others.  Check with your gaming group to be sure.

If you plan on playing in tournaments--especially larger ones, you will probably have to go with a more explicit conversion.  Tournaments are more likely to enforce strict WYSIWYG for the sake of side-stepping potential rules arguments.


Battlestar Galactica vs. Shadows over Camelot I've seen these games compared very often, with steadfast advocates on each side. link1 link2 link3  I'm mainly concerned with:

depth of strategy
suitability for new players (length of time to explain, etc.)
overall feel of the game
what situations you would recommend playing each of them in.
anything else you think should be included in regards to comparing and contrasting them

Some things I've noticed:

Shadows supports more and fewer people better, and seems to be easier to understand.
Both are Cooperative with the traitor mechanic.
Battlestar seems to be the 'improved' version of Shadows. (What's really improved that was 'wrong' in Shadows?)

One thing I noticed is that Shadows is much more... unfocused.  There are a ton of quests all over the board, and the players are going to be split up doing various things the whole time.  They're not much interacting with each other, just responding to the general board conditions and their own quests.

In Battlestar, you still have multiple threats (4 dials, 3 kinds of Cylon ships, Cylon boarders) but it seems like you're all working together more against these threats.  Perhaps it's the fact that the roles (Political/Military/Pilot) make it clear that each person is most useful in one area (whereas in Shadows it feels like any character can do any quest, mostly).

Most of all, though, the fact that all players are actively involved in every skill check that happens gives Battlestar much more interaction - there's more opportunity to really sabotage, but more opportunity to be exposed, and the Brig offers a way to "hedge your bets" and contain someone you suspect to be a traitor.

I also really like the second round (Sleeper Agent phase) in Battlestar, where some players may discover they're a traitor after all.  This means nobody's past behavior can totally prove anything, and that in the first round nobody really wants to do TOO well as a human, lest they turn out Cylon and be hopelessly behind.

When Jeff declined to help us pass that skill check, was he really out of green cards?  Or is he a Cylon?  OR is he a human, but afraid he'll end up Cylon and lose to the humans?


Examples of steady play in Go games? I am looking for examples of professional Go games where one of the pros played solid, steady moves that were initially considered slow by the commentators, but eventually won him/her the game.

My objective is to try and better understand the role of reinforcement moves.

Thanks!

Michael Redmond, the only western nine-dan pro, is a player who plays in the style you describe. The result is that he has placed "high" in several tournaments but has never won one. He "outlasts" most players but inevitably falls to one with a "sharper" style. His games (and game commentaries) often serve as models for the kind of play you are looking for.Here is some Redmond commentary. And here are some of his games

It has been noted by a commenter that the computer program Alpha Go plays "slow" moves that maximizes the chances of winning, rather than maximizing the score.


MTG: Yorion, Sky Nomad played into Yorion, Sky Nomad I've been playing MTG Arena and played a game where my opponent played Yorion, Sky Nomad when another copy was already in game. If I'm correct, he chose to keep the copy which was already in the play to stay and blinked everything and the new copy.
How is this possible if the trigger is related to the copy entering the board and states that only other permanents can be blinked? Am I mistaken and did he exile the old copy? Also shouldn't blinking the old copy possibly result into infinite blinking as the copies would take turns entering the battlefield?
I'm generally very confused with this play and found nothing which would help me to understand in the rulings.

You're probably mistaken as to exactly what happened; with one Yorion (Y1) on the battlefield, the standard play here is

Play the second Yorion (Y2).
State based actions are checked, and their controller chooses one of the Yorions to remain. They choose Y1, and the legend rule moves Y2 to the graveyard.1
Y2 still entered the battlefield, so its trigger goes on the stack, and at some point resolves. This trigger can flicker Y1 as this is a trigger from Y2, and Y1 is a different permanent from Y2.
The controller of the Yorions chooses to flicker Y1 (and probably a bunch of other permanents as well).
At the beginning of their end step, another Yorion (Y3)2 and some other permanents enter the battlefield.
The ETB trigger for Y3 is put on the stack. This trigger cannot flicker Y3, so no infinite loop can occur, but it can flicker all the other permanents, including the ones which have just entered the battlefield. This trigger resolves, and Y3 stays on the battlefield for the opponent's turn.
At the beginning of the opponent's end step, all the permanents flickered with Y3's trigger enter the battlefield.

To create an infinite flicker loop with Yorion, you need a second, differently named permanent; Charming Prince is probably the most common card in standard for this as of December 2020.
Notes:
1. The legend rule doesn't exile - it instead just moves all but one copy of the legendary permanent to the graveyard.
2. While this Yorion is represented by the same card as Y1, it is a different object. This probably doesn't matter very much here.


Gloomhaven: Does it count as me landing the killing blow if a monster dies to my retaliate? Related to Does it count as me landing the killing blow if a monster dies to a Wound that I inflicted?, will a character get credit (for Personal Quests/Battle Goals) for killing a monster if the monster dies due to retaliate damage inflicted by that character?

I would say yes based on the fact I have seen retaliate being a persistent bonus (rulebook p25).  In this case at least, using the retaliate actively takes something away from your character.

Contrarily, in the case of the wound, the status affect has already been applied and nothing is taken away from your character when it harms.

Tangentially, I also think the wound ruling is to prevent the complexity of trying to keep track of who did what wound (as far as I've seen not accounted for in the game; you'd need to either markup tokens, keep paper track, etc.).  Retaliate it's obvious since it's reactive.


Are the card backs identical for Once Upon a Time 2nd and 3rd editions? I was just about to order Once Upon a Time with the extra blank cards pack, when I found out that a third edition of the game had just been released.

Are the card backs the same, so I can mix third-edition Once Upon a Time with the second-edition blank cards pack? I can't seem to find a third-edition blank cards pack.

I can't answer your question directly, but I'm going to guess they're different, based on the redesign information. However, it may not matter. This looks like the 3rd edition blanks pack you're looking for. The release date is October 2012, the same as the 3rd edition release.


Recasting Azor's Gateway after it has been returned to my hand Take the following situation:

I have had Azor's Gateway in play and have exiled 4 cards with it. My opponent returns Azor's Gateway to my hand, and the next turn I recast it.

Will I be able to transform Azor's Gateway when I use it's ability one more time (making the total amount of cards exiled 5), or will the counter reset because Azor's Gateway will be a different 'object' after I've recast it?

In my opinion it would be the latter, but I haven't been able to find conclusive references to a situation like this in the rulebooks.

It will have to start again.

The exiled cards previously associated with Azor's Gateway are no longer associated with any object that still exists, so they're just normal exiled cards now.

The relevant rule is the following:

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

None of the exceptions apply. Also, this rule is related:

  406.6. An object may have one ability printed on it that causes one or more cards to be exiled, and another ability that refers either to “the exiled cards” or to cards “exiled with [this object].” These abilities are linked: the second refers only to cards that have been exiled due to the first. See rule 607, “Linked Abilities.”

So Azor's Gateway can only track the cards exiled by its own ability (not the ability of "some other" Azor's Gateway).

There are a number of ways Magic cards have been written to get around this. For example, Caller of the Untamed cares about cards that have been exiled by cards with a certain name, rather than its own object. Mairsil, the Pretender looks at exiled cards that have a certain type of counter on them.


Does Legacy's Super-human Durability and Fortitude interact? Superhuman Durability reads:

  Whenever Legacy would be dealt 5 or more damage from a single source, reduce that damage by 3.

Fortitude reads :

  Reduce damage dealt to Legacy by 1.

The unofficial FAQ mentions that:

  Further, “Triggered effects” from cards (e.g. “when this card is destroyed”, “whenever this card takes damage”, etc.) are processed immediately upon the fulfillment of the trigger condition.

There seems to be a hotly debated issue, on the Greater Than Games forum, and I cannot seem to find a link to an official response. The rules offer no clarity on the matter.

What is the official way to handle these cards interactions? (I.e. If Legacy is targeted for 5 damage, does he take 4 damage because Fortitude reduction happens first, or does he take 2 damage because Superhuman Duribility applies first? Does it matter which card came out first, if Fortitude is considered triggered, etc.?)

The order is up to you.
Under the original rules.
If you play under the original rules, resolution happens in order of whichever card was played first.
Under Conflict Resolution in the standard rules, it states:

Over the course of a game, there are situations in which multiple effects would occur simultaneously or have competing effects.  In all situations, card effects that happen simultaneously occur in the order in which the cards enter play.

The "oldest takes effect first" rule is consistently applied to resolve other simultaneous conflicts, even when they are on the same card.  For example, in the clarifications to La Capitan's "Split Across Time" ability in the advanced rules:

La Capitan’s “Split Across Time” side has an ability which reads “whenever la capitan would be dealt damage, move a card from under this card to the appropriate trash. If you do, prevent that damage”. Her advanced rules on this side say “the first time La Capitan would be dealt damage each round, redirect that damage to the non-villain target with the highest hp”. Which effect should trigger first?
Because of the order in which the abilities are written on the card, La Capitan would prevent damage by removing cards from beneath her until she could no longer do that, then use the damage redirection ability.

Thus, if Fortitude was played first, damage to Legacy would be reduced by 1 before Super-Human Durability takes effect.
But, if you don't like that, then you pick the order.
The whole "conflict resolution" section was designed to keep the game moving smoothly.  In some certain cases - and Superhuman Durability versus Fortitude is explicitly called out - resolving in order can make the game more complex or less fun.  Since the whole intent of the rules is to ensure players are having fun, players are allowed to resolve ambiguous situations as they deem fit.  So you can choose the order each effect is applied, as long as the cards are not "start of turn" or "end of turn" effects.
(Christopher is one of the developers of Sentinels, so that's about as official as you can get.)


Is there a standard name for the card game "Elevenses"? My mother taught me a simple single player card game called Elevenses when I was young. I'm wondering: does my card game have a standard name? I have not met many who have known of the game.

You start with a suit 3x3 grid of playing cards from the top of a shuffled deck. The aim is to get rid of the cards in the deck by placing them over 2 cards on the grid that equal eleven when added together. The player can also place cards over three face cards on the grid. This must be done at least once and an odd number of times, otherwise you will be left with one card in the deck at the end.

Ace has the value of 1, and face cards have the value of 10.

The name is Elevens from wiki:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elevens


Proper Punishment for Parrot Perdition, in Pirate's Cove We were playing the Days of Wonder game Pirate's Cove earlier this evening; it's a lot of fun but the rules aren't exactly watertight, and more than once I felt there was considerable ambiguity in how they should be interpreted. Here's one that I remember:

One of our pirates was fortunate enough to draw a Parrot as his starting card. Within the first couple of turns, though, our ships came into conflict. Being a hater of birds, I opened fire on his parrot and shot it clean off the mizzenmast instead of concentrating on sinking the shap. Losing one's parrot is obviously worth a humiliating -2 Fame. But if you had 0 Fame when you lost it, do you go to -2 or stay at 0? The scoring track is circular so it was easy enough to represent a negative score, but was this correct?

There is, unfortunately, no official ruling.  You can attempt to get one by contacting Days of Wonder directly: Question Submission Form.  However, as it's a popular question and no answer has appeared for some time, I wouldn't hold my breath.

As with any rules dispute, I highly suggest the group agree on a strategy for resolution beforehand (for all games).  My group usually does not like to halt the action, so we take a quick vote, go with the majority (or flip a coin on a tie), and then look it up later.

As for my personal opinion, Pirates Cove makes no distinction between Fame and Notoriety, so when even bad press is good press, the concept of being 'less than a nobody' doesn't make much sense.  All the pirates start out as absolute nobodies, and there's no where else to go but up.

A better defense than theme is that many games which take into account the possibility of going negative will often give an in-game way of tracking that, such as a -1 token, card (e.g. dominion's curse cards), or to start the players out with some points to lose.  Since this game did none of those and there are not explicit negative numbers on the fame track, the evidence points towards no negative fame.


Is there an equivalent of Deep Blue in the Go world? Deep Blue was a chess-playing computer developed by IBM. On May 11, 1997, the machine won a six-game match by two wins to one with three draws against world champion Garry Kasparov. Kasparov accused IBM of cheating and demanded a rematch, but IBM refused and dismantled Deep Blue. Kasparov had beaten a previous version of Deep Blue in 1996.

Is there an equivalent program that challenged and won the top Go masters (on the standard sized board)?

Is there a specific research project like this in progress?

AlphaGo

Now there is AlphaGo by Deep Mind, a company recently bought by Google playing currently a match against 9p Lee Sedol. It is the Deep Blue of Go.

EDIT: The final result of the match of five games was AlphaGo 4 – Lee Sedol 1. This confirms the former conjecture: AlphaGo is the Deep Blue of Go.


Revoke in duplicate bridge I revoked on trick 11 and the trick was played out. On trick 12 I was second to play and the revoke was pointed out. I was told to correct the revoke and we would sort it out at the end. I won the last trick.
I know we did not proceed correctly but should I have been penalised?

The penalty for an established revoke, as this was, is one trick plus return of the revoke trick itself if you won that. So you would properly have forfeited the 13th trick, plus possibly the 11th trick under the condition above.

There is also a provision for the Director to assess an additional penalty if required to restore equity. It is unlikely that such a circumstance could arise on the 11th trick.


In player v player combat, can a player resume attacking after I have passed? The ranged/siege attack phase and the melee attack phases end when both players have passed "in succession."  Does this mean that, after passing, one could choose to act, such as in Bridge? i.e. A attacks, B attacks, A passes, B attacks, A attacks.

pg. 10, Ranged and Siege Attacks, #6

  After resolving the attack, the other player gets his chance to be
  the attacker, and the Ranged and Siege Attack phase continues
  with both players alternating the roles of attacker and blocker.
  If both players pass on attacking in succession, the phase ends.

This is worded in a slightly confusing manner because of:

  both players alternating the roles of attacker and blocker

as opposed to

  If both players pass on attacking in succession, the phase ends.

These seem to be at odds with each other. However, the latter wording is more definitive because it specifies the conditions that need to be met for the phase to end: both players must pass in succession. The wording before it must then be an oversight.

That said, the usefulness of this is questionable. The only reason I can see to want multiple attacks is to "waste" your opponent's "big block" cards, which are fairly rare, while stacking attacks has a number of benefits (only suffering "rounding down" effects once, having a choice of targeting units, etc).

tl;dr

Yes, you can attack using separate attacks as long as you want.


Can Ward Slivers protection be responded to? So I was playing against someone sniping my creatures. I cast Ward Sliver and name protection from a colour. They said that because Ward Sliver says "as it comes into play" the effect is an ETB (Enters the Battlefield trigger) and can be responded to while it's on the stack, sniping Ward Sliver before it has protection. Is this true?

Your friend is incorrect.  The "magic words" for a triggered ability, which an ETB is a subset of, are "When", "Whenever" and "At."  Triggered abilities use the stack and can be responded to.

  603.1. Triggered abilities have a trigger condition and an effect. They are written as "[Trigger condition], [effect]," and begin with the word "when," "whenever," or "at." They can also be expressed as "[When/Whenever/At] [trigger event], [effect]."

"As X enters play" indicates what is known as a replacement effect.  It changes the standard rules for what happens when the spell resolves.  (In addition to it becoming a creature permanent as per standard rules, you also choose a color.)  Such an effect does not use the stack.

  614.1c Effects that read “[This permanent] enters the battlefield with . . . ,” “As [this permanent] enters the battlefield . . . ,” or “[This permanent] enters the battlefield as . . . “ are replacement effects.


Can You Buy a Catan Border That Fits? "The border of the 4th edition Settlers of Catan is too small for the board hexes.  To be exact, each hexagonal tile is about 79 mm wide.  Five of them, end to end, form the longest stretch of land requiring 395 mm of width within the shore tiles. And now, the distance between the shore tiles? About 393 mm. Yup, 2 mm short."  http://www.tinysci.com/2010/07/04/the-settlers-of-catan-something-completely-different/

Lots of custom boards out there because of this problem.

Is there an inexpensive commercially-available border that actually fits?

Get a crafty friend to cut a set of interlocking tiles for you.

http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:6681

Or print a set of border pieces.

http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:6436


When can an Ætherling use its blinking ability? If an Ætherling blocks something that could kill it, can it then use its blinking ability before it takes damage? I can't stop it with anything as it blocks and leaves with no damage.

  U: Exile Ætherling. Return it to the battlefield under its owner's control at the beginning of the next end step.
  U: Ætherling can't be blocked this turn.
  1: Ætherling gets +1/-1 until end of turn.
  1: Ætherling gets -1/+1 until end of turn.

As long as it is on the battlefield, Ætherling can use any of his abilities at any time when you have priority, unless another effect prohibits it.

  116.1b A player may activate an activated ability any time he or she has priority

I suggest you read the relevant comprehensive rules, here, if you want to fully understand priority, but I'll provide two examples to make it easy.

Your opponent has priority. He casts Doom Blade on your Ætherling.
You get priority. You respond by using Ætherling's first ability.
Your opponent gets priority. He does nothing.
You get priority. You do nothing. Ætherling's ability resolves and he goes into exile.
Your opponent gets priority. He does nothing.
You get priority. You do nothing. Doom Blade goes to resolve and is countered by game rules for not having a legal target.

As you may have noticed, every time both you and your opponent "do nothing", the top of the stack resolves. Let's looks at another example, in which you actually lose your Ætherling.

There is a Pithing Needle in play with Ætherling as the named card.
Your opponent has priority. He casts Doom Blade on your Ætherling.
You get priority. You want to activate Ætherling's first ability, but you can't because of Pithing Needle, so you do nothing.
Your opponent get's priority. He does nothing. Doom Blade resolves, and Ætherling is destroyed.

In order to avoid games that take hours, players generally do not step through these phases. You are allowed to take shortcuts as long as your opponent agrees, but you are never obligated to do so. You may always ask your opponent to step through the official phases, and you should when it matters.

Finally, it is worth mentioning that the Ætherling that comes back to the field is not the same Ætherling that went into exile. It may be represented by the same card, but anytime an object changes zones, it becomes a new object. Ætherling will lose all memory of who it was in a previous visit to the battlefield.


Can you cancel specific hits? When you cancel a hit, can you distinguish between the the original cause of the hit?

The shadow card Black Breath says that it triggers "if your Leader re-roll scores at least one hit".

In the scenario that the shadow player scores some number of hits on the Combat Roll and exactly one hit on the Leader Reroll, and the Free Peoples player has an effect that can negate a hit, can the Free Peoples player choose to negate specifically the hit of the Leader Reroll in order to prevent Black Breath from activating?  Or are hits no longer distinguishable from each other by the point in which they can be negated?

According to Board Games Geek cancelling a hit "simply means that one less casualty is inflicted". In the context of your question that would mean that you cannot prevent Black Breath from activation this way.


Dominion rule clarification: Repeater actions + choice actions When using a "repeating" action, such as Throne room, with a "choice" action, such as Pawn or Nobles, can you make a different choice on each repeated action?

For example, Throne Room states:

  Choose an action from your hand, play it twice.

Nobles states:

  Choose one: +3 cards, +2 actions

After playing these two cards, can you make the choice to get +3 cards from the first play of Nobles, and +2 actions from the second play of Nobles triggered by Throne Room?

Also, if you may choose each time, what order are these actions resolved? Would I gain 3 cards, then the second Nobles choice is made, or are both Nobles actions simultaneous, so both choices have to be made before the first can be resolved?

I read this as follows:

"Play it twice" applied to Pawn means:

Play Pawn and then
Play Pawn again

I.e. there are two subsequent plays of pawn, which implies

You can make different choices during each play
Benefits you gain during the first play are available during the second play


In Puerto Rico when using the "residence" how is "occupied island spaces" interpreted? When playing Puerto Rico and using the residence building it states that it is based on the number of "occupied island spaces".

Does this mean plantation spaces with a farm and a colonist? Or does this mean plantation space with or without a colonist?

It means just a plantation, no colonists are required.
From the rules:

Residence The owner of the occupied residence earns, at game end,
additional victory points for the plantations and quarries he has
placed on his island. For up to nine filled island spaces, he earns 4
VP, for ten filled island spaces, he earns 5 VP, for eleven filled
island spaces, he earns 6 VP, and for all twelve spaces filled, he
earns 7 VP.
Example: at game end, the owner of the occupied residence
has filled 10 of his 12 island spaces with plantations and quarries:
he earns an additional 5 VP.

No requirement for colonists.


Three player mahjong: flower as dora We didn't have a fourth player for some time so we switched from riichi to three player version with korean\japanese rules as described on Wiki (I guess that's the most popular version for 3 players).

Used to doras in riichi we played with one revealed dora. But I didn't find there what do do if a flower tile is revealed as dora.

Shuffling whole set again in this case seems too much so we decided that every flower sholds add one more bonus point. Is this right or is there some other commonly used rule?

I commonly flip over the next tile. (following the procedure in HK-style where if a player draws a flower, it is revealed and a replacement tile drawn)


Where does mana come from? So I am reading the rulebook of magic the gathering. I haven't played it but I am curious about the game. In the rule book, I didn't see how much mana you start off with. For example Naga Vitalist.

If you have one forest land card on the field can you summon her? My understanding was that you had to have 2 land cards on the field since she requires two mana. Do you start off with a certain number and type of mana in your mana pool? How much mana does a land produce and how is that determined?

Mana is an abstract resource produced by abilities and spell[1], though most commonly by the intrinsic activated abilities of basic lands (e.g. Forest).

  305.6. The basic land types are Plains, Island, Swamp, Mountain, and Forest. [...] A land with a basic land type has the intrinsic ability “{T}: Add [mana symbol],” even if the text box doesn’t actually contain that text or the object has no text box. For Plains, [mana symbol] is {W}; for Islands, {U}; for Swamps, {B}; for Mountains, {R}; and for Forests, {G}. [...]

This means that every Forest has an ability that produces one green mana at the cost of tapping the Forest.

I say "green mana" instead of just "mana" because mana comes in each of the five colors, and it can also be colorless.

Naga Vitalist's mana cost consists of 1 green mana and 1 generic mana. The generic mana cost can be met by paying mana of any color or colorless mana. So, to be able to cast Naga Vitalist, you will need to produce this much mana (e.g. by using the intrinsic abilities of two Forest).

"Mana pool" refers to the mana you have produced but not yet used. It empties at the end of each step and phase, so you can't carry mana you produce on in turn into the next (for example).

You can read more about it here.

  In the rule book I didn't see how much mana you start off with.

You do not start with any mana, or even any means to obtain mana. You will need to play lands first.

  My understanding was that you had to have 2 land cards on the field since she requires two mana.

Basically, yes, though they need to be untapped.

  Do you start off with a certain number and type of mana in your mana pool?

No. In fact, it's constantly being emptied. Mana basically need to be produced immediately when needed.

  How much mana does a land produce and how is that determined?

Each basic land produces one colored mana (white for Plains, blue for Islands, green for Forest, red for Mountains, black for Swamps) by tapping it.

For example, Naga Vitalist's ability produces mana.


Shouldn't Mana be a Copied Attribute? One of the new Kaldheim cards, Blessing of Frost, has the text:

Distribute X +1/+1 counters among any number of creatures you control, where X is the amount of {S} spent to cast this spell. Then draw a card for each creature you control with power 4 or greater.

and a ruling of:

If Blessing of Frost is copied, no mana was spent to cast the copy, so no +1/+1 counters will be distributed. You may still draw cards if your creatures are large enough.

But rule 706.10 says:

A copy of a spell or ability copies both the characteristics of the spell or ability and all decisions made for it, including modes, targets, the value of X, and additional or alternative costs. ... If an effect of the copy refers to objects used to pay its costs, it uses the objects used to pay the costs of the original spell or ability.

So why doesn't the snow mana of the original spell count for the copied spell?
(I know the spell and the rules both refer to X, but I'm not concerned about the X of the rules, mostly why the cost of the original spell can't be considered for the resolution of the copied spell)

When they say "the value of X" in rule 706.10, they mean specifically the value of a mana cost of X, the way it appears in, say, Hurricane. This X is an inherent part of a spell on the stack; as you cast a spell with X in its mana cost, you choose X at the same time you would for instance choose to pay for kickers and other alternate / optional additional costs, and the X is included in the converted mana cost as long as the spell is on the stack. As such, that value will be copied if the spell is copied.
However, the X in your Blessing is just another way of writing "Distribute a number of +1/+1 counters among creatures you control, equal to the amount of snow mana used to pay for this particular spell." And if you copy a Blessing, no snow mana was used to pay for the copied spell. That X isn't part of the spell itself. It is only part of the effect that happens when the spell resolves.


Do physical implementations of single player board games have any advantages over their electronic counterparts? While multiplayer board games can give you the enjoyment of hanging out with your friends and family, and all the social benefits you reap from those kinds of interactions face to face, instead of being in front of a computer screen...

What benefits does a physical implementation of a board game offer a solo player, that cannot be better implemented in software? (Is there something that software cannot implement better?)

For all those single player game enthusiast, what reason would you play a physical version of a solitaire game, if a computer implementation existed?

(Note: Please no "It doesn't require batteries" comments)

A lot of this really applies to all games, not just single-player ones.

Computer versions have limited interfaces: small screen, limited controls.

This is the biggest reason for me. It's pretty much impossible, with current technology, for a computer game to provide a comfortable view of a table-sized board and components, or for it to make it really easy to grab a small object out of that landscape. It's a bit of an extreme example, but take a game like Arkham Horror (which can be played solo in various ways). Imagine dealing with that on a computer screen, even a huge one. (There's actually a Vassal module for it - the interface definitely could be improved a lot, but it still gives you an idea of the issues faced.)

Physical versions are more intuitive and satisfying.

Even when things are of a size that's possible to fit on a screen, I usually find that "physical interfaces" much more comfortable. There's just something about physically seeing and moving objects, and having at least a little bit of a third dimension to them, that makes it a lot easier on my mind. I'm often frustrated by a feeling that things are somehow trapped in two dimensions on a screen.

Physical games are easier to customize.

If there's for whatever reason an issue with a game, it's a lot easier to fix it by drawing on a card or adding some more tokens if it's a physical game, or just changing the rules in a way that a computer version might not let you.

Board games have been optimized as board games.

There's a bit of a circular nature to the question. These games were designed to be physical, trying to take advantage of everything there is to offer in the format, and to minimize disadvantages. Electronic games are a different format, and hypothetical optimal games in that format (even confining ourselves to a similar category, turn-based things, and so on) will not end up being the same games.

I'm not trying to suggest that these reasons always justify choosing a physical game - there are a lot of things computers can do that physical games can't (e.g. instantly shuffle an enormous deck) - but that seems to be outside the scope of the question.


Diplomacy Attacking a Territory as they move If I convince Turkey, to move Army Bul to Gre, would I be able to send Army Ser to Bul and take the area?

Full image

Short answer: Yes.

Longer answer: you can enter an area that is left by another unit. But there are some conditions.

If unit leaving the space succeeds in moving out:

if there are no other units that are ordered to enter the space, you succeed in entering it.
if there are other units ordered to enter the space, the strongest (with the most support) succeeds in entering the space, if there is a tie, nobody enters.

If the unit leaving the space fails to move out:

if there are no other units that are ordered to enter the space, you only succeed if you are stronger that the defending unit.
if there are other units ordered to enter the space, but no unit is stronger than the defending unit, the unit stays.
if there are other units ordered to enter the space, and there is at least one unit stronger than the defending unit, the strongest unit enters. In case of a tie, the defending unit stays.

Just note that you only keep the supply center, if you occupy it during the fall phase.

And on the diplomatic level, if you trick another player like this, be prepared for revenge. So backstab wisely.

Each move has a strength. If moves conflict with other moves, the strongest move wins. In case of a tie, nothing changes.

An empty space has a strength of 0
A single defending unit has a strength of 1
A single moving unit has a strength of 1
Each unhindered support adds 1 to the strength.


Procession and Throne room interaction What happens when I play Procession and use Throne Room as an action card affected by Procession?

Let me give you an example. I have a hand of:

Procession
Throne room
Bridge
Village
Silver

I play Throne room within Procession and then:

Do I play only one action card in Throne room, e.g. Bridge, and it is played 4 times (Throne room played twice, both with Bridge inside) or
Do I play two action cards in Throne room, e.g. I use Bridge in first play of Throne room and then Bridge is used and when I play Throne room for the second time I have to use Village (my only action card left)?

In other words: does Procession treat an action card in Throne room as one card (as we usually do when we play Throne room) or not?

The Procession rules state:

  If you Procession a Procession, you will play one Action twice, trash
  it, gain an Action card costing more, then play another Action twice,
  trash it, gain an Action card costing more, then trash the Procession
  and gain an Action costing more than it.

There is no reason to assume that Throne Rooming a Procession would behave any differently: they both allow you to "play an Action card from your hand twice".

So your second scenario is correct: you would play two different action cards twice, not one action card four times over.


Do mines pay out at the end of the last phase in Castles of Burgundy? For Mines, the rules state:

  ...at the end of each phase, the player recieves 1 Silverling from the supply for each mine in his estate.

And in the Game End section:

  The game ends after the fifth phase has been played through to completion.

My reading of these rules are that after the final round of phase E players would receive 1 Silverling for each mine they have and then the final scores would be counted.  So effectively you'd get an extra point for each mine you have at the end of the game.

Is this correct, incorrect or something ambiguous where you could just agree on the interpretation before the start of the game.

Your reading is right - you do get 1 Silverling (effectively 1 point) per mine at the end of phase E. If you want evidence beyond the rules you quoted, check out the reminder icon on the board that says "A-E":


Is there a way to quantify the effects of luck versus skill in rubber bridge? Duplicate bridge was created to "eliminate" the luck factor. That is partnerships are compared only against other partnerships playing the same cards.

Rubber bridge is a different animal. Here, "luck of the draw" is clearly a major factor in the result, at least until you get to a "law of large numbers" point where the luck factors cancel out.

Suppose there are two partnerships, A and B, playing ONE rubber. From their play at duplicate, we "know" that partnership A plays one trick better than the other. Clearly partnership A would have better than a 50-50 chance at rubber as well. But how much better?

Is there any computer software, statistical formula, or mathematical algorithm that could estimate the relative chances of partnerships A and B winning the rubber?

As Eric Murray famously said in the case of Crown vs St. Clair Bridge Club:

  "The game [rubber bridge] is only one of luck when played as the
  justices of the Ontario Superior Court play it in closed chambers."

That is of course the same Eric Murray of the Canadian partnership Murray & Kehela that was widely ranked the third best in the world during the 1960's and early 1970's.

Ironically, the luck element reduces as the overall quality of the players improves, yet increases in importance because the qualitative differences between the various players is reduced even more.

This question is difficult to address because of the above point. However, consider this advice to the budding "play for money" bridge player:

  Choose Chicago against players who are a little bit weaker than you;
  but choose Rubber against players a lot weaker than you.

The reason is that when your skill advantage is small, you want lots of points in play, so that the luck evens out faster. When your skill advantage is larger, you want more opportunity for the opponent to make foolish decisions. A typical rubber-bridge strategy is to sit on a part-score and collect penalties for several hands before converting the game. Then repeat. even if the opponents get "lucky" and win the rubber, they will often have lost much more in penalties than the rubber bonus was worth.


Are you allowed to play a 5 of a kind in Exploding Kittens to add an Exploding Kitten to your hand? My friend discarded 5 different cards to add a card from the discard pile to his hand, but he chose the Exploding Kitten. Is that allowed, and what happens to it after?

In the rules,

  Five Different Cards

  If you play 5 different cards (any 5 cards with different titles), go
  through the Discard Pile to take any single card you’d like. (Grab the
  Pile quickly to choose your card so that you don’t get “Noped!”)

So you could probably grab an exploding kitten. But why should you:

  Exploding Kitten 4 Cards

  You must show this card immediately. Unless you have a Defuse Card,
  you’re dead. Discard all of your cards, including the Exploding
  Kitten.

So two things can happen:

You have a defuse card. Use it and put the kitten back in the game.
You don't have a defuse card, you are out of the game.

The second option is a creative way to leave the game early. The first is possible a valid option if there is only one player left and you know for sure your defuse card was the last in the game and all attack and skip cards are gone. So by putting the kitten on top of the stack, you force him to draw and explode resulting in a win for you.


Taking, searching, and managing card decks After reading various sections on Eldritch Horror's deck management, namely the sections on Searching, on Gaining Possessions and Conditions, and on Discarding, I've tried to sum up some aspects of deck management.

Spells and Conditions (the 2 sided cards) never have a discard pile. Cards returned to them are shuffled right back in, while other deck types reshuffle their discard piles once the deck runs out. This is likely to keep the possible multiple outcomes of spells/conditions as varied and unpredictable as possible.
Random cards are drawn from the top of single-sided card decks and from the bottom of 2-sided card decks. If a repeat (such as for a condition/spell card) is found, the drawing continues and, once finished, this "temporary" discard pile (i.e. the cards passed to find a valid card) is shuffled right back in. This approach is done to minimize the possibility of having to shuffle.
Searching for a specific card or a kind of card (i.e. Madness) is done from the bottom of the deck and always followed by shuffling, but discard piles in the 1-sided decks are not shuffled back in. I don't know what rationale there would be for searching through the double sided cards from the bottom up as it seems marginally faster to search top to bottom.

Are there any other obvious or helpful guidelines and rationale to managing the decks?

I have split all conditions into small sections (delimited by foam in my box).  So, when I draw a madness, I pick from the madness deck. This makes the game move slightly faster as there are less draws to get what you need/must.

This could lead to some card counting. The trick there is to shuffle the desk each time it is used. You could also shuffle the desk for someone else and they give you a number, say X. You then pick the bottom/top X card to give them. Yet another alternative, as Joey suggested is to have a masking card at the top of the deck, maybe showing what type of card you have?


If I rebound Seasons Past what happens? Narset Transcendent can give any sorcery or instant rebound.

Seasons Past says "put on bottom of owners library".

What happens if I rebound Seasons Past and then cast it?

If you give Seasons Past rebound it will still be placed on the bottom of your library. It will not be exiled and thus can not be cast during your next upkeep.

The rule for rebound says (emphasis mine):

  702.87a Rebound appears on some instants and sorceries. It represents a static ability that functions while the spell is on the stack and may create a delayed triggered ability. “Rebound” means “If this spell was cast from your hand, instead of putting it into your graveyard as it resolves, exile it and, at the beginning of your next upkeep, you may cast this card from exile without paying its mana cost.

"Instead of" creates replacement effect that exiles the card in place of it going to the graveyard. Since Seasons Past is never put into the graveyard that event won't be replaced.


In a chain, if a card will be banished : can I still activate its effects? So here's the situation: my opponent has a Vendread Chimera with the following effect (thanks to houndhorde): "Once per turn (Quick Effect): You can target 1 Spell/Trap your opponent controls; banish it".

2 cases :

I activate Switcheroroo (trap card), and as a quick effect, he banishes it with Chimera. Does the switcheroroo effect still happens?
He banishes my switcheroroo (face down) as a quick effect. Can I activate it as a response?

He says the effect of a card doesn't resolve if it is banished in a chain, and he also says I can't activate cards that are going to be banished.
I think exactly the opposite for both cases since it doesn't negate.

The effects of Switcheroroo still happen. There is no negation on Houndhorde. It's like chaining Twister to a trap for example. Trap still goes off.
You can chain your trap to that. He declares he's going to banish > You chain Switcheroroo > Card gets banished > Switcheroroo effect goes off in the chain. The only time this is different is when the card specifically states the card it's targeting (or any card) can't be chained. I can't find an example but I know some cards do state this.

For that last statement, you're absolutely correct. Banishing is just banishing. If it doesn't say it negates, it's not going to be negated.


Blackjack: If you're insured, and bust, do you collect on the insurance? In Blackjack, if the dealer's initial draw reveals an Ace, players are allowed to "insure" against a dealer having a natural blackjack.

If the dealer turns out to have a natural blackjack, the player collects a 2:1 payout on the insurance - so that you don't wind up losing your bet!

Here's the specific scenario I'd like to understand: Imagine that you're a blackjack player who has $1,000 in chips:

You bet $200 (so you have $800 left).
Cards are dealt, dealer shows an Ace.
You buy insurance (cost: $200; you now have $600 in-hand).
You hit, and your hand busts: you've gone over 21.
Dealer reveals their hand, it's a natural blackjack.

Which of the following outcomes would apply?

Outcome A: You don't collect your insurance, because you busted. You have $600 in-hand.
Outcome B: You collect insurance, even though they busted. You now have $1,000 in-hand.

Option B, but not for the reason you think.

You have made two errors:

When you take insurance, you may insure only up to half of your original bet, turning what would ordinarily be a loss into a push at 2:1. In this case, if your wager was $200, you could insure for up to $100.
Once insurance is "closed," the dealer checks to see whether he or she has a natural 21. If he or she does, it is revealed immediately, your insurance is paid out, and all other players lose[*]. If he or she does not, insurance is collected, and the hand proceeds normally. In no case would you still have an insurance payout pending and get to hit.

[*]= Barring those who had naturals themselves, who either took the option for "even money" before insurance had closed, or will now "push" against the dealer's 21.

So, in this case:

You bet $200 ($800 left)
You take insurance of $100 ($700 left)
The dealer shows a natural 21. You lose your $200 bet, but your insurance bet pays out 2 to 1 -- your initial $100, plus $200, for a total of $300 back to you.
You have $1000, same as you had before this hand.


Discarding to go out Can I throw out my discard, and then lay down my hand?
Or am I then supposed to wait until the next turn to lay it down?
If I do lay down after I discard is that cheating?
My Stepdad throwed his discard and then laid down his hand. He had a fit when I told him he couldn't do that since that it is cheating. Am I right?
I know that in any card game I played you must lay down your hand before discarding, but I can not find anything on this anywhere.

This sounds more like a question of sportsmanship and the play-style of people you choose to play with rather than an actual rules question.
Yes, discarding is the last thing you do on your turn; when you make a meld you do so during your turn before discarding your card.
However, as long as the next player has not taken a turn, or provided any additional information, there is no reason to not allow a player to still play their meld.
It is unclear from your question why your opponent did not lay down the meld first. In Phase 10 there is never a reason to hold onto a meld that you could play instead. So is it that he didn’t notice that he didn’t have the meld until just after he discarded? Or he didn’t understand that melding should happen before discarding? Or was it just his style of laying down all his cards to lay down the discard right before the meld; just messing around? In any of these cases, I and the people I play games with would consider it poor sportsmanship to tell the person that they cannot play their meld because technically the discard card hit the table before the meld cards did. What matters is that they all happened on the same turn.
This could be different in other similar games where there is sometimes a reason to not play a meld when you can. In that case a person could choose to not play a meld, but then change their mind at last second after they discard a card; perhaps because something in their opponent's face told them that the card they chose to discard means that this turn was their last chance to meld. But in Phase 10, laying down your meld as soon as you have the required cards is an automatic decision; there is no skill or strategy in deciding when to meld.


Initiating combat in Eclipse According to the rulebook combat will take place if ships that belong to two or more players finish in the same hex.

Does combat always have to take place? Is there no rule that allows ships to pass each other without fighting? What if you are in a diplomatic relationship with another player?

Combat will always take place. If you are in a diplomatic relationship with another player, that relationship is broken the moment one player enters a hex occupied by the other player. This is covered on p11 of the rules:

  Your Diplomatic relations  stay in
  effect until the end of the game, unless you attack  one of the
  players you have Diplomatic relations with, or  they attack you.
  Moving your Ships to a hex where the other player has a disc or a Ship
  is also considered an attack. Both players then return the Ambassador
  Tiles and cubes  to the owner. The cube goes back to a Population
  Track,  chosen freely by the owner

There is no possible way to pass through a player's hex without any combat, because of pinning. p14 says:

  If your Ships move into a hex, or out from a hex, containing  other
  players’ or Ancient Ships, at least one Ship per each  opposing Ship
  must stay (the Ship is said to be "pinned")  and engage in combat in
  the Combat Phase

So the only way you can move a ship through another player's hex is if you already have 1 ship in that hex per opponent's ship in that hex.


If a spell is countered, do on cast effects still get triggered? If I cast a spell that has an "on cast" effect, does the effect still trigger even if the spell is countered? For example, if I play Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger and it gets countered by a counter spell, do I still get to exile 2 target permanents?

Yes. A player doesn't have a chance to cast a counterspell until after you have finished "casting" your spell, and any "when cast" triggers are triggered and put on the stack. At that point, a player could counter your spell, but the triggered ability is still there as a completely separate thing.

  601.2. To cast a spell is to take it from where it is (usually the hand), put it on the stack, and pay its costs, so that it will eventually resolve and have its effect.

  112.7a Once activated or triggered, an ability exists on the stack independently of its source. Destruction or removal of the source after that time won’t affect the ability.


Are newer editions of Carcasonne compatible with older expansions? If I have the new edition of Carcasonne with the river and abbot mini expansion, are all the old expansions still going to be compatible?

Mostly I'm looking for a compatible expansion that will add a 6th player and am wondering if Carcassonne Expansion 1 - Inns & Cathedrals  will satisfy that. Surely this doesn't come with a 6th abbot piece for example (and I'm assuming different tile art as well?)

Looking at the New Edition FAQ I would guess that there is no sixth player abbot piece nor expansions with the new artwork.

According to the FAQ you linked, the tile backs are compatible. If you want to restrict yourself to the new art style just to make it look pretty, you certainly can, but you'll be limited to any expansions that get (re)printed with the new style in the future. So if you want expansions now, you pretty much have to ignore the art difference.

Among the older expansions, Inns & Cathedrals is the expansion that actually adds the sixth player's basic meeples, so it's the only expansion that will really satisfy that need. True, it doesn't come with an abbot piece, but you can find a placeholder. (You could also omit the abbots entirely when playing with six players; people have been playing just fine without them for a long time!)

Some other expansions are then compatible with Inns & Cathedrals. For example Traders & Builders adds builder tokens and pigs, and they come in all six colors. Plenty of other expansions don't add anything player-specific at all, so they'll be fine as well. (I won't try to list them all right now; you can look at a list.)

All that said, Carcassonne isn't exactly the best six-player game. You can end up with a lot of downtime between your turns unless everyone plays quickly. Each player also doesn't get to play very many tiles, which means they don't place very many meeples, they don't score very many times, and can't be very efficient.

The base game including the river is 84 tiles; if you get say Inns & Cathedrals (18 tiles) and Traders & Builders (24 tiles) you're up to 126, giving each player 21 tiles to play. Even if you play a meeple on every single tile the game will be 1/3 over before you get them all down. If you want to complete your cities, you'll probably be stuck making a lot of small ones. And it feels pretty random; with five other players taking a turn before you get to go again, you have very little control over the things you start to build. Rare tile shapes are basically impossible to get. (Good luck with the four-sided city tiles!)

If you really want to play Carcassonne with six players and still have a serious game, I'd suggest playing with people who are familiar with the game and can play pretty quickly, and buying a lot more extra tiles. That might mean multiple copies of one of the large expansions or even the base game; you'd be buying them for the tiles, not for the extra mechanics.


Can all players change roles with "New Assigment"? In Pandemic On The Brink, the wording for the "New Assignment" special event card says:

  Any player (including the current player) may discard their current Role card and select a new one from the unused ones in the box.

Our reading of this card is that all players may chose to change their role cards when this card is played. Is this correct?

Only one player can change their role. The game's designer Tom Lehmann answered this in a thread on BGG:

  Matt's and my intent is that any one player may change their role.


Did every booster of Unglued contain basic land? So says wiki

On the other hand unglued basics are listed as "Common" (implying shared sheet with other commons) on Gatherer, official product information.

Gatherer shows them as silver-bordered, but they appear black-boredred on actual photos.

Anyone has a definite source one way or the other?

(Unhinged/Unstable black bordered lands which were definitely on a separate sheet)

Every pack of Unglued should contain a basic land, barring any collation issues.

After fourth edition all large sets used a separate sheet for basic lands, but small sets still had their lands printed on the common sheet (why use extra sheets when you have 110-121 slots to fill?).

While the sheet distribution for Unglued isn't known, at 94 cards it definitely falls into the small set category, and most likely only had two print sheets.


Can I choose to sacrifice from Remorseless Punishment if I have Sigarda, Host of Herons in game? If I have Sigarda, Host of Herons in play, whose rule text says.

  Spells and abilities your opponents control can't cause you to sacrifice permanents.

And my opponent plays Remorseless Punishment:

  Target opponent loses 5 life unless that player discards two cards or sacrifices a creature or planeswalker. Repeat this process once.

Can I choose to sacrifice my creatures, avoiding this effect due to Sigarda, or am I forced to choose another option?

You cannot sacrifice a creature to avoid losing life to Remorseless Punishment's ability. You can still discard cards instead.

One of the rulings on Sigarda, Host of Herons says

  If a spell or ability an opponent controls instructs you to perform an action unless you sacrifice a permanent (as Ogre Marauder does), you can’t choose to sacrifice a permanent. You must perform the action. On the other hand, if a spell or ability an opponent controls instructs you to sacrifice a permanent unless you perform an action (as Killing Wave does), you can choose whether or not to perform the action. If you don’t perform the action, nothing happens, since you can’t sacrifice any permanents.


Thematic relevance of credits when icebreaking I find Android: Netrunner to be one of the most thematically rich games I've ever played. The role of credits is obvious in many of the interactions and mechanics; in the game, much like in real life, everything costs money. One major use for credits, however, I find thematically elusive: the runner spends credits to strengthen their icebreaker programs and break subroutines. Much of the core action in the game, running on servers, comes down to whether the runner has made enough money and can afford to turn it into a successful run. How does this use for money make sense, in-world?

Imagine a team of criminals planning to rob a bank. They need money to:

Buy and maintain equipment
Conduct dummy runs
Bribe corrupt police officers to get information or turn a blind eye
Upgrade the getaway vehicle
Pay for fuel/food/cool hideouts etc.

In my mind, similar espionage costs apply to the runner. Let's take the icebreaker Yog.0 as an example, which has the fluff text:

  The Yog.0 database is a crowdsourced compilation of sniffed, spoofed, and logged passkeys. If the key to the gate is in the database, you're in. If it's not, change the gate!

Pumping up the strength represents that the gate you've come too is causing trouble and you need to 'emergency crowdsource' a key (read as 'pay some shady guy to give you the key for this gate'), or similar workarounds.


Landfall, land creature enter effect If I have a creature like Embodiment of Fury and I play a land and use its landfall effect on the land that just entered will it trigger entry effects, for example Elemental Bond?

Is it seen as entering as a land then turning into a creature or is it seen as entering as a creature?

The land enters as a land, and only later turns into a creature. This is because Embodiment of Fury's effect is a triggered ability, so the ability has to go on the stack after the land enters, and only later when the ability resolves (perhaps much later, if the players feel like responding to it) does the land become a creature. If instead you controlled e.g. a static ability which said something like "All lands are also 3/3 creatures", the land would enter as a creature and trigger effects like Elemental Bond.


Does Containment Priest exile Dryad Arbor? Containment Priest has this effect:

If a nontoken creature would enter the battlefield and it wasn't cast, exile it instead.

Dryad Arbor is a Land Creature — Forest Dryad. If I play Dryad Arbor as my land for the turn does it get exiled by Containment Priest?
A strict reading of the rules indicate "yes", but it's very weird (since playing a land is apparently a special action that cannot be responded to) so I'd like to check.

You can't cast a land, only play it:

Cast
To take a card from where it is (usually the hand), put it on the stack, and pay its costs, so that it will eventually resolve and have its effect. See rule 601, “Casting Spells.”

601.1a Some effects still refer to “playing” a card. “Playing a card” means playing that card as a land or casting that card as a spell, whichever is appropriate.

305.1. A player who has priority may play a land card from their hand during a main phase of their turn when the stack is empty. Playing a land is a special action; it doesn’t use the stack (see rule 116). Rather, the player simply puts the land onto the battlefield. Since the land doesn’t go on the stack, it is never a spell, and players can’t respond to it with instants or activated abilities.

That means Dryad Arbor isn't cast, and Containment Priest's ability will exile it.

since playing a land is apparently a special action that cannot be responded to

That's right, but the rules talk about a situation when an opponent would like to cast/activate something that would resolve before the land enters the battlefield. Aether Flash would trigger for Dryad Arbor too.


Diplomacy question involving a convoy An army is being convoyed, with a force of 2, into a coastal region where there is an opposing fleet.
The opposing fleet(moving) is attempting to dislodge the convoy, with a force of 2.
The convoying fleet is supported adequately so that it is not dislodged.
Do the units bounce or does the army land successfully?

If the convoy is not dislodged, the army can use it as long as it has enough strength to enter the area.