Solitaire game where you deal four up, four down What is the name of this solitaire game I learned when I was a kid?

You lay out 52 cards (1 deck), dealt four up, four down.

You get 8 piles:

on the left, four face-up (arranged so you can see all of them).
on the right, face downward except for the top card on each which is face-up.

This makes 7 cards per pile on the left and 6 per pile on the right.
To play, you stack cards on top of each other according to suit, in descending order (like jack of diamonds on queen of diamonds).
You move any cards on top along with the card you're placing on a higher one of the same suit.
Kings can go into empty spaces and aces go in a row above the cards you dealt out.
You must turn up all the face-down cards and you win if you get all 4 suits from ace to king in the piles above.

I have been searching the internet and nobody has mentioned a solitaire game laid out like this.

The game you are looking for is a mixture between the classic solitaire games Scorpion  and Yukon.

I've looked through over 700 games in both SolSuite Solitaire and Pretty Good Solitaire and I came really close to finding your game in a variation called Geoffrey (by Thomas Warfield) in Goodsol's game Pretty Good Solitaire. The only difference is that Geoffrey is played with the last 2 cards dealt face up (instead of just the last card) in the last 4 columns.

Geoffrey
https://www.goodsol.com/games/geoffrey.html

Info
 - 1 Deck.
 - Success rate - Medium (30%).
 - Mostly Skill.

Layout
 - 4 Foundation columns (on top) - Build up in suit from Ace to King.
 - 8 Tableau columns (below foundation) - Build down in suit.
 - No Stock

Object of the game
To create four suites of 13 cards each in an ascending suit sequence from Ace to King, by moving all the cards from the tableau to the foundation.

Tableau
 - 52 cards in eight columns.
 - At the start of the game 7 cards are dealt to the first 4 columns and 6 cards are dealt to the next 4 columns.
 - In the first 4 columns, all cards are dealt face up. In the next 4 columns the first 4 cards are dealt face down and last 2 cards are dealt face up.

Rules
 - Tableau columns must be built down in suit, e.g. a 10 of ♠ can only be played on a Jack of ♠.
 - Any face up card, no matter how deep it is in a column, may be moved to make a build. All covering cards are moved with it together as a unit.
 - When a face down card is uncovered, it is automatically turned face up and is available for play.
 - Nothing can be placed on an Ace. A King cannot move, except to an empty space.
 - Spaces can only be filled with a King or groups of cards headed by a King.
 - Foundation columns must be built up in suit from Ace to King.
 - The top card of each tableau column is available for play to the foundations.
 - The game is won if the entire deck in all four suites has been moved to the foundation.

Here are some other examples of similar games:

Scorpion from SolSuite Solitaire

ScorpionCell from SolSuite Solitaire

Scorpion
https://www.politaire.com/scorpion

Applegate
https://www.politaire.com/applegate

Scorpion Head
https://www.politaire.com/scorpionhead

Three Blind Mice
https://www.politaire.com/threeblindmice

Farmers Wife
https://www.politaire.com/farmerswife

Double Scorpion
https://www.politaire.com/doublescorpion

Russian Solitaire
https://www.politaire.com/russian


Graft illegal creature Does Graft's triggered ability use the stack?
What happens to the +1/+1 counter if the creature that graft was offloading to gets removed? Does it stay on the Graft permanent?

Example:

Llanowar Reborn is on the board. A player summons a Nyx-Fleece Ram, Llanowar Reborn Graft ability gets triggered and the player decides to move the +1/+1 counter to the Nyx-Fleece Ram. A rival player Dismembers the Nyx-Fleece Ram.

Can the rival player dismember in this case? (I assume so)
What happens to Llanowar Reborn's +1/+1 counter?

Yes, Graft is a regular triggered ability and can be responded to, for example by destroying the receiving creature before it gets the counter. If that happens, or the creature becomes unable to receive the counter for any other reason, the +1/+1 counter stays on the Graft permanent.
Graft is a triggered ability:

702.57a Graft represents both a static ability and a triggered ability. “Graft N” means “This permanent enters the battlefield with N +1/+1 counters on it” and “Whenever another creature enters the battlefield, if this permanent has a +1/+1 counter on it, you may move a +1/+1 counter from this permanent onto that creature.”
603.1. Triggered abilities have a trigger condition and an effect. They are written as “[When/Whenever/At] [trigger condition or event], [effect]. [Instructions (if any).]”

All triggered abilities (except triggered mana abilities) use the stack.

603.3. Once an ability has triggered, its controller puts it on the stack as an object that’s not a card the next time a player would receive priority. [..]

If the creature that is about to receive the counter dies or otherwise becomes unable to receive the counter, the counter stays where it is, on Llanowar Reborn in your case:

122.5. If an effect says to “move” a counter, it means to remove that counter from the object it’s currently on and put it onto a second object. If either of these actions isn’t possible, it’s not possible to move a counter, and no counter is removed from or put onto anything. This may occur if the first and second objects are the same object; if the first object doesn’t have the appropriate kind of counter on it; if the second object can’t have counters put onto it; or if either object is no longer in the correct zone.


Is a monster taking damage and a monster having its toughness reduced the same thing? This post I authored months ago questions the use of the term "toughness".  I recently found a reference in the Strange Remnants expansion that states:

  If the active Mystery requires an Epic Monster to be defeated, place two Health on the card. The Epic Monster's toughness is reduced by one for each Health on the active Mystery.

The act of placing health markers strongly implies to me that it is to be treated as if one did 2 damage on the monster, yet the wording here clearly states that the markers reduce the toughness of the monster and do not necessarily do damage.  This makes me question whether my original post regarding whether toughness was a measure of max or current HP was concluded incorrectly.  The only way it could be valid is if this treatment of Epic Monsters when advancing mysteries is explicitly different from the normal course of doing damage to monsters, which seems less likely, given that I haven't found any actual supporting documentation that clarifies that toughness is max HP.  Thoughts?

Reducing toughness is very different from dealing damage.
Toughness tells you how much damage can a monster withstand. From the Reference Guide, "Monster" (page 8)

When a Monster has lost Health equal to or greater than its
toughness, it is defeated.

Toughness almost never changes. Several monsters (mainly epic ones) have variable toughness. Barring that, advancing the mystery is the only effect that can reduce a monster toughness.
An official response from FFG (Nikki Valens) on this matter:

A Monster’s toughness is the printed value in the top-right corner on the token’s back (surrounded by green tentacles). A Monster’s toughness is unaffected by the amount of Health the Monster has lost.
In the case of advancing a Mystery that includes an Epic Monster, the Epic Monster’s toughness is reduced by a number equal to the number of Health tokens placed on the Mystery card. This effect specifically reduces the Epic Monster’s toughness; it does not cause the Epic Monster to lose Health. In this way, advancing the Mystery can bypass any restrictions the Mystery might have for harming the Epic Monster.


How many is "A bunch"? If someone has assembled the Deceiver Exarch/Splinter Twin combo, and they say "make a bunch of dudes and kill you", without telling me the number, what happens?

The problem with asking him is that this is a situation where the player is committing a minor rules violation — he's not proposing a proper shortcut — and he gets rewarded for doing that by getting free information: he knows that I'm interested in the number of Deceiver Exarchs that he's making

Is there a way to handle this situation without rewarding my opponent with free information?

There's not a lot you can do to screw over a player for being vague. Because the rules-provided answer is basically "Force them to be less vague."

Really what players are doing when they say they make "a bunch" of tokens is telling their opponent "Look, I have my combo. Gonna scoop now?" If you do anything other than scoop, of course they're gonna play more tightly — since now they're actually playing it out.

Get in the habit of always asking for clarification. Then you're not giving away any information about your own plan.

About the most "underhanded" things you can legitimately do are:

Ask really casually and hope they say something a little more definite.

  "So, that's what, a million damage heading my way?"
  "Yup."
  "After blockers, I'll Rakdos Charm."

I think most competitive players would call a judge on you and you'd end up in an annoying argument about who exactly said what when. You might also develop a reputation for pettiness of poor sportsmanship.
Ask someone to slow it down and show you the combo steps. As they do so, they'll probably announce a specific number as part of a shortcut. (This works better with Rakdos Charm than Batwing Brume, because you can do it while they execute the combo instead of having to wait for them to declare attackers.) This is a trick that may actually get you some wins against the more complex combo decks, when they just straight-up botch their combo.


How does Magic handle “Type – Subtype” lines that don’t fit on the card when translated? This question links to a Russian version of Peel from Reality which has “Мгновенное заклинание” as its type line—literally, “Instant spell” rather than just “Instant” (I assume there is some Russian grammatical reason why just “Мгновенное” would be unacceptable).

“Мгновенное заклинание” takes up far more horizontal space than “Instant,” which got me thinking—what does Wizards do when the translation of a type line takes up more room than the available space? I know some Magic cards have substantially longer English type lines than “Instant,” and several fill up very-nearly the entire available space (e.g. Theros’s “Legendary Enchantment Creature — God,” though I see the Russian version of that is “Легендарные Чары Существо — Бог” and fits in the available space—though it’s getting even closer to the limit there).

So, does Wizards of the Coast limit type lines based on translations? Or do they accept that some translations aren’t going to fit—and if so, what do they do then? Clearly, “Мгновенное заклинание” suggests that they haven’t found as-short-or-shorter translations for everything, so this is a possible concern (not that I expect them to print a “Tribal Instant — Arcane” or anything like it any time soon, which seems like the only way “Мгновенное заклинание” itself could run into trouble). Do we have any examples where it was a real concern?

Generally—they just make the font size in the type line really tiny.

Some good examples are the Titans from Theros Beyond Death, which are Legendary Creature — Elder Giant. I've included other Giants in that search result so you can see that they just shrank down the font size a lot on Kroxa and Uro. They did the same for Thryx, the blue legendary card in those results, who is an Elemental Giant.

Here's three white cards in Russian side by side so you can see how much the font size might vary:

(Also the vertical alignment varies too apparently, probably for lack of attention/care rather than for any good reason. Oof.)

That's not limited to Russian, either. Here's some German cards undergoing the same treatment, where the middle one doesn't need any font size adjustment:


Are number of cards in hand public knowledge? Are the number of cards in a players hand public knowledge? If a player requests to know the hand size of another player, does that player need to reveal the number of cards they have?

While there's no specific rule governing this in the rulebook, the board gaming community as a whole seems to agree that the number of cards in a player's hand is public knowledge.

There are a lot of forum threads that reiterate this answer on both BGG and Fantasy Flight Games (here, here, and here, for starters). The basic reasoning for this is because some alien powers require that information to be public, such as the Mutant and the Genius. (And, if I remember correctly, one of the alternative win conditions for one of the alien races is to have more cards than the other players.)

Additionally, in the last link above, forum member Adam notes that the online game allows you to check the number of cards in a player's hand, although I haven't played it so I can't confirm whether that's true.


In Uno H2O, what is the difference between these two cards? Today I was playing Uno H2O and I found these two cards, but I'm not sure what is the difference between these?
One looks like a Wild Draw 4, but it doesn't have the +4 on it, so I'm confused about its purpose.

Those are both wild cards, just from two different printings.

The one on the left is the original 2004 design, and other from the end of 2005.
Matel updated the design for printing UNO H20 Splash, seemingly to avoid confusion with the Draw 4.


How is Test of Faith resolved with multiple blockers? As an extension of this related question, how is Test of Faith resolved in a situation where this instant is cast on one of multiple blocking creatures assigned to a single attacking creature?

Let:

A = 8/8 attacker
B1 = 1/1 blocker assigned to A
B2 = another 1/1 blocker assigned to A

In this scenario, let us assume that:

the defending player declares both B1 and B2 to be blockers for A
B1 is the first blocker to receive damage from A
Test of Faith is cast on B1

Specific questions:

Is the defending player allowed to wait until the attacking player
has declared the order in which damage is assigned before playing
Test of Faith? (i.e. attacking player declares damage to be dealt to
B1 followed by B2 before defending player casts spell)
Given that A
would normally deal 1 damage to B1 with remaining damage to B2 (in
the absence of any instants or abilities), does Test of Faith
prevent 1 or 3 damage in this scenario?
Given that A has sufficient
power to destroy both B1 and B2 even with the damage prevention and
+1/+1 counters provided by Test of Faith, does A end up dealing more damage than initially
planned to finish off B1? Or does B1 survive?

Short version: yes, the defending player can cast Test of Faith after damage assignment order is chosen, and yes, the attacking player can send enough damage at B1 to kill it.

This is fairly easy to answer once you know how the declare blockers and combat damage steps work. (Remember the steps of combat: beginning of combat, declare attackers, declare blockers, combat damage, and end of combat.) Focusing on the relevant bits, we have:

declare blockers

the defending player assigns blockers
the attacking player announces damage assignment order
the active player gets priority (your chance to cast spells or activate abilities)

combat damage

the active player announces how combat damage from attacking creatures will be assigned
the blocking creatures assign their damage
damage is actually dealt

(This is pretty much all in the basic rules, but if you want gory details, see 509 and 510 in the comprehensive rules.)

So the answer to (1) is easy. Yes, the defending player can wait until after the order is assigned to cast Test of Faith - in fact they pretty much have to, unless they want to cast it before they even declare blockers.

The answer to (2) and (3) depends on what the attacking player decides, but if they're smart, they can kill both B1 and B2. They've already chosen the order back in the declare blockers step, but now they can choose the amount to assign to each creature in order. They have to assign at least lethal damage* (1 damage, since it's a 1/1) to B1 before going on to B2, but otherwise they can split it however they want - 8 and 0, 7 and 1, and so on. Presumably they'll decide to assign 7 to B1 and 1 to B2, so that B1 ends up as a 4/4 with 4 damage marked on it and dies, and B2 takes 1 damage and dies as well.

Note that this isn't really terribly specific to Test of Faith. All that really matters is that you can deal any amount of damage to B1, as long as it's at least 1 (lethal damage). No matter what the weird effect is (prevention, redirection, +1/+1 counters appearing...) you choose the amount of damage and can send the necessary amount at it, so you'll never get weird cases where B1 somehow survives even though you could've killed it, or where the damage assignment amounts somehow change outside your control. You do have to consciously make the right decision (deal 7 damage even though 1 is "lethal"), but beyond that, nothing really fancy happens.

* Lethal damage doesn't have to take into account abilities and effects that might change the amount of damage that ends up being dealt, so Test of Faith doesn't matter here - if they wanted B1 to live for some reason, they could deal it just 1 damage.


Can a creature be tapped to prevent its activated ability? Possible Duplicate:
  How do twitch effects work with the stack vs activated tap abilities?

If I have a creature with a tap to activate ability, can my opponent use an ability to tap it in response to my tapping it to prevent it from being activated?

No, this is not possible, for one of two reasons depending on the game state:

If you have priority, then you may choose to activate your creature's ability. If you do so, then everything involved in the activation of the ability (including the tapping of your creature to pay the ability's cost) happens immediately. Your opponent does not have any opportunity to interrupt this. Only after you are done activating your creature's ability does your opponent has a chance to play his tapping ability, but by that point your creature is already tapped, and tapping it won't have any effect.
If you do not have priority, then your opponent may choose to activate his tapping ability to tap your creature. However, in this case, the tapping is part of the effect of the ability, not the cost, so your creature does not become tapped right away. Your opponent's ability gets activated, goes on the stack, and then sits there for a while. You may choose to play abilities of your own in the meantime ("in response"), so for example you could use your own creature's ability before your opponent's ability resolves.

The process of activating an ability is described in rule 602.2, and the timing rules are described in rule 116. You may want to review those (although they're too long to quote here).


Does Deathtouch apply to damage dealt via Fall of the Hammer? Does Deathtouch (from my creature) apply if Fall of the Hammer is used on an enemy creature?

The rules say about deathtouch:

  The rule that causes creatures dealt damage by a source with deathtouch to be destroyed applies to any damage, not just combat damage.

Deathtouch does in fact apply when Fall of the Hammer is used. Fall specifically says that the first target creature deals the damage, and that means that this is treated just like any other instance of a creature dealing damage to another. Deathtouch applies; Lifelink applies; everything that applies to a creature dealing non-combat damage applies to this.


Bridge: Opening lead from AK - why K instead of A Many books, including Goren, recommend leading K from both a AK (or AKQ) and also a KQ.

Why an ambiguous lead like this? Why not A from AK and K from KQ?

Consider a trump contract. Partner leads K from a non-trump suit. I have a void in that suit. Do I ruff assuming it's from a KQ or do I discard assuming it's from a AK?

The reason that K is traditionally lead from AK is because there are two important circumstances where a different signal is requested from partner (rather than attitude). The Ace lead is reserved for these particular circumstances because it is very important that there be no ambiguity in these circumstances:

Notrump:
The Ace lead against notrump signals a nearly running suit headed by at least AK, such as AKJT53, and requests partner to unblock an honour if he has one, else to give count.

Suit:
The Ace lead indicates a desire to ruff, either in own hand or partner's, and requests a partner with length to show attitude and a partner with shortness to show count. This lead might be made from singleton A or doubleton Ace small, or from A empty fifth or sixth.

In the former case it should only be made by a defender without entries, because it is partner who must get in to generate the ruffing leads. In the latter case it must be made only by a partner with entries who can get in to eliminate declarer's tricks in the suit.

As partner of K opening lead in a suit contract:
 When partner leads the King against a suit contract, the guideline is to show attitude unless you have two or more touching honours, in which case you play the highest of the touching honours. For example:

Play your highest card from a small doubleton;
Play your lowest card without an honour in hand;
Play low with precisely Qx;
Play low with Jx, or Tx - unless dummy has come down with precisely Queen third and you desire an immediate ruff;
Play the Q from QJ doubleton or longer;
Play the J holding JT9 doubleton or longer;
Play the T holding T98 or longer;
Play your second highest card from Qxx or longer.

Thus the play of an honour from third hand in this situation always denies the next higher honour, and shows either shortness or the next lower card (and possibly another).

Partner will almost always be able to read your card in order to play sensibly at the second trick.

As partner of A opening lead in a suit contract:
Only encourage holding length with either the K or a quick trump winner with which to provide partner with his ruff. Otherwise discourage so that partner will switch to another suit before declarer's tricks get established.

There are other Signalling agreements besides these standard ones, but if these suffice for repeat World Champion Bob Hamman they are certainly sufficient for casual partnerships and beginning players.


How does fire on sidewalk spaces affect vehicles (outside of the building) When fire spreads to spaces outside of the building, how does this affect vehicle movements and usage?

Do vehicles extinguish fire as they drive over it?
Are vehicles unable to drive through fires (until they are extinguished). Pretty tough mechanism if so.
Do vehicles simply ignore the fire but firefighters on foot do not?

Fires spread outdoors and affect firemen/victims accordingly, but are removed at the end of the Advance Fire phase, so they shouldn't have any impact on vehicle movement.


What is this game that is about connecting streams? A few years back, my parents had this game about connecting streams, or rivers. The goal was to connect the streams which started at your side of the board to the other side, and deny the streams of your opponent (in some way, bit foggy). It most probably had a Japanese name, or Japanese sounding to us Europeans (so basically "an East Asian name").

Board
The board was like a small basin, with a large area surrounded by a tiny wall (or, better to say, the main area was slightly lower than the edges of the field), about a tile deep. On the part of the edge where players started there were tiny knobs, presumably meant as the sources of the streams. The main area in the center was shaped as a grid, so the tiles would not be able to move (too much).

Tiles
A tile is a rectangle of size 2x1 if we take the squares in the grid for measure. On each tile a stream is shown, having at least two ends "flowing" to the edges of the tile, but there were also tiles with more than two ends (where the stream could split). The tiles were coloured red, with the streams being white lines painted on them (and maybe slightly pressed in).

Gameplay
Two players play one tile per turn, alternating between the two players. The goal, as said before, is to connect your stream to the other side. Based on this, I presume one player plays horizontally and the other plays vertically on the board. Tiles can be laid down in any orientation, as long as it connects to at least one stream and does not block/abruptly end existing streams. First player to have some amount of knobs on the other side connected to, wins (I guess, may just be any amount of streams reaching the other side).

You possibly played Ta Yü.

It's one of many games that follow the "connect two sides"-pattern, more popular ones are Hex or Quoridor, versions can even be played on a Goban (Go board)

However, there are differences to your Description:

Players are starting in the middle of the board and try connecting to two opposite sides
The "streams" are apparently never colored red:


Does a Seeker of the Way affected by Arcbond deal one batch, or multiple sets, of damage? What follows is a question wrapped in a word problem.

Facing an opponent attacking with an undefined, yet non-lethal, number of 1/1 tokens, I block one of them with Seeker of the Way. Once I am able to cast a spell during the Declare Blockers step, I cast Arcbond targeting my Seeker of the Way. (Recognizing Process trigger and lifelink gained.) Combat damage happens.

One damage is dealt to Seeker of the Way, triggering the Arcbond. Seeker of the Way deals 1 damage to each other creature, and each player. Lifelink causes me to gain life for each point of damage dealt.

Now, for the purposes of accounting +1/+1 counters gained by a Ajani's Pridemate, is the damage dealt by Seeker of the Way one blot of damage to the all the creatures, or separate spats of damage done to each creature? Would the Ajani's Pridemate gain one counter, because I've gained life, or multiple counters, because I've gained life multiple times?

I would say that Ajani's Pridemate only gets 1 counter.

  702.15b Damage dealt by a source with lifelink causes that source’s controller, or its owner if it has no controller, to gain that much life (in addition to any other results that damage causes)

And for damage:

  119.4. Damage is processed in a three-part sequence.

    119.4a First, damage is dealt, as modified by replacement and prevention effects that interact with damage. (See rule 614, “Replacement Effects,” and rule 615, “Prevention Effects.”) Abilities that trigger when damage is dealt trigger now and wait to be put on the stack.

    119.4b Next, damage that’s been dealt is processed into its results, as modified by replacement effects that interact with those results (such as life loss or counters).

    119.4c Finally, the damage event occurs

In this case, there is a single source, and a single event of damage.  Yes, it's hitting multiple things, but it's only one event of damage.

Additionally, Gatherer says of Ajani's Pridemate:

  A creature with lifelink dealing combat damage is a single life-gaining event. For example, if two creatures you control with lifelink deal combat damage at the same time, Ajani’s Pridemate’s ability will trigger twice. However, if a single creature you control with lifelink deals combat damage to multiple creatures, players, and/or planeswalkers at the same time (perhaps because it has trample or was blocked by more than one creature), the ability will trigger only once.


Blast markers hitting multistorey buildings This has caused a large amount of discussion today and we couldn't find a suitable answer in the rule book. When a blast marker (not flamer template) hits a multistorey building, who gets hit? Is it everyone or is one level nominated. If possible, could you also provide a pointer to where the information is?

In previous versions of the rules, the blast would only hit the top floor. RAW in the current version blasts hit every floor. Many tournaments use 6th edition rules. For your local play group I would suggest picking one way and sticking with it, or at least deciding before the start of the game.


Lavinia, Azorius Renegade vs Kalia of the Vast and friends If Lavinia, Azorius Renegade is on the field, and Kaalia of the Vast attacks me, when Kalia's effect puts a creature onto the battlefield from the hand, is it countered by Lavinia's second effect? What happen in case of Mayael the Anima and Golos, Tireless Pilgrim?

Lavinia affects Golos's activated ability, but not Kaalia's ability or Mayael's.

Both Kaalia and Mayael put creatures onto the battlefield directly. They do not have you cast anything, so Lavinia's ability is never relevant.

Golos's activated ability, on the other hand, allows you to play cards without paying their mana costs. Rule 701.13b defines what exactly that means:

  To play a card means to play that card as a land or to cast that card as a spell, whichever is appropriate.

So, if you exile any nonland cards, you can cast them without paying their mana costs. This exactly what Lavinia is looking for, so her last ability will counter any spells cast this way.

Of course, if you exile lands with Golos, you can still play them as lands. In this case you are not casting anything so Lavinia's ability doesn't do anything.

Note that when casting spells without paying their mana costs, players can still pay any additional costs that may apply, and if they pay mana to do so Lavinia's ability will not counter the spell because some mana was spent on it.


What are the Pros and Cons of using cards from multiple different sets when drafting? My friends and I have never drafted before and are planning to try it in the next few weeks. However, one thing we're not sure of is whether its better to mix cards from different sets or just have them all from one set (We're actually just using random cards selected from my copies of the sets and not boosters, but I don't think that will make a difference for this question). Currently I'm planning on having the first 2 rounds be all M11 and M12 mixed together and the last round be Innistrad, but I don't have any reasoning for doing it that way and am curious what others think.

Are drafts normally done with boosters only from one set, or from different sets? Why are they done this way? If multiple different sets are used, should the packs from that each set be all used in one round or used one in each round (1 round of all Innistrad packs vs. at least 1 pack of Innistrad mixed in each round with whatever the other packs are)?

Normally drafts are restricted to a single block.

In sanctioned drafting (with sealed boosters), the distribution looks like this:

Core set, the first set of a block, or a "big third set" like Rise of the Eldrazi or Avacyn Restored: three boosters from the same set, e.g. M12 / M12 / M12.
The second set of a block: one booster from the new set, two from the first set (which is bigger), e.g. Dark Ascension / Innistrad / Innistrad.
The (small) third set of a block: one booster from the third set, one from the secondset, one from the first set, e.g. New Phyrexia / Mirrodin Beseiged / Scars of Mirrodin.

(Note that, before Scars block, the pack order was reversed.)

As you can see from the list above, the size of the potential card pool will vary. M12 / M12 / M12 has around 250 possible cards. NP / MB / SOM is closer to 600. Thar larger card pool is trickier for players to learn (folks who play regularly will learn it incrementally, as new sets are introduced). I've heard of triple small-set drafts (e.g. Worldwake or Eventide), but many players say that these have very stilted environments -- both because the card mix is to small and because they were never designed to be drafted stand-alone, so a lot of the card pool assumes you'll have cards from the other set to round out your deck.

The main advantage of staying within a block is that block themes provide players with a reference point for making draft choices. Stepping outside of a single block presents players with additional challenges in evaluating cards against the "metagame" of the total card pool. This may be desirable if you're specifically looking to force players to think on their feet in an unfamiliar situation, but novice drafters have enough to worry about without the extra complexity.

Generally, the cards in a block are all designed to work together (in draft more so than anywhere else, actually -- only some of the cards in each set are intended to be "Constructed-worthy"). When you stray from that structure, you risk watering down the archetypes built into a set / block. For example, M12 has a lot of bloodthirst creatures in it. Red and black, the two colors with the highest concentration of bloodthirst, have access to common-level "enablers" to make bloodthirst decks run smoother: Goblin Fireslinger and Tormented Soul. Mixing up M12 and M11 cards would make it more difficult to draft bloodthirst due to the lower probability of finding these cards (although you might be able to compensate with M11 cards like Lightning Bolt and Prodigal Pyromancer). It's not to say that you can't break up blocks, but ideally you should have a pretty good reason for doing so. In particular, watch for sets with "parastic" mechanics like Kamigawa's soulshift -- diluting the card pool with cards from another set will greatly weaken these cards, making for a wonky and unbalanced drafting environment.

As I said in this answer, I don't think absolute pack-for-pack correctness is super important in a DIY draft, because I don't like going into pack 2 knowing you're absolutely "cut off" from any more set 3 if you didn't draft them in pack 1.


How do Dominion tournaments compensate for the luck that's always present in the game? Dominion is definitely NOT a game of luck. I'd wager it's at least 90% strategy. But at the higher levels I'm sure the luck comes out as players get better at finding the best strategies available to them. In Bridge tournaments, pairs have to play the same hand and see who does better at it. Obviously in Dominion tournaments you'd have everyone play the same kingdom sets, but how do you compensate for bad shuffles? If there's a Mountebank/Witch/Treasury or any other awesome opening cost-5 card and no good opening cost-4 cards, any player who starts 5-2 is going to have a substantially better odds of winning already. Likewise if you have a lot of villages and terminal actions, but virtually never get them together, you're also at a substantial disadvantage.

How do Dominion tournaments compensate for this? Is it possible to play Dominion in a form where it's 98+% strategy and <2% luck, or is luck of the draw just an essential part of the game? How often does luck determine the winner of a game of Dominion?

I don't think Dominion is alone in being a game with a significant amount of luck.  Magic the Gathering has a massive amount of variance, but the pros rise to the top time and again, because they are experts at keeping the role that luck plays in their game down to the very minimum.  Even with that being the case, I'd say that if you win 75% of your Magic matches at a pro level, your skill level is pretty godlike.  If you can consistently win even 60% of the time, you're doing more than fine.

As such, I don't think that it's a sensible question "how can we keep luck in Dominion to being a <2% factor".  There's always going to be games of Dominion where you repeatedly draw exactly what you don't need and your opponent draws exactly what he does.  But if you don't let those games faze you, and just concentrate on outplaying your opponents, your win percentage should creep up comfortably above 50% as you become an expert at the finer point of the game.  And that's all it takes to be a great Dominion player.  Not 100% win rates against "lesser opponents" and the total elimination of luck, just the ability to maximise your game, whatever the game throws at you, and even though sometimes it won't be enough.


How can I balance mandatory quests in two-player games of Lords of Waterdeep? I am looking for a variant to balance out mandatory quests when playing 2 player. I understand that normally they are powerful, and exist as a catch up mechanic, allowing all players to target the leader.

This does not work in a two-player game.  In a three-player game when a mandatory quest is played, the biggest winner is the player not involved in the play. In a two-player game the biggest winner is the player playing the card.

What I find bad is not that mandatory quests are powerful, but how weak all the other Intrigue cards are.  Instead of getting a boost, they are mostly weakened.  Cards that get you agents and points get you less.  Cards that give things to opponents, make you give things to "all" opponents.

This seems to make the game much more luck-based, as drawing mandatory quests is just so much better than any other Intrigue card.  This is the aspect that I really dislike.

One solution might be to create a dummy player. This player would always do what the person playing the Intrigue card wants, giving agents or VP for instance. I would like to know if there are any other ways that would balance the cards out better.

First, I agree that Mandatory Quests can be a little unbalancing. I've never played 2-player, but I can see how they could be even worse in that case. I've seen a handful of alternatives, any of which may work for you and your opponent:

Don't use them. Remove them from the Intrigue deck beforehand, or discard and draw again if you draw one during the game.
Allow, but penalise, completing other quests while they're in play. Make them not mandatory. Allow the receiver of the Mandatory Quest to complete other quests, but any VP reward is reduced by, for instance, the VP reward of the Mandatory Quest, until they complete the Mandatory Quest to remove this penalty.
Allow other quests, but penalise taking time over the Mandatory Quest. Allow other quests to be completed, but at the end of every one of your turns when you have an incomplete Mandatory Quest in front of you, lose some VP. You could lose 1 VP the first turn, 2 the second and so on, tracking with VP chips if necessary (or think of a flat rate per turn - 2 VP maybe? - if you prefer). You could probably ignore a Mandatory Quest late in the game (when they're most annoying, in my experience), but early Mandatory Quests should be completed before they snowball.
Allow counters. You can reveal a Mandatory Quest from your hand to cancel out being given one. Both are discarded. This would reduce how often they're played, since you may keep one in your hand in defence.

Hopefully one of these suggestions will help you out, or inspire you to come up with your own solution that you feel is right!


Does Thassa, God of the Sea's "devotion to blue" clause count when it's not in play? The first Theros god card was unofficially spoiled today. Although it may change, it currently reads:

  Thassa, God of the Sea {2U}

  Legendary Enchantment Creature - God

  Indestructible

  As long as your devotion to blue is less than five, Thassa isn't a
  creature. (Each U in the mana costs of permanents you control adds to
  your devotion to blue.)

  At the beginning of your upkeep, scry 1.

  1U: Target creature you control can't be blocked this turn.

Looks pretty insane. Anyways, my question is would this clause only matter when Thassa is actually on the battlefield? For example if my "devotion to blue" is zero, can I still discard it to  Lotleth Troll or return it to my hand with  Corpse Hauler?

Based on the information you presented, it only functions on the battlefield. Even with no devotion to blue, it's a valid target for Lotleth Troll and Corpse Hauler.

The ability would only function outside of the battlefield if it was a characteristic-defining ability. For example, Ghostfire is colorless in all zones and even when deck building.

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

However, it fails to meet two of six1 criteria for a characteristic-defining ability.

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

(1) It defines a characteristic other than the object's colors, subtypes, power and toughness.
(5) It sets the characteristic only if certain conditions are met.

The sixth is that it must be a static ability.


How can I refer to specific hexes on a hex board? I have seen games using hex boards but none using systems to refer to specific hexes (like you can do in Chess with numbers and letters). Is there a standard way to refer to a specific hex without numbering each hex on the board? A bit like a system of coordinates but that would be fairly clear and user-friendly?

There is no standard way, but as it's a two-dimensional grid you can easily project a coordinate system on it.

You can either go in a 90° angle then every second row or column is offset for one half to the bottom or right.

Or you can go in a 60°/120° angle to have straight lines but that looks unusual (and depending on your starting point can easily go into the negatives).


In Scrabble, what happens if a player has to leave the game early? Earlier today, a group of us were playing Scrabble. One of us had to leave early due to something external. What happens to that player's tiles?

While there are no explicit rules in Scrabble to handle this, it's pretty straight forward to do this in Scrabble with minimal disruption.  I've done this on several occasions.

Leave any tiles on the board where they are.  Even if you could remember which tiles they played, you wouldn't want to.  Tiles that are played are essentially communal property, as any player can play off of them.  Also, removing played tiles from the board would be potentially disruptive to the next few plays, where leaving them has no ill side-effects.

As long as there are still tiles left in the bag, return their rack of tiles to the bag without looking at them.  The game is predicated around their being a particular set of tiles in circulation.  Taking these tiles permanently out of circulation is bad for anyone tracking tiles, and keeping them in circulation doesn't hurt.  (Note that due to a lost challenge, some of these tiles may have been revealed, but in that case, they've been revealed to all players, so there isn't really an advantage to any player.)

If there are no tiles left in the bag (it's endgame), keep their rack out of play and face down.  At this point, players are no longer drawing replacement tiles, and so suddenly introducing replacements would have a profound disruptive effect on whoever went next.  You may want to even do this if there are very few tiles left in the bag; that's up to the table.


What does Masquerade do when you have no cards in hand, library or discard? If you play the card Masquerade, and you have zero cards in hand, library and discard, what happens? I assume the person to your left will still have to pass a card along. Do you have to pass a card from play (potentially the Masquerade itself), or does the player to your left receive nothing, essentially reducing his or her deck by one card?

Out of interest, how did you reach the position of having zero cards in hand, library and discard?

Anyway, the answer is fairly simple, I think.  Consider the following section of the rules, qualifying the action of "draw 5 cards from your deck":

  If there still aren't enough cards to draw/reveal, he just
  draws/reveals what he can.

It seems clear that Dominion follows the same rules philosophy as, for instance, Magic the Gathering: if you cannot fully carry out an action, carry out as much of it as you can.

First, you try to draw 2 cards.  You can't, so instead you draw 0 cards.

Next, you try to pass a card left.  You can't, so you don't, though you probably do receive a card from your right.

Next, assuming that you were passed a card, you have the option to trash it.

Simple enough!


In Dungeon Fighter, what is the priority between death and activating an ability? I've got this question because I cannot find it in the rule book:

I roll the dice, I miss (so the monster attacks me), I die because of the miss, but the dice shows the "eye" (so for example I activate an ability that works even when the dice misses). In this case, the ability is activated before I die or I die before activating the ability?

Thank you in advance.

EDIT, right answer: the ability activates before dying when there is a "miss" with the dice.

Quick disclaimer, I've not played the game or even heard of it until I read the question.   However, I've watched a tutorial video and found the rules online here  to try and find the answer for you.

Look at the rules on page 9 for 'No Damage'  it says :-

  No damage: If activated, the hero takes no damage if he misses the target board.

This might infer that you get to activate this ability before taking damage.  However unhelpfully back on page 7 the rules say this :-

  Hint: The damage dealt while becoming defeated by a
  monster is not avoidable. No special powers can prevent that
  damage.

It would be really helpful to have that 'hint' on a page with all the abilities but it does seem to make it explicit that if a monster defeats you then you do not get to activate a special power, including those that are activated when a character misses.


Ticket to Ride house rule to help players with short destination tickets The game balance in Ticket to Ride (in my social not highly competitive environment) seems to favour the person with the longest destination tickets and getting short tickets is almost automatically a loss.

I have been wondering about game balance in Ticket to Ride and thought a good idea might be to allow a player to draw a new ticket after completing a mission and being allowed to throw it back if they don't want it.

Perhaps we play in too friendly a fashion and the person with small tickets should be more disruptive of long routes but what are people's thoughts on the game balance and this suggestion?

The goal in TTR is not "complete the cards you're given", it's "get the most points". There are plenty of ways to do this with short routes (e.g. by focusing on building only length 4+, not going for longest route, and picking the spots where everyone wants to go).

If no one in your group wants to adjust their play style to match the cards they're dealt, then you obviously don't want to play the game as intended. A rule change might be an outcome, but this perceived unfairness might be part of the process of getting to know the game mechanics.

  I (...) thought a good idea might be to allow a player to draw a new ticket after completing a mission

This rule comes with a drawback. You would have to show your completed routes, which is something you would normally do at the end of the game. I would not recommend this as it would upset yet another part of the game.


Can I place settlements on harbors in set-up? In Settlers of Catan, when you place your initial settlements, are you allowed to place them on harbors, or can you only place them on interior spots that have 3 land hexes adjacent?

From the rules:

  The starting player places a settlement on an open intersection of his
  choice. [From the setup instructions]

  Intersections are the points where 3 hexes meet.

  In order to control a harbor, you must build a settlement on a coastal intersection which borders the harbor.

Water hexes are hexes, so the points at which two land tiles and two water tile and the points at which of one land tile and two water tiles meet are intersections.

During the initial placement, you are allowed to place a settlement on any open intersection (as constrained by the proximity restrictions), so you are allowed to place on coastal intersections, so placing on a harbour is a legitimate placement for a settlement during setup.

This is supported by the official FAQ:

  Q: Settlements and Cities - May I build a settlement at a harbor during the set-up phase?

  A: Yes. This is not contradicted by the rules.

The upside of placing on a harbour is obtaining the harbour.

The downside of placing on a harbour is that you touch at least one fewer resources than you could by placing elsewhere. This means your potential for gaining resources will be lower, the variety of resources you can obtain will likely be lower, and you'll start with fewer resources (if the harbour was your second placement).


Does sliding/shifting have to happen in a straight line, or can it be curved? I've started playing Dungeons & Dragons Dungeon Command and had a question regarding sliding/shifting.

Does the sliding/shifting have to happen in a straight line? In one case, the other player slid two spaces forward then one space to the right. Is this okay?

The rules do not specify one way or the other.

Unless otherwise specified, movement does not have to be in a straight line. Special movement modes follow the rules for normal movement, except where they specifically differ.
Shift and slide don't specify any extra limitations on the direction of movement, so we follow the default movement rules. If we wanted to, we could slide a creature back and forth one square at a time!
From these rules, pages 9-11:

MOVING
A creature can move a number of squares up to its Speed, entering squares one at a time.
Each new square a creature enters must be adjacent to the last, including diagonally adjacent. However, a creature cannot move diagonally around the corner of a dungeon wall (see “Terrain and Movement” below).
A creature can always move fewer squares than specified by an action or effect (including special movement modes).

SPECIAL MOVEMENT
Some creatures have special forms of movement that affect how they interact with terrain and with other creatures. As well, effects from Order cards might grant special movement to creatures.
SHIFT: When a creature shifts, it ignores the requirement to stop when entering a square adjacent to an enemy creature. If it starts its movement adjacent to an enemy, it can move up to the number of squares stated by the effect (however, its Speed is still 1 for the purpose of effects that state “shift its Speed”). It is still affected by terrain while moving.
SLIDE: Order cards can let you slide other creatures. Sliding a creature lets you move it regardless of who controls that creature.
A sliding creature doesn’t have to stop when entering a square adjacent to or occupied by an enemy and can slide the full stated distance even if it starts adjacent to an enemy. It is still affected by terrain while moving.

Additionally, from the diagram on page 11, we see an example of a Copper Dragon using flying movement. The rules for flying don't explicitly specify that the flying creature can change direction after each square, because that's covered under the normal rules for movement.


First game board to use hexagonal tiles? Hex is likely the most famous early application, circa 1942.

The wiki for Sannin Shōgi, a modernization of three-player Shogi, puts the invention of that game circa 1930.

This article Games for Three lists Three-Handed Hexagonal Chess as first developed in 1912 by by Sigmund Wellisch.

Are there earlier applications of hexagonal gameboards?

Stern-Halma (aka "Chinese Checkers") is the earliest application I've found so far.  Although the board is not formally divided into hexagons, the center region allows 6 directions for movement from a single cell.  (This is allowed because the tokens are place in the intersections of triangles--triangles seem to have preceded hexagons for three-player variants of popular combinatorial games.)

One possible answer could be the game Agon (sometimes called "Queen's Guards" or "Royal Guards"). I ran across a reference to the game in the book "A world of chess: its development and variations through centuries and civilizations" (Cazaux, J., & Knowlton, R., 2017). They state the following:

  Perhaps the earliest recorded board game using hexagonal cells is Agon, a very original strategic Pawn game first published in 1842.

There were some claims that the game originated in the 18th century, but apparently the first published record of the game can be verified as 1842.

Cazaux, J., & Knowlton, R. (2017). A world of chess: its development and variations through centuries and civilizations. Jefferson, NC: McFarland & Company, Inc., .


If I fail to evade Dimensional Shambler, am I lost in time and space? Failing a combat check results in being lost in time and space, and this monster has no combat damage listed. If I fail to evade, that implies I suffer no damage nor do I become lost as it was not a combat check. Is that correct?

Failing an evade check results in exactly the same consequences as failing a combat check.  So if you fail an evade check to a dimensional shambler it results in you being lost in time and space.

The FAQ covers this for a different monster

  Q: If you fail an Evade check against The Beast (Mask
  monster), does that count as failing a Combat check and
  are you then devoured if you also fail the Horror check?

  A: Yes.


What game do these dice go to? I remember that these dice went to a specific game that we played growing up. (I was born in '75.) But that is all I can remember!

The dice appear to be from a game called Don't Bug Me, published in 1969/1970 by the Pacific Game Company (of California).

A look inside the box reveals a pair of dice with an identical bug on each die:

(Note that many other companies have released unrelated games under the same name too.)


Are you able to build a settlement from a separate ship? Let's say that I have a boat from island A, after a few turns I move boat to island B, now can I start a settlement on island B? Or do I have to make a full shipping line from Island A to Island B or can I just move one ship to island B and start a settlement?

I have read the Seafarers rules booklet, but I have not been able to find any information on this.

Boats are like roads with a few exceptions:

they must border at least on one side to water.
they require wood and sheep to build.
you can pivot the last ship in a row of ships (but it needs to stay connected).
they are affected by pirates

You can only change from road to ship (or ship to road) through a settlement (or city).

In order to build a settlement on an Island where you have no settlement yet, you need to build a row of ships starting from a settlement at the first island until you get to the second island. You can now continue building ships along the coast, or you can build a settlement. And if you are the first to build on an island, some scenario's reward you with an extra victorypoint.


Sedris and Nicol Bolas, the Ravager If I unearth Nicol Bolas, the Ravager thanks to Sedris, the Traitor King, then use Nicol Bolas's activated ability to exile it, does it return to the battlefield transformed?

Unearth seems to replace where it goes when it leaves the battlefield, but it's already going into exile.

Yes, Nicol Bolas will be exiled and return transformed. The Unearth effect does not apply to that event.

Sedris, the Traitor King has the following ruling:

  If a creature returned to the battlefield with unearth would leave the battlefield for any reason, it’s exiled instead — unless the spell or ability that’s causing the creature to leave the battlefield is actually trying to exile it! In that case, it succeeds at exiling it. If it later returns the creature card to the battlefield (as Oblivion Ring or Flickerwisp might, for example), the creature card will return to the battlefield as a new object with no relation to its previous existence. The unearth effect will no longer apply to it.

The exact definition of Unearth is in rule 702.83a:

  Unearth is an activated ability that functions while the card with unearth is in a graveyard. “Unearth [cost]” means “[Cost]: Return this card from your graveyard to the battlefield. It gains haste. Exile it at the beginning of the next end step. If it would leave the battlefield, exile it instead of putting it anywhere else. Activate this ability only any time you could cast a sorcery.”

It is not going "anywhere else", so the Unearth replacement effect does not apply.


Whom is a player bankrupt to if a Chance card tells him to pay $50 to each player and he can't pay? If a player draws the Chance card (US standard edition) that tells him "You have been elected Chairman of the Board. Pay each player $50", and his cash is insufficient (even after he sells hotels/houses and/or trade/mortgages properties), then whom is he bankrupt to? To whom must he hand over his remaining assets?

There are indeed no instructions in the official rules on how to resolve multiple payments. A common mechanism in game design to handle such cases is to pay your debts in turn order. You go bankrupt to the player who you cannot pay.

Example: turn order is Alice, Bob, Charlie, Daniel and Eve. It's Alice's turn and she is instructed to pay $50 to each player. Her entire liquid assets are $149. She pays $50 to Bob and Charlie, respectively, but since she's $1 short of paying the debt to Daniel, she goes immediately bankrupt and turns all her assets to Daniel. Eve gets nothing.

Turn order is clockwise, as indicated by the rules:

  THE PLAY... [...] After you have completed your play, the turn passes to the left.


Does Eclipse under-estimate the game length, or are we playing it incredibly slowly? On the box, Eclipse says a game takes 30 minutes per player. We've only played it three times - two-player each time - and our games have taken between two and three hours, rather than the one hour predicted.

I don't think we're particularly slow players (we both get frustrated by slow players in other games), so I was wondering how long other people found the game takes. Does it take proportionally less time with more players? Does it get quicker with practice? (If anything it's getting slower for us as we understand the game better and realise more the consequences of our choices!)

I think games companies often estimate the time based on players who know the game. My first few plays of a game will often run long compared to the estimated time on the box, but my tenth, fiftieth or hundredth play will often come in around the box estimate (or less).

Eclipse is a big game with lots of things to take account of (various technologies, balancing your empires, etc.). I'd expect your first five or ten plays to require extra thinking time while you get to grips with it.


Can you remove a 'Personal Workshop' 'Power Counter' during an encounter with ICE? Personal Workshop

  When your turn begins, remove 1 power counter from a hosted card.
  When there are no power counters left on a hosted card, install it, ignoring all costs.

  [Click]: Host a program or a piece of hardware from your grip on Personal Workshop and place power counters on it equal to its install cost.

  1 [credit]: Remove 1 power counter from a hosted card.

I am the Runner.
I have nothing but Personal Workshop installed.
I have 20 [credits].
I have 1 of each icebreaker hosted on Personal Workshop with a variable amount of power counters on them.
I start a run.
The Corp rezzes an ICE of type X.
I pay Y [credits] to remove all the remaining Y [power counters] from icebreaker Z.
Icebreaker Z is now installed per the last listed ability on Personal Workshop.

  1 [credit] : Remove 1 [power counter] from a hosted card.

I can continue my run, but now with the icebreaker I need installed.

Is this correct?

Yes, Personal Workshop allows you to install programs/hardware during a run. You have already paid the click to host them though, so all its really doing is allowing you to defer payment until they are needed.

This does allow you to install a Femme Fatale after the corp rezzes and Ice, targeting that Ice for the special bypass, and then bypass the Ice as you encounter it that turn. Or to install a parasite on an Ice after its rezzed, and then immediately lower its Strength to 0 so it gets trashed using Wyrm/Datasuckers when you encounter it.


What is this Old French Game board with 10x10 squares and dark and light circular pieces? I have this old 10x10 wooden game board with dark (black) and light (brown) circular pieces for a long time and am trying to find out a little bit about it.

The entire board with storage is approximately 14 X 17 3/4 inches. There are 18 white and 20 black pieces about 1 1/4 in diameter. The slide covers are marked

That appears to be a relatively nice double sided International draughts/Checkers board.

Without any further identifying information, it could have been produced anytime in the last 1-200 years, but based on its appearance, I'd estimate it was manufactured around the 1940s-1950s.

The markings indicate the board has a Breveté SGDG, which is a French patent, the Breveté SGDG system started in 1844 and ended in 1968, so that narrows the age down to a 120 year window.


Can I make a monster indestructible? Let's say I have a monster on the field. This is my best card, and I want to make it untouchable by anything.

An example would be a monster who's effect can't be negated, and is not affected by card effects, equipped with an equip card that means it cannot be destroyed by battle, and that card cannot be destroyed either.

Are there any scenarios that allow this possibility?

  Indestructible: Cannot be removed from the field by any means.

Based on what you describe, the card that comes to mind that better fits your needs is Safe Zone:

  Activate this card by targeting 1 face-up Attack Position monster on the field; that face-up monster cannot be targeted or destroyed by your opponent's card effects, or be destroyed by battle. It cannot attack your opponent directly. When this card leaves the field, destroy that monster. When that monster leaves the field, destroy this card.

emphasis mine

Of course, every card has it's trade-offs, and this one's are that you can't attack directly. Also, if Safe Zone is removed that monster is also removed (however, if you are talking about Divine Dragon Knight Felgrand, he can save himself from this destruction with his own effect).

Now, it seems that you have to protect your Safe Zone from being destroyed. One card that can do that is Imperial Custom:

  Face-up Continuous Trap Cards cannot be destroyed, except "Imperial Custom". You can control only 1 "Imperial Custom".

Another way you can make a monster card impervious to any other card is with the effect of Number 81: Superdreadnought Rail Cannon Super Dora:

  Once per turn, during either player's turn: You can detach 1 Xyz Material from this card, then target 1 face-up monster on the field; that target is unaffected by card effects, except for its own effects, until the end of this turn.

This will prevent basically any target, effect destruction, change of control, or other effects that do not target. Of course, if your opponent summons more muscle than your card's it can still go down by battle. I suppose that combining Safe Zone with Number 81's effect would really make it hard to touch.

Other, option you got similar to Number 81 is Divine Dragon Knight Felgrand, which does basically the same plus negating that monster's effect (which could come handy in other scenarios):

  Once per turn, during either player's turn: You can detach 1 Xyz Material from this card, then target 1 face-up monster on the field; this turn, its effects are negated, but it is unaffected by other card effects.


How do I Make this Backgammon-Spinoff more Level and Fair? I call it March-Fall Gammon, or M-F Gammon for short.  Played with regular backgammon board, chips, and dice.  Game consists of 2 parts: The March and The Fall.  Start with a clean board, roll, and then use your 2 die rolls to either put chips into your home quadrant, or to move chips across the board into the opponent's home quadrant.  Once all your chips are in the opponent's home quadrant, you can start bearing off.  Once you fully bear off, your Fall begins, where you do the same thing, starting from the Opponent's home quadrant, and working your way back to your own home quadrant to bear off there.  First one to do that wins.

There's a case where, if you start your Fall before your opponent starts theirs, you can place a single chip on the board and move it down as fast as possible and start hitting the opponent while or even before they are bearing off on their March.

If you hit them, they have to start that chip all the way back in their home quadrant.  If they hit you, you also have to start back in their home quadrant.

Basically, if one person is on their March while the other is on their Fall, they share the same restart quadrant, and are moving in the same direction.  Meaning, the penalty of being hit for the person on their March is far greater than the penalty for the person who has already started the Fall. And even if they do hit you back, you guys will be getting back out in the same place, so you have a potential to roll and hit them again just by the act of getting off the bar, and further, you can 'chase' them all the way back to your own home quadrant where they are still trying to bear off.

If there is too much of a buffer between the beginning of your Fall and theirs, it becomes super easy to destroy all their progress, while making considerable progress of your own.  At that point, it actually becomes a good strategy to leave your own chips open, if it means having a greater chance of hitting ANY of your opponent's chips, even if they are all the way at the other end of the board, because if they hit you back, you just break even, and if they don't, its all profit.

How could I change the rules, so that this pole-reversal doesn't supremely benefit the person currently in the lead?

Things I DON'T want to do:

Limit the movement of players on their Fall
End the game at the end of the March
Bear into your home quadrant and bear-off in the opponent's home quadrant each time, or vice-versa (I like that you move one way, then move back, sort of like a real war or crusade.)

The easiest rule change would be to disallow hits made in a home board. Extending a nuance from this rule, would be to disallow hits made in a home board

unless they come from a point on the outer board or
only if the piece is entering the opponent's home board or
unless the roll is a double, then one piece may be entered on the point and make the hit

This rule and nuances create a catch up mechanism whereby the player on their march is not trapped by the opponent's fall, and the fall itself is also slowed by the points on the home board being clogged by singles.

Taking any or all of those extra details will have varying effect on this stage of the game. Given the proportion of games that would arrive at this situation, a significant amount of simulation or playtesting would be needed to determine which nuance(s) most accurately transfer the advantage held before this situation to the equivalent advantage held after it.


Where I can buy good resources to build games? Where I can buy boards, cards, dice, fake money, figures, and any sort of pieces? It would be nice if the store sells on the internet.

Another good reason is to buy replacements for damaged or lost pieces.

Here's a list from BoardGameGeek:

Industry Sources

It should get you started on the path to finding everything you need.


Is there a way to search for which models I can play in which Warhammer army? Say I wanted to field an Inquisition army with Grey Knights and... Lets say Astropaths. I want to do that because I've read some of the lore, and I want a fluffy army, not strictly an optimised army.
Or maybe I found Vespid, and I want to know what army they are meant to be played with?
Is there a way to search for keywords by model name, or the reverse, all models that have a keyword?
This is important as keywords are how you determine which models can synergise in a detachment, with some exceptions.

You can visit the GW site like the answer above. To see rules and in which army you can play which unit you can also visit Wahapedia before investing in a Codex of the army to be sure it is what you like.
Next to that you have listbuilder apps. When choosing a army, you can choose every unit that can be in that army. Games Workshop recently launched their own, but most of it is paid. An alternative, free and established app is Battlescribe. It can be a little bit hard to set up if your not into computers, like some of my friends say. (it can be used for more games, so you have to establish a Database) But when ready its perfect for list building and seeing rules that belongs to the units chosen.


Ship Movement Question Axis and Allies 1940 Global (Rules 2.0) I have a question regarding the movement of ships. The explanation could get confusing so I will try to explain it clearly.

My ship, a cruiser, is attacked by an enemy fleet of destroyers moving from a naval port (total possible move of 3) during my opponent's turn.
Enemy ships all move two spaces to engage in combat.
During combat, my ship is destroyed.
After destroying my cruiser, my opponent wants to move the enemy fleet one more space into an adjacent sea zone containing 2 of my ships and initiate another combat phase during their turn.

Is my opponent allowed to do this move and then additional attack in one turn? If not, are they allowed to use their remaining move during their Non-Combat Movephase to move their ships into the seazone where my ships are?

Thanks for the help in advance. If you need more clarification please ask.

Here is a 2 part answer to your question:

From the Rules (http://www.axisandallies.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/Axis-Allies-Pacific-1940-Second-Edition.pdf):

  Move as many of your units into as many hostile territories and sea zones as
  you wish. You can move into a single hostile space from different spaces, as
  long as each moving unit can reach that space with a legal move.

I added in bold the important part. During your combat move, you can move into a single, hence only one hostile space. So no he cannot continue to move to a second hostile territory afterwards.

From the Non-combat move rules:

  In this phase, you can move any of your units that didn’t
  move in the Combat Move phase or participate in combat
  during your turn

Once again in bold, units that DIDN'T move can move in the non-combat phase.

Exception: I know that your question was about sea units, but tanks have a special "blitz" ability which allows them to continue moving after combat. Just look for the "blitz" ability in the units part of the rulebook.

Hope this answers your questions.


What´s the reasoning for carry and equip items in Munchkin? In Munchkin, what is the logic behind the rule of carry and equip items? What is the difference between carry and just keep the card in your hand? It is not simplier keep in hand and not use the carry rule?

You equip items so you can get their benefits.

But there are restrictions to what you can equip. You can't equip items for which you don't have the required free body slots (e.g. hand). You can't equip items for which you don't meet race and class requirements. You can't equip "use only once" items.

You keep items you can't equip in your hand to protect them from traps and thieves, and to hide what they are from other players.

But there are limits to one's hand size.

You carry items you can't equip and won't fit in your hand to avoid having to discard them, or worse, having to give them to another player through the charity rule.

Note that you might hold back from equipping an item in your hand if you think you might lose it (e.g. to a thief, especially one at level 1), but there's virtually no reason not to equip something you can equip if you're currently carrying it.


Unpreventable damage to Gideon, the Oathsworn Gideon, the Oathsworn has a +2 loyalty ability that reads:

  +2: Until end of turn, Gideon, the Oathsworn becomes a 5/5 white Soldier creature that's still a planeswalker. Prevent all damage that would be dealt to him this turn. (He can't attack if he was cast this turn.)

In the card rulings, it states:

  If damage that can’t be prevented is dealt to Gideon after his first loyalty ability has resolved, that damage will have all applicable results: specifically, the damage is marked on Gideon (since he’s a creature) and that damage causes that many loyalty counters to be removed from him (since he’s a planeswalker). Even though he’s also a creature, if Gideon has no loyalty counters on him, he’s put into his owner’s graveyard.

What is a scenario that could cause non-preventable damage after this ability has resolved, which states that it will "prevent all damage"?

Essentially, all cards that mention that "damage can't be prevented", though the sorceries will require additional cards to be cast during Gideon's owner's turn.

Those cards do what they say on the tin; damage can't be prevented, neither by activated abilities like Circle of Protection nor by static abilities like Gideon's.


Constantinopolis Taberna Building I have just completed playing Constantinopolis(BGG) for the first time and there is a rule that I think requires clarification. The Taberna utility building (Reseller) is used for purchasing goods of a type you already produce. The section of the rules quotes this as:

  The owner of this building can buy goods from the market that he can
  produce.

I read this as I can buy as many goods as I like in accordance with the limitations of the market.

However, the graphic on the building tile (Taberna below) shows a goods cube with a number 1 next to it.

I would associate this symbol meaning either that it can only be used for a single cube, a single cube of each type, or a single type. I can't find any specific clarifications though. Does anyone know the correct rule?

According to this BGG post you were correct in your initial interpretation and the "one" is a misprint:

  unfortunately it was a misprint on the Taberna tile. [...] The correct symbol is the one printed on the board, [...] you are not restricted, you can use [the Taberna] as many times as you wish.

So yes, the rules are correct. You can buy any goods that you would not otherwise be able to buy (because you can produce them), but within the limitations of the current market.


Can I attempt to get rid of my Cursed condition on the same reckoning phase that a Warlock inflicts me? The warlock monster can inflict the closest investigator with Cursed during the Reckoning Phase. Since conditions are handled after monsters during the reckoning phase, can I then roll to see if I can get rid of the Cursed condition during that Mythos phase, or do I have to wait until the next Mythos phase?

Page 10 of the Rulebook:

  Resolve these effects in the following order: Monsters, Ancient One sheet, Ongoing Mythos cards, and lastly investigator possessions and Conditions.

Would suggest that you can, however, in the Reference Guide it states:

  If a Monster is spawned or an investigator gains a component while investigators are resolving reckoning effects, they do not resolve the reckoning effect on that Monster or component.

Since cards are components, you cannot get rid of it on this turn.


Can a "hero" player voluntarily become a traitor? Can a player who is supposed to be a hero character become a traitor by their own will? For example: if the haunt doesn't specify any hidden traitors or others but  the hero character wants to help the monster any way is that allowed?

No, a hero cannot become a traitor unless the rules of the scenario cause him to become one.

Allowing that would be no different than allowing a traitor to simply declare "I am a hero". Now, technically a hero can help the traitor if he wants to in a number of ways; but if the traitor wins that player would still lose.


Do troublemakers prevent single problem faceoffs? I've been poring over the Comprehensive Rules v.2 for MLP:CCG and I cannot find anything in the rules that implies that troublemakers prevent single problem faceoffs.  It's in the base rules, but the rules for troublemakers have changed significantly enough that I don't know the answer to this question.

If I confront only one problem, and the opponent could confront the same problem except that they are blocked by my troublemaker: do I simply score the problem, or is there a faceoff?

The FAQ for the comp rules says that "troublemakers only prevent confronting the problem not faceoffs", which seems to contradict the basic CN rulebook.

In the comprehensive rules, rule 611.4 says

  As a player confronts a Problem, that player scores a point. If an opponent also meets their confront requirements for that Problem (611.3), there will be a Problem Faceoff at that Problem.

And rule 611.3e says

  A player can’t confront a Problem if there is an opposing face-up Troublemaker or a face-up Troublemaker with Villain at that Problem.

611.4's reference back to 611.3 implies that there would be no faceoff (in accordance with the basic rules, whew), as the same confront requirements (611.3e) are needed unless there is a double problem faceoff.


smash up? run out of cards Recently I was playing ninja-mages deck. After I gained 14 points my deck run out of cards.
What should I do when I can't draw cards anymore? (because my deck is empty)

This is covered on page 4 of the rules.

  If you need to draw or reveal a card and your
  deck is empty, shuffle your discard pile. Put it on
  the table face down—that’s your new deck. Start
  drawing from there.

If you have no discard pile as well, that would be a very odd game!  I've never seen a game go anywhere near that situation though.


How many cards can I gain in a buy phase with a single buy? I was playing dominion this afternoon and I gained 4 cards during my buy phase with a single buy1, this was pretty impressive, however this got me wondering:  What is the theoretical limit to how many cards can be gained with a single buy?

Some ground rules to further clarify what I mean:

Only cards gained during the buy phase count.
As suggested by Joe W and GendoIkari only cards gained after you purchase something count.  (for example using loans to discard tunnels doesn't count as gaining)
You may only use one buy even if you have more.
We only count cards that are kept until the end of the turn. If a card is gained but trashed it does not count.
We care about only what is theoretically possible, not what is reasonable, so you can dictate:

What other players choose to do
Shuffling outcomes or any other source of randomness

But the result must still be possible, meaning that there must be some path through proper play that arrives at the turn and all moves in the turn must be legal.
You may choose to play with any number of players.
To keep the scope a little small I would also like to ignore black market.

Just thinking about this on my own I came up with a way to gain 75 cards now 141 cards in a single buy which I posted as an answer to get the ball rolling.  I had a lot of fun coming up with it but I'm sure someone who knows the newer sets can come up with something way better.

1: I bought border village, which allowed me to gain cache which gave be two additional coppers (which I ended up turning to silvers with my trader)

You can gain over 200 extra cards without using extra buys.  The limit to the number of buys will come from component limits rather than anything inherent in the game, the most important number being the number of each treasure card you play with (as there are at baseline only 136 cards to gain).  Ignoring that, the number of types of kingdom cards and the number of each kingdom card in play is also a substantial limitation as you can only pick a subset of the following abilities to use together in an actual game.

Mechanisms of gaining extra cards

There are four distinct ways to gain extra cards during the buy phase.

Extra buys.  This is the normal way, and so is not what we're considering here.  Via action chaining and action replication, the limit on extra buys you can get comes purely from component limits.
Action hacks.  The Innovation project lets you play an action card during your buy phase, and there are a bunch of actions that let you gain cards.
Triggered abilities that cause you to gain cards.
Free cards.  Treasure Chest gives you an extra card every buy phase.

All of this assumes arbitrary setup and that you are going to buy a King's Court for maximum action hacking.

Action Hacks (260 extra cards*)

Have the following in your hand:

9 King's Courts
10 Throne Rooms
9 Thieves
9 Beggars
9 Remakes
9 Develops

Now when you buy a King's Court, you use that to play an extensive tree of King's Courts and Throne Rooms, which will letting you then play a bunch of other action cards that will happen many times.  I believe the optimal way to play it is Throne Rooms first and King's Courts second, giving you ability to play 18 actions 3x each and 11 actions 2x each.

If we rig the game (let's say everyone is playing big money with massive decks) and it's 6 player, Thief will gain you five cards every time, so that's one of the one we want to use on the 3x actions.  Beggar gives the second most (3 cards per shot), so this is what we want to use the rest of the 3x actions on.  This is already 216 cards*.  We can then use the remaining 2x actions on Develop/Remake (2 cards per shot) for another 44 cards.

* This number may be lower in practice depending on how many coppers (and silver if you use Trader) are in the supply.

Triggered Abilities (100+ extra cards)

The cards in this category I know of that work with the action hack above are:

Haggler
Cache
Border Village
Death Cart
Market Square
Catacombs
Hunting Grounds
Skulk

(Hoard and Port aren't going to work because they only trigger off of buying a certain type of card.)

Taking component limits into account, we're only going to be able to use 10 of each of the triggered ability cards.  The cards listed above let you gain over 100 extra cards (given we have some way to trash cards during the buy phase).

Maximum without projects (50 extra cards)

Without using the Innovation project, the limit here is going to be the most triggers we can chain off of one buy.

In this case, I believe the optimal move is to play 10x Hagglers, 10x Hoards, and then buy a Province.  This will let you get 20 extra cards, 10 of which can be Border Villages, which can in turn let you get 10 Caches or Death Cards, which will give you 20 more cards.  This gives you a total of 50 extra cards.


How do Rum and Lucky Duke/Horse Shoes interact? With the introduction of the Gold Rush expansion, there is no FAQ on how to handle Lucky Duke/Horse Shoes with Rum.

Lucky Duke says each time he "draws!" flip the top two cards and chose one. Horse Shoes says whenever you "draw!", you reveal 1 additional card and choose the result. Rum says "Draw!" 4 cards: you regain 1 life point for each different Suit revealed.

So how do these interact? It's not clear if Rum means to draw 4 cards, or draw 4 times. My play group has ruled that it is intended to draw 1 card 4 times, which would mean Lucky Duke and Horse Shoes would take full advantage of it. But that may not be the case; it's hard to say since Lucky Duke was created before there were any cards that had a draw of multiple cards.

Here are the different ways I can see this working.

1) Based on the wording of Lucky Duke he only draws two cards for Rum and would draw a 3rd card if he had Horse Shoes, putting his use of Rum at a disadvantage compared to all other characters. This would also mean all other characters would draw 5 cards from Rum and they would chose the 4 that they would want.

2) Based on the assumption that Rum is intended to draw 1 card 4 times, Lucky Duke would get 4 draws of 2 cards, and chose one after each two card draw to determine how much life he gets back. If he has Horse Shoes he would draw 3 each time and any other character would draw 2 each time.

From my searches I have seen people arguing for both sides. Personally I'm thinking the second choice is right since it seems that Lucky Duke should have an advantage when it comes to draws.

Another possibility:
This doesn't follow the letter of the rules, but since it's a translation, I think it might be more appropriate to attempt to follow the spirit of the rules.
There's several characters (most, even) whose special abilities essentially are like having a "built-in" item. Willy the Kid has a built-in Volcanic, Paul Regret has a built-in Mustang. I think the intention for Lucky Duke is to have built-in Horse Shoes. Although the wording is different on Lucky Duke and Horse Shoes, for any standard single-card "Draw", the effect of either one is the same.
Continuing with this logic, the correct way for Lucky Duke to use Rum, would be to draw an extra card, for 5 total. And if he has Horse Shoes, then he gets one more for 6. This is much like Jourdonnais, who has a built-in barrel. (Okay, Jourdonnais' ability isn't exactly a barrel since it only applies to Bang! cards, but it's darn close.)
This isn't official, but in addition to the reasons above, I think it makes sense from a balance perspective. Lucky Duke definitely shouldn't have a disadvantage for a luck-based card like Rum, but drawing 8 cards is perhaps too good. See the probability discussion below, and you can decide for yourself how good Lucky Duke's ability should be.
Probability simulations:
From our comments, I got curious about how much of an advantaged each of these methods would allow. I coded it up and a million simulations of each. As I suspected, the drawing two-at-time method is nicest (but it's not as much of an improvement over drawing 5 and choosing 4 as I would have thought). The means (and standard deviations) are in the table below, and the graph below that shows the distribution of unique suits obtained under each rule. If anyone wants to see the code, leave a comment and I'll edit it into my answer.
Draw 4   Draw5   Draw 8
   2.7     3.1      3.3
  (0.63)  (0.64)   (0.56)

Under the draw 5 rule and the draw 8 rule you're the odds of gaining 3 life are about the same (58.8% and 59.9%, respectively), but you see an increased chance of only gaining 2 life in the Draw5 rule.
  Gain    Draw 4   Draw5   Draw 8
2 life    30%      15%      6%
3 life    58%      59%     60%
4 life    11%      26%     34%

I abbreviated the draw-2-at-a-time rule to "draw 8", but I modeled it appropriately as two-at-a-time, picking one of the first 2 randomly, then for each subsequent two cards picking randomly unless one suit was already selected and the other wasn't. Each set of draws was from a 52-card deck with 13 of each suit. I'm not sure exactly how many cards Bang uses, but it's probably close enough.


If damage is assigned to AAA during bombardment, can it defend before general combat begins in the territory or is it removed? Question pertains to Axis & Allies 1942, 2nd edition.

If a defender assigns damage to anti-aircraft artillery units during the bombardment phase of an amphibious assault, do the AAA's still get a chance to defend prior to beginning the general combat phase?

For example, UK forces conduct an amphibious assault (with 2 cruiser, 1 transport carrying 2 infantry, and 1 fighter flies in for land combat from another territory) on Italy (defending with 2 AAA's and 2 infantry). There are no defensive sea forces in the sea zone, so skip sea combat and begin bombardment phase - cruisers roll twice and get 2 hits. Defender wants to assign one hit to one infantry and other hit to AAA.

I know the one infantry is removed from the remaining land combat, but is the AAA also removed or does it first get to roll against the fighter before it is removed?

Thanks in advance.

On page 15 of the Axis and Allies 1942, Second edition rulebook, it is stated:

  "Roll one die for each battleship and cruiser that can conduct bombardment…For each hit, the defender will move a defending unit behind the casualty strip.  These casualties will be able to defend during the land combat step before they are eliminated".

This means that not only does the AA gun in your scenario still get to fire, but so does the infantry unit that got knocked out by the bombardment as well, at least for one round of combat.  In addition, even if the lost AA gun didn't get to fire due to its destruction, the other still would, and the destruction of the first would therefore be irrelevant because in the description of AA guns, it says,

  "Only one antiaircraft gun can fire in a battle, no matter how many are in the territory".

In sum, both of the destroyed units in your scenario would have the ability to fire after naval bombardment phase.


Demonic pact and Harmless Offering If I play Demonic Pact and then before my fourth upkeep, then just before I pass the turn I use Harmless Offering to give it to an opponent, what would happen?

Let's start with the basic question: can you make your opponent lose the game by "giving" them Demonic Pact after all but the last mode have been chosen?

Short answer: yes.

Demonic Pact's ability includes several uses of the words "you" and "your," which always refer to its controller.109.5  Harmless Offering makes your opponent the controller of Demonic Pact, so they must now deal with the Pact during their upkeep.  This also means that "You lose the game" refers to them losing, regardless of who used to control the Pact.

Another question to ask at this point would be whether the previously chosen options are "reset" when the card changes controller.  The Gatherer rulings confirm that they do not:

  It doesn’t matter who has chosen any particular mode. For example, say you control Demonic Pact and have chosen the first two modes. If an opponent gains control of Demonic Pact, that player can choose only the third or fourth mode.

Putting all this together: if you can "use up" the first three modes of the Pact and then give it to your opponent, Demonic Pact's ability will require them to pick the only remaining mode and lose the game.

Note, however, that there are ways for your opponent to deal with your clever ploy.  They could, for example:

Use a Counterspell to eliminate Harmless Offering before it resolves.
Destroy Demonic Pact using Naturalize during your end step.
Stifle Demonic Pact's ability before it can resolve.
Use Angel's Grace to prevent the Pact from making them lose.

All in all, though, it's going to be tricky for them to get out of this situation.  After seeing you play Harmless Offering, they'll certainly be wishing they could ignore the Gatherer rulings and "refuse your generous donation!"


Has the significance of the term 'cast' changed? Spellshock currently has the following wording in the Gatherer:

  Whenever a player casts a spell, Spellshock deals 2 damage to that player.

However, the original wording shown in the card image is this:

  Whenever any player successfully casts a spell, Spellshock deals 2 damage to him or her.

To me, the word "successfully" implies casting a spell which is not countered, though I'm not aware that the word "successfully" is ever defined in the rules. Otherwise, the word "successfully" means nothing at all, since it's pretty hard to fail at casting (as opposed to resolving) a spell. In more modern parlance, we might phrase the original ability this way:

  Whenever a spell resolves and is not countered, Spellshock deals 2 damage to that spell's controller.

Is this the original intent of the card? If so, when and why was the wording changed?

TL;DR Yes, cards with "successfully cast" have undergone a functional rule change.

The change you're talking about is actually a fairly old rules change - the removal of the phrase (and function) "successfully cast" was with the Sixth Edition rules changes. Previous to the Classic rules (the Sixth Edition rules changes), the Interrupt spell type still existed, and counterspells were of that type. You'd use an Interrupt to counter a spell, and it would fail being "successfully cast." See the Sixth Edition rules change letter for some specifics:

  Classic rules do away with interrupts. All interrupts are now instants, which means you can counter a spell any time before it resolves. (Abilities that trigger on a spell being "successfully cast" now trigger on a spell being "played.")

As a result, all previous triggers based on spells being successfully cast now trigger on spells being "played," which was changed to "cast" during the M12 rules changes. This has caused a functional rules change - a spell which is cast and countered will still trigger an ability on these older "successfully cast" cards.

The choice was either describing these triggers as "when a spell is cast and resolves" (which is a bit complex), or widening the trigger window for these cards. Your phrasing of the original intent is close, but not quite right. For the original trigger to happen, the spell would have had to be cast and resolve. With your phrasing, copies of a spell (created with Fork, Isochron Scepter, etc.) resolve and may not be countered, but are never cast.


How does Void Winnower affect face down spells and creatures? Void Winnower says

  Your opponents can't cast spells with even converted mana costs. (Zero is even)

  Your opponents can't block with creatures with even converted mana costs.

If I control a Void Winnower, does it prevent my opponent from casting Morph and Megamorph cards as face down spells? Does it prevent face down creatures from blocking?

Void Winnower does prevent your opponent from casting face down spells and blocking with face down creatures.

The most important rule here is 202.3a:

  The converted mana cost of an object with no mana cost is 0.

The description of Morph is in rule 702.36a:

  Morph is a static ability that functions in any zone from which you could play the card it’s on, and the morph effect works any time the card is face down. “Morph [cost]” means “You may cast this card as a 2/2 face-down creature with no text, no name, no subtypes, and no mana cost by paying {3} rather than paying its mana cost.” (See rule 707, “Face-Down Spells and Permanents.”)

Since the spell has no mana cost, you cannot cast it for its mana cost, so you need an alternative mana cost to cast it [CR 117.6a]. In this case, the rule allows you to cast it for an alternative mana cost of {3}, but that does not change the actual mana cost of the spell.

And the description of Manifest in 701.31a says

  To manifest a card, turn it face down. It becomes a 2/2 face-down creature card with no text, no name, no subtypes, and no mana cost. Put that card onto the battlefield face down. That permanent is a manifested permanent as long as it remains face down. The effect defining its characteristics works while the card is face down and ends when it’s turned face up.

In addition, rule 707.2a says

  If a face-up permanent is turned face down by a spell or ability, it becomes a 2/2 face-down creature with no text, no name, no subtypes, and no mana cost. A permanent that enters the battlefield face down that wasn’t cast as a face-down spell also has these characteristics. These values are the copiable values of that object’s characteristics.

Putting these together, we can see that face down morph spells, and any creature that is face down for any reason has no mana cost, so Void Winnower prevents your opponent from casting face down spells and blocking with face down creatures.

Void Winnower's Gatherer page now has a ruling that says

  The converted mana cost of a face-down creature spell or a face-down creature is 0. Void Winnower will stop face-down creature spells from being cast and face-down creatures from blocking.


When does my new family member occupy a new room? I was playing Agricola the other day and an odd situation came up.

I had three rooms with three family members occupying them.  In one round I was able to play these actions in this order:

Family Growth (even without room)
Build an additional room
Family Growth

Now ordinarily when a new room is built, a doubled-up family member would immediately occupy it.  But my reasoning was that my new family member hadn't actually come home yet (as that happens at the end of the round), so the new room I'd just built wasn't yet occupied.

None of the people I was playing the game with had a problem with this (in the end, I didn't win anyway)...but was I right, or wrong?

(I'm aware of this existing question, but I'm asking specifically about whether it makes a difference when these things all happen in the same turn.)

According to the rulebook (pg 9):

  After Family Growth, also 1 Minor Improvement (Stage 2): A player may only use this Family growth space if he has more empty
  rooms than Family members. It is irrelevant how the family has grown
  before and whether the Family members are on the game board or in the
  farmyard.

Since you had four family members and four rooms, you couldn't have done your second Family Growth action, even though the new family member had not returned home yet to "claim the room".