Can Conjurer's Closet be used to keep a stolen Commander? We had this situation come up in a game last night, and we think we stumbled upon the right answer, but we're not sure.

So, Player A's Commander (Sliver Overlord) was stolen by Player B using a Zealous Conscripts. Player B also had a Conjurer's Closest in play. At the end of the turn Player B decided to use the Conjurer's Closet on the Sliver Overlord, with the idea that after it was 'blinked', it would permanently be under her control.

But then we remembered that Player A can choose to have their Commander return to the Command Zone when it would be exiled or go to the graveyard, so that trick wouldn't work. (Player B ended up using it anyway, as Player A couldn't recast his general at that point.)

Did we play this out correctly?

You got it wrong, but this interaction is tricky. Sliver Overlord can be put in the command zone, but the ability of Conjurer's Closet will return it to the battlefield anyway.

We follow the instructions in the triggered ability:

1) "exile target creature you control": instead of putting it in the exile zone, we put it in the command zone. We don't first exile it, then put it in the command zone. The commander is directly put in the command zone.

2) "return that card to the battlefield under your control": notice how this doesn't say "the exiled card". It says "that card". So we return the card from the command zone to the battlefield under player B control (because "your control" refers to player b, as he is the one who controls the triggered ability).

The rule that allows this to happen is the same one that allows to return the card from exile in the first place:

  400.7g A resolving spell or activated ability can perform actions on an object that moved from one zone to another while that spell was
  being cast or that ability was being activated, if that object moved
  to a public zone.

Here is a link to a similar ruling in Wizard's forum, about a commander and Cloudshift. Post 12 in that thread is from an official Net Rep, therefore that ruling is official.


Methods to protect Salamangreat Sanctuary? So, I see a lot of people who are playing Salamangreat play only 1 Salamangreat Sanctuary because it's effect is once per turn and drawing many would be a problem, so protecting it should be important.

My question is, what cards can be used to protect it? And is there any Salamangreat monster that can protect it with its effect? As far as I know Balelynx can prevent destruction but I doubt that it prevents the negation. I could add Twin Twisters I guess but I would like more recommendations.

My question is, what cards can be used to protect it?

Perhaps the most adequate card for your purpose would be Field Barrier (emphasis mine):

  Field Spell Cards on the field cannot be destroyed. Neither player can activate a new Field Spell Card. You can only control 1 "Field Barrier".

That way, your opponent would have to destroy Field Barrier first, and then attempt to destroy Salamangreat Sanctuary. This will have to be in two, separate attempts, as activating a global destruction (like a Great Storm, say) would save the Field as it is simultaneous destruction (moment in which Field Barrier still saves it).

The only downfall is that it does not prevent Salamangreat Sanctuary from things like returning to hand (as it does not destroy). One card that could bypass Field Barrier could be Murmur of the Forest, for example... but using Field Barrier already gives you a great advantage.

  And is there any Salamangreat monster that can protect it with its effect?

Most likely, the reason why only one field spell card is used is because Salamangreat Falco can recover your field spell card (emphasis mine):

  If this card is sent to the GY: You can target 1 "Salamangreat" Spell/Trap in your GY; Set that target to your field. If this card is in your GY: You can target 1 "Salamangreat" monster you control, except "Salamangreat Falco"; return that monster to the hand, and if you do, Special Summon this card. You can only use 1 "Salamangreat Falco" effect per turn, and only once that turn.

So most likely meta Salamangreat decks rely on using 3 copies of Falco, which can recover your Field Spell card when sent to the GY (like, when you link summon, for example).

You can then bring Falco back to the field, send it to the GY again, and recover another Spell/Trap card.


How to approach a game of Othello / Reversi? I have played the game Othello (Reversi) numerous times but I never approach it with a specific logic or algorithm to apply on each move in my mind. I won many times and lost as much.
How would one approach this game? How would one work in his mind to prune the possible moves and choose the "right" one in each step?
I see that most Othello CPUs more or less "think" the same at each move, how should I think on each move?

I am not speaking as a highly expert player, but rather someone who always wins against people with little or no experience, and against overly simplistic computerized versions. So the approaches I've learned can get you from beginner to intermediate. I'll start with simple stuff first:

Corners are vital. Once you get a corner, it will never change color. More importantly, it is an anchor for getting many more pieces that will never change color. Once you do have a corner, if it's early enough in the game you can simply flip pieces to your color as close as possible to the corner, expanding gradually away from the corner and not doing any other types of moves. None of the pieces can be re-flipped, and eventually your opponent will have so few (or zero) moves that you can control the rest of the game in any way you like.

Key concept all beginners must grasp: All moves prior to the first corner being taken must be geared toward maximizing your chances of being the first to get a corner (or in rare instances, setting up the board to turn your opponent's first corner to your advantage). At the same time, you want to minimize the chances of your opponent gaining the first corner.

It's easier to think about avoiding bad moves than making good moves. The worst move that you can make in Othello is to play a piece diagonally adjacent to a corner. Even if the opponent can't immediately seize the corner after that move, it usually takes a turn or two to find a way to get the color flipped along that diagonal in a way that can't be re-flipped on your turn. The turn after that, your opponent gets the corner.

It can be thought of as less risky to go adjacent to a corner horizontally or vertically if you have control of that side. And it may be that for many turns thereafter it will not enable the opponent to get a corner. But unless forced to go adjacent to a corner like this, it's better to avoid it, for 2 reasons. One is that if the opponent does get that corner by other means, he'll then get the entire row you (thought) you controlled. A second, more subtle reason: If your opponent gets a corner on the other side of that row you control, their next move will be to get the corner you're adjacent to. Even if you do get that other corner, your opponent can use that other corner against you, like so (you are black, "controlling" the side with 5 blacks, then you get the corner coming in from another direction):

_ _ B B B B B _
B _ B B B B B _
B W B B B B B _

You can see that white can now take the other corner at any time, and irreversibly control the entire side except the corner on the left. This is what I meant earlier about turning a corner against someone. The only easy way to do this is if they have previously placed a piece adjacent to a corner along that same side.

Many people figure out everything I've written so far after 20-50 games. If you haven't already mastered all of the above, be sure to do so before trying to grasp the more complex and conceptual material to follow.

Concepts

There are several important concepts that drive Reversi strategy. First, to review the already mentioned concepts:

Avoid giving up a corner, and have that drive your early game
Avoiding bad moves is more important than making a good move
After getting your first corner, turn pieces to your color that are as close as possible to that corner.

A simple concept I did not yet mention:

The end game consists of simply counting the number of pieces you get vs the number of pieces your opponents get. This works fine for the last 2-4 moves of the game, but should rarely be a driving force behind moves in the earlier part of the game before the first corner is taken.

The most important game concept takes a long time to master:

Minimize the number of moves your opponent can make, while doing your best to insure that you maximize the number of moves that you can make.

When you are playing someone who has mastered the simpler parts of the game I described above, they will only make moves that allow you to get a corner if they are forced to. The only way you can force them is by limiting the number of moves they can make. You can do that only if you have many moves to make, some of which will not create further moves for your opponent.

I don't expect that most people will fully understand this last part of strategy I described without actually practicing. So I encourage anyone who likes this game to play a few games where your main goal is not to try to win, but to try to get used to making moves that have the result of reducing the number of your opponent's future moves while expanding your own set of moves. Once you get used to this, start trying to win again, using what you've learned to force your opponent to move adjacent to a corner, because that is the only remaining move (or one of a small set of equally bad moves).

One last note: The only player I ever struggled to win against had not played as much Othello as I had. But he was a good Go player. Apparently, Go players learn to think in a way that translates very well to Othello. Perhaps an experienced Go player can leave a comment explaining why a Go player learning Othello will grasp the game far faster than players without that background.


How to own the most cards possible? What's the most cards I can own at once in a game, presumably with the cooperation of all players?
I think it's something like Graveyard Busybody with an Abyssal Persecutor, so the opponent(s) can have all their cards in the graveyard and the game still goes on.
That gives a player ownership of all the cards that's possible to be played in a game.
But are there ways beyond that? Like my hypothetical "turning an infinite number of tokens into 'cards' a.k.a 'things that will persist beyond death'", is currently impossible, but are there other ways?

There is no limit to the amount of cards in your deck. For a given number N, the simplest way to own at least N cards during a gaming of Magic is to start with N cards in your deck.

100.5. If a deck must contain at least a certain number of cards, that number is referred to as a minimum deck size. There is no maximum deck size for non-Commander decks.

Most cards are limited to four copies each, but basic lands and cards like Relentless Rats are not.
Also, the only cards which change the owner of other cards are either silver-bordered or referring to ante and are outright banned in any competitive format.


What does it mean to be "treated as a Blue Eyes card"? I have a Dragon Spirit of White which says:

  (This card is always treated as a "Blue-Eyes" Card.)

Apparently this is its archetype?

Does that mean I can Polymerize it with a Blue-Eyes White Dragon to summon my Blue-Eyes Twin Burst Dragon? What exactly does it mean to be treated as a Blue-Eyes card? What can it be used for because of that?

This refers to the fact that, in Yu-Gi-Oh, monster "archetypes" are based in the card names. In the original Japanese cards, the name usually contains a certain phrase that identifies a monster as part of an archetype. However, in English and other languages, this sometimes gets lost in translation. The most common cause of this is that, at the time of translation, the name was not a planned archetype. To correct this, a wording convention was eventually created called an Archetype Condition, which states that any effect looking for an "'X' card" may also point to this card. Eventually, this also carried over back to the Japanese cards as well if the original card would not be named to match an intended archetype.

Examples of when this became an issue can be seen in the HERO archetype (where, as new HERO types were created, existing cards that were intended to work with all HERO archetypes had to be continuously reworded until it was decided to retroactively rename the English cards. See the history of Elemental HERO Stratos for examples of that) and the Daemon archetype (where, for many years, the TCG simply had to maintain a "List of Archfiend cards", as many older cards did not translate Daemon consistently until Archfiend became an archetype and the older cards needed to become Archfiends as well).

In the case of Dragon Spirit of White, the intention was for this to be considered a "Blue-Eyes" card like Blue-Eyes White Dragon. This allows it to be used as a Blue-Eyes card when an effect calls for Blue-Eyes cards generically. Specific examples include:

Blue-Eyes Spirit Dragon - a Synchro monster whose materials are "1 Tuner + 1 or more non-Tuner "Blue-Eyes" monsters"
Deep-Eyes White Dragon - an Effect monster whose effect triggers "When a face-up "Blue-Eyes" monster(s) you control is destroyed".
Beacon of White - a Spell card whose activation condition requires a certain number of "Blue-Eyes" monsters in your graveyard.

However, this does not make this card a "Blue-Eyes White Dragon." Archetype conditions only make the card a generic instance of the archetype they refer to. They cannot be used to replace cases where full, explicit card names are necessary. As a result, Dragon Spirit of White cannot be used as a Fusion Material for Blue-Eyes Twin Burst Dragon because it explicitly lists "Blue-Eyes White Dragon", not "1 "Blue-Eyes" Monster". For that, you would need a card that specifically says that the monster's name "becomes" another card's name.

An example of that can be found in Blue-Eyes Alternative White Dragon, whose effect, in part, reads

  "This card's name becomes "Blue-Eyes White Dragon" while it is on the
  field or in the Graveyard."


MUs from Memory Strips for Deep Data Mining? Do memory units provided by MemStrips count as free slots for Deep Data Mining? The hard part is the "use the MU on MemStrips only for virus programs" note on the MemStrips.

For example, I’ve got 3 MUs used by some non-virus icebreakers, 1 MemStrips installed and I play the Deep Data Mining. What is the count of free MU to resolve this run ability? 1 or 4?

The memory from MemStrips counts towards Deep Data Mining.  This is because Deep Data Mining doesn't actually use memory, it just looks at how much memory you have vs how much you are using.  MemStrips gives you memory, with a restriction on what types of programs can use it.

I've seen MemStrips used with Data Folding and Overmind for some powerful combo potential under this same principle.


Can creatures with Defender be unmorphed while attacking? I have a face down Monastery Flock card on the battlefield.

I begin my attack phase, and declare the face down Monastery Flock as an attacker.

The defending player blocks with  Llanowar Elves, then during the blocker declaration phase, the defender casts a Giant Growth on his elves.

I would like to know if, within this phase - and therefore before the assignment of combat damage - it is possible to activate the Flock's morph ability to prevent it from dying.

I asked this question because there is an apparent contradiction in the simple operation described here.
Since the face-up side has Defender, I'm afraid it cannot be declared as an attacker.  Or, however, if it is declared as an attacker when it is still face down, it may not be possible to unmorph it.
In game practice, it is never said that there is (or there isn't) some note that specifies whether a given action can or cannot be executable.
Therefore, I thought that in a case like this it was right to ask experienced players what the right interpretation is.

Is this an action that can be performed without problems, or is it still an illegal action?

Yes, you can morph anytime you could cast a spell or activate an ability. Once a creature has been declared as an attacker, it remains an attacker even if it gains defender afterwards.

You may morph whenever you could cast a spell or activate an ability:

  702.36e Any time you have priority, you may turn a face-down permanent you control with a morph ability face up. This is a special action; it doesn’t use the stack (see rule 116). [..]

Whether or not a creature is a legal attacker is only checked once, not continuously, on the "declare attackers" step of the combat phase.

  508.1c The active player checks each creature they control to see whether it’s affected by any restrictions (effects that say a creature can’t attack, or that it can’t attack unless some condition is met). If any restrictions are being disobeyed, the declaration of attackers is illegal.

Your 2/2 creature does not have defender, it can be an attacker.

  508.1k Each chosen creature still controlled by the active player becomes an attacking creature. It remains an attacking creature until it’s removed from combat or the combat phase ends, whichever comes first. See rule 506.4.

The creature, whether it's the 2/2 or the 0/5 with defender, remains an attacker for the duration of the combat phase, because gaining defender does not remove it from combat.


What does playability of a Scrabble word mean? While studying Scrabble word lists through Zyzzyva, I came across the term playability order. I understand the term probability order, which lists the most probable tile combinations on a rack of 7 tiles. However, I was unable to understand what criteria orders the words based on playability order.

The first three words in the playability order for 3 letter words are

  QIN
  QAT
  QIS

Which according to me is quite absurd to be most playable, as one is more likely to draw two E's (out of 12) and one R (out of 6) to play ERE or REE, rather than drawing the only Q.

Can someone explain to me in simple words the meaning of playability order of words in Scrabble?

"Playability" refers to how often these words crop up in real games. Someone will have made a database of all the words played across a large number of "high-standard" games (e.g. club level and above) and ranked how often certain words crop up.

QIN ranks highly because it is a very common way of getting rid of a Q (since there are relatively few Q words to choose from). In addition, it can be formed by hooking -N onto QI, which itself is a very commonly played word. Thus QIN can be considered a useful word to know.

In your example, it might be quite common to have the option of playing ERE, but in most situations that won't score you many points, and there will be better combinations present on your rack.

Note that "playability" is a slightly more subjective concept than "probability". The latter can be calculated precisely, whereas playability will depend on the set of games chosen to average across, and ultimately the decisions of the players taking part in those games.


In UNO with card stacking rules, can you stack the opponents final card? While playing UNO in the end only two players were left.
Player 1 had five cards and player 2 had two cards (both of them a 'Draw 2').

Player 2 puts down the first 'Draw 2' card, and calls UNO.
Player 1 stacks on it a 'Draw 2' card.
Player 2 puts down his last card that is a 'Draw 2'.
Player 1 again stacks on it a 'Draw 2' card.

Does that last 'Draw 2' apply to player 2 or has he won?

We have played with this house rule in our gaming group before and we resolved it in the same way we resolve MTG (Magic the Gathering) chains and that is the action must resolve upon the final valid play. So, if you are playing with the chain draw 2 house rule, in your scenario where there are two players remaining, the player who is unable to add another draw 2 into the chain is the one who gets stuck drawing as many cards as are in the stack.

If this results in one of the two players going out, that player wins. Otherwise, they draw more cards and the game continues.

The "As soon as one player goes out" rule as it was originally written for Uno did not take into effect this "chain stacking" house rule. In order to be the most correct, it must be interpreted to mean "As soon as one player goes out at the end of a play". In this case, the draw 2 chain is considered a single play as the draw 2 chain only stops (resolves) on the player that cannot place a draw 2 on the stack.

As a final note, we ultimately did away with Chain draw 2 combinations because of this exact argument we would have every time a new player arrived. If two players remain, player one has 5 cards, player two has 2 cards, player two gives player one a Draw 2, then player one draws 2 cards, then plays a Draw 2 back on Player two. No stacking or chaining is in effect, so Player two now has 3 cards and Player one has 6, and the game continues.


What is the Purpose of a "Ducking" Play In Bridge? Sometimes I will have Axx in a key suit, opposite dummy's holdings of Kxxxx. In such situations, I was taught to make a "ducking" play by playing a low card from both sides, instead of playing an A or K, and letting the opponents win with a Q or J or some other card.

One advantage of this is that I save my A and K for later rounds. So is the ducking play like a "hold up?" Or is it used for a "throw in" situation where I want to put an opponent on lead?

What are the benefits of ducking? Are there times when this would be a bad play?

Ducking can be used for multiple purposes (not necessarily all on same hand, of course).

Some uses of ducking

Entry creation: This IMO is the primary use. Sometimes you duck in your side suit to make sure you have enough entries to establish the suit and cash it. Notice that the primary use of hold-up is to prevent opponents from having entries to cash a suit.

Example:

xxx
xx
AKxxxx
xx

AKx
AKx
xx
Axxxx

You are in 3NT, playing rubber bridge. Opponents lead a spade.

You have 5 tricks outside of diamonds and need at least 4 from the diamond suit. You have to hope diamonds break 3-2.

If you play diamonds from the top, on a 3-2 break, you will lose the third round, and establish the suit, but you will not have a way to cash them.

But if you duck the first round of the suit, then you have lost a trick while you hold a small diamond in your hand. Now once you get back in, you can play a diamond to dummy and play AK drawing the opponents diamonds and are in dummy to cash the rest of the suit.

Avoidance: You duck a suit making sure an opponent who cannot harm you will win the trick.

Example:

AQx
AKxxxx
xx
xx

9xx
xx
AKQJT9
AK

You are play rubber bridge and have gotten to a diamond small slam.

LHO leads the spade 7.

You have 11 top tricks, and the 12th can either come from either the spade finesse, or by establishing a long heart.

If you play the SQ at trick 1, RHO might with the K and knock out your spade A, thus removing your option of establishing the long heart too.

The correct play is a low spade from trick 1. The 9 in your hand ensure that your RHO has to win it, who cannot attack spades without giving your the 12 trick.

This play also lets you combine your chances.

Say RHO plays back a club. Now you can draw trumps, play AK of hearts and ruff a heart.
If hearts prove to be 4-1, you can fall back on the spade finesse.

Timing: You might duck to rectify the count of a squeeze, at a time it is convenient to you, etc.

A common example (for defence) which is cited for this is the following:

South is playing 6NT.

        KQJ
        AKJ
        AKQx
        Qxx
xxx           Axxx
xx            xxxxx
JT98          xx
JT98          xx
        xxx
        Qxx
        xxx
        AKxx

Say West leads a spade and East should hold up. Declarer wins and play a spade. East should hold up again. Now if declarer plays another spade, East can cash two tricks. If declarer abandons spades, no matter what he does he cannot avoid losing two tricks.

If east takes either the first or second spade, declarer's count is rectified and West gets squeezed in the minors.

As with almost every play, there are times where it would be a bad play. For instance, you duck and realize you just gave away the setting trick :-)


Are there any single-screen human-vs-human go clients/programs available? This is a question about Go software, so it might not be the correct place to ask this, but I expect it to be the best place. ;)

I want to give a group of people a quick overview on Go but I don't have the resources to obtain actual material, so I was looking for a basic sandbox program and that turned out more difficult than I expected.

So, a single-screen / hot-seat go client. Where one (or two players) could run a human-human go game on a single machine (Mac/Windows/both but preferably Mac)

Almost any SGF editor. Most common choice would be - cgoban (KGS client). Just create an empty board, and begin playing.

Alternatives: MultiGo (windows only?), eidogo (online, but the board is small), SmartGo.


How can I translate a Magic card printed in a language that I don't know? I bought a bulk pack of magic cards today and one of them was in a foreign language. I don’t know which language it is. Google translate is not recognizing it, even when I take a picture of it. How can I determine what the card says?

Instead of trying to translate the card, just search for it with other unique identifiers.  Your image contains a collector number (that first number at the bottom of the card 71/244) and a set symbol (the one for Avacyn Restored, aka AVR). With those two pieces of information, I used Scryfall to search for the specific card.   In this case I searched for https://scryfall.com/search?q=number%3A71+set%3Aavr which returned a result for Peel from Reality

If you don't recognize the set symbol, you could include other search parameters (like the mana cost and artist) or look up the set symbol at https://scryfall.com/sets. Here's another search using just the collector number and artist that also found a single result: https://scryfall.com/search?q=number%3A71+artist%3A%22jason+felix%22


Is there any complete downloadable Pokémon TCG text database? I'm aware those guys have such a database, but I couldn't find any way to download it. Not even access it by an API. Is there any one of those available for download?

Here's a SQL database for cards from Base Set => Double Crisis:

https://github.com/Guernouille/pokeplayer/tree/master/database

http://pokeplayer.com/cardex/search


How Closely Did Afrika Korps simulate the actual campaign conditions? My understanding is that the Afrika Korps game parameters give the Germans and British about equal chances to win, that is, 50-50. Were the relative chances actually about 50-50 in real life? If not, what adjustments were made to the game to balance it? For instance, was Malta more or less disruptive to Axis supply convoys in the game compared to real life?

Example: Using Midway, which I know better, a number of adjustments were made in favor of the Japanese. That's because the large number of planes on Midway made it a "fourth" carrier, with all the American carriers larger than any of the four Japanese heavy carriers. That is to say that the Americans actually had the advantage historically.

So Midway, in the game, starts with perhaps one third of its historical complement of aircraft. Also, the Japanese carrier Kaga starts with three more toredo squadrons than she had historically (this is critical for game play). "Alternate" rules also prevent the American player from deploying B-17 bombers (which existed, but had no historical impact, but is a "random" factor in favor of the Americans). I believe these changes largely balance the game.

Not very well at all, but good enough for a board game.

The impact of Malta is reflected in-game as the difficulty of the Germans getting reinforcements and resupply as the game goes on. (I'd get the rules out and cite a detail if only my brother didn't end up with the game; I got Waterloo and D Day, he got Afrika Korps and Panzer Blitz; the local games club got the rest when we moved out).

Of particular interest is that the air element of the campaign is utterly missing.

Balance with "historical" verisimilitude is a very tricky thing.  Afrika Korps is not one of the more complex AH games (I played them all from about 1970 - mid 1980's).  A wide variety of decisions made outside of that theater left both Rommel and Monty with constraints on their resources, and how to make that work "in game" can be tricky.  The 'trickle in' gamism of reinforcing units is reasonably close to how things played out. The relative ineffectiveness of most Italian Divisions is also "close enough" to work in the game.

I've seen games of Afrika Korps won using zones of control and a Recce Company choaking off supply trains at the left edge of the map when Rommel is near to El Alamein.  :-)   IRL, that's not gonna work.

I did not study that campaign in detail until after college, and played it mostly in high school and college.  With the game as an introduction, it was nice to be familiar with the topic, but as one reads the history one begins to see how a game has to take a lot of short cuts with verisimilitude to arrive at a playable state.  (Midway was kind of clunky).

Something you may want to appreciate is that the sales brochures that AH put out back in the 60's and 70's had a "complexity" assessment for each game.  Afrika Korps was one of the easier games; 1914 was a nightmare of complexity.


Does Slithering Behind You cause the encounter deck's discard pile to be shuffled into it? Slithering Behind You reads:

  Revelation - If Hunting Horror is in play, add 1 doom to it. If Hunting Horror is not in play, search the encounter deck, discard pile, and the void for Hunting Horror and spawn it at your location, engaged with you. Shuffle the encounter deck.

Does it cause the encounter deck's discard pile to be shuffled into it at the end?

No, it does not. Slithering Behind You interacts with Hunting Horror. If that is not in play yet, it makes sure that that happens - by searching in the available cards, in the discarded cards and in the void.

After searching the Encounter deck, you have seen the order of cards. So that needs to be randomised again. This does nothing with the discard pile.


How to break a stalemate in Hive? My wife and I are playing it first game of Hive, and we're a little confused on how to win.  We're playing without the mosquitoes and ladybugs as the directions suggested. Given the game below, couldn't white's grasshoppers just surround the queen bee indefinitely? What would force them to move?

From the rules, p11 (see also p1):

  The game ends as soon as one Queen Bee is completely surrounded by pieces of any color.

So the situation you depict is not a stalemate - it's an immediate victory for Black.


Why are there multiple copies of figures in Gaming Night Kits I'm curious as to why there are 6 copies of the same miniature an corresponding ID cards in the Gaming Night Kits. I understand the different languages ID cards copies of the same miniature? I would of expected 1 miniature and three ID cards (one for each language) however i get 6 miniatures and 18 cards (6 for each language).

Does this mean that I can play with the same character in the same game and there are no restrictions for the same survivor? So if I owned multiple copies of the game I could technically have a team of all the same survivor?
Does anyone know if there is a rule that stops this from happening or why the gaming night kits bring 6 miniatures?

Most gaming kits come with supplies to provide prize support for multiple people (whether it be players, people who help moderate the events, or other qualifications).

Regarding playing the same character, there's nothing that prevents you from doing this, although typically you'd want to have more diversity of roles (and some characters could make the game much easier with multiple copies.)  The other issue is that without painting your minis or otherwise making them distinct, it could be hard to determine which of the 4 identical minis represent you!


Does it cost more to counter Sphinx of New Prahv? Sphinx of New Prahv says:

  Spells your opponents cast that target Sphinx of New Prahv cost {2} more to cast.

Does the counter spell countering the Sphinx also cost 2 more, or does the effect only work on the battlefield?

No, Sphinx of New Prahv's ability only works while it's on the battlefield. Spells that counter other spells can only target objects on the stack, where the Sphinx's ability would not work.

While the Sphinx is a spell and could be countered, it's on the stack.

  111.1. A spell is a card on the stack. [..]

Abilities of permanent cards such as creatures generally only function while that card is a permanent on the battlefield. There are exceptions, but none apply here.

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


Is it a players whole turn if they are chosen for a Showdown? If I play a showdown card and play against the person next to me, what happens after the showdown? Does the person I challenged still get their turn, or was the showdown their turn.

I've never played this but I've now read the rules pdf from here
Firstly I couldn't find anything in the rules that indicated when the next player would start there turn!  I can only assume this the same as [basic Uno rules] in that play passes clockwise after a player takes a turn.2
The rules for showdowns say

The player who played the card takes the Showdown unit and places it
between themselves and the next player in the current order of play
(unless they played a Wild Showdown Card – more on that later).

and later

When you play this card, you get to choose which player to have a
showdown with

There is nothing in these rules which indicates that taking part in a showdown is a players whole turn.  It seems to me that a showdown just happens with the. next player in turn order and then that player takes there turn after.
If it was that players whole I would expect the rules for wild showdown to suggest that play continues from the player chosen for the wild showdown, which. they do not.
As a general rule for games, if something is not stated clearly in the rules they it almost certainly is not a rule.


If my commander's mana cost is colorless, but it has an ability that includes another mana type, what cards can be in my deck? Morophon, the Boundless has a mana cost is 7 colorless mana, but he has an ability that includes all mana types. If he is my commander, what cards can be in my deck?

The color identity of your commander includes mana symbols in both the cost and any abilities; so you would be able to use cards of any color if your commander is Morophon.

903.4. The Commander variant uses color identity to determine what cards can be in a deck with a certain commander. The color identity of a card is the color or colors of any mana symbols in that card’s mana cost or rules text, plus any colors defined by its characteristic-defining abilities (see rule 604.3) or color indicator (see rule 204).

903.5c A card can be included in a Commander deck only if every color in its color identity is also found in the color identity of the deck’s commander.

And similarly, Morophon could only be in your deck (as not your commander) if your commander contained all 5 colors in its color identity.


What happens if Merfolk Trickster taps Emmara? Emmara, Soul of the Accord

  Whenever Emmara, Soul of the Accord becomes tapped, create a 1/1 white Soldier creature token with lifelink.

Merfolk Trickster

  When Merfolk Trickster enters the battlefield, tap target creature an opponent controls. It loses all abilities until end of turn.

What happens if the trickster targets Emmara?

She gets tapped and then loses all her abilities - but does it count as simultaneous so her ability sees the tapping and creates the soldier?

You will still get the token.

Merfolk Trickster's ability does 2 different things, one after the other. Emmara's ability will trigger when the first one happens (tap target creature).

  603.2. Whenever a game event or game state matches a triggered ability’s trigger event, that ability automatically triggers. The ability doesn’t do anything at this point.

So at that moment, the ability has triggered (but it is not on the stack yet). Then, immediately after, Emmara loses all abilities.

Next time a player gets priority, the triggered ability goes on 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.

This ability is not tied to Emmara at all; so it doesn't matter that Emmara doesn't have the ability anymore:

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


Does Equinox counter Desolation Angel if it's kicked? Can the ability granted by Equinox counter Desolation Angel if the angel is kicked. Or is it considered to be indirectly destroying lands as it requires it to enter the battlefield first?

No, Equinox cannot counter Desolation Angel. Equinox says

  Enchanted land has "{T}: Counter target spell if it would destroy a land you control."

When a creature spell resolves, its only effect is to put the creature onto the battlefield. In the case of Desolation Angel, after it enters the battlefield its ability triggers. That ability is what would actually destroy the lands, and it is a separate game object from the Desolation Angel creature spell—and is in fact not a spell at all (it's an ability) so Equinox can't counter it. So, if you activate the ability granted by Equinox targeting a Desolation Angel spell, it will do nothing because the spell itself won't destroy any lands.


How to tell rarity of old magic cards? How do you tell the rarity level (common, uncommon, rare) of old magic cards? (Alpha, beta, unlimited, revised)

The rarity of some sets cannot be determined only using the cards themselves. Early in Magic's history, it was intended to be part of the "experience" to let the market determine what was rare, and to let rares be surprises.

Over time, it became clear that players wanted more feedback, and the rarity was added to the card.

Your only hope now is to use an external resource. The canonical resource for all cards is the gatherer at http://gatherer.wizards.com which you can use to filter by individual cards, sets, rarity levels, and so forth. Keep in mind that searching for a card at a given rarity might yield strange results if that card was later released at a different rarity.


Are 4-of-a-kind dedications unbalanced? I read a review of Lanterns: The Emperor's Gifts that argued:

  The base game of Lanterns has a flaw, and it was one that threatened to kill the game for me over time. You see, the "four of a kind" tiles were statistically better than the other types, to a degree that if you did nothing but target them through most of the game (until they were depleted enough to make the card-cost-to-VP ratio more even with the other dedication types), you were probably going to win.

In a reply, the reviewer explained:

  So, in the base game, to start, it's 4 cards for 8 points, or 7 cards for 10 points for the first tile. The latter is wildly worse, for what I believe are obvious reasons. It's a 2:1 point ratio vs. something near 1.4:1. You get 2 less points, but keep 3 cards toward your next turn-in. At that point, those three cards are worth more than 2 points regardless of which dedication type you use. Now extrapolate that advantage across a whole game. Taking it a step further, a 6-point four-of-a-kind dedication is still a better ratio. Which is exactly my point. It takes a lot of depletion in four-of-a-kind before this isn't true. And if the other piles are being similarly depleted, it's often going to be true for the entirety of a game.

My experience is the game is very competitive. I just finished a 4-player game that ended 45, 43, 43, 42.  (I was 43 and my 7-year-old son was the winner!) We depleted the  3-pairs dedication and almost depleted the all-7-colors dedication leaving 4-of-a-kind barely touched. If one of us had saved their lanterns by going after 4-of-a-kind, would we have made up for the smaller payout of that dedication? Does the one-dedication-a-turn rule come into play in the analysis?

It's hard to say what would have happened in your game had more 4-of-a-kind tiles been claimed, but it only takes 3 (8, 7, 7, if I remember correctly) in a 4p game for the points per card to be more in-line with those of the 6- and 7- card dedications.

To answer the question in the title, one of the goals for the expansion was to make the 4-of-a-kind strategy (even if only for the first few dedications) less powerful/obvious. Yes, there is a trade-off when considering the limited opportunities to dedicate in the game, favor tokens, etc., but 2 points per card is very strong while you can get it!

Source: I developed the game with Randy, the publisher.


Which Electronic Scrabble Games / Platforms Offer The Hardest Computer Opponents? One can do a google search to find which websites and which smart devices have Scrabble applications, but I find that computer players vary widely and are often misclassified.  For example, Lexulous is an example of a site where the computer players are grossly overrated. I remember when I played Scrabble on my iPod (remember those?  I am old) there was also an overrating and the quality of the computer players were relatively poor.  Sometimes, a computer has trouble using 1 or both blanks at the same time, playing tactical Scrabble to open up the board when I try to close the board, and time management (only using a fraction of what they are given).

So where can I find a truly difficult computer opponent?

There are two well-known Scrabble AIs.   One is the commercial Maven which is made by Atari and bundles with most official Scrabble versions.  The alternative is called Quackle and is free open-source and of comparable strength.


In Citadels, when do characters get the extra gold from their colour? In the Citadels one of the benefits of your characters is receiving extra gold from buildings of the same colour.  For example, each green building gives one extra gold to the merchant.

I am wondering; does this bonus start immediately at the beginning of your turn, or can one trigger the bonus at will?  In the last example it could be beneficial to build a new building before triggering the bonus so one gets an extra gold piece.

Also, do you have to trigger the whole ability at once or can you split it up?  This is especially important for the merchant who already gets 1 gold by default as special ability.

You can trigger the bonus before or after building. This means you can either build a building with your existing gold, then trigger the gold collection, OR trigger the gold collection, and use that gold to pay for a new building.

What you cannot do is gain some of the gold, build the building, and gain the extra gold from building that building.

To answer the edit, you always get the merchant's one gold before building.  You can still choose to take his 1 gold per green either before or after building.


Can Breaker Bay Grid be used to reduce cost of other Regions? Breaker Bay Grid states:

  The rez cost of cards in this server is lowered by 5.

  Limit 1 region per server.

Can this be used to lower the cost of rezzing another Region (and then trashing Breaker Bay Grid to satisfy "Limit 1 region per server") like SanSan City Grid, or must I trash the first Region before rezzing the second?

You cannot because upgrades are always installed un-rezzed from your hand.

In order to put SanSan City Grid onto a server you first have to discard Breaker Bay Grid. Therefore by the time you can rez SanSan City Grid you no longer have the effect of Breaker Bay Grid.

Also note the reason is because you aren't allowed to have two regions installed and the time to discard the other one is before the new one is played per the rules.


If I can see the top card of the deck, does shuffling the deck change the game state? Follow up question to Can I mill an opponent who has Emrakul, the Aeons Torn by comboing until opponent's deck is stacked in an exact way?

Suppose in addition to the mill combo I also have Lantern of Insight in play. In this case every time I shuffle the deck, I can see the top card changing. Does this mean I can execute the mill combo now without triggering slow play rules?

No, seeing the top card is not enough to let you execute the combo. An article about the Four Horsemen combo that was referenced in answers to the linked question has a relevant section:

  There are also persistent questions about what qualifies as “the same game state”, and both players and judges have misapplied this. It’s not something that we could realistically codify; there are just too many variables. In general, though, returning to the same state means that the physical state of the game as it relates to the loop has reverted back to a previous state. So, if the iteration of the loop popped a Narcomeba into play, or did a point of damage to the player, that’s a change to the game state that’s directly related to the loop in question and the game is clearly advancing. If the player tapped an island halfway through just to “change” the game state, that’s not meaningfully advancing the game, as it’s not part of the looping process.

It's important to note that the examples they give for changing the game state are actions or events that make meaningful progress towards ending the loop: there are a limited number of Narcomebas in the deck, and there is a limited number of damage a player can take before they lose. Even if the top card of the library changes from one shuffle to the next, that change doesn't meaningfully advance the game, so it shouldn't be considered a different game state for the purpose of deciding whether you can continue the combo.


How to quantify first player advantage? In playing a two player variant of sheepshead, the group I play with decided that it wasn't that much fun. So I simplified it, and taught it to my niece (5 years old) as a start to learning about trick taking games.

The game goes like this:

Deck of 4 suits, 2-9 (32 cards)
Deal out a 4x4 grid face down
Deal out a 4x4 grid on top of the face down cards face up.
Each player plays the face up cards from the 8 stacks closest to them at the start of the game.
Follow suit lead if possible, diamonds are trump
When a face down card is uncovered, at the end of the trick, flip it over.
Player who takes the most tricks wins.

It's a rather straight forward game.  Its about learning how to follow suit and what to throw off when you can't.

And while we believe that there is a first player advantage to this, how does one quantify that amount to determine if a handicap for the second player (beyond winning a tie) is necessary?

One way to remove a first-player advantage (in general for any open-information game) is to let one player make a proposed first move. Then the other player can choose to play as either side.

This is similar to splitting a cake by letting one person cut and one person choose. The first player cannot take too obviously powerful a first move, or the second player will opt to choose that side.


Is bidding nil while holding the Queen of spade reasonable? Holding the A♠ is a sure trick which means you can't win a nil bid.
Holding the K♠ is too risky since you can only play it when someone else (hopefully your partner) plays the A♠.

Assuming you don't otherwise have any weaknesses in your nil hand (like too many spades or a singleton face card), is it reasonable to bid nil with the Q♠?

Specifically, let's say your hand is: ♠Q32, ♥432, ♣5432, ♦432.  In what conditions is this hand a nil bid, and in what conditions it is a 1 bid?

Your proposed hand is an excellent hand to bid nil.  Because literally the only issue is with the Q♠ I'd try for it whenever partner bids does not also bid nil and your team doesn't have a huge lead or is about to win the game.

Remember that your opponents have no particular idea of where the weaknesses in your nil hand are, so they won't necessarily be able to set you up for failure without possibly missing their own bid.  Realistically, the only risk you face is your Left-Hand Opponent holding both overcards.  Then they could play the A♠ and K♠ if you don't use your Q♠.  But that's an unlikely distribution (1/9 chance), especially if your partner bids high.

As for bidding nil with the Q♠ in general, it's certainly worse than a side suit queen, but high bids from your partner will mitigate this weakness.  You need a more perfect suit holding since you can't protect the Q♠ with length because it's the trump suit.  But I don't think that single card makes it too risky to avoid bidding nil outright.


How can I modify Green Tron to better combat Aggro Spirits? I realise this post might be broad, but I’m struggling to find cards to beat an Aggro spirit deck. I’m playing green tron and my opponent has a spirit deck which with the flyers is taking me down too much by the time I get my tron lands down.

Are there any modern cards that will help destroy a spirit deck aiming to get many Spirits down which boost each other?

Or if Tron isn’t the right deck, what decks work well vs a spirit deck?

My deck is as follows

  Lands

  Urza’s mine x4
  Urza’s Power Plant x4
  Urza Tower x 4
  Basic land Forest  x4

  Artifacts

  Expedition Map x4
  Planar Bridge  x2
  Treasure map x 1
  Oblivion Stone x 4
  Chromatic Star x4
  Mana Vault x1

  Planeswalker

  Karn, scion of Urza x1

  Sorceries

  All is Dust x1
  Sylvan Scrying x 4
  Ancient Stirrings x4

  Instants

  Natures Claim x3
  Haze of Pollen x2
  Commencement of Festivities x2
  Swell of growth x1
  Crop Rotation x1

  Creatures

  Deceiver of form x2
  End Bringer x2
  Conduit of Ruin x2
  It That Betrays x2
  Platinum Angel x2
  Kozilek, the Great Distortion x1
  Emrakul, the Promised End x1
  Emrakul, the Aeons Tornx1

  Sideboard

  Skittering Invasion x2
  Wrapping Wail x2
  Titan’s Presence x 4
  Not of This World x2
  Loxodon warhammer x2
  Endbringer x1
  Conduit of Ruin x1
  Artisan of Kozilek x1

Disclaimer: not an expert on Modern. The following comes from my understanding of other formats & my reading of Modern strategy articles.

As Hall-of-Famer Paulo Vitor Damo Da Rosa wrote, Tron is slightly favoured against spirits, especially pre-board. However, your build of Tron is subpar because your payoff cards are less than ideal. Cards like It That Betrays cost so much mana to cast, doesn't immediately impact the board, and even if you survive to attack with it, you might not win (opponent can sacrifice 2 lands and swing back for lethal). You're also running cards like Nature's Claim in the maindeck, which is completely dead against spirits (this is the reason why Nature's Claim is a sideboard card: it's dead against too many strategies; you only bring it in when it's good). As a result, a complete answer would be very big indeed since it'd involve a complete rebuilding of your deck. I'll refer you instead to these two primers on G/X Tron and Eldrazi Tron on MTG Salvation. Note they are different decks and play out differently - you should choose one and build that way, not try to be both.

For cards themselves I'll mention only these, because they're the most critical to the matchup when both decks are well-built.

Oblivion Stone: I see you're already running four, so you should know how good they are.

Wurmcoil Engine: gaining 6 life means they can't kill you, and it's too powerful for them to trade with. They basically need to have Path to Exile or lose.

Ugin, the Spirit Dragon: Ugin's second ability is a one-sided sweeper against Spirits.

Walking Ballista: this lets you snipe off all their X/1's easily and still maybe have a body left over. Remember it also instantly kills Phantasmal Image.

Edit: remembered that spirits runs Aether Vial, so maindeck Nature's Claim aren't dead. However, it's still not worth it. They will have hands which don't contain Vial, and it's not like you auto-win if they don't have Vial either. Nature's Claim is for fighting the likes of Stony Silence (which, if it resolves, almost paralyzes you) and Affinty; the sideboard is the place for these narrow hate cards, not the maindeck.


Can activated abilities be used multiple times on a single target? If I have one creature card in my graveyard and my opponent gains control of my turn using Cruel Entertainment, could my opponent activate my Phyrexian Reclamation multiple times by targeting the same creature in the graveyard?

For instance, I have ten life and ten black mana open. Could my opponent activate the ability on my Phyrexian Reclamation 5 times and win the game even though there is only one creature card in my graveyard?

Activated abilities can be activated as many times as a player can pay for it, assuming it can legally be activated.
In this case, the ability requires to pay 2 life, two mana, and target a creature card in their graveyard.

117.3. A player can’t pay a cost unless he or she has the necessary resources to pay it fully. For example, a player with only 1 life can’t pay a cost of 2 life, (...)
602.2b. The remainder of the process for activating an ability is identical to the process for casting a spell listed in rules 601.2b–i. Those rules apply to activating an ability just as they apply to casting a spell. An activated ability’s analog to a spell’s mana cost (as referenced in rule 601.2f) is its activation cost.
601.2c. The player announces his or her choice of an appropriate player, object, or zone for each target the spell requires. (...) The chosen players, objects, and/or zones each become a target of that spell. (Any abilities that trigger when those players, objects, and/or zones become the target of a spell trigger at this point; they’ll wait to be put on the stack until the spell has finished being cast.)

Your opponent still has priority after activating and putting one ability on the stack, to activate another in response before the first one resolves. That way, even if there's only one creature in the graveyard, since it's still a legal target until one of the abilities resolves and removes it from the graveyard.

116.3c. If a player has priority when he or she casts a spell, activates an ability, or takes a special action, that player receives priority afterward.

note that in tournament scenarios, you have to explicitly mention that you intend to retain priority
In other words, they couldn't return the same card five times to your hand, but nothing keeps them from trying. Once they activate the ability the fifth time and pay the costs, state-based actions see you at 0 life, and you lose the game.


While covering the Queen, what happens if I pocket only an opponent's coin? I pocket the Queen and then, while covering, pocket only an opponent's coin instead of my own. Both players still have more coins left on the board. Does the Queen count as being covered by the opponent or will it be put back on the board?

No, you fail to cover the Queen so your turn ends and the Queen is replaced in the centre of the board.


Cuba Libre: Is Cash Laundered by another player earmarked for a particular LimOp? In Cuba Libre by GMT Games, Rule 2.3.6 (Launder) has the following clause that allows another player to Launder Cash in another's favor:

  ... Alternatively, a different Faction may remove its own Cash marker to enable the 1st or 2nd Eligible Faction to execute such a free Operation. ...

Suppose another player wants to Launder their Cash to give me a free LimOp for a particular purpose. Which of the following happens:

a) The other player spends the Cash, and I choose any LimOp I desire as if I had Laundered the Cash myself, allowing me to trick the other player into financing a different operation than they intended

or

b) I choose the operation, and the other players can choose whether or not to Launder for it, enforcing honesty?

It's not explicit in the rules, but the way Operations are payed for is that the Faction chooses an Operation, pays the cost in resources and the follows the Operation procedure. So the Faction has the right to do an Op by the sequence of play order and the paying of the Op is done during the Operation, after the Operation type has been declared.

On the other hand, to Launder a Limited Op, the Faction needs to Launder the cash to be granted the free Lim Op. If there is no Launder there is no free Op. So it seems that if another Faction wants to Launder cash they should first spend the stash and then the active Faction could get a free Op... which could be anything (except Construct 3.3.5).

Also, the rules for Negotiation 1.5.1 are clear in that there are no binding agreements in this game, so there is that.


Trouble: can you move any peg on your second pop after landing on double trouble? My kids are having a debate about how Trouble should work. If you land on a Double Trouble, you are granted a second turn. Do you have to move the peg that is on the Double Trouble spot, or can you move any peg?

The instructions don't say, but I could see it either way:

it's just another turn, so any peg could be moved
you got the turn by virtue of the peg that landed there, so it's another turn for that peg, specifically

Note: this game doesn't seem to be tagged here, and I can't find a generic "board game" or similar tag. Someone with more rep should feel free to better categorize this.

According to a review of Trouble, not Double Trouble, which is a different game, on boardgamegeek.com, the player takes another turn. Which pegs, if any, a player can move on a turn is dependent on the die roll. Players have turns; pegs do not. The extra turn belongs to the player, not the peg.

https://boardgamegeek.com/video/120000/trouble/trouble-review-warp-and-double-trouble-additions


Is it worthwhile to build a competive Standard M15 deck when a block is about to rotate out? So I want to start playing competitive magic again, in the standard format (just started up again after about 6 years of not playing).

Is it worth it for me to build a competitive standard deck right now, considering that the RTR block will be rotating out and most competitive decks contain RTR cards? Or should I just play draft right now to build up cards that will be in the Theros block and will still be legal In standard play come this fall, and wait to see what decks are still competitive this fall after the new set rolls in?

I would seriously consider waiting for the rotation. Two, possibly three of the major decks (namely U/W Control, Mono-Black Devotion and possibly Mono-Blue, whose competitiveness will depend on on the strength of red in Tarkir block) will be completely transformed or outright lost to rotation.

I would focus on getting the key cards from Theros block/M15 that are safe vet to be used in decks after rotation. Stuff like Hero's Downfall, Sylvan Caryatid, Courser of Kruphix, Stormbreath Dragon, Nissa, WorldWaker, Elspeth, Sun's Champion etc.


What happens to a spell that is cast with flashback when it gets countered by a Remand? I know if a spell that has been cast with flashback is countered with a regular counter it is still exiled, but what about cards that return the card to the hand like Venser or Remand or even a counter that returns the card to the top of the library like  Memory Lapse?

Where does the flash-backed spell go then?

A spell that was cast using Flashback will always be exiled, no matter how it left the stack

702.33. Flashback
702.33a Flashback appears on some instants and sorceries. It represents two static abilities: one that functions while the card is in a player’s graveyard and another that functions while the card is on the stack. “Flashback [cost]” means “You may cast this card from your graveyard by paying [cost] rather than paying its mana cost” and “If the flashback cost was paid, exile this card instead of putting it anywhere else any time it would leave the stack.” Casting a spell using its flashback ability follows the rules for paying alternative costs in rules 601.2b and 601.2f–h.


In Dominion: Adventures, does the discarded Traveller have to be in hand, or can it have been played? I've read the instructions three times, and I can't understand whether the Traveller card being discarded can have been played that turn, then discarded in the clean up phase, or whether it should still be in hand at the clean up phase, and discarded at that point to trade up to the next level of Traveller.

Secondly, does one need sufficient coins to trade up to the next level during their buy phase, or is trading up free, costing only the discarded card?

I understand that the discarded card should go back in its original pile, not in the Trash pile. I'm just unclear on those two points mentioned above.

Thank you for your help!

From the rulebook, bottom of p5:

  When a player discards a Traveller from play, he may exchange
  it for the card indicated.

Your hand is never considered to be "in play":

  "In play" - Action cards and Treasure cards played face-up to a play area are in play until they are
  moved somewhere else—usually until they are discarded during a Clean-up phase.

So discarding it from your hand does not do anything; you must play it and then discard it from play at cleanup to trigger the exchange. You do not pay for the upgraded card - the upgraded version has a cost only because of the many cards like Remodel that care about a card's cost.


How can we remember to score points for claimed routes? When we play Ticket to Ride we sometimes forget to score the points and move the score markers. You know; you're playing not only to get points, but to enjoy the game. And when someone realises they forgot to score a route, we need to recalculate all the routes from the beginning, and that's not very fun.

What are the best ways to not forget that you need to score? Maybe there's a specific way to mark what you're going to do, like scoring first and only then paying for the route? But when playing games with tunnels I fear we could forget to "unscore" such points if we couldn't complete the route.

I hope we're not the only forgetful players out there, and someone already came up with a solution to this. We've played ten games so far and are still having this issue.

We usually just don't bother to score any points at all until the end of the game.  Then, you go over all the claimed routes and score them, as well as scores for tickets to determine the winner.


Ultimate Werewolf Good 10-12 Player setups I recently played a game of Werewolf where the moderator was not very experienced with the game, and (I feel, anyway) the whole setup was very one-sided.  After doing some reading of the rule book I admit I still don't really know how to make the game feel less 1-sided.

I know about the number system on the cards (try to balance to zero) and that there are some scenarios existing, but any tips or links on what to read for a good fun game would be much appreciated!

Also a little off-topic, should the players know what all is in the game at the beginning or not?  Thanks!

The question is not completely clear. But I give it a try.

The balance between werewolves and good villagers is important. A rule of thumb is 1/3 werewolves. But it is not that critical. A single smart werewolf can win versus 12 villagers and 5 werewolves can be beaten by 12. Note that on a typical night the wolves eat a villager and during the day there is a chance the villagers kill a wolf.
So if the balance (wolves, villagers) = (a, 2a). Then the balance on the next day is either (a-1, 2a-1) or (a, 2a-2).

The normal 12 player setup would be:

1 Seer
1 Witch
1 Hunter
1 Cupid
4 Villagers
4 wolves

Idea's to expand the game:

You can experiment with additional roles to spice up the game.
You can even try a game without wolves (the moderator selects the victim each night).
Try adding a theme to the setting. For example Call the village Waterloo, the villagers are the french, the wolves are enemy spies and the Mayor is called Napoleon.
Try adding extra elements.  For example, in the morning, there is a mysterious bottle in the village. The first player that drinks it, has the effects (this can be good (protected vs the wolves for the next night) or bad (you are dead)).

In order to enjoy the game it is important to see it as a team effort. Even if a single villager survives, the villagers have won as a team. (Same for wolves).

In a face to face game, I rarely let the players know in advance what the roles are. In a forum game, more information is needed so I often include the roles.


Agricola Family Growth by 2 (or more) Is it legal to use the Family Growth action to extend your family by 2 or even 3 if you have enough rooms? The rules do not forbid it, but they only talk in singular about the new family member.

You can add at most one newborn regardless of the number of empty rooms you might have.
The rules are clear on this:

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.
A player who chooses a Family growth action adds their newborn offspring to the Action space
In the Return home phase, the new Family member is taken home ...  A Player who takes the Family growth action will therefore have one additional (adult) Family
member to use from the following round onwards.


Does qGo + GNU Go save or load handicap games incorrectly and how can one work around it When I save a 2-stone handicap game with qGo 2.0.0 using GNU Go 3.9.1 as engine and then open it with the same software, the handicap stones are missing. This is quite annoying, as one has to imagine the missing stones and the scoring function will count them as territory or dame or treat the position as unsettled.

I can add them to the SGF file by hand, in which case they appear as unnumbered stones when I click the button for the first move, followed by white’s first move numbered 1.

It is evident that either the save or the load function is incorrect, and I suspect that it is the former, as handicap stones need not be on hoshi.

Does the file format prescribe how handicap stones should be saved?

If so, does qGo+GNU Go do it right?

Is this function performed by qGo or GNU Go?
Is the manual addition of the stones the best workaround?

Here is an example of an SGF-file saved and edited, with the handicap stones added by hand (AB[pd][dp] at the end of the second line):

(;GM[1]FF[4]AP[qGo:2.0.0]ST[1]
SZ[19]HA[2]KM[0]PW[Human]PB[Computer]AB[pd][dp]

;W[pp];B[cd];W[ed];B[hd];W[fc];B[np];W[qm];B[cg];W[cc];B[bc]
;W[dc];B[dk];W[cn];B[en];W[cq];B[cp];W[bp];B[bo];W[bq];B[bn]
;W[dq];B[gq];W[eq];B[oq];W[pg];B[nd];W[bb];B[pq];W[qq];B[qr]
;W[rq];B[qf];W[qg];B[pe];W[qc];B[rd];W[rb];B[pj];W[pb];B[nb]
;W[qd];B[re];W[rc];B[sc];W[ri];B[gb];W[gc];B[hc];W[fb];B[hb]
;W[ef];B[bd];W[nc];B[mc];W[oc];B[sb];W[mb];B[lb];W[md];B[ma]
;W[od];B[ne];W[oe];B[kc];W[of];B[me];W[ld];B[le];W[qe];B[jq]
;W[mg];B[eg];W[gf];B[fg];W[ff];B[rr];W[sr];B[qp];W[rp];B[qo]
;W[ro];B[po];W[qn];B[hj];W[gg];B[ep];W[mj];B[ml];W[ok];B[kk]
;W[on];B[mn];W[oo];B[op];W[pn];B[fi];W[gr];B[fr];W[fq];B[hr]
;W[gp];B[hq];W[fp];B[hp];W[er];B[cm];W[ho];B[go];W[fo];B[gn]
;W[fn];B[fm];W[gm];B[hn];W[hm];B[io];W[in];B[ho];W[fk];B[im]
;W[em];B[fl];W[el];B[gl];W[hl];B[gk];W[dn];B[dm];W[eo];B[fj]
;W[ek];B[dj];W[dg];B[dh];W[df];B[cf];W[ij];B[ji];W[ii];B[ik]
;W[jj];B[kj];W[jh];B[ki];W[hh];B[gs];W[co];B[nj];W[nk];B[pp]
;W[mk];B[kh];W[jg];B[mi];W[ni];B[nh];W[oi];B[mh];W[oh];B[lg]
;W[ng];B[nl];W[ol];B[ab];W[il];B[jk];W[cb];B[je];W[if];B[nm]
;W[om];B[ie];W[ll];B[lk];W[nn];B[mm];W[mo];B[mp];W[ln];B[jn]
;W[lp];B[lq];W[kp];B[kq];W[lf];B[kf];W[mf];B[no];W[lm];B[ko]
;W[kn];B[jp];W[jm];B[lo];W[in];B[hk];W[jo];B[ge];W[fe];B[ob]
;W[kg];B[jf];W[lh];B[li];W[ig];B[hi];W[gh];B[ih];W[lg];B[mn]
;W[mm];B[gd];W[gi];B[gj];W[de];B[fh];W[ce];B[be];W[rs];B[pr]
;W[ao];B[bm];W[an];B[am];W[ap];B[dl];W[oa];B[ej];W[en];B[jl]
;W[im];B[ii];W[nf];B[ke];W[ga];B[ha];W[fa];B[jn];W[km];B[qs]
;W[es];B[fs];W[hf];B[sq];W[sp];B[ss];W[rn];B[sq];W[lc];B[mb]
;W[sr];B[jo];W[sq];B[mo];W[ac];B[ad];W[dd];B[rs];W[ba];B[ac]
;W[aa];B[af];W[pa];B[he];W[na];B[fd];W[kl];B[lj];W[tt];B[tt]
TB[ae][ag][ah][ai][aj][ak][al][bf][bg][bh][bi][bj][bk][bl][ch]
  [ci][cj][ck][cl][di][eh][ei][gr][hs][ia][ib][ic][id][ij][ip]
  [iq][ir][is][ja][jb][jc][jd][jj][jr][js][ka][kb][kd][kp][kr]
  [ks][la][lc][ld][lp][lr][ls][md][mq][mr][ms][nq][nr][ns][or]
  [os][ps]
TW[aq][ar][as][br][bs][ca][cp][cr][cs][da][db][do][dp][dr][ds]
  [ea][eb][ec][ee][ep][hg][ml][nj][nl][nm][og][oj][pc][pd][pe]
  [pf][ph][pi][pj][pk][pl][pm][qa][qb][qf][qh][qi][qj][qk][ql]
  [ra][rd][re][rf][rg][rh][rj][rk][rl][rm][sa][sb][sc][sd][se]
  [sf][sg][sh][si][sj][sk][sl][sm][sn][so]
)

Summary

The specification shows that the file is wrongly saved and can be corrected by adding the AB property. The game seems to be saved by qGo.

Details

How to do it correctly

We can find the specification from Sensei’s Library SGF, which refers us to [SGF on Red Bean]http://www.red-bean.com/sgf/; there the specific properties for Go link to https://www.red-bean.com/sgf/go.html. There we see:

Property:   HA
Propvalue:  number
Propertytype:   game-info
Function:   Defines the number of handicap stones (>=2).
        If there is a handicap, the position should be set up with
        AB within the same node.
        HA itself doesn't add any stones to the board, nor does
        it imply any particular way of placing the handicap stones.
Related:    KM, RE, RU

So we conclude that the standard does specify how to set up handicap stones and that qGo (or GNU Go) does it wrong. Moreover, adding the AB property by hand is correct, as it yields the file as it should have been saved.

For n conventionally placed handicap stones, copy the line above n up to and including the “]” above the n from:

AB[dp][pd][dd][pp][jj]
         2   3   4   5
AB[dp][pd][dd][pp][dj][pj][jj]
                         6   7
AB[dp][pd][dd][pp][dj][pj][jd][jp][jj]
                                 8   9

Which code is in error

We can start GNU Go with a command-line interface with gnugo -level 20 (for example, and see in the help text that save file saves the game. Testing this, I see that the saved game (with two moves) includes the AB property:

(;GM[1]FF[4]
SZ[19]
GN[GNU Go 3.9.1 Random Seed 1519478141 level 20]
DT[2018-02-24]
KM[0.0]HA[2]RU[Japanese]AP[GNU Go:3.9.1]AB[pd][dp]
;W[pp];B[dd])

I conclude that qGo implements its own save function and does it wrong; perhaps it implements this in order to include the player names (PW & PB), territory (TW & TB) and something called style (ST[1]) which is described at https://www.red-bean.com/sgf/properties.html#ST:

Property:   ST
Propvalue:  number (range: 0-3)
Propertytype:   root
Function:   Defines how variations should be shown (this is needed to
        synchronize the comments with the variations). If ST is omitted
        viewers should offer the possibility to change the mode online.
        Basically most programs show variations in two ways:
        as markup on the board (if the variation contains a move)
        and/or as a list (in a separate window).
        The style number consists two options.
        1) show variations of successor node (children) (value: 0)
           show variations of current node   (siblings) (value: 1)
           affects markup & list
        2) do board markup         (value: 0)
           no (auto-) board markup (value: 2)
           affects markup only.
           Using no board markup could be used in problem collections
           or if variations are marked by subsequent properties.
           Viewers should take care, that the automatic variation
           board markup DOESN'T overwrite any markup of other
           properties.
        The  final number is calculated by adding the values of each
        option. Example: 3 = no board markup/variations of current node
                 1 = board markup/variations of current node
        Default value: 0
Related:    C, FF, GM, SZ, AP, CA


When does the Collapsed Ceiling deal damage? In the Pathfinder Adventure Card Game, the Collapsed Ceiling barrier card says in part:

If you fail the check to defeat by 4 or more, you are
dealt 1 Combat damage that may not be reduced.

The check to defeat is 8.  Does the ceiling do damage if my check total is less than 12 or if it's less than 4?

Please help!  My domestic tranquility is at stake!

Neither. The ceiling does damage if your check total is 4 or less.

...
check total = 3: Failed by 5 (failed by 4 or more): Failed with damage
check total = 4: Failed by 4 (failed by 4 or more): Failed with damage
check total = 5: Failed by 3 (failed by less than 4): Failed without damage
check total = 6: Failed by 2 (failed by less than 4): Failed without damage
check total = 7: Failed by 1 (failed by less than 4): Failed without damage
check total = 8: Passed the check
check total = 9: Passed the check
check total = 10: Passed the check
check total = 11: Passed the check
check total = 12: Passed the check[1]
...

Guessing from the little I know of the card, you're trying to dig your way through a room with a collapsed ceiling.

If you roll 8 or more, you succeeded.
If you roll 5, 6 or 7, you didn't make it through yet.
If you roll 4 or less, you didn't make it through yet, and you hurt yourself in the process (dropped a rock on your foot, stabbed yourself on a piece of rebar, pulled a muscle, etc).

If your total is 12, you didn't fail the check, by 4 or by any other amount.


When someone dies who controls a permanent but does not own it, what happens? In a multiplayer game, if I were to give someone a permanent with Donate and they were to die while controlling that permanent, then would I get that permanent back? Or would the permanent get put into a graveyard?

I am specifically wondering for Celestial Dawn but I figure it would be the same with any other permanent.

You get your permanent back.

  800.4. Unlike two-player games, multiplayer games can continue after one or more players have left the game.

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

Check out this related question for some more info: In Magic free-for-all multiplayer, what happens when someone dies?


Zero ATK Fighting zero ATK What happens if a 0 ATK monster attacks another 0 ATK monster?

I would say that since monsters do not have any attack, they can't do any damage, so nothing happens. On the other hand there is this rule stating that if a monster attacks an equal ATK monster, both monsters are destroyed during the fight.

I read a little bit of everything on the internet, what do you think about it?

Looking at the rules nothing happens:

  0 ATK monsters

  Monsters with 0 ATK cannot destroy anything by battle. If two Attack Position monsters with 0 ATK battle each other, neither monster is destroyed.

End of page 46 (or PDF page 50) here: https://img.yugioh-card.com/uk/rulebook/Rulebook_v9_en.pdf


Where can I play Carcassonne or Colonists of Catan online? Possible Duplicate:
  Boardgaming Online

I want to play Carcassonne or Colonists (Settlers) of Catan online, either against other people, or against a computer opponent.

I want to improve my skills so that I won't finish last when I play with my friends.
Where can I do that?

Brettspielwelt hosts Carcassonne and Settlers (as well as a number of other games) which you can play against other people, and Catan.com hosts Settlers, again against other people.

For playing against the computer, or other people, JCloisterZone is a great, free, downloadable clone of Carcassonne.


Would changing the value of Scrabble tiles have a negative effect on the game? This morning my Facebook friends are up in arms about a proposed re-valuation of Scrabble tiles in line with letter frequency in modern language usage:

Scrabble: Should letter values change?

All of them (admittedly they are mostly more casual gamers than me!) are united in the opinion that any normalisation of the tile values would be tampering with, and probably even breaking, something that isn't broken.

My own viewpoint is that the only real consequence of such a change would be to reduce the swinginess inherent in the game from, e.g. drawing and scoring big points from the Z.  I want to know whether it would be fair of me to tell my friends, "well, by all means argue for keeping the tile values as they are, but be aware that what you're arguing for is keeping the ratio of skill to luck in the game weighted towards luck".

Of course perhaps it's me that's missing the point, and there would be unforeseen negative consequences to gameplay and fun from reassigning the letters with "fairer" values.  Can anyone think of any?

The article says that the changing dictionary has changed the values of letters, and this seems like a very good point. For example, the existence of a single word, ZA, listed as entering the language in the mid-late 60s, makes the Z much easier to play. (I wish I had an old dictionary to figure out when the even-more-important QI entered English dictionaries!)

However, there already exists a "Scrabble-inspired" game with different tile values, of course: Words With Friends. (That game seems to have made their letter value choices based on different guidelines than the article; for instance, its G is still more valuable than an M.) Players who are good at Scrabble are still good at Words with Friends; I would not expect to see any differences in win percentages below the master level of play. Ultimately, your luck in your tiles' value is largely outweighed by your luck in drawing tiles that go well together; a good blend of consonants and vowels, for instance, and plenty of the powerful S (which would be the best tile to draw even if it were worth 0).


Do abilities that say "each player/opponent" target, and can I change who's affected? If an ability that affects all players is used, then does that make each player a target of the effect?

I.e. Is Guttersnipe activated am I able to change the target of the ability?

No, only things chosen for the word "target" are targets.

One notable exception is Aura enchantments, which are cast targeting the thing you want to enchant even though the word "target" does not appear on them (rule 303.4a).


Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx vs Contamination In my current meta one of the players likes to play Contamination.  If I have a Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx in play, and my opponent has a Contamination, would it be possible to produce non-black mana with the Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx?

With Contamination on the battlefield, you cannot get anything other than a single black mana from activating Nykthos's abilities.

The current wording of Contamination's second ability says:

  If a land is tapped for mana, it produces {B} instead of any other type and amount.

This is a replacement effect (indicated by the word "instead") that modifies the effect of tapping a land for mana. Rules section 106 has the following relevant rules about tapping for mana:

  106.12. To “tap [a permanent] for mana” is to activate a mana ability of that permanent that includes the {T} symbol in its activation cost. See rule 605, “Mana Abilities.”
  106.12b A replacement effect that applies if a permanent “is tapped for mana” or tapped for mana of a specific type and/or amount modifies the mana production event while such an ability is resolving and producing mana or the specified type and/or amount of mana.

Both of Nykthos's abilities have the {T} (tap) symbol in the cost, so both are modified by Contamination's ability. So, if you activate either one, no matter what mana you would normally get, you get exactly one black mana instead.


Source for Dragonology rules? Recently acquired a copy of Dragonology via an Estate Sale, and there were no rules.  Based on the article at board game geek, it looks like we have everything we need, except the rules.

I followed several links in internet searches, but they seemed to lead to phishing sites.  I couldn't find any legitimate (or non-evil) looking download for the rules.

Board Game Geek doesn't have an "official" website either for the game, nor could I find one.

We just got the game a few weeks ago as well. I found the rules here:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/6u03sg6m6dvtesn/rules.pdf?dl=1


When is a Spell considered to be "Cast"? Is a spell "Cast" when it is first declared and put on the stack?  Or when it resolves?

I used to think it was when it resolves.  But I think I am wrong.

For example, if my opponent puts a creature spell on the stack, then I put the spell Silence on the stack, it sounds like all spells on the stack will still resolve.  (I get that any other spells can also go on the stack and resolve until Silence resolves.)

So I guess that spells that use the word "Cast" mean when they are first put on the stack?

Neither. A spell is cast after its costs are payed, before anyone has a chance to respond to it, before it resolves. From the rules:

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

So yes, if you cast Silence, it will be too late to stop any spells that are already on the stack. This is also important for effects that say "whenever you cast a spell", for example.


Accessing an Archived Ambush Can cards in archives affect the runner without explicitly saying they do?
In the rulebook on page 6, it describes archives like so (emphasis mine):

Archives- This is the Corporation’s trash pile. Archives is
kept adjacent to R&D. This is where Corporation cards are
placed when they are trashed or discarded. Cards in
Archives are inactive.

However, rules can be trumped by special abilities on cards. Compare the cards Snare! and Shi.Kyū.
Snare!:

If Snare! is accessed from R&D, the Runner must reveal it.
If you pay 4[Credits] when the Runner accesses Snare!, do 3 net damage and give the Runner 1 tag. Ignore this effect if the Runner accesses Snare! from Archives.

Shi.Kyū:

When the Runner accesses Shi.Kyū, you may pay X[Credits]. The Runner must take either X net damage or add Shi.Kyū to his or her score area as an agenda worth −1 agenda point. Ignore this ability if the Runner accesses Shi.Kyū from R&D.

So, does Shi.Kyū affect the runner if they access it from archives? It doesn't mention archives, so you'd think the default would be inactive (and therefore not harmful to the runner). But then why would Snare! explicitly mention that it doesn't work in archives? Is it just being redundant?

Base rules state that the runner accesses all cards in Archives when they access Archives.  When they do, they resolve the effects of the cards normally.  This goes for things like Shock, NAPD Contracts, and Shi.Kyu.  However, text on the card always overrides basic rules in the game.  You can see this with cards like Snare! and Fetal AI where they specifically do not trigger their abilities if they are being accessed from Archives.  However, Fetal DOES still cost the two credits to steal from Archives, as that ability is not suppressed in Archives.

This is why a Jinteki thousand-cuts deck is deadly.  Even if a Shock is trashed, it's still deadly in Archives and will happen every time the Runner tries to access that server.  Another thing to note is that Personal Evolution still happens after the Runner steals any agenda from Archives.

One note on this, however.  Even though the Runner has to access everything if they want it to be considered a successful run, they are allowed to choose the order in which they access these cards.  So, if you would access Archives and steal your final few points, you do not flatline as a result of other cards doing damage to you.  Nice to know when Jinteki starts really burying their agendas in there.


Double Deck Solitaire for PC 1989-1992 Looking for the name and information on a solitaire game found in early releases of solitaire for the PC (circa 1989-1991).

It used two decks, eight foundation piles and a tableau with maybe 3 rows of 4 piles?

The object was to build up on the foundations (which began with queens perhaps).  One foundation went up by ones, one by twos, one by threes, and one by fours, I believe.

Was it called Queen Solitaire or King Solitaire, perhaps?

This sounds a lot like Picture Gallery Solitaire, a game that was put out for Palm.

I believe you can find an implementation on SourceForge.


Where can I find an opening database of professional games for 9x9 Go? I'm looking for an opening database (also called game explorer) for 9x9 Go, showing in every position the percentage of times each move is played and also possibly the percentage of times each move leads to a win for Black.

The database must only include games played by professionals.

Just like the following database, but for 9x9 instead of 19x19: http://ps.waltheri.net/

It doesn't matter if there are not a lot of games in the database. Even a hundred games would be sufficient.

Edit:
I found one! Here it is: https://online-go.com/puzzle/181
But I would still be interested in other databases. So if somebody else finds another 9x9 database, with at least as much games (361) as the previous one, please do give me its link.

It's not professional games but they are between very strong players:
http://dcook.org/compgo/9by9_experiments.html

This has tons of games:
http://gobase.org/9x9/


Simplest finesses in Spades? A finesse is a technique which enable a player to win a trick when an opponent is holding a stronger card.
I read several articles about finesse in contract Bridge, and I interested, What are the best finesses to use in Spades?
I see 2.5 major differences between Bridge and Spades that may prevent some of the finesses:

There is no Dummy player with an open hand,

There is only one round of bidding, thus players have less information about other hands,

Signal scheme are much more common in Bridge than in Spades.

The theory of Bridge describes many types of finesses:

Basic finesse
Double finesse
High card finesse
Two way finesse
Deep finesse (defenders have 3 cards higher)
Secondary finesse
Repeat finesse
Entry retention finesse

For more see:

Many Ways to Finesse by John Grossmann
Richard Pavlicek list of finesse

The smaller amount of information in Spades means it is hard to purposefully start a finesse, but you can still easily continue one if it is started by accident. For example, your partner happens to lead small and first opponent plays small, and you are holding the AQ. You can now play the Q and hope that the K is not in the remaining opponent's hand. In Bridge in the simplest model, this has a half chance of working because you don't know which opponent has your missing K. Here in the simplest model it's very similar: there's a 1/3 chance your choice doesn't matter at all (because your partner has the K), but when deciding your move you should assume that your choice does matter (such an assumption will never hurt you), and so there's effectively still a half-half chance of success.


Can a worker leave a territory controlled by an enemy mech? I have already unlocked the +1 movement mech upgrade. I take one of my workers inside my mech, I use one of my movements for move this mech with the worker inside to a place where already are an enemy mech. I know my mech cant move more, cant use this +1 movement upgrade, need stay there and resolve the fight. But the question is, I have still one more movement for whatever other of my units before resolve that, so can I (with this other second movement) move this worker that was "inside my mech" out from this spot to other spot?

No. The worker cannot leave a territory controlled by an enemy Mech. The rulebook says:

If your character or mech move into a territory
controlled by an opponent’s character and/or mechs,
its movement ends (even if you have a mech ability
that would allow it to move further). The opponent
still temporarily controls that territory. After you’ve
completed all Move actions, if any of your mechs or
your character share a territory with an opponent’s
character or mechs, combat happens (see Combat
section, pages 22-23).

Your workers cannot move by themselves into or out
of territories controlled by opponent characters and/
or mechs.


Can I buy a card without any treasure cards on my hand? Our English-speaking friends surprised us in a game of Dominion when buying cards with no treasure cards on their hands. In the German booklet, a treasure card is explicitly required to perform a buy (emphasis mine):

  Um eine Karte zu kaufen, legt der Spieler eine oder mehrere Geldkarten aus seiner Hand offen auf den Tisch.

A literal translation of the above would be:

“In order to buy a card, the player plays one or more treasure cards from his hand to the table."

However, the English booklet contains the following phrase (emphasis mine):

  The player may play some or all of the treasure cards from his hand to his play area [...]

Given the English rule book, I wasn't able to prove their move illegal.

So, can I buy a card without any treasure cards on my hand?

Short answer: yes, its possible and it has been officially acknowledged that the German rules are wrong.
Long answer: as you have already quoted from the base game rules (emphasis mine)

The cost of a card is in its lower left corner. The player may play some or all of the Treasure cards from his hand to his play area and add to their value the coins provided by Action cards played this turn.

Your total available money comes from played treasures and action cards.
An additional example for a leftover buy:

If he wants to use all 6 coins to buy one card, he can buy a Copper (for free) with his second Buy or not buy a second card. Players do not have to use any or all of their Buys.

This example makes clear that you can buy cards for free, thus you are not required to play any treasure cards.
The English rules are the original ones and take precedence over any translation. Furthermore, Hans im Glück, the German Publisher, have officially - and indirectly - acknowledged that this phrase in the rules is wrong. From their "Regelfragen" Rules Questions page

Kauf
Zitat aus der Regel: "Um eine Karte zu kaufen, legt der Spieler eine der mehrere Geldkarten aus seiner Hand offen auf dem Tisch aus. Zu diesen Geldkarten kann er das virtuelle Geld auf seinen zuvor usgelegten Aktionskarten hinzu zählen."
Dies bedeutet nicht, dass es nötig ist Geldkarten auszulegen um die Boni durch virtuelles Geld nutzen zu können. Es können auch Käufe ohne eine einzige ausgelegte Geldkarte durchgeführt werden.
Karten die 0 Kosten, können immer gekauft werden, solange der dafür nötige "Kauf" vorhanden ist.

Which roughly translates to:

This does not mean that Treasure Cards must be played in order to be able to use the virtual money. Purchases without playing any Treasure Cards may be carried out in this way.


Can you hoard a Wild or Wild +4? Say you have a Wild card, and a blue 7, suddenly a person places a green 9. Technically, you have a playable card (the Wild), but you want to save it for your last card for a guaranteed win.

Are you allowed to save the Wild card even though it’s playable, instead drawing from the pile for a different playable card?

In short, yes; it's called "reneging".

Here's a snippet from the PDF of Uno's rules from Mattel's service website.


Ambassador Counteraction in Coup In the card game Coup, assume that player 1 states they are the Captain and takes 2 coins from player 2. Then if player 2 challenges player 1 they risk losing 1 card. But if instead they block player 1 by claiming to be the Ambassador then they still risk losing only 1 card. Is that correct? If so, what's the difference?

If player 1 takes an action then Player 2 has 3 options.

They let the action go through
They can challenge the action and if they are correct then Player 1 loses a card, if they are wrong then Player 2 loses a card.
They can claim a blocking action and that leaves Player 1 with the first two choices that Player 2 had.

What the big difference is that if Player 2 claims a block then the decision and risk of losing a card shifts back to Player 1. Which in the case that Player 2 is correct it would mean Player 1 could lose a card for the challenge. So it puts more risk on Player 1 then Player 2.


Wort, Boggart Auntie and Goblins with Echo So, I've got an EDH deck featuring Wort, Boggart Auntie as my General. I really want to exploit her ability for all it's worth, so I've been looking for different goblins that have "Enters the Battlefield" effects and/or sacrifice effects. I can across two with Echo that seem like they'd work really well: Mogg War Marshal and Stingscourger.

Let's say that I cast Mogg War Marshal last turn and that I have Wort in play. During my upkeep, can I decline Mogg War Marshal's Echo cost, sending it to the graveyard and then retrieve it with Wort?

If a triggered ability has a target, you have to choose the target when it goes on the stack.  The target has to be valid both when the ability triggers, and when it resolves.  From the rulebook:

  114.1d A triggered ability is targeted if it identifies something it will affect by using the phrase “target [something],” where the
  “something” is a phrase that describes an object, player, or zone. The
  target(s) are chosen as the ability is put on the stack; see rule
  603.3d.

You get to choose the order in which the triggers go on the stack.  But in this case, that won't help you.  Wort's trigger always happens before Marshall's trigger resolves.  So when Wort's trigger goes on the stack, the Marshall is not yet in the graveyard.  So it is not a valid target for Wort's ability.


What's different in San Juan's second edition? I just bought a copy of San Juan after playing it a few times on iPad and loving it. When I got it home, I saw that it is the second edition. On Board Game Geek, first and second editions have their own entries. What's new/different in San Juan's second edition that it would get classified as a separate game?

Artwork and the following.

The Prefecture now costs 4 instead of 3.
With the Goldmine, you now get to keep the cheapest card instead of any card.
With the Guildhall, you get 1 point per production building and 1 point for each different production building.
New building Hut: "In the trader phase, the owner of a hut draws one card from the supply if no good was sold by any player during this phase."
The Bank now costs 3 instead of 4.

And yes this is a copy paste from BGG, if you don't want that please explain how BGG didn't fully explain this.

Link: https://boardgamegeek.com/thread/1330934/differences-between-1ed-and-2ed


Can I still crown a king if I run out of pieces? Let's say in checkers, I somehow manage to get seven pieces crowned. I only have twelve chips, but I would need fourteen chips to crown seven kings. What do I do? What if the opponent doesn't have enough non-playable chips to give me either?

(Warning: Clicking on the rulebook link below will download a Word document.)

From the American Checkers Federation's official rulebook (emphasis mine):

  1.16  When a man reaches the farthest row forward (known as the “king-row” or “crown-head”) it becomes a king, and this completes the turn of play. The man can be crowned by either player ( ) by placing a man of the same colour on top of it before the next move is made. (It may be necessary to borrow from another set if no captured man is available for the purpose).

Like the rules say, if you run out of pieces, you can just borrow from another set. You are not limited by the number of pieces in your set.

If you are playing casually with friends, you can crown a king using coins, dice, torn pieces of paper, etc. As long as the board state is clear to you and your friends, it doesn't really matter how you crown your kings.


Does "advance the active mystery" apply to an AO's final mystery? The two most recent expansions for Eldritch Horror have introduced the "advance the active mystery" effect that makes it possible to make progress on the mysteries via other channels. How this works with the normal mysteries, drawn from the Ancient One's mystery deck, is clear enough.

But does this also apply to an AO's final mystery, on the AO card's backside.

During last night's game we had successfully completed all the necessary 'normal' mysteries and were dealing with Syzygy's final mystery when an encounter card instructed us to "advance the active mystery".

The two possible interpretations were:

Advance the final mystery as it is the one we are actively trying to solve
The final mystery is a special case and can not be viewed as an active mystery, that title referring only to the "normal" mysteries.

Ultimately, we resolved this by applying the rule "when not sure about a rule, interpret it in the manner least beneficial to the investigators". I.e. we went with #2.

Given that Syzygy always requires you to resolve the final mystery, this is very likely to come up again. It would thus by very nice to know if there is an official ruling on this.

Further digging turned up this thread where official rule clarifications from the maker of the game have been gathered.

Turns out it this has been addressed.

  How do the effects "advance/solve the active Mystery" interact with the Final Mystery?

  Quote :

    The Final Mystery is not the active Mystery. As such, “advance the active Mystery” and “solve the active Mystery” effects will not affect the Final Mystery.

So, it seems I was correct in how I played it.