Best cross-country route in TTR USA? There are a number of potential cross country routes in Ticket to Ride USA:

the northern route (via Canada, Vancouver to Montreal)
the mid northern route (Seattle-Helena-Duluth-Sault St. Marie)
the central route (SF-Salt Lake City-Denver-St. Louis etc.)
the southern route (LA-El Paso-Houston-New Orleans-Miami)

Are any of these cross-country routes definitively more or less advantageous? What about with the 1910 expansion?

Another way to phrase this is, based on an analysis of the available tickets and scoring, within the framework of a cross-country strategy, are any of the potential cross-country routes particularly advantageous over another? Or are they essentially equal?

Please note: This answer is predicated on the use of the 1910 expansion pack. The analysis for which tickets are available for which route will not be valid for the "vanilla" Ticket To Ride: USA game, but the other elements of analysis (which routes are easier to build, get more points for building the routes themselves) will still be of value.

On a basic level, each of the four cross-country routes executes the same game plan: get across the country to connect as many high-value tickets as possible. There are of course other game plans, but if you wanted to use a cross country route, here is some advice.

Some ways to analyze our options are:

The number of turns it takes to build all of the lines (if it takes fewer turns to lay down the trains, then you can use more turns for picking trains, getting tickets, etc.)
The value of the trains for the lines (the actual value of building the trains themselves)
The number of trains it takes across the country (higher can be better because it helps get the longest train card, however lower can also be advantageous because you need to collect fewer train cards, and gives you more trains to do other building with)
The tickets that you can potentially complete using said route -- for example, if you can get Los Angeles to New York, you can get Los Angeles to Chicago relatively easily (but only if take the central route)

Depending on what you want to prioritize, the routes will be appealing to different amounts.

Before attempting to analyze the routes, here are the routes themselves:

Northern Route: Vancouver-Calgary-Winnipeg-Sault St. Marie-Montreal-New York (alternately, the so-called "more southernly northern route": Vancouver-Calgary-Winnipeg-Sault St. Marie-Toronto-Pittsburgh-New York)
Mid-Northern Route: Seattle-Helena-Duluth-Toronto-Pittsburgh-New York
Central Route: San Francisco-Salt Lake City-Denver-Kansas City-Saint Louis- Pittsburgh-New York
Southern Route: Los Angeles-El Paso-Houston-New Orleans-Miami

Number of turns

Northern route: 5 turns to build (vs. the "southernly northern route": 6 turns)
Mid-northern route: 5 turns to build
Central route: 6 turns to build (via Chicago: 7 turns)
Southern route: 4 turns to build

Value of trains

Northern route: 51 points (vs. the "southernly northern route": 43 points)
Mid-northern route: 49 points
Central route: 35 points (via Chicago: 31 points)
Southern route: 49 points

Number of trains it takes to cross the country

Northern route: 23 trains
Mid-northern route: 22 trains
Central route: 21 trains
Southern route: 20 trains

Tickets that can be completed

To assess this, we can see which tickets are completed within the route itself (i.e. you don't have to do any additional work - if you get the route, you can get the ticket) and those which are easily completed if you get the route (i.e. if you build a couple more times, you can get the ticket).

Also, the question of which tickets can be completed is predicated on which ones you actually get. So in a game with fewer players, of course you have a better chance of getting the specific tickets you want. You also have to be prepared to spend many turns taking tickets and hoping you get the right ones - which is why no strategy is foolproof. You can always just get the wrong tickets.

Northern Route

Tickets completed within the route itself:

Vancouver-Montreal (20 points)

Tickets easily completed from off of the route:

Seattle-New York (20 points, requires 2 extra routes)
Vancouver-Duluth (13 points, requires 1 extra route)
Vancouver-Denver (11 points, requires 2 extra routes)
Portland-Nashville (17 points, requires 4 extra routes -- yes, this one is a long shot -- unless you use the "more southern" option that goes through Toronto and Pittsburgh, in which case it only requires 2 extra routes)

Mid-northern route

Tickets completed within the route itself:

Seattle-New York (20 points)

Tickets easily completed from off of the route:

Portland-Pittsburgh (19 points, requires 1 extra route)
Vancouver-Duluth (13 points, requires 1 extra route)
Denver-Pittsburgh (11 points, requires 1 extra route)
Chicago-New York (5 points, requires 1 extra route)
Vancouver-Montreal (20 points, requires 2 extra routes)
Seattle-Oklahoma City (14 points, requiers 2 extra routes)
Vancouver-Denver (11 points, requires 2 extra routes)
Portland-Nashville (17 points, requires 3 extra route)

Central route

Tickets completed within the route itself:

Denver-Pittsburgh (11 points)
Salt Lake City-Kansas City (7 points)
Denver-Saint Louis (6 points)

Tickets easily completed from off of the route:

Salt Lake City-Chicago (11 points, requires 1 extra route, unless you reroute through Chicago)
Chicago-New York (5 points, requires 1 extra route, unless you reroute through Chicago)
San Francisco-Washington (21 points, requires 1 extra route)
Las Vegas-New York (19 points, requires 1 extra route)
8 Portland-Pittsburgh (11 points, requires 1 extra route)
Kansas City-Boston (7 points), requires 1 extra route)
Seattle-New York (20 points, requires 2 extra routes)
San Francisco-Atlanta (17 points, requires 2 extra routes)
Portland-Nashville (17 points, requires 2 extra routes)
San Francisco-Atlanta (17 points, requires 2 extra routes)
Chicago-Santa Fe (9 points, requires 2 extra routes, unless you rereoute through Chicago)
Chicago-Boston (7 points, requires 2 extra routes)
Los Angeles-Atlanta (15 points, requires 3 extra routes)
Seattle-Oklahoma City (14 points, requires 3 extra routes)

Southern route

Tickets completed within the route itself:

Los Angeles-Miami (19 points)

*Tickets easily completed from off of the route:*

Las Vegas-Miami (21 points, requires 1 extra route)
Los Angeles-Atlanta (15 points, requires 1 extra route)
Los Angeles-Oklahoma City (9 points, requires 1 extra route)
San Francisco-Atlanta (17 points, requires 2 extra routes)
St. Louis-Miami (8 points, requires 2 extra routes)

What does this tell us?

The Northern route via Montreal is perhaps the most out-of-the-way route: there are not a huge number of tickets to complete if you keep to the top of the board. However, if you compromise on using long trains only, and go Sault St. Marie-Toronto-Pittsburgh-New York instead of Sault St. Marie-Montreal-New-York, you have more potential tickets, because many tickets stop in Pittsburgh

The mid-northern route completes very few tickets in and of itself. However, off of this route there are a great many "high value" tickets which can be completed. This also means that there isn't as much competition for it, both because it consists of so many 6-train routes (and none of them are gray!), and because relatively few tickets go to Helena, Duluth, or Toronto.

The central route has the most versatility, due to the fact that it is in the middle of the board and so you can build off of it in both northern and southern directions.

The southern route is perhaps most difficult to complete, because the Houston-New Orleans route can be taken easily, and is highly valuable. If you choose this route, take that quickly; but it may give away your strategy.

The southern route clearly has the highest route points per turn necessary to build the route, and can be built quickly. So the southern route works best in conjunction with another strategy, such as building up the east coast (which gives access to many other tickets such as Los Angeles-New York, etc).

If you choose the central route, going through Chicago will get you more potential tickets, but you will lose a turn and 4 points by building two routes (St. Louis-Chicago and Chicago-Pittsburgh) rather than the single St. Louis-Pittsburgh route.

Though it is the most versatile (and can be completed even if there is competition over it, due to the double-routes), the central route has a number of downsides. It takes many turns to build, which reduces the number of chances to take tickets - a central element to the basic strategy of trying to complete as many tickets off of your main route. In addition, it is worth far fewer points in and of itself. Especially if you go through Chicago, in which case you both lose a turn building, and there can be a 20 points difference between the central route and the northern route! It is also the most visible of the routes -- since it has so many double routes -- and so people gravitate towards it and it is highly contested.

Plus there's the element of luck. You can't quite just pick a strategy and get the tickets you want. In many ways the appropriate strategy is based on the random tickets you get at the beginning if the game.

In the end, the routes are very balanced - as one would expect from a game which exhibits such high replay value.


Anybody know what game this belongs to Any body have any guesses to which game these belong .... most likely a card/dice combo

It took me a while to recognize the dice, but I think they are from a Jenga-like game that I played when I was younger (20-25 years ago). It was called Timber, but I have a hard time finding pictures of it, the best I could do was this:

I can only find local (I'm from the Netherlands) references to the game, for example the Dutch wikipedia for Jenga mentions the following:

Een variant van dit spel is "Timber", waarbij de toren bestaat uit lagen van rode, gele en blauwe blokken. Hierbij dient telkens een kleur te worden gegooid met een dobbelsteen en mag alleen een blok van de gegooide kleur uit een willekeurige laag worden gepakt.

Which translates to:

A variation of this game is "Timber", where the tower is made up from layers of red, yellow and blue blocks. A dice is thrown every turn, resulting in a color and you can only remove a block of that color from an arbitrary layer.

The Dutch wikipedia on dice also mentions this version of the game and the dice, stating the following:

In de Jenga-variant Timber wordt een dobbelsteen met kleuren gebruikt. De kleuren zijn rood, blauw en geel, twee van elk.

Which translates to:

In the Jenga variation Timber, a colured die is used. The colors are red, blue and yellow, two sides of each.

And from memory I recall that game using these dice. I don't think you necessarily need to stack the blocks like in the picture, I thought it could also be alternating layers of red, yellow and blue blocks.
EDIT: I also found the game on boardgamegeek.com and it would be called Klumpeduns, only thing is that the dice on that link don't exactly match the dice in your picture.


Do you get an extra turn at the end of the age? If you build a wonder that gives you another turn as the last turn in an age, and there are no cards left, do you forfeit the extra turn?

In the rulebook in small italicized text on page ten above the header 1. Construct a Building

it states:

  If a player has a replay effect that would allow them to take another turn at the end of an Age (when the structure is empty), the effect is lost.


What books do I need to get all the rules for the Tyranid armies units/formations/detachments? I have the Tyranid codex and got the Shield of Baal: Leviathan supplement but what other books or datasheets would I need to get all of the rules for my army? I would like to get as many of these in physical form as possible.

Also is it worth picking up these books with so many rumors about 8th edition floating around? I stopped playing in 5th but 3rd to 4th to 5th didn't invalidate all the books until a new codex was released. Is this how 5th to 6th to 7th went as well?

Current main resources for Tyrannids are

Codex

The Codex is the only one that is needed to run a Tyranid army, but the Shield of Baal series and Rising Leviathan dataslates do provide some additional formations (noted with the [F] below).

Additional resources include:

Shield of Baal: Deathstorm (Children of Cryptus, Phodian Hive Warriors, The Beast of Phodia, Phodian Annihilation Swarm [F])
Shield of Baal: Leviathan (Hive Fleet Detachment, Mucolid Spore Cluster, Zoanthrope Brood, Maleceptor,Toxicrene, Tyrannocyte, Sporocyst, Hypertoxic Node [F], Neural Node [F], Skytyrant Swarm [F], Skyblight Swarm [F], Sporefield [F], Skytide [F])
Start Collecting! Tyranids (Hive Vanguard [F])
Dataslate Tyranid Vanguard - Rising Leviathan I (Lictor Forest Brood [F], Manufactorum Genestealers [F], Deathleaper's Assassin Brood [F], Broodlord's Hunting Pack [F], Gargoyle Bio-Bombs [F])
Dataslate Tyranid Invasion - Rising Leviathan II (Incubator Node [f], Synaptic Swarm [F], Skyblight Swarm [F], Living Artillery Node [F], Endless Swarm [F])
Dataslate Tyranid Onslaught - Rising Leviathan III (Bioblast Node [F], Wrecker Nide [F], Tyrant Node [F], Subterranean Swarm [F], Living Tide [F])

As for holding off to buy them, that's your call. Rumour has 8th Ed dropping around June/July apparently, that said though it will take time for them to update all the current codex's to the new edition, so by no means will they be immediately invalidated.


How can make a balanced equipment deck with seasons 1 and 2, and TCM? When playing with both season 1 and 2, and TCM, what is the best way to build the equipment deck so it is not unbalanced? It seems like the likelihood of drawing a three damage weapon is quite low with all the cards together.

It seems like the likelihood of drawing a three damage weapon is quite low with all the cards together.

S1 alone is the worst. S1+S2 is about the same as just S2. Adding TCM greatly improves the odds.

S1: 2/52 = 3.8% (2 sets of Molotov ingredients)
S2: 3/71 = 4.2% (2 sets of Molotov ingredients, Concrete Saw)
S1+S2: 5/123 = 4.1%
S1+TCM* = 5:/69 = 7.2% (2 sets of .44 Magnum + Hollow-Point Rounds, Flamethrower)
S2+TCM* = 6/88 = 6.9%
S1+S2+TCM* = 8/140 = 5.7%

TCM* = TCM excluding Ultrareds.

  A better way to look at the question would be if the decks are already combined how should they be broken down?

S1 - 62 equipment cards

52-card deck:

4x Aaahh!
3x Bag of Rice
2x Baseball Bat
3x Canned Food
2x Chainsaw
1x Crowbar
1x Fire Axe
2x Flashlight
2x Gasoline
2x Glass Bottles
1x Goalie Mask
2x Katana
4x Machete
2x Pistol
3x Plenty of Ammo (bullets)
3x Plenty of Ammo (shells)
2x Rifle
2x Scope
4x Sawed Off
2x Shotgun
2x Sub MG
3x Water

Set aside:

1x Crowbar
1x Evil Twins
1x Fire Axe
1x Ma's Shotgun
2x Molotov
3x Pan
1x Pistol

TCM - 23 equipment cards (itemized in the rulebook)

17 cards to add to deck:

2x .44 Magnum
2x Assault Rifle
2x Cookies
2x Gas Mask
1x Flamethrower
2x Hollow-Point Rounds
4x Laser Pointer
2x Spare Change

6 Ultrared cards to add to deck:

1x 911 Special
1x Betty
1x Doug's Dream
1x Jack & Jill
1x Ned's Atomic Flashlight
1x Sweet Sisters

Set aside:

1x Pa's Gun
4x Pan

S2:PO - 83 equipment cards (itemized in the rulebook)

71-card deck:

2x Automatic Shotgun
4x Aaahh!
3x Bag of Rice
2x Baseball Bat
3x Canned Food
2x Chainsaw
3x Claw Hammer
1x Concrete Saw
1x Fire Axe
2x Flashlight
2x Gasoline
2x Glass Bottles
4x Hatchet
2x Katana
4x Kukri
2x Meat Cleaver
2x Nails
5x Pistol
3x Plenty of Ammo (bullets)
3x Plenty of Ammo (shells)
2x Rifle
2x Riot Shield
4x Sawed Off
2x Scope
2x Shotgun
2x Sub MG
2x Wakizachi
3x Water

Set aside:

2x Gunblade
2x Nailbat
3x Nightstick
2x Molotov
1x Claw Hammer
1x Fire Axe
1x Pistol


Skilled Dark Magician's effect in response to attack What if I have a Skilled Dark Magician with two spell counters and my opponent uses a spell card (which would give me a third) and attacks, lets says with a monster that has less than 2500 attack.

Can I use his effect to summon Dark Magician and block his attack?

No you can't, because Skilled Dark Magician's effect is Spell Speed 1. In other words it is not a quick effect. This we can see from it's text:

  Each time a Spell Card is activated, place 1 Spell Counter on this card when that Spell resolves (max. 3). You can Tribute this card with 3 Spell Counters on it; Special Summon 1 "Dark Magician" from your hand, Deck, or GY.

We can see that it does not include "during either player's turn," or "(Quick Effect):", in it, which are the ways to know if some effect can be activated as a Quick Effect (Spell Speed 2+). For example, check the text of Crystal Wing Synchro Dragon to see an example of such wording.

This means that you can only activate it's effect during your turn (and only during your Main Phases), thus you can't do it during your opponent's Battle Phase.

If I may suggest, a card that could be really useful for you is Magical Dimension, which happens to be quick-play so you could indeed use it to "block" the attack by forcing a replay when the attack target leaves the field (and even destroy a card while at it):

  If you control a Spellcaster-Type monster: Target 1 monster you control; Tribute that target, then Special Summon 1 Spellcaster-Type monster from your hand, then you can destroy 1 monster on the field.


In 4-player Unspeakable Words, what is the likelihood of more than one player not going insane? Unspeakable Words is a word game where each player tries to score 100 points without going insane. Each player begins with 5 tokens that represent their sanity. Whenever a player scores a word, they roll a d20, and if the roll is greater than or equal to the points you scored, you don't lose a sanity token. If you lose all your sanity tokens, you lose the game.

What are the odds that 2 or more players would survive to 100 points in a 4-player game?

(Note: Assume players can always score words of the point value they wish between 1-20, and will not attempt actions that leave them with a less than 50% chance of winning)

This question's been unanswered for a while, so I thought I'd take a crack at it.  First up, I should say that I haven't looked at the four player case, just the two player game. The main reason for this is that it makes presenting the data a lot easier. I've put some graphs later, and you can see that they're already hard enough to understand for the two player case!  The methods I've used here could be applied to the four player game, the program would just take longer to finish as there are many more game states.

Assumptions

I've assumed a two player game, where players can choose to score between 1 and 20 points on their go. I've ignored the letter distribution, and whether it might be hard to score a large number of points in one turn.  I've assumed both players start from 0 points and 5 sanity, and have to get to 100 points without losing all their sanity.  I've accidentally alternated between the use of "sanity" and "lives", because this game is rather like a computer game where you start with five lives.

The script

I wrote a program to search through all possible game states for two players, and for each determined the best move.  This isn't as hard as it sounds, the positions near the end of the game are easy to find the best move, and then the positions earlier in the game quickly reduce to a position we've already considered.  The source code is here.

The output of the program is a lot of lines like:

2 3 3 13 [3, 0.16920657742104506]

This line means that if it's player 1's turn, and they have 2 sanity left and 3 points, and their opponent has 3 sanity and 13 points, then the best move is to make a word of length 3, which will give them a 17% chance of winning.

The results

The output of the program is 250000 lines long, which is not very accessible. I've converted this into a couple of graphs.  The first looks like this:

The graph is divided into 25 squares, representing the number of sanity tokens the two players have left. Each square is 100x100 pixels, representing possible pairs of scores. Each pixel represents a possible game state, and the colour shows the length of word player 1 should make to maximise their probability of winning.  Red represents states player 1 should score one point, green represents states player 1 should make 10 points, and blue represents states player 1 should make 20 points.  Colours in between represent values in between, e.g. the states where player 1 should make 3 points is shown by a reddish brown. The black areas are regions where player 2 can force a win, and so it makes no difference what player 1 does.

Another thing I looked at was the probability of player 1 winning in each state.  This second graph shows that:

In this graph white represents a forced win for player 1, and black represents a forced win for player 2.  The graph is not symmetric, as it's player 1's turn.

Conclusions

Some interesting features of the results above.

Steps

Within many of the inner squares there is a step-like pattern. This is clearest in the bottom right square. This is caused by a player being able to force a win. A player can force a win when they have more sanity left than the number of turns it will take them to get to 100.  The bottom right square is where the players have the most lives, and so a forced win is more common.

Rainbow Stripes

In the first graph, at the bottom of many of the inner squares, there are 'rainbow stripes'. These represent points at which player 1 can force a win in one turn. If they are on 99 points then they can force a win with a score of 1 (red), if they are on 80 points then they need a score of 20 (blue).

Dotty Red/Blue Regions

Towards the left of the first graph are some dotty red/blue regions, e.g.:

I'm not completely sure about why these exist. It could be a bug in the program, although I did check it through.  It might be related to the fact that when the probability of winning with different moves is the same, my program picks the largest score. The other thing I noticed was that the best moves, as shown by the link in the question, are the extreme scores.

First Player Advantage

My program gives the first player probability of winning for the starting position as 53.9%. It advises that the best move is to risk a 20 point score (if you don't lose a sanity then you have a forced win by continuing to make 20 point scores).


When a creature turns into a frog, does damage stay on it? I dealt 1 damage to a creature that my opponent controls. Then I want to cast Polymorphist's Jest and turn it into a 1/1 frog. Does damage stay on it or does all damage reset?

Damage stays on the creature.

This rule outlines all the situations in which damage would be removed from a creature, without a card explicitly saying so:

  119.6. Damage marked on a creature remains until the cleanup step, even if that permanent stops being a creature. If the total damage marked on a creature is greater than or equal to its toughness, that creature has been dealt lethal damage and is destroyed as a state-based action (see rule 704). All damage marked on a permanent is removed when it regenerates (see rule 701.13, "Regenerate") and during the cleanup step (see rule 514.2).

(emphasis added) Note that this rule says nothing about the creature turning into a different creature or changing its power/toughness or other characteristics. Since there is no rule that specifies that damage should be removed when those things happen, the damage stays.


Draughts: King required? Can one be compelled to use his king when there are alternative moves? Especially if that move will end up having the king killed. My opponent saud I was obligated to use the king.

No. You are never obliged directly to use a specific piece to move.

The only exception is trivial: a game played under forced capture rules where there is exactly one piece able to make a capturing move.

Even then, if that piece has a choice of captures, the player may choose which capture to make.

It is likely your opponent has either confused this rule with another, has played in environments with this uncommon variant rule, or the king had a capture available and no other pieces did.


Can Trap Hole be activated in response to Denko Sekka's summon? Trap Hole is a normal trap card (speed 2), and normal summon of Denko Sekka (speed 1). Trap hole (as I believe) is faster but doesn't include summon negation (it only destroys). I've read in some forums people saying you can only activate cards that has negation effect like Solemn Warning.

So my question can we activate Trap Hole against Denko Sekka?

So my question can we activate Trap Hole against Denko Sekka?

No.

The reason is because Trap Hole effect activates after the summoning of Denko Sekka, thus her effect is already in place. This is exactly the reason why Denko Sekka's effect is powerful.

Reading Trap Hole's effect, emphasis mine:

  When [that is after the summon is successful] your opponent Normal or Flip Summons 1 monster with 1000 or more ATK: Target that monster; destroy that target.

You could, however, negate and prevent her summoning altogether, with cards like Solemn Warning as you correctly pointed out. From its text, emphasis mine:

  When a monster(s) would be Summoned, OR when a Spell/Trap Card, or monster effect, is activated that includes an effect that Special Summons a monster(s): Pay 2000 LP; negate the Summon or activation, and if you do, destroy that card.


If a fighter can't land during combat, can they land on carriers moved to them during the non-combat move phase? If I move my fighters into combat and they can't make it back to sea, can I use my non-combat move phase to move my carriers to make it possible for them to land?

I am playing Axis and Allies 1940, 2nd Edition.

Yes, you can use your non-combat move phase to have a carrier move to a position so that those planes that were moved in the combat move phase can land. Fighters land in the non-combat move phase of the turn.

When you move fighters in the combat move phase, you can only move them to squares where you can show that it is possible (even if it doesn't end up happening, see below) that they have some way for them to land in the non-combat phase.

Note that providing a landing for your fighters is not optional, it is mandatory. However, it is only required to show it is possible, and not carry out the movement. If the fighters are destroyed, you no longer need to provide a somewhere for them to land, and the carrier can move elsewhere in the non-combat movement phase.


Can a player lose their last army? I know that a a region with a player's last army cannot be invaded.

However, I played a solo game and the dummy player kept starting wars with their last army. I consistently won those wars and played so that they retreat to the nearest empty region, whilst paying the relevant food cost.

My question is, was I playing this correctly and a player can never lose their last army (even if they suicidally throw it away)?

From the core rules:

  You may never enter a region occupied by an opposing player’s last meeple
  (i.e., the only meeple they have in play), nor may you use your last meeple to
  enter a region occupied by an opponent.

From the solo rules:

  If [the meeple] cannot move in the selected direction, continue clockwise until you find a region it can move into.

and

  The dummy player may always collect resources if they are unable to fulfill the action, even if they are the active player.

So suicidally throwing away your last army is illegal for both real players and the dummy, and the dummy will choose a different place to move instead (or collect resources if there are no legal moves).


Can Calamity Janet play a Punch as Missed? She can play BANG! cards as Missed! cards and vice versa: can she use a Punch (or any other BANG card, e.g. Knife or Buffalo Rifle) as Missed?
Vice versa, can she use an Iron plate as a Bang?
If I take, for example, Jourdonnais, he can use his ability also when he's hit by something different from the card BANG!. I'd tend to think the same is true for Calamity Janet too.

No she can not play a punch as a miss. BANG! are specific cards and those are the only one she can use as a miss. There are other cards that can be used to damage players but they are not considered a BANG!. One of the key parts of a BANG! is you can only play one of them a turn unless you got a card that says otherwise and a punch or other damage card can be played as many times as you want.


How do you run a short multiplayer Conspiracy draft tournament? There is a new set in Magic the Gathering coming out, called Conspiracy. Conspiracy is a set specifically designed for drafting, and notably, multiplayer games.

My question revolves around how to fairly run a tournament for a multiplayer draft.

Normally my group of 6-8 will play 3-4 rounds of swiss pairings, where 3 points are awarded for a win, 1 for a tie, and 0 for a loss. Tie breaks are based off of things such as games won percentage and opponents win percentage (we use mtgarena.appspot.com for handling this part). Our drafts normally take around 4 hours (an evening after work). We have a lot of experience with this and are very comfortable with it.

Now, I do not have a lot of experience playing multiplayer magic, but in my experience games tend to take a lot longer.

Is there a "standard" way of running a multiplayer tournament?
How do you determine who plays who in a round?
Is it feasible to run a "fair" multiplayer tournament in 4-5 hours?

Since multiplayer games tend to run longer than single-player matches, it's hard to do as many rounds as you would for e.g. a standard pod of 8.  The scheme we've come up with at my LGS is to run two rounds with swiss pairing and per-game prize support:

Do the draft itself.  For convenience, I'm going to presume a perfect 8-person pod here.
Break into two 4-person groups (WotC suggests randomly, but even/odd would also work well here)
Each group plays a single four-person game; award prize support to the top two finishers in each group.  (My LGS is going to do 3 packs for first and 1 for second here, but if you want your draft to perfectly utilize a 36-pack box, then you can go 2/1.)
'Swiss' the players for a second round: the top two players from each of the two round-1 games form a new four-person group, and the bottom two players from the round-1 games also form a new four-person group.
Play out the second round of games, with the same prize support as the first: 2 or 3 packs to the first-place finisher in each group, and 1 pack to the second-place finisher.

This way, (a) everyone gets to play a couple of games with their deck (and don't be surprised if folks play again on their own after the draft); (b) everyone but the bottom couple of finishers gets some measure of prize support (which IMHO is important for a political and 'casual' environment like Conspiracy); and (c) players are incentivized to win their games and not just play for top-2.


Can you play older versions of cards in standard? Say, for example, you have a card that is still legal in standard but the version you have of it comes from a set that has since been rotated out. Can you still play the version from your older set?

Yes. The only thing that matters for determining card legality is the name of the card. As far as the Oracle is concerned, 2 different printings of shock are the exact same card for all game and tournament rule purposes.

From the tournament rules:

  3.3. Authorized Cards
  Players may use any Authorized Game Cards from Magic: The Gathering expansions, core sets, special sets, supplements, and promotional printings. Authorized Game Cards are cards that, unaltered, meet the following conditions:

  The card is genuine and published by Wizards of the Coast.
  The card a standard Magic back or is a double-faced card.
  The card does not have squared corners.
  The card has black or white borders.
  The
  card is not a token card.
  The card is not damaged or modified in a
  way that might make it marked.
  The card is otherwise legal for the
  tournament as defined by the format.
  The card is a proxy issued by
  the judge of a tournament (see section 3.4 for rules about proxies).

  Any other cards that are not Authorized Game Cards are prohibited in all sanctioned tournaments.
  Unglued and Unhinged basic land cards are allowed in sanctioned Magic tournaments.

  Players may use cards from the Alpha printing only if the deck is in opaque sleeves.

  Players may use otherwise-legal non-English and/or misprinted cards provided they are not using them to create an advantage by using misleading text or pictures. Official promotional textless spells are allowed in sanctioned Magic tournaments in which they would otherwise be legal.

  Artistic modifications are acceptable in sanctioned tournaments, provided that the modifications do not make the card art unrecognizable, contain substantial strategic advice, or contain offensive images. Artistic modifications also may not obstruct or change the mana cost or name of the card.

  The Head Judge is the final authority on acceptable cards for a tournament.the mana cost or name of the card.


How does Imp Temple scale with multiple people and multiple discards? In Boss Monster 2, Imp Temple essentially lets you take a card from an opponent when you force him to discard it, however the language is ambiguous.  It says "Once per turn, when you force an opponent to discard a card, put that card into your hand instead."  However, we could not come up with a consensus for what "Once per turn" meant.  Does it mean:

This ability can 'steal' one card, one time per turn.
The ability can 'steal' one card per player you steal from.
This ability steals all cards discarded as the result of a single action.

Essentially, my friend used a Chump Chomper to destroy a Cursed Tomb, which caused all 3 opponents to discard 2 room cards, and he believed that by using the Imp Temple at the same time, he was entitled to all 6.  We compromised on #2 for the sake of time, but I'm curious how others interpret these cards.  What is the official meaning of 'Once per turn?'

It means once per turn. You can steal a single card once per turn.

It's hard to justify this beyond the wording of the card. The card says once per turn, so you can do it once per turn.

In your scenario, your player stole a card three times in a turn. That's not once per turn. Otherwise, it would say something along the lines of "one per turn for each opponent".

The ability refers to a singular card. "When you force an opponent to discard a card, put that card into your hand". If more than one card is discarded at once, you can choose which one to take, but you can't take more than one, because then you've done it more than once per turn.

The ability refers to a singular opponent. If more than one opponent discards, you can choose who to take from, but you can't take from more than one, because then you've done it more than once per turn.

For it to work on all discarded cards, it would say something along the lines of "Once per turn, when you force an opponent to discard any cards, put those cards into your hand instead." In your scenario, this would allow the player to get 2 cards from one of the opponents.

For it to work as your player believed, it would have to say "Once per turn, whenever you force any opponents to discard any cards, put those cards into your hand instead." Alternatively, it could just not have the once per turn limitation.


What's the most effective storage solution for x-wing to keep bases, dials and templates next to ships? I have a small x-wing collection, which consists of 2 base sets, 1 of everything in waves 1, 2 and 3, 1 of each "aces" set and a couple of other small ships.

I am looking for a storage solution which will:

Store all these ships in one or more boxes.
Store them safely in transit, so that the paint doesn't chip/scratch
Store the base, 4 base templates and manoeuvre dial in the same compartment as or directly next to the model
Can be purchased at a reasonable price in the UK.

Most of the popular solutions I see violate one or more of these principles, particularly number 3 - which is vitally important to me because I'm sick of digging through boxes looking for the relevant cardboard when setting up.

Is there anything that would suit my needs?

What I use is a large organizer box.  Something like this

The trick being having one where the size of the spaces can be adjusted, and one deep enough to fit the ships.

Then I cut up the original packaging of the ships.  They are already perfectly molded to the shape of the ship.  Cutting them out in exact size of the square that I am going to use I insert the packaging into he box, and then the ship into the packaging

I keep the cardboard for the ships in logical squares below the model


Can I activate Keegan Lane via Acme Consulting ability? Can I activate Keegan Lane (trash+"virtual" tag removal) during the runner's encounter with the outermost piece of ice if the id is Acme Consulting? The runner has no tags before the run and the ice does not give them.

No.
From ANCUR UFAQ [Michael Boggs]:

  Can the additional tag from Acme Consulting be removed?

  No. The Runner is considered to have an additional tag during
  encounters with outermost ice, even when they have none, but it does
  not exist for the purposes of being manipulated (such as removing it).


Acerola Supporter card effect Put 1 of your pokemon that has any damage counters on it and all cards attached to it into your hand.

Does this mean I can move my active pokemon which has damage on it straight into my hand?

Yes - that is exactly the point.  Sometimes this is just a free heal - sometimes it’s useful to for example play a Tapu Lele or Dedenne another time, or even reuse an ability that was already used that turn (when the Pokémon leaves the zone of play, it no longer is that same Pokémon essentially and can reuse its ability so long as it’s not a ‘only one of X ability can be used per turn’ ability).
Note that if you do this and have no Pokémon on your bench, you lose!


Will an 8/8 with trample die if it's blocked by 4 2/2 creatures? When attacking with a creature that has trample, can it die if the blockers' power succeeds or equals the attacking creatures' toughness?
Example: A 8/8 with trample attacks. 4 creatures, all 2/2, block. So all 4 creatures blocking and the attacking 8/8 with trample would die correct?

Yes, it will die. In general, trample only affects what happens with excess damage from the attacking side, i.e. when the attacking creature's power is higher than the total toughness of the blockers. The other way around (blockers' total power vs. attacker's toughness) is not affected.
The blocking creatures will die too, except when the attacking player makes the (usually inferior) decision to distribute more than the necessary 2 damage to some of the creatures, e.g. 4 to the first and 2 to two others.


Apparent contradiction in official rules for Kamisado? I have in front of me the official Rules of the Game for Kamisado. They make me wonder which player takes the opening move in a new round after filling from the left or the right.

The section "Filling from the Left or Rights" explains that the towers "can be set up in one of two ways, determined by the player who won the previous round. This player will be the Defender in the new round". So this would suggest that the player who lost the previous round takes the first turn in the next round. That's also what seems to be implemented e.g. in the online version at Yucata.
However the description of Figure 7(h) states that the "diagram shows the possible moves open to Alain with his purple Sumo dragon tower, should he decide to make his opening move with this tower". Alain has just gained a Sumo tower by winning a round, so this would suggest that the player who won the previous round takes the first turn in the next round. Only if Alain were to begin could he chose which tower to make his opening move with.

I suspect that 1. is the right answer but am not yet sure. Who knows better and can explain the apparently odd description for Figure 7(h)?

You must add third fact from the official Rules (in the "Opening Moves" section):

(3). "In any round, the player that moves first is known as the Challenger. The other player is known as the Defender for that round."

This rule is "hidden" in the basic rules, not where expected - after Filling L/R. The facts (1) and (3) together suggest the option 1: the player who lost in the previous round takes the opening move. That convinced me (I had the same hesitation). There is the common sense also - the opening move is said to give considerable advantage, so the loosing player could recover and the match would prolong.

I guess the description for Figure 7(h) must be simply an overlook, and should instead read: "diagram shows the possible moves open to Alain with his purple Sumo dragon tower, if he gets the opportunity to make move with purple and if nothing is blocking the purple tower". Too complicated; the figure should have been taken from another match not to confuse people.


Is one allowed to play Go with a notebook? This may be a silly question—but, is it illegal for one to enter a Go (or Chess, for that matter) tournament with a notebook in hand?

I can only answer the Go perspective. I hear it is pretty much banned in chess.

Paper notebooks, or preferable kifus, are always allowed. If is not uncommon for tournament directors to supply players with kifus for free or cheap.

I've often seen people use electronic notebooks in Go tournaments to record their matches. However, this is usually accompanied by asking the opponent beforehand for permission (it would simply be rude not to ask). To my knowledge, this is almost always approved, in particular when the display is visible to both players during interaction. Similarly, there is not usually a problem in photographing the board. There have been no real incidents with people cheating yet.

I have never seen it in high level matches, probably simply because anyone beyond low dan level can memorize their matches to a high degree anyway. I usually record my matches after they finished, and possibly take a photo if a strange move happens which is difficult to remember.

In Go, the tournaments with large price money are exclusive to few top players, and Go bots are not able to compete with them, so there is no incentive to use them. This may slowly change in the next several years.


If I change the text of a permanent while its ability is on the stack, does the ability change? Say my opponent activates an Acorn Catapult's ability targeting me, and I respond by casting Sleight of Mind targeting the Acorn Catapult and changing the word "green" to "white". When Acorn Catapult's ability resolves, do I get a white Squirrel token or a green Squirrel token? In other words, is the text of a permanent's ability based on the text of the permanent when the ability is activated, or when the ability resolves?

Green.

If you had let the ability resolve before casting Sleight of Mind, you would surely have no doubt that the squirrel would remain green. This is because tokens are objects with their own characteristics.

The same goes for abilities on the stack. They are full-fledged objects with their own characteristics.

  602.2a The player announces that he or she is activating the ability. If an activated ability is being activated from a hidden zone, the card that has that ability is revealed. That ability is created on the stack as an object that’s not a card. It becomes the topmost object on the stack. It has the text of the ability that created it, and no other characteristics. Its controller is the player who activated the ability. The ability remains on the stack until it’s countered, it resolves, or an effect moves it elsewhere.

  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. See rule 116, “Timing and Priority.” The ability becomes the topmost object on the stack. It has the text of the ability that created it, and no other characteristics. It remains on the stack until it’s countered, it resolves, a rule causes it to be removed from the stack, or an effect moves it elsewhere.

Just like changing the text of an object has no effect on the tokens it has previously created, changing the text of an object has no effect on the abilities that were previously created from it because they are separate objects with their own characteristics.

In your example, nothing caused the characteristics of the ability to be changed, so it will produce a green squirrel.


Mathematically / logically determine unit alignment for close combat ** This question involves knowledge of computer programming and/or math and algorithms. **

I am working on writing a Warhammer combat simulator in Java and have hit an interesting snag.

Pg 20 BRB:
"Once the charging unit contacts the enemy unit, it must perform a second, bonus wheel if required to bring its front facing into flush contact with the facing of the enemy unit that has been charged, maximizing the number of models in base contact on both sides"

Aligning the units in this way is absurdly simple when looking at them, but trying to write the code to do the same thing is proving difficult. I tried posting the question to Stack Overflow, but I think the concept is too vague.

Basically, I'm trying to simulate combat between a unit of spearmen (20x20mm bases) and a unit of horsemen (25x50mm bases), and programatically determine how many models will get attacks during the combat.

Any help would be appreciated.

get the number of unit on the face being charged, see how many of the charging units front of base length fit in it then * that by the number of units being changed are open on that side.

if you have uneven formations you would need to keep the current shape of a unit in an object, then find all the lengths along the charged side and use some sort of packing algo to put the charging units along them


House rules to speed up Citadels play time? I enjoy Citadels, but find the game can often quite a long time. Since players must draft their role card in sequence, there ends up being a lot of down time while other players make their selections. The game is particularly prone to analysis-paralysis. Even limiting the game to a small number of players (4 or 5) and triggering the end game sooner (first player to build 7 buildings instead of 8), the game can still draw out. Any more ideas on how to improve the flow of this otherwise great game?

I played this game intensely a few years ago with 2 and 3 players (sometimes up to 4) and the analysy-paralysis problem disappeared after, say, 2-3 games with the same group.
I tried the same solution of lowering to 7 buildings (in fact, it is even suggested on the rulebook) and worked quite well for 2 players, never tried it with 3-4 players.

I personally think the hard time-limit is a too crude option. I'll try instead to insist on the players to 'think fast' in order to make a more agile game.

Notice that you can begin to think about which characters are the best for you on advance, while other players make their choose. And never forget that a little randomness on your decissions are desirable, as you'll be a perfect target for assassination and/or robbering the moment you become too predictable.


If Mirage Mirror becomes a copy of a creature, and then is put into the library some how, does it still stay a creature until end of turn? If I turn Mirage Mirror into a copy of a creature, and then put it back in the library, is it still a creature until end of turn, or does it go back to being an artifact in the library?

No, it's just an ordinary Mirage Mirror artifact once it's in your library. It won't still be a copy of anything.
The key rule here is:

400.7. An object that moves from one zone to another becomes a new object with no memory of, or relation to, its previous existence. There are nine exceptions to this rule:
(None of the exceptions apply. They're mostly about cards keeping track of each other between zones when they need to.)

Generally after something moves to a new zone, it's reset to a fresh state of just being whatever the card says.


Diana Stanley dreams of a sunken city Does Diana Stanley gain sanity from doom tokens when the environment "Dream of a Sunken City" is in play?

Diana Stanley's unique ability:

  Dark Insight - Any Phase: Gain 1 Sanity or 1 Stamina each time a doom token is added to the Ancient One's doom track

Dreams of a Sunken City Mythos card:

  Mythos Ability: Investigators cannot gain Sanity except by receiving psychiatric care at Arkham Asylum (or from Carolyn Fern).

Diana Stanley's Dark Insight ability does not override the effects of the Mythos environment in play. If it would override the Mythos card, it would state so.

For example, Akachi's ability states:

  Secret Rites - Any Phase: Akachi gains +1 bonus to all skill checks to close or seal a gate. In addition, Akachi may always seal gates, regardless of other game effects.


What happens when I copy a spell with cascade? Yidris, Maelstrom Wielder states that when he deals combat damage to a player, spells you cast from your hand gain cascade.

Let's say that a hit with Yidris connects on a player and I cast a spell from my hand. Let's also say, for instance, that I have a creature with Dual Casting attached to it. If I copy the spell that I cast from my hand which now has cascade, does the copy also have cascade? I would think so, but I don't know where to look this up.

The copy of the spell does not have cascade, and even if it did, the cascade ability wouldn't trigger.

Copying objects in general is described in rule 706.2:

  When copying an object, the copy acquires the copiable values of the original object’s characteristics and, for an object on the stack, choices made when casting or activating it (mode, targets, the value of X, whether it was kicked, how it will affect multiple targets, and so on). The “copiable values” are the values derived from the text printed on the object (that text being name, mana cost, color indicator, card type, subtype, supertype, rules text, power, toughness, and/or loyalty), as modified by other copy effects, by its face-down status, and by “as . . . enters the battlefield” and “as . . . is turned face up” abilities that set power and toughness (and may also set additional characteristics). Other effects (including type-changing and text-changing effects), status, and counters are not copied.

The cascade ability is not printed on the card or part of a copy effect. It is also not a choice made while casting the spell. It is granted by a continuous effect created by Yidris's ability. That effect is not copied, so the copy of the spell will not have cascade.

In addition, the rule for specifically copying a spell is 706.10:

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

And the definition of Cascade is in rule 702.84a:

  Cascade is a triggered ability that functions only while the spell with cascade is on the stack. “Cascade” means “When you cast this spell, exile cards from the top of your library until you exile a nonland card whose converted mana cost is less than this spell’s converted mana cost. You may cast that card without paying its mana cost. Then put all cards exiled this way that weren’t cast on the bottom of your library in a random order.”

Since the copy of the spell is not cast, cascade never triggers for a copy.


Do "if you would gain life, gain that much life +1" abilities trigger once per turn, or once for every instance of you gaining life For example, I have a Black/White deck built around life gain. If I have 2 creatures that cause me to gain 1 life with every creature summon and 1 creature with "if you would gain life, gain that much life +1"...

When I play a creature would I gain +1 (summon) +1 (summon) and then +1 (additional) totalling 3

Or would I gain +1 (summon) +1 (additional) and then +1 (summon) +1 (additional) totalling 4

I guess the question is does it trigger for every instance of me gaining life, or just the fact I have done that turn.

A creature like that is Angel of Vitality; its ability applies for every instance of gaining life, not just once per turn.

  The middle ability of Angel of Vitality applies just once to each life-gaining event, whether it’s 1 life from Impassioned Orator or 4 life from Dawning Angel. If you gain an amount of life “for each” of something or “equal to the number” of something, that life is gained as one event and the ability of Angel of Vitality applies only once.

(emphasis mine)

So in your scenario you would gain 4 life, since the 2 creatures' abilities trigger separately and are considered two separate life-gaining events, even if they're triggered by the same event.


What happened with Chronicles? I often read on the internet people referring to Chronicles expansion as a disaster, the worst mistake ever made by Wizards, the biggest drop value in Magic's history.. but nobody explains what happened!

I understood that Chronicles was the reprint of some cards the first four expansions (that went sold out in a really short amount of time) excluding some of the most powerful cards, but I miss how this has led to 70% drop in cards' value, sellers leaving their job, people not trusting Wizards anymore and finally to the Reserved List.

Can anybody explain me what happened and what made Modern Masters different?

The difference is that wizards printed a whole lot of chronicles, and they sold it cheaper than normal packs.

The result was a massive market flood of cards, some of which actually were somewhat valuable. compare the prices of  Nicol Bolas to other obscure legends that weren't printed in chronicles like Angus Mackenzie, to see how chronicles affected it.

The value of people's collections dropped drastically, and people don't like it when that happens.

Modern masters was different because wizards charged more for them and they purposefully printed a very limited run of it.

if you wanted to get modern masters for MSRP, you had to already know that it was coming.  Stores that sold them at MSRP sold out in less than a day.


Destroying Odric, Master Tactician in response to declared attackers Alright, so we were playing a game and confusion was brought up.
Player 1 Attacks with 5 creatures as well as Odric, Master Tactician. When doing so, Odric's ability kicks in saying P1 could choose which creatures block, and who they block. In this phase, when P1 declared which of his monsters were attacking, and P2 played Bright Reprisal, which states "Destroy target attacking creature. Draw a card." P2 used that card to destroy Odric. So with that being said, would Odric's ability still be in effect?

Abilities written as "Whenever X, Y" are triggered abilities, they go onto the stack when the trigger condition, in this case "Whenever Odric, Master Tactician and at least three other creatures attack" is met, the ability's effect, in this case "you choose which creatures block this combat and how those creatures block" is put on the stack.

Once an ability is on the stack, changes to the board itself don't affect that ability, it is going to resolve unless countered. So unless you Stifle the ability, removing the Odric, no matter where he goes, be that to hand, exile, graveyard or even flickered back to the board, will not stop his ability from resolving. The only change to boardstate that can affect a spell or ability on the stack is if that ability is no longer legal, say removing all targets, causing the spell or ability to fizzle (be put in the graveyard as it would resolve).


Do you need more to "pre-empt" with a major, than a minor suit? When I pre-empt at say, the three level, I am doing so with a "lopsided" hand that has relatively few points and is long in one suit (and short in two or three others). Under the circumstances, if the remaining high card points and "lengths" are distributed evenly between my partner and two opponents, I expect that my opponents will be able to make ten tricks in their longest suit.

If I pre-empt with a minor suit, there are two chances out of three that my opponents' "longest" suit will be a major, for which ten tricks represents game. If I pre-empt with a major, the chances are only one out of three that my opponents have a major suit game.

If my partner has the three to four defensive tricks needed to defeat a ten-trick contract, I'll (probably) make my bid. If partner has "no defense," the opponents may make a slam.

So I don't mind going down one trick, or even two doubled, (except when vulnerable versus not), if my opponents' ten tricks represent game most of the time. But I do, if those ten tricks represent game only a minority of the time.

Are there any systems or experts that say that you need "more" (either tricks or points) to preempt with a major than a minor suit, because you need to go down "less?"

Your statistical analysis is completely wrong:
 As a preempter, your shortness in unbid major(s) increases the likelihood of opponents having an eight-card major fit. This fit doesn't have to be their longest suit, and the hand will often play for more tricks if it isn't. As a matter of systemic agreement the opponents will often choose to play in an eight-card major fit regardless of other hand features, unless a running side suit with stoppers has been identified.

So no, no-one suggests that you need more to pre-empt in a major than in a minor (at the three level). That 3-level pre-empts in a major may typically be made on stronger hands than in a minor is because the top=end of minor preempts tend to open a Gambling 3NT instead.


Shortening Harry Potter the Battle for Hogwarts while keeping the difficulty My wife and I like the deck-building game harry-potter-hogwarts-battle.  Games 1 to 3 where too easy for us; Game 4 is challenging to our liking.

However, playing game 4 means having to battle all villains from levels 1 though 4.  Which takes time.  It takes us more time than our two sleeping children allow us (our baby sleeps in 45 minute block, some times 1h 30m if we are lucky).
In addition to battling villains, building a deck also takes plenty of rounds of play.

Are there house-rules for playing that both keep the game at our desired level of challenge (with the option to increase challenge if we grow) and shorten the time it taken to play a game?

(We prefer playing an complete game on one evening over pausing the game and continuing an other evening)

In this BoardGameGeek thread here another player had the same questions. The only problem is that they are playing the full game, and there are things that do not apply to you (moreover there will be spoilers that maybe you want to avoid).

So I'll try to sum up his rules that apply to Game 4:

To make the game shorter, I would say start on location 2, and reduce the number of villains. He recommends from experience to divide the Villains in three categories, from easy to hard. I report his list, with only the villains you discovered:

Easy Villains:

Crabble
Quirrel
Death Eater

Medium Villains:

Draco Malfoy
Basilisk
Dementor
Tom Riddle

Hard Villains:

Lucius Malfoy
Peter Pettigrew

I personally disagree with the dementor being a medium villain.
But regardless:

Remove one villain from each category and you'll have shorter game.
Also start from location 2 to make it a little harder.

As for player hands, I would start with 4 cards added from the store each. There are different ways you can do this:

Pull out 8 cards from the store and choose who gets which (try to still do 4 each)
Assign yourelf 20 influence points and choose the cards (I would ban Petrificus Totalus though, as it's quite strong (Maybe not in 2 players though))
You could also stratify the cards (like 1 card expensive 5+, 1 card 3-4, and 1 card 2 for each players) but that takes a longer setup so maybe you won't like it

To conclude:

-3 Villains
-1 Location
+6 Random cards

There are other different tweaks that the post gives, but I haven't included them as they could be spoilers.

EDIT: Also, when you reach further games let me know so I can update this summary with the new information.
Credit goes to BGG User ranissi for these rules.


Searching for Plant Growth Board Game with Stacking I am trying to find a game that is similar to Photosynthesis. Unless I am completely misremembering, it plays very similar to Photosynthesis, with a central area that everybody competes in and a sun that rotates around the board. However, instead of using 2-d cut-outs of trees, as Photosynthesis has, this game had stackable game pieces representing roots, vines, flowers etc.Does anything like this exist?

I never saw the game in person or played, I believe I saw it on boardgamegeek.com. Takenoko looks the most similar, but the actual game play area was very tight and there were no meeple-type pieces. It seemed like it was a square grid with dimensions of ~7-9 square units (whatever the size of the pieces/ tiles were) and I vaguely remember the pieces having some height to them, like little plastic majong tiles. They may have snapped together, similar to legos, but I'm more uncertain of that last detail than the others.The sun would "shine" on the gameboard from the 4 cardinal directions and higher stacked tiles would block the light for anything behind it.

Sounds like Arboria

players play cards to grow flowers, move the sun, move the cloud, create rain, or destroy opponents' flowers. On your turn, play three cards from all available (yours and the unused ones from your preceding opponents). Once the sun has circled the board, the game is over. Points are allocated by multiplying the height of your biggest flowers by the number of same color flowers in a row.


Power Grid removing lowest plant if first player passes A friend of mine (a bit of a board game geek) says that this following rule is wrong, imbalanced, and is changed in one of the expansions:

  (Auction phase)
  If, in later rounds, no power plant is sold in a round, the players
  remove the lowest numbered power plant from the market, placing it
  back in the box, and replace it by drawing a power plant from the draw
  stack. They then rearrange the market according to the rules.

He says that if the first player (the one leading) passes, then right after his pass we should get rid of the lowest power plant and get a new one, before the rest of the players would start their auctions.

He claims this makes the game more balanced, as otherwise the leader could "freeze" a bad board, and get even more advantage.

The way I see it though, the leader is heavily penalized in this game, and putting even more burden is just too much. We had games this way where everyone tried to stay behind, and basically the game was an endless tier one with a quick burst of 9-10 buildings /player in one round.

My questions are: anyone else heard of this modification? Is it really part of an official expansion? Do you think the leader needs more penalty?

No, this is no part of the original ruleset; the base-game rule has never changed and remains as you quoted: if nobody buys a Power Plant, then at the end of Phase 2 you discard the lowest Power Plant and draw a replacement. Source: it simply doesn't exist.

On the contrary, your friend's house rule is imbalanced; discard the lowest one only if the first player passes? This really tilts the balance in favor of the other players. Not to mention that it completely breaks 2-player games by disincentivizing players from getting the pole position.

edit: Please note that this is the base game rule: all players have to pass to remove the lowest power plant. The Russia map from Power Grid: Russia & Japan (2010) amends this base-game rule (source, p. 2)

  Starting in game turn 2: when the first player in a game turn does not
  offer a new power plant for auction and instead passes, remove the
  smallest power plant in the actual market and replace it with a new
  power plant from the stack. This rule replaces the base game rule, so
  that players DO NOT remove the smallest power plant from the
  market when all players pass and nobody buys a new power plant.

Emphasizing: please note that this is an amended rule on a specific expansion map (Russia). Otherwise, the rule is as stated: all players have to pass.


How can I make a fast, MTG Modern Glimpse-based mill deck? I have always been fascinated with MTG milling decks and, since Ravnica, have wanted to build a fast Glimpse the Unthinkable based mill deck. I've tried numerous times but the deck is always too slow, puttering out before I finish off my opponent. Further, it's tough to find a balance of aggressively milling while simultaneously defending myself from attacks.

So, is there a way to make a speedy Glimpse the Unthinkable mill deck?

My deck constraints are:

Build around Glimpse, the Unthinkable
Only use Modern legal cards

The latest iteration of my deck is:

Lands

Island x12
Swamp x9
Watery Grave x2
Drowned Catacomb

Creatures

Hedron Crab x4
Wall of Frost x4

Planeswalker

Jace, Memory Adept

Enchantments

Memory Erosion x4
Jace's Erasure x4

Instants

Grasp of Darkness x4
Visions of Beyond x4

Sorceries

Glimpse, the Unthinkable x4
Mind Funeral x3
Mind Sculpt x2

Artifacts

Keening Stone x4

The older versions of this deck relied on Ravnica Transmute cards like Shred Memory, Muddle the Mixture, and Dimir Infiltrator to quickly retrieve the Glimpses but, without mana acceleration, it still took 5-6 turns to get three Glimpses out.

If you want a fast glimpse the unthinkable deck, then the best you are going to do is definitely going to be cutting those wall of frost, and some of the mill enchantments. play 4 ghost quarter (think of it as a 0 mana spell that mills them for 1 card, you can also kill your own land for more hedron crab triggers), and 4 Archive Trap, a spell that does a lot to win you the game when your opponent isn't expecting it after ghost quarter, or turns your ghost quarter into the extremely powerful and mostly banned Strip Mine when your opponent is familiar with your deck.

You would probably be looking to extend your longevity with spells like damnation or black sun's zenith to keep the opponent's side of the board under control. Snapcaster mage will let you reuse your glimpses for additional mill, and provide a defense to slow your opponent down, but remember it cant cast your Archive Traps for their trap cost.

you will want 4 Dimir Signet, because a turn 3 play of Signet into glimpse the unthinkable is a very efficient ramp turn. Mind Funeral and Mind Grind are also both very good cards.

Additionally, you will make better use of those hedron crabs by using fetchlands such as scalding tarn and Marsh Flats, allowing you to get 2 activations per turn, cheaper alternatives include Terramorphic expanse and evolving wilds

I would suggest the following changes:

-4 Jace's Erasure
-4 Wall of Frost
-4 Memory Erosion
-4 Keening Stone
-4 Grasp of Darkness
-2 Visions of Beyond
-9 Island
-7 Swamps
-1 Drowned Catacombs

and bring in:

+1 Hallowed Fountain
+1 Plains
+2 Watery Grave
+4 Scalding Tarn
+4 Marsh Flats
+4 Ghost Quarter
+4 Dimir Signet
+1 Mind Funeral
+2 Mind Grind
+4 Snacpcaster mage
+4 Damnation
+4 Archive Trap
+4 Path To Exile

I cut a land as the dimir signets help fix your mana, it might be worth cutting another, it depends on how it plays.

Visions of beyond is a bit overkill, as long as you can average about 7 cards milled per card you play, you can win within 4-6 turns, and visions can slow that down, as winning revolves around spending your mana effectively in the early turns. I kept 2 in though as sometimes you just draw all removal and no mill

Damnation might seem counter productive if you have hedron crabs on the field, but with fetchlands, you can hit 6 cards milled per crab with just one land drop, meaning they will usually provide enough mill to be worth playing out even if you then kill them.

Mind Grind is there to mitigate when you get mana flooded, so that you can get a higher return per card due to having so much excess mana, it's not something you would want to cast for anything less than x = 4.

Splashing white might be beneficial also, path to exile gives you another route to activate archive trap, and does what grasp of darkness did cheaper. it can also turn a snapcaster mage who gave you a flashback mill last turn, into another land to activate hedron crabs for further mill.

these changes should help speed the deck up, and increase your survivability in a more synergistic way than previously. feel free to tinker with numbers based on your own knowledge as i haven't played the deck, but i advise against tinkering the cards that were totally removed back into the deck.

A faster mill deck

Having said all of the above, if you want a fast mill deck, there are definitely better choices than Glimpse the unthinkable.

abandoning the idea of glimpse the unthinkable, a mill deck that will usually run much faster than glimpse the unthinkable can would be the protean hulk combo deck. If you were to play acceleration such as ramp spells ( rampant growth,  harrow etc) and Heartless Summoning to accelerate casting your Protean Hulk you will be able to get it onto the battlefield around turn 4 or 5, any of a number of spells would allow you to sacrifice it (fling, viscera seer, birthing pod, and many others, just search gatherer for rules text "Sacrifice a creature").

once you have managed to summon and sacrifice your hulk, your milling combo comes to fruition. It's ability to search for a cumulative 6 converted mana cost worth of creatures allows you to search for the 4 hedron crabs in your library, and the 4 dryad arbor, all of which translate to only 4 converted mana cost of creatures. They all enter the battlefield, each dryad arbor triggers all 4 hedron crabs, which is 16 hedron crab triggers which is 48 milled cards. the final 2 CMC can be used to find a viridian emissary, which would either die instantly to the Heartless Summoning, or be sacrificed to the  viscera seer or another sacrifice outlet, and give you a basic land and another 12 milled cards.

i will leave the building of an actual 60 card deck of this combo to you, if you wish to pursue it, since it is not strictly an answer to your question. above should give you an idea for the options, and key cards of the deck.


Recent semi co-op maze game designed to be played blind I saw a game recently appear on my personal twitter but forgot to fave it and now I cant't find it so might have been deleted.

I think its a fairly new game that is a semi co-op,  All players against one other.  Player are trying to escape a maze whilst the other player is trying the hunt them down.

What made the game look interested was the fact players except the hunter had to wear blackout glasses and we unable to see.  I believe there was a story about the designer trying to come with a game design playable by a blind relative?

The board looked plain black with many squares.  Between them were what looked like white/glow in the dark wall pieces.  These all had rough looking spiky tops.

That all I can remember and cant recall the title.  I was wanting to read rules and see how a game played blind would work.

The game is Nyctophobia. I spoke with the designer last weekend, and she said it's scheduled for a Gencon 2018 release.


Why is card counting considered illegal in Blackjack? As far as I can see, a card counter is still subject to the same mechanic as any other players, but they are able to perform better then most people within these confines. So why is card counting a justification for casinos to kick people out? Obviously, a card counter will cost them money, but if that is the only justification, then it's like the casino is cheating- they only allow sucky players to play. If you are too good you get thrown out. Is that all there is to it, or is there a valid gameplay justification for this?

Card counting isn't considered illegal. Casinos have the right to deny service to anyone, and of makes sense to deny players from playing a game in which they have an advantage versus the house. This isn't  cheating in any sense of the word. 994 P.2d 1151 (2000) CHEN v. NEVADA STATE GAMING CONTROL BOARD and Monte Carlo Resort & Casino:

  This case presents a conflict between two inconsistent public policies that have developed over the years with regard to the gaming industry. On one hand, gaming establishments have the unquestioned right to protect themselves against so-called "card counters" who have developed expertise in the game of "blackjack" ("twenty-one"). On the other hand, neither card counting nor the use of a legal subterfuge such as a disguise to gain access to this table game is illegal under Nevada law.

cheat transitive verb

1 : to deprive of something valuable by the use of deceit or fraud
2 : to influence or lead by deceit, trick, or artifice
3 : to elude or thwart by or as if by outwitting  intransitive verb
1 a : to practice fraud or trickery b : to violate rules dishonestly   [...]


In Catan, is it possible to steal from yourself with the robber? If I move the robber in Catan to a hex where I also have an adjacent settlement or city on, can I choose to steal from myself instead of another player or if I am the only valid player?

No, you may not.
According to the official rules on the website:

(1) You must move the robber immediately to the number token of any
other terrain hex or to the desert hex.
(2) Then you steal 1 (random)
Resource Card from an opponent who has a settlement or city adjacent
to the target terrain hex. The player who is robbed holds his Resource
Card hand face down. You then take 1 at random. If the target hex is
adjacent to 2 or more players’ settlements or cities, you choose which
one you want to rob.

One could argue the second part "if ...adjacent to 2 players'", but I find that interpretation completely mis-aligns with the unambiguous previous rule that you do not and would not rob yourself.


How is my mouse's ability attack resolved? We are a bit confused by how ability attacks work in Mice and Mystics, and in particular how they interact with equipped items.

Our Maginos has the ability Mystic Bolt, which states (emphasis mine):

  You may use this ability instead of performing a normal battle action. Choose a minion ... [who] is attacked by this mouse with a ranged attack. The battle value of that attack is equal to this mouse's lore.

Our Maginos is also equipped with an Enchanted Bow, which grants +1 to ranged attacks and has the text (emphasis mine):

  The first time this mouse attacks with this bow on a turn, if any [Bow w/ Star Symbol] were rolled in that attack, this mouse may attack 1 additional time with this bow.

Now, Maginos has a lore of 3, so if he uses the Mystic Bolt ability clearly the battle value will be 3.  The question is: how do we perform this attack?

Do we:

Roll 3 dice, hoping to roll [Bow Symbol]s?
Roll 4 dice instead of 3 due to the +1 from the Enchanted Bow?
Ignore dice completely and just count it as an attack that hits for 3?
Do something else?

Furthermore, if we do roll dice, does the special text from the Enchanted Bow (about sometimes making a second attack) come into play, and if so, how does the extra attack work?

For the Mystic Bolt you roll three dice an perform a ranged attack, i.e. you want to roll bow and arrow symbols.

The bonus from the Enchanted Bow only applies, if you attack using the enchanted bow, and not Maginos' Staff, e.g. by casting said Mystic Bolt.


What happens when I Radiate a Time Stretch with Timesifter in play? The question is based on the following situation:

In a five person game, there has a been a Timesifter in play and the turn order has already been varied for a few turns. A player plays a Time Stretch and I target the card with a Radiate. What happens next, and subsequently, what happens when the person with Timesifter is eliminated from the game?

As an immediate result, I assume that the person who was targeted with the original Time Stretch takes the next turn, which results in a trigger of the Timesifter, sending us back into a whirlwind of turn order that is dictated by the artifact. I'm relatively certain this is correct, although an affirmation would be nice. But, when the person with the Timesifter dies, where does the turn order go? Are the extra turns from Time Stretch still stacked? Does the original target of the spell take their second turn, followed by everyone else taking two extra turns in normal turn order?

There are several different things going on here, so it's important to understand the key details.  Those boil down to:

1) Nothing in your scenario changes the turn order.  This is essential, because it's the first guide to understand what's going on.  While Time Sifter looks like it effectively changes the turn order, instead it specifically generates extra turns itself.

2) This is relevant because the game maintains what amounts to a stack (not to be confused with the actual stack in the game, for resolving spells) of extra turns; any effect that says '~player~ takes an extra turn after this one' adds an extra turn for ~player~ onto that stack.  This is spelled out in rule 500.7:

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

Let's look at how this works on its own: suppose you're playing a four-player game, players A, B, C, and D (in that order); the turn order would then normally be A B C D A B C D etc.  Now, suppose player A plays a Time Sifter.  At the start of player B's upkeep, the structure of the upcoming turns looks like (using [] to denote the current turn: [B] C D ...  Technically, the game doesn't actually know that C will be taking a turn after B; instead, it knows that the 'present' turn is controlled by B.  I'll denote this by starring that turn: [B*] C D A ...  Now, Time Sifter's effect resolves; we'll say that D wins.  An extra turn for D (we'll label extra turns with a ' symbol, so D') - is 'inserted' after the current turn: [B*] D' C D A ...  Now, B finishes their turn and it goes on to D's extra turn: B* [D'] C D A ...  Assume that now C 'wins' the Time Sifter fight.  Then the turn structure becomes B* [D'] C' C D A ...; D's extra turn finishes, the turn passes to C's extra turn, and the game all the while is remembering that B took the last 'non-extra' turn and that C is next in turn order: B* [C'] C D A ...  Things go on like this until Time Sifter is removed.

3) Now, the next piece of the puzzle: Radiate's interaction with Time Stretch.  I'll assume that during one of player A's 'extra' turns (so that the current structure is B* [A'] C D A ...) they cast Time Stretch (targeting themselves!), and that player B Radiates it.  As other answers have noted, when Radiate resolves copies of Time Stretch will be generated for players B, C, and D; these copies resolve before the original Time Stretch does.  I'll presume that player B stacks them with his copy on the bottom, D above, and C's copy on top, so that the resolution will be CDBA; this means that after all the copies and the original Stretch resolve, the 'turn stack' looks like: B* [A'] A' A' B' B' D' D' C' C' C D A ...

4) From here, Time Sifter will work as normal.  This means that (once A's turn ends) A will start to take the first of their extra turns, putting the Sifter on the stack: B* [A'] A' B' B' D' D' C' C' C D A ...  Now, suppose D wins.  Then a new extra turn for D will be added, but all of the other extra turns are still there: B* [A'] D' A' B' B' D' D' C' C' C D A ... and once the turn passes from A to D, it'll look like B* [D'] A' B' B' D' D' C' C' C D A ... - but all of those extra turns are still hanging out, waiting for Time Sifter to go away somehow so that they can be had.

I hope this helps somewhat - it's obviously a remarkably complex situation, but once you understand what each effect is actually doing it all flows relatively straightforwardly.


Evolution: Symbiosis Cards and Carnivorous/High Body Weight The Symbiosis card states that:

  [Symbiosis is] played on a pair of creatures in a tandem. Choose the first creature as a "symbiont". The second creature can not be attacked as long as the "symbiont" stays alive, and can receive red/blue food tokens only after the "symbiont" has been FED.

I was wondering if there were any restrictions for carnivores and/or high body weight as the "dependent" symbiont.

For instance, I had a marked a small creature the symbiont, and its dependent was a high weight carnivore. During my first action in the feeding round, I used my dependent symbiont to eat another creature. Do I pass on the two blue tokens since my symbiont partner had not been fed yet? This didn't make sense since eating another creature has no bearing on the relationship.

Are there any annotated rulesets that might help clarify these types of pairwise card plays? I for one find it odd that a high weight creature could be dependent on a low weight creature for food. This is especially true if the dependent is also a carnivore.

According to the official FAQ (in Russian),

  Симбиоз

  Может ли животное (птица) со свойством хищник, находящееся под защитой симбионта (крокодила) атаковать его?

  Да, если симбионт (крокодил) уже накормлен.

In English, that would sound like,

  Symbiosis

  Can a carnivorous animal (a bird) that is protected by a symbiont (a crocodile) attack the symbiont?

  Yes, if the symbiont (a crocodile) has already been fed.

In my understanding, that means the protected animal cannot attack other creatures too, until the symbiont is fed.

P.S. See also A Living FAQ for Evolution: The Origin of Species in English


How does the Tribute mechanic work? Full disclosure, I am relatively new to the game and haven't experienced all the mechanics yet.

There are a couple premade decks in the Born of the Gods set that use Tribute. We're a little hazy on how exactly it works...Is it simply a yes/no answer to paying tribute from the target player? Or is there a mana/health/whatever cost as well? It seems like some of the pay/don't pay choices are total no brainers.

As a creature with tribute enters the battlefield, an opponent of your choice "may" place +1/+1 counters on the creature. The "may" means that he has 2 choices: do it, or don't do it. There is no "overpay", and no health or mana costs associated with this. Just read the reminder text literally.

Also note that it is not a "target" opponent. Tribute doesn't target, meaning you could choose an opponent with hexproof.

Here's an excerpt from the Born of the Gods new mechanics notes:

  As Pharagax Giant enters the battlefield, you choose an opponent. That opponent then decides whether to "pay tribute" by having Pharagax Giant enter the battlefield with two +1/+1 counters on it. If he or she does, then that's it—you've got a bigger Giant. If he or she decides not to pay tribute, then Pharagax Giant's enters-the-battlefield ability will trigger instead. Either way, it's good for you—and in the meantime, you get to watch your opponent sweat.

And here's the comprehensive rules on it:

  702.103. Tribute

    702.103a Tribute is a static ability that functions as the creature with tribute is entering the battlefield. "Tribute N" means "As this creature enters the battlefield, choose an opponent. That player may have this creature enter the battlefield with an additional N +1/+1 counters on it."

    702.103b Objects with tribute have triggered abilities that check "if tribute wasn’t paid." This condition is true if the opponent chosen as a result of the tribute ability didn’t have the creature enter the battlefield with +1/+1 counters as specified by the creature’s tribute ability.


Pocketing the last coin and the striker at the same time Only one black (mine) and one white (opponent's) coin are on the board. (All the other coins and the queen have been pocketed)
I pocket my black coin, but accidentally also pocket the striker.

Who will win?

Nobody wins yet. You return 2 C/m to the board and continue your turn. According to the ICF rules:

  If a player pockets the Striker with his own C/m by a proper stroke, the number of C/m so pocketed, with a Due C/m, shall be taken out for placing and the player shall continue his turn.


How much life can I gain attacking someone who can't fall under 1 hp with lifelink creatures? Context :

My friend played Worship, it states:

  If you control a creature, damage that would reduce your life total to less than 1 reduces it to 1 instead.

Question :

If I attack him with a 4/4 creature with lifelink while he already has 1HP will I still gain 4 HPs?

The damage is still dealt fully, even though Worship makes it so your life total can't go under 1. This means you gain the full 4 life from the lifelink creature.

Source: Gatherer rulings

  10/4/2004 It reduces your life total to 1, not the damage to 1.
  10/4/2004 Worship does not prevent damage. It causes some damage to be
  unable to lower your life total. So any damage rendered useless by
  Worship was still dealt and is counted by effects that track the
  amount of damage done to a player. In addition, Worship does not
  prevent loss of life, so loss of life bypasses Worship.


Humility and +1/+1 counters If I play a kicked Quag Vampires, and my opponent has a Humility on the battlefield, will the Quag Vampires still get his counters and be larger than a 1/1?

Your vampire will be larger than 1/1.
The relevant rules reference is the power/toughness layer when handling continuous effects. Note that because of this layering rule, it doesn't matter whether the creature entered the battlefield first, or the Humility.

613.3. Within layer 7, apply effects in a series of sublayers in the order described below. Within each sublayer, apply effects in timestamp order. (See rule 613.6.) Note that dependency may alter the order in which effects are applied within a sublayer. (See rule 613.7.)
613.3a Layer 7a: Effects from characteristic-defining abilities that define power and/or toughness are applied. See rule 604.3.
613.3b Layer 7b: Effects that set power and/or toughness to a specific number or value are applied. (That is the Humility)
613.3c Layer 7c: Effects that modify power and/or toughness (but don’t set power and/or toughness to a specific number or value) are applied.
613.3d Layer 7d: Power and/or toughness changes from counters are applied. See rule 121, “Counters.” (the +1/+1 counters)
613.3e Layer 7e: Effects that switch a creature’s power and toughness are applied. Such effects take the value of power and apply it to the creature’s toughness, and take the value of toughness and apply it to the creature’s power.
Example: A 1/3 creature is given +0/+1 by an effect. Then another effect switches the creature’s power and toughness. Its new power and toughness is 4/1. A new effect gives the creature +5/+0. Its “unswitched” power and toughness would be 6/4, so its actual power and toughness is 4/6.
Example: A 1/3 creature is given +0/+1 by an effect. Then another effect switches the creature’s power and toughness. Its new power and toughness is 4/1. If the +0/+1 effect ends before the switch effect ends, the creature becomes 3/1.


Bang! 6 Player Problem - It's unbalanced one way or another. My group has played a good amount of bang of the year. 6 player bang however always seems to be unbalanced no matter what we try.

We've taken the advice of a message board to shuffle randomly a outlaw or a renegade instead of the third outlaw. But that conflicts with robbers roost who can do actions given an unbalance in players.

We've tried two renegades, or two deputies, but either way it becomes really unbalanced in favor of the law.

We've tried better informed players where the renegade is strongly encouraged to play as the law until the outlaws are eliminated. This has proven to be the most effective. But our data tracking sheet is still showing a clear biast for outlaws to win.

Also we've tried giving the sheriff a built in mustang. This helps, but is much like the random renegade/outlaw where it's still unbalanced it's just random which way its going to lean. Because it's just a matter of luck if the outlaws are able to get a gun or not.

The only thing that seems to come close is a general rule that no one can shoot bangs against the sheriff on turn 1. This prevents the sheriff from getting jumped early and rallying the outlaws before the other two players have time (or cards) to respond.

Any one else have any suggestions for 6 player bang~?

From reading your question and responses in the comments I would say that 100% you are playing the game in the spirit that it was designed.

Rules

  4 players: 1 Sheriff, 1 Renegade, 2 Outlaws
  5 players: 1 Sheriff, 1 Renegade, 2 Outlaws, 1 Deputy
  6 players: 1 Sheriff, 1 Renegade, 3 Outlaws, 1 Deputy
  7 players: 1 Sheriff, 1 Renegade, 3 Outlaws, 2 Deputy

Killing a player

  Eliminating a character
  When you lose your last life point, you are eliminated and your game
  is over, unless you immediately play a Beer (see below). When you are
  eliminated from the game, show your role card and discard all the cards you
  have in hand and in play.
  Penalties and Rewards
  •    If the Sheriff eliminates a Deputy, the Sheriff must discard all the cards
  he has in hand and in play.
  •    Any player eliminating an Outlaw (even if the eliminating player is
  himself an Outlaw!) must draw a reward of 3 cards from the deck.

End Game

  The game ends when one of the following conditions is met:
  a) the Sheriff is killed. If the Renegade is the only one alive, then he wins.
  Otherwise, the Outlaws win;
  b) all the Outlaws and the Renegade are killed. The Sheriff and his
  Deputies win.

I will break down the conditions that need to happen in order for the renegade to win.

4 Player Game:

The renegade needs to kill (or assist) both outlaws
Once both outlaws are dead the renegade needs to kill the sheriff

5 Player Game:

The renegade needs to kill (or assist) both outlaws
The renegade needs to kill (or assist) the deputy
Once both of those are done the renegade needs to kill the sheriff

6 Player Game:

The renegade needs to kill (or assist) all three outlaws
The renegade needs to kill (or assist) the deputy
Once both of those are done the renegade needs to kill the sheriff

7 Player Game:

The renegade needs to kill (or assist) all three outlaws
The renegade needs to kill (or assist) both deputies
Once both of those are done the renegade needs to kill the sheriff

Note with expansions there is also an 8 player game that adds in a 2nd renegade

8 Player Game:

The renegade needs to kill (or assist) all three outlaws
The renegade needs to kill (or assist) the deputy
The renegade needs to kill (or assist) the other rendage
Once all of those are done the renegade needs to kill the sheriff

  I think it's a good rule of thumb to act as a deputy early, but working with the other deputies to buff the sherif is not always a good idea. It can oftern put you in a position where its you and the sherif and but the sherif's sitting pretty with barrel/mustang/hideout or something.

What you are forgetting or ignoring is that with no matter how many players (4-8) a game is setup with a renegade will have to ensure that every player but the sheriff is killed in order for them to have a shot at winning. So it will always come down to a situation where the sheriff and renegade are in a dual so there is no reason not to help the sheriff kill the outlaws. In fact if you do a convincing enough job you might get the sheriff to kill the deputy which would make them lose all their items and become easier to kill.

Another thing you should remember is that not all games are designed to be perfectly balanced for one side or the other and in truth the real role that has reason to complain is the renegade since they can only win when everyone else is dead.

I would also like to point out that in a 6 player (or larger) it is very possible for the players later in play order to be killed before they even get a turn so I would not say this game considers balance at all.


Can I tap equipped artifacts for Improvise? The reminder text for the Improvise keyword states:

  Your artifacts can help cast this spell. Each artifact you tap after you're done activating mana abilities pays for {1}.

Can I tap an Artifact that is equipped to a Creature? And does the equipped Artifact retain its effect applied to the Creature it is equipped on?

Yes you may use Equipped Artifacts to pay costs of spells with Improvise.

The Improvise is defined in the comprehensive rules under 702.125 as follows:

  702.125a: Improvise is a static ability that functions while the spell with improvise is on the stack. “Improvise” means “For each generic mana in this spell’s total cost, you may tap an untapped artifact you control rather than pay that mana.”

Whereas equipment is defined under 301.5 as:

  301.5: Some artifacts have the subtype “Equipment.” An Equipment can be attached to a creature. It can’t legally be attached to an object that isn’t a creature.

All the Improvise mechanic cares about is that the object you are tapping is an Artifact, and your equipment fulfills that condition. Tapping the equipment isn't one of the conditions outlined in 301.5 for unattaching equipment, so it will remain attached (and continue applying its effects to the attached creature). For completeness sake common conditions that will cause the equipment to unattach are:

The Equipment becomes a creature
The Equipment loses the subtype "Equipment"
The Creature it is attached to stops being a creature
The Creature it is attached to gains protection from the equipment
The Creature it is attached to leaves the battlefield
The Equipment is attached to a different permanent
An Effect specifies that the Equipment should be unattached

One thing to keep in mind is though is when some people attack with a creature, they will tap the attached cards along with the creature they are attacking with. This isn't actually correct, but rarely makes a difference in the game. So just know that if you attacked with equipped creature you may still use the Equipment to pay costs of Spells with Improvise.


With what kind of trump holdings is a 4-4 trump fit superior? One poster has noted on other questions that a 4-4 trump fit was better almost a trick better than a 5-3 trump fit,and had a smaller premium over a 5-4 fit because of the ability to make either hand the master hand.

I could see that being the case where the two hands both had HHxx, where the "H's" are honor cards, and the x's are random small cards. But about "extreme" cases like AKQ6 opposite 5432, or JTxx opposite xxxx? How would the 4-4 advantage still hold? In the latter case for instance, I would welcome a fifth trump in either hand, because if it were a "spot," it would be a "long" trump after the opponents take their honors, and if it were a Queen or better, it would be a third honor?

In response to my Stayman question, the same poster (Pieter Geerkens) noted that one of the weaknesses of the four card heart suit was its lack of a ten (an honor) or nine (close enough). Could a lack of honors in "four card" major suit like 8632 dissuade one from using Stayman, or otherwise seeking a 4-4 fit?

The considerations which you describe affect the overall strength of the hand very much more than the playability of the suit. If you have two or three high card losers in your 4-4 fit, where are they going? If your combined holding with partner is sufficient for a play at game, J9xx vs T8xx has a legitimate chance for 2 or even 3 tricks with ruffs when the trump suit, but only a long-shot-con at 2 tricks if not the trump suit.

That being said, having the preponderance of your high cards in short suits makes a hand feel more balanced.  For example with

S - xxxx
H - ATx
D - K9x
C - QJx

a raise of partner's 1NT opening to 3NT looks like the most descriptive call even playing Puppet Stayman, whereas with

S - QJxx
H - ATx
D - K9x
C - xxx

a Stayman call starts looking more attractive.


How many Number Monsters have been released in Yu-Gi-Oh thus far? I know a few cards of the Numbers have been released in Yu-Gi-Oh card game. How many have been released in the TCG so far?

125 Number Monsters

The Yu-Gi-Oh! Wikia has a semantic search function that allows for creating complex queries. In this case, we want to query things that are:

Monsters in the real-life card game (either OCG or TCG)
Part of the "Number" archetype (including variants, like C and S)

This query can be constructed with [[Concept:CG monsters]] [[Archseries::Number]]. Running the query shows that there are 125 Number Monster cards at the time of this writing.

If we add [[Category:TCG cards]] to the query, we find that there are 122 Number Monsters in the TCG. The 3 that exist in the OCG but not the TCG are:

Number 29: Mannequin Cat
Number 41: Baguska
Number F0: Utopic Future - Future Slash