Can I use "Divinity of Pride" in my mono black commander deck? If not, then what card is/similar to Divinity of Pride but is a mono black?

Can I use Divinity of Pride in a mono black commander deck?

No.

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

White appears in Divinity of Pride's mana cost, so it can't be used in your mono-black Commander deck.

If not, then what card is/similar to Divinity of Pride but is a mono black?

There is no mono-black creature gaining abilities depending on having X "or more life"  – that's an ability associated with white.


Like Arcanist Lupus said, it depends on whether you mean simulating elevation on your board, or as a mechanic.  Here are some brief notes for either case, but I will improve the answer when you clarify your question a bit.

As far as simulating elevation visually is concerned, this can be done with a contour elevation map.  These are maps which have bands at each gradation of elevation.  Every point along a single band is exactly the same elevation, and the distance between any two bands covers the same amount of elevation.  If two bands are close to each other at a point, that indicates a steep elevation, whereas a further distance is representative of a more gradual slope.

As far as mechanics are concerned, elevation can impact movement and combat.  Some parts of your contour map could have bands which are very close together, to the point where they are too steep to be passable.  Additionally, you can have a movement penalty for increasing in elevation, or a movement boost for decreasing in elevation.  You could also add a chance for a vehicle to slide down the hill they are on if they are ascending too rapidly.  A vehicle at a higher elevation will have a longer range than one at lower elevation.  You could implement range in your combat with physical measurements (like inches or mm), and increase or decrease that range in game based on the relative elevations of your vehicle and its target.  So if you were to attack up an elevation, you would have reduced range, but attacking down elevation will increase range.


The guidance from the updated 2005 Europe rules almost assuredly applies. You MAY take losses on allied units even when on the attack, and furthermore, MUST take them if there are not enough attacking units to take all the losses. Allied subs may NOT submerge as they never rolled dice. Quote below:

  When German subs are attacked in a zone that contains Allied naval units of more than one nationality, Allied losses can be taken from any of those Allied vessels. If the defending German subs score more hits than the attacking player has ships, must the excess hits be taken from the Allied ships that are standing by? For example, a sea zone is occupied by three German subs and two British transports. The US player brings in two destroyers and attacks the subs. The German player rolls his defensive dice and scores three hits! Must the Allies lose three ships, even though the Americans attacked with only two?
  A guiding principle throughout the rules is that if there is a way to apportion hits so they result in losses, the losses must be taken. In this case, the Allies must lose three ships; whether those are two destroyers and a transport or two transports and a destroyer is up to the Allied players.

  In the previous example, what if the British transports had been subs instead? Could they submerge to avoid becoming casualties?
  The only time subs can submerge is immediately before rolling dice, whether attacking or defending. In this example, the British subs can't submerge because they don't get to roll dice (they're not defenders -- Germany is defending, the US is attacking, and the British are just innocent bystanders caught in the crossfire).


Explanation of Selvala, Explorer Returned's ruling?

Your rule 121.8 is out of date. The current version says this:

  If a spell or ability causes a card to be drawn while another spell is being cast, the drawn card is kept face down until that spell becomes cast (see rule 601.2i) or until the casting process is reversed (see rule 723, “Handling Illegal Actions”). While face down, it’s considered to have no characteristics. The same is true with relation to another ability being activated. If an effect allows or instructs a player to reveal the card as it’s being drawn, it’s revealed after the spell becomes cast or the ability becomes activated.

As for why casting the spell is reversed like that, that is covered in the rules that describe the process for casting a spell. Rule 601.2 says

  To cast a spell is to take it from where it is (usually the hand), put it on the stack, and pay its costs, so that it will eventually resolve and have its effect. Casting a spell includes proposal of the spell (rules 601.2a–d) and determination and payment of costs (rules 601.2f–h). To cast a spell, a player follows the steps listed below, in order. A player must be legally allowed to cast the spell to begin this process (see rule 601.3). If a player is unable to comply with the requirements of a step listed below while performing that step, the casting of the spell is illegal ; the game returns to the moment before the casting of that spell was proposed (see rule 723, “Handling Illegal Actions”).

Rule 723.1 says this:

  If a player takes an illegal action or starts to take an action but can’t legally complete it, the entire action is reversed and any payments already made are canceled. No abilities trigger and no effects apply as a result of an undone action. If the action was casting a spell, the spell returns to the zone it came from. Each player may also reverse any legal mana abilities that player activated while making the illegal play, unless mana from those abilities or from any triggered mana abilities they caused to trigger was spent on another mana ability that wasn’t reversed. Players may not reverse actions that moved cards to a library, moved cards from a library to any zone other than the stack, caused a library to be shuffled, or caused cards from a library to be revealed.

The quoted section is why Selvala's ability can't be reversed along with the rest of the casting process.


Rummikub allows you to break up sets and runs to form new groupings as you wish, as long as all groupings on the board are valid at the end of the turn.  This means all sets and runs must consist of at least 3 tiles and follow the other rules for creating them.  Therefore you can always split a run into two (or more) smaller runs, provided that each of the smaller runs still has at least 3 tiles.

However, it's difficult to answer your question as written because the initial state of the tiles on the board is invalid.  A joker tile must "stand in" for another tile that would be valid in the run, so you can't have "10, J, 11" - there can't be a tile in between the 10 and 11.

If we assume that your initial state is a run of 7, 8, 9, 10, J, 12, then it is legal to pull the 7, 8, and 9 away to form a new run, leaving the 10, J, 12 as a valid run.


When to reveal what you saw using the Map card in Saboteur?

When I have just looked a destination card I often afterwards put a road card that either:

Obviously leads towards the destination card that I just looked at, or
Obviously leads away from that card.

It is then up to my fellow players to decide whether they trust my obvious move or not, based on whether they think I am a digger or a saboteur. I noticed that this is often enough information for the other players to understand what you have seen on the destination card.

I don't think there is a better way that does not render you suspicious. If you give too much information away at a certain point, people will always become sceptical. However if you let them infer the "right" information themselves, they might believe that you didn't intend to give all information. And people consider their own "discoveries" more credible than information that was chucked into their laps. Even if you planned it that way. :)


Picking up multiple dropped objects following death or toad-ification in Talisman (4th ed.)

The Talisman app allows you to encounter all of cards/gold on a space, so if a player dies or is turned into a toad you get to go through ALL of their items and pick what you want to keep.  However, you still go in encounter order, so you have to fight monsters first.  The space works the same as if a player had purposefully left item(s) behind if they drew better objects and couldn't carry more.

This all is from how the app plays, but I'd hope that they got the rules right! :)


Think about the Elo Rating System used to measure the relative skill of Chess players. This is essentially an equation that takes a series of wins and losses and produces a number that can be used to predict the chances of one player winning a game against another player.

One of the inputs to the equation is a "distribution" that describes how much a difference in skill changes your odds of winning. This part is tweakable - they started with a normal distribution, but some groups have switched to a logistic distribution because they've found it to be more accurate.

If we had a fully deterministic game like "Which player weighs more?", the Elo rating would just be your current weight (or some deterministic mapping thereof), and the distribution parameter would be the Heaviside function (0 if less than 0, 1 if greater than 1).

If we modify that game a bit to make a game like "Roll a D6, add that to your weight, and see who has the highest number", the Elo ratings for everyone would still be the same, but the distribution function would have to change so that the behavior from -6 to +6 was a stepwise thing based on the distribution of die rolls.

If we had a zero-skill game like War, everyone would have the same Elo rating (and the distribution function wouldn't matter).

So if we have a two-player game that produces win/loss results, and a set of players, we can force the players to play games against each other and establish Elo ratings for every player, using some distribution function (maybe we start with a normal distribution like chess did). Eventually we'd be able to look at the results of all the games and determine that a logistic distribution (or a log-normal distribution, or some other distribution) did a better job of predicting the results than a normal distribution.

The shape of that distribution - how 'wide' it is, how it tapers near the ends, how steep it is in the center, and so on, is the answer to your question. Of course, this takes a huge amount of effort to measure, but it's theoretically possible to determine that curve.

Addendum: Here are some distribution curves (courtesy of Wolfram Alpha). Apologies that these don't have 100% consistent X/Y axes, but hopefully you get the point.

This is the 'normal' distribution (rather, its CDF). For example, using the yellow line, we'd expect a player with a skill of "+2" to win about 80% of the time.

The logistic distribution is very similar, but has heavier tails (this is really subtle!). The X-axis here is different (why, Alpha?); again using the yellow line we'd expect a player with skill "+50" to win about 90% of the time.

Note that with both the logistic and normal distributions, there is a parameter to tweak how 'wide' the spread is.

Heaviside:

Stepwise (using the "weight + d6" example, this should be transposed up and flatten out at the left/right extremes):


First Auction Power Plant in Power Grid?

After D won the first auction, Player A is obligated to choose a plant again. You may have missed this on page 3 of the rules:

  When the auctioning player wins the auction and gets the power plant, the next player in turn order takes his turn at offering a power plant for auction, if he has not already purchased a power plant this round. If he has, the next player in turn order may start an auction, and so on. When a player other than the player who started the auction wins the auction, the auctioning player may choose a new plant to auction from the actual market or pass.

Since the exception says everyone must buy a power plant first round, Player A may not pass.


Can ghost replenish hand in Reveal the Culprit phase

There is nothing in the Reveal the Culprit section about drawing new cards in the middle of the vision therefore you don't. It is similar to the Vision Interpretation part of the game where if you give a psychic multiple cards as part of a single vision you don't draw in-between them, only after you are done with that particular vision and a ready to move to the next psychic's vision.


The important rule here is that when multiple triggers happen off the same event the active player's triggers happen first. And a player gets to choose the order in which effects they control happen.
With that in mind...
The first question depends on whose turn it is when the runner accesses QPM.
During runner's turn the runner would be able to place QPM on Film Critic. Since both cards have the same trigger - "when accessed" - the person who's turn it is goes first, so Film Critic would take priority.
However, if the runner somehow accessed QPM while tagged on the corps turn (such as with An Offer You Can't Refuse) then the corp would score it, because on the corps turn QPM would take priority.
The second question the corp gets to choose who gets the agenda.
Since both Casting Call and QPM have the same trigger of "when accessed" and both are controlled by the corp, the corp player chooses the order of resolution. Most corps would pick Casting Call to resolve first, giving the runner tags and then resolving QPM to give themselves the point. However, there are a few situations where the corp might want to let the runner steal it, (such as landing Midseasons) in which case they let QPM resolve first and give the runner the point.
The runner would steal QPM as they are not tagged at the time of access.
Per the FAQ :

Question: If a Runner with no tags accesses a Quantum Predictive Model that hosts Casting Call, does the Corp score the Quantum Predictive Model?
Answer: No. The Quantum Predictive Model does not resolve if the Runner is not tagged when the access occurs.


How accessible are the many German-only expansions for Catan?

Allthough there have been numerous expansions and scenarios that were never published in English, it is still quite possible to acquire these scenarios in the US, along with reliable English translations of the rules. I would recommend starting at BoardGameGeek.com. That site can be a bit of a firehose for newcomers, but if you have a bit of patience, your efforts will pay off.

After creating a free user account at BoardGameGeek, use their game search function to search for the scenarios and expansions that you're interested in. Each expansion/scenario will have its own information page. These information pages are big part of what makes BoardGameGeek.com such a fabulous resource for those of us interested in boardgaming as a hobby.

In addition to basic game information and discussion forums for each game, the game's information page will also have two sections that will be of particular interest to you. First is the "Buy A Copy" section. This is where you can usually find used copies of the game for sale. These copies are generally supplied by individual hobbyists who set their own price and choose where they will and won't ship the game to. While many of the games you are asking about were only available in Europe, it's quite possible that the people who have listed their copies for sale on BoardGameGeek will be willing to ship them overseas.

The second section of interest is the "Files" section. Here you will often find translations for rulebooks of games when they haven't been officially provided by the game publisher in a particular language. A quick search led me to an English translation of the Atlantis expansion this way, as well as an English translation of the Alexander and Cheops historical scenario. I also saw numerous copies of the Alexandar and Cheops scenario for sale by sellers in the US, all of which were asking $25 or less (plus shipping, I assume).

You will need to create an account before you would be able to purchase from any of these sellers, but I suspect you'll find it worth your while.

You pointed out that your list of examples was not exhaustive. I'd like to suggest that you try a game search at BoardGameGeek.com using only the keyword "Catan"; I think you might be surprised at just how much stuff has been made available for that game. Have fun!


In Blood Bowl Team Manager, are Freebooter Stars supposed to be more or less powerful than their regular counterparts?

It makes a big difference when you gain the star player.  Gaining the average freebooter in the first round is better than gaining the average non-freebooter (there are always specific exceptions of course) because you will get to use that player statistically more often due to the smaller deck size.  Conversely, gaining a freebooter in the fourth round is potentially useless, as you want any star players you gain to come into play in the last round; only the ones put on top of your deck are guaranteed to do this.  The tipping point is somewhere in between.

One other consideration is how much sprinting your base deck has.  Decks with more sprinting have less use for freebooters because they can filter their deck mid-game.  Consequently, it is better to have more powerful characters to get the most value out of the sprinting ability.


What techniques should I use to teach my 5-year old to play chess?

I highly suggest taking him through the puzzles in Polgar's book.

The book starts off with very simple chess problems, with only a handful of pieces, with the idea of "solve for checkmate in x moves".  The problems are designed with a logical progression, highlighting specific tactics and strategies, and become increasingly complex and demonstrating more advanced concepts that build upon lessons learned from earlier puzzles.  Polgar used the puzzles in this book to teach his daughters, who each became grandmaster players in their own right.


Will multiple Exquisite Archangels give me many extra chances, or just one?

Only 1 Archangel gets exiled each time you lose. This is because the Archangel has a replacement effect, and when you have multiple replacement effects attempting to modify the same event you do it one at a time. The first Archangel replaces you losing with her effect. You are now no longer losing so the remaining Archangels don't have anything to replace so their effects do nothing.

616.1. If two or more replacement and/or prevention effects are attempting to modify the way an event affects an object or player, the affected object’s controller (or its owner if it has no controller) or the affected player chooses one to apply, following the steps listed below. If two or more players have to make these choices at the same time, choices are made in APNAP order (see rule 101.4).
616.1a-c These rules don't apply to this case.
616.1d Any of the applicable replacement and/or prevention effects may be chosen.
616.1e Once the chosen effect has been applied, this process is repeated (taking into account only replacement or prevention effects that would now be applicable) until there are no more left to apply.


You can only draw at most five cards from this. You could however gain up to 25 life.
Replacement effects can only be applied to an event once, and not indefinitely:

614.5. A replacement effect doesn't invoke itself repeatedly; it gets only one opportunity to affect an event or any modified events that may replace it.
Example: A player controls two permanents, each with an ability that reads "If a creature you control would deal damage to a permanent or player, it deals double that damage to that permanent or player instead." A creature that normally deals 2 damage will deal 8 damage-not just 4, and not an infinite amount.

Nefarious Lich has a ruling reminding us of how that applies here:

If you were going to gain life and you also have a replacement that can turn card drawing into life gain on the battlefield, you can gain life by using the Lich to turn the original life gain into card drawing, and then using the other replacement to turn a card draw into life gain. Nefarious Lich will not replace the life gain with a card draw again because it has already acted on this event.

Here's how that works out. When you draw a card, that's the event. You can replace it using Words of Worship:

{1}: The next time you would draw a card this turn, you gain 5 life instead.

... which turns the “draw a card” event into “gain 5 life”. This is still the same event, it's just doing something different now. That effect will in turn be replaced by Nefarious Lich:

If you would gain life, draw that many cards instead.

This turns the event into “draw five cards”. This is still the same event, just doing something different again.
If you had activated Words of Worship twice, the second Words of Worship replacement effect would see this event and replace one of the card draws to make this event: “Gain 5 life and draw four cards”. If you'd activated it six times total, these last five would would replace all card draws in this event, and turn the event into “Gain 25 life”.
You might be looking at the lifegain and thinking you'll draw cards, but remember: Nefarious Lich has already applied its replacement effect to this event to transform it once. Its replacement effect will not apply a second time. This means no life gain from this same event will be turned back into cards.


When to use card sleeves for a board game?

There are a few situations where you want to consider sleeving your cards

You want to prevent marking caused by uneven use (ever play Euchre with a normal deck of cards?)
You want to prevent marking caused by tears, folds, scratches and nicks (especially in games with a lot of shuffling or playing cards repeatedly)
You want to protect the value of the cards (for collectible card games, such as MtG)
You want to protect the condition of the cards (because you want them to remain in a nice state)
The cards are difficult or expensive to replace

And a few reasons you might want to not sleeve your cards

They will not fit nicely into the original packaging you have with sleeves
The cards no longer stack nicely with sleeves
It doesn't have much impact (if any) on the game if cards become marked (resource cards in Settlers of Catan, for example)
There is information on both sides of the card that needs to remain visible (you can, however, buy transparent sleeves)
The cards are easily replaceable (such as a normal deck of playing cards)
And, of course, sleeves cost money

So, in short, it's really a matter of personal preference.

I sleeve my cards when playing MtG as some of the cards are valuable and marking can be an issue.

I don't sleeve my cards for Arkham Horror as (although they are very worn) it isn't very important to keep information secret. The cards also come in various sizes and sleeving them all would be annoying.

For another game, Citadels, some information is very important to keep secret (roles) so I sleeve these cards to prevent marking, but other cards (buildings) are not as important to keep secret so I do not bother sleeving them. The same idea applies with Battlestar Galactica.


What is the best starting planet in Race for the Galaxy (base set)

I don't have stats, but the conventional wisdom is that production/consumption strategies are dominant in the base set, so ELC is generally thought of as the best. New Earth vs. Alpha Centauri seem like a toss-up to me for second.


Example 1: Yes

The effect of Cyber Dragon Infinity can negate the activation of any card effect, regardless of its location, as it does not specify any area in which the effect need be activated.

  Once per turn, when a card or effect is activated (Quick Effect): You can detach 1 material from this card; negate the activation, and if you do, destroy it.

As for the destruction of the activated card: if the card or effect whose activation is negated is in a zone wherein it can be destroyed, it is destroyed. This includes the hand, field, main deck and extra deck. If a card or effect whose activation is negated exists in the GY or is banished, the activation will still be negated, but the card cannot be destroyed in those zones.

Example 2: Yes, the Negation Occurs; Results Depend

As with Cyber Dragon Infinity, since Crystal Wing Synchro Dragon does not specify any area in which the activated effect need exist, it can negate the activation of any monster effect regardless of location. Now, as to the question of what happens: this varies depending on what kind of effect you activate in your hand.
Certain monsters, such as D.D. Crow, activate their effects by discarding themselves from the hand. Supposing that a player activates D.D. Crow's effect, Crystal Wing can negate its activation. However, examine the remaining clause (in bold):

  Once per turn, during either player's turn, when another monster's effect is activated: You can negate the activation, and if you do, destroy that monster, and if you do that, this card gains ATK equal to the destroyed monster's original ATK until the end of this turn.

So, the gaining of attack is wholly contingent upon the monster whose effect was negated also being destroyed as a result of Crystal Wing's effect.
As another example scenario, if a monster effect activates in the hand without discarding it, as is the case with the Danger! series of monsters, Crystal Wing can negate the activation and - provided the card is still in the hand when Crystal Wing's effect resolves - destroy that monster, and gain ATK equal to its original ATK.


Is it possible to jump back into MTG after 20 years away?

You can always play, but it will have some cost.
The rules have been neatened up and there are some core differences, but it remains mostly the same game.
Your existing cards can be played with, regardless of how good they are in light of current cards. You can make a few roughly even decks and play them against each other. The main risk of relying too much on old cards is that they can be confusing when teaching new players; a lot of them have had their text updated so you'd need to refer to Gatherer (e.g. Arcum's Whistle. Also, some of them don't present the stronger colour identities that help define Magic today.
If you just want to play together and get used to the game: I highly recommend building a few weaker decks out of a small-ish pool of cards. I did this on my return to Magic with a little more than the cards from 2 prereleases (About 20 packs in total), resulting in 4-5 decks which were varied but all playable against each other. Another way to do this is to ask for welcome decks at a game store, which are free 30-card introductory decks. Another option is to buy duel decks, which are full 60-card decks designed to play fairly evenly against each other.
You can also use your older cards in Commander decks (known as Elder Dragon Highlander), but these tend to require a larger card pool to put something decent together. Commander decks run 100 unique cards (unique apart from basic lands) with one legendary creature set aside that you can always cast. The format is designed for multiplayer, but there are more competitive two-player versions. Commander isn't pushed as a competitive format by Wizards, so different groups have very different philosophies to deckbuilding. Commander can be fun for new players, but there need to be enough decks and ideally enough players.
Constructed Formats
The following formats are competitive formats in which you bring a prepared deck. There are also banned cards which have been individually banned to prevent them from warping the game environment due to their strength (or for practical purposes).
Legacy and Vintage are competitive formats that use older cards, but far fewer players take part in these, and decks are streamlined and [incredibly] expensive. Games are often ruthlessly quick, as the best cards and combinations from all time are used. Legacy has a banned list, while Vintage allows 1 of each card on the Legacy banned list. Due to the complexity of the interactions and older cards, and the price, this isn't recommended for new or returning players.
Modern and Standard use more recent cards, and are better supported by Wizards and local game stores. Modern decks can contain cards that were printed in a Standard-legal set from Eighth Edition onward. Standard decks can contain cards in the 3 most recent blocks (each block having 2 sets). Due to the wide range of cards, Modern is a more stable format, with powerful and somewhat expensive decks. Standard is less expensive, and changes faster, but players need to change their decks as cards rotate out with the sets. Standard is okay for new/returning players, but still has a reasonable price tag.
Note that some cards from older sets may be legal if they've been reprinted since. Here are Ice Age cards that are Modern-legal, and here are Ice Age cards that are Standard-legal (currently only basic lands).
Limited Formats
While the constructed formats have varying price tags to be competitive, there are also limited formats, in which you use sealed booster packs of cards and build the deck before you play with it. Limited takes away the price factor in winning and distributes it between skill and luck. While each game of limited is cheap, you'll be using new packs each time you play. It can be a good way to play as you build up a base of cards for general play, or you can sell the cards after you play to minimise the cost as a hobby.
In Sealed, you build a 40-card deck using six booster packs and basic lands. This is a fairly quick way to play, and isn't too difficult to take part in once you're comfortable in Magic. Prerelease events use this format, and these are more casual events which are suited to newer players.
In draft, you pass booster packs around, picking a card each time. You then build a 40-card deck using the card pool you picked and basic lands. There are also 2-player draft formats which can be strategic and interesting. I've greatly enjoyed drafting with friends, although part of its success is that sometimes I've bought the packs and kept the cards (so newer players can experience the format without buying in). I love draft personally as it forces you to judge the value of cards that would be overlooked in constructed formats, and lets you build a variety of decks. However, I also don't mind the cost, and the cards go into my collection.
Finally, you have a combination of the two: Cube. This is essentially a constructed draft pool. You pick a large set of cards, and then take a random portion of it to play limited with. Some people spend a long time putting together and curating their cubes to make them interesting. You can also throw together a handful of cards you had otherwise.
Leagues
There's also the new format hosted at stores, Magic Leagues. This is kind of like an ongoing mini-sealed format. You use 3 packs and build a 30 card deck. As the event goes on over several weeks, you can add more packs to your card pool, and adjust your deck. This is designed to be a quick-to-play format which gives you experience building and then refining a deck from a limited pool. I haven't tried it yet myself.


How to resolve spawning two monsters on one tile in Castle Ravenloft

First:

On each tile, there is a skull pile on the floor.  When the first monster is placed on the tile, it is placed on the skull tile.

Each subsequent monster placed on that tile is placed as close to the skull pile as possible, so any square adjacent to it.

I believe this is stated in the rulebook, but I don't have it in fromt of me, so I will add the page number later.

Second:

I'm not sure that there is a huge need for house rules.  I think that the rules are succinct and well written.  I think that it can be easy to put too much thought into this game, and if you let go of the need to make it "D&D", you will find that the rules work quite nicely without customization 'needed'.

I really enjoy this game and take it out whenever I can.


Does the 30-point rule apply to every non-manipulating move, or only to the initial move?

I am going to guess that you were most likely playing Sabra Rummikub. You almost got it right with the former. The pagat page indicates that:

  The first meld made by each player must consist of one or more combinations formed entirely from that player's hand, where the total numbers of the tiles used add up to 30 or more. If a joker is used, it counts as the number of the tile it represents.

So, for the first meld of each hand, you must meld 30 points, since the game is made up of multiple hands.


Do you still collect a noble if the day ends?

I concur with Pat's answer - I have my copy of the rules in front of me, so can quote chapter and verse!

  Play continues in this manner until there are no nobles left in line
  at the start of someone's turn.  That day is then over and a new day
  begins. ... The player to the left of the person who started the
  previous day is the first player for the new day.

Essentially, emptying the line of nobles does not end the day, nor is the line immediately refilled with nobles.  The day ends at the start of the next player's turn, and as Pat says, a new player will be selected to be start player and thus the first to collect a noble.


If an attacking creature is sacrificed after being blocked, can I redeclare the block?

No.  The step for declaring blockers only happens once, followed by the ability to play abilities and effects, which can result in any number of situations including attackers or blockers no longer doing so, being destroyed, buffed, or whatever.  Regardless of the circumstance that results, blockers cannot be changed and the players must deal with the consequences of the units continuing with their combat orders to the best of their ability.


Possible to play 2x2 with 1 core set and data pack in Netrunner?

Short answer: Buy the What Lies Ahead data pack.  That with the core set lets you build two legal runner decks and two legal corp decks.

Longer answer

I assume from your question that you've already read the rules on deck building and aren't just trying to build the starter decks.  If you're thinking about buying data packs, you pretty much have to be building custom decks for things to even make sense.

If you're just going to play you're own decks against each other, you can do whatever you want in terms of deck building.  When limited in cards, ignoring influence limits is the best way to be able to follow agenda density requirements and deck minimums.  As long as your decks are fun to play against each other, that's really what matters.

If you want to follow all the deck-building rules, here's the run down:

Runner Decks

The base game comes with enough cards for you to be able to build two legal runner decks by having each run cards from the third faction.  Remember that you can spend up to 15 influence on out of faction cards (at least for the core set identities).  For the runners, all they need to do is get up to 45 cards (at least for the core set identities) while still staying under influence limits.

Let's assume we're making Shaper and Anarch decks.  The core set comes with 31 shaper cards and 32 anarch cards, with 15 neutral cards.  If we split the neutral cards between the two, that means we have two decks of 39 and still haven't used any influence.  That means each deck can run 6 criminal cards and has 15 influence to spend doing so.  Between Forged Activation Orders, Special Order, Easy Mark, Femme Fetale, and Bank Job, (all either 1 or 2 influence per copy) you're good to go.

Corp Decks

The primary limitation in building decks is the corp's agenda requirement.  The core set does not come with enough agendas to legally build multiple corp decks.  This is problematic because agendas cannot be run in decks of other factions (they have no influence value, which is different than having an influence of zero).  Of secondary concern for the corp is ICE.  The rule book suggests 17 - 20 pieces of ice for a 45 - 49 card deck.  This is an area where the corps might be hurting.

The deck building rules require 20 - 21 agenda points for the 45 - 49 deck size required by all the core set identities.  Given the core set only ships with 5 or 6 points of agendas in each faction and 15 points of neutral agendas, we need more to work with here.

The data pack What Lies Ahead is the best of the data packs for enabling more decks because it contains an agenda of each faction.  If you only buy this data pack, one of your corp decks must be NBN, as you need the 3-point Restructured Datapool.  This lets you run the neutral Private Security Forces in your NBN deck and the Priority Requisitions in your other corp deck of choice (along with the core set agendas and the corresponding What Lies Ahead agendas) and have two corp decks that meet agenda density requirements.

Now on to the ICE issue.  NBN (which must be one of your corps because of agendas) starts with 9 pieces of ICE from the core set, and gain another 3 (TMI) from What Lies Ahead.  If we split the core set's 6 pieces of neutral ICE (Wall of Static and Enigma) between our two corp decks, that means the NBN deck is already up to 15 pieces of ICE.  This means you only need 2 - 5 pieces of out-of-faction ICE which is fine on a 15 influence budget (look at Ice Wall, Shadow, Rototurret, Chum, and Wall of Thorns for 1-influence ICE).  You also get the neutral ICE Draco in What Lies Ahead, which probably works well in the NBN deck (goes with the "trace" theme).

All of the other corporations have at least 9 pieces of ICE in the core set, get another three from What Lies Ahead (though if you're running Haas-Bioroid, you'll probably need a Priority Requisition or an Accelerated Beta Test to be able to rez Janus 1.0, so maybe don't run all three copies of him), which leaves you in a similar situation to the NBN deck.  Pretty easy to get to the 17 - 20 range.

The fact that What Lies Ahead includes a piece of ICE and an Agenda for each of the four corporations is what makes it the ideal data pack to buy if you're just going to buy one.  Also, Morning Star is amazing.

2x2 Netrunner:

I'm curious as to how you're playing 2x2 Netrunner, as the standard rulebook does not support this at all.  The only rules I've run into on the topic were designed for the old Netrunner game (that's Netrunner the CCG, not Android: Netrunner the LCG), but could probably be adapted: http://www.darkpact.de/netrunner/variants/theBigSellOut.html.  That said, the simple solution is just pair off and play two games at the same time.  I'd be interested to know which you do.

A Purchasing Alternative

All you need from the core set to build multiple starter decks is a set of each of the neutral cards from the core set.  There are ways of buying these sets, such as buying a special of all the "triplicate cards from the core set" from http://borntoplaygames.com/product-category/customizable/netrunner/.  This would let you use the rulebook's recommended starter decks and have any corporation pair you want.


Yes, if a creature that is not named Lazav, the Multifarious activates the ability from Lazav, its name will become Lazav, the Multifarious.

Rule 706.9c says this:

  Some copy effects modify a characteristic as part of the copying process. The final value(s) for that characteristic becomes part of the copiable values for the copy.

In this case, Lazav's ability modifies the name as part of the copying process, setting it to "Lazav, the Multifarious", so the creature will have that name after the ability resolves no matter what name it had before.

With Sakashima in particular, after the ability from Lazav resolves, you will have two copy effects: one copying Lazav, the Multifarious, with the modifications made by Sakashima's ability, and one copying the target of the activated ability, with the modifications made by Lazav's ability. The second one has a later timestamp, so it overwrites the first one, and the resulting object just has the characteristics set by that second copy effect, including Lazav's name.

This would work differently if the ability said that it "doesn't copy" the creature's name, the way Vesuvan Doppelganger doesn't copy the creature's color.


Strong Pass systems are very rare, and as a Highly Unusual method you will never encounter one outside extended team play or without notice.

In extremis, adopt your Strong 1C defence by substituting a 1C call for a double of a 1C opening, and warm up the Double cards if opponents open a fert (any call besides Pass that is definitely limited) instead.

Anecdotes and alternatives from BridgeBase.com:

  When I met it years ago, I played that a One Spade overcall said "I am
  present at the table". The next player bid 1NT, alerted as Stayman.

and

  "Need" is a strong word, but it's always a possibility to consider
  making your "opening bids", especially in the majors, be more akin to
  overcall strength than full openers. This is tougher for the minors
  because you might need to make convenient minor full opening bids and
  it can be harder to distinguish them from overcall-style openings.

and

  If they 'open' a pass bid as much as you can as fast as you can. If they open a
  fert be prepared to double them lots with balanced
  hands and your overcalls are more like opening bids with shape. If
  they open with something else then use your generic meta defence and
  bridge principles.

and even:

  Use an anti-fert over the fert.
  1H  = 0-8,
  1NT = 0-10.
  Its a lot of
  fun.


Is this a correct formal heuristic for invalid moves due to Ko?

No, this logic unfortunately doesn't work: It prevents moves that are in fact legal, because they include a snapback.

$$ white to play
$$ . . . . . . .
$$ . . X O X . .
$$ . X O X . X .
$$ . X O O O X .
$$ . . X X X . .
$$ . . . . . . .

White captures:

$$W
$$ . . . . . . .
$$ . . X O X . .
$$ . X O a 1 X .
$$ . X O O O X .
$$ . . X X X . .
$$ . . . . . . .

Now with your definition:

  If in the previous half-turn exactly one single stone was captured

This is the case; white captured a single stone.

  then it is not allowed to play at the position of this stone in the immediately following half-turn (by the other player).

That position is marked as a. However, it's perfectly legal for black to play there, as it captures the whole white group, and thus does not repeat the board position:

$$W
$$ . . . . . . .
$$ . . X O X . .
$$ . X . 2 . X .
$$ . X . . . X .
$$ . . X X X . .
$$ . . . . . . .


Is there a "good" ratio of card types to have in an MTG deck?

Deck construction varies greatly from format to format, and even counting in formats that are more commonly played competitively with constructed decks (Modern, Standard, maybe Legacy) or limited formats (Sealed, Draft), you will find a great difference in deck lists.
Limited formats
Limited formats have the unique feature that you have to work with which cards you open or pick, meaning that while you might get lucky and draw some mana fixing, it will very likely not be enough to alter your mana base significantly because of it.
This will also largely depend on the edition you're playing with - while for most editions you're not too bad off playing 17 or 18 lands, Kaladesh is an edition where you will be suggested playing only 16 lands, due to the overall lower mana curve and speed of the format, and as far as I've noticed it, this is what highly competitive players actually opted for.
Due to the relatively low chance of building combo decks (due to not all editions featuring combo-enabling cards, as well as you not always drawing them), most Limited decks will have a great number of creatures compared to other nonland cards, as those are able to threaten damage over multiple turns, as compared to an Instant or Sorcery.
Constructed formats
Constructed is any entirely different animal. Not only do you get many different decks due to the different win conditions - you also can substitute card types you would normally use with others.
The consensus of comments and the first answer seems to be that lands, other than other card types, do have a recognizeable, repeating amount among decks. I would dispute that, due to the fact that MtG provides many different ways to come by the same resource.
To name an example, while you would normally produce red mana with a Mountain or other land card, you might opt for a Simian Spirit Guide (Creature) or Lotus Petal (Artifact), while other decks may still play the basic land, even for one and the same deck concept.
Another factor is how much mana your cards actually require to cast, and how long you intend to play before you win. Modern Affinity is notorious for dropping large portions of the starting hand into play on the first turn for having many cards that cost no mana to cast, resulting in a land base of 16 or even less lands (such as 12 back in 2011). Whichever conclusions you draw from that, and whichever average number you include it in, you will end up with a number that has nothing to do with reality, as the right number is not the average between 24 and 16 - it's 24 for one deck, and 16 for another.
As for other types, you're just completely entering random number territories. Decks will play their combo pieces, which can be any random card type - they are included because they're a part of a combo and do their job, not because the deck needs an arbitrary amount of a certain card type.
To again name an example, if you look at Splinter Twin deck lists, you will commonly find 4 copies of Splinter Twin, which is an Enchantment/Aura card. It's the key card for this very deck, but even considering adding a set number of Auras to a deck because it works for a single deck is ridiculous, as they make you weak to get "2-for-1-ed", meaning that you lose two cards to a single removal spell, for example. Not just including this card in a deck, but deciding to build entirely around it is what makes the deck strong and playable, but all of this is entirely independent of the card type - what matters is the card function.
Conclusion
I don't think you can create an accurate and purposeful diagram over the entire span of MtG competitive formats or decks. What you can attempt to create such a statistic for an individual format, but that will likely give you an average number with no practical purpose, since after all, you're likely not looking for a diagram with decorative qualities, but one to look at it and say "I should probably play n of that type to be successful", and I do believe such a diagram cannot exist for the entirety of the MtG universe.
Since you mentioned other TCGs in your question, let me also mention that MtG has a lot more formats that any other card game I'm aware of, making the issue of a general analysis even more of a complex dilemma, and the lack of this diversity in other formats may well be the reason that such a simple breakdown is possible for those games, but not MtG.
In this answer, the mentioned formats from my introductionary paragraph are the only ones I even considered - there are other formats played competitively, but not to an extend that makes their mention particularily worthwhile or representitive. Whichever numbers you might come up, once you enter Vintage Two-Headed Giant Commander (a format entirely covered by the official rules, mind you, yet not particularily tournament-viable), you will realize they won't work out even by a long shot.


What is the Chinese-language equivalent of gobase (main resource for SGF files)?

TOM qipu

http://weiqi.sports.tom.com/php/listqipu.html

Recent games, download SGF or view online with a java applet.

Flygo

http://www.flygo.net/jdqp.html

This one is a little gold mine if you know how to parse the page, old Chinese games, recent games...etc (downloadable SGF)

WeiqiOK

http://www.weiqiok.com/asp/English.asp

They have an english version. The kifu search is at the bottom of the page. (they also have tsumego, fuseki, joseki...etc.)

Here you can find a list of the players in their database.

Sina

http://duiyi.sina.com.cn/gibo/new_gibo.asp

On this page you can find recent professional games and games played on sina's weiqi server.

Eweiqi

http://www.eweiqi.com/qipu_more.asp

The Chinese portal for Tygem also has some Tygem + pro tournament kifu. (need to install an addon for IE to view)


Playing with the characters from the base and the Dark City expansion for Citadels.

I think that your statement concerning the combination of the cards is fairly accurate. If I had to do it, I think I would come up with the same result (except the last point that I will develop). But as it has been said, this variant has some drawbacks :

Increasing the chances of an attack by adding 3 offensive cards (Witch, Magician, Diplomat) out of 7. In my experience, I love Citadels for everyone want to avoid the dreaded attack at the wrong time that will ruin your game. Increasing the number of offensive cards is not a good point. Again, this is only my opinion, and I have never tried this variant. You may argue that this could be slightly compensated by adding the Artist and the Queen, but you then have to decide how you know that the Queen is next to the King (placement of characters in a player's own courtyard).
Modifying the balance between colors. Of course, if you have 4 red buildings, it will be very risky to choose the red characters, but if several players manage to focus on one of the two new "unbalanced" colors, the game will simply shift towards a game of luck : whoever manages to get a huge amount of coins then take the "cards" characters. This is like in the normal game, but will become slightly more hectic (which is not bad per se) and lose some balance in the colors.
The King/Emperor, according to me, loses all interest because of the combos for the other two colors (and the fact there are more green buidings). It may depend on the rule for distributing the characters on the next turn of course. As I see it, you have two options : you make players choose a first time for their first character and then a second time. What you can do to reinforce the power of the King is make players choose both characters at the same time, but I'm concerned about the general balance of this method.
To avoid the conflict with the King, one could propose that the Emperor picks in Second whatever place he's at. It would also help solving point 1 by adding a non-agressive card.

In conclusion, I would say this variant is certainly interesting but would create some minor balance issues that can be solved by some tricks that I mentionned. But it would be interesting to hear from people that actually have tried something like that.


How is France played in Allies and Axis Europe 1940 (Second Edition)?

Yes france is moot and standard rules.  Liberation is only hope. and if original French territory is taken by axis and then taken by allies while paris is not liberated, the original French territory may belong to the ally (until paris is liberated).


Is there a good place to keep updated on Carcassonne News?

Boardgame Geek's Carcassonne family page; which collects information on all of the Carcassonne games. You can also search for "Carcassonne" and get a list of all the games and subscribe to the individual games of interest.

Just sign up, click "Subscribe" and you will stay up to date on all Carcassonne news.


Thorncaster Sliver and Venom Sliver vs. Priority or Lack Thereof

The simple answer is that your opponent cannot use any of the abilities from Thorncaster Sliver to deal damage to Ethersworn Shieldmage, and Ethersworn Shieldmage can protect all of your artifact creatures from all of the damage.

This is the exact sequence of events for how your example should play out:

Your opponent declares 5 Slivers as attackers, with both Thorncaster Sliver and Venom Sliver on the battlefield.
For each attacking Sliver, your opponent puts their triggered ability from Thorncaster Sliver on the stack. This is part 508.2 of the Declare Attackers step. At this time, your opponent declares which creature each ability is targeting (see rule 603.3d and rule 601.2c).
Your opponent gains priority (rule 508.3). From how you described your example, they choose to do nothing and pass priority.
You gain priority. At this time, you cast Ethersworn Shieldmage.
You gain priority again, but you have nothing else to do here so you pass priority.
Your opponent gains priority. They have an opportunity to act here, but they can't do anything with the abilities from Thorncaster Sliver, because those are already on the stack. Once you do nothing and pass priority, Ethersworn Shieldmage resolves and enters the battlefield. At this time, the Shieldmage's ability triggers, and goes on the stack.
Your opponent has another chance to act, but they still can't do anything with the abilities from Thorncaster Sliver. They pass priority, and so do you.
Ethersworn Shieldmage's ability resolves. For the rest of the turn, any damage that would be dealt to any artifact creature is prevented.
The abilities from Thorncaster Sliver resolve. All of the damage that they would do to artifact creatures is prevented.

Your opponent did one major thing incorrectly: they tried to deal damage to the Master Transmuter in response to you casting Ethersworn Shieldmage. You didn't have an opportunity to cast Ethersworn Shieldmage until after all of those abilities were on the stack, so there is nothing they could have done to make one of those ablities resolve before Ethersworn Shieldmage.

However, since you revealed the Ethersworn Shieldmage out of turn, it would have been reasonable for your opponent to choose non-artifact creatures as the targets for any abilities that they had not yet declared targets for.


Yes. You make all decisions for that player, and what to vote for is a decision.

  712.5. While controlling another player, a player makes all choices and decisions the controlled player is allowed to make or is told to make by the rules or by any objects. This includes choices and decisions about what to play, and choices and decisions called for by spells and abilities.


I think this is because Liverpudlians, especially back in the 60s, were stereotypically a bit cheeky (as in, untrustworthy).

John is saying that it's the usual Liverpool way of shuffling so as not to shuffle at all, and likely the cards will be stacked in Ringo's favour.


Does the Town Hall count toward the Architect mission?

Just got the answer straight from the Publisher on BGG:

  Excellent question! No it does not!


How Would I Get A Modern Diplomacy -"Like" Game Produced?

A few immediate thoughts:

from a game play standpoint where are the "BRIC" countries (Brazil, India, Indonesia etc) or are you designing the game to largely involve conflict between the 5 powers you cited in Africa, South America etc?
from a "how do you get a game produced" there are many routes. An increasingly popular route would be to go independent - many games are starting with Kickstarter campaigns (where the supporters get the first copies of the game) which has the advantage of helping you gauge the actual market interest and demand. In the case of a modern update to an older game you may have to determine what, if any, patents or other IP rights you might have to license from the original (if any at all) and thus may have to deal with the original publisher (or who ever now owns the rights to the game). Since Diplomacy is a fairly old game it is likely that any patents on the game board etc have long since expired.
a final suggestion, Diplomacy has had a very long standing tradition of being played online (via email, via websites etc) could you make a digital, online version of your game before you make any investment into a physical game (with all the production costs & distribution issues that involves?). A digital game, especially if you can attract a core of engaged players, likely would also help you iterate on the game design and evolve the gameplay and game balance based on many rounds of playtesting.

And finally while there are game players here on Stackexchange I assume you do know about the very active and engaged board game community of BoardGameGeek? I'd strongly suggest reaching out to serious Diplomacy fans there and at reaching out to independent game publishers both on BGG and via their Twitter and websites. I'd also suggest subscribing to great game design podcasts such as Richard Garfield's great podcast (and there are many other board game related podcasts that feature long interviews with game designers and publishers).


Does card-counting work in online Blackjack?

Online casinos use an 'infinite shoe', which would preclude any card counting, as they effectively draw random cards with a fixed probability.  This means it's possible (though very very very unlikely) for all the players at the table to draw the same card (e.g. everyone gets an eight of hearts).

This is done both for ease of the game developer (fixed probabilities are easier to code than simulating multiple decks) and to prevent card counting (which is unenforceable on-line).

So, in short, card-counting is completely ineffective on-line.


Will Return to Duty get someone out of the Brig?

No, the rules are fairly explict about getting out of the Brig.

  Players may move out of “Sickbay” without difficulty, but not the “Brig.” They may only move out of the “Brig” by passing the skill check listed on the location.

Piloting Vipers

  A player who wants his character to pilot a viper simply moves his character to the “Hangar Deck” location and uses the action listed there.

Also from the BSG Errata, although it doesn't mention your particular example, it is a similar move a character from the Brig to some other location.

  Q: If a character is in the “Brig,” and a card sends him to “Sickbay,” is he moved from the “Brig?”
  A: No. This reflects a change from previous rulings.


Best way to improve ourselves when playing against a computer

I have no sources to cite, but I think it depends a lot on your own learning style. You will certainly not learn well if the computer just tells you the best play and you follow it, but if you can carefully think through your move before being told by the computer if it's bad, and if the computer has a better move you can reason out why it's better, immediate feedback is fine. However, if you find yourself getting impatient and cutting back on your thinking time, perhaps you should wait until the end.

I do Go problems on the computer a fair bit. With Go problems, usually the first move is the key, and often is the hardest move to find. Some programs will tell you immediately if the first move you've made is correct, but I much prefer the ones that will let me play out a bad sequence without telling me it's wrong until the end. That way I see exactly why it doesn't work, and it reduces the temptation to just try something that looks promising to see if it's right.


How to respond to publishers when they ask for rules?

Send the rules.

Fear of having your idea copied/stolen is a uniquely amateur mentality. Daniel Solis (designer) and Gil Hova (publisher who references other publishers) cover the topic well in their articles about this very topic. Additionally, there is this entry on BGG. They all conclude that you should not worry about someone stealing your idea.
The company asked for the rules. Do you suspect they won't act in good faith? If so, the rules issue is moot. Otherwise, please know that this is standard practice. Earlier this week, I made appointments with about 20 designers for Gencon - and declined several others - after looking at a combination of rules and sell sheets. Let the professionals see your game for what it is!


Using blade on supporting unit in A Game Of Thrones

This is clearly stated on page 20 of the rulebook. (For reference the rulebook and the FAQ.)

On p. 20 it states:

  If either the attacker or the defender holds the Valyrian Steel Blade token, that player now has the option of using its ability to provide +1 to his total Combat Strength. If used, flip the token to its faded side, as a reminder that it cannot be used again this round.

So, no, a supporting player is neither the attacker or defender and so cannot use the Valyrian Steel Blade in that combat.


The golden rule in Dominion is follow the card instructions as much as possible. You can play Pixie a second time, even if it has been moved, e.g., moved to the trash. However, you may not be able to execute some conditional effects, e.g., trash the card. So here is how a Throne Room/Pixie or Ghost/Pixie plays:

Play Throne Room; choose an action card.
Play Pixie once.

+1 Card, +1 Action
Discard top boon (Boon1).
Trash Pixie; receive Boon1 twice.

Play Pixie a second time. Note that Pixie is now in the trash.

+1 Card, +1 Action
Discard top boon (Boon2)
Pixie cannot be trashed, so you cannot receive Boon2, neither once nor twice.

Same goes with Ghost and any similar card (e.g., King's Court from Dominion: Prosperity, Royal Carriage from Dominion: Adventures, etc). No matter now many times you play Pixie, you can only trash the card once. But you always get the +1 Card +1 Action.


What are good strategies for sealed deck?

Exactly the same as for draft, in terms of the BREAD rule.  Obviously that you don't have to worry about what to pick and pass: all that has been done for you, by the vagaries of random chance!  All that's left is to locate the most synergetic deck you can from whatever you've opened out of your boosters.

One thing I've seen the pros do, that I think is a great idea, is start off by checking your rares and mythics.  Oftentimes any truly busted bombs will be found here, and give you a good idea of what colours you want to find a way to include, if humanly possible.

Beyond that, the very intuitive thing holds true: separate your cards by colour and look for piles that contain lots of good creatures and efficient removal.  If you have two such piles, you're off to an excellent start!  Be careful though of possible mana curve issues: if you have two piles that are both stacked with great expensive cards, you may be better off going for a weaker colour that better complements your curve.

Don't get greedy and try to play a 4-colour deck, just because you have bombs in 4 colours: sometimes you just have to show some discipline.  Anything beyond two colours with a small splash of a third colour should set off some serious warning bells.  Having said that, don't panic that your deck doesn't seem as "bomby" as the decks you're used to drafting.  Sealed is typically a much slower format, with a bit more room to develop your position, and a bit more tolerance for the odd clunky card.  Though of course if you have the good fortune to be able to assemble a blazingly fast draft-quality deck out of your pool, you probably ought to go for it!


Warkite Marauder and the timing for its effect

Warkite Marauder's ability will trigger during the "declare attackers" step in the combat phase, and your opponent will be able to respond to it.

The combat phase in each turn is divided into five steps:

  506.1. The combat phase has five steps, which proceed in order: beginning of combat, declare attackers, declare blockers, combat damage, and end of combat.

"When attack" abilities trigger when a creature is declared as an attacker, which is during "declare attackers".

  Declare Attackers Step

    508.1. First, the active player declares attackers. This turn-based action doesn’t use the stack. [...]

    508.2. Second, the active player gets priority. (See rule 116, “Timing and Priority.”)

      508.2a Abilities that trigger on a creature attacking trigger only at the point the creature is declared as an attacker. They will not trigger if a creature attacks and then that creature’s characteristics change to match the ability’s trigger condition.

      508.2b Any abilities that triggered on attackers being declared or that triggered during the process described in rules 508.1 are put onto the stack before the active player gets priority; the order in which they triggered doesn’t matter. (See rule 603, “Handling Triggered Abilities.”)

So before the active player gets priority, Warkite Marauder's ability will be placed on the stack. At this point, the active player gets priority, and when they pass, the nonactive player will get priority, all while the ability is still on the stack.

Note that placing the triggered ability on the stack requires declaring targets for it, so the defending player will know which creature is being targeted by the Marauder's ability when they respond. So they can respond by activating an ability of the creature that is being targeted, because the Marauder's ability has not yet resolved, so the targeted creature will still have its abilities.

If the nonactive player passes; then the Marauder's ability will resolve, and the targeted creature will lose all abilities.This means that by the time blockers are declared in the combat phase, the targeted creature will already be a 0/1 with no abilities.


Ghost Town - Do abilities of the characters still count?

Yes he can use his ability.
For reference the Ghost Town card reads:

During their turns, eliminated players return to the game as ghosts.
They draw 3 cards  instead of 2, and cannot die. At the end of their
turn, they are eliminated again.

Note that it states that they are to draw cards, so the ghost's will enter at phase 1, the draw phase.
Clause "The Saint"'s special abillity is:

He draws one card more than the number of players, keeps 2 for
himself, then gives 1 to each player.

From the answer to Q14 on the FAQ for the High Noon from the publisher dV Giochi:

Q14. How many cards Bill Noface and Pixie Pete draw when they enter in play as ghosts  thanks to the Ghost
Town?
A. Bill Noface enters in play with 5 cards, Pixie Pete with 3 cards.

We can see that a players special ability does not suffer from the Ghost Town card being put into play.
However as Claus "The Saint" is not specified in any FAQ that I could find, we do not know if he should have gotten the advantage that the Ghost Town card gives ("adding an extra card to the ghost", and thus giving him 6 cards to draw. So that he would end up with 3 cards for himself.), but seeing that Pixie Pete starts with 3 cards and not 4 (His special ability +1 (for the "extra card" from the Ghost Town), we have to assume that Claus "The Saint" get neither benefits or drawbacks from the the Ghost Town card.


Is there a conventional way of searching for lands in a mono-red deck?

Solemn Simulacrum is good colorless fetch (and draw).

Traveler's Amulet and Horizon Spellbomb can get lands into your hand.

Caged Sun will get you lots of mana (but no lands) as will Koth of the Hammer.

Iron Myr is a good mana producing creature

Infernal Plunge and Geosurge can also have their uses.

Fiery Fall is the only mono-red card that could be considered land fetch but it's not Standard.

Other non-Standard methods for increased mana in red can be:

Extraplanar Lens

Gauntlet of Power

Gauntlet of Might

Mana Flare


From Law 70.B:

B. Concession Defined

Any statement to the effect that a contestant will
lose a specific number of tricks is a concession
of those tricks; a claim of some number of tricks
is a concession of the remainder, if any. A player
concedes all the remaining tricks when he abandons
his hand.

Declarer's statement states that regardless of the play, he will lose both tricks. This meets the definition of a concession. Your opponents should have accepted the concession and ended the hand without further play.
As far as what the dummy should do, the best option would be to ask "is that a concession?" as it provides no additional information. Regardless of what you do at this point, the hand should be over.


My experience with Descent is that some maps are balanced towards the Heroes, and others towards the Overlord.

If you still find the heroes are losing a lot on most of the maps, in my opinion, your best bet is to pick up The Tomb of Ice expansion. It adds Feat cards for the heroes which are quite powerful, especially when you add them to the base maps.

If buying an expansion is not an option for you, there are many, many ways to rebalance the game. Some examples could include: Reduce the Overlord's threat by 1/turn, give the heroes more starting coins, allow the heroes to pick their starting characters or feats, use the monster cards designed for 1 fewer player etc.

Some of these are bigger balance shifts than others, but if you play around with them a little, you'll probably find something that helps.

Finally, it's possible that your hero team just isn't playing as well as the Overlord. This forum has pages of strategy for the heroes and Overlord. Why not get the hero team to have a look? http://boardgamegeek.com/forum/429/descent-journeys-in-the-dark/strategy


In King of Tokyo when playing with 5-6 players, what happens when monsters die?

Page 2 of the rules, under the Advanced Rules section, answers this question:

  If a monster is eliminated and that brings the number of Monsters below 5, Tokyo Bay can't be occupied anymore. The monster in it must leave Tokyo.

So your guess was correct. You can only occupy Tokyo City once you drop down to 4 Monsters.


When referring to "every location" in Dead of Winter does this include the colony?

The Colony is a location with six entrances. So for instance Raiding Party says add two zombies to every location. This includes the colony which would get one zombie in Entrance 1 and one zombie in Entrance 2

In your specified case when taking away zombies you would again take only two from the colony not two from every entrance

From the manual page 5:

  The game board is made up of 7 different locations, including the colony board and 6 location cards.

Page 12; note the specific phrasing indicating that other locations are "non-colony locations" thus including the colony as one location just a special location.

  Add 1 zombie to the colony for every 2 survivors (including helpless survivors) present there (rounded up). Add 1 zombie to each non-colony location for every 1 survivor present at that location.

thus the colony IS a location. a single location. The rest of it is a combination of cards saying to add/remove zombies from locations and not entrances.


What happens with continous trap/spell cards when they get negated by Light and Darkness Dragon?

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

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

The relevant rules are:

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


Hierarchy of dying - Is this Venn Diagram accuarate/complete

The new rules changed for innistrad. Dies and Enters the Graveyard are now very similar (A creature “dies” if it is put into a graveyard from the battlefield; rule 700.4.). Dies now means "is put into a graveyard from the battlefield.” So I'd start by putting "dies" and "is put into graveyard" together.

Toughness - Damage < = 0 makes little sense in that context (because it is completely arbitrary and has no in game analogue).

I'd just keep sacrificed, destroyed and 0 toughness as 3 entities inside "Died", with lethal damage inside destroyed, (and also add deathstrike inside destroyed).

Make the wording shorter too, it's obvious in context that lethal damage inside destroyed means it was destroyed by lethal damage. No need to say "dealt lethal damage".

Edited: Deathtouch as a subset of death touch. Legend Rule as another way to Die / put creature in graveyard.

  Left Battlefield

    Exiled

    Died / Put into Graveyard

      Sacrificed

      Legend Rule (like Diego noted)

      0 Toughness

      Destroyed

        Lethal Damage

          Deathtouch (as Hackworth noted, Death Strike causes lethal damage)


You can only activate the first effect, since while in your hand destiny hero - dark angel is no dragon. Since it becomes a dragon on the field, you can not activate it's effect due to the buster blader.

EDIT: Answering to your comment, if you mean DH Plasma, Then you are probably referring to its effect of negating opponents mosters effects. Since the Buster Blader negates only activated abilities, the continuous ability of Plasma is not negated. Then since Plasma negates Buster Blader, you could also activate it's second effect and equip him with the Buster Blader.


What is the name of this solitaire card game?

It sounds like a variant of Push-Pin.

  You can eliminate a card or a pair of adjacent cards between two cards of the same suit or rank. Select a card or a pair of cards you want to discard by clicking on them. The overall effect of successive plays is that length of the layout gets shorter and shorter. If the length is reduced to two cards the game is won.

The differences I see are:

In Push-Pin, you can remove two or one cards between cards of the same rank or suit.
In Push-Pin, if you don't remove all four cards when matching cards between cards of the same rank.
In your game, the cards are flipped in your hand as you go, not all at once, so there's no strategy required.

Since you can remove all four cards, it is possible to eliminate all cards in your described game. As there's no strategy required to "win" (the outcome is predetermined by the order of the cards) I don't think it matters which rule to win you use. ;-)


What is the board game featured in this Houkago Saikoro Kurabu picture?

The author has confirmed on Twitter that it is an imaginary game:

Translation courtesy Google Translate:

Hello! Thank you very much. The game with that illustration is my imaginary game and doesn't really exist ~ (^ ω ^)


In Chariot Race, do you incur a cornering penalty on being knocked back onto a numbered space after ramming?

No, you do not take cornering damage when you're forced back into a corner space showing a maximum safe speed. You only need to do this when you enter the corner via normal movement.

Note, however, if there a string of chariots lined up around a corner and you had really bad dice, you might be forced to ram several of them in succession after taking cornering damage. You might then be forced back into an empty space before the corner such that on your next turn, you'd be forced to re-enter the corner again through normal means. In that case, you'd take damage from the corner again. I've never seen this happen, but it's theoretically possible.


Quacks of Quedlingburg Crow Skull Set 2 Keep Drawing

No you can't continue to draw after your pot explodes.

The only ability listed for the Crow Skull set 2 is that you receive both victory points and coins if your pot explodes in the next 1/2/4 draws - it says nothing about allowing you to continue to draw after your pot explodes.

Thus the normal rules for stopping when your pot explodes would still apply.


Are there any non-supply cards besides Black Market?

All cards not in the supply could include:

Cards in your hand
Cards in your opponents hand
Cards in play (including opponents)
Cards in your deck
Cards in your opponents deck
Cards in your discard pile
Cards in your opponents pile.
Cards in other locations (ie Village Mat)
etc.

Example Play from Intrigue cards:

Play a two Mining Villages, play two Bridges, play a Swindler.
Opponent turns over an Estate which is now valued at $0, replace opponent's Estate with a Curse.


When you return an evolved pokemon to your hand, and you put it back into play, do you have to evolve the pokemon again?

You need to put them back into play the same as if they’d never been in.  You may return the Basic Pokémon to the field immediately if you want, but the Stage 1 must be placed on a Basic Pokémon that has been out since before the beginning of the turn.


Clarification of creature's subtype for card effects

In Magic each subtype is its own separate thing. So when the Inquisitor says "Human Soldier" it means "this creature is a Human and this creature is a Soldier". Similarly Avacynian Priest couldn't tap the Inquisitor even though it has the Soldier subtype because it is still a Human.

Ghoulraiser would work the same way, the Mauler is a Zombie (regardless of any other subtypes it may have) so it is an option to be returned to your hand.

  205.3b Subtypes of each card type except plane are always single words and are listed after a long dash. Each word after the dash is a separate subtype; such objects may have multiple types. Subtypes of planes are also listed after a long dash, but may be multiple words; all words after the dash are, collectively, a single subtype.
  Example: [...] “Creature — Goblin Wizard” means the card is a creature with the subtypes Goblin and Wizard.


I have the Dominion base set only, in what order should I buy the expansions?

Personally, my favorite expansion is Prosperity.  My least favorite expansion is Alchemy.

So, if I had to suggest an order, it would be:
Prosperity, Dark Ages, Seaside, Intrigue, Hinterlands, Cornucopia, Guilds, Alchemy.

Here are the major new things in each set:

Intrigue

New Mechanic: Multi-type cards (ex. Action – Victory)
Actions tends to be more complicated than Base's actions
Nastier attack cards
Standalone (doesn't require Base)
Emphasis on attacks and special actions

Seaside

New Mechanic: Durations (Multi-turn actions)
New types of Attack cards
Tokens and Mats for use with certain cards
Emphasis on setting up your next turn

Alchemy

Smaller set (12 Kingdom cards instead of 25)
New basic Treasure card: Potion, costs $4 worth 1p
Powerful cards, but 10 of 12 take a Potion to buy
Emphasis on extra actions/action chaining

Prosperity

New basic Treasure Card: Platinum, costs $9 worth $5
New basic Victory Card: Colony, costs $11 worth 10vp
8 Kingdom Treasure cards that act like actions when played during Buy phase
New Victory tokens, worth 1vp or 5vp each
Emphasis on treasure and victory points

Cornucopia

Smaller set (12 Kingdom cards instead of 25)
Emphasis on Actions and Drawing cards
Doesn't mix well with Prosperity
Jester is the real star of this set as it lets you gain one of a card an opponent flips up.

Hinterlands

Several new Kingdom Victory cards with special effects
New Mechanic: On gain, do X
Emphasis on +Cards and gaining cards
Puts a new twist on some existing card ideas (ex. Margrave instead of Militia)

Dark Ages

More new Kingdom cards than any other set
Shelters provide an alternative to starting with 3 Estates
New card type: Ruins. An action card that isn't very useful (brown border)
Emphasis on giving other players junk and action chaining

Guilds

Smaller set (12 Kingdom cards instead of 25)
New Mechanic: Coin tokens that you gain and can spend later
Emphasis on trashing cards and gaining coin tokens


The campaign game changes some of the rules, depending on which mission you are playing.

For example, on Mission 3 "A test of strength (hard)", the rules are

  [...] If you would make your opponent discard a card, you gain 2
  Authority instead. [...]

I'm pretty sure you were playing a mission with special rules.


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

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

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


How do you pronounce "Hacan" in Twilight Imperium?

Short answer: Ha- Kahn

Rationale:

There is no official pronunciation from Fantasy Flight as of yet (and I hope they don't release one, because this is one of the best things to argue about in the game).  That said, we have some theoretical basis to come up with one by considering that "proper" pronunciation will vary by language.

The first question we have to ask is whose word is "Hacan"?  Is that their spelling or the Anglicization?  I am assuming here that the language of Federation of Sol descends from English, which is not a perfect assumption since Sol is both the English and the Latin name for the sun, but they do at least use the latin alphabet.  I would further assume that "Hacan" is the Anglicization or at least "Solanization", since it is written in the latin alphabet.  A lion race probably has different phonemes than humans (due to their different anatomy and vocal chords) and the true pronunciation may not be easily expressed in the Latin alphabet.

The true pronunciation in Hacaneese is probably something with a growl or a roar in the middle, since this is a race of lions, and I assume that is what is implied by the heavy use of A's in the word.  Similarly, I assume that the Xxcha begins with a clicking of the beak that can only be properly made with a beak (that humans lack).

This then leaves us with the question of how close "Hacan" is to the actual word in Hacaneese.  There are three typical possibilities.  One is that it is very close.  For example, the typical English pronunciation of "Shanghai" is only off by one phoneme from the proper pronunciation in Mandarin (ignoring tones).  Another is that it is an approximation with some creative liberties, such as the English "Belgrade", which bears only mild resemblance to the Serbian "Beograd".  Finally, we could be in a situation where we use a totally different word, such as "Germany" instead of "Deutschland".

In any case, it is likely that "Hacan" follows at least vaguely regular English* pronunciation rules, or else the Federation would have spelled it differently.
 The fact that the Sol word for the Xxcha attempts to capture the sense of the word in the Xxcha language leads me to believe the same is true of the word "Hacan", meaning that "Hacan" being in the "Germany" category is unlikely (since it at least resembles the true pronunciation).  I would also contend that Hacaneese is different enough from future English that it is also unlikely to be in the "Shanghai" category since a near perfect phonetic analogue is unlikely to exist in English.  This means that the word is an English approximation of some lion word with a roar/grows in it, but is as concerned with having a regular English pronunciation as it is with mimicking the authentic pronunciation.

I think that "Ha - Kahn" would be the English word closest to the true pronunciation that is still consistent with the spelling and English rules of pronunciation.  There is precedent in English for a mid word "C" followed by an "a" to be pronounced "K" (ex. recap) and the hard C much more closely resembles a roar/growl than the soft "Ha- san".  I believe the A's have the same pronunciation as each other since this is still a reasonable English pronunciation that vaguely resembles lion noises.

* "English" being a stand in for "Future English or whatever other language the Federation of Sol uses"

Caveats:

We only have the Xxcha as the demonstration that "Hacan" is not in the "Germany" category.  We are also assuming that the language of the Federation closely resembles modern English, which it may very well not as even the same language changes a lot over thousands of years, so even if they use English, it may be a very different English (look up the Great Vowel Shift for an example of this).  Given these two things, you can make a case for basically any other pronunciation on the grounds that we use a totally different word from the one they use or that Federation pronunciation has migrated enough to defy our intuitions.  After all, Xxcha is a word that starts with a double "X", which no current English word does.


The Storm Bolter is typically a Terminator weapon; it's a double bolter. It is well illustrated on the 40K wiki. (Links below)

To make one, the easiest way is to use two bolters. Separate the hands/arm/pistolgrips from the body of the weapon. Shave off the right side of one and the left of the other, down until you've just touched the barrel. Glue these together, glue one arm back centered. Patch the gaps. Prime and paint.

To convert a terminator's storm bolter for non-terminators, cut off the weapon at the wrist, and the arm at the wrist, and swap.

Most of the terminator models I've seen ship with a storm bolter as the default weapon, and I don't recall seing the option for them for non-terminator troops since the days of Rogue Trader, but I'm a casual player only, and so don't keep close track.

http://warhammer40k.wikia.com/wiki/Terminator_Armour
http://warhammer40k.wikia.com/wiki/Storm_Bolter


Can the Runner/Corporation trash their own installed cards?

Unless a card states otherwise, players may only trash cards in the following circumstances:

In the rulebook (PDF) page 13:

  When installing a card in a server, the Corporation can first trash any cards already installed in that server. Trashed cards go to Archives faceup if they are rezzed, and facedown if they are unrezzed.

This means that under normal circumstances, Corps can trash ICE (rezzed or unrezzed), assets/upgrades (rezzed or unrezzed) or agendas when installing any ICE/asset/agenda/upgrade in that same server. They might do this to install a valued card in a well-defended server rather than creating a new server, or to reduce the install cost of ICE. They MUST trash assets/agendas in servers that already contain assets/agendas.

Corps cannot trash ICE/assets/agendas/upgrades at any other time or in a different server.

On page 15:

  The Runner can choose to trash any number of his installed programs at the beginning of an install program action.

Under normal circumstances, Runners can trash programs when installing a program. In fact, they MUST trash programs if their MU limit is exceeded in this instance.

Runners cannot trash hardware/resources (including Wyldside!) or programs at times other than the above.

But, a card's text can over-rule this. For instance, Wyldside cannot be voluntarily trashed of its own accord, but, as you correctly mention, a card like Aesop's Pawnshop can trash it (and for a benefit) because the card explicitly tells you to trash something:

  When your turn begins, you may trash another of your installed cards to gain 3 [Credits].


Ticket to Ride, Warehouses and Depots: How to collect train cards?

This is exactly how it works by the rules. Yes, you can clear your warehouse whenever you want, but by doing so you expend 2 out of 5 of your depots, so you probably also give up a bonus 10 points for having the most depots by the end of the game.

Compare this to claiming cards from already placed depot: you can still do that instantly just by connecting route there and spending 1 depot. It isn't that much different.


Should I avoid pairing my opponents first lay in cribbage (singles)?

Let's look at some statistics. Let's assume that you have only a single one of some card value 'x' and 3 other cards. Let's also assume that your opponent has a single one of that card value 'x' (since he laid the first of the 'x' cards). Assuming also that he chose 4 random cards of the 6 he was dealt (not likely, but makes the math simpler), he has 3 chances to have second of that 'x' valued card from a remaining deck of 45 cards (52 - Your 4 - The 2 you threw into the crib - Your opponent's 1 'x' card), 2 of which are value 'x'. The chance of him not getting the 'x' valued card in his 3 more chances is (43/45)*(42/44)*(41/43) or .870 meaning that he has only a 13.0% chance of having a third card of value 'x' and therefore being able to get that 3-of-a-kind. Because you get 2 points for the pair and your opponent gets 6 points (aka you lose 6 points) for the 3-of-a-kind, playing to get the pair nets you (2*.870 - 6*.130) or +.960 points.

If we assume that if he is given a pair of 'x' value cards in his 6 cards, then he will keep them (a reasonable strategy), then the chances of him not getting the 'x' valued card in his now 5 more chances is (43/45)*(42/44)*(41/43)*(40/42)*(39/41) or .788 meaning that he now has a 21.2% chance of having a third card of value 'x' and therefore being able to get that 3-of-a-kind. This nets you +.304 points, a lesser amount than before, but still positive.

In both these scenarios, it is unlikely that your opponent will have that third 'x' card and either way you get a net gain of points over your opponent. Others may have strategies to provide, but these are the raw statistics of your scenario.


What is the reason for cards stating "Until end of turn, you don't lose this mana as steps and phases end"?

In the Comprehensive Rules it says (emphasis mine):

  106.4. When an effect instructs a player to add mana, that mana goes into a player’s mana pool. From there, it can be used to pay costs immediately, or it can stay in the player’s mana pool as unspent mana. Each player’s mana pool empties at the end of each step and phase, and the player is said to lose this mana. Cards with abilities that produce mana or refer to unspent mana have received errata in the Oracle™ card reference to no longer explicitly refer to the mana pool.

So normally you do not keep mana across phases. Thus, for a card like Llanowar Elves, if you use its ability to tap and produce (G), but do not use it on that step, then it will vanish and you will have tapped it for no reason.


Redirecting counterspells to Redirect itself

Yes.  From the Gatherer rulings:

  If you cast Redirect targeting a spell that targets a spell on the stack (like Cancel does, for example), you can’t change that spell’s target to itself. You can, however, change that spell’s target to Redirect. If you do, that spell won’t resolve when it tries to resolve because Redirect will have left the stack by then.


Are special body slots reserved for equipment with the exact same name?

You can only use the indicated piece of equipment in the body slot, not any similar piece of gear.
From page 17 of the rulebook under Inventory > Body:

Alternatively, it can hold the specific Equipment card that is listed on it.

So rules-as-written it is quite clear that you can only equip that item, and not a similar item instead.


Vastwood hydra + Cathars' Crusade + Mercy Killing

Vastwood Hydra is already in the graveyard at the point where you say "And when the Vastwood Hydra goes to the graveyard". But everything else is correct.

You declare your attackers. [Kalonian Hydra's third ability triggers.]
Kalonian Hydra's third ability is placed on the stack, then resolves:

Add 4 +1/+1 counters to Kalonian Hydra.
Add 4 +1/+1 counters to Vastwood Hydra.

Your opponent declares his blockers.
You cast Mercy Killing targeting the Vastwood Hydra, then it resolves:

Sacrifice Vastwood Hydra. [It goes to the graveyard here. This triggers its second ability.]
Put 8[1] 1/1 Elf Warriors on the battlefield. [Cathars' Crusade's ability triggers 8 times.]

At this point, a player (you) is about to gain priority for the first time since some abilities have triggered, so triggered abilities are placed on the stack. You can place your abilities on the stack in any order you want. It doesn't really matter here.

Place Vastwood Hyra's second ability on the stack.
Place Cathars' Crusade's ability on the stack. (1)
Place Cathars' Crusade's ability on the stack. (2)
...
Place Cathars' Crusade's ability on the stack. (8)
Cathars' Crusade's ability (8) resolves.

Place a 9th counter on Kalonian Hydra, and one on each of the 8 Elf Warriors.

Cathars' Crusade's ability (7) resolves.

Place a 10th counter on Kalonian Hydra, and a 2nd on each of the 8 Elf Warriors.

...
Cathars' Crusade's ability (1) resolves.

Place a 16th counter on Kalonian Hydra, and an 8th on each of the 8 Elf Warriors.

Vastwood Hyra's second ability resolves.

Place 8[1] counters on Kalonian Hydra for a total of 24.

Notes:

Last known information (LKI) is used. When it last existed, it had 8 power and 8 +1/+1 counters.


Who chooses the targets for Captain's Maneuver?

The controller of the spell (who is the person that cast it) gets to decide which creature's damage is replaced, and where that damage goes.

When you cast a spell, you choose the targets for that spell. In the case of Captain's Maneuver, there are 2 targets that you choose. One is the creature that would receive damage, and the other is the creature that receives the damage instead. This works the same with Captain's Maneuver as it would with any other targeted spell such as Lightning Bolt.

  Casting Spells

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

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


You may return any of your tokens. The wording in the rules just confirms that the tokens you return can include any of the ones you just took.


Can opponents keep Jeskai Infiltrator under their control past the end of their turn if it was manifested?

Yes, they will keep control of Jeskai Infiltrator. The card was exiled and then returned to the battlefield, so it is considered by the rules a new permanent with no relation to the card that Act of Treason was used on.

  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 seven exceptions to this rule:

(none of the exceptions apply here).

Remember that everybody will know which of the face down cards is Jeskai Infiltrator, because who is the owner of a card is always known. There is a ruling in Jeskai Infiltrator that confirms this.


Does Brain in a Jar let you cast a Sorcery at Instant speed?

Yes, Brain in a Jar allows you to cast a sorcery at any time that you can resolve the ability, even during your opponents' turns. But technically, you're not even casting it "at instant speed". When a spell or ability instructs you to cast a spell, you go through the process of casting the spell while that spell or ability is resolving. Doing so completely ignores the standard timing restrictions of non-instant spells.

The reason this works is that the rules don't actually restrict when non-instant spells can be cast. They actually just allow you to cast the spell at certain times. So, the rule for Instants, 304.1, says

  A player who has priority may cast an instant card from his or her hand.

And the rule for Sorceries, 307.1, says

  A player who has priority may cast a sorcery card from his or her hand during a main phase of his or her turn when the stack is empty.

As you can see, the rules do not by default allow you to cast sorceries in as many situations as it allows you to cast instants, but neither rule says that those are the only times when you can cast those spells.

So, when you activate Brain in a Jar's ability, it essentially says "you can also cast an instant or sorcery (with a particular CMC) during the resolution of this ability".

Remember that if a spell explicitly says that you can only cast it at a certain time, or that you can't cast it at a certain time, Brain in a Jar does not allow you to avoid that restriction. So, Brain in a Jar does not allow you to cast Berserk after the combat damage step.

This difference between rules that allow you to cast spells at certain times and text that restricts when you can cast spells is the reason that cards that let you cast spells like Bring to Light have rulings like this one:

  If you cast the exiled card, you do so as part of the resolution of Bring to Light. You can’t wait to cast it later in the turn. Timing restrictions based on the card’s type are ignored, but other restrictions (such as “Cast [this card] only during combat”) are not.


Where can I find scans of D&D:TFBG board game cards?

I don't know where you can find scans to download and print, but you can use BGG to help out with things:

Full component list (with card names, but not full card text)
2013 Spare Parts Resource List entry for the game - He could post his wants there after seeing what is missing
Image gallery for the game (15 pages of images, there might be images of the cards)

Not a lot of scanning of cards for printing purposes because that leads to copyright issues, and since we're talking about WotC, they WILL go after people with C&D orders if and when they find that sort of thing. But the above links should help him in getting the actual cards.


Does Prowler's helm effect makes an unblockable creature blockable by walls?

You seem to be asking about a creature with

  [This creature] can't be blocked.

equipped with a Prowler's Helm that has

  Equipped creature can't be blocked except by Walls.

Each of these abilities creates a blocking restriction, and all blocking restrictions must be obeyed.

  509.1b The defending player checks each creature he or she controls to see whether it’s affected by any restrictions (effects that say a creature can’t block, or that it can’t block unless some condition is met). If any restrictions are being disobeyed, the declaration of blockers is illegal. [...]

So that means it's can't be blocked by any creature, and it can't be blocked by non-Wall creatures. The result is that it can't be blocked by any creature.


Can a phase requiring two colored sets be completed with the same color?

Since the wording of the phases as started say "of one color" for both colors instead of the second part of the phase saying "of another color" or "of one other color" the answer is yes, it is allowed.