What is a solid basic strategy for surviving Eldritch Horror?

I'll enumerate some general tips below (followed by keener insight after having played over 150 hours):

1) Do not obsess about keeping the world tidy, clear of gates, of monsters, of clues. Accept that it is messy and will just get messier. Think more about taking from it what's useful to you at any point in time.  You have so few turns before that mythos deck runs out, before that doom counter reaches zero. Think of it like you're standing at the doorway of the shack in the middle of the pen filled with walking dead zombies. Bee-line it.

2) Make your optimal clue-gathering plan. Some characters are particularly effective in obtaining, dispersing clues, which are generally good as dice saving graces and often essential for mysteries. Assess if you have a better plan than simply "let's see where the clues fall and get there fast". Example: Use the spy's special action to generate clues every turn; keep a partner close by to hand them off.  Move the Psychic one space over and park her in Arkham to try to get spells and score the Clairvoyance spell likely to make her a clue factory (and pair with her ability to send clues to players around the world).

3) Think about what your character does best and specialize. This might be obvious to seasoned co-op gamers, but became more obvious to me when realizing how fruitless it was to try to clean the board systematically and how much more useful it was just to tune out what a creepy bug in south america is doing at the moment. Take the politician; just sit in San Francisco with him for the first 2 or 3 rounds acquiring assets for your fellow team members and make the best of boosting their stats and equipment as early as possible where it will give you the best return.

These are only a handful of observations from 5 play throughs (1st loss, then 4 wins with very few players and an even number at that since I suspect the odd numbered teams have a tougher time after looking at the gate/clue spawn rate on the reference cards).  The takeaway is to make an initial specialized plan and then reassess 2 or 3 rounds in because, at that point, you probably have acquired assets, conditions (hopefully blessed), and spells that require you to shift your strategy to fully optimize your best chances of winning.  Stay nimble in that regard.

Edit: After having now played over 40 campaigns across all the expansions, I thought it would be nice to write down my thoughts on things to consider for optimizing success in Eldritch Horror.  In reviewing my old answer, I feel the advice I gave was more high level and hand-wavy, while the tips I'll list below will aim to be more focused and specific

1) Take Debt and Acquire Assets

The penalties for a collected debt are often well worth the extra bonus 2 successes. If you have a spare action to waste removing a debt, go ahead, but I usually reserve this strictly for investigators who have such high influence that they spend their turn removing debt and then acquiring assets again (i.e. Politician).  Having a large number of assets on hand is so valuable and can be handed down even after your investigator dies.

2) Take one (dark pact) for the team

When given the option to take a Dark Pact or advance doom, strongly consider taking the Dark Pact.  If the pact results in you or another being devoured, doom advances anyway, and thinking of the investigators as expendable allows you to get fresh characters and not hang onto someone who is flailing.  The Sanctuary asset card can sometimes come into play to remove the Pact before you suffer that 1 of 6 roll anyway.

3) Stand together

Look for ways to strengthen each other by moving together.  Many items and abilities work with others on the same space (Urban Guide Asset, Actress additional roll passive ability, Secretary's amazing abilities(!)). The certainty that comes with strengthening each others' rolls often outweighs the disadvantage of covering less space.  Often, key items such as the Mi-Go Brain Case and Plumb the Void altogether alleviate travel issues largely.

4) Tokyo

Look to Tokyo as a potential base of operations for sniping monsters across the board. The ability to damage and discard will minimize both the damage and uncertainty of combat encounters, and the wasted turns traveling (spend those turns acquiring assets, etc)

5) Specialize skills first

Take your best skills and lean toward improving those, not creating a 'renaissance' investigator.  This is just basic common strategy to try to assign roles quickly, such as the 'gate closer' (Shaman is great for that) or the 'spell accumulator' (Astronomer is great, and acquiring flesh ward and install bravery are very useful to soften damage to health and sanity).


Can you change the order of cards in a Graveyard?

By default you are not allowed to change the order of cards in a Graveyard. This is because there are some cards that care about the order that cards are in the Graveyard.

  404.2. Each graveyard is kept in a single face-up pile. A player can examine the cards in any graveyard at any time but normally can't change their order. Additional rules applying to sanctioned tournaments may allow a player to change the order of cards in his or her graveyard.

However, since they haven't printed any cards since before Urza's Saga that care about Graveyard order the Magic Tournament Rules contain this rule.

  3.14 Graveyard Order
  In formats involving only cards from Urza’s Saga™ and later, players may change the order of their graveyard at
  any time. A player may not change the order of an opponent’s graveyard.

This means that Legacy and Vintage are the only common tournament formats that you can't rearrange your own Graveyard, you are allowed to in Standard, Modern, Draft and Sealed formats.

In casual play generally as long as nobody is playing with any cards where Graveyard order matters it isn't a big deal if graveyards get reordered.


Can proliferate be used on life counters?

No, life total does not use counters.

Players can use whatever they want to track how much life they have, but their life points do not count as "counters" ever. A counter is always a specific thing that a rule or card effect will refer to as a "counter" using that word specifically.


What happens if a creature has no toughness defined?

With the introduction of Vehicles in the set Kaladesh, this situation is now possible and explicitly covered by the rules.

  208.5 If a creature somehow has no value for its power, its power is 0. The same is true for toughness.


Can I change the order of cards stacked in each room?

No, you cannot change the order of the Seed cards.  However, do make sure that you are using the latest errata.

If you have any specific concerns, please ask.  We can try to address this question without specifics.


KGS

http://www.gokgs.com/

IMO the best server for lower level games.

It as an active English speaking community
Ranking system is relatively meaningful, even in the lower ranks
Many features in the client, such as game reviews


Kasmina's Transmutation vs. Gideon Blackblade

3.
From the card ruling on gatherer:

  If an effect causes Gideon to lose all abilities during your turn,
  he’s still a Human Soldier creature and a Gideon planeswalker.

and

  If an Equipment becomes attached to Gideon while he’s a creature,
  it’ll become unattached during the next upkeep that isn’t yours. The
  same is true of any Auras that become attached to Gideon that can’t
  enchant a noncreature planeswalker.


Is it better to pick up a Chapel or Steward?

I would (almost) always prefer Chapel.

Honestly, if Chapel's on the board, I will buy it before my first shuffle, almost no matter what. This is because I love putting together combos, and Chapel is the fastest way to thin a deck, which then removes most of the chance from getting a combo to go off.

@ColinD's 5/2 hypotheticals all sound playable. (Steward/Fool's Gold sounds especially fun to me, especially if you can get another cheap card with +Buy.) But in every one of those cases, I think Chapel would work better than Steward. For example, in the Fool's Gold case, you can literally trash everything but Fool's Gold (and the Chapel) very quickly. If you can pick up a Market or two (or anything with +Buy) you'll soon buy out the Fool's Golds -- and that's the point when you want card draw. After the Fool's Gold pile is empty is the appropriate time to pick up an action for card-draw, though hopefully there's something better than Steward's +2 Cards.

The thing about Chapel is that it makes your deck fast. If you open Chapel/Silver and start trashing like crazy (and if you open with a Chapel you must buy something else that produces coin or gains cards), pretty soon you'll be down to a 7 or 8-card deck with no chaff. The good cards you've bought come up again really quick. It's fine if your non-Chapeling opponent has 2 Golds and you only have one if you're playing yours almost every turn! The situation is even better for terminal actions: a single Goons in an 8-card deck is much better than 2 Goons in a 16-card deck because it'll come up just as frequently and there's absolutely no risk of collision. This is why Chapel is so good at setting up engines: the engine cards are about the only ones in your deck, so they come up together every time.

Decide up front if you're going to use Chapel; if you are, buy it before the first shuffle. Waiting for an unlucky $2 hand defeats the purpose of Chapel: speed. With Chapel, you want to trash all the Coppers and Estates ASAP, and if you've waited a few turns and already bought several other cards you want to hang on to, you've already missed the boat on the Chapel.

When not to use Chapel:

Don't use Chapel for a Big Money. Big Money + Chapel is slightly slower than just Big Money.

Chapel is great because it can trash 4 cards at a time. Chapel is not great when your hand is small. If you've discarded down to 3 cards, your Chapel is now a crappy Steward, lacking the options that round Steward out into a useful card. Chapel is fast enough that expensive discard attacks (especially Goons ($6), but also Ghost Ship ($5) and Margrave ($5)) aren't too concerning. (Torturer even less so, just take the curse and immediately trash it.) But Militia and even Cutpurse can get in the way. This is especially true in > 2-player games where you have more than one opponent causing you to discard. If you almost always have a hand with < 5 cards, Steward is probably a better choice than Chapel.

Jack-of-All-Trades can also compete with Chapel. Chapel will be much more effective at setting up an engine, but it needs to be a darn good engine to beat "doublejack" (Big Money + 2 Jack-of-All-Trades).

@User1873 astutely pointed out that you need to consider available card-stealing/trashing attacks in evaluating Chapel. Thief, Noble Brigand, Pirate Ship, etc. steal/trash treasures and make a Chapel strategy riskier. A lucky attack or two could leave you in the unfortunate situation of needing to buy Coppers to afford a Silver! Any heavy trashing increases your treasure density so much as to make treasure-stealing cards very appealing. Masquerade can also make you give up good cards if they're the only ones left in your deck. Like the drawback of discarding attacks, the risks are exacerbated if several opponents are using stealers.


in Go, why does this setup make a false-eye?

As the right most eye does not have a solid chain it is still vulnerable.

This combined white's coverage on 8 means that when white takes E8 white will easily be able to move E9 into atari; after E8 white's next move would be F9, G8 or G9, which black cannot effectively block within the available two moves.


How and where can I propose new MTG cards?

Wizards of the Coast employees are not allowed to look at unsolicited card designs, from the Wizards of the Coast FAQ on Idea Submissions:

Game Submissions
We do not review unsolicited game or card submissions, return submissions, or make comments on submissions we haven't reviewed.

If you want other people to look at and critique your designs you can go to places like MTG Salvation's Custom Card Creation forum, but the only way to make actual cards is to work for Wizards or submit your design for something like You Make the Card


I will take the other answers a step further and say that talking during the Night phase is simply not allowed.

The other answers give good reasons why it could be an issue, but here's what the rulebook says:

  At night, players who are not active (whose eyes
  are closed) may not move, point, or do anything
  to communicate with the active player(s).

Any form of talking can be seen as covered under "doing anything to communicate with the active player(s)". The rule itself is a bit strange, because no one except the active player knows who the active player is! So you can't avoid communicating with the active player specifically, you would have to avoid all communication.

Also, if read completely literally, the rule seems to imply that the active player IS allowed to communicate. But this is silly, as if the active player ever says anything out-loud, then they are giving away that they are the active player. It is safe to assume that the rule is intending to say that the active player is allowed to "act" by doing the things they are instructed to do.

Also, from the rulebook:

  After the night phase, players discuss amongst
  themselves who they believe the Werewolves are.

This makes it clear that the time for discussion is AFTER the night phase.

So I think talking about anything related to the game is strictly forbidden during the Night.

If you are talking about more just general socialization, then this is somewhat similar to other games... in a casual game, card games which strictly forbid "table talk" may still have a lot of general talk and socialization while playing, as long as nothing about the game itself is spoken. However, the nature of the limited time in which to perform actions, along with the importance of hearing the instructions being given, makes socialization during the Night phase a bad idea, even if it is not strictly forbidden.


What's a good counter-strategy to Workshop/Garden?

Workshop/Gardens is usually a dominant strategy. There are a couple of exceptions:

Bishop can counter Gardens by buying Gardens and then trashing them for VP. This prevents the Gardens player from being able to get a favorable Gardens split and means that the Bishop player can focus on getting VP chips or Duchies while the Gardens player is buying out Workshops and whatever other pile.
Cursing attacks can often foil a Gardens strategy. Since Gardens games tend to end fast, a difference of 3 or 4 points can be huge. The threat of pumping up the value of the opponent's Gardens is overrated; even if the Gardens player gets all 8 Gardens, 10 curses would still be a net loss of 2 points.
Discard attacks can significantly slow a Gardens player. Only having 3 cards in hand means that the person can probably keep a Workshop and 2 treasures, which will frequently be Coppers. That's not enough money to keep acquiring Workshops or to get a double Gardens. Ghost Ship is especially brutal because the Gardens player will have lots of bad cards, and so forcing him or her to see those cards multiple times instead of being able to just discard them is really painful.
Embargo can make Gardens unattractive very quickly. Put an Embargo on the Workshop pile, then the Estate pile, then the Copper pile. Embargoing the Gardens themselves is ok, but usually the gardener will be gaining Gardens via Workshop and so the Embargo won't matter. If you Embargo their buy possibilities, however, it quickly slows down their deck.
A quick mega-turn engine may be able to overwhelm a Gardens deck. I'm thinking about Native Village/Bridge, which can be used to end the game in a single turn. This engine might be fast enough to buy a couple of Provinces, drain the Estates, and end the game on piles. It's ridiculously difficult to simulate because of the pile-ending conditions and needing some intuition in order to decide when to pull the mega-turn, but I played a couple of solo games earlier today and it seems viable as a strategy.


Are in-universe Magic characters aware of colors?

Characters know that forming mana-bonds with different areas (mountains, swamps, forests, etc.) will give mana that can then only be used for specific purposes; i.e. a mage who draws upon a mountain mana-bond will gain mana that can be used for creating fire, earthquakes, etc. whereas drawing on mana-bonds from the sea will give magic that allows for illusions, etc. Consider this 1999 story, where the mage Feldon visits various colours of wizard and learns from them. The scholar in the story says:

"Green calls to the living," he said. "Black calls to the dead. Blue creates the shadow of life. Red consumes, and that's very important as well, because you must often destroy before you can build. I study, and the magic I wield is White, which is the magic of comprehension and understanding."

Therefore yes, the in-universe characters (or at least some of them) are aware of the various colours of mana and what each is for.


magic: the gathering enchantment problem

Bestow is a choice that you make while casting a spell. If you choose to cast it with the Bestow cost, it is an Aura spell instead of a Creature spell. This is a choice that you can only make while casting the spell. If the card is already on the battlefield, you can't turn it into an Aura with the Bestow ability.

You can enchant an Enchantment Creature with an Aura that has Enchant Creature, including an Aura that is a bestowed Creature Enchantment card. An Enchantment Creature is just both an Enchantment and a Creature, so it can be affected by things that affect Enchantments, and by things that affect Creatures, including Auras with Enchant Creature. Adding the Enchantment type to a Creature doesn't otherwise do anything special.


During battle can I play a one-shot card?

Yes, go right ahead. For most one-shots, the only requirement for playing them is that there's combat happening. As soon as it is, you can play your one-shots. You don't need to wait your turn or anything like that - there's no turn to wait for! Snoozers losers, you've got loot and levels to find.

From the original rules:

  Items – Using Them

  Any one-shot Item can by played during any combat,
  whether you have it in your hand or on the table. (Some
  one-shot Items, such as the Wishing Ring, may also be used
  outside of combat.)

There are no other constraints, and no "you can only play it when the other players say it's OK or are done talking."

As for Curses in particular, remember:

  Curse cards may be played on any player at any time. ANY time, do you hear me?


Does the "CDC Planes Grounded" emergency event prevent the First Responder's ability?

CDC Planes grounded states

Players cannot move by direct, charter, or shuttle flight (or the event airlift).

The First Responders ability is

• As an action, you may move to any city with a research station.
• Immediately after an Epidemic, you may – out of turn – move to the epidemic city and Treat Disease there (before Infections).

Neither of these abilities are a direct, charter or shuttle flight, and so should not be affected by planes being grounded.
This thread on boardgamegeek comes to the same conclusion.


in Klondike-Solitaire, how likely is a deal with no legal moves?

In Klondike Solitaire there are 7 cards face up on the table, 21 face down on the table, leaving (out of the 52 card pack) 24 cards in the deck. If you're dealing 3 cards at a time, only 24/3 = 8 of these cards are available. So only 15 cards are available at the start of the game.

In order for there not to be any valid moves at the start, you would need:

No aces
No adjacently numbered cards

This is easily achievable with 15 cards. For example:

4 Kings
4 Jacks
4 Nines
3 Sevens

According to Wikipedia, which answers the probabilities:

  About 79% of the games are theoretically winnable
  The number of games a player can probabilistically expect to win is at least 43%
  In addition, some games are "unplayable" in which no cards can be moved to the foundations even at the start of the game; these occur in only 0.025% of hands dealt

You are therefore far more likely to win the game (even if your decisions are far from perfect) than get an unplayable/"null" hand.


7 Wonders Duel Pantheon : Can a player invoke a God during Age I?

Yes I believe you can activate a God in Age I using the Divine Theater.

  During Age I, the players will choose the Divinities they will be able to invoke during Ages II and III.

is taken from the Overview of the rules.  I think that's more just a general guide of what happens rather than a strict rule that prevents The Divine Theater from working.  I think if using The Divine Theater was in some way forbidden during Age I then that should be explicitly stated in the rules.  Note The Gate allows a player to use any god revealed from the top of any deck,  This was not chosen by a player to be able to be invoked during Ages II and III.  So if A God can be played that way (just not following the exact letter of the overview)  then I see no reason why The Divine Theater can not either.

Note your revealing all the cards from a 'Deck' so if you choose a category that only has 2 or 1 card left in the deck that that is all you reveal.  Note you return them in the order you choose, this is relevant for the Gate card.  I would also argue that as the cards are 'revealed' that your opponent will see the order they are returned.


In bridge, can the "rule of 20" be used outside of opening bids (e.g for takeout doubles)?

What North and South did is not a take out double, but a conventional response to a strong club opening.

One of the most important things to do facing a strong club is to intervene, making it more difficult for the opposing side to reach the optimum contract. You don't want you opponents to relay themselves into a hard to bid (grand)slam that no one else will make.

One of the simplest defenses to a strong club is Mathe, where Double shows the majors, and 1NT shows the minors. This is the easiest way to convoy shape, so your partner knows where to intervene, or where to sacrifice.

In this particular auction it would probably be better for South to bid 1D asking for North's better major as South has no real preference, and North would be 1S.


In the card game "War", what happens when a player plays their final card in a War?

It depends.

The linked Wikipedia article has this to say:

  Most descriptions of War are unclear about what happens if a player
  runs out of cards during a war. In some variants, that player
  immediately loses. In others, the player may play the last card in
  their deck as their face-up card for the remainder of the war.


If a Devotion God had a tap ability, would it be able to tap on the turn it came in if you didn't have enough devotion?

You would be able to tap it to activate an ability that had the tap symbol as part of its cost, yes. Summoning sickness only affects creatures, and the Theros Gods are not creatures if they are on the battlefield and your devotion is low enough. This also applies if your devotion is initially high enough to make them creatures, and then later in the turn your devotion goes down making them not creatures any more (which, incidentally, seems like the biggest opportunity to give the God a tap ability in the first place, such as mutating it with Parcelbeast or Porcuparrot).
The rule for the tap symbol only specifies creatures as a special case, so any non-creature permanent would be unaffected by summoning sickness:

107.5. The tap symbol is {T}. The tap symbol in an activation cost means “Tap this permanent.” A
permanent that’s already tapped can’t be tapped again to pay the cost. A creature’s activated ability
with the tap symbol in its activation cost can’t be activated unless the creature has been under its
controller’s control continuously since their most recent turn began. See rule 302.6.

where rule 302.6 basically repeats the final sentence, plus some more that is irrelevant in this situation:

302.6. A creature’s activated ability with the tap symbol or the untap symbol in its activation cost can’t
be activated unless the creature has been under its controller’s control continuously since their most
recent turn began. A creature can’t attack unless it has been under its controller’s control
continuously since their most recent turn began. This rule is informally called the “summoning
sickness” rule.


What happens if the text of Hardened Scales is changed from "if one or more" to "if zero or more"?

There's a few clear options to handle Hardened Scales at "zero or more".

Method 1, the black-bordered method: putting zero counters on something isn't a thing that happens; it's a non-event. If no counters were put, no counter-putting has occurred.

However, we're dealing with the silver-bordered world, and in that case we should seek out more awesome options. If something wants to care about zero +1/+1 counters being put on things, we can decide that must now be a thing that can happen.

There's two silver-bordered ways I think we can handle this. Method 2 below hardly works; method 3 I think works well.

Method 2, counters-on-everything-always: Things which have nothing at all to do with putting +1/+1 counters on a permanent are recognised as putting zero counters on that permanent by Hardened Scales, which makes that thing put a +1/+1 counter on that permanent.

The trouble with this method is "things" here can be anything based on what your group works out, from spells and abilities to even rules for progressing through phases and steps, to the several dozen state-based actions we check constantly. Depending on how wide you cast the net, it's fairly awesome but also proportionately unmanageable. Each turn through the game would put an arbitrary number of +1/+1 counters on everything, and make everything arbitrarily huge (but not infinitely huge). I don't recommend this because it's messy.

Method 3, things that put zero counters on stuff: If something can put +1/+1 counters on things, and would put some number on a specific permanent or set of permanents, but that number works out to be zero, Hardened Scales at "zero or more" makes it one +1/+1 counter instead for those permanents. This is the method I recommend.

This primarily affects two kinds of effects:

Creatures that enter with a number of counters: if that amount would work out to zero, they enter with a +1/+1 counter. If Academy Elite enters while there's 0 cards in graveyards, it enters with a +1/+1 counter. If you devour no creatures for Bloodspore Thrinax, it enters with a +1/+1 counter. Endless One cast for {0} enters with a +1/+1 counter.
Cards that put counters on things. If a creature with 0 power dies with Death's Presence out, you put a +1/+1 counter on a creature you control, and similarly Kresh the Bloodbraided would gain one +1/+1 counter from his own ability. Ezuri, Claw of Progress puts one +1/+1 counter on something when you have 0 experience counters. Lifecraft Awakening cast for X=0 puts a +1/+1 counter on something. A Bloodspore Thrinax that has no counters on it (maybe it was Aether Snapped) makes sure your creatures enter the battlefield with a +1/+1 counter on it, because it would give them 0 +1/+1 counters, which gets bumped up to one +1/+1 counter.

This scenario is a bundle of edge cases, but it lets us work in a silver-bordered but manageable way.


Bridge hand with high card points between 1NT (15-17) and 2NT (20-21)

I think it is tricky to stuff your artificial 1D response into the rest of SAYC.  When you consider the standard bidding structure over 1NT and 2NT, the pattern is that the weaker hand shows its shape as quickly as possible (via Stayman or transfers, for instance) and then either signs off, bids game, or invites to slam (giving the strong hand control in the latter two cases).  It is difficult to replicate this pattern after 1C - 1D because the opener would need to make another forcing bid in order to give the responder a chance to show his/her shape.  The best I can think of is to treat 1C - 1D - 1NT as an artificial force with systems on, but the usual systems over 1NT often terminate in 2NT or part-scores at the 3 level, both of which are too high if opener has a normal 1C hand and the responder is weak.

So I think you more or less have to pick one of the following two frameworks:

SAYC: The first two calls are normal, and a jump shift by opener (with cuebidding in competition) shows 18-19 points.  Responder can't pass with 7HCP, so you don't miss game, and s/he has some space to show features (like 4 card majors).  SAYC full provides two additional tools for handling some tricky edge cases.  The first is structured reverses for showing 5m/4M shapes; for instance, 1C - 1S - 2H is a game force with 5+C and 4+H.  The second is 4th suit forcing for finding difficult fits without wasting bidding space; for instance after 1C - 1H - 1S - 1NT, declarer can bid 2D to artificially force to game, giving responder the chance to show 5 hearts or other features.
Strong club: If you want to really pursue the reasoning behind your 1C agreement, you can choose one of several strong club systems (such as the precision club).  In these systems 1C is artificial and shows any hand with 16+ HCP, the thinking being that these are the hands where you want to have the most bidding space available.  This has all of the advantages of your approach, but since 1C can't be just 13 points you can use your usual systems without worrying about ending up too high.  It also allows you to use bids like 1NT and 2NT preemptively, which can make life quite hard for your opponents.  The downside of these sorts of systems is that they can get quite complicated and awkward in certain cases.


Necroskitter and clone/ board wipe interaction

I believe I am right but my friend says that Clone comes back as 0/0 as therefore dies. Who is right?

You are correct.

Clone's ability reads

  You may have Clone enter the battlefield as a copy of any creature on the battlefield.

This ability applies any time Clone enters the battlefield.  The person who controls Clone (in this case you) gets to choose a creature to copy as it enters the battlefield.  It will not die.


Traveling Players only becomes really relevant in the full game, when players' Occupations and Minor Improvements may trigger off using it.

So why is it still there in the family game, you ask?  Well, Agricola is a pretty tough game for newbies to "grok" on the first play, or even the first few plays.  The last thing you want is for them to have three Begging cards by the end of the second harvest, and vow never to play this stupid game again!

By having multiple spaces that just contain food piling up, even the least clued-up player has an obvious way of saving his family from grim starvation at the end of the harvest rounds.  And that's good.  Once they get a bit more experienced, they will turn their noses up at such an inefficient way of turning actions into food... but's that another story, for a later day!


Backgammon: Jacoby rule with doubling cube?

The rule (as in the link):

  A rule popular in money play which says that gammons and backgammons count only as a single game if neither player has offered a double during the game.

Probably the better way to say it is: If neither player has offered a double during the game, gammons and backgammons do not count.

This doesn't turn off the doubling cube, it just means that if you or your opponent don't double, the best you're doing is a single. Once the cube has been offered and accepted for the first time, gammons will count, and the normal range of 2-6 points is on the table.

(In theory, this means that every game will have at least 1 double offered, since this rule removes the potential of a position being "too good to double" before the cube is turned for the first time.)


What is this game with Knights and Ogres and wolf riders I played when I was a kid?

Battle Masters a collaboration of Milton Bradley and Games Workshop:

BoardGameGeek Page

This is a great game, had a huge board and the wolfriders and cool units you were describing.  I played several matches of this as a kid with my buddy who also played HeroQuest with me.  I don't remember the mechanics very well, but I will never forget how cool the pieces and map are.


What interesting 3-player strategy games are available?

I really, really recommend Ticket to Ride: Nordic Countries as an interesting and balanced three player game. Its unique selling point, over the other Ticket to Ride games, is that it is specifically designed for three! You can play a two-player variant, but you can't for four or more. So you're genuinely getting a game that works best for three.

The other game that is universally acclaimed to be amazing, and is very good for different number of players, is Agricola.  Agricola gives you a different initial board layout for three players, and has many Occupation cards that are specially designed for 3+ players (in addition to the standard ones for 1+ players, and some for 4+ players).  You really feel like the designer paid lots of care and attention to making sure the game would work amazingly for 2 and 3 player games, as well as for larger groups.  (And indeed there's even a serviceable solitaire option!)


Is there a limit on how good you can get at Hearts?

I just want to say, as a mathematician who has studied Game Theory for several years, that you DO NOT need perfect information to have an optimal strategy.  In fact, Game Theory has a very rich body of results about games of imperfect information.

It is a common misconception.  Here's another one: an optimal strategy means you win every time.  This is also not true.  An optimal strategy is one that maximizes your expected payoff.

Now that that's out of the way, I want to commend the questioner on a great question.  I was actually just googling this question myself, trying to see if any journal articles have been written about it (I was thinking about doing a game-theoretic analysis of Hearts for a thesis paper).  I haven't found anything yet.

Like most nontrivial games, Hearts has a HUMONGOUS game tree.  There are 52!/(13!^4) hands that could be dealt (each of the 4 players gets 13 cards).  That's just how many nodes there are at the second level of the game tree.  Each of those nodes has a huge number of branches (the number of branches at each of those nodes is the number of ways four players can choose three cards from 13).  Then each of those have yet more branhces, and so on.  Even a rough calculation shows that there are far more nodes in the game tree than there are atoms in the known universe.

So using Zermelo's algorithm to "solve" hearts (though theoretically possible) is - in practice - not possible.  So much more sophisticated techniques must be used.

If you want to write a computer program to play near-optimal Hearts, I would suggest using random samples and Markov-type simulations to estimate optimal moves.

In short, yes, optimal play does exist.  But it could be very hard to find without some pretty slick game-theoretical analysis and/or a lot of computational power.

I hope this helps.  :)


No,

The first part is mandatory, the second optional.

The Rules for Family growth (page 5) state:

  Players must have room for offspring in their home before they can
  use this action  – that is, they must have more rooms in their home than they have Family members. After taking Family growth, the player may choose to purchase a Minor Improvement

Note that in general, a player must be able to use an action to be allowed to place a worker on it. (page 3),

  A Family member may never occupy an Action space without
  performing its action.

Therefore you cannot place a worker there just to block another player.


Interaction between Ethereal Absolution versus Edgar Markov with Captivating Vampire

The vampire tokens will enter as 1/1 creatures and remain on the battlefield.
Both the -1/-1 effect from Ethereal Absolution and the +1/+1 effect from Captivating Vampire are continuous effects, generated by their respective static ability. These effects do not grant counters, and the abilities are not triggered. They are simply true, and immediately affect any object they do affect; there is no delay. Objects that are affected enter the battlefield with the modifications already active.
Continuous effects are handled in layers. Power/Toughness-changing effects happen in layer 7:

Interaction of Continuous Effects

613.1g Layer 7: Power- and/or toughness-changing effects are applied.

Within layer 7, there are sublayers for the different kinds of P/T-changing effects:

613.3. Within layer 7, apply effects in a series of sublayers in the order described below. Within each sublayer, apply effects in timestamp order. (See rule 613.6.) Note that dependency may alter the order in which effects are applied within a sublayer. (See rule 613.7.)
613.3c Layer 7c: Effects that modify power and/or toughness (but don’t set power and/or toughness to a specific number or value) are applied.

Both the +1/+1 and the -1/-1 are in that layer.
Within a layer or sublayer, the effects are applied in timestamp order, i.e. generally the order in which the abilities that generated the effects started working. However, in this case it doesn't matter, the +1/+1 and -1/-1 just cancel each other out, no matter which is applied first.


Life Link on an opponents creature by enchantment

You on a card always means the cards controller, or owner if it has no controller.

  109.5. The words “you” and “your” on an object refer to the object’s controller, its would-be controller (if a player is attempting to play, cast, or activate it), or its owner (if it has no controller). For a static ability, this is the current controller of the object it’s on. For an activated ability, this is the player who activated the ability. For a triggered ability, this is the controller of the object when the ability triggered, unless it’s a delayed triggered ability. To determine the controller of a delayed triggered ability, see rules 603.7d–f.

  303.4e An Aura's controller is separate from the enchanted object's controller or the enchanted player; the two need not be the same. If an Aura enchants an object, changing control of the object doesn't change control of the Aura, and vice versa. Only the Aura's controller can activate its abilities. However, if the Aura grants an ability to the enchanted object (with "gains" or "has"), the enchanted object's controller is the only one who can activate that ability.

Spirit Link does not grant the enchanted creature Lifelink, which is a Keyword ability.

  702.15a Lifelink is a static ability.

  702.15b Damage dealt by a source with lifelink causes that source’s controller, or its owner if it has no controller, to gain that much life (in addition to any other results that damage causes). See rule 119.3.

  119.3f Damage dealt by a source with lifelink causes that source’s controller to gain that much life, in addition to the damage’s other results.

It has a triggered ability that triggers whenever the enchanted creature deals damage.

  112.3c Triggered abilities have a trigger condition and an effect. They are written as “[Trigger condition], [effect],” and include (and usually begin with) the word “when,” “whenever,” or “at.” Whenever the trigger event occurs, the ability is put on the stack the next time a player would receive priority and stays there until it’s countered, it resolves, or it otherwise leaves the stack. See rule 603, “Handling Triggered Abilities.”

This is an important distinction, because if the controller of Spirit Link has less life than the Power of the creature, it can deal sufficient damage to kill the Spirit Link's controller, causing them to lose the game as a state-based effect before Spirit Link triggered ability will gain them back the life they lost.

  104.3b If a player’s life total is 0 or less, he or she loses the game the next time a player would receive priority. (This is a state-based action. See rule 704.)

  800.4d If an object that would be owned by a player who has left the game would be created in any zone, it isn’t created. If a triggered ability that would be controlled by a player who has left the game would be put onto the stack, it isn’t put on the stack.


In Small World, how does the Spirits' ability apply to already declined races?

The official rules (PDF) say (emphasis mine):

  When the Race tokens associated with your
  Spirit Special Power go into Decline, they
  never count toward the limit stated in
  Entering In Decline (p. 6) regarding having a
  single In Decline race on the map at any
  given time. You may thus end up with two different races In
  Decline on the map at the same time and score for them both.

This means that when your active Spirits go into decline, they do not push out an existing declined race. If in the future you decline another race, the old race will then be removed, and so on.


In the first mission Crossfire, is it better to end the scene just before the starting player takes his turn?

Being able to start the next set of obstacles without having to deal with a new crossfire card can be an advantage. Not to mention the fact that having a few extra turns to work on them might allow you to eliminate them with minimal crossfire cards going into the discard pile which will help you in the long run as you will get fewer hard obstacles to deal with.


How can we determine the winner in Love Letter if the last two players tie and have the same value of cards discarded?

I did not find the rules stated below from the English rulebook (Alderac). Maybe they did not have this situation during the early test games. The Finnish/Swedish/Danish/Norwegian rulebook (Nordic version, Lautapelit.fi), has been published a bit later, and there is a solution for this problem.

Tie-breaker for the winner of a round

The round ends if one player cannot draw a card at his turn. Then you compare the cards in your hands. If you both have the same card you will have to calculate the sum of the cards you have discarded. The rules say:

  whoever has the highest sum will win the round.

This implies that if you both have the same card in your hands and the same sum, you will both win the round (i.e., that round has multiple winners). This rule (that there might be multiple winners) is confirmed in the section concerning the beginning of a new round. It says:

  The player who won the last round will start the next round. If the
  round had multiple winners, the youngest one will start.

But what if this happens and the game ends?

This might also lead into a (very rare) situation, when the entire game ends and two players have to equal amount of points. The rulebook of the Nordic version states:

  When a player collects the required number of points/hearts, he wins
  the game and conquers the heart of the Princess. In the case of
  draw, the youngest player wins.

So, quite thematically, the Princess prefers to fall in love with the younger guy ;) (In a real life situation, it might happen that the fate favours the one who has more digits in his bank account. But the Princess does not lack in riches so...)


Kate Winthrop's Immunity to All Terror effects in Elder Sign - how does it work?

Kate Winthrop's ability should be played as if the terror die does not trigger the terror effects. So, no doom should be added, nor other investigator should suffer any effects. I could not find rules about that anywhere, but that's how things work in the mobile version of the game.


How would changing the timing of the "starter" affect strategy/tactics?

There are edge cases where it matters. If

you threw a card in your opponent's crib
that card came up
your opponent is close to winning
you are also close to winning

You would consider making more aggressive plays when scoring to try to out-peg your opponent. You may open yourself up to your opponent scoring more off your aggressive plays, but it's a risk you have to take because if you don't then you expect with high probability your opponent will win.

If you concealed the card, you wouldn't have that information about your opponent's crib during the pegging hand.

Also, if a Jack comes up, that player gets points and can win on the spot if they're close enough. (I forget if it's one or two pegs... but assume they're on the last one to win.) If you are close to pegging out too, you might win on pegging when your opponent would have won if the Jack would have given them the win.


Programme to help with face to face diplomacy

jDip is an exact fit for that. It is a free java program so can run on any platform.


Are the names of guilds in Ravnica protected intellectual property?

It does seem that wizards has trademarked all of the guild names (list here), so I would avoid using them without express permission or a licensing agreement, as wizards could pursue legal action.

However, trademark is primarily for commercial endeavours, so if this is for personal use there shouldn't be an issue.


What happens if a target becomes ineligible after a card has been cast?

Strangling Soot has an illegal target (only one) as it resolves and therefore fizzles (is countered by game rules due to all targets being invalid).

When you cast a spell with targets, you check the validity of all targets as it is cast. If any targets are invalid, the spell is "undone" and goes back to where it started. As the spell resolves, it again checks if the targets are valid. If any are valid, it resolves as much as it can; if not, it fizzles.

  608.2b If the spell or ability specifies targets, it checks whether the targets are still legal. .......


It depends on if Vanish into Memory is cast before or after the Monstrous ability resolves.
If Vanish into Memory is cast in response to the Monstrosity ability then the Beast will survive because when the ability resolves the Cerberus is no longer on the battlefield to trigger, and thus doesn't deal damage.
Gatherer Ruling:

An ability that triggers when a creature becomes monstrous won’t trigger if that creature isn’t on the battlefield when its monstrosity ability resolves.

If Vanish into Memory is cast in response to the triggered ability the the Beast will die because the ability uses Last Known Information to determine if the Cerberus had deathtouch. Basically the game looks back in time to how the Cerberus last existed on the battlefield to determine effects of the damage like deathtouch.

112.7a Once activated or triggered, an ability exists on the stack independently of its source. Destruction or removal of the source after that time won’t affect the ability. Note that some abilities cause a source to do something (for example, “Prodigal Pyromancer deals 1 damage to target creature or player”) rather than the ability doing anything directly. In these cases, any activated or triggered ability that references information about the source because the effect needs to be divided checks that information when the ability is put onto the stack. Otherwise, it will check that information when it resolves. In both instances, if the source is no longer in the zone it’s expected to be in at that time, its last known information is used. The source can still perform the action even though it no longer exists.
702.2e If an object changes zones before an effect causes it to deal damage, its last known information is used to determine whether it had deathtouch.


What happens to an Inkmoth Nexus that has had Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas' -1 ability used on it?

Whoever gave you the ruling was mistaken.

According to level 4 judge Chris Richter, the Inkmoth Nexus will remain a 5/5 artifact creature land but will lose flying, infect, and its Blinkmoth subtype after the turn ends.

Some more details on what happens afterward:

  When the turn ends, the animation effect from the Inkmoth Nexus will
  end. When this happens, the Nexus will be become a 5/5 artifact
  creature land. This Nexus will still have the normal abilities of an
  Inkmoth Nexus, the mana ability and the ‘animation’ activated ability,
  as well. But this permanent will not have flying or infect at this
  point. This is because Inkmoth Nexus’ animation ability has a duration
  that lasts until the end of turn, while the animation effect from
  Tezzeret’s ability does not. The animation effect from Tezzeret’s
  ability will last as long as that permanent remains in play. If no
  other effects are applied, then this Nexus will look like this (a 5/5
  artifact creature land with Nexus abilities) for the rest of the game
  or as long as this Nexus remains in play.

  However, you may just want to use additional animation effects on this
  Nexus for strategic reasons. If the Inkmoth Nexus’ animation activated
  ability resolves again, then this permanent will become an 1/1
  artifact creature land with both flying and infect. It is a 1/1
  creature again for the same reason as why it became a 5/5 earlier, the
  power and toughness setting portion of the Nexus’ effect is applied in
  timestamp order and overrides Tezzeret’s effect that makes it a 5/5.
  And, just as earlier, you can use Tezzeret’s ability again as well.
  Doing so will make this permanent into a 5/5 creature with both flying
  and infect. Then, as before, at the end of turn when the Inkmoth
  animation effect wears off it will become a 5/5 artifact creature
  land.


We have

Austria
  F Ion-Gre

Turkey
  F Aeg-Gre

Italy
  F EMa-Aeg

F Ion-Gre bounces with F Aeg-Gre because both have strength 1 so nobody wins.   As a result the fleets never leave their spaces and thus F Aeg stays at Aeg.

So F EMa-Aeg attacks an occupied space. Both have strength 1 so both stay at their spaces with the end result that nothing changes.


When you use Chancellor to discard your deck, do you gain a gold for each Tunnel discarded?

No
Per the Hinterland Rules, Chancellor does not trigger Tunnel

This ability does not function if cards are put into your discard pile without being discarded, .... when your deck is put into your discard pile, such as with Chancellor


Check for adjacency after or before using a moving tile?

The answer to your question, as asked, is "The settlement must go back to where you picked it up from."

But your question includes this phrase

I haven't built on any other desert fields yet. So the only neighbouring desert field would be that one.

This is not the correct rule.  Perhaps you meant to say that you haven't built on or next to any other desert fields.  If you've built next to other desert fields, then your settlement could be moved to a desert field next to those settlements.


Are there 3 or 12 MTG FNM cards for 2018?

12, only the 3 double sided tokens were numbered for FNM 2018 the other 9 used their set collector number.
In 2018, Wizards started giving out double sided tokens as FNM promos, this was not a popular decision, so after the first three of those tokens they changed the system. They started giving out versions of cards from the current sets. They had a different frame, promo rarity "P" and the "FNM" name on their collector number line, which had the collector number matching regular pack pulls. Opt was the first one:

The rest were: Cast Down, Shanna, Sisay's Legacy, Elvish Rejuvenator, Militia Bugler, Murder, Conclave Tribunal, Sinister Sabotage, and Thought Erasure. To find all 12 you can use this query on scryfall.
Now, however, they have stopped making specifically FNM promos and instead are having packs of promos using this frame that can be given out by stores how the stores want to.  These promos are marked with the set they are from and numbered as alt art promos are currently, with a just a number higher than the set count, and that count is excluded, They have the rarity "P" and "Promo Pack" for where they came from. At the moment, FNM prizes are digital for MtG Arena, where FNM events are currently played, this may change once the pandemic ends and we get back to playing in store events again.


Can I use tokens and basic lands from outside my format?

Yes. If a card (e.g. "Island") is allowed in the current format, you may place any print of that card into your deck.

You can even use a print of a card whose text has since been changed in Oracle. The text in Oracle always overrides the text on the card.

The cards much match the following criteria:

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

(See section 3.3 of the Tournament Rules for a couple of additional notes.)

Note that wear and faded ink on older cards could be construed as markings. Sleeves can address these issues.

As for tokens, you can use anything that can be tapped. You can use an Ace of Clubs as your Spirit token if you so desire.


What are rules for completely blank tiles?

I know some sets use a blank tile for a white dragon. The red one could be a red dragon.

This page has a blank white dragon.

And according to this page (link provided by  L. Scott Johnson):

  There are blank tiles in other sets too, including Chinese Bakelite and Bakelite sets. These tiles were always a bit of insurance that a lost tile would not make the set unplayable: one of the other tiles could be adapted. These sets tend to have carved White Dragons, so these tiles usually remain stored in the case until needed.

So it can be spare parts too.


Condensing Carcassonne & expansions into a single box

A great solution to this struck me as I was falling asleep a few nights ago (strange how the brain works): I won't need the expansion boxes anymore, so I could cannibalize those into smaller boxes.

After a lot of careful measuring, I took the expansion box lids and scored them across the top in three places with a pair of scissors and a ruler, creating straight fold-lines.  Then I trimmed off the bottom edge and a portion of each side, and folded on my scored lines.  I made my boxes a few eights of an inch taller than they are wide, but I think an even square (i.e. three equally spaced score marks on the lid) would be just fine, maybe even better, since a couple of mine turned out to be a tighter fit than I intended.

I kept the two corners in the upper portion of the lid intact, so it could serve as a lid on my smaller box, hinging at one of my folds.  I folded the whole thing up and, after some final trimming, I taped the corners together.  I also supported each folds with a strip of tape, to make sure they don't wear out and fall apart later.

The new box with hinged lid closed:

The box holds tiles and a baggie with game pieces.  The lid is the intact portion from the top of the original box lid.  The front, bottom, and back are all from the top of the original lid, all rolled up along my score marks.  I kept a square from the sides of the original lid for the end pieces of the box.

I trimmed the original cardboard insert and just kept the long narrow part that holds the tiles (bottom of last photo, below).  This left room for my three re-sized expansion boxes (Princess, Traders, and Inns), plus my small expansions (The Count, King & Scout, River II, and River (rubberbanded)) and my meeples in a bag.

I'm not sure if all Carcassonne expansions would fit using this method, but I own most of them, and it fit nicely for me.

Edit

My attempt at a diagram.  This is the expansion box lid in original form, with cuts and folds marked.  Create a mock-up with a piece of scratch paper first, if that helps.

Use scissors to score the three dashed lines across the top of the box (equally spaced).
Cut out the X'd portions - the entire bottom edge and the center portion of each side edge.
Fold the three scored marks to transform the large surface of the original lid into the front, back, bottom, and top of the new box.  The top edge of the original lid will now be the front flap of the new box.
The new lid will be just a little too tall for your new box, so trim it to match.
Tape up the corners.  You can also tape the folded edges for durability.


It says it in the spell description. On page 15 of the Nagash book each spell states what type can be summoned and can only be "selected from the Undead Legioins army list (page 20).

Hope that helps.


Where can I purchase extra wood pieces for Settlers of Catan?

Replacement parts can be found from Mayfair Games, although this will match your 4th Edition color pieces. (Older editions came in different colors). If you want Seafarer's , or other sets they have those too.

  Settlers of Catan- Pieces - Set 4 player -White Blue Red and Orange with Robber ( MFGP3061-41 ) Price: $12.00

If you wanted some approximate replacements, PnP Productions has wooden ships (Seafarer's), wooden blocks (Knights & Cities, city walls), plastic hotels & houses (settlements/cities), and wooden cubes (roads?) in quite a few colors that differ from the original 4th Ed. colors.


Help identify card game with teams and secret signals?

Sounds like a variation on what the internet tells me is called Kemps. (Edit: The specific variation being Spoons related but while Spoons has similar bluffing aspects it lacks the team aspects in common with Kemps

There is a more modern board game (Wink) that has a similar mechanic of getting your partner to announce you have the victory via secret signals I'll see if I can find it.


Yes.

In 8th edition the "Magical Interference" rule (Magic Items, pg 500) says:

  Wizards cannot choose magic armour unless they have an option for
  'normal' armour.

It goes on to say that most Wizards cannot use magic while wearing armour, but that any Wizard that "has armour as part of his standard equipment or an option for 'normal' armour" is an exception, having trained to do so without penalty.

As such, any wizard with armour/access to armour can wear it and cast spells as normal, and can be upgraded with magical armour.

However, most wizards do not have access to armour.


What is the largest amount of pebbles in mancala to win with?

First, the issues:

1: you've not defined which version. Yes, I know, yo've specified some starting conditions. But not the capture conditions.
2: There are literally hundreds of variants of Mancala, and at least 3 different capture mechanics I've played.
3: the normal setup is 12 pits... 6 per player...

Still, despite these, I think I can answer the question.

Given that I'm most familiar with Oh-wah-ree, the 3M bookcase game, which has a capture condition of "last stone played landed in an opponent's pit with 1, 2 or 3 stones already present, regress backward for additional pits captured"... And Oh-Wah-Ree's end is only one player can move, and can't provide a piece to another player (which is required if possible).

It is possible, in theory, to capture all the stones on the board in this variant.

In most variants, it's possible to capture all the stones, but not easy.

In the variants where you sow to the capture pit at each end, it's virtually impossible as your opponent must sow at least the starting number of pebbles worth into their own capture (if your capture is at the end of your side) or you must sow theirs (if your capture is at the beginning of your side).


How many allowed scrabble words are there in different languages

The answer will vary widely per language and will depend on how new words are created in a language.

In an agglutinative language, words are created by joining words together. For instance, a chair you use at a desk in the office, an office chair, is one word in German, "ein Bürostuhl" (literally a "deskchair").

As you can see, that way new words are created easily and on the fly. That is why Icelandic has such a large dictionary, which is not even exhaustive — it can't be.

So the answer to your question will be it depends. Perhaps you should restrict your question to a specific language, as not all languages are as liberal in word formation.

Dutch: 652,000 words

The Dutch Scrabble association, the  Scrabble Bond Nederland (SBNL) uses the Scrabble Word List (SWL) for words up to 9 letters and publishes separate lists for 10, 11, and 12 letters.

The SWL contains over 242,000 words, the supplemental lists contain about 125,000 words, about 141,000 words, and about 144,000 words respectively, for a grand total of 652,000 words of length 2 to 12.

English: 279,000 words

The World English-language Scrabble Players Association (WESPA) states in its rules

  Global word source
  The word source used in global Scrabble, known as Collins Scrabble Words or CSW (formerly Official Scrabble Words or OSW) is actually not a single dictionary, but an amalgam of three: Collins, Chambers and TWL, the current Northern American wordlist.

  TWL (Tournament Word List) is itself drawn from a range of sources, mostly different editions of Webster's. Americans and Canadians play by CSW rules in international tournaments and TWL in 'domestic' North American tournaments. But they are increasingly introducing CSW grades in various tournaments, and even some solely CSW tournaments. WESPA hopes this North American isolationism will end one day, for the good of global Scrabble.

Collins states on its website:

  Based on Collins English Dictionary, Collins Official Scrabble™ Words 2019 is the most comprehensive Scrabble™ word list ever, including World English from Australia, Canada, New Zealand, South Africa, UK, and USA brought together in a single list.

  With more than 279,000 permissible words, including inflected forms, this is a must for anyone playing Scrabble.

  (Emphasis mine)

French: 393,670 words

The French Scrabble association, La Fédération Internationale de Scrabble Francophone (FISF), uses L'Officiel du Scrabble which is currently in its seventh version, containing 393,670 words from 2 to 15 letters.

German: 180,000

The German Wikipedia article on Scrabble quotes a source about "120,000 words".
Scrabble Deutschland e.V. states the official list contains 179,998 words of 2 to 9 letters.

I'll add more sources and languages as I find them.


Can you win a two player Uno game by playing a skip card then your final card?

Yes, this is a good way to win. Since you played a skip card in a two player game it is your turn again letting you play your final card and win the game. It should be noted that he would still have time to say uno if he could say it before you did or you played your final card.


Arena, Triumphant surge without legal target

What you describe was certainly a bug in Arena. You can't cast a spell if you can't choose legal targets for it. By the rules, the spell will not hang around until there is a legal target.
Spells and abilities that require one or more targets can't be cast, activated, or enter the stack if you don't have a legal target at the time of casting/activating/triggering it. A spell that was started to be cast would be returned to where it came from, usually the hand.
The process for casting a spell, activating an ability, and triggering an ability are mostly identical for the purpose of target selection, so I'll only quote those rules for casting spells.

601.2c The player announces their choice of an appropriate object or player for each target the spell requires. [..]
601.2e The game checks to see if the proposed spell can legally be cast. If the proposed spell is illegal, the game returns to the moment before the casting of that spell was proposed (see rule 722, “Handling Illegal Actions”).


What is this card game called in English?

I believe you  are referring to Rummy or some variation of it

It has many different variants but the crux of the game is draw a card and put one down in order to make sets and runs.


Can Ring of Ma'rûf call in cards outside of MtG?

No, you can only get a Magic: the Gathering card.  The meaning of the word "card" is given explicitly in the rules:

108.2. When a rule or text on a card refers to a “card,” it means only a Magic card or an object represented by a Magic card.

Moreover, you can only get traditional Magic cards, so no Archenemy schemes, Planechase planes, etc:

108.2a Most Magic games use only traditional Magic cards, which measure approximately 2.5 inches (6.3 cm) by 3.5 inches (8.8 cm). Certain formats also use nontraditional Magic cards, oversized cards that may have different backs.
108.5. Nontraditional Magic cards can’t start the game in any zone other than the command zone (see rule 408). If an effect would bring a nontraditional Magic card into the game from outside the game, it doesn’t; that card remains outside the game.

So while you could choose your copy of All in Good Time with Ring of Ma'rûf, it would not be able to enter the game due to 108.5, and you effectively just waste your draw and exile the Ring for nothing.


Timing of Babylon's (B) and Halicarnassus' special abilities?

Babylon has a clarification in the rules that says:

  Clariﬁcation :
  - during the sixth turn, the player can therefore play both cards they have in hand. If the second stage of the Wonder is not built, the
  Babylon player can then build it on their sixth turn and then play the
  seventh card instead of discarding it.

Halicarnassus has the following clarification:

  Clariﬁcation : this special action is taken at the end of the turn in
  which the stage is built. If players discard cards on that turn (for
  example, during the 6th turn of an age), the player can also choose
  from among those cards.

I'd say from that that Babylon's power basically all happens "during the sixth turn", and so Halicarnassus can take advantage of any of Babylon's discards.  There isn't really a ghostly extra seventh turn getting created by Babylon's Wonder.


Missiles change a die into a '6' only. A missile can never modify a die to anything else.

Perhaps a non-spoilerific example might clarify.

An attack roll on a Ammo Shortage territory is 6,5,1 versus a defense roll of 5,5. The defender's high die is reduced by 1 because of the Ammo Shortage's -1 modifier making their roll 5,4. The defender uses a missile on the '4' making it an unmodifable '6' (Ammo Shortage can no longer affect it), and the attacker loses 2 troops instead of the defender (6,5,1 vs 6,5 after missile instead of 6,5,1 vs 5,4 before missile)


Can you play a wild card on an existing Canasta to go out?

Yes.

You can add to existing melds in general; whether going out or not. This includes adding a wild to an existing Canasta.

  A player may add additional cards to a meld by his side, provided that the melds remain valid (having no more than three wild cards).

Note that if you add a wild to a natural Canasta, it will become a mixed Canasta.

  Additional cards may be added to a canasta to score their point values, but these do not affect the bonus - except that a wild card added to a natural canasta reduces it to a mixed canasta (and a black card replaces the red card that was previously on top).


There's a German Q&A on this subject that says Knights are unaffected by volcanic eruptions. The reason for this is simply stated as "Because the rules on eruptions only describe the effects on settlements and cities, you can conclude that nothing happens to knights."

I find this answer quite unsatisfactory, and I recommend that you decide before the game starts how to handle this occurrence. Personally I prefer to think that the volcano drives knights away. The owner then has to move the knight to a different intersection, taking all relevant rules into consideration.


Do I have to shuffle with Settle The Wreckage?

You shouldn't have had to shuffle your library.

This is actually a known bug in Magic Online. It is listed here as "Settle the Wreckage does not give the targeted player the option to not search their library."

As for the rule itself... unfortunately there's no card ruling on Gatherer, but the rules of grammar should make this clear. If the card's intent were that the "may" applies only to searching the library, and not to the shuffling part, then the shuffling would have to stand alone as an instruction outside of the "may". It would look like this:

  That player [may search his or her library for that many basic land cards, put those cards onto the battlefield tapped, then] shuffle his or her library.

The problem here is that "shuffle" would have to be "shuffles" for that to be grammatically correct. If the card did say "then shuffles his or her library", then it would be reasonably to interpret that as a separate instruction apart from the "may".

So the only way for it to be grammatically correct is if it's:

  That player may [search his or her library for that many basic land cards, put those cards onto the battlefield tapped, then shuffle his or her library.]


Was it ever the case that Scrabble tiles had to be placed contiguously?

It seems it has never been a rule.
I've found a (non-HTTPS) site here that shows previous rules from different version of the game.  The oldest rules they have are from 1948, the year the game became Scrabble.
In the rules examples, they show the word "FARM" being played intersecting with "HORN", so that is clearly using "FA" and "M", splitting placement either side of the letter "R".


Only during your movement phase.

Page 22 or the rulebook, there is the card Currency :

  City management : Gain 3 culture tokens

and the following explanation :

  For example, Currency (shown above) allows a player to spend  one
  incense resource token to gain three culture tokens during the
  player’s City Management Phase


There's a modicum of skill involved.  You can do some things to increase the odds that random draws will go your way.  Any or all of these could be used to augment Basic Player's behavior.

Recognize that some keepers appear more often in goals.  Prioritize The Brain and generally anything to do with food.
Playing keepers toward the current goal is usually a waste of time, especially with lots of players.  The goal may change several times before your next turn.
Avoid Draw X rules when you don't have Play X to back it up.  Otherwise you hand all your opponents extra card draw before your next turn.  A fistful of cards increases your chances of going off on your next turn, but it does so for everybody at the table.  Risk/reward.
Play your cards in the proper order, e.g., by not reducing/trashing the current Play rule before you've played all your cards.
Hang on to cards like Let's Do That Again and Take Another Turn until the board has some favorable Draw and Play rules.  Setting up a Dominion-style 5-minute turn is soooo much fun.

Ultimately, Fluxx is a fun game because of the crazy combinations that make everyone's heads spin.  Actively trying to win is of lesser importance.  In my opinion, the better skill to master is to make sure you don't make the game boring for everyone else:

Hand Limit 0 is an awesome card, provided you still have plays left for yourself to change it before your turn ends.  Draw 1/Play 1 with 0-card hands is painful.
Play All with Draw 1 is similarly bad, though it gets less painful with more opponents.


Yes, you can take. In fact, you can rotate the Wild Card before placing a new card on the table to change its color and add your new property. ;)


If Calamity Janet has a Barrel, can she use it to avoid Indians?

In order to counter Indians, you must discard a Bang! card.

Calamity Janet can use Missed! cards as Bang! cards.

Barrel, however, does not give you a Missed! card when it works successfully - it just causes a Missed! effect that can be used to cancel a Bang!.

Since you don't have a Missed! card to discard, Calamity Janet can't use Barrel to avoid Indians in this way.


How to use big fun 'play the lottery' card

Given you can only choose the range of numbers that can be made by adding the values from a pair of standard Monopoly dice, and that no other rules in Monopoly use a single dice for their actions (at least, as far I am aware), then it's heavily implied you need to use the total of both dice here.


Can you prevent a permanent from untapping with a tapping ability?

No.

All of your permanents untap during your untap step unless an effect has specifically said they do not untap or that you can choose not to untap them. Tyrant's Machine has neither of those effects.


Can't cast an instant after my opponent declares attackers in Arena

Yes, declaring attackers happens during the Declare Attackers step (rule 508). After declaring attackers (508.1), the active player (your opponent) gets priority (508.2) but you'll get priority thereafter and should be able to cast an instant.

Unless there are other effects in place barring you from casting spells, it seems to be an Arena bug.


Chandra exiles a card, I play it, it gets exiled again

No, you can't play it again.

It's necessary to understand that everything in the game is only an imaginary game object. Objects are the things that players actually play with. Cards only represent objects; they serve as a reminder that there is an object and what its base properties are.

Whenever an object leaves a game zone (such as exile), it ceases to exist. If that object was represented by a card, a new object is instead created in the zone it moved to. Those new objects have no relation to their previous existence.

That means the object you exiled with Chandra is different from the one you cast and was countered, and different yet again from the exiled object put there by the counter. That means you can not cast it again with Chandra, because it's a different object to the one Chandra exiled.

  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 a few exceptions to this rule, but none apply here.


How bad would it to be to allow partial house renovation in Agricola?

I think the house rule will be harmless, and also that after playing a few games, no one will take advantage of partial renovation - because it's a terrible idea. It also introduces unnecessary complexity.

Balance: The only balance consequence I see is that the Renovation action can be taken much more often than in standard Agricola. In principle, you could use this to deny the action to other players. In practice though, I doubt it would be worth it - there are plenty more valuable things to do than renovate, in most games.
Strategy: You simply do not have time to upgrade individual rooms. As you point out, that's expensive in reed, but critically, it's using an action each time. And what for? Renovating a single room to Clay gets you a measly one point. If you also require that subsequent rooms must be built of the more expensive material, and that the house doesn't count as Clay until all rooms are completed, then partial renovation is clearly a terrible idea.
Complexity: There is already a mechanism for handling surplus goods - purchasing of Improvements. The idea of Renovation is that it's a major action, that takes careful preparation and timing, and may or may not be a good idea, depending on your resources, whether you can buy a Major Improvement at the same time, and whether you need a better house for your Minors or Occupations. In gameplay terms, partial renovation serves no useful purpose.

The second rule, about building houses from arbitrary building resources, has the potential for greater impact, but again is complex. It makes it easier to build rooms, while removing the resource niche effect that players get by Renovating. For example, one reason to Renovate to clay might be to make use of clay resources, while everyone else fights it out for wood for their rooms. This house rule would remove that tactical possibility, which is a shame. This is important because rooms are required to have children, and your workers drive the economic engine of the game (this is the reason that cards like Wet Nurse are so powerful). So messing with the room mechanic is not a great idea.

Overall, I think this is a solution in search of a problem. Bear in mind that the many, many Occupations and Minor Improvements allow all sorts of interesting game adjustments, including building options and alternatives. For example the Conservator lets you Renovate to stone in a single action. My advice is to tell your players to deal with the rules as they are, get them more experienced, and move them on to the full game as quickly as possible. With 14 different cards to manage each game, they'll have more than enough to worry about without needing to take issue with odd questions of building realism.


Optimal play on NxN boards where you need N in a row leads to a draw for all N > 2.

Contemporary Combinatorics, by Bela Bollobas has a proof of it.  Below is a summary of this.  The images below are from this book.

All board sizes 5x5 and up can be proven to be a draw by the second player employing a pairing strategy, namely where the second player plays a piece in a location next to or near the location of the first players move that most limits the options the first player has to play further.

For example, in the 5x5 game, optimal play for player 2 involves playing in the space with the same number as that played by player 1.  If player 1 goes in the center, or if the matching space is already occupied, player 2 can go anywhere.

Similarly, for 6x6:

3x3 tic-tac-toe can be proven a draw by brute force method, and 4x4 can be proven a draw by creating 3 different pairing strategies based on each of the three possible opening moves by player 1 (ignoring symmetry and rotation).

So, under optimal play, there is no winning strategy.

However, if you want to write a good strategy, it seems the thing you want to do in general would be to play pieces that give you as many options to win as possible.  This would be central locations at the beginning and locations that are part of multiple lines of your pieces in the mid-game and late-game.  Early game, I'd go for spaces on the optimal move chart where the blocking move is the furthest away.  Late game, I'd go for moves that win the game or block winning moves, and otherwise ones that give the most options in conjunction with existing pieces.


From the reference guide, page 11:

  He may use one effect that provides a bonus (for example “Gain +3 Will”). If multiple effects provide a bonus, he uses only the highest bonus.

This wording implies that when multiple effects are available he uses the highest bonus, not that he strictly uses the effect with the highest bonus potential. It implies to me that all the effects are in play and overlapping.  Narratively it supports the idea that multiple items operate concurrently, an idea also supported by the fact that items that grant rerolls can accumulate. This is how we have been playing.

Note that choosing to use Wither comes with its own cost when it fails, so there is already a penalty when it is attempted and failed.


What happens when I gain control of a creature that's a different color from my deck?

You don't need to pay mana to attack unless a card specifically says so. So, if you take control of a black creature using a white deck, you can attack with that creature.


Skyswirl Harrier has 3 power and 4 toughness.
After Renegade Freighter enters the battlefield, Salivating Gremlines has 4 power and 3 toughness.

Short other effects, creatures cause combat damage equal to their power, and can survive combat damage less than their toughness.

Attacker, Salivating Gremlins is Declared. Blocker, Skyswirl Harrier is declared.
Once you're able to cast a spell during the Declare Blockers step, you cast Harnessed Lightning, presumably spending 3 energy to do 3 damage to the Skyswirl Harrier. This is one short of lethal (4).

Combat damage happens. Salivating Gremlins does 1 damage to Skyswirl Harrier, and 3 damage to the opponent because of trample. Skyswirl Harrier does 3 damage to Salivating Gremlins.

Already having 3 damage marked on it for the turn, adding the 1 damage marks 4 for the turn, matching Skyswirl Harrier's toughness of 4. State Based Effects, Skyswirl Harrier dies.

Salivating Gremlin has 3 damage marked on it for the turn, matching its 3 toughness. State based effects, Salivating Gremlins dies.

An important rule here is 702.19b:

  The controller of an attacking creature with trample first assigns damage to the creature(s) blocking it. Once all those blocking creatures are assigned lethal damage, any remaining damage is assigned as its controller chooses among those blocking creatures and the player or planeswalker the creature is attacking. When checking for assigned lethal damage, take into account damage already marked on the creature and damage from other creatures that’s being assigned during the same combat damage step, but not any abilities or effects that might change the amount of damage that’s actually dealt. The attacking creature’s controller need not assign lethal damage to all those blocking creatures but in that case can’t assign any damage to the player or planeswalker it’s attacking.


What exactly does it mean to "cast" a spell?

Casting a spell means taking it from where it is, which is usually the hand (but abilities like Flashback or cards like Isochron Scepter can change that), and put it on the stack so that it can resolve and have some effect. This process also involves (among other things) choosing modes for a modal spell, choosing targets for spells that target, and paying the cost of the spell (after taking into account and alternative or additional costs).

For you example, as Door of Destinies enters the battlefield you choose a creature type (I will assume that Human was picked, though it would also work if Soldier were chosen). Then when you cast the Akroan Crusader since it is a Human it will trigger the Door's ability.

In order to equip a card onto a creature you must activate its equip ability, this is not a spell — it is an ability and will not trigger the Crusader's ability. Similarly the "{R}: equipped create gets +/1+1 until end of turn" is also an ability and also will not trigger the Crusaders ability.

  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. 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), ignoring any effect that would prohibit that spell from being cast based on information determined during that spell’s proposal. (Such effects are considered during the check detailed in rule 601.2e.) If, at any point during the casting of a spell, a player is unable to comply with any of the steps listed below, the casting of the spell is illegal; the game returns to the moment before the casting of that spell was proposed (see rule 720, “Handling Illegal Actions”).


Thematic relevance of credits when icebreaking

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

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

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

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

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


Do we skip crossfire events in Extraction when playing with less than 4 players?

Yes, you will still flip crossfire cards as the rules for extraction say to follow the crossfire rules of a standard crossfire game. In a standard game you flip it on the first turn with four players, second turn with three players and the third turn with two players. The only change to what is being flipped is obstacles which are flipped according to a tracker in the mission instructions.

Need to remember that crossfire cards are where a lot of the difficulty comes from. I have lost count of how many games have been lost in the last round just because of the crossfire card that is flipped.

Rules

Page 20 of the rules

  Obstacles and Crossfire: Use the normal Crossfire rules. Flip
  obstacles as instructed for each step of the mission track.
  Flipped obstacles start facing the Client, but the runners
  can protect the Client. At the start of each runner’s turn, a
  non-staggered runner can move one obstacle facing the Client
  to face them instead, if that obstacle’s color matches their
  role color. This choice must be made before any obstacle abilities
  that would trigger at the start of a runner’s turn.
  Obstacles will attack runners they’re facing, as normal, but
  when a runner becomes staggered, move all obstacles facing
  that runner to face the Client at the end of that turn.

Page 19

  Playing with Fewer than Four Runners: If there are only three
  runners, do not flip a Crossfire card at the start of the first
  round. If there are only two runners, do not flip a Crossfire
  card at the start of the first or second rounds.


How are skill check modifiers prioritized and ordered in Arkham Horror?

With all due respect to the amount of time you put in making that list, I think you may be asking the wrong question.

First of all, there's generally no fixed order or prioritization which requires a flowchart. You add up all the things that affect the modifier, and addition is commutative. If you have things that let you reroll, they can be used in any order you want. That is, the "flowchart" would be:

Add up all modifiers
Roll that many dice and see if you passed
If you failed, consider your options for re-rolling, re-roll if desired/possible, see if you passed, and repeat.

The bulk of your question, then, is just how to make sure you got the modifier right, and perhaps how to make sure you didn't forget a way you can re-roll. And I would argue that your list is not going to help you there, because your list is longer than the number of cards typically in play. It will be faster (and just as reliable) to simply look through everything in play every time a skill check is made than to consult a list like the one you're proposing.

Remember, there are relatively few global cards in play - perhaps an environment, perhaps the ancient one affects skill checks, and other things are very uncommon. Everything else is either on your investigator sheet or the little cards (items + skills + allies) right in front of you, and you can very quickly scan through those, until you start remembering that your shotgun always doubles sixes, and that your dark cloak doesn't affect luck checks.

If you want, you could try to use counters/dice/sliders to remember all the global modifiers (e.g. when the Heat Wave environment appears, set global indicators for fight to -1 and lore to +1), but that gives you yet another thing to remember to do (adjust those indicators when environments change) so honestly, you might as well just look at the environment card every time if you're having trouble remembering. Same goes for everything else - you could perhaps keep track of your current net stats, but it's easier said than done.

So, in general, just try to get all the players to keep an eye on everything, and probably someone will notice if you slip up. Keep your cards in consistent places: environments always in the same place, organize your items into combat and non-combat items. And don't worry so much - if you realize after the fact, you can probably either fix it or just let it slide.


Per the rules:

  Zeus now chooses a new adventure disk
  from the reserve and places it on the
  empty space where Odysseus' ship
  started the round.

I think the word "choose" is a clear indicator that it doesn't have to be a random disk.  Especially as it's specified to be a "face-up reserve"!


How much does Vryn Wingmare increase the cost of my Bring to Light by?

What does it cost?
You will end up paying 7 mana total, 6 for Bring to Light and 1 for the spell you find with it.
What happens is you cast Bring to Light you determine the cost of paying the spell, in this case the mana cost + the cost increase so you will pay 6 total mana for it. Then when Bring to Light resolves you go through the cost determination for the new spell, in this case the alternative cost from bring to light + the cost increase so you will pay {1} for the second spell.

601.2f The player determines the total cost of the spell. Usually this is just the mana cost. Some spells have additional or alternative costs. Some effects may increase or reduce the cost to pay, or may provide other alternative costs. Costs may include paying mana, tapping permanents, sacrificing permanents, discarding cards, and so on. The total cost is the mana cost or alternative cost (as determined in rule 601.2b), plus all additional costs and cost increases, and minus all cost reductions. If multiple cost reductions apply, the player may apply them in any order. If the mana component of the total cost is reduced to nothing by cost reduction effects, it is considered to be {0}. It can’t be reduced to less than {0}. Once the total cost is determined, any effects that directly affect the total cost are applied. Then the resulting total cost becomes “locked in.” If effects would change the total cost after this time, they have no effect.

What can I search for?
As for what you can search for, the Wingmare does not effect the CMC of cards, only the cost to cast them. So if you pay 5 different colors you can find a spell with a CMC of up to 5 (and not up to 4 if the Wingmare effected it). If you are playing with Un-cards so there are 6+ colors you could search for cards with a CMC of 6 assuming you have a way to add colors like pink to your mana pool.

202.3. The converted mana cost of an object is a number equal to the total amount of mana in its mana cost, regardless of color.
202.4. Any additional cost listed in an object’s rules text or imposed by an effect isn’t part of the mana cost. (See rule 601, “Casting Spells.”) Such costs are paid at the same time as the spell’s other costs.

From the Gatherer Rulings on Bring to Light:

If there are any alternative or additional costs to cast a spell with a converge ability, the mana spent to pay those costs will count. For example, if an effect makes sorcery spells cost {1} more to cast, you could pay {W}{U}{B}{R} to cast Radiant Flames and deal 4 damage to each creature.


What does playability of a Scrabble word mean?

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

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

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

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


In what zone do the lingering effects of spells reside?

They do not reside in any special realm. They just continue to apply. CR 611.2a states

  A continuous effect generated by the resolution of a spell or ability lasts as long as stated by
  the spell or ability creating it (such as “until end of turn”). If no duration is stated, it lasts until
  the end of the game.

What is interesting is, that these effects continue to apply even if the controller of the spell or ability that generated it leaves the game in a multi-player. So, if you turned some of your opponent's lands into swamps and then are killed, those lands continue to be swamps as long as they remain on the battlefield with the counters. Since you already left the game, your turn will be skipped and no counters are removed by the tomb's second ability.


What are some good introductory rules to bridge?

Rubber and Contract bridge aren't two different types. Rubber bridge is a form of Contract bridge.

There are essentially two forms of contract bridge these days

Duplicate Bridge
Rubber Bridge

In both forms (i.e. contract), for one deal, there is a 52 card deck dealt, the players do the bidding to determine the level and trump (or no trump), and depending of whether they are declaring or defending, they either try to make or break the contract.

The differences come in the mechanics around a set of deals, and how the deals are scored.

Rubber is mainly geared towards four players playing for money, and most of its quirks might have been derived from whist.

Duplicate is the form of bridge more prevalent these days and tournaments are held using that.

The raw scoring for a particular deal is almost the same in both rubber and duplicate: Declaring side makes 20 points for clubs/diamonds (i.e. if they chose clubs/diamonds as trump), 30 for hearts/spades (if trumps). 40 for the first no trump, and 30 for the rest.
Defending side gets 50 or 100 points for each undertrick. They get a 100 if the declaring side is vulnerable, which is determined differently between rubber and duplicate. The contract could get doubled and redoubled which might affect the score, but I suggest you ignore that for now.

100 points makes a game, and in order to get the game bonus you need to bid to the appropriate level and make it. Similarly you have the small slam and grand slam bonuses.

The difference between the raw scoring for Rubber and Duplicate comes in the bonuses calculation I believe (part score bonus, redoubled overtricks etc). I suggest you don't worry too much about those differences for now, and just remember the 20/30/40 and 100 for game.

In duplicate this raw gets converted to a different score, depending on the kind of duplicate.

In rubber, the raw scores get added up in various ways, in addition to rubber specific bonuses, and if you are playing for money, gets converted to money! :-)

For a beginner, I would suggest you forget about the scoring (apart from what was said above) and concentrate on the play first, and then the bidding, for a single deal.

The 30 making game scoring is probably an ancient form of bridge called auction bridge. I suggest you ignore that (and please check the publication dates of the books you read).

Hope this helped clarify some.


What happens to destroyed districts in Citadels?

It seems Fantasy Flight Games has never officially ruled on this, even though the question has been asked multiple times since the release of the game. However, there have been discussions from players about where the district card goes.

Board Game Geek

In this forum on BGG most people seem to agree that "Discarded/destroyed cards go to the bottom of the District (draw) deck." There is one person who says that they play with a discard pile, although a discard pile is never mentioned in the official rules.

Also on BGG, a user rewrote the character cards to "prevent ambiguity." He added this line to the Warlord:

  Place the destroyed district to the bottom of the District Deck face-down.

If you scroll down through the comments, nobody challenges this even though there is discussion about some of the other reworded character cards.

The third place on BGG where this sentiment can be found is here. About halfway down, user Mark Biggar notes that cards destroyed by the Warlord are "discarded" to the bottom of the District deck. There is no dissension on this thread, either.

Fantasy Flight Games Forums

The other place I could find any mention of this was on the FFG Forums. This thread is pretty bad. It has this badly worded question (emphasis mine):

  If the Warlord destroys one of your districts does it go back into your hand or at the bottom of the discard pile?

This is accompanied by a comment that doesn't really address the OP's question. This doesn't seem to really help with deciding where the destroyed district goes.

Conclusion

The consensus from BGG seems to be districts destroyed by the Warlord go to the bottom of the District deck. I'd go with this as the answer to your question.


Proposed answer : A new blockade cannot be formed

Parcheesi is the trademarked name of the American version of the Indian game Pachisi.
Milton-Bradley and Parker Brothers sold the game under this name and were acquired by Hasbro.

The Parker Brothers rules do not address the problem presented here.
Parker Brothers Parcheesi Rules

The Milton-Bradley rules do explicitly address the situation.

Milton-Bradley Parcheesi rules

Answer. You are not allowed to form a new blockade from an existing blockade.


The best way to feed your people, is to make sure you have just enough food.

Sure you can feed them other resources, but those resources will cost you at least 50% more (in terms of dice eyes). It's a lot easier to just get the food out.

Food is a means to an end, it won't score you any points. As the game develops, you can see where your chances of scoring big points are. Use this focus to determine how to get your food. If you get farmer (civilization) cards it makes sense to focus on getting high on the food track. In my experience, this can lead to having lots of excess food at the end of the game, which feels like a wasteful investment.

I've also won games without focusing on the food track, instead focusing on getting more people and sending them out to hunt. Again, if you overdo this you will run out of food.

All in all, there is no undisputed best solution, without considering the cards on the table and the choices of your fellow players.