Does a player rolling a 7 have to discard half their cards if they have more than 7?

Yes, every player, including yourself / the player who rolled the 7.
From the rules:

every player who has more than 7 resource cards must select half...

With SeaFarers, you can choose to move the pirate instead of moving the robber. But that's the only difference. The discard half applies either way.
The rules specify only the pirate/robber choice. Leaving it up to the reader to remember that there's also the discard. But for confirmation, see this blog post:

Rolling seven is the same as in the original Catan in that the player who rolls seven gets to move the robber, and can take a resource from any player effected [sic] by where they move it to. Additionally any player with seven or more cards in their hand still has to discard half of them (the lesser half in the case of an odd number, i.e. if I have 9 cards with a seven is rolled I must discard 4).


Cardgame where participants have to guess the situation based on hints

It's called "Black Stories" and is published by moses in various volumes. But it's (almost) always about guessing how somebody got (him-/herself) killed.
As far as I know, there's only one English edition of "Black Stories" out, but there are several German ones.

Z-Man published a similar game called "Dark Stories", which is in English as well.


Supreme King Gate Zero's role/s in a Dark Magician deck?

As your answer indicates that you suspect:

To Improve The Chance That Dark Magician Is Summoned On Turn 1

In the deck/article you've linked, the purpose of Gate Zero is to be used in tandem with Supreme King Dragon Darkwurm and Destrudo the Lost Dragon's Frisson to summon Odd-Eyes Meteorburst Dragon, and subsequently Ebon Illusion Magician. This inclusion of Darkwurm/Gate Zero exists solely to achieve this opening move, so that Dark Magician can more consistently exist on the field on Turn 1.

As the name sort of implies, the "Dark Magician" deck tends to prefer having "Dark Magician" in play; so it is quite desirable to optimize the likelihood of him entering play as early as possible. Gate Zero is a means to this end.

The other capabilities (although, certainly not the intended purpose) of Gate Zero are to summon Dark Magician the Dragon Knight and destroy it in a seldom-occurring pinch, or to set up a pendulum scale from 0 to 5 with Darkwurm, allowing the player to Pendulum Summon any of Maxx "C", Magician's Rod, and/or Flamvell Guard. And as you've noted, of course, it is a legal card to banish via Allure of Darkness.


How can I hold pieces in place between turns?

Use an acrylic or polycarbonate overlay designed to fit over the game board, with fitted slots that the individual pieces fit in.

One example is an official expansion for Azul called "Crystal Mosaic."  The overlay itself is shown below:

Here is the overlay in use:

An overlay isn't going to solve every possible scenario, but in my anecdotal experience, the main thing here (which is not exclusive to long gaming sessions) is that someone accidentally jostles the board or table and pieces move.  This overlay may solve that.  Plus, it is apparently cheap enough to manufacture that the above Azul expansion is being sold for about 10 US dollars at time of writing.

This answer assumes nothing about copyrights associated with such a solution - if the plan was to market such a thing as Azul's publisher did (in 2020)


By "exposing a set", I assume you mean the move when you take a just-discarded tile to complete a set you have in hand. When that happens:

You declare the match ("pong" if you're completing a 3-of-a-kind, "chow" if you're completing a run).
You reveal the matching tiles from your hand.
You take the tile the other player discarded and add it to your set.
You discard a tile, and play continues to your right (so if the discard wasn't from the player to your left, it changes the play order).

You don't draw a new tile, because the tile you took counts as your draw - you should always have 13 tiles in hand, or 14 when it's your turn, not counting any bonus tiles. You can only call chow from the player to your left, i.e. the one you'd be playing after anyway, but you can call pong from any other player's discard.
If you're completing a 4-of-a-kind ("kong"), then it is slightly different. You reveal your 3 matching tiles, take the discarded tile, then you draw a tile from the back end of the wall and discard a tile. The fourth tile in a kong essentially becomes a bonus tile that doesn't count towards your 13 tiles in hand, so you have to replace it so that you can still have a complete hand.


Pros and Cons of running a deck with no 1-mana spells?

When I'm playing standard, the game is typically decided in the first 5 or 6 turns. Consider how devistating a Titan was, and the number of extremely powerful 6 drops compared to extremely powerful 5 drops. Now in the current set, development actively tried to extend the game further out, but still in many cases the game is set in stone (barring a true bomb, of course) by turn 6. If you don't have a solid 1 drop in a standard game, you aren't so doomed that you scoop right away, but you are at a significant disadvantage because you lost the ability to play on one of the 5 game defining turns.

When I'm playing draft, assuming the opponent doesn't get mana screwed, mana flooded, color screwed, or some other 'lame' win, I expect the game to really not be decided until turn 8 or 9. And due to the sporadic nature of bombs in your draft decks, can completely turn around at any time. So missing out on a first turn creature and falling a little behind isn't a big deal. It's still not good to start at a disadvantage, but you're much more likely to come back from this in draft than in standard.

Now in something like Commander, when you have 40 life, a 1 mana creature doesn't do much at all. In fact, I only have 4 one mana spells at all (which, drawing 7 cards out of 100, means I have a about a 1/3 chance of getting one - not very high) in my main Commander deck, and none of them are creatures. They are all highly utility too: Sol Ring, which i consider more like a land than a spell, Shrieking Affliction, which isn't much of a turn 1 spell, but does a lot of damage over the course of the game, Virulent Swipe just because death touch is very important to the deck, and Quest for the Gravelord to profit from people fighting eachother. So really, only one of those cards is intended to be played on turn 1, and is still viable at any time in the game. (5/5s are always welcome!)

So, it's important to know what the tempo of the game is. I have control decks that don't mind not having a 1-drop. Multiplayer doesn't normally need one. It's all about knowing your deck, the tempo, and even your opponents. Like so many things... playtest, playtest, playtest!!


You would get to tap the only creature defending player controls before they can block.  When you actually declare attacks, what happens is that the Fiend Binder becomes tapped and is attacking a specific player.
That player is the defending player, so at that point the ability goes on the stack and you can tap one of their creatures. Defending player is defined before the defender blocks.

  508.4. If an ability of an attacking creature refers to a defending player, or a spell or ability refers to both an attacking creature and a defending player, then unless otherwise specified, the defending player it's referring to is the player that creature was attacking at the time it became an attacking creature that combat, or the controller of the planeswalker that creature was attacking at the time it became an attacking creature that combat.

In a multiplayer game, even though all opponents are generally considered defending players, the ability can only target a creature that the player this specific creature had attacked controls:

  508.4a. In a multiplayer game, any rule, object, or effect that refers to a "defending player" refers to one specific defending player, not to all of the defending players. (...)


Does Double Strike mean you count as Attacking twice?

No.

The trigger, "Whenever ~ attacks" means "Whenever ~ is declared as an attacking creature". A creature with double strike will deal damage in the two combat damage steps, but will only be declared as an attacker once per turn. (Normally, unless some other effect is creating additional combat phases.)


Klondike Solitaire - moving partial sequences between columns

I've never heard of any variation that would not allow you to do this. Though the help text you quoted is ambiguous, I believe that "deepest card" refers to the "deepest card that you want to move", not the "deepest card in the entire column". If the computer itself that has such a help file allows you to do the partial-run move anyway, do you have a reason for thinking that there is any such variation that doesn't allow it?


Axis & Allies Revised - Strategic Bombing broken?

According to these rules for Revised Axis & Allies I found online, Heavy Bombers do 2 dice of damage, with an expected value of 7, not 10. (If you're getting 10 damage per round per bomber, the dice love you.)

Heavy Bombers are, hands down, the single best technology (with Rockets or Long Range Aircraft being a close second, but only in the right circumstances). Strategic bombing is usually pretty iffy (since each die of damage is fairly pricey): a bomber costs 15 and deals 1d6 IPC damage with strategic bombing, but gets killed by AA 1/6 of the time. The bomber costs 2.5 IPCs per turn (if it lives for 6 turns of bombing), and deals 3.5 IPCs of damage per turn.  But with Heavy Bombers, it still costs 2.5 IPCs per turn, but deals 7 IPCs of damage per turn – and now strategic bombing is overwhelmingly valuable: build enough bombers to keep your opponent's income at 0, hold the line with infantry, and win with attrition (assuming that your opponent doesn't have too large of an advantage of units over you).

This other question, based on the non-revised Axis & Allies rules, handles the same issue, asking for house rules to rein in Heavy Bombers – they originally gave three dice while attacking, as opposed to the current two in the revised rules. (The original rules also didn't let you pick which technology you were developing for – you'd roll dice, and for every 6 you rolled, you rolled again to see which tech you developed. So Heavy Bombers required far more luck to develop.)

To answer your question: yes, Heavy Bombers are still a bit overpowered, but buying technology is expensive and variable, so you risk losing battles elsewhere. Most other technologies give you about a 50% boost to something, but Heavy Bombers gives you a 100% boost.


How to win 2 player Pandemic as Quarantine Specialist and Contingency Planner

The contingency planner should ALWAYS have an event card on his character. This frees up cards in his/her hand. It's hard to say whether one or the other should be dedicated to finding cures, it'll most likely depend on who can draw similar colors. The Contingency planner will have a slight advantage in holding cards for cures since both player's event cards can be played then saved on his character card for later use (one at a time obviously).

Quarantine Specialist obviously needs to go where the most cubes are being placed, and would probably be wise to be in charge of erecting research centers to allow quick access to the regions most susceptible to outbreaks.

The tricky dynamic with 2 players is, of course, not wasting cards by having to discard from being over the limit which can often happen when a player is saving for more than 1 cure. So open communication will be critical to prevent those kinds of situations from happening.

Hope this helps...


Multiple games in same box using same components. What was it?

Sounds like Stonehenge: an anthology board game:

Stonehenge is an anthology board game, a new concept where five award-winning game designers, all using the same gaming components, create five very different games in one box. The ancient ruin of Stonehenge will never be the same. The five games are:

a magic game by Richard Garfield (Magic: The Gathering, RoboRally, The Great Dalmuti)
a political game by Bruno Faidutti (Mystery of the Abbey, Citadels, Knightmare Chess)
a battle game by Richard Borg (Battle Cry, Liar's Dice, Memoir '44)
an auction game by James Ernest (Kill Dr. Lucky, Diceland, Pirates of the Spanish Main)
a science-fiction game by Mike Selinker (Risk Godstorm, Pirates, Axis & Allies Revised)


What does Leovold, Emissary of Trest & Teferi's Puzzle Box do to opponent's hands?

Even though the phrase "beginning of the draw step" suggests otherwise, those abilities trigger after the turn-based action of drawing a card for the turn.

504. Draw Step
504.1. First, the active player draws a card. This turn-based action doesn’t use the stack.
504.2. Second, the active player gets priority. (See rule 116, “Timing and Priority.”)

Regardless how many cards Player 2 has in this case, they will draw a card, then Teferi's Puzzle Box triggers, eventually resolves, then has that player put all cards on the bottom of their library.
Leovold, Emissary of Trest will prevent them from drawing any other cards, as they've already drawn a card this turn.


Flexibility of number of players in Fluxx

In my group, Fluxx tends to end by accident, regardless of number of players.  Actively trying to win pretty much ensures that you won't.  Having lots of players (I think my largest was 10) doesn't seem to change that.  I've had large games end in 5 minutes and I've played in games where we got bored and quit.  I see what you mean by your question though.  Intuitively it seems like a large group would make it harder to win.  In practice, I think there are so many ways to win that the number of players doesn't really change the game.

The only group size where Fluxx isn't as much fun is 2.


Can there be two winners at the same time in Catan?

Only the player who is currently taking their turn can win the game, so player C would be the winner.

Official Rule:

  ENDING THE GAME
  If you have—or reach—10 victory
  points on your turn, the game ends
  immediately and you win! You can only
  win during your turn. If somehow you
  find you have 10 victory points during
  another player’s turn, you must wait
  until your next turn to claim victory.

Source: Downloads page on www.catan.com


How does tournament-level Puerto Rico deal with seat-order disparities?

Here's how they did it at the 2010 World Boardgaming Championships and at EuroQuest:

BIDDING FOR SEAT POSITION, STARTING WITH THE QUARTER-FINALS: Starting with the quarter-final round games and continuing in the semi-finals and Final game, we will use mandatory bidding for all four seats. It will work as follows: Each player will randomly draw a random plantation tile (using the trading house values) to determine who bids first. For bidding in the semi-final round games, anyone advancing with a second place finish in the quarterfinals must pick last at his/her table (and hence will be assigned the lowest valued plantation). Similarly, anyone advancing to the quarterfinal round games with fewer wins will be assigned lower valued plantations than those with more wins, who shall be assigned higher valued plantations and therefore be among the first to bid.

Going around in plantation order value (coffee goes first), each player will place a matching plantation tile on a bid value ranging from 0 to 5.0 VP (in increments of 0.5 VP) on a chart to be furnished by the GM. Bids may be zero but in all instances must be higher than any previous bids for a particular seat. Any player who has been outbid will have his/her marker removed and will, when his or her turn comes, bid again--either a higher value for the same seat or a different amount for another seat. A player whose bid is not topped by another bid does not get another bid -- instead the bidding goes around to the next player without a bid marker in play. The process continues until all players' bid markers are on a different seat, with the resulting bid representing the VP handicap to be assigned for that particular game. These VP handicaps will be noted at the top of the particular seat position (1, 2, 3 or 4) on the scoresheet above the player's name and will be subtracted from that player's VP total at the end of the game.


Searching for Plant Growth Board Game with Stacking

Sounds like Arboria

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


If I pocket my man and the queen in a single strike, is the queen covered?

If a player puts the queen and a carrom man of the player's own color in the pocket with one use of the striker, the queen is automatically covered, no matter which went first.

Copied from Wikipedia


2 eternal souls 1 destroyed dm unaffected? Or destroyed

Read "Eternal Soul", it says unaffected by your opponent's card effects. They would be destroyed in your scenario.


In Chicago, or four-deal scoring, a team gets a 100 point premium for making a part score only in the fourth and final deal of the game.  If a team is carrying a part score forward from a previous deal, and do not convert it into a game score by the end of the fourth deal, they do not receive a premium.


What Are The Official Rules for Carcassonne: The River?

Lance is right on the starting tile -- according to the rules (emphasis mine):

  Remove the special starting tile from the game.  Instead, begin the game by laying the spring that starts the river.  Set aside the lake tile and shuffle the remaining 10 river tiles face down and draw from these before drawing from the tiles from the normal game.  These tiles are played and followers may be played as in the normal game with one exception: a river tile may not be placed so that the river makes a "U" turn.  Followers may not be placed on rivers.  Once these 10 river tiles have been played, the next player plays the lake and then play continues with the normal tiles.

In regards to the Source and Lake, we've always played that they connect in all directions.  The following links seem to back this up:

According to the PDF rules from ModernJive:

  The statement from Hans im Glück is "Officially, the farm goes around the spring. So it is a connected farm. I personally prefer to use it as a division, since otherwise, despite the river, there is still only one large farm."

And then from Carcassonne Central is this (although the confirmation link in the thread is no longer valid):

  Yes, officially the farm does go around the spring.


In Chess, Why Does Black Sometimes Play "Cramped" Openings?

"Cramped" openings are generally used by players who are good at piling up strong defenses for the opening and who hope to encourage overextension on White's part, in order to take advantage of it; or to fend it off till it has passed, and then muster an attack of their own.  After 1. e4 e6 2. d4 d5, which is the common continuation of the French Defense, Black main drawback is, as you mentioned, his Queen Bishop, which cannot usually enter the play until the endgame.  However, after ... c5, attacking the newborn White Pawn chain, Black's Pawn center may become threatening, and can grow into a major defensive asset, either forcing White to give up the center, or tying down White's pieces to defense of the center.  The point is that Black has many attacking chances as well, and while his first moves appear conservative, even "cramping", he is merely being more patient than in the alternative openings.  He uses more moves to get where he wants, but the extra moves can reap dividends when White comes to attack.

So a closed opening which is handled by a patient player holds much potential defensive advantage, and it is often played with a definite view toward strong reactions after White has burnt himself out trying to effect a successful attack.

Naturally, not all closed openings are effective.  More than one kind of cramped opening exists: the kind that looks cramped, but is in reality compact and smooth (closed), and then there is also the kind that is really unworkable and impossible to manipulate (cramped).  The latter turn into big mistakes, even worse than they look, especially when played by one who is more used to aggressive technique than the patient biding of time.  It wouldn't be recommended to play these unless you are the patient type, or unless you can force yourself to play quietly and defensibly until it's time to strike.

Edited later to say that there are closed openings for White, as well.


Catan pirates and explorers ships and roads

Yes, 2 ships and a road can share a coastline.
According to the FAQ for Catan Pirates and Explorers:

Sea Routes - Are only ships allowed on "sea routes" located between
terrain hexes and sea hexes / frame, or may I also build roads there?
Roads may be built on all paths, both inland and along the coast. At
the shore, roads can be parallel to ships, meaning that up to 1 road +
2 ships may simultaneously occupy a path on the coast.

Source :
Catan FAQ page 157


What is this round board game on a turn table?

It looks like a home made tabletop version of Horse Racing.
https://www.instructables.com/id/Horse-Racing-Game/

You roll the dice and move the horse along the number that's on its die.  The first to cross the finish line wins.


Can you purchase a hotel when you have 4 houses on a colour set?

From the rules you must build up properties evenly

https://en.m.wikibooks.org/wiki/Monopoly/Official_Rules

  The player may purchase up to four houses or one hotel per property (and only if there are properties to hold the houses), which raise the rents that must be paid when other players land on the property.
  The properties in a color group must be developed evenly, i.e. each house that is built must go on a property in the group with the fewest number of houses on it so far.
  A hotel may be built on a color group only after all properties in the group have four houses. A player purchases a hotel by paying the price of an additional house, and returning the four houses on that property to the Bank in exchange for a hotel.


When does paying activated ability costs occur in mtg?

Costs are payed as part of the process of activating an ability. Once you start activating an ability, nobody has an opportunity to respond until after modes, costs, and targets are chosen, and costs are payed. So, the situation you describe should have played out like this:

Your opponent casts a creature removal spell targeting Seal of Doom.
In response, you activate Seal of Doom's ability. At this time, you sacrifice Seal of Doom.
Your opponent has an opportunity to respond while Seal of Doom's ability is on the stack, but they can't target it with Snakeform because it is no longer on the battlefield.
Seal of Doom's ability resolves.

The rules for activating activated abilities use the rules for casting spells, and these are the relevant steps:

602.2a The player announces that he or she is activating the ability. If an activated ability is being activated from a hidden zone, the card that has that ability is revealed. That ability is created on the stack as an object that’s not a card. It becomes the topmost object on the stack. It has the text of the ability that created it, and no other characteristics. Its controller is the player who activated the ability. The ability remains on the stack until it’s countered, it resolves, or an effect moves it elsewhere.
602.2b The remainder of the process for activating an ability is identical to the process for casting a spell listed in rules 601.2b–i. Those rules apply to activating an ability just as they apply to casting a spell. An activated ability’s analog to a spell’s mana cost (as referenced in rule 601.2f) is its activation cost.

[...]

601.2h The player pays the total cost in any order. Partial payments are not allowed. Unpayable costs can’t be paid.

601.2i Once the steps described in 601.2a–h are completed, the [ability becomes activated]. [...] If the [ability]’s controller had priority before casting it, he or she gets priority.

Keep in mind that the original creature removal spell never does anything to Seal of Doom. Seal of Doom is sacrificed and the ability resolves all before that spell ever resolves. So even if that first creature removal spell had been another Snakeform, it wouldn't have mattered.

A Variation on the Ability
I would also like to clarify that even if the ability worked more like how your opponent thought it worked, they still wouldn't be able to stop it with Snakeform. Consider the hypothetical card Seal of Delayed Doom with the following ability:

{0}: Sacrifice Seal of Delayed Doom. If you do, destroy target creature.

The difference here is that the "Sacrifice Seal of Delayed Doom" clause is part of the effect instead of the cost, so you wouldn't do it until the ability resolves. If you had that instead, your situation would instead play out like this:

Your opponent casts a creature removal spell targeting Seal of Delayed Doom.
In response, you activate Seal of Delayed Doom's ability.
In response, your opponent casts Snakeform targeting Seal of Delayed Doom.
Snakeform resolves, and Seal of Delayed Doom becomes a 1/1 Green Snake with no abilities. But importantly, it's still the same Seal of Delayed Doom object, just with modified types, abilities, and color.
Seal of Delayed Doom's ability resolves. At this point, it instructs you to sacrifice Seal of Delayed Doom, which refers specifically to the object that created the ability. So even though it's a Green Snake and doesn't have the ability, the Seal of Delayed Doom is still on the battlefield and you can (and must) still sacrifice it. You do so, and the targeted creature is destroyed.

This is specified by rule 201.4:

Text that refers to the object it’s on by name means just that particular object and not any other objects with that name, regardless of any name changes caused by game effects.

Split Second
There is one way that the opponent could have destroyed Seal of Doom without allowing you to sacrifice it in response: the ability Split Second prevents players from responding to it's on with other spells or activated abilities that aren't mana abilities. If the opponent cast any of the following spells as or instead of the first creature removal spell, then you would not be able to activate Seal of Doom in response or after the removal spell resolves:

Krosan Grip
Molten Disaster (kicked, with X at least 2)
Sudden Death
Sudden Shock
Sudden Spoiling (would need to follow up with another removal spell)
Take Possession (would need to sacrifice the Seal of Doom while you control it)
Wipe Away
Word of Seizing (would need to sacrifice the Seal of Doom while you control it)


Are there many mandated "time outs" in tournament bridge?

The Laws of Duplicate Bridge indicate (in Law 73) that

  Calls and plays should be made without undue emphasis, mannerism or inflection, and without undue hesitation or haste. But the Regulating Authority may require mandatory pauses, as on the first round of the auction, or after a skip-bid warning or on the first trick.

The ACBL is a Regulating Authority that does require mandatory pauses for skip bids. The ACBL Codified Minutes, Chapter XII, Section A have this to say:

  A. How and When Made

  Players should protect their rights and the opponent's by announcing, prior to making an opening bid on the two level or higher, or prior to making any subsequent bid that skips one or more levels of bidding:

  When bidding orally by saying, "I am about to make a skip bid. Please Wait!"
  When using bidding boxes, by placing the stop card so the LHO sees it (the skip bidder is responsible for gaining LHO's attention). The skip bid is made. The stop card is replaced in the bidding box.

...

  C. Opponents of Skip Bidder

  All Players

  When RHO has announced a skip bid, the player following the skip bidder must wait for a suitable interval (about 10 seconds). In waiting the player's manner must be one that suggests he is an active participant in the auction (the hand should be studied during pause). any (sic) obvious display of disinterest is most improper.
  Experience Players

  Experienced players expected (sic) to maintain proper temp (sic) whether a skip bid is announced or not.

I've never seen a director called to protest that opponents are not using the stop card but would expect to see one called if an opponent was clearly using the stop card only for weak bids. I have seen director calls after a player took far longer than 10 seconds to make a call after a skip bid and his partner took a bid at his next turn.


What does BREAD stand for while drafting?

It's an acronym telling you which cards you should pick. Cards fall in one of five categories, and you should (usually) pick the card from topmost category (B > R > E > A > D) which is still left in the pack.

In a nutshell:

Bombs, powerful cards that win a game if unanswered. These can be something that generate an advantage every turn (e.g. The Immortal Sun), planeswalkers, or simply overly-large creatures for the mana cost (e.g. Lyra Dawnbringer).
Removal, cards which destroy/exile/damage creatures (said bombs, but of course they can be used earlier in the game as well).
Evasion, creatures with special abilities (e.g. flying) which make them harder to block.
Aggro, smaller creatures which give you early presence on the board and make sure you can play a card almost every turn.
Duds, cards you don't want in your main deck but might be useful in the sideboard.

Googling for magic draft bread gives some articles which explain everything in detail, including examples for each category in the current expansions.


How well do sleeves protect against spilled drinks?

My own experience is that, barring using a bag sealer on the sleeves, sleeving is not going to protect against direct spills nor large spills on a hard surface. On a surface that wicks moisture, an indirect spill will not get in. A direct spill (can knocked over onto cards, for example) will penetrate.

I've seldom double sleeved, and will note that it's a major pain to get done, requires two sizes of sleeves, and makes the cards really feel wrong.

And I've seen a card ruined by a direct spill despite double sleeving - a hockey card, to be specific, which was better material than most game cards.


A nontoken permanent “enters the battlefield” when it’s moved onto the battlefield from another zone. A token “enters the battlefield” when it’s created. See rules 403.3, 603.6a, 603.6d, and 614.12.

Cards such as Vizier of the Scorpion say "When Vizier of the Scorpion enters the battlefield, [do something]". But in this case you are turning an artifact that has already entered the battlefield into Vizier of the Scorpion. Since the artifact has already entered the battlefield, the trigger doesn't happen. It doesn't happen even if the artifact entered the battlefield this turn.

To get the artifact to amass 1, you need to turn it into a copy of Vizier of the Scorpion before it enters the battlefield, i.e. while it's on the stack.


Does Psychosis Crawler die in the middle of Days Undoing?

Psychosis Crawler won't die during the resolution of Day's Undoing.  Toughness check is done as a state-based action.  State-based actions are checked after each spell/trigger is done resolving.

704.3. Whenever a player would get priority (see rule 116, “Timing and Priority”), the game checks for any of the listed conditions for state-based actions, then performs all applicable state-based actions simultaneously as a single event. If any ...
704.4. Unlike triggered abilities, state-based actions pay no attention to what happens during the resolution of a spell or ability.


Which of the 5 resources in Settlers of Catan (base version) is most important? Why?

This will depend tremendously on the situation, but it's worth learning some generalities:

If you are playing with just the base set:

brick and wood are completely identical as everything that needs one wood also needs one brick (roads and settlements).
Wheat is completely superior to wool/sheep as it is also needed for cities in addition to everything wool is needed for.
Wheat and Ore are about tied as you need 1 wheat for a settlement and no ore and 3 ore for a city and 2 wheat. My experience is that wheat is slightly better as the ability to continue building settlements is usually worthy a slightly diminished city building capacity caused by an increase in wheat and decrease in your ore.

Anyone who has played 4+ games of Settlers knows that you need a variety of resources to win, although there are widely differing ways to get them, so there's no such thing as 'the best' resource as the distribution is so situational to the island layout, what other players have, what development cards and resources you have, and what everybody needs. However, wheat is essential to virtually any strategy, ore is needed for a city/development card strategy, wood and brick are necessary in at least small amounts for any expansion via new settlements and roads, and wool is overall probably least useful.

That is, until nobody goes for  wool but you, making you the one who can build settlements faster and extort ridiculous prices from your adversaries for it until you take an early 3 point lead for a decisive win. As I said, it's all relative. :D


Who gets to use a reanimated Gamekeeper's ability?

Your opponent. Leyline of the Void has no bearing in this situation, because the Gatekeeper is going to your (its owner's graveyard).

  400.3. If an object would go to any library, graveyard, or hand other than its owner’s, it goes to its owner’s corresponding zone.

When an object refers to you, it means its controller.

  Card Text: When Gamekeeper dies, you may exile it. If you do, reveal cards from the top of your library until you reveal a creature card. Put that card onto the battlefield and put all other cards revealed this way into your graveyard.

  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.


Leaders expansions: Is trade commerce allowed during Recruitment phase

Tl;dr: Yes.
A strict reading of the rules would imply that commerce isn't allowed for wonder construction even in the base game:

Throughout all 3 ages in a game, the players will get to build structures (cards) and Wonders (board).

...

Commerce
Often, a player will want to build a structure requiring resources he or
she does not produce.
If these resources are produced by a neighboring city...

However, the game designer has explicitly stated that you are allowed to use commerce for wonder stages. Given that clarification, it is reasonable to assume that when the Leaders rules are once again ambiguous on the matter, you can again use commerce for wonder stages there too.


Since the card text does not use the word "counter" it is not a counter. It's just a modification to P/T.  See also: Are +1/+1 counters different from +1/+1 effects?

And the return clause says "a creature" which means any creature (you control), so yes, any enchanted creature you control returns to hand instead of dying.


Can the sorcerer's ability be used at any time during the turn?

From the rules

Once per turn per opponent, your Sorcerers can conquer
a region by substituting 1 of your opponent’s active
tokens with one of your own from the tray.

From the FAQ

Q: Can Sorcerers use their Ability after placing all their units?
A: It depends what you mean. The Sorcerers cannot use their Ability after doing a final conquest for the turn using the Reinforcement die roll. But they can use their ability otherwise.

So it should be playing during the attack phase, before the reinforcement die roll.
Personally, I don't think it makes a big difference, but in Smallworld one point can make the difference.


What happens if I gain control of my opponent's Rekindling Phoenix until end of turn, and it dies?

You get the 0/1 token, but you don't sacrifice it unless you have another Rekindling Phoenix in your own graveyard.
The Phoenix's triggered ability triggers for the current controller of the Phoenix, which is you. Therefore, you put the 0/1 token on the battlefield under your control. The Phoenix, however, goes to its owner's graveyard, which is your opponent.

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.
404.1. A player’s graveyard is their discard pile. Any object that’s countered, discarded, destroyed, or sacrificed is put on top of its owner’s graveyard, as is any instant or sorcery spell that’s finished resolving. Each player’s graveyard starts out empty.

While the Phoenix lands in your opponent's graveyard, the ability triggers for you, because you were its last controller before it left the battlefield:

603.10a Some zone-change triggers look back in time. These are leaves-the-battlefield abilities, abilities that trigger when a card leaves a graveyard, and abilities that trigger when an object that all players can see is put into a hand or library.

You own and control the 0/1 token, because (in this case, not generally) you controlled the effect that created it:

110.5a The player who creates a token is its owner. The token enters the battlefield under that player’s control.

Since the triggered ability of the token requires a Rekindling Phoenix card as a target in your graveyard, if you don't have one in your graveyard, the ability immediately leaves the stack without resolving. It will keep triggering that way on each of your upkeeps. It will not find the Phoenix that has landed in your opponent's graveyard, and the effect will not return the Phoenix.
Note that if you had a Rekindling Phoenix in your own graveyard, for example because you had to discard it, or the opponent destroyed your 0/1 token before you could sacrifice it, the token generated by the opponent's Phoenix would allow you to return your own Phoenix. That's because the token's ability is not directly connected to the Phoenix that created it, and allows you to find any Rekindling Phoenix in your graveyard, no matter how it got there.
The same goes for your opponent. If he took control of your 0/1 token and then later sacrificed it to its ability, he would get his Phoenix back to the battlefield, whether or not the token was generated by a Rekindling Phoenix he owns.


If Conclave Mentor & Spike Feeder enter the battlefield at the same time, does the Spike Feeder get three +1/+1 counters?

No, the Spike Feeder will not "see" the Conclave Mentor, and it will not get the extra counter.
Both of these creatures' effects are replacement effects. The wordings of replacement effects are described in the subrules of rule 614.1. Conclave Mentor's is covered by 614.1a, and Spike Feeder's is covered by 614.1c:

614.1a Effects that use the word “instead” are replacement effects. Most replacement effects use the word “instead” to indicate what events will be replaced with other events.
614.1c Effects that read “[This permanent] enters the battlefield with . . . ,” “As [this permanent] enters the battlefield . . . ,” or “[This permanent] enters the battlefield as . . . “ are replacement effects.

In particular, Spike Feeder's replacement effect modifies how it enters the battlefield, so the details of how that works are described in rule 614.12:

614.12. Some replacement effects modify how a permanent enters the battlefield. (See rules 614.1c–d.) Such effects may come from the permanent itself if they affect only that permanent (as opposed to a general subset of permanents that includes it). They may also come from other sources. To determine which replacement effects apply and how they apply, check the characteristics of the permanent as it would exist on the battlefield, taking into account replacement effects that have already modified how it enters the battlefield (see rule 616.1), continuous effects from the permanent’s own static abilities that would apply to it once it’s on the battlefield, and continuous effects that already exist and would apply to the permanent.

The last clause is the important one here: replacement effects from other cards can only apply to a permanent entering the battlefield if those effects already exist. Replacement effects modify an event before it happens, so if another permanent is entering the battlefield at the same time (Conclave Mentor, in this case), it is not actually on the battlefield yet so its abilities don't exist yet.

This works differently from Valakut because Valakut's ability is a triggered ability. Triggered abilities are checked for after an event occurs, while replacement effects are applied before the event happens.


Does first strike damage occur before normal damage?

Yup, that's one of the reasons Drana's powerful - she can pump up your other attackers in time to help them deal more damage. The point of first strike is that it happens first!
Here's how combat plays out, assuming you attack with Drana, your opponent doesn't block her, and nothing weird happens:

First Combat Damage Step

Drana and all other creatures with First Strike or Double Strike deal damage. Drana will deal 2 damage to your opponent, unless you've pumped her up somehow.
Drana's ability triggers, then presumably resolves, placing a +1/+1 counter on each of your attacking creatures, including Drana.

Second ("regular") Combat Damage Step

All of your creatures without First Strike (including those with Double Strike) deal damage equal to their power, including the +1 from the counters they just got.

There are rulings on the Gatherer page for Drana to this effect:

Drana’s last ability triggers after combat damage has been dealt, so only attacking creatures that survive the combat damage step in which Drana deals combat damage will have +1/+1 counters put on them.
The +1/+1 counter won’t change how much damage Drana or any other attacking creature with first strike or double strike deals during that combat damage step. However, the +1/+1 counters that are put on attacking creatures without first strike will affect the damage those creatures deal during the regular combat damage step.


Can I use level/rank changing effects on Xyz monsters?

An Xyz Monster's Rank is not its Level; Xyz Monsters do not have a Level. Consequently, Xyz Monsters cannot be used for Synchro, Ritual, or Xyz Summons (unless specifically permitted); and any effects that would refer to the Level of a monster, such as those of "Gravity Bind", "Level Limit - Area B" and "Burden of the Mighty", cannot be applied to an Xyz Monster. Since Xyz Monsters do not have Levels, cards such as "Star Changer", "Scanner" and "Give and Take" cannot be used on them at all. Cards that modify Levels such as "Harmonic Waves", "Feedback Warrior", "Synchro Boost" and "Demotion" also cannot be used on Xyz Monsters.


Is Splendor accessible to those with red-green color-blindness?

OK, I have red green colorblindness.  It comes in a continuum from "severe" to "mild".  I am near the midpoint (sort of halfway between mild and severe, called "partial"), so there are people worse than me.  Note that while the term refers to red and green, it really isn't that red and green can't be distinguished, but is more complicated (having to do with the sensitivity of the various cells in the retina).  For example I often find blue and purple the hardest to distinguish in games that use those colors, because I'm less sensitive to the red that distinguishes them.  Also, if the game was designed with this type of colorblindness in mind, they might use, for example, baby blue and really dark purple, so that the saturation can be used to distinguish them.  Although I might not be able to name them, I can tell them apart.  I like games that have taken the care to make this additional distinction.

So, enough background, on to the actual answer.  All this later discussion is based on my red green colorblindness, if it's a different kind or a different severity, some of these conclusions might be different.  In fact, growing up I knew someone who was completely colorblind and only saw shades of gray.  That would be completely different.

In the picture in the question, I do have a little difficulty telling some of the colors apart.  However, in the larger version of that picture that you link to, I see the following colors as backgrounds to the numbers (what your comment said were important to distinguish): White, Green, Red, Black, and Blue.  If there's supposed to be an additional color, that's the one I can't distinguish.  When the red and the green are on the same card I can easily see which is which, but they are sort of close.  The card that you point out in a comment (second row, third card) is, in fact, the hardest for me to distinguish, but I'm pretty sure it's red over black.  But I got this by comparing it to a nearby card that had both, I'm not really sure how easy it would be in complete isolation.

And that brings up another point about playability that I've found important as someone partially colorblind.  Does the game have the players hold cards that are "secret" or not?  If there actually aren't any secret cards, I can ask other players about the colors I can't tell (which may give away some strategy info), but if there are secret cards that I have to do the color distinction on that are in my hand and not near the board, I can't do a side-by-side to tell, and I can't ask.  So that makes it harder.

On the other hand, if the backs of the cards need to be distinguished, I can tell you that in that picture the two lower face down stacks look like they are supposed to be different colors, but I'm not sure and definitely couldn't tell which of the two a particular card in isolation was supposed to be.

Now, the page you pointed to has a link to an even larger version of that picture.  Having clicked through to that, I can tell you that in that picture, I have no problem distinguishing any of these colors, even the card backs are clearly different in that picture.

Actually having stared at the larger photo a bit as I wrote this, I think I've actually played this game once and don't remember it as one of the "no play" games.  Having thought this, I clicked through to the description page at BGG, and, sure enough, I remember it.  So, unless your friend's friend is severely Red Green Colorblind, it should not be a problem.  I can't really be sure about more severe cases, but that's my guess.  And, again, if the nature of the colorblindness is not red green colorblindness, then none of this applies.


No, the Materials Will Not Count Toward the Damage Inflicted

Let us examine the effect of Chaos Emperor Dragon again, this time with a bit more scrutiny (emphasis mine):

  You can pay 1000 Life Points; send as many cards in both players' hands and on the field as possible to the GY, then inflict 300 damage to your opponent for each card sent to the opponent's GY by this effect.

The specific wording of the highlighted text is crucial to understanding why the materials are not included. Importantly, no matter the chain of strategic causality (i.e., "Without activating that effect, those materials would never have been sent to the GY"), it is not the effect of Chaos Emperor Dragon that is sending the materials to the GY.

Any materials attached to the XYZ monster are sent to the GY due to the XYZ monster leaving the field - NOT due to Chaos Emperor Dragon's effect.

Think of it this way: at the moment prior to the effect's resolution, there is an exact set of cards existing on the field and in the hand(s) - this is the set of cards which will be considered sent to the GY by Chaos Emperor Dragon, per the wording in its own effect. Note that any materials on any XYZ monsters on the field are not a part of this set. This is due to the way Yu-Gi-Oh treats XYZ materials with respect to Zone habitance:

  Xyz Materials are not treated as being on the field

Again, I cannot emphasize this enough, it does not matter that the XYZ materials were sent to the grave during the resolution of the effect - they were not sent by the effect of Chaos Emperor Dragon. They will not be counted toward the damage inflicted.


Rules on alerts are specified by the sponsoring organization, and may well be different for games played under different organization.
The ACBL alert chart does not specifically mandate an alert for a 1D bid wqhich promises an unbalanced hand, but does require an alert for "Natural Calls Not Specifically Noted" which show "Unusual strength, shape, etc". The ACBL Alert procedure says:

The objective of the Alert system is for both pairs at the table to have equal access to all information contained in any auction. In order to meet this goal, it is necessary that all players understand and practice the principles of Full Disclosure and Active Ethics. Ethical bridge players will recognize the obligation to give complete explanations. They will accept the fact that any such information is entirely for the benefit of the opponents, and may not be used to assist their own partnership.
This procedure uses the admittedly "fuzzy" terminology of "highly unusual and unexpected" as the best practical solution to simplifying the Alert Procedure. "Highly unusual and unexpected" should be determined in light of historical usage rather than local geographical usage. To ensure full disclosure, however, at the end of the auction and before the opening lead declarers are encouraged to volunteer to explain the auction (including available inferences)

In light of that, I would be inclined to alert the 1D opening. Or I might ask a local director before the game if such a bid should be alerted. If in doubt it is always better to alert than not.
Note that one should never say more than "alert" until and unless an opponent asks for an alert to be explained. Offering an explanation unasked can itself be a violation.
In an informal game not sponsored by any organization, procedures are whatever the players agree on.


Can tokens created by planeswalkers do commander damage

Rule 903.3 says

  Each deck has a legendary creature card designated as its commander. This designation is not a characteristic of the object represented by the card; rather, it is an attribute of the card itself. The card retains this designation even when it changes zones.

Only the cards that start the game as commanders count as commanders and can deal commander damage.


What are the strength and firepower of Ivory X bombardments?

I don't own a copy of the rule book, it's 75$. The briefing you linked to says the following about the Ivory X Special Rules:

  Ivory X Special Rules

  You may purchase an Ivory X Staff Team for +25 points. Deploy the Ivory X Staff Team when you would deploy Independent Teams.

  Anti-aircraft Artillery Platoons and Towed Tank Destroyer Platoons that have a Command team within 6”/15cm of the Ivory X Staff team can use it as a Staff Team to fire Bombardments.

  Anti-aircraft Artillery Platoons and Towed Tank Destroyer Platoons that do not have a Command team within 6”/15cm of the Ivory X Staff Team cannot fire bombardments.

  A Bombardment controlled by Ivory X uses all of the American Artillery special rules on page 240 of the rulebook, except for Time On Target.

Without a copy of the rules, it is difficult to say if anything within the rules for American Artillery special rules contradicts what is in the linked briefing.

Luckily, you can gather from the rest of the briefing that the Ivory X bombardments can only be used to pin down enemy units. The historical accounts mention that Ivory X was able to pin down the enemy. This is also supported by the fact that all Ivory X bombardment rows of the chart show '-' for Rate of Fire, Anti-Tank, and Firepower.

  Ivory X provided the Indianhead Division with plenty of firepower in the form of .50 cal and 40mm anti-aircraft guns. Their harassing fire helped keep the Germans from moving freely through the outskirts and hills of Brest, allowing the Indianheads to easily move in and outflank the enemy.

  Firing Ivory X bombardments   40”/100cm - - -

  Firing Ivory X bombardments   48”/120cm - - -

  Firing Ivory X bombardments   64”/160cm - - -

The only thing that still confuses me a little about the rules, is regarding Towed Tank Destroyer Platoons. The rules mention that linked Ivory X Tank Destroyers are the only ones eligible to fire a bombardment and only using the Ivory X special rules. Rereading the above Ivory X Special Rules, would lead one to believe that you only have two possible answers to the question. My guess is that the answer is the former, but the use of the word "can" could mean that you have a choice of either pinning down enemies or firing bombardments as a Staff Team.

1) Use the 1 ROF, 2 Anti-Tank, 6 Firepower stats for Staff Team when firing bombardments.

2) Use the - ROF, - Anti-Tank, - Firepower stats for firing bombardments to pin down the enemy (cannot hurt them).

Staff team 16”/40cm 1 2 6 Automatic rifles, Moves as a Heavy Gun team
M18 Hellcat GMC Light Tank 2 0 0 .50 cal AA MG.
M1 76mm gun 32”/80cm 2 12 3+

  Towed Tank Destroyer Platoons that begin the game linked to Ivory X do not use the US Tank Destroyers special rules and only deploy the Tank Destroyer Section on the table.

  A Towed Tank Destroyer Platoon can only fire a bombardment using the Ivory X special rule.


Will Awakening let me tap all my lands and get them immediately untapped?

You could use Awakening to tap your lands twice in one turn, but not exactly in the way you expect.

Starting with your untap step, play proceeds as follows:

Your untap step starts, and all of your permanents untap.
Your upkeep step starts, and Awakening's triggered ability goes on the stack. You gain priority. This is your first opportunity to do anything.
You can now tap your permanents to add mana to your mana pool.
Awakening's ability resolves, and all of your lands and creatures untap.


Current 'Axis & Allies: War at sea' Rulebook?

The page you linked has a "Quickstart Guide" and "Advanced Rules". What else are you looking for? That is, what did you see that led you to believe there is anything else?


An old group of mine found it very effective to give each player a "holy hand grenade" token at the start of the game.  This can be used to destroy any card, weapon, bunny, etc.

Feel free to adjust the number of tokens, if one simply isn't enough.  Just remember, "three shalt be the number thou shalt count!"


What are the rules to the card game “Queenie”

Quoting from the rules on this page:
Queenie
Build stacks of cards in alternating colors as in Klondike, move arbitrary groups of cards as in Yukon, and deal waves of cards onto to the tableau, as in Spider.
Objective
Place all cards on the foundation in sequence.
Deck
One standard deck of 52 cards.
Layout
Stock

When selected, deals one card to each tableau pile.
Only a single pass through the stock is allowed.

Foundation

Four empty foundation piles.

Any Ace may be played to any empty foundation pile.

A card may be built on a card in a foundation pile if it is one rank higher and the same suit.

An Ace may be played on a King, continuing the sequence.

Tableau

Seven tableau piles with one card dealt to the first pile, two to the second, and so on.

All cards are face-up.

An empty pile may be filled with any King.

A card may be built on a card in a tableau pile if it is one rank lower and a different color.

Stacks of cards may be moved from a tableau pile if they are each one rank lower and a different color.


After being drawn into a gate during an Encounter, do you have an Other World encounter in the same turn?

Yes.

Arkham Horror rules (page 10) says your character gets delayed after being sucked be a gate. Beign delayed means that in the next turn, during the movement phase, the only thing you do is to stand your character token (page 16). Nothing else is affected, so you should have your other world encounter.

For reference, below is the wrong answer I wrote before @Jefromi commented it.

No, although I'm unaware of any specific ruling about this.

Arkham Horror rules (page 10) says your character gets delayed after being sucked be a gate. Beign delayed means that in the next turn, during the movement phase, the only thing you do is to stand you character token (page 16). Nothing else is affected, so you should have your other world encounter.

But the FAQ (page 4) says:

  Q: Why is an investigator delayed when a gate opens up in their
  location, but not delayed if he enters the gate normally?

  A: If the investigator was not delayed by a gate opening up in his
  location, he would be able to get through the Other World having only
  one Other World Encounter rather than two.

So it seems that an investigators sucked through a gate should have exactly two Other World encounters. Should you have an Other World encounter this turn, next turn you'd stand your character marker, have an encounter in the first Other World position, then in the following turn you'd move to the second position to have a third encounter. This seems to contradict what is suggested in the FAQ. In this situation, the only thing that you can do to avoid violating more specific rules is to not have an Other World encounter when you're sucked by a portal during an encounter.


What is the best way for one character to check multiple other characters loyalty cards, without knowing who each card belongs to?

Some variations on the Resistance mechanism, that may be more efficient depending on your design:

Let each player being investigated take a "good" and "bad" token from a common stock, then put one of those tokens in a bag and the other back in the stock (in a way that you can't see what they put back.
Use a pair of hand-held clicker counters with the displays covered up. When you get them, you click the one that matches your alignment, then the person doing the investigation gets to see the final counts.
Do it like old-school Werewolf/Mafia, and just have a moderator handle all the secret information.


You will not get to count the counters from the player who has lost.
When a player loses the game in multiplayer, that player leaves the game, which means they are not in any way a part of the game. They are no longer an opponent, they no longer have poison counters, they do not exist at all as far as the game is concerned.

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

And

102.1. A player is one of the people in the game.
102.3. In a multiplayer game between teams, a player's teammates are the other players on their team, and the player's opponents are all players not on their team.

So a person who has left the game is not "in the game", which means they are not "a player", and "an opponent" must be "a player".


Ticket to Ride United Kingdom: Are technology cards kept after use?

See Purchasing Technology cards as a way to upgrade what you can do. Most of the cards are bought and kept in front of you helping your development (allowing you to claim longer routes or opening new areas for you to build).

In fact there are two technology cards that you don't keep but it's explicitely written in the rules: the "Right of Way" technology card and the "Thermocompressor" one (in the Advanced technology variant). You purchase those cards, apply them and return them to the pool for other players (or you for that matter) to purchase them again later.


Does anybody need the 6th epidemic card in Pandemic?

We play with six epidemics most of the time and win about half our games, which is a good ratio for us.  My husband and I play a lot of two-player games, but we also play with three and four players and use six epidemics unless we have beginners.

We use a house rule of dealing two roles per player and letting the players choose.  Discussion is permitted.

The key to playing with six epidemics, in my experience, is to be ruthless in not wasting actions.  Yes, that isolated city with three cubes will have an outbreak soon; absorb it if you've got spare capacity so you can focus on getting the cards together for a cure or attacking bigger problems.  It can be tempting to say "while I'm in the neighborhood anyway why don't I...?", but you should always look at whether there are more pressing demands first.


Three beginner clarifications about Cribbage

The non-dealer leads the play for each hand.  If either player is unable to play a card without breaking 31, he calls "Go" after which the opposing player plays any other cards in his hand that are playable.  The player who called "Go" then leads the next play, starting at zero. During the show, when the hands are scored, the non-dealer also leads.
During the play, each player places his own cards face up in front of himself, calling out the current total of played cards.  The cards in each players hand remain separate at all times so the hand may be scored at the end.
The cards are shuffled with every deal.

These rules are based on the standard two player game.  For three players, the game is played clockwise with the player to the dealer's left leading the play and the show for each hand, and the player to the left of the last person to play a card leading after a "Go".


It sounds as if you were playing something similar to the Star format (though it sounds like you didn't use the color restrictions). The comprehensive rules don't have anything about it, so we have to rely on the group just agreeing on an interpretation. Wizards did list the rules for many popular casual MtG formats in an article written in 2008.

Players sit in a star pattern identical to the one on the back of every Magic: The Gathering card. The player with the white deck takes the first turn and then play continues clockwise around the table.
A color, and the player representing it, wins when its two enemy colors have been eliminated regardless of who eliminated them. This means a player may be able to win even after being eliminated from play! Each player can attack any other player (even their allies), and each player can target any player, permanent, spell, or anything else in the game. Decks are usually built following Standard deck-construction rules, but players can determine for themselves if they'd rather use Extended, Legacy, Vintage, or any other format.

Based on the articles above, it seems like the typical way is no restrictions on targeting or attacking your allies. This makes sense, since your allies aren't your teammates as the rules define teams. I'd say you had every right to attack your ally like you wanted to.


If your partner opens with a "pass," does that make you the "captain" in a bridge partnership?

You ask three or four different things here; and while Mycroft does a good job of discussing the concept, I wanted to directly answer your questions.

Are you the "captain"?
No, you're not the "captain" necessarily, if you mean the person who ends up deciding where you go.  Captaincy largely means one person has a well-described hand, and the other has a more wide open hand; "pass" describes a huge number of hands in first or second seat.  Sometimes you do end up captain - sometimes partner does; if you open 1NT, for example, partner is nearly always now "captain".
Can you mislead your partner? No, you should not try to mislead your partner.  You should, in every situation, make bids that are in keeping with your agreements (and convention card).  Those agreements can make accommodations here though - "Could be light 3rd/4th seat", or as Cohen suggests, open 4 card majors 3rd/4th seats. Those are agreements - they're not misleading anyone, hopefully.
Can you take liberties? By agreement, you can do things you wouldn't do in 1st/2nd seat, and those things do include being a bit more likely to make an opening bid.  Does that mean you should make bids that your partner doesn't expect or doesn't know what they mean? No, absolutely not.  It just means the range of things you can do is greater - by agreement.

Third or fourth seat openings can still lead to big problems - partner could have a solid 11 count with 4 in your suit and be just short of opening 1st/2nd seat, but then they see you opening and think "Game!" when you really only have 10 yourself and 4 cards as well.  Partner isn't passing permanently!  I've seen people who do make inconsistent calls in 3rd or 4th seat, and it rarely works in their favor - even really quite good players capable of winning regional-level pairs events.


Corner enclosure after playing star point

It's true that you get the corner territory by adding the stone at 3-3, but the reason this isn't considered an enclosure is that you could have gotten the same territory by playing the 3-3 stone in the first place.  This means you're not getting full value for the 4-4 stone - you've gotten the outside influence that it gives you, but none of the territorial benefit.


How does Energy Field interact with effects that say you lose life?

In both cases Energy Field does nothing because both Hissing Miasma and Tainted Remedy cause loss of life and not damage, so Energy Field can't prevent it.
Damage to players causes them to lose life (assuming the source doesn't have infect), but loss of life isn't always damage.

118.2. Damage dealt to a player normally causes that player to lose that much life. See rule 119.3.
118.3. If an effect causes a player to gain life or lose life, that player’s life total is adjusted accordingly.


How many jokers can you use in a run or set in Rummikub?

You can use them all.
The only restriction on jokers in the rules is that you have to use a joker that you have replaced.


Stinkweed Imp + Rancor and a flying 3/3 blocker

No.

If a creature has been dealt damage by a source with deathtouch since the last time state-based actions were checked, that creature is destroyed. The damage itself leads to the destruction.

But that's not the case for Stinkweed Imp. Its damage does not leads to the destruction, a triggered ability eventually does. It must assign damage normally, so it must assign all three of its damage to the flyer.

Here's the key difference: One can respond to Stinkweed's Imp's ability. It can even be countered.


What happens when you roll "Off the top" of a result table?

This question has now officially been answered in the latest FAQ:

  Q: Can the result of a die roll be modified to be more than an
  “8”?

  A: No. After all modifications to a die roll have been calculated,
  any number greater than an “8” is treated as an “8.”


Borborygmos Enraged's ability around dying in combat

The ability triggers, but you can't use these lands to activate Borborygmos Enraged's ability
The ability triggers when Borborygmos Enraged deals combat damage, even if at the same time it's dealt lethal damage itself. State-based actions see lethal damage marked on it and destroy it, causing it to go into your graveyard. The ability is then put on the stack and you get priority, but since Borborygmos Enraged isn't on the battlefield anymore, you can't activate it's ability.
If nothing else happens, the triggered ability will resolve and possibly reveal an amount of lands you may put into your hand.

Relevant Rules

510.2. Second, all combat damage that's been assigned is dealt simultaneously. (...)
510.3. Third, the active player gets priority. (...)
510.3a. Any abilities that triggered on damage being dealt or while state-based actions are performed afterward are put onto the stack before the active player gets priority (...)
704.3. Whenever a player would get priority (...), the game checks for any of the listed conditions for state-based actions, then performs all applicable state-based actions simultaneously as a single event. (...) Once no more state-based actions have been performed as the result of a check and no triggered abilities are waiting to be put on the stack, the appropriate player gets priority. (...)


How to build / ideas for a multiplayer lifegain control deck?

There are a couple main reasons you might see a lot of multiplayer decks with 1 or 2 of each card.

First and foremost, multiplayer is a pretty casual format, so people are playing with the cards they own, and trying not to spend all their money. They probably only have 1 or 2 of a lot of cards, so they're just building the deck they can build.

Along with that, casual games tend to be about fun, not just winning, and a lot of people do like the excitement and variety of having a lot of different cards. There's something to be said for getting to cast a bunch of different spells, even if they're not quite as good as the 4-ofs you might put in the deck if you wanted to perfect it. People obviously really like this; Commander is getting pretty popular, and the entire format is built around the idea of having only one of each card.

As for your specific deck idea, sure, it's possible!

First of all, remember, lifegain is in general a weaker mechanic than it seems at first, because unless you actually deal with the things that keep making your life go down, it only buys you a little time. So you really need to make it count - find the most efficient life gain you can. This means both getting the most life you can out of it, and hopefully getting an extra benefit. Happily, extort and Gray Merchant (mentioned in the comments) do both. They gain life for each opponent, so lots of lifegain. But they also drain your opponent, and give you an extra creature. (Or in the case of Blind Obedience, slow down aggro decks.)

Depending on your constraints (and your collection) there are probably a lot more cards in that vein - try searching for "each opponent" gain life or even just "gain life equal to", and you'll find some more potential candidates.

Beyond that, it does depend on the kinds of decks your friends play. If you're surviving to the late game but still losing, maybe you just need better win conditions. If you're getting killed early before you can get your cool stuff online, maybe you need some faster removal, or in general faster answers to the kinds of things they're trying to do. The control side of your deck needs to be strong and efficient too, not just the lifegain. But it's hard to give terribly specific advice here; we don't know what kind of decks you're playing against, or what kind of cards you have at your disposal. I think about the best general advice is to look at what's killing you and figure out ways to address it efficiently.


How do I manage double-faced cards in Innistrad (MTG) tournament play?

Yes, there's been a lot of anger about double-faced cards online.  Obviously they're going to "kind of, sort of" work, but only in a really clunky and annoying way.  No one want to have to be constantly subjecting their cards to wear and tear by sleeving and resleeving them - and players with bad memories are going to keep forgetting what's written on the second face too!

To answer your question, I cannot imagine there could be any possible objection to you keeping the number and nature of your DFCs secret.  I personally would probably want to invest in a deck box and keep the double-faced cards in there with your trades or casual decks.  Having any sort of visible "exchange-pile" (beyond your 15-card sideboard) when you sit down gives your opponent too much information: really, you don't want him knowing if you're playing double-faced cards at all, until you play one.

And if you think playing in Constructed tournaments is going to be annoying, just wait until you consider the implications for Draft.  Curse you, Wizards!  You've gone too far this time! :D


What if two players are eligible for the Express bonus?

The rules, p7:

  If several players are tied for the longest path, they each receive the 10 point bonus from the European Express card.


Can I keep multiple goods of 1 type if I have multiple warehouses?

From the Harbour FAQ on BGG:

When using warehouses, how many goods can you store?
You can keep up to the number of goods you have warehouse symbols. However, you cannot use warehouses to increase the amounts of goods to higher than they were before shipping.
Example: You ship two stone and four wood and have three warehouses. You can save two stone and one wood, one stone and two wood or three wood. You cannot "store" three stone since that is more than was shipped.

Based on this, you are allowed to store multiples of the same type of good, you just can't store more than you currently have (i.e. no making things out of thin air.)


Partial answer...

Yes. There is no meaningful difference between an ability triggering twice because of Clockspinning, and a triggered ability being copied because of Strionic Resonator. Either way, the triggered ability has resolved 2 separate times. Note that the choice of card name is only made when the ability resolves, so it will not have been made yet while the ability is on the stack and being copied.
No, the chosen value is not a copyable attribute of Medomai's Prophecy:

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

For 1 and 2, the relevant rules are in 607, Linked Abilities. The 2 abilities are linked:

  607.2d If an object has an ability printed on it that causes a player to “choose a [value]” and an ability printed on it that refers to “the chosen [value],” “the last chosen [value],” or similar, those abilities are linked. The second ability refers only to a choice made as a result of the first ability.

However, while rule 607.3 deals with what happens when an ability refers to "the exiled card", and multiple cards have been exiled; there does not seem to be a similar rule to deal with "the chosen value" when multiple values have been chosen.


If you pass GO, do you collect 200 at the end of the turn or as you pass GO?

Original answer
You collect $200 each time you pass over or land on the GO. See the official rules.

Each time a player's token lands on or passes over GO, whether by throwing the dice or drawing a card, the Banker pays that player a $200 salary.
"The $200 is paid only once each time around the board. However, if a player passing GO on the throw of the dice lands 2 spaces beyond it on Community Chest, or 7 spaces beyond it on Chance, and draws the "Advance to GO" card, they collect $200 for passing GO the first time, and another $200 for Advancing to it the second time by the instructions on the card."

Your question is quite interesting, it has been asked before here and here.
What I think, is that player should collect $200 only if passing GO in the clockwise direction or landing on it (also by advancing to or over the GO using card). The rules state that it is possible to collect $200 more than once in a turn, however in this case I think that the player in question should:

Collect $200 for passing GO.
Take the chance card, go back 3 spaces to Mayfair. Do not collect $200 for passing GO this time.
Collect $200 for passing  GO in the next turn.

I might be wrong though.

Edit
There were some good comments posted that made me think more about this particular situation. I'm making this edit to answer all of them comprehensively, hopefully. Sorry about the long post.
Pay a $10 fine or take a Chance
Comment from @ColinD made me look for more information about the card. I've found information on Wikipedia  that this card was omitted in U.S. editions since 1936. I'm assuming it wasn't ommited just in U.S. editions, since I've never actually seen this card in real life and I live in Europe.
This might be what makes things complicated here. As @ColinD suggested later, situation described in the OP's question might be the only way to achieve passing GO in the counter-clockwise fashion. Since the card allowing this to happen was omitted, there was no need to address this issue in the official rules - that's why they might not be crystal clear about this. I'm also afraid that looking at the rules from 1936 wouldn't solve this issue.
If you would like to learn more about the history of Monopoly game, take a look on this and this.
Authorities
I wasn't completely sure my answer was correct and there were some good points made by other users. So, I decided to contact authorities for consultation. This is what I was told.
Hasbro Customer Service
After contacting them by online form and describing situation (without mentioning my thoughts on how this should be resolved) I received following response:

Thank you for contacting Hasbro Customer Service regarding the rules
for Monopoly. I'm delighted to help!

The player collects $200 for passing GO. They can choose to ask for it as soon as they pass the space or at the end of their turn.
Either way, no matter when they ask for it, it's owed to them for
passing GO.

Players do not collect $200 for passing GO counter-clockwise.

Yes, the player should collect $200 again as they passed GO.

I hope this helps! Happy gaming!

Ok, so this answer doesn't provide much reasoning behind this, but the results of rules interpretation seem to be the same as mine.
Main Judge of the Polish Monopoly Championships
I've contacted Mr. Michael Stajszczak, who was the main judge in all editions of the Polish Monopoly Championships. He judged many other games in tournaments and made a fair amount of rules translation for different board games. Again, I didn't suggest any particular interpretation of the rules in this situation. This is what he replied:

If described situation was to happen in the tournament, the decision would be like this:
Player should immediately collect $200 for passing GO, before drawing Community Chest card. He doesn't collect money for passing over GO in backward direction. However in the next move,
when he will be passing GO again, he should collect another $200.

This is the way I understood the rules. However, @Johno made a good point that maybe the player shouldn't collect another $200 when passing GO on the following turn due to the The $200 is paid only once each time around the board clarification, because he's already had the return for completing that circuit. I've also asked Mr. Stajszczak about this interpetation of the rules:

Indeed, this sentence could be interpreted in more than one way.
However, I think it addresses different issue. This was to resolve the
situation where player finishes his move on the GO - so that he
won't get the money twice (first time for landing on GO and second
time for leaving it).
By the way, the quoted sentence isn't present in Polish set of the
rules. That's why this wasn't an issue in any of the Polish
tournaments. Unfortunately we can't ask the game designer about this
since he passed away.
Just in case of doubt, there was always an information in the
Championship rules that the game rules are as main judge interpets them.

I believe this is probably the best answer you could get for this situation. That's the way the issue would most likely be resolved in the official tournament.


Stuffy Doll blocking 11/11 trampler. Phyrexian Obliterator blocks 11/11 trampler

You should have only taken 1 damage.  When damage happens, you choose how to assign your 11 damage. You must assign at least 1 to Stuffy Doll. Because your creature has trample, you can assign the other 10 to your opponent. Even though Stuffy Doll has indestructible, 1 damage is still considered lethal damage. So Stuffy Doll will take 1 damage, your opponent will take 10, and Stuffy Doll will deal you 1 damage.

Similar thing for your other question. Your opponent must assign at least 5 damage to your obliterator. He can assign as much as 11. So how many permanents he sacrifices depends on how much he chooses to assign. If his creature does not have trample, he must assign all 11 to the obliterator, and he will sacrifice 11 permanents.


Is Dimir's milling strategy viable in Gatecrash sealed deck? If not, what can they do instead?

Well, it's up to you to figure it out based on your card pool, really.

However, some numbers are handy:

At the start of the game, your opponent will have at least 33 cards in his or her deck (more if there are mulligans).
Each instance of the "mill until you hit a land card" ability will mill something like 2.5 cards on average. That's pretty weak.

What Dimir does have going for it is that a lot of the milling in this set is attached to other stuff -- the common Balustrade Spy is a feeble mill card but also gives you a 2/3 flyer for a reasonable cost, for instance. And you do have access to some repeatable milling, like the prerelease promo Consuming Aberration and lower-rarity carsd like Paranoid Delusions, Sage's Row Denizen, Undercity Informer, and Duskmantle Guildmage.

I don't think Gatecrash's milling is nearly as explosive as similar decks in Dark Ascension Limited. And Dimir creatures are by far the weakest of all the guilds; if you want to actually play a solid defense, you're likely to need Orzhov or Simic to help you stabilize (Dimir can work well with both those guilds because it offers them the missing component they need to be a control deck -- lots more removal for Simic, countermagic for Orzhov). If I'm mixing guilds like this, though, I'd much rather be trying to win off of cipher+extort than straight-up milling.

Mostly I just don't think the power cards are there in any capacity. It feels like black in AVR -- you can get a reasonable deck going in draft if no one else is in your colors, but the card pool's pretty thin overall. Magic pro Paulo Vitor Damo da Rosa had this to say about Dimir in Sealed, for instance:

  This means Dimir has a bad promo, a bad Keyrune, an OK Guildmage, an
  OK Charm, horrible rares, horrible uncommons, and horrible commons! To
  top it all, pretty much all of the guild pack’s slots are filled with
  cipher cards, which are not very useful—you want mill cards and
  defensive cards, but those won’t be found in that pack. Unless I
  underrate cipher very much, I’d stay away from Dimir, because it
  doesn’t look like you’ll beat anything but the Orzhov decks.

  In the end, if you want to play the Dimir colors, I think the best
  alternative is an esper deck. You get the milling from Dimir and the
  defense from Orzhov. If this is your plan, then I think the Orzhov
  pack actually offers better cards for you—you lose the Dimir promo,
  which is better, but instead of useless cipher cards you get 1/4
  defenders and regenerating Thrulls.


Does the first piece in a standard blokus game have to have a square on a corner cell?

According to the rues, "The first piece played by each player must cover a corner square." They show an example of an illegal first move, as a piece that "surrounds" the corner without touching it, like an X would. This does mean that the X cannot ever be the first piece.

http://www.mindware.com/Blobs/22021_inst_blokus.pdf


It has been more than a year since I've asked this question. So, here are the rule modifications that I've play-tested. It seems to balance well, though I would like the game to go a little longer.

Objective: Get 12 victory points before 3 years are up.

Remove the following cards from play: "Conflict" event, Merchant, Herb Woman, and all Attack cards.
Shuffle Event cards without the "Year End" card. Pick 4 random cards from the shuffled event card deck and shuffle those 4 cards with the "Year End" card. Put this (5 card) stack on the bottom of the event card deck.
5 commerce points earns you the windmill token.
7 strength points earns you the knight token.
When a tournament is rolled on the event die, if your number of tournament points is greater than or equal to the number rolled on the resource die, you get one extra resource of your choice.

Feel free to critique.


Can I play a straight with phoenix on top of a 1-A straight?

No.

When using the Phoenix as a wild card, it must always take the value of another regular card from 2-A. Because there is no card with value "Ace + 1", there's no card there for the Phoenix to stand in for.

Only a bomb can go over any Ace high straight.


You can play online on Yucata http://www.yucata.de/en/GameInfo/Reversi.  Generally the games are played over days rather than "real time" though.

Lots of other great games too


There is no limit to the number of lands that you can tap per turn. For your other question, all of your tapped permanents will untap at the start of each of your turns, during the "untap" step.

You have a few different important basic terminology mixed up though. Mana and Land are 2 different things. Land is a type of card, one that most commonly produces mana (but some lands do not produce any mana). Thus, "Forest" is not a type of mana, "Green" is a type of mana, and Forests are cards that produce Green mana when tapped.

Also, you do not need to pay mana to attack with creatures, including Arbor Colossus. You need to pay mana to cast Arbor Colossus (to out him from your hand into the battlefield), and to activate his "Monstrosity" ability, which gives him 3 +1/+1 counters.


Control Effects - Interaction between Molten Primordial and Willbreaker

The creature will come under your control by Willbreaker's effect, Molten Primordial's ability will not be applied.
Let's break down the interaction step by step:

Aaron (Active player) controls a Willbreaker. Nick (Non-Active Player) controls a Bear Cub.
Aaron casts Molten Primordial, there are no responses, and it enters the battlefield. Stack is Empty
Molten Primordial's ability goes onto the stack, then you choose targets for it. Aaron chooses to target Nick's Bear cub. Bear cub is a legal target, as it is a creature that Aaron's opponent controls.
The Bear cub has been targeted, so this triggers Willbreaker's ability, which goes onto the stack.

The Stack now looks like this:
(Top) Willbreaker Control ability
Molten Primordial's Control ability
and begins to resolve.

Aaron gains control of Nick's Bear Cub (through Willbreaker).
Bear cub is no longer a legal target for Molten Primordial's ability, as it is not a "creature that player (Nick) controls". As a result it is countered as per the comprehensive rules(emphasis mine):

608.2b: If the spell or ability specifies targets, it checks whether the targets are still legal. A target that’s no longer in the zone it was in when it was targeted is illegal. Other changes to the game state may cause a target to no longer be legal; for example, its characteristics may have changed or an effect may have changed the text of the spell. If the source of an ability has left the zone it was in, its last known information is used during this process. The spell or ability is countered if all its targets, for every instance of the word “target,” are now illegal. If the spell or ability is not countered, it will resolve normally. Illegal targets, if any, won’t be affected by parts of a resolving spell’s effect for which they’re illegal. Other parts of the effect for which those targets are not illegal may still affect them. If the spell or ability creates any continuous effects that affect game rules (see rule 613.10), those effects don’t apply to illegal targets. If part of the effect requires information about an illegal target, it fails to determine any such information. Any part of the effect that requires that information won’t happen.

Final Result:
Aaron control's Willbreaker, Molten Primordial, and Bear cub. If at any point Willbreaker leaves the battlefield, Nick will gain control of the bear cub again, even if it is this same turn.


Are a group of abilities added to the stack all on the stack, or each resolves before the next one goes on the stack?

The accepted application of MTR 4.2 is that "I pump Pummeler 5 times" is a proposed shortcut to activate the ability and let it resolve 5 individual times.  So you would not be able to eliminate the creature with grasp of darkness (assuming the other player wants to pay more energy to keep it alive.)  Yes this is different from playing the game by a strict reading of the comprehensive rules without applying the MTR.

The reality is that 5 individual activations is the 'correct' line of play in almost every scenario that would come up in real games.  It's pedantic to make people sit there and say.

"I activate my pummeler once, do you respond?"

"I activate my pummeler once, do you respond?"

"I activate my pummeler once, do you respond?"

"I activate my pummeler once, do you respond?"

"I activate my pummeler once, do you respond?"

In order to perform the obvious line of play people intend in >99% of scenarios.  Around 2005 or so DCI started shifting judging policy away from meticulous enforcement of every comma and toward facilitating people playing the game naturally.  In the early days of tournament magic you were in fact expected to say it 5 times.

I didn't find a canonical reference for this from a wizards netrep, but here is confirmation from two high quality sources known to be written by people who are actually judges:

http://www.cranialinsertion.com/article/818

http://blogs.magicjudges.org/rulestips/2013/04/shortcuts-adding-multiple-objects-to-the-stack/


Does equipping an equipment go on the stack?

Equip is a regular activated ability. It goes on the stack and can be responded to. If it didn't resolve yet, the targeted creature is not yet equipped and does not benefit from the equipment in any way.

702.6a Equip is an activated ability of Equipment cards. “Equip [cost]” means “[Cost]: Attach this permanent to target creature you control. Activate this ability only any time you could cast a sorcery.”
602.2. To activate an ability is to put it onto the stack and pay its costs, so that it will eventually resolve and have its effect. [..]


Both of the abilites are triggered when the Storm Herald entering the battlefield, and since you control both sources, you will choose the order the abilities go on the stack.

603.3b If multiple abilities have triggered since the last time a player received priority, each player, in APNAP order, puts triggered abilities they control on the stack in any order they choose.

In this case, since you want the buff from the Colossification on the Herald before the Terror of the Peaks ability resolves, you'll want to put the Herald's ability on the stack last so the Aura will be placed first. This will buff the Herald to a 23/23 when the Terror's ability resolves. The Terror's ability will see the final power of the Herald and do 23 damage to any target you choose, probably at your opponent. :)
Notably, if the the Herald is killed before the Aura is placed onto it, the Terror deals damage equal to its last known power, which would be 3. If the Colossification is placed, and then the Herald is killed (say, to a spell like Smite the Monstrous), the last known power will be 23 for the purposes of the Terror's ability resolving.

608.2g If an effect requires information from the game (such as the number of creatures on the battlefield), the answer is determined only once, when the effect is applied. If the effect requires information from a specific object, including the source of the ability itself, the effect uses the current information of that object if it’s in the public zone it was expected to be in; if it’s no longer in that zone, or if the effect has moved it from a public zone to a hidden zone, the effect uses the object’s last known information. See rule 113.7a. If an ability states that an object does something, it’s the object as it exists—or as it most recently existed—that does it, not the ability.


What happens when Teysa Karlov is equipped with Helm of the Host?

You get one more trigger for each Teysa Karlov you have. So if you have 2 Teysa Karlov, you get 3 triggers.

From the Rulings on the Gatherer page:

  1/25/2019 — If you somehow control two Teysas, a creature dying causes abilities to trigger three times, not four. A third Teysa causes abilities to trigger four times, a fourth causes abilities to trigger five times, and so on. This also means that if you control Teysa and cast a second one, an ability that triggers when it dies due to the “legend rule” triggers three times.

It works this way because Teysa Karlov's ability is a replacement effect, and replacement effects can only apply to an event once. When a death trigger occurs, one Teysa sees it and replaces it with two death triggers, then the other Teysa sees it and replaces it with three death triggers. Both Teysas have now applied their replacement effects to this one event and can't apply additional times, so they won't loop infinitely.


Can player floop Ancient Scholar when no Rainbow cards in their discard pile?

Yes, player can FLOOP Ancient Scholar even if there is no Rainbow cards in their discard pile
In this case they fail to return a random Rainbow card to their hand, but still can gain 1 Action (if control a building in the lane). This is explained in detail by Matt Hyra at boardgamegeek.com forum: Flooping without fulfilling ability?
According to the explanation, the general rule is

you may always Floop if the ability doesn't target anything. If it requires a target, you must have a legal target before you can Floop


Can Turn to Frog prevent 'enter the battlefield' abilities?

There are two cases of "Enter the Battlefield" abilities.

If the ability is on the creature entering the battlefield, such as Abbot of Keral Keep, Turn to Frog isn't an answer. You can't target the creature until it has entered the battlefield. Once it has entered the battlefield, the Ability has already been triggered and is being added to the stack.

However, if the ability is on a creature already on the battlefield, such as Agent of Erebos or Ivy Lane Denizen, Turn to Frog is a valid answer. In response to any number of effects that would cause creatures to enter the battlefield, casting Turn to Frog while they are on the stack will pre-empt the ability. Turn to Frog will resolve first, affecting the target with the Enter the battlefield effect. When other creatures enter the battlefield, the ability no longer exists.


Is there a correct overcall or double in this case?

As pointed out in the comments, the range 12-18 is a double range for which both sides must be looked at separately.

With the lower half, 12 to a bad 15, just pass. Don't hesitate; just pass in your normal tempo. Trust partner to balance when necessary, or find a partner who will. Any hesitation with this hand gives partner an ethical problem that will prevent a reopening call.

With the upper half, a good 15 to 18, just bid 1NT in tempo.


Does snapping reset the plusses (e.g +4) in uno?

Chaning/Snapping/Stacking draw cards does not reset the penalty amount. E.G Player 1 plays draw 2, player 2 plays another draw 2, player 3, having no draw 2 cards, must draw 4 cards.

From wikipedia as a part of the house rules:

  Progressive Uno: If a draw card is played, and the following player
  has the same card, they can play that card and "stack" the penalty,
  which adds to the current penalty and passes it to the following
  player.


How do the Batman Cuffs work in Batman Fluxx?

The FAQ already answers part of your question:

  Q: How exactly do the Batman Cuffs work?

  A: Yes, the wording on that Keeper is a bit vague. The intention is
  that you can hide one Creeper under the card on your turn. You can
  reveal it at any time, but the hiding can only be done on your turn.
  We will be updating the wording on subsequent print runs to make that
  clear.

Remains the question if you can hide someone else's creeper.

We can'be sure what the intention is on this one. But based on several Fluxx set's I own, I assume you can't. There are a few cards that work on other player's creepers and these are spelled out. So it is not likely that you can use these for creepers you don't control.


Is it possible to combo Spy and Wishing Well?

Your understanding is correct. You are just misinterpreting the article.

You would need something like Scout to combo more effectively. Draw 4 cards, at least two non-victory, put them back, draw one using WW and wish for the second.


Do I need to keep the Ascension expansion boxes as I have the original one?

It looks like that version of Ascension has the Broken Token Box Organizer (or similar) included, which should allow for most, if not all, of the expansions to fit into the one box.

The game normally comes with an insert that looks a little different.

As such you would not need to keep the additional expansion boxes if you have no desire to resell the game, or display the boxes.


Are drawing an extra card and playing an extra card optional when the Party Bonus rule is in effect?

May is optional.
While I could find no direct rules citation there is this question from the Rabbit Wiki:

Q: When a card states that you "may" play 1 extra card (e.g., Rich Bonus or Party Bonus), and inflation is in play, it is treated as you may play 2 extra cards. Does this mean that you have to choose between playing 0 and playing 2, or can you also play only 1?
A: It's either zero or two. There is no one.

The answer clearly indicates that may is optional.