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

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


Should spiderines be allowed in 'A Dig Too Far?'

From the rules (p.7)

  Troop Redeployment:

  Once a player's conquests for the turn have ended, he may
  freely redeploy the Race tokens he has on the board, moving
  them from one Region to any other Region occupied by his race
  (not necessarily just an adjacent or contiguous Region), provided
  that at least one Race token remains in each Region under his
  control.

At the end of the Spiderine player's turn there should be at least one token per region, which means that

He cannot "abandon the regions and let the monster races flood out"
Other players should be able to attack that player, giving him losses and thus forcing him to go into decline eventually.


Do Surge triggers happen "on cast" or when the spell resolves?

The effect that checks whether the Surge cost was paid resolves when the spell resolves. This is because abilities of Instants and Sorceries are by default "spell abilities", and resolve when the spell resolves. Rule 112.3a says

  Spell abilities are abilities that are followed as instructions while an instant or sorcery spell is resolving. Any text on an instant or sorcery spell is a spell ability unless it’s an activated ability, a triggered ability, or a static ability that fits the criteria described in rule 112.6.

None of those exceptions apply here. It's not an activated ability, because it doesn't have the form "[cost]: [effect]" [CR 112.3b]. It's not a triggered ability because it doesn't start with the word "At", "When", or "Whenever" [CR 112.3c]. And it's not a static ability, because it's written as an instruction, not a statement [CR 112.3d].

When you are resolving the spell, rule 608.2c says

  The controller of the spell or ability follows its instructions in the order written. [...]

so the Octopus token enters the battlefield immediately after the other creatures return to their owners' hands, and it does not itself get returned.


You have to choose and return a valid target if there is one.

You have to follow instructions of all spells and abilities that resolve. Scrap Trawler's ability requires you to target a valid card in your graveyard if possible, and you have to return that card to your hand if it's still a legal target by the time the ability resolves.

In the general case, we have to differentiate between choosing targets and performing actions on them.

If the ability simply says "target [object or player with a certain quality]", then you have to choose a valid target to satisfy that instruction, for each instance of the word "target". Some abilities say "any number of targets", or "up to N targets". In those cases, you don't have to choose any objects or players. This matters for abilities that trigger when a player or object becomes the target of a spell or ability.

The action to be performed on the chosen targets, if any, can be preceeded by the word "may", such as "you may return that card to your hand". In that case, you choose whether or not to perform that action on the chosen targets on resolution of that spell or ability.


Replacing ships after taking control of enemy ports

Available here means ships that are still in your supply. Use only those ships, not ones from the board.

You may find this useful from Page 4:

  Exceeding the Components Provided
  Each House is provided a limited number of units,
  tokens, and cards. If a player is using all his components of
  a particular type, he may not bring additional components
  of that type into play. Units that are destroyed in combat (or
  removed from the board for any other reason) are available to
  be mustered again.


Best place around the table in Blackjack

You are correct that the best seat is just before the dealer.

The reason for this is that you get extra information before deciding whether to hit or stay. Keep in mind that in your example, you would still have the same decision whether to hit or stay when sitting on a 16 and the dealer showing 11. The only difference, is that sitting to he right of the dealer allows you to see more cards if more than one person is playing and adjust the odds of drawing a particular card.


Do creatures with enchantments on them keep the enchantments if they return to the battlefield from the graveyard?

No, nothing like that happens. Once the creature is in the graveyard, it's no longer associated with the aura in any way.
When the creature dies, the aura is sent to the graveyard as a state-based action (i.e. the next time a player would gain priority):

704.5n If an Aura is attached to an illegal object or player, or is not attached to an object or player, that Aura is put into its owner’s graveyard.

And the creature card and enchantment card in the graveyard don't know they were ever associated:

400.7. An object that moves from one zone to another becomes a new object with no memory of, or relation to, its previous existence. There are eight exceptions to this rule:
[...exceptions that don't apply here...]

So if you return the creature to the battlefield, it's yet again an entirely new creature, nothing to do with the aura that was once attached to that creature card.


Can survivors with the jump skill jump into/off towers in Zombicide: Black Plague - Wulfsburg Expansion?

No, you can't use jump to move into/out of a tower, as the towers are surrounded by ramparts which specifically block movement.

From the Wulfsburg rules (page 5):

  Tower tiles feature both building and street Zones, bordered
  by ramparts ....

  Ramparts can’t be crossed but don’t block Lines of Sight.


The Chess Master series is arguably capable of doing this.  It creates personalities that are defined by their personal valuation of the various pieces.  Starting with the standard, rough approximations that are typically used (Queen = 8 points, Rook = 5 points, Bishop = 3 points, etc...), each AI personality has these numbers adjusted, often subtly (down to small fractions, such as Queen = 8.08 points, or Rook = 4.73 points).  These different weights lead to different (and often non-optimal play) where moves are not-necessarily "bad" per-se, but rather simply valued in a way that a master would not value them.


With regards to an effect that triggers when a creature attacks, how does it entering the battlefield tapped and attacking apply?

No, you don't get the "on attack" trigger.

One of the rulings on Kaalia covers this point:

  The creature card is already tapped and attacking as it’s put onto the battlefield. Any abilities that trigger when a creature becomes tapped or when a creature attacks won’t trigger for that card.


It is not explicitly stated in the rules.

A large Catan faq  (German only) argues that, because the rules don't distinguish between metropoles from different branches, the player who owns them may decide which one to revert.

What you describe is a common house rule (I use it as well). In the faq it is mentioned that some people paint the metropoles to make this house rule more visible.


If maximum stamina gets reduced during an environment card, when the card is discarded, do I return to max?

No you wouldn't.

You don't instantly gain stamina/sanity when your maximum increases, thus you also wouldn't gain stamina/sanity if a penalty to your maximum was removed.


Here's an analysis of the game of Zilch, whose scoring only differs slightly compared to the scoring you've given:

Three pairs scores 1,500 instead of 750.
You may score 500 points if you roll all 6 dice and have no other scoring combinations
Multiples of the same dice score 100*n^(x-2) instead of 100*n*(x-2), where n is the value of the die and x is the number of dice in the combination.  I.e. 4 twos would score 800 instead of 600, 5 twos would score 1600 instead of 800, etc.
Scoring a "Zilch" (a score of zero) in three consecutive rounds costs 500 points.

The first three rule differences will slightly increase the expected value of a roll.  The fourth rule difference can be ignored by only following the Zilch strategy when you have zero Zilches.


Bind Monster and Shriveling are both Attack Spells.  Just under the title of the card is the phrase, Spell, Attack.

Bind Monster will stun the target while Shriveling will do a good amount of damage if you pass the test to cast them.

Gloria Goldberg can start with Bind Monster while Harvey Walters can start with Shriveling.  Otherwise you will have to gain the spells during play by reading a tome.


Play card before previous player has finished its turn

If you look at the rules:

  Draw Two – When a person places this card, the next player will have
  to pick up two cards and forfeit his/her turn. It can only be played
  on a card that matches by color, or on another Draw Two. If turned up
  at the beginning of play, the first player draws two cards and gets
  skipped.

You can not play a second draw-2. Although this seems to be a common house rule.

Then again, it is nice to wait until the player has drawn the two cards before playing the next card.


Can I activate the tap ability of a creature summoned last turn before I have to remove it to my hand?

Yes, he can do this. The rule for summoning sickness is as follows:

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

Emphasis mine. In this case, the creature was under his control continuously since his most recent turn (which is the current turn) began.


Settlers of Catan Cities and knights - Knights VS Barbarians

First, you check if Catan wins or not by comparing the strength of the barbarians (the number of cities) against strength of the knights (the sum of the value of active knights). In the event of a tie in the strengths, Catan wins.

If the barbarians win, the player who contributed the least has one of their cities pillaged. In the event of a tie for the lowest contribution, all players who contributed the least have one of their cities pillaged.

If Catan wins, the player who contributed the most gets a Defender of Catan card worth 1 VP. In the even of a tie for the highest contribution, all players who contributed the most get a progress card of their choice instead.


How does Imprinting and the affinity work together?

You don't get any benefits from Affinity.

The activation cost of Soul Foundry's activated ability is based on the Converted Mana Cost (CMC) of the imprinted card, and Somber Hoverguard's CMC is 6.

  202.3. The converted mana cost of an object is a number equal to the total amount of mana in its mana cost, regardless of color.

  202.1. A card’s mana cost is indicated by mana symbols near the top of the card. [...]

Affinity doesn't affect the mana cost. It's a cost reduction that reduces the cost to cast the spell, not its mana cost. To paraphrase 601.2e,

  cost to cast a spell
  = mana cost or alternative cost
  + additional costs and cost increases
  - cost reductions


How does Only A Test affect the end-of-round honor bonuses/penalties?

Only a Test has you treat a failure as if you didn't fail. If you were the only failure, and Only a Test was played on your "failure," everyone would receive an honor bonus (+1 Honor) and you would not receive the additional (-1 honor) penality for being the only "failure." A moderator on SJG Forum said:

  You still fail, the manager just kinda hides the fact. So, in the context of the game, you did not fail. And yes, it will affect the game that way.


Deviation of 3-3 invasion - how to live/kill?

In the deviated form, white can play at B18 and the corner will live or die as a ko, or it can end up in seki.  Even if black has more than enough ko threats to win the battle, it is unlikely ever worth it.

$$Wcm4 Continuation of deviation: Ko
$$ +---------------------------------------+
$$ | 7 . 3 6 5 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . |
$$ | 2 1 a X X O . . . . . . . . . . . . . |
$$ | . X X X O O . . . . . . . . . . . . . |
$$ | 4 X O O . . . . . , . . . . . , . . . |
$$ | O O O . O . . . . . . . . . . . . . . |
$$ | . X X X . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . |
$$ | . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . |

The corner lives or dies depending on who wins the two stage ko; black's normal defense of playing 7 at a won't work due to a shortage of liberties.

Alternatively, if white does not have sufficient ko threats the whole corner could end up as a seki as follows:

$$Wcm4 Continuation of deviation: Seki
$$ +---------------------------------------+
$$ | 8 a 3 6 5 7 . . . . . . . . . . . . . |
$$ | 2 1 . X X O . . . . . . . . . . . . . |
$$ | . X X X O O . . . . . . . . . . . . . |
$$ | 4 X O O . . . . . , . . . . . , . . . |
$$ | O O O . O . . . . . . . . . . . . . . |
$$ | . X X X . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . |
$$ | . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . |

Note that in this variation, black can choose to start the same ko by playing 11 at a instead.


Conventional treatment of a particular negative double

As I understand things these methods originated in Italy. Many Italian experts play that the double shows 4 or 5 spades and hands with 6+ spades start with 2H. I've tried this in a few partnerships but don't yet have enough experience with it to say how well it works. The partnership does need to agree on followups over 2H since it has a wide range - most use 2N as an artificial ask.


Is the Forager's coin bonus counted during Action Phase or Buy Phase?

It gives you the coin when you play it. You just don't use it until the buy phase.

This is really a case of "do what it says on the card, in the order it says it", what you called "top to bottom" in your question. It's true that a lot of people tally up their coin at the start of the buy phase, but that's just because it's when they care about it, not because the coin didn't exist until then. As the original rules say:

  +$X -- the player has X number of additional coins to spend in the Buy phase

They're granted immediately, and available to spend later in the Buy phase.

Similarly, if you play a Salvager and trash something costing $4 to get +$4, then play a Bridge, it doesn't retroactively make the Salvager only worth +$3. And if you play a Bank, it only counts the treasures that came before it - you don't get to wait until the end and count everything for them.

You can see hints of this elsewhere, like in the wording of duration cards. For example, Merchant Ship says "Now and at the start of your next turn: +$2." It grants the coin at the start of your next turn, not on your next turn's Buy phase.


Stonecoil Serpent with X = 0 + The Great Henge

The Serpent dies and you draw a card.
The timing is as follows:

The Serpent enters the battlefield with 0 counters. The Henge triggers.
State-based actions are checked and performed. The Serpent dies because it has zero toughness
The ability from the Henge (and anything else that triggered during point 1 and 2) is put on the stack.
You gain priority and can play instants and activate abilities. Then your opponent gains priority.
Eventually, the triggered ability from the Henge gets to resolve. It tries to put a +1/+1 counter on the serpent, but fails. It then instructs you to draw a card.

The first points can be deduced from rule 116.5:

116.5. Each time a player would get priority, the game first performs all applicable state-based actions
as a single event (see rule 704, “State-Based Actions”), then repeats this process until no state-based
actions are performed. Then triggered abilities are put on the stack (see rule 603, “Handling
Triggered Abilities”). These steps repeat in order until no further state-based actions are performed
and no abilities trigger. Then the player who would have received priority does so.

For point 5, consider the Gatherer ruling on the Henge:

Once The Great Henge’s last ability has triggered, you’ll draw a card even if you can’t put a +1/+1 counter on the creature for some reason (most likely because it has left the battlefield).

This originates from rule 609.3:

609.3. If an effect attempts to do something impossible, it does only as much as possible.

The Henge's ability tries to put a counter and the serpent and making you draw a card. It can't do this. It therefore does as much of it as they can, which is just making you draw a card.


Did tactics training improve your chess significantly?

As BlueRaja said, chesstempo is good, but you can train tactics @ FICS, chess.com, gameknot.com, chesscube.com...etc

Famous quote "1 problem a day keeps the patzer away"
Indeed when you start doing tactics regularly you immediately see results.
You tend to do a lot less blunders (which obviously takes you a rank up), remember some positions and tactics.

There's also some tactics training that I will describe as an answer to your other question.


Can a "hero" player voluntarily become a traitor?

No, a hero cannot become a traitor unless the rules of the scenario cause him to become one.

Allowing that would be no different than allowing a traitor to simply declare "I am a hero". Now, technically a hero can help the traitor if he wants to in a number of ways; but if the traitor wins that player would still lose.


Buying houses and selling hotels in a housing shortage

There is something about this scenario that seems unusual.  Instinctively, I would say that Alice should have priority because Bob has to first sell his hotels before buying the houses. She should get her 6 houses and then Bob can downgrade his hotels to acquire the remaining.

A poster on this Board Game Geeks thread refers to The Monopoly Companion's description of a tournament rule (created after the 1983 U.S. Championships) that enforces this restriction.

  While a Building Shortage exists, players desiring to buy the houses
  remaining in the bank have priority over those wishing to break down
  hotels.

I recommend that thread because they go into other examples that are pretty interesting.

I believe that Bob triggers the building shortage rules once he states his intention and Alice responds.  However, if Bob were to simply state that he is selling his hotels, then it may delay the building shortage and allow for a procedure more similar to the one mentioned by @ghoppe.


When using the Burning Scimitar, must you remove exactly 2 meeples?

Yes you can remove just one meeple.

The designer Bruno Cathala answered this question himself on BGG questions here, here, and here


MTG: Zegana, Mul Daya Channellers and Green Suns's Zenith

Short answer:  Prime Speaker Zegana will get 5 +1/+1 counters, and you'll draw 6 cards.

Long answer:
This is what happens, step by step:

1: Search your library for a green creature card with converted mana cost X or less.

Note that technically, we can't change the order of the library while we search it, even if in practice we often do so because it matters only in very corner cases (like this one). It's usually not a problem because the cards that let us search the libary always make us shuffle it afterwards. So the top card of the libary will be the same one until we shuffle.

2: put it onto the battlefield.

We put Prime Speaker Zegana on the battlefield. Its replacement effect see a 5/5 Mul Daya Channelers on the battlefield, and thus it enters the battlefield with 5 +1/+1 counters. Prime Speaker Zegana triggered ability triggers (but it doesn't go on the stack yet).

3: then shuffle your library.

The library is shuffled. Now a new card will become the top card of the library. We must reveal that card because of Mul Daya Channelers ability.

4: Shuffle Green Sun's Zenith into its owner's library.

We shuffle Green Sun's Zenith into the library. Technically, we are shuffling a second time. Usually it's just fine to use a shortcut and shuffle just once, but because shuffling a second time will cause another card on the top of the library to be revealed, we can't use a shortcut this time.

5: Prime Speaker Zegana triggered ability is put on the stack.

Triggered abilities wait to be put on the stack until a player would get priority. After this, and when both players has passed priority, the triggered ability will resolve and 6 cards will be drawn.

Note that spell don't resolve as one big event, they can have several steps that we must follow in order:

  608.2c The controller of the spell or ability follows its instructions in the order written. However, replacement effects
  may modify these actions. In some cases, later text on the card may
  modify the meaning of earlier text (for example, “Destroy target
  creature. It can’t be regenerated” or “Counter target spell. If that
  spell is countered this way, put it on top of its owner’s library
  instead of into its owner’s graveyard.”) Don’t just apply effects step
  by step without thinking in these cases—read the whole text and apply
  the rules of English to the text.

PD: also, even if the top card of the library when Green Sun's Zenith starts to resolve is the same Prime Speaker Zegana that we'll put into play, it would still get 5 +1/+1 counters. Because the replacement effect look at the other creatures just before Prime Speaker Zegana enters the battlefield, and at that time Mul Daya Channelers was still a 5/5.
It's for the same reason why Prime Speaker Zegana entering the battlefield at the same time that another creature (for exampel with Tooth and Nail) won't count that other creature for getting +1/+1 counters.


If you help someone in combat and you lose, do you both get the 'bad stuff'

Both players must roll to run away separately, and any player that fails to run away suffers the bad stuff.

From the official rules

  If two players are cooperating and still can’t defeat the monster(s), they
  must both Run Away. They roll separately, and each player chooses in what
  order to Run Away. The monster(s) CAN catch them both.

and

  If you fail to Run Away from a monster, it does Bad Stuff to you, as
  described on its card.


Multiple effects causing extra phases in M:tG

Medomai adds turns, not phases, so the rule you quoted isn't really necessary. Assuming no blockers, here's what happens:

Medomai attacks on your turn. Finest Hour's abilities trigger.
You can stack Finest Hour's abilities in either order. Assuming no other actions, Medomai is now 5/5 and there is now a combat phase after the current combat phase.
Medomai deals damage. Medomai's ability triggers, so you take an extra turn after this one.
You get another combat phase. Medomai attacks again, gaining another Exalted trigger.
Medomai deals damage. Medomai triggers and you get another turn after this one (and before the other extra turn, not that it matters)
You take two consecutive turns in which Medomai can't attack. Each of those turns can get a bonus combat phase from Finest Hour if you have non-Medomai creatures to attack with.


What is the proper way to set up a Jenga tower?

You make the stack (without using the insert).
You put the cardboard insert over the stack, with the horizontal bit on top, and push all the blocks into the insert to make sure they're all straight.
You take the insert off and start playing.


In what order do single spells or abilities that target multiple targets trigger?

Vanguard of Brimaz and Phalanx Leader trigger on the spell being cast. There's only one spell being cast, so their abilities trigger simultaneously. The next time a player would get priority, you get to place the triggered abilities on the stack in the order you desire. (If the abilities of more than one player triggered simultaneously, each player starting with the with active player would place their abilities on the stack in the order of their choice.) They resolve in the opposite order (last in, first out), so you'd place Phalanx Leader's ability on the stack first.

You cast Dauntless Onslaught targeting Vanguard of Brimaz and Phalanx Leader. Simultaneously,

Vanguard of Brimaz's ability triggers.
Phalanx Leader's ability triggers.

Phalanx Leader's triggered ability is placed on the stack.
Vanguard of Brimaz's triggered ability is placed on the stack.
Vanguard of Brimaz's triggered ability resolves:

Put a 1/1 white Cat Soldier creature token with vigilance onto the battlefield.

Phalanx Leader's triggered ability resolves:

Put a +1/+1 counter on each creature you control.

Dauntless Onslaught resolves:

Vanguard of Brimaz and Phalanx Leader get +2/+2 until end of turn.

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

  603.3. Once an ability has triggered, its controller puts it on the stack as an object that’s not a card the next time a player would receive priority. [...]

  603.3b If multiple abilities have triggered since the last time a player received priority, each player, in APNAP order, puts triggered abilities he or she controls on the stack in any order he or she chooses. [...]

  101.4. If multiple players would make choices and/or take actions at the same time, the active player (the player whose turn it is) makes any choices required, then the next player in turn order (usually the player seated to the active player’s left) makes any choices required, followed by the remaining nonactive players in turn order. Then the actions happen simultaneously. This rule is often referred to as the “Active Player, Nonactive Player (APNAP) order” rule.


Answering the questions in order:

  Can you pick up cards from your villages during your turn?

No. when a card is played to a village, it remains with that village until either it is destroyed, it is kidnapped, or all units of that village are destroyed. The singular exception (that I am aware of) is a guest unit in an Inn - by the Inn's effect, that guest unit may return to your hand at the start of your turn.

[edit: The "Distant Lands" expansion adds a second building card that allows two additional guest units (one of each color adjacent to the village's color) to be in the village, and like the Inn, they may return to your hand at the start of your turn.]

  Can multicolor/light units switch which village they are in if possible?

As noted in the previous question, the only unit that could "switch villages" is a guest unit residing in an Inn.

  if there is a village made of light units, what color is that village?

A village's color does not change, even if the only remaining units are multicolor or light units. The rules do not specify whether or not a red village with only Light units remaining is considered destroyed or not, only that there is no such thing as a "Light village" (that is, when the village is created, there must be at least one non-light unit in it)


Does Throne of the God-Pharaoh work with tapped vehicles?

The Throne will see the Vehicles as creatures and work with them just fine.

This is because the ending phase works through the following steps:

End Step — Triggered abilities that say “at the beginning of the end step” or “at the beginning of the next end step” trigger. Players get priority and can cast spells and activate abilities.
Cleanup step — In order: the active player discards down to 7, damage is cleared off all permanents, and all “until end of turn” and “this turn” effects wear off. (Then under rare circumstances, the players might get priority and more cleanup steps might happen.)

Your Throne triggers at the beginning of the end step, and your Vehicles don't stop being creatures until the cleanup step happens.

Also, just so you know, Throne of the God-Pharaoh's ability will always trigger even if you have no creatures out (its rulings mention as much), and we only determine the amount of life to be lost as that triggered ability resolves.

This means after it triggers and before it resolves, you have the opportunity to ensure you have more tapped creatures. Handily, you can also activate a crew ability for a vehicle even when it's already crewed, as confirmed by vehicle rulings:

  You may activate a crew ability of a Vehicle even if it’s already an artifact creature. Doing so has no effect on the Vehicle. It doesn’t change its power and toughness.

So if you have a Vehicle sitting around, if you'd like to, you can crew it some more to get more tapped creatures.


From the rules for melee combat,

Each die roll equal or higher than the Accuracy value on the
weapon’s card is a successful hit. The player divides his hits as
he wishes among the possible targets in the Zone.

This means that a melee attack landing three hits could target and kill up to three creatures.
Ranged combat works the same way, except there are limitations in the order in which you can target monsters (targeting priority).
Keep in mind that there's no point in assigning more than one hit per creature.

Fatties are killed with a 2 Damage hit (or more). It does not matter how many hits you obtain with a weapon that inflicts 1 Damage.  A Fatty will absorb the hits without flinching.
Abominations are killed with a 3 Damage hit (or more). As no weapon naturally has Damage 3 in Zombicide: Black Plague, you have to destroy the monster with Dragon Fire (see page 35) or with Samson using a Damage 2 Melee weapon in conjunction with his +1 Damage: Melee Skill.


Why can I not place a tile that scores more than 10 points in Kodama: Tree Spirits

My guess it is to keep the tree growing in many directions and not just along a single path. Since scoring is based on how many icons from the card you played are on other cards in a path to the bottom it would make the most sense to never branch off and victory comes down to who gets the best card draws. With this rule in place there is more strategy to where a card is placed not only to maximize your points but to minimize other players points.
Rules

After placing a branch card, look at the icons on that card. You score 1 point for each instance of those icons in that contiguous line of cards. You do not score points for other instances of that icon if they are not part of this contiguous line of cards.

You only score points based on the icons on the branch card you added this turn. Those icons must be part of a contiguous line of cards with the card you just added. Any other icons elsewhere on the tree do not score points.

The contiguous line of cards extends from the card you just added, continuing down toward the trunk or until the shared icons do not appear on a card.


Discard White Stone of Ancients to activate effect

Yes you can use the effect in the End Phase if you send White Stone of Ancients (WSoA) to the Graveyard by some means throughout your turn.

In your question you mention Dragon Ravine

Once per turn: You can discard 1 card, then activate 1 of these effects;
● Add 1 Level 4 or lower "Dragunity" monster from your Deck to your hand.
● Send 1 Dragon monster from your Deck to the GY.

As discarding a card implicitly sends it to the Graveyard you gain use the effect of WSoA if you discard it for Dragon Ravine's cost, or if you send it to the Graveyard as part of its effect.
Other means of getting WSoA out of your hand to use it's effect in the End Phase could be a card like Cards of Consonance

Discard 1 Dragon Tuner with 1000 or less ATK; draw 2 cards.

or you can summon it and link summon into Linkuriboh.


Does this mining mechanic add genuine choice to my game?

Instead of modeling you can compute these results exactly. If you roll n dice at difficulty d, the variance will be [d * n * (d-1)/6 * (7-d)/6], and the mean net gain will be [d * n * (7-d)/6 - 1]. Both scale linearly with n, so here are the mean (measured in Net Gain Per Die) and variance for each value of d:

-----------------------
| d | Mean | Variance |
-----------------------
| 1 | 0    | 0        |
-----------------------
| 2 | 0.7  | 0.3      |
-----------------------
| 3 | 1    | 0.7      |
-----------------------
| 4 | 1    | 1.0      |
-----------------------
| 5 | 0.7  | 1.1      |
-----------------------
| 6 | 0    | 0.8      |
-----------------------

As you can see, there's definitely some actual choice here. 6 looks pretty useless (and 1 is entirely pointless - even if you didn't explicitly disallow it in the rules, no one would have reason to pick it), but the others are all somewhat reasonable and come in pairs - e.g. assuming you want the maximum average output (1 resource), do you want the lower variance that 3 offers or the higher one of 4? And are you willing to pay a little in expected output (down to 0.7) to get the extreme consistency of 2 or the extreme variance of 5? I'm not sure how much practical difference this will make to your game though; I'd have to know more about the game first and it'll also be a matter of opinion.


A trail card says I pass if I roll an even number and die if I roll a 1. What happens if I roll a 3 or 5?

A Board Game Geek user sent in some rules questions to Pressman Toys and received responses from the company president and game designer. They were kind enough to post them on Board Game Geek, and this question was one of them:

  1) River card: “Roll an Even number to ford the river. Roll a 1 and die by drowning.” What happens then when the person rolls a 1 and dies? Would you take that to mean the river was forded, but lost that player to drowning? What happens if a 3 or 5 is rolled?

  -When players are trying to ford a river and they don’t drown or ford the river play passes to the next player, who rolls to try to ford the river. This continues until all players drown or a player fords the river. No player may play another Trail Card until the river has been forded.

In other words, a result of 3 or 5 means that the river is not forded, but there are no other ill effects. The next player then attempts to ford the river. Only when a person rolls a 2, 4, or 6 is the River considered to be forded and a new trail tile may be drawn.


Gisela, the Broken Blade or Bruna, the Fading Light as a Commanders

Yes, if either Gisela or Bruna are your commander at the start of the game, when they meld together Brisela will still be considered your commander for all purposes. When and if Brisela leaves the battlefield only the original commander half will follow the commander rules for returning to command zone, the other half will behave as any other creature would. This is covered in the rulings for both Bruna and Gisela:

  In a Commander game, your commander may be Bruna, the Fading Light or Gisela, the Broken Blade, and the other may be in your deck. If they meld into Brisela, Voice of Nightmares, Brisela will also be your commander; but if Brisela leaves the battlefield, only the card chosen as your commander at the start of the game may be put into the command zone.


Does the 2nd ability of Teysa, Orzhov Scion trigger with mass destruction?

Yes, if Teysa, Orzhov Scion and 10 other black creatures all die at the same time, you get 10 Spirit tokens. Rule 603 covers how triggered abilities work:

603.6c. Leaves-the-battlefield abilities trigger when a permanent moves from the battlefield to another zone, or when a phased-in permanent leaves the game because its owner leaves the game. These are written as, but aren't limited to, "When [this object] leaves the battlefield, ..." or "Whenever [something] is put into a graveyard from the battlefield, ..." An ability that attempts to do something to the card that left the battlefield checks for it only in the first zone that it went to. An ability that triggers when a card is put into a certain zone "from anywhere" is never treated as a leaves-the-battlefield ability, even if an object is put into that zone from the battlefield.
603.6d. Normally, objects that exist immediately after an event are checked to see if the event matched any trigger conditions. Continuous effects that exist at that time are used to determine what the trigger conditions are and what the objects involved in the event look like. However, some triggered abilities must be treated specially. Leaves-the-battlefield abilities, abilities that trigger when a permanent phases out, abilities that trigger when an object that all players can see is put into a hand or library, abilities that trigger specifically when an object becomes unattached, abilities that trigger when a player loses control of an object, and abilities that trigger when a player planeswalks away from a plane will trigger based on their existence, and the appearance of objects, prior to the event rather than afterward. The game has to "look back in time" to determine if these abilities trigger.

The ability is a leaves-the-battlefield ability and it existed before the creatures were destroyed, so the ability triggers.


Ferries and Tunnels in Ticket to Ride Expansions

No,

These rules do not stack.

You can only in 3 cards to fill the designated locomotive spots.
You can use locomotives to fill in the colored spots.

You cannot use the first to get a locomotive and then trade that in for the colored card.

This question was asked of designer Alan Moon, on BGG and his response was as I have given here.


When the creature dies, both abilities go on the stack.  They are placed on the stack in "Active Player, Non-active Player" (APNAP) order.  This means that the player whose turn it is places all of their abilities that triggered on the stack, and then the other player will place all of their abilities that triggered on the stack, above the active player's abilities.  If both abilities belong to the same player, that player chooses the order.  Then the top ability on the stack resolves, moving the creature.  When a card changes zones it becomes an entirely new object, and the only ability that can track it to the new zone is the ability that caused it to move.  So when the second ability tries to resolve it won't be able to do anything because it can't find the creature it is trying to target.

This means that the exact result depends on who controls the effects, and whose turn it is.

If you control Endless Cockroaches that you enchanted with False Demise, then when the cockroaches die you choose which order the effects go on the stack.  If you order them so the cockroaches' ability is on top it will return to you hand.  If you order them so the False Demise ability is on top, it will return to the battlefield.

If you control Endless Cockroaches, and your opponent enchanted it with False Demise and the Cockroaches die on your turn then the Cockroaches ability will be placed on the stack first, and then False Demise will be placed on top of it.  False Demise will resolve first, and your opponent will get your Cockroaches.

If instead it was your opponent's turn, then the False Demise trigger will be placed first and the Cockroach trigger will be placed on top, meaning that the Cockroach trigger will resolve first and the roaches will be returned to you hand.

From the description, it sounds like the enchantment in question is Grave Betrayal.  If that is the case, then the roaches will always go back to their owners hand.  That's because Grave Betrayal reads

  Whenever a creature you don't control dies, return it to the battlefield under your control with an additional +1/+1 counter on it at the beginning of the next end step. That creature is a black Zombie in addition to its other colors and types.

Grave Betrayal's ability triggers and goes on the stack the same way I described above.  But even if it resolves first, it doesn't try and move the creature until the beginning of the end step.  That means that when the Cockroaches' ability resolves, it will still be able to find the Cockroaches and will always move the roaches to their owner's hand, and when the Grave Betrayal trigger tries to move the roaches at the beginning of the end step they won't be able to find them.


Is it common in Munchkin to allow characters to reach higher than level 9

It probably is a common mistake, although it seems pretty clear to me from the rules, page 1 under Starting and Finishing the Game

The first player to reach 10th level wins ... but you must reach 10th level by killing a monster, unless a card specifically allows you to win another way.

Some amount of people must make the same mistake since it is the first rule included in their FAQ.

Important Note #1: Reaching Level 10
The general rule is that you may not reach Level 10 except by killing a monster. If you are at Level 9 and something else happens that would normally let you go up a level . . . you don't. You stay at Level 9. If you have a card or an ability that lets you mess with another player and get a level in return, you cannot play that card or use that ability.

This is all under the assumption that you aren't playing Epic Munchkin, where the rule wouldn't apply. (But, a similar 19th & 20th level rule would apply instead)


When discarding the card in the Love Letter, is it mandatory to show the card you had?

The Tempest version of the rules is just a little bit vague - it does say that to play a card you discard it face up, it does say that your discarded cards go in front of you, it does say that when you're knocked out you place your card face up in front of you, it doesn't explicitly say that a card you discard to the Prince should be face up (although I'd say that they weight of all the other rules says yes it should).

The Kanai version definitely spells it out:

All discarded cards should remain in front of the player who played them, visible, so that it is clear in what order they were discarded.
If a player is out of the round he or she must reveal the card in his or her hand (if any) and place it in front of him or her.


Can I make Vitu-Ghazi Indestructible with Nissa's Emblem?

Yes, after you -8 Nissa, lands you control have indestructible, including the land animated by Awakening of Vitu Ghazi. It does not matter what other types, if any, your lands have.
Nissa's effect says that "Lands you control have indestructible". "Land" is shortcut for "land permanents". Therefore, every permanent you control that is a land has indestructible, and indestructible extends to the whole permanent, not just the land part of it. A permanent is a land if it has the land type, and that's all the Nissa effect cares about. It does not care whether or not that land is also a creature. Awakening of Vitu Ghazi states that the permanent retains its land type, so it will be affected by Nissa's -8.

109.2. If a spell or ability uses a description of an object that includes a card type or subtype, but doesn’t include the word “card,” “spell,” “source,” or “scheme,” it means a permanent of that card type or subtype on the battlefield.
300.2. Some objects have more than one card type (for example, an artifact creature). Such objects combine the aspects of each of those card types, and are subject to spells and abilities that affect either or all of those card types.


Do I get to fetch a basic land when putting my commander in the command zone for Path to Exile?

This concerns the following rule:

  CR 903.9. If a commander would be exiled from anywhere or put into its owner’s hand, graveyard, or library from anywhere, its owner may put it into the command zone instead. This replacement effect may apply more than once to the same event. This is an exception to rule 614.5.

If the Commander's owner chooses to apply the replacement effect, you perform the following instructions when resolving Path to Exile:

  Exile target creature.Move target creature to the command zone. Its controller may search his or her library for a basic land card, put that card onto the battlefield tapped, then shuffle his or her library.

There's nothing preventing the rest of the ability from resolving, so you do get to search your library for a land.

Similarly, you perform the following instructions when resolving Swords to Plowshares:

  Exile target creature.Move target creature to the command zone. Its controller gains life equal to its power.

So, you do gain life.

Let's consider a different scenario. Say there's a creature on the battlefield with the following ability:

  Whenever a creature dies, ...

Then, let's say you cast the following spell targeting a Commander:

  Destroy target creature. Draw a card.

If the Commander's owner doesn't replace the effect,

You perform the following instructions when resolving the spell:

  Destroy target creature (by moving it to the graveyard). Draw a card.

The triggered ability will obviously trigger.
If the Commander's owner chooses to apply the replacement effect,

You perform the following instructions when resolving the spell:

  Destroy target creature (by moving it to the graveyardcommand zone). Draw a card.

Since the creature never died (never went to the graveyard from the battelfield), the triggered ability won't trigger.

Either way, you draw a card.


Is either player at a disadvantage when cards "aren't' shuffled well enough"?

As long as neither player has information about the order of cards in a deck of cards, no player can gain an advantage from a "bad" shuffle.

A "bad" shuffle could be defined as a shuffle that does not, by a reasonable standard, erase all information remaining from the end of the previous game, most notably the order of cards. This does not mean that there is no recognizable order to the cards, only that neither player knows in what order the deck is, including after a player has seen a part of the deck.

If a particular game produces long streaks of ordered cards on the table, and a subsequent shuffle before the next game does not break up that order, then there is the potential that information remains to be gained in the next game, and a possible advantage for one player. The amount of shuffling needed to prevent that depends on the technique used and the amount of order that is present (e.g. how large are the blocks of ordered cards the game typically produces).

As for your problem with the half-serious allegations of negligience or even cheating by your wife: That question is not likely to be resolved with better shuffling alone, it's about venting her frustration after losing - she is not going to complain about a bad shuffle if she wins. Simply offer to let her shuffle the deck whenever she wants, or at least let her cut the deck before the game starts. This involves her in the shuffling process and she has no more reason to take insufficient shuffling as an excuse.


You get a copy for every previous spell, not just the ones you cast. The Storm rules (that you linked to) define Storm in rule 702.39a:

  Storm is a triggered ability that functions on the stack. “Storm” means “When you cast this spell, put a copy of it onto the stack for each other spell that was cast before it this turn. If the spell has any targets, you may choose new targets for any of the copies.”

As you can see, it uses the same wording as the reminder text you quote. It does not mention who cast the previous spells, so it counts all previous spells.

Cards that care about which player did something always say so. If any trigger event, or description, or bit of text that cares about information does not mention a player, then it does not distinguish between players.


Can I use the effect of the Winged Dragon of Ra from the Yu-Gi-Oh! anime in a real game?

Effects from the Yu-Gi-Oh! anime do not apply to the card game, especially not in a legal tournament. You can only use the text that is actually on the card (and any modifications due to errata or official rulings).

Of course, in a friendly game, you and your opponent are welcome use those affects if you agree. If you want to play that way, nothing is stopping you.


Looking at the rules here the rules clarification for Double the Rent says (emphasis mine)

  Play with a standard rent card to double the amount

The FAQ link to here it says

  Does the Double The Rent card count as a turn? Does it count as one of your three plays? Yes. An example would be a player lays a property
  card, a rent card, and a double the rent card during their turn. This
  would be all three of their card plays.

So based on that i would says that 'Double the rent' is playing with (ie simultaneously) with the rent card.  The payment is 1 x 16 million lump sum because 'Double the Rent' and 'Rent' are played at exactly the same time.

I'm confused as to why asking for 16 million once over 8 million twice makes a difference as I've only played this once many years ago under duress and just checked the rules to answer this.


What Are the Requirements for a "Jump" Bid Opposite a Takeout Double in Bridge?

I believe you're correct, and your partner is talking nonsense when he says "I thought your jump meant you had an opening hand".  Everything I can find on the subject suggests that the jump is appropriate for a hand with 8+ HCP, or perhaps 9-11 modified HCP as per this bridge tip from pro player Eddie Kantar:

  When responding to a takeout double, add one extra point for an unbid
  four card major and two extra points for an unbid five card major.
  Then if your total comes to 9-11 working points ( do not count
  anything for jacks or queens in any suit bid by an opponent) make a
  single jump response, not forcing. With less than 9 working points,
  make a non-jump response. With more than 11 revalued points, cuebid
  the opponent's suit.

With 8HCP and a diamond doubleton, you might be borderline, but you're still within your rights to test the waters.  Tell your partner (and opponents) to read up on responses to takeout doubles!


It will never be a creature at any point, assuming that your devotion is not high enough.

From the rulings on Purphoros:

  As a God enters the battlefield, your devotion to its color will determine whether any replacement effects that affect creatures entering the battlefield apply to that God. Because replacement effects are considered before the God is on the battlefield, the mana symbols in its mana cost won’t be counted when determining this.

and

  When a God enters the battlefield, your devotion to its color (including the mana symbols in the mana cost of the God itself) will determine if a creature entered the battlefield or not for abilities that trigger whenever a creature enters the battlefield.

So if Purphoros itself brings your devotion to red to 5, then triggered abilities that trigger upon a creature entering the battlefield will trigger, but replacement effects that happen as a creature enters the battlefield will not.

It isn't clear which ability you mean by "does this ability work in a graveyard"... if you mean the "As long as your devotion to red is less than five, Purphoros isn’t a creature." ability, then no, this doesn't function outside the battlefield. But that doesn't matter, because something cannot be a creature until it is on the battlefield anyway.

  604.2. Static abilities create continuous effects, some of which are prevention effects or replacement effects. These effects are active as long as the permanent with the ability remains on the battlefield and has the ability, or as long as the object with the ability remains in the appropriate zone, as described in rule 113.6.

It may sound like this is a characteristic-defining ability, which would function outside the battlefield, but it's not:

  604.3. Some static abilities are characteristic-defining abilities. A characteristic-defining ability conveys information about an object’s characteristics that would normally be found elsewhere on that object (such as in its mana cost, type line, or power/toughness box) or overrides information found elsewhere on that object. Characteristic-defining abilities function in all zones. They also function outside the game.

    604.3a A static ability is a characteristic-defining ability if it meets the following criteria: (1) It defines an object’s colors, subtypes, power, or toughness; (2) it is printed on the card it affects, it was granted to the token it affects by the effect that created the token, or it was acquired by the object it affects as the result of a copy effect or text-changing effect; (3) it does not directly affect the characteristics of any other objects; (4) it is not an ability that an object grants to itself; and (5) it does not set the values of such characteristics only if certain conditions are met.

It wouldn't have any meaning outside the battlefield anyway, because a card not on the battlefield is never a creature:

  109.2. If a spell or ability uses a description of an object that includes a card type or subtype, but doesn’t include the word “card,” “spell,” “source,” or “scheme,” it means a permanent of that card type or subtype on the battlefield.


Plan your last few VPs with resources you can gather yourself. For example, if you have decent wheat and ore resources, build your extra villages before your towns. That way when you have only the cities left to build and are a VP or two away, you can finish off on your own power without trading. Obviously ports can increase your versatility in this manner.


Has online play testing been an important part of any boardgame designs?

VASSAL offers a way to create on online version of a game easily. I was involved in play testing Crown of Roses using a VASSAL module. The map for Clash of Monarchs has been critised as being difficult to use and the reason provided for this was that most of the play testing was done online which had a much clearer map.


When Data mine is triggered, if the runner survives this ice, can (s)he/other still continue?

Core rules:

  After the Runner breaks all of the ice’s subroutines and/or any
  effects from unbroken subroutines resolve without ending the run, he
  has passed that piece of ice. He then continues the run by either
  approaching the next piece of ice protecting the server or proceeding
  to the Access phase if there is no more ice to approach.

Data Mine doesn't end the run, so the run continues.  In you example, the runner would go on to access Melange Mining Corp.

It trashes itself as part of its ability because trap ice cards are designed to be hard to break but only hit once.


What if three players are "the closest investigator"?

The final decision is always down to the active investigator when you are deciding the nearest but two or more targets are an equivalent distance.

From the rules reference (page 9):

  When determining the “nearest” space or token, find the space or
  token separated by the fewest number of interconnected paths.

  If two or more spaces are tied for nearest, the active investigator
  chooses


Is the Diver able to turn when swimming across a flooded or abyss tile?

Yes, he can turn.

Page 4 of the rules state

  The Diver may move through one or more adjacent missing and/or flooded tiles for 1 action.

There is a thread on BGG here where the designer confirms that turns are allowed.


Option 2 is correct. You say it yourself, priority only controls what order the robots move in. There's nothing in the rules about cancelling a robot's move.
From page 6 of the Wizards edition:

Priority
The priority numbers on each Program card indicate a robot’s
priority for that register phase—how quickly it moves. Whenever
robots are likely to bump into each other, use the priority numbers
to determine which robot moves first. A higher number means
faster movement, so a robot with a 200 card would move before
a robot with a 100 card.

(Emphasis mine)


Here's what I did, and they don't look bad.

Used a towel to pat dry the tiles.
Used my fingers to press out the wrinkles and squish the expanding cardboard back together.
Laid them down between two towels, put a textbook on top, and pressed down to get some more water out.
Pressed out the wrinkles and squish cardboard together again.
Laid them down between two paper towels (paper towels are thinner and I wanted to make sure they stayed flat) and laid several textbooks on top.
After several hours, squished with fingers again.
Dry paper towels and textbooks again.
The next day, I pulled them out and laid them on a dry towel.

At this point they're holding together really well and are only marginally thicker than the undamaged pieces.

The damaged piece on the left is only a bit thicker than the dry one on the right.


In Settlers of Catan, is it possible to avoid "losing a won game?"

10 Points On Your Own Turn = You Win!

If you have 10 or more points at any time during your turn, you win the game outright immediately.

From the University of Catan FAQ (emphasis added):

  Q:    Can a player win the game when it is not her turn? For instance, during another player's turn, the player remembers that she has a victory point card and that card along with other points that she accumulated gives her 10 points. Can she win during another player's turn or does she have to wait her turn to play the victory point card and declare herself the winner?

  A:    You can only win during your turn. If somehow you earn enough points to win during another player's turn (such as getting Longest Road because another player broke the longest road, or because you remember your victory point card) you must still wait until your turn. However, you can win at any point during your turn, even before you roll the dice. On the other hand, if another player earns 10 points before your turn, that player will be the winner even though you had 10 points first!

Fear the Boot

So, there's a particular mini-expansion called Fishermen of Catan. You can find the rules online (PDF link). This expansion contains the "Old Shoe." Every time your fisheries produce resources, there's a chance you'll draw the Old Shoe card, which can turn your 10/10 VP into 10/11 VP. Oh noes!

Here's a rules quote (emphasis added):

  D. That Old Shoe

  One of the tokens shows an "old shoe" that you might
  accidentally draw while collecting a fish token. If you
  draw the old shoe, you must reveal it immediately! Keep
  the old shoe face up in front of you. As long as the old
  shoe is in your possession, you will need 1 additional
  victory point to win the game! So, you would need
  11 victory points to win the basic Settlers game!

  There is good news, however! During your turn after
  rolling the dice, you can give the old shoe away! You can
  give the shoe to any other player who has the same or
  more victory points than you. But, if you alone have the
  most points, you must keep the old shoe for yourself!

So, it looks like the Old Shoe can, in fact, "turn a win into a loss" if this scenario happens:

You get 10 VPs on some other player's turn (per the Longest Road example in the question).
Then another player's roll generates resources for you, and you end up with the Old Shoe.
You can't win on your turn because of your new VP threshold.
Another player goes after you, gets to 10 VP, and wins.

However, if an opponent already has a lot of VP on the board just like you, you can do this on your turn:

(same) You get 10 VPs on some other player's turn (per the Longest Road example in the question).
(same) Then another player's roll generates resources for you, and you end up with the Old Shoe.
You roll the dice, then give the Old Shoe away.
Claim your victory immediately (as above)!

This is yet another case where it's useful to hide your +VP dev cards in your hand until the exact moment you claim the win (sine it makes it easier to dump the Shoe).


Flashcards to learn Blackjack strategy table?

Yes, there are flash cards in the excellent book by Ken Uston titled "Million Dollar Blackjack"  This is a great book with interesting stories and strategies for different house rules.  Applies to counters and non-counters; single, double, and multiple deck games.  Vegas, Reno, AC rules explained as well.  I think you can find it for less than $20.
Good luck at the tables!


Can I use a program run ability (eg: Sneakdoor Beta) and an run event card (eg: Account Siphon) for the same run?

No.

Each of these are a single 'click' to actually play.  Sneakdoor Beta specifically lists that you are using a click to use it's ability.  That click kicks off a run, but the click starts at using Sneakdoor Beta's card ability.  Once the run starts, you can no longer user clicks to play cards, use card abilities, ect.  On the same token, to play Account Siphon, you must use a click to play the event card.  As you do, the event card kicks off a run, but again, the click starts at playing a card ability.  This is all by design so you can't stack up a bunch of 'run' abilities.  It would also make other cards broken, like the event card for Shapers that lets you consider one piece of ice as all three types.

Things that will work?  Security Testing and Dirty Laundry.  +2 credits the first time you succesfully run a chosen server and +5 credits for completing a successful run on a server.  You use the click to play the event card and, since it was the first successful run on that server, you get the security testing instead of accessing cards.  Add in Desperado for a +1 credit after every successful run and play as Ken to get +1 credits from playing a run event and you're looking at a net of +7 credits for one run.  But that's just an example of the synergy that IS possible.


No, they do not get any additional movement.

What happens is the unit is not engaged in a combat, so it does nothing in the close combat phase.

I assume you are thiking of the Overrun rule? Where if you wipe out a unit in close combat on the turn you charge you get to move another 2D6" forward afterwards.

The rules for Overrun (8th Edition Rulebook, pg 58) specify that a unit only gets an Overrun if "all it's enemies have been wiped out as a result of the combat". So if the opposing unit was wiped out before the close combat phase began, they would get no Overrun move.


Good set for building several casual level decks

Core sets like M20 are pretty much built for this kind of "introductory" play, although if you want to represent EVERYTHING magic has to offer you might need to bleed across multiple core sets.

I'll also say that core sets tend not to have very much multi-colour support - Return to Ravnica springs to mind as a set that explicitly encourages dual-coloured deck building, if you're willing to branch out even further.


Thunderstone game taking too long (2 players)

The original Thunderstone, while a great game, has a bit of a design flaw in that the 'Militia' you start with are just objectively too bad.  It is honestly a winning strategy to spend literally your entire first 6 turns of the game doing nothing but trashing your militia and then starting up building a deck without them.  If you haven't sort of 'realized' this yet in your strategy, the game can be very slow to start and take a long time for your decks to get powered up.

The expansions to the original Thunderstone address this to some extent by adding ways to kill them off into the monster abilities and some spell/item effects that otherwise utilize them.

Thunderstone Advance makes them better by reducing the XP cost to promote them to a L1 warrior, and adding an equipment to your starting deck that gives an ability when equipped to them.

For the base game, you may consider simply starting with fewer of them in your deck to speed up the early development and be strong enough to start going to the dungeon faster.

1) My group can finish a 4 player game in 45 minutes.

2) Not significantly in my experience, but I rarely play with fewer than 4.

3) Cull some of the militia out of the starting deck.  Use one of the several Apps available that generate 'semi-random' starting boards but make sure things are balanced.  This way you don't get really challenging combinations like monsters that require magic and all figher-type warriors that makes for a very slow start.

4) I always go to the dungeon if I have card draw effects in my hand that give me any reasonable hope of possibly defeating something.  (Not withstanding extreme cases like the Last L3 hero is on top of a hero deck and I have enough gold to get it or something...)

Thunderstone Advance is also a vastly improved game and highly recommended if you are willing to drop more $$$.  Your monsters and equipment/spell cards are 'compatible' and can still be used with it.


Puerto Rico - Custom gameplay tweaks to introduce player interactions

Puerto Rico is mostly an open information game. The plantation tiles are randomized and hidden information, and VP points are hidden, although a player with good memory could count when each player earns victory points.

There is player interaction in Puerto Rico, but it isn't like Settlers of Catan wheeling and dealing, which allows multiple players who are losing to trade resources among themselves to help each other catch up to the leader. The other two games are very similar to Puerto Rico in their player interaction, in Agricola you can deny your opponents a particular role when you choose it, and in Le Harve you can get your goods to the ship first blocking the boat. (It is confusing that you mentioned them)

I almost never see a player waiting to use newly acquired buildings, any longer than the one round that would be necessary to choose the Mayor action to fill the building/plantation. Puerto Rico is designed as a resource management game. Nearly every turn, it feels like their are two things you need to do, but you can only choose one.

Can you modify the rules to allow trading coins for building use, sure but there will be added complications.

Do buildings "open for business" still require a colonist from your opponents to use?
Do your or other colonists "block" a open building for use by other players? (i.e. are the number of circles relevant on buildings)
How will players indicate they are using your building if colonists are required, how do you keep track of which colonist is which players?
If using a building doesn't require a colonist, when can a player decide when to use it? (i.e. Can I use a Factory right before/after crafting, a Storehouse/Harbor during shipping, etc?

If you think about adding this feature, realize what you are doing. You are allowing other players to trade coins to another player for Victory Points. How many players are going to leave their Guild House, City Hall, or other large building "open for business?" Why would I make my Harbor available to anyone else, when the point of getting it was so that when we ship, I get +1-2 extra VP? I am pretty sure you will find this rule rather pointless.


There are many variables and unknowns here.  That said, the fact that the initial card was turned over by the dealer and no one had ordered it up provides a great deal of information.
You say you called the suit and have the lead and the right bower... What was the rank of the card turned over?  Was it a jack?  An Ace?  A nine?  Now... was the suit you called the same color as what was turned over by the dealer?
If what was turned over wasn't a jack and is the same color as what you bid, then chances are better that the opponents won't have the left bower (as them having it would have increased the likelihood that the dealer would have picked up or been ordered up by their partner) implying there is a slightly increased chance your partner does.
At the same time, noting that no one liked the initial suit well enough to order up or pick up, this implies the non-bowers of that suit are rather well distributed among all four players or are turned down (with the initial card specifically being among those turned down), specifically with slight bias away from the opponents.  That is to say, it is very likely your partner has one of the suit turned down in addition to possibly the other bower and it is quite possible that one of your opponents has a void in that suit.
In such a situation, if your strongest notrump kickers are in the suit of the same color as trump, I would personally want to burn trump twice before trying to run the off suit.  You say "and not much else" which implies to me one other small trump and middling kickers.
Now... the lead I recommend may be controversial, however I have had great success with it in the past (and was frequently accused of cheating / table-talking as a result) and that would be lead with your smallest trump.
For example:  You sit left of the dealer, your hand is Qs,Js,9h,Ah,Kc and Qc was the turned-up card.  Four passes occur and Qc is turned over.  You bid spades.  I would lead with the Qs.
From here, you hope your partner replies with the Jc.  If they do and if they are thin on trump, they will likely continue by playing their strongest notrump, hopefully Ad or Kh.  In the case of Kh, you actually overplay them with your Ah and then burn a final time with Js, followed by 9h and then Kc.  In the case they had a second or third trump, they will instead lead a low trump back to you on the second play.  In the case they didn't have Jc, you'll hope to regain control via hearts or clubs, or hope to see your partner take control somehow instead.
The easiest way for you to be set in this scenario is if the person to your left had the left bower and another trump as well as strong diamonds.
Do I get set some times playing this way?  Yes, but being in control of the bidding goes a long way, and I win on this bid more than often enough to make up for the occasional setbacks to make it worth it.  Especially for tournament style play where risks are more rewarded.

Now... in the event that you are opening bidding on a color different than what is turned over... that is a different story.  If your hand was Qs,Js,9h,Ah,Kc and it was a heart that was turned over... I would not have bid at all and would have waited for an opponent to bid black and tried to set them (begin by leading Ah, trumping in on a diamond lead with the Qs or Kc, burning with the Js, and then playing 9h) or let my partner bid diamonds if they were so inclined.  (Them knowing me however, that I didn't bid the suit turned over while sitting left of the dealer lets them know that I don't have any help for them in terms of trump in that case)


Do I own a token that I create under somebody else's control?

No, that token is owned by the other player.  From the current Comprehensive Rules:

  110.5a A token is both owned and controlled by the player under whose control it entered the battlefield.

Tokens used to be owned by the controller of the effect that created them, but this was changed in the Magic 2010 rules revision to line up better with people's intuitions about ownership of permanents.


Trick-taking card game, where you aim to reach zero points?

This sounds like a trick taking game in the Rams group.

  Rams group: in these games players have the opportunity to drop out after seeing their hands, but anyone who stays in and fails to make their quota of tricks suffers a penalty.

None of these seem to match the rules you state exactly.

Raub starts at 21, with players trying to get to 0 points. But, it is played with 4 cards, when you fail to score a trick you add +4.

Loo: doesn't have the starting total, with players winning shares of the pot for the proportion of tricks they take, with players that take none having to pay into the pot.

Bourre: also isn't a perfect fit. It also has a pot like Loo, has players who fail to take tricks paying into the pot. It does have the first revealed card to indicate trump.


Are two teams that attempt a planet mission present with each other

The answer is actually in the core rules (p 13). Section "Present"

  If a  card is  on   a  planet, it  is  present with any    other personnel and equipment on the same planet


Would a Necromantic Selection and Angel of Glory’s Rise combo work?

If your intention is to:
 - Play a large assortment of Humans
 - Play Necromantic Selection to destroy all creatures
 - Choose to return Angel of Glory's Rise to play, getting all your humans Back.

Resulting in having significant board presence, the answer is yes-ish.

Since the ability of Angel's of Glory's Rise is one sentence with multiple clauses, the entire effect will resolve. You would exile the angel, and then return all humans from your graveyard to the battlefield. Inefficient, but it would work.


The website http://OhioEuchre.Com/ has much information on bidding strategies. Euchre is a game of chance where aggression pays off. The more you play the better you will get. Take chances! Even when you are getting euchred you're learning more about the game.

The person that said there is little strategy to euchre is incorrect. Just play in any tournament. You'll see that the same people seem to win most of the time. I don't think they're just luckly. I think they took the time to learn the different strategies of the game


Is the cast keyword triggered from the graveyard?

No, "casting" a spell has a more specific meaning

What does casting mean?

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

Normally, you are only allowed to cast spells from your hand, unless a card says otherwise. There are cards that allow casting spells from somewhere other than the hand, such as Bring to Light (casting from exile), Descendants' Path (casting from library), or Karador, Ghost Chieftain (casting from graveyard). The Commander game variant allows you to cast your commander from the Command zone.

Casting a spell or ability with a reanimation effect such as the namesake Reanimate never counts as casting the reanimated creature itself. It is simply an effect of that spell or ability.


Yu-Gi-Oh! Card Ruling for Keeper Of The Shrine scenarios

Well, since the card Keeper Of The Shrine excludes tributes, and Lava Golem tributes an opponent's monster, Keeper of the Shrine should NOT summon since the effect of Lava Golem declares it as a tribute instead of a card effect.


Why does an open pinfu get 2 extra fu added to the score?

I wonder is it related in any way by the fact that it is the lowest possible score?

  THE SMALLEST POSSIBLE SCORE Many charts won’t have a value for 20 Fu, 1 Han. That’s because you just can’t make a hand that cheap.

  What happens if you make an open Tanyao using Shuntsu only, a Ryanmen wait, and win by Ron? Should be worth 20 Fu, 1 Han right?

  Actually, such a hand is called “kui-pinfu” or open pinfu, and will be scored as 30 Fu, 1 Han. Since a kui-pinfu is the only way to get 20 Fu, 1 Han, we can thus say the lowest possible score for a hand is 1000 points.

  Unrelated to kui-pinfu is the 30 Fu, 1 Han hand won by Tsumo. Such a hand is called “gomi”, because of the payments (500, 300 = 5, 3 = go, mi), and because “gomi” means “trash”.

Wikipedia has this to say, since a no-points hand must be self drawn, add 1-han yaku of self pick to the hand.

  The reason why there are no scores in the 1 han/20 fu cell is that such a hand is impossible. The only 20-fu hands are the no-points hand (pinfu, 平和) where the winning tile is self-drawn.However, since a no-points hand must be closed, making the win via a self-drawn tile automatically adds 1-han yaku of self pick to the hand. Therefore, a 20-fu, 1-han hand cannot possibly exist.


What happens if 2 separate abilities require you to sacrifice a creature?

Your opponent has to sacrifice a different creature to each effect to stop that effect from happening. Note, however, that in your particular example, Mogis triggers only on your opponents' upkeeps and Indulgent Tormentor triggers only on your upkeep. However, if we consider the case where you control two Indulgent Tormentors, it's still basically the same question. And in that case, your opponent will have to sacrifice two creatures to stop you from drawing any cards.

More specifically, here's the order of actions:

As your upkeep begins, you choose who to target with each Tormentor trigger. In the interesting case, they both target the same player.
Assuming nobody does anything else in between, the first triggered ability resolves. Your opponent chooses whether or not to sacrifice a creature. If they don't, you draw a card.
The second triggered ability resolves. Your opponent again chooses whether or not to sacrifice a creature. If they don't, you draw a card, independent of what happened in step 2.


Is there a Magic intro deck that focuses on lifestealing?

One of the clearest "life stealing" mechanics is Extort, which is a triggered ability permanents have that says

  Whenever you cast a spell, you may pay {W/B}. If you do, each opponent loses 1 life and you gain life equal to the total life lost this way.

Extort is from the Return to Ravnica block, and there were two intro packs built around it and related mechanics: Orzhov Oppression from Gatecrash and Orzhov Power from Dragon's Maze.


Table for both 2-person and multi-person games

Have you considered rhombus tables? One alone is excellent for two people.

If you then require a greater amount of tablespace for four people or need to fit six-plus people at a round table, three rhombuses together make a hexagon.

The hexagon can then be extended by adding two more tables to two adjacent sides, allowing larger and larger subtables to be added, or crescents around a central game manager or leader to be formed.


Do death triggers still happen if I am at 0 or less life after combat damage?

Here's what happens:

Combat damage is assigned and dealt - no stack
Your life total is set to (less than) 0, creatures that were dealt lethal damage are moved to the graveyard. Cutthroat;s ability is placed on the stack X times, once for each creature that died.
Before Cutthroat's triggered ability can resolve however, you have already died because coming to 0 life or less is a state-based effect. Whatever's on the stack doesn't resolve anymore.


The Baltic Sea is not adjacent to Skaggerak, so the Russian move is invalid. Around Denmark, England attacks with two uncut supports, so a total strength of 3. Denmark would need at least two defensive supports to stay, so the English attack prevails.

Even if the Russian unit moving to Skaggerak was moved to Norway to make it a valid move, this would not affect the situation in Denmark.

In general you can check the outcome of any situation you desire at Stabbeurfou (this is not the only sandbox out there online that you can use, I believe at least Backstabbr has one too)

The Diplomacy rulebook (pdf) is also available online to help you.


Agricola: Fireplaces and Cooking Hearths

Yes, you can use each as much as you want. The reason to own more than one is mostly if you get a better one later when you could only afford a cheap one earlier; or to deprive other players of them.


How does the ability on Urza, Lord High Artificer interact with Treasure Nabber?

It's sort of surprising and counter-intuitive, but Treasure Nabber won't nab artifacts that are tapped for mana with Urza's ability.

The rules are fairly specific about what counts as “tapped for mana”, and it's more specific than we might intuit:

  106.12 To “tap [a permanent] for mana” is to activate a mana ability of that permanent that includes the {T} symbol in its activation cost. See rule 605, “Mana Abilities.”

The {T} symbol here is the tap symbol. That is to say, we have to use an ability found on the permanent itself that is similar to the form “{T}: Add some mana.”

This means when we tap an artifact using Urza's ability, even though we get mana out of it and tapped something, it isn't considered to have been “tapped for mana” by the rules: we didn't use an ability found on the permanent we tapped.

The rulings on Treasure Nabber also describe this for us:

  An artifact is “tapped for mana” when a player activates a mana ability of an artifact that includes {T} (the tap symbol). Notably, tapping an artifact to pay for a spell with the improvise keyword is not tapping that artifact for mana.


Do cards that say "Each player..." still affect players with Shroud?

"Shroud" means "This permanent or player can't be the target of spells or abilities."

Unless the ability specifically uses the word target, it is not affected by shroud.

I'm not sure which enchantment you are talking about, but if it says each player, like Grave Pact, then it is not affected by shroud. If it says target opponent or target player, then it is affected by shroud.

Note that there is a subtype of Enchantment, Curse, which have the line Enchant Player. These Enchantment Aura spells do target a player when they are on the stack, so they are affected by shroud.


Well, the situation of dying with an unresolved Curse die isn't addressed specifically in the rulebook, but your second question is!

From page 7 in the rulebook, under "Death of a Taoist"

  His board becomes possessed (see neutral board below) and the ghosts occupying
  it continue to act, despite the Taoist’s death. The steps 1 & 2 of the Yin phase must
  be played. The other players will have to suffer the effects and consequences of
  the ghosts on this board.

From page 10 in the rulebook, under "Possessed Board"

  A neutral board that has lost all Qi tokens
  is called "a possessed board", Its specific
  power cannot be used anymore through
  neutral power tokens.
  Any further loss of Qi points (i.e. board
  overrun or tormentor) must be endured by a player of your choice (the green
  Taoist’s power is ineffective if Qi loss is due to the curse die).

So if a player is dead and a curse die roll triggered by a ghost on the dead player's board causes a loss of 1 Qi, somebody else has to lose the Qi. Whether that somebody else must be decided before or after the roll is made is unclear. I would apply this ruling to the situation you present in your first question as well, the game doesn't want someone to weasel out of a curse die roll!


The remaining opponents get 1 Fame each.

(Quotations are from the rules (English, German))

The Scoring section is somewhat confusing in the English version:

  Pirates GAIN fame from each of the following actions

  Winning Battles (1 point per player that is defeated or flees after being hit)

The German version (note that the original game was German) translates to:

  Winning battles (one point per player whose ship has been destroyed or flees after being hit)

However, the emphasis seems to be on the action of a ship being disabled or a ship fleeing, not in the outcome being called "winning" a battle. The Forced retreat section follows this thinking:

  A crippled ship brings all remaining opponents on that island 1 point of fame.

And the German is even clearer:

  All opponents remaining on the contested island receive one fame point for a destroyed ship.

The fact that the word "opponents" is plural and that the German still calls it a "contested" ("umkämpften") island both refute the fact that a battle must be completely "won" by dispatching all other opponents.


When you choose to engage an enemy, do they engage you too?

Yes.  From page 16 of the rules

  Whether an enemy is engaged through an engagement check, through a
  card effect, or through a player’s choice, the end result is the same,
  with the enemy and the player engaging one another. In all cases, the
  player is considered to have engaged the enemy and the enemy is
  considered to have engaged the player.


Merchants and Marauders NPC Combat Decisions

This is quite a controversial question that has already been extensively discussed on BGG [1][2]. The general consensus is that you should play the NPC as if you were the NPC captain and it was your own ship, even to the detrimental of your own captain. Examples:

The NPC neither plays no politics nor it has any knowledge of the scoring board. You should try to sink it even if that means letting another player win.
Boarding "should" only occur when the NPC is "sure" that they can win. Otherwise, if you just roll for boarding without good chances, just to let the human player inflict damage or escape, then you are not trying "hard enough" to win.
Remember that the official rules state that an NPC can only try to flee if either their cannons or their crew are less than the respective stat of the human player. Therefore, it's perfectly fine to try to flee at that point, albeit should the NPC be on the verge of sinking the human player, then such a decision may be controversial.

Controlling the NPC is, overall, a delicate situation. In a single phrase, it can be summarized as do your best to sink/board the enemy ship, even if it means going against your own captain (you were planning to attack that player) or letting a third player win.


I have found that it is possible for Troll to actually play a strong game, however, there is a fundamental issue with seeing that one could win with either the trolls or dwarves.

Remember, Thud! is an asymmetrical game--and in actuality a complete game comprises of what more closely resembles a "match"--a player plays one game as as each and the remaining value of the pieces are summed to determine the winner.

Thus, if you find your games really only feel like loss-minimizing--and lack strategy--the same applies to your opponent on his turn.

There isn't a lot of openly available games downloadable for analysis for Thud! as it is rather unpopular, but I'm basing this on my own personal play vs a computer opponent that I myself have designed: Thudgame on github. While the AI itself isn't an infalliable player, you might find that the Troll AI can often be quite threatening and I believe there's much that can be learned from it.

Unfortunately, there's not much depth to the openings (the board is symmetrical).  Some common openings I see the Trolls winning with are pretty much one of these two moves:

It's not always the same trolls, but you choose your attack vector based on the initial dwarf move (whether you want to hit the dwarf-swarm or the side dwarves are neglecting).

There's a system in how well you can get a single troll to defeat far more than his own value (5 dwarfs per troll is winning), but I have a hard time generalizing it. Give the bot a shot and I think you'll see some winning patterns emerge.


Here's the AlphaGo team's paper that has all of the details (behind a paywall): http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v529/n7587/full/nature16961.html

I gave a couple of tech talks about this recently.
This one is about how AlphaGo works and the match with Fan Hui 2p: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HTDxpxmFRGo

I gave another talk last year about why it's hard to create a good Go AI.  This one also briefly explains the rules: http://blog.fogcreek.com/go-and-artificial-intelligence-tech-talk/


Complexity of Eldritch Horror versus Arkham Horror

I own both AH and EH. I have the Kingsport, Innsmouth and Black Goat of the Woods expansions for AH. Only have the base game for EH right now but those four expansions call me pretty loudly. I really couldn't say that either is better than the other because I really love both a lot but for different reasons.

One thing that I can say I really miss from Arkham when I play Eldritch is how the investigators interact with the monsters. I like that in Arkham the monsters move around, block your path and can straight halt your action when you run into one. Sometimes it seems like those cardboard tiles somehow know what we're trying to do. I'm really not much of a fan of how unimposing the monsters are in EH, I mean, in real life, if you're sitting there and all of a sudden a portal opens up where you're at and spits out a Shoggoth you probably won't be going for groceries, you'd run, hide, fight or die. In Arkham you pretty much have to make one of those choices...

However, in Arkham when a portal opens where you are you're sucked through instantly before it even spits out a monster, then you're delayed in whatever other world opened up (in AH every gate has the name of an other world that it connects to)then you gotta find your way back to Arkham(you'll have two encounters in the other world before you move back to Arkham), close that gate, which requires you to do a test of either your fight skill or your lore skill plus or minus whatever modifier is on the gate), then you get that gate as a trophy (if you succeed the roll, success is still a 5 or 6). THEN, if that Shoggoth never moved(each mythos phase makes certain monsters of a type specified move, but you never know what will move or where it'll move to) then you can't move past it unless you succeed at an evade check(which is a test of your sneak skill plus or minus the monster's evade mod). If you fail the test the monster deals you its damage and then you have to fight or just not move.

Arkham's game world is more alive, much more intense and forboding and much more rules heavy in terms of stuff you gotta keep an eye on each turn, but winning gives a real sense of triumph and there's much more player freedom.Arkham rocks, rocks. Great way to spend a weekend with friends.

On the other hand, Eldritch's game world is more streamlined, more static and funnels players along in a much more controlling way, BUT as a result of that it tells a more comprehensive story thsn Arkham does on a game by game basis.

If Eldritch Horror was a bestselling novel, Arkham Horror would be the five star epic survival horror (and AH very much is, EH can be tough but AH can and will beat you senseless)video game RPG adaptation. Eldritch Horror tells the story but Arkham lets you live it... but on that note you should really think about checkin out Mansions of Madness too. If I could play that game solo I'd own it in a heartbeat (but one of my best friends has it and all the expansions so we just play his). It could also be said that if Arkham Horror was the book then Eldritch Horror would be the (good) movie based on that book.

Also, like EH, you can play solo which I highly recommend doing for playing for your first couple games(unless you have an experienced buddy who can bring you up to speed) so that you and your friends don't have to spend the day reading rulebooks. Plus it's a blast to play even alone (I suggest playing at least two investigators for solo games though, Arkham's a pretty formidable place for a lone ranger). Sorry to go on and on, just love these games. Hope this helped. Have fun! :)


How is Yu-Gi-Oh played with more than two players?

Play with the rules the show gave for free-for-all duels

The closest we have to official rules for Yu-Gi-Oh! with more than three players is Episode 122 of the original Yu-Gi-Oh! anime. It featured a four way free-for-all duel with the following rules (plus a rule involving the results of this duel determining seeds for the final four):

  Each Duelist must play with no more than 40 cards in his Deck.
  Each Duelist can attack or target any of the other three, but may not attack until one full turn has been played.

  The turn order is determined as follows: each player selects 1 monster from his Deck and removes it from play; the owner of the monster with the highest ATK goes first and the lowest ATK goes last. [All duelists had  different ATK, so it was not explained what happens in a tie]

Throughout the duel, there were temporary alliances that were made and broken. The duel ended when the first player got to 0 Life Points and everybody was ranked for tournament seeds. In other words, the highest remaining Life Points was ranked first, with others being ranked in relation. Yugi and Joey initially teamed up, then then turned against each other when they realized it was advantageous to do so in order to get favorable tournament seeds. Again, there were no ties, so it was unclear what would have happened in that case.

I would suggest adding the following rules:

Each player selects 1 monster from his Deck and removes it from play; the owner of the monster with the highest ATK goes first and the lowest ATK goes last. You cannot choose a monster with a ? on either ATK or DEF.
In the case of a tie with the highest ATK, all tied players use the following tie-breakers with the cards they chose until there is no tie, with the winner going first.

Highest DEF
Highest Level (monsters without a printed Level, such as Xyz monsters, count as 0)
Highest Xyz Rank (monsters without a rank, which would be any monster aside from Xyz monsters, count as 0)
Highest Link Number (monsters without a Link Number, which would be any monster aside from Link Monsters, count as 0)
Each player rolls a die with the highest winning the roll, repeat as needed for ties.

Example: Yugi chooses Kuriboh (300/200, Level 1). Bandit Keith chooses Machine King Prototype (1600/1500, Level 3). Odion chooses Dragon Zombie (1600/0, Level 3). Mako chooses Fire Kraken (1600/1500, Level 4). Yugi goes last since his monster had the lowest attack, but the three remaining duelists' monsters tie with 1600 ATK, so we need to go into tiebreakers, starting with comparing DEF. Mako and Bandit Keith both have DEF 1500 monsters, while Odion has a DEF 0 monster. Odion will go after the other two. Since there is still a tie, Level is compared. Mako's monster is a Level 4 monster, but Bandit Keith's is a Level 3, so Mako goes before Bandit Keith (since Odion is already out of the running, his monster's Level is not compared). Thus the order is Mako, Bandit Keith, Odion, Yugi.

If you don't want to have the strategic layer of selecting monsters, you could just have it where all players roll a die with the highest roll going first. The disadvantage to this is that players do not have the ability to strategically determine whether they want to go first, last, or in the middle.

Also, you can play to the last man standing if desired.


What game has black dice with keys on three sides?

They're dice from Got'Cha! from Milton Bradley.
Detail of box cover:


Do you get 2 coins from Xenophon for yellow cards put into play by Halicarnassus/Solomon?

Yes for both. "Build" is just a short, thematic word for putting into play.

On p. 4 of the rulebook, it states:

  player will get to build structures (cards)

and a bit later on:

  Some cards have no cost and can be put into play for free.

(using the Eastern Trading Post as an example.) The same page uses "construct" as another synonym. ("Some cards have a resource cost. To construct them, the player must...")They all refer to the same thing.


Yes, you can do that. Since you're activating the ability when you receive priority back from the declare blockers step, your creature hasn't been blocked and cannot be blocked after that.
If your intention is to have your creature deal its damage to the defending player, then no, you cannot do that. When a creature is blocked, it has been blocked regardless of whether you give it any kind of evasion ability or protection. What will happen in this case is that your creature will deal its damage to the blocking creature, and the (black and/or green) blocker will deal no damage to your creature since it has protection from black and green. This falls under rule 509.1b (emphasis mine):

  509.1b The defending player checks each creature he or she controls to see whether it’s affected by any restrictions (effects that say a creature can’t block, or that it can’t block unless some condition is met). If any restrictions are being disobeyed, the declaration of blockers is illegal.
  A restriction may be created by an evasion ability (a static ability an attacking creature has that restricts what can block it). If an attacking creature gains or loses an evasion ability after a legal block has been declared, it doesn’t affect that block. Different evasion abilities are
  cumulative.

No. You can fetch and equip Argentum Armor with Stonehewer Giant's ability, but the equipment will not trigger, since it's been equipped after the attackers have been declared. This falls under CR508.2a (emphasis mine):

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