text:
Axis & Allies - Opening strategies for the U.K.
I haven't played Axis & Allies in a while, and I'm currently getting my butt handed to me in an online match (partly due to a failed Kwabang attack).
I've got what I feel is a solid grip on Russia and US strategies (build tons of infantry, and put pressure on Africa and the Pacific, respectively), but I'm rusty on my U.K. strategies.
Assuming that Germany has taken out the U.K. fleet, and still has a strong fleet/air force available, what are the best opening moves for the U.K.?

Are you asking generally across all editions or one in particular? They are very different from each other

I think there are three basic strategies for the UK:

Focus on India - with this approach, the UK cedes Africa to Germany. On the first turn, the UK builds a factory in India and uses its transport to move its two troops in Egypt to India, as well as the Egyptian tank and Syrian infantry into Persia (to move into India next turn). The fighters that start in the UK are moved to Karelia and then to India. For this tactic to work, UK must build troops and tanks in India each turn and continually harass Japan in Burma.
Focus on Africa - here, UK cedes India to Japan and focuses on holding Africa. UK starts by moving her troops and fighter from India into Egypt. Sometimes people will build a factory in South Africa when going with this approach.
Ignore Africa and India in the Early Game - with this approach UK does not build any factories. Some players build a bomber the first turn to have two bombers to take out the German fleet in the Mediterranean. Others build nothing the first turn, saving it for a carrier and transports for turn two. The general strategy here is to bide your time, prepare for a joint invasion of Africa and/or France with the US, and then make your move. In this approach, Germany will usually take Africa early on (although they won't hold it presuming their navy has been sunk) and Japan will take India early (and will hold all of Asia for most of the game).

The Focus on India approach is designed to slow Japan down, to make her focus on building up forces and taking India rather than moving west toward Moscow. Against weaker players you may be able to force Japan off Asia from this factory (with reinforcement fighters from UK via Karelia), but against stronger players the factory is doomed.
The Focus on Africa approach is aimed at bottling Germany up in Europe. This works best if you still have your Med sub after turn one and if you were fortunate enough to take out a number of German fighters when they attacked the UK sea zone. With this approach you need to kill off the German Med navy ASAP and then reclaim Africa from within. This almost always works against weaker players, and usually works if Germany has poor rolls at the beginning. If Germany had decent rolls and the player is good, you're going to lose your South African factory sooner than later.
Personally, I prefer and usually play the Ignore Africa and India in the Early Game, especially if I'm going against someone who is a strong player. With this approach you don't spend any additional money or time on India or Africa in the early game. Instead, you build transports, a carrier, and coordinate with the US to take Africa back later (after the German Med navy is destroyed) via landing at Algeria from Spain Sea Zone. With this tactic you are letting Japan have Asia without much effort, so you'll need to make sure Russia heavily fortifies her capital and ensure that the US/UK can get their troop pipeline into Karelia going sooner than later.
If you haven't yet read Don's Axis and Allies Strategic Essays, I heartily recommend them. They give a good overview of the Axis and Allies primary goals and tactics, and then delve into suggested opening moves and game-long plans for each power. (Don is a proponent of the Focus on India strategy for the UK.)

Focus on India: I've had luck (in the right circumstances) with building an American factory in Sinkiang as well. As long as you're sure Japan can't take it that next turn, the two extra tanks per turn in Asia along with the Indian British, can work wonders. I've pushed Japan on mainland China before completely with this strategy.

Focus on Africa: As Germany, I not only counter this strategy but virtually guarantee holding Africa for a while by buying a 2nd Med transport on my first turn. The ability to dump 4 inf or 1 tank/4inf early can easily overwhelm the British units stationed there and can probably over-run a South African factory as well. The investment pays for itself with the extra African IPCs integrated over the 3 or 4 turns you can hold it. Even better, if American and the UK focus on taking back Africa from the Atlantic, that's less pressure on Europe and more time for the Axis ground game to mature.

@Adam: I agree that the Focus on Africa approach is doomed if Germany has a strong Med naval presence. But if the UK battleship and/or sub in the Med survive, that plus a bomber can probably take out at least both transports.

@adam I agree with you that Germany is basically "renting" Africa (and its IPCs). This, of course, is for the purpose of getting enough of an edge on Russia. Then it becomes a race between whether Germany can take Moscow before the Allies get back Africa. Germany and Japan start with 57 IPCs (55 if you remove the two in Africa). The Axis overrun Russia, +24 IPCs and the Allies get Africa. 55+24=79 plus, presumably Sinkiang and China for 83. One more IPC (even Hawaii or New Zealand) gives the Axis EV84.

Britain is challenging to play because it has three basic strategies:

Land-based: Build a factory in South Africa or India. It's hard to get U.K. ground units into the game except through that way.
Air based: Use (and build) bombers for strategic bombing, and hope to cripple the German economy. The downside is that this might not matter if Germany gets enough extra IPCs by conquering Africa. That's unless you get heavy bombing, which means spending IPCs on research.
Seabased: Build battleships to replace units lost in the early going, and sweep the seas of Axis shipping, to provide support for American land and air operations in the Mediterranean.

None of these strategies is totally compelling, meaning that fate depends largely on Russia and the U.S. UK is arguably the hardest country to play: Lots of IPCs to start, but hard to come to grips with the enemy.
And see my piece on the "Kwabang" attack. The British player will suffer even if it SUCCEEDS. In most cases, it's a "sucker" play.

The more I play the less I like UK building factories. For the SA factory, a skilled German player will have their own troops running the factory within 3-5 turns. For an India factory, a skilled and patient Japanese player will have it in 4-8 turns, and to reinforce the Indian factory the UK must cede Africa to Germany for the early game.

@scott I think you're right on the money. Alert Axis players can capture both factories (rather than build their own), making them NEGATIVE contributors. That's why I mentioned the alternative land-based and sea-based strategies.

Depending on the edition, but for 1941-1942 (the current 'standard') I'd say that factory in India only makes sense to relieve russia an doesnt make sense if US doesnt focus on japan AND russia had at least an acceptable round one. Factory in  SA is in my view bad for every strategy: takes too long to do anything

I like the method of just doing what you can in Africa and India without committing to a factory or additional resources.  You will lose both soon but it is better to invest the money into a navy that can escort troops onto mainland Europe.  Instead of dividing your forces and leaving small battles up to chance, concentrate your forces in one area such as a UK invasion of Western Europe, followed by a US occupation.  Or use the UK to invade and hammer Easter Europe and let the Russians through unscathed and ready to hammer the capital.  In my opinion the Allies have it so much better because they can coordinate and concentrate their military offensives and defense whereas the Axis really can't until they meet in Asia.

OH my bad just realized he wanted UK only.  UK is the most under rated player in Axis.  Impossible to take over  great at support and can pull off some good surprise assaults. And can keep Japan at bay by itself.  India is UK's ace up it's sleeve.  My friend and i like to fly fighters in from India to Moscow until there is about 10. then switch to industrial bombing Germany and buying bombers and late game buying Navy and attack Germany.

Destroy the German Navy.
With America and UK help get Germany out of Africa Germany cannot hold it and beat Russia they will be force to buy navy to keep Africa  and it buys the Russia too much time.
use your transports in Australia to move  the infantry from Australia to India then use the transport to move UK infantry from Africa to India.
Once your certain you can hold India buy an industrial complex there.
buy 2 fighters and 1 infantry every turn if money allows ( always buy as many fighters as you can in India and move them to Moscow every turn) this creates a brick wall in Russia that sets the game up for a long game in Allied favor.
once Russia is safe with about 10 or so UK fighters there switch to Bombers and Industrial Bomb Germany  every turn once you get about 4-6 bombers the effect is devastating.  The anti aircraft can sometimes get lucky and shoot down 3 or so but still keep buying Bombers.
I buy 1 bomber a turn with America to help UK industrial Bomb as well.  Once Germany is feeling the pain of industrial bombing start buying Navy with America while still buying Bombers with UK and 1 Bomber with America.  As Soon as America has a Navy at UK buy nothing but transports and infantry with UK and America and attack western Europe you can use the bombers to attack at 4 and use the infantry as cannon fodder.  Its just a matter of time for the Allied  3 turn advantage to win. Germany cannot take Russia due to the industrial bombings and constant western Europe attacks with Bombers and Infantry from UK and America And Russia is sitting Pretty with 50 infantry and 10+ UK fighters. Once Germany is Getting Beat down UK can switch and use the fighters against Japan as well late game.  But we usually Concede if either the Allies take Germany or the Axis Take Russia.

Really the Key is for UK to Use the transport at Australia and use the infantry in Australia and Africa (once Germany has been removed from Africa) to secure India.  India is the Key for the Allies it stops Japan from focusing on Russia and keeps the Axis from getting Africa and can fortify Moscow with UK fighters without having to go through anti  aircraft  in Karelia.
that's how i play UK enjoy

Britain's problem is that her forces are scattered. The key to victory is Germany. You must build a combat fleet and land troops. First turn buy: 1 Carrier, 1 Transport, save 4 IPCs. Use your combat assets to cleanse the Med. At any cost you must destroy any transports the axis possess. Germany must not be allowed to re-inforce Africa. Pull all your troops back to Egypt and fort up. Fear not, help is on the way. This leaves the same number of troops on both sides in contact. 3 inf, 1 armor, 1 fighter. Knowing the relative combat power on attack and defense, you hope the Germans attack, you need the Germans to attack, you should goad your opponent to attack. These are all the troops Germany will be allowed, the sooner they die, the better for you. You give Japan India for free. But you trade 3 ipcs in India for 10 ipcs in Africa. Japan will rove around and smash things up for a while. But she will be contained and eventually destroyed.

The best strategy for the Axis is to focus on Russia.  If you take Russia you win.  Germany must take out UK sea to defend against a back door attack, that way all the tanks and infantry can overwhelm Russia.  Japan must buy Industrial Complexes on 2 of the 3 Asia lands, buy tanks there and use transports to bring in all infantry from the islands and also take out Pearl Harbor sea on the first turn.
The only way the Allies can beat this is if they focus on Germany.  Russia builds a lot to slow them down assuming they can't attack first turn, and the Allies must get a foot hold on Germany that causes him to fight a two front war.  Russia move sea to UK territory, and UK buys an aircraft carrier with 2 planes, then load up on the transports when you know you can defend against Germany's air.  US build up transports and infantry so that once UK breaks Western Germany's line and gets a foot, US can add on with lots of infantry and fighters.  If Germany is not harassed on the west boarder then Russia will be easy once Japan arrives.
The extra money from Africa is nice but don't put any extra resources in taking it for that will only take away your chance for taking Germany or hurt Germany's chance for taking Russia.

The question is for UK strategies, not Axis strategies.

Answers are answers.  If you don't like the answer, downvote.

@LittleBobbyTables - I've raised your flag dispute on meta here.

This answer hypothesizes Axis strategies, then explores UK strategies to beat them. That's "good enough" for an answer.

I disagree with Jhono about doing "Pearl Harbor." Losing the Japanese Navy is a gamble. Sure, it destroys the  American fleet but then Japan has to take the land road to India or leave India all together. America can rebuild it's navy easily, while Japan cannot. India can be a deadly threat to Russia by landing fighters directly into Moscow.  My friend does this; he flies fighters in from India to Moscow. Try taking Moscow with 30+ infantry defending at 2 and 10+ UK fighters defensing at 4. It's not GONNA HAPPEN. My opinion is India is the make or break for the Axis.  Leaving it buys time for the Allies which will win them the game. India can be taken on turn 3 with the whole Japanese air force, navy and some infantry on transports.  Once India is out of the way Japan cannot be stopped and Russia is dead before it even knows it.

For Japan, I take a hybrid approach. I consolidate the Navy around Japan adding two transports. I send 8 infantry at a time with the 5 fighters and bomber to aid in devastating attack. My first goal (2nd round) is "Fortress Mongolia". This position allows attack to nearly anywhere in Asia. Its the Karelia of east asia. Works better to take sinkiang and India than going through China.  Its also great defensively because the allies have to pay for the privilidge to attack it. The Russians are too broke to pay the nuetrality violation and I beg the US to pay the fine to attack my 8+ infantry and 5 fighters. About the 4th round, I buy an additional bomber and use both to industrial bomb russia. Same for germany 4th round. At that point russia doesn't have the IPCs to defend with against the japanese infantry/ fighter push.
If Japan uses this plan, Germany destroys the allied Atlantic fleet, dedicating all of the luftwaffe for Atlantic defense,  takes egypt, and buys med fleet 1st round. 2nd and third round it romps Africa abroad while in Europe It buys only troops and retreats, goading russia to go after it. By third round, germany has also taken Brazil (out of reach of allied bombers) and dominates the atlantic. 4th round transfers 2 fighters to it. The key for Germany is steal the southern IPCs from the allies, sink anything they put in the Atlantic, and hold off the Russians til Japan gets there. Its sort of the allied plan against germany, but in reverse.

This is a good answer, but the question is about UK strategies, not Japan strategies. If you'd like to contribute to Japan strategies, look at questions like this one: http://boardgames.stackexchange.com/questions/4943/in-axis-and-allies-does-it-make-sense-for-japan-to-attack-sinkiang-on-the-first

I won a local A&A event with my German and Japanese blitz tactic.
Japan

DO NOT Pearl Harbor. Consolidate your whole Navy at Japan.  Buy infantry and transports until you are certain you can take India.
Take India.
Move the Japanese fleet with some infantry to Alaska to throw America off; they will freak out for a couple of turns.
Buy nothing but tanks and 1 bomber every turn. Industrial Bomb Russia every turn.  Suicide attack russia with tanks every turn over and over; they cannot afford the loss.

Germany

Destroy the British Navy; you can do this without losing fighters.
Try to take Africa with the transport in the Med. Sea. Don't spend too much energy; you cannot hold it very long but the temp. IPCs help.
Consolidate all of your tanks, fighters, bomber and infantry on Eastern Europe, leaving about 5 infantry on Western Europe to prevent an easy take over.  Begin buying all infantry every turn moving your Eastern Europe army one space a turn with 1 pile of infantry behind it.  Do not worry about Karelia yet.
When you reach Moscow, attack Karalia, then rotate between retaking Karelia or Ukraine over and over, never attacking Moscow directly.  Once they quit trying to retake those two territories start attacking Moscow but retreat after the first attack never allowing your tanks and aircraft to get hit. NEVER split your force to hold both Karelia and Ukraine; the point is to sucker them in to losing the money and a few infantry every turn trying to retake it.  Then reinforce the army with the infantry moving one space a turn from Germany. The combination of attacking once, retreating and reinforcing every turn is devastating to Russia.  This allows Germany and Japan to starve Russia of money and they cant hold out very long. The long term game is in the Allied favor they have 3 turns to your 2 with more money.

The key to the strategy is an early taking of India by Japan by not doing the "Pearl Harbor" and using the Navy to take India. This allows Japan to expand quickly and to starve Russia and to Industrial Bomb Russia and attack with tanks.  Usually 1 bomber 2 tanks from India every turn.  If you can afford it make a factory and do the same in Burma.
Germany just acts like a battering ram of infantry; sooner or later they're going to get in and it's game over.

Welcome to the site and thanks for the answer! It looks like the question's asking specifically about UK strategies though. You should feel free to edit and improve upon your answer if you want to better answer the question.


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How is "shifting" supposed to work in Death Angel?
I've read and re-read the rules for shifting marines, but I'm still completely baffled as to how shifting is supposed to work in Death Angel.
This evening I had the following setup:
Dark Corner - Brother Claudio - Ventilation Duct - Genestealer
       Door - Brother Zael    - Corridor
              Brother Goriel
              Brother Noctis
              Brother Omnio

I used Brother Claudio's "Heroic Charge" attack, and since my die appears to be loaded, I rolled yet another 0 and Brother Claudio died.
The rules for shifting state:

Shifting is resolved by taking every Terrain card, Space Marine card, and Genestaeler card in the smaller segment of the formation and moving them up or down to fill in the slain Space Marine's previous position.
The smallest segment is defined as the half of the formation that contains the least Space Marine cards.  If both segments of the formation are even, the bottom segment is shifted up.

So once Brother Claudio dies, I'm left with this:
Dark Corner - ??????????????? - Ventilation Duct - Genestealer
       Door - Brother Zael    - Corridor
              Brother Goriel
              Brother Noctis
              Brother Omnio

Question 1:  When are the formation halves determined, before or after the marine dies?  And what happens when you have an odd number of marines, what exactly is a segment?  And in this case, does it really even matter?
Question 2: Should (1) the Dark Corner, Ventilation Duct and Genestealer from Claudio's row shift down to Brother Zael, placing the Dark Corner and Door both on Zael's left, and the Ventilation Duct, Corridor and Genestealer on the right?
Door / Dark Corner - Brother Zael    - Ventilation Duct / Corridor - Genestealer
                     Brother Goriel
                     Brother Noctis
                     Brother Omnio

Or (2) should Zael shift up to where Claudio was, Goriel shifts up to where Zael was, and Noctis and Omnio stay where they are, leaving the formation as follows:
Dark Corner - Brother Zael    - Ventilation Duct - Genestealer
       Door - Brother Goriel  - Corridor
              Brother Noctis
              Brother Omnio

Can anyone more clearly sum up the rules for shifting?

by my understanding...
the halves are determined by looking at the space left by the dead marine. So it's after removing him.
I believe that, yes, when claudio dies in your example, the terrain all winds up at the front.

Mostly posting to agree with aramis, but adding in a couple links.

Official Rules
Condensed Rules

As to your first question, I think the wording on page 27 shows the shift (which includes figuring out the larger side) takes place after removing the slain marine:

If a Space Marine is slain (usually by being attacked by a swarm), his
  card is removed from the formation and returned to the game box. The
  formation will then need to be shIfTEd (see page 28).

On page 28 of the official rules, it states:

Shifting is resolved by taking every Terrain card, Space Marine card,
  and Genestealer card in the smaller segment of the formation and
  moving them (up or down) to fill in the slain Space Marine’s previous
  position.

and

When shifting, note that it is possible for more than one Terrain card
  to be in the same position.

From the example on page 29, it's clear terrain next to a slain space marine in the middle of the formation would stay where it is, and have things moved to it, but in your example the only place for the Corner and Duct to go is down, to Zael's position. Moreover, I believe that first quotation makes it clear the Door and Corridor would stay on Zael's position.

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How does Confusion in the Ranks trigger itself upon entering the battlefield?

Under the rulings for Confusion in the Ranks is this gem:

12/1/2004
Confusion in the Ranks triggers on itself entering the battlefield. If an opponent controls an enchantment, exchange Confusion in the Ranks for that enchantment.

For some reason, I simply cannot wrap my brain around this.
How does Confusion in the Ranks trigger itself when it comes into play?  I would have though that by the time it was already in play, it would be too late to trigger itself.
Is there a particular ruling in the Comprehensive Rules that I'm just not seeing?

Triggers look at the board state immediately after the spell resolves and moves from stack to battlefield.  The "event" is object of given type moved from stack (or other zone) to battlefield.  The state of the board is checked for triggers that see that event immediately after the event, and so there it is.  I guess there isn't really a better answer than, the comp rules say so, so here it is!

603.6a Enters-the-battlefield abilities trigger when a permanent enters the battlefield. These are written, “When [this object] enters
  the battlefield, . . . ” or “Whenever a [type] enters the battlefield,
  . . .” Each time an event puts one or more permanents onto the
  battlefield, all permanents on the battlefield (including the
  newcomers) are checked for any enters-the-battlefield triggers that
  match the event.
603.6d Normally, objects that exist immediately after an event are checked to see if the event matched any trigger conditions.

The last line was what I was looking for!  "Each time an event puts one or more permanents onto the battlefield, all permanents on the battlefield (including the newcomers) are checked for any enters-the-battlefield triggers that match the event."  Somehow after all this time, I've missed those points.  Thanks!

Well, compare Confusion in the Ranks to this type of card:

When Banisher Priest enters the battlefield, exile target creature an opponent controls until Banisher Priest leaves the battlefield.

In Magic, cards definitely "see" themselves entering the battlefield. It's a mechanic that gets used all the time.
As far as comp rules go, that's because we check for triggers after an action has occurred:

603.6a ... Each time an event puts one or more permanents onto the battlefield, all permanents on the battlefield (including the newcomers) are checked for any enters-the-battlefield triggers that match the event.

I'm aware of that, I guess my confusion was this:  I cast CitR; CitR resolves.  It's now in play.  Why would it then trigger itself once it's already in play?  It's already in play, I would have thought that only future cards would trigger it.

@LittleBobbyTables It's the same template as Banisher Priest, just more broadly. CitR sees itself enter the battlefield for the same reason that Banisher Priest sees itself enter the battlefield.

@AlexP I think the confusion is more that we've gotten so used to the "When ~ or another [permanent type] [does X]" that clarifies this situation, that this template (which would be weird if formulated that way) is capable of throwing someone for a loop.

i think the example really helps explain this concept.

@Circeus I've seen such clarification-by-redundancy wordings in several games, and every time these eventually caused problems. Sooner or later you run into a situation where you can't insert the usual redundancy, and then the inconsistency causes confusion.

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Before the haunt, can players agree to automatically crack the Vault?
This came up while playing with a bunch of rules lawyers this weekend:
There doesn't seem to be anything in the rules that you must explore a new room every turn, or leave the room you're currently in, or prevent you from ping-ponging between rooms, or basically just waste your turn, which my question hinges on.
Consider the following scenario:

a person discovers the Vault;
that person has a high enough Knowledge trait that a 6+ roll is statistically possible;
the Haunt has not begun yet, so there is no Traitor

The question is:

Based on the assumption that the player in the Vault is statistically guaranteed to open the Vault at some point in the future, can all players not in the Vault simply agree that they will all pass their turns until the Vault is unlocked?  Basically guaranteeing an eventual successful unlocking of the Vault?
Or, to put it more succinctly: before the haunt, if all players agree, can a person in the Vault with enough skill to open it automatically open it?

I can imagine the characters sitting around in a haunted house, bored out of their minds, getting impatient, "Have you opened it yet?", the sun rises, and sets again, everyone is getting hungry, and the person in the vault says, "No, but I think I'm close!"
It seems kind of unsporting but it does run the risk of giving the traitor two sweet, sweet items, and I can't find anything that seems to prevent this.

Great question.  Even if it wasn't, I'd upvote anyway because your name is awesome.

You don't have to do anything on your turn, so if all players agree there's no reason you couldn't give the player who discovers the vault all the turns until they open it.
However, I'd suggest this is tactically a bad idea for the players not in the vault. Until the haunt starts you don't know who is on your team. An individual player could increase his or her own chance of winning by grabbing the sweet, sweet loot for themselves. It would make more sense for all the players who stood a chance of opening the vault to rush there as soon as it is discovered, personally I think that would be much more fun.

I don't see why not. Like you said, you're not forced to do anything useful. Besides, if everyone playing thinks this is the more fun way to play, then who cares what the rules say anyway.

I think the "playing with a bunch of rules lawyers" portion of the original post clearly covered who cared what the rules said.

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Can a single player have all nine potential queens in one game?
I would like to know whether it is possible to, in a single game, convert all eight pawns of one colour into queens while retaining the original queen.
Presume that we are both playing chess competitively from the start of the game. Is there any circumstance where this could happen? Has it happened in the past?

Yes. This thread contains a set of sample games.

That thread is insane ... people have too much time!!

They get all 18 queens on the board.

Theoretically, it is possible.
In practice, it will never happen unless your opponent goes out of their way to let it happen.
It is not unheard of for "real" games to involve one player having 2 queens at the same time, and there are no rules that prohibit multiple pawns from promoting to queens (although don't forget: sometimes it is better to promote to a knight than a queen!).

You would have to go out of your way as well to not inadvertently checkmate your opponent. If you had 5 or 6 queens, you would have to be very careful not to accidentally checkmate your opponent.

@epotter: Well, for you to get that many, your opponent probably has to be complicit anyway, so they could just tuck away their king behind some other pieces and let you do your thing.

@epotter Also, once you've got that many it's very easy to accidentally put the game into a draw.

Like Beofett said it is theoretically possible, but this is something you would only want to attempt while playing a weak computer for the lolz. Strong players who have a habit of playing computers from time to time, like Nakamura, may take pleasure from promoting his excess pawns to knights/bishops and proceed to checkmate the computer with them. Here is one example: http://www.chessgames.com/perl/chessgame?gid=1480850
There are two reasons why it should not happen in a game between to two human players:
If your opponent allows it to happen (i.e. he is weak) you should not prolong his misery any more than necessary (which is bad etiquette). If he is aware that the situation is hopeless he should resign and not allow it to happen as well.

I don't believe "weak playing" would be sufficient for 9 queens.  The opponent would almost have to be actively attempting to assist.

@Beofett allows it to happen. Also, stupidity knows no bounds.


text:
What is the best method to choose whom to lynch on the first day?
When playing Werewolf, my group and I always have the same problem: whom should we lynch on the first day?
In a group of ~10 people, we usually play 2 werewolves plus 2 "seers," who have one shot per night to guess one werewolf. On the first day, either the seers don't have correct information, or it would just be stupid to share information with the group because the werewolves would kill them the next night. Increasing the number of seers or reducing the number of werewolves always seems to unbalance the game too much to one side or the other!
Without any real indicators, we always resort to guesses and "cold reading" people — I think you're the werewolf because I can see it in your face — resulting in many "feel-bad" moments.
What is the best method to choose whom to lynch on the first day?
or
What mechanics can we use to prevent or reduce lynching people at random?

The first day it is awfully random.  However, there are a few rules of thumb you can use.
First, you mentioned the seer, so let's get that out of the way, then the rest of my explanation should work for games without seers.
As a seer you should stay quiet until you've identified a werewolf.  Once you've identified a werewolf:

Say "I am a seer"
Reveal who've you've identified good and bad
The other seers in the game should ALSO admit to being seers, and give the information they've learned

Once this is done, there may be a werewolf masquerading as a seer.  This is fine, as both groups now will kill each other off until there are no more people claiming to be seers.  Since cards are revealed, you now know which seer information to trust and which not to trust.
Next, assume a game with no (more) seers.
To figure out who and how to accuse, consider the following:
As a werewolf:

The odds are against you, accuse the more experienced player
If you feel like the group is a forgiving one, accuse your other werewolf, be antagonistic to him throughout the game.  If this is known it's likely you'll be seen as safe once one of you dies.
Say nothing, at all, ever.  People tend to accuse people seen to have 'agendas'

As a human:

Accuse the most experienced player.  He is the one most likely to succeed at deception.
Accuse the most impatient person.  A werewolf doesn't need to wonder anything.  Wondering takes cognitive cycles, so werewolves tend to be quicker to talk/accuse.
With a 2/8 split, your odds of choosing someone randomly as a villager are 5:2 (71%).  So have all the players, simultaneously, choose a person at random and point to that person.  This is their 'safe' person that they'll 'trust' throughout the game.  If any two people are pointing to each other (the odds are against this), kill that person, else kill the person with the fewest fingers pointing at him.  (NOTE: The two at each other prevents the werewolves from protecting themselves).    Do not change your safe person throughout the game.  If your safe person dies, you do NOT choose a new one.   This technique works not within a single game (the odds of who gets the most safe fingers is random), but across games, as this makes the safer people MORE OFTEN the villagers than the werewolves.  The 'no two at each other rule' also helps to make the werewolves less likely to have the most votes.

BTW, cold-reading, is a perfectly valid strategy.  I correctly identified, on the very first round, a werewolf in 9 of my last 10 games I played.  The biggest tell is a change in people's behavior.  Most people are not good actors and can't help but play differently.

It wasn't my intention to pass cold-reading as an invalid strategy, I was just looking for ways to reduce the bad feeling people get on the first round when they are lynched by no reason and the bad feeling of killing an innocent on a bad hunch.

"since cards are revealed..." is a bit of an assumption. We play where "dead men tell no tales", and identities are kept secret until the end.

No-reveal games are much more difficult. I don't recommend this type of game except for very expert players.

We also reveal cards once we die. Seems to be interesting not to, since people sacrificing themselves for the greater good sometimes just make it really hard for the wolves.

You should play on the fact that no one is really sure of who is who. If I tell you "I am a seer, this guy and that guy are werewolves", who says I'm not a werewolf trying to pretend I'm a seer, just to kill some people faster?
Try that: each one has two roles, a real one and a fake one. Don't change the rules of the game, don't distribute more cards, just tell them to choose another role by themselves and to act during the day as if they were that person.
For example, I may be a werewolf, but I decide to act as if I was the witch (someone else could have the same idea and two people can claim to be the witch). During the day, you can ask anybody who he is, but you have no guarantee that that will be the truth.
By doing that and discussing freely of who is who, you will have a way to determine who to lynch: the one that seems to hide something (well, everybody does, but there are people who hide more hideous things such as "I am a werewolf").
Of course, you can't decide "who is a werewolf" on the first evening, nor can you choose randomly. So playing that way gives you a reason to talk to eachother and maybe find that "Pete's story has some holes in it. Maybe he's not a werewolf, but surely he is a liar. Off with his head!"

Isn't this hard to "implement"? Sure the werewolves are eager to pretend to be another person, but as a villager why should I be pretending to be anything else? My feeling is that people will just play like they do now.


text:
Can you select role which gives you money but you can't use it in Puerto Rico?
I have a situation where a player chooses the Trader because it has 5 coins even though he has nothing to sell in the trading house. Can he do it?

Taken from the rules:

Implementing the action of a character is voluntary (exception: Captain)

Note: You can still choose Captain if you have no goods, the exception just means that if you pull Captain and have goods, you have to ship.

this does not mean that you can't pick captain if you have no good

Just to clarify even further, the other players get a chance to take the action of the role you choose, even if you elect not to.

Definitely
Choosing a role merely for it's privilege is a perfectly valid move. It may not always be wise to choose a role you cannot fully take advantage of but if you are really short on cash such a trade off may be warranted...

as an addendum:  This is also a good way to screw with your opponents.

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.5/


text:
Modern affinity deck without Mox Opal
I am making a modern affinity deck with all the usual cards, Arcbound Ravager, Etched Champion, Inkmoth Nexus and the like.
The problem is I can't afford the Mox Opals - they're over £200 for the play set and that's just crazy.
Mox Opals are used both for early mana ramp and mana colour fixing, not to mention thay are zero cost artifacts that power Metalcraft.
Basically I need a card or cards to replace the 4 Mox Opal missing from the deck that will replicate their function as best as possible.

Can you edit in a link to a particular decklist? Affinity is a tried-and-true paradigm but the deck may change significantly when someone runs across this question in 2016.

Start by accepting that your deck won't be as straight-up competitive as it could be with Mox Opal — it's a staple, and cutting staples, especially for budget reasons, inevitably involves giving away some percentage points here or there. Maybe you can gain some improvements in unusual matchups, though.
#What does Mox Opal do for you?
Consider what Affinity does, in general:

Affinity is a fast aggressive creature deck
Generally, Affinity is an "all-in" deck. The Affinity player wants to dump their hand onto the battlefield as quickly possible in order to power up a card like Cranial Plating. The deck mainly relies on speed to blank a lot of your opponent's card. You have a few cards to dig you out of a stall (Etched Champion, Thoughtcast) but you really aren't trying to grind down an opponent slowly.
It plays a bit like a combo deck, sacrificing individual card power for massive synergy.
There's significant redundancy in kill conditions. Cranial Plating, Ravager + Inkmoth, Signal-Pest-powered beatdown, &c. But your deck generally sucks if you don't have one of your key cards out.

So, what does Mox Opal do in that deck?

It's an accelerator. You can use it to put a Cranial Plating or an Arcbound Ravager down on the field on turn 1.
It's color-fixing in a deck that plays lots of colorless lands (up to 12) and 2-4 colors of spells. Don't underestimate the value of being able to make BB to move Cranial Plating around at instant speed, as well!
It's an artifact. It ups your artifact count for Cranial Plating, Thoughtcast, and Etched Champion. You can sac it to Ravager. It'll keep your Glimmervoid from dying.
It's free. You can dump an Opal onto the field without disrupting the flow of the rest of your turn.
It's a non-creature artifact so it'll survive sweepers (besides the ones people sideboard specifically to hose you). I don't think that's as important right now, ever since Zoo pushed Pyroclasm out of the format.

That's a tough act to follow!
#Suggested alternatives
Here's my best shot.
The most important thing is to remember that consistently executing the deck's overall concept is more important than finding a direct functional replacement for the mana rock.

The closest thing to Mox Opal in functionality is Springleaf Drum. You should be playing a playset of these already, though.
You can also just add lands. Replacing 4 Opals with 4 lands won't do good things for your deck, of course, but you could totally add 1-2 lands. Gemstone Mine (already a staple) and City of Brass/Mana Confluence are decent picks for multicolor support.
Paradise Mantle is a 0-cost card that's basically a worse Springleaf Drum. It's a bit harder to get explosive starts with it due to summoning sickness. The main knock against it, though, is that doubling up on Springleaf Drums stretches your creature base pretty thin. I'd playtest 2 rather than the full 4.
Gitaxian Probe is a 0-cost cantrip. You can run these in the hopes of just getting to your other cards quicker. (It is way better for this purpose than Mishra's Bauble, which is an artifact but pretty terrible.)
Chromatic Star is a bit slow for this deck but it might be a decent color-fixer in a pinch. It cantrips if you feed it to a Ravager, and it counts for Thoughtcast's affinity even if you sac it to make blue mana for the spell (because you calculate costs first, then pay them).
Many Affinity decks already play a singleton Welding Jar. So try 1-2 and see how far that takes you. It's great for pushing through an Inkmoth kill.
You can always just up the creature count and play it more like a beatdown deck. Affinity typically runs some mix of "lords" like Signal Pest, Steel Overseer, and Master of Etherium. Just add the one you don't have already. (If you have all of those already: did you take out Vault Skirge or something? Try putting that Vault Skirge back in.)
You can experiment with maindecking hate cards, especially if you play in a relatively small and cozy environment where you know what decks you'll face:

Spellskite and Phyrexian Revoker are nifty creatures that can mess up a lot of decks (Ethersworn Canonist, too, but you're cutting color depth so I'd stay away from colored artifacts).
Relic of Progenitus is a great non-creature pick, since it cantrips and gives you splash hate against decks that run Goyf and Snapcaster.
Pithing Needle and Grafdigger's Cage can also work if you really, really know your metagame well.
Another way to maindeck hate is to add targeted discard in the form of Thoughtseize, Duress, or maybe Inquisition of Kozilek. Essentially you're accepting that your deck will be just a bit slower than the typical shell, but you're planning to make up for it by disrupting opponents more. You'll want to rejigger your mana to support more black sources to make this work, of course.

To reiterate: you'll probably want to add a land! Even if you go the Paradise Mantle route, none of these cards are quite as fast and flexible as Mox Opal, so you really do just want the extra land to smooth out mana production.
Note that you may need to adjust other cards if you're changing your ability to produce mana — not playing Mox Opal basically guarantees that you can't play the greediest of the Affinity lists.
Above all else, remember that, since there's no drop-in "next best" replacement, you're going to have to test and tune your deck.

(Prices below are approximations for singles, not playsets, using TCGPlayer prices as of 4/16/2014)
Fellwar Stone relies on your opponent having color-producing lands. ~$0.50
Star Compass relies on you having color-producing lands. ~$0.25
Coldsteel Heart comes into play tapped and produces only one color (chosen as it enters the battlefield). ~$1.50
Lotus Bloom takes 3 turns to enter the battlefield and sacrifices itself, although it produces 3 mana. Note: You can recur Lotus Bloom (with something like Salvaging Station) without waiting 3 turns. ~$5.00
Paradise Mantle can turn any of your creatures into a Birds of Paradise. ~$1.25
Springleaf Drum produces similar results to Paradise Mantle, without equip costs or caring about summoning sickness. ~$0.50
The Talisman cycle (Talisman of Dominance, etc.) and the Signet cycle (Azorius Signet, etc.) are both options as well, though each only produces 2 colors. The Signet cycle, while a net gain in mana, requires another mana source to use. The Talisman cycle requires taking damage in order to get colored mana. ~$0.25
All that said, none of the above is really going to compare to any mox, even Mox Opal, the baby of the group. There's a reason Opal costs so much more!

-1 A lot of the picks in this answer don't really account for what Affinity (a hyper-aggro archetype) is doing with Mox Opal. It's not a deck that wants to be casting two-drop mana rocks. (Paradise Mantle and Springleaf Drum are both reasonable.)

@AlexP, That's the problem; there aren't any very good alternatives to Opal. That's why it costs so much.

@AlexP Unless there are some other ideas out there that are missing here, it seems like a reasonable answer - it gives you a pretty good idea how much better Mox Opal is than the substitutes. Sometimes the answer is that there is no answer.

@Jefromi Affinity's not an archetype that needs mana acceleration, though. It just plays some because Mox Opal is AMAZEBALLS in a deck with 30+ cheap artifacts. But you don't necessarily want another mana rock to replace it. Imagine this question was "What should I play in my Jund deck now that they banned Deathrite Shaman?" -- the answer is to find another cheap card that fulfills the needs of the deck, not a mana dork that doesn't.

@AlexP Fair, I suppose; I just think that while this might not be the best possible answer it's not really bad, just maybe doesn't focus in quite the right places.


text:
After failing the test on Dhol Chants, does the card stay in the room or get discarded?
Cards like Dhol Chants state that if you pass the test, you discard the card and receive another one. It doesn't say what to do if you fail the test. Do I discard it also, or do I leave it in that room for the next action turn/next investigator?

If you fail the Test on a card, the investigator holding it still keeps the card UNLESS SPECIFICALLY TOLD TO DISCARD IT.
Your penalty with the tomes is that you've blown your action. The tome remains in your possession, so you can try again.
Reading the question, it seems like there's confusion. When you discover the tome by exploring, it's just equipment you pick up. You have to use another action (normally on another turn) to actually read it, but you can carry it around with you till you find a safe place to do so.

If you pass the test, you get a spell card. If you fail the test, you don't. but the Dhol Chants aren't gone. You can drop it by using an action.


text:
How does Charmed Pendant interact with Reaper King?
Charmed Pendant has the ability

{T}, Put the top card of your library into your graveyard: For each colored mana symbol in that card's mana cost, add one mana of that color to your mana pool. Activate this ability only any time you could cast an instant.

Reaper King has a mana cost made entirely of colorless hybrid symbols. If I turn over Reaper King with Charmed Pendant, can I add any mana to my mana pool? If so, do I have to add one mana of every color? Can I add any colorless mana to my mana pool instead of colored mana?

You have to add WUBRG to your mana pool.
From the Comprehensive Rules:

107.4e Hybrid mana symbols are also colored mana symbols. Each one represents a cost that can be paid in one of two ways, as represented by the two halves of the symbol. A hybrid symbol such as {W/U} can be paid with either white or blue mana, and a monocolored hybrid symbol such as {2/B} can be paid with either one black mana or two mana of any type. A hybrid mana symbol is all of its component colors.

Colorless is not a color, so you cannot add colorless mana to your pool in this case.

105.4. If a player is asked to choose a color, he or she must choose one of the five colors. “Multicolored” is not a color. Neither is “colorless.”

Also note the rules clarification on the card's Gatherer page:

If you flip over a hybrid card, you get one of either color mana, not both, for each mana symbol.

This is just in cases where you flip other, "proper" hybrid cards with 2-colored hybrid mana symbols. In this case, you don't even have a choice as you can't pick colorless for a color.

According to Reaper Kings' notes, it can be paid for with one of each color, or any combination up to 10 colorless. It does include all 5 symbols so therefore you can add 1 mana of each color in this situation.

As far as I can tell, this doesn't really add anything to the existing answer. And it doesn't actually give the same answer, and gives no explanation for the difference.


text:
Is this improvised card game a known game?
I'm looking for the name of the improvised card game for two players with the following rules:

Each player gets 13 cards numbered from 1 to 13 (These could also be from Ace to King).
Both players play a card and place it upside down on the middle of the table, and then turn their cards. The player with the higher number wins the round and scores one point. If the values are equal, no one scores a point. The player with the most points at the end of the game wins.

I have tried searching by description (''card game the card with the higher number wins''), but without success.

Goofspiel
This is a variant of Goofspiel with a single difference: in your version, prizes are equal (each win is worth 1 point), while in the official Goofspiel, each round is worth 1 to 13 points (at the start of each round, you reveal a random card from another suit of 13 cards to determine the prize value of the round).
This game falls within the domain of the Colonel Blotto game, which is studied intensively by game theorists.
Since players choose their next card it is a variant of Colonel Blotto game (unlike in War where players just pick the top card in their deck).

In Colonel Blotto, players are tasked to simultaneously distribute limited resources over several battlefields. The player devoting the most resources to a battlefield wins that battlefield.  The player that won the most battlefields wins the game.

In your variant, players contest over 13 battlefields. Each side poses 1+2+...+13=91 resources, however they must assign the resources to battlefields in set amounts (the value of cards).

What you describe sounds very similar to 'War' or 'Battle'.  There seems to be many different versions of this game such as this here and other examples on wikipedia.
The basic rule in these games is player simultaneously reveal a card and the highest ranked card get a point/ cards added to their deck which is what you described.

Thank you for your answer. I asked the question in order to find easy card games similiar to the one I described. I now find my enjoyment in reading the Category ''Children's card games'' in the Wikipedia-link you provided, so that I can play some (other) easy card games with the young members of my family in the future.

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/


text:
Can you gain a Silver with Trader if the original supply pile was empty?
We had a game with the following relevant cards: Trader and Witch. We're several turns into the game and the Curse pile has emptied. I have a Trader in my hand, and it's Barry's turn. Barry plays Witch to get the cards, I'd like a Silver.
I contend that even though the Curse pile is empty, I would gain a Curse (according to the wording on Trader) and therefore I can gain a Silver instead.
Barry says that since the Curse pile is empty, you wouldn't gain a Curse therefore you can't reveal Trader and in turn, cannot gain a Silver.
Who is right? If possible, please provide sources.

Trash a card from your hand.  Gain a number of Silvers equal to its cost in coins.
  When you would gain a card, you may reveal this from your hand.  If you do, instead gain a Silver.

Also, by your reasoning, you could "buy" (thereby gaining) a curse from an empty deck and (instead, though not really) gain a silver.

"When...would" text is only applied when the event specified actually would occur; if it is impossible for any reason, then the conditional is ignored.  The following is the relevant section in the FAQ:

19.2 "When would"
An ability that happens when an event would occur (such as when you would gain a card), happens before the event actually occurs (before you gain the card). Note however that this ability can only happen if the event would have otherwise occurred, i.e. if the event would have occurred if no when-would abilities had interfered (so you cannot for instance trigger a when-would-gain ability when "trying" to gain a card that's not available in Supply)

Donald X explicitly refers to this exact situation in this post on BoardGameGeek:

Trader only works if you really would gain a card. If you try to gain a card from an empty pile, you can't use Trader then. I see how this is a question and sadly it is not covered in the FAQ.

"When you would gain a card..."
(source - Trader card)
The condition "would gain a card" is not satisfied when there is no card to gain. Hence, there is no reason to think that you should gain a silver. Key word: instead.
Your reasoning doesn't make any sense. What could it possibly mean to gain a curse from an empty curse deck?

GAIN: take a card and add it to your discard pile.
From the rules. Accessed leap day 2012, 16:19 GMT -6
There is no card to take.
There is no gain.

The focus was that you were commanded to gain a Curse by the Witch. That is the time that you have the option to reveal the Trader.

@phasetwenty: To be pedantic, I think the idea is that you reveal the Trader when you would pick up the curse from the pile, not when you're commanded to do so.

Right. "instead of gaining a card,... " means "instead of taking a card and adding it to your discard...".

To be more pedantic, by the "you must do all that you can do" rule,  the Witch's "...gains a Curse card" is bypassed if there's no Curses to go around, since it can't be done.  So there would never be a 'gain' event for Trader's Reaction to react to in the first place.

To be more pedantic still... :) but seriously forks. I have yet to hear of a programming error on isotropic, so I recommend just playing a game with the card(s) in question in the future.

There are known rules errors on Isotropic actually. It plays the Ironworks/Trader or Ironworks/Possession wrong. Also, when there is 1 curse left and you would gain 2 at the same time, it doesn't let you reveal Trader twice to gain 2 Silvers, which it should.


text:
What to do in "Elfenland", if stuck in the desert
There are rare cases in Elfenland, where it is not possible to move away from a certain place for the whole remaining game. E.g. if you are in the desert city and you have no transportation cards for desert terrain. As you cannot play some cards, they never get exchanged.
It seems not to be described in the manual. What would you do? Exchange the players cards?

Thank you Erik for adding better tags. I was not able to create these.

Are you playing with the Caravan rules?  From the rulebook:

If a player cannot play the Travel
  Card(s) required by the type of
  transportation, he can play any three
  Travel Cards (including Raft Travel
  Cards) instead. This move is called a
  “Caravan”. “Caravans” only move on
  roads that provide a type of
  transportation. Caravans do not travel
  on rivers and lakes. If there is an
  Obstacle on the road, the player must
  play any four instead of three Travel
  Cards.

As I understand it, Elfenroads did NOT have this rule, making it easier to get stranded.  Apparently some people hate the Caravan rule because it means players don't have to be supremely careful not to get themselves stuck any more...

all_licenses: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.5/


text:
In Descent, can you make an attack without an implement?
In Descent each character has a number of dice representing their skill with melee, ranged, or magic.  There are also dice added for their weapons.
Can a character attack without a weapon?  Are there any special rules for this?

Yes, a character can attack unarmed.  "If a hero attacks without a weapon, he attacks with his fists.  This is a melee attack that grants one red die and has no special abilities."  (Descent rules, p19.)  So it's a base melee attack using the minimum melee dice - the red plus however many black.
Ranged and Magic attacks cannot be made without a weapon.
If you want to house-rule allowing weaponless attacks of all three kinds, I would argue strongly in favour of using the base red (melee), blue (range) or white (magic) die as well as the black; this is the basic die used for all weapons of that type and is important for game design in distinguishing the range/damage properties of each attack type.  These basic attack dice also carry the important one-in-six automatic-miss chance.

Since all weapons and skills etc. are essentially adding dice to your standard black dice, I would say you'd use only the black dice (or die) you have as standard for that type of attack.
Of course such an attack would be absolutely pants in comparison to a normal attack (1/3 chance of doing 1 damage with no surge conversion), but then so would fists in comparison to an actual weapon; I doubt you could judo throw a dragon.
I suppose this would presume ranged attacks would use bits of rock/rubble from nearby (or spit given the effectiveness), and magical attacks would be using the mage's own innate skill (or just meaningful frowning).

Meaningful frowning gave me quite the chuckle.  Hey, it works for Gandalf.

That's a good summary, and an extra thumbs up for "meaningful frown".

@C. Ross, @LittleBobbyTables: Glad it amused you: "If looks could kill, I'd be bruised."


text:
Recommendations for 6-player board game
What's a good game for six players? Many games can be played by 6 players, but suffer from a loss of pace, and long waits between turns. What games have parallel planning phases, or lots of interaction during turns?
Only one game per answer please (from now on) for voting purposes.

You're exclusively interested in board games, not card games?

Catan has an Expansion that allows for two more players to join in on the fun. The rules have been adapted for intermediate building phases in between player turns, which helps prevent long downtimes.
Twilight Imperium (Although a pretty hardcore game) allows for 6 players out of the box (I believe). It also has a pretty cool action sequence system in play that makes all players make small moves one at a time, instead of one long turn. Downtime between turns is also minimal.
For the more lighthearted games : Koehandel (Don't know the english name), The big Dalmuti, Set and Jungle Speed are all 6+player games, which are also quick and fun!

From what I remember, Twilight Imperium was designed with 6 players in mind, and only adapted to smaller teams.

Catan does work pretty well for 6 players but be sure to budget some extra time.  The additional players can sometimes extend the play time depending on how the board is laid out.  On the plus side, the rules are amended a bit to keep people involved when they aren't the active player.

Hands down, Power Grid is fantastic.  Whenever our gaming group has a game night, Power Grid gets played at some point.  The nice thing is it comes with two different boards, and if you get tired of those, there are expansions for around $10-$15 that come with two new maps and rules.  Once you get the rules down, even with six players, we've found it plays incredibly fast.
If you get the Inns & Cathedrals expansion for Carcassonne, you can play with six players, and Carcassonne is another personal favorite of mine.  It's fun to watch people figure out how to sneak their meeples into a city or farmland for the first time.
If you want something lighthearted, sets from the Munckhin series such as The Good, the Bad and the Munchkin are fun for playing, and have plenty of interaction between players.

I'm a big Powergrid fan, forgot that it's up to 6 players.

The word on the street is that Power Grid isn't really at its best when played with 6 players, but I've certainly enjoyed the 6-player games of it I've been in!

Bohnanza
Players play bean farmers and try to harvest crops to collect coins. This scales up to 7 players and there is a lot of interplayer action on every turn. There is lots of trading between players and the game rewards those who pay attention even when it's not their turn.

I love bohnanza because your turn never really ends. I prefer to play the game with everyone's hands face-up as it makes it easy to learn and adds even more strategy. The negotiations never stop, so the gap between turns is almost non-existant.

While it's more of a card game Citadels offers strong player interaction.  Each round, players do a character draft to determine who they'll be in the next round as they try and build up their city.  The game actually plays better with more people, and can seat up to 8 people.

I couldn't disagree more. Citadels is a brilliant game, and it's definitely best with 4-5, preferably 5. 6 gets convoluted, by the time you get to 8 most of the interesting the strategy is gone.

7 Wonders: Easy to teach.  Plays in 30 to 40 minutes.  Has a fun civ-building theme.  Simultaneous play.  Some interaction with the players to your left and right.  Completely fits the bill for what you're looking for.

I haven't had a chance to play with six players yet. It works really well with 5 players though!

30 40 minutes seems really quick, especially at 6+ players. Still an excellent game and suggestion

Bang
Description from BGG:
Four different Roles are available, each with a unique victory condition:

Sheriff - Kill all Outlaws and the Renegade
Deputy - Protect the Sheriff and kill any Outlaws
Outlaw Kill the Sheriff
Renegade - Be the last person standing

A player's Role is kept secret, except for the Sheriff. Character cards are placed face-up on table, and also track strength (hand limit) in addition to special ability.

This is a good game! Buy it!

Bang! can be fun, but one drawback is that players eliminated early are kind of screwed.  A coincidence of aggression or certain cards can even take out a player on the first turn, leaving him to sit around bored for the rest of the game.

I agree with the comment above. If I play a 6 player game I prefer something where everyone gets to play for the entire game.

@lilserf Yes, it is one from cos of this game.

It's also possible for someone to win on the first or second turn of the game.  Certainly not likely, but I've seen it happen.

Age of Renaissance and Advanced Civilization are two oldies but goodies that play great with 6 players.
They take some time to finish, but it is worth it.
Age of Renaissance is about trading empires in the Mediterranean during the middle ages.
Advanced Civilization is about world building in the Mediterranean from the dawn of time up until the Roman republic.

If someone's concern about six-player games is a loss of pace and long waits between turns, it's very unlikely that a game with a 6-12 hour playing time in which it's not uncommon for 2-3 players to spend 20 minutes optimizing their trades every turn is going to fill the bill.

@Robert, I personally don't find either of those games to have a lot of downtime.  I could well be biased, they are among my favorite games of all time.  Feel free to vote this down if you don't agree.  My groups typically have set a time limit on the trade rounds in Civilization to keep a couple folks from unintentionally blocking progress.  However, I did feel that the trading would be a good thing to the OP, as it should involve all players interacting every round.

@Robert: actually Civilization takes a lot of time mostly because of the trading phase, which involves all players at once

Well, in theory it involves all players at once.  In practice it's not at all uncommon for a player to get to the point where he's got no more profitable trades to make 10 minutes before all the other players have.

@Robert: that's true, but the same could likely be said about any game that allows all players playing at once: you have finished moving and you have to wait for the others to finish too.

It could be said theoretically about any number of possible games.  I was talking about the actual practice of playing Civilization, which in my actual experience involves a lot of doing nothing while you wait for other players to finish up.  There are six-player games that have this to a worse degree - Titan, say - but on the spectrum of six-player games with downtime, Civ is pretty far away from the end that the original questioner is looking for.

@Lo'oris, @Robert - OK, you both have had your say.  Please move along.  Up or down vote the answer as each of you feel appropriate.  Thanks!

Shadows over Camelot is one of my favourite 6 player games. Downtime between turns is minimised, because, as a co-operative game, you can always advise the active player, or plan for your next turn.
If you are a traitor, you can spend other people's turns giving subtly bad advice, too :)

On a similar theme, if you can get 2 more friends around to play, you can open up another great traitor game, Werefolf (or Mafia)

Dominion and its expansions are fantastic with 6 players, although to support 6 you must own both Dominion and Dominion: Intrigue.  Once all players have some experience wait times are very short, and with 6 players the competition for the best Kingdom cards is furious.

6 player Dominion is horrible. I love the game, and am a collector of Dominion expansions, but just no :)

Huh. What issues do you see with it?  I've had nothing but fun.  We play 3 or 4 times a week, usually with 5 or 6 players.

Long game times are frustrating in a game that normally takes about 20 minutes per play. Low availability of cards can result in games being more luck based, as people might just fail to get enough gold to buy scarce cards early on. Longer games + more randomness = disappointed players. I'd always split into two groups of three.

This is probably one of those things that depends on your group, then.  We can play a 6-player game in 30 minutes (depending on set, obviously something attack-filled will drag on) but we've been playing 3 times a week for months and know all the cards, so our average turn length is very short.

Whether it's good or bad, playing Dominion with 2, 3-4 or 5-6 players are all very different experiences. Cards that are very powerful in one scenario fall flat in others, and some cards are downright overpowered with 2 (Possession) or 5-6 (Pirate Ship) players.

Very true. I like it at all sizes, personally :)

As @Andrew Vandever indicates, card selection is key with more or less than 3-4 players.  Any card that effects everyone (most attack cards basically) will 1) be more powerful, and 2) slow the game down. The game can be decent fun for 6 though, one just has to be careful about cards and drive for an aggressive pace: analysis paralysis makes normal Dominion a bit slow, but turns 6 players into an absolute bore.

We should try a 1-minute timer for turns. :)

Here's some suggestions for improving dominion with 5+ people: http://boardgames.stackexchange.com/questions/2552/how-can-i-make-dominion-play-better-with-5-players

Yeah, I'm still of the opinion that house rules and special card selection are unnecessary unless you have new players, in which case it's probably worthwhile to spin out into two games for a couple of runs.

I upvoted this answer because I love Dominion, but I want to echo @Mark Withers's suggestion to break the group into two groups of 3 and rotate through groups throughout the evening.

I think Arkham Horror is the great game for that purpose, especially if you add some expansions to it to make it a bit more harder (core set will be quite easy for so big group of Investigators). You don't wait too long between turns because players take actions in phases and these are resolved pretty quick. And the game is also tons of tun.

I have such a love/hate relationship with Arkham Horror.  I really want to like the game, but there are parts about it I find incredibly clunky, and we've found it plays very slow, especially if someone doesn't know what they're doing.

First couple of plays is usually slower with any game until player are familiar with the rules. But I've been playing AH with even 8-people teams and once everyone knows the game the phases really end quickly.

My old favourite, Diplomacy, isn't particularly fast paced (although the 'Gunboat' variant speeds things up considerably), but both the diplomacy and move planning phases take place in parallel. Only the actual moving of pieces is done one after the other.
The diplomacy stage, when you face any or all of your opponents face to face, in secret, or in the open, is of course as interactive as it can get!

Pictionary is always good for a laugh. Or you could also try Balderdash (or Absolute Balderdash).

Betrayal at the House on the Hill is rather light and is fast-paced even at 6 players. You plays as a character exploring a haunted house, and your available option before the scenario is revealed is to move, turn up a new tile and draw a card. When a scenario starts, and the traitor is revealed, the turn could stretch longer because of combat, but it is still quite fluid.
A Song of Ice and Fire features simultaneous hidden orders. Aside from the analysis paralyze typical of the game and resolution, the hidden order feature makes the game faster than other war-games.

Dutch Blitz, also known as "Ligretto" and a bunch of other names.
It plays 2-12 players very fast, since all play is simultaneous. I've heard it called "speed solitaire", and that's a pretty apt description.
All the player are trying to clear away their piles into a common area, so you have a lot of high-speed interaction, but of very brief length. Mostly in the nature of "hey, I was gonna do that!".
Rounds take between 2-10 minutes, and there's a downtime of about 1-2 minutes while the scores are tallied. Apart from that, all the players are playing all of the time.
The downside to the game is its speed. There's a lot to keep track of, and many beginners will get confused. It the job of the experienced player to get them to stay calm and focus on the basics, until they get familiar enough to "see everything". That only takes 1-2 rounds.

Battlestar Galactica The board game is fantastic.
Plays 6. Massive tension. Co-op game with hidden cylons.
Find the Cylons before they wreck your day.
Downtime is not bad since each player only does 1 move + 1 action + 1 bad thing (flip over the crisis card) during his turn. I find games move fast once people know the rules.
Interaction is key. "You're the cylon!!!!"
There are expansions out for it too.
It's a lot like Shadows over Camelot in some regards.

I'm the Boss is another Sid Sackson classic that plays best with 6. Every turn is about getting enough players together to make a deal. Everybody can participate or at least advise on every deal. When the "I'm the Boss" cards start flying it can get pretty hectic.

An interesting game that I'm pretty sure no one else will mention is a 1998 German game called Die Seidenstrasse.  This is a sort of economic race game in which the players are merchants travelling along the Silk Road.
What makes it work so well with six players:  On your turn, you can do one of two things:  you play a card from your hand to the table in front of you, and apply its effect to you, or you play a card on the table on front of you, and apply its effect on another player.  You can't play a card from your hand if you already have three cards on the table, so after the game gets under way, half the time you're compelled to move someone else on your turn.  Also, you can't just move anyone; you have to move one of the two players who least recently moved.
This makes for a game that seems very chaotic, unless people have played it before and know the cards, in which case there's a surprising amount of strategy for a game where all you do on your turn is play a card.

We've played Tales Of The Arabian Nights quite successfully with a six player group; because you have lots of things to be looking up at any given time, the two books are passed around the table, with player 1 having their turn while player 3 reads the scenario and player 5 looks up the numbers.  Because you're continually switching roles, you don't have to wait longer than a single player's turn with nothing to do.

Sleuth
A classic deduction game that will play up to seven players.

Some bigger wargames can be played in teams as three-v-three games.  World in Flames and A World at War come immediately to mind as monsters that play better with teams than one-on-one.
For a more competitive, individualistic game, I adore Republic of Rome.

I recommend Diplomacy (normally a seven player game). Make Italy a "neutral," and place single armies  (that can be supported by other countries) to defend her cities. This corresponds with historical reality (Italy was a neutral country for a year in World War I.)
Italy is the country people enjoy playing LEAST. In this regard, you don't lose anything by eliminating it. And it actually speeds up the game by having one less player.
Diplomacy also has "parallel phases and lots of interaction between turns."

Junta. Better with 7 but still a lot of fun with 6. Games last 3 - 4 hours and like Diplomacy it's a lot of talking and then the turn occurs.


text:
Interaction in Race For The Galaxy
In Race For The Galaxy, I'm usually focused on my own cards, and only find out who wins during the scoring at the end of the game.
Is this a feature of the game — that is, is it low on interaction? Or is my strategy inadequate?

While low interaction is a frequent critique of the game, I think most experienced players would tell you that you're not playing the game as effectively as you could. First, I'm assuming you're playing the game without the Brink of War rules which add direct player conflict to the game. Second, a large part of the subtlety of the game is the need to very carefully make decisions about role selection - optimally, you want to balance your selection against the roles you think other players will select while avoiding selections that benefit other players more than they benefit you (in other words, you want to maximize the value/activity you achieve during a term while minimizing the value/activity of your opponents).
Another subtle point is the need to review other player's tableaus for point scoring combos - when you see someone else's combo fall into place, it's generally advisable to move the game to its end (unless of course your own combo is up and running and superior). The last tidbit that is typically overlooked is card denial. In most games of RftG, the deck will be shuffled a few times, increasing the odds that your opponents will get the chance to play rarer cards that can shift the victory point totals significantly. Holding on to cards that you intend to spend for a bit longer can mean that a useful card never sees play due to the timing of shuffles!

I'm definitely in the "Card Denial" camp.  One of the best parts of this game is holding/discarding the cards that my opponents need.

I think it is worth extending the answers already here,
As a big fan of RTFG, I do not think there is low or no interaction with other players.  The thing is, that after the learning curve has been surpassed (it is a bit extended) you will find yourself responding to opponent actions or forcing him to do the same.
The model simply doesn't feature card taking (until extensions) nor a visible pool of card that players compete for.
As the game states, it is called Race For the Galaxy, thus you are all racing to build a better empire.  To anyone reading this, if you are a new player:
Ever thought that "the game is too fast" or "I was about to play this or that card"? That's precisely the point, you shouldn't look at your hand only and devise the most point combo, but rather look at your hand and your opponent's tableu: that's the race condition right there; any advantage in developping, settling, trade, etc may give him the edge.
Finally about the takeovers, I will add that while it is true that they allow for direct interaction, they are used rarely at least in all the games I've seen, simply because there's always an alternative to them. Even if there are takeovers it doesn't happen more than 1 or twice in a 4+ players game.

The key interaction that we've found has been the timing of production and consumption roles. If your opponent is always playing the consumption roles, they're getting a bunch of extra cards and points that you aren't. Sometimes you have to play these roles a bit earlier than you would like, just to avoid getting scooped.

You can certainly place Race while in your own "bubble".  Many newbies do this since they're still learning and have too many things to worry about.  However, even though there's no direct or negative interaction (well, exp #2 and exp #3 add takeovers, but you can't always count on that anyways), being able to anticipate what others will call so you can leech off of them, and avoiding phases that help others, while calling phases that help you more are what separate those who win disproportionately more games vs. luck.
heck, uou can even play war games or their rough equivalent like Civilization the Board game, Small World, or Eclipse in your own bubble, but you especially want to pay attention to others here too.

There's no "negative interaction" in this game.  Well, with Rebel Vs. Imperium and Brink Of War expansions, the Takeover mechanic can be optional, and even when it is on, players need the appropriate cards for the TO powers, opponents need to be vulnerable (have certain conditions), and the aggressor needs to have sufficient military strength.
However, there are plenty of other interactions that'll help you play a better game by paying attention to others...
--obviously if someone has 10 to 11 cards on tableau, there's a good chance the game will end in 1 or 2 rounds, so you're better off "mad grabbing" for points than improving your engine.  Especially if those players have larger hand of cards
--If the VP pool is low, and players are collectively sitting on mountains of goods with Consume powers, better pick an action card that'll get you the VP you need (e.g. II to build that 6-cost dev)
--If someone has no cards in hand, there's a decent chance Explore will get called.  If they have goods, you can likely count on a Consume Trade
--If you're looking for specific cards, like a 6-cost dev.. seeing it on another player's tableau means you won't be getting it.  Likewise, the other devs only have 2 copies, so seeing both of them out means the same thing
--If players have powers, they're likely to pick those to exploit those.  For example, military strength tends to do more settling of Military worlds, or Produce bonuses for the sheer card draw.
--player specific ones too, like how some people may call Explore a bit too much

did you notice you had another answer for this question already? What's so different about this one?

I actually did miss that!  I'll see if these should be merged, or something else


text:
Should the core Battlestar Galactica game adopt the revised Cylon Resurrection Ship?
In Battlestar Galactica, revealed Cylon players can use the Resurrection Ship location to pass their unrevealed loyalty cards to another player at the table.  This can be necessary when one player has drawn multiple "You Are A Cylon" cards or can be used to sow confusion by giving "You Are Not A Cylon" cards away.
In the Pegasus expansion, the Resurrection Ship location no longer passes loyalty cards.  Instead, when a Cylon player reveals himself, he always passes his unrevealed cards to another player as part of the reveal process.
It's not clear which situation happened during Pegasus development:

The passing was made part of the reveal process in order to address an imbalance, and the Resurrection Ship location was changed in response to this
The Resurrection Ship location was changed for other reasons, and the passing was moved to the reveal process in response to this.

Having just played a game where I happened to be dealt both "You Are A Cylon" cards, I'm starting to think that the base game should use the Pegasus card-passing rules.
The process of revealing is purposely built so that the Cylon player doesn't get to do any "Cylon actions" until the round after he reveals - for one thing, this prevents a player from revealing and immediately playing his Super Crisis card.
A Cylon dealt both Cylon cards, however, ends up having to wait 2 full rounds to get all the stuff he needs to do done:

He needs to pass the other Cylon card
He needs to play his Super Crisis

Now, he won't always NEED to play the Super Crisis, but in most cases that will probably be true, particularly since there has been only one Cylon player sabotaging things to this point.  Whichever order the Cylon chooses, it's not great for him.  If he passes loyalty cards first, it probably looks pretty suspicious that he didn't play the Super Crisis, but prioritized card-passing more.  The humans are likely to assume the card recipient is now also a Cylon.  On the other hand, if he plays the Super Crisis first, there is one more human available to help against it for a round until the card is finally passed.
This two-turn latency to get all his ducks in a row seems like a harsh penalty, especially on top of the minor penalty that he's been the sole Cylon to this point.  Automatically passing as part of the reveal gets things back to the more "normal" setup - 2 Cylons, and a 1 turn delay before Super Crisis can be played.  It also makes the passing of the loyalty cards something that is not inherently suspicious, since it always happens.
If this had come about in Pegasus through just a rule change listed in the instructions, it would be a no-brainer to apply it to the core game.  But since it involves changes to the board that are affected by other Pegasus-specific stuff, it's not clear how applicable this should be.
Since I haven't played Pegasus, it made me wonder: is there a reason why it would be bad to apply this rule change to the core game?

First, Pegasus allows a Cylon to pass his unrevealed loyalty cards only if they are at distance 6 or less, if they're at 7+ then he's stuck with the cards.
Second, there's no reason why you couldn't use the Pegasus version of the Ship, as long you are using the correct and full version of the Ship. Wherein you only draw one skill card and as an action you may draw a super crisis card.
Although I will point out that this logic that Cylons NEED to play their super crisis card, and spending a turn to pass the loyalty card would only be done if it was the other "You are a Cylon" card is just wrong. Super Crises are situational, no point in playing fleet mobilization if there's nothing on the board. And sowing suspicions is what you want the human players to deal with, otherwise they'll be able to freely XO and get stuff done.

We don't actually HAVE Pegasus, so we couldn't as easily play with the completely changed Cylon board.
The Pegasus rules PDF (http://www.fantasyflightgames.com/ffg_content/Battlestar_Galactica/BSG-Pegasus-rulebook-web.pdf) doesn't mention anything about the distance mattering for passing unrevealed loyalty cards, though.

I'm totally confused, actually - Pegasus also specifies Cylons still draw two skill cards, but they have to be different colors.

I didn't say the Cylon would ONLY pass their cards in this situation, just that it's extremely suspicious. I've played several games of BSG and nobody has used Resurrection Ship until this game with 2 Cylon cards - the other Cylon actions are just more damaging than the suspicion sown by giving your cards away.  The case I described won't happen in every game, but it's most harmful to the Cylon player in the cases where he most needs to play the Super Crisis, and that's a bummer.

Resurrection ship in Pegasus is treated as a a hazardous zone a la brig or sickbay, in this case you can only draw 1 skill card when you start your turn there and can't return to it.

Ah, I see. Didn't realize you were referring to that space in the bit about drawing.

One more thing, the revised RS allows the Cylon Sympathizer to draw super crisis cards, so if you play with the Cylon Sympathizer keep in mind that this will change the balance, but its the only way you can have the other parts.

The only compensation for base game's Res. Ship location was distance can be 7 or less for the handoff, as opposed to Pegasus' 6 distance or less.  However, yeah, sicne you need to use an action in the base game, it's somewhat worse there.
In theory, you could give a cylon player the option to use base game or Peg's Human Fleet location, disregarding infiltrating since that's not possible in the base game.  Even though Daybreak's Res. Ship lets you farm super crisis cards, I wouldn't allow that in the base game.  Perhaps change it to do the super crisis card exchange thing, then draw a skill card


text:
How can I make Shadows Over Camelot play better with 3 or 4 players?
I recently bought Shadows Over Camelot and its a great game, but it seems a shame that it only really works well with 5+ players. Is there anything I could do to combat this and make 3-4 player games more optimal when playing at home? Here's some ideas I had so far:

With 3 players, each player gets to control 2 knights and alternates which one he plays. He plays them as if they were separate eg. he can't swap cards between their hands. Don't use the traitor when playing this way.
With 4 players, one knight is played by all the players. His hand is face up the entire game, and the players make decisions as a group. The collectively played knight cannot be a traitor, but the other players might be.

Does anyone have experience with improving the game with 3-4 people or suggestions to offer?

SoC is one of my favorite games.  I'm going to assume that the answer you're looking for is how to make it easier for 3-4 players.  I actually quite like three to four players games as there are more interesting decisions, risks, and strategies to playing and winning.
To make it easier consider mixing and matching any of these:

Play without a traitor.  Even
with three players you're likely
playing with 8 loyalty cards, so the
traitor isn't likely to be in the
game anyhow.  Removing infighting
and suspicion will make the game
easier.
If you're using a
traitor, don't look at loyalty cards
until 6 swords are around the table.
REMOVE whole sets of fight cards from
the white deck (1-5).  In higher
numbers of players, the game is
easier partially because the knights get to cycle through the white deck making multiple use of special white and merlin cards
Only require two merlin cards to cancel special black cards
Do not play with the grail.  Remove all despair, desolation, and holy grail cards from the decks.  This focuses the number of quests onto a smaller number of knights for balance.  Plus it eliminates a 'boring' quest.  (Grail duty!)
Increase the starting cards and hand limits, allowing longer quests for the knights.

Hand limits?  I wasn't aware that there were supposed to be hand limits...

Indeed.  You may not draw cards at Camelot if you already have 12 or more cards.  A common 7 player strategy is for everyone to fill their hands then white can quickly cycle the white deck.  Of course, don't forget that you need to shuffle BOTH decks when you shuffle white.

Please let us know on here if you try any of these variants and which you like best.

Another idea: Allow players to choose which knight they play, instead of selecting randomly.


text:
What are good strategies involving Remodel?
A basic strategy of using Remodel to upgrade Estates to Remodels, Remodels to Gold, and using Gold to buy or upgrade to Provinces is a powerful but slow strategy, so I haven't been able to win with it.
Are there circumstances in which you would use a Remodel-heavy strategy?  Assume there are no Curses.  How would it work?

I've never found Remodel to be very helpful, but apparently there are strategies for it. I'm gonna have to try it some time...

Be Ruthless!
This is basically an extension of the strategy of trashing all your lame cards presented here. Don't limit yourself to only remodeling Coppers and Remodels. Be ruthless about it: if you get a Remodel in your hand, play it, even if it means passing up other actions, and even if it means you won't get to buy anything. This will keep your deck small and powerful. And, as Powerlord pointed out, this applies to Expand as well, and I'd throw Upgrade into the same box. If Workshop happens to be around, it can speed up the process.

I agree; the key is to Remodel SOMETHING every time you draw it, and to buy more Remodels so you're drawing one every time.  In the initial set, I like to Remodel my Estates into Markets, letting me draw more Remodels.

You can't remodel estates into Markets - the cost difference is too big...

This sounds right to me.  When I was trying out the Remodel strategy in the base set, I don't think I was being ruthless enough.

There has been a new Remodel like card in every set except Alchemy.  Prosperity has Expand ($7), reads identically to Remodel except says $3 instead of $2.  Cornucopia has Remake ($4), which reads similarly to Upgrade but without the +1 Card and +1 Action... but it also says "Do this twice."  The best part of Upgrade and Remake is that you can't get a card back if you trash Curse or a Copper, as the cards you get back have to cost exactly $1 more.

Having said that, Prosperity also has Forge, where you trash multiple cards and gain a card costing the exact combined cost of the cards you trashed combined.

In my experience, heavy use of Remodel works best in conjunction with another strategy; you can't usually rely on it exclusively, but it can give you a strong boost.  Get into the Remodel game early and aggressively (especially when no other trashing options exist).  Most importantly, learn to recognize when other strategies are more powerful than Remodel, and don't be afraid to only buy one and use it only moderately when that's the case.
Remodeling from Coppers and Estates all the way up to Provinces takes a long time, so find a way to buy or gain a lot of Golds through other means, and then use Remodel to bump them to Provinces.  Near the end game, you can be especially aggressive with dumping your Golds, even when it drops your coin in hand down and limits your purchase to a Duchy.
It's also beneficial to combine it with attacks to slow your opponents down enough to let your Remodel strategy come to fruition.

Remodel has 2 major uses, both of which apply games of all very strong players.
1: in the early game, if there are no other better cards to take on turns 1/2 like baron/militia/smithy, then remodel can be a great pick because it let's you trash those estates.
2: in the late game, remodel is used on gold's and nobles to get provinces.  This will very often swing the game if your opponents do not take remodel at the correct time, and you do.

Remodel is especially useful in games without +Buy, allowing you to make an end-game Victory point purchase as well as a remodel.  This can often swing close games to your favor.  I'm a big fan of incorporating Remodel into my strategy and I buy them (and cards like it) early and often.  Great card!!

I'm not sure why you're discounting Curses here, but...
Remodel can be used to turn a Copper/Curse into any 2-cost card.  If you played a Bridge first, you can turn a Copper/Curse into any 3-cost card (because they now cost 2, and a card's cost cannot go below 0).
Remodel can also be used regain cards lost to Saboteur or Swindler.
The strategies presented here also apply to the Prosperity card Expand, but for 3 more.

Discounting curses because that's a pretty obvious reason to get remodel.

Hmm, really? I'd say several other trashing cards would be rather better than Remodel for the purposes of dealing with Curses. Having to gain a 2-cost card is not usually a good thing, unless the set includes Pawn or Lighthouse. I think Remodel is an excellent card, but I don't like having to use it at the low end of the chain: I much prefer Remodelling an Estate or a Remodel.

@AlexC: Believe it or not, there are other 2-cost cards that are useful.  In fact, it's surprising at how many non-terminal two cost cards there are, particularly from Seaside.

@Alex, agreed in general.  Keep in mind, however, that curses are often present in lengthy and low-scoring games.  Remodeling curses (to estates, even) might make a lot of difference.  If you have cards like Baron and Scout, remodeling into estates might actually be useful as well as get you two VPs.

Remodel is great for turning Gold (3 Treasure, Cost 6) into Provinces (6 VPs, Cost 8,) which can quickly get you tons of points and force a game end. This works especially well with Mine (which is in the "basic" set of cards,) Adventurer, and any card(s) which give +2 actions.

Play your +2 actions card(s)
If needed, use Adventurer to get Treasure cards (hopefully Copper/Silver) into your hand
Use Mine(s) to upgrade treasure cards
Remodel Gold -> Province

You will also have lots of Gold in your hand following this strategy, so it may be possible to simply buy Provinces outright.
This build can also be done without Adventurer, but you will want to build a small deck focusing on treasure, +card cards, and +action cards.

P.S. Since I am new I cannot embed images or have more than 2 hyperlinks. If you have mod powers feel free to improve my answer's formatting.

1) Remodel the Remodel Card for Gold (4+6)
2) Buy another Remodel during the buy phase to replace the trashed Remodel
3) precisely depending on the speed of the current game, shift your focus from Gold to Provinces, remodeling gold to provinces for the victory!

"Are there circumstances in which you would use a Remodel-heavy strategy?"