text:
Clocking Android Netrunner
I started playing Netrunner quite recently. Love it so far. However, we're finding it slow--or rather, I think Netrunner is finding us slow. I've only played a handful of games with one friend so far, but our fastest game has been close to 2 hours (and for a single game, not a match!). The impression I get from BGG and the tournament rules is that this is much to slow.
To encourage us to speed up, I thought using a clock would be a good idea. (Also open to other suggestions.) My question is, what time settings and rules should be used? The goal is just to encourage speedy play by introducing a small penalty for slow play.
Run out of time => forfeit doesn't sound like much fun, probably run out of time means your turn immediately ends (after current actions resolve) could work... which would mean having time that resets every turn. And maybe switch the clock while waiting for reactions, e.g., runner declares run on HQ, punches clock while corp decides whether or not to rez first piece of ICE.
How much time should go on the clock? What time settings and rules should we try? Are there established conventions for this?

To be honest, I wouldn't worry so much about slow play when learning, and I would not recommend complicating it further with a clock.  Here are my thoughts:
1) This game requires lots of mental arithmetic, especially when playing as the runner.  How much might that run cost?  Do I have the breaker suite required to make success likely?  What is the worst case scenario?  When you are learning, you can easily fall into analysis paralysis, which will slow the game down.
2) Some more information: Are you playing core only?  Which factions are you playing?  You should know that if you are playing the "FFG Recommended" matchup, Shaper vs. Jinteki, Jinteki is a notoriously slow corp to play/win with, especially against a cautious runner.
3) About tournaments, yes - two hours per game is way too slow.  In a tournament setting, you are typically allotted 65 minutes for two games (playing as both the runner and the corp).  However, because of this, I want to emphasize: decks that play fast are more common in a tournament setting than those that play slower.  For example, one of the most popular builds right now, the "Astrobiotics" deck (an NBN deck that relies on Biotic Labours to score agendas out of hand) is very light on defence and basically crumbles if it doesn't win within the first ten or so turns.  So, there are definitely decks that are really fun to play in casual play, but aren't really brought to tournaments.
4) From the above, know your decks!  If you know exactly what you have in the deck, you will know its strengths and weaknesses, and as you play more, you will start playing it much faster.
My recommendation?  Play more.  And against other people.  I'm sure there are some playgroups in Seattle you and your friend can show up to.  Learn the cardpool.   Having to read each card as it is played will drastically increase playtime.
BUT, if you are set on using a clock, I would just use it to time how long my decisions took in a given match.  If it is above ~35 minutes, consider what could have been played differently.

... 3 months later, this was definitely a good answer. To get up to a decent speed, we just needed a bit more practice and to get familiar with the cards we were using.

So glad to hear!  It is a fantastic game.

I will say, if this is a good answer, might I suggest you mark it as the accepted answer?  :D  Also, I agree with everything said here, but time does need to become a factor at some point.  Wish my Kate deck was viable...  :(


text:
Making 2-player Starcraft more enjoyable
In theory and according to the rules book, Starcraft can be played by 2-6 players. From my own experience and what I heard from others, it does not work at all for 2 players. The random factor gets really high and the game--which takes quite some time to set up--is over within a few moves if one party attacks early on. It is not fun that way.
I have heard from others that it starts getting interesting with 4 or more players. Unfortunately we don't have that many players available, so I am looking for ways to make the game more enjoyable for 2 players. Can anyone provide such house rules or strategies?

Downvoting because this is asking for recommendations of house rules to solve a problem, as mentioned on meta. The suggested rewrite, in this case, would be something like "What strategies can be used to counter early attacks in 2-player Starcraft?"

@DaveDuPlantis I felt like the question was very borderline on whether it needed editing or not. I made some minor changes to make it less recommendation-y. What do you think of it now? (Also @ Demento feel free to rollback.)

The first tip in the meta question Dave cites is "focus on what issue you are trying to resolve", which I think this question already did very well.

@shujaa, it's better, but I think the type of question that works best in this situation is more specific than "how do we make X more enjoyable?" That seems to me to be subjective and not such a good fit for this format. I really don't think asking for house rules is something that fits well; it's specifically mentioned in that meta post, and is more likely to lead into a discussion of house rules. Sticking with the perceived issues - randomness and quick games - and asking if that's an issue with 2-player Starcraft is, I think, a better way to go.

The Brood War expansion includes a number of scenarios, one of which is explicitly designed for two players.  The gameplay in a scenario is pretty much the same as the core game, except with predetermined galaxy layout and often some form of "capture the objective"-style mechanic added (the two-player scenario, for example, prevents either side from moving onto the Terran's home planet unless they have control of a "bridge" zone first).  I don't have the rulebook handy for reference so I don't know if the two-player scenario is entirely playable with only base-set pieces.
Fantasy Flight Games offers this scenario for free download, which is for four players (two teams of two players); there's no reason it can't be played with two players each playing both factions of a team.  It does however require pieces from the expansion.

To be honest I think the game function very well with only two players. In fact the best game I ever played was with just two people. I think it mostly comes down understanding the game mechanics that allow you to stop early attacks such as the air defense module and simply blocking their orders. If you're looking for ways to prevent super early aggression I have a few ideas...
Add a Planet
Obviously this will change a few dynamics in how special victories are can be obtained but this is actually a recommendation made in the expansion pack rule book. With this they recommend increasing the point limit but in a two player game one extra planet will make a pretty small difference and allow for more room to breathe before players are able to attack each other.
No Mobilize Orders on Home Planet
During the first planning phase don't allow players to place Mobilize orders on planets with other players home base. Going through a whole round without threat of attack is more than enough time to prepare adequate defenses.
Strategies to Prevent
Getting the air defense module severely limits the other players ability to be aggressive. By dropping your base on an area with a high supply cap (3 or 4) and getting the module, this makes it so that they have to land elsewhere on the planet first before they can attack your base. This allows you to be the attacker and arrange the fight how you want. Another thing to remember is that if they are building a lot of units early on they may be preparing for an attack. During this time investing in some better buildings or upgrades can lead to you have one better unit than them which could make their attacks very hard in the future if you hold them off.
Hope some of this helps. Like I said, I've played a fair amount of 1v1 games and they were actually quite fun. More people is a lot of fun but the game is definitely enjoyable with just two.
P.S. as was mentioned before the expansion pack has some great scenarios, one of which is specifically designed for two players. There are also a few new mechanics that I think help out with the problem you mentioned, in particular the defend order which makes stopping early aggression much easier.

Since Starcraft supports Team Play Variant, couldn't you an your opponent each play both people on a single team? (is Team Play also unbalanced?)
Otherwise, you will have to develop some sort of AI, or alternate turns controlling a third player (if that is possible strategically).

source: Stack Exchange

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

sort: votes


text:
Solitaire rules for Catan Card Game?
I want to play the Catan Card Game more often than I can find someone with the patience to play it with me. I know there are some good solitaire rules for Settlers of Catan, but are there any for the Catan Card Game?

It has been more than a year since I've asked this question. So, here are the rule modifications that I've play-tested. It seems to balance well, though I would like the game to go a little longer.
Objective: Get 12 victory points before 3 years are up.

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

Feel free to critique.

Late reply is exceedingly late, but oh well. I tested these rules out and liked them; I also came up with some modifications I think add a little length and tension to the game.
Objective: Get 16 victory points before 4 years are up. (N.B. this is theoretically extensible for use with add-ons et cetera- the 4VP/1yr formula seems to balance decently.)
Additional stipulations:

Do not remove the "Conflict" event.
At the beginning of the game, roll the resource die 3 times, taking the top card of the appropriate development card pile each time (roll again on a 6). Place these 3 cards off to the side; they are the neutral player's hand, which can be affected by "Spy" cards or "Conflict" events (if you have earned the knight token).
If, at the end of your turn (after you have refilled your hand if applicable), the neutral hand has less than 3 cards: roll to refill the neutral hand to 3 cards in the same way as at the beginning of the game.
Every time the "Year End" card is drawn, repeat the process from the beginning of the game of shuffling 4 random cards along with it and placing them at the bottom of the pile. (N.B. this is also theoretically extensible in both directions- it excludes 0-X events from the current year, where X is the number shuffled along with the "Year End" card, so game length will tend to increase as X decreases, and vice versa. However, this also reduces or intensifies the impact of luck respectively- X=4 is a good balance of all factors.)
When playing development cards, you must respect type: red developments can be played only on the additional spaces provided by a city. These may be built before or after green developments, but a city may only have 0-2 green developments and 0-2 red developments.
A settlement (town or city) is considered "complete" when all of its development spaces are occupied (2 for a town, 4 for a city). Developments in a settlement confer their effects as normal (for example, knights contributing strength towards the knight token), but nothing in a settlement- including the settlement itself- is worth any VP until that settlement is complete. (This means a completed village is once again worth 0 VP upon upgrading to a city.)

Possibly intended by original author but not explicitly mentioned:

Rolling a windmill on the event die while in possession of the windmill token entitles you to a free resource, as though you "stole" it from the neutral player
The same goes for the "Merchant" cards, which essentially become free one-time 1:2 trades.

Again, feel free to critique.

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

all_licenses: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/


text:
What is the value of the Iron Throne track?
I have only played the game once, but after that experience I do not see why anyone would bid on the Iron Throne track.
The main advantage it offers is to go first, but I never could see a use in it.  It always seems like it was best to go last, waiting to see opponents' actions.
Holding the throne token also did not seem useful. Ties are not very common, especially ties involving you in particular, and unlike Dice Town, there is no material reward a player can offer you for picking them.
In my case, playing House Baratheon, it was even less useful, as being last makes Stannis more valuable.
The game is so well designed and deep that it feels like I am missing some large advantage that the track offers.  What is its value?

Is the game of thrones board game, or living card game? I think it is the former, since I own the latter (although I haven't had time to play a game) and don't remember the iron throne track.

I am referring to the board game.  I may be using the wrong words because i was taut the game and never read the rules. What i am speaking of is the 3 positions that are bid on, where you win the throne, the valerien steel sword, and the raven.  If anyone knows the right name, please edit my question

The question is appropriately named and tagged. (As of now, we don't have any questions about the living card game.)

Control of the Iron Throne grants you the decision in all (non-battle) ties, not just ties involving you.  This can be useful to try and balance other players in respect to your own position (weaken closer players, for example, or the ones with a stronger board position).
The ability to resolve ties can be quite important when bidding, which can happen in two primary places.  First, once the bid for the Iron Throne has resolved and the order is determined, the new holder of the Iron Throne now resolves ties in the bids for the Fiefdom (sword) and King's Court (raven) tracks.  This allows the holder of the Iron Throne to bid less than otherwise and still have a reasonable assurance of a decent placement.  The positioning of other houses can also be important at this point.  Second, the bidding to defeat wilding attacks: the holder of the Iron Throne determines who gets the benefits or penalties in case there is a tie for the high or low bidder.
Finally, although it is often beneficial to let others go first in order of play, it can also be beneficial to go before your opponents.  For example, your Raid order could remove another Raid order before it has the chance to remove your Support order.
All that said, while there are advantages, I usually bid harder for the King's Court track than any other, myself. I love the starred orders too much.

So would, bid for first, or don't bed be good advice?

@Andrey: I really couldn't say, since it is vastly situationally dependent.  There are times I ignore bidding on the Iron Throne, and at least once where I won the game by bidding on (and winning) the throne.  I depends on what you are trying to accomplish, what others are trying to accomplish, and how much influence everyone has to bid with.

I've found having the Iron Throne to be very useful at the end of the game when I'm making a final grab for a stronghold. It gives you the opportunity to make a grab for the last point or two before anyone else can march. Additionally, the Iron Throne track is part of the tiebreaker. Granted, it's the last step after Stronghold count, supply strength, and power, but it could potentially happen.

Seconding EvilAmarant's comment - if two players have 6 stronghold/castles, the winner is likely to come down to whoever has first march. Both players will likely have their eye on a stronghold which can be captured in the move, and if one of those has first move according to the throne track, they are likely to be the winner.

Iron throne is indeed invaluable to select WHO gets to win bids for the starred orders and the other track. in the game i played, i was the leader on all 3 tracks whenever i had the first. and tended to get shunted back a whole lot when i WASNT the throne leader. since i actually was doing great and people DIDNT want me to have all 3 tracks. so they made me the "loser" of the 3 tracks instead... and THATS harsh. Plus raid is only useful if it lands before the other's guy raid (or order you'd rather remove before they before they raid your raid) [answer converted to comment]

another important aspect of going first that is often overlooked is how it effects siege engine (i play the game in a foreign language, so if that is not what it's called, i assume you know what i'm referring to all the same). since its only value is when it attacks, if you have it adjacent to an opponent, going first could be the difference of having a siege engine or losing it entirely. i hope this helps.

Although I'd usually consider the Throne the lowest priority to bid on it is possibly the best option if everybody is low on Influence Markers (e.g. if you bid two turns in a row or right after a wildling attack). In that case the average bid on everything is rather low and a lot of ties occur. To be king can grant you the best average for them all.
Besides it is one of few ways to influence all the map - even that dreaded super-player you don't share a border with. Tie breaking is subtle and while not usually a huge advantage for you individually it is still an influential power for the big picture.
Also people may share the oppinion of the thrown being a low priority so it can be snatched cheaply at times - especially if you are king to begin with and decide a potential tie. Kings sometimes establish themselves early and stay on the throne throughout since often nobody really challenges him on that while he can get the throne cheapest (tie breaking).
The positions 2 - 6 however are nothing I'd really bid on (as opposed to Raven and sword where the difference between 2 and 6 is huge). Nonetheless the turn order can be quite relevant for the finish.
Imagine you conquer one to three castles for a total of 6 but aren't able to really secure it. Unless the orders that your opponents chose for this turn (before knowing you'd advance) allow them to react immediately they will have zero opportunity to attack. This turn they may be taken by surprised, next turn you can finish before they can do anything about it. If you move before your neighbors do that is. Even an indefensible position doesn't matter if the opponent can't attack. You don't necessarily need the #1 spot on the throne either as long as those that actually threaten your castles move after you. This way you can realisticly take up to four castles before the enemy can do anything about it, albeit in two turns.
The risk is twofold: for one thing they may not be surprise-chained after all and stop / undo your initial gains before the turn ends. Secondly the Westeros phase in the follow up turn can change your position on the throne: you may not go first after all even if you did this turn around. If you fail you can expect heavy punishment.
In any case this can potentially be a chance to win from behind, especially if you combine it with siege weapons (this strategy doesn't defend anyway after all). You don't even need to leave troops but merely markers since you don't plan on defending - a small army may be all you need.


text:
Creating an "Everyone but me knows my role" mechanic
I am trying to design a game where there are X citizens + 1 saboteur.  Unfortunately for the saboteur he does not know that he is it.  All the citizens know that one of them is replaced, and they all have a "guess" as to who the saboteur is, but they can't be sure if their guess is correct of if they are themself the saboteur.
I want every person to know that it is either a specific player or themselves. Everyone's "guess" for the saboteur is correct, except for the saboteur, whose guess is another player at random.
My initial thought was to deal out role cards, and have everyone reveal their cards to everyone else but not look at their own card.  This unfortunately does not work.  The saboteur would just not see any saboteur cards and know he is it.
Is there any way to set this up without using a moderator?

Neat idea, but I don't see how it's possible. If you are a citizen, then you said you will know who it is. Thus, the saboteur will know he is the saboteur because unlike a citizen, he wasn't told who the saboteur was.

The saboteur thus has some other citizen told to him.  Everyone just knows its that guy, or you

Ah ok. I like it!

This question should be closed for being unclear, you already answered your own question, "I want every person to know that it is either a specific player or themselves." Every other player does knows who the saboteur is, because he has it Indian-style above his head. The saboteur knows it is himself, because he doesn't see a saboteur card. Everyone knows. QED

@user1873 Disagree. Perhaps it needs re-wording, but I believe the real goal is "I want every person to be able to know that the saboteur is either himself or one other player, but no player can be sure whether he himself is the saboteur."

@shujaa, that is precisely my point, the Question isn't well defined and your fix is worse, "I want every person to be able to know that the saboteur is either himself or one other player, but no player can be sure whether he himself is the saboteur." (This is accomplished by having a single saboteur card, and not revealing the role cards.)

@shujaa, "my answer," Your answer to what question? As I have pointed out, you don't know what question you are supposed to be answering.

@Andrey I'm going to edit your question a bit for clarity. Please do rollback or modify if any of my assumptions are incorrect.

While this comment isn't exactly on topic, it bugs me: how is this game supposed to be fun? How can you be sabotaging without knowing that you are supposed to do that? How can you make meaningful decisions while you dont know your goal? If the whole game is about detrmining your own identity, what would be the clues? If the players can freely communicate, its enough if two players agree on who the saboteur is. If not, how do they deduce it? I cant really wrap my head around the purpose of such a split of roles.

Working Solution:
For n players, you need two identical decks of cards, each with cards numbered 1 to n-1. Keep the first deck ordered from 1 at the bottom, to n-1 at the top, and add a random card from the second deck to the top of the first deck. Set the rest of the second deck aside. Each player will get a single card from the first deck, telling them the relative position of the (alleged) saboteur. For example, if you get a 2 that means the saboteur is the 2nd person to your left (or yourself). Because the cards are ordered, all the cards from the first deck will point to the same person. The one card from the other deck points to another player at random.
To distribute the cards, the order must be maintained but the starting point can be anywhere in the deck. So, the deck is "shuffled" by repeatedly cutting it, which preserves the order but randomizes the start. If the cards are dealt clockwise (to the left), then the relative positions will be also be clockwise.
Characteristics:
Everyone has equal probability of being the saboteur, and the civilian the saboteur is mistakenly suspicious of is chosen with equal probability. Equipment is relatively simple, you only need 2*(n-1) cards where n is the maximum number of players. Two decks of playing cards with the same backs could be used in a pinch. (With a bit of preparation, a single deck could be used. Separate out A through n-1 in two suits, and pick one of each rank at random to separate the two "decks".) The only drawback I see is that mis-shuffling will mess things up, but if players are careful it shouldn't be a problem.
For a worked example of this scheme see TTTPPP's answer.

I'll save my previous solution attempts below, none work completely as the one above does.
Almost Solution: Lots of ranked cards
Have many more uniquely ranked cards than players, e.g. cards numbered 1 to 100. Every player is dealt one card, and whoever has the lowest number is the saboteur. Players reveal their cards, as you suggest, to everyone but themselves (maybe Indian Poker-style, card on forehead). It generalizes: need more than one saboteur? Use the two lowest cards. Need a unknowing "citizen leader"? Whoever has the highest card.
You could even do it with a regular deck of playing cards. Just determine a rank order (make sure everyone knows if Aces are high or low) and a suit order to breaks ties in rank (such as Clubs, Spades, Hearts, Diamonds, as in Sheepshead--which is where I got this idea).
Pros:
Everyone has a guess to who the saboteur is. Everyone except the saboteur is right about their guess. It can be implemented with standard supplies.
Cons:
The non-saboteurs can't be 100% sure that they aren't the saboteur--but I really don't see a way around this. It requires a large number of cards that probably won't have another use in the game. During the reveal, there's a danger of people accidentally giving it away by asking questions clarifying the ranking of cards/staring/asking another player to confirm who they think the saboteur is.
It also enables people to make some educated guesses--if no one else has a particularly low card, you might get suspicious that you're the saboteur. My guess is people will overthink this and it will actually throw people off more often than it will give a good hint, which might end up making things more exciting.
Other Brainstorming: Cards numbered from 1 to n+1
This has a slightly different result, but it might be on to something so I'm recording it here in case it inspires someone else: If you have n players, have n+1 cards labeled from 1 to n+1. Deal each player one card, with the remaining card remaining hidden (call it the hole card). The saboteur is whoever holds the card one above the hole card, with the 1 card considered one above the n+1 card. As above, everyone reveals their card to all but themselves. Let's say we have n=5 players, so 6 cards, and the 3 card is the hole card. The two people adjacent to the hole card (including the saboteur, who is 1 above the hole card) see a "big hole", so they know that their card is either 1 above or 1 below the hole card, so they know they have a 50% probability of being the saboteur, and that whoever is above the big hole is the only other possibility. The people who are not adjacent the hole card see two small holes, so they can also narrow the saboteur down to two possibilities, but they know for sure that they themselves are not the saboteur.

I was thinking something like this.  Biggest problem is that if the 1 comes out, the cat is out of the bag.  My idea was that if the 1 is out, then 100 beats it.  If the 1 and the 100 are out the 99 beats it, and so on

Hmmm. That might make using playing cards better. If 1 is out, then odds are still low that 100 is out too. With cards, you could say if Aces are out, then Kings are low... I'll keep thinking about it. Feels like there ought to be a workaround.

I think it's fine if a 1 comes out... then the other players know for a fact who the saboteur is, but the saboteur still doesn't know that it's him. The only way the sab. would know for sure is if all the other players have the highest possible numbers.

@GendoIkari it's not totally clear in the question, but I think Andrey wants everyone to have some possibility that they are the saboteur, but to have a single other person they think could also be the saboteur. (I didn't realize this until the comment above.)

Hi shujaa, I don't have a problem creating one 'best' answer, consisting of the best ideas from all the answers, but it would be nice if you could at least add a reference to my answer below (assuming that's where the latest edit is taken from). Thanks!

@tttppp Sorry! I honestly didn't even see yours. I was thinking on it all day and came up with the same answer. I'll just reference yours since you beat me to it. Sorry for not noticing. I'm amazed at the similarity even in our write-ups!

@shujaa I've just edited our solution back in at the top of your answer, with some (very) minor edits to make the two identical.  That way this can stay as the comprehensive answer (yours had some nice analysis). When I first saw you'd got the same answer I thought it must have been copied, but I've spent several hours trying to come up with another method that works just as well and failed!  Consequently I can definitely believe you came up with the same thing.

Take two decks of cards with the numbers 1 to n-1 on them. The first deck should be in order, 1 at the bottom and n-1 at the top.  The second deck should be shuffled.  Put one card at random from the second deck face down on top of the first deck. Pass the created deck around the table, with people cutting and restacking it, so that the cards remain in the same order, but no one knows which card is at the top. Deal one card to each player around the table in a clockwise direction.
The chosen player is the one with the random card from the second deck.  Each player holds a card with some number x on it, and knows that either they have been chosen, or it is the player x places clockwise around the table.
Worked example for ten players (all cards are face down, top of deck is at the left)

Initial decks
First Deck: 9,8,7,6,5,4,3,2,1
Second Deck: 4,2,5,1,9,6,7,3,8

Add random card to first deck
First Deck: 5,9,8,7,6,5,4,3,2,1

Cut several times
First Deck: 5,4,3,2,1,5,9,8,7,6

Deal to players A to J
A5 B4 C3 D2 E1 F5 G9 H8 I7 J6

By looking at their card, most players know that either they have been selected, or that player F has been selected. F knows that either they have been selected, or player A has.

Enthusiastic +1 for coming up with this idea first, and enthusiastic thanks for working together on creating a great, comprehensive answer!

Eventually, the saboteur must learn that he is the saboteur, otherwise he won't be able to sabotage anything (unless the game is entirely predetermined, in which case it isn't actually a game, like snakes and ladders).
But you can delay his learning of his role. Let's say that each player has certain actions they can take (maybe they have cards to play). You can set it up so only the saboteur has cards that are sabotage cards, and that he doesn't see them until a few turns in. This can be accomplished with something like:

Cards are separated into two piles: a large 'good' pile and a small 'bad' pile.
Cards are separated further into piles for each player. Only one of the piles will have any bad cards (and may optionally contain a few good cards).
A person who did not do the separations above proceeds to randomize the position of each pile. In this way, no player knows which pile is the bad pile.
A few good cards are then put on the top of each pile. This will delay the revelation of who the bad player is until a few turns in (at which point, he may well have the best 'good' setup, only to learn he has to destroy it!! Mwahahaha!!)

Now perhaps you're not using cards, but you might be able to do something similar to this, or use it as inspiration for a cool mechanic.

In the game as planned, the last action of the game will be to decide to do the sabotage or not.  If you are a citizen and you do it you just loose.  If you are the saboteur you win alone.  If you do not and are the saboteur you loose.  if you do not and the saboteur does not, you win.  I am not yet sure about the middle:)

@Andrey So... the entire win/lose condition hinges on the saboteur trying to guess or deduce that they are the saboteur, and make the correct decision for the last action?

Yes, this would be about as deep as 1 night werewolf

Maybe you can change the game such that there are multiple saboteur roles(except less likely to come up), and then just not deal all of the role cards.
It might also be interesting to see how the game plays out when there are no saboteurs

That sounds workable: with N players, have (at most N-1) citizen cards and (at least 2) saboteur cards, so that at least one card will go unused. Of course, if you can see 2 (or whatever) saboteur cards, you can still conclusively prove that you're not a saboteur. Perhaps with N players, you have N citizen and N saboteur cards? Can the game still work with far more saboteurs than citizens?

@PaulMarshall you can just change the number of saboteur cards every game so that people can't just make that assumption

But somebody's going to know the number of saboteur cards: the person who created the set of cards to deal out. Of course, to be fair, that person could not play... but now you have a moderator, and OP is trying to avoid that.

@PaulMarshall Having a variable number of evil is easy.  good cards = to players+ X evil cards.  Shuffle cards. Deal 1 to each player.  Do not reveal the ones not used.

But the guy who does the shuffling knows exactly how many evil cards there are. Even if he doesn't reveal the number of unused cards to the other players at the table, he'll know: he has to gather the correct number of good cards and evil cards to create the deck he's going to shuffle. So one player is going to have special knowledge about the game that nobody else has.

Have the deal deck include 2 or 3 saboteurs, but be 2 or three cards larger than the number of players. Therefore, if he doesn't see a saboteur, he knows he's it, but seeing one doesn't let him off the hook.
Or, Deal 2 cards to each player. Each shows them to everyone else without looking. Then, after the process, everyone randomly picks one of their two, and discards face down the other. Everyone knows who might be the saboteur except the saboteur.  Works best if there are multiple saboteur cards.

You'd need something else to make the game interesting, but as far as I understand it you could probably just draw 5 citizen cards and 1 saboteur card and put them face down in front of each person, so nobody knows who anybody is.  Then they have to try to decide if they want to do the sabotage not knowing if they are a citizen or a saboteur.  If they decide to do it, they look at their card and if they're the saboteur, they win.  If they're a citizen, they reveal their identity to the group and are out.  That way each unsuccessful attempt increases everyone else's probabilities of being the saboteur.
You could also do something like Mafia where everyone has to try to vote on who they think the saboteur is.  Or something like that.

Sounds pointless of no one knows


text:
General advice for maximizing fun playing multiple games of Dominion
My girlfriend and I are a bit late to getting Dominion but so far are really enjoying it - we have the base set and just bought Intrigue. We don't have a lot of time to play (and so far at least have only played Dominion two player against ourselves) so I'm looking for some general "meta game" advice to maximize our fun when we do get a chance to play.
At the moment the one technique which we have adopted that is fun for us is to do the following:

we use the randomizer cards for the set we are playing with (since we just got Intrigue we still want to play with just it a bunch of times before we mix the sets) and deal out 10 cards to play with
we then reserve the remaining 15 cards and when we finish the first game, instead of reshuffling the randomizers we simply deal off the next 10 cards.

This insures that when we play two games back to back we experience two completely different games and play with 20 different cards.
Are there any other similar meta-game techniques people have to add to the enjoyment of playing Dominion - especially techniques for players who don't get a lot of time to play boardgames?
We don't have any of the Promo cards though I've thought about trying to get the Black Market card as playing with that would similarly allow us to experience a greater variety of card interactions (albiet with introducing more randomness to the game)
(I'm open to making this a wiki if people think that is the best format for this type of question)

This rather presupposes that not getting the same card in two consecutive games is a good thing.  One of my problems with Dominion is that sometimes I'm just starting to get a handle on a good way to use a particular cards... and then the game ends.  So I quite like Adam's suggestion below, because it creates the possibility of playing with similar card combos repeatedly (at least until you're totally bored of them)!

Yes. Hence my question. We do like playing this way to get to see all of the cards but also realize that it isn't the only way we might play. We do however enjoy the variation between games - it is good to alternate strategies and to try different approaches.

We've used a mixture of user-selected and randomly selected cards. One scheme that's worked: each player gets to pick one card they don't want in the next game (this is done first), and then two cards they do want in the deck. The remaining 2 cards are selected at random. (This was for a 4-player game; in a two-player game I'd experiment with 1 or 2 banned cards and 2 or 3 selected cards).
The purpose of this method is to give each player the ability to tailor the deck to include a couple of kingdom cards they think might be synergistic, enabling them to try out a new strategy. Also, as the latter players select their cards they're able to try out counters and other means of blocking what they think the other player's strategies might be.
Once you become experienced and comfortable with the cards and the potential interactions this method turns into a meta-game that may detract from the fun, but early on, while you're still learning the ins-and-outs of a new set of cards, it's an easy way to design decks to test out specific theories--and the random cards that are still in each game provide a mechanism for random learning and discovery.

thanks - we might experiment with something like this to get a mix of chosen & random cards - definitely a good alternative approach we'll try.

My group usually uses a randomizer app.
When we are trying to make sure that we see every card over a couple of play sessions, we select the new kingdom cards by replacing cards that were bought in the previous game while leaving in cards that were not bought. This gets some variety into the set while encouraging us to find ways to use seemingly less useful cards.

hmm I hadn't thought about this twist - perhaps we'll try keeping any card we either didn't buy or only bought one of (i.e. both players didn't try playing with it).

Have you worked through all the suggested combinations in the rules booklets yet?    Each of those sets ups has a certain play style and generally plays quite well.  When playing random games, cards may not show a lot of synergy between them.  This makes it more challenging to play, but also can slow down the game if your lacking cards that give extra actions, or have a lot of similar cards.  Even for random games, the group I play with tends to make adjustments in the cards on the table to make the game more exciting for us.
The group I play with also doesn't play games heavy on attack cards back to back.  Attack cards can be really frustrating when you keep getting hit by them, and if that's what the game degenerates into, I personally don't enjoy it as much.  There is more tension in the room during those games, and we like to alternate games like that, with card sets that allow you to build up easily.
Finally, try playing the game with three or four people.  Dominion plays a little slower, but it also gives more variety with what's going on.

as I noted playing with 3 or 4 people isn't really an option for us - we play at home, after work when it is just the two of us. Yes, playing Dominion with multiple players is a different game but it isn't one we get to play that way very often. We have played some of the suggested combinations but frankly we enjoy the aspect of the game of trying to figure out on the fly cards that will work well together - we enjoy the randomness.

Here's what we do:
When we clean up, we store the last set of ten cards and start with that as the base for the next game.
At the end of each game, the losers each pick a card to replace. If it's just two players we'll usually both pick a card and a card to replace it with. Collusion is TOTALLY allowed, and we tend to be rather relaxed about it. We usually try and swap in a couple of new cards at the end of the game even if it is the last one for the evening. It doesn't matter if a different group of people will be playing next time either.
This method keeps the game play fresh, and allows for small changes to suit a particular groups playstyle, and makes setup faster. When we first started we kept our choices secret or made the "winningest" player pick first so the lower placed players could base their picks off of that, but my group is fairly fairly relaxed, and we've found it's usually more fun if the "loserest" tells people what he'd like to see (as far as playstyle).
We do occasionally pick a set and try and get more of the cards from that set.

I like the way "veto mode" works over on Isotropic. With n players 10+n cards are randomly selected, and then each player chooses 1 to remove before the game starts. You could obviously adapt this for vetoing additional cards per person and combine it with randomizers or other methods of selecting the starting cards.

My house rule for multiple games is to remove every pile that was used (i.e., had at least one card gained from it) and leave in everything no one touched during the game for the next round. It helps keep people from getting into a rut, and ensures that cards that are eclipsed by a dominant combo (or groupthink) get a chance to get used.

When playing with 2 player we normally do 2 veto for each player and then each player get to choose 1 kingdom to replace the ones they veto from 3 random ones. It gives enough control that the boards will not be too horrible but still always for some interesting combo at times.

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


text:
Is there a strategy for consistent winning in the base dominion game with the base setup?
I've just started playing dominion a little while ago, so I'm pretty new. I get the basic tactics (big money, deck thinning, don't buy copper, etc.) and I do ok when the kingdom cards vary. However, when playing the "basic" game [moat, cellar, village, workshop, woodsmith, militia, etc.] I can't ever seem to win and I don't understand why. No one is playing militias (I've tried them to disrupt others strategies...to no avail)
We play "tournament style" where you can pick your first 2 cards to purchase.
Maybe my initial buys are not so good?
I usually start out with smithy+silver, and then pick up a mine when I get my first $5. From then on I usually do: $2=cellar, $3=silver, $4=silver, maybe one more smithy, $5=market, maybe silver, $6-7=gold, $8=province.
Basically I'm trying to do some variant of "smithy big money" but it isn't working out so well.
Does any one have a consistent strategy for the base game that works?

In my opinion, Base is the weakest of the dominion sets (arguably, either Prosperity or Dark Ages is the strongest).

Open with Militia and Silver.

Get a remodel on turn 2 to get rid of your bad cards and maybe throw in a smithy or another militia. Skip the mine, it's not really that great a card in this set as it gets pretty useless towards the endgame, whereas with remodel you can still turn gold into provinces.

If you have 3, buy a silver for the first few turns, then maybe switch to village or nothing once silver ends up being one of the worst cards in your deck. At 4, buy maybe 1 smithy, then go with one of the 3 options. At 5, take a market as it's better than silver 95% of the time. At 6-7 take gold. At 8 take a province unless it's really early in the game.

Once you get to the point where you only have <2 reshuffles in your deck, buy nothing but victory cards! Even take an estate if you have to. At this point, your will only draw each card in your deck about 2 more times, so that duchy starts looking way better than a gold, since the you'll barely be able to use the gold at all.

Forget that workshop, woodcutter, and mine exist. Take 1 moat only if people are getting lot of militias. Maybe take a cellar if you end up with a lot of copper and estates in your deck despite your use of remodel. Take a cellar only if you want to use a lot of actions and already have plenty of silver. Take village if you have a lot of action cards in your deck and consistently not enough actions to play them.

Interesting. Once the big money variants started beating the snot out of me I pretty much lost interest in remodel. I've also wondered about the usefulness of workshop (I already know woodcutter is almost always a bad choice). Thanks a bunch, lots of good info!

@javamonkey79 Woodcutter has very specific uses, i.e. when you really need that +buy and there's no other card providing it. In this set there's no need for it. Workshop shines if you're trying to end things quickly on piles, like in a Gardens strategy.

I don't really see 1 remodel having a lot of time to be useful if you have no way to pare your deck down. That is my only quibble though. +1.

My favorite Dominion article, Building the "First Game" Engine, looks at this problem. The article works out some very good strategies, comparing them to a baseline of Big Money + Smithy. They run simulations to "prove" which one is best. A Village/Smithy/Province (V/S/P) strategy beats Big Money + Smithy a little more than half the time, and eventually they find a strategy that beats V/S/P a whoppping 89% of the time! Best of all, the article showcases the depth that a single set of 10 relatively simple kingdom cards can have.
Their best answer is complicated--surprising to some, given the common overestimation of Big Money + 1 or 2 other card strategies. It uses a Workshop to pick up early Villages and a Remodel, a Mine, several Smithies and eventually a Militia, with Markets and Cellars "sprinkled in".
Of course it's not a definitive "best solution", but it's several clear steps ahead of an already very competitive baseline.

You are buying way too many actions that don't actually combine well. Try buying a single Smithy, and then buy the first thing you can afford from this list for the rest of the game: Province, Gold, Silver. Literally, that's it. You'll be able to buy your share of the Provinces in 14 turns, on average, which is a solid strategy.

Smithy/ Village is a good combination to have a few of, as it will allow you to draw a lot of cards in your hand. A single workshop very early can help to get the silver flowing, and help to get Smithy/Village cards, but no more.  From there, buy Province, Gold, or Silver as you can.

This question has been settled definitely by simulators. Single Smithy, no Village is far faster than any other number of Smithies/Villages. The Workshop will only slow you down because either you'll draw it dead from the Smithy regularly or you'll need to buy Villages to play it with the Smithy, which also slows you down from buying Silver. See http://forum.dominionstrategy.com/index.php?topic=288.msg15116#msg15116. WanderingWinder is one of the top players in the world and this is an easy scenario to simulate.

Wow, that's really interesting. Hmmmm...

@philosophyguy though improvement can be got with Workshop/Market to get those Villages...

And, looking at the article in my answer, they run simulations and find a Village/Smithy algorithm that beats Smithy Big Money slightly more than 50% of the time.

What I tend to do is use the silver and smithy start, and then use villages, throne rooms and smithys to draw my entire deck. I also try to get golds during this time too. Finally, it may be a good idea to grab one or two cellars and buy enhancing cards

What evidence do you have that your strategy is better than other strategies?


text:
Which boardgames need expansion sets before they work properly?
I think, sad to say, this is still a common problem in modern boardgaming.  You buy a game and it's maybe okay, but then you discover that there's an expansion set that makes all the difference.  If you don't go out and buy that too, you're not really experiencing the game as it was meant to be played.
It's in all of our interests as consumers to know which games are going to be satisfactory straight out of the box, and which have hidden costs involved.  Which games in your collection wouldn't really be complete without one or more of their expansions?  Obviously I don't want vague answers like "Dominion is really good but Dominion with all the expansions is even better": please provide concrete explanations of the actual problems a game's base set has, and how the expansion set goes on to fix them, if possible!
I have a bugbear or two of my own to tell you about, but rather than shoehorn them into the question as "examples", I'll post them as an answer below!

Wasn't a fan when I read the subject.  Seemed like YARQ (yet another rec question) but your writeup is really good.  I think this has good potential and am eager to see some answers.

@Pat: I'm hoping it'll produce useful information.  If it doesn't, we can just close it and say no more about it :)

Interesting question.  I cannot think of any, but then again if I didn't like how the base game played, I wouldn't be buying an expansion for it :)

@Chris: I guess part of the idea is to alert people of expansions that really transform the experience.  As you point out they might never even look at the expansions if the base game was flawed... and then they might be missing out!

uh, shouldn't this be turned into a wiki? I mean, there are no "right or wrong" responses here; no one should be given credit for "best answer" on something that's not rankeable but instead, a list.

Civilization
It's really a great game, but the so-called "expansion" Advanced Civilization is actually more of a "revised version", which fixes things which were a bit broken, and adds some variety.

+1.  I agree.  FWIW, it's somewhat straight forward to build yourself the Advanced Civilization with creativity, since it usually costs > $150 when you can find it to buy it

Agreed. Civ was fun, but flawed; advanced civ fixed the holes neatly.

I know I've played either Civilization or Advanced Civilization, but I'm not 100% sure which one. What was broken about Civilization, and what did Advanced Civilization do to fix them and add variety?

Trade was not exactly "broken" but it was greatly improved, so much you never want to go back. Also, it fixed win conditions, fixed advancements, and added a lot of new advancements too.

Two of the phases were switched - I think calamity phase happens before purchase of civ cards. Also, more trading cards, simplified trading rules and a few other things - list is here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Advanced_Civilization

Most of the time, I think the point of expansions is to improve replayability. Most games are fine without any expansions, but might get boring after you play them enough time. How many 'enough' is varies greatly on the game, but the approach I'll take toward the question is what games have relatively little re-playability without expansions.

Citadels is one that plays fine without the dark city expansion, but Dark City adds SO much new variety its hard to imagine playing without it. With just the base there's one possible set of 8 characters; with the expansion there's 256 possibilities with 8, and an extra 256 if you play with 9. There won't always be a gigantic change when you switch some characters, but there's definitely at least 20 different combination that all make the game completely different and require a total recalibration of strategy. The later editions of the game mostly come with the Dark City expansion in the box.
Settlers of Catan is another where the expansions add a huge amount a re-playability. The base has a significant number of different maps, but as with Citadels the expansions increase the possibilities of the island exponentially, not to mention giving some completely different strategies. Ending up with smaller surrounding islands with Seafarers will definitely change your building plans, and you'll probably think differently about your military if you have to worry about being attacked in Cities and Knights.
Countless more games have similar situations, like Dominion, Three Dragon Ante, Carcassonne, Pandemic, and probably at least 200 others. IMHO any good expansion should add a lot of re-playability.
Are they satisfactory without the expansions? Definitely. Are they really complete? That's a matter of opinion. Is the Dominion base set complete because it has 3,268,760 possible kingdom sets of 10? Or is it not complete until you have at least one big expansion and 10,272,278,170 possibilities? Or 2 big expansions and 828,931,106,355 possibilities? Or all the first 4 expansions and the 3 promo cards and 6.20885664 × 10^13?
I totally agree that there are some games that aren't very good standalone. My point is that the definition of completeness if very subjective. :D

+1 for calculating those ridiculous numbers, which made me laugh.  I wonder, does it really matter a game has a mere 10 million permutations as opposed to a googolplex?  (I tend to think that all lotteries give me pretty much equal chances of not winning...)  It could be argued that a smaller number of possible  kingdom sets are better, too.  One thing I don't like about Dominion is that, I start to see the possibilities for a given kingdom set halfway through the game... and then it's too late, the set will never come up ever again!

@thesunn how is it too late? You can always play that game again, especially if you save on a website for exactly that purpose, plus you'll know what kind of combinations to look for in the future. http://dominiondeck.com/games :D

+1 for pointing out a few games that feel like demos until you buy an expansion (Pandemic really comes into it's own once you have more jobs; I still haven't forgiven Settlers for insisting on selling me 5-6 player expansions for their expansions)

if this was to be a real question and not a wiki-like page (spoiler: no one turned it into a wiki even though it's really a wiki), this should be the correct response. You explain more about the question's central point mechanics than give random examples of how you don't like game X because it's missing expansion #3 or whatnot.

Alhambra
The basic game has very little variation and really only two methods to score victory points... buy buildings and place them so you have long walls.
The expansions each add some small element to the game, many of which are alternate methods of scoring victory points, but some of them are minor gameplay changes which create more interesting variations.
Bazaars as an example, are a tile which are more valuable the more tiles of particular types that are adjacent to it.  Treasure Chamber lets you buy and stow chests in your Alhambra for VPs.
On the other hand the expansion with coins gives you change for overpaying for tiles!  These little things help make an otherwise fairly humdrum tile drawing game into something pretty cool.  Or the thief you can use to steal money cards when it's not your turn.
There are multiple expansions and each comes with four of these game play elements and they are completely independent of one another.  So you don't have to own them all, or even play with more than one or two of them.  You can have a bit of variety every time.

Here's my big one:
St Petersburg
This is a pretty good mid-range boardgame, but its basic set has some serious problems.  It contains cards which are significantly undercosted, like the cheap Observatory and the seriously overpowered Mistress of Ceremonies.  Rather than fix these cards in a new printing of the base game, they released an expansion which contains replacements for the broken cards, as well as a 5-player option, and a few dozen new cards.  The problem being that this box costs over $20 for, basically, a slim deck of tiny undersized cards!  I really like fixed St Petersburg, but my local independent game store refuses to stock the expansion for being a rip-off, and I can't really fault his reasoning.
And a couple of minor quibbles for good measure.  Carcassonne I love, but the basic game is a pretty simplistic thing before you add in at least Traders & Builders and Inns & Cathedrals.  I guess most people buy the Carcassonne Big Box these days for value, so it isn't often a problem... but some people may buy the basic set and not realise they're not getting anywhere near the full Carcassonne experience.
Agricola is my favourite game ever, and it's superb straight out of the box, but I have to say I find it difficult to imagine going back after experiencing the Farmers of the Moor expansion.  There are some dominant strategies in basic Agricola, like building rooms for early Family Growth, that are hard to escape from: I have friends who have gotten bored of Agricola because, in their opinion, it's too obvious what move they should take at any turn, just take the resource that the other players have allowed to build up the most.  Farmers of the Moor really does fix all of that: now that you have to pay to heat your house, building lots of wooden rooms to fill with people is no longer a no-brainer strategy.  And the Free Actions really do give the starting player an agonizing choice between getting a choice pile of resources or an extra action in the turn.  Agricola is great, but FotM just makes it near perfect in my opinion.  Of course, the cost of both boxes is going to be well into three figures of dollars... :-/

Farmers of the Moor is cool, but the real issue I have with Agricola is the ani-meeples and vegi-meeples in the Goodies box set.  Why can't those be included in future printings of the base set?

@Pat: agreed.  Farmers of the Moor just makes the meeples situation worse, because now you have awesome horse-meeples, can you really go on living with stupid cubes to represent your sheep, boars, and cattle?

@the - you are completely right!  I had it easy and bought both expansions at the same time so I didn't have to deal with horse envy :)

The animeeples have not been (and most likely won't ever be) included in future printings because they were originally offered as a bonus to people who pre-ordered the first edition of Agricola from Z-Man.  Being able to get them without pre-ordering (or buying them separately) undercuts the idea of a pre-order bonus, and Zev committed to not do that.

Would be +1 for the main post, but I want to give a -1 to the Agricola comment, so it cancels out at +0. Our group has played Farmers of the Moor a few times, and it's certainly good, but we rather prefer the original Agricola. The diversity of strategies facilitated even by the E deck, let alone the I and K decks still in the base game, just feel more appealing. Farmers of the Moor seems to be going in a different direction to where we like Agricola.

@AlexC: Ooh, that's a debate that I'd like to have, might have to save it for a different question though!  I feel like I may remember you from Cambridge and/or Oxford a lifetime ago, by the way... if so, hello!

@PatLudwig & Robert - We just purchased Agricola and I was expecting to eventually have to purchase the Goodies to get animeeples, but it turned out they came with our base set! (But there were no vegimeeples, which I want very much now that I know they exist.)

comments in this answer reinforce this is not a QA post but instead a wiki-driven, open-ended topic. This question SHOULD become a wiki.

Cosmic Encounter, 1977 version (Eon games). This may have been the game that launched the expansion set trend, so worth describing for the historical value:
Original: Nice idea but not enough variation in Alien powers or edicts to make it interesting for more than a few games and limited to 4 players max.
Expansions 1-3: Worth buying for adding players 5 and 6 and a little more variation thanks to more powers and edicts, but the game still did not have strong replayability power.
Expansion 4: Flare cards added, which tremendously added to the variability of initial conditions and outcomes. Getting the basic set and expansions 1-4 is enough to get hundreds of games of enjoyment.
Expansion 5: Added moons. Most people I know hated moons and never used them. Was not a necessary building block for future expansions.
Expansion 6: Added lucre (a money system) and powers. It did add variation but some people liked it, some didn't. Best bought in conjunction with Expansion 8.
Expansion 7: Added powers. Best bought in conjunction with Expansion 8.
Expansion 8: Added the flare cards for the powers added in Expansions 6, 7, and 9. Therefore  a required purchase for those who bought any expansions above #5. Also added kicker cards, a welcome addition among those I gamed with.
Expansion 9: Added a single power (the Aristocrat) and rules/stickers needed for inverse play. The inverse rules were not liked by those I played with so this expansion could have been skipped (though Aristocrat was well loved).
Comments: This is the only game system I've used where the basic set is so boring that it's essentially a requirement to buy expansion sets (1-4 at a minimum). However, the expansion sets were sold in thin plastic bags at a low cost ($5-$6 for each expansion kit). So buying the basic set plus expansions 1-4 was the equivalent of paying for 2 games.

Note that the latest (fifth!), somewhat expensive FFG version of cosmic encounters includes the rough equivalent of the base game plus expansions 1-4 (and even a little more). So variability is plentiful, which justifies the higher cost.

It's funny that you mention Dominion.
Dominion's base set doesn't have any problems that require you to buy the expansions, but the Base set is extremely weak on variation.  In my opinion, Intrigue makes a much better starting set.
Other expansions are optional.

Hmm, maybe Dominion falls into the same category as Carcassone (in my answer): it's an okay game in and of itself, but serious gamers will quickly crave more meat.  I think people who don't like the extra complexity that Intrigue et al offer won't really like Dominion in the long run, so perhaps they should forget about the newbie-friendly set and just start with something more tricksy!

I feel like Settlers of Catan falls into this same category.  Perfectly fine game by itself, but serious gamers will want an expansion to add a bit more depth.

My vote is Twilight Imperium. They made a lot of changes to the base game that really improved it.

It was a question about how to fix a severely dominant strategy in the Twilight Imperium base game that sowed the seeds of this question in my mind, I think :)

Hmm... on the one hand, the Imperium II card change is a good example.  On the other hand, they released that change for free in the FAQ before the expansion came out, and aside from that issue I wouldn't say the base box alone didn't work well.  (I really like it as an expansion, it improves the game, but I'm not sure it belongs as an answer to this question.  In two minds - thoughts, anyone?)

Can you detail some of the changes and why they were needed?

I'd definitely agree with previous mentions of Catan and Carcassonne (although I've only played the latter on the 360, it also has available expansions, so I will assume the experience is the same with the original version).
From personal experience, I'd also suggest Talisman. (I think 2nd edition is what I've played.) It may be a fun game with just the base set - I can't say because we never played just with that - but if you add the Dungeon and City expansions, as well as the base Expansion, you've got a much deeper game. (I don't remember if we actually tried to tie in the Timescape expansion as well ... after a certain point, there can be too many options.)
Games like that, ones that have expansions that don't depend on each other, give you a lot of options in terms of replayability ... and you'll always have the original game if you want a simpler, scaled-down game night once in a while.

Heh, I used to play Talisman years ago when I was a nipper.  I did think that the expansions were fun, but as you yourself implied, once you had three or four expansion boards and were trying to play them all at the same time... it was just a bit too much.  There's a lot to be said for games with multiple expansions, but where you only play one of the expansions at any given time.  (Alhambra springs to mind... you'd have to be crazy to play with ALL the expansions in the Big Box simultaneously!)

Quite so. There's a sweet spot with Talisman: add the right expansions and you get enough variety in characters and such to make it much more enjoyable, but one too many and you spend twice as much time discussing how expansions overlap as you do playing the game itself!

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


text:
Is there a conventional way of searching for lands in a mono-red deck?
I'm constructing a mono-red deck and I was wondering whether there are any options for land search / ramp for this kind of deck? I don't want to combine my deck with green for land searching.
I was thinking about cards like this:

Any ideas?
Edit:
As a second thought: I'm looking for more mana in fact not land.
I'm constructing a Standard (Type II) deck.

I recommend saying "Standard (Type II)" since newer players might not know what the old Types mean.

Ok! I'll keep that in mind.

For what it's worth, Mike Flores said Druidic Satchel is a worthwhile faux-planeswalker for Standard (the trick is to double up on whatever you need most by sometimes using it on your upkeep).

Solemn Simulacrum is good colorless fetch (and draw).
Traveler's Amulet and Horizon Spellbomb can get lands into your hand.
Caged Sun will get you lots of mana (but no lands) as will Koth of the Hammer.
Iron Myr is a good mana producing creature
Infernal Plunge and Geosurge can also have their uses.
Fiery Fall is the only mono-red card that could be considered land fetch but it's not Standard.
Other non-Standard methods for increased mana in red can be:
Extraplanar Lens
Gauntlet of Power
Gauntlet of Might
Mana Flare

I just searched all cards on google. After that you created the links for them. :) :) Thanks for the info by the way. What do you think about mana-giving creatures? (like Llanovar Elves)

I chose to list non-Standard cards as well since they are useful for people with similar questions outside of Standard and because Standard is an ever changing format.

@edem - good point.  I added a few more cards.

Good point too.

I thnk that I'll choose Iron Myr since I'm using Goblin Gaveleer and Kuldotha Phoenix. Thanks!

Short version: in the current Standard environment, play Sphere of the Suns if you want to play 4-drops early, play Koth of the Hammer if you want to play 6-drops early or get a lot of mana for a big X spell; make sure you don't short yourself on lands; if you want to experiment with a rogue deck, try Geosurge.
Long version:
In the modern color pie, red is the color for fast-mana effects (called "rituals" after the old Dark Ritual). Unfortunately, the two ritual effects available in Standard, Geosurge and Infernal Plunge, don't quite hit the same sweet spot as Seething Song used to. Geosurge is still good enough to drop a big finisher (Inferno Titan, Wurmcoil Engine, maybe Balefire Dragon if you want to get cute) on turn 4, but that requires having both the enabler and the big creature in your starting 10 -- and remember that contemporary mono-red doesn't really have filtering or card draw. Most people probably figure it's safer to just play a strong four-drop.
I know some folks have experimented with B/R Heartless Summoning to play Inferno Titans quickly (turn 3 Titan using Priest of Urabrask, or turn 3 Urabrask into turn 4 hasty Titan). Those decks are rather inconsistent and vulnerable to disruption, though.
Honestly if you need consistent early-turn mana acceleration in a color other than green, I'd just play Sphere of the Suns. Like Myr, it's still an easy target for Ancient Grudge, but at least with Sphere half your mana base won't be blown up by a Day of Judgment.
Solemn Simulacrum is a great card for getting you from 4 mana to 6. As a bonus, you get to draw a card when it dies. That's nearly always a 2-for-1, and often a 3-for-1 if you can trade creatures.
The best big-mana card in red is Koth of the Hammer. His -2 ability gives you a lot of mana easily (if you have Koth and 5 lands on turn 5, for instance, you can play Inferno Titan and have mana open to stop Mana Leak, or hit your opponent with a 9-point Devil's Play). Koth's -5 ability is excellent at breaking through board stalls.
Also, with all these tricks, it's important to remember that ramp doesn't replace land drops. Most red decks running Koth as their big threat will want to consistently hit their 4th land drop on turn 4, and that means running 24 lands rather than the 20-22 you can sometimes get away with in aggro decks.

What I have right now is a goblin deck, but it is just a prototype: http://deckstats.net/deck-867122-6f9250174eeba9d2f862ae47749e20e5-en.html

I think that sphere is better for me, but it is yet to be decided which cards will I remove to put it in...

My rule of thumb: if you plan to hardcast anything costing more than 4 cmc, you need at least 24 lands. Note how Solar Flare often runs 26 lands, for instance. The reasoning is simple: mana acceleration costs resources, land drops are free. Paying 2 for Sphere of the Suns or Rampant Growth on turn 2 only to miss your turn 3 land drop is basically trading a turn to get what you could've gotten for free.

Oops! Almost forgot Solemn Simulacrum.

Mountaincycling
Below is the card that sprang to mind when I read your question, and I didn't see it on OrigamiRobot's list so I thought I'd add it.  It doesn't ramp, but it helps get you mountains in the early game when you need them, and can be played as a big red beatstick later on when you have enough lands - quite versatile!  (There are other creatures like Valley Rannet and Igneous Pouncer that cycle for mountains and also other types of land, but if you're mono-R then they're of less interest to you.)

I was looking for "search" and "land". Good catch.


text:
How to counter an aggro deck with massive +1/+1 counter packing
I recently played with a guy who had a deck full of vampires and whenever one of his vampire attacks/deals combat damage/etc that vampire or all of his vampires get +1/+1 counters.
How can I effectively counter that strategy? I was thinking about cards like Hex Parasite. My deck is mainly green/red but I'm open to new ideas.

I assume you are talking about a Black/Red Vampire Standard deck with Curse of Stalked Prey as the card that generates the counters.
Hex Parasite is probably a bad idea, as it will completely hog your mana supply. You have to pay mana to remove counters which he put on basically for free. You may be able to eat the counters, but the creatures will still hurt you with their base power and you will be unable to cast anything significant for additional defense. Since you are talking about a G/R deck, you won't have a lot of black mana available either, so you typically pay life (Phyrexian mana) to reduce damage - so Hex Parasite is not only mana-intensive, it doesn't even save you any life loss. Hex Parasite is clearly an offensive utility creature, not defensive.
A much better strategy is to simply beat down on your opponent better than he does, or to attack Curse of the Stalked Prey or the creatures themselves, without which the Curse is useless. With Green/Red, you should be able to pursue both strategies efficiently.
Green is known for being able to handle enchantments, and red is good at destroying lots of small creatures with damage.
So basically your strategy is to never let the enemy attacks gain any momentum. Put out some creatures of your own, especially green ones, which should be more efficient ( = more power/toughness per cost) than your opponent's black and red ones. If he manages to build a large army because of a stalemate, create card advantage by sweeping the board clear of creatures with your red spells (card advantage: you have more cards in hand and battlefield combined than your opponent). If you just want to go for a straight damage race, just make sure you get rid of the Curses with enchantment destruction.

Good suggestions.  For a green/red deck, 'throw more creatures at it more efficiently' is a good counter to most things; don't be afraid to play aggressively rather giving chances for counters to build up.

Off the record: What do you think about this deck? http://deckstats.net/deck-1427482-a7d138d5386987c323446c76aab3fea7-en.html

Exclusion ritual and rain of thorns are useless in this context.  A red/black vampires deck will have killed you several turns before you have the 6 mana to cast either of those spells.  Cloudshift is odd, when the only thing in your deck that has triggers to cloudshift is two Acidic Slimes.

If you're asking us how to beat a certain strategy you need to tell us what deck you're playing so we know your game plan. It's really tough to guess and answers will be very different depending on if you play a ramp/aggro/control/combo strat.
Always focus on your own deck first! You want to win the game before he does, not "make him not win" or "make him win slower". That could be a part of the plan but you still have to win before he does. So focus on that.


text:
In Magic, can an ability target a permanent that is being sacrificed as part of that ability's activation cost?
Suppose my opponent has a Darksteel Colossus in play, and I have Attrition and no creatures. During my turn I cast Act of Treason to gain control of the Colossus and attack with it. So far I haven't done anything controversial.
Now, at this point what I want to do is sacrifice the Colossus to my Attrition, so that my opponent doesn't get him back at the end of the turn. However, Attrition's ability requires a target, and the Colossus is the only potential target on the battlefield. Is it legal to activate the ability and target the Colossus, even though I also want to sacrifice him as part of the ability's cost?
In other words, can I target a creature with an ability, and also sacrifice that same creature as part of the ability's activation cost?
(The ability won't resolve, of course, but that was never the real goal. Normally it would be better to target another of the opponent's creatures, but in this case he doesn't have any, so the Colossus is the only potential target.)

Nice use of alt text, helps a lot.

The question is if attrition's ability can target the creature that is being sacrificed to pay for it, correct?

Yes, the key part is whether the same creature can be both the target and the sacrifice. The rest of the scenario just sets the stage for why you might actually want to do that, since normally it would be a terrible idea.

Sorry I misunderstood... the phrase "The ability won't resolve ..." made me believe that the goal was to use Attrition to sacrifice an attacking creature... which you can... not whether the colossus is a legal target of attrition... which it is.

I recall seeing cards with "sacrifice this card: do such-and-such to target creature" where there's a ruling listed on Gatherer specifically saying that the card be a target of its own ability.

Yes, you can target one of your permanents with a spell or ability, then sacrifice that permanent to pay for that very spell or ability.
When casting a spell or activating an ability, you first put it on stack, then choose targets (the creature you are about to sacrifice), then pay all costs (sacrifice the creature).
These are the relevant steps for casting a spell or activating an ability:

602.2a The player announces that they are activating the ability. If an activated ability is being activated from a hidden zone, the card that has that ability is revealed. That ability is created on the stack as an object that’s not a card. It becomes the topmost object on the stack. It has the text of the ability that created it, and no other characteristics. Its controller is the player who activated the ability. The ability remains on the stack until it’s countered, it resolves, or an effect moves it elsewhere.
602.2b The remainder of the process for activating an ability is identical to the process for casting a spell listed in rules 601.2b–i. Those rules apply to activating an ability just as they apply to casting a spell. An activated ability’s analog to a spell’s mana cost (as referenced in rule 601.2f) is its activation cost.
601.2c The player announces their choice of an appropriate object or player for each target the spell requires. [..]
601.2f The player determines the total cost of the spell. Usually this is just the mana cost. Some spells have additional or alternative costs. [...]
601.2h The player pays the total cost in any order. [..]

So in a nutshell, first you determine targets, then you pay costs. If all targets (Darksteel Colossus in this case) are illegal by the time the ability would resolve, the ability will fail to resolve, but the sacrifice to pay for the ability was still legal.

TL;DR Yes.
By CR 508 you perform the Declare Attackers step.  By the text of Act of Treason, the Darksteel Colossus is clearly eligible to attack.
There is a change of priority, and back and the Declare Blockers step.  By CR 509.2 you declare the attacker's damage assignment order.
The combat damage step happens per section 510.
At 510.4 you receive priority and can activate Attrition, which is placed on the stack.
This resolves during the cleanup step described in 514.3a
If there's a more specific scenario you're trying to understand, please expand on your question and I'll try to expand my answer.

I think the question was less about the timing of Act of Treason vs. Attrition, and more about whether or not he can at all use Attrition to target the very creature he wants to sacc.

@Hackworth I see.  I wasn't clear on what was being asked.  The information about attacking in the OP's question led me down a different though path :-)

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


text:
Can you sacrifice a tapped creature?
If a creature has both a sacrifice and tap ability can you tap it for the tap benefit and then sacrifice it for the sacrifice ability?
(Example: Gemhide Sliver taps for mana, Basal Sliver gives mana on sacrifice. So can I tap then sacrifice a sliver?

The answer received so far are correct, but if you are thinking about one specific creature please state which it is, because you might be missing something.

Slivers: Gemhide gives mana on tap, Baal sliver gives mana on sacrifice. So can I tap then sacc?

As a general answer: Whenever you are asked by a spell or ability for a certain target, or when you have to pay certain costs, then as long as the chosen object has all the required properties, all other properties can be whatever they are.
So if an ability requires you to "sacrifice a creature", it doesn't say anything about the creature being tapped or untapped, so as long as it's a creature, you can sacc it.

In general, yes, you can use the abilities of tapped creatures that do not have tapping the creature as part of the cost to use the ability even when the creature is tapped.


text:
How do Captivating Vampire and Deadeye Navigator abilities interact?
In a recent casual game, an opponent controlled a Captivating Vampire and had enough untapped Vampire creatures in play to use its ability.  I had a Deadeye Navigator on the battlefield, and on my turn I played a Craterhoof Behemoth, soulbonding it with the Deadeye Navigator.  Due to an abundance of mana, I also chose to activate its soulbond ability to exile the Craterhoof Behemoth and return it to the battlefield several times.
At the start of this process, my opponent declared his intent to tap five vampires and activate Captivating Vampire's ability to gain control of my Craterhoof Behemoth, preventing me from activating its ability.  We were unsure of how to proceed from there, as we should both theoretically be given the opportunity to react to each others activated abilities by activating our own creatures' activated abilities, each of which were at odds with the other in regards to who controlled the creature once everything resolved.
Can anyone explain to me how this scenario should have played out, or if there may have been different results depending on when and how each ability was activated?

I can see 2 questions to be answered here:

Who ends up controlling the Craterhoof Behemoth?
Which creatures gain how much +X/+X?

First of all, whenever you have complex situations, it's important to remember how the Stack works. Any spell anyone casts, and every ability that is brought into effect somehow uses the stack. So whenever you and your opponent respond to each other with instant-speed spells or abilities, they are put on the stack, and only when neither of you want to play anything, the stack starts resolving in reverse order, i.e. the spell or ability that was put on the stack last will resolve first.
Let's say you control only the Deadeye Navigator and the Craterhoof Behemoth. Your opponent activates his vampire ability (VA), and in response you activate the Soulbound ability (SA) 3 times. That gives us the following stack, resolving from right to left:
VA-SA-SA-SA
SA is removed from the stack and resolves: Your Behemoth bounces and your creatures get +2/+2. You may or may not re-bind your creatures.
The next 2 SA fail to do anything, because the creature they were referring to no longer exists:

400.7. An object that moves from one zone to another becomes a new object with no memory of, or relation to, its previous existence.

Thus the 2nd and 3rd instance of SA have lost their reference and therefore do nothing. They are countered as they resolve.
VA fails for the same reason: Its target, the Behemoth, has changed zones, and even though it returned, it's still a different object. Therefore VA has lost all its targets and is countered.
Result 1:

You control the Behemoth
All your creatures have +2/+2
The Behemoth has summoning sickness (new object), but for him that doesn't matter because of Haste.

Now I assume you imagined a different result: You wanted to bounce the Behemoth several times, so your creatures would get the +X/+X bonus several times. You can do that easily, but for 100% correct play, you would have to time it a bit differently:
When your opponent puts VA on the stack, you respond with only 1 instance of SA:
Stack: VA-SA
Then you both pass so the stack starts resolving:
SA is removed from the stack and resolves: Your behemoth is exiled and immediately returns. You bind your creatures again. All your creatures get +2/+2 until EOT. Your Navigator is 7/7 and your Behemoth is also 7/7.
Stack: VA
Both players have the opportunity to cast spells and abilities. You choose to activate SA again.
Stack: VA-SA
SA is removed from the stack and resolves: Your behemoth is exiled and immediately returns, but without his previous +2/+2, because it's a new object, as discussed before. All your creatures get +2/+2 until EOT. Navigator 9/9, Behemoth 7/7.
Stack: VA
Both players have the opportunity to cast spells and abilities. You choose to activate SA again.
Stack: VA-SA
SA is removed from the stack and resolves: Your behemoth is exiled and immediately returns, but without his previous +2/+2, because it's a new object. All your creatures get +2/+2 until EOT. Navigator 11/11, Behemoth 7/7.
Finally, VA is removed from the stack and resolves: It fails to do anything, for the same reason as before.
Result 2:

Your Deadeye Navigator gets +6/+6, your Craterhoof Behemoth +2/+2.
You control the Behemoth.
The Behemoth has summoning sickness (new object), but for him that doesn't matter because of Haste.

This is a great answer that really dives into how the abilities behave and resolve in regards to the Stack, which I was also hoping to see.  I'm glad you also addressed that I would need to wait for my SA to resolve before triggering it again, so that I can avoid making that mistake in the future.

@corsiKa thanks, didn't read the Behemoth properly. Fixed.

Works like this

He taps his vamps and targets your fatty.
You respond by exiling the fatty and him coming back in.
His ability resolves, but because its target is no longer in play (it's a different instance) it fizzles.

So you can use that ability as evasion.

It had not occurred to me that the exiled/returned creature would count as a different instance altogether, fizzling effects that target it.  That changes the potential dynamics of my deck quite a bit, thank you!


text:
How many lands should I have in my sealed or draft decks?
A standard draft deck has 40 cards in it; a 4-booster sealed deck has 30 cards. How many lands should I put in each of these formats? And why do I need this ratio?
The conventional wisdom that I received for a 60-card constructed deck is to have 20 lands, suggesting that 1/3 of the deck should be land. However, I was also told to include 17 lands in a draft deck, which is higher than 1/3. But a smaller draft deck will have a lower variance (fewer ways to shuffle a deck and get mana-screwed), so shouldn't you be able to get away with fewer lands than the 1/3 ratio?

"20 lands in a 60-card constructed deck" is a dangerous and almost certainly wrong piece of "conventional wisdom".  Unless there's something unusual going on (lots of mana creatures, for instance), I'd anticipate 26 lands being a good number for a 60-card deck.

I think there's a lot more flexibility in a 60-card deck, as you are able to tune it more than a limited deck and depending on the deck's strategy, you may not need a large mana base. I believe "conventional wisdom" is anywhere from 18 to 28 lands. Most people I know run 23-25 lands in a 60 card constructed deck.

FYI, all the Innistrad and New Phyrexia Intro Packs run 24 lands, three out of five of the Magic 2012 Core Set Intro Packs run 24 lands, with the other two running 25.

Thanks @ghoppe. It looks like the conventional wisdom I learned was wrong. Not surprising, really :).

@ghoppe, great idea to look at the Innistrad precons.  I think that mana curves are a little bit lower than they were in my day, due to today's card packing more bang for their buck!  In my day we got 1 power for 1 mana and 2 power for 3 mana and counted ourselves lucky...

@JSBᾶngs: perhaps just outdated. Back in 1998-ish a lot of decks ran about 21 lands. Of course back then, the average CMC of a spell in one of these decks was probably less than 2, which is somewhat harder to get away with today. Even at that time, control decks and others that had more expensive spells would normally use 24-26 lands.

The 1/3 land makes sense as a baseline if you think that in your first 3 turns you see 9-10 cards (depending if you go first), and you'd like to play 3 lands. That'd be great if most of what you wanted to play has CMC < 4, but as @David points out, that probably doesn't cut it anymore, so you'll probably want to see 4 lands in your first 4 turns (10-11 cards), which is getting up to 24 lands in your deck (ignoring variance). Bolster against a little bad luck, add another land or two depending on how bad you need it. Add a little mana fixing and take some out.

"Why do I need this ratio?" is discussed in more detail here: http://boardgames.stackexchange.com/a/7592/1910

Conventional wisdom is to run around 40% lands in Limited.  This means around 12-13 lands for a 30-card deck, and 16-18 lands for a 40-card deck.
Typically, you see three variations. Aggressive, low-curve decks (which curve out at at four or five) will run as few as 11/16 lands. Typical decks (one or two colors, curve out around six or seven) will typically to run 12/17 lands. Slower decks (and decks in slower formats) will often run 13/18 lands, especially if they're three-color or hitting a third or fourth land drop is very critical.
Mana fixing is always very important - anytime you can run a mana creature/artifact or filter lands of some kind, it's likely in your favor to do so.
As far as why, in Limited your reliance on never missing a land drop in the first four-six turns is much higher than usual. That consistent ramp up to four-six lands means dropping those higher-cost creatures and game-winning bombs.
EDIT: On the subject of mana acceleration, as I previously mentioned, it's almost always in your favor to run what you can (mana fetch spells, mana creatures and artifacts, filter lands, etc.), but depending on how many of them you run, you can sometimes decrease your land count.  Some people reduce by one land per mana/land-generating spell, others say one land per two spells - however, this is usually to a minimum of 15-16 lands in 40-card and 11 lands in 30-card (11 is very uncommon).

So what's the magic number for a 30-card sealed deck?

@JSBᾶngs 30-card sealed deck isn't a standard format, so there is no "magic number". I would just go with a similar percentage: 12-13 lands.

@JSB, a Sealed deck should run to the same number of cards/lands as a Draft deck: 40 cards, of which 17-18 are lands.

I agree with this answer, although you could drop it by one if you have 2 or more mana producing artifacts or land fetching effects.

Oh, okay, if 30-card Sealed is some strange new format I've never heard of, then my comment doesn't apply.  You'd be looking at the same ratio as a 40-card deck: 12-13 lands out of 30 cards?

@thesunneversets, 4 boosters to make a 30-card deck is the standard for sealed swiss tournaments: http://community.wizards.com/go/thread/view/75846/25006917/New_Sealed_Format_Discussion_Thread

Edited for 30-card Sealed.

@JSBᾶngs - Wow! That format managed to completely escape my notice, despite having been around for a year now.  I guess it's not exactly common, existing only for Sealed Swiss queues on Magic Online?  Still, a very interesting option for making Sealed more of a cost-effective proposition compared to draft...

@thesunneversets: Yeah, looks like that's MTGO-only (as least for now.)

For 40-card limited, I start with 17 as a base then shift up or down a land based upon mana fixers and curve.

Just to add another data point, in 30-card sealed i usually start with 14, and adjust from there, only if i my curve is higher or lower than the norm, or i have some other reason. N.b 15 is my most common adjustment. Hitting your land drops is important; if you have 7 drops you will need 15 land!

I made this script for something else but you can also use it to see how many lands you need in whatever-sized deck you want. Just put your deck size in the Input window and run it.
But you can just as well just take your deck size then multiply it by 0.4 (40%) to see what the recommended amount of lands are. Then depending on what type of deck you run you can add or remove 2~ mana. If you have two or more colors in your deck you need to figure out how many percentages each color is in your deck then you can math it out on the 40% to find out how many of each lands you need.
It's not set in stone, best way is to play with your deck and feel it out. If you're mana starved a lot then maybe add 1-2 lands or if you feel you always have more than enough mana then maybe remove 1-2 lands.
https://tio.run/##dVLLTsNADLzvV1hBSFkobSIKB6QegIoTSBW9ctkmLl012Y0cF1F@PjhpsuWZk9ePmfE41Z433l02jS0rTwyl4Y1SOWbbpf1AmIF1HFtX7TiO5pKFPh1prUC@E5gm8pyTWfMIrtt4ycblhvIRpEn7vvdlKRmkDvZRwlqyLdF4XXhPcWA7g2Q8PeKeQtE1WwcG2ibwEr0hmVdUzrsBKsxfQGBQK@9rRurlpldSTHvkFHauKszerAqETJQOzfUCaSEFpEFghraIA9UEvqDqMPVAJmMr2mZAfufy@L8JcUQrfGcyd/3oN56wx0SWH2x4MlsUCxjQ1FaEsYeM0DCKJ6UnWcC72gqY4257pSpqb1bz0VgN5xC9uEj3tegZMzkKylFy6KXAbSna@QYiaW6Hf3nSoUD8sz5s35UPPYeGb4vqP7kPJgkDtP/WkTucUeummSaf


text:
Building a mana base for WGB Tokens in Standard
So Wizards heard my prayers and has given me something to make my favored W/G tokens deck even better. Unfortunately, those somethings are black:

Dark Ascension isn't out yet, so we can't brew with full information, but I'm already working on a decklist for the upgraded WBG tokens. All of the following are strong candidates for inclusion in the deck (though some of them will eventually have to be cut):
Name                        Cost
=================================================
Doomed Traveler             W
Accorder Paladin            1W
Honor of the Pure           1W
Intangible Virtue           1W
Gather the Townsfolk        1W
Midnight Haunting           2W
Lingering Souls             2W, 1B flashback
Fiend Hunter                1WW
Hero of Bladehold           2WW
Sorin, Lord of Innistrad    2WB
Geist-Honored Monk          3WW
Gavony Township             {T} 2WG ability
Vault of the Archangel      {T} 2WB ability

The first thing to notice about this list is that it's very nearly mono-white, with three different cards costing WW. The second is that we actually have more B than G (though there's a little more G in the sideboard, as I'll probably continue siding in Autumn's Veil, and either Naturalize or Ray of Revelation.)
Now the W/G tokens deck had a very reliable manabase, what with having Razorverge Thicket, Sunpetal Grove, and Avacyn's Pilgrim available. Building WBG is quite a bit trickier: the only W/B land in standard is Isolated Chapel, unless Dark Ascension gives us another rare land cycle, which seems unlikely. How would you go about it? Or are we perhaps better off dropping Gavony (the only maindeck G) and going just WB?

This is functionally a mono-color deck with some "color splash".
You don't need any color but white early on, so you can forgo playing Scars-block "fast duals" in favor of the appropriate "buddy duals", which are Isolated Chapel and Sunpetal Grove. If almost all your other lands are Plains, it's going to be pretty easy to get them to always come into play untapped.
However, if the green is mostly an afterthought, I would play Swamps before I run Woodland Cemetery. This is because you need more black than green, and it's nice to have lands that come into play untapped. Also, a couple of Swamps in your deck ensure that an opponent can't use Ghost Quarter to color-screw you out of casting Sorin.
Your mana base could easily support green splash, but I think Gavony Township might be too much of a "win more" card in this deck, since you've got so many other pumping effects going already. Township doesn't really start doing its thing until the late game, and my suspicion is that getting there in the first place means your opponent is likely using lots of removal to keep your creatures off the field. Initially, I was thinking that I'd prefer to have access to Moorland Haunt (to generate more Spirits) rather than Gavony Township (which is useless if I have no guys to pump up), and sideboarding in blue countermagic against Day of Judgment and Ratchet Bomb. However, with the full Dark Ascension set spoiled, I'm not thinking you're better off with green to support:

Ray of Relevation to answer Curse of Death's Hold and your opponent's anthems in the mirror.
Garruk Relentless as another token-maker and an Overrun effect.

Both black and green only come into play after the 4th turn.
You could play a Plains-based deck with some Isolated Chapel and Sunpetal Grove. Remember that white is the most important color all the time, so both these lands provide white mana as well.
You could also play mana-fixers like Shimmering Grotto and Traveler's Amulet, but for such a small splash, I would say those two lands work pretty well.
edit: Maybe only 4 black mana sources would be too little for 6-8 black cards. I'd probably play 4 Isolated Chapel, 4 Sunpetal Grove and 2 Woodland Cemitery


text:
Are Saprolings still Tokens after playing Life and Limb?
After playing the enchantment Life and Limb all Saprolings and all Forests become "creature-land-saproling-forests" (see card rulings). My question is: Do they still have the card-type token?
Meaning:

Is it possible to use cards which explicitly say "sacrifice a
nontoken creature"?
Can I keep the saprolings on my hand if my opponent bounces them?
(Tokens would be discarded.)
The rulings also say, newly played lands get summoning sickness. So
they can't attack right away. Does it also apply for the mana
ability?

Related: https://boardgames.stackexchange.com/questions/9653/are-tokens-copying-essence-of-the-wild-still-tokens

Re "(Tokens would be discarded.)", Tokens wouldn't be discarded; tokens would cease to exist

Yes, they are still tokens.
First of all, Token is not a card type:

205.2a The card types are artifact, conspiracy, creature, enchantment, instant, land, phenomenon, plane, planeswalker, scheme, sorcery, tribal, and vanguard.

A token is any object on the battlefield that is not represented by a card. Note that a token is still a token even if you use an MtG card to represent it.

110.5. Some effects put tokens onto the battlefield. A token is a marker used to represent any permanent that isn’t represented by a card.
110.5e A token is subject to anything that affects permanents in general or that affects the token’s card type or subtype. A token isn’t a card (even if represented by a card that has a Magic back or that came from a Magic booster pack).

No effect can ever turn a token into a non-token or vice versa. All Life and Limb does is affect a permanent's card type which, as shown, has nothing to do with the object being a token or not.
That answers your questions 1 and 2. Tokens remain tokens under all circumstances and the same rules apply to them with or without Life and Limb.
Question 3 is only tangentially related to Life and Limb and is answered here:
What is Summoning Sickness