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Sharing Yu-Gi-Oh! card ideas
I have designed a few Yu-Gi-Oh! cards, and I want Konami to review them.
Is there a way to submit my designs so that Konami will see and consider them?

I would assume you mean an official submission process? Otherwise, you can easily publish it anywhere on the web.

Even if you could find a way to submit cards to Konami, I think that they would dismiss them out of hand if you refer to them as "yugioh" cards instead of "Yu-Gi-Oh!" cards. Not taking the time to properly spell or capitalize the name of the game you are submitting to does not show a lot of professionalism.

@Thunderforge , I wrote this very quickly because of lack of time. I will change it asap

@VortexYT What about the title?

Konami has general contact information for their offices. However, I highly doubt that they will accept unsolicited card suggestions. There are a couple of reasons for that:

They are already paying people to design cards, and they have a lot more experience.
If they were to accept fan-submitted cards, you would not be the only person submitting them. Konami would have to pay people to sift through all of the thousands of submissions.
Fan-submitted cards might have rights or legal issues. Do you own the card? Does Konami own the card? What happens if you submit a card and they radically change it? Do you have any say over the final outcome?
If Konami is like most TCG companies, they already have hundreds if not thousands of cards that they would love to publish someday (they plan out new sets well over a year in advance too). They have no need for half a dozen cards from a fan.

Konami has to date released 16 fan-made cards. Out of those, 15 of them were winners of contests that Konami specifically held, usually "draw a monster" contests open only to children. The last one, Tyler the Great Warrior, was a Make a Wish Foundation wish for a 14-year-old cancer patient (who ultimately survived). As best I can tell, all of these fan-submissions were only for monster designs and not for card stats.
Given this, I think your chances are practically zero for being able to show a card to Konami. Your best bet is to participate in one of these fan contests they have, or if you are an adult, convince a child to draw a monster that matches your design.

You suggest to have a child submit your idea, which seems like something that wouldn't necessarily be allowed (otherwise, why have the age cap at all?) I'm not familiar with those contests at all, but it seems like information worth adding to this answer, at least as a comment.

@TheThirdMan It was meant to be a tongue-in-cheek way of saying you should convince a child to draw your design. You're right, you can't just hand a child a drawing and have them submit it. I've changed the wording to make it clearer.

WotC claims a major issue with fan submissions is "What if we design a card, and then you claim it's derived from one you submitted?" Which is why there's a posted blanket policy of "if you send us something unsolicited, we won't look at it at all." Wouldn't surprise me if other TCG/gaming companies had similar standing rules.


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How do Hexproof and Combat Damage interact?
Here's a quick question: suppose your opponent attacks with an 8/8 with Trample, and you block with a 5/5 with Defender, Indestructible, and Hexproof. You also have Hexproof.
Trample is an ability, and Hexproof won't allow you to be targeted by abilities or spells. How would one assign damage then?
Or is Hexproof just not important at all by this point?

They don't interact at all.
The word "target" does not occur anywhere in the Comprehensive rules for 702.19, Trample, nor 510, Combat Damage Step (well, the latter does use the word "target" within some examples, but those uses refer to spells being cast, not to the combat damage itself).
The Comprehensive rules for Hexproof are short enough to include here in their entirety:

702.11. Hexproof

702.11a Hexproof is a static ability.
702.11b "Hexproof" on a permanent means "This permanent can't be the target of spells or abilities your opponents control."
702.11c "Hexproof" on a player means "You can't be the target of spells or abilities your opponents control."
702.11d Multiple instances of hexproof on the same permanent or player are redundant.

Because combat damage is not targeted, and Trample does not target the blocking creatures nor the defending player, Hexproof will not protect creatures or players from this damage.

Your opponent would deal at least 5 damage to your blocking creature and up to 3 damage to you.
Hexproof prevents your opponents from targeting your creature and you in this example, but hexproof doesn't stop other things from effecting your creature or you. Things target only when they say the word 'target' on them (and Aura spells on the stack), other things like combat damage, Wrath of God, Archetype of Courage, or Worldfire do not target thus will still effect creatures, players, or anything else with Hexproof.
From the M15 Basic Rules PDF:

hexproof  —A creature with hexproof can’t be
the target of spells or abilities your opponents
control, including Aura spells. Your spells and
abilities can still target it.

target — If a spell uses the word “target,” you
choose what the spell will affect when you cast
it. The same is true for abilities you activate.

Also of note, the OP says he has hexproof as well. Of course, this also doesn't factor into the combat formula, but I think this is part of the question and isn't addressed in your answer.

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multiple lines in spell abilities - why new paragraph sometimes
I have a question regarding the structure of rules text in regards to abilities and effects.
Incinerate reads:

Incinerate deals 3 damage to target creature or player. A creature dealt damage this way can't be regenerated this turn.

All of that text is on a single line.
Remand reads:

Counter target spell. If that spell is countered this way, put it into its owner's hand instead of into that player's graveyard.
Draw a card.

Here, much like Incinerate, we seem to have a Spell Ability that generates a one-shot effect as well as a continuous effect - both on a single line.
Remand differs, however, in that it seems to also generate a 2nd one-shot effect.
This question is perhaps pedantic, but I'm trying to reconcile the following.
Abilities generate one or more effects,

609.1. An effect is something that happens in the game as a result of a spell or ability. When a spell, activated ability, or triggered ability resolves, it may create one or more one-shot or continuous effects.

...but sometimes these effects are listed in separate paragraphs, as if they were themselves abilities (like alternate costs etc.), and sometimes these effects are listed in one paragraph and are seemingly sharing a subject, or "linked" in some way.
I can find traces in the rules of linked abilities, but the sentences that begin each of the above cards' rules text seem more like linked-effects of a single ability (the spell ability), and I can't find anything mentioning that.
What does the extra paragraph/line break signify?  Why is it there sometimes and not there others?
According to the following, which calls out what paragraph breaks mean, Remand's 2nd paragraph could be interpreted (obviously incorrectly) as an "ability".

112.2c An object may have multiple abilities. If the object is represented by a card, then aside from certain defined abilities that may be strung together on a single line (see rule 702, "Keyword Abilities"), each paragraph break in a card's text marks a separate ability.

Does Remand generate 2 effects or 3 upon resolving the spell ability?

An example of a permanent where different paragraphs would work different is Jace, Vryn’s Prodigy. As it is printed it would only flip if you use it's ability. If "if there are five..." was printed in a new paragraph it would trigger the moment when there are five cards in your graveyard even when you didn't use it's ability

@IvoBeckers Yeah, the question wasn't really about why abilities that generate related effects are grouped together in a single paragraph as you describe with Jace.  Instead, it's about why abilities that generate effects that are transactional/linked aren't grouped together into a single paragraph (in the above examples, these are spell abilities) in some cases, and how to classify those paragraphs in terms of the primitives provided by the MTG rules.

The paragraph breaks are only there for clarity. You always do everything the card says, and there's nothing in the game that tries to count how many effects a spell had. That said, Wizards is pretty consistent about doing this for readability, I think in roughly the way you've noted.
Incinerate is all in one paragraph because it's all related; the second sentence wouldn't make any sense without the first. It has a one-shot effect (dealing damage) and also creates a related continuous effect (no regeneration) that lasts until the end of the turn.
Remand does two entirely separate things, so they split it up to make it read more easily. The first part is a one-shot effect (counter the spell) with a related replacement effect (if it's countered, return it to hand instead). The second part is another one-shot effect (draw a card). It would do exactly the same thing if the paragraph break were removed, though - and in fact, if it were the effect of an activated ability on a permanent instead of a spell on its own, it would presumably be written as one paragraph.
The instructions you follow while resolving an instant or sorcery are spell abilities (112.3a), so in combination with 112.2c, I believe that technically means that Incinerate has one spell ability and Remand has two. I can't think of anything in the rules or the game that actually cares about that fact, though. The rules really only even mention spell abilities in a couple places where they need a phrase to specify that something is part of resolving a spell, like the first part of Cipher (the part that lets you encode the spell). Splitting abilities on paragraph breaks is far more important on permanents, where they might be activated or triggered abilities that really need to be clearly delineated. For example, on Dragon Tempest, it's important that the two paragraphs are separate abilities!
Yes, linked abilities do exist, and two linked abilities are often put in multiple paragraphs (like Oblivion Ring). But the paragraph break isn't what makes something a linked ability. There are a variety of things that indicate a linked ability (e.g. "cards exiled with X") but only one mentions paragraph breaks and in fact requires them to be in the same paragraph to be linked (static abilities and triggered abilities in the same paragraph are linked). There's none of that going on here.

This makes some sense.  I guess my confusion is caused by paragraphs being called out in rule 112.2c.  I've edited my question - what do you think?

@Mog I suppose that does mean that Remand technically has two spell abilities. I can't think of anything that actually cares about that fact, though; I'm sure the decisions about where to place paragraph breaks are made more for readability than for changing the number of abilities a spell has.

@Mog I edited in a bit about that - bottom line, I doubt that the specific rule about paragraph breaks was really written with spells in mind, and so trying to work through exactly what it means for spell abilities is unlikely to make a whole lot of sense, and won't affect any real situations that could ever happen in a game.

I think I can probably think of it as you say: "Splitting abilities on paragraph breaks is far more important on permanents, where they might be activated or triggered abilities that really need to be clearly delineated." such that spell abilities are just 1 ability that generate a bunch of effects (some related, some independent) unless one of those paragraphs is clearly a known type of additional spell ability (cost mod etc.), and on permanents each paragraph is an ability.

yeah, I just like to be able to dissect the pieces of text on a card into what they are - regardless of whether there ends up being any practical reason to do so.  However, once we start getting into the realm of multiple abilities... well, there is always Stifle.

@Mog Alternative/additional costs and cost reductions are not actually spell abilities. 112.3a says "Spell abilities are abilities that are followed as instructions while an instant or sorcery spell is resolving. Any text on an instant or sorcery spell is a spell ability unless it’s an activated ability, a triggered ability, or a static ability that fits the criteria described in rule 112.6." Cost modifications aren't part of the instructions for resolving; they're static abilities that function on the stack while you're casting the spell (112.6c).

The clearest examples of "known" spell abilities are probably Cipher and Epic, simply because they're explicitly mentioned as such in the rules. (Also, when you find the analog of Stifle that says "counter target spell ability" let me know!)

Yeah, you're right, I shouldn't have typed "spell" there.

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What is a good generic strategy for playing as Geralt?
In the Witcher Adventure Game, you can play as one of four characters trying to complete a set of quest. Geralt is clearly a monster slayer and as such should pick quests form the combat desk.
Is there a good generic strategy that can be applied to Geralt?

Meta

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Can a factory contain only one color or is there a rule to redraw four tiles?
When I play the physical version of Azul, I redraw tiles if all four that I place in a single factory are the same color. Recently Board Game Arena added Azul and I started a game. One of the rounds started with four blues in a factory:

I started writing up a bug report, but looking at the rules I don't actually see anything that disallows that. Am I playing with a house rule? Is there any reason to not allow this situation?

There is nothing in the rules that requires a re-draw of factory tiles - it can happen, and when it does then there will be a player who gets all four of those tiles without leaving anything on the table. It's probably advantageous for whoever gets to choose it most of the time, but it won't always be desirable - e.g. if that player has already committed to a different colour on their bottom rows.
Redrawing would be a house rule, and I don't think there's anything stopping you from playing that way, but you might need to work out what happens in the (exceedingly rare) situation when there isn't enough tiles for a redraw, or all the remaining tiles are the same colour.

It's already a rare situation and I can't think of how the house rule improves the game. So I think I'll just drop it. ;-)

The singleton factory is probably also going to be advantageous to whoever takes it. That's just how it works. Getting lucky with a factory is especially helpful is just part of the game.

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What card sleeves should I get for Cards Against Humanity?
They measure 63mm wide by 88mm tall.
The base set has 550 cards (460 White cards and 90 Black cards).
The expansion has 100 cards (80 White cards and 20 Black cards) plus 12 blank cards (8 white, 4 black).

For the uninitiated, Cards Against Humanity.

I bought ultra pro black sleeves and ultrapro white sleeves (700) for my cards against humanity [I have both expansions].
Using both colors helps keep cards distinct. Also, since we usually play around drinks it helps ensure that they stay protected/away from sticky surfaces.
Additionally useful, is that the write your own blank cards stay in tact (i used a sharpie and the text started to smudge off).

None, but I am betting this was a trick question. The cards dimensions are fairly close to the standard dimensions of a Magic: the Gathering card. The cheapest card sleeves you could buy are the aptly named penny sleeves. These sleeves will run you on average $0.01 US. Since Cards Against Humanity runs 550 cards in the base set, you would be spending $5.50 to sleeve the cards, slightly over 20% the cost of buying a complete replacement of the entire game. I suppose if you buy online, and sufficient quantity, you might be able to reduce the cost of the sleeves by 20%-30%.
Sleeving will increase the thickness, so it will not fit in the original box. There are other issues with sleeving. Sleeves of any sort make shuffling more difficult. Penny sleeves are also notoriously slippery because they don't have textured backs (Like Dragon Shield or other high quality sleeves). High quality sleeves would cost you more than the original game itself to sleeve. Games are meant to be played, and this game wouldn't suffer much from having marked cards. As an Apples-to-Apples clone, the only danger of marked cards is that the judge might know which card you or another player through in the pot. This problem can be eliminated by having the judge close his eyes, look away, and having someone else shuffle the cards before giving them to the judge (we usually do this anyway to prevent the top card being the card from the person who decided last).
I would recommend against sleeving.

Just to be clear, your recommendation against sleeving is mainly because of cost? If so, that makes a lot of sense. But what if I have a first edition set? Buy another set and not play with the original?

First Edition or otherwise wouldn't make much of a difference in this case. The cards themselves don't currently have much value, and will not likely in the future. Buying another set will double your costs. Why do you want to preserve the 1st Edition copy in the first place?

I like to collect cards haha. And I'd like my collected cards to be in good condition. It's not about preserving value as much as about preserving aesthetic.

I find that sleeves actually make it much easier to "mash shuffle" your cards (cut your deck and then mush the two halves together). Also, sleeves can be a good thing even for party games if you tend to play around food.

This is probably the correct answer considering the style of play of the game, but a small thought in defense of sleeving them in regular magic sleeves: Yes, a full set of sleeves will probably run you $25-40 but as those sleeves get damaged/split through wear you can replace them with identical sleeves. If you play this game a lot (and drinking or messy people are involved) the chances of having marked cards goes up, and it becomes a non-zero chance that the same card could get damaged twice or more... you don't want to buy a third set, but another pack of 50 sleeves'd only be a couple bucks.

I also bought Ultra Pro sleeves for my deck, in black. I made a fusion deck with the main set, 1st & 2nd edition, plus selected Apples to Apples cards.  Ended up with almost 850 cards in total, so I picked up a cardboard deck box from a game shop for less than two bucks.
With shipping, I was able to get them for $0.05/each on Ebay. Well worth the amusement of a durable, well used and (pseudo) hacked set.


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Is "meaningful decisions per hour" a good measure for how fun a game might be?
People quickly grow out of games like Candy Land and Tic-Tac-Toe. They don't have any meaningful decisions to make. Then there are games like Monopoly, that have a few meaningful decisions to make, but those decisions are spread out over a game that will take a long time to end. Even popular gateway games like Settlers of Catan can have very long game lengths (2-3 hours), with most of the important decisions made at the start of the game, and only a few later (who to steal from, or what/who to trade with). On the other hand, Dominion has very short game times, with very compact meaningful decisions.
If you examine the top ranked games, would you find that the majority of them have a high meaningful decisions per hour density?
Does too great a density decrease the fun of a game because of analysis paralysis?

Perhaps there's something quantifiable here - I'd certainly be interested to know it - but surely there's also a ton of subjectivity. Different people like different amounts of thinking and decisions, and also appreciate many, many other aspects of games.

It's an excellent question, even if the answer is "Usually Not" because of the subjectivity involved.

To answer this you are going to have to define what a meaningful decision is. As for the games you listed in candy land there is no decisions and everything you do is decided by a deck of cards. In Tic-Tac-Toe the issue is really the fact that it is trivial to solve the game and know what moves to make to ensure a tie game every time.

Meaningful decisions per hour is one of several contributory factors, not the only one.
Other important components of "fun", at least for me, include:

high ratio of meaningful decisions to total decisions
Interesting choices to make in those decisions
Interesting setting/backstory
visual appeal
link of setting/backstory/theme to mechanics.
interactivity of players.

It's important that meaningful decisions also be interesting - I find poker rather boring unless played for money (rather than just points), as the decisions are meaningful but boring.
Note also, burying meaningful decisions amidst many minimally meaningful decisions renders the senses numb to the meaningful ones.
Likewise, I'd rather play a good game with pretty pieces than a great game with ugly ones. I could easily make a Tsuro set, for example, but it wouldn't look nor feel as nice as the "real thing," and hence would get played less.
The setting and theme, if presented well and with mechanics that tie to it, makes a game more enjoyable.
Interactivity of players also matters. If the game is all meaningful decisions, but my turn is neither affected by nor affects the other players, then the game is less fun than if the do to a correct degree. (Some games can be too interactive, however. An example of this, for many, is Tongiaki. In Tongiaki, each player's action can cascade to totally change the situation, so ability to plan ahead is limited.)

Good answer! A game's set-dressing and look-and-feel directly aids meaningful decision-making. Intuitive metaphors for game actions and easy-to-read board states do a lot to keep the minutiae of handling from overwhelming the "meaningful" part of a decision.

+1. One item I would add is variability; this can be both in terms of situations that the game throws at you, and in choices you and/or your fellow players make. Although that might be part of your point of "interesting choices".

@ErikP. Making the same decisions every time is not interesting, so yes, variability is somewhat subsumed.

Another part of fun is interactivity. Games with a lot of trading or fighting or politics compared with games where each basically plays his own game (only the player whose turn it is gets do anything during that turn, and his decisions only affect his own score, not that of the others).

@RemcoGerlich Excellent point. And one I agree with and had overlooked. Added.

+1. Another item I think is worth adding: buildup or game progression. Think of opening/mid game/end game in chess, or the progression in Settlers of Catan from road building to settlements to cities and dev cards. In fact - meaningful decisions in chess are minimal the first few moves among competent players, but the density picks up once past the opening. Fluxx is an example of a game that suffers from having no progression.

Many people love Monopoly, despite the low density of meaningful decisions. I think it has high variability due to the luck of where you land. Breaking out "variability" seems worth while, as it seems to be about the only thing that has people play certain games over and over. The card Game of War (which has zero decisions and which I therefore hate) would never ever be played if you arranged the cards exactly the same before the start of each game. Variability is the ONLY thing that causes people to keep playing that game, so far as I can tell.

If you think Monopoly is low on meanignful decision, you probably haven't played the game as written. The auction aspect is highly meaningful, and with serious players, almost every turn.

@JoeGolton many players dislike a buildup, too. I tend to think it often takes too long in many games.


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Has computer go impacted the discussion about komi?
Komi is the number of points added to White's score in Go in order to compensate for his going second. Some fifty years ago, it was 5 1/2 points; then playing experience showed that it was insufficient; so that it was moved up to 6 1/2 points, then 7 1/2 points.
During the same period, computer Go moved from being a curiosity to being able to beat the best human players. That's because today's computers play the game more precisely than humans.
Has computer Go weighed in on the debate about the proper komi (to give Black and White equal chances), and if so, in favor of the status quo (7 1/2), or a different number?

It is not implausible that the ideal komi depends on the strength of the players, which one could investigate by making the machine play at different strengths! Of course, anything other than perfect play is hard to define, so maybe it is not really feasible.

One subtle point is that territory scoring (Japanese) with 6.5 komi is nearly equivalent to area scoring (Chinese) with 7.5 komi. Also for area scoring changing komi only has a significant effect if you change it by 2.

Something to note because many people are confused by this issue...  The skill of the players is irrelevant to komi. Komi is defined as the number of points given to white such that perfect play will yield a tie. (For example, komi on a 3x3 board is known to be 9 using Chinese rules because perfect play will wipe white completely from the board, and it's 9 regardless of the skill of the players.)
Traditionally, an extra half point is given to white to avoid a tie. Therefore, white should have a moderately greater chance of winning than black. (New Zealand's official rules don't do this.)
AlphaGo Teach, which assumes a 6.5 komi (Japanese) shows the percent chance of winning with black having the first move (https://alphagoteach.deepmind.com). Note, that black's best chance is 47.1%. Since white is expected to have a slightly greater chance of winning (because of the extra half point,) AlphaGo backs up the komi.
For Chinese rules komi is necessarily an odd number (because in order for there to be a tie, the sum of both player's scores must be even and there are an odd number of points available on the board.)
Whatever komi is, for Chinese rules there is widespread agreement that it's not 9 points and historically 5 points seems too low which means 7 points is the most likely value. However, without perfect play, we can't know for sure.
-- New information --
I've learned a couple of new pieces of info that relates to this question. Go on a 5x5 board was solved using a computer (not "deep learning" but a computer program none-the-less) and it turns out that komi is 25 points for that size board in Chinese rules. Also, 7x7 Go seems to have been "weekly" solved and it seems that the komi is 9 points for this. I'm not entirely sure about the info about the 7x7 board because the original paper is in Chinese and the derivative English info about it doesn't seem to be in agreement about what the paper actually says. So computers are telling us things about the proper value of komi.

DeepMind provided a set of 50 games played by AlphaGo against itself, where black won 12 games. It could be an indication that a 7 1/2 komi (Chinese rules) is too high.

Nonsense. Fifty games is far too small a sample size to make that determination.


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What is this d6 for? Faces are 0, 0, 1, 5, 5, and 6
I found a strange d6. It has two "blank" faces, one "1" face, two "5" faces, and one "6" face. Here's a couple photos:

It was in a very old and battered vintage "Risk" game box that was missing a lot of other components, so I don't have any context clues to help me out.
What game (or kit or whatever) is this die for?

Also try r/boardgames on reddit. They're very good at this.

It is possible that it was from an early example of a set of Nontransitive Dice, a set of dice A,B,C,... such that the probability that A is higher than B is greater than half, the probability that B is higher than C is greater than half, and so on... For instance, here perhaps this was die A.  Die B could have been 2,2,2,2,2,7 and die C could have been 0,3,3,3,3,3.  Of course, these numbers I made up on the spot and the chance of winning isn't particularly balanced, but with some effort they could be.

That said, I haven't seen any explicit reference yet to this particular distribution of faces in literature related to combinatorics, probability, or nontransitive dice and am personally unaware of any game specifically utilizing this distribution of numbers.  It is worth noting that this particular die does roll higher than a standard die with probability 13/36, ties with probability 4/36 and rolls lower with probability 19/36.

There was a previous question about similar dice and it was suggested that they were part of a magic trick, apparently magic shops sell 'dice without two', yours are obviously missing more than the 2 side, but could be used for a similar purpose. Given the age, I wonder if they might be from some sort of wargame. Is the blank side recessed as if you'd put a sticker there at all?
previous question: https://boardgames.stackexchange.com/questions/38243/what-game-is-this-d6-with-a-blank-two-for


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When was "pennant" renamed "coat of arms" in Carcassonne?
Carcassonne has historically used the term "pennant" to refer to the shield icons in cities but now appears to use the term "coat of arms".  They both do the same thing (add two points to completed cities and one point to uncompleted cities).  When did this name change happen?

The original German is Wappen.
English rules have translated that variously as Pennant, Banner, Shield, or Coat of Arms.
The Rio Grande edition called it Pennant.
The Z-Man edition called it Banner.
And when Z-Man printed "Carcassonne II" (art by Pätzke instead of Matthäus), they called it Coat of Arms.
From the German forum:

Das Wappen in dem Stadtgebiet:

Carcassonne (Grafik bei Doris Matthäus)
Bei RioGrandeGames: pennant
Bei ZmanGames: banner

Carcassonne II (Grafik bei Anne Pätzke)
Bei ZmanGames: coat of arms

So the change "from" pennant came in 2012 with ZMG 78000. That changed it to "Banner". The change from "banner" to "coat of arms" came in 2014 with ZMG 78100.

Carcassonne moved from being distributed by Rio Grande Games to Z-Man games in 2012.  Here's a quote from a June 2012 The Gaming Gang article :

Hans im Gluck announced that they will be using a new distributor for the English releases of their games. Their partnership with Rio Grande is coming to an end, and by this fall/winter you will only be able to purchase Carcassonne and all its variations from Z-Man Games.

This came with several accompanying changes, including an update to the art style on the box and tiles, as well as some terminology changes is the rules.  This is likely when the change in terminology from "pennant" to "coat of arms" occurred.
From the 2014 Z-man rules (emphasis is mine):

Each tile in a completed city is worth 2 points.In addition, each coat of arms is worth 2 more points.

From the 2006 Rio Grande rules (emphasis is mine):

A player who has a knight in a completed city scores 2 points for every city segment.  Every pennant scores an extra 2 points.


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In Exploding Kittens, how do you know that another player got the exploding kitten?
In Exploding Kittens, how do you know that another player got the exploding kitten?  I mean what's to say if I draw it I don't reveal it.  Is it like "go fish" where you have to trust your opponent?

There's certainly nothing stopping a player from cheating and not revealing a drawn Exploding Kitten, but since (at least in the base game) there's no way to put a card from your hand back into the deck you will eventually reach a point where the draw pile is exhausted but more than one player is left in the game, at which point you can look at each player's hands to see who cheated.

But you can wait until you have a matched pair, steal a card from an opponent, and then reveal the Exploding Kitten and claim that that was the card that you stole, and claim that your opponent cheated. Or, conversely, wait until an opponent steals a card from you and hope they steal the Exploding Kitten (or, if they use a Favor, hand them the Exploding Kitten).

It is nowhere stated in the rules, but our group has always played the game with the variant where the currently drawn card is briefly revealed for everyone to see and announced by name. This lets everyone confirm that the card is not in fact an Exploding Kitten and lets players have an estimation about the hands of other players ("Hey, don't steal from me, she has already drawn 3 Defuses, pick her instead!"). With even moderately many players it quickly gets infeasible to know each player's hand, in addition to the uncertainty caused by the initial deal and all the stolen cards, so nobody knows exactly what the others have and cheating (at least by holding an Exploding Kitten) is nipped in the bud.

That sounds like you don't trust each other to play honestly and allows you to target people based on knowing information that you should not know.

@JoeW yes, it does - and indeed, our group was always engaging in a friendly competition in finding creative ways to cheat and staying on our toes in order to catch the cheaters. It is a way of playing, admittedly not for everyone but quite fun for us. Independently, the additional information does not unbalance the game, as everyone gets the same amount, while opening up new dimensions in strategizing and diplomacy, as detailed in my answer.

Personally I wouldn't play with a group that cheated on a regular basis like that. Your answer is based on people knowingly cheating which isn't helpful at all in my mind.

@JoeW my answer, as clearly stated, reflects a personal decision and experience. It offers one possible solution to the problem described by OP, which can be adopted, adapted or ignored by anyone as they see fit.

And I am pointing out that if you are changing the rules because you can't trust people to not cheat and actually expect them to cheat that isn't a good basis for suggesting how others should be playing.

I actually like this variant to the game.


text:
Pokemon Evolution across types
Are you allowed to evolve a pokemon to a different type?  For example, I have a leaf Burmy.  I have a leaf Wormadam and a metal Wordamam.  Can I evolve my leaf Burmy to a metal Wordamam?

Yes, you can evolve.   Pokemon evolution doesn't depend on the type of either the basic or evolved pokemon.   What matters is that the name of the Pokemon listed as "evolves from" on the Stage 1 match exactly the name of the Basic Pokemon.    So, for example, your leaf/metal Wormadam state on the card "Evolves from Burmy".   Either can evolve from "Burmy", but neither could evolve from "Team Magma's Burmy" .

Thanks Glen.  That was my assumption I just didn't want it to only be an ASSUMPTION.  It is always hard to find examples of this in the rules and some of them are ambiguous.  If you have any links to official sites, please do include them in your answer although i have already accepted it.


text:
Forbidden Island Engineer's power?
In Forbidden Island, must the Engineer be either on or adjacent to a tile to shore it up?

From the manual:

Any character can shore up a tile that is either adjacent or underneath them. The engineer is listed as an exception because he can shore up 2 tiles per action. It doesn't indicate any other requirements or exceptions for the Engineer. It does distinctly say they must be for one action so you can't spread it around.
Some think that you can shore up two tiles away:

The group I played with argued that he could shore up two tiles in a straight "line". That is, one adjacent tile plus the one next in line, adjacent to that adjacent tile. So, shoring up a tile that has a tile between it and the tile he/she is standing on.

but the general consensus is this is incorrect. Nothing in the rules indicate that. The ability doesn't say he can shore up two adjacent tiles but 2 tiles which inherit the previous property of adjacent to the player.

Re "Nothing in the rules indicate that", Actually, that's exactly what the rules indicate. The Engineer's ability reads "shore up two tiles for one action", and the shore action is defined as follows: "To shore a tile, simply flip it so its un-flooded side is facing up". As written, the rules place no limit on which tiles the Engineer can shore up. Only the ability available to everyone has such as limit specified. But as you said, that's not the intended reading. The Engineer is only meant to be able to shore up his tile and orthogonally adjacent tiles.

I still disagree that the rules indicate that shoring up two tiles indicates t hat these tiles might be any two tiles. It doesn't for instance say "Shore up any 2 tiles" the way the sandbag does say "Shore up any one tile on the island" clearly stating that the tile doesn't need to follow the indicated rules. I believe in the absence of new rules the old rules are clearly and obviously intended thus the lacking of other exceptions means the Engineering tile doesn't imply more exceptions than it explicitly details.

also you indicate the shore action is defined as follows and then use only half the definition. Part of the definition of shore up action is that it only applies to adjacent tiles. It's actually the more important half of the definition as it pertains to this discussion. Shoring up is defined as something you do to adjacent tiles.

The indicated rules, as you call them, don't mention the word "adjacent" at all.

It's in the first sentence of the image I linked originally - https://i.imgur.com/w3uETri.png - You may for 1 or more actions, show up any ADJACENT Island tile - it then goes on to define specifically which five tiles are eligible for shoring up.

Yes, I know. I didn't say the word "adjacent" doesn't appear in the rules.

but this is the rule on shoring up. This is what we're talking about. You say the rules for shoring up don't mention adjacent and I'm saying it does. Is there a wire being crossed here?

There are two abilities here. One described in the first sentence of the image (shore up 1 adjacent tile for 1 action), and one described on the Engineer (shore up 2 tiles for 1 action). We're not talking about the first ability. The definition of shoring up is "To shore a tile, simply flip it so its un-flooded side is facing up". There's no mention of "adjacent" at all. The answer lies outside the rules. That's why you had to mention the general consensus.

@ikegami I know I am late to the party but I disagree - this is not describing separate abilities but providing an exception, a modification, to one ability based on the character, as is made clear by the rule book calling it an exception - so it changes the relevant part of the general rule where it says tile to "(up to) 2 tiles" with the rest entirely unchanged, including the restriction to adjacent tiles. The answer is definitely within the rules.

@Andrew, How is "You may shore up any 1 adjacent Island tile" and "You may shore up 2 tiles" the same ability/instruction? Yes, they provide a modification to shoring up (which is defined as "flipping a tile so its un-flooded side is face up"). Both of them do. I do agree that the adjacency requirement is meant to apply to both, but it's only specified for one as written. That's all I said.

@ikegami The basic ability is "you may for 1 or more actions, shore up any adjacent tile, or the Island tile your pawn is on [...]" The engineer has an exception that modifies that basic ability to "you may for 1 or more actions, shore up 2 of any adjacent tile, or the Island tile your pawn is on [...]" or however you want to word the modification of the same ability. Just like explorer "you may for 1 or more actions, shore up any adjacent tile, diagonal tile, or the Island tile your pawn is on [...]" Exceptions modify relevant sections of the base rule, not replace the whole thing.

@Andrew Re "The basic ability is ..." That's not what the rules say. The rules explicitly say that that to shore up is to simply flip it over so its un-flooded side is facing up. See the image in the answer to which this is a comment. Anything else is a modification to shoring up.

There is an image of the very rule I quoted from in the answer. The exception for Engineer modifies how many tiles it applies to only, the exception for Explorer modifies which tiles may be selected. You are ignoring the first half of the rule, the player action and focusing exclusively on the physical result of taking that action as if it were the entire ability text.

@Andrew Re "You are ignoring the first half of the rule", No, The definition given for shoring up is "simply flip it over so its un-flooded side is facing up". I'm not ignoring an part of that.

Let us continue this discussion in chat.

Yes.

The question is understandable.
The Engineer's ability reads "shore up two tiles for one action", and the shore action is defined as follows: "To shore a tile, simply flip it so its un-flooded side is facing up". As written, the rules place no limit on which tiles the Engineer can shore up.
But then one considers that other players are restricted to shoring up adjacent tiles. "You may, for one or more actions, shore up any adjacent tile (up, down, left, right) or the Island tile your pawn is on", and one might think this restriction is suppose to apply to the Engineer as well.
They'd be right. The restriction does apply to the Engineer as well.

Compare the Engineer's and the Explorer's ability.
The Explorer considers diagonal tiles to also be adjacent for shoring and movement purposes.
The more restrictive reading of the Engineer's ability gives it a free action almost every turn. This is a huge boon. It would be insane to also give it a power that's much more powerful than the Explorer's (considering all tiles to be adjacent for shoring purposes).

The same answer was previously given on Board Game Geek.


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Spoons - How to evenly distribute the spoons when playing in a rectangle
When you're playing the game of Spoons, it's a really good thing to have all the spoons distributed in way where they're all equidistant from the players.  This is easy to do at a round table.  However, at a rectangular table, it seems like it's hard to keep it balanced.  When I've played at a rectangular table, we usually have the spoons laid out like this:

However, this gives players at/near the ends a disadvantage.  When someone grabs a spoon and the free-for-all starts, players in the middle have a wide selection, even after several have been grabbed.  But players at the end have farther and farther to reach as the spoons on the ends get taken.  Often, the player without one is on an end.  Is there an better way to keep things balanced at a rectangular table, without giving anyone an advantage/disadvantage?

Is this the game you are asking about? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spoons

@JoeW  Exactly.  That's the one.

Simply place the spoons in an oval pattern; with each spoon handle pointing towards the players; all equidistant from the players.

Do you mean something like this?

@Zac Exactly. It should be possible to distance them in such a way that it's very close to equal for all players.

My issue with that is in a scenario like this.  Player A gets four of a kind and grabs Spoon 1.  Player B sees him, and grabs Spoon 2, and C grabs Spoon 3.  Now poor Player D has to lunge down the table to grab a spoon, because all of the spoons at his end are gone.  If this hypothetical game were at a round table, it wouldn't matter how many spoons are gone; D could still grab one as long as there's one left.  You see that the players along the side still have an advantage over those at the ends.


text:
Does moving the wagon after scoring stop you from taking the fairy?
So I've read the online PDF rules and can't seem to find an answer for this.
After scoring points in a round with the wagon, if you move the wagon to another unfinished city or road as per the wagon rules, does this count towards deploying a new follower and stop you from taking control of the fairy from the "Princess And The Dragon" expansion?

No. Redeployment of the Wagon following scoring (at the end of a turn) is a separate step from the figure deployment step (for the next turn), so it has no effect on any of the actions you can take during the figure deployment step, including moving the Fairy.

This is pretty much what I figured, but the people that I have played with stated that the wagon "re-deploys" instead of "moving". And since the Fairy is changed owner at the end of turn, they would say that the fairy cannot go to someone who's wagon was "re-deployed".

@IronWilliamCash: Yes, it helps to stick with consistent terminology.

Sorry if my terms aren't correct. I have most of the expansions in French, some in English and 2 in Dutch, so I might not have all the exact English terms since we play in French. But thanks, I'll try and impose terminology with a specific meaning.

@IronWilliamCash: No worries. I meant that it's common for people (even in "authoritative" rules references) to be lax about terms; and that's a common source of confusion.


text:
I'm looking for a card game with a deck of noun cards and a deck of occupation cards
It's a party game, players have a hand of noun cards and the 'in' person each round picks an occupation card up and chooses one of the occupations on the card like "I'm a firefighter".  Then all the other players pick two of their noun cards to make an 'item' and do their best to sell their item to the player for their occupation, and the 'it' player chooses the most convincing.  It's very silly and very fun and I can't remember the name or find it anywhere, please help!

In this instance it's Snake Oil. You combine two nouns from your hand to sell to the active player to help them in their occupation
Fun-Employed is similar in that the active player has a job posting to fill and players have a 4-hand 'resume' and can swap cards from their hand with a set of 10 cards on the table to best tailor their hand to the role.

It sounds like you're describing Funemployed or Snake Oil.

It would be a good idea to include a small synopsis of the games along with the links. As your answer stands right now, it will be a whole lot less useful if the links break in the future.


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Can you play a Progress Card even when you get nothing from it?
If I have a Progress Card for which initial preconditions do not hold, will I still be able to use it in order to discard it back to the pile? The goal is to prevent a spy from stealing it.
A few examples:

I am leading in victory points but I want to use Wedding card.
I have Irrigation but I don't have any wheat hexagons.
I have Blacksmith but I don't have any ore hexagons.

Welcome to the site! I cleaned up your wording some to make your question more readable; feel free to edit again if I changed the meaning of anything you were asking.

It appears the FAQ addresses this kind of situation, and the answer is no.
See question number 3 on this page of official catan FAQ:

Progress Cards: General - May I play a Progress Card if playing it has no effect?
If you know beforehand that playing the card will have no effect (e.g., the Foundry card, provided that you are not settling adjacent to a mountains hex): no.
If you have no way of knowing it (e.g., Trade Monopoly): yes.

Wow... I would really like to know why the FAQ says that. In general, a FAQ should only be providing clarification, giving rulings based on the actual rulebook. Here, the FAQ seems to directly contradict the rules. Considering that the FAQ is official, part of Catan.com, I'm inclined to say that it's the right answer.. but it sounds like an official errata / update to the rulebook is in order.

I would guess that not being able to discard or play progress cards when you want to is so that they can't be played for no effect or discarded for no reason to avoid being stolen by the spy.  Which to me makes sense as being able to play a card so another player can't steal it from you to play it doesn't sound like it is in the idea of a good game.

Hum, the is no "Foundry" progress card. The applicability of this FAQ to C&K is questionable. One of the other Catan games has an Iron Foundry, and it would make sense not to play it where it would have no effect as it actually takes up physical board space. But the logic that applies to the Iron Foundry doesn't necessary apply to C&K Progress Cards.

It is the same as just dropping a resource card without using it in order to avoid being robbed on a roll of 7.

@Moutabreath I would guess that is similar reasoning

@ikegami it still is the official faq for the cities and knights expansions even if it does have an error

@Joe W, Except it doesn't talk about C&K. Sounds like a mis-filled FAQ.

@ikegami the title says it is about C&K so unless there is some other official source saying otherwise the official rule is you can't play for no effect.

I have sent an email to hopefully get clarification on this. Either way we know for sure that there is an error in the FAQ; and it seems equally likely that the error was using the wrong card name, or that the error was placing that FAQ question under the wrong section.

@Moutabreath Your reasoning (that it is dropping the card, which is not allowed just as for resources) is the same that is given in the Encyclopaedia Catanica (volume 1, point 4.M.c, only in German), a more extensive version of the FAQ. It also lists which cards may be played without effect and which may not with a short explaination. Also the card names are correct in there (for the German version of the game).

FWIW, the German version of the FAQ uses the correct card name and has the same question with the same answer.

Yes, you can do this.
None of the Progress Cards have prerequisites that must be fulfilled. The rules do not give any limit on playing a Progress Card that's related to whether or not the Progress Card would help you at all.
Here's the full rules for Playing Progress Cards:

Playing Progress Cards
During your turn, you may play as many Progress Cards as
  you wish. All Progress Cards may only be played after you roll
  the dice (exception: the “Alchemist”). Here are some specific
  rules about the play of Progress Cards. More detailed
  instructions about every card can be found in the Cities &
  Knights Almanac:
• Victory Point Cards must be played immediately when
  drawn. The spy may not steal them, and they cannot be
  hidden in your hand. These cards do not count against
  your hand limit of 4 cards.
• You may never hold more than four Progress Cards in
  your hand. If you draw a fifth Progress Card, and you
  cannot play it because it is not your turn, you must
  discard one card (of your choice) to the bottom of the
  appropriate stack.
• Progress Cards may be played on the same turn that they
  are drawn.
• Progress Cards may not be traded with other players,
  nor may the robber steal them.
• When you play a Progress Card, place it face down under
  the appropriate Progress Card stack. Victory points,
  however, remain face up and in play.

Playing a Wedding card while you are in the lead does not go against any of these rules. As a matter of language, if you do something "for each" of something, and there are 0 of those things, then you simply do that thing 0 times. So when you play Wedding, you check which opponents have more victory points than you, and any who do must give you 2 cards. If no opponents have more victory points than you, then no opponents give you any cards.

A new answer has been added quoting the FAQ which states that if you know the card won't have any effect (ie no hidden knowledge for it) you can't play that progress card.

...but that FAQ reference a card that doesn't even exist in C&K, so it's applicability to C&K is questionable.

@ikegami it still is the official faq for the cities and knights expansions even if it does have an error

@Joe W, yeah, but the error is that it doesn't talk about C&K.

No, you may not, is specifically says so in the FAQ
"If you know beforehand that playing the card will have no effect (e.g., the Mining card, provided that you are not settling adjacent to a mountains hex): no."
https://www.catan.com/faqs/96?page=6

This does not appear to add anything useful or new. The same FAQ is quoted (to greater extent and with less ambiguity) in the accepted answer from two years ago.


text:
How can I add a taste of adventure games to my game?
I'm designing a card game based on an ancient fairy tale book. So far my game consists of some hero or character cards with 3 attribute: coins, strength and intelligence. And there are quest cards with the same 3 attributes and what you do is to pick character cards and when you reach to a quest card level, make it complete and then you do that card's actions.
My game at this time is basically a hand management game and somewhat similar to games like splendor and "Quests of Valeria".
But what if I want to add a taste of adventure games to the game with heroes, quests, items, treasures and so on? I still insist on it being a card game without a board.
How can I make my game a little bit more adventur"ish"?

D&D's Lords of Waterdeep board game has a similar mechanic - you draw a quest card, then 'withdraw' coloured blocks which represent quest characters; white for priests, orange for warriors, etc. You collect the blocks and spend them on completing the quests, gaining the rewards from the card. I believe a similar mechanic could be implemented, though of course instead of flat-identity blocks, you have differentiating characters with varieties of attributes. I would say that it would be important to balance the ratio of attribute variety for a start - be sure that there's plenty of average characters, with some rare, and some 'elite'-standard characters, just to bring some excitement into the luck of the draw.
Coin-use is  an interesting "attribute" to give a character - this could be used as bartering power for your more wiley character. They are able to bribe characters or get discounts for being economy-savvy or some sort of styling.
You say you want items and adventure and such - perhaps part of the quest rewards could include items which could be traded for cash your gold hoard (if that's part of your gameplan) or if kept, provide bonuses to your characters individually or as a general positive effect.

Lords of waterdeep is close to my idea. Thank you for mentioning it. About coins, they're neccesary for doing quests and hiring characters(through bidding for permanent use of characters) and in addition to 'coin' attrib of characters, there are physical coins in game. Thank for good answer.

I would suggest that you refrain from asking for clarity within the answer. If you would like something clarifying it is best to use the comments section on the question itself. That way the answer is more to the point.

Apologies - you're right. Sorry about that. I removed my questions - thanks for the pointer.

@GrayRoberts Good man :) It may add value to the post if you comment the questions you had and allow the OP to edit his question to reflect the comments.

@ThunderToes thank you! I do have some questions to help flesh out my point, actually.

@klaymen - Are there other attributes you've considered adding to this world? How else do you envision the attributes being important or influencing gameplay? I think random chance is always a good opportunity for excitement - consider providing 'chance' cards to your draw deck, in that there are opportunities for the gameplay to change randomly in lieu of a beneficial quest/character card. Also making quest rewards somehow randomised can prove to be exciting for players. Are any of these worth expanding?

@GrayRoberts of course it worth expanding. But i'm afraid of element of chance being out of balance. I dont like much chance in my game. My game is kind of action driven. Every quest card has two actions. First one is for the player, and second one affect the all the players. Actually based on your answers, i proceeded and developed my game. But i cant explain in comments more.if you intrested please message me directly.  Thanks again.

I think there is no direct messaging . sorry. Danialabdl90@gmail.com

This is an interesting scenario. The first idea that sprung to mind would be to have a set of cards that relate to each other specifically. Each card in the set needs a certain criteria to be met to allow you to then search the deck for another card in the set. The harder the "quest" is the more cards there are in the set that you need to complete the adventure.
On reflection, this seems more like a lore issue than a mechanical issue. The wording on the "adventure cards" may be the best place to include your adventuring aspects. Maybe have "Scenario" cards that explain a certain journey and need choices to be made at certain points (Maybe drawing from two separate decks that accompany the scenario cards?). These choices determine the outcome of the adventure.
This is only a brainstorm. I'd like to think I could come up with more ideas. If so I will update the answer.

Very valuable answer. I should think about your ideas. More ideas are appreciated. Thanks.

I'd like to direct you to a game within the Magic the gathering franchise that you may take a lot of influence from. Check out MTG Planeschase on Google. It lets you transcend worlds that give you certain benefits. Rather snazzy :P

Eldritch Horror has several types of complex encounters like this, where you usually have a characteristic test (or a decision to make) and then it splits to "pass" and "fail" sections with another test or decision, so there are up to 4 different outcomes with different measures of success. This system feels very "adventury" to me.
Another thing that adds to adventurous feeling is uncertainty of outcome. Having deterministic outcome for each pair of quest+character(or set of characters) just adds unexciting extra step here, so you want some kind of randomization for this to work. In Eldritch Horror it is achieved with rolling dice, but if you want to keep it cards only, I think push-your-luck based skill test is a good alternative.

Good point about uncertainty.


text:
How do the Monopoly odds change when the board is played in reverse?
One semi-popular house rule is to play Monopoly as usual, but move the pieces counter-clockwise instead of the usual clockwise - that is, hit the higher-end properties first and move down toward the lower-end ones. Another related house rule is to play in the normal fashion, but when someone lands on Free Parking, either that player or all players reverse direction. (Yes, that means different players could be moving in different directions. I didn't make up the rule.)
In the above versions, how does this affect the winning strategies? As discussed there, the properties landed on most often are the oranges and reds. Does reversing the board play for some or all of the game affect those odds to enough of a degree to make a difference in which monopoly rakes in the most revenue?

The key change in reversing the direction of movement is the fact that players now leave Jail in the opposite direction. The oranges and reds are particularly profitable because they are within 1-2 rolls of Jail, among other reasons. When moving counterclockwise, the dark purples and dark blues are now in a more often visited area, so I would expect their value to increase significantly, while the value of the orange and reds would decrease commensurately. Even the light blues, which are already among the best property groups, would get a boost from being in front of, rather than behind, Jail.

@DonielF - True, but it's the only thing that would really change when moving backwards. Chance cards won't change, nor will the development cost/profitability ratio.

You would usually not skip the Go square (and the chance to collect $200) before going to Jail. The exceptions would be the Chance square between Oriental and Vermont (light blues), and the community chest square between the two dark purples. Even so, you would collect your $200 on the tenth square after leaving Jail instead of the 30th, and you would not have to "run the gauntlet" of "Go to Jail before reaching Go.
"Jail" would sometimes spare you the relatively cheap Yellow and Red monopolies, (instead of the greens and dark blues) but when you leave, you'd be heading toward the relatively cheap Light Blue and Dark Purple monopolies.

I haven't heard of this variation.  Nuclear Wang's analysis is correct.  Note the Dark Blues getting a frequency boost along with their high rent would cause ownership of that color group be key to winning a reverse game.
To take the analysis further, take a look at the following site:
http://www.tkcs-collins.com/truman/monopoly/monopoly.shtml
This site includes the Markov chain analysis results for the forward game.  Markov chain analysis is rather involved.  The key results are shown in the Long Term Probabilities for Ending Up on Each of the Squares table.
Could estimate the reverse game's probabilities as the probability of the square opposite the Jail/Go to Jail axis.
So as an example the Park Place gets the probabilities shown for Indiana Ave.
 Its "Probability % (Jail Long)" increases from 2.0595% to 2.5671%.  This makes Park Place 25% more valuable in the end game.  Calculating the boost for Boardwalk is complicated by having cards that direct you to this space, but no card directing you to its reverse counterpart, Kentucky Avenue.


text:
Adam Logan vs. Ben Schoenbrun (2023 Canadian Scrabble Classic): where can JUN be placed?
In this YouTube video, the commentators say in this position

that if Adam Logan plays JUN then Ben Schoenbrun will play SIJO and win.  However, I cannot find where JUN can be legally placed on this board.  I guess I'm missing some obscure word here.
Question: Where can JUN be placed?

Looks like it's in the top right, hooking onto PI to make PIN.

His opponent would responding with SIJO on the top row over the triple word score.


text:
What is the difference between Draughts and Checkers?
Other than draughts is British English and checkers is American English, what is the difference between the two?

"Draughts" is a family of closely related games, so you need to be more specific about exactly which game you mean.

English draughts is exactly the same game as (American) checkers, the one played on an 8x8 board - and as someone brought up in the UK, I can confirm that is what people in the UK mean by "draughts".
International draughts (also called Polish draughts or international checkers) is the game played on a 10x10 board.

There is no "global" standard for these; in Italy, Latvia, Norway and the UK, the 8x8 version is the standard with the 10x10 version very rare, while in the Netherlands the 10x10 version is the standard with the 8x8 version being very rare.

However on the continent (and particularly in Netherlands in my experience) the 8x8 version is virtually unknown with only the 10x10 version played.

Norwegian here, and I have never, ever seen, and practically never heard of this game being played on anything other than a standard chessboard. So it's very much a regional thing.

In Italy we have "Dama" (8x8) and "Dama internazionale" (10x10). The 10x10 version is rarely played

Thanks folks, I've integrated those extra countries into the answer. Anybody else feel free to edit the answer to add the usage in other countries.

Latvian here. Today I learned that there are 10x10 boards somewhere out there. Cool!

As far as I know:
Draughts:

Board is 10x10
Normal pieces can jump backwards to take a piece
Kings can move several squares in each direction

Checkers:

Board is 8x8
Normal pieces can not jump backwards to take a piece
Kings can move 1 square in each direction. They can jump backwards to take a piece.

This may well be regional, but in the UK draughts is used for the game you've described as checkers. The game you described as draughts is something I've never encountered except on wikipedia.

Gotta be regional, the version I have seen in Russia has the rules of "Draughts" as described here but is played exclusively on 8x8.

The only version of Draughts that you can capture on a back move is Brazilian Draughts, also the only game I am aware of with the Flying Kings that can move multiple spaces in a single move. Brazilian Draughts is played on an 8x8 board as well.


text:
in Go, why does this setup make a false-eye?
I am an absolute beginner, trying to learn.
Let's consider that board (from a tutorial at http://playgo.to/iwtg/en/):

It's black's turn to play. The topic is to avoid a false eye at D9.
According to the tutorial, if I play at E8, I do not have a false eye:

But, if I play anywhere else and white plays at E8, I do have a false eye:

I do not understand how having a white stone, at the diagonal, would make a false eye.
Can anyone explain?

As the right most eye does not have a solid chain it is still vulnerable.
This combined white's coverage on 8 means that when white takes E8 white will easily be able to move E9 into atari; after E8 white's next move would be F9, G8 or G9, which black cannot effectively block within the available two moves.

Just think about what happens when your stones get fully surrounded, as will eventually happen: The stone(s) at E9 will only retain a single liberty, the false eye, and you will need to fill that single liberty with a stone to connect E9 to the rest of the black group. And after that, only a single eye remains.
That is the point of false eyes: They are liberties which you will be forced to fill yourself, or suffer your stones being taken. As such, they do not count towards ensuring the life of a group.


text:
Is cheating allowed in Munchkin?
I have been disputing with my friends lately about the fact that the creators of Munchkin intended for people to cheat or not. By cheating I mean doing anything the rules say you can't do or that is obviously not allowed, e.g.: using more hands then you're supposed to, stealing cards from the deck when nobody's looking. I believe the game is all about being a jerk and a backstabber in every way. Who agrees that you should be allowed to steal and cheat in Munchkin but have it be punishable however the GM sees fit?

What do you mean by cheating? Can you give some examples.

@JoeW just going by the definition of the cheating tag on this site. cheating is "breaking the rules" so anything that the rules say you cant do, like using three hands without the permitting card. Or anything that is just blatantly not allowed, like stealing extra cards while nobody is looking and stuff like that.

You should edit that into the question but my thoughts are that the answer is no because that makes the game not very fun to play

Munchkin the board game has no GM to police/punish cheating.  As a result, the players must follow and enforce the rules as a group

If cheating is allowed then wouldn't it kinda by definition not be cheating? My head hurts.

@goldPseudo Yes i know. I don't mean is it literally allowed, but what i'm really getting at is the intent of the game creators. I heard someone that they encouraged cheating. not exactly allowing it.

According to the very old rules from the beginning of munchkin you could cheat if the other players didn't catch you.

Likewise, you may also use only one headgear, one suit of armor, one pair of footgear, and two “hand” items (or one “two hands” item), unless you have a card that lets you cheat or the other players don’t catch you.

That was in an earlier version of the rules and doesn't appear in the newer rules, so probably a no. On the Munchkin FAQ the fifth question under General Questions is

Q. But don't the rules say it's OK to cheat if you don't get caught?
A. Not anymore, and even when they did, it was a joke. If you want a game where cheating is in the spirit and the letter of the rules, try Illuminati.

So again no.
Anyways, cheating is breaking the rules and makes the game not very fun, so I'd say no to cheating.
If you want to read those rules, I accessed them from https://boardgamegeek.com/filepage/3069/rulespdf. You need a boardgamegeek account to download them. To find that specific passage, hit Ctrl+F then write "cheat" in the box that appears.
Also see this old cheat card:

Also, scroll down to the bottom here to see the official stance of Steve Jackson Games on cheating - the line in the manual was meant to be a joke, and they do not endorse it. Unfortunately players took the line at face value and hence thought that cheating was encouraged.

@ConMan yeah I saw that that's mostly how I got my links

Point of fact: you can cheat in any game so long as no one catches you.

@L.ScottJohnson Point of fact: if people do catch you cheating, you will stop getting invited to play board games.  Risk/benefit analysis is an important life skill

@Zags Indeed. Just pointing out the obviousness of the "or the other players don't catch you" being a joke / not endorsed.

Your geekdo link is broken, Access denied, expired

@Andrew oh you might need a boardgamegeek.com account it still works for me

@YoutRied The XML returned by the request said the link expired at 2:30 am GMT, that was actually slightly over 13 hours ago. Looks like it may be a one time use link?

@Andrew I'll try and find a permanent link then but it still works for me

The expiry time is right there in the link... though it doesn't match with the data returned when I click the link it still is in the past. 1551666634 is 3:43 pm GMT today

@Andrew That's the best I can do for now... (please see edited question)

If you added the italics to the quote, you should note that fact.


text:
What game uses dice with sides powers of 2?
I have one die. It has six sides marked 2, 4, 8, 16, 32 and 64. Does anyone know what game uses this?

Backgammon uses a die like that; it's known as a doubling cube.  It's used, when playing a multi-game match or for money, to track the current stakes of the game.  Note that in this capacity it's not really rolled as a die; it's just a cube with the necessary numbers on the faces.


text:
Can you identify this "memory" card game with 3 secret cards, lowest score wins
Last summer, my nephew taught our family a card game.  I think he learned it in Singapore.  We would like to find out what the game is called.
THE RULES - as best as I can remember them:
Each player is dealt three cards, face down.  He can look at them once, but has to remember the values from then on.
The rest of the cards are put in a drawing pile.  One card is flipped and put in a discard pile.
The players take turns, drawing either the top discard or the top from the drawing pile.  He can swap the card with one of his three face-down cards if he wants to.  Then he discards the extra card in the discard pile, face up.  This swap will allow the player (and others) to refresh their memory of which cards are in which positions.
Face cards are special:

If you pick up a Jack (from the drawing pile or from the discard pile), you can peek at any face-down card.
If you pick up a Queen, you can swap any two face-down cards belonging to another player.
If you pick up a King, you can swap one of your own face-down cards with one of someone else's.

The goal is to minimize the sum of your three face-down cards.  When the draw pile is depleted, everyone flips their face-down cards and adds up the values (A=1, J-11, Q=12, K=13).
You can play many rounds.  Just keep adding the scores from each round.  The lowest score wins.
--
I might have some of the rules wrong.
Please help us identify this game.

This does sound a bit like the "Switch" variant of Thirty-One https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thirty-one_(card_game)

The rules are very close to Cabo. Differences:
number of cards

4 cards face down instead of 3, and the player may look at only two of them at the start of play

card powers

Q or J: blind swap
9 or 10: peek at another player's card
7 or 8: peek at your own card

scoring

all cards according to rank (A=1, K=13)

Wikipedia tells me I have been playing the Swiss variant of this. Thanks!

That sounds a lot like Four card golf though when I played it we did two cards face up, and two face down, so it's totally possible yours is just a regional variation.

Four card Golf with Power Cards, Yep. Cabo is one of the names for, as that page notes, "Golf with Power Cards"


text:
Munchkin Warhammer 40k - Running Away - Automatic Escape vs Automatic Failure
I recently played a game of Munchkin Warhammer 40k.
In the middle of a fight I was losing, I was cursed with a "Can't Locate the Astronimican"  which I responded by playing a "Tactical Rearward Advance".  This lead to great disagreement within the group.
Card Text:

Curse! Can't locate the Astronimican. Automatically fail your next run away attempt.

and

Tactical Rearward Advance. Play before rolling the die to Run Away from the first monster in your combat. You automatically escape from all monsters.

My argument was that

I was still allowed to play the Tactical Rearward Advance, as I had not rolled the die to Run away yet; and,
it would negate the Curse entirely as my escape was "automatic" - ie I was not making a "Run Away Attempt" as explicitly stated on the curse card

My opponent argued that the Curse would have effect immediately as there is no "stack"
In the event, we negotiated a compromise and moved on with the game, but I am curious as to other peoples interpretation of those two cards.

I am inclined to agree with you, you are not "Running Away" so the curse doesn't trigger. Of course, that means that you are still cursed until your next Run Away attempt, escaping this combat doesn't negate the curse.

Nevermind, the Arcanist Lupus' answer proves me wrong as well, hahaha

It's spelled Astronomican in Warhammer 40k lore. But I don't own that game, so I can't tell if it's written like that on the card.

You cannot escape this way
From the Steve Jackson Games Forums, on a thread about running away, the Munchkin Line Editor wrote:

If a monster doesn't allow you to Run Away at all, then there's no attempt that will automatically succeed or fail. (But some Items will allow you to try to escape even from monsters that don't normally allow a try; they will explicitly say you can roll even from those monsters.)
If you're under a Curse or Bad Stuff that means you automatically fail your next attempt, you can't use something else to make that attempt succeed (unless, as above, it says it can even supersede automatic failure -- Magic Lamp, for instance, or Tomb Dust, as you mentioned).
You can't use a Hireling to escape an automatic failure. You also can't use an automatic success to counteract an automatic failure, unless the auto-success says so; automatic failure trumps automatic success.
A monster that won't even pursue you never causes a Run Away attempt in the first place, so it doesn't trigger an automatic failure effect -- you're still stuck with it. However, if another card (such as Flask of Glue) counteracts the "will not pursue" clause, then your automatic failure kicks in.

Tactical Rearward Advance does not indicate that it supersedes automatic failures, therefore it does not.


text:
Does anyone know how to play the Shithead Card Game?
I tried playing the game, but the rules are too different. Each site has a different version. I found the site www.shedgame.com and Pagat's rules for Shithead.
What should I do?

As the answer by Arcanist Lupus indicates: there is no "The" Shithead Game, there are many games that go by the name Shithead (and those games also go by other names).

As long as you and the people you are playing with are in agreement as to what rules you are using, it doesn't matter what those rules actually are.
Many games that have existed for a long period of time and are taught by word of mouth tend to develop variations.  But as long as all the players in one game know what rules are being applied, then the game should be fair for all players.
Some experimentation might be needed to find the ruleset that your group likes the most.  But the beauty of games is that there is no wrong set of rules, as long as the rules are applied fairly.
Remember: the goal of playing a game is for everyone involved to have fun.


text:
6 / 8 / 10 / 12 Sided Dice Identification
dice

Any help with what these dice might go to? Can't find them in the dice ID questions here or anywhere online.
The 16 six sided dice show most of the symbols found on these dice.
The 3 larger six sided dice have the same symbol on every side. Two sides have a "1", three sides have a "2", and one side has a "3".
Did not even realize there were 10 sided dice. The two shown have the exact same symbols, with each showing one side.
The two 12 sided dice have the same symbols, with each one showing the opposite side.
The six 8 sided dice have sides numbered 1 through 7 and one side with no number. All 8 sides have the same symbol.
 TIA

This looks to be one or more sets of Dicemaster: Cities of Doom.
You can see many of the same symbols as in your dice.

In the game, each player needs their own set of dice. It looks like you have 3 or 4 sets.
It's hard to tell what is included from the photos; the back of the box shows only D6's and a D8, while some photos show D10's and D12's like yours.


text:
Which 40k codex would I use?
Thinking about starting a full army conversion project. The issue becomes if I use another faction's models. I’m looking to make Armageddon Ork Hunters which is a guard regiment. But they fight like orks. So if I convert a guard army to fit the ork codex completely. Which codex would I use the ork? Or would I still have to use guard, because looking at the army it would be like the guard looted the orks.

If you're playing casually, you do whatever you feel like so long as your opponent is happy with it.
If you're playing competitively and want to use the Ork rules, you need to stick to the normal rules for any conversions:

No potential to confuse your opponent - e.g. you can't just stick a Taurox down on the battlefield and claim it's a Trukk, it has to be clearly distinguishable from a Taurox.
What You See Is What You Get (WYSIWG) - e.g. if you want a model to be a Big Mek with Kustom Force Field, your model has to have equipment on it which generates a force field.
Games Workshop models only - they can be any Games Workshop model, whether from Warhammer 40K, Age of Sigmar or something else, but your conversion has to be Games Workshop models (with a small amount of green stuff allowed).

Is this possible? Yes, but it's a large amount of work; for actually the reverse of what you're proposing, see Matthew Beavis's amazing "Grot Guard" army. It is perhaps worth noting that Matthew has annotated the bases of the characters with their official names (Commissar Yarrick etc) in order to meet the "no confusion" rules.
Of course, everything in the end is down to the discretion of the tournament organiser (TO) - if you're intending to bring an army like this to a competitive tournament, you would be very strongly advised to start the discussion with the TO long before you arrive; don't be "that guy" that turns up with a marginally acceptable army and makes life difficult for the TO.


text:
Identifying a cooperative escape game
Setup: Maps are generated by placing provided tiles next to each other, which were either shuffled or placed according to some guide (don't remember). I remember there were distinct tile types with slides and ladders, and the ultimate goal was to escape the generated map. There may have also been a real-life time limit (hourglass?) and restrictions on communication.
I've searched high and low for the game but it's pretty hard to identify a game by these features. It's definitely not Alien Labryinth or Space Maze though.

Have you searched by mechanic? If not, I would start by Elapsed Real Time Ending:
https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgamemechanic/2882/elapsed-real-time-ending

What was the theme/setting? Was it horror themed with tiles building out a haunted house? If so, I don't know the name off the top of my head but I have access to a copy and figure it out tonight. Regardless, the setting would help in identifying it.

Magic Maze has slides and ladders and a real-world time limit.

FYI, on BoardGameArena they recently issued an alpha release of it, it's lots of fun; currently, only accessible to premium members and gametesters, but if it gets approved for release, will be generally accessible.

@smci mostly true, just one small correction: I don't think you need premium to access alpha stage games, just a ton of played games on a record. Also, once you've been invited to alpha game by someone, you can create it yourself.

@Deo: ok. BGA Premium is a nice Christmas gift. Anyway my point was everyone who likes this fun game (it's kind of like Gauntlet for geeks), help it get out of alpha and beta into general release, on BGA.

This is definitely the game we played. She vaguely remembers sushi but there definitely isn't a sushi-related one.

Magic Maze mentioned already seems like a good fit. Other options could be: Escape:Curse of the Temple (or another one from Escape series), and maybe Sub Terra (no hourglass, game is entirely turn-based, but it does have a timer)


text:
I want to know the correct name of this cards game
I played a card game.
My teacher told me how to play it, but she said "it is good not to say at school" didn't tell me the correctly name. she just tell me she call it "Oh no".
this game is making small numbers,
K=0 A=1 2=2(it is same to 10) J=10 Q=10
the rule of it is below.

it starts from 4 cards per person. these 4 need to be face down.
Players can see 2 of the cards.
place the remaining card in a pile and reveal the top card.
the first player replace the card, or pile and reveal the top card and replace the card or throw the card on revealed card
continue 3 and 4
when one of a players thought "my card is good condition" they can knock the table
the game is finishes after other player did one more play
the winner is who got smallest point

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golf_(card_game)#Four-card_golf maybe? see also https://boardgames.stackexchange.com/questions/44673/what-card-game-is-this-4-cards-per-player-faced-down

While it's not that game, I'm wondering if your teacher mistakenly thought this was Shithead.

This is Cabo with a standard deck. Other names include Cambio, Pablo and Cactus.
Gameplay: (from wikipedia)

Each player is dealt 4 cards, face down. After each deal, players may
peek at any 2 of their own cards.
In clockwise order, players do any of three things:

pick a card from the draw pile, and either keep the card (placing one
of their own cards on the discard pile) or discard it (if the card
drawn and discarded is a choice card, the choice card can be used if
so desired).
pick a card from the discard pile and place one of their
own cards on the discard pile
call "Cabo"


text:
How many allowed scrabble words are there in different languages
I just read about Nigel Richards winning the french scrabble championship after learning 370,000 french words by heart. There was also mentioned that the Islandic scrabble society invited him to the local championship, saying that they had over 2 million allowed words. So I wondered how many allowed scrabble words there are in the different languages.
Obviously I don't expect any single answer to be exhaustive, there are a lot of languages out there. Maybe start with English (and there seem to be differences between UK/US) and then see for whatever other languages you can find the relevant information.

As mentioned, it may not be possible to have an exhaustive answer. Then, how can such an open ended question have an answer that can be accepted to close the question?

@Ricky The number of languages is limited.

In which case, list them.
The context is, how can this question be closed? If the languages are listed, then if an answer can be provided for each language then we can close it.
Otherwise, this sounds more like a question suitable for open-ended fora (e.g. quora) where there need not be a conclusive answer, but more opinions for discussion.

@BlindKungFuMaster The Scrabble copyright co-owners are Hasbro and Mattel. Just find out the number of languages for which Scrabble is published.

The Scrabble word lists are very well defined. Currently tournaments that follow the rules of the World English Language Scrabble Players Association use the Collins Word List 2015 In this dictionary there are a total of 277663 words. Broken down as follows:
2 letter 124
3 letter 1341
4 letter 5625
5 letter 12917
6 letter 22938
7 letter 34171
8 letter 41883

The dictionary only defines words upto 15 letters in length since that's the width of the scrabble board. However in practice words longer than 8 letters are played extremely rarely.

The answer will vary widely per language and will depend on how new words are created in a language.
In an agglutinative language, words are created by joining words together. For instance, a chair you use at a desk in the office, an office chair, is one word in German, "ein Bürostuhl" (literally a "deskchair").
As you can see, that way new words are created easily and on the fly. That is why Icelandic has such a large dictionary, which is not even exhaustive — it can't be.
So the answer to your question will be it depends. Perhaps you should restrict your question to a specific language, as not all languages are as liberal in word formation.

Dutch: 652,000 words
The Dutch Scrabble association, the  Scrabble Bond Nederland (SBNL) uses the Scrabble Word List (SWL) for words up to 9 letters and publishes separate lists for 10, 11, and 12 letters.
The SWL contains over 242,000 words, the supplemental lists contain about 125,000 words, about 141,000 words, and about 144,000 words respectively, for a grand total of 652,000 words of length 2 to 12.
English: 279,000 words
The World English-language Scrabble Players Association (WESPA) states in its rules

Global word source
  The word source used in global Scrabble, known as Collins Scrabble Words or CSW (formerly Official Scrabble Words or OSW) is actually not a single dictionary, but an amalgam of three: Collins, Chambers and TWL, the current Northern American wordlist.
TWL (Tournament Word List) is itself drawn from a range of sources, mostly different editions of Webster's. Americans and Canadians play by CSW rules in international tournaments and TWL in 'domestic' North American tournaments. But they are increasingly introducing CSW grades in various tournaments, and even some solely CSW tournaments. WESPA hopes this North American isolationism will end one day, for the good of global Scrabble.

Collins states on its website:

Based on Collins English Dictionary, Collins Official Scrabble™ Words 2019 is the most comprehensive Scrabble™ word list ever, including World English from Australia, Canada, New Zealand, South Africa, UK, and USA brought together in a single list.
With more than 279,000 permissible words, including inflected forms, this is a must for anyone playing Scrabble.
(Emphasis mine)

French: 393,670 words
The French Scrabble association, La Fédération Internationale de Scrabble Francophone (FISF), uses L'Officiel du Scrabble which is currently in its seventh version, containing 393,670 words from 2 to 15 letters.
German: 180,000
The German Wikipedia article on Scrabble quotes a source about "120,000 words".
Scrabble Deutschland e.V. states the official list contains 179,998 words of 2 to 9 letters.

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

Yes, the answer will vary wildly per language, that's the interesting thing. I clarified what kind of answer I'm looking for. Also: This is a scrabble rules question. I don't think in agglutinative languages all joined words are allowed, but if so, that is an answer as well.

@sqb regarding German, every word in an acknowledged dictionary is valid, including declensions: http://www.scrabble.de/pdfs/Scrabble.pdf and duden.de lists >500,000 words "et cetera".


text:
Can we stun without dealing damage?
In survival guide for Haunt #58 it is written: You cannot deal damage to the traitor. Does that mean we can't even stun the traitor? Maybe not because attacking to stun works only on monsters.
What are all the ways this particular traitor's movement can be hindered (apart from the standard "stand in the same room as an obstacle")? Looking for answers from the second and third editions and Widow's Walk expansion.


text:
What actions constitute passing priority?
I played in my first PTQ (and got top 8!) a few weeks ago and received a warning for missing a trigger.
The situation was as follows:
It's game 3 of the last swiss round.  I pass the turn with a Krallenhorde Howler after attacking, playing two creatures, playing an Evolving Wilds, and cracking it.  I'm searching through my deck for a one-of basic so since it will take me a minute to find it and shuffle, I tell my opponent what I'm getting and to go ahead and take their turn while I search and shuffle.  They immediately untap, upkeep, draw, play a land, and then pass the turn.  I find the land, finish shuffling, and my opponent cuts.
This is where the issue happens, I put my hands on my lands, look at the board, and before untapping anything, point out that the Howler flipped back to a Duskwatch Recruiter on his upkeep and then said that on my upkeep it's going to flip back again.  I have not verbally indicated passing priority or said anything up to this point.  He called a judge, gave me a warning for a missed trigger.
That was the only warning I got in all of the rounds of that tournament so it didn't matter (and I won that game anyway).  My question is, did I imply passing priority by touching my lands?
In general, what verbal and non-verbal actions constitute passing priority at Competitive REL?

Maybe I'm misunderstanding, but you missed the trigger of the creature flipping during his upkeep while you were messing with your deck, correct? Then it seems that the warning was for a missed trigger during your opponent's turn, not during your turn.

Yes, I had cast two spells during my first turn in this scenario so the creature would flip back to the human side on his upkeep. Then he cast no spells on his turn, so it would flip back to the werewolf side on my upkeep. The warning was for missing the transform trigger, when it happened wasn't the relevant part. The question really comes down to what constituted my passing of priority? If I hadn't done anything to indicate passing I would have been able to treat his quick actions without any response from me as a shortcut and rewind the turn to his upkeep and point out that it transforms.

@ThePeavstenator I think you're still in the clear either way, but do you know for which missed trigger you received the infraction - the transform on his upkeep for having 2 spells on your turn, or the transform on yours for having 0 spells on his turn? You can't just get a penalty for a missed trigger - you could say missed trigger penalties are a targeted infraction :-)

@corsiKa Not transforming on his upkeep.  The judge was called right before I untapped and began my turn.

It seems curious that the opponent can cause you to miss a trigger by just playing on without ever passing priority to you so you can resolve the trigger. It would seem more logical that the opponent has to confirm you passing priority back to them by asking if they can start on the next action/step/etc.

I disagree with the ruling made by the floor judge. I also disagree with upgrading the penalty to a warning.
Ruling
First, let's get some terminology down:

You are the controller of the trigger.
I interpret "action" to mean "game action". For example:

Resting your hands on your lands is not a game action.
Untapping your lands is a game action.
Silence is not a game action.
Saying "Sure." is a game action.

The following is an excerpt from the Infraction Procedure Guide:

Players may not cause triggered abilities controlled by an opponent to be missed by taking game actions or otherwise prematurely advancing the game. During an opponent’s turn, if a trigger’s controller demonstrates awareness of the trigger before they take an active role (such as taking an action or explicitly passing priority), the trigger is remembered.

What this says, quite clearly, is that your opponent cannot cause you, the controller, to miss a trigger by drawing a card, playing a land, or otherwise advancing the game without your active consent. You never assumed an active role before remembering the trigger. Therefore, you didn't miss it.
This is reinforced in the Tournament Rules:

Triggered abilities are considered to be forgotten by their controller once they have taken an action past the point where the triggered ability would have an observable impact on the game.

If your opponent had said "Draw?" and you respond with a "Sure.", then you have assumed an active role by explicitly passing priority. In that case, the trigger is definitely missed.
Penalty
Missed triggers should only be upgraded to a warning if the trigger is considered detrimental to its controller. The game state is not a factor in determining this. As noted in the IPG:

Upgrade: If the triggered ability is usually considered detrimental for the controlling player the penalty is a Warning. The current game state is not a factor in determining this, though symmetrical abilities (such as Howling Mine) may be considered usually detrimental or not depending on who is being affected

According to an L2 judge on Reddit, neither side of Duskwatch Recruiter is considered "generally detrimental". It may be situationally detrimental, but according to the IPG, the judge awarding the penalty should not be using the board state as a factor in determining whether the trigger is detrimental.

Probably also worth noting, it's once the controller has taken an action. In this case the opponent took an action (playing a land) and tried to shortcut all the way back to the OP's turn, but it doesn't sound like the OP did. That's definitely not a valid way to make triggers be missed.

You passed priority to him when you told him to take his turn while you searched your deck (more on this in a second), and then you missed the trigger on his upkeep. So the issue wasn't with you touching your lands, it was with where the game state was when you noticed the error.
My guess is that when he went to draw a card, if you had stopped him and said "During your upkeep...," then no warning would have been issued because you were maintaining mandatory triggers. But since he drew a card and played a land, the game had passed through his upkeep. He implied priority when he went to draw a card, and that's where you would normally have caught him to make sure triggers were resolved. It is possible he realized that you'd miss your trigger and tried to speed through his turn, but the judge saw it as you not maintaining proper game state.
The moral of the story here is that you should never pass your turn while you are still taking actions, even if you don't think they take too long and won't change the outcome of your turn. While this might fly in casual games, any shortcut that involves another player taking actions while you resolve anything is probably in violation of a strict interpretation of the comprehensive rules. Under the section on shortcuts:

716.2a
At any point in the game, the player with priority may suggest a shortcut by describing a sequence of game choices, for all players, that may be legally taken based on the current game state and the predictable results of the sequence of choices....

Your opponent couldn't legally take their turn until you had put a land into play from Evolving Wilds, even though the placing of the land was a "predictable" choice. And had you waited to pass the turn until you had found your land, you may have noticed that you needed to resolve triggers during your opponent's upkeep.

In general, you should stick the shortcuts described in section 4.2 of the Tournament Rules. It's a fairly long list, but the relevant points for passing priority:

The statement "Go" (and equivalents such as "Your turn" and "Done") offers to keep passing priority until an opponent has priority in the end step. Opponents are assumed to be acting then unless they specify otherwise.

A statement such as "I'm ready for combat" or "Declare attackers?" offers to keep passing priority until an opponent has priority in the beginning of combat step. Opponents are assumed to be acting then unless they specify otherwise.

Whenever a player adds an object to the stack, he or she is assumed to be passing priority unless he or she explicitly announces that he or she intends to retain it. If he or she adds a group of objects to the stack without explicitly retaining priority and a player wishes to take an action at a point in the middle, the actions should be reversed up to that point.

If you plan on deviating from these with a proposed shortcut, keep in mind that you "must be clear where the game state will end up as part of the request." This may have been another issue in your proposed shortcut, because your opponent wasn't alerted to where they needed to pause the game next and there was no specific request for priority for triggered abilities.

I suspect that you're right about the judge's interpretation of the situation, but "take your turn while..." is not an accepted tournament shortcut, and I'm pretty sure that your interpretation isn't even a valid shortcut according to the comprehensive rules.

@murgatroid99 That's a good point. I'll edit the last paragraph to reflect that.

I will emphasize that he took his turn quickly.  The untap, upkeep, draw took less than a second and then he played his land and passed about 2 seconds after that.

What you should have done is announce the trigger at the beginning, like "You can take your turn while I'm searching, and the Howler transforms at the beginning of your upkeep". That's the first time anyone gains priority on your opponent's turn, so there's no reason to wait to announce the trigger.

And if you didn't do it like mugatroid suggested you should have called the judge once they drew a card.