We have played our first game with the Haflings this evening (both I and II). Thanks to SRBO and Khonnor we also played with the Dutch & Belgium Monasteries and Darmstadt for the first time.
Before we started, we agreed that we wouldn’t use the official rules for the Haflings - they just don't seems right.
We agreed that:
- A tile is a tile - half or whole.
- A gap is a gap, whatever tile is missing - half or whole.
- You get points for every tile in a structure - half or whole.
- You have one of each tile on your hand all the time. When you place one tile you draw a new one (whole if you placed a whole tile - half if you placed a half tile).
- When all of one type of tile is spent, you only get to have one tile on your hand.
- The game ends when all the tiles are used.
This worked just perfect and are now our official house rules.
We liked that the Haflings, with our house rules, gets you more opportunities to gather more points from cloisters and cities, but also more opportunities to stop your opponent.
Our conclusion is that SRBO’s first take on the rules (in his first post in this tread) makes the game more interesting and the official rules don't seem right.