Are Farmers a Core Mechanic or Optional?

[Decar]

I consider them a core mechanic, and would only consider removing them when explaining the rules to children, though they're not that hard.  They offer a very important tactical play, especially at the end-game when there is a mad rush to control them.  I wouldn't consider them particularly aggressive so could be played in a friendly way.

Linkback: https://www.carcassonnecentral.com/community/index.php?topic=3469.0

[jungleboy]

I consider them a core mechanic

But HiG does not. Does this keep you up at night? 

[Decar]

Hans Im Glueck considers it a core mechanic.  It's been quantified as a Supplementary Carcassonne rule; that doesn't make it any less important.
That's clear because it hasn't been listed as an expansion.  Regardless, it's still present in the world qualifying and championship rounds.

[jungleboy]

It's been quantified as a Supplementary Carcassonne rule; that doesn't make it any less important.

Of course it does. Farmers are an optional variant now. They are essentially encouraging people not to play with them.

[Decar]

It's like defining them as 'Advanced Rules' - you've played the initial game, no go back and try on a harder difficulty to experience the real thing.

[Just a Bill]

Hans Im Glueck considers it a core mechanic.  It's been quantified as a Supplementary Carcassonne rule; that doesn't make it any less important.

That's not how it reads to me. The intro to the supplementary rules says (emphasis mine), "If you are reading this, it means that you’ve already played a few games of Carcassonne and that you wish to increase the strategic options at your disposal." That's basically the job description of every expansion set. Furthermore, the farmers are grouped with The River and The Abbott, both of which are unquestionably optional.

If HiG doesn't actually want players to perceive farms and farmers as optional, then they've made a mistake in the structure of their 2.0 rules presentation.

Are knights optional? No. Are thieves, or monks, or coats of arms optional? No. Are farms and farmers optional? Yes.
This conclusion is unavoidable.

[Decar]

Except the Farmers appear before 'Der Fluss' and 'Der Abt' - both these expansions are labelled as 'mini-expansion'.

Farmers are not listed as an expansion, and the rule book states:

"Was wäre das Leben in Carcassonne auch ohne die wichtigen Bauern?"

or:

"What Would Life be without the important Farmers?"

[Just a Bill]

The omission of the word "expansion" does not change the fact that the farmers are clearly presented as optional, emphasized by making it clear that you use them only if you wish to do so. This is clearly a change from 1.0.

[Decar]

Yes, but that's true of any game I own.
I could happily play without thieves or without the Inns from Inns and Cathedrals as I choose.
A lot of people don't play with Farmers; by introducing these change HiG are allowing players to pick and choose as they want.
Regardless of that the World Tournament Rules will be implementing farmers.  They are still part of the core game, which was my initial comment.

[Mikeagan]

I think this was added for game play with younger children. Also, Some people like my mom have difficulty tracking the fields, are not as strategic, and therefore don't quite know how to play them properly. Therefore I would classify Farmers as Advanced Strategic Rules. You really have to determine the player base, so I would classify them as semi-optional.

[Just a Bill]

I could happily play without thieves

Yes you could, and this would be playing contrary to the rules. Leaving out thieves is a house rule, whereas leaving out farmers is not a house rule; it is merely not choosing to add in one of the three supplemental elements.

The point being, farms and farmers now have a different status than the core game elements. They are not required in order to play Carcassonne by the rules. They have a lesser role, according to the rules document — which never in any way presents them as a required part of the base game but rather leaves it up to the players' choice.

Tournament status is a different issue altogether. A tournament structure can require the river or windroses or anything else if it wants to. It can add or remove individual tiles; it can do whatever it wants, and this has no bearing on what is or is not a core requirement for a game on a tabletop, according to the game's rules document.

The bottom line here is that a player who was stuck on a desert island with no internet and no prior knowledge of Carcasssonne would open this game, read the rulebook, and conclude that farmers are optional (assuming he even bothered to read the supplemental rules — many players do not). Because that's how the rules present them.

Farmers are optional in Carcassonne 2.0 unless and until HiG issues some kind of statement to the effect that they are absolutely required for all tabletop play other than a new player's first or second game. (And if they do that, then they'd better revise the rules for subsequent printings, because that's not what they say.)

[Decar]

Except they have made a statement, by asking a rhetorical question about how important Carcassonne is with farmers in play, in a supplementary  rules section.  In my eyes supplementary documentation makes it no less important, and no less a core part of the basegame rule book.

[Just a Bill]

Except they have made a statement, by asking a rhetorical question about how important Carcassonne is with farmers in play

Naw, that's just flavor text, and it does not refer to gameplay at all, it refers only to the theme. I'm sure I don't have to tell you that theme/flavor text is not rules; if it were, then we might as well say that we also have to make sure a farmer is never removed from a field until it has "spent long hours" there. That's in the document, so it must be a rule, eh? Obviously that's a ridiculous claim, but the point is that none of the awkward flavor text in C2.0 has the authority of a rule, and the passage you quote is certainly not a ruling on the mandatory/optional nature of farmers. (And the statement isn't even the same in the English rules.)

Here's my own rhetorical question: You know what else is crucially important for life? Rivers. Is the river thus a mandatory part of the core game, too?

With all due respect, your argument is unconvincing. You're grasping to fabricate flavor text about the theme into a rule that does not exist. What's wrong with just accepting that C2.0 has some differences, one of which is that farmers are no longer a mandatory part of the core rule system? They're still official, still important, still advisable ... but no longer mandatory. It's right there in black and white.

[Decar]

I'm not sure it's precisely flavour text, and even if it could be considered that, it still appears in a supplementary rules section of the core rule book.  It's not labelled as an expansion.

I think the implication of the rhetorical question is that this is how Carcassonne should be played.

And even so, your rhetorical question doesn't appear in the rule book.  The river is clearly described as a mini-expansion.  And besides the River did not appear in the Swedish version of the basegame.

I think the Abbot is a core-mini-expansion, its implementation has been put into effect in all subsequent expansions.  It is core to the game play mechanically, it is ever present.  Farmers are core to the game play too, their opportunity is ever present in the fields of Carcassonne.  This is not the same as other expansions, which are not core, their extent goes only as far as their inclusion, whether it be additional meeple, or tiles with special effects.

If farmers are optional the Abbey and Mayor Rules would have said: 'If using the optional expansion Farmers' when explaining the rules of the Barn, however it does not.  Nor does it list farmers as an interaction with other expansions.  Instead Barns describe their interaction with farmers with no explanation.  Because by the point you're using Barns, you should be conformation with Farmers.

Talking again of flavour text the first paragraph, 3rd sentence of the rule book reads:

"Die Entwicklung der Landschaft liegt in ihren Händen, und der geschickte Einsatz ihrer Gefolgsleute als Wegelagerer,Ritter, Mönche oder Bauern ebnet ihnen den Weg zum Erfolg"

Which roughly means: "The development of the landscape is in their hands, and the clever use of their followers as road-keepers, knights, monks or farmers paves the way to success".

It doesn't list the optional Abbot from a mini-expansion.

Later:  "In dieser Anleitung leiten wir Dich im Nu durch die einfachen Regeln dieses modernen Klassikers."

Here are the simple Rules (ie: the advanced ones come later).

Under Spielziel:

"So entstehen lange Straßen, Ihr erbaut mächtige Städte, kehrt in Klöstern ein und bewirtschaftet das fruchtbare Land. Dabei könnt Ihr Eure Meeple als Wegelagerer, Ritter, Mönche oder Bauern einsetzen."

or:

"This creates long streets, you build powerful cities, enter monasteries and cultivate the fertile land. You can use your Meeple as a road-bearer, knight, monk or farmer."

I've not even started reading the rules and this thematic description explaining the scene has made references to Farmers.  Like the core rules always did.

Making farmers an optional consideration doesn't make them less important.  It's very clear in the black and white that farmers are still an integral part of the base game.

Looking at the actual basic rules it states:

"Dies ist die Bauernwertung, die wir zur Übersicht hier schon aufführen. Ihr könnt diese aber vorerst ignorieren und erst nach einigen Spielen dazu nehmen. Die Bauern werden auf der nächsten Seite erklärt."
Or:
"You can ignore them, but only after a few games. The farmers are explained on the next page."

Or:
"Sobald Ihr das Spiel ein- oder zweimal gespielt habt, empfehlen wir Euch, mit den Wiesen und Bauern zu spielen"
Or:
"If you have played the game once or twice, we recommend you play with the meadows and peasants"

How can Farmers be considered non-core when the rule book is littered with recommendations that players should progress to the advanced rules of using them.

The intention to use them is clear, not as an expansion but as a core mechanic.  Simply starting to learn to play the game without them (on basic-mode) is a mechanism to encourage players to start learning and improve their game.

[reddalek]

I am someone who discovered Carcassonne by playing 2.0 with another new player, and this is exactly how we interpreted the farmer rules. They are supplemental to your first games, but it never occurred to us to stop using them once we had started. For us at least this was clear from the instructions.