Variant Rules in CAR

[Just a Bill]

For the record, though, I am such a Carcassonne-whore that I'd probably buy Bigfoot and the Space Hookers of Proxima Centauri.

Watch for my kickstarter.

The Pandora's Box with those double and half tiles better shouldn't have been opend at all... 

I don't think it would have been much of a problem if they had approached this with a more practical goal rather than the dogmatic belief that the "ONE TILE" view had to be driving force behind all rulings. I prefer a more common-sense approach with low rules overhead, something along these lines:

Each German castle is obviously a single tile that occupies two spaces. Each halfling is obviously a single tile that occupies half a space. Two general rules govern their use:

1. Game effects related to movement, distance, or counting adjoining tiles actually count spaces rather than tiles.

2. A space that is half-filled still counts as filled.

I haven't looked at every possible situation, but I think these two simple rules basically answer the questions with cloisters, flying machines, the dragon, and so on, without the need to errata a bunch of previous rules or make three pages of explanatory diagrams.

Once the German Castles came into existence, they should have just recognized the fact that tiles and spaces were no longer always the same thing, and made the appropriate adjustments. Heck, even the two starting tableaux could have worked in the same unified model as the halflings and double tiles. Instead, we have piecemeal rulings, dragons/fliers that can move a lot farther than originally intended, and unnecessary differences between castles and The School for no reason other than how they decided to form the cutting dies.

Linkback: https://www.carcassonnecentral.com/community/index.php?topic=3565.0

[Decar]

Well there's no point dwelling on it.  HiG made it pretty clear they were not going to offer any further interpretation.  Hopefully, the second page of the Leipzig Market will clarify how the tiles are used.

[Just a Bill]

Well there's no point dwelling on it.

... unless one has been analyzing the situation and considering writing a house rule for the next CAR.

[danisthirty]

Well there's no point dwelling on it.

... unless one has been analyzing the situation and considering writing a house rule for the next CAR.

Is the new CAR going to include hiuse rules too? I would have thought the various diffierent official rules would have been more than enough to keep you busy!

[Decar]

Although the CAR contains some very small sections of 'Variants or House Rules' I believe these rules were taken from a list of player variants which were published on http://www.hans-im-glueck.de.  These variants have not long departed HiG's page, but are considered by some as similar to the fan-made expansions included on the HiG page now; like the Easter Bunny and Fortune Teller Tiles.

It begs the question, which variants should and shouldn't be included in the Annotated Rules for Carcassonne?

[Just a Bill]

I would have thought the various diffierent official rules would have been more than enough to keep you busy!

Yes, that is certainly true.

Although the CAR contains some very small sections of 'Variants or House Rules' I believe these rules were taken from a list of player variants which were published on http://www.hans-im-glueck.de.

Ah, I was not aware of that. I had always thought they came from this forum since the attributions are so informal.

It begs the question, which variants should and shouldn't be included in the Annotated Rules for Carcassonne?

Yep, that's a great question for discussion. I would propose as a starting point that they perhaps fall into four categories:

• Official or semi-official house rule recognized by HiG.
• Commonly used enough by the player-community that it merits being recorded.
• A "fix" or cleanup for an official rule that's negative in some way (confusing, complicated, detrimental to interactive play, etc.).
• Just an interesting idea.

Are there any other categories that make sense to consider separately?

[Willem]

It can be interesting for people to get new ideas for their games through the CAR, but we have make sure that it will be it is clear when it is a house rule.
I.e. maybe have all the house rules in a seperate chapter, and not list them in the mnain chapter for the expansion it is regarding to
Make sure we keep house rules and house/fan expansions seperated (so make sure we define 'house rule'. But i would say i think Bills categories have already got that sorted)

And we should consider how many house rules we want in the CAR. As there are many many many players of the game (and members here on CC), there will be lots and lots of house rules to consider.

I would say it is a nice idea to include house rules in the CAR, as long as we can do it neatly and keep it simple
And also (stating the maybe obvious) make sure the CAR states these are House Rules, and the reasoning behind them, but it is of course up to the player to determine if its used or not.

And Bill, if you want/need any help with the CAR7.5, I am happy to help in any way, just give a shout

[Just a Bill]

CAR 7.4 very clearly labels the house rules as such. It's very clear which rules are house rules, and of course I would want to keep it that way.

[ny1050220]

CAR 7.4 very clearly labels the house rules as such. It's very clear which rules are house rules, and of course I would want to keep it that way.

I agree.

Sometimes, people might find it useful to read a house rule explicitly written that happens to be the interpretation when people are puzzled with the official one (or when people don't read the official rules properly). Well, you know, when some one is too embarrassed to admit that they did something, they say "people did this, people did that"  .