Expansions becoming inconsistent during megacarcassonne games?

[corinthiens13]

Hi everyone,

In my experience, some expansions have mechanics that make them too strong, or too insignificant during megacarcassonne.

I've played house rules for multiple megacarcassonne games to improve the gameplay and wanted to share them.

What do you think? Are you using other house rules like these? Do you think some other expansions are inconsistent during megacarcassonne games? Or do you stick with the original rules no matter what?

Base game's farmers:
I often had one big farm with more than 50 completed cities, thus worth at least 200 points with a pig (+ castles points, and eventually pig herd).
This makes one farm to be the central point of the game, whoever not scoring it will be left far behind. The game becomes less interesting, as any action not involving that farm becomes meaningless.
House rule: Farm's core points reduced by 1 (2 points for completed cities, 3 for castles) and do not take the pig herd into consideration, or at least make it do not stack with pig figure bonus point.

Barn:
Same problem as above.
House rule: Do not use the barn, or same as above.

Tower prisonner ransom:
Paying 3 points for a prisonner buyback may bee insignificant in games with 600 points per player.
House rule: Pay 6 points to buy a meeple back instead of 3.

King and robber:
Counting the number of completed road ans cities is long and difficult, it's almost impossible to count every roads without forgetting some... And it's worth too much points in a megacarcassonne.
House rule : King and robber are worth 20 points each, no matter the number of completed cities and roads.

Ringmaster :
Circus and pyramid spaces aren't drawned very often, so the ringmaster bonus doesn't occur very often.
House rule: Fair are also counted for ringmaster bonus, eventually fortune teller's tents too (anything with yellow background except crop circles).

Artists:
You may have to stuck meeples for to much time to make it worth 5 points per meeple.
House rule: Artists are worth 8 points each instead of 5.

Wheel of fortune :
Stucking a meeple on the wheel's crown for the whole game isn't worth the few points you'll get.
House rule : Double the crown's points (6-12 points instead of 3-6)

The plague:
Spreading the plague can become very boring, especially when there's only one outbreak left with all of the 18 flea tokens connected, in a region of the game that has no meeples (I know that makes a lot of conditions, but this may be the case during 80% of the game during megacarcassonne).
So every player has to move a flea token, but with nothing at stake...
House rule : When every flea tokens are connected to the same plague, players may move one during their turn, or may ignore that action.

Messengers:
Message action can take place many times during a turn, especially when there's a builder's double turn. This takes a lot of time during each and every turn to perform the message actions and to calculate how to draw as many messages as possible, and may even lead to "new tile" message beeing drawned twice during a player's turn !
House rule: Use only one scoring meeple instead of two, and perform the message action only at the end of each player's turn instead of after each round of scoring (C1 rule).

Wind roses:
There's not much at stake with those little 3 points during a big game.
House rule: Placing a wind rose in the correct quarter gives 3 points, but placing it in another quarter is minus 6 points.

German monasteries :
Placing a meeple as an abbot may be worth more than 100 points! That's ok when you have to stuck a meeple during the game, but when someone draws a monastery near the end of the game, that's quite a jump with nothing to lose...
House rule: Don't use the possibility to place meeples as abbots, or keep the original rules but place the German monasteries in the first half of the tiles in the dispenser, that way they'll be drawned only during the first half of the game, and players wanting to place an abbot'll have to stuck a meeple for a long time.

Little buildings:
Variant 2 is ok, but variant 1 doesn't bring significant points during a big game. I don't understand why it's only one point, so 18 points for every buildings, when variant 2 is 36 points for every buildings.
House rule: With variant 1, buildings are worth 2 points.

Baba Yaga:
Unless it's drawed at the end of the game, it's not worth placing a meeple as it'd be stuck here for a long time with almost no possibility to earn more than 1 point (eventually 2 or 3 if it isn't completed at the end of the game.
House rule : Consider Baba Yaga completed as soon as it is placed. That way, it'll be scored during the scoring phase of the same turn, making that tile a lot more interesting (you can't place a meeple with a flyer or magic portal later as it's considered as completed).


Linkback: https://www.carcassonnecentral.com/community/index.php?topic=4924.0

[Willem]

Hi!

I think it's a good idea to put in some house rules to equalise some scoring mechanisms.

You've got quite a few to make things more valuable!
I guess it depends a bit on how big a game you play. A game. With a few hundred tiles can possibly benefit from these updates, so I like it 

For King and Robber; they give 1 point per completed city/road at the end of the game. I always found that these are already extra powerful in a big game, and easily would give more than 20 points already.

For Monasteries, we often play with the house rule of using the Abbot figure for these. That way each player only has 1 abbot to place, and it helps to prevent overpowered abbots when 1 player gets lucky and gets multiple tiles.

Other than that, based on the size of game, these could be good options! Especially as you make some smaller things worth it more

[corinthiens13]

For King and Robber; they give 1 point per completed city/road at the end of the game. I always found that these are already extra powerful in a big game, and easily would give more than 20 points already.

Right, my mistake. The 20 point house rule is to avoid having to count the number of completed road ans cities, as this may be a lot of points, long and difficult to count, and it's almost impossible to count every roads without forgetting some...
1st post corrected

For Monasteries, we often play with the house rule of using the Abbot figure for these. That way each player only has 1 abbot to place, and it helps to prevent overpowered abbots when 1 player gets lucky and gets multiple tiles.

That's a nice idea. Do you still use abbot figures as removable figures for gardens and monasteries?

[Willem]

When I started the abbot house rule, I was almost only playing C1, so that was easy. I just got extra abbot figures and that was an easy fix.
For C2 we usually don't use the gardens, although if we do, we use normal meeples for them. It makes it easier to use and wouldn't punish players who use their abbot on a garden and then get a monastery tile.
Alternatively, I'd perhaps add a second abbot for each player, so they can use 1 (dedicated) for monasteries and the other for gardens

[Vital Pluymers]

When I started the abbot house rule, I was almost only playing C1, so that was easy. I just got extra abbot figures and that was an easy fix.
For C2 we usually don't use the gardens, although if we do, we use normal meeples for them. It makes it easier to use and wouldn't punish players who use their abbot on a garden and then get a monastery tile.
Alternatively, I'd perhaps add a second abbot for each player, so they can use 1 (dedicated) for monasteries and the other for gardens

I don't know if "punish" is the right way to describe it. If you use your Abbot wisely on monasteries and gardens and grant them an early retreat regularly, you can also score a lot of points, definitely comparable or even higher compared to the scores a trapped Abbot on a special monastery could earn.

[corinthiens13]

I like both ideas:

Having two abbots per player with one dedicated to german monasteries (we could use a sticker to dedicate it).

Or having one abbot with a difficult choice of using it for gardens and "normal" monasteries, or placing it as an abbot on a German monastery.

[Meepledrone]

Hi corinthiens13 and Willem,

I love your house rules for Mega Carcassonne games. I was thinking of adding them to the WICA page. 

+1 merit from me. 

[corinthiens13]

Hi corinthiens13 and Willem,

I love your house rules for Mega Carcassonne games. I was thinking of adding them to the WICA page. 

+1 merit from me. 

Thanks, I'd be glad to see them on WICA.

Two other house rules I've used for some time now during megacarcassonne are for robber and mage & witch expansions, I didn't mention them above:

Mage and witch:
Consider water towers as mage and witch logo (to increase the occurence of the mage and witch action)

Robbers
Consider the robbers beside a road (little guys pictured on some tiles beside roads) as robber logo (to increase the occurence of the robber action)

[Meepledrone]

I just added the house rules here:

https://wikicarpedia.com/index.php/Mega-Carcassonne#House_rules

Let me know if you want additional clarifications or something needs to be corrected. 

[corinthiens13]

I just added the house rules here:

https://wikicarpedia.com/index.php/Mega-Carcassonne#House_rules

Let me know if you want additional clarifications or something needs to be corrected. 

That's perfect, thanks! 

[Meepledrone]

Thank you! 

[Willem]

Thanks! 

[Meepledrone]

@Willem I remember you posted some time ago about your use of abbot meeples on special monasteries. It made total sense and I was expecting that HiG would do something in that regard when the re-released the German monasteries in C2...

At the time I was a bit disappointed that HiG didn't yake the opportunity to fix the rules and decreased the complexity a bit. They preferred to stick to their original rules.

I'm always amazed with the fact that...
* You can only place an abbot as a monk on an abbey, but...
* You can place a meeple as an abbot on a special monastery

This is the perfect Carcassonne tongue twister. 

[corinthiens13]

I'm always amazed with the fact that...
* You can only place an abbot as a monk on an abbey, but...
* You can place a meeple as an abbot on a special monastery

This is the perfect Carcassonne tongue twister. 

That's amazing 

[Bumsakalaka]

It will be fine to get list of all house rules. We have also some - also described here in forum somewhere ;-)