Game: Keythedral

Thread: Re: Law card interaction: #18 & #19

truekid — 2008-11-15T22:41:38+00:00

i absolutely agree that some of the law cards could have been worded better.

however, this is not one of those cases, the interaction between those two cards seems very clear-cut...

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rober — 2008-11-14T09:09:02+00:00

overview

Thread: Re: Law card interaction: #18 & #19

atholbrose — 2008-09-03T21:10:33+00:00

The same problem cropped up (er, no pun intended) in a recent game of Keythedral. Seeing that this thread never got an official answer, I geek-mailed Richard Breese, and this is what he said:

Production can be doubled through ‘Double Production’ or ‘Good Harvest’. Production is lost through ‘Poor Harvest’. However whichever order the cards are played in the answer is the always the same [...]: 1 x 2 x 0 = 0 or 1 x 0 x 2 = 0.
I'm posting it in this thread so that any future answer-seekers may find it.

Thread: Re: Teaching Miss Mouse (or, the Lightbulb Moment, Actualized)

atholbrose — 2008-08-31T01:11:48+00:00

Wow. For some reason, I was convinced that as soon as both law cards have been purchased the purchasing round is over. I've now taught this incorrectly twice. Sigh.

Thanks for pointing out my error. Hope I remember it right for next time.

This way of playing does make things a bit more mean.

Thread: Re: Teaching Miss Mouse (or, the Lightbulb Moment, Actualized)

Badger on the move — 2008-08-27T20:46:06+00:00

atholbrose wrote:
"Hey," says C-- to J--, with that look on her face. "If we both buy law cards he can't get that tile until next turn."
I didn't follow why C & J taking law cards stopped you getting your tile, as turns continue until everyone has passed or taken a law card. As you had done neither then could you not have performed your 'one more buy'?

Thread: Re: Teaching Miss Mouse (or, the Lightbulb Moment, Actualized)

ooogene — 2008-08-24T07:52:15+00:00

Keythedral is one of my top 10 games! I'm glad that you enjoyed it. What I think I like about it the most is the "take that" of some of the villager placements and law cards. Reading your report makes me want to play again soon.

Thread: Teaching Miss Mouse (or, the Lightbulb Moment, Actualized)

atholbrose — 2008-08-24T04:12:16+00:00

I knew I only had one chance, and I didn't want to mess it up. C-- is well-equipped to deal with any game, but gets impatient with rules explanations. I printed out DrChek's excellent rules summary card and rehearsed brief explanations of the turn structure. I set the entire game up before she even entered the room, including partial set-up of the board to demonstrate worker placement, fences and so on. Thankfully, after all that prep, the rules explanation went well, and we rolled directly into play.

The game was much too big for our card table, so the town board and the Keythedral were on the leaf of a side table, and all the resource cubes went in a bowl. The shields, which kept getting knocked over, were just set aside, though I think when the game hits the table again we'll probably play with them. Pretty early on we decided that putting cubes out on top of workers as they were placed would make things much easier, and it did.

C-- took an early lead with a couple of 4 and 6 tiles, I had fewer, and J-- didn't score any until much later in the game.

One thing I love about teaching games to people is the lightbulb moment, the sudden "Aha!" of figuring out the key to the game's fun. C--'s lightbulb moments are pretty expressive, especially when the game is one with blocking or denial (and Keythedral is nothing if not heavy in that); she gets this kind of narrow-eyed gleeful look, and I know to watch out. From then on, the best move was the one that kept the most people from getting stuff, and law cards were being used to great effect. At one point, C-- turned to me and said "Yeah, this game is fun."

Finally, it was what I thought was the last turn of the game. The last 12 tile cost 1 gold and 2 wine, and I had just exchanged for gold. I just needed one more buy and it'd all be over, and I was sure I was comfortably in the lead.

"Hey," says C-- to J--, with that look on her face. "If we both buy law cards he can't get that tile until next turn."

I bid for start player, and won it -- but they both cooperated quite well to lock the board down. J-- played a double-production card for stone hexes, and I didn't get a single one. In fact I only earned three cubes in that worker placement phase. I did buy the tile right away in the purchase phase, but with the ridiculous hauls of cubes those two had gotten the scores were a lot closer than they would have been had there been a little less illumination going around.

I couldn't be happier with the way things turned out -- I really enjoy Keythedral, and it looks like it might join the ranks of games we play more often -- and I couldn't be prouder of the sly, sneaky, savvy gamer I have somehow cultured.

Final scores: R-- 65, C-- 58, J-- 47. Rules explanation 10m, game time 1h15m.

Thread: Re: Purchasing craft cubes

Peter The Rat — 2008-07-21T15:02:59+00:00

My guess is that you have to perform 2 actions to get the 2 gold!

Thread: Re: Law Card Nº 1: work order

squash — 2008-07-21T15:02:15+00:00

Keep in mind that the workers are still placed in the proper player order for each numbered placement. For example, if you play this Law Card and the player to your left has the "first player" button, you will choose the number for the first placement, but you will be the last to actually put your workers on the board. Then you'll choose the number for the next placement, and you'll be the second-last player to place workers on the board, and so on.

Thread: Re: Law Card Nº 1: work order

Peter The Rat — 2008-07-21T13:46:12+00:00

I am seriously thinking of making some houserules to balance this cards a little bit "better": So they fit our taste better.

Thread: Re: Unused law cards worth victory points at game end?

Peter The Rat — 2008-07-21T13:44:21+00:00

With the expansion, the law cards MAY be worth something at the end of the game (you may use them for buying the 12-victory points chits

Thread: Re: Missing Keythedral Pieces

howaa — 2008-06-28T15:06:48+00:00

That is awesome. Problem solved. Thank you.

Thread: Re: Missing Keythedral Pieces

GamesOnTheBrain — 2008-06-28T14:54:25+00:00

A just recently discovered a U.S. supplier of components:

http://boardgamebits.com/store/index.php?main_page=product_i...

10mm is a standard size for euros, along with 8mm.

Thread: Missing Keythedral Pieces

howaa — 2008-06-28T14:20:06+00:00

I just bought a used copy of Keythedral and found it is missing the following pieces: the red #5 cottage tile, 5 purple craft cubes, and 1 green resource cube. While, I can live with the missing cottage tile since it will only affect a five player game, the cubes are needed for any number of players. The cubes are bigger than most. They are exactly 1 cm square. The cubes for sale at meeplepeople,com are 6 mm square. Being the perfectionist I am, I really would like to have cubes the same size as the others. Does anyone have 5 purple and 1 green cube in the correct size (1 cm) or know where I can buy them? Thanks.

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Rokkr — 2008-06-06T18:26:07+00:00

rule book cover

Thread: Re: Is there a difference?

Soledade — 2008-05-28T17:24:17+00:00

Thank you.

I think I'll go for the Proludo version then.

I have the R&D version as well but I haven't played it.

Paulo

Thread: Re: Is there a difference?

Game Knight — 2008-05-26T21:18:23+00:00

As far as I remember, the VP tiles in the first version (R&D) range from 1 to 5, while in the Pro Ludo version this is changed to 4 to 12. I think this is a big improvement, because in the R&D version the game is skewed too much towards the top tiles. So I would recommend the Pro Ludo version.

Thread: Is there a difference?

Soledade — 2008-05-26T20:05:20+00:00

I've read some threads about both different Keythedral editions, Proludo and R&D. But I don't understand if they are that different or even if one is better than the other.

Can someone help me on this? Is there any major advantage of getting one instead of the other?

Thank you all
Paulo

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GordoMG — 2008-04-05T19:58:16+00:00

Just starting

Thread: Re: Placing and Replacing Law Cards

Jocel1 — 2008-04-02T10:03:57+00:00

da pyrate wrote:
I am working off the english translation of the Pro Ludo rules.

There are two aspects to law cards that I am not sure about.

1 - The rules say on page 8, "place the top law car(s) from the stack face down onto the enmpty new law space(s)." - are the law cards PURCHASED without the purchaser knowing which the law card will actually be?

Yes

da pyrate wrote:
2 - The rules also say on page 8, "there are two new law cards available in each round." Later on it says, "if one or both of the 'new law' spaces on the Keytown mat are empty, place the top law card(s) from the stack face down onto the empty new law space(s)." These seem to me to be self contradictory - the first one says there will be two new cards each turn while the second quote says that new cards will only go onto an empty space. Are unpurchased law cards replaced by new cards each turn?

You put card(s) onto the empty space(s). Unpurchased cards remain on board. As the cards are placed face down, there is no need to remove the eventually not-bought ones...

Thread: Re: Placing and Replacing Law Cards

Richard Breese — 2008-04-02T09:22:32+00:00

TVis wrote:
Summary: At the beginning of a round there are always two face-down Law cards avilable on the mat. Refill any empty spaces before the round begins. This correctly reflects my intention.

Thread: Re: Placing and Replacing Law Cards

generalpf — 2008-03-11T13:18:42+00:00

TVis wrote:
generalpf wrote:
1. The law cards are supposed to be face down, but given that some cards are better than others at certain times during the game, the game is much improved by placing the law cards face up.
It's a random draw deck, like a Chance card. The one you get might or might not be helpful. That's why, ... ummm ... you take your chances.
I'm not arguing how the designer meant it to be played. I'm just saying that after several games, I find it much more interesting if the law cards are face up. It makes for better decisions.

Thread: Re: Placing and Replacing Law Cards

TVis — 2008-03-11T10:36:50+00:00

da pyrate wrote:
1 - The rules say on page 8, "place the top law car(s) from the stack face down onto the enmpty new law space(s)." - are the law cards PURCHASED without the purchaser knowing which the law card will actually be?Yes.

generalpf wrote:
1. The law cards are supposed to be face down, but given that some cards are better than others at certain times during the game, the game is much improved by placing the law cards face up.It's a random draw deck, like a Chance card. The one you get might or might not be helpful. That's why, ... ummm ... you take your chances.

Thread: Re: Placing and Replacing Law Cards

TVis — 2008-03-11T10:20:27+00:00

generalpf wrote:
2. The law cards should always be replaced each round even if one or both are not bought.I read it quite differently.

da pyrate wrote:
2 - The rules also say on page 8, "there are two new law cards available in each round." Later on it says, "if one or both of the 'new law' spaces on the Keytown mat are empty, place the top law card(s) from the stack face down onto the empty new law space(s)." "New" means "never previously purchased", not "newly presented for purchase THIS round".

Summary: At the beginning of a round there are always two face-down Law cards avilable on the mat. Refill any empty spaces before the round begins.

Thread: Re: Placing and Replacing Law Cards

da pyrate — 2008-03-11T02:48:28+00:00

Merci beaucoup

Thread: Re: Placing and Replacing Law Cards

generalpf — 2008-03-11T01:52:19+00:00

1. The law cards are supposed to be face down, but given that some cards are better than others at certain times during the game, the game is much improved by placing the law cards face up.

2. The law cards should always be replaced each round even if one or both are not bought.

Thread: Placing and Replacing Law Cards

da pyrate — 2008-03-11T01:20:22+00:00

I am working off the english translation of the Pro Ludo rules.

There are two aspects to law cards that I am not sure about.

1 - The rules say on page 8, "place the top law car(s) from the stack face down onto the enmpty new law space(s)." - are the law cards PURCHASED without the purchaser knowing which the law card will actually be?

2 - The rules also say on page 8, "there are two new law cards available in each round." Later on it says, "if one or both of the 'new law' spaces on the Keytown mat are empty, place the top law card(s) from the stack face down onto the empty new law space(s)." These seem to me to be self contradictory - the first one says there will be two new cards each turn while the second quote says that new cards will only go onto an empty space. Are unpurchased law cards replaced by new cards each turn?

Thread: Re: Law card interaction: #18 & #19

gamesnight — 2008-02-22T17:15:02+00:00

I played Keythedral last night and had this issue crop up.

Law 18 was played first:
Play this card at the beginning of Phase 2.
All fields of one type produce double this turn. You choose the type of field.

And then Law 19 was played:
Play this card at the beginning of Phase 2.
All fields of one type produce nothing this turn. You choose the type of field. Do not take any resource cubes for this type of field in phase 2.

Both players picked the same type of fields, i.e. wine.

This is a clash that is very foreseeable and should have been addressed in the rules. Poor job on this by the rule writer. Most other games that have cards that can clash spell out the effects of the troublesome combos or have rules in place that sets up a way to prevent the clash. As an example, in Evo, only one card that affects climate can be played each round. If two players both want to play a climate card, turn order determines who gets to play a card. Perhapses only one card affecting 'harvest' should have been allowed each round but Keythedral's rules never speak to this situation.

Having Law 19 block Law 18 gives Law 19 TWICE the power of other laws. You have repealed a law like Law 10 does: LAW 10 - Where player B sits to the left of player A, this law card must be played before player B starts their turn. The effect of one law card just played by another player (player A) is ignored. PLUS you get to enact a new law, i.e. Poor Harvest.

No other law card works as two laws, why should this one?

We decided that the 'Good Harvest' increased the production of the chosen field by one cube and the 'Poor Harvest' decreased the production of the chosen field by one. The net effect of this is that the two laws cancel each other and the fields produce one cube each.

Other cards that clash are Law 4, Upgrade Cottage, and Law 12, House Moratorium. There was dispute on how these two worked if played in the same round.

Errata from the game designer would be a welcome touch. Remember that customer service and attention to details, such as errata, of past game releases will make future purchases of your games more likely.

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jsper — 2008-02-10T12:39:28+00:00

Indide box Side 4 of 4

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jsper — 2008-02-10T12:37:17+00:00

Indide box Side 3 of 4

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jsper — 2008-02-09T15:33:37+00:00

Green screen

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jsper — 2008-02-09T15:02:58+00:00

Counter sheet 8

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jsper — 2008-02-09T15:00:08+00:00

Counter sheet 7

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jsper — 2008-02-09T14:54:05+00:00

Indide box Side 2

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jsper — 2008-02-09T14:52:46+00:00

Indide box Side 1

Thread: Re: Question about price increase

shadow9d9 — 2008-02-05T14:20:42+00:00

Ah, cool.. didn't catch that part of the manual. Thanks!

Thread: Re: Question about price increase

TVis — 2008-02-05T13:08:05+00:00

An expanded explanation of this card (and all others) is in the back end of the rules.

The builing tile remains on the board. The card remains along with it, also, and must be fulfilled by any player who wishes to buy the tile later.

Thread: Question about price increase

shadow9d9 — 2008-02-03T19:18:31+00:00

If you use price increase and your opponent has no more cubes.. what happens? Do they still get the key piece or do they return the piece or what?

Thread: Re: iron and stone

TVis — 2008-01-27T13:23:53+00:00

Sigh. I, too, will admit being puzzled and dismayed.

Thread: iron and stone

alicious — 2008-01-27T05:03:12+00:00

why, oh why are the iron cubies white, and the stone ones black?

I've never seen white iron; iron comes from the blacksmith. and in the game the quarry tiles producing the black stone are white. like marble. black should be iron, white should be stone. whyyyy?

is there any logic behind this? irk irk irk.

we can't even just switch the two, because of the keythedral seats. I guess I could get at them with sharpies and white out.

Thread: Re: Purchasing craft cubes

Pallet Ranger — 2008-01-22T09:09:56+00:00

Kind of linked to this thread, or more accurately the title of it, my question is

'Can I buy multiple cubes in the same round?'

Assuming I have 8 cubes to spare, can I trade in all 8 for 2 gold at once, or do I have to take 2 seperate actions to perform this function? Same question applies to the glass-blower and forge. I couldn't find anything in the rules to specifiy a limit...

Thread: Re: Quick rules questions before playing.

shadow9d9 — 2008-01-19T20:17:53+00:00

Great thanks...

So it is better not to completely enclose them, but force them to finish themselves off?

Field tiles are never relocated, just cottage/house tiles, correct?

What is the black bag for then?

Thread: Re: Quick rules questions before playing.

AnakinOU — 2008-01-19T20:00:31+00:00

I haven't played the 2-player game, but I can answer the other questions...

shadow9d9 wrote:

If a cottage or house is fenced off, how determines where it is relocated to? The person who finished the closing off?

Whoever owns that cottage/house.

In phase three, players alternate doing ANY of the phase 3 actions and this continues until both players pick a law card or both pass or a combination of the 2? In other words, if one person picks the law card, can the other player continue doing actions?

Yup.

Which components are supposed to go in the black bag?

None of them.

Thread: Quick rules questions before playing.

shadow9d9 — 2008-01-19T19:35:23+00:00

With 2 players, you start with just 1 brown and one grey field tile without the keythedral tile, correct?

If a cottage or house is fenced off, how determines where it is relocated to? The person who finished the closing off?

In phase three, players alternate doing ANY of the phase 3 actions and this continues until both players pick a law card or both pass or a combination of the 2? In other words, if one person picks the law card, can the other player continue doing actions?

Which components are supposed to go in the black bag?

Any extra variations you suggest for playing 2 player?

Thanks!

Thread: Keythedral -- Session Report

gschloesser — 2008-01-05T18:05:30+00:00

My favorite Richard Breese design is Keythedral, part of his “Key” series of games. I prefer the Café Games version, which included some modifications that elevated the game to a new level. It has been some time since I have played it, so I was happy when Nathan suggested it.

Nathan seemed to be gearing up for a long-term strategy, aiming for the higher-valued seats in the cathedral and foregoing the opportunity to purchase the lower-level seats. He took the opportunity to upgrade his cottages to houses, but was unfortunately thwarted on several turns by his opponents’ placement of workers.

Meanwhile, Astra and I were purchasing seats at a brisk pace. I was hoping this would not deny me the opportunity to purchase higher-level seats, as I was using most of my resources on every turn. Ultimately, we both were able to save enough resources and secure high-level seats. Astra proved the most adept at this, winning an impressive victory.

Finals: Astra 68, Greg 51, Jason 35, Nathan 29

Ratings: Jason 9, Greg 8.5, Astra 8, Nathan 6

Thread: Unused law cards worth victory points at game end?

Thorwolf — 2008-01-02T01:56:08+00:00

If resource and craft cubes are worth victory points at the end of the game, it seems that unused law cards should be worth at least one, if not two victory points each at game end as some consolation for getting a lousy card or cards.

Thread: Re: Wrong Language - what to do?

RDHan — 2007-12-29T00:43:19+00:00

We had the German version at one time and I downloaded the English version of the law cards from this site. Didn't look to see if they are still there. But if not send me an email and I will email a copy to you.

Thread: Re: Wrong Language - what to do?

TVis — 2007-12-28T12:22:55+00:00

The last two pages of the printed rules provide expanded language for the Law cards. Is that part of the English copy you located? The cards are numbered so you can match them up.

Thread: Re: Wrong Language - what to do?

ekted — 2007-12-28T07:33:30+00:00

Best I could find:

http://files.boardgamegeek.com/geekfile_view.php?fileid=6878
http://files.boardgamegeek.com/geekfile_view.php?fileid=6134

Thread: Wrong Language - what to do?

Case — 2007-12-28T07:04:16+00:00

I received Keytheral (Pro Ludo version) and the expansion for Christmas. The expansion (such as it is) was in English while the main game was in French.

While the board was multilingual the Cards and Rules were not. The rules I found online, however where might I be able to get an English law deck and player "help cards", or at least paste-ups on-line for the cards (Am I missing them in the file listings?).

Thanks Everyone

Greg

Thread: Re: Viable for 2? here vs. geeklists

Tim Synge — 2007-12-18T23:01:37+00:00

It works very well with two. The initial placement is absolutely key and with two players it becomes the most fascinating part of the game.

Thread: Re: Viable for 2? here vs. geeklists

clearclaw — 2007-12-18T22:44:48+00:00

I like it better for 3, but it works just fine for 2.

Thread: Viable for 2? here vs. geeklists

shadow9d9 — 2007-12-18T17:31:38+00:00

I know it's been asked before, but on the geeklist that has people rating games for 2, 3, or 4 players it says that keythedral is bad for 2... people in this forum say that it could be very good for 2...

What are your thoughts?

Thread: Re: Explaining “Used” cubes for Law Card #7

Hobbespm — 2007-12-16T22:10:21+00:00

What we thought of doing for the trader was to put one of each resource in his store at the start of the game. Whenever you made a trade, you took the resource you needed and put the two for trade in his store. So if you needed a wine cube and there was none in the store, tough noogies.

Thread: Re: My keythedral has no gold!

rathstar — 2007-11-14T22:26:50+00:00

Richard Breese wrote:
Too bad, I read your private message which didn't mention my signing the cubes and not this one. Still hopefully you will still be pleasantly surprised when they arrive!
I must say, I was in fact very pleasantly surprised!! I just got the cubes today. Thank you so much!

On another note, I did get an email on the 12th from Cafe Games offering up replacements. I responded saying that they wouldn't be necessary, but I figured I'd clear that up that they weren't entirely unresponsive on the issue.

Thread: Re: Pro Ludo version: Cloth Bag?

jupiterchild — 2007-11-11T02:34:08+00:00

TVis wrote:
The initial setup of the field/resource tiles is random draw by turns. You could use it there although the rules just speak about making a face down stack.

I decided to use it for this purpose. Stacking the tiles face-down gives opponents the possible advantage of figuring out which tile is next based on the numbers.

Thread: Re: My keythedral has no gold!

Richard Breese — 2007-11-08T22:16:22+00:00

Too bad, I read your private message which didn't mention my signing the cubes and not this one. Still hopefully you will still be pleasantly surprised when they arrive!

Thread: Re: My keythedral has no gold!

rathstar — 2007-11-05T22:51:26+00:00

Richard Breese wrote:
Try sending your address to the designer
Woohoo!! You are so geekmailed. Would it be too much to ask for you to autograph each cube?

Thread: Re: My keythedral has no gold!

Richard Breese — 2007-11-05T22:33:51+00:00

Try sending your address to the designer

Thread: My keythedral has no gold!

rathstar — 2007-11-02T21:03:02+00:00

So I just got a new, sealed Keythedral this week, and when I opened it, I found that there weren't any yellow cubes. I found them mentioned in the rules and on building tiles so I assume the game is supposed to come with some. I emailed Cafe Games but haven't had a response, and I don't expect Pro Ludo to be any better. So does anyone know where I might find enough yellow cubes to be able to play this game? Thanks for any info.