Boat 4b and Winter Tile bidding

[Grizzlyface]

I haven't been able to use boat 4b 'If a tile has already been bid for, or it has been used for production, you don't have to follow the colour when placing workers on the tile' to bid for winter tiles with a different colour.

I've tried this in a couple of games and colours. Not trying to use green, not trying to use a mixture of colours. And it only happens when trying to bid on winter tiles, for example: 'Scribes' has 1 blue worker on it, cannot outbid with 2 red workers. As far as I am aware you should be able to use boat 4b with the winter tiles. This has happened on more than one game.

[apollo1001]

You are missing the fundamental difference between the two sides of this boat.

4a: allows BIDDING with different colours.
4b: allows ACTIVATION with different colours.

Hope that clarifies why you are having issues.

Apollo

[Grizzlyface]

I googled a little and I see.

There is absolutely no way I would even know this as the tile on boat 4b side says: 'If a tile has already been bid for, or it has been used for production, you don't have to follow the colour when placing workers on the tile'

The part saying 'OR it has been used for' has pretty much led to this problem. The BGA interface doesn't make the distinction, I even had asked a friend who has keyflower in real life and he didn't remember correctly either.

I see boat 4a does say specifically counter-bid which is much more clear.
Thanks for the answer anyway at least I know now.

[Jest Phulin]

A tile can be activated without being bid for, and, conversely, bid for without being activated. Under normal placement rules, once any color has been added to a tile any more meeples need to be the same color. This is why the OR is there. Reword the rule like this: 'If a tile has meeples on it (by being bid for OR used for production) you don't have to follow the color when placing workers on the tile.'

Or, evaluate each clause independently, but know when clauses join.
If
(
(a tile has already been bid for)
OR
(it has been used for production)
)
you don't have to follow the colour when placing workers on the tile.

[Grizzlyface]

A tile can be activated without being bid for, and, conversely, bid for without being activated. Under normal placement rules, once any color has been added to a tile any more meeples need to be the same color. This is why the OR is there. Reword the rule like this: 'If a tile has meeples on it (by being bid for OR used for production) you don't have to follow the color when placing workers on the tile.'

Or, evaluate each clause independently, but know when clauses join.
If
(
(a tile has already been bid for)
OR
(it has been used for production)
)
you don't have to follow the colour when placing workers on the tile.

You are correct, of course. I understand it better now. The original confusion came from never even noticing there were 2 types of that boat in the first place. I still feel that the writing on boat 4A is much more clear and obvious. However, I admit I'm not one for methodically reading through things. Thanks for explaining it in more detail.