2 players inequality

[Okeaz]

Hi, I noticed that when we played with 2 players, the first player play the last turn too. Play first it’s a big advantage ... because he played 1 more time. Is it normal ?
Thanks

[Maludico]

I agree: 1st player has an advantage.

I think that the reason is that the typography, which prints the tiles, wants to print a rectangle of 9x8 tiles, or 3 rectangles of 6x4 tiles each, which means 72 tiles including the beginning tile.
If they had to print 73 tiles instead, then they would have more waste of material because you cannot group 73 squared tiles in rectangles each having the same number of tiles.

[euklid314]

Hi, I noticed that when we played with 2 players, the first player play the last turn too. Play first it’s a big advantage ... because he played 1 more time. Is it normal ?
Thanks

Yes, unfortunately, this is "normal" for Carcassonne, i.e. this is also valid for the physical board game played at home.

In real life tournaments the organizers often try to let you begin half of your games. If there are some qualification rounds and K.O. rounds afterwards, the better player from the qualification round is allowed to start. In that way he/she has an advantage from the better play in the qualification phase.

Situation on BGA: On the long run it will level out - you will start your games approx. 50% of the time. And the starting advantage in a single game is nice but it is not game deciding. I would assume that the starting players win 51% or 52% of all their games.

[Okeaz]

Hi, I noticed that when we played with 2 players, the first player play the last turn too. Play first it’s a big advantage ... because he played 1 more time. Is it normal ?
Thanks

Yes, unfortunately, this is "normal" for Carcassonne, i.e. this is also valid for the physical board game played at home.

Yes, I noticed that when I play at physical game ^^. Thank you for your responses

[Robo65]

Yes, unfortunately, this is "normal" for Carcassonne

It can be normal, but not necessarily so. You can add the rule that cards are removed before the start of game, so that every player has the same number of moves. In the abandoned PC game by Koch Media, this was an option. Of course, this makes no sense if you play the Traders And Builders Expansion.

It can still happen that a card is removed while playing, because it doesn't fit anywhere. That can't be helped.

Robo

[Keszus]

In case of Team World Carcassonne Championship as well as some real-life local tournaments there is a rule that takes this disadvantage into account.
It says that in case of a tie (which is especially bad in ladder based tournaments here on BGA which promote player with higher ELO in such case), the player that began the game is a loser. This make up for advantage he gets for having one more tile and a big chance to fast score on first move.