Carcassonne-Tournaments Fair Play

[euklid314]

Since I am starting to play Carcassonne tournaments (turn based) I have one question.

What is the general opinion on tile counting? Since all played tiles are visible to both players it is easy to determine which tiles are still in play. Since there is so much time one can thus determine all the missing tiles before each move one makes.

What is the general opinion on any additional help to counting the tiles - like ticking off the tiles from a list? This would NOT be allowed in a real life tournament.

Is the latter considered cheating/unfair behavior on this platform? I.e., one may only count the tiles in ones head and one is not allowed to take any notes?

Has this topic been discussed before and are there any written rules about that - especially for tournaments? Sorry to ask that, but I am new to the boardgamearena.

[polettix]

This is an interesting question.

On the one hand, the goal of this platform is to allow playing those exact games. So I guess that one should stick to the spirit of the game: if you're not supposed to do something in a real-time match at a physical table, you should not do that here either.

On the other hand, everyone would have the possibility to do this, so nobody would have an edge. Simply put, you would be playing another game, so I guess that this should be agreed among participants before starting a match/tournament. In lack of explicit agreement, though, i think that the original spirit of the game should be preserved.

Another example could be: am I allowed to use a computer program to assist me to select the best move in a game? There are tournaments/platforms out there where it's explicitly allowed to do this (think of AI competitions), so everybody knows what they are playing *exactly*. Again, anyway, in lack of explicit instructions to this regard, using a computer to assist you selecting the best move, you should not do this and stick to the original spirit of the game: a bunch of people around a table, with their brains as their only tool.

[euklid314]

Thank you for your reply, polettix.

After my original post I found a thread from 2018. See:
https://boardgamearena.com/forum/viewto ... 30&t=13197
There one player presents a tile counter (in spanish). Thus, I conclude that tile counters exist and might be in use by some players already.

Please note that in real life tournaments you have only 15 minutes per player. There it makes a big difference if you are allowed to tick off the tiles as they appear or if you have to count in your head.
My question, however, was for a tournament where you have 2 days per player. With such a lot of thinking time you can easily count all the tiles before each of your moves. Thus, one could see the use of a tile counter just as speeding up the game but not changing the spirit of the game at all. It is not equivalent to using computer aid for choosing an optimal move.

But for the moment - before this matter is settled, e.g. by the tournament organizers - I will stick to your advice and ask my opponent how he/she is handling the matter.