From the rulebook,
This used to be interpreted that if no faction/color wins, no player could win, and indeed that was the original intent/clarification, but now it has been updated to a new ruling, confirmed by the designer (Matilda Simonsson) https://boardgamegeek.com/thread/316177 ... s-w/page/16. The Winning Faction
If all players Negotiate consecutively
on their turn, the game ends and the
faction that rules the most areas wins.
The first tiebreaker is the faction
with the most stones on the axe.
The second tiebreaker is the faction
with the most stones on the flag.
If all else fails, no one wins.
So the current BGA implementation is correct, if the factions tie, you still go to regular player tie breakers, starting with least stones wins.My original ruling was that "if no faction wins, no player wins" but I've come to the conclusion that "if no faction wins, the player with the least stones wins" is probably more interesting and certainly much funnier.
BGA also got it correct, and it does makes a lot of sense from the pov that "losing faction stones = negative points".