I was just reading a long thread complaining about a card in Terraforming Mars -- Asteroid Mining Consortium. The cards in that game are quite well balanced but even so, some players still don't like some of them. This seems inevitable in such games with large card sets and a variable number of players -- it's impossible to balance the cards for all circumstances.
In the case of that game, players just have to put up with it and that's fine by me -- a card game will have some luck of the draw and so it goes. But I'm wondering why Agricola is so different in having dynamic banlists which are controlled by some elite players in a manner that is unclear but is too political for my taste. I thought one of the fundamental principles of BGA was that games are played using the official rules but these banlists don't seem to be based on those. How is this allowed?
I'd contrast this with some balance tweaks that I've noticed in other games -- the alternate maps in Ark Nova and building costs in Puerto Rico. My impression is that they have some official basis but I'm not sure of the details.
In the case of that game, players just have to put up with it and that's fine by me -- a card game will have some luck of the draw and so it goes. But I'm wondering why Agricola is so different in having dynamic banlists which are controlled by some elite players in a manner that is unclear but is too political for my taste. I thought one of the fundamental principles of BGA was that games are played using the official rules but these banlists don't seem to be based on those. How is this allowed?
I'd contrast this with some balance tweaks that I've noticed in other games -- the alternate maps in Ark Nova and building costs in Puerto Rico. My impression is that they have some official basis but I'm not sure of the details.
