Mermaid River Town Tile Adjacency

[JohnnyKashyyyk]

Playing as Mermaid, I came across an opportunity to place a dwelling next to a town tile on a river, this dwelling would provide me with a combined 7 power value and a second town. I scoured the internet to figure out if the town tile in the river and that has no buildings on it is still considered "part" of the town. Well, according to BGA, it is. However, I found this clarification on BGG:
https://boardgamegeek.com/wiki/page/Ter ... _FAQ#toc23

I can skip a River space when founding a Town. I place the Town tile on this River space. Does this River space block adjacency? Does it count as a Structure?

No, the skipped River space (with a Town tile on it) is not considered to be a Structure. It counts as a normal River space, e.g. for the sake of adjacency. However, it's considered to be part of the Town.

And they even provide additional resources as reference:
https://boardgamegeek.com/thread/977887 ... 2#12318072
https://boardgamegeek.com/thread/952066 ... 3#11867473

What do you think?

[Ranior]

The town tile that is placed is part of the town, therefore if you put more buildings next to it, those will get "added" to the original town and you won't be able to create new towns off of them.

I'm not sure how any of what you link is confusing on that point, they all reiterate that the town tile placed to form the Mermaids town is counted as part of the town.

[JohnnyKashyyyk]

Oh interesting... where specifically is this defined?

For reference, the rules define the Mermaid ability as such:

ability: You may skip one River space when founding a Town. (You decide if and when you want to use this ability. When founding a Town in this fashion, put the Town tile on the skipped River space. Of course, you may build Bridges as usual.)

The word “skip” here seems a bit vague.

Also in the rules about founding a town the rules read:

• When founding a Town, all Structures directly adjacent to one another form that Town (Bridges are key here), even if there are more than the required number of Structures.
• Indirect adjacency (especially via River spaces) has no rele- vance when founding a Town. (Exception: The Mermaids may ignore any one River space when founding a Town.)
• Building new Structures directly adjacent to an existing Town expands that Town rather than forming a new one.
• When a Structure is built combining two existing Towns to one larger Town, these Towns do not lose their individual rights or functions (despite the fact that you cannot tell anymore where their borders are).
• The total number of Towns for one game is limited to 10.

Unless you are suggesting a town tile is a structure, there does not appear to be anything in these rules that makes it as clear as you seem to think it is. Additionally there is a note that mermaids can “ignore” the river space, again more ambiguity.

[Ranior]

I stated the stuff you linked all seemed to clearly answer this question to me.

They all essentially state the same thing--the mermaids river town hex is not counted as a structure, it does not block the river. It does however count as part of the town, therefore building more stuff next to it will expand that town.

[JohnnyKashyyyk]

No worries. I still don't think there is a clear answer one way or the other. I think this might be one of those cases where it's kinda a house rule and we just have to play by BGA's house rules here. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Cheers.

[CHTennis]

No worries. I still don't think there is a clear answer one way or the other. I think this might be one of those cases where it's kinda a house rule and we just have to play by BGA's house rules here. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Cheers.

I am confused on what you are suggesting, I am not trying to belabor the point, but what are you indicating? The town tile does not count toward the dwelling count or as a structure for power leech on BGA, is that the house rule you are talking about?

[Ranior]

I had no idea either which is why I stopped replying.

There is no house rule going on here, as the linked clarifications from the designers themselves indicate.

The mermaid town tile on a river does not count as a structure, does not block the space for others, but does count as a hex that is part of that town. As such one cannot add structures next to that hex without them also becoming part of that town. So if you're trying to make another separate town, it must not be adjacent to that river hex with the town tile on it.