Future building site & Overhaul

[lezurichois]

How should the minors future building site & overhaul interact? I get it this is a niche case and most players are probably happy to never ever play future building site . But in one of my last games (https://boardgamearena.com/11/agricola?table=707584734#), I drafted and played both cards and had a bad surprise.

Future Building Site (minor)
Up until all other farmyard spaces are used, you cannot use the unused spaces that are orthogonally adjacent to your house.

Overhaul (minor)
Immediately raze all of your fences, add up to 3 fences from your supply, and rebuild them. (You do not lose any animals during this.)

My read was that once all the other farmyard spaces are used, the condition is satisfied ("up until"). Thereafter, the player is free to dispose of the farmyard spaces as they wish.

In any case, this is not how the interaction has been implemented. For example, when playing overhaul, I was not allowed to fence a farmyard space adjacent to my house, even though this space was already occupied by a stable!

(So there are two implicit questions here: how should the two cards interact, and was it implemented along this interpretation?)

[alexwjb]

Interesting one.

I think my interpretation of Future Building Site would be closer to: "Unless all other farmyard spaces are used, you cannot use the spaces orthogonally adjacent to your home."

On the basis that if I meet the FBS condition, then un-meet it (because of Overhaul, or Sample Stable Maker, or whatever), then I don't see why the text on FBS couldn't apply again: "Until all other farmyard spaces are used...".

This would appear to be a bit closer in spirit to other similar-ish situations. Like suppose you have Shed Builder, Sample Stable Maker and Stable Cleaner in play (lucky you!). Shed Builder works every time you rebuild the last stable in your supply, even though it's I guess a bit debatable about whether it is still your "4th" stable at that point.

But I say all this with no great confidence, and would appreciate more views.

[lezurichois]

I think your interpretation is how the card was implemented. What do you think of the stable case though? Assume I played FBS, then satisfied the condition, such that I built a stable next to my house. I now play overhaul. Can I fence the farmyard space where the stable is located even if I don’t cover all farmyard spaces that are non-adjacent to my house?

[alexwjb]

I guess another way of putting that is: does the fact that a space is already used override a restriction not to use that space?

I think it's reasonable to say the answer is no: ie, you aren't allowed to "further" use that space by fencing it, because of FBS.

So on the "FBS applies as an ongoing conditional, not something you can complete and then ignore thereafter" interpretation, I think the implementation is reasonable.

But I'm still not completely sold that my "ongoing conditional" interpretation is actually correct.

Also, side note. I would bet the implementation would let you put an animal on that stable, even if FBS's restriction is active? Which is a bit weird, as that's kind of another way of "using" the space?