But that was no my 'question'. The question was that when one builds a city this way, for how many tokens it will count. I think 5, but usually building a city requires 6 tokens.

No, just like 'Universal Doctrine' and 'Politics' and 'Tyranny' and 'Civil War' you count the number of unit points.

A city is five units points, and if you may place a city, it's worth five unit points.


It's not the 'build cities' phase, where you may build a city using six tokens.

The previous version of Diaspora already allowed you to place a city worth five unit points.

Am I allowed to place 1 city and one/two token there? Even without Public Works?

Please read what I posted before twice.

30.14 Diaspora (Religion - 270)
30.14.1 Provides 10 Religion credits and 5 Art credits.
30.14.2 During the Special Abilities Phase (25.2), a holder may place up to seven unit points from stock into one or several empty areas, provided that an unblocked path can be traced to target areas. These seven unit points may consist of a city and tokens. For each area the number of tokens may not exceed its population limit, regardless of holding Agriculture (30.3). If more than one area is chosen this way, all chosen area must be adjacent to eachother. A city built this way can only be built on a city site, and no additional tokens can be placed in the same area this way.
30.14.3 A holder's hand limit of trade cards is reduced by one. (27.2.2)
--

Public Works allows you to HAVE an additinal token. (no must). But as Diaspora does not give you the additonal token for Agriculture, it also shouldn't give you the additional token for Public Works.

The next turn you could move one in, though.


All this should be mentioned inthe rulebook, but not on the card. We don;t do that for all other cards neither.

Ok, my bad. It is clear!

I was discussing this card with my cousin Gerart this weekend. As we were discussing this card we noticed two thing.

1. The island of Socotra near current Somalia is fully surrounded by Open Sea Areas. Therefore it should be mentioned whether you can trace a path across Open Sea Area. The same for Universal Doctrine.
It's either by always giving the possibility to trace a path accross O.S.A. or otherwise only by holding "Astronavigation". We both agreed we think we should not make it more compex than nescesary for the purpose of this one island only, and thus choose for only mention:

"A path can be traced across an open sea area".

It's no real big deal to add this, though 99% of the time it's indeed irrelevant, still not 100%.



2. Merlok had some doubt about the card being too strong. When we were talking about this, we actually did not see the need for the card to allow player to add 7 unit points rather than 5 anymore, since we now changed the card to 'several areas' instead of only 'one area'. If we change it back to 5, but keep the several areas option, it's both less overpowered (if that would be an issue), and symmetrical to most other cards (that speak about '5' rather than '7'). Also it takes away the doubt for 'Public Works' as you can never add more than a city and an area already contiaining a city isn't empty.




- I also added 'target' to define the difference between 'homeland' (which is a doubtful name) and 'target'.

- I noticed that pirates and barbarians cannot block a path either for the purpose of Diaspora, but in UD they are the target anyway. We could also change this to a dead end for tracing a path, but this makes it rather more complex.




So:


For the card:


For the Rulebook:

(Mention of definition of 'Tracing a path')












Do I miss something?

nice written, looks good for me with. just two more ideas:

1. I think it should be necessary two have astronavigation for diaspora or
Universal Doctrine to trace a path through open sea areas.
As everyone is forced to take astronavigation to get to this island usually,
you could easily use UD or Diaspora to get there without that card.
I know, it is only this one island, but otherwise it would by unlogical.
But if we think about my 2nd point it would be even more important...

2. I think Barbarians and Pirates should block a path the same way as
normal cities or tokens do. Just a feeling. It doesn't make sense
otherwise. Why should an enemy token block the path, but 10 barbarian
tokens do not??
As I think about pirate cities at a coast I see some guys on ships blocking
the sea part of this area. So Diaspora and UD should be not allowed to
trace a path thround the land part if there are barbarians and should not
be allowed through an area with a coastal pirate city at all.

(Additional thought: Pirate Cities should even block the normal movement
of ships during game play. But maybe this should be discussed somewhere else?)

I don't see this as easily for 270
Nevertheless, you got a point, that's why I mentioned it in the first place.

I first thought it would make it more complex, but now I think about it again, I think, it's just one single line to be added to the 'path tracing' subject. Not on the card.



Ok, let's put that in the rules as well, but as addition to Diaspora alone. In fact, this is an exception to the rules, because in any other case barbarians and pirates are never considered 'enemy units'. You cannot select them as secondary victims and are unregarded during any calamity such as Flood or Cyclone. Therefore, I propose to make this mention at Diaspora alone.



Ok, that goes for Diaspora alone, for UD targets barbarians and pirate areas.



My opinion: A pirate city may be a nasty calamity effect for a player, but should not be a problem to all players all the time. Just as the other players are not full-time 'enemies'. You can travel through any area containing an 'enemy' city as well. No matter how strongly the rivalry is.
In addition, just as the direct effect of any calamity is resolving DURING the calamity phase itself and is not continuing afterwards, I think it should not be changed for this calamity. The remaining city and barbarians tokens are bad enough by itself. In fact, THAT is the remaining affect of barbarians capturing a city. You could play it as game variant though.

I think the following should do it:

For the card:


For the Rulebook:

oh, sorry, copy/paste but forgot to change that essential word.

you're right.

Final version:

For the card:


For the Rulebook:

The result for the playtest of december 28th:

Number of players: 9
Mapboard: West

Only 2 times a player reached 9 cities. sometime a 9 was being bought.
there has not been 'piracy, 'banditry, or 'regression', THis was due to lack of space to expand. Every area was filled up all the time (except for some clamity effects and some conflict)

Just a few players reached the 200+ up cards, one player actually held 3 200+ cards, but this player focussed on crafts.



Diaspora has not been bought.


Opinions:

- The card itself seems fair, but there was no need for as there was a lack of space.

- I did not reach the 200+ cards at all.


General result of playtest as conclussion in discussion afterwards:

Good change, worth its 270, but maybe more usable in another game setting.

This makes me think that the 7 unit, go anywhere option should be used. It sounds like my fear ("Well it looks like a good card -but I might never be able to use it!) was correct...

Oh no, I think there's no need to increase the 5 to 7 again.

In this game, there wasn't even an option for adding 3 tokens. Even if someone would have bought it.
Even if it would have been 10 or 15 or 50, players didn't buy it. There was no room, and most players did not reach 200+ at all.


I think for now, the card is right. The playtest did not provide us with data. That's all

Keeping the number of unit points at five seems the best option as this number is inline with many other aspects of the game.

To my mind diaspora will always be quite a good card because it will help recovery from calamities regardless of the population density of the board. If I suffer from any calamity that could wipe out an area, such as famine or flood then diaspora will help me. Diaspora will also help me if my neighbours leave an area unpopulated during the calamities.

I like the card as it is.

DG.